Talking Head

(Preface: this is my first attempt at a short horror story, hoping to get some constructive criticism.)A bright, neon red light shone through my eyelids, disturbing my slumber. I slowly opened my eyes to examine the alarm clock on my nightstand. “ Quarter passed Midnight.” I thought to myself, slowly realizing what the date was. “Of course I would wake up at midnight on Halloween.” I wondered if there would be any good horror movies playing on Television at this hour. I shivered as I felt a cold draft blowing through my window, instantly producing goosebumps all over my body. I never sleep with the window open. Rolling over onto my back from my right side to investigate, I was met with a sight that instantly made my blood run cold and produced a sharp, sinking feeling throughout my body. Sitting atop the storage trunk I kept at the foot of my bed was an inhuman looking severed head. It’s bright yellow eyes with pinpoint dilated pupils seemed to stare directly into my soul. The eyelids and their surrounding, deep wrinkles seemed transfixed and unmoving. At the peak of my visibly paralyezed fright, the fiend’s flat, stoic mouth slowly arched into a smile so wicked in it’s innocent, childlike appearance that every hair on my being instantly stood on end. I again made eye contact with the creature, as it slowly and dramatically blinked his hauntingly bright yellow eyes twice in my direction. The head began to speak, though his voice was low and calm, every pronounced syllable seemed to boom in a way that made my heart pound perpetually stronger, as if it had been yelling at an ear shattering decibel. I felt as though I were going to blackout from fright.“Hello, child.” Spoke the demon. “I’m sure you’re quite frightened, and even a bit confused about what is happening. That is a normal reaction.” The stillness of the head made me sick to my stomach. The dark gray color of its skin and deep wrinkles contrasted only by the brightness of its almost illuminatingly bright yellow eyes which seemed to be almost force held open by the high and tight ponytail its greasy, wispy, black, dreadlocked hair was pulled into. It seemed to take subtle pleasure in the distress it caused my while it spoke. “I am here to increase a deeper sense of fear and warn you of your impending doom. It prefers you when you’re in your most frightened state.” Curiosity got the better of me and I found the strength and courage to question my tormentor “What prefers me at my most frightened state?” The head seemed to be surprised I was able to speak given my previous state of fear induced paralysis, yet took relish in answering me. “The creature, an ancient and demonic entity who stalks unsuspecting victims and feeds off of their fear before devouring them. The Creature finds deep amusement in toying with its victims. Fear is like an aura, the more fear the victim puts out into the world, the more powerful the creature becomes.”As the head spoke of the creature, I listened more closely to my surroundings and heard noise rattling through and banging through the house. My heart sank as I realized that what The Head spoke of was true, and that some horrid creature was currently rummaging through my house in search of god knows what. The Head smiled maliciously as its eyes darted to the far right, as if it were tracking The Creature. “Yes, he is out there. He leaves me to instill fear into his prey while he scours the house looking for other victims.” This made my blood run cold. In the state of shock and fear I’d been in, I had completely forgotten about my parents who were upstairs, asleep, unaware and defenseless. I went to cry out a warning to them, but The Head silenced me with a long, slow “shhh” before any sound could make its way out “Any movement or disturbance and The Creature will storm through the house and violently and painfully end your existence. I am not here to save you, only to prolong your suffering.” Fear began to turn to an angry curiosity. “What does the creature want? Why does it do these nightmarish things?” The Head smiled wickedly before recounting on the horrid origins of The Creature. “Listen closely and pay attention, child. For the tale I’m about to tell is important, and will horrify you to your core.”“Perhaps you are familiar with the Salem Witch Trials of the late 1600s, or what your school wanted you to know of them. Most depict them as simple mass hysteria or childhood imagination gone awry, but that’s only because they don’t want you to know the reality. There were, in fact, witches and witch hunts taking place in Salem. One day there was a massive witch hunt and an entire coven was massacred by a religious militia. The leader of this militia, Abraham Williams, cornered the coven’s leader, a high priestess in the society of Salem witches, against a tree, where he tied her up. She angrily and sternly told him of the mistake he was making, that her coven was, in fact, a coven of strictly white magic users.“The witches of this tribe have been protecting Salem from evil for over half a century, you have no reason to perform this mass execution on my coven.” Abraham smiled condescendingly at her statement. “No such thing as a ‘good witch.’” he said before spitting on the ground and tightening the ropes around her wrists, cutting off the circulation from her hands and making her gasp in pain. She retorted “If you go through with this, you’ll regret it for centuries beyond your natural life.” Ignoring her, he doused her long, black, cotton dress in lighter fluid before pouring some onto the end of his unlit torch. The witch bowed her head, closed her eyes, and began quietly chanting. Just as she was finishing the chant, he lit the end of his torch and walked towards her. Abraham touched the flaming torch to the bottom of her dress and watched as she was overtaken by flames. He felt nothing at the sound of her cries and screams in agonizing pain, or the smell of her burning flesh. It was when she stopped screaming and lowered her head slowly to make eye contact with him, bearing the most wicked smile on her weathered face, that he began to feel something: fear.The witch pulled back hard on her restraints, disintegrating the charred ropes and snapped her fingers. In an instant flames poured off of her and, as if like a snake slithers towards a rabbit, made their way to Abraham’s feet. He was almost instantly engulfed in his own flaming hell. Knowing her fate was sealed, she had placed a curse over the head of Abraham. As the witch finally succumbed to her wounds, Abraham lay on the cold, hard, forest ground in total combustion. His screams alerted his fellow militia members who went running to his aid. The scene they stumbled upon was little more than the charred remains of Abraham and nothing left of the witch. They proceeded to bury Abraham in a shallow grave. When nightfall came and the full moon was at its peak, Abrahams crusty, blackened eyelids slowly opened. His irises and pupils were completely absent, instead leaving milky, off white eyes. His body began to slowly transform. Long, thin, reptilic arms and legs broke free Abrahams charred and cracked flesh. He pulled himself up from his shallow grave in the middle of the forest, revealing his new form. A seven foot creature with disproportionately long arms and legs and sharp, narrow, claw like hands. His feet were like that of a velociraptor, each powerful step he took shook the earth around him. He had been cursed to become what he hated most: a tormentor and slayer of the innocent.”The Head finished his horrifying tale, leaving me with a deep sense of sickening dread and anxiety. As the head smiled at my disheveled appearance, a sound worse than even the voice of the head manifested throughout the house. The thunderous footsteps of the still unrevealed creature made their way slowly towards my bedroom door. A cold sweat broke across my brow, all of my nerves seemed to be trying to force their way out of my body, and it seemed as though no matter how hard I tried to breath I could not take in enough oxygen for comfort. The thunder ceased mere feet from my room and my bedroom door slowly screeched open into my room. The sound of rapturous stomping was replaced by the sound of something flying through the air and darkness towards me. What appeared before me were the twisted, mangled, and lifeless bodies of my parents being held dangling in the air by strings like some macabre marionettes. The creatures' repulsive, lizard-like claws worked the strings making the lifeless bodies of my parents sway and position themselves in a way that made them appear angry.“Billy, did you forget to lock the back door again BILLY!? You know how dangerous it is to leave the doors unlocked BILLY!” The monster was using the corpses of my parents to torment me further. “WE KNOW WHAT YOU DID, BILLY!” Tears were streaming down my face and I was choking on the oxygen I was trying to take in. “HOW MANY TIMES DO WE HAVE TO REMIND YOU TO LOCK THE DOORS AT NIGHT, BILLY!?” The creature made my parent’s bodies thrash about the room in angry, twisted pirouettes screaming “Help us, Billy! Remember to lock the doors next time, Billy!” while the head sat there grinning and laughing in the chaos. The movements stopped and the creature withdrew the bodies of my parents in one swift motion, the momentum slamming the door in its wake.The anger and hatred towards the head and the monster swelled deep inside me. Why had this creature chosen to torment me of all people? I hadn’t done anything to deserve this, and neither did my parents. I wouldn’t let him take me too, I had to think of a plan to get out of here. I thought to myself that it would be futile, with the head watching over my every move and the creature’s superior strength and speed. I would have to outsmart them. I would have to create a diversion that would give me even just a few precious moments to run to safety, whatever safety from this creature was. I heard the creature drop the bodies of my parents with a loud, audible “thump” that shook the house. My anger and determination to escape, to rob them of the pleasure of terrorizing and eventually killing me as well, only grew with every sound of the creature’s steps and every moment of eye contact with the head that was still relishing in my misery.“Why do you help this creature in its quest for blood? What do you get out of it?” I asked the head. The head seemed to pause and ponder for a moment. “I get to be eternal.” Stated the head. “I was once a notorious and ruthless serial killer in the Midwest. One of the most elusive stalkers this country has ever known. Until they set up a sting operation and finally captured me attempting to kidnap a local prostitute. They linked all of the other local slayings to me and sentenced me to death. I was one of the very last beheadings to ever take place in the United States. I really loved what I did. The power I held over my victims within my hands, the endorphin rush of how it felt to slowly drain their lives from them. But that was taken from me. The Creature was awareof who I was in his former life, and upon his transformation he hunted my grave down and reanimated my head to assist him in the torment of his victims. It isn’t the same as when I was able to do it myself, but it satisfies my lust to inflict torment and suffering on others. Human blood keeps me alive forever.”I was further disgusted by the head’s tale. I wanted to inflict suffering on them as deep as he had to others, to avenge the deaths of my parents. Though I knew there was nothing I could do with the creature lurking around the depths of my house. I had to focus on my escape. I knew it was only a matter of time before the creature stormed into my bedroom and used my own body for its sick, twisted fantasies. I shifted my eyes quickly around the room looking for anything that could be my salvation. The baseball bat in the corner by my door was too far away, anything more than a swift, almost instant movement would surely lead to my demise. I wish I could sneak upstairs to get to my dad’s gun cabinet. I slug from my dad’s .45 would surely do some damage to the head, and at least slow down the creature enough with a few precision shots to the heart to allow me to escape. The head seemed to be growing suspicious of my eye movements, as well as bored of waiting. He let out a screech to alert the creature just as my eyes caught my salvation. The original disturber of my sleep. I would have to make my timing perfect to accomplish what I was thinking, but it may be the only salvation I have.I heard the creature’s booming footsteps sprinting towards my room as the head laughed. Just as I saw the hideous creature mere steps away from penetrating the doorway, I slammed my arm backwards, grabbing the alarm clock that sat on my nightstand. I pitched it towards the head as hard and precisely as possible given my position. As soon as the alarm clock left my hand I darted out of bed towards the open window and threw myself out of it. I had been in the room just long enough to hear the head scream as it made contact with the creature, stopping it in its tracks in confusion. I quickly scrambled to my bare feet and began running down the street. I thought about running into the darkness, but considered quickly that the creature probably had better night vision than myself. I sprinted down the most well lit street I could spot, which still provided low visibility to me. The only way I really knew I wasn’t going to run into anything was the light from my neighbor’s Halloween decorations. The decorate ghosts and jack-o-lanterns and Frankenstein's cheesy, manufactured grins only tormented me further. I heard and felt the footsteps of the creature, it was hunting me. Its steps didn’t sound close enough to be immediately concerning. I had to think of somewhere to hide.After slowing my pace to something more manageable, I realized what street I was on. With the sound of the creature’s thundering footsteps becoming more and more distinct, I knew I had to move fast. I took a sharp right turn followed by an almost immediate right. I could see it in the distance. The tall roof of the church my family had attended when I was younger. I knew this could be my only source of salvation, as evil was not supposed to be able to penetrate the threshold of hallowed ground. I picked my pace back up to a dead sprint, being nearly blinded by the sweat protruding from my forehead and my body trembling from being pushed to its absolute limits. As I neared the church, the footsteps behind me got louder and louder. I knew the creature was getting closer and closer. It screeched at me in its nasty, high pitched voice. The velocity of its scream almost knocked me over in my stride. I noticed one of the church's windows was just open enough for me to volt through unharmed. I reached the green grass the church sat upon just as the creature was zeroing in on me. I just managed to hurdle myself through the window and escape its grasp by mere seconds. I instantly turned around and slammed the window behind me.I collapsed on the floor trying to catch my breath as the creature paced around the church, either trying to decide if I was worth attempting to break through hallowed ground or wait for me to come out. I was exhausted. Exhausted, yet furious. I knew I had to rid the earth of this malevolent creature, to prevent it from doing any more harm against innocent people. I sat and I thought of a course of action. I looked around my surroundings for inspiration. Upon examining a painting of the church itself, and hearing the rain strike the roof of the church, I knew at once what I had to do. I climbed the stairs to the church slowly and quietly as to not give away my position to the enemy. As I made it to the third floor, I opened a window and made my way out onto the roof. The heavy downpour of the rain made it difficult to see more than a few feet in front of me, only remedied by flashes of bright, white lightning. I made my way to the ledge of the roof to look for the creature. He eventually circled his way around the church to where he was directly beneath me. Right where I wanted him to be. I swiftly grabbed the heavy lightning rod and heaved with all my might, tearing it from the shingles of the roof. I waited until the creature stood motionless and dropped the sharp end of the lightning bolt towards the creature. It landed almost directly in the center of the creature's massive head, knocking it down as the creature let out a sharp cry in pain. The lightning rod was driven straight through the creature’s head and into the dirt below, penetrating the hallowed ground. The creature was struck with multiple bolts of lightning, leaving nothing more than a black scorch spot where its body once laid.Satisfied that the creature was dead, I made my descent back down the church stairs. Taking a final deep breath before exiting the safety of the church, I opened the heavy front door and walked through it. I walked over to the scorch mark to satisfy my curiosity. When I was satiated in my belief that the creature was dead, I turned to return home to finish off the head as well. But as I made my way passed the hallowed ground of the church, the earth vibrated below me and a sharp, reptilian claw broke through the dirt and grass and tightly and painfully latched around my ankle . via /r/horrorwriters https://ift.tt/2HrzlLO