CHAPTER ONE (The Vegas Rift by David F. Gray)

Road Trip

Tragedy brushed my family in the fall of 2013.

On the morning of October 7th, I left my house for school, coasting down the driveway of our tidy, red brick suburban home on my shiny, black Schwinn Sidewinder. It was cold that morning. My mother wanted to drive me, but I had been begging her for weeks to let me ride my bike. At fourteen, I was two years away from getting my license, but I was also only one year away from high school. All my friends were riding their bikes to school and I did not want them to see me getting a ride from mom. Besides, she had to take my younger brother Doug to his elementary school, which was six miles in the opposite direction. She finally gave in and spent the next several years blaming herself for what happened.

My name is Samuel Franklin Carr…Sam to my friends. I grew up in a small town called Independence. It might not have been as idyllic as Mayberry, like in the old Andy Griffith show, but it was a great place to be a kid. Nestled in the beautiful hills of northern Kentucky, it was surrounded by thick woods and lush farmland. The neighbors were good people who looked out for one another. My friends and I hung out at each other’s houses and if we trudged home a little after dark, the worse that happened was that we were scolded for being late for dinner. It was that kind of town.

I took off that morning, peddling down the sidewalk that ran next to Madison Pike. I remember waving at a few of the neighbors and getting waves in return. My school was on the other side of Independence, which wasn’t saying much. It took me all of five minutes to scoot through the center of town, which included a city hall, a couple of churches and a handful of small ‘mom and pop’ stores. I made it through to the other side, turned right at Maple Street, and burned rubber. There was now nothing between me and my school but open road and empty fields.

That’s the last thing I remember about that day. Later, my mom and dad explained to me that Fred Carson had been working all night at Brooks Dairy Farm a few miles south of my school. He had been pulling double shifts for several weeks to help defer his wife’s medical expenses. Fred was a good man in his late sixties with a weak heart. He had no business putting in those kinds of hours, but he loved his wife and was willing to do whatever it took to see to her needs.

He fell asleep at the wheel. His battered pickup swerved across the narrow two-lane road and smashed into a cluster of trees. In a perfect example of the worst timing ever, I was passing those trees at that same instant. He hit me head on and sent me flying a good thirty feet. It would have been further, but a thick, sturdy oak tree blocked my flight path. I smashed into the trunk and fell to the ground, unconscious and bleeding from dozens of cuts as well as a gaping hole in my abdomen, courtesy of a sharp, broken branch jutting out from the tree.

But for the fact that Ruth Foster had been following Fred after dropping off her son at my school, I would have bled out in minutes. Ruth saw the whole thing and pulled over immediately. She had her mobile phone with her and called 911. While she was telling the dispatcher about the accident, she pulled off her slip, wadded it up and pressed it against my gushing wound.

Paramedics arrived ten minutes later. I was airlifted to St. Jude’s where the trauma team went to work. Fred was not airlifted anywhere. The coroners arrived on the scene twenty minutes later. One of them took charge of Fred’s body, which was slumped over the wheel of his truck. It took them another fifteen minutes to find his head.

I did not regain consciousness for several weeks. My bodily injuries were bad enough; a lacerated liver, a collapsed lung, two broken arms and four shattered bones in my right leg. Far worse was the damage to my skull. The head trauma caused my brain to swell. I was placed into a medically induced coma while the doctors did everything they could to save my life. My mom told me that within twenty-four hours of arriving at St. Jude’s, my heart stopped three times. The third time I was gone for almost two minutes.

This was my first death.

The doctors nearly gave up but finally managed to get a heartbeat. Long story short, the swelling went down in my brain and they were able to repair my skull with several small metal plates.

It was a long road back. When I finally did regain consciousness, I could neither move nor speak. For that matter I could barely think. It was as if I was lost in a thick, swirling fog. Faces would appear in my narrow field of view. I felt as if I should know them, but they were strangers.

I slowly regained a little movement in my arms and legs, and bit by bit my mind started to clear, but two months later the seizures began. I was sedated and the strangers, who I now understood were my parents, were told that I could very well be dealing with these seizures for the rest of my life.

It took me six months before I could speak without slurring my words. It was another three months before I could manage to take a few steps with the aid of a walker. My memory slowly returned, but for a long time it was as if I was seeing my past life through thick gauze. I knew the faces of my friends and family. I could remember events like birthdays and holidays, but I could not feel them. Eventually I got it all back, but like I said, it was a long, painful journey.

My physical therapist warned me that I might never regain the full use of my body. I gritted my teeth and set out to prove her wrong. Months of work slowly paid off. I regained the use of my legs and managed to walk again. The seizures continued, but they slowly lessened until they finally disappeared altogether.

As I worked to get my body back, something wonderful happened to my brain. The specialist I saw on a weekly basis told me that sometimes, when injured, the brain can actually rewire itself. It can form new neural pathways and create new synaptic patterns. In short, the undamaged parts of my brain began to take over functions once performed by the damaged sections.

By the time I turned seventeen, I was running five to six miles a day. Seeing how driven I was, my dad bought a bench and a set of weights. Thanks to that, and the guidance of my physical therapist, I bulked up considerably. My hair grew back. My face had been relatively undamaged, and the rest of my scars were hidden by my clothes. As for school, I had to play some serious catch up, but I managed to graduate just one year late. Because of my grades, I even scored a full scholarship to Ohio State.

There were permanent changes. I understood that I would carry the physical, mental and emotional scars for the rest of my life. My legs ached when I pushed too hard or when the weather changed. I never rode a bike again, even though I could not remember getting hit. That did not bother me too much, since I had my license by my seventeenth birthday. Driving was never a problem.

There was something else. Every now and then, I felt the world around me grow…well, ‘thin’ is the only word that fits. It was as if the entire universe was nothing more than a heavy, theatrical curtain, and if I could figure out how to do it, I could pull that curtain back and see what was hiding behind it. I chalked those feelings up to the way my brain was now wired and got on with my life.

I graduated in 2017 and promptly left for Ohio State, where I studied structural engineering and architecture. I discovered that I liked designing and building things. Three years later Doug graduated. I came home that summer and we decided to take an old-fashioned road trip…one last fling before we ended up in different states and only saw each other for weddings, births and holidays. Mom wasn’t thrilled about us dipping into our savings and less than thrilled that we were going to be spending a lot of long days on the road. She had nearly lost one son to an accident and had no desire to tempt fate.

My dad shrugged and said something to the effect that if we did not do it now, we never would. Adulthood, that dreaded reality that included full time jobs, mates, children and mortgages was charging at us head on. And so, on a sparkling May morning in the year 2020, we packed the used but sturdy Subaru that had been my graduation present, hugged mom and dad goodbye and started driving.

I can’t begin to describe what we were feeling as we drove away from our house. The excitement, the sense of adventure and, above all, that feeling of absolute freedom was intoxicating. We were laughing like fiends and screaming like banshees. Any cop would have pulled us over on suspicion of driving under the influence. In time, we settled down and focused on our trip.

Doug had two passions…film and American history…in that order. Because of that we had spoken in front of our parents about taking a tour of some of the ghost towns that could be found in states like Arizona and Nevada. It sounded like fun and we honestly planned on hunting down a few of the more obscure locations. However, we had serious ulterior motives. As we put some miles between ourselves and our home, one single destination was on our minds…Vegas.

For years I had been fascinated by ‘Sin City’ and the chance to see it for real was irresistible. Doug was way too young to legally drink or gamble, and I was barely twenty-one, but we figured that there had to be some kind of trouble we could get ourselves into. If nothing else we would take in a few of the ‘safer’ shows, girl-watch by the pool and gorge ourselves at the buffets. To ease any feelings of guilt, we visited a couple of the lesser known ghost towns hidden away in New Mexico, but as soon as our consciences would allow, we put the empty desert behind us and set our course for Nevada.

Not long after that, on a hot, dry spring morning, we found ourselves cruising down Las Vegas Boulevard, better known as the Strip. We checked into our amenity-filled room at the big green MGM Grand, grateful to be out of the desert heat. We cleaned up, stuffed ourselves at the buffet and hit the Strip. As we walked, we gawked at the massive hotels like a couple of farm boys seeing the big city for the first time. We took it all in, passing the Bellagio, Planet Hollywood, the Flamingo and finally drawing even with Caesars Palace.

We were about halfway past Caesars when I sensed a sudden blur of motion to my left. I heard a sharp ‘snap, snap’ and someone shoved a laminated flyer into my stomach. I had been staring at the fountains in front of Caesars. I had seen them in a dozen different movies and had to admit that seeing them in person was something of a letdown. They were a little smaller than I had imagined. 

I took the flyer out of sheer reflex. I glanced down at it and saw that it featured a nude female model named Brandy, along with a toll-free number. Doug snickered like a grade school kid who had just found a stack of Playboys in his dad’s closet. With a righteous glare I dropped it. Brandy joined flyers for Sky, Sparkle and thousands of other um, professional ladies carpeting the pavement.

I glanced at the flyer’s source and saw that it was a tiny, stoop-shouldered Hispanic woman who had to be in her seventies. A second look revealed a line of people not unlike this woman, all of them handing out flyers. They were a mixed bag; Hispanic, Caucasian and African American. They were men and women, tall and short. Most of them had seen the other side of fifty and all of them had the same beaten down look that spoke of a hard life bereft of hope.

Ignoring me, the old woman took another flyer from a stack in her left hand and flicked it twice with her right thumb, producing the snapping noise that had caught my attention. She practically shoved it into a middle-aged man’s ample gut. Like me, he took it and gave it the once over. Unlike me he shoved it into his back pocket.

It was my first glance into the darker side of Vegas and I found it deeply disturbing. We were surrounded by some of most opulent hotels and restaurants on the face of the earth and yet here, across the street from one such hotel, stood this line of broken human beings. I grew up in a middle-class bubble, insulated from hunger and homelessness by hard working parents. I had dealt with my share of pain and setbacks, but looking at the faces of those people, I realized that I had no clue what it meant to experience true hopelessness.  

“You should’ve kept her,” said Doug, oblivious of the dark turn my thoughts had suddenly taken. He nudged me with an elbow, forcing my attention away from the line of people.

“Huh?”

“I think that she was your type,” said Doug with a smirk. “I could see the two of you settling down and starting a family.”

“Shut up,” I growled. That earned me another smirk and a chuckle. Doug elbowed me again and we moved on. He knew better than to push it. I was still hurting over Marcy. I haven’t really said anything about my love life, mainly because there’s nothing to tell. Rather, there’s a story, but it’s a short one, and it goes a little something like this.

Boy meets girl while a senior in high school. Boy dates girl. Boy falls head over heels in love with girl. Boy goes to college. Girl goes to college. Boy waits for girl. Girl hooks up with college senior. Girl dumps boy.

Anyway.

We walked as far as the Treasure Island, did an about-face and headed back to the MGM. We were not used to the desert heat and by the time we passed Harrah’s we were both drained. I could feel my skin drying out and my lips starting to chap. I made us cross the Strip before we got back to Caesars, ashamed that I did not want to see that line of broken people handing out their flyers. We were within a block of the MGM when Doug nudged me again.

“Stop that,” I snapped.

“Check it out, Sam,” he said, pointing across the strip to our left. “There’s a multiplex back there.” I followed his finger and saw an opening between the Grand and a line of shops. Through the opening I could see a wide walkway that ran maybe twenty yards or so away from the Strip. From there it made a sharp left. On the wall opposite the Grand was a multi-colored sign that read ‘Cinema on the Strip’. “Come on,” said Doug. He jogged to the nearest crossing, waited for the light and then headed toward the opening.

“We come to Vegas and you want to see a movie we could probably see at home?” I wasn’t really surprised. Doug was a film buff of the highest order, leaning mostly toward the fantasy and science fiction genres. He loved it so much in fact that he had been accepted into the film school at UCLA. I had a strong hunch that I would be reading my brother’s name on the credits of some Hollywood blockbuster not many years hence.

We entered the walkway and moved away from the crowded strip. I took a deep, grateful breath. The shade provided by the high walls on either side fell over us. It was a good ten degrees cooler and I shivered as the sweat dried on my back and neck.

I glanced at the sign as we walked past. There was no arrow pointing the way to this theoretical multiplex but since there was only one way we could go, directions were not needed. The only other point of interest was a pair of Styrofoam cups, like the kind you get at Starbucks, lying on the pavement below the sign. They somehow looked lost and forlorn. We turned the corner and followed the walkway to yet another ninety degree turn to the right.

“I don’t see any theater,” I said as we walked. It was weirdly quiet. My words felt muffled. The high walls on both sides made me feel small and insignificant.

“Probably just ahead,” said Doug. We turned another corner and he pointed. “There.” Sure enough, there was a large marquee bolted onto a wall over four sets of double doors. The glass was tinted dark enough to render the interior invisible. Doug read the list of offered movies quickly.

“Yes!” he cried out in glee.

“What?” I growled. I wanted to get back to our room and make plans for the evening.

“They’re showing Forbidden Planet,” said Doug. I followed his eyes and saw the title of the movie in question glowing in bright red LED letters. Next to it in smaller letters, I saw ‘Limited Engagement …Today Only’.

“So?” I asked. Doug shook his head, exasperated at my indifference.

“You liked it when I showed it to you in the hospital. Forbidden Planet; MGM, 1956, starring Leslie Nielsen, Walter Pigeon and Anne Francis in some of the sexiest outfits to come out of that decade.”

“I remember the outfits,” I said. “They were the best thing about it…that and the guy from those God-awful Airplane movies.”

“They’re hilarious,” said Doug, affecting a lofty attitude. “You’ve just got no taste.” He waved at the marquee. “I’ve been dying to see it on the big screen for years.”

“You’ve already seen it,” I said. “In fact, you’ve seen it more than once. Why waste what little time we have here in Vegas?”

“Hello? Big screen,” said Doug. “To see a classic like that the way it’s meant to be seen will be a treat!” I pointed back to the Strip.

“We’re in the middle of America’s playground and you want to waste time watching a movie from the fifties?”

“It’s got Robbie the Robot,” said Doug.

“Oh, well that’s different. I mean it’s got Robbie the Robot.” My mockery phased him not at all.

“It’s a serious science fiction movie,” said Doug. “You don’t get many of those. Come on, watch it with me.”

“I don’t think so,” I said. I liked movies just fine, but my tastes were decidedly different from Doug’s, running more toward the action/adventure genre with small doses of horror on the side. My brother snorted, disgusted by my lack of culture. He scanned the marquee and glanced at his watch.

“The next showing is in ten minutes,” he said. “It’s cool inside. We can see the movie and then figure out what to do this evening.”

“No thanks,” I said. “You want to waste your time, go right ahead. I’m going to head back to our room and see what shows are available tonight.”

“Anne Francis,” said Doug. “Miniskirts. That alone is worth the price of a ticket. You might actually enjoy yourself. Stranger things have happened.” He was so earnest that I almost relented, but the long days on the road had taken their toll. I was ready for a short nap in a cool, quiet room followed by a good show accented with a little bit of Vegas nightlife. The PG-13 version of course.

“You go ahead,” I said, reading the marquee. “This thing is a little over ninety minutes long. Have fun and meet me back in the room as soon as it’s over. I’ll find us something to do tonight. You got any preferences?”

“Boobs,” said Doug, smirking. “Whatever you find, make sure it has a lot of boobs. And I mean a lot…like twenty-five at least.” My brother could never fail to blindside me with his sense of humor. I barked a laugh and headed back down the corridor.

“You’re too young for boobs,” I said over my shoulder.

“I’m exactly the right age for boobs,” he replied.

“I don’t think mom and dad would agree,” I said.

“Mom and dad aren’t here. I’ll see you back at the room.” I waved and he disappeared through the darkened doors.

I threaded my way back to the Strip and rejoined the massive parade of tourists as they gawked at the sights. Curiously, we had not encountered anyone else from the moment we entered the walkway. There had been no one coming in or out of the theater and I had not seen anyone through the darkened glass doors. I put it down to the fact that, like me, my fellow tourists did not come to Vegas to go the same kind of multiplex that they could find in their hometown.

I got back to our room and thumbed through a magazine that listed a gazillion shows. I settled on a pirate themed magic show at the Treasure Island. It looked like fun, although unfortunately for Doug there were no boobs. Rather, there were plenty of boobs, but they were properly covered. Not that it mattered. Doug could not have gotten into any of the more risqué shows. Even if he had a fake ID his boyish face screamed ‘underage’. He would just have to settle for the skimpy but tasteful costumes worn by the showgirls of the Treasure Island.

I used my trusty iPhone to secure two tickets for the early show. As soon as I got the confirmation I stripped down and took a long, hot shower. Pulling out a comfortable pair of sweatpants and a loose T-shirt, I fell into one of the full-sized beds and turned on the television. The long day and the cool room conspired against me and within minutes I had fallen into a deep, restful sleep.

* * *

The door slammed and Doug shouted at me. I jerked awake, annoyed and a little angry at his thoughtlessness, but when I rolled over I saw that the room was empty. My head ached and I rubbed my temples. That feeling of thinness is always strongest when I first wake up and this time was no exception. I sat up, blinking my eyes, and for a few moments I felt as if I could almost reach out and touch that curtain. I got up, stumbled to the bathroom and splashed some cold water on my face. The thinness faded but did not disappear. Like the bedroom, the bathroom was empty. My brother was nowhere in sight. The light coming through the window had that late afternoon feel and when I glanced at the clock, I saw that it was nearly six.  

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I muttered. I shuffled back to my bed, grabbed the remote and turned off the television. Whatever police procedural was playing disappeared. I figured it was something from that show that had jolted me awake.

I wasn’t worried. My kid brother was probably wandering the Strip, taking in the sights. The idea that anything might have happened to him did not cross my mind. Despite the fact that he had a marginally decent head on his shoulders, he was easily distracted. In my mind I saw him leaving the theater, heading back toward the MGM and something, probably one of the many free shows that dotted the Strip, catching his attention. For that matter, he was probably somewhere inside the mammoth Grand, taking in the lion habitat or grabbing a quick snack.

I grabbed my iPhone off the bureau and thumbed his number. It rang for a while and then went to his voice mail. That bothered me a little, but I figured that the idiot might be wandering around the casino watching the guests lose their money. It was certainly loud enough down there that he might not hear his phone ringing, although he should certainly feel it vibrating. I tried again with the same result. The second time I got his voice mail I left him a terse message.

“Hey dick weed, we’ve got an eight o’clock show at the Treasure Island and it’s too late to return the tickets. Get your ass in gear and call me.” I tossed my phone onto the bed and tried to figure out what to do. I considered going to the show without him. He could find his way there easily enough. It would serve him right, but the more I thought about it the more worried I became. Granted, my brother was an idiot, but he was not a thoughtless idiot. While I could imagine him getting distracted, I could not imagine him ditching me like this.

I wandered over to the wide window overlooking Las Vegas Boulevard. We had splurged to get a Strip view and it was worth it. The late afternoon sun was giving way to twilight. Across the way the faux skyline of the New York, New York glowed in the dusk. I could see a steady flow of traffic, both mechanical and human, moving along the Strip and wondered where my brother could possibly be in that massive sea of humanity.

I leaned my forehead against the warm glass. The idea of looking for him was ridiculous. Even if he was in the hotel, the Grand was so large that I could wander around for the rest of the year and not find him.

“Come on, you idiot,” I whispered, my breath fogging the glass. “Get back here. Call me. Send up a flare.” I tore myself away from the view, plopped onto my bed and stared at the ceiling for a while. When that got old, I got up and looked out of the window again. Nightfall was coming hard. I knew that it was ridiculous, but I half expected to see a tiny Doug jumping up and down on the Strip far below, trying to get my attention. A few minutes later I sat down on the small couch beside the window and continued to wait.

Sometime around seven I gave up. Half angry, half worried, I got dressed, went down to Guest Services and had them print out a copy of Doug’s ticket. I went back to our room and carefully placed it on the corner of his bed. I emailed him a copy for good measure and, with nothing else to do, stormed out of the room.

The evening crowd was gradually replacing the day crowd. T-shirts and jeans were giving way to sports jackets and sexy evening dresses. The elevator was crowded on the way down and the casino was starting to hum. I wandered through row after row of slot machines trying to spot my brother. The beeps, trills and electronic fanfares of the brightly lit machines slowly grew more and more annoying. The lights seemed to flash directly into my eyes as if they were trying to blind me. The sounds became harsh, metallic and jarring. Time seemed to disappear.

As I prowled up and down the aisles a terrible feeling hit me. There was no way out. I was lost, doomed to wander through the casino forever. My mind curtain fluttered, as if it was going to pull back, and I was suddenly certain that I did not want to see what lay behind it. I bulled my way through another row of slots. When I came to the end, I caught a glimpse of the hotel lobby to my left. I stifled a cry of relief and hurried towards it. Once there I managed to regain a little bit of my equilibrium. I crossed the lobby and made my way outside to the Strip.

Suddenly I was so homesick I could taste it. All I cared about at that moment was finding Doug, getting our stuff and getting the hell out of Las Vegas. I wanted to see my parents again. I wanted to be back at our house, enjoying the simple sensation of being a part of a family. I wanted to go home.

I stood at the edge of Las Vegas Boulevard, watching the throng of people as they passed by. Behind me the Grand glowed bright green. The light spilled on the faces of the crowd, giving their skin an otherworldly hue. Every now and then one of them would glance at me. I suddenly felt as if I was being watched. Of course, in Vegas, you are always being watched. There are cameras everywhere, especially in the casinos, but even so I could not shake the feeling that I was somehow being singled out.

I finally decided to retrace our steps from earlier that afternoon. It was a hopeless long shot. The Strip was packed with pedestrians. I could have passed to within a few feet of my brother and not seen him. I eased into the flow of the crowd and headed toward the multiplex, but after several minutes I realized that I had somehow passed the opening to the corridor. I tried to go back but the crowd’s momentum pushed me forward.

I finally managed to turn around but now the crowd was blocking my way. They pushed past me in their eagerness to get to wherever they were going. I got more than a few glares. Someone shoved me aside with a curse and disappeared into the crowd. In frustration I darted to my right and managed to join a stream of people heading in the opposite direction. I kept looking for the opening but a few minutes later I was back at the main entrance to the Grand. I edged out of the flow of humanity and tried to think.

My choices were fairly simple. I could go to the show by myself and hope that Doug found his way there. Or I could go back to our room and wait, but for some reason I felt as if I needed to find the multiplex. I turned around I tried again, walking slowly. I almost missed it, but this time I forced myself to focus. It was like trying to wade through a river of molasses, but I finally saw the entrance. I had nearly passed it again but at the last second glimpsed it out of the corner of my eye. I turned back, bumping into a young couple who had been tailgating me. I got a nasty look and a muttered ‘asshole’ for my trouble.

I threaded my way through the crowd, keeping my eyes on the entrance. I had the crazy notion that if I looked away for even a second it would disappear. The glaring lights from the Strip penetrated only a few feet into the opening. Beyond that there was only darkness. I stepped into the corridor. The light faded and I had to give my eyes a few seconds to adjust.

The first thing I noticed was that the ‘Cinema on the Strip’ sign was no longer there. I stared at the barely illuminated wall, wondering if I had somehow found the wrong corridor, but a moment later I saw the pair of Styrofoam cups lying on the pavement.  

Since leaving the MGM I had been growing more and more worried about Doug. Now, seeing that bare wall, I suddenly knew beyond doubt that something was wrong. I moved on, penetrating deeper into the corridor. The curtain in my mind fluttered again. I moved slowly, my head down and my shoulders hunched. I felt as if the high walls on either side were going to come crashing down, burying me under tons of rubble. I turned the first corner and the glow from the Strip disappeared entirely. Only the dull gray light from the full moon overhead, reflecting off the walls, provided any illumination.

A few minutes later I turned the final corner and saw the theater. The marquee was dark, and I could see nothing beyond the doors. I stopped about ten yards away, trying to make some kind of sense of what I was seeing. There was no light of any kind coming from the theater; no security lights, no exit signs…nothing. The place was obviously closed, although I could not imagine why.

“My brother is in there.” I don’t know why I said that out loud, but in the instant I did I knew that I was right. Doug was somewhere inside that building. Not only that, but he was in trouble…as in serious, life threatening trouble.

My first impulse was to get back to the Strip, find a cop and lead him to the theater. I took a step backward, but I suddenly understood one single fact. If I left now, I would never find my way back. The corridor, the theater and above all Doug would be forever lost to me. I don’t know how I knew that. Maybe something was leaking out from behind my curtain. It didn’t matter. I knew.

I finally got up the nerve to do what I knew I was going to do since I reached the theater. I walked over to the nearest door and gave it a tug. It opened easily, which again made no sense. If the theater was closed, it should have been locked. My heart felt as if it was going to pound its way out of my chest, but I managed to step inside.

A split second later my stomach clenched. I bent over and the remains of the MGM lunch buffet surged up my throat and splashed onto the floor. My body began to shake. A fierce wave of dizziness hit me. I barely managed to stay on my feet. I heaved again and again until the spasms finally passed. Gasping for breath, I spat the rest of the sour chunks out of my mouth and moved away from the disgusting puddle of puke. I don’t know how long it took, but I finally managed to get myself under control. The nausea and dizziness receded, although neither disappeared entirely.

At that moment, my fear nearly got the better of me. I looked at the doors. The world beyond was invisible. Half of my mind was screaming at me to get out of there, get back to the Strip and flag down a cop. The other half knew that it would be useless. If I left, I would never see Doug again.

For a moment, both halves hung in perfect balance. Then I turned and slowly moved deeper into the building. It wasn’t courage or even desperation that drove me. It was the unbearable idea that I would have to face my parents with a single bitter truth; I had abandoned their youngest son.

I shuffled forward another few feet, but again stopped. I could not see anything in what I figured had to be a foyer or lobby. If someone was waiting for me in some kind of elaborate trap, I would be helpless. I’m no weakling. The years of physical therapy and weight training had made me stronger than I had ever thought possible, but I was hardly a trained fighter. The two scuffles I had gotten myself into in high school were little more than glorified shoving matches. I would be no match for an armed assailant.

A sense of dread had been growing in me since I had stepped off the Strip. The quiet corridor where no one else was around, the dark multiplex…none of it made any sense. None of it was right.  Far worse, I could not shake the idea that I was already too late to save Doug.

I tried to shove that idea away and get a hold of myself. I took a few steps forward but for the third time I stopped. I realized that there was no way I could go bumbling about the entire multiplex. I remembered from the marquee that there were eight individual theaters. The idea of finding them, let alone searching them in complete darkness was not just terrifying – it was impossible. Going back to the Strip and buying a flashlight was also impossible.

I pulled out my iPhone, squinting at it as it lit up. I thumbed Doug’s number but once again it went straight to his voice mail. I glanced at the power gauge and groaned. I had not charged it since that morning and it was down to less than a quarter charge, so even though I had a flashlight app on it, it wasn’t going to last long. I didn’t have a choice. I turned on the light and held it high above my head.

I was in a mid-sized foyer. Directly in front of me was the ticket booth, encased in Plexiglas. Like the rest of the multiplex it was deserted. On either side was a set of swinging double doors. I glanced at the floor and saw that it was covered with some kind of dark tile that reflected the light from my phone. Other than the ticket booth, the foyer was empty. I edged to the right and pushed through the doors.

The lobby was much larger than the foyer. Along the opposite wall was a concession stand. To either side were halls that led to the individual theaters. To my right I could see a small alcove that held maybe a half dozen video games and a couple of pinball machines. None of them were working. I kept moving forward, expecting at any moment to be rushed by some axe wielding serial killer.

A quick glance at the concession stand confirmed what I had feared since entering the building. The Cinema on the Strip was definitely closed. And not just closed. It was abandoned. There were no candy bars or milk duds or snacks of any kind behind the glass. Along the back wall was a long counter that at one time had probably held popcorn machines and soda dispensers, but they were long gone. From the dust on the glass and the stains on the wall it was obvious that this place had been closed for a long time. And yet, just a few hours earlier, I had seen a marquee listing both current movies and one decades old science fiction classic. Nothing made sense, so I put a lid on my thoughts. At that moment, what this place was, or even why it was, was irrelevant. The only thing that mattered was finding my brother.

Phone held high, I headed into the hall on the right. I could barely see the four sets of double doors, two on each side, that led to the theaters. They were placed about thirty feet apart, two sets at the head of the hall, two at the rear. Over each set was an electronic sign that indicated which movie was playing, but like the rest of the theater, they were dark. The black tile gave way to what might have been red carpet, although in the darkness I could not be sure of the color. Bolted to the walls were large metal frames that held movie posters of current and coming attractions. At first, I thought that they were empty, but as I moved deeper into the hall, I saw that one frame still held a poster. I got close enough to see that it was for Forbidden Planet. There was Leslie and Anne, and a large walking machine with what looked like a popcorn popper on his head…the famous Robbie the Robot. The glass that covered the frame was broken, and the poster was frayed along the sides. Even in the faint light of my phone, I could see that the colors had faded, as if it had been neglected for years.

“Trap.” I don’t know why I said that word out loud, but the instant I did I knew that I was right. I was walking into a trap, the same trap that had taken Doug. “Trap,” I said again. My voice was dull and distorted, barely audible, and yet my throat suddenly felt raw, as if I had just screamed. “Trap,” I said for the third time, and now it was worse. My voice seemed to emanate from somewhere outside of my body…and it did not sound human. In fact, it sounded the opposite of human…not inhuman, but anti-human. It was harsh, guttural, and it was the single worst thing I have ever heard. For an insane moment I had the nearly overwhelming desire to grab my throat with both hands and rip it out of my neck. I never wanted to make that sound again.

I could not even guess what Doug had seen or heard when he had entered the multiplex. Maybe he had perceived it as crowded, with each theater operating normally and the concession stand open for business. Maybe the instant he had walked through those doors he had been caught and taken to…where? I had no idea, but as I looked at that battered poster, I knew where I was going next.

The swinging doors to the theater were wide open, as if beckoning me inside. I obliged and stepped through them, only to be met with a blank wall. To my right a narrow hall ran to what I assumed was the actual theater. I followed it for about fifteen feet to where it ended in a ninety-degree left turn. Straining both eyes and ears, I turned and kept going. I expected to emerge into an empty theater. My imagination was running wild and I would not have been surprised if the instant I saw the screen it would light up and begin to play some cheesy horror movie. Instead I had not gone more than a few yards before the top of a staircase appeared in the floor, leading down into even more darkness.

Doug was here, I thought. He went down these stairs. I inched forward and held my phone toward the black rectangular hole in the floor but all I could make out were the first four or five steps. I glanced behind me but there was nothing but more darkness. It felt like a living, breathing thing, and I fancied I could hear it sneering at my tiny pool of light.

I went down the stairs.

Looking back, I think that was when I reached the point of no return. If I had turned back at any time before that I might have made it back to the Strip. I would have abandoned my brother but at least I would have reclaimed my place in the world. The instant my foot touched that top step, all of that was off the table.

I don’t remember how long it took me to traverse that staircase. I don’t remember how many steps there were, although I have a vague memory of trying to count them. I do remember reaching the bottom after what seemed like hours and I remember seeing the floor as it slid into view.

The carpet on the stairs gave way to dull gray stone. I stepped onto the cold surface and froze. I stood there for long seconds, listening. The air felt thick and cold, and I knew that if I said anything, my voice would sound worse than it had in the hall above. The walls, like the floor, were smooth, unadorned stone. Ahead, another hall led into darkness.

I took long, slow breaths that sounded unnaturally loud in my ears. I could feel the weight of uncountable tons of dirt and rock hanging over my head. My shoulders hunched and I was suddenly sure that the ceiling was going to give way, burying me in an unmarked grave far beyond my world of light and happiness.

I managed to take a few steps forward. When nothing happened, I picked up my pace. The hall was relatively short, at least compared to the staircase. After what might have been five or ten minutes I came to a plain, gray metal door. There was no lock, just a handle. I grabbed it and pulled, but it did not budge. I gave it a shove and it moved easily. I opened it just wide enough to squeeze through…

…and stepped outside.

The Vegas Rift is available for Kindle, in paperback, and on Audible here.

Hardback editions exclusively available through Barnes & Noble.

Follow David F. Gray on Facebook.

These three drabbles are from charity anthology It Came From The Darkness, in aid of The Max the Brave Fund.

Death Penalty

Theresa Jacobs

“It came from the darkness, so black it couldn’t be seen. But oh, I felt it.” Mark shuddered, eyes wide.

The doctor nodded. “Uh-huh. And what was this, it?”

“Pure evil, in its truest form.” He hissed, “Essence.”

“Well, Mr. Nolan, I find you perfectly sound. You’ve passed every test and I will not have you committed. You will be facing the death penalty for what you did to those people.”

Laughter boiled from Mark’s lips, his eyes rolled to the whites, his tongue cleaved in half and he leapt upon the doctor. “No Doc, you face the death penalty.”

Honeycomb Face

Eric LaRocca

It came from the darkness in the pit of my throat – a small honeybee the size of a dressmaker’s thimble. As I rubbed the precious cargo I’ve carried in my stomach for nine months, my husband looked at me with a wordless question.

I smeared sweat as thick as honey dripping from my forehead, my fingers gently massaging the tiny pinhole that had sprouted in my cracked skin.

Stomach curling, I sensed my insides harden as if they were suddenly made of cooling wax – a droning chorus of larvae beginning to crawl through me, a hive finally about to burst.

What Shadows Eat

Lou Yardley

It came from the darkness, made of shadows, doubt, and despair. I couldn’t see its eyes, but I knew it was looking at me. Staring. Studying. Night after night, day after day, it came to me. It became all I thought about.

Sat in the centre of my room, the shadow made a noise. It may have been a growl or stomach rumble. The trouble is, I didn’t know what shadows liked to eat.

I offered it my hand, but it didn’t lick or bite a finger. Instead, it swallowed me whole. It consumed me.

Now I’m in the darkness.

It Came From The Darkness is available for Kindle, in paperback, and on Audible here.

Trick or Treat (from Tunnels & Other Stories)

P.J. Blakey-Novis

“You’re all too old to go trick or treating,” Mum had told us. “Leave it this year; let the little kids get the sweets. It’s not as if Tommy needs to eat any more junk!” She was right about everything, of course. We were too old and Tommy was already heading for a heart attack at the age of fifteen, his diet consisting largely of sausage rolls and fizzy drinks.

“We’re still children,” I replied, with a smile. “One last time, I promise. Anyway, it’s all arranged and I’m meeting some people.”  I gave mum the innocent look that she could rarely refuse.

“What people?” she asked, studying my face to see if I was about to lie to her.

“Just Chloe and Phoebe. Tommy is walking over with them.”

“Like a double-date?” she asked, not looking as though she approved. She was strict, and was convinced that any time I would spend time with a girl would end up with her becoming a grandmother.

“Just friends,” I told her, and that was the truth, much to my disappointment. I liked both the girls, and so did Tommy. The difference between us was that Tommy didn’t stand a chance with either of them, which made things a bit awkward. After muttering something about being safe and not getting up to any mischief, she finally relented and gave her reluctant blessing. Before she could finish laying down the rules, I was already on my way upstairs to get into my costume; a Grim Reaper outfit, complete with a mask and plastic scythe. As a test run I decided to creep up behind my eight-year-old sister, who cried, so I guess it was sufficiently scary for the evening. I picked up my pumpkin-shaped plastic bucket which we had used for years to collect the treats in and told Mum that I was about to leave.

“Have you got your phone?” she asked.

“Nowhere to put it,” I explained, running my hands down the sides of the costume to confirm the lack of pockets. “They are meeting me at the end of the road in a few minutes.”

“And what if you need to call me?”

“I’m sure they will have phones with them, but we’ll be fine.” Mum looked worried. She always looked worried.

“OK, back at eight-thirty. That’s late enough to be knocking on stranger’s doors.”

“Nine?” I asked, cheekily.

“Eight forty-five, and not a minute after.” I lifted my mask to give her a peck on the cheek and ran out of the house, my black costume flapping behind me.

Tommy and the girls all lived on the same road, about a ten-minute walk from me. Without wanting to sound snobbish, it is a fact that my house is on the nicer side of town.  This is why we planned to knock on doors near mine; apparently, some of the houses over their way weren’t very friendly. This also made things easier with my Mum, knowing that I would be close by. I stood at the corner of the road feeling a little foolish in my costume, waiting for the others who were late as always. The thinness of the material provided little barrier against the cold wind, and I shivered, beginning to get impatient. I tried to construct a logical route in my head that would reap the most reward, but my thoughts were quickly interrupted by the sound of giggling coming from behind me. Tommy was wearing his usual clothes; blue jeans and a football shirt which did not completely cover his belly. The extent of his Halloween efforts consisted of some white face paint with a couple of red lines, which I presumed to represent blood.

The girls, on the other hand, had put in a lot of effort, and I was thankful that mum had not seen them. They wore matching, white nurses’ uniforms. Their faces were painted green and looked zombie-like; I guess girls are good at the face paint and make-up side of things. Far better than Tommy, anyway. The uniforms were short, almost up to their buttocks, and red, fishnet stockings did little to cover the exposed flesh. I tried not to stare, but it wasn’t easy.

“Where do you want to start?” I asked. “I thought we’d do my road and then the houses up towards the church; they’re usually pretty good.” The others laughed, looking at each other as if they had a secret. “What?” I asked, not understanding what was funny.

“The girls want to check out the Monroe house,” Tommy stated, a mischievous grin on his face. He knew how I’d respond.

“Are you serious?” I asked, looking at the girls.

“Don’t be a baby,” Phoebe replied, taking my hand. As much as it felt like a terrible idea, peer-pressure and a pretty girl made my mind up for me. The Monroe house was isolated, being situated on the edge of a large, green, public space, out of sight of any other houses. Dog walkers were pretty much the only people to ever pass the house, and rarely after dark. At this time of the year, the Monroe house went all-out for Halloween, with elaborate decorations adorning the front garden and exterior of the house. None of us had met anyone who had actually seen someone living at the house, and this had sparked a range of playground rumours. Of course, the house was haunted, no-one dared to refute that out loud (although I doubted that it was the case). Only Max, a boy from school who was in the year above us, claims to have been there last Halloween.

“You don’t actually believe Max’s nonsense about knocking there before, do you?” I said, as we made our way past rows of terraced houses with pumpkins in the windows.

“It’s probably bullshit,” Tommy said, starting to feel a little nervous as we approached the darkness of the dirt track.

“Yeah, maybe. In which case there’s no harm having a look,” Phoebe said, squeezing my hand. “And what if he was telling the truth?” Max’s version, which is highly debatable, was that he had knocked on the door of the Monroe house, bravely by himself, calling out trick or treat. Although he didn’t see anyone, Max told everyone around the school that some wrinkly fingers with long nails had pushed a fifty-pound note out of the letter box. He had stood staring at it in disbelief when the three full-sized skeletons that were decorating the garden turned to face him. He insists that they chased him away, and as much as everyone laughed at him, no-one dared to go there and find out for themselves. Hence, the legend began.

Part of me hoped the house would not have been decorated, that the lights would be off, that we would decide not to knock. I’m sure we all gasped a little as we turned the corner from the track and gazed upon the Monroe house. Three plastic skeletons were erected in the garden, positioned with shovels around a hole in the ground. A hole which looked to be the right size to bury a body. There were tacky decorations in all the front-facing windows; strings of lights with ghosts and pumpkins, decals of witches on the glass, and a light-up sign attached to the front door which read ‘enter if you dare!’.

“It looks pretty cool,” Chloe said.

“Guess so,” I muttered, my eyes fixed on the skeletons, just in case they moved. Which they didn’t, of course.

“Give the door a knock then,” Tommy ordered, from his position about six feet behind the rest of us. “Let’s get this fifty quid, and we’ll go somewhere else.” I looked at him as if he were an idiot. We were gathered by the small gate which opened on to the property, no-one wanting the take the lead. After a series of awkward glances had been exchanged, Chloe huffed and walked through the gate.

“If no-one else comes to the door, then the money is all mine,” she stated, turning to face us. Again, Phoebe gripped my hand tighter and followed her friend toward the door, dragging me with her. Chloe banged on the door, three loud knocks echoed throughout the house. We were greeted by silence.

“No-one home,” I declared with relief, turning to leave. Chloe knocked again. This time we heard footsteps, accompanied by a kind of dragging sound; the first image to come to mind was a heavy-set person dragging a body. We all took a step back and waited, suddenly hopeful that some money would be pushed through the letterbox after all. However, it wasn’t; the only sound was that of numerous locks being undone. I wanted to leave at this point, but I was also frightened to run away after we had disturbed whoever lived there.

When the last locked clicked, there was a pause. I wondered if the resident was elderly and had changed their mind about opening the door. Then, with a creak, it began to swing open.

“Trick or treat,” Chloe announced, trying to sound friendly. There was no-one there, just a dark hallway barely illuminated by a string of fairy lights of either side. “Hello?” she called into the house.

“Probably a good time to leave,” I said, no longer caring if my friends thought I was a wimp. There was no-one there and walking in would be trespassing.

“Hello?” Chloe called again, this time placing one foot across the threshold.

“You can come in!” came a voice, startling us all. It sounded as though it belonged to an old woman.

“Sorry if we disturbed you,” I called in response, whispering to the others once again that we should leave.

“It’s no bother,” the voice replied. “I’ve got some Halloween treats here, if that is what you were after? Just in the hallway, help yourself. Sorry I can’t bring them out; I’m a bit frail these days.”

“See! It’s fine,” Chloe said, not sounding entirely convinced.

“Seriously?” Tommy said, a little more loudly than he had intended. “She could make it to the door to open it, so why didn’t she bring the treats then?” He had a point. The temptation of money, or even some other decent reward got the better of us and each holding on to one another, we crept into the hallway.

“Leave the door open,” I told Tommy, who looked at me as if to say that was the most obvious thing in the world.

“I’ve set up a Halloween game in the hallway if you want to play?” asked the voice. “Do a trick, get a treat. I hope you enjoy it.” It was creepy, and I was beyond having second thoughts. I decided that we should see the Monroe woman, at least show our faces, so I walked into the dark room that the voice came from.

“Hello?” No reply. I fumbled for a light switch. It didn’t work.

“The power must be off,” Tommy suggested.

“The fairy lights are working,” I said, pointing to the plug sockets that they were attached to.

“Bulb must have gone, then,” he said.

“Hello?” I called again, moving further into the room. Nothing. My eyes adjusted to the dark a little and there was no doubt that the room was empty. I felt colder. Something was wrong. “I’m going,” I told them, turning back towards the door. Before anyone could answer me, the door slammed shut, the bolts’ locking of their own accord. Chloe screamed. Phoebe began to cry.

“What the fuck?” Tommy declared. He ran to the door, attempting to pull back the bolts but found them to be red hot; the tips of two fingers and his thumb now blistered. “Fucking hell!”

“I don’t like this,” Phoebe said, between sobs.

“Call someone,” I suggested. “I left my phone at home.” The three of them all pulled their phones out of bags and pockets. No signal on any of them; not phone signal or Internet coverage. The only option for us was to look for another way out. From the outside, we saw two large windows on the ground floor, with the hallway being central to the house. The living room that we had investigated was on our left; there should have been a door to the right but the wall was solid. There were three, front-facing windows on the first floor, but we could not see any stairs as we approached the end of the hallway. It was dark, but I could sense the dread that the others were feeling, hear the sobs that Phoebe tried to stifle.

“We’ll have to smash the living room window and climb out,” Tommy suggested, his voice rising in panic. Unable to think of anything else, we walked back along the corridor only to discover that there was now no door on either side. We returned to the entrance, to find the locks still white-hot. We were trapped, completely walled in. Chloe flicked on the flashlight app on her phone. The only items in the hallway were two boxes, each about two feet cubed. One was labelled tricks’; the other was labelled treats’. Tommy opened the treats’ box as Chloe shone her light into it. It was empty. Cautiously, the pair opened the tricks’ box. There were five black envelopes in the box, each numbered, beginning at one. Tommy picked up the first and opened it, pulling the card from inside. As he read it, he couldn’t help smiling and, for a brief moment, I thought everything was going to be OK.

“What’s it say?” I asked.

“It says,” Tommy began, “that when we complete the trick card, we will get a treat card.”

“But the box was empty.”

“Yeah, well the bloody living room was there a moment ago.”

“And what is the trick?”

“It says we have to kiss each other.” Tommy was smirking.

“Oh, piss off!” Phoebe said. “You’re making that up. It’s hardly the time for joking about.” Tommy showed us the card, and he was right; ‘Kiss the other members of your group’. It sounded simple enough. We all looked at each other, a little uneasily. Then Phoebe kissed me, full on the mouth. My teenage brain kicked in, and I kissed her back, not wanting to waste the opportunity. When she eventually pulled away, we looked at Tommy and Chloe. He wore a huge grin, but she looked as though she would vomit.

“It’ll be fine,” Phoebe told her, as if trying to prepare her for an unpleasant ordeal. They kissed, awkwardly and quickly, before opening the treats’ box once again. Empty.

“I read the card, so maybe I have to kiss both of you,” Tommy said, winking at Phoebe in the dark. She didn’t hesitate, and having nothing better to suggest, kissed him on the mouth. Still no treat, unless you count the pleasure Tommy was getting from it all.

“Or maybe you have to kiss everyone,” Chloe suggested, looking a little pleased with herself. It took me a moment to realize what she meant.

“Nope!” I said, without hesitation.

“It’s no more gross than us having to kiss him,” Chloe told me.

“Thanks!” Tommy replied. “Come here, big boy!” he said to me, trying to make light of the situation.

“OK, but no tongues,” I warned him. He didn’t listen, finding the whole thing funny as he slipped his tongue into my mouth. I leapt back in disgust. Chloe was right. He had needed to kiss us all, and there was now a treat envelope to open.

“Ten pounds,” Tommy announced as he pulled it from the envelope and stuffed it into his pocket.

“To split,” Chloe said.

“It was my card!” he retorted.

“You were the only one enjoying it; we should be paid for having to kiss you!”

“Like a prostitute?” Tommy replied, smugly. Chloe stopped talking after that.

“We can worry about that if we get out of here. Who is going to open the second trick?”

“I’ll do another,” Tommy offered. “Maybe I’ll get a hand-job this time.”

“I’d rather die,” Chloe said. “I’ll do it.” Handing the phone to Tommy to hold, she read the second card aloud. “Slap the other members of your group.” With an idea of the rules, and no restraint, Chloe smacked Tommy across the face, hard. He yelped and looked angry but kept his mouth shut. She proceeded to slap me, not with much force, and then Phoebe, muttering an apology as she did it. Quickly, she turned to the treats’ box and pulled out the new envelope, stuffing the twenty-pound note into the top of her stockings.

“Now you really look like a whore,” Tommy told her. She ignored him. “Who’s next?” He looked at Phoebe and I. I let her choose and, with the assumption that the tricks would become more severe, she asked to go next. After I had nodded, she opened the box, taking out the third envelope and reading it in her head. Her eyes widened a little, and she looked at us nervously.

“I’m not doing that,” she said, holding the card to her chest. “Let’s check the door again, maybe we can touch the locks with something over our hands?”

“Like what?” Tommy asked. “You two are pretty much naked and that Grim Reaper outfit looks like it’d burst into flames.” Phoebe headed to the door regardless, and we heard a clink as she slid one of the bolts aside. I ran over to her in excitement.

“Have they cooled down?”

“Only the bottom two. You can feel the heat from the other four.”

“Two cards, two locks,” I muttered as our eyes met. “We’re going to have to do all of them.”

“But there are five cards and six locks,” she pointed out.

“Maybe the last treat is the final bolt?” I said, hopefully. “What did your card say?” She passed it to me and looked at the floor. ‘Take blood from the other members of your group’. Attached to the card with some tape was a razor blade.

“It’s fine,” I told her, putting my hands on her shoulders. “I’m sure just a drop will be enough; it won’t hurt.” I unstuck the blade and handed it to her, extending my fingers in front of her. “Just prick the end.” It stung like a paper cut, quickly turning crimson as a few drops fell from the end of my forefinger. Tommy and Chloe were still bickering and hadn’t heard what we needed to do. Perhaps the strangeness of the situation had gotten to them, but they did not try to refuse. After all, what else could we have done. Phoebe went to the door to check our theory out and found three bolts were now cool enough to handle. In the treat box was an envelope containing a fifty-pound note.

“I guess I’m up next,” I said, moving towards the box.

“Shit, sorry,” Tommy mumbled, holding card number four in his hands. “I’ve just read it.” He didn’t look happy. I snatched it from him; ‘Choose one member of the group to leave behind’.

“Well I don’t see what you’re meant to do, it’s not as if we can get out yet,” I told him.

“And we aren’t leaving anyone behind!” Chloe said, panicking that Tommy would choose her. I opened the treat box but found nothing. We were puzzled, not understanding what was required of us.

“Just pick someone and say the words,” Phoebe suggested. “As long as we all understand that we don’t really leave anyone here.” We all nodded.

“I choose Chloe to leave behind,” Tommy announced, loudly. Chloe slapped him for a second time, muttering ‘prick’ under her breath. “Easy money,” Tommy said, tearing at the fourth envelope. “This is becoming quite profitable,” he said, holding up eighty pounds with a greedy grin. He added the money to his earlier ‘prize’, and then it happened. Perhaps it was a delay from him saying the words, maybe it needed him to actually pocket the cash, but that was confirmation enough. A swirling pattern began to appear on the wall behind Chloe. Before we could warn her, six arms reached out as far as the elbow, wrapping around our friend. She let out a muffled scream, but it was too late; they pulled her into the wall, and she was gone. Too quickly for us to react, too suddenly for us to even process what was happening. Phoebe launched herself at Tommy, pounding his huge gut with punches. He felt responsible, that much was obvious, but she was gone and there was no obvious way to get her back.

“One more card,” I said. “Let’s get this done and get out. We can find help once we escape this house.” I picked up the final card, ignoring my apprehension. I just wanted this to be over with. Inside the envelope was a small rubber stamp and ink; the sort of thing you find in gift shops at tourist attractions. I opened it to see a skull design. ‘Choose one member of the group to play with the skeletons.’

“That doesn’t sound like something any of us want to do,” Phoebe said. “Remember Max said those things in the garden chased him.”

“If that’s the case, then I should choose myself; I’m most likely to be able to outrun them.”

“What if you can’t? Or if that isn’t what it means?” We both looked at Tommy.

“Do whatever,” he said, not seeming to care. “If those bony fuckers try anything then I’ll sit on them.” He was trying to sound brave, but his voice quivered as he spoke. It was selfish of me, but he had done that to Chloe so it felt fair. If I had to choose between Tommy and Phoebe then there was no choice at all. I walked over and stamped a red skull on Tommy’s forehead.

“That was the last card,” I pointed out, opening the treats’ box. There was a larger envelope; thick and padded. From inside I pulled out a card with a grinning clown, and a thick glove. I stared at it for a moment. Heatproof, I told myself, slipping it on. We ran to the door, pulling across the last of the bolts and yanking it open. Outside was dark, but nothing like what we had been enclosed within. As we stepped into the fresh air, our path was blocked by the grave-digging skeletons, heads cocked to one side as they surveyed us.  We froze, just for a moment. Then something registered with them as they seemed to notice the stamp on Tommy’s head. It happened in the briefest of moments; he was surrounded and all three, simultaneously, extended their bony hands. They jabbed at Tommy’s belly with such speed that they became a blur, the white bones turning red in the spray. Tommy’s eyes were wide, his mouth gurgling blood as he dropped to the ground. We didn’t try to help him, it was too late, so we ran. Phoebe and I, together, leaving our friend to be dragged into the freshly dug earth.

The house was deserted when we came back with help. There were no decorations, no old lady, just dust and empty rooms. The doors were where they should have been, as were the stairs. It was as if nothing had happened, and it was just us playing a Halloween prank. Of course, Chloe and Tommy were never found, and we were under scrutiny regarding their disappearances but no-one could prove anything. The only person that believed us was Max, who had actually had company when he visited the Monroe house last year, but had been too afraid to mention the disappearance of his older brother. A year later and Max’s parents still think their oldest child is travelling the world.

Tunnels & Other Stories is available for Kindle, in paperback, and on Audible here.

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A sample from horror novella Dirges in the Dark

Prologue

“Tell me who you are.”

It laughed. Micah looked directly into its pale, white, cloudy eyes and, in a stern voice, commanded, “Tell me your name.”

“The cunt won’t be freed. Not now. Not ever. You failed like your pathetic King.” It spat on the floor.

“Tell me your name!” Micah shouted, veins popping, eyes wide, fury unleashed. It recoiled a little, having never heard such anger from one like Micah. It smirked a wicked crescent of a smile. Was it winning? Curled up in the dark corner, it hissed, trying to speak, but unable to say anything except these words: “Prince Vassago”. Dumbstruck, the Prince covered his mouth like a child who had just said a naughty word. Micah was winning.  

“Who are you?” Vassago panted. Furious.

“In the name of my King I command you, Prince Vassago, to leave this vessel … now.” Micah stood up over it, leaning into its face, unafraid. Its voice trembled.

“You see? We already got you, Micah. It took anger to get my filthy name out of your pure mouth and anger is a sin after all.” It tried to hide its fear. Vassago was a prince and not a king. What would his superiors do to him?

“In the name of….”

“Your King wept!”

“…all that is pure and good….”

“Sorrowing, sighing, bleeding, dying…” it sang.

“Prince Vassago, be gone!”

“Your King wept. Your King will weep. Your King is weeping,” it hissed out in a whisper, then the voice of spite and wickedness ebbed away. The vessel collapsed onto the bed.

“Still alive.” Micah checked the vessel’s pulse. He’d won this battle, but the war was far, far from over. He knew he would meet up with Prince Vassago again but not yet – not just yet, anyway. There will be more of him and his kind to challenge.

The vessel slept peacefully. A doctor stepped into the hospital room and checked her vitals. “She seems okay.” Doctor Ruben spoke his thoughts aloud. “I just can’t believe it worked.”

“How did this happen?” Micah, having only more to contend with, knew this war was everlasting.

“She was from that theater.”

“Theater?” This was news to Micah.

“The theater. That theater. Don’t you hear the news?”

Micah didn’t know how to answer. He wasn’t from these parts. He only recently discovered where he was from and by whom.

“Tell me more.” He sat on a chair and looked directly into Ruben’s eyes – lie detecting. Doctor Ruben shook his head wildly and quickly replied, “No, no, no, no. I will not mention her name. I will not speak of it. It is forbidden to speak of it. All the patients I’ve seen with these symptoms have got a picture of her, or a story of her, or a fucking blog about her on the Internet. Her name is never to be said. She is never to be spoken about. It’s the only way to keep them, those things, from making us their toys.”

“You mean her?” Micah pointed to the little lady resting on the bed recovering and in a deep sleep.

“No. Not her. I don’t know how she even managed to make it out of that fucking theater.” Ruben shook his head with his hand cupping his chin.

The little room where the vessel of Vassago rested was cold, machine-ridden, heartless, but a heavy weight had been lifted. The feeling of dread left with Vassago. All in shambles, unshaven, and a complete mess, Micah was tired – tired of it all. He rested his head on his palm, kept his eyes closed, and tiredly asked, “How am I supposed to deal with these things if I don’t even know what the fuck I’m going up against? Who is the one behind it all? What is this theater you speak of? Seriously, just tell me.”

“I’m too scared.” Seasoned old Doctor Ruben’s voice quivered.

“I am here. I will protect you. Just tell me…” Micah said patiently. “I have never failed, and I’ve never been wrong before. I’ve faced far worse than Vassago. The way you understand the mind and medicine is the way I understand these things. Tell me.”  

Dirges in the Dark is now available for Kindle, in paperback, and on Audible here.

From Keep It Inside & Other Weird Tales

Crown of Slugs

My brother often took things too far, like jokes or binge drinking, and conquering his fears was no exception. I keep him in a jar now with breathing holes punched in the metallic screw-top lid. I don’t know how much longer Seth will live. He can’t talk anymore. He just writes in a rudimentary scrawl.

We talked about our fears. Seth said that his vertigo doesn’t impact on his life. So, he could live with his fear of heights. He doesn’t believe in evolution. But he does think that life adapts to its changing environment in small ways. I now know this to be true. I just think ‘small ways’ is an understatement given what’s happened. He said, “Petra. You can’t go on fearing mice and spiders. You should immerse yourself, through therapy, to overcome your emotions.” I did.

I talked about spiders and I described the small rodents. Then, I watched videos as I bit my nails. I listed the good points. They play a part in food chains. Then finally, after breaking the therapist’s nose, I petted a mouse and let a tarantula edge its way up my arm. I felt so empowered. I booked a family holiday to Spain. I thought Seth would wobble at the thought of flying. But he said the clouds cushioned his fears as he couldn’t really look down. He’ll never fly again. He’s changed since that flight that he said ‘wasn’t a problem’.

Seth took some elective modules in Cryptozoology, at East Yorkshire University, towards his Degree in Anthropology. I know that Coelacanths have since been discovered after they were long thought extinct. I really didn’t believe in devils or The Loch Ness Monster though. Not then. Now, I think that anything is possible. I wouldn’t be surprised if ‘Area 51’ housed aliens.

Seth was finally due to leave Hellen Salads after eight years. He managed to get a job at the Holiday camp near Goadley. But it got closed down. The Press said that there’d been a lot of murders there. Some of our neighbours talked about unnatural things. I’m sure they’re just old wives’ tales. People have nothing better to do than gossip. So, Seth had to reapply for his old job.

From a young age, my brother poured salt or boiling water in the garden. Mam used to go mad at the slug carcasses scattered everywhere. “Are you scared of them?”

He laughed. “No! I’m just repulsed. I hate the way they rear up and slowly explore.” He told me about an incident where one of the factory lads had chucked one at him. The dirty big black slug clung from his fringe as Seth bent forward. He screamed and shook his head to shake it off. Then he gave the lad a good hiding.

I can imagine how the lad had found out though. I often caught Seth in a trance as he watched a slug on the patio. It was so bad that he couldn’t touch Shaun Hutson’s debut book cover or the sequel: Breeding Ground. We talked about immersion. I reminded him how I learned to remove house spiders by gradations. Seth was resolute. He could never go down that path. Then he talked about Stanislavsky.

I don’t know much about Method Acting but Seth became infatuated. He read about its psychological effects and how it helped the practitioner to ‘get into character’. It wasn’t long before I found Seth on his stomach. He wanted a slug’s perspective on the world. I said, “I think that you’re taking this a bit too far.”

Seth laughed with the clichéd, “There’s method in the madness.” He was on his belly again, propelling himself, like some bizarre gym exercise. Not long after, a lump became a growth on his belly. His arms and legs were losing muscle mass too. Entropy kicked in.

I remember us giggling at Cronenberg’s The Fly and I’ve read Kafka’s The Metamorphosis. I can’t think about Samsa’s fate now. I had asked Seth to give his ideas up. But he was determined. He used his arms and legs so little that he eventually lost them. The belly foot took over. His skin became more mottled and darker too. Eventually, his world became smaller as his single-minded attention focused on overcoming his revulsion. In short, he became that which he hated. Seth is a slug.

I suppose the irony is that I now stand transfixed as Seth did. His only means of communication was a slow scrawl of slimy broken English. After the tears and the horror, I brought myself to let him out in the rain-drenched garden. I watched for blackbirds and hedgehogs as my brother felt his way about. I realised that he’d really changed, one day, as he ascended a tree. He’d quite forgotten his fear of heights. I soon forgot the time. I had to forget that this leopard slug was my brother as a mate found him.

The second slug had picked up Seth’s trail. It nibbled and nipped his detritus covered tail. They pulsated forward to the nearest branch. I had to forget this was my brother having sex. But it was quite a wonder as the two slugs wrapped around each other, like a snail’s helix, on their silvery thread. They danced mid-air for hours. Then, I watched a penis emerge from behind their heads. They each looked flowered like an exotic orchid. These too seemed to dance, as each slug penetrated the other. It was difficult and fascinating at the same time. I had mixed emotions as both penises tried to untangle. The mate then bit my brother’s cock off and he became a girl. This act of apophallation happens a lot, I later discovered. It was quite a gruesome shock watching it. The slugs then dropped free-fall into the leaves below them. The amputation writhed like a chopped worm. It was very much still alive.

My brother became a lot more withdrawn after the castration. He wanted to be called Shoala. The name was traced repeatedly before she laid her eggs outside. Soon, I had more nieces and nephews than I could count; the hatchlings were too numerous. Shoala spent more time at the rim of her jar when it was too dry outside. I couldn’t understand her anxieties. Then she took me to the same tree where her member was dismembered. It still writhed. I let Shoala write ‘territorial’ in her snake-like slime writing. I followed, my sister, the slug.

She oozed over to a discarded house brick at the foot of the tree. As she disappeared, I lifted the brick and almost dropped it in disgust. About the size of a toad, the small abomination was slightly more human than gastropod. It was a man-slug king. Around its sticky temple were my sister’s children. They formed a dancing crown on the thing’s head. It was trying to usurp my sister. She has her own patch.

The slug-thing reared its head. Shoala hung back. Then the abomination struggled. It writhed as something tightened around its neck. I wanted to look away. I was torn. I watched the grip tighten and the thing keeled over.

Shoala died soon afterwards. In death, she became my brother again. I took Seth’s body to the Cryptozoology office and left the carcass to be examined. Professor Grimshaw assured me that he’d treat Seth’s body with the upmost respect. I didn’t tell him the whole story. Indeed, sometimes, I awake sweat sodden to feel the sensation of a penis constricting my neck.

Charity Bins

I don’t know much about the virus. I just need some milk. It’s late and I’m not keen on popping to the shop at this hour. At least the nights aren’t so dark. It’s still warm at 10.30pm. I close the door behind me. There’s the neighbour’s rubbish strewn across my lawn. They never get their bins out on time. I cross the road and realise I’ve forgotten something. The bathroom window is still open. I shouldn’t be gone long.

The back of the shops is awful at night. There’s usually someone going through the industrial waste bins looking for anything the charity shop has slung out. Sometimes, people drink there or inject where it’s quiet. There’s always crap everywhere once people have rooted through the cast offs. I usually cross over. Even though I don’t have to. I manage to avoid any encounters doing this. It smells of rot.

I cross onto the other path. It’s poorly lit in those shadows behind the shops. I see shapes. The hairs on my nape stand up as a shiver makes me shudder. They’re just strange. I can’t work them out. I pass, quickening my step. Then, I cross back and get some milk from the convenience store. Heading back, I can hear them rummaging through the bins. Those strange shapes, behind the shops, on the other side of the road. I hurry home to make a brew. As I unlock my front door, I feel really uneasy. But I can’t say why. It’s just a hunch. The stench of fish hits me as I lock the door behind me.

The rancid stink reminds me of a virus that’s been in the news. It’s world-wide. The virus has been altering people’s appearance and behaviours. I try not to feel negative. But I can’t locate the smell. It’s like that around the charity shop bins. I don’t know. I put the milk on the kitchen side. I flick the kettle on. A noise. A bang from the bathroom. I freeze. Someone is shuffling in my bathroom. There are people in my bedroom too. What the hell? I listen. Then I pick the biggest knife up. My palms are sweaty. The kettle is too loud.

Whoever the noisy bastards are, they’re quite light on their feet. It sounds more like the scratching of large rats. I take a deep breath. I charge through to the bathroom. There’s no point holding back. There’s a strange shape over the bath. I stab. I stab and I stab and I stab like someone who has had their personal space violated. There are shrieks of death throes from the strange shape. My hands are sticky. I’m about to flick the light on when I’m clawed.

I try to struggle. There’s the stench of rot. The light through the open window picks their pinched features out. They’ve got narrow eyes and whiskers. I’m seeing things. But the rat people pin me down as I drop the bloodied knife. They’re upon me. More man than rodent, the virus is turning them into vermin. They scurry about. They have strength in numbers. I’m bundled up to the loft space in the roof. The rat people bind me with electrical cables. I’m gagged. No-one will know I am here. My mother hasn’t phoned in months.

I try to break free. It’s the first time I’ve sat still in ages. The rat people are everywhere. They’ve taken over my flat. As my mind works overtime to think about escape, I notice something strange about myself. The electric cable cuts into my wrist as I gasp in horror. I am one of them.

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Keep It Inside & Other Weird Tales is now available for Kindle, in paperback, and on Audible here.