Terror Town (17 page)

8

Daniel tried to be brave but his plan was only half realized. The details of Patrick Love’s heroic rescue were beyond him. He wanted to save his friend, and he was willing to put himself in danger to do so. But what could he do, and how could he do it? Questions, it seemed, were easier to find than answers.

He pulled his t-shirt off and tossed it to the floor. An off-white dress shirt was lying across the arm of a chair. He needed something clean, and the shirt was right there, so Dan threw it on and buttoned it. It would have to do.

Now Dan was standing near the basement door with his ear to the wood. He couldn’t hear anything. Not a peep. He put his hand on the doorknob and applied some pressure. He turned the knob. The latch gave and Dan wondered if his nerves would give with it.

He looked at the gun. Was he ready to use it? Maybe.

This was the moment of truth.

After clearing his throat, he swung the basement door open. His heart rate increased and his fingers trembled. Stepping back, he pointed the weapon nervously. He was ready, willing, and able to fire a shot.

The stairwell was empty.

“Still in the shaft,” he whispered, exhaling a great and dramatic breath. Somehow it seemed like a mixed blessing.

He walked down the stairs trusting that the creature wasn’t hiding around a corner. He was right. The room was the same as before. The trapdoor was closed; the floor was littered with hammers and saws, drills and screwdrivers, crowbars and wrenches. Rolls of carpet sat next to the rotting pickets on the warped staircase. Hellboy’s doggy-corpse was in the heart of the room, lying inside a puddle of coagulating blood.

The poor, unfortunate thing.

Hellboy’s face looked like it had been caught in the gears of heavy machinery. Its eyes were open, staring into space. Teeth had been smashed free.

Dan sighed. The dog’s mangled snout was upsetting. It made him feel angry, sad, and confused, all at the same time. He ran his dirty fingers through his sweaty hair, wondering why Cameron turned so mean, so evil. It was almost like she had been possessed. He had never seen anything like it.

His eyes shifted.

The trapdoor wasn’t bouncing up and down or straining against its hinges, which he supposed was a good thing. Things had turned quiet. Hopefully that meant that Pat was safe and not dead.

He considered his options, finding the reasonable ones to be conflicting.

On one hand, he should wait for the police to arrive. More manpower and weaponry could only help. On the other hand, Pat needed assistance now. Not in five or ten minutes. Not in an hour. He needed it now. And waiting often led to more waiting, and authoritative assistance usually lead to red-taped bureaucracy.

Waiting was the easiest road to travel, but was it the right choice? Would it lead Pat to safety, or guarantee his death? These were the questions that ran through Dan’s mind with inconsistent translations. These were the choices that made his heart ache.

Dan made his way to the trapdoor and got down on both knees. His wounded leg throbbed as he did so. After placing the gun on the floor he put his ear to the wood and listened. He couldn’t hear anything at first. But then he could hear something. Didn’t know what it was, but the image of a seashell came to mind. That’s what he heard, the sounds of the sea, the winds and the waves, the water splashing against the rocks on the shore.

It was an illusion, of course. Not an optical illusion but an audible one. He couldn’t hear anything. The beast wasn’t there, or if it was, it was being very quiet.

He lifted the gun.

Assuming I don’t want to wait for help to arrive,
Daniel thought,
what now?

Opening the trapdoor was an option easier said than done. He was afraid of this option. It might end his life.

Dan considered the alternatives.

He could blast a few bullets into the shaft, but what would that achieve? Would he kill the beast, make it angry, or shoot a hole into his friend? Blind shooting was risky, very risky. He needed more choices.

He could fire up the chainsaw and carve a hole in the door to see what he was getting himself into. He liked this idea more than opening the door blindly, which seemed like suicide. But what were the pros and cons of using a chainsaw?

“Patrick,” he shouted; his voice cracked. “You there?” He waited three or four seconds, cleared his throat, and tried his luck again. “Patrick? If you can’t answer me that’s fine, but I want you to know we haven’t forgotten you!
I
haven’t forgotten you! I’m coming down but first I’m going to fire a couple bullets into the shaft. If you’re in the shaft stay close to the ladder. Do you hear me? I’m going to fire some bullets into the shaft!”

Daniel squeezed the trigger the smallest amount. Doing so made him more nervous than before. This was a dangerous plan. What if he pissed the animal off and it smashed through the door looking for revenge?

“Do you hear me? Do you? Here it comes, Pat! Stay close to the ladder! On the count of three! One! Two! Three!”

Daniel pulled the trigger twice.
BLAM. BLAM.
The noise was loud and the weapon shook violently in his hand. The smell of the gunpowder and oil mixed together made his nose irritated.

He listened but he didn’t hear anything. He put his ear to the door.

Nothing.

“Pat! Are you okay? Patrick?” He began to suspect that his friend was already dead. It was more than possible; it was probably to be expected. But he didn’t want to think that way. Not yet. Not until he was sure.

“Screw this,” he whispered, pulling himself to his feet.

It was time to get the chainsaw.

9

Cameron sat up quickly. The wind blew in her face through the open window causing her dark hair to dance wildly in the air. Her makeup was smudged. Her skin was more pale than usual; her blood loss was apparent. One hand sped through the air and grabbed the side of William’s face before he had a chance to look in the rearview mirror to look at her. As she bunched William’s skin into her palm, Cameron’s other hand latched onto Beth’s hair and yanked on it fiercely, like she was trying to pull Beth’s head from her body.

William screamed, more shocked than hurt. He shifted away from her, moving his head towards the open window, while fighting off the attack with his right hand. The car swerved. His foot pressed hard on the gas pedal and the vehicle sprang forward, heading into the wrong lane.

Cameron was thrown back, but continued to grip Beth’s hair.

Beth squawked like a seagull. Her head snapped back and her throat stretched awkwardly. Pain stunned her body. She thought her neck would break. Positioning herself defensively, she grabbed Cameron’s right arm with both of her hands and pinched her fingernails into her skin, shouting, “Stop it!”

Cameron’s face contorted into a vile and repugnant sneer. She clawed at William again with her left hand, scratching a line of blood in his cheek.

As William tried to knock her hand away his foot to slipped from the pedal. He turned the wheel right, trying to recapture his lane. Overcompensating, the car veered off the gravel. Tires smashed through a patch of long grass. The car hit a street sign that said: HIDDEN INTERSECTION. The old wooden pole snapped into three separate pieces and cracked the windshield as it went flying over the hood. Wood bounced across the road like a drunken break-dancer. The car went into a ditch. The front grill mashed into the earth and the vehicle made an abrupt halt.

Everyone lurched forward. The steering wheel smashed William in the chin and a sprinkle of light danced before his eyes. Beth’s seatbelt made a CLICK sound as it locked around her body, asphyxiating her momentarily. Cameron flipped into the front seat. Her head banged off the radio as she landed between William and Beth. The car’s back tires lifted a foot from the ground and then bounced down hard. As the car landed dust puffed into the air.

Cameron flexed her muscles, opened her mouth and chomped William’s leg as hard as she was able. As the pain shot through his body she scrambled towards the open window with her elbows flailing and her feet thrashing.

Beth covered her face with her hands. Dirty shoes pummeled her: Doc Martins, size seven. The kicks came fast and often. One snuck through her finger-blockade and smacked her in the mouth. Her lip cracked, leaving a metallic taste on her tongue. Now there was heel crunching her nose. Now there were toes kicking her breasts. Now there was a foot jammed into the side of her thick neck, ramming her towards the open window. It was too much. It was all happening too fast. It seemed as though someone had released a ravenous hyena inside the car.

“Get off,” Beth coughed out, as rubber slammed into her eye. She tried to push the foot away but was unable. Cameron was too aggressive.

Arms and legs thrashed.

And as Cameron pulled her body through the open window on the driver’s side of the car, her legs dragged across William’s face and her feet kicked the roof. She knocked the rearview mirror from the newly cracked windshield and the mirror fell onto Beth’s lap.

William shouted, “Stop it!”

Gravity pulled Cameron towards the earth, helping her escape. And with another shift of weight it was over. She was outside.

Beth held a shaky hand to her mouth. Blood dripped through her fingers. Her teeth hurt and her neck muscles throbbed. She said, “What’s that girl doing?”

William looked out the window.

With a hand on his chest, he said, “Cameron!?” He wasn’t sure if he was mad at her, worried about her, or scared to death of her. Might have been a mix of all three.

Cameron was on the ground with her shirt ripped open and her face in the dirt. The wound on her back was covered in blood and puss.

Hesitantly, William reached for the door handle, wondering if he should open the door or roll up the window. The little voice inside his head––the one that didn’t enjoy getting brutally attacked––wanted the window up and the door locked.

But it’s Cameron
, he thought.
She’s family.

And dangerous
, the little voice was quick to point out.
Very dangerous. She’s not to be trusted, not even for a moment.

William felt his heart ache.

Suddenly Cameron sprang to her feet and hissed like a rattlesnake. Her eyes were dark and vacant. Her teeth were covered in dirt and blood. And there was something attached to her, something colorless and threadlike, clinging to the skin around her neck. The fragile network resembled the fiber of a spider’s web.

William gasped at the sight of her.

Cameron hissed again. The cords in her neck pulsed.

Convulsing and trembling, she stumbled in front of the car and slammed a fist on the hood. Using both hands, she grabbed her shirt and ripped it from her body. She might have looked funny, like a sad imitation of the Hulk, if not for the grave expression on her sick face. The black cloth fell to the gravel. Her
SEX PISTOLS
button rolled into the grass. She unlatched her bra and let it fall, exposing her breasts to them both.

“My God,” Beth said.

William whispered, “What’s she doing?”

He couldn’t believe what he was seeing, and felt ashamed for looking. But he
was
looking; he was staring right at her. He couldn’t help it. He couldn’t pull his eyes away from her chest, and what he saw made him tremble.

Cameron’s breasts were covered in silky mesh. Her dark and rigid nipples were almost crusted with webbing. And worse than that, tiny bugs were crawling across her skin. They looked like crabs.

Running and staggering, Cameron made her way up the far side of the ditch and over thirty feet of meadow. She pulled off her shoes and her socks, unlatched her belt, and unzipped her pants. Her pants came off. Her underwear came off next.

She hissed at the car one final time and ran into the woods naked. And once she was completely surrounded by the dark shadows of the forest she crawled up a tree and wrapped both hands around a branch.

This is where she stayed.

She was changing, and needed to be alone.

10

Daniel didn’t walk and he didn’t run. He stomped his way out of the basement, through the house, and out the front door. His eyes had a mean attentive glint, his teeth were clamped together, and his lips were pursed into a chiseled sneer. He looked ready to pick a fight, which in effect, was exactly what he was doing.

Standing inside the garage, he slid his gun in-between his belt and his jeans. He pulled his chainsaw off the top shelf, checked the gas gauge, and stormed back into the house.

Approaching the trapdoor, he pulled the cord on the saw. The chain-blade began spinning. He wasn’t a thinking-man now. The time for good judgment and clear logic had ended. He was at war, ready to do battle. He wasn’t afraid or nervous; he was excited, energized. It was a time for combat. He was ready to show the beast who was paying the electric bill around here, because this was
his
place, dammit. He bought it, paid for it, cleaned it, and loved it. The house belonged to him and he wouldn’t share it with a killing machine. That concept was not an option.

The chainsaw was loud and powerful, with teeth that could bite.

Daniel smiled. His hair had become untamed and chaotic. His dress shirt seemed ironic, not elegant. His knuckles had turned white and his breathing was labored. His features expressed a growing hint of lunacy, the Joker without his make-up.