my first shot at horror fiction.....please comment
A SHADOW BEHIND ME
This is something that happened to me in the summer this year, when my parents were out and I was alone in the house.
I was working quietly at my desk when it happened. At first it looked like a flickering shadow behind me. No need to overreact, I thought, that oddly shaped shadow behind me is probably just a trick of the light. Until I heard the first wet footsteps behind me and cold, damp fingers touched the side of my neck.
I steeled my mind and whirled around, just fast enough to see a grotesque childlike figure slithering up out of the window, leaving behind the dank smell of marshland.
I stayed in my room for the rest of the night, my stomach clenching in fear every time I heard the smallest sound. I finally fell asleep, and woke up with a start to the sickening sound of something like slime and dead leaves and branches being dragged across the roof directly above my room. And when I tentatively stretched out my hand to draw back the curtains and look out, there were a pair of gleaming bestial eyes staring straight at me, upside down with the long matted filthy hair hanging like a screen to block out the streetlights.
At that point I dropped the curtains and ran, back into the corridor barely moments before the thing leapt through the window and went for my throat.
I edged desperately along the wall, and all I could see, all I could think of was the strand of brown, matted hair swinging before my eyes as it kept pace with my motions. And then I made a mistake. I looked up.
The child clinging to the ceiling was anything but. Beneath the slime the face was pitted and creased, with unimaginably horrific fangs that somehow still had blood on them, I didn’t dare to think from what.
At that moment a dog howled in the distance. The-the thing froze, and then bounded out the window, seconds before daylight broke.
I was in a state of paralyzed shock throughout the day. I heard the news of the savage mangling and death of a neighbor’s child with complete acceptance, like I’d known about it since I first saw the dank, slimy footprints on our roof, no larger than a child’s but with the imprints of attached talons. Talons that hours ago had ripped out and eaten a human child’s intestines while it was still alive and whimpering in terror.
There were wild stories circulating, stories I’d never heard before because I’d been too young, horror tales of savage swamp creatures that were driven out from their homes once the estate development people came, creatures that skulked in the putrid recesses of the marshland on the fringes of the suburbs, living on garbage and the occasional piece of human meat that came their way.
Apparently no-one had seen anything, or, like me, they were too scared to talk. This was two weeks before things went wild.
They came. Not singly or in pairs, but in an army of grinning, leaping, horrific savagery in the night, when everyone was sleeping. Soon dozens of us were dead, ripped apart and eaten in front of our numbed eyes. Children mostly went first, and strong-looking men and old people were clubbed to death and their bodies left to rot beneath lampposts.
The creatures stank of the marshland. Oozing slime, they threw our possessions around, made nests in our homes and drove us to the rooftops and cornices where we stayed for hours in terrified hiding. We’d lost all communications with the outside world, and soon some of us started dying of starvation. This was until the Army came.
Soon men in khaki carrying rifles stormed the suburbs and demolished about fourteen buildings before they could flush out the swamp creatures, which had taken to scampering around in broad daylight and provided an easy target to expert Army snipers and shooters.
Rebuilding and medical teams arrived within hours. In two days’ time everything was back to normal, except the families who had lost members to the mass carnage.
Life goes on. We have tried hard to move on from what happened this year. The military claimed the “incident” had been a “contained threat”. Everyone is busy trying to forget. Obviously it’s not that easy.
For one thing, there are still reports of the swamp creatures killing and eating some slum children. Various people have claimed that they’ve seen small lithe bodies leaping about in the swamp, especially when the street dogs start to howl.
And lastly, there’s me. Wherever these creatures are, I have a gut feeling that they’ll come back. It’s the marsh air that pulls them inland towards the city. And according to all sources, they breed like rabbits, so it’s only a question of time before there are more of them than there are of us, and they attack with greater strength for the final attack that could wipe us out for good. And next time they’ll mean it, because more than their original home territory, now they want their revenge.
This is something that happened to me in the summer this year, when my parents were out and I was alone in the house.
I was working quietly at my desk when it happened. At first it looked like a flickering shadow behind me. No need to overreact, I thought, that oddly shaped shadow behind me is probably just a trick of the light. Until I heard the first wet footsteps behind me and cold, damp fingers touched the side of my neck.
I steeled my mind and whirled around, just fast enough to see a grotesque childlike figure slithering up out of the window, leaving behind the dank smell of marshland.
I stayed in my room for the rest of the night, my stomach clenching in fear every time I heard the smallest sound. I finally fell asleep, and woke up with a start to the sickening sound of something like slime and dead leaves and branches being dragged across the roof directly above my room. And when I tentatively stretched out my hand to draw back the curtains and look out, there were a pair of gleaming bestial eyes staring straight at me, upside down with the long matted filthy hair hanging like a screen to block out the streetlights.
At that point I dropped the curtains and ran, back into the corridor barely moments before the thing leapt through the window and went for my throat.
I edged desperately along the wall, and all I could see, all I could think of was the strand of brown, matted hair swinging before my eyes as it kept pace with my motions. And then I made a mistake. I looked up.
The child clinging to the ceiling was anything but. Beneath the slime the face was pitted and creased, with unimaginably horrific fangs that somehow still had blood on them, I didn’t dare to think from what.
At that moment a dog howled in the distance. The-the thing froze, and then bounded out the window, seconds before daylight broke.
I was in a state of paralyzed shock throughout the day. I heard the news of the savage mangling and death of a neighbor’s child with complete acceptance, like I’d known about it since I first saw the dank, slimy footprints on our roof, no larger than a child’s but with the imprints of attached talons. Talons that hours ago had ripped out and eaten a human child’s intestines while it was still alive and whimpering in terror.
There were wild stories circulating, stories I’d never heard before because I’d been too young, horror tales of savage swamp creatures that were driven out from their homes once the estate development people came, creatures that skulked in the putrid recesses of the marshland on the fringes of the suburbs, living on garbage and the occasional piece of human meat that came their way.
Apparently no-one had seen anything, or, like me, they were too scared to talk. This was two weeks before things went wild.
They came. Not singly or in pairs, but in an army of grinning, leaping, horrific savagery in the night, when everyone was sleeping. Soon dozens of us were dead, ripped apart and eaten in front of our numbed eyes. Children mostly went first, and strong-looking men and old people were clubbed to death and their bodies left to rot beneath lampposts.
The creatures stank of the marshland. Oozing slime, they threw our possessions around, made nests in our homes and drove us to the rooftops and cornices where we stayed for hours in terrified hiding. We’d lost all communications with the outside world, and soon some of us started dying of starvation. This was until the Army came.
Soon men in khaki carrying rifles stormed the suburbs and demolished about fourteen buildings before they could flush out the swamp creatures, which had taken to scampering around in broad daylight and provided an easy target to expert Army snipers and shooters.
Rebuilding and medical teams arrived within hours. In two days’ time everything was back to normal, except the families who had lost members to the mass carnage.
Life goes on. We have tried hard to move on from what happened this year. The military claimed the “incident” had been a “contained threat”. Everyone is busy trying to forget. Obviously it’s not that easy.
For one thing, there are still reports of the swamp creatures killing and eating some slum children. Various people have claimed that they’ve seen small lithe bodies leaping about in the swamp, especially when the street dogs start to howl.
And lastly, there’s me. Wherever these creatures are, I have a gut feeling that they’ll come back. It’s the marsh air that pulls them inland towards the city. And according to all sources, they breed like rabbits, so it’s only a question of time before there are more of them than there are of us, and they attack with greater strength for the final attack that could wipe us out for good. And next time they’ll mean it, because more than their original home territory, now they want their revenge.
4 comments:
Bravo! Very well written!
Only....change the pic! Doesn't go with the story at all!
Wow.
Hmm... we humans deserve to be killed off, I often think. Civilization has SCREWED evolution!
simply superb!!!but put an appropiate pic....
u know at the beginning i was thinking here succumbs another talent to cliche especially durin the hollywoodish parts like them slasher and scream movies. but the endin was good. real good. especially the last sentences.
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