shadows

shadows  (18+) short story about shapless creatures that cause nightmerrish pain on their victims. #1243687 by angelwolf25

Preface: Shadows


                Jeremy sat on his sofa watching TV, finishing his psychology paper as the horrid storm rolled into town. The lights flickered as thunder and lightning threatened to rip the house apart. Each time the lights went off he found himself turning his head this way and that, trying to find the invisible specters that lingered just out of his line of sight. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath as he noticed his heart rate had accelerated dramatically.

                “I’ve got to stop watching all these horror movies.” He told himself as the latest slasher film comes back on the TV from the last power surge.

         Just then, with a bright flash of lightning and a thunders clap so loud you would have thought God himself was screaming from the heavens, the lights died completely. Jeremy’s breath stoped instantly as the lights blinked out. Again from the corner of his eye he sees the movement that, until that very moment, he thought was just a figment of his imagination. He listened carefully, his breath caught in his chest, into the darkness for any sound of movement. Tiny creaks here and there draw his attention to the hallway leading into the living area, and the only way out of the house from the den, the front door. If there was something in the house with him, he was all but trapped. With that thought in his head he began to hear a loud thudding sound coming from all directions. He starts to frantically look around, rising from his couch. He stumbled over the coffee table and landed flat on his back. Looking up to the ceiling a bright flash of light reveals something hidden in the darkness, but as the light fades, so does the unwanted visitor. Jeremy screams, shattering all other sounds. And as if a catalyst to the darkness, the lights snap back on.

         He still heard the thudding sound, only now in the light, he realized it was the sound of his own beating heart. A small laugh escaped his lips that snowballed into a hysterical fit of laughter. He gathered his thoughts and pulled himself back from the brink of insanity. He turned off the TV, shaking his head, and walked toward the hallway. As he approaches the dark corridor his cat, Jasper, appeared as if from nowhere. Back arched, hair standing on end, the cat hisses and scratches at the air toward Jeremy.

         “Look, I was just as spooked as you Jasper old buddy, but calm down.” As Jeremy takes another step toward the cat, Jasper swipes at him with his claws, digging into his shin. Blood trickled from the wound as Jeremy jumped back. “God damn it all the hell.” He limped back into the den. “What the fucks gotten into you? I knew I should have gotten your ass de-clawed.” He kneels down to look at the bleeding wound.

         Just then the cat turned it’s attention toward the dark hallway, and a low whimper escapes from the cat’s throat. Jeremy looked up toward the darkness and a sense of dread fell over him. The hairs on the back of his neck and on his arms stood on end. A chill ran up his spin as his body grew hot, a cold sweat built over his body. Every sense he has tells him to get up and run, as irrational as it was, he tried to do just that only to find his body would not respond to his brains commands. He found him self paralyzed by fear. The edge of sanity was slowly pulling away from him and if he didn’t do something fast he was going to fall off of it. He told him self he was being irrational, there wasn’t anything to be afraid of, the storm as taken a toll on his psychic because of the horror marathon he had been watching. Then the unusual way his faithful and usually loving cat had been acting, was just adding to it.

         But no matter how he tried to explain to himself, he couldn’t make himself move. He fought his minds urge to break up to the bitter end, but as the lights died and lightning illuminated the room, he came face to face with the catalyst of his approaching insanity. Standing before him, just a few feet in front of Jasper, stood… something. In that instant of light he noticed the malevolent intruder had no real form, a liquid shape formed from the darkness around it. Only the sense of dread and fear gave it its shape to his eyes. Then as if by magic, he saw it changed from it’s dark liquid form to an almost physical one, as if it produced it’s own light for him to see the transformation. The outline would suggest a man, two arms, two legs, a torso, and something resembling a head. It hunched over, it’s back almost higher then the head. It had four eyes that glowed, though from which part of the spectrum his brain couldn’t be sure. The just seem to pulsate, and the light shot right into Jeremy’s head. He had seen enough movies to figure it was the light from the eyes that was most likely paralyzing him. With that thought in his mind, we willed his eyes shut and regained control of his limbs, which was good for in the few seconds his eyes were shut he could sense the creature growing closer.
He started moving across the room to put distance between himself and the creature, which was blocking the only logical way out. He couldn’t help but notice as he searched for an alternate rout out, that Jasper was no longer in the room, most likely fled in terror as Jeremy himself was trying to do. He slowly circled back around toward the far wall. His only option was the window, though the thought of jumping five stories to the street below seemed foolish to him. The only other choice was to face the creature that stalked him in his den, and that was an idea he had no intentions of entertaining. The window would have to do. 

         He never took his eyes of the creature as it too circled the room, though he avoided looking into its eyes. If he were to fall to it’s paralyzing stair again, he knew he would be dead. So as his heart pounded, sweat pouring from every pour in his body, he slowly made his way back toward the window. The creature moved quickly, from the floor, onto the wall, and then the ceiling where it slowly crawled toward Jeremy and the window.

         As Jeremy reached the window the creature stopped, and a low, almost animal like growl filled the air. Jeremy stopped instantly, his hand inches from the windows lock. He’s hand became paralyzed, and for a second he took his eyes off the creature. It was then that he felt a hot breath on his neck and the smell of burnt and rotted flesh filled his nose. He braved looking over, and there it was, the face of true insanity.

         Up close he still couldn’t see much, it wasn’t until a flash of lightning filled the room that he could see, in all it’s horror, the face of his unwelcome visitor. Only it wasn’t just a face, it was four faces. Each one of the eyes he had seen was from one of the faces. The faces were distorted and twisted, as if the unlucky basterds who once owned them had seen far greater horrors then he was currently facing. Each face’s mouth jutted from a different corner of the grisly feature.

         He watched in paralyzed terror as the four mouths began to open, and forked toungs protruded from the openings. Then came the sound. No sound on earth could describe this error in nature’s verity of sounds. It cut through Jeremy as if it were a knife, tearing flesh from his body. His ears imploded, blood pouring from the holes. And his eyes burst from their sockets. As he opened his mouth to scream, blood poured into the air.

         As Jeremy fell forward, still alive, he caught himself on the ledge of the window. Fear released it’s self from him. In what was left of his shattered mind, he knew what his fate would be. Deep inside, his last shred of sanity tried to tell him it was all a dream and he would soon awaken. But the insanity, which long since over came the sane portion of his mind, wasn’t listening. He now knew the horror of the faces this thing wore as a mask. 'Had they suffered the same fate?' He wondered to him self. He could feel the creature sucking his soul from his body. Scourges of pain ripped him apart, peace-by-peace. It was then that Jeremy decided he wasn’t going to let happen to him what those poor basterds let happen to them, and with the very last bit of will power and strength he had, Jeremy threw himself toward the window. As the glass shattered around him, the creature emitted another horrifying scream.

         After Jeremy crashed into the street, he realized he could still see. He could also hear the screams of the people around him that had just pulled into the apartment building parking lot. He thought to himself as he looked up toward the window, if he had actually gone insane. Had he been dreaming, and just thrown himself from the window of his den by accident? As darkness began to take hold of his sight, he noticed movement from the shadows of the building, not just one, but maybe four or five of those creatures, perching against the wall, watching. A smile came across Jeremy’s face as he realized he wasn’t crazy, he had just saved him self. But as the creatures again began to scream, he noticed no one else looked toward them. As the darkness finally took hold, Jeremy tried to warn those around him. But it was too late.