Collateral Damage

Doctor Howler's most favorite day of all is, of course, Halloween. This little tale about a deranged coroner, and his home town get together, remains one of Doctor Howler's most popularly requested Halloween stories of all time.


Collateral Damage



To him there was nothing sweeter smelling than the aroma of a dead man's feet. That was one of the primary reasons he accepted a position in the Coroner's Office. Cadavers excited him. Made his juices flow. If he had to kill his victims to satisfy his lustful obsessions so be it. In his mind they were nothing more than collateral damage.

The little village of Hammer Mill was getting spooked, and not by the ghosts and goblins that would soon be calling at their front doors begging for candy.

In a ramshackle cabin, on the outskirts of town, he stashed away his collection of scalpels he had gathered from harvesting human organs. Especially hearts and livers. Delicacies he would pan fry and dine on by a flickering candlelight. His chalice full of human blood.

Some times he even treasured the eyeballs he gouged out of sockets for a tasty snack. There was nothing wrong with the human body, anatomically speaking. He had dined on every part of it.

He knew to sizzle the brain to a golden crunch. Filet the torso, and make steaks from the loins and thighs. Yes, he was a fancy connoisseur of meat.

He kept two freezers out back of the shed well stocked full of flesh. All varieties of it. Men, women, and children. He feasted on them all.

After he completed an autopsy, which behind closed doors he did on every stiff that entered the morgue, he always ensured the casket was closed so its empty contents could not be observed. At least fifty of them adorned the graveyard, and no one ever suspected their loved ones had garnished his dinner table. He operated his funeral parlor in just that fashion.

Once he even kept a severed head high up on his mantel. That was until he finally tossed the thing into a blazing fireplace one night, long after it rotted.

Now, it was Halloween, and he was throwing a party. He knew it would be the talk of the town. Or what was left of it. Which in his twisted mind, he did not plan would be very much. As a Coroner he was very popular. His fun games would include bobbing for apples...with razor blades in them. Oh, he would pass out lots of candy too...cyanide-laced, of course.

He decided that should keep his freezers full for some time to come. Everybody in Hammer Mill would come to his party. But, they would never leave again. After he poisoned the younger ones with his specially prepared candy, the older ones would be ripe for the pickings with his carving cutlery.

One by one he would attack them. He knew the spiked drinks he served would render them defenseless, and the mushroom-induced trip they were on would carry them to their fateful destination.

Jack-o'-Lanterns, possessing a wide variety of scary faces, decorated his property. The pumpkin patch was full of pumpkins, and the hayride was all set. The guests were steadily arriving.

He stood on the front porch of his run down shack with a mile wide grin on his face that said, "So very good to see you!"

If only his unsuspecting guests knew the fate that awaited them.

Happy Halloween!

Sleep tight my little munchkins!

Until next time -- Doctor I.B. Howler, Nightmareologist