Unleashed! Chapter Four

FOUR

The boy inspected the pulsating thing. It was like some sort of cocoon, roughly the size of a grown man. Inside of it seemed to be several green pulsating lights. The cocoon seemed to be covered in a snot-like substance that looked pretty disgusting. The oddest thing though were the hundreds of eyes that covered the cocoon. The eyes looked in all directions, and resembled those of a reptile.

The boy squinted his eyes a bit to protect them from the pulsating lights. He tried to make out what was in the cocoon besides the lights. He could discern some kind of lumpy form. Was it… moving? He came a little closer. That humming sound was quite annoying. He stuck out a hand to touch the cocoon. All eyes suddenly were on him. That was interesting. Were they part of the cocoon or part of what was inside of it?

It reminded him of something from one of Kingsly’s books. He wondered if that thing had inspired the writer maybe? He gentle touched the cocoon. It seemed to slightly vibrate, like an engine or something. He took away his hand which was now covered in snot. That was pretty gross. He may not know fear, he could sure as hell find something disgusting. He wiped his hand on his shirt and felt sorry for it afterwards. This was the only shirt he had left, as he liked to travel light.

Was this thing responsible for the slaughter of that poor cat? It didn’t seem to be though. It lacked the appendages, claws or teeth for that. It only had eyes. Or was it whatever was inside it. It didn’t look like the cocoon had been opened though. Whatever it was, it didn’t seem to be of this world. Fascinating.

He gave it a little poke with his finger. That intensified the humming sound, the lights started to pulsate faster, the eyes went wild, spinning. He took a step back. Had he hurt it somehow? He hadn’t meant to do that, he just wanted to learn more about it.

Kingsly had written stories about these beings from another dimension that he called The Otherworldly. Beings that defied all human logic, creatures with great powers that lusted for blood, wanted to enslave other dimensions. He couldn’t recall anything like the cocoon but it sure had the characters of something not from this world. He wondered if maybe he would be able to find something about it in Kingsbury’s library. He figured he could have a look.

He left the room and made his way to the study. He scanned the shelves of the library, searching for Kingsbury’s own books. He found an anthology of Kingsbury called The Otherworldly. He took it from the shelf, sat down behind Kingsbury’s desk and started to leaf through it.

The book contained several stories of The Otherworldly, detailing how they tried to leave their own dimension, invade ours and how brave men managed to thwart them. That or be slaughtered or go insane. There were some pictures in them as well. He marveled at the pictures of the strange creatures, beings with fangs, tentacles, wings, claws, bulbous eyes, scaly or slimy bodies. Nothing that resembled the cocoon though. There was one creature pictured that interested him especially. It looked almost like a caterpillar, but with a dolphin-like skin. It was big as a human, had a dozen eyes. It’s many legs resembled those of a green mantis. Caterpillars evolved in butterflies from a cocoon, right? Was he up to something here?

He quickly read through the story that the picture illustrated. It told the tale of a farmer who one day discovers one of The Otherworldly, the caterpillar-like being burrowing through the earth in one of his barns. His livestock has been brutally slaughtered, the smell of death and the flies that had been drawn to it making him puke. He manages to find the courage and strength to get his shotgun and tries to shoot the monster. The Otherworldly instantly heals from every shot though and ends up ripping the farmer to shreds before burrowing back into the ground. So in that one the humans lost.

The boy closed the book. Was that cocoon maybe holding the caterpillar-like creature from that story? It sounded totally crazy. These things couldn’t be real, right? They had to be just imagined things from Kingsbury’s creative mind. They had to! If these things were real, wouldn’t someone have encountered them earlier? Wouldn’t they have been featured on thousands of TV-shows not to mention the internet? But he couldn’t deny what he had seen. That thing really did look like something from another dimension. Or was he just going crazy like Kingsbury?

A scraping sound interfered with his thoughts. Like something sharp dragging across the floor. The sound started to come closer.

Unleashed! Chapter Three

THREE

The boy ran up the stairs two at a time. The light of his phone illuminated the walls, the floor and the ceilings in a wild pattern as his arms moved while he ran. When he arrived upstairs he saw something skitter away. Something small and dark. Nothing that looked like a ghost. He followed the dark thing into one of the rooms.

He almost stumbled on an overturned chair. Scanning the room with his phone’s light he determined this had to be the master bedroom. There was a two-person bed, a large closet and a painting of an angel on the wall. On the bed was the creature he’d seen making his way across the hallway. It was furry, glowing eyes in the dark and it snarled at him. It wasn’t anything to put any sense of fear into him though, nor any man. It was a black cat. And with the lack of fear came quite a lack of superstition, so the whole thing about a black cat crossing your path meant bad luck was a bunch of bullshit to him.

“Easy buddy,” the boy told the cat, slowly extending a hand. He liked animals. This one was probably just a bit frightened by his sudden appearance and meant him no harm. He came closer to the cat, step by step. The cat snarled again.

The boy was almost close enough to pet the animal. “Easy… Easy…”

With a loud hiss the cat jumped at him, his claws barely missing the boy’s face. The cat ran past him. The boy thought of running after it again but decided he didn’t want to distress the animal anything more. He’d never seen a cat that distressed though. Was it just because of his own presence? Tales had it that animals were more attuned to the supernatural, could see things humans couldn’t.

That bed looked quite inviting he thought. Maybe, if there were indeed ghosts to be found in this place they’d show up at night? It had been quite a long drive over here. He could use some sleep. So he just made himself comfortable on the bed, not bothering to undress or get under the covers. He’d been travelling so long and so light, sleeping everywhere he could he never had any trouble falling asleep.

The bed was just as comfortable as it looked, adjusting to the weight of his body like a loving caress. He lay there, looking at the ceiling, listening to the sounds of the woodwork creaking, the wind blowing against the window. He was reminded about the trouble his parents had understanding that unlike other children he’d never feared the dark, had never needed a nightlight or a teddy bear to comfort him. In a way he felt like he’d robbed them of a very essential part, essential longing of a parent to protect a child. He remembered very vividly how he’d been standing at the window one night during a thunderstorm, fascinated by the lightning that painted the dark sky in beautiful colors. His mother had entered the room, worried about him. She put a hand on his shoulder, telling him everything would be alright. He told her he wasn’t up because he was afraid but because he was hoping he might feel something like it. He couldn’t help seeing the disappointment in his mother’s eyes. One of those crucial moments that had him looking for fear when he turned sixteen. With that memory he slowly drifted away…He woke up from some kind of light, not aware how long he’d been asleep. The light was green. It seemed to pulsate. It illuminated the hallway. He got out of bed, walked towards the hallway. He didn’t need his phone, the light bright enough for him to see in the dark.

He felt something brush his foot. He couldn’t quite make out what it was. He bent down on one knee and had a closer look. What he saw had him gagging. It was what once had been the cat. It looked like it had been torn open, guts spilling out of it like stuffing out of mattress. What the hell had happened to this poor creature? Was there another animal in here? One that preyed on smaller ones? It must have taken quite some strength to pull apart the cat’s body like that and very sharp teeth.

He got up, looking down the hallway, looking for either the predator or the source of the pulsating green light. No sight of the predator, but it was clear where the light was coming from. One of the two rooms he hadn’t been in yet. He made his way over to it. As he came closer he could also make out a strange sound coming from it. It was like a hum. A low, throbbing hum. Not like a person humming, but also not like the hum of a machine. It was somehow a mixture of those two. A sound he’d never heard before. It drew him to the room like a moth to a flame.

He entered the room, probably the guestroom. There was a one person bed, a small cabinet, a small table and a chair. No paintings. The green light in the room made it easy enough to make out all objects in the room. It almost hurt his eyes in the dark even. The thing that was creating the light was also the source of the humming noise, as he’d thought. It was also something he’d never ever seen before. It looked as organic as it did otherworldly. Like something from a fever dream, something from what most folks would perceive as a nightmare. The boy was mainly just fascinated by it, like he’d been fascinated by the lightning. He slowly came closer to the hellish thing.