Stanton
Creed blearily opened his eyes, a sickening series of pops and clicks as the desiccated
corpse began to move from his fetal position at the bottom of the dried well.
His dirt-caked leather jacket and moth eaten short shook free a variety of
vermin as the skeletal ghoul rose to his feet, his body slowly rejuvenating as
it did every year. Blue veins followed by grey muscle swelled and pulsed along
his skeletal frame, filling his clothes with the body of a man who’d been prime
physical condition before his death.
Letting
out a rattling breath, a chilled fog seeping past his rotted teeth, the
reanimated outlaw coughed, clearing his lungs of the dirt and spider webs that
had filled them over the past year. Turning to the crumbling stone wall of the
well, Stanton Creed began his yearly ascension from his barren grave. His ears
picked up the sounds of laughter, of men and women celebrating close by, a
sneer spreading across his face, shallow and dirty. As he began to pick-up speed
in his ascension, the familiar hunger spread through his body, tingling in his
limbs and rattling deep in his bones.
One
leathery hand grasping the lip of the well, he heaved his fully fleshed body
over the rim, landing on his half-rotted boots. One hand checking his holster
for his pistol, he smiled a wicked smile as he made his way down the hill
towards the bonfire set up on the beach. Dancing around the fire like the
injuns of old, he could make out seven people in total, along with a bright red
cooler full of bottles of liquor.
Stopping
at just the edge of the light that the bonfire offered, he stood for perhaps
five minutes before one of the scantily clad youths caught sight of him.
“Holy
shit!” The shirtless man said, pulling a pair of girls further away from him,
as if her were about to pounce upon them. “Dude, what the fuck? Get the fuck
out of here, invitation only!”
In
a voice as thick as mud, a burst of cobwebs blasting past his lipless mouth,
Stanton Creed looked to the lad. “This here be my hill boy, I think that be
invitation enough.”
One
of the other man, a bald, muscular negro, let out a sudden gasp as a large
yellow and red centipede curled out from a hole in Stanton’s chest, curling and
crawling up to a hole in his neck, burrowing into the leathery flesh with glee.
“What
the fuck are you?” The negro asked, the girls moving back to put the bonfire
between them and the walking dead.
“A
man who was just sleeping before being woken by a band of stupid boys and
girls,” Stanton said with a sharp his, taking a moment to quickly take a snort
and a bite, spitting out a solid inch of the invading centipede as any other
man would spit out chewing tobacco. “Now that you woke me up, one of you has to
put me back to sleep.”
“Or
we could just fuck you up,” the first boy said, stomping up aggressively
towards Stanton, only to realize the ghoul was armed and ready for him, quickly
drawing from his holster and emptying three rounds into the boy’s sculpted
chest. The boy dropped to the ground, dead, while the girls screamed and the
remaining two men stood up, as if they were going to do something about it.
“You
could try boys, but old Stanton Creed has an aim as dead as his body,” the
corpse boasted, blowing at the end of his rusted six shooter before slipping it
back into his holster. “Now just settled down with your womenfolk and get out
your liquor, we’re gonna see if you folks can put me to sleep or not.”
“What?”
The negro asked, looking at Stanton with a weary eye.
“Simple,”
Stanton began, a chattering rasp echoing from his body as a series of spiders
came spewing forth past his teeth. “Old Stanton is a man fond of the drink you
see, and proud to say that not many can drink him under the coffin. We all take
shots of whatever you folk have, the last one standing being the winner. If one
of you win, I get to go back to my grave and rot until disturbed again. If I
win, I get to bring your souls down to Hell with me.”
“Why
the hell would we play against you?” The other man, an older one with a spiked
ringlet of ink around his bicep asked.
“Because
refusing me means I get to use my gun on you like I did your friend here, a
fate that guarantees a good time with Lucifer himself.”
Authors Note: Inspired by this song, a tribute to the band that has now been added to my playlist for when I write.
