Stanton Creed

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.

Coffin Hop

     To all that have participated in this great event, I am deeply moved by your kind words and well wishes towards my writings. Even the criticisms I received have helped me move forward as a writer, which is all I really want to be.

     As to my lack of updates these last few days, I'm wrapping up a few final projects I have that I am hoping to send to publishers in the near future. Apologies to those wishing to read more of my ongoing tales, but they will be seen to when the time is right.

     With my bones weary and my muscles aching, I think I shall retire for the next few days and try and let the stress just melt away. Perhaps put up a few movie reviews or previews, or merely relax in World Of Warcraft, fishing while listening to some nature sounds.

     Happy Halloween and Sweet Dreams,
     Nicholas Paschall

Zombie Games Coffin Hopper Edition Part Two!

The four-armed monstrosities were capable of taking an absurd amount of abuse, but in the end we downed them as much as they could be downed. One was torn to utter pieces, great swathes of hardened carapace torn free from it’s body, the tarry skin below ripped asunder by Tank’s frenzied rending.

The second one had been handled in a far smoother manner, with Soldier and Suit tackling the creature together, Suit using Tank’s discarded machete to parry away the creatures talons while sliding the blade skillfully between the segmented plating of the creatures body, all the while Soldier was merely breaking whatever limb she could get a hold of, dislocating joints and cracked the creatures shell whenever she could.

Now we had a much more difficult problem on our hands: Tank. The amphetamines I’d pumped into his system had kept him on his feet, but he had been bleeding out the entire time, finally collapsing on top of the twitching carcass of Doctor Dead’s little lab rat. Using what limited supplies I had, I had sewn him up as best I could, using a pair of makeshift tweezers and a needle with unwound steel wool for thread to stitch him back up. While I was patching him up, Geek and Scout were searching the rest of the laboratory, the earlier brawl having somehow made us not even notice the stairwell leading up to the second story and down to a basement. Soldier and Suit were now standing guard at the barricaded door, where the groans of the walking dead were still leaking through the walls.

As I was just finishing with the last hole that had been bored into Tank’s chest, Geek and Scout came down from the upper level, smiles on their faces.

“What’s the good news?” Suit asks casually, leaning against the rattling door as if this were any normal day.

“We found two places we could leave here from, plus a ton of supplies.” Scout squeals, hopping from foot to foot excitedly. “There’s a door that leads to a terrace up on the roof, where we could scale down the wall to the other side of the building and sneak away.”

“Problem is, there are a few of those fast zombies up there, and it looks like they have armor or something sewn into them.” Geek explains, rubbing the back of his head. “There’s a wide plate glass window that lets you look out onto the roof, and there’s like three or four of them just crouching up there, watching the door.”

“What about downstairs?” I ask, knowing Tank was in no condition to be climbing anywhere.

“A grate that leads to a sewer, some more supplies and a map of the island labeling other research facilities.” Geek says with a sigh. “If what I’m guessing is true, the grate should be like a sewer system, leading us straight to another building like this one. And one of them is near the waterfront where that boat is supposed to be.”

“What kind of supplies?” Soldier asks, stepping away from the barricade to begin walking towards the stairs leading up.

“Weird ones, a bunch of swords and knives, plus a lot of medical stuff.” Geek replies, nodding towards the mutilated corpses. “I think these things were supposed to wield weapons, because upstairs is essentially an armory.”

“I’m so there,” Suit says with a smile, moving to follow Soldier up the stairs.

“Where are the medical supplies?” I ask just as Scout hands me a first aid kit. “Perfect! Well, not perfect, but pretty close. Tank will need this for sure.”

Geek pulled a small metal handle from his pocket, handing it to me. “We snagged you this as well. A folding knife, just in case you get stuck too close to one of these fuckers out here.”

Looking at them, I could see that they’d both elected to grab a pair of swords that they’d strapped to their hips, Scout wearing a bandolier with a dozen stub handled knives.

Tank groaned, causing me to turn my attention back to him. I’d been sitting on the floor now with my back up against one of the broken containers, resting his head in my lap and monitoring him for a fever. He coughs and rolls over, spitting up a mouthful of blood as he pushes himself to his feet, wavering as he moved from the crash he’d suffered after the amphetamines had worn off.

“Damn,” he said, his voice dry and raspy, “What the fuck? Feel like I got hit by a truck and ate from a sand box.”

“Normal side effects of the stuff I gave you when you were dying,” I say quickly, grabbing his thick forearm as he teeters back and forth, his other hand rubbing at his eyes.

“Crank?” He asks, looking at me after a moment. “This feels like the crash from crank.”

“Yeah, what the monsters were being fed was a mixture of that,” I answer honestly. “When you got stabbed by the creature, you were about to go down and looked like you were going into shock, so I did what I thought was best.”

“Well I may feel like shit, but at least I’m alive.” He says after a moment, looking around the room. “We killed those fuckers I take it?”

“You killed one yourself, while we all took the other one.”

“Huh, well what’s the sitch now?” He asks, scratching at his stitches.

After I rely what Geek and Scout had told us all, he seemed far more excited as he slowly made his way downstairs with the two of them, asking if they’d seen any weapons for a “man of his size.”

Scout had merely giggled.

I’d just fought off the oncoming headache.

Trouble is, now we have to figure out where we can go without getting killed. Tank’s in better condition than I thought, though still vulnerable, but we’re all better armed now. The sewer system seems like a good idea, but who knows what kind of monsters our host has dropped down there? 

Authors Note: Just leave your vote in the comments below where you think they should head: out through the roof or down through the sewer.

Carver's Code

      After three hours with three dozen certified forensic scientists combing over the bodies, they had come up with the key, a letter folded neatly and wrapped in plastic, tucked into the throat of a younger woman, sixty-three silver-lined lead discs bearing the code J-6440. The following numbers were what was found. 

Codes Found Upon Corpses:

Upon the women: 1 1, 3 7, 4 7, 7 2, 5 5, 8 2, 9 6, 0 5, 2 9, 6 8

Upon the men: E 60, 5 A, NY, 1 1, 3 0, 4 6, 5 5, +, MH, 2 0

The letter itself was directed to "Chief Inspector Takeshi Sato". This had made the older man's stomach turn sour in mere seconds, especially when, upon opening it, his fears were confirmed.

The Organ-Snatcher was back.

"To Chief Inspector Takeshi Sato,

I know in our last correspondence, I swore we would never cross swords again, but I find myself in a situation just too delicious to pass up. With our seventh anniversary upon us, I felt that you needed to stretch your legs, so to speak, and have a chance to catch the one man that always eluded you.

Me.

Now sorry to say, I'll only be in town for the next few days. I have a specific little bar in mind where we could finally meet, face to face. The steps to finding out which one it is and when this will be are all up to you. I left you everything you need to know. Should you get so far, just be sure to ask for copy held in reserve for the past two months for a Mr. Sloan, in honor of your partners death.

Ciao,

S.S."

Authors Note: This is a special gift for the Coffin Hoppers who think themselves to be good at solving puzzles. All the clues are before you, just leave you answers, for those who dare to try, in the comments below. If a correct answer isn't provided in a day then the Carver must strike again, and Sato may never have a chance to close this last case.

Son of a Preacher Man: The Carver

“Gather ‘round children, gather round… I’ve a story to tell!” I say with a smile as I ease myself into my chintz chair, resting my cane next to my small table where I keep my pipe. My smile grows broader as my grandchildren and great-grandchildren all call to each other throughout the house, all giggling and shrieking at the thought of my stories.

I let them take their time as I pack my pipe and look about for a suitable match in my coat. By the time I’ve got my pipe lit and taken a few puffs, my living room has thirty pairs of eyes watching me hungrily, all chattering amongst them about what story I’ll tell tonight. It’s not often I visit anymore, after all.

I blame it on the distance, but my children know that my age is catching up to me.

“Oh my, so fast you’ve all come.” I say with mock-surprise. Over their heads I can see my daughter Ash smile at me, closing the door to the kitchen so that she and her brothers can have some time to themselves.

“We wanna hear your stories Grandpa!” One of my oldest grandchildren says, my dear little Holly. I brush my hand over her head, patting it gently before snuggling deeper into my chair.

“Well, for all of you I have a good tale to tell… a story of murder most foul!” I say with a dark whisper, causing a wave of cooing to come from my adolescent audience. “This… is the story of the Carver.”

***

“Found another one chief,” an officer calls from the upstairs bedroom, his voice a tad despondent. “Just like the others.”

Chief Detective Sato rubbed at his eyes as he stood in the middle of the third largest crime scene he’d ever had the misfortune of visiting during his long career as a, what the tabloids and papers referred to him as, the Serial Killer Catcher. One of the most decorated criminal profilers in the New York Police Departments history, his expertise had led to the capture and arrest of over thirty men and women that had somehow become the monsters that all serial killers were.

The only case he’d ever been unable to solve had been seven years ago to the very day. That left Sato… unsettled.

The Organ-Snatcher had been ritualistically killing every New Moon groups of people, either one at a time or en masse, and removing their organs with surgical precision. He did this for twelve months before he just… stopped. Sato had never mentioned it, but he had received a note from someone claiming to be the killer, apologizing to Sato for all the inconvenience he’d caused him over the years. The signature had been a simple pair of S’s, and three months with forensics had turned up nothing on the note worth, well, noting.

Now Chief Detective Takeshi Sato stood in the middle of an old three story home in Upper Manhattan, surrounded by over forty dead men and women, old and young. Hanging from the walls were flags bearing swastikas, copies of blood spattered copies of Hitler’s manifesto littering the house. While the whole situation was unsettling, what made Sato leery over the whole scenario was that most of the dead looked calm, as if they’d died suddenly, so suddenly in fact that they hadn’t even noticed.

That and they all had great holes in their chests, broken ribs and sternums abundant, with a total of forty-three missing hearts. It reminded him of a case his old partner had been assigned to just as the Organ Grinder stopped his killings. A young mother was found dead, her heart torn from her chest and her son missing. The husband had been ruled out due to the nature of the wound the mother had received, her chest opened with a single strike.

Just like all of these bodies. It was clear they were all in the middle of a meeting of some sort, a picture of Adolf Hitler hanging above the fireplace flanked by a pair of old German flags bearing the symbol that had become so synonymous with evil and hatred. The victims were all white supremacists, but they were still victims.

So far forensics had determined that a singular keg that they had all been drinking from had contained trace amounts of Rohypnol, better known as the date rape drug. Several small gas tanks had been found hidden throughout the house, slowly leaking trace amounts of Carbon Monoxide into the air. Not enough to be lethal, but enough to cause dry mouth and fatigue, enough to make a crowd of drunken racists grow weary and drop their guard.

“Another two up here, same as the rest!” Another officer called from another corner of the house. Sato rubbed at his eyes as he tried not to think of how this could quite easily be the same killer that had eluded him years ago.

Hours later, after sixty-seven heartless bodies had been discovered and transported to the coroner’s office, Sato now sat at his desk in his office, a cold cup of coffee at his side as he stared at a sheet of numbers, numbers that were still being sorted out.

Upon the delivery of the bodies, and the removal of their clothing, the officers had been horrified to find numbers and letters carved into each victim in their left forearm, with a single metal disk the size of a quarter inserted into their chest wounds bearing a number, all exactly the same.

J-6440

He had a few of his investigators looking into that number, but the answers weren’t as forthcoming as Sato would have liked. There were ten dead women with numbers carved into their arms, numbers that Sat believed were significant in two different ways. On one woman the number was 1 then a 1, while another one had a 2 and then a 9. There didn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to it.

Another ten, all young adults no older than twenty, had similar carvings, though these carvings also were done with something far more narrow, thin slices as if done with paper. The cuts would have barely even been noticed if not for the scabbing they had formed over the wounds.

Which mean the killer had made these marks before ripping their hearts out, allowing the wounds to close themselves.

On the oldest male they’d found, one Patrick Henderson, the coroner had dug out of his throat a key, a key with the word Sato carved into the side of it.

Taking a sip of his cold coffee, Takeshi shook his head as his worst nightmare had come true: some sick fuck out there was trying to challenge him in a game of wits.

Authors note: Read the previous installments if you wish for this tale to make any sense. I'll be posting the numbers carved into the dead, as well as the 'Forensic File' so that the dear readers can try and solve the mystery for dear Takeshi. Should you solve it, than Takeshi may get to finally meet the man he's thought of for the last seven years. If not, than the story will progress.

Sinister

     As you all know by now I frequent horror movies at almost every opportunity I can get. Well, I wish I had the time wasted watching Sinister back, as the whole film was nothing but a box of re-hashed pop up horror tricks and a ridiculously stupid protagonist that had me rooting for his death within the first half hour of the film.
     I can think of a dozen films that this one has stolen bits and pieces from, creating a true Frankenstein of a horror film, which in my eyes, was about as terrifying as the original Frankenstein in the early thirties. The plot is one that I think every writer has at least partially created at one point or another. In fact, sitting on my hard drive is a story quite similar to Sinister that I've yet to post out of shame.
     Save yourself some money and just wait for this one to come out on Netflix. Just grab any five horror movies you own and watch them back to back and you'll essentially get the same effect. Except there might be some decent acting involved.

Coffin Hopper

     For those who enjoy this blog and wish to seek out others like it, may I recommend visiting Coffin Hop? An excellent source for those who wish to sample the different flavors of horror throughout the whole year, with an emphasis on Halloween of course.

     So go ahead and check them out!

Hitchcock

     A movie about one of the true founders of modern fear, a man who took the most ordinary and turned it into the extraordinary. He made use fear birds, he brought us spy thrillers and, most importantly, he brought us this:

     Every American, both young and old, know this movie. Even those who have never actually seen it know the plot. It's been made fun of in popular culture (South Park, the Simpsons, etc) while also shaping how thriller movies are made with it's highly irregular soundtrack, high shrieking string instruments during action scenes, dead silence during certain suspenseful moments.

     "Give them pleasure - the same pleasure they have when they wake up from a nightmare." Perhaps the pivotal thought for all of those hoping to terrify their would-be audiences such as myself. The reason I bring this up, of course, is not only to highlight one of my favorite creative minds from the twentieth century, but to highlight the movie being made about him.

     I'll be there opening night.

     Won't you?

Ducks!

     As an Atheist/Buddhist, as well as a Historian and aspiring Horror novelist, I never pass up a chance to take a look at the more... esoteric fears that have come to bear in our society. While perusing my blogs and newsreels, I came across this:

     Not bashing upon the young girl's grammatical errors (we all make them), I am actually intrigued by her apparent fear that homosexuality, and the spread of it, will somehow put us at odds with waterfowl. Her apparent disbelief in evolution and lack of understanding in the most basic concepts of biology aside, I feel she was trying to be satirical... but she doesn't know how.
     This is why we need a better education system folks! She either truly believes the ducks (or perhaps some other water born avian) will overtake us because of the Gays or she doesn't know how to write satire. The only piece of this article I didn't find terrifying was the fact the she is homeschooled, something that was a major relief to me.
     It's not the school system that's failing her, it's her parents.
     Thank goodness!

Paranormal Activity Four

     So the wife and I got an invite to see a special screening of Paranormal Activity 4 for free, at the Silverado.

     The movie itself was pretty much the same exact thing as the first three, with a few added surprise! moments thrown in to jerk around with the audience. Whereas the first and arguably the second of the two movies had a decent amount of suspense and scare factor, this one fell flat on it's face in both regards.

     Not to post too many spoilers, but the only time I truly, actually jumped was when the protagonist's boyfriend snuck into her house and yanked her off the bed while off screen, a play off of the numerous times the demon had thrown people physically. The rest of the movie was a pathetic, and rather blatant, attempt at shock scares with no guesswork, and unlike the advertisements are saying, no final answers.

     Spoiler Alert! 

     One of the main characters in the movie is the neighbor boy Robbie, who the family takes in after his mother (Katie, the possessed sister from the other movies) is taken away in an ambulance. The boy is silent and strange, possessing a "Fork of Truth" and a century old stuffed sloth/bear/thing. It is revealed later in the movie that this bizarre little boy is indeed not Hunter, the stolen child from the second film, but some other boy with no origin story whatsoever.

     Hunter is actually the protagonist's little brother, who was adopted as a baby. Never explained how Katie lost him, or what the Hell is going on with all of the spookiness. In the first film, it wanted Katie. In the second film, it wanted Hunter. In the prequel film, it wanted Katie (to marry?). In this film, it wants to just be a strange ghost-demon that tortures and kills, and is an all around dick.

     So in conclusion: no questions are answered, only more are added to the pile; a new creepy boy is added to the character roll with no explanation, and nobody is checking their goddamn cameras on a daily basis when strange shit is going on around them. If they did that, the movie would have probably had some damn answers!