Truly Horrifying Tales, vol. 1

From the master of the macabre comes three tales of ULTIMATE HORROR...

#1

There is no moon and, especially here, beneath the thick forest canopy, it is morbidly black. Two teenagers whisper to each other through the dark, giggling, their footsteps eliciting muffled crunches from the rotting leaves underfoot.

They had strayed from camp about thirty minutes ago, unfortunately having missed an alarming radio broadcast concerning an escaped convict with an insatiable hunger for human flesh. He had apparently run from the wreckage when the vehicle transporting him between holding facilities had swerved for unknown reasons and careened violently into the forest.

Suddenly the two teenagers heard a twig snap and they stopped abrubtly, clutching one another.

"What was that?" the young, attractive teenage boy said, sounding curiously like a true coward.

"It was nothing!" exclaimed the exquisite and plucky blonde girl, "go on with what you were saying!"

"Oh, okay, well," the boy continued, "I was just saying that cancer is really frighteningly random and not so much even a genetic thing and that really when you think about it, it could strike you at any time, or someone you care about deeply, and furthermore that it can often go undetected for far too long especially if you aren't vigilant and, Jesus Christ, how one day you could just be at the doctor for a like routine check-up, like just your basic physical exam, when all of a sudden you're walking out the door with a newly minted expiration date and, seriously, when I really think about it, I don't know if it is more horrifying to be given like a month to live or to be told that it could be years of vicious and uncompromising and altogether miserable struggle against your own frail and deteriorating shell--"


#2

A mother and a daughter are driving through the desert at night. The sky is cloudless save a few tendrils snaking in front of the moon, which is itself a deep orange, almost red. Suddenly there comes from somewhere inside the car the dull sound of metal grinding and the car comes to an abrupt stop throwing both riders forward against the dash.

They are silent, stunned; they sit still, the ragged sounds of their respective breaths wheezing in and out of syncopation as the automobile steams on the deserted highway.

"What is that, mommy?" the little girl asks, pointing into the darkness. There are, gathering in the blackness, glowing pairs of what appear to be eyes, bright red and menacingly narrow. In a moment the eyes are everywhere and drawing nearer to the vehicle, surrounding it. The sound of ragged claws scraping against the sandy pavement is audible in the still night. The little girl begins to cry, and then, from the thick obsidian desert, comes a roar and a howl, as if the sand itself was howling, each grain together in some macabre symphony of death and oblivion.

And just before the mass of creatures descends upon the car in an orgiastic feast of flesh and offal, the mother turns to her daughter and cries:

"You must know that I never loved you, that I was never capable of loving you due to my own extreme narcissism and self-loathing, and that I have thought in a truly alarmingly consistent way from the day of your birth only of myself and my petty jealousies and desires--shhh, my darling! You must also know that you were in fact a complete accident, a real shocker if you must know the truth, and that your conception actually served as the reason your real father--no darling, Henry is not your real father--the reason that your real father ended up leaving me one night without so much as a word as I lay in bed alone weeping about my ruined future!"


#3

It happened in the middle of grandfather's funeral, right during dear uncle's heartfelt and tearful eulogy--the coffin began to shake and a dreadful moan rose from within. Uncle stammered briefly and tried to continue but the coffin suddenly crashed to the floor, springing open in the collision!

The congregation screamed and jumped to their feet as grandfather, three days dead, rose from the splintered coffin and bit forcefully into uncle's neck. As blood sprayed violently from the wound, my father turned to me and said:

"You see how your grandpa's bald? That means you'll probably be bald one day too. Good luck with that."