JSM Story Slices Vol. 2

Sunhat

I

I was in the basement when I saw the devourer again. Only the bottom of its scales could be seen crawling past the windows near the ceiling. I grabbed my knife. This time I was ready. It made grunting noises through its grotesque nostrils as I walked up the stairs, and I nearly lost my nerve as it circled the front door again. I pulled up my green sleeves of my V-neck shirt and crept through the darkness of the house at twelve noon. The curtains were drawn as they had been for the last month. The news was circling the tales of a serial killer on the loose, but they had no idea that it was the Devourer. It came everytime another body dropped. And now it had come for me. I grabbed the door knob and twisted it slowly, holding the black handle of my aunt's hunting knife against my chest. It unleashed a loud wail. It was melodic, like a chiming bell, the call of a demon. It was toying with me, attempting to confuse music with trust. I could feel my pulse flaming. The noise repeated, and now I was pulling the door knob backwards, into the darkness of my safehouse. I squinted at the stinging light, and the ugly shape of the creature came into full view.

Its mouth opened hungrily.

       It's eyes were bulging green orbs.

             It's head was splayed like large petals.

                Its clawed feet flashed in the intense light as it came towards me.

             I smacked the screen door on its hideous face, sending it stumbling backward.

       I pounced on the evil being and pummeled my knife down in its tough brown skin.

Hacking until its slippery claws ceased to pull at my arms; it was dead.

Then its green reflective mouth drew into a slippery mutated version of a grin, and it rose, flapping its wings and gawked at me. I screamed and ran through the sweeping landscape of my rural home until it leaped upon me from behind and I tripped over a log. I sprang up. The log was a man, bloody, dead. A large hole gouged into his leather jacket. The monster fled, sporting its fresh wounds. I had been too late. It killed my neighbor. I stared down at his sprawled shape. Aviators flung aside. A sun hat trampled in the mud and grass.

The Devourer had claimed another life. Not a serial killer. I couldn't let the media pounce on this one. The world wasn't ready for the truth.

I dug a deep hole for an indeterminate time behind a cluster of tall oaks. I threw in the green sunglasses, the snake-skin boots off his feet, his sunhat...

And then I buried him.

II

I darted through the barn door and locked it, hyperventilating as my spazzing fingers failed to slide the metal latch on a chain through the door lock.

I had just witnessed my neighbor savagely murder my boyfriend.

Sure he could be a bit difficult sometimes... trying to sell his BBQ sauce to every darn-tootin' passerby just lookin' for somebody to help push his car to the nearest gas station since we're so out in the sticks... but I hadn't wanted some Whack-O to make his chest some kinda target practice! Now She was walking back into the house. I backed up, watching through a small crack in the wood as I reached for my phone. The screen lit up. NO SERVICE. Son of a gun.

Nuh-uh. Nope. This barn had weapons...

I examined the wall and pulled down a shovel. I unlatched the barn door and pushed it open. That crazy chick was inches away from pushing my man into a hole. Nuh-uh.

I circumvented the trees until Her back was to me, and then I tightened my hands on the wood handle. She almost looked surprised before I whacked Her noggin so hard I dented the shovel and She fell right in the nasty hole She dug herself. What makes you stab somebody's man with no provocation? I dialed the digits.

Then I heard coughing. That psycho was still conscious. I got on my knees and whacked Her cranium from above for good measure, then finished explaining to the operator. I looked at something funny beside me in the grass and picked it up curiously. I could have sworn it was the object She used to murder my Sauce Man, but as I turned it over, I could see it was only made of plastic. Like one of those things you get at Marge's diner three miles east. I looked at my boyfriend. He was still face down in the grass. I kicked him with my riding boot.

"Hey! Sauce Man!"

I heard a low groan and watched as he rolled over onto his back, covered in BBQ and shards of grass.

"You dang fool! I thought you were dead!"

"She mucked up my sun hat..."

"That crazy chick smashed your jar of BBQ and nearly killed you with a plastic fork, and all you can say is She mucked up my sun hat? You dumb fool! I thought you were dead!"

"I'm hungry."

"That's the last time you ever use glass jars to market homemade BBQ..."

"She was shouting something crazy, about snakes and Devourers..."

"You fool! I bet she's that cuckoo nut that's been runnin' around, killing people's chickens!"

"The Lubo County Chicken Slayer."

"Explains why some of 'em had fragments of black plastic in their feathers."

"If I had known she was the Chicken Slasher, I wouldn't have offered her my Sauce."

"Let's get you cleaned up while we wait for the fuzz. Besides, it's time to feed the chickens."

End.