Roads To Hell: A Horror Anthology

Part 3 - The Seventh

Most people say they came in the night. But that's not true. They came at sunset – moon and stars and Sun in the sky. On the winter solstice. A most auspicious time. I've heard someone say they hunt in packs of exactly seven – for the seven pointed star – but I've seen them hunt in threes, in fives, in groups of twenty or thirty. The packs are getting bigger, healthier. Smarter. I'm the only one that sees what they're doing. I've tried to tell people, tried to warn them. No one listens.

We keep getting pushed back, crowding more and more people into the safe zones as they pick off the weak, sick and poor left for dead on the outskirts. People say they're scared of the walls, of the lights, of the guns – that's why they turn back, they say. Well, I say different. We are exactly where they want us to be.

Trapped. Hunted. Herded.

We are the sheep and they are the dogs, snapping at our heels to get us to flee exactly where they want us. Easy pickings for their masters.

Who are their masters? Who do you think controls such beasts? The smallest are four feet high at the shoulder; the tallest standing would tower over a Kodiak bear. Whip-thin tail, glowing yellow eyes that are set wide in their skulls, bone plates in the forehead. Paws as big as plates, black claws – serrated, mind you! See the edges here, a trophy from my first kill. I wear it as a reminder of – ah, the fangs! The jaws have a bite force that crushes steel! Scales and fur! Those pale tongues – they can smell fear! They enjoy it.

This is a being bred for one purpose, and no, no, I will not hear it was bred by a human in – in a lab! They are smart, malicious – cruel even. I've seen it. We might have bred their look, but you cannot simply breed that intelligence into an entire species of animal. Well, a human can't.

But their masters aren't exactly human, are they?

What then? Hell Hounds walk the streets, baying into the night – you hear them now, don't you? – and you ask what their masters might be made of? Fire, ash and brimstone surely? Pah! The night is dark and so are their kin. Shadow creatures, old gods, forgotten Otherkin. Angry, hungry, powerful beings that we should fear more than their pets.

Let the rich sit in their precious safe houses. May they drink champagne until Hastur comes to eat their souls.

What are we to do? You may wait with others to be slaughtered like sheep when the greater evil arrives – and they will! – or you may hide and hope to escape their wrath...for a time. The shadow of their hand stretches far across the earth, now. We waited too long to react and by then it was too late. What army could have fought against such beings? No human can stand to even look upon them for long. Something about them...they are there and not there. They shouldn't be there, they cannot, so our minds attempt to reject them, only to be affronted by their existence time and time again.

That's why all the scientists went mad and blew up that reactor, you know.

They don't obey the laws of this world; they move too fast, too sure. It's like they slid here from another universe – a dark universe – not quite like this one. The beasts have come to claim it for Them.

Do you hear that? It sounded like – anyway, where was I? Ah, yes. The reason you're here. After I saw you digging around my little hiding place I just knew you'd be perfect. You see, the ritual of the seven pointed star – the one that that summoned them from the cosmic prison – there is another spell, one to send them home. It's written down in this little book I found. Everything is just as it said it would be. The stars are aligned, as they say! Ahem, yes, well. It requires a certain sacrifice. That's where you come in.

Now, don't be afraid. The others may not have worked, exactly, but I know that you will be perfect. After all, the seventh time's the charm!

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Thanks for reading. If you like, vote or leave a comment. This one is a slightly more experimental or performance piece, set in a post apocalyptic landscape. Hope that came across okay!