the scene is thus:
paul wandered, right hand clutching an aching side, down the narrow pathway. with each step the area became colder and darker, each of his clumsy steps seemed to be hitting light switches in a room with perhaps millions of lights devoid of warmth. he was adrift between worlds, after all, and the sun here held no more warmth than the moon in his reality. his head remained blank, random thoughts raced by on their ways to god knows where in his mind, semi trucks with drivers hopped up on speed just thoughtlessly delivering goods. plans, directions, questions and meaning, no thought remained long enough to mull over nor did paul feel any real urge to dwell on them. what happened had happened, whether or not there was a reason behind it was of no consequence.
he hit the third block line, though it was hard to say without any street signs or traffic lights to mark, and turned left down a driveway. the naked trees desperate for company blindly reached across the driveway for the comfort of their neighbors, their branches intertwined like boney fingers. paul thought of the old couples he had seen walking together in the city parks, palsied, liver spotted hands weakly grasping one another as if, at any moment, one might just float away like a hot air balloon piloted by a smiling grim reaper.
paul like balloons.
the trees parted, finally, revealing a dimly lit cookie cutter house, one of those nondescript suburban homes from the late seventies, with chipped navy blue trimmings and a sky blue coat on the walls. paul, never quite set on a course of action, navigated his body with blank dead reckoning. he numbly approached the front door of the house and knocked, almost politely. parked to his left lay the blue sedan he had heard so much about, the engine clicked with content as it cooled. he knocked again, but still no one seemed to stir within. the dim light emanating from the living room window remained uninterrupted, no shadows crossed the line of light, no other lights were switched on either. a growing sense of unease emerged from somewhere amongst the grunts and groans his stomach made.
he took notice, then, of a small pile of lumber to his immediate right, neatly stacked and waiting beside the front step. he selected a good sized block of wood, tossing it lightly from frozen hand to frozen hand, and heaved it with as much strength as he could muster at the clucking car's passenger window. with a loud 'thucrack!' it lodged itself into the car about halfway. still no response.
he sauntered over, wiping his dripping nose on his sleeve now crispy and flaky with dried snot, and removed the log. the hole, about the width of a baseball, revealed to him, not one, but two pairs of leopard print panties that he identified immediately. the colors of one inverted and oppositional of the first, and appearing to be quite dry. she had intercourse with him earlier, paul thought, but not recently.
his vision went suddenly white then and his head rang loudly, the sound was not a crystal clear chime or 'dong' like a common church bell, but flawed and cracked, more like the liberty bell. it rang defectively and painfully. paul's senses began gradually returning to him then, his fingers felt dewey grass and his spine felt the random pointy stones and gravel strewn across the yard. he lay face up on the sticky wet leaves of the lawn while something trickled sweetly down the sides of his face. his head had been forced into the car door, the force and impact had split his pale forehead open and blood began fleeing excitedly from his open wound.
three figures stood above him, one smiling gleefully, two with fear stricken faces, they shifted back and forth nervously. the smiling man, paul could only assume, was the fiend. how he had taken on such a human-like form was, at this moment, beyond him. the fiend pressed his bare foot against paul's painfully swollen gut and pressed roughly. being dazed and bloody, paul could not help but express his dismay with a single burst of explosive gas followed by bits of fecal matter. it warmed him up, to some degree, but did nothing to help the crucial matter at hand. the fiend laughed, the raspy sound of desiccated scriptures being pulled from underneath piles of other archaic records. sulfuric smoke spewed forth from that horrid slit of a mouth. painful tremors began racking paul's splayed and helpless form. what had he hoped to accomplish, he wondered to himself, besides increasing the amount of shame he already felt?
the fiends foot, though encased in a black loafer, revealed to paul the fiends strange skin pattern for, where the shoe ended and the hem of his khaki pants began, was solid navy blue skin. the edge of a boom box only slightly visible from beneath the pant leg and a microphone, the wire seeming to connect to some amplifier in the shoe. the monster, it seems, had shed his old skin in paul's bedroom, a strange process of metamorphosis these peripheral demons underwent after spending a certain amount of time in this reality. a guess, on paul;s part, but likely true. the rest of his menacing form seemed obscured by shadow. yellow teeth and bloodshot eyes the only beacon in it's abysmal umbra.
the fiend flicked it's twisted hand then, motioning the two lackeys to join in. they froze, their eyes glazing over, and with rigid, robotic conveyance they grasped paul's legs and arms and held him dutifully, awaiting their masters next command. with foot still planted firmly on paul's throbbing gut, the abomination leaned inward to get a closer look at his victim's tortured expression. the same strange patterns ran over it's gruesome mien, they seemed to dance and shift, flickering more and more excitedly as their masters face drew nearer and nearer. this creature believed it's victory was at hand.
paul, bound by the his captors steadfast grip, felt the seething concoction of emotions erupting within, the frozen surface that once held them at bay shattered violently giving way to an active volcano, the hideous face of his enemy was within mouth's reach and paul reacted without thought. he felt his teeth sinking into a cold rubbery material, that could not possibly be human skin, and tasted bitter metallic liquid, much similar to the water at the stadium drinking fountain. the abomination, losing all concentration, reacted to the nose bite by jerking it's head back suddenly. this reaction caused much of the flickering skin on it's nose to rip free, it roared in pain and seemed to bat at invisible insects buzzing about the gushing nose. fountains of blood splashed paul's face, the dangling shred of skin till clamped firmly between his teeth.
this unexpected attack broke the creatures hold on his minions, they loosened their grip on paul's limbs and gaped in astonishment at their flailing master. paul, now free to do as he pleased, hefted himself upright and, with surprising speed, stumbled away from his three adversaries. he managed to take five steps before plunging, face first, into the grass. his stomach was quite agitated and had been rather rattled up by the fiends foot and the taste and swallowing of fresh blood, it seemed to pull the energy right out of from under him. the three, composure now regained, stormed towards paul who, once again, curled himself up into fetal position, eyes tightly closed. the apothecary's face floated in the darkness and he remembered that mysterious vial of green liquid.
paul weakly uncorked it, aware now that his enemies stood above him, perhaps plotting his slow and painful demise, and chugged the bottle's entire contents just as the large lackey grabbed him by the collar of his shirt. the abomination, face no longer gleeful, now full of pure anger and pain, pummeled the abdomen that jimbo presented him with. what seemed like years passed until finally, perhaps winded, the creature ceased his beatings. the smaller man, lefty, then handed it something sharp, something that glinted in the little available light. with this in hand, the fiend looked into paul's eyes and finally grinned, black blood spilling over it's mouth and chin, dribbling with sickening 'plopping' sounds onto paul's dangling feet. a swipe, a sharp sting and a sudden feeling of displaced weight was all paul felt, and then jimbo tossed him blithely to one side, his limp hand grazing the abomination's tense grip. paul felt himself hit the tree and his spine shatter. but through all the abuse, he had not one single thought and made not a peep, this aroused the creature considerably.
paul, in his sad state, somehow felt an overwhelming sense of accomplishment and satisfaction. he cradled his juicy intestines, now exposed to the cold elements, with the calm expression of a first time mother doting on her ugly, slimy newborn. while rocking his digestive organs back and forth, he began brushing bits of leaves and dirt off his exterior that had accumulated on impact. a soft smile, warm and welcoming, shone brilliantly from his face down onto his guts. he felt them twitch in his protective embrace and a sudden warm, substantial amount of weight was added to the little bit of defecation that stained the interior of his boxer shorts. finally, he thought, the unsettling gut feelings and pains he had were lifted, cured, even.
the fiend, along with his two minions, seemed utterly astounded by this unexpected reaction and approached the tree slowly and cautiously, the smile the creature once held up proudly now seemed to sway with uncertainty, held up by a single unsteady nail. the smell, the three creatures realized, became more putrid with each step, the heat also seemed to increase for paul's intestines steamed intensely in the winter air. they stopped short, a good two paces out of reach, when they noticed the soft cooing noise paul made, a lullaby without any real melody or rhythm. just one long, warbling musical tone.
paul lifted a hand, bloody and slimy with internal organ juices, and almost seemed to present the three gaping monsters with the piece of stolen metal. the triangular shaped shard had been wretched free of the fiend's grip, and now paul was armed, but was he dangerous?
he slowly brought the sharp end down towards his newly exposed organ and sliced, his facial expression revealing no pain to the fiend. he then presented a sliver of intestinal tract, inflamed and bloated, that pulsed happily in the palm of his opened hand. it began to swell, then, and, as if it had taken a life of it's own, began glowing a radioactive green. the three trembled slightly, but they remained still unable to free themselves from the horror that was unraveling before them. the pulsing picked up, bulging in random areas. the fiends crimson eyes grew wide on it's blood caked face, realization dawning on it's horribly disfigured face. it was not the only creature that could step between the realms boundaries, neither was this pathetic man. the apothecary, the vagabond, the whisper. they could all jump between, the only one the fiend had been on friendly terms with was already exhausted, meaning, any of the others could just as easily supply this mortal with a immortal weapon. oh, the fool he had been underestimating his peers meddling!
the appendix, green pharmacon breathing life into it's cheesy fajita soul, grew bigger and bigger, it's movements becoming more excitable with each size increase until it spilled out of paul's trembling hand. blob like movements seemed the only forward movement the creature was capable of, it approached the the fiend with blobby determination. a gurgling sound, like a fat man chuckling, resounded from somewhere inside the appendix, it sent chills down the abominations spine. the durability of this enigmatic organ's skin, once strained enough, began to fail. pin prick holes began appearing, one at first, then another not to long after, soon more followed, releasing with them a steaming yellow digestive liquid. the appendix's 'footprints' reacting to the wet earth like molten lava on ice.
paul's enemies backed fearfully away, one step at a time, and then turned to run, finally able to free their terror filled eyes. the second they spun around though, a large hole, the size of a grapefruit, split open and a fountain of acidic goo doused the three of them. the appendix, its contents now able to escape, began to deflate significantly with each gallon lost, the hole began emitting an unflattering sound, that of butt cheeks applauding its masterpiece performance.
all at once the three fools froze in their tracks and slowly began to turn towards paul's now exhausted form. skin began peeling away, flaps that eventually shriveled into themselves, revealing a bleached skeleton underneath. their eyes, faces quickly losing muscle and tissue giving way bubbling green froth, rolled wildly about in their sockets until, they too, began to liquify, dribbling poetically down exposed cheek bones. screams of all pitches and tones, pleas for mercy and promises for revenge, sang out breaking the stillness of the night. music to paul's bleeding ears. the steaming remains of the three creatures then tumbled into one another in a heap of crispy white bones.
leaning comfortably against the base of the tree with his intestines on his lap, paul felt himself drift sleepily into the unconscious realm, attaining that near zen state that had brought him here and had kept him mentally sound throughout the journey.
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