Scary Holiday Tales to Make You Scream (20 page)

From somewhere above, his master opened up a sucker while he uttered a new command.

MICHAEL A. ARNZEN

is a past recipient of the Bram Stoker Award and the International Horror Critic's Guild Award. His latest book, Freakcidents (DarkVesper 2003), is a collection of poems about impossible mutants and carnival freaks. His website, gorelets.com, is a popular visit for horror fans online.

By Bob L. Morgan

...It's only me dear

In my midnight disguise...

"The Kinks"

Halloween Night

2001

A Full Moon

Chicago IL.

Kedzie Ave.

"We are two bad muthafuckas," Bobby Joe Lee said to Jake Borton beside him and passed him the joint they were sharing. He blew a stream of smoke at the windshield and laughed.

Jake took his deep hit and held it in. The veins stuck out on the sides of his neck before he let the smoke out with a loud, "Haaaaaah," sound.

"Tonight we be fuckin some muthafuckas up," Jake said and passed the joint back to Bobby.

The car stereo blasted out some old hard pounding acid-rock. A light misty rain was coming down. The streets were wet and shiny. Streetlights, neons and headlights made streaks like laser beams down the pavement.

Jake pulled out his thirty-eight special and checked it again for the fourth time in the last fifteen minutes.

It was loaded.

He put it back in his belt line under his leather jacket.

Van Halen screamed to them from the radio, the song was Running With the Devil....

Bobby yelled, "That is the story of my fuckin life!"

"Mine too, muthafucka!" Jake answered him.

Bobby and Jake grew up together. They flunked out of and dropped out of High School together. They hung around the streets and did drugs together. They stole cars together, like the one Bobby was driving. They robbed drunks and junkies and raped women together.

They were like Martin and Lewis, Crosby and Hope, Starski and Hutch or a thousand of the other two-man teams who went down in history together. Except that they were ghetto white trash who didn't care about anyone or anything. And they were proud of it.

This was their favorite night of the year. The night when wearing masks didn't draw attention. What they were doing tonight they'd done for the last two Halloweens. It was so much fun that Bobby and Jake would make this their Halloween tradition, until somebody stopped them.

The plan was simple - rob fast, kill any witnesses. Spot a pair wearing costumes on the street. Kill them, take their masks. Steal a new car every time you get the chance. Then do it over and over again.

For the last two Halloweens, this worked like a charm. They were switching masks and cars so fast the police never knew what they looked like or what they were driving. They never left any witnesses behind.

Last Halloween they accounted for eight deaths by shooting. Jake always said it was nine. He said he got two for one because his final victim was a pregnant woman standing on a street corner waiting for the light to change. He shot her just because Bobby had a higher score than he did that night.

This was what these boys lived for. This was what got them off. This was their favorite night of the year. Halloween, their night of masks and murder.

Bobby pulled the stolen car over to the curb at the corner of Cermak and Kedzie. The car he drove was a beat up early eighties green Pinto. It had so many rust spots that it looked like it was suffering from a bad case of teenage acne. The newer cars were too hard to wire. After he tried a few recent models and almost got caught when the alarms went off, he gave those up.

They were parked in front of a privately owned convenience store. The sign read "Monster Mart."

Bobby grabbed a rubber mask from under his seat and pulled it on over his head. He checked the chrome plated forty-five that he took off a business man stupid enough to walk through Forest Park after dark.

Loaded.

Jake pulled on his mask.

They looked at each other.

Jake had on a Jason hockey mask from the Friday the Thirteenth Series. Bobby had on a Bill Clinton mask.

"Damn," Jake told Bobby. "You the scariest mutherfucker I ever seen."

"Yeah," Bobby answered laughing, "But that Hillary. She scare the shit outa' me."

Both the masks came off the rack at "Lowell's Groceries." The bodies of Mr. and Mrs. Lowell were discovered five minutes after Jake and Bobby left with the masks and the money from the till.

They both got out of the Pinto, leaving it running.

They walked across the sidewalk keeping their hands on the guns in their belts. Bobby kicked the front door open and stepped inside the store.

An old oriental man was behind the counter reading a magazine open to a spread that showed panoramic scenes of the countryside of China. He looked up when they entered.

"Hey!" Bobby yelled and jerked his pistol free from his belt. "Treat this trick, muthafucka!" He marched to the counter, the gun out in front of him pointed at the old man's head.

Jake stepped inside and to the right of the glass door. He kept his pistol in both hands pointed at the floor in plain sight.

This was a small convenience store. There were only three short aisles with coolers holding beer at the back and the cash register counter.

Two women, a black and a Mexican, were at the coolers. The Mexican was dressed like a fairy princess. The black had on an Elvira outfit. They froze when they heard Bobby's yell.

Jake waved his gun in their direction. "Don't you even think about moving," He shouted to them.

They couldn't have moved less if they were made of stone.

The old man behind the counter froze too. His mouth hung open in surprise.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Bobby shouted at him. "Get me the god-damn money!"

The old man was shaking. His hands were jerking so much he couldn't hit the right keys to get the cash drawer open. He started stammering, "I-I-I-I."

"Get the fuck out of the way!" Bobby yelled at the old man and shoved him with his left hand. The old man stumbled a step, then went down dragging some cartons of cigarettes off a rack with him. Bobby leaned over the counter and slammed at the closed cash drawer with bottom of his pistol grip.

The cash register bell rang like the starting of a round at Madison Square Garden. The drawer stayed shut.

"Get him to open the god-damn thing!" Jake yelled.

"Shut up!" Bobby yelled back. He banged at the register some more making it sound like he was playing a pinball machine.

The old man was gibbering, "You jam, you jam. It no open." He stood up but stayed stooped over, trying to be as small as possible.

"Open the mutha-fuckin-thang!" Bobby shouted at the old man who cowered against the wall.

"I can no open," the old man muttered, his eyes downcast.

Jake was eyeing up the two women at the beer coolers. He liked what he was seeing. There was an open/closed sign hanging from a hook at the top of the door. Jake flipped it over to closed. He turned the door latch locking them in.

"Have the old man turn the lights off," Jake said to Bobby. He had an evil smile on his face. Jake leered at the women, mentally ripping the clothes off their young slim bodies.

Bobby glanced at the women. He liked what he saw too. "Switch the lights off," he said.

"Please, "the old man pleaded. "I get you money. Nobody get hurt."

Bobby yelled at the old man, "I told you to turn those fuckin lights off!"

"Please. Nobody, get hurt."

Bobby's chrome plated forty-five roared twice in his fist and two holes were punched in the old man's chest. He flew from his feet in a cloud of gun smoke and red mist, landing in a crumpled heap on the tile floor.

Bobby went around the small counter and stepped over the old man and hit the light switch on the wall. The room was darkened to a dim neon gloom. The lights from the coolers and the orange tinted streetlights were all that illuminated the inside of the store.

Black Elvira was standing with her hands on her hips. All trace of surprise was gone from her face and posture. The Mexican Fairy Princess had her arms folded across her ample breasts. She gave the two bandits the evil eye as they approached.

Black Elvira shook her finger at Bobby and Jake. She was doing that head cocking thing that some black women do when they are getting ready to get pissed off.

"Oh, no, no, no, no," She said. "You don't want to touch me or my girlfriend. My man is Calvin Cooley. He's the head of the Cryps around here." She paused for effect. "He'll have you white boys skinned alive, you touch us."

Bobby and Jake were standing in front of the women now.

Bobby laughed.

Jake laughed.

Bobby said, "It's about time I got my dick sucked."

"Me too, muthafucka," Jake answered.

Black Elvira said, "You bring those wrinkled little white cocks out here and that'll be the last damn thing you do with them."

Bobby lashed out and punched Black Elvira in the mouth. She staggered back and bounced off a cooler door and fell to her knees.

"Oh no, choo did it now," The Mexican Fairy Princess said. "Choo geh her mad. Chee tear you up, man." Her voice and accent sounded exactly like Rosie Perez, the Mexican actress from White Men Can't Jump. Her eyes had an excited sparkle in them. She had a half smile on her lips.

Jake didn't like the smile. He stepped forward and shoved his pistol in her face.

"Bitch!" Jake yelled. "You best start getting those muthafuckin clothes off before I go upside your head."

The Fairy Princess's eyes seemed to blink a glowing red. Hair sprang from the pores of her face like grass growing in a time-lapse photography nature film.

Jake sprang backward into a rack of Green Giant canned vegetables. "What the fuck?" He yelled.

Brown fur sprouted and grew on the Princess' arms, legs, neck and face. Her nose and cheeks and lower jaw jutted forward creating a wolfish look.

"Momma taught me to be polite to peoples," She said. Her voice was now the raspy whisper of a threatened canine. Her body was thickening in waves, muscles jumping out of formerly feminine softness. "But choo called me the B-word. Choo don't do that to a lady."

Black Elvira looked up into Bobby's face. Her eyes glowed an ethereal blue. Her mouth had grown impossibly large. Pointed razor sharp shark's teeth and four long fangs grinned at Bobby. Her hands sprouted four-inch long black nails that looked like knives.

She swiped at Bobby like a cat and got him on the leg as he jumped back. Three tear lines went through his jeans, into the muscle of his leg and spewed blood.

"Girlfriend," She said. Her voice was a guttural growl. "We're going to have to teach these boys a lesson in manners."

The Mexican Fairy Princess Werewolf answered, "What gets me is, I just got my hair done." She reached up and patted her hair with vicious looking claws. "Wit me changin, I just trew dat money out da window."

Bobby and Jake let loose with their guns. The hail of bullets they fired drove the Black-Vampire-Elvira and the Mexican-Were-Fairy-Princess against the doors of the coolers. A few of the shots went wide shattering the glass doors and some of the beers sprayed foam into the air. They kept firing until their guns were empty and clicked repeatedly as they kept pulling the triggers.

When the cloud of gun smoke cleared, the two women, now looking like escapees from a horror film festival, were standing there dusting themselves off.

Black Elvira fingered one of the many bullet holes in the front of her dress. No blood came from the holes that closed as Jake and Bobby watched.

"I did used to like this dress," Black Elvira said.

"We're getting the fuck outa here!" Bobby yelled.

That was when they heard the hissing like escaping steam coming from behind them.

Slowly, they turned around.

Sitting on the countertop, eyeing Jake and Bobby was a lizard far larger than any lizard from any of their drug-induced nightmares. It had shiny green scaly skin and was about the size of a big St. Bernard dog. Its eyes were large and black. It sat like a cat. When the lizard breathed, there was an angry rumbling that came from deep within its chest. Smoke puffed from its nostrils and mouth. The teeth in that mouth were huge and looked as sharp as jagged glass.

One word came into Bobby and Jake's minds simultaneously.

Dragon!

Jake screamed as the dragon sprang from the counter and knocked him backward into Bobby. Both of them sprawled into the shelves that held Green Giant peas, corn and green beans. The dragon was after them, slashing with sharp talons and snapping at them with quick reptilian strikes of his jaws.

Bobby went down first when he stepped backward onto a can of nibblets corn. His foot flew out from beneath him and he crashed to his back, his head bouncing on the tile.

Bobby begged for mercy when the dragon climbed onto his chest. He started shouting long forgotten prayers, asking Christ and God and the saints for salvation from this hungry thing that stood on him. But, on this night, God looked the other way and saved his salvation for someone who deserved it.

With a rip of its claw Bobby's throat was torn open. Dark red blood geysered into the air. The dragon took Bobby's head in its mouth and tore it loose from his body. Bobby's arms and legs pistoned in and out in his body's last spasms. Then he went stiff and lay quiet.

Jake backed away from the carnage in front of him. He backed right into the waiting arms of two female things from hell. They welcomed him. Black Elvira on his right and The Were-Fairy-Princess on his left.

They wrapped their arms around him and caressed him with razor sharp talons and hungry mouths with daggered teeth. Jake screamed and cried as their nails cut gashes into his flesh. He fought against them and tried to pull away but their skin and limbs were as strong as steel. He was like a baby in their hands.

But there was no mothering instinct being stirred here. The instinct he brought forth from them was the instinct to feed. Jake was dragged to the ground and pinned down by the two. He screamed and cried and begged. It didn't make any difference.