Bible Camp (6 page)

Lance raised an arm to shield his
face, but several small shards impaled his flesh through his
clothing as he backed away. Screaming again, Mary threw herself
against the wall behind Lance, protecting her from the worst of the
spraying glass and splinters.

When the thing through the window came
to a stop, Lance shined his light upon it.

He couldn’t help but cry out, and Mary
kept on screaming.

It was Gloria’s body, the throat
sliced open so wide the head barely remained with the corpse. Her
clothes now ripped from going through the window, blood seeped from
her body out onto the floor.

Shock flooding her system, Mary let
out a last gasp of terror, then she went quiet.

“
He’s nuts,” Lance whispered, more to
himself than to Mary. “He’s completely insane.”

Snapping out of her terrors, Mary
grabbed Lance by an elbow and motioned deeper into the house down a
hallway.

“
Come on,” she said.

For a moment Lance could do nothing
but stare at the horror revealed by the glow of his light, but then
he allowed Mary to tug him along.

They bumbled their way down the hall,
in their state of shock bumping into the walls and almost falling
over one another’s feet. The end of the hall came all too soon,
however, and they were presented with a choice, either a closed
door on the left or a closed door on the right.

Without thinking, lance twisted the
door handle on the right and pushed.

The door swung open, the flashlight
revealing what was obviously a child’s room, a boy’s room. The bed
was narrow and short, and the legs had been sawed off so the frame
set flat against the floor. The mattress was bowed in the center as
if its regular user contained far too much weight. Posters of
clowns and old rock stars were littered upon the walls, and a small
table next to the bed sported a blue race car lamp. On the opposite
wall was a single window leading out front.

“
The other way,” Lance said,
withdrawing. “Maybe that’s where the old man keeps his
guns.”

A heavy thumping noise towards the
front of the house caused both of them to gasp.

Wasting no time, Lance tried the other
door, the one on the left. Turning the knob, he threw the door open
and jumped through with Mary right behind as a shadow appeared at
the other end of the short hall.

Footsteps followed, and Lance slammed
the door closed. Looking for a lock, he found none and braced his
back against the door, giving himself a look of the
room.

An ancient, rumbled mattress without a
frame was up against one wall, a small window on the other side. A
battered dresser faced the bed, atop it a small television, but
other than that there was nothing to the room, not even a
closet.

And there was no longer time to search
for a firearm.

The heavy footsteps came to a halt on
the other side of the door, and Mary let out a cry.

Lance pointed to the window with the
flashlight. “Go. I’ll hold him off as long as I can.”

Mary hesitated, not wanting to leave
her friend behind.

“
Go!” Lance shouted.

Again Mary didn’t move, but then
something heavy hammered into the door and she shrieked. Spinning
about, she rushed to the window, her fingers busy in the lack of
light trying to lift the sash.

“
It won’t budge,” she said over a
shoulder.

Again the door was hit, this time
harder, visibly jarring the door and shaking Lance.

“
Look for a lock,” he said, tossing
the flashlight onto the bed, nearer to her.

Grabbing the light, Mary turned it
around onto the window. Sure enough, a lock at the bottom had been
engaged.

Boom! The door shock harder than ever,
actually knocking Lance away before he lunged back and pressed
against the wood.

“
Hurry!” he shouted.

Mary thumbed open the lock, then tried
to lift the window but found it still would not budge. Too much
ancient paint held the sash tight against the frame.

“
It won’t do it!” she
yelled.

Again the door was hit, this time with
a cracking noise. Once more Lance was jarred, but he managed to
keep his back to the door.

“
I can’t keep him out much longer,” he
said. “You’ve got to do something.”

Thinking, thinking, thinking, Mary
could come up with nothing. She wished Ken was there, because he
always came up with good ideas, at least when he wasn’t being a
jerk. And she wished for something like a pocket knife, an item
that would allow her to cut away the old paint in order to free
herself.

But wishes were fruitless, and she
knew that, so she did the only thing she knew to do.

She closed her eyes, held up her hands
and prayed.

“
What are you doing?” Lance nearly
screamed.

The door thudded again, this time the
crack louder than ever, like metal on wood. And this time Lance
could not hold. The door burst inward, tossing the young man
forward to fall face first onto a threadbare carpet.

Standing in the doorway was a massive
figure, its head nearly touching the ceiling, its shoulders and
sides nearly touching the frame of the door.

Lance rolled over, hoping to jump to
his feet or to put up a fight, but suddenly the giant thing was on
top of him stomping away with heavy boots.

The first stamp caught Lance in the
side, cracking ribs and causing him to cry out. The second blow
landed on an arm, snapping it below the elbow and bringing another
bellow of pain. The third strike caught him in a leg, bringing new
levels of pain as bone was crushed.

Lance could do nothing but squeal and
scream like a tortured puppy.

Mary’s eyes snapped open. Her prayer
had not been answered. Or, at least, the answer had been “no.”
There was no one to save her but herself while the monster was busy
stomping and stomping and stomping her last remaining
friend.

Flipping the flashlight around, she
lifted it over her head and brought it’s back down upon the single
pane of the window. Glass shattered and the cool night air burst
into the room.

This brought up the giant figure’s
head. There was little to see in the gloom of the room, but his
eyes appeared as small moons as they stared at Mary.

Then he reached for her.

Without thinking, Mary threw herself
out the window, shards of glass still in the frame slicing against
her arms and sides.

She fell a short distance and landed
in thick grass, rolling away, losing the flashlight as she came up
against a tree.

Ignoring the pains caused by her cuts,
she looked up to the window.

No one appeared, but there was another
stomping sound, a heavy noise like a piano being dropped onto
something solid. A gurgle followed, then no more sound.

Using the tree to pull herself to
standing, Mary took off through the woods. She knew not what
direction she ran, and her speed was not much in the dark with
branches and sticker bushes constantly slapping or tugging at her,
but she would not remain at the house.

She had to move. She had to run. Where
did not matter. She had to get away. She was the last one alive.
All her friends were dead, each in a more and more gruesome manner.
There was no telling what had happened to Abby, and poor Russ had
taken a hatchet to the back of the head. Ken, thinking of him she
nearly cried out, he had been stricken down with an axe. Gloria,
her throat had been cut, perhaps more. And then there was Lance,
literally stomped to death. Even poor Mr. Tucker had died
somehow.

It was enough to drive someone crazy,
especially since it had all happened in such a short time. Mary’s
mind was nearly broken, but she would not stop charging through the
woods. She had no doubts her life would never be the same, but she
had to get through the night simply to have that life.

After a short while her lungs hurt too
much and she slumped against a tree to catch her breath. Looking
back, she could see nothing but darkness and the occasional glimpse
of moonlight upon branches. She also heard nothing other than her
own heavy breathing in her ears, another good sign she was not
being followed.

Once her breathing slowed, she shook
her head, clearing her thoughts. Her arms hurt most of all from the
cuts, and she could feel the slick of now-drying blood having
flowed across her skin, but this and the pain she could face. She
would have to. There was nothing else to be done.

Looking around some more, she spotted
a bright glow directly ahead. For a moment the view did not
register, then she realized she was seeing the moon’s image
floating upon the lake.

The lake. Maybe there would be a boat
somewhere, or maybe she could follow the shore until she found
another house. Perhaps she could even swim across if she had to.
She was a strong swimmer, and her only real concern was her sliced
arms. Would her wounds keep her from swimming?

She would never know unless she
tried.

Pushing off the tree, she bound down
an incline through the woods, heading for the lake.

After a few minutes she popped out of
the trees into a clearing. With the stars and the moon above, she
recognized she had stumbled upon the picnic area again with the
dock sticking into the water.

Glancing around, she found no sign of
Russ’s body, and while thoughts of what the killer did to poor Russ
made her shiver, she was at least glad not to see her dead friend
again.

Catching her breath for a moment, she
rushed towards the dock. Maybe once she was out away from the land
she would be able to see a light from somewhere else around the
shore, maybe another house or camp site or even a boat.

Pausing one last time to listen, to
make sure she was not being followed through the woods, she then
rushed toward the dock, sprinting from the grass onto the wood, the
planks bouncing beneath her feet. At the end of the dock she came
up short.

Something floated in the water in
front of her. Being night, it was nearly impossible to make out
what was there, but it was not small, about the size of a
...

Body. A headless body. A body dressed
all in black. It was Abby. There was no longer any doubt all her
friends were dead.

Instead of screaming once more or
becoming frantic, Mary merely backed away slowly.

There was no escape. Of this she was
now convinced. It made no sense for her to cry and wail, for it
would do no good. She would be dead before the sun rose again. She
could feel it in her soul.

A sound from behind further convinced
her. It was but a scuffing sound, a shoe scraping against wood, but
it was enough. He was coming, this killer, this figure from the
dark who had destroyed all her friends in one night.

With a last look out across the lake,
and not spying any lights or any other signs of hope, Mary bowed
her head and turned slowly.

With her eyes downcast, she could make
out nothing of the killer other than the heavy work boots he
wore.

She expected to be struck down at any
moment, but when it did not come, she realized there was only one
thing left to do.

Mary dropped to her knees, closed her
eyes and folded her hands in front of her face. “Our Father,” she
began, “hallowed by thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done,
on Earth as it is in Heaven. Please --”

A crunching noise cut her off. She
opened her eyes into slits.

The boots were now closer, directly in
front of her. The killer must be looking down right on top of her.
Yet he had not harmed her.

Suddenly wanting to see the face of
the person who would slay her, Mary opened her eyes wide and thrust
back her head, staring up.

He was gigantic, close to seven feet
in height. His shoulders stretched nearly as broad as he was tall,
and his chest and stomach were solid like massive tree trunks. His
arms and legs showed strength through the sewed-together army
jacket he wore and the jeans encompassing his legs. Most strange of
all was his lack of a face. Bandages covered his features, dirty
bandages stretched this way and that as if put on by someone who
was not sure what they were doing. These were not bandages meant
for healing, but for hiding.

“
It’s you, isn’t it?” Mary asked, her
voice low. “You’re Tommy, the one they hurt in that fire, the one
they called Tank. You didn’t die, did you? And Mr. Tucker, he was
your dad, wasn’t he?”

The only answer was a pair of black
eyes like marbles staring out from the mess of bandages, long hair
sticking out in all directions from behind.

The giant figure glared into Mary for
long moments, then it raised an arm, hefting a long-handled,
blood-stained axe up to a shoulder.