Fear the Abyss: 22 Terrifying Tales of Cosmic Horror (22 page)

This would work. It wouldn't solve everything. But it would help.

However, it had some side effects he hadn't anticipated, and the VQ needed to regularly be re-tuned, depending on the material. Maria didn't seem to mind it, but when they watched on of her favorite cooking shows on EatTV, even the knives that chopped lettuce seemed to be replaced by duller instruments and what should have been flaming pans seemed to sizzle without any fire to char the ingredients whatsoever. Cranking the buttons to their lowest setting didn't really solve the problem. It was inconsistent, from what he could tell. Golf, for instance, seemed to still be as golfy as golf gets, even though the clubs were swung with some violence at their balls and the players sometimes swore or made nasty gestures. The problem was that you couldn't be sure if the "Tamer" was taming down the already tame things, requiring you to twiddle the VQ buttons if you wanted to pay serious attention. He made a mental note to report this problem if he ever received a customer survey.

By 3:30, Mark decided to head up to bed. He set the VQ on the side table and left Maria sleeping in her chair--something that happened more and more lately, and he wanted to talk to her about soon. He turned on his bedroom television and set the timer to auto-sleep in an hour.

His suspicion that, once set, the VQ settings applied to all televisions in the house was proven true as he watched a late night episode of CSI: Alaska in his bed, fascinated by the way bodies were kept off screen throughout the episode.

Before he nodded off, he wanted to try one last thing. He called up one of the home movies, to stream it over the wireless and onto the television.

Apparently, the VQ worked with any image you streamed. The scene in their wedding video where they cut the cake and shoved portions of angel food and frosting into each other's mouths was completely obliterated, showing a close up of the bride's bouquet instead, while somewhere off-screen, the bridal party laughed with glee.

*****

Mark decided that he could allow himself the luxury of a $15 airplane drink. The stewardess scanned his smartphone and then handed him the tiny bottle and a pint-sized plastic cup that reminded him of the drinkware they used at the nursing home.

He nursed the Jack Daniels straight from the bottle, sipping it gently, the way a person might take cough syrup.

It was late and most of the passengers were sleeping, but Mark was still buzzing with excitement about the conference he'd been attending all weekend. He had presented a paper to the American Psychological Association about geriatric therapy using media and received a number of requests to share his research from journal editors he didn't even realize were in the audience. He couldn't wait to fire up his computer and develop the concepts. He felt like a real scholar again, doing very real work.

The idea had come, sort of, from the VQ. The way it worked with narrative. He had come up with a theory that if you edited out important snippets from the home movies belonging to the elderly, it would stimulate their memory to fill in the gaps. He didn't have the same technology as Intellivo at his disposal in the nursing home, and his test pool was very small, but with an experimental group of volunteers, he had designed an experiment. All it took was using the Intellivo at home to edit their home movies and play them back to them in his office. The response seemed to be positive, generating a lot of active recollection from his patience--even from those who seemed unable to remember what they had for breakfast seemed capable of filling in the edited memories relatively easily. He had recorded several of the nursing home patients talking about these memories with his home video camera, and put together an emotionally powerful presentation for the APA.

Publication of that paper is only the half of it, he thought. Maybe I can get a grant for long-term study. Something that would get me out of the nursing home before I have to actually move in to one for good.

He couldn't wait to share the news with Maria and Tommy. Things seemed to be going well enough at home that he could actually think and write and he was fairly certain that the Intellivo corporation was partially responsible for that, too, three months into their early adoption of the VQ.

Tommy had apparently stopped making crazy art and started making really good software models in his classes. He was getting As in programming, and by all reports was excelling in college prep math, too. And he wasn't only playing baseball with something approaching regularity again--he was in a team that was winning trophies, and he was visibly looking healthy. His arms were huge now.

And it must have been contagious because Maria, too, was lifting in spirit. She was cooking more often, eager to experiment with things in the kitchen. She'd even started gardening again. She was so much into it, he'd seen her working the electronic saw on the hedges…and she never bothered with that before. Heck, she even talked about maybe buying a new dog soon. And she did nothing but fawn over Tommy, squeezing his biceps and telling him how much of a good man he was becoming. It all seemed so…weirdly normal.

He'd taken the midnight flight, so his house was dark when he quietly crept into the front door. Maria was not in her living room chair, and they hadn't been sleeping apart for several weeks now, but he noticed that she had left a nearly empty bottle of scotch on the side table in her wake. He didn't see the VQ remote, and assumed she'd taken it up to bed with her.

He wondered what he could do about her alcoholism while he unpacked some items from his carry-on and then gently walked up the carpeted stairs.

He heard a muffled scream from the general direction of Tommy's room. In the upstairs hallway, he noticed flickering lights in the thin line of space at the bottom of his bedroom door. He heard a soundtrack of metal music. An ungodly sound -- something like a chainsaw. A woman crying for help. Cursing. Dark laughter.

"Goddamn it, Tommy!" he said and charged to the door. He stopped at turning the knob. Collected himself. Maybe this one discretion wouldn't cause much harm. Boys will be boys. Maybe Tommy could be forgiven for being one.

The chainsaw engine roared behind the door. A woman cried "Please!" but the killer replaced her cries with the tortured sound of grinding throat meat and the metallic clack of metal shredding bone.

"That does it!" Mark worked the knob. It was locked. He pounded on the door, hoping it might awaken his wife to join him. A unified front would only help. "Open the door, Tommy!"

The line of light at the bottom of the door went black. The dark laughter from Tommy's television seemed to go up in volume.

He pounded again. "I have the key to this room, boy!" He said this, not knowing if he did or didn't. Not knowing how, really, he was going to get inside the room if Tommy didn't answer.

No reply.

The chainsaw sound revved up again. Another woman's voice cried out in panic. Lights flickered.

He jiggled the knob and tried to pull as hard as he could.

Then he got an idea. Maybe the VQ was simply on the wrong setting. Maybe he could adjust it if he found the remote, and turn down the violence. If he couldn't, maybe he could just cut the power to his room from the circuit breaker in the basement.

He ran across the hall to the bedroom and opened the door. "How can you sleep through this racket?" he asked at Maria, who was a huddled mass beneath her red blanket. The TV set was on, but silent, beaming a station ID logo -- it was so late at night, her cooking channel had gone off the air. He searched the bedside table for the VQ, then the floor, then scanned the bed for it, patting the red quilt with his hands, half hoping he'd wake her from her drunken slumber.

It took a few pats for the truth to register. The cover was wet beneath his hands. The red quilt had camouflaged the fact that it was totally saturated with his wife's blood.

He held up his bloody hands in disbelief. The blood felt so...cold.

"Smile," Tommy said from somewhere behind him.

His was voice deeper than he remembered -- and unsettlingly calm.

Mark turned slowly. His eyes scanned past the electronic saw on the floor nearby. Blood spatter on the wall. Some kind of bodily organ on the carpet.

His son stood in the doorway. Stained down the front, like a badly trained butcher. He was holding up the family video camera. A little red light beamed out from it.

"What the hell? What...what did you do, Tommy?" Mark unconsciously gestured at the bed. "Did you actually do this? To your own mother?"

"Yes," he said, bringing his baseball bat out from behind him and swinging the hardwood against his father's forehead. "She crossed the line," he said, swinging it again as Mark tried to stand up from the floor, wondering what on earth he meant by that, what on earth was happening, what on earth--and again hardwood hit him in the temple and something spurted out of his ears and flew past his eyes. He was aware he was on the floor now, leaking out from his eye sockets, as Tommy held the bloody bat aloft and at the same time leaned forward with the camera in his other hand, angling for a good close up.

"Perfect," he said, and swung.

*****

Tommy perched on the edge of his bed and rewound the video recording of his dead mother. He had already watched his father's death about fifteen times, fine tuning the graphic violence equalizer in different ways to improve the thrill. At one point the baseball bat morphed into a long, rusty machete. It looked even better than he thought possible, chopping into his father's forehead. Good. He almost had it perfect.

But the art of it all still wasn't quite right.

He grabbed the bottle of scotch and took a swig. Tommy was beginning to understand why his mother had a taste for it. It felt warm in the belly and made your head forget about everything. It made the world a little wobbly, but it also put that world into sharper focus when it wasn't spinning and you paid attention to it.

He fondled the VQ remote on his lap and grinned. It had been so easy to reprogram while his mother was asleep. All it took was downloading the BIOS into a text editor and putting a negative sign in front of all the numbers that he guessed were the frequency levels for one of the sliding buttons. He guessed that if those numbers somehow took away from the shows, putting a negative sign in front of them would put things back.

And, he hoped, add some too.

He had tested it on an episode of a reality show where contestants competed for survival on a deserted island. One notch up the dial and they began beating each other with their fists, to the point of knocking each other out or leaving bruises. Another notch up and those fists were gripping homemade spears like giant toothpicks that they stuck into each other's chests with bloodlust and glee. Another notch and they were actually eating each other alive.

It had made even the dumbest of shows so much better. So much more interesting. Even... artful.

But that was nothing compared to what this did to his new home movies. He saw such potential for new art in this technology. He could stretch his imagination as far as he could and capture it on film. But then process it through the VQ and he could stretch things even farther.

He really wanted to watch what it did to his mother one more time.

But this was only the first stage. Three buttons remained for him to reprogram.

As he downloaded the firmware again and began editing the BIOS, popping in the negative signs, he wondered what would happen if he added zeroes to the ends of those frequency numbers, too. Would it still work if he multiplied the effect by a hundred? A thousand?

He still didn't know what each switch really controlled. Just that when he put negative signs into the program, the shows added new elements. He knew that the program was hooking into the Internet to pull things down from cyberspace and morphing them into the picture somehow. He didn't know how it really worked, but it didn't really matter. Maybe he'd figure out how to improve it even more, with enough time. For now, he just wanted to play. He knew that accidents sometimes make for the best art. "Glitch art," one of his favorite websites called it. He liked the sound of that.

Tommy edited the program, adding zeroes to the frequency levels, wondering how far he could go. If there was an end to how much information it could download to enhance his next art piece. If there even was a line he could cross.

Kenneth W. Cain

Kenneth W. Cain is a dark fiction author from Eastern Pennsylvania, where he lives with his wife and two children. His work has appeared and is forthcoming in several publications with many other great authors. He has penned a three novel series with more to follow, a collection of short stories and flash fiction, a handful of illustrated children’s books, and is currently involved in a collaborative project
for a young adult series.
kennethwcain.com

The obtrusive ring of Aiden’s cellphone bothered hi
m
. He glanced at the screen and groaned upon discovering who was calling. He ignored the call, replacing the phone in his pocket. No, his brother had cried wolf one too many times. What had responding to his brother’s constant needs ever done for Aiden?
Getting dumped by your girlfriend,
that’s what
.

He was unsure why he always felt the need to check on his little brother anyway. Sure, he was close enough he could run over right now, but sooner or later Neil was going to have to learn how to live without Aiden’s assistance. As the thought occurred to him, Aiden realized he missed taking care of his brother.

Pushing the urge away he instead reflected on the instances where he should have seen this coming. When a guy starts calling his brother’s girlfriend there should be suspicion. A blinded Aiden suspected nothing. He thought it an added annoyance to Jasmine if anything, and somewhat of a relief to have another person to share in the burden. He never anticipated them sleeping together.

Exiting his new apartment, he walked toward his brother’s house. This had once been his residence, a place where all three of them lived until a few weeks ago. He often desired to return to those days, yet with everything having become so fractured the notion seemed impossible. After all that happened, all the hurt feelings, here was his brother no doubt calling about some trivial issue.

The cellphone buzzed, indicating he had a message. Aiden retrieved the phone and leered at the screen knowingly. He contemplated listening as he came to a stop. What if Neil really was in trouble? If something happened to his brother he would never be able to forgive himself.

Their father had left when they were very young and Aiden took on the added responsibility of helping his mother raise Neil. When their mother passed it only seemed logical for Aiden to remain devoted to the task. Since Neil opted to sleep with Aiden’s fiancé that alone should suffice in severing their connection. Aiden deleted the message unheard and replaced his phone.

Halfway to his brother’s house he began to wonder why he was even strolling in this direction. Aiden didn’t want to tempt himself to check on Neil. The time had come to teach his brother a lesson. It never occurred to him the not knowing would end up being the most unnerving consequence of ignoring Neil.

Aiden began to worry, beads of sweat forming on his forehead. He struggled to contain his curiosity. His mind tried to recognize this need and the emotions associated with it. The familiar ring disrupted his anxiety. This time Aiden answered.

"Neil?"

"Ai-den…" His voice sounded hoarse and pained. "Ai-den…"

"Neil, what’s wrong?" Aiden barely noticed he had started walking at a faster pace.

"Hurts, Ai-den…"

"What?" Aiden started jogging. "What hurts?" No answer, only heavy breathing as he heard Neil’s phone rattle to the floor. "Neil? Talk to me!"

Aiden kept his phone pressed tight against his ear as he ran to the end of the street. Something about this made him feel like a sucker, knowing he had rented a nearby apartment for this very reason. Why should he care? His brother had hurt him. His brother deserved this. Only his voice had sounded like Neil was enduring a physical pain. Aiden disregarded the details of their strained relationship upon reaching the door.

When he turned the knob the door opened with ease. It displeased Aiden to discover his brother hadn’t locked the door. It was the sort of thing that fed his need to protect Neil.

He expected to find Neil waiting for him when he entered with an expression of terror struck on his brother’s face. He recalled seeing that very expression one too many times. But there was no sign of Neil. Boxes of Aiden’s possessions were stacked in every corner. It made the place appear empty without Aiden’s furniture to fill the rooms.

"Neil?" Aiden exited the foyer to the living room. Looking out the front bay window he saw a familiar car pulling into the driveway.
Great
,
Jasmine
. Evidently her moving out hadn’t terminated their relationship. It was then it occurred to him that she might have only done this for Aiden’s benefit. The idea she would do such a thing made his skin crawl with repulsion.

She rushed up the walk and in through the open door. Aiden cursed himself for not closing the door. "Is he okay?" She was still obsessed with his brother’s care. The guy had a way of sucking people into his terrifying little world. Once there it was almost impossible to break free.

Well, hello to you, too
. Her ignorance irritated him and Aiden felt a sudden disgust. "He’s fine." Although Aiden didn’t know this as truth it was often the case. Besides, he wasn’t sure he really even cared now that Jasmine had showed up. Their mother had always played to his brother’s paranoia, more so than Aiden. In the end Neil was always fine with his schizophrenia being the sole culprit.

"How do you know? Have you seen him?"

She was hooked and it frustrated Aiden. A burning sensation formed at the base of his neck creeping upward, the tiny hairs standing as it spread. He wanted to scream at her, to hash everything out all over again. He refused to further expose his emotions. He wouldn’t give Jasmine the satisfaction. "He always is."

"He said he found something in the basement." She paused, wrinkling her nose as if trying to smell something.

Aiden used to love the way she did this and his heart fluttered. He longed for her to come back, yet he knew now she never would. She still wore the ring he had given her, a false proclamation if there ever was one. He wanted her to keep it there as reminder of what they once had together. At the same time he wished she would give it back to him in light of her infidelity.

"He said there was scratching, as if something was trying to release itself."

"Scratching?" He considered this pushing his jealousy aside. "Like a cat?" Aiden didn’t think any such creature could get inside let alone end up trapped in the basement. The windows in the basement were old and beyond dirty, long since weathered shut.

"I don’t know," she said, full of trepidation. Neil was more of a concern than Aiden had ever been to her. "He sounded like it was driving him crazy. Then he said he had to go, to call you." Her hopeful eyes met his.

Aiden found it ironic she should choose these words. Did Jasmine realize that his brother really was crazy? He had told her so several times. Aiden assumed she had discovered something appealing in Neil’s madness.

He found himself drifting in thought while staring at the ring he had given her. Seeing this, she hid the hand from his view, either feeling guilty for what she had done or not yet willing to relinquish the past. There was hope in such an action. Maybe she would grow tired of Neil and return to Aiden. Did Aiden even want her back?

"Maybe he’s in the basement."

He hadn’t answered Aiden’s call and he was sure he had spoken loud enough that Neil would here even if he were downstairs. It wouldn’t be the first time Neil had ignored Aiden’s call. He supposed he had better check to make sure Neil hadn’t passed out or something of that nature.

Aiden sauntered into the kitchen and threw open the basement door, calling out his brother’s name once more. "Neil?" Still no answer, but a peculiar light radiating on the wall caught his attention. He turned briefly to Jasmine. "Stay here."

The wooden stairway creaked as he descended into the half-finished basement. Although it was dark what he could visualize was illuminated by a strange orange glow. He left the safety of the well-lit staircase for the open basement, walking around the wall to discern the source of the light.

From this angle only Neil's back was visible. Neil knelt before an object, orange light pulsing from it. Neil wore a white tank top laden with dirt. It appeared as though Neil was sweating, his lengthy hair hanging in thick bunches like black icicles.

"Neil? What’s going on?" Aiden approached with thoughtfulness, ignoring any contempt he held for his brother. The closer he got the more the light revealed. Neil wasn’t only sweating; he was dripping with perspiration. Aiden wanted to run to him and make sure Neil was okay. Yet the unsettling appearance of the scene kept him from venturing forward.

Bits of rubble, dirt, and blood as well as other unrecognizable debris were scattered about the place Neil knelt. He looked as if he were honoring royalty. His chest heaved, breathing with deep gasps of air and excruciatingly slow exhales.

The strange orange glow emanated from a large metal egg-shaped casing that appeared as though it been torn open. The object remained half-buried in the exposed earth amidst the wreckage of the wall. Aiden thought it might be a capsule of some sort. He couldn’t help but wonder how long it had been buried there.

Neil’s fingers dangled on either side, nearly resting on the floor of the basement. Blood oozed from each worn digit. Exposed bones made Neil’s fingertips appear as if they had been sharpened. Aiden thought it more likely the result of clawing repeatedly at a noise that would not cease, a sound that had played on Neil’s paranoia.

Aiden’s heart thumped steadily in his chest as he beheld the scene, observing everything. "You look pretty banged up, bro." Aiden felt his nerves bunching. His concern for his brother was overwhelming. "Come on, let’s get you to a hospital." He hoped his brother would leave the strange pod, but Neil ignored Aiden’s request.

"Is he okay?"

Her voice surprised Aiden out of the trance he had drifted into. He shook his head knowing she couldn’t see him doing so. His answer didn’t reflect his true thoughts. "He’s fine. Don’t come down."

"Why? What’s wrong?"

"Jasmine!" He hated that she was so distressed. "Just stay there, please."

She sighed audibly. Her shadow looming in the light of the stairwell, showing she had not fully retreated. Aiden returned his attention to his brother.

Neil’s heavy panting became rhythmic. Another noise found Aiden’s ears, penetrating his skull like an MRI might. It was a grinding buzz that burrowed into his thoughts as if scanning his brain. Neil grunted followed by an awful sound, as if something wet w
as
being pushed through an obstruction. The muscles on Neil’s back strained, flexing as he went into a fit of dry heaving.

The possibility this might be some sort of sickness had never crossed Aiden’s mind. Perhaps this was brought on by something that had been inside of the unusual pod. Aiden knelt behind Neil, placing his hand on his brother’s shoulder. "That’s it. Let it all out, bro." He regarded the strange metallic object with caution. "We’ll get you all fixed up as soon as I can get the paramedics out here."

He couldn’t keep from wondering if whatever infliction had found Neil’s lungs and nasal cavity might be communicable. With reluctance Aiden kept his hand on his brother’s shoulder to show his continued support. Then Neil’s retching came to a sudden stop. The panting and buzzing noise diminished along with the orange glow, fading to a very dull shimmer that played upon the shadows of the basement.

For a brief moment the situation improved. Then Neil turned and Aiden witnessed firsthand what his brother had gone through. Aiden stared into the destroyed cavity of his brother’s nose, seeing the strained glowing eyes. It was as if something was peering through the orbs, illuminating them from behind. Much of the flesh surrounding Neil’s nose looked as if it had been melted away exposing the passages of the sinuses. Something had crawled up inside of the hollow void and secured itself to Neil’s bone with tiny hook-like fingers.

Aiden screamed, leaping away from his brother. He landed hard on his butt several yards from Neil and scampered back on his rear. He heard Jasmine’s descent and wanted to warn her, but his voice had swollen shut, bringing only a wheeze of air. His eyes were glued to Neil. Aiden continued crawling backward towards the stairs. Jasmine’s meddlesome legs blocked his retreat.

When she saw Neil she burst into a fit of screaming. Her piercing shrieks were loud enough to jolt Aiden out of his stupor. He stood and turned to Jasmine without taking his eyes from his brother. Aiden ushered her back to the stairs.

Neil grimaced, the torn flesh flayed back from his teeth. Loose flaps that were once lips rippled with every movement of Neil’s body. Strange tentacles writhed inside of Neil’s mouth. They found Neil’s teeth and pried his mouth open wide, further tearing the flesh to expose a boney grin lined with thin red meat.

Aiden gulped, seeing his brother as more of a monster than a human. Neil crept toward Aiden, treading like some sort of four-legged animal stalking its prey. The need to hurry overwhelmed Aiden. He shoved Jasmine hard, as she continued shrieking, trying to force her up the stairs. She went, but not without reluctance.