The Predator's Screams

When Zach told Skyler that his dad had passed, Skyler didn’t know whether to congratulate him or offer condolences. He’d known Zach since they were kids, so he knew how strained that relationship had always been.

Then Zach told Skyler he’d been left a small inheritance so Skyler decided there was cause to celebrate. “Hell, yeah! What’d that philandering fucker leave you? A bunch of worthless Willie Nelson CDs?”

Alessandro stuck a finger down his throat with exaggerated disgust. “Ew!”

Yolanda leaned into Skyler from where she sat beside him on the couch, looking clueless. “Who’s Willie Nelson?”

It was a typical Saturday at Skyler’s apartment. Zach had bought the Tequila. Alessandro brought the weed.

Zachery asked Skyler, “Do you remember the summer between our junior and senior year? When I went out west to visit that bastard?”

“Vaguely. I was busy getting laid that summer.”

Yolanda rolled her eyes.

ZZZZZZach“Dad owned a ranch in the badlands.”

Alessandro looked skeptical, “I thought the Badlands was a national park.”

“A lot of it is, yeah. But my dad owned private property outside the park. A hunting lodge on several acres of land.”

“I remember now,” said Skyler. “What'd he hunt again? Longhorns, right?”

“Pronghorns.”

“Whatever. Same difference.”

Alessandro said, “No,” knowing otherwise.

For some reason, that caused Yolanda to giggle.

"So what are you saying," asked Skyler. "Did he leave you his gun collection? I know how much you'd love that.... not.”

Alessandro was the bright one. "Did you inherit his place?"

"Yes," said Zach. He looked at Skyler and clarified, "Me and Jena Marie.”

Skyler was startled. “Seriously? You and Jem?”

Yolanda asked, “Who’s Gem?”

“His sister,” said Skyler.

“My stepsister,” insisted Zach.

Zachery went on to explain why he wanted Skyler to go with him to survey the place.

They would meet Jem there.

Yolanda invited herself, of course.

Zach explained the cellphone service would be spotty, trying to discourage Alessandro from going, but he told him, “You can come too if you want.”

Alessandro said, “Why not! I could use a digital detox. Sounds like a party!”

“ROAD TRIP!”

*(。﹏。)

Four days later, the night they arrived in South Dakota, Zachery was feeling a venomous surge of savage delight, carrying the portrait of his father and a can of lighter fluid.

While Skyler was getting handsy with Yolanda, and Jena Marie was fixated on Alessandro— Zach slipped away without any of them noticing.

He didn’t think his stepsister would object to what he had in mind, but he didn’t want to risk the confrontation.

He went south, to a butte shaped like Abraham Lincoln’s head. Once behind it, h e threw his father's picture down on a flat rock, cracking the frame.

Scowling, squinting, glaring at the pretentious oil portrait, Zach doused it with an excessive amount of accelerant, then whipped out his lighter.

Bending over to ignite it, he was nearly singed by the whoosh of heat, which was almost as hot as his seething heart.

That’s when he heard Skyler calling for him in the distance. His friend was looking for him, and Zach could tell he was frustrated.

He didn’t care.

Staring at the flames consuming his father’s vehement visage, Zachery imagined him burning in hell.

-- (。﹏。)

When they discovered Zach was gone, Skyler and Jem went outside to look for him.

Skyler was more annoyed than concerned. He told Je(na) M(arie), “He’s always feeling left out. He couldn't get laid if his life depended on it."

“He’s always been that way,” said Jem. “It’s sad.”

Skyler chuckled. “It’s... something.”

“I feel bad.” Jem’s face was scrunched up. “I didn’t know you’d invite Alessandro.”

Skyler shrugged. “I didn’t know that would be a problem.”

She worried, “This is extra. I know he’s feeling all kinds of ways just being here. I had… different plans for tonight.”

No idea what she meant by that, Skyler said, “He’ll come back.”

She urged Skyler to, “Go look for him.”

“Um…”

“Help me find him and I’ll let you fuck me.”

Skyler’s heartbeat bolted between his legs. “Are you kidding me?”

“No. We can have an orgy. All five of us.”

"But, um..."

Jem pulled down her halter top and bra to flash him her right tit.

“Okay,” he said, pulling out his cellphone to turn on his flashlight. “But I’m not going that far. Which way should I go?”

She thought Zach was likely to have gone to the east, where there was a cluster of huge cottonwood trees where their dad used to carve his name; or to a place to the northwest, farther away, where there was a groundwater spring.

“That way.” She pointed east.

“Okay,” he said, then reiterated, “But I’m not going very far.”

“You’ll find him.” She surprised him by reaching over to fondle his crotch.

And so Skyler went searching for Zach.

Jena Marie went off in a direction.

-- (。﹏。)

Skyler had agreed to come on this stupid trip largely for one reason: Jem.

He’d known her since she came into Zach’s life, back with both Skyler and Zach were just out of high school. She was 22 at the time and Skyler was infatuated with her on first sight.

He had been hoping there might be some way he could get her alone this weekend so he could hit on her.

Then she offered to fuck him and made everything far less complicated.

All he had to do was find...

“ZACHERY!!!!”

After he'd been walking for at least fifteen minutes, having gone far enough from the ranch house to be well beyond its lights, he stopped to check how much battery power he had on his phone's flashlight.

He heard a bush rustle.

Suddenly imagining a coyote stalking him, fear cut through his buzz for the first time.

“Fuck this shit! I’m going back!”

That's when he smelled it approaching.

He couldn’t tell if it was a pleasant or foul odor. It was both. Neither. It was pennies and posies and purification and pink poison. It made him expectant and afraid, torpid and trembling, stirring internal mud with external bile—a roiling, reckless magnificent miasma of unconscionable contradictions.

Then the humanoid thing slipped out of the shadows into direct beams of moonlight.

It wore a tattered leather jacket, with shredded sleeves. The coat was open, revealing a gnarled ribcage poking out of rotting gray flesh. Skyler couldn't tell if it was male or female. It had nothing but exposed bones in the groin area-- no genitals. It was so decomposed, it shouldn’t be standing.

He thought the face was a woman's. It wasn’t nearly as skinless as its body. She had fat cheeks, as well as green eyeshadow and smeared blue lipstick.

“Whoa!” He back peddled, scrambling to turn and flee, only to trip on a sagebrush and fall. He squealed with more pain than fear, twisting an ankle as he went down.

With the sliding ring of metal-on-metal, the ghoul pulled a saber from a scabbard strapped around its skeletal waist.

Skyler tried to get up, twisted his ankle again, fell again, and tried to scramble backwards while still on his ass, like a panicked crab, kicking up dust around him that got in his eyes and onto his protruding tongue.

The monster just stood there, holding the moonlit blade in its left hand, while it reached up to latch onto its own wild scalp with its right.

Then vertebrae began cracking like dry logs in a fire.

And then came the terrible screams.

-- *(X﹏X)

Back at the hunting lodge, after both Skyler and Jem went off to find Zach, Alessandro turned his attention to Yolanda, pouring successive shots of Tequila for her.

Yolanda was so in love with Skyler, so submissive to him, so needful of his constant approval, she hadn’t even fantasized about another man in a very long time. But Alessandro was so sexy, she willingly leaned into the alcohol, allowing it (and him) to have its (his) way with her.

He gave her shotgun hit from a blunt that led to kisses.

That led to gropes.

She didn’t stop him until he started unbuttoning her blouse. “They could be back any minute,” she rasped.

“So?” His eyes had a mischievous sparkle. “You think Skyler will be jealous?”

She loved the idea of finding out!

That’s when they were both startled by the scream.

It hit them with the intensity of a siren, drilling through the walls like they were as thin as tissue. The shrill was entirely too powerful to have been made by a human—and too discordant. It grew in volume, sounding more like distressed machine than a mammalian cry.

“What the fuck?!” Instinctively, Alessandro jumped up and ran outside, absurdly wondering if the noise was made by a UFO. He had read there were sightings near here of strange lights in the sky.

Yolanda dashed after him.

When they were outside, the motion detectors turned on lamps, drawing in the moths.

The night was quiet again.

Yolanda touched Alessandro’s arm, “Was that a scream?”

“No. Couldn’t have been.” He decided, “It was probably Zach. Knowing him, he got lost and played some alarm on his phone or something so we could find him.”

In a brain intoxicated by both Mezcal and lust, it made perfect sense to him, even though he knew that shriek was entirely too loud to have been made by a cellphone.

Yolanda said, “I’m really drunk.”

That was tantamount to admitting she wanted him, as far as Alessandro was concerned. He pulled her into his embrace for another passionate kiss.

Eventually, as he fondled her ass, he told her, “I’ve always wanted to fuck under the stars.”

Two minutes later, they were doing exactly that. They went at it another two minutes—grunting, groaning, instantly working up a sweat—and then the disembodied head flew out of the darkness and struck Alessandro’s pumping buttocks.

Not knowing what it was, feeling the punch and the splat (of blood), he rolled off (and out) of Yolanda, yelping.

She saw the head and screamed.

When Alessandro saw it—a meaty long-haired female face with blue lipstick and green eyeshadow—he started gasping and panting, his panic blocking his airways. He flailed and flopped about, trying to get to his feet. In the process of getting up, he ended up pushing Yolanda back down, pressing her face into the dust.

Chivalry was dead.

Alessandro ran.

Yolanda saw the bony figure emerge from the gloom.

It had the body of a zombie…. but it had Skyler’s head. There was a clear demarcation line halfway up its neck, separating the old dead below with the newly killed on top. Skyler’s face was smiling the same darling smile she fell in love with. His blue eyes gleamed like azure silver. His face was unblemished, exactly as it had been an hour before when he was making out with her, except his ears were matted over with dripping blood.

'Skyler' carried a bloody sword in its left hand.

Yolanda’s terror choked off her yells.

Alessandro tried to escape but didn’t get far. He didn’t see what happened, but Yolanda did.

The monster reached up, grabbed his own (Skyler’s) hair and, pulled violently, yanking off its (Skyler's) head.

As soon as the head was disembodied, Skyler's jaw fell open, showing Yolanda that chipped front tooth of his that he got during a bar fight.

Skyler's head raised high like a lantern— Skyler's mouth began to scream.

The concentrated cacophony slammed into both Alessandro and Yolanda with 166 decibels, enough to shatter their eardrums. The pain from the shockwave was stunning, the vertigo overwhelming agony.

Alessandro’s body seemed physically pummeled by the explosion. His feet did a uncoordinated dance, his body twisted like rubber, and he ended up falling hard on his ass.

His eyelids froze, paralyzed, unable to blink. Through swimming visuals, he saw Skyler’s screaming head tossed aside after it finally went silent.

The monster stood over Yolanda, raising its frightful blade.

It brought it crashing down, lopping off Yolanda’s head.

A kind of neutral curiosity settled over Alessandro. He was mesmerized as the thing bent down to grab Yolanda’s blood-matted hair. It then dropped her head atop his vacated neck. There was squeezing pulse, a small squish of blood, and puff of dirt as the fusion took place.

When it stood up straight again, Yolanda’s eyes opened.

But it used them for only a few moments as it approached Alessandro.

-- *(X﹏X) ----- *(X﹏X)

Jena Marie had been sexually attracted to her stepbrother since the moment they first met. She thought certain Zachery felt the same.

Alessandro was just so sexy, he'd distracted her tonight, especially after getting her high.

She hated herself when they discovered he'd left. When asked Skyler to help look for Zach, and teased him with the idea of fucking, that was something she was already thinking about.

She had quickly picked up on the chemistry between Alessandro and Yolanda.

This was basically an orgy waiting to happen.

But she was now hoping to find Zachery out here alone. She was suddenly imagining seducing him, showing him her titties...

...when she heard the first scream.

Her impression of that first shriek was of some supernatural beast—like a werewolf.

It wasn’t human.

The banshee bawl raised in volume, while simultaneously both rising and lowering in pitch… and then it stopped.

All was silent.

Not single insect chirped.

Scared, Jem started back toward the lodge, dashing faster and faster.

She was nearly there when she heard the next preternatural holler.

Now terrified, she raced off in a different direction, headed to where her car was parked, a moderate hike down a gradual slope.

When she finally reached the driveway/parking lot where both her car and Zachery’s were parked, something with a sword awaited her, ready to yank off Alessandro’s head.

------- *(X﹏X) ----------

Zachery did recognize some of the screams.

The first one was a stranger’s, but minutes later, just as the painting of his father was turning to glowing ash, he heard what he knew was Skyler crying out.

He flashed on a vague memory of a spooky story his father told him one Halloween when he was a kid.

Which caused him to remember his father’s secret hiding place.

When they’d arrived earlier that day, they found his father’s gun case was empty. His old man had gotten rid of all his hunting rifles.

But Skyler heard a old conversations swarming through his head, talk about “contingencies” and “emergencies” and “self-defense.”

He hurried cautiously toward the ranch house, where he discovered the carnage.

Two bodies lay in pools of blood tinged with moonlight. They were both missing their heads. He saw the (Skyler’s) head nearby and falsely assumed it belonged to one of the bodies.

He was about to head down the trail to his car, to get the abandon everyone and hell out of dodge, when he heard the final scream, directly ahead of him.

That was Alessandro’s voice… which made no sense... and then...

POW! POW!

A short pause, and then,

POW! POW!

What the hell? Was that gunfire?

But then, when he heard four more….

POW! POW!

POW! POW!!!

… he intuited that was hearing the sound two cars having their tires blown out.

He turned tail and ran back to the hunting lodge.

He held up a hand beside his face as he rushed past the two corpses, determined not to look. He never knew how close he came to accidentally kicking Skyler's loose head.

He hurried inside the house, across the living room, down the hall, into what had been his father’s bedroom. He went to the closet, squatted down, and pushed open the panel on the floor that revealed the secret hiding place.

His father’s pistol was there. That's what he expected, what he came looking for.

But there was also a crucifix on a chain!

And a Bible!

That was more mindboggling than the corpses on the lawn.

The only god his father ever worshipped was himself.

The final object hidden here was a pair of heavy-duty protective earmuffs. They were black metal with white crosses on them.

Zach heard something in the living room.

He quickly put the crucifix around his neck, slapped the earmuffs on his head, then seized the gun and Holy Scriptures.

Of all people—it was his father that gave him hope he'd survive the night.

↯

_______________Bolt⚡