We want to give a big THANK YOU out to our Wicked Women Writer’s All-Star judges!
Michele Roger, Rhonda Carpenter, H.E. Roulo, and Killion Slade
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YOU! The listeners and readers of HorrorAddicts.net!
L. Marie Wood, A.F. Stewart, Shannon Lawrence, Laurel Anne Hill, and Courtney Mroch
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Calling all horror writers! The second annual Killer Shorts Horror Short Screenplay Competition is accepting entries from July 1st, 2020.
The Screenwriters Network is thrilled to partner with literary managers, producers and executives to unearth the next visionary talent in horror. The Top 10 scripts will be read by a star-studded panel of industry judges, with a further combined $5,000 worth of prizes up for grabs including copies of Final Draft screenwriting software, waived entry fees to multiple screenwriting contests, increased rank on Coverfly’s The Red List, free subscriptions to on-demand horror streaming service Shudder, and more.
The industry luminaries who will read the Top 10 finalists and select the winner include: Julian Terry (Whisper, They Hear It, The Nurse), Chelsea Lupkin (Short of the Week, Lucy’s Tale), Barbara Crampton (Re-Animator, From Beyond, You’re Next), Joe Bob Briggs (The Last Drive-In with Joe Bob Briggs), Scott Stoops (Good Fear Film + Management), Glenn Cockburn (Meridian Artists), Lee Stobby (Lee Stobby Entertainment), Scott Carr (Management SGC), Jason Tamasco (Bad Idea Films), John Zaozirny (Bellevue Productions), Krista Sipp (First Friday Entertainment), and Jenn Wexler (The Ranger).
The winner of Killer Shorts could well be the next Hollywood success story. Feature films such as Lights Out, Mama, District 9 and The Babadook all originated as proof-of-concept shorts. Recent shorts “Whisper” (Julian Terry), “Bedtime Story” (Lucas Paulino and Ángel Torres), “Meet Jimmy” (David-Jan Bronsgeest and Tim Koomen), “The Blue Door” (Megan Pugh and Ben Clark), and “Larry” (now titled “Come Play”, from Jacob Chase), have since been discovered by major studios and are now in development as features.
“We’re looking for writers ready to take the next step in their career” said Alison Parker, Contest Director and founder of The Screenwriters Network. “Savvy writers will get a head start on a feature version of their short, so that if they end up speaking with a literary manager they’re in the best possible position to sign.”
Killer Shorts very proudly works alongside female-led film groups to provide heavy discounts for submissions to their female-identifying and non-binary writers.
“In Season 2 we are focused on providing even more opportunities for women and POC,” says Alison Parker, “We hope that by being proactive, we will see more female-identifying and non-binary writers, as well as people of color, represented in our list of finalists in 2021.”
Finally, when asked for advice on what kind of scripts Killer Shorts is looking for, Alison responds, “Give us something we haven’t seen before. We received 765 submissions in Season 1. We read a lot of werewolves, vampires, serial killers, and zombies. There must be something unique about your story and how you tell it. Whether that’s how the killer kills, a location we’ve never seen before, a new type of monster, or a strange point of view, push yourself to be different and give us something new.”
The Killer Shorts Horror Short Screenplay Competition is possible thanks to the esteemed sponsors: Shudder, Final Draft, Rue Morgue, Creepy Co, Script Butcher, Coverfly, FilmFreeway, Screenwriters Network, ISA, Slasher TV, 1313 Mockingbird Lane Toys & Collectibles, Ghoulish Gary, Trick or Treat Studios, Waxwork Records, and Fright Rags.
Entry fees start at $20 for ‘Early Bird’ entries submitted by September 1 2020, with a final deadline of December 15, 2020. VIP members of The Screenwriters Network can enter for free. Entries can be submitted via Coverfly, FilmFreeway or ISA Network.
For more information, including further information on the judges, full details on qualifying criteria, competition rules and deadlines visit:
About The Screenwriters Network: Established in 2016, The Screenwriters Network is the world’s most popular screenwriting Discord server, with a fast-growing community of over 6000+ professional and amateur screenwriters. The server offers both free and premium VIP membership with additional perks and benefits, including a podcast, script hub and table reads.
For more information visit: Thescreenwritersnetwork.com
In honor of our newest book release, Kill Switch, HorrorAddicts.net is proud to proclaim the next five Thursdays as Tech Thursday! And, during Tech Thursday, we invite all Horror Addicts to join in on our Twitter Tech Thursday Scavenger Hunt! PLAY the game and WIN exciting mystery prizes!
HOW TO PLAY:
1.) HorrorAddicts.net will tweet five clues which lead players to a picture on Emerian Rich’s Amazon Page each week.
2.) The clues will come in the form of questions. (i.e. I have touched the vein and caused the crimson stain. What am I?)
3.) When a player finds the picture, they will Direct Message @horroraddicts13 with their answer. (i.e. The Vampire lips on the cover of Kill Switch.)
4.) Those with correct answers will have their names entered into a drawing at the end of the day.
5.) The player whose name is drawn will be declared the winner.
PRIZES:
The winner will receive a mystery prize from HorrorAddicts.net.
It’s easy as that Horror Addicts! Solve the clues, find the picture, DM it to @horroraddicts13 to enter the drawing, and Stay Spooky!
The theme for Season 13 is… “This place is CURSED!” So keep that in mind when submitting your song.
Every three seasons, HorrorAddicts.net chooses a new theme song.
Bands / Musicians are now welcome to submit their song for possible use on the show. If chosen, your song will be played as the theme song every show for three seasons. Your band name will be mentioned on every show to thousands of listeners across the globe. HorrorAddicts.net is an international podcast with our largest fan bases located in: UK, USA, Australia, Canada, and South Africa.
The song submitted must be in mp3 format.
Send us an email to: horroraddicts@gmail.com
Email must include:
*Your band name
*Short (100 words or less) bio.
*An mp3 of the song you’d like considered
*Contact email
*Picture of the band in png, or jpg format.
This contest closes Dec 31st, 2017 and winners will be announced publicly in 2018.
The new theme song will debut on Season 13 of HorrorAddicts.net starting in 2018.
By entering this contest, you are agreeing to allow your song played for three seasons of HorrorAddicts.net.
The theme for Season 13 is… “This place is CURSED!” So keep that in mind when submitting your song.
Every three seasons, HorrorAddicts.net chooses a new theme song.
Bands / Musicians are now welcome to submit their song for possible use on the show. If chosen, your song will be played as the theme song every show for three seasons. Your band name will be mentioned on every show to thousands of listeners across the globe. HorrorAddicts.net is an international podcast with our largest fan bases located in: UK, USA, Australia, Canada, and South Africa.
The song submitted must be in mp3 format.
Send us an email to: horroraddicts@gmail.com
Email must include:
*Your band name
*Short (100 words or less) bio.
*An mp3 of the song you’d like considered
*Contact email
*Picture of the band in png, or jpg format.
This contest closes Dec 31st, 2017 and winners will be announced publicly in 2018.
The new theme song will debut on Season 13 of HorrorAddicts.net starting in 2018.
By entering this contest, you are agreeing to allow your song played for three seasons of HorrorAddicts.net.
The theme for Season 13 is… “This place is CURSED!” So keep that in mind when submitting your song.
Every three seasons, HorrorAddicts.net chooses a new theme song.
Bands / Musicians are now welcome to submit their song for possible use on the show. If chosen, your song will be played as the theme song every show for three seasons. Your band name will be mentioned on every show to thousands of listeners across the globe. HorrorAddicts.net is an international podcast with our largest fan bases located in: UK, USA, Australia, Canada, and South Africa.
The song submitted must be in mp3 format.
Send us an email to: horroraddicts@gmail.com
Email must include:
*Your band name
*Short (100 words or less) bio.
*An mp3 of the song you’d like considered
*Contact email
*Picture of the band in png, or jpg format.
This contest closes Dec 31st, 2017 and winners will be announced publicly in 2018.
The new theme song will debut on Season 13 of HorrorAddicts.net starting in 2018.
By entering this contest, you are agreeing to allow your song played for three seasons of HorrorAddicts.net.
The theme for Season 13 is… “This place is CURSED!” So keep that in mind when submitting your song.
Every three seasons, HorrorAddicts.net chooses a new theme song.
Bands / Musicians are now welcome to submit their song for possible use on the show. If chosen, your song will be played as the theme song every show for three seasons. Your band name will be mentioned on every show to thousands of listeners across the globe. HorrorAddicts.net is an international podcast with our largest fan bases located in: UK, USA, Australia, Canada, and South Africa.
The song submitted must be in mp3 format.
Send us an email to: horroraddicts@gmail.com
Email must include:
*Your band name
*Short (100 words or less) bio.
*An mp3 of the song you’d like considered
*Contact email
*Picture of the band in png, or jpg format.
This contest closes Dec 31st, 2017 and winners will be announced publicly in 2018.
The new theme song will debut on Season 13 of HorrorAddicts.net starting in 2018.
By entering this contest, you are agreeing to allow your song played for three seasons of HorrorAddicts.net.
The theme for Season 13 is… “This place is CURSED!” So keep that in mind when submitting your song.
Every three seasons, HorrorAddicts.net chooses a new theme song.
Bands / Musicians are now welcome to submit their song for possible use on the show. If chosen, your song will be played as the theme song every show for three seasons. Your band name will be mentioned on every show to thousands of listeners across the globe. HorrorAddicts.net is an international podcast with our largest fan bases located in: UK, USA, Australia, Canada, and South Africa.
The song submitted must be in mp3 format.
Send us an email to: horroraddicts@gmail.com
Email must include:
*Your band name
*Short (100 words or less) bio.
*An mp3 of the song you’d like considered
*Contact email
*Picture of the band in png, or jpg format.
This contest closes Dec 31st, 2017 and winners will be announced publicly in 2018.
The new theme song will debut on Season 13 of HorrorAddicts.net starting in 2018.
By entering this contest, you are agreeing to allow your song played for three seasons of HorrorAddicts.net.
Hello, Addicts!
Well, how good were this week’s stories! I can’t tell you how happy I am that our judges did not agree. This way, we were blessed with seven stories instead of the promised three. And oh my Odin, what stories they were!
So this week’s challenge was to write 250 words about a monster. Seven monsters we were given, three survived to the next round and then one was picked and deemed worthy of the mini prize – Professional audio production of the winning short story.
Our stories, this week were:
1 LARVAE #teamsumiko
2 THE PET #teamdaphne
3 LINGUA #teamJC
4 BLOODWORM #teamjonathan
5 THE ODDMENTS MONSTER #teamadele
6 THE LAUGHING MAN #teamnaching
7 ALWAYS HUNGRY #teamcat
You can read and/or listen to all these brilliant stories here.
In the discussion after the stories were read, we learned some juicy deets about our beautiful, spooky host, Emz. Our leader into the night is scared of insects and monkeys! And even though the contestants have been warned, it will be interesting to see if any of them draw on this info for their next projects. Knowing what spooks the judges could give them a leg up or tear them down. Only time will tell if any of them dare to scare our dearest Emz.
But this discussion leads me to think … What do our fearsome fifteen fear? What makes our makers of fear jump in the night? I simply had to ask. (And if you’re wondering what scares me, it’s koalas.)
We had some super interesting answers. AE Kirk – our archaeologist – was freaked out by skeletons as a child. Sumiko – the author of LARVAE – has an irrational fear of maggots, which may explain her monster. Naching – our winner for this week’s challenge (oh, had I not mentioned that yet!) – is claustrophobic. Ten points to who can guess what JC is scared of …
One story, which I really wanted to share with you, was from our sweet Daphne. I will let her tell you the story…
“I am TERRIFIED of ladybugs. Yes, the little red and black beetles that populate gardens and children’s story books. I wasn’t always afraid of them–I wore a ladybug dress to my first day of kindergarten–but that all changed when I was ten.
My parents, after twenty-plus years of marriage, finally built their dream home in the Missouri countryside: a magazine-worthy log cabin situated on five acres of wooded land. All was well. The house was completed and we moved in. But at some point during the construction process, ladybugs had laid eggs in one of the interior rooms–specifically, what would become my room.
After a few weeks, the eggs hatched. Thousands of them. While the room had been open to the environment when they were deposited, it was now sealed, locking the beetles inside the house along with me. They were everywhere: in my bed, my clothes, my hair. Their tiny armored bodies blocked out the light that streamed through my windows as they swarmed toward what they thought was freedom. My father would vacuum my room every day (taking the wriggling, writhing mass of insects outside for disposal), only for more ladybugs to appear in their kin’s place. This continued for months before a significant majority of the monsters had been rehomed outside (where I assume they went on to reproduce more of their abhorrent kind). Yet, to this day, when visiting my childhood home, I, without fail, find one of them creeping over a couch cushion or across my arm.”
So, back to the contest. The top three stories this week were BLOODWORM by Jonathan Fortin, THE PET by Daphne Straset and THE LAUGHING MAN by Naching T Kassa. But I totally already spoiled it by telling you that Naching won. Her story, set in a war zone and crossed with creepy bedtime tale, won her this week’s mini prize which you can also hear on the podcast.
Next week on the #NGHW contest is challenge number 3! Write a 450-500 word, non-fiction, blog post about anything horror. This is to test our fearsome fifteen’s ability to blog which is a super important asset for any writer’s career. This is a very different challenge that may see some different contestants take the limelight. It will be really interesting to see how the contestants handle non-fiction. They will be judged on:
• Blog ability. What will appeal to the readers.
• Topic interest. Is it something horror addicts are interested in today.
• Writing quality.
The winner will have their subject discussed on a prominent horror podcast.
So, who will you follow? Perhaps you will be on #teamjonathan – the gothic, demon lover with a taste for the unique and bizarre – or #teamfeind – Cthulu’s best friend and our favourite metal head – or #teamquentin – our filmmaking fan of Frankenstein’s monster – or #teamriley – the beautiful cosplaying gal who loves herself a little bit of Freddy. Let us know in the comments or on the social media.
Stay spooky!
Hugs xxx
Adelise M Cullens
Listed in alphabetical order.
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GRAND PRIZES (One lucky winner):
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Dario Ciriello, Editor
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Challenge PRIZES (Open to all contestants):
Mark Eller
Mark Eller spent twenty years happily writing stories and then throwing them away. Then he met his future wife. She got mad about him throwing things away so he then happily began writing books, publishing his shorts, and creating audio-fiction podcasts, including The Hell Hole Tavern, Mercy Bend, and Traitor book one of the Turner Chronicles. He can be found most days sitting in his man cave with his fingers busy typing because new stories are constantly running through his head. |
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The Next Great Horror Writer Contest started with one of Emz’s crazy, mad-cap ideas.
“What if we had a writing contest where the winner would get a book contract?”
HorrorAddicts.net had contests in the past. In fact, we’d run two writing/podcasting contests, the Wicked Women Writer’s Challenge and the Masters of Macabre Contest. Podcasters like H.E. Roulo, Rhonda Carpenter, Rish Outfield, and Philip Carroll won as well as awesome writers like Laurel Anne Hill, Shaunessy Ashdown, Rick Kitagawa, and Killion Slade. However, with the great “podfade” that happened in recent years, authors were less-willing to produce their own audio. So what to do?
We decided to base this new contest primarily on writing. The authors would not have to produce their own audioplays and they would be able to concentrate on their craft. But with an awesome prize like a full book contract, we would need a tougher competition. The author that wins this one will have to REALLY want it. 13 challenges have been crafted to test their abilities in several different styles and formats. The winner will have to hold their own with fiction, non-fiction, and script writing.
After Emz asked…
“What if we had a writing contest where the winner would get a book contract?”
There was the matter of actually getting a publisher to help. Crystal Lake Publishing was the first publisher we contacted and the owner, Joe, was on board from the beginning. His enthusiastic interest in the contest helped propel this contest into being. With other sponsors such as Mocha Memoirs Press, Dario Ciriello, Sirens Call Publications, and Pixel Ghost Creations, we started filling in tangible prizes that writers would want to challenge for.
As Season 12 kicks off, we are so excited to have 15 of the brightest, imaginative writers competing to win the whole sha-bang. We hope you’ll join us for this first ever Next Great Horror Writer contest and cheer on your favorites.
For more information about the contestants, judges, and prizes, go to: https://nextgreathorrorwriter.wordpress.com
Get to know the contestants of the Next Great Horror Writer Contest!
What do you love about horror?
Horror takes the normal and turns it into paranormal. It brings chaos and change to the characters. We can read or watch these characters go through hell, get our adrenaline rush through fear and be grateful it’s not us.
What was the first horror movie/story/book/show that you fell in love with?
The first horror movie I fell in love with was Boris Karloff as the monster in Frankenstein. The first horror story was “Rumplestiltskin”, he scared me silly. First horror book was The Witches and The Grinnygog by Dorothy Edwards. First show was “The Children of the Stones”, a BBC1 kids programme.
Can you describe the sort of horror stories you write?
I write character-driven fiction. My characters are thrown into terrifying situations and have their lives change in ways they would never have dreamed about. I don’t write happy, sickly, sweet endings. I write horror that bites chunks out of the characters and their lives.
Do you listen to music while you write? If so, what?
I find listening to music helps when writing. At the moment Southern Gothic music is my favourite. Bands like Legendary Sack Shakers.
Do you have any hobbies besides writing?
I love to crochet eclectic dolls, which some people find terrifying.
What is your favorite part about writing?
The rush of the idea and the scramble to get it down on paper or typed.
What is your favorite word?
Coffee.
What is your least favorite word?
Decaffeinated.
What turns you on in a book?
Believable characters thrown into terrifying situations and snappy dialogue.
Why should people be on team Adele?
I write reality themed horror that readers can relate to. I’m a prolific writer and the wealth of ideas is endless. I scare people but leave them wanting more. I love discussing horror topics or characters and will engage in conversations around these themes.
Deadline: April 17, 2017
In the summer of 1816, in response to a challenge from friends to write the most terrifying possible ghost story, the young Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley dreamed up the story of a young scientist and his monstrous creation. The “Frankenstein monster” has fascinated the imagination ever since.
In conjunction with the ASU Frankenstein Bicentennial Project, Creative Nonfiction magazine is daring writers (as Mary Shelley was dared in Geneva) to write original and groundbreaking stories in the spirit of Frankenstein—but nonfiction. That is to say, we’re looking for true stories that explore humans’ efforts to control and redirect nature, the evolving relationships between humanity and science/technology, and contemporary interpretations of monstrosity.
Essays must be vivid and dramatic; they should combine a strong and compelling narrative with an informative or reflective element and reach beyond a strictly personal experience for some universal or deeper meaning. We’re open to a broad range of interpretations of the “Frankenstein” theme, with the understanding that all works submitted must tell true stories and be factually accurate. Above all, we’re looking for well-written prose, rich with detail and a distinctive voice.
Creative Nonfiction editors and a judge (to be announced) will award $10,000 and publication for Best Essay and two $2,500 prizes and publication for runners-up. All essays will be considered for publication in the winter 2018 issue of the magazine.
Guidelines: Essays must be previously unpublished and no longer than 4,000 words.
A note about fact-checking: Essays accepted for publication in Creative Nonfiction undergo a rigorous fact-checking process. To the extent your essay draws on research and/or reportage (and it should, at least to some degree), editors will ask you to send documentation of your sources and to help with the fact-checking process. We do not require that citations be submitted with essays, but you may find it helpful to keep a file of your essay that includes footnotes and/or a bibliography.
There is a $20 reading fee. To find out more, go to: Dangerous Creations
Are you a horror writer who dreams of seeing their work in print?Enter to compete in the HorrorAddicts.net horror writing contest!
This contest is free to enter.
Grand Prize (one lucky and talented writer will receive):
Mini-Prizes- Episode specific (one winner from each challenge will receive one of the following):
*Note: Unlike some previous HorrorAddicts.net contests, you will not be required to produce fiction audio for this contest. The only audio involved in this contest is in the form of interviews with HorrorAddicts.net staff. The contest will be based on your ability to write.
Professional writers, editors, artists, and movie industry people will be involved in the judging including, but not limited to:
Basic rules:
*You must be 18 years or older. (Or will be 18 by March 1, 2017)
*You must not currently be a HorrorAddicts.net staff member.
*You must be able to write and communicate in English, even if it’s your second language.
*You have to be a newbie—meaning you do not have a book-sized publication for sale with a publisher. Nothing over 10,000 words can be for sale by anyone but yourself. So self-pub authors are eligible.
*You are committed to doing your best to complete in each challenge by the deadline and in theme. Challenges run from March 2017-October 2017.
APPLICATIONS CLOSE MARCH 1st, 2017
HOW TO ENTER
TO ENTER, copy and paste the section below and fill in your particulars. Don’t forget to attach to your email everything listed in the “ATTACHED” section. Email to: horroraddicts@gmail.com
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STATS:
Pen name:
Real name if different:
Age:
City/State/Country:
In your own words, what does horror mean to you?
Your favorite horror genre:
What is your writer goal?
How many years have you been writing?
Why do you want to be the Next Great Horror Writer?
Social media:
Facebook:
Twitter:
Instagram:
ELIGIBILITY:
I understand that by submitting my name for consideration, I am in agreement with the statements below:
*I am 18 years or older. (Or will be 18 by March 1st, 2017.)
*I am not currently a HorrorAddicts.net staff member.
*I am able to write and communicate in English, even if it’s my second language.
*I have a full-length novel or novella ready to pitch to a publishing house.
*I understand I must not have a novella or novel-sized publication available for sale by a publisher of any size. (Self-pub is okay. Old book deals no longer in place are okay. As long as no other entity is making money from a book-length anything over 10,000 words–if in doubt, ask)
*I understand that the contest will consist of many challenges from March 2017-October 2017 and I am committed to doing my best to complete in each by the deadline and in theme.
*Writing, audio, or content I provide for this contest must be unaired, published, or otherwise distributed content aside from the final novel submission that can be self-published or posted only. More details on the content right will be discussed in the contract should I be chosen.
***Type your name here as proof of reading the above rules:
ATTACH:
*100 word story horror story. (doc or rtf)
*100 bio and list of previously published works. (doc or rtf)
Are you a horror writer who dreams of seeing their work in print?Enter to compete in the HorrorAddicts.net horror writing contest!
This contest is free to enter.
Grand Prize (one lucky and talented writer will receive):
Mini-Prizes- Episode specific (one winner from each challenge will receive one of the following):
*Note: Unlike some previous HorrorAddicts.net contests, you will not be required to produce fiction audio for this contest. The only audio involved in this contest is in the form of interviews with HorrorAddicts.net staff. The contest will be based on your ability to write.
Professional writers, editors, artists, and movie industry people will be involved in the judging including, but not limited to:
Basic rules:
*You must be 18 years or older. (Or will be 18 by March 1, 2017)
*You must not currently be a HorrorAddicts.net staff member.
*You must be able to write and communicate in English, even if it’s your second language.
*You have to be a newbie—meaning you do not have a book-sized publication for sale with a publisher. Nothing over 10,000 words can be for sale by anyone but yourself. So self-pub authors are eligible.
*You are committed to doing your best to complete in each challenge by the deadline and in theme. Challenges run from March 2017-October 2017.
APPLICATIONS CLOSE MARCH 1st, 2017
HOW TO ENTER
TO ENTER, copy and paste the section below and fill in your particulars. Don’t forget to attach to your email everything listed in the “ATTACHED” section. Email to: horroraddicts@gmail.com
———————————————-
STATS:
Pen name:
Real name if different:
Age:
City/State/Country:
In your own words, what does horror mean to you?
Your favorite horror genre:
What is your writer goal?
How many years have you been writing?
Why do you want to be the Next Great Horror Writer?
Social media:
Facebook:
Twitter:
Instagram:
ELIGIBILITY:
I understand that by submitting my name for consideration, I am in agreement with the statements below:
*I am 18 years or older. (Or will be 18 by March 1st, 2017.)
*I am not currently a HorrorAddicts.net staff member.
*I am able to write and communicate in English, even if it’s my second language.
*I have a full-length novel or novella ready to pitch to a publishing house.
*I understand I must not have a novella or novel-sized publication available for sale by a publisher of any size. (Self-pub is okay. Old book deals no longer in place are okay. As long as no other entity is making money from a book-length anything over 10,000 words–if in doubt, ask)
*I understand that the contest will consist of many challenges from March 2017-October 2017 and I am committed to doing my best to complete in each by the deadline and in theme.
*Writing, audio, or content I provide for this contest must be unaired, published, or otherwise distributed content aside from the final novel submission that can be self-published or posted only. More details on the content right will be discussed in the contract should I be chosen.
***Type your name here as proof of reading the above rules:
ATTACH:
*100 word story horror story. (doc or rtf)
*100 bio and list of previously published works. (doc or rtf)
Horror Addicts Episode# 130
SEASON 11!
Horror Hostess: Emerian Rich
Co-Hostess: Heather Roulo
Intro Music by: Valentine Wolfe
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wicked women writers and masters of macabre all-star special
Find all articles and interviews at: http://www.horroraddicts.net
99 days till halloween
new audio from: stacy fileccia, h.e. roulo, laurel anne hill, d.m. slate, jaq d. hawkins, emerian rich
Once Upon a Scream- special edition pack
https://horroraddicts.wordpress.com/2016/06/15/once-upon-a-scream-special-edition-pack/
“Broken Pieces” by Valentine Wolfe
http://valentinewolfe.bandcamp.com/track/broken-pieces
HorrorAddicts.net blog Kindle syndicated
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Write in re: ideas, questions, opinions, horror cartoons, favorite movies, etc…
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h o s t e s s
Emerian Rich
s t a f f
David Watson, Stacy Rich, Dan Shaurette, KBatz (Kristin Battestella), Mimielle, Killion Slade, D.J. Pitsiladis, Jesse Orr, A.D. Vick, Lisa Vasquez
Want to be a part of the HA staff? Email horroraddicts@gmail.com
b l o g / c o n t a c t / s h o w . n o t e s
Horror Addicts Writer’s Workshop Announcement!
OPENS: October 1st, 2015, 11:59pm PST
Deadline: December 31st, 2015, 11:59pm PST.
This is an opportunity for aspiring horror or like-genre writers to have their work critiqued by professional writers based on story structure, plot, style, and character development. One lucky writer will have their work produced for a HorrorAddicts.net show for Season 11 in 2016.
Submission criteria:
1) This workshop is free
2) You must state you if you are under 18 at the time of submission. We will not accept stories from children younger than 15.
3) By submitting to the workshop, you are stating this work is yours and yours alone and that you may submit it legally without publication ties. The work cannot be previously published in any form.
4) Stories must be Gothic, Horror, Steampunk, Clockpunk, Fetish, Dark Fantasy, Horror Romance, or have a horror element of some kind.
5) All submissions must be emailed to horroraddicts@gmail.com no later than December 31st, 2015, 11:59pm PST.
6) Submissions can be excerpts from a novel, up to 4,000 words, or can be a complete short story, no more than 4,000 words. Excerpts from a novel, can be any part of the novel, but a short (100 word) synopsis should accompany it.
7) Manuscripts must be presented in the following format:
a) Font size 10 or 12 point
b) Font style Courier or Times New Roman
c) Double spaced
d) 1st page header to state: author name, email address, type of story, and word count.
e) Following pages header to state: author name, story name, and page number.
f) Your manuscript must be in either DOC or RTF Format.
g) No more than 4,000 words.
h) In the body of the email, give us 100 words or less about you – a bio.
i) In the subject of the email state: HA WRITER’S WORKSHOP
8) We will review the first 20 manuscripts absolutely, after that, it is based on the number of pros available. Manuscripts are first come, first serve. If you do not receive an email stating your manuscript was received within two weeks, please send a polite query to: horroraddicts@gmail.com.
9) For any other questions, please leave a comment here or email: horroraddicts@gmail.com
Horror Addicts Writer’s Workshop Announcement!
OPENS: October 1st, 2015, 11:59pm PST
Deadline: December 31st, 2015, 11:59pm PST.
This is an opportunity for aspiring horror or like-genre writers to have their work critiqued by professional writers based on story structure, plot, style, and character development. One lucky writer will have their work produced for a HorrorAddicts.net show for Season 11 in 2016.
Submission criteria:
1) This workshop is free
2) You must state you if you are under 18 at the time of submission. We will not accept stories from children younger than 15.
3) By submitting to the workshop, you are stating this work is yours and yours alone and that you may submit it legally without publication ties. The work cannot be previously published in any form.
4) Stories must be Gothic, Horror, Steampunk, Clockpunk, Fetish, Dark Fantasy, Horror Romance, or have a horror element of some kind.
5) All submissions must be emailed to horroraddicts@gmail.com no later than December 31st, 2015, 11:59pm PST.
6) Submissions can be excerpts from a novel, up to 4,000 words, or can be a complete short story, no more than 4,000 words. Excerpts from a novel, can be any part of the novel, but a short (100 word) synopsis should accompany it.
7) Manuscripts must be presented in the following format:
a) Font size 10 or 12 point
b) Font style Courier or Times New Roman
c) Double spaced
d) 1st page header to state: author name, email address, type of story, and word count.
e) Following pages header to state: author name, story name, and page number.
f) Your manuscript must be in either DOC or RTF Format.
g) No more than 4,000 words.
h) In the body of the email, give us 100 words or less about you – a bio.
i) In the subject of the email state: HA WRITER’S WORKSHOP
8) We will review the first 20 manuscripts absolutely, after that, it is based on the number of pros available. Manuscripts are first come, first serve. If you do not receive an email stating your manuscript was received within two weeks, please send a polite query to: horroraddicts@gmail.com.
9) For any other questions, please leave a comment here or email: horroraddicts@gmail.com
Horror Addicts Writer’s Workshop Announcement!
OPENS: October 1st, 2015, 11:59pm PST
Deadline: December 31st, 2015, 11:59pm PST.
This is an opportunity for aspiring horror or like-genre writers to have their work critiqued by professional writers based on story structure, plot, style, and character development. One lucky writer will have their work produced for a HorrorAddicts.net show for Season 11 in 2016.
Submission criteria:
1) This workshop is free
2) You must state you if you are under 18 at the time of submission. We will not accept stories from children younger than 15.
3) By submitting to the workshop, you are stating this work is yours and yours alone and that you may submit it legally without publication ties. The work cannot be previously published in any form.
4) Stories must be Gothic, Horror, Steampunk, Clockpunk, Fetish, Dark Fantasy, Horror Romance, or have a horror element of some kind.
5) All submissions must be emailed to horroraddicts@gmail.com no later than December 31st, 2015, 11:59pm PST.
6) Submissions can be excerpts from a novel, up to 4,000 words, or can be a complete short story, no more than 4,000 words. Excerpts from a novel, can be any part of the novel, but a short (100 word) synopsis should accompany it.
7) Manuscripts must be presented in the following format:
a) Font size 10 or 12 point
b) Font style Courier or Times New Roman
c) Double spaced
d) 1st page header to state: author name, email address, type of story, and word count.
e) Following pages header to state: author name, story name, and page number.
f) Your manuscript must be in either DOC or RTF Format.
g) No more than 4,000 words.
h) In the body of the email, give us 100 words or less about you – a bio.
i) In the subject of the email state: HA WRITER’S WORKSHOP
8) We will review the first 20 manuscripts absolutely, after that, it is based on the number of pros available. Manuscripts are first come, first serve. If you do not receive an email stating your manuscript was received within two weeks, please send a polite query to: horroraddicts@gmail.com.
9) For any other questions, please leave a comment here or email: horroraddicts@gmail.com
Horror Addicts Writer’s Workshop Announcement!
OPENS: October 1st, 2015, 11:59pm PST
Deadline: December 31st, 2015, 11:59pm PST.
This is an opportunity for aspiring horror or like-genre writers to have their work critiqued by professional writers based on story structure, plot, style, and character development. One lucky writer will have their work produced for a HorrorAddicts.net show for Season 11 in 2016.
Submission criteria:
1) This workshop is free
2) You must state you if you are under 18 at the time of submission. We will not accept stories from children younger than 15.
3) By submitting to the workshop, you are stating this work is yours and yours alone and that you may submit it legally without publication ties. The work cannot be previously published in any form.
4) Stories must be Gothic, Horror, Steampunk, Clockpunk, Fetish, Dark Fantasy, Horror Romance, or have a horror element of some kind.
5) All submissions must be emailed to horroraddicts@gmail.com no later than December 31st, 2015, 11:59pm PST.
6) Submissions can be excerpts from a novel, up to 4,000 words, or can be a complete short story, no more than 4,000 words. Excerpts from a novel, can be any part of the novel, but a short (100 word) synopsis should accompany it.
7) Manuscripts must be presented in the following format:
a) Font size 10 or 12 point
b) Font style Courier or Times New Roman
c) Double spaced
d) 1st page header to state: author name, email address, type of story, and word count.
e) Following pages header to state: author name, story name, and page number.
f) Your manuscript must be in either DOC or RTF Format.
g) No more than 4,000 words.
h) In the body of the email, give us 100 words or less about you – a bio.
i) In the subject of the email state: HA WRITER’S WORKSHOP
8) We will review the first 20 manuscripts absolutely, after that, it is based on the number of pros available. Manuscripts are first come, first serve. If you do not receive an email stating your manuscript was received within two weeks, please send a polite query to: horroraddicts@gmail.com.
9) For any other questions, please leave a comment here or email: horroraddicts@gmail.com
Horror Addicts Writer’s Workshop Announcement!
OPENS: October 1st, 2015, 11:59pm PST
Deadline: December 31st, 2015, 11:59pm PST.
This is an opportunity for aspiring horror or like-genre writers to have their work critiqued by professional writers based on story structure, plot, style, and character development. One lucky writer will have their work produced for a HorrorAddicts.net show for Season 11 in 2016.
Submission criteria:
1) This workshop is free
2) You must state you if you are under 18 at the time of submission. We will not accept stories from children younger than 15.
3) By submitting to the workshop, you are stating this work is yours and yours alone and that you may submit it legally without publication ties. The work cannot be previously published in any form.
4) Stories must be Gothic, Horror, Steampunk, Clockpunk, Fetish, Dark Fantasy, Horror Romance, or have a horror element of some kind.
5) All submissions must be emailed to horroraddicts@gmail.com no later than December 31st, 2015, 11:59pm PST.
6) Submissions can be excerpts from a novel, up to 4,000 words, or can be a complete short story, no more than 4,000 words. Excerpts from a novel, can be any part of the novel, but a short (100 word) synopsis should accompany it.
7) Manuscripts must be presented in the following format:
a) Font size 10 or 12 point
b) Font style Courier or Times New Roman
c) Double spaced
d) 1st page header to state: author name, email address, type of story, and word count.
e) Following pages header to state: author name, story name, and page number.
f) Your manuscript must be in either DOC or RTF Format.
g) No more than 4,000 words.
h) In the body of the email, give us 100 words or less about you – a bio.
i) In the subject of the email state: HA WRITER’S WORKSHOP
8) We will review the first 20 manuscripts absolutely, after that, it is based on the number of pros available. Manuscripts are first come, first serve. If you do not receive an email stating your manuscript was received within two weeks, please send a polite query to: horroraddicts@gmail.com.
9) For any other questions, please leave a comment here or email: horroraddicts@gmail.com
On the next episode, 119, we’ll be announcing the winners of the Wicked Women Writer’s Challenge and Masters of Macabre Contest. But first, we want to introduce you to the judges.
Evo Terra is the founder and president of Podiobooks.com. Since 2005, Podiobooks.com has made available the best serialized audiobooks in the world, all of them available for free. He’s one of the original group of podcasters and has been deeply involved with independent authors of genre fiction since the early 2000s. He’s a published non-fiction author, penning titles in a variety of topics, including social media, craft beer, and two books in the “for Dummies” series. These days, he’s traveling the world as a digital nomad, telling the story of his travels on The Opportunistic Travelers.
Willo Clare Hausman is a director of both stage and screen, with a special emphasis on gothic fairy tales, haunting ghost tales, spiritual quests and intriguing mystical beings. 4 creative endeavors are currently in active development, including a sitcom set in an occult shop, a play called Grimm and 2 feature films, one revolving around a clan of modern day witches, the other set in Barnum’s wild American Museum circa NYC 1846. Find out more about Willo at: www.gryphonpictures.com
Dan Shaurette is a goth-geek and a fan of horror, especially vampires, ever since seeing Bela Lugosi’s “Dracula” as a young child. While vampires are his horror addiction of choice, Dan does not limit his preternatural proclivities to them. He is a fan of most sub-genres but prefers those that have a dark tale to tell versus pure shock-schlock. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. You can find him online at http://www.DanShaurette.com.
Dario Ciriello is a professional author and freelance editor. His nonfiction book, Aegean Dream, was a UK travel bestseller in 2012. His first novel, Sutherland’s Rules, a crime caper/thriller, was published in 2013. Free Verse and Other Stories, a collection of Dario’s short Science Fiction work, was released in June 2014. He is currently working on his second novel, another thriller. Dario, who has also edited and copyedited over a dozen novels, as well as three critically-acclaimed novella anthologies, also offers freelance copyediting, critique, and author mentoring services. He lives with his wife in the Los Angeles Area. For more information on Dario, go to: https://dariospeaks.wordpress.com
Lucy Blue has been writing and publishing gothic horror-flavored romances since 1998 when she co-authored These Our Revels, the last tie-in novel for the vampire TV series Forever Knight. She amassed her dazzling fortune (hahaha) as sole author of the Bound in Darkness vampire series for Pocket Books/Simon & Schuster. She is currently an author/publisher for Little Red Hen Romance, which publishes short, relationship-centered e-books in a wide range of genres, including horror, urban fantasy, steampunk, and science fiction. For more information on Lucy, go to: lucybluecastle.wordpress.com
Sandra Saidak graduated San Francisco State University in 1985 with a B.A. in English. She is a high school English teacher by day, author by night. Her hobbies include reading, dancing, attending science fiction conventions, researching prehistory, and maintaining an active fantasy life (but she warns that this last one could lead to dangerous habits such as writing). Sandra lives in San Jose with her husband Tom, daughters Heather and Melissa, and two cats. Her first novel, Daughter of the Goddess Lands, an epic set in the late Neolithic Age, was published in November, 2011 by Uffington Horse Press. http://www.sandrasaidak.com
Although we’ve added professional judges this year, that doesn’t mean you don’t get your say! 1/3 of the vote was decided by listeners and readers like you!
Thank you to all our participants and judges.
HorrorAddicts.net is proud to announce the
is now open for registration!
THEME: This year’s theme is “Tarot Card Audiodrama.*” This year we’re pushing the challenge to the next level by asking participants to write an audiodrama revolving around one of the tarot cards from the Major Arcana. Who will find justice in a horror world of zombies or werewolves? Will your story include Death in all his sexy glory or will the Empress use her skills to tame the beasts of the underworld? It’s all up to you!
Every contestant will be given:
*A tarot card from the Major Arcana
*A supernatural/evil being
And every audio must include:
*At least two different reader voices in their production.
To register now, fill out the registration form here:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/FJRKL5F
You will receive your specialized contest items and being to create a fantastical, horror-filled, terrifying audiodrama for the listeners of HorrorAddicts.net to enjoy.
Sign up by April 13th, 2015. The sooner you sign up, the more time you have to prepare.
*Note: The Wicked Women Writer’s Challenge and the Master of Macabre Contest share a theme this year “Tarot Card Audiodrama”, but they will still be aired and judged separately.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~FURTHER DETAILS~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SPECS:
VOTING CHANGES SINCE LAST YEAR:
There will be a 3-part voting system.
Dates to know in 2015:
April 13th – Registration closes
May 13th – Audio and text are due.
Week of May 25th – finalists will be announced
June 27th – Audio airs (text will begin posting near this date)
June 27th – Voting starts
July 27th – Voting ends
August 22nd – Winners will be announced on the HorrorAddicts.net show.
Questions should be addressed to: horroraddicts@gmail.com with the subject CONTEST QUESTION.
HorrorAddicts.net is proud to announce the
is now open for registration!
THEME: This year’s theme is “Tarot Card Audiodrama.*” This year we’re pushing the challenge to the next level by asking participants to write an audiodrama revolving around one of the tarot cards from the Major Arcana. Who will find justice in a horror world of zombies or werewolves? Will your story include Death in all his sexy glory or will the Empress use her skills to tame the beasts of the underworld? It’s all up to you!
Every contestant will be given:
*A tarot card from the Major Arcana
*A supernatural/evil being
And every audio must include:
*At least two different reader voices in their production.
To register now, fill out the registration form here:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/FJRKL5F
You will receive your specialized contest items and being to create a fantastical, horror-filled, terrifying audiodrama for the listeners of HorrorAddicts.net to enjoy.
Sign up by April 13th, 2015. The sooner you sign up, the more time you have to prepare.
*Note: The Wicked Women Writer’s Challenge and the Master of Macabre Contest share a theme this year “Tarot Card Audiodrama”, but they will still be aired and judged separately.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~FURTHER DETAILS~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SPECS:
VOTING CHANGES SINCE LAST YEAR:
There will be a 3-part voting system.
Dates to know in 2015:
April 13th – Registration closes
May 13th – Audio and text are due.
Week of May 25th – finalists will be announced
June 27th – Audio airs (text will begin posting near this date)
June 27th – Voting starts
July 27th – Voting ends
August 22nd – Winners will be announced on the HorrorAddicts.net show.
Questions should be addressed to: horroraddicts@gmail.com with the subject CONTEST QUESTION.
REMINDER!!! Closes Dec. 31st.
Contact:http://www.horroraddicts.net
Email: horroraddicts@gmail.com
Every three seasons,HorrorAddicts.net chooses a new theme song.
Bands / Musicians are now welcome to submit their song for possible use on the show. If chosen, your song will be played as the theme song every show for three seasons. Your band name will be mentioned on every show to thousands of listeners across the globe. HorrorAddicts.net is an international podcast with our largest fan bases located in: UK, USA, Australia, Canada, and South Africa.
The song submitted must be in mp3 format.
Send us an email to:horroraddicts@gmail.com
Email must include:
*Your band name
*Short (100 words or less) bio.
*An mp3 of the song you’d like considered
*Contact email
*Picture of the band in png, or jpg format.
This contest closes Dec 31st, 2014 and winners will be announced publicly in 2015.
The new theme song will debut on Season 10 ofHorrorAddicts.net starting in 2015.
By entering this contest, you are agreeing to allow your song played for three seasons ofHorrorAddicts.net.
REMINDER!!! Closes Dec. 31st.
Contact:http://www.horroraddicts.net
Email: horroraddicts@gmail.com
Every three seasons,HorrorAddicts.net chooses a new theme song.
Bands / Musicians are now welcome to submit their song for possible use on the show. If chosen, your song will be played as the theme song every show for three seasons. Your band name will be mentioned on every show to thousands of listeners across the globe. HorrorAddicts.net is an international podcast with our largest fan bases located in: UK, USA, Australia, Canada, and South Africa.
The song submitted must be in mp3 format.
Send us an email to:horroraddicts@gmail.com
Email must include:
*Your band name
*Short (100 words or less) bio.
*An mp3 of the song you’d like considered
*Contact email
*Picture of the band in png, or jpg format.
This contest closes Dec 31st, 2014 and winners will be announced publicly in 2015.
The new theme song will debut on Season 10 ofHorrorAddicts.net starting in 2015.
By entering this contest, you are agreeing to allow your song played for three seasons ofHorrorAddicts.net.
REMINDER!!! Closes Dec. 31st.
Contact:http://www.horroraddicts.net
Email: horroraddicts@gmail.com
Every three seasons,HorrorAddicts.net chooses a new theme song.
Bands / Musicians are now welcome to submit their song for possible use on the show. If chosen, your song will be played as the theme song every show for three seasons. Your band name will be mentioned on every show to thousands of listeners across the globe. HorrorAddicts.net is an international podcast with our largest fan bases located in: UK, USA, Australia, Canada, and South Africa.
The song submitted must be in mp3 format.
Send us an email to:horroraddicts@gmail.com
Email must include:
*Your band name
*Short (100 words or less) bio.
*An mp3 of the song you’d like considered
*Contact email
*Picture of the band in png, or jpg format.
This contest closes Dec 31st, 2014 and winners will be announced publicly in 2015.
The new theme song will debut on Season 10 ofHorrorAddicts.net starting in 2015.
By entering this contest, you are agreeing to allow your song played for three seasons ofHorrorAddicts.net.
HorrorAddicts.net is proud to announce the
is now open for registration!
THEME: This year’s theme is “Tarot Card Audiodrama.*” This year we’re pushing the challenge to the next level by asking participants to write an audiodrama revolving around one of the tarot cards from the Major Arcana. Who will find justice in a horror world of zombies or werewolves? Will your story include Death in all his sexy glory or will the Empress use her skills to tame the beasts of the underworld? It’s all up to you!
Every contestant will be given:
*A tarot card from the Major Arcana
*A supernatural/evil being
And every audio must include:
*At least two different reader voices in their production.
To register now, fill out the registration form here:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/FJRKL5F
You will receive your specialized contest items and being to create a fantastical, horror-filled, terrifying audiodrama for the listeners of HorrorAddicts.net to enjoy.
Sign up by April 13th, 2015. The sooner you sign up, the more time you have to prepare.
*Note: The Wicked Women Writer’s Challenge and the Master of Macabre Contest share a theme this year “Tarot Card Audiodrama”, but they will still be aired and judged separately.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~FURTHER DETAILS~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SPECS:
VOTING CHANGES SINCE LAST YEAR:
There will be a 3-part voting system.
Dates to know in 2015:
April 13th – Registration closes
May 13th – Audio and text are due.
Week of May 25th – finalists will be announced
June 27th – Audio airs (text will begin posting near this date)
June 27th – Voting starts
July 27th – Voting ends
August 22nd – Winners will be announced on the HorrorAddicts.net show.
Questions should be addressed to: horroraddicts@gmail.com with the subject CONTEST QUESTION.
HorrorAddicts.net is proud to announce the
is now open for registration!
THEME: This year’s theme is “Tarot Card Audiodrama.*” This year we’re pushing the challenge to the next level by asking participants to write an audiodrama revolving around one of the tarot cards from the Major Arcana. Who will find justice in a horror world of zombies or werewolves? Will your story include Death in all his sexy glory or will the Empress use her skills to tame the beasts of the underworld? It’s all up to you!
Every contestant will be given:
*A tarot card from the Major Arcana
*A supernatural/evil being
And every audio must include:
*At least two different reader voices in their production.
To register now, fill out the registration form here:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/FJRKL5F
You will receive your specialized contest items and being to create a fantastical, horror-filled, terrifying audiodrama for the listeners of HorrorAddicts.net to enjoy.
Sign up by April 13th, 2015. The sooner you sign up, the more time you have to prepare.
*Note: The Wicked Women Writer’s Challenge and the Master of Macabre Contest share a theme this year “Tarot Card Audiodrama”, but they will still be aired and judged separately.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~FURTHER DETAILS~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SPECS:
VOTING CHANGES SINCE LAST YEAR:
There will be a 3-part voting system.
Dates to know in 2015:
April 13th – Registration closes
May 13th – Audio and text are due.
Week of May 25th – finalists will be announced
June 27th – Audio airs (text will begin posting near this date)
June 27th – Voting starts
July 27th – Voting ends
August 22nd – Winners will be announced on the HorrorAddicts.net show.
Questions should be addressed to: horroraddicts@gmail.com with the subject CONTEST QUESTION.
PRESS RELEASE
September 21, 2014
Contact: http://www.horroraddicts.net
Email: horroraddicts@gmail.com
Every three seasons, HorrorAddicts.net chooses a new theme song.
Bands / Musicians are now welcome to submit their song for possible use on the show. If chosen, your song will be played as the theme song every show for three seasons. Your band name will be mentioned on every show to thousands of listeners across the globe. HorrorAddicts.net is an international podcast with our largest fan bases located in: UK, USA, Australia, Canada, and South Africa.
The song submitted must be in mp3 format.
Send us an email to: horroraddicts@gmail.com
Email must include:
*Your band name
*Short (100 words or less) bio.
*An mp3 of the song you’d like considered
*Contact email
*Picture of the band in png, or jpg format.
This contest closes Dec 31st, 2014 and winners will be announced publicly in 2015.
The new theme song will debut on Season 10 of HorrorAddicts.net starting in 2015.
By entering this contest, you are agreeing to allow your song played for three seasons of HorrorAddicts.net.
*~*Judging panel has not altered/edited this text.*~*
*~*Text is posted as sent by the author.*~*
Surface Tension
by Solomon Archer, Ph.D.
JOSEPH SNAPPED VIOLENTLY AWAKE from a restless sleep by a series of hard bumps as the tiny Cessna hit pocket after pocket of turbulence. As the jet shook and rattled, he could barely hear the pilot over the deafening roar inside the cabin.
“What’d you say?” he yelled. The pilot pointed toward the window.
“Ten miles to the starboard!” he shouted over his shoulder. Joseph looked out the small oval window at the vast ocean below them. The glare from the surface of the sea made it difficult to tell what he was looking at but when the sun momentarily ducked behind a bank of clouds, the mass came into full view. Even so, it took him a few moments to register what he was seeing.
“Oh my God,” Joseph muttered. The pilot nodded his head in agreement at the pile of floating debris covering an area approximately the size of Manhattan.
“You people are out of your minds,” the pilot muttered.
Joseph had been hired by Brooklyn Salvage in the past. He liked working with them, though he was not looking forward to being away from his daughter Abby for almost a month. His mother volunteered to look after her while he was away and for that Joseph was eternally grateful.
The crew of the ship, a 75-meter tug named the Cloudburst, was typical for a salvage operation with the exception of a marine biochemist, a cartographer, and two divers.
Joseph was somewhat disappointed that his skills as an underwater welder weren’t needed on this job, but he couldn’t argue with the money. Thirty thousand dollars for a three-week expedition was hard to turn down.
During the initial mission briefing the experts gave an overview of the expedition. The cartographer, whose name Joseph didn’t catch, used colorful maps and bathymetric charts to highlight the currents the garbage island had followed for nearly a decade before stalling over an area known as the Java Trench, a submarine depression in the Indian Ocean four and a half miles deep.
Kim Chen, the biochemist, explained that recent tectonic plate movements had created a vast array of volcanic cones along the lip of the trench. The cones, which were essentially like underwater chimneys, had been churning out a stew of toxic chemicals and debris from as far down as the earth’s mantle.
“What kind of chemicals?” asked one of the salvage crew.
“Well, sodium and calcium, of course. You find that everywhere in the ocean. But these things are also spitting out hydrogen sulfide, silica, chloride, and manganese, just to name a few. It’s a really poisonous mess and it’s coming out hot.”
“How hot?” Joseph asked.
“320 degrees Celsius,” Chen answered.
Joseph frowned, trying to convert that number to Fahrenheit. “And how hot exactly is that?” he asked.
“Hot enough to melt lead,” Chen answered. She must have detected the unease in his voice and quickly added, “Oh don’t worry. All that heat is lost before it gets anywhere near the surface. No, what worries me is the fact that toxic stew seems to be feeding your island.”
“You know, I’m gonna be knee deep in that crap starting tomorrow morning. You got any words of advice?” Joseph asked.
“Yeah,” she said after a moment. “Wear boots.”
It was early afternoon on the second day when their ship approached the floating island. He heard one of the other crew members refer to the island as “continental afterbirth,” and Joseph thought that description was quite fitting. The pile stretched out as far as he could see and appeared to be made up of several countries-worth of garbage. Its surface consisted of a frothy mix of plastic bottles, milk jugs, cardboard boxes, aluminum siding, and acres of discarded paper products. Dotted throughout were thousands of trash bags – some bloated from decomposition under the relentless sun, others ravaged by the sea and scattered about like ghostly mourners. Rivers of torn clothing and shredded linens meandered through the mass like serpents and the entire tableau was kissed by a layer of white foam.
Occasionally Joseph caught a glimpse of something more exotic: a stuffed white snow leopard that looked covered in mange, its fur faded and frayed by the elements; a ten-by-fourteen foot replica of Van Gogh’s Starry Night peeling from a weathered frame freckled with tar; a congealed mass of melted pink flip-flops that scarred the surface like some ocean-borne strain of Rosacea.
Perhaps strangest of all was what looked like a human torso, hirsute and pale, bobbing up and down in the current, one perfectly severed stump blindly scanning the surrounding sea like a bloodshot eye. The captain had radioed the Coast Guard about that last find, but the exchange consisted of little more than a relay of coordinates. It was unlikely that anyone would be declaring the area a crime scene.
Over the course of the next several days, he and another deckhand named Michael, got into a rhythm of sorting the debris into piles based on whatever language they could find on the items.
At one point he came across a teddy bear fr that was surprisingly intact, other than being waterlogged and a little faded.
“Whatcha got there, Joe?” Dr. Chen asked as she waved a Geiger counter over a nearby pile. He handed it to her, shrugging.
“Some kid’s stuffed toy, looks like,” he replied.
Kim turned the teddy over in her hands. “Huh,” she mumbled. “Mind if I run some tests? I’ve got a decontaminant I’ve been dying to try out if you don’t mind?”
“Knock yourself out, doc,” he said and returned to the pile.
When she was gone, Michael sidled up to him and, looking over his shoulder to make sure no one else was around, showed Joseph a watch he had found. The hands were frozen at 2:25 and it was missing a diamond at the 12:00 o’clock position, but otherwise looked to be in good shape.
Joseph whistled. “Is that a Rolex?”
“Score, right?” Michael beamed.
“You gonna tell the captain about it?” Joseph asked, already knowing the answer.
Michael snorted. “Hell no! I don’t know about you, but I’ve got bills to pay. I mean, 30 grand is great and all, don’t get me wrong. But this piece could be worth a couple thousand easy.” His smile faltered for a moment. “You’re not gonna say anything, are you?”
“’Course not,” Joseph reassured him. “Finders keepers. Congratulations. But if I were you I’d think about having Dr. Chen decontaminate it first.”
Michael smiled as he pocketed the watch. “Yeah, I’ll sure give that some thought.” Joseph nodded knowing Michael would do no such thing and the two returned to sifting through the trash.
By the time the Cloudburst finally docked at the Southeast Brooklyn Marine Terminal in Hudson Bay and Joseph had made it back to his apartment, it was nearly midnight and all he wanted to do was kiss his daughter, take a shower, and sleep for two weeks. As he unpacked his overstuffed duffel, he was surprised to find a clear plastic bag containing the teddy bear he had found at the site several weeks earlier and a note from Kim.
“Success!” the note began. “The decontamination worked better than I expected. Not even a trace of toxic chemicals or radiation. For providing me with my first test subject, you win a teddy bear! Signed K.”
Joseph examined the bear and had to admit Kim had done a damn fine job. It looked brand new with a shiny fur coat and it smelled like it had just come out of the wash. Abby would love it.
He popped his head into his daughter’s room found her asleep in her crib. He placed the teddy bear next to her head and was delighted to see her roll over, wrap a tiny arm around its neck, and start chewing on the animal’s ear.
Joseph went to the bathroom and stripped off his clothes and stood under the scalding stream for over ten minutes watching the water gradually get lighter as it circled the drain. He might have fallen asleep had not the high pitch of overworked metal pipes started screaming in protest. Joseph jumped at the racket coming from the wall and quickly shut off the water. But the squealing did not stop and it struck him that the sound was not coming from the pipes. He stood naked for a moment trying to figure out what it was when an inhuman shriek threatened to tear the bathroom door off its hinges.
He raced from the bathroom toward his daughter’s room, which seemed to be the source of the commotion. He was not at all prepared for what he saw when he opened the door.
In the dim pink glow of the nightlight, Abby was flailing in her crib and at first he thought she had somehow bitten into an electrical cord. He flipped on the light and raced to the crib, stopping short when he peered over the edge.
The skin from her face was entirely melted away, leaving a pulsing white and red mass of bone and tissue underneath. Her lips slid off her chin and dropped in a pile of blood, spit, and teeth on her chest, which was vibrating erratically. He thought crazily that she was having a seizure until the wet hole that used to be her mouth produced a bubbling cry followed by a fit of ragged wheezing as Abby desperately tried to fill her lungs with air.
Something in Joseph’s mind broke when he saw the skin of her neck tear open and he recoiled instinctively as several hundred worms, some more than four feet in length, bored through her throat. Red, orange, and black dots glistened on their shiny albino bodies and they moved impossibly fast as they engulfed her entire head. The sickening sound of his daughter’s skull cracking was enough to jolt Joseph to action.
He shot his arms forward grabbing Abby beneath her armpits, intending to pull her from the crib. It was last time he would ever touch her.
The moment his hands locked behind her back, her arms were torn from her body by a second wave of worms that had emerged from a gaping hole in her chest. He slipped in the growing pool of gore oozing out of the crib.
As he scrambled to get to his feet, he felt the first of them enter him through his ankle. He nearly blacked out from the pain as worm after worm burrowed into his legs and snaked into his body. They tore through flesh, bone, and muscle as they spread throughout. A few that had been devouring the contents of his last meal penetrated his bladder and exited his body through his urethra like a stream of lava. Some of the creatures had discovered his trachea and in their frenzied feast produced screams Joseph did not even recognize as his own. The last two things he ever saw in this world were the teddy bear, its stuffing teeming with what looked like albino maggots and the inside of his skull as his eyes were pulled into his head.
After that, he knew nothing more.
Madeline had been searching online for an anniversary gift for over an hour and had nearly settled on a tactical barbeque vest when she struck eBay gold: a Rolex Oyster Perpetual Datejust. She considered herself to be something of a connoisseur of men’s fashion and other than missing a diamond at the 12 o’clock spot, the watch was in near pristine condition and at $1500 this one was a steal. She hesitated over the “buy” button for only a second before confirming her purchase. She couldn’t wait to see the look on her husband’s face when he tried it on. It would be memorable – of that much she could be sure.
****************
To vote for this story in the 2014 Master of Macabre Writing Contest, send an e-mail to horroraddicts@gmail.com
Voting ends: September 9th, 2014
*~*Judging panel has not altered/edited this text.*~*
*~*Text is posted as sent by the author.*~*
The Samaritan
By D.J. Pitsiladis
Gary jerked himself upright and muttered an apology to his sour faced neighbor. The man muttered something in Cambodian before he turned his attention back to the window. The American received similar reactions since his arrival in Bangkok, Thailand, the day before, and he thought about how it differed from the pro-tourism ads he saw while planning the pilgrimage. As he popped open the third energy drink of the long bus trip, Gary promised himself, “Next time I take the window seat with all the fresh air.”
A bright flash lit up the sky seconds before the bus shuddered and began to roll on its side. Gary bounced off his neighbor’s body before he hit the floor and smacked his head against one of the benches. Pain blossomed behind his eyes from the impact before everything went black. He didn’t know how long he was unconscious for, but when a hand pushed on his shoulder and a girl’s voice said, “Wake up,” he tried to open his eyes. They remained shut until he felt another nudge, “Please wake up.” The American’s eyes fluttered open to find a young Thai girl’s tear streaked face as it broke into a relieved smile. Nausea washed over him like a wave and he laid his head back down until the girl whimpered and pushed his shoulder again. “Please, mister, you need to wake up.”
Gary sat up and winced when he touched the top of his head. “Probably have a concussion,” he thought as another wave of nausea hit. The girl, meanwhile, placed her hands on his shoulders to help steady him while he checked their surroundings. “Are there any others alive?” he asked. She lowered her gaze and shook her head with a sniffle. He swore under his breath, but then grabbed the side of the bench above him and pulled himself to his feet.
While he waited for his balance to steady, Gary checked out the girl for injuries. She wore a stained yellow t-shirt and tan slacks with dark patches of blood, but no obvious signs of injury. What really caught his attention were her clean running shoes. He looked around at the other passengers and saw a considerable amount of blood and debris mixed in with pale bodies. With all of that, he didn’t know how she managed to keep them so clean. He meant to ask her about it when a noise from the outside grabbed his attention.
With careful steps, they made their way to the shattered front window and peeked outside. Two of the temple complex’s five towers stood tall over a large pile of rubble while toppled trees burned around it. They stepped from the vehicle and stared in amazement. “How are we not dead?” Gary asked in disbelief. Men yelled for help off in the distance, and he took a look at the girl and made a decision. “Stay here,” he said. “Help will be here soon.” She opened her mouth to protest, maybe even beg him to stay until it did, but he worried that people might die if he did.
Military helicopters appeared within seconds and began to circle the fiery crater. Gary wondered about what crashed there, but thought, “There’ll be plenty of time to find out after the injured are safe.” Three armored personnel vehicles sped past the temple entrance and he jumped back to get out of their way. He didn’t see the girl behind him until she bounced off his back and fell to the ground hard. When she finally got her feet back under her, the girl headed for the temple with her left arm clutched tight against her chest. Gary watched in disbelief as the military vehicles swerved to drive around her.
Once inside the outer walls, two monks saw them and yelled for help from a nearby pile of rubble. Gary managed to free one of the men from the rocky trap, and let girl drag him out of the way while he turned his attention to the second monk. It took a little longer to free the second holy man, but when he did, neither the girl nor the other monk were anywhere to be found. When he didn’t find them, he checked the man’s leg and knew at first sight it was shattered and needed more care than he was able to offer. When the girl finally walked around the corner, he asked, “What happened to the other guy?”
The girl looked around at the piles of debris and said, “He went to help more of his people.” She met Gary’s gaze and pointed at the monk on the ground, “What about him?” The expression on her face looked weird, but he let it go given the stressful situation.
“He’s not going anywhere,” Gary replied. “His leg is badly shattered and we don’t have any way to move him.” She turned her full attention on the man and went to his side. The way she stared at the man looked more like hunger than concern, but, as much as his instincts told him to stay, he needed to go find more survivors. “Can you stay here with him?” She nodded and he jogged around the opposite corner. He didn’t get far before his gut told him to go back. When he rounded the corner again, the scene he found terrified him.
The girl sat astride the monk’s chest with her knees on each arm, her left hand clamped tight over his mouth, and some kind of flat red disk against his forehead. He realized when she pulled it away that the device was actually her hand.
“I can explain,” she said in a raspy voice. Gary stared in horror as her once young and beautiful face shriveled into an opaque nightmare. She took a tentative step toward him and added, “Then again, I don’t think you’ll understand the explanation any more than you can understand my hunger.” The girl took another step toward him, “My kind needs blood for sustenance, but I spared you to help me find safety.” His gaze lowered to the shriveled dead man behind her and realized not everyone on the bus died from the crash. It proved enough to break his paralysis and he darted behind the pile of stones and headed for the soldiers.
Gary saw the bridge that led to the army, but didn’t see the girl until she slammed into his back and sent him to the ground hard. Before he regained his breath, she rolled him over and sat on his chest with her knees firmly on his arms. “All of that running made me hungry, and you look kind of tasty.” He opened his mouth to shout for help, but her hand clamped over it as she laughed like a snake. “Don’t worry. I’m sure those soldiers will be happy to help. After all…” The girl’s image shifted back to the teenage girl and she said, “How can anyone resist a young girl in distress?” He closed his eyes as her other hand rested on his forehead and she began to feed.
****************
To vote for this story in the 2014 Master of Macabre Writing Contest, send an e-mail to horroraddicts@gmail.com
Voting ends: September 9th, 2014
*~*Judging panel has not altered/edited this text.*~*
*~*Text is posted as sent by the author.*~*
Lighthouse View
Rish Outfield
Carly arrived at the lighthouse just before ten in the morning, and the old man was already waiting for her.
“News lady?” he asked, putting down his large print Louis L’amour collection.
She had the camera and tripod on one shoulder, her sound bag in the other, but still said, “That’s me.”
He slowly rose to his feet. “You know you prolly made this trip for nothin’?”
“It’s not for nothing. I get to see your beautiful lighthouse.”
“Ain’t been beautiful in years,” he grumbled. He was an ancient-looking man with a white beard, a sailor hat over a bald head, and about a million wrinkles. “View’s nice, though.”
She followed him into the old building. It surprised Carly Page to find so few lighthouses on this part of the coast. Her internet search had classified the one at Puente Dormido as being “Closed.” Turned out the old man who ran it years before had bought the disused relic, and lived there now.
When she’d tracked him down on the telephone, he’d guessed what she was after. “There’s prolly a one in a thousand chance the monster comes here.”
“Good enough for me,” she’d said, sitting in front of her computer, satellite photos on the screen showing a tail, a bulbous head, and a long body, though not in the same shot.
The monster, or Quetzalcoatl, as CNN had dubbed it, had emerged from a volcano in the Pacific two days before. It seemed to be a giant snake or worm that either swam or flew–depending on if you thought the smudge in one photo was wings or not. Scientists argued about whether it would head for the mainland, go to an island, or never be seen again, perhaps burrowing back into the sea. Carly didn’t know why, but she had immediately thought of a lighthouse, and found the closest one. If the monster came here, she might get some great footage, if not, she would interview a fascinating old man.
The lighthouse was damp and foul-smelling, and had fallen into disrepair inside and out. “You okay?” The way he was breathing, she worried he might topple backward onto her.
“Just old,” he wheezed. Well, that was an understatement. Her grandfather had looked better the last time she’d seen him, and that had been in a funeral parlor.
On the upper level was a living area, with a sofa, several shelves lined with books, and a little radio.
“You say you’re from Channel 8?” he asked her, pausing to catch his breath. Above them, the stairs continued another ten feet or so to a thick door leading to the roof.
“I was.”
He squinted at her. “You got a face for the TV. What’s the problem?”
She figured the interview would go better if she earned his trust, so she told him. “The regular anchor had a baby, so I got the job to fill in for her. On my second day, I read a story with the word knickerbocker in it. Only I didn’t say it like that, exactly.”
“So, nobody caught the error?”
“Oh, about a thousand viewers did,” she said, though the calls and emails had actually numbered about twenty. “TV news is live. Goes out as you say it. They wanted me to apologize on the next show. I wouldn’t. On Wednesday, there was a new guest anchor sitting in for me.”
“So, gettin’ a picture of the killer snake monster will put you back on top.”
They emerged onto the upper terrace. The view was spectacular. Blue, grey, and white ocean water as far as the eye could see, a cool and refreshing breeze.
“The radio said the coast guard spotted it,” she said. “How far from us was that?”
“About eighteen mile from here.”
Carly’s odds of seeing the creature had just gotten better.
As if reading her thoughts, Walter said, “Eighteen is a lot of miles, Miss Knickerbocker. Don’t think we’ll be hostin’ a monster party today.”
They stood in silence, Carly and the old man searching the horizon for anything more interesting than a boat.
Finally, she turned the camera on him. “How old a man are you, Mr. Walter?”
“Ninety-one,” he said. He definitely looked his age.
“Does this discovery make you question your understanding of the world?”
“Stuff with the snake, you mean?” Walter gave her a wink. “Nahh, I fought Hitler and Benito, I always believed in monsters.”
She smiled at that. He was a charming man, even if he wasn’t very photogenic.
They left the terrace and went slowly down the creaking stairs. Carly wondered if this building would still be standing ten years from now.
She set up the camera in front of the man’s couch. The question she had asked him had been on a lot of minds since Quetzalcoatl emerged from the eruption. Many took the monster as a sign that the Biblical end times were finally upon us, many took it as evidence that God did not exist. Some were now worshiping the flying serpent like the Maya of old.
She sat Walter down with a microphone and adjusted the camera angle to best capture his craggy face. “State your name and spell it for me.”
“Alec Walter Junior. Eye-tee,” said Walter, and grinned for the lens. It made him look like a bearded skeleton from a Disney pirate movie.
“Mister Walter, could–”
“Call me Alec.”
“Alec, could you tell me when you first saw this lighthouse?”
“Oh, surely. I was six years old. My pappy had decided–”
And then Carly heard the sound of a helicopter through the microphone. It sounded close, getting closer.
Carly wrestled the camera off its tripod, and carried it up the stairwell with as much speed as she could muster. The old man followed, almost disappointed about the interview.
On the terrace, he saw the helicopter hovering over the water only half a mile away–a big ugly military vehicle. Carly was filming something beyond the helicopter. White water sprayed where an enormous shape moved fast through the ocean to the northwest.
“I can’t believe it!” she laughed, and it was infectious, the delighted laughter of the young. “This is it! I’m back in for sure now!”
“Hope you got enough film in that thing.”
A moment later, the helicopter rose higher. The monster exploded out of the water and into the air. The damned thing did have wings.
“Did you get that?” he asked, but the way she was beaming, he knew that she had.
The monster angled toward the shore. Its wings were tiny, flapping so fast they were a blur, like a bug’s wings. And as its body became more visible, a pale flying caterpillar, he realized that it looked a bit like his home.
“Here it comes!” Carly called in awe.
Alec Walter grabbed the girl’s thin arm and gave it a pull. “We need to go.”
She looked away from the creature, just for a moment.
“Move!” he shouted, clutching her arm as tightly as he could manage, and pulling her in the direction of the stairs.
She thought of recording the creature’s truck tire-sized grey eyes. Maybe, while she’d been looking at it, it had been looking at her.
She moved. The old man focused on descending the stairs, and halfway down, he stumbled. She steadied him with her free arm. He was gasping, his whole back wet with sweat.
There came a sound above them–a skittering noise that insects made in the woods–but it was much, much too loud. “Go!” Walter coughed. But she kept supporting him until they finally made it to the bottom of the lighthouse.
He burst out the front door, but Carly didn’t want to leave the protection of the building.
“Come . . . on!” he managed, putting out his hand to her.
“We’re safer inside th–”
“It doesn’t . . . want us,” he coughed, and she ran to his side, helping him again as they moved away from the foot of the lighthouse.
The chittering stopped, and Carly saw Quetzalcoatl as it hovered next to the lighthouse. It darted in the air, seeming to dance.
Beside Carly, the old man collapsed onto his knees, then rolled to a sitting position, where he could see the monster. “Are you alright?”
“Yeah, yeah,” he got out. He was barely getting any breath in, but she heard him whisper, “Shoot your camera.”
Quetzalcoatl kept bending its lower body toward the building, like a wasp about to sting. “It thinks the lighthouse is an enemy,” she marveled, raising the camera–which had never stopped recording–to catch the full body of the flying worm.
“Ain’t mad,” Walter laughed, surprising Carly. “It’s horny.”
She looked at its body language anew, and realized he was right. The monster, though smaller than the lighthouse, was shaped very similarly to it, and was shaking its tail like a . . . well, like anybody who shook their ass for a suitor.
The helicopter slowly circled the top of the lighthouse, the only other witnesses to the giant worm’s dance. Then the creature rotated itself 180 degrees, and landed on the side of the lighthouse. She heard the building groan with the added weight, and saw brick drop off where the monster’s body connected. Its tail was now right at the top of the edifice, where the terrace was.
Carly saw through the camera lens something wet and yellow emerge onto the top of the tower. “It’s . . . laying eggs!”
“Now I’ve seen everything,” Walter mumbled beside her, and Carly felt an almost overwhelming affection for the old man. If she hadn’t been holding the camera, trying to catch each sticky sphere as it came out and stuck in a pile, she would surely have hugged him.
Carly slowly panned onto the monster’s big flat face. Later, she would remember it looking right at her, as though aware it had an audience.
Finally, the worm’s opaque wings began to vibrate again, and it disengaged itself from the lighthouse. There was a cluster of twenty or so eggs up there, and Carly’s heart now thumped from exhilaration. She had a big grin on her face, and the smile never faded as Quetzalcoatl’s wings blurred into motion again and it—she–turned and plunged into the ocean once again. The military helicopter followed, trying to keep up.
She held the shot a moment more, arm aching from keeping the camera steady, and finally stopped recording. “Yep,” she said, lowering her right arm. “That will probably make me a–”
She turned and stared at the old man. Alec Walter Junior was laying back, his mouth and his eyes both open a slit. He no longer stirred, no longer breathed.
“Now you’ve seen everything,” she sighed.
****************
To vote for this story in the 2014 Master of Macabre Writing Contest, send an e-mail to horroraddicts@gmail.com
Voting ends: September 9th, 2014
*~*Judging panel has not altered/edited this text.*~*
*~*Text is posted as sent by the author.*~*
A Contrast in Worlds
Clattering filled the air, wry smiles etched their lips as they lifted the cups and sipped, a hum of gratification filing the space between them.
‘It’s certainly good here; best we have found so far I’d venture to say.’
A soft chuckle tickled the air as they set their cups back on the small saucers.
‘It certainly is, but I must say the heat is dreadfully oppressive.’
‘Agreed, but dear we must remember, this place is as new to us, as we are to it. We will eventually adapt, we always do.’
A slight nod greeted the softly worded admonishment. As the heat rolled over them, handkerchiefs patted at perspiration soaked brows. The quiet whisper of silk filled the air as, with delicate motions and supple fingers, the handkerchiefs were folded and once more tucked into the cuffs of their sleeves.
‘So darling how old did you say this colony was?’
‘Well, it’s taken us one hundred and fifty years to get this far.
‘When one thinks that we didn’t even know this world existed until those signals started coming through.
‘Even as faint as they were, they gave planning a reason to brush the dust off our old search probes.
‘The probes were launched and all the while we waited and listened. The signals were getting stronger and more frequent. The inevitable conclusion was that for the first time we had found another sentient race in the universe. The prize was within our grasp.
‘So with the information collated and analysed the first ships were sent out. I know that travelling halfway across the galaxy in stasis is a crazy thing to do but we were absolutely desperate for extra space, a civilisation can only survive on one planet for so long without exhausting the ecosystem to the point of collapse.
‘ Then when we arrive the place is empty. No signals. Nothing.’
‘And with that in mind my dear, I’d say it’s a good idea for us all to pay careful attention to the signs we were left by those that came before. You know as well as I that waiting a few hundred years more will not damage things. Besides the rest of the settlers will be needing a head counsel to oversee the ownership rights in this territory.’
A warm gust of air made their heads tilt. Eyes slid closed and nostrils flared, a short guttering gasp left them both as they stood, chairs clattering against the cobbled floor.
‘Come with me, I want to show you something, it was unearthed a few weeks ago.’
Their tapping feet filled the quiet street as they listened to the bustle of shoppers and families only a few yards away, the soft tremor that shivered through their feet made one pause, a soft gasp of fright flirting with his companion’s ears.
‘Darling, fear not, it’s just that beastly mountain again, damned thing has been gurgling and smoking ever since I was transferred here.’
Glancing back over the top of the buildings around them, the monolith of fire and heat smoked and rumbled sending a shiver down his spine as he hastened his pace and caught up to his slowly disappearing comrade.
‘So where exactly are we going dear?’
A small smile broke his partners lips as they drew level. Hands clasped behind their backs they moved out into a vast courtyard. The central fountain burbled echoing the gentle call of small birds that flitted above their heads.
‘We’re heading to the one place in this heat blasted world where we can see what became of this planet’s indigenous species and I for one would wish that my partner saw them just once before he is whisked away again.’
A gentle hand tugged at his elbow as the fluttering of wings filled the air and the sky was assaulted by a swarm of feathered bodies.
‘Now that was a pleasant and rather beautiful surprise.’
A soft hum echoed from his partner as they both watched trees empty of their twittering cargo.
‘Yes my sweet, it certainly was.’
They paused studying the glittering water as it bubbled and splashed over the cut glass pebbles and turquoise tiles.
‘Apparently my sweet this fountain here, although it has been restored numerous times, pre-dates nearly everything around us; from the tiles on the roofs to the relics we are unearthing on a daily basis. Now if you look at its size, this sculpted expanse, despite its complexity, has been constructed using the simplest of hand tools. Those that made it were twice if not three times our size, tall, broad and extremely muscular.
‘Those large plots of land not far from here with their quaint little temples honouring their fallen have a very handy system of rows and markers that, I must say, has made excavation quite an easy process. It shouldn’t be long before we have sufficient information on this planet’s aborigines. ‘
With a small nod of his head, he guided his partner to the furthest side of the courtyard and through a high archway, the weather worn stone casting a fine dust upon their heads as they passed through the frescoed alleyway.
‘Ah blessed cold, that heat was making me boil in my suit.’
A liquid filled chuckle echoed down the corridor, the chill air making them both shiver as they stopped. They paused a moment to bask in the shaded avenue before heading out in the blistering, heated air once more.
‘We only have a short way to go my dear, then we can sit in the blessed cool of the air conditioned viewing halls. I think you will truly appreciate what we have found. It is the only intact example we have been able to unearth from site six.’
****
The small dark eyes stared fixedly at the centre of the small table, the hollow gaze sending a chill through the already frigid air.
A skull sat in pride of place, the brightly lit pedestal rotating as its menacing stare slowly moved through all corners of the compass.
‘And here we have it my dear, such a lovely specimen, the ridges and brow lines are astounding. Many of the others we found collapsed into dust the moment we pulled them from the earth.
‘I have seen the way they endeavoured to preserve their dead and it is clever if a little archaic. Nothing like we have, but it shows a clear love of preserving beauty.
‘And as you have seen they applied that to the entire world around us, cities and park lands all pristine. This world has but two main land masses and is more than ninety percent covered in water but it was in a lovely condition when we found it, the last owners were wonderfully careful with things.
‘Although I have to admit my curiosity has been peaked at what drove them to extinction, these Homo sapiens were certainly a clever lot, it’s a shame really, they would have made such wonderful neighbours.’
His partner came up beside him, scaled skin cool against his lover’s neck.
‘They certainly would have been my love, certainly would have been.’
****************
To vote for this story in the 2014 Master of Macabre Writing Contest, send an e-mail to horroraddicts@gmail.com
Voting ends: September 9th, 2014
*~*Judging panel has not altered/edited this text.*~*
*~*Text is posted as sent by the author.*~*
THE THING UNDER THE BED
by Stephen Kozeniewski
“I’m going to eat you and your whole family.”
The girl didn’t say a word.
“I know you hear me up there,” The Thing Under the Bed said, “You can pretend to ignore me but I’m still going to devour you.”
An involuntary gasp escaped from the girl’s throat. She clapped both of her hands over her big fat mouth, but it was already too late. The monster chuckled.
“I knew you were awake. I’ll tell you what: I’ll make you a deal. If you come down here by choice, I’ll kill you before I eat you. Then you don’t have to feel anything. How does that sound?”
She clenched Captain Bundrick under her armpit. She had taken the poor rabbit’s head off twice before by squeezing him in just that manner, and yet she didn’t care now. Mum would grumble, but she would take him into the sewing nook for doll surgery as she always did. That is, assuming Mum or anyone else would be left alive in the morning.
The blanket began to shift, slowly, inexorably being tugged downwards. Obviously The Thing Under the Bed had caught hold of a corner and was pulling, but gently. The goal was to scare her, not to catch her. Nevertheless, she scrambled out from under the covers and planted her bottom on her pillow.
The Thing chuckled again.
“Look, it’s the best thing for you just to give in. What’s your plan anyway? What’ve you got up there? A pillow? And that desiccated old bunny?”
“My Da’ll be home soon enough,” she spouted defiantly.
“Tha’s a nice voice you’ve got. Very pretty. I think your vocal cords shall be very tasty.”
“Well, you’re just a big bully. If you’re so tough, whyn’t you come up here, then?”
So she had finally shut The Thing up. She grinned over her little victory.
“I’m afraid it doesn’t quite work like that, little pet. No, you have to come down here. And you will. Soon enough. Along with your Da and your Mum and everybody else.”
She hung her head, trying desperately not to let a mournful tear strike her mattress. To distract herself, she turned and looked out of the window. Big Ben seemed to be wearing the moon as a halo. She had not learned Roman numerals and she still struggled with reading an analog clock, but after a moment’s counting she saw that it was three…something. Sometime after three in the morning. Her father would be home from his shift any moment now.
“Why not call out to your Mum?” The Thing whispered in the darkness, “I’ll bet she’d be delicious. I mean…a big help to you.”
The girl couldn’t tell whether the monster was teasing or not, but the sounds of her Mum’s piggish snoring from the next room betrayed that she had spent another night deep in her bottles. The girl might call and call for hours but never wake her mother.
She rubbed her forearms. Without the blanket she was getting cold, but she feared being sucked down into the writhing darkness underneath the bed if The Thing decided to start tugging on the sheets again.
“Why don’t you just be quiet?”
A wave of laughter from beneath the bed splashed the girl’s face like cold water.
“Oh, Mum!” The Thing called out, “Mummykins! Mother dearest!”
With each word The Thing’s slimy, spectral voice grew louder and louder.
“Quiet! Quiet!” the girl cried, her heart now beating solidly in her throat.
“It doesn’t matter! She can’t hear! She’s soused. It’s just you and me, my darling. Now come down here and cuddle.”
At that moment the telltale noise of the door of the flat opening filled the air and a wave of relief washed over her.
“Da! Da!”
She dared a peek over the side of the bed.
“Not so eager to yell now, are you?”
The Thing held its peace.
“Da! Da!”
“Oi, what is it?” her father’s voice replied from the foyer.
“Come quick, Da!”
She leaned far out over the side of the bed. The writhing tentacles of darkness that seemed to slither out from under the bed, forever on the periphery of her vision, had disappeared. And from the monster, not a peep.
Her father appeared at her doorway, a silhouette in the moonlight. He flipped the switch and light filled her room, making her blink in surprise. Finally illuminated, she could see his kind face, smiling eyes, and cracked lips.
“What’s all the racket then, little bit?”
All at once she felt foolish.
“There’s a…there’s something under the bed.”
His right eyebrow shot up, nearly rocketing through the roof.
“What kind of a something? A shoe? A ball?”
“No, Da. A…a monster.”
He smiled deftly, his toothy grin suddenly overtaking the rest of his face.
“Oh, is that all? Let me run out and get me sawed-off then.”
He turned to leave.
“No, Da! Da! Don’t go! There’s really something under there!”
Her father nodded and went to his knees before her bed, as though he were praying, the same way she did every night.
“Let’s see what’s under here.”
Her father lifted the dangling blanket and stuck his head under the bed.
“Ohhh, I don’t see anything,” her father’s muffled voice reported back, “No, wait. What’s this?”
Suddenly a sound like a whirring blender filled the room. She stared down at her father’s kneeling form. His leg began to twitch.
“Da?”
In an instant his twitching leg turned into a kicking leg, like a grasshopper’s. Then his whole body began to writhe and shake. The whirring grew louder and louder and then in the space of a split-second his entire body was sucked under the bed, only his screams and the strange buzz of the devouring monster filling the air. A plume of blood exploded out from under the bed an instant later, spraying the floor, her Sunday shoes, and the wall.
The girl began to scream. She began to scream loudly, not caring what the neighbors would think. Not caring what her Mum would think, if it broke through her drunken torpor at all. She screamed and screamed for all she was worth at the horrible, bloody demise of her father.
“Enough of that.”
The voice caught her off guard. It didn’t belong to the monster. It was far too refined. And somehow it sounded…smaller.
She glanced down at Captain Bundrick, the stuffed rabbit. The captain was standing of his own volition and staring at her. His button eyes didn’t blink, but otherwise he seemed fully alive.
“Cap’n…how are you…?”
“Never mind,” the stuffed rabbit said, “Perhaps you’ve gone mad. But that’s not what’s important now. What’s important is that The Thing Under the Bed doesn’t escape.”
“Don’t listen to him,” the monster intoned, “He’s clearly a delusion.”
“If you toss me through the doorway,” Bundrick continued, pointing, “I know where your father keeps the gasoline and matches. You and your mother won’t survive. But most of the people in this building will have time to escape. And more importantly that thing will burn up, too.”
“I’ll make you a counter-proposal,” The Thing said, “If you come down here of your own choice, I’ll leave your Mum alone.”
“There’s no good decision,” Bundrick said, “But there is one correct decision.”
She grabbed the stuffed rabbit and tossed him with all her might through the doorway. A moment later, the smell of gasoline filled the air.
The next day, the Evening Standard reported a wholly different explanation for the fire.
THE END
****************
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Voting ends: September 9th, 2014
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Merry Go When
By Tonia Brown
Father had the carousel brought in special, all the way from Germany. The purchase was the result of a successful auction, in which he claimed to have outbid at least one hundred other buyers from all over the world. Why he wanted the thing was quite beyond me. My father wasn’t normally given to such childish proclivity, which made the purchase seem all the more out of place. Thankfully, he hid the thing in the garden behind our Kentucky home, where one had to travel down the field and past a small copse of trees in order to find it.
A few days after he had it in place, I inquired about the carousel’s state of being, to which my father sharply assured me it was none of my concern and commanded me not to revisit the matter. He surprised me with his gruff tone and unexpected anger. I hadn’t heard him use such a voice since mother left him for a much younger man.
Father never quite recovered from her abandonment.
The night after his outburst, I awoke to sudden movements just outside our quiet home. I stepped to the window, pulling aside the curtain and peering into the moonlit yard beyond, where a strange sight greeted me. The shadowy form of my father making his way to the garden in the middle of the night.
At first I thought he had taken to somnambulism, and I decided to go after him. I caught up with him just before he reached the carousel and I called out his name. My father turned to me with his mouth agape, as if shocked by my intrusion. This softened into a look of uneasy embarrassment. I demanded to know what was going on. With an unusual candor, he took my hand in his own and explained that the carousel was special. It was said to possess certain rejuvenating powers. That according to legend, the machine acted as a kind of time displacement device, removing years off of one’s life, and restoring the rider to an unbelievable degree of youth. He called it a blessing. A gift from God.
I couldn’t believe what my father was driving at. He was so desperate to be young again, he had fallen for a childish fairy tale. Some outlandish occult legend. To make matters worse, I knew it was all in an attempt to win back my mother’s heart. I begged my father to leave off this odd behavior and return with me to the house at once. He grew angry at me, pushed me aside and stormed off toward the carousel, hell bent on proving his words.
Even by moonlight, the machine was a breathtaking work of art. A large affair, at least thirty feet across, the carousel consisted of an intricately woven pattern of wrought iron, wood and brass. To the left of the entry ramp there extended an arm from the base of the thing, reaching away from the platform then doubling back once more toward the carousel proper; a delivery system equipped with brass rings, ready for the grasping. There were thirteen horses in all, each as large as a real stallion, and each bound by a post that ran the length from the roof to the floor, spearing each animal through their back.
I spied my father inside of the inner ring, manning the console. At his attention, the carousel sprang to life and light. The horses set into an up and down motion as the platform began a slow and steady rotation. This movement was accompanied by a cheery calliope played by an organ hidden somewhere about the mechanism.
My father stepped onto the moving stage, mounted one of the rising and falling steeds, and settled into place. Though he did so with the same aloof severity he reserved for business matters and other affairs of import. He didn’t smile, didn’t speak, didn’t seem to enjoy himself at all. He just held onto the steed and remained silent, as if concentrating on something other than the experience of the ride.
As the carousel turned, the platform spun faster and faster, and I began to grow concerned about my father’s safety. The music rose in pitch, to match the quicker rotations, driving into a wild orgy of wheezes and strained notes. And the horses … I know how this sounds, but the horses came alive! Their nostrils flared and steamed, heavy with breath. They kicked out, bucking against their poles, chomping at their bits and tossing their feral heads. Without warning, my father reached out and in a blur of motion, snatched one of the brass rings from the holder near the ramp.
At this the music lifted into a single, high pitched note, screaming into the wild night. The horses changed with this shriek, melting into nightmarish black steeds, each with matching crimson eyes, gnashing fangs and whipping forked tongues. They roared out, as one, in a single identical note as loud and chilling as the screaming music. I was filled with an utter dread for my father’s life, one that said should those beasts break free from this carousel, the town below our home would suffer in the most horrid of ways.
As the unnatural horses howled and bucked, the carousel’s lights grew to a blinding degree, and I had to shield my eyes.
When I was able to look again, the light dimmed and faded, and the carousel slowed to an eventual halt. The horses were normal once more, both stationary and plain. There was no sign of my father. I called out his name and searched about, worried that he had been flung from his demonic mount in the frenzy of the ride. Instead of my father’s voice, I heard the low croaking growl of something inhuman. I froze in place, worried some wild animal had been attracted by father’s carousel, and was now poised to attack.
In the thin moonlight, a creature emerged from behind the very horse my father had chosen as his mount. It crouched, at almost half my height, and was covered in a dark, leathery skin. Its mouth was stuffed with twisted, yellowing fangs, and nearly bisected its face with an abnormal width. The unholy thing clambered up to squat on the horse, looking out over the garden with wide glassy eyes that rested upon the top of its head. It grabbed at the air with wretched webbed paws and let out another soft, weird croak.
I screamed. I couldn’t help it.
Of course once I did, the thing whipped about to face me, that large, fang filled mouth snapping closed with a resounding click. It then lunged for me, leaping down from the carousel horse and almost atop me. It reached out for me, clawing the emptiness between us. I backed up a few nervous steps then took off in a run, heading for the safety of the house. Thankfully, the beast was slow, hopping in stunted bursts as if it had forgotten how to move its own webbed feet. Once I reached the house, I locked and barred the door, and headed immediately for father’s study, seeking father’s elephant gun—the single weapon he held onto from his younger, more adventurous days.
The beast was not far behind me, and began to scratch and beat on the front door. I loaded father’s gun, returned to the foyer, took aim for the front door, and fired. The door splintered into fragments as the shot tore the wood apart. With the blast of the weapon, the clawing and banging ceased. I switched on the electric porch light and stepped up, peering beyond the ruined wood to find my prey in a slump at bottom step. I reloaded the gun and, holding it before me, I stepped through the ruined door and made my way down the stairs, intending to finish the beast once and for all.
As I approached the creature, it gave a pained croak and flopped onto its back. With the added illumination of the porch light burning behind us, I was able to see the creature’s eyes more clearly. I gazed into those oversized orbs when a strange sensation befell me. I clearly recognized the beast’s eyes as my own kin. But how? Answer my silent question, the beast relaxed a webbed hand, and from it rolled a brass ring, spinning across the pavement between us until it came to rest at my feet.
It was then I understood what had happened.
Father was wrong. The carousel wasn’t a blessing. The machine, this time displacement device, did exactly as the legends proposed it would. It had displaced time from my father, only, it took too much. An unbelievable degree of youth, indeed! He thought he would step off the carousel a young man, but instead, in some kind of weird time traveling side effect, a type of crononaut’s ague, he came back a de-evolved monster.
A monster I had just slain.
With tear filled eyes, I lowered myself to his side, cradled my dying father’s head in my lap, and held him to me as he shuddered and exhaled his last breath.
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Voting ends: July 28th, 2014
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What Happens In Vegas
Lindsey Beth Goddard
Vivica tapped her six inch stilettos on the floor and waited for her cue to enter stage left. Her chest heaved in her sequin push-up top, and she fanned herself with both hands. Calm down, she thought, before your eyeliner runs and you turn into the world’s sexiest raccoon.
Stage fright was something Vivica had never experienced. She always said her nerves were stronger than steel; they were titanium. But you shouldn’t have done it. It’s a dirty trick, and it’s going to blow up in your face.
She watched Harvey on stage as a Burmese python slithered up the sleeve of his tux. It reappeared, center stage, in a cloud of confetti and smoke, and the crowd cheered. Vivica frowned as Harvey’s words from last night replayed in her mind. She remembered the way he had scowled at her, had moved so close to her face that she could feel his drunken body heat. “If I catch you flirting with another man again,” he had hissed through fetid whiskey breath, “I’ll feed that goddamn rabbit of yours to the snake.”
He smiled on stage. He turned to the crowd with a dramatic sweep of his arms. “For the next bit of madness, I’ll need some assistance,” he bellowed. “She’s hypnotic. She’s erotic. She’s not afraid of the blade! Please welcome… Ms. Vivica.”
Vivica entered the spotlight with a seductive swagger. She stepped over to a large wooden structure. It was circular, painted red and white like a huge target. She pressed her back against the wood. Harvey tightened her restraints.
He stepped back, took aim, and within seconds knives whizzed through the air, stabbing an outline of her body in the wood. Thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk. A blade struck the board mere inches from her face. She gritted her teeth. I’m getting too old for this.
The show dragged on and on, until finally the moment arrived. The hat trick. Harvey loved his tired old hat trick. “An homage to the ancestors of magic”, he called it.
There was a secret compartment in the table below his hat. That’s where Abra Cadabra was supposed to be waiting. Sweet, fluffy little Abra Cadabra, the bunny Harvey had threatened to kill just one night before. Vivica smirked.
He plunged his hand into the hat and felt around for the rabbit. He froze. A look somewhere between pain and horror crossed his features. His eyes grew wide, and he let out a scream so loud that it made Vivica cringe. He writhed and tried to pull away, but something yanked his arm deeper.
Vivica knew the rabbit would bite. That was the whole point of the prank—to startle Harvey, to deliver a blow to his pride in front of a huge audience. But this? Something wasn’t right. Harvey was in too much pain.
He freed his hand from the hole, and the fat, hideous rabbit dangled there, its yellow teeth buried deep between his knuckles. Blood and foamy saliva moistened its face. The hat was stuck between Harvey’s elbow and the frothing little beast. It made it difficult for him to get a good view of his predator.
But Vivica could see it. She gulped. What exactly was she seeing?
Triple the size of Abra, this rabbit’s beady red eyes were slanted, its hackles raised. Its sharp claws sliced the air. Harvey gripped its plump body with his free hand and attempted to squeeze the life out of the critter as it mangled his knuckles, whipping its mangy head back and forth.
It opened its bloody maw and chomped down, severing fingers. Blood squirted from the amputated digits. The theater filled with screams. It spat the fingers out and lunged forward, ripping into Harvey’s arm. Tears of pain welled in his eyes. Blood coated his shirt.
He reared back and flung the rabbit to the floor. It growled, exposing a mouth full of fangs. It hopped over to him and used its claws to scurry up the fabric of his pants. He tried desperately to kick it off, doing a one-legged dance with his mutilated hand tucked under his armpit. It scrambled across his chest. Its face hovered just over the pulse at his jugular.
Vivica ran to him. A scream of agony echoed through the sound system from a nearby microphone as the creature tore into his neck. He fell to his knees, ripping the little monster from his throat with both hands as crimson gore soaked its fur. Harvey’s fingers went limp and he dropped it.
Vivica’s shadow fell over the rabbit. It glared at her, yellow teeth bared. She lifted a slender leg and stomped down with all her might, driving the thin metal of her stiletto heel through the top of the rabbit’s skull with a wet crunch. The rabbit’s paws twitched as she removed the metallic heel from its brain. With one last feeble kick, it stopped moving.
She dropped to the floor beside Harvey. Blood spilled from his neck. It soaked her knees and pooled around them as memories of last night washed over her. The strange man’s words… “I have the perfect rabbit for you,” he had said. His eyes shined like obsidian in the dim track lighting of the hotel bar. “An extremely rare breed. One that will teach old Harvey a lesson.”
“I’m sorry. I’m not following. W-what do you mean?”
His teeth seemed too large when he smiled. “He deserves a little payback, don’t you think?”
“For… for what?”
“For what? Why, for threatening to feed your pet rabbit to his snake. And in public. I imagine he’s even worse when you two are alone.”
She had nodded. He’d certainly hit the nail on the head there. She felt odd opening up to a stranger this way, but she nodded all the same.
Harvey had embarrassed her, that was true. This was a business meeting, nothing more. The man she sat with at the lobby bar was a dealer of rare animals. Vivica had been hoping to retire Abra Cadabra and introduce a more exotic rabbit to the act.
But Harvey had come through the hotel and spotted them at the bar together. He’d made a scene, made accusations. As if she were the unfaithful one! Ha! She knew about Harvey’s indiscretions in the matters of monogamy. Still, he always found a way to point the finger at her.
“I’ve got a rabbit that is very different from the rest.” He flashed that peculiar smile again, all tooth and no lip. “She’s a biter. Positively vicious.You won’t need to handle her, of course. I’ll take care of everything.” He winked. “Just imagine, if you will, the great and powerful Harvey, humiliated by a rabbit!”
Why had she agreed to such a reckless prank? The memory pained her now.
The spotlights dimmed as crew members trickled out from backstage. The audience fell silent. Harvey’s body convulsed against the floor. His eyes rolled back in his head.
The color drained from Harvey’s face, and his movements slowed to a stop. One last, shaky breath left his lungs. And then, Harvey started to change…
Thick fur sprouted from his skin. It covered his neck, his cheeks, his nose—every part of him. His missing fingers grew back. Then all ten digits fused together into a disturbing human-like paw. Curved claws grew from the tips. His ears grew, too, rising up from his head, and he rolled to the side, coughing, sprinkling the floor with human teeth. Saliva glistened on his freshly grown fangs.
She scrambled back and rose to her feet just as Harvey sprang to his. Well, it was really more of a hop than anything. He tracked her with his beady red eyes. His still-human lips curled into a sneer beneath thick fur, and she could see the sharp points of his teeth.
She removed her high heels and prepared to run. He lunged at her, but she managed to sidestep him and bolt in the other direction.
Her bare feet slid in a river of blood. Blood from when Harvey had died. Time seemed to slow down as she fell, and all she could think was: He did die. I saw it with my own eyes. He did. The Harvey I know is long gone.
She hit the ground, flipped over, saw him closing in.
Beside her was a table with a mirror affixed to the front. On any other night, the mirror was just another prop used for an optical illusion. But tonight, it was a godsend.
She tightened her grip on the stiletto shoe in her hand and smashed the metal heel into the glass—once, twice, three times. It shattered. She selected a long, jagged piece, squeezing it so hard that it sliced into her palm. Blood trickled down her wrist as he fell onto her, straddled her, opened his mouth wide, ready to rip her throat out.
She stabbed the piece of glass into the side of his head directly below his giant ears. It sliced into his temple. Blood rained down on her face. The glass maimed her hand, but she kept on pushing, driving the shard deeper and deeper into his head, until his clawed paws loosened their grip and Harvey’s mutated body slumped to the side.
She crawled away from the monster that had once been Harvey. Trembling and hysterical, she cried on stage before an audience of horrified faces. And in that sea of faces, for the briefest of moments, she could swear she glimpsed a familiar one. His eyes so dark they glimmered black. A toothy grin, too big for his head. She was certain he’d been there… smiling.
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Voting ends: July 28th, 2014
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“The Gray Girl”
Stephanie Lenz
Mardi Gras, 1981
Since her mother’s disappearance, Maia had been drawn to the old St Louis cemetery. Mardi Gras made people careless so she had hope. Locked again but at its base, just inside the gate, she found a palm-sized rag doll. It smelled of lavender and she hugged it to her face. Attached to its dress was a note with words Maia couldn’t read.
Inside, a yellowish curtain of light seemed to cut the cemetery in half. A woman walking through the graveyard caught Maia’s eye. Not a ghost. Maia couldn’t see ghosts. Just people and their colors. She was as real as Maia herself and she glowed faint violet. The woman smiled, took three steps, and disappeared into the light.
In the morning, Maia found a woman sweeping beads, paper, and broken glass into Bourbon Street. She held up the doll and asked for help. The woman fingered the note, then wrapped an arm around the child and invited her inside. She made Maia a sweet cherry-almond drink that drew the damp from her bones, then made a telephone call that began, “Queen, I have a kid for you.” She smiled and draped cheap purple beads around Maia’s neck, adding, “Hold tight to that gris-gris, girl.”
“Gray girl?” Maia pulled at a goat’s hair poking through the fabric.
August 2005
The child had been curled in the corner of Queen Clémence’s shop since Giles had brought her the day before. No magic, real or imagined, could get her to speak, move, or take a sip of water.
“I can’t leave the Quarter,” Maia said, sipping a beer and leaning on the register counter, her bronzed arms glistening with sweat and work.
“Maia, it’s mandatory this time.”
“And the police,” she replied, pointing at his badge, “are trying to turn me into a babysitter. That is not what I do.”
He leaned forward. “I know what you do. That’s why I brought her here.”
Maia looked down toward the girl, barefoot with the dampness of the Ninth Ward still up to the knees of her pants. “What color was that man? The policeman who just left. Not his skin. His other color.”
The little girl allowed her eyes to meet Maia’s. “Purple.”
“I thought he was more of a pinkish-purple.”
The child unfolded and curled her legs alongside her body like a mermaid’s tail.
“He told me your name is Espie.”
“You’re purple too.”
Maia held up a finger, then opened the purse with the strap that she wore across her chest. Removing the doll, she asked, “Do you know what this is?”
The little girl’s eyes opened wide. “My dolls are all at home. Under the water. With my grandmamma.”
“Have you ever made a gris-gris?”
“Grandmamma says voodoo comes from the devil.”
Maia offered her hand as Espie stood. “Did she show you how to keep him away?”
Mardi Gras, 2014
“Goat Herder, wasn’t it?”
“You remembered.” She accepted the cocktail Hunt delivered to her, jostled by tourists spilling beer on her emerald green Tulane t-shirt.
He watched as she drank. “My, my, Maia. We never thought we’d get you.”
The potion he’d mixed into her cocktail rushed under Maia’s skin. Her protections, her memories, her training, as impossible to grasp as handfuls of water. His aura dissolved from pink to dusty orange.
She spotted this year’s kid on the other side of the club, his gris-gris bag knotted through a belt loop, as he sipped beer from a plastic gold cup. He’d gone from red to purple, the strongest aura Maia could sense. Hunt couldn’t see him. She’d done her job.
“Clémence’s hand-raised kid. Savior of the goats without horns.” Hunt ran his hands over her shivering flesh. He kissed her neck and whispered. “I’ll drain your mind before I’ll drain your blood. The meat,” he said with a squeeze, “is least of what I want. I might spare your precious Quarter for the year if you give yourself – all of yourself – to me, ma biche.”
As he spoke, Maia’s fingers searched her purse for her own red satin bag filled with herbs, cemetery dirt, and goat hair. She found it. He couldn’t see her or feel her but it was only temporary magic, a few minutes at best. She ran toward Basin Street, darting through the crowds to St. Louis #1.
As the night’s last tour group filtered past, carelessly dropping bits of stolen brick, Maia slipped through the gates, clutching the gris-gris with both hands over her pounding heart. The darkness rose like water.
“Voilà,” Hunt’s voice echoed off the marble and brick. “Maia Gray, Protector of Goats.”
Maia positioned herself carefully. The old border of the Vieux Carré ran right through St. Louis #1, soft, yellow, and pulsing. She took a step backward. The other colors of her world faded into gray.
Hunt picked plaster from a whitewashed tomb. “I have a lot to repay you for. Twenty-five years of hornless goats we didn’t get, plus that kid you kept as a souvenir from the Feast of Katrina. We’re hungry and we’re inviting you to the table, ma biche.”
Another step backward. Her dark curls lifted in a low breeze.
He recognized what she was doing. “You made a vow, Protector. You can’t leave The Quarter.”
“You’re right. I’ll never leave it.”
“You knew. You knew what I was gonna do, didn’t you? How long have you known?”
“All eight years.”
He nodded. “You drank it of your own free will. You know who I am, what I want. There’s nothing to save you from me now. Nothing to save the Quarter. Nothing to save your precious ‘kids.’ Let me feast on your fear, Maia.”
She dropped the gris-gris.
His eyes followed it, then fell on her face. His expression changed. The shadows around him swirled and rose like smoke. “No fear. How are you unafraid? For yourself. For the Quart… Another Protector? Th-that’s impossible! Tell me!”
“Au revoir.”
His scream caught in his throat as Maia took her final step backward and disappeared.
Hunt de Chèvre had promised he would deliver The Protector, that they would finally devour her – body and soul. Instead, they would starve. He waved a hand in front of the cemetery gates to open them. He didn’t see the orange sparks that flew from his hand.
The young woman sitting cross-legged on a low tomb did see. She’d always seen the colors. Grandmamma had told her it was a curse. Miss Maia showed her it was a blessing. Maia had also taught that those with this blessing were called by the Quarter to protect the innocent. Otherwise they – prey and Protector alike – would become “hornless goats,” sacrificed and consumed by de Chèvre and his followers. The final lesson had been how to dissolve into the Quarter if, by time or by trickery, your powers grew too weak to protect anyone, including yourself.
She carried two gris-gris in her bag: the one she’d made with Maia and the one Maia had given her. The Gray Girl, she’d called it.
Esperanza slid along Bourbon Street like sap over bark. She hooked a finger through a set of discarded purple throw beads, looped the beads around her neck, and let the Quarter lead its Protector into its heart.
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Voting ends: July 28th, 2014
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An Appetite for Trouble
When Doctor Toyin Katabe, professor of anthropology, had been preparing for a journey to examine a potential find in the jungles of East Africa, the association awarding her the research funding had insisted she not go alone. It didn’t matter that she had originally come from that area and was familiar with the language and customs there. It also didn’t matter that she had been studying ancient cannibalistic civilizations since completing her masters three decades before. Despite the fact that she was perfectly healthy, far fitter than the average woman her age and stronger too, they had insisted she take a graduate student along with her, and preferably one who was both young and male.
While not surprised that the old-fashioned, old-money codgers who chaired the association had placed such foolish demands upon her, Doctor Katabe had still been insulted. She had always been perfectly capable of taking care of herself while on these outings. Extinct ancient tribes hardly posed a threat to the living. Insects were a much bigger danger, so unless a grad student was intending to follow her around with a giant flyswatter, she didn’t need him for protection.
Besides, Toyin knew her away around a jungle and had a talent with handling wild animals. She even owned a trained monkey, Bobo, as a pet. More than a pet really – she considered Bobo a service animal because he could do things for her she couldn’t manage for herself. He could scale heights or squeeze into tight spots to retrieve things for her, and he had a few other special tricks he could perform with the right incentive. As far as she was concerned, he was better than any graduate student playing assistant. And while she might welcome human companionship while searching for evidence of Neolithic cannibals in Europe or South America, she preferred to visit her home turf alone.
At least, this is how she had felt initially, before it had turned out that the extinct ancient tribe of cannibals hadn’t been quite so extinct after all. Doctor Katabe and her six-foot-two twenty-something chaperone, Derek, had been searching through the aged evidence of ritualistic cannibalism – cannibalism similar to that of the Mangbetu tribe that had brought them to the Congo Basin in the first place – when they were ambushed. The swarm of mostly-naked jungle natives that surrounded and seized them had painted faces and wore jewellery made from carved pieces of cranial bones. It reminded Toyin of a scene out of an old adventure serial.
Derek had tried to fight but was quickly overcome. Toyin had known better. She would wait until the odds lay more in her favour. That way, unlike Derek, she was conscious when they bound her arms. She could bunch her muscles as much as possible to allow some slack when she relaxed them later. It might provide her with the opportunity to escape when they were paying less attention.
Along with being taken by surprise and frightened by the cannibals aggressive swarming, Doctor Katabe also suffered the disappointment of watching Bobo scramble screaming into the jungle. His loss was more grievous than watching Derek succumb to a well-placed blow to the head. She had never counted on any real help from the grad student anyway. He was there merely as a watchdog for the privileged old men who had funded her trip to prove to their cronies they supported education and the exploration of different cultures, like good gentleman should. Bobo, on the other hand, was her right arm. Without him, her chances of escape dropped to almost zero.
Now, captured and held in their secluded village, Doctor Katabe had to admit that taking Derek along had been worth it after all. The cannibals had taken one look at his youthful form and brawn and decided to eat the grad student first. In their place, Toyin likely would have made the same choice. One look at her silvering hair, lean muscle and wrinkling dark skin, and she would have assumed such a person would make for a tough and stringy meal, like chewing old leather.
She had been forced to watch as Derek had begged for his life, the young man in tears as they had prepared him for decapitation with a well-balanced blade that resembled the Ngombe cult weapons. Toyin didn’t see the point to grovelling. If she ended up at a place past any hope of escape, she would accept her fate with dignity. Why get upset when death was inevitable?
But she wasn’t there yet – she still had hope despite watching blood gush from the place where Derek’s severed head had once rested and his brawny form twitch in its death throes. She had time too, the lost tribe still full after cooking and devouring her grad student. She only prayed Bobo would make an appearance before it was her turn. If he did, she might not end up serving as the second course.
Doctor Katabe was depending on Bobo to follow the tasty trail she had left him while on route to the secluded tribal village. Knowing Bobo’s affinity for sweets, the anthropologist had secured a small bag of stuffed figs from a vendor outside her hotel, which she kept in her pocket as rewards for the monkey. She also had a chocolate bar secured in her shirt flap, but that needed to be saved for emergencies only. With her hands only loosely bound in front of her, she had managed to ease the figs one by one out of her pocket and drop them along the way. As long as Bobo’s appetite for treats drove him forward, he would reach her eventually. Toyin was relying on that.
In the meantime, she had been worrying at the ties that bound her wrists and she was close to the point where she would be able to free her hand to use as she pleased. She would need that free hand when Bobo arrived, in order to reach the chocolate bar in her possession. Her fate would be decided in that one moment: would she be liberated or would she be lunch? She certainly was aiming for the former rather than the latter.
Toyin had been pretending to sleep on the mat they had laid out for her, still struggling with her bonds, when she heard the first delightful signs of that Bobo had arrived, making curious little noises from the shelter of the trees. His arrival happily coincided with the somewhat painful removal of one hand from the ties. She smiled inwardly. The cannibals had no idea she was about unleash her worst weapon upon them.
Unbeknownst to the cannibals, the anthropologist truly had trained her monkey to protect her with the right prompts and the right incentives. Fortunately for Doctor Katabe, Bobo would do anything for chocolate, including attacking people upon her command.
“Chocolate, Bobo – chocolate,” she whispered, sliding the candy bar from her shirt flap. It was squishy, melted from the heat, but the monkey wouldn’t care. Toyin tore the oozy packaging in two, passing one to Bobo who had emerged from the shadows of the trees with his mistress’s tempting summons. She returned the other half to its original location. “You know what you need to do for the rest of it,” she told Bobo as he sucked the last of the brown, sugary sludge from his half of the wrapper.
The next few seconds that followed were pure chaos, when Bobo’s shrill shrieks attracted the cannibals. Once they came into view, he set upon them as if rabid, leaping upon heads, scratching at faces and biting at ears, gouging at eyes and clawing at scalps. Multiple attempts were made to grab at him, but he was more agile than those who sought to snatch him up. Soon cries of agony and blood from the rending of flesh added to the pandemonium. Toyin took the opportunity to free her ankles from their ties, while her captors were fully distracted by Bobo’s rampage. After a few hearty rubs to restore some feeling to her numb legs and feet, she lurched away from her mat and sprinted off into the jungle.
Her flight was hurried and haphazard, trying to put as much distance between her and the cannibal village before they noticed she was gone. The adrenaline generated by the memory of what had happened to Derek kept her running long after she normally would have succumbed to fatigue. When she finally did slide to a shaky stop, she had to count herself lucky for not tripping on some root or stone in her path, or impaling herself on some unfortunately-placed tree branch. She could no longer hear Bobo’s enraged hoots or the cannibals’ shouts of distress. Either they had managed to subdue him, drive him off, or Toyin had succeeded in running far enough that they were all now out of earshot.
She hoped Bobo had survived unscathed and had made his own escape. If so, she would definitely see him again. He would most certainly track her by scent, demanding the remains of his prize once he had found her. Doctor Katabe, in the meantime, would rest as best she could until morning, when she would reorient herself using the rising sun and make her way back to base camp and then the hotel. She had gathered more than enough data by that point to consider her venture into the Congo Basin a successful one.
Toyin realized, as she settled down into the greenery to relax under the moonlight, that her stomach was grumbling. She hadn’t eaten in over a day, the cannibals having only provided her with water to drink. For the briefest moment she contemplated devouring the second half of the gooey chocolate bar resting securely in her shirt flap. She reminded herself that it would be far better not to, despite the temptation. The melted candy would only dampen her hunger temporarily. After the crash from the sugar high, she would feel far worse.
And then there was Bobo. If and when he returned to her, she could only imagine how he would react to the fact that she had robbed him of the other promised half of his reward. His response to her would likely be more violent than his attack upon the cannibals. Toyin didn’t want to risk that, not when her monkey had such an appetite for trouble.
With that in mind, she left the chocolate bar where it was. She’d rather not invite that kind of pain.
Closing her eyes, with the vague chance of sleep, Doctor Katabe prayed that no other denizens in the area would also decide she looked and smelled like lunch. She had had enough of playing potential snack for a lifetime.
****************
To vote for this story in the 2014 Wicked Women’s Writing Challenge, send an e-mail to horroraddicts@gmail.com
Voting ends: July 28th, 2014
*~*Judging panel has not altered/edited this text.*~*
*~*Text is posted as sent by the author.*~*
Photo Finish
By D.M. Slate
Liza steps out of the cab, closing the door behind her. She shields her eyes from the sun, looking up at the sky scrapers that line both sides of the busy street. The over-cluttering of Japan’s rich, vibrant colored signs makes her smile.
Tossing her silky blonde locks over her shoulder, Liza straightens her shirt and heads for the front doors. Her photo shoot today is on the top floor – at the White Serpent night club. She enters the elevator, taking a deep breath as it begins to move. Today is Liza’s first time working with Chuu, the photographer, and her stomach jitters with nervousness. Being a petite blonde American has made modeling work easy to find in Japan, but learning the language has been a much harder task.
The elevator comes to a stop, and as the doors open Liza’s breathe catches in her throat. The White Serpent’s décor is stunning. Glowing chandeliers of red, blue and purple dangle from the ceiling, accenting the sleek white chairs, booths and couches that line the hard-wood floor. A massive sculpture of a white dragon slithers around the chandeliers from one corner of the night club to the other. To the south, a wall of windows provides a penthouse view of the bustling city below.
A man steps out from behind the bar and the movement catches her eye. She hadn’t seen him standing there, silently observing her. She smiles, raising a hand in a typical American greeting, before catching herself in mid-motion. Pulling the hand down, she gives a proper bow, instead.
Chuu approaches, speaking a mouthful of words that Liza can’t decipher. She’s taken aback by his appearance. Dressed in noting but black, his tall slender form seems to float across the floor toward her. His goth-like attire is complete with a sliver-link chain that hangs around his neck, and a head full of spikey black hair. When he comes to a stop next to her, Liza notices the eye liner that accentuates his almond shaped eyes.
Agitated with her lack of verbal response, he sneers at her. She rattles off the only greeting she knows in Japanese, which does little to win Chuu’s approval. He spins on the heel of his boot, walking away. Liza timidly scurries after him. The photographer retrieves an outfit off of the bar and hands it to her, pointing her in the direction of the women’s restroom.
Once inside the bathroom, Liza lets out a deep breath, trying to calm herself. Scoffing at the clothes, Liza shakes her head as she changes into the skimpy pleather outfit. A cross between animee design and sexy-school girl attire – the mid-drift top, short skirt and knee-high socks seem to be essential items in most of her Japanese shoots. And today, a pair of six-inch spiked heels completes the outlandish outfit.
Liza gives the shoes a trial run in the bathroom, terrified to trip and fall in front of Chuu. Satisfied that she’s stable enough on them, she stuffs her clothes down into her massive purse and slings the bag over her shoulder. Taking one last glance in the mirror, Liza digs down into the purse retrieving a bottle of hairspray. Giving her hair a final spritz, she drops the bottle back into her bag and exits the restroom.
The club has taken on a new life and her eyes sparkle with wonderment. Fog machines pump thick plumes of smoke out from the ceiling, filling the room in cloud of white. A fan blows lightly against a wall of various colored silks, and the materials dances in the breeze.
The lighting equipment for the photo shoot is set up next to the silk wall, so Liza saunters in that direction, looking around for Chuu.
She gasps in surprise when he steps out from behind a pillar wearing a red dragon mask. Covering his entire head, the large dragon-shaped mask seems unproportionate to his thin body, and Liza wonders how he’s able to bear its weight. Seemingly unaffected by the mask, Chuu points toward the couch by the silk wall. Liza approaches it, leaning lightly on the arm of the couch in one of her typical model poses. Chuu begins to snap photos, holding the camera up to the eye piece of the dragon mask. The lamps pop with a flash of light with each photo that is taken.
Ignoring the strangeness of the situation, Liza concentrates on posing for the photos. Feeling light-headed and dizzy, she leans her full weight onto the couch. The camera continues to click, and the lights continue to flash brightly before her eyes. The bulbs seem to stay illuminated longer now, and Liza finds herself staring at the lamps, drawn to them. Her mind is wandering, and before long, she forgets why she’s even at the nightclub. Looking down at clothing her mind spins in confusion.
With each inhale of the drugged fog, Liza slips further and further from consciousness. Chuu places the camera on a tripod, setting it on auto-click. He disappears into the cloud of smoke and the camera continues snap photos. By the time he returns, Liza has slumped to a seated position on the couch, staring blankly ahead in a drugged stupor.
Her eyes follow the movement of his large butterfly blades as he swings them from side to side. The twelve inch knives are curved – slender at the bottom, wide at the end – and he holds one in each hand. Fog dissipates and swirls around his crimson dragon mask as he slices the daggers through the air. Liza’s transfixed, unable to look away. With each swing of the blades her eyes hallucinate. Tracers following the curving arches of the knives transform into fluttering wings on the sides of this red dragon beast.
Liza’s brain never processes danger, until the first slice tears through her flesh. The razor-thin dagger bites into her pale white skin, gouging a deep cut into her thigh. Blood sprays through the air, and the butterfly blades continue to swing.
Scrambling away from the monster, screaming, Liza sprints toward the elevator. The spike of her heel tilts to the side, twisting her fragile ankle. She crumbles to the floor, crawling on her hands and knees, trying to escape. Another swing of the knife slices her lower back, sending her flailing to the floor. Liza’s hand snags the strap of her purse, and her fingers clamp down around it. She pulls the bag toward her, reaching for her phone.
The fatal slash of the blade penetrates the back of Liza’s neck, severing her spinal cord. Gasping for breath, her brain slowly begins to misfire.
Chuu reaches down grabbing Liza by her feet, pulling her body back across the floor. Reaching the couch, her rolls her onto her back, looking down into her dying eyes. Picking her slender body up with ease, Chuu places her on the couch, in a sitting position. Blood pours from the back of her neck, cascading over her shoulders and trickling down the front of her body.
The red dragon yanks the purse from Liza’s death-grip, not wanting it to tarnish his perfect photo shoot. The camera continues to snap on auto, click, click, click. Chuu marvels at the perfection of the scene he’s created.
He tosses Liza’s purse carelessly aside. The hairspray bottle rolls slowly out of the bag into the fog, but Chuu doesn’t notice. Brandishing a blade in each hand, he swings the butterfly knives again, triumphantly.
Side-stepping out of the camera’s frame, Chuu’s foot lands awkwardly on the hairspray bottle. Thrown off balance, his arms flail through the air as he trips, and falls. The razor-sharp blade pierces the soft flesh of his lower back, skewering his internal organs, before exiting his stomach.
Impaled on his own blade, Chuu struggles to breath. The mask falls from his head and his wide, dying eyes stare up into the fog. Blood trickles from the corner of his mouth with every laborious exhale.
All the while the camera continues to snap on auto, click, click, click to capture the glorious photo finish.
************************
To vote for this story in the 2014 Wicked Women’s Writing Challenge, send an e-mail to horroraddicts@gmail.com
Voting ends: July 28th, 2014
2014 Wicked Women Writer Challenge – Welcome to the 6th annual Wicked Women Writers Challenge
Hosted by HorrorAddicts.net
The audio for these stories will post by Saturday June 28th. The text versions will run June 29th-July 3rd. Subscribe to this blog so we can alert you with they post.
Premise: There is something both fearsome and attractive in a wild thing, be it man or beast. From creature legends told around ancient campfires, to modern tales of King Kong and cryptozoology, critters have always captured our darkest imagination. Five finalists have created stories based on this premise and with challenges that were randomly selected. Each challenger received: 1. Location 2. Blessing – Helpful Item 3. Curse – An untimely disability 4. Beast
Danyelle (aka D.M. Slate) resides in Colorado. She attended college at the University of Northern Colorado and completed a business degree, and now works as a financial analyst. She’s married to her high school sweet-heart, and together they have a young daughter and son. To find out more, go to http://www.dm-slate.com
An Appetite For Trouble by Chantal BoudreauChantal Boudreau is an accountant by day and an author/illustrator during evenings and weekends, who lives by the ocean in beautiful Nova Scotia, Canada with her husband and two children. In addition to being a CMA-MBA, she has a BA with a major in English from Dalhousie University. A member of the Horror Writers Association, she writes and illustrates horror, dark fantasy and fantasy and has had several of her stories published in a variety of horror anthologies, online journals and magazines. Fervor, her debut novel, a dystopian science fantasy tale, was released in March of 2011 by May December Publications, followed by its sequels, Elevation, Transcendence and Providence. Magic University, the first in her fantasy series, Masters & Renegades, made its appearance in September 2011 followed by Casualties of War in 2012 and Prisoners of Fate, in 2013. Find out more at: http://chantellyb.wordpress.com
The Grey Girl by Stephanie LenzStephanie Lenz writes mainstream and genre fiction in western Pennsylvania, where she lives with her husband, daughter, son, cat, and two dogs. She has a degree in creative writing from Florida State and edits Toasted Cheese, where she created and co-judges the annual “Dead of Winter” horror contest. Some of her southern gothic fiction has appeared in Quantum Muse, The Journal of the Blue Planet, and the anthology Harlan County Horrors. Find out more at: piggyhawk.net
What Happens In Vegas by Lindsey GoddardLindsey Beth Goddard’s stories have appeared in anthologies such as Mistresses Of The Macabre, Fresh Fear: Contemporary Horror, Axes Of Evil, and Bleed. She lives in the suburbs of St. Louis, MO. When she’s not writing, she enjoys interviewing fellow authors, playing with her children, and plotting ways to take over the world. www.lindseybethgoddard.com
Merry Go When by Tonia BrownTonia Brown is a Southern author with a penchant for Victorian dead things. She writes in many genres from horror to humor to erotica to steampunk. When not writing she raises unicorns and fights crime with her husband under the code names Dr. Weird and his sexy sidekick Butternut. To find out more, go to: http://thebackseatwriter.blogspot.com/
The 4th Annual Masters of Macabre Writing Challenge
This is the 4th annual Masters of Macabre story contest, sponsored by the nightmarish terrors residing over at HorrorAddicts.net. This is the chance for all the gentlemen to show the Wicked Women Writers that we can chill your bones and strike naked fear into the deepest crevices of your psyche just as well as any Great Old One you might find on your next expedition to the dark places of the earth…
What is the Masters of Macabre Writing Challenge?
This is a challenge to all male horror writers, both published and unpublished, to showcase their prose as well as to produce a reading to be aired in podcast form for all of our listening pleasure. Your story (in both text and audio form) will be judged and voted upon by the fans to determine the 2014 Master of the Macabre. Each podcast story must be crafted by the entrant and will be limited to ten (10) minutes.
This year we’ll be having a finalist round where only the very best audio stories will be competing in the final voting round, so make sure your words are as sharp as your claws and saddle up!
2014 Theme: CREATURE FEATURE
Premise: From the rubber costumes of the 20’s to lumbering shuggoths of H.P.Lovecraft to the CG terrors that grace the modern-day silver screen, monsters have always been an integral component to striking horror into our hearts. Whether it’s an alien behemoth from the sky, an otherworldly demon, or a simple mutant pet, it’s time to summon some dark, inhuman creature to menace society.
Challenge: Create a brand new written story and from that story create a 10 minute horror podcast that contains four story elements (below). Register to compete by May 20th, 2014. Audio and text are due on June 20th, 2014
Story Elements: Each participant will be randomly assigned the following three story elements. Your story needs to include each of the following:
1. Location: Where will the story take place? Will your creature attack in a shopping mall? An airplane? Perhaps the havoc will begin in the Gobi desert? The globe is our playground and the black crystal ball will let you know where the monster shall attack.
2. Item: A simple item will be assigned to you, and it must appear somewhere in your story. Whether it will help or hinder you (and/or your characters) is up to you, but the item shall be gifted to you so you gotta use it. Magic amulets, toilet plungers, dirty wigs, or animal corpses might find it’s way to your inventory, so be hope for the best and be prepared for the worst.
3. Creature’s Origin: Where will the nightmare stem from? Will the creature spawn in the dankest city sewers or will it be awoken from the depths of an abandoned copper mine? Will it live in an abandoned church or will it be found living in the hold of a tanker? You must craft the creature, but the dark lords we answer to will choose WHERE it was born.
Dates to Remember:
Registration opens – April 20th, 2014
Registration closes – May 20th, 2014
Complete story and audio due – June 20th, 2014
Elimination round down to the top 5 – July 1st, 2014
Stories air and voting begins – August 9th, 2014
Last day to vote – September 9th, 2014
Crowning the Master of Macabre – October 3rd, 2014
How to register: If you are up to the challenge, email your name, headshot, and a short (under 50 word) bio to: horroraddicts@gmail.com. Within a few days you’ll receive the complete set of rules as well as your assigned story elements. The sooner you respond, the more time you’ll have to craft your story and produce your podcast!
Questions? Then email us at horroraddicts@gmail.com. No questions and ready to create something terrifying? Email us at horroraddicts@gmail.com.
Good luck, and may dreadful winged things rend the flesh from your enemies of writing.
Dreadfully yours,
Rick Kitagawa
2013 Master of Macabre
Creed Noir Presents Mass Hysteria is a exhibition of great Horror trailers, shorts, and feature length films made by indie filmmakers.This is a different sort of film festival. We are looking for anything that has themes of madness, paranormal and occult, or the macabre. This live stream event will be hosted by Creed Noir himself as he introduces the show, each piece shown, and maybe an interview or two.
Come and join in on the fun and thrills of hosted Horror in the spirit of Elvira, Joe Bob Brigs, or the Crypt Keeper on June 6, 2014.
Currently there are no prizes involved, but there is NO submission fee.
For more information go to: http://machinationsintomadness.com/masshysteria/
The 4th Annual Masters of Macabre Writing Challenge
This is the 4th annual Masters of Macabre story contest, sponsored by the nightmarish terrors residing over at HorrorAddicts.net. This is the chance for all the gentlemen to show the Wicked Women Writers that we can chill your bones and strike naked fear into the deepest crevices of your psyche just as well as any Great Old One you might find on your next expedition to the dark places of the earth…
What is the Masters of Macabre Writing Challenge?
This is a challenge to all male horror writers, both published and unpublished, to showcase their prose as well as to produce a reading to be aired in podcast form for all of our listening pleasure. Your story (in both text and audio form) will be judged and voted upon by the fans to determine the 2014 Master of the Macabre. Each podcast story must be crafted by the entrant and will be limited to ten (10) minutes.
This year we’ll be having a finalist round where only the very best audio stories will be competing in the final voting round, so make sure your words are as sharp as your claws and saddle up!
2014 Theme: CREATURE FEATURE
Premise: From the rubber costumes of the 20’s to lumbering shuggoths of H.P.Lovecraft to the CG terrors that grace the modern-day silver screen, monsters have always been an integral component to striking horror into our hearts. Whether it’s an alien behemoth from the sky, an otherworldly demon, or a simple mutant pet, it’s time to summon some dark, inhuman creature to menace society.
Challenge: Create a brand new written story and from that story create a 10 minute horror podcast that contains four story elements (below). Register to compete by May 20th, 2014. Audio and text are due on June 20th, 2014
Story Elements: Each participant will be randomly assigned the following three story elements. Your story needs to include each of the following:
1. Location: Where will the story take place? Will your creature attack in a shopping mall? An airplane? Perhaps the havoc will begin in the Gobi desert? The globe is our playground and the black crystal ball will let you know where the monster shall attack.
2. Item: A simple item will be assigned to you, and it must appear somewhere in your story. Whether it will help or hinder you (and/or your characters) is up to you, but the item shall be gifted to you so you gotta use it. Magic amulets, toilet plungers, dirty wigs, or animal corpses might find it’s way to your inventory, so be hope for the best and be prepared for the worst.
3. Creature’s Origin: Where will the nightmare stem from? Will the creature spawn in the dankest city sewers or will it be awoken from the depths of an abandoned copper mine? Will it live in an abandoned church or will it be found living in the hold of a tanker? You must craft the creature, but the dark lords we answer to will choose WHERE it was born.
Dates to Remember:
Registration opens – April 20th, 2014
Registration closes – May 20th, 2014
Complete story and audio due – June 20th, 2014
Elimination round down to the top 5 – July 1st, 2014
Stories air and voting begins – August 9th, 2014
Last day to vote – September 9th, 2014
Crowning the Master of Macabre – October 3rd, 2014
How to register: If you are up to the challenge, email your name, headshot, and a short (under 50 word) bio to: horroraddicts@gmail.com. Within a few days you’ll receive the complete set of rules as well as your assigned story elements. The sooner you respond, the more time you’ll have to craft your story and produce your podcast!
Questions? Then email us at horroraddicts@gmail.com. No questions and ready to create something terrifying? Email us at horroraddicts@gmail.com.
Good luck, and may dreadful winged things rend the flesh from your enemies of writing.
Dreadfully yours,
Rick Kitagawa
2013 Master of Macabre
The 4th Annual Masters of Macabre Writing Challenge
This is the 4th annual Masters of Macabre story contest, sponsored by the nightmarish terrors residing over at HorrorAddicts.net. This is the chance for all the gentlemen to show the Wicked Women Writers that we can chill your bones and strike naked fear into the deepest crevices of your psyche just as well as any Great Old One you might find on your next expedition to the dark places of the earth…
What is the Masters of Macabre Writing Challenge?
This is a challenge to all male horror writers, both published and unpublished, to showcase their prose as well as to produce a reading to be aired in podcast form for all of our listening pleasure. Your story (in both text and audio form) will be judged and voted upon by the fans to determine the 2014 Master of the Macabre. Each podcast story must be crafted by the entrant and will be limited to ten (10) minutes.
This year we’ll be having a finalist round where only the very best audio stories will be competing in the final voting round, so make sure your words are as sharp as your claws and saddle up!
2014 Theme: CREATURE FEATURE
Premise: From the rubber costumes of the 20’s to lumbering shuggoths of H.P.Lovecraft to the CG terrors that grace the modern-day silver screen, monsters have always been an integral component to striking horror into our hearts. Whether it’s an alien behemoth from the sky, an otherworldly demon, or a simple mutant pet, it’s time to summon some dark, inhuman creature to menace society.
Challenge: Create a brand new written story and from that story create a 10 minute horror podcast that contains four story elements (below). Register to compete by May 20th, 2014. Audio and text are due on June 20th, 2014
Story Elements: Each participant will be randomly assigned the following three story elements. Your story needs to include each of the following:
1. Location: Where will the story take place? Will your creature attack in a shopping mall? An airplane? Perhaps the havoc will begin in the Gobi desert? The globe is our playground and the black crystal ball will let you know where the monster shall attack.
2. Item: A simple item will be assigned to you, and it must appear somewhere in your story. Whether it will help or hinder you (and/or your characters) is up to you, but the item shall be gifted to you so you gotta use it. Magic amulets, toilet plungers, dirty wigs, or animal corpses might find it’s way to your inventory, so be hope for the best and be prepared for the worst.
3. Creature’s Origin: Where will the nightmare stem from? Will the creature spawn in the dankest city sewers or will it be awoken from the depths of an abandoned copper mine? Will it live in an abandoned church or will it be found living in the hold of a tanker? You must craft the creature, but the dark lords we answer to will choose WHERE it was born.
Dates to Remember:
Registration opens – April 20th, 2014
Registration closes – May 20th, 2014
Complete story and audio due – June 20th, 2014
Elimination round down to the top 5 – July 1st, 2014
Stories air and voting begins – August 9th, 2014
Last day to vote – September 9th, 2014
Crowning the Master of Macabre – October 3rd, 2014
How to register: If you are up to the challenge, email your name, headshot, and a short (under 50 word) bio to: horroraddicts@gmail.com. Within a few days you’ll receive the complete set of rules as well as your assigned story elements. The sooner you respond, the more time you’ll have to craft your story and produce your podcast!
Questions? Then email us at horroraddicts@gmail.com. No questions and ready to create something terrifying? Email us at horroraddicts@gmail.com.
Good luck, and may dreadful winged things rend the flesh from your enemies of writing.
Dreadfully yours,
Rick Kitagawa
2013 Master of Macabre
Premise: There is something both fearsome and attractive in a wild thing, be it man or beast. From creature legends told around ancient campfires, to modern tales of King Kong and crypto zoology, critters have always captured our darkest imagination. Get your Beast on.
Challenge: Create a 10 minute horror podcast that contains four story elements, plus your written story. Registration closes 4-13-14. Audio and text are due on 5-13-14.
Story Elements: Each of our Wicked Belles will be assigned a location, a blessing, a curse … and a Beast. Your story must include a lady in peril and these four elements:
Location: Anywhere in the world is fair game. A private zoo? A Japanese Nightclub? Kindergarten Show ‘N’ Tell? You are the game. We’ll give you the board.
Blessing: A helpful item to tame the danger in your tale. We couldn’t have you stalked by a Werewolf without at least giving you a silver locket to melt down. Use your item wisely, Wicked. Even a trivial thing can save your life.
Curse: An untimely disability. You can’t skip through this one without feeling a bite of a fang on your ass. The Norns can be quite evil with this element.
Beast: Beasts will be drawn from the 12 animal signs of the Chinese zodiac: Rat, Ox, Tiger, Rabbit, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Goat, Monkey, Rooster, Dog, or Pig. The Beast may be a main character in your story, or may be represented in other creative ways… a tattoo? An advertising logo? A supernatural brute? Freak of nature? You name it, as long as you include it. Any genre of horror is welcome, but this ain’t Lassie, my Wickeds. Not unless she rips out your throat!
Dates to Remember:
Contest Opens – March 4, 2014
Registration Closes – April 13, 2014
Audio & Text Due – May 13, 2014
Elimination Round to 5 Wickeds – May 24, 2014
Voting Begins June 13, 2014
Voting Ends July 28, 2014
2014 Winner Announced August 23, 2014
WARNING: The Norns are majorly p.m.s.ing this year. This challenge involves shotgun-quick writing & recording skills. The squeamish need not apply!
If you would like to compete, send an e-mail to: Horroraddicts@gmail.com –We’ll send you the complete set of rules and assign your story elements. Remember, the sooner you respond, the more time you’ll have to write and produce your podcast.
GOOD LUCK, MY WICKED, AND MAY THE ODDS BE EVER IN YOUR FAVOR!
Margaret Fiske, our 2013 Wicked Women Writer Winner, will contact you for further challenge details and timeline. Deadline to enter the 2014 Wicked Woman Writer Challenge is April 13, 2014.
Please note: The earlier you enter the challenge, the longer you’ll have to prepare, write, edit, and produce your contest entry before the deadline. Contest slots fill up fast!
Listen to Jay Hartlove on the Season Finale of HorrorAddicts.net, #97, and tell us what your favorite thing about Halloween is below. Every comment on this post is entered to win Jay’s book! Good luck!
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The following text is posted as part of HorrorAddicts.net‘s annual Wicked Women Writers Challenge.
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Amy K. Marshall – Paternoster
Disaster – Loss of all fuel sources
Location – elevator
Helpful Item – Swiss army survival knife
Disability – sprained swollen ankle
Amy K Marshall
Paternoster
My name is Lily…
It’s been three days since the world went Dark. At least … I think it’s been three days. It’s been two days since I last heard a human voice. At least…I think it’s been two days. The last voice I heard was Perttu’s voice. He called to me from the 4th floor landing. He never liked elevators and he hated this Paternoster with an irrational vengeance. Yeah. Irrational. Not from where I’m sitting now. Nothing irrational about that now…
It’s Dark. It’s mostly silent. There were people in the elevator’s other cars. I remember people hopping on and off. I remember my car shifting and swaying…. Don’t know what a Paternoster is?
It’s Europe’s Death Elevator.
It’s also the quickest way up to the 6th floor—that’s where Dr. Mikkel Akselson has his neuro-opthamology lab. But that’s a million miles away now…
You stand there … watching… the cars rise without stopping. There are two lights on the floor … they blink … red – red – red – GREEN – red – red – red – GREEN. You see, when it’s GREEN, that’s when it’s safe to hop into the car. It doesn’t wait for you, though. It just keeps moving. It’s like one of those rotating filing cabinets … only this one is for people .. for bodies … now, I’m sure it’s for the dead…
It was evening … and the lobby was crowded. People were happy, talking, laughing … it was nearly the week-end, and, well, I was looking forward to time away from Copenhagen with Mikkel. Just Mikkel and me.
I hate this elevator. I was too lazy to take the stairs.
Red – red – red – GREEN.
Too late.
I hear unflattering things behind me in Danish. I know they’re unflattering because Mikkel and Perttu and I got drunk one evening and they decided I needed to learn how to swear in Danish.
Det passer sgu ikke! Means that’s not bloody true.
Jeg er ligeglad … that’s a good one because it means I don’t care.
Hold kaeft! That means shut up … I think. They laughed quite a bit over that one…
Det er sgu rigtigt! That means I’ll be damned
I’ll be damned. Sure as hell … I’ll be damned…
Red – red –red – Green!
A hand in my back shoved me forward.
OW!
Dit rovhul!
I hope I said that correctly.
I hit the back of the car and turn – I see their smirks as the car moves upward.
Upwards.
There’s no top to the car. I see the chain mechanism.
I rise.
The floors slide by. On the third floor, a red-haired young man starts to step in, but pulls back.
I rise.
Getting on is one thing.
Getting off is another.
Fifth floor.
“This, you must see…” I hear Mikkel’s voice slide through my brain. I can feel his hand on my arm. He smiles, and I’m lost in his eyes. I’m such a sucker for eyes. “Up and over—“
His gaze holds mine as we clear the 6th floor.
What the hell –
I’ve forgotten to get off!
The car rocks up and over the top of the mechanism. A large flywheel slips and spins, cranking the car around.
Get off on 6, you idiot …
“I’ve saved the best for last.”
What the hell is going on? I can still hear him. I think.
I miss 6.
I slide to 5.
To 4.
The young man on 3 is gone.
Two.
One.
“Into the darkness…”
I hold my breath.
We slid beneath the ground floor. Red signs slide by…they’re in Danish.
Mikkel’s breath is warm against my cheek as he leans closer in the darkness. “Keep Standing.”
“Pardon?” I breathe, my knees weakening.
Did I mention that Dr. Akselson is something you wouldn’t think of pushing out of bed?
“It’s what the sign says,” he replies.
“Oh…”
Deeper.
Darker.
We pass across the bottom of the mechanism.
We rise into light.
“I enjoy the darkness,” he says, his accent thickening. “Peaceful…like the grave.”
“Pardon?”
“No, no … I’m not saying it right.” He smiles.”My English.”
My Danish sucks, so what can I say about his English?
I’m lost in thought.
Third floor.
The red-haired young man is back. He doesn’t move. He just…watches. I feel his eyes follow me up.
Remember to get off on 6.
What the –
What the hell was that?
Hello?
Hello?
In those first moments, I strained my ears. I couldn’t hear anything. They rang with the remembered grinding of the Paternoster. The reverberated the bang of its stopping.
Hello?
I could hear others in other cars saying the same.
I changed tack.
I’m here! Are you there? Are you okay? What’s happened?
But … they’re all speaking Danish. No one answered me. Well, no one answered me so I could understand.
It won’t be long.
Hours passed.
Long hours passed.
This is crap—waiting for a rescue.
I rummage through my bum bag (that’s a fanny pack for you Americans) and come up with
A Swiss Army Knife.
WWMD?
What Would Macgyver do?
Better yet, what would Macgyver’s writers do?
Two blades … a corkscrew…and me without a bottle of wine … that saw that really isn’t a saw. Two screwdrivers, a way to pry open a beer, tweezers, and a toothpick.
Just.
Brilliant.
Keep Standing.
Screw that.
I slumped to the floor, flipping the blade open and closed. Open and closed. Open and closed.
Red – red- red- GREEN
But…there’s no light.
Open and closed. Open and closed open and –
That’s when I heard Perttu.
Hey, Lily! You okay?
I press my back against the back of the car and get to my feet.
Perttu?
How the hell does he know I’m here?
Stay put, Lil! I’ll get you out!
I hear him stagger away.
I mean … I listen to him …. Stagger…
What the hell is going on?
Then … there’s nothing.
It doesn’t occur to me that there’s nothing.
No one.
Only silence.
Open and closed open and closed open and –
What the hell was that?
The elevator starting up?
Closed and open –
Yeah … the elevator. It’s resetting or something…
What the –
SCREAM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Uff! Ow! Som’bitch!
(sobs) My ankle.
Som’BITCH! My ANKLE!
There was something there! In the dark! On 3!
It was … him… I swear … that guy … that red-haired guy was on 3!
Hey!
Hey!
Can you hear me? Can you hear –
(growl)
(heavy breathing) What the –
Shhhh…… shhh…. (heavy breathing)
There’s something out there –
Where is it?
I scrabble against the floor.
It’s only a Swiss Army Knife, but – what the HELL is that SOUND??
Those are … footsteps…
Oh … my God ..
Mikkel … Perttu … what the hell is this?
I’ve gotta get out of here.
But my ankle … Shit …
Ow … maybe if I –
(loud thump)
Oh … my God …
It’s dark. I press back against the side of the car. It’s dark. I can’t see it and it can’t see me…right? Right??
(low growl)
Right … right … shhhh…..
Maybe if I just –
(attack sound)
SCREAM!!!!
Get off! Get off! Help! Help!
Perttu! Perttu!
(heavy breathing) … no way …
Ew… is it? I mean … it’s not dead. I don’t think it’s dead…
Oh … my God … is it dead?
What is it?
(low growl)
Oh my God, it’s NOT dead!
It will be now –
(heavy hit)
(sawing)
I don’t know what it is… it’s not…human. It doesn’t look human at all. But, I’ll bet there are more of them.
I know what to do
(sawing)
It’s what I did.
The only thing I could think of to do.
(sawing)
“What did you do?”
“Pardon?”
“What did you do?”
(sawing)
I cut the skin off it. Carefully of course. It skinned like a rabbit. Like a little coat. One incision around the neck, and then I unzipped it. The guts made the floor slippery, but that was okay. Make it smell like a kill. Maybe that would keep them away. Or attract them.
Have you ever tried to skin something big with a Swiss Army Knife?
Sucks. Let me tell you.
Thank God I had a decent edge on that blade.
“What did you do?”
I ate part of it. I mean, three days is a long time, and it didn’t taste particularly rancid. I mean. I was still fresh.
And then, I wore its skin.
You see… that was the trick to getting out.
There were more of them. I tucked its skin around me. I cut away its face and wore it like a mask.
The Paternoster has no top.
Three days I waited … and then the thing got a little wormy, but my ankle felt like it could support some weight … so I tucked the skin around me and climbed out. It took a little balance on top of the car, but I’d cut away its claws and used them like pitons – you know, like mountain climbers use.
I climbed until I got to the ground floor.
There were bodies everywhere … but there were no creatures. Just…bodies. I saw the remains of the two guys who pushed me onto the Paternoster. I felt bad, ‘cause they’d saved my life.
It was night. A stinking night. And I walked out into it and –
And –
And –
“And?”
I noticed how the skin looked different.
“In the moonlight?”
“I don’t think moonlight had anything to do with it.”
“What do you think?”
“The air was clearer.”
“Indeed.”
“Can I see Mikkel now? I want to see him now.”
“You’ve seen him for days.”
It was later that I found Mikkel’s notes … his research had taken the darkest of turns before it became Night. Neuro-opthamology includes the study of reactive chemicals that can fool the brain into believing in hallucinations. He found the perfect dose.
“I got the idea from a book on Lily’s shelf,” he had written. “It was all about things underground and the dark … and monsters … and the monstrous dark. Perttu doesn’t believe such a random test is a good idea, but the chemical is only slightly reactive in the quantities I proposed. A slight hallucination for test subjects in the Paternoster. They are in a contained space. We can keep them in the cars for up to an hour. We can play at an elevator malfunction.”
What could possibly go wrong…?
*******
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