We were driving rapidly down Main Street as a horrible creature from another dimension followed behind us, its long strides keeping pace and making the car shake with each step it took. The engine roared as we sped away from the butcher shop. Randy was sitting in the seat next to me and it took me a minute to realize he was eating something.
It was a bucket of KFC.
“Seriously!? How can you be hungry at a time like this?? We’re about to die, Randy!”
“We got bigger problems than that right now,” he said, patting down his pockets with greasy fingers and leaving stains as he searched for something. “We’re all out of booze! We need to make a pit stop as soon as you get a chance.”
Normally this would be an absurd statement. But unfortunately the lack of alcohol was a bit of an issue, since there were plenty more monsters ready to come through into our world, and the only thing keeping them out was our ability to stay intoxicated so we didn’t see them. I had kept my percentage down below the legal driving limit, but I was starting to feel like that wasn’t cutting it anymore.
“You need to start drinking more,” Randy explained. “You’re the one who saw it first, remember? If anything, this is kinda your fault.”
I gripped the steering wheel with white knuckled rage and continued driving.
Regardless of what he said, I want to make sure it’s on the record that this was all Randy’s fault. He had admitted to making at least one wish using a cursed magic monkey paw - and we all know how that usually plays out.
I saw a convenience store and immediately slammed on the brakes. Reaching over Randy, I threw open his door and kicked him out. It was easy since he wasn’t wearing a seatbelt and was already beginning to fall asleep.
“What the fuck, dude?” He yelled as I pulled away.
“Get us more booze! I’m gonna circle the block,” I shouted at him out the window, picking up speed.
Then I took out my gun and aimed at the monster which was getting closer by the second. I took three shots at it over my shoulder and missed two of them. But the third caught it squarely in the neck and it began to howl a guttural cry, dripping black blood all over the street from its fresh wound. It slowed down momentarily, but then picked up its pace again, coming after me with renewed rage.
My goal had been accomplished, though. I’d been trying to keep it away from Randy, since he was on foot and more vulnerable. We would need to abandon the car, though, I realized. If I was going to start drinking more I wouldn’t be able to drive safely. As bad as things were getting, I wasn’t about to start breaking the law - especially that particular one. I’d seen enough death and destruction caused by drunk drivers over my years on the force. I wasn’t going to go down that road.
I looked back to see the creature still gaining on me.
My mind was racing trying to think of a way to evade it, to outwit it. I needed to do something to kill it. But what?
Suddenly my cell phone was ringing. I picked it up and looked at the caller ID. It was Jay, the delivery driver. He was in the car ahead of me and I had kind of forgotten he was there.
“Listen,” he said quickly. “I got a plan. We need to lure that thing to the swamp. Just follow me and keep up the pace.”
“It’s a cop car,” I said dryly. “I’m pretty sure I can keep up with your piece of shit-”
My words were cut short as the line went dead and the car ahead of me began to accelerate rapidly. I floored it but found the guy was still gaining distance between the two of us.
Whatever he had under the hood was making that little car go a lot faster than I would have thought possible.
My phone dinged and I looked down to see a text from Jay. It was an eggplant with a water spray emoji.
This fucking town…
*
We reached the edge of the city limits of Hollow’s End to find a parking lot which sloped at an unnatural angle downwards. At the bottom of this strange gravel lot was a murky-looking swamp full of brackish green water. A small copse of trees stood to one side near the shore.
No other cars were parked there which was good, since the creature was still close behind us.
I was following Jay as closely as I could and imitating his car’s movements, although my vehicle was sluggish and clumsy by comparison. He was still driving at top speed, and I figured it was important that I keep up with him for whatever he planned to do.
When we reached the edge of the water, near that little grouping of trees, he hit the brakes and swerved to the right. His tires stayed on the gravel, but just barely. The entire parking lot was sloped so severely towards the water that the force of gravity was insisting on taking us into the swamp.
Realizing that my bigger vehicle wouldn’t make the turn in time, I hit the brakes early and tried to slow down, knowing that otherwise I would crash right into a tree or go into the water trying to make the move.
As soon as I slowed down I could hear the creature’s breath and its movements just behind the car. I avoided the temptation to look back, since I knew it would be my death if I did. Instead, I yanked hard on the wheel and turned it to the right, skidding to a stop on the grass, my fender just inches away from a large pine tree.
The creature’s brakes were not quite as good as mine, since it was desperate to kill me and hadn’t really slowed down. Instead, it went skidding into the green water, coated with algae and looking much thicker than was normal. It was like a giant bowl of pea soup. The creature was thrashing around, looking as if it were in pain, and then I noticed the tendrils of swamp water moving on its skin, pulling it in deeper, like an enormous squid wrestling with a shark.
My phone rang again and I picked it up, my eyes still focused on the creature trying to get out of the swamp. It looked like it would not be able to escape from whatever was holding it there, and I breathed a sigh of relief that I hadn’t gone in with that wild last minute maneuver.
Then it was as if an enormous hand reached up from below and pulled the creature under. Despite the fact that there were only dark empty sockets where eyes should have been, I could have sworn I saw them widen as it was dragged under, and then was gone.
“Problem solved,” Jay said when I answered the phone. “You can thank me later. And we’ll definitely owe Swampy a favor. Now let’s get back into town and grab Randy. Maybe the three of us can figure out a solution to this whole mess.”
*
I managed to convince Jay to let me ride shotgun in his car, telling him that mine was having engine trouble. This was partly as a ploy to make him our designated driver, but also to cover for the fact that he was clearly the superior driver of a far better automobile than my cruiser. And who knew when we’d have to outrun one of those monsters again?
After applying copious amounts of duct tape to all of the mirrors on the vehicle, we were off, heading back towards the convenience store where I’d left Randy.
We found him out front with a large paper bag full of bottles in his arms, sleeping in the grassy ditch near the road. There were several children taking turns at poking him with a stick.
“Okay, beat it, kids!” I yelled at them as we approached.
The children ran off and out of the corner of my eye I noticed a few of them looked very odd. One had a furry face and ears like a dog, while another had red eyes, and yet another was running on all fours. They scattered in every direction, making it difficult to pinpoint any other discrepancies.
“What’s the deal with this town?” I muttered to nobody in particular.
“How much time do you have?” Jay asked, laughing. “This place is weirder than you could possibly imagine. There’s a lot of history here. Sorry to say, you didn’t really know what you were getting into when you moved to this place.”
“Can you give me a quick summary?” I asked, kicking Randy gently in the ribs. He snored and swatted the air like an annoyed cat, then rolled over on his other side. His right leg began to pump up and down as if he were chasing a rabbit in his dreams.
“I’m not really at liberty to discuss all of it. People in Hollow’s End prefer to keep their secrets to themselves. But if you get to know them, you’ll find most folks are nice enough. As long as you live here, anyways. Tourists do tend to occasionally go missing if they stay out past sunrise. And if you meet anyone wearing a hooded robe your best bet is to avoid them. Oh, and there’s this guy named Frank who-”
Randy sat bolt upright, screaming at the top of his lungs, clutching the bag of liquor bottles so tightly against his chest that I thought they would shatter.
“It’s okay, man,” I said, leaning down to pat his shoulder in what I hoped was a comforting gesture. “It was just a nightmare.”
He was breathing heavily for a few moments and didn’t respond. But then finally he unscrewed the cap of one of the liquor bottles and took a long gulp.
“Right. A nightmare. That’s all it was.”
He didn’t seem entirely convinced.
“Alright, what’s the plan, guys?” Jay asked. “I’m happy to help out if you need me to.”
I took one of the liquor bottles from Randy and took a long drink from it. After wiping my mouth, I screwed the cap back on and stuffed the bottle in my pocket. Thinking hard about the next lead to follow up on, I came up short. We didn’t really have anything.
“Do you know anyone who would be interested in buying a monkey paw?” I asked. “Is there anyone in town dumb enough or reckless enough to take ownership of it? Because I feel like that fucking thing is at the center of all of this. It’s like a murder investigation - if we can find the weapon used to commit the crime, we might be able to solve it.”
Jay looked at me and Randy looked at the ground between his legs.
“I know just the guy,” Jay answered. “You know how I was telling you to stay away from Frank? Well, we might need to disregard that advice, just temporarily.”
*
The three of us pulled up outside a house a short while later, now with Jay behind the wheel, chauffeuring us around town.
We went up to the front door and he continued explaining the protocol for how to deal with this Frank individual.
“Remember, whatever you do, don’t stare. And don’t go inside his house - whatever he wants to tell us he can tell us outside. People who go in there are usually tourists, and they’re never, ever seen again. That’s like guaranteed death just stepping into that place.”
I tried not to think about how many rules I was breaking, how many vows in my oath as a Sheriff were completely null and void now.
“You know I’m a police officer, right? Most people don’t speak so freely about the kidnapping and murder of tourists.”
Randy slapped my arm.
“Come on, man. Just when we’re starting to think you’re cool, you go and say something like that. Killing tourists is a proud tradition in Hollow’s End. If you don’t like it then you shouldn’t have moved here.”
I didn’t have time to debate the subject anymore, as Jay was now knocking on the front door of the house.
The door swung open on the first knock, as if it had been slightly ajar.
“Hello,” Jay called into the darkness. “Frank? Are you there? I need to talk to you about something.”
He stuck his head into the dark gap afforded by the open door. For a moment I had a horrible mental image of it slamming shut on his neck, squeezing and choking him as blood poured from wounds created by the pressure of sharp wood on his flesh.
But instead, something worse happened.
Jay let out a gasp and then disappeared through the gap. As if he had been picked up by his hair and was dragged inside by a hungry bear.
My heart was pounding fast as I realized I was going to have to ignore all of Jay’s warnings if I was going to save him and the town. Despite the dangers, we were going to have to go inside after all.