Twisted Roads – Twisted Horror Stories by Matthew Tonks

Fear Is the Key

“Pots and pans, sticks and stones, words to taunt, knives to hunt, to cut, to kill. All these things, they will not hurt me. All these things, they will not kill me. For all these things will only make me stronger, they’ll only feed my strength, my power, my will!” he growls as he leaps from shadow to shadow down the corridor, a broad deranged smile upon his face.

“Hiding is a waste of your time, you know I’ll find you, you know you can’t run forever. Eventually, sooner than you think, I’ll introduce you to the light, and suck you empty of your poor misguided soul to feed my endless march through this world!” he says as drool drips from his mouth—thick like raspberry jam. He stops and sniffs the air like an animal, slowly looking over his shoulder.

“There you all are,” he says, his voice now much deeper, more menacing. He leaps to the ceiling, hanging from it as if he’d somehow changed the very laws of gravity itself, then begins to crawl like an insect towards his quarry. He lets out a high-pitched scream—which drifts off into nothingness—as something tears into his stomach. For what feels like an eternity, everything stops. Then, with sudden force, something is torn from him, and he collapses into a heap.

No sooner has he hit the ground than he is surrounded by a small group of kids, the oldest no more than twelve.

“You don’t have any power over us anymore, we’re not afraid of you,” a boy says, as he steps forward, brandishing a large metal pole with a knife taped to its end, a sticky black substance dripping from it.

“You fucking kids think you really have the balls to stop me?” he says as he uneasily gets to his feet, clutching his stomach as the same black liquid from the boy’s blade slowly seeps out from beneath his tightly clenched hand.

“W-We, we know how you get your strength! We know you draw it from the fear you spread, it feeds you, b-b-but we—w-w-we don’t fear you ANYMORE!” the boy yells as they all charge at him with their crudely thrown together weapons, stabbing and hitting him. Their attack is unrelenting. It goes on for minutes, maybe longer, until he lies motionless on the ground before them in a pool of black liquid. They look around at each other, exhausted, but victorious.

“T-That’s for my little sisters, you bastard!” the boy screams as he drives the pole through the man’s skull, it hits the concrete floor with a clank, echoing down the corridor.

For some time they all stand around his remains, before finally slowly making their way down the long corridor. Once outside, the boy turns to the others and allows himself to smile, looking up into the sky as the sun shines through the clouds, spreading its warmth over him.

He feels a heavy hand rest upon his shoulder, and his body stiffens. Slowly, he turns, looking into the man’s bloodshot eyes.

“Do you think you five could really compare to the thousands that already feed my sin?” he says as the boy’s world turns black. He can hear the screams of his friends as they cry out in terror, and the fear—the fear that never ends—his fear, his cries, now become part of the beast’s forever engine.