Guest Post - Andrew Kincaid

Those who follow my blog regularly might remember a couple of book review posts I did awhile back for On DarkPaths and Strange World by Andrew Kincaid. Both are great short story horror collections that I would recommend to anyone who is a fan of the genre. Actually, I'd recommend them to anyone who likes to read a good story.

Anyway, I stay in touch with Andrew via Twitter and email and I asked him to post an excerpt for one of his stories to my blog. In turn, he allowed me to do the same on his blog. So, Andrew will be hosting a sample of my short story, Warleader, while you get to read a sample from one of his short stories from On Dark Paths.

Here's Andrew:

Regulars to Joshua's blog might wonder what a guy like me - a horror author - is doing here.  After all, Joshua writes epic fantasy, which couldn't be more different right?  Well it turns out I'm something of a genre traitor - I like horror and fantasy. And it turns out Joshua is the same way, as he liked my stuff well enough to be willing to offer me a guest spot here.  So I won't wear out my welcome by rambling on any longer.  To the meat of the matter!

What follows is an excerpt from my first collection of horror stories, On Dark Paths.  It is called Beyond the Veil and it is the first of thirteen stories that, if I did my job right, make you keep the night light on. You know.  Just in case...

Beyond the Veil
Reality as we know it is little more thana veil.  It's thin and porous as aneggshell; it doesn't take much for something from Outside to slip in via someunholy osmosis. 

I don't know who or what designed theworld this way.  I once believed in abenevolent God.  Once, but no longer.

Ithink that if there is a God he is at best indifferent to his Creation.  At worst, he regards us much the same way akid with a magnifying glass regards a line of ants on a sunny day. 

Do I sound crazy?  Maybe I do. Maybe I am.  All I know is that notso very long ago I caught a glimpse of something mortal eyes weren't meant tosee, something that shouldn't exist in any sane world.

The trouble started the night I met Mary.

I had just settled onto the couch thatnight after a long day slaving away at my cruddy retail job.  I had a six pack in hand and was lookingforward to melting my brain with reality television, my guilty pleasure.  Funny thing that; half of the people on myshows were as brainless and petty as the people I was forced to deal with on adaily basis at my job.  You'd think Iwould have had enough of it during the day, but I tuned in every nightanyway...

...and I'm rambling.  Probably because I don't want to recall theevents that followed.  I wish I couldhave watched my shitty shows, drank myself stupid, and then woke up the nextmorning with a massive hangover.  I wishmy life could have stayed normal, boring though it was.  That just wasn't in the cards I guess.

It was just getting good, onecarrot-faced girl with huge boobs had another equally busty carrot face pinnedto the ground because one had stolen the other's man, when there was a heavypounding on my front door.

I had downed a couple by that time so thesound took awhile to register.  I sat andlistened a moment, until there was another round of heavy pounding and a voiceI'll never forget for the rest of my life.

"Please!  Please help me!"  A woman wailed.  Her voice was laced with a fear the like ofwhich  I had never heard before.  If Idon't let her in, she's going to die!  The thought flashed through my muddled brainand my buzz disappeared in an instant.  Iall but ran to the door and threw it open.

A pitiful sight greeted my eyes,illuminated by the harsh orange glow of my porch light.  Once she might have been beautiful but thatbeauty had been stolen.  She stood starknaked, her body caked in filth and laced with angry red burns.  They seemed concentrated on her face, ruiningwhat once must have been a lovely sight. 

"Jesus..." I said.  I gaped like an idiot, not quite knowing whatto do. 

"Please.  Please let me in.  It's after me!"  She cried. Primal fear strained her ruined features. Whoever this guy is (my mind couldn't conceive of anything besidesa human that could inflict such wounds)  he must be a psycho, I thought. 

"Yeah all right.  Come on in." I said.  She rushed inside, practically bowling meover in her haste.  She slammed the doorand locked both the door knob and the dead bolt.

"Are any windows open?  Do they lock?"  She all but screamed the questions.  I wondered what kind of crazy broad I had letinto my house, but then from what I could read of her expression she wasn'tcrazy.  Terrified, but not crazy.

"Yes they're all locked."  I said. The weather hadn't warmed enough to warrant opening windows yet, and besidesI was never home and my house lay on the bad end of town.

"Check them."  She said. She busied herself doing just thatto the window closest to the door.  Istood there gaping like an idiot for a moment. She drew the blind and closed the curtains on the first window and thenmoved to the second.  I shrugged anddecided to help.  Why not?  At least it might make her feel better.

It wasn't long before the operation wasfinished.  My house was a one storymodular, little more than a glorified trailer, so there wasn't much tocheck. 

"What is your name, and what thehell is going on?"  I asked when wefinished. I admit I was freaked out by that time.  Somewhere in the process of pulling curtainson all my windows I had convinced myself that I had let an escaped mentalpatient into my house.  Even so I dug outa blanket out of my closet and gave it to her so she could cover herself up.  I prodded her until she would finally sit onthe couch.

"Water.  Please. Could I have something to drink?" She asked.  She sounded so pitiful!  So I poured her a glass of water. She gulpedit down as if she hadn't drank a drop in days.

"I honestly wish I knew what thehell was going on."  She said onceshe finished.  Her face relaxed as muchas it could with her scars.  There was alilting, musical quality to her voice.  Iwondered if she'd been a singer before whatever had happened to her.

"What happened?" I asked.  I cracked open a can of beer and took a biggulp. The coolness spread into my guts. I sighed contentedly.  Good olebeer.

"I don't know," she said,"I remember grocery shopping. People were worried. They said something about us being attacked.  When I got home I was surprised to find myhusband and kids had beat me there.  Hesaid they had let all the teachers and students go early.  He had the news on and was watching with thereally worried face I only saw on him when something terrible happened. Thekids were really scared.  I remember mylittle boy asking if a plane was going to fall on us..."

Something clicked in my brain.

"Whoa.  Wait. You don't mean 9/11 do you?"  I stammered. My stomach roiled.  Bile surged up the back of my throat.  I washed it down with another gulp of beer.The whole situation was way too weird, and I didn't know the half of it yet.

"What?" She goggled at me likeI had just flown in from Mars.

"9/11.  The September 11th terror attacks.  You know. The World Trade Center." I said slowly.  No...thiscan't be real...I thought.

"Yes!  They were showing the Twin Towers onfire.  It was so terrible!  Hey. What's wrong?"  She looked concerned,or at least as concerned as her ruined face allowed her to.

"This can't be...you mean you don'tknow?"  I blurted.  My gut did took to doing flip flops.  The room spun.

"Don't know what?" Sheasked.  Her eyes widened slightly, buther voice was level.  How could she be socalm?  Here she was running naked througha bad part of town at night, covered in scars and burns, and I was the one freaking out!  I forced myself to stifle the feverish gigglebuilding in my throat.

"Mary, the attacks were ten yearsago."  I finally managed.

Thunderstruck would be anunderstatement.  The glass dropped fromher nerveless fingers and tumbled to the floor. Her jaw gaped wide.

"That was....ten yearsago?"  She spoke after several longmoments of silence.

"Almost."  I said. She slumped back into the couch, her eyes wide. I gulped down the lastof my beer.  It didn't help.  I crumpled the can and tossed it aside.

"I've been there for tenyears?"  She said almost toherself.  A single tear leaked from thecorner of her eye and trailed lazily down her cheek.

"Been where?" 

"I..."  A soft scratch on the front door interruptedher.  She froze, and her eyes grew wildwith fear.  The scratches grew moreinsistent.  They moved from the door tothe front window, and then from that window to the next and so on untilwhatever it was made a circuit around the house. 

It scratched at the last window, thewindow to the left hand side of the door as you entered, and then the scratchesstopped.  Deafening silence ensued intheir wake.

"What was..." I said when myheart dislodged itself from my throat long enough for me to speak.

"Shhh..."  She hissed. The scratching started again, this time more insistent.  It made another lap around the house.  After what seemed to be an eternity thescratching subsided.

Whenthe silence lasted ten minutes, I whispered:

"What the hell was that?"

"The thing. The thing that tookme!" She cried.

She launched into the most bizarre storyI had ever heard.  Even to this day, evenhaving seen what I've seen, I still have difficulty grasping that such a placecould exist.  She told me in hushed tonesthat sometime on that day, so many years ago, she blacked out.  When she came to, blackness surrounded her.But the blackness had form and shape and sensation.  A slimy fog, her words, slithered over herlike a million worms. It caked her flesh with filth and left her shivering.  While it was dark in that place, it was alsolight, like the dim light of a gibbous moon obscured by high clouds.

She noticed other people there.  She spoke only a little with them, but enoughto realize there were people from all different backgrounds trapped there withher.  Some spoke no English. Some spokeEnglish but in a dialect so far removed from the modern usage that she scarcelyrecognized it. 

She was there an interminable amount oftime when suddenly the slimy fog took on a completely different character.  It oozed malevolence. 

The people around her becamefrightened.  Some screamed.  Some ran. Still others huddled in the fetal position, rocking back and forth andbabbling to themselves frantically.  Thefog became a thing.  A thing of darknessand teeth and claws.  She wouldn't sayanymore about it, and she didn't go into much detail about what happenednext.  All she would say was that she'dreceived the first of her scars that day.

"You think I'm crazy?"  She said. She barked a laugh. 

"No! Well...yeah.  But can you blame me?"  I said.

"If you don't believe me how aboutyou poke your head outside?"  Shesaid.  She grinned a devilish grin, theeffect amplified by the horrific scars.

"I'll pass." I said.  I shivered. Her story was unbelievable, but to doubt her was to doubt my ownears.  And my own sanity.

"Whatever it was kept coming backevery so often.  I don't know what itwanted.  I think it fed on us somehow; onour anger and pain and fear.  When itwas....doing its thing...."  Sheshivered, "it shared some of itself with us.  I don't know how.  I think that was what kept us alive and saneenough for it to feed.  A few people,surprisingly few actually, did go insane. When it was done with the rest of us, those people were gone."

"Jesus."  I said. I crossed myself.  I had grown upCatholic but spent the bulk of my adult life ignoring that sort of thing.  Right then seemed the moment to find religiononce again.

"I was wandering around after afeeding when I came across...I can't describe it other than to say it was adoor," she said,  "But itwasn't a door like we would understand it. It was a sort of ragged circle that looked like a pool of water.  And I could see street lights beyond it!  So I walked in and wound up in the middle ofa street.  I could sense whatever it wascoming behind me so I ran to the first house I saw with the porch light stilllit.  And here I am."

"Jesus..."  I repeated the name like a mantra.  How isshe so calm if what she's said is true? I wondered.

"Like I said whatever it was kept ussane so it could feed."  Shereplied.  I yelped, and my face turnedhot.  I hadn't realized I had spoken outloud.  She grinned, and continued,"I actually don't remember a lot of what happened.  I...I remember the feelings.  Burning, pain, anger, and terror.  But it's like I was somehow disconnected fromit.  Detached in some way.  So I guess that's why."

"So this....whatever it is..."I sputtered.  I couldn't believe it.  Part of me screamed that she was alunatic.  But she seemed rational to me;more rational than I would have been in the same circumstances.

"...wants me back."  She finished my statement for me.

"But it can't operate a door?  Really?"

"When it was...feeding...." Shesaid, shivering slightly, "It revealed a bit of itself to me.  I don't know if it was aware of that ornot.  I know that it has to followcertain rules when it comes into our world. And one rule is that it has to be invited into a home; it can't forceits way in.  But I guess it takes opendoors or windows as an invitation to come inside.  That's how it got me I think."

"That makes no sense."  I said, shaking my head. The part of mescreaming she's a lunatic! started tolook more appealing at that moment.

"I know it doesn't. " Shesaid.  She started to rise,"Look.  I know you don't believe meat all.  Whatever this thing is it canonly come out at night.  So at least letme stay here until morning and then I'll be out of your hair."

"I can't just leave you on your ownlike that.  You can stay here as long asyou like."  I said. Crazy she mightbe, but  I wasn't the type of guy toneglect someone in need.  Especially awoman. 

"Thank you."  Gratitude rolled off her in waves and shesmiled.  She sank back down onto thecouch with a contented sigh.

As wild as her story was I half believedher.  At the very least I knew somethinghorrible had  happened to her.  I briefly considered calling the police butrejected the notion pretty quickly.  Theywould have her locked up in a padded room within the hour if she startedtalking about her "slimy fog" and doorways again.  Part of me wishes I had called.  Maybe she would have been safe in a mentalhospital. 

At least then she might still be with us.

***
Want more? Come on over and check me out at http://authorandrewkincaid.com/where I talk about all kinds of weird and wonderful things.  You can check out On Dark Paths here and mysecond collection, Strange World, here. Andkeep an eye out fantasy fans, I also have a fantasy series in the works!

I'd like to thank Joshua for his hospitality, and you, dearreader, for giving me your time and attention. It's greatly appreciated :)