Baked Scribe Flashback : Headless

The screaming of the motorcycle as it raced past the house had been keeping him up all night, every night this week. He didn’t know who in the neighborhood was going through the mid-life crisis, but he was ready for it to stop. It was getting so pervasive in his subconscious that he was noticing motorcycles everywhere. Several times on the way home in early evening traffic, he would spot a lone headlight in his mirror, rushing up on him as if on a collision course. Something else would distract him, and when he looked back, nothing would be there. At work, he would doze off in his cubicle and snap back awake, certain that he had just heard the din of an engine.

Besides the racket at night, he had also been having horrible nightmares. He woke up with images of dark, hulking forms riding down on him, sometimes wielding a human spinal cord as if it were a whip. He might have to break down and see the doctor for a prescription. He needed his sleep.

It was in this half-dazed, half-asleep state that he found himself strolling down the street for a late night walk when he heard the motorcycle again. The sound had become so frequent for him that he barely noticed it, even though it sounded like it was bearing down, directly onto him. He turned, with just enough time to take in the spectral shape standing atop the giant black motorcycle. The towering creature looked down at him as the cycle approached, or at least that’s what he thought it was doing.

There was no head.

He was only vaguely aware of standing there, mouth hanging open as the cycle jumped the curb and raced down the sidewalk at him. The figure bent down as it approached, clutching a severed head in one hand while the other gripped the hilt of a sword, drawing back to strike. The instinct to run came to him, far too late. As he turned to run, he felt a dull, but heavy impact. He fell to the ground, watching from another, diminishing universe as his own headless corpse collapsed onto the grass next to him.