Night Shoot

by David Sodergren

Crawford Manor. It had stood for centuries, a brooding sentinel overlooking the North Sea, long enough for old mysteries to settle and gnarled roots to creep insidiously into the earth. Within the dank walls of Crawford Manor, secrets were given time to breathe. To atrophy. To fester.

The rising sun glinted off the windows and for the first time Elspeth spotted the bars that adorned the glass panes, thick black wrought-iron ones that covered every window in the house from top to bottom. Fair enough. There was probably a shit-load of expensive old-person crap in there. Can’t have anyone breaking in. Or out.

Crawford Manor was the perfect location for a horror film. Almost too perfect.

A musty smell, old but not unpleasant, seeped from inside. The dying embers of daylight forced their way through the ragged curtains, casting a crimson tint, illuminating an archaic wooden crib in the centre of the room. That wasn’t the problem though. It was the walls. They were lined with shelves, from floor to ceiling, and on those shelves were perched hundreds and hundreds of dolls. ‘You’re kidding me on,’ whispered Hannah.

The dolls themselves were mostly hideous, their cracked ceramic faces weathering years of abandonment. Some were missing eyes, others went without clothes, their bodies carved from what looked like lumps of misshapen timber. There were baby dolls and pirate dolls, sailor dolls and clowns. Too many clowns.

‘Mr Crawford?’ The noises stopped. Hannah reached the door and pushed it open. ‘Oh god,’ she said, her eyes darting across the room. ‘Oh Jesus Christ.’ Only then did the smell hit her, a charnel house stench that flipped her stomach as she struggled to take in the obscenity before her, her mind performing mental backflips to comprehend the bizarre horror behind the door. ‘Please,’ she said, ‘I won’t tell. I won’t tell anyone. Just please, let me go.’ She staggered backwards and he came for her.

Her left breast was missing. A souvenir, he supposed. Her leg had been severely gnawed, stripped of flesh, and he lifted it, positioning the bleached white bone over his knee, pressing down hard with both hands. They were easier to dispose of in parts. He pushed, trying to snap it, but it wouldn’t give. He was getting old. How much longer could he keep this up? In anger, he thrust his hands down and the femur shattered and Hannah jerked into life with a gurgled scream. He fell back, taken by surprise. She shielded her eyes from the light that burned her retinas, her mouth trying to open, straining against the fine cotton thread that bound it shut.

In the darkness, he could only make out the eyes, two clouded marbles deeply set into a creased, patchwork face. It lunged forwards, ragged lips closing over his own, a brittle tongue worming its way inside his mouth. Ted gagged as hands clamped themselves to the sides of his head, pulling him against the foul thing in the bed. It kissed him. It was like kissing a grave.

He kicked out but it wrapped itself around his legs, holding him close, cocooning him in its foul body, and then it wasn’t kissing, it was biting, broken teeth sinking into the soft pink of his tongue and tearing it free, his mouth filling with blood. Ted tried to muscle his way loose, but his arms were pinned. The ghastly mouth bit down on his teeth, enamel grinding against enamel, until he heard them — felt them — crack, splintering into his gums. His whole body shook in agony. Soon, he shook no more.

It towered over her, reaching down and grabbing her by the clavicle again, hauling Laura to her feet. It tightened its grip on the bone, digging its putrid fingers into the meat of her shoulder, putting its other hand on the top of her dizzy, nauseous head and pulling, pulling hard until her collarbone snapped and was wrenched from her body. She sank to the floor, briefly thankful for the darkness that swooned over her eyes.

‘She’s alive,’ said Robert. Elspeth nodded. ‘I know. I’m sorry. But we really have to get out of here. Because whatever did that to Aiden…’ Is still in the house. Here. With us.

She turned her attention to the pool of blood. A trail of it led away, suggesting a body had been dragged to the wardrobe, the door of which hung half-open invitingly. A creeping unease brushed her spine. It had to be a joke. A weird, sick joke. ‘In there,’ she said, pointing. ‘There’s someone in there.’

She was only a few feet away now. What if something was lurking in there, ready to strike? A killer? A monster? Don’t be ridiculous, there’s no such thing as monsters.

She scooched down on her hands and knees, squinting into the black of the wardrobe, where the shadows met the backboard. She crawled in further, the trail ending. It vanished into the wall as if… ‘Wait a minute.’ ‘What is it?’ She flattened her palms against the light wooden panelling. ‘What are you doing?’ asked Robert. Elspeth carried on. If she could just find… Click …the switch. The back of the wardrobe creaked open.

She inched forwards, one step at a time. Robert had shown them some films before the commencement of shooting, to give them an idea of what he was aiming for with the visual style and tone of The Haunting of Lacey Carmichael. The Beyond. Suspiria. The House With Laughing Windows. A bunch more she couldn’t remember the names of. Most had been enjoyable in their own way, but she had always been frustrated by the pacing. The characters did everything so slowly!

Over their heads swayed a frayed white rope, a ceramic duck on the end. Elspeth’s eyes travelled up the cord, to the old wooden trapdoor above them, from which came the relentless drip drip of blood, the beads splashing into the pool below. Whatever they were looking for, it was up there now. Up in the attic.

‘Scissor-paper-stone?’ said Deek. Robert took an eternity to respond. ‘Aye, I s’pose so.’ He held up his fist. ‘Best of three?’ Deek nodded. Elspeth wanted to laugh at the absurdity. A children’s game to decide which of them should go into the attic and grab the keys from the corpse of their friend. It was too ridiculous for words. And yet, she had no better ideas.

They pulled his mouth wider, Deek’s cheeks and lips burning from the pressure. He clawed at the hands, though he may as well have scratched at stone as he plummeted down a mountainside. He bit down on the fingers, his canine teeth digging into the filthy flesh, piercing the skin and drawing blood. It did no good. He heard his cheeks tear before he felt it, his upper lip splitting and ripping up to his nostrils, the loose skin peeling back, exposing gums and rows of stained red teeth. His mouth filled with blood and it poured down his chin as the hands invaded further into his face, dragging the skin apart until it burst and the lower half of his face came away, the sagging flesh of his own lips and jaw and chin held aloft by some monster.

The cold embrace of death enveloped him, and he welcomed it with open arms.

In the nineteen-seventies, it was easy. Hitch-hikers were a common sight, and DNA was years away. After a while, he started to pick up prostitutes. On particularly lean days, he had cruised past school playgrounds in far-off cities with a bag of sweeties and a sharpened knife in the passenger seat. The children were the easiest, but provided the least satisfying meal. Sebastian preferred the women. Yes, he had always been a real ladies’ man.

Ross Crawford smiled and waved at Elspeth, then pressed his foot to the accelerator. The car shot forwards, tearing up grass and mud, onwards, onwards, and then over the edge of the cliff. As the waves and the rocks rushed up to greet him, Crawford closed his eyes and awaited his judgement.

She decided to try Robert. His body wouldn’t be hard to locate. Just follow the trail of blood, like some X-rated Wizard of Oz.

She closed the door behind her and held the shotgun up to her shoulder, her finger hovering over the trigger. It’s just like Time Crisis 3 in the arcade back home, or House of the Dead. Pull the trigger and BAM!

The child. That’s all she was, a little girl. An innocent. Could she be held responsible? Was a child accountable for their actions? Elspeth didn’t give a shit. She hurled the girl through the air. That little bitch. Harriet landed in the fireplace, the old grey wedding dress bursting into flame, the inferno consuming her in seconds. She cried out as her arterial tubes popped and snapped, sprays of blood hissing around the room.

The music stopped, then started again. Once Upon a Dream, for the fifth time in a row. Once upon a fucking nightmare, more like.

Elspeth shook her head, tears running down her cheeks. ‘No, no,’ she muttered, tracing the tracks of blood that smeared across Sandy’s face below the ghastly red hollows where her eyes once were, the fragile cords of her optic nerves dangling from mutilated sockets. ‘You bastard,’ whispered Elspeth.