Shaffer was a small highway town in southeast Texas near the border of Louisiana. It held a peaceful and proud community, sporting a little over 9,000 residents, and was so small in fact that it was only ever marked on local maps relative to the province. The settlement sprung up around the 1960’s following the post World War II baby boom, and an increase in funding for highway construction.
The prosperity of the town slowly began to decline in the mid to late 80’s, and increasingly more so in the early 90’s. This was largely in part due to a multitude of factors ranging from suburbanization, and retail commercial changes, to globalization and outsourcing. Nonetheless the town held strong, and the people even stronger in spite of it all.
Or at least it had…
As it stands, all of the information you just read does not exist. The truth is so much more painful than you know, and…. As much as it pains me to recall the horrors of what took place in Shaffer from my own perspective on August 30th, 2018, I can’t hide it anymore.
Besides, I don’t have much time left anyways. And for all I know, this is the only way anyone will ever hear about what spontaneous events occurred in a small town in Texas.
I awoke groggily to a repetition of loud and increasingly aggravating blares to my right. “Fuck, already?” I murmured. I rubbed my eyes before propping myself up on my elbows with a sigh as I glanced over to my phone that read 6:00 AM and reminded me of that fact over and over again.
I shut the alarm off and got out of bed. After showering, shaving, and getting dressed I headed downstairs to the sight of my mother making breakfast. She hummed peacefully and upon noticing me she shot me a smile.
“Oh hey sweetie, I know you have work but I’m cooking you some breakfast.”
I scratched my head and looked down at the time on my phone. “Momma I really have to-.” I was quickly cutoff by her sweet voice.
“I know I know, but it’ll just be 5 more minutes, I promise. You’re not gonna make me go through all this for nothing are you?” She chuckled as she began to hasten her movements.
I let out a more prolonged than necessary sigh before conceding. “Fine.” I then gave her a peck on the cheek before patiently waiting by the front door while scrolling on my phone.
In her later years my mom’s mental state had slowly began to deteriorate. And, after my father died when she was 68, I just didn’t have the heart to put her in a nursing home. As inconvenient and difficult it’s been since she’s moved in, she’s all I have these days. Now she usually spends her time in the house. Cooking, cleaning, and overall maintaining the wellbeing of the humble household.
My mom met me by the door later than she promised, which was expected. She held a small Tupperware bowl with a lid on it that held some traditional bacon and eggs. She handed it to me as she spoke. “Now be sure to eat that as soon as you get to work, that way it’s still warm.”
“I will momma, just remember to feed Bubba while I’m gone.” Bubba was my grey house cat, whom my mom had grown closer to since she was alone at home most the time. He could be seen grooming himself on the living room couch. Paying no heed to either of us. She simply nodded and then gave me a big hug before I headed on my way.
On the road I turned on the radio to the local station, to be met with the overenthusiastic host. His tone always a little too energetic for it being so early in the morning.
“GOOD MORNING SHAFFER! I hope you all are having an amazing Thursday. I know I am! After all it’s the town’s anniversary. And I know y’all are just itching to celebrate on Main Street. So be sure to wear your best pair of boots to tread the town in, and maybe even listen to some music while you’re at it! Here on SES-FM we have some of the best early morning country tunes for you to start your day with. So be sure to say howdy to your neighbor, and love your girl like a mustang. I’m your host Allen Burg and this is Cowgirls featuring ERNEST by Morgan Wallen.” I turned down the radio some as I drove through town.
Every August 30th Shaffer held a town wide event for it’s anniversary. With a wild western theme as to acknowledge the local school district’s mascot, Rodney the cowboy. Main Street will soon be lined with hay bells, western themed vendors, and people dressed in boots and cowboy hats. Some people were already preparing their riding horses in the streets, and kids ran around without parental supervision to go play outlaw, because school was out for the special occasion.
As I was driving I saw a little kid in a cowboy hat wave at me. He had a a cheery contagious smile that forced an involuntary grin on my face. I simply gave him a wave back and continued driving through Main Street, only to be met by traffic. Great.
I groaned in annoyance as I tried to make my way through all the congestion just to reach the highway. I also couldn’t help but be mad at the fact that I didn’t manage to get the day off because I worked in a plant 30 minutes outside the town, and my supervisors weren’t exactly knowledgeable on the local holiday. I really wanted to spend some quality time with my mom for once, but some things can’t be helped.
“Oh you have got to be fucking kidding me!” I yelled in a fit of anger as I saw that the on-ramp I was trying to get to was closed off with traffic cones. I grit my teeth in further irritation at the realization that I’d have to take the public roads to make it to the next ramp. I was definitely going to be late.
I eventually managed to make my way off of Main Street and get to another road that lead to an on ramp about 10 minutes away. As I drove through the outskirts of town, on either side of the road was a tree-line that gave off a nice woodland feel and eased my frustrations for a bit.
I glanced over to the home cooked meal my mother made me and debated eating it while I drive. I reached over to the passenger seat and struggled with the lid as my attention shifted between the road and the food next to me. Finally managing to pop the lid off the bowl, I reached in and grabbed a piece of bacon.
However in the few moments I wasn’t paying attention to the road I heard a loud release of air followed by my car jolting suddenly. My car made this loud scraping noise, and it became difficult to control the wheel. It was a flat.
I immediately pulled over to the side of the road and turned it around before having an outburst of rage, making sure to use every explicit word I had in my vocabulary. After taking a moment to breathe and calm down I decided to call in to work, as at this point there was no way in hell I was going to make it. My supervisor seemed to understand and granted me the day off to deal with the situation.
I sat behind the wheel for a few moments before getting out of the car to check the damage. All of my tires were completely mangled. The rubber was frayed and torn beyond repair. I wasn’t getting back on the road anytime soon, that was for sure.
“What the-“. My biting words were quickly cutoff as I glanced over to see what I hit.
It was a spike strip, laid cleanly across the pavement. I planted my hands on the top of my head in pure irritated confusion, and chided myself for taking my eyes off the road at the worst possible time. I then immediately dialed the local sheriff’s department and informed them of the situation.
“We’ll have someone down there right away”. The officer on the other line said before we ended the call.
“This has got to be the worst day of my life.” I sighed, too exhausted to be angry anymore. Little did I know just how true those words would ring.
As I leaned against my car to smoke a cigarette while I waited for the police to arrive, I glanced over at the spike strip. It seemed odd, and of course I had no earthly idea why it was even there. I could only hope that my insurance would cover it.
While I was deep in thought and half way down my cancer stick, I heard a droning sound coming from above. Now flyovers weren’t exactly unheard of in our rural county, but as few and far between as they were, anybody is going to wanna look up out of simple curiosity.
What I saw was intriguing to say the least. What looked like a small jet, or military drone carrying some kind of spherical like cargo on its underside was climbing its way up into the atmosphere. From the angle it came in at, it looked as though it had taken off somewhere not far away. A few miles out maybe. I tried to squint my eyes and focus in on it, but it got too high up to make out clearly anymore.
As I was staring off into the sky I heard a car approaching. I looked back down to see a Shaffer police cruiser making its way towards me. The car stopped just before the spike strip on the road, and two police officers stepped out of the vehicle. They walked over to the strange strip and I quickly joined them.
“It came out of nowhere honestly. This thing is dangerous, why the hell is it even here?” I said, trying to veer away from any potential discussion about my negligence on the road.
One cop who was bald, with a goatee, and a little on the older side knelt down to analyze the spike strip, while the other who was taller and younger approached me as he spoke.
“Where were you headed?”
“To work.”
“You didn’t take the highway?”
The older officer answered before I could as he stood up with his curious eyes still on the spike strip. “He couldn’t of. It’s closed because of some construction that started yesterday. It won’t be open for another couple weeks or so apparently.” He poked the strip with his foot a few times before looking up at me.
“To be honest, if we didn’t have this same situation happening on the other roads out of town, I would’ve just assumed you set this up to try and get insurance money.” He joked.
The officers’ sarcasm was evident in his tone, but his jesting was lost on me. I found his words concerning as I questioned him.
“Wait…. This is seriously happening on all the roads out of town?”
“Yup” The officer affirmed. “We had this same exact situation happen with some poor woman in an SUV.”
The younger man interjected. “Her car actually spun out of control and hit a tree. She’s fine but her car ain’t. We don’t know who could’ve done this, but it’s gotta be someone with a chip on their shoulder.”
“Lots of money too.” Said the older cop. “These spike strips are leagues ahead of the contemporary ones we use. I’d even go as far as to say they’re military grade. Whoever did this was committed and likely didn’t do it alone.”
“Wait these aren’t like yours?” I questioned further. He just shook his head as he looked down at the dangerous road hazard.
“No, the ones we use are way smaller, and we usually just cast them out onto the road. These ones are bolted to it. See?”
The officer prodded at the spike strip with his foot again to demonstrate his point. It wouldn’t even budge. Suddenly some radio chatter could be heard from their cruiser. The younger officer went to check, as the older one continued.
“Look son, we’re currently investigating it, and we have the situation handled. I suggest you call triple A and see what they can’t do about those tires of yours. Tell them to mind the road hazards too.”
I nodded in understanding with a sigh. Then suddenly the younger officer poked his head up from behind the car door.
“Hey Mac, we gotta go, apparently some situation is going on up the way.” The two share a hasty nod as the older officer began to walk back to his car.
“We gotta go handle this. You take care now. I hope you get this situation sorted out.”
The officers then enter their vehicle and drive around the spike strip to head further up the road. I end up contacting triple A and they say they’ll have an agent arriving shortly. I decided to wait in my car and listen to the radio.
As I was relaxing and smoking another cigarette, I noticed a few drops of rain hit my wind shield. I knit my eyebrows in confusion since the forecast said it was going to be an all sunny day outside. In fact there wasn’t a single cloud in the sky when I had left home that morning. I rolled down the window a little further to try and look outside when I immediately pulled my head back inside in pain, before quickly rolling up the window.
It hurt…..
The few drops of water that managed to hit me left a small sharp sting akin to an ant bite where they landed on my skin. I was shocked to say the least and looked out my window to watch the rain fall. It was a small detail but I could swear that the rain was sticking to my car like oil or something. When I turned on the windshield wipers it did very little to clear the onslaught of water that was drenching my car.
Even a little drizzle or light pouring wouldn’t sound completely unusual on such a seemingly clear day. But this was something else. It was just so sudden, like a torrential downpour came out of nowhere.
I got worried so I picked up my phone and called my mom. It took a few rings before she finally picked up. I could hear her frantically breathing and whimpering in pain as she spoke.
“H-hello…. Sweetie are you there?”
Her voice made my heart race a little with panic. I couldn’t bear the thought that she could be hurt. “Yes it’s me momma, are you okay? Did the rain get you?”
“Yes it did-“ her words paused for a moment as she grunted with discomfort. “I was-.. I was in the garden and it came out of nowhere. It hurts a lot, are you okay?”
“Yes momma I’m fine, I only got hit with a few drops. Listen, just start up the bath and try to wash it off okay?”
She continued to whimper for a few moments before breathing out her next words in a near cry. “Ok I will, imma hang up now.”
She hung up suddenly, and I didn’t blame her. My heart ached to know she was so uncomfortable. I leaned back in my seat and sighed unnervingly. My foot tapping nervously on the floor of my car.
I checked the weather forecast on my phone, refreshed and checked again. It didn’t make any sense. There was nothing said about any rain whatsoever. If anything all it said was that it’d be a clear sunny day, like it was this morning.
My searching was paused for a moment as I heard something ahead of me on the road. I turned on my windshield wipers again as it cleared away the rain to see what was going on. My eyes widened with what I saw. There was a red pickup truck barreling down the road.
It was driving completely recklessly and not only that but it was about to hit the spike strip.
“Hey, HEY!” I yelled out despite there being no way for my words to reach the driver. I honked the horn frantically to try and get their attention but it was too late. At an alarmingly high speed the truck hit the spike strip and suddenly everything was in slow motion.
I watched as the vehicle’s back end lurched forward and upward from the sudden force as it passed my car mid-flight. Noises of breaking glass, skidding metal and a failing roaring engine broke through the now completely inaudible rain, and the sight of the truck tumbling and crashing violently off the road before pancaking against a tree cemented itself immediately in my mind.
I don’t know how long I sat in sheer wide eyed shock before the sounds of the rain returned. My whole body was shaking with what I had just witnessed. However, it wasn’t just the road accident that had me so stunned.
As I replayed the scene over and over and over again in my mind like a broken record, one thing stood out to me. Before the vehicle even touched the ground again, almost parallel to my window was the trucks’ driver side window.
Through the blurry rain and the speed with which everything happened, I could’ve swore that in that brief moment I saw the driver’s face through his open window. He didn’t look shocked, or even panicked. If anything, I could see an uncanny and unnaturally wide toothy grin staring back at me as his manic eyes met mine. That image alone betrayed my thoughts about how any reasonable person would react in that situation. How he even had the urge to look at me like that was beyond me.
I managed to snap out of my thoughts as I fumbled around for my phone. I dialed 911 as quickly as possible, my whole body was still shaking. However, for some odd reason it wouldn’t connect. The words “Call Failed” stared back at me from my screen. I tried again to no avail.
I tossed my phone in the passenger seat out of frustration, and yelled at the top of my lungs. What the hell is going on? First the spike strip, then the sudden rain, the truck flipping over, and that weird fucking smile I swear I saw on the drivers face. And now I can’t even call the fucking police! I had no idea what the hell was happening, and to say I was on edge would be a Guinness world record understatement.
I wanted to get out of my car but the rain…
Even if it didn’t hurt, there was no way I would be able to navigate through this weather and get anywhere safe. I bit my nail and tried to come up with any idea of what to do.
Then it stopped….
As quick as it came it dispersed. I couldn’t hear it anymore. I sat up straight in my seat and looked around but,… I couldn’t? The water or whatever it was that came down was stuck to all of my windows, and blurred my surroundings. It didn’t drip away, instead it kind of had a syrupy movement to it.
I hit the windshield wipers as they cleared off the fluid from the window, and everything, I mean everything was covered in this stuff. The liquid on any hanging tree branches didn’t fall like water droplets. It sapped its way down.
For whatever reason I pulled out my phone and snapped a picture of it. Then following the shudder of the camera I heard something outside my car. I could tell it was coming from behind me, across the street where the truck had crashed. I looked back and through the blur of my rear windows I could still see it crumpled against the oak like a crushed tin can.
I slowly rolled down my window to try and make out whatever that noise was, then I froze. I couldn’t see the driver in the truck but I could hear him. Faintly, I could hear laughter. It had a low tone to it, kind of like a compressed audio, and it was in hysterics. It went on and on until it slowly faded, and I could only assume that the driver was now dead.
I sat frozen for a moment. Laughing? If I somehow survived something like that, I couldn’t imagine laughing. Maybe a scream, or a cry for help but definitely not laughing.
After a few minutes of regaining my composure I decided I was going to get out of the car and try to make my way back to town. I had no idea what was happening, and I wasn’t about to leave my mom home alone in all of this. I still wanted to make sure she was okay.
I stepped out of my vehicle as my shoe carefully landed on the surprisingly non-slippery liquid. I still remained careful though as to not get any of it on my skin. I was about to start my way towards the town before a small surge of morbid curiosity crept over me.
I turned to face the truck. Yep, it was still there, and still wrapped around a tree. I hesitated for a moment. “Do I really need to see this?” I thought to myself. I remembered the expression and laughter that followed the unfortunate accident, and shuddered. Unable to fight the deep rooted intrigue I decided to at least check it out.
I began to walk my way over to the truck carefully. Making sure not to let any of the dripping liquid from the trees land on me. I finally got close enough to see into the drivers side…. Or what was left of it. What I saw made me stop in my tracks.
I saw the driver, a man that looked to be in his late 40’s was squished in between the wheel and the seat, as some pieces of metal from the engine bay were lodged into his sternum. Blood was still leaking from his chest onto the pavement.
However, his face, or at least the expression it wore will forever haunt me for the rest of my life. Staring back at me was an unnaturally broad, ear to ear, toothy grin and manically wide eyes. A chill shot down my spine as I turned away in revulsion, on the verge of throwing up.
“What the fuck?!” I cried out through heavy breaths, not daring to turn back around. I knew he was dead, but seeing the body was what suddenly made that fact so apparent to me. I stepped away from the vehicle hurriedly as I tried and tried to no avail to scrape the image of the man’s expression from my mind.
I began my walk down the road towards the town. I kept attempting to contact emergency services, and as expected, no dice. I gave up and decided to call my mom. The phone rang even longer than last time until she finally picked up.
“Sweetie?”
Right away I could tell something was wrong. Her voice was panicked and… multiple octaves lower than her usual tone. Each word spoken was breathed out frantically as she cried through the small speaker.
“Sweetie are you there?! Please, please, please I need to hear your voice.”
I tried to answer her. “Momma! Momma it’s me, what’s going on? What’s happening?” She couldn’t seem to hear me as she sobbed on the other line. Her cries were at an alarmingly low pitch.
“Sweetie the people outside… everyone. They’re not ok! They’re not ok! And there were so many of them on Main Street. DEAR GOD!”
I could hear my cat Bubba whining in the background. His meows seemed to be as frantic as my mother’s words. She was sobbing uncontrollably at this point as there was no way I could get a word in.
“Sweetie please, please, please! Something’s wrong!” She choked back a few more tears before continuing. “I feel sick! I want to leave!”
Then suddenly the phone call ended. My heart was practically bursting in my chest.
“MOMMA!”
I tried dialing again, and it rang and rang until it hit voicemail. Again. Voicemail. AGAIN! voicemail. I punched at the air in frustration and panic. “FUCK!” I yelled out as I pocketed my phone quickly. I began to run. I ran faster than I ever have in my life. I had to get back to town. Back home. I had to protect my mom.
Suddenly two large helicopters flew overhead towards the town. I didn’t stop to think why they were even there. Looking back, there was a lot I didn’t take into consideration. I ran as though I was practically chasing them. I had no idea what I was running into, nor was I prepared for it.
As I ran along the road I noticed that the sticky liquid began to evaporate. The squishy noises that accommodated each of my footfalls began to recede. At the time I paid no mind to it as it was the least of my concerns. I was simply glad that I could run without caution now.
I must’ve ran for nearly half an hour before I finally began to see buildings up ahead down the road. When I reached the first building which was a local gas station I stopped to catch my breath. Heaving out each gasp with exhaustion, I looked around frantically.
There weren’t any people to be seen, but there were cars left unattended. Some of them had the engines still running. Some had broken glass from the driver side windows, and the unnerving sight of a pool of blood present on the ground near a small black Nissan made it abundantly clear that something bad happened here.
I approached the car which was one of the few vehicles with its engine still on as I could hear the local radio station playing. The familiar voice of the host Allen Burg spoke in an alarmed tone.
“-and they’re trying to get in! Oh fuck oh fuck! What the fuck is wrong with their faces! I don’t know what happened to this town but someone, anyone in their right fucking mind please help! Oh God! SHIT THEY’RE BREAKING THE WINDOW!”
The sound of glass shattering could be heard followed by the yelps and screams of Allen as he pleaded with whomever was there.
“Please! STAY AWAY FROM ME YOU FUCKING MONSTERS! NO, GET AWAY-“
His helpless pleas were quickly cutoff by agonized screams. The noises that came after could only be described as flesh ripping from bone. Violent and grotesque in nature as I flinched at the sounds. The screams of the host trailed off and were soon accompanied by the unmistakably familiar noise of low pitched laughter. Even after Allen was already dead, the laughter nor the grotesque sounds ceased.
“Oh my God…” I whispered as I backed away from the car and back to the road. “What the hell is happening in Shaffer?”
I continued to run towards the direction of my house. I knew that on the way I would have to pass by Main Street as I remembered my mother’s harrowing words “There were so many of them on Main Street.”
Deep down I was afraid. No, the word fear couldn’t even encapsulate the sense of undeniable dread I was feeling. Knowing I was heading towards hell itself began to dawn on me. I wanted to turn around, to leave, to get the hell out of dodge, but the cries of my own mother, the only person I have left, the light of my life, kept repeating in my head. I couldn’t leave her. I’d never forgive myself.
Something was happening to the people around here. It was obvious that they were becoming violent and rampant. So I kept vigilant as I navigated the streets of the rural town.
As I began to near closer and closer to Main Street, up ahead, down the road I saw someone dart across the street. I could hear their low hoots of laughter, and I jumped in fear before ducking behind a nearby car. I stayed there for a moment to try and calm myself. As I looked up briefly to scan my surroundings I saw a nearby house.
The door was wide open, leading into the pitch black abyss of the inside of the house. Coated around the doorframe at various points were thick splotches of blood. A clear as day red handprint was stamped next to the entrance, as the liquid streaks trickled down to the floor. The lower half of a body could be seen lying there, the upper half shrouded by the darkness inside. The intestines were strewn out along the porch, and even more red vital fluid pooled along the wooden foundation.
I had to physically cover my mouth to keep myself from hurling. Tears trickled down my cheeks in horror as I couldn’t look up from the ground beneath me. “I can’t do this. I can’t do this.” I repeated in a quiet sob. “Why is this happening ?” My hand clenched at the stubble of the street below as I started to panic.
My breaths began to come out more frantically as my heartbeat pulsed erratically in my chest. I turned and sat against the rear of the car, grit my teeth and closed my eyes tightly.
I thought more about my mom. I thought about my dad who died, and how she had to move in with me. I thought about when she started taking meds. I thought about how she began to lose pieces of her memory. I thought about her sweet comforting voice.
I opened my eyes as I tried to catch my breath. My mom, no matter what. No matter what I can’t leave her here. “You can do this. get up. get up!” I wobbled my way to a standing position and glanced back over at the dead body in the doorway. I quickly averted my eyes once more, and made an attempt to temper my breaths while I continued my way down the street.
I was near Main Street now as it was only half a mile away. There were cars left out on the road, and some were even crashed into each other. I tried to keep my eyes away from any dead bodies I saw.
The closer and closer I got to Main Street I noticed the loud cries, and demonically low pitched laughs that rang from the area. I took a small back alley as I inched forward with increasing caution at the cluster of noises. Then finally I peered my way around a corner, and my heart stopped as I saw it.
It was nothing short of a bloodbath. People of all ages were running around the streets literally ripping each other apart. The riders who were preparing their horses this morning were now disemboweling them with machete’s and knives. The few horses that were still alive squealed out as their handlers feasted on their innards.
Locals were chasing each other down, or even crashing into each other with manic fury. I saw a heavier man stumble and fall on the road as he cried out in fear. “NO NO NO!”
The children who were hot on his trail pounced on him with deranged smiling faces. Their demonic laughter could be heard over the man’s yells of agony as they began to rip the skin off of his body like they were sheets on a bed. Their tiny hands gripping firmly around the fat of his flesh, and pulling back with full force and no mercy. His anguished voice began to drown out into a gurgling scream as a little girl, no older than 10 bit a huge chunk of flesh from his throat.
I stepped further behind the wall to avoid being seen. Looking up from my hiding spot in unsolicited horror I caught glimpses of even more acts of violence. The ones who were smiling and laughing didn’t discriminate. They’d even attack each other. Which was evident when two women were biting each other’s faces off mere yards from me. They didn’t look the least bit in pain as opposed to those who were trying to get away.
It was only in vain. Those who seemed sound of mind were the first ones being picked off. Like they stood out amongst the maddened faces for some reason.
For the next 20 minutes or so, I sat there in pure shock and undeniable hopelessness as the slaughter had yet to cease. I’ve never seen so much blood. You’d be surprised how many internal organs can fit into the human body. How far the short intestines can be stretched before peeling wetly apart.
Looking even further down the road the massacre continued with no end in sight. Their laughs, good God their laughs. Haunting and demonically low pitched. The screams of terror from those that were normal seemingly drowned out by them. Just past a large parking lot, I could see a familiar figure wielding something in his hands and clad in friendly mascot attire.
Rodney the cowboy, still dawned in his outfit was standing atop the roof of a strip mall as he swung his makeshift weapon wildly. Trying to knock off the crazed citizens that were attempting to climb up to him.
A woman nearly managed to get on the roof before the butt of his fake rifle connected with her skull and a loud crack rang out. She simply cackled as she fell back down to the ground. It wasn’t long until he was finally overwhelmed when two men with broken glass bottles attacked him from behind, stabbing him repeatedly without any intention of stopping. His agony was muffled by the headpiece he wore, and blood could be seen spurting violently over the smiling face of Rodney’s costume. The blood showered the freaks of nature at ground level as they opened their mouths widely to lap it up as it fell.
I continued to watch the scene unfold around me in all its viscera, and began to feel nauseous. Having seen one too many gut spills, I keeled over and vomited. It didn’t help that the smell was putrid and stunk of rot. Flies darted around the corpses, or rather, remains of those who were long since dead. I wiped my mouth before stumbling against the wall behind me looking around for a way through frantically.
I tried backtracking, and on my way out of the alley I entered through, I heard something that made me stop in my tracks. The collective low pitched laughs of those freaks as they were running down the alley after me. I looked back and all it took was a glimpse of their fucked up smiles before I booked it. 4, no maybe 5 of them were after me.
They were fast. I could tell that they were hot on my trail as I broke out onto the street and cut into a full blown sprint, narrowly avoiding one as she lunged at me. Her fingertips barely brushed against my leg as she fell to the pavement, before quickly being stampeded over by the others that followed.
I felt them gaining on me, inch by inch. Their footfalls were heavy and purposeful. I didn’t dare look back as I ran. I could hear one of them jumping along the cars that lined the street, the structured frames creaking violently under their weight.
I began to lose speed as their laughter grew ever more present by the millisecond. Running on fumes and nearly about to collapse, I looked around for anything, ANYTHING that could slow them down or stop them or something… I was helpless until I heard the blaring of a truck horn to my right. My eyes barely caught a glimpse of the semi as it missed me by mere inches, plowing into a small bakery to my left. The sounds of low pitched laughter were cutoff by the noises of shattering glass and tumbling bricks.
I didn’t register it at first until I found myself completely out of stamina and no longer able to run. Falling on my hands and knees I immediately scrambled behind a car and desperately tried to catch my breath.
I peered around to see what had happened. Still catching my breath I could make out the driver in the vehicle, his face bloodied and head faced towards me. The same grimacing smile was plastered on his face as he laughed maniacally, although thankfully I couldn’t hear it through the vehicle.
The front of the vehicle was covered in the remains of my pursuers. An occasional arm or leg would be sticking out, covered in the dust and grime from the rubble.
I looked at him with contempt while I stood up, realizing the situation in its entirety. The driver had tried to hit me and inadvertently ended up saving me from my would be attackers.
“Fuck you, you psycho!” His expression didn’t change. I flipped him off and turned back around to keep pressing forward until I got home. Luckily the chase had led me near my neighborhood as I could see my house just a ways down the street.