Behind the Veil

 [Original Story Concept]

It must be so easy… Walking through life, ignorant to what lives beyond the veil…oblivious to the monsters right beside them, within reach…but they just can’t see. They’ll never see. Only some of us, in fact…very few I’m afraid, know the truth. And sadly, I’m one of the few.

I can’t tell them what they can’t see. I can’t warn that man on his cellphone as he walks down the street in his over priced business attire, that there’s a horrid abomination with strings of drool oozing along rows upon rows of dagger like teeth as it stares ravenously with dozens of beady emerald eyes. I’m watching it now as he passes by, completely oblivious of the 9 foot tall nightmare with its pulsing maggot like flesh, throbbing as it wheezes, salivating in anticipation of the kill… It peers over at me for a moment and we lock eyes. And there’s a look I know all too well… It realizes not only that I can see it, but it knows What I am. The look is worth the time I’ve spent staring at the putrid creature, because now it’s going in the opposite direction. Guess it decided to skip lunch.

People think accidents are just coincidence. If they only knew the dangers they invite. When you’re not paying attention, you’re being hunted. Of course, you can’t see the thing pulling itself along the cracked pavement behind you as you walk down an empty sidewalk at night. It lurches its skeletal arms forward, three fingered claws curving into the concrete as it drags its legless abdomen like an ant with its back legs crushed. Something thick and viscous bubbles and oozes in sickening pools from strange gaping holes along its deformed body, soaking the sidewalk in a slimy grayish substance so it can drag its pulsing form faster behind its unsuspecting prey. And all the while you just feel uneasy…blind to the thing about to grab you when you stop, wondering why a chill just slid down your spine…

The news in the morning would say some unlucky sonuvabitch got run down by a speeding car that lost control at the last second and what they don’t tell the public is that they had to literally scoop up what was left of the pedestrian from the sidewalk where the car hit.

Ya…right. And Santa Clause is in league with The Easter Bunny.

Weird or freak accidents are the Monsters doing. But they’re always covered up in some fashion. Hell, you could’ve been on the other side of the street and you wouldn’t have seen the creature attack…you would’ve only seen the speeding car. And you would’ve never known that there was a second creature, inside the car just before it lost control…

They enjoy working groups, it makes it all look so perfect. Just an accident, bad timing… No word on if the driver of the vehicle was under the influence as they too lost their life in the crash. The investigation is on going. But you never learn anything more as the news goes on to something else. You never think twice about it, never wonder about what really happened. You never find out that there was nothing wrong with the car and that the driver, well…what was left of the driver, came out clean. Just a freak accident.

While two more nightmares slither away unseen with a full stomach… Their presence overlooked completely because humans just can’t see.

Except for me.

Not that I asked for this, it’s a genetic thing. Like a disease you can’t cure. You can treat it, stop it from flaring up…but you’re stuck with it. And sometimes when it flares up, well…let’s just say I try to stay indoors until it lets up.

It kicked in when I was fourteen, oh the joys of puberty. I didn’t think anything of it at first seein’ as I’d always had a very vivid imagination and just figured I was seeing things because my head was always in the clouds. But when I started to physically react to things…

In the beginning, when I saw my first monster, again I figured I was just nuts… Until the wounds started to appear. It looked like someone had tried to cut at my wrist. I was able to hide it well enough…until I started seeing more of them and the cuts got a little longer and little deeper. If I hadn’t started wearing long sleeved shirts, I’m sure the adults would’ve sent my ass to a hospital to be psychologically analyzed for self-mutilation and possible suicidal tendencies. And it should’ve sent up a major red flag because I was wearing long sleeves in a warm climate. But since I’d always been on the strange side, people just thought it was my thing. Didn’t help with the bullying, but I didn’t care. They were always gunna find something to pick on me for, didn’t matter what excuse they came up with.

Besides, seeing Monsters with your own eyes and having your body betraying you by seeming to tear itself apart is insane enough.

I knew I couldn’t tell anyone. To most I just seemed like a typical teenager that was fighting to understand what they were going through. They had no idea how terrified I was. And if you think High School’s bad on its own… Imagine hundreds of hormonal kids wandering around with no idea of the hundreds of Monsters trailing each of them. Some kids had two or three at a time. I always felt bad for them, because they were the most sensitive. The kids that suffered the most depression, had more creatures on their tail. There was only one kid I ever knew to start with one and then had more then fifteen monsters over the period of three months. A week after I saw that, he took his entire bottle of Paxil, his sister’s birth control pills and bought a brand new survival knife.

His mother found him in the bathtub… The kids at school said it was like a scene from Stephen King’s IT.

Ya, those weren’t rumors either. It was really that bad.

These monsters don’t just feed on our physical bodies. They feed off our life force. The stronger and brighter your energy, the more will hunt you. If you’re very strong willed and intuitive, you get the nastier types. The weaker you are, just an everyday Joe…you’re barely noticed let alone followed. Makes sense, doesn’t it? They feed off of the strongest. It’s their favorite kind of prey.

And I wasn’t impervious to them either. If anything I was their Biggest target. They called me ‘The Fledgling’ and thought it was hilarious to follow me in Droves so the scars would begin to show and I would get thrown into a psyche ward. That way I would become lost in my drug induced prison and they could feed off me for as long as I kept breathing. That’s why they go after the strong willed. It takes a lot longer for people like us to just give up. The more stubborn, pig-headed you are, the longer it takes to fall. It gives them years of convenient dining.

It was really hard in the beginning, but I started to understand I had more control than I thought. I found out I had Power…

It had been like any other night, just hanging out with my best friend. It had been a ‘slow’ day, didn’t see many monsters, nothin’ too nasty anyway… Until a few showed up…focused on my best friend. And she felt it immediately, she couldn’t see them like I could, but she could Feel them. Just like a blind person, who may appear helpless, but it’s quite the contrary. Their other senses are more keen and more developed, making them more aware of their surroundings. So she knew what I knew, and I could feel her fear. I could also see and feel they were pleased by this…

That’s when something Snapped.

I’m still not too clear how I did it, it was a long time ago…but what I remember, is suddenly seeing through tunnel vision, seeing them in all their grotesque, hideous glory and then I felt something inside me open, like a wind tunnel going inward… I blinked and they were gone. I also felt a little heavier, my chest had just slightest bit of pressure, like after a heavy meal. It was the weirdest thing…and made me realize something awful strange about myself.

I could devour them completely.

And that was just one of the first things I could do. Heh, oh ya…I’ve got an arsenal now. But I can’t tell you the end of the story first. Where’s the fun in that? I gotta give you just enough to get you interested, a bit of back story so you can decide for yourself whether you wanna join me on this journey I’m about to embark on within the pages of this twisted tail.

But be weary dear reader, for there may be an unseen horror peaking over your shoulder as you read this… Waiting for that perfect moment to strike…

Anybody not ready for this?

-To Be Continued-