"Fresh Human"
Ben Ormstad
“Fresh Human”
By Ben Ormstad
Copyright 2013 Ben Ormstad
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“Fresh Human”
«Wow, nice place!» Robin said. «Looks good outside and inside!» He laughed. It was impossible to read his tone. He closed the door and entered the house. Ripped off his black leather jacket and, since no hooks had been put up yet, threw it in the corner where the other jackets lay like burned skin.
Seth smiled. «Yeah, I know. I think it's awesome, and a bit .. uh ..» He paused and tried to insert the most fitting word he could download from the mental memory bank, then said: «It's a bit creepy, I guess.» He pointed a finger to the ceiling. «Jill's upstairs unpacking our bathroom stuff. She loves it too.»
«I bet,» Robin chuckled.
«Join me to our new and pretty spectacular kitchen,» Seth said and led his younger brother through the corridor like a well-paid servant of his own home. At the end of the corridor he opened a door leading to a big room with two more doors in it. «It should be here somewhere,» he joked.
Robin laughed, eyes wide. «Damn, this house is even bigger than it looks from the outside.»
«You have no idea.» Seth took him to the door on the opposite side of the room. «And finally,» he said and opened the door, «the kitchen!» He entered it. Robin followed like his shadow.
The kitchen was a huge room that looked more like an old forgotten cellar from the sixteen hundreds. Only things missing were chains hanging from the walls with maggot infested, half eaten bodies strapped to them. The sink looked like some form of rotten urinal with all sorts of weird stains on it. A single cable hung from the ceiling, and at the end of it was a naked lightbuld shining its shy little light on the unorthodox looking kitchen.
«Get a video camera and start shooting,» Robin said and held his fingers squared up in front of his eyes like a director looking for the best view. «This place is ready for the next B rated horror flick.» He turned toward Seth and captured him in his illusory snapshot view. «Starring this handsom looking dude, Seth Quillson!»
Seth laughed and posed like a dork before the non-existent camera.
«And don't forget the three sexy blonds he will have to try and rescue from the evil closet monsters of doom! BUT!» exclaimed Robin dramatically. «Will he make it?» He paused, and then almost screamed: «Of course NOT! We will get to see all the three babes shred to pieces, screaming drenched in blood – yes, ladies and gentlemen, we will even have a half naked, bubbly bathtub slaughter scene just for your viewing pleasure!» He immediately transformed himself into the audience clapping and cheering.
Seth laughed even harder. «You're insane, man,» he said through the staccato bursts of laughter. «Insanely funny!»
«Thank you, Sir,» Robin continued and bowed all the way down. «Thank you, thank you, and thank you!» He bowed again, then stopped, putting on a serious face. «Cut scene! It's crap, like all movies nowadays.» He made a gesture imitating throwing something away. «Next!»
Squeaky cracking sounds came from another room somewhere in the large house. Seth recognized it as coming from the second floor stairs. They heard the slamming shut of a couple of doors before Jill stormed into the kitchen. «Seth!» she said. Shiny droplets of sweat trickled down her forehead. «You gotta come check this out!»
Suddenly she realized Robin existed in the kitchen as well, and like a flash she was back in reality. «Oh, hi, Robin,» she said and gave him a sweaty hug. «Didn't notice you there!»
Robin wiped his face with the black sweater. «Hey Jill, nice to see you too,» he said and winked.
«So,» Seth said, rewinding the conversation back to the interesting part, «you've found something up there?»
Jill fixed her emerald green eyes on his dull blue ones. «Yes!» She gestured for the two of them to follow. «When I finished unpacking in the bathroom I got curious about the attic since we haven't really checked it out yet,» she said while taking them through a couple of rooms of differing sizes, until finally reaching the stairs up to the second floor.
«Yeah,» Seth agreed. «I haven't seen it at all.»
«Exactly, and I've barely stuck my head up without actually going up there,» she said. «Anyway, I moved a bunch of old cardboard boxes and other stuff laying around blocking the way, and in the deepest, innermost corner I found something.»
They climbed up the squeaky old stairs. It sounded like the house could come down any minute.
«What was it?» Seth said, perhaps a bit sceptical.
«That's just the thing, I have no idea,» Jill said and took to the left at the top of the stairs. «But it does look pretty interesting.»
They entered the door at the end of the new corridor.
«Welcome to our bedroom,» Jill said and waved a hand in the direction of the big bed planted beneath the window on the other side of the room. «This is where we sleep .. and stuff.» She looked at Seth and giggled.
A wooden ladderlike thing was hanging out of a hole in the ceiling, while resting on the floor readily available to any volunteers having an urge to enter the upper levels of this monstrous house.
«So this is the entrance to the magical world,» Robin said and looked up into the abyss in the ceiling, squinting his eyes. «And it sure looks dark up there, don't ya think?»
«Dude,» Seth said, «you serious?»
It took a second or so before Robin answered: «Naw, of course not.»
«Anyway ...» Jill injected into their little bubble of weirdness. «Up is the way to go.» She let herself up first, then Seth and Robin wiggled themselves up the small little shit of a wooden ladder-rope-thing after her.
«Come on, guys,» Jill cooed from above, «it's not that tiny.»
When they finally crawled up the ladder and stuffed their big bodies in the tiny first part of the attic, Jill was already waiting by a door a couple of metres away from the hole. She opened it and disappeared to the other side. The guys followed right behind her, although a bit slower. It was a tiny little ladder followed by a tiny little room for tiny little people. Well, that wasn't them.
On the other side, however, what appeared before them was a completely unexpectedly gigantic room. The ceiling floating far above them like in a barn. Spiderwebs as big and thick as a giant's hands covered it like a living tapestry of lethal traps. Some lit up from specks of sunlight growing out of the cracks in the walls. An undefinable smell that made something twist and turn in their stomachs permeated the atmosphere. And the attic was truly stuffed with all kinds of 'old cardboard boxes and other stuff' as Jill had said.
Like Moses parted the sea, Jill had parted the mess in the attic. A pathway of pure space was cleared across the room to yet another door at the end of it all.
«This is it,» she almost whispered. The door squeaked open and everyone entered.
Inside the other room, Robin said: «So there is an end to this labyrinth after all.»
This last room was about half the size if the previous one, but still relatively big. Lots of boxes, magazines, books and other things lay stacked or in clusters all around. Here too, the pathfinder Jill had parted the mess.
Jill went all the way in and bent down by an opened box on the floor. «Here it is,» she said and picked up a square box about the size of her hands. She passed it to Seth.
He held it close to his face and inspected the box like it was some sort of abstract art. «I've never seen any of these symbols before,» he said and let his finger glide over the box to feel the indentation of the carved markings. «And what kind of material is this, anyway?»
«Let me see,» Robin said and stretched his hand out.
Seth gave it to him and scratched his short beard. «Here, check it
.»
Robin studied it closely a few seconds, turned it around in order to take it in from all sides, and finally said: «Hell if I know.»
«Maybe it can do something,» Jill said, her eyes sparkled. «Maybe it's magical.»
Robin grinned.
Seth just shrugged. «I wouldn't count on it,» he said. «It's just a weird box.»
«Exactly!» Robin said. «That's the perfect reason for it to be magical, because that's the last thing anyone expects.»
«But now that you've just spoiled the big surprise it means you've deleted the chances of it being magical, because the potential for it to happen have been revealed.»
«Yes,» Robin said and took a couple of steps closer to his older brother, looked him in the eyes and whispered like a creepy introductory voice to a movie: «.. unless that's just what they want you to think ...»
Jill started laughing. Seth too, but not as lively.
«Okay, then, check this out,» Jill said and took the box from Robin. «This is the reason I had to show you.» She brought the box close to her eyes,
