NYC Midnight Flash Fiction Entry
I'll be posting another chapter to Howler soon, but here's a flash fiction entry just for fun.
Title: Black Dog
Genre: Horror (with requisite gore factor)
Word Ct: approx. 1000
Black Dog
“Jesus Christ, that’s one damned messy way to die.” Sheriff Mac McFadden stepped carefully around the globby crimson mass that had once been the torso of a man. The arms and legs spread radially from what looked like a volcanic eruption of flesh and intestine. The roar of band saws, rippers and de-barkers should have been shuddering the mill with their scream and thunder. Instead the buzzing of flies filled the quiet dust-thick vacuum.
“Cal-OSHA’s gonna shut me down,” said Jim Hanson, foreman and part owner of Skyline Lumber Mills. He lifted his company logo ball cap up to rake back his hair. “What the hell was he doing here running machinery in the middle of the night?”
“You’re not running night shifts?”
“Not any more. Work’s gone down the toilet this year. The crew’s spooked anyway. Too many goddamned accidents at night.”
McFadden squatted down beside the corpse. It was easier not to think of this explosion of gore as a human being. But it had been someone. “Who was he?”
“Peterson. Clint Peterson.”
“This blood is still pretty fluid. The coroner will make the determination but I’d guess the time of death to be more like early morning than late night.”
“I wonder if he came in early to cover for Ben.”
“Ben?”
“Maintenance. He’s supposed to be on the floor an hour before the crew gets here to safety check the equipment. OSHA’s bright idea. Government bureaucracy busy killing business. But the last couple mornings Ben’s flaked out.”
The sheriff stood up and snapped on a pair of blue latex gloves. “Well, before my detective gets here I can get started. You found him here?”
“Yep. Just like that.”
“Looks like this band saw has to be the guilty party. Probably got pulled in and spit out.” McFadden circled the behemoth piece of steel-fanged equipment. “Doesn’t quite add up, though. Blood spray pattern here and here… There should be more…” He stopped in mid-sentence. “No one’s touched these blades, right?”
“Not a soul. I got on the horn and cancelled the shift as soon as I discovered him. Poor bastard.”
The sheriff bent over to study the sawdust covered concrete floor. “You got a dog in here?”
“Stray. Couple of the guys were feeding it. I told ‘em to knock it off. It’s just a puppy and it’s liable to get killed wandering around the equipment here.”
“Puppy, huh?”
“Yeah. Little black mutt.”
“It’s gonna be one big dog when it grows into these paws.”
Hanson shrugged. “Damn. I need a smoke. I’ll be right outside.”
Sheriff McFadden began a perimeter check along the walls. Wedged tightly between a barrel stuffed with wood scrap and the north wall he found a crushed ball cap with the Skyine company logo and a dark splotch of blood on it. He snapped a quick photo and left it for the detectives. This industrial accident suddenly had the potential to turn into something else. He was sorry he had said anything to Hanson about the blood spray pattern.
Out of the corner of his eye he caught a movement outside the open bay doors. A skinny little black dog lurked just outside, tail tucked between its legs, its head lowered, watching McFadden.
“Hey, fella,” he said, dropping to one knee. He snapped his fingers. “C’mere.”
The puppy whined and grimaced, baring its fangs. It backed away and ran off.
** * *
The second body, Ben, the OSHA- required safety man, was discovered in the three-inch space between the lower edge of the wall and the concrete foundation, and behind an outdoor lumber pile, and wedged between the spiked barrels of the de-barker. Forensics had taken a week to sort out the parts and to determine they all belonged to the same man.
Jim Hanson had an air-tight alibi, as did the rest of his employees. Two men quit in the course of the investigation, however.
“Spooked,” Hanson told McFadden. “Like I said.”
The little black puppy was a welcome distraction. One of the men managed to lure him close enough to get a rope around his neck but he got away.
Two months into the investigation Sheriff McFadden was driving past Skyline Lumber Mills after a long evening of mind-numbing paperwork. The sun had set and the western horizon was bleeding scarlet into the blackening sky. On impulse he turned off the highway onto the gravel road up to the mill.
Every lead in this case had crashed into a dead end; every fingerprint, every smidgen of human DNA had been identified as belonging to someone who’d been ruled out as a suspect. He didn’t expect to find anything new, but revisiting a site after some time away can provide fresh perspective.
McFadden pulled up and cut the engine. Using Hanson’s keys, he unlocked and rolled up the big aluminum door.
Something prickled the back of McFadden’s neck as he raised his flashlight. Shadows of the equipment swayed from side to side under the moving beam of the LED light, shrinking and growing like monsters in the corners of children’s rooms. For no other reason than animal instinct, McFadden drew his gun.
He hadn’t taken more than a few steps into the building when he heard a low growl behind him. He spun around, aiming at the door.
It didn’t register what the thing standing framed in the bay door could be. At least five feet at the shoulders it hunched over on all fours, black fur bristling. The flashlight glare caught its eyes, reflecting silver white.
It gathered its haunches to spring and McFadden didn’t wait. He opened fire and emptied five rounds into the thing as it reared back, howling.
And then it leaped onto him. The last thing McFadden saw before he felt his throat being ripped away was the ragged rope that hung from the black dog’s neck.
*****