Red Rover (970 hits)
Category: NoneRating: 1.89 on 32 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by charminglybeef (View user info) at 2006-12-26 23:57:56 EST
I can hear the mutt whimpering but can't see him. The big german shepherd that had been with me for almost seven years. I am all loose and distant and not really feeling too much. I certainly can't move. On account of the needle, would be the logical conclusion.
But I'm not really sure that logic and I are on speaking terms anymore.
Yeah, sure, maybe my dog shits on the guy's lawn every now and then. And maybe I could do a better job of picking it up. But does logic follow that up with tasers and needles and handcuffs and this fucking room all filled with silver shit and and those funny boots with their laces all loose and the skinny, hairy legs sticking out of them?
Don't think so.
Maybe logic would offer up the dog poo flung back into my yard or left in a water-filled bucket, leaned up against my front door. Because yes, it opens inwards.
But not this.
So if logic doesn't really seem to stand, then maybe this is not logical. And then it can only be the result of two things: he is not logical, or I am not logical.
Well, which is it?
I can't talk. I can't really move either. My mouth is open. It all feels rather like a dream, but no dream is quite this real, is it? Well maybe I am just in the dream -- I am now remembering and experiencing that moment that I can never truly remember or experience when awake, even after it has just passed. Maybe that is it. My subconscious must be capable of producing stimulus this real, even only in my head. While asleep. And this is the moment where I am experiencing that nowhere, never moment.
It will be over soon -- on to the next one, or I will be awake and my sheets might be a bit wet and my alarm clock will be ringing.
Wait for it.
Ahh, the whole body feels stupid. Head included. I can hardly keep a linear train of thought going. It's a dream. It must be a dream.
And the boots come walking over, clunking on thick wood floor and the mutt still whines and I follow them up the thick, pubic, hairs on his skinny legs and past the fucking eighties, cotton print shorts and flapping tips of a lab coat and a simple gray t-shirt and then a shaven, pockmarked chin and thin glasses and thinner hair and it's greasy and almost spiked as well.
He smiles and his lips move slow and he says something about dog shit.
He gets up. Walks quickly to the silver table and grabs a cloth and then disappears and then returns and the cloth is stinking and brown and wet and I see a bit of red in there too and it really smells foul and he shoves it in my face and yells nothing and then rubs it, and my mouth is still open and slack and he shoves his fist inside of it, inside the towel.
What I can taste is bitter and rough, but far away.
The boots walk away and the cloth is still in my mouth. I work it out slowly and stupidly with my tongue and all the while I can hear the mutt's whimpers, punctuated by a frequent and ferocious yelp. The towel lays on the floor beside me and the boots come back and they've got a pair of tongs with a round, whitish... eyeball. The tongs squeeze and goo comes out like jelly from a donut. Scoops some up, puts it in my mouth.
Yelping.
Now none.
The boots, and a pulsing muscle with thin white fingers around it and more squeezing and I am reminded of an orange juice commercial.
It's gotta be a dream. I experience these moments a hundred times in the night, just never remember them. This will be one of those. It's gotta be soon now.
End.
End.
I try to wake myself up. But how? I try to fly. Turn the lights off. Manipulate my environment with my mind.
Please end.
The muscles in my back tighten. Not painfully, but they constrict and my chest is forced out and my arms pull back. I vomit. Grey and foamy and right on the ground in front of me. But I am not relieved. My back stays taut and my stomach muscles tense. I have the sensation of choking, but I can breathe.
The boots come back. With a bowl. A large, metallic bowl. He dips a hand into the bowl and when he lifts it out it is a ladle, filled with blood. It drips syrupy over the sides. I watch grimly as he raises his hand to his lips and tilts his head and pours it into his own mouth. It runs down his chin and drops over the edge and onto his gray shirt.
He smiles and the blood streaks and separates -- oily on the whites of his teeth.
Then he reaches his hand into the bowl again and scoops it out, moving it slowly towards my face, and I can only assume, my mouth. He tilts back my head and drips some into my nostrils. It spills out and bubbles and I can feel it trickling down my cheeks as well as the back of my throat. It forces me to erupt into cough.
And my back tightens further and I throw up again, this time straight up. And I have the sensation of choking but I really am choking and he rolls me onto my side and then picks up my legs and lifts them up and shakes me.
Looks like I might have given you too much medicine, he says.
And I lay coughing and retching on my side, my mouth and throat and nose all full of the sweet, rusty taste of batteries and brussel sprouts.
I never noticed him leave but he must have because now he's coming back and he's got a towel. He rolls me onto my back and lifts my head and slides it underneath. My gut pushes up and my back arches and my belly button is elevated above my head, even laying on the folded towel as it is. I can see the skinny legs leave and after a moment they come back and then an arm comes down, and a face, and it smiles and shines like the blade in its hand.
It's not a regular knife though. It's short and shiny and has an odd hook on the end that's sharpened on the inside. He kneels beside me and places a hand on my stomach. He looks as if he's kneeling before a table, all arched as I am.
He unbuttons my shirt and the hair on my belly comes free and into this dream, this dream, oh it must be a dream as he touches the tip of the blade to my stomach. I try to collapse but my back tightens further with the terror and forces my gut up and into the knife.
Maybe too much medicine is a good thing, he says, smiling.
I can feel dull pressure in the centre of my belly and then the sickening sensation of flesh parting. Not a lot. Just the width of the blade. I try to scream but can't. The pain is cold and electric and demanding. Then he flips over the knife and just the hooked end disappears inside of me.
There is tension at first, as it tugs upwards on my skin, and then suddenly, and almost satisfyingly it has come free and it slides easily up the length of my stomach. The flesh it parted is cool in the air its first time, and hot and angry all at once. Then the pain comes rolling up and inside my head and surging behind my eyeballs and bringing bile with it.
Fucked up, I think.
Fucked up dream.
And the thick green bile comes up past my lips and bubbles and stops me from really breathing. No matter though. The good doctor. He's dipping both of his hands into the metallic bowl and lifting them up over my arched belly and opening them up and letting the blood fall into my open insides. It feels soft as it hits the exposed flesh and organs and creeps its way down between the cracks. He scoops up another.
And another.
And drops them inside of me, with ever-growing fanfare.
And a symphonic gesture of his hands marks the delivery of another.
I begin to feel bloated.
And very sick.
And while I was feeling close for a moment there, things are getting far away.
Further than they ever have been.
Maybe that means it's almost done.
Back to reality.
Un-bloated reality.
User Reviews
Submitted by Fey (user info) at 2007-04-29 12:13:07 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I'm a sensitive soul, and it's upsetting that he calls his dog a mutt while it's dying. He perhaps meant it affectionately?
I almost couldn't get through this, you're that good.
Submitted by Orgasmatron (user info) at 2007-01-18 00:20:14 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
BONUS CAMPING EXTRAVAGANZA!
KARATE EXPLOSION!
DISCO VIETNAM!
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAND that's a wrap for me tonight.
Submitted by TuTs (user info) at 2007-01-16 23:56:38 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
And btw, piss is way worse than the poop. it kills the lawn dead in brown patches. and makes it look like little alien landing sites.
Submitted by TuTs (user info) at 2007-01-16 23:54:15 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
There is a moral to this tale, don't let your dog poop on some one elses lawn.
I identify most strongly with the killer.
Submitted by r1nce (user info) at 2007-01-16 23:30:50 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Well done.
Submitted by apollo88 (user info) at 2007-01-16 23:25:48 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
its weird i used to read posts like this on uber but now i can't bring myself to
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2007-01-16 23:18:16 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
So, I was watching Anthony Bourdain on the Travel channel when he was in Iceland- and this eskimo family was feasting on a raw seal in the middle of the kitchen floor. As the guest, the host was offered the delicacy of the eyeball, and squeezed it into his mouth. I thought of this post.
*shudder*
Submitted by peacenik_in_hell (user info) at 2007-01-16 22:49:38 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
"And I lay coughing and retching on my side, my mouth and throat and nose all full of the sweet, rusty taste of batteries and brussel sprouts."
I love that line. i love how i can relate to that, but i doubt i ever thought it in those terms.
Submitted by dexpaxas (user info) at 2006-12-29 11:30:49 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
This was artistic in its ghastliness. It's clear you're into scat films.
Submitted by Orgasmatron (user info) at 2006-12-27 23:57:34 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
I'm an only child. I know all about not wanting to read from anyone's perspective besides my own.
Submitted by charminglybeef (user info) at 2006-12-27 23:30:01 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
'Falling up' -- nicely put.
And of course it makes me happy to hear I've affected you.
The picture is always very clear in my head but I wonder how clear it is on the page. I have great difficulty reading from the point of view of someone other than myself.
Imagine that.
Submitted by Orgasmatron (user info) at 2006-12-27 22:35:07 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
This makes me think of that feeling you get when your stomach has just gone right out with sickness, where you feel light behind your calves and through your knees there comes a white tension. It feels like falling up.
Submitted by Orgasmatron (user info) at 2006-12-27 17:09:53 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Is going to get some eyeball juice if she's not careful below.
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2006-12-27 16:38:54 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
This is gloriously gruesome.
And really, Orgasmatron- eyeball juice is one thing. But there's no need to be so fatalistic.
Submitted by indoninja (user info) at 2006-12-27 14:07:31 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Meh.
Submitted by Snark (user info) at 2006-12-27 13:44:10 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
EEUUUURRRRRGH!
Thank You.
Submitted by rodyarask (user info) at 2006-12-27 12:48:30 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by charminglybeef (user info) at 2006-12-27 12:28:56 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
I have always been fascinated by that moment. Not in a good way, don't worry. It scares the shit out of me. The truest terror. One of the stories that always speaks to me, no matter how many times I read it, is the 'Pit and the Pendulum'. Those moments with the swinging scimitar -- man, I wish I never stumbled upon that 'Great Tales of Terror' book on my girlfriend's shelf.
And of course the opening paragraphs where he wakes up in the dungeon and tries to figure out what has happened to him and there seems to be that moment where he wonders whether he has been executed and all this musty blackness is death.
That's a fascinating premise -- the first few confusing and undoubtedly shocking moments after death (assuming your consciousness continues).
But all of that being said, I don't think your morbid comments have a place on this post, Orgasmatron.
Submitted by Orgasmatron (user info) at 2006-12-27 12:13:55 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
And all I meant by my first comment is that all of us are heading to the eventuality that is death, and the ins and outs of our lives could be seen as little more than distractions to keep us from the predatory stare of the grave. We 'drug' ourselves with details, with applications, with progress and procreation, yet all the while aware that there's a killer waiting around one of a countless number of corners. And we will all one day feel his blade.
Did anyone see Apocalypto? The sacrifice scene was terrifying to me...being seconds away from your end without a chance of survival.
Submitted by charminglybeef (user info) at 2006-12-27 11:56:43 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Thank you, Circe.
Very much appreciated.
Submitted by Circe (user info) at 2006-12-27 11:03:44 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
"I watch grimly as he raises his hand to his lips"
Wrong. Grim is cold, aware, measuring, analytical, and your narrator isn't any of those things. The word is very wrong where it is and it threw me out of the story like a catapult.
That said, the fact that I was so deep into it that I could be thrown out is well worth the 2.
But the word is still very wrong.
Submitted by TheUniter (user info) at 2006-12-27 10:19:29 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Jay_Bassman (user info) at 2006-12-27 09:31:54 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
This was fucking insane. My brow is still furrowed.
Submitted by Poots (user info) at 2006-12-27 09:29:51 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
kick ass
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2006-12-27 09:21:38 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
that's messed up
Submitted by Orgasmatron (user info) at 2006-12-27 08:38:00 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by charminglybeef (user info) at 2006-12-27 00:11:40 (#)
Ranking: 0
And can I ask you, Orgasmatron, do you actually feel this to be very good, or do you just rate me without consequence?
---
Please. You get no free +2s from me. You just keep earning them.
I blame you for this.
Submitted by joedaddy (user info) at 2006-12-27 01:22:10 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
fucking excellent
Submitted by Snare (user info) at 2006-12-27 00:29:43 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
I'm with Orgasmatron.
Spending 2500 hours a year for the last twelve years in cubicle farm, numbing myself to this grey, grey existence. First with booze & chasing poon, then with pills&powders and hard trance, then more booze, then as I get older (& slower), computer games and retarded web-sites.
Anything to numb that shit up. So I won't feel my boredom anymore.
Waiting for the day when it all becomes worthwhile.
Or just stops.
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-12-27 00:17:57 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
All because of a little dog shit?
Submitted by charminglybeef (user info) at 2006-12-27 00:11:40 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
And can I ask you, Orgasmatron, do you actually feel this to be very good, or do you just rate me without consequence?
Submitted by charminglybeef (user info) at 2006-12-27 00:09:44 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
I like to think I don't.
Die while helplessly drugged and aware, that is.
The other thing I do.
What about you?
What about all of you?
Submitted by Orgasmatron (user info) at 2006-12-27 00:04:16 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Fucked up.
There's something to be said of the pain and terror one experiences while waiting, helplessly - drugged and aware - to die. And there's something to be said of how this is what every one of us does every day of our lives.