Reality Check

Reality Check By Thomas Walsh

There was nothing as disconcerting as pain, especially when that pain is caused by blunt force trauma from a car accident. Garfield must have had some amazing luck, he thought, as aside from his suit being torn in several places and judging from the tenderness a couple of cracked ribs he was still very much alive. He did his best to stumble out of the wreckage that was his car, the doors having been blown clear off and the bonnet being caved in something awful, but there was just enough room to slide out of the mess.

The man tried to steady himself, a hand rubbing his aching, pale head as he looked around. It was bizarre, there it had been, busy London in all it's glory. And now there was nothing but an odd mis-mash of architecture. Houses were neatly aligned like a 1950's American suburbia, the buildings themselves all looking like Edwardian terrace houses, albeit split up like the designer hadn't understood the reason for their boxy shapes and big windows. Stumbling over to try and get help it became rapidly apparent no one was around at all, the houses deserted and made even weirder, their furnishings looking Japanese, probably around the 90's technology wise.

“Why... why does nothing fit here?” Garfield asked aloud, hoping beyond hope anyone would reply- There was a bad taste in the air, like iron when he spoke. Moving back to the main road Garfield started to wander around, looking for anyone that might be able to help, or a hospital, a hospital would be preferable. As he wandered around he it was hard to not notice the street signs were all in German, finding a hospital seemed all the much harder.

Turning a corner into a high fenced T junction he noticed something odd, a horse's head peeking around one of the other corners at him, backing up after a moment. Garfield ignored it, assuming his presence must have spooked it. He didn't fancy chasing after wild animals that could easily crush him ether although the fact it was wandering free worried him, he wondered if it were a sign of some kind of civil collapse, as well it was the first living thing he'd seen.

Moving away from the horse for the sake of his ribs Garfield turned the other corner, coming across a creepy sight. A lone, modern day church in the middle of a field, nothing but dead grass surrounding it with that high fence at the very outer-skirts. He wanted to leave it along but seeing as he could see people through a dusty and smeared window there seemed little choice but to interrupter the sermon. He walked the short distance to the church and knocked on the door heavily, shouting for help. The sounds of feet scrambling inside could be heard, the door opening and several pairs of hands grabbing and yanking Garfield inside.

He was thrown onto a bench roughly, crying out in pain while several pair of eyes looked at him. Gaunt, starved, disheveled, the people looking at him may as well have been dead. “One joins us...” they said individually, seeming almost livid about the man's presence. One of the dead like people walked forward after a moment, seeming almost furious as he pushed past his colleagues. “It... It.. It does not.. Does not belong!” he yelled in wheezing gasps, as if his lungs couldn’t take the strain of yelling any more.

From be next to the bench the leader produced an axe while the others watched, not helping or trying to stop him in the slightest, as far as he could tell they even looked eager. It dawned on him they even looked hungry. Trying to ignore the ensuing pain Garfield rolled from the bench as the leader swung, the axe missing and getting lodged right where his neck had been. He scrambled past the now frightened congregation. He did he only thing he could do and ran, out to the fields and back to the T junction.

He'd noticed that horse again as well, although this time it didn't back off, it's head coming around the corner for a closer look... and that was all that came for a closer look, just a floating black furred horse's head with the throat dangling along. The sheer sight made Garfield feel sick to his stomach, although it was quickly overridden with fear when the church mob caught up with him, standing off against the floating abomination, one on ether side of of him.

The mob recoiled in fear after a moment, turning to try and retreat back up the path they'd walked down, tripping and climbing over one another to escape. The head simply floated past, across the junction and past Garfield as it headed for the men and women. Their screams were deathly as they were nudged and touched by the head, seeming to melt from the point of contact. Within a few moments their yelling had stopped and nothing remained but a puddle of human 'goop'.

Garfield turned and ran back down the main street and past his car... where there had once been road however nothing remained, literal nothingness like a bubble as an ear destroying horse scream filled the air. The head... that night mare had it's eyes literally ablaze as it rushed over through the air, the ground under it seeming to disintegrate into nothingness. Garfield could only scream as it floated ever so close in front of him, seeming furious as a sudden pressure welled up in his arms. He looked at them, watched them inflating before they exploded, each bone like a bomb from forearm to finger tip, exploding painfully and painting the pitiful remains of a ground beneath him.

The man fell to his knees with a cry of agony, his legs soon following the same fate as his arms, leaving him as a wailing mass. The never ending screaming seemed to surround him, making his head spin with the pain as a sensation for force pressing against him made itself apparent. There was a few sickening cracking sounds before a guttural scream from the crushed blob marked Garfield’s' death, compressed into a point in time and space.

The night mare floated there, her job of checking this reality for that which didn't belong complete... now she only had to wait for the oncoming bang.