When
the First Leaves Fall in Autumn
Chapters 1 and
2 (of five)
by
Helen Jones
Word Count: 1700
1
The coroner poised above the stiff and cold cadaver, scalpel in hand, observing with professional curiosity and mild bewilderment where others had observed only with horror the cruel wounds present on the body. He put the scalpel down and picked up a foot long probe, running his long thin fingers along the length of cold metal. An almost inaudible sigh escaped his slightly parted lips. He returned his attention to the corpse and used the probe to see further into some of the more grisly injuries. The body was only just identifiable as a man. His face had been repeatedly bitten and scratched. Dirt littered some of the deeper wounds and gave them an eerie shadowed appearance, making them seem deeper than they really were. The man had lost an arm to his attacker, and his right leg was attached merely by the tendons and ligaments that held the head of the femur in its socket. His other arm and leg had the same appearance as the face, badly bitten and mauled. Deep ragged gashes, some extending nearly the entire length of his torso, disfigured his flabby body and exposed the entrails hidden deep within the cavity of his abdomen. In some places where the gashes penetrated through to the corpse's back, it was all the doctor could do to imagine how the man had stopped his intestines from falling out behind him as he fled from whatever had inflicted these horrendous injuries upon him. Or perhaps the doctor had just answered his own question. The man had probably fallen with the first blow and had been continually slashed until, or even well past, his death.
The coroner put his instrument down and pulled his gloves off, disposing of them in a small bin on his way to the phone. His call was answered after the third ring.
"You'd better come down here and take a look at It." the doctor said. The person on the other end said nothing. All the doctor heard was the muffled thump of the receiver being dropped back into its cradle before the uniform beeping on the other line told him the call had been terminated. He muttered obscenities under his breath as he returned to the gurney and resumed his inspection of the body. A cold shiver slithered down the length of his spine, and he couldn't help but peer into the deeper shadows, making sure he was alone in the small morgue. He felt suddenly colder, and the knowledge that the sheriff was on his way brought him only a small amount of relief.
Sheriff Steven Larkhaim drove along the night-blackened road to the small country hospital where he would find the coroner, Mitchell Blair, and the remains of a local farmer waiting for him. He scanned the road ahead, miming the words to the song playing on the radio as he drove. It was quiet. It always was on a Saturday. He had lived in this town all his life, and never before had a murder so vicious occurred under his watch. 50 years ago, a similar event had taken place on the old Kessler farm 5 miles out of town and a suspect had never been brought to trial for the case. Two people had died that day, old man Kessler himself and another farmer who had been hunting with Kessler at the time. The bodies were so badly ripped up they had to use dental records to identify them, and even then it had been a difficult task due to the damage to the face of each victim. Steve shivered and turned the heat up. Soon the lights of the hospital loomed out of the darkness like a ghost ship at sea. He parked as close to the main doors as he could get, and then felt foolish for running inside. He waved to the nurse on duty and headed down the hall to the morgue.
"Mitch, can you tell me what did this?"
Steve and the coroner were standing over the body; Steve looking decidedly ill while the coroner pointed out things on the body he thought the sheriff should know about. "All I can guess is a large animal, maybe a bear or cougar, but there haven't been any of those around here for about 100 years now, and definitely none this big."
"Well, I'll have to alert the town. If there is something big and dangerous out there, I can't keep them in the dark. I don't want any more deaths like this to deal with." The coroner nodded, agreeing with the sheriff's decision. He bent back over the body and started poking into the deep recesses again. It made Steve feel nauseous. He turned to go and was stopped by the coroner speaking again.
"If you as me, I'd say this was a big animal."
"You already said that."
"No, I mean really big. To inflict wounds like this, a bear would have to stand a least 10 to 15 metres tall and have claws about 7 inches long." He said that sentence without emotion, as if it were a rehearsed line and he was repeating it for the thousandth time. The coroner's lack of emotion made Steve uncomfortable.
"That's impossible. No creature that large could remain hidden around these parts. There are people hunting and camping around here all the time!" Steve replied, trying to fight down the now increasing waves of nausea.
"Don't look at me, Steve. I'm as baffled about this as you."
2
Jim Carter took his dog, Skeeter, hunting with him on a warm Sunday afternoon. He let Skeeter run ahead, baying joyfully whenever he disturbed a flock of pheasants or blackbirds nesting in the thick bush either side of the deer trail. He whistled a tune as he walked briskly after the dog. He was 64 years old, but still had the upright posture and healthy body of a 40-year-old. He prided himself on that. Skeeter was running too far ahead, so Jim called him back. The big bloodhound loped towards him, his tongue lolling out and a laughing look in his eyes. Jim laughed.
"Skeeter, yer a funny dawg, ye know. Always laughin' en chasin' them birds. I'll never for the life o' me turn ye inta a huntin' dawg, now will I!" Skeeter did a happy dance around his master before resuming his pursuit of the birds further ahead. Jim laughed softly to himself and continued after his dog. Half an hour passed without sign of any game and Jim was all but ready to turn back and head home when he heard a terrible scream from up ahead. He knew at once that it was Skeeter and his heart leapt in his chest. "Skeet? Skeeter! Where you at, boy?" He listened intently for any further sounds, expecting the dog to come creeping back on his belly, wagging his tail apologetically for making such a fuss when all he had done was stuck himself on a sharp piece of fence or thorn. Nothing. Maybe he had gotten himself caught in a bear trap, or fallen into a long forgotten cougar pit. He hurried ahead, all the while calling his dogs name. He rounded a bend in the path and stopped dead in his tracks. A huge creature was standing in the path, towering a good 8 metres over Jim. Skeeter was clutched in its claws and the beast was tearing at the poor dog's flesh. Though Jim knew Skeeter couldn't possibly still be alive, he could almost feel the pain those terrible claws were inflicting. The animal resembled a bear, but its reptilian features and long lashing tail gave it an alien appearance. Jim cried out involuntarily and raised his gun, firing repeatedly at the creature. It twitched as the shotgun pellets pierced its hide, and slowly turned, walking away on all fours, leaving Skeeter's broken body lying on the path in a growing pool of blood.
Steve yawned and stretched, standing from his desk and walking to the window that looked out upon the town's main street. Hardly any traffic stirred on Sunday afternoons, and today was no exception. His partner was out cruising the town, looking out for trouble that never happened and keeping the local scallywags in line. He returned to his desk and took a sip of his coffee. It was cold and he made a face at the bitter brew. He raised again, this time with the intention of pouring himself a fresh cup, when the phone rang. He returned to his seat and picked the receiver up. He had barely placed it over his ear when it was filled with excited blabber. "Now just hold out a second!" Steve demanded. The voice on the other end halted, but he could still hear laboured breathing. "Now, what's the trouble?"
"Skeet's dead…huge animal…oh God!...What the hell was it?…Teeth the size of carving knifes…lizard and bear….oh God!…So big, so big, so big…" The voice trailed off and was replaced by loud sobbing. Steve cursed softly and tried to calm the man. He finally aquired a name, Jim Carter. A respected store owner in town. He put he phone down and grabbed his keys to head over to Jim's farm. Something had scared the hell out of that man, and he knew it was something a lot more sinister than a bear or a lizard.
When he arrived on Jim's front stoop, the man was already waiting, waving a shotgun around and demanding the sheriff come with him to see his dead dog. He followed the man around to the back porch and saw a shapeless lump hidden beneath a bloodstained blanket. After waiting for a few seconds for Steve to reach a suitable inspection point, Jim flung the blanket off the dog. Steve stared, and then bent down closer to the glistening remains. It had been disfigured almost identically to the man in the morgue, and it also bore traces of torn grass, dust and a shiny substance that looked like saliva. He didn't say anything, but took Jim by the arm and led him to his car. On the way to the morgue, he asked the man questions about the beast he had seen, getting only hysterical babbling and tears from the old man. He set his lips into a thin line and stared at the road unfurling before him. He knew where the dog had been killed. A well known hiking track. He decided the only way to see for himself was to stake it out and wait for the creature to emerge
Read the concluding three chapters of 'When the First Leaves Fall in Autumn' in next month's issue of Novo.
