Part IV

When the mind cannot comprehend what the eyes see, does it have shape? When the mind cannot comprehend the sounds the ears hear, is it silent? When the mind cannot comprehend what you feel, does it exist?....

Mary Anne, a young woman who grew up in the small town who is the wife of officer Taft, married at a young age as most folks in these parts do, woke up to find her husband's side of their king size bed empty. Mary Anne let out an annoyed sigh, she knew, or thought she knew, damn well that he probably got called in because of some damn kids. It happened so often that Mary Anne no longer wakes up to the sounds of the phone ringing or wishes her husband a safe trip, not that anything could happen in this town.

Mary Anne laid back, her hand absently rubbing her swollen belly as she tried to find the energy to start the day. Glancing at the clock on her bedside table, an old rotary clock that her mama had given her as a wedding present, and saw that it was already five-thirty. Almost time to feed the animals, she thought as she crawled out of bed. If she didn't hurry, Harold, the old goat her daddy gave her before he passed, would start throwing a fit and no one wanted that.

Mary Anne quickly threw on her usual maternity pants and one of Michael's shirts that was big enough to hide her pregnant belly before making her way to the kitchen in the dark. The sun was just peeking over the horizon and a faint glow had started to spread outside but had yet to enter through the windows. Mary Anne smiled as she watched the light move along the ground for a moment, this was her favorite part of the day. She could not tell you why the sun's rays brought a smile to her lips, she just always felt a strange comfort from it.

As she stared out into her yard, getting ready to throw on her boots and get to work, Mary Anne noticed movement in the shadows where the sun had yet to hit. Frowning, Mary Anne squinted her eyes straining to see what or who could be on her property, it couldn't be Harold, she would have heard him breaking free and it was too big to be any of the other animals.

No, what Mary Anne saw was not Harold or any animal she owned. She could not describe what she saw, one minute it was a boy, the next a tall pale man, then a weeping woman stood in its place. Whatever it was, it was eating something… human like.

Mary Anne gasped and began to back away from the window when she caught a glimpse of an oddly familiar pair of boots on the ground with what remained of a leg sticking out of one. This caused Mary Anne to look at the creature, fear pulsing in her veins as she begged God to not let it be. Please, anyone but him, but… her prayers fell on deaf ears as the rays of the sun reached that corner and Mary Anne could see the face of Michael Taft staring back at her as the creature ripped skin from his body and consumed it like an animal that had been starved for days.

Without realizing what she was doing, without telling her body to act, Mary Anne let out a horrified scream and charged out the kitchen door heading straight for her husband's body. She had either forgotten the creature as she stared into her husband's dead eyes or perhaps she had lost all reasoning and wanted to die with him. It mattered little at this time as the creature turned its head and with a swing of its arm, knocked Mary Anne back and into the fence she used to separate Harold from the other animals.

She must have hit her head or something because when Mary Anne came to, she found herself being dragged across the ground. Around her, the green pasture she and her husband had bought years ago was replaced with a thick wooded area, the ground beneath her was smooth and damp, where her pasture was far from smooth and the land would have already absorbed the morning dew.

The… thing that dragged her behind it seemed to shimmer and make noises under what Mary Anne could only assume was it's breath. It's touch on Mary's leg felt odd, she would later tell others that it felt like a slug with needles taped to its lower body was set on fire and tossed onto a frostbitten area.

This is where we will leave Mary Anne for now, don't worry folks, we will get back to her soon but there are other things we need to take a look at first.