A gasp for oxygen had gone unheard in the attendance of a riotous growl of thunder. Deep amber eyes, pools of black in the blue-tinted midnight glow the outdoors constantly appeared to contain in the hours of twilight, fluttered open only to have mechanically shut at an inundation of glacial rainwater. A feeble groan escaped lips lined with the azure hue of a frosted body.

The novelist heaved his cumbersome weight--he felt as though he was dealing with twofold the quantity he essentially weighed-- from the suctioning, clay-like mud and threw back the tresses that the water had plastered to his face. It was nigh impracticable to perceive anything; the nighttime seemed to possess a larger dimness than natural, and his beloved spectacles were long vanished by now. He trudged forward nonetheless, muck grasping at his shoe at each step and all, with only the faith in his sense of direction. Had he been asked which day he would have considered the worst, it wouldn't have been the time when he had gotten divorced, it wouldn't have been that car accident...It would have been the current time. This was it. The worst possible night in the history of Morton Rainey. If only he could click his heels together and stated how he thought there was no place like home.

But had he in reality yearned to revisit the abode that bound him to so many agonizing experiences? Was it just another instinct to return to the place where heat and provisions were guaranteed? Perhaps the latter. Naught remained in that house for him. It kept alive those memories that he longed to let fade and drift away into the realm of the forgotten.

Yet...There was a maid. A woman. But she was only a maid. And a female, but again, only a maid. He simply fancied her possibly due to the verity he had been destitute of feminine fondness for such a long period of time. He wasn't concerned for her. It was her fault he ended up outside in the foremost!

Sighing, he plowed forth until his optics managed to catch sight of two silhouettes on his front porch. The trim stature of the biped bent and placed a hand on the top of the quadruped, whose pleasure radiated through movements. A yip echoed across the sheets of icy rain. He halted briefly and mused over the picture before him. With a quirk of a brow, he marched towards his house.

"Morton Rainey! Good God! I was about to send the fire brigade after you!" Cora scolded with a intimation of respite. "Get in here and out of the rain, you lunatic!"

Temperate arms welcomed his shuddering body, caring not about how sopping wet he had been. Warm fingers ran themselves through his matted mane, and a tender sweep of silk lips against his own calmed his entire soul. "Where did you go?" she posed softly.

"I went to find that dog."

"Which dog were you following? The dog ran onto the porch after the truck drove away!"

"Oh?"

"Yeah! I let him inside."

"Is he mine like you told me he was?"

"As a matter of fact...He was! He is!"

Rainey furrowed his brows in utter bewilderment. Nothing ever seemed to want to make an ounce of sense. Ever. Cora detected the perplexity within him and immediately acted to relieve it. "Chico! Chico, come!"

A patter indicated fingernails along the hardwood floors, and a heavy sliding indicated the dragging of a leash. Chico always dragged a leash around when we wanted to run around outdoors.

"Cora, Chico died a long time ago."

"You're not right in the mind. Chico!"

"No. You don't understand. Chico is GONE. He had a screwdriver in his skull that last time I saw him."

"He's perfectly FINE, Mort. Except I think he's a little blind. He's got cataracts."

Bright, cloudy eyes caught Mort's as the four-legged creature came bounding. At once, the author's facial features softened, almost as if he had forgotten that Chico did indeed die a while ago, and he kneeled to greet a faithful companion. To test the truth of Cora, he reached to the silver tag hanging from the collar. His eyes eagerly scanned it: "CHICO RAINEY". It was a gag. A sick joke. He gaped at Cora in distress and repulsion. "How could you!" he admonished, letting the dog's collar go.

Cora snapped back in protest, "How could I what? You think I'm lying to you? The dog is standing right there! I can't believe you, Mort! I...I just can't!" And with that, she turned away, face in her hands, weeping. She had been so insulted and erroneously accused!

Morton stood up, appearance screening almost instantaneous regret for his hasty and mindless actions. "I'm-I'm sorry," he apologized, taking the woman in his arms. But she refused him profusely as soon as he placed his arms around her. He made a second attempt, just for kicks. She responded more sensibly, putting her own arms around him, and cried on his shoulder.

The whole ordeal was odd, actually. Cora was never known to cry so much over such a little situation. In fact, it would have been more characteristic of her to come back with an almost humorous response. He could feel her warm tears on his shoulder, seeping across his cream-colored sweater. He looked at her. A dark, violet red doused his entire shoulder, and it was certain that it hadn't been a cut on him.

"Look at me, Cora."

She raised her head to face him. Her skin remained as flawless as it had been when he left...With respect to injuries, at least. The same burgundy that had tainted his shirt also stained her visage.

"Oh, nothing's been the same," she sighed. "I apologize for the crying. I overreacted."

"Not the same?"
"No. I think I'm getting sick. My head's been hurting a lot lately. It's like there's something in the back of my head trying to talk to me. And my eyes have been KILLING me. I've had to keep them shut sometimes. Like now."

"Maybe fumes from the household cleaning products?"

"I've never been this bad before."

"Have you seen a doctor lately?"

"Not since the accident."

"You should go, you know. It might be-—Chico, stop it!" Mort glanced downward at the dog, which seemed to be oblivious to the seriousness of the situation by the way he kept dragging that leash back and forth over their feet. The author was sent into a stew of utter bewilderment when he realized Chico possessed no leash. He ran across Mort's feet again, and a warm dragging...

"UGH! CHICO!" he said with a leap out of absolute dismay. "What IS that?" He kneeled to scrutinize his puppy, and was thrown by the spectacle of the animal's side, where the thin flesh and onyx pelt were ragged to shreds, and the outline of a ribcage under purple meat could be distinguished. Half of his blood-spattered organs were spilling out of this side. Far-flung along the floor laid a blue-violet intestine.

Mort stumbled back and crawled towards Cora's feet. He stuttered, "D-D-...D-D-D...D-D-D-Do you s-see th-that?"

"See...What?" she questioned as her response.

He scrambled to his feet, peering at the dog in distress. "You don't see THAT!"

"No. I don't see anything."

He turned to her. "How can you not see anything? We've got a fricken ORGAN revelry c--" He paused, musing over Cora's eyes. They seemed...Dark. And quite red around the edges. "Look here."

She turned to him, her eyes simply nothing but black holes in her head, blood spurting out of each socket with every heartbeat. "What?"

"GOD! WHY ME! WHY ME!"