i had to trim a lot of unnecassary garbage out of this

18: The Goblin

1

Standing over the coffee table, Herman Robern closes his hand around a stoppered bottle of cologne, his eyes burning with tears. He's coming, is the only thing he thinks, coming up out of the den to whoop my ass. Screaming madly and clutching the cologne's flacon, his finger jerking the pump in rapid succession and triggering clouds of musk-laced scent into the air, he spins around in circles. "Come on! I'm waiting! I got my defense system right here!"

Its voice comes back, crossing his mind in a swelling wave. Herman, so strange, so quizzical, so . . . odd. Evil, yet innocent, trying to hide what you can become with what you've built. I love it; and it looks I've arrived in good time!

He freezes for a brief moment in which he swallows ropily. First a fussy, careful look crosses his face, then a trace of light along with the nostalgic look of a memory. The voices. Herman has always heard voices. But not in this manner; so personal, so tempting, so . . . foreign yet familiar at the same time.

Talk to me babyyy, the voice cries in a bad falsetto, I'm here to give you a makeover. Can you see me?

Something strange about that speaks to him. They're odd sayings, yes, seeming nonsensical, but somehow full of so many ominous undertones. It is about as clear as the murkiness of an old mug of coffee. On any given day, he would've shied away from it. But now, he feels the need to listen, as if being pressured by an unseen devilish pact. Herman knows better than to ignore it.

His eyes frolic to one corner of the room, where he can see a vintage oak dresser and nightstand which is home to a lamp th at looks like it belongs in the 60s. Both are shoved up against the wall, hiding parts of its wallpaper with their pressboard backs, hiding its vines and other green, foresty undertones. He sweeps his eyes to the left, now looking at the side of the bed he always hops out of in the morning, and he can see something.

Someone.

He rests the perfume bottle on the coffee table, the cologne's waves petering out (his hands have been trembling) and surfing up against the flacon's sides in small spumes. He looks at the person standing in the right hand corner of his room. His vision is a bit blurry for an unspecified reason, but his legs seem to bring him closer on their own choosing. His head draws back a little, as if fighting back. "You?"

Yes you, the voice says, us. The person, it looks up, its eyes two, blinding, amber stars. It really is just me, myself and I. He reaches the foot of the bed, curving a hand around a smoothed-down ridge. He freezes. The blur in his eyes has dispersed.

Terror.

That someone; a monster, smiling at him with edged teeth. Its skin is a mucusy green, glistening beneath the sunlight streaming in through the window and stuck in its glow. Some kind of fluid races down its forehead in bloated drops. Wiry strands of hair hang limply out of its skullcap, slicked back as if it had been marinating itself in that same strange fluid. Its exaggerated hook nose curves in, nearly touching its raw lips, evening out in a knife of gristle. How could something so disturbing be alive? How could something so . . . simulated be real? He stares directly into its amber pitted eyes, flecked with black veins, glowing like the lens of a bleary searchlight.

Something about those eyes snapped him; filling him with their gold light, making him feel . . . its power, its fury, its insanity. That monster . . . "I—i-it's me?" Herman stammers.

It scoffs. Of course I'm you, you buffoon. Don't think you can hide from who you truly are, it pauses, me! You are me. We're one. You can't live without a shadow, can you? You can try to hide your shadow beneath other's, but that'll only take you so far until I come back. Its smile falters a little, and it looks to the side. Remember what you did, Herman? What we did together?!

Herman slinks forward, his back hunched in a semicircle. His mouth falls in horror and his eyebrows lower. "What did I do?"

It's everywhere, it laughs, check your phone, radio, anything!

A lump of fear materializes in Herman's throat and he takes it down in a dry swallow. He looks to the side and sees his Samsung Galaxy, with no logical reason, laying on his bed. He scoops it up reluctantly, his thumb succeeding in no more than missing the home button. Trembling as if the window is open (he can almost imagine a stale draft coming in through the window, licking through the curtains and making them do a funny dance, breaking his skin out in goosebumps), he powers the phone on.

His lungs cramp with a sudden weight that is painless yet frightening; that's when he sees the alert, active shooting at corporate building Herman Industries, suspect at large, 1 killed.

"Me?!" Herman cries. "I would never!"

Oh but you did, it taunts, you very much did! You killed that man. It may have been me who brought my hand down, but remember . . . it was you who killed him. You! It heaves in laughter. You're the one who killed him! MURDERER! A GOOD ONE AT THAT!

It shoots a reaching hand forward, a hand which crawls with maroon sores. Herman's eyes bulge. His mouth creaks open. He goes hell for leather, his legs turning to jelly after two steps. He only succeeds in making it around the bed before he collapses in agony. Smoldering liquid seethes beneath his flesh, making him gasp and mewl. His hands fly to his hair in claws and they tug on patches of his thick brown hair in desperation, desperation to make the pain go away, desperation to lose whatever the monster is. Tears spring to his eyes and worm out as he squeezes them shut.

Herman utters a rusty scream which makes his vision strain. "WHO ARE YOU?!"

It starts approaching. The stronger version of you, it says, what your weakness could never bring you to be.

And it happens, Herman Robern finds himself knocked senseless, now replacing his intelligence with a new one, a billow of smoke building up in his head to lock him up. He rises to his feet, not as Herman Robern anymore, but as the monster. The . . . goblin.

2

The goblin grimaces, shuffling down the steps, disgusted at Herman's pathetic nature. If he's going to get anywhere, he ought to take control over him more often. His steps kind of have a dull sound to them, as if a hollow space sits beneath the stairs. He pauses for a moment, his nose wrinkling. A few ideas sprint through the foreground of his mind. That's good, he agrees. A very, very good idea. Keep the wolf in sheep's clothing . . . stow it away! He finishes his trip down the stairs. His eyes are consistently being drawn to the clock over the fireplace, which he can see over the oaken banister.

In that instance, all of Herman's memories streak through his mind as if a chased vehicle, and a grin creases his face.

Past the flight of stairs which leads to the upstairs balcony over the kitchen, the living room sits. A green-cushioned sofa is situated against a wall, steps away from a stone mantel, its hearth a bleak darkness of years of neglect, absence of flames; no wood, no ashes, nothing. Herman doesn't seem to be very active, doesn't he? Well he is very negligent, with his mind that seems more restricted than that of a ragworm, unconsciously muzzy as all hell. His life seems to be nothing more than a never-ending string of demands and desires (GIVE ME THIS, GIVE ME THAT!) from his works of science, or his own son; Birtz is his name, he believes.

That kid better stay out of Herman's business if he knows what is good for him. And what's good for him is a place to sleep, not fashioned in the likes of a coffin, or one of those lockers at the coroner's office. His nose is a meaty one indeed, and it likely isn't uncommon for it to be stuck into places it shouldn't be in.

He sits down on the couch and ponders. How could he fix Herman? The memories of what has happened cycle through his mind again — The years and years spent killing himself over his research, a month's worth of sleepless nights, and the way the army general, Mr. Welson, thumbed his nose at it all. Now this person seems interesting. His mad desire to toughen Herman starts to intensify. He does not like to think of it as an urge at the back of his head; because if it were to be at that specific point, it would be nothing more than an instinctive ensemble of bad thoughts. That is not true at all. These urges control him — he willingly lives by them. One is better off imagining it as a big dial at the top of his head with the needle threatening to edge into the red zone. That characterizes who he is.

He starts to think about Welson more and more, curiosity driving him. And once he formulates a solid idea of what has happened, he hatches an idea, knowing exactly what to do.

3

General Welson should have known it was strange for someone to knock on his door at that time, that time where the moon was just beginning to melt into a puddle of white light amidst the darkened sky, the time when you could hear the nightly rhythm of chirping or yips or hoots. He should have had more than enough sense than to approach the door. Especially when he went up, called out for who was there, and out came a badly falsettoed cry: Country Lane Flowers!

He had just gotten done with a splash of Bourbon over a sphere ice-cube and may have been a little warmed up. That was okay. It was not unlike himself to feel a bit mellow when the early fire of alcohol started to flare inside his stomach. He kind of liked it that way. It made him ready for bed, though he wasn't really accustomed to getting enough sleep. Suddenly his hand tightened around that cup of firewater and he considered throwing it. His moment was ruined. Interrupted by this bonehead who thought he could just come up to his quarters at this hour and drag him to the door. His countertop was so shiny he had studied the reflection of his face in it, expecting to see something wrong, but saw nothing different instead.

And so he had come to the door, pressed an eye to the peephole, and wrinkled his nose. He could see no-one. He briefly thought back to what the person had said: Country Lane Flowers! He looked back into the peephole and saw no such thing, not a pot, vase or even a basket. This intelligence succeeded in doing no more than making him more irate. It had to be a prank too; what kind of idiot would do such thing! Especially to the army general.

He hawked and nearly spat onto the floor. "Listen here, I'm not here to play games with a prankster. Now you better get away from my property before I start taking these shenanigans seriously," his nostrils flared with a sullen huff, "You hear me now? Knock once if you got the message."

He waited and nothing came.

Instead, a hand came flying through the door out of nowhere, shrapnel fanning out around him, pointed bits of steel and wood nicking his open skin. Its open hand beelined to his neck and closed down on it with what he imagined to be the death-grip a dying Catholic would have on a cross. The hand yanked him forward, then shoved him back 10 feet or so, giving him leeway to breathe. Its hand closed back into a fist and snaked back through the breach in the door. The voice returned, more hoarse and grating this time around. "Country Lane Flowers! Here to give you dapper flowers for your blazing corpse!"

Suddenly, the door exploded. Particles gusted around the open room. The walls were struck in a shower of splinters and rugged pieces of wood. A tall silhouette lurched through the doorway, arms drawn back, hands strenuously poised in claws.

In an instant, he knew who it was.

And that made him ever more scared.

It was Herman, his body enclosed in hardwearing, emerald armor which cut off at the top, exposing his head. He was smiling with some kind of intent, a smile that was cynical, almost mad. His face was concealed beneath a black medical mask and his eyes shone in yellow stars beneath a thick pair of black goggles. General Welson could still nonetheless see the sheer insanity that Herman had fallen into. The way his skin glistened with sweat and the corners of his cheekbones perked up in small tents of flesh sent flying tremors through his body.

"Everything you wanted . . . it's ALL right here," Herman yelled. There was something awfully grungy about his voice. "Military-style weapons, military-style this, that. You want to see it in action? I made sure it was ready just for you!"

He went up to Welson. His eyes stared up at him, seemingly pried open and sinking into the back of his head. He was paralyzed entirely, confined to nothing but the shape of a pencil; fragile, brittle, numb . . . emotionless. He looked at his fist, knuckles plated with metal, and knew exactly what was to be done. What should've been done all this time.

Seething, the goblin took a handful of Welson's graying hair and whipped it forward. His head catapulted forward and smashed into Herman's knee with a cracking sound that was horrifying but all the more satisfying. Blood gushed and splattered everywhere; all over the legs of the armor, on the floor, Welson's face. Its smell, sharp and coppery, found its way through the mask and the goblin sucked it all in with a hearty breath.

He reached down and grabbed Welson by his throat again, grip unyielding against slimy rivulets of sweat. His pulse was beating into the goblin's palm, his jaw slackening into an O of choking agony. He uttered a fighting gasp, but air could only come out, not in. Sick satisfaction stirred in Herman's stomach. His lips were smiling, not necessarily in a conscious way.

"You attacked my heart," he said. "You destroyed everything I loved, everything I worked my damn hardest for!" He lifted Welson up and throttled him against the wall. "Now, I'm going to take it back!"

The goblin brought his free hand back, his fingers talons of bloodthirsty desire, teeth bared in wolfish fashion. His eyes flew open with sinister expectation. Then his hand came down in a walloping punch, moving with such intense speed that he grunted. Flesh tore and squelched. Bones crunched. Blood arose. Welson's pain was indescribable . . . inexplicably horrible. His eyes hazed and rolled into the back of his head. And at last the clutching hand retreated, crawling with meaty veins, squeezing a heart, still hammering but failing slowly. An eye for an eye.

All the while, the goblin could hardly see anything because he was grinning so intently.

Only seconds later, the goblin would flee on his saw-toothed glider. It flew in through the living room's bay window in a near musical crash, its panes shattering into fragments. Wind, with some kind of cool spring bite, cascaded into the room. Pleated violet curtains of what used to be the bay window flared out in wings. The glider swooped around, hovered in the air, waiting like a loyal dog. Its motors purred. The gathered dust beneath it had gotten blown away.

The goblin tossed one last look over his shoulder, looking at Welson, his eyes staring up at nothing. They were bleak . . . soulless.

This felt right. Justice was served.

And so he left through the shattered bay window, sections of those flying curtains hooking onto his suit and ripping off, lending him the appearance of an emerging sewer monster plastered with toilet paper. The rushing winds pushed up against him. He should have been shivering or recoiling against the cold breeze, but no. He was only warm, warm with his success.

Welson was dead, not able to hurt poor Herman any longer.