This is one of my oldest stories, it comes from a writing prompt about three years ago: link. If you want to skip straight to the story just go past the next separator.
I hadn’t reread this story in a long time, and I was excited to go back over it for this post. There’s so many technical problems I believe that this has to it, especially in the beginning. Yet, in all honesty, it does read a lot better than I thought it would.
At the time of writing I was just pretty excited to flex my vocabulary. I now know that this can create very exhausting stories that don’t end up doing all that much, but in this case I actually think it served the story well. It’s a tale about something very extreme and gruesome, so using this exaggerated language sort of helped heighten that sense. I’m not completely sure, I’d be open to hear more opinions on the matter.
I also found out later that there is already a comic book written about this very topic called Chew. No surprise I guess, the idea is pretty gnarly and fun.
Anyways, I hope you all enjoy the story. I expect I’ll revisit it for an hfy post soon. Let me know what you all think, thanks!
Justice demands flesh. It always has, I’m just the physical incarnation of that brutal fact. They keep me chained up in the back room of the precinct like their fucking hunting dog, a cannibal monster made to hunt criminals, born for the task by inhabiting this horrendous ability. The thing is, they think I hate this life. They think they have one over me by threatening to charge me with all the awful stuff I do, but what they don’t know is that I live for the hunt. That carnal passion of pursuit, the bottomless pleasure of a successful hunt, all manifested deeply inside my DNA. Yes, Justice does demand flesh, and I am the reaper that hunts it.
I know exactly when it’s time, I can smell the fear the air. They hate me, all the officers look at me like a Lovecraftian horror, and they should. The lights crack on in the hallway and I can see the shadows of footprints from under my door, it’s a crowd of them, it must be a big case. They swing open my door and I’m greeted by the usual frowns and scared eyes. “Get ready Hound, you hunt tonight.”
The captain is in front, telling me these things. He’s a tall bald man, stoic with his emotions and convinced that I think he isn’t scared of me. I’ve known the whole time, he reeks of it. Beside him are the usual assortment of hot-head deadbeat cops who think they’re cool for being on a case with the Hound. On the inside though, they themselves are wishing that they didn’t take the case. I can see how they look at me, with my massive features and dogged like appearance, they think I want to eat them too. Finally I see some new faces, young cadets who probably showed some sort of promise, so they’re thrown onto the case to see if they’ll break when dealing with the Hound.
I stand up and walk towards them, I tower above all of them. “Who are these supple ones?” I say while stroking the face of one of the young cadets. “Are they my treat after I catch the killer tonight?” I see them shake, the abject feat in their eyes as they glance over to the captain for help. What stupid things.
“Enough of that.” The captain says, “We have to hurry, we’ve got a couple bodies in the locker for you to eat.”
This is the hard part, the part that I dread everyday. Cold meat, it never gets easy. I would rather the flesh of a freshly killed body, still beating with blood and sizzled in the horror of their own demise. It is the pleasure that feeds me in the cold locker as bite into the stale skin of already dead humans.
“Hurry Hound, we think the killer is still in this city.”
I see the cadets looking at me with wide eyes, they’d never seen me do this, they’d only heard stories of the Hound’s ‘gift.’ I’ll make sure they see it clear as day. I sink my teeth into the cold leg of some long-dead woman, making sure that those pups see the ferocity and animalism of my bite. Immediately I’m sent back into a cold room, tied up to a chair and screaming for help. Before me stands a man, short and strange looking. He’s wearing rounded glasses and smiling the toothy grin of an arrogant man. He burns my feet with a iron rod and I see his face twist in sexual pleasure, he wants me to keep screaming so he does it again. Over and over he abuses me so that he can feel pleasure, his eyes roll back and I see the demon inside of him. Once I’m out of the delirium I fall to the ground out of exhaustion, following the dying dreams is very mentally taxing.
“Eat the others,” The captain demands. “We have to find him.”
“No,” I say while rising to my feet. I can feel the wicked grin glimmer across my face as cold blood drips from it. “No, the fool made on vital mistake… He let her get a smell of him.”
This is it! I’m dashing across the city, running with feet that move without my telling. Everything about it is autopilot, all instinct. I feel the blood that was born to hunt pulse in my veins, my sight tunnel visions into blurry streaks that pass by on my way to the killer. Nothing matters to me in these moments besides killing, I can smell him in the air and it invigorates me, my muscles pump for action and my jaw is grinding from excitement.
Behind me I can hear the cop cars desperately trying to keep up, they’re buzzing across the streets with horns ablaze telling people to get out of the way. They think I’m heading straight to the killer, but they do not know. In an instant I turn off into an alley and disappear, dashing through passage ways and through buildings I angle away to loose them. I can hear the shouting voices from my belt. Hound! What are you doing! Wait on us! They’ll catch up eventually, they’re tracking me, but all I need is a minute.
I arrive at the warehouse, his stench his everyone and it inflames me. It’s a tall dark green building, with busted windows and swinging chains decorating its exterior. He’s in there, I know it. I prowl around the sides so he doesn’t notice me, knowing that I have only a little time before the cops catch up. Inside I see him, working ruthlessly on some poor sap tied up to the bed. He’s doing the same thing he did to the lady I ate, torturing them for his own perverted pleasure. I see the eyes roll back, I can’t help myself.
I plunge from the darkness and latch into him. It is incredible, ruthless bloody slaughter as I tear his skin to shreds. I can hear his shrill screams and it’s music to my ears, his fear, it’s permeating through every inch of the room and it’s the most delightful thing that I’ve ever smelt in my life. He’s screaming why why, who are you? Please stop. But I do not care. I rip into him and start consuming him, feeding from him in the most delightful manner.
The cops are here, they’re screaming at me to get off of him. They’re pulling and yanking at me but I’m not done, right before six men get me off I rip out his heart and consume it, delighting in the sight of his life leaving his body.
The captain is screaming at me, he’s telling me how they needed him alive, and how they cant make him serve justice now. I look around at the young cadets, who see me covered in live blood and see the mangled mess of what was once the killer. They see the real me, the real Hound. Again the captain yells into my ear, telling me that I can’t just kill like that, that justice has to be served.
Oh but it was. That man that tortured for fun, he was a demon walking this planet and causing uncountable sufferings, there was no greater justice than what I done to him. Yes, in a world so filled with uncountable evils, I am the evil that hunts them. I am the killers killer, I make the hunters hunted. Where justice demands flesh, I am the one soul judge and jury, the executioner in a society born by blood. No man can withstand my hunt, I shall cleanse the world of its evils through the power of my bite. Yes, I killed the man, made him suffer, my only wish is that he suffered more…