Note: This is a two-part entry for Cud Flashes in the Pan. It commemorates the release of the rock album Bat Out of Hell. I’m splitting it between September and October as the September issue of The Cud will be up from September through October, and also because the entire thing would be far too long for one month.

An important event in the history of rock music occurred on October 21, 1977 when the album Bat Out of Hell was released. It was the brainchild of musician Jim Steinman, who was influenced by the likes of The Who, Bruce Springsteen, Phil Spector, and Richard Wagner (yeah, that guy—Der Ring des Nibelungen and such). And it showcased the overpowering vocals of a man once called Marvin Lee Aday but forever after known as Meat Loaf. Bat smashed records and even spent 471 weeks on the UK national charts and is currently the fifth highest-selling album in history, behind Michael Jackson's Thriller, AC/DC's Back in Black, Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon, and Whitney Houston's The Bodyguard. (Relax—Whitney's album is at 44 million and Bat is at 43 million. BOOH still sells 200,000 copies per year, and I'm guessing Whitney isn't moving that many of The Bodyguard.) But whether you like Bat’s brand of rock opera or not, you have to appreciate the iconic cover art: a musclebound motorcyclist blasting out of a grave, while a giant bat perched atop the headstone spreads its wings in observance. To commemorate the album's release 35 years ago this October, we’ll honor it, Meat, and Steinman with seven shorts inspired by the titles of the seven tracks. And in honor of Halloween and the very cool Bat cover art, those seven will be in the horror vein.

“Brat Out of Hell”
By David M. Fitzpatrick

Jennifer was totally devoted to her husband. That’s why she couldn’t understand why she did it.

She’d been out with a group of drunken friends one evening, playing designated driver. She’d spent the evening drinking Cokes at the bar when the strange man with the smoldering dark eyes began flirting with her. He was tall and strong, intellectual and charismatic, seductive and sexy… but even all that shouldn’t have been enough to topple her moral tower. But she couldn’t stop ogling the impressive bulge in the crotch of his jeans, and when he began to stroke her arm, she helplessly soaked her panties.

It wasn't rape, but something made her take his hand, let him lead her out the back door, and violate everything she stood for. She bent over in the dark alley like a cheap whore, skirt up and panties down, grabbing a Dumpster while he pounded her mercilessly. She didn’t care about the garbage, the rats, the stench; all that mattered was the ecstasy that grew every time she slammed her ass back against his powerful thrusts, screaming and begging for more.

But when it was over and he’d pulled out, Jennifer turned—and he was gone, vanished into thin air as if by magic. She was alone in the alley, dripping the vanished stranger’s semen, confused and mortified.

***

She let her husband believe the child was his. Later, when she’d given birth to the boy, she realized the rapist had been a mesmerizing demon that had used its powers to seduce her and teleport away. And she’d given birth to his spawn.

Alexander was evil. From the time he could walk, he delighted in wreaking havoc. Twice he started fires in the house. He killed the cat, choking it with his bare hands. And when he was five, he tried to kill Jennifer with a butcher knife while she slept. He hated his mother, and seemed to delight in that hate. Bill never witnessed these things, never believed her claims of the child’s evil deeds. And she couldn’t tell Bill why she knew the truth. She’d sound crazy.

One day when Alex was six, he said to her, “I’m telling Daddy.”

“Telling him what?”

“Who my father is,” he said with evil glee. “The man you fucked in the alley.”

Terror overran her. Bill could never know. And if Alex were this bad at six years old, what would he be like in another year? Five? Ten?

Bill was out of town when she did it, holding the pillow tightly while Alex madly thrashed. When he was dead, she wrapped his body in a trash bag and stuffed it in a plastic hamper. She drove through the night to an abandoned, water-filled quarry, where she added rocks to the hamper and wired the thing shut. The quarry was a hundred feet deep, and she watched as it sank, and waited until the air stopped bubbling up. Then she went home, happy at last.

***
Bill woke her when he came home early the next morning. She pretended to be asleep as she heard him mount the stairs, preparing to feign horror at their missing son. He’d wandered out while she’d slept, and someone must have taken him, and so on. She’d left the front door open to back up her story. It was flawless.

"Time to get up, honey," Bill said, and she rolled over—

—and Bill had Alexander in his arms. The child looked at her with evil glee, and she began screaming.

***

Jennifer blinked and looked at the ceiling in her room at the institution. She’d been there six months, ever since she’d told Bill what had happened that night. The doctors had worked hard with her all that time, with medications and therapy, to make her see the reality of what had really happened that night at the bar.

She’d had Cokes with her friends, lots of them—but the kind mixed with rum. She’d flirted with that sexy stranger, dragged him to that alley of her own accord, and bent over for him like a wanton slut. The next morning, sober, she’d been mortified by what she’d done to her husband—to her marriage. To herself.

The truth was painful. Knowing that she’d fooled herself all these years was painful. But she’d get through it—get better, get home, get to be with her forgiving husband and the child who wasn’t evil at all.

“My baby isn’t evil,” she said to herself, just like the doctors had taught her.

“Ah, but he is,” came a voice from her past.

She snapped her head about. He stood there, in her room in the hospital, as mysterious and sexy as he’d been that night at the bar.

“What?” she croaked. “No—you can’t be here…”

“But I am,” he said, a sly smile on his face. “I’m not just some random stranger you fucked, my dear. Now, I think that beautiful little boy needs a brother…”

He descended on her, and she was again helpless to resist him. She knew she had to scream for help, fight him off, but instead she let him peel her pants off, and then she spread her legs hungrily as she groped for his manhood, fed it into her. It was rejuvenating, and she begged him to do it hard. This time, when he plunged in and out of her, she felt guilt and horror—but she didn’t care. She buried those feelings because the overwhelming ecstasy was so worth it. He kept his clawed hand over her face to hide her wails.

When it was over, and he was gone, she suddenly cared about the guilt and horror, and she started screaming.

“You Took the Worms Right Out of My Mouth”
By David M. Fitzpatrick

Stupid Benny. Dumb shit never did anything right, and he fucked this one up good.

The last thing I remembered was seeing that giant SUV blow through the red light. I had the green, but on a motorcycle you lose against everything. I felt that big thing hit—and then blackness.

The next thing I knew, there was a bright light that hurt my eyes. I couldn’t breathe; something was in my mouth, blocking my airway. I reached for my mouth, trying to dislodge the obstruction.

"It's okay!" Benny cried. I saw his blurry form through the haze. "I got it!"

He dug in my mouth, scooped something out, then went back for more.

I blinked as my eyes adjusted. His hand was above my face, full of squirming worms. I shot upright, coughing and hacking, as he threw them aside.

"What the hell?" I cried, my voice raspy and my throat sore.

“I did it, Jimmy,” Benny said excitedly. “I did the spell and brought you back to life, like we’d always planned.”

I was naked. The biodegradable linens I’d been wrapped in had been cut away on the table in Benny's garage. My skin was bloated, cracked, split. Worms squirmed around the various holes.

"You stupid bastard!" I croaked. "You waited too long!"

"I'm sorry!" he cried as I struggled to my feet. "They buried you without embalming, in the green cemetery, like you wanted. But Janet wouldn't leave your grave the whole day. It was the first chance I had to dig you up."

Janet could never let go of anything. We'd been broken up for months and she still pined for me.

So here I was, reanimated and in bad shape. This was not how I'd expected things to go.

Anger boiled in my rotting guts. "Bring her to me."

***

When Benny brought Janet into the garage, she took one look at me and screamed. But only once; it was like a female reflex action. Then she stared in awe, moving slowly forward until she could reach out and touch me.

"How?" she asked.

"Magic," Benny said from behind her. “We had these spellbooks.”

"But stupid Benny waited too long, so now I'm fucked up," I said. "He couldn't dig me up because you wouldn't leave my grave all day."

"I still love you," she said, as if I hadn't just accused her of fucking up my undead life.

That’s when Benny clubbed her in the head with a shovel. She went down, unconscious.

“Just choke her,” I said, but her last words rang in my mind.

Benny squeezed the life out of her.

***

We waited until she’d started decomposing before resurrecting her. She was not pleased when we pulled worms out of her mouth.”

“Sorry, honey,” I said, “but you hanging over my grave for a day was why I ended up like this. I guess I wanted a little ‘turnabout is fair play.’”

She glared at me. “I always loved you.”

“I know. I realized that. So, if you want to be together… we’ve got a long undeath ahead of us.”

She smiled, her dead lips splitting and cracking. "Sounds good.”

I reached into the bag Benny had brought and pulled out a dead squirrel. Janet watched in shock as I bit into its head.

"You'll soon find a powerful hunger for flesh," I said. "Benny's been bringing me animals, but... well, I'm still pissed at him. I mean, you lingered over my grave, but if he'd had the sense to knock you over the head then and bring me back early, things would be better."

She furrowed her decomposing brow. "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying I'm tired of dead squirrel, and Benny should be here any minute."

She smiled.

We wouldn't be reanimating Benny. But based on him acting like a fucking idiot, I don't suspect his brains will be particularly filling.

“Hell Can’t Wait”
By David M. Fitzpatrick

His magic number was 100. But he was stuck, because Number 100 was unexpected.

He had a routine: Grab the helpless bitches when they were stupid enough to walk the streets alone at night, beat them unconscious, and take them to his house in the country. He’d tie them up in his barn, where he’d rape and beat them for hours or days, until he was bored, and then disembowel them. He’d watch them squirm and thrash in agony against their bonds, as their guts spilled to the floor and they died. Then he’d cut them up, bag the parts, vacuum-seal the bags, and save them until his current spree was done. Then, he’d drop all the body parts where they’d be found.

He’d done that for thirty years. He’d go several years between sprees, but when he killed, he killed a lot. His goal was a hundred, and he was finally there. He’d done for one grand purpose: With this kind of evil and gore, and this body count, he’d earn a place of honor with Satan himself in Hell.

Then Number 100 fought back. Came to when he was hauling her into the barn and broke his kneecap. She was on her feet in a flash, and beat the shit out of him. He never had a chance to respond before she’d knocked him out.

When he awoke, he was tied down in his barn, spread eagle as he’d done to so many of the bitches. And Number 100 stood over him.

“You fucking cunt,” he snarled. “I’ll torture you for years. Your pain and suffering will be legendary—Satan himself will hear your screams, whore!”

“Dedicated your life to Satan, have you?” she said with a leering smile.

“Don’t speak his glorious name, whore,” he spat at her. “I’ll drag you to Hell myself.”

“I’m sure you will,” she said, and with that, her eyes glowed red, fangs and horns sprouted, and she transformed into a red-skinned male demon. His eyes widened, and he smiled.

“Forgive me!” he cried. “I didn’t know you were Satan’s demon! But please—I beg you, let me get Number 100. Give me tonight to find one more. Then I’ll serve Satan in Hell forever!”

“Silly man,” she hissed. “There is no Satan, but one of greater evil. And there is no Hell, but a place much worse.”

And with a flash of smoke, he was on a barren plain, nothing but rock and weeds. The stars were unfamiliar. Three moons hung in the sky.

And all around him were a thousand body parts, and as he watched in horror, they began to fly into the air and assemble themselves into the bloody patchwork corpses of his ninety-nine women. Only now, as they closed on him, he saw they had red eyes, fangs, and horns.

“I’ll just kill you all again!” he screamed.

“No,” came the voice of the demon who’d bested him. “They’ll be killing you—forever.”

The circle tightened, and clawed hands reached for him, and he felt his guts pouring out of his body. There seemed like endless miles of entrails as he screamed and fought to run through the horde.

The entrails never seemed to end, and neither did the horde.

NEXT MONTH:
“All Wrecked Up And A Placenta To Go”
“One Out Of Ten Ain’t Good”
“Three Pair of Dice by the Dashboard Light”
“Crying Out Loud”

David M. Fitzpatrick is a fiction writer in Maine, USA. His many short-stories have appeared in print magazines and anthologies around the world. He writes for a newspaper, writes fiction, edits anthologies and teaches creative writing. Visit him at www.fitz42.net/writer to learn more.