Nightmare Magazine, August 2018 (Issue 71) by John Joseph Adams

Author:John Joseph Adams
Language: eng
Format: mobi, azw3
Publisher: John Joseph Adams
Published: 2018-07-17T04:40:29+00:00

©2018 by G.V. Anderson.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

G.V. Anderson is a British writer whose professional debut, “Das Steingeschöpf”, won the World Fantasy Award for Best Short Fiction in 2017. Her stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Strange Horizons, Fantasy & Science Fiction, and Lightspeed.

To learn more about the author and this story, read the Author Spotlight

Kill All Monsters

Gary McMahon | 3488 words

Two or three miles south of Sheffield, they pulled off the M1 motorway and into the badly lit car park of a grubby little HumChef roadside restaurant. Squat buildings huddled in the darkness, separated by narrow patches of overgrown wasteland. The road was narrow; the aged asphalt surface was cracked and blistered. The woman glanced at the clock on the dashboard; it was two-thirty a.m. The child was asleep in the back, snoring softly. The woman reached across and clasped the man’s hand on the steering wheel. Darkness pressed against the windows and the sides of the car. Metal creaked. The engine cooled.

“Here?” she said, softly. “Should we risk it?”

The man nodded. “We need to eat. Something to drink. We can’t just keep driving.” His gaze was locked dead ahead, focused at a point a few yards from the windscreen. There wasn’t much to see, but he was staring intensely: a high white-rendered concrete wall, a row of grey plastic bins, a pile of black rubbish bags with their tops knotted.

“I’ll wake the child,” she said, opening the car door. The interior light came on, flickered. The inrush of cold air from outside was like an unexpected kiss. It lifted her; she felt unfettered from the small, claustrophobic world inside the car. She could barely hear the traffic from the motorway; just the occasional hypnotic swish of hot rubber on smooth tarmac.

She walked around to the back of the car and opened the rear door. The child was lying across the back seat, her long, thin legs stretched out on the upholstery. Light from the small, jittery overhead bulb pooled around her face and gathered in her long blonde hair.

“Time to get up,” she said, reaching inside to give the child’s arm a shake. “We’re here.”

The child stirred. Sat up, blinking. She rubbed at her cheeks, scratched her head. “I’m hungry,” she said.

“I know. You’re always hungry.” The woman smiled and stepped back, moving in a crouch away from the car to let the child climb out. She caught sight of her own face in the wing mirror. There were dark bags around her eyes but the bruises on her cheek had faded to look like smudges of dirt. Her long sleeves hid the scratches on her arms.

It’s okay, she thought. You’re fine, now.

The car park wasn’t busy. Only a handful of vehicles sat in white-lined spaces. It was too late for the dinner traffic and too early for the breakfast crowd.

The man got out of the car, waited, and then locked the doors. He walked ahead of them, towards the island of light that was the restaurant, and paused, holding open the double doors until they caught up.

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