Free Anything Can Be Dangerous by Matt Hults Page A

its
wooden post waver, as if not entirely solid.
    He lifted the lid of the
dumpster.
    A hot breath pushed past his arm when
he did, and his mouth fell open as he found himself staring into a
massive tooth-lined throat that descended into a hazy orange
oblivion of fire.
    He stumbled away, shaking.
    There was a heart-stopping moment when
he felt the trash bags begin to fall from his grasp, and it only
came out of the sheer terror of not knowing what might happen if he
didn’t finish the task that he found the strength to heave them
into the dumpster from a distance.
    He turned and started back toward the
restaurant at a fast walk.
    From here, all he saw of the building
was the white rectangle of light that marked the open back door.
Wendy’s silhouette stood at the threshold, eagerly awaiting his
signal to join him.
    He shook his head as he neared,
praying she saw it.
    Don’t come out! he wanted to scream. Whatever you do,
don’t come out here!
    He’d closed to within sight of her
when he spotted a new employee enter the room behind
her.
    “ Wendy!” he cried, voicing
her name far louder than intended. He’d meant to warn her that his
plan had failed, that she should stay put, but she must’ve misread
the horror on his face and thought he was reacting to the thing
approaching behind her.
    “ Phone call for you, sir,”
the worker announced.
    She spun to face the man, and when she
did Ron had a clear view of the creature.
    It was Greg.
    Though torn limb from limb just hours
ago, the man appeared whole, pieced back together like some
horrific jigsaw puzzle. Thick black sutures followed the bloody
lines of his wounds like a network of interconnected rivers,
crisscrossing the visible parts of his body. He had on the same
type of grease-stained apron worn by the kitchen staff—which bowed
inward over his stomach, as if covering a huge hole—as well as a
creased paper hat.
    Wendy ran.
    She charged forward without a sound,
bolting into the unknown.
    Ron lunged for her as she ran past,
but only grazed the soft skin of her hand.
    “ No! Don’t!” he
cried.
    He turned around to see the darkness
flow forward, coming at them like a wave. Wendy froze at the sight
of it, watching as it swallowed the dumpster and lamppost, racing
toward her.
    Ron grabbed her. Pulled her back to
the doors.
    But then something had her.
    Both of them screamed as her feet got
yanked out from under her, and Ron swung around to see her legs
lift off the ground, immersed up to her knees in the
darkness.
    “ Ron!” she
cried.
    He held her with one hand, seized the
push-bar of the door with the other.
    Greg’s corpse watched them
indifferently.
    “ Ron! Oh, God! Help, me!”
she screamed.
    The darkness consumed her up to the
waist, pulling her higher, until Ron was looking up at her as he
fought the pull her inside.
    Grunting, he held on with all of his
might, feeling his muscle fibers stretch to their limit. The veins
of his arms stood out like lightning bolts. But he wasn’t only
fighting the brute strength of the entity outside, he discovered;
he was straining against uncounted hours of sweating over a hot
grill, handling food drenched in oil.
    Skin slid over skin.
    First he had her whole
hand.
    Then just her palm.
    Then only her fingers.
    He looked into her face as he felt her
nails reach the edge of his grip, knowing that in the next second
he’d lose her. With tears slipping from his eyes, he tried the only
thing left that might save her.
    “ Wendy!” he
shouted.
    The terrified girl looked down,
meeting his eyes.
    “ You’re fired!” he
yelled.
    Her screams cut off, replaced by
stunned silence.
    “ Effective immediately,” he
added. “Get off the property!”
    She held his stare even as the
darkness seeped over her face.
    And then she was gone, pulled out of
his hands.
    The doors flew shut. Ron collapsed to
his knees.
    He sat on the floor in the aftermath
of his actions, doubling over as a flood of emotions washed over
him. “Oh,