David K Mitchell

The rhythmic chugging of a steam engine swelled in the distance. As it approached the nearest pickup point little more than twenty feet from the house – Morwenna braced herself for the call, the morbid cry that grew no less painful with daily exposure. 

“BRIIIIING OUT YER’ DEAD. BRING OUT YER’ DEAAAAAAAD.”

Morwenna stepped outside, the sunlight scorched her eyes. A few of the neighbours were carrying bodies, bringing them to the flat bed carriage that was stopped on the tracks. Morwenna suppressed the urge to scream. 

“Busy mornin’, gotta be thirty new fungals!” proclaimed a man with a bulbous red nose and a failing comb-over, to anyone who’d listen. 

“BRIIIIING OUT YER’ DEAAAAAAAD!!!” cried another, stood on the edge of the flatbed carriage, stacking bodies upon bodies, upon bodies. His face hidden by a gas mask, some relic from before the fallout. “BRIIIIING OUT YER’ DEAAAAD. YOU GIRL, ANYTHING FOR THE SLEEPER TRAIN?”

She couldn’t see where his eyes were pointed – the mask’s eyes were obsidian black and bulbous, like a bug – but Morwenna could feel that his gaze was fixed on her. 

“OI, GIRLY! YER NOT WITHHOLDING DEAD ARE YE’?” The mask made the man’s voice reverberate unpleasantly, ghostly, ghastly. “ANYONE GONE, GETS ADDED TO THE MULCH PILE, WE ALL GOTTA EAT DARLIN’”.

He looked down and kicked a gaunt looking body below him, pallid tendrils crept from its eyes, its mouth, and its ears. It must have turned some time ago – Morwenna figured – as gills had formed in the creases of its skin – around its neck and elbows. 

“Stop it!” Morwenna found herself yelling, “They’re not dead, treat them with some respect.”

“Hyugghhhghghh.” The laugh caught in the man’s mask and rumbled like a generator. “You sure?” He leant down towards another body, its eyes had swelled into red and white caps, “if you’re alive, now would be a good time to speak up, because in a few seconds – if you don’t – I’m gonna start stomping.”

“No, please…” Morwenna whispered.

“One, two, three, four.” 

Morwenna turned back and slammed through her front door. 

“FIVE.” The call from outside was accompanied by a sickening crunch.

Morwenna crumpled into the corner of the darkened room, sobbing, wrapping herself in a blanket of mycelium.

“Oh god, mother,” she whispered, rolling under a greyish arm that had seemingly emerged from nowhere. “What should we do?”

A puff of spores shot across the room, dancing in what little light there was. A dangling tendril lowered itself into Morwenna’s eyeline, a small flower at its end. 

The flower’s petals unfurled slowly, like a magician revealing a coin. In the centre of its leafy palm lay a pile of fleshy seeds. Plantlike, but their outer casing was undoubtedly made of human skin. 

Morwenna plucked the seeds into her hand, and instantly the petals wilted and the flower died. 

“But where?” Morwenna asked. “The mulch pile?” 

Every tendril, gill and cap of her mother writhed in agreement. 

David’s prompts were: On a Sleeper Train, a Corpse, Seeds

David K Mitchell is a SFFH writer from Cornwall, England. He enjoys playing with ‘what ifs’ and bizarre hypotheticals. His work can be found in anthologies from Speculation Publications and Infesting Publishing.