SFX:
Waves breaking on a shingle beach . . . the harsh clang of hammer and anvil as if in the making of ancient bronze armor for horses. Fade up out of black to what looks like blood dripping from the twisted branches of a solitary oak, gelatin silver with moonlight.

VO:
I seek the confederacy of the spirits of magnetic devotion.

Dissolve through the branches to the face of the Woman in soft focus . . .

THE CHANT:
Take semen . . . yesterday’s rain and gunpowder . . .
Irish whiskey, a velvet ribbon and a live needle spider . . .
A lock of her hair and a single pungent, menstrual red rose . . . then build a fire beneath a high water moon.

Wally finally had a story—a story to scare the pants off his friends. Starting tonight, he no longer would be the butt of their jokes, the “piss-pants kid,” and the least important member of the five-buddy clique.

It was Friday night, the thirteenth, and they were again in Ben’s basement rec room. One last sleepover before they had to start high school.

Ben’s house was about the biggest in the county, and his rec room was just the best place for teenage boys to hang out in a small town. The room was long and wide, a pool table at one end, ping-pong table at the other, a stone-lined fireplace in-between. A TV was hooked to a video game player, and Ben always brought down his laptop so they could explore the Internet all they wanted.

Sometimes they liked to play poker for nickels and dimes. Wally always lost. He was out a good fifty bucks this summer, so he was glad nobody lobbied for another game tonight.

But after all the games, the sodas, chips and pizza Ben’s mom provided from upstairs, the boys liked to tell scary stories. Always after midnight. Ghost stories, slasher tales, Blair Witch knockoffs, vampires, werewolves, gore-sucking aliens, bizarre mutations, mummies, and zombies—nightmare fables only teenage boys could think up and find entertaining. Each story told when they truly tried to scare the crap out of each other. Which they never really managed to do—except for Wally.

“Six feet up is better than six feet under.” This advice, given on the morning that PFC James Moran shipped out for a tour of duty in war-torn Iraq, was given by his father—a veteran of the Vietnam War who’d returned from that conflict without the use of his legs. He’d issued the warning from his wheelchair, his normally stoic face trembling at the unspoken implication that needed no elaboration. “Come back in one piece, Jimmy.”

The soldier paused on the tarmac to glance back at his wheelchair-bound father, delivering a crisp, final salute that exuded confidence. He felt invincible, and his faith was strong. He boarded the plane recalling a memorable line delivered by Father Mulcahy during a sermon he’d attended shortly after receiving his deployment orders: "Be strong, do not fear; your God will come with vengeance; with divine retribution he will come to save you." As the transport plane moved toward the runway he caught a final glimpse of his father watching the plane pull away, unaware that it was the last time he’d ever see his father alive.

I was contacted by Shane Diablo (aka “Meatwhistle”) of the shock rock metal band DieMonsterDie and asked if I would like to do a review of their latest album, “Fall to Your Knees.” I’d never heard of them before so I took a look at their website and MySpace pages and saw the stage makeup and costumes and listened to the songs and was instantly thinking: “Hell Yeah!” I quickly replied and asked them to send the material over so I could check it out.

Man was I impressed. These guys are good. Not only are they talented musician who produce high quality tunes, but also they put on a bloody and shocking horror show to rival the best in the business. Their costumes are morbid, Gothic, sinister, and downright bloody and that was a plus right off the bat. I love the theatrics of shock rock. The music is the real meat for the grinder here though. If you’ve never heard of this band and you like metal and horror then you should head right over to their website and take a look and listen. You will be pleasantly surprised and horrified at the same time.

I have a new sedative and glucose drip.

My sister visits. She looks well and I tell her.

"Thanks," she says. "I had a weekend spa. Dad bought it for me, after all the stress."

"And the new job," I say.

"Whew," she says and wipes her hair from her forehead. "Let me tell you about the new job, Alex."  And she does. For a half hour. Everything is the same, the same as I remember from the last time she had a new job.

Lady Parasyte has gone through some changes since the last time she graced the pages of Macabre Cadaver. Not only has she added new members to the band (Mark Black, guitarist/programmer, and Miss Angela S., vocals), she has also been signed to machineKUNT Records. Her new album, Abandoned Places, is due out in late 2010. We have once again had the chance to chat with LP.

1. We see that Lady Parasyte has gone through some changes since the last time we spoke.....

Lady Parasyte- Definitely. Since the last time we spoke there has been a major change in the bands lineup and sound. We have also since signed with the indie label Machinekunt Records. We’ve also somewhat changed the look and feel of the band with our website and photos. Most importantly we are working on our first full length album “Abandoned Places”.

I walked down Teluna Lane. The ice shavings pelted right through my jacket, and the wind felt more like ice than the ice did—but I didn’t care. I liked the numbness it brought.

I shouldn’t’ve left Liz in the car, but I just couldn’t take it anymore. She was holding Mallory, rocking her back and forth, singing to her, pretending she was still alive. Pretending that her face wasn’t blue, that her eyes weren’t huge bulges, that her mouth was laughing instead of gaped open like a fish . . . that her . . . fuck it. I can’t take this.

A constant fog,
This bone yard blooms.
A requiem of last breath’s
Incites an ancient reverie
From the mouth of each lone tomb.
Inhale this debacle of a decaying madman’s delight.
And conjure the inarticulate meanings
In each departed corpse’s last rights.

She hated waiting on the other Zombies in the restaurant. Their pliant postures and self-deprecating jokes fogged the air with the stink of their cigarettes and the sharp alcohol scent of their highballs. The gin sloshed in their glasses as they awkwardly kissed up to their sleek vampire cousins.

The other day, on top of my Caesar's The Gallic Wars, I found a book my teenage daughter had borrowed from her highschool classroom: Acceleration by Graham McNamee. I'm not a huge fan of young adult horror or mystery, especially since the popularity of Twilight (and my very long,drawn out opinion of that series, which I'd rather keep to myself) had drawn hundreds of young adult authors out of the woodwork, trying to jump on the "vampire gravytrain". With a sigh, and some extra "bathroom reading" time on my hands, I picked up the book, and quickly skimmed the first few pages. "Ok", I told myself. "So far so good, no vamps or wolf-boys running around trying to protect a skinny young teenage female from the forces of evil". As I delved further, the pages began to quickly turn, as Acceleration began to ever increasingly peak my interest.