The weirdness continues just down the road from the site of the pool bar killings where injuries included: crushed schnozzes from billiard balls, eviscerations via sawed-off shotguns, and accidental chainsaw ingestion.
Get with the program and read the bit that came before:
Damn Clowns fucked up our barhop
Here’s the beginning of the story about Lamibogish, Nova Scotia, that mystery town that everyone seems to have forgotten...
We collectively recoiled from Hugh as he bent over, spewing the last of his vomit.
“What the fuck, dude!” Phaedra kicked some of the stuff off her shoes.
Hugh burped and straightened himself up, shaking as he did. “S-Sorry, fam. I don’t do so good with blood, you know?”
Jonah reached forward and patted his shoulder, “Say la vee [or however the hell you spell it], man, no hard feelings.”
“Yeah, forget it,” I said, even though the puke was seeping into my socks. I’ve had worse soaking them before.
“We need to call the cops,” Katie said, pulling her cellphone out of her jeans. We agreed, stepping with her away from the clowns’ bodies. Hugh went off into the bathroom, probably to wash up.
Jonah, Phaedra, and I watched as Katie dialed 9-1-1 and held the phone up to her ear. She tapped her foot as she waited, then frowned after a few moments of silence. Suddenly, she jerked it away from her face. “Ouch!” she tossed the phone between either of her hands. “It’s burning up!”
The cellphone erupted midair with a loud pop. We turned away from the heated, plastic shrapnel. The frame and buttons clattered to the ground and melted.
Katie pressed her palms against her forehead. “What the fuck?” she sobbed. “I didn’t even get through to anyone.”
Phaedra sighed and pulled out her phone. “I’ll try.” She dialed 9-1-1 and we waited, this time she put it on speaker and held it away from herself. The phone rang three times before a click sounded, then fuzzy static.
“Hello?” Phaedra asked.
Instead of an operator answering, a garbled voice started whispering a quick string of words. We leaned closer and closer as it went on. Suddenly, an electronic blare erupted from the phone’s speaker, undercut with a shrill whine. We all jumped back, Phaedra dropped the phone as it too exploded.
“Kahk!” she cussed (I think that means “shit”) and kicked the scraps of the phone away. We stared at the ground, Hugh’s puke settling into the carpet and stinking up the air along with the smoldering plastic and metal of the two little explosions.
“I don’t think we should stay here,” Katie said finally.
“It’s better if we do.” I looked up. “No telling if there’re more crazies outside.”
“Well, I don’t want to stay either,” added Phaedra. She glanced at the corpses and the gore scattered across the bar.
“It’s not about wanting to be here,” I said, “it’s better to hunker down, wait it out, make contact with someone who can deal with whatever’s going on.”
Jonah nodded. “I agree with Kevin. As gruesome as it is staying here, it’ll be better to wait.”
Phaedra folded her arms over her breasts, covered by a purple bra. “I thought you were the soldier, Kev.”
That stung and I let my face say it for me, but I tried to keep my cool in my response, “I was, but even then we weren’t rushing out into the open. We need backup.”
“What good is it if our phones just fucking exploded both times we tried calling for it?” Katie blurted. Her eyes were already red and puffy.
The bathroom door opened and Hugh wandered out, rubbing his face with a bundle of paper towels. He came over and asked, “So, what’s the move, fam?”
“Kevin says we should stay,” Katie explained, “but we can’t call the cops and it’s not sitting right with us to stick around.”
Hugh waved a hand. “Yeah, fuck this place, let’s bail.”
Katie sighed. “There, majority vote.”
“I didn’t put this to a vote; we aren’t picking which bar to go to,” I said. “We can make this place defensible. If we need to wait it out 'til someone who won’t kill us comes by, so be it.”
“What if more of them come by instead?” Phaedra pointed at the clowns.
“Yeah, we can hole up at Jacoby’s place.” Hugh shook my shoulder. “It’s big and he can call the cops for us.”
I grimaced at Jonah who merely shrugged. He and the others had already started shuffling towards the exit. They were going to leave whether or not I stayed.
“Fine, but I’m taking this with us.” I held out the shotgun, barrel aimed at the ground. “I suggest y’all get something to protect yourselves with too.”
“You’ll get busted for sure,” Phaedra said. “Considering you shot that guy as well.”
I threw my hands in the air. “Whatever, jail would be safer right now, anyways.”
The others gathered up some pool cues and glass bottles before we made our way to the door. I did my best to avoid looking at the red mess coating the bar as I stepped outside. It was still quiet like it had been when the sun went down just a few hours before. No cars, no people, just street lamps and silence.
O’Dougall’s sits in a plaza one road off the middle of Main St. next to the Goodlife gym and Petie’s 'Zas (the local pizza joint). Normally, there’d be a line of students across the street all the way to the pub on the corner of Main, but the sidewalk sat dry and empty and yellow in the streetlights. The trees just past the sidewalk were dark and not a breeze shook them.
We stepped into the middle of the street, following Hugh towards Main. He still wobbled and shook, but I was fine taking it slow for the time being to listen and watch out for trouble. As soon as we rounded the corner to go down Main, a car horn blared up the road, stopping us in place. A dark crowd stumbled through the street, I could see the many changing colors on their clothes and white faces, almost reflective in the sickish light. They flooded out of the darkness at the end of the road, darted into the street from alleys and buildings, smashing windows and doors. They threw themselves at one another like a bunch of bumbling toddlers. They laughed, whooped, and chattered up a mess of sounds that rolled overhead like a storm and ate up the quiet that held itself for so long before. Gunshots rang over the crowd, sending us jumping back a few paces.
Even in his state, Hugh turned tail and ran for the pub. Its primary doors sat on a short flight of steps facing the street corner. The others followed him while I fixed my sights on the gathering trouble.
“Inside! Inside!” I said as quiet as I could, taking up the rear while everyone filed into the pub. It was a spot we, along with most other students at St. Eunan’s, frequented—that is, when we could get in. It’s proper name Am Píob Mór (sounds like Uhm Peeb Mowr) means “The Big Pipe” in Gaelic, but most folks call it “Peebs.”
I held open the outer door of the entrance as everyone ducked in. Still keeping my eyes on the crowd of clowns, I entered as well. It was only when I went to lock the door did I notice the blood, just getting tacky, smeared over my hand. The inside of the door and some of the little window was spattered with it in the shape of a handprint. Hearing everyone gasp behind me confirmed we might have just traded one crappy spot for another.
Another set of doors stood across from the main entrance after a short hallway; my friends stood in the middle of the threshold, gawking inside. The pub’s lights were dimmed, but bright enough to see the shattered bottles and glasses, and broken bits of chairs and stools sprinkling the pools of blood on the floor and dripping off the bar. A sign right above the bar proudly displaying they served Keith’s had been painted over with words in more blood reading, “THE KING IJIT’S COME.”
“Fuck me,” Hugh groaned. “It’s not cool here either.”
“Too late,” I said, nudging everyone in. I locked the inner doors and shuttered them. The clowns’ ruckus was muffled but growing closer. “We need to lock or barricade every other door in this place, block all the windows, and stay low.”
The others blinked at me, then glanced about. I pointed and gave clearer orders, “Hugh, with me. Jonah, girls, check the side door and kitchen.”
The latter three nodded and went for the door past a couple booths off to the right of the entrance. It was the one people used to leave when the place got packed late at night. I’d dodged many-a puke puddle on the sidewalk leaving from that door.
Hugh and I went over to the dance floor. It was darker than the front half of the pub with some flashing, colorful lights shining on the floor and walls. They made the blood on the ground look shiny and black. The corpses it came from were also dim and featureless, except for when a light shone coldly on them. The bodies were placed in a circle at the center, heads towards the middle of the formation, their legs spread out and touching one another. Hugh whimpered and shuffled as we approached the scene.
“Shit, there’s so many,” he breathed. There were about twenty or so, mostly students I figured, but quite a few were in the black, plain clothing of the bar staff. Their wounds were ragged and messy; they’d likely died in a lot of pain if the shock didn’t numb them to it first.
I pointed to the door left of the DJ booth on the far wall, a red-lit EXIT sign over it. “We’ll check there,” I said, taking point. Hugh tip-toed behind me, skirting around the bodies. I levelled the gun waist-height as I opened the door. It swung outward to the pub’s back patio, overlooking the small river running alongside Main. Trees and a fence concealed it from the street, but I moved slowly as to not alert the mob getting closer and closer. The smell of beer and tobacco hung in the air; strands of lights with bulb covers shaped like ghosts, bats, and jack-o’-lanterns ran between the corners of the roof overhead. Several more bodies lay on the ground, their faces and joints driven and twisted into the concrete like someone had stomped on them. Hugh gawked at one body in the dart-throwing area left of the door. It was a younger guy, a student by the looks of his clothes. He was pinned by his hands with clusters of darts to the pair of boards on the wall. A bundle of cigarettes, about the width of a pint glass, was bound together by duct tape and shoved into his mouth, and fastened there with more tape over his lips and chin. He looked like the Patron Saint of Barflies, martyred to save their souls—hope to God all those people I’ve seen are resting the best they can.
“Ah hell,” Hugh swore, “I think knew this kid.”
He squatted to look into the body’s face, but it’s head jerked upright. The sorry bastard was still alive. He gagged, the ends of the cigs smoldering as he tried sucking in air through his mouth—another strip of duct tape plugged his nose shut.
“Shit!” Hugh stumbled back. “H-Hang on, dude, we’ll help you.”
The poor guy thrashed and jerked, hesitant to pull his hands away from the boards. He wheezed as he threw his head around, eyes and face turning red and wet.
I got closer just to see what could be done about him. The tape over his mouth and nose had been secured tightly ‘round his head. Had I a knife on me, I could’ve cut him loose.
High started plucking out the darts in his hands, one at a time, which made the fella squeal and squirm in place. They hadn’t been stuck in shallowly either. Each dart removed made the guy breathe even faster, the ends of the cigs shrinking in trails of ashes. I figured the smoke would kill him before any sort of blood loss.
“Hugh, Stop,” I said, grabbing his wrist before he pulled out another. “Help me with the tape. Gotta be careful and quick.”
I reached for the nearest seem I could find by the guy’s mouth. The whole bundle was only a few puffs away from reaching the filters. His head, red as a tomato, hung loosely between his shoulders; his chest still rose and fell quickly. Brushing my finger against his cheek, made me almost pull away with how hot his skin felt. I figured a thermometer would clock him well over 100 degrees. Seeing his lids flutter urged me to get back to clearing his airways. Almost a moment after I went to it, however, the cigarettes sizzled as the embers met the filters—then the guy’s head burst into flames.
Hugh reeled backwards, screaming. I rushed over and clamped a hand over his mouth before the noise reached the mob. I too, however, watched dumbfounded and right scared as the guy gave a muffled, prolonged moan in his death throes. His hair evaporated in a flash of yellow and puff of stinking smoke. The skin on his face melted, his cheeks bubbling and popping in gouts of dripping fat and scorched flesh. Both his eyes ruptured and ran like a waterfall of white jelly with the rest of the gore. He stilled by the time those exploded, his head bowing one last time to show us the dome of his skull.
I let go of Hugh and the both of us stood there, just blinking at the remains as the flames slowly died. I honestly did not feel much in the mind to move at all—I half hoped one of my blinks would see me waking up in my bed with a head full of aches and dim memories of our night out, no clowns in sight. Those clowns were real as could be, however, crowding the streets likely looking for more havoc. And just then it sounded like they were within spitting distance of Peeb’s.
Next chapter:
Damn Clowns drove the town crazy
"When the circus comes around. We will dance under the moon. Eejit clowns stumble loosely. Holdin' on to what they know."
“Damn Clowns trashed our favorite pub” © Ethan Sabatella 2025 – Current Year, All Rights Reserved. Reprinting or replication of this work in its entirety in any form (written, audiovisual, etc.) without express permission of the author is prohibited. Excerpts may be used for review or promotional purposes with credit and acknowledgement of the author. This piece cannot be used for training of Artificial Intelligence programs.
This is some fun grindhouse style gore-ror horror; gruesome, visceral, and creatively over the top to the point that you straddle the line between some proper slasher/survival horror and parody. It's a hard line to tread without stumbling too far in either direction, but you're balancing it well. That your PoV character, Kevin, is a lead I find myself wanting to follow certainly helps that, as does the fact his friends aren't insufferable, as is so often the case in stories of this nature. Not bad at all. I look forward to seeing what other havoc these killer klowns (not from outer space, presumably) get up to, and even more than that, how your cast is going to make their way through.
Suspenseful, really keeps you on edge— what is going to happen next?