The Squelchers

The Mueller family lived on a generational farm in southern Indiana, close to the Kentucky border, but an hour's ride from the nearest highway. It was a quiet, secluded, part of the country, where the closest neighbors were out of sight of the Mueller's house, and a hundred acres of forest hid the horizon. The farm was big enough to provide them with everything they needed, as long as they did the work. The children were happy and healthy, if a little wild. The parents, Patrick and Teresa, liked things just the way they were.

Life was good, until the squelchers showed up.At first the disturbances caused by the creatures was limited to eerie sounds coming from the forest. High pitched keening cries filled the air from three days prior to the full moon to three days after. The children were frightened by them, as were the animals. The chickens stopped producing eggs, and the goats quit giving milk. The dogs hid under the porch and refused to come out, even for food. As time went on, strange things began to happen around the farm. Chickens disappeared, but their feathers and blood were found out in a field. One of the dogs ran off to the forest, and Patrick couldn't get it to come back. At night, they heard chittering vocalisations and a weird squelching sound that repeated in a pattern like footfalls. The family started keeping the doors locked and bolted.

It was Little Jack, the youngest, who caught the first glimpse of the creatures. He had gotten out of bed in the middle of the night, and with a little flashlight in hand, was standing watch at the back door, peering through the bottom window pane. The first thing that he noticed was a green glowing orb bobbing across the field toward the hen house. He switched on his flashlight, and immediately saw two enormous yellow eyes with narrow slitted pupils, staring straight at him. The orb swished back and forth behind the creature's head, at the end of a long, furry, black striped tail. The thing was standing upright on two thin legs that terminated in bright red, fleshy, roundish, large feet. Little Jack described them as being like toilet plungers. It was those oddly shaped feet that made the squelching noises as it walked. The creature was covered in silvery grey fur, except for three black tufts on it's head, between the long, dangling ears. Little Jack stared at it in awe, until it suddenly opened it's mouth wide, revealing double rows of sharp, needle shaped teeth, with hooked fangs, and screamed one of those keening cries. Little Jack screamed in terror, dropped his flashlight, and ran to his room where he hid under the bed until morning.

When Little Jack told the family what he had seen, they thought he'd had a nightmare, brought on by all the recent strangeness, until they went outside to do the morning chores. Two more chickens were missing. This time, Patrick searched the ground for tracks, expecting to see coyote or raccoon prints. Instead, he found a trail of circular impressions that matched his son's description of the creature he had seen, and knew that the boy had been telling the truth. After that, they all started referring to the creatures as squelchers. The next night the squelchers came in a pack. They took all the rest of the chickens and killed the remaining dog.

Patrick drove his truck to the home of their neighbors, the Kelley family, to ask if they had been having similar troubles, and maybe get some help. When he got there, the doors were standing open, and no one answered when he called out. He went inside the house, where he discovered what remained of their bodies, strewn throughout the house, bones completely stripped of flesh. Consumed with terror for his own family, he drove at top speed back home. He enlisted the children to board up all the windows and the back door. He reinforced the front door himself, and then he and Teresa positioned themselves with shotguns and boxes of shells, to wait for the squelchers to attack.

They came around midnight, keening and chittering, sniffing the ground all around. Within minutes of their arrival, the squelchers charged the front door. Patrick was prepared. He blasted two of them in the face in quick succession, and reloaded in five seconds, while Teresa covered him by firing into midst of the furry horde. The squelchers scattered but rallied quickly, attacking from different angles. The Muellers picked off four more of them before they turned and ran back to the forest, green orbed tails trailing behind them.