Tainted Meat

It didn't take a genius or the smell of boiled ham to see that his coworker was dead, but the ham smell helped.

Peter stood slowly, his mind numb. Absently, he took the air freshener from Jim's desk and sprayed the cubicle before placing the can back to its place next to the keyboard. He turned to Jim's shocked cubicle buddy and shook his head. The man's face went white and fell behind the partition followed by the sound of vomiting. It was the same all over the office. The dead stinking bodies of accountants lay everywhere. Peter sighed, pulled his hanky out of his pocket and covered his mouth and nose. "Somebody call 911."

For an instant the world froze. It held Peter in a death grip, not even letting him choke on the solid knot of air in his throat. A strange humming filled the back of his skull, like a bee fluttering in some empty space in his brain. It left as quickly as it had come though, the hardness of the air going with it. Peter gasped, only noticing the strange quiet of the people around him after he had taken a few breaths. He looked around and saw the awe on the faces of his remaining coworkers. They all stared behind him, towards the photocopier. Peter turned around slowly, his common sense to run a low murmur in the back of his mind.

It stood on the photocopier, searching the room with mutilated, eyeless sockets that dripped black onto its pale cheeks.

"So this is what humanity has come to." the creature's voice came out tinny through an entanglement of metal wires and braces that stretched and contorted its mouth into a dark dripping cavern. Black, greasy, unkempt hair drooped to its shoulders. A dark gray robe, tattered and stained, hung from its whisper thin frame. "No doubt you've been expecting me as all the signs have been given" it called out. No one spoke. They remained as still as statues, afraid to move and be noticed by those eyeless sockets. It scanned the faces from atop the photocopier before dropping itself to the ground. The thing let out a sigh followed by dribbles of spittle from its braced open mouth. "The prophet has been subjected to both the Breath and Blood of Death, enabling me to reach into your world so that I could use their," the thing pointed to one of Peter's steaming coworkers, "life energy to open a portal from my prison to here... Sound familiar?" He drew only more blank stares. Its head drooped, letting drool and its wounded eyes drain down the front of its robe. "How long have I been gone?" Trebore whispered to himself.

He had thought the tales of his exploits would have haunted humanity for eons. He lifted his hands in front of his face. His countless deeds of destruction had faded even from the obscurity of children's stories. It looked up with a pale rage. "I reigned over your world for six years before I was imprisoned" Six years. Even Trebore himself had to admit that the length of his reign wasn't long. And if you put his six years of terror alongside the millennia of his imprisonment... well, the math wasn't difficult. But, he had done what no other had done before and it was a certainty none had done it since. He had held all of humanity under his fist. The world was united under the power of Trebore, "and it will be again. Starting with... YOU!" It pointed at Peter with an insane, trembling determination.