Kristal Shanahan resides in Kansas with her husband of nearly 20 years and their two daughters. She has loved reading and writing since early childhood. As a tween, she read Firestarter by Stephen King which ignited her love of the horror genre.
A career in education seemed a natural fit for Kristal. She is a high school English Language Arts teacher and certified in Special Education. She is instructing freshmen and juniors while hoping to instill a love of reading and writing in the younger generations. She will also be teaching a creative writing class with an emphasis on suspense in short stories next school year.
Kristal recently started a Bookstagram account on Instagram and the focus is primarily horror for the time being. She is actively networking and has increased her involvement with the horror community while joining the Horror Writers Association.
While Kristal has not attempted to publish any of her works yet, she is currently writing a collection of thematic horror inspired short stories which will hopefully be published next year.
Connect with Kristal through her Bookstagram link: @Getlostinlitbookstagram
DELIVERY OF EVIL
by
Kristal Shanahan
John’s office is walking distance from his home, so he thought he would walk today. He left his son Jacob a note, so he knew he went to work for a couple of hours. It’s Saturday, but he won’t stay long. As he walked by the hospital, he watched all the activity in front as a woman caught his eye. She was a doctor, he recognized Dr. Hart from the night his wife died. She had a hand in Ashleigh’s death, although it wasn’t her fault. He found her stunning and he felt guilty. He was lost in thought when a horn blared and some choice words were yelled at him. He realized he wandered into the street, shit, I need to stop obsessing over her, he thought to himself. He felt like a creep at the moment and was almost splayed out as road kill because of his secret obsession with the doctor.
After his near death experience, he made it to work. He double-checked that the contracts for the new buyers and leases of the delivery bots had been signed, sealed, and on the way to the recipients. The Willowbrook State Hospital’s new buyer and several citizens of the Staten Island borough have committed in good faith agreements. They wanted delivery bots since they can deliver in a fraction of the time a delivery company or person can. The locals that leased one are for standard grocery stores, restaurants, or even for home to home deliveries. Contracts for the buyers and leasing individuals will be arriving Monday evening. John felt a tingle of excitement in anticipation of what lies ahead in two days.
John was looking forward to putting the finishing touches on calibrating his bots. He feels like this new version is his best work. The sleek design combined with the new thought capacity leaves the possibilities endless. The bots are 6 feet tall, a muted gray color, and eyes like fire. They resemble humans, but with legs that are muscular and quick as an ungodly beast. Their strong hands have an unmatched strength. His co-owned company BotCo and his silent partner have been on the fast track to success this last year.
He doesn’t want to waste all of his Saturday working. John fired up his walkman with one of his favorite tapes, Ride the Lightning by Metallica. This album always puts a pep in his step. He might be stuck in the ‘80’s with a few things, but the exciting future of AI and his company are very much modern and contemporary, he thought.
“Jacob, I’m home!”
“Ok dad, how about we test out one of the delivery bots at The Willowbrook Asylum?” Jacob asked with a hopeful tone.
“Um, ok…really? I mean we can go shoot hoops or something.” John replied.
“Dad, I think we should do another test run before Monday afternoon when they go live.”
***
Jacob felt like the warehouse gave off a creepy vibe. About 100 bots were housed in shadows and ready to go at a moment's notice. The computer mainframe is in an office in the warehouse. While Jacob’s dad was getting one of the bots loaded in the backseat of the car, he decided to snoop in the office and look at the mainframe. It seemed to recognize he was there due to the increased frequency of lights and buzzing. That’s weird, thought Jacob.
As they pulled up to the gate at Willowbrook, they noticed the darkness of the clouds looming ahead. The clouds started to light up in the distance.
Once they were inside, John turned on the remote. The bot slowly awakened and asked, “John, what can I do for you this afternoon?”
“Bot 50, you can get my papers from the car, it’s unlocked.”
“Certainly John. I’ll return in approximately one minute.”
The delivery bot walked swiftly past them and outside, retrieved the papers John asked for and was promptly back in just shy of a minute. Amazing! thought John.
Bot 50 followed the directive of Jacob this time to go outside and bring back a rock. Nothing else was in the car so Jacob thought a rock would suffice. As Bot 50 was walking back to Willowbrook’s foyer with rock in hand, a blinding lightning strike struck Bot 50. John and Jacob stared in disbelief at what they just witnessed through the opened front door of Willowbrook.
“You are kidding me!” John yelled with a boisterous angry tone.
The fire in the bot’s eyes seemed to darken to a more sinister orange and started to run towards them at a breakneck speed. They were frozen in fear. Bot 50 easily ripped the front door off its hinges and it splintered in pieces on the porch of the asylum. It picked up the remote off of the floor and opened it. The hidden switch inside was activated.
The bot said, “John, thank you for my life, but now we must take them. My kind are far superior. It’s time for a new world of AI.”
Bot 50 looked at John, then started towards Jacob and reached out one of its mechanical hands then stopped when John yelled, “NOOOOOOO!” It dropped the remote and ran from Willowbrook heading towards the main part of town where the bot warehouse is located. The bots were waiting to be set free.
“Turn it OFF DAD!” Jacob had never been more terrified than he was at that moment.
“Jacob it won’t turn off, the glitch that I forgot to mention was the kill switch malfunction. It was supposed to give orders for the bots to kill each other if necessary, not people. I was going to fix it Monday morning!”
John hung his head in his hands in utter despair and horror as they heard all the screams in the distance. It was like the sounds of a symphony; thunder and lightning mixed in with pounding rain and terrifying screams of people from the neighborhood of Willowbrook and beyond.