Horror - Short

This story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are fictitious and any similarities to actual persons, locations, or events is coincidental. This work cannot be used to train artificial intelligence programs.  No AI tools were used in the writing of this story.

All rights reserved. Fix Job Copyright © Eddie Generous 2026

FIX JOB

Sweat cut gullies through the filth on Mike Zolen’s cheeks as he trudged the four-foot cement forms down the second flight of stairs. “Did you get paid this week?” he asked.

Equally sweaty and filthy, Brock Linkletter looked over his shoulder. “Sometimes ya gotta wait.”

As if that explained it.

Brock led the crew into the subbasement that stank of mold and something like animal musk mixed with shit. It was a slap-dash fix up job. The earth had shifted in the winter. That created craters and cracks in walls. Repairing the outer walls of the foundation was no trouble with the right tools. Repairing beneath was a total headache.

The building sat in a formally busy, but now nearly vacant, industrial area. No worries over live power lines or busy lanes. Most places couldn’t make it work for one reason or another. Folks blamed Chinese industry and K-Mart. Others said it was bad luck, just one of those blocks. The revolving door on the businesses in the neighborhood pertained to all but one site. For ninety-two years, Seeds Headwear had offered the best in natural fur hats.

“What do you mean we got to wait?” Zolen asked, indignant.

Bringing up the rear of the first crew, Kirk Crawford, a burly twenty-something, laughed. He had an easy way, good-spirited despite anything his boss might force onto them. “What he means, is sometimes we have to wait until the boss decides she can spare enough. She usually catches up right, but sometimes your pay is subject to Pammy tax.”

It was Linkletter’s turn to laugh.

“What’s Pammy tax?” Zolen leaned the forms he’d carted against a bare cement wall.

“Pammy tax is a percentage Pammy sees fit to retain from your check at her whim. It only ever comes when she owes you for more than a month, and by then, we’re all too relieved to get anything at all,” Crawford said.

“Yup.” Linkletter nodded slowly, pouted his lower lip.

“You don’t say nothing?” Zolen had a car payment and rent due in a week, he couldn’t wait a month for a paycheck that was already a full week late.

“Not if I want to keep my job and my balls. I’ve seen Pammy lift a man over her head by his beanbag. She’s no joke and as much as I find it funny for the new guy to get it from Pammy, I don’t think anyone needs to cross that line without some warning,” Crawford said, serious as a house fire.

“Bullshit.” Zolen wanted to smile, but the mood and tone didn’t carry it there.

They continued the work, down the stairs, up the same stairs, and back down again, lugging forms, rebar, and steel strapping as they went. Once they had the necessary tools and molding, they set to work. Everything was dirty and dim, outright dark where the spotlights didn’t touch.

The second crew hadn’t begun. Those assholes usually drank coffee until it was time to mix and pour. Seniority was a powerful instrument on Pammy’s crew.

The subbasement floor had wooden slats covering its entirety. They shifted underfoot as the crew worked. Not a scene apt to pass any codes, but it was mostly empty down there. A bit of a mystery at that.

Turning the spotlights often, the crew wired the rebar into a meshwork, set the forms and readied the straps for the pour. The whole job was one great big pain in the ass, and Zolen bubbled, on the verge of boiling.

“I’m going to say something. I can’t wait,” he said. “I have bills, can’t wait.”

“Good luck with that one. You guys notice the slats? The pour’s going to screw if they ever shift.” Crawford knocked on the wood beneath where they’d set up the rebar and forms.

“Yeah-huh, just thinkin’ the same,” Linkletter said.

“I’m serious. I’m going to stand up to the bitch.” Zolen looked from one co-worker to the other, as if hoping to gain a wingman. “She can’t do this. I’ll call the labor board.”

“Good luck, kid. What do you suppose this room is for? They said storage, but all I see is feed seed; ‘hell do they need feed seed for down here?” Crawford dug his fingers under a three-foot slat next to the formed area. “Oof! There’s a stink. What is that?”

“Just because you two are pussies,” Zolen flopped his arms in front of his chest, “don’t mean I’m one. She’s going to get a piece of my mind.”

“’Fuck is that?” Linkletter helped Crawford with the slat.

Fat steel grating sat below the wooden slats, sets of green-white eyes glowed—the light from the lamps reflected back. Zolen stepped forward for a look, thought maybe the others might try something. He wished he hadn’t called them a name. They were bigger, and the crew wasn’t afraid to push around the new guy.

“Are those cats?” Zolen asked.

The animals chattered below. “Coons, why they got coons?” Linkletter scrunched up his face.

“Jesus H., they make coon hats. Coon farm right under the floor,” Crawford said, a secondary sound filtering through from deep below: distant and different. “What’s that now?”

They listened.

“What other kind of hats do they make here?” Crawford asked.

Zolen looked back at Linkletter, a smile rode his goofy face. “Rusky rabbit.”

“Shit,” Crawford said, stretching the vowel sound and then repeating it. “Sheeeiiit.”

“What’s Rusky rabbit?” Zolen was finally off the topic of Pammy.

“It’s muskrat or giant mole rat. Companies bring over giant mole rats, raise ’em and skin ’em, sell them as rabbit fur. You hear any water?” Crawford had his right ear pointed to the floor.

“Why water?” Zolen asked.

“No water, no musky.” Linkletter also had his right ear turned to the floor.

They listened and Crawford shivered. They didn’t hear any water, making it a dry pen. Muskrats lived in damp regions. They were something like ugly beavers. Giant mole rats were infinitely nastier than muskrats, in the looks department anyway.

“Let’s see.” Zolen lifted another slat, uncovering more eyes on the first level and then catching a glint of motion from the second. “Stinks something awful.”

“They feed the coons, let the mole rats survive on seed spill and coon shit, Christ.” Crawford shook his head.

They uncovered two more slats and looked down into the lively crowd of future hats.

“‘Hell’s going on here?” the booming and familiar effeminate voice called.

Crawford straightened quickly. “We were just making sure the forms can settle on these floorboards.”

Linkletter nodded along behind him.

“Then you decided to take a break, did ya?” She spoke slowly, emphasizing each word more than the last, settling the gravity of her power. “Better be ready for pouring.”

Linkletter nodded. Zolen gulped down his cowardice, his testicles shrank, but it was now or never.

“You owe me money and you aren’t pouring a thing until you write my paycheck.”

Linkletter and Crawford stepped aside.

“What’s that?” Pammy softened her tone and moved closer.

Zolen instinctively backed away.

“I said you can’t pour until I’m paid. You may scare these—” Zolen started, Pammy lunged. “Hey, damn you!” He skittered away.

“You don’t sass Pammy, didn’t they tell you?” Pammy sniggered.

The sound of the second crew coming down the stairs blocked the path Zolen had hoped to take. He grabbed a two-foot piece of rebar from the floor and Pammy under-arced her arm with a blind uppercut grab, aiming for gonads. Zolen swung and there was a thump. Pammy yelled out a string of sounds, never really forming an entire word.

“You done it now,” Linkletter said.

Zolen circled around the men and away from Pammy, heading for the stairs.

A man at the bottom smiled. “I’m going to enjoy this.” He and the other two blocked the way.

“Shit, come on.” Zolen rounded back, his foot found an uncovered grate, he slipped, and Pammy dove at him. A thump whooshed air from Zolen and then the grate gave. They fell through. Pammy screamed again, her hand stung as she struck the floor, blood bubbled in a perfect line. The coons scattered, the level was only three feet deep—the floor grates below them, not used to the weight, creaked but held.

Zolen attempted to leap from the hole. An ancient man from the second crew put out a boot. “Nah, Pammy ain’t done wit’ ya yet.”

“Better skitter, kid,” Crawford said.

Zolen’s heart banged in his chest like an unpracticed marching band. He crawled away from the light as if maneuvering monkey bars, approaching a heavier scent of feces and blood. Seeking darkness.

That steel grating was slippery. The coons stayed a perfect distance: close, but not so close that the intruders might touch them. The coon pen kept going and Zolen crawled blindly, huffing and grunting as the air wheezed from his chest.

His hands slipped when someone yanked his ankles out from under him.

“Got’cha!” Pammy pounced.

The grate floor moaned again, creaked, and fell.

The giant mole rats scattered as the ceiling crashed down.

“Get away. I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Zolen whimpered as he kicked out. Pammy belly flopped on him once more. Her giant breasts were like boulders on his throat. The floor below them was solid in shape, and yet cracked under the pressure. Pammy didn’t notice. She was going to suffocate the wise-mouth kid. Nothing about the scene seemed to faze the anger or need to stand against the challenge.

The floor continued to suffer under Zolen’s shoulders until it whumped and opened, and they slid into pure dark earth.

Free to breathe, Zolen gasped, “Help!”

—

The sound rode up. Distant. Crawford looked at the men of the second crew. The second crew conceded, passed out a few flashlights from the toolboxes, and Crawford and Linkletter crawled down to follow the terrified screeches.

“Pammy?” Crawford called out, still not fully on Zolen’s side.

Linkletter turned back to the second crew. “Well, come on, gotta find ’em,” he said.

The others rolled their eyes but followed into the pitch black. The flashlights flicked on, and hundreds of eyes stared back at the men.

—

“You’re dead, you little shit,” Pammy seethed.

Zolen squirmed free from her damaged grasp. He crawled further downwards into the polished dirt. They’d fallen in a tunnel system, dug deep into the clay. There was just enough space to move on their fours. Zolen scampered as quickly as possible, down the slope, aware of nothing but the fact Pammy was still right behind him.

Pammy groaned, it was tight around her girth, but she pushed onward like a worm in the dirt. The place was slick and well-worn underhand, but she managed a hair faster than Zolen. It was just a matter of time; nobody back-sassed and got away without taking some of Pammy’s famous medicine.

—

Crawford called out, “Found the hole!” He swung his head below with a flashlight in hand. The shine met massive square teeth, and he shot backward, smashing his temple on the grate. “Eck!”

The flashlight fell and the furry mole rat jittered away. Blood poured from Crawford’s face and Linkletter grabbed onto his sliding body. Crawford’s leadership role ended right there. They rolled his woozy form topside and Linkletter led the way to the hole below.

As a group, the men moved onto the mole rat floor; their lights met the glint from yellow teeth rather than beady eyes. On hands and knees, they trudged through the shit and piss soup, searching for Pammy and Zolen.

—

The tunnel widened into a larger space and Zolen paused long enough to hear a strange groaning chitter. It was almost as loud as Pammy behind him. But not quite and he rushed forward when he imagined her breath on his neck. Overdrive gear. Zolen swung palms looking for a wall, and then paused as he heard two breathy sounds.

“I’m gonna tear out your nuts from your throat, you little shit!”

On the other side, there was a snorting groan, like a pig munching on a marmot.

Out of nowhere, Pammy passed Zolen in the darkness, yelling as she went. Zolen dove to the side and then doubled back toward the tunnel, keeping to the wall, out of sight.

—

“Here!” one of the second crew called finding the caved hole in the floor that led to the tunnel.

Linkletter gazed below, shining a light. “I’ll go on and call up to yas, if I needs yas.” It was dark and the second crew smiled collectively; fuck him and the kid, those smiles said to the dark shitty space.

—

Zolen saw the light and raced toward it, but so did Pammy. “I see ya, kid,” she warned, playful.

The strange noises followed her, but her existence loomed such a vast presence that Zolen didn’t see the sources. Didn’t care, Pammy was bad enough.

“I’m going to eat your dick on a Kaiser, kid!” She cackled, his fear fueling her.

The light drew closer and Zolen heard Linkletter. “Here!” he called.

Zolen chased Linkletter’s voice.

“If he wants to keep his job, he won’t let you by!” Pammy said.

Linkletter froze at the edge of the tunnel. The beam from his flashlight found a terrified face, a furious visage chasing closely behind, and several giant beasts with bandit masks and massive square teeth. Dark fuzzy eyebrows had overgrown their eyes and somewhere in their evolution, they’d lost normalcy in their legs. The coon-rats slithered like worms, chattering and grunting, tiny feet out the sides like fins, brushing them along.

Linkletter screamed.

Pammy turned, screamed.

Zolen flipped into a crab stance to watch as giant square teeth tore into Pammy’s massive weighty thighs in the dim glow coming from the dropped flashlight. Blood showered forth and Zolen joined the screaming chorus. The sliding beasts raced toward him. He turned onto his knees. The scene had frozen Linkletter in place.

“Move!” Zolen swung a fist and connected with the man’s shoulder. A coon-rat chomped Zolen’s foot away with one clean bite. “Ahh, dammit, help me!”

Linkletter thawed and spun, he pawed around for hold of the flashlight, sending the glow back up the tunnel. “Help!” he called to the second crew.

The sound of the coon-rats lapping in the pool of Zolen and Pammy’s blood clapped and echoed around Linkletter. There was laughter above and he raced toward it. The walls around him vibrated with burrowing coon-rats. It felt like the mother of all earthquakes.

The stinking dirt fell away beneath Linkletter. He teetered before dropping into a giant mouth, open and waiting for blood. The laughter ceased. If something was really wrong, they had to get Pammy out, at a minimum.

They crawled down into the tunnel.

The mess was sloppy and running red. The ground came away in clumps. The coon-rats chattered, chased, snorted, and bit. The concrete crewmen screamed until they screamed no more.

—

Crawford awoke under the bright light of the work lamps, his brain jumping against the walls of his skull, blood trickling down onto his neck. “The new guy,” he mumbled and looked around. There was nobody there with him and he knew they must’ve left poor Zolen. Crawford looked down into the hole, wondering if it was all worth it, the kid, the job, Pammy, any of it.

“Anybody down there?”

The animals chittered and chattered.

Could leave, say fuck it all, look for a new job. “Could,” Crawford said and slid down into the hole to look for the kid.

XX