Grimlock ♥ Ultra Magnus

I got this from the author for review.  

So, I'm gonna get the negative out of the way first.   "The shackles around her wrist were cumbersome but didn't affect her progress."   Should be wrists, I believe.   However, only one typo that I found?   Impressive.

The concept is somewhat simple, and the trope is couple driving get stalked and horrible things happen to them.   (Like the shackles.)  It's neither the setup nor this concept that is important in this short story; it's not even really the characters, in my opinion.   It's the atmosphere and the slow build up of tension, only to have yet another source of tension, and horror, and fear drive up behind the couple and sideswipe them.   (Not literally, though.)   It's the slow creeping sensation that no matter how wrong things get, you're not really understanding how wrong they really are until the ending is revealed to you.  

It's the sense of despair, of loss of hope, only to have hope within your reach only to be pulled away with you with vicious glee.   It's pain and loneliness and uncertainty.   It's a menace you can't see, but you think you know is there - unless you're going crazy.  

It's also a dude who is called the red priest.   He is incredibly creepy, partly because I don't really find out what his motivation is: I don't feel I understand him, so he's a variable.   And some of the scariest things are super-smart variables.   They know how to manipulate you, but you don't know how they're going to manipulate you.   This is how I feel with this dude.   

I kept thinking I knew how much he was fucked up and in which ways he was fucked up, and I kept finding out I knew less than I thought I knew.   It's was maddening, maddening in that way that pushes you to read on so you can piece together this puzzle.   And maddening in that you don't get full answers, but it's also perfection that way.   Sometimes, ignorance is frustrating bliss.   I don't think I want to know everything about the red priest, at least not in this story.   It would have detracted from the horror that you don't really know his motivations, when keeping me guessing was the best thing the author could have done. 

And I'm often times not crazy about open endings.   They don't work, they don't serve a purpose, and I can't understand why I don't get my whatever it is I'm looking for from a book - happy ending, whatever.   This, though?   This is the best example of an open ended short story.   This is the horror of the unknown, smirking at us, coy in the knowledge that us not knowing exactly what is going to happen will set our minds working overtime, filling in the blanks with our own personal horrors.   Creepy as fuck, and pitch perfect, just like the rest of this story.  

Highly recommended.