October 23, 2019. (Guest Submission: Noah Witt)

Spooktober story xx:

Jon Phillips tears into an elk tenderloin with his genetically altered front teeth. After the jungle gym accident he’d undergone an experimental procedure to splice his dental genes with that of the common rodent. Lifelong regeneration.

As blood from the recently-severed muscle drips from his chin he tucks his necklace into his shirt as to not stain the reminder of their purple morbidity. His white button-up can be bleached, but the teeth can’t stand an endless routine of erosion.

His new teeth are getting long; longer than he’s had the chance to notice. The first bite of tenderloin is deep and juicy, but the second has painful results. He clips the gums in front of his bottom incisors and slices a small gash through his lower lip. With ravenous hunger and no distinction between his own blood and that of the slaughtered elk he continues his feast, unaware or willfully ignorant of his automutilated wound. His lust for soft meat has done nothing to dull the ever-lengthening teeth in the front of his mouth. A knife will not dull quickly by cutting through butter.

The small gash becomes an infected hole, with raw meat constantly being pushed through. The hole gets bigger, and the teeth get longer. Jon’s next meal, a rabbit, again does nothing to grind his ever-growing incisors. Blood drips from the pierced loin, and he hides his toothy necklace behind the buttons of his now oft-bleached white shirt. The first bite doesn’t quite penetrate both sides of the meat, but the second impales clean through. Teeth through the rabbit, and the hole in his lip, and the already bloodsoaked flesh of his chin. He winces at the pain of teeth meeting his own jawbone, but he’s gotta eat. Another bite, and a deeper chip into his chin. By the time the rabbit is fully consumed, Jon’s jaw is obliterated by his own chewing.

His next hunt, while successful in killing the prey, is a difficult cut to swallow. Even as he begins to use his molars to crush the soft innards he cannot avoid the annihilation of his lower jaw. Before the magpie is even halfway eaten the pain is too much. Gangrene has set in his lower lip and fatigue is beginning to take hold. Curled beside the magpie nest Jon realizes his fatal flaw.

“I should have just gotten dentures,” he thinks.

“I should have included dental in my health insurance plan.”