#horrors of malformed men

[weirdlookindog]

Teruo Yoshida in Horrors of Malformed Men (Kyofu kikei ningen: Edogawa Rampo zenshû, 1969)

[japanese-movie-god-at-yahoo]

[lisaeldritch]

Can't help but stan the dad from that movie. Malformed, femme, and driven by spite. I love being represented in cinema.

[wonderfulstills]

The Horrors of Malformed Men

[ Teruo Ishii • 1969]

[goryhorroor]

What are some underrated horror films? I have watched all the popular ones and need more! Thanks!

mentally prepare yourself because im ready to give a gumbo list (this has been sitting in my inbox because i had to ask all my friends and this is the list we came up with):

curse of the demon (1957) the serpent and the rainbow (1988) paranoiac (1963) the old dark house (1932) countess dracula (1971) golem (1920) haxan (1968) island of lost souls (1932) mad love (1935) mill of the stone women (1960) the walking dead (1936) the ghoul (1933) tourist trap (1979) the seventh victim (1943) ganja & hess (1973) dead of night (1945) a bay of blood (1971) let's scare jessica to death (1971) alice sweet alice (1976) the deadly spawn (1983) the brain that wouldn't die (1962) all about evil (2010) black roses (1988) the baby (1973) parents (1989) a blade in the dark (1983) blood lake (1987) solo survivor (1984) lemora: a child's tale of supernatural (1973) eyes of fire (1983) epitaph (2007) nightmare city (1980) slugs (1988) death smiles on a murderer (1973) intruder (1989) short night of glass dolls (1971) the children (2008) alone in the dark (1982) end of the line (2007) the queen of spades (1949) the housemaid (1960) tormented (1960) captain clegg (1962) the long hair of death (1964) dark age (1987) the crawling eye (1958) the kindred (1987) the gorgon (1964) wicked city (1987) baba yaga (1973) 976-evil (1988) bliss (2019) decoder (1984) amer (2009) the visitor (1979) day of the animals (1977) leptirica (1973) planet of the vampires (1965) lips of blood (1975) berberian sound studio (2012) a wounded fawn (2022) matango (1963) the mansion of madness (1973) the killing kind (1973) symptoms (1974) morgiana (1972) whispering corridors (1998) dead end (2003) infested (2023) (this just came out but im adding it) triangle (2009) the premonition (1976) you'll like my mother (1972) the mafu cage (1978) white of the eye (1987) mister designer (1987) alison's birthday (1981) the suckling (1990) graveyard shift (1987) messiah of evil (1987) out of the dark (1988) seven footprints to satan (1929) burn witch burn (1962) the damned (1962) pin (1988) horrors of malformed men (1969) mr vampire (1985) the vampire doll (1970) contracted (2013) impetigore (2019) eyeball (1975) malatestas carnival of blood (1973) the witch who came from the sea (1976) i drink your blood (1970) nothing underneath (1985) sauna (2008) seance (2000) come true (2020) the last winter (2006) night tide (1961) the brain (1988) dementia (1955) don't go to sleep (1982) otogirisou (2001) reincarnation (2005) mutant (1984) spookies (1986) shock waves (1977) bloody hell (2020) the den (2013) wer (2013) olivia (1983) enigma (1987) graverobbers (1988) manhattan baby (1982) evil in the woods (1986) death bed: the bed that eats (1977) cathy's curse (1977) creatures from the abyss (1994) the dorm that dripped blood (1982) the witching (1993) madman (1981) vampire's embrace (1991) blood beat (1983) the alien factor (1978) savage weekend (1979) blood sisters (1987) deadly love (1987) playroom (1990) die screaming marianne (1971) pledge night (1990) night train to terror (1985) the devonsville terror (1983) ghostkeeper (1981) special effects (1984) blood feast (163) the child (1977) godmonster of indian flats (1973) blood rage (1980) the unborn (1991) screamtime (1983) the outing (1987) the being (1983) silent madness (1984) lurkers (1988) forver evil (1987) squirm (1976) death screams (1982) jack-o (1995) haunts (1976) a night to dismember (1983) creaturealm: demons wake (1998) the curse (1987) daddy's deadly darling (1973) nightwing (1979) the laughing dead (1989) the severed arm (1973) the orphan (1979) not like us (1995) prime evil (1988) the monstrosity (1987) dark ride (2006) antibirth (2016) iced (1988) the soultangler (1987) twisted nightmare (1987) puffball (2007) biohazard (1985) cameron's closet (1988) beast from haunted cave (1959) the she-creature (1956)

[love-minor-poltergeist]

A/N: I've only known this man for roughly a week and I want to pour milk on him and violently throw him against the wall (lovingly). While I'm not known to write for horror media, let alone for a franchise as brutal as Outlast, but I've been quite captivated by the Outlast Trials since the July 16th update. Because of course I would fixate on the hyperviolent mafioso with extreme mommy issues. _:(´ཀ`」 ∠):_

General Franco Barbi Headcanons

╔═══━━━─── • ───━━━═══╗

Loathe as he is to admit—  that is if he’s willing to acknowledge it— Franco and his father are far more alike than one would think. Both men share the same hair-trigger temper, a fondness for collecting artisan firearms, tastes in women… And who could forget that sailor’s mouth? 

Hell, prior to his exile, it became something of a running joke between the triggermen of the Barbi family. The minute they hear Franco and Don Barbi’s shared “FUCK”/“CAZZO”, they share a knowing look amongst themselves. Like father, like son.

Of course, they also take it as a warning to keep their heads down and quietly pray that lupara isn’t pointed their way.

His birth mother was killed long before he could even remember her. No one dared utter it aloud, but he knew why. He would’ve been downright stupid to think it was because of anything other than how he came out. Ugly. Malformed. Hell, his father certainly made it clear how he felt about his defective son whenever he got mad; and Franco’s got the scars to show it.

However, during one of Don Barbi’s infamous bouts of rage– fueled by alcohol and his ever-growing frustration over Franco’s reckless spree killings– he had let it slip that Franco resembled his late wife far more than he was comfortable with. 

Dark eyes– cold and vast like the deepest parts of the sea– regarded the crumpled form beneath him. Franco couldn’t have been more than seventeen or eighteen then. He had just gotten back from a hit. Some rat bastard from another crime family; a lowly racketeer who thought he was hot shit. At least he did until he was filled with hot lead from lupara. Only thing was— his father just wanted the intended man dead. It was a simple request. And what did his ugly shithead fuck of a son do? Franco ends up massacring the whole bar he had tracked the man down to. Staff, patrons, and a band of musicians that were unluckily set to perform that night— a whopping thirteen other people on top of the measly single target the Don wanted. And the real fucking kicker? That very bar– dinky as it was– was under Barbi family protection. And they had paid handsomely for their services. 

All hell broke loose once Franco came home. The minute he stepped foot in his father’s office, the world became a blur of violent shouting and spat expletives. The walls and furniture shook with each slam as the Don punched and kicked at the younger man. Franco had tried to fight back, getting in a few nasty hits himself, but it was clear his father easily overpowered him. In a matter of minutes, his vision and lungs grew wet with blood. Everything hurt, and all young Franco could do was fight for air.

“You had one job, boy. One. Yet I find that we lost a paying customer— one that we’re supposed to protect. Making me look like the asshole for not keeping my word.” 

The older man crouched down, yanking Franco by the little patches of hair he had. The Don was baring his teeth now, eyes boring holes into his son. 

“You’re even lucky I let you live, you miserable waste of spunk,” he pulled harder on Franco’s hair, ignoring the latter’s grunt of pain. “I could have killed you in your crib. I should have.” 

He accentuated each word with a rough yank, and a particularly pathetic pained moan from Franco only made the Don slam his head into the floor. Hot, sticky crimson coated his broad fingers, and he regarded the now weeping visage of his son with disdain; as if he had found a piece of gum stuck to his shoe. A pregnant silence fell between the two. Nothing but the faint sounds of breathing filled the air. 

Then the Don spoke once more.

“Even now, you look just like your mother. Useless, bloodied, and soft.”

Don Barbi never did talk about his first wife again after that incident. Not that Franco ever cared. He never knew her. Though, he did faintly hear from a few of his father’s older associates that he shared his mother’s eyes, or that he had the same hair as her. One man even said that had Franco been born normal, he would’ve been the spitting image of her. 

Said man was later found in the alley between a bar and sundry store. Discarded within a dumpster and body absolutely mangled. 

Once, when he was around maybe ten years old or so, his father had tried to take him to the dentist in order to get braces. Something to fix up those “broken piano keys” he had, as his father put it. Franco didn’t even last a half hour before a capo had to come pick him up because the boy went and bit the finger clean off of the poor dental assistant that tried to get him ready. 

He has some breathing problems, going off what could be heard within the trials. If he’s not yapping off, he could be heard heavily panting and straining to catch his breath. It’s nowhere near bad enough to be considered asthmatic, but Franco’s definitely not winning any marathons, that’s for sure. Not that his little baby legs would let him-

Absolutely refuses to drink anything that isn’t sweet enough to send a bear into a diabetic coma. If he doesn’t have his thermos of wolf’s milk on him, he’s dumping a whole bowl’s worth of sugar into whatever’s given to him. He doesn’t care if it's already been sweetened. He needs it sweeter.

Murkoff’s budgeting department is at their wit’s end and it is absolutely Franco’s fault. Does he care? Of course not. He deserves nice things and it’s a travesty that someone of his status is forced to live in squalor. About a week after he’s been taken to Sinyala, a special budget ends up being put aside for him. He goes over said budget every time. No, he won’t stop, either. He is a luxury that few could afford.

The first thing he demanded for his living space was the fanciest phonogram Murkoff could get and some records. He didn’t particularly like juke boxes– he thought them too flashy and that they usually played the same boring tunes. Usually if you walk by his containment unit, you'd hear the rich, dulcet tones of Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, and the occasional Engelbert Humperdinck.

Don’t ever take him to the beach for too long. He usually forgets to put on sunscreen and ends up sunburnt at the end of the day. It’s one of the few things he doesn’t miss about Miami/Cuba. 

Small dogs hate him. His stepmom Angelina owned a few pomeranians. He and the little bastards never got along. It wasn’t all too uncommon to walk in on him telling one of them to fuck off whenever they bit at the pant leg of his suit. He’s held a vendetta against all tiny dogs ever since. 

While he may not look like it, he’s quite fond of the ocean. He enjoyed the boat rides he took to and from Cuba, and would occasionally fish if time was passing by a bit slow. Though he didn’t do it very often thanks to bastardly seagulls and pelicans trying to bully him for whatever he caught. 

Would probably own an aquarium of tropical fish if Murkoff trusted any of their test subjects with a living thing under their care. When he was younger, Franco’s father had an associate who owned a giant tank full of brightly-colored tetras, cherry barbs, and guppies. And while his dad sat through boring talks, Franco would usually watch the little things dart around in the water.

Speaking of, he’s particularly fond of ranchu goldfish. Mostly because, in his words, “they’re ugly little fuckers”.  Franco means this lovingly, of course. 

╚═══━━━─── • ───━━━═══╝

[landscape-suicide]

I think that the best comparison to Lynch in terms of cinema is probably ero guro as a film movement and its offshoots its like all about shallow almost simulated "normal" worlds that make way into cavernous subterranean lairs emblematic of both base carnal desire and the infrastructural violence that scaffolds the "normal" world above it. its like all self destructive eroticism and fetishistic infatuation and disgust towards war and human violence, and a dissolution between artifice and truth that sort of inevitably makes its way into all consuming true love. literally almost always follows the same symbolic lines as Lynch too, lots of doppelgangers and starlets and voyeurs and guys in white face paint and spooky red rooms and a big focus on disability and a sort of kitsch "new money" sensibility and the fearmongered imaginary of gang/subculture stuff. and the awesome thing is that it basically entirely predates him like it saw its most major booms in the 60s and 70s. everyone who likes Lynch should definitely watch Horrors of Malformed Men and Blind Beast

[diavologlazer]

Japanese horror films (recommendations)

Theres a few i want to share, some of these are popular with the horror community in general and some just within people who are interested in these themes!!

starting off with some well known:

Ring (1998; directed by Hideo Nakata)

Ju-On: The Grudge (2002; directed by Takashi Shimizu)

Perfect Blue (1997; directed by Satoshi Kon)

Godzilla (1954;directed by Honda Ishirō)

Ichi the Killer (2001; directed by Takashi Miike)

Audition (1999; directed by Takashi Miike)

House (1977; directed by Nobuhiko Ôbayashi)

A Page of Madness (1926; directed by Teinosuke Kinugasa)

Kuroneko (1968; directed by Kaneto Shindō)

Onibaba (1964; directed by Kaneto Shindo)

Horrors of Malformed Men (1969; directed by Teruo Ishii)

Kwaidan (1964; directed by Masaki Kobayashi)

Tokyo G0re Police (2008; directed by Yoshihiro Nishimura)

Gozu (2003; directed by Takashi Miike)

Three... Extremes (2004; directed by Fruit Chan, Takashi Miike, Park Chan Wook)

The Sinners of Hell (1960; directed by Nobuo Nakagawa)

Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989; directed by Shinya Tsukamoto)

slightly less known:

Meatball Machine (2005; directed by Yūdai Yamaguchi)

Girl Hell 1999 (directed by Daisuke Yamanouch)

Noriko's Dinner Table (2005; directed by Sion Sono)

Naked Bl00d (1996; directed by Hisayasu Satō)

Shogun's Sad1sm (1976; Yuji Makiguchi)

Vampire Clay (2017; directed by Sôichi Umezawa)

Marebito (2004; directed by Takashi Shimizu)

Cold Fish (2010; directed by Sion Sono)

Grotesque (2009; directed by Kōji Shiraishi)

Strange Circus (2005; directed by Sion Sono)

And my personal favorite 1991s 964 pinnochio !!

I tried not to put too much exploitati0n/ extreme horror on here. I based them on how much people on social media talk/have talked about them.

Also is it obvious i love Takashi Miike.

If you need any more Japanese or in general horror from other countries/places i got u!!

Enjoy :D

[ronmerchant]

HORROR OF THE MALFORMED MEN (1969)

[ghostytoad]

🎃 ROTTMNT Halloween Headcanons 🎃

Horror Movies

Summary: The Hamato siblings & horror movies

Headcanons for: Raph, Donnie, Leo, Mikey, & April

Halloween Headcanons - Haunted House Edition

Halloween Headcanons - Haunted House (x Reader ver.)

i added a few horror movie references here and there (betcha can't name 'em all!)

Raph:

Favorite genre: Zombie horror

Least favorite genre: Gore/Torture

isn't too fond of horror movies; would rather watch action movies

he's convinced that 'based on a true story' movies are 100% real

easily jumpscared but tries to laugh it off every time

leo will tease him about his fear stink tho

believes twilight technically counts as horror

"it's a movie about vampires and high school! how'zat not scary?"

might watch horror movies alone if he's surrounded by plushies and his blanket

won't sleep all night tho

leaves the light on after a horror marathon "just in case"

Donnie:

Favorite genre: Psychological when done right; Time-loop horror

Least favorite genre: Found footage

isn't too bothered by horror movies

but plot holes will frustrate him to no end

and he WILL make his brothers listen to him rant about it afterwards

"SCOFF! he was OBVIOUSLY a ghost, literally no one else noticed him or talked to him!"

prefers j-horror (subbed even tho he understands japanese)

he doesn't have a favorite movie but he does like the japanese film 'horrors of malformed men' (江戸川乱歩全集恐怖奇形人間)

considers found footage horror movies inferior and 'lazy'

spends most of the movie criticizing the characters and making fun of the villain

was terrified of pennywise as a kid (dvd rental mix-up that went unnoticed by papa splinter)

for the longest time, he thought pennywise lived in their sewers

Leo:

Favorite genre: Slasher movies; Parody horror

Least favorite genre: Classic

he loves horror movies and binges them for halloween

joins in on donnie's commentary, which mildly annoys mikey and raph

most of leo's commentary is just making fun of his brothers

"oh hey, don bon! i had no idea you were on tv... congrats on the blob monster role~!"

finds silent horror movies to be incredibly booooring

enjoys campy 80s horror (evil dead 2, gremlins, creepshow, ect)

unironically considers killer klowns from outer space a masterpiece

is banned from picking movies bc of this

might get spooked from time to time

not that he'll admit it

nothing can shake this ninja warrior, nuh uh no way

Mikey:

Favorite genre: Paranormal/Ghost movies

Least favorite genre: Psychological

considers himself a "horror expert" and owns all the classics

likes to play "who would survive this plot" with his brothers during the movie

according to him, leo's usually the most likely to die first

has a plan for every possible zombie apocalypse scenario (that he totally didn't get from a bunch of zombie movies)

"i'm not saying that he *should*, but donnie could totally build a giant prison maze for ghosts. it'll be just like the movie!"

will occasionally watch scary movies alone in the dark

overestimates his fearlessness every time-

loves a good ghost movie but he's a bit of a scaredy cat

might need a few cutesy romance movies afterwards to feel better

April:

Favorite genre: Found footage

Least favorite genre: Slasher/Killer horror

loves a good horror movie binge and will jump on any chance to watch them with her brothers

always ready with halloween themed snacks and candies

is also a self-proclaimed "horror expert"

she knows a lot more than mikey tho

can tell you about the directors, the history of horror movies, and the stories the movies are based on with complete detail

"movie night at my place? i've got just the thing to scare y'all out of your shells~"

rec is probably one of her top 5 favorite movies

likes the idea of creating her own found footage horror movie

mikey, leo, and splinter are all on board to be in her movie

donnie and raph? not so much

[maudeboggins]

End of Year Review Every year I like to create a review of media I consumed. Here is 2024:

Books: In 2024 I read 68 books. My favourites were:

Clyde Fans (Seth, 2019)

Brother (Ania Ahlborn, 2015)

The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of a Donner Party Bride (Daniel James Brown, 2009)

Revenge (Yoko Ogawa, 1998)

Audition (Ryu Murakami, 1997)

Piercing (Ryu Murakami, 1994)

Coin Locker Babies (Ryu Murakami, 1980)

Life is a Banquet (Rosalind Russell, 1977)

Rosemary's Baby (Ira Levin, 1967)

I'll Cry Tomorrow (Lillian Roth, 1954)

A Kiss Before Dying (Ira Levin, 1953)

The Beast in the Jungle (Henry James, 1903)

I read 7 books on Arctic and Antarctic exploration (1 fiction). I read 3 books on Garbo. I read 12 Japanese books. I read 7 graphic novels. I read 15 non-fiction books.

Films:

I watched 437films in 2024

Favourite new to me films:

The Vampire Lovers (1970)

Horrors of Malformed Men (1969)

Strait-Jacket (1964)

Sorry, Wrong Number (1948)

The Body Snatcher (1945)

The Youngest Profession (1943)

It Started with Eve (1941)

The Cowboy and the Lady (1938)

The Black Cat (1934)

Cleopatra (1934)

After Tomorrow (1932)

Love Me Tonight (1932)

Lucky Star (1929)

Favourite Re-Watches:

Ninotchka (1939)

Jezebel (1938)

Favourite new release: La Chimera

Favourite actors of the year:

Lupe Velez, Marion Davies, Clara Bow, John Barrymore, Gary Cooper, Sylvia Sidney, Greta Garbo, Jeanette Macdonald, Norma Shearer, Goria Swanson, Rochelle Hudson, Christopher Lee & Peter Cushing

[scholarlycoffee]

ABOUT ME

I'm Sam (they/them)

I'm a 21yo from Wyoming

I write dark, literary-leaning fantasy and horror

I am also a stage actor, director, and playwright!!

My published work can be found HERE!

MY WIPS

Monroe just laughs and runs her fingers over the mug's smooth glaze, wondering if that isn’t a bit like how her heart looks: warped and greenish and malformed, with June’s fingerprints all over the surface.

Sequel to Mosswood.

Genre: Adult contemporary fantasy, horror novel

Setting: The fictional town of Los Cedros, California, 2014

Summary: A decade after the events of Mosswood, Monroe moves to a small town in California where she meets Joey Hart, a self-proclaimed Paranormal Private Investigator who recruits her for his cross-country expedition in search of the supernatural, but as her past and present begin to collide, she finds herself being pulled back to Ponderosa Bay and the darkness that waits in its forests.

Status: Drafting / 19k

What a cruel world this is, she thinks, that these are the people who must become protectors, warriors: gentle young men whose hands seem better suited for feeding the hungry, but instead bear the scars of a war that cannot be won.

Genre: Adult Fantasy, post-apocalyptic novel

Setting: Edrebet, a small farming village in Vanlia, 87 years post-Rot

Summary: A young hero sets out on a journey to save the world from a deadly magical infection. He is not the main character of this story. When he passes through her small farming village, he strikes up an unlikely friendship with mild-mannered shopkeep Sen who has barely seen anything outside the town walls.

Status: On hiatus / 31k

The light-leaks and scratches on the old film flicker over her face, masking her reflective white eyes. The video kicks back and loops. “My name is Nettie Schultz and I have died three times,” she repeats. 

Genre: Adult, supernatural mystery

Setting: Tombedel, a mysterious medieval island off the coast of England. November of 2025, but also 1983 and 1934 and 802 AD and 509 AD.

Summary: On the island of Tombedel, no one dies. At least, no one stays dead. Ex-private investigator Abe Tannen’s vacation to Tombedel takes an unexpected turn when a man is murdered in his hotel—the first person to die on the island in over 1,000 years. When he ends up being roped into the investigation, he teams up with Pippin Young, a 13-year-old ghost with a mysterious past, and an eclectic bunch of ghosts.

Status: Planning

[marlasomething]

Sawlentine's Week 2025: Day 4 - The Origin of Gwen

I found @sawlentines2025 two Saturdays ago, after I made all my friends watch the OG movie (in a double feature with Zombies Party, soooorry, English speaking audience: Shaun of the Dead) and, fuck if I'm going to try to post this (though AO3 it's a mystery when it'll be available). I'm doing this with the promps + dice rolls + very short format (trying to)

Day 4: SORRY FOR THE DELAY Confession + Pintshipping + The Magnus Protocol characters

CW: mentions of death, body horror

Hope you enjoy! All feedback is always GREATLY APPRECIATED

"So...you seem pretty worked up about that case" for once, Alice didn't want to pry. At least, not as much as she usually did. The ocassions when Gwendoline Bouchard looked actually affected by one of their cases were few and far between, much rarer when they did not only prone a reaction in her, but made her lips tremble, the omen of tears to come clear as water.

Of course, the answer she got was just what she had expected.

"None of your business, get a life outside of worrying about your missing exboyfriend and mourning our crazy informatician".

Then, Alice had to pry.

"Fuck..." there was an address attached to the file, and, though Alice knew she should absolutely let it be, she just wanted to stop thinking about how her life had gone from being sourrounded by unexplicable shitshows to become one of its own.

And, for some reason, she was compelled to try to understand Gwen and what on fucking Earth her headspace was suppossed to be.

She rang the bell twice before someone finally opened. He was a decently good looking man, reeking of American essense, around Gwen's age.

For the looks of the place, Alice deduced they were richy-buddie-international-besties growing up (or even more, she wasn't even sure whether Bouchard was into men or not).

Then, he began turning, a clot of blood extending from the middle of the body he occupied with tendrils whose colour seemed more and more sickening as they went further and further away from that point in between, where his meat felt as if had been cut into dices and poorly rearranged by a drunken surgeon, and, in the other, a gorgeous woman stood.

At least, she was wonderful once the part of her that wasn't horribly malformed began.

Shocked beyond believe, Alice could only mutter:

"I'm friends with Gwendoline Bouchard" the half that the case identified as Mallick Scott smirked sadly.

"I guess she got our file, come in".

The story was harrowing, much more than on the case file: a cult tried to teach them a lesson and they were the only two that survived.

"The worst fucking part is that it actually worked" the woman half, Brit, smiles, resentful, as the noise of two hands holding through guts inside the one-bodied couple almost made Alice barf.

She stood up, uncomfortable.

Because of the monster in front of her, but also because of the tale and...

...because there was something about Brit that reminded her of Gwen, and something about Mallick that felt close to home.

"Uh...alrighty".

"Alice" Mallick said, as she was already almost through the door, "Gwen and I....we were friends because we were bastards together, but there is something good in her, as there was in me. Help her find it before..."

Alice nodded; she understood.

[sureinsunlight]

Song Prompt-- All My Dust-Fed Men

Requested by @entropyking

Saddam-- AlicebanD

You think the man you love is lonely

As the bridge you climb is burning

But the bridge you climb is smoking

As the flames are all put out

CW for gore and body horror under the cut!

Ah, Ah, Ah.

When first I awake, it is to the knowledge of gore. Of buzzing blood and waking hunger.

I know whose flesh it is that's closed about me before I feel its press.

The gate is closed. I'm on the wrong side, sewn into a body that is not mine. And despite this all, I rejoice.

My clapping hands shape from rib and tendon and burst through skin to ring bloody in the air. My jaws calcify in bloody pockets, chewing through fat to feel the cool sting of air and gasp voiceless praise. This is what I am-- chrysalis personae, malformed dredges of humanity pushing out to give desperate thanks. No eyes to see, for what is there but disappointment for them to gaze upon? No ears to hear, for the only voice I care for hums through our bones. The sobbing of my precious hound, my jackal who has swallowed down the scraps of my corpse and given me a gift most holy.

Oh, Cerberus mine, how I wasted your potential afore. How I smeared blasphemy upon your name. What grace, to belong after such damnation. To have meaning still.

I chant. He sobs, and holds me. I hold him. They will not take him from me now. We will be holiness.

He puts rings on my fingers. Gilds his insides for a gift.

Ah, Ah, Ah.

[sciencestyled]

A Stake in the Code: Van Helsing's Wild Foray into Bioinformatics

Let me tell you, dear students, about the day I discovered that monsters don’t always lurk in dark castles or foggy graveyards. Sometimes, the most sinister creatures hide in something far more diabolical—data. Yes, you heard me right. While you imagine your brave professor charging through the night, crucifix in one hand, holy water in the other, you must now picture me hunched over a glowing screen, battling spreadsheets and strings of code. How did it come to this, you ask? Well, sit tight, for this tale involves an unfortunate encounter with a conference on modern science, an espresso machine with a grudge, and, of course, Dracula.

It all began when I was invited—lured, more like—to a prestigious science symposium. A splendid opportunity to expose these modern "men of logic" to the perils of the undead, I thought. Instead, I was met with a barrage of jargon, acronyms, and more slides of molecular models than I’d care to recount. I made it through the first day, my senses numbed by an endless stream of buzzwords—"genomics," "data analysis," and, shudderingly, "algorithms." Oh, the horror! I was sure that even a vampire bat would be driven to stake itself in frustration.

However, my despair peaked during a presentation by a rather excitable researcher on a topic called "bioinformatics." Now, I had no idea what kind of nefarious creature this was, but the term "bio" immediately set off my vampire-hunting instincts. Perhaps this was some new breed of blood-sucking pestilence? The researcher, with the fervor of a man possessed, prattled on about deciphering genomes, comparing them to vast tomes of knowledge that could predict diseases, track mutations—essentially, the modern-day grimoire of disease.

I tried to stay awake by guzzling coffee—until the machine itself turned on me. One ill-timed splutter, and I was doused in scorching liquid. As I wiped the caffeine from my waistcoat, it hit me: bioinformatics was a science of tracking. Not just tracking disease, but tracking the malformations of life itself. It was a code, a pattern, a series of markers… much like the bite marks of our nocturnal enemies! If bioinformatics could trace illness, then surely it could predict vampirism—or at least explain why Dracula’s hair had the consistency of damp hay.

My interest piqued, I cornered the researcher after his talk. Through a series of incomprehensible diagrams, I learned that bioinformatics involved massive troves of genetic data, all neatly catalogued and ready to be mined for clues about humanity’s most terrifying afflictions. This was no mere science. This was a battlefield. And as we all know, I have never met a battlefield I didn’t like.

I had found a new crusade. In bioinformatics, I saw the potential to eradicate vampiric curses at their source—by identifying genetic markers long before the first fang ever punctures a jugular. Picture it: no more garlic garlands or holy water showers! Imagine a world where we can pinpoint who is destined to become a creature of the night with a simple blood test. No more guessing whether your charming neighbor is just a night owl or plotting your demise.

Of course, there were skeptics. My students, bless their skeptical hearts, scoffed. "But Professor," they cried, "surely science can’t predict something as mystical as vampirism?" To which I replied, "If it can decode the human genome, it can decode Dracula!" Armed with this newfound knowledge, I plunged headlong into the arcane realms of bioinformatics. Genomes, sequences, databases—they became my prey, and like any great hunter, I stalked them with unyielding determination.

Thus, I resolved to pen my insights. Not just for posterity, but as a rallying cry. For if we can battle genetic ghouls with modern science, perhaps we can rid the world of vampiric plagues once and for all. And so, dear students, I present to you my findings—my digital stake in the dark heart of bioinformatics. Let us see where this madness leads...