‘Jennifer’s Baby’ – By Mark T. Bates (The Curious Dark #8)

‘Jennifer’s Baby’

A Short Story …

By Mark T. Bates

(2026)

***

Jennifer slowly opened the eyes she had been pinching shut since the throbbing pain which swelled from her womb and infected every muscle in her body had become completely unbearable. Bright lights now pierced her vision, but there was at least a brief respite from the excruciating pain she had been experiencing. She was laying flat on her back, on what appeared to be a bed moving forwards at some pace on rickety wheels; her head raised slightly on a pillow. Worryingly, her hands and feet had been buckled tight to the four corner posts, although she did not recall this being done, or by whom. Her body began to involuntarily spasm at the thought of having been restrained in this manner … and in her condition. 

She was being wheeled down a corridor lit brightly in a hue of translucent blue at some speed by four unknown people, one at each corner of the bed. They were all wearing dirty white laboratory style coats, but their faces were invisible to Jennifer, distorted by the light. Whenever she screamed out loud, pleading for someone to tell her what was happening and why; she was met with stone cold silence. The only sound in the corridor being the loud screeching of the bed’s rotating wheels. Jennifer started to panic, and she began to hyperventilate as the pain began to grow warmly inside her once more. It felt like she was being stabbed from the inside out.  

Jennifer had no idea how she’d found herself in this position, and her mind began to race back as she once again closed tight her eyes. She could last recall standing in the bathroom of her thread-bare apartment, looking at herself with bemusement in the cracked mirror she one day intended to replace. When she’d felt a sudden and intense feeling of wetness explode from her vagina and gush down her legs. She’d looked down and studied the pool of bloody water at her feet, and then fallen towards the floor; first onto her knees, and then down onto her side. This is when the most excruciating pain she had ever experienced in her life had first begun, and Jennifer had curled herself into a ball; screaming out to no one.  

Jennifer had been alone in the apartment; she had no husband after all. And it was as she lay there terrified, unable to understand what was happening to her; that the banging on her front door had started. She had somehow found the strength to crawl out of the bathroom on her belly into the hallway, and had tried to call out; but her voice was already weak and barely audible from the intense screaming she had already subjected it to. Then, the door had burst open with a violent force that shattered the hinges. Four faceless bodies in blood-splattered paramedic uniforms had rushed through towards her now shaking limp body. And she’d had just one last thought before she passed out; Who on Earth had called them to her … and how had they arrived so quickly?

These were Jennifer’s final memories before she now found herself being rushed down the brightly lit corridor tethered to a hospital bed. I need to get away, she thought to herself. But the more she tried to squirm and move her body, the tighter the restraints around her wrists and ankles seemed to get. She began to shout and swear at the four bodies around her, when the shadowy figure above her right shoulder eventually looked down. Jennifer froze. She could now see clearly that much like the paramedics earlier, this body had no face. It was completely smooth; no mouth, no eyes … nothing at all. The figure’s arm suddenly appeared and placed a clear plastic cup over her mouth and nose. Jennifer instinctively breathed in, and a horrid musky smell of gas soon overpowered her.

Everything turned to black; and the darkness wrapped her in a chilling embrace.  

***

When her eyes opened once more, Jennifer was still partially blinded by a light. But she was instantly aware that she was no longer being wheeled down what had seemed like an endless corridor. Jennifer quickly tried to move her body, but realised that her arms and feet were still tightly tethered. She was still trapped; she was still a prisoner. The next realisation that slowly returned, as she regained her senses following the dreamless sleep brought on by whatever gas had been administered … was the increasing sharp pain in her womb.

Jennifer lay still and tried to stay in control of the contraction she was now experiencing once more, when she heard the sound of a metal door slowly creaking open. She heard the shuffle of footsteps; of what sounded like a group of many people entering the room. She tried to raise her head from the pillow to see what was going on, to see who was there; but the light was too bright. She could hear the shuffling of footsteps grow louder as they came closer; and she heard a growing murmur of voices as they approached her bed.

The over-bearing lights slowly began to dim, and Jennifer was provided with clarity on the situation around her. Circling the bed was a sea of people all wearing surgical masks. Each one had piercing yellow eyes and they did not appear to be the faceless men who had brought her here. The figure closest to her head leant over the bed, and the outline of their body and face now appeared large and clear. The figure removed its mask, and Jennifer could see that she was looking up into the face of an ageing and horribly ugly man. His skin looked rough like leather, and he smiled down at her baring two rows of crooked discoloured teeth. 

“I’m Dr. Schranz,” he said to her in a gravelly voice. “I will be taking care of this unfortunate and rather unpleasant business for you.” He smiled once more, and Jennifer was disgusted to see a thick drool had formed on the corner of his mouth; and it was starting to drip down towards her.  

“What the hell is going on, what are you all doing to me?” she screamed with all of her remaining strength, before a fresh stabbing pain shot through her body once more and her abdomen began to cramp. 

“It is time,” the doctor said; completely ignoring her cries as he pulled the mask back over his face. The figure next to him passed a large, dull metal implement. The doctor grasped its handle, and Jennifer was horrified to see that the end resembled a circular saw; with an incredibly sharp looking jagged edge. The doctor started laughing as the saw began to spin. The sound of the whirring metal pierced through Jennifer’s ears, and before she knew what was happening; the instrument was being pushed down into her belly. 

She tried to scream once more, but was in such a state of shock that no sound came out. Her eyes looked down to where the saw had entered her body. Blood started to spray in all directions, covering her face and the surgical gowns of the dark figures who leered over her bed. Suddenly, the doctor stopped what he was doing and passed the instrument back to the figure next to him. He then held his gloved hands up and looked back down at Jennifer. 

“This will all be over soon my dear,” he said before pushing both of his hands down into the bloody mess he had made of her lower body. He started to rummage around; the pain was unbearable. Then, he gripped onto something deep inside of her and started to pull.

“My baby!” Jennifer cried.

The doctor continued to pull, wrestling with the foetus as he tried to yank it from her. Then he put a foot up onto the side of the bed and began to use it as leverage. He pulled harder and harder, grunting as he did so … until the child eventually burst free of Jennifer’s stomach, leaving a pulp of bloody entrails oozing out of her wound.

The rest of the figures all turned to look where the doctor was standing, and they began to chatter excitedly amongst themselves. The doctor turned to Jennifer; “A tricky little bastard this one was!” He held the baby up so Jennifer could see her offspring, but what he held horrified her even more than anything else that had just happened to her. 

The baby was badly deformed; it didn’t even look human. A blank face sat upon a huge bulbous head, dripping with a mucus like slime. The thing’s body was purple and wrinkled; its limbs were long and rubbery with no fingers or toes at the ends. Jennifer began to shake her head from side to side in revulsion, and she started to scream once more …

***

Jennifer opened her eyes and sat up. She was in her bed back in her apartment, sweat dripping from her brow. She placed her hands on her bloated body; relieved to feel the baby bump was still there, despite its conception remaining a complete mystery to her. She was hyperventilating and tried to calm herself by breathing deeply in through her nose, and then slowly out through her mouth. Once she had managed to sufficiently compose herself, Jennifer swung her legs to the side and stepped out of the bed. 

She made the short walk across to her bathroom and went inside. Making her way to the sink, Jennifer poured water into her hands and splashed her face half a dozen times. She looked up and studied herself for a while in the cracked mirror, before an intense feeling hit below her stomach. She looked down just in time to see the bloody broken waters stream from her body. Jennifer dropped to the floor as the pain in her womb started to stab with a burning rage; and as she curled up into a ball … the loud knocking on her apartment door began to echo violently around her.

*** End ***

Copyright 2026 Mark T. Bates

All Rights Reserved

This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Mark T. Bates – Writer Bio

From a young age, Mark immersed himself within the world of genre storytelling. Devouring paperbacks from the likes of Stephen King & Clive Barker, while immersing himself in the movies of John Carpenter & David Cronenberg. All combining to lay the foundations for a life-long love of Horror, Fantasy & Sci-Fi, which has naturally transcended into a passion for telling his own tales.

A number of his short stories have been published online by Crystal Lake Publishing and The Dark Corner Horror, whilst he has appeared in print anthologies from Strangest Fiction and Alien Buddha Press. His stories have also on the Creepy Podcast. Mark is publishing his own short story series ‘The Curious Dark’ on www.kult-zilla.com – where he also writes plenty of Horror adjacent non-fiction. 

His debut novella – ‘The Curse of Six’ – released with RDG Books in the autumn of 2025, while his second novella – ‘A Slow Decay of Flowers’ – followed in the Spring of 2026 via Alien Buddha Press. His next release is coming soon … a duology of two new novellas titled; ‘The Reaper Always Rings Twice.’  

Mark can be found online in all of the usual places!

Check out the rest of the creepy tales … in our Horror short story collection:

‘The Curious Dark (Vol.1)’

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‘The Curious Dark (Vol.1)’ – By Mark T. Bates