Zombie Games, Part One

“Welcome, one and all, to Doctor Dead’s Island of Fear and Dread!” Crackles an overly cheerful voice over a loudspeaker, a loud squawking noise honking out from the old set directly above me with almost every word. I grab at my head, trying to will the pounding headache away, but have little luck.

“I’m sure you’re all wondering what you're doing listening to my dulcet tunes this fine morning instead of waking in your oh-so-comfortable beds like you would any other morning!” The voice screeched over the intercom, ignoring my pleas to just shut the fuck up. “Well remember that dreamboat or hottie you were talking to last night, that you were planning on bringing home to shag rotten? Well, turns out they’re kind of a bunch of dicks: you see, I pay them to drug people for me and then load them onto my boats, bringing them to my private little island.”

I blink my eyes, rubbing at them as best I can from inside this strange metal coffin, looking down at my feet, I can just make out that while there’s no lid to this thing, there is a small door. I quickly begin kicking at it, cursing the damn bitch who I thought was so into me last night; laughing at my jokes, twirling her hair, blowing me in the parking lot… the signs were all there that she thought I was a catch.

Turns out she was just a slutty mercenary.

Why do I always attract money-hungry whores, I wonder. With the first few, you think it’s them, but I’m well past the counting stage now… so it must be me.

Fuck.

“For those of you that haven’t heard of me, you’re obviously not a big fan of the internet or the news, so I’ll fill you in,” the voice continues, grinding into my hangover like a screwdriver in my ear, “We all know the dead are a very real, very dangerous thing, yes?”

Of course, I think bitterly. Fucking zombie outbreak every other week on the news, the CDC must be working overtime cleaning all that shit up. It’s why I quit watching the news actually… to damn depressing.

“Well I’m the cause of all of those fun times. You see boys and girls, Doctor Dead here actually is a Doctor! I invented a fun parasite based off a few existing ones that essentially brings George Romero’s nightmares to life!” The voice was entirely too cheerful for this time of day. A-ha! My boots have dented the door and a ray of blinding light is now filtering into my tiny metal case.

“Since I’m hiding from all the major governments of the world, I’ve decided to have a little fun with my projects… by testing them on you!” He cackles over the intercom, not the laughter of a sane man. “Right now you and five other men and women are sitting in a time locked vault on my little island maze, with the great prize at the center: a case of antidote for any who get infected, one per person of course, and a speedboat fully stocked and loaded with a GPS locator to send you to the closest friendly nation. All you have to do is survive.”

Oh fucking hell…

“Despite many governments best wishes, I stream this live from my island via a few hundred cameras to over a dozen different casinos throughout the world. Should you survive, and added bonus is you automatically have a fifty thousand dollar bet placed upon you to live, payable to an account in your name. I of course, as the master of ceremonies, get a ten percent cut of all winnings from the happy gamblers and their addictions, and the populace at large finally gets a reality television show worth watching.”

“Now that we’re all on the same page of the playbook, I say let’s let the games begin shall we? This time around, I’ve decided to divide the teams evenly, with three men and three women per team. Now, just to be a fair host, I’ll just remind all of you that while you are indeed suffering from a hangover, that pain in your head is actually from a pair of microscopic cameras I inserted into your eyes, so the audience can see what you see.”

Thought this was a rather harsh hangover… I think bitterly, kicking again at the door before a loud buzzing noise emits from it, popping it open. I yelp as the metal sheet I’m lying on rolls out, revealing we were all in morgue-style cadaver boxes, and that we’re all cursing and cussing at the sudden infusion of bright light.

“Ten minutes before the vault door opens, boys and girls! Ten more minutes before I release the lever that holds back a good deal of the zombies at bay.” The voice crackles over a new intercom coming from the center ceiling tile of the room. “You should find plenty of supplies to make weapons or armor as you please, so go ahead and have fun… and to quote a man I love ever so dearly, let the games begin!”
Next Time!

Dark Eclipse Magazine #15

     A new issue of Dark Eclipse Magazine is out, and yet again it's full of thrills and chills! Swing by the Amazon page if you own an e-reader and contribute to a local publisher, the cost is only a $1.99, and helps local writers get their creative juices flowing!

Dark Eclipse Magazine #15

Son of a Preacher Man: Pound for A Pound

Son of a Preacher Man Part One

        Night in New York has always been a comforting time for me, for as long as I’d lived here. After migrating here in the early sixties, I’d had the fortune to blend into the growing crowd of delinquents and hippies that were fighting for basic human rights, allowing my rather illicit nightly activities a bit of leeway, the police more worried of some Satanic cult springing up than of a Vampire stalking the streets. I always made certain, especially in those days before the organ trade was worth noting, to thoroughly loot my victims.
Back then such finds were easy to move through pawn shops, or to melt down into small bars of gold or silver. Cell phones with tracking devices were never anything I needed to fear, nor credit cards; cold hard cash was easy to find so long as I looked hard enough.
I can feel the harsh rays of the sun ebbing as the fiery orb slowly sets over the horizon, my rigor stricken body gaining mass and strength as it did every night. My burrow or grave dirt, dug beneath my hall closet, was far too narrow for a man to try and fit into.
Thankfully I wasn’t a man.
Death has a funny way of granting you a new perspective that not many are so fortunate to know. For example, flexibility. With my body being nothing but rubbery bones that suffer from nightly decay, I can squeeze and slither about like the fabled serpent of Eden. Twisting my limbs, groaning in pleasure as my joints crackle and pop from the tunnels tight grip on me, I writhe and push with my muscles, inching my way up from my sunless burrow, pushing the trapdoor up and away from the hidden tunnel with one gangly arm as I emerge, covered in dirt and grime that mars my pallid flesh with dark streaks of mud.
Pulling myself bodily from my nest, I lean back and allow my bones to realign themselves within my body, cracking and grinding as they slide back into the proper positions to allow me the grace of appearing human. Reaching up with long fingered hands, I pull one of the many towels I keep here from a low shelf, wrapping it around my naked lower half as I struggle to stand.
Even the dead have modesty you know.
I push the door open, ignoring the gagged cries of my house guest dangling in the spare bedroom, and slowly pad my way to the bathroom in hopes of getting a hot shower. I do so love my hot showers these nights, as they not only make me feel human, if only for the slightest  while, they also heat my the stolen blood coursing through my dead veins, allowing it to move faster than the sluggish, clotted rate it moves now.
The hiss of the shower reminds me of my nightly chores that I have to do, from finishing the new set of jewelry for the upcoming wedding at the Temple to checking in at one of the many businesses I own. Stepping beneath the scalding water, I sigh as my pale flesh begins to grow pink.
“The only one who could ever teach me…” I begin singing softly, watching the swirling brown water, carrying the filth of my warren, down the drain in a lazy circle. My shower, like all showers, is brief; I don’t sweat and have no discernable odor to speak of, so bathing is a rather pointless endeavor barring I dirty myself.
I spritz on a few pumps of cologne before dressing myself. My thermostat tells me the weather outside is a tad frightful, so I make sure to dress appropriately. A navy blue sweater with a black vest and matching slacks should be more than enough to ward away the cold. My wrist length gloves fit nice and tight, as do my boots. One thing I learned from my time in Poland was, despite their horrid war crimes, the German’s knew how to dress for the cold.
I check on Oleg before I leave, tapping his catheter a few times to make certain I didn’t need to change it yet, his IV bag still half full with fluids. He scowls at me (as best as one can with a ball gag strapped into their mouth) and gurgles what I can only assume to be an insult at my. I smile and pat his face lovingly.
“Now try not to get too crazy while I’m gone,” I say to him with a smile as I move to set up the stereo, turning it to the classical channel just in time to catch the beginning of one of Traetta’s operas. “A little culture would do you some good, my dear Oleg. Try and absorb the tragedy within the music. Perhaps you’ll learn something from it.”
He howls in rage as I get my overcoat and keys, turning to leave him. As I grab my hat from the rack by the door, I snap my fingers as I remember. Moving quickly, I stride down the hall to the spare bedroom where Oleg hangs from the ceiling and pull the door closed, and move to set the heater to a comfortable setting for him. Grabbing my hat, I hum my favorite song as I lock up and make my way out for a night on the town.

***

The young woman shrieks, a high keening wail that echoes from the high walls of the tall buildings surrounding us here in Lower Manhattan. The street lamps are all out, darkened by a mere force of will to allow me an easier hunt. The young woman who was waiting for the bus noticed the darkness that had swallowed her up and, just as I was climbing down the lamp post, ready to pounce, pulled a flashlight from her purse and turned it on mere inches from  my face.
The sight of my distended jaw and jagged teeth was apparently too much for the poor thing, as she’d taken off running whilst screaming her lungs out. I wasn’t about to allow her to escape, as there were enough rumors going around about murderers and serial killers thanks to my extra curricular work harvesting organs. The last thing I needed was some terrified teenager telling some reporter about a monster that tried to eat her.
Leaping from pole to pole, boots bouncing from my shoulders where they hung from knotted shoelaces, I follow as silent as the stars above her, carefully guiding her into a narrow alley that ended with a high brick wall. Every time she tries to veer away, running in a different direction, I drop to the ground, hissing and swiping at her with my extended claws. Between my gaunt features, rows of needle teeth and blazing red eyes, its enough to corral her where I want her.
And want her I do. She may not know it, but she’s someone I’ve been stalking for years, waiting to find a chance to make her mine.
As she runs into the darkened alley, tripping over discarded newspapers and other assorted garbage I drop at the mouth of the alleyway, sealing her in. She screams even louder as she runs into the wall, scraping at the uneven bricks loud enough for my ears to hear nails cracking, for my nose to smell the slight coppery scent of blood rising room her hands. She cries, begging me to stop, begging for God to save her… begging for someone to save her from me.
Nobody can hear her, save for me.
I slowly begin strolling down the alley, allowing the light behind me to flicker back on, granting her a small reprieve from the darkness that had consumed her. Now she stares at my silhouette as I approach.
“What do you want?” She cries at me, her face puffy and red. She throws her purse towards me, its contents exploding out from within it at my feet. “Money? Just take my money and leave me be!”
I stop, looking down at her offering. Bending down, I casually root through her assorted make-ups and feminine products before finding her wallet, tugging it free from one of the many compartments of her rather expensive wallet. Flipping it open, I ignore the checkbook and the credit cards, as well as the line of crisp bills folded neatly into the money clip. I smile as I yank her drivers license free, tossing her wallet behind me carelessly.
“Angelina Leopold… what a beautiful name.” I say aloud, reading from her drivers license as I begin walking toward her again. “I can assume you have no clue as to why I’ve been hunting you, do you?”
She shakes her head, her breathes short sobs and far too erratic for her to speak. I press on closer to her, earning a keening cry from her as I close in on her.
“I’ve come for you this cool Autumn night as I have you have a debt to be paid to me, Mrs. Leopold. One that has been owed to me for over eighty years.” I rasp, my teeth dripping with saliva as I close in on her, her pounding heart music in my ears.
“I’ve never don anything to you!” She all but shrieks, shaking uncontrollably. “I don’t know who you are!”
“That’s of no consequence.” I dismiss, walking slowly until I stand a mere three feet from her. “My grudge is not against you, but your bloodline. You are the great-granddaughter of  Julius Schreck, a man who did so much wrong in his lifetime that his crimes must be paid for be his descendents.”
“I don’t even know who that is!” She wailed, backing away from me until her back hit the wall. “You have the wrong person.”
In the blink of an eye I’ve slammed into her, pinning her against the wall with my forearm, my other hand grasping at her bleeding fingers, pulling the hand up. “This is all I need to know who you are child.” I rasp, my eyes flaring red as I begin to lose my temper. Reeling it in, I allow my eyes to smolder as she stares at me in terror. “Your grandfather was a cruel man Angelina… a very cruel man. He and I had a deal some eighty years ago that he reneged on, throwing me into Hell instead of allowing me to live free.”
She gurgles at me in protest, fighting to breath despite my elbow in her throat. I press into her harder, causing a pained whine to slip past her lips.
“I told myself I would get my revenge, one way or another.” I say with a feral smile, dropping her limp hand as I reach into my coat pocket, fishing out a scalpel. Holding it up just high enough for the light to glint off of the stainless steel, I smile as she begins panicking once more. “Good, you realize what I’m here to do then?”
I take her choked rasps and sobs as a no. “I’m here for my proverbial five pounds of flesh, as it were. Not many are willing to settle their debts to me it would seem, so I’ve decided the Bard’s tale seems to possess a fitting punishment for those unwilling to settle their debts.”
Twirling the blade between my lithe fingers with precision, I bring it up in a flash of glinting metal, slashing through the side of Angelina’s blouse with a single swipe, revealing the pale white skin beneath. A slight scar, faded by time, ran from her bottom rib and up beneath her black silky bra.
It seems like a good place to start as any. Looking her in the eyes, I smile reassuringly at her tear streaked face, making shushing noises to silence her choked sobs.
“Be quiet child, shhh…” I whisper comfortingly, as well as I can with my forearm pinning her to the wall of a darkened alley. “I seek only what your grandfather owes… for my time in Hell, for every month I suffered, a pound of flesh is but a paltry sum if you think about it.”
She begins to scream and scramble against my grasp, though I quickly silence her movements with an ample amount of pressure to her throat, silencing her with the blissful state of unconsciousness. Using my glittering tool, I quickly shed her outer layer of clothing and lay her down in the alleyway, her back partially in a puddle of stagnant rainwater. Looking around, I smile at the cover provided by a large green dumpster, and quickly set to work.
Pulling a long length of several plastic garbage bags, I lay them flat next to her body, which now lies nude before me in the light of the full moon. My bloodlust tingles in the back of my mind, tickling at my senses in it’s desire to be sated.
Not tonight, I’m afraid.
Reaching for my ear buds, I slip them on and press play on my mp3 player, smiling as Dusty’s voice takes me back to a time when things were simpler, hunting was easier and those that deserved punishment didn’t try and hide themselves.
Humming softly to myself, I pull a small white scale, no more than a few ounces in weight and completely digital, and set it gently on the ground. Pulling a lighter from another pocket, I flick the flint a few times before the flame erupts forth, basking us in a warm orange glow. The sharpened edge of my scalpel needs to be properly cleaned if I’m to do this right.
The next ten minutes are pleasantly spent listening to the wiles of a preacher man’s son while I slowly, carefully, begin to carve away nine pounds of flesh away from the young woman. The first to be carved away are her cheeks, then her breasts, all tissue that is unnecessary to stay alive. Both index and ring fingers join my collection, leaving my an ounce over nine pounds, which just isn’t fair.
Pulling my bloodied gloves free from my pallid hands, I reach into one of my inner coat pockets and fish out an old necklace, one warn by a kind French woman who’d had the displeasure of encountering me whilst hunting some fifty years ago, lone before I migrated to America. I wrap the golden chain around her wrist, avoiding the golden cross dangling from the end, and cup her ruined hand around it. Cauterizing the wounds is a trivial matter, as is wrapping up my gathered meats, wrapping them tightly in plastic wrap before bagging them in old grocer bags, stuffing them within my jacket.
I pull a bottle of filtered water from my coat, rinsing off my blade, as well as my leather gloves, before taking a small squirt bottle full of ammonia and spraying the entire area down. While I may leave no fingerprints, and DNA testing merely reveals a hodgepodge of who I’ve been eating, I’ve learned over the decades not to take chances. Pulling my gloves back on, I reach into her purse and rifle around until I find her phone. Flipping the strange device open, I dial 9-1-1 before merely dropping it on her body and leaping up the wall of the alley; she’d live, but she’d always carry the scars of the past, just as I did.

***

I return home late, with only a few hours until the sun rises remaining. I carefully stow away my liberated justice within my fridge and make my way to the back room to see Oleg. The radio has abandoned Traetta’s work in favor of some of Mozart’s later symphonies, forcing my to turn the damnable thing off lest my ears begin to bleed. Oleg hangs from his hands, naked as the day he was born, with tubes running in and out of him, carrying nutrient-filled fluids and waste to and from his body.
His eyes flutter open weakly as I close the door behind me, shucking off my long overcoat as I hum the last chorus of Dusty’s song. Looking to him, I smile. “The only boy who could ever reach me, was the son of a preacher man oh yes he was… was… was…”
He grumbles behind his ball-gag, a tired and thoroughly defeated noise. “My my Oleg! Have you finally admitted defeat?” I ask in mock surprise. “Well that changes how this evening will be going drastically.”
He looks at me, his dead eyes full of nothing but curiosity and loathing. “What would you say to an actual meal, instead of all of this needle-food I’ve been forced to give you?”
He looks at me as if I’d grown a second head before hesitantly nodding his head. I move forward, a smile on my face as I remove the ball-gag from his mouth, granting him the ability to talk for the first time in three days.
He moves his jaw back and forth, stretching it out as he clears his dry throat. “Wh-what you gonna feed me? Poison?”
I laugh, patting him on his sweat drench shoulder gently. “By no means would I do such a thing. To murder you wouldn’t teach you a lesson. And after all, that’s why we’re here isn’t it? To learn a lesson.”
He ignores my bait and instead shakes his head slowly. “What you gonna make me?”
I smile, flashing all of my sharpened teeth to remind him of his manners. “I’ll make you some lean meats, if it’s all the same to you; chicken breast, maybe some pork chops… a few ribs if you behave while the restraints are loosened.”
“Oh my god, yes… yes, of course I’ll behave… sir!” He says, tears coming to his eyes at the very thought of getting real food into his growling stomach. The gastric feeding tube I’d cut into him some months ago was, while wholly nutritious, in no way filling. He was perpetually starving with the small amounts of nutrient rich glop I forced into his system, and an actual meal would be a small slice of heaven to him right about now.
Well… more like a slice of Angelica. But he needn’t know that.

Authors Note: A stand alone story that has always left me wanting to write more. Shylock is an interesting character in my eyes, as you rarely find a Vampire story that not only identifies with his victims, chooses to try and help others while maintaining his needed supply of blood. He metes out punishment as he sees fit, and has a long memory. In this story Angelina is the descendant of a former SS Officer that was a personal friend of Adolf Hitler and was known for his rather volatile actions taken against Jewish and Gypsy populations.

Enjoy!

The Art of Fear

            Not a horror story, but more of an analysis on what fear truly is. I’ve commented before in previous publications, but true horror to me is something that is different with each person as it grows, but it all spawns from the same tool.

            Suspense.

            Suspense is what separates the good horror from the bad, allowing an author (or director) to craft a scene and plant the seeds of fear in the reader (or viewers) mind. Once planted, the author can manipulate the story however he pleases, so long as he watches his Crop of Fear. If used properly, he can use Suspense to elicit a maximum amount of fear from a reader with minimal effort.

            Here is a fine example of how to use Suspense to create a memorable moment, while also being scary on a psychological level.

            View even if you do not know the game, as the video also shapes and introduces the characters as needed. A perfect showcase on how to use Suspense visually, in my eyes.               

A Warrior's Tale Part Two

Previously...
The pitch-eyed dead come at him faster than he'd like, a slow lumbering gate that while not exactly fast, promises that it will never slow down. All three have similar wounds, a simple torn out throat, and a carving of the Horned One’s emblem upon their foreheads. James recognizes one of them to be his comrade in arms Heinrich a fraction too late as he is forced to raise his arm in defense of the grasping fingers of the first of the groaning corpses.

As these zombies were once soldiers, all of them seem to have retained their strength and then some. James had hoped the leather handle of the whip would have been enough when draped over his arm, but the hungering maw of the dead merely bit into it, the bloodied teeth scraping so close to James’s arm in the process, and begins to chew through the tough leather like it’s a slice of roasted ham.

Ignoring the jeering crowd above, James kicks Heinrich in the stomach, sending him tumbling back into his fellows, and makes a break for one of the spears lying on the ground some ten feet away. The dwarf squawks in fear, and runs back with me, scooping up a sword with both hands. He looks to James in desperation, the dull gleam that James had grown accustomed to seeing in the dim jailers eyes pleading him for aid.

James merely nods before moving forward, slowly. The downed dead right themselves seamlessly, requiring neither hands nor knees to pull themselves up from the ground, merely the muscles of their body working in complete and utter concert together.

“That is not right,” James grumbles at the sight, choking back the bile billowing in his throat from the smell of the rotten flesh pervading the air, as well as whatever fluid they were covered in… ale?

The undead move in unison, shambling forward, one with a whip dangling from its mouth as it continues to choke the weapon down, the long cords of leather slowly disappearing down the dried gullet of my former friend.

Before they even get within striking distance, James lunges forward with the bronze-tipped spear, sinking it deep into the throat of the largest undead, yanking it to the side to sever the esophagus and vocal cords, but sadly not the spinal column. Some damage was done it would seem, as the ghoul drops to the ground, seemingly forced to drag itself with one arm while kicking out with one leg to propel itself in a truly bizarre shuffle.

The Dwarf is trying his best to handle Heinrich, and failing utterly due to my former-allies superior strength. The Dwarf sank the blade deep into Heinrich’s hip, causing his right leg to go slack. Sadly, going slack doesn’t prevent Heinrich’s probing hands to gain purchase on the Dwarf’s leather jerkin, ripping into it with the full ferocity of a starving wolf, the whip now waggling about like some obscene tongue. The other undead, a hulking mass of rotting flesh that could have only been Baldric, reached over Heinrich and grabbed at the dwarf as well, his jagged nails tearing a deep gouge into the hapless jailer’s semi-exposed chest, blood spurting out from the wound in thick gouts, splattering across the cold floor in a messy streak that only seemed to excite the dead further.

James whirled his spear around and once more stabbed at his crippled foe, this time scoring a solid meaty wound into the beasts swollen back, the bronze tip sinking into the creatures back like a knife slicing into undercooked meat, black blood welling up from the wound, dribbling onto the cold floor like heated tar. The dead thrashed about at the end of his blade, but it allowed him enough leverage to kick the beast in the side of the head, cracking it’s skull open and dislocating its jaw with a meaty thump. The creature shuddered and collapsed, its energy spent and its body done.

James released the spears haft and made his way to the two undead ripping into the jailer. His jerkin had finally been peeled off; revealing his hairy folds of greasy fat to the hungering dead’s questing fingers. Heinrich, the tail of the whip now dangling past his swollen and torn lips, was twisting and pulling on the screaming dwarfs arm with a fervor bordering on the mad, the arm in question cracking and snapping at the rough treatment it was receiving, already dislocated from a brutal yank.

Baldric’s titanic form had pushed Heinrich out of the way, lifting the dwarf bodily into the air as he sank his rotten teeth into the jailers flank, tearing away a wide strip of flesh with wild thrashings of the head, chewing on the meat noisily as the Dwarf screamed and pleaded for aid. Above it all, this disfigured man had begun a sermon concerning the Horned One’s kindness, his love for us all, and how we could repay it.

Wrenching the sword from Heinrich’s hip, James brought the gore-spattered blade in a high arc before flashing it low, sinking it deep into the back of Heinrich’s neck, tearing through sinew and spine alike as he yanked it free to stab once more into the rapidly expanding wound. By the third strike Heinrich fell to the floor truly lifeless, his head dangling from his neck by mere strips of worn and leathery flesh.

Turning on Baldric as he tore into the Jailer, James took a moment of ignoring the dwarf’s dying screams to take in all that Baldric had become. Pitch black eyes, with skin pale enough to see the dead veins beneath his cold flesh, heavily muscled limbs seeming to strain with every movement as Baldric’s body and muscles moved in complete tandem, unlike James’s own living body, which would scream in agony should he try and move like Baldric.

Despite his terrifying size and strength, he was dispatched easily enough as he was too enthralled by his captured dwarf, the light sword taking four hearty chops to fully remove his head from his taut shoulders, the dwarf falling to the ground like a forgotten chicken bone. James stomped on the poor dead things head, just to make sure he wouldn’t have to fight a diminutive zombie next.

“The Champion of Light has showed us the way!” The disfigured priest declared before a distraught audience, silencing their growing anger with his jubilant praise. “The Horned One desires the merchants to be better tested upon later, gifted with a more potent plague perhaps or some other amazing boon from the Horned One. For now, Champion of Light… what is your name?”

“Uh… James. James Hartglow.” He calls up, a tad embarrassed, and confused. He’d never had so many eyes upon him at once.

“Well than praise to James, Champion of the Light of Truth, shining unto us the true will of the Horned One through sacrifice, going so far as top slay the jailer that held him for us.” The disfigured man bellowed, clapping his hands three times in a slow rhythmic way that his congregation followed. “Go now my children, and come back once the New Moon has come, when the eyes of jealous God’s will be turned away.”

As the crowd apparently began to disperse, James looked up to see the smiling face of the disfigured priest. “Go on then Champion, the jaw is also a set of stairs to the kennel. I will have someone meet you there.”

***

The climb up the stone stairwell was slippery, slick with whatever the three walking dead had been soaking in, the sweet smell of decay mixed with the strange alcoholic stench confusing James’s senses far too much for him to hazard a guess. After climbing perhaps forty steps, he arose in a well lit room inside a high walled bowl of sorts, the thick glass walls of the bowl reaching the ceiling almost.

When he leaned in to look at the glass closely, he heard the grinding of gears and the clatter of chains once more, the path behind him closing up with a smooth piece of stone rolling over the stairwell, and undoubtedly the jaw was closing outside. A closer rattling of chains began, spinning off of a pulley and being pulled by some sort of cloven animal, from all the commotion going on past the glass barrier.

Which was slowly sinking into the ground until it was only knee high, revealing the disfigured priest and a pair of armed guards wearing the same grey robes. The room was long, carved from the same stone his jail cell had been made of, and containing a number of iron-wrought jail cells, deeply cut alcoves with iron bars and doors covering them, holding back the moaning dead, at least forty to fifty of them between four such cells. Opposite of the lowered glass barrier was a turn sty with a bound horse, the flank hairless and torn into by some savage beasts, or men, before it had died. Now the dray beast served eternally as a beast of burden, an iron muzzle strapped over its mouth and an iron backing keeping the creature from rearing up and hoofing people to death, or trying to eat people.

James could not even imagine how terrifying a flesh-starved horse from beyond the grave could be, and prayed to God he’d never find out.

“Here’s our dear Champion.” The disfigured Priest said happily, holding out his arms as if presenting James a present. “How are you feeling James, are you hungry? Thirsty?”

Looking around at all of the rotting meat, James swallowed the bile in his throat before clearing his throat. “A, um, a little thirsty?” He half said, half asked.

“Of course!” The priest said, his hearty voice not something James would expect from the emaciated, diseased body standing before him. “Let’s get you out of here and into some more comfortable clothes, get some food and wine into you!” 

James couldn’t argue, save for when the priest slung his arm over James’s shoulder, patting him on the chest with a leprous hand as he guided him out of the kennel and down a well-lit corridor, the two guards following them, but at a respectable distance.

They entered a smaller room, two long wooden tables adorned with bowls of fruit and small casks of wine dominating the majority of the room, both curved around the center which held a roasting pit, red hot embers cooking what appeared to be a sheep or hornless goat, slowly being turned on a spit by the skeletal remains of some poor soul.

“Spicer, is the mutton ready yet?” The Priest asked the skeleton as he forced James into a seat, and to James’s horror the skeleton remained silent while an unseen boy, emerging from a shadowed alcove he hadn’t noticed, probably due to the presence of a skeleton that upon closer inspection as it moved around the fiery pit and into a better source of light, looked like it was wet with recently spilled blood. Yet he left no sanguine smears as he patted the boy on his shaven head, running his fingers almost lovingly down his bare back. The boy was clad merely in stitched leather pants, with a leather cloak and hood that he wore, which were folded over his tiny arm.

“Ready enough for the killer over there, yes. I prefer mine more burned, and I know the child prefers it well done.” The little boy spoke in a flat tone, looking at James the entire time with a lost, dead stare. James took a moment to stare at the boy before realizing with a terrifying revulsion that the bloody skeleton somehow spoke through the child.

The skeleton seemed to pick up on James’s thoughts, and the child merely shook its head. “You misunderstand Champion, the boy was a needed sacrifice to grant me a voice, true. But he was also a volunteer from amongst the followers of the Horned One. He has served me now for a little over a week, and probably will survive a full year as my voice before I must select another child.”

“That’s horrible!” James cried, looking on in revulsion as the young child moved to tend to the spit sheep, grasping the handle and turning it slowly.

“That’s debatable, but most would agree that I’ve spared the poor boy a horrid life of disease and famine that seem to run through this region fairly often. Even when we’re not spreading the disease ourselves.” The skeleton said with the child’s voice, the small body of the boy straining as it spoke for the unholy creature. “And afterwards, he’ll go to the afterlife to be with the Horned One. You’re Christian I assume?”

“Yes? What’s that have to do with anything?” James hotly demanded, looking between the speaking child and the seated skeleton.

“Just look at me, not the boy,” The boy said as he finally managed to get a rhythm to the spit sheep. “It just means you’re familiar with sacrifices and slavery is all. I find it strange you view this so poorly.”

“What the Hell do you mean?” James asks again, this time focusing on the skeleton, and the baleful green glow that radiated from the empty sockets.

“Well let’s see…how about the story of Jephthah, who burns his daughter alive for God as an offering, in thanks for his great luck as a competent general? Surely that’s far worse than what I’m doing here, especially as the young lass hadn’t accepted Jesus as her Lord and Savior, and so she went to Hell afterwards for essentially committing suicide by allowing her father to do such a thing.”

“That… that’s different! The Lord commanded that!” James protested, only to see the skeleton go into a fit of convulsions as the boy let loose a string of high pitched laughter.

“That… That is rich. Your Lord commands it, so it must be fine. Well I serve a different Lord and no,” the skeleton rose its bony hand before James could interrupt, “I don’t serve Satan or whatever. Hardly a point in siding with the losing team after its already lost.”

“Then who the Hell is this Horned One supposed to be?” James demanded, taking an apple from one of the fruit baskets as he only now realized how hungry he truly was.

“A God that backs up his word with actions, not just sending his son in some lame excuse for a loophole out of eternal punishment that hadn’t been known before said son came about.” The boy snorted as he took a long fork and a sharpened dagger and began slicing off long juicy pieces of flank, placing them on a wooden platter at his feet. “I mean really, why the sudden need for a Hell?”

“It’s always been there, we just didn’t know about it!” James cried, not really knowing how to argue with a skeleton and his boy-puppet. That seared sheep did smell good though, and the disfigured priest smiled as he nudged a small decanter of wine towards James with his elbow. “Thanks, I guess.”

“Don’t mention it,” He waved a thin hand at my thanks before pointing at the skeleton. “And don’t argue religion with Spicer, he’s as cruel with his words as he is knowledgeable. You’ll regret debating him about your God or his existence.”

“So you all are Atheists?” James asked, remembering the word from the Latin Mass.

“Please,” the boy laughed as the skeleton convulsed once again. “We know of your God’s existence, that’s why we denounce Him. After all, He’s just one of many to choose from.”

“He’s the one true God!” James argues, giving the priest a pointed glare as he chuckles and shakes his head.

“According to him.” The boy says dully, placing the platter of steaming sheep flank before me. “Dig in, more than enough to go around. And to quote your God in reference to other deities, ‘You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me.’”

“Yeah,” The priest says around a mouthful of pear. “That just shows he’s not the only God.”

“And that he’s jealous of other deities taking what he views as his.” The boy said with a tone of finality to his words, slicing away a rather crispy piece of leg meat, and chewing on it thoughtfully.

James found that he knew no way to argue as he ate, especially against a Pagan priest and a skeleton using some sort of twisted magic to use a boy as his voice. It was all too surreal for him to even try and argue.

The food was good, at least.
Next...

Apologies for the Delay

My humblest of apologies for the brief sojourn without my scribbles, I've been dealing with some rather scary things in the real world.

Rest Assured their fairly well handled, and so regular updates shall commence!

A Warrior's Tale, Part One

Waking up to a crack from a whip across the back isn’t any way any man should be awakened. Alas, dear friends, twas how James was awoken. Shaking his head groggily, he rubbed at his aching head and stinging back, blearily looking around to try and figure out what exactly had happened to him. Last he remembered, he was serving as a guard for a Jewish Caravan traveling through the Northern regions of West Francia towards Bretagne. Spice merchants, they’d employed him and three others to act as guards for the journey. For forty shekels a piece, we were more than happy to provide the service to the superstitious Heebs. They truly believed the hills of the area to possess mad ghosts of men and women buried at the crossroads, of the beasts that roamed the wood looking for the tender flesh of children, and most of all they feared the Slender. A tall and gaunt figure without a face, the Slender was said to scare you and, in your moment of fright, snatch away your soul through your opened mouth.

Well, judging by the knot on the back of his head, James was willing to bet they’d all been caught up by a group of people that liked spreading the rumors of all the beasties and nasty’s that supposedly haunted the wilds of Gaul. Looking up from his prone position on the ground, he groaned at the sight of iron bars, and a burly looking, whip wielding thug with a sneer full of yellowed teeth.

“Great,” James said, letting himself fall prone to the ground once more with a wet splat. “Bandits.”

Crack!

James winced as the whip snaked between the bars well enough to crack across his back once more, rolling over and edging his way to the back of his cell, however small it was. Set into unworked stone, he truly had no space to really even stand if so desired, and a crack above him allowed a continual drip of water into his cramped quarters, creating a perpetual puddle that he’d been rolling about in.

“We’re not bandits, you simple minded cretin!” The man sneered, twirling the whip loosely about the floor. “We’re followers of the Horned One.”

Great, James thought, rolling his eyes, Cultists. Damn countryside is getting full of ‘em.

Cultists to various dark or pagan God’s were commonplace in the wilds of Gaul, far from the bustling urban centers like Paris. The Word of God hadn’t made it this far, or hadn’t made it successfully. Most Cultists were mere lunatics and madmen that polite society had cast away, their only crime being perpetually on the verge of violence or possessing a horrifying temper. Exile was best for them, and sadly they usually ended up beneath one banner, the banner of the craziest amongst them.

Judging by the semi-official looking leather jerkin this goon wore, emblazoned with a horned diamond, James could hazard to guess where he was.

In a Cultist’s prison.

“You’re good with a sword, right?” The jailer asked James, cracking the whip against the wall, a torrent of cries and pleas letting James know he wasn’t alone. “The put you in the fighters block for a reason, right?”

“Oh yes, sure!” I said, holding up my calloused hands as if they were evidence. “Been using a sword all my life, why, damn things almost like a second hand to me.”

The guard squints at James before grabbing a rusty ring of keys… three keys to be precise. That is an odd thing to see, James thought to himself as the heavyset man began unlocking his door, you’d think they’d have more keys.

James scampers out of the narrow door, standing up with the help of the wall, popping his sore back as he finally got to stand up. He closed his eyes in bliss as he popped his back and stretched his arms before remembering why he was actually standing in the first place. Opening his eyes, he spun to look for the guard and see what the man wanted him to do…

…only to end up looking about two feet too high. The sneering guard with a whip was almost a dwarf when compared to James, who had an easy two and a half feet on him, as well as half a stone in weight.

Before he could get any plan into motion to dole out some justice to the minute man, the whip cracked painfully close to his ear, sending him back against the stone wall, panting as he rubbed at the aching spot.

“March pretty boy,” The dwarf chuckled darkly, twirling the whip back for another strike.

James chose to march down the dark, cavernous tunnel, the only light coming from the occasional sconce in the wall, usually a skull with a candle inside it, his only companion a surly sadistic dwarf that seemed to get off on hurting people bigger than him.

Namely James.

The sound of their footsteps, along with the dwarf’s labored breathing, was the only thing echoing about the tunnel for what felt like ages until James could finally see a light ahead at the end of the tunnel, and hear the steady hum that came from man voices speaking at once. Looking back at his guide, James decided to give the squat little toad the slip and burst into a dead sprint. Ignoring the foul midget’s cry, he ran as fast and as hard as he could towards the light, until he burst from the tunnel at his fastest.

Slamming into a poorly built iron rail, the metal bending loudly as James fell onto his back cursing and swearing everything that he could. Beneath his pounding fists he idly noted that wherever he was no, the floor was at least wooden instead of stone.

“Brothers! Sisters!” Came a shrill cry from below, echoing up along the curved walls and high cavern ceiling. Oh great… James bitterly thought. More Cultists… “Gather for tonight’s homage to the great Horned One!”

A chorus of mumbling and laughter broke through what sounded like a crowd, James noted sourly as he rolled to his side, pushing himself up to his knees. His friend the jailer had just caught up with him, panting and gasping for air now, with his hands on his knees as the small ball of greasy fat and muscle fought to remain standing.

Looking down, James could see he was at what appeared to be the top of a great carving of a human skull with prominent horns leading up from its temples, curling like a rams horns before swooping up and back, almost like antlers. Standing atop the skull, where a small wooden platform had been set coming from its own stone tunnel, was a miserly looking grey-robed man, half his face covered in weeping boils, the other half bearing a brand of the Horned One.

“He must not go out terribly often…” James muttered to himself. James’s own platform sat atop one of the stone horns, and overlooked a great auditorium, filled with grey-robed men and women, and even children, dancing about the seats surrounding a deep looking pit.

“Tonight the Horned One will dine on the souls of the wicked and the just! If the sacrifice lives, we shall not release the plague upon the merchants. If he dies, the merchants go free to spread the Horned One’s hunger to all they would trade with, those struck down by the illness fodder for our Lord’s unending hunger!”

“Ok, I don’t like the sound of any of this… dwarf, who’s the sacrifice?” James says, turning to the gasping dwarf.

James gets his answer when the wooden floor beneath him drops out, revealing his position atop one of the carved horns to actually be over a chute. Almost by reaction, he lashed out and grabbed the dwarf (who immediately stopped gasping and started screaming) as they both started plummeting down the smooth stone chute, sliding like a pair of greased up geese over a cooks chopping block.

Tumbling about in darkness, the chute finally opened up into the pit that had been far below, but was sadly now all too close for James to enjoy. Scattered about the odalisque pit were bits of rusty armor and a smattering of weapons: swords lay forgotten, maces lay half embedded in rock over brown stains, and even a spear or three were all within reach. As well as a gasping dwarf and his whip, which James quickly liberated without so much as a fight.

“Let the Horned One reveal to us his plan!” Bellowed the disfigured man from above, pulling a lever and walking back and out of James’s line of sight. A horrid cranking of gears and cracking of chains echoed from within the walls around him, seeming to radiate from the front of the Horned One’s edifice, as the lower jaw of the great carved skull began to lower slowly, dripping red hot fluids that seemed almost luminescent. As the maw widened, three figures came tumbling down most unceremoniously from the maw, steaming with the glowing juices and striking the stone floor with a wet slap of fish hitting the pier.

James could only watch in horror as the three fallen figures rose bonelessly from the ground, their eyes as black as pitch and their flesh as grey as the stone around them, steam rising from their bodies as they began to awkwardly stumble his way, arms outstretched and a low moan escaping from all three of their lips. 
Next!   

And the Results are In!

With but nary a few hours left, I can say with reasonable certainty that the readers have decided the path of Bushido for our dashing young Hero! The second part will be up tomorrow, just to make certain about the poll, and should be a thrill ride for all the fans out there.

Feel free to comment on anything about my stories; suggestions and advice are always welcome, as are the searing flames of the internet editor’s fiery tongue. And as always, keep checking in because I update at least twice a week (Tuesday and Thursday) with short stories, and Sunday’s with the series “The Atheist’s Nightmare.”

Thanks to Ray Comfort for that phrasing he made so many years ago, I still laugh about it. Have a look:

These two are Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron, two Evangelical Christians that happily made certain I never looked at Christianity as a viable life style or religion, choosing the more philosophical aspects of Buddhism to be my main pillar of morals, as many zealous individuals proclaim we all must gain from a religion.
Big thanks, by the way to an original artist who made a picture for my sight, so you wouldn't have to see the confused Viking every time you honor me with your eyes.

Ah well, now I’m just rambling… snuggle deep into the comforts of your coffins, dear hearts and have yourself a good read; this Texas heat is too much for my sensitive features!

Sweet Dreams

Son of Preacher Man

I fumble with my mp3 player as I stand in the bitter darkness of the alleyway, trying to set the damned thing to my “Work” playlist. God, how I miss cassette players, they were just so much simpler to use. But far be it from me to be an “old man” as my grandson would often call me whenever he saw me messing with this stupid device. He’d gotten it for me for my birthday this past November, and even though I had a hundred dollars’ worth of music I could “buy” for it, I just chose the one song.

I smiled as the familiar tune began; the swaying guitar matched the rhythmic tapping of the drums. “Ahh… Dusty. Lord knows to my surprise…”

I stand with one ear bud plugged into the side of my head, my dark cardigan slightly damp from the constant dripping of the alleyway I was standing in. One of the many joys of New York, there is never a shortage of alleyways to work with. My shoes, clean and buffed as of this morning, while also sanded down on the bottom, make almost no noise as I move to the side of the dumpster that was blocked from the view of the open street. My large leather satchel, still cold to the touch, and my instruments still laid out in a neat row atop a long rolling leather case.

I move back to my position at the alleys mouth, popping my back as I go, pulling the brim of my golfing hat lower over my eyes. My trench coat, a genuine Burberry if you can believe it, is undone, hanging loose down to my ankles, blending in with my black slacks. Checking my watch (not my phone mind you, there is an actual difference!), I hear Dusty begin to sing again as my first client of the night begins walking down the sidewalk towards me, a hulking black man, and two of his friends.

I step from the shadows just as they are upon me, causing them all to flinch and swear. “Goddamnit man! You can’t be sneaking up on people like that dawg!” One of his friends, a well-dressed younger man with a very rich scent… high dollar cologne.

The other friend is more “down to earth” I suppose you would say, and is merely in jeans a few sizes too large for him, held taut at his waist by a belt with hammered holes through it; perhaps he’d just lost a great deal of weight?

My target however, the largest of the three, is built like one of the solid Redwoods of California; tall, dark and thick. He was dressed casually enough, though he wore a pair of shiny black shoes and a pressed pair of pants beneath his colorful shirt. These three were obviously out for a night on the town.

“Terribly sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.” Adopting a Scottish burr of an accent, a practiced and simple task for me.

Something everyone in my line of business needs.

“I was just wondering two things gentlemen,” I say, moving closer to them slowly. None of them move back or even tighten up their muscles… they don’t see me as a threat.

“First of all is I was hoping I could get the time from you, as my pocket watch,” which I fish out subtly with my leather clad hand, the flashing bit of gold remaining visible for but a moment before I drop it back into one of the lower pockets, “has unfortunately stopped working, and I’m supposed to begin my evening shift at 10:00 PM sharp.”

“Well damn man, you gonna be in trouble then.” Tight-belt said, checking a flashy looking device. “Its 10:07 man, you are late!”

“Oh, it won’t matter terribly and thank you for telling me, I need to keep my watch better wound… but I was also wondering if any of you might have a cigarette for an old man on this cold night.” I ask genially, having stopped in between all three of them, each merely a foot or two away from me.

“Nah man, we don’t’ smoke.” The largest one said, waving away at the idea. “That shit’ll kill you.”

I look at him for a few moments, a small quirk of a smile forming at the corner of my lips. The other two laugh and agree they can’t help me out, using euphemisms that men and women had fought so hard to ban from our butchered language that it almost distracted me as I picked the largest man’s wallet, deftly putting it into inner breast pocket of my coat, subtly pulling the slim identification card from its place atop a money clip.

“Ah well, fortune doesn’t look down upon me this evening, sadly.” I say, looking at the largest man, smiling slightly, before turning and walking back to the darkness of the alley (I’d broken all the light bulbs earlier this evening.) pulling my pocket watch and winding it to set it to 10:10,  to keep it accurate. “Thank you gentlemen, especially you Simon Masterson, of West Cherry Hill, apartment number five-zero-five.”

They had begun walking away, chuckling to themselves about the odd little man until I called that out. Simon, the man who was now lighter one wallet, whipped around to look at me, the half of my leaning out into the light of the street, my grinning face and leather hand holding his wallet catching his attention.

“Son of a bitch!” He shouts, and turns to run after me, his two friends right by his side. I slither back into the darkness, back behind the dumpster and quietly scale a fire escape ladder about ten feet up.

I have no means of seeing them as the bumble through the alleyway, but my ears (the one not listening to a song about young, forbidden love) could hear every scrape of their shoes, every gasp of breath, every muttered curse as they fumbled down the darkened alley looking for me. I only begin to descend the fire escape as the trio pass under me, going deeper into the hungering darkness.

Pocketing the wallet, I retrieve my Benchmade Model 4X, spinning it skillfully between my fingers as I sling the butterfly knife into an open position, locking the five inches of razor-sharp black steel into position as I casually walk up behind one of the shorter ones, the cologne connoisseur, and quickly fold my opened hand over his mouth and run my blade through his neck, stabbing into the side and pulling out to cut off his vocal cords.

Dead a second later from the sudden blood loss, I yank a clean roll of gauze an quickly bind the wound, taking the extra ten seconds to make sure he’s not bleeding too heavily onto the paved street of the alleyway. I wipe my knife three times on his coat before standing and moving after the other two, who are still shouting and looking for me in the darkness.

From their thunderous stomping, I can hear Simon is marching back towards the light of the street. No, this won’t do at all! As Dusty sings of the one boy who could have her reach God, I firmly plant my feet, and pull my hands up, allowing the butterfly knife to slide down into my sleeve. As Simon’s towering form closes unknowingly in upon me, I do my best to guess where he will be, and hold my hands out, both in the open palm position.

He slams into my hands and I spring into action, taking hold of his shirt and driving my knee into his solar plexus, smiling at the flexibility I still possess as I he doubles over in pain. Flipping my blade back into my hand, I drive it to the hilt into the base of his skull, using it as a handle to twist and break his neck to keep his death silent in the flurry of movements.

I pull the blade free, wiping it three times on his colorful shirt clean off his dark blood before wrapping a few rounds of gauze over the wound to stem the bleeding, pushing him off to the side.

“Simon, where you at? I can’t find the faggot who took your wallet man, shit!” Tight-Belt cries, a brief flash of light exploding like a beacon amongst my comfortable darkness. The man’s phone has a built in flashlight… this I hadn’t planned for. The light is weak, only giving him perhaps three feet of clear visibility, but that’s more than I prefer him having. The problem with my line of work is leaving stragglers, and judging by his voice, he plans on bolting as soon as he can.

“How well I remember… the look that was in his eyes… knowing that he was all mine…” I mutter to myself, as I hug the wall, slowly growing closer to him.

“Adrian! Simon! Guys, where you at?” He called his voice echoing down the empty labyrinth of alleys. None of the homeless ever came into these alleys. They were more in touch with the age old fight-or-flight mechanic, and could somehow sense that I hunted here on occasion. Nobody would here Tight-Belts cries.

Nobody except for me of course.

I clear my throat quietly, changing my accent to that of a Parisian. “Who might you be my scared little black bird?”

“Oh shit, who’s there? Dude, just back off man, I’m warning ya, I know how to fight man!” Tight-Belt proclaimed his face and hands dripping with fear-tinted sweat.

That stopped me cold. “En réalité? And by what discipline do you command your combative skills from, dare I ask?”

I half expect him to take a karate stance, finding myself slightly amused by Tight-Belt. But no, he drops his phone to the ground, the light shining up to illuminate his immediate surroundings, taking a rather solid stance, hands held high, weight balanced evenly between feet as he squares his hips towards the sound of my voice. Someone knows an actual fighting style!

“I know enough mother fucker, not that you’d know what it is!” He barks out at the darkness like a terrified hound: showing a brave front, in hopes of scaring the opponent away.

“That looks an awful lot like a Krav Maga stance to me, if I was forced to guess. How long have you been training?” I ask, smiling even wider as his eyes show his surprise, his fear, at my knowledge.

“Just cleared up to my brown belt, so you better not mess with me old man!” He snaps at me, looking around the general direction I was in a moment ago. Sorry to say for him, I’m now prowling around him, to his left side, seeing as he’s right handed.  “I don’t know what you did to Simon and Adrian, but I’m gettin’ out of here!”

Flipping the butterfly knife closed and sliding it into my pocket, I watch him stay in his stance, solid as a rock of the mountain. Studying him, I can tell he’s lightly muscled, and that he must have been overweight for quite some time, if the stretch marks on his biceps are any indication. He must have gone to a Krav Maga center to try and lose weight, and learned to fight in the process.

Sadly, that’s not how that style works. Krav Maga is Israeli and not a very old style as well, having adopted from the various other street fight styles that existed around the world to create a fight style for a killer. Half of the maneuvers are designed to lead into a killing strike, while the other half is actual killing strikes. This isn’t a fighting style for someone like him, a pudgy boy trapped in a fat man’s body.

It’s for someone like me.

That’s why I know it as well.

I launch myself from the darkness just as he opens his mouth to call out to me again, leaving his attention elsewhere. I slam into his side, my right palm crashing into the left side of his jaw, shattering the fragile bones there before I duck beneath his raised hands and into his “box,” his own fighting stance and reach, slamming my left fist into his kidney’s as I grab him by the ear, yanking him downward, face first into my right knee. His gurgled cry goes even softer as I punch the back of his head with my left fist twice in rapid succession before shoving him away by my grip on his head and my left foot in a simple and slow forward kick.

I’d felt him adjust his guard, trying to trap my right hand for a possible arm-bar, but my kidney shot had caught him by surprise, surprise enough to yank him down into a knee strike. I’d even felt his own feeble attempts at grabbing my ankle, perhaps to flip me back and away from him.

The two punches to the back of his skull had halted that attempt. He now lays on his side, mere inches from the bright screen of his phone, coughing and sputtering, openly crying at my assault.

“The funny thing about claiming you know how to fight,” I say, dropping all pretenses and accents as I walk into the light, to allow him to see me as I speak, “is that you actually know how to fight outside your training center. Krav Maga isn’t for people trying to look cool, or trying to get in shape. Its sole purpose, the sole reason it exists, is to teach you how to survive.”

He chokes back a sob as I stomp on his phone once, killing the light and allowing the comfort of the night to swallow us once more. “You failed to learn that lesson tonight.”

I move forward and palm-strike his bloody face, corkscrewing my hips into the motion to throw my weight into the blow, slamming him hard against the asphalt, crushing his skull. I wipe my bloodied glove on his clothes, pulling a bottle of water from my coat to rinse off my gloves and coat, using a small flashlight to check myself over. Once clean, I get to work.

I drag all three of the men behind the dumpster, heads touching the buildings foundation while feet are stretched out. I remove their shoes and socks, pulling six dirtied, worn ones from my jacket and slipping them onto their feet, which are visible from the road; now there’s just three sleeping bums, not three bodies.

I kneel next to Simon, removing all of his jewelry and money from his pockets and hands, dropping them into a Ziploc bag with his wallet that went into my trench coat. Taking the first of my finely crafted surgical tools from their unrolled leather kit, I begin cutting into Simon, flashlight held between my teeth as I create a wide slit, before fishing for what I seek… ah-ha!

Slowly, cutting the connected tubes, I gently remove the liver of the man, checking its overall color to make certain I haven’t gathered a sick man’s organ, before wrapping it in several layers of plastic wrap, writing Simons name and blood type (courtesy of his driver’s license and organ donor card) with a black sharpie, before sliding it into my ice-filled satchel.

I turn slowly on aching knee as I move to the cologne connoisseur, one Adrian Higgs, taking away his various valuables  and his wallet, choosing to leave the expensive looking phone of his, seeing how I despise them. I feel over his abdomen, smiling when I feel the almost imperceptible bulge of his kidneys, and begin my incisions there, repeating the process I had performed with Simons liver mere minutes ago.

I finally turn to the brutalized corpse of Tight-Belt (Jacob Jordan, apparently). With him I grab my bone saw, and begin slowly sawing into the left side of his chest, whir of the electric blade humming along nicely to Dusty’s dulcet tones. After removing the severed ribs at the base with an eerie cracking noise as I tear them away from the sternum, I carefully extract the left lung, then the heart and then finally the right lung. Wrapped in plastic and snug in my satchel, I check through his wallet, frowning at the lack of an organ donor card.

“How rude…” I mutter to myself as I pull a spray bottle of lye, and spray down wherever I touched, humming to myself idly. Pulling my pocket watch, I see that it’s nearly 10:25, giving me an easy twenty minutes to make it to my train.

I pack the bottle away nice and snug next to the organs and the packed ice, pushed some more ice atop the human tissue, to keep it fresh and shoulder the bag, which is now easily ten to fifteen pounds heavier than twenty minutes ago. I sing along with Dusty as I exit the alley and begin making my way down the street, towards the subway station.

Just as I reach a corner crosswalk flashes the universal sign to stop and be patient, so I do. Looking to my left, a small newspaper kiosk catches my attention, the headlines of the New York Daily News catching my eye.

I stroll up to the kiosk, passing a dollar bill to the owner of the small storefront and grab the paper, opening it right there to read about the fifth discovery of the “Organ –Snatcher”, a serial killer that had been plaguing New York for the past seven months. Looking to my right at the sign of movement, I see a police officer stop and buy the same issue, looking at the headline before shaking his head.

“Any good leads on the rogue doing this?” I ask him, switching to my Scottish accent. The police officer seems surprised by the question, but quickly covers it with a warm smile towards me. He’s a younger man, with slightly Asian features and short cropped black hair, with a swimmers build.

“We’re doing what we can,” He says in a mildly evasive way.

“Come now, he’s killed what, twenty people now?” I ask, pressing the lad for information. “Do you have any witnesses to the crimes or anything? Any leads?”

“Well he’s actually only killed seventeen I think, but we have issued a statement claiming that he is probably a younger Caucasian male, with a boxers build.” The Officer replies, basically repeating the garbage I’ve been reading for the past few months. “We think he might be doing something ritualistic with them, maybe even eating them, as none of the missing organs are cropping up anywhere in the city.”

“Hmmm… so you think he’s a cannibal?” I ask, faintly amused at the notion. I’d tried a strip of human meat once before and found it unappealing, though I mostly blame the cook for that review.

“Personally, yeah. I mean, he’s just targeting people at random, so he’s obviously just after the organs.” The Officer replies before motioning at the crosswalk. “Safe to go now.”

“Oh, thank you!” I say, rushing to cross the street before the timer on the small neon box ran out. “And good luck catching your man sir!” I call back to him.

***

I reach the train station at precisely 10:40 PM, five minutes early. It seems my partner in crime is just as early, so we move towards each other, arms spread wide for gentle side armed hugs, our satchels each weighing heavily on our aching backs. We take a seat along the long benches in front of the empty tracks, no train due for another twenty minutes.

“So what do you have for me tonight Sal?” My friend asks his Italian accent one I’ve never been able to mimic. That’s why he calls me Sal, short for Salamander. He claims it’s the lizard that can change color and regrow limbs, and even though I refuted his claims on that, the name has stuck these past few months.

“One beater, two inhalers, two filters and a flask, the inhalers and beater unidentified.” I reply, using the code we’d come up with once we’d started doing business. “You bring enough for all of that?”

“Jesus man, that story is gonna be a nasty one, isn’t it?” He asks me, referring to the inevitable story to be printed within the next few days. “And yeah, I’m pretty sure I got enough for ya. You said you prefer B positive right? HIV positive?”

“Yes,” I reply with a solemn nod. “I find it makes it easier for the collector if my desires aren’t too high. Did you label the races they came from this time?”

“Yeah, just like you asked Sal.” He said with a shake of his head, his older features far more haggard than mine, even though we’d both suffered through the same horrors of War. His skin old and patchy, flaking in certain spots due to his constant psoriasis. He was balding as well; something I’d been happy to learn would never happen to me. “Man, I gotta know what you want with all this tainted blood? You running a scam with it or something?”

He asks every time, and I merely tell him the same thing every time. “That’s not in the deal Joseph, you know that. Now let me check my payment.” I reply, holding out an arm for his satchel, a desert storm camouflaged bag that almost made me snarl at his idiocy. Holding the bag, I could tell it was easily sixty pounds, and upon unzipping the top most compartments, I see a sealed medical bag, filled with the vital red fluid I needed.

“Alright, it seems good enough.” I say after staring at the small baggies longingly, zipping the bag up. “Come back in say, two months and three weeks, same time and place of course. And bring enough for at least ten pieces this time. In something that actually matches what I wear.”

“You got it Sal,” Joseph chuckles as he leans back on the bench. As I stand to leave, I hand him the paper I’d purchased, smiling at him as he thanked me, “you have a safe walk home now.”

I merely wave over my shoulder as I put the second ear bud in, turning up the volume of the song, softly singing to myself as I walked home, a small flat that I keep just a mere two blocks from the train station. The night is a tad chilly, so I pull my coat tight around me as I smile at a lovely couple walking past me.

As I make it to the door of my flat, I unlock the door, putting the key back into my pocket before entering my cozy little home a three bedroom, two bathroom basement level flat that cost me a hefty two grand a month.  I’ve furnished it like I had in the old country, with solid wooden flooring and furniture, a radio and record player next to a high backed chair and a towering bookshelf, with a hall leading to my office and workshop, and into my bedroom.

I move to the fridge and begin unloading the pint-sized bags of blood into fridge; sliding them into slots I had inserted there myself. The forty-odd bags filled out the remainder I had left within the fridge, calming my worry. Ever since that night, I’d been easily worried, and prone to hoarding.

I reach beneath the blood and pull a readied bag of nutrient-rich fluid I’d just received this morning from the drug store. The nutrient rich food that went along with it came in a tube, similar to the cookie dough I saw in a supermarket the one time I went.

Stopping off in my office I throw the three dead men’s wallets into a green recycle-bin full of them, their jewelry into a mason jar I’ve placed onto a shelf lined with similar contents: sparkling silver and glimmering gold, with diamonds and rubies galore. I would spend my next few nights separating the gems from the metals, determining the qualities, and then melting them down into thin bars that I could then sell with ease. The gems I mostly kept for myself, or for when I hear of a local wedding at the Synagogue; then I fashion the bride and groom a pair of brilliant necklaces, and show up if it was at night, claiming to be a distant cousin that merely wished to congratulate the couple with a gift.

It’s always nice to give back to the community.

“You out there Shylock?” Came the raspy voice of my roommate, who’d obviously been awoken by my movements about the house. I stood up straighter, removing my trench coat and hanging it next to my desk as I took a moment to flip through the next few days in my calendar book, noting the electric bill was due soon. Making a mental note, I scoop up my supplies as I make my way to the bedroom.

Hanging from the rafters of the room by leather bracers, stretching him wide at the shoulders and connecting him to the ceiling wall by a hefty length of chain, I stand in the doorway and merely smile at my friend, who sadly doesn’t reciprocate. Nude, the man is covered in tattoos, swastikas and Nazi propaganda littering his body like trash in the subway. His feet are held down by cement blocks, but other than the strung up Neo-Nazi, the table holding his IV stands and his Gastric Feeding Tube device, which run a clear plastic cord up to his ribs, piercing through and leading into his stomach the room is bare. A catheter runs up the limp shaft of his penis, leading to a half full plastic sack sitting on the table. His fluids bag is empty, so I set to work replacing the various bags and tubes, smiling as he growls out his usual insults and slurs. I always find myself fascinated by his tattoos, and how one could willingly subject themselves to such treatment over and over again.

The only time a needle has pierced my skin was when I was taken, and it remains to this very day, some sixty years later, my second greatest fear, just below the beauty of a sunrise.

I tap his blood bag idly, watching as the blood seems to have stopped draining into him, meaning the best thing of the night.

He’s full.

I walk in front of him, grinning from ear to ear as I remove my hat, allowing my pointed ears to show, and I open my mouth allowing my fangs to flip down from the roof of my mouth. I place one hand over his mouth as I bite deep into his left pectoral, right over a tattoo in German that roughly translates to “Die, Jew, Die!”

My eyes, which I know have become red from my bloodlust, keep an eye on his half empty blood bag until the fluid begins to drain into him again. I keep draining, holding his face still as he bites into my gloved hand weakly, his muffled screams of protest growing weaker by the moment due to his sudden change in blood pressure. I drain him for a solid minute, one hand over his face, the other on his wrist keeping track of his pulse, until he begins to reach a critical level.

At that point I stop; licking the wound closed, and quickly switch out the now empty blood bag with a fresh one, the word “Black” written hastily over the side, identifying the race of the original carrier.

“There you go, my friend. All better, ja? I give you the Negroes blood this time; see if you can purify it with your Aryan roots you seem so proud of.” I say as I take some wet wipes, cleaning my own mouth and his chest.

“God…” He pants, hanging limply from his constraints. “How long have I been here now?”

“Two months and eight days.” I reply succinctly. “And as I told you when I first swooped in upon you, your beliefs earned a stay in prison equal to my stay, so you have another nine months to go.”

“Fucking Jew… we had it right when we said we needed to kill all of you!” He rasps, his throat to dry from not having any water pass through it for several months. “Fucking monsters the lot of you!”

“On the contrary, it was your beloved doctors who made me what I am.” I reply, revealing to him my origins, as I did with all of my Neo-Nazi captives that I’ve held over the years. “I was but a man who wanted to live a simple life as a jeweler, until you and your war mongrel brethren ruined that for me.”

I spin back to him a wide grin on my highly vampiric features now; blood red eyes and pointed ears, with skin so pale you could see the stolen blood pumping through my body in time with my dead heart beating. We all look this way after feeding, taking some time to calm down and begin to look “human” again.

“But now that we’re in America, I’ve been able to start anew! And thanks to the very principles of this society that allow me my religious freedom, they also grant you your right to your hate speech. My religion and culture led to an unjust punishment; I find it only ironic that your insipid beliefs lead to the exact same treatment I was given.”

“And if I live?” He asks, for the first time.

“Then out the door you go, your body crawling with HIV and Hepatitis from all of the poisoned blood I’ve been processing through you.” I reply with a sadistic grin. “I left the camps diseased, so why shouldn’t you?”

I move his ball-gag back into place, tightening the collar in order to get some silence. I had a whole array of new jewel crafting materials to play with waiting in the other room, and only so much time before dawn broke, and I had to retreat into my hall closet.

Listening to his horrid moans and vitriolic howling through the gag, I merely shrug and move on. If he wants sympathy from J-6440 I think darkly as I subconsciously rub my inner right arm, then he’ll be waiting quite a while. Wonder which of us two monsters will last the longest?
To be continued...