Ten Open Graves: A Collection of Supernatural Horror

by David Wood

  The familiar subtle corn silk strokes comprising the hair and the contrasting vibrant blue eyes reflected back at his eager gaze. The Mara held firm, as entrenched as ever in the canvass between his shoulder blades. No tell-tale signs revealed that she had recently exercised any life beyond the limits of his skin.

  Good and bad. Relief and disappointment.

  He willed his eyes to slide over the rest of his inked skin, looking for any signs of life. The naked incandescent bulb above the mirror supplied dim light, enough for him to confirm that nothing had changed. The Ouroboros still sat on his forearm. Mother Mary remained on his bicep and so on with all his ink. The Komodo dragon skin on his neck, the Grim Reaper above his navel, the death’s head skull on his calf, not a single sign that the blood infused ink contained any power.

  Feeling the emptiness of impotence, William shuffled to the front of the shop. He turned on the fluorescent lights, unlocked the door and displayed the open sign. He hoped a flood of weekend business would improve his mood.

  Days passed with no word from the cops. In William’s mind that could only mean one thing; the injured girl had not been Kelly. If it had been, his connection to the crime would stand out like a tramp stamp on a nun and they would have initiated some form of interrogation.

  Rain tapped on the glass, running in sheets that blurred the scrawling graffiti art and the Inkenstein logo on the front windows. November had brought with it the first serious stretch of moisture and the constant downpour drove people from the outdoors into Portland’s plethora of businesses. William benefited, his tattoo enterprise thriving in recent weeks.

  However, pockets full of money did little to ease his troubles. Increased insomnia plagued him. Any troubled sleep he managed would end with another visit from the Sleep Crusher. He still blamed the Mara tat, but failed to find any concrete evidence of her involvement.

  Lately, the ink on his body aggravated his skin, causing it to itch as it had when the static-eyed wraiths had claimed Kelly. He kept viewing it as a sign something significant would transpire, but his tats still refused to exhibit any life.

  At one point he had tried to mentally breathe life into them, willing them into animation the way God had done with Adam. They refused to accept the curse of existence. Wise, perhaps, considering how it had turned out for Adam.

  As long as the tattoos remained dormant, Kelly’s disappearance would wear on his emotions like sandpaper on paint. Often, to relieve the torment of guilt, he imagined following her in an attempt to bring her back.

  The problem with that was he only knew one way to follow her path and he couldn’t muster enough courage to summon the wraiths. He would make a move when he was ready, and being ready meant unlocking the secrets of the black magic tattoos covering his body.

  William folded his hands on the illustrated desk, fixed his Mother Mary tattoo with an adamant stare and hoped she could come up with a miracle or two.

  Chapter 16: Signs Of Life

  Another week passed with no word from Kelly. The thin structure of hope that her absence would be temporary started to deteriorate one brick at a time.

  As William sat in the ink parlor, shivering from the cool late November evening, he mulled over the decisions facing him. He could continue to let the remorse crush him into a shadow of the stable man he used to be, or he could try to redeem himself by getting Kelly back.

  Getting her back involved a commitment to the very act he found repulsive. Kelly had deemed it the ultimate piercing; trepanation. All his life he suffered an aversion to anything that penetrated the flesh. He tolerated tattoo needles only for the beautiful work of art that would display its glory until the passing on of the body. Of course, black magic also figured in.

  On the other hand, the studs, barbells and closed captive rings used in the piercing field were not expressions of art, but rather a masochistic way of taking your inner pain and giving it some physical, outward manifestation. It had been that way in Kelly’s case. After each painful event of her young life she endured another piercing, her way of saying to her peers, "Look how screwed up my world is". William made no room for such self-pity in his domain.

  Nevertheless, he found himself on the verge of committing the repugnant act of drilling holes into his head. He had to, as much for his sake as Kelly’s. The crux of the matter was he loved her. As his hope for her return faded, the more his love intensified. How could he face the accusation of that love while sitting back and doing nothing?

  Another thought kept lobbying for his attention. He dreamed it every night. It involved taking a knife to Kelly’s dad, or a gun and watching him die a slow and horrendous death. He deserved it, every drop of spilled blood justified. However, that desire, made fertile in the subconscious of his dreams, wilted away when the Sleep Crusher overtook his mind and sent him into a state of paralytic panic.

  By the time the Sleep Crusher released him, followed by the unnerving itch of his tattoos, the murder fantasy filed itself away in the farthest corners of his mind. His thoughts returned to the latent powers of his tattoos. Deciding to go after Kelly would be a cinch if he could only figure out how to unlock the magic of the mystical ink.

  The pattern repeated itself every night; the dreams of murder, the crushing paralysis and the itching, dormant tats. It robbed him of sleep. It ushered him to the brink of insanity.

  Not knowing how many more such nights he could endure William decided to no longer use his impotent ink as an excuse. He had no way of knowing what the pierced wraiths were capable of. By now, they could have chopped Kelly into thousands of little pieces, adding to the collection of decomposing meat dangling from their hooks and chains. The thought revolted him.

  No time for further delay. Biting his upper lip, he fetched the Hello Kitty duffle bag from the supply closet and looked up. The ceiling in the main work space of the shop, fifteen feet or more overhead, would be too high.

  He carried the duffle bag into the cramped bathroom down the hallway. Glancing up at the eight foot sheet rock ceiling, he nodded his head and placed the bag on the sink. He pulled out the drill.

  He hesitated. The odds of success were low. He could fail to pierce through and end up collapsing on the sink, his life bleeding out his perforated skull and down the drain.

  Would that be so bad? Didn’t love demand he forfeit his life should the need arise? Weren’t most love stories thinly disguised tragedies? He loved her, and that love demanded action regardless of the consequences.

  He planned to summon the pierced wraiths and demand they take him to Kelly. He needed to right his wrongs even though the very thought shimmied his guts.

  How the hell did Peter what’s his face attach the drill to the ceiling?

  He stood on the toilet and discovered that his head could reach the ceiling by standing on his tiptoes.

  Fighting squeamish sensations, he lifted the drill to the sheet rock. How to affix the drill to the ceiling became the next obstacle. He thought of duct tape, or maybe some sort of brace.

  A tinkling from the front entrance bell broke his reverie.

  “Crap.” He climbed down from the toilet. He usually locked the front door after hours, but maybe in his haste to pierce through it had slipped his mind. He groaned at the prospect of facing another insistent customer.

  “Shop’s closed buddy,” William called out as he made his way down the dark hallway.

  No reply, only an awkward silence.

  “Hey. No after hour inking, especially today. You hear me?”

  Still no answer.

  He cursed himself for failing to turn the lights on earlier. The switch was all the way near the front of the shop.

  “Hello?” he said, still trying to solicit a response. He passed his desk, scanning the murky interior. “For Christ’s sake, what do you want?”

  He bumped into the sanitation station. In that instant, fluorescent light erupted, stabbing his dilated pupils. He rapidly blinked his eyes and looked towards the entrance.
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br />   His visitor stood next to the light switch.

  “Glad to see me?”

  William gaped. “Kelly? Is it really you? Jesus Louisus, where have you been?” The sight of her brought with it a flood of relief. Self-trepanation was no longer on the agenda.

  “Been places.”

  She looked different. Her Goth Lolita attire looked edgier, darker. He fought the urge to comment on it but she caught his look.

  “A refreshing change, don’t you think?” She executed a clumsy curtsy. “No more pink petticoat, no more striped stockings. Just leather and chains, baby. Well, fake leather that is. Got to stay environmentally friendly, right Willy?”

  Everything was faux leather; the boots, the skirt, the blouse and fingerless gloves. However, the oddest feature was her choice of accessories. Silver plated chains, four to six inches in length, dangled from various points along her blouse, skirt and boots. Thank god there were no hooks and no meat.

  “Why chains?” he asked. The associations his mind made disturbed him.

  “Just a way of commemorating what I’ve experienced. I’ve been through so much. So damn much.”

  William continued to examine Kelly. She had always flaunted an edge and rawness lacking in her school peers, but it had always been balanced by the innocence of her youth. That had all been stripped away, leaving the human wreck that stood before him. She looked desperate and antsy as if the slightest disruption would cause her to bolt.

  A bombardment of emotion battered his heart. He had questions, a multitude of them. No matter how hard he tried he couldn’t put them to words. A wave of guilt rose up and he ended up sputtering and sobbing like a man nearly drowned.

  He ran forward and threw himself into her arms. Deep sobs rocked his body. He smelled meat. He looked at the chains again. Nothing rotting there.

  “Oh Kelly, I’m so sorry.”

  “Silly Willy, don’t beat yourself up over this. I’ve seen glories and wonders few are privileged to see, or more accurately, endure. I’m the better for it.”

  “How so?” He managed to force a couple words through his sobs.

  She pulled away from him. She rubbed his goatee and pleaded for understanding with her piercing jade eyes. “I admit, piercing through wasn’t close to what I expected or hoped it to be. I don’t know how to explain it. The thing is I now have this knowledge, this firsthand experience of something beyond this blasé existence we’re all forced to swallow like some mind numbing pill. I’ve seen and experienced things that would make this society of corporate slaves, zombie students and clueless soccer moms cringe.”

  His tide of guilt ebbed a little, leaving him in emotional limbo. She tried her best to project a confident and stable voice. There was, however, an undertone of abrasiveness that complimented her ruined condition. He didn’t know how to respond so he opted not to.

  She filled the void by recounting all that had transpired after piercing through. The retelling flowed past her lips with casual ease as if she were describing a day at the beach.

  “Wait a minute,” William said, interrupting the middle of her tale. “So that was you. When I saw the blood and lantern I thought I had gone mad. Why didn’t you wake me? You had the cops and I totally baffled.”

  Kelly’s face drew up into itself like a turtle’s head retreating into its shell. “Don’t know, really. I guess I didn’t want to involve you any more than you already were. It worked itself out. They took me straight to Legacy Good Samaritan. Doctors there were as good as gold.”

  “Still, I could of…”

  “I know, Willy. Forget about it for now. Let me finish telling you what happened.”

  He drew silent and lent her his ears. Listening to the strange account filled him with wonder. He was tempted to dismiss her story as he would superstitious tales from a tribal chief. Certain elements of her recounting reminded him of the bits his mind still fought to reconcile about the afternoon she had pierced through. To this day his mind struggled to accept the implausible existence of those horrible floating wraiths with their hooks and rotting smells. However, her words confirmed what he feared. They were real, and dangerous.

  Another fragment of her tale caught his attention; the robed monk who had saved her from the living tower of flesh. He thought of the Chinese herbalist and his Thai monk friend.

  “Did he give you a name, this man who saved you?”

  “Yes.” She turned her head to one side, as if that basic movement would jog her memory. “Something Asian, no more like native American. You know how Indians call themselves Running Bull or Crazy Wolf. It was something similar.”

  William laughed. “A monk with an Indian name. Really?”

  “Oh. It’s on the tip of my tongue. It had to do with a hand. Yeah, that’s it. Claw Hand.”

  He laughed harder. It felt good to lighten the mood. “Sounds more like a midnight creature feature at the Mission Theatre. Beware The Claw Hand.”

  She cut loose a fit of giggles. “Stupid.”

  William’s laughter came to a screeching halt. Claw Hand sounded very similar to Klahan. Could it be possible that Kelly’s hero was the same person he had witnessed undergoing the extraction ritual at Mister Chung’s shop?

  The implications were too deep to uproot at the moment. Instead, he steered the conversation onto another matter. “So how are the holes I drilled in your head? I’ve been worried about them.”

  “The least of my concerns now. They healed nicely. You can see two tiny indentations covered by skin. The doctor actually asked about it.”

  “He did? What did you tell him?”

  “Told him I was born that way.”

  William chuckled, but he was hardly amused. His thoughts strayed back to his inadequacies, chief among them the inability to protect Kelly. He felt as if they both were being pulled into something they couldn’t fully understand. Try as he might, he just couldn’t weave the loose threads into a fabric that made sense.

  There remained too many undercurrents to these events, undercurrents that threatened to sweep both of them away if he didn’t find a way to protect them. The means of protection lay on his inked skin.

  “Willy, what’s wrong?”

  He patted her head. “Nothing. I’m just glad you’re okay.”

  “Am I really okay? Look at me.” She moved towards him, exhibiting nervousness like a prey animal. Her movement stirred the air.

  “My god, what is that?” he asked. A hideous stench like spoiled meat in summer sun penetrated his nostrils. He gagged, placing a hand over his mouth.

  “Long story. I wanted to see you today for a lot of reasons, the smell being one of them. I almost didn’t come. I didn’t want to involve you further, but I’m running out of options. They’ll catch up to me any minute. They always do.”

  “The pierced wraiths?” He escorted her to the bamboo chair.

  “Pierced wraiths?” she repeated, scrunching down her left eyelid. “Yeah, whatever you want to call those freaks. They’re coming and I don’t know what to do.”

  “I’m just glad you’re here. You won’t believe it, but I was actually getting ready to pierce through myself.”

  “To find me?”

  “Who else?”

  She sighed. “How sweet, but it’s too late. I’m finished one way or the other.”

  William seated himself on the edge of his desk. “How so?”

  “Can’t you smell me?”

  “Well, I didn’t want...”

  “Hey, watch it.” She rubbed the cropped brown hair on her head. “I can feel myself decomposing from the inside out. It started once I escaped. Sort of their insurance policy, I guess. I can keep running, but in the end I’ll simply rot away or become a zombie. I don’t know.”

  William scratched the reptilian skin inked into his neck. “Holy mother Mary, that’s the damndest thing I’ve ever heard. You say these pierced wraiths are still pursuing you?”

  She nodded.

  “What can I do to help?”
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  She grabbed the fuzzy hair at her temples, and looked at him with deep fatigue in her eyes. “I don’t know. I’m so tired of running. And I don’t know how long my flesh will hold up anyway. You’ve smelled it. My zombification is in full progress.”

  “How much time do you think we have?” William rushed to the equipment tray

  and picked up an ink gun.

  “Your guess is as good as mine. Every time I think I’ve escaped, they show up again. It’s as if we’re connected. After all, it was the trepanning that released them from my mind. I’m just as much a part of them as they are a part of me. They always hone in on my whereabouts.”

  “Well I’ve got an idea.” He rummaged through his needle collection, taking note that several patches of his inked skin itched from a gently forming heat. “I’ve studied up on black magic tattoos. I think I can give you a defense against these jackasses. I’d like to give it a try.”

  “Ah, you’ve finally found a reason to ink my skin, have you? After all the years I objected, and now look. You’ve finally got your wish.”

  “I’m serious. This could work. Let’s hurry.”

  “Fine. I really don’t have many options, do I?” She transferred herself to the reclining patient’s chair.

  William had been saving the stolen vials from Mister Chung’s shop for the right occasion. He flicked on the lamp behind the chair and poured a few drops of blood into a black ink cap. He threaded a thin outlining needle through the four inch tube and hooked it to a prong on the machine. Scrunching up the sleeve of her leather blouse, he dipped the needle in the black ink and blood mixture. He pushed down on the foot pedal and the needle hummed to life. Tightly stretching the skin on her forearm, he began his masterpiece.

  Every once in a while he stopped to rub or scratch an aggravated patch of his own skin. His tattoos tingled, burned, itched, and more so by the second. He glanced around the fluorescent lit shop and wondered how much time they had.