Dark Incarnate - Chapter11 Book1

Dark Incarnate

By Mr. Black

Chapter 11

Kelly’s Fall From Grace

Billy was working on the pig pin about two miles away.  The old posts had rotted in the constant slop and mud.  He was supposed to mend the cross boards, but the wood was like butter.  He rolled his eyes as he pushed a ten penny nail through the wood in three different places.  He had seen the problem coming and luckily his unconscious mind had worked out a solution.  In the old barn were hundreds of pallets, he started dragging a few over to the pen.  He could stand them up and lash a rope at the joints to make a new fence without the old posts.  It was either that, or find the post-hole diggers.  He had mud up to his knees when he heard the dog barking viciously in the distance.  The sound made him shiver.  Wolves and coyotes...  He had been up there just the other day.  His brother rounded the barn and smiled at Billy’s progress.  Josh would never admit it but he was jealous of Billy’s ingenuity, and a little threatened.  Why hadn't he thought of the pallets before?  Soon the barking subsided and they both looked up at the mountain when the screeches and cries started.

"Dumb bird."  Josh leaned against one of the old posts nearly falling into the muck as it cracked under his weight, "How does a bird get caught by a coyote anyway?"

Billy didn't like it.  The switchboard was at least two miles away and it would have to be an awful big bird to sound like that.  "I'm goanna check it out."  He stood brushing the caked mud from his forearms and hands.

"You' crazy?  Them ol' pallets was a pretty good idea, but after that Dad says you gotta get after those malfloura bushes."  He looked back up as the sound died, then back a Billy with a smile. "See aint nuthin but a buzzard."  Billy knew it was something more.  He had spent most of his life out at the barn to avoid the house, and he had never heard anything like it.

Josh smiled, “Whatever it was, it’s dead now.”

Tom twisted the door open and carried her in.  The building had been shut, before today, for over twenty years.  The air was damp and heavy like a tomb smelling of mold and rotten wood.  Tom had only gone in once before Higgins brought his prize.  No light shone through the windows, they were thick encrusted with mold and moss.  He kicked the door closed like a mule shrouding the strange vestments of history from the light again.  An old coat rack, rudimentary cupboards and slots, an old pair of coveralls and hardhats with headlamps, all covered with age and corroded by the humidity.  To Kelly it looked more like a shipwreck at the bottom of the ocean than the civilized world.  Tom swiped at a window near the door with a free hand.  The few rays of light shone through like grace to a forgotten time.

It was the same vanishing act that gripped the whole town.  Thrift stores with too much thrift, empty churches, bars, and gas stations littered the outskirts of the abandoned town.  The only new construction since the 1970’s had been a Walmart and the housing development Candace lived in.  It appeared as if most of the population just got up and left one day.  This place was ground zero.  When the mines closed it happened suddenly, and by the time the union members realized they signed their own death warrant it was too late, and the locks were up.  New townies who arrived over the years felt the dirty underbelly of Spencer’s history but only the old ones really knew.  The coal still smeared the Town like it had covered the thousands of faces and lives it destroyed.  This building was a museum, an annual of forgotten history that none wanted to remember.

The old building was built like most old things, to last and endure.  Long rafters and huge support columns with thick log walls made this soundless tomb a world of its own.  Tom lugged her like a troublesome package and slipped a rope around her neck he’d hung from the rafters.  Kelly turned to attack him, but he yanked the rope tight against her jaw pulling up against her ears and her feet left the ground for a moment.  He strung her up choking onto her tippy toes and walked off into the black depths of the room.  Kelly clawed at the rope but to no avail.

"That fat buss driver gave me a bit of a problem though," He wanted her to stew in the complexity of his plan.  "Everybody's got a price.  He gave me a bit of a scare.  He was the driver on duty today, so I had to convince him.  His price just wasn’t in dollars."  Tom tied the rope off leaving her barely able to breathe dancing on her toes.  "Funny, you would think a man in his position would be happy to get a blank check, but all he wanted was you.”  The silence screamed in her ears.  “I hope you don't mind, and if you do, perhaps you should thought better of my deal, but you'll be going home with him." 

Truth was Tom didn't trust a man like George Caldwell.  BigRed69 was begging to be caught, and Tom had a man to tie up loose ends.  He would be easy to frame, and the case would be open and shut once Kelly was found dead in his basement.

"You see, you went to Higgins to spin your wild tale an’ he brought you down to the station this morning to take a report.  Then hearing how bogus your claims were, he told you it was all hearsay and you stormed out and caught the town bus home.  After that nobody would ever see you again.  It'll be no surprise after they learn about your Aunt's lies too."  He stood behind her, savoring the meal to come.

Kelly's thin stretched neck coughed gasping for air.  She felt him, felt the black malice boiling in his chest.  If only he knew, if only she could tell him what was really going on, if she could explain the evil inside him.  She could draw him one of her monsters or show him her apartment and he'd understand that he wasn't himself.  He willingly ventured into the darkest corners of human nature seeking his own demented pleasures, but something found him instead.  He wasn't himself, and he wouldn’t see the cliff until it was too late.

In a way Tom knew he was going too far.  With Candace his lifestyle was safe, because he stayed safe.  He kept It in a box locked deep inside, like a heroin user hides his stash so not even he can get to it too easily or too often.  Restraint and limits kept him safe, but he was drunk now.  The darkness consumed him.  He looked through half lidded and floating eyes lying to himself believing that he was sober and in control.  Like the drunk driver who had killed her parents.

"Aww Kelly, I thought spaghetti straps were against the school dress code."  He flicked a strap off her shoulder revealing a stiff cup of her padded bra.  She swung wide to smack him but lost balance and chocked against the rope until she regained the precarious footing.  He relished her resistance.  "Hrmmph, back to work" he walked back off into the dark again.  “Don’t worry, I’m almost done.”  He called back over his shoulder, but never stopped to think how he could see in the dark; his human eyes couldn't.  The thing from his box of guilty pleasures slowly emerged.

Kelly spun carefully in the rope trying to see, but beyond the soft glow of the window smear she couldn't see a thing.  The cavernous room was huge.  She could hear him well enough, a puddle, the crunch of broken glass, then he moved something large and began pulling... a desk maybe.  The legs dug into the organic floor as he pulled, cutting across rotten wood and moss.  She felt his every move sensed the unnatural disturbance.  He worked forward with the same blind progress that she'd seen in Higgins, a robotic calm, slow and methodical.  Why wouldn't he think and understand what was really going on!  Tom thought he knew, but he also thought he had control over it.  He was after all Tom Chambers: Master of his Domain.

She watched him drag the ancient desk into view just short of her. His eyes glazed over and she knew why.  The tiny box enveloped his being with the same commanding voice Kelly had heard in her dream that night.  Tom was losing himself in the dark.  She had felt him before, felt his darkness.  It was a part of him, something he dabbled in, but now it filled his soul like a sock puppet.  He steadied himself against the desk as the last bits of Tom Chambers evaporated.  Kelly understood now.  She knew what it was, what it wanted.  It was the darkest pits of human potential and malevolence.  It moved through the world and the hearts of men fluid like shadow, but it wanted more.  She had denied it thus far; left it with no choice but to posses and manifest itself in a puppet like Tom.  She understood the creatures too, why they did what they did.  It wanted life.

She thought she was in danger before, but now the room was changing.  It looked the same bleak nothingness, but she was on It's turf now.  The picture she drew for Candace had locked It's realm out, but it was becoming real around her, unchained.  Kelly had power, rather it lacked power to affect her reality directly, but the world she knew was slipping away giving way to the void.  She was that luminosity Darkness needed to survive, to contrast; it would feed off of her suffering and grow strong.  She gave it power through fear and suffering, enough power to come into this world once she was overcome.  

Kelly's mind reeled as she broke her nails against the impossible knot of the rope.  She had to fight; the alternative was a fate worse than death.  Tom's eyes blinked; black pits of loathing locked onto her helpless figure studying her futile struggles like a curious insect.  She lifted her shoes off the floor and double kicked the creature sending him to the ground.  Her shoes grappled at the desktop and slid against the slick surface unable to get any traction until she kicked off to swung back and try again for a better hold.  Her face was deep purple as she caught the second time.  Carefully standing on the desktop she coughed her first strong breath into her chest.  Tom's body rose by puppet strings.  The slip knot could loosen with the slack and she almost had it off when a hand wrapped around her leg just above the knee.  It was impossible, fingers weren't that long, they wrapped around her whole thigh.  Her heart stopped and she looked down slowly and unbelieving.

Black shadow fingers in the dark looped around her leg and pulled her closer with impossible strength until the rope strained her neck again.  Like a child working a square peg into a round hole, It learned the stumbling human puppet and released her.  She dangled like a hangman clamoring for the desk while it reached out with an over long shadow arm and took the rope.  Kelly caught the desk and took another breath before the rope went tight stringing her up again.  She dangled freely in the air kicking wildly hoping to land another blow.  The rope pulled higher until her head bumped the rafters.  The tension in the rope spun her around to see the smudged window.  The old Tom had done that, and she was thankful.  Her eyes stayed on the sunlight as she feared the world would fade away entirely as her vision narrowed.  He cut the rope and she fell back onto the desk like a sack of potatoes coughing air into her lungs.

She looked over at it.  The creature was black food coloring, a squid’s ink, dripped into the air.  It didn't move; it swam.  The rope wrenched her head over the side of the desk and left her peering into the nothingness.  She couldn't see the window anymore, only the dark depths of the room.  Her hands clutched at the rope when Darkness washed over her, hugging her body intimately preventing any escape.  The first person she had ever been close to was Candace.  When they shared a bed their bodies and spirit intertwined to become one of comfort and compassion.  This things inky presence pressed against her body like the embodiment of dread.  It stole all the happiness and joy from her heart.  She had never felt such panic.  She didn’t cry, couldn’t, she could only breathe, gasping as it ripped at her clothes and tore at her soul begging to be let in. 

Mrs. Francis had been there that night at the exhibit.  It was really more her big night than Kelly’s.  Kelly was proud of her work sure, but she felt embarrassed to have so many people vying for her attention and gushing at her works.  Mrs. Francis tugged her around the room introducing her to countless old associates and journalists, but she just wanted to be left alone.  If they wanted to play dress-up and gawk at her works then fine, but she didn’t need to be there.  It was a dreadful night.  Storms had been rolling through all week and that night was no different.  Thunder rolled and shook the building while the rain fell in blinding sheets.   Kelly was on edge and gave a frightened yelp when somebody popped a Champaign cork.  Mrs. Francis had laughed and clapped her on the back, and that’s when she saw the officers stepping in out of the rain.  She recognized them as her father’s new friends.  They had been over several times first to help unpack, then a couple grill-outs and a Super Bowl later they were best buds.  Their faces were grave, and tears immediately began welling in her eyes.  She knew, just knew. 

The desktop was soft, either from rot or moldy growth, and cold too.  Her bare spine pressed against it as the creature lifted her milky smooth legs into the air.  The position allowed her to breathe easier and even scream if she wanted, but she knew what was coming next.  Her arms waved and slashed at it but never landed.  Tom wasn’t there.  Her hands dipped into empty cold currents.  She had dipped into It’s realm.  A child playing in the sun warmed water of the shallows would experience a similar shock when their toes touch a cold channel of deep water.  That was a different world, one that kids didn’t like to think about, one of big fishes and unnamable fears lurking in the dark. 

The thin cotton on her powder blue panties were swished aside as if by that cold water and she felt her nether lips wrap around the tip of Tom’s manhood.  It was his, the same that had brushed against her bottom on the night of the sleepover.  It paused, threatening the barrier of her virginity with slow and deliberate force.  Unable to see anything but the black pitch of the room, the depths of the other side, she told herself it wasn’t real.  It couldn’t be.  She was paralyzed in a nightmare of fear and despair, unable to move in an odd grip of sleep paralysis.   It toyed with her barrier, pushing, stretching, smearing; it was also the barrier of her mind; her will.  

She had one glimmer of hope, like the blurry swipe at the window that allowed the sun through.  Candace’s theory said that it couldn’t hurt her.  She desperately wanted to see the sun again.  She begged to see golden dust particles falling in the warm glow of a lazy afternoon one more time.  But that was a different world, a lifetime away.  

It knew her thoughts; how she lied to herself.  Her useless delusions allowed it to appreciate her pain, her fear.  The spirit was a dealer of death.  It had been in the eyes of the Aztec High Priest’s who daily ripped out the beating hearts of children so the sun would rise.  The sun would rise no matter, but it desired blood the lie was just a means to an end.  So long it had waited; dancing in the shadows of men’s hearts, now It’s time had come.  It would shatter her mind like glass explodes in a fire.

The flesh of Tom Chambers tightened his grip around her ankles and stretched her legs wide pulling her closer as she tried to shrink back.  Inky currents slithered from Tom’s possessed spirit over her body like snakes clamping her hands down and circling her tiny breasts with potent icy diligence.  Another slick murky phallus touched the tiny clenched star of her butt where it joined in trying advances. 

Since the time mankind was gifted with self consciousness and made gods of the flesh, It was the prince of the air.  She existed in the three dimensional world believing that the nature of reality revolved around visible light.  With mild annoyance It would cure her naivety.  Tom felt a similar inclination but the concept was impossible for his flesh to understand or replicate and was called pride and arrogance.  Her body was ripe and harvest had come.  Resistance was futile.  The awful awareness and mind link disturbed her psyche and overwhelmed her body.  Kelly finally screamed.  Her whole body screamed, in fear of what would happen, in anger that she didn’t deserve this, and in despair because she knew she had already lost.  Her cry betrayed as the forceful scream allowed the solid shadows to scoop inside.  In an exalted thunderous cry It sent her mind flying into abyssal oblivion. 

Her scream was cut short and her eyes went wide.  The mental manifestation of Kelly’s self image scrambled on slick black volcanic rock that was the sky, the universe, a vast infinite expanse where the thin veil of her consciousness ended where she rocketed toward the crushing synthesis of darkness.  She was flying with incredible speed out there somewhere, yet into nothing.  Her imaginary hands and feet clamored at the impossible onyx tying to hold, trying to stop, to slow down, to understand.  Her body was left gasping for more than just air; she gasped in harsh truth of fear.  Her futile grasps at hollow faith left her with nothing, there was no escape, no refuge, no hope, only It’s dark purpose and plan. 

In the revelation of its true evil she didn’t know why it paused pulled back from her defiled body, carefully smearing the oily slick.  It would just assume slit her throat and drain the battery of her innocence in a flash of exaltation, watching the innocent blood bathe her naked breasts, than to give her this moment of respite.  But It needed her for more than that.  Tom pulled back, but the mysterious inky probe squishing through her tight sphincter continued forcing its numb decent into her bowels.  The only part of Tom she knew still existed rubbed the flared head and rubbery foreskin against her clit.  She instantly thought of what Candace had done to her in the shower, but she was far too horrified to feel anything now. 

She sensed a wall, an end to the infinite space and time, and it was trying to smash her into that wall shattering her perception and feeble hold on reality.  Kelly Evans would no longer exist.  It planned to enlighten her consciousness, to change the nature of where she existed to something similar to a radio wave, but she wouldn’t have control of the band.  Her body would exist, that’s what the van was for, but she would be forever lost in static.

It finally spoke with It’s unintelligible cracking thunder that hurt her ears and brought her back for a moment.  She understood it.  ‘Surrender’.  Her head lulled back over the side flying at the speed of light toward her abolition with no point of reference.  Did she still have a card to play?  Eight, ten, twelve inches snaked into her clean colon.  Her father had gifted her with a clear sense of right and wrong, good and evil.  No deal or surrender to this pure unadulterated evil could be in her interest.  It wouldn’t just be a failure to uphold her own sensibilities, but she would be betraying the cosmic forces of humanity to do anything it wanted.  Her mind snapped back like a rubber band.  Tom’s member took its place back inside her broken body gently pushing further each time she took a shallow breath.  She was thrust back into the abyss at unimaginable speed.  It used her own breathing against her; slowly she accepted it deeper and deeper until its blind eye kissed her uterus, waiting. 

Kelly was frozen, paralyzed, petrified with fear and apprehension, but her mind was clear.  Resist.  Her hands slapped the cold onyx of space gaining a hold with her resolve.  She seemed to have a power it couldn’t match, the ability to resist and fight.  Kelly cleared and felt the rubberband snap her instantly back, safe from oblivion.  The adrenaline and shock helped with the pain, but It couldn’t allow that.  Her body’s fight or flight response pulled blood to her center, protect the vital organs and give the major muscle groups the fuel to fight.  But It had something else in mind.  The calm before the storm, it drew her like the buoyancy of air bubbles in water, aiding her circulatory system.  Blood warmed her extremities again giving her body the sensitivity and knowing equal to that which it seeded into her mind.

In a flash of anger It undulated the inky tentacle and flexed the impaling rod.  Could this be it, the end?  Her face pinched begging for it to be over, wishing it away.  The indomitable human spirit couldn’t be taken, only surrendered.  Hypersensitive, she felt a gurgling thick flow reluctantly emanating from the members.  It wanted her to know, wanted to savor her nightmare.  Her mind’s eye was filled with images of her parents rotting in their graves.  She blinked and closed her eyes but couldn’t escape the darkness.  Their flesh churned with maggots.  The first lumpy clog spurted into her most scared and protected place.  The strong and virulent larva had grown fat off fetid flesh and squirmed within her searching for more. 

Kelly kicked and screamed losing any sibilance of self control ferociously squirming in It’s grip and against the phalluses.  The flow was continuous and unending.  The tentacle buried in her bowels was better suited for the task and flooded her empty system.  Tom’s penis, however; would clog until the building pressure spat them into her.  Kelly’s small sex was wrapped around his impaling manhood like a stretched rubber band.  Filled and overflowing, maggots tumbled onto the mossy desktop and spread in a hundred different directions over her milky skin continuing their slimy blind search. 

She struggled and shook violently like a rabbit caught in a snare, but there was no escape.  Tom’s flesh had pulled back to allow her vaginal cavity to hold more of the boiling mass.  Besieged with the sensation her muscles finally went ridged, seized.  The creatures weren’t violent or even painful intruders, rather constant and soft.  The hot breath of the room and soft warmed table cradled her existence and left her with nothing but the sensation.  Her body began to relax accepting the flow easier, only shaken by the occasional twitch.  This singular wanton depravity overwhelmed her five senses and worked It’s magic against her mind.  Their perverse writhing explored over her body and bloated her insides, wrecking her consciousness.  The inhuman hands relaxed from her ankles and her legs slowly fell through the peculiar gravity of the inky darkness coming to rest on Tom’s hips.  She didn’t have anymore fight left and barely noticed how her legs clung to him.  She stared into the dark, overloaded, trying to make sense of it; trying to remember the world she came from, trying to hold on.  Seconds, minutes, hours, days, she had no idea how long it let her marinate.  Did time even exist in this place?  Her wrists were also released and the rope loosened and slid over her head, but Kelly just stared blankly into the void.

Billy had just finished up with the pig pen when he heard the thunder.  A few light clouds dotted the sky and he leaned against his new makeshift fence daring it to fall.  It didn’t look like rain, but maybe it was the far side of the ridge.  Surely Mason Sr. didn’t expect him to clear briars in the rain.  Josh would.  He scowled at the clear sky.  Maybe it was one of the old mine shafts collapsing. 

His brother wasn’t around and he headed to the barn for the clippers.  What he really needed was a few gallons of Kerosene.  He looked up at the old silo and a chill ran up his spine.  He couldn’t stop thinking about that sound.  It hadn’t sounded like any kind of bird to him, but he couldn’t be sure if his mind was playing tricks on him.  Of course foxes made a funny sound and screech owls didn’t screech at all.  It had just sounded so… human.  But who in their right mind would be up there?  “Wolves and coyotes, that’s who!” he muttered.  None of it sat well with him.  He had been up there just yesterday.  On his way home from Kelly’s…

He wanted to go check it out.  That had been his gut reaction when he’d first heard the sound, and still was.  If his brother caught him ‘goofing off’ he’d kill him for sure, or give him a matching black eye.  Without thinking his hand went to his puffy and swollen face.  What’s the worst he could do to him?  Surely his dad wouldn’t kick him out; he was still in High School for cryin’ out loud! 

What if Kelly had followed his footsteps?  She should have been in school, and if she wasn’t, she wouldn’t know he was home.  Not to mention, she didn’t know his address, and wouldn’t have anymore than his leaving through her back yard for a clue.  He stood staring up at the mountain keeping an eye out for his brother.  Billy wasn’t actually slow but when he thought, when he really got to thinking, you could almost see the wheels turning in his head.  Another thing bothered him.  Why hadn’t his father yelled at him for being gone?  Josh was mad sure; he might actually have to do some work if Billy was gone.  Was his silence a form of acceptance?  A way of admitting Billy had finally grown up enough to be his own keeper.  Just being around Kelly had changed him.  He glanced over his shoulder once more, just to be sure, and decided to go check it out. 

He rinsed the mud and pig slop off at the hand pump and swapped boots and started out.  Wolves and coyotes… He turned back, one more thing.  His grandfather had kept a pump shotgun at the barn.  Back when they raised cattle, mountain lions had been the biggest fear.  Billy thought if he ever saw a mountain lion he’d just lie down and die, but he’d moved the shotgun before his brother could pawn it.  The gun showed a little dry rust, and checking the shells he found more rust and corrosion flaking the edges of the brass.  As long as the primers and powder weren’t damp it’d work.  He wasn’t much for social pleasantries but he was invaluable around the farm.  He slid the stock under his armpit and his wrist hooked under the grip expertly.  Sneaking around unnoticed was also his specialty. 

It was time.  The tentacle pulled back just plugging her butt gently and massaging the flesh that separated it from Tom’s cock which started to pump in earnest.  She was rocked awake and back to whatever dimension this was.  Shuddering gasps shook her as his tool sunk deeper plunging at the mass of larva.  She had no thoughts, only deep seated biological memory.  She was a woman.  She was made to survive this, endure this, but her mind felt like a veil of fog.  As if on cue the oily tentacle changed, morphed into a veined and throbbing penis.  It was so clear; she felt the heavy ribbed veins of the bee’s strange sexual organ.  It knew her.  She had felt guilty and dirty for doing what she did.  It was he same for Billy.  She had done it because she had to, to get him to cooperate.  The flat head of it rammed into her mashing maggots deeper.  His cock was pistoning hard against her uterus while the new morphed phallus cranked up too.  Her body clenched and pushed, but it was something else.  The tingles of Candace’s touch in the shower, how it had exploded from the tiny place, but this was deeper harsher… wholesome.  Candace’s distant memory felt like a drop of rain to the ocean.  Her whole body tensed as he shoved harder and harder.  The wave passed as her breathing increased trying to compensate.  It hurt, plunging deep into her body, but it was a dull and distance pain easily accepted, it knew what she could handle.  Her body tried to push back against the members get them out, to rest, but it only made it that much worse, and that much more intense. 

Its thunderous voice shook the room, “Submit.”

What was it doing to her?  Her sphincter rippled over the rough veins.  Was it going to put one of those things in her?  The questions distracted from another wave and she just felt the swishing and tumbling of the mashed and rolling worms against her inner walls.  It was evil.  Her head dangled and bounced waving her long brown hair as It picked up speed.  The rope was gone, her neck was sore and she could barely lift it.  But she could, if she found the strength.  Tom yanked her knees back pinning her to the table at her chest and opening her wide.  Another wave struck her, and her pale skin broke out in oily perspiration and red flushes.  He ravaged her with newfound vigor until she crunched her head up electrified by stronger waves that she couldn’t understand.  Her small breasts throbbed as they bounced freely.  When had he released them?  She cupped them in her hands and squeezed gently.  They ached, throbbed, full of blood.  Her areolas, her nipples—

A cresting wave hit so sudden her hands seized. 

“Yeeessssss.”

Tom smashed against her and held.  His wiry pubic hair mixed with the worms rubbing them into her swollen labia and clit.  Her legs were released and flopped lifelessly.  His hands were around her tiny waist lifting and smearing her body against his pelvic bone.  Corrupted black seeds of evil pored directly into her womb.  Convulsions wrecked her until she finally relaxed against him.  She wanted to pass out, begged for it just to be over.  Half lidded she drifted closer to what felt like sleep.  He dropped her and she slid off him back onto the desktop without a struggle.  Arms, legs, and head lay limp over the side as she wandered into the darkness.  Totally relaxed, maggots and black seed flooded out of her.  The strange feeling inside was the only reminder of where she was, that her body existed.  Her broken orifices clenched and spasmed around the lumpy mess in the aftermath. 

She heard Tom’s voice.  “I love it when they wink at me.”  His finger poked her retching anus.  It clenched on his fingertip mashing against squirming larva.  Was he coming back, was he released?  He wriggled his finger and her body pushed again, expelling a slimy wad over his hand.  “To think, we’ve just begun.”  He rolled her limp body over onto her chest as more slimy writhing maggots spilled down her thighs.  He had taken the fight out of her and she was his now.  

Sudden light flooded the room as the door opened.  The mountain sounded like it was collapsing, painfully reverberating inside her skull.  Billy shuddered back forcing his mind to believe what it saw.  He had opened many dark rooms but never had the darkness fought back!  As It retreated Tom’s naked hairy body stumbled back too, hand blocking the light from his weak eyes.  Billy didn’t think, he saw the naked body slumped over the desk and bare legs that met pink tennis shoes.  He could recognize Kelly’s shoes anywhere.  He couldn’t be blamed anymore than water can be blamed for freezing and breaking a rock.  He shouldered the shotgun and pulled the trigger. 

A dry click echoed in his ears, but he pumped the shell out without a thought and the second fired.  The meat on Tom’s right tricep evaporated leaving exposed white bone riddled with pellets of grey buckshot.  Tiny pin holes of sunlight filtered into the room.  One painted Kelly’s face and she rolled over on the far side of the desk, away from the harsh sound and away from the sunlight.  Tom spun and cradled the wounded arm as darkness enveloped him.  Billy’s eyes flared, his nose snarled as the clicked off a second dry round (chugck-chick).  Billy would never say what he actually saw, but the dark figure seemed to flex and bulge pushing the sunlight back like a billowing wool blanket.  A third dry click, (chugck-chick).  Tom’s lips curled as the fifth and last shell exploded.  The right side of his skull disappeared plastering the wall with white gooey fragments and flesh as he sank.  The light rushed back into the room.

Kelly curled.  The light was blinding and she couldn’t handle it yet.  She wanted more than anything to see the sun again, but it was too painful.  It hurt her eyes and her fear of being seen.  She knew it was him, a sheltered part of her knew he would come, but she couldn’t look at him.  Not yet.  She wasn’t ready to come back to that world.  Couldn’t. 

The ‘not to tight, not too loose’ elastic of her blue panties closed over her privates as she strained her knees together.  A part of her knew the nightmare was over, but a minute past midnight was still long time from sunrise.  Not like this.  He couldn’t see her.  Her hand’s cupped her stomach, the real nightmare was about to begin.  The mind meld with the creature gave her insight to things It didn’t want her to know.  It had completed only half of the ritual.  It had her DNA, a dark double helix cloned the parts it needed and corrupted her body’s fertile eggs with its purpose.  Now It needed a man’s flesh. 

With whimpering cries of apology, assurance, and sorries Billy rushed over and cupped her head and gently folded her limp arms over her naked chest.  “It’s OK, I’m gonna get you someplace safe.”

She welcomed the loving arms through her embarrassment.  "Higgins…”

“The school resource officer?”  He felt something on her, it was impossible to tell in the dark, but he brushed the rubbery bits off.  Billy never thought he’d ever caress her naked body or touch her pert breasts and stiff nipples but this was something else.  Love and fear twisted together and surged through him with adrenaline.  He would have rather fought a hundred wolves on the darkest night of the year with his bare hands than do this now. 

“Tell him…” Her weak eyes lulled and blinked unable to focus.

“It’s ok, you can tell him later.  Let’s get you outta here.”  Kelly didn’t weigh much, and he lifted her gently holding her head against his collarbone and headed for the door.

Her arms hugged his neck.  “The key,” he picked up the pace jogging into the sunlight.  “Post office box, they have cameras, they’ll see him.”  Each footstep hurt and jostled her insides and cargo and she shied away from the bright sunlight.  “Tell him… make him clean this up.”  She had to stop this from getting out.  If the town knew that Tom had taken her, the rumors.  Th-The maggots...  “MAKE HIM DO IT!”  She screamed echoing off the rock face.  It was the same scream that brought him up here. His mind reeled, what had happened to her?

His hand comforted her weak neck.  “Rest easy Kelly, you’re ok now.”

Her limp body bounced in his arms, Billy wasn’t terribly bright but he had a good heart.  He didn’t know what else to do but try to listen and understand what she was saying.  She didn’t say hospital or police, she was trying for something else.  He had to get her safe for starters, and his barn loft was the only place that came to mind.  He had always felt safe there. 

She squeezed him holding on tighter and tighter.  Her insides were emptying into her tight panties.  The writhing mass still massaged her with unending stimulation inside and out.  Billy didn’t notice his eyes were focused on each careful step over the tracks and slick pine needles that carpeted the forest floor. 

Her breath was heavy in his hear, “They-they’re...T-too-ho… much” her moans chilled Billy’s soul.  How could this have happened to her? 

He shushed her quiet.  His heart hammered in his chest.  Her house was miles away and he’d never be able to carry her all that way.  His house was much closer, she could rest soon enough, and he could find her some clothes.  Two miles as fast as he could run was still twenty minutes and now he was carrying Kelly, but he couldn’t think of anything else to do.  He didn’t understand what she meant about this Higgins guy, or what to do about the fact that he had just shot someone.  His one track mind knew only to get her someplace safe, and fast.

Her body gripped him tighter.  “Noo-“her voice was soft and wispy when she began to tremble.  Released from the thing, shock returned, “Don’t look…”  The cramps were stronger, but she was so weak.  Her favorite pair of panties bulged with expelled and searching maggots.  Their blind writhing boiled in the thin fabric until the elastic stretched to let some drop to the forest floor.  Her crying sobs seemed natural enough to Billy; given the circumstances.

One arm still around his neck, her other cupped her stomach as another cramp doubled her over.  She was delirious; a part of her mind was still fighting to come back to her world.  “They, they couldn’t…be,” Her hand slid under the band of her panties and into the squirming mass.  “My parents were… buried, sealed.”  She bounced rhythmically as he jogged making her voice impossible for Billy to understand.  “Embalmed.”

“It’s ok, you’re safe, don’t worry everything’s going to be ok.”  He struggled not to sound so out of breath.  He was almost to the loft and thought about the van.  He didn’t have a license of course, and the thought hadn’t even crossed his mind, but he should have taken the van.  Maybe they could go back.  What was he thinking?  He couldn’t ask her to go back, not yet anyway. 

”It couldn’t have got to them…”  Kelly forced her hand between her legs, trying to push the worms off of her sensitive places.  They weren’t as lively as before.  She pushed her panties aside and let a squishy mass fall.  Her fingers brushed and dug at her newly loosened and sore pussy trying to get them all.  They were everywhere, an impossible part of her that she couldn’t be rid of.  She grew more and more frantic, regaining her mind and realizing what they really were. 

Billy paused looking at the backside of the barn.  The last thing he needed was to run into his brother.  He finally looked down at Kelly who wiped at her crotch like there was a bee in her bonnet.  He saw them, and almost dropped her in disgust.  Yellowy white maggots clamored up her legs and over his arm that hooked under her legs.  His eyes went wide and he was utterly dumbstruck.  He did drop her legs to the ground and gently started to let the rest of her down. 

She cried in whimpering sobs, “Noo..ooo…hooo, don’t look.”  Her feet were crossed and her knees rubbed together while she writhed like one of the worms.  He couldn’t help but look at her panties; he had folded that exact pair into her drawer the day before.  What had happened to her, where had the maggots come from?  They dotted the fabric like terminates or ants and hundreds squirmed underneath.  What had she been through? 

He forced himself to focus on her words and look away.  He lay down along with her and nuzzled his head beside hers trying to reassure her.  The two of them were still inside the treeline.  Trying to ignore her nakedness he looked around.  Fat pines oozed fresh sap in the heat and the ground was springy with dead needles, but he needed to get her into the loft.  He couldn’t leave her in the open.  He got her attention and looked into her big brown eyes, red and tear streaked, “Just a little further ok?  You’ll have to help me with the ladder but I can get you some clothes and then we’ll get you back home.”  Her nose poured snot and mixed with the fresh tears.  She was back.  With a sniffle she gave a quick nod and Billy picked her up and started for the barn. 

The barn was built half on a hillside and the loft was on the higher and sheltered side.  Her weak arms struggled with the short and failing ladder and Billy pushed from below.  He got an eye full of her backside; the maggots were coming from inside her, spilling out from under the thin cotton.  It had to be the project.  This was it; he wouldn’t allow them to do it anymore.  Who was the other man and how was he involved.  He felt a bullet of jealousy.  What was she keeping from him?  He reminded himself, he had to trust her.  He couldn’t fall apart now when she needed him most. 

He had played along up until now but something really bad had happened to her.  It was different now, more serious, this was Kelly.  His heart hurt thinking of the treachery, there was suppose to be something out there, some great wheel in the sky watching over the innocent.  This couldn’t be happening, maybe to someone else, but not Kelly.  The evidence was right in front of him, squirming under her clothes.  It did happen.  That man deserved to die, whoever he was, but Billy wanted more.  Maybe he killed him too quickly.  Kelly suffered while his troubles were over.  It wasn’t fair.  Not to Kelly, she had been through so much.

This Is a Work of Fiction

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Dark Incarnate - Chapter10 Book1

Dark Incarnate 

By Mr. Black

Chapter 10
The Jig Is Up

Home... there should be a different word for Billy's house.  His father was usually drunk and his mother had split years ago leaving him and his older brother to fend for themselves like a couple of raggedy bear cubs, and Billy was the runt of the litter.  The small farm only had a few animals left but no lack of chores.  Billy’s dad, Butch Mason, loved to assign these from this throne in front of the small TV without so much as turning his head.  His brother Josh was the real problem though. 

What would Josh have to say about Billy’s absence over the past few days?  At least he had chosen the right direction, on the right track, so to speak.  Josh was seven years older, but that's all he was.  School hadn’t been much more than a training camp for Josh on how to avoid work.  So now, even though Billy was still in school, Josh managed to divert most of those chores at him.  Both boys knew they were really alone in the world and Josh tried to play the father figure to Billy.  He would always say, “builds character” or “it’ll put hair on you’re chest and make you shed water like a duck” whenever Billy got the short end of the stick.  It might have even worked; Billy was in desperate need of a role model.  But Josh didn’t even have a job beyond bossing his younger brother around, and was an example of what not to do. 

Billy passed the old train station; the place gave him the creeps.  The yard had been cut right out of the mountain side.  The old boarded up mine shafts were cut deep into the far rock face and several coal piles larger than his house waited for trains that would never come.  It was the place of his nightmares.  Part of it was an irrational fear of the unknown but given the option, Billy would rather leave those depths to the unknown.  His Dad used to send him up here to collect the coal for the woodstove.  Billy wasn’t more than six or seven at the time.  Josh squirmed out of the duty as usual.  One night Billy set out a little too late at dusk.  He got scared as most young boys would have and lost his coal running the whole way back.  He had heard a sound he didn’t recognize and his imagination created shadows that didn’t exist.  The darkness scared the hell out of him.  He took a few beatings over the years but refused to go back.  In reality it had only been a fox.  His first night at Kelly’s was also the first time he’d slept without a nightlight, and even then a streetlamp glowed through the curtains. 

If he was seen coming from the old tracks it would really get in interrogated so he cut through the thick pines and came to the blacktop.  The Mason Farm mailbox barely stood vertical marking the drive.  With his head hung low, Billy plodded up the pitted and washed out driveway like a dead man walking.

In this part of the state a good gravel driveway was a luxury.  His grandfather almost had their drive paved back when times were good, almost.  The Appalachian Mountains sent a deluge of water runoff every spring that devastated anything that wasn’t pavement.  Not that pavement was immune to the rock and mud slides, but without it the Mason drive was nothing but deep cutouts and slick red mud.  It had been years since the drive had seen any new gravel and rode more like an obstacle course than anything a normal vehicle could traverse.  As far as Mason Sr. was concerned it helped ward off the dreaded Tax Man.

Billy came to the old barn first, the ailing two story shack and fences barely stood.  He shivered at the sight.  Being away for a few days was nice and being with Kelly was heavenly, but the harsh reality began to set in again.  Leaning against an old twisted fence post he propped a foot on the rusty barbed wire daydreaming about how things used to be. 

When he was young the land was beautiful, fertile, and full of hope and possibility.  His family reached way back to the Revolution.  His forefathers bought the land back when land ownership was the measure of the man.  The rough terrain was bought cheap too.  He had heard stories, more from his grandfather than his father, about how the Mason tobacco helped win the war.  He'd even seen an old brown picture of a lake on the property.  The natural spring still ran through the gully, but the glory days were long gone.

He shifted uneasily looking up at heavy clouds and the approaching night.  The grey wood of the barn haunted the land like an evil old hunch-backed witch.  The farm was nothing but a mud-hole of twisted brush now.  The old irrigation channels and runoff steams were clogged and would need nothing short of a team running a back-hoe and chainsaws to clear.

Billy knew it was painful, like using a drug but the memories were too strong.  His grandfather had been teaching him to ride a horse in the field just to his left.  It was hard to believe.  The tall hay and blue grass would ripple in the wind like the ocean.  It was all beaten down or choked out by the briars and tuffs of malflora rose now.  It was really called multiflora, but Papaw Mason always malflora.  The stuff was thick, strong, and grew with amazing speed in huge arches taller than he stood, and the roots spread like wildfire underground.  The only way you could really kill it was to burn it out.  The roots would either send up new shoots or the stumps would sprout new growth the next year if you didn’t spray poison after clearing them.  Poison would only work after cutting; if you just sprayed the thick woody vines would laugh it off only browning a little.

Billy had learned one of the guiding principals of his life just a stones throw away, but it was a lifetime away.  Maybe it was being with Kelly, but reminiscing felt sweeter than usual.  He and his Grandfather had been riding horses, and somehow he had fallen off and got the wind knocked out of him.  Before he could take a breath his Grandfather grabbed him up directing him back onto the horse.  Billy wasn't sure what to make of it, maybe if he didn't get back on the horse would run off or worse it could step on him!  He hadn't taken time to feel pain or even wipe the trickle of blood from his split nose, he just got back on.  He looked over curious at his Grandfather, who just stood smiling up at him.  "I'm proud of you Billy, sometimes we fall and you just gotta pick yourself up and ride on.  You did great." He had slid his cowboy boot in his stirrup and leapt up onto the horse just as natural as breathing and reached to pat Billy on the back, "Remember that, and you'll make a fine man one day."

Papaw Mason was probably one of the only people on earth who had ever believed in Billy, and when died of colon cancer less than a year later, it ripped his heart out.  Billy didn't understand much about cancer, but imagined it was like malfloura rose.

Sometimes, you just gotta pick yourself up and ride on.  His eyes welled and he started to tear up.

He heard yelling in the house around the bend.  His brother would be furious; Billy knew he'd better not waste any more daylight, and snuck around the bend to the house.  He slipped in the back door and grabbed his rubber boots and headed out to the barn to try and make amends.  As he slid out the door he heard them again arguing in the kitchen about him.  Maybe they thought he was gone for good?

Around back of the barn stood an old grain silo, the roof had long since fallen in.  The eerie block structure stood empty and almost three stories tall and leaned like the tower of Pisa.  It was another artifact of the old days standing in defiance of the times.  The muddy floor was a good ten feet below the ground.  How many animals could that thing have fed?  He couldn't help but look inside every time he passed.  When he was young he used to throw stones and rocks in just to hear the plop in the muck floor and giggle at the messy eco that raced up and out of the top.

He climbed up a rickety ladder that would probably be his death one day into the hay loft which was yet another death trap.  The tin roof of the barn had weathered too many storms without proper care and leaked like sieve.  The floor of the loft caught most of the leaks and had more rotten spots than solid ones.  Long years of practice and careful footing kept him safe as he dropped hay down chutes to the animals below.  He loved to come up here.  It was his secret place.

Papaw Mason had raised cattle for slaughter when the barn was built, but piece by piece the land was sold off to the railroad in the coal years and now they barely had land for a few pigs, a couple of milk cows, and one stubborn mule.  Chickens had once roamed freely but when the coal mines shut down, and the railroad went silent, either wolves or coyotes had moved down out of the mountains.  His father told him they lived where the old train switchboard used to be.  Billy didn't like thinking about wolves and coyotes.  They couldn’t get into his loft though.

He looked down though a chute at the poor mule, his stall was a mess; he didn't know how many years it’d been since the beast had seen a Ferrier.  Billy went for the pooper-scooper, a kid name for the pitchfork that just stuck, and wheelbarrow to clean the stall.  They didn't have much for proper stall care, the last load of sawdust ended when the driver got stuck in the driveway, but pine needles worked well enough.

Kelly turned so she could keep an eye on the drain.  Every move she made caused a small flush of cool water to release.  The warm shower was a relaxing contrast.  It didn't take long for the fear and adrenaline to wear off and she couldn't stop the waves shaking and crying.  Her soft sobs and scrunched face couldn't begin to express the true nature of how she felt.  She knew she was in shock, and maybe knowing would be enough to get her through it.

Her mind refused to believe the nightmare of what had happened.  She forced herself calm with deep breaths, which also helped water drain out of her system.  It wouldn't let her forget, it wouldn't let her calm down.  As soon as she stopped sobbing another painful reminder of the violation would trickle out and she would clench up again.  Nothing was safe or sacred to this darkness, this pure evil.  She could have died!  How could they have ever dreamed to control such a thing?  Her body was rocked by harsher and harsher convulsions as she lost the battle to calm herself and she nearly doubled over, followed by more cold water.  Why was it so cold?  Wouldn't her body have warmed it by now?  What had that thing done to her?  She searched her feelings, but where she had understood it before, she felt nothing.  Her mind went to the small pink worm and then to Candace; how could they have been so stupid?  Kelly's stomach was still bloated and she pressed just below her ribs.  "Anything," she sobbed "I'll do anything just get it out!"  Her tiny sphincter relaxed allowing the cold essence to flood the basin of the tub yet again.  It made sense to her subconscious but not to her frantic state: cold, the absence of warmth; darkness, the absence of light.  What had it done to her?  She couldn't stop asking, over and over again the question replayed in her mind.  Worst of all, there was no way of knowing, no way to be sure.

She tried to stand.  The hot shower made it easier because she couldn't see her own tears.  Gravity helped the exodus of evil too.  Cool streams mixed with the warm shower trailing down her shaking legs.  The bathroom and shower had always been a place of comfort; it was small and eternally warm thanks to a furnace vent next to the door.  The vent was too much for the one room, but felt great.  She found no comfort today and maybe never again.  She stared at the drain.  The water swirled and disappeared, but it would be so easy for the monster to disguise itself in that.

She had to check, wondering if the thing had hurt her.  She didn't feel pain, still a little boated but no pain.  She couldn't help but worry.  A small finger slid between her swollen and clammy lips, another reminder of how rough the attack had been.  She probed and felt the tightness of her virginity, still intact.  Maybe Candace was right, but how was that possible?  It implied a greater intelligence and prescience that she didn't want to understand or believe.  If Candace was right, the shadow had been playing them both like an instrument, but why?

Kelly reached around and slid her hand down her firm butt probing the tiny clenched orifice.  Her skin was inflamed and warm to the touch.  The thing had used her so violently, wielded her body like an empty vessel.  She didn't want to do this; she was exhausted and wanted more than anything to curl up in her bed and cry herself to sleep.  But how could she sleep unless she got it all out?  She wanted Candace too.  Thinking of all the things Candace endured gave her strength, and she finally forced her finger in.  She found a reservoir of cool water inside and closed her eyes trying to relax and push using her finger to assist.  So much of the monster had forced itself upon her how easily it could have split off and remained inside.  Maybe an x-ray could tell.  Her eyes went wide at the prospect.  A doctor sliding the black negative into the light and pointing to an odd foreign blob that shouldn’t be there brought fresh sobs.

Kelly stopped and pulled her finger free.  She couldn't allow herself to think like that, she had always felt It before, and this attack hadn't changed that.  The fact that she felt nothing meant that there was nothing to feel.  That was final.  Its cry washing down the drain had been the end.  Those thoughts lead nowhere.  She had to push on, continue with her life.  She couldn't let it continue to hurt her.

Soon enough, the room smelled of honeysuckle and rosehips as she washed her hair and body.  A few more icy reminders flooded down her legs as she soaped up, but she forced herself on.  She dried and plopped down on the toilet.  The natural position helped a few more dribbles escape.  She wanted to call Candace but it was way too late, though she didn't know exactly what time it was.  Her eyes burned and felt heavy enough that she didn't have to know.  She stood up to scared to look, but the water was clean as she flushed anyway.

She stumbled off on weak legs to her bedroom and slid the panties on she had previously discarded.  Climbing under the warm covers she finally felt safe again.  Falling to sleep a little too quickly she shuddered awake fearing the monsters down the hall.  Soon she went under the velvet blanket of peace and quiet sleeping exhausted and without dreams.

Miles away Candace threw her leg over a body pillow falling back to sleep.  A very unnatural stir woke her up.  She lied to herself and said it was a gas pain or a hunger groan, but she felt it again and her hand cupped the small of her tummy.  She was glad her father hadn't come to visit her.  Something was up with him he was never this quiet, but she wasn't going to kick a gift horse in the mouth.

The tiny larva had been injected directly into her womb.  The ovipositors que was when it felt the tightness of her cervix.  The simple creature knew only its purpose and desperately wanted to mix with her DNA, but Candace was barren.  Dear ol’ dad had made sure she wouldn’t have any unwanted accidents a long time ago.  The supernatural life-force of the creature sustained it, drawing its energy from the girl.  It was restless and confused.

Billy was the only one who didn't sleep easy.  His mind was wrought with worry.  His Dad hadn't whooped him for being gone and hadn’t bothered with the where or whys.  Maybe he was too drunk to notice or care.  Or maybe he was sober?  Billy had only seen Mason Sr. sober on rare occasions, and the prospect of the unknown scared him.  On the other hand he knew his brother was plotting some sort of revenge.  He'd better be home for the next few weeks, or make plans to stay gone.  A pass like this didn't happen often.  He also knew he couldn't leave Kelly anymore than you could tell a bird not to fly.

The night was dreadfully long.  The hazy summer heat was unbearable and in a month school would be out.  An early heat wave was putting a strain on the power company because of all the air conditioners, but Billy's house wasn't a part of that.  It was four or five AM before the room cooled enough that he could drift off where he had restless dreams.

His sheets were stained with sweat when his brother Josh woke him the next morning.  "Geeet up Biilly!  We got work to-do” Billy tried to roll back over on his damp pillow and ignore it.  There wasn't anything to do; he'd seen to it last night.

"I said get up!" he grabbed the sheet and slung it across the room revealing Billy's naked body and caused him to recoil.  Josh wasn’t a homosexual but he made Billy feel uncomfortable a little too often.  Sometimes Billy would be in the shower or changing clothes and Josh would barge in.  Maybe he didn’t notice or care, or maybe Billy was the weird one for feeling uncomfortable, but it seemed him that Josh would go out of his way to be around at those times.  "Dad said you're not going to school today.  We got to work the fences."

"No!"  Billy didn't know any other way to respond.  He had unconsciously pulled his knees up and wrapped his arms around them.

"You better get your ass up and get dressed!  While yur here under this roof you better do as you're told.  Now get up and get dressed.  I'm moving the pigs and you better be workin on that pen when I get dun!"

He had been caught off guard and half asleep but it didn't matter he had to see Kelly, something was wrong he knew it.  "I'm going to school and I'll work on it when I get back."

His brother was halfway out of the room and slowly turned; he'd never heard Billy backtalk like that.  He took large strides to where his brother sat on the bed.  His eyes were on fire when he swung a balled fist wide and crashed it against Billy’s face like a lead cannon ball.  Billy was knocked to the scuffed hardwood floor.  "Now you got a black eye and if you don't want another, you- BETTER GET TO FUCKIN WORK!" He screamed loud enough to make his own ears ring.

Kelly reached to silence her alarm but she felt like she'd been run over by a truck during the night.  She had never been so sore, every muscle in her body ached.  She felt pretty good considering what had happened.  Years back in elementary PE she'd learned that a good workout released endorphins, what they called 'feel good stuffs', but she never thought it'd apply to wrestling a water monster.

She elected to hit the snooze, but it was a waste.  Five minutes felt like five seconds, and it didn't even do anything for your tired body.  It just made you feel better about not getting up, and the alarm went off again just teasing.  It didn't matter, she hit it again.  And again.  Finally she silenced it, but didn't get up.  She rolled back over to give herself a personal snooze timer with a promise to just lay there for a second. Just a second.

Her body woke her up just under an hour later, she had to pee.  There was no snooze for that, lucky thing, because she only had a few minutes before she had to be at the bus stop.  The thought of skipping came to mind, but her friends would be worried sick if she didn’t show.  Her friends…  What would she tell them about the attack?  Candace would understand, but she really would rather not have that conversation with Billy, him and his little notebook of events.

She crept up to the bathroom door, feeling entirely too naked in nothing but panties.  Peeking around the door she saw everything looked in order.  Her poor smiley t-shirt was crumpled in a wet puddle on the floor.  Not trusting the trail of water that leaked from it she got some toilet paper and relaxed as it soaked up.   The creature hadn't soaked into anything but her.  She didn't trust the toilet water either.  She wanted to cry again, and felt a deep shiver of pain and fear welling deep inside.  The creature had cried out and disappeared down the drain, but she couldn't trust that it was really gone.  She hovered precariously inches above the seat and finally let go, still keeping a watchful eye on the water between her legs.  A smile touched her lips as she thought of Beverly Marsh from "IT," she didn't trust the drains either.  She wiped and stood back up.  Beverly and her friends ended up miles under Derry’s ancient sewer system fighting a real nightmare with a sling shot and silver dollars... hopefully it wouldn't come to that.  Kelly had her first laugh.  The soft chuckles made her feel a thousand times better as she remembered the time, and ran to her room to dress.

At least her clothes were clean.  Maybe it was the familiar wrinkled and jumbled state of her underwear drawer, but she felt bad for being so mean to Billy.  What did she expect; he'd wear welder’s goggles and gloves while washing her clothes?  She grabbed her favorite pair of panties; light blue and not too tight and not too loose.  The spandex on some would bite and drive her nuts all day, but this pair was perfect.  It was supposed to be hot this week, but she wasn't wearing anything but jeans for a while.  She chose light and breezy spaghetti strap black top so she wouldn’t die.  Spaghetti straps were technically against school dress code, but they only cared about skirt length.  Almost as important as her panties she was glad to have clean socks again; she grabbed some anklets and her pink tennis shoes and leaped down stairs two and three at a time.

If she'd gotten up in time she could have had that bacon.  Her face wrinkled in disgust as she pulled the droopy package out of the sink and tossed it back in the fridge.  A groan rumbled through her stomach, maybe when she got home.  Who was she kidding, she was absolutely starving!  Her bus barely got to school on time, but she had to have some breakfast.  Mrs. Francis would just have to wait until she got something to eat.  She raced out the front door seeing the bus pull up and not even taking the time to lock the door back.  The morning air was hot humid breath.  During the night a light rain wet the ground.  She got to the bus as it started to roll off but the driver saw her and took her seat over the wheel hub.  Her hunger groaned again and was almost as bad a reminder of what had emptied her stomach.  Kelly was aware that she was completely empty.

The late bell rang when she approached the lunch line.  Miss Patty was just locking up her register when she saw Kelly.  "Oh dear, I'm sorry we can't serve after the bell.  Too many students were skipping don’cha know."

Kelly pouted her lips and tossed her head to the side like she’d done to her father a thousand times, "Please I'll take it to class, I'm already late and I'm starving..."

"I've already closed out my register dearie..." The old lunch lady couldn't stand the sight of the sad little girl, "Well alright, just grab something and hurry onto class."  Her old wrinkled face tilted with a warm smile.  Kelly smiled back, somehow old ladies just knew.  Old-lady-scense.

She didn't have to be told twice, and ducked under the half closed gate and grabbed a bagel.  She started to dig for money but Miss Patty just waved her off. Kelly jogged to class.  Rounding the last bend, down the walkway-to-nowhere, Kelly saw Mr. Higgins the school resource officer standing at the far end in full black cop uniform.  He usually wore something light and sometimes funny but he was all official today.  Kelly secretly thought he adopted the Hawaiian shirts as a reflection of her father's silly smiley t-shirt.  She almost jumped for joy, Candace must have came forward.

"Ahhh, there you are.  I've been looking for you." He had been waiting outside for half an hour.  He didn't like Mrs. Francis anyway; something about her face reminded him of an evil old bird, a Skeksi to be precise.  "Please come with me Ms. Evans."

Her heart sank her last name?  Why didn't he just call her Kelly, he knew her well enough.  Someone's found out about the monsters in her apartment; she was sure of it.  Maybe the water creature attacked someone else, and they linked it back to her somehow... it didn’t make any real sense but neither did Officer Higgins presence.  His face was too stern and she knew whatever he had to say wouldn’t be good.  He hadn’t been with the other Officers that came to tell her about her parent’s accident, but he seemed to carry the same weight now.  Had something happened to Candace? 

"Wa-What's this... about?"

"Just follow me please." His face was cold, almost pained.

She was scared to death, but not seeing any way out she followed him.  Mr. Higgins turned toward the empty side of the walkway, to the small forest.  Her heart screamed for her to run, but she didn't have anywhere to go.  She looked frantically side to side, if she could just see Candace or Billy; if she had just gotten to class in time, she would know, or they might tell her.  They were probably worried sick as soon as the bell rang.  But maybe they were already being interrogated, or worse.  A hundred dreadful things coursed through her.

Reluctantly she followed the officer and breathed a sigh of relief when he turned at the edge of the building.  His unmarked Crown-Vic was parked just up a short embankment around the corner.  He paused and waited for her to go first, and popped the back door with keyless entry when she got close.  This was it; she was going to be disappeared to a government lab.

She turned and threw her bagel like a Frisbee, smiling as it skidded onto the concrete at the end of the walkway.  Maybe her friends would find it...  She had to hope.

"Let's go..." he took her backpack off and cupped the top of her head helping her into the car and closed the door.

The backseat was a cage, and it looked like it was built for an animal; a plastic mould like a carnival ride but without the fun.  The car bounced as Higgins added his weight to the driver’s seat.

"Can you just tell me what's going on?"  She pleaded through the glass not sure how much of her voice got through to the officer.  He wasn't Mr. Higgins anymore, not the man she knew anyway.

"I'd think you should know."

Kelly's eyes were crazed and darted around the car.  She patted her small hands onto the glass trying to get his attention, "Please..." Her hands left smudges on the glass. 

He was silent and put the car in drive speeding off the school campus.  Kelly watched helplessly as her life got further and further away.  She was terrified.  He wasn't driving for the police station or her apartment.  He pulled onto a small two lane winding road thick with evergreen pines on both sides.  "Where are you taking ME?"  She started to scream and lunged from side to side trying to find something recognizable on the mysterious road.  But he drove on like a robot.  He wouldn't even look in the rearview to see her.  He'd had sworn and oath to protect the weak and serve the innocent, and if he looked into her eyes he knew he'd fall apart.

After an eternity of steep winding road, he turned off and started down an even smaller road.  The industrial drive opened into a vast oval clearing over a mile long.  One side a sheer rock face while the rest was a wall of solid pines.  The ground was filled with criss-crossing train tracks and covered with pine needles.  The clearing was so vast the far forest was foggy and opaque in the humidity.  Kelly had no idea where she was, or what was about to happen.  If this was some sort of secret government installation it was the best hidden and kept secret she could imagine.  The place looked deserted.  Only one lone abandoned building stood off-center in the clearing.  Dead pine needles skittered across the ground and the long scrubby grass waved as the car passed.  Wherever this was, nothing had been here for a long time.

After the car bumped over several tracks they stopped at the deserted building.  A pristine white van was parked around the corner; it had Tennessee tags.  Mr. Higgins got out and walked around the side.  The building was impressive.  It must have been the switchboard for the old trains that ran through the area.  Only the tracks lead in and out clearing. She'd have to make a run for it, disappear into the trees.  Circling back she could follow the tracks easily enough; she just had to make that treeline.  The small road they drove in on had already disappeared, not that she would have found any help on it.  She sat back in the uncomfortable seat; she'd have to wait for the doors to open before she could try.  If she looked complacent maybe she'd have a chance. 

Mr. Higgins walked back into sight looking down at his shoes while another man patted him on the back.  Tom Chambers followed close behind and opened the back doors to the van and handed Mr. Higgins a small key.  Kelly recognized it as a post office box key; her Aunt had a million of em, and she recognized the funny corners.  The two men shook hands and started for the car.  Mr. Higgins put the key in his front breast picket beside his badge.

Higgins seemed reluctant, and only stood by the far door as Tom took Kelly's arm pulling her out.  As soon as she was out of his car, the officer didn't waste any time peeling out of the yard bounding harshly over the tracks and disappearing out through the obscure driveway.

Tom held his captive for a moment watching him leave.  "I tried to tell you..."  Kelly just looked down at her shuffling feet weakly waiting for her chance.  He jerked her flailing arm toward the van but turned to the abandoned terminal door.  "Ya know, I bought that Higgins man pretty cheap." Kelly stayed calm biding her time still looking down at her shoes.  He wanted to gloat, to drink her fear.  He lifted her chin to look into her soft brown eyes.  "He was a friend of your dad’s right?"  Her eyes flared and she spit in his face.  "That's more like it," and he licked the spittle off his lips.  She was strong and lively, a deeper part of Tom felt a rush at the sight.  She felt him too, felt his darkness again, felt his vampiric desire to drain her like a battery.

Kelly took her shot when he reached for the door, twisting and jumping with both feet she broke free.  Stumbling on the loose pine needles she scrambled away and around the corner kicking up tuffs of needles.  Tom laughed; he knew she would never reach the forest in time.  He leisurely walked up and opened the passenger side door to the van where Buster sat patiently.  "Get-em-boy!" and he snapped his fingers and pointed in her direction.  Buster flew out of the van and sniffed at the ground were the car had been before he noticing the fleeing girl.  He shot at her like a bullet after treading needles for a second too.

Kelly heard the galloping dog gaining on her, and looking over her shoulder; she recognized Candace's dog.  She ran with everything she had.  Her pumping legs were already sore with fatigue and her lungs gulped air.  Her father had told her never to go with a stranger, but he went further than most parents on the subject.  Anytime something bad happens there's a crime scene, and sometimes there's two crime scenes.  The second is always worse than the first and usually the last thing a victim sees.  She knew that whatever was in that abandoned building, it was the second crime scene.  She had been tricked and kidnapped by the cop from the first.  How could she have known?  She knew Tom was evil and her fear drove her harder but her shoes stumbled over the railroad ties and tracks.  She couldn't outrun the dog, and she knew it.  Why had Tom sent him, was he going to attack her?

Kelly stopped and turned, maybe Buster would remember her.  His face was determined and his lean figure moved like a fish in water.  She bent and called to him, but he didn't seem the same.  She thought he would run into her, but he snapped at her leg as he passed.  If her jeans weren't loose he would have taken her leg off.  Would Tom rather kill her than be caught?  It was possible.  The dogs running momentum swung him around and jerked her leg out from under her.  She screamed as she went down.  Buster began viciously barking and growling at her face.  She couldn't bear to look and curled into a fetal ball.

Tom calmly walked over, slow deliberate and calm as ever.  It had been a while since Busters last roundup with Candace, but he was trained well.  He arrived and picked the girl up by the waist like a sack of feed and carried her back under his arm.  Kelly was scared now.  More than just scared, she was terrified for her life.  She couldn't have guessed what was waiting for her inside, but knew that she may never see the light of day again. She kicked and screamed, finally giving over the frantic struggles.  Her mind left her and she became a bird caught in a net.

Before the move to West Virginia, Kelly had climbed into her Dad’s chair at his big desk in the study.  If he caught in here he’d kill her for sure.  He spent hours pouring over cases and paperwork and wouldn’t even let her come in to say goodnight, she had to wait at the door.  She didn’t understand why they had to move.  Atlanta was great!  Why did they have to go to the middle of nowhere?  An old brown envelop sat at the center of the desk.  He had been looking at it recently.  Maybe she could understand…

     ‘A complete model and psychological profile of the death fetishist does not exist.  The compulsion is a result of a complex misplacement of values, and a deviation of cultural norms and social mores.  He is more likely to be white male and average to above average intelligence.  Cases of fetishists of with IQ’s over 150 have been documented. 

     The progression of pathology can be traced from the fantasy stage to the eventual acting out of fetishistic impulses, including opportunistic homicide.  Agent Evans believes strongly that the suspect in this case is escalating towards this action.  Once he begins to murder, it is the killing that draws attention away from a deeper motive.  A motive which, most people including Law Enforcement professionals dare not imagine.  It is somehow easier to believe as Agent Fox does, in Aliens and Demons than in the kind of cold blooded inhuman monster that will prey on the living to desecrate the dead.
     Death is a recorded event.  For reasons natural or un-natural when a body ceases to function, the cause of the effect can clearly be reconstructed.  A body has a story to tell.  If a victim was strangled an examination of the veins in the eyes will reveal this.  If the victim was shot entry wounds and gunpowder residue can be used to reconstruct the events leading to death and help to establish a possible motive.  Hair and fibers, slivers of glass, plastic, even insect casings can serve to recreate the circumstances under which death occurred. 
     It may be an irony only understood by those of us who do these examinations, that death like life itself is a drama with a beginning, middle, and end.  It is my opinion having conducted this examination that the victim died a wrongful death with the expressed purpose of preparing the body prior death for post mortem intercourse with the corpse.  The time of death cannot be accurately determined, due to what I believe must have been immersion in a cold environment mostly likely water.
     For the record it is also my opinion that outside of child homicide, which may be more tragic and heinous, this is one of the most angry and dehumanizing murders imaginable. 

She hadn’t understood much of what it then, but the words were clear now.  Her dad a fought the terrible and grotesque and wanted a safe quite life for his daughter.  Ironic.

This Is a Work of Fiction

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

ALTERNATE DI Chapter8 Book1

This is as titled the ALT chapter 8.  I wrote it... while high, and really enjoyed the scene between Tom and Kelly.  It actually flows better with something Tom thought earlier in the truck scene, but just didn't allow for what I've got planned in Ch10.  Enjoy.  Many of you have already read this I had previously posted this as the standard Ch8 so you might go see the changes in the new one, mostly just cuts though.

Kelly was also having trouble sleeping on a couch some miles away.  Problems with no solutions on top of more problems.  It was easy to see the dark path into apathy and just not care.  Which seemed even more complicated than the one she was on.  If she were to be selfish and just not care then it left her with an even bigger question, what did she want?   She thought about that fateful day and saw the forest leaves again.  They were already disturbed now in a slight swirl ready for her to curl up in like a cat.  She drew closer in her mind slipping off to sleep.  They looked comfy and relaxing, and end.  An easy answer.  It was dark out, but a few close trees were sheltering and would provide company.  A swirl of her ghostly body filled the basin of leaves like dense fog.  

One last effort to remember something and she turned her eyes up and the darkness had taken on a new form.  It was solid, still blanketing everything but her trees and bed.  The trees started to look like bars and her heart quickened.  No more of a solid shape than her own mind and self image, she felt the dark blackness take form.  Evil and corrupted it wanted her needed her.  It asked her to do something before it would let her rest.  She knew if she did this it would let her rest.  She was so tired. 

"Kelly... Honey wake up..."

"Huh?"

"I want to talk to you about something."

"No.. I was so..."

"It will be time to get up soon, just a chat then you can go back to sleep."

"Kelly looked up and her blurry vision cleared into Tom Chambers face."

She didn't know exactly what to think.  At first she felt an impulse to follow because he was the adult.  Then she heard Candace's voice telling her not to.  The clear feeling of the strange darkness was still in her mind.  Tom smiled down at her as she continued to come around. 

Kelly felt the darkness in Tom, but a different kind sort of Tom's own darkness with it's own purpose.  She could fight him and refuse, but that sort of felt like the dark path too but her own path to apathy letting her friend drown.  Her father had always told her the right path or the righteous path was the one she should always follow.  What could this man do?  Hurt her, humiliate her.  She could take it if she had to.  Candace could take it, but Kelly would stand up to him.  And in the end she would win and they would cart Tom off and she would finally free Candace from her dark tree prison.

"I guess, if you'll make breakfast soon."  She took Tom's hand as he helped her out of bed.  Her face red with pillow lines and pajammas wrinkled she followed  the pulling hand.

"I'm sorry to get you up so early, but I can't sleep sometimes and I was in the kitchen and heard you.  Sounded like a bad dream?"

"It was." Complacently holding his hand she followed up the stairs past Candace's room to the far end of the hall where a thin wooden set of stairs lead up. 

"It's ok don't me scared, I had a beautiful balcony built up here.  Tell me about your dream."

"I' actually could use a talk right now."

"What's on your mind Hon'?"

"How do you know the difference between right and wrong?"

"Whelp, that's a good question, one of those things everybody has to ask themselves.  It's not an easy one or even one I can answer for you, but I can help."

"And what's your advice?"  They arrived at a door above the stairs and went out into the fresh warm night air. 

"Have a seat," Tom sat across from here in a very non-threatening way.  "Sometimes you have to just pull out your magic ball and look into the future.  Think about your troubles and then ask yourself which path leads to good things and happiness, and which leads to bad things and more trouble." 

Kelly could see how the bars of Candice's prison were constructed.  "My dad used to say that normally the right path was the hard one you didn't want to go down."

"That doesn't make much sense to me!  What does your father do?"

"He was the sheriff here."

"Oh, uh well it sounds like he must have a pretty good sense about him."  Mr. Chambers played dumb he knew who her father was and that he was dead.  "But where is he now?  I heard you mention your Aunt,, but what about your him?"

"He died..."

"I'm sorry to hear that but you see life is random sometimes.  Things don't have meaning if there is some great plan or meaning to all of this why what is the point in living?  YOU have to do the best for YOU.  Maybe if your father wasn't so worried about righting other people's wrongs he would still be alive and with you."

"I don't think going down the easy path of apathy is winning though." The dream still fresh in her mind still.  She saw his eyes burn and linger for a moment in dim light. 

"History doesn't judged diplomacy and peace a tool of the losers does it?"

"That is completely different."

"You really need a father, how long has it been? All alone for you?  You miss him and need someone don't you?"

"I'm fine!"

"Yes it appears that way.  You should be happy to have Candace as a friend she can teach you alot, but there is no substitute for a good father figure."

"I think we're talking about two different things.  What you call a father I call a selfish manipulating pervert robbing his own daughter of a life she will never be able to live!"  Kelly jumped up and to door.  He was evil.  She saw how his own personal darkness shrouded the caring guise.  "I wont let you do this to her!"  Her tone of voice a little too loud for his comfort. 

She turned to run away, not thinking of where but just away.  The door handle jiggles, locked.  Kelly took a deep breath to scream as he suddenly rose, but he was on her before she can.  Pinning her by the throat against the wall.  Before her mind can cope his practiced hands got her borrowed pajama bottoms off.  Mr. Chambers reaches for her panties to find her bare.  His menacing laugh echoes in the dark night.

Kelly shocked and embarrassed gets shoved to the floor and the pj bottoms wrap around her mouth and tie behind her neck in an instant.  Her muffled whimpers and cries disappear in the open night air.  

She is shoved against the wall facing away from him.  He grabs a healthy handful of hair at the base of her neck and wrenches back breathing heavy in her ear.  "Let me show you the ways of the world little girl... This is what Candace knows, she keeps her mouth shut while I be nice and buy her things or I fucking kill her.  See honey I make more money from two days in surgery than the new piss aunt Sharif does in a year.  I'm going to make my point and your going to stay quiet or I'll have this bullshit story of yours called slander and get you in trouble with the law, then when things get quiet I'm going to have you disappeared.  Cunt's like you disappear all the time."  The adrenaline surging though his veins. 

Kelly learned what real fear was.  Grinding his teeth hissing instead of breathing she felt his spear like manhood brush across her bottom as he moved.  He mashed her head forward into the wall and wrenched one of her small breasts.  If she did go the authorities she'd defiantly have the bruises to prove it.  He slung her over to the banister and shoved her upper body out pinned at her stomach.  She could see the darkened street, if only someone was walking their dog.  He spread her legs as she scrambled to get some sort of grip on the banister.  He let go for a second and Kelly tried to scramble to correct the dangerous position over the rail.  He raked the pj top trapping her arms in the sleeves and shoved her back over.  He bent low and she felt the smooth tip of his searching cock.  her tiny slit split open with ease against the lubricated condom.  A mighty hip shove buried his cock and bounced her off his hard hips.  She was lifted off the ground and now rested between the banister and his impaling thrusts.  Kelly let out a muffled cry but it didn't seem to matter.  Pain exploded in her as he ripped though her virginity and introduced her body to sex.  He plunged into her again pushing further out off the railing.   

He held her precariously by the wrenched shirt top.  her feet dangled and her pointed toes reached for the ground blindly.  She was more over the rail and in open air only held by Tom.

He  began thrusting his hips faster and harder, violating her with strong thrusts that pinched her legs.  He was breathing like a bull.  He finished while her mind was still reeling fighting the fact that it was actually happening.  He let her fall safely back onto the balcony.  She was sobbing too heavily to do anything but curl the fetal position. 

Tom rushed down and grabbed her hair bringing her face up, Here you want some DNA evidence?"  He shoved the spent latex condom into mouth and throat.  The salty goop spurted from her lips and onto the wood soon followed by the crumpled condom.  

He walked over to the door and flipped a simple latch looking back over his shoulder.  Now you leave me alone and I'll leave you alone, ok?"

Kelly started to sit up trying to cough the bitter coating out of her throat.  She knew, she was going to kill the bastard.  Tom walked out and left her calmly shutting the door.  Kelly scissor her legs wincing at the pain inside.  Getting up was worse.  She put the bottoms back on and took a few steps to the door.  It was time for her to be selfish it didn't matter what anyone else wanted, she was going to try her damndest us use her ability for something useful and kill the motherfucker.  She couldn't let Candice know.  And she limped back off to the couch to think. 

Thirty minutes later Candace jingled down the stairs to get her up.  Candace had been worried that her dad might come for her in the night.  she really wasn't up for it, and worst of all he surely find her looser. 

Candace dressed her friend the next morning in some old jeans that she had grown out of.  Kelly never let on that anything had happened last night.  It was hard for her not to space out just boiling with anger.  There was a brief encounter with her on their way out but Candace was an expert at leaving her house quickly.

She let her father use her and event enjoyed it at times, but it didn't make her life any easier.  He had made a habit lately of catching her at the worst moment when she really didn't want to be messed with.  She had been so annoyed lately and it only aroused him more.  She had to get Kelly away before he pushed the limits with her around.  It would be just like him to sneak up and take her while Kelly was around and might see.  At least she thought he know Kelly was off limits. 

Candace started to get a slippery wet feeling soaking into her panties thinking about Kelly's body.  Kelly would never do anything like her father.  She was so shy and quiet but once she opened up Kelly would just gush with this cute intelligent voice.  She knew Kelly would never be pushy or demanding.  As her own body cranked up Candace found it hard not to make Kelly uncomfortable with advances.  Their chatter on the bus was a little quieter than normal.

Candace was a little extra friendly, "What do you think we're going to do in Mrs. Francis's class?"

"I think today she is suppose to start a depth and perception chapter or something."

Candace cocked her head not really sure if that was a good or bad thing, "What's that?"

"You'll see but we'll probably just be doing shapes and outlines maybe an apple or something."

"Your  not worried are you?"

"Naw, I think I can feel it, the thing but it's more like a darkness or a dark thing with no shape.  It's hard."

"You looked worried."  Kelly looked over from watching the road roll by and saw her friends concern.

"Oh, sorry I'm just worried about what all this means.  It wants something...