Tamara flexed and tightened her back, as she felt the sharp pain in her punctured heart. While she frantically swung her arms up at the nurse, to fight her off, the slender IV tubing inserted into her hand whipped and thrashed in the air. From the side, she saw the IV pump to which the tubing was connected violently jerk, and then teeter on its stand. With another panicked tug, Tamara felt the needle, lodged within hand, tear away from her flesh. Her terrified eyes watched blood spatter across the nurse’s steely face. Then, she heard the IV pump slam down onto the floor, shaking the ground underneath. The pounding thud could be heard and felt many rooms away.
But the effort was feeble and ineffective. The nurse pressed down harder over Tamara’s mouth and neck. She only needed to wait.
Outside the door, the true nurse trotted hurriedly to Tamara’s room. She quickly searched for the two police officers stationed there, but they were nowhere to be found. As she briskly opened the door, she asked, with concern in her voice, “Sweetie, are you ok?” When she entered the room, her head turned to face her patient. She froze at the threshold, horrified by what she saw.
With terror in her wide-opened eyes, Tamara looked to the side, at the nurse. Her muffled scream died in the air between the two of them. She desperately waved her hands in the air, as she attempted to reach and claw at the face above her. The mattress shook and jumped while her legs and feet struggled to push her body away from the deadly grasp she was in.
Seeing the true nurse at the door, the eyes of the nurse at Tamara’s side began to glow red with heat. In an instant, her whole body was engulfed in a red-hot glow. Her hands seared the skin over Tamara’s mouth and neck. Another instant later, the glow disappeared and the form of the young woman Crystal, clothed in black, stood in the place of the nurse replica.
Immediately, Crystal removed her hand from Tamara’s mouth and quickly extended her arm toward the nurse at the door. A trio of slender yet powerful tentacles sprung from the palm of the extended hand. Within a split second, they reached the nurse. One whipping tentacle wrapped itself around the nurse’s neck, choking her and preventing the flow of blood to her head. With tremendous speed, the other two tentacles entwined around their captive’s torso. Quickly, Crystal yanked the nurse from the threshold and into the room. Then, her tentacles lifted the body into the air and used it to slam the door shut. There, the nurse’s twitching feet hung, as she wriggled and frantically struggled to breathe.
Tamara still had lifeblood within her. And now, there was only one hand holding her down. With all her strength and courage, Tamara pulled herself away from Crystal’s grasp. Reaching the opposite side of the bed, she saw the horrific sight of the three slender, smooth tentacles wriggling between the tear in her neck and the opening in Crystal’s palm. Her frightened pounding heart spurted blood from the arteries of her neck onto the clean, white bed sheets. As a scream escaped her, Tamara used both hands to yank the tentacles from her neck. She felt her hands twitch and shake in terror, while she attempted to grasp and extract the red, blood-coated appendages.
Crystal, realizing the immediate need to restrain Tamara, wound more tightly the tentacles around the nurse’s neck and body. In a vehement tug, she pulled the head and body away from each other, snapping the pitiful nurse’s neck. She quickly and abruptly tossed the nurse’s lifeless body to the far corner of the room, next to the bathroom.
The bathroom door flung open, and there on the floor, the two dead bodies of the policemen lay.
The three retracting appendages found their way back to Tamara. One grasped an ankle, and the other two seized both of Tamara’s wrists. They raised Tamara into the air and held her horizontally above the bed.
Still fighting, Tamara struggled to pull her limbs free, and she repeatedly kicked her unrestrained foot down on the bed. She began to scream.
From the other hand, Crystal quickly used one tentacle to wrap tightly around Tamara’s mouth and prevent the screams from escaping. She shoved the other two tentacles back into Tamara’s neck.
With the only sound coming from the frantic muffled thudding of Tamara’s foot against the blood-spattered bed, blood once again was stolen away from her pumping heart.
In time, with her lifeblood draining, Tamara weakened.
The thudding against the bed eased, and then stopped, leaving her foot limp and lifeless.
In deadly silence, Tamara’s head fell back, as the tentacle restraining it slithered loose. While the other wriggling tentacles suspended Tamara from three of her limbs, her limp body dangled and hovered eerily above the blood-splattered white bed.
Crystal’s black form stood at Tamara’s bedside. Breathing in deep, Crystal drew in and smelled the blood around her. Feeling it deep within her, she felt the blood ignite her body. Once again, she took pleasure in both the control she had over her prey and the exhilaration of her hunt, giving her a rush of excitement, in which she now just wanted to remain still and enjoy.
Like a puppet master, precisely controlling, precisely orchestrating, she skillfully arranged the final movements of her unnaturally crafted scene.
Moments later, a lifeless body sprawled on top of the bloodstained bed sheets; and from it, the unique, rare, and priceless lifeblood was completely drained.
Finished, Crystal stood motionless.
Then, with a quick flash of a red-hot glow, she transformed herself back to the likeness of the nurse.
Calmly, the nurse walked around the edge of the bed to make her way out.
But, as she reached the end of the bed, she suddenly shuddered and her legs faltered. Quickly, her hand reached out and grasped the bed sheet, and her fingers dug into the mattress.
Suddenly, thousands of tiny crystals appeared and flashed their multi-faceted edges on the surface of her face, body, and clothes.
She took another step.
Again, her body shuddered, and this time she fell to her knees with her hand slapping flat onto the floor.
With her eyes revealing her pain, she asked perplexed, “What’s happening to me?”
Like rapidly undulating waves, the pigmented crystals layered throughout her form heaved and shifted.
Quickly and uncontrollably, the nurse’s eyes glowed in burning red heat, and then she transformed into the likeness of Agent Stevens.
Agent Stevens could feel the turmoil within him.
He froze in pain, not knowing what to do.
Then after some time, he settled himself. Finally, able to regain his balance, he propped himself up off his knees.
He took a cautious step.
He took another step.
But then, his legs faltered, dropping him on all fours.
As he gasped for air, he coughed, “Only once before. Only once before did this happen!” The crystals on his surface waved erratically once more, their facets reflecting the dim light of the room. In a crystalline wave, Agent Stevens vanished, and the nurse’s form replaced him.
With her head dropped low, the nurse heaved and crouched and heaved again.
For a long while, she waited for her strength to return. As she breathed in deep, her lungs struggled, and her eyes continued to burn red.
A short time later, she regained her composure. With gradually disappearing waves, the crystals melted and fused into each other. Soon, she was renewed, and she lifted herself to her knees, and then up to her feet. Carefully, she staggered to the door. With her hand on the door handle, she regained her strength, and then stood straight and confident.
Now, with her emotionless face glancing back at the body on the bed, she thought, “It was a long time ago when I first felt this pain.” Trying to remember, she asked, “What happened then?”
The blood from all of her four victims was very unique and very rare. It was precisely the blood she sought. However, the blood of the lifeless woman behind her was quite different.
Mitsuko Kaneko. The Japanese names meant child of light and child of gold.
The blood of this child of light and of g
old was even more rare, and even more unique. It was of a lineage that began many thousands of years ago.
However, this rare quality was something that the crystalline entity had not anticipated.
As the nurse turned her head back toward the door, her face put on a warm and pleasant facade.
Slowly, she opened the door.
Gently, she closed it behind her.
Only moments later, at Tamara’s bedside stood the dark figure of a man in a thick, long hooded black coat. Underneath the hood, his head slowly turned right then left, examining Tamara’s body and examining the death wrought by the creature named Crystal.
Nevertheless, he was unaffected by what he saw.
He hid nearby, when Crystal was shaken by having Tamara’s blood within her. From outside the room, he had sensed the dramatically harmful effect Tamara’s blood had on the otherwise powerful creature.
The hooded man now knew he had found the one he sought. In his thoughts, he prepared for his next meeting with Crystal, The thrill of her hunt has caught her off guard. Although puzzled now, she will soon realize that I have used her to seek something. And she will be quite enraged. Then, he considered the state of his designs, As one more step forward, I have deployed the three spheres. And this woman, she has the blood. Both her body and the spheres will be needed much later, after my deception of the dark entity has been completed, and our bargain shattered.
Regarding the progress of the longhaired man, he assessed, He is gaining his abilities and utilizing them superbly. These trials I am putting him under are achieving what I desire. In time, he and I will deceive the dark entity. Thus, the time comes closer for him to know who I am, for me to closely test his skills, and for his raw actions to tell me who he truly is deep within.
There was one more thing he wanted to do. To those who were following, he needed to reveal the city where the next victim was to be - where the longhaired man had unknowingly chosen it to be - and encode it within a tiny object. He said, “This will complete the five cities. It is the last of Samuel’s victims and the last of Jalel’s targets. And I have been successful in keeping the dark entity from knowing that I am subtly disclosing its plans.” Thinking of the longhaired man, he said, “I will later see if he understands what I am revealing to him through these victims.”
Reaching out his hand, he gently turned Tamara’s head to the side. Carefully, his fingers swept away her straight, long, black hair, in order to expose her ear. Then, with his right hand, he covered it.
A faint glow of white light began to appear between the ear and his hand. Slowly, the light grew stronger and stronger, until the intense brightness completely hid Tamara’s head, and his hand became a dark formless shadow.
In German, he began to faintly speak words and phrases. Finally, he spoke one last phrase, the phrase that would unlock and open the protective covering around the object he was creating.
When his words ended, the bright light began to fade, just as slowly as it intensified.
Carefully, he lifted his hand.
Underneath it, within Tamara’s ear, appeared what looked like a red pearl.
* * * * * * *
He and Dancy sat on the couch, in the living room of her apartment, directly in front of the TV. The Thanksgiving Day football game between the Chargers and the Forty Niners would soon begin. Both of them had a can of cold beer in hand.
The longhaired man decided to tone down his football fanaticism, quite substantially, so as to not scare Dancy away. Thus, he was in subdued good behavior. While they talked about previous Charger games, he was proud of himself that he could both put on a calm objective demeanor and suppress the football fanatic within. As kickoff approached, his excitement gradually increased, but he had the strength to hold it back, within his pre-determined confines.
The game was about to start.
Dancy grabbed the remote and turned the volume of the TV up loud.
He glanced at her, from the side, watching her excitement.
“Ooo!” Dancy exclaimed, “The game’s about to start.” Her personality suddenly shifted gears. As her hand excitedly patted on his knee, she simultaneously bent down to set her beer on the floor. “Come on! Come on, get ready!”
He was anxious and ready for the game to begin, but he didn’t quite know why he had to “Come on and get ready‘.
The Forty Niner kicker positioned himself a short distance behind the football that was propped up on the tee. The crowd in the stadium screamed. As customary, Ozzy Osbourne’s Crazy Train began to play in the stadium, to herald the kick off. Once the crowd heard the guitar riff intro, it erupted in deliriously louder cheers.
“This crowd is electric!” exclaimed one TV announcer. “And with that tremendous cheer, our Thanksgiving Day game between the home team, San Diego Chargers, and the visiting San Francisco Forty Niners is about to begin!”
“Come on!” exclaimed Dancy, with noticeable excitement in her voice. She raised both her hands high in the air and excitedly jittered them about.
Without turning his head, he glanced at her, from the side again. His eyes moved up to watch her hands and fingers flutter in the air.
Once the kicker struck the football and launched it into the air, she called out in both gradually escalating effort and increasing volume, “Ooohhhhhhhh!”
He was shocked. His eyes didn’t know what to do; they darted between her and the TV, and then from the TV to and her.
The ball tumbled, end over end, high in the stadium air.
Once a Charger player caught the football and began to run, Dancy exclaimed with high energy, “Game on!”
She had done exactly what he traditionally did during kickoff.
Surprised, his body and head suddenly jerked away from her.
Dancy noticed. “What?!” she asked, in a high-pitched voice.
With an exaggerated look of shock, bewilderment, and horror in his face, eyes, and lips, he responded, “You’re weird!”
A few hours later, the TV football game announcer finished his sentence emphatically, “…and with that the Forty Niners cap a game ending two-minute drill with a field goal, to win on this Thanksgiving Day!”
Both of their faces were in shock.
He buried his face in his hands, covering his mouth. In muffled protest, he exclaimed, “Oh. My. God! 30 to 28! How did this happen? We had the game!”
After a long moment of motionless silence, Dancy regained her composure. She leaned over and hugged him. With her head resting on the back of his shoulder, she said trying to console him, “I’m so sorry, honey bunch.”
“Thanksgiving Day! In front of the whole country!” He uncovered his face. Responding to Dancy, he put his arm around her. But his protesting didn’t want to end. “Unbelievable.”
Dancy began to pout. Then, she said, “I’m so sad, baby.”
He shook his head saying, “Me too, babe…me, too.”
Reaching for the TV remote beside him, he muted the TV. The image of the game-ending field goal kept repeating on the screen. The camera panned on the deflated and dejected crowd leaving the stadium. Soon the announcers appeared, mouthing their praise and amazement over the last-minute scoring drive.
With their arms around each other, they sat back and leaned against the couch in deflated spirits.
After a while of sitting in silence, he moved his left hand around from the side and reached for her hand.
Dancy noticed the symbol on the inside of his wrist.
“Hey, nice ink…I guess I’ve never noticed that before.”
She was right. He had purposefully hidden it from her, by always wearing long sleeved shirts, when he was to meet her. But today he decided that he really didn’t care to keep her from seeing it anymore, and so he simply wore his white t-shirt. “Oh, yeah.” he said nonchalantly.
“Is it finished?”
“No, actually. Uh, I haven’t made the time to get it all done.”
Using both of her hands, she pulled up his
wrist and examined it closely, with peering eyes. “Wow. Those are really clean lines, and they look like they go down deep.”
“Yeah, not bad, huh? The guy who’s doin’ it for me really knows his stuff…painful as heck though.”
Dancy set his arm back down and continued to hold his hand. “You’re such a baby!” she teased. “When are ya gonna get it finished?”
“I don’t know. The guy’s really busy. You’d think he’s running the universe or something. I guess I’m a little disappointed.” He gave his best look of disappointment.
“Where’d you see this design from? It’s gonna look pretty cool, yeah?”
“Well, I’d like to say that I came up with it myself. But the guy’s just doing it out of his head. He doesn’t even want to tell me what it’s gonna end up being.”
“So, I guess you trust him, huh?”
He nodded his head a few times, and then finally said, with a smile, “Yeah, that’s a maybe.”
She laughed.
* * * * * * *
The house was made in the late “70s just outside of the city of San Francisco. It was one-story, with wood shake roofing, four small bedrooms, and having spacious front and back yards. Paige’s parents had always been the owners.
Inside the house, Paige carefully set some dishes down into the kitchen sink. She looked up through a window and watched Isaac play in the front yard, with three of his cousins about his own age. She heard their high-pitched laughter through the open window.
Her mother, Sandi, walked in, with some glasses in her hands, and placed them into the sink. The two were about the same height, with her mother having wavy blonde hair down to her shoulders. She was a gentle-speaking woman and always polite with others. Her love for her children was limitless.
Sandi said, “I’m sorry about all the razzing the boys gave you about the football game.” Paige’s two brothers had just given her grief over the Chargers losing to the Forty Niners.
Beginning to wash dishes, Paige chuckled, “That’s ok, mom. It’s all part of the fun of the game. I’ll have my turn.”
RB 01 Through Flesh & Bone Page 41