killer without mercy.
He had to be stopped, but I didn’t know how.
I stayed in deep shadow, watching the dead body, thoughts, doubts, tumbling through my mind. The three men had been laughing and clapping each other’s shoulders as they departed the scene, and I loathed them for what they had done. But I loathed Moker more.
Just when I felt I’d waited long enough and was about to approach the recumbent body, something stirred. At first, I thought it was the woman herself—I was sure she had moved—but as I peered closer, I realized I was mistaken. Once again I backed away, retreating into deeper shadow. Without doubt, I was afraid of the monster who had possessed his victim. As before in the underground car park, a nebulous shape, a configuration that was transparent, was slowly evolving into something recognizable, and even in the darkness, and despite its limpid nature, I could tell it was Moker leaving the body.
The gauzy form thickened, took on more solidity, and began to arrange itself into something more human— except, of course, for the face. The body of flesh and bone beneath him was completely motionless, a lifeless corpse once more, as Moker continued to rise. There was no awkwardness to him now; his emergence was even graceful. I shrunk further back, almost passing through the glass of the shop door behind me. As I realized this I took another step backwards so that I was now on the other side of the glass, and inside the shop itself. There was the usual uncomfortable feeling for a nanosecond, a kind of claustrophobic thing followed by a sense of being at one with the glass, absorbed by its molecules, nothing overwhelming, just a natural transition spoilt only by the fear I had for the thing that was out there in the street.
The vision that was Moker stood upright in a fluid movement, and glanced back down at his victim. Although in shadow, he was clearly visible to me, not quite in solid form, but giving off a slight glow in the darkness. I wondered if I would look the same to him. In fact, his reappearance in this form caused me to wonder about his ability to float out-of-body. Was it the same ability that I possessed? It had to be—it could be nothing else. But he had left his physical self so quickly and effortlessly. Perhaps it was the very nature of the man himself that made it possible, the curse of loneliness giving time for the perfection of the pursuit of leaving his own body.
And what better incentive to leave his own wretched form than his own physical imperfection? What better motive than living as someone else for a little while, someone fit, attractive, wealthy—respected? (And in his twisted mind, who better to shame and humiliate—his victims the very type he had always envied, later wanting to destroy their faces and bodies to satisfy his own vengeful hatred of them? He despised them for the qualities that he, himself, had never possessed and so his final retribution on them was to render them in his own likeness by way of a chopper.)
How Moker had discovered he could leave his own body at will, there was no way of knowing, but there was no doubt he had developed the gift to a fine degree. And again, how he had learned to enter deceased bodies and possess them, there was also no way of knowing. But he did work in an environment of corpses, in a mortuary.
My conclusion was that Moker had put in the hours. To me, the OBE was an occasional habit; to Moker, it was both a release and a means of revenge. He’d obviously become adept at it.
His dimly luminous shape remained immobile as he continued to look down at his poor victim. Then he shifted and looked about him. For a tense moment I thought he might discover me hiding in the shop but, although his eyes lingered for a long second on the shop’s doorway, his attention moved on.
After a while, he himself moved on and, for a reckless moment, I wanted to chase after him. I wanted to destroy him. I wanted to prevent him from doing this same thing ever again. But he terrified me and I held back. Besides, I didn’t know if I could make contact with him in our state of being. That was my excuse anyway.
I did have another idea though.
Moker had long departed before I ventured out of the shop. Before crossing the street to the doorway where the urine-sodden woman was sprawled, I checked to my right, making sure the killer wasn’t about to reappear. I waited nervously, ready to flee. The street was empty. I crossed over.
I examined the dead woman, checking that she hadn’t, by some miracle, started breathing again. No, she really was dead.
I wondered if her killer’s plan was to return in his car using his physical form then mutilate the body here, where it was dark and quiet, with little chance of being disturbed. Maybe that was how he always did it: kill, possess, leave the dead victim somewhere isolated, return and chop it; or maybe he would load the corpse into his car and take it elsewhere to mutilate. Whatever, I knew the nightmare wasn’t over, that he’d be coming back to finish the job, and that I didn’t have much time.
I wondered if I could pull it off.
After studying her for a few moments—her lip was cut, her cheekbones black with dirt from the undersoles of the three Arabs’ shoes when they’d kicked her, her previously smart business suit drenched with blood and piss—I squatted down next to her (I suppose in some way I was trying to get the feel of her). I squeezed into the gap (yeah, no need to squeeze in my form, but I did anyway) behind her on the step and, taking a deep pointless breath, I melted into her.
And it worked, I seemed to fit.
But only seconds after I was enveloped by her flesh, the fading memories rushed at me. I experienced her life, just flashes, only moments in time, but it seemed to cover everything, from birth to death. I guess even after death, a residue of precious life remains in the brain and even in the flesh of the body. Like those old radios and televisions whose energy faded rather than stopped immediately when switched off, so this was an ebbing of power rather than a complete cut-off. Now, it seemed to me as I immersed myself into this cooling corpse, energies—at least, her memories—lingered in the substance of her form.
My own mind sapped up the remains of the woman’s lifetime experiences. It wasn’t focused enough to be overwhelming, but it was startling.
Images, sensations, thoughts: they poured through me.
A huge bright red ball with yellow spots, bigger than me, the observer, it seemed; absolute joy—a man, somewhere in his early thirties, I thought, although he seemed very old, giggling as he pushed me on a swing; it was a long time ago and this was my father and I was his little daughter (there was no question, no mystery, it was just as it was), and wonderful happiness spread through me, but it quickly left, a harsh sadness taking its place as the man was gone—a woman now, an unhappy strict woman, pleasant face, yet a severity to her eyes; mother, the dead woman’s mother, and there was love, but it was not the same as before; the woman was older, grey-haired, and she was angry, raising her voice, at me, and dislike weighed heavily on the love; but it seemed that in death, my death, forgiveness was granted and I ached with longing—still pining, the regret of having lost my father so many years ago—
Although I was experiencing the remnants of the dead woman’s memories, my own feelings continued to intrude, for my own mind was ensconced in this host of flesh and stilled blood, and I wondered if Primrose would mourn me for years to come. An image of my father came to me too, but he was like a stranger.
—a slim pink doll, a Barbie or a Wendy (the resolution was not clear enough)—a puppy dog, me calling its name: Rumbo—a boy, a surge of love here—the sea, a wonderful calm sea that was green then blue—a jolt, an accident of some kind, an arm in pain, soon gone—guilt, guilt, guilt, more sorrow, visions of a man, an indistinct person, a woman behind him, and I knew that he was my lover and the woman was his wife, deep, deep grief, a terrible wrench of emotions, the affair soon over—the sea again, beautifully warm and calm—
I soaked up tiny segments of the victim’s life just before they faded, before they finally left the storehouse of flesh, bone and tissue.
—the mother again, love still present, but also a stronger dislike—bad times, black times, it all came to me, some moments witnessed as through a kaleidoscope, while others were individual and sharply defined, some fleeting, others lasting mere seconds that felt like long periods—thoughts, energies, flowed through, but fading, fading all the time, dwindling, waning, as if growing weary themselves—now an office, a workplace; computer screens, faces, mixed emotions, snap visions that somehow were complete—an apartment, simply but tastefully furnished, a warmth for that place, and now a black-and-white cat called Tibbles—people, friends—leaving the office—
And then it all changed: darkness entered, slowly at first until it was almost absolute; it brought with it fear…
—and terror, heart-freezing terror—a lonely walk down into shadows, a sense of danger—the car, very near
