The Thousand-Year Tattooist
By Sean E. Graham
Smashwords Edition
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PUBLISHED BY:
Sean E. Graham on Smashwords
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The Thousand-Year Tattooist
Copyright © 2011 by Sean E. Graham
Originally published in Steampunk: An Anthology by Sonar4 in 2010
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*****
The collar of his overcoat was pulled up high around his face and his top hat sat low to fight back the driving English rain. Horses clopped on the cobbles behind him as he stepped off the main street and into an alleyway and made his way past the piles of rubbish, stopping at a nondescript wooden door. Three knocks, pause, four knocks, pause, then two knocks. The peephole darkened from the inside and he presented his face to the hidden peeper. Many locks rolled back in a short symphony of metal on metal.
A small Asian man in loose-fitting black trousers and shirt stood in the doorway. He nodded sharply, his waist-length queue swaying like a pendulum, and disappeared into the darkness. The coated man followed and the hall opened into a wide room. Smoke lingered in the air like coastal fog. Men and women, like apparitions in the dim candle lighting, lay about on filthy mattresses and loose bedding passing long pipes between them.
They continued past several scantily clad Chinese girls waiting outside tiny rooms and room set apart from the rest. An ancient Asian sat on the floor, a low tray before him, shoveling noodles into his mouth from a bowl with a pair of chopsticks.
“Missah Tattingham, so nice see you,” he said. His long, thin beard bounced as he spoke. He motioned with his elbow towards a nearby pipe. “Smoke?”
Tattingham brushed the water from his coat and pulled his hat off, revealing a deeply scarred face. Molten, raised flesh covered his left cheek and ran across his shorn scalp.
“Have I ever?” he said sharply, but slurred as the right corner of his mouth was scarred and drooped. “The artist, Lee, where is the artist?” His gray eyes flared like coals.
Lee chuckled. “Yes, Missah Tattingham, yes, yes. Long-life tattoo, as ordered.” He rose gingerly, staggered, and Tattingham’s escort bolted to his aid with incredible speed. “Thank you, Chang,” the old man wheezed. “Come.”
The trio went back into the hall and through another locked door before descending a spiral staircase ending at an iron door. Lee drew a ring of keys from his robe and opened the series of locks. The door groaned and swung inward. Tattingham stepped in behind Chang and grinned with the side of his mouth that still responded.
Sitting on a stool next to a plush couch was a small boy, brown skinned and slight. He could not have been more than eight or nine, much younger than Tattingham expected. He looked the boy over greedily. On a small, circular table next to the boy sat a tray of long bamboo needles and small tins of jet black ink.
Lee extended his hand. “Payment prease—half now, then begin.”
Tattingham pulled a fist-sized bag from his coat and dropped it into Lee’s hand.
“Good ruck, Missah Tattingham.” Lee bowed several times as he exited the room. Chang remained and closed the door, shutting the trio inside. They heard Lee lock it from the outside.
Chang stood cross-armed, back to the door. Tattingham smiled and began to undress, placing his top coat on the couch arm. He undid the top tie of his shirt, pulled it over his head and flapped it out dramatically like a bull fighter. His chest and arms were covered in spiraling, looping, linking, intertwining tattoos. Under the ink lay more thick scar tissue.
“It’s not polite to stare, boy-oh,” Tattingham said to the gawking boy and winked at Chang, who remained stone-faced. Tattingham lay face down on the couch, closed his eyes and channeled his thoughts to the giant waiting outside. “Shall we?”
***
Jox followed his master down the alley at a nonchalant distance and waited behind a collection of rubbish bins for instruction counting roaches on the pavers until the familiar itch arrived He liked to count things because he could. It started within the abstract image of his master tattooed on the back of his head, traced the suture lines that bound his great mass together, and finished in his toes, curling them. His master’s beautiful voice slithered into his mind from the ether and his next actions were made clear. As clear as things ever got for Jox.
He moved from the garbage to the door, knocked three times and waited. Jox was unaware of the purpose of the knocking, but his banging hands like cooked hams triggered the microscopic clockwork timer embedded in the black-powder putty planted in the jamb by Tattingham on his way inside. A second later the door blew off its hinges, washing Jox with an eruption of fire and debris. His block face was charred and shards of oak jutted from his cheeks. His right ear was aflame.
Jox ran through the smoking den, as men and women ran the opposite direction and into the intersecting hall and Lee stepped from his room. Jox recognized him from a photographic plate and followed his instructions. Lee’s eyes widened as the monster bore down on him and hit him like a bull. Lee went down easily, his brittle bones cracking under his attacker’s massive weight.
Jox rained fists down on the ancient opium dealer until his face caved in, then stood and followed the hall at a run. At the second locked door he knocked three times and was greeted with more fire and wood.
Chang heard the explosion and instinctually turned and tried to open the door. It didn’t budge. Tattingham heard the heavy steps of his man outside and in one motion rolled from the couch, pulling it over him and dragging the young boy down with one arm. There were three knocks on the door before it exploded, blowing Chang backwards over the couch and against the wall.
Tattingham peeked from under the couch, saw Chang unconscious in a heap against the wall, and stood. In the doorway, breathing heavily, was Jox, his tattooed body heaving with each breath, his sewn joints pulling at their seams. Tattingham grabbed the boy by the shoulders with both hands and handed him over the couch to Jox, who took him in a bear hug. The ruse had worked—he didn’t need a long-life tattoo, he had one already; he needed the boy.
“He gets away, I’ll send you back to the graves you came from,” Tattingham said. Jox nodded; a shard of wood fell from his face, leaving a doughy hole that immediately began to mold closed. Tattingham walked over to Chang and ripped his shirt off. Tattooed on the man’s biceps were circular, spiraling images. Tattingham flipped out a straight razor and began to slice the tattooed flesh from the man’s arms. “You won’t be needing these anymore. Good ink should never go to waste.” He did the same to the tattoos on Chang’s calves and stuffed the skin flaps into a sack before cutting Chang’s throat for good measure.
***
Abner sat in his sun room, wearing tennis whites and reading the morning paper over tea. Tapu sat across from him buttering toast. There was a knock on the side door from the garden. No one was in the garden. The men exchanged looks. “Enter, Sergeant Sanford,” Abner said.
The door opened and a sheepish Sandford stepped through. He was ruddy and sweating.
“You’re out of uniform, Sergeant,” Abner said, smiling.
“Oh, fuck off, Abner,” the London constable said. “You owe me for this. If Smith knew I was here.…” He looked at Tapu and stopped; the man always made Sandford uneasy. Tapu was Maori—a New Zealand native—huge, muscled, and carried a palpable aura of strength with him like a cloud wherever he went. Tapu smiled at Sandford with black tattooed lips and mouth. Sandford stepped back unconsciously and Tapu stuck a black tongue out at him.
“Oi! Is that necessary?” Sandford shouted.
“Now, now, boys,” Abner said. “Why have you interrupted morning tea, Sandy? I trust the sky is falling.” Abner sipped from his cup.
“Could be.” Sandford looked around the room as if he was in a crowded pub, then back to Abner. “I think your mate is at it again.”
Abner’s eyes widened. “Tattingham?” Sandford nodded. “What is the old chap up to this time?”
“Killed Lee, the opium dealer—you know Lee—and nabbed a little fella,” Sandford added.
“A little fella, you say?” Abner probed.
“Yeah, a pup—new arrival, the madam said, from…over there.…”
“Over there would be China, dear Sergeant. Lee and his cohorts are Chinese.”
“Right. Said the boy was an artist or something. The fellas found paint spilled all over the place.”
“Paint?” said Abner.
“Yeah, paint. You get’n hard of hearing, Abner?” Sandford said. “Anyway, thought you would be interested, is all.”
Abner looked at Tapu. “He’s at it again,” Abner said. Tapu nodded and took a bite of his toast.
“At what?” Sandford asked.
Abner continued speaking with Tapu. “You think he’d try it again? The bloody bastard almost killed himself last time. Went up like a firecracker.”
Tapu nodded and raised his eyebrows.
“Last time it was the artist though, wasn’t it, not the design. If he could get his hands on the right artist it might work.” Abner downed his tea and folded the newspaper neatly on the table. “We know he has the design and we can assume he has the ink formula.…”
“Inkers are cheap,” Tapu said, speaking for the first time. “He could find the right ink anywhere for a price.” His South Pacific accent still thick after years of living with Abner and the English.
“True, but the artist, now that’s a bird of a different feather. This boy, do you think…no?”
“Stranger things, boss.” Tapu chewed more toast, agreeing with the unspoken.
“The magi?” Abner mused. “But how would old man Lee get his hands on the magi?”
Tapu shrugged. “Stranger things.”
“What the bloody hell are you daisies talking about?” Sandford barked.
The two men in their tennis whites turned to Sandford and in unison said, “Tattoos, mate.” Confusion hung on Sandford’s face. It was not an unfamiliar expression for the man whose heart was bigger than his intellect.
“Tattoos, Sandford. There are those”—he glanced at Tapu—“who believe there is inherent power in a tattoo; that when the right design is driven into the blood of the right person with the right ink, by the right hand, that tattoo will bestow power upon its owner. Great power in some cases.”
“Poppycock,” Sandford said and glanced at Tapu, expecting the savage to leap over the table and scalp him. “I mean…well.”
Abner continued, “Our boy Tattingham, ex-Duke Osborn Tattingham, to be exact, is one of those people. He believes that with the right ink in his veins he might control the world—or at least his dukedom again, at any rate. I’m talking about a doomsday tattoo.”
“Ludicrous,” Sandford said. Tapu crunched heavily on the last bit of toast and Sandford jumped.
“I only wish it were, Sandford. What would you say if I told you that with the right ink the dead can walk and golems can engineer locomotives?” Abner said.
“I’d say ludicrous poppycock, of course,” Sandford said, visibly pleased with his wit.
“I’ve seen it with my own eyes, Sergeant. Tattingham means to take over the world, and this ‘little fella’ you mentioned just might be his ticket.” He stood and turned again to Tapu. “Ready, Lightfoot.”
***
Merata sat in the third car of the short, four-car locomotive, scared and cold and hungry and perpetually watched by the featureless mannequin standing at the car’s door. Black ink covered the dull flesh of the golem from head to toe in swirling lines and patterns. Before him were three dozen ingredients, all waiting in clay bowls for his hands. An ancient parchment, the ink recipe that, in conjunction with the right design and Merata’s hand, had the power to kill or give birth to the world, lay on the floor in front of him where his abductor had left it hours ago—blend this or you’ll starve to death on this bloody train, boy-oh.
His father would say this was his fate, that he was the chosen one, the Thousand-Year Tattooist, and that there was no avoiding it; he was the millennium’s magi. He had a responsibility as an artist, as the artist, to the world and the kami-spirits that guarded it. Even at his young age, Merata understood that he must find balance within the trial the fates had dealt him and create something beautiful for the world. It was his duty.
The recipe itself was amateurish, but its intent was clear to Merata. Under the eyeless gaze of the flesh man beside him, he began to blend feverishly.
Hours later he was shoved into the studio car, sweating and exhausted. He had poured his being into the bowls in his hand. Tattingham sat on a plush sofa, completely nude. Two more featureless flesh golems stood solemnly nearby.
“Well done, lad.” He stood, his manhood dangling, and looked at the three bowls the boy was balancing in his hands; black, red and violet.
“Three colors,” he gasped. His head titled backwards and he looked to the ceiling. “Of course, of course. It makes all the sense in the world now. What a fool I am.” This little terrier was indeed the magi. He had taken the recipe Tattingham had developed over years, read into its meaning and developed the perfect mixture, well beyond the written words on the parchment. “A single color could never contain the full power of the design, of course, boy-oh.” Tattingham lay on his stomach.
“I know black and red, but violet…?”
The child’s eyes dropped to the floor, but offered nothing.
“Oh never mind, never mind. Let’s get on with it,” Tattingham interrupted.
A table had been prepared for Merata—bamboo needles, a small wooden mallet and towels, many towels, and burning incense. The blueprint of the tattoo—two full-sized outlines of a man, of Tattingham—were pinned to the car’s wall. A collage of spiraling shapes, lines and figures covered every inch of the outlines. Eagles and wolves could be made out like constellations within the lines. A large sphinx covered most of the figure’s back and suns covered the breasts.
Good, but still the work of a beginner, a student. The teacher would now complete it. Merata was pushed to the table by his giant escort. The boy set the bowls down and began to pray, washing his face with the sweet smoke of the incense while he silently asked for the strength of the spirits.
“Today, son!” Tattingham snapped and clenched a leather strap in his teeth. The two tattooed golems approached Tattingham and held his arms and legs. They were instructed not to let him up until the boy said he was finished. Tattingham knew he was taking a chance by giving up this level of control, but he couldn’t risk succumbing to the pain and ruining his chance at conquest and redemption.
The Thousand-Year Tattooist, trancelike, moving like a clockwork engine, picked up a bamboo spear, dipped it in the bowl containing black ink and took the mallet in the other hand. The young Merata closed his eyes and tattooed. Tattingham bled and screamed.
Jox sat in the engine of the locomotive, adjusting controls, monitoring gauges. A lesser golem shoveled coal nearby. Jox made faces at the bush-league version of himself. It made him laugh that the creature had no eyes to see and was forced to operate solely by command from the master. If the train’s firebox were to suddenly move, the idiot would shovel coal right onto the floor. Its tattoos were simple and allowed the being only to move the shovel from point A, scoop, rotate to point B and dump. That was it; its entire existence.
Jox, on the other hand, was the tip of the spear, the leading edge in inanimate control and tattoo science. His tattoos gave him the closest thing to cognitive thought and decision-making ability available to an inanimate compilation of human organs and other matter. A smile crept onto Jox’s face. He thought that meant he was happy, but wasn’t sure; the concept of emotion still eluded him, but he was gaining on it every day.
Something appeared in the distance above the towering tree line of hundred-foot pines, something moving. Jox leaned forward and pressed his face to the windshield.
“Oh shit.” Was that fear he felt? Progress.
***
The HMS Lightfoot floated across the sky, her bank of rear propellers whirling, her enormous silver balloon holding above the small cockpit like the very firmament. She was the quickest ship in her majesty’s fleet of dirigibles and was on permanent assignment to the crown’s Special Tasks Division, whose membership consisted wholly of Abner Hornsby and Tapu Ti Puni. The two men zeroed in on the black locomotive, following its churning tower of smoke over the rugged landscape like a signal flag.
Abner stood on the port bridge wing smiling to himself. If Sandford could see them now, he would surely shit his state-issued britches. Abner and Tapu had been under the Queen’s employ for almost twenty years, addressing the most complicated matters and generally saving the world and the throne from men like the ex-Duke on a too-regular basis. It served their ends best by keeping this fact a secret from, well, everyone, especially the local law enforcement who viewed federal involvement as an intrusion and insult. It was best to let them all think the pair a couple of adventuring eccentrics with a penchant for danger.
“As predictable as a dog to a bone, Tapu,” Abner shouted over the howl of the wind. Tattingham maintained a keep, of sorts, in the mountains of northern England guarded by the walking dead and other abominations. “Anchor off the rear car.” Abner stripped off his pilot’s goggles and leather jacket and tucked his trousers into his high boots. Tapu pushed the throttle and the dirigible picked up speed as Abner, feeling the moment, feathered his twin Colt revolvers with the tips of his fingers.
They sailed over the train and Tapu pulled back on the throttle, locked it in place and went to the starboard bridge wing and found a heavy grapple. He twirled the hook and released. It caught the rear safety railing of the caboose. Tapu pulled tight and wrapped the lines around the ship’s bollards. Abner tossed a rope ladder over the side.
“See you in the middle!” Abner swung his leg over the railing and descended the ladder. Tapu, dressed only in a tight loincloth, his tennis whites long gone, closed his eyes and began a traditional war chant, pounding his chest. Glowing a pale yellow, rhythmically pumping with the primal sounds were eight tattooed rings aligned vertically down his back, four on each side, the largest at his shoulder blades, the smallest at the small of his back like the folded wings of a bird.
Tapu grabbed his wahaika, a native stone axe, oval-shaped, twelve inches long and half as wide, from the helm console as his feet lifted from the deck. The circles lit with a steady light, and Tapu went horizontal in the air and flew from the bridge wing, arms stretched out like eagle’s wings. He saluted Abner, who was now stepping onto the rear platform of the caboose.
***
Jox whirled and punched the horn with his huge fist. A steam horn whistled loudly into the air, and he knew that every one of his master’s minions would muster to the call. He checked the speed and temperature once more and turned to find his master’s side when from the corner of his eye he saw a night-black panther with the wings of an eagle coming for the cockpit.
Jox whirled to face it and saw a man, huge and muscular, although not as huge and muscular as Jox, with a black-inked face and wild demon eyes landing on the train’s steps. The intruder was fast and came at him with a club, but Jox sidestepped easily and struck the man with a right uppercut in the ribs. The new tattoos his master had given him itched like mad but had taken wonderfully. The light brown skin flaps of Chang’s tattoo clashed with Jox’s sickly pale color, but their power meshed perfectly. Heavy thread bound them to his biceps and calves, giving him unholy strength and speed, beyond what he already possessed.
The blow hit Tapu like a freight train, sending shock waves of pain through his entire body. He rolled with the blow and delivered a spinning backhand that missed. He followed up with another strike from his wahaika that also missed his intended target but struck the shoveling automaton at the shoulder, cleanly severing the fleshy, putty arm. It dropped to the ground along with the shovel with a clatter. The thing continued its mindless motion of shoveling from A to B, short one arm and one shovel.
Two more lightning-fast body blows hit Tapu, and the air left his lungs in a spray of blood, something cracked inside and he dropped to one knee. The monstrosity grinned at Tapu and stepped in just as Tapu lashed out with the stone blade. The blade dug deep into Jox’s side, slicing through a large serpentine tattoo. He staggered backwards as sutures ripped apart and stapled organs tried to fall out.
Jox stepped back, eyes wide; something had happened, something had changed. He felt weak and out of control. His foot landed on something that rolled under his weight, and as he toppled backwards he saw that it was his dumb cousin’s arm. Who had the last laugh? Jox caught the railing before tumbling from the train and tried to pull himself up while holding back his guts.
Tapu lunged, striking the beast at the wrist and in one bloodless cut removing the hand that held the monster to the train. Jox howled, not in pain but in fear, real fear, at not being able to support his master in his most dire time. In his final moments he had recognized fear, failure and something akin to love. Almost human, he thought before tumbling to the ground, his extreme weight pulling him like an anchor. The relentless locomotive snagged him and pulled him under the rotating wheels. Jox made no sound as he ceased to exist; the tattoos that gave him life ripped apart, their power destroyed.
***
Abner stepped into the caboose and was greeted with a room full of featureless golems; Tattingham’s early work, mindless, their tattoos basic, but still deadly under the wrong handler.
“Hello, gents,” Abner said and drew the Colts. The trick was to find the life tattoo, usually a snake or serpent of some type, but could be a random shape if inked by the right hand, and that would be a problem as these creatures were covered with random shapes.
Lead flew. Golems dropped, but not quickly or in enough numbers. They closed on Abner even as hot lead pierced their putty amalgam forms of recycled flesh and God knew what else, throwing hammer fists as he tried to reload. They drove him backwards in a relentless barrage of blows until his back hit the rear railing and the clanging of steel on steel tracks rang in his ears. His cheek split, nose popped in a rose of blood, and he lost both pistols in the melee.
They grabbed him, lifted him into the air, meaning to toss him overboard or tear him limb from limb, whichever came first. The tension on his joints as they each pulled for their share was immense. Abner fought back a scream with gritted teeth.
The golems raised him in the air, and he felt weightless for an instant as his body momentarily won the eternal battle against gravity. The track raced away beneath him in a blur. This is it. This is how Abner Hornsby meets his maker. Good luck, Tapu, give ’em the Queen’s hell. Sorry I couldn’t have been a better service.
Then something brushed over his face, something rough hewn, not smooth like devilish flesh. He instinctually grabbed for it and found it. It was Lightfoot’s ladder.
The momentum of the throw swung Abner like a pendulum. He hung in the air momentarily, at the end of his arc, staring at the pale pink creatures that stood like columns, sightless, thinking him dashed upon the tracks. He began his return trip back towards the train and stuck his legs out, forming a human battering ram. The golems parted like ten pins as he broke through; several took their leave over the sides and broke apart on the rocky crags.
Abner released the ladder as he entered the car and skidded across the floor. He jumped to his feet and shut the rear door, locking out the surviving beasts.
“Now then,” he said, found his pistols and stepped through to the next car.
The lighting was dim, the room in disarray. A small boy lay in a heap in the far corner. Two golems stood slouched in the center of the car. Abner’s presence did not seem to bother them. Tattingham sat slouched on a sofa, his back to Abner. He was nude and dripping with blood and ink. Angry lines of inflamed flesh marked the ultimate design. They were too late. The magi had done his work.
“Hello, Abner,” Duke Tattingham said, not turning around.
Abner checked his pistols, found that they were empty, and reloaded. Tattingham chuckled.
“It’s far too late for that, old friend,” he said.
Tapu burst through the opposite door and squared off, ready for more battle. He was bleeding and battered, wild eyed and grinning. Scraps of flesh putty clung to his body and dripped off his blade.
“Ah, we have a quorum at last. I wouldn’t think of starting without you, Tapu.” Standing, Tattingham stuck his arms out and turned in a circle for the men. “Look upon me, gentlemen, if only to go to your graves with the image of perfection still dancing in your little minds.”
“I’ve had enough fun for one day, ex-Duke,” Abner said then aimed and fired the Colts. The rounds struck the man in a series of tiny red explosions, but Tattingham simply smiled at his nemesis. The duke dug his finger in one wound, twirled it around and stuck the finger in his mouth.
“Ahhh,” he said. “Now my turn.” He closed his eyes and began to chant. The ink that covered him began to glow, and as Tapu had earlier, Tattingham levitated into the air. He brought his hands together in a double fist, which he pointed at Abner. “Goodbye.”
A bright blue-white light shot from his hands and struck Abner in the chest, knocking him across the room. Abner fought for breath, clutched at his smoldering chest and tried to stand, but collapsed. Tapu let out a war cry and charged Tattingham, leapt, but was repelled by an invisible barrier and was thrown backwards like a rag doll. Tattingham threw his head back and laughed.
“Isn’t it glorious?” he shouted, reaching for the heavens. “The world is mine!”
But his victory cry was cut short with a wince of pain.
He winced again, longer this time, and hissed through his teeth against the building pain. The glowing faded and he dropped to his feet and began to scratch at his skin. “What’s going on? What’s happening?” Panic laced his voice. “It burns!” He whirled on the unconscious boy. “What have you done?”
The patterns of violet ink began to glow red, then ignited. The red and black followed, and soon Tattingham was a screaming ball of blue flame. He ran for the boy, yelling madly, “You! You!”
Tapu regained his footing and ran for the child as Abner found the strength for one more go and raked lead across the serpent tattoo spanning the golem’s legs. The creature dropped silently like a sack in front of Tattingham, who tripped over the hulk and went down hard. Tapu snatched the limp boy up in his arms and rolled past the flames’ fringe. The plush carpeting ignited, and soon the entire car was engulfed in a white-hot inferno.
“I’d say that’s our cue,” Abner said.
***
Abner stepped into the stone room. The young boy lay on a straw mat. A demure maid held a bowl to his mouth and helped him sip from it. Abner coughed gently and the maid looked up and bowed her way out of the room.
“You’re well?” Abner said.
The boy nodded. They stared at each other. A proverbial elephant stood in the corner.
“So?” Abner asked.
“Mr. Hornsby,” the boy said, looking to Abner like the Thousand-Year Tattooist for the first time since they’d rescued him days earlier, sage and old beyond his years, “you are a traveled man?”
“Of course.”
“And you have seen many tattoos?”
“Yes,” Abner said. “Where are you going with this?”
“And you know your colors?”
“I’m no Tapu, but I’m no slouch either.”
“Black?”
“All colors. The binding color, the color of control.”
“Red?” Merata continued.
“Dominance, war, bloodshed.”
“Violet?”
Abner thought for a moment, but had nothing to offer.
“How many violet tattoos have you seen in all your travels, Mr. Hornsby?” Merata said.
“Well, none,” Abner conceded. “What is the color for, Merata?”
There was a long silence before the boy spoke. “Humility, Mr. Hornsby. Violet is the color of humility; a quality not often found in man.” He sat up. “Power must always be balanced with humility. There must be balance. You needn’t fear your doomsday tattoo.” The ancient child sat forward. “Those with the arrogance to seek it do not possess the humility to bear it.”
“A push, as they say,” Abner said, astonished. “There’s another one for the books.”
#####
The End
Sean lives in central Oklahoma with his beautiful wife Tammy. They share their home with a couple of short haired felines and a pair of three legged dogs. His short fiction can be found in various anthologies, e-zines and periodicals. Check out his blog at seanegraham.blogspot.com.
Also by Sean Graham…
Henderson Hell Machine
Featured in ‘Monster Mash’ by Pill Hill Press
Lee’s Decision
Featured in ‘Gone with the Dirt’ by Pill Hill Press
Five Minutes in Africa
Featured in ‘Dark Things’ by Pill Hill Press
Dummies
Featured in ‘Dark Things II’ by Pill Hill Press
Dimensionator
Featured in ‘Dark Things III’ by Pill Hill Press
Shag 3000
Featured in ‘Dark Things IV’ by Pill Hill Press
Jacob Fine Clothiers
Featured in ‘365 Days of Flash’ by Pill Hill Press
The Crick
Featured in ‘Cup of Joe’ by Wicked East Press
Allergy Season
Featured in ‘Seasons of the Abyss’ by Blood Bound Books
(To be released in 1st quarter of 2011)
Remember Us
Featured in ‘Seasons of the Abyss’ by Blood Bound Books
(To be released in 1st quarter of 2011)
Johnson’s Hot Tubs
Featured at Deathheadgrin.com, August 2010 Issue
Decisions, Decisions
Featured in Bloodmoon Rising Magazine, January 2011 Issue
Ten Count
Featured at Deathheadgrin.com, June 2011 issue
Axe-Mart
Featured in ‘Short Sips: Coffee House Flash’ by Wicked East Press
Released December 2011
…and you can download the first edition of the 1%ers series They Rode Personal Transportation Vehicles now on Smashwords!