Wednesday, November 27, 2013

"Checkmark"

     Hello everyone, and Happy Thanksgiving! Since most of you will have the day off tomorrow and may or may not be watching the football game with a plate of turkey resting comfortably on your chest, I thought it might be nice to post a new short story I recently finished. I have been experimenting with coming up with new characters to introduce to the "Requiem" universe, and in my opinion, a hero is only as good as his villain roster. So, today I introduce the world to Checkmark, a self righteous killer who tattoos his victims with a list, and then proceeds to check those items off the list with his blades. I assure you, no turkey's were harmed in the making of this story. However, I do have a disclaimer that this story, that although an origin for Checkmark, it does get gruesome at times. Writing this story was an experiment for me because I don't normally write in 2nd person POV and I don't know of many stories that take everything away from the reader and force them to sit in place of the victim. I have had some really good feedback about this story, and some really bad feedback just the same; and I hope that since this piece is still in the revision stages that you guys will give me some feedback. Thanks and have a fantastic Turkey Day.







"Checkmark"
by Christopher A. Kouse
            You wake up blindfolded. Your mouth held closed. After a moment passes you come to the conclusion that your bonds are made entirely out of duct tape; you would know that rubbery taste anywhere even if it were coated with sugar; that pungent stench still finds a way to seep through your nostrils. Your wrists, your ankles, all held firm to the chair. The texture of the bonds leads you to believe they are from the same material wrapped around your mouth. A slight pain begins to tingle through the amnesia in your arms and legs. Even the front of your neck has a slight tickling sensation that sets you off into borderline madness. The Who’s, What’s, and Where am I’s are the only thing you have left to call your own-- other than to listen for the approaching footsteps from beyond the barrier of shrouded sight.
            “If you had to, could you recognize yourself?”
The blindfold is rushed off of your head with a disregard for comfort. The light billows down from a single lamp that’s light makes up your world. You notice that beyond what the light touches there is nothing; only darkness. The hand of the mysterious speaker reaches out from within the darkness with a gloved, open palm. Within his hand rests a porcelain mask with the same features of your face. You immediately recognize this mask as one you created a long time ago, somewhere, in another time and place. How did he get his hands on that?
“So, I see you do recognize yourself. Hard not to, it’s almost an exact likeness. It’s well made. The work of someone with skilled hands no doubt. However, there is one flaw,” the speaker turns the mask over to reveal it’s hollowed out self. “It’s empty.”
With an effortless and precise twist the hand crushes the mask, allowing the shards, now covered in blood, to fall to the ground. One by one the tiny orchestra of bouncing porcelain fragments echoes off of the floor; and in hearing them your world grows by momentously into the darkness, but only to be twisted with the maniacal laughter of the figure looming just beyond the shroud.
“Oh, don’t look so sad. You can always make another one, but still- perfection is long far off.”
Your eyes wander away from the hand and look towards the source of the voice; and as the hand retreats beyond the beam of light and back into the realm of dark, a face emerges to meet yours. It’s the eyes that first grab your attention; black, nocturnal, void of emotion-- except that of maybe pleasure. The face is covered by a thin material; silk perhaps, and although you have no idea of who is behind this mask, you know exactly who it is, and your hope of getting out of this alive dissolves within the cold recesses of his eyes.
“I can hear those cogs turning as loud as church bells in that little head of yours- at least you’re using it for something other than a…”
You try to give a rebuttal but the words are swallowed by the gag.
 “What’s that?” the figure leans in closer with one ear as if sarcastically trying to listening. He then sharply pulls away. Although you can’t see it clearly, you can make out the line of his smiling lips through the mask.
“No, you don’t get to speak. You’ve been doing that for years. Your logic has made me sick and now I have the stage—or at least…”
He reaches down to your legs which bring attention to the two on your arms and two on your legs. You can’t see it, but you assume there is a third on your neck where the pain sensations have been coming from. The figure grabs and quickly rips the bandages that were wrapped around your legs off. The sharp ripping sensation exposes the hidden flesh to the pungent air.
The sharp sudden pain of the adhesive is mild in comparison to what you expect is to come. You know this creature and the torments he is capable of. In your thoughts, one word becomes clear to describe this vile person, the only word- Checkmark. You look down; see the freshly completed work of a master. On your left leg you make out the word Death, and on your right leg it reads the word Experience. Above each word rests the outline of a box looking to be filled with regret. Immediately, Checkmark lowers his head to your thigh where he can catch your gaze.
"Beautiful, isn't it?" His head cradles the leg marked Death and kisses the box through his thin veil with a promiscuous embrace. He rises from your leg and adjusts his gloves to regain the tight feel in the fingertips. As he turns from you he walks back into the darkness from whence he came.
"Your eyes give you away, you do realize that don't you?" You hear a shuffling of metal sliding along metal in the darkness. Your heartbeat becomes quicker as the footsteps begin to pace forward in your direction again. God! Somebody help me.
"God cannot help you now. This is for your own good and you fear your own death to a fault. Always wondering when your time will come; could it be today, could it could be tomorrow- but now I will release you from your burden."
You are blinded for only a moment by the reflection of the light as it bounces off the sword. You wince twice, the first time to protect your eyes from the light, the second, to mask your scream as it is stifled through your gag. You open your eyes wide to the sound of metal piercing flesh. Your eyes wide and your heart beating outside of your chest as you feel the cold steel begin to cool off the meaty interior of your leg.
"You fear me...although I would too if I were in your position, but you know what I am capable of; you know who I am and what tonight is all about." Checkmark slowly twists the blade at an angle and drags it through your flesh. His skill is perfect and his strength inhuman.
The pain is only bearable because of your restraints; if not for them you would be pouncing and kicking and screaming and, Oh God make it stop! With a tightened grip around the hilt of the blade, Checkmark removes it oh so delicately from your flesh. You jerk in your bonds trying to get free, but they are unforgiving, much like your captor. It takes only a moment for the stinging pain to subside and as you begin to feel the warm red liquid ooze from your wound, it brings a sense of understanding and calm washes over you in waves. It’s impossible to make the distinction between ecstasy and endorphins. You examine the artist’s handiwork for the first time and it is painfully beautiful. No jagged edges, no flesh missing, just a clean cut in a perfect V like fashion with one line longer than the other. You tell yourself the worst is over...isn’t it?
***
An hour passes; maybe more. Time begins to have no meaning when you lose control. The slow burn in your left leg where the cut was made just a while ago has become numb from the loss of blood. Your vision, the only thing that you can control, begins to deceive you. Left alone with your thoughts, your vivid imagination about what Checkmark is planning when he comes back sends chills down your spine. Perhaps he never left. Between the loss of blood and the constant state of shock you have been in, at one point in time during the last hour you could have sworn that you saw his face staring back at you from the darkness. That was the difference between your world and his, the dark is always more readily, and easily accessible; he resided within the dark, and it’s always easy to see those in the light when looking from the shadows.
“…(whistling your favorite tune)…”
You hear the slow tapping of shoes touching the floor; the sound moving towards you. It seems so far away. How big is this room? Next comes the sound of a slow drag of steel gliding along concrete. Your breathing begins to increase. The memory of the pain in your leg begins to return. You know he is coming back and there is nothing you can do to stop it. You look down at the tattoo marked Experience on your right leg and wonder what gives him the right to judge. How does he know? The skin under the bandage on your chest begins to itch again, sure to be the last to be revealed in this sick and twisted game. What could I have done to deserve this? You are sure that anyone in your position would be asking the same question, but instead of an answer, you know that no one believes that they deserve this kind of punishment, when in fact, maybe… just maybe they do. Do I?
“Sorry about the hold up.” Checkmark emerges from the darkness before you. “I hope I haven’t kept you waiting for long. I know you hate me and believe me I do know; but you can’t really blame me for showing you the flaws in yourself.”
            Checkmark begins to circle you counterclockwise, still dragging the tip of his sword along the floor. “Tonight is about a purging of sins,” he comes to a halt behind you. “-and after tonight you will thank me.” You see the blade come from above your head slowly and rest its tip in the middle of the square tattoo on your right leg. As the tip presses ever so lightly on your skin you see a tiny teardrop of crimson roll down the side of your leg. You know the judgment is coming, and you hold your breath with quick fleeting hope.
            “You lack experience.” Checkmark begins to tease your skin by turning the blade as if trying to make up his mind. “What have you done with your life? You have nothing to show for the way it has been lived so far.” You feel pressure being applied to the blade and your senses run wild with the loss of control. “You have become content with your life and that cannot be tolerated.” The blade is surgical this time. Slowly piercing and twisting. Your eyes roll back in your head as you let out a moan of agony from behind the gag. The muscles tighten as you try to pull yourself off of the blade as it is masterfully turned to make the intersecting point of the checkmark into your flesh.
            The blade is slowly pulled from you and you wish for the numbing sensation that you have in your other leg to set in quickly. Checkmark rotates your chair to face him and he kneels so that his eyes meet yours. “You are being such a good sport about this. I know you would just love to get your hands on me, but really—what would do? Soon you will see what a great friend you have in me.” You notice a smile form behind his mask again. A different word comes to your mind other than friend to describe him, and you convey that message through the look in your eyes. “I can see you need some time to yourself, but first let me give you something to dwell on.”
            Checkmark grabs a hold of both bandages on your arms and with little effort he rips them from your body. The pain this time pales in comparison to that which courses through your legs. Checkmark drops the bandages and slowly walks backwards into the darkness, his right hand up giving a tiny wave of goodbye. You look down unsurprised to see two new tattoos; one on your left arm, and the other on your right. Your heart drops seeing the words Ambition and Responsibility beautifully designed with two empty square boxes just waiting to be filled. Although you fear what comes next, the location of the last bandage is still what scares you the most.
***
The coolness and the drowning sensation of a glass of water being poured onto your head wake you from the safety of a dream. Waking from a fantasy to a nightmare is the only comparison you make in this situation. The lack of blood running through your legs has left them limp and motionless. You realize that even if you were to manage to get out of this situation, there are no guarantees you would be able to walk again. Your eyes are blurry from the blood loss and the figure of Checkmark before you is a skewed one. What now? The thought runs through your head, what more could he do to you? But, you know the answers to all of your questions. You even know why you are here. Some part of you is able to make sense of all of this, and yet even though futile, you still resist him to the last drop of your essence.
            “Still with us I see.” The image of Checkmark tears through your dilated eyes like removing a pair of prescription glasses.
            “Although, I don’t think you have much left in you so, I tell you what I am going to do. As much as I have enjoyed your company, the night is so very young and I have other places to be, more art to make and other lives to save. So, let’s speed this up.” Checkmark reaches behind him into the dark. You hear the grinding of steel on concrete first, and make out the frame of a chair being pulled towards you. The chair spins effortless on one leg in Checkmark’s hands; and even before the chair becomes firmly planted, he falls upon its seat, legs spread as his arms rest upon the top of the high back chair facing you. Your eyes rise to meet his, and his head turns to meet yours. You let your eyes do the speaking for you.
            “Ambition and responsibility,” Checkmark gives a grunt to acknowledge the heft of those words. “I want you to understand that it is you that give these words meaning. One person’s flaws are never the same as another’s. And if you were in my position you would be doing the same for others who are slaves to themselves. The truth is that people hold themselves in contempt-“He reaches behind his head with both arms and frees two blades from their sheaths. “- and I set forth to free them of this self-loathing nature.”
            “Responsibility,” Checkmark aims the tip of one of his swords at the square box on your upper left arm. “You refuse to take it. All your life you have failed to live up to your own expectations. Consistently, you have blamed others for your faults and have refused to take the responsibility of your actions.” He produces the second blade in his left hand and points it towards your left arm marked Ambition. “Ambition- you have none. What a worthless corpse your life has become; an empty shell of regret that you have allowed to consume your life. What happened to the hopes you had as a child- what things you could have seen, the places you could have went and the person you could have become. Let me show you.”
            You try pleading a case with Checkmark with muffled sounds, but he would not hear it. Checkmark rises to his feet and with one firm kick, he sends the chair he was sitting on flying back into the dark. Your attention is so focused on the mad man that you almost fail to notice that there was no loud crash from the chair hitting the floor. With a single thrust from both of his hands, Checkmark sends the blade perfectly into each of your arms with such a strong force that your chair tips over and your head collides with the ground causing you to blackout.
***
            Some time passes until you regain consciousness and it dawns on you that you are sitting upright again and alone. By the time your eyes readjust, the nerve endings in your arms finally send the signals of pain into your brain. Looking at both arms you notice a perfect checkmark shaped sign engraved into each tattoo box. Blood is still seeping from the wounds, but the initial shock of metal penetrating flesh subsided when your head slammed into the ground. The ache in the back of your head causes you to stretch your neck muscles. You are unsure of which was worse, feeling the slow cuts or dealing with a possible spinal injury.
            You notice that the itching just below your neck is gone and you feel a cool breeze brush past the freshly exposed area. Reality begins to sink in that the end is coming, and you struggle to see the tattoo. You know it’s there, it has to be. Why would he do anything different this late in the game? Anxiously you struggle to twist your head to see, but your neck isn’t forgiving. It’s a trick; he wants me to go mad. You calm yourself to make it appear that you aren’t falling into madness. He has to be watching.
            Time seems to slow down and you begin to examine your predicament and all that has happened to you tonight. You notice the pool of crimson at your feet; it has almost entirely blanketed every part of the floor that the light touches. Your world is drowning in blood. I deserve this. You struggle to find some lie in the truth that Checkmark has been preaching tonight, but fail. You are afraid of death, you do refuse to take responsibility, you do lack experience and you don’t have any ambition. What is the final piece of the puzzle!
            You see a light twinkle within the darkness. The light appears to be coming closer and as soon as it reaches the threshold of blood pooled out on the floor, you make the light out to actually be a mirror. You look into the mirror and your heart drops as you read the final tattoo inked into your neck; Martyr, with a square box above it. You feel a vibration run along the back of your chair and realize that your bonds holding your hands have been severed. Within seconds you feel the same sensations cut through the tape on your legs, and they fall free away from the stiff chair. You struggle to reach up to remove your gag, but your head tilts down to meet your hand half way; and although hard to move, you remove the remainder of the tape on your wrists and wait for Checkmark to make himself visible one final time.
***
            His voice pierces from the darkness. “It seems we have a mutual understanding.” You hear him giggle slightly in a disoriented manor. Checkmark walks into the light and you notice the dark outfit he wears is now soaked in his own blood and torn in areas. Cuts are in the form of checkmarks and have been made into his flesh in the exact same way they were impressed upon you. The tattoos are the same as well. You watch as he pulls both blades from his back and looks at them for a moment. “I can find no fault in you for this last test. You cannot force someone to become a martyr.” He fluidly rotates one of the blades in his hand and presents it to you. You struggle from your chair and catch yourself a few times from falling. Your hand reaches out and claims the blade for your own.
            Checkmark reaches up with his blood soaked glove and begins to pull back the mask that shrouds his face. You stand there and face him, the real Checkmark. It is as if looking into a mirror. His face is yours, or my face is his. He presents his chest to you and the tattoo marked Martyr.
            “You have a choice. Take my life and end this momentary torment, or ask me to end your personal hell.”
            You consider his words carefully and search yourself for what you really want. The mark on his chest looks so empty, and the itch returns on your own chest—an itch needing scratched. You rotate the blade towards his chest, and Checkmark readies himself for the final blow…
            You turn the blade on yourself and pierce your own chest, squarely center of the empty box marked Martyr.
***
            You wake up lying on your bed. The nightly breeze from the open balcony of your apartment chills the sweat droplets on your body. You reach up and remove the porcelain mask from your face and sit up right. Directly ahead of you across the room, past the dark, lies a mirror staring back. You see the scars of the self-inflicted wounds within the tattoos marked Death, Responsibility, Experience, Ambition, and Martyr. All filled with perfectly carved checkmarks.
            Lying next to you on the bed is your tattoo kit, on the other side your weapons of choice. You pull the satin mask over your head, pack up your things and head out into the night searching for lives to save.
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