Never Burn A Witch: A Rowan Gant Investigation (11 page)

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I was
becoming convinced I could hear her screaming.

“There was an odd residue in her mouth.” The
M.E. had taken a scalpel from the tray, working as she spoke. “I
took a sample for the lab. I’m not quite sure what it is but it
appeared to be synthetic. Like plastic.”

A bright flash of the young woman’s torture
stabbed into my grey matter like a blunt arrow. Ravenous tendrils
of yellow-orange flame raked across her flesh, hungrily rending it
from her bones. An anguished scream fought to tear free from her
throat, only to be detained by the soggy mass that filled her
mouth; denied exit by the tightly stretched fabric that had once
been an article of her clothing. A pitiful nasal whine was all she
could manage as tears rolled down her cheeks and vaporized steamily
in the intensifying heat.

I blinked away the talon of agony that raked
through my brain and cleared my throat. I could still feel the
thick gag in my own mouth.

“It IS plastic,” I volunteered in a quiet,
scratchy voice. “Nylon. He gagged her with her own pantyhose so she
couldn’t scream. They probably melted in the heat.”

The sound of Ben scribbling in his notebook
filled the silence that followed my comment.

Doctor Sanders held the scalpel in mid-air
above the young woman’s chest and stared back at me, unblinking.
“I’ll mention that to the lab,” she finally said.

This wasn’t the first time she had
experienced one of my ethereal revelations, and she definitely
wasn’t the skeptic she had once been. On the other hand, she
certainly wasn’t as used to them as Ben, and I understood that at
times the intimacy of my visions could be somewhat disturbing.

Turning back to the job at hand, almost
painfully oblivious to our presence, she proceeded to make a
Y-shaped incision in the trunk of the body. She first carefully
forced the blade through the cauterized skin then into what
remained of the softer flesh beneath. With three smooth strokes,
she exhibited skill gained by years in the profession and it became
instantly apparent to me why Ben called her “the best of the
best.”

The arms of the Y curved upward below the
breasts and to the shoulders. The tail extended downward to the
pubic area. With the deep incision made, still using the scalpel,
she proceeded to peel back the burned tissues and muscle. She
displayed nowhere near the cold, unfeeling demeanor of the M.E. we
had met in this room earlier in the day. However, her professional
detachment was evident as she pulled the “chest flap” upward to
expose the front of the ribcage.

In a fleeting thought, I was reminded of what
a perverted killer had done to his victims those few months ago.
Mercilessly skinning each of them for a purpose I was happier not
knowing. One primary difference was that his victims had been among
the living and conscious when he began cutting.

“In case you are interested, Mister Gant,
what I am preparing to do is remove the chest plate. This will
allow me to extract the internal organs in one block. This is
something we medical examiners refer to as the ‘Rokitansky
Method.’”

She glanced quickly over at my motionless
form before proceeding. The scalpel clattered noisily against the
metal tray where she dropped it. Then she wrapped her gloved hand,
smeared with blood, around a somewhat larger device.

“I’m not exactly sure how you do what it is
that you do, Mister Gant.” She had returned her attention to the
corpse as she spoke to me. “Or, how it is that you know the things
you know...but, if it would help at all, please feel free to come
closer. Just don’t touch anything.”

I didn’t move. My eyes were still fixed in
the direction of the autopsy table even though the clarity of focus
had long since fled. The macabre scene had taken on the blurred,
grainy appearance of a poorly received image on an old television.
Colors were hastily blooming and collapsing—bleeding into one
another in a palette gone berserk as rushing noises filled my ears.
Doctor Sanders continued speaking for the recorder, and her words
became thick mouthfuls of gibberish joining with the mutated
cadence of the background music. My vision tunneled and fire danced
across my skin as I realized too late what was happening.

The angry, high-pitched cry of a Stryker saw
meeting bone neatly pierced the roaring in my ears. Physical
reality spun uncontrollably into formless void as I joined with the
young woman on the metal table. Her recent pain was no longer
confined solely to somewhere in the back of my thoughts.

Everywhere in my mind, I heard her
screaming.

My mouth tastes tinny.

Metallic.

Electric.

Blistered.

Raw.

My chest is shrieking in protest. I can feel
my flesh being smoothly peeled back, as though I am being violently
wrenched inside out. With each passing second, I become aware of
more nerve endings being delivered naked and screaming into the
cold antiseptic air.

“Why is she doing that?” a weeping feminine
voice asks.

I search through slitted eyes while gritting
my teeth against the pain.

I try to turn and suddenly I find myself
slowly spinning.

Twisting lazily on an unfelt breeze.

Floating.

“Why is she doing that to me?” the voice asks
again.

“Where are you?” I ask as I continue to turn
lethargically in a formless void.

I can see no one.

I can see nothing.

“Who are you?” I call out through my
agony.

“Why is she cutting me like that?” The voice
is beyond weeping. She is sobbing now. Her words break off in hard
bewildered pieces between each breath, tumbling forth and
shattering in my ears, “Haven’t I been through enough?”

A violent sensation, making agony seem a mere
discomfort, bites into my side, gnashing at my bones with countless
glittering metal teeth.

My body stiffens.

A tortured cry fills the void.

An angry crimson wail explodes inside my
skull.

I’m falling.

Spiraling downward.

Faster.

Faster.

I crash into nothing and splinter into a
thousand obsidian shards reflecting the inky darkness. Absorbing
and smothering all that is light.

“Mister Gant?” Doctor Sanders’ voice mimics
itself in a grotesque parody of speech, casually piercing the
ethereal veil. “Did you want to come closer?”

Gradually, I open my eyes.

The black formless void still envelops
me.

I can’t see.

Where am I?

Who am I?

Something is tightly stretched across my
mouth.

Between my teeth.

It bites into the corners of my lips,
abrading them roughly before continuing its constriction around my
head.

My mouth tastes of plastic.

Of sweat.

Of blood.

I cannot speak.

I cannot scream.

I can only cry.

“Mister Gant?”

I’m nude.

I’m cold.

I cannot move.

My arms are extended above me, and something
rigidly encircles my wrists. I can feel my flesh being torn. I can
feel the trickles of my own blood running along my skin from the
wounds, mixing with sweat and forming rivulets from the headwaters
of my pain.

My mind is numbed by the agony. My muscles
are stretched beyond their limits.

Something cold and hard cinches my
ankles.

It pulls stiffly downward, unyielding.

The stress threatens to tear me in half.

Sharp spasms rack the muscles along my back,
and I arch against it. Bucking against my bonds as best I can.

If it weren’t for the pain, I would swear I
was already dead.

A soft-edged whimper escapes my throat.

Hoarse but distinctly feminine.

Who am I?

I cannot remember.

I only know that I am not who I am supposed
to be.

It’s dark.

I can’t see.

Where am I?

Who am I?

“Holy fuckin’ shit! Goddammit!” Ben’s voice
was echoing distantly. “He’s done this before and the last time his
friggin’ heart stopped.”

Doctor Sanders’ voice followed thickly, her
words ricocheting from his. “What do you mean his heart
stopped?”

“I mean it just fuckin’ stopped! He almost
died.”

“Calm down, Storm! He still has a pulse.
Mister Gant? Mister Gant, can you hear me?”

My ears discern the mournful squeal of rusted
hinges.

I’ve been in the darkness for what seems an
eternity.

A faint light filters in from above, and it
is almost blinding.

How long have I been here?

I strain to lift my head.

My ears have grown
accustomed to the unbroken silence,
and the
mechanical snap of a light switch comes like a gunshot.

I can even hear the hum of the electricity as
it arcs along the contacts.

A bare incandescent bulb ignites above me,
casting harsh streams of light.

I wrench my head away, regretting the act the
moment the pain it brings bludgeons me. I blink. I regret that
too.

Even blinking hurts.

Slowly, biting back the stabs of misery, I
raise my face once again to look around.

I peer cautiously through the stringy mats of
my long, flame red hair as it hangs in front of my face, and I try
to focus on my surroundings.

A rough concrete wall, grey and pitted with
age, confronts me. A large crucifix adorns its otherwise blank
emptiness. Countless unlit white candles of all shapes and sizes
cover a small wooden table before the shrine.

I am in what appears to be a basement.

Biting hard on the gag in my mouth, I tilt my
head farther back, squinting my eyes against the harsh light.

Black iron shackles encompass my scraped,
blood crusted wrists. Connected by a heavy chain, they are affixed
securely above.

I am hanging from a thick beam.

I am suspended from the rafters.

The small amount of strength I mustered is
fleeting at best, and my head tilts back forward of its own accord,
bringing my chin to heavily meet my chest.

Breasts.

I am a woman.

Something sequestered in the nether regions
of my mind tells me that this isn’t right. I am not supposed to be
a woman. Or am I?

I have no idea who I AM supposed to be.

Slow, deliberate thudding partnered with the
doleful cry of creaking wood meets my ears and chases my latest
revelation away from immediacy—along with its still unanswered
questions.

Someone is coming.

HE is coming.

Unfettered, acidic terror rips outward from
my abdomen and singes me.

Something warm begins to run down my inner
thighs and splatters wetly to the floor.

I have no control as my bladder releases.

I begin to cry.

A strangely familiar feminine voice stretches
itself past me in a textbook example of Doppler distortion. “Help
me get him on the free table over there.”

“Nooooooooooooo!” My scream is muffled by the
soggy, biting fabric in my mouth.

A mechanical sound reaches me, felt as well
as heard.

Tick, tick… Click!

Tick, tick… Click!

Tick, tick, tick… Click!

My body tenses as I feel my shoulders slowly
and simultaneously ripped from their sockets. Something is pulling
down against my ankles and my legs are straining to remain joined
with the rest of my body.

The metallic click of a gear ratcheting
reverberates again.

Tick, tick. Click!

Tick! Clunk!

“Nooooooooooooo.” My cry is no more than a
meek whimper.

Muscles and tendons are
tearing. Various spots along my upper back spasm and snap like
broken rubber bands.
White-hot projectiles
of torment race through my nervous system at a quickening
pace.

Bursting like bullets from my chest, they
only turn to re-enter and retrace every inch over and over
again.

It is more than I can stand.

As the light begins to fade, I can see his
shadow on the floor in front of me, large and foreboding. I can
barely hear muffled words.

Something about proof of my crimes.

Something about proof of my heresy.

Something about evidence to validate my
“confession.” Something about begging the forgiveness of God.

Darkness overwhelms me.

A deep voice echoes to me. Someone I should
know. A name comes to mind. Ben. “Come on, white man, you
sonofabitch! Don’t you die on me!”

I am no longer in the basement.

I am outside.

I am still nude.

It is freezing.

Icy wind is slicing through me like a
razor.

My arms are bound behind me, as if it
mattered. They hang limp and useless from my shoulders. I am
secured to something that is rough against my back. It feels like a
post or a tree, but I can’t be sure.

The pain is the only thing of which I am
positive.

Even the frigid night cannot kill the
pain.

I can taste something oily and acrid mixing
with the blood in my mouth.

Something strong.

Something caustic.

It numbs my tongue and burns my nostrils.

The smell of it is familiar.

The memory tickles my brain.

Something about light.

Something about warmth.

Kerosene.

It is kerosene and I can feel it splashing
down my body.

Dripping.

Corrosively eating away at my open
wounds.

“Kendra Darlene Miller.” A dark voice accuses
me, “You have openly admitted your crimes of heresy and of engaging
in the practice of WitchCraft.”

An enormous, gloved hand roughly grasps my
jaw and forces my face upward.