Some months back I was approached by Dark Discussions host-founder Philip Perron about doing cover art and contributing a story for an upcoming anthology called Canopic Jars: Tales of Mummies and Mummification. Actually, that rather lengthy title hadn't been thought up yet. Phil just said that the theme was Canopic Jars and or Mummies, and maybe even some mummification. Initially I agreed to the cover art, but didn't commit to a story because I am hip deep in writing my new book and didn't think I could afford the time or distraction. Besides, what could I write about mummies that hadn't already been written? So I agreed to support the project artistically, which was being spearheaded by Great Old Ones Publishing and Phil suddenly became my conduit to two other gentlemen: DB Poirier and Gregory L. Norris.
During my off time I did a couple of conceptual pieces, that I bounced off to Phil, who in turn bounced to Poirier and Norris. The initial drawings were rough, but as time went on they began to come together and suddenly a little piece of magic occurred. Art is a medium I often use when I write, but it is not the only medium. Either through art or photography or even music my muse sometimes whispers and when this happens, it pays to listen. In this case, the cover I was putting together began to awaken a story that might be suitable for the Mummy Jar Anthology.
I sent off a new cover and began thinking about my first book THE EQUINOX, but more specifically a character from the book. A Chicago Police Detective named Sean Woodman who made a brief appearance in the beginning and near the end of that book as a supporting character. I liked Sean Woodman, he was smart, tough and he would never find resolution to a string of serial murders that occurred on his watch. Woodman simply came into the story early on and turned up later on when another string of bizarre killings took place in a little town called Thomasville after the Chief of Police contacted him about a possible connection.
I always wondered what had become of Woodman and suddenly as I stared into the piece which would become the front cover and another piece that would end up as the rear cover, my muse didn't just whisper, but began to rant. "Take him back to the Run-off. Run-off 31!" And so my fingers did their ritualistic drunken dance n the keyboard as the story spilled out and onto the page. I was done the piece in about three hours. I toiled over it for a day or two. Sent it to Writer Pal, R. James Steel. He sent it back and I gave it another going over. Then I forwarded it onto Phil, who in turn took it to the boys and they accepted it.
Along with my piece there are also stories submitted by Gord Rollo, B.E. Scully some guy named HP Lovecraft and many many more. I have had a chance to read a few of these stories and have to say that there is some real treasures in this book. Who knew that there could be so many interesting variations on the Mummy tale. Go out and grab a copy of this book, if not to read something by me, but to get a candy dish of different tales from which you can sample one at a time or gorge yourself completely. Either way, the fix will be a rush so check out the link at the end of this post.
With that in mind, I'm going to borrow from B.E. Scully and post an excerpt from my story Run-off 31. I say borrow, because Scully did the same thing in her blog, so I am openly admitting that this is not an original idea. Without further adieu here is an excerpt from Canopic Jars: Tales of Mummies and Mummification.
Run-off 31
by MJ Preston
1
The
bodies started turning up in late July. Before long, police began to
think that this was not the work of one serial killer, but two,
possibly even three. The only flaw in this thinking lay in the fact
that every victim had been left with an identical incision from solar
plexus to belly button. Some of the detectives called them the 'X
Killings', because carved into each victims belly was an X that was
not a symbol, but the end result of evisceration. The reason they
speculated the killings couldn't possibly be committed by one
perpetrator, the sheer number of victims. To date there were 44, and
the dead weren't more than a day or two old when they began turning
up. Now, into the end of August, meant only one thing, the killer or
killers, were claiming a victim a day on average, with the odd
double.
Sean
Woodman was not assigned to the case, he wasn't even a cop anymore,
but he followed closely through the papers. It reminded of a case
he'd worked back in his days as a Chicago Police Detective. A case
that was never closed. He'd been young and cocky back then, but along
with his damn-the-torpedoes attitude, he also had a talent for seeing
things others missed. And with the exception of that one unsolved
case, he'd cleared a lot of murders. Those cleared cases garnished a
respect which would eventually pave the way to a door plate which
read: Deputy Chief of
Police. That was the
end of the line for Woodman. He wasn't a cop anymore, just a PR man
who practiced politics with the best of them. Truth was, he hated it.
He missed the smell of an unsolved case and made it his business to
poke his head in on a task force or two to get a whiff of that scent.
At
first they thought he was some crazy micro-manager from upstairs. But
Woodman proved a great help to his fellow officers; and even better,
he took zero credit. Word got around, and after a while the task
force cops to start coming to him for insight.
Chief
Jorgenson didn't like it when Woodman got down in the trenches with
the troops. Woodman thought that dislike was born out of resent.
Jorgenson had been an career pencil pusher and had no cred with the
cops he commanded. Although Jorgenson disapproved, there was no real
reason to put a halt to Woodman's actions. He balanced his position
as Deputy Chief with an occasional task force consultation quite
well. When a case cleared, the Chief did what any politician would
do. He held a press conference – congratulated his officers, and
basked unabashedly in their success.
Then
the unthinkable happened to Woodman. The unthinkable being, a car
accident that resulted in the death of his wife Jesse. Then there was
the trace amounts of alcohol in his bloodstream that hardly
registered .04 on the breathalyzer. He hadn't blown enough to be
charged, he wasn't legally drunk, but Jesse was gone and when word
got out, the media hooked onto him like a pariah. They dogged him
about the accident, and about how much he'd drank after someone
leaked the blood alcohol tests.
His
career ended in much the same way Jesse's life ended. Abrupt and
without mercy. He found himself standing before the Mayor and Chief
Jorgenson. On either side, like book ends, a Public Relations Bitch
and the City Lawyer. Set neatly on a table before them, a stack of
paper roughly an inch and a half thick.
That's
the “The Big Fuck You”,
he thought. Somewhere through that he heard the Mayor offering words
of regret, and there was even a round of condolence. But was it was
hollow, the papers on that table spoke more about what was at play
than these four assholes put together. In the end he did the only
thing he could do. He signed his resignation, took a handsome buyout
and left them to pat each other on the back. That was the end of Sean
Woodman's career in the Chicago Police Department. And though he was
gone, he never forgot that one big case that got away. The one with
the Indian named Blackbird and the bodies of women they found in the
Chicago sewers. They had also been eviscerated, but the belly's of
those girls had been torn open. They called the case Little Big Horn,
because on the evening of the last murder there had been an exchange
of fire which included the use of a cross bow. Considering that
Daniel Blackbird had been of Native descent and was the one firing
the arrows, the name stuck.
Scott
Emmett showed up on his doorstep with a case file thicker than a city
phone book. He liked Emmett, but he was adamant that his days as a
cop were over. Emmett was the son-in- law of his partner and best
friend, Brad Rosedale. Coincidentally, Rosedale had been a part of
that forgotten case as well. Unlike Woodman, Brad moved on. In fact
he moved all the way on down to Tennessee; somewhere between
Nashville and Memphis with his third wife.
“I
can't do this Scott. In fact if Jorgenson found out you were on my
doorstep you could find yourself in deep shit. You could lose your
job.”
“Well,
normally I'd say fuck Jorgenson, but to be honest, he sanctioned this
visit,” Emmett replied.
“Don
Jorgenson told you to come see me?”
“Yeah.”
Woodman
laughed, not because it was funny, but because he couldn't believe
the bastard would have the nerve. “Nothing personal Scott, but you
can tell Jorgenson to could go fuck himself.”
“We
need your help Sean.”
“Why
should I care? I'm not a cop anymore.”
“The
last one was a 10 year-old girl.”
“Jesus
Christ.” Woodman sighed and pushed open the screen door.
END EXCERPT
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If you want to check out this story and others, grab yourself a copy of the book Canopic Jars: Tales of Mummies and Mummification on Amazon.com
