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 the car—shambling footsteps from behind—all these last sounds and images felt with a resurgence of power—pain, terrible pain and screaming fear!—the darkness strong, peaking before starting to drain away—fading, wasting away—until there was only light…
Inside her, I reeled under the pressure of it all, some of her terror left with me. I willed myself to be calm, aware that if those last sensations had gone on any longer I would have fled the cold flesh that now bound me. I felt myself trembling, even though that wasn’t possible. Her death had been horrible and the suffering had continued even after the heart had stopped.
I steadied myself. I was in a void; nothing else of the woman was left. The body was without any trace of its previous owner.
It was time for me to subjugate it. I prayed for it to be possible.
I settled my mind and it was surprisingly easy to do. Despite everything I’d been witness to that night, despite my fear and anxiety, I soothed my own consciousness by repeating the exercise I had used to travel outside my own body.
Deep, deep breaths (pretend breaths now, obviously), long, long exhalations. Addressing each part of my non-physical form, starting with the absent toes and moving up my non-existent legs, then invisible groin, working my way through my impalpable belly, chest, shoulders, arms right to my indiscernible head, willing them all to relax. Then, instead of commanding myself to move out of my physical form (usually by concentrating on one specific spot near the ceiling of whatever room I was in—mostly the bedroom—and willing my inner self to go there), I forced myself to become part of the vessel I now inhabited. That in life I’d been much bigger than the unfortunate woman seemed to make no difference—I still had to “fill out” her human shape. I felt myself flow into her, strangely expanding rather than shrinking, sensing myself into her muscles and bones and organs. Occasionally, a fragment of her memory would return, but always too weak to linger.