From a Tomb in New Orleans Pt. 01

A woman named Emily falls asleep after having read Call of Cthulhu by HP Lovecraft...

The tentacle wrapped around her head, the suckers latching onto her already ruined face with the power and finality of the vacuum. The pain was excruciating, as pieces of her skin strained to move away from muscles, the sounds of her voice were smothered by the overlarge turban of cephalopod muscle. Then, like the starting cord of a lawn mower, the tentacle jerked away and her face unpeeled. It was not a smooth continuous string of flesh and hair. It was a miniature explosion of viscera and bone. Blood gushed from the stump of her neck, part of her oesophagus was stretched and collapsed over her bare breasts. While her skull was gone, what remained of her spine stuck out like a bit of shattered porcelain. The dying piece of meat hit the blood soaked concrete in a twitching writhing mess. What was once was a very promising sample lay in an undeserving heap. More tentacles ripped the corpse's limbs off and mashed the torso to a pulp. The eggs laid inside could not be allowed to gestate and so a very powerful acid was sprayed over every inch of the gore stewn floor.

As the meat pile liquefied, the nameless creator of its destruction allowed a moment for disappointment. New stock would have to be acquired, and that was always a thankless task. Then the moment expired and was replaced by a lusty greed. New stock that would be worthy this time, a much greater sample size would be collected and surely one of them would survive.

A white tomb in a New Orleans graveyard opens and out steps a man with a briefcase. He is stunning. Short brown hair frames a chiselled face, strong broad features hold two deep brown eyes. His posture is ram rod straight and his suit is expertly tailored to him. He begins to move through the tombstones towards the lights and screaming car horns of the city. When he is at the graveyard gates, a decrepit mortician in a moth eaten evening jacket is waiting at the guard post and hands him a wallet and key ring wordlessly. The man opens and observes the wallet's content: a driver's license for Herman Shaw, $10,000 in crisp greenbacks. The keys are to a 1938 AC Coupe and to a former dance studio, now an office, in the French quarter. The man with the briefcase nods to the mortician and walks over to his car. He gets in and drives the car to the new office. He opens up the office. It is pitch black and there are dust coverings over the furnishings. In the absolute darkness he begins to take the coverings off and clean the place. There is a push broom, a mop, floor wax and a duster in the cupboard. He selects the broom and beings to sweep the floors in perfect lines, with no overlap. Then uses the mop to apply a fresh coat of floor wax in a graceful dance of arcs and swoops. When it is done, he stands in the center, still as a mannequin until 7am. Then, he goes to a phonebooth outside, and organises water and power to be restored to the dance studio.

The switch board operator is a middle aged woman Odette. Everything about her is full, full lips, full hips, a full plate and full of regret. She has two kids at home and a husband off at war. Her eyes are the same colour as the bitter coffee she has to inhale to keep up. She wants nothing more than for her husband to return home and for things to get back to normal, until she hears the voice on the other end of the connection. 'How may I connect you?' is the last thing she ever says before that voice ruins her life. It is like the sound of thunder far away and all she wants to do was to listen to it. She feels her shoulders loosen and she sits up a bit in her seat.

"Hello?"

"Yessir, How may I connect your call?"

"I'm new in town and I need my water and power turned on. Can you help me?" A shiver runs down her spine. He sounds friendly as well as polite.

"I most certainly can sugar, let me connect you to the state electric".

"Hold on a second"

Thank goodness the man wanted to talk to her! The relief was a physical shudder through her body.

"How would you like a job?".

She started sweating, what was this?

"What sir?"

"I asked how you would like a job, I need someone who can make connections and you seem to fit the bill, plus you've got a voice like molasses".

She nearly said yes on the spot,

"Sir, would you still like to connect to the state electric?"

She could practically hear the smile in his voice "Sure thing darling, but do you have a pen on you?"

She did, he gave her the address for the dance studio.

"Now, when do you finish work?"

"My shift ends at 6 sir"

"Alright, now please come to the address as soon as you finish. I can't really detail anything about the job over the phone, other than it pays well and the hours are flexible. Swing by and I promise a more detailed explanation".

Her heart is racing now. Imagining getting to meet the face of that voice is almost incentive enough.

"I can be there around 630, Mr.?"

"Shaw. I look forward to meeting you."

With that she put him through to the state electric and releases a breath she did not realise she had been holding in. It takes her a few moments to settle down again. She almost wishes he would call back so that she could talk to him more. 630 seems too far away.

6 comes around and Odette leaves work in a mad rush. The very moment the clock ticks over, she seizes her handbag, jams her time card into the slot and strides as fast as her stockings and frock would allow. Going from the nice cool brick building to the New Orleans pavement in July is like having a hot wet towel pressed over your mouth. She feels herself starting to sweat, but continues her rapid pace down the sidewalk. The bustling warehouse district that had once roared with activity is now merely humming with the war on. She continues her bustle and the cramped french quarter with its shop signs and iron lattices balconies coming into view.

It is getting later in the evening, not so much that the street lamps are on, but the alleys are getting darker. Odette is keeping her eyes ahead and walking with purpose, she is feeling a bit nervous even still. It is generally a very bad idea to be an unaccompanied woman of colour in this area of town with night approaching. Not as bad as the old days, but still bad enough that when she sees the dance studio there is a feeling of the spring inside her unwinding and easing her mind.

As she gets to the door, she takes a moment to smooth down her frock. She is feeling a tingling sensation as her own hand moves over the rayon fabric. What is happening to her? Here she is all flustered over a man's voice on the other end of a phone and a job she knows nothing about.

She rapts on the door with what authority she could muster. The door opend before her hand could come for a second hit. she involuntarily lets out a small shriek and put a hand to her mouth. His mouth smiles, like the sails of a tall ship unfurling.

Then he says

"Ahhhh, you must be the one I spoke to on the telephone. Please come on in"

She moved forward effortlessly, her eyes drinking in everything about his face. He walks her across the hard wood floors to a leather couch facing a desk. The couch was a grandiose and opulent thing, long enough to accommodate her lying down fully. He meets her eyes and it is as though a magnet is pulling her to him. Her skin is tingling and her mouth has gone dry. He was like something out of a billboard, one of the war bonds ones. The connection is broken when he took his hand from his suit pocket and gestures to the couch while striding around to the other side of the desk. He sits down, opens his pen and then looks up quickly. and she felt herself fidgeting, suddenly she had so much restless energy coursing through her.

"So, what can you do?"

"Begyourpardonsir?"

He laughs with genuine amusement

"I asked what you can do, what makes you useful?"

"Well my job is making connection for the telephone company, I can answer a phone and take messages."

"Anything else? What was your purpose before the telephone company?"

She pauses, simultaneously to keep looking at his stupid beautiful face as well as to think about his gorgeous question. What was her purpose? Well...

"I was a dancer, Sir."

He nods and writes it down. "I have questions regarding your biology. What are your measurements? What is your medical history? What is your family situation?"

She feels a twinge of unease. Something internal and slight, but still a twinge enough to have the hair on the back of her neck stand. Looking into his eyes, after having spent the last few minutes trying to guess what his chest looks like under that suit, she sees an intensity that hadn't been there when he had answered the door.

"I've forgotten myself sir, silly me. What is this job you're interviewing me for?"

He freezes there, still as an alabaster statue, the motion seems to just leave him. It was a full minute before he responded.

"I am a movie maker, I am interviewing staff for a war film. To Help The Troops".

She nearly jumps him right then and there, she loves the movies and took her kids whenever she could. If this strange man was making a film, then it would probably be a release from the fucking telephone company.

Odette stands up, "Do you mind if I have a glass of water?"

A pulse of confusion passed across his face for an instant and then he smiles that sunbeam of a smile

"please, make yourself at home. There are glasses by the sink"

He gestures with his thumb to the basin. There are five wine glasses in the drying rack. She sets her handbag on the couch.

"thank you kindly."

She stands up slowly, giving her potential employer time to put his eyes on anything he wants. Then she slowly strides over to the basin. Odette is very aware of the figure her frock cuts for her, no one could tell she was black over the phone but her white male bosses oft need to be reminded why she should keep her job. She turned on the tap and the pipe gurgled, whined and eventually spat a stream of brown gunk before giving way to the clear water.

"The people at the utilities are really looking out for yah hun?"

He stares and gives a thin polite smile, obviously confused.

"Don't worry bout it sugar, just some teasin. Where yah from?"

"I'm from Europe originally, It is hard to understand the accents over here sometimes."

She sips the water from the wine glass while leaning back, hips probably pushed a leeetle too far forward. He's European though, so he is probably used to worse.

"Oooo where in Europe darling? I would so love to go, but I can never find the time."

She chuckles into her glass, thinking about how she has never left New Orleans city limits.

"From a little island in the Baltics that no one has ever heard of."

"You speak excellent English though!" she giggles, giving him a huge toothy smile.

"Learned it all from your radio and magazines"

"Well well well, aren't you're just clever as

that then."

"What kind of dancer were you?"

"Oh all kinds, jazz, tap, salsa, ballroom... Mostly burlesque though"

That politely confused expression returns to his face again and she cut him off before he could speak.

"It was a while ago, but I still have the moves. I do miss it dearly. Would you like me to show you?"

He then smiles and then gestures.

She showes him her moves. She just brought a beat to her own hearing and then started follow it. All she has on was the frock she had picked out for work, but with burlesque it was never really about the clothes. She smiles that dancer's smile, a non-verbal promise of amazement. She swayes her hips with every step, slowly at first, playing with imaginary gloves. Then as the beat in her mind picks up and she lets the pent up energy go. She feels her posture straighten to match his, but with her eyes looking down her nose at him in the chair. Odette sways and sashays over to him. The big bang brass in her mind clashing and making that rousingly forlorn sound. There is a fire building within her and the heat is radiating from between her legs. She was within a foot of his chair when she banks sharply to the left. She took the pin out of her hair and let it fall down her back. Gorgeous ringlets brushed her ass and side as she looked over her shoulder.

Now the stranger was looking at her with those smoldering brown eyes. She flicks her hair and turns to face him, maintaining eye contact. Her twinge is gone, replaced by the urge to prove herself. Two quick steps forward, two quick back. The right leg sweeps in an arch and she dropped into a sitting-squat. The effect was that her right leg was fully extended to the side, leaving her open to him. She used her left hand to draw lines with her fingers across her inner thigh, stopping just before her sex and then smoothly moving upwards to her face via her breasts. As quickly as she had dropped she swings into being upright while twirling to have her back face him.

She slowly pulls down the zipper to her dress, savouring the sound in the empty dance studio. Then withdraws her arms and lets the frock fall over the mounds of her breasts and ass. Now she is only dressed in her white panties and bra. They are covering her like spring snow on a hill, clinging to what it can in the face of the sun.

She was turning around when she feels the hands of her would-be employer wrapping themselves around her waist, the right moving up and the left moving down. She finds herself relaxing into his powerful embrace, God help her she was aching for it. His right hand finds the clasp of her bra nestled between her breasts, with a quick flick he undoes it and casts it aside. His left hand is just as dexterous, and he tears her panties off in a swift brutal motion. The hand balls up the torn bits of cotton up and throws them. She screeches in surprise and more than a little pain.

"You bastard! Why'd you do that?!!"

Suddenly she is spun around and bent over the desk. Her shoes trip her but her momentum is nothing to him and her head is slammed into the desk. White stars appear in her vision and there is throbbing pain. His right hand is holding her neck pressed to the desk with the force of what feels like a thousand cinder blocks. She tries to buck him never the less, determined to fight.

"You can either cooperate with me or you can have you head slammed into the table until it's two dimensional. Decide"

The words are spoken with an eerie calm, he clearly has no qualms about what he is doing. She stops her thrashing, closes her eyes, breathes deep and becomes very still.

"Good, stay as you are"

The pressure on her neck disappears, only to be immediately followed by the feel of needles penetrating her flesh. She begins sobbing, the moisture that had soaked her panties was now cold to the open air and she is being tortured for an unknown reason. All at once though, the needles disappear. She can feel where they were, but something is attracting her attention. He body is warming up, her cheeks flush with warmth, her thoughts become quicker. She opens her eyes and the colours of the room seem more vivid. Her hands are appearing to take on a life of their own, shaking the move to her slit and open it wide.

She hears the words, but only realizes that they are coming from her a moment later.

"cmon, fuck my holes big man. What are you waiting for?"

Then there is a cock between her legs and all her nerve endings start to scream in delight. She can feel it in the top of her scalp to the soles of her feet. His left hand snakes down and just gently brushes her clit. She is howling with ecstasy, a wordless animal shriek of pleasure. The cock hits every spot inside her in just the right way and the pace is perfect. Her juices go into production overdrive and within seconds they are running down her leg.

The desk is heavy and old, but it is shaking with the force of their coupling. She feels her cunt clamp down on the cock and her cries cut out as if the volume had been turned off, such is the force of her reaction. Her orgasm rocks through her nervous system like a tidal wave, crushing everthing before it. She can feel him dumping his thick load into her. There is tons of the stuff, it fills her and dribbles out. He pulls out from behind her and she drops to the floor in a great heap.

She has only just caught her breath when a cold circle snaps around her neck. She cannot even bring her arms up to try to tear it off. The stranger then says,

"Sleep"

Her world becomes darkness.