Necro Files: Two Decades of Extreme Horror

Tony hunched his shoulders against the rain and the breeze, which had chilled and grown brisk. Cold rain trickled down his neck. The warehouse loomed over him, but he was still not at the loading docks.

Thinking about her reminded him of the barren apartment that was now his home, the loneliness he felt sleeping alone. He missed her sitting on the sofa, reading, while he watched television. He missed her cleaning up in the kitchen after he cooked their meals, and coming back from the laundry with their clothes bundled in sacks, and pulling out coupons as they shopped in the supermarket. He missed the click of her high heels on ceramic floor tile, the play of muscle under skin when she tightened straps and flicked a crop or whip, the way leather and latex hugged her body. Without Lisa, he was empty. He could not give her up.

He realized suddenly, as he put his foot on the concrete step leading to the loading dock, that it was emptiness driving him into Painfreak.

The hollow feeling within him had been growing since she left him days ago without a word. Each failure to re-establish contact with her had sucked another piece of his inner self away. She had not gone to work in a week; Tony had called her line and waited outside her office building. She had run away from him outside her girlfriend’s apartment building, from which he had followed her to Painfreak. She had the doorman warn him the police would be called it he persisted in trying to talk to her.

He wondered how he had coped with the terrible, raw and aching hole at the center of his being before he met her. It was the pain of that emptiness that was overcoming his fear, making him return to Painfreak to find what he had lost.

On the loading docks, Tony took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Though he was afraid, the desperation of pain was stronger. And now he had something to tell Lisa. He understood there was more than fear inside of him. Surely, she could relate to his emptiness. Perhaps, he thought as thunder rumbled nearby and the rain suddenly began to pour, she felt the same way. Empty. Missing something essential. Perhaps he had failed her in some unknown way. Perhaps he had driven her to Painfreak with his failure.

He had words, now, other than the pathetic: please come back, don’t leave me. He had questions: are you as empty as I? what are you looking for in this place? how can I fill your emptiness, as you’ve filled mine?

Fist trembling, Tony knocked on the gate. The steel rattled. A gust swept rain across the open dock. The side door opened, and Tony approached the darkness.

Shadows stirred, then a tall, wide form separated itself from the deeper blackness and blocked the entrance. A thick-necked, bald-headed man crossed his arms over his chest and looked down on Tony.

Tony reached into his pocket for money, then stopped and stared at the doorman. He had a few more scars on his face and hands, and he was dressed in grey and black instead of the more colorful styles fashionable on his first visit, but there was no doubt the doorman was the same as when Guy had brought him in. It did not seem as if he had aged.

Someone reached out and grabbed Tony’s right wrist while he was pulling out his money. Strong fingers wrenched his hand back and twisted, paralyzing him in a painful joint lock. Tony knelt to escape the agony of tearing muscles and ligaments, then looked up. A slightly built Asian man dressed in a dark suit and turtleneck regarded him impassively while the doorman, his arms still crossed, stood behind him. Tony’s money fluttered away on the breeze.

“Referrals only,” the Asian man said softly. “Please leave.”

“My wife just went in—” Tony began, but then gasped as the Asian man twisted his hand a fraction more.

Wrong answer, but what was the right one? Guy had led him in the first time, talked to the doorman. No money, but what? The hand. Like Lisa, he had shown the doorman his hand. There had been a hand stamp, with invisible ink, to allow patrons to leave and return the same night. Both Guy and Tony had been stamped, but that was so many years ago. Stupid to even think—

“Been here, Guy brought me, long time …”

The Asian man released him, and the doorman gently helped him to his feet. They gazed at the back of his left hand. The faint outline of a bone mark glowed on his skin. Tony searched for the UV lamp, but found only blackness beyond the two men.

The Asian man stepped back while the doorman pressed a stamp down on the back of Tony’s left hand. His flesh tingled, and he remembered the sensation from his first visit. The doorman stepped aside and motioned him to enter.

“Always show the mark,” the Asian man said reproachfully before melting into the darkness.