Silverweed Road, page 21
‘The top lip is all wrong,’ said Olga, crossing her arms.
Behind the curtains in powdered shadow, the goat eyes of The Mogon pulsed. Geppetto felt a shiver of black heat. Some fun, perhaps, before the serious work began. Hand sneaked behind Damienn’s bust, he opened his palm and slapped the clay.
‘What the hell?’ yelped Damienn. He rubbed his head, hat askew. He frowned at Olga, confused.
‘Why,’ said Geppetto, eyes fixed on Olga, ‘you just hit him?’
‘I did not,’ Olga protested. She pushed at Damienn’s chest.
A fissure of suspicion opened between them. Geppetto drove in his wedge.
‘Who kill my Mogon?’
Heads turned. Glares switched. Damienn addressed the demon in the room.
‘OK, let’s talk about why we’re really here,’ he said. ‘Where is it? Where’s the suit?’
Geppetto repeated himself, words stretched out, slow and cold, the question now a statement. ‘Who. Kill. My Mogon.’
A pause. A chasm. Post’s lips parted, preparing his lie.
‘Because the other one,’ said Olga, ‘is ten times better.’
Damienn shot Olga a look.
‘What?’ Olga shrugged. ‘He’s going to find out sooner or later. Skinwalker FX are doing The Mogon. Huge improvement, actually. Damienn wanted a model on set for the actors to react to, didn’t we Damienn? Your dumb suit – it’s just the stand-in for the CG.’
‘Stand-in?’ trembled Geppetto, aghast. La Granata’s pin inched from his shell. ‘Stand-in? You waste nine months of my life so Brian fucking Cox can hit his marks for CG? Vaffanculo!’
Geppetto’s eyes burned on his Mogon rejectors. It now became clear why Damienn hadn’t cast an actor to fill the bodysuit. La Granata’s pin dropped and clinked. He was all but ready to detonate.
‘It’s why we need your Mogon back,’ said Olga. ‘Now answer Damienn’s question. Where’s the suit?’
Geppetto had heard quite enough. He turned Olga’s bust around. Geppetto did not feel like smiling yet Baal-Berith insisted. A rictus grin carved through his face, lifting the pale flesh of his cheeks. Black heat charging through his fingers, Geppetto pressed a thumb into Olga’s bust. He swiped a seal through the cool clay lips. There was a peculiar muffled cry, as if she were screaming underwater. Geppetto looked up. Olga’s lips were coiled together, like a swirl of raspberry ripple.
Before Post could react, Geppetto turned his attention to Damienn’s bust. Seal his lips too? Or experiment first? He pincered his fingers. He squeezed the nose. The soft red clay thinned to his touch.
Damienn’s hands leaped to his face. Red trickled between his fingers. Geppetto watched his writhing villagers, dancing out of time to their rhythms of pain. Olga’s muffles and Damienn’s groans sang a dark duet.
With a swish of his trench coat, Damienn grabbed Olga. He stumbled towards the workshop door. Geppetto relished Post’s panic as he pulled and hammered at the locked door. Blood streaming from his pincered nose, Post unholstered his phone and, trusting he’d be back imminently, speed-dialled Milton Hinds.
A ringtone sang in the workshop.
Damienn scoured the room, searching for the source. His eyes widened on the oven against the workshop wall. Geppetto cursed himself for not stamping hard enough on Milton’s phone.
‘What the fuck is Milton’s phone doing in the oven?’
Olga slid against the door, hand clamped over spiralled lips. Geppetto swivelled on his stool. Damienn blurred past, trenchcoat whipping. He stopped by the oven, pressed his ear to the door. Milton’s ringtone chirped within. A bead of sweat pipped on Geppetto’s head. Damienn opened the oven door.
Hardened horror director Damienn Post had never seen a dead body before. Milton Hinds was his first. Urged by the weight of his head, the top half of Milton lolloped from the oven. The gristle from a curtseying neck clicked. One eye was shut, the other open.
Post recoiled from the door. Panicked eyes flashed at Geppetto. He already had Damienn’s bust on his lap, like a severed head on a plate. Palms flat, arms out, poised to clap, Geppetto opened out his elbows. With a whip of the air, he cuffed Damienn’s bust.
A hat fell to the workshop floor. Post’s hands leapt to his temples, quivering from the thunderclap. Vision trembling like a strummed guitar string, his vision settled on the bust. There, in the murk of the workshop, Damienn awakened to Geppetto’s terrible power.
‘The head, Geppetto. Give me my head. I don’t know what voodoo shit you’re up to, but give me my fucking head back.’
Geppetto pulled the bust close to his chest, like a goalkeeper shielding a football. He shook his head, widened his arms, threatening a round of applause. Damienn flinched at Milton’s sagging head, single eye glaring back, and, fearing what was to come, immediately changed tack.
‘Name it. Whatever you want. Geppetto Savini, first on the credits. On the fucking billboards if you want, above Brian Cox. My personal guarantee. Let’s trade. Give me the head, you get The Mogon.’
Palms out, poised to clap, Geppetto considered Damienn’s proposal.
‘The original design? My design? Full creative control?’
‘Anything you want. Just give me my head, Geppetto. Give me the head. And make Olga right again.’
‘Nine months, you lie to me,’ raged Geppetto. La Granata exploded as froth foamed on his lips. ‘Full creative control, you say! CG is bullshit! Practical effects! Why you destroy me?’ Geppetto let go of the bust, clawing at the tufts of his hair. ‘Why you—’
As Geppetto raged, Damienn made his move. Arms out, he charged from the oven to reclaim his head. Geppetto leaned back on his stool. He quickly pressed a thumb to the bust. A smear of clay dragged over an eye, blending it with the cheek. Like a sheet of pink pastry, a flap of eyelid folded over Damienn’s eye. The director recoiled, clutching his cheek. Trench coat folding like a sack, he crumpled next to Milton.
There was no time to savour the spectacle. A rushing force surged from behind. Springing from the workshop door, a roar contained behind spiralled lips, Olga leaped at the bench. Geppetto toppled from his stool. Olga swiped for her bust. She missed. It fell. The bust rolled on the plastic sheeting. Carried by the impetus of her dive, Olga toppled from the bench. She crashed to the floor in a blur of limbs and landed in a daze next to Damienn.
Behind the curtains, The Mogon loomed, the last figure standing in the workshop.
Groaning on his back, an upended turtle, Geppetto came to his senses. Still clutching Damienn’s bust, he scrabbled for Olga’s and clutched it to his chest. His game was spiralling out of control. Geppetto glared at Olga and Damienn, curled on the floor by the oven, considered their treachery, playing God with his creation, and decided it was time to play God himself.
The scream of villagers assailed his head. A black heat charged through shaking hands. Geppetto forced the busts together, feeling the clay surrender to his will. Olga and Damienn’s heads attracted like magnets, as if engorged by a fatal, consuming kiss. Skin churned like trodden mud. Protesting legs writhed and kicked. As clay pressed clay, bust into bust, two heads crushed into one. Geppetto watched their faces blend, slaves to the power of creative control.
A sliding eye poured below a mouth, which itself began to move. With great artistry, two pairs of lips fused to form one conjoined line that spread the breadth of two merged faces. A row of teeth clinked, like a horizonal zip. But for the crunch of binding skulls, Geppetto worked in silence, perfecting his Orthrus. His rage was made flesh by Baal-Berith: he who moulded men into madness and murder.
Legs, once kicking, lay lifeless.
Geppetto towered above Olga and Damienn, their traitorous heads pulped into one. His only wish was that they had lived a little longer. For him to watch the eyes blink below the mouth. To hear the long zip of teeth ripple and click.
It was at this moment Geppetto became what would now endure. No longer a mere mortal: a poet of flesh and bone. Hands reborn, to create and destroy. The entire world a special effect, to be moulded and resculpted to his will. Full creative control! Look on my works, ye Mighty …
Geppetto pulled back the curtains and knelt before The Mogon, refocillo, refocillo dripping from his lips. Behold, the mighty Geppetto Savini: the Picasso of Baal-Berith.
Who next?
A setting sun blooded Silverweed’s rooftops. Geppetto tossed a hat into the oil drum and stirred it with a stick. Inside the workshop, Olga and Damienn had been wrapped in plastic sheeting, like cocoons that would never hatch.
As Geppetto lit a celebratory cigar, there was a flash of blinding white. He looked up to an open window. Augustus Fry leaned out of his office, a smartphone shining in Geppetto’s direction.
‘I’ve got your fires all on video,’ shouted Fry. ‘The council will be here tomorrow, Savini.’
Geppetto puffed at his cigar and waddled in silence back to the workshop. His hands would do the talking.
Geppetto unhooked a prosthetic leg from the workshop wall. He sat at the bench, picked up his fettle knife, closed his eyes and invited the screams. As the mummified face of Augustus Fry filled his vision, he sawed through the knee of the latex leg, got up from his bench and leaned out of the door. Geppetto relished the howls, picturing Fry as he hopped around his office, grabbing at a leg that was no longer there. Look on my works, ye Mighty …
Who next?
Drenched in the blood of others, Geppetto shivered out of his overalls. He prowled the creature workshop, a naked Midas of destruction, considering his next display. Drunk on power and possibilities, Geppetto erupted with a boundless control denied his entire creative life. Was there, at this time, a more powerful being on this Earth, as yet contained in a lowly workshop on Silverweed Road? Now that he had satisfied his vengeance, who would be answerable to Geppetto Savini’s mighty hands? Who would know? Who could catch him? Who next? Who not next?
Eyeing the ball of clay on his bench, Geppetto cracked his knuckles. He turned on the workshop TV. Sky News flashed on the screen. The Prime Minister appeared from the door of Downing Street and settled behind a podium.
Geppetto worked fast, moulding a face from the clay. He tickled the left cheek of the bust. His eyes flicked to the screen. The Prime Minister paused mid speech to scratch an invisible itch. Geppetto ruffled his tufts, considering how best to direct this moment: this living, breathing horror movie, broadcast live to the world. Mould two eyes into the nose, watch them blink inside the nostrils? Pull the mouth into a hideous beak? Or simply crush down the forehead in one fatal collapse of flesh? Geppetto rubbed his palms. Delicious screams began to swirl. He closed his hands around the bust and …
‘Police. Open up.’
Geppetto flinched to three sharp knocks.
‘Geppetto Savini? We want to talk to you about the disappearance of Milton Hinds. Now open up.’
Geppetto tumbled off his stool and scrambled under the bench. Cowering in shadow, he clawed at his hair. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right. It was far too soon to spoil the game. The knocks continued. The calls got louder. The TV blared. They knew he was in.
Geppetto crawled from under the bench and scuttled like a beetle across the floorboards. He slithered under the curtain. The Mogon towered in the murk, promising protection. Geppetto crawled around its hooves, scrabbled for the zip at the back of the suit, squeezed inside and fastened it.
Geppetto waited in the warmth of The Mogon, listening to the muffled knocks. He pressed his ear to the demon’s belly. If the police had a warrant, they’d be in by now. Swallowed by the seven-foot suit, he waited for the knocks to fade, the voices trail. Geppetto now judged it was safe to re-emerge and continue with his work.
Geppetto wriggled an arm behind him and felt around for the zip. Too plump to turn inside the suit, his fingers searched the lining. Face pressed into the Mogon’s belly, hands behind his back, his scratching became ever more frantic. He pawed for the zip and clawed at the lining. A sticky liquid seemed to coat his hands, as if the latex suit were leaking.
The zipper. Where was the zipper?
Cursing into The Mogon’s belly, Geppetto felt the heat of his stifling breath. Pearls of sweat pipped on his skin. With each passing second, the walls of the suit closed in. Geppetto pushed against the suit, tried to turn, a miniature Houdini in a padlocked sack. Now the knocks at the door returned.
Geppetto, out of instinct, cried out for help. The knocking continued, increasing in volume. Ba-dum. Ba-dum. Bad-dum-dum-dum. Only now did the terrible realisation hit. The knock-knock-knocking was not at the door. The police had not returned. It was the beat of his own thudding heart.
Trapped inside his own creation, Geppetto panicked and clawed at the lining. The suit was leaking more now, webbing his fingers in gluey sauce. Gasping for air, his breath splashed back at him. His feet stamped. His arms wriggled. Sweat poured in the stifling heat. Geppetto cried once more for help. His call was swallowed by a sharper sound that echoed through the suit. The ruinous screams of ancient villagers swirled within The Mogon.
With every squirm and every wriggle, the suit drew ever closer. Geppetto took fishy gulps at thinning air. The hot sweat on his naked body clung like gluey sauce. Another revelation. Far worse than his knocking heart.
The suit wasn’t leaking. He was leaking.
Geppetto’s screams joined those of the villagers. The suit pressed in reply. Geppetto peeled into the sticky walls, his flesh now fusing … softening … Ribs began to snap and crumble. Black lungs wrinkled into prunes.
Remoulded by the might of Baal-Berith, a gritted howl was his last utterance. Geppetto felt his mouth flood with a tide of sticky flesh. His skull sank, dripping into his shoulders. His shoulders dripped into his hips. His hips dripped into his feet. Before his brain bubbled into meaningless soup, Geppetto was granted one final thought, or if not a thought, a sensation: of a mother being eaten alive by her own ravenous child.
Baal-Berith rolled its shoulders, settling inside its Mogon suit. Why could it not have absorbed something more substantial? Something … taller? Hot breath hissed from its crocodile snout, contemptuous of its ignoble state. Lucifer’s pontiff recalled the base human language its disciple had uttered in evocation. Refocillo. Resurge. Refocillo. Revive. Refocillo. Resurrect …
The black broth that swilled inside instantly responded. It charged and flooded rope-thick veins. A snout lengthened. Limbs bulged. In a rapid charge of hell-red flesh, the demon swelled towards the ceiling … where its limitations became all too apparent.
Horned crown scraping the workshop rafters, Baal-Berith regarded its domain and decided, at once, to leave.
The demon shook out a testing leg, bending the floorboards with its cloven hoof. Head lowered, snout hissing, Baal-Berith charged like a bull and butted through the door. What was left of the workshop entrance tilted on a buckled hinge, clinging to the wood like a loosened tooth.
Inhaling the scent of its new dominion, the demon scoured the night sky. In milk-pale moonlight, unrestricted and free to grow, Baal-Berith bulged once more. A crimson geyser of hell-red flesh ripped up from the earth. Towering over the workshop roof, the demon opened out its wings. Bewildered at first by this new addition, Baal-Berith warmed to chances of flight, the promise held by its new design.
To the heavy whip-crack of beating wings, hooves lifted from the path. Up and up, the demon soared, into the clear night sky. Above the rooftops of Silverweed Road, Baal-Berith cast its shadow, eyeing the sparkling cities beyond.
Black heart thudding to the beat of its wings, a grin sawed through its crocodile snout. The bone-white eyes of Baal-Berith glowed from the atrocious joys to come. Of towering over unclaimed villages. Of fistfuls moulded by its might. Of sweetest flesh squeezed like berries, dripping in its grip.
Look on my works, ye Mighty …
Who next?
Extract from The Silverweed Files, 24 November 2024
A personal blog by former Detective Chief Inspector Jim Heath. The views expressed do not reflect those of Kent Police nor the victims impacted by events.
I have no qualms naming names. They may have escaped disciplinary action, but Constables Greening and Mortlock have a lot to answer for. On the evening of 20 November 2019, the two officers responded to a missing person enquiry. After attempting to gain entrance to Geppetto Savini’s workshop, Greening and Mortlock left no. 17 Silverweed to buy chips. When they returned twenty minutes later, Savini had fled the scene. Had they remained and done their job, the serial-killer would have been caught.
Thirty years of murder hardens the stomach. I did not buckle once from the abominable desecrations left by the Meadway Ripper, Peter Klint. And yet even I battled a wave of nausea when I first faced Savini’s atrocities.
The extent of the injuries has never been made public. I reveal them now, not to satisfy some ghoulish urge, but as an appeal for help. Should any of the methods below be even remotely familiar, I would ask you to email me: jhsilverweed@gmail.com. To preserve the dignity of the victims, I relate their injuries anonymously.
The right arm of Victim 1 had been dissected with such precision, the pathologist concluded the incisions could only have been achieved with an industrial laser. The flesh, organs and face of Victim 2 had been stripped from the skeleton in a manner likened to a piranhas’ feeding frenzy. And the heads of Victims 3 and 4 had been, for want of a better word, ‘welded’ together.
None of these injuries were inflicted post-mortem. The victims were very much alive during the attacks. The murders were undoubtedly premeditated. Savini had previously practised his techniques on various sculptures and latex models. Chillingly, from the clay bust found on his work bench, Savini was planning to assassinate our glorious prime minister.
How a five foot tall special effects veteran could mutilate four victims in the space of seven hours remains a mystery. It is not only a crime beyond the realms of human decency. It is a crime beyond human ability.
Geppetto Savini’s motivations are clear enough. He had been dismissed from the production of Blood Astrum and, in his ire, had stolen a latex bodysuit from Meadway Studios. The victims were simply trying to recover what was rightfully theirs. Tragically, they fell victim to a gore-obsessed lunatic so delusional he wished to turn his odious cinematic fantasies into reality.
