The Medallion (Collaborative)

It is difficult to say precisely when it was that I discovered the truth about my birth and origins on this planet; but it must have been about a week or so after the death of my father, last year. That was when I came across the old medallion wrapped in oil cloth and hidden behind the bureau in his bedroom. If I had known then what I do now I might have thrown the damn thing into the sea and have done with it; though perhaps not; they say the Devil you know is better than the one you don’t.

My sister, Teresa and I had been going through my fathers small house in Huntington Beach taking inventory of his possessions in preparation for an auction of the contents the following week. I was trying to decide whether the bureau which was very large and made of old pine was worth keeping for myself when I noticed the small oilcloth bundle taped about half-way down the rear of the thing. “Hey”, I exclaimed, “secret treasure.”

“What’s up”? My sister asked from just outside the bedroom door.

“I don’t know, exactly”, I replied, :”take a look at this”.

“What in the world would Dad have that was valuable enough to hide”? She queried,

“and if it was that important to him why didn’t he put it in a safety deposit box”?

“ Haven’t got the least notion”, I replied “ let’s take a look and see”.


As I unwrapped the duct tape that had secured the pouch to the bureau I was suddenly filled with a deep feeling of dread; I suddenly wasn’t so sure I wanted to discover what was in the oilskin pouch after all. My sister must have had a similar feeling because when I turned to look at her she seemed suddenly pale and ghostly even though it was just after noon and sunshine flooded through the large bedroom window.

“What’s wrong”? I asked her.
“Nothing much”, she replied shakily; “I just though I felt a sudden draft, is all”.

Taking a deep breath to steady my nerves, I opened the small pouch, and reaching inside extracted a small gold and onyx medallion. It was about an inch-and-a-half across and roughly oval in shape and strangely heavy in the palm of my hand for so small a piece of metal. There was no chain. The center of the medal was occupied by a raised relief depiction of some animal somewhat like a lion but not any lion that I had ever seen. This animal seemed be more a cross between a lion and a something out of a drug addicts nightmare.
The medal itself seemed to be made entirely of burnished gold; except the eyes of the beast which appeared to be onyx or obsidian. Taken all together it was a strangely hideous yet appealing and somehow commanding piece of jewelry, all at the same time “God”, Teresa almost shouted, “Where in the world do you think Dad found that ugly thing”?

“Beats me, but I can’t say it seems the kind of thing that I would hide behind a bedroom bureau. It must have been important to Dad, though and we’ll never be able to ask him about it” I replied.

“Well, it’s all yours Kenny”, she said. “ It gives me the creeps”.

* * *

The funeral was a pretty lonely affair.

I was there with my sister and she was crying. My mother was somewhere else, probably crying for her own set of reasons. She left my father several years prior because, in her own words, he had simply lost an interest in her. Teresa and I sided with our mother throughout the divorce. Our allegiance was a no-brainer really. When she said that my father had lost interest in her, it wasn’t really the whole story. He lost interest in the entire family: myself, Teresa, and Garrett, our younger brother. When Garrett died, our mother was left without a shoulder to cry on and that, as they say, was that. She served him divorce papers in a fit of anger and he signed them in a fit of apathy.

So there I stood looking at my father’s discount casket, trying to bring my sister to a level of consolation that would allow us to leave.

The funeral director stood nearby, staring at the drapes behind the casket. There was a large spot on one of them and he couldn’t imagine how it could have gotten there. He was wondering if he could clean while it was hanging, or if he’d have to take the whole thing to a dry cleaner, when his line of thought was interrupted.

“Can I see him please?” Teresa took a cleansing breath. “I’d like to see him.”

“I’m sorry?” The funeral director was embarrassed to be caught so far away.

“I would like to see him. Can we…open it?”

My heart sank. I was ready to leave. Prolonging the stay did not sound appealing, even if I was looking at my father’s corpse.

“Ma’am, I…I was under the impression that this was not to be an open…I was told by-“

“Yeah that was me you talked to,” I said apologetically. “But…can’t we just…you know…” I pantomimed opening the casket cover.

The funeral director had become quite flustered. His suddenly pale face stood in sharp contrast to the purple drapes behind him.

“I’m sorry…the body has not been prepared. The wounds have not-“

“The wounds?” Teresa’s chin rose for the first time in an hour and the funeral director’s eyes grew wide in panic. I must admit, I wasn’t prepared to hear about “wounds” either. We were told that our father died of a heart attack while climbing Machu Picchu in Peru.

“Ma’am…sir…I don’t…”

“It’s not your fault,” I said, trying not to sound overly intrigued. “Where did these wounds come from? We were told our father died of a heart attack.” I mentally kicked myself for turning down the opportunity to identify the body at the morgue. Our mother volunteered for that morbid task, and her report of the event didn’t include anything about wounds.

“I’m sure that you were told the truth sir,” replied the fidgeting funeral director. “It’s possible that he was dead when all the…when…it was probably wild animals you see.”

That was enough for my sister.

“It’s okay. I don’t…I’d rather not. Thank you.” The funeral director swallowed hard. Thank goodness. As he watched the two mourners exit the chapel, he couldn’t help but remember a vomiting son who insisted on viewing his father who had died in a hunting accident. The funeral director smiled grimly as he rolled the cheap casket toward the back room. That hunting accident was peanuts compared to the mess in this box.

***

I dropped my sister off at her apartment before heading back to my father’s house. The sooner we could clear that place out, the better, and my sister was in no state to help. I grabbed a six pack from the local minimart and had a beer cracked before I even hit the front door.

As soon as the door opened, I could tell that things had changed. Something had been in the house. Something had moved, even if it was just the stale air in the living room. I set my beer down and picked up a hammer that was laying on the hardwood floor.

Then a noise. A chair. The distinctive sound of a chair sliding across hardwood, and it came from my father’s old bedroom. My breath felt heavy in my chest as I moved to the door of the bedroom and gently swung it open.

And that’s when everything changed. Forever.

What was left in the room had been ripped apart, literally splintered and destroyed. A single lamp in the corner cast long shadows across the wreckage. Sitting in a shadowed corner of the room was the silhouette of a man. My heart seized as the man leaned forward and a stripe of light was painted across his mangled face. His pale lips parted to reveal a broken and crooked smile. Then the man spoke, his voice dripping out of his distorted jaw like blood:

“You have something of mine, son. And I’ll be needing it back.”


[edit on 17-10-2006 by Essedarius]

My heart skipped two beats. Our eyes engaged, though his eyes were swallon and bloodied. The shock when something this unreal happens is absolutly impossible to describe. Fear, complete fear. I did the only thing any sane man would do. I lunged foward with the steel hammer, shooting past his head and slamming into the wall. The damn hammer got stuck. He looked at me curiously.
'Son, what are you doing...?'
'Don't call me that!'
I tried to pull it back, but it was no good. I faced this hidious creature. All i could think was what the hell had happened to this man. His body was blisetered and cut. One of his arms was almost completely shreaded of any skin.
He began to speak again. 'Son, it's me.' I just stared, it was impossible, but at that moment i could see him, my father.
'WHAT THE HELL'S GOING ON!'
'Well my boy, this is very complicated. All you need to know is that I need that medallion....Where is it?'
'Wat the F@ck, you think.. I.. what the...No... It's impossible. I need an explanation.'
I stood there, still stunned. 'Boy, I'm not playing games. If I get the medallion, i can make everything o.k again. I'm here son, but i won't last long, I can be stronger than before.'
He rabbled on, not making any sense, like something out of a twisted horror film.
I began to walk away, slowly. This was not right, i knew it. I feared this man, he wasn't my father, not the one i knew.
'Don't walk away from me' his voice was deep and visious. I couldn't stay, i kept pacing backwards, not taking my eyes from his.
'Son, I can bring Garrett back, It's possible, I mean look at me. I was expiered. But I'm not dead.'
I turned and ran outside to the car. Fireing the engine into life, speeding off. I had to get away. I had to make sense of it all. But unfortuantly, it didn't stop there. I got much much worse.........