PROMPT: Rust, Buried, Past
Time 40 Minutes
Exhumed
The coffin was exhumed. Rusted locks bolt cut off the rotting wood, falling to the turned earth below.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
Creak.
The lid opened nosily, not wanting to reveal her secrets. Let her contents go. Expose the past.
“Is this really necessary? Sometimes it’s best to let things stay buried,” the coroner told the descendent of the disinterred.
“Yes.” The word rang out, mingling with the midnight bells of the church attached to the cemetery causing it to warp ominously. “I must know.”
“Very well.” The coroner leaned over the remarkably preserved body of Arthur Kilroy, pulled out his pen, and raised the pale lips of the deceased. The two front teeth were long and sharp, white as bone.
The descendent stilled at the sight. “Please, check the stake.”
"Superstitions," he sighed. The coroner turned to the torso resplendently clothed. It was perfection, save for a large iron stake hammered through where the heart of the man should be.
“Thank you very much. I can take it from here.”
The coroner stepped aside, allowing the woman regally dressed to take his place.
“Great-grandfather,” her words trembled. “I have been driven from my home and country. I seek answers only you can give.” Quickly, her gloved hand laid hold of the stake and drew it out like a sword form a sheath. She then undid the mouth sutures with a small pair of wire cutters.
While removing her right glove, she revealed her own sharp front teeth. Piercing the skin of her wrist, she let the blood flow into the now open mouth of her predecessor.
“What are you?”
She hissed at the coroner. No one would believe him anyway if he did tell of this night.
Retrieving her wrist, she licked it closed and waited.
The clouds parted and the moonlight shone upon the corpse. As the light touched his eyelids, they opened with a snap. Fast as lighting, he was out of the coffin and feasting upon the coroner, a large gash nearly decapitating the man providing all that was wanted.
It only took seconds.
The scream of the coroner was cut short as his neck was snapped, and a ghastly hand buried deep in his bowels.
Dr. Arthur Kilroy pulled his hand free, trailing guts out of the cavity of the man. They could be lovingly arranged later. Made into art.
“My dear,” his voice was dark and deep, like the grave he had just come from. “You are of my blood. Tell me what you wish for.”
“Teach me.”
Her feral grin was matched in return.
The End