Pearce

Pearce

By Bill Gallagher 062306
NM

7265 Words



The fly flies by, he's got a buzz, sounds like THURZzzzzteee, thurrrrzzzzteeeeeeee....wanna drinka-wah-tahhhhhh...just a little drinka-wahtah, any orifice will do, even those glands on ya skin will do for me, I'm just a fly, don't need much, and i am thurzzzzzteeeeee...need a drinka-wahtah...


He buzzes round my head twice then takes off down the room out of sight. I go back to work at my bench, cutting stone beads. Then the fly comes flying back full speed, but for some reason he does not see the flytape hanging from the ceiling, swinging in the breeze from the air conditioner, and he hits it so hard it moves, and SMACK! dangles the thurztee fly.


THURz...THURzzzz....THURzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz..!


Now he is stuck as well as thirsty, and even though this has all been very hilarious, I am not going to make an afternoons entertainment of it, which is how long it takes for a fly to die of old age on the flytape, or longer i am sure; so I carefully squash the fly on the flytape he is now stuck on (Carefully so my fingers do not get stuck on the flytape too) and with a very slight, nearly inaudible popping sound, the fly expires, and will never ever suffer no more.


The fly will thirst no more.


Heh, heh, hehhhhhhhhhh...


Now, again, the bead spins on the abrasive grinder as I apply its various edges to the rotating wheel, as beads in their making have been doing very nearly forever, and the White Tiger Picture Stone I am working with is not called that for nothing. It shows pictures even while sitting still. Now that I have it rotating in pure and truly stroboscopic form, with magical talking flies dead and hanging nearby, the spinning of the bead grabs my attention. There is something orderly here, something calling to my eyes, a trigger mechanism from another time and place. A scene has been suddenly born. I watch, because like so many of my type, which is to say the Human type, that is one thing we do very well. Watch.


We teach ourselves to snap out of it sometimes, but this did not occur to me then, because between the talking fly and the scene unfolding like a moving-picture on the spinning bead, my mind had been auto-suggested into duty as a multiversal-bio-portal and Time-domain-interference-channeling-device, or some such; I became interested in the story on the spinning bead, and even involved. It got me; not only was escape impossible, I did not WANT to escape, I did not even consider it an option. Engrossed. The fly had lost his buzz, and his thirst in the process, and the bead spun, and I watched, and the show did indeed go on...

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The spirit of the world lives in its creatures, lives AS its creatures. There are many kinds of creatures across everywhen.


The spirit of the world is itself a part of something much bigger, because all of reality is intricately alive, always, and forever. You are part of it: you are Identity in reality. Id-Entity. Can you say that? Id. Entity. I knew you could. Identitys are built across the eons and always retrievable.


Sometimes you are needed, sometimes you are called from heaven.


Quite Regularly In Fact.


Its just the way it is.


Nothing is wasted here, ever. Experiences, all, are recorded and never forgotten in this milieu of matter, this something-in-nothing whose finest derivation is light, but which re-coagulates, re-coalesces, reorganizes continuously, as flow, and cannot be created or destroyed, it just takes new forms, and it is, and you are one of its creatures.


YOU Happen.


Hah.


When this is good, it is very good. And, as you would expect, when this is bad, it is very, very bad.


There is the justice of Man, the justice of the World, and the justice of Reality. When you are born here, before you leave, you will know all three.


**********************************************


I am Pearce I like to Pierce

My Name Is PEARCE and I PIERCE-PIERCE-PIERCE

I PEARCE,I PEARCE

I PIERCEPIERCEPIERCE...!


**********************************************


Early morning sun flickered through the mists rising off the surface of the Tennessee river, and the odor was one of full rich dankness and lush decomposition. This reminded the man, one Terrance Robbins, or Terry to those who knew him by name, of a bit of trivia he had come across somewhere, stating that the mud of the Nile river had been so omnipresent, and nearly revered, in that world of ancient times, that the Egyptian people had a dozen or more different terms for it, for Nile mud, each a fine delineation of description, differentiating between the various states of Nile mud, its colors, its compositions, the way it stuck to things...

Terry was in his late twenties, and looked like many of the white men in North Alabama; he had thick brown hair cut short, green eyes, and the physical stature of the vikings, or something like them. At 6'3" and a trim 220, Terry was just regular sized among his kin and companions.

Fish swirled all around the banks and docks of the boat ramp, and the sun was now actually striking the water. Terry made sure of his sunglasses, and a few other necessities while readying his boat and air compressor to perform their work out in the waters of the great Tennessee River, in search of freshwater mother of pearl mussels, which the Japanese were buying like there was no tomorrow.

Terry heard the noises of 3 or 4 other mussel fisherman all around, and he watched warily as the man called Pearce backed his boat and trailer down the boat ramp, then expertly hit the brakes at just the right time so that the little johnboat, air compressor and all, slid perfectly into the water and did not go far, because of a short rope tied from the front of it, to the back of the trailer. Pearce looked neither right or left as he went about his quick chore of getting the boat secured to the dock, then he got back in his truck and parked it and the trailer in the designated area. Once again he walked over to his boat without a word or look to anyone, lost in his own little world, surly, and Terry noticed what appeared to be a shiny and large metal stud in the nose of the man, highlighting other visible piercings, tattoos, and God only knew what else under his clothes. And though most divers wore a leg knife, Pearces could only be called a leg SWORD, because the handle was up around his kneecap, and the sheath tip was somewhere down around his ankle. And he didnt wait until he was ready to dive to don the silly looking thing, he wore it as a part of himself, a part of his decoration. Overall, a very fancy Neanderthal, was Pearce.

Macabre.

Terry shivered -- that whole dang scene was gross, far as he was concerned. It plain old creeped him out, no two ways about it. A couple more mussel fishermen walked by now, on the way to their boat, and one looked over at Terry, with a short wave.

"Mornin' boy."

"Mornin'," Terry answered, congenial and uncaring. In Alabama the men call each other boy, as a sort of compliment, a respectful friendly address, much like many black males calling each other nigger, as in "What happenIN' mah niggah?".

Terry went back to work securing his gear and then got into his truck and did his very own rendition of the truck-boat twist, popping the 15 foot V-hull off its trailer into the water with speed and finesse at one of the empty ramps. He had gotten good at that little ditty as a catfish hunter, 6 years ago it was, and then some, my how the time do fly, yessir, way back in 1985 it was, which was of course before the Japanese had gotten so hot for the freshwater mother of pearl mussels, thereby creating windfall profits for a few years, and a boon to the local economy. Everybodys Grandparents got fancy new grave stones, stuff like that.

Terry had gotten good at getting the BIG catfish, the BIGGEST catfish, and not only did he hold the local record of 353 pounds, but he had also sold several other of his bigger catches as aquarium fish, which brought a premium and had allowed him a little breathing room at home. The bills are always due in Alabama, seems like, and seems like the king of england never heard of the revolutionary war here either, or at least as far as taxes and rack-renting and banking goes.

He shook his head to clear these unwelcome remembrances, and made his way to his boat. There were dollars at the bottom of the river, coin of the realm, so he wasted no time, and in just minutes he was cruising out of the channel from Grant into the awesome blue morning. Remembrances. Yeah. Worlds full of 'em. He let his mind wander again as he steered lazily with the current to the bed he was working. It was 2 miles of nice riding and he thought back to the catfish, and again to leaner times, but the beginning of better times.

It had all started in 1984, when Butch Savoy, owner of the Shiny Shiner Baitshop over near Guntersville, had told Terry, who was 24 and father of two at the time, AND his cousin by marriage, about the money making possibilities of catching big catfish for aquariums.

Terry had been happy to make 35-40$ cash a day, setting trotlines, retrieving his catch of regular sized catfish and buffalo perch; it was enough to keep going, and thats all. Working 6 or 7 days a week at that rate was enough to keep the electric on, and put food on the table. That last was helped along because, like all fishermen in Alabama, Terrys family ate a LOT of fish.

Terry had gotten his piece of property from his daddys family, once he had gotten married, and now Terry just had to pay the english land tax on it, the tax of the kings men who were slowly taking back what they thought was theirs, damn their black souls forever...other states called it a land tax. In Alabama its known as the kings tax, and is spat upon at every opportunity.

Some people make fun of Alabama ways, and those people are foolish, because Alabama ways may not be pretty but they are the truth. And that is as good as it gets here, most times, and if you're lucky. Theres Green Men in Alabama. If you go there, you had better know what that means.

Terrys twenty five acres out west of Scottsboro was well watered, fairly flat and high, and it sure did produce some fine growings during the summer. Even the peach trees were getting big.

So, the 35-40$ cash a day was not enough money to get ahead on, but it kept things holding until opportunity knocked. Terry perceived the news about catching big catfish as a loud rat-a-tat-TAT on that door leading to opportunity, and he turned out to be right as rain. "Big Cats", Butch had said, deadpan, "Keep them alive, anything over a hunnerd pounds, I'll pay double the per pound price of the regular eatin' cats..."

There was the added advantage that Terry was already a commercial fisherman , and had some good idea where to start fishing, and most importantly HOW to fish for the big cats that feed in the deep channels and backwaters of the Tennessee river. This knowledge had come to him accidentally, but no matter, he had it, and one must always ask oneself, really, is ANYTHING accidental here?

Terry remembered the incident well. He had been hunting the bottom of the river for indian arrowheads: they washed out of the banks in places and peppered the bottom of the river, if you knew where to look. His Uncle Jimmy had shown him this place when he was a boy, and now, as a young man of 20, this is where he came to be alone and just do something he really liked to do. Terry already had a bucket full of broken pieces, and two killers -- one of which was a 4 inch long and PERFECT Dalton Greenbrier, made from some exotic agate, an obvious trade item. A nice thing.

As he rested at the surface, floating, breathing through his snorkel, he peered downward through his mask into the dark but clear water of this channel which caught a lot of underwater erosion, but actually was a real slow place in the river, a giant eddy, where a hefty current from the river proper turned around an outward jutting island. And that was the only reason diving was even possible here. Otherwise one would be swept away faster than one could reach the bottom. This was almost a boiling place, like a spring, and overall it was a real cool spot.

The channel itself was about 25-30 feet off the shore and about 25 feet deep where Terry was snorkeling, and it then just dropped off into a black abyss as it went out toward the river proper. He could see the rock cobble bottom, and his uncle Jimmys voice rang clear through his mind once again: "...And its all up in them rocks where the spearpoints is at, yessir, and its only 'cause I am your Uncle Jimmy that I am tellin' you all this boy, so don't go blabbin' it to any of yer friends or I will know exactly who did it, I mean it will stick out like a turd in a punchbowl, and then things'll get uglier than a fart in church, you understand??..."

Terry smiled to himself, floating, serene, happy. He pictured the old man grinning toothlessly as he spouted his scatalogical warnings, and he sure did miss the old duck. Ten years ago it was now, the old man had tried to drive, drunker than two coons, and had driven off the road onto that fresh cut hill over by Colliers.

He had then fallen out the door which had gotten jarred open by going over all those little stumps, and fell halfway out the door, asleep or comatose, who would ever know? It must have happened kind of just right, thought Terry, because the next day, when they all went looking for Uncle Jimmy, some of the men found him, or the lower half of him, chopped cleanly at the waist and wedged into the wrecked car at the bottom of the hill. After he had fallen out the door, it had caught one of the larger stumps and SLAM that was it for Uncle Jimmy. The other half of Uncle Jimmy they had to hunt up, and Terry was glad that it was not he who found it, but one of the gleepers from the Veggie stand. Just thinking about it was uglier than a fart in church and a turd in a punchbowl combined...

As Terry listlessly watched the bottom of the channel, reminiscing and catching his breath, a small mudcat, maybe 5, 6 pounder, wriggled its way across the rocks below, cleaning algae off of Gods own aquarium it was, vacuuming the rocks. Terry almost looked away, and was very glad he didn't because he then saw something that very few ever get to see, and it was that something that would ultimately give him an edge when fishing for those big cats, although it sure did nix any ideas of further searchings for arrowheads here, at least for this afternoon.

At first he thought it was some kind of a shadow, because it was just black, but then he saw a silhouette of the thing as it emerged from the deeper part of the channel -- it not only caused the nape of his neck to rear up like a razorback, but he was thankful he was swimming because he felt sure he peed his shorts in at least one little spurt. At Least.

The big dark thing looked almost like a cessna airplane, thats how big it was, an underwater airplane which was really the largest catfish Terry had ever seen. It was headed right for the other catfish which was still obliviously feeding off the rocks directly underneath Terry. It headed toward the vacuuming and much smaller catfish on the rock below, and the little fish saw it coming and wriggled frantically at the last moment but to no avail. In one quick and graceful sweep it slid over the smaller fish and back into the deeper channel. And the little fish was gone. Terry realized two things right away. That thing was over 600 pounds, and it had been watching that little fish from its lair in the darker part of that channel. Then he realized, with not too little horror, that it, of course, had been watching him too.

He made his way out of the water rather quickly, never realizing then that this little episode would lead him to the biggest money in the river.

It would be years yet before Butch Savoy of The Shiny Shiner would approach Terry about catching big cats, but when he did, Terry knew where to start, and he knew what to use for bait. He never told another soul about this, and that was his edge, his advantage, and he kept it that way. Butch pestered him at the beginning, but realized Terry wasn't going to come off it, so he gave up and just made good money right along with Terry, every time a big catfish caught by his cousin showed up at the dock. And they were many.


**********************




"You are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness." Matthew 23:27


The year is 1868. Near Huntsville Alabama. A fight has just broken out in a saloon by the riverfront, a rough area full of rougher people.

Yosi Octa was sprawled out drunk, on the sidewalk near the front of the saloon. He was having a vision. Something about being in water. Then the brawl began, and Yosi Octa, once a well respected holy man of his tribe, now a drunken sot, became just one more of the occurences that have come, over time, to epitomize America, and these occurences are of course known as THE INNOCENT BYSTANDER.

Yosi Octa did not even feel the knife stabbing his chest until the second thrust, and by then the pain was quick, sharp, and already waning; his blood flowed and his life ebbed from his body in pulsing gushes. A stutter, a cough, a shudder. He did not even open his eyes.

The man who stabbed Yosi Octa to death did it out of pure blood lust, which he was no stranger to at all. His name was Pearce, and he indulged his lust whenever possible. He liked to do it as much as possible. This Pearce persona flashes continuously across many aspects of the multiverse, cropping up in the oddest of places, and like all other alive personae here, it never dies, it is immortal. And without a doubt, it grows, though the Pearce persona is just one persona among Billions. Billions and Billions and Billions.

This perpetrator Pearce was not even drunk; he had been drinking only tea while sitting at a table by himself in the saloon. He had followed the melee out of the bar and into the street. As the scene churned, Pearce noticed the old indian seemingly asleep through it all, and his stiletto was out momentarily: it was never far. With the crowds eyes on the men screaming-kicking-biting-cursing in the dusty street, and yes, now there was a gunshot, now a woman screamed; it was all a great crescendoe to the ears of Pearce as he PIERCED and PIERCED and PIERCED again, seeing the blood drip ethereal through the cracks of the wooden walkway like red raindrops glistening in the sun, and then Pearce moved on, quickly, as he always did always did always did....

There are pushers and piercers and poisoners and petty food foulers here in this world of grief and hate. There are child molestors and those who simply wish harm on others continuously. And more. The harm wishers actually seem to be a vast majority among the evil on this world though, and perhaps they are all in pain. One must wonder. Facilitators are what they really are, a fertile psychic hotbed nurturing the miasmic weft and weave of higher evil, higher darkness, more orderly and darkly shining chaos. They are food of the collective Incubus. And they love it.

And there truly are myriad other vermin within the night of the human soul here; some manifest and easily avoidable, others well hidden, such as this one, this Pearce. These hidden ones, these shapeshifters (i PEARCE i PEARCE iPIERCEPIERCEPIERCE...) usually take great care to create a respectable facade in their lives, to better hide their predatory inclinations, and therefore ALL rigidly-defined-respectability should be suspect to the wise and knowing, because attributes of violence actually lend advantage when in pursuit of worldly posessions. You bet.

Pearce left town that night on a well appointed stagecoach, the only passenger, heading west. No one noticed, and very few would ever remember him in Alabama at all. Pearce would be back someday, another form with the same name, but not for a long time. At that distant time it would be much easier to hide himself, because there were a great many more people, and bizarre behaviour had actually become fashionable then. None of this mattered to this Pearce of now, and really, not much mattered to this Pearce of now at all. Blood. There was that.

Yosi Octa was already in the ground, wrapped in a bloody shroud, and tossed in an unmarked and shallow grave. Yosi Octa had not exactly gone home, no, but he had definitely gone to a better place. A higher plane. The Yosi Octa persona continued to grow, and that too, is as good as it gets here, children. Pain is fleeting, but identity is forever.

The one thing the reptilian-minded humans such as Pearce have in common is this: to a one they always seem able to justify or rationalize their actions, to themselves at least, as some sort of punishment. Many even believe they are Gods Tools.

And in a very general way they are. Because strictly speaking, everything here is Gods Tools. Reality is beyond strange.

It is....Reality.



***********************

The spinning bead is getting small now, it is getting ground down, and that is not good, though I really do not notice it at all, because, as stated in the beginning, I am watching the picture as it develops, I am enthralled. I am a catten having its belly scratched, or a lizard on a rock in the nice warm sun, I am mesmerized, hypnotized, I am freaking out and its not disguised...

Then:

BING!

The bead breaks into pieces which go flying off in several directions at once, except for one which goes THUNK right between my eyes.

I blink blearily, finally snapping out of it, I am made to snap out of it, if truth be told....I grab a drink of my now cold coffee, then glance over my shoulder somewhat furtively, looking for magical flying insects of all types, or even their ghosts. With trembling hands I put another rough bead of this picture rock on the wire pin, and apply it to the grinding stone. What else is there to do?

The show must go on, and though I can't know for sure, I instinctively have a feeling that this story ain't over yet, not hardly.

And I am right, but don't worry, you won't hear from me again. Unless THIS bead breaks, which I do not think will happen, because its a big gnarly one...


-----------------------


The year is 1985. The boys name is Pearce. He has a last name, but the boy is simple, and does not even care. One name is good enough for him. Quite enough. He isn't going anywhere far. Ever. Anybody that needed him, they could call him by his first name, or just go away. There is a lot of that in Alabama. There is a lot of that everywhere.

The boys name has nothing at all to do with his Ripper Psychopathy. That came from places deep, and dark, and old. It triggered once again in this Pearse persona of 1985 as a result of hog slayings in his youth, a necessity on many farms, and something that not too many people enjoy, although Pearce did, and he did not even try to hide it.

All his life many of his kin would say they only saw Pearce jolly during butcherings. One might think that this would have naturally led to full time employment as a butcher, but, as already stated, the boy was simple, and events many times control even the best of us. Pearce lived on his momma and daddys property, in an outbuilding of the barn that he and his father had converted to an apartment with plumbing and electricity. Its where he came to clean up, and sleep. Otherwise, Pearce kept pretty busy, or, rather, his daddy kept him pretty busy, and that was allright with Pearce. They worked the farm, fished and hunted the river, and also presided together at the occasional butchering of animals for their own farm, or for money.

In the mind of Pearce these butcherings became BLOOD EVENTS, and later, as he matured and other chemicals began dominating his system, as the boy became a man, he realized that he himself could initiate and control BLOOD EVENTS, of all kinds. With the cunning of something closer to animal than man, Pearce also knew instinctively that ANY kind of blood event could be experienced, as long as he did not get caught at it, which is the hallmark of every psychopath, up to and including the president of the United States.

It was during his late teen years, on a drinking trip to Memphis with some of his cousins, that Pearce saw his first tattoo and piercing shop, and though he could not read well at all, he heard someone nearby the shop say the word pierce, and he answered to it. It was not far from there to the realization by the teenager Pearce that his name sounded exactly like another word which meant almost the same thing as BLOOD EVENT.

He took this as an omen, and over time his mantra evolved from this chance happenstance in the city of Americas first king. Of course the mantra was this:



I am Pearce I like to Pierce

My Name Is PEARCE and I PIERCE-PIERCE-PIERCE

I PEARCE, I PEARCE

I PIERCE PIERCE PIERCE...!



Now, during hog slayings and beef butcherings, the persona of Pearce took on less jolly overtones, although there still was some of that; now there was a seriousness too. None knew that it was because Pearce was in what some might call a religious fervor. His mantra played continually through his mind during these blood events now, and trips to Memphis became highlighted and punctuated with tattoos when he could afford them, and some of the more exotic piercings which he could not accomplish himself.

After 6 or so ear piercings and a cheek stud, as well as a few arm tattoos that were more than loud, they were obnoxious, and he liked that...welllllll, after this, he and his daddy had a BIG blowout, and damned near got into a fist fight, and thats when the old man finally realized it was all beyond him now, the boy was a man, and had gotten as much upbringing as he was going to get. Pearces father adopted a new stance of reluctant acceptance, because overall he was just glad for his sons help on the farm. That was the rationale, anyway, but he was still unhappy with these developments of Memphis on his son (Which is how he saw it -- that damned rock 'n roll was evil and always would be -- everything it touched turned ugly) and he let it be known so. But once all that was done his conscience was clear, and even though he did not accept these progressing transformations of his son, it did not come up again. Otherwise it was just life on the farm, and the days went by. The weeks and months like hours of the day. Years. It became 1990.

Then came the Japanese, and their seemingly bottomless wallets, and their insatiable appetites for mother of pearl shell, to feed their quickly growing cultured pearl industries overseas. The mother of pearl shell industry in the Tennessee River had always had a following in Tennessee proper, because the river is big and deep up there, and the shells were very plentiful. Much earlier in Tennessee history the various types of shells were harvested to make buttons, before plastic came along.

The Japanese wanted this shell so badly they were paying 2-3 times or more the usual price for it, plus bonus moneys for certain loads, and this is what caused the local fisheries such as that in Grant Alabama to be born and flourish for a few years. Washboards, Monkey Paws, Pistol Grips, and many other types of white Mother of Pearl shells were harvested legally under license and sold to make tiny white mother of pearl beads, that were then implanted in pearl making oysters to become some of the highest grade pearls in the world.

Being on the river daily, both Pearce and his daddy heard about the coming money long before it actually happened, and though Pearce was simple he was not that simple and could learn to dive with a hookah rig/compressor with no trouble at all. And like others of his intellectual standing, what he lacked in straight up IQ, he made up for in brawn, and animal cunning.  Some would say he surpassed intellect, as far as getting things done was concerned. Physical brawn is only scoffed at by those who are scared of it. Ideally, in this world and in many others, a mixture of brawn and brains works out best. No argument from anywhere, the thing about Pearce, he was lopsided.

Once the Japanese money for Mother of Pearl started flowing, Pearce was one of the first to collect the freshwater mussels for money and he and his daddy did real well. During the summer it was not uncommon for some divers to stay down 3-4 hours at a time: when the minimum wage is 5 dollars an hour, and you are making 100 + dollars an hour, that is great incentive. Pearce had an almost unbelievable physical stamina underwater and he collected shell with perhaps not-quite the zeal he tackled BLOOD EVENTS, but with zeal nonetheless.

His trips to Memphis became more frequent after his daddy had a cousin help get Pearce a drivers license.

This was a true quandary for Pearces daddy, because even though Pearce needed the license to drive the farms vehicles, these trips to Memphis really stuck in his craw. He was forever lecturing anymore. But Pearce needed the license to drive the farm vehicles, and because he had his own money, a car was inevitable. Trips to Memphis, inevitable. It was on one such trip that Pearce lost his virginity, in more ways than one.

He saw her watching him from across the street in the bar district, which was where the body art, and dance, and fashion and food were too, a well lit nook of the downtown historical district, restored and kind of going off. Cool. Hip.

"Thems the ones daddy calls sluts," he thought.

Then, like a knife, like HIS knife, like the short sharp blade he ALWAYS carried, sharp energy spiked upward from somewhere down below his belly button, because another thought occured: "World would not miss one of them..."

She winked and walked off. He followed discreetly until he found her near a short full tree at the back of the cemetary park...she thought she knew what he wanted, really, he was like all the rest, so she stroked his crotch, and all thought of the knife left his mind as the dull ache grew in his loins, seemingly of its own volition. The hardness between his legs grew and grew, and she unzipped him, and guided him, and the soft wetness and heat and smell of her were too much and he felt himself spasm, and it was only then that he remembered the knife...

Thus began a short spate of what the Memphis homocide people would call the Piggy Ripper Rapes, because the murders were all done in the same style of cutting and gutting, by one who was well familiar with pig slaughtering.

This little factoid really did not narrow things down in the least, and all of these crime realizations were still over two years away anyway, because it took over a year to compile the stats, and then almost another year before a bright boy downtown realized there was a pattern to these 5 ripper rapes. It was all over before it was begun, actually, because by time the lieutenant had gotten around to reviewing these statistics, Pearce was already dead. The lieutenant did not know this, and he never would. The investigation would take another year, and no one would ever connect it with Pearce, or know it was Pearce, or know that the problem had already taken care of itself.


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The entity finned the water lazily at the bottom of the River. It waited. It watched. It fed. It was very good at feeding. It was very very large.

It enjoyed its environment. It was safe. It inhabited this flesh today, other flesh tomorrow, a special-electricity alive across dimensions and times and there is no tomorrow really, only tomorrows forever, and travel amongst them, and now.

The entity enjoyed this Now, it was serene, and the action of the water on the skin of this flesh, and the drawing of sustenance as gas from the liquid itself, and the feeding: it was all very nice. The entity reveled in its condition and existence. It was Good. And even though names did not matter to this entity -- for what were names but anchors and chains? Even though these encumbrances no longer concerned the entity, it still knew of itself, and its past, and it got a chuckle from remembering the death of Yosi Octa, the death of itself, not far from here, not far from here at all.

That was just a minor flash of recall for the entity now, there was so much more so much more...it did NOT find surprising the fact that this place was its place, it always came back here, and would again no doubt, the multiverse is big, but most of its places are the same, all the same, static, unchanging, or nearly so. This was a little nexus of boiling light and life and it would be nice if this spread and the entity did its best to nurture that along, in its being, in its returning.

This point in space called earth, this nexus of light and chemicals mixing so nicely allowing the coda to speak, nay scream....it was very special....its inhabitants thought it just happened this way and the entity found this amusing in the extreme....no, things like this were carried onward, they had to be created, and most of the seeds never grew...

Then:

The entity sensed....something...something behind it, something familiar, something expected, and it was moving unnaturally and with menace, but of course the entity did not fear, it was immortal afterall, and each moment made itself. This id-entity was just a player in Now, again, a dabbler in forever, continuously learning. A phantasm of spectral light, it was knotted in the fabric of the multiverse, freely moving as a flowing pattern, amongst a multitude of other patterns. Flesh of a giant Catfish resting on a mussel bed...here for a reason. Here for revenge. Drawing the quarry in.


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The last morning on earth for this aspect of Pearce was spent putting his boat in the water and running out to a new mussel bed another cousin had put him onto. It sounded good, and one of the shells the cousin had found, the biggest pair, weighed over 20 pounds when the clam inside was kilt and the shells were cleaned! Thats a big mussel! Perfect washboards laying all over the bottom, thats what the man had said, and there was no reason not to believe.

Pearce did not waste any time, and he noticed none of the other fisherman like Terry, at the dock that morning, because he really couldn't, he was simple, especially that way, except as concerned BLOOD EVENTS, and this was not one of them. At least he didn't think it was. It in fact WAS a BLOOD EVENT, or soon would be, and he would be directly involved, he just didn't know it yet.

He got to the site alright, and worked a fair day, and it was like the man said, washboards all over the bottom. He was 4 hours on the bottom, in about 12 feet of water, which was real easy and nice diving. The water was clear enough to see 20 or 30 feet away in places, because of a strong current coming off an underwater spring here. Its probably why the shells got so big here too. Pearce was just hitting his stride this afternoon, and he still felt fresh, even though there were four big bags of shell collected already and laying on the bottom. Stashed for recovery in another hour or so. Then:

"Skeery geezus h christmas looka that thing there its a gigantic catfish!"

The biggest catfish Pearce had ever seen lay on the bottom of the river, about 25 feet away, all amongst the mother of pearl shells, and he figured it would weigh in at gawd amighty maybe 500 pounds or more! This was the best AND the best AND the best...getting the killer shells and a BLOOD EVENT TOOOOOO!!!!

He carefully withdrew the over sized knife from his leg sheath, and crept in close, without breathing. He was sure the thing was unaware of his presence and he planned on getting right up on it and stabbing it with all his might right in the top of the head...

A BLOOD EVENT to end all.


I am Pearce I like to Pierce

My Name Is PEARCE and I PIERCE-PIERCE-PIERCE

I PEARCE,I PEARCE

I PIERCEPIERCEPIERCE...!


Right before it happened Pearce perceived or sensed that this was all very primal, this thing that was about to happen, a battle he had been involved in before, with this very same being, somehow. He had an erection.

This was somehow a battle forever, but these were fleeting thoughts in a simple mind, and they did not amount to much. He came from behind the giant thing, knife raised, but only for an instant, then down FAST, into the neck of the fleshly entity.....
And then nothing but foaming bubbles turning red as two different bloods mixed in the water across the multiverse and the knotted energys battled: BZZZZZZTTTTTTT flaring white hot like a live wire in a mud puddle -- and punctuated by a high shrill staccato screaming sound that Pearce did not even realize emanated from him.

The flesh of the Yosi Octa entity went into a defensive frenzy, deploying all its fin bones at once, and violently, twisting and thrashing toward the source of its pain, and those giant fin bones were like serrated knives and they caught Pearce up in a defleshing whirl -- flayed strips of his skin, some with tattoos on them, and one with his face on it, cheek stud intact, filled the water like down from a ripped pillow --


PIERCE!PIERCE!PIERCE!PIERCE!PIERCE!PIERCE!PIERCE!...


It was not quick for Pearce and raw nerves screamed for some minutes as he actually drowned to death, versus bled to death. It was close, but he drowned first. The entity, the id-entity, the giant catfish, had severed one arm completely off at the shoulder, alongwith disattaching him from his breathing apparatus, so that he left gobby twirls of blood through the white, feather-looking pieces of his skin, in his dying spasms, trying to swim away; a carnival painting in blood, a fiesta of flesh.

An observer of this happening, this cosmic vengeance, would have seen a white hot ball of light just as Pierce stabbed the entity, which then turned blood red and expanded, then sort of...just...popped...

Then nothing, except perhaps a giant shadow swimming away from the scene, and a bloody pulp beginning to float upward, and away, to suffer no more, to cause suffering no more. For awhile.


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Butch Savoy of the Shiny Shiner bait shop in Guntersville Alabama would never forget that night as long as he lived. When asked about it later, things would get all jumbled up, and he would have to start again, or plug things in he forgot, because it was just about the worsest memory he could think of. His cousin Terry was no help at all. Terry claimed he got amnesia over it all, and maybe he did at that. It was enough to make anybody forget, just so they could keep their sanity.

The story always started with Butch hearing Terry hollerin' outside, and damned if it didn't sound like the boy was bawlin' like a baby, but that couldnt be, it was some kinda joke....Butch went outside with a half crooked smile on his face, which he lost immediately, because he saw that it was Terry, and he WAS bawlin' like a baby, and he was carrying something in a shroud, a bloody shroud....

It was Pearce, or what was left of Pearce. Terry said a catfish had got him, the man was missing his knife, among some other things, and Terry finally got it out that he thought maybe Pearce had ignorantly attacked a big one. Butch had to agree, and if anybody knew about catfish wounds, these cousins did, but neither had ever seen anything like this before, and neither ever wanted to see it again...


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Terry had not really gotten amnesia, but he knew he had better say that he did, because nobody, not even Butch, would believe what had really happened. Fortunately everybody was so shook up over it they never asked how he knew to stop and check at Pearces boat. He would never do something like that just out of friendliness, no. He would of course lend a hand to any brother on the river, but what Terry could never say was this:

As he was returning that afternoon, with a good load of shell himself, he had noticed Pearces boat down this little cove, not odd at all, except that just as he looked, a huge bright almost blinding ball of light lit up under the water, and the water itself bubbled up and roiled like there had been some kind of explosion. Then the foaming water turned red, and thats what had turned Terry around. By time he got there there was nothing but bloody water and a floating corpse.

Pearce.

Pierce Pierce Pearce.




FIN