Inktober 2022

An old pickup truck slowly made its way up the short hill to a house, the engine coughing and sputtering afterwards. Samael hopped out from the driver’s seat after he parked it at the intersection between his front and back yard. He turned his head to look at the large, heavy bag in the cargo bed and sighed. A meal first, he’ll take care of it later.

Samael made his way into the kitchen and opened the fridge to get some leftovers. He was being a bit lazy not cooking, but hey, you shouldn’t waste still perfectly good spaghetti. Once the container was placed into the microwave, he picked up a dog bowl from the ground and scooped in some dog food. He walked to the back door and shook the bowl.

« Codes! » He shouted towards the woods. « Cody! » He tried again, but his dog still hadn’t appeared out of the shrubs where he usually played. Samael shouted a few more times, before shrugging and leaving the bowl a short distance from the door. He then walked back to his microwave, got his now heated spaghetti and ate.

The supper was as eventful as you’d expect, which was extremely boring. After all, Samael was a (painfully) single man in his late thirties living with just a dog, who wasn’t even here at the moment. He washed the single dish in silence, wiped the table and started playing a song on a pocket radio. He grabbed a flashlight and car keys and left once again.

Samael started up the engine and drove towards the little forest behind his house, parking right before where the road narrowed down to a width where he couldn’t drive anymore. He hopped down the truck and tackled the load in the bed. With a grunt, he got it to fall onto the ground and he dragged it from there on.

With a clear destination in mind, he tugged the long bag across a small trail he had prepared a few days prior, leaving a long trace in the dirt behind him. After but a few minutes, he finally got to a tiny clearing near a big oak tree, where waited his shovel, a few more tools and a small pit. With a few huffs to catch his breath, Samael wore his thick gloves then zipped open the bag.

« Time to get you in the ground. » He said in mock-cheerfulness, grabbing his shovel to deepen the small crater he had started working on the day before. Once he was content with the size of the hole, a size at which even he could lie down comfortably inside, he walked a few steps to drag the bag closer.

Suddenly, a nearby shrub started to rustle and Samael whipped around, alarmed. What came out of the bushes however was a black and white dog, its fluffy tail standing tall and wagging excitedly.

« There you are Cody! Gave me a fright! »

The dog trotted over happily, dropping a long stick-like object into the pit his owner had just dug. Samael squatted down to give the dog some pats with one hand and reached into the hole with the other, pulling out a long bone recognizable to him as a human femur.

« Oh, Codes! Why’d you dig this up? You bad dog. » Samael sighed while the dog simply panted at him, seemingly smiling. « Now I gotta find which pit you got this one from. »