Page 137 of Nash Falls

“Can’t it be fake? Or how about a tat sleeve?”

“Fake comes off. You need to be the real deal or nothin’, man.”

“So where on my body?”

Jackson snorted. “Might be easier to say wherenoton your body.”

Nash touched his hairless head. “Wait,thiscanvas!”

“Ain’t nobody gonna think you Walter Nash when you inked all over.”

“But won’t that take a long time?”

Shock shook his head. “Nope. Can do it all in one day.”

“How?”

“General anesthesia. Four ink artists, nine hours. Good to go.”

“General anesthesia! Am I going to a hospital?”

“I’ve got an anesthetist lined up. And a nurse. They’ll come here.”

“I’m a fugitive.”

“They got their own troubles.”

“Including the anesthetist?”

“Especially him. Now, you just got to pick out your designs. But we doin’ the back, legs, arms, chest, head.”

“Is this really necessary?”

“Naw, man, not less you wanna live. Your call. No lie.”

Nash looked woefully down at the binders and started to slowly turn the pages.

He’d wanted to choose the knife, eagle, and spear like his father’s, but Shock had, quite rightly, vetoed those choices.

“Don’t want to make it too easy for ’em, Walter.”

Thus he’d selected a roaring, fanged lion, his mane spread wide, for his back, and a dragon for his right arm and shoulder—the dragon’s head covered the delt and the rest of the creature slid down the arm all the way to the back of his hand. For the chest and abdomen he’d chosen a huge scales of justice with the blindfolded Lady Justice holding them. Another symbol. On each thigh was a shield, like that carried by an ancient warrior. On each calf was one of a pair of dice. Every step he took Nash figured he was gambling whether he was going to live or die.

Finally, for the tat that would run from the top of one ear, over the crown of his head, and straight down to the top of his other ear, Nash had not picked from the binders. After some deliberation, he had drawn out a length of thick, steel-blue chain edged in gold. It had three kinks in it equidistantly spaced. The kinks were roughly in the form of hearts. He knew what they meant; that was enough.

Then came the day to be inked.

The artists had placed the chosen designs from the binders plus Nash’s rough sketch for his head onto iPad Pros. They had then customized each design after back-and-forth discussions with Shock, who was acting as Nash’s intermediary. After final approval, these designs were then printed out on transfer paper using a thermal printer that used heat to transfer the image, giving it crisp, clean lines and guaranteeing the integrity of the final images. Nash learned that ink was not actually used in this process, but rather carbon-based paper that reacted to heat to create the stencil, actually burning the design onto the stencil paper; it had four layers, including a yellow sheet that held the original in place while it was in the copy machine. Cosmetic grade dyes were used because they were safe for the skin and were also smudge-proof.

Nash had to make sure his skin was well hydrated and clean. A mild soap had removed oil and dead skin cells. He had applied Hibiclens all over his body twenty-four hours prior to the procedure. It was the same product and process hospitals used before surgery. His skin was then shaved, and a layer of stencil gel was applied to his body; it enabled the ink to adhere better to the skin. The transfer papers holding the designs were precisely placed onto the skin and then peeled off, leaving the actual design in place on his body exactly where it would be inked for permanence.

Shock explained, “For large tats, like these, you can’t have no mistakes. Get in there with your tattoo pen and go from memory, things can go sideways fast. With the designs planned out, printed out, and applied directly to the areas the tats will be goin’, makes it a whole lot easier and safer to bring out the pens then. And my guys are good. They don’t just ink it on. They mold it to your body. Fittin’ it not just to size and space but how your body moves with it there, muscles and all.”

“So you’ve done this before? For your clients?”

“Oh yeah. For those that needed to disappear.”

“Why would law-abiding clients need to disappear?”