Colour neo-traditional tattoo of a Martian head with exposed brain and bulging eyes in a glass dome, with ACK lettering, on the calf.

Martian head in dome with ACK lettering on a leg

Neo-trad · Calf · Colour · Photo

A cartoon Martian head sits inside a glass dome above a metal base, with a pink brain exposed on top and two large bulging eyes. The word ACK appears three times in bold orange and yellow lettering with black outlines. Bold black outlines, flat fills and soft blended shading give it a bright, saturated colour palette against plain skin.

Neo-trad Calf Alien Brain Eye Skull Lettering

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Tuesday, 14th October. Wrote nothing for three days because Dad says a man who writes in a book while the roof is talking should be fed to the pit ponies. Here it is anyway.

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The thing came up in the bucket at the bottom of Hollin Level, wrapped in wet sacking and sat in a glass bell as if somebody had ordered it from a catalogue. Green face, two eyes on stalks that swivelled at the lamp, a brain sitting on top like a cold pudding. Mr Ashworth wanted it chucked back down the shaft. Then it opened its mouth and said, "Ack!" and Mr Ashworth sat down on the rail and did not get up until dinner.

It has said nothing else. Not a word of English, not a word of Welsh, which Evan Pugh tried in the Lamb on Friday. Only ack, short and bright, like a cork coming out. Mrs Pugh says it's a curse. The vicar says it's a hymn he doesn't know. Children now stand under the chapel window shouting it back, and the greengrocer has started selling carrots in paper twists labelled "for the Martian".

Yesterday the ground under the washery gave way and the new seam flooded. Nobody died, which we all agreed was lucky, and the head in the dome seemed pleased. Its eyes went round like a clock. Then it looked straight at me and said, "Ack," once more, quieter, the way you'd say goodnight to a dog that had done well. I've put it on the windowsill facing the pit wheel. I think it's counting.