by Tom Lewis
Within two hours he had read the ritual book, then moved on to the diary. It turned out to be more of a journal the priest had kept and was written in a way to provide instruction to priests who followed in his grim footsteps.
It broke the Exorcism down into stages and provided indicators for the priest to be on the constant lookout for — anything that might show a change in the ever-shifting battle between the priest and the possessing demon.
It also warned of traps to be wary of that could quickly ensnare the priest in a prison from which he had little hope of escape.
But the most critical point of all, and the one it repeatedly emphasized, was that the priest must remember he is there only as a proxy for God. It’s the source of his protection and authority, and without it, the priest would come under the full blast of the demon’s fury, with little to no chance of ever recovering. So despite the vile personal slanders and emotional attacks the demon would hurl at the priest, the priest could never step out from behind that protection and engage on a personal level with the demon. This, the writer cautioned, was the deadliest trap of all, and it had lured many priests to their doom.
Despite the growing sense of dread, Sean was mentally exhausted, and within an hour he had fallen asleep at his desk.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Something Wicked This Way Comes
“By the pricking of my thumbs
Something wicked this way comes.
Open, locks, whoever knocks.”
— Macbeth by William Shakespeare
****
An ominous silence hung over the cold marble hallway. Cassie was alone in that dark crypt where she had once heard the dead stir from within their vaults. At each end, the hallway was lit by a silver candelabra that cast dancing shadows along its sphere of light.
Between those lights lay darkness, and it was from that darkness that eyes watched her.
She began walking toward a door at the end of the hallway, but she noticed that the farther she walked, the farther away it withdrew. She tried running, but this only made it recede away faster. No matter what she did, or how fast she ran, that door wasn’t going to let her reach it.
She finally stopped to catch her breath.
Something was approaching her from behind.
Cassie turned, and from the darkness floated the ghost of a teenage girl. She made no sound as she glided inches above the floor. She raised her hand and pointed to a marble plaque on the front of a vault.
Cassie approached the plaque and leaned close enough to read its name in the dim light — “Cassie Stevens.”
As she stared at the plaque, things emerged from the darkness behind her. She turned, and dozens of dark shapes now stood there. There were thirty-six of them — the number of her fellow partiers who had burned to death at the rave.
One by one, they broke out in flames till Cassie was surrounded by these walking human-shaped torches.
She squeezed past them, and raced as fast as she could toward that exit... only to see it retreat farther and farther away into an infinite distance.
And now the smoke from those burning partiers caught up to her, and her nostrils filled with the stench of burning flesh. She gasped for breath as she trudged forward, with no hope of ever reaching that elusive exit. She finally collapsed on the cold stone floor, and the smoke completely enveloped her. It filled her lungs till they burnt like fire. She could no longer breathe, and she squirmed as she suffocated in a slow agonizing death...
Only Cassie could no longer die — she was already dead.
She closed her eyes with the realization that this agony would never end. It would continue to grow worse and worse, and yet death could never offer her reprieve.
Just as all hope slipped from her grasp, a gentle warmth brushed her skin and cool fresh air filled her lungs... and with it came the scent of daisies.
Katie was here.
Cassie opened her eyes and saw Katie kneeling beside her. “He’s coming, Cassie,” she said. “You need to wake up.”
****
Cassie startled awake in her bed at Hillview to the blaring wail of the emergency alarm in the hallway. It meant someone had escaped from the hospital’s containment wing.
She looked over at her door and saw red emergency lights flickering through its narrow window. It meant the power had also gone out, and the hospital was running on its backup generator.
She went over to the door and pressed her ear against it, but could hear nothing over that alarm.
She opened the door and stepped into the hallway. The red lights mounted at each end of the hallway flickered like strobes, and in each flash she saw dozens of patients in their white hospital gowns shuffling aimlessly. As several of them shuffled past, she caught the glazed, unseeing stares in their eyes. They were like zombies.
She backed against the wall to avoid them, and that’s when she saw two things crawling across the ceiling toward her. With each strobe, these things skittered closer. It was like watching two giant spiders till they were finally close enough to see their details — it was Trish and Silvia, with their limbs disjointed outward like insects.
Cassie screamed and retreated back into her room. She slammed the door shut and jammed the chair beneath the doorknob.
She raced over to her nightstand and grabbed her cell phone, then ducked behind her bed. She checked the display — there was only one bar, and it blinked in and out. She quickly typed “they’re here” into her text app and sent it to Justin. And hoped it went through.
A skittering sound caused her to look up... and right into the dark eyes of Seth, Trish, and Silvia, who clung to the ceiling above her.
****
“Sean...”
Amy’s voice called from the darkness, and Sean startled awake into his dark bedroom. His face was plastered to the priest’s diary, where he had dozed off... how long ago had it been?
He slowly sat up and gave his mind a second to clear. He could swear he had heard Amy’s voice and didn’t recall having any dreams it could have come from.
The storm howled outside, and heavy rain pelted the window behind him. There was just enough ambient light from the window for him to see around.
Then it struck him — why was it so dark? He knew he had turned on all the lights because he had felt so silly doing it. Yet now the entire rectory was bathed in a cold gray gloom.
He went over to the window from which he could see the entire neighborhood, and the lights were out everywhere. Even the streetlights were out.
He headed from his bedroom and down the hallway, patting his way along the wall as he went. His hands finally came across a small cabinet, and inside it he found the flashlight he was looking for.
He flicked it on, then followed the hallway to the stairs. He shined his light down them to the living room and over to the front door.
It was open.
Sean knew he had closed and locked it before going upstairs.
He went down to the living and over to the door, passing the opening to the kitchen on his left. He looked out the door into the storm.
“Hello?” he called out, but he heard only the rain.
“Father?”
Justin’s voice came from behind him and nearly startled Sean from his skin. He spun around and Justin stood there.
“Sorry,” Justin said. “Your kitchen door was open.”
“It’s okay,” Sean said, catching his breath. “What is it?”
“This.” Justin showed him the text from Cassie on his phone — “they’re here.” “I think she’s in trouble.”
“Did you try calling her?”
Justin nodded. “It keeps going to her voice mail.”
“What about the hospital?”
“I tried, but nobody’s answering.”
“There’s no answering service?”
Justin shook his head. “There’s supposed to be people on staff twenty-four hours a day. But I’ve tried five times now, and nothing.”
Justin watched Sean as Sean seemed to debate what to do. “I’m going there right now, Father, and was seeing if you’d come with.”
Sean nodded. “Yeah. Wait here while I grab some things.”
Justin waited in the dark living room while Sean ran upstairs. He returned several minutes later with a backpack, in which he had packed the Exorcism missal, candles, two crucifixes, and two vials of holy water. He had also grabbed a second flashlight that he handed to Justin.
“You know this could go really bad for us,” Sean cautioned. “I have no idea what I’m doing, so I’m just going off what’s in the missal.”
“But that has the ritual in it, right?” Justin asked.
Sean nodded. “Yeah.”
“Then it should work.”
“I hope so.”
They turned to the open doorway, and in it stood the dark silhouette of a large dog. A low growl rumbled from its throat.
“Don’t make any sudden moves,” Sean cautioned.
“I think it’s Cassie’s dog,” Justin said. She had told him about seeing Rex that night and the terror she had felt.
“Rex? Is that you, boy?” Justin said calmly.
The dog let out another deep rumbling growl.
“Back away slowly into the kitchen,” Sean said. “We can go out that door.”
Justin took a cautious step back, and then another... and as he did, the dog’s head followed him.
Sean took a step toward the kitchen, and the dog’s head snapped around to him.
He froze as another deep growl rumbled in Rex’s chest.
Then Rex stepped in through the doorway. His head was low and ready to lunge at any moment.
Sean saw Justin disappear into the kitchen. “There’s a broom in the closet,” Sean said in a low steady voice. “Let me know when you have it.”
Sean took a slow step toward the kitchen, and then another, while Rex steadily advanced. Sean heard the broom closet open...
“Got it,” Justin’s hushed voice said from the kitchen.
“Be ready,” Sean said. “On three. One... two... three.”
Sean leaped sideways through the kitchen opening and quickly dodged past Justin.
Rex lunged in behind him. Justin swung the broom handle, and it cracked down on Rex’s head. The dazed dog staggered back, then lunged again. Justin swung again, and Rex snatched it in his jaws. He bit down and snapped it in half like a toothpick.
Sean stepped past Justin holding a mop. He jabbed it at Rex.
“Get out the door,” Sean said, “and be ready to close it behind me.”
Justin dashed out the door, just as Rex bit down on the mop and tore it from Sean’s hands.
Sean raced out, and Justin slammed the door shut. A second later, Rex crashed against it.
Justin and Sean raced across the lawn to the cars parked out back. “We’ll take my car,” Sean hollered.
They climbed in, just as Rex bounded out the front door and came at them across the lawn.
Rex leaped onto the hood as Sean started the car. Rex’s head crashed into the windshield, and cracks spread across it.
“Shit! Go! Go!” Justin hollered as Rex pulled back and slammed his head into the windshield again.
Sean jammed the car in reverse and peeled out from his parking space into the alley. Rex lost his footing and tumbled off the hood, but was quickly back on his feet and chasing them.
Sean slammed it in drive, and the tires spun out on the wet pavement as the tires sought traction. They finally gripped, and the car fishtailed wildly as it barreled down the alley.
He spun a sharp turn onto the dark street at the end, and then they were speeding off into the storm.
To their meeting with a demon.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
What Rough Beast
“And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?”
— The Second Coming by William Butler Yeats
****
The lone car plowed through the storm. Sean and Justin had been driving for an hour and had seen only a dozen other cars. They had watched through thick sheets of rain as the road climbed from the rugged coast into the sweeping foothills near Hillview. And the anticipation as they neared it was excruciating.
Sean had briefed Justin on what he thought they could expect and what each of their roles in the Exorcism would be. But all of that was based on what he had read only a few hours earlier. He admitted he was flying blind on this and was scared out of his mind.
The risk inherent in an Exorcism was more than its failure to liberate the victim. It would be a clash of wills between the priest and the titanic will of the demon, and the journal had cautioned that the priest would come under ferocious attacks. And if he failed, the priest himself could fall into possession.
As the miles ticked by, Justin’s initial courage had failed him as well. When they had discussed performing an Exorcism in Cassie’s room that day, he had no idea of the terror he would feel when that moment arrived. And now, as they finally turned onto the winding drive that led to Hillview, Justin had his first doubts he would survive the night.
Lightning crashed through the sky as they wove through dense thickets of trees to the perimeter fence. And when they finally emerged from the trees, a cold fear gripped them.
Hillview was dead.
Hillview’s massive structure loomed darkly beyond its perimeter fence. There were no lights anywhere — not on the grounds or in windows or even the lobby.
They pulled up to the main gate. It was open and the guard shack abandoned.
“Something bad happened,” Justin muttered. “This gate’s never open.”
“Do we go in?” Sean asked. But it was as much to himself as it was to Justin.
“I think we have to.”
Sean drove through the gate and up the drive that cut across the front grounds to the entrance. Justin stared out the passenger window at the dark grounds and noticed ghostlike shapes moving in the distance. A sudden flash of lightning lit the sky — and he saw that they were patients in their white hospital gowns. He turned to Sean.
“The patients are out.”
Sean looked past Justin and saw them too. Several appeared to be heading their way. He sped the rest of the way to the entrance and skidded to a stop. He could see through the windshield that the lobby’s front door was wide open and it was dark inside.
“Call the police,” Sean said.
Justin pulled out his phone and looked at its screen. He shook his head.
“There’s no signal.”
Sean turned back to the dark lobby. Every instinct told him to get out of there. They were going to die.
Or worse.
“Do we do this?” Justin asked, watching the worried look on Sean’s face.
Sean wanted to say no. He wanted to turn the car around and get out of there. But that word wouldn’t come to his lips. It was too final. If they left, it would be over for Cassie.
She’s going to come to you soon, with no other hope, and you need to be the Sean I fell in love with.
Amy’s words from the dream came suddenly. Despite everything, she still believed in him. She knew he could do this. And that gave him the boost he needed.
“We need to,” Sean said. “Just remember everything I told you on the drive here.”
They climbed from the car and were instantly drenched. Sean grabbed the backpack and flashlights from the backseat and they hurried over to the entrance.
It was eerily quiet and dark as they stepped inside the lobby. There were no more alarms or flashing emergency lights from earlier — only the hollow, empty feel of a tomb.
They flicked on their flashlights and shined them around the lobby. It was a wreck, with broken and overturned furniture, and papers scattered across the floor. There were also dark smears along the floor and walls that could be blood.
Then they caught the first sounds echoing from elsewhere in the hos
pital. They were demented sounds of screams and deranged laughter.
“Try your phone again,” Sean said. “We need to get the police here.”
Justin checked, but there was still no signal. He shook his head.
Sean swept his light over to the check-in desk. He hurried around behind it and checked the phone. There was no dial tone. He pressed several buttons and listened again but there was still nothing. He looked over to Justin. “We should check her room.”
Sean led the way down the hallway behind the check-in counter. There was just enough light from the lobby’s entrance to see by as they crept through the gloom.
They reached a door on their right marked “Stairs.” Sean eased the door open and shined his light up the stairwell that wove up three flights.
They climbed the stairs to the third floor, moving as quietly as possible. Sean eased the door open and peered out into the gloomy hallway. Faint screams echoed from somewhere on the floor. He looked down the hallway to where it connected with the hallway Cassie’s room was on. That hallway was better lit by the windows at each end.
“It looks clear,” Sean whispered back to Justin. They eased from the stairwell and down the hallway to where it connected with Cassie’s hallway. From somewhere on the floor came echoed fits of disturbed laughter. Sean gripped his flashlight tighter. He might need it as a weapon.
Sean peeked around the corner to Cassie’s hallway. He could see all the way down to the far end and there was nobody on it. They crept down it to Cassie’s door on the right-hand side. Sean tapped lightly.
“Cassie. It’s Father Sean and Justin.” He waited a moment, and when there was no reply, he tested the doorknob. It was unlocked.
Sean eased the door open and they crept inside. The room was icy cold and their breaths misted as they swept their flashlights around.
