“Uh,” Devon looked to Jake who was now fully in shock, “sure, I’ll get the elevator.”
Ten agonizing minutes later, Roland sat Jake down on the side of his bed and knelt before him; placing a hand on either side of his face, “Jake, are you still with me?”
“Meh.” Jake swatted at Roland, “Le’me sleep.”
“Alright. You go ahead and do that.” Roland turned to face Devon as Jake dropped down onto his side and passed out.
“So, you’ve clearly got a story to tell me.” Devon’s arms were crossed over his chest as his eyebrows lifted in amusement, “It looks like a good one.”
“Yeah, to cut to the chase, there is a second part of the freezer hidden behind the normal one and it is just full of butchered corpses and volatile chemicals.”
“You’re kidding!” Devon was no longer smirking.
“Not at all. I guess the absolute mass of corpses being created in this building is hard to deal with all at once as they weren’t cleaned out faster.”
“Mass of corpses?” Devon had stepped back to lean against the wall, “I feel like I’m missing part of the story here.”
Roland realized that he hadn’t spoken to Devon since before they had uncovered the cause of the mass haunting, “Oh, dude, you might want to sit down for this one.”
“No, I’m fine. Just hurry up and tell me why a freezer full of corpses didn’t send you running directly to the cops.”
“The nutshell version is that someone here has made a deal with a demon to trade sixty-six human souls for unimaginable power without signing their own soul over as a contract binder.”
Devon’s jaw clenched as he seemed to be fighting with himself over something, “How does this all work?”
“Whoever started this opened a deal with the first sacrifice and will close the deal with number sixty-six. Anyone in between who has died in the hotel is bound to the building as tribute until the last one is killed and the demon deal is finalized, at which point Satan will own the souls and the demon and its master will walk free.” Roland noticed how agitated Devon was becoming, “I’m sorry to be so blunt on such a rough subject. You might want to go and find a new job though. Like… now.”
“How close is this person to completing the deal?”
“Sixty-three people are dead and their souls all reside within these walls.”
The maintenance man ran a hand over his face, “Sweet Jesus, this is bad.” He started pacing, “Can you fix it?”
“My demonologist friend is flying in tonight. She will be here in the morning, but there isn’t much we can do until we figure out who is doing this and-or where the sacrifice room is.” Roland was now leaning against the wall opposite Devon, “I’m serious when I say you should probably get out while you still can.”
Devon took a moment to think it over. Rolling his neck as he looked up to the ceiling and shook his head, he appeared to be glaring at God himself before he turned back to Roland.
“You need someone who knows the building. I am here to help. Please, don’t argue.”
“Thank you.” Roland nodded as he looked down to his hands; surprised at how many random strangers were so willing to stand in the line of fire with him, “You should wear a cross or something iron at the very least.”
“I already am,” Devon pulled a small silver chain with a cross on it from under his shirt, “though, from what you’ve told me, it seems like the human is doing the damage, not the demon.”
“So far, that is true, but the closer we get to breaking this deal, the more agitated the demon will become and everything will get much darker and more dangerous very quickly.”
“Okay.” Devon was nodding as he thought over this new information, “How can I help?”
“Well, first off, can you please go back to the kitchen and put the freezer door back on its hinges? Also, we really need to find the room that the sacrifices are taking place in, but I assume that if you had noticed a dark room full of candles with a giant, bloody, inverted pentagram on the floor, you would have mentioned it.”
“I can do that and, yes, I definitely would have told you about that.” Devon shook his head, “I will start actively looking for it after I fix the freezer.”
“That would be incredible, thank you.” Roland smiled lightly, “We need to know who made the deal in the first place too. The person would have to be old. Like… nearly ninety years old as the first murder was sixty-eight years ago.”
“Roland, I don’t want to burst your bubble, but the oldest resident living in this building right now is a fifty-two year old widowed female Buddhist.”
“Ugh, of course.” Roland rubbed at his stubble, “I suppose the person doesn’t have to necessarily live here.” He huffed, “It actually would explain the amount of space in between the murders.”
“When did the last one take place?”
“Just over a year ago.” Roland rubbed his palms together nervously, “Jake had a close encounter with the guy’s decapitated head in the freezer and that’s why he’s out cold right now.”
“That would do it.” Devon looked over to Jake who was shifting around in his sleep, “I’m going to go see if I can get you any new leads.”
“Alright, thank you again for helping me get him up here.”
“No problem. Hit me up if you find anything else, okay?”
“Of course, and the same goes for you.” Roland nodded to the man as he stepped out into the hallway.
Nudging the door shut with his foot as he turned back to Jake, Roland winced as the door shut louder than he had been expecting. Looking over, he felt incredibly guilty as he saw Jake’s disheveled blonde locks shoot up into the air.
“Who’s there?!”
“It’s just me.” Roland moved over to sit on the bed next to his friend, “How are you feeling?”
“I’m freezing.” Jake held out his arm that was covered in goose-bumps.
“You’re still really pale too.” Roland threw the duvet over Jake’s shoulders,” Are you still dizzy or nauseated?”
“No. I’m just really tired,” Jake rubbed his hand over his eyes, “any my mouth tastes terrible.”
“Those are both pretty self explanatory.” Roland patted his companion’s back, “Why don’t you sleep a little more? I promise to be quieter this time.”
“I have a couple of questions first.” Jake shifted to lean against the headboard, “How the hell did we get up here?”
“Oh, I didn’t realize you blacked out quite that early.” Roland felt slightly worse for what he had inadvertently put the other man through, “We bumped into Devon in the dining room and he helped me get you into the elevator.”
“Huh.” Jake accepted a glass of water that Roland had gotten up to get for him, “I remember entering the dining hall but I don’t remember much else.” Jake took a sip before a small grin crossed his face, “You took the elevator for me?”
“Yeah, well, I owed you one.”
“You owe me a million,” Jake pointed an accusatory finger at Roland, “but for now, I just want to know what was in the barrels.”
“They were full of some kind of corrosive chemicals. It was probably Hydrofluoric acid or Lye, I’m no expert chemist, but those are the two main chemicals used to dispose of bodies.”
“But there were… bodies.” Jake shifted uncomfortably.
“Yes.” Roland sat back down next to Jake, “The liquid in the barrels was fairly… sludgy.” He coughed uncomfortably, “I think they had been over-used to the point that the acidic properties were neutralized.”
“That. Is. Disgusting.”
“Definitely.” Roland nodded.
“So, we’re really not involving the police in this?”
“We absolutely will, after we deal with the demon. Having the police here will only obstruct our mission and give this place a ton of publicity that will draw in a crowd that would most likely be used to finish this in a hurry.”
“Okay,” Jake took a moment
to accept this truth, “you’ve made me an accessory, but whatever.” There was a teasing tone to his voice.
“I’d take it to my grave that you were ever involved. No one would ever know.”
“Wow.” Jake turned to fully face Roland, “I was kidding, but you would really do that for me?”
“Obviously.” Roland shrugged, “Not that it will ever come to that anyhow. By this time tomorrow, we’ll have an incredibly credible witness who has worked with the police on many occasions before. Even if they did somehow find out you were involved, the police would never charge you with anything.”
“Your friend Janette really has that much power?”
“The field of paranormal investigation has a much stronger foot-hold in the real world than most people realize. You’d have to really work hard to find any law office in this country that hasn’t, at some point, used the assistance of someone in my line of work.”
Jake sighed and leaned his head over on Roland’s shoulder as his fatigue was sneaking back up on him again, “Have you ever solved a case for the cops?”
“I’m working on solving a bunch of them right now,” Roland chuckled, “but no, the most prominent person I’ve ever personally helped was some rich guy that came from an even richer family down in Louisiana.”
“What did you do for him?”
“Don’t you want to go back to sleep?”
Jake shook his head, “No, I want to hear the story.”
Playfully rolling his eyes, Roland shifted into a more comfortable position as he figured he owed Jake whatever he wanted at this point, “The guy had been plagued by a slew of misfortunate that he and his wife thought was a curse put on the family by a pissed off slave a few generations back but, when they called in a Voodoo Priestess, she said it was a spirit, not a curse, and that it wasn’t in her job description to make it move on.”
“Spirits can cause misfortune?”
“Honestly? Not really. They can push you down the stairs and scare the everlovin’ shit out of you, but this guy was actually just projecting the misfortunes of coincidence and the economy on the spirit.”
“So, did you get rid of the spirit anyway?”
“I sure did.” Roland grinned, “It was just some guy who owned the house before that didn’t want to move on because he was attached to his worldly possessions. I talked him through it and he moved on fairly peacefully.”
“That didn’t actually solve the man’s misfortunes though.”
“Rarely does a man’s misfortune come from the source he’s pointing his finger at.” Roland glanced down to his companion who was quietly looking over the tattoos on his left arm, “I did my job and I did it well so I can rest easy at night.”
Jake hummed lightly as he was clearly trying to read the Latin inscription on Roland’s forearm, “What was the most helpful you’ve ever been then?”
“Jake, seriously, wouldn’t you rather sleep than play twenty questions?”
“Answer that one questions and I’ll go back to sleep.”
Running a hand over his hair as he thought, Roland spent a few moments choosing a case, “I guess the most helpful I’ve ever been was to a little girl whose name was Marci. She was just over four years old and stuck as a spirit on our plane as she was absolutely determined to find her mother. The issue with this was that her mother had died on the same night the little girl had, but the woman have moved on correctly.”
“What killed them?”
“A carbon leak.” Roland sniffed as he refused to get emotional, “The little girl was absolutely terrorizing the new family that lived in the house as, after years of confusion and loneliness, she had forgotten who and what she was and was releasing her pent-up emotions violently. It took a great deal of trial, error, and talking to get her to move on, but it was the first case I ever handled unassisted.”
“I’m not sure I’d ever be emotionally stable enough to handle your job.”
“You’re already more emotionally stable than me, honey.” Roland looked down to the blonde who was clearly starting to doze off again, “You seem to have your anxiety at a normal level.”
Jake sleepily swatted at Roland, “Anxiety is chemicals, not you.” Jake gestured to all of Roland, “You as a person are the most stable and level headed individual that I have ever…” Jake paused to deal with a jaw-cracking yawn, “Had the pleasure of knowing.”
“You need to meet more people.” Roland allowed a light grin to cross his face as Jake glared up at him.
“Quit being a jerk, I’m serious. You are not anxiety, you just have it sometimes.”
“You know,” Roland patted Jake on the head, “that makes a weirdly large amount of sense.”
Chuckling, Jake pressed the back of his hand against Roland’s forehead, “You’re starting to understand my shock babbles, I think maybe you should nap too. After that, we can go looking for that missing part of the third floor.”
“Alright.” Roland looked down to his watch, “If you don’t mind sharing a bed with me, of course.”
“I’ve just had a violent visceral reaction to corpses. Leaving me alone right now would be reckless abandonment.”
“You make a fair point.” Roland wiggled away from Jake to kick off his shoes, “Don’t hesitate to wake me up if you need anything though, okay?”
Jake put a hand over Roland’s mouth, “Shut up and sleep.”
Nodding, Roland flopped down on his back and looked up to the ceiling of the unfamiliar room, hoping to God that he would be able to sleep ever again after the turn his case seemed to be taking.
6
“Roland. Rooo-laaaand.” The man in question felt someone shaking his shoulders as they attempted to pull him out of his deep slumber.
“Ugh, what do you want?!” Roland snapped out as he had never been a particularly pleasant person upon waking up.
“Don’t be cranky.” Jake was sitting up and looking over to Roland, “Someone has been incessantly texting you for the last fifteen minutes and your phone is in your pocket so I can’t reach it and I feel like you should probably see what’s so important.”
“Oh!” Roland sat up and shoved his hand into his pocket, “Sorry.”
“It’s fine. I’m not exactly a cherub when I wake up either.”
Roland was half blinded by his phone as, while he was resting, the sun had gone down and the only light currently on in the room was streaming out of the half open bathroom door. Scrolling through his texts, Roland read through them quietly before pocketing his phone again.
“All that and you’re not replying?!”
“Nah.” Roland moved to re-do the messy bun he kept his long hair in near-constantly, “The first one was Janette telling me she was in the airport fixing to board the plane nearly four hours ago. The other few were pages from Devon who is trying to find a way into the hidden section of the third floor. So far, he’s been unsuccessful, so he suggested we keep looking elsewhere and he will contact us again if he finds anything useful.”
“Awesome.” Jake nodded and revealed to Roland that his hair was wet as he had apparently showered recently, “How about we got get my phone and poke around the rest of the basement?”
“Oh, yeah!” Roland stood up and stretched his arms over his head, “I had forgotten about that. I’m sorry.” He rubbed his eyes and nodded, “Alright, we can do that as long as you are sure you’re feeling better.”
Jake hit the light switch at that moment to reveal that, not only had he showered and changed into clean clothing, but that he had also finally shaved away his stubble, brushed his hair, and cleaned his room, “I’m fine now, thank you.”
“Christ, how long was I asleep?!”
“You were out cold for a little over seven hours.” Jake gestured to the digital clock that read nine-twenty-seven p.m.
“Wow, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. You didn’t exactly sleep last night so I figured you should get some decent shut-eye. I don’t want you messing up bec
ause you’re half dead while going up against a demon.”
“You chose an awful way to phrase that, but thank you.” Roland pulled Jake into a one-armed hug, “How about we go poke around the basement for awhile and then we can come back up and order something to eat?”
“I like that plan. Jake nodded and gestured to the door, “After you.”
~~~
Roland was casually watching Jake run his hand over the top shelf in the basement maintenance room in pursuit of the exact spot he had left his phone in.
“I think it was further to the left on the other side of that paint can.”
“Ah-hah!” Jake’s hand finally found the phone, “Thank you.”
“Don’t mention it.”
Jake’s face fell into a brief scowl before he shoved the phone in his pocket, “All that time and not one single missed anything.”
“That’s rough.” Roland patted Jake on the back, “Do you want me to start sending you messages every now and then so that you can get some semblance of the normal human experience?”
“Thanks, but no thanks, I think agreeing to that would be an even deeper low.”
“Right then.” Roland turned to walk through the door that led into the hallway beyond, “Do you think we should continue going clockwise?”
“I don’t see why not.” Jake grabbed the handle to the first door on the right, “Do you want to make a bet?”
“On what exactly?”
“What the other rooms contain. If that’s too hard, we can simply bet on if any of these rooms hold what we’re looking for.”
“I haven’t got a clue as to what is down here, but I feel like Devon or Vanhousen would have noticed if one of these rooms was a murder cell.
“Or, we’re being lured into a trap.” Jake casually pushed the first door on the right open and started looking for a light switch.
“Or that,” Roland blinked as the white room beyond momentarily blinded him, “but they need three more deaths so I feel like we’re safe until one more happens.”
The Moorsfield Hotel Page 8
