Blood & Baltazar

by Liam Inscoe-Jones

  He looked up and found a few metres ahead of him another snipping, shorter this time yet just as telling. He traced his hand over the floor, coating his skin with dirt yet finding no new pieces of interest. Still his conquest wasn’t entirely without use as it was during his search something in his mind clicked.

  He knelt beside the tree trunk, examining the corpse of the rodent leant against it. The creature was an agouti: not unlike a gerbil in appearance with big ears as thin as a sheet, a little bump pricked with tiny holes for a nose and eyes, black as oil and glimmering with silver pupils. It was recently deceased, but already rot had begun to sink in, the fur of the animal bristled and dry, the back soaked with blood and the onset of maggots.

  He found the behind of the rodent was burrowed into the soil, and as he pulled it out something else drew with it. A rope seeped from the soft soil, a few centimetres thick but countless metres long. The hardened corpse been stuffed with the rope and knotted to its insides: fashioned into a handle for the pulley contraption.

  As he tugged Josiah felt tension, and with one final heave the whole ground shifted. He shuffled aside and watched as a square panel rose from the mud, sweeping away all the undergrowth as it went and revealing below a deep, black hole carved into the dirt. He dropped the rope and paused for a moment on the brink of the chasm.

  Josiah Hartt’s mind abruptly filled with voices, faces, thoughts. These figures in his head weren’t people who’d lived before him, or even those that would follow but his own creations. They were inventions of people - flooding his brain with possibilities of what he could become.

  Their conceptual personalities would be the last piece of his disguise.

  One was a war hero: sharp tongued, honour-bound and filled with youth. Maybe that was too much his own fantasy. Another man followed, a con artist, filled with the tricks Josiah learnt in the time he spent waiting in camps over the years. Or a Detector, old and tired and betrayed by the force he’d served for years, looking for a new fight. For a second he even considered a young woman called Lacy Marbelle, yet all those briefs imaginings were soon forgotten as he was inspired to create the ideal persona, and in his final breaths he assimilated the character that would mask Josiah Hartt, the false man’s loves, hates; his long lost romances all now pushed to the front of his mind.

  Ready for the performance.

  He shuffled forward, unfastened his waistcoat, and jumped.

  Josiah Hartt’s feet scraped against the ground, his rubber soles sliding as the loose earth shifted beneath his weight. He found himself inside a dark tunnel, crafted from the dirt and stretching like a burrow into shadow. He walked ahead with caution, following the luminous flickering of firelight glowing from the blackness a few metres ahead. It glimmered off the walls, coated in stale dampness like it was finished in varnish, slithering and sliding under the grip of his heel.

  He made his way towards the glow, the mud turning to stains on concrete as the floor became hard. He found himself facing a door surreally planted into a wall of hard earth, the flickering flames glowing from the crack beneath the smooth beach panel. He nervously placed his fingertips on the handle, the bronzed metal still damp with hot sweat. The door opened with a creak and he felt his beating heart relax as he found the space before him was unoccupied.

  Josiah stepped further inside the room, most prominent in which was a large, grand table seated in the middle. His quizzical mind first questioned how on Earth they’d managed to get it down the tiny hole, but those thoughts soon faded to admiration of the exquisite gargoyles carved into the wide oak legs. Around the table sat a dozen chairs, all tightly propped between it and four cabinets surrounding the edges of the room, breaking only for another couple of lime green doors at the end of the space. The walls were made of rocks, stacked on top of each other and fixed together with mud. The windows between them seemed rather pointless – they only allowed a view of the deep pit of soil outside.

  Josiah suddenly felt as if he was drowning, as he noticed if it wasn’t for the rows of assorted candles lining the window frame he would have been standing in complete darkness. Hartt also noticed a metallic sting at the base of his neck, a steel nib pressing harder and harder into his flesh.

  He turned and locked his eyes with a woman; firm jaw tight, a long sweep of blonde hair lying flat over a pair of pale, white eyes. Her features were so tiny and innocent he would usually have dismissed her as harmless and cute, yet the gun clenched in her palm and forced into his throat pricked his ears somehow.

  “Who are you?” She asked politely.

  “I’m here to fix you’re boiler.” He remarked, raising his finger and twirling it as he saw she was unimpressed. “I’ve heard you were having problems, what with the winter setting in and the thousand tonnes of forest above your head...”

  “No really…” The woman pushed the gun harder into his skin.

  He tutted. “You cornered me pretty quickly – I’m impressed.”

  “We’ve been following you for a while.”

  Josiah Hartt knew this; he’d noticed them in the water at least half an hour ago. But he wasn’t Josiah Hartt anymore, he was playing a different part now and this new man wasn’t half as clever. “Oh really?”

  “Really.” The blonde shouty lady grunted. “So now tell me sleeping beauty, who the hell are you?”

  “My name Oscar White and I’ve been looking for love in all the wrong places.” He beamed at her, playing the character perfectly as he placed a sly finger under her chin. “Though I think I might just have met my match.”

  The little woman snorted, backing away and waving the gun at him. “Sit.” She ordered, to which he reluctantly followed, sloping around the table and grinding a chair across the cement from beneath it.

  “Go and tell Edgar we have a visitor.” She snapped, a command Josiah at first thought was directed at him, but out in the corner of his eye he found another man waiting in the doorway. He was tall, his back hunched up against the frame, his pumped up chest and thick muscles pressing against the inside of his denim jumpsuit. He replied quietly and hurried around the table, opening the left hand door at the other side of the room and disappearing inside. The lady followed the man around, coming to a halt the opposite side of the table and stretching the gun across it towards Josiah’s forehead. “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t paint our walls red with your blood.” She said, savouring the power.

  “I think you’re going to like what I have to say.” He muttered calmly, the man’s voice he’d adopted in favour of his own was dark and gruff, like a nail was rattling in his throat as he spoke. “I know who you are, that’s why I came here.”

  “Why did you come here?” She quizzed.

  “The people, the minds. There’s a man in here with blood on his hands, and another with a plot to assassinate a Patriarch. I want to speak to these men and I want to shake their hand because I want to help wipe out that treacherous man too.” He grinned, pleased with the riddle of words he’d produced, but he quickly twisted his delighted grin into an arrogant smirk. She was standing above him, yet somehow he ensured Oscar White was looking down at her. “I say men…there’s always a slim possibility…You didn’t kill the people in the village did you?”

  She squirmed and placed the gun in her other hand, flexing her tense muscles. “Not personally no. I plotted, I…”

  “I didn’t think so.” He sniffed, enjoying his part slightly too much. But it was working; the woman retreated slightly, as if ashamed. “How did you find us?” She asked. “Nobody on the east coast could know about us, we’ve only just moved here...”

  Josiah knew this already of course, there were signs everywhere. He’d first realised as he approached the door, when the hinges didn’t yet carry the familiar rubbings of years of wood scraping against the metal. There was no damage around the handle which repeated use would have etched into the wood. The concrete on the floor was etched with marks around the table legs from where they’d hurried it in b
efore the mixture was even dry.

  He stopped just short of blurting his deduction out loud. That was a character trait he couldn’t allow to be seen while he remained hidden, it was too strong, too distinctive. Any whiff of his true personality rising to the surface and there was a danger someone might link Oscar White back to Josiah Hartt.

  “There were rumours.” He replied. “Mutterings about a group in this valley who wanted to overthrow a key player of the Liberal Reform. The people I speak to - places like this are never too secret. I’ve been taught how to track the enemy. Once I knew you were hidden somewhere in this valley all I had to do was follow the rivers.”

  “The rivers?” The armed woman quizzed.

  “The water in Ashton River, it developed a rather bitter taste as I walked across the hills. I’m talking sewage Little Miss, even the most efficient, devious of secret underground organisations needs to take a crap.”

  “You said you were taught to track the enemy…” The woman began. “You’re what, a Detector? The enemy; is that us?”

  “No.” He smirked. “I was a volunteer Revolutionist in the war. I’m guessing if you want to take out the Reform you’re not great Liberal fans either. So you’re the best friends I have. I came to find like-minded people, people who have the guts to take out a leader and the power to get away with it.” Josiah looked around, tapping his foot impatiently on the ground. “I must say though, I came here expecting to be slumming it for a couple of weeks, but it’s really rather plush. I’ve stayed in hotels that have had worse décor,” he nodded at the gun a few dozen centimetres from his head. “I mean, the service could be a little better, but we can work on that. No, I’m really rather impressed: secret society living underground, you can’t help but think of caves and mud and holes for toilets, but this place has something really rather Mother Hubbard about it…”

  He was cut off as the door into which George had disappeared opened again and he walked out; alone. He pulled up his own seat and sat beside the woman. “So?” She asked pressingly.

  “Edgar says he’s busy, he says we should have warned him sooner.” The large man explained, to which he received an aggravated grunt.

  “For Christ’s sake George, he’s busy? How long’s he going to be?” The woman exclaimed as he sat beside her, suddenly whispering slightly. “He’s been here too long already, it’s not like we can just turf him out now if he’s unsuitable!”

  “That’s kinda obvious Josephine.”

  “Okay…” The woman named Josephine nodded. “Then we just make sure he doesn’t leave here. No matter what.”

  Both their heads turning to face their newcomer as he raised his arm. “Do I get a say in this?” Hartt asked mockingly, their threats leaving Oscar White unfazed while in truth, behind the mask, Josiah was quaking in his boots.

  “No.” Josephine replied, resting on her elbows. “We’re going to sit here until Edgar is done, and if you move, if you make one more sarcy comment or give us another tip on the décor then this trigger gets pulled. Agreed?”

  Josiah nodded quietly, pleased at last to be able to rest his act.

  It turned out the wait would be a long one, and with no sign of movement eventually even Josephine lowered the gun and started tracing it in circles on the table. The quiet wasn’t wasted however as it allowed Josiah time to think and observe; the surroundings were unexpected and strangely civilised, which meant it was easier to notice the little things.

  He’d of expected the door to the office of Oh-So-Important Edgar to be fastened by the lock, yet it was the room beside it that was sealed shut. Whatever was in there was even important than he was.

  Josiah found more fascination in the man and woman across the table however. Josephine was constantly sighing, muttering to herself and tapping her foot impatiently on the floor. She was anxious for Edgar to make an appearance, but her anxiety was strong even before Josiah had arrived. Her hair was ragged and starting to grey before its time, her nails were rough and sharp with dried blood where she’d tore too hard into the skin. There was something constant and brewing that was distressing her: their plans, whatever they may be, were coming to fruition.

  Her male companion however was much for aggressive in his anxiousness: thumping his first relentlessly into the table, grunting and groaning and eyes staying fixed on the door. Hartt could tell sometimes this aggression couldn’t be controlled even by the dominant woman beside him. While she had a gun and a holster tied to a strap across her torso, he didn’t. But he did once. There were marks where the leather buckle had worn at the shoulder of his shirt, and steel dirt on his fingertips where he’d rubbed at the metal of the trigger. Someone had taken his weapon away, meaning sometimes George’s violence meant he couldn’t be trusted.

  It was easy to distinguish the pair as part of a group, with various signets scattered around their bodies. There was a red handkerchief tied around both their left arms and right legs, and more prominently a tattoo scored into the base of their necks in the shape of an extended figure of eight.

  He could establish from this that Josephine had been part of their group much longer than her male friend. At face value she seemed to know their leader much more intimately when she spoke, yet there was more proof in the redness of the mark on George’s neck; the wound was fresh and recently imprinted while Josephine’s was beginning to heal. The cloths tied around his limbs were deeper in colour and the material itself was fresh as well. Josephine’s however, fitting with the rest of her appearance, were ragged and losing their sharpness of tone.

  It was of interest to Josiah that the Detector’s traitor, Field Specialist Elisa Smith, bore no sign of either fabric or tattoo – which perhaps showed she only flaunted her membership when away from enemy eyes or, considering neither signet would mean anything to anyone outside of the underground group, she wasn’t yet a fully initiated member.

  Josiah Hartt was growing tired of the waiting himself and without being allowed to speak he couldn’t glean anymore information from the pair. He ensured the gun was firmly rested on the table in preparation for another question when a loud bang rattled from the end of the room.

  As the door opened the dull space was soaked in a bright flash, a shocking white burning at his eyes, just for a moment, until it receded and his vision was left to rebalance. At first he thought Josephine had fired a badly placed shot, but as the blurred plethora of shapes and shadows realigned it became obvious whoever had cast the blinding light was now standing right before him.

  Edgar Mulligan was small, shuffling a foot or so beneath Josiah’s own height. His hands were tucked in his pockets, a battered yellow shirt hanging limply from his shoulders. Yet he was every bit the villain. A thin scar ran from his hairline to his nose, his eyes razor thin, glimmering with an electrical blue the like of which Hartt had never seen before. The group’s red fabrics were wrapped around his limbs and the tattoo on his collar bone only added to the cliché. His lips were so thin they were barely visible, a crease on his skin, a blemish where not even freckle had marked his leathery flesh.

  “And here he is…” Josiah grinned, assessing the man standing before him with a pretend confidence.

  “Indeed.” Edgar nodded, tracing his piercing gaze along Josiah’s jawbone, tilting his head in thought. “And you’re what, a Detector?”

  Josiah laughed mockingly. “No, no I’m not, the swine…”

  “Says he’s one of us! Says his name is Oscar White; a noble soldier from day’s gone stale…” The girl shouted from afar, laughing from the back of her throat. “Then what are you finding so amusing Josephine?” Edgar snapped. “And why would you hold him all this time with a weapon to his head?”

  “What, so you don’t want me to kill him?” She asked: the hint of disappointment in her tone making Josiah’s eyes water. Yet there was something about it that told him her sharp tongue was more an attempt to impress the great leader and that her aggression was as false as his own.

  “No, no I think
we’ll leave it for now.” Edgar Mulligan smiled at Hartt where he sat. “After all, we’re not monsters.”

  Josiah couldn’t quite hide an ironic sneer. “Quite.”

  He watched with confusion as Edgar turned back to the doorway and began to walk into the shadows. His questions were answered as the leader turned back to look at him expectantly, beckoning him forward with an inviting wave. A bead of sweat dripped from his forehead as he stood from his chair and followed the killer’s direction.

  Edgar Mulligan’s office was small in comparison to the vast room they had left, with the floor soft beneath Josiah’s feet as the concrete ran out and mud became the carpet. The room was almost civilised: a simple square with refreshingly cool air that didn’t feel like it would turn against him any moment and suffocate him where he stood. A small desk was pressed into the dirt, a series of rugs slung across the mud in order to give the pretence of humanity in the strange hollow. Lamps illuminated the room, with a separate silver glow emanating from a series of tiny cracks embedded in the canvas of mud which he could only presume led directly to the surface a few dozen metres above.

  “She said your name was Oscar White,” Edgar Mulligan began, shutting the door behind Josiah. “She said you were a solider. A killer too?”

  “Absolutely. Some would say I still am. Some would swear it to their graves…” Josiah walked around the desk and sat himself on what he presumed was Edgar’s chair.

  Mulligan merely nodded with appreciation and leant against the wall, refusing to put himself in the lesser seat.

  Josiah continued. “That woman, Josephine, she’s quite a handful. She likes to take control, but then, sometimes in there I thought she was a little…?”

  “I think grief has driven her crazy, for shame.” Edgar tutted. “There’s laughter in her that’s not quite right, a cackle which perhaps need be tamed. Don’t worry Oscar, if she causes any trouble I’ll put her to rest…” Hartt leant away and coughed in an attempt to hide his disgust. After all, he’d had been trying to express his concern, not fuel an execution.