Fatal Error rj-13

by F. Paul Wilson

  She nodded, biting her upper lip. "I do. I've just got to see them. But I'll be back Sunday. I promise."

  What could he say? All he could do was let her go and hope for the best.

  "Okay, but you call me from O'Hare, and again when you land in Des Moines, and then again when you reach your folks' place. Got it?"

  Jeez, I sound like a nervous mother.

  Well, he was nervous. Couldn't help it. That feeling of growing menace in the air… and these were the two most important people left in his life.

  She smiled and wiped away a tear. "Got it."

  He walked her to the security check line, kissed her and Vicky good-bye, then watched until they were passed through and headed for their gate.

  He avoided the baggage claim area on his way out, but memories rose like ghosts… red memories… blood… his father in a pool of it…

  He'd have to face it when Gia and Vicky returned, but for now His phone rang. Eddie? He'd called but got no answer so he'd left a voice mail to call him back.

  But this wasn't Eddie.

  "My boy!" cried a male voice. "H-h-he cut off-" He broke into sobs.

  "Munir?"

  "Please… I have no one else to call. He's hurt Robby! He's hurt my boy! Please help me, I beg you!"

  "But what-?"

  "PLEASE!"

  "Okay. I'll get there as soon as I can."

  What the hell?

  10

  The woman coming her way along Columbus Avenue looked familiar.

  Aveline Lesueur had been trundling along, wishing she were about fifty pounds lighter and that it weren't so cold. Her down coat hid her RT uniform. She was proud of the yellow tunic and what it represented-it gave her instant respect in the Dormentalist temple-but it was sleeveless and this wasn't sleeveless weather. Not by a very long shot.

  She enjoyed her job as a Reveille Tech. It paid some of her expenses at the temple, but didn't put food on the table. So she was on her way to her second job as a restaurant hostess when she caught sight of this dark-haired woman in her midthirties coming the other way. She was sure she didn't know her but her face The BOLO!

  She'd found a Be-on-the-Lookout flier on her desk this morning and was sure this was the same woman. Her hair was longer, her face a bit thinner, but the resemblance was remarkable.

  She stepped to the side and stopped, fishing the flier from her coat pocket. She unfolded it and checked the drawing as the woman passed.

  Yes. No question. The same woman: Louise Myers.

  Aveline did an about-face and followed her. She felt like some sort of secret agent. Well, in a way she was-an agent for the Dormentalist Church. She had no idea why the Church was interested in this woman, but her place was not to question, simply to obey on her road to Fusion.

  After a few blocks on Columbus Louise Myers turned onto a side street. She carried a North Face backpack over one shoulder with something bulky and heavy looking within. As she approached a high-rise apartment building she slipped a plastic card from her pocket. Aveline came up close as the card swiped through the slot-just like in the temple-and slipped into the vestibule right behind her. She followed her to the elevator and joined her in the cab.

  Her heart thumped in her chest. This was so exciting.

  She noticed the Myers woman had pressed the seventh floor, so she pressed a button at random-the eighth.

  What to do now? She hadn't thought this out. Couldn't follow her to her apartment-too obvious. Besides, she'd already pressed another floor. How to prove this was the woman when she returned to the temple? If only she had some sort of mini spy camera, she could Her phone!

  She pulled out her cell and flipped it open.

  "Don't get your hopes up," the woman said.

  Aveline froze. She looked up, half expecting to see a gun pointed at her. But instead the woman's finger was pointed at her phone.

  "What?"

  "No signal in the elevator," the woman said.

  Right. Aveline's screen showed no bars.

  "My-my phone's pretty good."

  She thumbed the camera, framed Louise Myers in the screen, then pressed OK. No click like a regular camera and yes! A bit blurry due to her shaking hand, but it would do. She saved it and snapped the phone closed.

  "You're right. 'No carrier.' "

  The doors slid open and Louise Myers stepped out. "See ya."

  "Yeah."

  The doors closed and Aveline sagged against the rear wall of the cab.

  I did it. I really did it.

  She couldn't wait to get back to the temple and show her photo to one of the paladins.

  11

  "Take it easy, guy," Jack said to the sobbing man slumped before him. "It's going to be all right."

  Jack didn't believe that, and he doubted Munir did either, but he didn't know what else to say. Hard enough to deal with a sobbing woman. What do you say to a blubbering man?

  Munir had been so glad to see him, so grateful to him for coming back, that Jack practically had to peel him off.

  He helped him to the kitchen where he noticed a heavy meat cleaver lying on the table. Several deep gouges, fresh ones, marred the tabletop. Jack finally got him calmed down.

  "Where is it?"

  "There." He pointed to the upper section of the refrigerator. "I thought if maybe I kept it cold…"

  Munir slumped forward on the table, facedown, resting his forehead on his crossed arms. Jack opened the freezer compartment and pulled out the plastic bag.

  A finger. A kid's. The left pinkie. Rock hard from the freezer. Cleanly chopped off. Probably with the cleaver he'd seen yesterday in the photo of a more delicate portion of Robby's anatomy.

  The son of a bitch.

  And then the photograph of the boy's mother. And the inscription.

  Jack felt a surge of blackness from the abyss within him. He willed it back. He couldn't get involved in this, couldn't let it get personal. He turned to look back at the kitchen table and found Munir staring at him.

  "Do you see?" Munir said, wiping the tears from his cheeks. "Do you see what he has done to my boy?"

  Jack quickly stuffed the finger back into the freezer.

  "Look, I'm really sorry about this but nothing's changed. You still need more help than one guy can offer. You need the cops."

  Munir shook his head violently. "No! You haven't heard his latest demand! The police cannot help me with this! Only you can! Please, come listen."

  Jack followed him down a hall to the office again where he waited while Munir's trembling fingers fumbled with the answerphone controls. Finally he got it playing. Jack barely recognized Munir's voice as he spewed his grief and rage at the caller. Then the other voice laughed.

  VOICE: Well, well. I guess you got my little present. MUNIR: You vile, filthy, pervertedVOICE: Hey-hey, Mooo-neeer. Let's not get too personal here. This ain't between you'n me. This here's a matter of international diplomacy. MUNIR: How… [a choking sound] how could you? VOICE: Easy, Mooo-neeer. I just think about how your people blew my sister to bits and it becomes real easy. Might be a real good idea for you to keep that in mind from here on in. MUNIR: Let them go and take me. I'll be your prisoner. You can… you can cut me to pieces if you wish. But let them go, I beg you! VOICE: [laughs] Cut you to pieces! Mooo-neeer, you must be psychic or something. That's what I've been thinking too! Ain't that amazing? MUNIR: You mean you'll let them go? VOICE: Someday-when you're all the way through the wringer. But let's not change the subject here. You in pieces-now that's a thought. Only I'm not going to do it. You are. MUNIR: What do you mean? VOICE: Just what I said, Mooo-neeer. I want a piece of you. One of your fingers. I'll leave it to you to decide which one. But I want you to chop it off and have it ready to send to me by tomorrow morning. MUNIR: Surely you can't be serious! VOICE: Oh, I'm serious, all right. Deadly serious. You can count on that. MUNIR: But how? I can't! VOICE: You'd better find a way, Mooo-neeer. Or the next package you get will be a bit bigger. It'll be a whole hand. [laughs] W
ell, maybe not a whole hand. One of the fingers will already be missing. MUNIR: No! Please! There must beVOICE: I'll call in the mornin' t'tell you how to deliver it. And don't even think about goin' to the cops. You do and the next package you get'll be a lot bigger. Like a head. Chop-chop, Mooo-neeer.

  He switched off the machine and turned to Jack.

  "You see now why I need your help?"

  "No. I'm telling you again the police and the feds can do a better job of tracking this guy."

  "But will the police help me cut off my finger?"

  "Forget it!" Jack said, swallowing hard. "No way."

  "But I can't do it myself. I've tried but I can't make my hand hold still. I want to but I just can't do it myself." Munir looked him in the eyes. "Please. You're my only hope. You must."

  "Don't pull that on me." Jack wanted out of here. Now. "Get this: Just because you need me doesn't mean you own me. Just because I can doesn't mean I must. And in this case I honestly doubt that I can. So keep all of your fingers and dial nine-one-one to get some help."

  "No!" Anger overcame the fear and anguish in Munir's face. "I will not risk their lives!"

  He strode back to the kitchen and picked up the cleaver. Jack was suddenly on guard. The guy was nearing the end of his rope. No telling what he'd do.

  "I wasn't man enough to do it before," he said, hefting the cleaver. "But I can see I'll be getting no help from you or anyone else. So I'll have to take care of this all by myself!"

  Jack stood back and watched as Munir slammed his left palm down on the tabletop, splayed the fingers, and angled the hand around so the thumb was pointing somewhere past his left flank.

  Jack didn't move to stop him. Munir was doing what he thought he had to do.

  He raised the cleaver above his head. It hovered there a moment, wavering like a cliff diver with second thoughts, then with a whimper of fear and dismay, Munir drove the cleaver into his hand.

  Or rather into the tabletop where his hand had been.

  Weeping, he collapsed into the chair then, and his sobs of anguish and self-loathing were terrible to hear.

  "All right, goddammit," Jack said. He knew this was going to be nothing but trouble, but he'd seen and heard all he could stand. He kicked the nearest wall. "I'll do it."

  12

  Dawn had carried her lunch salad up to the top floor of the penthouse. She sat in one of the poolside chairs and gazed through the green-tinted glass walls at Central Park below. Not nearly as pretty now as in the summer when the trees were in full leaf. The bare branches and winter-brown grass were totally ugly. Shadows from the buildings along Central Park West were stretching her way, edging onto the frozen surface of Jackie O Lake. On the far side of the park, the setting sun peeked between the towers of the El Dorado building.

  She sighed.

  So damn lonely. She could have eaten downstairs with Gilda bustling about, but being around Gilda was worse than being alone. She'd had a thing against Dawn ever since Henry got the sack, or whatever happened to him. A lot of that was Dawn's fault, yeah, but Henry had gone along with it.

  Anyway, she was sure Gilda would have totally poisoned her food long before now if not for her boss. "The Master," as she called him, kept Dawn locked away here for her protection. Supposedly. If anything hap She cried out and doubled over, sending her plate flying as a sharp pain ripped through her lower belly.

  The plate shattered and the flying pieces hadn't settled before the pain was gone.

  Dawn straightened and took a breath.

  What was that? The start of labor?

  Tensing, she waited for the next shot but it didn't come. After ten minutes of nothing happening, she rose and headed for her room, leaving the broken plate and scattered lettuce behind. Let Gilda clean it up. If it had been anyone else, Dawn would have picked up the pieces as best she could, but not for Gilda.

  She stepped carefully, not wanting that pain to hit again while she was on her feet. But she reached her room without even a tiny pang. She lay down on her bed and waited.

  13

  "Ready?"

  Munir's left hand was lashed to the tabletop. Jack had loaded him with every painkiller in the medicine cabinet-Tylenol, Advil, Bufferin, Anacin 3, Nuprin. Some of them were duplicates. Jack didn't care. He wanted Munir's pain center deadened as much as possible. He wished the guy drank. He'd have much preferred doing this to someone who was dead drunk. Or doped up. Jack could have scored a bunch of Dilaudids for him. But Munir had said no to both. No booze. No dope.

  Tight-ass.

  Jack had never cut off a finger. He wanted to do this right. The first time. No misses. Half an inch too far to the right and Munir would lose only a piece of his pinkie; half an inch too far to the left and he'd be missing the ring finger as well. So Jack had made himself a guide. He'd found a plastic cutting board, a quarter-inch thick, and notched one of its edges. Now he was holding the board upright with the notch clamped over the base of Munir's pinkie; the rest of his hand was safe behind the board. All Jack had to do was chop down as hard as he could along the vertical surface.

  That was all.

  Easy.

  Right.

  "I am ready," Munir said.

  He was dripping sweat. His dark eyes looked up at Jack, then he nodded, stuffed a dishrag in his mouth, and turned his head away.

  Swell, Jack thought. Glad you're ready. How about me?

  Now or never.

  He steadied the cutting board, raised the cleaver. He couldn't do this.

  Got to.

  He took a deep breath, tightened his grip -and drove the cleaver into the wall.

  Munir jumped, turned, pulled the dishrag from his mouth.

  "What? Why-?"

  "This isn't going to work." Jack let the plastic cutting board drop and began to pace the kitchen. "Got to be another way. He's got us on the run. We're playing this whole thing by his rules."

  "There aren't any others."

  "Yeah, there are."

  Jack continued pacing. One thing he'd learned over the years was not to let the other guy deal all the cards. Let him think he had control of the deck while you changed the order.

  Munir wriggled his fingers. "Please. I cannot risk angering this madman."

  Jack swung to face him. An idea was taking shape.

  "You want me in on this?"

  "Yes, of course."

  "Then we do it my way. All of it. First thing we do is untie you." He began working at the knots that bound Munir's arm to the table. "Then we make some phone calls."

  14

  Munir understood none of this. He sat in a daze, sipping milk to ease a stomach that quaked from fear and burned from too many pills. Jack was on the phone, but his words made no sense.

  "Yeah, Ron. It's me. Jack… Right. That Jack. Look, I need a piece of your wares… small piece. Easy thing… Right. I'll get that to you in an hour or two. Thing is, I need it by morning. Can you deliver?… Great. Be by later. By the way-how much?… Make that two and you got a deal… All right. See you."

  Then he hung up, took the glass from Munir's hands. Munir found himself taken by the upper arm and pulled toward the door.

  "Can you get us into your office?"

  Munir nodded. "I'll need my ID card and keys, but yes, security will let me in."

  "Great. There a back way out of here?"

  Munir led him down the elevator to the parking garage and out the rear door. Night was falling. They caught a cruising gypsy cab and rode downtown to a hardware store on Bleecker Street. Jack told the cabbie to wait, then grabbed Munir's arm.

  "Let's go."

  "I can stay with the cab."

  "No way. This won't work without you."

  Munir followed him inside to where a painfully thin man with sallow skin and no hair whatsoever, not even eyebrows, stood behind the counter.

  "Hey, Jack," he said.

  "How's it going, Teddy? How're you feeling?"

  "Like warmed-over shit. This chemo sucks the
big one."

  Munir noticed a pack of cigarettes in the breast pocket of Teddy's shirt and made a tentative diagnosis. And yet he was still smoking? He didn't understand some people.

  He followed Jack to the paint department at the rear of the store. They stopped at the display of color cards. Jack pulled a group from the brown section and turned to him.

  "Give me your hand."

  Baffled, Munir watched as Jack placed one of the color cards against the back of his hand, then tossed it away. And again. One after another until "Here we go. Perfect match."

  "We're buying paint?"

  "No. We're buying flesh-specifically, flesh with Golden Mocha number one-sixty-nine skin. Let's go."

  And then they were moving again. Jack slapped a ten-dollar bill on the counter as he passed.

  "What's that for?" Teddy said.

  "Your trouble. Hang in there, Teddy."

  "Like I got a choice."

  And then they were back in the cab. Jack directed the driver to the East Side now, up First Avenue to Thirty-first Street-Bellevue Hospital. He ran inside with the color card, then came out and jumped back into the cab empty-handed.

  "Okay. Next stop is your office."

  "My office? Why?"

  "Because we've got hours to kill and we might as well use them to look up everyone you fired in the past year."

  Munir thought this was futile but he had given himself into Jack's hands. He had to trust him. And as exhausted as he was, sleep was out of the question.

  He gave the driver the address of the Saud Petrol offices.

  15

  Kris Szeto knocked on the door of apartment 7C and waited. He'd already checked A and B, so now it was C's turn. Best to search in an orderly fashion. Much less apt to miss something.

  The photo of the woman had come attached to an email from the Grand Paladin of the Dormentalist temple on Lexington Avenue. A Dormentalist woman had spotted someone who looked like Louise Myers-Drexler had begun referring to her as Louise Connell, but she would always be Louise Myers to Kris.