by James Curcio
Then a freak faggot with purple hair punched the living Christ out of him.
They jumped into the nearest van and drove away.
As Loki drove, the other two shined flashlights out the windows, as though looking for escapees.
“We’ll do a loop, then head for the gate. You two duck and I’ll–”
“Stop!” Dionysus yelled.
Loki slammed on the brakes. Standing in the glare of the headlights was Cody, clutching his guitar.
“Friend of yours?”
“Roomie, remember?” Dionysus said, nodding.
“Destiny,” Jesus said.
Loki scrutinized their faces. “No use arguing, is it? Fine.”
They pulled alongside Cody, who jumped in.
“Stay low, okay?” Loki said.
They halted at the exterior gate. A security guard nervously squinted up at them. Loki opened the drivers window.
“There’s a breach in the East fence, I’m gonna check it out. You have a radio?”
The security guard patted the walkie-talkie on his belt. “Just this one.”
“Mine’s dead. Shit. Call it in and have someone follow me out.”
“Got it,” the security guard said, waving them out.
They drove off into the darkness of night. The moon hung in the sky, nearly invisible. She sent her borrowed sunlight off into space instead, perhaps jealous of her big blue brother.
Chapter Two
A white Crown Victoria, unmarked, pulled up in front of a brick apartment building. The engine hitched and knocked a moment before stopping. The door kicked open, and Adam Trevino heaved a sigh for no apparent reason.
He plodded up the stairs to his apartment, brooding at the way his sidearm thumped his ribs as he climbed. Might as well fret about the gun; its weight, suddenly uncomfortable, the vast legal machinery dedicated to keeping it in the holster. Better that than to contemplate the empty pocket in his overcoat, where his credentials used to be. His suspension was in its third day. It wouldn’t be reviewed for two more, and in all likelihood, he would be stripped of rank. Orphaned. Better to sit at home and watch the news.
At the door, he reached into his pocket and removed a key-less entry fob. Pushing it once shut down the motion and pressure sensors, pushing it twice unlocked the door. Trevino’s front door featured a typical urban dweller’s fetish of deadbolts, though vestigial. Inserting a key or a tension bar would only set off the alarm.
Upon entering one’s apartment, one hung up one’s coat. One locked the door, and pushed play on the answering machine. One removed shoes and turned on the television against the gurgling backdrop of coffee brewing.
His eyes caught on the citations hanging on his otherwise bare walls: bravery, marksmanship, forensics. None of it mattered, it seemed, after one mistake.
He hit play on an old-fashioned answering machine and continued through the apartment towards his coffee machine.
“Adam, hi. It’s Sheila. Look, I heard about... It’s bullshit, you’re damn fine police. It’ll blow over, I just know it...”
Having poured himself a cup – black, no sugar – Trevino flopped onto a creased leather couch. He started flipping through the channels, though he couldn’t manage to ignore the damn answering machine.
“I just wanted to say, we’re all here for you, you know? Anything we can do to get you back out there, just...Call me, okay?”
“Christ, Sheila. Adopt a dog,” Trevino grunted. The machine beeped. “Next message...” There was a long pause. The voice that emanated from the speaker sounded somehow more robotic, more cold, than the automated voice of the answering machine.
“Good evening, Adam. We understand PA SBI unit no longer requires your services. Subject to 28 U.S.C. 561 (d), you are hereby informed of appointment as Special Deputy US Marshal Adam Trevino.”
Trevino almost dropped his coffee.
“You report for duty tomorrow, 7 AM, in room 101 of the Federal Building. Congratulations, Deputy.”
Trevino stared at the answering machine, waiting for the other shoe to drop. He entertained the thought that his old buddies were playing a practical joke on him. But no. They knew that was one thing an officer did not joke about. Certainly not now. He looked up at the citations on his walls. Finally, he smiled to himself. “Beats the shit out of the Pinkertons, doesn’t it?”
He settled into the news, still unable to wipe that smile from his face. A blond news reporter stood in front of a fence with a sign that read Pennhurst Psychiatric Hospital. Her perfect little face was creased with solemnity and her eyes were perfectly blank.
“Can you tell us more about that, Amy?” the voice-over asked.
Trevino's attention wandered as he wondered why he was planning on drinking a pot of coffee at this hour.
“... for ten months, involuntarily committed in the wake of a series of bizarre attacks on 24-hour eateries and places of worship in Montgomery county.”
Amy was replaced with grainy surveillance footage of a 1950’s style diner, devoid of audio. A bald man stood on a counter, dressed like a South American guerrilla, wearing what looked like an explosive vest. He was preaching wildly while waving a detonator. A purple-haired freak ran around the store throwing money at hostages. Two terrified looking waitresses stood in the background, holding up a black banner with white Arabic writing. In front of the banner were a bunch of giant paper mache penises, painted with pink swastikas and the words “GAY FOR ISLAM.”
Trevino shook his head in disbelief. Those kids were obviously not real terrorists, but you simply do not fuck around like that. They ought to be locked up.
Amy’s voice over continued, “...While staff report the two were responding well to therapy and medication, it is now clear their recovery was anything but genuine.”
There was a close up cut of the bald man’s face, mouthing the words “Lip reading is dead sexy. Call me.”
Trevino blinked. “Oh, I remember you now, you little shit...” That did it. The smile was gone. He’d worked that case.
Standing in front of Pennhurst, Amy continued. “In a daring, late-night escape, the two have vanished, taking with them a hostage: 29-year-old Cody Kilroy. Hospital staff are unwilling to comment on their pending investigation...” There was a close up of the rope ladder, danging from the blown-out window, fluttering in the breeze.
Trevino frowned.
“...but Action News has learned that explosive devices were triggered in the course of their escape, before the three fled, apparently on foot.”
Trevino shook his head. “My ass. That ladder’s upside down. Loki and Dionysus hit the roof...” He turned off the TV. “...then grabbed Jesus while everyone ran off into the woods. Steal a van, join the pursuit, split off.” He shook his head and stared at the ceiling. “I’m glad you shit-canned me, Major. Twelve more hours and this could’ve been my ass.”
He frowned again, and looked around his empty apartment. “I really need to adopt a dog. All this talking to myself is getting creepy.”
Trevino arrived at 7 A.M. sharp wearing a new suit and with a spring in his shamble. Grim-looking people bustled through cryptic errands. After passing a security check-point, Trevino crossed towards a bulletproof glass gate, manned by a receptionist.
“Morning, I’m–”
Without making eye contact, the receptionist replied, “Elevator to B1, make a left, second door on the right.”
The gate buzzed and slid open.
The three suits contained separate bodies. They sat in separate chairs along the polished walnut table, and carried separate briefcases. None of that meant anything.
There came a discrete tap on the door, and the suit paired with a blue tie called, “Yes?”
A dour, Eastern European woman leaned in. “Mr. Trevino is here for his interview. Shall I send him in?”
“Thank you, Ms. Bejta. Have him wait, please.”
She nodded and slipped out.
The three drained of animation and turn
ed their attention elsewhere. Folders opened, pens went into motion, and knuckles thoughtfully cracked.
“Ms. Bejta?”
With post-Soviet efficiency, Trevino was bullied through the door. He appeared pale, intimidated. The suits relaxed as he took in the Seal on the wall behind them.
They sat on one side of the table, equal parts salesman and bureaucrat. Between them was a badge and a thick file bearing the CLASSIFIED stamp. Like hungry cats, all three sets of eyes latched onto Trevino as he sat stiffly and tried to appear competent.
“Special Deputy Trevino. Adam. Welcome.”
He shook each of their hands in turn, unable to tell them apart. They may as well have been triplets.
“SBI’s loss is our gain. Glad to have you.”
“Sit.”
One of them pushed the badge across to Trevino, while the others passed him the file. Trevino put the badge in his pocket and patted it. “Let’s hope it stays there.” He gestured towards the folder. “May I?”
“Your clearance was updated this morning.”
“That’s the spirit.”
“We approve.”
Trevino raised an eyebrow, feeling a vague twinge of memory, something about a scene from Macbeth. He pushed it away and opened the file. He was immediately confronted with the close-up of Dionysus from the previous nights news footage.
“You worked the Mother Hive Brain case in early 2011, is that correct?”
“Sir...” Trevino started.
“You don’t look happy, Adam.”
He continued turning the pages in the folder. “Happy doesn’t enter into it, sir. Though that name never meant anything. It was just something for the news. ‘Mother Hive Brain, agents everywhere, alien brain terrorists, be afraid.’ Three mad geniuses and an insanity defense.”
“There were two.”
“That we made,” Trevino said. “This one–” he tapped a photo of Loki and several other terrified patrons being escorted from the diner by solicitous firemen, “stayed out of the file. He remained at large, and I believe he broke the other two out last night.”
“This theory wasn’t well-received at SBI, I take it.”
Trevino laughed bitterly. “It wasn’t like that. We just had nothing and said nothing. With these two in custody, we closed the file. Good guys win.”
“Film at eleven.”
“Yeah. Something like that. So, why DoJ? They’re just a bunch of punks.”
“We have reason to believe these...individuals are, or will be, instrumental in a widespread terrorist conspiracy to manufacture domestic insurrection in advance of a series of attacks.”
“We want them, Deputy.”
Trevino closed the file and tried very hard not to laugh. “I don’t see that, here. What am I missing?”
“Nothing.”
“That’s why you’re here, Adam.”
“Your mission is to gather human intelligence on these subjects, liaise with our office to correlate your reports and build a domestic terrorism case. Once you’ve gathered sufficient information, only then do you take them down.”
The three looked queasy. Nothing in their vocabulary enabled them to tell Trevino the simple truth: that those three men had to be stopped. They could barely think it, let alone express it in human language. Their only answer was a deep, blind howl in themselves, a primal negation of the three men in that folder who, for reasons they could never express, could not be allowed to live. Laws had to be obeyed.
Trevino blinked, finally taking their awkward silence as a kick under the table. “Ah. So, let me see if I understand you. I locate and observe the subjects, determine if they have co-conspirators, investigating them as well, if they do. Then, once I have sufficient information and evidence...I am to ask them to accompany me to the nearest, duly constituted authority for whatever reason seems most convenient. And when they resist with deadly force, I am to prevent civilian casualties by dropping them all in their tracks. Am I correct?”
The suits deflated. “Precisely, Agent.”
“You start now.”
“Emphasis on now.”
“Good luck, Deputy. We’ll be in touch.”
The door closed behind him, and the three slumped in their seats like discarded marionettes. They had another meeting in an hour with the military people, and bodies need their sleep.
Jesus rubbed her eyes. The lights of passing cars streaked by like trails during an acid trip. It was raining. Soothing patter of droplets on the glass. A slate-blue, gloomy evening. She blinked, tried to sit up, but something was holding her in place. Seat-belt.
She heard voices in the front seat chattering like two squirrels. Though she could only make out part of the conversation, she knew the speakers well: Dionysus and Loki.
Her eyes closed again. She took another drag off a cigarette, only then realizing she had lit one. Being comatose was so much more pleasant.
“That was brilliant. I prefer a plan with more mescaline, but...” that would be Dionysus.
“All your plans start with getting high. You ever notice that?” Loki asked.
“Ah, but there wouldn’t be a ward to escape from. We’d just slip between the dancing molecules,” Dionysus said.
“It really amazes me that you can tie your own shoes.”
“Velcro, motherfuckah. Velcro.”
Jesus cracked open her eye. She was still dressed in inmate chic. A cigarette dangled from her lips, half ash. The ash finally fell all over her chest.
“What. The. Fuck,” she said, brushing the ashes away with three curt motions.
Loki looked back at her, driving casually with one hand. “Oh, she speaks. Have a nice nap, did we?”
“Ugh. Had to wait almost a year to break us out of that hell-hole, did we?”
Snorting, Loki said, “I can turn around. Come back for your anniversary?”
Cody shook his head. “No way, man. No fucking way. I’ll get out and walk.” He craned his head, looking out the window. “Really, the corner up ahead looks just fine...”
“How’d you spend ten months locked up with this guy if you can’t take a joke?” Loki asked.
Dionysus laughed. “He’s from So Cal, They don’t have sarcasm out there. Maybe we can import it for them, along with irony and a healthy dose of Eastern indifference. What’s the conversion rate on that?”
Cody crossed his arms. “We do indifference just fine.”
“Terrific. Now that we have that sorted, where exactly are we going?” Jesus asked.
Loki shrugged. “Well, I broke you guys out. I thought maybe you could come up with step two of this plan.”
Silence fell in the van for several moments.
“Alright, so... I bunked with Dionysus here. And I recognize Jesus from the halls of the asylum... but who are you?”
“Loki.”
“Huh. You guys a cult or something?”
“Well, since you put it that way, I suppose we are,” Dionysus said.
“Or were,” Jesus said.
“They kind of got themselves mistaken for terrorists. It put a little crimp in the Wednesday potluck,” Loki said.
“Since I put it what way?” Cody asked.
“Well, you could put it a lot of other ways. Like... We are a disorganization, a chaote order of the highest disorder, a mythological manifestation of–”
Cody put up his hands. “Now you’re just freaking me out.”
“I’d think you would be used to that by now, too,” Jesus said.
“You’d think that, but no. For my part, there’s not much to say. I’m Cody. I play guitar.”
“They put you in Pennhurst for playing guitar?” Jesus asked.
“Music wasn’t how I lost my mind. It’s how I got it back,” Cody said, eerily.
“Right.”
“See...It all started with my wife, Margarite. We met at a small coffeehouse in Santa Cruz. I remember...the place was heavy with the tangy smell of lemon, dill and shrimp that night.
; “I matched gazes with Margarite’s chocolate brown eyes after I started the second set. My hands fumbled, the notes came out all wrong. That was a first. Then I ripped loose. I turned myself inside out on that stage. Nothing remained hidden. It was a tender, unadulterated message for only one set of ears. I was asking – are you Her? The tears in her eyes said yes. The awkward sensation felt by the rest of the audience was the result of their unwitting voyeurism.”
“I think I know how they felt,” Jesus said.
Cody didn’t seem to notice the not-so-subtle nudge. “The two of us spent that night drinking margaritas, salty as sweat, first in a nearby bar, then in a hotel room. It could’ve been tawdry, but it was our Eden.
“The next month in Vegas was painfully sweet, mostly spent looking into her eyes as the two of us lay moistly entwined...”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, man. I was trying to be polite, but stop.” Jesus broke into laughter.
“She let out a faint gasp, and then suddenly, she wasn’t there at all. Her softness was still all around me. Rose petals everywhere, drifting away coyly in the spring breeze.” Cody looked out the window with a far away look in his eyes.
“See? There’s a reason he was in the crazy bin with us. Though I think that’s more than he said the whole time we roomed together.”
Jesus kept laughing.
Dionysus continued, “But this much I can vouch for: he can play better than you or I, Jesus. And I know you’re no slouch.”
Jesus’ hysterical laughter wouldn’t subside. She was crying. “We’ve got an over-sharing idiot savant, a transsexual, and two assholes. Sounds like a rock band to me!”
“Count me out. More of an audiobook guy,” Loki said.
“What do you do, then?” Cody asked.
“Paint-by-numbers. Prison breaks.”
Jesus’ laughing fit subsided very suddenly.“Ahem. Since we have no better plans, do you guys want to find a place to eat? I’m fucking starving.”
Chapter Three
