Red Shadows

by Mitchel Scanlon

  "Multiple pinpoint haemorrhages in the blood vessels around the orbits of the eyes," the Med-Judge said, glancing up from the mediscanner as he noticed Anderson standing over him. "That's what made her eyes go red. Can't blame her for panicking, but the blindness should only be temporary. Either way, you have to figure she got off easy." With a jerk of his head, he indicated the half-dozen other wounded citizens sitting along the block corridor ahead of them. "So far we've got one confirmed fatality, with a couple of others taken to hospital in a critical condition." He nodded towards the door of an apartment at the end of the hallway. "Crime scene's in there. I warn you though, if you've eaten anything recently you might want to give it a miss."

  Nodding towards the Med-Judge by way of acknowledgement, Anderson continued down the corridor towards the apartment. By the watch on her wrist it was 22.47. The graveyard shift was barely three-quarters of an hour old, and already it showed every sign of being another busy night. She had been wrapping up the first case of her shift, finishing the psychic interrogation of a suspected arsonist, when she had heard the call come over her Lawmaster radio. "Psychic incident at Frank Assisi Block," the controller had said over the airwaves. "Judges on the scene request Psi Division backup. Psi-Judge Anderson, please respond." Fifteen minutes later, having left the arsonist chained to a holding post to await pickup, Anderson was on site at Frank Assisi, having seen an old woman whose terrified, sightless eyes streamed blood like water, wondering exactly what kind of situation she was about to get herself into.

  Just another night in the Big Meg, Cass, she told herself. If you wanted a quiet life you shouldn't have let yourself be born with psychic powers.

  Passing the group of wounded citizens sitting along one wall of the corridor, Anderson saw they all had blood running from their eyes, ears and noses. For a moment, she wondered whether the high pressure compression wave of an explosion had caused their injuries. Then, she noticed several of them had dark red patches staining their trousers - front and back - as though they were losing blood through every orifice of their bodies. Whatever lay ahead of her inside the apartment, it seemed likely it was going to be more than the aftermath of a simple bombing.

  "We thought it was a sign from Grud," a woman said from among the casualties. Sitting at the end of the line, she seemed younger than the rest - perhaps in her mid-thirties, where the other casualties all appeared to be oldsters. She looked up as Anderson passed, holding her hands open before her with the palms cupped upwards, two spreading pools of blood gathering in her hands and slowly dripping to the floor as her palms overflowed.

  "A sign from Grud," the woman said again. Gazing into her eyes, Anderson saw she was in shock. "But Father Grigori... he said we were wrong... He said the boy had the Devil in him... The Devil... My poor little Alexei..."

  Her voice trailing away, the woman lowered her eyes to stare at the blood welling in her hands, her body rocking back and forth as a low, keening moan escaped her lips. Caught between duty and compassion, Anderson wavered for a moment as she considered trying to comfort the woman. In the end, duty won out. The Med-Judge was here to aid the survivors. She had another job to do. Her business was inside the apartment, with whatever had caused all this havoc.

  No time like the present, Cass. As she pushed the apartment door open she saw that the outside of it was plastered with bloody handprints. After this kind of build-up, all we need now are some screaming teenagers and a psycho-killer in a jetball mask, and we'd have the makings of one of those horror-dramas they show on late nite Tri-D.

  Inside, once she had stepped from the hallway into the living room, the apartment resembled a scene from a nightmare. There was blood everywhere: staining the carpet and furnishings, splattered and dripping from the walls. Every visible surface was coated with the same slick patina of blood. Noticing the furniture had been pushed back and stacked against a wall as though to clear a space for a performance, Anderson saw the body of an old man in black robes lying in the centre of the room. Approaching it, she realised it was the body of a priest.

  A gold crucifix around his neck, rosary beads on his belt, a thick black beard framing what must once have been a stern and hawkish face. From the style of his robes and accoutrements, she guessed he had belonged to a Christian sect. Eastern Orthodox maybe, she thought as she knelt down beside him. It was clear the priest had been the source of most of the blood now staining the room. His features were chalk-white and shrunken as though there was barely a drop of blood left in him. But while Anderson could see a quantity of blood congealing in the priest's beard, there was no sign of any obvious injury to account for his death - much less the sheer magnitude of the blood splatter around him. It was a mystery.

  For all that, given the unsettling grimace frozen into the priest's face, it was readily apparent that he had died an agonising death.

  Scenarios played out in her mind, but none were able to explain how the old priest had died. Then, as her eyes scanned the rest of his body, she saw there was something curled around his hand. It was a whip, the lash made from a thin braid of synthi-leather with a series of knots and barbs set along its length. It made a sinister contrast. It was the kind of thing she might expect to see during a raid on an S&M bar, not in the dead hands of priest.

  Okay, so let's review what we've got, she thought. A dead priest armed with a whip, with no obvious wounds on his body, in a room covered in blood; so much for trying to read the scene like a Street Judge, this is getting me nowhere. Forget the physical evidence. It's time to dig a little deeper; time to try it the Psi Division way.

  Bending forward, she noticed small flecks of fresh blood on the barbs of the whip. Taking her glove off, she stretched out a hand towards it. Here goes nothing...

  She opened her mind, letting the thoughts bubbling in her head grow still and silent as she extended her awareness from the physical world of commonplace reality to the more mysterious psychic world co-existing around it. The psi-flux, her tutors in Psi Division had called it when, as a child, they had first shown her how to control her powers. Whether they had the ability to read other people's thoughts or move objects with their minds, every psychic unconsciously manipulated the shifting frequencies of the psi-flux in order to use their powers. It was a realm of boundless potential and limitless energy: the source and wellspring of all creation - though even the most gifted psi could only draw on a fraction of its power. Right now, Anderson was less concerned with the infinite possibilities of the psi-flux than she was with finding out what had gone on inside the apartment.

  She breathed in a deep draught of air, letting her awareness of the wider physical world fall away from her with a practised ease. In its place, she turned her attention to a series of smaller sensations as she attempted to make contact with the psi-flux. She felt the whip in her hand, the roughness of the synthi-leather at her fingertips, the wetness of the blood. She concentrated on her breathing, feeling the rhythmic expansions and contractions of her ribcage as each breath of air entered and left her body. In and out; deep breaths, counting down toward her destination. Five, Four, Three, Two, One...

  Contact.

  In an instant, a rush of images and sensations all but overwhelmed her. She saw the priest standing with the whip in his hand, his face sweating; his eyes aflame with righteous fury as he raised the whip and brought it down. Crack! The whip rose and fell again. Crack! She saw a group of men and women standing in a circle around him, screaming and shouting prayers. Recognising some of the wounded citizens she had seen in the hallway, she realised they were members of the priest's congregation. She saw faces contorted by fear and hatred as they spat and jeered at something lying at their feet. And, in the centre of the circle, she saw the focus of their attention. A young boy, perhaps ten years of age at most, his body naked and shaking, huddled face-down on the floor with his arms up to protect his head, the exposed flesh of his back a brutal patchwork of welts and cuts.

  Crack! The whip struck again, droplets of blood
dancing in the air as it scourged the boy's back. Crack! The boy screamed and begged for mercy. Crack! The priest brought the whip down once more.

  She saw the scene from a shifting series of perspectives, her point of view switching crazily back and forth from the boy to the priest. Dimly, she realised she was simultaneously reading the mutual psychic residue they had both left on the whip - the emotions and experiences of both victim and aggressor imprinted on an arm's-length piece of synthi-leather. She was the priest, breathing heavily from his exertions, his heart beating madly in his chest, his mind a raw haze of zealous frenzy. She was the boy, trapped in a world given over to pain and madness, agony coursing through him with every fall of the lash. Among the shrieking crowd, standing in a circle around him, he saw the faces of his parents. Help me! He put his hands out to his mother in supplication. Help me, Momma! Face wrinkling in disgust, she shied away from him while, beside her, his father kicked and stamped savagely at his hands.

  Crack! His body shook as the whip struck once more. Crack! The priest hit him again. The boy looked up at the face of his tormentor. The priest's eyes were wild and staring, his lips moving to mouth incomprehensible words. Seeing the whip rise again, the boy felt a sudden rush of rage building within him. With it came a strange new sensation. A feeling of power; a buzz and crackle inside his head like the sound of rain drizzling on a high-voltage line. The feeling grew stronger.

  He looked at the priest more closely, peering past the outer layers of clothing and skin to the simpler patterns hidden beneath them. Instinctively, the boy felt a shift of perceptions.

  Abruptly he saw the priest not as a man, but as a latticework of veins and arteries; a blueprint written in red. Barely understanding what it was he was doing, he reached out with his mind to the flowing red patterns in the body of the man standing over him. He felt the beating of the priest's heart, the pounding of his pulse, the thrum and throb of blood moving through him. Still using his mind, the boy reached out and squeezed...

  The whip faltering in his hand, the priest paused in his labours. For an instant he seemed to grow unsteady on his feet as a shiver ran through his body. Then, while around him his parishioners continued to shout out prayers, the priest began to gag and choke, the skin of his neck becoming pink and distended as a bulge gathered at his throat. The bulge grew larger, the neck turning scarlet and bloated, the skin pushing out like the cheeks of a croaking bullfrog. At last, noticing their leader's distress, the priest's followers fell quiet - watching in appalled silence as the red bulge pushed its way upwards towards his face. The priest's body began to shake uncontrollably, his eyes widening in horror. Suddenly, a torrent of blood exploded from inside his mouth to spatter those standing near him. There were cries of terror and disbelief. But even as the screams reached a shrill crescendo, the boy had eyes only for the priest. Rapt in concentration, he squeezed hard with his mind as a jetting fountain of blood vomited from the old man's mouth. He squeezed harder, feeling a thrill of exhilaration as the priest fell to his knees, his head lolling back as the blood surged out of him. There was blood everywhere. Blood hit the ceiling and the walls. Blood seeped from the eyes, ears and noses of the people around him. He saw his mother screaming, blood welling in the palms of her hands, and he felt no remorse. Blood; they had hurt him. Blood; he would punish them all. Blood...

  "Anderson?"

  With a sudden start, Anderson heard a voice behind her. Her mind still filled with images of blood and panic, she looked around her in dumb confusion for a moment. The whip, the thought forced its way into her mind. I was reading the psychic residue on the whip to find out what happened. I must have gone in deeper than I intended. Lost track of the real world...

  Finding her hand was clutching the whip, she released it, the last fading echo of the horrors she had seen falling away from her as the contact was broken.

  "Anderson?"

  She heard the voice again. As she stood up, she found herself face-to-face with a Street Judge standing beside her. His features beneath his helmet seemed familiar. Looking at his badge, she saw his name was Jansen.

  "We've met before?" she asked.

  "A few years back," the Street Judge nodded. "We worked a case together in Sector 15. A gang of stookie glanders were using a rogue psychic to help get rid of their competition. A pyrokine. He ended up going psycho and turned on his employers."

  "I remember," she said. "We had to take him down the hard way." Unpleasant memories briefly flitted through her mind: a burning warehouse, herself and Jansen both injured, helping each other to safety as the building collapsed around them. It had been a close escape for both of them. She shook her head to clear it. "Long time no see, Jansen. I take it you're the one who called me in?"

  "Yeah." He shrugged uneasily. "'Course, I wasn't expecting them to send in somebody so high up the food chain. This is pretty much an open and shut case." He nodded towards the whip lying on the floor. "I saw you doing a psi-scan. Guess you already know what happened here."

  "Some of it." The memories of the things she had seen in the scan returned to her: the boy, the priest and the circle of screaming zealots. "It would be better if you told me the whole story from the beginning. It might help me fill in the blanks."

  "Sure." Jansen paused for a moment, as though gathering his own thoughts before proceeding. "It started with a routine call from a neighbour complaining about a noise disturbance. When I arrived here, I found the scene like you see it now. Housing records show the apartment as belonging to Yuri and Elena Voysich - husband and wife. They're Sov Bloc dissidents. Came to Mega City One fifteen years ago claiming religious persecution in the old country, and were granted political asylum. They have one child. A son named Alexei. Ten years of age."

  "Alexei." Without even realising it she said the name aloud, the sound of it lending reality to the images and sensations she had seen imprinted on the whip. "The boy's psychic?"

  "Yeah. Only thing is, apparently nobody realised it. Somehow the boy's potential didn't show up in the usual genetic scans. Either that, or some Tek Judge screwed up." Jansen shrugged tiredly. "It happens. From interviewing the survivors outside, I found out the boy's powers began to manifest about six months back. Instead of the usual poltergeist activity or whatever, it started with him having attacks of unexplained spontaneous bleeding in different parts of his body, his feet, on the side of his torso, his forehead, the palms of his hands. Anybody normal would have taken the kid to the block doc for treatment, but the Voysich family are religious types. They don't believe in modern medicine. Instead, they decided it was a miracle."

  "Stigmata," Anderson said quietly, understanding dawning as she remembered the woman with blood pooling in her hands. "The wounds of Christ. They thought it was a sign from Grud."

  "That's right." Jansen shook his head in disbelief. "Damn holy rollers. With some of them it's like they don't realise they're living in the modern world. Like they still think it's the twentieth century, back when people used to burn witches." Beneath the faceplate of his helmet, she saw his expression grow dark. Then, pursing his lips in a sour expression, he began again. "Anyway, things started to go crazy a week or so ago when one of the neighbours died. Apparently, the neighbour was yelling at the kid about playing in the hallways when he suddenly dropped dead of a stroke. After that, the boy's parents decided maybe their kid's powers weren't a miracle after all. They went to a priest." Jansen gestured at the body of the old man lying in the centre of the room. "Who told them their son was possessed. The priest decided to perform an exorcism. That's what the whip was for. They were trying to beat the Devil out of the boy."

  "That's what caused all this?" she said. Granted insight by the psi-scan earlier, her words were as much a statement as a question. "They beat the boy and he turned to the only means of protection he had - instinctively using his powers to defend himself."

  "Looks like it," Jansen grimaced as he gazed down at the priest's body. "Don't know what the Med-Judge is going to call i
t when it comes to writing up the autopsy report: death by Psychic Exsanguination, maybe? What about you, Anderson? You ever hear about anything like this before?"

  "It's called bio-manipulation," Anderson said. "The boy can use his mind to control the physical processes in the bodies of himself and others. It's a rare talent, but hardly unheard of. There's a theory that says the way our powers choose to manifest themselves is dictated by the unconscious mind. I wonder..."

  An idea suddenly occurred to her. She moved over to the other side of the living room where she could see a series of pictures hanging on the wall. Cleaning the worst of the bloody spray from each one in turn, she revealed the images hidden underneath. They made a disturbing collection. The first picture showed an image of Christ's crucifixion painted in a digitally enhanced photo-realistic style, the specifics of his wounds rendered in gruesome and loving detail: the hole where the centurion's spear had pierced his side; the iron nails hammered through his feet and hands; the scourge marks criss-crossing his flesh.

  The picture beside it showed a close-up of Christ's face with the crown of thorns biting into his forehead, wet red droplets running down his cheeks like bloody tears. Next to that there was a Tri-D holo-picture of Christ as the Sacred Heart, his hands pulling back his robes to reveal the beating heart exposed inside his chest, like a cutaway illustration in some kind of hellish textbook on medical anatomy. Incredibly, the picture was animated - the heart pulsing with a hypnotic metronome rhythm. Watching it, Anderson thought of the boy Alexei. The years of his childhood spent in the company of such images while the unknown power inside him grew slowly to maturity. A power nurtured and shaped by his environment while the number of his days were counted, second-by-second, by the beating of an animated heart.

  "Anderson?" Having followed her as she went to the wall and cleaned the pictures, Jansen was now looking at her strangely. "You Okay? We seemed to lose you for a minute there."