Mason turned one of the computer monitors toward the detectives. The image was indeed clearer and relatively free of shakiness. In it, the events of the shooting unfolded. The audio was not very clear, except for the fear-fueled, profanity-laced narration of events by the phone’s owner.
“Apparently, this is a shortened version. It just has the meat of what happened. I mean, take a look at this.” Mason paused the screen and then allowed the images to advance at reduced speed. They showed Scott approaching the gunman.
“That’s Campbell, right?” Grace asked. “Man, he just strolls right up to the guy, like he’s about to ask him for directions. He must have some gigantic balls.”
They watched Ralph Stevens lift the carbine to his shoulder and then fire.
“Whoa!” Kevin cried. “Holy shit! Did you see that? Did you fucking see that?”
“I know, right?” Mason agreed, laughing. “The muzzle of the rifle is what, two feet, no more than three feet away? And the shithead misses! Near point-blank and he misses his target completely! Can you believe that?”
“Goddamn!” Kevin said. “That Campbell is one lucky son of a bitch.”
The video advanced to the image of Scott grabbing Ralph and pushing him against the adjacent drywall boarding.
“That dude has some serious speed and power on him,” Grace observed.
“Hells yeah!” Kevin said. “Dude must push iron. He just picks that little prick up and bam! Like he’s nothing.”
Mason paused the video feed. “Wasn’t that awesome?”
“Oh fuck yeah!” Kevin said. “Nothing better than watching some scumbag get his ass handed to him.”
“Wait,” Grace said. “Something isn’t right.”
Kevin and Mason glanced at each other. “What do you mean?” the sergeant asked.
“Reverse the feed. Start it over.”
Mason complied. They watched the footage again.
Mason stared at the footage. “Okay, I—”
“Again, in slow motion,” Grace said.
Again they viewed the footage.
“Grace, I don’t see it,” Mason said. “What isn’t right?”
“Blow the frame up.”
And again, with the image enlarged, they watched the video. Again, neither Mason nor Kevin saw anything that gave them pause. Grace sighed. “Again. I swear, something is not right about this. I think I see something…out of place.”
“Oh yeah?” Kevin asked. “What’s that?”
“I’m…not sure. A shadow, or something…”
“Funny, I didn’t notice anything, and we’ve been over that footage a couple times…”
“Grace, why don’t you watch this on your own time?” Mason suggested. “Hell, try and contact the guy who posted the video, this ESP76254 character, and find out what his story is. But right now, you’ve got a stack of cases a foot high waiting for you. This case is over and done as far as myself and the district attorney are concerned. Okay?”
Grace reluctantly agreed. Mason dismissed the detectives from his office, and they returned to their desks to focus on the multiple other cases they had been assigned.
Monday afternoon came, and Scott left for work, again taking his mother’s Prius. He tried to protest, but Irene was insistent, and since it was his mother, he thought it was best to play along. As he drove to work, his thoughts went to the previous night and the horrible nightmare in which he slaughtered poor Dawn Rhinebeck. It was going so well, until it went Fifty Shades of What the Hell. I hope I don’t have that one ever again. At least, not the second part of it. The disturbing confrontation with Tommy, the impish creature that called itself his Tormentor. If I see that little bastard again, I am going to kick his ass all over my room. The fact was that he had invoked the name of the Son of God in that confrontation and he hadn’t burst into flames. For a second there, I thought my head was going to go all Scanners on me. Glad it didn’t.
He arrived at work, not looking forward to the thousands of messages he’d surely have in his inbox. He entered through the Employees Only door, as usual. He stopped by the office breakroom to deposit his “lunch”—blood, of course—in a metal thermos. Scott hesitated briefly, concerned about any potential “accidental discoveries” someone rummaging through the refrigerator might make. He did screw the lid down extra tight and put his name on a piece of tape that he wrapped around the thermos. Not a perfect arrangement, he knew, but he couldn’t come up with anything better at the time.
Even from as far back as the breakroom, he could easily hear the conversation at the front desk with his enhanced hearing.
“That’s the one with Channing Tatum, right?” Robin asked.
“Yeah, he’s in it,” Zed replied. “So what?”
“So what? Dude, it’s Channing Tatum! He is like the ultimate hottie!”
“What? Robin, aren’t you, like, a lesbian?”
“Yeah, so? For Channing Tatum, I’d switch. Well, temporarily, anyway.”
“Wouldn’t your girlfriend be kinda pissed about that?”
“Pissed? Dude, she’d congratulate me! Don’t you think Channing Tatum is hot?”
“Me? Naw, he’s not quite my type.”
Scott cleared the corner to the cubicle area, where he saw banners announcing “Welcome Back!”
“Hey, everyone! It’s Scott!” Zed shouted.
There was applause. Oh God. Stop it. It gets annoying after a while.
“Hey, big hero, welcome back!” Robin cried.
“Oh, hey, guys, you didn’t need to do this for me,” Scott said. No, really. I mean it. I’m kinda getting tired of playing the hero.
“The heck we didn’t,” Zed said. “You are the man!”
“Yeah,” Robin said. “This is such a big deal that Al said he’s going to spring for food. What do you want, Scott? Pizza or sushi?”
Scott was shocked by Al’s newfound generosity. He knew that it wouldn’t last. “Ah, well, I don’t know. Guys, what would you like?”
“I’ll bet I know what Zed would like!” Robin said.
Zed knew where she was going. Despite his ethnicity, he wasn’t keen on sushi. “Hell yeah, pizza!” he said.
“Okay, then,” Scott said. “Pizza it is.”
Zed came over and fist-bumped Scott. Scott then noticed an odd scent coming from his coworker. He had first noticed that smell when Zed had visited him in the hospital, but it was very faint, and Scott didn’t think it would have been good form to mention it. Today, the odor was strong. Very strong. And kind of disgusting. Scott knew he was most likely the only one who could smell it. Of course, he wanted to ask. So he phrased the question as sensitively as he could.
“Zed, do you happen to own a dog?”
Zed shook his head. “No. Well, not anymore. I used to have an Akita, a big old goofy Akita. Had to put her down, though. Sad times. Why do you ask?”
“No reason. It’s just that…you know what, never mind.”
“Scott!” Al called from within his office. He didn’t even have the courtesy to step out but remained behind the protective confines of his desk. “Scott, good to see you! I need to see you. In my office.”
Scott asked himself, What does that petty little jerk want now?
Scott excused himself from Zed’s company and entered his supervisor’s office.
“So, it’s the big hero,” Al said. “Sit down. We’ve got to go over a few items.”
Scott did so, sitting in a fabric-covered cushioned chair while Al sat behind his desk. He did not continue with the small talk but got right to business—a relief to Scott, who didn’t look forward to conversing with the pretentious loser.
“The routine firewall checks haven’t been done in a while, so I’m going to need you to get on those right away. Okay?”
Scott snorted. “Yeah, more firewall checks.” His patience was already thin as he felt anger burn within. Anger at having been passed over for raises. Anger at being given pointless make-work projects. Anger at the condes
cending attitude. Anger at having to work for this unlikable, insufferable fool. Anger at his cable provider. (Okay, not Al’s fault, but Scott threw it in there anyway.) And he was going to let Mr. Toilet know it.
“Is there a problem here, Scott?”
“Is there a problem here, Al? Yeah, there is a problem here.”
“Well! Do tell me. I am…interested in employee input, as always.”
“No, you’re not. That’s the problem—your attitude about the people who work for you. You don’t take me seriously. You don’t take anyone here seriously. It’s all just a stepping-stone for you, part of your career path. That’s why you flood me and most of the department with pointless projects in the hopes that the dean’s office will take notice of your productivity. It’s a joke, and so are you.”
Al sat there in stunned silence. Scott had never spoke to him with that level of honesty before. No one had. He wasn’t even struggling to find words. Scott himself was shocked by his sudden burst of brutal honesty, but he continued, “So, in order to look good to the dean, you pad your résumé with crap. Like the firewall checks. Firewall checks? Why the hell are we doing firewall checks? We have never had an issue with the firewall. Well, except when you were setting up the original Wi-Fi configuration for the campus. Then we started having issues with the firewall. But, oh, that Wi-Fi setup, wasn’t that your personal project?”
More stunned silence.
“Oh yeah, it was. Really went well, didn’t it? Which explains why you called in contractors. Those weren’t consultants. They were private IT contractors who fixed most of the issues you caused! But no, somehow you rewrote history to make yourself the hero, which brings us to the firewall checks. Did I say they were a pointless waste of time? Because they are a pointless waste of time!”
Al slowly regained his composure. “Pointless or not, the firewall checks will be done.”
“Yeah, well, they are pointless, and I ain’t gonna do them!”
“You will do them, or you will be fired.”
Scott glared at Al, the hate raging within him. You piece of shit. I would so kill you, but I don’t think I could drink your blood, because I would find it distasteful. Scott almost tipped his hand, almost gave Al the same evil trancelike glare he had given Ralph Stevens. But he didn’t. Almost unexpectedly, fury found itself tempered by reason.
Scott, you still need this job, if only for a while. You told Al what you’ve been wanting to tell him for the last year, and he heard you. And you are still here.
“Well, I won’t do them happily!” Scott said as he went out the door, slamming it. Zed was standing on the other side.
“Were you listening?” And don’t you lie to me. I smelled that wet-dog musk from inside the office.
“Dude, things sounded pretty tense in there,” Zed answered. “But damn, you put that prick in his place! You told him what we’ve all been wanting to tell him. And he didn’t fire you! So good on you!”
And again, I play the hero. I’ve got to knock that off.
After leaving the sheriff’s office for the day, Grace hit the gym to use the free weights, bench press, and the treadmill. She followed up with a visit to the hot tub, where a muscle-headed wannabe bodybuilder hit on her. She turned him down by explaining that she was both a cop and a marine and she could disassemble his beefcake ass without breaking a sweat. The message may have been a bit overboard, but it proved effective. Afterward, she headed home, where her cats and a packaged mixed-green salad awaited her. After dinner, she relaxed with her usual cup of decaf mocha and checked her personal e-mail on her laptop.
After wading through a few personal messages and a lot of spam, she surfed over to YouTube. Of course, she was going to view the footage of the mall shooting supposedly shot by an anonymous poster who identified him- or herself as ESP76254. She viewed the footage at regular speed, then at slow speed, setting the video to be viewed at full screen. She pored over the footage, sure that she had missed something. She forwarded to the moment Ralph Stevens fired his rifle at Scott Campbell. She watched Scott’s head snap back.
What the hell?
She reviewed the footage, advancing it frame by frame. She knew what she was seeing. She could not believe it, because it was impossible.
Son of a bitch. That’s an exit wound.
She viewed it again and again. She saw the dark mist that appeared to shoot out of the back of Scott’s head. A goddamn exit wound! But how is that possible?
She grabbed her cell phone, went to the Favorites list, and called her partner. Kevin answered, annoyed and out of breath. She could hear a female voice cursing in the background.
“What are you doing, Kevin?” Grace asked.
“I’m doing sex, thank you very much. What the hell?”
“Kevin, that footage. The video that got uploaded to YouTube today. Check it out.”
“Now?”
“Yes, Kevin, now!”
She heard Kevin curse and argue briefly with the female. A few seconds later, he told Grace that his laptop was up and running, and his browser was open to YouTube. And soon enough, he found the footage. Grace walked him through the scene.
“There! At one minute thirty-three seconds, what do you see?”
“The asshole shooting at Scott. I don’t know—what do you want me to see?”
“The head! Look at Campbell’s head!”
Kevin viewed the video again, focusing exactly where Grace told him.
“Okay, I see it. It kinda does look like material is being blown out of his head. That’s weird.”
“It’s an exit wound, Kevin. It’s a goddamn exit wound.”
Of course, she could not hear Kevin shaking his head. “Grace, it’s not an exit wound. If it were an exit wound, Scott Campbell would be, oh, I don’t know, kind of dead. So it’s not an exit wound. Have you been drinking?”
“It has to be! What else could it be?”
“I don’t know! Some kind of video artifact, a reflection of some kind? You know, there’s this phenomenon known as “matrixing” where people think they see patterns that really aren’t there, like those potato chips with Jesus’s face on them. It’s all a trick of the mind. But anyway, Grace, it is not an exit wound. No way, nohow, end of story.”
Grace knew she could not convince Kevin that she was right. And Kevin did have a point; if that had been an exit wound, Scott Campbell would be dead.
Dead. A fearful thought raced through her mind, chilling her to the core. But she said nothing. She thanked Kevin for his time and hung up the phone.
Could it be…no. No way. It couldn’t be one of Them. One of Them wouldn’t show up at a suburban mall. One of Them would not save a human life. And even if Scott Campbell was one of Them, who would believe me anyway?
Grace shut her laptop and headed off to sleep. She did not sleep well that night.
CHAPTER 14
Tuesday morning came, as did the continuing rains, falling from the heavens with vengeful force. Scott found himself considering a mini-refrigerator, one that would fit in a corner of his room, so he could store the bags of rejected human blood Jack had left with him at the hospital. Scott wasn’t sure if he was more concerned that there might be some cross-contamination or that his mother might discover that he was drinking blood. Both possibilities had their downsides. Scott had already emptied two of the bags—he was really hungry, as young vampires tend to be, and besides, that stuff was actually pretty incredible, once he had gotten over the fact it was human blood he was drinking—and he had two left.
Scott was concerned about finding another safe source, fearing the warning Jack had given him about falling into a bloodlust and eating someone he liked. Irene’s face came to his mind, which he found disturbing. This was the woman who had raised him, who had sacrificed for him, who allowed him to live in this house. Ripping her throat out would be poor compensation. Besides, the thought of eating his own mother gave him the cold willies. Sure, he was a vampire, but how evil did he have to be?
Scott decided that he really needed his own private fridge, especially in light of a late near disaster when his mother had almost discovered the true nature of the “medicine” he’d been taking. She did have other questions concerning his mysterious diet aid.
“Why can’t you just have some of your special diet drink with me when we have dinner together on Sundays?” Irene asked. “And oh, how is that stuff working? Because it certainly looks like it’s working! You seem to have an extra bit of pep whenever you drink it. Anyway, I am looking for new dietary supplements. I’d sure be interested in whatever it is you’re using!”
“Uh…yeah. Well, you have to have a prescription from…like a doctor.”
“Maybe if you told me what it is, I could check with my doctor.”
“Yeah. You know what, Mom? You wouldn’t like this stuff. Trust me. I’m sure your doctor will help you find something that’s better suited for your particular needs.”
“Ah, you mean my elderly lady needs, don’t you?”
“There you go!”
Remembering the summons delivered by the darkly attractive lady vampire on Sunday and Jack’s promises to appear in his support, Scott decided to call off from work. He made the excuse that he needed to attend some follow-up medical exams that his doctor had ordered in the wake of almost dying the previous week. It sounded reasonable and was accepted without question. Scott used the same excuse with Irene, who questioned why the appointment was made at such a late hour.
“I don’t know, Mom. My HMO has some weird policies. I’m sure it’s related to something like that.”
Irene wasn’t really satisfied but chose not to pursue the issue.
Scott drove through Gresham to the interstate and then to North Portland; almost got lost in the Saint Johns neighborhood (Scott always got lost in Saint Johns); crossed the ancient steel suspension bridge to the west bank of the Willamette River; took the twisting, forested Germantown Road, its switchbacks snaking through the woods of Forest Park; and finally reached Skyline Boulevard. Scott drove southbound on the peaceful, rustic road until he came to the address on the parchment.
Suburban Vampire: A Tale of the Human Condition—With Vampires Page 12
