by Grey Durose
He awoke at noon to the sound of honking car horns and shouting. He got up and wandered over to the window to see what all the fuss was about. Down on the street, the traffic was at a halt and angry motorists were swearing and gesticulating - as only the French can - at a truck driver who'd failed to secure the building materials he'd been transporting. The road was blocked by his truck while he hurriedly tried to reload bags of cement and gravel while stopping from time to time to return fire at the baying mob. Clouds of breath and exhaust belched out of people and cars and a white coat of frost clung to the bark of trees as the midday light struggled to warm the city. One thing was sure, he was going nowhere for the time being. George resigned himself to enjoying a leisurely late breakfast.
After he'd eaten, he sat down to a large cup of black coffee and began to view the news reports on his laptop. The News agencies were beginning to report a story about a series of disappearances, not all the cultists in Paris had as yet been missed but enough of them were late for work or hadn’t come home the night before, to arouse suspicion so soon after the prominent cultists in London had gone missing only to be found dead shortly afterwards. Some journalists were already beginning to ask questions, 'Could this be another mass murder? Are the missing connected in some way? Will there be more victims yet to be reported missing?' and if so, 'Was the same person responsible?'
Back in England, the press were having a field day. Details of the contents of the cupboards in the bedroom had been leaked and lurid stories of debauched orgies among the rich and famous of London were already filling the headlines. The word cult was being bandied about quite liberally but not in any precise or informed manner. George chuckled to himself, for the press this was about as good as it got but if they knew the true story it would be the front page news of the century.
He turned his attention to Rome. The cult members there were interesting, not as prominent as the London Sect or those in Paris, who'd included a junior Government Minister among them, but they had clear power and influence. A judge, one with a clean track record, without a hint of corruption in his past. A Priest who lived in Vatican City, assisted the offices of two cardinals and was said to have the ear of both men. The Mayor of a medium sized town outside Rome, not that influential on a global or even national scale but if the sect had something they needed doing, in that town they could no doubt get it done without raising too much suspicion or resistance. So the list went on, there was even a known senior Mafioso among them. He perhaps would have proved more useful to the sect than any of the others.
George sat back in his seat and sipped the last of a cold cup of coffee, it was time he had a shower and got rid of the smell of burning that still clung to his skin and hair. He rose from the chair, with his back complaining and a surge of blood pounding at the back of his head. He began to walk across the room towards the door, when he heard the tinkling of breaking glass downstairs. He stopped dead in his tracks then went to the balcony again, to check on what was going on at street level. He found that the mess had been cleared up and traffic was flowing smoothly by. The sound had come from downstairs but was sufficiently muffled for George to be unsure if it had come from his own property. He made his way swiftly to his bedroom, grabbed his dagger and rushed downstairs to the ground floor, forgetting his aches and pains.
Part of the ground floor was living area but the other half had been converted into a garage, so he could park off-street. He checked the empty rooms first and, when he found no sign of broken glass he realised the sound must have come from the garage. The garage door was wooden but had been reinforced by steel bars and had a good solid lock on it to deter any burglar determined enough to attempt a break in. He pressed up against the door and could hear some noises coming from beyond. Strange, animalistic squeals and shuffles, and scraping sounds, like something struggling to get free. George got the key to the garage and slowly turned it in the lock, summoning up his courage before bursting in.
There was nothing to be seen and the room fell silent as he entered, but moments later the frantic scraping noise started up again. It was coming from the other side of the garage, beyond the two cars. George looked up at the small windows at the top of the far wall, one of them was smashed. There was a large hole where half the pane had once been and only shards of glass at the other end.
He closed the door to the house behind him and crept past the back of the cars. As he reached the edge of the second car a strange picture began to reveal itself. On the cement floor next to the second car, was a bundle of rope and bits of string which seemed to be moving about on their own. George approached the phenomena to get a better look at what was going on. As he got closer the rope began to writhe more violently and without warning it seemed to rip itself apart. As the rope fell away, George realised there was something else present. All George was visually aware of, was a warping of what he could see, the edges of the shadow against the wall swayed and rippled and he found it hard to focus on the surface of the cement. George had seen this before and he took an instinctive step back from the pile of shredded rope.
It was a Blurring Beast. They were strange little creatures, about the size of a large house cat but far more dangerous. A Blurring Beast was a creature which could straddle the rigid veil between two realities; they weren't as clever as a human but had more intelligence than any ordinary animal and they were also covered in an array of spikes and spines. They were usually tied to the being who’d summoned them in to existence and were fiercely loyal, serving their masters long after that person had died, protecting their resting place or hunting down those responsible for the death, if their master died violently. This one must have belonged to the cult leader and now it was seeking vengeance.
George lunged forwards plunging his dagger in to the space where the creature had been struggling. It must have seen the blade coming because by the time George's dagger arrived the creature had skittered off under the car and the tip of his blade chipped off a small piece of cement instead. He dropped down on to his front and looked around under the car, trying to spot a clue to its whereabouts. There was no sign of the blurring but George could hear the panicked breathing and grunts of a small animal somewhere in front of him. He stretched out his arm and swept across the space beneath the car with his dagger, all he hit was thin air but it did prompt the creature to move. There was the sound of tiny claws scuttling on cement and then a sharp pain in his forearm, followed but the sensation of claws ripping at his skin. Fine red lines appeared, as if from nowhere, as it latched on with its teeth and raked him with its claws. Blood poured from the thin, deep slashes and George retracted his arm with a yelp.
He jumped to his feet with the creature still wrapped around his arm and slammed it against the wall as hard as he could, sending chips of stone flying as invisible spikes scraped against the bricks. The creature shrieked and released its hold, dropping on to the ground. Without thinking, George stamped on the beast. As his bare foot landed he felt three very sharp objects enter his sole and, as his weight followed through, he saw three bumps appear on the skin of the top of his foot. The skin burst and the holes widened in to bleeding wounds, held open by an unseen force. George gritted his teeth and suppressed a scream as he fell on to the knee of his other leg. No matter how much it hurt he couldn't let the beast struggle free. It wriggled and scraped at the ground below his foot, twisting the spikes and sending fresh waves of pain crashing through his foot.
George reacted calmly; sweat pouring down his face, he took his dagger and slid the tip of the blade in to the area in front of his toes, the creature struggled all the harder for a moment - as the blade met with something solid - then, with a thrust, George pushed the dagger down until the tip met the floor. He held it there until the creature lay still.
He lifted his foot, using the knife to prise the beast's spikes out of his flesh. George clenched his eyes shut and pressed his lips firmly together as sounds of agonised strain escaped from his throat and fresh beads of col
d sweat formed on his brow. He grabbed a nearby plastic bag and placed the invisible corpse inside, tying it shut.
George climbed back up on to his one good foot, leaning heavily on both car and wall he hopped back to the house to clean himself up and dress and stitch the wounds to his foot and arm. Once he was cleaned up, he went to the cupboard in his bedroom and sought out the old cane Master Giovanni had used in his later years. He'd be needing something to lean on for a couple of days to come.
He cleared up the blood trail he'd left behind him and did his best to clean the cement floor in the garage. Eventually he came to the small pool of rich purple blood left by the creature when he killed it. The blood of Blurring Beasts was highly prized by some people. Imbibed in small quantities it would allow you the opportunity to glimpse other realities, other versions of yourself or other people living out another existence. It could be addictive to the weak minded. George decided to store as much of the blood as he could, he set about draining every drop he could squeeze from the little beast. He wouldn't be able to face another battle for a while, Rome might have to wait a little longer, he thought.
Chapter Fifteen
Jacqueline studied her arm. The blood had clotted and now she was examining the six round puncture wounds left by the cultist's bite for signs of infection. The cultists had gone down pretty easily - much easier than she'd expected - but she'd left the scene with the nagging feeling she'd missed something important. Hunches were all she had, if she was forced to track these people down she really wouldn't know where to start. She wasn't a detective but the internet had made life a lot easier for everybody.
She'd been in this game since she was a teenager, helping out her mother, who'd followed in the sensibly shod footsteps of her grandmother. Each of them had more to pass on to the next generation. None of them knew their fathers.
The pull, an intense gut feeling which had dragged Jacqueline to London then on to Paris, had started while she was in Kuwait and contemplating a trip in to Iraq. It had grown stronger each day since and even now it had not abated, commanding that she push onward somewhere to the South, perhaps Italy. This instinct was unlike the others, it was now much stronger than ever before and a feeling of dread drifted in to the pit of her stomach to accompany it, an unfamiliar feeling which beckoned for her heart to sink down and wallow in it.
She bound the bite-wound tightly in a white linen bandage, it was clean now and had stopped throbbing, a good sign that impending infection had been avoided. She needed to get some rest, as she intended to get an early start the next day; there was another feeling she couldn't shake. Earlier that day she'd stumbled across a guy from the flight to Kuwait: George. His answers to her gentle probing had been unconvincing to say the least, and the coincidence of his appearance in two locations had aroused her suspicions enough to cause her to follow him home from the market where they’d bumped in to one another.
Her suspicion wasn't the only reason for following him, though. She felt something stir the first time they met and it was stronger still the second time. Her mother had warned her about such stirrings, that one day she'd suddenly be struck down by them. Jacqueline had put her mother's warning down to Angela's desire to see the family line continue; a longing for a granddaughter, perhaps.
Jacqueline put her thoughts about George to one side and prepared for bed, 'Maybe a good night's sleep'll cure me.' She mused. She lay back on her soft mattress and, as her head hit the pillow, she closed her eyes on another day. Sleep came, after a time.
The next morning came too soon for Jacqueline's weary body and she awoke much later than she'd planned for. There was just about time for a shower, followed by coffee and croissants, before she headed out on to the streets again. It was another busy morning for Paris and Jacqueline had a tough job weaving in and out of the traffic on her moped. A cold wind tugged at her clothes and pushed in through every gap like the icy fingers of an over-eager suitor. She'd packed a selection of small arms and unsophisticated break-in tools and planned to park a couple of streets away from the house she'd observed George entering. Jeans, boots and a hooded top were the order of the day, the sunglasses were part practical and part style.
Jacqueline parked up and began the short walk to her target; hoping he would be out or still sleeping. She reached the corner and could see the house, she decided to walk a little way up the road; it would make crossing easier and there'd be plenty of cars to use as cover and to limit the number of people who remembered seeing her. Should things get messy.
Having crossed, she began to make her way back towards the house. An open-backed builders truck sped by, there was a sudden screech and the rasping of rubber on a gritty road surface. The truck had slammed on its brakes and it came to a sudden stop, spilling its contents across both lanes and in to the connecting road beyond. Jacqueline looked across at the scene with alarm. As she looked on, something odd caught her eye: there was a bizarre shimmering in the road in front of the truck. At first she thought it was a trick her tired eyes were playing on her, but the shimmering began to move. It shot across the road and straight up the side of the building she was aiming for. Jacqueline looked up at the front of the house, blocked cars were beginning to honk their horns angrily and the traditional Parisian gesticulation had begun. If this George guy is at home he won't be able to ignore all this noise, she thought.
It took a few seconds but, as expected, a face appeared at one of the upstairs windows. It was him, a nondescript face, nothing outstanding, yet there was something about him something indescribable. Jacqueline's heart leapt every time she saw him, even when she expected to see him.
She found herself taking the rather odd precaution of ducking behind some iron railings, which offered her no cover whatsoever. It was too late to make a move to somewhere more logical so she waited, holding herself dead still, her eyes locked on his face. After a few moments, he disappeared again and she could breathe again. For some reason her heart was in her mouth, other people felt like this all the time but for Jacqueline it was unusual, even in circumstances such as these. Her unconventional childhood had prepared her for almost any eventuality and she generally took the world in her stride without a hint of trepidation, usually.
She decided to beat a retreat to a less obvious vantage point and wait and see what happened. She crossed the road in front of her and managed to find a bench, where she pretended to be listening to some music on her headphones while she watched the house. From time to time, she took a looping circuit around the area, never taking her eyes off the house for more than a few seconds at a time. After a while, she found herself wandering along the street the house was on, as she passed in front of the house she heard the sound of breaking glass coming from down the side. She hastened her step and, as she passed, she glanced across to see where the noise had come from. A small window on the side of what seemed to be a garage area, had been smashed. She just caught the slightest hint of the shimmering shape wriggling in through the hole in the glass. 'What the hell was that?' she asked the universe. She was even more convinced than ever that George was in this up to his neck and needed to be thoroughly investigated.
She kept moving along the street and turned the corner, out of view from the windows of the house. She feared the shattering of the window might have drawn George's attention to the outside world once again. She walked onwards for a while, then decided to circle round and back to her moped. This place was too busy for her to try anything and Jacqueline came to the conclusion she should leave her plan until later, when the cloak of darkness would allow her to get on with it undisturbed.
Jacqueline got back to her apartment and switched on the TV, she put on a news channel and let it play in the background while she stripped and cleaned her guns and made sure she had everything she might need. As she began to apply some gun oil, her attention was drawn by the story continuing to unfold in London. A group of supposed cultists had been found dead at an address in the heart of one of London's most exclusive nei
ghbourhoods. It made sense; Jacqueline had been pulled to London for some reason but, before she could hunt down her prey, the pull had dissipated, leaving her momentarily directionless. Within an hour of that happening she'd found herself drawn to Paris and, slightly confused by the events of the day, had set out for France as soon as it was humanly possible. It was quite clear now that someone, or something, had beaten her to it in London but whoever it was, they had not been here in Paris. It was worrying, but not something she could afford to waste too much energy on. The cult she'd found worshipping in the sewers was small and they'd dropped like flies, for the most part. Only the one with the fangs had given her any trouble.
Jacqueline took the opportunity to spend the day restocking and preparing for her trip to Rome. An overnight train seemed the easiest route, so she'd have all night and the next day to deal with the mysterious stranger, George, and perhaps discover what that strange shimmering object had been, too. The behaviour of the blurred outline had been like that of an animal but she'd never heard of anything in the natural world that could disguise itself quite so well. With the pull of Rome growing all the time, she had no instinct that George was an imminent danger to her or other people. If she could have forced him out of her head she'd probably already be on her way to Rome.
Darkness fell but Jacqueline felt she should leave her breaking and entering activities for a few hours more. The anticipation of what she might find grew stronger with each passing minute. She distracted herself with a good book, for a while, and kept the lights low so she wouldn't have too much trouble adjusting to the darkness outside when the time came.
It was the middle of the night when she found herself standing outside the house again. Her breath shone white in the icy moonlit air and she wished she could have worn a thick coat to keep the wind off. The narrow window at the side of the garage hadn't been repaired but some temporary boarding blocked it off. It was a fairly tiny space but Jacqueline had found that she could squeeze through any space bigger than her head.
