creak...
The killer steps into the moonlight, its towering frame illuminated. It takes the slow steps as if it is unsure of its footing or is merely stalking its prey. I cannot analyze its behavior for I am finding it impossible to even understand the sight of the creature that descends the steps before me. There are so many things wrong about what I am seeing that I scarcely know where to begin.
The stout legs are encased in an armor that is bulky and intricately decorated with unfamiliar symbols and glyphs. This armor covers legs and torso and small stubby arms. The plating across its chest looks dented and marred with signs of battle. The creature's hands have four long fingers tipped in black claws. On top of broad shoulders, sits an oval shape that looks to be a helmet adorned with twenty small portholes—
Suddenly a bright light comes on above. I immediately find the source of the light: the airship. The airship bathes this part of the city in an almost-blinding light as if it were searching for something. However, the light suddenly begins to flicker as if someone were turning it on and off... at varying lengths of time.
Code.
The killer on the stairs pivots towards the ceiling and the lights I had seen in the upstairs hallway flash on again. This time, though, I'm a stone's throw from the killer so I can see that the light is coming out of the portholes.
And the light is pulsating.
My growing sense of dread seems to suddenly crest and that need to flee pulsates like the light. Moving my limbs experimentally, I find that they respond to my brain's directions with little physical resistances. However as I stand up, one of Poe's cartridges falls out of my vest pocket, flittering to the ground and spilling the gunpowder it encased through a tear in the paper. I pick up the cartridge only to find that it's stuck to a wad of chewing gum someone had left on the floor.
"Wha— What in God's name?" a voice suddenly wails from behind me.
I painfully turn to find a young woman in a plain white dress no different from the two dead women I've seen today. She's standing just outside a glass door, one hand on the doorknob and her other shielding her face from the pulsating light. Her face contorts in horror as she stares at the creature on the stairs. But when the creature's lights suddenly stop pulsating and it turns towards the young woman, her face suddenly blanches white and the scream that erupts from her lips chills me to the bone. The creature returns with its keening and begins to shuffle hurriedly down the stairs.
I turn toward the woman, yelling "RUN!" but my voice is drowned in the din of their noises and can't seem to turn from her gaze from the creature. It has pulled the short blade that had killed so many upstairs and has almost reached the landing.
The woman isn't going to run.
She's going to die.
I have to do something. Forget who I was or who I might become. Who am I right here and now if I let a defenseless woman die at the hands of this sadistic killer? I am someone who has no business living on this earth at all.
Gunpowder.
Chewing gum.
Iron hand.
Instantly – as it used to happen many times before – a course of action plants itself in my head.
1. Smear the chewing gum over the iron fist.
I rush toward the spilled gunpowder and the chewing gum I found on the ground. As I pull up the gum from the floor, the creature reaches the bottom stair and the landing below. I can smell that horrible stench of decay and death that seems to surround it. Through the small portholes, I can see a pale, putrid skin covered in multiple eyes that have gone milky white. There's no movement to the eyes. It's as if they are—
The thing inside is dead! That smell is nothing but the dead creature... who walks and moves as if it is alive.
2. Open remaining cartridges with teeth.
Paper cartridge clenched in my teeth, I hear the woman's scream suddenly die in her throat. I turn to find that she has opened the door she'd come through. I take the cartridge out of my lips and encourage her behavior: "GET THROUGH THE FUCKING DOOR!"
3. Pour gunpowder on chewing gum-covered iron fist.
A sudden blur of moment and I barely have a chance to move before the killer is lunging for me, that Shoto sword arcing towards me. I lean out of its path and draw my iron fist-encased arm back, hearing an audible click come from the Fightin' Jack. Electricity sizzles and the pistons on either side of the brace contract.
4. Trigger the Fightin' Jack.
The creature's helmet suddenly splits down the center, opening partially to reveal the putrid-skinned thing inside. The dead eyes – though milky still – seem to be alive now, swiveling crazily on fibrous stalks. An oval mouth full of long shear-like teeth opens!
"GET DOWN!" I yell to anyone who is listening.
The force with which shoots my arm forward takes me utterly by surprise! This power is not my own. It is technology.
My fist collides with the helmet just aside the open maw. Instantly, there's a sharp flash of orange flames, sparkling and igniting outward like fireworks. The compression from the fist and the flames causes the gunpowder to explode outward, sending a jet of flames into the helmet that incinerates the undead creature inside. I feel the flames lick at my arm and face as suddenly I'm throttled backward. For a moment or two, gravity has no effect on me. I am beyond this world's restraints. Then I connect with something hard (a banister) and physics reasserts its control on me. Darkness creeps in from all sides and, this time, I do not fight it. I embrace oblivion as she envelopes me in her arms, holding me steady until I am asleep like a loving mother.
* * *
The first thing I am aware of is the rough texture of a cool washcloth drawn delicately across my face. None of my other senses are alive except for touch. The washcloth traces across my forehead then down the side of my face. The skin feels tight and tingles slightly under the cool water. It feels wonderful.
A soft lilting hum whispers in and I know that I my hearing is fine also. Someone – a woman, I imagine – is humming a sweet tune that has an air of familiarity to it. She cascades over the chorus once, twice and I, oddly, think of my mother. I can smell instantly the strong scent of the soap she used to clean the floors with. Her callused hands wrapped in mine as we walked to church. I—
I open my eyes.
The woman who kneels before me is unbearably beautiful. Though she wears a plain white maid's dress, it cannot mask her pretty Irish looks. She's the woman who discovered the creature on the stairs. Her blue eyes twinkle for a moment, a small tear appearing in the left. "I thought you dead."
"Not without trying," I reply, my voice sounding rougher than before.
"Your face is burned slightly. Same with your left hand," she says grimly, carefully touching my check and forehead with her cloth. But when she meets my eyes, she smiled. "I imagine that you'll live, though."
"Duly noted."
She fixed me a look, holding my eyes for a moment. "You saved my life, good sir."
I shook my head slightly about to make another witty retort but found none to say. All I could do was watch her eyes. She glanced off to the side and I followed her eyes. Poe stood speaking to a collection of men in fine uniforms, some the dark blue of the Constabulary and the others the red of the military. Other men were carefully examining the floor, stairs, and landing above for evidence. The Chief Constable of Detectives was a man with interesting ideas in investigation.
Poe noticed us looking at him and nodded, leaving the men he had been speaking to.
"The constable wants to talk to you," the woman – whose name, I realize, I don’t know – tells me as she stands up.
I watch her rise and smooth out the wrinkles in her dress. Poe comes up beside her and she takes her leave of me, nodding to Poe and mouthing the words 'thank you' as she walks away.
Poe makes to crouch before me and I can see him wincing with every movement. The gash on his forehead had been tended to, a few black stitches against his chalk white skin to mark the spot, though he is cle
arly injured in other places. I put out my hand, eager to meet him on a level playing field. He takes my hand and helps me stand up. Muscles scream, joints pop, skin feels like stretched leather, and I feel as if I might pass out or vomit. He hands me a walking stick. "Here."
I take the thing and lean on it, feeling slightly steadier.
"How's the head?"
"I could ask you the same question," I replied.
Poe grimaces, a strange sight I am sure to the men in the room. "We both lived. That's a bit better than I thought we would fare."
Poe motions beyond us and I follow his gesture to a black tarp near the wall. It covers some unseen misshapen form. "You saved lives today. Mine included. If that thing had gotten out—"
"It wasn't trying to get out," I replied, turning away from it. The airship still hung in the sky, though, no lights were lit. "It was here for a reason. What I have no clue but it was supposed to be here and, I think, kill certain people."
"I know."
I spun on Poe as best as I could without turning all the way around and falling to the ground. "You— you what?"
Poe watched me carefully as if he were trying to glean some information from my face. Clearly unsatisfied, he began, "This wasn't the first time this has happened. It's the third."
"The—"
"On two other occasions, multiple people have been found dead inside an office building like this. All have been servants."
"Why the hell didn't you tell me—"
Poe made to reply, his face twisted in anger but he stopped himself. He took a deep breath, then fixed those coal-black eyes on me. "You have never been straight with me, Jonathan Adams, so why should I be so with you? I asked you to come today because I knew...," he paused for a moment and carefully pointed to the tarp, finishing, "I knew you could handle that."
"Why would you think that I could—"
"Because you are more dangerous than you seem."
Poe took a step back from me and motioned to a constable standing behind him. The man held my valise and coat slung over his arms. I was being told to leave, I was sure; but there was no way in hell I was going to go! Why would he think anything about... this? I have never given him any reason to believe I am anyone but who I say I am! I—
Poe motions to the door. "Our business is concluded, Mr. Adams. Good evening. I imagine we will not call on you anytime soon."
Bastard. I fix him a grim face and take my belongings from the constable. "That, dear sir, is fine by me."
I do not give anyone the satisfaction of drawing this scene out any longer. Clearly, by the faces on the Constabulary and military officers, they are enjoying this little farce. I almost tell them to find a Nickelodeon if they wanted to take in a show but I keep my tongue. Instead, I am mute as I storm to the door, throw it open, and leave The Franklin Building.
* * *
It is only when I am far enough away from the building that I dare sneak a peak in my valise. Ah! I knew he would deliver! Standing underneath Franklin's statue, an arc of water leaping from his lips, I carefully take out the device that Poe had handed to me only hours ago. I knew he had put it in there. I'm unsure of how much of what he said was actual truth – for I panicked when he talked of lying because I have been, to him – but I knew he was doing it for the benefit of the audience. He wanted me to have this device to find out more about it. Three sets of murders. The game was indeed afoot.
As I found my way onto Market to hail a cab, I allow myself a small moment of pride. Not for stopping the creature but for not becoming something else in the process. I have stared down many dark things in my days and what they brought out in me time and again is something I truly fear more than anything else in the world. But not today. Today I remained me. I know so... because I hadn’t taken the creature apart limb from limb, segment from segment, with an ax.
And smiled the whole time.
Jonathan Adams will return
for another tale from Philly-Punk.
In the meantime, turn the page
and enjoy an exciting excerpt from
The Fire Inside: Sidekicks Book 1
Ten Years Ago...
Osprey ran out of the stairwell door first. He was a handsome young man (just a few months into nineteen), lean and tall. He wore his jet-black hair short and a domino mask framed chocolate brown eyes that darted around the room, marking the three men. All were in crimson leather jackets – the signature of one of The Rook’s badasses. One drew a pistol, another a knife, while a third swung a nasty-looking machine gun. The black leather cape fastened to Osprey’s grey tunic flapped behind him as he leapt and tucked into a roll, gunfire filling the small kitchen with a deafening clap-clap-clap. Windows exploded, tile chunks flew, and pieces of white dinner plates rained down like hail as he rolled across the faded linoleum floor. Without hesitation, he leapt onto his feet and catapulted himself for the shooter.
Behind him, Osprey’s best friend, Sparks, stormed out of the stairwell, the stomping of his rubber boots being the only sound of his arrival. He was a blur of dark blue (his fire resistant body suit) and red (his hair) as he slammed into the thug with the knife, his powerful body a locomotive bearing down on the strung-out henchman.
Osprey heard bones crunch and metal clang to the ground as he dropped the machine-gunner with a quick roundhouse then jerked to the right, cartwheeling across the decaying dirty blue linoleum as the third thug unloaded his pistol. The kitchen pulsated with light as the henchman fired on Osprey and–
WHAM! The thug got clocked aside the head, turning slightly to see flaming eyes before a follow-up punch sent him pitching into darkness.
Osprey bolted after Sparks, his friend already flying through the living room and foyer. They’d woken up, tied to chairs, in this deserted house. Osprey had no idea how they’d gotten here or where here was but he was going to find out.
Sparks threw open the door and they ran out of a run-down rowhouse on a street that didn’t look much better. Osprey spied a few parked cars.
They needed to get uptown fast!
* * *
Minutes later, they were shooting uptown on a main thoroughfare. Osprey was in the passenger seat gripping the 'oh-shit' handle while Sparks drove the car, pushing it as fast as it could go. Feeling Osprey glancing at him, Sparks turned his way. Osprey said nothing but they’d been best friends long enough that a glance was sometimes as loud as a scream. “What?” Sparks asked.
BOOM! Straight ahead, thunder shook the air and the sky flashed an intense orange for a second.
“Nothing. Just keep driving.”
“You’re sighing over there like my mother.”
“You never knew your mother.”
“I imagine she was sigher," Sparks snipped. "All the women I’ve ever met have been!”
“It’s just... could you have stolen a slower car?”
“Don’t start with me!”
“You had to pick a lunchbox that can’t hit fifty without losing pieces!”
“And the station wagon you were eyeing was a gem?”
“That was a solid car!”
“A solid piece of shit!”
“Look, I know you’re worried. So am I but—“
“Your father’s life isn't at stake!”
Anger suddenly flared in Sparks’ chest like a lit match, all brimstone and combustion. Gripping the steering wheel like a vise, he jerked it to the left, swinging around an abandoned car in the right-hand lane. More empty cars were ahead, the drivers probably having run off. Sparks could see smoke in the distance and flashes of green, orange, then blood red. He jerked their car around another, his own thoughts warring. “Look! Just because I'm no one’s sidekick doesn't mean that I don't care about what's happening—“
“I know. I'm sorry. I know that they... that The Rook means a lot to you too...”
Ahead, the heavens rumbled and the two young men watched a lone man fall from the clouds, the buildings swallowing him.
“Just get us t
here fast. Please.”
Friday
JUNE 16TH
Chapter One
Jack King lay in a place somewhere between sleep and wakefulness, a part of his brain knowing that he should get up. Another part, one that was stronger and quite expressive, told Jack to go the frak back to sleep. However, he felt Rachel stir beside him and knew that all was lost. As if to further that point, his cell phone alarm sounded, first vibrating then belting out some smooth jazz melody that was the least offensive of all his pre-programmed ringtones. Jack, well practiced in this most important of actions, reached out unseen, grabbed his phone, and pressed SNOOZE.
“Good morning,” Rachel purred in his left ear.
“No talky. Sleep.” Jack replied, pulling the sheets up over his head.
“I have to get up. So do you.”
“Why?”
“Because I have to be in court by ten. And, if you don't go into the store, Cecil will probably burn the place down in some antisocial form of expression.”
Jack pulled down the sheets, his eyes peeking out at her. And what a sight she was. Wrapped up in his sheets, she revealed nothing but the shape of the lithe form underneath. He still had no idea why this beautiful, intelligent, funny lawyer wanted to spend her free time with him.
“Right....” Jack groaned and got out of bed, the chillness of the slightly-open window a little wake-me-up against his naked body.
Rachel just lay back, watching the show. And whistling.
“You like what you’re seeing?” Jack asked her as he tugged on underwear.
“Oh, yes.”
Jack grabbed his t-shirt. Before he slid it on, he motioned to the end table beside the bed. “There's something in there for you. I meant to give it to you last night but I got—“
“Distracted?”
The Franklin Incident (Philly-Punk) Page 3
