Angel of Death

by J. Robert King

  “On the other hand, other aspects of the crime scenes

  – those committed with McFarland and those committed solo – indicate someone utterly methodical, manipulative, and premeditative. Certainly Azra showed all these signs, and his canny ability to elude and taunt police even now demonstrates this psychopathic side.

  “Add to this obvious discrepancy two very distinct and equally incredible stories of this man’s past. The first story, reported widely by the Son of Samael and, by all appearances, believed by him, is that he was the angel of death assigned to the greater MilwaukeeChicago area. His work as an angel of death fits very nicely with the psychopathic elements of the crimes. Control is the hallmark of this kind of killer, knowing the victims in advance, humanizing them during the act, and taking an artistic care in the ways the deaths occur.

  It is the truth. I was an angel. Only among humans does the truth enslave.

  “The other story, that the Son of Samael was a POW MIA from the Gulf War, fits well with the psychotic elements – a man driven to commit heinous acts by some half-understood delusion, sometimes in broad daylight, often leaving a crime scene filled with clues.”

  That is the lie – the lie you taught me to believe.

  “I suggest a temporal distinction. Prior to the murder of Derek Billings, Samael believed himself to be an angel, and his involvement in the murders had an organized quality. Afterward, he believed himself to be a madman, and his murders – specifically the killing of Derek Billings – became psychotic.”

  I was mad to believe I could be human.

  “So, what does the Son of Samael believe himself to be now? Interestingly, his first post-escape civilian victim was a priest, whom he shot but did not dismember. In fact, the lethal wound on the priest’s abdomen had been inexpertly bandaged. A cashier at a gas station nearby, who said she spoke to the Son of Samael the night before and the day after the priest’s death, said he wanted everyone to know he was polite to her, paid his money, and did not threaten. He said, ‘Tell them what I was like. Tell them what I was.’

  “Here lies another transformation. Having at last been convinced of his humanity, the Son of Samael acts according to it. He tries to kill himself when he believes I am dead, then kills only to escape paramedics and police, then shoots a priest who is about to summon police, but feeling bad about it, tries to save the man’s life. The priest’s death is the final indicator to the Son of Samael that he can never live as a decent human, that he will be hunted all his life, and when caught in a situation that requires him to kill, he will kill.”

  Oh, Donna, even now, you know me so well. I wish we could go back. I wish I could turn time backward as once I could.

  “But the final transformation, the stressor that preceded this latest rash of killings, was the announcement of the falsehood of the Son of Samael’s human past. Here is a man who, after much browbeating, was at last convinced that he was human, and had the name William B. Dance, and had a very specific past filled with horrific tortures. Now he is told that that very past is a lie. All he is left with is his belief in an angelic origin, and his knowledge that he cannot regain his lost divinity. With the death of the priest, he could not even retain his humanity. So, what sort of creature is he now? What kind of being kills humans with impunity?

  “Fallen angels. Fiends. Demons. At the tattoo parlor, there was a drawing that none of the workers had seen before, an ornately patterned mask. The Des Plaines police recently learned the face is a ritual mask of Shaytan, the Arabic name for Satan.”

  Very good, my angel. Very good.

  “Do you see? He thinks he has fallen from the heavens here to Earth for a short while, and descended farther than that to an abode in Hell. He is rejected by God and man. He is alone in torment, and desires only to strike out of the black heart of Hell to terrorize those with the smug fortune of living above.”

  You know me so well. If I cannot have you as a companion, I will be content to have you as an adversary.

  “Now, what does all of this have to do with catching Samael? First of all, it gives us a model for judging his behavior. When he believed himself to be an angel, he killed accordingly. When he believed himself to be human, he killed accordingly. Now, believing himself to be Satan incarnate, his murders are vicious, brazen, defiant acts of revenge.

  “Our proactive strategies, therefore, ought to involve actions that wound his pride. He needs to be made a fool of in order for him to take the bait. Unlike the angel, who sought to kill anonymously, the new Son of Samael wants everyone to know who is doing the killing. He acts out of egotism. He wants publicity. He’s probably read every account printed about him, noting the names of writers who build up his violence and power, and noting also those who trivialize his position. Understanding this dynamic gives us a starting point for luring him in.”

  A plenary such as this one would be irresistible.

  “Even so, he uses the very faces and hands of his victims as disguises. This shows his utter contempt for humanity. Having been human for a few short months, he thinks he knows enough about us to despise us. We can expect many more such attacks on humanity, perhaps something at a school or a YMCA, perhaps something at a hospital or nursery.”

  Thanks for the ideas.

  “In the end, it does not matter whether this man was ever an angel, or is now a demon. All that matters is that he thinks he is these things, and acts accordingly. My time is just about up, I see, but I’d like to open the floor for questions.”

  Perfect, thought Mike Uriel, standing up and raising his hand.

  Detective Leland pointed his way, and all eyes turned toward him.

  Lowering his hand – in fact, the somewhat fleshy hand of the old man – he growled out a question in an old-man voice. “You say that this demonic killer will be looking to attack humanity – children in particular. What do you think the killer’s intent is toward your child?”

  Even from that distance, he could see her face whiten. A growl of offense moved through the crowd. Mike Uriel did not sit, though, awaiting a reply. Detective Leland waved away the angry sound of the crowd and said, “No, no. It’s a good question. I’m up to my eyeballs in this particular case, and my child will be, as well. Let’s first get this straight – the child is mine, not his, not the department’s. And, secondly, let’s hope the Son of Samael is caught before the baby is born, in another four months. If not, he may well try to take the baby.”

  “Take the baby? Why would he want it?” asked Mike Uriel. “Wouldn’t a demon prefer to kill the child so that nothing of his humanity would remain?”

  “Perhaps,” Donna responded slowly, as though she hadn’t considered that possibility. “But he may want to claim the child as his own, as the flesh and blood incarnation of evil. The son of Satan, and all that.”

  Mike Uriel nodded. The pleased smile on his face quirked the skin of the dead man. “Thank you. Most insightful, most helpful. Thank you.”

  The ambulance waited outside the stage door, and a line of policemen stood on either side of the walkway, a gauntlet Detective Leland must run.

  Leland was in no shape to run. She felt like sleeping for three days. Another officer wheeled her chair out the doorway and toward the waiting ambulance. She smiled wanly and waved. The cops cheered her, some reaching out to pat her back in appreciation. When she reached the ambulance bumper, a thin young paramedic emerged from within and took her hand, gently helping her up into the vehicle. He guided her to a gurney and helped her lie down. Leland touched a hand to her chest, breathing hard from even that little exertion. The paramedic blinked his sensitive silvery eyes and handed her an oxygen mask. He eased the handle. “Just until you catch your breath.”

  She didn’t put the plastic cup over her face, clutching it in one hand. “Wait until the crowd can’t see.”

  He laughed a little. “That’s easy enough.” He lifted the folded wheelchair into the back of the ambulance, swung the doors closed, and stowed the chair. “There.
How about you take a whiff of that stuff?”

  She already had the mask over her face. Two breaths later, she was unconscious.

  “All right, go ahead,” the young paramedic said to the driver.

  The ambulance let out a small bleep as it lurched forward. The paramedic drew the door to the cab closed, then moved to the side of the unconscious lieutenant. He lifted the oxygen mask from her face and shut off the cock. Then, from his own face, he peeled away a mask of skin and stowed it in a bag at his belt. The Son of Samael grinned, rubbing away the clinging balls of spirit gum. Beneath lay the blue-gray crazings of the demon tattoo. Lines ran along his cheekbones, outlined his eye sockets and lips, and thickened into black swarms upon his brow. The whole of the tattoo formed an exaggerated skull, and every line upon it flamed with the fires of death.

  “Oh, Donna. I know we can never return to that place of bliss. But I wanted to kiss you again with my own lips.”

  He leaned over her, laid his lips upon hers, and kissed her, long and lingeringly. Drawing away, he watched her, the slow rise and fall of breath in her chest.

  “You were right about me. You are the only one. You understand me. You are the Antivirgin, who will always intercede for me. We have communed, have shared a maculate conception. In that, we will be forever joined.

  “But the child conceived by us – it cannot be allowed to live,” he said, pulling down a syringe he had laid aside.

  He drew a three-inch cardiac needle from an adjacent drawer and fitted it to the wide cylinder. Then, stabbing the side of a bottle of window-washing liquid, he drew the blue stuff up into the syringe.

  “I want nothing of me to remain in the mortal realm. Why else do you think I’ve stolen so many faces and hands? I want to pass completely from this flesh. Already I do not identify myself with my own features. I certainly won’t have my face and hands running around on another body.”

  He pulled the shirt back from her pregnant belly, probed for a hard spot – the baby’s shoulder or head or hip – and then rammed the needle home, emptying the shaft in one long compression. Donna did not move at all, except from the jolt of his fist. When he drew the needle out, there was a little clear fluid mixed with the blood and window cleaner. That seemed a good sign. He leaned away, sliding the door back just slightly.

  “How much farther to the first tollbooth?” he asked the driver.

  “About ten minutes,” the driver responded. “Why?

  You got a girlfriend there?”

  “No. I just thought I’d stretch my legs.”

  “How’s the cop doing?”

  “Sleeping like a baby.”

  TWENTY-FOUR

  The wheels of the gurney rattled irritably upon the polished linoleum of the St Mary’s emergency room. Metal doorways and wire-reinforced windows scurried past on one side, a long, unrelieved expanse of flowered wallpaper on the other. The blue-white glow of fluorescent lights flashed overhead in warning.

  “Pulse steady at a hundred twenty. Pressure seventy over forty and dropping. Breathing rapid and shallow.”

  The man pushed, his face pimpled with cold sweat above his heavy EMT coat, which dragged stiffly at his arms.

  “Injury? What happened?” The intern looked frumpy in her gray scrubs, white coat, and hair net.

  “I don’t know. The paramedic was a new guy. He disappeared after the first toll. He must’ve screwed up and panicked.”

  “God damn it. Here, this way. Got an empty bay over here. What did he do to her?”

  “He gave her some oxygen. After that, I don’t know.”

  “Oxygen or anesthetic? She could be overdosed, back in a coma, or worse.”

  “What about the rapid breathing? That’s not from anesthetic. More like a toxic reaction.”

  “God damn it. She was supposed to be safe with us. Anything else?”

  “Not that I can think of.”

  “Clear off. Nurse, ready the crash cart. IV push. Get somebody checking her mouth for signs of poison. Hell, her shoulders and hips for needle marks, too. God damn it! It’s like that bastard’s able to reach right into shit. Cut her clothes off. Check everywhere. Check every inch of her. Who knows what that fucker did to her.”

  I shouldn’t have done that one. I shouldn’t have done him like I did. From the very start, it was a lark. A whim. There wasn’t enough grim poetry in it, only the fun of a lawyer strangling at sixty-five miles an hour on the Edens. But it wasn’t fun. It was cheap and sour and foul.

  He was a lawyer, a sometime-prosecutor – a killer, like me, except authorized by the government instead of by God. He made sure criminals received what was coming to them – sometimes steel cages, sometimes death. We were peas in a pod, he and I. I had the same outlook and wanted him to get what he deserved. I chose him partly for that, but mostly because I couldn’t resist when I saw his name spelled out in white plastic capitals on the office register: PHIL JUDGEM.

  I shouldn’t have done him. Right then I knew it. This would be no more than a cheap joyride. A fling. A hand-job…

  The elevator doors parted. Phil Judgem stood within the red-velour space. He wore a sleek suit of gray-blue, cut to hide his pudginess. A suit can do only so much. His neck strained in its white collar, and venous hands drooped beneath silver cufflinks. The glint of metal was brief, like a spark at his wrists. Judgem moved on. He walked through the lobby. It was a modern sanctuary of glass, steel, and marble. There were others of his kind here, silent and sleek and a little wide-eyed like salmon nuzzling past each other. Judgem reached the perpetually revolving doors, timed his feet, and came out into the sunlit plaza.

  I was waiting. The valet jacket was only slightly too big for me. The cap fit perfectly.

  “The green Mercedes,” he said to me, holding up the claim card.

  I nodded enthusiastically, snatched the keys, and hurried down into the parking lot.

  The place was dark, a cave of cement and rusted wire. It smelled poisonous from exhaust. I scanned the current batch, fitted tightly bumper to bumper, and found a dark green Mercedes. Going to it, I tried the key. It fit. I opened the door, sat down in the driver’s seat, started up the car, and pulled out, heading for the main entrance. It was some car, with seats of black leather, power everything, and a ride quiet as a purr.

  The gray parking garage gave way to a wedge of cloud-cluttered sky. The car glided up the ramp and came to a smooth stop beside Judgem. I opened the door, stepped from the driver’s seat, and gestured him toward his car. He placed a dollar in my hand and moved past me to get in.

  I might not have killed him even then, might have let him drive off, but for the sweaty crumple of that dollar in my hand. I thought of the fifty from that reporter, Blake Gaines. It had been the same. Warm and intimate. Disgusting. One kick knocked him sideways into the passenger seat. He kicked back at me. I shot him. It was a fat bullet. The impact shoved him all the way over. I climbed behind the wheel, locked the windows and doors, and roared out toward Ohio Street and the ramp onto 94 North. He cowered beside me. His hand lay limp in his lap. One fat leg was wrenched a little sideways.

  “You can have the car. You can have my wallet. You can have everything, just let me go.”

  It was going sour. The whole thing. He smelled of feces – maybe the bullet had cut through bowel, or maybe he’d dirtied himself. He was white and soft as a pudding. He jiggled.

  “Please. Anything.”

  “God damn it, shut up. Shut the fuck up.” I pointed the gun at his head. I felt sick. I couldn’t enjoy it anymore. He was disgusting. Not like the others. There was no dignity. It was like walking on white worms lying in rain puddles. “Shut the fuck up.”

  He vomited. I pressed a button. His window rolled down halfway. We were going sixty-five up the Edens.

  “Stick your fucking head outside!” I shouted. Wiping his mouth, he stuck his head out the window. I pressed a button. The glass rose to catch him beneath the chin. He tried to pull his head out, but already it was caught be
tween glass and chrome. He fumbled to reach the controls, but I kept my finger down so nothing he did made a difference. I was sick. He was like a pig with its head stuck in a gate, fat and grotesque as he struggled and died. I couldn’t stand it. I emptied the gun into him, let down the window, and let him roll in beside me. God, what a fucking mess.

  Samael was not the angel of death who turned Lot’s wife into a pillar of salt. Nor was he the angel of death who stole through Egypt to slay all the firstborn sons of the land. Samael’s commission began later, when it was time for Moses to die.

  Elohim sought an angel to descend among his people and separate the soul of Moses from his body. God asked the archangel Gabriel, the great messenger to humans, who did not wish to slay the Lawgiver. Next God asked Michael, who was the head of Heaven’s armies and would in time become the angel of death for Christians, but he also refused. Samael, however, was eager for the job of killing God’s greatest prophet.

  Though as holy and angelic as all the rest, Samael had a certain penchant for cruelty. After God gave him the task of killing Moses, Samael spent a long while determining how best to do it. Perhaps Moses should die through a series of Egyptlike plagues – his blood would turn to water, his hair to locusts, his genitalia to toads, his skin to boils, his shadow to impenetrable darkness, and so forth. Or, perhaps, Moses could be enticed to part the Jordan River and cross, despite God’s prohibition against him entering the land of milk and honey. Then Samael could loose the tide when Moses was halfway, and the water would crash over him, and he would drown. Or, best of all, Moses could be murdered by a man who, in the single act of killing him, broke all Ten Commandments. The murderer could be Moses’s covetous son, who dishonored his father in an adulterous affair with an idol-worshiper on the Sabbath and, when discovered in the act by Moses, blasphemed and stole Moses’s dagger and murdered him with it, then ran away and testified that his neighbor had done it. Unfortunately, Moses had no such son.