Scream Catcher

by Vincent Zandri

  Because aren’t canaries supposed to sing?

  * * *

  Now standing inches away from the antique birdcage that Rosie picked up at a Sunday village flee market, Jude grips the flashlight. But he doesn’t require the light to see that the birdcage door has been left wide open. That the bird lies upside down on the flat metal bottom of the cage atop a bed of scattered seeds and shed yellow feathers.

  Fucking sadistic Black Dragon … fucking dark monster … It must be you …

  Jude turns, lunges the short distance from the living room through the dining room, into the kitchen, out the back door. He bolts through the rain, down to the docks. But he doesn’t cover the entire distance to see that the Lund motorboat is no longer floating on the lake surface. The motorboat sits on the rocky bottom. Motorboat’s been scuttled. In his mind he pictures Lennox standing on the dock aiming a silenced .22 cal. at the boat’s bottom, pumping six or seven holes into it while Jude dozed off in bed.

  But then Lennox is inside the house. Jude is down on the dock.

  Turning too quickly he slips. Feet fly out from under him. He goes down hard onto his side on the wood planking. The air is knocked out of his lungs. He bolts up anyway, sprints his way back up to the kitchen door, plows through it, hooks a sharp left down the stairs to the garage door. Jude opens the door, shines the flashlight on the Jeep CJ-7, sees immediately that the hood has been propped up, sees that the engine has been sabotaged, bits of metal and wire scattered all about the concrete floor.

  Back up the stairs in the kitchen he grabs the cordless phone, presses it to his ear.

  The phone is dead.

  Blackout …

  Blood boils inside his brain. Maybe the air is gradually returning to his lungs, but Jude is going insane from panic. Slamming the phone down onto the hardwood counter its electronic guts explode and scatter. That’s when Jude pulls the cell phone from his pocket, punches Send to redial his adoptive father’s number.

  Mack’s seven-digit number appears along the digital readout.

  He puts the phone to his ear.

  “Answer! Answer! Answer goddamnit!”

  But he gets nothing other than busy signals. Then a total signal disconnect. The heavy realization sinks in: he is all alone with a wife and child asleep in their beds. He stands paralyzed in the center of the kitchen floor with the rain falling steadily outside the picture windows, a lake flanking one side of the home, a dirt road and thick woods flanking the other. He knows now that Hector Lennox, the man he is to testify against, is hiding out somewhere inside his home and there isn’t a fucking thing he can do about it. Lennox has begun to play a kill game, starting small by killing two of Rosie’s pets. Black Dragon is working his way to larger, more complicated thrills, spills and kills.

  What is there to stop him?

  No cops, no phones, no transportation, no protection …

  Jude tries to swallow his fear, hold down the demon. But it’s impossible. He’s too weak.

  Where is Ray Fuentes? Where is Mack?

  He swallows something cold and bitter.

  Shining the flashlight into the vestibule, he goes for the upstairs bedrooms.

  55

  Lake George Village Precinct

  Friday, 12:10 A.M.

  “You still haven’t made contact?” barks Lt. Lino.

  The dark-suited, mustached, thirty-nine-year-old detective stands over the young uniformed woman in charge of the switchboard inside the basement Department Communications Center.

  “Mack radioed but did not respond with a copy,” she nervously explains. “That was only minutes ago. We’re running the show by generator. Like, half power. Now the best I can do is static.”

  Eyes back on the dispatcher.

  “The blackout is killing us. Please try one more time.”

  Fingering a series of keys on the keyboard, the dispatcher speaks into her headset, “Number nine, number nine. This is dispatch. Do you copy? Over.” White noise oozes over ceiling speakers. “Captain Mack this is dispatch. Do you copy? Over.”

  “Shit,” Lino moans.

  “I’m doing the best I can, Lt. Lino.”

  Exhaling, the Lieutenant sets his hand on her trembling shoulder.

  “Sorry.”

  Fingers hovering over the keyboard, the dispatcher exhales, awaits further orders.

  “What about transponders?” Lino says after a time. “Holy Christ, I can’t believe I didn’t think of it earlier. What if we trace the transponders?”

  Typing, the dispatcher glues her eyes to the flat monitor where the department’s entire list of Jeep Cherokee cruisers appear by license plate number, including numbers 8 and 9—Fuentes’s and Mack’s respective rides. Thumbing the mouse, she sets the little red cursor on the plate marked 9, fingers Enter. A real-time satellite-generated map appears on the flat screen. Towards the upper right-hand corner of the screen in the area marked Northeast can be found a small yellow triangle.

  “Enhance,” Lino requests.

  The dispatcher types yet another command. The screen zooms in on the yellow triangle, enough so that the satellite-generated black and white flames that shoot up from Fuentes’s cruiser become clearly visible. In plain view, only a few feet away from the fire, Mack’s apparently undamaged Jeep.

  “Can you get a fix on that?”

  “Parcel 445, Fort Anne Road and Lake George Road. Site of the old Molloy gravel pit.”

  What in God’s name is he doing out there?

  “You want me to print a hardcopy, Lieutenant?”

  “Hurry.”

  The dispatcher prints it.

  Lino pulls the sheet from the printer before she has a chance to retrieve it for him.

  “Alert Command of possible policemen down,” he shouts while jogging out of the Communications Center, up the two flights of metal pan stairs, on his way to the building’s rear exit.

  56

  Assembly Point Peninsula

  Friday, 12:11 A.M.

  She’s lying on her back when Jude throws open the bedroom door.

  Rosie, all four limbs tied to the four opposing legs of the mahogany bed frame, white panties stuffed in her mouth. Standing paralyzed inside the open door, Jude senses that his pregnant wife is trying to communicate with him.

  Not with her gagged mouth. But with her eyes.

  The back of her head is pressed deep inside the pillow. Half her face glows in the candlelight, while the other half remains concealed in shadow. He’s able to make out her brown eyes. Eyes that in the burning firelight are wide and unblinking.

  The bedroom is as still as an empty church.

  Jude gazes up and down Rosie’s naked body with a kind of frightened curiosity. There is a small cut that’s been made just below her right breast. A thin line of blood trickles from it, runs down along her ribcage. There’s the small bruise on her lower left forearm from the IV she was injected with the night before. The tiny silver hoop that pierces her naval glistens in the candlelight. So does the pale skin immediately above the carefully trimmed pubic hair. Her long black hair is disheveled, some of it spread out over the pillow, some of it veiling the right side of her face. The tangled hair and the small laceration tell him she put up a silent struggle against Lennox’s assault.

  Jude’s Police Academy training comes to mind: one must be completely aware of one’s surroundings.

  But even by then he has no idea how long he’s been standing inside that open door, just staring at the naked, bound image of his wife. A half second maybe. Or a full minute.

  Fear warps time, bends it the same way it cripples his insides.

  For Jude the present moment no longer possesses any logic or proportion. He knows he has to do something. What he wants is simply to lift his feet, put one foot in front of the other. He wants to rescue Rosie. But he discovers that he can do nothing more than watch her struggle against the ropes; watch her eyes watch his own.

  Eyes that do not plead with him to save her.

&
nbsp; Rather, eyes that tell him to leave this place; to grab his boy, get the hell out while they still have the chance.

  I’m not running out on my wife … my unborn baby.

  Suddenly, the closet door is thrust open.

  57

  Assembly Point Peninsula

  Friday, 12:12 A.M.

  Black Dragon drops the baseball bat to the floor beside the now unconscious Player. He steps over the prone body, makes his way to the beautiful Mrs. Parish’s side of the bed, leans himself over the still struggling pregnant woman. He reaches out with his right hand, extends a gloved index finger, runs it up and down the flesh on her protruding belly, flicks her naval ring. Through the black leather gloves he feels her pulsing fear, her sensual warmth. He moves the finger lower and lower still, gliding it over the dark hair. He probes until he feels the division of skin, the fleshy moist heat, the tight internal opening.

  It excites the beast to sense her wet warmth.

  Peering directly down at her, he is able to see through her skin to the veins and capillaries that crisscross her flesh. He sees her spleen, kidneys, liver and lungs. He sees her heart, sees it pumping the blood into arteries and veins. He’s amazed just to see the path the blood follows on its way through the body. He sees a small baby floating in clear fluid. The baby is sucking its thumb.

  He slides gloved fingers in and out of her insides. He watches Mrs. Parish wince and gasp painfully while he works his extended fingers. Gently gliding his fingertips up to her breasts, he pinches her nipples one at a time, causing each of them to grow hard and pert. This is a sensual game Black Dragon plays. It’s a game in which he can feel and be felt.

  Outside the bedroom windows lightning flashes, thunder rumbles.

  Black Dragon reaches up to the woman’s face, pulls the panties from her mouth. He licks the entire length of the leather-gloved index finger as though it were a lollypop before running the delicate undergarment slowly over his lips and nostrils. He inhales deeply before tossing them onto the floor.

  “Victim doesn’t scream,” he whispers. “Yet.”

  Bending over, he shoves his mouth against her quivering lips.

  58

  Assembly Point Peninsula

  Friday, 12:16 A.M.

  Jude awakes with a start only to find that Rosie has vanished, along with the shotgun and the flashlight. There remains only a cell phone set on the wood floor beside his throbbing head. Reaching for his own cell phone, he finds that it has been removed from his pocket.

  He can’t concern himself with what must have been a deliberate cell phone switch for long. Because there is a shooting pain in his head and an egg-sized lump protruding from the forehead directly above his right eye. He touches the lump with the fingers on his right hand only to pull them back quick from the sting.

  Jude breathes, tries hard to calm himself; focus. But all objects contained within his peripheries are blurry, depth-of-field spinning and pulsing like an out of control video camera.

  The candles set in all four corners of the bedroom have been relit. Now the candles are burned down to almost nothing. Pushing himself off the wood floor, Jude sits up, sees the empty place that Rosie occupied when she was still strapped to the bed. All that remains are the cut-away ropes, the crumpled bed sheets, a pair of discarded underwear tossed onto the floor.

  Something else grabs Jude’s attention. He’s overcome with acrid smoke.

  Fire.

  * * *

  He pulls the bedroom door open, runs out into the hall. That’s when the dancing orange flame reveals itself like a devil’s aura. It burns bright against the blacked-out night inside the half-inch linear space that exists between Jack’s bedroom door and the carpeting tacked to the floorboards.

  Jude will not allow himself the luxury of thinking. He simply lowers his shoulder, rams the door down.

  The abrupt introduction of new oxygen causes the flame to shoot up from the bed. The mattress, pillow and down comforter are ablaze as if the bed has spontaneously combusted. Inside Jack’s closet, Jude reaches for the top shelf, grabs hold of the extra comforter. He whips the quilted comforter through the air like a fisherman and his net, spreads it out over the burning bed to smother the flame.

  Thoughts of burning himself never enter his head. Rather, the thoughts enter his head, but they seem unimportant. There is only the need to douse the flame before the entire log home goes up.

  It takes maybe thirty seconds before he manages to pat the fire down, rob it of its oxygen. Jude coughs and chokes from inhaling the thick black smoke that billows from the mattress. Outside in the corridor, the smoke alarm blares. But in his brain, he hears a different alarm.

  Lying on the nightstand is a tipped over candle, the black wick oozing a thin, coiling trail of white smoke. The candle has been fired back up. He steps back away from the remains of the bed, cups his hands around his mouth.

  The word for tonight is careful with a capital “C” …

  “Jack!” screams Jude.

  59

  Assembly Point Peninsula

  Friday, 12:17 A.M.

  The white Ford cargo extend-van is backed up in the Parish gravel driveway. The steady rain drums against its sheet-metal roof. Now that Black Dragon has loaded two out of the three bodies, plus the remains of Fuentes (a bowling ball-sized parcel wrapped entirely in a green trash bag), there remains one task left for him to accomplish. The beast pulls the satellite phone from off the Velcro utility belt. He dials a rerouting code, then the two digit county code, followed by the area code and finally the seven digit number for the Player’s brand new cell phone.

  Black Dragon thumbs Send.

  In his head he pictures the invisible radio waves shooting into space, bouncing off one shiny satellite after another. He anticipates the connection with a spine tickling-excitement.

  While the phone rings, he settles himself back in the driver’s seat, glances into the rearview to check on the state of the bodies laid out in the cargo space. One adult woman; one prepubescent boy; one supercop head-case. So to speak.

  All of them dead to the world …

  60

  Assembly Point Peninsula

  Friday, 12:18 A.M.

  Jack’s fire-damaged bedroom becomes a four-walled chamber of acrid smoke and toxic fumes. But the bad air does not stop Jude from searching for the boy inside the closet, under the desk, beneath the burned-out bed. Frantic, he searches every corner of the square-shaped room as if amidst the gray-black haze the open spaces are able to conceal a seventy-pound child. From down on hands and knees he examines the smoldering mattress on the off chance that the unthinkable has occurred—that Jack has gone up with the bed.

  The good news: there’s no sign of the boy amongst the ashes.

  The bad news: there’s no sign of the boy anywhere in the room.

  Outside in the hall, the ceiling-mounted smoke alarm ceases its piercing tone … only a second or two before the cell rings.

  * * *

  No voice or sound of any kind comes through the earpiece. In the place of a voice comes a text message that displays itself on the radiant face of the picture phone.

  Rule 1, the message reads, The Player does not scream unless requested to so.

  Rule 2: The Player does not run away.

  Rule 3: If the Player breaks any of the first two rules, its family dies.

  Jude presses the phone against his head, screams, “Where’s my family!?!”

  He waits for an answer.

  But then he remembers to pull the phone away from his ear, stare down at the screen.

  The answer reveals itself in the form of another text message.

  The Player broke rule number 1

  Connection terminated.

  * * *

  Jude heads straight for the windows, starting with Jack’s.

  He strains to gaze outside. But the windows are covered over in soot and ash. A few of the panes are cracked from the fire’s heat. But then the night is so black
and thick it is nearly impossible to make out anything beyond the window glass.

  It’s the same story with every other window he peers out of on the home’s top floor. Nothing but black, overcast night.

  Jude stands alone in the smoky hall, his breathing labored, his lungs filled with smoke. He presses his back up against the wall, slams his skull against the horizontal logs. But the pain never registers. He tells himself that now … now is the time for the power to be restored. As if the simple wish will make an ounce of difference.

  Electrical Power Grid System …

  Holding the phone back up to his face, he stares at the electronic display. He thumbs the commands that might reveal Lennox’s number. But the caller identification display reveals “Unknown Name.” He can only wonder how the beast managed to locate a usable signal in the blackout. Maybe the phones—or at least cell phones—are up and running again. Just the thought provides him with a sliver of hope.

  With a trembling hand, he begins to dial the number for the village cops. Not Mack’s personal office phone. He doesn’t recall the number off the top of his head. He dials Emergency 911. But before fingering the second number in the three digit sequence, he stops himself cold.

  He stares out into the darkness and silence of the log home. He asks himself, What if it’s possible to get through to the police? What if they immediately dispatch a set of squad cars to my home? What will Lennox do when he spots the cruisers? What kind of revenge will he take out on Rosie and Jack?

  He allows his hand and the digital phone it grips to fall to the side. He has no idea which way to turn for help. Not without getting his family killed in the process.