Stevens plucked the key chain from his pocket. The ceiling lights still hadn’t come on. Up ahead, through the dimness, he could see the glow from the incinerator. The A850 groaned and rumbled as it first melted and then turned millions of dollars worth of research and development into a pile of smoldering ash.
Stevens entered the disposal room and was struck at once by the heat coming off the incinerator. The intensity made him wonder if he hadn’t walked into a sauna. The metal cabinet where they kept the spare drugs was becoming uncomfortably warm to the touch. He jammed his key in and yanked open the heavy door.
Stevens removed a white plastic box, unsnapped the lid. Inside were three cases of Noxil. A Cheshire grin split his features. He had only expected two.
$45,000. That bastard better have enough money for all of this.
Stevens checked his watch. Quarter of three. If traffic wasn’t too bad he would have just enough time to reach Central Park and the nearly fifty thousand dollar paycheck that was waiting for him there. He turned on his heels to leave and suddenly stiffened. All the hairs on his arms were standing on end. His head made a slow tilt to one side as though this new angle might help his brain better explain what his eyes were seeing. Although the in-patient room was still dark, the overheads in the distance had started coming on. But that just made the image of what he was seeing all the more strange. None of the hospital bed curtains were drawn, except for just one and behind it was the shadow of something large. And it looked like it was moving. No, wiggling. Just then something tickled his nose and he flicked it absently away. Another touched his hand. Then the back of his neck and forehead. That’s when Dr. Stevens became aware of the noise. At first he mistook it for the hum of live electric cables.
The tiny shape of an insect blurred before his eyes as it flew toward the bed with the drawn curtain and the large shape that was now writhing behind it like a giant worm. Then all at once his awareness seemed to open up and he saw dozens, maybe hundreds of black dots zigzagging, all of them heading in the same direction. The space above the bed was becoming thick with flies. Stevens blinked. The amorphous shape behind the curtain was getting larger. That’s when he felt the first inklings of fear beginning to course through his veins and he fought to control it. After all, this was his turf and no homeless guy, however he had managed to sneak in, was going to scare him away. Stevens started toward the form moving behind the curtain. He was less than ten feet away when his nose registered an unusual scent.
Pine trees.
The scent was sweet and earthy, but Dr. Stevens’ nose tuned mostly to fine wine and caviar had detected another scent lurking beneath the surface. One that was familiar to him. One he recognized immediately.
Death.
His hand cramped around the three cases of Noxil. Stevens pointed his feet toward the glimmer of sunlight far in the distance, past the gauntlet of hospital beds, past the boardrooms, past the nurse’s station, but above all else, past whatever was undulating behind that curtain.
Risking his own skin was definitely not in the cards for Dr. Charles Stevens. You never knew what diseases vagrants were carrying around with them these days. No, he decided, trying to ignore the panic welling up inside him. It might be best to wait until he was safely en route to his meeting place with Tyson Barrett before he called the police and informed them that some disgusting bum had broken into their lab and was using it as a Holiday Inn.
The lights gave one final flicker and came on. The bed with the drawn curtain was still between him and the exit and Stevens hadn’t meant to keep watching. Definitely hadn’t wanted to, but his neck was turned nevertheless as though some invisible hand had kept tugging at his chin.
A spurt of blood sprayed inside the curtain wall. Then another and another after that. Soon the fabric was saturated with gore. One by one the thin metal hooks gave way. Stevens looked on in horrified amazement. He’d been an ER doctor for nearly ten years before moving into pharma. Nicked arteries and gouts of spurting blood were nothing new to him. But in all that time, he had never seen anything like this before. The curtain gave one final groan and then tore away completely. What was left lying on the bed, clotted with blood, was so far out of Stevens’ realm of experience that all he could do was gawk. For a moment, there was no more fear. Just wonderment. Wonderment because he was surely witnessing something no one else on earth had ever seen.
The thing on the bed lay motionless. Skin brown and covered in thick mucus. The thick tail wiped back and forth and it was then that Stevens began to recognize what he was seeing. It looked and moved like a caterpillar larvae. Thick scaly outer shell. A separate tail that swung in useless circles.
That was when his fear became terror. If this was some kind of giant larvae, then it begged the question: what was moving around inside? And if there was something inside, surely it wanted to get out. Almost in answer to his question, an appendage punched through the hardened outer shell.
Five fingers rose into the air and uncurled to reveal a hand. A small hand with long slender fingers. Then the thick elastic inner membrane stretched and broke revealing a child’s face. Black syrupy liquid ran down its face. It scanned the room with large insectile eyes and then stopped when they found Stevens. Stevens took a staggered step backward. The blood in his veins dropped by a steep ten degrees. The hairs on the back of his neck were standing painfully on end.
He watched in mute horror as the tiny form with the impossibly large eyes slid off the bed and onto the floor. A stream of purplish liquid coated the floor as the inner membrane gave way and emptied. It used its hands to push itself off the floor and the first thought that fired through Stevens’ mind was: It’s a boy.
The second: The flies are gone. The ceiling had been swarming with them not more than a moment ago and now they were gone.
The third made all of the strength go out of his legs.
Ahriman.
Stevens took an unsteady step backwards and nearly tripped over a discarded bedpan. The demon from Persian mythology who came to earth in the form of a fly. He was before Stevens now and was getting ready to lunge at him and that was when Stevens took off running. Not toward the front entrance, which seemed now like it was a hundred miles away. He didn’t get farther than a few feet when he heard the creature grunt and felt it clawing up his leg. He turned in time to see the creature’s jaw unhinge and clamp down on his thigh, could feel the flesh and bone coming undone. He howled with a pain more excruciating than he had ever known. A soupy stream of dark bile poured from the creature’s mouth. Stevens howled as the acid tore through his trousers and ate away at his flesh. He looked down in disbelief as his lower leg detached and dropped away from the rest of his body. It seemed to have just melted away. Stevens tumbled to the ground. The case with the vials flew from his hands, some of them shattered, littering the floor with blue liquid. Out from the stump where his leg had been only moments before pumped dark red blood.
The room with the incinerator was where he had been heading. If he could only make it inside and lock the door behind him. Maybe then he could stem the bleeding and wait until help arrived. The small form with the large black eyes still had his leg in its mouth, watching him almost playfully. The way a dog gnawing on a ball might look at its owner. It wanted to play and when it propped itself up on both hands, Stevens swung out with his one remaining leg. The sound of snapping twigs was like music to Stevens’ ears and he watched with glee as the creature crumpled.
Then Stevens had another idea. Clawing frantically at tiles now slick with his own blood, he scrambled toward an IV stand. The wheels rolled with ease and he brought it over to where the creature lay. It was trying to stand up on broken arms. Stevens spun around into a sit up position and gripped the IV stand like a giant ax. Then he swung it onto the creature’s head with what remained of his strength. He had already lost so much blood, but he knew he couldn’t stop the bleeding until this thing was dead for good. On the third swing, Ahriman’s head came apart and the de
mon stopped moving. A pile of clean bed sheets sat in a bin near ‘bed one’ and Stevens made his way there. With shaking hands he tore the sheets into a long strip and then fumbled for the cell phone in his pocket. He put it on speakerphone and dialed 911.
“Nine one one, what is your emergency?”
Stevens tied off the tourniquet. “I’ve just been attacked and I’m bleeding really badly, please send an ambulance.”
“What address are you at?”
“The medical clinic on the corner of Fourteenth and Houston.” Stevens’ vision was swaying in and out of focus.
“I need your name, sir.”
“Doctor Stevens. Are you sending someone, you silly bitch? I’m bleeding to death here.”
“I’ve already dispatched emergency personnel. I need to know if your attacker is still there, Dr. Stevens?”
He looked over the bed frame he was using as a back rest and noticed the creature wasn’t moving.
“I think I killed him.” A fly landed on Stevens’ phone and then flew off. Another fly tickled his nose as it tried to climb inside. He flicked it away. “Oh, no,” he said.
“Mr. Stevens, please go someplace safe until the authorities arrive.”
Stevens could already see the creature’s fingers beginning to twitch. He’d left the IV stand next to it and there was no way he could get back there in time. Stevens dropped the phone and headed for the room with the glowing light, his hands making frantic slapping sounds as he struggled for purchase. Behind him, Ahriman was getting up. The sound of broken bone and cartilage snapping back into place. Wet sounds, horrible sounds, and Stevens wished he could plug his ears and stop himself from hearing anymore. But right now he needed his hands to drag himself into the incinerator room. On the floor behind him was his cell phone where he could still hear the 911 operator asking him what was happening.
The incinerator room door was less than five feet away now. The blood streaming from his body, the fiery pain that fought for his attention with every pounding heartbeat. All these things weren’t important. Right now, the room with the warm glow and the door that would close between him and this thing was what mattered most.
Stevens crawled inside and spun himself around so that he could get his hands on the base of the heavy metal door; the words ‘incinerator’ were stenciled in bold black letters and below that in blood red the word ‘caution.’ He pushed and the door began to swing on its hinges, powered by the adrenalin surging so furiously through his system. In another fraction of a second, Stevens would be safe. That’s when the door stopped short with a sickening crunch. Stevens’ eyes grew wide and his heart seemed to freeze over and shatter into a million pieces. Above him, he could see a man’s leg jammed in the door. Attached to that leg was a foot with a shoe remarkably like his own. The cuff on the slacks identical to the ones he had stepped into as he hurried to dress for work this morning. The notion that the leg was his own seemed like some vague and distant concept or the punch line to some horrible joke.
He tried to keep the door from opening, but he wasn’t strong enough. The creature with the bulging eyes entered.
It ambled over to the A850 and paused. In the bright room, Stevens could see it clearly now for the first time. It had the upper body of a child but where legs should have been was just a stubby tail.
The roar from the incinerator was deafening. The demon studied it as though it were some new toy. Stevens watched in horror as it balanced its weight on the end of its tail and rose up so it could close a hand around the lid. The lid opened, filling the room with intense heat. Stevens could feel the moisture around his eyes being sucked away.
He’s gonna try and throw me in there. He’s gonna throw me in and close the lid.
But then the creature did something that shocked even Stevens. It reached into the scorching inferno with its bare hand. Its arm jammed in all the way, its chest pressed against the smooth metal surface as though it were fishing for something inside.
This is my chance, Stevens thought desperately. He clawed at the ground in front of him. His plan was simple. Grab hold and flip it into the incinerator. He reached for the rough bristly flesh around its waist when it turned. Ahriman had something in his hand. The arm that had been moving around inside the A850 was seared and blackened and Stevens could see in places where the flesh had been burned away completely. The stuff in his hand was dark blue and it ran between his long skeletal fingers like a clump of melting bacon fat.
Noxil.
Thousands of pills, destroyed and useless. But what could he want with that? Stevens wondered numbly.
A second later Stevens got his answer when the monstrosity that had slithered out from a blood squirting cocoon rammed the dripping sludge into his mouth.
Chapter 18
Hunter was in Bowes’ office again, peeling open the doors to the metal cabinet where his boss kept the scrapbook, the one with the article clippings.
The last time he was here, Al Quinlan, the janitor, had almost discovered him sticking his nose where it didn’t belong and it was only by the quickness of Hunter’s thinking that he had escaped. But maybe escaped wasn’t really the right word. Hunter had seen a touch of suspicion on Al’s face as he tried explaining that his office had been flooded by a leak from the ceiling. At the time, with his heart hammering wildly in his chest, Hunter was sure that pouring the cooler water onto the floor had been a stroke of genius, but he had quickly realized his error. Crusty guys like Al might not look like much, but their brains were storehouses filled with useless information. The men’s bathroom on two needed hand towels. The hallways on four and five weren’t waxed on Friday since Dan Cromley had to leave early to take his little boy to the emergency room. All the water jugs on six were replaced on Monday. And here was Hunter’s sitting half empty just a day later.
Hunter could see Al’s suspicion growing more acute every day as the man’s computer-like brain tried to make sense of the parts that didn’t quite add up.
“I was in your office last night, looking for that leak you mentioned. I gotta tell you, it was the darndest thing. No sign of water damage whatsoever.”
Hunter had done his best to look confused, even bored. “That’s strange. Water must have come from somewhere.”
“Only thing I can think of is that water jug of yours musta sprung a leak, cause I’d filled her up only the day before. Unless you’re in the habit of drinking more than a gallon and a half of water a day, that is.”
Hunter had shrugged, but a thought was dawning on him. That Al was playing dumb, the way Detective Colombo on TV played dumb when he knew all along exactly who the killer was. As long as no one could tie him to Bowes’ office after hours, then a leaky water jug was all it would ever be.
Hunter sat on the floor in Bowes’ office and crossed his legs, the leather scrapbook resting comfortably in his lap. He flipped through the pages, trying to find where he had left off the last time, navigating by the dim sickly light cast from the banker’s lamp on the old man’s desk.
He flipped a handful of pages and there it was.
Grizzly Scene Stuns Quiet Neighborhood
Jack Bicman
Police responding to a domestic violence call came upon a disturbing scene yesterday afternoon. Brenda Barrett was taken into custody by Columbia County sheriffs for the attempted murder of her five-year-old son Tyson Barrett.
Hunter laid the book down, pushed himself up on achy legs and searched Bowes’ disastrously messy desk for a pen and a scrap of paper. On it he wrote: Tyson Barrett. Still alive?
Then he sat back down with paper and pen and continued reading.
But it was inside one of the bedrooms that police made the most shocking discovery. The partially mummified remains of five-year-old Alexander Barrett.
Hunter paused. Where had he seen the name Alexander before? A flashbulb of recognition went off in his head. Brenda’s diary and the spider that lived by her bed. Alexander was what she had named him and she had loved and doted
on it as if it were her own flesh and blood.
Coroner Paul Shuute wouldn’t speculate on the cause of death citing that nothing could be confirmed before an autopsy was completed. He also wouldn’t say how long Alexander had been in the room. He would only say that the dead child was born with a rare disease called sirenomelia; a condition where an infant’s legs fuse together in the womb.
Alexander was found dressed and posed in a bedroom that Sheriff Johnston said “looked like some kind of shrine. In all my years in law I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Police have also taken Frank Barrett in for questioning. As per friends and neighbors, Frank was frequently away on business and of late had become estranged from his wife on account of her strange behavior.
Police continue to scour the house for any additional bodies, although Brenda Barrett claims there aren’t any others to find.
Hunter added two names to his list.
Frank and Sheriff Johnston.
He flipped the page and found an article from the New York Times called “When Mothers Kill.” In it, they used Brenda’s trial and subsequent imprisonment at Sunnybrook to highlight the point that fathers who murder their children are often considered evil and put to death, while mother’s are assumed to have severe mental illness and sequestered into institutions. One final point from the article would stay with Hunter for a while after he finished reading it: 90 percent of infant deaths under the age of five were due to infanticide. And 90 percent of those were committed by women. Hunter would have to check those figures of course, but if they were right, they would make a dynamite opening for the research paper on Brenda he was going to write.
Hunter was outside Bowes’ office pulling the door closed when he heard his name being called.
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