by Riley, R. Thomas; Zoot, Campbell; Chandler, Randy; Kauwe, Faith
"You see, Tom," Galvin says, "the Church has reason to believe that the 'near-death experiences' that some people report represent the departure of both the consciousness and the soul from the body. Now, if the biological experience of death is somehow stopped, consciousness can return. But sometimes the soul does not return with it."
"So where does it go—the soul?" I ask him.
"Most likely to Limbo," he says. "Not as bad as Hell, of course, but a far cry from the eternal joy of Heaven."
"So, you guys are telling me that my soul is stuck in Limbo, and there's nothing I can do about it?"
"Not necessarily," Galvin says. "God is merciful, Tom, and He listens to the entreaties of those who serve Him."
"There are means of assistance that Mother Church can offer you," Costello chimes in.
"Indulgences, prayers, other things. You know, tens of thousands of priests around the world offer Mass every day. It wouldn't be impossible to have your intention included in some, if not all, of those masses—day after day, year after year, for as long as you live. In addition, there are orders of nuns, such as the Poor Claires, who spend much of their time in prayer. They're amenable to special requests, if they come from the proper quarter."
I give Costello the stare I used to reserve for door-to-door salesmen. "Don't think I'm not grateful, okay? But I can't help wondering why you guys are willing to go to so much trouble for somebody who hasn't been inside a church for over ten years, apart from weddings and funerals. Pardon me for being blunt, Fathers, but—what's in it for you?"
The Archbishop and the Monsignor look at each other for a long moment. Then Costello turns back to me and says, "A man with your unfortunate condition could be very useful to the Church in certain situations. Uniquely useful, I'd say."
"What kind of situations?"
Apparently that tosses the ball back to Galvin, because he clears his throat and says, "Tell me, Tom, do you know anything about . . . exorcism?"
***
The demon struck with a physical impact that knocked me back a couple of steps, even though I'd been braced for it. For an instant, I sensed the evil thing inside me; knew its malice and fury, experienced its feeling of triumph.
But then I felt it pass through me like water through a sieve, felt it leave and keep on going, going, all the way back to Hell.
I heard its screams of frustration and rage inside my head for what seemed like a long time.
Apparently, there are rules for everything, even demonic possession. Over the centuries, holy men and women have figured out what some of them are.
Like the one that says a demon can't possess someone without a soul. That's not usually an issue, I guess, since almost everybody has a soul. But every once in a while, a special case comes along. Someone like me.
Another rule, they tell me, is that a person can only be possessed once. Once a demon leaves its victim, or is driven out, it can't return to the same place. So after finding me an inhospitable host, the demon was unable to go back inside poor Frank Stimpson again. The damned thing had nowhere to go—except back to the Pit, where it came from.
Because I'm invulnerable to demonic possession, I'm a handy guy to have around when an exorcism's taking place—just in case something goes wrong, like it did today.
In return for my services, the Church has all those priests and nuns praying for the salvation of my soul, which is currently believed to be residing in a cozy corner of Limbo. When I die, I guess I'll find out how well they did.
I hope they're all praying real hard.
BLOOD RIGHT
By Dagny Macallan
I make it a habit to drive real slow whenever I come home. The station isn’t that far of a commute, but I like to take the time—make my brain slow down, try to disconnect from all the things I think about all day. Plus I live in suburban sprawl. There’s always some snot nosed kid bouncing around in the street, not paying attention to traffic so it’s a good thing I like to drive slow coming home.
***
Tonight it’s that ginger kid who lives four doors down, what the fuck is his name, Jimmy or Johnny or some such shit. Christ, you’d think people would come up with better names for their brats. As I pull the car around the bend of the cul de sac where I live I can see his fire hydrant head, bent over something, intent as only an adolescent can be.
I honk the horn and wave as I drive by. Never hurts to be friendly. He jerks away from whatever he’s doing, casts a quick furtive glance in my direction and skirts off towards his house. Rude little fucker. Not even a wave. I catch something out of the corner of my eye, something moving the opposite direction of Ginger Fuck. It’s Mrs. Tsuji’s little spaniel. The thing is older than an 8 track and likes to yap, but it’s a cute little mutt and Mrs. Tsuji adores it more than Oprah. Ginger Fuck must have been walking the dog or something. Something registers in my brain as I pull into the driveway and put the car in park. Something I should probably remember but Abby, my hot as hell wife, is pulling a load of laundry out in the garage, her perfect little moon of an ass just peeking out from the boy shorts she likes to wear around the house.
She yips like a cat in heat when she sees me, sets the laundry basket down and saunters over to plant a big wet one on me. Her lips taste like her grape chapstick.
“Hey there, handsome,” she says with a grin. “I just got home from the shelter. How was your day?”
Before answering, I grab a beer from the fridge in the garage and crack it open. I take a deep swig.
“Shitty,” I say, giving her a little swat on her rump, “real fuckin shitty.”
Her plump little mouth curves down in a frown.
“You can talk to me, babe” she says, twining her fingers through my hand and leading me into the house. “Tell me all about it while I get dinner together.”
Normally, I never talk about my work with Abby. She’s a sweetheart, sweet-minded and sweet- assed and I’m a cop, a detective in Homicide and the last thing she needs stinking up her pretty little brain are thoughts of the murderous, twisted scum that I spend most of my days thinking about. But today, I really do need to get this shit off my chest. I sink into a chair at the kitchen table, holding the cool neck of the beer bottle between my fingers, watching Abby as she pulls potatoes and green beans out of the fridge.
“Crime scene today was another sliced up victim,” I say. Abby makes a sympathetic sigh in the back of her throat and scrubs the potatoes down. “It’s absolutely fucked.” I take another swallow of my beer. “Male in his late thirties, found in his apartment in North Park. Clawed to ribbons. No blood in the corpse or anywhere else in the apartment.”
Abby cuts the potatoes into chunks and drops them into a pot of boiling water. “Could it be some kind of animal attack?” she asks.
“Impossible,” I say. “The marks are too precise, too clean. Forensics can’t find any sort of dirt or bacteria on the wounds and an animal’s claws would have to be filthy. In fact, forensics can’t find a damn thing, not a trace of anything we can use. This is the second one just like it in a month, Abbs. It makes no fucking sense.” I’m not a sensitive man, or even a very nice one and I’ve done my fair share of bloodshedding but that body today had even me disturbed.
“Maybe a bear escaped from the zoo? Or maybe it’s some other kind of animal, a big one we haven’t heard of yet.”
“Zoo would have let us know if they had a wild animal on the loose, babe. And I’m pretty sure there isn’t an animal alive that we haven’t heard of.” Not the sharpest little axe, my wife, but I didn’t marry her for her brains. I married her for the way her ass looks as she’s bending over, pulling two thick ribeyes out of the fridge. And more than that, I married her for her infernal innocence, her inability to ever think a bad thought about a single solitary soul. Even with my temper, my terrible, dark moods and my not so shining history, she still doesn’t believe I can do a damn thing wrong.
“I keep thinking it’s a weapon of some sort, some mechanized bla
de—that would account for the precision, and the sterility of the wounds. But why the blood? Where does all the blood go and how can it be removed so completely, so cleanly?”
Abby bites her lower lip thoughtfully. “Maybe it’s a vampire?”
“Honey, you watch too many of those teenage vampire movies.”
She juts her little chin out stubbornly. “Hank, there’s plenty of things you can’t explain in life. It’s not crazy to think there might be things in the world that science doesn’t understand.”
God, I hate it when Abby gets on her supernatural tangents. Some nights, I find it cute, entertaining even, but right now I’m so frustrated with these cases the last thing I want is one of her haphazard vampire/ werewolf/ mutant goblin theories. I decide to avoid the disagreement entirely and change the subject.
“By the way, Abbs, what’s that neighbor kid’s name? The redhead who lives a couple doors down?”
“Jason,” she says, sliding the ribeyes into the sizzling skillet. “Jason Ritchie. His parents are Craig and Sue.”
“Right,” I say. “Well, Jason’s a rude kid. I waved at him today driving in and he just ran off.”
Abby makes her fake sad face. “Aw. Did he hurt your feelings, honey bun? Poor old Hank, getting ignored by the neighbor kid.” She winks mischievously at me and I growl and grab her by the waist, scooping her onto my lap where her play swats quickly turn into something else.
“Not now, baby,” she says, breathlessly. “I’ll burn the steaks.”
Reluctantly, I let her get back to making dinner. Down boy, I tell my half mast boner.
And later, after steaks and beers and the half mast has gone full sail and then happily deflated, I lay in bed, Abby’s tumble of blonde hair itching my nose and all I can think of is how the fuck does he get the blood out of the bodies? Some sort of vacuum? We should start looking at medical devices, medical professionals- they’re the only ones who would know their way around a body so well.
A cat squalls outside the window, loud and shrill, interrupting Abby’s breathy little snore. Cussing mildly, I slam the window shut, cursing cats and their damn nocturnal yearnings. I fall asleep, dreaming fitfully of bloodless corpses and rows of sharp, shining knives.
* * *
First thing in the morning, I drive over to the crime scene in North Park with my partner, Langley. I float him my theory about medical professionals. Admittedly, it’s not much to go on, but he likes it. We decide to head back to the apartment again and look through the vic’s medical history and address book. Maybe he has some connection to the medical field. And if we can find a similar connection with our other vic, a middle aged schoolteacher, then my hunch might actually lead us somewhere. For the first time in a month, I feel that sweet old thrill of the chase, my nose leading me somewhere, my gut stirring like an old man’s rheumatism predicting the weather.
My rheumatism shoulda predicted bad weather. There’s nothing in our boy’s apartment to link him to the medical industry. We even find his neatly organized, alphabetized file cabinet and where it says Medical Records, there’s nothing but immunization records and a couple of negative STD test results. His email synced smartphone is easy to crack and there’s no MDs listed in any of his contacts. My detective brain notices that contact list is awfully short for a single, healthy, well off and attractive male in his 30s. Emails and text messages are sparse and completely businesslike. Homeboy didn’t have much of a personal life. Something tickles my gut, like the steely hand of too much hot sauce on my breakfast burrito. I cast another glance around the apartment, this time letting that tickle in my gut guide my eyes. Stack of towels on the bathroom counter, folded perfectly symmetrical. Spice rack, largely untouched but alphabetized. Rows of cleaning supplies under the kitchen sink, also alphabetized. Industrial size box of latex gloves. Not a picture of a single living soul to be seen anywhere in the apartment, just some random color splotches that look like shit and probably cost a couple grand. Bookshelf, mostly nonfiction—biographies on people I’ve never heard of and historical war books. My eyes fall on a handsome leather bound first edition of The Demolished Man, an old classic sci-fi book my dad used to read to me when I was a kid. Weird seeing it in this sterile collection. My gut goes crazy. I pick up the book and notice the heaviness in my palm even as I flip it open
“Hey Langley, you better come check this out.”
Turns out the gorgeous first edition of the book has been ransacked, the pages neatly cut out to reveal a nesting place for a collection of knives. No crime in that, plenty of oddball Dungeons & Dragons types like to collect knives and swords. But these aren’t bullshit knives you buy off the Internet, engraved in Elvish. These are the real fuckin deal, hunting knives, wickedly sharp, some of them serrated and all of them looking like they’ve been used.
“Well fuck me running,” Langley says, elegantly. He does the same double take of the apartment I just did.
“C’mon, buddy,” I push. “If you didn’t know this was a vic, tell me who you woulda thought lived here.”
“Obvious neat freak, obsessive compulsive, no pictures of friends or family, little hidey
hole of deadly weapons…” he runs through the list. “Could be nothing, Hank.”
“But you know it isn’t. The more we look at it, the more our vic is looking like some of our most fucked up perps. Better run his DNA through the criminal database.” He sighs, runs his hands through his graying hair. Langley’s getting on in years, getting to the years where he’d like cases to be neat and tight, open and closed.
“I’m gonna have a cigarette,” I say.
Down in the courtyard of the apartment complex, I sit on a planter and light up, dragging that gorgeous killing smoke into my lungs. Stupid fucking luck. Instead of finding any answers or anything even resembling a lead, all I’ve uncovered is more fucking questions. I gotta quit smoking. I stub out my cigarette. Fuck it. I light another one up. I’m shaking out the match when I notice a beautiful gold and cream cat hunching terrified next to the planter. I don’t really care much about animals but this cat is really something, looks like it should belong in the zoo or a painting of Egyptian gods. I reach out a hand and the animal starts back but doesn’t quite run away.
“Hi. Uh. Are you with the police?”
I look up. Well, hellllo, sweetcheeks. The leggy, olive skinned brunette looking worriedly down at me is wearing next to nothing, looking like how Abby does when she gets out of her yoga sessions. Thank god for those stupid hippie stretch classes. Anything that encourages gorgeous women to wear less clothing and sweat a lot gets my vote. Down boy. I inhale again.
“Yeah, I’m Hank. Detective Hank Rearden. What can I do for you?”
She fumbles her pretty hands together.
“Well, uh, you know, I heard about Fred. I’m Lupe and I live in number seven. It’s really terrible what happened to Fred and you know, we’re really shaken up and if you need anything, we’re here, but um, I was just wondering what you’re going to do with the cat?”
“Cat?”
“Yeah, Fred had a cat. A really gorgeous cat, she’s an Abyssinian. I put some food out for her this morning, but I’m just a little worried, you know, because Fred didn’t really have any friends or family and I’d hate for the cat to get put down or something.”
“Oh, this cat?” I gesture with my cigarette at the little sphinx whose now rubbing against Lupe’s leg.
“Oh, Bonita!” Lupe scoops the cat up happily, petting her gently while giving me a happy smile. “I just call her that. Fred never told me her name. I’m glad she’s still hanging around.”
“Listen, Lupe, you said a second ago that Fred didn’t have any close friends? Or family that you knew of?”
She shrugs her perfectly toned shoulders.
“We’ve been here six years and Fred’s been here three and I’ve never seen him with another person. He just keeps to himself. To be honest, I always thought he was a little, well, off. I mean he was a good look
ing guy, but whenever I said hi to him, it always seemed like there was some kind of disconnect. I don’t mean to speak ill of the dead.”
She nervously rubs a small gold cross at her neck and crosses herself with her free hand.
“Please don’t get the wrong idea,” she hastens. “He must have been a nice guy to rescue Bonita.”
“She’s a rescue?”
“Well she must be.” She shifts the cat in her arms, “See? All these scars? Bonita was probably a show cat and her owner abused her. Those cat people can be real psychos.”
Sure enough, when Lupe points them out, I can see the network of fine scars under the cat’s cream colored fur—scars that look like they’re the work of a very sharp knife. I frown.
“Normally, if there’s no family member or friend who wants to take a pet we take it to the humane society,” I say. “But the cat looks happy enough with you—you could keep her if you want.”
Lupe shakes her mane of dark hair sadly, “I’d love to, I really would, but my girlfriend is deathly allergic to cats.”
Girlfriend? There is a god. That’s a picture for the old imagination. Down boy!
Whether it’s because I’m just a horny dude and this is a really hot lesbian or I’m feeling genuinely sorry for the pretty little thing, and I mean the cat, I decide to be nicer than my usually dickish Hank.
“Tell you what. My wife volunteers for a no kill shelter in Encinitas. I’m gonna call her right now and have her pick up Bonita. I’ll give her your name and have her give you all the information. Then, you can go visit Bonita whenever you want.”
Lupe presses my hand gratefully, her big brown eyes all limpid and doe like just like I like women’s eyes to be. I dial up Abby’s cell. I can tell the second she picks up that something’s wrong.
