by David Skato
“I am so happy to see you. I couldn’t talk there but meet me at The St. Regis Atlanta room 1306, 6 pm tomorrow evening.”
Roche’ was honored that, even though it was her sister, a superstar wanted to see her.
Roche’ Dupont showed up at the hotel and went directly to room 1306. She knocked on the door, and sure enough, her sister opened it. The two embraced each other and cried.
“They told me you were dead,” Rochelle said, weeping.
“I’m not. I’m here,” Roche’ responded.
The two sat on the bed and looked into each other’s eyes.
“Where have you been all these years?” Rochelle asked.
“In the country.” Roche’ laughed. “Rochelle, I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“I watched them take you, and I didn’t do anything. I just ran.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“Now, I see that you turned out just fine.”
“Roche’ listen. These are bad people and I’m not fine.”
“What are you talking about? You’re the biggest star in the world.”
“Yes, but I would trade it all not to be. These people are evil. They are working on something, I don’t know what, but I’m trapped.”
“How is that possible? You can walk out anytime you please.” Roche’ explained.
“I wish that was true. This is my luxurious prison. The only reason you are here is because I paid this guy over the hotel security to loop the cameras every Saturday evening from 6 to 7. “During that time,” she holds up air quotes, “I take showers.” “So we need to make this fast.”
“That sounds crazy.”
“I know how it sounds, but why would I lie?”
Rochelle’s face was super serious, and Roche’ knew her sister. Rochelle got up and slowly walked to the window, almost in a trance-like state. “Do you believe in god?” She asked, looking at the ground below.
“What?” Roche’ asked, caught off guard.
“I prayed. Though my soul is already gone, I prayed anyway. Then I saw your face in the crowd. Was God laughing or smiling?”
“Rochelle, you’re not making any sense.”
Rochelle then whispered to herself. “Nothing without me.” She turned around and rushed to Roche’ and took her hands. “I’ve never stopped loving you. In my heart, I knew you were still alive. Out there somewhere. I dreamed that you was with people that loved you and you had a family.”
“I do. They’re great. I’m happy. Come with me. Disappear.”
Rochelle looks down in thought. “Prison is the opposite of what people think. It’s not being isolated in a small cell only seeing the sun one hour a day. It’s being recognized everywhere you go. Being followed at every turn. I can never disappear.” She slowly looks up at the small camera positioned in the corner of the ceiling. “When eyes watch you every move, you can only move freely in your mind.” She states, staring into blank space. She shakes herself out of it. “You have to go.”
“But I just got here.” Roche’ pleaded.
“I love you, and I would never do anything to hurt you. You know that right?”
“Yes.”
“Leave this place. Leave this city and never come back.”
“Why are you saying this?”
“You have to go.”
She ushers Roche’ to the door. “Please leave. Don’t come here again. I will miss you,” she whispered as she closed the door.
Roche’ walked down the hall with her head down. She was heartbroken that her sister, whom she just found, was lost again. As she exited the hotel, she clumsily bumped into a guy wearing mirrored sunglasses.
“Excuse me,” she said as she looked up briefly but ducked fast to avoid eye contact before speeding out of the door.
The man looks as if he’d just seen a ghost. After standing for a while and watching this woman go to her car, he shrugs it off. He continued to walk to the counter of the hotel, where he leaned towards the receptionist.
“I’m here to see Adonis Sterling,” said Harnando Vasquez.
Ω
Jessi hangs up the phone and takes in a deep breath. “Here goes nothing.” She whispers to herself before standing on her desk and calling for everyone’s attention.
“Hey, hey, hey hey” She then places her fingers in her mouth and blows a loud siren sounding whistle from her lips. The room falls quiet.
“I need all of you to go with me to the Quest building. There are some people trying to take over the world using the internet.” She says, immediately realizing how stupid it sounded.
In the back of the bullpen, someone snickered, someone else tossed a paper ball her way, with the rest continuing as if she hadn’t said a word. Jessi starts to step down, just as the lights in the bullpen got out.
“I bet you will get your asses up now.” She states with pride.
Everyone starts to look around. A few look out the window and see the clouds forming over the Quest building. Jessi jumps down and grabs her coat from the back of her chair. While most of the officer’s attention is directed out the window, Jessi heads for Wilcox’s office. Jessi took pleasure and smashing the glass and taking the prized Louisville Slugger from the wall.
She takes a small practice swing. “Damn, this might be worth that house money.” She rushes out the door with her fellow officers rushing behind her.
As she rushed outside, she spotted her car across the parking lot and made a mad dash for it. Suddenly a gunshot rang out so close that she could feel the ringing in her ears, causing her to drop down and reach for her gun on instinct. Looking around to see who was shooting at her, she realized the shot came from the car she was leaning against, the Chief’s car. She slowly rises, being careful to stay out of the line of sight of whoever was doing the shooting. She noticed that the front driver’s side window was bathed in crimson red blood, and brain matter bits slowly slid down the window. Jessi covered her mouth to hide her gasp. Through the clean spots, she could see the Chief slumped against the driver's side window with half his head missing.
“Fuck” she whispered, but she needed to focus. Wilcox was part of the reason all this crazy shit was going down. She needed to get to Wade. She jumps in her car and barrels down the road with Quest lined up in her sights. As she drives, she notices strange shadows projecting from the top of the quest building.
“What the fuck is that” She slowly whispers.
Ω
They lied to her as she rode in a super nice stretch limo sipping champaign and eating a weird rich people’s cheese. The death of her sister was still fresh, but she was too distracted to think about it. They made sure of that. This Russian woman was really nice, and she had told her the ropes of what was needed. “Everyone wants to be a star, right?” The woman said with a large grin and thick accent. “You just get to skip the hard work,” she added. Roche’s parents had kept her a secret all this time, and now, here she was in the clutches of what they feared most, her sister’s kidnappers. But she was an adult, and she could call the police any time she felt threatened. Her sister told her that these people were evil, but she didn’t get that vibe. She was happy that they came to visit before her mom got home. That woman would have had a fit. She was so cautious about weird white people visiting and made sure that it was etched in Roche’s mind. She had lost her husband and didn’t want to lose her only child too. She found it odd that when she asked how they found her, the Russian woman ignored the question. They were so nice that she eventually forgot about it. “We just need you for two shows,” the woman with the thick Russian accent said. “But first, we need to make sure you are committed. We can’t have you quitting on us.”
The thought of living just a moment in the life of Rochelle gave her overwhelming excitement. She wanted it so bad. She was furious at her mom the first time she told her she couldn’t seek out her sister. “It’s for the best,” the woman would say. “The best for who?” Roche’ thought. “She gets to travel t
he world and have millions of fans while I go to this boring ass school and eat dinner every night with two old people.”
Those thoughts seemed like an eternity ago as Roche’ laid cuffed to a table in this motherfucking lair with a demon rising from the floor. The first time she saw something like this, the same decrepit old hag made her read a book in some old, abandoned church. Now she was here, facing her failed choices. Rochelle told her these people were evil.
The face upon the shadow was so hideous that Roche’ froze in fear. It was so much bigger than the one from the old church, and this time it brought with it the feeling of petrifying fear and abysmal hopelessness. It floated upwards until it touched the ceiling the gently descended until it was face to face with Roche’. The creature had a look of pure admiration for the beautiful young woman. “Umm,” this was his new body, and what a body it was.
“Baphomet!” The old woman screamed, causing the creature to quickly look in her direction.
“My lord, I welcome you to this vessel. We are humbly here to serve you, my lord.” She continues.
The creature looks back at Roche’. It then rises to the ceiling once again, but this time darted downward, impaling her at lightspeed. Roche’s body went into a seizure. Her mouth oozed foam as her arms and legs shook uncontrollably before finally coming to a complete stop. The old woman walks to the table and stands over Roche’. With one swift move, the creature, now inhabiting Roche’s body, breaks the restraint holding its hand and grabs the old woman by the neck. Its face morphs into what looked like a more deadly Carasaca, letting out a loud screech. The old woman’s eyes bucked in a look of sheer surprise and horror. The creature throws her against the wall breaking her back and killing her instantly. Baphomet breaks the remaining restaurants and steps onto the floor. This was Roche's face and body, yet anyone who looked upon her would know that this was a monster. The thing oscillated evil as shadow beings circled around its body. It walked slowly until it was at the head of the table. She then went into a trance, and with a quick thrust, it raises its arms, and a mass of shadows begin to protrude from its body at lightning speed, leaving the building by going through walls as if the stone, plaster, and glass weren’t there.
Ω
Dontae started his steady pace run, keeping his eyes on the strange things happening at Quest. As he proceeds in that direction, he is perplexed by the sight of a massive blob of shadows ejecting from the building going in all directions. He runs faster. Suddenly a man tackles him from the side, and they both go crashing into the window of a small boutique. The man gets a few good punches in while on top of Dontae’ before he realizes what’s happening. He then gives the guy a right hook to the side of his head, knocking him to the ground. He rolls on top of the guy.
“What the fuck is your problem?!” He yells.
With much surprise, he looks into the guy's eyes to see total darkness. His eyes are completely black, and his face is expressionless. “They have done it,” he thinks. He gives the man a hard hit with his elbow, knocking him out cold. He peeks out of the broken window to a sight of terror. A car drives at full speed barreling through a crowd, sending bodies flying as high as eight feet in the air. Three men drag a kicking and screaming woman into an apartment building as a body comes flying from a sixth-floor window of the same complex. A crazed man chased an already blood-soaked man down the street with what looked like a machete. An explosion in one of the distant highrise buildings shakes the ground and rocks the city. People had lost their minds. Maybe even a better explanation would be, people had become possessed. Dontae’ had to make it to Quest fast, and he hoped Jessi would be there. Most of all, he hoped she was safe. He continues using back streets to avoid confrontation until he arrives in front of the building just in time to see his partner pull up. Jessi steps out to a surprise attack by a pretty sizable guy, but she is much too fast for the fat man. She manages to swing a bat and proceeds to beat the guy senseless. Dontae’ walks over with one eyebrow raised.
“It had to be done.” She remarked, wiping sweat from her forehead. “What’s our move Wade?”
They both look up to see swirling clouds in the sky and shadows still coming out of the Quest building at lightspeed. The entire sky now had a purple hue but translucent enough that the stars still shined. They knew that this was not just downtown Atlanta, but people were being possessed all over the world. The video challenge had over two billion views, and it could be estimated that at least half of those people completed it. Life had led Dontae’ to a suicide that occurred in a building that was now the epicenter of the apocalypse.
Dontae’ brought his attention back to Jessi. “Rochelle is in there, Roland is in there, and most likely, the Devil is in there.”
“Fuck. I’m sure that means we need to head to Fiji, but I know what you gonna say.”
He nods in agreement. Other officers start to pull on the scene and group around the detectives.
“Detective Mason, we’re following your lead,” one of the officer's states.
“Ok, we need to get into this building. Whatever is going on, started up there”, Jessi tells the officer as she nods to the top floor. “Remember, these are still people, only use deadly force of you absolutely have to.”
The officers agree.
Jessi and Dontae’ walk to the doors to quickly discover they are locked. Jessi takes the bat and bashes the doors sending glass flying everywhere. At that moment, an unusual silence pulls her attention. Around the city, the possessed have all stopped in their tracks simultaneously. They all turn and head for the Quest building running at full speed and letting out an unbearable screeching noise—all in unison.
“Oh shit,” Jessi whispered.
The team of officers sees the onslaught of people headed in their direction and group closer to the doors. One of the officers throws Dontae’ a gun.
“You two go; we’ll hold the line.” The officer says as he pulls another gun from a hoster tied to his ankle.
Jessi and Dontae step through the broken glass and head for the elevator.
“Shit, there’s no power.” Dontae’ explains.
“No problem, I got it.” Jessi rushes to the door that reads “stairs.” She takes the bat and beats the handle until it falls off. At this time, the police are almost overwhelmed by what looks like hundreds of the possessed.
“Wade!” Jessi shouts. “You got this. I need to stay here to make sure no one goes up these stairs. Go do what you got to do. You’re all we got” She winks as she throws him the bat, which he catches.
Dontae’ didn’t disagree. He knew what had to be done, and he knew that he couldn’t do it with an army at his back. He could handle Roland, something that he had been waiting on for a long time. He starts up the stairs.
After a painstakingly run-walk up twenty-eight black-dark flights, Dontae’ finally makes it to Roland’s office door, which, surprisingly, he finds open. He pulls his gun holding it tightly in one hand while he holds the bat in the other. He turns the corner gun pointed. No one is there. The thoughts ram shacked his brain, and he knew they had to be here. Where were they? He thought about a basement before recalling the two missing elevator buttons. “floors 29 and 30,” he thought. He holstered his gun and began to look at the large paintings. He recalled the one behind Roland’s desk with the writing. “Rochelle was trying to tell me something,” He thought. He puts the bat on Roland’s desk and tugs at the painting. It swiveled and opened to reveal a door. He pulled open the heavy door, which led to another stairwell. He picks up the bad and goes up the stairs.
Ω
He enters a room to see Rochelle in a trance. Her arms spread wide with shadows hover around, in, and out of her. He notices Roland and Salvita standing in awe at the sight. He can see the body of an old woman lying on the floor next to him. He slowly steps in, trying not to draw any attention when Harrison suddenly blindsides him. The bat goes flying across the room. He regains his composer after the nice punch and readies his fist. Before
he could take a swing, he is grabbed from behind by Ford. Harrison walks over and punches him in the stomach sending him to the floor. Clenching his stomach, he pulls his gun and manages to shoot Harrison directly in the forehead before Ford knocks it out of his hand and grabbing him from the back. He elbows Ford and gives him a backward headbutt causing blood to splatter from his nose at an alarming rate. Dontae’ dives for his gun as Ford charges him. He’s able to get two shots off, causing Ford’s body to fall on him hard. He struggles but manages to push the large man off. From the corner of his eye, he sees Salvita scurry out of the room. He stands and walks a little closer to Rochelle, who seems oblivious to what’s going on. Roland walks towards him.
