by J. D. Oliva
Dana crashed down to the floor. A spiderweb burst across the visor. What the hell happened? She pulled herself back up to her hunches and caught a swift kick to the gut, driving her back down.
"Stay down," said a familiar voice.
It took a second to identify it, but as soon as she saw his perfect head of hair behind the visor's fractured webbing, it made sense. Michael went from being very annoying to insane. Not the first time that happened with a guy.
"Hi, Michael," she said, still trying to catch her breath.
"Reverend Summerville still believes in you for some reason. Must be a chick thing. If it were up to me, I'd crush your fucking skull right now."
Back on her hands and knees, Dana caught sight of something in his hand. A rolling pin. That's probably what caught her in the face. Why not just kill her? Why the games?
"But Julia doesn't like that idea. She thinks we owe you for bringing the Prayer back to us. I think it's even more reason to kill you. You know too much, but in a few hours, none of this is going to matter. Everything is going to be over."
"If you're trying to convert me, it's not working."
"Oh, how about this?"
The rolling pin came crashing down against her back. She heard the sound of ribs cracking inside as she let out a scream, muffled by the helmet.
"Torture conversions aren't real. Besides, that's more of a Catholic thing," Michael said.
The pain in her side throbbed, but she pushed back up to her hands and knees. Slowly, she started to crawl over to him before crumbling back to the floor.
"Even if you did, it wouldn't be real. You're not worthy of saving."
"Says the big guy beating a woman."
Michael's laughter is the loudest thing she heard since waking up. The sound almost pierced her eardrums.
"I'm already saved. If I sin, I just ask for forgiveness."
Michael kicked her in the side again.
"I'm sorry," he said before delivering a soccer kick to the head. The helmet took most of the blow, but it still hurt like a bitch.
"I'm so sorry," he chuckled.
Julia didn't want her dead, that's why he strapped the helmet to her. He could beat her as much as he wanted, but as long she was alive, everything was fine. Scrambled-egg brain be damned.
Dana rolled back over and started crawling back toward him.
"Look at you. You don't quit."
Nope.
"I get what Julia sees in you. I thought you were just some nice piece of ass, but you got some spunk. I like that. Maybe you are worth saving—"
Dumb move. He let her get close enough to reach up. Her dad wasn't a perfect father, not by any stretch, but he did teach her how to defend herself. She reached and grabbed hold of his crotch.
"You like this, huh?"
Not at all, but she had to feel around for a second till she isolated one testicle. She tightened her grip and punched. His laugh turned to an uncomfortable groan.
"Stupid bitch!"
Michael leaned over to grab her, but she threw her helmeted head upward, smashing into his nose. The rolling pin hit the floor. Good enough. Dana grabbed the handle and swung at his shins. His legs didn't have the padding he gave her head, and the sound of bone splintering was loud enough to echo inside the helmet.
He stumbled to the carpet, and they were on the same level. Dana gripped the pin like a bat and reigned down with thunder on the back of his head. She knew a single blow wouldn't be strong enough to stop him. After sixteen more blows to the back of his head, he stopped moving. The spider-webbed plastic visor was covered in red chunks.
Dana threw the pin to the floor and crawled into the kitchen. Her ribs were broken, and pulling herself up to the counter was more painful than any of Michael's shots. She pulled open a drawer and found a steak knife. This would have come in handy two minutes ago. She ran the serrated edge against the strap until it came loose. Unfortunately, the blade caught her under the jaw, slicing into her cheek. That hurt, but it could be worse.
She threw the helmet across the room and took a huge breath that hurt like hell. It was time to get the fuck out of here. She padded her pants down, trying to find her phone. She needed to call Jericho. Of course, they took the damn thing. She looked back into the room and wondered if Michael had it. She debated leaving the damn thing inside, but what if one of Julia's other goons found it? Her family's info was in there. So was Jericho's.
Dammit.
Dana hobbled back into the room to the mess she made. It took everything she had not to violently throw up all over everything. She took a deep breath and kept it inside. This is the first and hopefully last time she had to go to these lengths. Michael was a piece of shit, but did he need to die?
Yes. Yes, he did.
Looking at the crushed skull is bad and patting him down, trying to find her phone, is worse. But there it was, in his back pocket. She pulled it out and found a missed call from Jericho. She called back.
"Hey, it's Dana," she whispered.
"Are you finally in a safe place?" He asked.
"Not really. What do you mean 'finally'?"
"I guess that text wasn't from you."
Looking down at the dead man who took her phone, it was easy to put that together.
"I don't know what you mean."
"I had a hunch."
"What do we do now?"
"Hang tight. I'll be there in five minutes."
"How do you know where I am?"
"Your phone dropped a pin."
Funny. She dropped a pin, too.
"Bad idea. It's gotta be a trap!"
"Yep. But you're there, and I'm ready to be done with this bullshit."
LXX
Inspector Meijer was behind the wheel of his 2018 Volkswagen Atlas when he got an email from Dana O'Brien, the trouble-making American reporter. At first, Bram Meijer thought she was just some annoying kid making trouble, but the girl turned out to be smart and resourceful. She might actually figure this thing out before them.
Things here are getting sticky.
Might be in some more trouble (shocker).
I'm giving your info to a friend of mine. We've worked together before.
He's a source, so no names. But you'll know him when he contacts you.
Trust me on that one.
D.
What did that mean? He'd know him? It didn't make sense. But nothing with this girl did. The Monk theft had officially been closed, despite Ms. O'Brien's best efforts, but crime in Amsterdam pressed forward.
A few hours after the email, Meijer found himself in a coffee shop trying not to read up on the history of the Gouden Zon business. He was failing. His phone rang with an unfamiliar tone much different than his regular ringtone. It's a Skype call from a person the screen read as Louis Thunderfoot. I guess this is what O'Brien meant.
"Dit is INS Meijer."
"Kunnen we dit in het Engels doen? Mijn Nederlands is zwak."
That surprised him. He didn't expect O'Brien's American friend to speak Dutch or speak it well enough to admit he didn't speak it very well.
"I understand we have a mutual friend," Meijer said.
"That's what I hear."
Meijer had to admit he's a little disappointed the call is voice only. With such a booming voice, he was curious what this Mr. Thunderfoot looked like.
"What can I do for you, Mr. Thunderfoot?"
"I didn't want to make this call, but I think O'Brien's in trouble."
Meijer took a sip from his coffee, still unsure how to play this whole thing. He assumed the strange voice on the other end is another reporter, but something about his tone and delivery made him second guess his assumption. Reporters ask questions. This guy was making statements. It sounds like the mystery man expected him to just open up and tell him everything.
"Can't say it surprises me," Meijer said.
"Guess you guys have met then. I need to know a little something about Antonio LeMay."
"I'm not f
amiliar with that one, partner."
The man on the other end went quiet. Meijer isn't going to just tell this strange voice on the other end anything. He had no idea who Thunderfoot was. Maybe this guy already had Dana. How did he know?
"Look, I came to you for help cause O'Brien told me to. I'm gonna try this once more 'cause I'm not in the mood to have my time wasted. I'll go first. This LeMay cat arranged for the murder of a priest here in Chicago. He's looking for those pages. I got a hunch he's the man behind the robberies up by y'all. You're probably looking for Paolo Garces, but he's dead."
"Yes, I read that. Shame."
"LeMay's probably behind it too. Publicly, he's the frontman to this Church of the Sun, but I can't find anything about this joker ain't more than five years old. Homeboy didn't even have a Myspace page back in the day. So I need to know who this guy is. Can you help me, or should I go somewhere else?"
"Church of the Sun? Do you mean Church of the Golden Sun?"
"My bad."
"Funny you should mention that. Ms. O'Brien thought the private security firm that made a mess of the Kröller-Müller heist might be up to something."
"Private security?"
"Yes, a company called Gouden Zon, which is Dutch for Golden Sun."
"That's a little on the nose. By chance, the guy running the security company, is his name Daniel Prince?"
"I don't have that information. But Gouden Zon seems to have a working relationship with a company called Blackfire."
"That's odd. Blackfire usually keeps its dealings quiet."
"It sure seems like they wanted someone to make a connection."
"A connection to a man named Antonio LeMay. A pain in the ass client."
Meijer knew where Thunderfoot was going. It was too easy. The company made minimal effort to hide anything. Either they wanted to be found, or someone else wanted them to be found. Or blamed.
"What do you know about Golden Sun, Inspector?"
"I imagine the same as you, Mr. Thunderfoot. The Order of the Golden Sun has been around for years as an occult fraternity. There are hundreds of membership rosters floating around online. But most of the people on them are dead,"
"Correct-a-mundo," Thunderfoot interrupted. "But in the last couple of years, this LeMay fellow reinvented them as the Church of the Golden Sun, an anti-religious organization doing all kinds of anti-Christian demonstrations. They've built up quite an online following."
"It almost seems like Mr. LeMay is a perfect scapegoat."
"Or a straw man."
Meijer stared into his black coffee, wishing he was sitting next to Thunderfoot. This gent was about to break something open, and it was going to be a lot of fun when it happened.
"Good luck with this one, Mr. Thunderfoot."
"I appreciate the help, Inspector Meijer."
LXXI
Jericho set the Chromebook onto the F-150's dashboard. His phone made a decent mobile hotspot. A far cry from his old ToughBook computer with its satellite-capable WiFi access. He's used to getting the best, but could still operate on a budget when he didn't have a choice. This whole thing is the definition of "didn't have a choice."
It was an hour twenty-minute drive from the far South Side to the far west suburbs. St. Charles is the home of the DuPage County Airport, a small private facility Jericho used in the good old days. But the Green Beast, which he started calling the F-150, was doing the trick. The Beast is a gas-guzzler, but no more than the old Humvee. Plus, she's much less conspicuous out here in the sticks.
The Chromebook settled on a Google image search of Antonio LeMay, whose namethe Devil. was a little too close to Anton LaVey, the leader of the actual Church of Satan who died in the late 90s. Even looking at the pictures, it was obvious LeMay is doing a twenty-first-century cover band version. The guy is a phony, but a phony who wanted a real-life thousand-year-old ode to the devil. That part Jericho still hadn't figured out.
Rain started to pour as he turned south onto Randall Road off of Interstate 90. Jericho needed to refocus on finding Dana. Technically, this Willowbrook Church is his current client, but the check hasn't cleared the bank, and until it did, they were as suspect as LeMay and his fake New World Order. It did beg the question as to what some megachurch in the white-collar suburbs wanted with the pages? When he took the job, he assumed they were trying to keep the Devil's Prayer away from LeMay. But after Dana dropped that pin, the idea that these were good Christian soldiers looking to reunite the missing pages with Codex Gigas, the Devil's Bible, seemed slim.
The monolith colloquially named Willowbrook Community Church appeared behind a large hill off Randall Road. Megachurch isn't just a cute term. The place is huge. Part arena, part school, part community center. It was like a small town housed under one roof, kinda like one of those biosphere's they built in the 80s to simulate colonizing other planets. Maybe that's the point? Not the other planets part, but building a safe zone in case of...nah.
The wipers pushed light rain away from the windshield. As Jericho pulled into the driveway that might as well have been a country road leading up to the Willowbrook parking lot, he was greeted by a blockade of cars. A beat-up Ford Fusion and a stretch Lincoln Town Car barricaded the front entrance. Ten men in suits who looked like the Smiths—not the new wave band, but the guys from the Matrix—lined up in front of the barrier. In front, leading the greeting crew was LeMay, in the flesh, and the pro who destroyed the RainyDay Center. The Prince called this cat Zion. It was pitch black and raining, but he was wearing sunglasses just like him. Jericho flipped on the Beast's high beams and pulled fifty feet from the blockade.
"You must be, Mr. Jericho," LeMay shouted. "I liked your house. Too bad about what happened to it."
Damn, now he had to kill this guy, too.
Jericho exited the Green Beast. The black trench coat he bought off Ike for only ten bucks flapped in the wind. Zion was still wearing the same white jacket, now stained with blood. How much of it was his own? Jericho positioned himself right between the high beams, making sure his body was obscured by the light he was sure is still streaking through Zion's vision. Can't fight what you can't see.
"Look at this army you bought, LeMay."
The leader of the Church of the Golden Sun smirked. "There's even more inside."
"I'm sure. I bet the Prince cut you a hell of a price for these freelancers."
LeMay's smile withered. That stung a bit, having your lack of actual followers thrown in your face.
"I mean, it's not a bad idea to start your own security firm and rent all these pros from the real deal. Shoulda kept the name, though. Blackfire is a lot scarier than what you came up with," Jericho said.
"We're an ancient organization that—"
"Were. The real deal, the Order of the Golden Sun, is long gone. This shit's just cosplay."
"We gonna talk or we gonna fight?" Zion shouted.
"I'm game, I got business to finish. Where's the portfolio?"
Zion unslung the black case from his shoulder. The package looked the same way it did when Garces left it on his front door in Provo. He handed the portfolio to his client and slowly moved toward the high beam lights, which created the perfect spot for an arena of their own. Jericho stayed in position, trying to watch the way Zion moved. Did he limp or a stagger? Anything that might give him an advantage. The Brit reached from behind his back and drew two curved knives.
"What you know 'bout the keris, Jericho?"
"It's a knife."
"You right, it is!" The 6'8" killer laughed, twirling the blades in his hands. "But these are special. They're Indonesian, and the man I took them from says each one is possessed by a little demon called a djinn."
"That so, Aladdin?"
"That's right. 'Cept this one's got a name. I call him Roscoe, and he knows your tummy ain't healed yet. He looked inside you. Saw your demons. They made him laugh."
The curved metal shimmered with a strange blue light that almost seemed to bend the world aro
und it as Zion moved them. Something about it terrified Jericho, not that he was going to show anything. Instead, he reached behind and under the flowing trench coat.
SSSHHHRRRNKK
Jericho's hand wrapped around the base of the katana blade as he pointed it at Zion.
“And this is a motherfucking sword.”
LXXII
Dana grabbed the rolling pin, but wondered how effective a weapon it could be in a real fight, even though she crushed Michael's skull with it a few minutes ago. Instead, she took three steak knives, sheathing two of them in her front pockets while taking hold of the third. In her free hand, she took hold of a long, serrated bread knife. If anyone tried anything, they're getting cut.
Dana cracked open the door and quietly moved down a back hallway. Like Princess Leia and Luke Skywalker darting through the Death Star to escape. She finally watched Star Wars last month when she was procrastinating writing the book. She thought it was a little overrated.
The halls were eerily quiet. It was late on a Thursday night, ready to bleed over into Friday morning, but there is probably a lot more action going on than on a regular, old, Thursday evening. Something felt wrong.
A couple of parishioners turned down the hall. Dana ducked behind a doorway as they quickly moved by. She wasn't hard to find, so they probably weren't looking for her. Considering no one knew what happened in the apartment yet, it made sense.
Dana pressed the down button on the elevator, but reconsidered before it opened. Being trapped in a tiny mobile room isn't the best idea. She had two choices: either find Jericho or let him do his thing and get the hell out of here. Jericho is probably good at what he did and didn't really need the help of Dana-Four-Knives. Option B was the best plan. That meant the staircase. She pushed open the door to the back stairs right as the elevator door opened.
"There she is!" A voice shouted.
Dana didn't recognize the voice and didn't care to find out whose it was. She slammed the door behind her and tore down the stairs, hopping over every few railings trying to move faster. Coming down on the first landing, she saw a door labeled Red 6. Five more flights. Taking a painful deep breath, she picked up speed, tearing down each flight. Adrenaline masked the pain. On the floor labeled Blue 3, a door burst open and two musclebound security guards reached out. Dana ducked under one of their long arms. The other caught her, wrapping his thick arms around her midsection. Mistake. Dana ripped the serrated edge across his arm like a roll of french bread.
