House Infernal by Edward Lee (5 page)

What's making this guy tick? Berns wondered. He's not
crazy, and he's not fucked-up from drugs. What gives? "So
you had two accomplices for the Wammsport job?"

"That's right. Another dude and a chick."

Berns whipped out a notebook. "Names."

"Uh-uh. It was me who did the cutting anyway. They
just helped. Forget them. It's me you want. They were just
help on the side. Adjuncts."

Johnson's recent selection of words began to bother
Berns. "Equinox, adjuncts, oblations-shit, Freddie, that's
a mouthful for a guy like you, and it bugs me. They can't
be sexually tainted? You talking about sacrifice? Is that
what this is all about-you're some kind of Satanist?"

"Let's just say that I'm an Eosphorian, man." Johnson
winked again.

"The occult, huh?" Lee remarked. "He's got a pretty
creepy looking tattoo, by the way."

"Ohs yeah?"

"Freddie, you want to show the Captain your tattoo?"

Johnson hopped back up. "Shit-yeah, man. I'm proud
out it," and he unbuttoned his utilities, dragged his arms
out, and began to drag them down past his waist.

Berns signed. "I did not drive all this way to see this
guy's dick, Sergeant."

"Freddie, please. just the tattoo. I'll Taser anything else
you whip out."

"I believe you would, Sarge." Johnson grinned. "I believe you would."

Johnson pulled the utilities past his navel and stopped
just above his pubic hair. "Check it out..."

The tattoo, the size of an index card, was between Johnson's navel and crotch:

Berns didn't know why but there was something sinister about it. "See what I mean?" Lee said, then, "Art
show's over, Freddie. Hoist 'em back up."

"Is that cool or what?" Johnson shouldered back into
the jail-cell pajamas.

"It looks new."

"Got it less than a year ago. Hurt like hell, too, and I
think the chick doing the work was digging that."

"Fine. So what is it?" Berns asked.

"It's ... my trademark, man." That gold-toothed grin
seemed to hang in the air. "And that's all you need to
know. So how about it? I've leveled with you. Level with
me. You gonna help me out?"

"Believe it or not, I'm thinking about it," Berns told him.

"I mean, come on. You guys are cops. Cops hate the idea
of murderers having rights, and I'm a murderer. Dudes
like you believe all hard criminals should be executed
without trial-save tax dollars for better things. Get the
shit out of the gene pool, right?"

Berns and Lee traded smiles.

"You're speaking our language, Freddie."

"Well, here I am. I confess to the Wammsport murders.
Transport me to New Hampshire and charge me. I'll
plead guilty and deny my appeals. And since I'll be on death row I'll be on the PC block. They'll punch my ticket
in a month, and I'll have a smile on my face."

Berns stroked his goatee. I don't think this scumbag is lying....

For the first time, Johnson seemed distraught. "Captain, in two days they're gonna haul me out of here and
take me to my arraignment. Then my ass lands in centralprocessing at the Warren supermax until my trial. Warren's the worst state cut in the East-I'll be hamburger
there after five minutes."

"I know," Berns said.

Johnson's eyes beseeched Berns with an earnest plea.
"Help me out, man. And you get the collar for busting a
guy who murdered a nun. You'll be the local hero."

"You really do want to die, don't you?" Berns leaned
closer. "Why? You're not crazy. You're not suicidal."

Johnson sighed, as if exhaling cigarette smoke. "When
the party's over, it's over, man. That's my philosophy. But
don't make me off myself in Warren. Help me out, Captain." Freddie paused, grinning again. "Who knows? You
might be rewarded someday."

Berns let his thoughts tick. Then he said this: "I'm going
to come back and see you in a week, Freddie. And in the
meantime, I'm going to ask the Sarge here to request an arraignment delay for pending evidence analysis. I'll fax up
your confession tomorrow, and you sign it, and then I'll talk
to the New Hampshire state attorney's office and have
them prioritize your charge. Then your smiling redneck ass
gets to stay in this cushy cell until you're transported to
protective custody in New Hampshire. How's that sound?"

Freddie's grin turned huge. "I knew you were a cool guy!"

"You can thank me at your execution."

"Damn straight!"

Lee added, "And maybe I can even scrounge up a TV so
you won't have to watch any more paint peel."

Johnson clapped his hands and whistled. "You guys are
the bomb!"

"When I come back here next week, I'll have some more
questions, all right, Freddie?" Berns said.

"Hell yes, Captain."

"I'm gonna want to know about your accomplices on
the Wammsport job."

Johnson leaned forward on the cot, hands clasped.
"Captain, those flunkies don't matter for shit. I did the cutting. I'm the murderer. I don't even know their last
names-that's how we worked. You want descriptions, I'll
give 'em to you, but you won't be able to find 'em anyway."

.Why?"

"The day after the murders, we all split."

"All three of you left the state?"

"That's right. That's what we agreed, and we agreed not
to tell each other where we were going. I'm the guy you
want. Those other two? Ain't nothing but a pair of pissant
rednecks. They could barely even hold down jobs-I had
to buy their fuckin' beer!"

Berns looked at him.

Freddie's tooth flashed like a mint commercial. "But
when you come back to see me? I'll tell you all about the
blood."

"Okay, Freddie. Don't fuck me over on this one."

"Ain't gonna happen, Captain. See ya next week."

Berns and Lee returned to the front office. "Are you
okay with that arraignment delay?" Berns asked.

"Piece of cake."

"Thanks-and do me another favor, will you? Have
your guys go over Freddie's pad with a fine-tooth comb.
Look for anything out of place."

"More out of place than forty grand in cash?"

„Anything ...occult," Bens clarified.

"Sure. But what was that business about the blood?"

"When we found the bodies of the nun and the church
custodian, they were drained of blood. I think what Freddie's promising to tell me-if I keep my end of the
bargain-is the blow-by-blow."

"Dead bodies with no blood means they were killed in
another location," Lee said.

"Yeah, and maybe it means more than that."

"Something occult ... ?"

Berns shrugged. "There's a lot of delusional people in
the world. They believe in fucked-up things because-"

"Because they're fucked up." Lee was pouring more
coffee. "You want my gut feeling?"

Berns sat down, suddenly exhausted. "Your gut feeling
is probably the same as mine. Freddie's not lying about
committing the Wammsport murders, but he is lying
about his accomplices."

"That's the read I got too. Which means his accomplices
are still in your jurisdiction." Lee smirked after the next
sip of coffee. "Happy trails, Captain. It looks like you've
got a real murder investigation on your hands..."

When Ruth awoke, she was drowning in blood. She
gagged, mindless, her arms and legs churning in the hot
coppery brew. But could it really be blood? All of this?

She couldn't think. She didn't even know who she was
yet. Only instinct fired her nerves-the will to survive.

It didn't occur to her just yet that she was already dead.

Her thoughts screamed. Where am I? What is this? Somebody help me!

She desperately breaststoked, but more madness
shrieked through her psyche when glimpses upward
showed her a sky that was as red as the blood she was
swimming in, and smudged clouds idling across a black
moon shaped like a sickle.

I'm having a nightmare! she managed to think. I'm seeing
things. The sky isn't fucking red, and the moon isn't black,
and it's fucking impossible for me to be swimming in a lake of
blood!

She tried to stabilize herself: dog paddling now, then
floating on her back, etc. Her thoughts spun like a whirl pool. Every time her head pitched above the surface, her
eyes strained but could see nothing, nothing but the tossing, endless expanse of scarlet.

Just keep moving. Eventually the nightmare will end....

Hours later she was still paddling ... and wearing out.

Then ...

Did she hear a voice? Was someone calling her name?

Something white bobbed on the low surf, fifty yards
ahead.

A boat!

It looked like a canoe or lifeboat, but that didn't matter.
It was something that could get her out of all this blood.
And, though she wasn't sure, she thought she could feel
things swimming below her.

Fifteen more minutes of alternating breaststrokes and
dog paddles got her to the little white boat. Stenciled letters on the bow read PROPERTY OF S.S. NEFARIOUS.

Ruth had no idea that the S.S. stood for "Satanic Ship."

When she finally hauled herself up onto the tiny skiff,
she looked once-

And screamed so loud she thought her throat might
explode.

Collapsed at the end of the boat were two corpses
half-bloated by decomposition. Flies that were red and
the size of bumblebees buzzed in abundance. Ruth
stared frozen at the two congealed masses. Of course
their skin would be discolored-the effect of decaybut...

Each corpse seemed to have a pair of horns on their
heads.

"Help me! For God's sake, I'm over here!"

Ruth sat hunched at the bow, mortified. I did hear a
voice.... All that she'd seen so far, in her first twenty minutes of Damnation, had reduced her sense of reason to
something as thin as tracing paper, and through that
metaphorical paper, she could glimpse nothing but a raging madness.

"Ruth Bridges! In the name of God, would you please
just look over here!"

"My name," " she gasped to herself.

She looked off the port-quarter and indeed saw a head
bobbing in the bubbling red surf.

There's a man out there....

She was trying to pry the oars from their paste of dead
blood and heat-baked bilge, but they were stuck to the
floor as if glued. The current suddenly changed, and
now...

The man tossing in the water began to drift toward
Ruth rather quickly.

"Grab me!" he bellowed. "And pull me in!"

Ruth had no desire to do anything of the sort but-

Who is he? How does he know my name?

"For God's sake, you better get ready to grab me! I'm
the only one who can help you!"

Help, her thoughts sputtered.

The current was bringing him closer, faster. "Your name
is Ruth Bridges! You're from Collier County, Florida! And
right now, you're terrified because you don't know where
you are. I can tell you! I can tell you everything, but that
ain't gonna happen unless your stick your hands down and
grab me!"

Ruth figured the command made sense. She looked for
his hands to grab but didn't see them under the rushing
blood.

"Grab me! Grab me!" he gargled just as he would drift
beneath the boat.

Ruth thrust her hands down, grabbed onto something
that felt like it might be his collar, then she pulled.

She screamed again-louder than the first time-when
she saw what she'd dragged aboard: a man in a black
jacket ... with no arms or legs.

"Calm down, Ruth," the head on the torso said. The
blood from the impossible sea ran down his face. He was
wearing a Roman collar.

"You're a living torso!" she shrieked.

"I know. My name is Thomas Alexander. I'm a Catholic
priest." At least the head on the torso was handsome, not
like those horned things festering at the other end of the boat. Short dark hair with some gray, intense eyes,
leaned-faced. But still ...

'"This is fucking impossible!" She desperately pointed
out into the endless sea of blood. "That's impossible!" She
pointed to the scarlet sky and black sickle moon. "That's
impossible! And you're im-fucking-possible!"

The torso-priest slouched against the bow. "Unfortunately, Ruth, none of this is impossible. It's all very regrettably real. Right now we're both floating on the Sea of
Cagliostro-a sea of blood. About an hour ago, you died,
and now you're in Hell."

Ruth sat paralyzed in the bobbing boat as the priest
talked.

"It's impossible to explain everything, so I'll just tell it
as we go. It was foreseen that you'd be here. I've been
waiting for you in the city for a while now. I'm supposed
to hook up with you-I'm on a job, so to speak. There is a
great power that needs your help, and mine."

v Ruth's eyes bugged, as if to pop out. "I don't know
what the fuck you're talking about!"

The priest sighed. "Just listen. And believe. This isn't a
nightmare that you're going to wake up from. This isn't a
hallucination or some aspect of insanity. It's real. You're
what's called a Newcomer. You're one of the Human
Damned. You have a body identical to the one you had on
earth-the Living World-but here that body is called a
Spirit Body. The soul inside is immortal. In Hell, it's very
difficult for your Spirit Body to die, but when that happens, your soul continues to live. It moves to the closest
Hellborn life-form. Do you understand?"