Modern Rituals (19 page)

“Theo, I don’t see anything but bronze,” Holmes said.

“We didn’t either, but watch what she does. Susan, keep Part Five in Feed B while showing the zoomed Feed D,” Theo said.

Come look at this,
Olivia said. She read the hidden message aloud and the feed ended.
 

“Theo, you and I both know this is impossible. Perhaps she imagined it? The stress of the ritual getting to her?” Holmes said.

“I thought that too. Susan performed every analysis: spectral, ecto, kinetic, thermal, magnetic, nuclear, dark matter—you name it, we checked for it. Nothing. But, Part Four and Five’s brainwaves indicated that they were, in fact, seeing
something
—well, not just something but the exact same thing. Then I had an idea. You know that new tech I’ve been tinkering around with—the Occipital Interrupt?” Theo said.

Holmes nodded.

Theo had fielded a bio-sensor research and development project a few years back. Its purpose was to address a growing concern over the fragility of monitoring rituals simply from camera feeds and basic bio-analytics. Magnus desired more information—more insight. Among the research’s products was the Occipital Interrupt, a small organic sensor designed to sit between the eye and optical nerve, and relay the brain’s visual signals. It had showed promise during trials, but never got past the alphaware stage as it produced noisy data. Theo insisted that the OI be installed in participants to help work out the kinks. Now he was glad he did.

“Well, I grabbed a slice of their optic impulses while they were reading aloud—terrible quality, noisy as all hell—and wrote a custom Kalman algorithm to clean it up. Got a relatively shitty image of what their eyes were seeing and laid it over the feed. Check it out,” Theo said, and nodded at Susan.

She scrubbed to the beginning and replayed it. This time, however, a grainy, jumpy picture lay translucent over the original feed of Buddha’s back. Holmes sat down at a temporarily empty workstation, placed his elbows on the desk and leaned forward. The feed showed Olivia rounding the statue. When her eyes fell on Buddha, Feed D displayed words written, as if by finger, in luminescent ink.

“What in God’s name? How is this possible? Is Part Four’s optic scan the same?” Holmes said.

“Exactly the same. As for possibilities? Not to get all doomsday on you, but we might have a problem even this facility cannot handle,” Theo said.

“Go on,” Homes said, his face solid steel.

“I believe we are dealing with an entity who possesses the power of a God,” Theo said, reflecting on Magnus’ great achievement: the confinement of all seven Gods to blood chambers. “The seven’s blood readings were benign at the time of the ritual hijack. However, to our knowledge, only a God is capable of conjuring mental imagery in a participant without releasing some form of identifiable energy.”

“Are you telling me we have another God on the loose?” Holmes said.

“That is the only likely scenario at this point. There are some positive factors however. If there is a free-roaming God, then the world should already be down shit creek—the fact that we’re still sitting here is a good sign. Why, though? Maybe the God doesn’t have all of its power? Maybe it needs the ritual to fail? I’m really not sure. What I do know is that we need one more sacrifice if we’re going to keep Amida at bay. He’s thirsty though—it might require more,” Theo said.

“And we only have one sacrifice thus far, with eight more hours to go?” Holmes said.

“About that. Tim, can you confirm?” Theo said.

Tim, sitting off in the corner, tapped away on his screen. He jumped at the mention of his name.

“Sir—checking now! We have exactly seven hours and forty-eight minutes remaining before Amida’s plasma-lock releases,” Tim said.

Theo wheeled around in his chair to face Holmes and let his head fall to his chest. He then raised his eyes and stared at the general.

“Now, do we have a problem regarding Trevor?” Theo said.

Holmes face reddened.
 

“Theo, your brilliance is unparalleled—I get that. But if you keep another secret like this from me again, consider yourself nixed from this op. We are watching you,” Holmes stood and turned to the room. “All of you.”

14

They moved from building to building. Each corridor and outdoor passage alternated emergency red to dusk to red again and watered James’ vision. In college, he’d elected to take an analog photography class and had despised every second spent in the dark room—the chemicals and bloodshot light left him ill—now he fared no better. Trevor led them to a hallway between the gym and multipurpose room.
 

“Let’s see, I came through here,” Trevor said, leading them down the hall. “…and I was—ah! Here we go.”

A pair of open doors at the end of the hallway led to a stairwell that climbed a few stories. A wire-caged canister lamp illuminated the stairs, casting crimson shadows onto the steps, blending them into a dark, daunting obstacle course.

“Watch your step,” Trevor said to Colette.

Trevor hopped two steps as he climbed, reaching the second and third floors ahead of them. James heard the echo of a door opening above him. When he reached the last flight, Trevor stood outside pointing to a large, white symbol painted on the ground.

A low wall enclosed a football-field-sized roof. Trevor stood at its center surrounded by air conditioning units and fenced power boxes. He circled the symbol, walking its wide circumference. James joined him.

“This looks like a gate,” James said. One by one the others appeared.

“It is a gate—more specifically, a torii,” Keto said, arriving last.
 

The torii, painted in white as if by an immense sumi brush, sprawled ten feet in diameter. It exhibited a stacked, curved roof supported by two columns, disclosed with masterfully articulated strokes—it captivated James.

“This is a Shinto image. It represents the transition from the physical realm to the sacred,” Keto said.

James lost himself—his eyes danced along the lines, jumping from stroke to stroke, but a peculiar shape seized his attention.

“Is that a bird perched on the roof? No, wait—there are several,” James said.

Keto squinted.

“Hmmm. Yes—I did not see that before,” Keto said while twisting his head as though straining to listen for someone in the distance.

“What is it?” Olivia said.

“We must be wary. The presence of birds often means death,” Keto said.

James shrugged and said, “What’s new? Is there anything else odd about the torii?”

Keto stared, his eyes skipping across the image.

“No,” Keto said. “This moonlight offers poor visibili—”

A
click
, and a stream of light flooded the ground.

“Does this help?” Tomas said.

James shielded his face along with the rest of the group.

“Dear God! Tomas, why didn’t you tell us you had a flashlight?” James said.

“My secret,” Tomas said. James swore he saw a smile behind the glare.

“Better late than never,” Horace said, lumped on his crutch. James was surprised the man had made it up the stairs.

“Tomas,” James said. “Any chance you could hop on the air conditioner there and shine the light from up high?” James said.

“No, but you can,” Tomas said and tossed the flashlight to James.

“Thanks,” James said. “Keto, can you give me a boost?”

Keto moved next to the tall unit, clasped his hands tight and bent his knees. James placed a foot in Keto’s hands and leapt as Keto pulled up. James soared higher than anticipated—his arms flailed until he found his feet.

“Damn, Keto—work out much?” James said.
 

“I’m accustomed to lifting lumber at my home in Kobe,” Keto said.

“Remind me to come visit,” James said. “Okay, here goes.” He pointed the flashlight downward.
 

A swath of light washed over the image—it seemed James held a stadium light in his hands. Every last detail of the torii
clarified—and dead-center, between the pictured gates’ columns, stood a girl with long, wiry hair in a white gossamer gown.

CHAPTER 4
 

Beware the minotaur.

(Phæleh 40:33)

1

Trevor watched the mayhem unfold from the roof’s exit. Super-814N, better known as Arikura Fukushima’s residual spectral energy (or ghost), bared her hands and locked her mad eyes on Horace. Hair whirled around her tiny body, creating a vortex that lifted her into the air.
 

The group shouted and scattered. Colette retreated backward to the roof’s edge until her hips bumped the retaining wall—she steadied herself with her elbows and sunk into a helpless position, her lips quivering. Horace attempted to escape but fell flat and then crawled toward the edge of the roof. James leapt down, tumbled and dove for Horace. Super-814N reacted instantaneously—hair shot from her head, aimed at Horace’s neck—he dodged and grabbed hold of the ledge. A rope of hair wrapped around his midsection and heaved him toward her. He anchored himself to the ledge and howled.

James threw the flashlight at Super-814N. The heavy cylinder smacked the back of her head, fell to the ground and somehow leaned upright against the girl-ghost’s leg. It shone a bright beam in her eyes. She screamed and flailed and kicked the flashlight away, then turned on James—her grip on Horace loosened in that moment, and he desperately launched himself in the opposite direction.
 

James dashed toward Horace, paying no mind to Super-814N who blocked his way. He dodged, but she swatted his sternum and he sailed high and long, wind knocked from him, head jostled—and as he flew, Horace toppled over the ledge.
 

Trevor rushed to find Horace’s body.

Olivia stood with Colette and Keto near the exit. She saw Trevor head down the stairs, and almost called to him, but a meaty thud interrupted her: James skidded along the ground and stopped short of her feet.
 

“James!” Olivia said.

James’ eyes scrunched, lips in a grimace, and he lay lifeless until his diaphragm let in a storm of air. He fought against Olivia as she helped him to his feet.
 

“Sorry—damn—she can throw a punch…” he said.

She shoved him through the exit. As he stumbled through the door, she caught a glimpse of the girl peering over the ledge, fixated on the place where Horace’s body had fallen.
 

Olivia took the stairs two at a time and filed into the hallway with James, Keto and Colette. Instead of returning to the multipurpose room, she chose the nearest exit, which led them outside where they regrouped in a field near a stand of trees.

Colette spun around.

“Where’s Trevor? And Tomas?” She said.

James looked around with the others.

“No time to look for them,” James said.
 

“I saw Horace fall,” Colette said. “He…He landed on his neck.”

“Shit,” James said.

“There was nothing any of us could do,” Olivia said.

Olivia scanned the roofline for the girl’s presence and saw nothing. James waved to her to follow and she scurried past the field to the forest after him. Keto, Olivia and Colette kept close. They slowed after minutes of running full speed. James keeled over, panting.
 

“Ugh—I’m not this out of shape, I swear,” James said. Everyone seemed exhausted, herself included.

“All things considered, I think we’re holding up rather well,” Olivia said.

“We need to find those two and think through what to do about that thing—” James stopped. “Dammit! I left the flashlight up there. Speaking of which, it bounced off her like she was made of steel. I doubt there’s much we can do confronting her physically.”

“She did give you quite a wallop,” Olivia said. “You are lucky the wind is all that got knocked out of you.”

“No kidding—thank God she decided to punch me—” James said. “That hair of hers is some scary shit! She also seemed hellbent on Horace.”
 

A wave of disgust wrenched James’ intestines. He peered through the tree branches into the black sky. Hope evaded him. His imminent death—as alien an idea to his twenty-five year-old mind as maintaining a 401(k) or getting married—mocked him. Just hours before he’d flown into New York, prepared to indulge himself in art and perhaps a girl—or two—expand his palate over Haute Gastronomique and help his sister acclimate. His sister. She must be worried. His parents, too. And his friends.

Wait.
 

Joe.

If he just had his smartphone, he could email Joe. If anyone could figure this out, Joe could.

No. It was hopeless.

Aside from the NcCo cable, they had uncovered no evidence of cell phones, landlines or computers. This place may be beyond the Internet—the thought startled James.

We have no means of leaving or contacting anyone. This is it.

He waited for his heavy panting to subside and gestured for the others to follow. James didn’t know where to go. He figured moving away from the school was their safest bet. If they hit the invisible wall, so be it. The wall was better than facing a devilish zombie-bitch dead set on murdering them.

2

Trevor plunged down the stairs and ducked into a hall closet, keeping a safe distance from Super-814N as she attacked. He had no means to restrain her or defend himself if she chose to turn on him—well, not hand-to-hand that is, though Clayton had a gadget or two that could do the job. Out of the nineteen kill zones, the roof most disturbed her: Amida had murdered Arikura’s little brother there.

He waited, crouched. Four members of the group passed and moved to the rear of the school grounds—they escaped unharmed, including James, who carried the wooden figures of Arikura’s family—Trevor imagined that Purgatory 8’s camera feed had burst some blood vessels in Theo’s eyes, and maybe an artery or two as well. Next, he needed to confirm Part Seven’s death and find Part Two.
 

Horace and Tomas, was it?
 

He disliked referring to them by name; the mental association felt too personal, too human. They operated as ingredients to a ritual, nothing more. Some people just had shit luck.