The Somnibus: Book I - Finding the Mark (A Paranormal Thriller) (6 page)

T
hree hours passed before the sun broke the
horizon. The lights in the upstairs room had finished dancing over two hours
earlier, but I couldn’t get myself to move. Afraid to go back into the house, I
waited outside. Not because I worried about getting hurt, but because I didn’t
know how I would find Mort.

I talked myself into walking up the stairs,
fearing that I would find him lying there, in a heap. The thought of it caused
a tear to slide down my cheek.

My feet slowly made their way upstairs. The foul
smell penetrated my nose, and I tasted metal in the air. As I walked down the
hallway leading to my bedroom, my eyes watered from the rancid odor that hung
heavy in the house.

At the open doorway, my stomach twisted on itself.
The putrid smell became too much to handle, and I braced myself on the
doorframe as I heaved. I wiped my chin on my shoulder and held it there, using
my arm to shelter my nose from as much of the stench as possible.

As my eyes absorbed the scene my senses went numb
the smell of death forgotten, all sound gone.

On the floor at the foot of my bed, a stain
saturated the carpet. I made my way to the mark and I remembered Mort telling
me about the only way to destroy a Somnibus. This was it, the remains of
Somnibus destruction. He’d given himself in order to protect me. I lowered my
arm from my face and stood over the soiled carpet.

After the initial shock wore off, I studied the
stain, squinting at the image buried within. It looked as if Mort had been
lying face up on the floor and had a huge pane of glass dropped upon him from a
building. His face stared straight up, mouth agape with his hands chest high
facing outward, like a shadowy mime, forever trapped behind a glass panel.

I sat on the floor next to the stain while my mind
wrapped around the fact that even though he had just come into my life, it
seemed like I had known him forever. I’d had an unexplainable bond to him;
something I didn’t know of before, but became aware of now that he was gone.
Mort was now a blemish of a memory on my bedroom floor.

I found myself grieving for a man I’d only known
for a short time. My grief flowed from sadness to anger as I questioned why
he’d died. I owed it to Mort to learn all I could about my power.

After a couple of hours, I decided to figure out what,
if anything, I needed to do. After all, I’d had a man living in my house who’d
melted into my floor. Surely, someone would come looking for him. I wondered
how I would explain it to the police if they came around asking questions.

Then the thought occurred to me; I lived in his
house, not mine. What would happen to the house since he’d just disappeared
into the thin air?

I
stood in Mort’s room, going through the paperwork
on the desk next to his computer. I spent the rest of the afternoon with the
windows open, trying to rid the air of the constant, lingering reminder of his
death. The chirping from my phone in my room brought a needed dose of reality
back to my mind, and I walked down the hallway to answer my cell.

“Hello?”

“Is this Mr. Black?”

“Yes.”

“My name is David Honeycutt. I’m an attorney and
it appears we had a mutual friend, Mort Bell.”

My breath caught in my throat, and I swallowed
hard.

“I believe you knew Mr. Bell…I mean Mort. He hated
to be called Mr. Bell.” He chuckled.

“Yes, I know. I mean, I guess I
knew
Mort.
How did you know? I mean, how did you find out?”

Honeycutt interrupted me when I struggled to form
a complete sentence. “It doesn’t matter. As you’ve surely found out, he was a
special individual.”

 “Yes he is, or was. What can I do for you,
Mr. Honeycutt?”

“Well, it’s more a matter of what I can do for
you. He left his possessions to you in a document he had me draft just before
buying and subsequently moving into your house. He gave me your contact
information. He told me he would call me every morning at 7 a.m. and let the
phone ring once. Until this morning, he did just that. He told me if the call
was not received on time, it would mean he had met with an unfortunate event, and
I was to contact the proper people to carry out the orders of the document.”
Honeycutt ruffled through papers as I waited for more information. “Seeing as
how it is late afternoon and I haven’t heard from Mort since yesterday, I will
assume such an event has indeed occurred. Judging by your reaction, it appears
as though I am correct in my assumption.”

“Yes, you are. I’m sure he will not be contacting
you in the morning,” The stain at my feet assured me of that.

“Well then, we must get together so I can go over
the documentation with you and have you
sign
the
paperwork.”

“What exactly is it that I’m getting?” I regretted
asking as soon as I’d said it.

“Well, there is the house, of course. You will receive
full ownership of it. He paid cash, as you know, so the house is yours to do
with as you please. There’s also a briefcase for you. I’m not sure what it
contains, but he insisted that you….”

I interrupted him mid-sentence.

“Why was he so set on taking care of me?”

“I’m afraid I don’t know the answer to that. He
was a very private man, and as an attorney, I make it a habit not to pry into
the lives of my clients. They tell me what they want me to know, and some
things I’m better off not knowing.”

“I understand. When would be a good time to meet?
I can come to your office anytime.”

“It would be easier if I came to your house. I
don’t keep normal office hours
anymore,
I’m more of a
freelance attorney. How about I stop by tomorrow morning around ten?”

“Sounds good, I’ll see you then.”

“Okay, have a good evening Mr. Black.”

“You too.
Thanks.”

I hung up the phone and held it in my hand,
realizing that may have been the call that changed the direction of my life.
Now I wouldn’t have to find a new place to live.

I recalled part of my conversation with Mr.
Honeycutt. He said Mort had a briefcase as well. My mind raced with the
possibilities of what might be inside.

T
he doorbell rang at exactly ten o’clock the next
morning. The night before, I had gone to sleep on the couch and had the best
night’s sleep in a while. The room spun when I jumped up a little too quickly.
I sat up and steadied myself before heading to the door. I peeked through the
window at a man standing on the porch. I rubbed the sleep from my eyes and
opened the door, greeted by Mr. Honeycutt.

“Hello, Mr. Black.”

A portly man, Honeycutt’s wrinkled suit looked as
though it had come from the back of his closet, from a time when he was younger
and his waist a bit less expansive. The buttons on the front of the jacket
struggled to hold their position and his belt, which hovered around his belly
button, barely hung onto the first hole. His hair
was
disheveled
, as if he had driven over in a convertible. Honeycutt’s eyes
were pinched
closed by the puffiness of his cheeks pushing
up into his lower eyelids, and his upper eyelids drooped into his vision.

“Good morning. Come in.”

“Nice to meet you.”

He extended his ballooned right hand to me, and I
shook it as best I could. I held the door open as he waddled through the
doorway and stood in the foyer, awaiting directions.

“Let’s talk in here,” I motioned him into the
kitchen.

I pulled the chair out at the end of the table, and
Honeycutt sat down with a thud and a grunt. He removed his hat and put reading
glasses on while I took the seat across from him. I waited with my hands
crossed on the table in front of me while he shuffled through his briefcase and
caught his breath.

“Well, it looks as though you have once again
become the owner of this beautiful house. I just need a couple of signatures
from you.”

“No problem.”

I continued to speak while he tried to gather the
papers and make some sense of them.

“Yesterday on the phone, you mentioned other items
he also wanted me to have.”

He reached to the floor and slid a weathered brown
briefcase toward me.

“Yes, of course. There’s this locked briefcase
that requires a code to open. I don’t have the code, but Mort said you would
know the correct combination.”

My head searched for numbers as I reached to grab
the handle. I placed the case on the table in front of me and spun it so the
handle faced me. The only thing I could think of was the combination of 5-6-1-2
that we used for my harness lock. I slid the numbers on top of the case and the
tabs sprung up at me.

My heart raced in anticipation when I opened it.

“Here you are.”

I instinctively flinched and shut the case when
Honeycutt’s voice rumbled behind me.

He reached around my back and slid the papers in
front of me. I had no idea what I’d just signed, but they had the proper name
and address and seemed official enough, so I’d signed without reading them. All
I thought about was the case on the table in front of me.

He went back around the table to the pile of
papers and gathered them into a disheveled stack. “Well, that wasn’t too
painful, was it?”

Honeycutt struggled to button his jacket as he
stood. He placed his glasses in his coat pocket and extended the bloated right
hand in my direction.

“Not at all.
So there’s nothing else I need to do?” I reached
out to shake his hand.

“Nope.
He took care of everything. I’ll submit the
proper paperwork and have the deed reissued in your name. You should receive
verification in four to six weeks. I’ll stop by Mort’s bank and make the proper
changes.”

“Sounds good.”

I led him to the door and held it open as he wobbled his way down the
porch st
eps, pausing at the bottom. “Take care,” he said.
“And be safe tonight, Michael. Be safe
.” The words hung in the air as he
climbed into his car and drove away.

H
is parting words bounced around in my brain. He’d
uttered the exact words Mort had that first day. I remembered the briefcase on the
table and went back inside, still wondering why he had used that particular
phrase.

I made a cup of coffee and sat down in front of
the briefcase. As I placed my hands on the latches, a knock sounded at the
door, making me jump.

Making my way to the door and glancing through the
peephole, the view revealed a man whose expression
was
shielded
by sunglasses and stringy hair hanging in front of his face.
The man’s head swiveled back and forth, and he knocked again, but much harder.
Taking off his glasses, he leaned in toward the peephole. His huge pupil peered
at me, causing my heart to gallop. He stepped back and raised his right hand
with his fingers spread wide, revealing his palm. With his left hand, he traced
a circle in the center of his palm and then pointed to it with his index
finger.

“What do you want?”

He just stood there, swiveling his head back and
forth.

“Go away before I call the cops!”

The empty threat had no effect on the stranger. I
opened the door, just until the chain caught, to make myself clearer when his
shoulder pressed the door open. I fell to the floor, dazed, but managed to
scramble back to my feet. I ran after him as he went into the kitchen and
grabbed the briefcase. He spun the locks to the proper combination and spilled
the
contents onto the table. He
picked up a key of some kind and pulled it close to his chest. Standing in the
doorway, blocking his exit, I wasn’t about to let him leave the kitchen with
anything he hadn’t brought in with him. “Put that down and get the hell out of
here before I call the cops!”

His dilated pupils focused on me for a second
before he rushed at me. I braced for the impact, but instead he shoved the key
into my chest, forcing me to grab it from him. I spun to the side as he rushed
past and leapt from the front porch. I caught myself and ran after him, but I
couldn’t catch him and he disappeared around the corner.

I stood in the middle of the street while my
heartbeat steadied, and the adrenaline ran its course. I squeezed the key in my
hand and walked back to the house.

 In the kitchen, I shuffled through the items
he’d spilled onto the table
;
the key, a small pile of
papers, and a weathered photograph of Mort holding a baby.

The key looked like it opened a safety deposit box
of some kind. It had FCB stamped on
one
side and 373
on the other. The paperwork Honeycutt left had an account at First Community
Bank. It didn’t take too much to figure out there must have been a safety
deposit box waiting for me. I set that aside and moved on to the papers.

They consisted of closing documents from when Mort
had bought the house and a few random pages with writing scribbled on them.

The picture showed Mort holding a baby in a
hospital.  Someone lay in the bed behind him, but Mort obscured the
person’s face. He had such a look of sincerity as he held the infant close to
his face. My first thought was that it may have been his child, but he’d never
made mention of having a child. Maybe something happened to the baby, but when
I flipped the picture over, I saw the date stamp: December 10, 1987.
My birthday.

I wondered if my mother was in the bed behind him.
Why had she kept him a secret from me? Obviously, he was close with my parents,
so why had I never met him?

The key caught the corner of my eye, and I
snatched it off the table. Standing up, leaving the picture and papers in
place, I grabbed my car keys from the counter before heading out the door.