Our Lady Chaos, page 6
part #5 of Bloodletter Series
“Come on inside now, Debbie. Let’s get you checked out by these fine doctors and nurses.”
Again, Debbie nodded, but again, she made no move to climb out of the car. Tom slid out and closed the door gently. He circled around and opened the passenger side door. Debbie turned her gaze on him. “He didn’t even…” She shook her head. “He just scared me again and again. Why did he…”
“Some things, Debbie, defy understanding. These kinds of people are broken inside. They’re not human anymore. Harper has been…” Tom grimaced, memories of Harper’s life in Genosgwa flashing before his mind’s eye. The occasions he’d responded in such weird ways—situations from before he’d perfected his act, his mask—the peculiar way he’d acted back in 1986. The funny looks, the weird way Tom had felt around him. “Well, Mason Harper has been a strange egg from the very beginning.”
“Those others. They talked about…about demons.”
“Come on, now, Debbie. Let’s get you checked out.”
She inclined her head, then lifted it slowly, and this time, she swung her legs out of the car. “I was so scared, Tom.”
“Anyone would have been. Had a moment there, myself.” He held out his hand, a gesture out of history, but one that felt right.
She looked at him then, her gaze assessing him, judging if he had lied to her. With a faint smile on her lips, she took his hand and allowed him to help her out of the car. “My husband…”
“Give me his number. I’ll call him and let him know where you are. Get him directions.”
She smiled and then hugged Tom hard. “Thank you,” she whispered in his ear.
When she stepped back, Tom nodded once, as his friend Joe Canton had always done. Somehow, it just felt right.
5
LaBouche pulled the car into the handicapped parking spot near the glass door of the Oneka Falls Town Hall. With a glance at the liquid-silver features of Nicole Conrau, he grunted. She remained unconscious but had been twitching for the past fifteen minutes. “Come on, now,” he said. “Wakey-wakey.”
Nicole groaned and rolled her skull on the headrest.
“Snap to, Chief Conrau. We’re going to need our Chief of Police.”
Her head slumped to the side, and she made no other sounds of coming awake.
LaBouche blew his breath out in frustration. He got out of the car and stomped into the building. Sally McBride stood behind the reception desk, wringing her hands. LaBouche snapped his fingers at her. “No time for sniveling, Sally! Get Chief Conrau inside and wake her up.”
Sally bobbed her head. “Where’s… Is Chaz…”
Lee rolled his eyes and let loose another irritated sigh. “He’s gone. Brigitta sent him home.”
“Home…” She glanced around the lobby.
“Yes, yes! Home. All the way home.”
“All the way,” she murmured, and her eyes filled with oily tears.
“Christ on a stick!” snapped LaBouche. “Hop to, McBride! Your grief is unbecoming, and we have things that need doing. Who was Welsh’s right-hand?”
“Right-hand?”
“Yes, yes! His second-in-command?”
Sally’s shoulders twitched as if she’d suppressed a shrug. “Red Bortha is as close as he got. Well, until Nicole.”
“Right. Go carry her in from the car. Wake her up.” LaBouche stared at her as her eyes glazed. “Get moving!” he snapped.
Sally jumped and strode toward the door.
“And I want the keys to that blue monster in the parking lot.”
“Chaz’s BMW?”
“No longer,” said LaBouche with a self-satisfied smile. “Everything that belonged to Chaz now belongs to me.” He leered at her with a slow smirk distending his face, his shark-like teeth glistening.
Sally gulped and turned away.
6
“No! I want to talk to Chaz!” Mason yelled.
The big man—the fat fucking cop—seated across the desk grimaced and squeezed his eyes shut. “Mr. Harper, listen to me. Chaz gone. Chaz no come back. Never.” His eyes snapped open and bored into Mason’s. “Get it now? Have I said it in simple enough language?”
“Where? Where has he gone?”
He sighed and raised his hands out to his sides before letting them thump on the surface of Chaz’s desk. “Brigitta tells me you are of use, but I’ll be damned if I can figure out what she sees in you. From where I sit, you seem incredibly stupid.”
Mason leaned back in the armchair and sneered.
“Chaz is dead. In this world, and in all likelihood, in the next one as well. Do you understand? Where Chaz has gone, you can’t follow.” He swiveled his chair—Chaz’s chair—to the side and released another lungful of air. “I’d send you on to search for him yourself with joy in my heart, but it would not please Brigitta if I killed you.”
“Give me a car. I want to go home.”
The thick cop shook his head. “All that is blown, Mr. Harper. My ex-partner was among the humans you met back there, and if I know Scotty, every member of the New York State Police already knows your name.”
Mason glanced at the badge lying on Chaz’s desk and the cop flashed a lopsided grin. “Yes. I’m a State Trooper, but more importantly, I’m Brigitta’s second-in-command. My role with the troopers is to safeguard others of my kind.”
“Demons.”
The trooper chuckled. “And our friends.”
“And you go by Lee?”
“I prefer LaBouche. It just fits better, but in this culture, everyone has to have a silly little moniker stuck on the front.”
“LaBouche, then. So, if I can’t follow Chaz—” He raised a hand to stop LaBouche from interrupting. “—and I can’t go home to finish my work, what am I supposed to do?”
LaBouche tilted his head to the side and lifted his hands. “We’ll find you somewhere to live here in Oneka Falls. We will take care of you here—hide you from the authorities. I’ll do what I can from within the State Police to lead them away, but for now, you’ll have to lie low, to curtail your…activities. There is still an investigation going on in town, so it’s important you follow me.” His stare bored into Mason’s. “No hunting. If you must kill, we will bring you someone. Do you understand?”
Mason sat and fumed for a moment. He’d never done well with authority. Finally, he nodded but did not meet LaBouche’s gaze.
“I heard Red Bortha and Chaz Welsh spent a lot of time with you—teaching you, guiding your development.”
“And?”
“It may be possible to continue that tutelage, albeit under my wing. Would you like that?”
Mason turned his gaze on a guise he knew to be false. That was okay with Mason; his face was also a mask. “Sure. That sounds great.”
7
It seemed as if ten elephants had sat on her skull, and her arms and legs ached as though abused beyond measure. Nicole Conrau opened her eyes and then shut them at once. The afternoon sunlight burned and made her brain throb. Her brain processed the glimpse, and she realized she was back in Oneka Falls, in the single-room police department, slumped in the corner like a bag of garbage.
Raising a hand to block the light, Nicole opened her eyes the merest of slits. The last thing she remembered was being up above the forest, glassing the battlefield through the scope of her rifle, when something hissed and spat right below her. She had the vague impression of falling to the earth through the branches of the tree, and then, nothing.
She shook her head. Whatever had happened, Chaz must have brought her back to town. He would have dealt with the hunters—either that or Dan Delo dispatched them. She never considered that the humans may have won. That would be preposterous.
“Oh, good, you didn’t die.”
The contempt-laden words pounded at her ears, and Nicole winced. “McBride,” she whispered.
“Yes, McBride. I expect it satisfies you. I hope you are pleased with yourself,” Sally sneered.
Nicole shook her head. “Get out of my grill, McBride. I’m in no mood. Is Chaz in his office?”
“No, you silver bitch! Chaz is not in his office.”
Nicole suppressed the urge to backhand Sally with two of her fists. “When?” she grated.
“When? When what?”
“When will he return?”
Sally’s expression froze in a grimace of hate and pain. “When will he return?” she parroted. “How about never? You saw to that with your…with your perky tits and tight little stomach!”
Nicole sighed and rubbed her temples with one set of hands. “What are you talking about, McBride?”
“He’s gone. Brigitta was so incensed at your failure, and at his…his…puppy love for you that she banished—” Sally sobbed and turned away.
“She sent him home?” asked Nicole in a soft tone.
Sally nodded and snuffled, reminding Nicole of feeding pigs.
“Who has taken charge?”
“LaBouche,” said Sally in a monotone voice.
“Oh,” said Nicole. “How delightful.” Sally whirled to face her, and Nicole raised a single index finger. “You wouldn’t survive it,” she hissed.
Sally huffed and stomped out of the room.
“That one is tiresome,” Nicole murmured to herself. “Her lack of control is dangerous.” She stood for a moment, thinking hard, then smiled. She knew just what to do.
8
“Has he settled down then?” Brigitta asked.
LaBouche tilted his head to the side. “It seems so. We brought him a…playmate.”
“That should appease him.” She turned in the seat of the blue BMW that had, until recently, belonged to Chaz Welsh. “For a time. If I know Mason, he believes he’s playing you. He has some plot going in his brain, some intrigue.”
“And I play a central part, no doubt. Though he says otherwise, he seems to have taken a dislike to me.”
“You don’t say,” said Brigitta around a tight-lipped smile.
“Yes, it perplexes me, too. I’m such a likable fellow.” LaBouche spread his hands. “Kind. Humorous. Friendly.”
Brigitta chuckled low in her throat and patted his arm. “It’s because you are a cop. Mason hates all cops on principle.”
“I explained all that.”
“Doesn’t matter to one like Mason.” She sighed and leaned her head back. “You drive this car with much more care than Chaz did.”
“I appreciate fine automobiles. Chaz…” He shrugged.
“Yes,” she said and closed her eyes.
LaBouche watched her from the corner of his eyes. Her recent behavior perplexed him. It seemed…out of character.
“And Nicole?”
“Sally is watching her until she wakes.”
Brigitta lifted her face and opened her eyes, turning to stare at him. “Sally?”
“McBride is easily cowed.”
Brigitta tilted her head, a small smile playing at the corners of her mouth. “She has…hidden depths. Don’t dismiss her.”
Lee shook his head. “The shit she let Chaz get away with…”
“Yes, but still. She has been here for ages. She was one of the first to arrive. She came across with my father.”
LaBouche glanced at her, eyebrows raised. When Brigitta nodded, he said, “Things must have changed between then and now. She was my pawn, she was Chaz’s whipping girl, his dupe.”
Brigitta smiled, and the sight of it chilled Lee to his core. “It would be a mistake to underestimate her. She served her, you know. That’s why she came across so long ago.”
Lee’s eyebrows shot upward. “She’s a ji—”
“Don’t say it,” said Brigitta, putting her hand on his arm. “Don’t even think it.”
LaBouche turned his attention back to the road, his mind racing, recalculating. If what Brigitta implied was true, Sally could be of immense value to his plans.
9
Mike groaned and stretched, moving carefully to avoid pulling out his stitches. He sat in one of the overstuffed recliners that faced the floor-to-ceiling window overlooking the shore of Lake Erie. A warm glow of relaxation and contentment coursed through him.
To Mike, it seemed as if the events of the past week had zipped by in a blur of color and sound. He’d moved from being a drunk—incredibly unhappy, one hundred percent in the closet, and about as lonely as a person could get—to being…happy, content. Surrounded by two out of three of his best friends from childhood, and new friends such as Shannon, Greg, and Scott. Only one thing was missing, and Mike had made do without romantic love for his whole life so far.
Besides, who knew what fate had in store for him—for all of them.
Toby came down the stairs, yawning and stretching.
“Good nap?” he asked.
Toby turned his head, his gaze resting on the golden-pink reflection of the sunset on the water. “It’s marvelous, this time we’ve all had to rest and…”
“Reflect?” asked Mike.
“Yeah. Sit up so I can look at your wounds.”
“Wow. That’s a great bedside manner you’ve got, there, Doc.”
Toby grinned. “Most of my patients aren’t so sensitive.”
“Or so alive.”
“Or that,” said Toby. “There are benefits to being a pathologist. Now, shut up and let me check you out.”
Mike grinned and tilted his head to the side and dropped the footrest of the recliner. “You’re pushy, you realize that?”
“Am I? Lift your shirt and turn around.” Toby flashed a crooked grin at him.
Mike chuckled and turned away from Toby. “How long do we stay here? How long will we be safe here?”
“Good questions. Let me know when you figure it out.”
“Yeah. Those are the easy ones, though. Aren’t they?”
“What do you mean?”
“It doesn’t seem as if we’ve done much since we burned the old tree. Ran around and got people hurt for the most part.”
Toby stopped prodding him but said nothing.
“I didn’t mean that as an accusation, Toby. But I’ve been thinking about what—”
“I get it,” said Toby in a quiet voice. “It seems like every time we believe we are being smart, we’re only making things worse.”
“How…” Mike shook his head.
“No, go ahead.”
“How can we fight them, Toby? How can we hope to make any meaningful progress? Getting rid of them one at a time is—”
“Can I suggest something?” asked Greg from the door to the kitchen.
“Sure,” said Mike.
“Trying to stop water running through a hose is easiest when you first turn off the spigot.”
Toby drew a deep breath and blew it out. “I’ve been thinking along those lines, myself. As long as they can come through the Passage—or however they are really moving here—at will, it doesn’t matter how many we send back.”
“That’s it,” said Greg.
“But—”
“The problem, Greg, is that we don’t understand how they are coming here. We interrogated a demon, but he told so many lies and half-truths we don’t understand what’s real.”
“I’ve been thinking about that. Do you know what I do for a living?”
“No,” said Toby.
“I’m a software developer.”
“Okay…” said Mike, pulling his shirt back down over his bandages.
“We lack information, correct?” asked Greg.
“Yeah. Desperately.”
“Right. We need to sort through all the falsehoods, all the stories, all the reports of paranormal occurrences. We need a method of culling the lies from the truth.”
Toby nodded. “That will take decades. We have descriptions of demonic activity in this area going back thirty or forty years. We lived—”
“More,” said Greg. “There have been rumors of the supernatural in this area for centuries.”
“Great,” muttered Mike.
“If we go back that far, we’ll all be old men before we have even a guess as to the truth of it.”
“Yes, using the methods you’ve employed to date. Using just the members of this small group.”
“You have got a better idea, then?”
“Have you ever heard of the human search engine?”
“Human search engine? Like Google?”
Greg nodded and came into the room. “It’s a way of solving big problems by harnessing the brainpower of a ton of people and the material on the Internet. A human search engine relies on hundreds and thousands of individuals over the Internet, each one doing what they do best, then passing the information on. The next person grabs the data and does what they do best, et cetera.”
Toby nodded, a small smile on his face. “I’ve got this website—”
“I’ve seen it. What I’m thinking of goes way beyond a forum for people to tell stories. I’m talking about setting up an organization.”
“What? A company?”
Greg lifted his hands. “Maybe, but not necessarily. What if we formed a not-so-secret secret society? On the surface, it would look like a bunch of crackpots, but under that obfuscating layer—”
“We could have one of those human search engines.”
“Right.”
Mike tilted his head to the side. “How do we keep the crackpots out of the underwear layer?”
“Always with the jokes,” Toby said with a grin.
“That would be the secret part. I don’t know how we select people—I do software—but once they're selected, they’d have access to a level of technology and data beyond what the public sees.”
“Secret meetings?”
Greg shook his head. “Nah. You’re thinking too analog. Think digital. Think global.”
“Think software,” said Toby, eyes dancing.
Greg smiled.
10
“I will need the two of you, working in concert, to find them. It is of the utmost importance that we put a stop to their meddling. Once and for all.”
Nicole nodded, as LaBouche knew she would, but Mason didn’t move. He’d been staring at Nicole since she’d entered the house where LaBouche had stashed him. She hadn’t bothered with a visage.
She hadn’t bothered with clothing, either.
It amused LaBouche. Her dress—or lack thereof—had been a calculated tactic on her part. She used her sexuality as a whip, and a strong lash it was, but she’d underestimated LaBouche. Many did, but he didn’t mind. It made dominating them all the easier.
