Luxuria part eleven
Disclaimers in part one.
Tina watched, helpless, as the thing controlling her took her yet again to the waterfront. She couldn't drive, and this thing didn't either, but it made her take her bike and load it on the front of a city bus, then ride the bus to the nearest stop to that old building and take her bike from there. Tina never rode her bike, it made her feel like a little kid, and she would never go in the warehouse district at night. She was terrified.
She was doing magic, she was pretty sure. It gave her no thrill; in fact, it made her feel sick. Every time she did something at the old building-chipped a pentagram into a floor, placed her Harry Potter wand by a door, inserted the creepy DVD into her Discman which then played on that old dead TV, even from outside the building-every time, she felt like something in her was dying. Like she was a tree with more and more dead branches. She was trapped in a nightmare. Her family and school seemed more and more distant, her expectations for her future faded. Fanfiction and praise were ludicrously insignificant. She was losing her soul.
The wheels of her bike slid in the mud and the remains of ice on the long grade down to the lake. She was cold and wet. Whatever controlled her took no care with such things as coats or umbrellas. She had only her backpack with the Discman DVD player and the disk that should have been Sense and Sensibility. The rain and darkness were so thick, she could hardly even see where this thing was taking her, but she knew she was returning to that old abandoned building. She had no idea why.
###
Mike watched, aghast, as Henry studied the angle necessary inside the joint, glancing at each arm and positioning himself experimentally, looking for the right placement of the break in his arm as if he were preparing his tools for a bit of carpentry. Part of Mike wanted to say, "Wait, you don't need to do this," but he couldn't. Dehydration had given him a headache to rival any migraine, and without the water his body needed, his recovery from the day's rigors had halted. He was still weak and in pain, and they both needed all the strength they could manage if they were to fight off whatever the demon had in store. He just didn't know if he could watch this.
But he couldn't look away as Henry braced his right forearm between the floor and the wall, palm up and limp, as if his bone were a piece of lumber. Henry raised his gaze to Mike's, dispelling the sense of alienness Mike had felt watching these preparations. The look in Henry's eyes was very human. Apprehension and resigned determination. But definitely some fear. "I've done it before," Henry said as if to reassure Mike.
Mike nodded. Henry raised his left arm, the heel of his palm forward, fingers curled, reminiscent of a martial arts striking position, took a breath and-halted. He repositioned his arm minutely and set his jaw. A second time he started to deliver the blow but stopped. He didn't look at Mike. This was about working up his courage, Mike could see that. The tightness in his chest reminded Mike he had to breathe.
The third time, Henry's hand came down too fast for Mike to see, but he heard the appalling crack that resulted. Henry cried out and curled protectively around the arm, making no attempt to be stoic about his agony. He lay with one cheek on the concrete floor, his cries lessening as he conquered the pain. Mike was frozen with horror. Even Henry's approach to pain had a look of familiarity and plan. What did a guy have to go through to make breaking a bone a commonplace tactic?
Henry sat up, his features slack, mouth slightly open, and leaned back against the wall. He held his broken arm in his lap. The fracture was compound, Mike saw. Henry didn't seem to bleed as much as Mike would expect, but the white of his bone showed through torn skin. "Christ Almighty," Mike breathed.
Henry glanced at him and slid closer to the gash in the drywall. He leaned forward, the better to move his arm into place without actually using it. He used his good arm to lift the broken one through the hole, but then was forced by lack of space to take his good arm out. Mike saw his whole face tighten with pain as he moved his broken arm under its own power within the small space.
The attempt didn't appear to work at first. Henry's gasps and tiny sobs spoke of the difficulty he was having. Mike had broken his arm once as a child, and he remembered now how hard it had been to grasp with his hand. Maybe it was different for a vampire, but, watching Henry's struggle, he doubted it. He felt growing dread that Henry couldn't do this.
Then came the groan of rending metal, quickly silenced as Henry jerked slightly. He dropped his head forward and squirmed. The sound returned; aluminum bending and breaking. He lifted his head and Mike saw the gleam of fangs. His face contorted with pain and effort, interrupted by repeatedly losing his grip and having to recover it, Henry worked the dingy grey drainpipe out into the room.
Dingy grey, and dripping. Mike worked his throat in what would have been a swallow had he had any saliva. As he moved toward the pipe, it gurgled and surged as rainwater found its new route through the twisted metal. Water flowed as if from a tap and Mike seized the pipe, leaned down and drank.
###
The second Vicki and Coreen were out the door of the videostore, before Vicki could even put up her umbrella, they both spoke at once.
"I can see the symbol. I know where the final murder will be-"
"Her name is Tina Lemke. She's been acting really strange-"
The rain poured on them. Thunder rumbled.
"What?"
"What?"
"Let's get in the car!"
They scrambled into the car where the rain was only a noisy curtain insulating them from the rest of the world. "Take me here," Vicki said, placing her finger, not based on accessible streets, but where the name of Astaroth should end. "No, here," she said, backing her finger up to the nearest busy street to that area. She didn't want Coreen with her all the way.
"You know what the symbol is?" Coreen asked, starting the car. "How?"
"I looked at it without my glasses. It's Astaroth's name. Damn, that should have been obvious. How did you learn the girl's name?"
"I chatted with Antonio. It's his Harley out front. Nice ride. Didn't you ever look at it without your glasses before?"
"Hey, I needed to see the map. Like now." She turned on the car's interior light and read street names. "Turn left. What else did the good Antonio tell you?"
"She's sixteen, about five foot two and a hundred and thirty-five pounds. Thick dark hair with a bleached skunk stripe and tongue and lip piercings. Ew. Turn here?"
"No, head for the waterfront."
"She finds these weird DVDs in the cases sometimes. Antonio has seen her open them, see the DVD and then close it up and let the customer walk out with it. He never finds them, just her."
"And then someone at that house gets killed, I betcha. Hey, watch it! Don't hit anyone. And don't get a ticket, we don't have time."
"Mike could fix it for me, though, right?"
"Not if he's not alive."
They both fell silent.
"Okay, stop here."
"Here? But-"
"Yeah, here!"
Vicki folded up the map, and opened her bag. She checked her baton and her cell phone, and she put her glasses away. She couldn't see in this darkness anyway, she might as well try navigating with this other sight of hers. In her bag, Henry's cross was glowing brightly. She took it out. She hadn't noticed before that it was on a cord with wooden beads. A rosary. Each bead for a prayer, but that was the extent of what she knew about rosaries. It felt warm and beckoning, and smitten with a sudden attack of sentimentality-who knew if Henry were even still alive-she put it around her neck. She took out the cash she'd been paid just the other day, though it seemed like a year ago, and handed most of it to Coreen. "Here's your back pay," she said.
"What?" Coreen cried. "Why are you giving me this?"
"Because you earned it, of course. You don't want your pay?"
"Why are you giving it to me now? Vicki!"
"Because I have it, that's why. You can thank Mike, that manipulative bastard, once I rescue his ass. Coreen, I need you back at the office. If I don't find Henry or Mike I'll call a cab. I want you where you can research things for me."
Coreen's face, completely indistinct to Vicki without her glasses, was a mournful blur of melting makeup. Vicki was pretty sure she was crying, on the inside if not on the outside.
"Oh, come on," Vicki said and popped her umbrella as she opened the door. "It's not like that." She hopped out of the car and slammed the door. Thunder boomed, closer now.
At least I really hope it's not.
###
Tina reached the outside of that abandoned building. She was soaked to the skin and shivering. The temperature had teetered on the edge of freezing all day. Lightning flashed over an angry Lake Ontario, blinding her. Not that it mattered. She was only a puppet, responding to her strings.
She stopped her bike, took off her backpack and removed her Discman, despite the pouring rain. Inside she was wailing. She was about to do some magic; she just knew it. She would die a little more. But there was nothing she could do. She opened Sense and Sensibility and popped the disk into her little machine.
###
When Mike took a rest from drinking, Henry gripped the drainpipe and bent to take a few swallows of his own. Water was pooling on the floor. Henry sighed. Yet another thing to worry about. It wasn't good for Mike to get wet; he was probably on the verge of hypothermia as it was. The agony from his arm was wearing on him. Additionally, the feeling of evil magic in the room was growing stronger, making him feel almost physically sick. He had to concentrate. Where was their greatest danger from, and what could he do about it? He tried to think while Mike drank again.
Finally Mike leaned back from the drainpipe like a man pushing himself away from a feast, already looking healthier to Henry's senses. Mike picked himself up out of the water and moved away from it. He was moving better, too. Henry was pleased. Now he needed to get himself in better shape. Thank God he had fed so well the evening before-he had to swerve his thoughts away from Vicki-but his arm would have to be dealt with. Healing it would soak up any excess benefit from his feeding. And first he'd have to set the bone.
He looked up, surprised to see Mike seating himself on the floor before him, on his right side, facing Henry across the resting arm. "You want me to set it?" he asked, his voice recovering its usual timber.
"I can do it," Henry said.
"Sure, but who wants to set their own broken bone?" Mike held out his hand, now steady. "I can do it."
"It's growing worse in here," Henry said. "The evil. Can you feel it? The demon hasn't given up."
Mike nodded. "Give me your arm," he said. "We've got to be ready. I've been thinking. If you were supposed to be the sacrifice at dawn, then the demon needs a plan B."
Henry held out his arm and let Mike take it. He hoped whatever medical training Mike had had was good enough. Maybe he should have insisted he do it himself, but he had such a weakness for human contact. Sometimes any human contact. "Do you want us to be ready or do you just want an excuse to hurt me?" he asked.
Mike smiled faintly, probing gently around the break. "Why can't it be both?" he replied. He gave Henry a serious look. "On three."
Henry's arm trembled minutely in Mike's grip and Henry had to force it to steady. He almost braced his good arm on Mike's shoulder, but thought better of it and braced against the floor. "One, two, three." Mike's pressure was sure and strong. Henry cried out and bent forward, pulling his arm to himself. He'd never absorbed the modern idea that there was something shameful about showing pain. Sometimes yelling helped.
The set was good. "Thanks," he gasped.
As Mike flinched away he gave a snort. "Any time," he said. He bent down to drink again, still showing some stiffness.
Warmth suffused Henry's arm as precious blood and life-force rushed to the area. Henry took a deep breath as the pain started to fade. "I've been thinking, too," Henry said.
"Do tell," Mike said between swallows.
"About your kid. The murderer. Do you know what Hell is?"
"After today I do," Mike muttered. Then he looked up, at Henry, shrugging. "I know what they taught me in Sunday School. Hell is the pain of separation from God."
Henry nodded. "And physical torment, as well as the spiritual. Demons want to come to this plane for a lot of reasons, but one of them is to lessen their pain. If your kid were a demon, why would he say it's painful for him to be here?"
Mike shook his head. "I don't know. If he's not a demon-who would find earth painful?"
"Exactly," Henry said. "Do you know what 'messenger' is in ancient Greek?"
"I suppose you're going to tell me."
"Angelos. Angel."
###
Against whatever was left of her will, Tina pressed "play" on her Discman.
###
Lightning outside flashed on the interior wall, lighting the TV screen behind Mike. Henry saw it, though Mike couldn't.
"Well, that's just great, then," Mike said. "Because our angel friend is locked up in The Don, and completely inaccessible until he gets a court date. Because he murdered someone. How very angelic."
Now it wasn't lightning. The TV was on, showing static. Henry leaped to his feet. At his action, Mike whirled around.
"It's not possible," Mike said. The broken wires from the TV set were still clearly visible, one black, one red.
Thunder, but not thunder; sound on a sub-sonic or sub-ether level roared in the air. At their feet, in the center of the room, the concrete floor where the water was pooling lost its form and became a swirl of darkness. Both men backed away, but it grew.
Grasping at anything, Henry yelled, "Water! Pour running water on it. It insulates against magic!"
Grabbing the drainpipe, Mike yelled back, "That might have been good information to have!"
"I don't know that it will help! The pentagram is engraved; we can't rub it out!"
The TV screen flickered and settled, to Henry's amazement, into a cheerful daylight summer scene with Emma Thompson's face. "Sense and Sensibility" appeared on the screen, along with a DVD menu. And suddenly, horribly, Henry was overpowered by all the fury he had ever had with Mike Celluci. All the jealousy, the betrayals, the insults. Celluci had to die.
With his last shred of willpower, he yelled, "Mike, shoot me!"
###
Continue to the conclusion
Tina watched, helpless, as the thing controlling her took her yet again to the waterfront. She couldn't drive, and this thing didn't either, but it made her take her bike and load it on the front of a city bus, then ride the bus to the nearest stop to that old building and take her bike from there. Tina never rode her bike, it made her feel like a little kid, and she would never go in the warehouse district at night. She was terrified.
She was doing magic, she was pretty sure. It gave her no thrill; in fact, it made her feel sick. Every time she did something at the old building-chipped a pentagram into a floor, placed her Harry Potter wand by a door, inserted the creepy DVD into her Discman which then played on that old dead TV, even from outside the building-every time, she felt like something in her was dying. Like she was a tree with more and more dead branches. She was trapped in a nightmare. Her family and school seemed more and more distant, her expectations for her future faded. Fanfiction and praise were ludicrously insignificant. She was losing her soul.
The wheels of her bike slid in the mud and the remains of ice on the long grade down to the lake. She was cold and wet. Whatever controlled her took no care with such things as coats or umbrellas. She had only her backpack with the Discman DVD player and the disk that should have been Sense and Sensibility. The rain and darkness were so thick, she could hardly even see where this thing was taking her, but she knew she was returning to that old abandoned building. She had no idea why.
###
Mike watched, aghast, as Henry studied the angle necessary inside the joint, glancing at each arm and positioning himself experimentally, looking for the right placement of the break in his arm as if he were preparing his tools for a bit of carpentry. Part of Mike wanted to say, "Wait, you don't need to do this," but he couldn't. Dehydration had given him a headache to rival any migraine, and without the water his body needed, his recovery from the day's rigors had halted. He was still weak and in pain, and they both needed all the strength they could manage if they were to fight off whatever the demon had in store. He just didn't know if he could watch this.
But he couldn't look away as Henry braced his right forearm between the floor and the wall, palm up and limp, as if his bone were a piece of lumber. Henry raised his gaze to Mike's, dispelling the sense of alienness Mike had felt watching these preparations. The look in Henry's eyes was very human. Apprehension and resigned determination. But definitely some fear. "I've done it before," Henry said as if to reassure Mike.
Mike nodded. Henry raised his left arm, the heel of his palm forward, fingers curled, reminiscent of a martial arts striking position, took a breath and-halted. He repositioned his arm minutely and set his jaw. A second time he started to deliver the blow but stopped. He didn't look at Mike. This was about working up his courage, Mike could see that. The tightness in his chest reminded Mike he had to breathe.
The third time, Henry's hand came down too fast for Mike to see, but he heard the appalling crack that resulted. Henry cried out and curled protectively around the arm, making no attempt to be stoic about his agony. He lay with one cheek on the concrete floor, his cries lessening as he conquered the pain. Mike was frozen with horror. Even Henry's approach to pain had a look of familiarity and plan. What did a guy have to go through to make breaking a bone a commonplace tactic?
Henry sat up, his features slack, mouth slightly open, and leaned back against the wall. He held his broken arm in his lap. The fracture was compound, Mike saw. Henry didn't seem to bleed as much as Mike would expect, but the white of his bone showed through torn skin. "Christ Almighty," Mike breathed.
Henry glanced at him and slid closer to the gash in the drywall. He leaned forward, the better to move his arm into place without actually using it. He used his good arm to lift the broken one through the hole, but then was forced by lack of space to take his good arm out. Mike saw his whole face tighten with pain as he moved his broken arm under its own power within the small space.
The attempt didn't appear to work at first. Henry's gasps and tiny sobs spoke of the difficulty he was having. Mike had broken his arm once as a child, and he remembered now how hard it had been to grasp with his hand. Maybe it was different for a vampire, but, watching Henry's struggle, he doubted it. He felt growing dread that Henry couldn't do this.
Then came the groan of rending metal, quickly silenced as Henry jerked slightly. He dropped his head forward and squirmed. The sound returned; aluminum bending and breaking. He lifted his head and Mike saw the gleam of fangs. His face contorted with pain and effort, interrupted by repeatedly losing his grip and having to recover it, Henry worked the dingy grey drainpipe out into the room.
Dingy grey, and dripping. Mike worked his throat in what would have been a swallow had he had any saliva. As he moved toward the pipe, it gurgled and surged as rainwater found its new route through the twisted metal. Water flowed as if from a tap and Mike seized the pipe, leaned down and drank.
###
The second Vicki and Coreen were out the door of the videostore, before Vicki could even put up her umbrella, they both spoke at once.
"I can see the symbol. I know where the final murder will be-"
"Her name is Tina Lemke. She's been acting really strange-"
The rain poured on them. Thunder rumbled.
"What?"
"What?"
"Let's get in the car!"
They scrambled into the car where the rain was only a noisy curtain insulating them from the rest of the world. "Take me here," Vicki said, placing her finger, not based on accessible streets, but where the name of Astaroth should end. "No, here," she said, backing her finger up to the nearest busy street to that area. She didn't want Coreen with her all the way.
"You know what the symbol is?" Coreen asked, starting the car. "How?"
"I looked at it without my glasses. It's Astaroth's name. Damn, that should have been obvious. How did you learn the girl's name?"
"I chatted with Antonio. It's his Harley out front. Nice ride. Didn't you ever look at it without your glasses before?"
"Hey, I needed to see the map. Like now." She turned on the car's interior light and read street names. "Turn left. What else did the good Antonio tell you?"
"She's sixteen, about five foot two and a hundred and thirty-five pounds. Thick dark hair with a bleached skunk stripe and tongue and lip piercings. Ew. Turn here?"
"No, head for the waterfront."
"She finds these weird DVDs in the cases sometimes. Antonio has seen her open them, see the DVD and then close it up and let the customer walk out with it. He never finds them, just her."
"And then someone at that house gets killed, I betcha. Hey, watch it! Don't hit anyone. And don't get a ticket, we don't have time."
"Mike could fix it for me, though, right?"
"Not if he's not alive."
They both fell silent.
"Okay, stop here."
"Here? But-"
"Yeah, here!"
Vicki folded up the map, and opened her bag. She checked her baton and her cell phone, and she put her glasses away. She couldn't see in this darkness anyway, she might as well try navigating with this other sight of hers. In her bag, Henry's cross was glowing brightly. She took it out. She hadn't noticed before that it was on a cord with wooden beads. A rosary. Each bead for a prayer, but that was the extent of what she knew about rosaries. It felt warm and beckoning, and smitten with a sudden attack of sentimentality-who knew if Henry were even still alive-she put it around her neck. She took out the cash she'd been paid just the other day, though it seemed like a year ago, and handed most of it to Coreen. "Here's your back pay," she said.
"What?" Coreen cried. "Why are you giving me this?"
"Because you earned it, of course. You don't want your pay?"
"Why are you giving it to me now? Vicki!"
"Because I have it, that's why. You can thank Mike, that manipulative bastard, once I rescue his ass. Coreen, I need you back at the office. If I don't find Henry or Mike I'll call a cab. I want you where you can research things for me."
Coreen's face, completely indistinct to Vicki without her glasses, was a mournful blur of melting makeup. Vicki was pretty sure she was crying, on the inside if not on the outside.
"Oh, come on," Vicki said and popped her umbrella as she opened the door. "It's not like that." She hopped out of the car and slammed the door. Thunder boomed, closer now.
At least I really hope it's not.
###
Tina reached the outside of that abandoned building. She was soaked to the skin and shivering. The temperature had teetered on the edge of freezing all day. Lightning flashed over an angry Lake Ontario, blinding her. Not that it mattered. She was only a puppet, responding to her strings.
She stopped her bike, took off her backpack and removed her Discman, despite the pouring rain. Inside she was wailing. She was about to do some magic; she just knew it. She would die a little more. But there was nothing she could do. She opened Sense and Sensibility and popped the disk into her little machine.
###
When Mike took a rest from drinking, Henry gripped the drainpipe and bent to take a few swallows of his own. Water was pooling on the floor. Henry sighed. Yet another thing to worry about. It wasn't good for Mike to get wet; he was probably on the verge of hypothermia as it was. The agony from his arm was wearing on him. Additionally, the feeling of evil magic in the room was growing stronger, making him feel almost physically sick. He had to concentrate. Where was their greatest danger from, and what could he do about it? He tried to think while Mike drank again.
Finally Mike leaned back from the drainpipe like a man pushing himself away from a feast, already looking healthier to Henry's senses. Mike picked himself up out of the water and moved away from it. He was moving better, too. Henry was pleased. Now he needed to get himself in better shape. Thank God he had fed so well the evening before-he had to swerve his thoughts away from Vicki-but his arm would have to be dealt with. Healing it would soak up any excess benefit from his feeding. And first he'd have to set the bone.
He looked up, surprised to see Mike seating himself on the floor before him, on his right side, facing Henry across the resting arm. "You want me to set it?" he asked, his voice recovering its usual timber.
"I can do it," Henry said.
"Sure, but who wants to set their own broken bone?" Mike held out his hand, now steady. "I can do it."
"It's growing worse in here," Henry said. "The evil. Can you feel it? The demon hasn't given up."
Mike nodded. "Give me your arm," he said. "We've got to be ready. I've been thinking. If you were supposed to be the sacrifice at dawn, then the demon needs a plan B."
Henry held out his arm and let Mike take it. He hoped whatever medical training Mike had had was good enough. Maybe he should have insisted he do it himself, but he had such a weakness for human contact. Sometimes any human contact. "Do you want us to be ready or do you just want an excuse to hurt me?" he asked.
Mike smiled faintly, probing gently around the break. "Why can't it be both?" he replied. He gave Henry a serious look. "On three."
Henry's arm trembled minutely in Mike's grip and Henry had to force it to steady. He almost braced his good arm on Mike's shoulder, but thought better of it and braced against the floor. "One, two, three." Mike's pressure was sure and strong. Henry cried out and bent forward, pulling his arm to himself. He'd never absorbed the modern idea that there was something shameful about showing pain. Sometimes yelling helped.
The set was good. "Thanks," he gasped.
As Mike flinched away he gave a snort. "Any time," he said. He bent down to drink again, still showing some stiffness.
Warmth suffused Henry's arm as precious blood and life-force rushed to the area. Henry took a deep breath as the pain started to fade. "I've been thinking, too," Henry said.
"Do tell," Mike said between swallows.
"About your kid. The murderer. Do you know what Hell is?"
"After today I do," Mike muttered. Then he looked up, at Henry, shrugging. "I know what they taught me in Sunday School. Hell is the pain of separation from God."
Henry nodded. "And physical torment, as well as the spiritual. Demons want to come to this plane for a lot of reasons, but one of them is to lessen their pain. If your kid were a demon, why would he say it's painful for him to be here?"
Mike shook his head. "I don't know. If he's not a demon-who would find earth painful?"
"Exactly," Henry said. "Do you know what 'messenger' is in ancient Greek?"
"I suppose you're going to tell me."
"Angelos. Angel."
###
Against whatever was left of her will, Tina pressed "play" on her Discman.
###
Lightning outside flashed on the interior wall, lighting the TV screen behind Mike. Henry saw it, though Mike couldn't.
"Well, that's just great, then," Mike said. "Because our angel friend is locked up in The Don, and completely inaccessible until he gets a court date. Because he murdered someone. How very angelic."
Now it wasn't lightning. The TV was on, showing static. Henry leaped to his feet. At his action, Mike whirled around.
"It's not possible," Mike said. The broken wires from the TV set were still clearly visible, one black, one red.
Thunder, but not thunder; sound on a sub-sonic or sub-ether level roared in the air. At their feet, in the center of the room, the concrete floor where the water was pooling lost its form and became a swirl of darkness. Both men backed away, but it grew.
Grasping at anything, Henry yelled, "Water! Pour running water on it. It insulates against magic!"
Grabbing the drainpipe, Mike yelled back, "That might have been good information to have!"
"I don't know that it will help! The pentagram is engraved; we can't rub it out!"
The TV screen flickered and settled, to Henry's amazement, into a cheerful daylight summer scene with Emma Thompson's face. "Sense and Sensibility" appeared on the screen, along with a DVD menu. And suddenly, horribly, Henry was overpowered by all the fury he had ever had with Mike Celluci. All the jealousy, the betrayals, the insults. Celluci had to die.
With his last shred of willpower, he yelled, "Mike, shoot me!"
###
Continue to the conclusion