Post by Kwan on Jan 12, 2012 13:10:21 GMT -5
* * * Entry One * * *
The first thing I noticed upon entering the room was how the blood splattered against the wall. People try and make it artsy when they describe it in books or show it on film. Staring up at the walls, my stomach bubbling and my throat drying, I didn’t feel like I was inside a museum. A mess of shocking red ran down the wall and pooled upon the sickly, green carpet. Everything else seemed so normal; from the television watching the room from its perch upon the wall to the DVDs sitting upon their shelf. Everything was normal except the body that was slumped, unmoving in the armchair.
The room is the latest exhibition in the Science Museum that features several rooms dating through the ages, way back to Victorian times and through to the current day. The one I'm currently standing in is the 21st century. All of the other rooms are untouched, apart from this one, which the victim seems to have lived in for one day. On the floor next to the armchair is a plate with crumbs on (the skeletal remainders of a sandwich) and an empty mug with tea stains. Looking around, I have no idea where he even managed to find boiling water for the tea because the room is only a lounge. There is no kitchen. The nearest kettle is the staff room on the next level and I doubt the corpse knew it's location.
The case gets even weirder because it's obvious this chap's been here for a day, yet the security team didn't see anybody here last night when they locked up. I spoke with them on the way in; not the brightest bunch but the plastic-piece-of-crap warrant card covered that. Unless this guy was living in a temporal shift, which is highly unlikely but feasibly possible, there's no way he could have been here before midnight last night.
"Why were you here?" I scratch my head absently, asking the body in the hopes it'll reply and make my job easier. The greasy hair shuffles through my nails and fingers, unwashed this morning. Being called on at 4am to check a dead body isn't in my usual routine day. Normally it involves destroying computer viruses and making sure the Laundry's network is running (and avoiding the random paper-clip audit). Unfortunately the job also includes some occasionally field-work. This body flicked up on the Laundry's radar due to the random thaum discharge here a few hours ago. Usually not good news.
The body doesn't answer but somebody else does. A gentle, familiar, voice sweeps out from behind me. A few years ago it would have scared me in the deathly silence. "What do you think happened?"
I turn around, smoothly and without jumping despite the creepily empty museum. It's Juliet. She's here to bag and tag the body as part of the investigation. We've met before. She's aware of the Laundry. Most detectives and sergeants have had at least one run in with a Laundry spook before. "No idea. Know that's not what you want to hear but it's all I've got."
Not feeling very conversational and like I'm still waking up, I routinely check the tablet running on the floor. It's still ticking over and checking the thaumic levels in the room, along with the Silencer that keeps all outside influence out. The museum will be opening in just over two hours and then we'll need it to stay out of sight. Blue and white police tape is good but it draws too much attention. If people were trying to look in this exhibit they'd find their eyes slipping away like butter in a heated frying pan.
Juliet takes a step into the room before I can stop her. Every muscle in my body flinches and tightens. In this exact moment I feel like I could crack a coconuts with my arse muscles. Juliet continues blindly on as my breath catches in my throat. I won't lose another one. I won't lose another innocent bystander. For one, I don't want to deal with the Auditors and the Operation Oversight, or the paper-work that follows. Still, all of that isn't as bad as the guilt. I've still not been able to wipe my mind of the first and last time this had happened. The flash of recognition as her face first shrivelled and then imploded as her body withered down to dust.
"The fuck, Juliet!" One hand clutching the tablet, the other grabs the back of her t-shirt and pulls her physically out of the room. "One does not simply walk into Mordor! The circuit's still live – you could be dust!" Frantically, I point at the floor, finally letting go of Juliet but not the tablet. That little piece of technology has been my life-line more than once.
Juliet's eyes track down. On the floor, going around the armchair and delving deeply into the carpet is a circuit. From the signs and marks, it looks like a simple summoning grid, connected to a laptop situated in sleep mode under the armchair. Whoever did this knew what they were doing.
You see, magic works but it's not the typical hippies, herbs, candles, or incense most of the time. Magic is formula’s and computer generated queries and mathematics. With the right code and math, you can connect to the other realms and pull forth things that shouldn't be. Even the regular family PC could be reworked to summon something with enough blood sacrifice. An opening to anywhere is an appealing opportunity for those out there interested. It even has a great big "Free buffet" attached to it. It explains how there are so many shells, used to be humans, working in the stacks at the Laundry with wriggling green worms behind their eyes.
That is what's going on here. The metal lined pentagram on the floor, along with the computer, and the corpse. Somebody was trying to summon something and it went horrible wrong. If it hadn't gone wrong, the body in the seat would chowing down on flesh. My current train of thoughts finally catch up with the my suspicion as the penny drops; unless this was a sacrifice to something bigger.
Hands automatically dial via the tablet. It's a secured line thanks to my friends Pinky and Brains, as much as I hate to admit it, they did a good job with the technology on the new tablet.
"Hello, Capital Laundry Services? We clean anything."
The front desk. "I need to speak to Andy. It's Bob."
The receptionist, not exactly human, doesn't ask any question and patches me through. "Hi, Bob?"
"Andy. I need you to run few reports. Find out all of the news in South London and any weird spikes. Check for correlation between the two. This is bigger than just a dead body." Weirdly, I notice the tone of my voice. There's no excitement or feeling any more. That alone tells me I've been in this job too long but it's not like you can leave the Laundry. Once you've accidentally tried to re-landscape Wolverhampton via the elder Gods they don't let you out.
"Right." He sounds busy but he'll do it.
"Thanks," I hang up. Juliet is still sniffing around the edges of the room and I can't blame her. She's staying far enough away from the body. I think seeing me lose my cool like that has shocked her. When somebody from the Laundry yells at you and looks worried or scared, you learn to pay attention.
"Give me a second. I'll have it unlocked so you can take the body away." It's fetching up to be a bad day and technically it's not day yet. I wouldn't even be out of bed by now. Time to get this sucker out of here before it starts stinking and the museum opens.
The tablet contains most of the tools I need. A couple of clicks later and I have all of the background things I need running including True Sight via the camera. Mentally I thank Pinky for that nifty little application no matter how disgusting it really is. Seeing what is truly there isn't a gift. Carpets shouldn't be that kind of colour and it certainly shouldn't be leaking out over the floor and on to the walls. Even the DVDs that sit on the shelf are a putrid green and oozing and I don't even dare look at the body. Kneeling in front of the tablet so I can see via the cam, I test the ground and green stuff carefully with my fingertips; they come away green even after the slightest touch.
"It's transferable. Clever. Juliet, stand still." I swing the cam around to see her. She's almost swimming in the green stuff it's so thick. Whatever it is, it's growing quickly. "You're contaminated."
"I'm-what?" It's still interesting to see the shock in other people. Her face has visibly dropped along with the rest of her posture. Her mouth is gaping open like a goldfish struggling for air. She even went far enough to raise her hands to inspect them. Her voice was high-pitched and squeaky enough to challenge any homeless person's kart.
"You can't see it like that. We'll need to get you cleaned up. Think you've just been recruited to the Laundry, Juliet. You'll need to come back to the office. Do not touch anything else." The last steps to disabling the grid are completed quickly. I use the specialist pencil in my kit to smudge out and short the circuit and finally shut down the laptop that was running it all. By now I'm probably crawling with green stuff as well. Not good. Probably have to spend the next day in decontamination. Brilliant. That'll please Mo. She was expecting me to cook dinner tonight. "It's got to be some kind of summoning grid … but why would it be pulling through all this green puke?"
Juliet has found her senses again. "Didn't even know it could do that!" She's standing next to my tablet, watching the scene. "Even more scary is, I'm starting to understand your garble."
My phone goes off like an atomic bomb in my pocket. I fumble, then answer, still holding the pencil. "Bob speaking."
"Stabilize the body, then get back to the office." It's Andy, although a little more short than usual, which is worrying.
"Big stuff?" Am I even allowed to ask, I wonder. Almost everything from big to small is classified by codewords and geas.
"Bigger. Body count and reported green sludge. Void mean anything to you?" He's dead serious. I can hear the commotion outside of his office. That's never happened before.
"Void. Created the Old ones. We were created by them; slaves."
"Get back here, Bob. The void's come again." The line goes dead and my stomach plummets.
* * * Entry Two * * *
The first thing I noticed upon entering the room was how the blood splattered against the wall. People try and make it artsy when they describe it in books or show it on film. Staring up at the walls, my stomach bubbling and my throat drying, I didn’t feel like I was inside a museum. A mess of shocking red ran down the wall and pooled upon the sickly, green carpet. Everything else seemed so normal; from the television watching the room from its perch upon the wall to the DVDs sitting upon their shelf. Everything was normal except the body that was slumped, unmoving in the armchair.
“Thus ends sin,” the hunter reckoned.
I took a step towards the body and then looked to him. His face was hidden by the broad leather brim of his hat. His hands were in the pockets of his overcoat. “May I move the body, sir?” The photos and examinations had already been done by forensics, so there was no need to leave it as it was: yet I dared to do nothing without the witch hunter’s permission. He nodded once, slowly. Then he took out a silken cloth and began cleaning one of his pistols.
Rigor mortis had not yet taken hold, and grasping the greasy red hair, I drew the head back to examine her face. The neck was a blackening chasm, all exposed meat and torn muscle. Her skin must have been fair in life. Now, it was white as fresh ashes. Her mouth was slightly agape, and her teeth were yellowed.
“Certainty,” he said, so softly that it was almost a whisper.
I turned. He was still rubbing the pistol. “What was that, sir?” I asked quickly.
“It is my weapon.” Without raising his face towards me, he strode over to the television, and crouched down to look at the DVDs beneath it. I went to stand beside him. He opened a case: it was some series set in Old California. He opened a case, to examine the disc within. A woman raised her eyes demurely on the DVD’s picture, while two sullen-faced boys stood by her. The colors were green, and yellow, and blue: living hues. The brown-clad hunter took out the disc and held it delicately with the edge lightly pressing against his palms.
“They don’t make them like they used to,” I commented inanely.
He took it into his fingers, flexed it once, and then snapped it in two. With no trace of rancor or any other passion, he threw the two pieces back among the other DVD cases. “They are many,” he sighed.
“The…the discs, sir?” I asked, in spite of my growing trepidation. I wondered if this man had ever felt a woman’s flesh without strangling her, if he had ever known what childhood was, or if he ever wept outside of prayer. I wondered if he saw my thoughts, as I had heard said of his kind.
“No.” His hands were dark, sun-beaten things, grey with calluses. I had seen him kill once with them, breaking a boy’s neck. In the old movies, that had always been something the hero could do to a foe of his, but I had heard that it took incredible physical power to truly do such a thing. Yet he had twisted the fair, bewildered face with the craftsman’s ease, and bereaved it of life as fast as a heartbeat. I waited by his side. He glowered at the DVDs for a few moments further, and then got to his feet. “I mean the children of sin.” He raised his face, his eyes meeting mine from under the shadow of his hat. “The intransigent agents of perdition. They are many, and we are few.” He looked over at the corpse. Then he smiled faintly. “For now.”
“Sir?” I whined vapidly.
“The sun is rising,” he murmured. He walked over to the corpse. “The wicked flee before its rays, while the righteous will sing the dawning chorus. There can be no escape.” He leaned down to look at the dead body, examining her face. “No escape.” Her face had begun to stiffen into a strange snarl, a posthumous defiance of her murderer. His smile widened, and he sang very softly, “He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword!”
Perhaps he was mad. I cleared my throat, and said, “Sir, what exactly do you need me to do here?” If he would have but let me leave, I would have thanked God Almighty and never blasphemed again. But he and I had known each other for a long time, and perhaps he saw me as a friend in some way, so that I would have been ashamed to turn away from him.
He turned and stared at me, the smile vanished from his face. He said flatly, “I need you to be here, Officer Eldridge. My work is not yet done.” He put his hands in his coat pockets, and looked at the darkening splashes of blood across the walls. “She died before I had the time. I would have saved her, but she did not listen.” Her limbs were crucified with bullet holes. “The debauched wretch thought that she might invoke her… rights.”
I shifted uncomfortably from one foot to another, conscious as I did so that no detail escaped his notice. “Sir,” I said tentatively. “You said that word strangely.”
He turned again towards me. The red-bearded face was inscrutable in its dispassion. “So I did, Officer Eldridge.” Everything he said was so crisp and clear: he spoke deliberately, as if he oversaw his words with rigid economy, and feared that he might go bankrupt. “I need you to be here because I must give a message to you.”
For a moment, I wondered about my wife, about my parents, and about my son. The thought of them being under suspicion filled me with a horror so strong that it rolled across my body and knotted agonizingly in my gut. My breath quickened, my body crouched ever so slightly. “I am all ears, sir,” I managed to say without a whimper or a groan.
The nameless man closed his eyes for a moment, in some contemplation. “We have known each other for some months now. You have aided me in the destruction of libertines and of sinners on more than one occasion, as you will well recall.”
A better man than I would have felt shame instead of relief.
“Perhaps you do not share my convictions,” he said, almost lazily, slurring the words together now and saying them faintly. “But necessity has made you my ally, Officer Eldridge.” He furrowed his brow as he spoke further, eyes still shut. “The world is changing, and the laws with it are changing.” He touched his pistols. “Leniency has begotten corruption. That must change.” He opened his eyes now. “This is but a small town, I know,” he continued. “We are no place of drug-peddling gangs or ruinous bawdy houses. Yet everywhere is the sneaking rot. I see the adolescent girls in their sluttish attire, and the boys with their idolization of drugged numbness.” The furrow deepened in his face, the upper lip lifting from his teeth. “We tolerate them for the sake of their rights, their individuality. We put the insidious conceits of a few faithless Virginians above the ancient laws that were given us. It shall not continue,” he snarled at the corpse. “The law of our people and the purity of our faith will be restored and will be united to a common purpose.” He grabbed my shoulders now, his pale eyes staring insanely. “So tell your police chief that from this day forth, the sinful of this benighted town must prepare themselves for Hell.” He raised a trembling hand and pointed down his finger at the girl that he had slain. “And I shall send them there.” As swiftly as it had appeared, the fervour in his face was extinguished, replaced by inhuman equanimity. “For every deliberate prevarication, a tongue will be torn out. For every wicked passion, misery. And for every defilement, retribution.
I considered his madness. I dared not to speak, but thought of the bright champagne that we drank on Christmas morning and New Years’ Eve, the thrilling flicker of cinema, and the glitter and insinuations of the advertisements that ruled the television. All would fade, for the hunt was on. Countless lunatics like this one, unleashed by the thoughtless mandate of a frightened and failing nation, were to shrive us. “May I ask, sir, why you killed this girl?”
He looked over at her with what seemed to be genuine regret upon his face. “She smoked cannabis, a vehicle of stupefaction and stupidity. She shut herself out the light of the Lord, so I shut her out from the light of the world. She would not listen.” He sighed.
I wondered how many harmless sycophants, foolish artistic dilettantes, and freethinking rebels he would murder before his work was done.
“Thus ends sin,” the hunter reckoned.
