Occasional Demons Page 16

  Dazed as he was by the punches he’d taken, Phil ducked just in time to avoid the knife. The momentum of his swing brought the Alley Cat’s knife arm around enough so Phil could grab him by the wrist and bring his fist down hard on the man’s forearm. With an animal-like hiss, the man wheeled around, but Phil dove forward, hoping to pin him to the ground. Phil watched as the knife moved in hallucinatory slowness, and he clearly saw that it was a switchblade with a six-inch blade, honed narrow and sharp—exactly what the coroner’s reports stated had killed the Alley Cat’s five victims. For a moment, the blade seemed to be alive. It kindled with a baleful blue glow.

  Phil drove his weight down as hard as he could on the man’s shoulder. If he could just get him down, he could disarm him and then finish him.

  But the man, small though he was, was wiry. He fought and kicked and scrambled beneath Phil like a wild bronco. His heels and elbows dug into the ground as he tried to get enough purchase to toss Phil off him. The Alley Cat’s throat made deep growling sound as he struggled. His heated breath, reeking of onions, blasted into Phil’s face.

  From behind him, Phil anticipated hearing Annie call out to him, if only to let him know that she was all right. Maybe she was being so quiet because she was too frightened to speak … or maybe the slash Phil had stopped hadn’t been the first one, and she was already dead. Frantic, he redoubled his efforts, hoping against hope that it wasn’t too late for him or Annie.

  Fiery rage swept through him. He cocked his arm back and drove his fist into the man’s stomach. The impact made a sickening squishy sound, and Phil felt an immense satisfaction when he heard the man’s breath explode from his chest. But it didn’t stop him as Phil had expected.

  What’s with this guy? he wondered. Is he even human? You can’t take a punch like that and not end up doubled up and puking.

  But the Alley Cat kept fighting, struggling to bring his knife hand around. If he succeeded, Phil knew it’d be all over for him and for Annie.

  As the man shifted his weight around, Phil reached up and grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him close, adding to rather than resisting the man’s momentum. They rolled over a couple of times in the weeds. Each time, Phil felt rocks and roots dig into his back and legs, but he held on until at the end of the third roll, he ended up on top. When he pinned the man’s shoulders down and got a good look at his face, Phil’s heart almost stopped in his chest.

  “What the— Richards!“ he shouted.

  He didn’t say anything else before Captain Richard’s fist rocketed up and caught him under the chin. An explosion of light and the sound of breaking teeth filled his head as he flew backwards. His arms and legs flailed wildly as though a giant had suddenly lifted him up from behind. When he hit the ground, the impact slammed the wind out of him. Before his head cleared, he saw Richards lurch to his feet and start for him. The blade of the knife in his hand glowed with an eerie blue gleam.

  “I suppose you would have found out eventually,“ Richards said. His thick voice was distorted, and when he spat, something dark spilled from the corner of his mouth and ran down his chin. He grinned as he wiped it away and straightened up. He was laughing softly as he approached Phil, the knife in his hand swishing back and forth. Its glowing blade left brilliant trailers across Phil’s vision.

  “For Christ’s sake—“ Phil gasped.

  That’s when cops make mistakes... Sometimes fatal mistakes...

  Phil was trying to orient himself as fast as he could. Behind Richards, lying on the ground, he could see Annie’s slumped figure. As he watched, she stirred and started to sit up.

  She’s not dead, Phil thought. Hurt, maybe, and dazed, but not dead.

  He had to live so he could save her and end this man’s brutal murder spree.

  “Now do you understand why I took you off the case?“ Richards asked. He chuckled softly to himself, a rattling, watery laugh. “Now you’re definitely too close to the case, Phil.“ He cocked his head to one side and spat out a wad of blood. “It’s your turn.“

  “You son of a bitch!“

  Over Richards’ shoulder, Phil could see that Annie was struggling to sit up. She moaned softly as she swung her head back and forth a few times as though trying to clear it. The sound drew both men’s attention. Phil saw an opening—his last chance—to rush the man, but as he shifted forward to position himself for the attack, his hand brushed against something metal that was lying in the grass.

  My gun, he thought, almost bursting out with laughter. His fingers wrapped around the handgrip, and he started to raise it. In the same instant that Richard sprang at him, he leveled the gun at him and pulled the trigger. Three ear-shattering explosions accompanied with three bright flashes of light punched the night. There was a high-pitched wail that was cut short, ending in a bubbling gasp as the bullets tore through Richards’ chest. The knife dropped to the ground as he threw his hands up over his head and did a quick, spinning half-turn before flopping backwards as though the ground had suddenly shifted beneath his feet. He grunted once—loudly—when he hit the ground. After that, he just lay there in a twisted heap, perfectly still.

  “Annie!“

  That single word tore from Phil’s throat, feeling as though it removed a few layers of skin with it.

  He ran over to where she lay motionless on the ground. His hands were trembling as he gently felt her neck to see if he could detect a pulse. In his panic, he couldn’t tell if he could feel one or not, and he told himself to calm down. It was over. The weeds cast thick slashes of shadows across her face as he leaned close and whispered her name in her ear. After a moment, she stirred, and her eyes flickered open. She took a short, sharp inhalation as she looked up at him, obviously trying to focus on his face.

  “...Phil...“ she murmured, her voice nothing more than a whisper. “...I...my side...it...hurts...“

  She coughed once, and something dark spilled from her mouth and ran down the side of her face.

  “You’re gonna be all right, baby. You’re gonna be all right,“ he said softly as he caressed her face. The wailing sound of a police siren suddenly pierced the night. “Help’s on its way, baby. You just stay lay there nice and still. We’ll take good care of you.“

  He sat back on his heels and looked from Annie to the silent form of the police captain, stretched out on the ground. His shirt had been shredded by the three gunshots, and gouts of blood stained his face and shoulders.

  Phil couldn’t believe that a cop—his boss—had been the Alley Cat. The knife he’d used, the knife he wanted to kill Annie with, lay on the ground, inches from his dead hand. Rage boiled like lava in Phil’s gut. Hurt and crumpled over, he moved closer to the man’s body. If he’d had the strength, he would have kicked him in the balls just for good measure, but he had to settle for placing his gun barrel against Richard’s temple and pulling the trigger once. The blast of the revolver shattered the night, drowning out, for a moment, the sound of the approaching siren.

  “You lousy, rotten, mother-fucker,“ Phil said, sneering as he hawked up and spit into Richards’ face. When the knife on the ground caught his eye, he bent over and picked it up. The instant he wrapped his hand around the handle, his eyes widened in shock. A low, humming charge ran up his wrist to his shoulder until his whole body started tingling.

  “What the fuck—“ Phil whispered as he raised the knife in front of his face and turned it slowly back and forth. Light from the nearby streetlight played across the metal blade. Strands of blue light deep within the metal twisted and turned, seeming to reach out and charge the night air with terrible energy. Phil remembered how the blade had glowed when Richards held it, threatening him, and he realized now that he hadn’t been imagining it. The light reflecting off the blade danced like tongues of blue fire. Thin lines of lightning twined snakelike from the tip of the blade to the hilt, shifting downward and encircling his hand with a warm, electric glow. The tingling sensation increased as Phil turned the knife over and over in his han
d, entranced by the sight and the feel of it.

  He was amazed how it felt so...so right in his hand, like...like suddenly his hand had had been filled...had been completed.

  For the first time in his life, Phil knew he was holding something special, something that he had never known was missing...

  Until now.

  The wailing siren was drawing closer, and Phil could see the flickering blue police lights as they rounded the corner onto Union Street. He looked from the glowing knife blade to Annie, lying still on the ground, and he suddenly understood. It wasn’t the man who killed.

  It was the knife.

  Leaning over Annie, he smiled a wicked smile when she opened her eyes and looked up at him. Her eyes had the glazed distant glaze of pain as she stared at him, but the thought that she might already be in shock and beyond any more pain that she might feel never even crossed his mind.

  All he could think was, I have to get the job done!

  He had to finish what the knife wanted finished.

  With a single, quick sweep of the blade, he laid Annie’s throat open from ear to ear. She made a strange gargling sound deep within her chest, twitched briefly, and then lay still.

  As he straightened up, Phil noticed that the knife was no longer glowing. The blue light and the strands of static electricity had faded, washed away by Annie’s blood. Now, it was nothing more than an ordinary switchblade knife.

  As the cruiser squealed to a stop near the vacant lot, Phil leaned over Richards’ body and wedged the knife into his cold, stiff hand. After wiping the blood from his hands as best he could on the grass, he walked with a stiff-legged lurch over to the cruiser as the two patrolmen were getting out. Both of them had their revolvers drawn and ready.

  “He’s over there,“ Phil said in a low, shattered gasp. His legs started to buckle under him, but he braced himself.

  “Who is?“ one of the patrolmen asked as he looked past Phil toward the weed-choked lot.

  “The Alley Cat,“ Phil said, drawing in a breath as the enormity of what had just happened started to sink in. “I—Jesus Christ, I got him. I killed the Alley Cat.“

  He took another, deeper breath that tore into his chest like razor blades.

  “But not fast enough... Not fast enough.“ Phil narrowed his eyes, staggered, and almost fell. “They—they’re both over there. Dead“

  He pointed weakly in the direction of the bodies. One of the patrolmen had a flashlight, and he switched it on and swept the area with the cone of light until he saw the dark depressions in the weeds.

  “She’s dead!“ Phil said in a shattered voice. “He killed her! Oh, dear God in heaven. She’s dead! Annie’s dead!“

  Every Mother’s Son

  I was there at the beginning—or at least the beginning of the small part of it that happened at the hospital where I work. What happened there was happening—is still happening—all around the country and the world, for all I know. There have even been reports of several instances in China but, naturally, they have been officially denied. The first physical hint of it that we got here in the United States was when that baby was born in a hospital in Oklahoma City. The baby—a boy—entered the world with everything just the way it was supposed to be except for one small detail: he didn’t have any fingerprints or footprints.

  When did it really begin?

  Who can say? If you listen to the pop-philosophers on the television talk show circuit, it started the day...the cosmic instant the scales shifted.

  Shifted from what to what?

  Well, just hang on a bit, and I’ll tell you. First, I want to tell you a bit about myself. Not that it really matters, but...well, if something does happen, I want all of this to be on record.

  My name is Judy Morrow, and I’m a nurse at Southern Maine Osteo., in Portland, Maine. I got my nursing degree from B.U.MedicalSchool some years ago. I guess wanting to get away from big city pressures is what prompted me to move to Maine. The simple...or, at least, the simpler life was going to be the key to my future happiness. And it was...for a while.

  The only opening I found was working the swing shift in the o.b. at Osteo. Since I always liked babies and thought I’d never have one of my own, I didn’t mind ushering the little sweethearts into the world. Of course, most parents-to-be have innumerable fears, both rational and irrational, but the vast majority of cases are absolutely normal, and so are the results of anywhere from two to twenty-four hours of intensive labor.

  …Mostly...

  I suppose it’s time to mention Doctor Thomas Jacobs. He was one of the residents—the resident, actually, who set most of the nurses’ hearts a’flutter whenever he was around. “A flutter!“ What a stupid word, but that’s the best I can come up with. The night I met him, after I’d been on duty only three nights, my heart literally skipped a couple of beats, and I was as tongue-tied as a junior high school girl with a mad crush.

  Look, I was young at the time, but I was a “city girl.“ I’d been around. I knew the score. But—damn! My heart did skip a few beats. I wish I could stop resorting to these cliches, but—really—that’s how he made me feel. I said I was young!

  Anyway, at first Dr. Jacobs—Tom—and I would just sit together now and then in the break room (the one with that cute little sign: “BEWARE OF STAFF INFECTIONS!“) and shot the breeze. He told me right up front that he was married, and I didn’t miss that gold band he wore. He told me how he hadn’t started med school until several years after college, with a stint as a medic during the Gulf War in between, so he was quite a bit older, almost twelve years older than I was.

  But like I said, I was a “city girl,“ so I thought that more or less evened things up. So what started out as just a doctor and a nurse chatting over a cup of coffee now and then turned a bit more serious—a lot more serious after a while. Long hours working double shifts—the usual pressures of the job, especially in those rare instances when “complications“ do occur—all of that more or less brought us together. After a while—hell, I won’t mince words here—Tom and I started sleeping together. Never at work, mind you...although now and then an empty bed in an unoccupied room got mighty tempting. Just a couple of times at my apartment on Montrose Ave after work...and once out behind the hospital in the parking lot one summer night. Steve Blodgett, one of the janitors, almost caught us that time. I teased Tom a lot about that, telling him I was the “kid,“ and he should have known better. And we laughed a lot … I remember that.

  Then...well, of course, we heard about that baby in Oklahoma City like everyone else did. Just the idea of a baby with no finger-or footprints was pretty freaky, to say the least. But when we heard more of the details, what was at first interesting or weird started to get downright creepy. Rumors travel fast in the medical field, and we started hearing things that didn’t get to the media right away, like about how the baby in Oklahoma City was...different.

  I know this sounds like something out of a cheap paperback horror novel, but word got around that the baby boy supposedly “looked“ dead. His eyes, so the rumor mill informed us, looked like the eyes of a dead person. Oh, he was alive, all right. Make no mistake. He ate and slept and filled his pants—did all the things a normal baby does. But the way some folks described it, he looked like he had no soul...like he was empty...the husk of a human being, but not the contents.

  Then reports started coming in from around the country. Soon, within a couple of weeks, we heard of nearly fifty cases of babies, both boys and girls, being born with no fingerprints, no footprints...no soul!

  Six weeks after the first one was born in Oklahoma City, we had one right here in Portland. Believe me, all the grist from the rumor mill and the sensationalism in the media didn’t prepare me for that baby!

  It was...cold!

  Now, back stepping a bit here, I don’t intend to analyze what brought Tom and me together. Chemistry? Pressure at work? Fate? Sure. And the problems he was having with Becky, his wife, certainly didn’t help, either. So it mi
ght have been all of these...some of them...or something else. Who cares? I do know what broke us up, though. It was when Tom found out that, after three years of trying, Becky was pregnant. Once that happened, he dropped me like a bad habit, let me tell you.

  Oh, yeah. It hurt. You might say I was crushed, but—hey! Be realistic, I kept telling myself. You don’t have an affair with a married man and honestly expect him to dump it all—lay his marriage, his life, and his career on the line for...for what, truthfully, had been just a couple of nights of fun.

  There’s this thing I’ve noticed about life, you see. You have to pay for your fun.

  Always!

  Like I said earlier, parents-to-be have all sorts of worries. Most of them, I know from experience, are absolutely groundless. But with everything that had been happening lately, and news reports of more instances coming up daily...well, Tom got pretty upset. No, that’s putting it mildly. He was in a state of near constant dread that his baby would be born with no fingerprints.

  The media didn’t help any. It rarely does. They’d picked up the stories from around the world and were running them for all they were worth. Radio and TV talk shows, and newspapers at the grocery checkout counters were the worst. Aren’t they always? They started in with explanations ranging from terrorist plots (after nine-eleven, people could believe anything) to pre-invasion tactics of the interstellar aliens to astrology and reincarnation.

  It was the reincarnation angle that got to Tom, and after listening to him, I have to admit that it kind of got me worried, too. We had stopped having sex together by then, but we were still friends. Many a slow night in the staff room we’d talk...and talk...

  And Tom told me he was convinced the reincarnation angle was the right one. That’s what I meant as the start about the “scales tipping.“ The basic thrust of the idea was that, with all the improvements in medicine and with life expectancy being extended well into the eighties and nineties, the Universe was running out of souls to be born. Babies, so the theory went, were still being born within the normal course of nature, but there simply weren’t enough souls left over to fill all these new bodies. “NOBODY IN THE BODY,“ as one banner headline put it. Fingerprints were like the souls’ identification card number, the cosmic bar code. There was no way to stop the babies from being born, so the cosmos or whatever just kept churning them out, but it had to leave out the contents!