I wonder if she would have become more responsible with time. I wonder if she would have rushed to me like that mother did in the grocery store parking lot, full of relief some agent saved me.
After returning home, checking on Maya- there is no sign of Tim- and showering, I make my way to work. No thought is given to makeup or brushing my hair. When I arrive at the FBI headquarters, the place is in chaos.
I gun right for Hazel’s office.
Hardwick and Royce are already briefing the Director. Several other agents are present, all wearing matching jackets like Tomlinson’s men did in Los Angeles.
As I enter, Director Hazel dismisses everyone but Hardwick. The small crowd shuffles out, closing the glass door behind them. Hazel stands and rounds the desk with an outstretched hand.
“Ramona,” he says, as I return the gesture, shaking his much larger hand. “Excellent work. Just excellent.”
“Thank you, sir. Just doing my job.”
Hazel releases his grip, and our arms return to their respective sides.
“Well, if that’s meeting the minimum threshold of performing a great service to this country, Agent Knox, I cannot wait to see what you do when excelling.”
I do not deal well with praise.
“Thank you, sir.”
Hazel shakes Hardwick’s hand as well, and he looks just as uncomfortable.
“Stephen- you have done remarkable work on this case, through all its phases. Knox may have made the actual break, but you made one too. What happened with Jim was unfortunate, but I haven’t forgotten your service to this agency, and your country.”
“Thank you, sir,” Hardwick says, looking at the floor as the men release their handshake.
“Now,” Hazel says, “I believe you have a suspect to interrogate. Meantime, I need to meet with Louis Rickard and Secretary Parks.”
“How is the family doing, sir?” I ask.
“Not well,” Hazel replies, “I am doing what I can to keep them apprised of the situation, but all this needs is to get out, and we have a city in panic.”
He returns to the chair, lowering himself into it; his mast in a storm, shaking this city up before it drowns us. We thank him again, returning to the hallway. Our feet move in tandem toward the elevator, where we must descend to the holding area on the fourth floor.
“Congrats, rook,” Hardwick says as I push the button to call the lift, “You keep making these breaks, we’ll take down West and his crew in no time at all.”
I search for hints of contempt or jealousy in his tone; initially, it sounds like he thinks of me as Hazel’s pet. In processing his words, though, they are filled with genuine relief.
Way to be a cynic, Ramona.
“Let’s hope,” I reply. The lift door opens, and we join a group of analysts on the way down, lowering our voices as the doors close.
“I won’t lie. Feels good to win one.”
“After all you’ve gone through, Stephen? Can’t say I blame you.”
The suspect, already identified as Patrick Barker, is detained on the other side of a two-way mirror. I recognize an older version of one of the boys in the Los Angeles photos, forever hung on the wall of my mind.
His eyes don’t look up from the ground. The blue hood sags around his shoulders. Well-kept hair and a shaven face aren’t the appearance of a criminal, but someone who blends into society, its darkest incarnation.
“So how you want to play this?” Hardwick asks. Apart from us, Royce waits in the room’s corner, arms crossed, a toothpick hanging between the teeth. Every so often, his gaze lingers on me too long.
I’m not a relationship kind of girl.
“I’ll talk to him,” I reply, not breaking sight with Barker. “That is, unless you’re itching to play Good Cop, Bad Cop?”
Hardwick purses lips, lethargically shaking his head.
“As you were, Knox.”
Entering the tiny room consisting of two chairs and a table, the cold air trapped within it might make my arm hairs stand on end. The expression on my suspect’s face does that for me.
There is nothing in his soul, just empty space where it should be. The eyes are dead. He does not shake or panic at the idea of going away forever.
It might be the only difference between him and I.
I drag the chair across from where he is shackled to his own, allowing its feet to scrape across the concrete floor. Looking back at the mirror, I can’t see Hardwick or Royce, but they can see me. That will see me through this conversation.
I lower myself into the chair, returning focus to Barker.
He says nothing.
I don’t need him to.
Not yet.
“Patrick, my name is Ramona Knox. I’ve been thinking of all the things I wanted to ask you on the ride over here. Why the world is so ridiculously screwed up, maybe. What the meaning of life is, you serving the Church and all. Maybe God has let you in on that secret already. Hasn’t said word one to me about it.
“But mostly, what I want to know, is what in the everliving fuck you people are reaping from taking children, Patrick. Children. Of anyone in the world, they have done nothing to you or Jordan West or any of your other friends.”
There is no indication he appears to be absorbing what I’m saying. I place elbows on the table, clasping my hands.
“Do you realize the consequences awaiting you, Patrick? Are you at all aware? Let me tell you. You will all be found, if it takes every last agency on Earth. Your stories will surface; the public will condemn you. The media will dig it all up, crucify you in the headlines. Like that? Little Jesus joke there.
“Then, will come the spectacle of your trial; whereby you will sit for weeks, being forced to relive everything. Being assailed with the photos and stories of your victims. Little boys and girls who did nothing to deserve this.”
His calmness unnerves my deepest reaches, but I must remain the calmer of us.
“I’m just like you, Patrick. One different decision, my life could have taken a much different path. When I was two, my father shot my mother, then himself. Bottom of a gravel pit.
“What I don’t tell most people, or even myself, Patrick? I was in that gravel pit with them. Only feet away. Don’t remember it, but when they found me? I was covered in blood spatter where the bullet came out the other side of my mother’s head.”
I have not let myself acknowledge that in a long time.
“Point is, Patrick, we all suffer tragedy. Some have it worse than others, but better things can come of it than this. You can help me. Jordan West isn’t going to protect you once you’re inside. You can bring Emily Rickard, and so many others like her, home.”
Something must prompt Barker to raise his head; finally meet my gaze piercing his hairline, for lack of level eyes to look into.
The words are slow, methodical, deliberated to no end.
“‘Fury is not in me. Would that I were as the briers and thorns in flame, I would with one step burn it altogether.’”
I immediately recognize the words as Scripture; not well enough to place it, but enough to connect it to those in the basement of a Los Angeles church.
If Hardwick has any intuition whatsoever, he’s grabbing a Bible right now.
“A two thousand year old book is not going to save you, Patrick. You will be federally tried, and we will push for the death penalty. You and your friends will forever be a shit stain on human history- unless, that is, you want to help me.”
Barker smirks.
“We are beasts of the sea, Agent Knox. We are fulfilling God’s will. Your threats are useless.”
He is not going to give me anything, other than regurgitating West’s twisted philosophy.
They are willing to martyr themselves for him.
Pushing back my chair, I tell Barker to think about it, walking to the door. Hardwick enters the code on the other side; within seconds, I am back with human beings who have souls, and grateful for it.
“Well, that we
nt fucking splendid,” Royce observes from the opposite corner, pulling the toothpick from his mouth, twirling it in his fingers as he talks. “Wouldn’t you say?”
I ignore him, still fixated on Barker.
“I want to know what Bible verse that was,” I muse aloud.
“Isaiah,” Hardwick says, snapping my gaze to him. Before I can ask how he knows that, the grizzled agent frowns. “Dad was a reverend.”
Interesting.
“That story true?” Royce asks, “About your parents?”
“Yup,” I reply, “I don’t need counselling, Ryan.”
“Need something, alright.”
“Ryan?” Hardwick asks, “You two dating now, or something?”
“I don’t know?” the detective shrugs.
“Nope,” I insist. “I’m trying to figure out where logic fits into any of this. Why go after kids? Why not the Catholic Church, or the priest which did it? God, I fucking hate this, Stephen!”
“Stephen?” Royce mocks. “What, you two dating now?”
“Shut up, Royce!” Hardwick and I bark in unison. The detective recoils, and says nothing else.
“There’s no logic here, Knox,” Hardwick says. “He’s not gonna talk to us.”
“Oh, he’ll talk. Just needs proper motivation.”
“Could always bring him a pizza,” Royce jokes, earning glares from both of us. No idea what has gotten into the detective, but I don’t have time for a manchild.
Leaving the holding area, Royce accompanies me into the hallway, visitor badge swinging wildly around his neck.
“Wait up!” he calls, matching my pace as I quicken it. I was always terrible at awkward conversations.
“So, do you want to grab some food later?”
I’ll say it again- I’m more of a one-night stand kind of girl.
“Think I’ll pass, Ryan.”
“Well, how about tomorrow? Dinner?”
Go away, a little birdie in my brain protests. Surrounded by agents passing us in the corridor from both directions, this is really not a conversation I’d have publicly.
“There are kids missing, Royce, unless you’ve forgotten.”
“Ah,” the detective chuckles, “I’m sure a couple hours- at …say, Viggo’s, around eight?- will prevent a huge break, Knox.”
“It might.” I keep walking, because it is the only method to escape unsolicited courtship by a mid-level city cop. Thankfully, Royce gets the point.
“Alright, well, give me a holler if you change your mind.”
The ball rising up my throat arrives at its choke point. I stop in my tracks, turning to face him in a crowded corridor.
“What is it with you? Are you so deluded, you’ve forgotten five minutes is the difference between life and death in cases like this?”
“I-” he begins; I have no intention of letting him stammer through some lame string of excuses.
“What happened last night, Detective Royce, was a one-off. A mistake. I don’t make many, but that was definitely one, which you’re doing a pretty good job proving.”
Royce cringes, and I relent.
Why am I such an asshole?
“Look,” I say, to the glares of colleagues whose names I haven’t been here long enough to learn, “Everything about my fucking life, Ryan, is complicated. Whatever you think might exist between us, only exists to you. Anything else would be a lie, and unfair to you.”
Frowning, the detective holds up both hands in joking surrender.
“Alright,” he replies, “Can’t blame me for trying.”
I have nothing to respond with, and tell him I’ll see him later. Leaving Ryan Royce in his cloud of sexual harassment and rejection, I don’t want to imagine this becoming a regular thing.
If it does, I might just move to Los Angeles.
Chapter Ten
Maya is awake when I enter the apartment, watching Wheel of Fortune. Times like this, I wish there was a pet to greet me. I’m not an animal person, but might have one just to say hello when I walk in.
Closing the door behind me, I kick off my shoes. Looking in the kitchen for any sign of Tim, I see none, and gravitate to my aunt, asking how she feels.
“If you don’t know the answer, dear-”
I roll my eyes, smirking, and take a seat beside her.
“I don’t deserve to know?”
Maya chuckles. “Worse today. My chest is tight.”
“Can I get you something? Herbal tea, perhaps?”
She shakes my head.
“I’m always sleeping now. I’ll sleep enough when I’m dead. Right now, I can just watch Pat and talk to you. God knows how much longer I’ll be allowed to do even that.”
All I can think of is Tim standing over her last night; her impending death making him hesitate. I push the image from my mind as Maya grimaces.
“I love you, Ro,” she says through a wave of discomfort, eyes fluttering.
“Shh. Don’t talk like that.”
Maya laughs, because we have never been sentimental people. She is scared, desperate enough to say it. The laugh seems to bring more pain than joy, failing to mask her underlying terror.
“You joke,” she winces, “but you have always been a daughter to me. I...never wanted children. I would have...never had one of my own. But from the first time...I saw you in the hospital, Ro, I was absolutely in love.”
I don’t want to hear this, but have no wish to interrupt a dying woman. The tube hanging on her upper lip seems darker, air force fed into her little body more lethargic.
“What happened to my sister....your mother; for so...long, I was angry. At her. At Daniel. For putting me in this position. Not being careful; bringing a beautiful baby girl into this horrible, twisted...world, and Daniel...doing...what he did. I blame myself, Ramona.”
I place my hand over where hers rests on the couch arm.
“You are the best mother ever. I might not have come from you, but everything I am is thanks to you. I wouldn’t be alive, let alone a fucking FBI agent, if not for you, Auntie. I owe you everything.”
Maya smiles, fighting tears before her chest tenses. She lurches forward in the chair, hand over her heart and I regret being so selfish.
“Auntie!”
I call her name, but Maya is out of reality’s reach. Cheeks darken, her temples bulge from the side of her head. She mutters for an ambulance.
Snapping out of panic, I bolt for the kitchen, letting the swinging door slam against the stove and fridge on respective sides. The air I pull along blows papers of my investigative trail aside.
I couldn’t care if they were set aflame.
“Come on, come on, come on,” I whisper into the mouthpiece. My prayers are subverted when, a second later, ringing in the receiver becomes constant; a tone which has no end.
“Hello?”
The sound continues before I realize it’s not coming from the phone at all, but the apartment itself. In addition to it, everything in my kitchen is stained a new filter of blue. At my feet, black flakes rise from the floor, evaporating around my knees.
Lowering the phone, I don’t place it in the cradle, but on the counter, slowly walking through the swinging door. Just beyond it, I am met with my reflection, whose stare I cannot meet; thus, I turn back to the living room.
In the armchair, Maya is frozen. The withered hand is still at her breastbone; something unnatural holds her in place. The flakes rise from her feet as well, forming triangles before evaporating to dust. On the television, Pat Robertson’s expression is frozen in laughter, conversing with people I cannot see.
Maybe I’m the one who’s dead.
“Hello, Ramona.”
The presence behind me is self-explanatory. Turning to face the apparition who has plagued me since I was five years old, I suddenly understand.
“What is this?” I ask anyway.
I want the man who calls himself Death to explain it to me.
“This,” Tim says, “is a chasm between the seco
nds. It is the entrance to the Arcway, and the end of Maya’s time.”
I scoff, saying nothing.
Tim continues.
“Believe me, Ramona. This is not what I want. It just...is. So it has been for every human being, since the beginning of history. We are fragile creatures, so wrapped up in delusions of personal significance, it is easy to forget.”
Walking closer, I ask if this is about Royce. I don’t know what possible cause Death has for the greenest emotion, but my accusation of jealousy flies off the mark.
“It’s not personal, Ro. I have never been here to interfere, but to guide you.”
“Why?”
“Pardon?”
“I want to know why,” I reply, “Why you give a damn. No one else does, least of all God. So unless I’m dead, there is no reason for you to be visiting me, is there?”
“What? Apart from the fact this is the case in which my own sister was a victim?” He chuckles at my realization he does in fact see and know everything.
“I used to be just like you. Cynical. Questioning. Alive, for one. But these...unexplainable events kept happening, until the point I was forced to take this position. And ever since, I’ve just wondered what kind of difference I could make, without breaking the rules that have long been in place for good reasons.”
“And what difference are you making, Tim; other than killing my aunt?”
Maybe I’m being too harsh. To correct that, I know I am, but there is no other possible way I can react.
“I didn’t kill Maya, Ro. Time, mortality, lifestyles. Those killed her. In contrast, I am mercy. Mine is the gateway to her next life.”
“Next life? What are you talking about?”
Shaking his head, the man who calls himself Death walks to the couch, taking a seat next to Maya’s still frame of agony.
I can’t bear to see her like this.
“There was this town... called Haven. I went there after my wife died. That’s where I met the last Death. He was a cruel being, intent on ending the world as we know it out of bitterness. Along with several others, we defeated him in his realm, called the Shroud.”
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