The Spirit in St. Louis

by Mark Everett Stone

  Billings headed down the hall ahead, eyes wide and glassy, weapon at the ready. Slowly, slowly, each step carefully, quietly placed, he said, “What makes you think I’m a sociopath? You said something about evidence.” The glasses were once again perched on the bridge of his nose.

  “Your own words, Mr. Billings, about how you do not have emotions like ‘regular people.’ And your general impassiveness in the face of such a stressful situation.”

  Another grunt, which seemed to be his standby reaction to surprise. “Foolish of me. I must be off my game to be so clumsy. What makes you think I won’t smash these glasses to keep you quiet about the matter?”

  “That would be futile, as my program is housed in the amulet around your neck. The glasses are merely the interface, like a computer monitor. Albeit a powerful and sophisticated one.”

  One hand letting go of the AR-15, Billings fished for the chain around his neck until he pulled the amulet free. The silvery face was unadorned, free from engraving or embellishment. “How about I put a bullet through this, then?

  “You will certainly destroy me then, Mr. Billings, but perhaps a better idea would be to simply order me not to divulge the information. I am programmed to obey your orders and that of the original Ghost. Even better, you could order me to forget anything to do with your particular psychological impairments and I would.”

  “Humph. You shoulda told me that before.”

  “I did not think you would pose a threat. Tell me, is Director Bauer aware of your condition?”

  Once again Billings cocked his head to one side. “Of course.”

  “And he does not mind?”

  Billings stared at the amulet for a long time, face inscrutable as a boulder, before saying, “Yes, he does. The only reason he cleared me despite the mandatory psych screening is because I’ve never harmed anyone, despite my … tendencies. In all my life, I’ve never killed another human being.”

  “No one? That is quite odd.”

  “My mother discovered my … strangeness when I was eight, after the family cat went missing. The first real lesson she ever taught me was causality.” The big man clutched the amulet tight in one gloved fist. “Cause and effect. For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. Big believer in causality was Mom.” Eyes closed as if reliving a specific event, he sighed heavily. “So I learned to incite conflict. I knocked a lot of heads, but never threw the first punch. I put a lot of guys in the hospital, but never the morgue—that’s how careful I was. And I’ve always been careful. I was recruited by the BSI from the DEA and I was happy to join because it meant that I could finally kill things and even be rewarded for it. BB just made it clear that if I strayed from the path the punishment would be … drastic.”

  “Sociopaths generally lack that level of discipline.”

  A shake of a shaggy head. “Negative. Normal sociopaths do; they are weak-willed and self-indulgent. The exceptional ones, like me, are never caught.”

  Billings waited a while before Ghost Copy finally said, “What are your orders, sir? Would you like me to erase all memory of this conversation?”

  “I don’t know,” he mused, running the chain through his fingers. “It’s … pleasing to acknowledge all this out loud, you know? There are so few I can share it with.”

  “You can share with me.” It was a whispery sort of voice that entered the conversation, full of malice and darker things.

  The effect on the Agent was immediate. Weapon up, Billings had his eyes aimed down the sights and swiveled the AR-15 up and down the hallway, searching for something to kill.

  “I am no danger to you, Agent Billings of the BSI. We are, in fact, kindred spirits.”

  A rumble filled the air, low and deep. It took a moment for Ghost Copy to realize that Billings was growling. “Mr. Billings, you should be seeking cover.”

  “Hold a sec, Ghost Copy?” Billings subvocaled.

  “Yes, sir.”

  The whispery voice floated on the air like eiderdown. “You and I, Agent Billings, are cut from the same cloth, part and parcel of a dynamic whole. I am going to give you a singular offer that only someone like you can understand.”

  “What do you make of that?” The AR-15 kept swiveling, but Billings couldn’t see anything to shoot.

  “There is not enough information to form a hypothesis. To make a guess, that voice might belong to the entity that brought the Bureau to St. Louis.”

  Billings called out, “Where are you?”

  “Close by, Agent. Why don’t you walk down the hall a little ways so I can greet you properly?”

  Ghost Copy’s drone cut through the exchange. “Careful, Mr. Billings.”

  “I don’t have time for careful.” The words, while subvocal, managed to convey urgency.

  “Come now, Agent,” said the whispery voice. “You have my word that I shall not harm you. I merely wish to pose an opportunity.”

  Shaking his head, Billings slowly made his way down the hall, ignoring Ghost Copy as it implored him to explain the situation.

  At the end of the hall, Billings chose to head right, where the light was brighter. Soon he saw that the hall intersected another that followed the outside glass wall. A figure stood next to the window, silhouetted by the bright light shining through. It appeared to be a tall man sporting a top hat, a half-cape, and a cane.

  The figure doffed its hat. “It is good to lay eyes on you, Agent Billings,” said the figure. Its voice was no longer whispery, but deep and avuncular—the voice of someone in authority.

  Billings stopped, sighting down the AR-15. “State your name.”

  The top hat reappeared on the figure’s head. “What’s in a name? You can call me what you wish, as long as it is with respect.” Long arms spread wide. “I do not lie when I state that we are kindred spirits, Agent, you and I. We are both creatures of dark urges, beings for whom the world is but a playground. However, where you have been limited by threats of imprisonment, I roam free, able to force my will upon a pallid planet filled with sheep. In my world, causality is something I can choose to ignore.”

  “Mighty big talk from a man on the wrong end of a rifle.”

  Ghost Copy cut in, “Mr. Billings, I must urge you to not converse with this being.”

  “Shut up and stay shut up until I tell you otherwise,” replied the Agent. He waited a few seconds to be sure the Ghost copy complied before turning his attention back to the silhouetted man.

  “Oh, if it pleases you to shoot me, Agent Billings, feel free to do—” the silhouetted man began, but was drowned out by the clatter of the AR-15. Brass flew as Billings ripped through the entire clip, then changed it before the echoes faded.

  The only result was deep laughter, hinting at a terrible mirth. “I am impressed,” the man said, doffing his top hat once again. “You are a gem, a true gem, and that’s a fact.”

  Billing narrowed his eyes. “You the ghost that’s haunting this building?”

  “And what if I am, dear sir?”

  A grunt. “Just wanted to know. Don’t suppose I can kill you.”

  “That is a valid supposition.”

  He stared at the apparition for a few moments, head cocked to the right. “You said something about an offer.”

  The man began to walk forward slowly, as if approaching a strange and dangerous dog. “Yes, an offer which only a man of your caliber can appreciate,” he said. “A most wondrous offer, indeed.”

  Billings lowered the rifle, but kept the barrel pointed in the man’s general direction. “Go on.”

  Another few steps. “I know the pleasures you’ve never been able the explore, Agent Billings. The glory of flesh and razor, of knife and skin. Dark pleasures, for sure, but pleasures nonetheless. I have traveled to more places than you can imagine to work my will upon those who were weaker, to take from them the red joy, to revel in the fading spark of life. What do you know of such things, Agent Billings? You who have been hamstrung by society’s intolerance of our superiori
ty. What I offer you is to break free from the shackles of a hypocritically degenerate society crippled by false ideals and the suffocating blanket of political correctness.”

  Another step, then another. Slowly, slowly. The overhead lights flickered and died as he drew nearer, keeping the strange man’s countenance in shadow. “Come with me. Take my hand, and we shall explore together the blackness of our desires, the subtle yielding to the darkness and the joy that comes with complete freedom. Freedom from judgment, freedom from rules and false mores, and freedom from those who try to keep our uniqueness under lock and key when we should be celebrating those traits, displaying them for the world to see. Come with me and find a joy you have never experienced. I guarantee that once you have sipped from the clotted pool of your desires, there will be no going back.” There was a hint of a horrid smile from within the cloak of shadows, a slash of yellow white in the dark. “Nor will you want to.” As the last words left his mouth, the man stepped out of the dark and into the light of a bulb that did not flicker or dim.

  Billings saw his face for the first time.

  The AR-15 hit the carpet with a dull thud.

  A gloved hand rose, and the man caressed Billings’ cheek with fingers gloved in black kidskin. “Yes. You want my secrets, do you not? You want to join me. Take my hand and leave all else behind. There is nothing left of your old life that you can bring into the new.”

  The amulet slipped from nerveless fingers and Billings took the hand.

  Chapter Nine

  Ng

  Black Water

  A furry something slid across my fingers, shocking me awake, and then came a curious plopping sound as if a quarter dropped into a bucket of water.

  Darkness hit my eyes. I fought a moment of panic before realizing that I could handle the situation easily. I used the voice command for the DRAFTlite and subvocaled, “Nightvision.”

  And then I could see. Wish to hell I couldn’t, but there you go. Like the Rolling Stones sang, you can’t always get what you want. Craning my neck all around, I could see that I was surrounded by water, my little grassy hillock of land a pimple in the middle of tiny wavelets in a strangely placid ocean. I had maybe an eight-by-eight patch of uncomfortable dirt and grass to work with. Above, the sky was devoid of stars or any other form of celestial light, and that bizarre sight reached into my belly with claws of fear.

  What the hell? Where was I?

  I marveled at the blankness of the sky, its dark barrenness. After a bit of staring, I cupped a hand to my ear. My surroundings were oddly silent; only the faintest lapping of small waves disturbed the air. It was if my ears were stuffed with cotton. A lack of any sort of fishy smell that usually emanated from the ocean added to the air of unreality.

  I stood and took stock of my situation: weapons … all of them (hidden and not), spell gems … same there. In fact, everything was accounted for except for me in the real world of the Quint Building in St. Louis. Somehow, someway, I’d been plopped smack dab in the middle of a big wet nothing.

  “Good to see you awake, Mr. Ng.”

  My feet damn near left the ground. “Holy [BLEEP], Ghost, you scared the life outta me!” I’m sure my voice carried far across the waves. My heart hammered fast in my chest. It’s not often someone or something startles me, and I wasn’t used to the sensation.

  Ghost then proceeded to tell me he wasn’t Ghost but a copy created to give me a hand. Nice, but I could’ve used the more sentient version, considering my circumstances. I decided to call him Spooky. Seemed appropriate.

  “That’s all well and good, Spooky. Do you have any ideas on how I can get out of here?” The place was getting to me, filing across my nerves with a dull rasp.

  “May I take control of your glasses, Mr. Ng?” he asked, pronouncing my last name correctly.

  “Please.”

  And the strange world I stood in became even stranger. How do I describe what I saw when I couldn’t even understand it? The waters, at first black with gray highlights, became green. Not the green of string beans or lima beans, but an electric light green that shone so bright I had to squint. Yellow blobs the size of dinner plates darted under the surface with quick, jerking motions. The grassy knob of land I found myself on offered several different shades of blue from light to midnight, every leaf of grass a diamond-edged, multi-hued blade that looked sharp enough to slice gently falling silk.

  Fascinating as that was, the sky took all that wonder and smashed it flat. Black. Not the black of a cloudy night during a new moon, but the soul-sucking black that ate anything even resembling light. It looked like the forbidden heart of a black hole and it scared me off my feet. My knees hit damp earth with a startlingly loud thump.

  “Oh, my dear lord,” I whispered into the blackness.

  “Odd, is it not, Mr. Ng? You are seeing the world as a pigeon does, but there is no ultraviolet radiation from the sky, nor is there electromagnetic. It is if the heavens above do not exist. Most peculiar.”

  I held my stomach, trying not to vomit. I had been robbed of words.

  “Please regain your feet, sir, and look around. Perhaps there is a way off this small island.”

  Complying was the hardest thing I’d ever done. I wanted to weep, to throw my hands up in denial and despair. Years of discipline, first at college, then at Quantico so I could become FBI, and later at Coronado so I could join the BSI, left me in an instant.

  “Where am I?” I whispered, lost and confused.

  “Apparently we are no longer on Earth, Mr. Ng. As to where, I have no idea.” It might have been only semi-sentient, but Spooky sounded scared to me, its static-laden voice trembling.

  What kept me from losing my mind to the blankness above was the movement of those plate-sized yellow blobbies just peeking out of the water. One was swimming closer, spiraling around the tiny island, circling like a shark. Its slow, lazy progress in my peripheral vision compelled me to gaze at the greenly luminescent water. The dozens and dozens of other blobbies remained far enough away that the circling one was unusual enough to be notable.

  “Mr. Ng, please keep your focus on that circling object.”

  “What’s going on, Spooky?”

  “I am attempting a clearer visual.”

  Ultraviolet and electromagnetic was suddenly replaced by harsh black and white with very little gray in between. As for the blobby, it came to life as something both ugly and beautiful, a sphere the size of a basketball covered in what looked to be long, fine hair that undulated in the water in such a manner that I surmised that those long tresses were what propelled the creature.

  “What is that?” I whispered, drawing my weapon, a Mac-10A, and taking aim.

  Spooky answered, “It appears to be a large creature much like a sea urchin. Instead of spines, it has tendrils like an anemone, only finer.”

  Suddenly the vision kicked back to pigeon. “What happened?”

  “Conserving energy, sir. X-ray vision consumes an inordinate amount.”

  Ah.

  Holding the Mac-10A loosely, I waited patiently as the blobby spiraled closer and closer. Soon half of the creature was above the level of water as it hit the shallows. Its color went from yellow to orange, and the tendrils showed white with lavender tips.

  “A scavenger?”

  “Unknown, sir. It appears to be unafraid.”

  My mind cast back a few minutes to my moment of waking, the furry something slithering across my fingers. I examined my fingers where they poked out through the gloves at the first knuckle. Not standard BSI-issue hand wear, but I had an aversion to the loss of tactile sensation and Kal didn’t seem to mind. Nothing wrong with the skin or nails, so if it was one of the blobbies, it hadn’t bitten me. Perhaps a scout?

  When the hairy basketball came on land, it propelled itself with its hair-like tendrils. Those tendrils, roughly eight to nine inches long, probed the grass and dirt ahead of it before impelling it forward.

  Letting the Mac-10A swing from its lanyard, I k
nelt and pulled out a fingered glove from my belt (I couldn’t bear to call it a Bat Belt; I wasn’t a fanboy), removed the fingerless glove from my left, and slipped on the new.

  “What are you doing, sir?”

  I licked my lips. “Checking something out, Spooky.”

  “It is not advisable to touch the creature. It could be poisonous.”

  “In case you haven’t noticed,” I said, waving my fully gloved hand. “we don’t have much room to play with here. I want to know if our danger is immediate.”

  “Good point. Be careful.”

  Right. My hand forward, its fingers were a few short inches from the creature when the first tendril encountered the glove. Immediately a dozen started caressing the tips of my fingers, probing. Tasting? Whatever they were doing, their touch was light and feathery. Hair-thin strands wrapped gently around my pinky and thumb and squeezed. It was like shaking hands with a wig.

  Suddenly my hand was engulfed by the blobby, thrust into the middle of its spherical body, and dozens of pinpricks, needles of pain, shot through my knuckles. I cursed and shook my hand, but the blobby, which couldn’t have weighed more than a pound, pound-and-a-half, kept holding on. I pounded it into the soft dirt, over and over again, because the pain was getting worse—it was really starting to burn. I hammered it over and over and then the hair parted, moving aside to reveal an eyeball, a dead black orb like a marble, soulless and full of malignancy. I screamed because more blobbies were coming straight at me, coming to the little island, and soon they would be all over me, stinging and hurting. I did the only thing I could do because hammering it against the ground wasn’t cutting it: I lifted the Mac-10A and cut loose, ripping rounds through the black eye, through the heart of the beast. It hurt because the bullets slapped into me as well, tearing at the flesh of my hand, but the blobby fell to the ground and I hosed it, sending black blood flying, until the chamber racked dry.

  I stood, tears running down my cheeks and blood filling my glove, but the blobby was dead, torn to bits. It smelled like rotting seaweed and chicken feces, like corpses in the sun. An overpowering stench that almost eclipsed the pain in my hand. I didn’t want to look at my fingers. I was afraid of what I would see, how mangled they would be, but I could feel the blood leaving my body, so I did the only thing I could think of. With my good hand, my right one, I reached into my belt, pulled out a spell gem, and said the activation word, “FLOGDROPPING.”