The mini mushroom cloud of roiling fire rose, and the skin of the corpses blistered and charred. One of them shrieked and tried to claw out of the pyre, but I shot it in the face.
The rest burned quietly. Yang made the sign of the cross, and after the fire died down, we left for the entrance to the old, abandoned ward.
***
Yang and I did not speak as we made our way through the quiet corridors of the hospital. Like the command center, everything was cast in the red glow from the emergency power system. We avoided several other dead, most in hospital beds, life support machines whining. Corpses lay across the stairway entrance. One man's genitals and eyes had been taken.
Yang pointed. "Up?"
"Yeah."
We climbed the stairs and exited on the third floor.
"This way," I said, walking toward the window leading to the closed-off ward.
Yang put a hand on my shoulder. "Wait." He stepped into the room first, shotgun raised. Something snapped under his shoe.
"What was that?" I asked.
"All clear."
I went into the room. Yang was knelt down inspecting small, white, roundish objects that were scattered on the floor. He held up a tiny sliver to his squinting eyes. "Pistachio shells? I found these at the pond, too. Right where Taylor's body was spread out under a maple tree." He dropped the shell, wiped his hand on his shirt, and stepped through the already-open window.
Before I made it through, a scream pierced the silence and a blur ran past. "Look out!"
I dropped the gas can, leaned out the window, and shot at the hulking figure running toward Yang. I wanted to shoot again but didn't for fear of striking the detective. He turned and fired his shotgun twice but the thing kept coming and plowed into him. I pulled my way through the window and ran to help. They were too far away and much too close to the edge.
I advanced toward the two sparring bodies. Yang's foot slipped backward off the edge, and he gripped the thing by its t-shirt. Just then it dived forward, sending them both cartwheeling over the edge.
"Yang!" The crash came a second before I made it to where they had fallen over the side. It was too dark to see the ground below. "Yang!"
The small door creaked open, and two eyes shimmered in the dim light for a moment before fading back into the darkness. I gritted my teeth and clenched the gun tight in my fist.
"I'm coming for you, motherfucker!" I charged for the door. From inside the ward, someone whistled an old Civil War tune, and the lyrics played in my mind.
***
I went in as fast, catching a glimpse of a hooded figure turning the corner. I paused for half a second, confused by the soft yellow glow coming from the kerosene lamps hanging in the hallway. I gave chase and when I turned the corner, my feet slipped on something wet, sending me sliding into a pile of body parts that littered the floor. From around the next corner, I heard a laugh fade into the distance.
"Oh Christ," I said, stunned by the carnage in front of me. I went forward slowly, stepped over arms, legs, torsos, and heads. I couldn't help but to step on them. The human remains were laid out like cookie crumbs leading me deeper into Hell. I followed the footprints, and by the time I made it down to the basement, I was covered in so much blood and gore that I could have easily lay down and fit in perfectly with all the discarded pieces.
As I entered the room with the false wall, someone whimpered. I placed my finger on the trigger, muttered a quick prayer, and entered the room.
A wool blanket lay propped up against the far corner in the shape of a person sitting on the floor, legs crossed. It had moved slightly when I had approached. Behind the huddled form, on the peeling plaster walls, was a painting of tiny stick figures hanging from a massive maple tree.
I slowly made my way over and reached out with my free hand to pull away the wool, letting it fall into a pile on their lap. The last of the cloth slipped away, and a woman sat there hunched over, head down, long auburn hair obscuring her eyes.
"Mary?" I touched her warm, trembling skin. Her head rose slowly, and I raised the gun toward her temple.
Her eyes met mine, confused and terrified, but then her face softened. "Jon?"
I lowered the gun and let out a breath. "Mary, thank god. I thought you were dead." The front strands of her hair had turned bright white and stood in stark contrast next to the rest of her auburn locks. "I'm going to get you out of here, okay?"
"He came and took me from your room."
"Where is he now?"
Her head turned toward the pitch-black opening in the middle of the broken wall. "Waiting for you."
I stared into the void, then said, "We need to go."
Tears welled in her eyes. She smiled, shook her head, then looked down at the blanket. "I can't go. He's got me."
I pulled the blanket away from her lap. A brown cardboard box sealed closed with red packing tape lay across her folded legs. She held it steady between her right hand and a bleeding stump where her left should have been. Bones protruded from the wrecked flesh. Satin bands were tied in a tourniquet around the crook of her arm.
Mary nudged the box with her stump. "It doesn't hurt anymore."
"My god."
Mary cocked her head to the side, her eyes appearing vacant. "I'm to give you a message, Jon."
"You're in shock. I have to get you some help."
"You need to listen."
I swallowed hard. "What are you talking about? Message from who?"
"From the one who understands," she said. "He wants you to take the box in exchange for his property."
"What property?"
"The saw. It's of the tree, and he wants it back."
The box seemed to bulge as if something inside was trying to break through. I said, "I know what it contains and I don't want it."
Mary laughed. "Maybe I'll open it then."
"No, Mary. Don't."
She nodded.
"I need to go now. Will you wait for me?"
She nodded again.
"Okay," I said then brushed back the strands of white hair and kissed her forehead. "You'll be okay. I promise."
It took every ounce of willpower to turn away from her. I walked slowly toward the tunnel, feeling Mary's stare burning into my back, and I paused…just a moment…before stepping across the threshold to face whatever fate awaited below.
***
Thirty-three paces later, I entered the hidden room where Taylor and I had first discovered the saw. Dozens of burning candles sat on the floor along the edge of the four walls. A figure with his back toward me stood in the center. Over top a black zip-up hoodie, he wore a Civil War coat with the collar propped. His arms hung at his side. One hand held Mary's severed wrist, and the other…the saw.
"Hiii, Jooon." The man's voice sounded like Jesse's grandfather, Howard Taylor.
I raised the gun and fired. Bullets tore through the man's back until the Glock's slide finally locked back, clip empty. He didn't fall. I let the useless gun slip from my fingers, then stood there and waited to die.
Back still toward me, he raised the saw above his head. "Goodtime wanted me to collect this for him," he said as his voice changed into one I knew well. "It belongs in his shop, he had told me. I was too weak, the power too strong, so I kept the saw for myself, not understanding what it would mean."
The man turned around.
I stumbled backward. "T-t-taylor…"
"Hey, gimp!" He moved closer, opening his arms for a hug.
"Taylor, you…you're dead. I saw your body."
He stopped three feet away, smiled a knowing smile, then shrugged. "I got better."
"You killed your family," I said. "You killed everyone I cared about."
Taylor raised his eyebrows. "Did I? That's a lie." He glanced at Mary's arm. "This piece doesn't fit." He dropped the arm, reached into his jacket pocket, and withdrew my copy of The Death Agreement. "But this one might."
I drew in a sharp breath.
Taylor waved
the Death Agreement back and forth. "I know your secret. Shame on you, Jon," Taylor said. Only now it wasn't Taylor standing in front of me in the trench coat, it was his mother, Mrs. Christina. "You should be ashamed," she said.
"W-w-hat the fuck?"
Mrs. Christina stepped forward and handed me the envelope. As she did, the figure morphed again, bubbling into Mr. Hunter. "Money doesn't replace a father," he said, waving his finger at me before changing into Tiffany. Her soft voice said, "Do you remember taking me out on Blackbird Bay, Jon? Why didn't you kiss me? I wanted to be the one."
Kyle's features pushed through, replacing his sister. He said, "When you hit your low point, I tried to help you. We were friends, too. If only you had let me help. You could have told me about the girl."
Lorie faded in, holding Little Jon in the crook of her arm, "Children stay young forever." She cocked her head and cooed down at her son.
Taylor reappeared in her place and laughed. "We're all so much closer now. You are family too, Jon. But you're not blood. That's why I couldn't saw you. I'm sorry you couldn't join us."
Taylor walked in a circle around me, dragging the tip of the saw across my midsection. I wanted to pull away but was somehow frozen in place, unable to move or speak. The teeth of the saw tore through my uniform, and I felt them bite into my flesh, scraping across muscle.
"The voices had said we would all get better if I removed the bad blood." Taylor tapped the side of his head. "I had it wrong. It wasn't the parts that were bad, it was all the excess. It's the parts that needed to come together. Tell me, when you look at me, what do you see?"
Taylor let the long coat and hoodie slip off of his shoulders, revealing his naked body beneath. The flesh shimmered in the candlelight as jagged lines appeared and crisscrossed his body, seeping a black fluid.
The true form stole my remaining sanity. Eight pieces: legs, arms, torso, chest, neck. They were all different parts of the Taylor family…and god help me, little Jon's tiny head lulled to the side, milky white eyes rolling back, and his blackened tongue hung loosely between tiny, toothless gums.
The lips moved, and Taylor's voice emerged. "Blood is the secret. Blood made us better. That's why the children I created tonight all died. They were tied by the bonds of military brotherhood, but they weren't tied by blood. No matter how many times I tried, I couldn't get any pieces to stay together. Oh, I wasn't the first to try either. The saw has been around for a long, long time, cutting and cutting until someone finally locked it away after the Civil War." The Frankenstein's monster-like corpse changed once again into Jesse Taylor. "None knew the secret to making things…stick. Now that I know…I can saw all the right pieces and make others. Just…like…me."
The saw tore deeper, and I felt blood running down my legs. "You can't do this. I'll stop you, Jesse."
Taylor laughed. "Stop me? Your parts are going to be used for the next one."
"No!" I screamed and pushed Taylor away. He swung the saw in an arc at my head. I slapped my palms around it, stopping it inches from my face. I fell backward, pulling the saw free of his grasp, but Taylor toppled on me, his body morphing into the jigsaw of corpses. Black gore dripped from his mouth into my eyes, and an inhuman voice boomed, "E pluribus unum!" Then the Taylor family screamed like a chorus of the damned, "Out of many, one!"
"Mary! Run!" I struggled to get my fingers around the handle of the saw and felt a power surge through me. Once I had a firm grasp, I ripped it from the thing's grasp. It tried take it again, but I slashed at its hand, severing three fingers.
Footsteps echoed through the dark corridor.
"Go!" I screamed. "Leave me!"
The thing that had once been my family looked up into the hallway and screamed. Liquid sailed over my head, covering the monster which morphed back to Taylor again, eyes burning with rage. The room that shouldn't have existed exploded in flames, and the thing tried to climb over me. I drew back my legs and kicked it into the fire, feeling the wound on my stomach rip.
A hand grabbed me under my arm and pulled me up the tunnel.
Taylor screamed and tried to climb out of the inferno, but I held him back with one foot. My pant leg caught fire and I wondered why I couldn't feel the pain.
"Joooooon!"
Someone continued to drag me further into the tunnel, and my prosthetic separated from my body. I felt a warmth spread over me and color faded from the world.
Taylor screamed and struggled, flailing to make it out, but the prosthetic seemed to have wedged against the ground, pinning him in the burning room.
After another tug up the tunnel, a deep cough erupted from my lungs. I screamed in pain and wrapped my arms around my blood-soaked midsection. Heat came not just from behind me, but from ahead, too. Black smoke flowed from both directions. The entire basement was burning.
"Jooooooon!" Taylor screamed. "Jooooooooon!"
"Wait," I said, remembering the saw. I looked at my bloodied hands, wanting to feel the power course through them. I tried to reach back toward the hellish saw but it was out of reach. "Goodtime," I said. "What about Alan Goodtime?"
The hands pulled again…and my eyes closed.
EX POST FACTO
On the last page of The Death Agreement, Taylor and I had added a section titled Ex Post Facto: Latin for after the fact.
Like the Preamble, this section had remained a mystery to us at the time. Like staring into a dark mirror, possible futures are in constant flux, and you can never be sure what will be thrown your way.
I had believed the Preamble would turn into a brief overview of the role other people play in the lives we live, but instead it became a warning to those who might read this tale. I apologize for that.
As for Ex Post Facto….Well, I still dream about meeting with Taylor's family one last time. I imagine they've all gone on to complete the wishes they vowed for themselves. I find myself talking with them, asking about life's simple joys, all the while I'm transcribing what they say into this section.
In one scene, one lost future, we're sitting in their backyard in the sunshine, looking out at Blackbird Bay, laughing together the way that only families can.
Little Jon bounces on Lorie's knee. Mr. Hunter and Mrs. Christina hold hands while they lie in matching lawn chairs. Kyle and Jesse are skipping rocks. Tiffany is building a house of cards on the picnic table. Even Howard Taylor is present, but everyone calls him Grampa Howie. He's a happy old man doing backstrokes in the pool.
It feels right. It feels like home.
But the smiling faces fade to terrified distortions as limbs begin to fall off. One by one, body parts drop to the ground until the Taylor family is nothing but piles of flesh and bone.
The pieces are still alive. Severed heads look to me with their dead, pleading eyes and scream out in soul-crushing pain. "Heeelp usss!" I stumble backward, slipping on blood. "Heeelp usss!" Others join their crying. Hundreds of voices, thousands, ring out from the dark. I see their faces on every surface, faint, superimposed shadow images. They beg for help, for salvation. "Heeelp usss!"
I back away faster, looking for an escape. The shouting continues to grow and resonate until I can't hear my own thoughts. The pain is unbearable. I press my hands to the sides of my head in a feeble attempt to block out the screams of the condemned, but it grows louder still, louder until I hear a ripping, and warm liquid begins to flow from my ears.
I turn in a circle, slowly at first, then faster and faster, desperately looking for a place to run.
When you're in Hell there is no place to run.
***
I woke drenched in sweat, heart pounding violently in my chest, and I realized I wasn't alone. A pale-faced, blonde haired woman lay next to me. Her naked body, partially covered by a white sheet, looked perfect and inviting. Frost-blue eyes fluttered open and met mine.
"Good morning, Superman," she said, and smiled.
"Morning."
She reached a hand over and scratched my back. "Sleep well?"
"No."
"Nightmare?"
I nodded. "They feel real."
"Shhh. It's over now. Relax."
Her name is Erika. We've been seeing each other for three weeks. This was the first time she'd slept over at my place, the first night she'd had to deal with the aftermath.
***
A lot has changed in the months that followed the events at Walter Reed. Within twenty-four hours of the incident, the base shut down under BRAC and control of the grounds was transferred over to the State Department.
Once the transfer happened, all information related to the facilities became classified top-secret and any requests for information were systematically denied under the umbrella of national security.
I've done my share of searching and the most I could find was information about the closure. There isn't a single mention of the dead or the fire. It has all been swept under the rug. Coincidentally, the names of several people I knew to have been killed that night at Walter Reed show up on the passenger list of a transport helicopter that crashed in Iraq.
I'm surprised Mary and I weren't on that list, too.
I was charged with several counts of murder. The FBI tried to get me to confess and to get Mary to testify against me. If either of us had cracked, I suspect some kind of fatal accident would have befallen us, but we were both smart enough to stick with our Fifth Amendment right to remain silent.
Whoever ran the conspiracy had decided to leave us alone. Maybe our disappearances would have caused one too many questions. Broken the camel's back, or so they say. Maybe something else was going on that we weren't aware of. In any case, testimony from us would have resulted in a one-way ticket to Spring Grove Mental Institution, at best. Since I had no desire to end up like my mother, no matter what threats the agents threw at us, I kept my mouth shut. Eventually they relented and dropped the charges.
***
Erika stroked my hair while I smoked a cigarette. Her soft caress relaxed the tension in my shoulders, but my heart refused to slow down. It was by far worst anxiety I'd experienced since that night. I was shivering like a dog in a thunderstorm.
***
Mary had used me for the story. It's difficult opening up to someone once you feel like your trust has been betrayed. She was sure that I wouldn't mind that she scanned the documents. She said that she would have told me as soon as I returned from Litwell's office.
The Death Agreement Page 10