by David Dwan
“Yes, sorry Father, yes it’s me. Didn’t hear the phone,” he said hurriedly. He knew Mendez was calling from the Vatican and he knew the priest would know why he had been so distracted.
“So, you saw the show then I take it?”
Show? Such a strange word for what he had just seen. “Yes, sir,” he replied. “I saw it.”
“Bastards,” Despite his position, Mendez had never been one for decorum. “We are trying to trace the location, we’ve narrowed it down to France, but France is a big fu...” He stopped mid curse, perhaps he did have a little decorum after all Ross mused. “Place.” Mendez finished modestly.
“You can’t believe it’s real,” Ross said.
“I hate to say it, Shane, but I do think it’s possible for things like that creature to exist. To be honest I’m in a minority of two or three around here.” Mendez said. “But if this one is real, then we need to find it, Shane. We need to get it back here to the Vatican or better still destroy it and end that accursed show.”
“Okay,” Ross felt a sudden stab of dread. Something was coming.
A week ago, when he had first been asked to review Winthorpe’s case and then watch tonight’s show, he had thought it was in a purely professional capacity. Ross had a degree in psychology and was about to take his PHD, all paid for by the church. So it was only natural to assume the Vatican wanted to combine the two. Their interest in demon time, and how it was recruiting its, for want of a better word, contestants, and Ross’ master’s thesis. Now though...
“Father, do you want my opinion on what’s driving priests to enter the show?”
“No, not exactly,” Mendez replied.
“Or the type of personality that would want to participate in such a show? So, maybe you could find out who might volunteer next?” Ross’ throat was dry again he tried to swallow but only succeeded in making himself cough.
“We know who’s going to volunteer next, Shane.” Mendez told him.
Ross could taste bile at the back of his throat now, his skin felt cold and clammy his hand holding the phone was sweating so much he feared it may slip from his grasp.
“We have a mole, right here in the Vatican,” Mendez said and Ross caught a hint of reticence in his voice which just made him feel worse. “A novice, who was selling names of potentials to the show’s producer. Even persuading the priest he had targeted to go on the show, to fight the demon! Despicable really, preying on the more vulnerable priests.”
“That’s terrible, sir.” Ross’ voice was barely a whisper now and he frantically searched his small flat for a waste paper basket, plant pot, anything close at hand he could throw up in if he lost his battle with the growing nausea threatening to overwhelm him. His eyes went to the bathroom door and silently he calculated how many steps it would take him to get to the toilet without ruining the carpet if he failed to get there in time. He didn’t like the odds of making it.
“It is terrible,” Mendez went on, his voice sounded to Ross like he was speaking from under water. “Anyway, we caught him...” Mendez stopped and Ross could tell he was trying to find the right words to articulate what he wanted to say next. “We have come up with an idea of how we can use him, to get someone we want onto the show.”
Now Ross knew why he had been asked to clear his schedule for the next few weeks. He had thought he was going to be asked to join some kind of taskforce or committee which was looking into the show and the effects on those priests involved. He had even imagined taking a trip to the Vatican as part of the assignment, but in the context of an expert not out in the field. Especially not this kind of field.
What was worse still, what he imagined Mendez had in mind actually made perfect sense. Shane Ross’ past was perfect for the show, he fitted the profile down to the last detail. When Ross was in his mid to late teens he had been a chronic drug addict, in and out of rehab and juvenile detention centres since he was fifteen. Then onto the real thing once he was old enough. He had been convicted of theft and GBH when he was seventeen. Eighteen months in Armley Prison, Leeds.
Ross inadvertently traced the old track marks on his right arm with his free left hand. Prison had been his saviour in the end. That was where he had found God, and kicked the drugs. He had thought the Catholic church had been his saviour, the light in those dark times. Dark times he had thought he had out run forever. But now they were right there on his heels once more, ready to push him head long into God only knew what.
Was he about to replace that old monkey he had so successfully kicked off his back with something far, far worse?
“Father, if I may say a word?” Ross asked softly.
“Of course Shane, anything.”
“Shit.”
“That’s as good a word as any son.” Mendez said with no little sympathy. “Grab your passport, Shane. You’ve quite a journey ahead of you.”
FOUR
“Just over twenty thousand, boss.” Davis’ assistant Tiff had her face pressed dangerously close to the screen of her IPad as she read out the numbers from tonight’s show.
“Did you lose your glasses again, Tiff?” Davis loosened his tie and opened up the top button. Now that he was outside, the balmy night air was making him sweat. Although it might also have had something to do with the three glasses of Champagne he had drunk.
“And my contacts,” Tiff replied almost proudly. Tiff was invaluable to Davis, at only twenty-two he had at first been reluctant to hire her, straight out of film school that she was. She had started as an unpaid intern (Davis’ favourite kind) but had soon made herself so indispensable Davis had been forced to hire her to avoid losing her skills. She was a natural producer, albeit a little too nice, but he would soon train that out of her.
Davis watched Tiff as she scrolled through the figures on her IPad. She was wearing tatty denim jeans and a Killer’s tour t-shirt that she never seemed to take off. Her unruly red hair fell down in front of her face in cascading ringlets. Everyone commented on just how attractive she would be if only she made a little more effort. But Davis liked the fact that she didn’t feel the need to use her looks to get a head. Tiff was all business and her scatty nature was all part of her charm. And something of an act he suspected.
She blew her hair from out of her face, not that Davis imagined that would help her see better, without her glasses or contacts she was as blind as a bat. “And we have another seven thousand who have already signed up for the repeat show.” She said.
“Next time we should up the cost of the repeats, Twenty Euros seems a little low,” Davis told her. Which won a none committal nod from the young woman. Still these were some very healthy numbers. Added to which they had the haul from the lottery tickets and a Five Euro charge for a short edited highlights show.
“Your car’s waiting, boss. I’ll make sure everyone’s packed up and gone.” With this Tiff wandered off in the direction of the last few vehicles left. These were mainly the construction team, who had already stripped and packed away the temporary seating platforms, PA and most of the outside Broadcasting unit. In less than an hour’s time, it would have been like they had never been here.
Except for the house, of course.
Davis felt a chill at his back and turned to look at the house, now standing all on its own in the middle of the field. It was a strange sight, a ramshackle haunted house out here, like it had been dropped from the sky by the Devil Himself. He moved a little closer and the warm night air began to cool with every step he took towards it. Davis stopped some twenty yards from the structure when he realised he could see his own breath.
The house would sit there until the morning, even after the creature inside had been incapacitated and shipped away to a secret location literally only four people knew of. No one, not even the hardest of the construction crew would go near the place in the dark. Not when the demon had been so recently in residence and Davis couldn’t blame them. The place simply radiated evil.
Like everything else, the house was a set
, especially made to strict specifications. It boasted fifteen remote cameras, which Miller and his team could control from the safety of the outside broadcasting studio. Every possible exit had a series of small metal charms nailed to it, strange runic symbols charged by magic Davis had no comprehension of.
The walls of the structure looked like they were made of wood, but were in fact thick steel sheets, dressed to look like old wood. All part of the grand illusion.
The house was, by necessity the most expensive part of this whole circus, it had a specially hired crew who attended the cameras inside and struck the set, once it had been warmed somewhat by the following day’s sun. It was getting harder and harder though to find crew members who were willing to attend the place. Those who did brave the deconstruction of the house were considered fucking rock stars in the eyes of the rest of the production.
Forget Dex Dexter, he was just another prop to them. No, the ‘demon crew’ were the real deal. Even Davis himself was somewhat in awe of them, although the attrition rate was getting to be a problem. No one was ever harmed by the job, no physically, not yet, but if you ever had the misfortune to catch the look into a demon crew member’s eyes. It was enough to give you a sleepless couple of nights.
Rummaging absently in his trouser pocket, Davis felt the small tin box he always carried with him. He took it out and turned it over in his hands. Such a small thing, nothing remarkable in its design, just a little bigger than a match box. But the small piece of parchment it housed was the key to the whole show. Davis opened it, but didn’t take out the folded piece of paper inside, not yet. Besides, he had read the text it contained so many times, over the months since it came into his possession, that he could recite it by heart, although he never did. That could be suicide.
The ancient words had to be read, exactly as written down to the subtlest of syllables, or for want of a better phrase, all hell could break loose. Well one of its creations to be more precise. On the paper was an incantation that kept Mister Minx compliant. If the creature was awake, as it was now, the words were like some obscene lullaby, once spoken the creature would crawl obediently into its specially constructed box. And conversely, the exact same incantation would wake it when the box was once again placed in the house ready for the next event.
Minx called the box its coffin, that was how they shipped it from show to show. Again, that task left to two members of the demon crew. They would draw straws for the dubious honour of shipping the monster, for which they got double pay. But anyone unlucky enough to win that little lottery would give the bonus, plus their pay check and no doubt a generous IOU to anyone willing to take on the task. Inevitably though every time they would try this, friends would become strangers until the job was done.
FIVE
Such a strange turn of events, Davis mused. Was it really just over twelve short months ago that he was bankrupt? (Morally as well as financially if he was honest.) Holed up in some seedy London hotel wallowing in his own self-pity, waiting to reap all the pain and misery he had caused throughout his cursed career. Michael Davis, that Michael Davis had been little more than a pornographer back then. A peddler of some of the most degrading filth imaginable.
It hadn’t always been that way. When he had started his film career, back in the late nineties he had dreamt of being the next David Putnam. But as it turned out he had neither the know-how, contacts, or to be fair the talent to realise that particular dream. The films he had managed to scrape together were low budget affairs, nasty little horror flicks with increasingly violent and sexual themes.
So, gradually as his debts rose and his reputation plummeted, Davis’ productions had become little more than torture porn. Some towards the end quite literally so. It still made him shudder when he thought back to the depths he had sunk to make a quid or two.
The lives he had forever tainted because of their involvement in his obscenities. Bright eyed young starlets reduced to the most depraved of barely legal acts that towards the end even he couldn’t stomach to watch.
So many damaged lives, so much money owed to some of the lowest most violent scum Europe could offer. It all had a sickening inevitability to it. He deserved his fate, Davis had fully accepted that.
He had been expecting a hitman to come creeping into his room one night, but what he got was in fact the most unlikely key to his salvation. The irony was so thick you could choke on it if you weren’t careful. In the end it was Mister Minx who had come to despatch him that night, conjured up by whom Davis didn’t know. Not that that really mattered in the end.
He winced inwardly as he remembered that night and how Minx had been taunting him with the drawn out sadistic luxury of a thing with all the time in the world to carry out its mischief. That in the end had been the creature’s own down fall.
Davis it turned out had been little more than live bait for the demon. In truth he had little recollection of what had happened when the trap was sprung by that crazy German, Hauser. One second the monster was on his chest promising all kinds of hell to come, the next it was on the floor writhing in pain.
Apparently, the German had been tracking Minx’s creator, waiting for him to strike. It was something he did from time to time when he got wind of such an abomination to come. ‘Which is more often than you would like to think’ he had said.
Then as Davis had sat draining a newly opened bottle of whiskey with the German whilst watching Mister Minx gradually stop fitting and slip into a coma on the floor of that non-descript hotel room. An insane idea began to form in his fear addled mind.
“What are you going to do with it?” He had asked.
“Fuck knows,” the German replied. “I hadn’t expected it to last this long. They have usually exploded or something by now.”
“Can you control it?”
This had won a look of suspicion from Hauser. “I can, why?”
At the time Davis had no clue what he was going to do with the thing, but he knew this was a sign, a demonic gift horse if you would. And he wasn’t going to look it in the mouth (Once was enough for that as it was sitting on his chest promising pain and lots of it.) The plan would come in time he knew that.
It had been the German who had given Davis all the paraphernalia he needed to imprison Minx, at a hefty price of course but the man had nearly bitten his hand of at the offer.
After all like he had said, he didn’t know what the hell he was going to do with the creature as it was, now that it hadn’t just up and died as he had expected it to do. So after half a bottle of cheap booze they had agreed it was a win-win for both of them.
And so thanks to that unlikely visitor and fifty grand of stolen money, Michael Davis got the biggest break of his life. A second chance, not at redemption, Christ no he was too far gone for that. No, a second chance to have it all.
“Life on a knife edge is better than no life at all,” Davis said out loud as he thought about how things were now. His life was still far from easy, there were still those who wanted him dead, or damned, or both and he would certainly never be respected as a broadcaster and entertainer. But as tonight’s figures showed, what he could be was rich. And on the balance of things he would take that above all any day.
He felt the front door of the house open before he heard it. And his fingers instantly tightened around the box. With all the lights in the house turned off, it was pitch black inside. Davis instinctively scanned the threshold for the charms, which he could just about make out nailed around the door frame. He was safe enough, but still he held up the box like a priest might hold up a crucifix in the presence of vampires.
A moment past, then a small bony hand curled its fingers around the door, and then Mister Minx’s face appeared out of the darkness, lit only dimly by the security lights dotted around the high chain link fence that surrounded the field. Its black soulless eyes narrowed all the same and the creature retreated slightly from the light so only half its face was now visible behind the half open door. A small mercy Davis was
glad of all the same.
“Good show tonight,” Davis blurted out and instantly cursed himself.
“Let me go,” it sighed.
“Fuck,” Davis hissed through gritted teeth. That voice. The words cut right through him it felt like physical assault. Whenever the thing spoke to him directly, no matter how softly the words were spoken. He found himself taking a sharp intake of breath like he had been sliced with a razor.
“You have my word,” the creature continued. “I won’t seek vengeance for all this, this... Humiliation.”
“Soon,” Davis lied then was cut off by a hideous hocking sound as the demon spat out a mouthful of God only knew what. The dark phlegm instantly evaporated as it crossed the line of charms at the door.
Davis lowered the box, but kept his hand by his side, taking comfort from the power it held over Minx.
“Look what I’ve become,” Mister Minx lamented. “My kind shouldn’t last this long. I should have returned to smoke and misery long ago. I am a travesty.”
No argument here, Davis thought.
“It’s time for you to go to sleep, Minx,” he said. “The next show should be in a couple of months or so.”
The creature moved to speak again, but seemed to think better of it. It slipped back into the darkness of the house and the door gently shut a moment later.
Davis exhaled in relief. It had been hard not to run off screaming during that little exchange. His head was pounding from the sheer effort and it was only now he realised he was shaking. With cold or fear he didn’t know.
“Boss?” It was Tiff. Davis turned away from the house and instantly felt a little better, he could still feel the thing looming over his shoulder, but its hold on him along with that of its sole resident wasn’t as nearly as strong when it was out of sight.
“Tiff?” He had to shout, the woman was standing over by the open gate of the security fence which now surrounded the house. Davis saw she had managed to acquire an ill- fitting pair of glasses from somewhere, still he could see her squinting at him from there.