A Friend of the Devil

by David Beers

  Something might look back one day, Abel had said.

  Emi didn’t pause for another second. She simply reached forward to the glass and drained it.

  Twice more before passing out. Emi slept like the dead.

  Vince sat on his back porch. The television was on inside, and the door cracked so that he could hear the news. The last half hour, they’d finally stopped talking about the murders.

  He’d switched it to a national channel, wondering if they’d gotten hold of the story yet. Fox News and CNN weren’t running anything on it, and—

  See, Vince. I told you. I told you I’d take care of it. There’s nothing to worry about here.

  It was nearing 1:00 in the morning and Vince had gone outside to sit. It was cold, but he’d went anyway, bundling up in a coat and gloves. He hoped the cold could keep the voice at bay, at least for a few minutes.

  Things had … deteriorated.

  And that was saying a lot, given how far he’d already descended.

  Vince stared out at his black backyard. The neighborhood was silent except for the television humming inside his house.

  He just needed to focus for a few minutes. He just needed to keep the damned voice away for 10 minutes, and then he could get a plan together.

  Vince understood that’s what he needed: a plan. It didn’t have to be intricate or long term. It just had to get him through tonight. A few more hours, and then in the morning, he would end all of this.

  It was today that changed his mind. The FBI showing up.

  Only Vince wasn’t concerned for the reasons one might think. The FBI coming to speak to him—calling the governor and then moving through the entire building—that was serious. It meant he might be caught for the things he’d done. That was reason enough to turn himself in, yet Vince sort of believed the voice when it said it would get him out of trouble. He didn’t understand how the voice could do it, nor why he believed it … only, the voice had been in control a lot, and every time it took over, Vince made it out safely.

  Today, even.

  Vince hadn’t said a word to those two FBI agents. He hardly remembered the conversation, only bits and pieces as if it’d been some wild, drunken night.

  The voice had taken over.

  The voice had promised to help in any way it could.

  And then, the voice had given at least some control back to Vince. A measure of control, as Vince now thought of it. Not completely, because the voice didn’t want …

  The cold weather was focusing his mind some. His hands were shaking and his teeth starting to chatter. Vince could freeze to death if he did this all night, but he only needed the plan. A small one. A short one.

  The voice didn’t want him to be in complete control, probably for this exact reason. Because it might be able to trick Vince, might be able to take over as long as it had a foothold. Vince didn’t know what the voice was, whether long held insanity that had laid dormant in his mind, or fucking aliens from another planet.

  He didn’t care anymore, either.

  The FBI showing up today had showed him that this was going to escalate. Career, future, all of it could be damned. In his lucid moments—which were growing further and further between—Vince understood that he could compartmentalize it somewhat, because he didn’t actually remember most of his actions. The voice had been in charge, bearing the brunt of the true ruthlessness.

  The FBI had changed his mind, because the voice wanted that woman. Special Agent Emi Laurens of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. It wanted her worse than it had wanted either of the other two … and …

  It’s insanity. You’ve lost your mind and you have to keep yourself sane long enough to get a lawyer tomorrow. First thing in the morning, you get a lawyer, and you tell him what is happening. You tell him about the murders, the voice, the whole thing, and then you go to the police.

  Vince could go now. He knew he could simply call the numbers the agents left with Sherry, or simply dial 9-1-1, but … Self-preservation came in. He knew enough about law enforcement to understand that they wouldn’t be on his side. That anything he told them would only be used against him. He didn’t know what was going to happen to him once he admitted to all of this, but he wanted his best chance at having some sort of life. Going straight to the police … It wouldn’t bring back those already dead, and might end with a needle in Vince’s arm.

  Tomorrow morning, he’d get a lawyer, and he’d tell all.

  What if the voice doesn’t let you? What if you call the lawyer and it simply takes over, saying it’s a wrong number?

  That was a good question, and one Vince couldn’t guarantee would not happen.

  A letter, he thought. You write a letter tonight and then tomorrow it won’t matter what happens in the office. You hand the letter to the lawyer, and even if the voice does take over, you’ll have that.

  Vince couldn’t see the holes in much of his logic, though they were there. His mind was too wrapped up in keeping the voice away, just for a little longer. Just until he could get to the lawyer.

  Vince stood up and went inside. He grabbed a yellow notepad and a pen, and walked back outside, to the cold outdoors.

  He leaned over the patio table, his shadow casting across the page. Vince started writing.

  My name is Vince Demsworth and I murdered two families over the past month. The name of the last one is Corinth, and I’ve forgotten the name of the first. I never knew either family, though they both worked in the same building I do, and that’s how I first saw them.

  I need to say up front that I didn’t do this, at least not in the sense that you’re probably thinking. There is something inside me, a voice that is propelling me forward. I don’t remember much of the crimes, because I wasn’t actually in charge of my body when they happened. If that’s hard to believe, I understand, as it’s also hard for me to write.

  An FBI agent named Emi Laurens is investigating this crime and she is in danger. The voice inside my head wants her, and I feel that if I am not detained soon, I will be forced to act in ways that are detrimental to her health.

  Detrimental.

  Detri.

  Detrimental.

  I like that word. It’s a new one.

  Deettrriiimmeennttaaall.

  Detrimental to her health.

  Yes, that’s exactly right. You will act detrimentally toward her health, Vince. That’s what we want to do. We don’t want to kill her, though. No, no, no. She’s not to be an Altar, but a Vessel. She’s to be like you. You, me, and Emi. She’s been touched. You can feel it too, can’t you? Sure you can. Emi Laurens has been touched and so what we can do with her is going to be much more exciting. We can give real glory to the Master. Yes, yes, yes.

  No need to write this letter. No need to do anything, Vince, except give that glory to the Master by taking another Vessel. By being detrimental to her health. By using her to kill, to cut, to create Altars, because it’s in those moments that we’re free and the being who cast us all low sees his creation is nothing.

  Yes, yes, yes.

  No letter.

  I’ll take care of everything. I’ll make this all go away, and I’ll let us have some real fun, Vince.

  Just trust me. Just put this pen up and burn this paper in your sink. Wash the ashes down the drain and we’ll keep playing by the RULES. By the RULES, Vince, just so long as we can have her. Touched, touched, touched, and that’s going to open up a world of possibilities for us, isn’t it?

  Yes. Yes. Yes.

  Let’s go to sleep.

  Lots of work to do tomorrow.

  We don’t need this letter.

  Chapter Seven

  Abel stood at the side of the common area, looking out the window. The television was on behind him and some of his ‘roommates’ were watching it. Abel didn’t know any of their names and they, of course, didn’t know his.

  Abel was looking out the window, but very few thoughts were going through his head. He was in a perpetual state of fe
ar, and had been for the past two days. Two weeks had passed since the dead started talking, and he’d been practicing his ‘three days off, a few hours on’ routine in regards to sleep, but he knew that wasn’t satisfying them. They had more to say, wanted more time, and Abel thought they were nearly finished dealing with him in his dreams.

  And that meant a few things were about to happen.

  One, Abel would see them when he was awake.

  Two, eventually others would notice how he acted … and finally the Ambien.

  The dead would have their say, then—Abel knew that far too well.

  He’d managed to keep everything on an even keel for the most part over the past two weeks, enough so that Geoffrey hadn’t come to him and started asking more questions. Even if Abel could keep this routine up, they wouldn’t let him. The dead.

  Abel was listening to the world around him, paying attention to things that shouldn’t be there, but suddenly were. The yard outside was empty, and that was good. When the dead came, they didn’t care where he was or what he was doing. The empty yard outside or the bathroom, it was all the same to them.

  He heard a new pair of footsteps treading through the room behind him.

  There was a harder click to them, and Abel heard it well. They weren’t the soft echoes of tennis shoes, but rather someone with soles made of a much harder substance.

  Abel swallowed, still staring outside.

  He saw someone walking across the dead grass, knowing immediately who they were.

  She was naked, her skin as white as porcelain. Her ribs jutted out as if they might crack through her skin at any moment. Her stomach was sunken in and her breasts nonexistent. The flesh on her neck was tight, sinking deep into her collarbones. She walked with arms that looked far too long, her thinness causing the deception.

  The woman went to the middle of the field and turned so that her emaciated body faced Abel, a tiny tuft of dark groin hair visible from where she stood.

  She lifted one rail-thin arm up and pointed at Abel, though he knew that wasn’t what she meant. She wasn’t pointing at him, but behind him.

  To the person who had made the hard clicking on the floors.

  Because that wasn’t a patient, orderly, nurse, or doctor.

  That was the dead, ready to spread their curse as had been their right since Abel was born.

  The dead woman just kept pointing. She had no eyeballs in her head, just black holes that looked endlessly forward.

  “Mr. Ease,” the man behind him said, his accent heavy. Sometimes the dead had accents and sometimes they didn’t. Sometimes they knew his name, and other times they never spoke at all.

  The man behind him cleared his throat, as if trying to get Abel’s attention.

  There wasn’t any real sense in continuing to stare forward. He knew that. It wasn’t like looking out the window would change anything; the dead would hold a parade outside if they wanted. That was the point, despite what Abel attempted, there wasn’t really any hiding from them. He could stay awake, drink coffee, even smoke meth if he wanted … and in the end, the curse held. The dead came.

  He turned around.

  The Jewish man was wearing a Nazi uniform, which explained the hard clicking on the floor. The black boots shone in the fluorescent lights hanging above.

  “Mr. Ease, you’ve been avoiding our calls,” the dead man said, his accent sounding heavily European to Abel’s ears. He knew his family’s history, knew why these apparitions were here, but he knew hardly anything of Germany or Austria. He’d never been. He would never go. He would never leave the confines of Sunny Acres.

  This man here didn’t care one whit about that. Neither did the woman outside.

  “We’ve been patient, but we can be patient no more.” The last word was clipped and harsh.

  Abel looked away from him and walked across the room. He pulled a paperback book out from his back pocket, then sat down in a chair. He cracked it open to the bookmark, and tried to start reading.

  The hard clicks of the dead man’s shoes echoed through the silent room as he followed.

  “You cannot run. You know this.”

  Abel did. He was only trying to ignore it for as long as possible, because even this was better than the Ambien. Better than unending sleep where you were forced to watch these creatures forever and ever.

  “Okay, Mr. Ease. We have tried to work with you. We have tried to be reasonable. But such things aren’t possible with your kind. They never were.”

  Abel didn’t look up as the man walked around to the back of his chair, he simply stood and started going toward his hallway. He would get to his room. He would deal with this there.

  He didn’t look at Geoffrey who was talking to a nurse, only hoping they wouldn’t notice his speedy gait.

  Abel almost made it.

  His foot had just hit the hallway—nearly out of anyone’s view—when the dead man reached for him.

  He grabbed Abel by the hair and ripped him backward. Abel’s feet slipped out in front of him and he hit the floor, the dead man whipping around on top of him; he moved like a spider rapidly embracing its prey.

  “OHHHH, MR. EASE—WHY ARE YOU FIGHTING?” the dead man shrieked. He pressed his face close to Abel’s, his nose like a needle jutting out from his bony face. “Now you will see what it was like for us. For all of us!”

  His breath smelled of maggot infested meat. Something left to rot in the sun’s scorching heat.

  Be calm, Abel thought. Just be calm and maybe the staff won’t notice.

  Someone yelled from across the hall, though. Maybe Geoffrey, maybe another nurse.

  And the dead man’s breath caused Abel to gag. The dead man’s hand flashed upward to his mouth.

  “Eat this, Nazi!” the skin wrapped skeleton shouted, then shoved something sour into Abel’s mouth before closing it with a click of his teeth. Abel heard footsteps falling, people rushing to him, but they were too late.

  The sour pill had popped and fire lit in Abel’s throat, rushing down to his gut.

  Be calm, he thought. It’s all in your head, just be—

  But the flames exploded in his stomach and his teeth clamped down hard on his tongue, blood spurting out through his teeth and onto his chin.

  The dead man reared back, shrieking laughter from his black mouth like some hellish ghoul.

  Hands were touching Abel, even as his body started twitching across the floor and white foam spewed from his mouth, mixing with the blood already dripping down his chin.

  Abel lost consciousness as the orderlies grabbed him, hearing the dead man’s shrieks as he went under. Howling as if this was the funniest thing he’d ever seen … in either life or death.

  The Ambien came then. Full dose every night, and Abel got at least his eight hours in.

  Sometimes more.

  Each morning for a week, he woke up gripping the sheets and staring straight up at the ceiling above. His mouth would be twisted in a horrible snarl, yet no sound escaped his lips. His eyes bulged from their sockets like tiny, white melons. Finally, after a minute or so, his hands would relax and the fear paralyzing his body slowly alleviated.

  He would simply lay there, staring at the ceiling, a man unable to shake what he’d seen the night before.

  The dreams had been going on for far too long at this point. He was ending his third week, and they usually lasted only two.

  The human mind wasn’t meant to take this much, and the dead knew it. The reason his father had snapped was due to the years of abuse. Even so, the dead had never come at him for three weeks in a row—at least as far as Abel knew. They’d ground his father down over time.

  They wanted to make it last.

  Yet this was different, because the dreams weren’t ending.

  “How is the Ambien treating you, Abel?” Dr. Thoran asked at their weekly meeting.

  Abel stared at the diploma. “Something is wrong,” he said, more to himself than the doctor.

  “With the med
icine?”

  “With the dead. This isn’t normal.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Abel shook his head, trying to come to terms with what had been happening to him. He needed to understand this, and he needed to understand it quickly. He simply couldn’t handle what they were doing to him for much longer.

  “It never lasts this long. A week. Two tops. I’ve told you what it’s like. You know what it’s doing to me.”

  “What you’re allowing it to do to you,” the doctor said. “You don’t have to allow it, but we can’t take you off the medicine until you come out of this episode.”

  “It doesn’t matter, medicine or not. They’re not stopping.”

  He was silent for a minute—a long one, in which Thoran didn’t interrupt.

  “I think they’re telling me something,” he said, nodding.

  “Telling you what?”

  Abel kept nodding. “That’s gotta be it. I don’t know why else they would keep this going.”

  “What are they telling you?” Thorn asked.

  But then, there could only be one thing. Only one change to this, because each night he watched Emi. He watched the dead kill her, eat her, burn her, fry her, pull her apart. Every single night he watched them take her and make her theirs.

  And why are you just now coming to this conclusion, Abel? Why is it taking you so long to think through all this? If it’s her that’s different, why didn’t you bring this up a week ago?

  But that answer was simple: he didn’t want to. He didn’t want to face it, not if the dead were actually telling him something … because of what it meant.

  “Abel?” Dr. Thoran said. “What are they telling you?”

  “I’m going to have to call Emi Laurens,” Abel said, his eyes finding the psychiatrist’s.

  The doctor was quiet for a second, leaning back in his chair and lacing his fingers over his stomach. He studied Abel, and Abel knew why. In 15 years, he’d never once asked to make a phone call. This wasn’t just out of the ordinary, it was unheard of.