by Tom Clarke
Nico looked at me with a sense of confusion on his face, “Nico, I am an American Police Officer, slide your ass over here and reach under my wrist watch.”
Nico slid his chair next to mine so he could reach the wrist watch on my left hand. “Reach under the watch, there is a small disc taped to the bottom.” Nico slid his fingers under my watch and was able to recover my escape key. It was a small plastic circular handcuff key carried by myself, and untold other Police Officers across the country. This particular item specifically designed to be used should an officer ever be taken hostage and handcuffed.
Nico smiled as he pulled the hideout key from under my watch and again said something in Swedish I did not understand.
“English Nico” I said, “I love you Jim” Nico replied. “We can make out later, unhook me” I replied. Nico was able to use the key to undo my left handcuff. He then gave me the key and I released the other cuff holding my right hand to the chair.
I leaned over and started to undo Nico’s handcuffs when I heard the lock on the door start to turn. I looked at Nico, he motioned with his head for me to move away from him, he then lowered his head as if he was still unconscious. I grabbed the metal chair I had been secured to and moved to the far side of the room near the door.
As the door opened I could hear the two men walking in say, “He told us not to take the cop, but that we can have the Swed.” As the two men stepped into the room they were standing shoulder to shoulder with each other, the one on the left looked at me and before he could say anything I hit them both square in the face with the metal chair I had been secured to.
The leg of the chair hit both men in the mid-face and mouth area, they both doubled over at the waist, grasping at their mouths. I then swung the chair again, this time in a downward motion hitting both of them across the back of their heads, driving them into the ground.
Both men went to the ground, still almost shoulder to shoulder. I pulled the chair up and hit them both again as hard as I could, rendering them motionless. I set the chair down and slowly closed the door, making sure that it was unlocked and that I was not relocking us in the room.
I quickly stepped over the two men, who I could see were both wearing motorcycle vests with Lone Wolf patches on the back, and uncuffed Nico. “Help me with these retards” I said to Nico as we picked up the semi-conscious bikers and sat them in the chairs we had just escaped from. I then handcuffed both men to the chairs, except I cuffed their hands to the rear of the arm rests and not the top.
“Nico search that one” I said as I started going through the pockets of one of the men I had just beaten with an officer chair. I removed a small frame 9mm handgun from his waist band, along with a Buck hunting style sheath knife.
Nico removed a large frame revolver and another large knife with a probably 10-inch Bowie style blade from his guy. He then removed a small hand-held radio, the kind that you buy at the sporting goods stores for camping.
“Now what?” Nico asked, looking at the large knife with a gleam in his eye.
“Now we get some answers” I replied.
Both men started to come around and began to struggle against the handcuffs securing their hands to the metal chairs. As soon as they saw Nico and I they stopped struggling and just looked at us. “That one’s mine” one of the men said motioning towards Nico.
“He was promised to us, that one’s mine!” he yelled again, straining so hard against the handcuffs that his hands started to bleed. He clenched his jaw and bit what was left of his teeth together, I could tell he was getting ready to scream or start yelling, so I reached out and punched him as hard as I could in his face knocking more teeth to the ground and rendering him unconscious.
I looked at the other biker who was sitting there with a look of confusion on his face, “Where are we?” I asked.
He looked at his friend slumped over in the other chair, then he looked up at me, smiled and said, “That one’s mine! He was promised to us, that one is MINE!” I reached out and slapped him across the face hoping the sting would bring him around.
“Jim” Nico said, “Check his back for a mark.”
I grabbed our prisoner by the hair and pulled his head forward, then I pulled his shirt up and could see on his back the mark. “Yeah, he’s marked, this other one too I would bet” I said as I slapped the biker across the top of his head.
“If they’re marked there is no sense in trying to get information out of them” Nico said, “They are already gone.”
As I stood there looking at the two bikers handcuffed to the chairs it suddenly hit me, I knew these two. “Jesus Nico” I said, “I know these guys, I bought some meth and a couple of guns from them about a year ago.”
“But this doesn’t make any sense” I said shaking my head, trying to clear more of the fog I was feeling. “These guys should be sitting up in Smoky Point Federal Prison awaiting sentencing.”
Then the one of the two that was still alert smiled and said “Prison.”
“Yeah prison” I replied. “How did you get out of prison?”
“He let us out, he freed us” the man said.
I knelt down close to the bikers face as asked, “Who freed you?”
The man in the chair smiled and said, “You will meet him soon” then he started to let out a hissing sound and speaking in what sounded like Egyptian.
“Oh no you don’t!” Nico yelled as he ran over and sunk the large Bowie knife he had recovered into the man’s upper chest at the base of his neck.
“What the FUCK!” I yelled as I stumbled backwards away from Nico and the man in the chair he had just stabbed.
“Nico, what the FUCK was that?” I barked, looking at the man sitting in the chair with the large knife still sticking out of his neck.
“He was starting to call to his master; we need to get the hell out of here right now!” Nico said.
I just stood there with my eyes wide and my mouth slightly open for a second, “JIM!” Nico said to me as he pulled the knife from the man’s body, “We need to leave.”
I shook my head and as I thought how they should have stayed in prison. Nico and I started moving for the door. “Wait a second” I said as I walked back over to the other biker, now somewhat semi-conscious.
I pulled the man’s t-shirt off and wound it up to make a gag. I then gagged the man’s mouth with the shirt, tying it into a knot behind his head. “You should have just killed him” Nico said. I looked at Nico and said, “Come on, let’s go” as I slowly opened the door and peered into the hallway.
Looking into the hallway I couldn’t see any other rooms or windows, just poorly rigged lights strung along the ceiling.
I motioned to Nico with my left hand that I was going to move out the door and to the left. Nico nodded and we moved from the room into the hallway. As we moved down the hallway I had the small handgun I had taken from the biker pointed in front of me, my trigger finger was indexed along the slide and my elbows were bent so that the gun itself was closer to my chest than it would be if I was standing and shooting. Nico was right behind me carrying the revolver he had in almost the same manner, except that he was covering the area behind us as we moved forward.
We came to a corner where the hallway turned to the left, I stopped short making sure not to let the muzzle of the handgun pass the corner. I pulled the handgun into my body, canting the muzzle down towards the ground.
I then braced my left knee against the wall along with my left hand and took a quick peek around the corner, making sure to expose as little of my head as possible and only for a brief second. I knelt low to the ground and took a second quick look. Not see anything I reached back and tapped Nico and said in a very low voice, “Moving left.” Nico reached forward and tapped me on my leg and we moved around the corner into the next section of the hallway. We repeated this technique another time, except to the right.
As we continued to move down the hallway I started hearing what sounded like a muffled chanting. Then I coul
d see at the end of the hallway a set of stairs going up, the closer we got to the stairs the louder the muffled chanting became.
We stopped short of the stairwell so as not to expose ourselves to anyone who may be standing in the stairs. I turned to Nico and said, “Do you hear that?” Nico replied, “Yes, chanting, I think they are getting ready for a ritual.”
I looked at Nico and said, “Ritual? What kind of ritual, they are not going to bring another one of those things over are they?”
“I don’t know Jim” Nico replied. “Maybe, sounds like there are several people up there, they may just be doing a sacrifice.”
“Sacrifice?” I said. “Are you fucking kidding me!” Nico just looked at me, “Nico we cannot just stand there and let them chop someone’s head off, I’m a Police Officer for God’s sake.”
“Jim, we need to get out of here!” Nico replied, “We cannot stay here.”
I looked at Nico, there was some serious conviction in his voice about getting out of there, and I understood that, but then I started to have a second thought. This guy was with Grergedes I thought to myself. What if he’s trying so hard to get me away from here because he’s afraid that I may find the stone Stevie stole, and destroy it.
I looked up the stairs and saw that they were clear and the door was shut. I holstered the handgun I had by stuffing it into my front pants pocket. I took a deep breath, looked at Nico and said, “Nico listen.”
I didn’t say another word, I just hit him in his right shoulder with my left hand as I reached forward and pulled his left shoulder towards me with my right. This move spun Nico around so he was facing the wall. Before he could react, I shoved him into the wall, drew my handgun and put the muzzle against the back of his head.
“Nico” I said in a hushed voice. “I’m going to check you for a mark, if you resist me I will blow you brains all over this wall, nod if you understand.” Nico nodded. “Slowly reach across the top of your shoulders and pull your shirt up so I can see your back.”
As Nico pulled his shirt up I didn’t see any marks. I did what looked like scars from a whip.
Covering the scars was a large cross tattooed that took up the majority of his back.
“Satisfied?” Nico asked.
I stepped back allowing him to turn around and face me, “Yeah, sorry man I just had to know.”
“That’s okay” Nico said “Now, can we please get out of here.”
Just then the door at the top of the stairs opened, I was able to get a quick look at what was on the other side of the door before the person shut it and started down towards Nico and I. We were positioned on either side of the stairs with our backs against the wall, out of sight of the person coming down.
I looked at Nico, pointed to myself, and then to the person walking down the stairs. I made a wringing motion with my hands, and then I pointed to Nico, made a gun symbol and pointed up the stairwell.
Nico nodded that he understood that I would take on the person coming down the stairs and he was to cover the stairwell with his handgun.
As the person coming down the stairs got a few steps from the bottom I stepped out and with a closed fist struck them right in the groin. The person doubled over, I grabbed them by their head and pulled them down the stairs and on to the ground. The person landed with a large thud about a foot out from the last step in the stairwell.
As soon as they hit the ground I shuffle-stepped forward and kicked them in the side as hard as I could. I reached down and grabbed them by their head and twisted it to the side, kind of like twisting the top off of a beer bottle. Keeping in line with the old adage of “Move the head, move the body” their body rolled so they were now on their back and I could see their face. Shit….it was Jeff, the bouncer from Rocket’s.
Jeff looked at me, dazed and very confused, he started to sit up. I struck forward with my right hand hitting Jeff just below his left ear and just above his jaw with an open palm strike. He went limp and crumpled back onto the floor.
I quickly started to search the unconscious Jeff for any weapons. I looked up at Nico and said, “I know where we are, were at Rocket’s.”
Without taking his eyes off the stairwell Nico replied, “Rocket’s, what’s that?”
“Strip club” I said as I finished my pat-down of Jeff. I then rolled him over and pulled his belt off. I used his belt to secure his hands behind his back by running the loop of the belt tight around his wrists and then tying the belt off after running it through the belt loop on the back of his pants.
I pulled one of his boots off, took his sock off, balled it up and shoved it into his mouth.
Jeff started to moan a little which brought Nico’s gaze quickly from the stairwell to Jeff.
“Jim” Nico said, “you police have an issue with the stuffing of socks into people’s mouth.”
I looked up at Nico and smiled, “Yeah, true statement.” We then pulled Jeff out of the view of anyone coming down the stairs.
“Nico listen” I said. “These stairs come up into the back kitchen, you can boogie out the back door if you want. I’m going to find these shitheads and put an end to this nonsense tonight!”
“Jim” Nico replied, “We should really get some more people.”
I looked right at Nico and said “Look bro, you go if you want! These guys killed my friend and who knows how many others. They fucked with Sylvia’s head, kidnapped us, and have been making my life very difficult.”
I ejected the magazine from the handgun I had picked up and did a quick ammunition count, then re-seated the magazine back into the gun. “Demons, ghosts, whatever, shit ends tonight!” I said.
Nico looked at me, shook his head, took a deep breath and said, “Okay, I’m with you, but listen, if they are up there we need to destroy any glyphs we find.”
“Got it, what else?” I asked.
“Jim” Nico said in a heavy, somber voice. “The demon is powerful, he is charismatic, and he is scary. He will tempt you, try to fool you, and then he will try to scare you. For some reason he wants you, he wants your soul Jim, he is drawn to you.”
I looked at Nico, I knew the answer but didn’t, for some reason, want to admit it. I had met this monster before, when I was a little kid. He came to me in the form of a large, and at the time, very scary wolf. A wolf that night after night in my dreams killed my family in front of me.
The monster then would devour them, one by one, and I was too scared to do anything about it. I recognized the voice right before I passed out in the SUV. It was the same voice that called to me, tormented me, and then ultimately stated that he was going to end me.
I must have had a pretty grim look on my face as I thought about the creature from my childhood nightmares because Nico reached out and put his hand on my shoulder. “Jim, whether you believe it or not, God is on your side.”
“Well, let’s go make him proud then, shall we” I said.
Nico nodded his head in agreement and then led the way up the stairs and into the main floor of Rocket’s.
As we emerged from the stairwell and into the back kitchen we saw no one, but could hear a low-level hum, almost like chanting. I looked around and then saw the door that led into the back-parking lot of Rocket’s.
“Just a minute” I said as I quickly walked over to the door. I gently pushed the door open to make sure that it was not locked or barricaded from the outside.
“Nico” I said, “this is our exit if things get ugly. Exit leads out into the parking lot. Across the street is a hotel, and about ¼ mile down the road to the right is a grocery store. The far-right side of the hotel parking lot will be our rally point number 1. If needed, and we are on the run, the grocery store will be rally point 2.”
I looked at Nico and said, “No matter what happens do not go back down stairs! There is no escape from there.” Nico nodded, we both took a deep breath and I reached out and tapped him on the shoulder with a closed fist.
Nico looked at me and I said, “For Danny.”
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br /> Nico said something in Swedish, then turned and we both started moving out of the kitchen and towards the sound of the chanting.
As we made our way through the kitchen we encountered a door that opened into a hallway, which in turn, led to the main bar area of Rocket’s. Before opening the door, I put my ear against it to see if I could hear anyone on the other side.
Hearing nothing, I cracked the door and could see that the lights in the hallway were turned out, and the lights in the main bar area were dimmed. I very gently shut the door, turned to Nico, and motioned for him to turn the lights off in the kitchen area using the switches on the wall next to where he was standing.
Nico flipped the switch and the kitchen went dark. With darkness cloaking my movements I gently opened the door leading into the hallway. Reaching around to the other side of the door, I turned the door knob, just to make sure that it wasn’t locked. We may have to come back this way in a hurry and I didn’t want any surprises like a locked door.