by Joey Ruff
Keeper of the Faith
A tale of the Midnight Defenders
by Joey Ruff
It was just after 3 AM when the Philadelphia police entered my hotel room. Unlike the movies, there wasn’t a dramatic crash as the SWAT team kicked in the door. The night guy at the desk gave them a key. The single, shrill beep as the red light on the lock flashed to green barely registered.
I’d been in and out of sleep for hours. I didn’t know what was going on as the men entered, shoes making almost no sound on the carpet. I heard the din in the bathroom as one of them clicked on the light, pushed the door in and swept back the shower curtain.
Nobody said anything as they circled around the bed, guns drawn and held in two-handed grips. As my eyes cracked open, ambient light filtered in between the curtains from the parking lot, and I could make out their forms.
Suddenly, the lights came on all at once and a woman in a bulletproof vest was screaming, “Austin Finnegan, you are under arrest for the attempted murder of Pope Innocent XIV!”
Then she read me my rights.
* * *
I was taken downtown in one of the hotel’s terrycloth bathrobes. After being printed and photoed, I was left alone in an interrogation room for nearly an hour. A cart sat in the corner with a TV on it.
All I could do was sit there and struggle to stay awake. I wasn’t processing any of it. I remembered the detective’s words, kept replaying them in my head, but they didn’t make sense. I hadn’t tried to kill anyone – not lately – let alone the Pope. I hadn’t even seen him yet.
Eventually, the detective came in. She was a middle-aged, well-preserved red-head with a sour look on her face. She looked tired. Behind her entered a black man, neatly shaven, looked maybe a few years her junior.
“I’m Detective Jade Hall.” She motioned to the other guy. “This is Detective Whittaker.”
Detective Hall took a seat opposite me while Whittaker took a position beside the TV cart. I kept catching Whittaker giving me strange looks.
“Mr. Finnegan,” Detective Jade Hall began, opening a file folder on the table before her. “I see you were a priest in Seattle several months ago. What brings you to Philly?”
I smiled at her, but didn’t say anything. I didn’t do anything and felt no compulsion to play games.
“Do you have a vendetta against the Pope? Is that why you came here? Did you plot to kill the Pope because the Catholic church let you go?”
“I didn’t…,” I started to say, but stopped. I let a few awkward seconds tick by before I calmly added, “I quit the church. They didn’t quit me.”
My file would have no details on why I left the priesthood. The only reason I gave was personal reasons. Nobody really knew what happened that night except me and God, and to a lesser extent, the woman I saved. There was nothing in there about me killing a man…a serial killer, yes, but still a man. Not the literal monster I had assumed.
As I watched her eyes, watched her watching me, studying me, I realized that I was still a little drunk from the night before. I wondered if she noticed. She could probably smell it on me. It didn’t matter. She had preconceived notions of who I was, who I would have to be to do something like what she was accusing me of.
“Where did you get the scars?” Whittaker asked.
“Motorcycle accident,” I said.
“How long ago?”
I shrugged.
“They look like burn scars.”
“I was trapped under the bike when it caught fire.” I watched him for a minute, fought to keep him in focus as my head swam with booze and exhaustion. “Is that relevant? Was I mad at the Pope because a semi merged into my lane and the roads were slick?”
“Maybe you were mad at God?”
I stifled an annoyed laugh. Before I could say anything, Detective Hall said, “Where were you tonight?”
“Right where you found me.”
“And before that?”
“I had a few drinks,” I said with a shrug.
“Is that all you did?”
I didn’t say anything. She was insinuating drug use. Maybe she wanted to know about the prostitute…?
“Why are you in Philadelphia, Mr. Finnegan?”
I yawned. “I’m Catholic. I hear there’s a convention.”
“A rally,” Whittaker said. “For teenagers. About abstinence.” He almost laughed when he said the last word. Guess they did know about the prostitute. Well, escort. They would’ve checked credit card transactions.
“I’m not sure what you’re implying or what this is about, Detectives.”
“Show him the tape,” Detective Hall said.
Whittaker turned on the TV beside him and pressed play on the machine. After a few moments, the black screen gave way to a security feed. It was time-stamped with yesterday’s date. 11:53 PM.
The tape was of a hotel room, and, from the angle, the camera must’ve been mounted on the ceiling, maybe in the corner. It was a nice place – nicer than the one I was staying at – a suite…possibly the penthouse from the view out of the large windows in the background.
A cardinal in his red cassock was talking to two men in black suits that could’ve been secret service agents, but I knew were Swiss guards, the Pope’s personal defense. Each of the guards, a brunette and a redhead, had a full beard, neatly groomed.
The tape didn’t pick up sound, but after a few seconds, they stopped talking, and Pope Innocent entered the room.
Dressed in a white cassock and skull cap, the Pope approached the Cardinal and embraced him. Each of the guards shook his hand with a smile, and then Innocent moved to stand near the windows, overlooking the city.
“Make sure you pay special attention to this part,” Whittaker said with a smirk.
A man walked in. He wore a leather jacket with a hood, which was up. Walked right under where the camera was, keeping his back to it. The two guards took notice immediately, stepping away from the Cardinal. The man in the hood produced a knife, and each of the guards did as well, though their blades caught the gleam of the light in just such a way it made their daggers appear to shimmer.
The guards attacked first, but the hood side-stepped their blades, stuck the brunette guard in the side of the neck. As the other guard scuffled with the attacker, throwing a series of elbow strikes, the Pope turned around and called out. Then he brought his own ring to his lips and kissed it.
As skilled as the guard was, the hood was clearly stronger, and quickly overpowered him, stabbing the guard in the gut before lowering him to the ground. The Cardinal slowly backed away, which left only the man in the hood alone with Pope Innocent, who stood against the windows.
Before he could take one step, the hood was tackled from behind by another guard in a black suit. As they wrestled for a minute, the Pope managed to get away.
The assailant kicked the guard off and stood. His hood had fallen away, and I could see his face clearly as he looked over the guard into the camera. The blonde hair, the eyes… It was like looking into a mirror…almost.
Then the man turned, took three steps, and dove through the glass window. Whittaker stopped the tape and both detectives looked at me. There was no denying, the man in the video sure looked like me, except for one critical difference.
“How did you do it?” Whittaker asked in a tone dripping with malice.
“What?” I said. “Lose the burn scars?”
“Survive the fall, genius. Pope’s suite is on the tenth floor.”
“Did you see the same video I saw?”
“The scars can be covered up with make-up.”
“If
I went to that much length to hide burn scars with make-up – which I don’t think is possible – why would I not make myself look like…I don’t know, anybody else?”
“We also found a print,” Detective Hall said.
“Just one?”
“One clean print,” she said. “On the elevator. Several more partials that are still being analyzed.”
“We’re hopeful,” Whittaker added.
“This is ridiculous,” I said. “I was nowhere near there.”
“Eye witnesses put you at the convention center earlier in the day. You’re an ex-priest with an axe to grind. We have prints and video evidence putting you at the hotel and video showing you assaulting two guards and attacking the pope.”
“Allegedly,” I said. “That isn’t me.”
Detective Hall stood, nodded to Whittaker, and they both moved to the door. “Regardless,” she said, “We’ve got plenty to hold you on.”
“You’re making a mistake.”
“Save it for court,” Whittaker said.
* * *
I was taken back to a cell and left alone. My head was buzzing with their accusations, but one thing was certain: I didn’t try to kill the Pope. I needed him alive.
The reason I was no longer a priest was because of a single confession – one I couldn’t ignore. I had thought the man was a literal monster. I was wrong. But I had broken my priestly oath and the sacredness of the confessional. Which got me excommunicated – something only the Pope, himself, could overturn.
The reason that wouldn’t be listed in any file on me is because the excommunication was never official. My bishop never needed to tell me. He didn’t have to. I knew the rules. And so did God. That was all that mattered. And the rules stated that only the Pope could overturn it.
The fact that I was on tape trying to kill him was obviously some kind of cruel joke – or worse, a trick. Which gave me my first suspect.
Not even a week ago, I ran afoul of the biggest, meanest trickster around: Loki. We didn’t exactly part on good terms, and part of me thought maybe this was him lashing out.
It was clear I was being set up, but I couldn’t do anything about it from a jail cell. There was at least one person who might know what was going on, but even if I did get my one phone call, I wouldn’t know how to reach him. The last place I had seen him was the middle of a National Park in Nebraska. Who knows where he might have gotten off to.
There wasn’t anything in the cell but a toilet and a bed, whose rusty hinges squeaked when I sat down. As part of my gear with the Hand, I had a book called a Codex that held certain information about the myths and monsters that lurked in the shadows. If you needed to find the kryptonite for a couple lamia or how to mix a love potion, the Codex could tell you. It was a comprehensive supernatural wiki wrapped up in a leather-bound tome. Unfortunately, it wasn’t in my possession at the moment, having stashed it back in the room, per my normal prostitute procedure, along with any other valuables. No point getting mugged while I slept.
On the bed, in the cell, sans Codex, there was nothing I could do but wrack my brain for years of stored information on how to summon a Native American demigod.
As I yawned, an idea hit me. It was a long shot, but the best – the only – one I had. I moved the mattress to the side, pulling free a loosely wound metal spring, and set to work fashioning it into a crude loop. Once I’d done that, I began tearing the thin bedsheet into narrow strips and wove them around the metal to form a makeshift web. A few white flakes of down were escaping through a frayed corner of the mattress, and I fashioned the feathers to the bottom of the loop.
Then I lay down on the bed, placing what would have to pass for a dreamcatcher over top of my face, as there was nowhere to hang it. Tired as I was, it didn’t take long before I fell asleep.
As I drifted, I kept mouthing the word, “Coyote” and tried to picture his face in my mind.
I dreamed.
I was standing in line at a Starbucks. Behind me stood Detective Whittaker, in front, ordering, was Detective Hall. When I looked down, I saw the cuffs on my wrists.
I wasn’t sure what I expected, but as I searched the room, scanning the faces in the small dining area, nothing seemed out of place: a man with glasses typed away at a laptop, a couple college girls gabbed in the corner, an elderly man read the paper. None of them were Coyote.
As Officer Hall stepped away, the girl behind the register stared impatiently at me. Her black hair and lip rings were striking, yet…off, somehow.
I took a step forward, not sure what to say, what to order. Before I could say anything, music began to play. I knew in that strange way you just know things in a dream that the melody, which was an old Joni Mitchell song, was actually a ringtone. While my pocket didn’t vibrate, I knew the phone belonged to me. What was worse, the song played so uncomfortably loud in the small room that everyone turned to stare at me.
“You just picked up a hitcher, a prisoner of the white lines on the Freeway…”
I reached for the phone, but with the cuffs, I couldn’t get my hand into my pocket to fish it out.
The girl behind the register cleared her throat, eyeing me impatiently. Everyone else just stared.
“Coyote’s in the coffee shop. He’s staring a hole in his scrambled eggs…”
I couldn’t reach the phone, felt all eyes on me, heard the ringer far louder than any normal phone should cry. For a moment, I felt like scrambled eggs myself.
The girl behind the register started laughing uncontrollably, doubled over and fell across the register. When she looked up, her features had changed into something more familiar. While the piercings and make up remained, the girl’s face had been replaced with the face of a man I knew as Charlie, a reporter from Dakota.
“You should see the look on your face right now,” Coyote said. “You look really uncomfortable.”
The phone fell silent and every set of eyes turned away. All at once, almost robotically.
“Funny,” I said.
“You say that, but I get the feeling you don’t mean it. I think it’s hilarious.”
I didn’t say anything.
“So…nice trick with the dreamcatcher. Not sure if I should be offended, though. It’s like racial profiling…”
I sighed. “Not trying to be rude or anything, but there is a point to this.”
He studied me for a moment. “You okay?”
“Not really. I’m in jail.”
“You…what!? Straight arrow like you? Oh, this is serious.” He snapped his fingers and everyone else disappeared. It was just the two of us alone in the dining room. “What happened?”
I tried to motion with my hands, but felt the cold steel of the cuffs still binding them.
Coyote noticed and chuckled. “It’s your dream. Make them go away.”
“How do I do that?”
“Dream them away.”
I stared at my wrists, picturing them without the handcuffs. After a second, they disappeared. I rubbed my wrists as I said, “Thanks. They…felt real.”
Coyote shrugged. “Don’t mention it. Now, tell me what’s up.”
“I was set up.”
“You don’t say. Any idea by whom?”
“Just one,” I said. “Loki.”
He laughed so hard it took a few minutes for him to catch his breath. “No,” he said, composing himself. “Not Loki. Sounds like his speed, but it couldn’t be him.”
“Why not?”
“What is it with you hunter-types not knowing anything?” He took a deep breath. “You dusted him, what…three days ago?”
“I didn’t kill him. He ran away.”
“Obviously, you didn’t kill him. You can’t. Not with…what you’ve got. Loki was an angel, right? And like every other one-time angel, he’s a being of spirit. He has no physical body. But he makes one in order to…interact…play, here on Earth. But you put a hurt on him, and he went home to recoup. Ditched the man-suit he was wearing. You’re luck
y you caught him at his weak point, after he’d just spent so much energy on the contest. He barely had enough to keep that body together, and rather than try to heal it, he just gave it up.”
“Can’t he make another?”
“Of course, and he will. But that’s my point. It takes a lot of juice. Juice to create the physical, juice to maintain it. And once they do manifest, they’re using so much power and concentration, even the strongest have barely half their normal strength and ability.”
“Like a handicap?”
“Now he’s catching on. That’s what makes the J-man so special.”
“Who?”
“Weren’t you a priest? Jesus. God didn’t create a physical form just to come down here and fix your mess. He would’ve been nerfed…uh, less powerful. What he did was something else entirely. He became physical…fully human. It’s why none of them saw it coming.”
“Wait, none of whom?”
“Keep up, Finn. I’m talking about the A-holes that want to wreck shit. The Fallen, mostly. The supreme power of the Universe became fully human and allowed himself to be killed. Like, for real killed. That shit changed everything. Three days later, he popped back again like it was nothing. Never been done like that before or since. And Loki’s not that powerful. I mean, sure, compared to others, he is, but…. It’s going to take more than a few days for him.”
I just stood there, staring off at the wall. His words were like clanging cymbals that chased every other thought from my head.
With one finger, Coyote poked me between the eyes.
“Earth to Finny-boy…”
I shook my head, looking at him. “So… How long would it take then? Before Loki could make another body?”
“Normally, a week or two, but he’s gotta recharge. Like I said, he used up his juice with the Trickster games. It’ll be more like…months.”
“Okay, fine. But he’s resourceful. Can’t he do something from wherever he is?”
Coyote shrugged. “Sure, if he had help. But…” He stopped, studying me curiously for a few minutes. “Before you go all Judge Judy on a fellow trickster, we should probably consider all the evidence.”