What Immortal Hand

by Johnny Worthen

  “Actually, it does.”

  “Lynette told me to beguile the time, look like the time.”

  “MacBeth,” says Trent. “Who’s Lynette?”

  “My sister. She died in Barstow.”

  “Oh.”

  “Not I’m sorry?” says Michael.

  “Nope,” Trent says.

  They pass a motorhome across a double line up a hill. The engine complains but performs.

  “Nice ride,” he says. “We’ll have to lose it in Tahoe though. They’ll be looking for this.”

  “The family are Thugs?” Michael says. “Thuggee. Deceivers.”

  “Yeah.”

  “The hunt. That’s killing people on the road.”

  “Yes,” he says. “Keeping the streets clear of valuable possessions and fools.”

  “Is there a head of the family?”

  “Older folks, custodians of wealth, but no king,” he says. “Or queen. We have a place in Arizona called Kaleekah and an investment company to help launder money and things.”

  “How’d you find me?”

  “Kali told us to look for you.”

  “How?”

  “Visions.”

  “Everyone?”

  “No,” he says. “It was Jessica. She’ll tell you about it. Her streak, too. They all knew the laser would bring you back.”

  Michael’s head is spinning. The walls of reality, already crumbling, are falling fast in this conversation. He tries to tell himself that he’s talking to a liar. Do not believe him. He is a deceiver.

  Michael forces his mind to stay objective. These things may be true but they may not be. He might be insane and none of this is happening. He could still be sleeping at the rest stop before St. George. His companion could be an amalgamation of recent events and terrors. Or he could be a Deceiver, a Faithful Tiger, sent by a blood-thirsty god to bring him back.

  He acts the tiger. Michael can sense a playfulness in his manner, not unlike a cat toying with a mouse. He is easy and light, forthcoming and friendly but with a hint of unseen danger. Trent is easy to like, easy to trust. It is like talking to an old friend or a practiced conman.

  “Laser,” Michael says.

  “Do you know about that? There was some big medical laser Jessica’s streak caught. That was the thing—that’s what I heard. Shame to lose the ground, though. Crystal Spring had history, and it’s hard to find good ground like that, you know? Good places you can bury your kills. But what can you do, eh?”

  “Isaac Lowe,” says Michael.

  “What? Who’s he?”

  “The truck driver who was killed. The one who had the laser.”

  “A friend of yours?”

  “No. I was investigating the case for an insurance company.”

  “Are you sad he died?”

  “He had a family. A wife and a little girl,” says Michael.

  “I’m not sure you answered the question.”

  “Theoretically, yes. Yes it does bother me.”

  “He beat his wife,” Trent says. “He was a racist hooligan. He killed a Mexican kid two years ago in a drive-by in New Mexico. Just for kicks. Are you still sad?”

  “I didn’t know any of that,” says Michael. “That changes things. I guess he had it coming.”

  “A public service.”

  “Yeah,” says Michael remembering that Trent didn’t know the man’s name before he told him.

  “That laser was a good catch,” Trent says. “Jessica’s having a hell of a year. If this goes off, we might cut the season short.”

  “If what goes off?”

  He points through the windshield.

  They drive out of the forest and into a town. On his right, there’s a manicured golf course, a train of white golf carts scurrying toward a flag. To his left are low wooded mountains behind grassy lots for sale. Prime Development Land promises the sign. Before them is a cluster of buildings, hotels, and casinos.

  “Tahoe,” says Trent. “Jessica’s streak needs help bringing down something big here. She’s hunting whales.”

  “How do you know this? How did you know to come here? Kali?”

  “Cell phones,” he laughs. “Duh.”

  The mundane explanation confuses Michael. He’s slipping into a fluid reality where gods and technologies merge to upturn morality, laws, and lives. It all can make sense, somehow, he thinks. It might have once, before the Dormitory, when he was in his “streak.” It must all have made sense then.

  He presses his hands to his temples and closes his eyes. He’s feverish. He feels the heat seep into his palms from his head.

  “When you first met me last month, did you know who I was?” he asks Trent.

  “I did not,” he said. “But I saw the smoke.”

  “Smoke?”

  “Kind of a black halo around people,” he says. “It comes and goes, like an acid flashback. A side-effect of the Jaggery Sacrament. When you didn’t give the hook or the sign, I was puzzled. But sometimes there are people who have the smoke but aren’t part of the Family. They’re touched by Kali, but not Tigers, you know? We leave those guys alone. I figured you were one of them.”

  “Who are those guys?”

  “I knew a guy who had smoke in LA once. Not a Tiger. No connection to The Mother at all. But, he was great fence. See, I had these bonds that were pretty hot. I had to move them right away, or they’d be worthless. A biker I knew, not of the Family but in the same profession, introduced me to this guy. When I saw the smoke, I knew I could trust him. It’s rare to see smoke outside of a feast or a festival when the sacrament is shared. I took it as a good sign. Maybe some of the old folks could tell you more about it. I’m not that versed in it all.”

  “Where are they? The old Thuggee home?”

  He laughs. “When they’re too old to hunt and too old to help, we send them on.”

  “That’s cold.”

  “Nope. Without purpose,” he says thinking for a second, “what’s the purpose?”

  The pun is so stupid it draws a laugh from Michael. “I’m hungry,” he says.

  “I hear that,” says Trent. “I know a place.”

  They cruise over the state line into California.

  “We gotta ditch this ride,” says Trent. He pulls into underground parking below the Pine-Palm Desert Inn.

  “Get your stuff out,” he says.

  “Why?”

  “Someone’s going to be looking for this car,” says Trent. “Time to get rid of it.”

  “Are we just going to leave it?”

  “Hell no. I’ll have it picked up. Good day’s work, this Range Rover.”

  “You’re taking it?”

  “Do you mind?”

  “Will I need it?”

  “No.”

  “Then I guess I don’t mind.”

  Michael has less than Trent; a single bag with a broken strap compared to his companion’s bright duffel bag. He finally rips the shoulder strap off and carries it by the handle.

  The garage is littered with cars wearing California and Nevada licenses plates in equal measure, but they are the only people there. Their steps echo off the concrete walls and ceiling as they snake their way between cars and cement pylons to an elevator.

  “I hope they have a buffet here,” Michael says.

  “Hey Michael,” Trent says pushing the elevator button. “Do you know what an approver is?”

  “It’s a turn-coat, right? A deceiver who rats out the gang?”

  “Yeah,” says Trent. “With all I told you, you’d make a pretty good approver now.”

  “Who’d I tell? Who’d believe me? I’m not even sure I believe it.”

  “Oh there are lots of folks,” he says.

  “Everyone’s telling me to keep secrets,” says Michael.

  “Who else?”

  “There was a cop. An FBI agent and a Homeland Security goon. They told me to keep quiet about Crystal Springs.”

  “Did they?”

  “Yeah.”
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  “You’ve been gone a long time,” Trent says impatiently pressing the call button again. “It’s good to have you back, but you’ve gotta imagine there are those of us who don’t know you the way I do, who might not trust you. Some may think you turned approver after Barstow and think you might be a plant to flush the tigers out into the open.”

  “That’s poetic, but pretty farfetched.”

  “What can you do? People are naturally suspicious,” he says. “It takes effort to win their trust.”

  “I thought my coming was foretold by prophesy.”

  “Visions can be interpreted differently. Jessica said you were coming back. Here you are. What now?”

  “We do Jessica’s thing.” Michael steps forward and tries his luck pushing the button.

  “We gotta be sure, Jim,” he says. “You already cost the Family a ground. It’s nothing personal.”

  The elevator finally dings and the doors open.

  “What’s not personal?” asks Michael.

  “This.”

  Two men step out of the car and rush upon Michael. He’s suddenly aware of two other men behind him. He’d not seen them, not heard them approach.

  He throws his bag at the two coming out of the elevator but it’s deflected easily. One grabs his legs, one each his arms, and one, with a flick of his wrist, whips a scarf around his throat. Michael hears the clatter of coins and feels them slap against his neck. He can’t get out a scream. He drew a final breath in surprise and that final breath is trapped in his lungs. He falls back against a concrete post and then is pulled down like prey beset by a pack of wolves, or rather, a streak of tigers.

  They hold him still; the melee settles and the counting begins.

  His eyes darken and sting, his tongue is forced out his mouth. His last breath turns to acid in his chest. His struggling muscles are on fire, burning from the poison of unreleased carbon dioxide.

  It is a fair kill, he thinks. He had every clue to sense the hunters, every reason to be wary, every chance to escape. The decoy was engaging and put him at ease. His timing was impeccable. The takedown was a choreographed ballet; the cast of the strangling scarf a master stroke. He can accept this death. It is a good one.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  He’d think he would dream, but he doesn’t. When he comes to consciousness, his head contains no images, only pain; no inspiration, only confusion. He is not dead, and he’s not sure how he feels about that.

  “He’s waking up,” someone says.

  Michael opens his eyes. They’re dried and painful. He knows they must look red as ripe strawberries. They ache, and it is by their aching he knows he’s alive.

  He’s on his side; the world is tilted ninety degrees. He’s on a couch. He blinks and takes in a large room. A couple of couches on thick beige carpet. Bright curtained windows, a lake visible in the distance. He tries to get up but cannot. His hands are bound behind him. His ankles tied together. Hands grasp his shoulders, and with their assistance he is lifted and sat upright.

  “How you doin’ Jim?” Trent asks him, using the hook.

  Michael follows the voice to a row of steel barstools across the expansive room. Trent sits on one, two others are occupied by men he does not recognize beside a woman he’d have remembered seeing. Besides Trent they are all strangers.

  One man stands behind the bar. Michael thinks he may be the one who threw the scarf—the rumal, around his neck. He looks dispassionately at Michael and shakes a sweating silver drink shaker over a sink before cracking it open pouring three martinis.

  “I’ve been better, Jeff,” says Michael. His throat is raw and sore. It hurts him to speak. “Who’re your friends?”

  “Family,” Trent says sipping a martini.

  “I’d give the sign,” he says, “but, you know.”

  The woman beside Trent is a healthy fifty-something. She could pass for early forties except her hands give her away. Her hair is pulled back in a bun, but not severely. Her face is accentuated with expertly applied makeup and her dress could get her admitted to an Oscar party. Her cold blue eyes are menacingly fixed on Michael.

  “Hello,” he says to her.

  She looks away and huffs in disgust. The expression is shared by the others to a greater or lesser extent. Trent alone looks friendly, but Michael knows better.

  “Why are you toying with me?” Michael rasps. “Do it and be done.”

  “The words of the prophet,” says a voice behind him.

  Michael shifts to see more people: four more men and two women.

  He coughs in surprise when he recognizes Robert Poulson from the truck stop in Ely. The black store owner wiggles his fingers in greeting, but his expression is cold and unreadable.

  Michael should not be so surprised to see standing beside him the state trooper Perez. He’s out of uniform, but Michael recognizes him instantly. He’d forgotten the strange dialog they’d had at Crystal Springs. He’d assumed it’d all been a hallucination. Seeing him here now, with Poulson, Trent, and these others, Michael cannot be sure he is not dreaming now.

  “Don’t let them rattle you, Jarrad,” Perez says with a wink.

  He’s in a hotel suite. A big one; multiple bedrooms, office, full bar, plenty of seating. The woman in the cocktail dress looks like she could afford a room like this. One of the men behind Michael is in a business suit and could be a banker. One of the woman looks like a secretary by trade, while the other could be a mother come straight from her daughter’s soccer game. Michael thinks he recognizes the orderly who pushed him out of the Vegas hospital, but he’s not sure. He didn’t pay enough attention. He counts eleven people in the room. Eleven killers. Twelve, including him.

  “Seriously,” says the woman at the bar. “Screw this waiting. Kill the approver.”

  “Fuck that!” says Michael. The outburst tears his throat and he swallows hard to stop the pain. Strange the insult would bother him so much.

  “Shut up,” says a man next to Trent at the bar, a thin ex-marine type with a shaved head and a thick diving watch.

  “He’s afraid to die,” says the bartender as if that settled some argument.

  Michael shakes his head. “Wrong again,” he says. “And I’m not an approver.” The last syllable catches in his injured esophagus. It feels like glass coming up.

  “Get him something to drink,” says the other man at the bar. He’s a muscular black man in his late thirties, tan slacks, tight polo shirt. He casts a deferential glance at the woman who rolls her eyes.

  The bartender fills a highball glass with tap water and hands it to Trent who carries it to the couch.

  “They don’t believe you, Jack,” he says pouring the tepid water into his mouth. Swallowing hurts, but the water soothes the swelling. Michael knows he’s deceiving himself, but he tells himself that Trent is on his side, that he can trust him. He used the hook when addressing him, as did Perez, and he takes that as a friendly gesture among this gang of thugs.

  There’s a knock on the door and the black man from the bar goes to attend it. In a moment, he’s back with a uniformed member of the hotel staff helping to guide a large rolling table into the room. Michael looks to the concierge, expecting a reaction to the scene of a bound and strangled man held captured on the couch, but he barely glances at him.

  “Any sign of Jessica?” asks the woman.

  “I saw Tyler in the lobby,” says the concierge. “No sign of her.”

  “So send him up,” she says. “He’ll do.”

  “We’ve got to wait,” says the man in the suit. “Mother’s taken an interest in this. We should move slowly.”

  “He gave up Crystal Springs,” says the marine at the bar. “My great-grandfather used that ground.”

  “Eh,” says Perez, “It was doomed. The Mormons were buying it up for a handcart exhibit or something. It wouldn’t have lasted another season.”

  “But it wasn’t the Mormons that shut it down, was it? It was Baby Michael here. Approver.”
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  “Fuck that!” Michael yells again, the volume tears his throat.

  “What else do you call it?” the marine says. “You showed them the ground.”

  “She showed it to me,” Michael croaks.

  His neck feels like torn sandpaper so he doesn’t know how he managed the inflection to communicate who “She” was but they understand, and the room falls silent.

  After a moment, the concierge starts handing out sandwiches, tall clubs with pickles and chips; a room-service staple. They eat in silence, the discussion put on hold.

  Trent administers another glass of water to Michael before taking his own lunch.

  When they are nearly finished, Trent’s cell phone rings.

  “The natives are restless,” he says for a hello. He listens for a moment, then says, “Hurry” before hanging up.

  “Jessica’s in the elevator,” he says.

  The bartender shakes another round of martinis.

  Michael studies the people, looking for a friendly face and thinks some may have softened toward him. The drinks are poured and sipped in silence. The stillness is surreal and Michael considers again the possibility that all this is only happening in his head. It could all be part of a fevered dream of guilt and poison killing him in a Las Vegas hospital room, or maybe the last nightmare flash of narration before he dies, strangled in a Tahoe parking garage.

  There’s a knock on the door and Jessica enters with two men Michael thinks he’s seen before. They might be the men he saw on the video in Ely. One of them is dressed casually in jeans and a windbreaker, the other is in a suit only half a step down from a tuxedo. Michael studies them for a moment and then realizes he’s seen both men before in a Las Vegas laundromat a lifetime ago.

  Jessica is in a bikini, her bottom half concealed beneath a floral sarong. She moves into the room like a breeze.

  “About fucking time,” says the woman at the bar. “You have six streaks here and you make us wait around staring at this shit excuse for a clay-man? Who do you think you are?”

  “Fuck you,” says Michael to the woman, another insult too great to ignore.

  The woman looks around at the others holding her hands up in wonder that nothing is being done to kill Michael right then.