by Garrett Cook
“I should be able to respect your work, and if I’d known about it, I sure as Hell would have. Man, I didn’t want to get caught back when I was killing most of those first 347 people, but I did. You’re good. I should have been able to respect you. But then, you gun down Kris Kringle. Not great, but gruesome. He was a genius in his own humble way. Then, you take away my friend Tom. Something of a space cadet, but he was nice enough. His fans loved him. If I had known it was you back then, I would have gutted you for that.”
The studio audience shouts back. The hands from the woman’s opened womb give me thumbs down. The Dark One ape baby gives me the finger.
“That was offense enough. It was a shock to the Reap community and to America at large. It was just plain improper, Jeremy. We love our celebrities. We need our celebrities and you take them from us? America should hate you. And yet, they’ve grown fascinated. You walked into Le Couteau and shot Wayne Pfenniger and you killed two of the Aberrations. Yes, you have the right to kill, but you shouldn’t have. It was horrible of you to do that, I mean; honestly, those kids were just there to have fun. Who are you to judge them for having fun? And who are you to judge others for killing?”
A sudden surge of bravery comes to me. “I’m Mr.400.”
“You are bad,” says the zero on Jack’s shirt. I translate for Jeremy. I speak the shunned tongue. I speak the elsewhere tongue. I can help him. I can get him free. Let me help you. I made you this. Let me help you. He won’t let me help him SHUT UP You are bad Jeremy you are bad for not listening I will set you free the Jackal and the Serpent King must not win I can set you free SHUT UP You are bad We are screaming we are begging listen to me I will I will I will I will not. I don’t need you.
The nurse hands him the ape baby and her knife. Look away SHUT UP look away look away you cannot stay Shut up shut up shut up He skins it like a pro, tearing the hairy flesh from its body like he clearly has so many other bodies. He rolls the skin into a ball in his hand and then opens his unhingeable jaw as wide as he can. It looks like he could fit whole turkeys into that jaw, like he could have fit the entire baby in it, and in fact I’d heard accounts of him doing so. He chews the skin as loudly and dramatically as he can. I wonder how he can eat all those hairs. For a moment, I imagine him coming closer, opening that unhingeable jaw of his wide enough to fit me down his throat. But he wouldn’t do that yet. He’s going to relish his diatribe and his chance to torture me to death. Look away or he will eat the Earth
“And even after all of these horrible things you’ve done, Jeremy, you took my image and mocked me. You mocked all psychopomps, implied that we were not the forces of nature that we claimed to be and that we could never stack up to cancer. I’m going to make you wish you had cancer or you were in a car accident. You’re going to wish you were fucking fried alive by lightning. So, how can you, in your position tell me that cancer, AIDS and car accidents are more frightening than me? You underestimate me or you overestimate cancer.” He shows me a tattoo on his arm, I hadn’t even thought about it or noticed it, but I see it now. It is a big, red zero, like on his shirt, like the painting in the ballroom.
“You don’t impress me Mr.400. Numbers don’t impress me much. It’s all about one number. It’s all about the snake that eats its tail, the beginning and the end. The world began as nothing and it will end up as nothing. There’s only one number worth believing in. You stand beside big numbers. What do they matter? Don’t you see that those four hundred don’t matter now? They’re nothing, just like you’ll be. I’ll make sure of that. I’m gonna turn your brain into nothing, then I’m gonna turn your body into nothing, and maybe, in my infinite mercy and willingness to educate, I’ll save you a trip to Hell and destroy your soul outright. My great granddaddy was death. He made friends with the zero. Don’t think I can’t. I’ve given a lot to the big zero. I’ve taken lives before they’ve even started, eaten them right out of the womb. I take them all into me, the faithful servant of the big nothing that makes the world go around. It spins on an axis doesn’t it? That makes it a circle, and a circle’s really nothing but a big zero. You might be Mr.400, but I’m Mister Nothing, and that’s infinitely more. When I’m done with you, you’ll pray for cancer, you little shit. You go and you say I’m not a force of nature. You’re wrong. I am nature. I devour until there’s nothing left, and I encourage others do the same, I build ecosystems in the model of the only shape in nature that matters.”
I long for cancer, AIDS, my burnt and broken body devastated in an accident or a fire. I long to be perforated by bullets. He picks up the fleshless ape child and he begins to tear at his muscles and organs and even snap bones for emphasis. I can see the oily stuff all over the body, but Jack doesn’t mind at all. Perhaps he’s been eating it for ages, and bits of little Dark One have contaminated his soul. He has soaked up the radiation from this other dimension. Let this evil be part of him. It makes him more imposing than ever.
His face becomes scaly, his neck elongated, his body more serpentine. He is a living, scaled vision of the horrible statue near the Contessa’s house. This is the Serpent King Lud talked about in all of his vile splendor. Jack laughs as the nurse reaches for a syringe and injects it in my arm. Suddenly, the dark smoky room vanishes and I look out at the city of the Dark Ones. You should have looked away …
Courage
My father, a consummate Atheist, always said that we invented God because it was hard for us to find strength from within. Funny that he said that, because he was renowned in my family for his lack of bravery, and yet created no God for himself. So, maybe my father wasn’t the coward we always said he was. I like to think of myself as a brave person, and yet here I am, seeking models of strength outside myself. I seek strength with someone whose strength at last failed him, who was carted away wounded. WWJD? What would Jeremy do? If I were captured by Godless Jack what would Jeremy do? Well, he would burst in with a lot of firepower and bladed implements of destruction and rescue me. So, okay, I’m ready to break a promise. He would too. There is no option.
First step is to track Jeremy and Jack down. I sit open up my trusty laptop and I’m ready to once more play Nancy Drew with it. This time I should be substantially easier. Jack has the embarrassing distinction of having his home address up on his personal website. It’s not anybody would come get him anyway. Nobody, that is, but me. Sniper rifle, swordcane, kitchen knives, aluminum bat, shotgun…that will do. Damn, I wish Jones had sold us that nuke. It’s a bad sign that this many armaments don’t feel like much. I find the address, which sadly enough is about two and a half hours away. Would Jack have brought somebody to a house halfway across the state if he intended on torturing them. Shit, think, think…my thinking is interrupted by a knock on the door. I get up, grab the aluminum bat and prepare to take out the flunkies that Jack has sent to capture me so that he can rape me to death, sew my skin onto that of my slain boyfriend and wear it on network TV.
“Come in!” I shout.
I don’t know if I should even bother fighting back. After all, Jack will just send more after this. I want to remain brave, but now that I’ve thought about it all, if he decides he’s going to kill me, it will probably got done. Surrender. Maybe you’ll see Jeremy in Heaven or Hell or whatever. Maybe there’s some place after death for people who thought they were doing the right thing, but had no clue what the consequences would be. Death could be a blessing. I’m so confused. I don’t know what I’m saying or thinking. I might have a chance to save Jeremy before he dies, or to get back at the guy who killed him. No time to be confused. I have a bat in my hand and I’ve just invited whoever’s outside waiting to kill me in. Fuck it, I’ll fight. I scramble to a hiding place, ducking down and preparing to take out their knees. When I take out their knees, their skull will be next.
The door opens, and in walks Penny Dreadful. I remember the broadcast and how we shot two of her bandmates. What would I do to somebody who killed two of my best friends? Probably something like what I plan on do
ing to the guy who might have killed Jeremy. It will be gorgeous. Whatever Penny has planned for me, she ought to find it beautiful. I stand and watch and contemplate her, until I realize that she can’t possibly be armed. She knows that I probably suspect she’s armed, too. She throws her hands up.
“Cass? Cass Flynn? I’m here to talk to you about something important. I don’t have any weapons on me, really. I swear. If I wanted to kill you, I wouldn’t have knocked on the door. I don’t want to kill you. I want to help. Everybody already knows what Jack’s done. I told him to call me when he caught Mr.400, and he did. He told me when he caught your boyfriend, and he told me what he’s been doing to him.”
I stand up and drop the bat on the floor. Maybe I’ll trust her. Nothing to lose from trusting her. She has news on Jeremy. I want news on Jeremy. I don’t want news on Jeremy. I don’t want to hear about the kind of ungodly things that have been done to him. I want to remember the man I love before every one of his limbs was sliced off and he was castrated. I want to remember the man I love before he was flayed alive and forced to look at his fleshless, limbless body. I want to remember the man I love before Jack won. Her news can’t be welcome here, it can’t be.
“I don’t want to know how my boyfriend was dismembered and killed. I don’t need all the gory details.”
“I could understand that,” says Penny, “but Jeremy’s alive, Cass. He’s not exactly fine, but he’s alive and I know where he is. I think you might be able to save him, if you’re interested. I have to warn you, it’s dangerous and you might not like what you see when you get there.”
Alive. I can almost hear his heartbeat when she says it. I can feel his breath against my neck; feel the kiss goodbye on my lips. Even if he is dismembered, he’s still Jeremy and I owe him my life and my love. No bailing out now. No ignoring his plight, nasty as it might be. Something too big to describe stops sitting on top of my heart and flies away to go torment somebody else. Lucky them.
“Where is he? How is he? What’s been done to him? Can it be undone?” I talk fast, thinking that there must be some question I’m missing, but couldn’t even think to ask.
“I wouldn’t say he’s fine,” Penny begins solemnly, “Jack’s been injecting him with all kinds of hallucinogens and eating in front of him, and you know how and what Jack eats. He’s planning something else later, but I suspect first he’s gonna make his mind snap completely before he does it. I don’t think Jeremy’s one to beg, though, so hopefully you have awhile. And as for where…well, you’re gonna have some problems.”
“I don’t care if Jack took him to fucking Alcatraz. I’ll get him.”
“Well, Jack’s taken him to the Contessa’s mansion. I would say that he’s more than well guarded, especially since Jack expects you. I’m warning you about this because if Jack catches you, you’ll get something worse than Jeremy gets,” she sighs, “you got any beers? I could use a beer.”
I go to the fridge and get her a Guinness. “I hope this is okay. I don’t drink actual beer.”
“It will have to do.” Penny finishes it in a couple of huge gulps.
“I’m sorry that you have to be the one to convey all this to me.”
“So am I,” she replies, “but I’m glad to help. You’ll need to go in through the back to find him. When you do, you’re gonna be facing Jack. There’s no doubt about that. Nobody’s getting there without Jack knowing.”
“I want to face Jack. Don’t worry about me. He’s done so much damage, more than you could ever understand,” I breathe deep, tempted to grab some liquor myself, “I can’t let him live, I don’t think.”
Penny nods. She puts her hand on mine. “I want you to do one thing for me, to pay me back for this favor.”
“And what is that?” I don’t know if I can pay her back for my lover’s heartbeat, for the location of Godless Jack, for a chance to prove my love and courage. I can’t think of anything that would be worth that. I honestly don’t know what I would have to give after all I’ve been through, especially if he’s dead or his mind’s destroyed.
“I want you to bring me Jack’s head. I want you to bring me his head, so that I can put it on a stake and declare a press conference to say he’s been beaten.”
I can only smile at this. “I wouldn’t have it any other way. But what do you have against Jack?”
Penny looks ten years older as she stares into my eyes. I can now see that she’s careworn and concerned and has been up a few nights soul searching. “He’s led to a lot of confusion, not just me, but a lot of people. I want to feel less confused, so I figured I’d give you some help.”
“I’m sorry about your band.”
“I’m sorry about your friend.”
I can’t stay in my kitchen waiting, so I give her a silent goodbye before collecting a more realistic set of implements of destruction. I gather two sharp knives and two pistols. No sniper rifle, no shotgun, no bats, no swordcane, no bullshit. I wish I could rush into Jack’s own home, blazing gun after gun, but I’ll have to settle for sneaking into the Contessa’s house from the back and getting Jeremy out, probably shooting Jack a couple times in the meantime. Simple plan, simple enough I suppose. I hold on tight to the knowledge was at least alive when Penny last heard from Jack.
I park discreetly, a ways away but not too far to run. Jeremy has always stressed the importance of nobody spotting you getting out of your car or getting back into it. It’s one of the most important aspects of the raid. Good thing he taught me what he did. If he hadn’t, I wouldn’t even think about being able to pull this off.
I’m not surprised that she has a girl patrolling a quarter mile outside the grounds, too. If she didn’t, I would think something’s up. The girl is armed with a shotgun, but she holds it like it is heavy to her, like she doesn’t know what to do with it. Maybe she doesn’t. I get the feeling from the careless and uninformed way she goes about her patrol that she’s not especially well trained at doing what she’s doing. A topless Goth chick with awkward black angel wings and a shotgun isn’t top notch security, but she’s expendable. Maybe that’s what Penny meant about security being tight. It’s all about the numbers. There’s one girl here, but I need to drop her fast, before she gets backup. Time is of the essence, that’s the real problem. I duck behind a tree in a deliberately noisy fashion.
Of course the girl turns to look at me. Of course she doesn’t expect to be shot in the head. Hopefully this was enough noise to get a couple of girls from the house to come running. I return to my place behind the tree, but I leave the girl’s body in front of it. As I suspected, these girls aren’t well trained at all. They start out with a potentially fatal mistake. One of them leans down to check the dead girl’s pulse. Fucking idiots. The Contessa’s cult has plenty of members, but she thinks that handing all those girls guns will compensate for their stupidity. It won’t. I take them by surprise, creep around and stab the girl who isn’t checking the pulse. She doesn’t have time to pull her gun, only to register the pain before I bring my arm up and slit her throat. The other one begins to rise. The hand on her gun trembling. I kick her in the face as she’s preparing to get up and she falls on top of the other girl’s corpse. When I pin her gun hand with my foot, she knows she’s as good as done. I fall on her with my knife, repeating the motion several times. It had once been hard to kill one person, but these three felt like nothing. The faces fade into one face and they are only obstacles between Jeremy and me. I should feel bad about this, but the Contessa most likely doesn’t feel any different. It’s not me sending these young ladies to their maker, it’s the Contessa.
As I expected, the two that responded to the shot had been guarding the door. It’s twisted how easy this is. Suspicious even. I ready one of the guns as I open the door, blasting a confused black-winged Amazon with an AK-47 in the chest. She clutches her chest instead of firing, the sort of mistake these girls make. How easily I could have ended up as one of them, too, a devoted Reap cultist willing to give her life f
or a cannibal and the leader of a satanic cult. Funny how life works. As the girl makes her mistake, I put a slug into her clearly empty head and start down the hall to the room Penny told me about. I can only hope that this wasn’t all a trap designed to put me in the same place Jeremy is. If it is, it’s a great one, because I’m just about there. No turning back, though, suspicion or none.
Right outside the room Penny mentioned, I duck a crossbow bolt fired from the end of the corridor. Of all the stupid things…God, a crossbow. If she weren’t working for who she works for I’d pity her too much to shoot back. But she is, so I do. Two more of the girls run toward me, but for some reason they stop. Unlike me, they see the hand shooting out from the doorway, wrapping itself around my throat. Unlike me, they see the other hand, which yanks the gun from mine. Unlike me, they know instantly who I’ve been caught by. Unlike me, they’re not willing to do anything to get in his way.
“You stay still Mrs. 400. You stay still, Miss Flynn. You struggle or you kick and scream, I’ll crush your fucking windpipe. Do you know who I am, bitch? Do you know how many little sluts like you I’ve killed?”
I know who he is and I know exactly how many he’s killed. As he drags me in, I go limp so that he doesn’t choke me any harder. He knows just how hard to choke me to keep me still and to make sure I don’t fight back. He’s done this plenty of times. Three-hundred-twenty-eight times. I brought down those girls like they were Indians in a John Wayne movie, but this fish is bigger. Rather, this snake is bigger. I should panic, but miraculously, I don’t. I’m too full of hate to let him get away with what he wants to do to me. I came to get Jeremy out and while I’m in the hands of Godless Jack, that’s impossible.