For the first hour or two at the hotel, Frank was thrilled to get away, to lead a somewhat normal life. He tried to watch television, but it was too much like what he did on shift—constantly staring into monitors in the event something happened. Then after a while, he found himself missing the work, missing the anticipation of something important about to happen.
Chapter Four
Bombay Beach Motel. Blane pulled into the dusty parking lot of the abandoned Bombay Beach Motel situated in the Palm Springs suburb of Bermuda Dunes. Named after a city on the shore of the toxic and almost dead sea not fifty miles south, the motel had a much in common with its namesake. He found a spot for his 76 Caddy beside an orange and blue VW Van. Before leaving the car he searched the sky, but there was nary a dark bird in sight. He slipped inside the L-shaped building, strode down the long hall, then opened what had once been the door to the laundry room behind the cobwebbed reception desk at the apex of the L.
Frezzie and Pippa were using long sticks to move markers the size of little green army men around an immense twenty-by-twenty foot table map. Blane recognized a new one–Dick. He felt bad about that one, but what could he do? Sure Dick was a nice guy, but this war was bigger than all of them, and to place the welfare of one above the welfare of them all was selfishness bordering on genocide.
Pippa, a thin slip of a girl with red and blue hair cut pixie-style, glanced up from the map. “Looks like you ruined someone else’s life today. Congratulations.”
He gave her a cold hard look, then noted that her arms were healing. He’d give her a pass. She couldn’t help herself. “Glad to see you too, Pippa.”
She frowned at her inability to get a rise out of him. She was mad, but it was the good sort of mad. Not the sort, he hoped, that would get her back to cutting. She’d been one of the few they’d been able to save from the Black Bishop and they needed her at her best.
Blane walked over to a cabinet and took out an empty file, shaking his head.
“Really, Pippa. Give him a break.” Frezzie rolled her eyes. Clearly she wanted to say more, but she kept her mouth shut.
“Why does he need a break? I’m telling the truth aren’t I?”
Frezzie sighed. “Sometimes we don’t need to be reminded of the truth.”
“That’s not what Chance would have said,” Pippa started, “If he was still here.”
Frezzie glared daggers. “That’s what I’m talking about. Why are you bringing him up?”
Chance had gone missing last week and just mentioning his name sent Frezzie into a spin. She and Chance had been together for almost a year. In fact, next week was their anniversary. Nothing was known for sure, but as more time passed, the worst was expected.
Blane turned to Pippa as well. It wasn’t exactly Asperger’s, but she was certainly emotionally bereft.
Pippa looked up from her work and noticed the attention. “What? You think that’s my fault too? I’m not the one who chased him away. The Black Bishop probably has him anyway. Like he has everyone else, even your precious Mandy,” she said to him.
He gritted his teeth, but kept his voice even. “No one is saying it’s your fault, Pippa,” Blane began. But even as he said the words her face wrinkled as she began to cry. She tried to stop it, then ran from the room.
Blane stared at the doorway for a moment, then at Frezzie. Regal in the way only a tall black woman could be, she glared imperiously after her friend, her posture indignant. As she stared, she was probably going through every possible fate that Chance could own. Finally she lowered her gaze, relaxed her posture and glanced at Blane.
“Hi, Blane.”
“Hi, Frez.”
“They say you got your man.”
“I did. Do we know how he’s doing yet?”
“Sebastian is trying to bring him online. Keeps bitching about the booze, says it’s interfering with his transmissions. He mumbled something about your tactics and how he’d rather bang his head against the wall than deal with your zombies.”
Blane shook his head. Let Sebastian try and make a zombie, then he’d see what the problems were. As if it was as easy as making cookies in an Easy Bake Oven. Everyone had a fucking comment. Everyone was an expert. They could take his job if they wanted to. But the moment he thought it, he rescinded the thought. He needed to be doing what he did. This was more than a job, more than his life, this was a commitment of the soul.
“Is he downstairs?”
“Like he can be anywhere else.”
Blane wasn’t insulted by her tone. Instead, he nodded and passed her a manila envelope along with the empty folder he’d drawn from the cabinet.
“Here’s his wallet. Make an Alpha file with the information and back it up on the database. I want those pictures accessible to Sebastian in case the mark begins to lose it.”
Opening the wallet, she said, “Richard Dean Smith.”
“What?”
“Richard Dean Smith. That’s his name. You always call them the mark.”
“I know what I do and I do it for a reason.” What was this, fuck with Blane hour? First Pippa and now Frezzie. “Go and check on Pippa, and when you’re reminding her to mind her own business, remind yourself the same thing.”
He descended the staircase at the back of the room and went down and down and down, more than three stories underground. The basement was what was left of an 1800s salt mine. The walls, floor, and ceiling all glistened with white crystals, winking as the lights of the candles shone upon them.
The center of the roughly circular room was occupied by a metal-mesh papasan chair, reinforced to contain the obese man sitting half reclined. Nearly 500 pounds, Sebastian Van Pelt directed the only other occupants of the room, two small Meso-American Indian men, as they cut a long slash along his immense right thigh. As the blood welled, one of the men captured the dark viscous liquid in an oblong bowl. They filled the container with several inches, then the other smeared a white cream over the cut, which helped to close and seal the wound. Wearing a toga which barely covered his midsection, the palette of Sebastian’s white skin had been forever destroyed by a thousand cuts and scars, criss-crossing like a road map of the streets of Los Angeles drawn by a crack addict on a runaway train.
One of the small men moved to the wall with the bowl of blood, while the other held a ten foot long pole with a brush at the end up for Sebastian to grasp. He held one end from his place on the chair, while the small man held up the end closest to the wall. Working as a team, the man dipped the brush into the blood, then held the rod steady while Sebastian drew runes upon the crystalline surface of the walls, all the while murmuring his incantation, each word more powerful than anything Blane could aspire to.
When Sebastian was finished, the two Indian men removed the rod and the bowl and retired to a corner of the room where they brewed tea and rice on a double hot plate. Sebastian turned towards Blane and gave him a tired look.
“You were hard on the girl.”
“I know.” Blane stepped all the way into the room and went over to the wall where the runes had begun to glow. “She reminds me of things I’d rather forget.”
“We all need to remember where we come from.”
“Even so, there are things we don’t need to speak of.”
“Even so.” Sebastian sighed. “You’re right, of course. I’ll speak with her later, Blane.”
“How is it going? Frez said you were having trouble.”
“Trying to lock on. Always hard when you feed them so much booze.”
Blane shrugged. “Couldn’t be helped.”
“We’ll see.” Sebastian suddenly swooned. “Wait a moment.”
Blane’s gaze shot to the wall in time to see the glowing runes melt like wax, obscuring the once sure strokes, creating a bloody circle the size of a porthole. And like the dozen other circles painted upon the walls around the room, a vision appeared in the bloody remains of a sea of windmills. Blane knew the point of view well– he was seeing through the eyes o
f a stumbling man– his zombie.
Sebastian wheezed. “Got him.”
Another job well done. He’d taken a man with no evil in his heart, with no police records to mar his past, with no desire to harm a living soul and turned him into a zombie. The irony was never lost on him that it took a saint to make a zombie.
One thing was for sure. He was no saint, so he should never fear becoming a zombie.
He headed upstairs to his room on the second floor. He’d begun drinking earlier and was ready to finish the job he’d started. He barely glanced at Frezzie and Pippa who’d gotten back together as he passed through the room. He took the stairs two at a time. When he found his room he closed the door behind him and pressed his back against it, the man’s words haunting his thoughts.
“Wow. She’s almost amazing, isn’t she?” Dick Smith had asked.
“Why almost?”
“Only my wife is really amazing. I gotta reserve that for her, you know? But that woman, Sarah is her name? I’m not going to forget her for a long, long time.”
Blane wasn’t going to forget her for a long time either. He pressed his palms against his eyes for a long moment as Sarah danced through his mind. Mandy replaced her on the stage, an adult now, her face hidden by shadow, her hips gyrating like a perfect slut, harlot to the Bishop and whore to the world.
Sarah was amazing.
Mandy was amazing.
The Black Bishop was —
Blam Blam Blam! Harried thumps on the door. “Hey! He took the bait. We got him, Blane!”
He stared at the door. It took him a moment, but he got to his feet and opened it.
Frez stood on the other side breathing heavily, a smile slashing her face. “You gotta see this. Your zombie was grabbed by the monks. They’re using him.” She clapped him on the shoulder. “They’re actually using him.”
She hurried down the hall and down to the operations center.
He glanced forlornly at the unopened bottle of Maker’s Mark sitting on the nightstand, then followed her down. It was rare that a zombie actually worked. That Dick had been picked up was fortune they couldn’t overlook.
He hated the feeling of excitement that tickled his stomach. He reminded himself that the purpose of the monks was to crucify. Even Jesus didn’t survive his crucifixion. What made him think that Dick would survive his? But if he did, oh mother, if he did, then they’d have a set of eyes inside the Black Grotto.
That alone seemed worth it.
Chapter Five
Bombay Beach Motel. Blane ran down the steps and stopped beside Sebastian, whose labored breathing was the only sound in the room. His small men had added blood to the porthole to keep the image alive. Even now the elevation of the image had changed. What had been a view of a sea of windmills, those hundreds of energy-creating wind machines dotting the valley and hills north of Palm Springs, was now a bird-like point of view from somewhere high above the Great Plain of Palm Springs.
A smile snuck through Blane's worry and lit his face. It'd been a long time since one of his sainted zombies had been grabbed by the monks. As the image began to tumble, a cheer went up.
Frez and Pippa smacked hands.
Sebastian sighed.
Even Blane let out a “Hell yes” as he pumped his arm.
The image spun clockwise faster and faster until it reached a nearly dizzying speed. Watching it for any length of time wasn't good for anyone, the slightly blurring image sending crooked fingers into the stomach that twisted and teased.
Blane approached the image until he stood within a meter of the blood covered salt wall. He could almost feel the wind and energy being generated through the portal. The Monks of the Western Wind had crucified Dick Smith, each of the man's arms on a blade, his feet bound to a single blade, so that all three blades encompassed the man's existence.
And all within eyesight of Interstate 10. Thousands of people passed these windmills daily and none of them ever knew that many of them contained actually people. Or if they did see them, they were past so quickly they thought it had been a trick of the eye. Then again, these same people didn’t know about the Black Bishop. They’d never heard of the Black Grotto. And they’d certainly never believe in the idea of Dark Harlots invading their dreams.
Blane reached out a hand as if to touch the image, then jerked it back as a prickling sensation attacked his neck. He turned to Sebastian, who glared coldly at him. The menace in the sorcerer wrestled Blane's excitement away. Shame replaced it and, with head down, he walked over to Sebastian.
“Are you forgetting something?” asked the albino giant.
“No…yes! It's been so long since we were successful, I guess I did forget.” He licked his lips. “Maybe I wanted to forget.”
“These are not toys we're playing with—”
“They're humans. I know.” Blane looked up, beseeching Sebastian to understand the shame that he felt. “Forgive me, Sebastian.”
“Don't ask my forgiveness.” A great meaty paw rose and pointed toward the wall. “Ask his.”
If there was a single thing on the planet that Blane hated worse than recruiting a zombie, it was testifying to one. During the formation of the League of the Red Palm it had been decided that some of the methods they would employ were little better than the Black Bishop's. Testimonials were devised to provide balance. Like a vampire explaining to a victim why his blood was needed, like a werewolf explaining to the little girl why her flesh was the most tender, members of the League were expected to testify at that moment where success seemed imminent, giving the victim that one last chance to back out.
“I will,” murmured Blane.
He steeled himself for the pain he was about to channel. Finally he turned to one of Sebastian's little Indian men who held a scalpel ready to slice. Blane laid his palms flat and winced as the blade scored each hand, turning his palms red. He approached the porthole and pressed his hands against it, his blood merging with Sebastian's and the magic.
Vertigo assaulted Blane and drove him to his knees. He couldn't remove his hands now that he was engaged with the zombie, so he experienced the duality of his body remaining upright and the body of Dick Smith, who he now inhabited, spinning on the blade of a great windmill. Blane's stomach lurched and heaved. He felt the splatter of his own vomit as it struck the wall, but he willed the image away. He willed everything away, everything except for Dick Smith, his zombie who had been crucified by the Monks of the Western Wind.
One minute he was Blane, the next he was Richard Dean Smith. Blane spun and spun until he was able to move inward. He searched the empty mind of his zombie, looking for the entity that had been Dick Smith. He hurled past memories of insurance seminars, through a morass of kid's soccer games, around football Mondays and bowling Tuesdays. Over and under sex with the wife and the swamps of the hidden secrets of married men to include the porn that he watched on his office computer and how he lusted after his best friend’s wife, Joanna. Finally Blane found his zombie, huddled like a little boy beneath the memory of a grandma, an upright woman with a thousand yard stare and a chin that could stop an army.
“Dick are you there?” he asked.
“Please leave me alone, Mister,” came the voice of a young boy.
“Dick, it's Blane, we met in that bar earlier.”
“Leave my grandson alone,” came the voice of the old woman.
“Stow it grandma.” The voice was no more than a memory dredge. “Richard Smith. If you want to see your wife and children again, you need to stop hiding behind the old lady's skirts and get over here so I can talk to you.” When the entity made no move to get up, Blane leaned in close to the old woman and whispered, “Boo!” And like a puff of smoke, she was gone, leaving Dick huddled and naked on the floor.
“Leave me alone,” Dick cried, like he'd probably done as a child when the boogeyman taunted him from the closet.
Blane crouched down in front of Dick. “Let me explain to you what's going on, Dick. You've been vol
unteered for a mission to help us defeat the Black Bishop. You've heard of the Black Bishop, haven't you?”
“It's just a fairy tale,” he whimpered.
“Once upon a time this fairy tale is real. The Black Bishop exists, Dick, in all his badness. He's the wicked witch, the tooth fairy, Billy Goat's Gruff, the ogre and every other badass fairy villain you've read or heard of all rolled into a ball of mean fucking evil, and lucky you…you've been volunteered to fight him. If you want this to have a fairy tale ending with they all live happily ever after then you're going to need to pay attention to me.”
Blane knew the words had sunk in by the fear in Dick's eyes.
“Are you hearing me, Dick? Do you understand what I'm telling you?”
“Why me?” asked the terrified little boy.
“Placement and access. You're an innocent. Your mind and conscience are clean. Hell, you even passed the test of the Monks and they don't like anyone.”
“What are they going to do with me?” the little boy's voice had been replaced by that of an older boy, cracking with the promise of puberty.
“If we're lucky, they'll take you down pretty soon and escort you to the grotto. The Black Bishop needs to surround himself with innocents. They say it makes his evil taste that much better.”
“And if I'm not lucky?”
“Then they'll leave you up here forever.”
“Forever?” asked Dick the Zombie.
“Or until your limbs rot enough so the wind will scour the blades clean. If you haven't noticed, I can't tell a lie to you. Ask me anything and I have to tell the truth.” Blane hated this part. He knew what was coming.
“Why'd you pick me?” The older boy's cracking voice was replaced by a young man's, confidence growing with every word.
And there it was… the question he always hated being asked. “Like I said, Dick. Placement and access. You were the exact person I needed.”
“You could have waited for someone else to come around.”
Red Palm Page 3