Burning Sky

by R. S. Scott

  The beast growls and fumbles through phrases. Its eyes red with fear and black with darkness. It raises its fists and pushes, pressing into the air against the attacker.

  The attacker pushes forward, fists raised, face redden and teeth bearing. Snorting half-phrases and pushing hard into an invisible wall that formed before it. The two struggle to the left then the right, around the grand mess of broken furniture in a locked formation, pushing with tightened fists. The attacker releases a grip and thrusts a fist into the beast, then again holds the grip. Again, the beast counters with equaled malice.

  The attacker drops slightly and upends the beast. The beast is flung forward onto the entertainment unit with arms flailing. The attacker pulls back the beast with a grip of an iron vice. Gripping its core backward, the beast howls loudly. The muddled phrases from the beast continue as the attacker’s grip holds it steady at a slight angle tilted backward. With arms clutching the air and swiping at the fortress behind him, the beast growls and shouts in old Navajo.

  “Oh shit! Hold your fire! Hold your fire!” Jeremy’s voice nearly cracks as he grips his sidearm pointing at nothing.

  The cat is irate beyond reason, hissing loudly, biting, and clawing at nothing. Racing from one end of the room to the other, it tries to leave the room but cannot.

  The beast regains its voice and loudly proclaims and utters words and phrases disturbing to all who hear. Words never uttered publicly are shouted as if shouted by many powerful voices. The blackness comes nearer, the air thick with darkness choking the mortal. The beast stands on its feet with the attacker on its back, attached by defying words and utterances. The beast walks, still cursing loudly, swinging its arms and kicking the air.

  The cat follows unwillingly, biting and swiping the air mimicking the beast. It follows the beast toward the far wall walking on its rear paws.

  The attacker mutters loudly, commanding unseen tasks to bring death and grave misfortune. The uttering brings loud cries from the beast as its arms fly outward hopelessly mimicking the attacker’s arms. It screams as its arms couldn’t move.

  The attacker mutters more words and locks the beast’s arms in midair. The beast screams. It cannot move from the invisible grip on its wrists. The beast mutters and laughs, sounding like a room full of violent, drunken men. The audience of federal agents and officers stare in disbelief trying to mentally accept the fantastic display of the incredible. The tales of childhood lore and songs of pretend magic are remembered.

  “Calm that cat!” Jeremy yells. The cat stands on its rear paws, an upright stance with front claws held wide open.

  As the beast’s mutterings end, a loud cry escapes his lips, and he rises above the floor to just several feet below the ceiling. So rises the attacker still attached to its back and the cat, now twisting and thrashing about in a space in time void of gravity’s law.

  “Holy Shit! Hold your fire! Hold your fire!” Jeremy again fixates his aim at nothing.

  The attacker strikes the beast from the back violently, repeatedly as the organic thuds shake the room again and again, until a bloodied object comes forth from the beast’s chest under its shirt. The beast pulls at its arms as its wrists slowly turn black dripping with blood. The uttering is no more as the beast vomits blood and blackened matter into the air. To the left, the cat still hisses, thickened tail and raised claws it circles about void gravity’s authority.

  “Cable! Now!” Shouts the attacker, his eyes red and cheeks raised. His face bruised and bloodied, he reaches out past his body to the mortals. “Cable!”

  “Give him the cable! What cable?” Jeremy looks confused then pulls a black power cord from an overturned computer. It immediately flies out of his hands into the attacker’s grasp.

  The attacker strings the cable around the beast’s neck twice and pulls. Within moments the utterances stop and become gurgling drowning chokes. The attacker situates his feet behind the beast’s head and pulls mightily, grunting loudly.

  Moments pass and the pair drops to the floor. The cat falls and runs out of the room hissing. The attacker keeps pulling as the beast is reduced to slight jerks. The beast turns, its face a frightened boy. Not one word escapes its mouth as its tongue protrudes out, wheezing lightly. The attacker pulls until silence speaks loudly, but the beast’s eyes still move about, gazing at one individual then another.

  The attacker knots the cable then crawls away panting, then collapses.

  “Chris? Are you there? Homeboy, you there?” Jeremy approaches the attacker timidly. Side arm at the ready. Jeremy creeps slowly. “Brother, are you OK?”

  Suddenly, the beast rises again to its feet, hunched over like a large, upright cat. It cannot speak as its throat is tied, but it tries to utter a word. With its tongue protruding out of its mouth, a wheeze escapes its lips. In an incredible blur, it races out of the room and breaks the hotel tower glass. A great commotion erupts downstairs as the beast falls. Officers point their guns at a dead rotting corpse.

  Chris vomits and heaves in uncontrollable jerks. I hold onto Rebecca and Jess. Rebecca has hidden her face behind me. Jess seems lifeless. There is no sign of Hailey.

  “Jess?” I say softly.

  CHAPTER 15

  The video feeds are blank. The feds are very frustrated and irate as one of their own has fallen. I am interviewed repeatedly, and I repeat the same story. A Salt River deputy spots a blur climbing the hotel tower. Then shoots Agent Henry, then himself, breaking some of his incisors while biting onto his pistol slide.

  Karen is an emotional rock having witnessed the full display of our current enemies as we deem them. Chris and Jeremy are escorted elsewhere along with Abel, no word from them. Hailey seems to have vanished from sight during the commotion and will be placed on the missing persons list. Counseling is encouraged with FBI personnel and Salt River PD on hand. Jess refuses to talk to me. Her family has come and taken her away despite my requests to converse. I am horribly hung over and exhausted. I lay on my bed in my room as federal agents remove their defunct hardware and cameras to bring the hotel rooms to somewhat visual normalcy.

  “Hey, how are you?” Karen stands at my hotel room entrance.

  “Not good,” I mutter slowly in a defeated tone. “Christopher is going to turn on us.”

  “Simon got away, but we got his goons,” Karen says.

  I lay defeated. “Jess is gone, Hailey is gone, Henry is gone.”

  “I know. You OK?” Karen asks.

  I am quiet for a moment. “I’m scared, I think. I wasn’t before, but I am now. I’m scared,” I confess.

  Karen approaches my bed. I lay face down. “Keller, you did well out there, you did. I hope you know that. I put that in my report. The feds did the same.”

  “I got drunk again. Then things went to shit.” We share a silence. “If I was sober, I would have done things differently.”

  “Keller, listen, you did good with the way you handled Tracy Monroe. Whatever you said to her made a difference. I mean it’s the only video feed they got from casino surveillance. She just took down the other goon like it was nothing.” She sits on my bed. “We got it on video. Do you want to see it?” Karen asks.

  I get up and wipe away my moistened fright. “Let’s have a look.” We make our way to the media room now void of its entirety except for Karen’s laptop.

  In a hazy, colored view, Tracy sits in the hotel lobby, fidgeting and looking about anxiously, clearly struggling. She gets up and walks about shaking her head, then sits back down. A commotion sets in as hotel security and Salt River PD run past her. She seems to wink at the camera. FBI and Salt River PD arrive and order her to the ground. She raises her arms and drops to her knees. A hooded teenager appears to the right on the screen, he waves his hands and gets the attention of the officers. Instantly two officers drop to the ground. The focus turns to the hooded teenager. There was no audio with Karen’s video, but the audible commotion is undeniable. Lips move in frantic paces, guns pointed, and shouts shouted. The
commotion moves away from the camera video feed as onlookers appear gravely uncomfortable. Tracy still appears on her knees with arms up. Then slowly gets to her feet and disappears from the video feed toward the commotion. She returns, dragging the hooded teenager by his right leg, then returns to her knees with arms pointed up. The video feed ends.

  “What happened?” I ask.

  “That was Simon’s other goon.” Karen says pointing at the video feed, “One came up the side of the hotel tower, and the other was coming up the elevator. She took him down. No idea how, but he’s alive and the FBI have him. Some kid from Kayenta area. Thing is, they took Tracy, too. Once they move Tracy away, he’s out of their control again. Whatever she’s doing, she’s got that goon by the balls.”

  “Tracy.” I nod.

  “What happened back there at the bar?” Karen asks.

  “I didn’t like what was happening. Chris is doing his thing with his bear pelt with Simon coming. I didn’t like it. It didn’t sit well with me. So, I went to have a drink to calm down a bit, and Hailey sits by me. But it was Tracy. She says she was there to help, I didn’t believe her, so I gave her permission to do her thing on me.”

  “Oh no. Keller, damn it!” Karen curses.

  “I know, I’m sorry.”

  “Tracy is up to no good, and you allow her to get that close to you? What were you thinking?” Karen asks.

  “I wasn’t, I was drunk. I was drinking IPA and tequila,” I tell her.

  “Keller, what is it with you and tequila? You and Old Man Taylor have the same fucked up problem.” Karen mutters.

  “I know, I’m sorry,” I say.

  “Then what happened?” Karen sighs.

  “So, she does her thing on me then freaks out saying she saw our son sitting on the next barstool staring at her,” I say.

  “You and Tracy’s son?”

  “Yup.”

  “How?” Karen asks.

  “Like I know how to answer that question.”

  “Geez.”

  “And Jess left with her parents. She’s pissed at me, again,” I tell Karen.

  “She didn’t take things too well?”

  “No, and she didn’t want me getting involved with the Rez crap. I told her everything was going to be OK, and now all this. She was right about all this. She was right.”

  “We have our final statements and exit interviews to do with the feds. After that, we leave. Salt River marketing is doing a cover story for all the shit happening here. A lot of people saw things they really shouldn’t have. Thirty minutes, come on.” She escorts me back to my empty room. “The feds have rented out one of the meeting rooms, thirty minutes.”

  “Officer Steve Keller, have a seat.” Agent Ellington offers me a chair.

  “Agent Tom, how are you?” We shake hands as a host of other federal agents look on with pending suspicions.

  “Sobering up, are we?”

  “Yes, let’s speed this up, I want to leave.” I demand.

  “Of course. What is your relationship with Tracy Monroe?” Tom looks through his notes.

  “I hate her. Anything else?”

  “Could you expand on that please?” Tom asks.

  “Tracy Monroe is the daughter of Daryl Monroe, patriarch of the Monroe family of lunatics from the Rez. She’s crafty and violently manipulative. You could say she’s the devil in female form. But you all know that already.”

  “And?”

  “We’ve known each other since we were teenagers.” I say, “That goes for most of us that grew up in that community. I knew her father when I was a teenager, and I knew her. She’s a fierce woman.”

  “What do you mean by a fierce woman?” Tom asks.

  “She’s easy on the eyes. I’m sure you know that. But she also knows that, and knows how to use it. That vulnerable, sweet, lovely woman who mutters about in slight tones in her adorable ways, it’s all an act. Her family works a form of witchcraft that includes premonition. They are damn good at what they do.”

  “I see.” Tom scribbles on his paper notepad. “What was said in your conversation with her at the bar?”

  “I went down for a drink to calm down. I was not on duty and didn’t carry a weapon, so I went to have a drink.” I glanced at the other agents in the room. “Carrying lots of stress.”

  “What was said?” Tom demands.

  “Hailey was there, and I got plenty high with her. But it turned out to be Tracy, looking like Hailey.”

  “Tracy in disguise to look like Hailey?” Tom asks while scribbling on his note pad.

  “No, it was Tracy taking on the form of Hailey.” I point at Tom, “Yes, that kind of form.”

  Tom scribbles on his notepad. “Then what happened?”

  “Tracy and I got into it, or perhaps I started to lose it, and challenged her to then peer into my soul for whatever it is that she wanted from me. She claims we will have a son.”

  Tom glares at me stoically.

  “I think she’s full of shit.” I shake my head, “She’s full of shit, like always.”

  “Steve,” Tom turns to the FBI agents, and they share a collective nod, “Tracy is two months pregnant.”

  “What?” I sit with my mouth open. “Wait! What?”

  “Have you had relations with Tracy Monroe?”

  “No, I hate her! She’s a lying, manipulative, whore of a woman who knows no bounds regarding her lust. You think I want to be a part of that? Hell no! I haven’t been with her.”

  “She negotiated terms of her current involvement, pending the safety of her child.” Tom looks on.

  “Negotiated?” I ask.

  “Yes, our attempts to bring Simon’s other recruit under control were unsuccessful, until Tracy is near, then he calms right down.”

  I sit silently.

  Tom continues, “Tracy claims you are the father of her unborn child. She also asks that we do everything in our power to assist you in whatever you do.”

  “Shit.” I sit with arms folded, retracing my steps as of recent days, then weeks, then months. There are no blank periods of time that I can recall, no events that involved any intimacy of any kind with Tracy, none. “Who is the goon?”

  “We’re working to identify him. He has no records anywhere.”

  “He’s a soldier.” I say. “Bred and born to kill. A soldier.”

  “Keller?”

  “Brought up in the arts from when he was a child, knows nothing else. Where is Simon?” I ask.

  “Salt River PD chased him to the summit of Red Mountain and then he vanished.”

  “Sounds about right.” I sit nodding, “Can I go now?”

  “Tracy requested a visit if you’re up to it.” Tom looks on, studying my reactions.

  “The only controlling mechanism you have over that soldier hell-bent on killing you all is Tracy? And she wants to talk to me?” I laugh. “Sure, why not. Where is she?”

  Tom leads me to the basement of the massive resort and hotel. The halls are walled with thick concrete, void of delicate casino décor. We walk from one long dimly lit hall to another, finally arriving at the door to the centered corridors of rooms that are enclosed by the long halls.

  “Officer Keller, listen.”

  “Call me Steve.”

  “Steve, Tracy is very unpredictable. At everything. But the kid is just violent. He’s somehow able to manipulate his surroundings as well as those around him. When we took Tracy to see the gynecologist, the kid threw a massive fit. He was somehow able to get the two guards to turn on each other. We found the kid upside down in the dark corner of the room. Tracy came back, and he fell from the corner ceiling onto the floor. She just pointed at the chair in his room, and he obeyed.”

  “No shit, Sherlock. Can I see Tracy now?”

  “We will be recording your session.” He opens the door. I walk in.

  “Shyboy!” She smiles widely. “I didn’t think you’d come.” She gets up and walks to me. I pull away by a step. “I would never hurt you.” She h
ugs me and holds me tightly. “They’re keeping me here for a couple of weeks I think. That Kayenta kid is pretty strong, but he’s young and a bit stupid.”

  “Not like you?” We sit at a table.

  “No, not like me. Hey, you want a sandwich or something? I’ve been able to get anything I want from any of the restaurants upstairs.”

  “How is your dad taking all this?”

  She looks down. “Dad doesn’t know about me being preggers if that’s what you mean. I was able to block that.”

  “How do you block that from your father? Who, I assume, knows more about your skills than you do,” I say.

  “Please, Shyboy. I know everything he does. And more actually.”

  “Nice. I think,” I ponder.

  “You going to ask me about our son?” She rubs her stomach.

  “Eventually,” I say.

  “I’m sure you want to know how and when right?” Tracy says.

  “I’m all ears.”

  “On one of your visits to Winslow to see Jess, well, that was me,” Tracy confesses.

  I laugh. “Yeah, makes sense.”

  “Shyboy, what’s funny?” Tracy asks.

  “I remember that. You ate an entire stack of pancakes with sides of bacon. I’m thinking, damn, Jess must be really hungry. You just inhaled it. Then she smelled different. I think it might have been your deodorant, or your breath, or something,” I recall.

  “Shyboy, that was expensive perfume. I bought that specifically for that night,” Tracy says.

  I smile. “I didn’t like it.”

  “No, I guess not.”

  “I gave my DNA. We should know by next week if that is my kid,” I tell Tracy.

  “So, you’re just going to leave? Just like that?” Tracy asks.

  “Yes, I am.” I get up from my chair. “Tracy, you deceived me, fucked me and now claim to have my son in your womb? What exactly am I supposed to say about that? You manipulated me, and now I’m expected to go along with it? Like it’s OK for you to do that?” My voice echoes loudly.

  “You’re right, I’m sorry.” She looks down at the table. “It’s too much to ask, right?”