Psycho Candy

by Steven Hunter

  “Do you really think I'd let you cut her up?”

  Fortune never got a chance to answer as Shub grabbed a hold of his head and bit into his face. Blood seeped from her lips as she took away his left eye and nose. All Candy could hear was the start of a scream which the goat silenced with her hand.

  “No screams. Please. Come meet the others. Such fun we'll have.”

  She turned Fortune around for Candy to see, and even for her serial killer mind the sight disturbed her.

  Half of his face was missing and his mouth was pulled into a permanent grimace, though which he made disturbed breaths.

  Blood leaked from his other eye, and his nose.

  Candy could barely utter the words, "What... what are you gonna do?"

  “Take him to the covenant. We have a night ahead for what is left of this fine young chap. And then to Dizor. My young will be getting hungry and they love fresh meat.”

  And then she was gone, pulling the still breathing Fortune through the mirror.

  Candy turned and threw up.

  Still, drug induced or not, it had been one hell of a trip.

  She then escorted herself from Fortune's office and made her way to the office of Randolph Nowes. Given her privileges the orderlies were used to seeing Candy walk the corridors so she was not questioned.

  The door to the professors’ room was unguarded and she walked straight in. He was busy looking out the window and she took no time in turning the key, which sat in the newly installed lock. The sound of the mechanism clicking into place alerted the professor to another presence in the room and he turned and sagged visibly at the sight of Candy, who stood grinning from ear to ear, idly dangling the key from the leather handle of its attached ring; a visage of relaxed calm signifying danger. She twirled the keys, their circular jangle instilling paradoxical feelings of justified angry calmness, which grew and intensified with the speed of each rotation until there was nothing but a blur extending from Candy's right hand.

  Like the nurses on the ward, Randolph wore on his belt the small alarm beeper which alerted orderlies to any problems at the push of a large red square button.

  He was after all the professor, the most heavily guarded person on the premises. It was just his misfortune that the orderly outside his door had a bad case of the runs that day, yet instead of forfeiting a day’s salary the orderly had come to work anyway, yet had been in the nearest toilet with watery shit squirting out his ass. The need had been so urgent and the act so unpleasant that he never gave thought to proper procedure, which was to notify someone of his absence, and wait for a replacement to arrive to temporarily fill in.

  At the moment Candy had walked towards the professor’s office he had been running full pelt for the toilet.

  Randolph however still had the beeper and hastily fumbled for the little red button that would bring a hoard of well muscled men crashing though his locked door. His hands finding purchase on what now seemed an annoyingly difficult gadget to locate, despite its size (not taking into consideration his stomachs) he smiled involuntarily.

  He had won.

  The bitch was well and truly fucked.

  Candy however had yet to discover a small trick.

  Her mind instantly knew of the new risk ahead of her, was aware that Randolph was a mere second away from pressing a button that would probably bring her plan of action to a premature end.

  And like any intelligent part of life it took action. A heap of adrenaline was unloaded into her bloodstream, however that was not all. A mixture of chemicals from the pineal, including the naturally occurring powerful psychoactive D.M.T was also released and she literally reached out with her mind and jammed electrical interference into the beeper.

  When Randolph pressed it, it was dead.

  John would later tell her it was her will; what was left in the mind when the mind was quiet and no internal dialogue could be heard, however at this moment she did it without explanation.

  All that was left was the telephone on the desk.

  Both eyed the auditory equipment; however it was Candy who reached it first and yanked the wire from its place in the wall.

  "So, Randolph. It looks like it's just you and me again," Candy smiled.

  "Listen, I don’t know what you want. But you aren’t going to get away with whatever it is."

  "I don’t expect to Randolph. That’s the beauty. You were going to cut me open and I’m here to return the favour."

  Candy picked up the letter opener, still a permanent feature on the psychiatrist's desk, a sign of assured arrogance much like the deceased Malone had noticed. Candy noticed too.

  "I’m betting that a man with an ego as big as your must have a small penis."

  "Yes, Candy. It’s only natural you want to humiliate me. Textbook stuff. But kill me? You’ll never get out."

  "Oh, I’ll get out alright. My friend the goat just ate your buddy Fortune. However she still has my soul and I thought it fitting that I get a piece of it back from my captor. Kinda makes us even in the whole karma stakes. It may take me twenty years to get out of here but you won’t be around to see it."

  "Candy, I was going to sanction your release."

  (Lying wants you dead accident in surgery ask about Mary)

  "Yeah, just like you were going to sanction Mary’s release?"

  "How did you... I mean no one..."

  Mary had been a patient that the professor had murdered after a bloody operation with Fortune. He had always wanted to try it out, to see what it was like to kill, to truly understand the killers mind. Unfortunately it did him no good with Candy. She was an expert.

  "Strip, you fat fuck!"

  "Candy, it’s just a letter opener not a gun. I’ll do no such thing. Not unless you come over here and..."

  Like a flash Candy was beside the professor, the blade at his eye. He tried to grab for the blade but was no match for Candy who had been doing press up after press up, night after night.

  "If you don’t be a good little piggy, I’m going to be performing some pretty radical surgery myself. Now take off your clothes!"

  Randolph let out a little whine but began to undress.

  "This is for every humiliation you’ve put every person through in this evil place."

  "I think we both know who the evil person is here," spat Randolph with venomous tone through clenched teeth. Candy stabbed him in the shoulder, the dull blade needing extra strength to pierce the skin. Randolph cried in pain, however soon he was undressed.

  Candy glanced at his penis and laughed. "Guess I was right."

  Randolph blushed. "What are you going to do to me?"

  "Simple," said Candy and drove the letter opener through Nowes' right eye and straight into his brain. She did not stop pushing until the handle was no longer visible, a thick red waterfall obscuring its view.

  In his desk drawer she found a bottle of good scotch and a packet of cigarettes, along with an empty glass tumbler and a book of matches. She filled the glass to the brim then lit a cigarette.

  After a large swallow of the scotch, and a few draws of her cigarette she lifted the receiver of the telephone from its place and got directory enquiries to transfer her to the local news office where she admitted to the recent murder of one Professor Randolph Nowes.

  After she had finished she replaced the handset and settled back in the comfortable leather chair. Draining the last of her glass she watched the blood spill from the eye socket as it stained the carpet, trying to find pictures in the patterns as one would do with a Rorschach test. It would give her something to do as she drank and waited for the rest of the hospital to catch up with the current events. Topping up her glass, she guessed she would pay. But this didn't worry her. What they made her pay for now she would collect on later. With interest.

  She sipped her drink, then lit her cigarette.

  And waited.

  PART TWO

  THE LA DOCUMENTS AND THE RIDERS FROM HELL

  "Strained politeness weigh
s heavily on my words, a broken smile long forgotten. There is tightness in my chest that makes my organs bleed, like I’m crying inside, the bloody tears of a failed heart. Did I fail her? Does she hate me wherever she is, the pure hate, the kind born of love? My soul is awash in a river of fire, my mind attacked by a barrage of damaging questions. What does time tell exactly? Where we’ve been? The things we’ve done? What atrocities our future holds? Does it tell of the things we’ve seen? Believe me. We’ve seen a lot..."

  CHAPTER ONE

  MARCUS MAKES A WOLF

  The sun’s fire burned lower throughout the bleu céleste sky-scape, as sparsely distributed clouds, pearlescent in their whiteness, appeared on the horizon, heralding a subtle yet distinct change in the impending twilight.

  Gradually they spread out, forming a thickening fleece of obnubilation, and as l'heure bleue approached it appeared as if an enormous inkstand of Mauvéine tinctured had been carelessly knocked over and left to flow and mingle throughout the already darkening sky. Discolouration rapidly took place within this aerial textile. It was as if it had been summoned to deal with the spillage, and the absorption of this polluting mixture had resulted in changes to its texture and personality which one may have described as mystical, yet also frightening in a way that was in essence ineffable; except to say that one begot the other.Just as this phenomenon had obscured the fading light, it now did the same with its replacement, separating the darkness it held back from the darkness it had created beneath in doing so.

  Now, as if an entity alive, possessive of a mind of its own, perceptive of both time and reason, the gathering of clouds paused. No longer making guessing game shapes, they instead sat deliberating, waiting.

  That moment between opposites, of differing tones had arrived.

  Twilight.

  Now the colour drained from the clouds, leaving them nirvana in their whiteness, and in an instant they evaporated leaving a patch of virgin sky, untouched by either day or night.

  Out of this circular ripples pulsated in both directions, beginning a strange and unnatural communication between lightness and dark.

  Change was occurring within the reality’s fabric.

  With the ease of a razor slashed into a cotton curtain, a slight tear appeared in the framework of particles that made up the atmosphere, and a pink light, vibrant, yet thinly concentrated, emanated from the slit that had opened.

  Ragged sky flapped in the high altitude breeze.

  The crack between the worlds had opened.

  And throughout this crack appeared a single golden feather, which hung, suspended in the glow of pink light.

  A harsh electrical wind gathered within the cloudless space and descended down upon the narrow cobbled street below, taking the golden feather with it, amidst sharp lightning glares of power that struck against ageing tenement walls.

  The feather once again rose into the air and spiralled amongst rough debris and scatters of leaves with a synchronized elegance, a movement that suggested a sharp intake of breath had been gasped by invisible lungs as the now darkened night’s sky struggled to compose itself after such an effort.

  Then the feather again began its descent, floating easily around the pink light that shone into the open widow of the top story apartment of Marcus Garvey, who lay changed and unconscious on his living room floor.

  The feather settled on his cheek.

  CHAPTER TWO

  THE TRUE LEGEND OF WILD JOHN THE INJUN

  It was a Saturday in the month of July, the year 1616, and for the past six days, massive rainfall had confined most of the Kanien'kehá:ka to their conical shelters.

  The tribe’s shaman had prophesied the opening of the skies river banks the day before it had occurred.

  The day before that he had conducted the ritual to make it so.

  He was the seventh son of a now deceased elder, and was waiting with patient expectation for the birth of his new baby with his wife, who had already given him six others, all boys who ranged in age from 3, 5, 7, 9, 11 and 14 years old.

  The latest addition would of course be his seventh.

  His father's dying wish had been only that his son should equal him in his own fertile success and give seed to seven male children of his own.

  Like his father, he had been a warrior of great success and had taken the lives of many other warriors, contributing this ability to his other ability to make more with such ease.

  During a major battle with a warring tribe, he was badly gouged down the left hand side of his body, leaving a gaping wound that ran from the bottom of his ribs to the top of his thigh. Miraculously, he had managed without aid to find his way back from the fight.

  His wife had been the first to set eyes upon him and upon his sight had ran to his side to aid him in this time of need. Yet, he had turned her away, stating that this, his injury, was no accident, but was instead fate, and that he did not believe the great spirit intended for him to die that night. He requested only a pile of furs to lie upon and a container to catch any blood that would spill until the wound would heal; much to his wife's hysterical dismay. She proclaimed he would die within the hour if his wounds were not sealed and bound. He disagreed and said that this was a test, and that during the night great knowledge would come to him through this wound and that the knowledge itself would heal him. His wife, stricken with grief at the thought of her husband dying, begged him to reconsider.

  Yet, when it appeared that with each passing moment he was losing blood, she agreed that if he would not let her help him then she would place her faith in the Great Spirit and left him, so she thought, to die.

  The next morning his wife went to check on her husband. As she stepped over the threshold of the tepee, she noticed that there was an unnatural stillness to his body which made her want to cry out. His back was turned to face her, his wounded side against the pile of hides he had requested. She was sure he had bleed to death in that position and walked gently to his side. When she was a mere footstep away, she thought she could hear a low rasping, and her heart quickened with joy at the possibility that her husband was still alive. She laid her hand on her shoulder and turned him onto his back and stared at the steady, if shallow, rise and fall of his chest. Slowly he opened his eyes and studied her, his mouth a wide spread grin, and for the first time she saw the massive scarring that had taken place, for the wound had indeed closed overnight, just as he had said.

  That night, a council of the elders of the tribe was called.

  The tribe’s shaman, a wise, wild eyed old man, sat at the head of the circle, as the events of the previous night were discussed.

  The warrior who had undergone the miraculous healing was known as Seven-Still-Breeze; his wife Gentle Elk. His name like all of the tribe's contained a simple meaning, as for the entire week before his birth not one gasp of wind had been felt in the air. Now he was called into the council meeting with the elders. The shaman nodded for him to take a seat, which he did, proud to be amongst such venerable company. When he was seated, the shaman nodded at the others in the circle and one by one they stood and left.

  Soon, Seven Still Breeze sat alone with the shaman of the tribe. “I am getting older. It is no accident this has happened,”

  Seven Still Breeze nodded. He had known as such. “You are to take my place. My life in this body is soon to end and before it does I must teach you all I can. No longer are you to go into battle with the others. Instead you shall study the shamanistic ways of the Kanien'kehá:ka.”

  So it had gone from that day. Eventually the elder shaman had died and Seven Still Breeze, the seventh and youngest in his line of sibling brothers, had become the tribes shaman.

  Now, thirty years later, it appeared he had succeeded giving his farther his dying wish and would not be looking again to impregnate his wife, a beautiful woman whose looks still gave the appearance of youthfulness. As tribes shaman he had many a treatment to prevent birth and still carry on the natural act of love making.

 
Both he and his wife truly loved each other and contrary to her name, Gentle Elk, she had made ferocious love eight months and 29 days before. She sat now with bulging belly, stroking at the shape of her unborn child. As the sky grew darker and Saturday turned to Sunday she felt the familiar twinges in her abdomen and nodded at her husband. Fourteen minutes later her water broke. The shaman set to work mixing a potent brew, containing amongst other things extract of opium poppy, which would all in all ensure, as relaxing and pain free a birth as possible.

  /Tsjata/kon:tʌʔs/ or Seven-Still-Fall was born at exactly 7.07am that very morning. His newborn screams could be heard from the neighbouring tepees, even above the roaring drumming of rainfall which suddenly ceased the moment that his umbilical cord was severed by his proud father. His name was a testament to the rainfall which had lasted throughout the hours of his birth. Put simply, his seventh son had been born when the rain was still falling.

  In his first few years of birth it was obvious, at least to his parents, not least his dotting mother that there was something different about their son. Strange things seemed to happen in his presence. For example, one day she had set him down in the small crib that his father had built for him, whilst she attended to that evenings meal. She had only turned her back for no more than a few seconds and when she looked round again he had vanished. Her first instinct was to scream, as she frantically turned this way and that, searching for signs of the whereabouts of her son. As she was about to raise the alarm within the camp, she noticed him lying curled up instead on the pile of furs which she and her husband shared, his thumb in his mouth, fast asleep.

  As he grew older still, he became popular with the younger women of the tribe and would always be seen in the company of one girl or another. His mother and father were getting on in years by this stage and would constantly ask him whether he intended on giving them any grandchildren to enjoy before their passing. Their son would merely smile and shrug his shoulders.