by Matt Drabble
The Shadow World was cold and dark, and time flowed slowly and in reverse as she would watch on helplessly as a poor soul was brutally butchered before her eyes. All she could do was to steel her stomach and watch carefully for any identifying characteristics of the killer. The problem then was just who to tell. She had learned quickly that, despite her obviously sincere appearance, her offers of help were constantly refused, sometimes politely and sometimes forcibly. It had been an immensely frustrating time as sometimes she had valuable tips to give the police but they wouldn’t listen. She had made several anonymous tips, but soon she’d found that the public phones she’d used in order to avoid using her own line had started to be watched as her insights had led to several arrests.
Eventually she had met Detective Inspector Karl Meyers. He’d shown up at her door one late autumn afternoon as the sun was dying and the red leaves in her garden were fading and falling. He’d been a big man but somehow stooped as though carrying a heavy invisible weight on his broad shoulders. He’d explained to her that despite her best efforts there was a reputation floating around about her uncanny ability to find things that were lost. Her first instinct had been to flat out refuse his request for help tracing a little girl who had been missing for the past month or so. But he had been so sad and so beaten down by the fruitless search that eventually she had relented.
Josie Dawn Jacobs had been attending her own 4th birthday party when, amidst the cake and balloons, she had disappeared out of her back garden. The story resonated with the media because she was as cute as a button with missing teeth in her wide smile and the country was soon gripped by her plight.
Jane had let Karl take her to the Jacobs’ home and had made him swear that he would never reveal her involvement. She was convinced that the world was not ready for a real psychic given their treatment of the charlatans.
She’d stood in the back garden, half hoping that she would be able to help and half hoping that she wouldn’t. She had stood that way for almost an hour before little Josie had suddenly rushed out of the darkness and gripped her arms fiercely. It had been the first time that anything from the Shadow World had physically touched her and it had been a truly frightening experience to realise that these weren’t just pictures in a book. Slowly, Josie’s face had retreated back into the shadows and lost its twisted fury. The scythe had started its pendulum swing, cutting through reality and leading her backwards through the last moments of Josie’s life.
When she’d been shaken back to reality by Karl’s worried rough hands, she’d felt her cheeks sticky with dried tears. Little Josie had been snatched from the party by one of the guests who’d wandered into the back garden and mingled with the other parents. The man had lived a couple of houses down and was well known and well liked by his neighbours; he’d even organised the first search for Josie, all the while knowing that she lay dead in his basement. Jane had witnessed the poor little thing’s debasement before being she had been wrapped in polythene sheets and hidden behind a wall in the man’s cellar which had been built for just that purpose.
Karl had watched her carefully as she’d told him what she’d seen and eventually he’d taken her home, remaining passively thoughtful on the ride. He’d returned to her cottage two days later and told her that they had found Josie just where she’d said. At first, she had been afraid that Karl’s mind would be full of suspicion, but even his checks on her alibi seemed half-hearted, as though he was just going through the motions. From then on, he would come to her whenever he was stuck. Sometimes she helped, but more often than not there was nothing for her to see.
The Crucifier case had been their final collaboration and had ended with such tragedy that it had forced her into retirement on the spot. The arriving officers had viewed her with naked suspicion at first, but after her innocence had been assured by the girl that she had saved, their attitudes had changed to open hostility. Apparently, Karl had kept a journal of their exploits and had trusted his partner with a few details.
Jane knew that it was her fault that Karl had died. She had become so caught up in the case that she had started to act like a detective and had tracked the killer down to his lair. She had been staking the place out when Karl had arrived to chastise her for her foolishness. They had argued in her car when the killer had arrived home, carrying a suspiciously large sack over his shoulder. There had been no time to wait for backup and they had rushed in. Karl had ordered her to stay outside but she knew that the little girl in the sack was not long for this world; it wasn’t a psychic flash, it was just common sense.
The aftermath had allowed her to fade away into the background, as the police were desperate to avoid any public knowledge of her involvement for fear of ridicule or even a ruling of an unlawful search of the building, despite the girl being saved. Jane had been warned in no uncertain terms that any mention on her part would lead to dire consequences. It had never entered her mind to seek publicity for either her involvement or her ability, but Karl’s partner Tom Holland had put the fear of God into her.
Tom Holland was a bear of a man, all belly and chest with thick powerful limbs and a well honed knack of using his physical size for intimidation purposes. Tom had thrown her into the back of his car on that night and driven her to a secluded spot where he assured her that no one would hear her scream; she’d believed him. If she’d ever had any inclination about getting back in touch with her gift, it only took one flash of Tom’s red sweaty face, straining like a hungry Rottweiler at the leash for fresh meat, for her to step down hard on such thoughts.
It had been 8 years since she had set foot in the Crucifier’s basement of horror and she had no desire to open up that life again. There were flashes from time to time but she had developed a resistance to the intrusions. She had built a wall around her mind that was constructed from steel and concrete and had almost been impenetrable. She could feel her mother’s disapproval from the other side, but she also knew that she had to live her life and she had saved enough people, given enough blood, and caused enough damage.
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She walked across the bedroom floor and entered the bathroom. Soon, the small en-suite was filled with hot steam from the shower and fragrant raspberry body scrub.
Jane looked down at the half completed symbol that was still scarred onto her chest. The Crucifier had started to place his symbol on her chest with the tip of his blade before Karl had shot him. The gnarled crude symbol had faded over time but her body was flush with the shower and the scar always stood out larger when it was red. She had thought many times about having a little cosmetic surgery to hide the mark, but something had always stopped her, as though it would be like denying Karl’s bravery to erase the mark.
She walked to the sink with a towel wrapped around her still enviable figure, hiked up a little higher to hide the mark. She opened the bathroom cabinet and withdrew a jar of moisturiser. As she closed the mirrored cabinet, she was suddenly dumbstruck by what she saw in the steam on the glass. The Crucifier’s symbol had been drawn with a single finger through the clinging droplets. A pentagram with a crucifix in the middle was staring back at her and a hand flew to her mouth to stop herself from screaming aloud. There had been a few isolated occasions when something from the Shadow World had pierced her carefully constructed barricade, but never anything that had caught her unaware. She could normally feel their fingers scratching around the corners of her mind, rapping nails demanding attention and begging for help. But this time she hadn’t felt anything trying to reach her; she could only see a symbol that had appeared out of nowhere. She knew that it had to have been her hand that had drawn on the mirror, even though she couldn’t remember doing it; she just didn’t know what it meant.
Her thoughts were interrupted as someone rang the front doorbell and she felt a stab of terror in her gut that, no matter how carefully she had hidden, some things just wouldn’t be denied.
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The young woman at the door looked to be in h
er late teens or early twenties. She was short and skinny, but not unattractive, with collar length blonde hair tucked behind her ears. She had delicate features with warm blue eyes and a friendly smile.
Jane had dressed quickly after wiping away the symbol drawn on her bathroom mirror. She wore jeans and a hooded top, adorned with a pet shop logo, and her thick hair was swept into a simple ponytail. As usual, her mother’s silver brooch was in her pocket when it couldn’t be worn.
“Can I help you?” she asked politely, as she held the door open a crack.
“I certainly hope so,” the woman replied. “My name is Lana Genovese and I was led to understand that you are able to…, well…, to help people in my position,” she said shyly.
Jane stared at the woman, wondering if this was the day that she was exposed. Perhaps she was a reporter, or an author, or maybe she worked for the police. “Well, I work part-time at a pet store, Miss Genovese; were you perhaps looking for an animal of some sort?”
The woman looked down at her shoes, blushing furiously, and Jane relaxed a little. She wasn’t giving off any sort of dangerous vibe and seemed pleasant enough, but she was still an uninvited visitor.
“Please, Miss Parkes, I just need a moment of your time. I’m sorry for just turning up out of the blue but I had to see you. You might be my only hope,” she pleaded.
“Obi-Wan,” Jane joked back, but only to a look of total confusion. Lana’s face was desperately unhappy and, in spite of her better judgement, she felt a stab of pity for the young woman. She had a puppy dog look that Jane often saw in the store where she worked - small furry faces pressed up against glass, desperate for love. “I can give you five minutes,” she eventually relented, and opened the door fully for Lana to enter.
Ever since her experience in Arthur Durage’s basement she had worked hard at changing herself from the frightened frozen rabbit that had almost died. She worked out rigorously and had spent the last 8 years studying various self-defence techniques at regular classes. She knew that she could physically handle herself against most opponents and this woman was several inches shorter than her and some way lighter. She still wore a small combat knife in an ankle holster and had done so ever since her retirement, determined to never be caught unarmed again.
“You have a lovely place here, Miss Parkes,” Lana said, looking around appreciatively.
“If you don’t mind, Miss Genovese, perhaps you’d get to the point,” she said bluntly.
“Certainly. I need your help.”
“What sort of help?”
“The special kind,” Lana said quietly, not meeting her gaze.
She stared at her for a few moments, weighing her up. “I don’t know what you’ve been told or what you’ve heard, Miss Genovese, but I can assure you that you’ve been misinformed.”
“I don’t think so,” Lana said in an even quieter voice.
“What exactly is it that you think I can do for you?”
“I need answers, Miss Parkes. Answers.”
Jane suddenly started to get an odd feeling about the woman before her. She still didn’t offer any sort of physical threat, but she radiated a cold aura that chilled her. “Are you a reporter? Or are you with the police perhaps?”
“I just need your help,” she pleaded, her voice rising in pitch and volume.
“I don’t do that anymore,” Jane found herself saying.
“HELP ME!” Lana suddenly shrieked and Jane backed away as she started to realise what was in front of her. “WHY WON’T YOU HELP ME? IT’S COLD HERE! SO COLD!”
Jane stood and staggered backwards as the pleasant young woman in front of her started to decompose before her eyes. The flesh sagged and crumbled from Lana’s bones as bloody wounds shredded her body, tearing the clothes and exposing her pale skin. The young woman screamed as her eyes bulged in their sockets and her head shook violently from side to side, becoming a blur of motion. Lana’s hands reached for her and, in spite of her now grotesque appearance, she reached for her as Lana became wracked with torturous pain and torment. And then Jane was clasping at thin air. Lana Genovese was no longer there and had never been. Jane slumped into an armchair, unable to comprehend just how someone from the Shadow World had rung her doorbell and walked into her home, and also why the young woman had seemed oddly familiar.
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“Best 4 Pets” was a small family-owned pet shop as the name suggested. Jane had been working there part-time for the past 5 months or so. It was an easy job that required little in the way of concentration and took up only a few hours of her time. She had come to discover that, as much as she might appreciate the company of an animal at home, her now only occasional psychic bursts were still too much for a dog to take. It was as though the animal world could sense that she was different and that a whole other realm was dangerously close by. The next best thing had been to work in a pet shop, giving her access to the store’s inventory without freaking them out.
She turned up for her shift on time as always, but the sense of disquiet had not left her as she pulled into the staff car park. There had been precious few incidents over the past 8 years and even on the rare occasion that one broke through her defences, she had always been able to stay in control and shut it down quickly. The young woman that had appeared at her door had not seemed anything other than an ordinary visitor and Jane was deeply concerned at the fact that someone from the Shadow World had stepped effortlessly into her home. It was a unique occurrence and it was at times like this that she wished there was some kind of helpline for those few genuine mediums like her.
“Hey, Jane,” a voice greeted her as she stepped through the automatic doors.
She turned and saw Marty Kline, a young man in his twenties who had developed a crush on her in recent weeks. “Hi Marty; I thought that you were on this morning?”
“I switched shifts,” he grinned, with a touch of red blushing his cheeks.
Jane groaned inwardly; the kid was nice enough but the last thing that she wanted was to have some love-struck boy mooning over her. She liked this place and didn’t want to leave if she could help it. Keeping a distance from the world around her helped maintain her internal barricade and she didn’t want it lowered, but now it had been breached.
She busied herself with stock taking, followed by cleaning out the rabbit cages. The small bundles of fur shrank from her touch as she tried to stroke them. As always, she felt a stab of regret at the refusal of comforting contact.
“Excuse me?” A voice startled her from behind as she was kneeling and peering into the huge plastic container where the puppies rolled and played.
She turned around and saw a very handsome man looking nervous. He was tall and well-groomed, wearing an expensively tailored suit. His hair was a chestnut brown with just enough flecks of silver to add a touch of maturity.
She found herself blushing uncharacteristically as she stood, their eyes becoming level.
“I was in here earlier and I think that I might have left my wallet behind,” the man said as he shuffled from foot to foot.
“Let me see if anyone found it,” Jane replied, suddenly wondering if this was what Marty felt like every time he spoke to her. She looked around and saw the young assistant manning a cash register. “Marty?” she called out as she walked towards him, with the man in tow behind her. “Did anyone find a wallet this morning?”
She caught Marty’s look of distrust and jealously at the man looking for his wallet and was annoyed by the often ridiculous nature of human emotions. “Well?” she said a little irritably.
“No,” Marty answered sulkily.
“Oh dear,” the new man sighed heavily. “I really must find it; it’s awfully important.”
Jane looked back at the attractive man and felt a desire to help. Her gift wasn’t all about catching serial killers. In fact in the main it was as dull and humdrum as winter rain. She took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. The visit of the young woman at her cottage had shaken her badly an
d it would be a long time before she even thought about opening herself up again. But this was just a little peek; she didn’t have to dismantle the barricade, only open a window the tiniest crack.
“Come with me,” she said to the man and offered him a hand.
He took it without qualm and Jane could feel Marty’s hurt gaze boring into the back of her head but she ignored it. She immediately noticed that the guy wasn’t wearing a wedding ring, not that she cared -or not much at least.
“I have a little trick that I use when I lose things,” she said as she led him to the back of the shop. “Close your eyes and think about the last time that you had your wallet in your hand. Think about the feel of the wallet, the weight, the cracks on the surface, the colour, the smell. Think about it in your hand, see yourself taking it out to use it and what you were thinking about when you did.”
Jane kept hold of his hand and ignored the small goosebumps that his touch gave her. The swinging scythe cut through the light of the shop and cleaved reality in two. She could see the man in the store earlier. He was with a small child, a girl. The child was excited and bouncing, unable to walk in a straight line. The girl rushed up to the puppy enclosure and laughed loudly as the dogs rushed towards her, their paws too big for their legs as they tumbled and rolled. She saw the man lift the girl up so that she could pet the puppies over the side and then she saw his wallet slip from his inner jacket pocket and fall into the enclosure.