Skeleton Crew tuc-2

by Cameron Haley

  “We’re speculating again,” I said. “Truth is, we don’t really know enough to hand this off to Terrence and Oberon. We saw what one of those things could do. If Mobley can bring more in, it’s fucking stupid to give him an excuse.”

  “Mobley isn’t giving Terrence much of a choice. He’s either got to soldier up or lay down.”

  “You’re picking up the lingo pretty good, even if you are country. Terrence has to fight, no doubt. Hell, Mobley will get suspicious if he does anything else at this point. But we can’t go at him directly. We can’t back him into a corner as long as he might have some demons in his back pocket.”

  Adan nodded. “The only way we can stop him from gating in more demons is to deny him the juice he needs to work the ritual.”

  “Right on, so it’s just another gang war. Terrence needs to take his streets, muscle him off his corners. No juice, no demons. Once we dry his ass out real good, then we can move in and take him down.”

  “It’s a good strategy,” Adan said.

  “Thanks.”

  “But I don’t think it’s going to work.”

  I frowned and did my best to keep the annoyance out of my voice. “Why’s that?”

  “Look at it from Mobley’s perspective. He put a demon in King Oberon’s house. Maybe you’re right and he was just trying to sow dissension in the ranks, but even so it’s a damned aggressive move. He didn’t have to bring the fey into it. He didn’t even have to bring us into it. Yeah, he knew what it meant when Simeon Wale went over to Terrence’s outfit, but he could have let it go. That gave him an excuse to escalate but he didn’t have to seize the opportunity if he didn’t want to. He’s fully committed, Domino. He’s got to know he doesn’t see the other side of this thing unless he takes us all out-you, me, Terrence, Oberon. Everyone’s got to die. Which means…”

  “…if he’s got more demons, he’ll use them,” I finished. “And we can’t just put a crew together and take him down. Even if we bring in the other outfits, it’s not clear we’d win an all-out war.”

  “We need time,” Adan said, “but Mobley obviously isn’t going to give us any.”

  “So we don’t give him any choice in it. All we really need to do is avoid committing our forces to a fight we can’t win. We can do that as long as Mobley has something to keep him busy.”

  “Terrence. You’re willing to sacrifice him?”

  “Call it what you want, Adan, Terrence is on the frontlines. If I’m going to be the wartime captain, some hard decisions are going to come with that. It’s the right move. If this is a fight we can’t win, our objective has to be not losing. The only way we do that is by not fully engaging the enemy. We need cannon fodder.”

  “I agree, it’s the best play we’ve got. I’m just surprised. I know it can’t be an easy decision.” I met his gaze and saw something in his eyes. It was something I’d become used to seeing but had never really earned. It was respect. I didn’t feel like I’d earned it now, either. What’s so respectable about giving up a friend?

  “Damn it!” I said, and slammed the laptop closed. I rubbed my eyes and temples and let out a long breath. “I was going to make an army out of this outfit, Adan, but I haven’t done shit. We should have been doing…army stuff. Training, organizing, gathering intelligence. Our guys are gangsters. They don’t know anything about being real soldiers. I don’t know anything about it, either. Now something happens, it’s exactly the kind of thing we were supposed to prepare for, and we’re sitting here with our thumbs in our asses. And the only move I’ve got is to sacrifice a friend just to buy a little time.”

  “I’m not sure how much training or organizing you can do with this bunch. Even if you can turn the outfits into that kind of army, it’s not going to happen overnight. You’ve got them looking at the big picture. They’re willing to fight with you, and for something more than their own corners and rackets. That’s a small miracle in itself.”

  “Intelligence is the big problem,” I said. “I may not be much of a soldier, but even a gangster knows you can’t win a war if you’re always reacting. You have to know who the enemy is, what he’s planning, and you have to go on the offensive. We can’t do that because we don’t know what’s coming or when. That’s why we don’t have any options with Mobley. We’re on defense and it’s getting our people killed.”

  “We can talk to the other outfits,” Adan said. “Maybe some of them have more capabilities in that area than we do. I’ll put Chavez on it. I need to check in anyway, make sure nothing else is on fire.”

  “Yeah, that’s good. Make sure he talks to Sonny Kim-the Koreans pride themselves on having better information than anybody else. And if they do have something, it’d be just like them to keep it to themselves unless we come asking.”

  “What’s your next move?”

  I sighed. “I have to tell Terrence to charge the fucking machine-gun nest. I have to figure out what to do about the zombies, and there’s another angle on the intelligence problem I want to try.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I’m going to the Feds. Those motherfuckers have to be good for something.”

  All the bosses in L.A. have front businesses. Sometimes these businesses are juice boxes, like Rashan’s strip clubs and massage parlors. Other times, though, they’re just mundane enterprises meant to grease the wheels of the illegal commerce that keeps the juice flowing in the boss’s neighborhoods. Sometimes they’re even legitimate.

  Terrence owned about a dozen Laundromats in South Central, and I met him at the store on Normandie the next morning. The business shared a battered, peach-colored concrete building with a tiny storefront Baptist church and a check-cashing joint. There were tags on the walls but they were defensive wards-Terrence wasn’t getting any juice from it when people fed quarters into his machines. Of the three businesses, the Laundromat seemed to be doing a more robust trade, but that may have been because it was a Tuesday.

  Once the muscle out front passed me through, I found Terrence in the back working on a seventies-era dryer. The venerable machine was partially disassembled, and Terrence knelt on a drop cloth on the stained, concrete floor, pounding on something with a crescent wrench.

  “Seems like you could find someone else to beat on your washing machines for you,” I noted.

  Terrence jumped and banged his head on the edge of the access panel. He swore impressively and wiggled back a ways on his knees so he could turn around. He wasn’t exactly the right size to get inside most home appliances.

  “It’s a fucking dryer, Domino. And I do it because it relaxes me. All of a sudden, I ain’t too relaxed, though.” He rubbed the back of his head and winced.

  “What I need to say isn’t going to make you feel any better,” I said. I found a folding chair and turned it around, straddling it and crossing my arms on the backrest.

  Terrence got up and smeared the grease into his hands with an old rag. He nodded and leaned against the dryer. “I guess I wasn’t expecting good news,” he said.

  “Mobley gated the demon in. It wasn’t a summoning spell. We don’t know how he controlled it, or even if he controlled it, but he can probably do it again.”

  Terrence didn’t say anything for a while and I could tell he was turning it over in his mind. Finally, he lifted his eyebrows and nodded his head once. “You got to throw me under the bus.”

  “God, I’d like to shoot whoever came up with that saying. Seems like everyone’s getting thrown under a fucking bus every time they’re a little inconvenienced or get their feelings hurt.”

  “I ain’t complaining, Domino. Seems like that’s the only thing you can do. You got to look at the big picture, and that means you can’t go after Mobley until you’re ready.”

  “I’m not happy about it, Terrence.”

  “I know that. This is a war, Domino. You made it pretty clear it wasn’t going to be much fun.” He shrugged. “We’ll do our part.”

  I didn’t deserve the respect Adan had shown me
for giving Terrence this raw deal. But Terrence deserved a hell of a lot for manning up and accepting it with grace. I hoped he could see it in my eyes, the way I’d seen it in Adan’s.

  I nodded. “We don’t need you to be a hero, Terrence. You go to the mattresses. You have to let Mobley come after you, but you don’t have to stick your neck out. Stay alive and when we get in front of this thing, we’ll put that motherfucker down together.”

  “Wasn’t planning to stick my neck out. I was planning to let Simeon Wale stick his out. Plus, we got Anton’s crew. He already growing that motherfucker, Domino. Got Zeds hooking up with him that ain’t even in our game.”

  “Zeds?”

  “It’s what they call the zombies. Anyway, maybe it’s just that Anton knows more about eating than anything else but he makes a pretty fucking good zombie. They turning Mobley’s hoods into a slaughterhouse and Anton’s keeping the peace with the civilians. I figure Mobley will need a couple demons just to keep Anton’s hands off his fucking brains.”

  I chuckled. “Maybe he’s found his calling.”

  “Yeah. The rest of it, we’ll lock this shit down and see how it goes. I got some of my guys working on wards, maybe give us a couple safe houses the demons can’t get to.” He looked at me and cocked his head to the side. “Maybe you got some assets could help with that.”

  “I’ll send you some warders and I’ll get some taggers working so you can draw juice from our blocks. You should be able to keep at least some of the demons out of some of your juice boxes. Truth is, Oberon could have kept the demon out of his club if he’d been thinking ahead. It’s kinda nice to know you can catch the motherfucker off guard, I just wish we hadn’t been there at the time.”

  “Yeah, Mobley can still bring them in somewhere else and put them on us, but it be nice to know a demon won’t show up in my bathroom while I’m taking care of my business.”

  I stood up and swallowed against the tightness in my throat. “Just stay alive, Terrence. I’m going to make this right.”

  “I know you will, D.” Terrence walked over to me and we clasped hands. Then I pulled him in and hugged him. Just a couple slaps on the back, but I had to do it. I wasn’t sure I’d ever have a chance to do it again.

  The Department of Homeland Security’s Special Threat Assessment Group had purchased an ashram just east of San Bernardino when the resident guru had been convicted on multiple counts of tax evasion, fraud and sexual assault. The compound was nestled at the base of the mountains, a hidden oasis of landscaped lawns and gardens and brightly painted cottages and bungalows built in the forties and fifties. At one time, before the lawsuits and criminal charges, the ashram had been a favorite destination for spiritualists and New Agers from all walks of life-as long as they could pay the price of admission. Now it had been turned into Area 51, Southern California style.

  When I’d called Agent Lowell and told him what I was after, he’d seemed pleased. Maybe it gave him some sense of affirmation in his career choices, or maybe he figured I’d be easier to control if I actually needed him for something. Either way, he was probably kidding himself. But the fact that the Ashram-the Feds were nothing if not creative-was a black operation with no official oversight or budget meant Lowell could extend an invitation to a gangster on nothing more than his personal authorization.

  I checked in at the front gate and a soldier in black fatigues with no insignia or identification handed me an access badge. The badge was just a white plastic card with a barcode on it-no name, no photo. It did have some juice, though, and I could smell Lowell on it. I drove the Lincoln along a winding road and parked in a gravel parking lot.

  Lowell and Granato had set up offices in a yellow building with white shutters and trim, and flower gardens flanking the wide porch. The whole compound had a Dharma Initiative vibe I approved of, but maybe with a little more style. I slapped the access badge against the card reader by the front door and walked in. Lowell saw me through the open door of his office and waved, and he and Granato both came out to greet me.

  “Couldn’t you have found something a little closer to civilization for your secret hideout?” I always felt an irresistible compulsion to annoy Granato, and his scowl didn’t let me down. “Malibu Canyon is nice. You could probably pick up something on the cheap, with the foreclosure crisis and all.”

  “We had specific requirements for the work we do here,” said Lowell. “And the isolation is convenient.”

  The truth was, it had taken me less than an hour with my traffic spell. There was no getting around the fact it was San Bernardino, though. “You can skip the nickel tour,” I said. “I hope you’ve got something for me now that I drove all the way out here. You mentioned something about zombie experiments.”

  “Let’s go,” Lowell said, and he and Granato escorted me back outside and along a narrow path that wound its way deeper into the compound. We walked in silence and arrived at a cluster of cottages arranged in a semicircle around a small duck pond. “This is where we’re doing the CMI research…uh, that’s Critical Metaphysical Instability.”

  “I remember,” I said.

  “Okay, let’s go to Building Thirty-four,” Lowell said, and led the way to one of the cottages. He swiped his badge and then hesitated. “What you’re going to see isn’t pleasant, Ms. Riley. It’s not pretty but it’s necessary. We’re doing what we have to do to protect the city.”

  “I guess I wouldn’t be here if I thought otherwise,” I said. “And most of the shit I see from day to day isn’t all that pretty, either.”

  Lowell nodded and pushed open the door, and we went inside. The interior of the cottage had been remodeled in sanatorium chic. The front door opened into a small viewing area where a young woman in a white lab coat sat at a metal desk and occasionally tapped on the touch screen of a tablet computer. She looked bored.

  Most of the far wall was dominated by a rectangular window through which I could see a large, padded cell. A little girl in a straitjacket huddled in the corner with her knees drawn up and her head down. I drew in a sharp breath, and even to my own ears it sounded like a hiss.

  “Runaway,” Granato said, glancing at me. “Multiple stab wounds. Homicide. We picked her up before LAPD found her.”

  “I guess it doesn’t bother you they won’t find her killer,” I said, my voice tight.

  Granato shrugged. “Not my job, Riley. What is my job is figuring out why she can’t rest, and making sure it doesn’t happen to anyone else.”

  “How’s that going?” I asked. The words had a little more bite to them than I’d intended.

  “Cindy,” Lowell said, speaking to the woman in the lab coat, “this is Ms. Riley. Tell her what we’ve got.”

  “This is Subject Number Eighteen,” Cindy said. “She’s a Stage One-”

  “What’s her fucking name?” I said.

  Cindy’s mouth opened and froze. She looked at Lowell and Granato. “We, uh, find it easier not to think of them as people.”

  “Easier for you, right? I guess it’s not easier for them.”

  Cindy swallowed hard. “Gretchen,” she said. “Her name is Gretchen. She’s eleven or twelve years old.”

  I nodded. “Go on.”

  “She’s a Stage One. She died between one-thirty and three this morning.”

  “What are you doing with her?”

  “We’re observing the transition. Ideally, we’d monitor and record vital signs, but…”

  “…Gretchen doesn’t have any vital signs,” I said.

  “That’s right. Physiologically, she’s dead. No pulse. No brain activity. So there’s not much we can do except observe and record changes in her appearance, behavior. When she reaches Stage Two, we’ll do some tests, measure her response to various stimuli.”

  “Sounds fascinating,” I said. I didn’t want to know what kinds of “stimuli” she had in mind. “Have you actually learned anything?”

  “Her animation is completely nonphysical,” Cindy said.

&nb
sp; “Um, it’s paranormal. I mean, there are absolutely no physical processes animating her body-no chemical activity, no electrical activity.”

  “She’s running on juice.”

  “We believe so, but it appears to be a finite source.”

  “She’s burning it, Ms. Riley,” Lowell said.

  “Right,” said Cindy. “They burn it very quickly. We believe this condition is responsible for the cannibalistic compulsions. As they burn up their own, uh, juice, they must feed to survive. It’s not a biological process but there are obvious parallels.”

  “What happens when they don’t feed?” I asked.

  “We could show you,” Granato said. “We can show you Stage Three, Four and Five. You probably won’t enjoy it.”

  “Their condition begins to deteriorate,” Cindy said, “physically and mentally. Their bodies begin to decompose and they begin to present symptoms of acute psychosis. This acts as a kind of survival mechanism because the psychosis enhances their ability to find food.”

  “Problem is,” said Granato, “the hunting and feeding drives most of them bat-shit crazy, too. Either way, they wind up insane.”

  “Most, but not all,” said Cindy. “The transition’s time-line is different for each subject. Some animate immediately, while for others it takes hours. The original personality is intact at the time of death. Some are more successful than others at coping with their undead state.”

  “And the cause of all this is that their souls can’t leave their bodies?”

  “Their souls are not leaving their bodies,” Lowell said, “and that’s causing the undead state. We don’t know why it’s happening. We don’t know if the souls can’t leave or won’t leave.”

  “Maybe hell is full,” Granato said, snickering.

  “Fuck you, Granato.” I felt like saying more but he pissed me off so much I couldn’t think of anything.

  “We do know a little more,” Lowell said, “based largely on your reports and our own efforts to control the out break.”

  I nodded. “We can free the souls from the bodies. But they still can’t move on-the ghost remains trapped with the remains.”