DEUS-X: THE REALITY CONSPIRACY
Joseph A. Citro
First Digital Edition published by Crossroad Press & Macabre Ink Digital
© 2012 / Joseph A. Citro
Copy-edited by: David Dodd
Cover design by David Dodd
Illustrations © 2012 / Stephen R. Bissette
Foreword and Afterword © 2012 / Stephen R. Bissette
LICENSE NOTES
This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return the vendor of your choice and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
OTHER CROSSROAD PRODUCTS BY JOSEPH A. CITRO
NOVELS:
Lake Monsters
UNABRIDGED AUDIOBOOKS:
Joe Citro's Weird Vermont
Seven Good Reasons to Read DEUS-X
1. Named one of the "113 Best Books of Modern Horror" by critic Stanley Wiater.
2. Reviewer Don Kaye: "…a supercharged cross between The X-Files and The Exorcist."
3. Fangoria: "For those of you who are tired of vampires, serial killers and angst-ridden, deteriorating artists, DEUS-X will be welcome relief.
4. Emmy Award winner Anne MacLeod: "Why it hasn't yet been turned into a movie is beyond me."
5. T. B. Estabrook: "Lucy—dear, sweet Lucy—she's easily the scariest anti-heroine I've ever encountered. Even though my skin crawls every time I think of her (and what eventually happens to her), I'm glad I met the creepy little being."
6. Amazon reviewer: "…will spook you in ways you've never been spooked before."
7. Artist Stephen R. Bissette: "DEUS-X culminates in one of the most chilling finales in modern fiction."
One Good Reason NOT to read DEUS-X
1. It might scare the sap out of you!
******************
Scare-master Richard Laymon: "Citro's stuff is as good as it gets."
Acclaimed author Dan Simmons: "…the work of Joseph A. Citro could make a vampire fear the dark."
ALSO BY JOSEPH A. CITRO
FICTION
Not Yet Dead, 2009
DEUS-X: The Reality Conspiracy, 2003
Lake Monsters, 2001
The Gore, 2000
Guardian Angels, 1999
Shadow Child, 1998
NONFICTION
Vermont's Haunts, 2010
Vermont Monster Guide, 2009
Weird New England, 2005
Cursed in New England: Stories of Damned Yankees, 2004
Vermont Ghost Guide, 2000
Green Mountains, Dark Tales, 1999
Passing Strange, 1996
Green Mountain Ghosts, Ghouls and Unsolved Mysteries, 1994
Curious New England, 2003
Vermont Air (Ed. 2002)
Vermont Lifer (Ed. 1986)
Acknowledgments
To properly thank everyone who helped me with DEUS-X: The Reality Conspiracy would require another volume this size. Scores of individuals made contributions, whether they realize it or not. However, I owe a substantial debt to the following: Michael Johnson, Pat Whitman, Craig Goden, John Keel, Steve Bissette, Wayne and Darlene Decker. In addition, I'd like to thank David Dodd and David Niall Wilson at Crossroad Press for bringing this book into the 21st century. Thanks, too, to everyone who, by request or oversight, is not listed above.
"The only thing I will say with complete confidence about the mystic and invisible power is that it tells lies."
— G. K. Chesterton
Contents
X Marks the Spot: A Foreword (by Stephen R. Bissette)
Part One: In the Beginning
1. Tribulation
2. Rapture
Part Two: The Next Year
3. Mr. Splitfoot
4. The Ancient Priest
5. The Widening Gyre
6. The Secret Birthday Wish
7. Pig on a Spit
8. The Foolish Fates
9. The Crouching Man
10. Crawling Things
11. Strange Awakenings
12. Blue Monday
13. Foul Spirits
14. Ghosts
15. Hand
16. A Coming of Serpents
17. Invaders
Part Three: Revelations
18. Earl King
19. Time to Kill
20. The Acolyte
21. Necessary Evil
Part Four: Devil's Town
22. Shepherds of the Light
Part Five: Armageddon
23. The Change That Is Coming
24. The Name of the Father
DEUS-Xtras
Commentary
Deleted Scenes
X Marks the Spot: An Afterword (by Stephen R. Bissette)
X Marks the Spot: A Foreword
Let us begin by noting that there are, in and about us, "bad places." If you visit a "bad place," deliberately or inadvertently, you may see "bad things."
Unlike the novel you are about to read, I'll begin by putting all my cards on the table:
Joseph A. Citro is a friend of mine. In fact, he's one of my best friends in the world. So you see, I already have a stake in this volume.
I also have a stake in this book because I made my own mark in here—or, rather, my marks. Joe's DEUS-X was originally published in 1994. It was his fifth and, as it turned out, final novel to date. It was also our first published book project together, as I illustrated the signed-and-limited edition hardcover first printing.
I have a personal philosophy as an illustrator: give nothing away. (Damn near every copy of Moby Dick I've ever seen gives away Moby Dick's smashing of the whaleship Pequod—oops, sorry. Spoiled that for you, I reckon. Apologies. PS: Ishmael alone survives.)
I make sure my illustrations are eye-catching and fit the text, but to keep them free of "spoilers" some illustrations will seem downright eccentric and enigmatic until you've absorbed the narrative, which is as it should be.
The same goes for intros and forewords: I'll give nothing away here, either, about what you're about to read.
DEUS-X was also, as Joe details in his appendix to this edition, a "cursed book," in and of itself. I was privy to every nuanced emergence, twist, turn, and element of that curse, but found myself left strangely untouched by it. If anything, the only manifestation of the curse I personally experienced was the world's seeming indifference to its publication. Neither the world at large nor the world in miniature blinked an eye or cared a whit.
Mind you, while I might have expected the lack of attention to my own humble contribution (the illustrations), I was gob-smacked that even the so-called "horror community" seemed oblivious to Joe's newest work, and its considerable significance.
That is the greatest curse of all I've seen attached to DEUS-X: the curse of apathy and neglect.
In this, there's not much of a surprise. As with the Devil himself (as upstanding Catholic youths such as Joe and I were told again and again), the forces at work in DEUS-X count upon our apathy, myopia, ignorance, and neglect; our lack of attention spans, of noticing when things go awry, or of comprehending anything once they do.
So, a suggestion:
Pay attention. Remember what you read and see and hear in the following pages. There are forces greater than you or me or the Devil or the Deep Blue Sea counting on the fact you don't, and won't.
I dare say that much, much more than merely your state of mind or comparative comfort level with the following novel i
s at risk.
Pay.
Close.
Attention.
I fear I've said too much, though really I've told you nothing at all.
Oh, and, please, one more thing—
Turn the page.
And—ahem—enjoy…
Stephen R. Bissette, Mountains of Madness, VT
February 2012
PART ONE
In the Beginning
"God laughed, and begat the Son. Together they laughed, and begat the Holy Spirit. And from the laughter of the three, the universe was born."
—Meister Eckhart
"Then we who are alive, who are left, shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air; and so we shall always be with the Lord."
—Thessalonians 4:17
Excerpt from
The Reality Conspiracy:
An Anecdotal Reconstruction of the Events at Hobston, Vermont
We are born into a tiny room without windows and doors. Docilely, through unspoken consensus, we name the six planes that surround us; we call them reality.
Four walls, the floor, the ceiling, they define our limits and our aspirations.
Yet, there are some among us who say there is more. They place an ear against the wall and swear they hear a whisper on the other side. Some hear footsteps. A scratch. A gentle, rhythmic tap.
Others say they hear a chorus of voices chanting the unfamiliar words to an unfamiliar song.
While all the time our priests and politicians, our cynics and our scientists, testify that we are alone in the room, that its sturdy walls, infinitely thick, extend into eternity.
But wait! Now, from the far side of the wall, the gentle scratch becomes a tap.
And the tapper starts to pound.
Our wall trembles, begins to split. And now—oh God—something is coming through!
Tribulation
Boston, Massachusetts
Thursday, November 12
08:05 hours
Dr. Ian "Skipp" McCurdy led the man from the Pentagon along the narrow, neon-lit corridor.
The man, who had introduced himself only as Rex, carried a small leather attaché case and wore dark glasses, even in the basement rooms. His suit was obviously expensive, cut to complement his health-club physique. It seemed perfectly pressed, brand-new. McCurdy couldn't figure it: the man had flown in from Washington much earlier that morning; he had no doubt been jostled at the airport, bumped on the streets, and cramped in the cabs, yet he looked as if his suit had just come freshly from the closet.
For a moment McCurdy thought perhaps he himself should have dressed better for the occasion. Maybe his corduroys and sweater vest were not the most well-chosen attire. After all, there was a lot of money hanging on this demonstration, almost a billion dollars, another two years of generous research funding. McCurdy thought how horrible it would be if the whole project were shot down because there was no dress code at the Academy.
Absently, McCurdy clicked his tongue, "Tch, tch, tch."
"What's that. Doctor?" Rex asked.
"Oh, ah . . . nothing."
McCurdy stopped before a locked metal door. "Right in here, sir," he said as he punched in a numerical code that released the lock. He pulled the door open. The man nodded and preceded McCurdy into the dim, indirectly lighted chamber. The door locked behind them with a metallic thud.
The room was nearly bare. At its center, two canvas director's chairs faced two forty-five-inch Mitsubishi television screens about ten feet away. Without waiting for formalities, the man took a seat, placed the attaché case on his lap, as McCurdy walked over to an electronic control panel on the wall by the television screens.
"Are you satisfied with the briefing to this point?" McCurdy asked. "If I can answer any more questions . . . ?" His voice seemed weak and hollow to his own ears. He hoped his nervousness didn't show.
"Quite satisfied, Dr. McCurdy. I'm not here for more explanations. I'm here for a demonstration. If you'd be good enough to proceed."
McCurdy clicked his tongue. It was hard for him to come to grips with the fact that the entire demonstration was for the benefit of a single individual. He had expected some kind of committee. Three people, at least. He was uncomfortable that so much seemed to rest on the opinion of just one man. But as Rex had explained in military jargon, the fewer people who were "cognizant" of this, the better for all of us.
Well, if this was how it had to be, then so be it.
McCurdy turned the switches. The screen on the left began to glow red. A golden circle formed at its center. The circle expanded until it nearly filled the screen. White lines began to intersect the circle.
McCurdy said, "I'll turn up the volume so you can hear the sounds that accompany this. They'll continue throughout the demonstration, but we won't have to listen to them. I just want to give you the idea . . . ."
The man nodded impatiently.
McCurdy pressed the volume control and a guttural, synthetically produced dirge filled the room. McCurdy could pick out a word now and then, but his mastery of Latin had never been what it should be, and the electronically articulated syllables were really not that easy to understand, anyway.
For a moment he stared, almost hypnotized by the flowing, shifting patterns on the huge screen,
"Dr. McCurdy . . . ?" Rex urged.
McCurdy turned down the volume, and the dirge faded slowly into silence. Here goes, McCurdy thought.
He flicked on the second TV.
The video image was in black and white. The background was featureless, just a flat, white, nondescript wall.
In the foreground stood an empty chair. It was wooden. Square and solid-looking. McCurdy knew it was bolted to the floor. He had seen such chairs in Vietnam. No one sat in them willingly; they were for interrogation.
At the bottom of the screen electronic letters flashed on and off, reading: November 12 / 05:18 hrs.
McCurdy picked up a microphone and spoke into it. "Please stand by," he said. "We're almost ready to begin."
McCurdy turned to Rex. "This picture is coming to us via satellite all the way from California. The signal is thoroughly scrambled, indecipherable. That's all I know. Your people picked the location. It is unknown to anyone at this facility. You and I will see everything in real-time, exactly as it happens. We'll hear everything just as it is being said. The important thing to remember is that what we'll watch is happening four thousand miles away at an undisclosed location. And the only thing connecting us with them is the television signal."
"Yes, yes, I understand, Dr. McCurdy. Now if we could begin . . ." McCurdy picked up the microphone again. "You're on," he said. This time his voice cracked like fragile ice.
On the screen two men in black suits, with ski masks over their heads, led a third man into the frame. The man was naked. He didn't struggle. There was a vapid glaze to his eyes. His mouth hung open.
McCurdy noted how skinny he was, took in the filthy, dark hair tied back in a ponytail. A ring in his left ear caught the light; a homemade tattoo blemished his left shoulder. Some kind of scar was visible on his abdomen. Surgery or knife wound, McCurdy couldn't tell.
The men in black worked like a well-practiced team. They pushed the naked man into the wooden chair and efficiently bound his arms at the wrists and elbows with nearly invisible monofilament ties. Then they bound each of his legs at the ankle and at the knee. One of them tied a final loop around his throat. It held his spine tightly against the chair.
With a terrified expression on his face, the seated man watched the men in black. When he made as if to say something, the man to his left jerked a flattened hand to chest level, poised for a karate blow. The naked man fell silent, eyes downward. There was no further struggle or protest. No further attempt to communicate.
The monofilament held his legs so that they were slightly apart, butted against the frame of the chair. McCurdy could see the man's penis, a hairy gray knob of putty between skinny thighs.
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Without taking his eyes from the screen, McCurdy sat in the director's chair beside Rex.
He watched the two men in black leave the frame, abandoning the tethered man to the TV camera. The man looked imploringly into the lens, then looked away. McCurdy looked away, too.
A fourth man, dressed in a white smock, entered the frame. He wore a surgeon's mask and a tied cap that covered his face and hair. He taped sensors on thin wires to the man's skin. McCurdy could hear him muttering to the man, "This won't hurt at all. We're just going to track your vital signs. It's no more painful than a lie detector test."
The man nodded. Tried to smile.
The doctor worked rapidly, then left the screen.
In a monotone, an electronically altered voice spoke clearly through the speaker between the two TV screens, "Can you hear us, gentlemen?"
McCurdy cleared his throat, "Perfectly."
"Then we'll begin. I'd like to introduce you to Mr. Denton Rene LaChance, age forty-seven. Denny, his friends call him."
Denny's eyes flicked back and forth. He shifted his weight in the wooden chair. A light rime of sweat glistened on his forehead. McCurdy could see how the invisible monofilament made grooves in his arms and legs.
The voice continued, "Denny's in excellent health for a smoker and frequent drug-user, our medical assures us. But Denny's not a very nice guy. Got kicked out of the Army for playing with heroin. It was planted on him, he says. Might be true, I might add. Like everybody else, the Army was anxious to get rid of him. Overwhelming evidence suggests he put a bullet through his lieutenant's head. We had enough trouble with the Cong without Denny blowing our officers away."
The Reality Conspiracy Page 1