“Okay. You still there?”
Whaddya want?
“I’m going to give you a chance to earn your room back, fat boy,” I said. “Listen carefully. In a few seconds, the door to your interrogation cell will pop open. I want you to walk to my office and open the file in my cabinet marked with today’s date. Go the stack of papers for the past hour. Within the text, you should find a detailed account of the area surrounding the safe house in Woody Creek.”
So?
I couldn’t believe it. The pudgy bastard was still busting my balls.
Then, I heard a sharp cry: “Nevins! Get down here!”
Uh-oh.
“Harlan, you tub of shit, go in there and study the area. Help me the hell out of here. Find a car, and lead me to it.”
I heard him laugh. A deep, phlegmy chuckle. I’m going to need more incentive than that, Chief.
“No, you’re not. Because if I don’t escape, I’m going to be caught by the FBI. And most likely, I’m going to have to make a run for it, because it’s my only chance to save the investigation. Even more likely, some sharp-shooter is going to put a bullet in my head before I escape. Which means you and five other souls are going to be wandering a muddy creek in Butt-Hump, Illinois until the end of time.”
On my way, boss, Harlan said. He might have been a greedy bastard, but he knew when to listen to common sense.
I opened my eyes to see a swarm of Feds hopping over the rail. Until Harlan found what I needed, I had to improvise. I climbed the steep, rocky hill along the side of the house, then crouched down next to the front porch. Took a peek over the rail; nobody there.
I listened for voices, and heard some fevered yelling, but couldn’t make out anything. There were about ten meters between my current position and a tree. I decided to go for it. I stood up, looked behind me—just to make sure no agent had doubled back and found my footprints in the muddy bank—and started to run.
“Freeze!” a voice yelled. I indeed froze. Slowly, I turned my head around to see Agent Fieldman, clipboard-carrier, holding a gun larger than his hands and pointing it at my chest.
“Don’t move, Kennedy. Down on the ground. Hands behind your head.”
This was not good. Fieldman was green, and twitchy on the trigger. I didn’t want to have the investigation end right here in Woody Friggin’ Creek. “Excuse me!” I shouted. “Did you tell a Special Agent to drop to the ground?”
“You heard me. Down.” Fieldman scanned my body, looking for a hidden weapon. Of course, I had none. Unless you counted my eyes.
“Look at me, Fieldman,” I said.
He did.
And that’s when I grabbed his soul.
In my years of soul collecting, I’d only worked with the recently dead, or the near-dead. It was weird snatching a live one. Kind of the difference between shucking crab meat from a dead shell and ripping live, functioning tissue from a pissed-off crustacean. Fieldman fought it every inch of the way. He may not have known what was happening to him, but I’m sure he knew it wasn’t a good thing. Fieldman’s body collapsed to the ground in pieces, like a puppet with cut strings: first the gun, then his knees, torso, arms, shoulders and finally, his head.
I’d always wondered what would happen to a live body if its soul were to be removed suddenly. I wanted to observe how long his vitals would maintain themselves, but there was no time. Fieldman’s colleagues had surely heard him cry out, and would be back in no time. I had to work fast.
I closed my eyes, lay down on the ground, and surrendered control of my physical body.
To do this, I relaxed a certain part of my brain. It’s hard to describe to someone who’s never known about it being flexed; trust me, every human being does. Until someone makes you aware of it, you have no idea you’re holding it tight, even when you sleep. If people were aware of it, suicide would be a hell of a lot easier than razor blades and unlit ovens.
Then, as usual, the blackness started to pulse with waves of deep light—like when you close your eyes and press your palms into your eyeballs.
An instant later, the lights came up. Walls, ceiling and not-so-tasteful Oriental carpet formed around me. I was standing in the lobby of the Brain Hotel, right in front of the entrance. This was the symbolic gateway between the Hotel and the real world; whenever I wanted to go back, I simply walked out the front doors. If any other soul tried it without permission, they’d run into a brick wall. Literally. (My touch. I couldn’t resist.)
Fieldman’s soul was standing in the lobby, too, holding an imaginary pistol. His soul had arrived a second or two earlier.
“Relax, Agent Fieldman,” I said.
“Wh-Wh-Where am I?” he stuttered. The poor guy. One minute he’s having his soul removed from his body; the next, he’s standing inside the lobby of a cut-rate Holiday Inn.
“You’re having a bad LSD trip. Some jokester in the unit laced your coffee; you’re going to wake up in an extremely bad mood. In fact, you’re going to want to pummel the first agent who crosses your path.” I had no idea if a hypnotic suggestion given to a discorporated soul would work, but what the hell.
“I am?” Fieldman asked.
“Yep. And you’re not going to remember any of this, either.” I cold-cocked his soul with my spectral fist—you can do that, you know—then walked through the front doors and back into the real world.
I stood up and dusted myself off. Then I closed my eyes again, and visualized Agent Fieldman. Once I had him, and started to feel the weight of his conscious mind, I popped open my eyes and flung Fieldman’s soul back into his physical body. A moment later he popped back to life, choking and writhing. In my professional opinion, he’d live.
I started to run down the road. My head pounded something fierce. I wasn’t used to collecting and flinging souls around like that. About twenty yards later, I heard Harlan’s voice in my head. Uh, boss? What am I looking for again?
Boy, was I going to hurt that fat bastard when this was all over.
Two miles and four pounds of sweat later I found a black Dodge, recent model. My dress shirt was drenched. I removed my jacket, wrapped it around my elbow, smashed the passenger window, unlocked the door, brushed broken glass off the seat with my jacket and slid across the seat. I couldn’t stop sweating. My head felt like a garden hose with a hundred leaks. I wiped my forehead with my coat sleeve. Wonderful. Another $35 investment down the tubes.
It was time to call for back-up. I closed my eyes, and visualized a microphone with a big black button on its base. I mentally depressed the button—which triggered a set of speakers in the Brain Hotel—and started thinking out loud. Doug Isom. Paging Doug Isom. Doug was this hippie who used to steal stereos to buy marijuana. I’d absorbed him for moments like this.
Hey, Del!
“Hi, Doug,” I said. “No time to chat. I’m going to surrender control to you in three seconds. I need you to start this car.”
Right on, man.
Since Doug could grow all the Brain pot he could ever use in the comfort of his own room, stealing was now strictly for fun. In many ways, reality was a bigger high for Doug—especially parceled out in tiny snatches, here and there.
I nestled back into the seat, closed my eyes and slipped away, and found myself inside the Brain Hotel lobby. Doug was there, smiling lopsidedly at me.
“Go ahead,” I said. “Body’s all yours.”
Doug walked through the front doors and into total blackness. His image vanished as his consciousness was transported to reality. And let me tell you, reality must have been a serious rush for this baked potato. But he didn’t let it affect his professional abilities. He cracked the column, pulled out a wire, and sparked the ignition.
“Your car, sir,” Doug said upon his return. He was laughing to himself. He was always laughing about things that, quite frankly, were not even remotely funny.
“Thanks, Doug,” I said as I passed him and walked back through the front doors.
I hammered the gas pedal
like the back of a long-lost friend.
I wanted to drive west, to return to familiar turf, but my instincts told me to head east, away from the maelstrom. Indiana came and went and I’d barely registered the state. Not much to it; a lot of highways and random office buildings interrupted by farmland. The only thing that kept me sane on the trip was the car’s AM radio. Thank God it worked. I’d missed listening to my albums back home—sometimes, I think pop music holds the tattered and worn fabric I like to call my “life” together. Songs pin down times and places like nothing else. I can remember what song was playing the day I drove home from college graduation (“True Love Ways”), the first time I had sex, (“Sweet Pea”), and the day I was hired as a reporter at the Bulletin (“What is Life?”). Right now, the station I’d found was playing Lynn Anderson’s hit “Rose Garden.” Big hit in 1970—the year I was collected. “Smile for a while and let’s be jolly,” I sang along. “Life shouldn’t be so melancholy.”
Yeah, pop songs were comforting all right, but sometimes they could be a huge pain in the ass.
Five
Pepperoni and Cheese
After a few days of zig-zag driving, I found a trucker’s motel in a part of Ohio called “Buckeye Lake.” The names kept getting better and better. Whose job was it to name towns in Ohio, anyway? I mean, who looked at a dirty puddle and thought, “lake,” then attached that grandiose description to a name that belonged to a one-eyed pirate? This is but one of the many mysteries that had gone unsolved during my lifetime.
Actually, the place wasn’t so bad. The bed was pliable, the bathroom was scum-free, and the towels weren’t too stiff. The room even had a TV—the fancy push-button kind, with giant rabbit ears. Not that I planned to watch anything except the local news. I dropped my shopping bag on top of a battered bureau which doubled as a desk, and unpacked. A six-pack of Fresca, a package of store-brand crackers, a pound of Cracker Barrel sharp cheese, a slab of imported pepperoni, and a copy of a local newspaper. I walked over to the sink and found a cheap plastic tray with a plastic ice bucket and two plastic glasses wrapped in clear plastic. The guy in The Graduate was right about plastic, I guess.
I took the tray and brought it back to the desk, then used my Swiss Army knife to chop the pepperoni and cheese. I opened one of my Frescas, and took a sip to prime the system. Then I tore into the pepperoni and cheese. It was the best meal I’d had since the FBI coffee the day before—and I was going to need my energy if I was going to do a full face reconstruction. I only wished I had a Budweiser instead of a Fresca.
I pushed the bureau closer to the bed, so I could have a proper seat. Checked the local paper, but couldn’t find a mention of the Woody Creek incident. Stuff on the Ford assassination attempt was all over the place—something about a Manson family freako chick named “Squeaky.” (Seems like Sheriff Alford was on to something about those Manson folks, after all.) I didn’t think I’d see something about Brad Larsen, or about the Woody Creek incident. Nevins had made it clear this venture was quashed, effective immediately.
But during the last 10 hours of solid driving, my mind started playing tricks on me, and I’d hallucinated headlines like ROGUE FBI AGENT ON THE RUN. In reality, there was nothing. Whatever manhunt I’d caused, it was being conducted in secret. Which made sense, from a public relations point of view.
The best part: soon, I was going to be safe. The Feds were looking for Special Agent Kevin Kennedy—gaunt-looking male in his late 30s, with a sharp jaw and receding hairline. Height: 5‘11”. Weight: 175 pounds, soaking wet. Light blonde hair, green eyes. While the height and weight still applied, no other similarities remained.
Soon, I would have ice blue eyes, rich, reddish-brown hair, and a baby face that didn’t need to shave often. I was going to lose at least 10 years in the transaction, too. The only way it would backfire would be if some enterprising Feds put Brad Larsen’s face out on the wire, but why would they? For all they knew, Brad Larsen was sitting in the middle of Woody Creek with his baby face blown to smithereens.
Right Brad? I thought.
Brad wasn’t answering. During the drive, I would pull over from time to time, close my eyes, port myself into the Brain Hotel, and peek into the interrogation room where Brad lay sleeping. Not a peep. He looked like a college kid sleeping off a hangover. I wanted to check on him again, but wasn’t looking forward to more disappointment. Besides, he’d come around soon enough. All souls did.
I stuffed a few slices of meat and cheese into my mouth. I wasn’t hungry, but I had to keep my strength up, just in case I had to skip out and drive another ten hours. I was trying to pry a thick hunk of cheese from the roof of my mouth when I saw the sirens flash through the slats of my window blinds. My body snapped to attention and I dove across the bed, reached into my jacket for my pistol, then rolled on the carpet until I was hidden beneath the window.
They couldn’t have found me this fast—could they?
I snatched a peek from behind the curtain, then slid back down. A sheriff’s car, lights whirling. Not many others—a few curious truckers. This wasn’t a Fed deal, unless they’d sent advance word, and the local boys were here to scoop me up. If they were, it would be better to find out now. (And besides—locals, I could handle.) I stood up, brushed the wrinkles out of my trousers, then walked over to the bureau. I ate a few crackers to cover the smell of scotch, then tucked my piece under the mattress.
Once outside, it became clear I was not the focus of attention. A couple of blues were entering a room a half-dozen doors away from mine. Other motel occupants had come out of their rooms, too; I was merely one of the crowd. Finally, somebody cut the flashing lights. I heard some woman mutter, “Thank the sweet Lord.” The cop who spared our collective retinas started walking in our direction.
“Nothing here, people,” he said, holding up his hands. He was young. “A li’l family squabble. Go on back to your rooms and watch some TV.”
“Bull shit,” mumbled a thick guy next to me. His eyes found mine. “I heard they got blood all over a shower down there.”
“You’re kidding,” I said.
“Wish I were.”
Meanwhile, the kid cop was still trying to put everyone to bed. “Come on now … please return to your rooms.” His tapped his nightstick in his right hand, pretending it was something he’d used before. The crowd did start heading back to their beds, but not because Captain Nightstick was putting the fear of God into them.
The thick guy and I started walking together. “What happened?” I asked.
“Who knows?” he said. “Some couple checked in yesterday. Now, nobody can find them, and there’s a whole lot of blood all over the bathroom. This is all I need—some friggin’ nutbag slashing my throat in the middle of the night.”
“They think it’s a serial killer?”
Thick Guy gave me a stupefied look. I’d strayed out of his vocabulary. I amended: “Some kind of nut?”
“Yep.” At this point, we’d both reached a door—his. “Well, happy dreams.”
I wished him the same and wandered back to my own room.
I wondered if it was me, or if the world was becoming increasingly, strangely, violent. I ate more pepperoni, drank some Fresca, then pulled my pistol out from under the mattress, tucked it beneath my pillow and tried to sleep. Soul collecting took a lot out of a guy. Ordinarily, just to keep the Brain Hotel functioning, I needed about 10 to 12 hours sleep per day. Any less and the residents start complaining about maintenance problems. Considering the events of the past few days, I was going to need to sleep for three days straight.
After two days of lounging in the motel, I decided I’d stalled long enough. I’d had plenty of food and rest. Brad Larsen’s soul still wasn’t in shape for any kind of interview, and nothing else was worth investigating until then. So, now it was time to get down to the dirty work. Now it was time to rearrange my face.
Boy, did I hate this part of the job.
This is important, I reminded myself. The
y feared his face.
I packed a small paper bag with a few necessary items, left my motel room and drove outside of the Greater Buckeye Lake area. It took about one minute. Eventually I came to a grassy area that seemed relatively abandoned, so I scooted my car into a spot that couldn’t be seen from the road. I opened my paper bag and spread my supplies on the dashboard. I flipped down the visor and taped up some of the photos I’d taken of Brad Larsen’s corpse. I set my first aid kit on the passenger seat, and fastened my seat belt.
I wished this were as easy as absorbing a soul. Why did the gods who invented these strange abilities make this one so difficult? Why bother calling it a “gift” if it was so hideously painful? The last time I did this, I almost went into shock and died.
Okay. No more procrastinating.
They feared his face.
I got to work.
I closed my eyes and visualized a control panel. Robert had taught me it really doesn’t matter what I look at—the panel was a symbol. It had a miniature screen, with two buttons on each side. The screen was divided into four perfect squares; each button corresponded to a square.
I opened my eyes and looked at the photo of Brad Larsen. Then I closed my eyes and imagined it appearing on the miniature screen. Opened my eyes, studied the photo, closed my eyes, visualized it on the screen. I repeated this process for a good twenty minutes. To an observer, it probably looked like I was playing a marathon game of “Peek-a-Boo” with an imaginary friend.
Finally, after endless opening and shutting of my eyes, I had a sharp picture of Brad Larsen on my mental control panel. The image had burned itself into my mind, and divided into four quadrants.
Yep, there it was. Ready to go.
Yessir.
Oh, shit.
It was time to push the first button. The lower left button, which corresponded to the lower left face of Brad Larsen.
Secret Dead Men Page 3