The Trilogy of the Void: The Complete Boxed Set

by Peter Meredith

  Chapter 7

  Jim Meets Talitha

  Jim Anderson was about six millimeters from death.

  He had been warned about the girl, but the warning had seemed absurd at the time and he had ignored it. She was a murderer, she was insane, she could kill with her bare hands, and they were all afraid of her. Good for them. Let them cower, but he wasn't afraid and if she wanted a fight, he was her man.

  He was hugely strong with tremendous shoulders and tree trunks for legs. However, he wasn't an Adonis and he battled against his waistline on a daily basis, but regardless of that, there were very few men that could take him in a fight. And the idea that a hundred-pound woman, no matter how insane, could stand toe to toe with him, was laughable.

  He could see that she was fast...faster than he thought possible, but he was ok with that, he'd fought fast men before. She was strong as well. She had sent that annoying cop Milner, flying with no problem and that too didn't bother him. No, the only thing that bothered him was that he was going to die at the end of a gun.

  It was a coward's way, especially when she had some sort of super powers. Now if he died fighting hand to hand, well that was that, but she wasn't going to give him the chance.

  He gave her a snide look from around the gun. "I thought you were supposed to be tough." This he said so calmly, you would've thought they were having a drink in a bar. The trigger continued its slow backwards motion a millimeter at a time. "I guess not," he intoned blandly and waited for the arrival of the bullet. It was going to be lights out before he knew what hit him.

  Somehow, the girl held the trigger a hair from sending that bullet into Jim's face. "Are you questioning me?" Talitha asked.

  With a slow smile, that he hoped would rile her enough to either pull the trigger or fight, he replied, "No, I'm questioning the reputation you have with the good Father here. He told me you were dangerous and powerful, but I see now that you're only a scared little girl hiding behind a gun. There're plenty of those running around all ready, who needs another?" Even though he was sure he had just sealed his own fate, the girl's brother relaxed visibly and laid back on the floor.

  Talitha smiled in a strange exultant fashion, while her eyes came alive. "Interesting...you think you can actually take me."

  Father Alba still seated and still sweating said, "Miss Jern, I'm sorry if we offended you in some way, but we're not here to hurt you or to challenge you. We actually came all this way to talk to your brother."

  Talitha gave the priest a quick disgusted look. "I have to tell you, Alba, I'm not much interested in what you're here for, but I'm glad that you brought this one. I think I want to try him on and see if he's all talk."

  The gun, despite its size, hadn't wavered an inch and Jim smiled around it at her. "Let's go out to the woods. I bet we can find a nice spot."

  "No, James. Please, there're lives at stake here," the priest implored.

  "Yeah, don't be an ass, Jim Fella," Milner added as he got to his feet.

  Jim's smile slipped into a hard look and his dislike was plain for all to see. He'd never liked Eric Milner. The cop had been in the orphanage as a kid and being older than Jim by four years had bullied him almost ceaselessly. When Jim reached the age of fourteen and was six feet in height, the two had fought a couple of times. He'd lost both fights, but he also stopped being picked on. Now, Milner was a cop and expected his ass to be kissed by everyone in sight.

  Jim had secretly enjoyed what Talitha had done to him and seeing it replayed in his mind, caused the grimace to invert back into a smile. He said to Milner, "Just trying to speak the lady's language...something you obviously can't do."

  "Ha, ha, ha," Talitha guffawed loudly and stepped back before lowering the gun. "I like him already. The priest called you James and the nitwit cop called you Jim Fella...what do you call yourself?" Her eyes gave him a long roving gaze and he felt like a prize bull at auction.

  She seemed to hold onto his many flaws with her look and his confidence diminished rapidly. It may have been his hypersensitivity, but she took the greatest interest in his scars, his broken nose and most embarrassing, his cauliflower ears. The unsightly bumps and odd, ugly swelling of his ears was one of the side effects of years of wrestling. He always kept his hair long to cover them but he could tell by her look that they were exposed and he felt the first touch of a blush starting to warm his hideous ears.

  Talitha had no flaws at all, not even the smallest pimple blemished her perfect tan skin. Her full lips glistened provocatively and her teeth, straight and white flashed out from behind them when she spoke. He realized he was staring and turning away, feeling the heat of his blush spread to his cheeks.

  "Everyone at the orphanage pretty much calls me Jim and some of my old friends call me Jim Fella, but my name's James Anderson."

  "Sure it is...what's your real name?" she asked him as she brought the gun to her nose and sniffed at it, in what looked to be a habitual manner.

  "Uh, all I know is the Jim part. I never knew my parents...I was left at the orphanage."

  "The orphanage? There's only one?" she asked still eyeing him in an unsettling way.

  With the likelihood of a fight having disappeared, the last of his confidence went with it. Talking with pretty girls always made him feel even uglier than usual. "Uh, Saint Thomas' Home for Boys."

  "In Boston, correct?" He nodded and she continued looking irritated, "I can tell by all the moronic accents...especially the cop's." Whatever was affecting her—insanity Jim supposed—came out in a withering look at Milner and he blanched at the sight of her face.

  "Yes Miss Jern, we've come up from Boston." The priest looked like he was pulling himself together and sat composed in a luster of sweat, "We have a dangerous and delicate situation...you've heard about the recent spate of kidnappings in Boston, I suppose?"

  "Oh yes, of course! And I'm glad you came all the way up, to hear my confession...it was me! I ate them, starting with their wee little toes." The girl then started to chatter her teeth up and down. She was no longer beautiful and looked on the verge of abandoning sanity altogether, smashing out the last smoldering ruin of it in the ashtray of her mind. Her brother gaped at her in horror, fully believing she had done just as she had said.

  Father Alba had a queer, sick looking, half-smile draped over his face, "Miss Jern, there's someone else who claims to have taken the children." He was clearly afraid of contradicting the girl, "This man...is also possessed by the demon Ba'al Zubel!"

  Talitha stopped her crazed chattering at the sound of the name and the tan of her face went white. "That's not possible," she whispered, shaking her head. Suddenly she laughed. "You had me going there for a moment. I assure you that it's not wise to be this great of a buffoon around me."

  "And I can assure you that he's possessed." Father Alba looked put out not to have been immediately believed.

  "First, it's not Ba'al, and second, a man can't be possessed at all. I thought as a priest you'd know this."

  Jim was confused and the priest was right there with him. He held up the black book. "I don't want to be contradictory, however there are quite a few references in the bible concerning men being possessed."

  "Yeah, but that book was written by men to be read by men. Women didn't count for much back then. You should trust me on this. I know a thing or two about demons."

  Alba sort of half shrugged clearly fearing Talitha's response. "I think this one is genuine," he said. "The man knows thing he can't possibly know. He speaks in tongues, Latin, and some other horrible sounding language. I recorded it just in case I needed proof. He also bleeds at will, instantly in the form of the Stigmata. Do you know what that is?"

  "Of course I do," she snapped at him irritably. "Let's hear these so called tongues, Priest and if its pig-Latin, I'm going to pull the cop's ears off and don't think for a moment I won't!"

  Jim believed her and so did Milner. He backed away from her with a horrified look on his face until he hit the wall behind hi
m. There he stood shooting his eyes back and forth from Jim and the girl's brother as if begging for help.

  Father Alba dug out the Sony walkman he had borrowed from Sean Shay and without ceremony pressed the play button. The girl's reaction to the sound coming from the little machine was immediate as well as startling. Moving in a blur, she jumped full at the priest who squawked in fright and held up the walkman as if to shield himself. She snatched it from his hands and in one quick move dashed it to the floor. Without a word, she ground the thing beneath the heel of her black shoe.

  When the plastic had been crushed into an unrecognizable state, she knelt, digging about in the remains of the machine, pulling at the thin tape of the cassette until moments later her hands were full of what looked like black spaghetti.

  Now as she stood up, her brother had a strange look playing about his face. Sorrow and hatred seemed to battling for control of his features and he took a small step forward. His body tensed as if he was about to spring and Jim looked to see the cause.

  It was the gun!

  It lay as if forgotten next the girl's right foot and the man was obviously contemplating making a grab for it. Having seen the speed the girl possessed, Jim thought Will crazy for even thinking it.

  Talitha seemed to have forgotten the gun in her distress. "Alba, you're such a moron! Don't record anything that man says, ever again. Ever!" she repeated in a shout. "And certainly never play something like that in a church."

  "What language was it?" the priest asked wiping sweat from his eyes with the sleeve of his black shirt.

  "It's a language that's used in the lower plains of the void. Very low," she added ominously. "Milner, give me that lighter in your shirt pocket."

  Milner jumped at the sound of her voice, but hurried to obey. He reached into his pocket and looked surprised to find his own lighter there, even though that was where he always carried it. He started forward to hand it to Talitha, but quickly had second thoughts about getting too close and instead tossed it to her.

  His shaking hands short armed the throw, so that Talitha had to take a long step forward to catch the lighter before it hit the ground.

  Her brother proved no slouch in the speed category himself. Will made his move almost as if he had committed himself to going for the gun the second Milner had tossed the lighter. His timing was perfect and he and his sister seemed in complete sync as they both stepped forward with the same motion, she snatching the falling lighter, he grabbing the gun. She noticed the movement behind her a half second too late and even though she spun with amazing speed, Will had the gun up and pointed into her face.

  "Don't try it!" he commanded. "I said, don't try it! I saw what you were planning to do...even you won't be quick enough." He held the gun with a steadiness that was impressive, but Talitha simply looked around it wearing a vicious smile.

  "You're going to hand over that gun, Will, one way or the other," she said easily. Will just shook his head.

  A sudden exhaustion overcame Jim and he went to sit down next to Father Alba, who gave him a light pat on the knee. The priest looked tired as well and it was no wonder.

  The night had been long and completely without sleep. The possessed man had demanded that a room be set up for him in the cellar beneath the chapel. How he knew the rooms were there, was a mystery—pretty much like everything else about the man. The storage rooms were dark and fetid, especially the one he picked out. They were all along a single corridor and he chose the last, the one that routinely flooded and smelled of decay and mildew. He had asked for only three things, a mattress, a gallon of wine and to be locked into the room.

  They were all too happy to give in to his demands, and Jim had felt a good deal of relief when he had locked the door behind the demon/man. The relief had been short lived however, because within minutes, screams of an inhuman nature came slipping around the doorframe. This caused a nervous Father John to order Sean and him to guard the man for the remainder of the night.

  Now, Jim was blinking his gritty eyes, content to watch the brother and sister action play about before him. However, the girl had caught his movement out of the corner of her eyes and, ignoring her brother, she turned and looked at him with a small mysterious smile.

  "So Jim Anderson, where'd you get that name? Did a nun give it to you as some sort of celibate joke?"

  "Talitha!" her brother demanded.

  She smiled at Jim as if to apologize for her brother's rudeness. "Just one second," she said and turning back to her brother, she pushed her forehead to the barrel of the gun. "Go ahead. What are you waiting for? Just tell me first, how are you going to rationalize this? Are you going to pretend that it's for my own good? Are you going to pretend that you'll be saving some stranger even though by killing me you'll doom the kids the priest is so worried about? How are you going to explain this to Lisa? Are you going to tell her the truth? That you killed me in cold blood?"

  The brother swallowed audibly and there was great pain in the depths of his sky blue eyes. He pulled back on the trigger slowly, not out of maliciousness but due to the battle waging within him.

  "Come on Will, be a man! Shoot me! We both know you're doing this to be rid of me. So you can sleep in on Sunday mornings! Come on you selfish bastard! Show me that you hate me."

  Tears over flowed the damn of his eyes and he blinked hard and savagely, "You're right...I hate this part of you. You're the most vicious person...there's nothing here to love."

  She gave him a smile that was almost endearing. "Now pull the trigger and I'll make sure to save a spot for you in the void. Come on! Paint that wall red and paint your soul black."

  Father Alba got up from his chair in haste. "Will, please don't. Murder is always wrong and besides we may need her. She speaks the demon's language. Will, put the gun down. The lives of five children are at stake here, please."

  Talitha chided the priest, "No, that's a mistake Alba. I'm not the sweet girl you knew and lusted after. I'm very dangerous and Will knows it. He's always known it. I want you down in the void with me, Will...then it will be my turn."

  The gun now wavered and Will's face screwed up in painful confusion. "If I don't shoot her now she'll eventually get the gun back and..." An odd spasm jerked his features around and he stepped away from the girl, lowering the gun.

  She held out her hand for it. "I'll take it from you eventually, just as you said." When he still hesitated she added, "I'm getting bored here. Either give me the bullet or the gun, those children aren't getting any older." She giggled at her own sick humor and it deflated him. His shoulders drooped and he tossed the gun her way not caring whether she caught it.

  Will turned from his sister and said to the priest tiredly, "What do you need me for? You say the demon claims to be Ba'al Zubel?"

  "He is a liar," Talitha sing-songed the words and then brought the gun up to her lips touching it there gently. She turned her gaze on Jim and it seemed she mocked him with her eyes and the small smile again came to her lips as if she had some sort of special knowledge of him. He looked away deliberately but could still feel her eyes roving over him.

  "Whether he's a liar or not, remains to be seen, but he did use that name and he did it with some authority." Father Alba told her patiently, "The reason we're here...he asked for the uh, object I entrusted you with."

  Will's eyes filled with alarm and as an involuntary action, they darted to his sister. He had to force them back on to the priest. "Did he say why?"

  "No, but he was willing to trade the lives of the children for it."

  Will seemed suddenly burdened with the news and his fatigue became more apparent. "I'm sorry, Father but I don't think I can give it up for this. When a demon offers to trade for something, you never agree to the deal. Talitha, this language of the lower planes, can someone learn it without being possessed?"

  "Will, trust me, he's poss..." the priest began.

  The girl interrupted, "I'll have to see the man first to know. Wait, Alba, did you actually
make sure he is a man? Did you check his plumbing?" She walked up to priest, her face mostly hidden by the large gun that was constantly stroking her lips.

  He seemed disconcerted by her proximity. "Uh, no...I told everyone to keep away from him and not to touch him."

  Without asking, she pulled the Bible from the priest's hands. He had carried it about, non-stop since the night before when they had confronted the man.

  Ignoring his look of surprise, she said, "That was wise...when you touch a demon inappropriately, he's bound to sue." Without warning, she tore out a good chunk of the bible and dropped it on the twisted chaos of the cassette tape. "Now since you aren't Jewish, you won't need the first few chapters in this book, right? It's full of trashy tales anyways and besides, all that dirty begetting gets me hot you know."

  The priest's face turned into a frown at this, but when she bent and lit the paper on fire, he seemed to feel actual pain. "Are you done...with the rest?" He anxiously pointed at the remains of the bible in her hand.

  "Sure," she flipped it at him nonchalantly. "Big Jim, you better pull that smoke alarm...what?"

  He had never liked being called Big Jim and he hadn't realized it had shown on his face. "Most people call me, uh Jim."

  "Well, I'm not most people, Jimbo. So reach up there and turn that smoke detector off before we have a panic on our...never mind, a panic will work too." She smiled innocently up at him, as he stretched out his long arm to the ceiling and took the battery out of the little white box, just as grey smoke began to curl up, heavily into the air.

  "You're just no fun, Big Jim. So, you guys have beaten around my bush long enough, what does Mr. Zubel want? And don't lie! We're in a church and I'll be all too happy to administer God's punishment on you." She did seem happy at the prospect.