The dream was the same, it was always the same, relentlessly and without fail it had come to him every night since they had discovered the tomb. He could hear the screams but he could not see them, the helpless victims, begging and pleading fruitlessly for their lives. The fog was too thick. The more he tried to brush it aside the more it swirled about his head occluding his vision and driving him to the brink of insanity. Still he pressed onward, following the shrieks like a moth drawn to flame, knowing with certainty that he was heading to his own demise, yet not able to turn away. He had to help them because it was all his fault.
At last he is able to see it, a dark patch in a sea of white. It sat on the far edge of his vision and seemed to draw no closer though he ran as fast as he could towards it. The faster he ran the faster it sped away, like chasing the horizon on the open ocean, it left him frustrated and devoid of hope. And then finally, slowly but surely the form began to grow, he was making progress albeit slowly. The lunacy of the situation always sunk into his brain at this point. He was chasing the dark at the end of the tunnel, and he wondered how it had come to this.
The fog was beginning to thin now, and he could make out shapes in the mist from the corners of his eyes. They begged and pleaded with him, trying to lure him away from the path like sirens to the sailors of old. McGinty placed his hands to his ears, trying desperately to drown out their pleas but they pierced through his skull, accusing, begging, pleading, seducing, they all called out to him.
John, over here John. This way, follow. Follow.
He saw the wraiths beckoning to him with their fingers, casting an alluring spell and trying to drag him into the mist where he would be hopelessly lost for an eternity. He forced himself to look away and pressed onward. Now the spirits grew more desperate, and their deceptions more devious, they began to take familiar shapes. His heart nearly stopped in his chest as he saw his mother standing off to his left just feet from the path he walked.
Johnny please, comfort your mother. Come here Johnny please!
And then she began to weep, violently and with such agonizing sobs that McGinty found that his own eyes had begun to tear.
“You’re not my mother!” He said as he brushed his tears aside.
And then the spirits became angry, pelting him with a flurry of obscenities and curses, their voices melding together into one androgynous tongue.
You killed us John. You put us in this miserable place.
“No! It’s not my fault, I didn’t know.
But you did John, you knew all along.
“No! I didn’t, I swear! I didn’t know.”
YOU FUCKING COCKSUCKER JOHN! WE’LL SEE YOU ROT IN HELL!
They were shrieking now, right into his ears and clawing at him from the shadows. He began to run faster, trying desperately to reach the darkness before they overpowered him and drug him into the mist. He could hear their claws and their hooves scraping against the cement floor as they began to pursue him. He looked behind him at the horrors now close on his heels. They came in all shapes and sizes, grotesque twisted creatures of the mist. Blood red eyes shown from beneath the hoods of their cloaks, saliva dripped from razor-sharp fangs, scales and rotted flesh clung to their bony claws. Finally the darkness was just ahead. He began to sprint. The air assailed his lungs as he labored for his next breath, willing himself to continue onward despite the burning in his legs. The darkness grew closer but so did his pursuers. He could feel their claws as they raked along the back of his neck, searching frantically for a place to grab on and drag him backwards into the mist. With one final effort he lunged forward, propelling his body with one last surge of his legs. The claws behind him latched onto his shirt and then and there John C. McGinty knew he was dead, but his shirt ripped free from his chest under the momentum of his own weight, the tearing sound echoing around him as he crashed to the dirt floor. There he lay for a moment, gasping for air, naked from the waist up.
At last he looked around him, letting his eyes slowly adjust to the darkness. Only a few scant torches lit the massive room. And then the fog of confusion lifted and he knew to his horror and with undoubted certainty where he was, the tomb of the Bedouin. The terror in his chest threatened to draw the oxygen from his lungs. He willed his legs to work, but they were shaky and rubbery beneath him. With great effort he hoisted himself to his knees and knelt there trembling and afraid. A coolness emanated from his crotch and thighs and he knew that he had urinated in his pants. He reached down between his legs and felt with certainty the already cold contents of his bowels that had permeated the fabric of his trousers and now clung tight about his skin.
Every night he had wet himself, despite his assurances before he drifted off to sleep that he would not, not this time, and each night his bladder failed him like a frightened child afraid of the monsters in the dark. He knew when he awoke that his sheets and bed linens would be soaked and he would lie there in the cold puddle of his shame.
Slowly he dragged himself to his feet. The torches were beginning to burn low, as they always did in this part of the dream, and the darkness was beginning to close in around him. The five pillars spanned to the ceiling, disappearing into the vaulted darkness high above. He saw the markings of the four horsemen of the apocalypse etched deep within the stone, their chiseled lines calling out to him in their mocking way.
Thank you for setting us free John.
“No, it’s not my fault.” He was crying now.
But it is John. It was your doing that has fulfilled the prophecy. The great one shall walk the earth and we will be set free to bring about Armageddon. Thanks to you John, thanks to you.
“NO!” He screamed from the bottom of his lungs. “I will not let it happen!”
He staggered forward, marching menacingly and with determination toward the sarcophagus that awaited in the center of the chamber. The sledgehammer sat propped against one pillar, the pillar of death, where it always sat in his dream. He reached out and clasped the oak handle, feeling its splinted surface beneath his palms. The ragged shards of wood bit in to the flesh of his palms, drawing minute traces of blood. He moved forward uncaring. As he drew near the voices in his head began to grow louder.
No John, it is not your place. What has been set forth cannot be stopped.
“LIARS!” He bellowed. “I started this and I can stop it!”
Go ahead then John try. Try as you have every night, but you know well that your efforts are fruitless.
He took the final steps towards the marble coffin until he stood just feet from it and stared down at the smooth stone beneath him. He raised the hammer high above his head, ready to smash the object of his torment, and here like always he was unable to bring the mallet down.
The voices in the dark mocked him, called out to him in their taunting ways as they always did, cackling in his ear as his arms quivered, unable or perhaps unwilling to deliver the striking blow. This is where it always stopped, the symbolic failure of his life. All that he had hoped to accomplish, his hopes and dreams never realized played before his mind’s eye. His failures in school, in his love life, his career, they all came back to him. It was these failures that drove him to leave his mark on the archeological world, that pushed him to discover something beyond the realm of imagination. He had sought it, sought it in the elusive tombs of the Bedouin, and when he found it he realized that some things were meant to be left undiscovered. Now he stood before the object of his demise and he was unable to turn back the hands of time, for what has been discovered no man can see undone.
Bring forth the hammer John, if you can.
The voices mocked at him.
You know very well that you can’t. You’ve failed John. Your entire miserable life has been a failure, and now you could erase it with a few striking blows and yet you are unable to do so.
“NO!” He stammered as the weight of the hammer grew heavier.
Your life has meant nothing John, nothing at all, except to be the man who brought forth the wrath o
f Hell upon the Earth, so go ahead and smash it John, smash it and see what lies beneath.
“NO!” He screamed once more in futility, knowing full well that this is where the dream would end. He would be unable to smash the object that brought him so much fear, he would fail again, and awake in a puddle of his own urine. And then to his amazement something shattered in the realm of his subconscious, a barrier that until now had held fast. He watched in disbelief, almost as if he were standing beside himself and watching the entire event unfold as his arms brought the hammer down in a crushing arc. The air split, emitting an ear-deafening SWOOSH as the hammer fell. It struck the marble with such force that he felt his teeth clash together and a blinding light shoot from the edges of his vision. Chips of stone sprayed in all directions like a Chinese fire cone sparkling in their own brilliance beneath the light from the torches above before falling silently into the darkness below. Unwavering he brought the hammer high above his head once again and sent another pummeling blow to the marble lid of the sarcophagus, the violence of the act captured in the reverberating echo of the sound waves that rang throughout the chamber. He raised the hammer and struck again, closing his eyes to shield himself against the flying rock chips that stung his flesh, leaving small dots of blood as the only signpost of their passing. He struck down one final time, feeling the hammer smash through the stone as it collapsed inward on itself, buckling beneath the unyielding force of the hammer’s inertia. When at last he stopped he stared in awe as he peered into the marble coffin.
Beneath his feet lay the object of his torment, the epitome of all the evils in the world. He glanced at it slowly, letting his eyes take in the horror that he observed. He started at the feet and scanned upward. The creature before him was unlike anything he had ever seen, the essence of nightmares and far beyond.
The skin was drawn tight about the body, clinging to the tendons and bones beneath. It was black as night, arid and leathery yet still managing to shine in the darkness like obsidian in sunlight. It was tall, well over seven feet, he could tell from the length of the legs alone. Grappled claws sat idle at its sides culminating in razor-like hooked claws. The torso was a mass of dried flesh weaving its way back and forth over the massive ribcage with small openings that allowed him to gaze at the decaying organs beneath. He glanced upward and stared upon the face of the demon, a face that would haunt him for the rest of his life and possible well beyond. And then it seemed the earth fell quiet, the face that peered back at him in a menacing grin was his own.
FORTY-TWO
Darrow read the letter again, unable to believe his good fortune. He focused on his favorite line.
Settlement shares are estimated to be between ten and fifteen thousand dollars.
It wasn’t an exorbitant amount of money that was for sure, but it would still come in handy. He had nearly liquidated his bank account of the monies Abby had inherited from her parents, almost all of it going to buy the mansion. And though he had plenty of equity, he couldn’t touch it. The God damn banks wouldn’t lend him a cent, not with his credit. Plus the part time work that he had been getting didn’t pay much and he had a nasty habit of pissing away money almost before he had it in his pocket. The sad truth was that even though on paper he was worth more than half a million dollars, Jack Darrow was broke.
He ran his fingers over the letter one more time, trying to convince himself that it was real. His fingers had been transformed into greedy little paws and he was eager to fill them with cold hard cash.
Free money! Hot diggity shit, free money. Well almost free anyway.
All they needed was a signature and he could provide that. The letter was addressed to Abby but he had power of attorney. He had forced her to sign legal authority over to him when she was in the hospital and the move had already paid off substantially, Abby didn’t want to buy this house, wanted instead to save the money for their retirement, but when it came right down to it, she didn’t have a say in the matter anymore.
He placed the letter on the kitchen counter and took out his recently acquired cell phone. The buttons were small and his swollen fingers were barely able to depress one button at a time but he managed to dial the number and then tried to remember what button the girl at the cell phone store said he had to push to get it to work. After a minute of thought he depressed the one with the little green telephone picture on it and the phone went into dial mode. It wasn’t so darn hard he thought.
On the other end of the line detective Connelly nearly fell out of his chair. The phone that he had carried on his hip day and night was finally ringing and it startled him. He quickly regained his composure and looked down at the incoming number, it was a local 360 area code. It was Darrow, had to be, unless someone dialed the number by mistake. He was sitting in the dining room of a Seattle Burger King, and he didn’t want to jeopardize the operation. But he couldn’t let the call go, he had to answer it. He pressed the pick up button and placed the receiver to his ear. When he spoke his voice was smooth and easy.
“Brad Jennings attorney at law.”
“Mr. Jennings, this is Jack Darrow you sent me a letter concerning a lawsuit.”
“Jefferson County disability lawsuit?” He said it as blasé as possible.
“Yeah, that’s the one.”
“Okay, what was your name again?” Connelly played it as smooth as silk, he’d let Darrow walk himself into his own trap.
“Darrow, Jack Darrow.” His voice was laced with irritation.
“Alright, let me just pull you up on my computer here. It’ll be just a second.” He paused for a moment and then replied. “I’m showing an Abby Darrow on our records, but no Jack Darrow, are you a relation?”
“Damn right, I’m her husband.”
“Okay Mr. Darrow, is Abby available to talk?”
The irritation in Darrow’s voice grew more pronounced. “No she’s not available to talk; she’s a God damn invalid.”
The children behind him were making a ruckus in the Burger King playground, Connelly hoped that Darrow wouldn’t draw any conclusions. “I’m sorry to hear that Mr. Darrow, but the lawsuit directly implicates those that may have been discriminated against for employment opportunities in Jefferson County, and I’m afraid that we would need her signature for authorization to proceed with the lawsuit on her behalf. Is she incapable of providing a signature?”
“She might be able to sign, but she wouldn’t know what the hell she was signing. I have power of attorney so that shouldn’t be a problem.”
Darrow wasn’t giving an inch. It was going to be more difficult than he had anticipated. “Okay Mr. Darrow, I’ll have to meet with you and your wife and if she is truly incapacitated then you will be able to submit your signature on the lawsuit.”
Connelly waited with baited breath, hoping that Darrow would bite. The seconds dragged by with a cruel slowness.
“Fair enough, so when’s a good time for you?”
Bingo, Connelly thought, bingo.
“How about tomorrow afternoon, say around four?”
“Yeah, I guess I could swing that. How long is this gonna take?”
“It won’t take too long at all Mr. Darrow, probably a half an hour, at the most.”
“See that it doesn’t, I’m a busy man.”
Pretentious prick. “Of course Mr. Darrow, I understand. So I will be there at four O’clock tomorrow then?”
“Fine.”
And then the line went dead. Connelly placed the phone back on his belt and returned to his Whopper. Even after speaking with Jack Darrow for just a couple of minutes he could see why nobody liked the man. He was vulgar, vile, and crude without a shred of regard for anyone but himself. But all of that didn’t matter one damn bit to Ryan Connelly. He was only interested in getting to the truth of the matter and if Jack Darrow was the man who killed that prostitute, then he would be the man who brought him to justice. No, Jack Darrow was not a man to be afraid of. He had dealt with far worse. He took another bite from his Whopp
er and relished the last thought as he chewed. Watch out Jack Darrow, I’m coming for you, and when the time is right I’m going to squash you like a bug.
On the other side of Puget Sound, Jack Darrow snapped his flip-phone shut, his skin still crawled from having to speak to that blood sucking lawyer. But that didn’t matter to Jack Darrow, as long as the man got him a cut of that money. Abby was going to be another problem however. She had become a little too adventurous the last couple of months and he didn’t want her talking to anybody, let alone a blood sucking lawyer who might advise her to divorce him and come after what was left of his money. No he couldn’t have that. He strode out of the kitchen and towards the front door. He had a lot of work to do before tomorrow night, after all he had to make sure that Abby wouldn’t be able to mutter a single word to anyone, especially a damn lawyer.
FORTY-THREE
“I haven’t told you the worst of it.”
Ellie was still crying, it seemed that over the past several days she had not been able to stop. Her behavior was beginning to scare Randall but he did his best not to let her on to this fact, afraid that it would only increase her anxieties, after all the poor woman had been through enough lately. He tried to think how he would have felt had he just learned that his family tree differed greatly from the path that he had thought it followed all of his life. No doubt it would be difficult, but he was starting to wonder if she was going to need professional help. Dear God, he almost couldn’t bear the thought of it, straight out of rehab and into a psychiatric ward. Here you are honey, home sweet home, hope the jacket’s not too tight, we’ll come back to get you when you’re no longer crazy. He was afraid to ask but he swallowed the lump in his throat and proceeded without hesitation.
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