The Whittier Trilogy

by Michael W. Layne

  Before he’d met Zana, he hadn’t needed the necklace for that.

  After coming out of a tight curve in the road, he reached up and rubbed his shoulder through his dark red dress shirt.

  Zana looked over and winced.

  “Still hurts,” he said.

  Zana rubbed her hand along his thigh.

  “You two must have been having a really good time when she gave that to you.”

  “Very funny,” he said.

  They were quiet for a few moments as another grungy guitar solo shook the car’s interior.

  Zana looked out the front window, but he could tell her mind was working on something.

  “When are you going to tell me more about what happened in Whittier, with her?”

  “Before we get there. I promise.”

  She chewed on her lower lip for a few seconds, then her eyebrows arched up.

  “I won’t ask any questions about Whittier or about Christina, if you teach me about mentalism. Show me some magic I can do to impress someone. Something…basic.”

  Trent thought for a moment or two.

  “First off, a mentalist is different from a stage magician. There’s some overlap, but we perform even common tricks very differently.”

  “Example?” she said.

  “Let’s say you pick a card from a deck and I try to guess it—the most basic of tricks. A magician might note where you took the card out and mark it with his thumbnail when you put it back. A mentalist on the other hand would memorize the order of each card in the deck and be able to tell which card was out of place. Or he might let you cut the deck until you were satisfied that there was no way he could determine which card was yours.”

  Zana looked confused.

  “I don’t think I’m following you.”

  Trent grinned.

  “Think about it. It’ll come to you.”

  Zana sat back in the passenger’s seat and stared out the window. After a minute, she turned back to Trent, excited.

  “Because cutting the deck doesn’t change the relative order of the cards. No matter how many times the deck is cut, the card that’s above the chosen card will always be above it, right?”

  Trent laughed.

  “Not bad.”

  Zana’s smile faded.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I just felt a shiver. The same way it felt when I was around the Hunter. I know he’s dead, but…”

  Trent reached over and squeezed her hand.

  “Close your window all the way. It’s probably just the cold from outside. Like you said, the Hunter’s dead. He’s gone, and he can’t hurt you or your friends any more.”

  Chapter 2

  THE HUNTER OPENED one eye partway and coughed as he tried to fill his lungs with air.

  The hospital room around him slowly came into focus, and he tensed at the sight of his father standing at the foot of his hospital bed.

  The old man grimaced, but not in a caring way.

  “What the hell happened to you, boy?”

  The Hunter was fifty-two and far from being a boy anymore. He looked down at his left arm and saw the thin rubber tube snaking into it. His right arm was in a cast as was his left leg. He lifted his left hand to his face and winced when it made contact with the bandages surrounding that were wrapped around his head.

  The Hunter looked again at his father. He wasn’t sure what was in the IV bag hanging by his bed, but he guessed it was a concoction that included painkillers strong enough to cause hallucinations.

  “You don’t answer your father anymore? I said, what the hell happened to you?”

  The Hunter groaned and turned away from the old man’s glare.

  “It wasn’t my fault,” he murmured through the lips of his swollen face.

  “A man takes accountability for his mistakes.”

  “The thing that did this to me wasn’t a man. It was something else—like the creatures you used to tell me about at the military base.”

  The old man grunted, then walked around to the side of the bed. The Hunter could tell that he had the old man’s attention.

  “Tell me about this thing,” his father said.

  “It looked like a man, but it moved and tracked and had the strength of an animal.”

  The Hunter paused.

  “It killed like one, too.”

  His father stared blankly into the distance for a few seconds before turning to the Hunter again.

  “The moon was full?”

  The Hunter nodded.

  “It was just last week.”

  “I’ve seen the creature you’re talking about, but not for decades. Not since the soldiers who were bitten. Did the creature have a thick, night-black hair and wear an old black suit?”

  The Hunter weakly nodded again.

  “It wasn’t enough that the son of a bitch took everything I had,” the old man said as his voice grew louder. “He had to go after you, too.

  “And nobody goes after my family.”

  It had been a long time since the Hunter had been a young boy, living under the oppression and abuse of his father, but even as an adult, he had to gather his courage to speak to his father without first being addressed.

  “You know him? You know Trent Walker?”

  The old man nodded as he slowly pulled back the Hunter’s bed covers and started to slide into bed with him.

  The Hunter tried to squirm—to move away from his father.

  “Don’t worry, boy. I’m gonna get in there and make you feel better. Then you and me are gonna go hunting like we used to in the old days.”

  The Hunter had been all over the world, since he had left his home and his father in Alaska so many years ago. He had hunted the largest and most dangerous game there was. In the business world, he controlled men’s lives on a day-to-day basis, and he was used to getting what he wanted.

  But as his father lay down in bed with him, the Hunter was terrified beyond anything he had ever experienced, because his father, as real as he seemed at that moment, had passed away less than two months ago—killed by a grizzly an hour’s drive outside of Anchorage in a small Alaskan town known as Whittier.

  The Hunter trembled in horror, as his father’s body turned ethereal and merged with his own, like a dark plague settling into a new host.

  He began to panic, and his skin prickled both hot and cold, like he had a fever. He was trapped, with nowhere to run from his father, and he could tell that his father was in his head, occupying his mind along with him—forcing thoughts of vengeance into his head—as if he needed to do that—and controlling the chemicals released into his bloodstream.

  After only a few minutes, the Hunter stopped fighting as his pain started to recede, his muscles and bones began to heal, his strength returned, and his mind cleared.

  He looked at the tube running into his arm, reached a heavily bandaged hand over and pulled it out.

  As he readied himself to get out of bed, he heard a voice inside his head, as clearly as if it were his own thought.

  Trail’s getting cold, boy.

  The Hunter nodded and carefully moved his legs over the side of the bed, making sure to not disconnect his blood pressure cuff, the plastic finger clip that monitored his pulse and the oxygen levels in his blood, and the electrode stuck to his chest to keep track of his heart’s electrical activity.

  Whatever was happening to him was unnatural to say the least, and being this close to his father, even given the fact that his body was healing at a greatly accelerated rate, was like walking around with a rock in his stomach and a tumor in his head.

  He checked the door to his hospital room and reached down to his bag of clothes on the rack underneath his bed. He pulled his folded-up pants out of the bag and reached into its right side pocket. His left hand grabbed a small all-in-one pocketknife and set it to the side on top of his covers.

  Carefully, he unwrapped the heavy tape from his cast until the stiff, blue-colored, fiberglass itself was visible. He
opened his knife and flipped out the scissors, then started to slowly cut through one side of the cast. When he finished that cut, he moved to the opposite side of the cast. Within moments, the fiberglass shell fell to the floor, and the Hunter wiggled his fingers and made a fist.

  A little sore, but far from broken.

  He started to work on the cast around his left leg. This one was tougher to cut through and harder to find the right position to give him the leverage he needed. But eventually, that cast also fell to the floor.

  He flexed his leg and his foot. Both seemed almost completely healed. He took a deep breath, filling his lungs. This time, he didn’t cough.

  The Hunter thought about leaving the bandages on his face, but didn’t want to look that conspicuous walking out of the hospital, in case someone tried to stop him. He reached up and started to unwind the gauze. As the air hit his raw skin, he could tell without even looking that his face was not healed like the rest of him.

  There would be time to deal with that later. Right now, it was time for him to get out of there.

  He glanced at a newspaper on the chair next to his bed. The date told him it was two days after he had been almost beaten to death in the tunnels.

  He had no memory of how he had made it out of there. Most likely, his men had gone searching for him once they discovered the carnage back at the Lodge and realized that their boss was missing. If they were following protocol, one of them would also be standing guard outside his door right now.

  He sat on the edge of his bed and took a deep breath, then exhaled slowly. It was time to go.

  With a smoothness of efficiency, he disconnected himself from the devices that were monitoring his vital signs as the monitor to his left showed flat lines and filled the room with a single, piercing tone.

  The Hunter knew he didn’t have much time before a nurse or a doctor would burst in and demand to know what was going on, so he put on the rest of his clothes as quickly as possible.

  In less than a minute, he was dressed, holding his shoes, and making his way out the door.

  As he had suspected, a muscular man in a suit, with shoulders wider than the doorway turned to face him—startled that he was up and walking around.

  For a moment, the man stared at the Hunter, trying to hide a look of obvious revulsion.

  “Get me out of here, Mickey.”

  “You okay with the stairs, boss? Less people to ask questions.”

  The Hunter nodded and Mickey led him by the arm, straight to the stairwell.

  With each step, the Hunter’s mind cleared more and more, and he felt himself smile as best as his damaged face would allow—not because his body was healed or because he was leaving the hospital.

  The Hunter was smiling because, for once, he and his father both wanted the same thing—to see Trent Walker dead.

  Chapter 3

  “HOW MANY SIGNS for falling rocks have we passed since we’ve been on the road?”

  Zana squinted at Trent and pursed her full lips.

  “I have no idea.”

  Trent smiled.

  “Twelve.”

  “How do I know you’re not just making that up?”

  He looked at her and raised an eyebrow.

  Zana crossed her arms.

  “Mentalism is about using your mind,” he said. “Muscles get bigger when you exercise them. Your brain gets better the more you use it. Do you remember seeing any signs at all for falling rocks?”

  “Of course. A couple of them since we left.”

  “You saw them, but I observed them.”

  Zana laughed.

  “You’re getting pretty Zen on me, babe.”

  Babe.

  The word rolled off her sweet tongue so naturally. And he liked it, but it was still odd after knowing each other for only a couple of weeks. True, they’d been through a lot in that amount of time, but the familiarity they felt with each other continued to surprise him.

  He glanced down at the backpack she’d been holding between her feet all day on the floor of the car.

  “What’s in there? Hope we’re not carrying a bomb or something.”

  She reached down and patted the bag.

  “Don’t worry. It’s not a bomb. I call it Bob.”

  “Your bag has a name?”

  “Stands for bug-out bag. Everyone should have at least one,” she said as her voice trailed off.

  “In case the zombie apocalypse comes?”

  “Maybe. But there’s plenty of things out there that worry me a lot more than dead people wanting to eat my brains.”

  “Says the girl who sees a dark spirit attached to my shoulder…”

  “Ha ha,” she said.

  “I’m only saying that there are plenty of real disasters that could hit us at any time. Besides, living in the tunnels, I never knew when I might have to move. It was better to be prepared. Aren’t you worried about anything ending the world as we know it?”

  “At the moment, no. I’m more worried about a dark animal spirit that takes control of me whenever there’s a full moon and makes me do horrendous things to my fellow human beings.”

  “You consider the Hunter a fellow human being?”

  Trent was silent for a moment.

  “Good point,” he finally said.

  Zana reached into her bag and pulled out a long piece of paracord with a short metal bar attached at each end. She carefully looped the cord around itself again and again, then handed it to Trent. He took it from her while braking for a driver in front of him who was riding his brakes.

  Trent recognized the length of paracord Zana had just given him. It had acted as both Zana’s belt and as a quick and easy way to lift the heavy manhole covers that led down to the storm drain tunnels beneath Las Vegas.

  “Why are you giving this to me?”

  Zana’s eyes seemed to be looking past Trent, like she was remembering something.

  “I don’t want to live in the tunnels again, Trent. I’m hoping I won’t ever need to lift another manhole cover, so I’m giving it to you to hold on to.”

  Trent pocketed the paracord bundle in his suit pocket. Even though it was an odd gift, he knew that the sentiment meant a lot to Zana.

  “Anything else in there?”

  “Just the basics. Candles, lighters, a knife. Pair of running shoes. A few other things.”

  For the rest of the drive that day, they alternated between periods of complete silence, blaring rock music, and more conversations about mentalism that helped the miles pass.

  By the time they arrived in Twin Falls, Idaho, he was ready to get off the road and relax some. He passed the exit for Twin Falls and continued on to the next sign that advertised lodging.

  Trent yawned and shook his head. He was worn out in a way he hadn’t felt before.

  She put her hand on his leg.

  “Are you feeling okay?”

  Trent nodded.

  “My body feels great, but it feels like my battery’s drained.”

  “Being fully possessed by a spirit takes a lot out of a person. More than you realize when its happening. It’s like coming down from a caffeine high. Feels great when you’re on it, but when it’s gone, you realize how much energy you’ve just expended.”

  “Maybe that’s all it is.”

  “If it’s more than that, I want you to know that I’m here for you,” she said. “You saved me from that asshole in the tunnels, and now it’s my turn to help you.”

  Trent had always been the one to give help to others and never the one to ask for it. But somehow, it made him feel warm inside just knowing that she would help him if he asked.

  Before they could continue the conversation, he pulled the car into the gravel parking lot of the Grand Palomino Motel that was located just past town.

  It was a one-level motel that made the Lucky Imp—the place he had stayed in Vegas—look like the Taj Mahal. Despite its rough exterior, he was sure the price would be right, and that was more important to them both
at the moment.

  Trent parked their economy car that was good on gas mileage but hard on their legs.

  They ambled into the main office, and Trent leaned against the counter. Within seconds, a skinny woman in jeans and a cowgirl-style shirt emerged from the back room to greet them.

  “Welcome to the Palomino,” she said with a smile. “How many nights will you be staying with us?”

  “Just the one,” Trent said as he leaned in closer to her. “We’ve got plenty of money to pay for the room, but I’m a professional performer, and I was wondering if you’d be interested in trading a night’s entertainment for our room. I could put on an amazing show in that small lounge over there.”

  The woman looked at Trent dubiously—shrugged her shoulders.

  “What do you do?”

  “Ever heard of a mentalist?”

  “I watch the TV show. That’s one good looking man, there.”

  Trent saw Zana roll her eyes in his peripheral vision.

  “I do the same types of things he does,” Trent said, “just not for the police.”

  The woman smiled, but Trent could tell from the micro expressions on her face—her frown that lasted less than a fraction of a second and her eyes looking away—that she wasn’t really interested and was only trying to be polite.

  “The place is pretty empty tonight,” she said. “Don’t think you’d have much of an audience. You understand.”

  Trent nodded at her.

  “You never know unless you ask,” Trent said.

  “That is one hundred percent correct, sir. And I will have to ask you for a credit card. Just in case you and your lady friend throw a party and wreck the place.”

  The desk manager laughed until she coughed, as she took Trent’s card and ran it through her register.

  The woman smiled and handed him two keys to their room and his credit card.

  “You two have a good night, and let me know if there’s anything I can do to help. Dial 0 on your phone, and I’ll be the one who picks up.

  They thanked the woman as Trent held the door open for Zana, and they stepped into the brisk night.