The Soul Consortium

by Simon West-Bulford

  I remembered my youth, my fascination when taught about the blind spot of the human eye. At the point where the optic nerve sprouts from the back of the eyeball, the brain receives no visual information and fills in the gaps with a fabrication of its own. With one eye shut, a single black dot on a piece of paper could be made to disappear if held at the right distance; the eye could not see the dot, and the mind would fill the void with its best approximation—the surrounding paper. To me Keitus Vieta was the same thing: a fabrication of the brain to explain something that should not be there, a paradox, a tangible ghost, something unreal. Yet he was there. He was real.

  I needed to shut him out of my waking thoughts if I wanted to make it through the day with my composure intact, so I walked into town, my coat drawn about me like a vampire’s cloak, stalking from pavement to pavement, road to alley, alley to street. It didn’t matter to me that my choice of clothes and miserable scowl on such a bright morning could draw unwanted attention. I wanted to hide, though, withdraw for a time until I could better understand what happened last night, but no inner peace would be mine until I’d discovered what the local reporters had squeezed out of the police. It was the same in most of the towns and cities I moved to: they’d splash the news across the front of the local tabloid like blood from a Shakespearean tragedy.

  I could usually predict what the local papers would say. A day or two after my kill, I would buy one for the purpose of amusement and to scope out any notable stories about people who had narrowly evaded death. But today was different—today I needed to know, because last night was all wrong. Control had been lost. And it still evaded me. More than ever I felt alien eyes calculating my every move, and now I had to accept the truth: it was no longer a paranoia to be dismissed out of hand. The eyes are real. And my stalker even has a name. Had Fate disowned me? Had she sacrificed me to this new stranger’s will? I expected punishment for my carelessness, but this? Abandonment could destroy me. I need her. I need her like a child needs his—

  My shoulder glances off another’s.

  “Hey, watch it, mate!”

  “Leave it, Bill. Please don’t start.”

  I turn, look at the couple holding hands. The man stares at me as if ready to prove his prowess to the woman at his side. A flash of rage ignites deep in my stomach, and I chew my lower lip to suppress the rising urge to make an example of him and spread the insolent fucker’s brains over his girlfriend’s flayed corpse.

  He backs away, stepping on his girlfriend’s foot—must have read that thought on my face.

  I suck back an audible, measured, long, steady, soothing breath … as if I am about to blow the two of them into the road, spattering them into oncoming traffic where their guts will …

  Don’t! I know what’s happening. I see it. Impulsive violence is a poor tool. Like a sledgehammer in oily hands it can destroy much, but it rarely hits the nail.

  He’s still looking at me, sizing me up with no idea in that apelike brain how close he just came to his end. Interesting. Did he just cheat Fate?

  A one-sided smile slides across the man’s face as he lifts his palms. “Women! Lucky for you she’s the one in control, eh?”

  My eyes widen as I move toward him. “What?”

  His smile loses place to confused suspicion. “What d’you mean … what? Listen, mate—”

  “Bill, leave him. He’s a bloody weirdo.” She yanks his arm, and the man shakes his head as he’s pulled back onto the path.

  He was right. She’s in control. I go through one night of doubt, and I almost lose myself. I should know better than to think she would abandon me after just one night of failure. No, like Jesus in the wilderness, this is my test, but I won’t take forty days to learn my lesson. I’ll trust her. Whoever this Keitus Vieta is, she must control him too, and if he wants to help me, so be it.

  EIGHT

  April 5: Liam Butler. Fell from someone’s roof trying to replace some broken slates, landed on the pavement, and smashed his pelvis. His head missed the edge of his wheelbarrow by the width of a finger. He should’ve died.

  After reading about it in the local paper the following week, I made sure the job was finished, though there was nothing in the man’s eyes that yielded any of the Grim Reaper’s secrets. The hospital staff were clueless about my unauthorized presence on the ward at night when I administered the drug, and they had even less idea about why Mr. Butler didn’t make it through after such a standard operation. Their only notable comment was about the strange old man who, claiming to be a relative, turned up only an hour after the death had been declared. Police could not locate him after the visit, and none of Mr. Butler’s other relatives were able to conclude who it could have been. It was also noted that the deceased’s reading glasses had mysteriously disappeared from his bedside.

  June 23: Vanessa Fullworth. Fell asleep at the wheel of her car. She smashed through the central reservation, taking with her the front bumper of a transit van as her metal tomb slammed her into two other cars. Except she didn’t die. At least not until I found out about her miraculous escape. Another hospital visit set things straight. Again the mysterious visitor. Again a missing object.

  September 12: Steve Warren. A local electrician found unconscious in his workshop after electrocuting himself repairing an old TV set. An ambulance found him quite by chance, having arrived to deal with injured people at a pub brawl at the end of the road. One of Mr. Warren’s customers, irritated by the inconvenience of the shop still being closed well after lunchtime, had peered through the back window and seen him slumped over his bench. Had the ambulance and its capable paramedics not been there at the time, Mr. Warren would have died—or so I was led to believe by the owner of the shop next door.

  I called on Mr. Warren’s services as soon as he was back to work, claiming I needed an expert to examine a faulty circuit breaker. Nobody ever found out what happened to him, and I saw nothing new in his dying eyes, either. The following day somebody broke into my home while I was out. The lock had not been forced, and nothing had been stolen, but the spots of blood coughed up by Mr. Warren onto my carpet had been cleaned off in my absence.

  September 18: Ibrahim Yelsin. This was the incident that led to the discovery of Steve Warren. Ibrahim was the victim of a racial attack outside the Golden Lion pub, and it was the landlord who had called the police and the ambulance. The unfortunate teenager had been stabbed in the chest, and it was a miracle the blade missed his vital organs.

  Finding this boy was not difficult, he was well known in the area, but my inquiries had brought with them considerable danger—once Ibrahim’s murder had been made public, my own discovery would be simple. A test then. How would Mr. Vieta cover my tracks this time? The newspapers were kind enough to reveal the answer with a two-page spread. All the boy’s friends, any witnesses to my involvement, were no longer able to speak. Attempts to discuss the demise of their friend resulted in prolonged episodes of mute panic and tearful hysteria. I chose not to investigate further.

  December 1: Jane Laughday. Survivor of a laboratory explosion.

  December 12: Jamie Colson. Remission from prostate cancer.

  February 14: Troy Davenport. Failed suicide attempt.

  March 3: Alfie Bennet. Sole survivor of a food poisoning scandal.

  May 29: Lisa Barclay. Thrown from a fairground ride.

  June 8: Tim Sweetman. Lived through an aneurysm.

  Died a few days later after a second aneurysm … with a little help from a certain cocktail of drugs, of course.

  The list went on. Each time I found out about people who had cheated my goddess I was there to ensure they paid their debt. And no matter how many times I tested Mr. Vieta’s ability to clean up my murderous mistakes, he would always be there, waiting.

  The entire nation, consumed by fascination, had labeled me the Magpie Killer. One particularly resourceful detective inspector noticed that all my victims had lost a personal item they had been using close to the time of death. The
motive was unknown, but the discovery earned the inspector a commendation, a sizable reward, and a sudden brain seizure, for which I am quite sure was the handiwork of my creeping shadow, Keitus Vieta. The only communication the psychoanalysts could get from the inspector was a stream of letters scrawled in block capitals: HEISNOWHERE. And they were always followed by a long scream of terror that could only be silenced with morphine.

  Under such circumstances it seemed my calling was irrevocable. I would never be caught. But that all changed the following year, seven days after my forty-sixth birthday, the day Keitus Vieta chose to take something of mine.

  NINE

  Addiction is ugly. When one is deprived of their vice, the heart swells like a ravenous sponge. It becomes a fallen tyrant, screaming its demands and sobbing its grief in a volume that drowns out any words of quiet reason the mind might impart.

  Five months passed without a victim. I had gone longer than this before but not without consequences. I walked the streets in a daze, knowing only that my desires were unquenched. I scoured the papers, studied the local news, hovered around hospitals, but I had not found one person anywhere who had cheated Fate. Perhaps the true link to all the murders had been discovered, and the media had been silenced to flush me out. Perhaps Fate had abandoned me. Perhaps it was another test. But I know now that the answer is more subtle, more fitting than any of those.

  On my final day amongst the masses I walked the cliffs of Cornwall to clear my mind, following the coastal path to Tintagel—a place that breathes history through every ancient blade of grass and every moss-covered rock. I fished through my pockets to find my shades in the hope that I could dwell on the view for a time without squinting, but they had gone. When the seaside sun burns in the heights of a cloudless sky and the smell of ocean water fills every pore, one would have to be born without a soul not to smile. I watched anyway without my sunglasses.

  For a time I found my contentment, but the serenity was soon broken. Shouting is not something one expects on a pleasant Sunday morning walking the cliffs, but nevertheless, a short way ahead of me two men bellowed above the barking of a large dog. Other walkers gave the two men a wide berth but not me; I thrive on conflict.

  The argument had escalated into finger-stabbing posturing, and as I drew closer, I noticed that the man standing with his back to the cliff edge had lines of blood tracked across the back of his hand. The dog, still barking but restrained with no small effort by the other man, had blood on its teeth.

  “Of course he’s going to bloody bite. He thought you were threatening me.”

  “Threatening? I was running past.”

  “You knocked my arm. What the fuck did you think was going to happen? Fuckin’ arsehole.”

  “What?”

  “You heard.”

  The man with his back to the cliff, a good two inches taller than the other, moved his face within head-butting distance.

  The other stood his ground, faltering slightly as he held the Alsatian back from a second attack.

  Time for me to jump into the fray. I closed in. “I take it from your tones that neither of you gentlemen is from this area?”

  They observed me for no more than five seconds as one might examine a piece of excrement that had suddenly acquired the ability to speak, then turned back to each other.

  “I’ll be making sure that fucking mutt gets put down, pal.”

  “Not if he puts you down first, you piece of shit.” Another finger stabbed into the man’s chest.

  My organs leapt when the man’s heel shuffled ever closer to the cliff edge. Had my five months of fasting finally come to an end? I salivated as he pushed forward again. The man closest to the edge flinched, and he grabbed the dog man’s coat collar, more to hold himself steady than anything else. I stepped closer.

  Neither of them seemed interested in my approach. They held each other’s clothes, eyes wide with horror, tottering like skittles, but at the same moment they both understood the danger and stepped away from the edge.

  Unchecked by its distracted owner and alarmed by my approach, the dog yanked itself free and hurtled toward me like a frothing demon.

  “Chip! No!”

  I sidestepped but the dog had already charged into me, and then it was my feet that scuffled on the crumbling precipice. The hungry waves a hundred feet below beckoned as my right foot found nothing beneath it. My arms wheeled like rotor blades. My insides exploded with adrenaline, and time stretched as my mind rebelled. A solid jolt of knuckles bruised my collarbone as a fist grasped my shirt, and I hung for a moment, one foot dangling, the other sliding against chalk, before I was pulled onto the grass.

  At least the dog had stopped barking.

  “Jesus! That was really close. You all right, mate?” The man was half laughing.

  I stared at the ground, panting on hands and knees. Two sets of boots stood in peripheral vision, the dog sitting beside one of them, sated with a chew stick provided by the owner. I looked up at the man who had saved my life but lingered there less than a moment; someone else caught my eye on the brow of the hill, perhaps two miles away.

  It was him.

  Specific detail was impossible to make out at that distance, but I could still discern the same hunchbacked posture, the hat and black clothing, and perhaps a flicker of indigo from the jewel in his cane. Keitus Vieta turned, as if he had been waiting for me to notice him, then disappeared over the hill.

  I stood up, faced the man who had stopped my fall. “You saved my life, Mr.—?”

  “Booth … Andy Booth. You all right?”

  “A little shaken but, yes, I believe so.”

  The other man squatted down to ruffle his dog. “Bet you saw your life flash before your eyes then, eh? Lucky he caught you.”

  I smiled. “Fate has uncanny taste, doesn’t she?”

  “The council ought to put some bloody fences here. I reckon loads of people must end up splattered on them rocks. Anyways, looks like it was your lucky day. Take it easy, mate.” He looked at the dog and its owner, and I saw the debate in his eyes about whether he should continue the argument or leave it alone. A glance at the sea changed his mind, and he turned to leave.

  With an equally cautious glance, the other man left too.

  Somebody should have died today on that cliff.

  I fished around my pockets, looking for my sunglasses a second time. Still missing. Or taken. I faced the empty hill and nodded. I knew what had to be done.

  TEN

  Today. Such a casual word for most people. One hundred and fifty thousand people die every day, and for some, today will be their last. I wonder how many of them know that. I suspect the number is relatively small.

  “This gonna take long, chief?”

  I stare at my target, study every part of him. Silence, when combined with scrutiny, is a powerful thing.

  He shifts from foot to foot, one grubby toe poking through a tear in his trainer.

  There’s a moment of regret at selecting this man. Not because I think he is incapable of the task, but because I would prefer not to be locked away in a room that has boarded-up windows and virtually no ventilation in the presence of a man who has not discovered the benefits of soap.

  He draws his canvas coat tighter against his body as if the action might shield him from my gaze, and a urine breeze finds my nose.

  “I’m paying you, aren’t I?” I pinch my nostrils with my left hand and pull a packet out of my pocket with my right. “Cigarette?”

  “Cheers.” The vagrant shuffles forward, snatches nervously at the white stick with oily fingers, and plants it between his lips. “Nice place.”

  If that’s his attempt at sarcasm, I’ll forgive it. In the next few minutes this grimy-walled room with its festering floorboards and roach problem will be a place more than fit for such an observation. I pull a lighter from my pocket, light his cigarette, then one for myself.

  “Take a seat.” I inhale a lug from my smoke and gesture to a wooden chai
r in the middle of the room. Facing it is another chair, and focused on both of them from the side is a video camera on a tripod.

  “So what sort of documentary is this anyway? Another one of those why the homeless can’t get a home jokes?” He pulls hard on his cigarette, slumps into the seat with a leering grin, and blows smoke at me.

  “No … Nothing like that.”

  “A talent show for the great unwashed, then?”

  I allow a slow smile to creep over my face.

  “Well?” He flicks a palm up. “You gonna give me a hint? Do I have to act or something?”

  I push the red button on the camera, take my coat off, and hang it on the back of the chair opposite him. “All you need to do is keep your eyes on mine.”

  “You a queer?”

  As I lower myself onto the chair I pull a syringe from one of my coat pockets and hold it up to the light, checking for any bubbles in the liquid. It’s fine.

  “Hey! What’s in the tube? You a druggy? Just ‘cause I live on the streets that don’t make me a spliff head.” He makes to get up.

  I grab his sleeve. “Sit. Down.”

  He pauses and we lock eyes. He sits again, still looking at me as he draws on his cigarette almost down to the filter. Mine is only halfway through.

  “That’s better. Just keep your eyes on mine. It’s really not that much to ask, is it?”

  “I ain’t taking any drugs.”

  “I’m not asking you to.”

  “Then what—?” He balks as I slam the needle into my arm. “What’s in the tube?”

  “Drugs.” I smile, suppressing the pain as the cold liquid works its way up my vein. “But not the kind you think. Keep looking at me, right at me.” I toss the empty syringe aside, its contents now wending their way toward my nervous system. And after crushing my cigarette under my heel, I grab the vagrant’s face and pull it to mine.