Extreme Liquidation: Caitlin Diggs Series #2

by Gary Starta

  Carter had begun the day with hope. Maybe one day Mollini would use his mental abilities for the benefit of humankind. Carter repeated these words to himself during the drive from Boston. He would offer a few breadcrumbs as an incentive. Mollini would be granted access to the prison’s exercise room in exchange for the positive identification of Agent Diggs’s black-robed mystery man. Because Carter was convinced that the black-robed man possessed mental abilities on par with Mollini, he had theorized a form of extra sensory perception—or what parapsychologists labeled as remote viewing—could possibly form a mental conduit between the two men.

  Up until this moment, Carter had remained quite optimistic that Mollini could not only name Diggs’s nemesis but also pinpoint his exact whereabouts using ESP. Carter’s optimism waned over the course of the next few minutes. Mollini began the meeting, complaining his confinement over the course of the last fifteen months had stunted his powers. And when Mollini proposed he and Carter join minds to remedy that situation, the final ebb of optimism flowed out of Carter as quick as rainwater descending into a street sewer.

  Carter’s hands trembled but not just from the cold. Although he knew Mollini was probably quite capable of reading his fear, Carter concealed his hands in his parka, feigning discomfort from the frigid January day. And in a way that was true. Mollini, ever the magician, had manipulated Carter’s internal thermometer, the place in his heart reserved for optimism. The chill of Mollini’s proposal had all but drained the detective’s internal reservoir of hope. And if it wasn’t for his compunction to aid Agent Diggs, Stanford might have balked, refusing to join minds with such a dangerous and demented individual no matter the circumstance.

  “I see you’re apprehensive, Carter. It reads on your face like a headline. But don’t worry, we won’t have to embrace or anything like that to establish our connection.”

  “Ah, so you mean it won’t be anything like that Vulcan mind meld thing they do on Star Trek? You won’t be placing a hand on my face or anything?” Carter’s mind flashed back to a Star Trek episode where Spock read Dr. McCoy’s thoughts via contact telepathy.

  “Quite correct, detective. Obviously, you’re aware of my modus operandi. I am most definitely not the touchy feely type. Now may we get on with it? I may have a superior mind, but my body is still susceptible to the cold.”

  “I thought you would simply employ mind over matter.”

  “That’s very Zen of you to say something like that, Carter. I recall when you captured me on the Anderson’s back lawn. You began chanting. I believe you attempted to block my suggestive powers.”

  “What do you mean attempted? I did block you.”

  “I would say the SWAT team and the dozen guns they had trained on me at that very moment was what ultimately stopped me.”

  “Enjoy your moment, Mollini, but your attempt to scare me won’t work. You see, I also have a strong will when it comes to my mind.”

  Mollini stared at Carter in silence, unsure if the detective was truly confident or merely bluffing.

  “You know, Carter. This joining may give you a lot more than a suspect’s name. If you study Buddhism, I’m sure you’re aware of something called Nibbana?”

  “Yes. It’s the place where one can see the world in perfect balance. Most practitioners simply refer to it as Nirvana.”

  “That’s right on both counts. Nibbana, or Nirvana, is a state where opposites join together. Emptiness and plentitude, life and death, good and evil.”

  “You and me...”

  “Bravo, detective. If my hands were free I would applaud. Yes, I know you want to attain this state, any Zen student would. Because of this, I am willing to take you there—to let you experience Nirvana. You might come out of it with a better understanding of yourself and your place in the world.”

  “Why are you being so altruistic? Even if you could allow me to experience Nirvana, I could never repay you. You’re still going to spend your life behind bars, either way.”

  “I would have hoped your studies would have freed you from guilt. Who asked for anything in return? You won’t owe me anything for this, Carter. Let’s just say a good magician needs to dabble every now and then, to keep his skills sharp.”

  Carter glared at him. “What are you planning?”

  “Nothing, I merely was stating a fact. If you want me to help you solve cases, I must keep my skills polished. I’m not talking dark arts or prison break, if that’s what you’re afraid of.”

  “I’ll allow the joining, the Nirvana, but ultimately I want a name, Mollini.”

  Mollini bowed his head, his eyes rolled back in their sockets. For a moment, Carter feared the prisoner might be experiencing a seizure. He started to reach for his cellphone but stopped when the cold presence of an internal visitor sent a tingle down his spine.

  “You feel me, detective?”

  Eyes trained on Mollini, Carter’s face paled as he realized the voice emanating from inside of him was Mollini’s. The body that stood before him was slack. It had not uttered a single syllable.

  The pallid color of Carter’s face changed quickly as if an artist had suddenly dashed some crimson paint upon it. Blood rushed to his forehead. He nearly stumbled forward, but caught himself. He found he could no longer keep his eyes open. When he shut them, he saw nothing but red for a few seconds.

  And then images began to emerge from the red light, rotating one after the other, resembling a slideshow. He saw President Duncan. Dictator Al Zarqawi. An olive branch followed, which in turn traded places with a nuclear missile silo. A hand reached out to him. Carter instinctively withdrew his hand from his parka to grasp it in handshake. Just as he did, the hand balled into a fist. He felt the jolt of a punch. It stung his cheek. The images started running faster and faster. He saw a farmer seeding some land. Seconds later, the land produced grain in the form of wheat stalks. The same farmer took a sickle to a wheat stalk. He fed a cow with the harvest. A piece of this cow wound up on the farmer’s plate in the form of hamburger. The farmer was then shown standing on his land, braced against the wind which had blown back his hair. A tornado washed over him, claiming all life on the farm.

  All the while Carter absorbed the knowledge, never feeling that nature, animal or man had betrayed the other. They merely existed. The images turned more personal. Carter saw the murder of his cousin in a convenience store. Next, his relative’s killer was facing arraignment. It was the reason why Carter joined law enforcement—to exact justice. A picture of Jill Seacrest followed. Jill had recently joined Stanford’s department as a crime scene investigator. He experienced an immediate attraction to this woman.

  Time jumped forward again. Carter enjoyed a meal with a Medical Examiner Andrew Shock, who made an inappropriate and vulgar remark concerning the detective’s obvious attraction to his subordinate officer. A more disturbing image followed: Carter witnessed the transformation of Shock from medical examiner to killer. Emulating a serial killer, Shock had gone off the deep end. He saw what was once “a good man” succumbing to madness, preparing a weapon for his next kill.

  He then saw Shock surprising Jill in her apartment, readying to make her his next victim. He saw himself. He charged up Jill’s stairwell, gun in hand, praying he would get there in time to avert a tragedy. He burst through the door, gun trained on Shock, who shielded himself with Jill’s body. The ME held a knife dangerously close to Jill’s throat. Then the images stopped. A voice began to prod at him. Are you really going to be satisfied with the outcome, detective? The voice narrated what transpired next.

  You had shot Shock in the arm forcing him to drop his weapon. He had been knocked backwards, freeing Jill from his grasp. A trial ensued. Shock was found guilty. He would serve a life sentence. Do you want more? This man nearly killed your future wife? What kind of justice is a prison sentence? Was the conviction of your cousin’s killer satisfactory?

  Examine the glimpses you saw previously. Did you feel the slaughter of the cow or the weather relate
d death of the farmer was cruel? No, they were not cruel. They were part of nature. And man has a nature too. Man’s nature is no superior to that of a hungry animal hunting its prey or a gust of wind claiming a child’s life. The containment of emotion goes against our nature. Learn to admit this to yourself. Admit what you really want. You wanted to see your cousin’s killer die a miserable, pain filled death. Admit you wanted to blow the medical examiner’s head off, not merely disarm him, when he threatened to take away the most precious person you had ever met. Reveal yourself...

  Carter found himself suspended in time. His finger rested on the trigger. He could easily put a slug into the medical examiner’s head as he could his arm. These two areas had been left exposed. Mollini told him to stop fighting his true nature, and to fire the weapon with the intent to kill.

  Carter had to make a split second decision. He realized this was not Shock’s first kill. Shock wouldn’t hesitate to sink the knife into Jill. Carter raised his gun slightly. He no longer targeted the medical examiner’s arm. And as he cocked the gun, he felt the icy penetration of Mollini permeate his being.

  Truth was, Mollini’s motives never did revolve around money. Mollini found he could claim his victim’s souls, their life force, upon the moment of their death. That was why he willed them to kill themselves. Mollini had found a way to absorb the life force of humans, a force some identify as the soul. Mollini waited as a split second in Stanford Carter’s life played out as if in slow motion . He expected Carter to give in to impulse, the innate animal desire he himself had succumbed to, the weakness that had turned him into the devil. Mollini was so sure of the outcome he allowed a smile to grace his face.

  Still standing toe to toe, eyes closed, the two men presented an odd picture. One bound in chains, laughing. The other, unshackled, free to choose his will, succumbing to a carnivorous desire to exact revenge. And as Carter stood there, trancelike, frozen in time , he did not realize Mollini ultimately pulled the strings. If Carter gave in to emotion, he would misfire. The bullet would never take out Andrew Shock at all. Instead, the misfire would give the medical examiner the perfect opportunity to slice Jill Seacrest’s throat. The realization of his folly would hit Carter like a ton of bricks.

  Mollini knew all too well what would happen next. Stanford would turn his gun on himself, because he couldn’t live having failed Jill. And in the next few seconds, Carter, held hostage to what he believed were his own thoughts, did exactly what Mollini hoped he would do. Stanford Carter held a gun to his mouth. His body protested what his mind had willed him to do. His hands shook, his legs quavered. But the gun remained firmly pointed at his mouth. And when Carter’s subconscious mind began to fight Mollini’s influence, his eyes flew open. But instead of relief, Carter fell into a further state of dismay because he discovered that, in reality, he had actually removed his service revolver from his holster. Carter grimaced, finding his unwilling hand still pointing the gun at himself like it did during Nirvana, only this time he appeared to be awake and standing upon the frozen soil of a prison yard.

  Chapter 28

  “Dudek, can you hear me now?” The words croaked over his cellphone, slithering in pitch and frequency. It was as if the voice speaking was some kind of audio snake able to manipulate microwaves. Despite a weak signal, each syllable of every word emitted from the phone weighed heavily upon Dudek’s ears, transcending a moment of time, reverberating in an echo. It wasn’t so much about words, Dudek realized, half dazed and bleeding from a stomach wound, but all about style. The question had been spoken with a lilt, conveying a patience usually mastered by the elderly or leaders of a faith. It rang in a chiming melodic fashion. Each vowel was more musical than dissonant. Through all the masking, the voice was still human. It was the kind of manipulative voice sometimes used by parents to coax an unwilling child to an early bedtime.

  Dudek felt controlled, dominated by a short string of words. Despite the effort to cloak the question in sickeningly sweet sugar, Dudek knew the voice behind the question wasn’t really concerned if he literally heard the words. Connah Hainsworth, the speaker, had veiled his question with surreptitious implication. In essence, what Hainsworth really wanted to know was if Dudek was ready to listen to his words, and perhaps, willing to convert to his twisted religion. Another voice rang in Dudek’s ears, but it was not coming from his cellphone this time. This voice penetrated his thoughts. Yes, the song you hear, it is all about impression, control and domination.

  Assistant Director Andrew Dudek had used his last bit of might to retrieve the device from his inside coat pocket a few seconds ago, hoping against all odds the voice on the other end of the receiver would be Diggs or someone who could aid him against the purple-garbed lunatic. If he could get medical attention now, he might survive the bullet wound to his stomach. At least he thought it was a bullet. His brain had only had a few seconds to process and analyze what had really happened. Dudek’s will forced him to abandon all thoughts about magic.

  Hainsworth hadn’t fired a gun at him. He had only waved his arm, unleashing a force that somehow penetrated Dudek’s body and now left him swooning from blood loss. And although Dudek wanted to believe in magic, to understand the paranormal, he simply couldn’t admit to himself what was really happening. He simply couldn’t stomach the truth: his arch nemesis was in possession of supernatural gifts.

  Dudek struggled to cling to life, lost in a myriad of thoughts, still sitting atop the Zamboni. Still positioned directly across the Verizon Center ice rink from him was his nemesis. Instead of a tailored suit, the enemy now wore a purple robe. Instead of assuming the role of Director of the FBI, he now acted as if he were the Pied Piper .

  Dudek winced from pain. It made him recall the time he had once been grazed by a bullet, nine years ago. It ricocheted off a building. He had been fighting drug dealers at the time, squaring off in an old fashioned western showdown. Only twenty-five meters separated him from his attacker. A projectile, fired by the assailant, had missed Dudek’s body entirely. Yet it managed to lacerate his arm by bouncing off a brick wall adjacent to him. Dudek took out his attacker with his last round of ammunition, and then spent years doubting himself. Deep down, he never really believed he had won the fight by employing finesse or courage.

  And although his superior labeled him a “hero,” Dudek came to realize he only survived that day because of blind luck. That luck catapulted his career. Two years later, he was promoted to assistant director. Whether he survived through sheer luck or not, Dudek was now on the fast track to becoming director—or so it seemed. To his chagrin, Connah Hainsworth had somehow finagled his way right past him, assuming the directorship with nearly no field experience.

  And now wrapped in a pious cloak and seated directly across from the rink of the Verizon Center, the FBI director turned magician spoke eloquently and politely, as if he was a man of the priesthood attempting to lure a wayward parishioner back into his flock.

  “I will supply you with the answers you’ve always wanted, Andrew. I know deep down you’re still puzzled to this day as to why I became director. I also know you feel tragedies like nine eleven and even the death of your dear agent friend, Geoffrey McAllister, could have been averted. The truth is they could have, but for the good of all humanity, they shouldn’t have.”

  The words should have stunned Dudek and shaken him to the core. But the words were still wrapped in a guise of diplomatic tolerance. Melodically intimating a higher power may have intervened, resulting in the condemnation of a few human vessels for the benefit of the many.

  Dudek stared at the blood soaking his shirt and jacket, wondering if he would soon join dearly departed friends. He was somber, not filled with the kind of rage he always imagined he would possess when confronting his duplicitous superior. He reflected upon those killed in the New York City plane attack, and most recently, the suspicious deaths of Geoffrey McAllister and Greg Salinger. They could all be attributed to the same madman who sat across the rink from him,
continuing to speak over his cellphone with courtesy and diplomacy no matter how disturbing the subject matter. He had the enemy in his sights. But he had no will to inflict harm upon him. Dudek dug his right hand into his pants pocket and pushed a button on a mini tape recorder. He clung to the hope that the recorder might at least prove Hainsworth’s duplicity,

  “Yes, Dudek. You always wondered why no one ever acted on the tips about the planes. That was all my doing. Part of the greater plan, you might say.”

  “You let innocent people get incinerated and crushed to death all for a higher purpose. Is that what you’re saying, you twisted bastard?” The words twisted bastard immediately dissipated into nothingness as soon as they left his mouth. It was as if Hainsworth was a network censor, punching a mute button. Dudek had become a remote toy for the maniacal director to play with.

  Dudek fought the censorship with what little strength he had left. He had to vindicate the deaths of those unfortunate Americans, even if all he could ever do for them was curse their executioner. He tried to call Hainsworth an evil demon, but again no sound left him. He began to succumb to the cold, entering a state of shock from blood loss. He was positioned atop a vehicle sitting upon ice. But Dudek felt the cold was coming from a less plausible source.

  The initial shrill of the ring tone had been chilling. The realization of his injury and the bizarre manner in which Hainsworth had been responsible for it was unsettling. Dudek remained placid though. Dudek’s mind fought to reason this behavior. Maybe he had indeed experienced an icy chill; but perhaps his mind hadn’t been able to process those sensations. He began to wonder whether his mind had been manipulated for the purpose of concealing his true feelings.

  If this were true, then it stood to reason his will was no longer his own. It began to make frighteningly sound sense. If he were master of his will, he could simply hang up on the deranged bastard right now and call 911 for help. Maybe he could even summon enough strength to reach for his gun to take aim at Hainsworth. What was Hainsworth doing to him? What was stopping him?