Our War with Molly Nayfack

by Chris Capps

  "They are leaving you now. Justice has been served. Mayor Sugarhill has paid for his sins by resigning. And Sherriff Rind has paid for his sins with his own death."

  Molly walked across the stage back to the man who knelt, with handcuffs behind his back, a black hood over his head. She reached behind the hood, untying it and pulled it up off the face of her prisoner. Off the face of a living, breathing, Sherriff Clayton Rind.

  "Rise, Clayton Rind. You are free to go."

  "What the hell!?" Felix said leaping from his chair, trying to peer at the face of Sherriff Rind as he slowly and weakly stumbled to his feet. The robes he wore cascaded to the ground as he rose, revealing a torn uniform. He leaned his head over the podium, only the sound of his labored breathing audible to those present.

  Jessica and Frankie quickly rushed the stage, climbing up and grabbing Sherriff Rind by the shoulders,

  "Sherriff!" Jessica said, fumbling for the handcuff keys in her belt pouch, and working to unlock the steel cuffs around his wrists. She was as confused as ever, but leapt into action with what little about the situation she could understand. Rind had been dead. She'd looked at him lying in the coroner's office mere hours ago. And yet here he was, also alive. Just as Molly had been dead, apparently, but was now alive.

  Rubbing his wrists, the Sherriff leaned forward bodily on the podium, whispering something to himself. Everyone in the field was by now standing, talking or screaming to one another. A few people from the crowd had already started running away, back toward town, chasing the safety of their own homes. Still more stayed and watched.

  Harry Tanhauser, sitting at the back of the field watched, shaking his head,

  "Alright," he said, setting his beer on the coffee table at his feet, "Get my rifle. This is too weird."

  "Doctor," Pastor Ritzer said, gripping the shoulder of Dr. Rosario, "It's not possible. Just like the two Chance Coopers we saw in the morgue. The two Robs. What the hell is going on in this town?"

  "I don't know, Pastor," Dr. Rosario said shaking his head uneasily, "But I would imagine this is more your jurisdiction than mine. What kind of miracle is this?"

  "I don't know if that's what we call it," Ritzer said, "But we may want to leave."

  Jessica leaned her head forward, trying to hear what the Sherriff was saying. He grabbed her shoulders with previously unseen depth to his ferocity. There was fire in his eyes, a rage that knew no horizon. His mouth was shaking as he hissed at her, showering spittle, saying,

  "Arrest that witch!"

  Sweat was trickling down the sides of his face. He took a couple of weak steps, and nearly collapsed then, but Frankie stepped forward and grabbed him by the shoulders. Jessica walked past, approaching Molly who stood where the Sherriff had been kneeling previously. It was clear she didn't mean to move.

  "Molly," Jessica said, "I'm going to put these handcuffs on you and we're going to take you in for a bit. We just want to ask you some questions."

  "I can answer your questions here," Molly said, "The ones you need answers to."

  "Molly, please," Jessica said, still holding the handcuffs she had taken off of the Sherriff, "Let's not make an incident out of this. Just come with me and we'll just talk. We've got coffee at the station. I bet it's been a long time since you've had a nice decent cup of coffee."

  "I don't drink coffee," Molly said, pulling a knife from a pocket within her robes, "And I don't think you should take another step."

  "Molly, you don't want to do anything you'll regret."

  "Regret?" Molly said with a laugh, turning the knife inward, holding it up to her own throat, "You don't know the meaning of the word."

  Jessica's training took over. Perp with a knife, likely suicidal. She calculated the geometry of the knife at the young girl's throat. With a simple leap forward she could both disarm Molly, and hold her down. And then with that movement she knew she would have backup descending on her in seconds.

  "Molly," Jessica said, trying to distract her, trying to change the subject as the fog rolled through, making even the five feet between them difficult to see through, "How long were you out there?"

  "Long time," Molly said, "Several lifetimes."

  "How come you didn't get older?" Jessica asked, tensing every muscle in her legs, getting ready to pounce, "Why are you still young?"

  "Kiss, kiss," Molly said, pulling the knife back to her throat to end her own life.

  Jessica leapt, holding her arms out to grab the hand holding the knife. With a surge of adrenaline she felt her hand wrap around the girl's wrist, feeling every muscle in it contract as she thrust the knife toward her throat. With Jessica's other hand she thumped Molly in the chest, trying to knock the wind out of her, and send her sprawling back safely away from the thin knife. It didn't work.

  Molly was striking Jessica with her left hand, gritting her teeth and screaming. It was a scream that became a slow gurgle as Jessica put a barrier in the form of her hand on Molly's throat between it and the knife. Molly jabbed the knife back, slicing deeply into Jessica's fingers, trying to wiggle it between them into her own jugular vein.

  "Stop," Molly gurgled as Jessica felt the needle tip of the knife dig into the flesh atop her index and middle fingers, "Stop."

  Dry white scratches were opening up, mingling with a trickle of blood as Jessica strained, screaming to pull the knife away from her own hand. She felt Molly's throat shift as she tried to swallow, slick with sweat. Molly pulled the knife away from her throat and stabbed Jessica in the hand. In horror, Jessica watched as the knife stuck between two boney segments that would terminate in fingers.

  "Frankie!" Jessica screamed, straining to keep the knife out of Molly's throat, "She's trying to kill herself!"

  The McCarthy brothers, snapped from the trance brought on by this spectacle of violence, suddenly rushed up the stage and grabbed Molly's hands, holding them apart from one another. Jessica squeezed the thin muscles in Molly's wrist, causing her to drop the knife. It clattered to the ground, ringing harmlessly on the concrete like a bell.

  Molly kicked and screamed, pulling herself free from the grip the three of them had on her. She dropped to the ground, scratching across the concrete with bloodied nails as she reached for the knife, barely out of reach. She didn't say anything, at least not anything they could understand. She was growling, screaming like an animal as she grabbed for the knife, her teeth clenched and blood spilling from between them as she clawed outward.

  "Kick that knife away!" Jessica shouted at Mike McCarthy. He did so, and Molly watched as the shining glint of metal fled into the shadows at the back of the amphitheater beyond her grasp.

  She huffed, breathing out and in like a bellows. Finally, after a momentary pause, she whispered something under her breath. The three working to restrain Molly watched as she raised her head up, arching her back as far as it would go, and brought her head slamming forward as hard as she could.

  It thudded on the concrete with a sickeningly soft sound.

  "Jesus!" Mike said in shock, grabbing for the robe at her back. She reared up again, and slapped her head against the concrete, a thin trail of blood pouring down with her hair. She reared back again, and then collapsed, twitching. A thick pool of dark red was blooming from under her ivory face, reflecting the faces of the three shocked captors that stared down at her.

  "She's..." Jessica said, looking back at Sherriff Rind, who was weakly stumbling toward them. She never finished the sentence.

  "Good," Sherriff Rind said, wheezing as he half crawled off the stage into the field, "Good."

  Pastor Ritzer gripped the small faceless crucifix he had brought to the meeting on impulse, feeling the wood dig into his shaking hands as he gritted his teeth in horror. He hadn't seen much of what had just transpired on the stage, but what little he had seen had left a deep wound in his psyche. In a fugue he walked over to the base of the amphitheater stage and leaned his hand on the corner, not realizing that it was touching something warm and sticky spill
ing over the edge. He had retreated into a world of prayer. He prayed for Molly, but he also prayed for the rest of them.

  The whole town.

  Doctor Rosario was at the other side of the stage, looking up on a hill where he could see something glowing. Tanhauser noticed it too, at the back of the field. He had returned from his truck with his rifle in hand, only to realize that the last of the masked figures were nowhere in sight. Instead, Tanhauser noticed a glowing orange blip on the hill at the far edge of town. It was impossible to see, but given the size and location of the blip relative to the field, he knew the location well.

  "What do you think that is?" one of his boys asked, pointing.

  "It's the old power station house. It's on fire."

  ***

  As old Lady MacReady reached her house, something caught her eye. She quickly guided her grandchildren inside, telling them to go upstairs and wait for her to read them a story. She'd be back in just a moment.

  "Alright, grandma!" the youngest boy said as they filed into the house, turning on lights and bathing the street in the warming glow of home.

  But the thing she saw was beyond that glow, hanging from the tall sign post in front of the gas station. It couldn't be. She crept into the street on echoing flat soled shoes, staring up at the place where she could hear the sound of a creaking rope. Something was hanging from the sign. A boot twitched twice to the ever present tune of that rope creaking.

  It was Sherriff Rind - the man who she already knew had died. A corpse copy. Here he was again, hanging by the neck, still twitching, eyes bulging from their sockets. They looked fit to burst.

  Around his neck was a paper sign, written in black ink.

  Wrong Decision.

  "Read 'em a story, Grandma," she heard a voice say from the fog. Molly walked forward with her hands in her pockets and a grin on her face, "Read 'em a story about something they'll like."

  Chapter 9

  The next morning came too quickly for Jessica. The remainder of the previous night had been spent coordinating six of her officers to secure the area around the fire consuming the power station cabin. From the time Molly left the meeting all the way to the time when the first rays of sunlight reached through the morning fog, she had a blur of conversations about the dangerous wooded cabin and its unreliable electrical system. It was the story she and her officers recited to one another until morning to keep their nerves after their bizarre town meeting with Molly Nayfack. But she knew better than to believe any of it. She knew what arson looked like.

  Flexing her hand through the thick bandage that nearly immobilized three fingers on her right hand, Jessica winced as she noticed that the dull white of the sterile cloth had once again begun turning a dark shade of brown and red in places. She would have to get it re-bandaged again after this area was secured and the bodies inside, if there were any bodies, were identified. Peering past her hand at the shrouded cabin, blackened around the edges of its doors and windows, she watched the first of the fire Marshalls walk in.

  A voice from behind startled her out of her fugue,

  "Deputy Jessica."

  It was Sherriff Rind, the man who she had thought dead until he mysteriously resurrected the night before. He was priming a .45 caliber pistol and holstering it at his hip. His eyes had a look of determination she found difficult to place. He walked up to her, favoring his right leg, giving it the majority of his weight. He motioned with his head sideways toward the burned out cabin, chewing a toothpick in his cheek,

  "Edge of town, near the woods. I'll give you three guesses who did this, but the first two don't count."

  "After last night I'll only need one," Jessica said. It hadn't, as Jessica had hoped, become less strange to talk to Rind as the night progressed. If he did understand how strange it was that he was now back and giving orders again, he hadn't shown any sign of it. He crumpled paper cups, spat, swore, and assumed command like he had before he had disappeared. It was as if nothing had happened. As if he hadn't died. That was one hell of a conversation yet to be had.

  "She'll be back again," the Sherriff said, "Don't let that pile of meat they carted off to the morgue fool you. She'll be back."

  "Maybe she's here now," Jessica said quietly, as if to herself. She stared at the swirling fog all around them, realizing uneasily that Molly could be two dozen feet from them in any direction and they would never see it. It wasn't the thickest morning they'd necessarily seen, but the fog screen up around them made her nervous.

  "I hope she is," Rind said, "I can't wait to put ten bullets right here." He reached up with his thick hand silhouetting the sneer curling across his face. He tapped his forehead twice with his middle finger. His eyes were burning with a sustained hatred Jessica couldn't fully comprehend, "Molly Nayfack is going to die again and again. That's her gift to me. That's my payback."

  Silence for a moment after that.

  "Two bodies inside," one of the firemen called out through the open door of the cabin, coughing into his hand, "Burned pretty bad. Really bad."

  "Sherriff," Jessica said, reaching a hand over to calm him, but then thinking better of it, "What happened out there?"

  "Just focus on doing your job, deputy," the Sherriff said, "You've got a lot to, and no time to..." he trailed off as he noticed something being pulled through the burnt cabin doors by two of the firemen. They were carrying it between them at either end in a thick cloth bag. Rind called out over Jessica's shoulder, "Who is it?"

  "Don't know," one of the men said, "Rosario will tell us."

  "I'll tell you who it is," Rind said, lowering his voice to a near growl and taking long heavy strides back toward his patrol car, "It's someone luckier than us."

  "What happened to you out there?" Jessica asked again, "You need to talk about it. If nothing else, for the investigation.

  Reaching his car, Sherriff Rind looked over his shoulder back at Jessica. After a moment's pause he raised his hand and pointed into the car, indicating that she should follow him. She did.

  Once inside they sat, slamming doors to block out the gentle electric commotion of rescue workers calling to one another as they searched the area in the dense and unyielding fog. Rind reached into the ash tray between their seats and produced a small steel box of pills, dropping one on his tongue.

  "Sugarhill gave me these," he said, "for nerves."

  "Sherriff," Jessica started, but Rind interrupted her. His hand was darting into his shirt pocket, retrieving a soft pack of worn and bent cigarettes,

  "Would you believe the weather we had yesterday morning? Warm and clear as a cow fart. Sky was a lot bluer than I remember it being. Not a trace of fog," he paused, hands trembling as he placed the pill box back in the ash tray, "Not a trace of fog for miles around. Nothing to stop somebody from seeing all the way up onto the hill. It was the sort of day I would have taken off work if it had been any of the others. I would have grabbed a rifle and gone bird hunting or maybe called a few of the deputies out to fire up the grill," He lit the cigarette hanging loosely from his mouth, exhaling a cloud of smoke as it crackled on his lips. He glanced down at his lighter, eyes reddened, shiny. He continued, "I don't remember much of the night before. I had gone to visit the grave, just like Sugarhill said. We dug up that dead body, and we were relieved when we found her bones. Then, impossibly, she walked out of the woods and started talking to us. There were others out there. Hands grasping from darkness, pulling me along. I don't know how long I was screaming for help. That coward Sugarhill disappeared, nowhere to be seen. I guess he got taken away too, but in a different direction. Back to town. They picked me because I was the one that shot Molly - years ago."

  "When?" Jessica asked, "You never mentioned any of this."

  "Years ago," the Sherriff repeated, "Years ago I was responding to a call I got of a prowler. It was just someone wandering around looking in peoples' windows. I don't remember who originally made the call. Maybe the theater director or someone. Just somebody from town who heard n
oises out in the fog and got scared - like any other night. I remember arriving on the scene and looking around that night. I saw a shape darting from house to house. It was talking to itself, saying strange things. I only caught bits and pieces. One word in particular stuck out in my mind, but I didn't really understand what it meant until last night."

  He paused, taking another drag from the cigarette, stifling a tremor of emotion pulling back on the corners of his mouth, trembling his jaw, "I approached her thinking she was just someone from town who had snapped. Hysteria or something. I don't know. But then she turned, finally noticed me and started screaming. The things she said, they were just gibberish. But they scared the hell out of me. When I realized it was the girl who had run off into the woods, when I realized it was Molly, I guess something in me just couldn't accept that. I still don't know why. Maybe it was the isolation in that fog, maybe it was the fact that she had gone missing and was thought to be long dead. Or maybe she just said the wrong bit of gibberish and something inside me couldn't handle it. I just shot her. Sounds weird, huh? Just random words, though. Random sounds. Scared the hell out of me."

  "Did anyone hear any of this?"

  "Sure they did," Rind said nodding, running the back of his hand over an eye, "But they didn't investigate. It was the middle of the night - years ago. Sugarhill helped me that night, helped me drag the body out into the woods where we buried it. Things were weird about her, though. Some things just didn't make sense."

  "What sorts of things?" Jessica asked. Outside the car they could hear the gentle hum of commotion among rescue workers swelling as several of the men started walking into the dense fog.

  "She didn't look good," Rind said, "Lacerations, bruising in a ring around the throat, things like that. At first I thought she might have been kidnapped, but that didn't pan out. This all happened just before the ghost stories started circulating."