by Ethan Cross
*
As Marcus blended into the darkness, the officer watched his former prisoner move away from the scene of the crash. He retrieved another cell phone strapped under the driver’s seat in the ruined cruiser. He put a hand to his throbbing forehead and dialed. “Mr. Director? This is Michaels. I’m not going to make it to the rendezvous. He kicked out the back window and crashed the car. I’m sorry.”
“That’s fine, Michaels. Are you all right? Do you still have the package?”
“Negative, sir. The package is on the move. I’m not sure what direction he’s heading in. I’m … I’m a little turned around, so I’m not sure of our exact location.”
“Don’t worry, Michaels. I know exactly where he is. We’ve had to improvise a bit, but everything is still going according to plan. We’ll be in position.”
21
As Alice slumbered, Ackerman saw to the children and then picked up the phone that rested beside Alice’s bed. He dialed a number that he knew by heart.
“Hello, Father Joseph speaking.”
“Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned.”
“What have you done, Francis?”
He sat down on the edge of the bed. “I dreamed of the dark man again last night. I—”
“Please, turn yourself in. This has to end.”
He was silent for a moment, but then said, “As I said, before you rudely interrupted, the dark man visited me again last night. I’m sure you think of Lucifer when I describe him—a man of seeming beauty but with a face that the shadows seem to follow. A man who walks amongst the light, although the light never seems to touch him. There was a time when I might have agreed with you. I thought it was Satan himself, but then I wondered if maybe the dark man was my father. Now I’m beginning to feel that the dark man is what I’m becoming. I think he’s me.”
“What have you done, Francis?”
He spun the chamber of the revolver that he had commandeered from Alice. “I’ve taken a family. We’re going to play.”
“No, please. Lord, grant me strength. Why?”
He could hear in the priest’s voice that the man was crying. Oddly, it gave him no satisfaction.
“Why do you have to kill? And don’t feed me any of the fairy tales that you tell your victims. I want to know why. I want to understand.”
He hesitated a moment and then gazed at his own reflection in the mirror above Alice’s dresser. He realized that tears had formed in his eyes as well. “Because it’s the only time I really feel alive. The only time I don’t feel hollow … and I can forget the pain. To know that I hold someone’s existence in my hands … It’s euphoric. It’s transcendent. The greatest feeling you can imagine. I can’t stop.”
“I want to help you. The doctors can help you. They said you were responding to treatment … that you were making progress.”
He dried his tears and sat up straighter. A scowl formed on his face. “The doctors didn’t really want to help me. They just wanted to study me. To learn what makes me tick. I’m tired of being a lab rat.”
“Your father was sick. You know why he did all that to you. The doctors aren’t like that. They want to help you, but first, they need to understand you. I’ll be with you every step of the way.”
“I know what my father did and why. And that makes it even worse. I could maybe accept what he did if I thought that he was evil or disturbed, but he wasn’t. Not really. He experimented on me for his own pride. A damn psychology study. An experiment. That’s what they called me, The Experiment. I was nothing but a guinea pig … nothin’ but a rat in a maze. It was all just a game. Life is just a game.” He scratched at his scars until crimson stained his fingernails.
“You’re wrong, Francis.”
“Oh, really. About what?”
“Your father. There’s nothing I can say that will erase the past, but if in some twisted way it gives you comfort, I do know one thing for sure …”
“I’m listening.”
“Your father didn’t hurt you for his work. He did it because he was a sick man … and evil in every sense of the word. We all have evil inside us, and we can’t fight it alone.”
“You really believe in good and evil?”
“Of course I do. There’s always balance. Heaven and Hell. Angels and Demons. Darkness and Light. Good and Evil. Heroes and Villains. But things usually don’t seem that clear-cut on the surface. Bad things happen to good people, but there is a reason for everything. The Bible says, ‘And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.’ God has a plan for us all, but we have to choose to walk the path. If we could step outside time and space, maybe we could understand the reasons, but we can’t. We have to live by faith that we—”
He hung up the phone and reflected on Joseph’s words. He walked to the kitchen and sat down at the table across from Alice. Everything has an opposite.
He reveled in her simple beauty and wondered what ugliness existed in the world to counterbalance such radiance. She looked at peace as she slumbered across from him. But she would awaken soon, and her peace would fade like a dream cleansed from her memory in the ether between worlds.
Then, it’ll be time to play.
22
When Alice Richards awoke, she found that her entire world had become a violent, malformed distortion of the reality to which she had become accustomed. The day-in-day-out monotony of her life looked like paradise now. Even if she survived the terrible ordeal which she now faced, the world through her eyes would never look quite the same. She would never be able to gaze into the darkness without fear. She would never feel safe.
Her eyes had been opened to the truth. She now knew that her safe, little world was an illusion and that she would always be at the mercy of the wolves. They would always be waiting just beyond the threshold of her happy home. If she allowed them any opportunity to penetrate the sanctity of her sanctuary, then she would be powerless to stop them from stealing away everything that she held dear.
Her head throbbed from the killer’s blow, and it took a moment for the haze to clear from her eyes. When it did, the sight before her filled her heart with despair.
She sat at her kitchen table with her children in their own spots around her. Ackerman had gagged and bound them to their chairs.
The madman—who had stolen any dream of safety and security she once held, killed her husband, and now more than likely planned to kill her and her two innocent children—sat across from her.
“Hello, Alice,” Ackerman said, as if he were a loving member of the family. “You look truly beautiful while you sleep. I bet your husband never took the time to notice. I bet there were a lot of other things he never appreciated about you.”
She wanted to dive across the table and strangle him until his evil spirit fell to the hellish eternity that he deserved. She had never in her life felt such murderous anger. She made no attempt to quell her rage. Instead, she nurtured it at the sight of her children and the audacity of her husband’s killer. He acted as if he was a friend and confidant rather than the invader and destroyer of her life and home.
She wasn’t bound to the chair like her children, but she knew that she was no match for her attacker. Also, the fact remained that he had let them live when at any moment he could have extinguished their lives. She had yet to decide whether she should be fearful or hopeful regarding the reasons for his mercy.
“The world is a strange place, isn’t it? It is a place of great cruelty and great compassion, a place of great tragedy and great joy, great corruption and great beauty. While I sat here and watched you, as I basked in the light of your beauty, I had an epiphany. Everything in this world has an opposite. For every light, there is a darkness. After every day, the night must inevitably come.
“This simple realization has sparked a sudden insight in me and allowed me to understand certain truths … truths concerning my place in this world and my inevitable purpose. You see
, Alice, I’ve always felt that the world was meaningless. But maybe not? Maybe my purpose is to balance the equation? What if I was always meant to be a dark stain upon the world? I’ve never really thought of myself as evil. I never believed in good and evil. I just knew that something was broken in me … something that made me feed on the suffering of others. But maybe I’m not broken? Maybe I’m just the dark side of the equation? But I don’t want to bore you with my own personal introspection and thoughts of my destiny, especially when your own destiny is at hand.”
He rubbed at his palms, and she noticed for the first time that scar tissue covered his hands. “Since I am in such a benevolent and philosophical mood, I’ve decided to give you an opportunity to save your lives. Normally, I only play games with my victims when I am sure of an inevitable and satisfactory outcome. But with you, I have decided to offer a genuine chance to save yourselves. I toyed with the notion of just letting you go, but that kind of mercy isn’t in my nature. In the end, we must be true to who we are. Don’t you agree?”
Her eyes widened with fear at the thought of what terrible fate the deranged killer had dreamed up. Despite the man’s calm and intelligent exterior, she had seen the primal rage that lurked within his soul.
Under different circumstances, she would have found him attractive, both for his charismatic manner and good looks. But she had seen the man’s true nature, and when she looked at him, she saw past the charming facade and straight to the monster within.
“I’m rambling again, aren’t I? I have a tendency to do that. So, getting to the point, we’re going to play a little game …”
23
The farmhouse stood out like an oasis in the desert. It was a beautiful, two-story home with a wrap-around porch and a tower of sorts jutting up like the conical spire of a medieval castle.
Marcus thought the house looked out of place, resting in the south Texas countryside. However, the details of the home’s architecture were unimportant to him. The only issue of importance was the assistance that he might receive from the home’s owners. He had considered simply stealing a vehicle from the property, but then he concluded that he wouldn’t make it far without any allies. The home’s owners were his best options, and he had nothing to lose.
He approached with caution since a guard dog might have been on duty. He made his way to the front door and rang the bell. From within the confines of the home, he heard a rustling as the inhabitants prepared to investigate their new and unexpected visitor.
A large man in his fifties or sixties answered the door. He had gray-white hair, a closely trimmed beard, and wore a pair of glasses that rested low on his nose. Despite his size, he looked intelligent, the kind of man who would be seen reading a book by the fire in an antique armchair. All of this seemed to fit with the home’s architecture.
The man bathed him in the glow of the front porch light and said, “Can I help you, son?”
Marcus could tell by the look in the man’s eyes that he was cautious, but receptive. “I think maybe you can,” he said. “I hate to wander up here in the middle of the night and ask for help, but I’m all out of options.”
The man seemed to notice the bloody gash on his forehead, a wound that he had suffered during the crash. “My God, boy, has there been some kind of accident? Are you hurt? Do you need me to call an ambulance?”
“No, sir. Thank you, though. I really don’t know how to explain all this. It’s kind of a long story.”
A fatherly expression came over the man’s face, and he said, “Why don’t you start at the beginning, end with how you found yourself on my doorstep, and be as honest as possible.”
Marcus wanted to share everything he had learned with someone, anyone. He wanted to relinquish some of the burden to someone else, but he knew that by doing so he would put that person in the same kind of jeopardy that he now faced.
“I’m sorry. I don’t have much time, and the less you know the better.”
The man seemed offended by his reply. “Nonsense, son, ignorance is never to be preferred over knowledge. No matter what knowing may cost you. Apathy and blindness to the truth are the chains that hold us down and make us prisoners within our own minds. The truth shall set you free. If we—”
From within the house, a female voice said, “Are you preaching a sermon, old man, or are you actually trying to help in your own twisted way?”
“I’m handling this,” the man said in a defensive tone. He turned his attention back to Marcus. “There’s something about you, kid. Something in your eyes, I suppose. I’m usually a pretty good judge of character, and I can tell that you’re a good person.”
The man’s right hand had been concealed since the beginning of the exchange in the pocket of his hooded sweatshirt. But now, the man removed his hand to show that he had been clutching a menacing black pistol from the first moment he had opened the door. Marcus recognized the weapon as the FNP-9 and knew that it held sixteen 9mm rounds per magazine. “I’m going to let you in, but I’m also going to hold onto this. And if you so much as get a funny look in your eye, we’ll both find out if I know how to use this thing.”
He liked this guy already. “Fair enough,” he said.
Once inside, the man ushered him to the kitchen table, where the man’s wife brought him a glass of water. He drank it down in large gulps. He hadn’t realized how thirsty he was. Then, he recounted his story as best he could, and like the man said, he tried to be as honest as possible. The simple act of sharing his burden made him feel rejuvenated.
The man, who he learned was a retired English teacher named Allen Brubaker, and his wife, Loren, sat with rapt attention. Although there were a few skeptical glances exchanged between the two of them, he felt that they believed his story.
After he finished, Allen leaned back in his chair. “That’s quite a story, Mr. Williams. But I believe you. I’ve heard rumors and had my own suspicions. To be honest, most of us around here know that something’s been going on. And it goes far beyond the Sheriff killing off a few criminals. It’s bigger than that. We look the other way out of fear, I suppose.”
Allen shook his head. “Maybe we’ve all been blind for so long that we’ve stopped trying to see? Maybe we see what we want to see? I don’t know. I’ve heard claims that the Sheriff and his men have permanently silenced people like us to hide their secrets. Maybe you were right when you said we were better off not knowing? Maybe we’ve eaten from the tree of knowledge and will now be cast out of paradise? But then again, as Edmund Burke said, ‘All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.’ And I’m not one to stand by and do nothing.”
Allen turned to his wife and said, “Loren, wake the kids. We’re going for a little drive.”
24
Ackerman laid the revolver on the table.
Alice Richards exchanged looks of terror with her two frightened children but tried to express to them without words that everything would be okay. Her own fear, however, was impossible to mask.
The weapon that she had once thought would be their savior now appeared to be the instrument of their destruction. She wasn’t sure what scared her the most: the thought of being shot with the revolver, or the unknown game of which she was now an unwilling participant. Fighting back tears, she said, “What do you want from us?”
“I told you,” Ackerman said. “I want to play a game. If you follow all of my rules and don’t try to cheat, I’ll let you and your children live to see the light of another sunrise. But if you break any of my rules...” Ackerman brought his other hand up to reveal a large knife. He placed the knife on the table next to the revolver. “Do you agree to my terms?”
“What choice do I have?” She wanted to spit in his face, but she knew that wouldn’t be good enough. She would have rather thrown scalding water in his face or maybe light him on fire and hit him with a truck. But she would play his game. She would do whatever she had to do to save her children.
Ackerman nodded. “You alwa
ys have a choice, but I don’t think that you would find any of the alternatives satisfactory. The game is my version of Russian Roulette. I’m sure you’ve heard of it. The rules are as follows. The gun will have one bullet in it. I will place the bullet in the chamber and spin it. We will then each take a turn pulling the trigger with the gun pointed at our heads. You’ll point the gun and pull the trigger on the children’s turns. We will continue to do this until one of us is dead. The three remaining players get to live. If you or one of the children is the unfortunate loser, I will leave the other two unharmed. Either way, if you follow the rules, a minimum of two of you survive beyond this evening. Plus, you’ve got a one-in-four chance that I eat the bullet.”
She heard the words come from the man’s mouth, but she was in shock at what they meant. He didn’t intend to kill her or the children. He intended for them to kill themselves.
“You’re insane, and one day you’re going to get what’s coming to you! You’re going to burn.” This time she did spit on him, and although it was an impotent gesture, it made her feel better.
Ackerman wiped the spit from his face and said, “You’re probably right. And maybe I’ll find out soon. Either way, you are going to play my game. Do you agree to the rules?”
“Yes.”
“Very well. Let’s play.” He picked up the gun, and although he moved it below the rim of the table where she couldn’t see it, she saw Ackerman remove one of the bullets from his pocket and bring it down to the weapon.
The eerie sound of the spinning chamber made her wonder if she had actually died in the hallway and was now a contestant on the most popular game show in hell. Maybe Lucas was right when he thought that the bogeyman had crept into his room? Maybe Ackerman was more than just insane? Maybe he was evil incarnate, a real-life creature of the night?