Verity Rising (Gods of Deceit Book 1)

by Phil Scott Mayes

  CHAPTER SIX

  The bar’s patrons gather behind me, gawking at the morbid scene and mumbling in horror. I carefully approach Dave, tiptoeing around the crime scene, and feel for a pulse that I know I won’t find. I look back toward the onlookers and see Matt approaching with his phone to his ear.

  He motions my direction and asks, “Is there a pulse?!”

  I shake my head no as I crouch by Dave’s side, eyes filling with tears that I blink hard to hold back. Sometime later this evening, an officer will arrive at the door of Bridgette McConnell’s house. This officer will knock not with the startling force of a battering ram, but with a tenderness that’s far more frightening. Bridgette will open the door and see no officer at all, but a courier of the grim reaper himself, come to deliver secondhand death. Her existence will shrivel to a skeleton of its former beauty and those boys will once again be fatherless. Dave’s hand twitches slightly and I lean back in to check his pulse but there’s still nothing.

  “There’s no pulse,” Matt tells the operator. He nods and offers several yes and no answers. Angling the phone away from his face, he says, “The police are on the way,” then returns his attention to the operator.

  This isn’t my first time being this close to death. When devoid of animation, the human form is unsettling. Sunken cheeks and nebulous orbs replace the trademark features we are conditioned to recognize. Death never quite feels real because the dead don’t bear the likeness of the souls they once carried.

  As I look soberly upon what remains of Dave, death is different than I remember. The color has yet to fully leave his face. He sleeps a dreamer’s sleep, haunted by a never-ending nightmare. If not for the exposed contents of his skull, I might expect him to lurch awake at any moment. He’d look at me through tearful eyes and beg for my help exposing Pentastar. The fact that such an opportunity is gone weighs heavily on my heart.

  The ear-prickling, staccato screams of an approaching police siren pull me back to reality. Tires chirp as the squad car grinds to stop. The sea of gawkers parts and the familiar faces of Sergeant Drake and Officer Lewis emerge from the gaggle. Lewis turns to the crowd and directs them back from the scene so he can roll out the yellow tape. Drake heads straight for me.

  “Sir, I need you to step away from the scene,” commands Drake. “Wait over there, please.”

  I shuffle back to the opposite wall of the alley and watch as Drake checks Dave for a pulse or breathing. He turns to Lewis, who is already collecting witnesses contact information and shouts, “Lewis, he’s gone.”

  Withdrawing Dave’s wallet from his pocket, he perks up slightly as he reads the name on the driver’s license. Studying Dave’s face, he seems to have made the connection between Dave and Pentastar. It won’t be long until he makes that same connection with me. Reaching across his chest to his radio handset, he squeezes the button and makes a call to dispatch.

  “Dispatch, seven-seven.”

  “Go for dispatch.”

  “Dispatch, I’m ten-seven. Go ahead and send OMI to my location,” says Drake, referring to the Office of Medical Investigators.

  “Dispatch copies. OMI is en route to your pos.”

  An ambulance and second squad car arrive. The EMTs remove a gurney and a body bag from the back of the ambulance and wheel it over toward Dave’s lifeless body. Drake halts them with raised palms and walks over to brief them. Their heads bob in understanding and as they part ways, the medics cart their equipment to the side, down the wall from me.

  Drake hones in on my location and approaches with fiery eyes and taut lips that forewarn of the storm he brings. Several onlookers snap photos that blast the alley in white light and burn a carbon copy into my retinas. The flash stops Drake in his tracks and spins him around.

  “Lewis, make sure those get deleted and move them around the corner!” he shouts angrily. He turns to the officers that pulled up in the second car and yells, “Make yourselves useful. Help him! And get that barrier moved! Come on people, move! Let’s get this scene secured!”

  The officers scurry around, eager to comply with their sergeant’s orders. They collect the phones from those who took pictures and make sure they’re deleted, then hand them back. Whether opportunists hoping to sell them to the Port Ellis Tribune or sadists taking them as proof that they were at the scene, it makes no difference. Drake won’t have any of that. Not at his crime scene. He pivots and continues his charge in my direction. Five feet away, he aims a ferocious finger at my face.

  “You! You’re the one from the jumper at Milburn Tower this morning.” His inflection matches his quizzical expression. I offer no response while I inspect the topography of his face. His light brown skin is tinged red with anger, blushing at the ridges but leaving the creases and valleys dark. At an age that can’t be north of thirty-five, the premature onset of crow’s feet paints a very different picture of him than I’ve come to know: a smiling Drake.

  “What in the actual hell is going on here?” he exclaims. “Two deaths in the same day and you’re at the scene of both of them.” He takes a moment to process the situation. “This time it’s your boss who told us about your conversation with Joel and gave you an alibi—shot in the head. Let me guess, was he threatening to come clean about you and Joel? Did he try to shake you down?”

  “I didn’t kill Joel and Dave was telling the truth about my whereabouts. There was nothing to ‘come clean’ about.”

  “Well, you’re out of luck this time. I don’t believe in coincidence and I’m definitely not going to take your word for it.”

  I look over to Dave’s still body, then back across to engage Drake’s accusatory stare. His golden hazel eyes smolder intensely in the glow of the alley’s streetlight, his combative stance ready for a physical altercation. Given that I’m bigger than nearly every human I meet, it’s quite rare to find one that isn’t blatantly intimidated by my presence. Within Sergeant Drake resides a valiant and laudable sentinel, a noble guardian prepared to rebuff all threats. Rather than glare at him down my nose like I would with most adversaries, I lower my face and offer a pacifying look.

  “I didn’t kill him.”

  “Of course you didn’t. Any idea who did?”

  “I don’t know. I was inside when it happened. I think he did it to himself.”

  “Another suicide…right after you talked to him,” he says with a curious tone, a break in his tough-cop character. “You’re gonna have to do a little better than that. Let’s go, hands against the wall,” he grunts with a rough hand to my back.

  I spread my arms wide and touch my palms to the ruddy bricks that still hold some of the sun’s residual warmth. The gritty mortar grates the tips of my fingers as Drake swipes and pats his way down my sleeves. His rough search of my torso bumps my chest to the wall, but it’s the realization that he’s about to discover the vial in my pocket that brings frenzied thumping behind my sternum. A rush of adrenaline sweeps from my scalp to my toenails, bringing every follicle on my body to attention.

  He pulls the phone from my right pocket and places it on the nearby dumpster before continuing to my ankle. Moving to my left leg, he slides his hand over my pocket and down to my knee before returning to the small bump of the vial. Every muscle tenses, ready for action. I close my eyes and exhale a slow, calming breath as his hand fumbles around my pocket and withdraws the glass tube.

  “What do we have here?” he asks with a gunslinger’s swagger that’s far more cocky than intrigued.

  I look back as he lifts the seed in front of the light. Shimmering crimson and violet hues churn and caper in the whites of his eyes. Mesmerized by its luminescence, Sergeant Drake is frozen in awe. Traces of joy flit across his cheeks, raising his brow and creasing his eyelids. The ethereal splendor of truth pervades the confines of the vial, drawing a tear that wanders down to Drake’s jaw then drips to his shirt.

  He shakes himself loose from the wondrous clutch of the seed and lifts his shoulder to wipe his cheek. Eyes moving like sca
lpels, he visually dissects my appearance for confirmation of something, but what? Could he know of the Nephilim, or is it something else? My height is not the only hint of my true nature. The prominence of my cheekbones and strength of my jaw allude to my structural differences while an atypical combination of brilliantly blonde hair and deep mahogany irises paint me with an exotic palette. He seems to find nothing actionable during his scan and returns his attention back to the vial.

  “Let’s go. I’m bringing you in,” he says abruptly.

  “Why? I was inside when this happened. You can ask the bartender, Matt. I heard the shot, came outside, and found him like this.”

  “You can stop talking now. Your connection to all this is more than a coincidence. Normal, healthy people don’t just walk out of a bar to blow their brains out in the alley and there’s nothing to suggest a third party. Hell, I’ve never even seen a crazy person do something like this. You’re behind this and now you’re coming with me.”

  He presses into me with his shoulder as he pulls my arms down behind my back and squeezes hardened steel handcuffs around my wrists. The cold metal shackles link my arms in bondage in the way my tongue is bonded to the truth. In moments like this, my calling becomes my burden.

  I understand what drives humans to lie. The right lie could get me out of this mess entirely. If I hadn’t told Dave that I saw Joel this morning, the cops would never have caught my trail. In fairness, telling the truth about the Fosillix trial could also get me out of this. But then I wouldn’t be able to finish my work here and I’d have to rely on human beings to investigate the truth and enforce justice, and they’d screw that up. Pentastar would spend a fortune on lawyers and those most deserving of wrath would escape unscathed. That’s an unacceptable outcome. I must be sure they suffer the consequences they so callously earned.

  Sergeant Drake escorts me to his car and pulls the door open. He pushes my neck low and I stoop awkwardly with both hands locked behind my back until I settle into the seat. Looking through the open door at Drake, I can’t tell if he’s the flipside of my coin or a servant of something darker. If he somehow knows of the Nephilim and knows us well enough to figure me out, I can only imagine who’s supplying him with information.

  There have been rumors of rogue humans that have adopted the role of Nephilim hunter. Convinced by the ancient books that we are real, that we still exist today, and that we are the root of most earthly problems, they look for telltale signs of Nephilim activity, like suicides, and then stalk and attack their target. They would be brave and bold with pure intentions, like Drake, taking action to rid their world of a perceived evil. Oftentimes, those are the most dangerous people. Police officer is the ideal profession for such a zealot.

  “Ask Matt. I was inside when Dave died,” I tell Drake, repeating my defense.

  “Just like you were in Dave’s office when Joel jumped off the roof of a skyscraper? You may not have pulled the trigger and you may not have pushed Joel off that roof, but that doesn’t mean you weren’t the cause. Something tells me a lot of people die after talking to you. Oh, and you didn’t answer me about the vial, but I’d rather you don’t,” he says with a salty smirk. “I already know it’s blood.”

  With that, Drake shuts the door and walks back to the dumpster to bag my belongings. He heads over to Lewis, who is still taking witness statements, and sets the evidence bag in the passenger seat in front of me as he passes. So close, but it might as well be on the other side of the Cascades. I may be strong, but I can’t rip these cuffs open, and even if I did, I’m still caged in the back of this car. From a criminal’s vantage, I watch as he checks in on his protege. He listens to Lewis’s questions and looks over his shoulder for a moment, then gestures toward Lewis’s notes. Sergeant Drake scans the crowd, then locates Matt and pulls him aside.

  The Office of Medical Investigators’ van arrives at the curb and several people jump out wearing hooded white coveralls and latex gloves and carrying cameras and toolboxes for documenting the macabre exhibit. Dave’s body remains undisturbed, preserving any evidence that could point to a shooter other than himself. I doubt they’ll find anything, but if they do it’ll be my hair, or my blood, or a skin cell, or some microscopic parasite that will worm its way into Drake’s mind and whisper accusations about me. After his comments about people dying around me and the vial containing blood, I have some grave concerns of my own about the hypothesis he’s forming. If he knows about the Nephilim and thinks himself a hunter, I may have no choice but to do the unthinkable.

  The muffled voices of first responders, rubberneckers, and journalists form a hypnotic white noise. Enclosed in this wheeled lockbox, I’m sequestered from the pandemonium that epitomizes human existence. Call it drama, call it thrash, or call it chaos, I call it prodigal. So much time and energy is wasted scurrying around, getting in everyone else’s business. Just let me do my job as a Nephilim, Drake, and I’ll turn it over to you when I’m done. I close my eyes, hoping to find a moment’s solace from the surrounding mess.

  As my eyelids touch, Bridgette stands before me. She drops to her knees and wraps her arms tightly around herself in crushing agony. From my peripheral vision, Teddy and Franky run into their aunt’s embrace and all three weep bitterly. Their anguished wails rattle in their lungs and bring a flutter to mine.

  The only comfort I could hope to offer is that I tried to avoid this end. I didn’t want Dave’s death and even allowed myself the vain hope of his redemption. The possibility of survival and redemption exists even in the sowing process, but I have never been emotionally invested in the outcome before Dave. This time was different. This time I cared.

  The flashing red and blue lights reflect sharply off the metal on Drake’s uniform as he talks to the bartender. Those lights, much like my presence, mean drastically different things to different people. To some, my presence is a flag of liberation, flying at the front lines of the battle against deceitful oppression. To others it is the dreadful beauty of a tornado barreling towards them. Of course, no one knows which perspective to hold until I have revealed myself, but by then it’s too late.

  My perspective of Sergeant Drake is shifting with each interaction. Another wag of blue glints off his badge and nameplate, and for an instant I detect how heavily they press against his chest. However passionate he is about catching bad guys, police work is not his life-giving pursuit, it is a means to an end. There’s something else, something of greater importance in his life that pulls him from sleep each morning. I just hope it’s not hunting Nephilim. I would love to believe that an explanation of my mission would align our efforts, but it seems ever more likely revealing my purpose here would only solidify our adversarial relationship.

  After finishing a short talk with Matt, he strides back toward the squad car and takes the driver’s seat. The car wiggles side to side as he plops heavily onto the weathered black leather.

  “Bad news, Ted. It’s not looking good for you.”

  “You talked to Matt. Surely he told you I was inside when this happened.”

  “He did, but he also said that you two were arguing before Dave came outside and wound up dead. From our interview this morning I know that you were also arguing with Joel before he ended up falling to his death. So, again, it seems that you argue with people and they die. I’m taking you in.”

  Drake recites the Miranda warning with the enthusiasm of a mortician, and Lewis pops open the passenger door and takes his seat as Drake reaches the end.

  “Do you understand these rights as I have explained them to you?”

  “Yes.”

  Drake aggressively shifts the transmission and begins the relatively short drive to the Twenty-Seventh Precinct. There are several police stations in the downtown area to shorten the response time to emergencies and quell the rampant crime that has swallowed other cities whole. This strategy seems to have had an impact as the violent crime rate here is markedly lower than comparable cities.

  That’s not to say
they’re doing any better at prosecuting criminals. Eyewitnesses here still have sudden changes of heart. Paper trails disappear in the form of confetti or smoke while ones and zeroes are wiped away. As much as technology has helped in the investigative process, it has also empowered the tech savvy with new ways to elude authorities and manipulate information. In my case, it’s not manmade technology that will exonerate me, but ancient foresight.

  Long before toxicology reports existed, my kind were designed with blood that is indistinguishable from humanity. If they test the contents of that vial, they’ll discover that it contains a few milliliters of my blood. There may be abnormalities, but nothing that can’t be explained by several hereditary conditions or certain dietary habits. They’ll never have anything more than circumstantial evidence of my involvement in these deaths. Nevertheless, my greater concern is not the justice system, but Sergeant Drake. When I get released, and I’m confident I will, he will continue hunting until he’s satisfied. I’ve met his type before.

  There are still six potential targets remaining at Pentastar, and this attention from the police will make them virtually impossible to sow one at a time. My only chances of evading arrest while I complete this operation are to carefully execute these sowings so that they aren’t immediately discoverable, or to sow all of my remaining targets at once and then disappear. Of course, it would help if some of my targets survive their sowing.

  Just three blocks north of The Downspout, we pull into the Twenty-Seventh Precinct parking lot. This stately two-story concrete building houses the department with a field-level forensic lab and a lock-up suitable for scoundrels and drunkards. I know this because one of my previous targets was a morally bankrupt police lieutenant. I never worked at the department, but my extensive research for that sowing delivered plenty of insider knowledge.

  I don’t belong here—an angel, shackled by men, placed in a criminal’s cage, and about to enter a structure that reeks of mankind’s self-importance. How many fiendish men have worn this jewelry and warmed this seat? How many devils have earned this humiliating treatment with their evil deeds? Drake opens the back door and stands aside as I slide out.