by Erik Lynd
As this corrupt and false priest pulled the boy further and further into his disturbed nighttime world, the Collector twisted the stories of the bible with the realities of his life. Soon the priest invited his protégé to join him in the delights of torturing the flesh in service to the soul. His own soul. Pain and suffering became confused with consumption and personal power. He began to think that, if he only knew where to look, he could find the seat of power in every living thing.
In his warped mind he developed a fantastical theory: if he could find and consume the part of an animal that held its power, say, the stealth of a cat or the flight of a bird, he could take on that power, just as the disciples had taken the god-child's.
The second turning point came when fantasy became his reality: he began capturing animals and dissecting them in search of what it was that gave them their power. When he thought he had found it, he would eat it, hoping—no, knowing—he would get a piece of that power.
When his theory didn't work, he assumed it was because he hadn't found the right part. He just needed to keep looking.
His priestly mentor knew the boy was insane, but kept him close because he was a good, pliable partner. His young partner was taking more and more interest in their nocturnal activities, delighting in the torture, though not in the pain, that the priest enjoyed inflicting on their victims. The boy wanted to cut to the chase, tear into the body, and look past the pain etched on their faces.
The next turning point came when the Collector realized that the reason he couldn't find what he was looking for—he was not an animal. He needed to look inside a human: there he would find the power he sought.
One night as the priest lay sweating and breathing heavily on the thin sheets of the tenement bed, the beaten body of a young woman moaning in pain next to him, the Collector made his move. He crept to the side of the barely conscious woman and, with the precision of a doctor, he sliced into her.
The priest thought to stop him; they had killed many people of course, but that had always been in the throes of passion. It was the cold calculation that startled him. But it also excited him. He watched as the boy cut into the girl and sifted through her entrails as though looking for a treasure. Watching the Collector work, he thought, was almost a thing of beauty.
"Aha," the boy cried out and ripped a piece of something, some slick organ, out of the woman's torso and slurped it into his mouth, the woman's dead eyes staring at the ceiling.
The boy Collector looked at the priest, trying to wipe the blood off his face with the back of his hand, but instead left a wet smear across his lips and chin. "Am I prettier?"
"Yes, my boy, yes you are beautiful," the priest said, lust shining in his eyes. He didn't know what the boy was talking about, but he knew what he wanted. He reached out and pulled the boy to him.
.
The boy, emboldened, set about on his new task. Together they found their victims: the priest to enjoy the sport of their dying, the boy to collect their power when they were finished.
By the time the boy was in his teens they had amassed quite a pile of bodies without anybody noticing. Why not? It was just Five Points, nobody there was worth paying attention to. Death had taken up permanent residence in the neighborhood and nobody outside cared.
The Collector had found his place in the world, his task and mission. He still ran errands for the gangs for money and took on the occasional higher profile jobs, like killing for money. But his real love was his nights with the priest, working in partnership.
All that came crashing down the night the priest died. Fredrick Bailey was fifteen the night it happened. It started like any other of weekly diversions. But tonight, it was one victim too many for the priest. They had found their target, pulled her into an alley and began their fun.
But they had gotten over confident, cocky even, and neither of them saw the strength in their victim's eyes. They wounded and they tortured, but they did not break this one. The Collector left his knife next to her as he turned to his hands for more of a tactile delight of her skin. Through the haze of pain, she saw her chance. She grasped the knife and before either could react, the blade came down in the priest’s eye. He screeched in horror as the tip punctured the orb.
Then she pulled the knife back and struck again, then again, and again, each time finding a new soft spot on the priest. The Collector watched in horror as the priest’s screams grew weaker and weaker. Then they stopped, and he could do nothing. It was as though the concept of the priest, his mentor, his only family, dying could not register. It was an impossible thing and he had no answer for it.
The woman turned to him, eyes wild with madness and vengeance. He knew her then. She was Mad Molly, one of Jake Callum's women. Jake was a ranking member of a heavy hitting Five Points gang.
She lunged at him, but she was weak from the fun they had been having with her and the Collector, roused from his frozen state, was able to dodge away and make a run for the door. He was quick and nimble, it was his trademark after all. He was able to get away from her.
But there was no getting away from what he had done. He had left her alive and she would tell, she would tell everyone. Five Points was always dangerous, but when Jake heard what he had done, saw what he had done to his woman, it would become fatal.
Reeling from the loss of the only other person he had ever cared about, the Collector had an idea. He cleaned himself up the best he could while keeping his head down. Word came to him that people were looking for him. He had little time.
Cleaned up, he took what money he had—crime does pay when done right—and went to the seminary. With luck, some quick thinking, the mention of his priest mentor, and most of his money, he was allowed in. He was to be a priest.
And it suited him. He relished his studies, but seen through the filter of his own damaged life, they had very little to do with heavenly salvation. In fact, it was at the seminary he discovered demonology. This, he believed, was where the real power lay. A good god in the sky was nice for the weak, but he had seen evil up close every day. He had embraced it and found strength in it. Demons, the Devil—this is where the real power was. This was what he had to tap.
He played the part of the good priest, stuck to his studies and soaked up all the knowledge he could. Not just theology, but a wide range of subjects. He became a scholar. Soon he came to the attention of those who ran the school and he was looked upon as a prodigy, someone who could go far in the priesthood. He did not care for the politics of it all, but he did enjoy the indulgence they allowed him to pursue his other areas of interest. Soon he became the seminary's resident expert on demons and the realm of Hell.
And through it all he continued his other, nocturnal games, searching for some glimmer of power. He stalked the other slums, keeping away from the Old Brewery and his old neighborhood as much as possible. He killed a large man, thinking he would gain the man's strength. He killed a keen business man slumming for the evening, thinking he might gain his business sense.
He gained none of these things of course, but in his mind, it was because he was just missing some key process or step. Once he completed his work he would find this power.
In his studies it occurred to him that the power he sought lay in the soul. He believed it was tied to the evil in all men. So, he changed his process to try and draw the evil out of his victims before eviscerating them. He turned to the tools of his mentor, torturing them as the priest had done.
It was not enough. He collected scores of victims, but never found the power inside. His failure and frustration was taking a toll. He delved deeper into occult mysteries and became careless, failing to hide the intensity of his research.
When his superiors noticed, they grew concerned that his studies were consuming him and may not be entirely godly. They told him it was time to take a break, to move on into other areas of theological study. He was forbidden to study the nature of demonic corruption so closely.
By now Fredrick Bailey knew that
the priests had no clue about the nature of true evil, its real beauty, it’s real power. He ignored their warning, hiding his true calling from them. His killing became more frantic as he adopted occult rituals into his torture and murdering. He got sloppy covering his research, and after repeatedly ignoring warnings from the church, he was defrocked and released from the priesthood.
Angry at the priests’ ignorance and the lack of progress in his collection, the Collector left New York. He traveled the country visiting the smaller rural settlements mostly in the Midwest territories. Here he was safe playing the part of the traveling priest, creating one lie or another as to why he was traveling. These small towns were so far removed, by the time someone had thought to check his priestly credentials, he was already gone, having accepted what charity the community could give him. He always had food available to him, and enough money tithed to him to buy what he needed.
And of course, he never stopped collecting. This is how he thought of it now: finding what he needed, what he wanted, in others and then adding them to his collection. He could remember most of the victims…how they looked, how the smelled. But now he had a bigger purpose. Rather than taking their power, he wanted to sacrifice what they were for what he could be. He tracked down ritual after ritual, and when he couldn't find any more he made up new ones. However, he was unable to summon a demon, to get that taste of real power, until the day he died.
Why this day was different he would never know. He had just left a community the day before, eating dinner at a farm house on the outskirts of the town, a place far enough away that no one heard the screams of the husband and children that lived there as the collector killed them, weakening them with poison then bashing in their heads with an ax handle. Far enough that the nearest neighbors would not see or smell the smoke until morning when he set their house ablaze.
He took with him the wife and mother, barely conscious from the poison, but alive. He was not ready for her to be dead yet. In the night, he rode deep into the forest of the Kansas territory, far enough from the road to not be discovered, but close enough to find his way back when he was done.
He found a suitably flat clearing and set about his work. He knew rituals that embraced the world below needed to be precise and specific. But by now his need to collect power overwhelmed any sense of caution. He had become ruthless and brutal, all subtlety gone. He worked frantically, as though he was racing against time to finish his collection.
Perhaps it was this angry frustration, or maybe it was the new twist to the ritual he had worked out, whatever the reason, when his blade opened her up in sacrifice surrounded by the archaic symbols he had learned over the years, something heard his call.
A wind picked up slowly, growing to a long howl. It shook the trees as it passed through, leaves in the tall branches rustled loudly at the power of the wind. There was no reason for it, this wind, and he knew something, finally, was happening.
He smelled the rot and fester that could only mean something dark was coming, something powerful. He heard a moan, a low-pitched sound of menace.
This was it, this was what he had started. He smiled, and as the wind grew and the stench of death filled the air, he began to giggle. A part of him had given up hope, told him to forget this silly pursuit. But now it was all coming true. His giggle turned into a laugh, uncontrolled and maniacal.
A dark mass formed above the woman's body. Inky black smoke drifted up from her pooling blood as though it burned. It pulled together drifting higher and higher. Whatever it was becoming it was tall, gigantic. He sobered for a moment. A part of Fredrick Bailey knew this was dangerous, this was something from the other side of Hell, but he didn't care. He was finally coming face to face with his life's work. Everything he had done had led to this moment.
Then he laughed again, a deep belly-laugh of pure joy even as the thing took solid shape. Its skull-like visage and long, spindly appendages looked like they had been stretched out on some sort of torture rack; the demon appeared exactly as he had pictured it. It would be a great start to his collection.
He was still laughing hysterically when the demon noticed him. Then, ignoring the protective binding circles the Collector had painstakingly created around it, it reached out one thin but powerful arm, grabbed Fredrick and lifted him off the ground by the neck.
Putrid breath washed over him as it brought him to its mouth. Thin leathery skin pulled tight against its skull and outlined each bone that made up its oversized head. It looked at him with eyes no human could read, but Fredrick the Demon Collector thought it wanted an explanation. The claw around his throat was tight, but he could squeak out sounds.
"I'm going to collect you," the Collector said.
The demon bit his head off.
This was the life and damnation of Fredrick Bailey.
Christopher leaned back, suddenly realizing a chair had materialized and he was sitting in it. Engrossed in the text he hadn't even noticed.
At some point while escaping from hell Bailey had learned how to actually collect the demons and use their power. It took going to hell and back to achieve his dream. Christopher flipped the page. At the top of the next page was a time.
AT LARGE: 5 Years, 26 Days, 5 Hours, 34 Minutes, 10 Seconds.
As Christopher watched, the ink of the seconds shifted and flowed, incrementing second by second.
So, The Collector has been loose from hell for over five years. Had he really collected an army that big in five years? That seemed like a lot of demons to find here on earth.
He set the book down on the pedestal and found the Librarian out in the hall.
"Do you know how many demons roam earth at any given time?" Christopher asked him.
"I would not know the exact count, but it would be no more than a handful. Too many would have caused... concern in the mortal world."
"That's not enough," Christopher said to himself.
"Interesting, most people would agree that one is more than enough."
"No. I just meant that this Fredrick Bailey already has an army under his control, but he has only been out for five years. He couldn't have collected that many."
"An army?"
"Well, I encountered dozens trying to fight me, it could have been as much as a hundred. And that’s just what attacked me. Who knows how many he has in reserve?"
"Having a hundred demons, or even just a dozen, obeying your command would easily make him the most dangerous dark soul on earth, or at least the one capable of the most blatant destruction."
"But how could he have that many? You just said there are only a handful active at any... shit," Christopher said. There was one way he could have so many. "He must have brought them with him."
"Interesting, but human souls are at a distinct... disadvantage in Hell. I don't know how he would be able to gather so many. It would be quite a feat."
"It does seem like there is something odd going on. There seem to be more fugitives from Hell than ever before..."
"Well to be fair, the human population is growing," the Librarian interjected.
"...at least some are banding together. You also said they had never done that before. Even going so far as to attack me, the office of the Hunter to be exact, directly. I assume that has never happened before either."
"Yes, most of the dark souls strove to hide and avoid the Beast. He was greatly feared. I just assumed it was because they saw you as a weak, pitiful little human not up to the task..."
"Hey..."
"But it does seem like there is something more going on."
"Yeah," Christopher said, ignoring the Librarian’s pitiful little human comment. "Like some sort of mismanagement down below."
"You might be right, it does seem like something is going on," the Librarian said. "But you do realized Hell is not physically 'down below'."
"Yes, I'm not an idiot."
The librarian said nothing.
"So, what do you suggest?" Christopher asked.
"I think
it is in everyone’s best interest if you stop this Demon Collector before he destroys the world."
"Have I ever told you how insightful you are?"
"You want insightful?" the Librarian asked. "How about this. You have had what? A couple of days of training? An army of demons will kick your ass."
"But they didn't. I had help from Hellcat and Dark Eris, but I survived," Christopher said.
"Exactly."
It took a moment for what the Librarian was saying to sink in, but when it did he suddenly felt sick to his stomach. "He let me win."
"Yes. Even your predecessor, one of the greatest warriors of all time, would have been hard pressed to survive such an attack. I mean I admire your confidence but really, an army of demons?"
"Okay, Okay, I get it. I was being a sucker. How the hell am I supposed to stop him? Up until now it has been one on one, or at least one at a time. How does one man fight an army?"
"Well for starters, you are not a man. Not only a man anyway. You have all the power of hell behind you."
"What does that even mean? What good does it all do if I don't know how to use it? No matter how powerful I am, or think I am, I will get overrun by a demon army."
The Librarian remained quiet. Perhaps there was nothing more to say.
"Perhaps you should consider a less direct assault? Subtlety can be its own type of power. Surprise its own weapon," said the Librarian.
"He's gonna know I'm coming. Like you said, he set this up by letting me get away. It's got to be a trap."
"Of course it is, and you will probably end up dead and the world will end, but that's a poor excuse for not trying. If you try, at least you go down swinging."
"I'm leaving before you completely destroy any confidence I might be able to muster," said Christopher. He turned for the exit door that had appeared near him. It was always there when he needed it, but he never saw it until he looked.
"Remember, direct approach, you die. Try to sneak up behind him."
"Right, thanks again for your pearls of wisdom," Christopher said and stepped through the door.