by Ron Ripley
Christopher’s Blade
Haunted Village Series Book 7
Written by Ron Ripley
Copyright © 2019 by ScareStreet.com
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
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See you in the shadows,
Ron Ripley
Table of Contents
Chapter 1: Sneaking Around
Chapter 2: Nothing Works
Chapter 3: Wondering
Chapter 4: Moving through the White
Chapter 5: Scouting out the Neighborhood
Chapter 6: Meeting the Neighbor
Chapter 7: In New England
Chapter 8: No Response
Chapter 9: Shadows in the Night
Chapter 10: Messages Sent
Chapter 11: The Absent Guest
Chapter 12: Roaming Questions
Chapter 13: Witnessing
Chapter 14: A Pleasant Conversation
Chapter 15: New Work
Chapter 16: Lamentations
Chapter 17: Among the Living and the Dead
Chapter 18: A Storm Front
Chapter 19: The Problem with Neighbors
Chapter 20: A Challenge
Chapter 21: In the Darkness
Chapter 22: Walking, After Midnight
Chapter 23: Understandings
Chapter 24: In the Morning Light
Chapter 25: A Request
Chapter 26: A Winter Wonderland
Chapter 27: Organization
Chapter 28: Coffee Time
Chapter 29: A Right and Ancient Ritual
Chapter 30: How to Win Friends
Chapter 31: Twisting Fate
Chapter 32: A Change in the Layout
Chapter 33: Obligations
Chapter 34: The News at Six
Chapter 35: Setting it all in Motion
Chapter 36: Too Close to the Cages
Chapter 37: Morning News
Chapter 38: A Good Walk
Chapter 39: Lost
Chapter 40: Information Control
Chapter 41: Staying Alive
Chapter 42: Bird Dog
Chapter 43: And the Word is ‘Go’
Chapter 44: Christopher’s Game
Chapter 45: Slowly
Chapter 46: Christopher’s Summary
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Chapter 1: Sneaking Around
Annabelle was bored.
It was an understatement, she knew, but it summed up her description of the current situation perfectly.
“I hate this,” she finally said.
Izzy looked at her and said, “Hate what?”
“Standing here,” Annabelle grumbled. “Doing nothing. We used to go in and patrol.”
She gestured to the Village beyond the wrought iron fence and shook her head.
“I mean,” Annabelle continued, “why the hell aren’t we in there? Are we just giving it up to Timmy and the old guy and the kid?”
“Hey,” Izzy said, “I don’t know any more than you do about this.”
Annabelle shifted her body armor, stamped her feet and said, “I think we should go in.”
Her friend turned and looked at her.
“Don’t do anything stupid. David’s on edge as it is. Do you want to be restricted to the compound?”
“We already are!” Annabelle shook her head in frustration. “Listen, what’s the difference between officially being on house arrest, and not being allowed to go anywhere because David and the Professor are having conniption fits over Timmy and Subject B?”
“Relax,” Izzy said. “We just started our shift, and if you’re going to complain for the next six hours, you can go on in and explore the Village for all I care.”
Annabelle looked at the gate, and then she glanced back at Izzy. “Really?”
Izzy shrugged. “What do I care? You’ll be fine. Nobody’s seen the damned dead Indians since the whole fiasco with the schoolhouse.”
“Yeah,” Annabelle grumbled. “That’s true. What is it, three days now?”
“Yup,” Izzy said, shifting her shotgun from the crook of one arm to the other. “So, if you want to take a stroll up the cobblestone road and back, you go right ahead. I’ve got to secure the gate behind you though.”
Annabelle smiled.
“No problem with that,” she said. “Thanks.”
She readied her shotgun and waited as Izzy slid the gate open. Annabelle stepped into the Village and listened as the gate slid shut behind her. A thrill raced through her, and she walked through the knee-high snow, keeping her attention on the clock ahead of her. The time read 2:15, and the stars were bright in the clear sky above her. Along either side of the street, the gas lamps flickered, casting their curious light on the strange and deadly little village Professor Abel Worthe had created.
Annabelle was nearly abreast of the clock when she slowed down and came to a stop.
The house before her had always piqued her curiosity. It reminded Annabelle of her grandparents’ home. Part of her wanted to know if it was similar inside as well.
I may not get another chance, she thought, staring at the small, New England style cape with a three season porch on the front of it. White clapboard siding stood out brightly in the light of the lamps, and the windows on either side of the porch were narrow and shuttered. The roofing was a dark asphalt, and a narrow brick chimney protruded from the building’s center.
She walked forward, paused at the concrete steps, and then climbed them. For a moment, she hesitated before taking hold of the porch door’s handle and pulling it open.
“What are you doing?” Izzy asked over the radio.
“Just going inside for a minute,” she replied, stepping onto the porch and closing the door gently behind her.
“Damn it, Annabelle,” Izzy said. “How stupid can you be? Those houses are still occupied.”
“I’ll be fine,” Annabelle said. “Listen, I’m armored and armed, I’m good. Hot to trot, you know?”
“I cannot go in after you,” Izzy said, each word spoken slowly and deliberately. “You need to come out now.”
“Hold on,” Annabelle said. “I’m bored out of my damned mind.”
As Izzy continued to chide her, Annabelle reached out, took hold of the front door’s latch, and let herself in.
Standing in the darkness, she reached up under her helmet and pressed a small switch, activating the new and improved night-vision array that had been installed in the previous few days.
The display flickered into life on the interior of the visor, and Annabelle was afforded a view of the house.
She took a second step into the room and saw the neat, military precision with which the furniture was set out. Every photograph was perfectly aligned on the wall, and frames standing on shelves were angled with rigid formality.
A thin layer of dust coated everything, but in no way did it detract from the austere beauty of the room.
Whoever kept this place had their act together, she thought with appreciation.
Annabelle walked to a small bookshelf tu
cked into one of the walls and examined the items arranged upon it.
She saw images of soldiers in uniforms from the First World War. Large gasmasks hung around their necks and curious, saucer-shaped helmets were perched on their heads. The men carried huge rifles. In all of them, the subjects were grinning, as if war was the greatest adventure they had ever participated in.
Among the photos were relics. A brass shell casing from an artillery piece. Two sets of brass knuckles. A piece of wood wrapped in barbed wire.
What caught her eye and held her attention was a large bayonet that looked more like a sword than anything else.
It was easily two feet long, if not longer, and in addition to the wicked edge upon the blade, there was a saw-toothed back. She winced at the idea of the weapon being thrust into someone’s stomach. Her imagination ran wild, picturing the damage it would cause to intestines and other organs.
The night-vision array flickered, faded, flickered again, and went out.
Plunged into darkness, Annabelle frowned, reached to the battery pack at her waist and slapped it several times, trying to jar the connections.
The visor remained dark.
She raised her hand to lift up the visor, but stopped.
I’ll be open to an attack, she thought sharply, and then she remembered her training.
The admonition of the instructor about how the dead could drain batteries. Even freshly charged batteries.
A sliver of panic tried to get a grip on her, but Annabelle remained in control.
“I can smell you.”
The words were enunciated perfectly, and they caused her to bring her shotgun up. But she couldn’t pinpoint the location of the speaker, not with the way the helmet interfered with her hearing.
Around her, the house was black. There was no light, not even a sliver of it. She remembered how the shutters had been closed over the windows.
Were the curtains drawn, too? she wondered, trying to remember.
Annabelle couldn’t recall seeing them.
“I can hear your heart thumping,” the voice said, and she realized it was a man who spoke.
She took a step toward what she hoped was the door.
“Why won’t you speak to me?” A genuine note of sadness filled the voice and caused her to hesitate.
“I need to leave,” she said impulsively. “I have to get back to my post.”
“Ah,” he said in a knowing tone. “I understand completely. My name is Christopher. Christopher Watts, lately a Sergeant in the United States Army.”
“Annabelle Burke,” she replied. “Sergeant, United States Marine Corps.”
“Currently serving?” Christopher asked politely.
“No, finished,” Annabelle said. “Hey, do you think you could help me get out of here? I really can’t see anything. It’s um, well, dark.”
“Ah, yes.” Christopher’s voice was closer when he spoke again. “Sergeant, if you turn around and take three steps forward, you will be directly in front of the door.”
Annabelle sighed with relief.
“Thank you, Sergeant,” she said. “I appreciate your help.”
“You are quite welcome,” he replied as she turned around.
“Sergeant,” Annabelle said after a moment before stepping toward the door. “May I ask you a question?”
“Certainly,” he replied.
“Why are you here?” she asked. “What I mean is, most of the ghosts in this place, they’re a rough crowd.”
“Of course, they are a rough crowd,” Christopher said. “We’re all killers here. Make no mistake about that.”
“Even you?” she asked, feeling surprised. For some reason, she had a difficult time associating the precise, pleasant voice with a killer.
“Yes, even me,” he said, chuckling.
Annabelle turned around, facing his voice.
“Was it because you were a soldier?” she asked, curious.
“No,” he said with a sigh. “Not at all.”
“What then?” Annabelle asked.
“Because of this,” he answered, and something cold plunged into her stomach.
She gasped in pain, but the gasp transformed into a shriek as whatever was in her belly was slowly turned. Annabelle felt flesh and innards catch as if they were spaghetti being twirled on a fork.
Her shriek became silent as the unseen weapon was carefully, almost playfully withdrawn.
She could feel her stomach and her bowels being drawn out through the impossibly small hole, and Christopher sighed as it occurred.
“I can’t help myself,” he explained. “Someone said I came back from France broken, in 1919. I believe them. I can’t remember who it was. It may have been my sister. But I killed her, too. The same way, you know. The same way as all the others. Just like how I’m killing you now.”
Annabelle sank to her knees, the weapon clattering to the floor, her hands unable to hold onto it as she struggled with the pain.
A heartbeat later, she vomited blood and bile into her helmet.
Collapsing onto her side, she felt a tug on her stomach and realized Christopher was taking out the rest of her innards.
“I can remember,” he said conversationally, “being hungry when I was in France. It was terrible. We would get caught, pinned down by artillery fire and the Germans pushing all around us. There were days where we wouldn’t have anything to eat. Not a morsel, unless we found some in a dead man’s kit. I became rather obsessed with food for a time.”
Christopher chuckled.
“Do you know what I feel compelled to do, Annabelle?” he asked.
She couldn’t answer. The pain had struck her mute and rendered her immobile.
“I am compelled,” he explained, “to see what a young woman has had for dinner. You have such delicate stomachs, you see. I need to know. Truly, I do.”
Annabelle wept and spat blood as she felt her intestines disengaged from the metal. A moment later, she screamed again when the unknown weapon slipped into her stomach and opened it.
“Ah, yes,” he said appreciatively. “I always did enjoy a good steak myself.”
She sobbed into the darkness for several minutes, and then Christopher spoke again.
“You know,” he said, his voice contemplative, “the Germans made excellent weapons. It’s true, I admit it. This bayonet, for instance. Magnificent. Who else but a German would add a saw to a bayonet? Brilliant. Brilliant.”
Annabelle tried to speak, but she couldn’t. The pain robbed her of her voice.
“Yes,” Christopher murmured, “they were brilliant.”
Annabelle shuddered as the bayonet slipped through her injured belly again and pinned her to the floor.
Chapter 2: Nothing Works
Abel Worthe felt as though a thousand men with sledgehammers pounded against the backs of his eyes.
He sat in his dimly lit private study, and he wondered whether or not he should call for the nurse.
I think I may be relying upon her far too much of late, he thought, closing his eyes and rubbing gently at his temples. Then again, that would be why I hired her. She is my nurse.
He sighed, reached for his phone and then stopped as the door to the study opened.
Nurse Schomp strode into the room, a grim and determined expression on her face. In her hands, she carried a pill-bottle and a glass of water.
“Here,” she said unceremoniously. “Take these.”
Silently, he accepted the bottle and opened it. Two small, white pills were in the bottom, and he shook them out into the palm of his hand.
Nurse Schomp passed him the water, and he dutifully took the medication and chased them down with a long sip of the cold liquid.
“Finish it,” she said when he tried to hand the half-empty glass back to her.
He shook his head at her impudence and finished the water.
She took the glass from him then and looked at him sorrowfully.
“If you don’t take your medications on a
regular basis,” Nurse Schomp said without her usual dictatorial attitude, “you’re going to get worse, Abel.”
For a moment, he was shocked by her concern and her familial tone.
“Thank you, Nurse Schomp,” he said finally. “I do appreciate your efforts.”
She nodded, turned and left the room.
When the door clicked shut behind her, Abel closed his eyes and tried to think.
He attempted to focus on his experiment, of the continuing need to place Marcus in harm's way to record the man’s reactions, but he failed. Instead, Meredith’s smiling visage appeared before his mind’s eye, and he found himself totally enthralled once more.
A smile crept across his face, and he wondered what the woman was up to.
She continued to sleep in her missing lover’s bed, and Abel felt the skin on his forehead tighten as he thought of Timmy.
He’s nothing better than an animal! he thought angrily, but the rage he suffered at the mere recollection of Timmy’s continued existence failed to take proper shape.
What did she give me? Abel wondered as he realized he hadn’t asked the nurse what medication she had passed to him.
His thoughts drifted for a minute, then focused on the boy, Alex.
He opened his eyes as he considered the boy’s power.
Where does it stem from? he asked himself. Abel tried to stand up, felt the world shift around him, his eyes unable to focus on anything. Surprised, he collapsed back into his chair.
What did she give me? Abel thought again and then closed his eyes as a drugged sleep washed over him.
***
“He’ll be all right?” David asked, peering in at the professor.
“Of course,” the nurse said. “I do know what I’m doing, David.”
David rolled his eyes and closed the door.
“Yes, you do,” he said. “I’m sorry.”
She shook her head and walked away.
David followed a moment later, and while she went towards her own apartment, he made his way to the ready room. Entering it, he found Jane sitting with Luis, and neither of them looked pleased.
“What’s the situation?” David asked, sitting down at the long table that occupied the center of the room.