Behind the Wall: Three

  Red Handed

  P.S. Power

  Orange Cat Publishing

  Copyright 2023

  All Rights Reserved

  Table of Contents

  Copyright Page

  Chapter one: The Thing Under the Ground

  Chapter two: Night and Day

  Chapter three: Evil Woman

  Chapter four: Rah, Rah, Rah...

  Chapter five: Bloody, Bloody Hands so Red.

  Chapter six: The Ghost of Terrace Springs

  Chapter one: The Thing Under the Ground

  Near the back of the basement, which was a simple concrete room, unfinished but with nice thick walls, the chained man mewled. Jacob stood across from him, understanding that the fellow was just that much of a wimp. Complaining, crying and sobbing as he was.

  After all, no one had harmed him. Yet.

  Taken him from his home, certainly. In the middle of the night, in a fashion that no one would have ever really expected. His wife hadn’t even woken up as it had taken place. Neither had his young daughters. Instead, perhaps having heard a soft sound, or a gentle rapping at the door, the man had gotten up to see what was on his porch, and been taken by several, very large and powerful soldiers. Men and women who he couldn’t have beaten individually in a fight, even if he’d been armed and they were the ones half asleep. Knocked out instantly, before he could yell, the man had fallen. From the video of it happening and the surveillance of the house the next day, no one had even realized the child molester and murderer was missing.

  The man wasn’t really there for Jake, of course. Not even for Mr. Prentis, who was carrying a nice set of torture implements, wrapped in a tan bundle made of sewn canvas. That was rolled and tied, to keep the metal and wood bits inside their perfectly sized pockets. Seeing that, perhaps even understanding from his own habits what it likely meant, the man on the floor pulled at the heavy iron chains. Those clanked and didn’t give at all. They were, Jake realized, nearly perfect for the job at hand. They were massive and black, bolted into place tightly, not locked with a key. It would be easier to cut the hands off to remove them than to attempt using tools. A thing that had been put in place on purpose.

  Then, the man wasn’t leaving the room alive.

  Standing up toward the top of the wooden stairs, not coming down as of yet, were several people. Cole Laird, who was one of the local Vampire leaders, if they had such a thing, was in front of his other people. Not all of them. Bix, who was only sixteen, hadn’t even been invited. Not that night. In the back, dressed in a long black leather coat that was marvelous to behold, with a hard expression on his face, was a Vampire who Jake only knew as Uncle Roger. Normally the man was fairly kind seeming. Friendly and polite. They all were, even if they could also be a bit edgy, being blood drinkers. It was possible that they were just nice to him, or, even more likely that being kind and polite was tradition, since it made hunting people later easier.

  Between the two men, protected, or being restrained, was Sarah Laird. Bix’s mother. She looked to be about fourteen, and was pretty, really. Honestly, Jake would have asked her out on a date, if he’d been better looking and the woman wasn’t his friend’s mom. The way she looked simply made it too hard to keep in mind that she wasn’t his own age.

  Her face told a story of course. One of rage, at having been killed by the man chained to the wall. Of pain and betrayal. A young heart broken, perhaps beyond mending. That had happened nearly seventeen years before, Jake thought. Mixed with the anger though, was something else. A thing that made sense, really.

  Fear.

  Not for the mewling and frightened man chained to the wall but of him.

  Even if Sarah Laird had no reason to fear that particular waste of space ever again. She hesitated regardless of who and what she was, standing on the stairs, shaking a bit. Invisible to the man, except for as a pair of feet and lower legs. She was in jeans and a t-shirt. The most casual clothing that Jacob had ever seen her in. She was the kind to be more comfortable in a skirt, since it was summer and had been for the whole weeks he’d known of her. They weren’t close of course, really. They’d talked, a few times but never alone. Being in the same space as a vampire, no matter what they looked like, when you were filled with lunch was a poor idea, most of the time.

  As chance would have it, Jacob was the one who ended up in front. A sight that probably wasn’t going to intimidate the chained-up monster all that much. A thin and not that tall boy simply wasn’t going to spark fear in many people at all. Still, he tried to look like a bit more than he was. As much as his face would allow, at least.

  There were guards however, still upstairs. Men and women on loan from the Army, in fact. One of the super soldier programs. Not that they called them that. They preferred the term augments. Why that was, no one had ever told him. Probably to make it harder to figure out what they were doing in freedom of information act requests. The giants up the stairs weren’t familiar to him, however. Except from the video of the take down the night before. They’d worn masks at the time, black face coverings and hoodies, with black trousers. It was the same four who had taken the man, though. He could tell from their sizes and musculatures, as odd as that sounded.

  No names had been given.

  Well, except one. He smiled then, cheerily. Not actually feeling it at all.

  In fact, his face was numb at the moment, fear and a few other unwelcome emotions warring inside of his mind all at once. Getting him to wonder what he thought he was doing there. Ready to make the man pay for his crimes. All of them.

  “Rory Doxon.” It wasn’t a question. They had the right man. He looked up, on hearing his name called, his face surprised, for some reason. As if he might have been taken by mistake, or as part of something that didn’t have anything to really do with him at all. The fellow was balding on the top of his head and had a beefy, nearly thick quality to him. Without it being a sign of strength or physical power, at all, which was hard to pull off for most men. Still, even with a slightly square face, he had clear skin, and only one bruise showing on his right cheek. That was huge, being the size of a large man’s fist. Showing the exact spot where a single blow had taken him all the way out.

  The man wasn’t the best-looking person in the world but it was possible to see that, nearly twenty years before, he’d been far better off that way than average. Even sitting there in the dimly lit room, the man was probably doing okay, as far as appearance went. In an older, about to fail him totally, fashion.

  Instead of answering, or begging, the man went slightly wide eyed. Then spoke, still sounding afraid. Meaning he was smart enough to at least understand that being chained up to a wall was never a good thing. Not the way they were doing it.

  “You’re a kid?”

  Jake smiled. He was, much like Sarah, dressed in his normal clothing. Generic teen wear uniform and all. Jeans and a t-shirt, with running shoes. Indeed, they were his single oldest set of clothing, with permanent green stains in places, due to a lot of work outdoors and more than a few mended tears. If he got them covered in blood that night, he needed something that he didn’t mind losing. Not too much. Not that the plan was for him to actually torture the fellow.

  No, Mr. Prentis, the blood mage, was planning to do that for them. The man was a sociopath but he managed to be polite and even charming, most of the time. Jake was, oddly enough, there to keep the vampires in check. With words, only. Polite ideas and smiles, if it came up. A thing that had actually been planned out, rather meticulously. He’d sat at a table three times, attempting to come up with a script to use, if it was needed, to prevent instant death for one Rory Doxon. Not to aid him, either but so they could do the spell they were attempting correctly. That, and of course, so they could torture the man enough to make him pay for what he’d done.

  Nothing else was going to work, after all. Even tiny and young-looking Sarah, a half head or more shorter than he was, and just as thin, could have literally ripped his head from his shoulders with only a bit of effort. As in popping it free from his neck. A trick that took massive power, or would, if anyone ever bothered doing that kind of thing. Which thankfully wasn’t likely. After all, a single punch would have ended him just as easily and with a lot less mess, he had to figure. So, if he had to rein the woman in, it was being done with soft words and a reminder that the monster on the wall, the inhumane creature they were there for, needed to suffer a lot more than a quick and easy death would allow him. He’d harmed more than one girl, after all. From the sound of it, there had been closer to twenty, over the years.

  Still, at the moment he nodded, smiling gently for the man chained to the wall.

  “Let me shorthand this for you, Rory. I can call you that?” He was being too polite really. It didn’t matter what the man wanted. So he forced another grin that he wasn’t certain showed at all. His lips were tingling. His voice sounded... Smooth. Calm.

  Insane, for all of that.

  He gave a nod then. A single drop of the chin. The kind of thing that you did when passing another man on the street. A polite matter of acknowledgement, without making any other statement. For that portion of things, he was going to have to use his words.

  “You were taken to answer for your crimes. Pedophilia, rape, murder. This isn’t a trial. We aren’t a court. We know that you’re guilty already. Even if you weren’t, even if you could prove that the claims were all lies and that you’re a virtual saint among men here on Earth, it’s too late and you’re going to have some very horrible thi ngs happen to you, shortly.” It was, oddly, part of the spell they were working on. The victim, the sacrifice, had to know they were helpless. From the very start they had to have any thought that they might live, that they could be spared even a moment of pain, stripped away from them. “Nothing you say or do can save you. It is far too late for that. You cannot escape. You cannot plead. You may not repent. Nothing you do will save you from the awful, horrific, torment you deserve.”

  There were no questions but the book he’d read on the subject had told him to expect certain things from the victim. Begging. Claims of being innocent. Bargaining. Also cursing and, of course, screaming. A whole lot of that last one.

  The man, Rory, looked at him and...

  Sneered.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about, you crazy piece of shit! Let me go, this instant, or I’ll break these chains and rape your skinny little ass and eat your fat friend for a snack!” The man had, at least, rallied a bit.

  Jake laughed, a nearly mad seeming giggle that simply popped out, not being able to help it. Glancing to the side he noticed that the vampires were all becoming angry, suddenly. Ready to move. To end the chained man. He waved for them to come down but spoke before they could.

  “That’s the spirit, Rory! It’s not what will happen, of course. It does kind of seem like an admission on the pedo stuff. A bit gay, too. I hadn’t heard that about you. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. The homosexual part, I mean. Gay away, if that’s your thing. The killing and rape, well, that’s already over. I’m sure your family won’t miss you that much. You raped all of them, too.” He was trying to ask a question. It came out sounding very certain, instead. As if he knew things about the man.

  Again, the monster twisted his face into a mask meant to intimidate, giving the lie to the whining he’d been doing, not long before. That, it seemed, had been a trick, to hide what was actually inside of him.

  “What if I have? They belong to me. I can do what I want with my property. Now, fucking let me go, or I’ll...”

  Sarah spoke then, not sounding nervous at all.

  “You’ll what, Rory? Break those chains? I doubt that. Pull them from the wall? Again, possible, I suppose, for anyone else in this space. Except for you. I could tear them out, stretch them like soft taffy, of course. When you killed me, what had to be done to save me, to allow my child, our boy, to live, that left me strong. More than you can ever possibly imagine.” She moved forward then, the man not even pretending he didn’t get it.

  “Sarah.” He glared. “I killed you. I gutted you, to kill the brat you were trying to force on me. This piece of shit is him? He doesn’t even look like me. Then, you always were a little slut. You were probably sleeping with what, three other guys at the same time? Five? Every guy on the hockey team who wanted your ass had a turn, I bet.”

  The annoying words caused Sarah Laird, the pretty seeming girl with pale skin and fairly short brown hair, to change. It wasn’t an instant thing but Jake had never seen it happen, either. Not before that moment. Her face twisted, distorting, pressing forward at the mouth, carrying her nose along with it, fangs appearing where they hadn’t been before. It wasn’t a slow matter, either. There was in fact, a snapping sound like bone shattering in several places, as she grew taller. Lanky and thinner for that piece of lengthening being done. Her fingers dripping with dark red blood at the tips, as black talons thrust forward.

  It was impressive, Jake had to admit. The room wasn’t pure black, or dank but there was suddenly a scent that reminded him of earth and things half rotted. To his credit, Rory seemed to finally understand that things weren’t normal there, at least.

  Sarah didn’t lash out but did step forward, to be better seen, under the single bare bulb overhead. At least Jake thought that was her intent.

  “I’d believed you, when you’d said we were in love. I trusted you. Naïve of me, obviously. You did kill me, though. I’m no longer alive. Our child is. He survived your best attempts. He’s strong. Brave and bold. Bixby. Not Mr. Hines here, no. Now, where were we? Ah, yes. You can’t break those chains. I could. Vampires are strong. You get that, don’t you? That you were dead, a long time ago. You have been, as certainly as you sit here now. You simply didn’t know it. From the instant you plunged that knife into my middle, you were going to be here, chained up, and helpless, with beings far more powerful than you ever were deciding your fate.”

  The woman played her part, since she was supposed to be pointing out how helpless the man was. It was part of the spell. The torture that was needed by the blood mage to bind the defeated enemy to their cause, as a spirit, after he died. In nine, grueling and terrifying days.

  Jake was about to take back over, when she carried on.

  “These men are my family now. Beings so powerful that few in this world could stand against them. Cole stole me from your work, bringing me over as one of the dead but tied to this world. Roger is an ancient power who has fought hundreds of men like you and barely noticed it happening, more than once. Ryan Prentis is one of the greatest blood mages of this entire age.” She grinned then, a twisted thing, on her snout. The skin was whiter than it had been but she looked like a cross between a teen girl and a hairless bat. It distorted her words, ever so slightly, as she moved closer to the man.

  “Mr. Hines...” She glanced back as Jake then. “He mows our lawn.”

  Even the man chained to the wall blinked at that. Even if it was true, it sounded a bit off. Jake nodded, in agreement. Everyone else laughed.

  Cole spoke though, his voice dark and menacing.

  “True. He does good work, too. When he heard of what had been done to Sarah all those years ago, he ordered the government, your own people, to take you and chain you here, for us to seek retribution on. Think on that, sitting on the cold hard floor, chained with iron that you cannot break... A mere boy, of no particular strength or might, is still more than you could ever hope to have been. You thought yourself mighty, stealing the innocence and lives of others...”

  Cole stepped forward then, changing his own face. Growing nearly as fast as Sarah had. Ending up thin and nearly seven feet tall, even hunched over a bit. Uncle Roger did that as well but was smaller, in the end. Not by much but a good six inches. Leaving Jake the shortest person in the room. Not that he hadn’t mainly been before. Sarah was cheating a bit though, growing like she had.

  He smiled at the thought.

  “If we need to beat him, I’ll do it.” His voice was soft. Placating, he hoped. Hitting the man with the full force of one of the undead would kill him. They had a spell to see to, first. Plus loads of other bad things. Clever ones. Terrible events that would mimic the worst of what the man had done to others, himself. Only not ending in death. Not until it was time. When the man was truly broken, and willing to agree to anything, to stop the pain.

  Sarah nodded.

  “Thank you, Jacob. I nearly forgot myself here. You see, Rory, we have some wonderful things for you, over the next days. You will not be allowed death, until I let you go. You will not be allowed rest, of spirit, either. You are a true monster and deserve the inhumane death of such a being... Mr. Prentis, if you will?”

  There was a show then, as a low wooden table was pulled around, with a good bit of showmanship. The heavyset man wasn’t truly fat, just a bit fluffy, really. Not robust but well dressed, in a nice jacket that shone under the light of the single bulb overhead. That was a bare thing, which was the right spirit for the moment but an LED, not the old fashioned kind, even if that would have lent more of a sinister air to the whole thing.

  Unrolling the canvas, the white ties hanging artfully from the edge of the brown wooden table, several implements were pulled out. Brandished, so the man chained up could see them. There was some moaning again. Acting tough, at least on the part of the child molesting murderer was apparently done for the moment.

  Meaning Jake just had to see to his own act.

  Taking a deep breath, he moved to the table, and pulled a small, sharpened metal bit with a wooden handle. It was, more or less an ice pick but rusted and the end was sharpened to a point that might well have rivaled a hypodermic needle. Not stopping to think, he held the item up, showing it to everyone there. Teasing the man against the wall with what was about to come. Feeling as if the whole thing wasn’t exactly real, in the moment. Like a dream, or a trip to an alien ship, far out on the edge of the Milky Way. He sneered, his own face trying to twist, then moved past Cole, patting the man on the arm, gently, as he moved. The stretched and warped vampire.

 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9