Direct evidence, p.31
Direct Evidence, page 31
Chase didn’t want to know—she was suddenly feeling nauseous. Was it because of the vertigo Tate had mentioned that can happen when dropping in? Or was it the heroin that Tony had injected her with clearing her system?
“Oh, I’m going to show you the difference.” Tony’s grin spread from ear to ear. This, Chase decided, had to have been modified. “The difference is… wait for it… wait for it…”
Tony held both hands out to one side and his army bodyguards separated, revealing the outline of a woman. Chase squinted, trying to get a better look as the figure came forward. Her long, white dress reflected the flickering flames, making it seem as if she was a phoenix rising from the ashes.
“…the difference is that here in Cerberus, in my world, in our world, Chase, what’s dead doesn’t have to stay dead.”
That’s when Chase’s sister stepped in front of Tony and her face came fully into view.
“Georgina?” Chase gasped. “Is that—“
“Chase, oh God, Chase, I’ve missed you so much.”
Chapter 76
It was her sister. She had the same red hair, same green eyes, same… everything.
And it was terrifying.
Chase took two awkward steps down the concrete stairs, but Georgina kept coming. She passed in front of Tony on the throne, then began to descend.
Chase was torn. She wanted to run from the apparition because she knew that her sister, her real sister was dead, but she also wanted to run to her.
Because this was Georgina.
Wasn’t it?
“Chase?” the woman said in Georgina’s voice.
“What the fuck—what the fuck is this, Tony?” Chase begged, her eyes not leaving her sister’s.
“I told you, this is real, Chase. This is real. This is your sister, the one who was murdered. But she’s still here. She’s always been here, waiting for you to arrive.”
“I’ve missed you, Chase.”
This broke the spell. Georgina would never say something like, I’ve missed you. And was it Georgina? Or Riley? Does she go by Riley? Or does she go by something else here in this Hellish place? Lilith, perhaps?
The three veterans, Geoff, Mark, and Fred, spread out and followed Georgina, staying roughly five feet back from her at all times.
“It’s not perfect, I know,” Tony admitted. “But here’s the thing, Chase you can help with that. You can help make her… better.”
More real.
That’s what Tony wanted to say, Chase knew.
“But—“
That wouldn't be real.
And that’s what Chase wanted to say. Tony had a response for that, too, even though her words went unspoken.
“That’s the beauty of this world—“ of Hell, “—it learns. I programmed it to learn, to grow, to breathe.” Tony grinned with his perfect teeth. “It’s a living place, Chase.”
Georgina continued down the steps with the vets in tow. Chase stopped backing up and eventually, they found themselves within inches of each other.
Chase’s mind had become fractured, incongruous.
Run.
Stay.
It’s not your sister.
Riley wasn’t your sister either.
This is Georgina.
This is real.
This is a simulation.
When Georgina extended her arms, Chase couldn’t resist.
Real or not, one last chance at embracing her sister was something she couldn’t turn down in Heaven or Hell.
Chase hugged Georgina, expecting her to be completely without form or, at the very least, be cold to the touch, but she wasn’t. Georgina was full and warm and… Chase closed her eyes and breathed deeply.
It even smelled like her sister, which was impossible. With Tony’s computer prowess, he’d have no problem digging up images, even long-buried ones, of Georgina Adams aka Riley Jalston. Thanks to Drake and Sergeant Yasiv, her sister’s death in the Butterfly Gardens was a distant memory and news coverage had been deliberately scant. But if you looked hard enough…
The smell? How could Tony know that her sister smelled faintly of vanilla and lilac?
As Chase inhaled again, she began to wonder if this really was her sister’s smell. After all, the most poignant memories she had, ones that hadn’t been stripped from her mind, were of them as children. Georgina didn’t smell like vanilla and lilac back then, did she?
It’s just your mind projecting what you think Georgina smells like.
This realization did not affect her in any compelling way.
Chase adjusted her grip and her forearms made skin-on-skin contact with Georgina’s shoulders.
It happened instantly; Chase saw through her sister’s eyes. She saw herself in a field, her fingertips brushing the tops of the daisies. They were both singing, singing Ring-around-the-Rosey.
Tears flowed and Chase let them streak her warm cheeks.
“Chase,” Georgina whispered.
“Georgina.”
They embraced, in this world, in the other, in the vision.
“Chase, look after my daughter. Please.”
Chase froze. This was too much. She slowly peeled her arms away from her sister and when she opened her eyes, she found herself back on the steps in Cerberus.
Tony was staring at her, still smiling that Cheshire grin.
“No,” Chase said.
Too much… too much.
She angrily swiped the tears from her face.
“No,” Chase repeated more aggressively this time. Georgina reached for her and hugged her again. Chase tried to push her away, but the woman’s grip was strong, and she squeezed her tightly.
“Stop,” she insisted, wriggling to try and break free. “This is… wrong. It’s fucked up. It’s not real.”
“Doesn’t it feel real?” Tony asked.
It did. That was the worst of it. It felt so fucking real.
All of it.
“Doesn’t it look real to you? Smell real?”
Chase felt like she was reliving the same moment over and over again, a macabre Groundhog Day.
But was that such a bad thing?
“I—I can’t,” she whimpered. At last, Georgina let go.
“Why not? You can stay here with me.” Georgina gestured toward the heads on spikes. “We can do whatever you want. We can make up for all that lost time, all those lost years.”
That’s when Chase noticed him for the first time. She wasn’t sure if the head had been mounted on a spike all this time and she hadn’t noticed it, or if Tony had placed it there when she’d been using her voodoo to see through her sister’s eyes.
Brian Jalston’s head. The attention to detail was incredible. Whatever template Tony had used, it wasn’t from an archived photo. It was recent. The man’s hair was gray, his jaw more chiseled, less flabby skin on his cheeks.
Chase started to smile.
This is what she wanted. Brian’s head on a spike.
And now she had it.
“You see?” Tony bellowed, his voice coming from everywhere now. “Anything you want, Chase. If you can dream it, in Cerberus, you can have it.”
Chase stared into Brian’s lifeless eyes.
Tony was right, she really wanted this.
There was just one thing that he had missed in his bid to have her join him in Hell.
Her niece.
Perhaps this had been a tactical move by the man, thinking that it would be overwhelming for her. Or maybe he just didn’t want to remind her of little Georgina.
But he could conjure her. There was no doubt in her mind that Tony could replicate the little girl’s orange hair, the freckles on the bridge of her nose, her bright green eyes—brighter even than her sister’s. Except that wouldn’t change the fact that she was still out there. Deep down, Chase knew that Louisa would end up being a better mother to the girl than she ever would, and would have no problems with being the surrogate, either.
Chase could just stay here, in Hell, and leave her body back wherever Tony had put it.
Look after my daughter.
That’s what Georgina had said.
And everything Chase did now was for her, for little Georgina.
“No.” It wasn’t a question now, but a statement. “I can’t stay here. And neither can you.”
Tony’s smile faltered.
“This is my home, I run this place.”
“You killed Jake, Tony. You set up Stu. You need to pay for what you did.”
Tony laughed maniacally, the sound amplified by the invisible speakers.
“You have no power here, no authority,” he said. “I am God and I am the Devil all in one. I am the creator.”
“Maybe here,” Chase admitted with a condescending shrug. “But not out there. Not in the real world.”
Thinking that this was a good time as any, she raised her arms, intent on removing the VR helmet.
The veterans were on her instantly, holding her arms out to her sides.
“Let go!” Chase shouted, trying desperately to break free. But there were three of them.
How is this possible? Is someone holding my arms in real life, too?
Chase didn’t know but figured that this had to be the case. Otherwise… otherwise, what did that mean?
“No, no, no, you’re not going to be doing that. But that pose… that gives me an idea. Maybe beheading isn’t the way to go with you. I like you better as a martyr—maybe I’ll crucify you.” Tony laughed again. “I was really hoping that you would join me here because I like you, Chase. I do. But no one, not even you, are worth what I’ve created. And no one is going to take it away from me.”
Chapter 77
Floyd made it to U-Lock-it in record time. He drove up to the barricade and leaned on the horn, flashing his badge in the vicinity of the camera.
C’mon, c’mon, hurry the fuck up!
Seconds ticked by and then there was a buzz, and the mechanical arm began to lift. It moved painfully slowly, and Floyd drove Stu’s car beneath it before it was all the way up. There was a horrible scratching sound as the bar scraped across the roof, but he barely noticed.
The aisles between the rows of storage lockers, which were like individual car garages, were too narrow for the car so Floyd parked it as close as he could get before leaping out.
412… I need unit 412…
It took him all of thirty seconds to figure out how the units were arranged—the first number representing the row, starting with 0, and across from that, the next number in the sequence, while the last two digits indicated the individual units—and Floyd sprinted down the third row.
He had no problem finding the locker, but when he arrived in front of unit 412, he realized that he’d made a fatal error. The orange, accordion-style garage door wasn’t just closed but there was a large padlock on the ground, looped through an impressive metal ring embedded in the concrete floor.
“Shit!” Floyd dropped onto his hands and knees and tried to open the locker anyway. It lifted about four inches off the ground but then the slack caught. He pressed his ear to the concrete slab and peered beneath with one eye. The smell was bad down here, the air still and stagnant. “Chase?” he yelled. There was no reply. “Chase!”
He couldn’t see much—it was too dark and the opening too narrow to angle his eye upward. Even using the flashlight on his phone revealed little.
“Chase!”
Movement. Just a blurring of shadows but unmistakable, nonetheless.
Floyd rocketed to his feet and tried to wrench the door open, all the while shouting Chase’s name. The lock held fast, and Floyd quickly gave up, his fingers aching. After kicking the door twice, more out of frustration than a reasonable attempt to get inside, Floyd ran back down the aisle.
The man that he recognized from the last time he was here was in the small office waiting for him.
“I need the keys!” Floyd shouted, flinging the door wide. “I need the fucking keys to unity 412!”
The man shook his head, his open flapping.
“We don’t have keys. People bring their own locks. The only person who has the key is the—“
“But you have something to open the locks, right?” Floyd interrupted. “You must! On those shows, the ones where people don’t pay their fees and you auction off what’s in their lockers you cut the locks off. You must have a saw or some big fucking snips.” When the man just stared, dumbfounded, Floyd slapped the counter. “There’s someone trapped in unit 412! There’s a fucking FBI Agent in there!”
The man’s eyes bulged.
“We have…” he reached beneath the counter and pulled out a pair of massive bolt cutters. “…these.”
Floyd didn’t hesitate. He snatched the snips from the man’s hands and sprinted back to the locked storage unit.
***
“Let go of me!” Chase shouted. But no matter how hard she struggled, she failed to break free from the iron grip of the men holding her. On of the army veterans had released her arm and instead clutched her around the waist. Chase bucked wildly, but she was still rather effortlessly carried up the steps to Tony’s throne. As a last-ditch effort, she looked back over her shoulder at Georgina. “Please, help me. Make him stop.”
Georgina looked away. Chase should have expected this reaction, as it was in character for her sister, considering how the woman had once bowed down and offered servitude to the man whose head was rammed on a spike beside Stu’s and Jake’s.
“Chase! Chase!”
This new voice, familiar, came from nowhere and everywhere and her first thought was that it was Tony.
But even the king himself looked surprised by the interruption, his wide grin contracting a smidge.
“Nobody leaves Hell, Chase. Nobody.” Tony nearly shouted his words, clearly trying to drown out the mysterious interloper.
But even he couldn’t speak loud enough to cover two distinct bangs, like massive rumbles of thunder, even though the texture or color of the sky did not change.
“I make sure of it.”
The final two words of Tony’s sentence degenerated into something akin to a snarl.
Then the man’s face began to change. His nose elongated, becoming feral, snout-like, and his ears migrated from the sides of his face to closer to the top of his head. If this hadn’t been so… natural, like the metamorphosis of a caterpillar to a butterfly, it would have been far less terrifying.
A shudder ran through the man’s entire body, and he flopped out of the throne, landing on his hands. These, too, started to change, to morph, the fingers shortening, becoming paw-like.
The sound made everything worse. A wheezing punctuated by staccato wails. Two buds appeared on Tony’s shoulders, mounds like tumors having gone unchecked. These grew at a phenomenal rate, darkening, molding themselves into the heads of snarling dogs.
In less than a minute, Tony had become completely unrecognizable, his humanoid form completely replaced by that of a snapping, drooling, three-headed dog.
When the unholy beast spoke, the words came from the air itself.
“I’m Cerberus and nobody escapes Hell.”
***
Floyd squeezed the handles of the bolt cutters as hard as possible. The padlock clasp was indifferent—it didn’t even yield.
“C’mon!” he screamed. “C’mon!”
Floyd pressed one of the handles against his inner thigh and the other to his belly. Using all 173 pounds of him, Floyd squeezed with all his might.
Nothing other than pain and instant bruising.
Floyd adjusted his grip again and then grunted with exertion. Just as he thought it was a loss cause, he felt the handles come a little closer together. Not much, just an inch, maybe two. But it was enough to inspire him to squeeze harder still.
The sound of the razor-sharp blades snapping together was perhaps the most satisfying thing Floyd had ever heard. But he wasted no time reveling in it. Floyd dropped the cutters and finagled the split clasp through the loop in the concrete. Once free, he didn’t hesitate in flinging the door upward with both hands. The orange slats made a characteristic frrrrrrrp sound as they accordioned upward and back.
Light spilled into the garage, as did fresh air, which forced its stale counterpart in Floyd’s direction. It was foul and fetid but the scene inside the locker, equally as disturbing as the air was odiferous, was what took Floyd’s breath away.
There were buckets on the ground, some already brimming with human waste, others empty, waiting to be filled. There were also cases of water stacked against one wall, nearly to the ceiling.
This was no temporary set-up; Tony was planning to be here for some time.
Floyd spotted two chairs in the locker, one near the entrance, one further back.
Both were occupied.
The first by a man, although it was difficult to determine gender from features alone. The figure’s hair was filthy, hanging in ratty, dreadlocked clumps that cascaded over the goggles that covered most of his face.
It was Tony.
The man’s lips were pulled back in a half-sneer half-smile, revealing those broken front teeth.
Floyd saw Chase next.
She was seated in a similar chair to her captor, a soiled gaming chair, and, like Tony, she had a VR mask over her eyes. But whereas Tony held controllers that he moved freely in his hands, Chase’s hands were taped to hers and then her wrists zip-tied to the arms of her chair so that she couldn’t move.
Keep the train going.
“Choo-Choo,” Floyd whispered as he bent down to pick up the snips again, took a deep breath, and then rushed toward Chase.
Chapter 78
Chase screamed. Tony, now completely canine, bounded toward her. She turned her head away, but he pressed the moist, warm snout of one of his three heads against her cheek, forcing her straight.
The vets were still holding her tightly, making it impossible for her to move.
This is fake… so why can’t I just take the fucking mask off? All I have to do is take the goggles off and the nightmare will be over.
