This is the end. Thanks to those who were kind enough to take the time
to say something about the story. It's nice to know someone, somewhere,
is reading!
Chapter 10
I near the edge of a clearing. A glow reaches out from it, clawing its way through the darkness towards me. A sense of danger crawls down the back of my neck and I slow my movements. Kelly is behind me, her constant, low chanting a dull hum against the night's quiet. I wonder if she'll be heard, but don't turn around.
/Where're we going, Daddy?/
A few steps further and I stop.
Not understanding at first, I try to take a step forward.
I can't.
Things unseen press against me, holding me in place, keeping my arms at my sides, my head locked and facing forward, my feet planted firmly on the ground. I can breathe, I can hear, I can move my eyes, but I ain't going anywhere. Kelly's still moving up behind me- I try to grunt a warning, not understanding what it is that's got me, but sure it ain't good and that it's got something to do with what's happening in the clearing to Monica.
I hear Kelly slow, her chanting taking on a different timbre. Her words encircle my head, vibrating in the air. Something inside me relaxes, and they flow through me, resonating inside my chest like a second heartbeat. Slowly, the pressures holding me in place melt away and I'm free to move.
Shaken, I turn towards Kelly. "What-?"
"He knows we're here now; he'll sense we've broken his holding spell." She looks towards where the trees end, her eyes briefly showing fear. "He's alone, but he's very strong. I've never felt so much evil-" She shakes her head and closes her eyes.
My disquiet grows. I know I should get to Monica, but I'm outta my league here and know it. Desperately, I wish Monica was standing in Kelly's place. Nothing here feels right - Monica would know exactly what to tell me, exactly what I needed to have explained.
"What do we do when we get into the clearing?" I ask, hoping she knows.
Lifting her head as though to sense what the air carries past her, Kelly pauses, then nods. "Get to Monica. If you can move her, get her away from him. If you can't, just do what you can to protect her from him. I'll try to-" She stops abruptly, then says, "He's-" She gasps again, and bends over. When she straightens, she draws the back of her hand across her mouth. A dark streak - blood? - smudges across her cheek.
"You all right?"
She nods, but looks as though she's having trouble speaking. "Get to her, and..." Fumbling in her pockets again, she draws out a bag and a large medallion with letters and symbols of some kind drawn on it. With trembling hands, she holds them out to me. I look down at them, then back up at her. God, she's arming me with amulets and potions. Checking for the reassuring hardness of my gun again, I accept what she offers without comment.
"Lay these on her chest," she explains, "with the bag beneath the medallion. They'll help protect her. I don't know how far along he's gotten."
How far he's gotten. I realise then that the one thing we're not saying is that he may already have gone too far. Resolutely, the thought is shoved away. Shooting a quick look toward where the trees end and the clearing begins, I try to get a fix on what to expect. "You mean how far along he's got with the ritual?"
She nods. "If he's after her abilities and powers, there's a very specific rite to go through before he kills her."
Before he- Oh, no. Not on my watch he doesn't.
"So I just get to her, put this on her?"
Kelly nods. "I'll do what I can to distract him. He's going to try very hard to stop you and he'll summon help to do so. Ignore anything you hear or see. Just keep focussed on Monica."
"Summon help?"
"He'll call up help if he thinks you're a real threat."
/Can I help, Daddy?/
Call up...? My mind isn't ready to go there. A sense of urgency washes over me again. Only seconds have passed since I was halted and Kelly freed me, but our hastily whispered words feel as though they've taken ages to speak. I turn towards the clearing. Ain't no way in hell I'm ready for any of this, but I signal I'm going, and begin to move.
The top of a small incline marks where trees give way to meadow, and it provides a good view of our destination. I can see Monica lying spread eagle on the grass. There are five torches stuck in the ground: one at her head, and at each of her outstretched hands and feet. Their flames waver in the night air, creating shadows that dance and take on a life of their own. Outside the pentagram formed by her body and the torches, she's surrounded by a perfect circle, marked out by dozens of smaller votive candles.
Peter is standing over her, his voice murmuring something. He stops and turns when he senses my arrival. When he raises his hands towards me, Kelly hisses, "Look at Monica! Ignore him!"
I do as she says. Kelly begins a chant, the sound of it filling my brain and seeming to flow through me and out towards Monica. Peter is still there, but my focus is only on my partner. I hear him speak, but his words fly past me without meaning. He gestures, but again, the gestures and their meaning do not register with me. Holding tight to the medallion and the potion bag, I run towards Monica.
Just before I reach the nearest torch, my breath is forced out of my lungs as I hit a dark, thick wall of air that slows me, forcing me to struggle against pressures I can't see. I falter as I see Monica rise and wave we away. Smiling, she turns to Peter and reaches out a long fingered hand to him. I swear I can see love in her eyes as she steps nearer and looks up at him; she looks like a bride, reaching out to her groom. He, in turn, looks back at her, a gleam of possession on his face, fire in his eyes.
My mind screams 'No!', refusing to believe what I'm seeing. Struggling forward, I close my eyes for a moment, refocussing on my destination. When I open them again, Monica is back on the ground. There is blood on her outstretched hands. Once more, her eyes are closed.
A cachophony of sound erupts around me. Voices, thunder, laughter, screeching, the chittering sound made by frightened rodents... and I can still hear Kelly's chanting, its steady rhythm a reassuring counterpoint to the sense of horror growing inside me.
/No! I don't like it here! No, Daddy!/
Time does something weird. I don't know any more how long I've been moving forward, can't measure the distance I've come or the distance I have left to go. Hell, it's hard for me to tell if I'm moving or standing in place.
As I concentrate everything I've got on getting to her, Moncia transforms into a burned husk of humanity: flesh blackened, features scorched away. Her head moves, turning towards me. There's a red glow where her eyes should be. Her bared teeth grin. I look away, but still urge my feet forward. Barely inside the circle of small candles, something hits me in the back of the knees and I fall. I roll automatically, preparing to fight. Peter towers above me, his face a mask of pure hate, a knife clenched in one hand.
Relief floods through me. This is familiar ground - fighting with fists I know; knives can be defended against.
I don't know how long it takes to get the knife away from him, don't know how long it is before Kelly's pounding on my back to stop because I'll kill him if I don't and I have to take care of Monica.
A red haze slowly dissipates and I turn to her. Kelly's face is pale, her eyes huge in the flickering candlelight. Her lips move, but what she's saying I can't decipher. Quickly, her hands gesture in a way I don't quite catch, and then sound resumes and she's speaking plain English. "John, stop! He's unconscious. It's over. You can let go of him. He can't hurt anyone now."
I turn back to the limp body I'm kneeling over and slowly relax my fist. Backing off him, I draw a bloodied hand across my face and wince as I touch an open wound. "Monica - is she all right?"
Kelly gestures towards where her friend lies on the ground.
I'm not sure how I get to her side, but I'm there, kneeling beside her. Her hands are bloody, and I can see the ends of the spikes that have been driven into them, pinning her to the ground. With relief I see that she's not bleeding at her feet or from any wound to her abdomen: he hadn't got far with the ritual. She doesn't move when I say her name, though. Urgently, I put my fingers on her neck to look for a pulse. It's there: slow, but steady.
"What's wrong? Why doesn't she wake up?" I ask Kelly.
"She's drugged. With several different kinds, most likely."
I turn my head to look up at her and she explains,"The early part of the ceremony needs the victim to be conscious but unable to respond. Later, it's not so important that they be aware of what's happening." She looks down at Monica, her worry showing. "She likely passed out from the pain."
I look at Monica's hands and the spikes still driven through them and grimace. My hands itch to free her from them, but I know that pulling them out could cause more damage and further bleeding. What Monica needs is professional medical help, not me making things worse. "Call 911," I tell Kelly.
"Already done."
I have no recollection of her having time to do that.
Kelly interrupts my thoughts. "He surprised me. I expected him to go for you with everything he had, but not to attack you personally." She looks over at the fallen policeman. "He certainly hated you." Looking back down at me, she continues, "Which was a lucky thing for us. He'd never have lost control and gone after you himself otherwise. We're lucky, because that's what did him in."
Hate me? Why would he hate me? I start to ask, but something more important dawns on me. There's a moment of silence, then I say, "Kelly, I don't remember anything after he knocked me over."
She nods and looks at me, her eyes dark and compelling. "That's okay," she says in a soft voice, "the important thing is that we won, right?"
I look over at Monica, who stirs slightly, her face wincing as she tries to move her hands. Relief pours through me. Kelly's right. No point in thinking about what I don't remember. The important thing is that everything is okay now. Or it will be once we get Monica to a hospital.
I slump to the ground beside her, lying on my back to stare at the night sky. My heart still racing, I become aware of my body and the beating it's taken. I hurt. My knuckles are a mess, my eyes are swelling shut, I'm bleeding from several cuts, and I feel like someone's given my kidneys a real shit kicking. I ache all over.
Foggily, I hear Kelly murmuring something, the sound slowly lulling me towards sleep. She moves around Monica and me quietly, and I feel her lightly touch my face. I feel myself drift, and, for a moment, a welcome sense of peace settles over me. In the far, far distance, I can hear a siren disturb the night. They're coming. Exhausted, I close my eyes in contentment as Kelly's chant picks up in tempo.
/It's okay, Daddy, it's okay./
Everything's going to be all right.
Chapter 11
Twelve hours later, Kelly and I have both been interviewed separately, and they've filled me in on what they figured happened. I'm having a hard time believing my ears when they tell me Kelly's version of events. Meeting her in the waiting room afterwards, I look at her, wanting to say something but knowing I'll sound like a damned fool if I do. She said there isn't much to tell, but that can't be true - I remember that we spoke before I lost consciousness, and she was up and doing something after I lay down. I can distinctly remember hearing her move around after I closed my eyes. And, having examined the scene photos, I know she did way more to the scene than she's letting on.
I look at her from across the waiting room they've put us in and try to figure out what she's up to. She stares back at me calmly. I open my mouth, but stop myself from speaking. I can't call her a liar, and she knows it - I've no proof, just a certainty that she didn't just sit there and wait after she phoned the ambulance.
I think back to the crime scene photos; they looked remarkably like the photos from the murders we've been investigating. Far more so than the scene I remember from last night. "That's not how I remember it," I'd explained to the police when they'd interviewed me. "He was standing in the middle of a circle of candles with her. I went to get her. He was performing some sort of ritual." Here I'd stopped, unwilling to speak about what the ritual was, caught precariously between telling everything I knew and telling what would be believed.
Bringing my thoughts back to the present, I look over at Kelly again, understanding why she's left out some of the stuff she has. I don't understand, however, why she didn't leave things at the scene the way I remember them.
An officer comes in and disturbs the silence. He assures us that he'll contact us if he needs more information and allows us to leave. Kelly and I walk out of the station together, stepping from the cool darkness of the building and into the bright, mid-day heat without speaking. As we walk down the worn stone steps to the sidewalk, I wonder when I should say something. We're both heading for our cars, so when our feet hit the sidewalk, we both turn left.
As we near the parking lot, I place a hand on her arm. Unable to keep my questions to myself any longer, I bring her to a stop and ask, "Why the hell did you mess with things? I know you didn't just sit down and wait for the ambulance to come: I can remember hearing you moving around before I passed out."
She hesitates, squints her eyes against the bright sun and makes a show of watching a newer model car leave through the parking lot exit, the barrier arm dropping with a bounce behind it. "I did what had to be done," she says quietly, watching as the car drives past us.
While I'm wondering just what it was that had to be done, she starts walking again. I follow. We're parked side by side, and as I reach my vehicle, it hits me. Looking at her over the roof of my car, I say, "You did something of your own afterwards, didn't you? That's why Peter doesn't remember anything. You did something to him."
She faces me, but her eyes are focussed on the distance. "I had to," she says. A heatbeat, and she meets my eyes. "I had the chance to take away his knowledge, John. I had to do it. What was going on there- it was evil. It was too dangerous not to..." Her voice fades as she contemplates things I don't want to imagine.
I don't know where to go from there. Ain't no doubt there was seriously bad stuff going on there, stuff I have trouble admitting to in the light of day. But exactly what she did and how she did it, I don't know, and I don't think I want to know, because if I did, I likely wouldn't believe it.
"You were bleeding."
She nods, accepting the change of topic.
"Should you be seeing a doctor?"
She shakes her head. "Preparing to face something like that can be as dangerous as facing it. I'm okay now, though, thanks."
I'm not sure I understand, but I nod when she says she's okay. Remembering the powdery stuff she blew in my direction and the potions and amulets she had with her to protect me and Monica, I ask, "You had to take something to protect yourself? Something dangerous?"
She shrugs. "I did what I had to do. For now, at least, it's okay. We don't have to talk about it anymore."
I sigh. The police seem satisfied: they have a suspect under arrest and an air-tight case against him. They aren't going to question their good fortune. I can see gaps in the story a mile wide - it's as plain as the nose on your face, for example, that the scene's been tampered with - but they appear content to think Peter went off the deep end and used the cover of occult practices to prey on unsuspecting women. Kelly's just a foolish woman who moved things when she shouldn't have, and they're busy rolling up their sleeves to tie Peter in with the other occult murders they've had accumulating on their books. They've already told me they can finish off the cases Monica and I were sent down to investigate on their own, now that they've caught the culprit.
I look at Kelly and wonder how much she influenced the police's thinking. Can she do that? I remember how calm I was, how accepting of what had happened before the ambulance came. Had Kelly done that? I look at her uneasily, wondering if I should push for answers. I decide not to: it has, after all, turned out okay, and ain't no one gonna believe stories about stolen powers and such, anyways. Working for the X-Files has taught me a lot about outsiders and their attitudes. No point inviting more derision than we need to.
Disturbing my thoughts, she asks, "Heading to the hospital now? It'd be good if you could be there when she wakes up." Her eyes, when they meet mine, are clear and without guile. The question startles me - almost as much as the intensity of her blue eyes does. Once again, she's reminding me to focus my thoughts on where they should be.
"Yeah. You coming?" Even as I'm askin' it, the question surprises me. Examining my feelings though, I realise I really don't mind if she comes with me. She's many kinds of weird, and I can't say I'll ever like or totally understand her, but Kelly's a friend of Monica's: a real friend.
She'd turned towards her car, but my words stop her. Turning back towards me, she smiles. "Thank you," she says, as though responding directly to my small change of heart, "but no, I'll wait. You two need to spend a few minutes together alone. Call me once you've spoken with her, though, okay? I'll come over then."
"Sure," I answer. "Anything you want me to tell her?"
She shakes her head. "Nothing in particular. Tell her everything's okay for now, and not to worry."
I frown. "Worry?"
She looks like she wants to bite her tongue. "It doesn't matter right now," she says in a dismissive tone. "Just be happy things are okay. Concentrate on Monica."
My lips curve upwards. "You keep tellin' me that."
"I do, don't I? It's good advice."
She's lookin' me straight in the eye, and suddenly I feel as though she's hittin' on things I don't think she should be: personal stuff I'm not ready to deal with just yet. As I'm sure she expects me to, I back away. "I'll call."
She nods. Putting her key in her car's door lock, she turns it and opens the door. She gets in, but before she closes the door, she looks at me and smiles. "I'll talk to you later. Give Monica my love."
I watch as she reverses out of her space, gives a small wave, and then drives away. She looks so normal. I look around; so does everything else. Maybe that's how things are when extraordinary things happen to ordinary people - once it's over, things just go back easy to being what they always are.
Makes it kinda hard to believe what happened, happened.
Another four hours later, they finally let me in to see Monica. They operated on both her hands, repaired the damage and have declared her miraculous, predicting that she'll have no permanent damage to either hand. I'm standing beside her hospital bed, holding flowers and thinking she's the most beautiful sight a man could ever hope to see. An intravenous line has been put in one arm, and both hands are bandaged until they look like shapeless lumps. She opens her eyes, takes a moment to focus, and then smiles up at me. She looks pale against the white of the pillow, and tired, too, but the smile reassures me and I relax a bit.
"Been here long?" she asks, her voice a little raspy.
"Nah. Brought you some flowers."
"So I see."
I look around, feeling stupid.
"The nurses usually have vases at the desk. I'm sure they'll lend you one."
Of course they do. Of course they will. "I'll be right back."
A few minutes later, I'm back with the flowers in a vase. Placing them carefully on her bedside table, I turn to look down at her.
"You gave us a real scare."
"I was a little worried myself, once I realised what was happening."
"Anyone been in to talk to you about it?"
"They tried, but the nurse tells me they didn't get much. I kept passing out on them. I can remember getting up to the part where we were in the clearing, but I don't know if I made too much sense. You and Kelly have spoken to them, right? They know they have their man, so they're probably not all that worried about my statement just now." She looks up at me and says, "Sit down. You look uncomfortable." Her eyes follow me as I obey, and she adds, "You look like a truck hit you: a big, mean, ugly truck."
I grunt. "I feel like it. I'm a little long in the tooth for some of this stuff. Can't take the punches like I used to." She, on the other hand, though she's looking tired, is sounding awful chipper for someone who almost got herself killed last night.
"Poor baby," she smiles. "What happened?"
I place my hand on her arm, just above where the bandages begin. My hand looks tanned and weathered compared to the smooth paleness of her arm. "I don't remember much," I confess.
"Good."
She makes the word sound like a sigh of relief and I look at her in surprise. "What do you mean?"
Looking away, she says, "Nothing." A sideways glance at me and she says, "It looks as though it was quite a fight you were in. There's no harm if you don't remember every punch."
I frown. It's more than just a punch or two that I don't remember. Some part of me questions why I don't mind not remembering, but it quickly shuts up when Monica asks me to help her sit up more. Hell, it'll all come back to me eventually.
As I get up to figure out where the mechanism is that works the bed, Monica asks: "Is Kelly all right?"
I nod. "Yup. She didn't look too good there for a while, but she seems fine now." I want to ask her if she knows what the heck went on last night that I don't remember, but looking at her tired face, I figure it's a conversation that can wait for later. If anyone knows what Kelly is capable of, Monica does. She'll tell me what happened, but I won't push her now, not in her condition.
Finding the control, I press what I figure must be the right button, wait 'til she's elevated enough, then rearrange her pillows for her. Once she looks settled, I ask, "Have they said when you're getting out?"
"You don't know?" she asks.
"Well, yeah, but I'm making conversation, here."
"Oh, well, in that case, yes, as a matter of fact, they have."
Knowing the answer, I still ask, "And when is that?"
"In two days, if no infection sets in - and if I can guarantee that I have someone to look after me until my hands heal to their satisfaction." She smiles. "Apparently, someone has already volunteered."
So she knows. I'd kinda wanted to pass it by her first, but...
"You don't mind, do you?"
"Of course not. I'm just thinking it might not be the most comfortable thing you've ever offered to do. I'm not sure I'm a very good patient..."
"I can handle it if you can. Between Kelly and I, I figure we can manage." I pause, taking a second to realise that the name 'Kelly' doesn't leave such a bad taste in my mouth as it once did.
Breaking into my thoughts, Monica asks, "What's Skinner got to say?"
"Stay as long as I need to, within reason. He wants me to finish up the case here, write my report, ecetera, ecetera. Said he'd take a look to see if there was some other use they could put me to down here for a week or so until you're ready to travel back to D.C."
"He can be nice when he wants to be."
"I'll let you know about that after I find out what he puts me to doing."
She smiles, but it fades fast, as though it takes more energy than she can give it.
Feeling guilty I haven't been paying more attention to how she's feeling, I curse myself for sitting her up higher. It's tired her; maybe made her hands hurt. Quickly, I tell her, "I should be going. I'll put the bed back down."
She lifts a bandaged hand. "Please don't." She yawns. "Don't go, I mean. You can put the bed down, though. I'm sorry. I shouldn't be like this."
I fly to her defence. "Considering what you've been through, I don't know why you should be anything different. You lost a ton of blood last night, and you're lucky you have the use of your hands today. The sonofabitch hammered spikes through them, for Godsakes. The doctors are saying you're damned lucky there was no permanent damage." I sound like I'm lecturing her, so I add feebly, "You be as tired as you want to be. I'll stay 'til you want me to go."
There's another silence between us. I'm so glad she's okay, so glad that nothing worse happened last night. She'll never know how scared I was.
"He didn't want to, you know. It wasn't what he planned."
Softly spoken, her words come out of nowhere and stand in the air between us. Surprised by them, I try to absorb their meaning, but cannot. I'm in no mood to allow Peter Worthington leeway or excuses. She thinks he didn't want to? He sure as hell acted like he wanted to.
/Be nice, Daddy./
There's silence between us while I try to come up with something to say that doesn't make me sound revengeful. Finally, I say, "I'm sorry, that doesn't make sense to me, Monica."
"No, I suppose not," she says, her voice soft and contemplative.
A worried look crosses her face. Seeing it, I ask, "Wanna tell me about it?"
She shakes her head. "No. Not yet."
"Later?"
"If that's okay."
She's tired. She's been through hell. Of course later's okay. "Sure. Whenever you're ready." I'm worried enough about her I don't care what it is she's not saying. It can wait.
"Do you mind keeping me company until I fall asleep?"
"No problem," I tell her, understanding her not wanting to be alone after what she's been through and glad in some strange way that it's me she wants there. Slowly, I ease the bed down so that she'll be comfortable while she sleeps. Hair has fallen across her face, and I gently move it back out of the way. It takes all I've got not to stroke her cheek with the back of my fingers. She looks tired and fragile, and I want to take her in my arms and protect her. From what, I can't say, but that's how I feel. Instead, I sit back down in my chair and move it a little closer to the bed. Placing my hand back on her arm, I say, "You sleep. I'm going to call Kelly later and tell her how you're doin'; she wants to see you. Everything's going to be fine. Get your rest."
/'night 'night, Daddy./
She closes her eyes. In a few minutes, her breathing tells me she's asleep. Not letting go of her, I put my head down on my arm. She's safe. I'm with her. Closing my eyes, I give way to my own exhaustion.
Epilogue Four Weeks Later:
"Whatd'ya mean, 'didn't commit them all'? How'd they figure that? He hasn't said a word in his own defence 'cept that he can't remember anything. Why would he let them accuse him of stuff he didn't do?" I'm trying to keep the annoyance I feel outta my voice, but I don't know if it's working.
Monica lifts up the report she holds in her lightly bandaged hands and gestures towards me with it. "They've re-examined the evidence, looked at the time line, and he couldn't possibly have committed them all. There's proof he was in another part of the country when a couple of them happened." She frowns. "He still claims he doesn't remember doing any of the things he's been accused of, or know why he was doing what they claim he was doing."
"Yeah, well, talk to Kelly about that," I mutter.
My remark is met with dead silence. Slowly, I turn to face her. Her eyes hold mine, huge, dark, and compelling. "She did what had to be done, John."
I don't bother responding to that. No point, is there? Peter had remained just as uncommunicative about his activities as he had been when they'd first taken him into custody. He'd regained most of his memory, but remained adamant that he couldn't remember the murders or why he would have committed them - though he did admit the evidence against him in some cases was irrefutable.
Big of him, eh?
It frustrates the hell outta me that Monica still seems to have a soft spot for the guy, as though he and what he did to her are somehow separate. She said it was evil there that night, and I guess that's true: what he was doing to her sure was. I can't absolve him of what he did - after all, he allowed that evil to work through him. If you listen to the mumbo jumbo stuff, it says he had to seek it out for it to have any sway with him. I figure if that's the case, if he actually asked to be part of what had control of him, then he deserves every bit of justice he gets for what he did -and I don't give a tinker's damn if he can remember it all or not, sick bastard. The evidence will show what the evidence will show. It won't be me or spirits or weird powers or whatever that will prove Peter guilty: it'll be good, hard, solid facts.
The kind of facts I understand.
Pausing in my recriminations, I stop to consider the memory lapse thing. It still nags at me a bit. I'm sure that Kelly and her activities had something to do with that inability to recall certain things. It's hard to say if she helped or hindered, but I know there's no evidence to prove anything. What was done was done. She's got her own agenda, whatever it is, and I can't figure it out. In the day time, I'm sure she can't do the things that late at night I suspect she can. At least, I think I am. After all, you don't just wipe a man's memory clean, and you certainly don't do it in such a selective way that he can remember everything but what you need him to remember. One thing's for sure: he's guilty as hell for a number of those murders, and I'll be damned if he shouldn't pay for them.
"The one thing in his favour is that they can't figure out why he committed the murders."
I grunt at her intrusion into my thoughts. "And no one I know is likely to tell them, either."
Monica's voice is softly reasonable when she says, "They wouldn't believe the truth, and you know it; you still have times when you don't, and you were there." She glances away. "Still, I'm sure they'll ask me again if I can think of why he chose me."
They had asked me that a few times, too: wondering if I knew how close Peter and Monica were, wondering if she might have made him angry enough to turn murderous. They even asked what my relationship was with her, hinting that maybe Peter thought we were too close to be just partners and became jealous. I did my best to set them straight.
I shrug. "They can ask themselves why he chose any of them."
"I don't think he chose any of them; it's just not like him."
I look at her derisively. "What are you talking about? How can you say that after he nailed your hands to the ground? It sure looked to me like he'd chosen you for something to me. It didn't look like he planned on letting you go home alive, either. That wasn't like him either?"
She waits a minute before answering. "I know what you're saying," she finally admits, "but what he did...there was something else there that night. He was totally taken over by it, totally in the thrawl of whatever had possession of him. Not all the murders felt the same, John. Not all were touched by the same evil. It was very confusing then, and I think I mentioned that. I still believe that some of the women committed murders of their own. I agree there were murders he committed to gain the powers he wanted - but there were others committed by someone else, some other serial killer we still haven't found, who was killing for different purposes we haven't yet figured out."
"You think the murderer's still out there."
"Well, a murderer is still out there, yes."
"And into the same shit Peter was?"
Monica shakes her head, shrugs. "No. Maybe. I don't know."
I frown. "Same MO, maybe different reasons?"
She nods her head thoughtfully. "Perhaps. The New Orleans office is responsible for it for now, though."
I jump on her wording. "For now?"
She looks at the folder lying on her desk. "I have a feeling we'll have something to do with this again before it's all over. There's more to those murders than just your regular madman." Looking up at me with shadowed eyes, she asks: "What if what we've seen is only part of a bigger picture?"
My heart sinks. I don't wanna hear it. Leaning back in my chair, I regard her silently for a moment. What she's saying is that there's more mumbo jumbo heading my way. Sighing, I resist an urge to hit something. There's nothing for it but to go with the flow. When the shit hits the fan, at least I'll be there to recognise it for what it really is. "So we haven't seen the last of Kelly?"
She looks over at me and smiles. "Not by a long shot. Something tells me this all centres around New Orleans."
I groan. This is what Kelly meant when she said that everything was okay for now. Monica was out of danger, and so was anyone else that Peter might have needed - but it wasn't the end.
I sit back in my chair and wonder when the 'now' will be over and when we'll be called in to help in the investigation of a serial killer who's decided to get back to his routine.
"We should do something, tell them what to look out for."
Monica makes a quick, negative movement with her head. "The police know what they're looking for, and wouldn't take our assistance too kindly, you know that. When things start getting a little weirder, they'll be more willing to consider it an X-File. We need to learn from this and prepare ourselves. We won't be able to help until they're prepared to accept the help we need to give them. Kelly is there keeping an eye out. She'll let us know what's happening."
I don't like the sound of that at all. She's falling too deeply into the witchcraft/demon/magic/whatever stuff. Hopefully after a while back here where at least some vestige of sanity reigns, she'll be back to her normal self.
Not that 'normal self' is all that normal.
Unaware of my thoughts, Monica looks up at the clock. "Time to go."
"You made it through the whole day with no pain killers," I observe, glad for the switch in topic.
She smiles. "Yup. In a couple days, they're taking these off." She holds up her hands, indicating the light bandages that are wrapped over them, then begins her preparations to leave.
I watch as she tidies away the files on her desk and wonder what it is that I've learned from these past few weeks. Because she needed the help, she stayed at my place for a while, it being easier for me to have her there than for me to put up at her place. She's moved back to her apartment now, though, and I miss having her around. Her living with me created this weird sense of intimacy that I miss. She's become an important part of my life in the few months since she agreed to join me in the basement.
I shake my head and look away. The warning signs are all over the place, and I'm not so stupid I haven't noticed them. It's been a long time since I've felt this way, and it's a little scary. I wonder if it's what I think it is, and if I'm ready for it.
I wonder if she is.
She gathers up her jacket and turns to look at me expectantly. Thoughts of Peter and powers and occult madness are totally out of my mind now.
I wonder if she'd like to go out and grab some dinner somewhere before going home.
Life goes on.
I feel the warmth of my son's smile.
/'Bye, Daddy/.
End 5/5
New Orleans
By: Mariel
Chapter 10
I near the edge of a clearing. A glow reaches out from it, clawing its way through the darkness towards me. A sense of danger crawls down the back of my neck and I slow my movements. Kelly is behind me, her constant, low chanting a dull hum against the night's quiet. I wonder if she'll be heard, but don't turn around.
/Where're we going, Daddy?/
A few steps further and I stop.
Not understanding at first, I try to take a step forward.
I can't.
Things unseen press against me, holding me in place, keeping my arms at my sides, my head locked and facing forward, my feet planted firmly on the ground. I can breathe, I can hear, I can move my eyes, but I ain't going anywhere. Kelly's still moving up behind me- I try to grunt a warning, not understanding what it is that's got me, but sure it ain't good and that it's got something to do with what's happening in the clearing to Monica.
I hear Kelly slow, her chanting taking on a different timbre. Her words encircle my head, vibrating in the air. Something inside me relaxes, and they flow through me, resonating inside my chest like a second heartbeat. Slowly, the pressures holding me in place melt away and I'm free to move.
Shaken, I turn towards Kelly. "What-?"
"He knows we're here now; he'll sense we've broken his holding spell." She looks towards where the trees end, her eyes briefly showing fear. "He's alone, but he's very strong. I've never felt so much evil-" She shakes her head and closes her eyes.
My disquiet grows. I know I should get to Monica, but I'm outta my league here and know it. Desperately, I wish Monica was standing in Kelly's place. Nothing here feels right - Monica would know exactly what to tell me, exactly what I needed to have explained.
"What do we do when we get into the clearing?" I ask, hoping she knows.
Lifting her head as though to sense what the air carries past her, Kelly pauses, then nods. "Get to Monica. If you can move her, get her away from him. If you can't, just do what you can to protect her from him. I'll try to-" She stops abruptly, then says, "He's-" She gasps again, and bends over. When she straightens, she draws the back of her hand across her mouth. A dark streak - blood? - smudges across her cheek.
"You all right?"
She nods, but looks as though she's having trouble speaking. "Get to her, and..." Fumbling in her pockets again, she draws out a bag and a large medallion with letters and symbols of some kind drawn on it. With trembling hands, she holds them out to me. I look down at them, then back up at her. God, she's arming me with amulets and potions. Checking for the reassuring hardness of my gun again, I accept what she offers without comment.
"Lay these on her chest," she explains, "with the bag beneath the medallion. They'll help protect her. I don't know how far along he's gotten."
How far he's gotten. I realise then that the one thing we're not saying is that he may already have gone too far. Resolutely, the thought is shoved away. Shooting a quick look toward where the trees end and the clearing begins, I try to get a fix on what to expect. "You mean how far along he's got with the ritual?"
She nods. "If he's after her abilities and powers, there's a very specific rite to go through before he kills her."
Before he- Oh, no. Not on my watch he doesn't.
"So I just get to her, put this on her?"
Kelly nods. "I'll do what I can to distract him. He's going to try very hard to stop you and he'll summon help to do so. Ignore anything you hear or see. Just keep focussed on Monica."
"Summon help?"
"He'll call up help if he thinks you're a real threat."
/Can I help, Daddy?/
Call up...? My mind isn't ready to go there. A sense of urgency washes over me again. Only seconds have passed since I was halted and Kelly freed me, but our hastily whispered words feel as though they've taken ages to speak. I turn towards the clearing. Ain't no way in hell I'm ready for any of this, but I signal I'm going, and begin to move.
The top of a small incline marks where trees give way to meadow, and it provides a good view of our destination. I can see Monica lying spread eagle on the grass. There are five torches stuck in the ground: one at her head, and at each of her outstretched hands and feet. Their flames waver in the night air, creating shadows that dance and take on a life of their own. Outside the pentagram formed by her body and the torches, she's surrounded by a perfect circle, marked out by dozens of smaller votive candles.
Peter is standing over her, his voice murmuring something. He stops and turns when he senses my arrival. When he raises his hands towards me, Kelly hisses, "Look at Monica! Ignore him!"
I do as she says. Kelly begins a chant, the sound of it filling my brain and seeming to flow through me and out towards Monica. Peter is still there, but my focus is only on my partner. I hear him speak, but his words fly past me without meaning. He gestures, but again, the gestures and their meaning do not register with me. Holding tight to the medallion and the potion bag, I run towards Monica.
Just before I reach the nearest torch, my breath is forced out of my lungs as I hit a dark, thick wall of air that slows me, forcing me to struggle against pressures I can't see. I falter as I see Monica rise and wave we away. Smiling, she turns to Peter and reaches out a long fingered hand to him. I swear I can see love in her eyes as she steps nearer and looks up at him; she looks like a bride, reaching out to her groom. He, in turn, looks back at her, a gleam of possession on his face, fire in his eyes.
My mind screams 'No!', refusing to believe what I'm seeing. Struggling forward, I close my eyes for a moment, refocussing on my destination. When I open them again, Monica is back on the ground. There is blood on her outstretched hands. Once more, her eyes are closed.
A cachophony of sound erupts around me. Voices, thunder, laughter, screeching, the chittering sound made by frightened rodents... and I can still hear Kelly's chanting, its steady rhythm a reassuring counterpoint to the sense of horror growing inside me.
/No! I don't like it here! No, Daddy!/
Time does something weird. I don't know any more how long I've been moving forward, can't measure the distance I've come or the distance I have left to go. Hell, it's hard for me to tell if I'm moving or standing in place.
As I concentrate everything I've got on getting to her, Moncia transforms into a burned husk of humanity: flesh blackened, features scorched away. Her head moves, turning towards me. There's a red glow where her eyes should be. Her bared teeth grin. I look away, but still urge my feet forward. Barely inside the circle of small candles, something hits me in the back of the knees and I fall. I roll automatically, preparing to fight. Peter towers above me, his face a mask of pure hate, a knife clenched in one hand.
Relief floods through me. This is familiar ground - fighting with fists I know; knives can be defended against.
I don't know how long it takes to get the knife away from him, don't know how long it is before Kelly's pounding on my back to stop because I'll kill him if I don't and I have to take care of Monica.
A red haze slowly dissipates and I turn to her. Kelly's face is pale, her eyes huge in the flickering candlelight. Her lips move, but what she's saying I can't decipher. Quickly, her hands gesture in a way I don't quite catch, and then sound resumes and she's speaking plain English. "John, stop! He's unconscious. It's over. You can let go of him. He can't hurt anyone now."
I turn back to the limp body I'm kneeling over and slowly relax my fist. Backing off him, I draw a bloodied hand across my face and wince as I touch an open wound. "Monica - is she all right?"
Kelly gestures towards where her friend lies on the ground.
I'm not sure how I get to her side, but I'm there, kneeling beside her. Her hands are bloody, and I can see the ends of the spikes that have been driven into them, pinning her to the ground. With relief I see that she's not bleeding at her feet or from any wound to her abdomen: he hadn't got far with the ritual. She doesn't move when I say her name, though. Urgently, I put my fingers on her neck to look for a pulse. It's there: slow, but steady.
"What's wrong? Why doesn't she wake up?" I ask Kelly.
"She's drugged. With several different kinds, most likely."
I turn my head to look up at her and she explains,"The early part of the ceremony needs the victim to be conscious but unable to respond. Later, it's not so important that they be aware of what's happening." She looks down at Monica, her worry showing. "She likely passed out from the pain."
I look at Monica's hands and the spikes still driven through them and grimace. My hands itch to free her from them, but I know that pulling them out could cause more damage and further bleeding. What Monica needs is professional medical help, not me making things worse. "Call 911," I tell Kelly.
"Already done."
I have no recollection of her having time to do that.
Kelly interrupts my thoughts. "He surprised me. I expected him to go for you with everything he had, but not to attack you personally." She looks over at the fallen policeman. "He certainly hated you." Looking back down at me, she continues, "Which was a lucky thing for us. He'd never have lost control and gone after you himself otherwise. We're lucky, because that's what did him in."
Hate me? Why would he hate me? I start to ask, but something more important dawns on me. There's a moment of silence, then I say, "Kelly, I don't remember anything after he knocked me over."
She nods and looks at me, her eyes dark and compelling. "That's okay," she says in a soft voice, "the important thing is that we won, right?"
I look over at Monica, who stirs slightly, her face wincing as she tries to move her hands. Relief pours through me. Kelly's right. No point in thinking about what I don't remember. The important thing is that everything is okay now. Or it will be once we get Monica to a hospital.
I slump to the ground beside her, lying on my back to stare at the night sky. My heart still racing, I become aware of my body and the beating it's taken. I hurt. My knuckles are a mess, my eyes are swelling shut, I'm bleeding from several cuts, and I feel like someone's given my kidneys a real shit kicking. I ache all over.
Foggily, I hear Kelly murmuring something, the sound slowly lulling me towards sleep. She moves around Monica and me quietly, and I feel her lightly touch my face. I feel myself drift, and, for a moment, a welcome sense of peace settles over me. In the far, far distance, I can hear a siren disturb the night. They're coming. Exhausted, I close my eyes in contentment as Kelly's chant picks up in tempo.
/It's okay, Daddy, it's okay./
Everything's going to be all right.
Chapter 11
Twelve hours later, Kelly and I have both been interviewed separately, and they've filled me in on what they figured happened. I'm having a hard time believing my ears when they tell me Kelly's version of events. Meeting her in the waiting room afterwards, I look at her, wanting to say something but knowing I'll sound like a damned fool if I do. She said there isn't much to tell, but that can't be true - I remember that we spoke before I lost consciousness, and she was up and doing something after I lay down. I can distinctly remember hearing her move around after I closed my eyes. And, having examined the scene photos, I know she did way more to the scene than she's letting on.
I look at her from across the waiting room they've put us in and try to figure out what she's up to. She stares back at me calmly. I open my mouth, but stop myself from speaking. I can't call her a liar, and she knows it - I've no proof, just a certainty that she didn't just sit there and wait after she phoned the ambulance.
I think back to the crime scene photos; they looked remarkably like the photos from the murders we've been investigating. Far more so than the scene I remember from last night. "That's not how I remember it," I'd explained to the police when they'd interviewed me. "He was standing in the middle of a circle of candles with her. I went to get her. He was performing some sort of ritual." Here I'd stopped, unwilling to speak about what the ritual was, caught precariously between telling everything I knew and telling what would be believed.
Bringing my thoughts back to the present, I look over at Kelly again, understanding why she's left out some of the stuff she has. I don't understand, however, why she didn't leave things at the scene the way I remember them.
An officer comes in and disturbs the silence. He assures us that he'll contact us if he needs more information and allows us to leave. Kelly and I walk out of the station together, stepping from the cool darkness of the building and into the bright, mid-day heat without speaking. As we walk down the worn stone steps to the sidewalk, I wonder when I should say something. We're both heading for our cars, so when our feet hit the sidewalk, we both turn left.
As we near the parking lot, I place a hand on her arm. Unable to keep my questions to myself any longer, I bring her to a stop and ask, "Why the hell did you mess with things? I know you didn't just sit down and wait for the ambulance to come: I can remember hearing you moving around before I passed out."
She hesitates, squints her eyes against the bright sun and makes a show of watching a newer model car leave through the parking lot exit, the barrier arm dropping with a bounce behind it. "I did what had to be done," she says quietly, watching as the car drives past us.
While I'm wondering just what it was that had to be done, she starts walking again. I follow. We're parked side by side, and as I reach my vehicle, it hits me. Looking at her over the roof of my car, I say, "You did something of your own afterwards, didn't you? That's why Peter doesn't remember anything. You did something to him."
She faces me, but her eyes are focussed on the distance. "I had to," she says. A heatbeat, and she meets my eyes. "I had the chance to take away his knowledge, John. I had to do it. What was going on there- it was evil. It was too dangerous not to..." Her voice fades as she contemplates things I don't want to imagine.
I don't know where to go from there. Ain't no doubt there was seriously bad stuff going on there, stuff I have trouble admitting to in the light of day. But exactly what she did and how she did it, I don't know, and I don't think I want to know, because if I did, I likely wouldn't believe it.
"You were bleeding."
She nods, accepting the change of topic.
"Should you be seeing a doctor?"
She shakes her head. "Preparing to face something like that can be as dangerous as facing it. I'm okay now, though, thanks."
I'm not sure I understand, but I nod when she says she's okay. Remembering the powdery stuff she blew in my direction and the potions and amulets she had with her to protect me and Monica, I ask, "You had to take something to protect yourself? Something dangerous?"
She shrugs. "I did what I had to do. For now, at least, it's okay. We don't have to talk about it anymore."
I sigh. The police seem satisfied: they have a suspect under arrest and an air-tight case against him. They aren't going to question their good fortune. I can see gaps in the story a mile wide - it's as plain as the nose on your face, for example, that the scene's been tampered with - but they appear content to think Peter went off the deep end and used the cover of occult practices to prey on unsuspecting women. Kelly's just a foolish woman who moved things when she shouldn't have, and they're busy rolling up their sleeves to tie Peter in with the other occult murders they've had accumulating on their books. They've already told me they can finish off the cases Monica and I were sent down to investigate on their own, now that they've caught the culprit.
I look at Kelly and wonder how much she influenced the police's thinking. Can she do that? I remember how calm I was, how accepting of what had happened before the ambulance came. Had Kelly done that? I look at her uneasily, wondering if I should push for answers. I decide not to: it has, after all, turned out okay, and ain't no one gonna believe stories about stolen powers and such, anyways. Working for the X-Files has taught me a lot about outsiders and their attitudes. No point inviting more derision than we need to.
Disturbing my thoughts, she asks, "Heading to the hospital now? It'd be good if you could be there when she wakes up." Her eyes, when they meet mine, are clear and without guile. The question startles me - almost as much as the intensity of her blue eyes does. Once again, she's reminding me to focus my thoughts on where they should be.
"Yeah. You coming?" Even as I'm askin' it, the question surprises me. Examining my feelings though, I realise I really don't mind if she comes with me. She's many kinds of weird, and I can't say I'll ever like or totally understand her, but Kelly's a friend of Monica's: a real friend.
She'd turned towards her car, but my words stop her. Turning back towards me, she smiles. "Thank you," she says, as though responding directly to my small change of heart, "but no, I'll wait. You two need to spend a few minutes together alone. Call me once you've spoken with her, though, okay? I'll come over then."
"Sure," I answer. "Anything you want me to tell her?"
She shakes her head. "Nothing in particular. Tell her everything's okay for now, and not to worry."
I frown. "Worry?"
She looks like she wants to bite her tongue. "It doesn't matter right now," she says in a dismissive tone. "Just be happy things are okay. Concentrate on Monica."
My lips curve upwards. "You keep tellin' me that."
"I do, don't I? It's good advice."
She's lookin' me straight in the eye, and suddenly I feel as though she's hittin' on things I don't think she should be: personal stuff I'm not ready to deal with just yet. As I'm sure she expects me to, I back away. "I'll call."
She nods. Putting her key in her car's door lock, she turns it and opens the door. She gets in, but before she closes the door, she looks at me and smiles. "I'll talk to you later. Give Monica my love."
I watch as she reverses out of her space, gives a small wave, and then drives away. She looks so normal. I look around; so does everything else. Maybe that's how things are when extraordinary things happen to ordinary people - once it's over, things just go back easy to being what they always are.
Makes it kinda hard to believe what happened, happened.
Another four hours later, they finally let me in to see Monica. They operated on both her hands, repaired the damage and have declared her miraculous, predicting that she'll have no permanent damage to either hand. I'm standing beside her hospital bed, holding flowers and thinking she's the most beautiful sight a man could ever hope to see. An intravenous line has been put in one arm, and both hands are bandaged until they look like shapeless lumps. She opens her eyes, takes a moment to focus, and then smiles up at me. She looks pale against the white of the pillow, and tired, too, but the smile reassures me and I relax a bit.
"Been here long?" she asks, her voice a little raspy.
"Nah. Brought you some flowers."
"So I see."
I look around, feeling stupid.
"The nurses usually have vases at the desk. I'm sure they'll lend you one."
Of course they do. Of course they will. "I'll be right back."
A few minutes later, I'm back with the flowers in a vase. Placing them carefully on her bedside table, I turn to look down at her.
"You gave us a real scare."
"I was a little worried myself, once I realised what was happening."
"Anyone been in to talk to you about it?"
"They tried, but the nurse tells me they didn't get much. I kept passing out on them. I can remember getting up to the part where we were in the clearing, but I don't know if I made too much sense. You and Kelly have spoken to them, right? They know they have their man, so they're probably not all that worried about my statement just now." She looks up at me and says, "Sit down. You look uncomfortable." Her eyes follow me as I obey, and she adds, "You look like a truck hit you: a big, mean, ugly truck."
I grunt. "I feel like it. I'm a little long in the tooth for some of this stuff. Can't take the punches like I used to." She, on the other hand, though she's looking tired, is sounding awful chipper for someone who almost got herself killed last night.
"Poor baby," she smiles. "What happened?"
I place my hand on her arm, just above where the bandages begin. My hand looks tanned and weathered compared to the smooth paleness of her arm. "I don't remember much," I confess.
"Good."
She makes the word sound like a sigh of relief and I look at her in surprise. "What do you mean?"
Looking away, she says, "Nothing." A sideways glance at me and she says, "It looks as though it was quite a fight you were in. There's no harm if you don't remember every punch."
I frown. It's more than just a punch or two that I don't remember. Some part of me questions why I don't mind not remembering, but it quickly shuts up when Monica asks me to help her sit up more. Hell, it'll all come back to me eventually.
As I get up to figure out where the mechanism is that works the bed, Monica asks: "Is Kelly all right?"
I nod. "Yup. She didn't look too good there for a while, but she seems fine now." I want to ask her if she knows what the heck went on last night that I don't remember, but looking at her tired face, I figure it's a conversation that can wait for later. If anyone knows what Kelly is capable of, Monica does. She'll tell me what happened, but I won't push her now, not in her condition.
Finding the control, I press what I figure must be the right button, wait 'til she's elevated enough, then rearrange her pillows for her. Once she looks settled, I ask, "Have they said when you're getting out?"
"You don't know?" she asks.
"Well, yeah, but I'm making conversation, here."
"Oh, well, in that case, yes, as a matter of fact, they have."
Knowing the answer, I still ask, "And when is that?"
"In two days, if no infection sets in - and if I can guarantee that I have someone to look after me until my hands heal to their satisfaction." She smiles. "Apparently, someone has already volunteered."
So she knows. I'd kinda wanted to pass it by her first, but...
"You don't mind, do you?"
"Of course not. I'm just thinking it might not be the most comfortable thing you've ever offered to do. I'm not sure I'm a very good patient..."
"I can handle it if you can. Between Kelly and I, I figure we can manage." I pause, taking a second to realise that the name 'Kelly' doesn't leave such a bad taste in my mouth as it once did.
Breaking into my thoughts, Monica asks, "What's Skinner got to say?"
"Stay as long as I need to, within reason. He wants me to finish up the case here, write my report, ecetera, ecetera. Said he'd take a look to see if there was some other use they could put me to down here for a week or so until you're ready to travel back to D.C."
"He can be nice when he wants to be."
"I'll let you know about that after I find out what he puts me to doing."
She smiles, but it fades fast, as though it takes more energy than she can give it.
Feeling guilty I haven't been paying more attention to how she's feeling, I curse myself for sitting her up higher. It's tired her; maybe made her hands hurt. Quickly, I tell her, "I should be going. I'll put the bed back down."
She lifts a bandaged hand. "Please don't." She yawns. "Don't go, I mean. You can put the bed down, though. I'm sorry. I shouldn't be like this."
I fly to her defence. "Considering what you've been through, I don't know why you should be anything different. You lost a ton of blood last night, and you're lucky you have the use of your hands today. The sonofabitch hammered spikes through them, for Godsakes. The doctors are saying you're damned lucky there was no permanent damage." I sound like I'm lecturing her, so I add feebly, "You be as tired as you want to be. I'll stay 'til you want me to go."
There's another silence between us. I'm so glad she's okay, so glad that nothing worse happened last night. She'll never know how scared I was.
"He didn't want to, you know. It wasn't what he planned."
Softly spoken, her words come out of nowhere and stand in the air between us. Surprised by them, I try to absorb their meaning, but cannot. I'm in no mood to allow Peter Worthington leeway or excuses. She thinks he didn't want to? He sure as hell acted like he wanted to.
/Be nice, Daddy./
There's silence between us while I try to come up with something to say that doesn't make me sound revengeful. Finally, I say, "I'm sorry, that doesn't make sense to me, Monica."
"No, I suppose not," she says, her voice soft and contemplative.
A worried look crosses her face. Seeing it, I ask, "Wanna tell me about it?"
She shakes her head. "No. Not yet."
"Later?"
"If that's okay."
She's tired. She's been through hell. Of course later's okay. "Sure. Whenever you're ready." I'm worried enough about her I don't care what it is she's not saying. It can wait.
"Do you mind keeping me company until I fall asleep?"
"No problem," I tell her, understanding her not wanting to be alone after what she's been through and glad in some strange way that it's me she wants there. Slowly, I ease the bed down so that she'll be comfortable while she sleeps. Hair has fallen across her face, and I gently move it back out of the way. It takes all I've got not to stroke her cheek with the back of my fingers. She looks tired and fragile, and I want to take her in my arms and protect her. From what, I can't say, but that's how I feel. Instead, I sit back down in my chair and move it a little closer to the bed. Placing my hand back on her arm, I say, "You sleep. I'm going to call Kelly later and tell her how you're doin'; she wants to see you. Everything's going to be fine. Get your rest."
/'night 'night, Daddy./
She closes her eyes. In a few minutes, her breathing tells me she's asleep. Not letting go of her, I put my head down on my arm. She's safe. I'm with her. Closing my eyes, I give way to my own exhaustion.
Epilogue Four Weeks Later:
"Whatd'ya mean, 'didn't commit them all'? How'd they figure that? He hasn't said a word in his own defence 'cept that he can't remember anything. Why would he let them accuse him of stuff he didn't do?" I'm trying to keep the annoyance I feel outta my voice, but I don't know if it's working.
Monica lifts up the report she holds in her lightly bandaged hands and gestures towards me with it. "They've re-examined the evidence, looked at the time line, and he couldn't possibly have committed them all. There's proof he was in another part of the country when a couple of them happened." She frowns. "He still claims he doesn't remember doing any of the things he's been accused of, or know why he was doing what they claim he was doing."
"Yeah, well, talk to Kelly about that," I mutter.
My remark is met with dead silence. Slowly, I turn to face her. Her eyes hold mine, huge, dark, and compelling. "She did what had to be done, John."
I don't bother responding to that. No point, is there? Peter had remained just as uncommunicative about his activities as he had been when they'd first taken him into custody. He'd regained most of his memory, but remained adamant that he couldn't remember the murders or why he would have committed them - though he did admit the evidence against him in some cases was irrefutable.
Big of him, eh?
It frustrates the hell outta me that Monica still seems to have a soft spot for the guy, as though he and what he did to her are somehow separate. She said it was evil there that night, and I guess that's true: what he was doing to her sure was. I can't absolve him of what he did - after all, he allowed that evil to work through him. If you listen to the mumbo jumbo stuff, it says he had to seek it out for it to have any sway with him. I figure if that's the case, if he actually asked to be part of what had control of him, then he deserves every bit of justice he gets for what he did -and I don't give a tinker's damn if he can remember it all or not, sick bastard. The evidence will show what the evidence will show. It won't be me or spirits or weird powers or whatever that will prove Peter guilty: it'll be good, hard, solid facts.
The kind of facts I understand.
Pausing in my recriminations, I stop to consider the memory lapse thing. It still nags at me a bit. I'm sure that Kelly and her activities had something to do with that inability to recall certain things. It's hard to say if she helped or hindered, but I know there's no evidence to prove anything. What was done was done. She's got her own agenda, whatever it is, and I can't figure it out. In the day time, I'm sure she can't do the things that late at night I suspect she can. At least, I think I am. After all, you don't just wipe a man's memory clean, and you certainly don't do it in such a selective way that he can remember everything but what you need him to remember. One thing's for sure: he's guilty as hell for a number of those murders, and I'll be damned if he shouldn't pay for them.
"The one thing in his favour is that they can't figure out why he committed the murders."
I grunt at her intrusion into my thoughts. "And no one I know is likely to tell them, either."
Monica's voice is softly reasonable when she says, "They wouldn't believe the truth, and you know it; you still have times when you don't, and you were there." She glances away. "Still, I'm sure they'll ask me again if I can think of why he chose me."
They had asked me that a few times, too: wondering if I knew how close Peter and Monica were, wondering if she might have made him angry enough to turn murderous. They even asked what my relationship was with her, hinting that maybe Peter thought we were too close to be just partners and became jealous. I did my best to set them straight.
I shrug. "They can ask themselves why he chose any of them."
"I don't think he chose any of them; it's just not like him."
I look at her derisively. "What are you talking about? How can you say that after he nailed your hands to the ground? It sure looked to me like he'd chosen you for something to me. It didn't look like he planned on letting you go home alive, either. That wasn't like him either?"
She waits a minute before answering. "I know what you're saying," she finally admits, "but what he did...there was something else there that night. He was totally taken over by it, totally in the thrawl of whatever had possession of him. Not all the murders felt the same, John. Not all were touched by the same evil. It was very confusing then, and I think I mentioned that. I still believe that some of the women committed murders of their own. I agree there were murders he committed to gain the powers he wanted - but there were others committed by someone else, some other serial killer we still haven't found, who was killing for different purposes we haven't yet figured out."
"You think the murderer's still out there."
"Well, a murderer is still out there, yes."
"And into the same shit Peter was?"
Monica shakes her head, shrugs. "No. Maybe. I don't know."
I frown. "Same MO, maybe different reasons?"
She nods her head thoughtfully. "Perhaps. The New Orleans office is responsible for it for now, though."
I jump on her wording. "For now?"
She looks at the folder lying on her desk. "I have a feeling we'll have something to do with this again before it's all over. There's more to those murders than just your regular madman." Looking up at me with shadowed eyes, she asks: "What if what we've seen is only part of a bigger picture?"
My heart sinks. I don't wanna hear it. Leaning back in my chair, I regard her silently for a moment. What she's saying is that there's more mumbo jumbo heading my way. Sighing, I resist an urge to hit something. There's nothing for it but to go with the flow. When the shit hits the fan, at least I'll be there to recognise it for what it really is. "So we haven't seen the last of Kelly?"
She looks over at me and smiles. "Not by a long shot. Something tells me this all centres around New Orleans."
I groan. This is what Kelly meant when she said that everything was okay for now. Monica was out of danger, and so was anyone else that Peter might have needed - but it wasn't the end.
I sit back in my chair and wonder when the 'now' will be over and when we'll be called in to help in the investigation of a serial killer who's decided to get back to his routine.
"We should do something, tell them what to look out for."
Monica makes a quick, negative movement with her head. "The police know what they're looking for, and wouldn't take our assistance too kindly, you know that. When things start getting a little weirder, they'll be more willing to consider it an X-File. We need to learn from this and prepare ourselves. We won't be able to help until they're prepared to accept the help we need to give them. Kelly is there keeping an eye out. She'll let us know what's happening."
I don't like the sound of that at all. She's falling too deeply into the witchcraft/demon/magic/whatever stuff. Hopefully after a while back here where at least some vestige of sanity reigns, she'll be back to her normal self.
Not that 'normal self' is all that normal.
Unaware of my thoughts, Monica looks up at the clock. "Time to go."
"You made it through the whole day with no pain killers," I observe, glad for the switch in topic.
She smiles. "Yup. In a couple days, they're taking these off." She holds up her hands, indicating the light bandages that are wrapped over them, then begins her preparations to leave.
I watch as she tidies away the files on her desk and wonder what it is that I've learned from these past few weeks. Because she needed the help, she stayed at my place for a while, it being easier for me to have her there than for me to put up at her place. She's moved back to her apartment now, though, and I miss having her around. Her living with me created this weird sense of intimacy that I miss. She's become an important part of my life in the few months since she agreed to join me in the basement.
I shake my head and look away. The warning signs are all over the place, and I'm not so stupid I haven't noticed them. It's been a long time since I've felt this way, and it's a little scary. I wonder if it's what I think it is, and if I'm ready for it.
I wonder if she is.
She gathers up her jacket and turns to look at me expectantly. Thoughts of Peter and powers and occult madness are totally out of my mind now.
I wonder if she'd like to go out and grab some dinner somewhere before going home.
Life goes on.
I feel the warmth of my son's smile.
/'Bye, Daddy/.
End 5/5
New Orleans
By: Mariel