Max Tarasov
Chapter 2
From outside, the tiny, block building on Washington Street didn't look much like a precinct or station. Square and plain, with no markings save for a bronze address plate with embossed numbers. Only a few vehicles were parked outside. A large, and very new, black SUV for the chief and a smattering of used vehicles for the dispatch or secretaries. As Lilian approached, an unmarked cruiser screeched in and took up two parking spots. An officer stepped out and nodded curtly at Lilian. Then he stepped to the back door and lugged out a handcuffed boy. “Hey, uh, you got a light?” Lilian asked, waving her cigarette pack.
“Seriously, Miss Parcel?” the officer said. He shook his head and looked at the boy. “Use the plug lighter, just make sure to lock the doors when you're done.”
“Thanks, slick. You're the best.” Lilian bent over and pushed the car lighter into the socket. She bent the knee of her bad leg, resting it on the passenger seat. After a few seconds, the lighter popped back out, and Lilian pressed the glowing orange metal to her cigarette. The soft crinkle of burning paper filled her ears, and the sharp odor of nicotine flowed up to her nose. “Perfect.”
“Better get inside, it's starting to rain,” Jake said from the doorway of the precinct.
“Goddamn weather man can't get anything right.” Lilian pressed the button on the door to lock the officer's car and hobbled to the door. “Wish I could get paid to wear a suit and make shit up.” Jake gestured at the door, and Lilian tugged it open. She braced her body against the door to drag her leg inside. She took a quick drag on her cigarette and stepped into the lobby.
One of the secretaries stood up and pointed sharply at Lilian. “Hey, hey! You can't smoke in here!” Lilian rolled her eyes and snubbed out the cigarette, putting it in her pocket. “Thanks.” The secretary peered at the corner. “Chief, the psychic girl is here again!”
“For God's sake, how many times do I have to tell you? I'm not a damn psychic! You want your lotto numbers, call that stupid bitch on the radio station on Saturday nights. I'd bet my mother's urn that if you had to call me for something sincere, you'd drop the sneering bullshit.” Lilian stared at the secretary, who only returned a blank, uninterested look.
Chief Saxxon appeared from around the corner. “What the hell is going on in here? The cat adoption drive is down the street, ladies.” Saxxon was a tall and broad-shouldered man. Once, his hair had probably been blacker than Evelyn's burned coffee. Now, it was streaked with flashes of silver. The fellow was clean shaven but sported thick sideburns and sharply angled eyebrows. Beneath his brow, he had the curious eyes of a detective, though age had now worn them from sharp steel to a dull, muted gray. His moved his gaze between the two women, folding his arms over his chest. The seams of his suit coat bulged against his arms.
“Fine, whatever.” Lilian stuffed her hands into her coat. “My sister said you called.”
“I did. We have something weird, I'd like you to have a look at it.” Saxxon gestured for her to follow, and Lilian hobbled towards him.
“Couple of homicides at the theatre downtown. You know, the fancy one on Washington by the mall. Blunt force trauma, looks like.” Saxxon opened his office door.
“Don't get it. You got the bodies and cause of death. Sounds like some stage hand or understudy got pissy with some divas. What do you need me for?” Lilian collapsed into a chair, massaging her leg. Jake stood behind her.
Saxxon looked over Lilian's right shoulder. “Hello, Jake.”
“Hey, boss.”
Lilian looked over her shoulder at Jake. “Why does everyone look that way?”
“Habit, I guess,” Saxxon said. “He always stood there, didn't he?”
“I guess so.” Lilian watched as Saxxon fumbled through some paperwork on his desk before popping out an unmarked jewel case for a CD. A sticker from a label maker denoted the case as NOV10THEATRESECCAM. “What do you have here, security footage?”
“Yeah. One over the stage caught some weird shit, Lil.” Saxxon looked directly into Lilian's eyes. Lilian pursed her lips in response.
“Well. Show it to me,” she said.
The computer screen flicked on, and the police chief inserted the disc to the computer below his desk. A few seconds of blue screen with formatting bars ran before the grainy security footage began playing. “It was late in the evening, the two actresses with the lead roles had come in to do some extra rehearsing for a big fight scene. At least, that's what the theatre manager told us.” Saxxon's voice was there but didn't entirely register in Lilian's brain. Something else was catching her attention in the video.
The two girls were obviously pretend-fighting, acting to slap each other and yell. At the same instant, both of them jumped and looked off-stage. One of them put her hands to her mouth, as if she were screaming at something. The other girl suddenly ragdolled across the stage, tumbling across the wood and striking her skull against the edge of the stage framing. Blood pooled around her mouth. The second girl lifted off the stage a few inches. “Jesus Christ!” Lilian said. The second girl then snapped over backward, and in her mind, Lilian could hear the sound of the girl's spine breaking. The body was pummeled several times into the stage, splattering blood across it. A small mist, an error in the pixels, floated around the body as black lines began to appear across the screen. “Mother of God, turn it off, Kevin!”
“Now, I know it's gross, Lilian but-”
“No! Turn it off right now!” The lines were getting darker, seeping through the monitor. “God bless it, Saxxon, turn that damn thing off!” Lilian's breath was heaving as Saxxon fumbled and finally pushed the power button off. The streaks across the screen stayed for a few seconds, pulsing a pale emerald color, before evaporating.
“What's gotten into you?” the police chief asked. His brow was furrowed, his eyes gauging Lilian's reaction.
“You should be thanking me for what didn't get in here,” Lilian said. She rubbed her face, making the sign of the cross again. “I'll look it into, Chief. Standard fee, I'll have a logbook for man hours ready to turn in at the end.” She looked over her shoulder again, and Jake only shrugged. “And one more favor, if you don't mind.”
Saxxon sighed, rubbing his forehead. “The super hates when I pay you. Ok. All right, what do you need?”
“Can you give me a ride to the hospital?”
Chief Saxxon dropped Lilian off at the hospital off Sixteenth Street. “I'll be back in about an hour. Get some time in with your dad, kid.”
“I'm not a kid,” Lilian said. She drew in a deep breath, letting her gaze follow the glass spire up for twenty-some odd floors. For all its sterility, the place struck her as more religious than a cathedral. Here, so many people would beg and pray and ask for support. A twinge of guilt struck her. She'd not been to a mass for a month, and she could certainly use the support. But, the thought receded as it had come. Out of habit, she reached for the cross necklace she usually wore then remembered it had been left hanging on a jewelry tree in her closet.
Lilian entered the reception area, banked around the corner, and rode an elevator up to the third floor. She snaked her way through people and waiting rooms, through lobbies and magazine stands. Jake followed her the whole time. Mumbles of medical prognoses, people crying, and laughter echoed from the rooms. Bleach and disinfectants scorched away any smell that wasn't the biting odor of cleanliness.
The curtains were drawn in Room 318, but the lights were on. After a short pause, Lilian knocked on the door. “Come in,” said a man. “And you better be the pretty redhead with a good lunch.”
“Sorry to let you down, Pop.” Lilian walked in and looked around the curtain. She glanced over her shoulder, and Jake shrugged at her, leaning against the door frame. “You shouldn't be hitting on the nurses, it's embarrassing.”
Gabriel Parcell looked up at his daughter, setting his newspaper down in his lap. He smiled. “Lilian! I'm so glad you came. It's been a while.” He folded the newspaper into quarters, then tossed it onto the chair by the bed. A push of a button moved the chair into an upright position, and Gabriel held out his arms.
Lilian hugged him and scoffed. “Come on, Dad. I was just in here like three days ago. On Saturday? You probably don't remember, you were out of it.” She took a seat by the bed, picking up the paper.
Her father narrowed his eyes and looked up at the ceiling. “Yeah. Maybe. Listen, don't have heart problems if you can. They don't let you eat good food anymore, and the medicine they give you messes with your head.” Gabriel gave his daughter a stern look.
“Trust me, I know. I never took those stupid painkillers, they make me sick.” She unfolded the local news section and began scanning. “How old is this paper?”
Her father arched a brow. “Did you not take the medicine because it made you sick, or because they'd have killed you with how much you drink?” Lilian continued scanning the headlines in the paper. Gabriel looked at the doorway. “Why didn't he come in?”
“Who knows,” Lilian said. “Evee won't stop talking to us about living in sin.”
“Didn't want to upset you while you weren't feeling well,” Jake said.
“Ah, don't worry about Evelyn.” Gabriel reclined and looked back at his daughter. “It's today's paper.”
The young woman clicked her tongue and continued thumbing through the pages. After a few moments, she leaned forward, her brow bent with intensity. Then, she copied her father's movements and folded the paper into fourths, tossing it on to his lap. “Found it.”
Gabriel mouthed the headline: Double Homicide at Theatre, Cops Looking for Suspects. “What is this, Lilian?”
“Work.” Lilian played with the cigarette in her jacket pocket. Saxxon wouldn't let her smoke in the new car. “Chief wants my 'official' services. Whatever did it imprinted itself on some security camera footage.”
“Sure it was an imprint?” Gabriel's jovial tone had vanished. “Not just the spirit corrupting the data?”
Lilian mimed lighting and taking a hit from a cigarette. “No. Data corruption doesn't try to leak through a computer monitor. Saxxon didn't see it, but the monitor was about to bleed ecto. It knew I was watching so it's intelligent. Or at the very least, aware.”
Her father peered over the top of the paper. “Smoking's bad for you. Don't know where you picked up that habit.” He scanned a few more lines of the article. “How bad is it, Lilian? You think it's a demon, or just a haunting?”
She looked out the window, at the rain pelting against the glass. The tree branches swayed, a few determined leaves still clinging to their stalks, refusing to acknowledge the changing of months. “Can't say. It's definitely malevolent. Didn't just kill those two girls, brutalized them. Broke one's spine and smashed her against the stage.”
Gabriel followed his daughter's gaze out the window. He scrunched his mouth to one side, making noises of contemplation. “Could be a spirit holding some kind of grudge. Might be a curse.”
“Could be a lot of things. Won't know until I go down there.” Lilian stretched her arms out, arching her back. “No point going now, though. Might as well wait til after sundown. The girls were killed later in the evening.”
Her father nodded. “Good call. Show up when the emotional energy manifested itself. The daylight would weaken an unbound spirit anyway. Probably can't coalesce.”
Flipping her wrist over, Lilian checked her watch. “Look, Dad. I have to go. Saxxon's gonna pick me up again in a few minutes.” She stood and leaned over, kissing Gabriel on the cheek. “It was good to see you.” She started for the door.
“Wait.” Her father set the newspaper in his lap. “Aren't you going up to ICU?” She stopped, and Jake looked at the floor. “You should go see him. It might help.” Lilian looked away from Jake and continued out the door. Gabriel sighed. “Love you,” he said and waved at his daughter's back, but only Jake acknowledged and wove back.