Kingdom of Shadows (2 page)

No one came or went from the office building, and the lone wire-meshed window facing the street was grimy and dark.  Had the place gone out of business?  He could’ve sworn he’d passed by here a few days before and it was alive with workers and trucks coming and going, loading and unloading.  He tried to remember where he’d heard about the job opportunities here.  Had someone told him?  Had he seen something at the Unemployment Office?  Rooster watched the area a while with the experienced and trained eye of a thief.  In time he looked back at the street.  It was empty but for bits of trash and debris blowing about in the wind.  He checked his watch then gazed at the sky.  It normally wasn’t so dreary this time of afternoon, but the drab winter sky conspired to cast everything in a dull pall reminiscent of dusk.

After another quick look around, Rooster stepped through the open gate, crossed the parking lot and slipped into the office building.

He found himself in a long, dimly lit corridor that reeked of bleach.  With the dull industrial tile floors, low plaster ceilings, steel-encased light fixtures and unimaginative but practical architecture, the building more closely resembled an archaic hospital or dated mental institution than office space.

Rooster pulled off the knit hat he was wearing and held it in his hands.  Though the heavy steel entrance door had closed silently behind him he could still see his breath in the hallway.  Surely they had heat here, why wouldn’t it be on?  A small sign protruding from the nearest doorframe read: RECEPTION.

He looked past it to the far end of the corridor, which was draped in darkness.  Had something moved just then?  Startled, Rooster took a step back.  He was certain he’d caught a glimpse of someone shuffling into the cover of darkness, and the sudden sound of labored breath seeping down the hallway in its wake seemed to confirm it.  The noise echoed along the walls, transforming into strange, indecipherable whispers.

Whispers that did not sound human.

Rooster stuffed his hat into his back pocket, took a deep breath then ran a hand over his face, eyes trained on the shadows at the end of the hall.  
Calm down
, he thought.  
It’s just the nightmares again
.

An unusual ticking sound drew his attention to the reception office.  A lone woman well into her sixties sat behind an inordinately large desk, banging away on an old Olympia typewriter and seemingly oblivious to his presence.  A series of metal file cabinets filled out the remaining space behind her.  Clad in a dowdy dress and a cardigan sweater thrown over her shoulders for good measure, the receptionist’s silver hair was pulled up into a bun, and a pair of half-glasses attached to a chain strung about her neck sat along the bridge of her bulbous nose.

Rooster stepped through the doorway.  “Are you still hiring?”

Without looking up from her typewriter the woman retrieved a sheet of paper from a metal bin, slapped it down and slid it over to the edge of the desk.  “Fill out this application, front and back.  Turn it in to me when you’re finished.”

Rooster took the form.  “Is it always so cold in here?”

“Comes as a shock to most but that’s the way it is.”

He nodded like he’d understood her answer.  “Are you open today?”

“We’re always open.”

“Then where is everybody?”

The woman’s head snapped up, her eyes glaring at him with demonic fury.  “Where are
you
?”

Rooster watched the paper fall from his hand as the familiar torment of agonizing screams came to him again.  But these were not nightmares or daydreams, he could hear them bellowing from deep within the building, as if people were being tortured in the bowels of the facility.  Heart crashing his chest, he backed out into the hallway, terrified.  The receptionist’s mouth hung open as she panted with anger, spittle dripping from her pale, cracked lips.  A quiet growl emanated from her, like the low rumbling snarl of a dog just before it attacks.

He turned and bolted for the front door, slamming into it with his shoulder and stumbling out into the parking lot as it gave way.  Staggering forward, he nearly pitched face-first onto the pavement but regained his balance at the last moment and in one frantic, uninterrupted motion, broke into a full run.

He did not look back.

*  *  *  *

The payphone on the corner was occupied by a rotund woman carrying a brown paper bag filled with groceries.  Across the street, Rooster waited, watching from the burned out doorway of an abandoned building only a few blocks from his apartment in the housing projects.  Though he couldn’t hear what the woman was saying, she was clearly upset and quite animated.  He remained huddled in his hiding place until she finally slammed the phone down and stormed from the booth, a look of desperation and confusion creasing her face as she toddled toward the top of the street.

He checked the boulevard in both directions.  It was empty.  Not even a car or city bus to be found.  Moving quickly, he crossed the street, ducked into the phone booth and dug a shred of paper from his jacket pocket.  Jotted across it was the information Gaby had written down the last time a call came in.  Rooster dropped a dime and punched the numbers.

The connection crackled and hissed but eventually went through and began to ring.

“Hello.”

Even after all this time Rooster knew that voice.  “Snow.”

An exhale of relief and then: “Rooster-man.”

He gripped the phone tight and spun around so he could watch the street.  “You’ve been calling me.”

“I can’t believe it’s really you.  Didn’t know if I’d be able to track you down after all this time.”

“Are you here, in the city?”

“Where else would I be?”

“What do you want?”

“We gotta talk.”

“I’m not in the life anymore.”

“You got no idea what life you’re in.”

A sharp pain stabbed Rooster’s temple.  He flinched.  “What’s that mean?”

“What the hell you think it means?  Means I need to talk to you, bro.”

“Whatever you’re into these days I’m not interested.”

“This is serious shit.”

“Snow, what do you
want
?”

“I need to see you.”

The receptionist’s demonic eyes tore through Rooster’s memory in strobe-like flashes.  “Just leave me alone, man.  I got enough problems.”

“Motherfucker, I’m trying to help you!”

The visions faded.  The fear remained.  “Stop calling me.”

 “You don’t hear nothing else I say you better hear this.”  A crackling hiss bled through the line again.  “You need to know what I know.”

A burst of wind forced the phone booth door open.  He pinned the phone to his shoulder with his ear and sparked a cigarette, making sure to cup the flame until he got it going.  “What do you know?”

“I know what you’re going through.  The headaches, the nightmares. Hearing things, seeing things.  Bad things.  
Evil
 things.”

Rooster’s eyes watered.  He told himself the cold was to blame as a black Crown Vic with a tinted windshield and windows turned at the head of the street and slowly rolled by.  
Cop car
, he thought, feeling the muscles in his stomach clench.  He hadn’t been a criminal in years, but old habits, old fears, died hard.  He watched the car until it was out of sight.

“There ain’t a lot of time,” Snow pressed.  “I
need
 to see you.”

Rooster breathed heavily into the phone in quick nervous bursts.  “When?”  

“Today.”

But for their labored breathing, the area is deathly silent.  Fog rolls over the open field, cutting across the desolate country road and floating through a thick expanse of forest on the other side.  The full moon, still masked by cloud cover, reveals a mist-shrouded landscape of crucified scarecrows, demonic sentries guarding a farmhouse no one would want.

Snow stays in the back of the van with Carbone’s body but the rest pile out of the vehicle and wander about the street amidst confusion and high emotions, attempting to gain their bearings while figuring out what to do next.

“What’s with all the scarecrows?” Landon asks.  “Nothing’s grown there for years but weeds, why would they need scarecrows?”

As he surveys the area, Starker still clutches the AK47 he used on the job, his hulking presence and enormous shaved dome daunting even in limited light.  He moves to the side of the road.  “Maybe it’s not crows they’re looking to scare off.”

“Well if they’re meant for me they’re working,” Nauls says.  “Fucking things are creeping me out.”

“Yeah Nauls,” Landon quips, “they’re meant for you.  Jesus, what an idiot.”

“I’m an idiot?  You’re the one who stopped here.”

“Yeah, because shit-for-brains bit it.”  Landon jerks a thumb at the van.  “And if it’s OK with you I’ve had my fill of smelling dead ass tonight.”

Snow emerges from the rear of the van and wipes his bloody hands on his jeans.  “What did you say?”

Landon faces him.  “You heard me.”

“Say it again, motherfucker.”

“Hey, I’m sorry Carbone stepped off, but it’s nobody’s fault but his and you know it.  He blew the back doors too early.  Total amateur-hour horseshit, he knew better.”

“A good man’s dead.”  Snow stepped closer.  “Show some respect.”

“He fucked up and now we’ve all got blood on our hands.”

“What the hell would you know about it,
wheelman
?”

“Enough to know the stupid bastard could’ve gotten us all killed.  And I didn’t hear you making any driver jokes when I was carting
your
sorry ass the fuck outta Dodge.”

“You’re working my last nerve.”

Landon squares his stance.  “Blow it out your ass.”

Rooster steps between them.  “Both of you cool it.”  He knows he must get the crew focused, split the take and make arrangements to wrap things up one way or another.  But it can’t be done out in the open, even in a desolate place such as this.  One local police car or nosy townsperson passing by is all it’ll take to escalate things, and there’s been enough escalation tonight.  No one was supposed to get hurt.  The job had been meticulously planned, rehearsed and timed to the millisecond.  Yet there were still mistakes, and what began as a robbery ended in a homicide, one guard dead, two badly injured.  And now they’ve lost one of their own.  They have to move and move fast.  “We’re still on the clock, which means I still call the shots, so get your heads out of your asses and get back in the fucking game.  Now.”

Snow points at Landon.  “We ain’t done.”

“Any time, douche.”

Rooster stands his ground until both men drift away in opposite directions.  “All right, let’s get inside and finish our business.”

Nauls, holding two large canvas duffel bags stuffed with cash, shuffles about like he needs a bathroom.  “Can’t we find someplace else?”

“I don’t like this shit bin any better than you do,” Rooster admits, “but it’s out of the way and nobody should bother us here.  Nauls, you stay with me.  Landon, get the van off the street and under cover.  Snow, you and Starker check the place out.  It looks deserted but let’s be sure.”  

“OK how come the two brothers got to check the farmhouse out?” Snow cracks.  “We more expendable, that it?  We ain’t special like you white folks.”

“Just get it done.”

Snow pulls two .45s from the back of his belt and turns to Starker.  “All right, big man, let’s go.”

Apparently mesmerized by the field of rotting scarecrows, Starker does not respond.  He stares off into the darkness as if in a trance.

“Come on biggins, time for some recon.”

Starker continues to stare at the horrible faces peering across the field through the darkness and fog.  Rooster approaches him and cautiously places a hand on his shoulder.  “Starker.”

He says nothing.

“Stay with me now,” Rooster tells him softly.  “We need you.”    

Starker remains locked on the field, one enormous finger resting on the trigger of the AK-47, the other hand sliding almost lovingly back and forth across the top of the weapon in a slow and steady motion.  “Something’s not right.”

“You see something?”

“I feel it.  So do you.”

He’s right, but Rooster can’t figure out how Starker knows this.  Perhaps he hasn’t hidden his anxiety and uneasiness as well as he thought he has.  “Maybe we should all go,” Rooster suggests.  “Check the place out together.”

“It doesn’t much matter.”  Starker blinks slowly, his eyes eerily reflecting moonlight.  “We’re all gonna die tonight.”

*  *  *  *

Memories of Starker’s bald head covered in blood flashed before Rooster’s eyes, the huge man spitting and slobbering between horrific screams, choking on his own blood and bodily fluids while begging like a child for mercies he would never be granted.  

The horrible sounds of that night were the last to leave him, fading gradually like the slowly dying things they were.  And like the dead, a gruesome residue remained in their wake.  A reminder of their power, perhaps, evidence that such figments of torturous nightmares had, in fact, existed.

Out in the open air the winter wind cut like a razor.  Rooster held his ground at the mouth of an alley between a seedy bar and a blown-out storefront, his jacket collar flipped up to protect the back of his neck.  A red neon sign advertising the strip joint two doors down blinked with a steady rhythm, painting his face in a strange and frightening haze.  His headache had weakened, but a dull pain still lingered behind his eyes.  He rubbed his temple and studied the passersby.  Everyone on the street seemed suspect, every car a potential menace.  He swore he’d seen the same black Crown Vic twice more since he’d walked the eight blocks from the payphone to the agreed upon meeting place, but of course there was no way to know for sure if it was the same vehicle.  Even if it was, what would the cops want with him?  He’d been doing straight time for years.