They (18 page)

Vince’s stomach turned over in his stomach, as if dropped down an elevator.
The chanting dream
! “How do you know about that?” he breathed.

“I have them, too.”

Vince looked surprised. “You? Wh…why?”

“I was there with you, Vince. That’s why I remember a little bit more of it than you. We were
both
there. Along with Nellie, and some of the other kids we used to play with. They stopped bringing us to them when I was five or six, but they continued the ceremonies themselves.”

“Ceremonies? I don’t understand—”

“Our parents were involved, Vince. Mine. Yours. A group of twenty or more people. Samuel Garrison was their leader. I even remember the sacrifices.”

A bolt of memory flashed through his mind. “Sacrifices?”

“Yes. I know it’s hard to believe, but—”

“Your parents were
devil worshippers
?”

“Not just my parents, Vince. Yours, too.”

THIS SUDDEN REVELATION drained Vince. He needed a drink.

Frank suggested they get out and wander over to the recreation center. There would be soft drink vending machines there. They walked across the park to the recreation center, not speaking, both lost in their own thoughts. Vince bought a Coke, Frank a Dr. Pepper, and they walked back to the car, the summer sun beating down over them as they made their way back to the vehicle. The shouting laughs of playing took Vince back to the summer he remembered spending in California that was clearest in his memory. Seven years old and playing outside with the neighborhood kids, delighting in afternoon games of hide-and-seek, playing Dinosaurs, watching cartoons. Mom and Dad working, spending his days with Nellie and her folks, chasing after the ice cream man in his carnival-music-sounding truck as it drove slowly down the street as sprinklers showered summer lawns with cool water to run and play in. It was a magical time that seemed to last forever.

When they got back to the car, they climbed back in and sat in the stillness for a moment, savoring their soft drinks. Vince broke the silence. “It’s just so…hard to believe.”

“I know,” Frank said, sipping his Dr. Pepper. He turned to Vince. “And I’m sorry you had to find out about this. Especially after your mother died.”

“Are you sure my mother was involved?” Vince turned to Frank, imploring him to tell the truth.
Don’t lie
. He hadn’t had a lot of respect
for his mother in the last ten years of her life, and he could accept an
ything about her regardless of how hideous. But this? Devil worship? It was beyond him. She’d been so…fundamentally
Christian
.

But then maybe that explained it.

Frank nodded. “I thought the memories were planted by the therapist I was seeing. I thought they were the result of my drug use. I didn’t know
what
to believe. But the more I thought about it, the more it began to make sense in a sick sort of way. I started thinking back on what I could remember that’d happened to me and place them with what I knew. It wasn’t until I started doing my own research into the occult that I found out a lot more. A
whole
lot more.”

“Like what?”

“So much that you can’t even imagine,” Frank began.

“My mother was killed by a devil cult I think,” Vince broke in, the words just tumbling out as everything began to come together. “The local detectives just think it’s some twisted kid or something, but… hearing all of this really ties it all in.”

“That’s why I’m here,” Frank said. “When I heard about your mother, I knew they’d tracked her down. And that’s why I had to get to you before
they
did.”

“But who are they?” Vince admonished. “I still don’t understand all that’s happening.”

“Okay, first things first.” Frank took a sip of Dr. Pepper, put the can in a holder between the bucket seats. “You need to know some background, how I came to find you and know about all this stuff. Okay?”

Vince nodded; he wanted to ask Frank why this cult would want him dead, but he remained silent. He took a sip of Coke, sat back and waited for Frank to begin.

“When I began my research into the occult, it was because of the repressed memories and dreams I was having that were coming out during therapy. At first I thought it was bullshit. The dreams actually first started coming sporadically about three years before I went into therapy. I wrote a novel loosely based on them called
Darkness Inside
. I thought I was purging the dreams when I wrote that novel. The dreams became a flood when the book was published, and that’s when I sought therapy. I thought I had another idea for a book—in fact, I’ve written several things based on these dreams, but we don’t need to go there. What you need to know is what I found in my research.”

He took another sip of Dr. Pepper and continued. “When I started doing my research I realized that there were many different kinds of satanic cults. There’s the usual group of stoned teenagers who have maybe listened to a little too much Danzig or Marilyn Manson, smoked too much dope and think Satan is cool and form an informal coven out of a sense of camaraderie. Most of the time these groups are harmless. Sometimes they cross the line into vandalism and other petty crimes. Sometimes they cross the line further and sacrifice neighborhood pets. Very rarely do they cross that line into killing people. Most often they’ll do blood ceremonies where they prick their fingers, squeeze blood into a chalice and drink it as their benediction. For the most part, these groups are very unorganized. Their theology is largely made up as they go along, but they usually find inspiration in black metal bands, horror movies, and a snippet from
The Satanic Bible
. In short, they’re usually formed out of rebellion.”

“
The Satanic Bible
?” Vince was amazed. “You mean one actually
exists
?”

“That’s where the second group of Satanists comes in,” Frank said. “That would be the ‘legitimate’ satanic groups.” He emphasized the word legitimate by moving his fingers in the air: Quote, unquote. “I call these groups legitimate because they have taken the pains to register their organizations as institutional religions, and have even gone so far as to advertise themselves in local phone books. Groups like the Church of Satan, the Temple of Set. Both of these groups revolve around the basic belief structure of
The Satanic Bible
, which was written in the late sixties by Church of Satan founder Anton LaVey. LaVey passed away almost two years ago and the reins have now been handed down to his companion, Blanche Barton and his oldest daughter, Karla. The group itself is basically atheist. They don’t even
believe
in the Devil, much less God. They use Satan as a symbol of man’s carnal, natural instincts and behavior, and encourage this through ritual designed to appeal to man’s basic Jungian need for religious ritual. To the LaVeyan Satanist, you,” he pointed at Vince, “are your highest God, thus if you are a LaVeyan Satanist you worship
yourself
.”

Vince was soaking this in. “Wow! I’ve never heard of this.”

Frank managed a small grin. “Satanism in this context is somewhat misleading. In actuality, it is a philosophy of Jungian ritual and social Darwinism that seeks to appeal to man’s basic’s instincts. LaVey was very heavily influenced by a German philosopher named Frederick Neitchze and utilized his concepts and philosophies when formulating his church’s beliefs. While LaVeyan Satanists use the traditional trappings of the occult like the Baphomet symbol and invoke Satan and various demons in their rituals, these are only used symbolically. Despite what born-again Christians may think, LaVeyan Satanists are harmless. They don’t believe in killing innocent people, or animals or children, nor do they engage in the type of behavior that your average born-again might like you to believe. In fact, they explicitly disapprove of such behavior. They’re very law-abiding people.”

He continued, holding up three fingers. “Then, there is the third kind of Satanist, the kind that most of our current myths of devil cults are based on. The more traditional form of Satanism, I guess you could say. Traditional in that unlike the legitimate Satanists, these groups, or group in this case, really
believes
in the Christian Devil and God, and they worship him the way Catholics pay homage to Jesus and the Virgin Mary. Unlike the LaVeyan Satanists, they whole-
heartedly believe in blood sacrifice and they practice it. They are hol
d-overs from the old European devil cults of the Middle Ages and their sole purpose in life is the total destruction of not only Christianity, but man in general. It has been suggested by various groups that this group is largely imaginary, that it has been fostered for years by the Christian church and doesn’t exist, except in the minds of those who wish to believe in them.”

He paused for a moment, his eyes riveted on Vince. “To a certain extent, the skeptics are right. Fundamentalist Christians who specialize in writing about the occult from a Christian standpoint claim Satanists kill 50,000 people a year in ritual killings. That’s
twice
the number of the average homicide rate. They also claim they’re responsible for the majority of missing person’s cases and the list goes on. Most of what they say about Satanism is pure bullshit.” He leveled his gaze down, took a sip of Dr Pepper. “But unfortunately, a group like this
does
exist. They aren’t responsible for 50,000 murders a year. And
they aren’t involved in the majority of kidnappings and child mole
stations that occur, either. They don’t run all the day care centers in America and rape our children. But they do exist, they can—and
do—
kill, and they are so powerful you wouldn’t believe it. It is this last group that our folks were involved with. A group that has been gaining strength since the late sixties and is now established all over the country and in many parts of the world. They worship not only Satan, but a god that is even older than Satan, a god that was worshipped when man was just a primitive ape with no language skills. This god is almost unknown to everybody but an elite sect of devil worshippers and these people are very secretive, very real, and very dangerous.”

All of this was coming at Vince so fast that it was hard to process, much less believe. He took another sip of Coke, his mind racing with a thousand questions. “I just have one question. If you found out my mother was killed and you feel she was killed by…one of
them
…how can you be so sure they don’t know about me yet?”

“I made extra sure of that, trust me,” Frank said, sipping his Dr. Pepper and looking out at the park beyond.

“Are you sure? Because…if you’re sure they don’t know about me, then who was the guy that tried to kill me yesterday at John Wayne Airport?”

“What’s that?” Frank raised his eyebrows, interested.

Vince told Frank a simplified version of what happened at John Wayne Airport. Frank reacted visibly; he actually went pale. “Fuck,” he said, one gloved hand rubbing his mouth. “You’ve got to be kidding. And the cops say they’ve got somebody in custody?”

Vince nodded. “Yeah. One of the detectives I’ve been working with is supposed to call me this afternoon with more info.”

“This changes everything, then.” Frank glanced in the mirrors, once again making Vince paranoid as well. “I’m gonna have to tell Mike about this.”

“Who’s Mike?”

“A friend of my father’s. He and I have been working on this for the past six months or so. He’s the one that did the extra surveillance on you and determined they hadn’t gotten to you yet. Obviously, they have. Shit!”

Frank’s mood had darkened considerably since this bit of news, and Vince sought to steer his mind back to the task at hand; he needed to know everything Frank knew. “Tell me about Mike.”

Frank continued looking out the windows and into his rear and side view mirrors. “He contacted me over a year ago. He’d been researching my father’s disappearance. You see, my
mother
originally left my father when I was about three years old. She just packed me up and moved to San Francisco and she took me with her. From what I’ve been able to gather, she wasn’t a member of the cult yet, but she was exposed to them in the Bay Area. My dad tracked us down and things get kind of fuzzy there.” He turned back to Vince. “He essentially disappeared for two years. He turned up later in El Paso. He was…all fucked up. Severe mental problems. My aunt Diane and Uncle Charlie tried to help him out, but he took off again a year or so later and nobody’s seen him since. Anyway, a few years ago, my dad’s best friend from when he was a kid, Mike Peterson, decides to do some of his own detective work. And he found out more than he cared to know. He was the one that initially found out the basic information on the cult. He tracked me down and asked if I wanted to help him. At first I didn’t, but by then I was having the dreams. So I agreed. It was through my memories that you and your mother came into the picture. I didn’t remember your names but therapy helped that, and even now I’m surprised I was still able to find you the way I did.”

“Why’s that?”

“I don’t remember you as Vince Walters,” Frank said. “I remember you as Andy and your mother as Margaret. Your name is….or was…Andrew Swanson.”

At the mention of the name Vince felt a weird sense of
deja vu
. Andrew Swanson. The name came to him so effortlessly, so easy. It was as if the long missing piece to a puzzle had been finally inserted in its place again. He felt whole and complete.

“Andy,” he let the name roll off his tongue.

“Trouble was, we couldn’t find you,” Frank said, turning back in his seat again and facing Vince. “We tried every method of skip tracing known to man. So do you know what we did?”

“What?”

“Several things.” He brought the old photograph of him and Vince out and held it up. “We scanned this into a computer and with the aid of a sketch artist I know, he aged your picture to make you appear as you might look now.” Frank grinned. “Scott was pretty damn accurate.”

Vince managed a small grin.

“Next, I remembered you were good in math and sports. I thought this would be a long shot, so I checked at the local universities and colleges first. Our plan was to search colleges and universities statewide, but I thought I would try California first, since it seemed the easiest thing to do. I had them compile a database of alumni from the years 1985 to 1992, years I figured you would be attending college if you enrolled, and I asked them to pay close attention to math majors, computer science majors, and accounting or business management majors. I also paid attention to those students that excelled in sports or maybe gained sports scholarships. The database spit out a list, and Mike and I narrowed it down to several hundred thousand candidates.” He laughed. “Quite a lot, I know, but it didn’t take us that long to go through it. We obtained school photos and began comparing, which helped whittle down the list. And we found a match right away. A University of California at Irvine alumni by the name of Vincent F. Walters, graduating class of 1988. From the small town of Lititz, Pennsylvania where he had previously lived with his mother, Maggie Walters.”