To (Un)Live and Die in Las Vegas...Part 6

So there I was, sitting in the perp chair, waiting for a detective, or someone with some rank on their shoulders to come and talk to me.

It is simultaneously easier and harder to wait patiently in one place now that it was when I was alive. It is easier because I don’t have any of those pesky biological urges that people get when they are forced to sit in one place. I never have to yawn, sneeze, fart, belch, or even take a leak. It is often harder though because without any of those biological distractions, I am left with the racing thoughts of an otherwise undistracted mind. This can lead to running through a lot of different scenarios in one’s head.

As I sure you are well aware of by now, I was never mistaken for a person who had problems with overthinking situations. That was one reason I was pretty good at most sports that I played in my youth, and probably the best reason for why I was a good fighter, both before and during my police career. When you can just free your body to act and react according to situations as they develop, you can become a pretty good athlete, and a great fighter. Often, when you see a great athlete fail in a crucial moment, it is because he is running through all of the consequences of failure or success in his mind, and his thoughts get in the way of his natural, honed abilities to succeed.

I was never a great athlete, I simply lacked the raw talent to excell in any sport, but I was a great scrapper, or fighter. I often took down guys nearly twice my size when they needed taking down. My fearless tenacity and ability to ignore pain allowed me to win a number of fights that even I would have figured I couldn’t win.

But lately, I have found myself more often distracted by my own racing thoughts. It’s almost funny in a way, now that I truly don’t have to fear death, or even pain anymore, I can’t stop thinking about things.

Sometimes I focus on past events, either in my prior life, or events that have happened more recently. At other times, I try to bring some order and sanity to various possible futures, if I take certain actions.

At this moment, sitting in that interrogation room, I seemed to have two simultaneous thought patterns running through my head. On one thought track, I kept thinking back to that bloody suite and how Papa Locks and that monster were able to hide in what must have been almost plain sight and why exactly Drake would have wanted them to make such a mess of things. The second track of my thoughts, was on my possible actions from this point, do I cooperate with the Police and expect them to believe the truth of my innocence? Can I hope that my friends will believe in my innocence as well and that they will do what they can to free me? Are my friends even still alive? Did Papa Locks get to them as well?

I cannot tell you how long I sat there exploring these various thoughts, they don’t allow clocks in interrogation rooms-you want the perps to be divorced from as much reality as possible in those rooms, but I finally came to the conclusion that I couldn’t wait any longer to find out some information on what was going on at that resort.

I opened myself to the Spirit World and allowed my Spirit to slip from my body, still sitting there defiant and stiff, and to slide down the drain in the floor underneath the table. (These rooms all have tiled floors with a slight dip in the center with a drain at the center of the dip--it is much easier to clean up the blood and such with a hose, you know, in case things get rough.)

That drain openned up into my usual entry into the Underworld. I was in my usual form, which looked an awful lot like how I looked when I was alive. I breathed deep the air in the clearing, enjoying the scent of pine and clean, fresh air. The breeze felt so good on my skin. I could standf there and enjoy the feeling of being alive forever, but Ihad people I needed to call and things I needed to find out, so reluctantly, I took of at a slow jog for the meeting place where I usually met John Red Bear.

Within minutes, I was in our special meeting place. I sat down in the middle of that place, crossed my legs and raised my arms and my voice to the darkened sky. I started softly, but gradually raised my voice in that rhythmic chant that John had taught me what seemed like ages ago, the Spirit Call Chant. I don’t know what the words meant, only how to pronounce them, and in what order to recite them. If John could come, he would. But to be sure of some sort of response, I also pictured the images of Herne, Ravyn, the Frau and Cerrydwen, hoping that one or all of them could come to me.

My first warning that tings weren’t going to as well as I would have liked was when I heard the distant howling of wolves. The sounds grew closer and closer as I finished my chant, and the grew silent when I did as well. I could hear the rustling of branches and could just make out the multiple sets of red colored eyes as the shadow wolves padded about the clearing, but stayed just on the outside.

Realizing this did not bode well, I got back up and prepared for a fight. I could feel my body form shifting into my current form in the real world. It was strange, sort of like putting on a suit of armor. I flicked my wrist, and my familiar baton dropped into place. A second flick and its length was extended. I wasn’t at all sure how effective this thing would be against these kinds of foes, but I was ready for action nonetheless.

What I wasn’t ready for however, was that all too familiar cackling laughter of El Diablito. His bony little form emerged from the darkness of the forest edge and he virtually pranced into the clearing. The wolves paid him no heed as they continued to circle without advancing.

“Hee hee,” he cackled. “Do you like my friends Rusty? That is what you are called now, isn’t it my friend?”

“Yeah. Thanks to the shit you and those other pricks did.”

His eyes danced nearly as much as his feet did, “Woo hoo! Don’t you like your immortality Rusty? So many others would give nearly anything to have eternal life!”

“Some life, you prick. What the fuck are you doing here anyway?”

“Ah, so direct. I am fine, thank you very much. We haven’t seen you in quite some time now, and you are missed my son. Drake wants you to come back to us. He has read your words, he feels your pain. Won’t you come back to us now? Can’t we end this little fight between us?”

“Fuck you. I have seen the shit you would have me do. That monster that Papa Locks was dragging around has your fingerprints all over it, you sick bastard. I can’t believe that you would kill so many innocent people just to get me into trouble. Why?”

“Hee hee! Innocent people indeed. Don’t you know my boy, there is no such thing as innocence? Evil lies within us all. It is who and what we are. Most humans deceive themselves into thinking they are good at heart even though they are as evil as the rest of us when it comes down to it. The Darkness Within is what gives us all strength and desire, what drives us to survive in the face of insurmountable odds. It is that which allows you to continue to survive even after my best spells and charms were destroyed! You have such strength, child. Come with me, join us! I will teach you how to harness that Darkness and to become greater than you could ever imagine!”

“You shit, I’m not falling for any damn Join-the-Dark-Side fucking speech. This ain’t no fucking
George Lucas movie, this is life! There are real damn people dying up there, and for what?”

That tirade stopped his dancing. He stopped, turned towards me, eyes locked into mine and spoke with a clear, dangerous voice. “You are right. This is not a movie, there are real consequences to your choices Rusty. If you continue to fight us, if you insist on joining forces with this group you have cast your lot with, they will have to be eliminated.”

“Wait a minute...”

“No, there is no more waiting. You have seen what we are capable of. We have other tools at our disposal that you have not even imagined. If you value these people, these ORCs,” he practically spat that word out. “Then you will stop this nonsense and come back to us now. Otherwise, we will have to treat them as more than the mere nuisance they have been up to now.

“We have had spies in that group for sometime now. We have not had to move against them until now because they were of no real consequence. They are charlatains and apprentices playing at being sorcerors. But since they had been keeping to themselves and hadn’t overstepped their abilities, there was no need to deal with them previously. If you insist in throwing in your lot with them, they will pay a price that you will have caused them to pay. Can your recently found conscience stand that?

“This is your last to save the lives of those dear, sweet people. There will be no more offers, no more subtle messages.”

“Subtle, my ass. Your monster killed eight fucking people. I don’t even know what you want me for, I won’t kill people like that monster!”

“No, we have never asked you to kill, Rusty. We have only killed because we have needed to, in order to save others. Come back to us and your role will be properly explained to you. But be assured, your role is absolutely vital.”

I shook my head, trying to clear my thoughts. “Even if I wanted to join you again, I’m sort of stuck you know. I am presently in an interrogation room at Police Headquarters. I don’t exactly have the option to get up and leave.”

He smiled, the kind of cold, dead smile I that remembered Drake making when he spoke. “If you agree, here and now, to stop this resistance, to come back to us peacefully, all of this will be cleared up quite quickly.”

“How do I know you haven’t already hurt or killed some of my friends?”

“You don’t. But that uncertainty will disappear if you don’t agree. You know all too well how long the process can take with some police departments. By the time you make any headway in that, I can guarantee that none of your friends or their allies will survive until you are freed if you don’t agree.”

“Well, that just leaves me with a real damn choice now, doesn’t it?”

He held out his hands to his sides, palms up in the way that says, ‘So what?’

A moment of silence passed, before I decided to play along, at least for now. I took my baton and tossed it to the side, still within the clearing, but no longer in the middle, where I was. I looked around at the still circling wolves and then back to El Diablito. “Alright, I’ll come back. I promise to behave this time. I’ll do anything you ask, as long as I don’t have to kill anyone.”

He smiled, this time with what seemed like genuine affection, “Very well then. Return to your body and wait there. Someone will come for you soon and release you to the custody of another FBI Agent. Go with that agent, he is an ally of ours. He will take you to a warehouse where you will be given further directions. But be warned, if you resist in any way, or bring any danger or unwarranted attention to our operations, you will be neutralized but only after we destroy the ORCs.”

“Yeah, yeah, I got it.”