The Department of Hate - A Love Story (21 page)

“The gardener has vanished. When I went to see him the second time he was a nervous wreck, white faced, shaking. He looked like he’d seen something come up out of Hell itself. He wouldn’t sign anything, denied everything. Now he’s gone.”
Boone was thinking out loud

“Bennet couldn’t have got to him. We’ve had him locked up.”
Jones replied

“Yes Sir, and there’s more.”
Boone looked at him wearily

“Go on
.” Jones continued to explain

“You saw the original videos. Very grainy. Old cameras. We could make out figures, not much more.”
Boone was impatient

“Yes, get on with it.”
Jones hesitated; he knew how DCI Boone would react to the next bit

“The videos have come back from the lab - enhanced. On most of them there’s nothing now. But on the one showing the actual murder, well ... have a look.”
The scene was already displayed on one of his screens. He selected play. Boone watched it carefully.  His face tightened but he said nothing. Once it stopped he stood there for several minutes, rage barely contained. Jones waited. Finally Boone snarled

“That’s just great, so now we’re looking for a fucking midget.”
Watching the tape had been very difficult for him. As he’d said to Jarrod he’d known Elizabeth all of her life. She had been childhood friends with his daughter Louise – and had often visited their home. He’d been here for twenty years and had seen her often, watched her grow up. To see her kicked to death like this was almost overwhelming.  But he was still certain that Bennet, the fuckhead, had something to do with it. But he wasn’t the killer. They would have to let him go – at least for now.  As he walked towards the doorway leading to the interrogation rooms Detective Jones called out again

“Sir, one more thing
.” Boone turned and waited.

“What the fuck now?”
Jones spoke slowly

“Someone from Scotland Yard called.  They got a copy of the videos. They want to talk to you. They have a large number of related cases, hundreds apparently. Same suspect.”
Boone was surprised. That might mean something. But for now he had something else to do – something vastly unpleasant. He replied

“That’s just great too.”  Then he went through the doorway.

When he got back into the interrogation room Jarrod was sitting on the chair. Jarrod looked up at him calmly enough. Boone thought to himself

‘
Smug little prick.’
But what he said out loud, however reluctantly, was

“All right you can go, we’re dropping the charges
.” Jarrod looked back at Boone, surprised. Boone stared back at him. He continued

“But we’ll be watching you. You can be sure of that.”
Jarrod was curious and wanted to ask more but then thought better of it and continued to keep his silence.  He rose to his feet. Boone wondered if he was the sort to try to create trouble. He asked, sarcastically

“Any complaints about the treatment?”
Jarrod replied casually

“No, no harm, no foul. I hope you do far worse to the real killer when you catch him
.” Boone looked at him.

“Hm
m, so you say. Be sure we will.” He paused.  “I have to say you are taking all of this very, ah, rationally.” It was a question – he was still suspicious. But Jarrod just shrugged.  Boone pointed to the door.

Jarrod’s wallet, keys and phone were returned to him. He left the police station. He called a cab and headed for the nearest subway. There was clearly no point in going back to the Collins’ house. Detective Chief Inspector Boone was completely mistaken about his state of mind. Inwardly he was seething with rage, he’d never been so angry   – but he’d deemed it prudent not to express it openly. That this miniscule, irrelevant piss ant little piece of dog shit had had the authority and the audacity to actually knock him around was simply inconceivable. Jarrod was being completely rational, though not in the way Boone conceived it. It was a question of short term versus long term. One always had to defer, at least temporarily, in the face of overwhelming force, or the threat of it. He had managed to keep a straight face but this asshole was on his permanent shit list. And if there ever was any way the fucking little bastard was definitely going to pay.

Chapter 17 – The Plains of Desolation

Jarrod and Cassandra were slowly making their way across the Plains of Desolation.  They had been walking for many hours and the Infernal City was now just a faint smudge on the horizon, far behind them.  The terrain was flat and dead, mostly sand and dirt, scattered rocks, nothing living. There was no sun but the sky was a bright screaming yellow in colour, sick and distressed, angry and burning. The heat was intolerable. Asmodeous had warned Jarrod that the Plains of Desolation was the abode of the permanently insane and on its far edges the realm of ancient and savage Gods. The further they travelled the more they felt a rapidly increasing and almost overwhelming sense of confusion and despair - fleeting glimpses of desperation and pain beyond any possibility of endurance. The lost, the defeated, the abandoned - crying out, screaming endlessly. They pressed on trying to ignore all of it – focusing instead on their one small chance of escape.

They stopped for a short break, sitting together on a rock, sipping on some of the water Jarrod had brought along. Jarrod checked Paimon’s compass – it was still clearly pointing straight ahead towards what now looked like low lying hills far on the horizon, another day at least. Of course if they did not travel in precisely the right direction and missed the portal they could wander around the plains forever. They would not be the only ones. They could hear others moving about, sometimes directly behind them, or to one side or the other, a movement of air or sand, a harsh whisper or sigh. But if they turned around they could never catch sight of anyone. Cassandra especially was a bit spooked by all of it. She made the comment

“In some ways this is worse than back there.”
Jarrod shrugged

“At least there’s no Pit.”
Cassandra sighed

“Dammed or mad – are these the only choices?”
Jarrod didn’t reply. Only a few hundred metres ahead of them there was a sudden blur of motion and an agonising scream that ended abruptly. Cassandra shuddered

“
Oh no, not again. What was that?” Jarrod spoke quietly

“On Earth it would mean someone just got killed and eaten by someone else. Here, who knows? Much worse probably! We don’t want to find out.”
Cassandra agreed quickly

“No, we don’t.”
They got up and continued on – now more painfully aware than ever of unknown movements behind and around them, strange sounds, hostile intentions. They expected to be attacked at any moment. But the hours went by and nothing happened. They walked on and on endlessly, forcing themselves, constantly reminding themselves that there was simply no alternative.

Night, or what passed for night on the Plains, arrived suddenly. The sky went black and the temperature dropped rapidly. Asmodeous had warned Jarrod to stay down during the night. The freezing cold would be the least of their concern. The insane were more aggressive at night and would attack – and it wasn’t just humans who lost their sanity and fled onto the endless plains of despair. Jarrod and Cassandra didn’t say much at first. They made their way to the nearest cluster of rocks and found a space in between the two largest which provided some sort of cover. They unrolled a blanket and lying down together wrapped themselves in it, drinking some more water, catching their breath. Jarrod couldn’t believe how tired he was and he could easily see that Cassandra was also. But neither of them wanted to sleep. They would have to take turns anyway – one of them on watch. Jarrod spoke softly

“Do you know what’s really strange?”

“What’s that?”  replied Cassandra.

“Well, we’re in Hell, dead, and yet we still eat and drink, get tired, sleep. There is still day and night. What’s going on?”

“No stars though, no moon.” Cassandra replied.

“Yes you’re right, it’s almost pitch black. Some light from somewhere but not much”

“No Sun during the day either” Cassandra added, a little mournfully.
Jarrod put his arm around her and they pushed in closer to each other.

“We’re going to get out of here you know.”

“I wish I could believe it. I haven’t heard of anyone else coming back from the dead, have you?” Jarrod replied with a smile

“Well there was this one bloke – they founded a religion on it.”
Cassandra shook her head and grimaced

“Not funny”.
Jarrod tried again almost whimsically

“The portal is only another day or two away - same one that was used by Aeneas no doubt, it comes out somewhere in Northern Italy.”
Cassandra looked at him unimpressed

“What are you talking about?”
Jarrod realised his mistake

“Just
old stories. But then I thought this whole place was just a story - invented by priests, to terrify and control gullible medieval peasants.” Cassandra replied sadly

“I wish that it was.”  She paused, thinking.  “When we go through the portal do we come out like this? Will we be alive again? What about our – well, you know - our bodies?”
Jarrod had already discussed this with Abaddon.

“Here we’re just a soul. It takes a form its familiar with. So we look the same. Maybe all of this down here is about taking a form we’re familiar with - just projections. I don’t know. But when it returns back up there it will be coated with another material body, same as the old one.”   He stopped to think before adding    “And I don’t mean down here, up there, literally of course.”
Cassandra was sceptical

“How do you know all this?”
Jarrod shrugged

“It’s common knowledge here. Asmodeous told me some of it, the rest I got from Abaddon. That’s just how it works
.” Cassandra wasn’t much impressed by his sources. She groaned

“Well, that’s just great then.”
Jarrod couldn’t see what the problem was. The rules worked in their favour for once. They still had a chance. Jarrod took the first watch. Cassandra somehow managed to fall asleep.

Time passed – Jarrod had no way of knowing how much. The very faint light had gone completely and it was now pitch black. It was bitterly cold. Jarrod was concerned, – he tried to look around but he couldn’t see a thing.  He could feel Cassandra pressed against him, sleeping – warm and reassuring - but this only added to his anxiety. He had to protect them both. He could hear things moving about nearby. Something coming closer. Something big. It knew where they were. It was coming straight for them. Suddenly there was a blinding burst of light and a snapping sound then nothing. Cassandra  woke up with a jolt and sat up beside him. She whispered

“What was that?”
Jarrod covered her lips with his hand. He was absolutely sure they should both be completely silent. They sat there, motionless, waiting, barely breathing. They held hands. Now something else was moving out there. Something. Someone. Then they saw it - a pair of eyes, large, glowing in the dark, impossibly close, predatory and malevolent.  Moving about, looking around.  Looking straight at them, holding its gaze for what seemed like ages, then moving on. They waited for many minutes not daring to move a muscle but nothing else seemed to be near.  Jarrod started to say

“What the ...”
But this time Cassandra shushed him, pressing her fingers across his lips. She put her mouth to his ear and whispered as quietly as she possibly could

“You should get some sleep now, I’ll watch.”
Jarrod lay back down. He couldn’t even begin to imagine going to sleep though he was desperately tired. He lay there, saying nothing, not moving at all, but then before he knew it he fell asleep.

It continued to get even colder through the long and seemingly endless night. They huddled together and slept fitfully, each in turn. Throughout the night one or the other of them on several occasions heard someone in the distance screaming. Each time it seemed to go on and on until it was ended abruptly and not happily. There were several more nocturnal predators. Some came quite close, eyes shining brightly, apparently staring straight at them before abruptly turning about and heading off. Jarrod and Cassandra thought that this was all just good luck. What they didn’t know is that they were being protected and that without this protection they never would have made it as far as they had. Hovering directly above them in the night, unseen by them but clear to any would be aggressor was a glowing pair of eyes, easily brighter and more fierce, larger and more malevolent than any of the others – eyes burning with anger and rage far beyond the ken of mere created beings, alive or dead; the all seeing and all vengeful eyes of the ancient Babylonian god Marduk – with whom Beelzebub had made a deal, a long time ago.

Daybreak was abrupt and they got up immediately. When Jarrod was rolling up the blanket Cassandra made a special point of kissing him good morning. Jarrod didn’t know what to say after that and so just smiled. He was beginning to feel a kind of intimacy he’d never felt before. The terrors of the night faded quickly. With a sense of having survived the worst they set out again on their journey across the plains. Cassandra watched on as he again checked Paimon’s compass and pointed to a spot on the far distant hill. She admired his tenacity and something more - maybe she was falling in love too. She certainly had the feeling that having come so far they would now surely succeed. But they still had a long way to go and another night on the Plains at least. It wasn’t over yet - failure and defeat was always possible.

They walked for hours, the sky still screaming, the ground still burning. Then they saw something up ahead – movement, dust rising. A few minutes later they could clearly make out long rows of people marching towards them - thousands of them, all chanting.  Jarrod turned to Cassandra

“Not good, we need to go around.”
She replied

“Obviously.”
They turned right and started walking as fast as they could, almost breaking into a run, despite the heat. But it was no good. There were more rows of people marching at them from that direction. They turned around and started going in the other direction, left. But there were yet more rows of people coming at them from there. They turned to go back the way they’d come but realised finally that it was hopeless. The marchers were approaching them rapidly enough to overtake them no matter what they did. The rows of marchers from left and right merged with the main ranks coming straight at them. Thousands of them, tens of thousands. As they got closer Jarrod could see their insanity plastered across their faces. Eyes glazed, maniacal demeanour. He could make out the chanting now. They were saying

“All Hail the Sacred Bunny. All Hail the Sacred Bunny
.” Repeated over and over. Ten thousand voices in unison.  He heard Cassandra say

“Well, this is just too much.”
She looked like she could hardly believe what she was seeing. They stood there together, holding their ground, waiting. The marchers came to a stop when they reached Jarrod and Cassandra. They stopped chanting. They also were waiting - with a clear sense of expectation. But waiting for what?

Their leader finally stepped forward. He was a small man but he more than made up for this in intensity. Obviously he was as mad as a hatter but Jarrod couldn’t help but notice a certain slyness and cunning in his manner as well. He was clearly their priest. He stood in front of them, confronting them

“Hail travellers. Do you worship the Sacred Bunny?”
The implicit threat was obvious and Jarrod certainly wasn’t going to fall for that one. He replied quickly.

“Yes, we do.”
The priest smiled back at him smugly, and then slowly and with infinite malice he asked

“Do you follow the left hand paw or the right hand paw?”
He was insistent and clearly dangerous. Jarrod knew he had to answer quickly. He thought to himself

‘Just fucking great. After all we’ve been through there was now a fifty-fifty chance of getting ripped apart by a rabid mob of insane bunny worshippers.’
But before he could attempt an answer Cassandra spoke up, loudly and clearly

“Master, we’re simple folk. We worship the Holy Bunny but beyond that we are ignorant. Please show us the way.”
She seemed so utterly genuine. The priest wasn’t exactly satisfied but would have to accept her answer for the time being. His followers seemed to approve of her. He answered loudly

“Certainly my children. We follow the left hand paw of course. Please join us.”
He motioned with his hands for them to join the front row. They didn’t have much choice and quickly did so. The thousands of marchers then turned around and started marching back the way they’d come. Again they all started chanting.

“All Hail the Sacred Bunny, All Hail the Sacred Bunny.”
Jarrod and Cassandra joined in the chanting also, knowing that it would be folly not to. Jarrod glanced at Cassandra from time to time. He could see that she was highly amused by it all and could barely stop herself from laughing out loud.  He could only think

‘Oh please don’t. Not now. Not yet
.’
He had no desire to see at first hand how the bunny worshipers dealt with heresy or blasphemy.  It wouldn’t be pretty. It never was.