Darkest Heart (7 page)

"Who is it?" The voice speaks before the lips move, like that of an astronaut circling the moon. Although I can see the tattooed man thanks to the digicam mounted on his computer monitor, he can't see me.

"It's Sonja," I reply, identifying myself.

The bald man's broad lips pull into a wide smile. "Sonja! Long time no see - so to speak."

"Back at ya. How's the virtual world treating you, Webhead?"

He shrugs bare shoulders covered in spider-web tattoos. "I was scheduled for a second trepanation, but the dude who was going to drill me got cold feet."

"Bummer."

"Yeah, but you didn't log on for small talk. What do you need?" He reaches off-screen to retrieve what appears to be a defused mortar shell.

"What do I always need you for?"

"Besides the hot monkey sex?" he leers, firing up the bong.

I snort good-naturedly. It's part of our ritual banter. "In your nightmares, kiddo! I need a search done -

newspaper archives, police databases, the discussion groups that cater to true crime and serial killer buffs, that kind of thing. I'm looking for unsolved homicides involving decapitations. Oh, and filter out those with known sexual assault."

Webhead lifts an eyebrow, his interest piqued. "Time frame?"

"The last five years."

"You want me to charge it to the Swiss account?"

"Sure."

"You got it. I'll beep you when it's ready."

The PIP disappears, signaling our business transaction is at its end. I log off and stare at the blank face of the laptop's display for a long moment. There is no guarantee that Webhead will turn up anything of any real use to me, but it would be a start. Whoever the mystery man I ran into in the alley might be, it's clear he has his moves down. And you don't get that smooth without practice in the field.

I yawn and strip off my leather jacket, draping it over the back of the chair, one of the few pieces of furniture in the loft I've made my base of operations. Its getting harder for me to locate suitable space to crash out in during the day - most of the old warehouses are in the process of being renovated into yuppie condos.

I kick off my boots and drop onto the old mattress that serves as my bed. The ticking is stained and torn, and there are no bedclothes. Not that it matters. I never feel cold.

The ache in my shoulder pulls at my consciousness, urging me to surrender to the petite mort. I can already feel my blood pressure dropping, plummeting like a stone hurled down an empty well. My heart slows its beating. My lungs fold in on themselves like paper lanterns. I close my eyes, only to be swallowed by the dreamless void, and I am still as death and...

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) The sun is down.

I know this because my eyes are open again. I lay there, flat on my back, my hands folded in repose atop my breastbone, and wait for my heart to resume its pumping. I emerge from death, as easily as another woman would climb from a bath, feeling rejuvenated and restored. The pain in my shoulder is gone, the bone completely mended, the flesh bearing only the slightest trace of a scar.

I reopen my laptop and find an email with an attachment awaiting me. The file Webhead has compiled keeps the printer busy for over an hour. Most of it consists of archived newspaper accounts of badly decomposed bodies found in ditches, but that's not all.

There's a series of articles from the Portland and Seattle papers detailing "ritualistic" murders committed in 1995 by a killer dubbed the "Headhunter" because of his (or her, as the reporters were Politically Correct enough to point out) removal of the victims' craniums.

An unusual aspect of the Headhunter's killing spree was that all but two of the victims remained unidentified, and those two had each been listed with Missing Persons for several years. The killings, which transpired over a four, month period between several major metropolitan areas in both Oregon and Washington, ended abruptly in April of 1995. To date, the seven murders remain unsolved, the cases still open.

In May of that same year, three murders occurred in Chicago, the modus operandi bearing an eerie similarity to those in the Pacific Northwest. These slayings were attributed to the so-called "Head-Man."

In the spring of 1996, Toronto was terrorized by a faceless killer known only as the "Skid Row Butcher,"

who took the heads of four victims in the span of six weeks. During 1998 and most of 1999, several headless bodies were found at rest areas along major Eastern Seaboard turnpikes, although the various investigative agencies involved didn't connect the murders.

Of far greater interest to me are the FBI files Webhead hacked into. While local law enforcement never saw a pattern amongst the various slayings, the same did not hold true for the Feds. Although J. Edgar's boys never announced to state and metropolitan law enforcement agencies that a serial killer with over twenty notches on his belt was on the loose, that has not kept them from compiling a dossier. The Bureau's codename for the killer is "Harker."

I skim over the Bureau profiler's by-the-numbers assessment of Harker's make-up: white, middle-aged, male, above-average intelligence. So what else is new? The autopsy reports on the victims are far more interesting. There's a marked similarity in the forensic evidence in every case. Some of this uniformity is due to the manner in which the bodies were mutilated, but that's not the only reason.

Despite the fact the victims vary greatly in sex, age and race, all of the bodies proved so badly decomposed upon discovery it was impossible to tell what mutilations were done before or after death. The only thing the forensic reports say for sure is that each victim was shot then decapitated. The link between the various killings lay within the ballistic report: silver-jacketed .38 slugs were retrieved from each and every body, and it was the Bureau's opinion that Harker himself had manufactured the ammunition.

The fact that the killer could afford to have bullets made using precious metals placed him far outside the Bureau's normal experience. At this point two Special Agents, a man and a woman, were called in to help expand the investigation. Reports written by these Special Agents show a mixture of bafflement and grudging respect for Harker, not to mention an undercurrent of genuine disquiet. However, the agents'

apprehension didn't appear to be generated by the acts of the killer they were investigating insomuch as by the background information they uncovered about the victims.

Shortly after the Special Agents filed their reports, a memo from high within the Bureau ordered them to withdraw from the case and to keep the existence of Harker secret from the public and, indeed, all other branches of law enforcement.

This last bit does not surprise me in the least. I've long suspected that select officials within the FBI and CIA, along with their opposite numbers throughout the globe, know the truth about the monsters of ancient legend who walk unnoticed, if not exactly unseen, amongst humankind. It's much easier, and far safer, for those who know the truth to look the other way whenever possible, blaming the growing incidences of missing children and unsolved murders on anonymous serial killers rather than werewolves and vampires. Whether these high-ranking politicos are acting in the best interests of the human race, or under orders from inhuman masters, is another question altogether.

I take the printouts and carefully feed them into the only other technological luxury I have allowed myself: a crosscut paper shredder. As I watch the hard copy of the FBI files turn into confetti, I have no doubt in

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) my mind that the stranger with the white hair and the Bowie knife who shot me is their so-called

"Harker." But who he is, and why he's dedicated himself to hunting vampires is another matter... one I intend to get to the bottom of.

* * * *

frequented by minions - those debased humans who had willingly enslaved themselves to the undead.

There were numerous postings from the likes of "NecroPhil" and "renfield236" reporting sightings of a mysterious female who was rumored to be a vampire slayer of great ability. Given that she was often spotted in different cities on the same day, he had assumed the Blue Woman was nothing more than an urban myth; a post-modern folied deux, similar to the mass hysteria that birthed the Satanist Daycare Trials of the last century. Especially, considering how unstable minions tended to be, it was reasonable to assume the Blue Woman was nothing more than a punishing mother projection born of psyches tortured by subconscious guilt.

The minions spoke of her the way children whisper of the bogeyman, and for good reason. According to the reports, the Blue Woman was Anglo, African-American, and Asian. She was tall and short, fat but thin. Some even claimed she was a pre-op drag queen. She was all of these things, yet none of them; all the descriptions were equally valid and equally dubious, since no one who actually laid eyes on her ever survived to tell the tale.

The very mention of the Blue Woman scared the living shit out of those who trafficked with the undead.

Knowing the power of myth, he doubted much of what was credited to her was true. But then again, he had also assumed she wasn't real at all until the night before.

He had to find some way of meeting her. Granted, she might not want to renew their acquaintance, considering that he'd put a bullet in her. Still, he had to try. This was the first time he had crossed the path of a fellow vampire slayer. And it was possible she might know something about the whereabouts of Blackheart. He refused to contemplate the possibility that the Blue Woman might have already killed the vampire. He was determined to reserve that pleasure for himself.

The moon looks down on the park's carefully maintained nature trails, and bike paths with all the warmth and expression of a baked fish. I move through the shadows, heading towards the lake, the liquid heart of the city. As I hurry along, I can make out furtive shadows moving between the trees and shrubbery along the trail. These do not concern me, as I recognize the figures haunting the dark to be more of a distinctly human, and decidedly carnal, nature.

In the moonlight the water looks as black as oil. A huge weeping willow hugs the bank, its verdant tresses dipping into the moonlit water, like a longhaired woman peering at her own reflection. A frog, startled by my passing, leaps into the water with a splash. I part the green curtain and step inside the natural canopy.

The willow's inner sanctum is darker than the night outside, not that it makes any difference to my eyes.

"Jen?" I find myself whispering, even though there is no need. "Where are you?"

"At your service, as always, dear cousin."

I tilt my head upward in the direction of his voice. Jen is nestled in the crotch of the tree, feet dangling in mid-air, grinning down at me like a laterday Puck. I wonder how he managed to scale the tree wearing five-inch platform heels.

Jen is slight of build, standing no more than five-seven, with graying hair kept in a medusa's coil of braids decorated with ceramic beads. With his heavily mascaraed eyes, matching rouge and lipstick, skin-tight crushed velour pants, and pectoral of gaily painted finger bones about his neck, he looks like a demented transvestite Peter Pan.

"I have a use for you."

"All things have their uses, even those of us trapped between the natures," he replies, smiling flatly.

"I seek a man."

Jen rolls his eyes and grins lewdly. "So those rumors I heard about you are true, eh?"

I choose to ignore his remarks. "He is a stranger to me. He is in his late twenties, early thirties. His hair is long and white and he keeps it in a ponytail. He dresses all in black and favors western clothes. I'm talking Johnny Cash, here, not Garth Brooks. He carries a pistol that shoots silver bullets, a Bowie knife with a silvered blade, and there are silver caps on his boots. I want you to find him and tell him that I wish to parley."

Jen shifts about uneasily. "What matter of man is this stranger?"

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"He is a hunter."

His eyes narrow. "A hunter of men?"

"A hunter of those who were once men."

Jen's eyes go from gun slits to open windows. "Have you lost your mind?!?"

"Don't argue with me! Or would you rather go without a protector?" Jen scowls and quickly looks away, but does not reply.

"Answer me! Do you serve me or not?"

Jen turns back to face me, his voice tight with rage. "You know I must serve you. I have no choice."

"That's bullshit! There is always a choice."

"Not amongst those born damned."

It is my turn to fall silent. "Forgive me, cousin. I misspoke." I lower my gaze in ritual shame.

Jen nods slightly in acceptance of my apology, but does not look me in the eye. After a long second he finally returns his gaze to mine. "Are you sure this is the course you wish to take?"

There is something in his voice that gives me pause. I stare hard at his face. It is as immobile as a kabuki mask, save for a slight tremor at the corner of his left eye. In the years since we first met, I have learned to read Jen as easily as I once read dear, deceiving Chaz. I can see he is hiding something from me. And the cold black thing coiled in the back of my brain knows exactly what it is.

"You know who this man is!" The words drop from my lips like heavy stones. Jen shakes his head in adamant denial, his braids clattering like wooden wind chimes. "I never said such a thing!"

"You didn't have to," I reply. "Who is he, Jen?"

"Honest, Sonja, I - "

I yank him out of the tree so that he lands on the ground face-first. I bring my boot down hard on the back of his neck, grinding his mouth into the grass. For the briefest of moments I contemplate breaking Jen's neck, but quickly force the thought from my mind.