24 Declassified: 10 - Head Shot Read online

  Neal rose, saying, “He’s clean. Of weapons, that is. He smells like he hasn’t had a bath in a long time. No wallet, keys, or identification of any kind.” He nudged the shaggy man in the ribs with the toe of his shoe, none too gently. “Get up. And no tricks. Try anything funny and I’ll shoot you in the knee.”

  He said to Jack, “I don’t like guys with knives.”

  Jack said, “I don’t blame you. That’s some knife, too. A real pigsticker.”

  Neal’s shoe toe prodded the shaggy man’s ribs again, harder. “Come on, get up.”

  The shaggy man got on his hands and knees, shaking his head to clear it. Neal had him covered with the .357, so Jack holstered his pistol, fitting it into the shoulder sling. He still held the knife.

  The shaggy man groaned, rubbing the back of his head where Neal had clipped him with the gun barrel. He rose unsteadily to his feet, swaying. Neal came up alongside him and put the arm on him cop-style, using his free hand, the one not holding his gun, to grip the other firmly just above the elbow, steadying and steering him.

  Jack flanked the shaggy man’s left side but otherwise let Neal handle the play. He was a visitor, a guest, while this was Neal’s home territory. Let Neal have the credit, if any, for bagging a suspect, if the shaggy man should prove to be one. Neal was right about one thing, though; the man was no Zealot. The Zealots’ dress code ran to jackets and ties for the men, obedient to their guru Prewitt’s admonition that they should always be mindful of making a positive appearance of neatness and cleanliness on the public at large. The shaggy man looked like a tramp, a hobo.

  Neal said, “Come into the light and let’s see what we’ve got.” He and Jack hustled the shaggy man around the corner of the mess hall, across the north face, and around to the front of the mess hall. The captive lurched forward with a shambling, shuffling gait.

  A wooden platform something like a plank sidewalk made a kind of apron along the east face, serving as a kind of unroofed front porch. A lamp mounted over the front door shed a yellow cone of light.

  Neal sat the shaggy man down on the platform under the light. The shaggy man rested his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands. His long hair fell over the front of his face like a curtain. It was the color and texture of a steel wool scouring pad.

  Jack eyed the hunting knife under the light. Its finish was dulled with dark patches, not of dried blood but of rust. He pointed it out to Neal, quietly and out of the hearing of the shaggy man.

  Neal nodded. Then he went to work on the captive. “Look up when I’m talking to you.”

  The shaggy man lifted his head up out of his hands. His raggedy iron-gray beard reached down to his collarbone. It had the texture of a bird’s nest. He didn’t show much skin between the hair on his head and his face, and what did show was seamed, weathered. Bloodshot watery gray eyes were tucked into baggy pouches between a wide, flat-bridged nose. A threadbare flannel shirt was so grimy that its original red-and-black-checked pattern could barely be made out. A pair of denim bib overalls hung in place by a single shoulder strap; the other was broken.

  Neal said, “Who are you? What’s your name?”

  The shaggy man said, “Lobo . . .”

  “Lobo? What kind of a name is that? Lobo what?

  What Lobo?”

  “Just—Lobo. That’s what everybody calls me. That’s been my name for as long as I can remember.” A confused look came over his face. “Which ain’t all that long . . .”

  Lobo rubbed his face with his hands like he was scrubbing it, trying to rub some feeling into it. Fear stamped his features. He looked up at Jack, Neal, said, “Don’t! Don’t kill me!”

  Jack and Neal exchanged glances. Neal said, “What’s all this talk of killing? Nobody mentioned killing but you.”

  Jack chimed in, “You’re the one with the knife.”

  Lobo said, “I was scared, I didn’t know what I was doing!” He rubbed and chafed his right wrist and forearm. “You like to busted my wrist when you kicked it, mister. It hurts awful bad.”

  Neal was unsympathetic. “You’re lucky you didn’t get shot pulling a stunt like that. Anyway, the hand’s still working. I don’t see that anything’s broken.”

  Jack said, “You pulled that knife quick enough.”

  Lobo said, “To defend myself. I thought you were some of Them.” The way he said “Them,” you could practically hear it being capitalized.

  Jack said, “Them?”

  “The devil men!”

  Neal scoffed, “That crazy talk won’t buy you anything. You’re sane enough, so talk sense. And make it quick.”

  A shift came over Lobo’s features, firming them with stubbornness. He looked down, not looking Jack or Neal in the face. He muttered, “I know what I saw . . .”

  Jack said, “What did you see?”

  Lobo looked up now, staring Jack in the face, studying him. He blinked repeatedly, his watery eyes glimmering. He came to a decision. “Nope. You ain’t one of Them.”

  Jack pressed, “One of who?”

  Lobo stared Neal in the face, coming to a quick conclusion. “And I know you ain’t one of Them. You got a mean face, but not as mean as they got.”

  Neal said, “Who’s Them? Damn it, man, speak out plain!”

  Lobo said, “Them devil men.” Tension fled from his face, his expression sliding into slack- jawed relief. “Huh! Maybe you ain’t going to kill me after all?”

  Jack said, “We’re not killers.”

  Lobo pointed out, “You got guns.”

  “To defend ourselves. Like you with your knife. You’re not a killer. You just wanted to protect yourself. Against the devil men.”

  Lobo grinned, bobbing his head in agreement. “That’s right! Now you got it. So can I have my knife back?”

  Neal said, “Don’t get ahead of yourself.”

  Jack said, “You don’t need a knife, Lobo. We’ll protect you against the devil men.”

  “So you say. But it’s easier said than done. They got Satan’s power working for them.”

  “Remember the Psalm, Lobo: ‘I will fear no evil.’”

  “You would if you seen what I saw. That’s why they want to kill me.”

  “What did you see?”

  Lobo shook his head, sadly. “Can’t tell.”

  “Why not?”

  “If I do, they’ll have to kill you, too. Nobody is safe who knows the truth.”

  Neal, fighting down impatience, said, “We’ll take our chances.”

  Jack said, “They’ll want to kill us anyway for siding with you, Lobo. So you might as well tell us. The more we know, the better we’ll be able to help.”

  Lobo tilted his head to the side, as if listening to unheard voices. “You may just have something there . . .’Course, bad as they are, the devil men ain’t the worst. Oh no.” He leaned forward, with an air of one about to impart some great truth. “It’s those hog-faced demons you really got to worry about!”

  Neal, dangerously calm and soft-spoken, said, “Hog- faced demons, is that right?”

  Lobo nodded vigorously. “The gospel truth. The devil men, they look just like us. Like anybody, only more mean- faced. That’s how they can walk among us. Two of Them have been dogging me all day, back in the hills. That’s where I live, all by myself, in a little hidey- hole I got fixed back up there.” He gestured toward the sandstone formations. “Ain’t nobody can find me in the rocks if’n’ I don’t want ’em to, devil men included.

  “But I got hungry. I ain’t had nothing to eat for two days. There’s a hole under the fence that I slip right through sometimes at night. I sneak up in back of the kitchen here and raid them Dumpsters for what I can find. Lawd! The food that these here camp folk throw away would feed an army! Perfectly good food, meat, taters, bread, vegetables, sometimes even cake!” He smacked his lips at the conclusion of the recital.

  Jack prompted, “Camp folk? You mean the folks living here in the compound?”

  Lobo nodded. “T
he very same. It’s like a church camp, an old-time revival meeting, the way they’re always getting together and listening to that ol’ preacher of theirs. He’d come on the loudspeaker and jaw to ’em for hours at a time and they’d just be a-setting there in the campground, taking it all in. Hoo-whee, how that man could talk! ’Course, it was way over my head, I couldn’t make no never mind of it. But they seemed like decent enough folks, what I seen of them.”

  His face fell, becoming despondent. “Not that it did ’em any good in the end, though, not when those hog-faced demons came to drag ’em all off to hell last night.”

  Jack said, “It happened last night, you say?”

  “Yes, sir! As I live and breathe. It was only by the purest luck they didn’t get me, too! I come sneaking around when the moon was low, like I always do when I plan to do me some Dumpster diving. I was up in the rocks when I seen it, a green fog coming out of nowhere and covering the whole camp.”

  “Green fog?”

  “Green as pea soup, sonny! Damnedest thing I ever seen. Right off I knew it wasn’t natural, wasn’t nothing that comes from God’s good earth. It rose up out of the east and in less time than it takes to tell, it grew into a great big green cloud that rolled right over the whole danged camp and just set on it. Like to froze me in my tracks at the sight of it! I stayed up in the hills to marvel at it and a good thing, too. Else it would have got me, along with the

  rest of them poor souls.”

  “The camp folks, the people in the compound.”

  “None other. They was all sleeping, I reckon,

  tucked up tight in their bunks when the green cloud come up on ’em. Like a thief in the night, just like the Good Book says. That’s when them hog-faced demons showed. Lawd, they must’ve been vomited up straight out of the gates of hell! You never seen nothing like it, nobody ever did—and pray that you never do!

  “Hog faces they had, big ol’ long snouts sticking out and big bug eyes a-goggling and staring! Hog faces and the bodies of men! And here’s something for you to think on: they didn’t come a-riding Satan’s lizards or flying in on bat wings, no sir. They drove up in cars! Cars, mind you, just like normal everyday folks out for a moonlight drive! Now, don’t that beat all?

  “Then all hell broke loose. Them hog-faced demons fell on those poor folks like badgers on a warren of baby rabbits. It was something awful. They just waltzed right into their cabins and houses and carried ’em away. There was screaming and shouting and shooting and all kinds of unholy racket going on. I’m surprised they didn’t hear it over to the next county.”

  Neal said, “You saw all this?”

  Lobo’s expression was patronizing, almost pitying. “I’m telling it, ain’t I? The green cloud covered most of it at first, which was a mercy, but it thinned out and broke up pretty quick, so I seen most of it. The worst of it, sure, when the demons dragged those poor souls out into the open, herding them like cattle to the slaughterhouse. Some they killed straight off, gunned ’em down—seems funny, don’t it, Satan’s minions using firearms to do the Devil’s work here on earth? Guns and cars? Makes sense when you think about it, though. Who better than Lucifer to make use of the modern ways of destruction? No back number him, he’s up-to-date!

  “The demons loaded every last one of ’em, man and woman, onto that blue bus. A blue bus! Them hog-faces got back in their cars and the blue bus and they all drove off straight to hell! Not before they almost got me, though. Like I said, that green cloud lifted mighty quick and I got antsy to see what was happening. I got a mite careless and showed myself up on the rocks and one of them hog-faces sees me and starts taking potshots at me! Came mighty close, too, but my guardian angel must’ve been working overtime and the demon missed.

  “After that I faded back into the hills and made myself scarce. ’Course, Satan don’t give up that easy. That’s why he sent two devil men into the hills today to ferret me out. I reckon those hog-faces can’t walk around in the daylight. The devil men, though, they look like anybody else, only meaner than most, like I said. That pair was a couple of two-legged rattlesnakes in tandem. Not that it done ’em any good. Trying to track me down in my own hills! Shoot, I seen ’em coming from a country mile away. They were combing the rocks all day until they got tired and went away.”

  Nobody spoke for a moment. Neal broke the silence at last, saying, “That’s some story.”

  Lobo said, “Every word of it is true. The proof’s in the pudding. Look around you. Where’d everybody go? If I’m lying, where’d they all git gone to? Tell me that!”

  He looked Neal in the face, then Jack. “No answer, huh? I didn’t think so. Well, that’s about all of it there is to tell . . . Say, you boys wouldn’t happen to have anything to drink on you, would you? I was stone-cold sober last night and I’ll swear to it on a stack of Bibles. But I sure could use a drink right about now and I don’t mean the non-alcoholic kind, neither. Something with a kick to it. This talking is mighty thirsty work.”

  Jack said, “Sorry, no.”

  Lobo said, “Figgers. That’s my fool luck working against me.” He brightened. “Still, it was working for me pretty good last night, to keep me from getting tooken!”

  Neal took a cigarette from the pack and put it between his lips. Lobo looked up hopefully, said, “You wouldn’t have a smoke to spare, would you?”

  Neal gave him a cigarette. Lobo said, “Thank you kindly.” Neal flicked on his lighter, holding the flame to the tip of Lobo’s cigarette until it got going, then lighting up his own. Jack instinctively looked away while they were lighting up, to avoid totally cancelling out his night vision.

  Jack said, “Didn’t you see the police searching the

  compound all day, Lobo?”

  “Sure, I seen ’em.”

  “Why didn’t you come down and tell them what

  you saw?”

  “Mister, I make it a practice to keep as much distance between myself and the law as possible. I got no hankering to go back to the state hospital again so the doctors could treat me like I was sick in the head.”

  Lobo took a long draw on his cigarette, exhaled a cloud of smoke. “Some of them cops had pretty mean faces, too. Could’ve been devil men for all I know. I sure wasn’t going to put myself in their clutches. I laid low until they packed up and went home and I stayed low until that pair that was dogging me in the hills got tired and went away, too.

  “Even then I didn’t show myself for fear of the hog-faces coming back by night. It was getting late and the moon was low and they still hadn’t shown, so I took a chance on breaking cover and coming down into camp to see what I could scrounge up. I was getting powerful hungry, my belly was all twisted into knots. I made my move and that’s when you fellows showed up and turned on the lights. I ducked down among all them garbage cans to hide. I was afraid you was gonna search back there and I wanted to get away before you did only I made too much noise and gave myself away.”

  Lobo smoked his cigarette down to the nub and tossed it away, the bright orange-red tip making a tiny splash of embers when it hit the dirt. He looked up at Neal. “Could I trouble you for another of them smokes?”

  Neal gave him a fresh cigarette and held the lighter until Lobo got it going. Lobo said, “Much obliged. You fellows cops?”

  Jack said, “No.”

  Lobo nodded, as if confirming a previously held notion. “Thought not. Cops would’ve already been whomping on me, beating the piss out of me for drawing my knife, even though I was scared and just trying to defend myself.”

  Jack said, “We’re government men.” Neal looked at him sharply, unsure of where Jack was going. Jack went on, “We’re part of a top secret outfit set up to investigate satanic crimes.”

  Lobo cackled, “I knew it! Like the Men in Black.”

  “We’re the Anti- Beast Brigade.” Jack was straight-faced, serious. “You’re an eyewitness to what happened here, the only eyewitness. We’re going to take you to a safe place where the devil men c
an’t get you and you can tell your story. You’ll also be able to get cleaned up and get a hot meal.”

  “I ain’t so big for cleaning up but the hot meal sounds all right. You think maybe I could get me a drink or two?”

  “I can’t make any promises but we’ll see when we get there.”

  “You’ll put in a good word for me, won’t you? About that drink. After all I seen last night, I sure could use one!”

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  “Let’s get out of here then. I don’t mind telling you that being bird- dogged by those two devil men day and night kind of got me spooked. I won’t mind putting some distance between me and Them.”

  Lobo rose, standing up. His sudden movement undoubtedly saved Jack’s life. Shots cracked; Lobo pitched forward, slamming into Jack, knocking him off his feet.

  Jack was still holding Lobo’s knife in his right hand and he twisted sideways to keep Lobo from impaling himself on the blade as the other lurched into him. He needn’t have bothered because Lobo was already dead, killed by that first shot. But things were happening too fast for Jack to make sense of it all.

  They both fell tumbling in a tangle of limbs to the mess hall’s wood- planked porch. Jack lay on his left side, with Lobo sprawled half across him.

  Jack glanced up in time to see the top of Frank Neal’s head explode, spraying blood, bone, and brain matter. It meant instant neural extinguishment, the cessation of all thought and reflex motor action. The body dropped like a stone.

  A bullet hole showed in Lobo’s upper back between the shoulder blades, marking the shot that had brought him down. His dead weight pinned Jack to the boards. Jack let go of the knife and started wriggling out from under him.

  Lobo’s body spasmed violently under the impact of a second round thudding into it. The shot had been meant for Jack but hit Lobo instead. Jack clawed out his pistol.

  Two figures stood in front of the men’s barracks north of the mess hall, barely a stone’s throw away. One had a rifle and the other a handgun. A patch of gun smoke like a small, puffy ash-gray cloud hung in mid-air in front of the duo. The rifleman stood with the weapon held at his shoulder, swinging the barrel to get a clear shot at Jack.