“Randall Oglesby, get your ass down these stairs this minute, or I'm going to shotgun that damned computer of yours myself.” This time it was his dad's voice, half-kidding as usual.
And if Helsinger 2051, the single pure point of light, the only armed warrior left to defend against the darkness, were to die under Mercer's talons and fangs tonight, no one would shed a tear for him, for Randy or for ROT out there in the ether of Netland. Nor would any river of remorse flow for Helsinger if the so-called authorities who'd turned a deaf ear to him were to catch him here tonight. They would imprison him for killing the monster's bitch who'd served Mercer's contemptible and banal needs tonight. No one would come to his cell or argue against the State's right to destroy Helsinger, who would endure yet another execution.
So Helsinger ran to the beat and command of Randy's fingers.
He ran without regard to direction or circumstance, the running and the whipping of branches and cold air across his face making him feel alive and strong and in control. But soon he found himself faced with having to ford a stream-no way around it, no footbridge or stones to skip over.
The black and icy liquid instantly filled his shoes, immediately numbing his toes. He raced on for the darkness of a deeper wood, a smile of triumph curling about his lips until it became a full-blown laugh.
“Killed your whore, you son of a bitch! Killed and gone!”
Still Helsinger's exaltation was tempered with his disappointment. He'd wanted to see the beast itself killed, see Mercer squirm under the metal arrow where it should have impaled him against that wall. He'd wanted to follow up Mercer's instant demise with an assault on the vile nest where this bastard thing slept, to destroy anything that moved in the large house that Master Mercer had come to own through the foul means of his true profession.
Helsinger had also wanted to rob Mercer's lifeless body of its head, to bury the damnable, disgusting thing somewhere out here below a cross of stones so that there would be no way Mercer's reanimated body could touch it or dig it up to replace it and start over again…
But everything was ruined now. Helsinger was caught and returned to his pit. Placed in chains in an asylum, thumping his head against an unforgiving, unyielding stone wall, wondering how he might escape again.
The screen erupted with the colorful game logo: a dungeon with several people of each sex chained to walls, an ancient, blood-weeping medieval rack in the center of the room, a little computer-imaged male squirming up and down under the pressure of a stake being driven into his chest. In bold red lettering blinked the words HELSINGER's PIT. Below this came the name of its creator, copyright junk, and the software company's name and logo. Randy waved good-bye on the modem to Razor Oreo Teeth, knowing full well that ROT was long gone, signed off, and finally remembered to breathe, and that his parents were anxiously waiting for him downstairs for supper.
“Damn! All's in ruins now! Off with Mr. Squeegee's head!” the thirteen-year-old shouted as he raced from his room and down the stairs to a chorus of ignored shouts from his parents and sister. “'Stead of carvin' the ham, Dad’ll carve me up, punishment for letting Helsinger down and letting the greens get cold!”
TEN YEARS LATER
7b4LTclass="underline" \C42111\Category 42… Topic 49LOG… Message 388… Mon… July 8 1996… 12:10:01
Questor 1… Helsinger's Pit…
Qclass="underline" There is a problem. Cain has risen anew and has flown from the 13th Kingdom. The demon must not be allowed to escape. Take all necessary precautions and take as much help as you require. Good luck. Questor 1. END TRANSMISSION Category 42…Topic 49LOG… 12:12:06
Category 42…. Topic 49LOG…. Message 389… -Mon-July 8, 1996
…. 2:51:00
Questor 2…. from the Pit…
Q2: Agreed. Taking all resources necessary. Will locate alien being in Star Kingdom 49th realm. The creature was nurtured there. Will seek and destroy. Reply this board at 0100 tomorrow.
END TRANSMISSION, Category 42, Topic 49LOG… 2:52:01
Category 42…. Topic 49LOG — Mon… July 8, 1996…. 9:13:07
Questor 3…. Out of the Pit….
Q3: Count me in Q2-Close to your destination. Can rendezvous midnight usual place. Q1's communication and your message clear. In numbers we have strength. We go now to return with the head of the beast to place at the altar. Q3 is your dedicated servant-Look for us tomorrow in a new realm, sage one.
END TRANSMISSION….Category 42… Topic 49LOG…Mon July 8-1996…9:15:02
ONE
HOUSTON, TEXAS, THIRTY-FIRST PRECINCT JULY 12, 1996
A reality check for most people meant a closer look at their social or economic situation, but for Lucas Stonecoat, reality was a demon god capable of inflicting great and lasting pain; for him and for most cops, reality was the prism through which violence shone. Reality also spoke to Lucas Stonecoat in her unfriendly, unsettling, judgmental tone, lecturing him, telling him what he was physically capable of and what he was physically incapable of. True to character, Lucas had chosen to ignore the bitching reality and her advice, going ahead with his life and his plans as best he could, from crutches to standing on his own two feet and learning to walk again, and now this triumph.
To some it didn't seem like much, but for him, stepping from the Houston Police Academy and into real police work for the second time in one life meant something, a rebirth of sorts. Regaining some semblance of control over his life again, getting it back on track after the high-speed chase and accident resulting from a shoot-out in downtown Dallas, might've been reward enough, but returning to active police duty? This might be considered a miracle by some, and for him it meant true accomplishment and closure. And he'd done it despite reality, despite the fact that at one time everything-including his own body-was adamantly against his ever even walking again, much less finishing the grueling training he'd endured these past months in Houston's top-flight police academy.
Still, reality just sat there atop his head, and it began to seep into his brain, to stain his mind with an ugly gray truth: Lucas “Cherokee” Stonecoat was no different from the other 999 new recruits hired by the city-just another rookie in training with the Houston Police Department, which meant a long ladder of rungs to climb to regain detective status. But at least he had a dream, even now at his age, to regain what had been his before the accident, before the mangled and brutalized body ever existed.
Still, such minor things as God Reality remained his enemy, along with God-awful Pain, and his own body, which daily conspired with the other two against him. As a result, the tiresome phrase “I am my own worst enemy” held special meaning for Lucas.
Nowadays when someone called him Redskin, it referred less to his Texas Cherokee heritage than to the burn that snaked along much of his neck and cheek on the right side of his otherwise handsome face.
The accident had even taken him down a peg or two in stature. A tall man at six feet four, he rose now to perhaps six feet two, thanks to the condition of his spine. “Lucky to be alive; unusual, startling case; one for the books,” the doctors had chorused.
A cursory glance at his own medical records, collected up at the request of his lawyer when he went after the city in the ill-conceived suit that had put him on the defensive ever since, had turned his stomach. The same records had convinced at least one young medical resident to change his career path. The records showed a man near death when he was raced to the ER in the back of a police squad car that he'd bled all over. The records showed a man not expected to live, much less recover. The records also showed that he was partially to blame. The records showed in cold black Anglo lettering what had happened to a once proud and arrogant man.