Chapter 14
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Back at the office, we filled everybody in on what had happened, and I asked Sophia to contact Seton.
“See if you can help,” I said. “Maybe you can get any hits or visions off of Dan-Dan. This guy’s had more than just a scare. It feels like part of him is missing.” I shuffled through the mail, putting aside two letters that I had to answer myself.
“PTSD can alter the brain structure. Trauma leaves lasting effects, mentally, emotionally and physically. Trauma can literally trigger off certain chronic conditions because of the hypervigilance.” Carson finished off his coffee.
We were sitting around the table in the breakroom, as usual.
“True that,” I said. “Well, it’s been a productive day, as much as we can hope for. Saturn agreed to talk to my father again and try to smooth things over. Orik, if you would call Lazenti and tell him what went down on that front. I’m just glad that he’s out of there now.”
Orik nodded, frowning. “Speaking of trauma, what are we going to do about Give A Hand Up? Somebody needs to put a stop to Appleberry. I’m willing to pay him a visit, if need be. His family line should end with him.”
“I agree,” I said. “But we have to do this in such a way that we’re not targeted by the cops. They don’t trust us at any rate, and we don’t want to give them a reason to take things further.”
“By the way, Destiny called while you were out,” Carson said.
“What did she want?” I asked.
“Well, I asked her to look into Mark Ryles’s disappearance.
I didn’t tell you because I didn’t know if she’d have time.
She took a look and said that his employer has replaced him, and they don’t want to say anything.
The company’s extremely tightlipped, but she doesn’t think it’s because they know anything.
Apparently they’ve had problems in the past with fudging the laws on hiring practices.
Now, they try to keep as far away from the cops and the Washington State Department of Employee Relations as possible. ”
“So we’re back to where we were. No sign of Mark anywhere —”
At that moment, my phone rang. I glanced at the caller ID, surprised to see it was Destiny. “Hey, we were just talking about you. Nothing bad,” I said.
“Well, I spoke too soon when I talked Carson. I don’t know exactly how to tell you this, but we kind of found Mark.”
“Can I put you on speaker?” I asked.
“Of course.”
I put the phone on speaker and we all leaned in so we could hear her better.
“All right, we are all listening. Now, you said you kind of found Mark?”
“Well, part of him.” She sounded like she didn’t even believe herself.
“What do you mean?” Carson asked.
“We found… How can I say this? We found his skin.” By the disgust in her voice, I had no doubt she meant what she said. I just didn’t understand it.
“Skin? Um… What exactly do you mean?” I asked, not sure if I really wanted to know.
“You know how a snake sheds its skin and leaves the outer layer behind?”
“You aren’t saying that Mark…” Sophia paused, glancing at me with a horrified look on her face.
“Yeah. We found a Mark skin suit. Drippy, wet, and kind of slimy. It’s like the top of his head open up and everything inside just crawled out.
All that we found was the outside of his body swimming in his clothes.
Actually, I hate to say it, but a 12-year-old found him.
Luckily a cop was nearby and he heard her scream.
Nobody knows what to think of it at all — it’s just freaky as shit.
There’s a ton of speculation on what might have happened, but I can tell you that the medical examiner is stumped.
I talked to him a little bit, because my boss sent me out on the case.
He says he’s never seen anything quite like this.
It’s not like somebody took a knife and skinned him alive. ”
“You mean there’s no sign he was killed?” I asked.
“Right. It’s just like whatever was inside of him isn’t there anymore.
Like he deflated.” Destiny sounded as bewildered as she was disgusted.
“Nobody needs to know this, but I took a couple pictures and I can send them to you. I doubt if this is going to make the news, because this would cause panic, and nobody wants that.”
At that moment all of our phones chimed, signaling that she had sent a picture to us.
Carson brought it up on his tablet so we could all see it.
The resulting view made me rethink the wisdom of eating.
It really did look like Mark had just deflated, like on a cartoon where character is flattened into a two-dimensional figure.
There was a lot of slime, what looked like residual blood, and something that made me think of afterbirth.
“Oh my gods,” I said, breathing softly. “That’s… I don’t even know what to say.”
Carson tapped on the screen, pointing at the head. It did, indeed, look like something had popped open at the top of Mark’s head, allowing whatever was inside to slither out.
“Mark wasn’t a snake shifter, was he?” Dante asked.
I shook my head. “No, he wasn’t. This is beyond disturbing.” Turning back to my phone, I said, “Destiny? Do you have any thoughts on this? Have you ever seen anything like this in your days on the force?”
“No,” she said. “I really haven’t. Even snake shifters, they don’t leave behind sheds that look like this.
You know, dried epidermis, but nothing like this.
Whatever happened Mark, I’m guessing that it was painful.
Maybe a transformation? Like a chrysalis and butterfly?
Or maybe there’s an entire body’s worth of inner organs, muscles, and bones somewhere, waiting to be found. ”
I grimaced. I had no clue what to say next. But Destiny solved that for me.
“I have to go. I’m wiping this picture off my phone and making sure that any trace of it’s gone.
I don’t want to get in trouble for sending it to you.
But I knew you were looking for this guy, and I thought you should know.
He was identified by the drivers license in his wallet. ” Without further ado, she hung up.
“Well,” I said, looking around the table. “This was unexpected. At least we know that he’s no longer among the living—”
“We don’t know that for sure,” Orik said.
“If it was a case of caterpillar/butterfly, then whatever he turned into might be out there walking around. You know, there is one thought I have. Thanks to their neurotoxins, spiders liquefy the inside of their victims. Then they suck them out, leaving a dried husk. What if this is something like that? What if we are facing a giant spider, or spider folk? I know there are werespiders in the depths of the world,” he said.
“I didn’t need to think about that,” I said. The last thing I wanted to do was face some massive spider who was going around liquefying people and eating them from the inside out. Shelob belonged in Lord of the Rings, not in real life.
“This is enough to give me nightmares,” I added.
“Well, what are you going to do? Or rather, what are we going to do?” Dante asked.
“Carson, another lovely research topic: creatures that can liquefy others. Orik, start looking for any other cases like this. Check all the databases, even on amateur sites. And as for me, tonight Penn and I are attending the Tetrachordian Temple meeting at seven-thirty, to see what we can find out. I’ll make sure we turn on our Find Friends app so you can locate us. ”
“Are we going to tell his wife?” Carson asked.
“I don’t,” I said. “I have no idea what the right thing is to do in this case.” And with that, I headed to my office, deep in thought.
Both Give A Hand Up and the Tetrachordian Temple had ended up with missing persons cases.
While I knew they didn’t have a connection, I desperately wanted a basic old fashion monster case that we could take care of by a hunt-and-destroy session.
* * *
When I arrived home, Penn was waiting. She looked a far cry from her usual self.
She had changed her goth rockabilly look for a sad beige sweater, and an olive green corduroy skirt.
She was wearing flats, and had braided her hair back.
She also toned down her makeup so she looked like she could fade into any wallpaper.
I stared at her for a moment then blurted out, “I can’t believe that’s you. You look… Sad.”
“Yeah. This look works for some women, but I don’t feel at all like myself,” she said. “But if we are looking to blend in, we can’t look too self-assured.”
“I understand that. What do you think I should wear?”
She looked me up and down. “No matter what you wear, you look statuesque, but what about that floral caftan in the back of your closet? You wore it when we had that retro Three’s Company party. Remember? You dressed up as Mrs. Roper? Or is that a little too on the nose?”
“I think they’d shove me out of the temple rather than try to recruit me,” I said with a laugh.
“What about if I wear that tan skirt — you know the one. I bought it when I was trying to blend in at the Micro Technia party. I went undercover as one of their HR people?” It had been an odd case, and I hadn’t thought of it in years.
But I still owned the linen skirt and a pale pink shirt to go with it.
“That works,” she said. “Brush your hair back into a loose ponytail, and tone down your makeup like I toned down mine. If you have a pair of flats, wear them. The last thing you want to do is intimidate the guys with your height.”
“Should we eat first? You know I’m apt to spill anything messy on myself.” I scooped up Jangles and nuzzled her fur with my nose. She smelled good, dusty and warm, like comfort incarnate. Murdoch wove in and out around my legs, mewing.