about words
by
The Christ Prescription
Leaving Las Vegas
The newly dead are not silent. They gurgle and twitch with unfinished chemistry. Death does not come with closed eyes and clean bullet holes. There are no heroes to hold the dying.
Sliced open with the skill of a surgeon's knife, 23-year old Dana Skye Sole was eight months pregnant and still quivering with the chemistry of death. Her womb was empty, robbed by her killer of the child she carried; the child she'd put her concert comeback tour on hold for, the idiot cocksman she'd married to keep from bearing a public bastard.
Her body was found in the hallway of the penthouse suite of the Wynn Hotel. I had it from a reliable source, and some crude cell phone photographs taken secretly at the crime scene. There is a very good reason you never hear about murders at the monstrous hotel casinos millions of tourists frequent every year. It's bad for business. It's hard to rent a dead man's room. The Las Vegas police and the casinos have a cozy arrangement that keeps the blood out of the headlines and the quarters flowing into the slot machines. Unless somebody takes a very public plunge from the top of the Stratosphere Hotel you never hear about Sin City's casualties.
In Las Vegas the hotel dead are called "the disappeared" and their passing is handled quietly by casino security. Surprisingly, Sin City is run by Mormons. It's really just a dirty little desert town; a Phoenix with fake eyelashes and falsies. But, the Latter Day Saints dominate the politics and cash registers. When you see new mommies compulsively punching the video poker machines at Ralph's while a kid cries in the shopping basket, you can credit Joseph Smith with keeping the wheels greased.
I spent my nights chasing slaughtered black kids on Avenue B, and my midnights till morning at the blackjack tables swilling White Russians to wash the dry taste of adrenalin from my mouth.
I once watched a guy have a heart attack at a craps table at Binnion's. The croupier never stopped play. Paramedics came in quietly, pitched a little pup tent over him, and pumped his chest till they were sure his losing streak had come to a permanent end. As they wheeled him out, another shooter took his corner, and rolled seventeen consecutive sevens. He walked away with his profit and the blonde at the table that came with it. We all have our winning streaks, but in our hearts we know we can't defeat the mathematics of evil.
Television reporters like me are not allowed in the casino, and are even banished from the sidewalk in front of the giant gambling meccas, unless they resort to some subterfuge. I called the front desk on my cell phone. "I'd like to reserve the penthouse suite for Wednesday." The desk clerk happily complied. I put on a ball cap camera and sunglasses and tried to take the elevator to the 25th floor. It stopped cold at 24. The stairwell was locked and guarded by a couple of guys who looked like NFL defensive ends.
I walked back across the street and waited for a grab shot of the body coming out. It would likely leave the casino tented on a bellman's trolley like a "meals on wheels." I had a live shot to do. Percival Moran from Channel Four was already getting ready for his. Fifty yards away I could see him spit-grooming a camouflage of thin blonde curls over the freckled exposure of his widow's peak. Percival had never been much on questioning the cops. He was a runner and a gunner, and frankly that's what his boss liked and my boss wanted.
We worked the same beat for different stations. It was called the Body Detail. And, hard facts could get in the way of good drama. The idea wasn't a lot different from the old police gazette magazines: lurid detail and lots of it, modernized with a walking standup, a tortured face, and a tear-edged voice. We circled like urban vultures over bloody gang casualties, and inner-city fetuses abandoned in trash cans. We spied like peeping toms into the ransacked bedrooms of bludgeoned coeds, and forced our microphones in the faces of wailing fathers who had just watched their children burn alive. The camera insulated you, distanced you like an actor in a TV drama. Murder scenes that would have shocked me on the doorstep of my apartment were muted cinema when I walked in the bullet-proof glow of the camera.
I was scheduled for lives shot on the 5 and 6pm broadcasts of my employer, Channel 12. I took off the cap and glasses to get ready.
"Dana Skye Sole was found brutally butchered on the top floor of the Wynn Hotel this morning. Dead on arrival. Police say so far they have no suspects and no details on the murder." I spoke into the live shot camera. Tape rolled from the studio.
"Action News has obtained these exclusive crime scene photographs from the scene." The video played with the worst brutality of the crime blocked by an editor's black spot. After I signed off, I caught my old friend, the coroner coming out the casino exit of the Wynn.
"How about a little help Jock?" I asked coroner Jock Duvall as he tried to duck away.
"Off the record?" he asked.
"Off the record." I agreed.
"Something fishy about this one Shannon. Sole's baby was stolen from the womb and is theoretically still alive. Never saw anything like it." Jock said. "Call me tomorrow and I'll have something from the DNA."
"Thanks Jock," I said, clapping him on the back and offering him a Kool Filter King to smoke out the stench of death from his nostrils. The sun glinted off the copper windows of the Wynn as I drove away. The scent of tonight's buffet wafted from the kitchen exhaust. The DNA results would shock the world.
Chapter Two
The Pope's Prophecy
Vatican City
At the Vatican they know how the world ends. And it ends under the barrel of a microscope instead at ground zero of nuclear explosion. The little known 5th Prophecy of Fatima is the most closely guarded secret of the Holy See. Three Portuguese peasant children had a vision of the Virgin Mary on the 13th of each month in the summer and fall of 1917. More than a million people witnessed the final vision. Two of the child witnesses died shortly thereafter. But, Lucia Dos Santos wrote down the Five Prophecies the Virgin had given her. The Virgin predicted the Second World War and the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul, and the rise of a godless Soviet Union. But, the fifth and final secret remained under lock and key in the Vatican archives. In September of 2012, the first African Pope, Kwame the 1st, asked the Vatican archivist to bring him the scroll dictated by the Portuguese peasant girl. Monsignor Gregor shivered as his shoes clicked across the mother of pearl marble of the archive vault. He removed the scroll from a sealed tube and deliberately averted his eyes as he handed the ribbon wrapped papyrus to the Holy Father. Kwame's palsied hands trembled as he unrolled the scroll that held the world's most terrible secret. He read the words and set the paper aflame with a fireplace match used to light votive candles. His face drained of blood and the first Kenyan pope turned as white as Venetian alabaster and he clutched his chest. He fell forward into the scorched document. The death would be officially called a cardiac arrest. But, Monsignor Gregor would always say that the horror of being human killed him. The only man who knew how the world ends would take his secret to the grave.
Chapter Three
Who's Your Daddy?
In Las Vegas, there was ten a.m. news conference the following morning. The coroner began by giving the ghastly details of the star's murder. "The surveillance camera that would have shown the crime or at least the placement of the body had been disabled with chewing gum by someone who obviously knew what they were doing.
A round of questions about the killing and the baby's fate were rifled from the crowd.
"Have you determined paternity?" my archrival from CNN Percival Moran asked.
"No," Jock said, "so far we have no idea. We're investigating everyone she partied with eight months ago, before she went into rehab."
"What about the weapon?" my ex-wife Sylvia shouted from the crowd.
"The killer apparently used hospital instruments like a professional. There was a fatal wound to the vena cava. The baby appears to have been removed with forceps. Whoever did this knew what they were doing and the missing baby seems to have been the target. We believe the baby was smuggled out with a bellman's food tray. We found remnants of blood on a silver service in the kitchen."
"Pictures from the crime scene show Dana's ring finger severed at the second knuckle. Any idea what that means?" I asked.
"I can't comment on crime scene photographs," Jock answered.
"And what did you find out from the D-N-A?" I followed.
Jock took a deep breath and put an unlit cigarette in his mouth.
"DNA shows Dana Skye Sole was not the baby's mother."
He walked away from the podium as the press corps let out a collective gasp.
Chapter Four
The Director's Cut
"Shannon the F-B-I's Los Angeles bureau is taking over the case because they think the fetus has been transported across state lines." my news director Oscar Delcarrio said. "I want you to fly there and follow the story." My cameraman Kinclow Jones and I boarded a red eye for Burbank a few hours later and caught four hours sleep. Director Vlad Badinoff was furiously finishing the day's shoot of his first 3-D movie in smell-o-vision when the phone rang. He listened in rapt silence for a moment then asked. "Are the police involved?" He waited a moment and then folded up the cell phone. He smiled at the answer. Vladhad directed Dana Skye's first feature film. A pop star and a big time director united in a musical fairy tale that flopped at the box office. I had seen Badinoff on the phone in the distance. I expected to be hustled off the set by a couple of Hollywood hooligans. But, When Vlad spotted me he walked up and warmly shook my head. "Shannon Blaine," he said. "I watch you whenever I'm in Las Vegas. I love tabloid news." "Mr. Badinoff..." "Call me Vlad," he interrupted. "Vlad, I hope I won't be the first person telling you, but Dana Skye Sole has been murdered in Las Vegas. Murdered?" he tried to look surprised. His acting would not make the director's cut. Badinoff had made billions on a space epic he directed early in his career. He was rumored to be the leader of a Hollywood youth cult. Fading Hollywood starlets joined, went into seclusion, and emerged looking 20-years younger. "She was gutted on the top floor of the Wynn hotel." I continued. "I'm crushed to hear that." He said. "But, you know stars like her are like collies on Lassie. There's always another one waiting in the wings. They'll just find another tight tummy and impressive rack on the woodpile. But, still I liked her. She was with child as I recall." "Yes, the baby's missing." "Missing?" "Yes, missing," I said, "the fetus was stolen from her womb." "That's a new twist," Badinoff said I glanced at his left hand and noticed his ring finger had been severed at the knuckle. I studied his dark eyes for a hint of recognition. "Any lead on the killer?' he asked. "I would think hotel surveillance cameras would have a nice snapshot of the hallway." "I didn't mention her being found in the hallway, Vlad." "Just a guess," he said. "The surveillance camera was disabled. "What can I do to help you Mr. Blaine." "Well you knew Dana Skye. I wondered if you might know who would want the baby bad enough to want her dead." "A mad fan? Like John Lennon's killer. Her stupid husband. A vindictive record company. A rival climber jealous of Dana's ink in Page Six of the New York Post. Trust me Mr. Blaine. Money puts a bull's-eye on your back." "I noticed in the photographs her ring ringer was amputated at the knuckle. Like yours. Any idea why?" "This conversation is over Mr. Blaine. Good luck to you and your inquest." In the studio parking lot I bumped into the woman I still loved, an enchanting young reporter named Sylvia Garcia. Our relationship had ended a couple of years ago in an awkward lurch. "Sylvia, what are you doing here?" I asked my heart racing and my palms sweating." "Shannon you aren't the only one who can spot an obvious connection." She walked away like I wasn't there. My cameraman, Kinchlow Jones and I climbed into the live truck. Blue Oyster Cult's "Don't Fear the Reaper" was playing on the dinosaur rock station when he turned the ignition. CHAPTER 5 WITHOUT MELISSA I flipped the radio receiver to KNX Newradio. The bourbon cured voice on the radio reported that the Shroud of Turin, believed to be the burial shroud of Christ had been stolen. The shroud currently on display at the L.A. County Museum of Art was a fraud. Theshroud had been the subject of rancorous scientific debate. Some scholars claimed it contained the negative image of Christ as he ascended to heaven, others maintained it was a clever hoax from the MiddleAges. The latest carbon dating put the shroud's antiquity at almost exactly the time of Christ's crucifixion. We drove back the L-A F-B-I headquarters and started feeding the evening's package on the Sole murder. I would be on satellite with the anchors at Channel 12 for tonight's show. That was generally a badge of honor for a reporter with a big story. But it always spooked me because that had been the setting for a story that still haunted me. 10-years ago a child molester was stalking the valley and we came across a crude video of the pedophilac Casanova in action. The sex act was cut out in editing, but we wanted to mask the little girl's face so she was not identified. We were rushing to air and the editor failed to black out her face. I never had a chance to preview the piece. Her identity was immediately revealed to millions of people. Melissadisappeared hours after that report and was never heard from again. Some believed she had been kidnapped by the suspect molester, who also disappeared at about the same time. Others though she ran away after the shock of seeing herself on television. Five years after the fact Melissa's mother told me I was the father. A one night stand I did not remember from my blackout drinking days. I honestly did not remember her. But, I kept a faded snapshot of Melissa thumb tacked over my desk to remind me that judgment should always trump expediency when it comes to journalism. Tonight I would tell the story of Dana Skye's in the plasma monitor next to venerable anchorman Tom Hoyers. I read my intro. "The shocker from today's news conference is that the baby the starlet carried was not her own." The edited piece ran without incident. Hoyersand his co-anchor Christina Martinez glanced in shock at each other in shock as the intro wasread. The package ended and I tagged on camera. "For God's sake, Shannon how was the baby not be hers? I've never heard of a case like this." I hear Tom Hoyersin my earpiece and watched in themonitor as he shook his salt and pepper hair in disbelief. "Neither has the coroner Tom. He says it the strangest turn any case has taken in his 30-years on the job. The only explanation is that Dana Skye carried someone else's baby in her womb." CHAPTER 6 PRIVATE PARTS My ex-wife Sylvia Garcia hair sprayed a raven forelock out of her emerald green eyes. The toggle light went on in her live shot camera. She was standing just feet from me outside Sole's Hollywood Hills compound. A blue kidney shaped pool glistened behind her and was the foreground for a spectacular view of the city. I met Sylvia when she was on the way up and I was on the way down, I had fallen from the City of the Angels and she was just a slick agent away from scaling the heights of Los Angeles. "One of the strange coincidences of this case is the strange amputation of Dana Skye Sole's ring finger, she spoke into the camera. KNBChas been investigating a youth cult allegedly tied to famous movie director Vlad Badinoff. File tape rolled of the midget movie director barking out orders on the set of his now famous space epic. His fat, Slavic face looked angry in his scaled down director's chair. The pictures cut to a close-up of Dana Skye's severed finger from the crime scene. Shannon had slipped her the shot from his cell phone video. "The Sole death has been declared a homicide and kidnapping, and the F-B-I has taken jurisdiction because they think Dana's unborn child has been transported across state lines, which makes it a federal case. What we don't understand is why a 23-year old music star would get mixed up with a cult that claims it has a youth serum. And even stranger, why the coroner would say D-N-A shows the baby was not hers. Sylvia had been surprised at her reaction to see me again. She had been his intern during the summer when Melissa Summer's face had been exposed on television. I think she still felt a bittersweet love. She once told me when she saw me it reminded her of the fall seasons during her college years, when a cooler breeze and a smaller sun signaled the hopeful start of a new school year. "Thanks for the ring finger shot, Shannon." She said with her heart pounding inside her chest. "Not a big deal. I love you." Shannon said and kissed her on the left cheek. Sylvia stepped away and pulled out her cell phone and called her source inside the cult. "Why would Dana Skye be taking the youth serum?" Sylvia asked into the phone. "She's only 23." The mysterious baritone on the other end said. "There's something bigger going on Sylvia. I think Dana Skye is part of a much bigger experiment. I don't know exactly what. But our leader says we are engaged in an experiment that will change the world." CHAPTER 7 THE CHOSEN In unmarked Quonset hut on the movie set, director Vlad Badinoffstood half fearing and half admiring the stolen child. The experiment had grown from a dark spot in a Petri dish, into a viable embryo, suspended in a life giving fluid, and then transplanted into the womb of one of the world's most famous stars. The second coming of Christ would arrive via movie trailer instead flaming chariot. The cloning had been much easier than stealing the shroud. The midget movie-maker stood on his tiptoes and peered down on the incubator with a beatific smile. Monitors to the left and right of the infant beeped and blinked with life. "Mr. Badinoff, how can you be sure that the right genes alone will guarantee that this tiny thing will grow up to become the Christ?" "That's the beauty of it." Badinoff said to his tall tuxedoed butler Alfred . "It's like one of those straight to video movies. The box office is already in the bank. What breathing believer wouldn't pay top dollar meet with the child who could be Christ?" "I suppose you have a point." Alfred said. "Still it seems like one of those bearded lady freak shows at the county fair." "Trust me Alfred, millions of pilgrims pay thousands of dollars to walk on the dirt a dead Christ might have traveled. What do you think they would pay for a one-on-one audience with the Savior in the flesh? A Savior who could guarantee eternal life? Alfred this experiment is foolproof. If the little bastard turns out to be a shadow of Jesus it will just be gravy." Just as Badinoff go down from tip-toes, the bedside monitors went wild. The EKG had flat lined. Vlad sputtered a desperate command. "Find a doctor CHAPTER NINE THE MESSAGE At 7 P.M. Shannon drove through the honking Hollywood Boulevard traffic and took a hard right on Sycamore. The air stank of fluid from dollar dry cleaners and the scent of pizza and French fries from the food stands on the Boulevard. The sound of a heavy metal band rehearsing shook the concrete catwalk of his apartment building. It was a new structure on old land, and the sound of settling of the concrete at night woke with cracking noises that sounded like the start of an earthquake. He reached his second floor door in the cement tenement he had rented to cover the story, and as he started to turn the key he heard the bark of the long-haired dachshund he had brought along for company. He noticed an envelope Scotch-taped to the door. He was sure he had paid the rent, but the envelope read "Shannon." He opened it and his blood ran cold. The note said, "Find the killer and you find Melissa. Fail and she dies too." Shannon had long since given up hope that Melissa might be found alive. His head pounded with migraine pain and his stomach turned sour at the thought of her living in captivity for all these years. He stepped into his disheveled studio and sat down on the futon. Maxinne jumped into his lap and licked his face with enthusiasm. He loved her more than he loved most humans. He tore open the plastic wrapper on a pound of ground sirloin and gave her a bite while he looked at the note. It was printed on parchment in red, mismatched fonts. The author could only be talking about the killer of Dana Skye Sole. The phone rang and he put the receiver to his ear and started to say hello, but he was interrupted by a recorded voice that sounded like a digitally spliced Vincent Price. "We hope you understand our message Mr. Blaine." The voice said. He did. Loud and clear. He hung up the phone and checked his caller I-D. The number read 666-666-6666. He dialed Sylvia Garcia's cell phone. . CHAPTER NINE IN THE BELLY OF THE BEAST The produce warehouse doubled as a rave venue for the Ecstasy inclined kids who flocked there on Friday and Saturday nights. Tonight, entry was discrete, in the rear of the building through a weathered pair of double doors that used to be the loading dock for fresh fruit and vegetables for the San Joaquin Valley. Sylvia had tipped off Shannon that cult members wore an outfit similar to a Muslim burkha. It covered the body in black from head to toe, except for small slits for eyeholes. Anonimity was key to the cult's survival. Exposure would provide fodder for the Tinseltowntabloids and expose its more prominent members to a scrutiny that could wreck their careers. He wore gloves with his ring finger folded in the matching slot on the gloves to give the illusion that he too had been through the signature amputation. Two muscle-head guards in matching burkhas were stationed on either side of the double doors and hardly glanced at him as he walked into the candlelight ceremony. Dark organ music began on the purple lit stage, Wagner's "The Flight of the Valkries." Two leggy stage models in abbreviated burkha tops carried something in a black blanket to a guillotine in the very center of the ceremony. A small dark figure entered stage left and placed the package in the notch in the guillotine. The organ struck a thunderous cord, the blade drop, and what sounded like a babies cry issued from the instrument of death. Blood dribbled down the wood grain case of the guillotine. A chant went up from the crowd. "By the blood we are renewed. By the blood we shall live forever." Shannon felt like vomiting. He was dizzy and confused by what he had just watched. The assembled audience then ritually circled the blanketed object like the swirl of pilgrims in Mecca. Each communicant dipped their amputated ring finger a catch basin below the sacrifice and then, with their hand under the hood of their burhka, and dabbed it on their forehead like Catholics on Ash Wednesday. Shannon dashed from the building, puking as he ran. CHAPTER 10 APOCALYPSE NOW? Monsignor Gregor Primo boarded the Vatican's private jet on a red-eye flight to Los Angeles. The white smoke signaling a new Pope had poured from the chimney of St. Peter's Basilica just hours before. The new Pope. The first Russian,took the name Potemkin the First. He had immediately dispatched Gregor to investigate reports that the shroud of Turin had been stolen. The Vatican had its own secret service that rivaled Israel's Mossad for efficiency . Gregor would have to walk a fine line between disrupting the prophecy or fulfilling it. He knew only that the theft of the Shroud signaled the Second Coming of Christ. The prophecy painfully reconstructed from the scorched parchment set afire by the late Pope Kwame, only allowed that the Savior's vehicle of return would involve Man himself. Gregor was greeted without ceremony by the Archbishop of Los Angeles as his plane touched down at L-A-X. The two men shared the two handed handshake of Catholic prelates. "We have intelligence that the Shroud may have been taken by a cult that promises eternal youth to its parishioners." Gregor told Cardinal Sanchez. "To what end?" Sanchez asked the Monsignor. "To return Christ to Earth for the Second Coming." The archbishop lit an unfiltered cigarette and stared intently at his visitor. "So we have entered The End of Days?" Sanchez asked. "Perhaps," replied the Archbishop. "The last article of the Fatima prophecies was left scorched by his late Holiness. The future of mankind hangs by that burnt thread." "The services of the Diocese are at your command Cardinal," the archbishop replied. "I am afraid we may need a power greater than that," said Gregor as he reached for the cigarette proffered by the archbishop. CHAPTER 11 WILD ABOUT HARRY FBI special agent Harry Lukjack was not happy about the new case he had drawn. He had eight more months to retirement and did not need a media morsel like the death of Dana Skye Sole screwing up his last hurrah. Lukjack looked loosely like an agent, but his cheap blue suit sat higher on one shoulder and he forever chomped on a half burned cigar as though daring the Bureau to stop him from smoking. One leg was shorter than the other, giving him a pronounced limp like Chester on Gunsmoke. Lukjackhad already had a call from a reporter that gave him a headache. Shannon Blaine was good and persistent enough to rub a blister on even the most tolerant investigator. At midnight he was still motoring through the murder book that arrived on his desk less than an hour ago and could not divine any clear "person of interest" who had reason to murder the pop star. Certainly no one interested in killing her in such a public forum and then stealing her unborn child. He wasn't even sure legally if the unborn child was technically kidnapped. His eyes were drawn to the amputated ring finger and the ritual pose the body had been left in. Lukjack had heard vague rumblings in the Bureau about a cult of youth worshippers who underwent amputation as a rite of initiation into a strange new religion. Hollywood had always worshipped youth, but this was the first time he could recall someone having made a religion out of it. The cult was also rumored to have strange connections to a spurious cryogenics lab that froze the heads of the dead, most notably Walt Disney, and Ted Williams. Talk radio fodder for a crusading paranormal late night disk jockey named Scott Tell. On top of that the Vegas cops had been notably reticent about the murder. They washed their hands of it after conducting a very cursory investigation. But his well advanced pity party was interrupted by a late night knock at his office door. The bureau's best profiler let herself in after two raps on the wooden entranceway. Dominique Duvall was a striking woman with long red hair, a fulsome bust line, an hourglass waist, and a splendid pair of poles poking out from a skirt that was dangerously short by FBI standards. "Caught a hot one, huh Harry? she asked as she glided down into the schoolroom chair opposite his desk. She crossed her legs in a slow, seductive ballet of the lower limbs. Harry tried to avoid staring, but was not sure he pulled it off. "Yeah. Something about the murder doesn't add up. In one of the most secure hotels in one of the most secure cities in America, a young woman with the best bodyguards money can buy is trussed like a turkey in front of a surveillance camera, and nobody has any idea what happened. "Believe it or not Harry murder is the second leading cause of death for pregnant women." Dominique replied. "Remember the Lacy Peterson case and how long it took to bust her husband for her death?" "Yeah, but nobody even knows who the father is on this one. Or the mother either for that matter. You heard the coroner say the child did not genetically belong to Sole." "There's something special about that baby that we don't know. Someone went to a hell of a lot of trouble if they just wanted to steal a child. I'm thinking artificial insemination with some very special seed." The profiler looked at Harry with her big green eyes. The phone rang just as Dominique finished her phrase. Harry listened for a moment and then his face went ashen. "Another pregnant woman sliced open," he said. "The baby missing again." "Let's go," Dominique said as Harry buttoned his jacket. CHAPTER 12 DRAWING THE DEUCE Shannon heard the 187 call go out over the scanner. The location was a slope over Lake Hollywood in Griffith Park. KABC was out of position covering the missing shroud news conference. Their assignment desk called me on the radio to ask me to run it, but I was already on the way. "No hurry." The gruff voice on the two-way said. "This one's not going anywhere." At 10am on a weekday the winding road to Lake Hollywood was deserted except for a few suburban Silver Lake joggers, a few serious 10-speeders, and a handful of gay cruisers lining up for anonymous sex in the public toilets. My cameraman, Kinchlow Jones, floored it through the daunting series of curves and probably gave a few bicyclists heart attacks, but we beat the first patrol car to the scene. Up the slope I could see the still uncovered body. It was nude, appeared to be female, and that was about all I could tell at a distance. We scurried up the hillside to get a few grab shots of the nude body, we'd never be able to use. When we reached the top, every hair on my neck got an instant erection. Another young girl, this one a stunning brunette, with soft brown eyes rolled back in her head in the rictus of death. Aboveher still slight hips, she had a breathtaking pair of store-bought breasts; 38-D's at least, beginning to fill with the milk of motherhood. Her slashed placenta lay beside her on the grass, with no sign of the infant she carried. Special Agent Harry Lukjack pulled up in an unmarked FBI car and a team of LAPD Homicide detectives screeched to a stop behind him. I watched as they climbed the hill in slick black shoes, using the sagebrush of the cliff side as makeshift banisters. Lukjackand I had had a run in during the disappearance of Melissa Sommers. He had asked me not to speak with her. I ignored his advice. Since that day he had blamed me for her fate. Lukjackglared at me as he crested the hill. A light rain had begun to fall and he nearly tumbled on the last step of the climb. "See you got your press pass back, shithead." Those were his first words to me in 10-years. I extended my hand in a gesture of truce but he did not take it. Lukjack stomped off to the unmarked car where he sat making notes in the narrow light of the rear-view mirror. I called the assignment desk. We just drew the deuce. The pregnant murders just went serial." CHAPTER 13 DIAPERS AND DAGGERS Father Gregor watched from the top floor his room at the Bonaventure Hotel as the deadly smog painted a spectacular bright orange and periwinkle sunset across the Los Angeles skyline. He had poured a brandy from the mini-bar and lit a cigarette to steady his nerves as he stood on the balcony, waiting for a call from the Vatican's chief scientist. He had been surprised as a young priest to learn they had a chief scientist, but had long since learned that the Vatican had one of everything. The call would give him a good idea of how much time he had and what dangers he faced. The phone rang halfway through his third glass of brandy and his fourth cigarette. . Monsignor Gregor? the voice asked. Yes. Gregor answered. Is this a secure phone? the Germanic voice continued. No. Gregorgave him the reversed digits of his satellite phone, as was customary, and opened the communications briefcase as the hotel phone clicked off and the terrestrial phone began to chime. Helsling, what are we looking at? he addressed the scientist by his last name. Well, it's complicated. the German said. Bruno, the Pope's personal emmissary did not fly five thousand miles to feed the pigeons. I know its complicated. What do you know? the testiness in his voice was part brandy and part fear. Gregor, the child, as you know ,is a genetic clone from the stolen Shroud. ? Helslingsounded tentative. The markings on the Shroud, we believe are a negative image of Christ as he ascended to heaven. Yes? Gregor drummed his fingers nervously. This was not going to be pleasant, he thought. We are afraid, Bruno continued? Rather we don't know the impact of that negative charge. Meaning what? Gregor was losing his patience. Meaning we don't know if the child is the Christ or the Anti-Christ. So do we kill it, or do we worship it? Gregorasked. We recover it Father. It must be watched carefully, and watched soon. Helsling said. With God's help, we will do our best? He clicked the phone off and dialed the Vatican's Secret Service. Dimitri, he said. We'll need daggers and we'll need diapers. Bring both. Not sure which we'll need. CHAPTER 14 DOWN WILL COME BABY, CRADLE AND ALL Inside the movie production hut the flatlined infant had begun to breath normally again. An aging doctor who used to write dexedrineprescriptions to the stars hovered over the child as the midget director's butler administered a bottle like it was a live hand grenade. A beatific smile of contentment spread across the baby's face. The doctor studied x-rays from the portable machine Vlad Badinoff had delivered to the Quonset hut. Well? Vlad asked the question in a troubled voice like a gambler doubling down on a weak hand. It's simply growing too fast Dr. Vick said in his croaky Kissinger voice. He still called himself Dr. Vick even though his license to practice had been suspended years ago. This child is growing at five times the rate of a normal infant. This causes a tremendous trauma to its body. At this rate the child will be as large as an average fifteen year old at the age of three. I've never seen anything like it. Dr. Vick had been working under the table long enough to know not to ask questions. What do we do? Pray. the doctor said. Vladchortled at the idea of a pervert midget praying for Christ. The baby had finished bottle and was slipping into a deep slumber as the midget and the medicine man conferred. I've given it a sedative. the doctor continued. But, I can't guarantee this won't happen again. As a matter of fact it may happen with some regularity. The prospect of the Christ child kicking off before the director could cash in appeared to make Vlad a little nauseous.He slipped the decrepit doctor five one hundred dollar bills. Then I'll need you to be on call at a moment's notice, I have an extra trailer on the lot where you can stay. The doctor stuffed the bills into his dandruff coated suit without protest. Vlad kissed the sleeping infant on the forehead, not like a father kisses a child, but like a superstitious man kisses a rabbit's foot. The doctor stumbled at the door and Badinoff glared at his butler. Alfred, he said. Get the dead man on the phone. It's time to make a deal. CHAPTER 15 DAWN OF THE DEAD Harold Haines had been dead for five years. His disembodied head set atop an array of weezing silver hoses that fed his brain a steady stream of pure oxygen, super-nutrients, and fresh blood in the Arizona cryogenics lab that was now both his home and his prison. Haines was tended by an array of young Scientologists, whom he paid top dollar. They worked in rotating shifts of three, standing watch over the delicate piston that pumped life into the world's latest, greatest billionaire. His face looked remarkably young for his 88-years, 83-alive, two dead, three revived, post-mortem. He looked young because he had traded in organs like some men rotate their tires. The best kidneys from Bangladesh, two hearts, one from a Rio street urchin, another from an Aborigine child whom his parents thought possessed., and lungs from a Hutu marathoner. He even had new skin grown in a sterile silicon chamber in his quest for the one thing that mattered to him, everlasting life. But his best laid plans lay in shambles. The child he had so desperately devised, the child for whom he brazenly stole the world's greatest religious relic, slept in the arms of a stranger. Oh sure, Ted Williams and Walt Disney had their heads frozen too. But they put no more planning into the After-Death than they had the After-Life. They were mothballed two floors down waiting for a miracle. Haines would never leave his revival to chance. The last year of his previous life he had spent marshalling the best science, the best thieves, and the best hit men to ensure that he would be the world's first immortal. A billion dollar award awaited the man who had woken him from his frozen slumber. Now some grifter, with a hot tip, from loose lips had stolen his future. A telephone squawk box had been mounted on a marble pedestal immediately in front of the apparatus that gave him life. It rang at precisely 3:45 AM Mountain time. A dour young Scientologist in a white lab coat pushed the speaker button to answer. It was the call Haines had been hoping for. A digitally disguised voice on the other end spoke after three rings. I've got something you've been looking for. was all it said.