Flesh Gothic by Edward Lee Read online

  "Was there visual?" a woman asked.

  "Yes, a long stream. I'm pretty sure it was active, and I'm positive it wasn't hypnagogic or pompic."

  The other woman again. "Are you sure you didn't touch anyone before you went in?"

  "Who's that?" Westmore asked. "It doesn't sound like Adrianne."

  "It's Cathleen Godwin," Karen said, "the one who claims she was assaulted outside. She's the one you haven't met yet." She pushed the video button. "There."

  Westmore had forgotten. The display screen was now a tiny television, and he could see them all sitting solemnly around a long William and Mary trestle table. A blonde in a soft-green sundress was the one Westmore hadn't met yet. She listened and talked with her fingers steepled, her eyes either grim or very focused.

  Nyvysk sat at the table's head. "All right, so Willis and Cathleen have already had positive contacts. And so have l."

  "What?" Adrianne said, sitting further away across from Mack. "Gauss? Imagery?"

  "EVP, from three different targets."

  There was a long silence.

  Nyvysk continued. "It looks like we've found a charged house."

  "Don't jump to conclusions," Adrianne said, chin in hand.

  "Three out of four? With us?" Willis remarked. "It's hard to be skeptical with a percentage like that."

  "What about you, Adrianne?" Cathleen asked in a way that sounded like a challenge. "Are you going to sit around the whole time you're here, or put that bottle of pills away for a couple of hours and help us out?"

  Adrianne didn't seem affected by the slight. "I did some RV-ing already."

  "And?" Nyvysk asked.

  "Nothing. Just that writer guy. I don't know if I like him."

  Westmore frowned, could hear Karen chuckling behind him. "See what eavesdropping can do sometimes?"

  "There's no reason for her to dislike me, for God's sake," he complained. "I don't even know her."

  "These are some of the most psychic people in the country. They're also the most paranoid."

  "Great."

  "I don't trust that blonde," Cathleen said. "She's a floozy, and I swear she was shit-faced before she even walked in."

  "What did that bitch say?" Karen exclaimed. "I'm gonna tell her to stuff her implants up her-" Karen impulsively reached for the intercom button, but Westmore snatched her hand away.

  "Don't do that," he said. "We'll give ourselves away. I don't know about you but I kind of like the idea of them not knowing we're listening." Now it was Westmore's turn for a laugh. "See what eavesdropping can do sometimes?"

  "That tramp ... " Karen went to pour herself another drink from the small kitchen bar. "I'd like to slap her silly."

  Nyvysk maintained his place as moderator. "Let's stick to business; we're here to do a job, and I agree with Willis. This house is a charged target. But what were you saying, Adrianne? What did you see in your RV?"

  "The writer. He was upstairs, and he found a safe hidden in a wall, but he doesn't know the combination."

  Mack, in the screen, looked dismayed.. "How did you know that?"

  "Trust me

  "That's a good question," Westmore said to Karen. "No one's been in Hildreth's office-Christ, we just left there a few minutes ago."

  "I told you, this is a freaky bunch:'

  "And what the hell did Nyvysk mean? Something about an RV? I got a funny feeling they're not talking about recreational vehicles."

  "It stands for remote-viewing. According to her bio and resume, Adrianne can see things from a distance. She can sit in a room and focus, and then see things in other rooms."

  .Bullshit," Westmore said.

  "How'd she know about the safe?"

  "I don't know. Maybe Mack told her in confidence and that whole thing was a con game to convince the others she's for real. Or maybe-maybe she did the exact same thing we're doing. Watching on the videcom without our knowledge."

  "Hildreth's office isn't wired. No intercom, no camera."

  Westmore shook his head. "Look, I know I can be gullible sometimes but not that gullible. I'm not convinced."

  "I'm not necessarily convinced either, I'm just telling you what's in her bio. She claims she can do the remoteviewing thing, and also some other, freakier things."

  "I don't even want to know ..." Westmore was trying to keep hold of his journalistic roots, blade and white roots. He wasn't ready to even consider anything beyond that yet.

  "I don't even know what she's doing here," Cathleen said at the table. "I think she's just jealous of me. Frowned at me when I met her at Vivica Hildreth's."

  "She's talking about me again!" Karen railed. "Jealous? Why would I be jealous of that over-the-hill whore!" ,

  "Calm down," Westmore said, amused.

  "I've got no problem with her," Adrianne said. "But she drinks too much, that's for sure. When I was RV-ing, I saw her at the liquor cabinet twice."

  "That bitch!" Karen exclaimed again.

  "She's a drunk and a half." Cathleen again. "But somebody answer my question. Why's she even here?"

  "To snoop for Vivica, I'm sure," Mack contributed. "Karen doesn't act like it, but she loves to snoop ... "

  "Prick! Turncoat son-of-a-bitch! Who's he to talk? He's the biggest brown-nose I ever met in my life!"

  Westmore just shook his head, listening.

  "We're getting off track," Nyvysk suggested. "Forget about the others. It's us. The four of us. No offense, Mack, but in this situation you're an outsider, too. The four of us need to make a conclusion. Three of us have."

  Every head at the library table turned to Adrianne.

  "I will. Tonight," she said, as if fatigued or dreading whatever it was she vowed to do. "After midnight's always better." She rose from the long table. "I'm going up now to get ready. I have to be by myself, so I'll use one of the bedrooms."

  "Aren't you going to eat?" Cathleen asked. "The writer and the drunk girl are fixing dinner-"

  "That bitch!" Karen fumed, wobbling with drink in hand.

  "No, no, I never eat beforehand." Adrianne set a bottle of pills in front of Cathleen. "Watch those for me, will you? And I'm sorry about what happened to-you earlier."

  Then she walked shakily, out of the library, leaving them all, especially Cathleen, to their own contemplations.

  "She'll be all right," Nyvysk assured. "She's been doing this for decades."

  Doing WHAT? Westmore thought, irritated.

  "I'm not really hungry myself, come to think of it," Nyvysk said, and rose. "I'm going to start hooking up some thermal units upstairs, and charge the gauss meters. Tell the writer to leave something for me in the fridge."

  What am I, the mansion heuseboy? Westmore thought. On the screen the others were getting up. "Shit, help me," he urged, flicking the videocom off.

  "Huh?"

  "We're supposed to be cooking dinner. Gimme a hand, will you?"

  "Sure," Karen said. "I'm going to get another drink first .. "

  III

  She stripped down to her panties and bra, already aglint with sweat since closing the room's air-conditioning ducts. Higher temperatures, for whatever reason, seemed to aid Adrianne's psychic endowment, her "jaunts," as she would call them. She chose the smallest bedroom she could find on the fifth floor, preferring a base that was cramped because returning from a jaunt felt less wild: siphoning back from expansive and often barely definable perimeters into a relatable containment. I doubt that anyone out there can see me, she figured with some insecurity. Way up here on the fifth story? But she did feel self-conscious about her body. Between Cathken and Karen, I'm the last person anyone uvuld want to peek at. Several lights were on in the bedroom, which afforded her an unwitting glance at her reflection in the oblong dressing mirror: arms and legs too skinny, small breasts, an abdomen losing some of its elasticity. She had no tan, but at least hoped to work on that during her stay. She groaned at her jutting hip bones. The Lobrogaine provided an essential advantage to OBE-ing but one side effect was fa
ster-than-normal fat metabolization; she could eat like a pig but not gain an ounce. Such was her multisided curse.

  That and total abstinence from sexual contact, the only way she could maintain control ...

  The pills she'd left downstairs with Cathleen were strong barbiturates; the ones that remained in her pocket were her secret. She sat on the high four-poster bed for several minutes, breathing slowly, absorbing the room into her senses. As an experiment, she needed to calm herself and fall into what she thought of as her zone. Then she got up, parted the veranda drapes, and opened the french doors, unconcerned by her near-nudity. The hot night rushed in, caressing, bidding more perspiration and the tacky calm she needed. She looked down the vast hill, and saw only dark woods and a yellow moon rising.

  It's time, she thought. She knew she was procrastinating ... and she knew she was afraid. She could sense the house, too, just like the others, but she hadn't said anything because she needed the safety of remaining objective for as long as possible. She turned all the lights off in the room except the small lamp on the nightstand. The room's midnight-blue wallpaper with cruciform symbols of various sizes appeared multidimensional; her Christian roots found solace in them. Next she poured herself a glass of water from the bedside decanter, and withdrew her other bottle of pills.

  Lobrogaine was a psychoactive by text definition, and possessed some minor analgesic properties in low doses. FDA had long-since banned it for fear of misuse, because in unmonitored doses it could produce psychedelic hallucinations and, in some cases, psychosis. The Army's Telethesia Program had adopted it to accelerate the proficiency of persons with Adrianne's talents, citing the benefits for national security outweighed the risks. Adrianne had since become at least psychologically addicted to its morphine-like properties and hence required even more habituating barbiturates to keep functional. "Just remember what you're doing for your country," her clinician at Fort Meade always reminded her. "Psychics like us are pretty much washed-up in the regular world, or condemned to freak-shows and tarot parlors. We save so many lives by using our gifts as we do here." Adrianne supposed he was right, and she also knew that she was flushing her own life down the toilet for her "duty." Now it didn't matter.

  She popped one vanilla-colored capsule and lay back on the bed. When she took the drug she "slipped" out so much faster to the point now that such slips often occurred against her will; hence the barbiturates to counteract the effect. She knew she could go now if she tried but she opted to wait a half-hour for full absorption. She lay in a cruciform shape of her own, toes pointed, arms outstretched, breathing deep and slow. With her eyes closed, her vision was nothing but a scape of dark grain.

  First, she tried some remote-views, easier still. Concentrating on a simple target-thought let her mind's eye start to draw "snaps." It wasn't like an OBE at all; there was no roving, no sense of movement or disembodiment. She thought South Atrium, and then saw it, spotted Cathleen watching television, legs crossed, something clearly on her mind. Then, Kitchen, and saw Karen and the writer busy preparing dinner. She saw their lips move as they conversed-Karen seemed upset about something-but couldn't hear what they were saying. While remote-viewing all she could ever hear was a drone in her head, and her field of vision differed from stereoscopic eyesight, instead more akin to viewing something through a slit. She thought of the several areas she'd seen outside, then "snapped" onto them: the front culde-sac, the back gardens, some of the woodline. At one point she thought she saw a small sports car but nowhere near the parking court; instead it sat as if stowed in the woods. She could see no one inside. Then, further afield, Another car? Yes, an old, long sedan with a landau roof, and some dents. Exhaust from the muffler floated upward, the engine obviously running. A man and a woman inside but she couldn't see their faces. Had she remoted off the grounds? Sometimes that happened. She tried to redirect herself.

  She recalled Cathleen's encounter at the graveyard, and then she saw it: the overgrown perimeter hidden in the woods, surrounded by a spiked iron-crested fence. She saw tilted gravestones, some very old, but even in the dark she managed to read the name on one of them: REGINALD HILDRETH.

  Okay ... Now ... Push, she told herself.

  Down.

  Deeper and down ...

  The "snap" grew murky. She couldn't see.

  Doom. Deeper.

  She was through the ground, she was seeing inside the coffin but nothing plainly visual, just cold traceries of a death-eminence.

  She saw a body but no face.

  Out, out!

  She snapped out, acrawl from claustrophobia. Yeck! She hated seeing bodies.

  One more thing and then she could move on to an OBE; she remembered her first remote-viewing earlier: the writer snooping in the office on the third floor. He'd found a safe hidden in the wall.

  Safe, she thought.

  And there she was, looking right at it.

  Through, through .. .

  Reading tag numbers, street names and addresses, and information on documents and computer screens was the ultimate value of remote-viewing, at least for military and law-enforcement purposes-Adrianne had been trained well. But today she struck out.

  Her vision could detect nothing inside the safe. Just darkness.

  Give it up she advised herself. When she forced her vision out of the safe-an image like a camera in reverse zoomshe saw one last thing: a framed picture that looked quite old, an engraving. In her mind she squinted, and the slit of her viewing field homed in-on an inhuman, empty-eyed face, then lower, to finely chiseled words: MY SELF AS I DARE TO REFASHION THE COUNTENANCE OF MY VISION: BELARIUS.

  The words and the engraving meant nothing to her. It was time to end this now, but the practice had fortified her; she hadn't remote-viewed in a while, and she was glad to discover that she hadn't lost her touch; if anything she felt even more attuned-

  -which would be good for what came next.

  She opened her eyes on the bed, found herself looking straight up at fascinatingly detailed tin ceiling tiles. She brought her hands to her face, then down to her bra'd breasts, her abdomen, and thighs. Sweat saturated the bra and panties, and her skin felt glazed. Heat always invigorated her, and heightened her perceptions further.

  The Lobrogaine had kicked in, it left her smiling dopily. Perhaps it was the drug's most paramount side effect--a greedy satiation much like orgasm-that attracted her most to it. Was she subconsciously using it to replace genuine sexual release? The two weren't the same but this was awfully close, and her dependency made more sense given the fact that she'd abstained from sex for almost a decade now She couldn't even masturbate. It was an indulgence she longed for.

  But she was too afraid to do it now ...

  She relaxed, reclosed her eyes, maintaining her position of crucifixion. She prayed to herself, God, I know that what I on is part of You. Release me in the midst of this evil place and keep me safe ...

  Her abdomen tightened and her face seemed to bulge, as if something bigger than her physical form was exiting her, which in a sense was true. She was out in an instant.

  The best way she could ever think to describe an OBE was having your eyes and brain inside a transparent helium balloon. She felt buoyant and barely stable, a row boat on an ether sea but with a faulty rudder.

  She looked down, and saw her body lying still on the big bed.

  Adrianne was apart from her body now, connected to it only by some aeriform nerve that out-of-body-experients sometimes called their "soul-tether."

  Then she backed away, and was gone, out of the room.

  She had no hands now to touch with, no feet to run; instead the urn of her spirit flew.

  Through doors, through walls. Through life-size statues of solid marble. On the third floor, she wisped through the door of the communications room and found herself hov ering over Nyvysk who tinkered with one of his detection machines. When she guided herself through his solid body, he flinched, welping, "Damn, that's cold!" He looked around, looke
d up, shaking his shaggy head. "I know you're there somewhere, Adrianne. But please don't do that!" She laughed to herself and drifted out of the room, then down, through the carpet and floor-studs, and the next ceiling. She rocked the vessel that she could only think of as her head and saw Cathleen looking in rooms, carrying her tote bag. When she chose a room and entered, she closed the door behind her, but Adrianne pushed through its oaken panels.

  She hovered and watched, an otherworldly spy, a mystic candid camera. Cathleen seemed pent up about something, murmuring, "Oh, God, what is wrong with me?" and then she lay down on a high-post bedstead plush with a thickquilted mattress. She's insatiable! Adrianne thought when she saw what the lusty blonde was doing. From her bag she'd withdrawn some implements: two nipple-clamps and a frightfully realistic vibrator. In a desperate second, her breasts were popped out of the swells of her top, her nipples clipped hard by the clamps, the hem of her sundress dragged up. She wasted no time in placating herself with the vibrator, teeth grinding and eyes squeezed shut. Adrianne felt embarrassed but also infuriated. Cathleen whispered, "Please, please, please. I just ... can't ... stop ...

  The vibrator hummed, delving in and out. If Adrianne had had a mouth, she surely would've frowned. I've seen about all of this that I can stand. She was glad she couldn't read minds, for Cathleen's was likely full of sexual garbage right now, the images she summoned for her pleasure a kaleidoscope of all the countless men she'd let herself be used by in the past.

  But Adrianne at least was honest enough for this single thought: Oh, u4iat I wouldn't give ... before she zipped out of the room.

  Up through more ceilings and flooring boards, and she bobbed into the middle of a dimly lit hall on the fifth story. The chapel stood eerily silent, its hardwood walls utterly black. There was no crucifix, naturally, but a single underlit sconce before a black altar whose rear panel was carved with a simple inverted cross. A black pulpit faced a few rows of black pews and black kneelers. The environment upset her, so she backed out but not before spying a cistern whose silver bowl sat empty. Next to it stood a racked stand containing several stoppered glass flasks which, in a church, would be full of holy water. These flasks, however, appeared to be full of semen.