Children of The Smoke

Mist always hung low over the forest, but never this low, it was as if the heavens were sagging with the weight of what had happened. A fire had burned through the night, smoke still billowed up from the smouldering trees, rising to mingle with the morning rainfall. The police had combed the aftermath and found a burned out convertible, a mysterious hatch in the ground, and the corpse of Jacqueline Crowe. She was only a year out of high school, about to go to college in Albany, but as she lay peeling in the back of the blackened convertible, it appeared that the universe had other plans for her. What lay beneath the hatch, somehow, felt even more dreadful.

Beneath the hatch, a delicate smog of incense fumes mingled with thick black smoke, curling like thick black serpents around Jack Burton as he descended. Police Chief Wilkins was already down there, joined by the headless chickens that he called deputies. A pentagram had been drawn in white chalk, which lay in stark opposition to the blood which had pooled up around the kneeling corpses, wrists slit in ritual suicide. Wilkins turned to Jack as he emerged into the scene, “Jack, this shit isn’t supposed to happen here.”

“This shit isn’t supposed to happen at all,” Jack coughed, he placed a handkerchief over his face. The smoke was rising out of the chamber, leaving only the smell of two day decayed meat.

“And that girl out in the car,” Wilkins began, his head heavy on his shoulders. “Her parents say she ran away on Thursday,” it was Sunday now. “But what? Was she wrapped up in this—this cult? This is some satanic shit, Jack.”

Painfully long silence followed... Could it be Satanism?

In the car outside, Jacqueline’s body was charcoal, her skin had melted into the leather of the backseat, and Jack saw bindings on her wrists. The car’s plates had been removed, and any identifiable features had burned off, although there was the slightest hint of red paint. Jack tipped his head back and looked to the skies for an answer, but saw only the clouds diluted with smoke. Jack lowered his head inside the car; The smell didn’t bother him out here, he’d been around bodies enough today, and when they were burnt they always smelled better. “Any suspects yet?” Jack asked, pulling at the lining of the car with carefully precise fingers.

“Nah, nah. Got a couple of my boys doing the rounds at The Nag’s Head and whatnot,” The Nag’s Head was the local dive bar. “Her parents haven’t been too useful. Gave us a picture.” Wilkins held up a photograph of the girl, black hair, blue eyes, pale skin.

Jack sighed and yanked at the glovebox, which swung open, its contents spilling onto the melted front seat. Fridge magnets, melted bubblegum, a hairbrush, and a map. “Take these into evidence, will ya,” Jack insisted, stepping back into the open air to let one of Wilkins’ men bag up the items. “And I want to look at that map when we get back to the station.”

Jack spent all night deciphering the map, from what he could make of it, the car and the hatch in the ground were unrelated. The kidnapper had marked out multiple towns and women’s names across Colorado, with some crossed off in red. Jack had taken the time to search the names in the police database, and found that each one matched with a Missing Persons Case. The fridge magnets from the glovebox corresponded with each of the towns that were crossed off. Jack had also found multiple sets of fingerprints on the hairbrush he’d found, and sent them in for review. It was a lot to go on, thank god.

But no matter the outcome, he was dealing with a lot of death.

Dozens of girls had been taken without a trace across the state. It was with a cold detachment that he reported in to Wilkins, his mind felt miles away as the words left his mouth, “We have a serial killer in town,” he wasn’t even sure, but he couldn’t think of any other way to frame it.

Wilkins was behind his desk, cigar smoke rose from his ashtray to catch the riptide of the ceiling fan, which spat the smoke back out across the room. It was as if Wilkins hadn’t heard Jack for a moment, he didn’t look up right away, “Go see the girl’s parents. Maybe they can tell you something.” A moment later he was trying to salvage the end of his burnt out cigar from the ashtray, but it crumbled between his fingers and he slammed a meaty fist on the desk in futile rage. Jack left him to it.

Jacqueline’s house was greyer than anything Jack had ever seen, with a red brick chimney standing over it, spitting fat clouds up into the air. Their rust-bucket of a car was covered in leaves and needles, it looked as if it hadn’t been driven in years. The forest was eating the house from every side, pine trees and lichen, small dead bushes, holly, and a tumbledown firewood store. The windows on the front of the house were frosted over, and Jack could only just make out the faint light inside; Somebody was home. He rapped on the front door and a moment later it opened, halted by the door chain, eyes the colour of moss watched jack through prison bars of jet black hair, “We already spoke to Chief Wilkins,” her voice was hoarse, as though she had been crying. She pulled the hair from her face and Jack saw her pale skin underneath, heavy purple bags hung from below her eyes, the woman hadn’t been sleeping.

“Mrs. Crowe, I’m Detective Burton, I’ve just got a few questions, need to square off a few points—just paperwork stuff really,” Jack lied, it was more than paperwork, he needed to know why Jacqueline had run off; He needed to know why her parents hadn’t reported her missing until after her body was found.

The door closed in Jack’s face, before opening again, this time Jacqueline’s mother ushered him inside. Jack stepped over the threshold and was welcomed by an unexpected warmth, the inside of the house was decorated in rich colours everywhere he looked. Paintings lined the walls, patches of patterned wallpaper peering out from between golden picture frames. The entryway was cramped, boots and coats were piled up on one side, and a dark wooden chest of drawers stood imposingly on the opposite side. “Ted’s in the living room,” Mrs. Crowe muttered.

Ted motioned for Jack to sit across from him, it was a very plush couch, with more cushions than space, Jack had to pick up a rather large pillow in the shape of a cartoon raccoon to sit. A fireplace burned to the side of the coffee table, which was littered with cups of various liquids. Jack had to sit at an awkward angle, because the floor was also covered with books and smoking paraphernalia. “I’m Detective Burton,” Jack began. “I want to help you find the man that took your daughter.”

“Do you believe in God?” Ted asked, ignoring Jack’s question, his eyes didn’t rise from the fireplace. His hair was as black as his wife’s, but he wore it slicked back, with a thin moustache above his pursed lips.

“Yes I do.” Jack was in no mood for playing games, and an honest answer escaped his mouth.

“What kind of a God lets something like this happen? What kind of a God lets a little girl be taken away like this?” he shuffled in his seat as he asked this, shooting an accusatory glance at his wife.

Jack had no answer, he was not inside the mind of The Lord, and while he was a religious man in his youth, his faith had been tested far too many times. It was Mrs. Crowe who answered, “Our girl was taken, because God isn’t watching. God is done with us. It is only The Devil now, who else would let this happen?”

Jack felt coldness slipping through his ribs, it was the feeling of anxiety and dread that he hadn’t felt in a long time. Jacqueline’s parents were stranger than he had prepared himself for, “Mrs. Crowe—”

“—Lilith,” she interrupted.

“Lilith… I’ve been a detective for over two decades, and in my time I have seen a great many things which have shaken my faith. I don’t claim to be an agent of Christ, but if I can bring your daughters killer to justice, bring him before The Lord… I hope—”

Jack was interrupted again, his phone was buzzing in his pocket, steady, heavy vibrations that cut through the atmosphere, which Jack hadn’t noticed had turned hostile. The caller ID read ‘Wilkins’, and Jack had to answer. “Jack get your ass down here. We’ve got a suspect in custody. Caught him trying to bury license plates out in the forest above town, stupid asshole says he’s been camping in the woods, we didn’t find no campsite.”

Wilkins hung up on the other end. Jack was back in the room with Jacqueline’s parents, both of whom were now staring into his face, expectantly. “My apologies, I have to get back to the station. I hope you don’t mind, I’ll be back tomorrow, I need to have a look in your daughter’s bedroom.”

“Of course,” Ted began. “Do you have a suspect? Is that where you’re going?”

Jack wasn’t at liberty to discuss case details, and left without another word.

Jack was seated across from a mangy, grinning man, wild-eyed and coated in the stench of death. He stared right through Jack’s head with eyes the colour of the forest, his whites’ flecked with flames of blood. He leapt right into it, without context, “The fire was an accident. Note that down. I had nothing to do with that,” rapping his fingers on the metal of the table between them, his hands were cuffed down.

“And what about Jacqueline? Why did you take her? Who helped you?”

The mess of hair and dirt shifted on the man’s face, he looked confused, “Which one’s Jacqueline? Hmm… The Taker takes them all for the same reason. Did it all by myself, I did.”

“The Taker? That you? Why’d you do it?”

The Taker leapt as hard as he could, yanking his wrists up as high as the chains would let him, firing a cloud of thick dirt across the room. He danced a jig, before settling back down, staring at Jack once again, “Everything,” he began to weep. “Everything I could want, ten thousand times over… he is waiting for me in Hell.”

Jack felt that same pang of ice in his chest that he had felt back at the Crowe house, “Where did you take them? You got messy this time, tried to bury the evidence, right?”

“All of them… their pieces. They were all good, sweet, innocent girls… we had to use them. Their parents let it happen; They let us in,” the tears were still falling down his face, sending dark brown lines through the filth that coated him. “We die. We are reborn, you see. You must see. You breathe the smoke, you become like me.”

“What do you mean?”

“The fire, the smoke, the burned forest… one day none of that will matter. None of the girls matter now, even the other,” he shifted in his seat. “They never gave me rebirth. They said I am too important. It’s over now, I will have my day in Hell.”

“The girls are reborn?”

“No!” he began to drum hard on the table until his wrists were bleeding, his hands shook violently as he looked down on them. “They are fuel. They are wood. They create the smoke that we breathe into new life.”

“Quit messing me around. Tell me something useful, work with me.”

The Taker thought for a long while, his forest eyes sinking their roots into Jack’s soul, “You… talked to her parents? Didn’t you?” he wiped the tears from his face, smudging the darkness across himself, joining blood and filth together on his cheeks. “I wouldn’t be so sure,” again, he laughed, a sickening hoarseness, until he could no longer breathe.

“You know something about her parents?”

“They are not her parents.”

The drive back to the Crowe family house was frantic, Jack didn’t know what to think. All the religious talk was starting to choke him, the kidnapper and Jacqueline’s parents had both made mention of God and Satan, maybe it was all linked after all, the hatch, the fire, the kidnapping, Jacqueline’s parents. Their car was missing from the driveway as Jack pulled in, and no smoke was rising from the chimney. He cursed to himself as he ran to the door and began to hammer against it. No answer. Jack looked through the windows, but they were too stained for him to make out anything.

He ran around to the back of the house, slipping in mud as he went. The back door was locked just as tightly, “Lilith? Ted?” he called out, his voice rang through the forest, with only the trees to hear him.

Something inside the house shattered, and a male voice cried out. Jack heard hurried footsteps in the hallway before the door slammed open. Jack was sent hurtling onto his back as a pair of boots flew across him, trailing black fabric behind them. He scrambled in the mud, desperately regaining his footing and searching the close treeline for any sign of the man who had sprinted past him.

He caught sight and ran. Jack was fast, he had to be. It was only a few short moments before he was upon a familiar man, Ted Crowe. Jack grabbed him by the neck and flung him to the ground, “Why did you run, Ted?” he roared.

“Why are you chasing me? Shouldn’t you be out trying to find the other girl? Or did you not put that together? I ain’t Ted. Ted’s gone, I took him. The Devil gave him to me. You breathe the smoke, you become like me.” Ted moaned and laughed in the same manner as The Taker.

“What other girl?” Jack’s voice echoed around them. Other girl… other girl… other girl…

“The Taker always takes in twos. The other girl, he managed to hide her away. She might even still be alive. And you ain’t looking for her. What sort of man are you, Jack?”

Jack had no time to play these games, he turned over Mr. Crowe, or whoever was using Mr. Crowe’s body as a conduit, and he cuffed him behind the back. Lifting him to his feet, Jack kicked him along until they reached his car, before shoving him head first into the back seat.

Jack had been driving around town in search of answers, he had failed to realise that the map he had found in the burned out car had two names in each town. If he had just worked that out sooner, he could’ve already found the other missing girl. Her parents obviously hadn’t reported it, as they too were likely conduits for whatever Satanic force was occupying Ted Crowe. He was so lost in thought that the drive was already over, they were at the station. Ted was in custody.

It was only a small victory, but a victory nonetheless.

Jack was back in the room with The Taker, who was still smiling just the same. Jack sat, “Thank you, I managed to catch Ted Crowe, he is in custody now. Your little cult, whatever it is, is over now. Tell me where the other girl is.”

The Taker’s smile fell, he looked earnestly into Jack’s eyes, “Okay. Get me a map. See if you can get there before she’s dead.”

Jack brought through a map, he knew where The Taker would point before he had. A house on the edge of town, kids use it for smoking and drinking when they get turned away from The Nag’s Head. Jack nodded and left the room. Some sick sense of vengeance came over him, he didn’t tell Wilkins where he was going. He just left.

At the house, the flicker of firelight was emanating from the upper floor windows, this was it. Jack kicked down the door and flooded into the house, a one man tidal wave, he tore through the hall up to the staircase, pistol in hand. The sound of chanting was ringing in Jack’s ears as he ascended the steps, there was nobody on the landing, the sound was coming from a door on the opposite end of the hallway.

As Jack crept up to the doorway, that cold feeling returned to his ribcage once more, it was familiar to him now. He shook it off and placed his palm against the splintering wood of the door, beginning to push it open.

The door had only creaked open a few inches when it was yanked from the other side, Jack’s hand was grappled and hauled through into a room filled with smoke. A black haired girl was tied up in the middle of a chalk pentagram and hooded figures stood enrobed in darkness at every angle. He tried to pull himself free, but the smoke began to taste sweet, cloying, ambrosial… Jack felt himself slipping, his mind beginning to wander. Something unfamiliar rang out in the back of his head, and he began to speak with a voice that was not his own. Jack opened his eyes again, they were as green as the forest. There he stood, no longer Jack Burton, but a child of the smoke.