The Devil Next Door

43

Swinging his nightstick by its thong, Warren moved up the streets flanked by Shaw and Kojozian. He stepped over the naked corpse of a woman and past a couple of dogs feeding out of an overturned garbage can. Across the way, a car had crashed into a fire hydrant and water was flooding the streets. Kojozian went down on his hands and knees and lapped water from the gutter.

“What are you? Some kind of goddamn animal?” Warren said to him, pointing his nightstick at the big man.

Shaw folded his arms and shook his head. “You hear that, Kojozian? He wants to know if you’re some kind of animal.”

Warren thumped Shaw on the back of the head with his stick. “What are you? An echo? He heard what I said. You heard what I said, didn’t you?”

Kojozian nodded, his face glistening wet, his streaked warpaint running some. “I heard you. I was just getting a drink is all.”

“Well, don’t be lapping like a dog,” Warren warned him. “Remember, you’re a cop. You’re wearing the uniform. You want to drink from a puddle, cup your hands; don’t lap.”

“I was thirsty.”

“Sure, he was just thirsty,” Shaw said.

Warren stopped. “You see these hash marks here?” he said, pointing to his sergeant’s stripes on his filthy uniform shirt. “These are experience. These say I’m in charge. And when I say a cop doesn’t lap water like a dog you better believe I know my business.”

They walked on, oblivious to the destruction and mayhem around them.

Yes sir, this was Warren’s town. He was a cop and he kept the peace. When you wore the uniform for a living, people expected things from you. Warren was unconcerned that his uniform was untucked, stained with blood and dirt, he only cared that his badge was shiny and his hat was on. Regulations. If a man didn’t live by the regulations, he lived by nothing.

He walked on.

The sun was sinking towards the horizon. It had been a fine day, Warren thought. A productive day. He looked up into the sky, noticing that a great many birds were circling above the town now… gulls, crows, ravens. A buzzard was perched atop a mailbox across the street. A flap of something was hanging from its beak.

They came upon the fleshy white corpse of an obese man out in the flooded street. A few more inches and he’d float away. A terrier with a blood-red snout was gnawing on his arm, a thin woman in a skirt and nothing else was chewing on his throat. Both seemed unconcerned that they were being watched.

Warren tipped his hat to her. “Evening, ma’am.”

She hissed at him.

Just ahead they paused. There was the sound of screaming. Warren looked at the other two. “Sounds like somebody’s having a party. We better break it up.”

They jogged to the end of the street, came around a corner and saw something which stopped them dead. Warren tapped his stick against his leg. Shaw patted his round belly and pulled the survival knife out of his Sam Browne belt. Kojozian, bare-chested, painted and wild-looking, bunched his blood-stained hands into fists and raised his haunches. A State Police cruiser was pulled up at the curb across the street. Two uniformed officers that Warren thought looked kind of familiar were kneeling on the concrete. They had knives in their hands. Carefully, grunting and exerting themselves, they were peeling the scalps from two corpses, sawing away happily.

“Of all the things,” Warren said. “Cops, Poaching in our territory.”

A fuzzy half-memory swept through the archaic ruins of his mind. Those men. He felt he knew those men. He could see them… around a fire, yes. Cooking trout in a pan. Drinking beer. A fishing trip. Yes, Warren had been on a fishing trip with these men. Ray Hansel and Paul Mackabee. Trooper Hansel. Trooper Mackabee. They were old friends of Warren’s. Both old hands on the state force. Warren knew them well. Drank with them. Fished with them. Jesus, Ray and Paul—

Then it was gone. He didn’t know who they were and cared even less. Poachers. Goddamn poachers.

He sighed. “Sonsofbitches,” he said.

“You seeing this, Kojozian?” Shaw said. “You seeing what I’m seeing?”

The big man shook his head. “I’m seeing it, but I’m not believing it. I think somebody ought to go over there and remind those monkeys that this is our beat.”

“Well, why don’t you?” Warren said.

“You think I should?”

“I insist.”

“Yeah, I insist, too,” Shaw said. “Of all the things.”

Kojozian slid a length of chain from his belt. It gleamed in the dying light… except where it was stained with something dark. He walked right across the street, huge, long-limbed, almost ape-like in his stride. One of the state troopers looked up. He had a leather sash with human scalps sewed to it tied around his throat. When he saw Kojozian coming, he rose up, brandishing his bloody knife.

His eyes luminous with ferocity, he charged.

“This guy’s not real bright,” Warren said.

“No, he’s not bright at all,” Shaw agreed.

The trooper darted in, slashing at Kojozian as the big man swung the chain over his head. He slashed, he jabbed, he tried to get in to draw blood. Kojozian stood there, oblivious to it all. He baited the trooper in. Thinking he had an easy kill, the trooper jumped in for a killing blow and Kojozian brought down the chain with all his muscle and weight behind it. The chain made a sharp whooshing sound and then made contact with the trooper’s head. His scalp was peeled from forehead to ear and he went down to one knee, shrieking. Kojozian brought it down again and split the crown of his head open.

The trooper shook and shuddered on the ground, but he was done.

Kojozian stood over him, bringing the chain down again and again until it was dyed red and tangled with hair and meat.

Meanwhile the other guy came after him.

“Hey, you better watch it,” Shaw called out.

But Kojozian was too intent on beating the other trooper into about two-hundred pounds of raw, red meat.

The trooper slashed with his knife and caught Kojozian across the ribs. He slashed his face, his arms, almost got his throat but Kojozian snapped the chain to his temple and down he went. Standing there, bleeding and dazed, Warren decided it was time to help him. He and Shaw went over there.

“You could’ve stepped in,” Kojozian said.

“I thought you could handle them,” Shaw said. “I guess I was wrong.”

Kojozian grimaced. “I don’t care for your tone.”

“Easy,” Warren told him.

“Fuck that,” Kojozian said and punched him right in the mouth. When he tried to get up, he punched him again.

Warren stepped between them with his stick. Good thing, too, because Shaw looked pretty mad. “Listen,” Warren said. “You guys wear the badge. Act like cops. Use your knives.”

They both pulled their blades and circled one another. Kojozian kept wiping blood from his eyes and Shaw tried to stay on his blind side. Kojozian jabbed and Shaw brought his knife around in a quick arc, laying his arm open. Kojozian let out a cry like an enraged bear and, trying to keep the blood from his eyes, slashed out wildly back and forth. Shaw sidestepped him, ducked down low, and jabbed him in the ribs.

“Nice,” Warren said, lighting a cigarette.

Kojozian was fighting sloppy now, just whirling around with his blade, slashing out blindly as he wiped blood from his eyes. Shaw played him, let him get in close, and then darted away. Kojozian leaped at him. Shaw jumped away, let the bigger man’s forward momentum carry him. Then as blood yet again filled Kojozian’s eyes, Shaw slipped behind him and buried his blade between his shoulders. Once. Then twice. Kojozian fell to one knee, crying out, and slashed Shaw on the elbow and Shaw stabbed him in the chest.

Kojozian dropped his knife… lumbering, trying to find his feet, but weak now from the pain and the blood which poured from him.

“Let me see that knife,” Warren said.

He took it from Shaw, went up behind Kojozian and slit his throat.

The big man went down, coughing out ribbons of blood, squirming in a red sea of his own making.

“Come on,” Warren said. “We have police work to do.”

They left Kojozian dying on the sidewalk…