They

Chapter Sixteen

FRANK CALLED FROM Mike Peterson’s cell phone at eight-thirty. “We’re on the turnpike,” he said. “We should be back in about twenty minutes.”

“What happened?” Vince asked. He’d spent the past three hours watching a movie called Grosse Point Blank, which was hilarious. It was about a hired hit man attending his ten-year high school reunion.

“We’ll talk when we get back,” was all Frank would say.

Vince tried to get back into the movie after the phone call, but couldn’t concentrate on it. Finally, when Mike and Frank stepped into the room Vince turned the TV off. “Okay, I’m bursting at the seams here, guys. Talk to me.”

Both of them looked frustrated and disappointed. They were still in their suits. Frank took his jacket and tie off. Mike headed to the wet bar and broke the seal on it. “I need a drink.”

While Mike made himself a drink, Vince turned to Frank. “You didn’t find her.”

“We didn’t find her,” Frank said. Aside from the look of frustration on Frank’s mug, there was also a look of worry. “But we found stuff out. Boy, did we find shit out.”

Mike took a sip of his drink—Jim Beam straight—then sat down at the desk. “Where to start?”

“The beginning,” Vince said. “You went straight to Nino’s right?”

“We went to Nino’s,” Mike said, nodding. “There were a couple of kids there. Frank and I identified ourselves as FBI agents. It was easy, considering what happened there today. Everybody in town had already heard about what happened at the Family Cupboard.”

“I bet,” Vince said. He was beginning to yearn for a drink himself. He could make out the distinctive label of a Rolling Rock beer in the refrigerator.

“We asked them where we could locate Mary Ann, and one of the kids directed us to her friend Jackie. They gave us Jackie’s address. We went over there and Jackie proved to be very cooperative. She told us that Mary Ann was gone.”

“Gone?”

“She split,” Frank said. He took his shirt off and looked at Mike. “If you don’t mind, I’m taking these off. I never was used to wearing this suit and tie shit.”

Mike nodded and Frank stripped down to his underwear and began rummaging in his overnight bag. Vince turned to Mike. “So Mary Ann skipped town, too?”

Mike nodded, sipping his drink. “Jackie said Mary Ann called her this morning from a bus stop in North Carolina. She said that she was afraid of those guys coming back to Lititz to finish what they started.”

“What did she mean by that?” Vince was listening with bated breath.

“I don’t know,” Mike said. He sighed. “Fortunately, we were able to talk to Jackie at length. Her parents were at work, so we sat in the living room and talked. She was quite the chatter box.”

“I got the impression that she was standing on the sidelines when this shit happened,” Frank said, pulling a pair of black jeans over his legs. “She and Mary Ann were friends, but she didn’t hang out with this other gang of kids much.”

Mike chuckled. “Yeah. She said that she felt she was much better than Clint and his crowd. I caught a whiff of contempt.”

“More like an air of superiority,” Frank said, pulling a T-shirt over his lanky frame. His tattoos gleamed in the light.

“The basic story is that Jackie confirmed to us that Clint and his friends were dabblers in a devil worship group,” Mike said. He took a sip of his drink. “She admitted quite freely that they were into it for the shock value. She didn’t hang out with them, but Mary Ann did. She said Mary Ann usually went along for the ride whenever Clint and his friends were out on the town.”

“They were a bunch of your usual Marilyn Manson fan boy, pot smoking losers who thought it was cool to worship the devil,” Frank said, sitting down on the second bed. “Twenty years ago they would have been Black Sabbath fans.”

Vince nodded. He remembered the stoner scene very well from high school.

“Anyway,” Mike continued, “she said she never met Mark Lancaster and the other fellow, but Mary Ann did. And Mary Ann was scared of them the instant she met them. She told Jackie that Mark and Glenn were definitely serious about the occult. Jackie says she warned her friend to stay away from them, and luckily, Mary Ann heeded her advice. But she was still loyal to Clint; after all, they were dating. She loved him. So most of what happened comes directly from Clint telling Mary Ann, and Mary Ann later telling Jackie. It sounds like pretty reliable third-hand information, though. Jackie struck me as a very smart girl. She did some research of her own and found out some disturbing things.”

“What kind of disturbing things?” Vince asked.

“In a minute,” Mike said. He took another sip of his drink. Frank got himself a Coke from the refrigerator. He looked at Vince and resumed the narrative. “According to Jackie, Clint wanted to impress these guys. He was thrilled that a pair of older guys was into the same things he was. Clint and his friends felt they were respected when they were with them. So they started hanging out. When Mary Ann told Jackie the name of the cult these guys claimed they belonged to, Jackie grew even more concerned and scared. She’d already done a lot of reading on the occult, and some of the things Mary Ann said about them bothered her. So she did some more research. There was one bit of information that kept nagging at her—the group Mark and Glenn claimed they belonged to. Apparently they told Clint they belonged to an organization called The Children, and that they were based out of New York City.”

“Another name for The Children of the Night?” Vince asked.

Mike nodded. “Yes and no. I’ll get to that in a minute. What Jackie did, was she went on the Internet and did some intense research on the occult and Satanism for three days, asking people on various newsgroups about the Children. She got one response. The only thing the person said was that The Children was supposed to be a secret, sinister devil cult based in New York. That was all the correspondent would relate. The correspondent even went so far as to admit that the group itself was only rumored to exist. Jackie did some more checking and was able to confirm evidence of the rumor in a book linking the Son of Sam murders to a secret, underground satanic organization.”

“So what did she do?” Vince asked, entranced by the story.

“It scared the hell out of her,” Mike said. “And rightly so.” He traded a glance with Frank. “The Children are the New York State counterparts of The Children of the Night. There are factions in other parts of the country that go under other names as well. There’s a group in Alabama called ‘The Children of the Black Cross,’ for example. Another group in the Midwest calls itself ‘The Children of Darkness.’ They’re all connected with the main group in California.”

The bottle of Rolling Rock was weighing heavily on Vince’s mind, and he finally dashed over to the refrigerator and pulled it out, opened it, and took a drink.

“Jackie claims she told Mary Ann to stay away from Clint,” Mike continued. “She told her friend everything. She didn’t know if Mary Ann related all this to Clint. She claimed Mary Ann told her she would find a way to tell Clint without revealing the source. She seems to think that Clint already knew he was over his head and was staying away from Mark and Glenn out of his own fear. When the dead dogs turned up in that field she knew something big was going to happen, but she didn’t know what. She said Mary Ann avoided her in the next few months. Like she was ashamed that she was still seeing Clint, who by now was regarded as the Black Sheep of Warwick County. Then Maggie Walters was murdered, and at first the newspapers weren’t reporting the occult symbols found written on the walls at the murder site. But for some reason, Jackie had a feeling there was a connection. Then last week, the Intelligencer ran an in depth article on the case, and for the first time all of Lancaster County learned about the mutilation and the Satanic symbols found in Maggie’s house. And then Clint disappeared, followed closely by Mary Ann.”

“Does she have any idea what might have happened to them?” Vince asked.

“Not really, but get this. Jackie came to the same conclusion Frank and I have been coming to. Maggie may have been killed by these guys for some kind of revenge ritual. The killing of the dogs on April 30—Walpurgisnacht—is significant. It’s a day that is said to provide great power to the black magician for certain rituals. The murder of the dogs was done in conjunction with a preliminary ritual for something bigger in Lititz. That something bigger was probably the murder of Maggie Walters.”

“I don’t think I follow,” Vince said.

“The first ritual opened the gates,” Frank said. He was sitting on the couch, holding his can of Coke. “They probably invoked the names of whatever demons they have working with them. It was all done in preparation for the murder of your mother, which was designed to be both a revenge killing and to lead them to something bigger.”

“In other words, they’d already staked her out?” Vince asked. “They’d found her months before they actually killed her?”

Frank and Mike nodded. “Yes,” Mike said.

“Why didn’t they just bump her off then?”

“You still don’t understand these guys,” Frank said, looking grim. “The ritual they performed was also probably one of protection. They didn’t want to get caught. They wanted to throw confusion and chaos among the local population. And it worked.”

Vince was about to open his mouth again and blurt out another question, then stopped. He had to keep reminding himself that he was dealing with religious nuts. Religious nuts did all kinds of wacky things like perform suicide bomb missions for this or that jihad, or self flagellate themselves for whatever purification purposes. Or they killed abortion providers for God, or killed dogs to summon up demons from hell.

I can’t believe I’m dealing with this bullshit, Vince thought, nodding at Mike and Frank to continue.

“Jackie doesn’t know what will come next,” Mike said. “But she said that she was pretty convinced that was the group’s purpose. That Maggie’s murder was both an act of revenge and a ritual designed to go after somebody else.”

“Me,” Vince said.

“We don’t have solid proof of that,” Mike said.

“What about what happened today?”

“I admit that what happened today and last week in Irvine are disturbing,” Mike said. “But I really believe they aren’t related to the group responsible for your mother’s murder.”

“How can you say that? They tried to kill me!”

“Mike’s right,” Frank said. “Whoever tried to kill you today are not cut from the same mold as The Children of the Night. Those guys were operating more like hit men than deranged cult members.”

Suddenly, it hit him. The revelation sparked in Vince Walter’s mind so great that it was as if fireworks went off in his head. “Oh my God,” he said, feeling faint.

“What?” Mike looked worried. “Vince, you okay?”

“You’re right,” Vince said, his voice hoarse as his throat constricted. He could feel his heart pound in his ribcage. “The guys who tried to kill Tracy and me, the same guys who tried to get me today back in Lititz… they’re not part of this Children of the Night group.”

“About time you started listening,” Frank said, drinking his Coke dismissively.

“They’re part of an opposing group,” Vince said. He looked at Mike and Frank with dawning revelation. “A Christian one. And they’re trying to kill me because somehow they know.”

Mike appeared to catch on. “Goddamitt, Vince, I’ve told you that—”

“They’re trying to kill me because they know I’m the Anti-Christ.” Vince licked his lips nervously. “And this… this Children of the Night group… my mother took me all those years ago because she knew. And they’re trying to get me back.”

THEY ARGUED ABOUT it all night. Mike quickly changed into a pair of shorts and a T-shirt during the debate. The chilling revelation remained with Vince, yet part of him still couldn’t believe the accusations he was coming up with about himself. I don’t feel any different, he thought as Frank glared at him from across the room. I’ve never felt any different… like I was a god, or a demigod, or a demon, or whatever. I’m a blood and flesh human being. I don’t have supernatural powers. If I were the Anti-Christ—or the Messiah for that matter—wouldn’t I have some kind of supernatural power? Wouldn’t I have known before now?

Mike even verbalized this in the debate. “If you’re the Anti-Christ, Vince, prove it. Make something move with your mind.”

“Yeah,” Frank sneered, lounging on the bed. “Make that glass over there levitate.”

“Take a hike,” Vince said. He felt like a jerk for even bringing it up.

“I’m serious,” Mike said, stepping in front of Vince, looking at him sternly. “If you feel you’re the Anti-Christ, you should be one of the most powerful men on the planet. You should have some kind of magical powers. Let’s see you do something. Come on, hotshot, let’s see your stuff.”

“You’ve made your point,” Vince said. He was getting angry, and while he wanted that anger to be directed at Mike and Frank, what he felt was anger toward himself.

“Come on!” Mike was pressing the point. “Just try. Here.” He walked over to the other side of the room and picked up a plastic glass. “Focus on this glass. Try to tap into your psychic energy and push it off my hand.”

Vince rolled his eyes. “You can’t be serious.”

Frank nodded. “Go ahead. Try it.”

They were dead serious. He briefly considered retreating further into the shell he was beginning to build around himself, then decided to take the test. This would be proof positive. If he could move the glass by the sheer power of his will, and do it easily, then he would have the proof that he possessed supernatural powers. He knew that there were people that possessed telekinetic power, but this was different. Telekinetics usually had to summon up their power from some deep well within themselves. They had to work at it. If Vince were a supernatural being, he should be able to topple that glass over as easily as if he were doing it with his hands.

Vince focused on the glass, than willed his psychic energy toward it, not even knowing what he was doing or where to tap into it. He simply willed himself to push the glass off of Mike’s hand.

Nothing.

He concentrated harder. The skin of his forehead furrowed in concentration. He pictured the glass in his mind, visualized himself toppling it off of Mike’s hand with a single mental push.

It remained on Mike’s hand.

He relaxed and looked up at Mike. “I can’t.”

Mike grinned. “See? You don’t have supernatural powers, you dimwit.”

Vince relaxed. Mike’s jovial tone put him at ease. Maybe Mike and Frank were right. He was taking this much too seriously. He had to look at this from a logical angle. He’d never felt different around other people, and he surely didn’t feel any different now. He was not the Anti-Christ. He was simply a man. A man who was being stalked by two groups of crazed religious fanatics for whatever insane reason they may have.

“Okay,” he said. “I’m sorry we had to argue about this, but…” he ran his hand through his hair. “What else could they be after me for? I mean, think about it.” He looked up at Mike and Frank, silently imploring them to at least consider his original reasoning for his crazy idea. “True, I don’t feel any different, and I don’t have supernatural powers. Fine. But these two groups are after me for some reason, and the only thing I can think of is that I must be important to them. I have a feeling that this Children of the Night group isn’t responsible for trying to kill me today. I don’t think they were involved in the botched attempt in Irvine, either. I think you guys presented some very logical explanations regarding this fact. And if you consider your own theories, you have to consider the possibility that if The Children of the Night is a group of crazed devil worshippers with an Armageddon complex, there has to be a Christian organization focusing on the same thing.”

“Of course,” Mike said. “That would be the host church from which The Children sprang from.”

“Yeah, but even those guys wouldn’t be involved in what happened this morning,” Vince said. He rose to his feet and paced the room. “They wouldn’t want me dead. They’d want me alive.”

“Which makes your theory fall to pieces,” Frank said.

“What if there’s another renegade Christian group out there?” Vince said, whirling to face Frank. “Some other underground group that thinks I may be the Anti-Christ?”

“Vince,” Mike said, his eyes closing in frustration. “We’ve gone over this time and time again and—”

“Wait a minute, just hear me out here,” Vince said. He regarded the two men calmly. “I’m not the Anti-Christ. I’ve accepted that. But suppose this other fictional group I’m talking about really thinks I am. For whatever… strange reason they might have.”

“Why would they think this?” Mike asked.

Vince didn’t have an answer. “I don’t know.”

“That’s the stupidest reason for them wanting to have you killed,” Mike reiterated.

“But let’s suppose it’s true. Suspend your disbelief for a moment. Use your imagination. Apocalyptic Christian sect splits into two opposing groups. One sect worships the devil. The other remains Christian. Their sole purpose is to bring about the Anti-Christ to usher in Armageddon. They want to fulfill the prophesies in the Book of Revelations. I think it’s insane, and so do you. These guys don’t, though. They’re dead serious about it. Okay, still using your imagination? Great. Let’s pretend my mother and your mother,” he looked at Frank as he said this, “are really into this group, for whatever reasons they may have. They’re stoned, they’re really fucked up, whatever. My mom gets knocked up and has me. I don’t know who my father is, but I know he’s not the guy that I remember growing up with. I know my mother never talked about him. Now, still in make-believe land? Great.” He stepped toward them, really absorbed in the narrative now. “Let’s say with a combination of all the drugs and the mysticism and all that went on back then, that my mom is brainwashed into believing I may be the Anti-Christ. In reality, she probably fucked some guy at a love-in and got knocked up, had me, joined this group around the same time. She’s young, she’s confused, she’s lonely, and they provide all the support and comfort she needs at the time. She also meets a man she falls in love with. He’s a member of this cult. She joins up with them right when they make this split and she’s so happy that they accept her, and the drugs are just blowing her mind that she gets really sucked into their spiritual beliefs. She buys the crap they’re pushing. You still following me?”

Mike and Frank nodded. Frank said, “Yeah, I can buy that. Keep going.”

Vince was on a roll. “Okay, let’s pretend they convince my mother that I really am the Anti-Christ. The key word is they convince her. Maybe they brainwashed her into believing that she really fucked the devil or something. Maybe they were all tripping the night she got knocked up and they used this to their advantage. I don’t know. What’s important is this: they need their Anti-Christ in order to feed on their own religious hysteria and support their theology. They need this… this figurehead to legitimize their creed. The Christian side of them knows this, but they aren’t aware of me. They may know that the devil side of the sect has, quote unquote, conjured up the Anti-Christ, but they don’t know who he is or where he’s living. Remember, this is a war for them, even though they’re really fighting for the same thing. They’re still playing it out as if one side or the other is going to win. So they convince my mother I’m it, I’m the son of the devil, I’m the one that’s going to lead them to victory and glory and they’re going to rule the world. They bring me to a bunch of rituals and pray to the devil and all that other happy horseshit that I’m now starting to remember. And they brought Frank and some of the other kids to the ceremonies, too, simply because they were still too stupid and too caught up in the drug scene to know any better.”

Mike was listening to the narrative with interest. Frank was nodding along, his features impassive as Vince took him down memory lane.

“So things proceed along as fine as can be. Oh, they need to spread a little mayhem every now and then. Perform some satanic rituals, kidnap and sacrifice a few runaway kids, that sort of thing. They’re Satanists, remember, and even though we think they’re completely bugfuck, they believe this horseshit. They really believe they’re performing some divine rituals when they do this stuff. So the years pass, and we move into this nice suburban home, and my mom and who I think is my dad try to protect me and shield me from the world as any good normal parent would do. Mom is pretty much zoned out because maybe her husband keeps her that way. But she wises up somehow. She gets off the drugs, and within a year or two she begins to wise up even more. She begins to think that maybe this crap she’s been led to believe is nothing but crap. Maybe she begins to look at me in a different light. After all, I’m just a normal, eight or nine-year-old boy. I don’t have horns growing out of my head, I don’t have a tail, I don’t smell like brimstone or have fangs. My mother has inspected every inch of my body from the time I was a baby and she knows I don’t bear the mark of the beast.” He sniggered. “And forget about that shit about the numbers being on my head. I was as bald as Telly Savalas when I was born. She would have been able to see it.

“The point is that she wises up. She sees them for what they are. Religious fanatics. And during her brief period of rationality, she plans her escape and makes good on it. She takes me in the dead of night, when dad is out of town, and whisks me away. I have vague memories of traveling with her through Arizona, New Mexico, maybe Texas. We were on the road for a long time. Next thing I know, we’re in New York. We move to Buffalo. Mom finds us a small motel room and a few days later she tells me we’re changing our names. She asks me what I want to be called. I’d always hated my name so it was no wonder I almost forgotten about it until you called me that day. I picked Vince as my new name. So my mom had our names changed. I’m guessing that she got us genuine fake identifications, with new birth certificates. Whatever it was she did, it worked for twenty-five years. We lived under our new names, moved to Toronto, mom got really religious, and that was all I knew from then on. We came to Lititz in 1983, when I was sixteen turning seventeen. By then I’d almost forgotten about my early life.

“The point is this.” Vince hunkered down, sitting in a chair. “During this time the group, the Children, they were freaking out. They probably embarked on this huge search for me, but mom was so good at changing our identities, she eluded them for twenty-five years.”

“One would think that if there really were a devil, he never would have allowed you or anybody else to escape the cult,” Frank said. “I can dig what you’re saying. They’re religious nuts. They’re not working with reality. They may be great at skip tracing and eventually tracking people down and getting rid of them, but they never would have been able to anticipate you and your mom’s defection.”

“Exactly! They’re just people. They’re not supernatural bogeymen. But regardless, they’re as fanatical about the devil as Jerry Falwell is about God. They’re also as fanatical as this other group is. This group I’m alluding to, the one that tried killing us this morning and tried to kill me Sunday afternoon. Sometime during the period The Children of the Night was looking for me, this other group found out about me. It is this group, which I am using fictitiously now, which is trying to kill me. Maybe they started off as a genuine church group. Maybe they were already comprised of fringe members of the Christian far right. Who knows? What matters is they somehow found out about not only me, but also The Children of the Night. Maybe it was an ex-member.”

Mike spoke up. “It could be possible. There have been defectors, although most of them usually die in so-called accidents, or disappear.”

Frank rubbed his chin. “Let’s suppose somebody does defect though. It’s possible they could have remained hidden very much the way Maggie did. Maybe they started this other church and their sole purpose was finding you,” he nodded at Vince, “and, once finding you, killing you.”

“See?” Vince exclaimed. “How many times do I have to spell things out before you start believing me?”

“Granted, it’s a good theory,” Mike said. Now Mike was pacing the room. He went to the window and peeked out between the blinds. He was silent for a moment. “It’s possible. The more I think about it, the more plausible it sounds.”

Frank appeared to be accepting the theory more, too. “Whoever this group is, they wouldn’t have to be very big. It could be as little as half a dozen members.”

“And they wouldn’t necessarily have to have been together for very long,” Vince said. “Just long enough for whoever knew enough about The Children to preach Children theology to his new congregation, and come up with some kind of tactical plan in finding me.”

“Do you think it’s possible that if this is true, that this renegade member might be a member of both sides?” Frank asked Mike. “You know, a member of The Children of the Night and a secret member of this other group?”

“I don’t know,” Mike said, shaking his head. “I find that hard to believe, but anything’s possible.”

They were silent for a moment, Mike returning to the other bed. Frank remained reclining against his bed, Vince in his chair. Finally, Mike broke the silence. “Let’s see what the news says.” He reached for the television remote control and turned it on.

He flipped through the channels. It was closing in on ten p.m., and they had to endure another ten minutes of Law and Order before the local news came on. When the broadcast started, the shoot-out in Lititz was one of the top stories.

They watched spell-bounded as the facts were revealed. There were four dead, with another—Reverend Powell—listed in critical condition. Only one of the dead had been positively identified—Lititz Borough patrolman Tom Hoffman. Vince felt a stab of guilt as he learned this, then quickly fought to push the emotion down. Dozens of people had witnessed the gunfight, which erupted shortly before the lunchtime rush. Three of the gunmen had gotten away and were being sought. Police sketches came across the screen and Vince fought the urge to laugh. Frank did laugh. “What a joke! How the fuck do they expect to find people with sketches like that?”

The sketches in question were rendered with stiff brushstrokes of heavy pencil. Even though the caricatures didn’t resemble any of them remotely, Vince was able to pick out who was supposed to be who. Frank was easy to pick out—his sketch showed a longhaired man with a puffy face and squinty eyes and a stubbled beard. Good thing they’d all gotten haircuts. As far as a puffy face went, Frank never had one to begin with. So much for witness descriptions.

Mike and Vince’s sketches were crude, and if presented side by side with their actual photographs, one would be hard pressed to find any resemblances. The one Vince guessed represented Mike’s depicted a guy with less hair than Mike really had, also with squinty eyes. Vince’s own sketch revealed a guy that looked like Timothy McVeigh; stony-faced, cold, emotionless.

The broadcaster finished by saying that the State Police and the FBI had been brought into the case and that a manhunt was now underway. And, of course, anybody seeing anybody resembling the sketches was urged to call a special hotline that had been set up.

Mike turned to Vince and Frank. “Good thing we parked our first rental car in a public parking garage. Let’s leave it there. We’ll drive the other one to Pittsburgh and turn it in and catch the first plane we can get tomorrow.”

“Sounds good to me,” Frank said.

“You think that’ll be enough to throw them off?” Vince asked.

“You don’t see them breaking down the doors to get to us now, do you?”

“No.” That wasn’t the point, though. There was still the possibility the authorities would eventually catch up with them.

“We’ll see what’s in the paper tomorrow,” Mike said. “And check out the news on the major networks. That should give us some clue as to how the investigation is progressing. Maybe they’ll ID the other guys by then. For now, I think we should get some sleep.”

That was easier said than done. They shed their clothes for T-shirts and boxers, and they all took turns in the shower. They flipped a quarter for the sole bed and Mike won. Vince lay down beside Frank in one of the beds, facing the window, thinking about all that had happened and wondering when the nightmare was going to end.

EVERYTHING WENT SMOOTHLY the following morning, Friday. After waking up, they washed up, brushed their teeth, dressed into the suits they’d purchased the day before, packed their things, and exited the room. Mike turned the TV on while they changed, hoping for more news on the shoot-out but there was nothing else forthcoming. They meandered downstairs to check out. Mike signed the bill and they were off.

Vince was nervous as they headed through the hotel’s parking garage to the vehicle Mike and Frank secured yesterday. He kept expecting federal agents to pop out from behind cars and black SUV’s brandishing weapons yelling, “Freeze! You’re under arrest!” Or, worse, another assassin popping out from behind a parked car and letting loose with more automatic gunfire.

Of course they were armed again, but Vince didn’t feel any safer. Mike unlocked the car—an Audi—and they stowed their luggage in the trunk and Vince slid into the front seat. Mike drove. Vince watched to see if they were being followed as they exited the garage and headed up Broad Street. “We aren’t being followed,” Frank said fifteen minutes later as Mike headed west out of the city limits.

“How do you know?”

“Because I know. I’ve been on alert like this for a year now. I’d know if we were being followed.”

Vince almost responded with, if you’re so good at telling if we’re being followed, how come you didn’t know we were followed to the Family Cupboard yesterday? That only would have sparked a fight and he didn’t want to fight with Frank.

They made the drive to Pittsburgh in silence. Vince fiddled with the radio, then stopped at a rock station playing the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Mike turned the air conditioner on, and Vince sat back and watched the scenery flash by.

It was a four-hour drive. Once they got to the Pittsburgh city limits, Mike pulled over to a gas station to fill up the car’s tank. Frank went into the station’s kiosk and emerged with bottled water, sodas, and a map. They consulted the map over their refreshments after the gas tank was filled up and ready to go. “Pittsburgh Airport looks to be a twenty minute drive,” Mike said. “Let’s go.”

Thirty minutes later they were at the Pittsburgh Airport parking garage. Mike turned to Frank. “Let’s get these in the suitcases,” he said, taking out his gun and the spare clips from his coat pocket. They packed the weapons securely in the suitcases then, carrying their luggage and looking very much like normal, upper-middle class businessmen, they made their way to the rental car agency where they turned in the keys to the Audi. Mike led the way to a United Airlines terminal. He walked to the ticket counter and talked with the agent for fifteen minutes. When he came back he was holding three tickets. “I got us stand-by seats on a flight that leaves in two hours,” he said. “Let’s go to the gate and hang out.”

They walked leisurely through airport security, then past various gates. Frank nodded toward a newsstand. “Let’s see if there’s anything in the paper about us.” Vince and Mike followed him.

Vince spotted the New York Times with a headline story about the shoot-out. “Here we go,” he said, picking it up. One of the sub-titles read Victims Identified.

Frank paid for the paper and they sat down near one of the gates, passing the paper around. Most of the article covered what they already knew. What was new to them were the identities of the three dead assassins: they were being identified as Matt Newberry, Hank Warner, and Andy Duncan, members of an apocalyptic Christian church called Soldiers of Christ. Information on the group was sketchy and a church spokesman, speaking on a condition of anonymity, said the church had no statement other than the three dead men were acting alone and that they had no knowledge of their criminal intentions.

“This is proof,” Vince said. “Soldiers of Christ. On a mission to wipe out the Anti-Christ. Me.”

Mike folded the paper. His features were stern. “When we get back to California we’ll do some research on the Soldiers of Christ.”

“Don’t worry, bro,” Frank said, patting Vince’s shoulder. “We’ll get to the bottom of this.”

Vince tried to take assurance that Frank and Mike would take care of things, that now that the proof had been presented to them they would have to take extra precautionary measures. When he read that the gunmen were members of the Soldiers of Christ he’d experienced a feeling of immense dread as his fears were confirmed. “We might not need to do anything,” he said. “I’ll bet right now a bunch of journalists are all over this and by tomorrow, information about these guys will be all over the news wires.”

Mike didn’t say anything and Frank nodded. Vince checked his watch. “Guess we should head to our gate.” They stood up and began walking down the gateway, and even when Vince was strapped in his seat in the DC-10 two hours later he still didn’t feel calmed by the knowledge that he now knew who it was that was trying to kill him. If anything, it only made him feel more in fear for his own life.