The Spook House (The Spook Series Book 1) (11 page)

Checking my watch only added to the sense of urgency I already felt. I (or should I say “he”?) was getting ready to kill someone in twelve minutes.

What am I doing here? I wondered, I’m not here to change the past. I did the right thing back then. I spared the man. I’m going to do the right thing again. You’ll see.

I didn’t know whom I was talking to. I knew this wasn’t a test from God, or a “review” of my life after I died. God didn’t need to catch up on what type of life I’d lived. In fact, at this time, He’d been watching intensely. I know. He was the one who had put me up to this.

That brought another terrifying thought to mind.

If I’m back in time, that means that I’m here! I’m hiding out about a hundred meters from here! I’d better not startle him!

I could imagine the terror I would have felt if someone had approached me or spoke to me in the woods that night (or should I say, this night) when I was in the sniping position. I would have died of fright, or maybe just started shooting.

Of course, I only had the rifle then, and now I had a machine gun. But what good would that do? It might be good as a noisemaker, but that would surely wake up the whole neighborhood and bring an army of cops. Machine gun fire in a quiet, rich neighborhood like this? I didn’t think so. Plus, what would happen if a stay bullet hit Young Jacob? What if he got killed? Was that even possible? If I died, how could I exist to grow up, travel back in time and do the shooting?

I was going to give myself a mental hernia, so I stopped thinking about it. I was just going to hunker down and be very, very quiet. I would let things play out the way they had in the past.

The bedroom light was on in Tubb’s room upstairs. Then came bathroom light. I was hopped up in anticipation what was to come, and I knew my younger self was too. Tubb took forever in the bathroom, just like I remembered.

The bathroom light went out. Tubb was coming down the stairs. The hall light came on. The porch light came on. The door was opening. Tubb stepped out of the house.

Oh, fuck! It’s him! I thought, as if it could be anybody else. It’s really him! This is really happening!

Dressing in the exact same robe and slippers I remembered, Tubb waddled out to the bottom of his driveway to get this newspaper.

I knew his head was in the crosshairs now.

“Now, the dog,” I said to myself. “This is the part where the dog comes out.”

I even remembered his name – Barney. This was the part were the small pug with the big smile came running out. That was the defining moment, I remembered. At that moment, Tubb (at least in my mind) changed from a power-tripping pathetic little punk that God wanted dead into a lonely man who lived with a dog.

“Anytime now,” I told myself. The dog would run out at any second. Everything else was exactly as I remembered it.

But Barney didn’t run out. Tubb bent over slowly to pick up his newspaper. He got it, and then stood back up, groaning from the effort. He stretched his arms over this head and opened them wide. His eyes were closed, and this mouth was open in a yawn.

Then his head exploded.

17

“NOOOO!”

The word screamed in my head, but somehow got mangled there, and all that escaped my mouth was a gasp. I finally managed to say, “Oh no, you did not! You did not! I mean, YOU DID NOT!” You fuck!, I thought, You bastard! You idiot! You ruined my life!

This wasn’t the way it had happened.

I could hear hurried activity by one of the trees in front of me. A figure was moving. I couldn’t make him out clearly. I was too far away and it was too dark to make out a face, but I knew who it was. It was me, packing up and fleeing the scene. He was gone in 60 seconds, just like I planned. That left me alone in the small strip of woods, dressed in full military fatigues and armed with assault weapons.

Tubb’s body lay in a motionless heap. The small dog ran out the door. He stopped at the spreading pool of blood on the driveway, sniffed, and ran back inside, whimpering.

I had to get out of there. I ran through the forest like a panicked animal. I couldn’t get far enough away. I popped out in an upscale suburban neighborhood, since the “forest” was only a small (but dense and dark) area of trees bordering a golf course.

It was dark out, but it wouldn’t be for long. The morning was foggy, just like I remembered, so that provided me some soft cover, but one thing became immediately clear once I got to the sidewalk: I had to get out of sight. I had to “hole up” somewhere and find a change of clothes. I couldn’t afford to be seen this close to the crime scene, especially not dressed like this. I thought about ditching the helmet and the gun. I could just be a guy wearing clothing from a surplus store. But I knew that wouldn’t work. You might see men dressed like that in my hometown in the mountains, but not in the city, and certainly not in this exclusive neighborhood.

Things looked bad. I would be locked up and blamed for the murder. That was, of course, unless I fought back. I could outgun any cop right now. I had a machine gun! But was I really ready to shoot cops? I didn’t want to find out. I had to go.

I darted from yard to yard, begging God for help. He came through for me. There was a house for sale. I saw a realtor’s lockbox on the front door. That was perfect. It meant nobody lived there.

I snuck into the backyard. I breathed a small sigh of relief when I was off the street. Then came my next task: to break in. A bathroom window was unlocked. Score.

God is being good to me, I thought.

I split the screen with my knife, and slipped in. There were no personal items in the bathroom. That was another good sign that the house was empty.

I moved down a short hallway, pointing my gun wherever I looked, as if doing a house search. I scanned the darkness, half-expecting to see pop-ups or other nasty surprises. So far, so good.

In the blue gloom, I could tell I had entered a “great room” – the large kitchen, dining room, living room entertainment area that was a common design in newer, expensive houses. The ceiling was high, and the room was spacious. It was a welcome change from the claustrophobic corners and alleys of the mock Iraqi village, and the natural light was a nice change from the Spook House, where I felt the darkness closing in on me.

I looked around. In the dim light of the coming dawn, I could tell the house was clean and organized. It looked too clean for anyone to actually live there. It was obviously staged. That as a good sign that the house was empty. I started to calm down a little. If I could find a change of clothes, I would be good. I just had to …

WHACK! Something hit me hard on the back. I was wearing body armor, but I was still hit so hard I saw a flash of white. I was going down. I hit the floor hard. I expected a secondary burst of pain from the weight of a man’s body (like a cop or homeowner) piling on top of me, but it didn’t come. I tried to move, but I felt like I was lying on a floor that was tilting. I closed my eyes and the world around me disappeared.

–––––

I woke up again wondering, Where am I?

My body was sprawled out on a hardwood floor. I sat up, expecting to be punished with agonizing body pains for sitting up so quickly, but there weren’t any. I felt the area around me. Remarkably, my gun was still there, lying where I had dropped it. I scooped it up and looked around. I was in a different house.

I could see better now. The time of day was later. Sunlight streamed through windows into an earthy kitchen. The house had an almost outdoor quality, like being in a cave with many holes serving as natural skylights. It was cluttered with stuff, and had a familiar smell that reminded me of chopped wood. I knew exactly where I was. I was home.

Like with the Eucalyptus grove, I knew where I was, but had no idea about how I had gotten there. I lowered my gun. I didn’t want to accidentally shoot myself, and by that, I meant my younger self. What would happen if I encountered him face-to-face?

I wondered if I somehow had arrived home before him. Come to think of it, I didn’t know what time, what day, or even what year it was anymore. I wondered where Sampson was. Would he freak out when he saw me? No, I was sure he wouldn’t. I still smelled the same. It was still me, after all. He was probably outside.

Almost immediately after I thought that, I heard him barking outside. I smiled. I really was home, and Sampson was here where he belonged. But something was wrong. He was barking too much and too loudly. I nervously peered out the window.

When I saw what he was barking at, I felt like someone was pouring cold water down the back of my shirt. A black van and two police cars had silently pulled up and parked in front of my house. Officers were crawling out of them like giant beetles in black shells. I had a flashback to something I called “The Battle of the Ants”, where I watched smaller ants overwhelm termites with sheer numbers and a single-minded relentlessness. Similarly, I had a machine gun, but I felt just as doomed.

The cops had approached without their sirens on, presumably to catch me off guard, but Sampson had ruined their plan. There was a small field of property between the road and my house, and the cops had some ground to cover before surrounding the house.

Sampson didn’t charge them, but he stood his ground, letting them know that he wasn’t going move any closer to them as long as they didn’t move any closer to him. This was the same bravery he had shown protecting me from wolves and a mountain lion in the woods. But, outmatched as we were in those confrontations, the wild animals had wisely backed down. They were predators. They wanted easy targets.

The cops didn’t have the luxury of backing away, and they probably wouldn’t even if they could. They were getting off on this. I know, because they’re like me: adrenaline junkies. They were feeling the thrill of the hunt.

I was going to give up peacefully when I saw something that shattered any remaining fragment of sanity. One of the cops pointed his gun at Sampson and fired. The barking stopped. There was a pitiful whine, and another gunshot. I imagined the officer standing before a boardroom, explaining how the German Shepherd “attacked” him. He would say, “I was afraid for my life,” (which the police always say every time they shoot someone) and that he felt his life was in “imminent danger.” There might even be a mention of the shooting being merciful “so the animal wouldn’t suffer.” Then the board would give put him on “paid administrative leave” while they reviewed the case only to clear him later.

But I did not forgive him. I would show him the same “mercy” he showed Samson – a quick death.

 The killer who shot Sampson was a deputy or a sheriff with a stupid mustache that only cops wear. He wasn’t one of the badass guys in the black tactical gear. The problem was, I’d have to take out some of those guys to get to him.

You’d think I’d be freaking out more, but I wasn’t. I knew I was going down. The only question was, “How many of them would be coming with me?”

“Many,” a voice in my head answered.

Tink! What was that? I heard the sound of something hitting the floor and rolling toward me. It took my brain a second to register what it was. Then the thing at my feet exploded.

It was like somebody took my photo with a flash about a foot away from my face, while at the same time somebody else shot a gun next to my head. I lost my sight and hearing in an instant. There was no pain of my body being torn by shrapnel, so a part of me recognized that the “grenade” was a flashbang, a device used to temporarily disorient people with loud noise and bright light. As a soldier, I almost admired the strategy.

I sensed the kitchen door being bashed in. I was tackled and hit the floor hard (for the second or third time today). My machine gun was yanked from my fingers. I heard muffled voices and saw shadows as my hearing and sight slowly came back. I felt an enormous weight bearing down on my four limbs and on my chest. I tried to move but couldn’t.

My eyes were watery and my vision blurred. I could make out the cops on top of me. They were faceless stormtroopers entirely clad in black, wearing black helmets with mirror-like visors. I tried to say something, but couldn’t. My hearing was restored enough to make out a muffled, “Stop resisting!”

I saw the punch coming but there was nothing I could do about it. My arms and legs were pinned. The fist connected. There was a flash of white, and I was out.

18

I woke up again wondering, Where am I?

This time, I appeared to be in some type of operating or recovery room. There were no windows. I was lying on my back on either an operating table or the world’s hardest mattress. 

I tried to sit up but couldn’t. A restraint strapped across my chest held me down. I tried to move my arms and legs but they were tied to the metal frame of a table or bed.

At least I could move my head. I looked around until I had learned everything I could and got bored. I lay there, staring up at the ceiling. Eventually, two faces came into view. Two men were looking down on me. One was Dr. Smith, a.k.a. Owl-Eyes. The other was Major Jones.

Smith was wearing his signature white coat. Jones was out of uniform and wearing a business suit. He had an ID badge clipped to his pocket with the letters “MD” visible after his name.

“Here’s the young man you’ve seen before,” Owl-Eyes said to Jones. “Jacob Abrams.”

Jones peered down at me with a worried look on his face.

“We don’t really know how to categorize him,” Smith explained. “He’s in his own world now.”

“Did that happen before or after the murder?” Jones asked.

“Mostly after,” Smith said. “His experiences before could be classified as schizophrenic behavior – hearing voices and experiencing hallucinations. He claimed to have seen God and regularly met with Satan. After the murder, his brain completely disassociated from reality.

“He was arrested in his house, wearing full military gear and holding a machine gun. He apparently has no recollection of his trial. From what I gather, his brain has transformed the stress and hardship of life of prison into a story about going through basic training in boot camp. That way, the incarceration seems like it was his choice. The beatings, the rape, and the structured environment have all been incorporated into his fantasy world.”