James Swain - The Program

“I know it’s none of my business, but would you tell me what happened down in the basement earlier?” Fitch asked.

“I saw Jason Crutchfield,” Linderman said.

Fitch did a double-take. “You mean a ghost?”

“I don’t know what it was, but I saw him.”

“That’s downright spooky.”

Linderman thought he heard a noise and shifted his attention to the road. Being an FBI agent had a lot of pluses. For one thing, people rarely questioned his sanity, even at times when it probably should have been questioned.

“Were you aware that Jason was involved with Satanic worship?” Linderman asked when he realized it wasn’t a car.

“That’s news to me. How did you find that out?”

“There’s evidence of it in his bedroom. He quotes the laws from the Satanic Bible in his notebooks. There was also a creepy cartoon character he drew over and over. It’s burned into the wall of his room by his desk.”

“Burned? Are you sure?”

That was a good question. Linderman wasn’t sure what was real and what wasn’t real anymore, the two sides of his brain melding into one, the hallucinations blending into what was absolute and concrete. He said, “Maybe I need to look again.”

They entered the house and headed downstairs to the basement. Linderman wondered how long Crutch had lived in this black hole as a boy. A year? Two? Had he been banished here for a reason? Or had his mother and three sisters just wanted him out of the way, their lives inconvenienced by the presence of an adolescent boy?

They entered Crutch’s bedroom. Holding Fitch’s flashlight, Linderman pointed the beam at the wall behind the desk, and the menacing character with pointed ears materialized before their eyes. Fitch ran his fingertip across it.

“You’re right – it’s burned into the concrete.”

“Any idea what it is?”

“No, sir.”

Linderman took one of the spiral notebooks off the desk, and headed upstairs. Stopping in the kitchen, he flipped the notebook open to the middle. Both pages were consumed with drawings of the same character burned into the wall. He photographed the character with his cell phone, and emailed the image to FBI headquarters with the request that the analysts in D.C. run it through the bureau’s image data bank.

The FBI had many unique data bases for catching criminals. There were data bases for DNA samples, fingerprints, facial recognition, known aliases, and reoccurring images in violent crimes. Linderman was hoping that the image he’d found in Crutch’s room had appeared in other crimes, and might lead him to understand its significance.

Five minutes later, he had his answer.

The image was the symbol for the Pagan Motorcycle Gang, and was of a mythical figure Surtr, or “the black one.” That was all the information the bureau had.

He called Vaughn Wood in Jacksonville. The Pagans were one of the motorcycle gangs that Wood had run with during his Little Jesus days. Linderman hoped Wood could shed more light on the image’s significance.

“You back in South Florida?” Wood asked by way of greeting.

“I’m in Pittsburgh. You heard about Vick.”

“Saw it on the news this morning. I thought I was going to puke. Are you having any luck finding her?”

“I’m chasing down a lead right now. I need for you to tell me about the Pagan Motorcycle gang’s association with Surtr, the black one.”

“That’s an odd request.”

“I’m at Crutch’s family home. There’s an image of Surtr burned into the wall in Crutch’s bedroom, and Crutch’s highschool notebooks are filled with drawings of him as well.”

“Well, that explains a lot of things.”

“What does it mean?”

“It means that Crutch went over to the dark side a long time ago. Surtr is an evil god from Norse mythology. He looks small, yet can spring up at any time, and become a jotunn, or a giant. According to mythology, at the end of the world Surtr will wage war and defeat all the gods and burn the world with fire.”

“So he’s a killer.”

“An evil killer, without pity for human life. He’s also a cannibal and a vampire. The Pagans worshiped Surtr and considered him the embodiment of everything they stood for. Part of joining the club was swearing your allegiance to him.”

“So Crutch is possessed by Surtr.”

“I wouldn’t use the word possessed.”

“Why not?”

“I have to go back to my experience with the Pagans. Those boys were evil because they wanted to be. They wanted to hurt and kill people.”

“So they were evil before they found Surtr.”

“That’s right. I did a lot of soul-searching when I ran with the Pagans. I came to realize that good and evil are impulses buried within a person’s soul. You can choose to be good, or choose to be evil. It’s a free choice.”

Impulses. The word made Linderman think back to his meeting with Crutch in the chaplain’s study. He had wanted to kill Crutch for the things he’d said about Danni, and that impulse had tripped him over to the dark side. It had let him think evil thoughts, while also seeing a dark side to himself which he hadn’t known existed. There was no way to explain the things which had happened to him.

But there was an escape. He would stop thinking about revenge and retribution, and go back to the man he’d always been. He was not a killer, nor was he an avenging angel. He was an FBI agent, and had sworn to carry out the law. That man.

“This has been very helpful,” Linderman said.

“Glad I could help,” Wood replied.

The back door opened, and Fitch stepped into the kitchen.

“The cadaver dogs are here,” Fitch said.

Linderman ended the call and followed Fitch outside. A long bed silver pickup was parked in the yard. In the back of the truck were a pair of dog crates containing two eager German Shepherds. Beside the truck stood a barrel-chested, shaven-headed African-American man dressed in battle fatigues. In his hand were a pair of long leashes.

Fitch made the introductions. The handler’s name was Raheem Gleason, only everyone called him Doc. The dogs names were Tuffy and Bones.

“Did you find the elderly man you were looking for?” Linderman asked.

“Sure did. My dogs are the best,” Doc replied.

“Was he dead?”

“Naw, he was still kicking. So, how many bodies are we looking for?”

“Four,” Linderman said.

Doc scowled. “Who the hell is going to dig “em up?”

Fitch fidgeted uncomfortably. Linderman had assumed that the officer had called the Oakmont Police Department and asked for an excavation team to come out after he’d requested the cadaver dogs. That was the order of go when searching for corpses. Fitch pulled out his cell phone, and walked out of earshot.

“Dumb ass cops,” Doc muttered under his breath. He opened the crates and leashed his dogs. His personality changed as they jumped to the ground and glued themselves to his legs. Like a proud father showing off his offspring.

“I always wondered when I’d get a call to come out to this place,” Doc said.

“Why’s that?” Linderman asked.

“Jason Crutchfield was warped. One time in highschool he offered to write a term paper for me if I’d let him tie me up to a chair. I said no thanks.”

“Smart move.”

“You have any idea where the bodies are?”

“All we know is that they’re somewhere on the property.”

Doc walked around to the side of his pickup and opened the door. He returned holding a handful of white flags similar to the ones used by the power company to mark the location of underground wires. He handed the flags to Linderman.

“What are these for?” the FBI agent asked.