Pilate Read online

  They nudged, bickered and spun themselves up. They’d confirmed to themselves what the pink smudgy goodness was. Judas was now completely enclosed in the circle they had made of themselves. They crept closer still. They poised at the edge of the moonlight and coveted the vampire’s second skin.

  When they attacked Judas, he never heard them coming.

  H erod’s cops drew weapons. The guns cleared leather as one and Pilate stepped between them and Immanuel. His back was fully exposed as he scooped Immanuel up and hugged her to him. He covered her and her heat hissed against the cold

  vampire. Pilate grit his teeth as the fangs dropped. The talons burrowed into his arms enveloping her. He expected to be buffeted with countless bullets in the back for the tiny Christ, but they never came.

  He held on a bit longer and was shaking with adrenaline when Pilate finally put her down. He turned back and saw Herod’s cops. The cops still had their guns tightly clenched in white-knuckled fists.

  Pilate felt a wave of relief, followed abruptly by confusion. Herod’s cops were on their backs on the floor of the passageway. They were less than ten feet from the Throne Room door and almost posed in their positions. The cops were a triangle of heavy pins, knocked flat by a deaf bowler. It was a silent and deadly strike.

  Pilate looked from the cops to Immanuel. She graced him with a miniature smile.

  “That,” she said, indicating the fallen pins, “has not been written.”

  Pilate glanced back and saw that they were, all of them, dead. He stared at her and saw the cuffs gone. Pilate looked at the door separating them from the Pharisees desire. Pilate thought he saw hope in her eyes. A choice now had to be made. What’ll it be, nigga? Is you in or is you out? Make your decision. There are only seconds left.

  Pilate made his decision.

  The vampire reached out for Immanuel’s hand. “Let’s get the hell out of here,” he told her with a harsh whisper.

  Immanuel put her naked wrists up before his face and cuffs reappeared. They closed on their own with a snicksnick and snapped into place. She lowered them and regarded Pilate with her gaze.

  “C’mon,” he repeated in a whisper both harsh and impatient, “what the fuck’s wrong with you, let’s go!”

  “We stay,” she stated, “The both of us.”

  Immanuel’s words stunned him. She really wasn’t leaving and he couldn’t leave her. He couldn’t believe this was happening. She really wasn’t leaving. What possible reason could she have for wanting to stay? Pilate knew she knew what was coming. She knew they were going to kill her, and still Immanuel insisted on staying. Why?

  Their window of opportunity was closing fast.

  “We can make it,” he pleaded. Motionless, she remained. “Why,” he tried, “won’t you let me save you?”

  “Why won’t you let me,” asked the Christ, “save you?”

  Before Pilate could consider that, the door slid open with a pounding metallic bang. Herod stood in the threshold of the open door.

  He bid them welcome.

  CHAPTER 39

  J udas sat quietly in the driver’s seat of his car. He was in the lot of the same park where Immanuel spoke, hours before. Tears flowed salt-pink down his cold vampire cheeks.

  He closed his eyes and thought. He knew it all now: he was Judas Iscariot and sold the Christ to her enemies for thirty grams of silver.

  “How fucking clever,” he told himself. He had not seen until too late. But now there were no doubting his guilt. In this life and ancient times, Judas had sold his soul for gain at the expense of the one he should have died for. He sold the Christ twice for a handful without even thinking about it. It was what he’s meant to do and there were no doubts. None whatsoever.

  Judas removed the plastic baggie from his coat. He peeled it open and stuck a finger in. Judas retrieved a goodly bit of Plata on the tip of his finger and snorted the fucker up. It was his first time.

  The Plata made Judas feel most intensely. It exacerbated all his rotten feelings and amplified ugly thoughts. The Plata was what Judas needed. He needed to feel like shit. The silver helped in this regard. For Judas thought he knew what came next. It was fine and well deserved. And it was far better than another turn on this carousel.

  It was ironic Judas thought that he now believed in God, in the Christ. It was because she kissed him. She never did it before. She never, not so much as even touched him in their three years together. It never occurred to him why, but now he knew. Knowledge of this sort is not power, but rather a curse. This knowledge fed him his longterm future and prospects were bleak. But there was no turning back from what he did.

  There wasn’t a chance in Hell.

  The piper has played and Judas had had his time to dance. The bill was on its way and it’s time to pay the piper what he owes. No more turns. It was time to play his part. Judas must pay the piper and finish this. There are no more turns awaiting him.

  Judas left the sedan, made his way into the park. The stand of dark trees waited for him.

  “We go now,” it hissed and jeered at the others. They watched intently Judas howling at the night sky with its waxing moon.

  “We must wait,” argued another, “The Master wishes it. We must wait.”

  “Yesss,” a third replied, “but for what, why?” “Until,” it explained, “he comes over to our

  side. Then we can have him.”

  “What will the Master let us do to this one?” “Whatever we wish,” answered the first one,

  “Then we will take him down with us.” They all cackled gleefully at that. Whatever we wish! They had to shush each other. They were being children up past their bedtime. Naughty, they chuckled cruelly and shoo-shushed each other, but with thin success. They had to try, lest their wicked cackling be overheard by the vampire raging at the sky.

  Judas vividly recalled swinging in his vision from the dead tree. He remembered the true attempt at hanging himself. The dogs snarled as they tore into him and he wouldn’t die. Instead, he was left wandering the countryside, subsisting on the diseased blood of lepers, learning vampirism in a trial by fire. Surely he didn’t last long and had perished in violence.

  He realized this was to be his last go around. The visions were messages, warnings. He got it. Finally and far too late, but he got the message. Judas was late by much. He felt it definitely was time to not be.

  “I’m gonna do it different,” he said aloud. He strode through the park, kicking off shoes and unbuckling belt. He would not be left hanging, this time.

  His jacket left on the ground behind him, tears streaming, snot bubbles blowing out his nose and shirt torn in self-loathing misery.

  Less than a minute later, Judas was standing naked in the stand of trees. He had nothing on, save socks. He was naked to the world; naked before God, displaying his sin as shameful tattoos.

  Judas took scoops of Plata and vigorously rubbed it all over his nude skin. His bald head, clean-shaven face and neck got the brunt of it. Then more Plata smeared on the chest until all thirty grams of silver pasted itself to his cold, sweaty vampire skin.

  The Plata mixed with the sweat of pink that sprang wet from his pores. The coating was sticky and potent. Absorbing, then constricting and dilating blood vessels waiting beneath the skin. They pulled in blood to engorge vessels, resulting in Judas sweating great drops of blood.

  His arms were flung out wide and his head thrown back. Judas howled in pain and self rage from the knowledge he possessed of his fate. Judas hated it and hated himself. And there were no more turns for him.

  In all this he was being watched. They waited at the edge of the light and drooled over Judas.

  As one, they attacked.

  “Soon,” the first one whispered. The others nodded their agreement. They watched Judas and shook with their greed. The Plata fiends slept wherever they could find. They took advantage of enabling parents, weakwilled friends and naïve relatives. They slept in dingy shelters or wherever they could find. It
didn’t matter. The fiends were awake a lot, jonesing. They had loads of time on their hands. The major

  ity of which was spent in the park. There they invested time and a great deal of effort finding the high, getting high, keeping high, and trying to find the high again. Over and over this happened in an endless cycle of self-defeating prophecy. The fiends existed only for Plata. All energies, all efforts and all thought were for dope. Their being required it.

  Nothing else mattered.

  The Plata fiends bounced on itchy feet at the edge of the trees. They encircled and studied him. They did not question why gram upon lovely gram of the silver was smeared on the pale, naked man. It was Plata, they knew it and that was all that mattered.

  The fiends numbered twelve strong. They rushed into the slim circle of moonlight. They fell upon Judas as a lion befalls a gazelle.

  He never heard a thing.

  Mouths were biting him in twelve different places. Then they rapidly moved on to twelve new locations. Plata was being consumed wholesale along with whatever skin, capillaries, and fascia hid beneath the pink, yeasty smudges.

  Engorged blood vessels exploded with the tearing of flesh. Judas was brought rapid and rough to the dewy grass. He was held there fast. Judas was on his back while the fiends feasted upon him. It was manna to them and it seemed to rise like dough from his pores.

  The faces of his tormentors were awash in great gouts of the vampire’s blood and bites of flesh. The fiends were smeared with Plata, blood and the broken fragments of teeth from the throng of fellow attackers. They snarled and growled at each other. They brawled for the most.

  Judas did not resist. His pupils blew as he stroked from the absorbed Plata. The overdose slit a miniscule hole; ripping the wall of a blood vessel in an unbeknownst weakening in his brain.

  His mind was swimming in the warmth of his own leaking blood. It was soup; comfort food for those that waited still.

  Judas saw nothing. He felt nothing and knew nothing.

  Nothing.

  It was still full dark when Judas sat up and scanned the area. The clearing in the stand of trees had a few bodies strewn hither and yon. He checked all around him, not able to recall why he was there, not knowing the identities of the dead surrounding him.

  Judas glanced at his abdomen and noted enormous gouges taken out of him. Huge chunks of flesh were missing from everywhere he could see and palpate. He sat in a veritable pond of his own lost blood. Judas was too afraid to do a check on his face, but he forced himself. It was worse than he thought. His face was pretty much non-existent.

  Re-scanning his stomach, Judas focused in on a hard bit of something lodged in the ragged edges of one of his many wounds. He plucked the hard something out and raised it. He realized it was a piece of a tooth. He ran a fast tongue over top and bottom and was relieved to find all dentistry in place. His lips were missing, but his grill intact. Judas studied the tooth fragment some more, then dropped it forgotten when he saw the man. He stood there, watching Judas. His stare made Judas feel he was a used car, bought for a song.

  The man was eight feet tall, if he was an inch, and he grinned at Judas. He stood at the edged of the stand of trees.

  “Who are you?” Judas asked, afraid. The obscenely tall man looked down at him.

  “I am the Piper,” the man replied. “I’m here to get paid.”

  With that, the Mighty One turned on heel. Enormous footprints sinking inches into grassy parkland followed him as he melted into the night. He went to prepare a special place for Judas Iscariot. A nice chilly spot shall be reserved for the damned vampire in the Pit of Despair. Where he shall be tormented: day and night, for all time. Until Judas begs for the pain like a warm glass of milk and forgets who he ever was.

  A rustling came from the trees, high up in them. Judas’ eyes darted up and he saw them.

  “Now is time,” Judas heard them say. They tumbled down from the trees.

  The three demons hit the ground running. They converged on Judas’ shoulders. One demon slid itself around to the vampire’s face and grabbed hold of both ears. The demon shoved it in and furiously thrust his oozing fetid penis into the vampire’s lipless mouth. The demon pumped maniacally, quickly ejaculating. Clumps of greenish/brown demon pecker pus rocketed out Judas’ nose. His muffled, gagging protest coincided with tree roots erupting from spongy earth. The tree roots slid up over his hands and feet. The roots tugged them tight to the ground.

  Judas struggled in vain as the other two buried claws in his skull. They were going to drink of the soup the stroke had cooked up for them. They planned to rip Judas to shreds and dig in his brains with their forked tongues.

  As soon as they could pry the lid off.

  CHAPTER 40

  P ilate was ready to grab Immanuel against her will. He wanted to drag her down the passageway and out of this place. Sensing this, she stepped

  over the threshold of her accord. Pilate’s hand

  grabbed at empty air as Herod turned to him. Herod looked at him, but Pilate had already recovered, gazing impassively back at the Mayor. “What in the world happened to my boys?” he

  asked, smiling.

  “Don’t know,” Pilate responded, honestly, “They

  were okay a minute ago. You might want to check on

  them,” he added. “I think they might be sick.” Herod merely shrugged his shoulders.

  “Oh, well,” he shouted, “More for the Brood!” “More for the what?” Pilate asked.

  “Never mind, not important,” Herod assured him. Herod put hands on hips and appraised his former conduit. “I hope we can put our unfortunate

  past behind us, let bygones be bygones.”

  Pilate stared hard at Herod. What an unbelievable asshole, he thought. Herod had stolen everything Pilate had; his entire existence. And yet, he

  stood there like he owned up to nothing more than

  quaffing your last beer, or joy-riding your car. It

  was all Pilate could do to keep from tearing out

  Herod’s throat right then and there.

  Herod was still smiling at Pilate, the fuck. Behind him, niggas were coming out of the woodwork.

  Pilate couldn’t see them all because Herod was in

  the way, but he could definitely smell them. The

  men were alert and tense with wary fear. These

  niggas all knew him and there was more than a few

  of them. They knew the name of Pilate and were

  afraid. That made them very cautious and extremely dangerous.

  “I’m only here,” Pilate told the Mayor, “following orders.”

  “As am I,” concurred Herod; still smiling. Pilate’s not buying it. The smile was completely

  false. It was both silk sweet and bitter ash. It was

  nothing more than a chocolate covered rat turd.

  And Pilate was tired of eating this shit.

  “The Pharisees imposed the truce between us,

  Herod,” Pilate told him. He knew full well he

  couldn’t take out Herod with all those guns. He

  would have to wait for an opportunity to present itself. The Christ was staying, that much was clear.

  “I just wanted you to understand something,” Pilate

  told Herod.

  “Yes?”

  “The Pharisees’ truce is the onliest reason your

  bitchass still standing.”

  Pilate curiously observed Herod’s reaction to

  being dissed and threatened in front of his boys on

  their home court. Herod darkened a moment then

  the cloud slid right past him. Crazy, he seemed to

  take it all in stride. Herod held out his hand. “Truce, then?” he asked. His smile was big and

  vampire. Herod’s face was melting and slick with

  infectious paste. Herod: obviously beyond Pilate’s

  attempt at intimidation.

  As Pilate looked on, bugs began mating on the
<
br />   hellish landscape of Herod’s diseased face. Worms

  were crawling over each other in Herod’s rippling

  eyes. It was pretty fucking sick.

  Herod’s hand was dry except for the index and

  middle fingers. Bone showed there, where it connected to the now permanently unsheathed talons.

  Waxy boil juice had eaten away the flesh of

  Herod’s fingertips. Pilate noticed, but Herod didn’t

  seem to.

  “Truce,” Pilate agreed, but would not shake the

  diseased hand. He would play along, Pilate will

  protect the Christ. Tomorrow meant nothing to him

  now. Tomorrow was gone.

  Herod shrugged off Pilate’s decline to shake his

  hand as a duck shakes off drops of water clung to its

  back. He’s stepped aside to allow Pilate entrance to

  his most favorite room. Pilate stepped into the big

  room. He stopped and perused the chamber. He

  had never seen the inside until now. He had no idea

  what was lurking in the shadows.

  The Throne Room had been cleaned recently, Pilate noticed. The surface of it was anyway. There was below the natural lemon scent a deeper, frozen and more solid stink to the great room. The stench

  clashed rudely with Herod’s ostentatious throne. The walls of the Throne Room held on to the

  stink; fed on it. Misery, Pilate knew from experience, had a stench all its own. It flourished here. Pilate turned himself slowly around. He noted

  the exact number of cops in the room while doing

  so. Damn, there were lots of them.

  “What do you need all these niggas for?” Pilate

  asked, “Y’all havin’ a motherfucking Town Meeting, or what?”

  Herod chuckled. “No,” he explained. “My men

  are here to watch this:” Herod pointed to the wall

  opposite his grand throne.

  The wall Herod indicated was in deep darkness.