THE SECOND SIGHT
Chapter 80
Death was in the air.
I quickened my steps slid past that vile thing, giving it a wide berth.
I could feel its intensity and the stench it exuded. This was prime evil, and I could hear the huffing crackling sound in it, the angry un-dertones of violence. It wanted to be free, but I had the impression that it was being kept ti-ghtly in control.
The door wasn’t locked when I turned the knob, and I entered quickly.
A large white room, recessed fluorescent bulbs illuminating everything adequately. The temperature was controlled by a faintly humming split air conditioner in the uppermost part of the right wall.
The bed looked huge and the pastor was looking very frail and tiny on it. He was surrounded by gadgets – machines that emitted beeps and sent images to four television screens on the wall.
There were gadgets fixed to his legs, arms and ribs.
Some were running into both nostrils. Some were being fed into his body intravenously.
He was absolutely still, but his eyes were wide awake, staring with panic at the white-clad bald-headed man standing over him and patiently extracting a clear colourless liquid out of a brown bottle with a syringe.
Samson Basoah, dressed just like a doctor, complete with disposable gloves and tiny spectacles perched precariously on his nose.
He was facing me, head bent as he concentrated on what he was doing. He didn’t look up as I entered although he would’ve heard the door opening.
Leaving it unlocked in the first place spoke of the man’s total confidence in himself.
He thought it was one of the nurses, or a doctor … or worse a security guard. He had no fear or use for them. He would deal with them in his own way.
I could hear Paul Anderson’s silent screams of horror, and as I closed the door gently I was suffused with a wrath so strong I trembled. I stood just inside the room and watched him.
He finished drawing the fluid into the syringe and sli-pped the bottle into the side pocket of the white overcoat he was wearing.
He lifted the syringe and checked for bubbles, tapping it a couple of times and depressing the plunger slightly to get rid of gathered bubbles … and then he finally looked up and saw me.
SAMSON SOUL
I took great plea-sure in his quick intake of breath.
I saw the fear that filled his face, causing the blood to drain from that bestial face. His disbelief was so total that his mouth sort of fell open, and again this brou-ght me considerable plea-sure.
SAMSON
(horrified)
No!
He breathed hollowly, and he swallowed de-eperly.
Slowly the mark of the beast emerged on his forehead, red and angry, blazing blood.
BOAT
(whispering)
Yes.
I took another step into the room.
He shook his head numbly, and then slowly he began to puff himself up, to give himself a slice of courage to face me.
SAMSON
(softly)
I don’t know what happened, boy, but I believe we killed you. It is just a matter of killing you again.
I said nothing, but I took another step into the room.
I could see the sudden perspiration on his face now.
He glanced at Anderson, and then at me.
He was gauging distances, calculating his moves, weighing the odds. He was scared, but he aimed to go out fighting and causing the gravest destruction he could achieve in the little time he had.
Suddenly his right hand flew upward and downward, aimed at Anderson’s brea$t. He wanted to stab the sick man with whatever poison he had in the syringe and possibly kill him before doing battle with me.
The unfortunate thing was I had come into full control of the awesome power I wielded, and at the moment the syringe would have disappeared into the pastor’s body it simply disappeared from his hand.
He stood thus, transfixed, looking at his empty hand with stunned intensity.
He chuckled, a hysterical piece of cursed sound that only helped to aggravate the fury I was feeling. He whirled suddenly, and now his left hand was clutching a huge gun.
SAMSON
(hissing)
Die, you f****ng as-s-hole!
He hissed and pressed the trigger again and again.
The bullets left the gun, eight of them, but instead of traveling at a speed so fast that the eye could not follow them, they sailed throu-ghthe air sluggishly, lethargically, in perfect slow-motion.
Also read – The Second Sight – Episode 46
The gun made no sound although there was no silencer attached.
Finally we all heard the clic-ks – the sound made by an empty gun.
He had fired all the bullets.
The slow-motion bullets struck my che-st, one at a time, and they slid and fell at my feet with light metallic thuds.
He was standing facing me, gun still extended, and now I could smell his pungent fear as the sweat trickled down his face.
A man I had once loved above all else, a man who had been a friend and a guardian, a man who had sold his soul and caused great pain to many.
In that silent moment when our eyes met and held, a story of a lifetime was told, the good weighed against the bad, the judgment silently pa-ssed … and he was guilty.
Slowly he dropped his hand and shook his great head again.
SAMSON
(scared)
What happened? You died! We saw you die!
I said nothing.
He took a longing look at the window.
It was closed and barred, reinfor-ced with a metal sash mounted into the wall behind.
His li-ps came off his teeth in a poisonous snarl.
SAMSON
(hissing)
You can’t win, shitface! We’re far too many, and far too strong!
BOAT
(gently)
So you think.
He slid the gun into his pocket, and then his great hands balled up into fists, and his mark blazed angrily.
SAMSON
(contemptuously)
Are you going to kill me, Yaw? Is that what you want? Go on, shitface, do it now! Do your worst!
BOAT
(softly)
You wish.
My voice was brimming with all my rage and disgust.
Suddenly I saw it, the Death cloud.
It whirled into the room – vibrant, sizzling, angry, evil, volatile!
I could see the tentacles struggling to come out of it, the nasty little faces that shimmered in there, wishing to tear, to possess, to destroy.
Samson was cringing now, his face filled with a terror that for a moment thawed my heart. He took frantic steps backward until his back came up against the wall.
SAMSON
(whining)
No, you can’t do this! No human can do this, Unblind or not! Yours is not this power!”
The Death Cloud was all around him, whirling, wailing, howling!
I looked on, slightly afraid as I gazed on the sheer malice in that thing. It moved, agitated, swirling round and round, the little faces mad as they now gazed at me with hatred and impatience.
Samson was looking at me now, and there was a desperate look in his eyes, a look that told me he knew something, a secret that he was keeping ti-ghtly.
And suddenly it dawned on me.
They – whatever they were inside the Death Cloud – were waiting for me!
They could not act without my command.
And suddenly I un-derstood: Samson Basoah knew about the Death Cloud, and he knew only I could control them. So long as I remained a novice they could only come so close, but they could not cause him any harm.
Maybe he saw the whole thing dawning on my face, because suddenly his huge frame began to tremble with great fear.
SAMSON
(imploringly, devastated)
No, Yaw, don’t do this to me! Shoot me, push me out of the window, take my heart … but please don’t let me die like this! Yaw, please! Yaaaaaaaw!”
I looked at the evil for-ce again, and I nodded slowly.
BOAT
(softly, resignedly)
Go on, go get him!
I spoke, not with a vengeful heart, and certainly not with even fury.
At the last moment I realized that the power I wielded went beyond my personal vendettas. It was to be used impartially, without guile, without hatred.
So I pushed my hatred and fury aside; I even pushed thoughts of my father aside, and I was left with a simple truth: despite his charisma, despite all the good things the man Samson Basoah had done for me, he was evil, and didn’t deserve to live.
The terrible things inside the Death Cloud howled with glee and rushed upon the hapless man.
White and ash claws reached out and to-re into the frenzied Basoah.
Evil being after evil being to-re into him, reached in and grabbed.
His soul came out, a dirty soul that struggled brutishly, resisting the strength of the evil hands tearing into it. I could see the agony on the face of Basoah’s soul as it was being forcibly wrenched free.
Finally, with an evil whoop, the whole soul came out, gripped fiercely in the hands of the evil for-ces inside that ash cloud.
They enveloped it, screaming with frenzied evil, dragging that squirming little thing into their middle, eating it, taking it over, and in that manner they crashed throu-ghthe wall with a final wail … and were gone.
The great hulk of Samson Basoah fell forward, hitting the floor hard, his head turned to the side, his tongue lolling out thick and blue, his face still bearing the mask of the terror he had experienced.
He was dead.
I could not stand it any longer.
I turned and rushed blindly throu-gha side-door into the bathroom.
I ba-rely made it to the sink, and then the vomit came spewing out of my mouth.
After a very long time I came to grips with what had happened.
I splashed water on my face and wiped it off with a hankie, and then I returned to the room.
Basoah was where he had fallen, horror-struck eyes still staring. I bent and closed his eyes, and then I turned my attention to Paul Anderson.
To be continued…