Kill Whitey

“That’s how those guys make their money,” I said.

Sondra stared at us in confusion.

“I’m sure you’ve seen Jason,” I told her again. “Big dude with a machete and a hockey mask?”

Yul nodded. “He always wears a hockey mask.”

Sondra frowned. “And this Jason is like Whitey? ”

“Yeah,” I said. “Sort of.”

“But Whitey not wear hockey mask. Is very vain. Wears nice clothes. Expensive.”

“That’s not what we mean. See, Jason kills people. Lots of people. He’s a serial killer. Slaughters surplus teenagers out in the woods—and once in Manhattan.”

“And in space,” Yul said. “Don’t forget about when he went to space.”

“That one sucked.”

“Are you high, Larry? That was the best of the series!”

Sondra looked even more confused. I glared at Yul, and he fell quiet again.

“See,” I told Sondra, “in the movies, Jason can’t be killed. He’s murdered all these people—like, over a hundred—but he can’t be stopped. They’ve stabbed him, shot him, hung him, drowned him in the lake, and cut his fucking head off. The FBI even mortared his ass, but he always comes back. Jason just keeps on coming. He’s—”

I stopped in mid-sentence, my words dying in my throat. Sondra’s eyes were wide and frightened. She had that same look I’d seen on her face when she was hiding beneath my Jeep. I reached out and touched her hand. Flinching, she pulled away from me.

“Sondra, what’s wrong?”

“This Jason,” she whispered, “is very much like Whitey. Very much.”

This wasn’t the first time she’d made a weird reference like that regarding Whitey, and despite how I felt about her, I was getting tired of that vague shit. Things were off the hook, too far gone to keep secrets or tell half-truths now. Darryl and Jesse were dead. I was a murderer, even if it was in self-defense. Playtime was fucking over, far as I was concerned.

“Sondra,” I said, trying to keep my voice calm and neutral and my body language non-threatening, “is there something you haven’t told me about Whitey? Because if there is, now would be a real good time to tell it.”

She lowered her face, staring at her lap. “Da.”

“What is it? And why wait until now to tell me?”

“Because I am being afraid you not believe me. Is, how you say…difficult?”

“Try me.”

“Okay,” Sondra said. “I tell you.”

fourteen

“In America,” she asked, “have you hear of Grigori Rasputin?”

Yul shook his head. “Never heard of him. Is he another mob guy?”

“Yes you have, man.” I nudged him. “Rasputin, the mad monk? Big ZZ-Top looking beard?”

He blinked.

“You’ve heard of him,” I insisted. “The Russian dude they couldn’t kill?”

“So he is like Jason Voorhees,” Yul said.

“Like I said, he took a lot of damage and kept coming.”

“He is like Jason,” Sondra said. “Not wear hockey mask. Not have same name. But like each other. Hard to kill, no?”

“Jason was hard to kill,” Yul agreed. “But I still don’t remember Rasputin. The name’s not ringing any bells.”

“Rasputin was like a wizard or something,” I said. “Supposed to be some kind of psychic faith healer. He acted as a counselor for Tsar Nicholas.”

“Tsar who?”

I sighed. “Russia’s last royal family? The Romanov dynasty? What the hell did you learn in school, Yul?”

He shrugged. “Not this. And not much else, either. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be working at GPS.”

“The Romanovs ruled Russia,” Sondra said. “Larry is right. They our last kings. Tsar Nicholas, Tsaritsa Alexandra, and their son, Tsarevich Alexei. Alexei had sickness. Had…what is word? When you are to bleed?”

Yul stared at her blankly. “I don’t know.”

“Hemophilia,” I said. “He had hemophilia.”

“Da. Hemo…however you say. He inherit from his great-grandmother. She had, too. One summer, while on vacation, Tsarevich Alexei fall off a horse and bruise his back. He gets very sick and weak. Has much bleeding inside of him. People say he might die. Tsaritsa Alexandra looked everywhere for help. Doctors, faith healers, holy men. Nobody can fix. Alexei gets worse. But Alexandra’s best friend, Anna Vyrubova, tells her that she can help. Anna knew of a wandering strannik in Siberia who was supposed to be powerful healer. Is maybe part of the Kwan.”

“The Kwan?” I hadn’t heard this part of the story before. “What’s that?”

“Am not sure.” Sondra shrugged. “But is not a what. Is a who. Much mysterious. Much said in whispers. Maybe they are magicians. Is said in my country that they secretly rule the world from their black lodge.”

I frowned. The only black lodge I knew of was the song by Anthrax.

“Black lodge?”

“Is place where magicians go.”

“So this Kwan,” I asked, “they’re like the Illuminati? You believe that shit?”

“I don’t know what is Illuminati,” Sondra said. “Is that to turn on lights?”

“No,” I said, “it’s a group of people who supposedly control the world. They own the politicians and the corporations.”