Cannibal Corpse, M/C

Chapter Twenty

“And what was that?” Slaughter asked him.

Feathers poked the fire with his stick. He took another cigarette from Slaughter and snapped off the filter, lit it, blew smoke from his nose. He reached into the pocket of his shirt and pulled out a card. A tarot card. It was The Devil. On his throne, Satan sat with bat’s wings outstretched, one hairy arm lifted as if in greeting. The card was well-worn, greasy, yellowing.

Slaughter reached out to take it from him, but Feathers pulled it away, shaking his head. “No, I don’t think you should touch it, son. I think it carries a black juju of sorts on it.”

“A curse?”

Feathers shrugged. “Something like that. Something intended for me and only for me. I don’t think you need any of this bad rubbing off on you. Maybe there’s no power in this thing but I believe that there is. It’s from the Skeleton Man’s pack and when he comes to collect it, he’ll collect me, too.”

A fetish object. Slaughter had heard of such things. A juju could be both good luck or bad luck, and in this case it was definitely the latter. Like some kind of engraved invitation that would carry Feathers through the gates of Hell.

“But you still haven’t told me how you knew those things,” Slaughter said. “How you knew his name was Chaney or what happened in that house. How did you know those things?”

“I told you I knew ‘em same way you’ll know ‘em.”

“And how’s that?”

“By going on a vision quest.”

Slaughter just looked at him. The story Feathers had just told was weird, gruesome, and more than a little unnerving, but he wasn’t sure if he believed it or not. Feathers seemed to be honest and his words had a ring of truth to them…but a vision quest? That was mysticism and Slaughter had very little patience with things mystical and unseen, things divinatory and spiritual. He was by nature an existential kind of guy that believed in what he could see and touch and know to be true through his five senses. Other than that…he was skeptical. Yet, Black Hat had showed himself in that video at the compound and he had crept into Slaughter’s dreams. Maybe that didn’t mean much, maybe there was nothing truly flesh-and-blood about any of that, but Slaughter had a nasty feeling about it all.

“And how do I go on a vision quest?”

Feathers smiled. He put the tarot card back in his pocket. From the other pocket he took out a little packet of tinfoil and unwrapped it. Inside, there were three little dried slices of cactus about the size of coins. Peyote buttons. Slaughter had seen them before. He had tripped his brains out on the stuff once and was discovered naked in a field the next day.

“Buttons? The bad seed?”

“Sure, it’s the only way.”

“Go on a trip?”

“See your destiny.”

Slaughter smiled, thinking about it. Black Hat aside, he was out here to get that bio out of the fortress and maybe kick some Cannibal Corpse ass in the process. This was business. He was on a mission and he needed to hook back up with the Disciples. Did he really want to go scrambling his brains at this point? The answer to that was no, obviously, but as he looked into Frank Feathers’ eyes he saw something in them—an integrity, a complete honesty, a certainty that was nearly mystical in and of itself. Slaughter could plainly see that the man wasn’t playing with him. He really believed a trip on the button express could unlock secrets and unveil mysteries, open doors of perception long closed and provide an acuity, a bird’s eye view of things, that would be forever denied him unless he let the peyote wake up his sleeping brain and notch his mind up to complete consciousness.

Look at him, man. He’s got his finger on the pulse of something bigger than the both of you. Maybe it’s because he’s an Indian but more likely because he’s had commerce and interaction with old Black Hat and maybe some of that supernatural mojo rubbed off on him like gold dust.

Slaughter took the button and chewed it up, filling his mouth with cool spring water from the mug Feathers gave him. The button tasted like shit like they always tasted like shit. He worked it into a mush in his mouth, swallowing the sacred juice in droplets.

“You’re on your way, friend,” Feathers said, patting his arm. “Wish I could go with you. Wish we could travel together. I think we’d do well together, you and I. But it’s not to be. Tonight, tomorrow night, I’m going to have a visitor and he’s going to want the card I hold in my pocket.”

“Sure.”

“You’d best be on your way.”

Slaughter understood. Where he was going now was not for the old man to follow. His trail was his own and the lights he saw and the shadows that moved there were of an intimate variety. Frank Feathers had his own upcoming trip to contend with and he needed time alone to come to grips with his god (or the lack of one).

Slaughter hopped on the hardtail and waved to him and Frank Feathers waved back, both knowing they’d never see each other again. At least not on this side of the pale. Slaughter followed the dirt road out to the pavement and opened up the hog until he could really feel the wind biting into him. He rode like that for maybe twenty minutes until he felt a weird anxiety taking hold of him. He wasn’t making the turns in the road so good anymore. He was sweating. He was shaking. A town appeared before him and a green sign said: EXODUS, pop. 1200. He pulled in and followed deserted streets, getting tangled up in a weird snaking labyrinth that was partly physical but mostly in his head. He parked his scoot at a little grassy park and stepped off, falling face first into the grass which was so vividly green it seemed to reach up to him, every blade a separate finger of hallucinogenic color. The smell of it was intoxicating. He pulled himself to his knees, grounded by waves of intense nausea. He vomited but had no temporal memory of it, thinking it had happened many hours before except that the bile on his chin was wet, so very wet. It smelled like a freshly-cut lawn.

He stood uneasily, sweating rivers.

Before it went too far, he grabbed his road bag off the scoot which contained the Combat Mag and extra speed loaders and his Kukri. It was important to have these things with him, he decided. In his mind they were totemic. He stepped through the vibrant green grass, making for a peeling bench bordering a monument. The earth felt squishy beneath his boots. He was aware of the blades of grass crushing beneath his step, the sound they made. It was almost like they were crying out in pain.

The bench.

He fell into it.

And went for a ride…

* * *

He was shivering in the sun and sweating hot rivers, his limbs feeling numb and his mouth oddly dry. The sky above was so brilliantly blue that it was like neon. The monument was a great slab of stone that seemed to rise higher before him like a monolith. It sparkled like silica. He was getting off good and he seemed to know it without actually knowing anything but the whisper of the wind and the clarity of all things like his eyes were truly open for the first time in his life.

“What was that Indian’s name?” he heard his voice ask. “Did he have a name?”

He put his hands to his ears because his voice was loud and booming and he could see the sound waves moving through the air like ripples in a pond, picking up speed, flying off towards the hazy mountains in the distance and then rolling back at him, each individual wave hitting him like breakers and making him cry out. The words were turned around and pulled inside out and they echoed around him, hitting him from all sides.

“THAT…”

What?

“DID HE?”

Stop it!

“NAME WAS THAT…”