Ashe waited at the bar for their drinks. Cybil had disappeared into the crowd to find a place to sit. Despite what she’d told him, this bar seemed more crowded than the one he’d wanted to go in. Everyone around him appeared to be of the same fashion persuasion as Cybil. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been in a place with so many people dressed in black and neon colors.
“Here you go.” The bartender placed two longneck beers on the counter in front of him.
Ashe handed him his credit card. When he received his card back with his receipt, he waded into the people, looking for Cybil. The whole place smelled like clove cigarettes and the music that thrummed through it made his teeth vibrate. He found his companion after she waved to him from a table close to the far wall.
“Here you go.” He handed her a beer. “You are old enough, aren’t you?”
“Of course,” she said and took a slug of the drink.
“So this is less crowded than the other place?” He hoped that it didn’t sound mean but at the same time hoped it did.
“I guess I was wrong,” she said. “Probably because they have live music tonight.”
Ashe looked at the stage. A band’s equipment was set up, but the music filling up the place was recorded.
“Who is it, Casper and the Ghosts?”
Cybil shook her head while taking another drink. “It’s this local group called the Goth Sox. They play funky electronica punk semigoth stuff. They’re between sets right now.”
“Are they any good?” he asked.
“It’s according to your taste in music, but if you’re into Pat Boone, no they aren’t.”
He laughed. Pat Boone had never been to his taste. Back in the day he’d rocked out to Nirvana and Pearl Jam like most everyone else his age and a little bit older. An old photo or two might even have shown him in his flannel and ripped jeans phase, but he’d never understood the electronica rave music.
“I guess we’ll have to see.”
Finally he drank from his own beer. He hoped the alcohol would relax him just a bit. Tension still pulled at his insides. Cybil didn’t seem to notice or if she did, she was hiding it well. His pants began to vibrate. For a moment, he thought he’d given way to his slight amorousness, but quickly realized he’d put his cell phone there when they came into the bar. He fished it out and answered it. The noise in the bar was too loud for him to hear.
“Hold on a second,” he yelled into the phone. “I need to walk somewhere I can hear.”
Ashe walked from their table to the door. He stepped outside into the cool, damp air. His ears rang slightly from the reverb of the speakers inside.
“Are you still there?” he asked.
“Yes, this is Detective Semmes. Sounds like a raging party.”
“I came to the parade to try and get my mind off of things,” Ashe said. “Then I ended up at a bar.”
“Drinking doesn’t make things better. It makes them worse most of the time.”
“I promise I’m not trying to drink my blues away. It’s just a beer, and a cheap one at that. I’m sure you didn’t call to find out what I’m doing though.”
“You’re right. I like a man who gets straight to the point. I’m heading up to Birmingham tomorrow. I found out they’ve had a similar case at one of their hospitals.”
“What do you mean similar?”
“They had a dead woman get up and walk out of the morgue at St. Vincent’s Hospital. I thought you might want to ride up there with me.”
“Why would I want to do that? I’ve missed quite a few days of classes. I don’t think the university is going to let me just keep missing,” Ashe said.
“For one thing, it might help me because you might notice similarities between Marianne and this woman. Another is that the police up there might not be very welcoming to me, but probably would think twice if I brought you,” Semmes said.
“You want to take me along for sympathy,” Ashe said. “I don’t think so.”
“Don’t hang up. I really need you to go for the first part. If there is any similarity between the two women, it could give us an MO or something.”
“What kind of similarities am I going to be able to see? I’m not a psychologist, Detective. Just because I built a machine for recording emotions, doesn’t mean I understand them.”
“That’s not what I mean.”
“So what do you mean?”
“I mean, physically.”
“You mean carnally. You’ve got stills from the morgue video at University Hospital.”
“Okay, you knew her carnally. I can’t explain it, Ashe; I just need you there. You saw the video of Marianne. You have a doctorate, so you give it more credibility than just me. Even though I’m a detective, they might still think I’m crazy.”
Harsh notes from a keyboard screeched from the bar’s open door. Ashe cringed as the notes assailed his ears. The Goth Sox must have taken the stage.
“All right, when are you leaving?” he asked.
“Around 6 a.m. I’ve got your address so I’ll pick you up at your house,” Semmes said.
“I’ll be ready.”
Without another word, Ashe hung up and slipped his phone back into his pocket. He walked back into the bar. Green and red lights flashed from off the stage. A skinny woman with green and pink striped hair clutched a microphone in both hands. She sang something that sounded a lot like nothing to Ashe. He tried to block out the noise as he made his way back to Cybil. When he got there, a college-aged guy with eyeliner around his eyes sat beside her. She looked up at Ashe and smiled.
“Dr. Shrove, this is Stewart, a friend of mine.”
Jealousy poked at Ashe as he stuck his hand out to shake with the guy. Stewart didn’t reciprocate.
“I don’t shake hands,” he said. “Germs.”
Ashe cut his eyes to Cybil. “I’ve got to go. The detective working on Marianne’s case needs for me to ride up to Birmingham with him tomorrow. We’re leaving early so I need to get in bed.”
“The band just started,” she said.
“Maybe Stewart could give you a ride back to campus,” Ashe said.
“No, I came with you, and I’ll leave with you. Besides, I left some stuff in your office, so I’ll need you to let me in.” Cybil snatched up the beer that had been his. She chugged it down. “No need wasting it.”
She patted Stewart on the arm as she walked past him. Ashe and she left the bar.
Cybil let Ashe open his office door and turn the light on. She slipped past him, allowing her hip to brush against the front of his pants. Her backpack lay in one of the chairs he kept for visitors. She snatched it up and pulled it onto her back. The straps were tight and pulled her coat open. This drew her peasant blouse tight across her breasts. She turned to face Ashe, sticking her chest out as far as she could, which wasn’t far.
“I got my stuff,” she said.
He looked at her and then to his desk. “I think I left Detective Semmes’ number in my desk.”
He stepped past her. She smiled when she knew he couldn’t see her. Ever since she’d flashed for the stuffed alien toy, he’d been avoiding looking at her anywhere except her eyes. She didn’t mind it too much though. He had very pretty eyes. She could understand why Marianne had been with him even if he was a giant geek.
“I guess I’ll be going,” she said.
Ashe looked back at her and smiled. “Be careful. I’ll see you in a day or two.”
“Thanks for tonight. It was fun,” she said.
He turned around and looked at her. “I should be thanking you for dragging me out to the parade and that bar. I’m sorry we had to leave so early.”
“It’s okay,” she said, walking to him.
Cybil licked her lips. She thought about kissing him because there was no way he would kiss her first. Instead, she gave him a hug and put her mouth close to his ear.
“I’m sorry about everything. I’m around if you need anything,” she whispered.
He let the embrace fall away and nodded his head. “Thanks again, Cybil. You’ve been really great to me these last few days. If you don’t mind, tell my electrical engineering class to read ahead in the next unit, and I’ll have a special make-up day for them. Also drop in on my graduate class, and tell them to download the lecture by Dr. Marcus O’Shea from Columbia University’s website. It’s the one about the emotional engram machine.”
“Why not have them listen to one of your lectures on that, since you invented the thing?” she asked.
“He’s the guy I asked for help. It was some of his theories that helped me make it,” Ashe said. “I’ll be back in a few days.”
“Okay, sleep well, and have a good day tomorrow in the Ham.” Cybil started out of the office.
“The Ham?”
She turned back and smiled. “It’s slang for Birmingham. Goodnight.”
He mumbled something as she left, but she didn’t understand it. Deep inside her she wished that she could help him figure out what happened to his girlfriend. Maybe she would do some poking around while he was away for a few days.
A thin layer of fog settled over the campus when she left the building and headed to her Vespa. It would be thick by the next morning, she thought as she kicked the scooter into starting and headed toward her apartment.
Ashe sipped the police station coffee from a small Styrofoam cup. It tasted scorched and too bitter. Morning had come too soon for him. He slept poorly from the time he’d gotten home until his alarm sounded. As promised Semmes was at his house on the dot. The four-hour drive north bogged down in Montgomery due to school and work traffic. Although Semmes drove a marked Mobile PD cruiser, he refused to ride with the lights on even in the heaviest traffic.
After all that time riding, the lead detective on the case in Birmingham left them waiting in the main lobby of the police station. Semmes sat beside him on the hard wooden bench. He too sipped at a cup of coffee, but he seemed to enjoy it. His badge hung from the pocket of his sports coat.
“How much longer do you think we’ll be sitting here?” Ashe asked.
“Probably just a few more minutes. They said this detective had a few people to interview this morning over at the hospital,” Semmes said.
“We couldn’t have just gone to that hospital?”
“According to the detective, the hospital isn’t very excited about this and wants to keep it hush hush.” Semmes took a slug of the coffee. “Plus I don’t know how to get there. I don’t get up here much.”
The doors to the outside opened. A gust of cold wind blew inside. A bald man with dark brown skin that was almost the color of the coffee Ashe drank walked in. A young man with rumpled hair followed behind him. They both wore black peacoats. The bald man smiled and walked toward them.
“You must be Detective Semmes from Mobile.” He extended his hand. “I’m Perry Monroe. We’ve been communicating back and forth about the Heinz case.”
Semmes stood up and shook Monroe’s hand. “Nice to meet you in person.” He pointed to Ashe. “This is Dr. Ashe Shrove from Alabama Tech. He’s the gentleman I was telling you about.”
Ashe stood and put his hand out to Monroe. They shook. The bald detective introduced his partner as Joey Brewer. All four men crossed from the lobby into the interior of the police station. They ended up in a conference room on the third floor.
A large television covered the majority of a wall. A window looking out on a downtown park made up another wall. They all sat grouped at one end of the conference table. Ashe and Semmes sat beside each other.
“So y’all had someone get up and walk out of a morgue down there in Mobile?” Brewer asked.
“It was more than just somebody,” Semmes said.
“It was my fiancée who died mysteriously the same night,” Ashe finished.
“I didn’t realize that. I’m sorry,” Brewer said.
“Rookie mistake,” Monroe said. He turned his attention to Semmes. “You know how it is when you are first made a detective. We just can’t seem to keep our mouths shut.”
“We’ve got a long drive back home,” Ashe said. “Can we get to it, please?”
Monroe nodded. He turned the on television and pressed play on the DVD player. The screen showed a cold storage room in a morgue. The camera was positioned so that it showed both walls that had drawers in them. A man in dark scrubs walked through the room and off screen. The time marker noted the time.
“This is a few minutes before the incident. We’ve interviewed that morgue tech. He said that nothing happened out of the ordinary,” Monroe said.
“What was his name?” Semmes asked.
“Jackson. Steven Jackson,” Brewer said. “He has a small record for misdemeanors like possession of drug paraphernalia, but according to his personnel records, he’s been clean on every single drug test, even randoms.”
“Someone is coming on the screen,” Ashe said.
A man in a lab coat walked into the morgue. It was not the same man from Marianne’s abduction in Mobile. This man was shorter and stockier. He walked to a drawer near floor level and slid it open. A black body bag lay in the drawer. He unzipped the bag. A woman’s face stared up at the ceiling. Ashe couldn’t tell anything about the detail of her face. The camera was positioned too far away from it. The only thing he could tell was that she was probably later middle-aged and a light-skinned black woman.
“That is Heinz in the drawer,” Monroe said. “The doctor is unknown.”
“No one saw him come in, or he wasn’t required to sign in?” Semmes asked.
“There is a doctor on record entering the morgue at this time. The name on the sign-in was Smith. St. Vincent’s Hospital has no doctor named Smith with privileges,” Monroe said.
Ashe listened but kept his eyes on the screen. He saw no similarity between his fiancée and this woman. The doctor pulled out a device from his lab coat’s deep pocket. The angle and distance of the camera made it difficult to see what it was, but he placed electrodes on the woman’s forehead. After a few seconds, she sat up in the drawer. The doctor helped her down from the drawer. They walked out of the morgue. Monroe switched the television off.
“That’s it,” he said.
“Does that look familiar to you, Ashe?” Semmes asked.
“It’s almost exactly what happened with Marianne, the device is even the same. The woman was much older than Marianne. I couldn’t tell anything else about her from the camera,” Ashe said.
“We have a photo of her,” Brewer said.
He opened a manila folder lying on the table and took a picture from it. Brewer passed it to Semmes. Ashe looked at it as well. The face from the photo was pleasant and familiar. Ashe was sure he’d seen it before. He searched his memory.
“I saw that woman last night.” He recalled the woman on Dauphin Street.
“That’s impossible,” Monroe said. “She’s dead.”
“Apparently not,” Semmes said. “You saw her walk out of that morgue. Not many dead people can do that.”
“Unless they aren’t dead,” Brewer said, “or are zombies.”
“Rookies,” Monroe said to Semmes. Then he turned to Brewer. “There are no such things as zombies or vampires.”
“Don’t be so quick to judge,” Semmes said. “So far we have two women presumed dead, who have walked out of hospitals alive.”
“Only after being visited by a mysterious doctor,” Ashe said. “I guess I should say doctors because that wasn’t the same man who stole Marianne.”
“I want to get back to what you just said,” Monroe said. “You claim to have seen this woman last night. Where at?”
“Dauphin Street in downtown Mobile. It was after the parade last night,” Ashe said. “Except she had these weird amber-colored eyes instead of dark brown. It was the same woman though.”
“She was alive?” Monroe asked.
“Very much so. She told me and the person I was with that she was the president of a society that would be parading on Mardi Gras night at almost midnight. She kept mentioning a very specific time that the parade would start and finish, 11:15 p.m. to 11:59 p.m.”
“Did she try to eat your brains?” Brewer asked.
“What kind of a stupid question is that?” Ashe said. “I just told you she spoke to us. She didn’t attack us or do anything unusual, except she walked a little stiffly.”
“She is dead,” Brewer said. “Rigor mortis made her shuffle just like a zombie.”
“Rookie, we’re going to have to have a talk after Detective Semmes and Dr. Shrove leave,” Monroe said. He turned to Ashe. “Are you willing to sign an affidavit stating you saw her?”
Ashe looked at Semmes who nodded. “Of course. I’ve got no reason to lie about this.”
“We’ll get something drawn up and send it down to Semmes,” Monroe said.
“I think we’ve gotten everything we’re going to get from here,” Semmes said. “We’ll keep in touch.”
The detective stood. Ashe did the same. They left the police station. The air outside still felt very chilled. As they walked down the sidewalk, Ashe put his hands in his pockets to keep them warm. The traffic moved steadily down the street.
“What was the name of that society Heinz said she was in?” Semmes asked. “I don’t remember any society parading that late on Mardi Gras night.”
“She said it was a new one called the Knights or Mystics of Mayhem,” Ashe said. “This is the first time I’ve celebrated Mardi Gras so I don’t know all the names yet.”
They crossed the street at an intersection and headed to the Mobile PD cruiser. Semmes pulled a cigarette out and lit it.
“I’ll have to go check them out.” He took a drag off it. “You about ready to head back south?”
“Yeah.”
Ashe looked forward to nothing else. He needed some quiet time to process everything. Life seemed to be moving in a direction he didn’t like, and he thought that he might need to be making some changes.