“Tom Cook, I presume?”
Shelby walked toward the tall, rail-thin man, smiling and holding his massive paw out for a handshake. Cook returned the smile and accepted the handshake, although he winced a bit at the firmness of Shelby’s grip. Shelby relented and let the man’s hand drop. At times, he didn’t know his own strength and forgot that not everyone had spent their lives relying on their brawn to survive.
“That’s right,” the man replied, his voice almost shockingly high-pitched. “And you must be Shelby.”
“In the flesh,” Shelby said. He jerked a thumb toward Mack. “This is my sidekick, Jerry MacIntyre. But you can call him ... well, whatever the hell you want. He answers to pretty much anything.”
Mack rolled his eyes and stepped forward. “The name’s Mack. And ignore my sidekick. He occasionally has these psychotic lapses during which he suffers from an inflated sense of his own importance.”
Tom laughed, and the sound stabbed at Shelby’s ears like an icepick. The man seemed nice enough, but good god—that voice. It sounded like the poor guy hadn’t gone through puberty yet, even though he was at least forty years old.
“Pleased to meet you both,” Tom said. “It’s about time Gagne got us some real security on these shoots.”
“Speaking of that,” Shelby said. “Why don’t you fill us in on why we’re needed. I understand the general need for security, but I got the feeling that there were specific things happening that prompted the request.”
Cook nodded. “That’s right. But it’s pretty nasty out here right now. Let’s head into the director’s RV and get out of this weather.”
The snow that Shelby had earlier thought might improve the landscape had arrive and the wind was already whipping it around.
“Sounds good to me,” Mack said.
The three men walked toward a mid-level RV, and Tom opened the door to let Shelby and Mack enter first. Once inside, he motioned toward a table that was covered with storyboards and shot lists. A few cheap metal chairs were scattered around it. As Shelby tried to quietly calculate if they were demonstrative of the production budget as a whole, Cook indicated that they should sit.
“Now forgive me if the questions I ask sound stupid to you, but I assure you, I’ll explain everything. My first question is simple. You are from Serenity, correct? I mean in the sense that it’s your hometown?”
“Well, it’s both our home now, but yeah, I grew up here. Except for when the boxing career was at its peak and I was pretty much on the road constantly, this is where I’ve been.”
“Mack, you’re not originally from the area?”
“No, I’m a city boy. Detroit born and bred.”
“Yet you’ve chosen to move to Serenity.”
“Well, yeah.”
Shelby suspected the real reason his old friend had finally left the city behind was to keep an eye on him but hoped that little fact wouldn’t come out as he doubted it would instill an abundance of confidence in their new employers. The topic of “spells” needed to remain unexplored.
Mack continued, laying Shelby’s worries to rest. “Shelby finally convinced me that the slower pace would prolong my life.”
Tom Cook considered them both, scanning their faces. Then he seemed to come to a decision.
“Good. The reason I asked all of this is simple. I need to know, from someone who has been here for a long time, if certain things that we’ve seen and, well, heard are ... normal in this, uh, part of Michigan.”
Shelby experienced another moment of doubt about the viability of the entire enterprise. Not only was the young director’s voice probably lethal in large doses, but he sounded suddenly hesitant to tell them exactly what he needed to say.
“Ookaaay,” Shelby said. “Such as?”
Cook hesitated just a moment longer, then pulled a couple of photos from the bottom of a pile of random papers. He fanned them out in front of the two men.
For a moment they both just looked at the photos, then Shelby reached out and picked one up.
“What is this?”
“Vandalism, obviously.”
Shelby continued to examine it, at one point turning it sideways before returning it to its original orientation.
“I meant what is this building?”
“Ah, well, thank you for thinking it’s a building at all. It’s merely an exterior façade built to look like a cabin in the woods.”
Shelby squelched the urge to snarl, put off by the director’s obvious pride in the work someone else had done, independent of any input or oversight from him. But instead he turned the picture sideways again.
Mack frowned at him. “Shel, why do you keep doing that?”
Instead of answer him, Shelby looked up at Cook.
“This film,” he said. “It’s a horror film?”
Cook nodded. “Serial murder – hints of the paranormal. Yes.”
“And the main scenes are being shot at the house just north of town? The old Parré house?”
Again, Cook nodded. “That’s right. Given that the house is already famous, at least among horror enthusiasts, we thought it would make an excellent location.”
Shelby looked back at the picture. “If I’m not mistaken, this will be the first major film shot there, although many others have requested access.”
“Ah, yes.” Cook shifted in his seat, appearing just a bit uncomfortable. “You are correct there as well. And I might as well be completely honest with you. The star of our film, Colton Matthews, has been very involved in the early development of this film.”
“And is this the reason he’s the star?” Shelby asked bluntly.
Again, a shift of discomfort from Cook. “Ah, well—Colton has his fans. It was a good fit. But I would be lying if I suggested the two circumstances didn’t, shall we say, complement each other.”
“What prompted him to get involved in the first place?”
Cook shrugged. “You’d really have to ask him. He said something about reading an old book? I suppose he just kind of fell in love with it. Just among us and the fencepost, Colton Matthews is something of an odd duck. Very into the occult, magic, and all that nonsense.”
“The kind of stuff you make movies about,” Mack said.
“Oh, but just movies,” Cook retorted, waving away Mack’s thinly-veiled jab. “Everyone knows it’s all in good fun.”
“Everyone but Colton,” Shelby said.
“Well, yes, actually. The guy gets really into his roles. Method acting is all well and good, but Colton ... well, sometimes he gets downright scary on set. You’re not sure if he’s going to be able to turn it off or not. I mean, hell, it plays well on the screen, but the terror on the faces of his co-stars is just as often genuine as it is a result of superior acting talent.”
Shelby nodded. “Interesting. Very interesting.”
He passed the picture he’d been examining over to Mack. In the picture what appeared to be a cabin built in a glen deep in the forest, had been defaced by spray paint.
“Pretty bad tag job,” Mack said. “I’ve seen better art than this on the side of train cars in Detroit.”
“Watch. If you look at the painted lines this way …” Shelby reached out and adjusted the picture in Mack’s hands. “Here, do you see?”
Mack squinted. “Yeah ... it looks like gothic styled letters.”
“That because it is. And do you see what two letters?”
“Looks like an M and ... yeah, that’s a P.”
Shelby looked at Cook with a meaningful expression on his craggy face. “Can you think of anyone connected with the film who has the initials MP?”
Cook brow furrowed as he thought. “No, I don’t—”
“And I don’t mean cast or crew. Think beyond that.”
Cook thought again, and then a sharp intake of breath punctuated the air. He quickly pushed his chair back and stared at Shelby.
“You don’t mean—”
“Yes, I do. Michael Parré.
Tom Cook seemed to have paled a shade or two. “I’m not going to lie; I just had a chill go up my spine.”
Mack coughed and then leaned forward. “Pardon me for not being as up on my history of the town as I ought to be. I mean, I’ve heard of the Murder House and all that. You can’t go downtown Serenity without seeing the signs trying to lure tourists up there. But I don’t know the history.”
“And a full history will have to wait for another time,” Shelby said. “Suffice to say that Michael Parré was a serial killer whose methods were exceptionally horrifying, and he did most of his work in that house on a hill north of town. He often preyed on newcomers who came to town in search of work in the lumber industry, as they were often transient indigents without family or friends to come searching for them.” He reached for the picture, and Mack handed it back. “Pretty ornate graffiti, made all the more so by the fact that whoever did it … did it sideways.”
“That’s just weird,” Cook said.
Shelby looked up, a slight smile on his face. “Right. Mack, file this one under ‘just weird.’”
Mack nodded “Just weird. Check.”
Shelby now picked up the second. His face showed his obvious displeasure with what he saw. Again, with the false cabin in the background, there was what appeared to be a small pile of animal carcasses. Or, more accurately portions of them.
“What the hell?” Shelby asked, turning the picture toward Cook.
“Ugh,” he said, “It’s horrible. I know. Two days after the carpenters finished the cabin we found the spray paint. Then the day after that when we showed up to do lighting levels we found this in front of it. It was rabbits, mostly. The kid who cleaned it all up said there was a fox also and … someone’s cat.”
“Probably a stray,” Mack said, as much for his own benefit as anything. It had been gruesome enough when it had appeared to be wild animals. The thought of a domestic animal—a pet. That brought the depravity level from orange to red.
But Cook shook his head, looking sad. “The part they found was wearing a collar.”
“Well, shit,” Mack said. “Filing this under ‘just fucking awful.’” He set it aside as well.
The final picture was again of the cabin. Shelby reasoned it was the most recently taken of the batch, not only because a large bloodstain could be seen on the ground where the deceased creatures had lately lain, but the fake cabin had an almost perfectly circular hole in it, traces of charring on the edge. It was though a cannon had fired a very large, very hot ball directly through the wooden structure.
“By this point we had security, such as it was, at the mouth of the access road you guys drove down to get here. So, how someone managed to sneak a fucking cannon into the location unnoticed I cannot say.”
“Well,” Shelby said, looking closely at the picture which had clearly been taken with a pretty decent camera, and focused his attention of the burnt-looking circumference. “It doesn’t necessarily have to have been a cannon. Could have been a cordless jigsaw, and a little propane torch.”
“I suppose it could have. But it wasn’t,” Cook said. “The security posted at the entrance to the road said he heard a loud bang, louder than a shotgun.”
“And when he went to inspect?”
“Uh, yes. Well, he didn’t.”
“Beg your pardon?”
“Yeah, he pretty much started the car and bolted. Drove back into town and told me he quit.”
“Was it a local guy?”
“No. He was provided by the studio.”
“Well, that’s good at least,” Mack said.
Shelby turned to look at him.
“How so?”
“I’d hate to think someone local would be that much of a pussy.”
“True. But look, Tom—can I call you Tom?” Cook nodded. “Tom, I don’t have an instant answer as to what we’re dealing with here. I’d really like to say it was just kids, being fucking idiots.”
“But you repeat yourself,” Mack said.
“Mmm,” Shelby said, nodding in a way that clearly meant, “Don’t even get me started.”
“I’d like to tell you that, but here’s the thing. Serenity’s got its share of stupid-ass kids. Maybe more than its share. And I’m not pretending to know each and every one of them. I’ve pretty much made it my habit to avoid them whenever possible. I could see kids tagging the cabin, but everything that happened after that is beyond what I’d expect. I’m not saying there might not be some latent tendency toward this kind of behavior. Like I said, I don’t know them personally. But given the sophistication of the graffiti, I’m not really even liking kids for that part.”
“And I’d don’t think any of Serenity’s youth have access to a cannon,” Mack added.
Shelby reached over and took the other two pictures again. He leafed through all three several times before laying them back down in front of Tom Cook.
“Okay. Well. Someone is fucking with you. That’s clear. Who it is … that’s the opposite of clear.”
“Opaque,” Mack offered.
Shelby scoffed. “No one says, ‘Who it is, well that’s opaque.’ Do you even listen to yourself?”
For the first time since they’d sat at the table Cook smiled.
“I enjoy the banter between you two.”
“I’m glad you do,” Mack said, “because I’ve had more than enough of this old bastard’s bullshit.”
In lieu of a verbal response, Shelby flipped his friend off while saying to Cook, “It sounds like the weather’s stopped being an asshole for the time being. I’d like to see the place in person.”
“I’ll take you there, but there’s not a lot left to see. The day after the hole appeared the whole thing burned down. Damaged several trees. There was no line in the budget for paying off park rangers.”
Shelby stopped.
“Park rangers?”
“Yeah. They showed up after the fire. They had come to find the source of the smoke.”
“Park rangers,” Shelby said again.
“I told you already, yes.”
“Tom, this isn’t a park. This is all reforested private property. It’s still owned by one of the logging companies that used to pretty much run Serenity. There’s nothing close enough to being a park for there to be any rangers.”
“They had uniforms.”
“Ever hear of the internet, Tom? They could have ordered spacesuits just as easily, but you might not have fallen for that. You fell for the old, ‘Howdy, I’m a ranger in this here non-existent park,’ routine.”
“Never heard of that one,” Mack said. “But I am familiar with the efficiency with which Blanchard Hardwood’s people work in this area now. Let’s just say a lot more of the forest would have to have caught fire before anyone from their company would notice or care.” He’d laced the word “efficiency” with so much sarcasm it almost stung to hear it spoken.
Tom Cook stood and pulled his jacket on. Walking toward the door he said, “So, those were like the people who did all this.”
“Or working for the people who did, yeah.”
“I’ll know better,” Shelby said, stepping down from the trailer, “once I get the lay of the land.”
Mack closed the door behind him as he was the last to exit, and said, “It always ends up being about you getting laid.”
“That’s not what I said. Check your hearing aid batteries.”
“Oh, you two are just delicious,” said Cook, leading them on foot further down the access road.