The Lapis Chronicles:Psychic Slaughters Two

The Lapis Chronicles:
Psychic Slaughters Two

Copyright © 2002 By Cassandra J. Houston

To:

Lapis Lawrence Stone for the use of the name.

Gabriel for the use of the name and inspiration.

The Stainless Steel Box



Stone Brewton looked up as his son entered his office. Lapis walked to the
huge desk and stood before it. For a long moment father and son simply
stared at each other. Stone stood and walked around his desk and stood
facing his son. Lapis was two inches taller than Stone, so Stone did not
have to look up much to address him. \'Business first.\' Stone reminded
himself.

\"There are more than seven billion people on this planet, Lapis. Less than
a million of those people are Polleo. That\'s less than one percent. Perhaps
a percent of a percent. Of the million Polleo there are probably four
hundred thousand who are Conscius. Aware that they are Polleo. Of those
four hundred thousand, only half ever get into one of our schools. We
remaining Polleo are known officially as Verus Polleo, the Truly Able.\" he
began. He knew Lapis already knew the numbers, but Stone was adjusting the
same speech he used with all the new people at the International
Parapsychological Institute.

\"We are scattered throughout the world. A few of us on every continent.
Those of us who do not work officially within the IPI hold positions of
power among the Insciens. There are, of course, the Pene Polleo, the Nearly
Able. They tend to be the ones who almost make it to a school. Almost, but
not quite. Often they make their livings high within shadier occupations.\"

\"Vultures.\" said a small voice from the door. \"Every last one of them.\"

Both Lapis and Stone turned to see Apsara Zala closing the door. She
walked around Stone\'s desk, climbed into the chair and then onto the desk.
On the desktop, she walked up to Lapis and hugged him. She held him by the
shoulders and looked at him. \'Your mother would be so proud of you.\' she
communicated to him, telepathically.

Lapis smiled at Apsara. From the desktop, she was about the perfect
height. He looked at the petite Hindu woman before him and grinned. Apsara
Zala was five foot nothing and weighed less than a hundred pounds. She was
the smallest person Lapis knew.

Apsara now turned to Stone. \"I\'m sorry I am late, Stone.\" she said.

Stone smiled. \"It is an unusual day, Apsara. Even for us.\" and he turned
back to Lapis. \"You are here to be assigned. You will work in
investigations. That means you will be working with me. Is that going to be
a problem?\"

Lapis shook his head. He\'d looked forward all of his life to work with his
father. \"No problem.\"

Stone nodded, with a grin on his face. Apsara groaned. \"You will work with
us as Servo Polleo.\"

Lapis worked to keep his jaw from dropping. \'Protector of the Polleo.\' he
managed, mentally. He would be working with his father. He would also be
working with Gabriel. He was being given the most difficult and dangerous
job in the IPI. And his dream.

He father nodded, smiling. He took a step closer to his son and they
embraced. \"I am proud, son.\" he whispered in Lapis\' ear. Lapis did not miss
the emphasis on \'am\'.

<><><><><>

The two men and one woman stood when Stone and Lapis entered the large
lounge. Lapis took them in. He knew Gabriel, of course. The other two he
did not know, although he had heard of them either from his father or from
Gabriel.

The six-foot Swede was Danne Giertz. He approached Lapis and held out his
hand. Lapis shook it while looking into eyes of palest blue. Danne\'s hair
was so light it was almost transparent. \"Good to see you again, Lapis. You
may not remember me.\"

Lapis shook his head. \"I remember. You graduated my third year. Magna.\"

Danne grinned. \"Good memory.\" he said, nodding.

Lapis was then introduced to Feruzi Jackson. Feruzi wore a beautiful full
length skirt and blouse. Lapis marvelled at how dark she was. Like ebony.

Feruzi smiled while Lapis shook her hand. \"I am sorry to say we have never
met.\" she said flirtatiously. \"I went to the Indian Oceanic Institute.
Class of Eighteen. I\'m actually new here myself. I transferred from the
Cape Town IPI last week.\"

Lapis smiled his winning smile. \"Nice to meet you. Sort of nice knowing
I\'m not the only new one.\"

Danne sighed dramatically. \"We could use a pretty face around here.\" he
said. \"Too much testosterone for our own good around here.\"

\"No one can argue that.\" Apsara appeared at the door, a quarter smile on
her face. She surveyed the people in the room. As usual, she was the
smallest. Even Feruzi was a head taller than she was. She craned her neck
to look at Stone. \"You get to try your rookies out, Stone.\"

Stone raised his eyebrows. \"Oh?\"

\"You\'ve been requested at the coroners office.\" she said, as she turned on
her heel. \"Josh said he hopes you haven\'t had breakfast and don\'t stop for
it.\" and she was gone.

<><><><><>

The Cook County Coroners office was only a few blocks from the lakeside
offices of the IPI, so they walked. The basement was, somehow, much colder
than even the air conditioned building it was in and all four men were glad
of their suit jackets.

Stone spotted Josh Levin immediately. He met them halfway down the hall.
Stone quickly introduced Lapis and Feruzi, who Josh had never met before.

\"It\'s in the lab.\" Josh said, grimly.

They followed him into the stark white and silver lab, where Josh led them
even further, through a door to a back room. This was a special lab where
cases which required special handling were kept.

There was a single stainless steel box on the table. It seemed filled to
the rim with blood. \"I don\'t know where the rest of the blood is.\" Josh
said as Stone and his fellows gathered around the table.

\"What is that floating in there?\" Feruzi asked, her face wrinkled.

\"A hand.\" Josh said, simply. \"The box is ten inches square. The police
measured it at the scene.\"

Josh caught all five of the sharp looks thrown at him. Before he could
speak, however, another voice sounded from the door.

\"A Polleo did this.\"

It was Satya. He was in a white lab coat and looked green, to Lapis.

\"How do you know?\" Stone asked him, as Satya approached the table.

Satya shrugged. \"Because the whole body is in there. It\'s been Morphed.\"

\"I wanted you to see this. I would have called you in any event, but Satya
here told me the body was Morphed, or whatever you people call it.\" Josh
said.

Stone looked at Gabriel and nodded. Gabriel sighed. \"Sometimes I really
hate this job.\" he muttered as he took off his jacket and rolled up his
left sleeve. Danne was doing the same.

They each placed a hand on a side of the box. And they both suddenly
snapped their heads back as if they had been shocked. Their facial muscles
got tighter and tighter. Neither man lasted more than a minute before they
both wrenched their hands up and away. Both men, already pale to begin
with, seemed to be three shades paler.

Danne recovered first. \"She was Morphed all right.\" he ran his right hand
through his white blonde hair.

\"Over and over, she was Morphed, from what I can tell.\" Gabriel said, his
voice shaking.

\"It\'s too intense, Stone.\" Danne said, his hand was clenched in his hair.
\"Whatever was done to her was so intense I can\'t hold on more than a few
seconds.\"

\"Me either.\" Gabriel said. \"She was female. I know that. She was also
Insciens. But she was in so much pain, I can\'t lock on.\"

Danne looked at the box with something like fear in his eyes. \"He, and I
know it was a he. He,\" and he ran his hand from the top of his head down
his face.

\"He Morphed her in a hundred different ways before he got her into the
box.\" Gabriel said, also looking at the box with fear and loathing. He
looked at Josh. \"You\'ll find her entire body in there. Everything. Shoved
in there.\"

Josh\'s mouth had fallen open. \"How?\" he began, but Stone cut him off.

\"Someone who knows how can fit the human body into a pop can.\" he said,
quietly.

\"But who would want to?\" Lapis said. \"Some big time sadistic fuck.\" he
went on, answering his own question.

\"By the way,\" Danne said, gripping the towel tightly. \"All her blood is in
there.\"

\"That\'s impossible.\" Josh said, looking at the box. \"There isn\'t enough
room.\"

\"Psychometabolism.\" Feruzi whispered, looking horrified.

\"He adjusted her cells.\" Satya said, sadly. \"Twisted them. To get them to
fit in the box with her body.\" he walked over to a table and came back with
a slide. He dabbed a finger into the blood in the box and smeared it onto
the slide. He and Josh went to a microscope across the room. Satya put the
slide under the microscope and looked. \"Yes.\" he said, grimly.

Josh looked. Without moving he said. \"Jesus Christ in a chariot driven
sidecar. Look at that. The cells are twisted. Folded.\" he straightened up
and turned. \"If I didn\'t know what you people were capable of, I would
swear this was some sort of joke. A very sick joke.\"

Stone looked at Danne and Gabriel. \'What exactly did the Farsensing
reveal?\' he said, telepathically.

Gabriel wiped at his mouth. \'Someone knocked on her door and she opened
it. She knew him.\'

Danne was shaking his head. \'She didn\'t use a name. Just said, \'Hello.\'
when he pushed her into the apartment or house or whatever it was and
closed the door. It was an apartment. Yes. Nearby, I think.\' He glanced
at a clipboard next to the box. He read off of it. \'The exact address is
here.\'

\'He crushed her throat with Metamorphosis, then he began.\' Gabriel said,
then closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. \'She could not
talk. She could not scream.\'

Danne bit his lover lip. \'He was very careful not to break her back.\' he
said. He heaved a huge sigh and shook his head. \'The pain became so bad
within a few minutes she blocked most of it out.\'

\'What did he look like?\' Stone pressed.

Both Danne and Gabriel frowned. \'No idea.\' Gabriel said. \'When she
answered the door he was looking at his feet. He had a baseball cap on.\'

\'New York Mets.\' Danne said. \'He never looked up. Not once while she could
have seen him.\'

Stone made a frustrated sound. \"How long until you can figure out how tall
she was. Put the body back together.\" he said aloud to Josh.

Josh looked at him like he\'d lost his mind. \"I won\'t be able to put this
mess back together.\" he said.

\"I might be able to.\" Satya said, scratching the back of his neck. \"But
it\'ll take me a few days.\"

Stone gave him the no nonsense look that meant he would be obeyed.
\"Wednesday. We\'ll be back Wednesday.\" and he turned and left. The rest
followed him.

They left the building and began walking back to the IPI. Stone did not
speak, but communicated with them all through telepathy.

\'You will go to that girls place and find out everything you can about
her. No matter how insignificant. Pass the information onto Lapis and
Gabriel.\' he said as they all walked silently along the lake front. \'Lapis
and Gabriel, you will follow up on every scrap of information they give
you. Check out every name, address and telephone number. Find the links to
the Polleo. And I know you may not like it, but I want Gabriel and Danne to
go over what you found in the farsensing over and over. Maybe a mirror or a
pair of glasses of something caught a reflection.\'

\'Alright, Stone.\' came Gabriels thoughts.

\'Go. Now.\' Stone said, as they approached the building. \'I will start
checking and seeing what sick fucks we have in our databases that might
have done something like this.\'

Stone turned into the IPI building as Lapis, Feruzi, Danne and Gabriel all
walked further down the lake front. The victim lived a mere three blocks
away in a high-rise.