The Hollow Ones(52)

Odessa grasped the fabric on the back of Blackwood’s jacket, steadying herself. Blackwood said, “They are called the Hollow Ones. The emptiness—the ever-hungry. Mesopotamian lore has them born last of the Udug Hul—the foul spirits. Don’t come close to the sea salt circle, you don’t want to touch it.”

Another of them hissed and gnashed its teeth, shrinking away from a rooster at its ankle.

“Foul entities,” said Blackwood. “You see them revealed here in visible form. But there are many entities surrounding us, at all times. I have seen, in the course of certain investigations, forensics experts enter a crime scene and use a special ultraviolet lamp…”

“A Luma Lamp,” said Odessa.

“Yes, to reveal how a clean room truly looks—that which is invisible to the naked eye. Well, that’s the way these things are visible to me. All around us. All the time. These particular ones: larvae, who jump from human body to human body like young adults stealing cars and taking them on a…what is it?”

Joachim said, “A joyride.”

Distressingly, all three entities followed Odessa around the room with their gazes, turning their eyeless heads in unison.

“Yes, a joyride. A Hollow One only inhabits a human host for a limited amount of time. They are creatures of chaos. They thrive on it. They enjoy when their host body is killed. That is how they are forcibly ejected from the body, ending the ride. You have to understand that the moment of death, of being murdered, is to them an immensely pleasurable experience, which is why they go on killing sprees. The hosts experience these occupations as blackout moments. Such as your fellow agent, Leppo.”

The thought of Walt Leppo was the only thing that could bring her voice back into her throat. “Walt?” she whispered.

Blackwood walked toward the cylinders, Odessa releasing his jacket. “They are compulsion—addicts to heightened emotion: The moment of death, of ejection, is a sensation such that they seek to repeat it again and again.”

“Dying?” said Odessa.

Blackwood nodded. “Oftentimes, if for whatever reason the death wasn’t satisfying enough, they will leap directly from one corpse into another nearby human, in the hope of intensifying the experience. They gain access most easily to the emotionally conflicted and the mentally unstable…though they can take advantage of any situation with the element of surprise. They are wily, cunning creatures who will exploit any opportunity.”

She watched them turning in circles, plagued by the roosters. Odessa said, “I don’t know if I can believe what I’m seeing.”

“Hollow Ones are mortally afraid of only one thing, and that is roosters—black capons—virgin capons. Interestingly, they love to eat boiled eggs. We have to keep them separated at all times. Together, they could achieve great destructive power, a mass casualty event.”

Odessa saw now that the fourth cylinder, the one farthest away from her, was empty. “Where’s the…?”

“Ah, yes. Over the years, I have caught and captured three. The fourth receptacle awaits the last of them. The last of the last—born at the end. The hungriest.”

Odessa watched the creatures jerk away from the small roosters, screeching. “And you think the fourth one is…?”

“Is free, raising havoc—yes. Rode the disgraced governor’s aide in the airplane trip over the island of Manhattan, crashing and slaying his own family. Rode the town supervisor in the office massacre on Long Island.”

Odessa realized now, having not put it together before: “Both political figures.”

“Yes, I thought of that. The Hollow Ones’ only weakness, other than their fear of the black capons, is their random nature. They embrace the thrill of death and all its chaos without any regard for the circumstances, careening from one tragic catastrophe to another. But if they were focused somehow…say, directed to inhabit persons in positions of power…you could imagine what would happen…”

Odessa shook her head. “How did you catch them?”

“Different situations, different eras. Their inconsistency of behavior has served them well in that regard. But now the fourth—the elusive fourth—appears to have established itself, of all places, in the New York–New Jersey region.”

Joachim wandered over to the cylinders, standing inside the implied diamond. He knocked on one of the hard, clear polymer containers, startling the Hollow One trapped inside. It immediately attacked, pressing its concentric-circled mouth against the Plexiglas. A fat, pale tongue rotated hungrily, slowly, streaking saliva all over it.

Blackwood said, “Joachim watches over them here—their jailer, you might say. If they ever get free, it would be, well—something mankind has not experienced for a while.”

“Then…why keep them here?” said Odessa. “Why keep them alive?”

“They are elemental beings,” said Blackwood, as though that should have been obvious. “They cannot be destroyed. Only caged. The closer they are to each other, the calmer they stay. They sense each other…they sense you…”

She saw one of the Hollow Ones squeal with its face-wide mouth and felt sick to her stomach. “This is one hundred percent, completely insane.”

Blackwood said, “We have to focus on why here, and why now? Who might have unleashed the fourth, or harnessed its energy in some way? What is their goal?”