What happened next went from zero to unspeakable in a very few seconds. Soon afterward, it went beyond unspeakable, to a level of horror that there are no words to describe.
Twelve very long minutes later, the blond man gave one last, agonized scream and escaped into death. We sat there and watched him die.
Then somebody must've pressed Stop, because the screen went mercifully dark. A few seconds later, the lights came on.
The nine people in the room sat in stunned silence, blinking in the sudden brightness. Then everybody started talking at once.
There had been eleven people in the room when the lights were turned off. But there'd been enough residual glow from the big monitor for me to see two tough, experienced police officers quietly leave over the last few minutes, one with a hand clasped tightly over his mouth.
I was glad nobody would know how close I came to being number three out the door.
My partner Karl leaned toward me and said softly, "Sweet Jesus Christ on a pogo stick. And people say vampires are inhuman."
"Well, strictly speaking, you are," I told him, just to be saying something.
"You know what I mean, Stan."
"Yeah, I do. And I'm not arguing with you, either."
The two FBI agents walked to the front of the room and stood waiting for us to quiet down. They'd been introduced to us earlier, before the horror show started. Linda Thorwald was the senior agent, and she'd done most of the talking so far. She was average height and slim build, with the ice-blue eyes I always associate with Scandinavia. Her hair was jet black, and I wondered if she was a blonde who'd had it dyed to increase her chances of being taken seriously in the macho culture of the FBI. People have done stranger things, and for worse reasons.
Her partner was a guy named Greer, who had big shoulders, brown hair, and a wide mustache that probably had J. Edgar Hoover spinning in his grave. He moved like an athlete, and I thought he might be one of the many former college jocks who find their way into law enforcement once it sinks in that they're not quite good enough for the pros.
When the room was quiet, Thorwald said, "I regret that I had to subject all of you to that revolting exhibition of sadism and murder. If it's any consolation, I've seen more than one veteran FBI agent lose his lunch either during or immediately after a showing of this… supernatural snuff film."
Snuff films are an urban legend, probably started by the same kind of tight-ass public moralists who used to rant about comic books destroying the nation's moral fiber. But the myth made its way into popular culture, and stayed there. There's been plenty of counterfeit ones made over the years, with sleazeballs using special makeup effects to rip off the pervs who think torture and murder are fun. These days, you can see stuff like that at your local multiplex. It's all fake, but I still wouldn't want to know anybody who was a fan. If I'm going to hang out with ghouls, I prefer the real kind – they can't help what they are.
There have been some serial killers who took video of their victims to jerk off over between kills, but that was for their own private use. If by "snuff film" you mean a commercially available product depicting actual murder, then there's no such thing.
Or rather, there wasn't. Until now.
"I wanted you all to see that video," Thorwald said, "because it's important that you understand what we're up against, and what the stakes are. Copies of that DVD have surfaced within the last month in New York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and, uh–" She turned to her partner.
"Baltimore," he said.
"—and Baltimore," she went on. "But the Bureau has been interested in this case for longer than a month. Quite a bit longer."
Thorwald took a step forward. "You know that expression, 'I've got good news and bad news'? Well, I'm afraid I don't have any good news to offer you today. Instead, I bring bad news, and worse news. Brian?"
I could almost see the two of them rehearsing this act in their hotel room last night. The whole thing had a stagy quality that was getting on my nerves. Of course, after what I'd just witnessed, my nerves were pretty damn edgy already.
"The bad news," Greer said, "Is that what you just saw isn't the first video depicting this kind of torture-murder. I mean, one apparently carried out by a demon that's been conjured and then allowed to 'possess' an innocent party."
That must've been the dark-haired man we'd just seen. He hadn't done all those awful things to the blond guy – the demon who'd taken him over had done them, using his body as an instrument.
"In fact, it's the fourth one," Greer said. "Same M.O. every time, with the same… gruesome result. All that varies is the technique, and the victim."
The technique varied. I guess that's why whoever was running the show had put out a selection of torture devices for the hellspawn to use. Nothing like variety.
Thorwald took over again. "The going price for one of these videos in the illicit-smut underground is one thousand dollars. To give you some perspective, you can buy one of a four yearold girl being raped for about three hundred." A look of disgust passed over her face, the first genuine expression I'd seen there. "Presumably, each one of the DVDs has sold well enough to keep those producing them in business. The economies of scale are pretty good, from their perspective. Once you've recorded the master, you can burn copies for less than a buck apiece. There's no way to know how many have been put into circulation. And no reason to think these people are going to stop doing it. That, as I said, is the bad news. But, as far as you officers are concerned, there is worse news." She paused for effect, and I wondered if she'd learned that at the FBI Academy, or in some college speech class. Maybe she'd been on the debate team – she was the type.
"We have been unable to establish the location where these atrocities were made," Thorwald said. "As with the one you just saw, what's visible onscreen doesn't give us much to go on. However, based on new information, we now have reason to believe that at least one of these DVDs was shot right here in Scranton."
Then she stood there, looking at us. I don't know what kind of a reaction she expected. If she was looking for gasps of surprise, she was talking to the wrong crowd. Most of us hadn't gasped since we found out the awful truth about Santa Claus.