Ch. 6 - A Hail Mary
“The knife has no anomalous properties.”
Princess Luna looked at the unicorn behind the weathered oaken desk. “Are you sure? You haven't sensed any magic?”
“Oh, I've sensed magic,” said the unicorn, adjusting her thick glasses. “Just not in the knife. It's the blood that pinged.”
“The blood?” Luna stared blankly. She looked down at the desk. The gold dagger sat on a silk cloth. Much of the ruddy substance caking it had been scraped off, leaving a glistening surface beneath.
“Yep. We sent the samples in for testing. It told us two things. One, it's not from any species native to Equestria.” The unicorn mare shuffled through some parchment on her desk, levitating a relevant sheet. “And two, that it's got a dark resonance, the blood. It's unusual in its magical properties, only found where the undead are concerned.”
“The undead...” Luna said slowly. She nodded her head, still staring at the dagger. It wasn't that big a surprise. “But the blade...it had nothing? No magical properties?”
“Far as we can tell, it's regular gold,” said the mare. “No residual signs of enchantment, not even temporarily. The one and only thing irregular about the blade itself is that someone would make it out of gold at all. Gold is among the softest metals known. When alloyed through high alchemy with silver it produces rare Mythril, of course. But just gold makes for a terrible weapon. Signs show this blade wasn't used very much at all, which is just as well.
“It's the oddest thing, really. Only thing I can guess is that it was decorative to begin with, and was used in a fit of passion. Maybe.”
The alicorn stared intently at the dagger. Watched it glisten in the light. “Do you...mind if I keep it?” she said, looking at the unicorn.
“Of course, your highness!” The mare levitated the dagger before her. “Just give me a chance to scrap off the rest of the blood and clean it, and I'll have it ready for you.”
“That is much appreciated. Thank you.”
The unicorn gazed at the dagger with one eye. “May I ask why you need this particular weapon, Princess?”
“...insurance. I don't know why, but this dagger...it means something more to him than just a weapon to be used.”
“'Him', your highness?”
“The vampire. Dougal Dempsey.”
August 1953
“Draft dodger. Draft dodger!”
Dougal slammed his glass of whiskey down. The bar top and everything on it rattled. Drops of precious booze flew up from his glass with the force.
“I didn't dodge the damn draft!” Dougal said, fingers squeezing the glass. He gritted his teeth.
“Uh huh,” said the bartender, wiping down a glass with a rag.
“I didn't!” Dougal insisted. “Why does every...single...business...think that I dodged the draft. They didn't ask for me!” He angrily brought the glass to his lips and shotgunned the drink. “It's like a damn hive mind out there. How the hell do they keep hearing about me? And why the hell is everyone getting all patriotic about it? So I didn't serve. Why the hell should that determine whether I can do the fucking job?”
“Mm hmm.” The man tending bar uncorked the whiskey and topped Dougal off.
“I mean...thank you...what's a guy gotta do to make use of his business degree, around here?” Dougal gulped back more liquor.
“What kind of business?”
Dougal looked to his side. A rather slick Italian sauntered over, seating himself next to the unemployed businessman.
“What?” Dougal said.
“What kind of work you do, my friend?” the man asked, adjusting his cuff links.
“...I was a manager at my last job,” Dougal said. “Handled accounts, kept things running smooth.” He sipped more whiskey. He could feel his toes tingle. “Then, I get arrested on trumped up charges. Extortion.”
“You do it?” the man asked.
“No, someone else eventually confessed. Problem is that I spent a couple months in jail waiting for that to happen. By the time I'm out, my image was toxic. Boss had to let me go, even though I was innocent!” Dougal brushed back his hair. “And now, because I didn't jump at the chance to join my college buddies dying in the war, everyone has decided that I'm not American enough to hire.
“And I need work. Not just for me, but for my mother.”
“You support your momma?” said the stranger. He stuck a cigarette in his mouth; began fishing in his pocket for a match.
“She's got cancer. Just like dad.”
The man whistled. “Holy smokes, that's rough. Speaking of.” He offered a cigarette.
Dougal held his hand up. “No thanks. Besides, it was smoking that killed dad.”
“Your mom smoke?” the man said, eying his cigarette thoughtfully. He lit it anyway.
“No...that's the strangest part.” Dougal stared into his beverage. “Never smoked a day in her life. And it's weird, because her coughing fits started up out of nowhere. When we went to the doctor, he couldn't understand it. She'd developed this...this mass of tumors overnight...”
“So you need money for her treatment?” the stranger said. He took a long drag. Blowing a great billowing cloud of smoke, he said, “Donny. Mind giving us some space?”
The bartender nodded to the man. “Sure thing, Tony.” He walked off.
Dougal watched the bartender abandon his post. “...how do you...?”
“Nevermind that,” the man said, leaning closer to Dougal. “Listen, I'm always in need of...quality help at my...businesses.”
“Really?” Dougal said, then stopped himself. He coughed. “I mean, what kind of work is it?”
“Well see, I employ a lot of mooks for what I do,” the stranger said. “Thing is, there's no shortage of lunkheads, but never enough competent guys managing them.”
“Like a foreman? Teamsters?” Dougal turned more fully towards this strange Italian.
“...you promise not to tell anybody?”
Dougal moved away, tilting his head back and looking at the man sideways. “...are you a spy for the Reds?”
“No! No...” The man started laughing. “Nothing at all like that. I might not have been oversees when the fighting started either, but I'm just as American as you. I love capitalism.” He leaned forward, gesturing with his fingers for Dougal to come in.
Dougal leaned in closer.
“My business isn't treasonous,” he said, “but it ain't strictly...legitimate, if you get my meaning.”
“...you're with the mob?” said Dougal.
“And since you apparently really need work, I can offer you a job. How about it?”
“No, no,” Dougal said, shaking his head. “I couldn't do that. I can't...join the mob.”
“What do you have to lose?”
Dougal said nothing, staring into his drink. The whiskey was gone, leaving only wet ice to jingle in the glass.
“Tony” reached into his jacket and pulled out a card. He summoned a pen as well, and started writing something on it. “Well, if you change your mind...what was your name again?”
“Dougal...Dempsey...?”
“Dougal.” The man placed the card on the bar. “If you change your mind about the job...” He slid the card Dougal's way. He stood up from the stool. “...give that number a call. Ask for Tony.” With that, he walked away, not even turning once. The door to the bar swung open, casting the man in a silhouette against the glaring afternoon sun.
Dougal eyed the card. Eyed his empty glass. Eyed the card.
He sighed.
Present
“These volumes checked here. Yes, thank you.”
“Right away, sir!”
Luna's hooves clattered against the cobblestone floor as she descended the steps. When she hit the bottom step, he nostrils took in the musky, damp smell. The noted (with certain satisfaction) that the dungeon was so rarely used. Most of the cells were empty.
Except the one at the end. “Excuse me!”
Luna stepped aside to allow a mare guard rush past. “Excuse me...uh, where are you going?” Luna asked.
“Your highness!” the guard saluted, twirling on her hind legs. “I'm going to the library!”
“For what reasons?”
“Because Mr. Dempsey has a list!”
“Of books?”
“Mm hmm!”
“Has he been doing this often?”
“I've been running back and forth for three days so far!” She began scaling the steps. “I finally suggested getting a list of books for him to choose from, instead of asking for different ones every time. I have to go, your highness! Bye!”
“...bye?” Luna turned back towards the depths of the dungeon, frowning. “Dempsey.”
She ventured forth, and forthwith came upon the deepest cell. Two guards flanked the door. A glow emanated from the little window.
“Open the door, I wish to see the prisoner,” Luna said.
“Of course, your highness.”
A key was placed in the door lock. It clicked, and the door flew open. Luna ventured inside, bracing herself for anything.
She did not expect to see the vampire sitting on his bed, a lamp installed on an end table, with a thick book in his hand.
No, scratch that. The lamp wasn't sitting on an end table. It was sitting on another stack of books to go with the many that surrounded him.
“Ah, your highness!” Dougal said, shutting the current book in his hand, save for a single finger that remained inside it to mark his place. Luna noticed how his burns were significantly diminished since that night. “I didn't know you were coming to visit.”
“Dougal Dempsey...what is all of this?” Luna asked, gesturing to the many, many books littering the cell. “Have you really been reading all this?”
“Well of course, Princess.” Dougal sat up in his seat, waving a hand in the air. “If I'm to remain here for an indeterminate amount of time, I might as well learn everything I can about the world I have just entered. So I have.”
“So you have, yes,” Luna said, staring at the books. “You read more than Twilight Sparkle.”
“Who?”
“Twilight Sparkle, my sister's former personal student and current Princess of Magic.”
“Oh? Do tell!” Dougal leaned forward, dark eyes opened wide. “A Princess of MAGIC, you say? What do her responsibilities entail? What kind of magic? Does it...”
“Dougal Dempsey, please,” Luna said, waving a hoof plaintively at him. She sighed. “Are you always so...enthusiastic?”
Dougal's bright smile waxed, and he slumped against the wall, rubbing his scalp. He sighed. “Sorry, I've just...I've been reading for so long that I've lost track of the normal flow of time. And maybe a few other things.” He shut his eyes.
“Are you sure that was not simply your attempts to lure me into a false sense of security?” Luna said, watching him closely.
“More likely, I've gone slightly insane,” Dougal mused. He picked from the tomes he'd amassed like a literary magpie. “The other night, I was reading...one of these books, I can't recall...and had to stop and remind myself that I have to take everything written in these books seriously.” He discarded the one book he'd been reading – apparently a book on the dietary variations of various Equestrian races and cultures – and picked up another. “Take this for example. 'Equestria: A History'. It reads like a child's storybook. Not just in that it uses very simple, very storybook language, I mean that I feel like I'm reading a fairy tale. And yet your guards insist – and other books agree – that everything described in this tome literally happened.”
“I...don't understand,” Luna said, mouth hanging open. “Our history seems...ridiculous to you?”
“It seems...like I've stepped into fancy and myth,” said Dougal, flipping through pages. “These are the sorts of things parents in my world tell their children to entertain them. They don't tend to have actually happened. Yet...yet I'm now dwelling in a world of colorful talking ponies...” Dougal's hand smacked against his face, pulling his flesh down with it. “...and then I started just accepting it at face value, and then started reading more and more, trying to find the end and...” He slumped over, head in his hand. “...Princess, I feel like I'm going mad, or that I went mad some time ago, and I can't stop.”
“...well, um...” Luna said, jaw flapping as she tried to find the words. “...you aren't mad, at least anymore than I think you already were. I mean...hmm...”
The two remained silent for a long time.
Eventually, Dougal sat up in his bed and asked, “When do you think I shall be made to 'talk' with Princess Celestia?”
“My sister has told me she is working on a solution,” Luna said, breathing a sigh of relief. “She hasn't promised anything, nor is she forthcoming about the exact avenues she is pursuing.”
“Hmm...” Dougal glanced sidelong at the ceiling, at a spot on the far side of the cell. “I feel her presence, you know.”
“You do?” Luna said, eyes widening.
“When we entered the castle the other night, I could feel something,” Dougal said. “I didn't know what it was. Now that I've...met her highness Princess Celestia, I cannot help but notice it. I sense her moving around the castle. Like a bright lamp swinging about...”
“Really?”
“I hate it.”
Luna raised an eyebrow.
“No offense to the Princess, but...” Dougal shut his eyes. He steepled his fingers. “...it's not a comfortable feeling, being in this place. When she draws near, I feel the terrible weight that in the past only ever accompanied the risen sun.”
“Would you leave, if you could? That is, return to your home?”
“I would rather be anywhere but here, regardless of her patience and hospitality,” Dougal said. He smiled slightly. “Despite your understandable, justified animosity, you yourself have been exceedingly lenient. I thank you for this. But indeed, I would like nothing more than to return to my own world. It would be best for everyone.” He opened a book, skimming pages. “Do you have a method for transporting me to my own world?”
Princess Luna rose to her hooves, blinking in bewilderment. She sighed. “None at the present time, no. Our own magical researches have, for some time, considered this very problem...” Longer than Dougal had even been there, as a matter of fact.
Dougal's ears perked up once again at the mention of magic.
“...we shall continue our researches, though we have no leads as of yet. Hence, why it is imperative we figure out what to do with you in the meantime.” Luna walked towards the cell door, knocking against it. “Open up.”
“Yes your highness.”
As the iron door swung open, Luna made to leave, then paused. “One last thing, Dougal Dempsey,” she said, looking over her shoulder. “A question. Does the word 'Skull Heart' mean anything to you?”
His head tilted slightly. Dougal's mouth twisted to one side. Finally, he said flatly, “Never heard of it, your highness. Why?”
Luna blinked, then turned back to the door. “Nothing. It's not important. Do not think overmuch about it.”
“Have you had any luck?”
Princess Celestia stepped carefully between piles of broken machines. Her wings hugged her sides, conscious as she was of knocking something over. She supposed that whatever system of organization existed in the castle workshop was fully functional to the engineers on duty. Not all her little ponies could be as filing-obsessed as her former student.
For this, she was frequently glad, she admitted to herself.
“Ah, Princess Celestia!” an engineer unicorn turned to the solar diarch. His work clothes were covered in oil stains and dust. He motioned to a pile of parts disassembled before him. He frowned. “Alas, not quite. This machine is over three hundred years old, and I'm just now figuring out how it works. Not to worry, however.” He smiled. “Given enough time, I'll be able to start reproducing vital parts, and it'll be up and running.”
“That's good to hear,” Celestia said, eying the work. “Did you receive my memo? The one that said I'd like its range extended?”
“I did, your highness. Once I have it working at optimum efficiency, we can work on putting in the longer wires.”
“Then I will leave you to it,” Celestia said, nodding. She started her way out the door.
“Say, Princess?” the engineer said, calling after her. “If you don't mind me asking?”
“Hmm? Of course you may. What would you like to know?”
“Where did you get this wonderful toy?”
“Oh, that's easy.” Celestia beamed proudly. “It was a gift.”
“Ave maria, gratia plena, dominus tecum.”
Luna walked down the dungeon hall, hooves clattering on the cobblestone. She came up to the guard-flanked cell door. She paused, listening. He ears twitched.
“Benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Iesus.”
She looked at the guards. They simply shrugged, one of them taking up the keys and fitting them into the lock. Mechanisms tumbled and clanked.
“...Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus...”
The door opened wide, and Luna stepped inside.
“...nunc et in hora mortis nostrae finalis. Amen.”
Dougal stood in the middle of the cell, facing away from the door. His jacket lay folded on the bed; he wore only his purple shirt. Clasped in his hand was that string of beads, ending in the bizarre pendent. He thumbed the last bead in a long string, letting it join the others.
“Dougal Dempsey,” Luna said, “I...”
Dougal held up his free hand, bidding silence.
Luna closed her mouth, leaning back. What was he doing?
Dougal continued, “Gloria Patri, et Filio, et Spiritui Sancto...” He began wrapping the necklace around his hand, curling it all up. “...Sicut erat in principio, et nunc, et semper, et in saecula saeculorum. Amen.” Finally, his hand clutched the pendent, pinched between finger and thumb. He stared at it, then brought it to his lips. Kissing it, Dougal allowed it to drop again.
He turned to his visitor. “I'm sorry, your highness,” he said, “you wanted to see me?”
Luna blinked, mouth agape. “...what was that about? Are you chanting magic spells?”
“No, no, no! Of course not!” Dougal said, shaking his head. He was smiling broadly. The burn scars were almost completely gone, as if they had never existed. “I was engaged in prayer to my God.”
“...I...” Luna said, blinking twice more. “...you...are religious?” She pointed a hoof at him. Her mind was set spinning, her face scrunched up in confusion. “You?”
Dougal chuckled. “I perfectly understand your skepticism,” he said, hands playing with the beads. “A foul undead monster, giving prayer to heaven? It seems so far-fetched.”
“...I have never known a vampire to do that, no,” Luna said. Then again, until Dougal arrived, she had never known a vampire that gave any thought to matters outside its own survival.
He looked at the pendent. “It's true, most of my kind have a dim view of religion. If they believed in a God at all in life, they often rejected Him after the Embrace. That God had cursed or damned them eternally, or else that He did not exist at all. By their thinking, what god could allow them to be changed so horribly, forced to feed upon the blood of the innocent.” He lifted the necklace up, admiring it.
“And you, Dempsey?” Luna asked, cocking an eyebrow. “You do not?”
“To be perfectly frank, your highness,” Dougal said, gazing at the figure on the cross, “I never had time for prayer, back when I was alive. I didn't have a rosary...” He slid his fingers over the beads. “...nor a Crucifix.” He lightly tapped the cross. “Nor did I bother attending church. It was...time consuming, and I didn't want to so waste my time.
“When I died and became Cainite, I suddenly found myself with an abundance of time, and so little to fill the void in my heart. In effect, I am the opposite of most Kindred.” Dougal looked momentarily in the distance, then back to Luna. “Does your country have priests or churches?”
“...I would not know,” Luna said, looking at her feet. “There was a long period where I was...absent from Equestrian affairs...”
“I know,” Dougal said, stepping backwards. His hands brushed against a stack of books. “I had plenty of time to read of your government and recent history. You were...banished, if I remember correctly.”
Luna dipped her head solemnly. “I...do not wish to talk about that...”
“Of course,” Dougal said, letting his probing hand drop. “We all have pasts we're not proud of. “ He began examining his finger nails.
She looked up, frowning slightly. “...that was not fair, Dougal Dempsey. Playing upon my past, just to earn my sympathies.”
“It is always good to talk to someone who can empathize,” Dougal said. “It helps to know one is not alone.” He looked at the pendent – the Crucifix. “About those priests...”
“You will have to ask Celestia, when she communicates with you,” Luna said, turning her head away. She peeked sidelong at him. “Why, exactly, do you need a priest? Any Equestrian religious leader would hardly suit your needs...whatever they are.”
“...I need someone to confess to,” Dougal said, frowning.
“Confess? Confess what?”
“My sins.” Dougal held up the Crucifix for Luna to see. “I am a Christian – a follower of Jesus, the Christ – but I am also Catholic. I was raised Catholic, and took it back up when I...died...” He shrugged. “It is a denomination in love with ritual and tradition. Other sects play fast and loose with devotion, prizing the intent of prayer over its form, with the idea that God will understand regardless. But Catholicism holds the proper forms in high regard. One of these is the Confession: confessing one's sins to a priest in order that they might be forgiven. And given circumstances beyond my control – more or less – it has been a long time since my last confession.”
“...is this a pressing...concern?” Luna asked, squinting her eyes. Almost as soon as the words escaped her mouth, she wondered if what she said was massively insulting.
“Not especially,” Dougal sighed, pocketing his rosary. He walked to his bed and took up the jacket. “God in heaven knows what I've done, I can always break protocol by asking him directly. I suppose. In any case, I am also not in any hurry.” He put his now very wrinkled jacket back on, covering the hole in his shirt that was still stained with blood. “I am, after all, immortal.” He smiled at Luna. “At your highness's sufferance, of course.”
She grunted. “Of course,” Luna said mockingly. She looked around the cell. Newspapers were taped to the walls, various notes and circles written across them. She stepped closer, noting how many of them were business periodicals, or else articles of current events. “I see the guards have also been providing you with newspaper.”
“They are very kind, despite what I am,” Dougal said, bowing. “If this was out of bounds...”
“It's...not against the rules to provide prisoners newspaper,” Luna mumbled, stepping away from the wall. “Is there...anything else you need?”
Dougal cocked an eyebrow. “Hmm? Well...” He motioned to his clothes, in all their filthy glory. “I new set of threads would be appreciated. If it's not too much trouble.”
Luna rubbed her face. “I will talk to Princess Celestia about this. Oh, and she has informed me that she shall be able to talk to you in a few days time.”
“Oh? Excellent!” he said, clapping his hands. “I look forward to it...provided it doesn't kill me...” He paused, then nervously chuckled. “Unless that's what she wants, of course.”
The princess merely rolled her eyes. She was still thinking.
“A priest, huh?” she muttered under her breath. If Dougal heard her, he responded not.
May 1954
“The souls of the just are in the hands of God and no torment shall touch them. They seemed, in the view of the foolish, to be dead; and their passing away was thought an affliction, and their going from us, utter destruction.”
A great crowd was assembled, most so silent as to not crowd out the rushing of the wind. They were more as a mass than a group; black as coal, with a dozen solemn, weeping heads sprung up from it. They curled like a serpent around a hole gouged from the soil. Suspended over the hole was a polished pine box. Countless bundles of sweet-smelling flowers sat upon the box, or else clutched in the beast's many hands.
The beast's many eyes were centered on the box, or upon the singular individual that stood at its head. One, in the face of many. Clad in the vestments of his duty.
The priest recited on, “But they are in peace. For if in the eyes of men, indeed they be punished, yet is their hope full of immortality; Chastised a little, they shall be greatly blessed, because God tried them, and found them worthy of Himself. As gold in the furnace, He proved them, and as sacrificial offerings he took them to Himself. Those who trust in him shall understand truth, and the faithful shall abide with him in love: Because grace and mercy are with His holy ones, and his care is with his elect.”
At the opposite side of the circle, Dougal Dempsey barely heard the words. They comforted him little. He could only stand and stare at the box.
The priest droned on and on, until finally he finished. “Amen.” A signal was sent, and the coffin was lowered into the ground. Any spare flowers were cast into the hole.
Dougal's eyes watered up, but his expression remained hard. All around him, men and women, mostly older folks, took turns approaching him with condolences. He registered that they likely knew as little of what to say as he did; he nodded his understanding, though the words meant little. He did this each time in turn, vaguely aware that the crowd was diminishing. Each well-wisher he barely knew saying their peace and departing, or else leaving with any words left unsaid.
He stepped back as the grave diggers walked in, and began piling the dirt atop the coffin, filling in that grave. Dougal noted almost numbly that she was being entombed in raw ground, cut off from him forever. The diggers spared him no glances, and he required nothing from them.
The funeral director approached solemnly. “Dougal...Mr. Dempsey, I know...this is a hard time,” he said, looking meekly at the ground. “I knew your mother – your father too – and I...well, I know you're having a hard time these days as it is. I won't press you if you...take your time paying...”
“...no...” Dougal choked, weakly, “...I'll get you your money.” He sniffed, rubbing his nose with the back of his hand, letting his cheek moisten a little.
“...alright...” nodded the funeral director. He stepped away, turning back briefly before walking off.
And then Dougal Dempsey was alone. Slowly, he traced the outline of freshly packed earth. He stopped at the gravestone, a sentimental message chiseled beneath his mother's name. Only a foot and a half away, the headstone of his father lay, the earth at its feet long grown over by grass.
The man stood there, rooted to the spot, tears rolling down his face. His composure broke down, and Dougal wept, sobbing openly in the seclusion of the cemetery.
Hours passed.
Finally, with the setting sun shining warmly on his back, Dougal trudged off.
He walked for many minutes, letting the wind blow through his hair and whip his black jacket about. In minutes, he came upon a pay phone. His dress shoes tracked dirt on the pavement when he took his place before it.
Dougal's hand quivered, latching onto the receiver. He fished for coins through his pockets, almost numb. A quarter went in, a business card came out; fingers played over the numbered buttons.
Ring. Ring. Ring. Click. “Hello, this is Tony speaking.”
“This is Dougal Dempsey. We met in a bar last year. Is that job still open?”