It was raining lightly. I slinked along the Yarra Promenade, heading away from the crown casino amidst the somber Melbourne crowds. I spotted Kenny standing on the Evan Walker bridge, looking down into the water, staring at patterns of concentric circles of raindrops hitting water— cigarette hanging out of his mouth.
He was in off duty clothing. Brown fleece collar jacket, characteristic sunglasses and exposed balding head with tufts of stringy black hair. I’ve been spying on Officer Lothar for over a month. Ever since the yellow envelope turned up on my desk, addressed, ‘Urgent. For the eyes of -P. Dronefire’—inserted, a photograph of our mate Kenny, and a stack of hundred dollar notes. That’s me, Pharlap Dronefire’, (I work as a private investigator, from my inexpensive offices in South Yarra.)
Kenny’s been staying in a hotel in Southbank since Monday. I watched with binoculars— and waited till he left this afternoon, then followed behind him on the busy bridge crowds, crossing the river as the last glimmering rays of the sun fell behind the skyline of skyscrapers, domes and architraves on the Hexton North bank.
They say there are no corrupt cops anymore, well it’s true the old boys clubs were all taken down by the commissions in the 90’s and 00’s. They aren’t hiding in plain sight perhaps, but the smart ones just evolved, Kenny Lothar is one of the most cunning corrupt cops I’ve ever reviewed. A real bastard. If my hunch is right, Lothar dropped business mogul Art Herraway off the very same bridge I now watched him standing on, chopped up body parts in a green garbage bag —submerged now beneath ice cold, turpid Victorian water. That was three years ago today, it’s no wonder Kenny was staring down so melancholically into the green water of the Yarra river. He’s got a lot to think about.
We cross through the Flinders Street Station tunnel, and I follow at a safe distance in the busy commuter crowds. I almost lose sight of him as the green and yellow tram pulls past, ringing it’s gentle chime— but I just catch his frame as Kenny ducks into a small Vietnamese restaurant on the other side of the street. Shortly, I sneak in and take a seat at a small table behind a patterned screen, where I can see him but he can’t see me.
I order a raw beef Pho, taking a moment to absorb my surroundings and re examine Kenny’s case files in my mind. Something happened whilst Lothar was on the beat in Sydney, I’m sure he was involved with a murder that happened on Mcellhorne stairs in Kings Cross. Then he gets some contacts in the Victorian Police and transfers to Melbourne, but whatever he was up to in Sydney— he’s continuing it down here—I’m sure of that. There’s an underworld of clues, from the Walsh street massacre, to the gangland killings of the nineties. Unsolved murders and connections that create a puzzle leading straight to Kenny. Twenty two orange gold fish swish their tails longingly in a nearby fish tank next to a wooden statue of Bhudda. Fumes and aromas float over the counter adorned with green dragon carvings and a row of ceramic maneki-neko cats waving their arms in unison, below— Kenny’s balding head wrinkles with tension as he waits for his food.
I won’t pretend he doesn’t scare me. If it were just for Kenny’s underbelly credentials, and links to the Melbourne mafia— that would be enough to make me think twice about taking the case. But there’s more to Kenny Lothar than just power and murder. He is into some strange things— the occult. Pacts, rituals, self flaggelation. The case is so out of my usual line of work, I can’t help but wonder what the fuck I am doing taking it up.
I was slurping cautiously at my pho for two or three minutes before I got the break I needed. Kenny stands up to use the bathroom, leaving his wallet on the table. I know I’ve only got a slim chance to get it right, standing up as if I’m also going to relieve myself, then the subtle yawn, and sleight of hand. Before anyone notices I’m back out on the street, not having paid for my Pho, running —and holding the keycard for Kenny’s hotel room in my pocketed hand.
The rain increases. You get some weird cases as a Private Investigator. Most are straightforward; spying on cheating partners, divorce cases, over protective parents. Then there’s the ten percent, the odd cases from secretive private contractors, where you only learn bits and pieces about your client, what they want to find out and why. No doubt a lot of it is criminal linked, even though I do my best to filter out those types of clientele. Some of them are just perverts, mad eccentrics. This particular client was extremely secretive. Dealt only in cash, and written correspondence. I’d have hesitated entirely from being involved, but it’s good pay— and I’d do just about anything to help nail that prick Lothar.
As I’m walking back over the bridge towards Kenny’s hotel I start thinking about the objectives. The guy wanted pictures of Kenny’s hotel room— he was very specific about that. Seems very hung up on Kenny’s private activities. Wanted detailed notes and photographs on any occult rituals he was conducting. I mean—What the fuck, right? Ever get the feeling you’re getting caught up in the dangerous weekend games of eccentric rich people?
I pulled my collar up, ducking out of the rain inconspicuously into the Travelodge lobby. Trying to appear casual and sure of myself as I walked past reception and entered the elevator.
Kenny’s apartment was on the tenth floor, apartment 1001. Fortunately there was no one else in the lift, and I guiltlessly approached Kenny’s door once in the top floor. He had the ‘No servicing- do not disturb’ card over the door handle. The keycard tripped the beeping lock, and the door opened. There was a strange musty smell that hit me the instant I opened the door to his room.
Then the vision hit my eyes, he had been busy! Kenny’s hotel room was messy. It was a fairly big room, one huge decorative pillar marking the left wall, and drawn velvet curtains adorning broad, thick windows overlooking the city. There was a hexagonal table beneath the window covered in papers, and an adjacent chair on top of a zebra patterned rug which seemed to be concealing something staining the floorboards. The floor of the adjacent room was covered in curious objects that required detailed analysis. I resolved to first examine the table and the rug. Moving aside the chair, I quickly flipped up the zebra rug, and gasped as I observed the curious design beneath.
I took three photographs of the symbol with my phone, before continuing my analysis. It was a huge symbol, inked on the floorboards. The pattern was a kind of triangle with three six-shaped arms attached to all the vertices. My first thought was that the red stain was painted with blood, but as I touched the wet surface I concluded that it was more likely some thick kind of ink, pigment or paint. Certainly the symbol had been created for ritual occult purposes, thus far unknown.
I carefully placed the rug exactly where it was, so everything would be found exactly where Kenny had left it.
From my current vantage point I could see that there were two more symbols painted red on the walls in the first room; a circle with a serpentine line running through it on the left wall, and a symmetrical triad of lines on the right wall. I took some more photos of the symbols, and the layout of the first room with my phone.
I sat down at the table now, quickly examining the note books, covered in scrawled handwriting, books and reference material scattering the surface. It was immediately clear to me, that all of the written material was directly related to the ritual which Kenny had been enacting in the adjacent room— so I figured I’d better get a look at that room before any of the written material would make a lick of sense.
I walked cautiously towards the doorway marking the dark room beyond. I tried the light switch, but it appeared that Kenny had tampered with the power circuit. I turned the flash feature on, and snapped a few more pics of the dark room.
A friend of mine was a cop, who investigated the Hotel room of Vegas Shooter Stephen Paddock, the guy who turned his hotel room into a fortress of guns, before killing 58 and injuring 515 people at a country music concert. My friend had told me going inside that room had filled him with such a sickness and revulsion at being in the lair of such a demented mastermind he’d had to take psychological leave for a month. I was starting to feel the same sickness exploring Kenny’s hotel room.
The most obvious aspect of the layout of the darkened room was the kind of checkerboard Kenny had painted in the middle of the room. The entrance to the room was marked in each corner by two pillars, with square plinths, and miniature stair cases leading down each side. Leaning against the ridged pillars were an ornate Axe, and on the other side was a heavy, Ancient gold shield emblazoned with a red scorpion.
Scattered all around the checkerboard were a vast array of objects which could at first be construed as random clutter, but only slowly developed a sense of order — that chilled me to the bones. Drawn on squares of the checkerboard I could make out an upside down crescent moon in the lower corner, and a thin, narrow isosceles triangle in the upper right corner. To my horror, I saw too, in the centre of the checkerboard was a yellow piece of parchment — upon which appeared to be resting ; a bleeding, severed human hand. I now realised with abhorrent terror that the red liquid pouring from the severed hand was the same texture of the symbols in the first room, they had indeed been inked in somebody’s blood. Victim currently unknown. The smell of death became suddenly more disconcerting.
At the back of the room, lining the entry to the bedroom there were two classic statues, of Ancient Greek appearance, depicting the forms of two voluptuous women. Immediately in front of me, at the foot of the doorway to the darkened room was a sigil— two circles joined together by a malignant double-U.
I was unable to process the other scattered objects at that time, so resolved to return to Kenny’s notes which would hopefully bring some clarity or closure as to the meaning of these horrific scenes.
Once more, I sat down at Kenny’s chair. I flicked through several lined note pads, until I found a diagrammatic illustration of some of the items in the other room. This did help provide context to at least some of the items in Kenny’s ritual. Nothing about the severed hand.
The illustrations were grotesque and horrific. The placement of items in the other room mimicked very closely the items in the illustration, but the labels didn’t provide much more than a superficial meaning to the display. The shield leaning against the left pillar, with the scorpion engraved on it was marked as ‘Soldier’s Shield from Motaris’, whilst the decorative axe leaning against the right pillar was labelled ‘The Axe of Sagron’. Scanning the other illustrations I saw that the W shaped sigil was revered as the ‘Sigil of the Star Diver’, whilst the two statues of naked women were labelled ‘The Godess of the Dawn’ and ‘The Sister of the Moon’ respectively. These sculptures were given particular significance—as an ethereal field between the feminine statues was labelled ‘The Gateway’.
Another marking got my attention, and I had to return to the darkened room to confirm its presence, because I hadn’t noticed it the first time. Sure enough, inlaid beside the checkered board there was a cornucopia wedged on a tripod from which fumes were emerging- grey streamers billoughing through the darkness. Based on the diagram I gathered that there was ritual incense burning in the cornucopia and that this was the origin of that strange smell I had noticed on first entering the apartment. Returning to the diagrams, I began to panic as I realised that the herbs burning in the cornucopia weren’t in fact incense as I had first deduced, but some form of hallucinogen— utilised to accelerate the heightened state required for completion of the ritual.
Instantly I started to feel light headed, wondering if the hallucinogen was already taking some effect upon me. I must have inhaled quite a large amount already, I covered my mouth with a handkerchief to create a temporary toxin mask.
Just then, my paranoia was exacerbated, as I heard a clanking noise at the front door. I shivered, my soul sinking. Had Kenny returned early and been granted a spare keycard from reception? I cowered beneath the door, my heart began to pound in my chest like a professional’s basketball. Once more the door latch quivered and shook as though somebody were jangling the latch on the other side. Finally a voice called out, it was a vibrato tone, female, with an Eastern European accent; ‘Mr Lothar? This is cleaning. Do you want the service? Clean sheets? Mr Lothar?’ I breathed a sigh of relief, and summoned the deepest voice I could; ‘No thank you. Busy thank you.’ The sound of trolley wheels slinking away indicated the woman had taken the hint.
I breathed heavily, trying to recuperate from the trauma. As I stumbled away from the door, suddenly I felt a terrible sensation within. I realised that the hallucinogens were indeed taking effect. My head throbbed, and my face grew red, filling with blood. Then my eyes began to mist up, and I felt my body growing weak— soon I fell to the carpet upon my knees.
My vision was drawn to the terrifying sight beyond the large glass window— framed by red, velvet curtains. Something had occurred outside. Something uncanny and horrific. The day had changed. The sun was gone. Nature had somehow leapt off its natural track of organic physics. That which we call daylight and night had lost dimensional form, and their aspect had merged with the vast indescribable void of the universe.
It is almost impossible to describe the hallucinations I saw outside that window, except to say that the Melbourne skyline was changing rapidly, in the nature of a time-lapse video. Architecture, once familiar became foreign and disorientating. It was as though I was watching the build up of human culture along the Yarra from a perspective outside of the usual constraints of time. I remembered from my history classes, that the aboriginal Wurundjeri tribes had called the Yarra river Birrarrung, meaning "Place of Mists and Shadows". Never did this description seem so apt, for what appeared to me now — a world only perceivable as a kind of fog of place. First, all of civilisation seemed to vanish, as indigenous tribes gathered beneath gum trees for their corroborees, then did I see white settlers, and British red coats come and conquer the land, then suddenly dark and futuristic sky scrapers leapt from the earth.
Now something happened that even further defied explanation. My body seemed to grow numb and limp, and collapsed upon the floor. The truly strange aspect however, was that I watched this happen, seemingly from outside my own body. I found myself now, somehow as a ghost inhabiting the space apparently outside of my usual physical and mental constraints.
As I looked around the hotel room, everything within seemed ominously different, red hued and sinister. Particularly a curious demonic glow originated from the other room where the ritualistic items had been laid out upon the floor. There was an odd electric energy coming from within that room now.
Most of all, there was a plainly visible force field of energy growing, like a vortex, between the statues of the two Greek Godesses. This vortex now seemed to open up, like a gateway—- onto a world with a red sky. Beyond the gate was an immense marble staircase leading downwards into some unknown ethereal city.
I summoned up the courage to journey through the gates, knowing that I was surely hallucinating from the unknown drug, but prepared to ride it out. I stepped down the strange marble steps, coming into an unknown, slightly futuristic city. Perhaps it was Melbourne in the future, I couldn’t discern with any confidence. There did seem to be some grand palace or castle where the Crown Casino had been, and Kings Road was marked by a distinct vibrant road built of shiny red bricks.
There were no cars, or streetlights- but all around were immense skyscrapers and modernist buildings made of glass and steel. The river water of the Yarra had apparently dried up completely. I soon stood on the ground where once the Waterside Workers Hotel had been, there was now only a curious labyrinth of white, marble stair cases leading up and down in a confused jumble of intention. For a moment I sat on the step, flustered and bewildered by the strange situation and the concrete real ness of my imaginary world. I felt the presence of a kind of grid of familiarity— stretching out on the horizon. I felt strange allures pulling me and enticing me onwards. I feared these forces, and yet could not deny them. There was an odd heat and humidity. Something was compelling me to descend further down upon the staircases, heading underground into the catacombs beneath this strange city. The further down I went, the more intense the heat became, until finally there appeared an open platform which looked out into a vast abyss of plateaued rock and raging flame.
Amidst the hades-like landscape in the lower caverns, my hallucinations now took full and plain form. Amidst the acreage of darkness and flame a titanic figure now came forward. The giant’s skin was lush crimson, and his naked body was taught and muscular, his head barely resembling some insectoid creature of earth. But the enormous, many sphered and barbed tail which swung from his buttocks, and his claw-like hands identified him as a giant humanoid scorpion of some form. The scorpion demon, who was half engulfed in flames now bent in the darkness, almost crouching in the opposite direction to me. I soon discerned that he was engaging to speak with another small figure, perched on a plateau of rock far out on the other side of the chasm.
Something even more peculiar happened then; my body suddenly seemed to go utterly limp. At first falling in an almost fainting motion, my mind suddenly faded as though into a dream-like place. I was no longer a walking human, but a floating invisible mass, a watching eyeball floating over the caverns of fire. Soon, I drifted and became the voyeur overlooking the terrible scorpion being, and as I grew closer I soon was able to view with clarity the other being he was talking to on the rocky plateau.
It was Kenny Lothar.
I tried to analyse my dream logic, obviously it made sense that I would hallucinate about Kenny, he was at the forefront of my mind due to the case. But as I began to overhear the conversation of the unlikeliest acquaintances, I marvelled at my mind’s fantastic longing.
‘The ritual is underway’, the sinister balding figure in sunglasses had stated. The immense flaming scorpion being flexed it’s muscular neck, and clamped it’s jaw, leering like an avalanche over Kenny; ‘Do you know what forces come to roost under cover of the red skies of Val Galais?’ Asked the scorpion in a booming voice. ‘My role is not to question the will of the beings outside the dome..’ Kenny replied cunningly; ‘Mine is only to serve.’ The giant red scorpion flushed its face and furrowed its brow in gesticulation; ‘That is a good answer, puny mortal. But I know that your species is incapable of acts that aren’t driven by the most base desires of personal gratification. You follow commands because you wish some of the glory of the coming age to be bestowed upon yourself. Confess it!’ ‘If I am to be gifted any fortune by supporting the armies of the winning side, should there be any discomfort in it?’ Kenny retorted, ‘All that matters is the end goal. Victory for the beings outside the dome!’ The scorpion glowed with wicked pride; ‘Yes! It is true. For the watcher is at hand, and the sacrifices are being made, piece by piece. The vultures move into place, and the shapeshifter reigns in the land of the setting sun. The dead armies shall hold back the forces of Tennylind and a new dark age shall Dawn’... I watched with fascination as my hallucinations played themself out. With intrigue I followed Kenny’s monologue as he spoke about his dark motives. I knew they were not real, just the product of my delirious brain trying to draw loose ends together.
Nonetheless, in my imagination Kenny Lothar began to explain to the horrific scorpion demon his back story in this hideous plot. He spoke of the corrupt police forces in NSW, and how they had gone underground during the Royal Commissions of the 1990’s. He spoke of secret meeting places in Bishop’s Valley, Bathurst, Canberra and Ballarat. Organisations united in a common purpose, to protect the agenda of corrupt white men; the Freemasons, the Druids guild, The order of the Red Seal, The Knights of the Roman Grid, The Future guard. He spoke of gangland killings, and shuffled ranks in the Victorian Police. In my dream, Kenny was not acting alone; but conducting his nefarious rituals for wealthy underground cults.
I knew the dream was becoming too absurd now, and like my mind was rejecting outright the state of being, I felt my ethereal self begin to drift and return to Kenny’s hotel room where I lay unconscious.
Strangely, however, my awareness of that perpendicular plane of existence didn’t utterly fade. I watched with my mind’s eye, as Kenny slowly ascended a labyrinth of marble staircases, until at last it appeared as if I was watching —as Kenny exited the elevator of the hotel. He seemed to walk in a tangent universe just beside my own, walking alongside his hotel room. I was now floating above my own body, which lay unconscious on the hotel floor, as Kenny entered through the vortex of colour.
But something was magnificently wrong. Surely, I thought, I was still hallucinating. Yet, why did the room look so enchantingly similar and yet different? As I floated above as an ethereal mist, I noticed that all the ritualistic paraphernalia lay in the adjacent room exactly as it had —- with only one minor difference....
The decapitated hand was no longer placed ceremoniously on the parchment in the middle of the checkered floor. Nor were the strange three symbols painted in blood in various locations in the room where my body lay unconscious. With infinite terror, my mind started to leap to horrorible conclusions. Kenny was rubbing his skin, as if coated in a thin layer of goo. He appeared to be adjusting to his transition back into this reality. How absurd this dream was becoming, I thought to myself.
With malice, Kenny now begun to pace around the dark room, as if checking the artefacts for his ritual. He then raced to his desk, checking over his notes, and reading furiously. I tried to move my body, or wake from slumber, but I remained trapped in that elusive immaterial dream space.
I continued to watch paralysed. Kenny now turned in his chair with terrible and malevolent purpose. Returning quickly to the other room, he appeared to see something. I watched with horror now, as he came back into the main room holding the decorated Axe from the ritual. I began to curse under my breath with fear, as Kenny methodically approached my unconscious body. He had the most sadistic look of glee in his eyes, and malice on his lips, as he grinned with yellowing teeth.
With one sharp movement, Kenny raised the heavy axe above his head, then with a movement as swift as light, the heavy metal carved through the flesh and bone of my left hand. Although still detached from my body, I somehow still felt a piercing pain in my wrist, that ached like swollen agony, and throbbed with pain, yet I had no mouth to scream.
Satanically satisfied, Kenny squatted next to my decapitated hand, extending two fingers and dipping them into my freshly drawn blood. Time seemed to flash forward, or backwards as Kenny timelapsed around the room, creating the strange symbols on the walls and floor which I had investigated. Then returning the bloody Axe to the pillar it was resting against, and moving my gored and grotesque severed hand into place on the parchment on the middle of the checkered floor. Somehow this all made some terrible sense in my dreaming mind, that I had perhaps become a part of Kenny’s terrible ritual.
That was then. This all stands now, only as some sort of curious dream. The severing of my hand, I can speak about with certainty. For when I awoke in a hospital bed, my left arm was nothing more than a stump. Mercifully the doctors stopped the blood loss, and probably saved my life, though how I got from Kenny’s hotel room to there, I’ll never know.
It’s been a significant period of recovering, and for now, the investigation of Kenny Lothar is on hold. Right now I am too fearful for my well being to continue.
However, I feel this will not be the last time I have a run in with that dangerous and reprehensible character.
(This is the second story surrounding Private Investigator P.Dronefire. You can read the first story 'The Cockroaches Between the Clues' at 'The Weird Fiction of Goitye Powerhouse)
https://weirdfictionofgoityepowerhouse.wordpress.com/2017/12/11/the-cockroaches-between-the-clues/
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