Scottish African Hebrews and the Missing Texas Girl (Part 2)

[PART 2]

I woke up on the cold, hard floor of what appeared to be some sort of holding cell, my head a heavy, pulsating drum. My mouth tasted like a dead lizard had been sleeping in it, and every joint in my body screamed in protest. For a single, fleeting, beautiful moment, I didn't know where I was. I felt nothing but a strange peace, the kind of spiritual vacuum only a total blackout can provide. It was the bliss of pure nothingness.

Then the light hit me, a harsh, unforgiving fluorescent glare that sliced through the darkness behind my eyes. I saw the boots first. Big, black, official boots. Then the uniforms, crisp and starched. They belonged to two men who looked less like police officers and more like high-ranking members of some grotesque, globalist puppet show. The first officer, a hulking Scotsman with a face like a slab of granite, was staring down at me with an expression of weary disgust. The second, younger and more twitchy, was taking notes on a clipboard, his pen scratching with a manic intensity.

"Well, well, well," the big one grumbled. "Look who's decided to join us. Welcome to Edinburgh, ya little twat."

I pushed myself up, my brain sloshing around in my skull. "Where the hell am I?" I croaked.

"Edinburgh Airport," the younger one said, his eyes darting from me to his notes. "You've been detained for... Well... A lot of things, sir."

"Detained?!" I shouted, the sound reverberating off the walls of the small room. "What for? I was on a pilgrimage! A journey of the soul! On my way to Jedburgh to expose the death of meaning, for Christ's sake! I'm a journalist!"

The granite-faced officer just snorted. "No, what you are, mate, is pissed out of yer fuckin’ mind. You ran up a tab on that plane that would make Keith Richards blush. You called the flight attendant a 'psychic vampire' and demanded she bring you 'the good stuff.'"

I squinted, trying to piece together the fragments of memory that were floating around in that haze. The portly accountant next to me… I remember that. The feeling of being a sardine in a can… I remember that. The flight from O’Hare to Scotland... nothing.

"You also reportedly spent a good fifteen minutes," the younger one added, "attempting to 'baptize' the flight crew with a bottle of Jack Daniel's while yelling something about 'vital lies' and 'the final descent into oblivion.'"

My mind raced, trying to find a footing in this new, terrifying reality. My pilgrimage had gone completely sideways, derailed by the very same absurdity I was supposed to be documenting. The shame hit me like a physical blow. “Why did they have to wake me up?” I thought to myself. Pulled from the most peaceful state I had ever known by the very agents of order I so despise. They were the ones who would drag me back into the world of ceaseless noise and manufactured nonsense.

Then a sudden wave of desperation hit me. "What about my typewriter?!" I screamed. "My notes! The research! It's all there, isn't it?"

The granite-faced officer pointed to a small, red case in the corner of the room. "Is that the one you were trying to sell to a German tourist for 'sixteen bottles of Heineken and an exemption from Auschwitz?'"

I just stared at him, a dull, throbbing ache pounding the shit out of my brain right behind my eyes. "Did they find the Acid, too? Or did I finish the rest of it on the plane?" I wondered. "How the hell will I survive this?"

The interview room embodied the kind of misery you get right out of a Hollywood studio. The white walls, cheap metal table, two plastic chairs, and a single accusatory light buzzing overhead. I was looking down the barrel of a gun. It was over for me, I just knew it. Why did I take this god forsaken assignment? I’m not Duke. Foolish of me to think that I could keep that spirit alive in the year 2025. Gone are the days when a man can simply show up, cause a massive scene, and be hailed a prophet. These days, you're just a goddamn criminal.

Granite-Face, or "Detective Inspector" Granite-Face, according to his badge, sat across from me, two massive hands resting on the table like two sledge hammers. The twitchy one, Constable Too Much Caffeine, was in the corner with his notepad, scratching away with his pen like a teenager who just abused Adderall for the first time.

"Let's go over this again, Mr...?" Granite-Face started in a low rumble.

"Fuck it," I thought. I'm screwed anyway. Might as well ham it up for the story.

"Look here, Scot, I don't think you understand. I am an ethnographer of the absurd. Yessir. A journalist. My name is irrelevant. I am but a vessel. A vessel for the truth."

Granite-Face blinked impatiently, a tectonic shift in his stony features. "Right. So, 'Mr. Vessel,' you deny assaulting the cabin crew of British Airways?"

"Well, yessir, I do. I was performing an impromptu exorcism," I clarified. "That woman's aura was a parasitic void. I was liberating the crew from her psychic vampirism with a sacramental spirit. A baptism, if you will."

"With a liter of Jack Daniels," Corporal Tweaker chirped from the corner.

"The holiest of water," I shot back.

Granite-Face leaned forward, the chair groaning in protest. "Listen, you addled twat. You're facing charges that could see you rotting in Barlinnie for life. We have a dozen witnesses. We have you on video trying to trade your typewriter for 'a ticket out of this cultural cadaver.' Your so-called pilgrimage is over. Now you get one phone call. I suggest you use it to contact a solicitor, not to order a bloody pizza."

He slid a chunky phone across the table. One call. Behind the cool I tried to keep, this felt like the final prayer of the damned. A solicitor was pointless, considering the severity of my crimes. I needed a different kind of intervention. One with the conviction of money, power, and fame. The kind of authority that got Johnson off the hook for assassinating Kennedy. I needed the man who funded this very assault on the frontline of the apocalypse.

I dialed his number from memory. It rang twice.

"Yes?" The voice was calm, clipped, and radiated the kind of power that doesn't suffer fools, nor questioning.

"It's me," I said, completely unsure of how this conversation would go. "There's been… Well… A professional complication."

A frustrated sigh came down the line, "Edinburgh, I presume?"

"You guessed it," I answered.

"Give me the short version. Did you assault a public figure or just an anonymous prole?"

"Flight crew. Sacramental whiskey was involved. They're talking about endangering an aircraft."

"I knew this was going to cost more than nine grand," he muttered under his breath, then paused. I could hear the faint clinking of ice in a glass. "You're a liability, Merritt, but I knew that when we met. Put the officer in charge on the phone."

I looked at Granite-Face and pushed the phone towards him. "He wants to speak to you," I said with a maniacal grin.

Granite-Face scoffed, but took the phone. "D.I. MacLeod," he grunted. He listened. His brow furrowed. He listened some more… The granite began to crack. His face turned pale as he looked at me, no longer seeing a drunken degenerate, but something else entirely. A problem. A problem with a very powerful owner.

I smirked.

"I understand," he said, his voice now stripped of all authority. "Yessir. I see. That will be…" a large gulp, "taken care of."

He placed the phone back on the table as if it were radioactive. The dynamic in the room shifted. The law, that great and terrible absolute, was suddenly revealed to be negotiable.

Granite-Face, or "D.I. Macleod?" stood up and walked to the door, avoiding my gaze entirely. He spoke to someone outside, and when he returned, he said, "Right," the word full to the brim with disgust. "Here's what's going to happen. All witness statements concerning your… 'episode'... have been deemed unreliable due to a potential gas leak in the cabin's ventilation system, causing mass hysteria. Funny, that."

"Ha!" I blurted uncontrollably. A gas leak? The sheer, brutal poetry of the lie was breathtaking.

"The assault charges," he continued. "Have been dropped, as the flight attendant has decided she doesn't wish to press charges after receiving a sudden and very generous 'trauma settlement' from your 'employer'. The airline has been compensated for the liquor and has been assured that this will not happen again. You are no longer under arrest."

"Haha!" I squealed and kicked, still handcuffed to the chair. I had stared into the abyss, and the abyss had been bought out.