Disclaimer: The Sentinel belongs to UPN/Paramount and Pet Fly Productions. No copyright infringement is intended and no money has changed hands.
Author's note: This story actually takes place before the series starts. It fills in a few holes dealing with Blair's side of the deal, the Shaman thing. That's going to be very important in future stories, so it makes sense to tell you where it all came from and how it works.
WARNING: Graphic description of a really nasty crime scene!
A note about the Kakari Indians: This tribe is a figment of my imagination. Any similarity to actual cultures, rituals, names, and/or individuals is purely coincidental. I'm only writing for fun, guys. I mean no disrespect to any native cultures of any nation or their belief systems.
Monday, March 15, 2004...
The scene was one of the worst any of them had ever seen. Jim had only seen worse during his days in covert ops when he'd been sent to stop a Colombian drug lord. The fiend had discovered an undercover operative in his midst and had him drawn and quartered, then left in the sun to rot as a warning. Several officers had already anointed the bushes outside the house, but Blair hadn't joined them, and Jim was glad, because he wasn't sure he could handle this himself without his Guide there to anchor him.
The victim was Charlie Odawe, a Kakari Indian who was living in Cascade in order to help Rainier University's North American Tribal Art And Culture program by authenticating artifacts, correcting assumptions, and providing information about his people. Since the U was, in turn, granting scholarships to several Kakari youths who'd shown promise, he had gladly agreed. He was a Shaman of his people, and Blair had sought him out two weeks ago to learn more about the Shamanic practices of the Kakari. Odawe had agreed to talk to Blair because he had recognized the mark of a Shaman on his heart.
Now the man was dead, and in a most horrible fashion. He had been lain on a coffee table, nude, his limbs bound to the legs of the table with three-inch-wide strips of leather, the ends of which were fringed and decorated with turquoise and bone beads. His shoulders had been dislocated to accommodate the awkward position. His head had been shaved and a design had been carved into his brow. His chest and abdominal cavities had been laid open, cut in an "I" shape under the collar bone, over the hips, and down the middle, and the skin folded back and pinned to his sides by beaded silver pins. Then the abdominal muscles had been sliced away and every organ removed from the cavity, leaving only disconnected bits and nerves. The spinal column hadn't been touched. The organs and muscle tissue had been left in a pile on the floor beside their owner. From some of the splatter patterns, Cassie Wells had said that she thought the last three organs removed had been the diaphragm, lungs, and heart, so if it wasn't shock that killed him, he had been alive for the entire procedure.
Then there were the markings that were all over the floor, walls and ceiling. They had been made in blood, probably that of the victim. It was the marks that Blair was focusing on. They would have to work on the rest of the scene later, after Forensics was done with it, but hopefully the markings would tell them something about the murderer, and Blair was deffinitely the man to handle that part of the case.
Blair suddenly swore, drawing the attention of his Sentinel. "Jim! The killer was Kakari, and he was trained as a Shaman."
"What?"
"Yeah. These markings are the same on every wall, and they all say the same thing. 'This Betrayer now belongs to Esoniye and will suffer until the sun rises no more for his rejection of the Dark One.' Esoniye is the Kakari Spirit of Darkness, their version of the Devil. Our killer follows him instead of Inowe, the Benevolent Great Spirit." The Shaman shuddered. "God, Jim! He's trapped here! The marks are on every wall, the floor and the ceiling, effectively blocking every escape route his spirit could have. He's still here, being tortured!"
Jim couldn't control the shudder that went down his spine. What a horrible way to go! "Sandburg, I'm not even going to attempt to question if you mistranslated this stuff, but are you sure it worked? Can someone really trap a soul like that?"
Blair frowned, thinking back to the stories that Odawe had told him. Could one man, even an Esoni, have been able to gather enough power to trap and torture Odawe's soul? He was so old, so strong! He had been a Shaman for over fifty years! He didn't think so. "Not on his own. Either he had an accomplice, or Esoniye Himself is helping him. Can you tell if there was more than one person in here?"
Jim turned back to the room, scenting the air. At first the blood was too much, but he finally managed to filter out that scent to see what was underneath. Two people, one of which was Odawe. "No, just the killer and the victim." He sighed. "Chief, I know better than to question the validity of the mystical stuff by now, but please tell me we aren't going up against an actual god."
Simon chose that moment to walk into the scene. He heard the tail end of that conversation and groaned. He needed to get them somewhere that they could talk in private. "Ellison! Are you two done in here?"
Jim looked up and knew that his question had been heard. Simon wanted to talk to them. "Yes, sir."
"Come outside." He turned and left the house, not waiting for a response from his men. That meant that he was either pissed or worried or both. Never a good sign, at any rate. They followed their commander out to a tree on the outskirts of the crime scene. He took a cigar out of his breast pocket but didn't put it in his mouth. He looked at his detectives warily. "I'm guessing it's safe to assume that you know something about this guy's M.O."
Blair flinched. "You're really not going to like this, Simon." The Captain just looked at him. Okay, tell him anyway. "From the markngs and the ritual I can tell you that the killer is probably a Kakari Indian or someone raised by the tribe. Either way, he was trained as a Shaman by the Kakari. I remember only one instance from Charlie's stories when that method of killing was ever used, and it's the most vindictive form of murder I've ever encountered in any culture. Not only does it kill the body, making sure that they don't die from the shock so that they are awake during the entire ritual, but it also traps their soul in the place where they died and keeps them in pain as severe as that which killed them."
"Jesus! I'd hate to think that could actually work."
The young Shaman nodded. "Yeah. The symbols say, 'This Betrayer now belongs to Esoniye and will suffer until the sun rises no more for his rejection of the Dark One.' He's following the Devil, and he probably got help from Esoniye Himself. Jim didn't find evidence of any humans in that room other than Odawe and the killer. Odawe was too old and too powerful to be trapped like that by just one man."
Jim thought about it for a moment, then said, "Well, what if it didn't work? What if our guy had a big enough ego that he thought he could pull it off without help?"
Blair concidered it. "That's possible, but I don't know how to find out. Let me think." He paused for a moment, trying to think of who would, then said, "We'll need to talk to some of the tribe anyway. Susan Freewater ought to know who all was trained by Odawe. The motive here was deffinitely revenge, and it had to be a trained Shaman. That isn't the kind of information he would have released to the University. Kakari Shamen are like Catholic priests; they don't get married. There aren't any children so the killer is probably one of his students. There are three other Kakari Shamen here in Cascade, all connected to the exhibit. Hopefully one of them will be able to help us. We'll need to know who all of his students are and which ones might have had a reason to kill him."
Susan Freewater, Charlie Odawe's secretary, was a lovely young woman, and the closest thing Odawe'd had to a daughter. She was distraught when they told her of his death, but Blair was able to calm her down. "Susan, we need to know the names of any of Charlie's students who might have had a grudge against him."
She looked him in the face. "Why?"
Blair couldn't tell her the details of the crimescene, but that didn't stop him from answering her question. "We think that whoever killed him was after revenge, and we need to talk to those who were closest to him."
Susan wasn't stupid. She narrowed her eyes at him. "Does that make me a suspect?"
Jim said, "Right now, anyone who knew him is a suspect. It's nothing personal. We just have to talk to everyone so we can narrow down the list."
Susan nodded. "All right. Charlie was the First Shaman, so every living Shaman of our people was trained by him. He also has-- had two students at the moment, Idona and Rikowi."
Blair asked, "What about someone who was once his student, but who didn't pass the trials?"
She thought about it for a moment, then nodded to herself. "There were two that I know of, Laito and Chani. Chani left because he fell in love and could no longer devote himself to Inowe alone. Laito, however, didn't pass the trials. Charlie said he had a darkness in his heart that he wouldn't cleanse, something he was keeping that he should have let go of. He blamed Charlie for his failure, accused him of fraud and left the training ground. I never saw him again."
Jim had monitored her vitals as a matter of course, but he could detect no lies. He decided to throw one last question into the mix, just to be sure. "Do you know of anyone who was following Esoniye rather than Inowe?"
Susan was on her feet in an instant, horrified. "Do not speak that name here! Why would you ask such a thing?" Then understanding dawned in her eyes. "Oh, Lasai! The killer has given theirself to the Dark One?" The detectives looked at each other, then Blair nodded. "We must speak to the council quickly. This cannot be ignored. He has too much power, and if he has found a vessel, we are all in danger."
It was a fact. Susan could really move quickly when she was motivated. Within two days, the entire Kakari tribal council was assembled in Cascade. The council was made up of every chieftain and Shaman in the tribe. It was unprecedented. Kakari Shamen didn't usually get together like that, generally keeping to their own clan. With thirty men to accomidate, they requisitioned the use of the department's press room, making sure to lock the doors and to disconnect the surveilance cameras. The events of a full council meeting were not to be seen by the uninvited. They allowed Jim, Blair and Simon to be present for the meeting, knowing that they would be pivital in the coming battle.
Among the entire tribal council, only one was a woman, a Shaman named Lourin. She was young, the newest of the Shamen, and it was said that she was second in power only to Odawe. Lourin had temporarily taken the place of First Shaman until Inowe could declare who it would be, which meant that she was completing the training of Odawe's current students. She could also take on new students as a part of those duties, and she had the loudest voice among the Shamen in the council.
When Lourin first looked a Jim and Blair, the Sentinel heard her heartrate spike. He looked her in the eye, trying to figure out what her problem was, but she looked pleasently surprised.
Susan introduced the three men, then left the room, knowing that the meeting was not for her ears. Lourin was the first to speak. "Thank you, Captain, for allowing this meeting. If Esoniye is to be defeated, we are going to need all the help we can get. I am glad that your Guardian pair will be a part of the fight. They could prove to be the weight that tips the scales in our favor." Then she looked at Blair. "You seem to be a very powerful Shaman, but your power is raw, unfocused. Are you having a problem?"
Blair shook his head. He should have realized that Lourin would have seen his strength. Charlie had talked about her. She was nearly as powerful as he was, and he'd seen Blair's gift immediately. "The only problem is that I have not been trained. I don't know how much use I'm going to be in this fight."
Lourin stared at him for a moment. One of the others seemed to sense what she was thinking and approached her. "Is this wise? Pushing the training like that could harm him."
She nodded. "I know, but it may be a risk we have to take. He will be needed. At any rate, the decision is not ours, but his."