Monday, March 22, 9:22 a.m. Denver Public Library, Colorado

Stained fingers raced across the jagged word landscape. The jittery man shut his eyes and ‘read’ the newspaper with his fingertips. As instructed.

He stood out among the patrons of the Denver Public Library. Not just for his black-leather jacket, tight jeans and alligator shoes. Nor for the partially missing fingers on his left hand.
Harold R. Holt was extra ordinary. Blessed with piercing blue eyes and a demeanor like a hissing live wire. These traits weren’t genetic; instead, they were gifts of the dark abyss. For a couple of years ago, Harry had been demonically possessed, nicknamed the Watcher and assigned a deadly mission.

Harry blew on his eight remaining digits, bruised from overuse. Such hard work seeking and stalking the Chosen One. He had never felt so crappy in all his forty-something years. Here he was, supposedly immortal. Instead, he was bloody wasted.

Trapped into a zombie-like existence. Not one of those wild-eyed, bloodthirsty lunatics from old horror flicks, but a waking dead, all the same. No longer aged, needed sleep or protein. Just Twinkies and Ding-Dongs.

The Watcher’s unholy task was simple: travel and scan local and international newspapers and magazines, searching for references to unexplained religious phenomena. For anything other than the Chosen One, he was to investigate, disprove and report. It was boring and he hated the flying.

In his stint as the serpent’s disciple, he had nosed his share of inexplicable cures and holy shrines but never a whiff of the Chosen One. He wasn’t sure he wanted that ‘special’ experience. Sometimes, it’s better not to know.

The morning was dying. He needed to piss. But he pressed on, fingers prickling. Eyes shut, the Watcher rapidly digit scanned.

It had taken weeks to acquire the sensitivity to comprehend by hovering. Early on, he had scalded his fingertips. Couldn’t ‘watch’ for fourteen days. The Big D freaked, brutally penetrating his core. Lesson number one: never, absolutely never, ever disappoint the Monarch of Hell.

He sighed, forcing his fingers closer. Skimmed the New Mexico news brief, slowing at the phrases “…reports of a miracle...” and “...bleeding Virgin.” He smiled when he read her byline: Rachel Willingdon. Shit, that woman was good. Gotta meet her.

His fingertips rippled across newsprint. After thirty minutes, he reached for a stack of old entertainment publications. “Yeooo!” His mind throbbed with pain. “Christian sensation and stigmatic, John the Apostle, and unknown companion caught leaving the Passion Ministry compound.”