Millie Drake and I viewed the large ballroom around us, there in that mansion house in suburban New York. The guests that night were all strangely similar. The men were late middle aged, well-dressed types of the wealthy class. The other guests were made up entirely of young girls, ranging in age from about twelve to fifteen, all clad in scarlet-hued bikini tops and matching miniskirts.
“So what do you think is going on here, Daniel?” asked Millie. “You said we got an anonymous message to investigate Crowe Mansion, and the invitation to this party was easy to forge, but why are we really here?”
“That is what we must ascertain, my dear,” said I. “The owner of this house, Mr. Eliseus Crowe, is a rich shipping magnate about whom there are some strange rumours. I have it on good authority that the note we received was from one of his household servants, disgusted at Crowe’s lifestyle. Nevertheless, there is something quite strange at work here; something… otherworldly.”
I was clad in my usual finery; including a frilled poet shirt, purple velvet suit, jungle boots, panama hat, Star of David necklace, and one of my favourite opera capes.
My companion, known as Miss Millie Drake, is an exceedingly beautiful young lady; petite and perfect with luxurious chestnut hair, enchanting violet eyes, an sun-kissed skin. The flowered dress she wore only served to highlight her slender figure.
Kit-10, our robotic cat friend, had stayed behind at our downtown headquarters to monitor the computer systems.
Millie and I had by now strolled over to the punch bowl. I took a glass of it and sipped it carefully.
“Hmmm,” I pondered. “Ordinary fruit punch, laced with a good imported wine. Chardonnay 1969 if my palate deceives me not.”
I noticed that one of the other guests, a grey haired man in a smart tuxedo, was eyeing my Magen David.
“I say,” he said, “I don’t think I’ve seen you at the meetings before. Are you a member of the Brotherhood?”
I looked at him sharply, silently encouraging for him to give up more information.
“I assume you must be,” he continued. “This meeting is closed to all except members of the Brotherhood of Marduk. Well, and our partners for the ceremony, of course.”
He then walked away to speak to some of the other guests.
“‘The Brotherhood of Marduk’?” wondered Millie Drake. “Oh my goodness, Daniel! Isn’t that…?”
“Quite so,” I replied, twiddling my frills. “Marduk is one of the mythological ‘gods’ of ancient Babylon, in fact the most honoured deity of that notoriously decadent culture. So this is a secret meeting of some modern devotees of that ancient obscenity, led by none other than…”
“Good evening, members of the Brotherhood of Marduk,” said a cultured man’s voice. “Welcome to our most important meeting ever, for this is the night in which we shall achieve immortality!”
I looked up and beheld the man who was speaking from a podium on which was a symbol quite like a black spade. He was wearing over his suit an ebony vestment robe covered with weirdly embroidered symbols of stars and planets and astrological signs. His strong features and complexion carried with them a look of mixed Mediterranean and Anglo descent.
“Eliseus Crowe himself,” I whispered. “He is the leader of this cult devoted to the ancient Babylonian debaucheries.”
“What does he mean by ‘immortality’?” queried Millie.
“By the Eternal Spires!” I swore. “It appears that the cult is intending to use these young girls in some sort of horrid sex magic ritual!”
“But where did they get them?”
“Countless children go missing each year in America. That many of them end up as high-end prostitutes is well-known -- and far too often ignored.”
“My Brothers,” continued Eliseus Crowe, a strange black and scarlet light beginning to play around him like a slithering snake, “nothing can hinder us, for -- as you can see -- the power of Marduk is mine. Tonight we, with the help of our young assistants, will experience renewed youth and vigour -- by the power of the most ancient Magic! Tonight -- The Gates of Babylon shall open!”
“But Daniel,” said Millie, “the Babylonian gods aren’t real, right?”
“Of course they are not gods and originally had no real existence,” I explained, “but through the generations of obscene sexual rites that were performed in their honour, a certain psyche-mentalist force was generated that exists in their form for those who would do the horrid perversions necessary to call it forth.”
Eliseus Crowe continued his unhallowed sermon from behind the podium: “Now, my Brothers, the time has come that we should take these young assistants and perform the ceremony of renewal! Take them, ravish them, enter them! By the covenant of our lord Marduk, take them and be invigorated!”
“No, Eliseus Crowe,” said I, stepping forwards to-wards the hideous cult leader. “You shall not debauch these youngsters. I am Doctor Daniel Rumanos of Algol, and I am putting a stop to your immoral cult right now!”
“What!” Crowe responded with a mixture of outrage and mirth. “You would stand against me? I am the modern high priest of Marduk, the greatest of the gods of Babylon! I have practiced his rites and have gained his powers -- powers that I can use to destroy you!”
With this, a thing of awesome eldritch evil occurred. The darksome energies that had been spinning around Eliseus Crowe suddenly intensified an hundredfold, and in doing so they took a definite shape; it was the form like unto an huge writhing serpent, black and red of hue, resplendent in its horrid slithering evil as it raised its horned serpentine head above Millie Drake and me!
“Oh my gosh!” cried my companion. “Daniel, what is that?!”
“That, my dear Millie,“ I opined, “is the great Dragon of Babylon, the very token of Marduk. Crowe, through his sick depravities and unholy magic, has managed to call this horror forth!”
As I spoke, the horrendous Dragon -- with an horrifying sound as much an hiss as a roar -- continued to advance to-wards us!
And so, my friends and most patient readers, I wonder if you are capable of understanding the complete abject horror, forsooth the utter living nightmare of what we were then experiencing, there at that suburban New York mansion house. There we were, the lovely Millie Drake and me -- Doctor Daniel Rumanos, Knight of the Eternal Spires. There we were, facing the evil Eliseus Crowe and his horrid cult, the Brotherhood of Marduk, that intended to violate that group of young girls as part of an ancient sex magical ceremony in order to renew their own youth. There we were; as the eldritch darksome powers of the infamous city of Babylon -- now manifest as the very Dragon of unholy darkness -- prevented us from doing anything to prevent this unholy outrage!
“Begin the ceremony, my friends!” repeated the wicked Eliseus Crowe. “Nothing can stop us now! Take our young assistants and renew your very lives! Take the powers of youth as your own!”
I looked and saw the men beginning to shed their clothes as they prepared to commence an orgy of rape against the young girls who stood hypnotised with fear.
“Daniel, we’ve got to stop them!” Millie cried. “What can we do?!”
“Millie, take my hand,” I said. “Take my hand and tell me -- do you love me?”
I felt Millie’s dear little hand in mine as she spoke.
“Yes, Daniel,” she said. “I do love you. You know I love you more than life itself.”
“I love you too, my dear little Mills,” I said. “I love you with a love of purity and truth -- and by that most supreme power I do declare the fall of Babylon!”
Then a wondrous thing happened. From the Star of David I wore suddenly showed forth a dazzling light of pure whiteness; a light that soon filled the room.
“Baruch atah Adonai,” I invoked, “Elohenu melech ha-olam ha-aretz! By the power of Hashem, the God of Israel, I do break the forces of the false gods of Babylon, as did the Nevi’im of old! Marduk bows and is vanquished along with his followers!”
With my prayer, the white light then focused itself directly at the great red Dragon, hitting the horrid monstrosity directly on its head. The thing began to shake and writhe in pain and, within a few seconds, accompanied by a sound like unto an enormous hissing screech, it seemed to explode into countless black and red particles before then totally vanishing into nothingness.
The light then again widened, filling the room with its purity. I heard Eliseus Crowe shout and scream in indignant annoyance turning into absolute terror before he then vanished -- along with the other members of that rotten cult which is remembered in eternal infamy as the Brotherhood of Marduk.
Then, with a brief sound like unto the singing of an heavenly choir, the holy light slowly faded away.
I looked around the ballroom. Eliseus Crowe and his cult members had indeed vanished, and the evil had been exorcised. The young girls were unharmed, and stood by looking mystified as to what had occurred.
“Are you all right, my dear Mills?” I queried concernedly.
“Yes, I’m okay,” she replied. “What happened?”
“The power of the old Hebrew invocation, along with the purity of our love, defeated the demoniacal Dragon; it defeated the filth of Babylon; forsooth, the very filth of this world! The repulsive Eliseus Crowe and the Brotherhood of Marduk are no more, destroyed forevermore by the divine power before they could commit the unspeakable outrage that they intended.”
“But what about the girls?” asked Millie, looking around at the now confused group of kidnapped youngsters.
“I shall call our old friend Commissioner Hurley of the NYPD,” I announced. “He has the proper authority and connections that can relocate these children into safe and proper homes, as we can hope could happen to all who face such ungodly exploitation!”
***** DANIEL RUMANOS AND MILLIE DRAKE SHALL RETURN
