Murder in the Vatican.

   ''In nomine magni dei nostri Satanas, introibo ad Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti, introibo ad altare Domini inferi''.    
   And so starts the Black Mass in a dark corner in a deep basement of the Vatican.    
                                                 XXXXX    
   Three weeks before.    
   Father John Blair was in his office putting the last touches to his notes concerning his investigation into  Satanic Pedophilia and child abuse in the clergy.  He was a well respected cleric, well versed in Canon Law.  The Church and righteousness were his entire life.    
   He was not one to go against the grain, but things were coming out in the open and worse was to come.    
   Pedophilia was bad enough and the Church was paying countless millions in compensations for the disgusting deeds done by many of its members.    
   Satanic pedophilia was something else.  He needed somebody to help him leak out the story.  This was way beyond pedophilia, as it included satanic rituals, severe abuse of children and, as he'd been able to gather from barely whispered voices, human  sacrifice.    
   He barely had time to press the ''send'' button on his computer before there was a click at the door.  A fellow entered without knocking.    
   ''Yes?'' he said, a bit surprised by this particular visitor.  ''I have not seen you in a while.  I was not excpecting for at least another week''.    
   ''Change of plans, my friend'' said the visitor as he approached Father Blair, and as swift as a trained S,E.A.L., had his knife out and slit Father Blair's throat.    
   When John Sweats arrived at The Trumpet at his usual hour of seven he was stunned to see that a priest had been killed.  In a town where the biggest crime was normally a speeding ticket in a school zone.    
   The second surprise, as he took a sip of hot coffee from his cup  with the logo of the NFL's Vikings on it,  and switched the computer on, was that the priest in question, who he did not know at all,  had sent him a file.  When he started reading, he was glad he'd skipped breakfast.  Some of the allegations were truly extravagant to say the least. Priests and pedophilia, lesbian nuns abusing their young charges, nothing new.    
   But this was going beyond.  Disbelieving, he started doing searches on the internet.  Satanism,  Black masses.  Human sacrifices.  By priests and higher-ups in the  Catholic Church higherarchy.    
   And many  many references to Rome and the Vatican, as underlined by Father Blair.  
   By noon he felt confident enough with the content of his file to go see his boss with it. His boss agreed that something merited further investigation and authorised the requested trip.  
   it took him a day to put put everything in order, add a contact in Roma and then he was on his way.  HCe hardly slept on the plane, reading some more over the subject.  
   Landing at Fucuomo airport early the next morning,  he took a cab which led him to a charming little hotel walking distance from the Trevi fountain where tourists were gathered and throwing coins in the water to accompany their wishes.  
   Setting things in motion, he called his contact, Father James Barton at the Pontifical Biblical Institute.  They agreed to meet at a small café near the Vatican.  He was the first to arrive.   Considering the number of black robes around, it was simpler for him th tell the priest to look for the young man with the long black hair.  
   As John and Father Barton were both in their young thirties they got along well from the start.  
   ''I must say that I am shocked by the cruel death of Father Blair.  His  excellent reputation as a wordly scholar extended to the Vatican.  Yes, he was a thorn in the Vatican's side but I must say I am intrigued by this. Who would want to to execute a priest, and in this manner goes beyong understanding'',  
   As John was about to interrupt, Father Barton continued:  ''Oh, don't get me wrong, I am not blind to what is going on.  But you are talking about an infinitely small number of priests who engage in pedophilia,  As for the rest, satanism and all, I am very dubious''.  
   ''But what about the Black Masses and human sacrifices?''  
   ''I want to reassure you that the Holy See takes these matters seriously. I converse often on such matters with my mentor, Cardinal Wolanski, a brilliant man.  He assures me, and assure you, that this satanic stuff is nonsense.  Yes, it did exist in the past but is is certainly no longer the case.  Human sacrifices in the Vatican? Huge nonsense.  I wished to meet with you only to make sure that you do not waste too much of your time in Rome''.  
   Disappointed, John left the café to walk along crowded streets , refelcting and thinking and, without even realizing it, ending up right in front of his hotel.  He logged on. searched, and found an article by a journalist named Antonia Fressa from La Stampa.  He would try to contact her.  
   At the same moment a young girl was walking by the parc.  A black van pulled beside her, stopped, door opened, a big guy came out, grabbed her, threw in the van, got back in and closed the door as the van was already moving on.
   Tomorrow was the sabbath.  A sacrifice was needed.
  
 On this Sabbath  late afternoon, Cardinal Wolanski and friends, led by a select security group, made their way very very discreetly and by a hidden door to their cherished cavern in the bowels of the Vatican.
   The  altar was already set, the fatal injection already injected in the victim's veins and now she was naked, quite dead and being cleansed and made ready for the ultimate offering to Satan.
   The cardinal, dressed in his finest garbs of Red, for the blood to be spilled, and Black in honor of death, approached the altar once all was ready, named himself Pope Sixtus IV, in honor of the real Pope Sixtus IV who led the Church part of the way in the  fifteenth century.  He was a pedophile, a pimp, he practiced incest and, of course, sodomy.  His papal palace was in fact a whorehouse.
   A grand moment as he picked  up the ciborium with the consecrated hosts, dropped  them to the floor and crushed them with his shoes, all the while praying for Satan to join them.
   He then turned to the altar and made ready to sodomize the dead body.
   It is at that moment that Antonia Fressa accompanied by John and led by her father, chief of the security force,  finally found the secret passage.  Only the Pope's personal secretary new of it, if we are to believe,  but there was no time to waste as they proceeded quickly, arriving at the secret cave just as the false Sixtus IV was invoking Satan before the last part of the rite could take place.
   It was too late for the victim, sadly, but at least preventing the last insult to her body.
   The shock was incredible.
   But the discoveries of the atrocities was only beginning.