Fear: 13 Stories of Suspense and Horror (22 page)

But down deep—deeper than she cared to acknowledge—Soo-ling had always known it was more than that. She could not explain it. Tragedies drew her, called to her—and with a can of spray paint she could somehow prevent them.

Until now.

“What are you going to do?” Bobby finally asked.

“I don't know.”

“Should I call Auntie Loo?”

Soo-ling frowned. Her mother's youngest sister, Auntie Loo, had taken Soo-ling in after her mother had died. Her aunt was a loan officer for Bank of America, practical and serious. She pooh-poohed the ancient traditions her mother held so dear.

“I'm not sure Auntie Loo can help with this.”

But she might know something, anything to make sense of all of this. With no choice, Soo-ling fished out her iPhone. Her fingers trembled, making it hard to call up her aunt's number from the phone's contact list.

Bobby reached and covered her hand with his own. He squeezed once, then slipped the phone from her fingers. “Let me.”

“Thanks.”

She folded her hands in her lap to stop them from shaking. She stared out the window as Bobby called her aunt. His voice dissolved into the background hum of traffic.

She spent the drive home struggling to understand. Someone knew of her work. Or some
thing
—

Her sight suddenly glazed over, narrowing down into darkness. She blindly clawed for Bobby's hand. She clung to him as if she were drowning. But this time, she knew what was happening.

A vision opened inside her. She saw it all.

Screams filled her ears.

She knew what that meant. The blank wall was her next canvas. It called for her work . . . called for her protection against this coming tragedy. As the vision began to fade, she felt both relieved and terrified. Even after three years, these callings spooked her down to the marrow of her bones. She could no longer dismiss them as coincidences or nightmares born out of anxiety and guilt.

As the screams of the dying faded, mocking laughter followed.

She recognized that trail of dark amusement. It was the hunter revealing himself, letting his presence be known. It was both a challenge and a warning to her.

Bobby took her in his arms and held her to him. “What's wrong, Soo?”

She hid her face in her hands, not wanting Bobby to see her so distraught and scared. In a corner of her mind, she still heard the jeering laughter over the screams.

“An earthquake. Tomorrow,” she finally mumbled into his tuxedo jacket. “I can block it, but he'll try to stop me.”

“Who?”

“I don't know, but we need to hurry. I need answers.”

 

 

“. . . only old stories.” Auntie Loo paced the red Moroccan rug of the living room. Cigarette smoke traced her path. She was a stocky woman who cut her black hair into a fierce bob, nothing like the slender grace of Sooling's mother. “Mumbo jumbo nonsense. All incense and pseudoreligion.”

“Auntie, I don't have time for this. You've been keeping secrets all my life.” Soo-ling sat straighter on the leather couch next to Bobby. “Mother knew I had the power, and she must have told you.”

“Soo-Ling, you don't truly believe—”

“Something is coming for me,” she said, cutting her off. “I know it.”

A cloud of fear passed over her aunt's features.

“It will tear this city apart to get to me,” Soo-ling pressed.

Auntie Loo turned away to study the intricacies of a dynasty vase. Her voice became a faint whisper. “If you're right, then he's found you.”

Soo-ling's heart skipped a beat. “Who?”

Her aunt refused to turn around, as if afraid to face any of this. It didn't fit into her world of spreadsheets and financial appraisals.

“Please, Auntie,
who
? Tell me.”

“Gui sou
,” her aunt finally whispered, seeming to sag under the weight of ancient history. “The demon.”

A stirring deep within Soo-ling responded to the quiet syllables:
gui sou
. With the beast named, her body knew it.

“What do you know, Auntie?”

“Just stories. Told to scare children to bed. Nothing but myths.”

Soo-ling crossed the room to her aunt and hugged her from behind. Auntie Loo trembled in her embrace. “Not myths, Auntie. They're as real as my flesh.”

Her aunt broke their embrace and crossed to the fireplace. “I did not want to believe.”

“But why?”

“The family stories tell of dishonor. Cowardice and shame. Our family is a disgraced line. I was supposed to tell you when you came of age. But it seemed like fiction. I thought I could protect you from needless shame by concealing our family secret.”

“But I don't understand. Having this power, this ability to protect, should be an honor.”

Auntie tapped out her cigarette on a crystal ashtray. “It was.
Once
. Our clan was one of thirty-five chosen families, one from each province of China. Each family had the responsibility to protect its province. Our family guarded the Shandong Province on the coast of the Yellow Sea. We were a cherished clan in China.”

“So what happened?” Bobby asked.

“As the story is told, the gods of order and chaos are always at war. Guardian families grew to be a part of this balance. They were gifted with the ability to interrupt certain strands of chaos and deflect disasters.”

“Like I can do,” Soo-ling said.

Auntie nodded and sat on the arm of a leather chair. “Yes. But over the passing centuries, the Chaos Lord became enraged at our interferences and forged a hunter from a part of his spleen, the
gui sou
, to destroy the guardian families. This hunter was unleashed, and many were destroyed before the families finally banded together. Each family sent one representative to form a union powerful enough to entrap the hunter. It took thirty-five guardians to encircle the beast and trap him, but before the enchantment was complete, one member—the one representing our family—panicked and fled. With the circle broken, the spell unraveled. The hunter destroyed the remaining thirty-four guardians. Our disgraced family was banished from China. After decades of wandering, we finally settled here.”

“But what of the beast?”

“The story told is that the
gui sou
was injured by the failed assault and can only regain his full strength to push back into our world by finishing the destruction of the circle of guardians. He knows the power of the guardian is passed to only one member of each generation.” Auntie Loo stared hard at her. “There is only one member left of that direct descendant line.”

Soo-ling crossed back to the sofa and plopped down. “And of course that would be me.”

Auntie Loo nodded.

Bobby took her hand, a silent promise that she was not alone.

“So how am I supposed to stop such a creature? It took thirty-five experienced guardians to stop him in the past. I am only one. Where am I going to find so many others before the sun rises?”

“I don't know. The stories give no other clue.”

Soo-ling closed her eyes. If she did nothing, then L.A. was doomed. But how could she face this demon alone?

From the hallway, an ancient grandfather clock, an heirloom of three generations, chimed once. They were running out of night.

Bobby spoke up. “I have an idea. But it's a long shot.”

Soo-ling turned to him doubtfully. “How?”

“Magic.”

 

 

At two in the morning, the studio lot still bustled. Spotlights and sodium lamps held back the night. Levi's-clad wranglers from a new Western mingled with black-robed ninjas from an action film, while prop men and camera crews scurried to and fro.

No one paid attention to Soo-ling and Bobby as they hurried across the lot.

“What if we're caught?” she asked, sticking close to his side.

Bobby pointed to his back. He'd replaced his tuxedo coat with a bomber jacket. The logo for Titan Pictures was stenciled on the back. “Got it with my internship. No one will give us a second glance.”

She must have looked little convinced.

“No worries,” he assured her. “This is the land of illusion. It's not about who you are—but who you
appear
to be.”

He flipped up the collar of his jacket.

Soo-ling glanced around as they left the chaos and headed into a quieter section of the studio. Bobby had never fully explained his plan. “Where are we going?”

Her friend kept walking.

“Bobby . . .”

He stopped and faced her. “If that demon is tracking you, maybe we'd better keep this on a
need-to-know
basis. For now, the less you know the better.”

For the first time, she read the fear in his face. He suddenly looked both older and younger at the same time. His eyes shone in the darkness, full of worry—but beneath that something more, something that had always been there, only she'd failed to recognize it. Until now.

“You don't have to do this,” he said. “It's not too late. We could call both our families. Get the hell out of Dodge.”

His words held their usual bounce, but she knew it was feigned, as much illusion as the rest of this place. He truly wanted her to flee, to run away, to live.

She acknowledged his fear—and what lay beneath it. Both gave her the strength to lean forward and tip up on her toes.
When had Bobby grown so tall?
She gently kissed his cheek, then lowered to her heels.

“I'm not going anywhere,” she said firmly. “This is
our
city.”

He smiled, blushing high in his cheeks. “Damn right it is.”

Turning smartly on a heel, he led her away. And once again, her hand somehow found its way into his. Together, they hurried through the maze of backlots and alleyways until he halted in front of a green door marked F/X.

“Special effects?” she asked, confused. “I don't understand.”

Bobby finally relented. “Seems like we've reached that
need-to-know
moment.”

As he explained his plan, her eyes grew huge. “Are you insane?” she gasped, and swatted him in the shoulder.

He rubbed his arm while shrugging. “If you have a better plan . . . ?”

She didn't—and they certainly didn't have time to come up with an alternative. She had to trust that Bobby knew what he was doing.

“Fine. Then let's do this.”

His smile grew broader. “Who knew you were this easy?”

“Shut up.”

Bobby used his studio keycard to unlock the door and enter the special-effects studio. She followed him up to a workroom on the second floor. It was full of computer equipment, giant plasma monitors, and a neighboring green-screen studio.

“Do you know how to run all this?”

Bobby gave her a how-stupid-do-I-look glare. “Who grew up on Xbox and could hand-build his own computer from the age of nine? Besides, as an intern, I spent a few weeks here slinging coffee and doughnuts for the post-production crew. I learned everything I could. You'd be surprised what doors a Double Whip Mocha Latte will open for you here.”

She turned in a circle. “What do I have to do?”

“First, you'll need a new outfit.” He pointed to a row of black spandex suits hanging on a row of pegs. The bodysuits had Ping-Pong balls glued all over them. “You can change behind that curtain.”

She took a deep breath, grabbed the smallest of the suits, and retreated behind the curtain. She quickly stripped to her bra and panties and shimmied into the tight outfit. Once done, she stared down at her body. The spandex clung like a second skin. She felt naked—and stupid.

White Ping-Pong balls marked each joint and curve of her body.

“What's taking you so long?” Bobby called to her. “I'm all set here.”

She stepped from behind the curtain and pointed to him. “Not a word!”

His mouth dropped open at the sight of her. He lifted a finger to his chin and closed his mouth, but his grin remained and spoke volumes.

He crossed to her and handed her a pair of goggles that looked like a large black scuba mask. The goggles trailed a set of black cords.

“What now?” she asked.

He pointed to the neighboring studio, wrapped all in green. “The motion-capture suit works best against a green screen. Put on the goggles and you'll see everything I do on the computer.”

Bobby walked her into the empty studio and helped her put on the heavy goggles. The inside of the mask was one big digital screen. A computerized test pattern filled her vision.

“Okay,” he said. “Just stand there until I say go.”

“Then what?”

“Do what you do best. I'll run the controls while you just paint.”

She heard him plug in the goggle's cords, then retreat out of the studio. The door closed. She felt suddenly alone. Over the years she had developed a suspicion of technology, going back to the machines that had failed to keep her mother alive. She had turned instead to what her mother loved: the simplicity of oil on canvas, of spray paint on walls. That was magic enough for her. She had no use for the cold calculating world of computer technology.

That was Bobby's domain.

She had to trust him—did trust him.