Sea Change (16 page)

Alan lunged
towards John, his hands out, but it was as if he were moving
underwater. John ducked down and skipped underneath Alan's arms,
dodging past him. A hand scraped along his coat but couldn’t take
hold, and then John was away, running through the hall, sprinting
up the wooden stairs, stumbling footsteps coming from behind him.
He ignored them and raced along the landing and burst into
Charles's room.

His first
thought was: he's dead. The old man lay flat in bed, his eyes
closed, his face pale and not human, more like a waxwork. His
breathing was the only sign that he was still alive. The sound was
faint and laboured, as if every breath was an effort. John looked
over beside the bed and saw the airline draped along the floor on
the far side of the oxygen cylinder, which had been dragged a few
inches back from the bed. Only a few inches, but right out of
Charles's reach.

Oh God, John
thought. Oh God. He heard a stumbling thump on the landing behind
him, and without thinking he slammed the door shut, and pushed his
hands against it. Pointless, he thought. Elias might be slow when
he's controlling Alan, but he'll still have more strength than I
do. He looked around the room for something that he could push
against the door but saw nothing that he would be able to move in
time. Then he saw the key.

Idiot, idiot,
he thought, an old house like this, of course it has. He didn't
waste any more time, just locked the door and ran over to the
bed.

"Charles, it's
me," he said, and the old man's eyelids fluttered but he did not
move. His breathing was shallow, and made a sound like the sea on
the shingle.

A thumping
began on the bedroom door. It was slow and without rhythm, but
there was some force behind it and John did not know how long the
door would last. He pulled the oxygen cylinder back towards the
bed, picked the airline up and sniffed at it, held it to his ear.
He didn't think anything was coming out. John slipped the tube over
Charles's head, rested the yellow plastic vent under his nose. That
would do, as long as it would just stay in place. The door shook in
its frame as Elias used Alan to pound at it, a clumsy marionette
stumbling around to do his bidding but with little
co-ordination.

John looked at
the oxygen cylinder in bewilderment. There was something that
looked like a tap, and something that looked like one of the
control knobs on the radiators at home. There was also a dial, with
one end of the scale shaded in red. The needle was flat at the
other end of the scale. Okay, John thought, I know how much I can
give him without making the whole thing blow his nose off. But how?
The door shook again, and John heard a splintering sound. No time
to hesitate. He grabbed the control that looked like a tap and
pulled it on, full. Nothing happened. The needle stayed where it
was, and he could not hear any sound from the hose. Another heavy
bang came on the door, and this time there was the sound of
cracking wood.

John turned the
knob, one, two, three twists, taking it round as quickly as he
could. There was an immediate hiss from the hose, and the needle
leapt up towards the red end of the dial. John stopped turning,
went back two turns. The needle flickered and then settled down,
quite high, but not near the red area. Best to leave it as high as
I can, John thought. He checked to see that the air outlet was
directly under Charles's nose, and then looked around the room to
see if he could find anything to push against the door, anything
that would keep Alan—Elias—out for a little bit longer.

There was not
much else in the room other than the bed. There was a heavy-looking
wooden dresser, with old photographs standing on the top, which
John did not think he would be able to move. There was the bed, a
wardrobe that looked heavier than the dresser, and the chair that
John had sat in when he came to visit Charles. That will have to do
John thought, remembering films where the hero had propped a chair
under a door handle to give himself enough time to escape. He
grabbed the back of the chair, and was halfway across the room with
it when the door crashed open, hanging drunkenly on one hinge for a
second before falling to the floor. Alan stood in the doorway. John
stood in the middle of the room. Behind him, he could hear Charles
muttering but could not hear what it was that he was trying to
say.

"Alan," John
said. "It's me, John. It's your dad here, it's Charles, I know how
much you love him, look after him. Fight Elias, Alan, he's weak. If
you fight him he can't control you."

Alan stepped
forward into the room but after a step he paused, clenching and
unclenching his hands, his eyes flickering open and shut.

"That's it,
fight him. Go on Alan, don't let him win. He'll harm your dad."

John heard a
voice from behind him, a thin croak that lapsed into a wheezing
cough.

"Don't try and
talk Charles," John said. "Just breathe."

Alan took one
step forward, and then another. John moved away, trying to create
as much space as possible between himself and Alan, trying to draw
the man away from the door so that he could make a break for it.
Elias was slow, clumsy in another man's body, drained of power, and
weakening. If John could slip past, Alan could not catch up to him.
But what good would that do, John thought? I can't leave Charles,
not after what Elias made Alan do. And I can't go to the police,
what am I going to say, don't arrest this man and charge him with
attempting to murder his father, he's only temporarily possessed by
the spirit of an old man who died years ago but somehow is still
alive. Or is something that is like being alive.

John felt more
trapped than he had in the cave, trapped by the presence of Charles
behind him, faced with something that he could not just run from.
Alan took another step forward, closing in. Then he shuddered,
shook, and moved a step away from John. John thought for one moment
that Elias had lost control, that this was Alan gaining the upper
hand, but then he realised that it was not. Elias was saving John
for later. Alan was heading towards the bed again, towards his
father. Elias must have realised that his hold was weakening, but
if he could take the life of an already frail old man then John
would be left without an ally, left without knowledge of how to do
anything other than Elias's bidding. And maybe, John thought, he's
going to kill Charles to teach me a lesson, to teach me not to
disobey him again.

And in that
second, John knew what to do to save Charles. He stepped between
Alan and the bed, and said, "Come on, then."

Alan stopped,
waved his arms in front of him, as if he were trying to swat a fly.
John easily ducked out of the way. Alan walked forward until John
had no option other than to come into physical contact with him to
prevent him from reaching the bed. The man raised his hands to
smash them down, but John ducked down almost to a crouch, grabbed
at one of the ankles in front of him, and then rolled to the side,
putting all his weight behind it.

Already off
balance, Alan fell to the floor with a crash that made the photo
frames jump into the air off the top of the dresser. He had not
done any of the usual things to break his fall, had not put his
hands out, had not tried to turn himself to cushion the blow. Elias
did not have the control to do it. He could make Alan stand again
though, scrabble to his feet, and send him lurching across the room
again.

“Sorry, Alan,"
John said, and he ducked behind him, jumped on his back and pulled
hard, as hard as he could. Alan started to fall again, and John
quickly let go and jumped away. He landed awkwardly, and for a
moment pain stabbed at his ankle, but he had managed to not be
under Alan when he fell. This time the man was even slower getting
up. When he was on his feet he stood for a moment, shaking his
head, swaying from side to side. John could see that Charles had
struggled up to a sitting position in the bed, and was staring out
at them.

"It's not him,"
John said. "It's not your son doing this. It's Elias."

Charles nodded,
did not try to speak. Alan stood between them, muscles rippling
along his face as though something was burrowing beneath the
skin.

"Come on,
Elias," John said. "A young boy and an old man, and we're getting
the better of you. Is this the best you can do?"

Alan shuddered
and groaned and then spoke, his voice thick and hoarse, as if the
air were being dragged up from his lungs.

“Get...what I
want...or... all of them.” Charles's eyes widened at the sound. It
was his son speaking, but not his son's voice. “I will take. All.
Them. You. Sister. All."

"So come
on
, then. Do it now. I'm never going to get the stone for
you Elias, never. So you might as well do it now. Come on, you're
the one with such great power, you're the one that says he can
raise the dead, that takes over the bodies of the living—come on,
one boy and one old man, surely even you can manage that,
dead
man
."

Alan lumbered
forward again, but this time he was more uncoordinated than ever,
and looked as if he were walking through glue. He came towards
John, but shot one hand out to grasp the end of the bed, stopping
himself from moving forward.

"Go on, Alan!"
John shouted. "Fight him. He's getting weaker."

Alan's other
hand came round and prised the hand from the end of the bed. As the
resistance gave way, he went stumbling forward again and all John
had to do was to step out of the way. Alan slammed to the floor
again, and this time he stayed down there. One hand skittered and
searched about, like an insect searching for prey, but John moved
back out of the way and it could not reach him. Alan's eyes
fluttered open and then closed again, and his mouth moved as if he
were whispering. Then with one last shiver, he managed to speak one
more time.

"More than
death," he said, "that is what I promise you.” Alan’s body
convulsed, his shoes drumming on the floor, and then he was still.
Breathing, but still. John looked at him, wary of another
trick.

"I think he's
gone," he said. "Elias. He's done so much tonight, I think he was
weak, he couldn't hold on to Alan any longer. Seems he only has so
much power, and when it's gone he can't do anything until
he—wherever he gets it from—until it comes back. I'm so sorry,
Charles."

"Sorry?" the
old man's voice was still a whisper, but it carried more of its old
fire. "What do you have to be sorry for, boy?"

"Bringing this
upon you, bringing this thing into your lives. He—" John gestured
at Alan, was about to say he nearly killed you, but then he thought
that Charles might not know about the air hose, and that if he
didn't it would be best left unsaid.

"It isn't your
fault. You didn't ask for this, this...thing. You can't blame
yourself for something that you had no control over. How's my
son?"

John bent over
Alan. The man's face had relaxed now, had lost much of the tension
that had pulled it in such a way that it no longer looked like his
own. His chest was rising and falling at regular intervals.

"I think he's
asleep," John said. "Just asleep."

"Let him,"
Charles said, "There's spare bedding in the bottom drawer there,
make him comfortable, will you."

John took a
blanket and a pillow from the drawer. He draped the blanket over
Alan, lifted his head with care and slid the pillow underneath.
Alan didn't stir.

"He'll be stiff
as a board in the morning, and with a raging headache," Charles
said, "but he's slept on plenty of floors before. And he’ll have
had worse hangovers."

"Will he—will
he remember?"

"Doubt it." The
old man paused for a moment, taking in more of the oxygen with slow
wheezing breaths. "He will probably not remember a thing from the
moment it started to the moment he wakes. Which is all for the
best, I think."

There was
silence for a while, just the gentle hissing of the air hose.

"What will you
tell him?"

"About what's
happened? Nothing at all. It isn't Alan's world, John. He won't
believe me. He'll think that I'm turning senile as well as
breathless."

"He's going to
know that something's happened when he wakes up on your floor."

Charles nodded.
"I'll tell him that I had a bad night, and he was concerned so he
slept on the floor here, much against my protests of course. He'll
be puzzled that he can't remember it but put it down to being tired
and one too many malt whiskies. Anyway, let me worry about that in
the morning. What makes a dead man so concerned about what I might
tell you, that he takes possession of my own son to try and kill
me?"

"You believe
me?" John asked. "That I've seen him."

Charles smiled
wearily. "Lad, I knew him, remember. I've just heard his voice. You
don't have to convince me. Yes, I believe you. There are things in
this world—" he broke off, coughing, and John thought that it
wasn't going to stop. Eventually Charles got his breath under
control. "I travelled, when I was young. In the navy. Went to some
strange parts of the world. Saw some strange things, John. Things
that others did not see. Or chose not to see. Maybe it's like a
sense of smell, or taste. Some of us can just smell more than
others, taste things that others cannot. See things that others
cannot. You can, I know that, more than me. I can feel it when you
walk in the room. It's like a feeling before a storm, the hairs on
my neck stand up when I'm close to someone who has it. It is what
drew Elias to you. It's a rare thing."

"Why—" John
stopped.

"Go on."

"Why didn't
Elias just take you over? To stop me talking to you? Or why not Sal
or Simon?" John felt a sudden twist of paranoia, thought back to
the meeting in the street. No, they had been themselves. He would
have known.