The Children of Old Leech: A Tribute to the Carnivorous Cosmos of Laird Barron (42 page)

Ratch’s right hand was blood and pulp, shreds of muscle showing and even bone at a couple knuckles but he still found strength enough to throw his left into Dumont’s own crotch and drive him back against the cab though the shot missed hitting his balls dead on and took him more on the upper right thigh. Dumont gasped and spun but kept his grip on the door even as it swung to on his fingers and gouged them. Crotch and cut arm shooting pain, he drove two more quick kicks at Ratch’s wrist before the other fumbled for the rail with his free left. Bone cracked and Ratch’s bloody ruined right grip slipped and he tumbled backward from the platform, flopping left to keep from falling off and thrusting himself instead half over the righthand stairs. Dumont rained kicks against his feet and crotch and thighs, anything to propel him further… and
off this fucking train
.

Ratch struggled to rise but this only cost him further traction and dragged him down. He bumped flailing over the stairs, skull grinding a second in the right of way gravel before he slipped off the ramp altogether, whipped away quick in the outside wind. He didn’t cry out or scream and the trainsong covered any thump he might’ve made as he struck.

Oh fuck oh shitfuck had he just killed a man?
Dumont fought near as often as he ate—sometimes more—but he never sought to kill, only to defend himself a friend or a dog, only to protect, only to survive. True he might’ve done for Worm already but he had no way to be sure so he wasn’t going to count it. Not just yet at least. Dumont leaned panting on the rail, wounds and bruised scrotum still screaming with dull aching pain, and looked into the night along the route they left behind. He saw Ratch’s crumpled form beside the tracks receding at twenty plus miles an hour… then rising. First the Rider was on his feet again then he was running down the tracks after them in ever lengthening strides, right arm flopping loose at his side. Coming closer.

With no time and still too pumped to reflect on this latest madness Dumont glanced around the platform for something to throw and so missed the moment a vast blot of blackness shuffled out of the night on the left, a thing impossible in size, larger than an elephant though smaller than a house, stumpy limbs visible only as hints. It bent over the running Rider and dipped, engulfing him to the waist and hefting him up. Ratch’s legs kicked half a minute then the top part of whatever… clenched. Or something. Ratch’s lower half tumbled back to the tracks in a dark spray. Dumont turned away. He’d seen enough. This time Ratch was dead. No question. Those legs would not be running after him all on their own.

He stared and the mass astride the tracks cocked the hump he took for its top as if to watch him but it did not pursue, halting there instead above Ratch’s bottom half, disappearing back into the dark in the wake of the train. Missy barked from between his ankles but he shushed her, herded her back inside the hatch door and relatched it.

Inside Dumont pressed his hands to the chill trembling walls for balance, stability, tried to process what he’d seen. Shit had gone from crazy to what he couldn’t even say. And yet he’d taken out two of the Riders, if Worm was truly down for the count and he included Ratch in his tally. He had a little help on that one. Somehow he got the jump on each of those guys though. They were as big or bigger than him and experienced brawlers both. But they hadn’t shown it and he had. They’d been slow. Could be Marlo doped them with something to guarantee obedience, but Dumont never heard of any such drug. And what about Marlo? Was he somewhere on this train too? How often did he rely on his flunkies? Or could it be he and Ratch split up to hunt for Dumont on separate trains? Or did he send Ratch ahead alone because he himself was a coward? He had that coward stink, big talk but bigger buddies. Could be Marlo had his whole cult or crew with him now, scouring the train for Dumont from front to back and Ratch was only the first to arrive. Two more Shadow Riders might show up next. Maybe three or four or five, Marlo with them. Dumont could make his way back up the train but he was probably gonna run right into them like that. Getting Missy over the tops of cars wasn’t likely either, and he wasn’t going anywhere without her. He could hide with her in the engine’s restroom but he knew Marlo would look there and he and Missy would be trapped. In the end he slumped back in the leather seat, determined to stay more alert for the next attack or the end of the line, whichever came first. He slid into sleep again almost at once.

***

When he woke a gray fingered light reached in for him through the windows and his balls still ached. The train was slowing though. Fersure.

Missy remained on guard at his feet, lying on her side but head still up, her vigilance more consistent than his. Must be she’d been like that all along. He slid down, crouched beside her, scratched behind her ears. Oh you’re a smart girl, yes you are. You done good
.
Way good
. She saved his life already once this ride. Both their lives. He stroked her sleek black fur and she rolled on her back, offered her belly, legs quivering with unrestrained joy while he scratched her. He knew they could go on like this forever but it was time to hop off so he stopped. She arched to lick his hand and he leaned over, hugged her once quick tight. She licked his cheek, his ear. His intended laugh emerged as a grunt and he released her after a final squeeze.

He felt their pace slow further, the trainsong tempo extending in an exhausted drawl. They were moving slower now than when they hopped on. —Time to go, he whispered in Missy’s ear. She seemed to understand, rolled to her feet, watched him expectantly.

He led her down the steps to the hatch, opened it slowly this time and peeked around. No more Shadow Riders, no Marlo, no bulls, no one at all. No monstrous globs of night behind them either. He supposed some Riders might be out of sight on the roof, approaching like spiders or ants, but he and Missy would have to risk it.

They worked their way down the stairs, Missy turning her nose up at streaks of Ratch’s blood on the steel. She leapt from the still moving engine then paced the train till he stepped off behind her toting the caseless guitar with a hand around its neck.

***

They’d got off before the yard this time, though they could see it ahead. He had no clue where they were. To their left the backs of shops butted up all but on the railroad’s right of way. Retail stores, not the sort of industrial stuff they’d waded into before. At least now he could hitch out of a proper town, shake whatever scent Marlo and his crew somehow followed on the freights. Might be he’d head up north where he was supposed to have family. Real family, blood family. He knew he had cousins he never met somewhere. Jersey, he was pretty sure. Yeah. Jersey fersure.

He called to Missy and they set off toward the shops, crossing several empty tracks and crawling under a chain link fence before reaching the back street. He wished he could clip a leash on her but that was lost with his pack. He’d keep his eye out for a scrap of rope that might do the trick. She still wore her collar at least.

From there they took an intersecting side and a short block later came out on what had to be Main. The sidewalks remained empty of pedestrian traffic this early in the day and the only cars were parked, but it seemed otherwise solid and real, not like the industrial park in Meridian or wherever. He could read the signs on the stores even, across the street a Rexall Drugs beside an antique shop, display window crowded with old clothes and ottomans and a faded red Radio Flyer sled. A grubby dive bar that hadn’t opened yet two doors down. Everything closed but otherwise normal.

He took off with Missy in a direction he thought perpendicular to the now obscured yard, hoping to spot the red and blue shield of an interstate on-ramp or at least a local highway or truck route. They passed more restaurants and stores and bars, everything closed. Even this early something ought to be open, a lunch counter serving breakfast maybe, not like he had the cash, or that they wouldn’t throw him out
’
cause he was dirty and he smelled.

At least the stores were normal and he could read the signs. This wasn’t another mindfuck trap like the last stop. Just an uptight southern town where they rolled up the sidewalks at night and put them back out late in the morning and… he spotted
them
ahead, four or five all scrunched up together near the next corner, a bunch of gutterpunks same as him.

Okay… if they were cool they would help him, tell him where to find food, water, where to catch a ride. Maybe share some whiskey. Best to come up slow though, be all nonthreatening, most of all not look like he planned to stay any while. Talking up his search for a ride out ought to help that.

Closer in he saw four dudes and a girl, backs to him all, mix of leather jackets with Carhartt overalls, hoodies, flannels, camo. All with their heads down and angled away from him.

About 10 feet out he stopped and called to them —Wassup dudes? No response. He came forward a few more steps, spoke again —Hey, no hassles you know. All I’m lookin’ for is the best place to hitch a ride on to F.L.A., maybe some water and some dumpster pizza. Then I’m outta here, fersure. Can you be cool with that?

None of them turned but at last the girl began to speak, a blunt susurrus Dumont could not understand. The first phrase he could pick out came across as —Along alas alack a leak…

Followed by the boy in leather…

—Tracks leak to the dark star call for a bite of blood bad bitter or better.

Had leather boy said leak or
lead
? No way to tell. And the girl—what the fuck, were these kids talking French? Could be they were Cajun, but all the way out here? Wherever here was…
’
Bama, Georgia maybe…

—Hey guys, we’re just looking for a good spot to hitch out from, head north maybe, you know?

He paused so they could respond. They said nothing but one began to turn, a boy with ragged dreads wearing filthy Carharrts over a torn green Army jacket.

The boy had no face. Beneath his dreads and a bare inch of greasy forehead the front of his head was a round dark hole. Other than the teeth that lined it Dumont saw nothing inside. The blank aperture contracted slightly in an irregular quivering rhythm, pulsing to narrow its diameter just barely then expanding again, all as if with some unseen breath.

The faceless boy began to chitter and hiss. The other four turned and Dumont saw the same impossible lamprey faces gaping each in dark lopsided holes rimmed with rough and irregular teeth, each with its singular rhythm of expansion and contraction, each hissing or even screeching at him now in its own particular pitch. Some spoke in broken words others simply chittered or moaned and one cried
—Dumont Dumont Dumont…
but he couldn’t tell which.

He staggered back feeling Missy dodging and feinting around his calves. She didn’t bark though. She really was one smart girl. She knew when to sound the alarm and when not to push it. Was he hallucinating? If Marlo’s blade dosed him there should be other effects… there was that last town of course—that and the thing that bit Ratch clean through.

He saw the worst then. The five faceless punks were not just scrunched together—they had only one body below the waist, cloaked beneath folds of filthy cloth. The heads all twisted toward him now, necks extending to impossible lengths and writhing like flower stalks in the wind, like baby birds begging for puked up food from their mom. They chittered or chanted nonsense except for the one repeating his name.

He backed away two more steps as the whole distorted distended mass began to advance his way, crawling heavily over the concrete sidewalk same way as a slug—a slug the size of a rhinoceros. He turned and ran, Missy pacing ahead but glancing back every few feet. The punk glob came on only at a slow and plodding pace and he soon opened up a lead, the better part of a block. He turned the corner and… there they were ahead. Crawling toward him again from the end of the block. Same overlapping clothes, same many headed configuration reaching toward him like an enormous hand.

Dumont turned back, saw them still there advancing as if in a mirror. He ran with Missy back to Main… and there they were as well, crossing toward him from in front of the Rexall. He found a side street leading away from Main and it was empty. He and Missy hustled down it and came out close to the yard. No one blocked their path, no mass of toothed blind heads, no Riders, no bulls.

In the yard itself he found an open corrugated aluminum shed and crouched beside a stack of rusted parts. Missy paced before him and he stroked her back each time as she passed. Dogs were a big part of this life but he never saw any of the Shadow Riders with one. Another reason to give them space, keep away. Never trust anyone who rode the rails without a dog.

A sketchy rain began falling, fat scattered drops plink plopping over the rippled roof and puffing small tired question marks of dust from the ground outside. Dumont thought about plucking out a song on the guitar, practicing one of his originals, but he had to remain vigilant, couldn’t risk it. Bulls, Riders, those freaky gape mouthed kid things… all might be hunting him. Best not to call their attention down. Seemed like they were safe here at least for now.

He dozed in fits. At some point the rain stopped. A bit later he woke. The rain began again. It didn’t last this time, ten minutes tops. As it faded he heard train wheels beginning to roll.

Gripping his guitar he made his way into the yard, Missy close behind. Rounding three trains he found a fourth pulling out, a row of rust hued boxcars passing close. He eyed one of only two still open and as it came close he trotted to pace it, shoved the guitar across its floor, lifted Missy inside, then followed along till he could clamber up to join her, his cut arm almost altogether numb.