You and Me against the World: The Creepers Saga Book 1 (31 page)

Then a familiar voice yelled to her through the dark mist.

“Goldie … slide!”

The Queen of Wands

Susan screamed.

The head rolled across the wood floor and came to rest at her feet. The dead eyes looked up at her. The face was badly torn, but Pam’s features were still unmistakable.

“Play time’s over, children,” came the sound of Bart’s voice. He was speaking through something that sounded like a bullhorn.

“Oh shit,” Nick said.

Thorn hugged Susan, and she looked away from Pam’s dead stare.

Nick grabbed a towel and covered Pam’s dismembered head. “This guy is a real fuckin’ psycho,” he said.

Devin evaluated the expressions on his friend’s faces. He saw shock, horror, anger, and cold calculation. He glanced back at the shattered window. From the alley on the opposite side of the central street, he saw the Tahoe as it made the tight drive between the buildings. It came out of the alley, made a half turn in the street, and then stopped. A man slid to the passenger’s side, opened the door, and got out. The driver took a quick look at the window and then ran toward the sound of Bart’s voice.

“I have a very simple proposition for you,” Bart said in the loud bullhorn voice. “You throw out your guns, you get in that truck, and you leave.”

“What, no option B?” Brandon said in a low voice.

“Or,” Bart continued as if he had heard Brandon, “you can play the heroes and wind up like Pam and Bob.”

Devin’s head spun toward Annie.

“I thought you said Goldie was with Bob?” His voice was harsh, and his cheeks flushed with anger. Annie took a half step backward.

“She went ahead of him. I-I don’t know,” she stuttered.

“Like I said, my brother”—Austin’s flat, even tone matched his cold stare—“we will be getting her back even if I have to tear apart every one of those fuckers.” Austin headed to the door with his bat across his shoulder.

“Wait,” Devin said and regained his composure. His hand gently grasped his brother’s shoulder and Austin stopped.

“My patience grows thin, my friends,” Bart called. “Perhaps you should come out and see the big picture before you decide on anything foolish.”

“Perhaps we should,” Devin said and limped toward the door. Thorn had braced his leg with a couple of wooden chair legs and duct tape, but the pain was evident on Devin’s face.

“Devin, that might not be the best idea,” Thorn said.

“Can’t stay here,” Devin said, but he didn’t look back. He grasped the door handle, pulled the door open, and stepped out onto the small porch. The others followed him down the porch steps and into the street.

They all looked to the end of the street. Devin said over his shoulder. “Caroline, get behind the Tahoe.”

Bart stood at the intersection in front of the school. He had the bullhorn in hand, and a smug look of victory on his face. Members of his congregation, people who had once seemed friendly and helpful, stood beside him. Most stared at them with open hostility, but a few looked down at their feet with less conviction. Behind Bart was the parked van. In the windows, they could see the children’s faces staring out at them.

“Well, so much for trying to get a shot at him,” Nick said. “He knows we won’t risk shooting one of the kids.”

“Throw those weapons into the street,” Bart called.

“Or what, Bart? Seems like a standoff,” Adam yelled.

Bart laughed.

“Not really,” he called and nodded to someone out of sight.

A man appeared holding on to a long pole. At the end of the pole, a Creeper was secured with a noose. Bart nodded to a second man, and the man opened the van’s back door. Austin recognized the guy as Mustache Mike, and his resolve strengthened. The man used the pole to drive the Creeper toward the van’s open door. It did not require much effort as the thing screamed and clawed at the open air as it tried to reach the children. The children screamed and crowded into the front of the van’s interior.

“You motherfucker,” Nick yelled and started forward. Brad grabbed him hard, and Nick struggled to free himself.

Devin shook his head and threw his shotgun into the street in front of him. The others followed suit. When no machetes joined the pile, Thorn looked casually around and noticed that Annie was not with them.

Be careful, little dancer
, he thought.

Bart signaled the man with the Creeper, and the man pulled it back away from the van. The Creeper was in a frenzy, and the man struggled to keep his grip on the pole.

“See how easy it is when we all follow instructions,” Bart called. “Now, I know you aren’t gonna give up easy,” Bart continued, “but in case you think any hope remains, let me set those notions to rest.”

He walked behind the van and then returned with Kira.

There was a chain wrapped around her neck, and Bart held the other end like a leash. He pushed her forward and then pressed down on her shoulder so she would kneel in front of him. She faced the group, and they could see the bandages over her eyes. Blood soaked through the white gauze.

“Yes, plan B, whatever that was, has also failed,” Bart said into the bullhorn. He had something in his hand, and he threw it at them. When Adam realized that the thrown objects were the remains of Kira’s eyes, he screamed in rage. Bart laughed.

Adam ran at Bart.

Bart laughed harder into the bullhorn.

Kira was alone in her head. The others had gone somewhere deep and dark. She had never known such solitude. As far back as she could remember, there had always been the other girls inside her head. Even when she was “out,” as they called it, the other girls were behind her, advising or chastising or crying or complaining. Their company, even when it annoyed her, gave her a sense of strength and belonging. Now, even Dani was gone, and the
aloneness
made her feel weak and sad. Kira was not the sad one; that was Dani’s job or Rachel’s or Cindy’s but never hers. Her job was to be the fighter when the body needed a fighter. The void she felt was worse than the body’s blindness. In truth, she felt an emotion she had never known: fear. She had experienced all kinds of punishment in her life. Bart had been similar to many of the men her body had encountered. Men who liked to hurt. It was always Kira who came out for the pain. She took it, laughed at it, while the others found safe places inside their shared mind where they could pretend everything was fine. She knew that her capture would result in some pretty harsh punishments, but never had she imagined that he would take out her eyes. The pain had not been bad; it was the permanence of it that frightened her. Broken bones would heal, torn flesh would scar, and emotions could be controlled, but her eyes could never be replaced.

She could hear the outside voices. They were a distant, underwater sound and seemed unimportant. Then she heard the little ones scream and that brought her closer to her mind’s surface. Someone pulled on the chain around her neck. She could hear Bart’s voice, and her fear slipped down a notch as the familiar fiery anger began to glow deep inside. She was pushed down again; the pavement was rough on her knees. Her sense of smell returned, and the odor of Bart’s cologne surrounded her. The rage grew a little brighter. It was impossible, but light appeared before her absent eyes.

At first, it was dim and gray. She could still hear Bart, and then over the sound of his laughter, she thought she heard the boy, Adam, scream; but then all the sounds faded away, and again there was just the light. The light became a white mist, but then even that lifted, and she saw the back of a young girl. The vision was blurred, as if she looked through a rain-swept glass. The girl stood with guns drawn. Beyond the girl were infected people running with outstretched hands. The girl shot at them and then ran toward them. A voice as loud as thunder filled Kira’s head, and then the vision washed away and before her was an empty desert road.

A shadowy figure approached, the face hidden behind the sun’s blazing light. When it drew nearer, she could make out the shadowy figure of a man. Next to him was a very large dog that wagged its tail and seemed anxious to run to her. “Relax, boy,” the voice said to the dog. It was the voice of thunder that she had heard, although now it was a softer sound.

The man drew closer, and then his face appeared. He smiled at her. He looked familiar, although she could not place where they had met.

“Hello, Kira,” the man said.

“Is this real?” she heard herself ask.

“Real? Hmm …” He considered her question. “Reality is perception, I think. But perhaps it would help if I told you that this is not a dream and you have not lost your mind.”

She nodded, although the explanation made little sense to her.

“Kira, I need your help,” the man continued.

She was struck again by the feelings of familiarity she felt.

“I don’t think I can be much help to anyone,” she replied.

“Oh, you’d be surprised. I want to show you something,” he said and put his hand over her eyes.

She expected darkness, but instead she saw the white mist again. When it parted, she could see the street where she knelt. At the end of the street were the young visitors, but they seemed suspended in time. She saw Adam in mid stride as he ran toward her; she saw a boy crouched with a baseball bat; she saw the girl, Caroline, peering out from behind an SUV; and she saw the others all frozen in time. Then she saw the young man with the makeshift brace on his leg. She looked at his face, and she made the connection. The vision faded, and she was again looking at the older, slightly different version of that same face. The man smiled again.

“A picture is worth a thousand words,” he said.

“Yes,” was all she could manage, and it felt like a stupid response.

“Are you him?” she asked.

He laughed and the sound made her smile.

“No, no, time travel—that would be a step outside reality if you can believe anything you’ve seen on the Science Channel.”

“But … then …” She didn’t finish, as another possibility occurred to her.

“They still need your help,” the man said.

“I can’t help them,” she whispered. “I’m blind.”

“You seem to be seeing just fine,” he said and smiled again.

“This is different, this is …” She trailed off.

“Not reality?” he asked.

She didn’t know what to say.

“All they need, Kira, is a few extra seconds. You’d be amazed at what a second or two can mean in the end.”

The word
slide
echoed in her mind, and now she was certain it had been his voice.

“Okay, what can I do?” she asked.

“First, remember I’m right here with you; you aren’t alone, and when we’re done, I promise Dani will be back.”

“I’d like that,” she said.

“I’m gonna show you something else. When you see it, you’ll know what to do, but it will be up to you to pay the cost of it.”

“I’m okay with any cost,” she said.

He looked at her, and his smile became a sorrowful thing.

“I know, Kira, and for that, I thank you,” he said.

“They’re all so important to you, I can feel it,” she said.

He nodded and then placed his hand over her eyes again.

She could see the street again. The ones at the end of the street, the ones she needed to help. They were in motion, but it was all slow motion. The man’s voice came to her.

“Look to your right, Kira.”

She turned and saw Bart standing next to her. On his waist hung a large knife. She could see the ivory handle. Bart moved in slow motion too, so it was easy to reach out and take the knife. She only had to come up into a squat to reach it. She wrapped her hand around the handle and pulled the blade from the sheath. She turned it in her hand. Then she drove it into his side.

Time returned to normal, and again she was in the lonely darkness. She heard Bart scream, and then she felt the blade puncture her back. There was a loud sound like a winter wind blowing through the eaves. She realized that the sound came from her punctured lung a moment before the rough pavement met her face.

Chapter 17

Village of My Sweet Revenge

A
ll Dressed Up and Nowhere to Go

We may never fully appreciate the connectedness of all things. The way that one event holds some hidden tie to the next or the next or the one beyond that. Our minds fill with knowledge, yet the slow currents that bind each of us to one another remain veiled in the secret dance of the Great Plan.

Within each of us, there is a drive to connect with others. A siren song that insists we combat the loneliness of our physical existence and forge friendships, find love, and form our mortal bonds. It is a need to find the splendor. That need is undeniable, and yet we remain skeptical of the very energy that unites us all. Its truth seems to dwell in some deep place beyond our comprehension. Or perhaps that truth just resides somewhere that we dare not explore. A room within us that we walk past with averted eyes, or a closed closet door that our courage cannot breach.

But if by chance or providence—when in some grand and spectacular moment the darkness looms and our disbelief no longer shields our ordinary world—we should catch a glimpse of that splendor, if we should happen upon universes in a single blade of grass, we still find ourselves unable to give such experience adequate voice. In those moments, it is not fear that silences us but the inadequacy of our rational voice. For our voice requires words, and words are a device of the mind, and it is only in the deep mist of our soul that such explanations might be understood. In that place filled with emotions and intuition where words do not exist because they are not required. That place where we understand beyond doubt that the beings we call friend or lover, sibling, or parent is our true meaning, our true purpose, and our true reason. That place where we speak to one another in a voice that requires no words and is beyond explanation, yet perfect and complete. That place where we are all connected.

This is both the joy and the burden of the human condition. This is the dichotomy of our existence. It is the knowing and the unknowing, the bond and the solitude, the courage and the fear, and the faith and the doubt. Conditions experienced in equal share, with equal importance, and with the grand purpose to create within us a place of great and undeniable power.

That place that is the wellspring of our hope.

Bart’s wound was not fatal. He twisted the knife from Kira’s hand and drove the blade into her back. Kira collapsed onto the hard tarmac. Adam screamed in rage and charged forward. Brad attempted to block his friend’s suicidal advance. Adam’s anger was an iron horse, and he knocked Brad aside. Bart watched Adam’s advance with cool satisfaction.

“Kill him,” he said.

Mustache Mike didn’t hesitate. He smiled as he took aim. He pulled the trigger. Adam fell.

In those final moments, it all seemed to have ended, their survivor game finished. Not by the teeth and claws of the Creepers, but by the hands of one man’s insanity. Everything they had attempted, every sacrifice made, every step fought had brought them to the same apparent conclusion: their world had died, and they were just ghosts waiting to join those who had gone before them. It seemed unfair, it seemed cruel, and yet the tired expressions suggested that perhaps they no longer wished to struggle against the inevitable.

Some miles away, a young, blue-eyed girl charged forward against her own impossible odds. Her guns blazed. The Creepers fell, but their numbers were greater than her supply of bullets. Her expression suggested that perhaps she too no longer wished to struggle against the inevitable. She ran faster, and the distance closed.

In those final seconds, the girl’s eyes change. They are no longer the shark eyes. They burn brilliant like the gunfire. A long dormant thing blooms. Rage fuels it, and it burns with hungry consumption. Her inner storm has at last surfaced, and it explodes. The sound of the storm fills her ears, it crackles like hot electricity through her every muscle, and then it finally bursts from her throat in a scream. She is the storm. Her breath, the vengeful wind; her tears, the sweeping rain; her stare, the deadly lightning; and her body, a crushing natural force. Then a thunderous voice fills her head. It commands one single action, its tone familiar. A father’s anger whose voice requires immediate obedience.

She listens without question.

Annie moved with singular intent. She planned to kill Bart. The others had gathered out front, but she had stood last in line. When her friends left the dining hall, she reversed her direction and went out the kitchen’s exit. She moved now with caution. She had no desire to be gunned down in the back alley. Bart’s men were welcome to kill her but only after she chopped Bart’s head off with her blades. She moved to the alleyway, the opening that connected to the main street, and she put her back against the wall. She peered around the corner. Two men were in the alley, but their backs faced her. The men waited, crouched down on the far end of the alley. One of them had a gun; the other held something in his hands, but she couldn’t identify it. Then it became clear.

It’s the size of a football.
She heard Pam’s voice. The man held the bomb.

Annie leaned back against the wall. She understood Bart’s plan now. Once everyone was in the SUV, the man with the bomb would charge. He would detonate the explosive and kill them all in one push of the button. She didn’t think her friends intended to get into that SUV, but the man might charge the group anyway. She had only two options. Kill Bart or kill the bomb man. She took a deep breath, pushed off the wall, turned the corner, and then sprinted down the alley at the two men. She saw Adam run past the alley in the street beyond. She heard the gunshot. She ran faster. The man with the bomb remained focused on the street. The second man, the one with the gun, turned and spotted her.

Nick had worked his way around the backside of the Tahoe. In the row of buildings that sat between the garage and the weapons depot was one of an odd size. It was too small to serve as a residence. At one time, it had served as a break room for the fort’s employees. Bart’s congregation had created a makeshift library. They had plans to collect the best works of literature and house it in their library. There had been many animated disagreements as to the definition of “best.” Nick had visited the library on a number of occasions.

On one early visit, back when his suspicion still outweighed his hope that the fort’s residents meant them no harm, he had hidden a little insurance. Behind a row of encyclopedias, he had placed a loaded nine-millimeter Sig. He figured if things went well, he would return and remove the weapon before their departure. If things broke bad, the hidden weapon provided a nice fallback position. Now as he circled the Tahoe, he wished the gun were a bit closer. In the distraction, he planned to break away to the back alley, enter the library, and retrieve the weapon. Once he had it, he would work his way around the garage and kill as many of the armed congregation as he had bullets. The final bullet, of course, he would save for Bart.