Flood Plains (30 page)

“You want me to stay here?”

“Will it make it easier on your conscience if I refuse?”

“I think so.”

“Then
get.
I don’t need you. You’re wasting my oxygen just sitting there. You’ve got your son to think about anyway. Go on. Who needs you?”

Big Time put his arm around the old woman and hugged her tight to him. She embraced him back as he kissed her gently on the cheek.

“You take care, okay?” he said, getting to his feet.

“You, too.”

As Big Time headed slowly back up the ladder, he was struck anew by the immensity of the situation. He wondered how much of the world’s remaining population would believe it if they heard the fate of mankind rested with a little old black lady sitting in a pipe down in Texas.

Chapter 35

Z
akiyah’s heart beat a mile a minute as she stood in ankle-deep water beside the pipe her grandmother was preparing to die in. The minute any danger arrived, Mia would take care of it, but Zakiyah was still nervous about putting all her survival eggs into the basket of a little girl and her aged granny. It seemed like someone in authority should step in. This was exactly the kind of thing that should be left in the hands of someone who had worked out all the angles, not a professional psychic and an eleven-year-old.

To make things worse, the sun was setting and a cold wind blew in off the Gulf, cutting straight through her wet clothes to chill her to the bone. The rain had momentarily stopped, but the air remained heavy and damp.

Someone took her hand.

“You ever heard someone called ‘Flinty’?”

It was Alan, pulling himself over to her. Tony and Mia were over where the pipe split into three, keeping their eyes on the floodwaters. Big Time was up on top of the pipe but, given the gray skies, wasn’t in a particularly better vantage point.

“Nope, never heard that,” Zakiyah said, lightly gripping his hand back.

“It implies somebody that has a lot of sharp edges, more than any other rock,” Alan explained. “But a flint’s what you use to create a spark in order to start a fire ’cause you need that friction to make the flame. So, it’s a double-edged comparison. Can mean ‘implacable, unmovable, or stubborn,’ but can also mean, I suppose, ‘incendiary.’”

“Incendiary
?
I like that.”

“How’d you know I was talking about you?”

Zakiyah was about to say something nasty but then noticed Alan was grinning. She smirked. Alan turned wistful.

“Makes me wish I’d known your mother a little better, as I think that’s where you got it from,” Alan continued. “Remember meeting her a few times, sure, but never really got to know her. Hanging with your grandmother, I see it’s a family-thing.”

“Is this you trying to be insulting?” Zakiyah scoffed.

“Is that what you hear?” Alan asked. “I’m telling you you’re tough. I’m telling you you’re
incendiary
. I’m telling you that when the chips are down, you have reserves I never knew about. These are things I should’ve known to tell you a long time ago.”

Zakiyah was surprised but quickly recovered.

“I think that would describe my mom, too.”

“Maybe that’s why you’re such a good mom.”

“Maybe. But maybe you forced me to be by making me realize that if I didn’t do something right, no one else would.”

“Harsh, but true,” Alan admitted. “But here we are, the parents of the girl who’s going to save the planet.”

“What’s your angle? What happened to the Alan who earlier wanted to turn his back on all this?”

Alan sighed. He tried to move his legs a little but couldn’t. The numbness had climbed up his torso and moved down his arms. His mind was drifting away, ready for a rest he couldn’t fight off much longer.

“That was the old me. Knowing what I know now and seeing what might’ve been, I’d love nothing more than to get the chance to put some of that into practice. Start over with you and Mia. I want that so bad I can see the house we’d have, see what we’d get up to on weekends. I see our family together for good. But we both know that’s not how this is going to end. I’ve got a couple of hours to go, but I’ve been dead since this morning.”

This information hit Zakiyah pretty hard. A part of her had known it to be true, but to hear it spoken aloud was still a shock.

“I’ll be with you,” Zakiyah said.

“I know you will. I just wanted to tell you that.”

Zakiyah nodded, fighting back tears. She squeezed Alan’s hand a little tighter as the air grew colder.

•  •  •

Up on top of the pipe, Big Time listened in as his son quizzed Mia on her powers.

“Where is it?” Tony asked. “Can’t you hear it?”

“It’s there,” Mia assured him. “It’s coming.”

“You’re sure?”

“Positive.”

“I just want it over with,” said Tony, lowering his voice. “If this thing really does have my mom and my brothers and my grandma trapped inside of it, I want it dead. I don’t want to think of them trapped in there forever.”

Big Time felt like he’d stuck a finger in a light socket. This is what his son was thinking about. Fifteen years old and already capable of imagining a hell worse than death.

“Do you hear my family?” Tony asked.

“No,” Mia replied. “I don’t hear any one voice, and they don’t sound like anybody in particular. Just words appearing in my head that are said aloud only in my thoughts.”

Big Time forced his attention away from the conversation and back over the water. Several objects had tricked him over the past hour. They’d bob up and down in one place and he’d think they were on the move, only to be proved wrong a second later.

Now, his eyes had picked up something else. It surfaced and went back under but didn’t come back up. He watched the spot for a second, only to see it reappear ten feet closer to the pipes a moment later.

“It’s here!” he cried.

Inside the pipe, Sineada hadn’t needed to be told. She’d been feeling its gradual approach for the better part of five minutes. As the day had gone on, she’d taught herself how to better pick up the creature’s “signature,” as it were. She didn’t kid herself into believing she was better than Mia, but thought she was good enough to attempt what she was about to try.

I’m what you’re looking for, I’m right here,
she screamed out in her mind.
C’mon, now. I’m right here!

She knew Mia’s veil was waiting in the wings to cloak the others, even Big Time up above, but she realized something felt off. The collective’s thoughts were more directed this time. It wasn’t hunting anymore. There weren’t any searching questions in its movements. It was like an arrow released from a bow.

Mia?
Where are you?!

I’m here, Abuela. It’s in front of me in the water.

Don’t wait! It might be closer than you think!

Outside, Mia inched closer to Tony. She surprised him by taking his hand and holding it tight. She shut her eyes.

Suddenly, a sharp banging sound came from one of the massive tanks in front of them. It clanged twice, as if the black mass was trying to bash its way inside. It surrounded a service hatch just above the water line. Flattening itself, it swam around the bolts and slowly sluiced its way through the fissures.

“Ain’t that a thing,” whispered Alan.

Zakiyah nodded dumbly. But then she was gripped by something inside. Her pulse quickened and she turned to the tank, her grandmother just on the other side of the thin steel wall.

“What’s wrong?” Alan asked. “Mia’s protecting us.’

“Yeah, but my grandma’s in there. I’m protected, but she’s not. I should be with her.”

“You’re crazy!” Alan exclaimed. “You want to fuck this up?”

But Zakiyah was already at the ladder.

“Mom? Where are you going?” cried Mia.

“I’ve gotta get to
Abuela,
honey. I’ve got to get in there.”

“Big Time!” Alan yelled up. “Zakiyah’s coming up.”

Big Time, who was closing the hatch, heard Zakiyah’s footfalls on the ladder. He opened the hatch and looked down at Sineada, barely visible in the dim light.

“Close it,” she said. “You can’t let her in here.”

Big Time nodded and slammed the hatch shut just as Zakiyah reached the top of the pipe. He was turning the wheel with the wrench to seal it when the young woman grabbed his hand.

“I’m going down there.”

“You’re not,” Big Time said quietly. “There’s nothing for you to do there.”

“I want to see her! I want to be with her when her time comes.”

Big Time saw anguish in Zakiyah’s eyes but also just a little madness. He balanced himself against the hatch and put his hands on her shoulders.

“You can’t be. You don’t know what’s going to go down in there. We have to keep this closed and let her do her thing.”

“I just want to see her,” she pleaded. “I just want to say goodbye!”

“You already said goodbye. Think about Mia. You’ve got to get back down there. Let me do this.”

Big Time’s face was like granite. He wasn’t going to budge on this. Zakiyah couldn’t help it and started crying.

Down in the pipe, Sineada could hear all of this. She knew Big Time would take care of it but wished she hadn’t caused her granddaughter so much pain. She wanted to reach out to her, maybe soothe her mind, but she couldn’t. She had to remain focused.

It took the sludge worm some time to force itself into the service hatch. Even more to extend itself into the trio of pipes that emptied out into the single large pipe that Sineada sat in. But soon she could hear its approach. The liquid slid across the metal in a snake-like motion, using the slickness of the surface to hurry its progress.

Come on
, Sineada whispered to the collective.
I’m right in front of you
.

We know
, it seemed to hiss back, though Sineada figured this was a figment of her imagination.

Suddenly, the ghost wind rushed from the darkness and smashed Sineada backward. Her head slammed into the pipe wall, and she knew her skull had been fractured in multiple places. The voice had been right. This was the day she was going to die.

As the tendril of black oil reached her foot, Sineada realized what had been wrong. The tentacle beginning to flay her skin from bone was hardly the whole piece. A second sludge worm remained outside in the floodwaters.

“Oh, God,” Sineada whispered.

Before she could reach Mia, the ghost wind pummeled her again. This time, she sank into darkness.

•  •  •

Outside, Mia felt the death of her grandmother and immediately began to cry. Her breathing sped up, and she thought she might hyperventilate.

“Mia?”

She turned. The voice had been Alan’s and was tinged with horror. Behind him, a web made of dozens of thread-thin tendrils of sludge rose from the water around the pallet.

“I thought it couldn’t see us!” Alan said, astonished.

Before Mia could react, the web slapped down over Alan’s torso, freezing his mouth in mid-speech. His jaws wrenched open, and the threads descended down his throat as the rest emerged from the water and engulfed his body.

Chapter 36

S
ineada found herself in some sort of suspended animation. She couldn’t use her senses in a traditional fashion but perceived her surroundings. It was like being asleep but dreaming she was someone else. She was borrowing the vision of others but only catching flashes of light. Orange, red, different shades of yellow, then back to orange.

What a strange sensation
, she thought.

At the moment of her death, she’d tucked her memories deep inside her consciousness, fearing that that would be the first thing jettisoned. But there it was, the single word:
Mia
.

She focused on that word even as she felt herself carried along, as if by a tide. She could sense the presence of many, many others around her but was unable to pick out individuals. She didn’t feel crowded, however. They were so small, so inconsequential. She perceived the space around her as infinite.

But she forced herself back to the word. It was so easy to allow herself to drift and explore this new dimension, but she had one last job to do in the mortal plane. Or, she imagined, what she once thought of as the mortal plane.

Mia. Where are you?

The colors around her went to reds and then black. There was a fury, and it was directed towards her. She felt it inside as well. She was angry at herself. This wasn’t what she wanted to do, was it? How could she?

Mia!
She cried out again.

Her fear turned to cold panic. She had underestimated the collective will of the spirits that surrounded her. How was she going to be able to do this? It was impossible, came the thought over and over again. There was only one thing to drive it all forward, and this was revenge.

Far away in her subconscious, she knew that she had been so very, very wrong…

•  •  •

It took only seconds for the second sludge worm to devour Alan before turning its attentions on Tony and Mia. Tony lifted Mia up out of the water and was trying to move away when the poltergeist effect propelled itself against Tony and knocked him off his feet. Mia shrieked and splashed back down into the floodwaters.

“Daddy!” she cried, turning back towards the wooden pallet.

But there was no sign of Alan, not even blood.

“Mia!” Zakiyah cried.

She was halfway down the ladder when Tony staggered back to his feet. The smaller worm meant that the poltergeist packed a lighter punch. Otherwise, Tony would’ve likely been torn apart.

“Hey, goddammit,” Zakiyah yelled at the sludge worm. “Why don’t you come get me?”

Zakiyah leaped off the ladder, breaking her ankle as she landed in the water between the rising sludge worm and Tony. She gritted her teeth with the pain as the poltergeist force knocked into her so hard all the air was blasted out of her lungs. She banged her head into the massive pipe and tried to right herself just in time to see the tentacle rising in front of her. As it had when it attacked Alan, it had formed a web that now hovered in front of her face.