Monsters: The Ashes Trilogy (7 page)

“What—”
But whatever he meant to say next simply fizzed to nothing on his
tongue as he realized: it was dark because he was completely blind.
Can’t see . . .
and he was drifting now, the world dissolving, his
mind—that buoyant balloon—sailing into air that was too thin . . .
can’t breathe, can’t—
“Hannah.”
He felt a surge of sudden strength born of panic.
“Hannah,
b-blind
. . .”
“I know. I’m sorry.” Her voice, as transparent and fragile as a soap
bubble: “Let go, Chris. Stop fighting it. Let it go.”
“N-no.”
The cold was a boot on his back, a fist on his chest, a hand
draped over his eyes.
Can’t see, can’t move, can’t . . .
“Wuh . . . why . . .”
“Shh,” she said. “I’m sorry, Chris, but there’s nothing we can do
for you. You’re hurt too badly. This is better, Chris. Trust me. It’ll go
easier if you stop fighting.”
But what if he
wanted
to fight?
I don’t want to die, I’m not ready, I’m
not . . .
“Nooo,” he moaned.
“Don’t.”
“Shh,” she said again, but now her voice was no more than a sliver,
a waning crescent of sound. “Don’t fight it, Chris. Accept this and let
go. I’ll stay with you until the end. You won’t be alone.”
No.
But he couldn’t stop this. His mind was drifting away, higher
and higher, the margins of his world closing down like an iris.
No . . .
don’t let go, Chris . . . don’t . . . let . . .

Gasping—no, not gasping; croaking,
straining
for air, the sound a
ragged
awk-awk
, an invisible fist crushing her throat. She swam up
from the dark of nothing and into the blackness that was her now. The
pain in her lungs was awful, more than a burn; every breath was like
sucking down broken glass. Her brain was pulsing so hard it felt like
her heart had crawled into her skull. Or maybe that was the monster,
straining to get out, beating its fists against bone.

From just above her left eye came a dim, sulfurous glow.
White
light?
Was this how it was supposed to go? First, the light as her brain,
starved for oxygen, gave up the ghost, and then that tunnel, and at
the end . . .

No, not a glow. Tiny pinpricks. Not breaks in the snow either.
She worked at bringing the light into focus and understood: Ellie’s
Mickey Mouse watch. She hadn’t taken it off since the night before
that terrible morning that Harlan shot Tom and took Ellie. Mickey
said it was—she forced her vision to firm—five after seven.

Past dawn. Been here for . . .
She couldn’t do the math. The glow
from Ellie’s watch was fading, the lights winking out and pulling
apart even as her mind shimmied and seemed to swell beyond the
limits of her skull. For a brief moment, she actually thought she was
standing above, on the snow, as her gaze swept over splintered trees,
rocks fractured to rubble, and . . . a ski pole? She couldn’t tell, had no
time to parse it out. The vision faded and what was left was something blinding and too white, like the eye of a full moon before the
world died.

This must be that last tunnel. There was the light. That was where
she had to go, because Tom had been there, high above and unreachable, and if only she could float far enough, fast enough . . .
Tom . . .
wait . . . wait for me . . .

All of a sudden, her mind shifted with a hard, panicky clench, a
flutter, the sudden bunch and twist of the monster sensing that she
really was on her way out. That this was it, end of the line—and it
was fighting like hell to work its way free.

Despite everything, she wanted to laugh. Might have, if she’d had
the air. The monster had become something more, the way Kincaid
thought it would, but it was still trapped inside her head, and
she
was
buried alive.

Got you . . . I g-got you . . .
Her thoughts were slurring.
Hurts, this
hurts.
So hard to focus. Words slipping through her fingers, dropping
out of her mind. Everything going away, except for the pain.
Hurts.
No air. Chest . . . hurt, hurt. Dark. No . . . air . . . n-no, can’t let go.

Outside the torture house, the horses were restless, nickering and tossing their heads. Matching him step for step, Greg’s golden retriever,
Daisy, alternated between anxious pants and high whimpers.

“Yeah. All the animals are spooked.” He looked up at the older
boy. “You felt it, too. I know you did.”
“Felt what?” With his fun nixed, Aidan had attached himself to
Greg and Pru. For Aidan, an alert over the radio? Excellent. Go where
the trouble was, because you just never knew when the next opportunity for a little mayhem might present itself. “I didn’t feel nothing.”
“Well, I did. Ground shook, just like Kincaid said. Like a . . . a
rumble, something vibrating. You know? When a semi goes by? Or a
big lightning strike, real close?” Pru lifted his nose and sniffed.
“What are you doing?” Aidan said.
“Sniffing for the ozone,” Pru said. “You know. The way air smells
after lightning.”
“Shut up.” Aidan snorted. “Lightning’s electricity. It ain’t got a
smell.”
“Yeah, it does,” Greg said. “Like car exhaust in summer.”
“Ozone,” Pru repeated, then shook his head. “I don’t smell anything but the snow.”
“Well, I
can’t
smell because it’s so damn cold,” Aidan said. “My
nose froze five minutes ago. You guys are just being pussies, letting
Kincaid psych you out.”
“Oh yeah?” Pru pointed to the left of the stable’s slider. “Look at
the snow, A.”
Greg saw what Pru meant at once. They’d had fresh snow the
night before, but instead of only a new layer icing the hard pack piled
atop the entry ramp, there were discrete hummocks, like miniature
mountains of sifted confectioners’ sugar. Digging out his flashlight,
Greg scrutinized the roof. The stable had no gutters, so whatever melt
there’d been showed in a glittering bristle of long icicles, as sharp and
pointed as bloodied fangs. Several had snapped, however, and now
protruded, like silver stilettos, from the hard pack.
“So?” Flipping up his snorkel hood, Aidan jammed his gloved
hands into his parka pockets and hunched his shoulders against a sudden snatch of wind. “Snow slid off,” he said, his voice so muffled and
far back it reminded Greg of second grade: tin cans on string.
“Yeah, no shit, Sherlock.” Pru said. “But why’d the snow slip? It
hasn’t been warm enough for a melt, and the snow’s not soft. Those
icicles are snapped clean.”
“Slabs got shaken so much they slid right off.” Greg skimmed the
light over the roof and saw naked shingles where snow had caromed
down the incline. “Same as an avalanche.”
“Come on.” But Aidan sounded uncertain now. “What could do
that? Like . . . an earthquake? That’s crazy. This is Michigan. Stuff like
that doesn’t happen here.”
“Until now,” Greg said.
PART TWO:
WHERE THE BODIES ARE

It was another foot this time—the left, and a guy’s. Those tufts of
hair sprouting from the toes? Dead giveaway. The owner was a pig.
Terminal case of corns, two huge bunions, calluses so rough you
could use them for sandpaper, and toe rot. Since the person had been
old—they were all old—the skin was mottled, papery, wormy with
bulging blue veins. The crumbling nails were so long they actually
curled into snot-colored talons. Peter couldn’t imagine how the old
geezer had walked.

“You’ve got to kill the guards,” Simon hissed.
“I know,” Peter said, over the
bong-bong-bonging
. Damn bells had
started up eight days ago, right after the Rule mine blew, and just
wouldn’t quit. Naked as a jay, he sat cross-legged on the chilled
concrete of his corner cell, trying very hard not to look around for
Simon. No point. That little bugger—
—
hallucination—
was
fast
. And Peter
certainly
didn’t want to linger over the others, who
watched from the remaining nine cells: glittery-eyed Changed, their
faces pressed to the bars like monkeys in a zoo. The only thing they
didn’t do was hoot. Peter thought there had to be at least sixty kids.
Knowing Finn, there were probably a lot more Changed stashed in
other cages throughout the camp.
The thing that got to Peter? Well, besides Simon and the
bong-bongbong
of the bells and being naked and stewing in his own shit? Some
of
these
Changed had names. He knew these kids, and that freaked
Peter out, big-time. For example, in the cage directly opposite, that
honking big kid with the Neanderthal brow? Lee Travers: Forest
Road, third house on the right. His squirrelly grandma spent all day
whacking furrows with this wicked-sharp Warren hoe, whether that
garden needed to be dug up or not.
And what about this very pretty, doe-eyed brunette in the cell to
his left? That girl who made him hungry in ways he couldn’t hide
well without clothes? He was pretty sure that was Kate Landry: sixteen, liked cats, and oh my God, those lips, those
breasts
. Peter got
these
flashes
, the two of them, naked, thrashing in the snow . . .
Stop it.
Peter’s breathing had sped up, his mouth gone dry with
desire.
Get control. Think. Why is Finn snapping up these particular kids?
Their friends?
“You know, instead of thinking about sex,” Simon said, “you
should be figuring a way out.”
“I understand that, Simon,” Peter muttered, averting his eyes from
the very luscious Kate, those lips, her breasts. At times, another idea
floated into his brain, something right out of
Rise of the Planet of the
Apes
: kill the guards, open the cages, and they’d surge out to conquer
the world. Or
The Wizard of Oz
:
Fly, my pretties! Fly, fly!
But first: sex.
Lots and lots of sex, in the snow, on concrete, anywhere; take Kate,
bend her back, and take her and take her and take—
“Don’t you wish,” Simon said. “Be lucky she doesn’t bite it off for
a snack.”
“Jesus, Simon, shut the hell up.” Christ, he couldn’t have even a
good fantasy in peace.
“Make me. You’ve got way more important things to worry about,
like me and Penny, not to mention
Finn
and why he’s rounding up
Changed, kids from Rule, the
mine
, and all you can think about is
hooking up with some
girl
? We
need
you!”
“Yes, I
know.
Stop, Simon,
please
.” Moaning, he rolled onto his
belly, away from Kate’s eyes, her hunger, his thoughts. Simon was a
spike in Peter’s right ear, like those needles they used on frogs back in
. . . God . . . junior bio
.
And look who’s the frog now.
Stunning but true.

The Rule mine had blown eight days ago, and when Peter wasn’t
screaming or raving like a crazy person because of the bells, those
damn bells in his head, those
bong-bong-BONGs
. . . when he wasn’t
doing that, Peter was either awake and dreaming awful nightmares
that clung like burrs—
water and a dark fan of sea grass and the boat and
eyes in stone
—or he was awake and not dreaming but thinking, hard,
the thoughts bubbling in the pressure cooker of his skull:
Get out of
here, Peter, get out, get out, got to get out!
If he didn’t find a way out, his
mind would go
ka-BOOM
. Nothing left but a drippy red socket.

Because there was something
in
there.
Yeah. For
real
. In his skull. This red . . .
scuttling
behind his eyeballs,
spidering
over the soft pink cheese of his brain. He thought maybe it
had crawled in through an ear. Or boogered up his nose. He wasn’t
sure. But he felt it all right. Sucker was growing.
He tried getting rid of it. Once, he used his shirt. He remembered
only snatches: slowly strangling from his own weight; the raw pain of
it; that wild, frantic moment when his vision blacked as he ran out of
air and his lungs imploded; the knot so taut the noose sawed his skin
like a length of fine piano wire. Another ten, fifteen seconds, he’d
have cut through his carotids.
So, they took his clothes. Nowadays, he wallowed, naked as a
baby, in his own filth, because they took his crap bucket, too. His
fault, but taking the shot was worth it. The raw, primal satisfaction of
drenching Lang—that
traitor—
with rank piss and runny shit . . . Oh
Jesus, that was good.
But those bells were killing him. They were so damned
loud
.
When he
could
think about it, Peter suspected the water. Good delivery system. When those first few muted clangs started up, Peter tried
rationing himself. Just a swallow here and there, until his tongue
was so thick it clung to the roof of his mouth and breathing got too
hard. Eventually, Peter drank because he had to, and then the bells
just
bellowed
. Shrieking at Finn—JESUS, GOD, WOULD YOU TURN
THESE DAMN THINGS OFF?—only earned him cryptic mumbo
jumbo:
Don’t you find it fascinating, boy-o, that the people who call on God
the most believe in God the least?
In quieter, more rational moments, Peter understood how tempting it was to see Finn as a crazy, broken-down old Vietnam vet turned
militia leader: a creepily intelligent and sadistic son of a bitch with a
bug up his ass about Rule; a guy who’d arranged an ambush seven
weeks ago so he could take out his frustrations on Peter first. If that
were the only truth, then Finn’s conclusions, his methods and experiments, would be much easier to dismiss.
But Peter had gone to college. Hadn’t graduated for . . . reasons,
ones that had to do with
eyes in stone and orange water
. And Penny.
And Simon. And that damn boat. He didn’t talk about any of that,
not about college or the accident. Not even Chris knew. No point. But
Peter had studied genetic rescue and evolution and endangered species. Once upon a time, he’d had big ideas and grand dreams, too. He
was going to save the world. So, sometimes, Peter really understood
where Finn was coming from. There was a ruthless logic to Finn’s
madness that a true Darwinian might find very appealing.
Then, again:
bong-bong-BONG.
Peter wasn’t exactly sane.

This was the literal truth. “It’s a little more complicated than
that,” Peter said, still trying to hold it together, keep it down. “Just
give it a rest, Simon. Okay?”

“Who the hell’s he talking to?” That was the new guard, a jowly
oldster with a hound-dog face and jug handles for ears in a standard,
olive-drab uniform. Sidearm on his right hip, expandable baton in
a cross-draw, slide side-break scabbard on the left. Jug Ears and the
other duty guard were behind a plain wooden desk squared before a
deep hearth in which a fire crackled, all the way down at the other
end of the prison house.

A voice Peter recognized: “Beats the hell out of me.” The second
guard, Lang—
Traitor
, Simon hissed,
tear out his throat, pop his eyes, eat
’em like grapes
—yawned hugely, stretched. “He’s always going on like
that.”

Now, those guards had to be fifty, sixty feet away, and yet Peter
heard all this, loud and clear, and despite the bells. He’d become like
this bat, see, picking up
sounds
: the
sssss
as the residual water on a
fresh log hissed and evaporated, the
CREE-cree
of Lang’s leather belt
as he walked, even the squeak of boots over snow outside the prison
house. Sometimes, he thought he actually heard other,
very
tiny
voices inside his head. Nothing distinct but more of a hubbub like
being in a crowded train station with a very high ceiling.

“Well, Jesus, the way he talks to himself,” Jug Ears said, “it’s kind
of spooky.”
Spooky. BWAHAHAHA.
They didn’t know spooky. The
bongbong-BONGs
were spooky. Not sleeping, at
all
, was spooky. An old
nightmare you saw while you were awake—
orange blood in murky
water and the boat and eyes that were holes in stone—
that was spooky.
Something growing electric red wings in your brain was spooky.
He watched as Lang’s hand crawled into an oily gray helmet of
thinning hair and dug in for a good
scritch-scritch
. “Boss says they’re
hallucinations,” Lang said as dandruff salted his shoulders. “They’re
supposed to go away. He gets too loud, go ahead, give him a couple
whacks. That’ll shut him up.”
“I’m not a hallucination,” Simon whispered. His voice always
came from Peter’s blind spot on the right. Hoping to catch him out,
Peter sometimes whipped around, but Simon danced away in a quicksilver sparkle. “I know that,” Peter said, although a very small, still
sane part of his mind also whispered,
Oh, riiiight.
“Where is the boss, anyway?” Jug Ears asked. “He’s been gone
over a week.”
“You
know
I’m real,” Simon said.
“Shh,” Peter whispered. “Simon, please, be
quiet
. I need—”
“Last I heard, boss took a bunch of Chuckies. Wants to see how
they do,” Lang said. “Said they learn faster when they go out in teams,
especially once they got enough in them.”
“Uh-oh,” Simon said.
That got Peter’s attention.
Enough
in
them? Of what?
Lang and Jug
Ears weren’t talking only about his fellow inmates. So who? Finn
had
different
Changed? Different how? He thought about the bells.
Thought about how well he heard things and the constant scrim of
the old dream. Thought about the scudder in his skull.
And Simon; I
hear someone I
know
can’t be here. So what if—
“Well, Jesus, them and us together . . . that makes my skin crawl.
And what happens with that stuff ? To their
eyes
? Like what’s going
on with
him
?” Jug Ears hooked a thumb at Peter’s cell. “Scares the
bejesus out of me. Like something out of a movie.”
Wait. What’s going on with me?
His fingers traced the bone of his
sockets and dragged over the soft hummocks of his closed lids. His
eyes were so raw they might be weeping blood.
Eyes, eyes in the dark,
holes in stone. But I have real eyes. Unless I’m Changing, too, into something
else. Unless Finn is—
“Yeah, but you’ll be glad when the time comes. Whole lot
more
of
them. Better a Chucky eats a bullet than me,” Lang said.
“Maybe.” Jug Ears sounded doubtful. “But I’m telling you, the
first time one of them looks at me crosswise? Blow its fucking head
off. And what about these Chuckies here and the other holding
areas? You got any idea what the boss wants with them?”
“Well, some he takes,” Lang said. “The ones he thinks are smarter,
I guess. But what we’re going to do with all the rest . . . hell if I know.”
Finn has more Changed, and not just here. He’s divided them into groups:
the ones he leaves alone, and then the ones he . . . drugs?
Peter could see it.
How stupid was it for him to believe Finn when the old bastard said
they could handle only ten Changed at a time? It had been almost
five months since things went to hell. Finn’s militia was in place long
before. Finn was ready for things to fall apart.
So he’s working with the
Changed,
on
them somehow, not only taming a couple as pets. He wants
only the smartest, the fastest, the best.
What Finn might want with these
others
, though, the ones in here
with him, Peter couldn’t imagine. They weren’t food—well, not for
the Changed, anyway, who killed but never fed on one another. So
what was Finn up to with all these kids, a ton of whom were from
Rule?
Another thought:
He has me. He
knows
all about me.
So did Finn
know about Simon? About Penny? What if Finn was looking for
them, too?
Relax, he won’t find them. No one knows where Penny—
“I don’t know,” Simon said. “Finn got you. What makes you think
he can’t figure it out? You have to do something, Peter.”
“I’ve done what I can. I’ve kept you alive.” Peter’s overstressed
brain felt as if someone had crammed it into a blender. “I’ve lost
everything
for you.”
“No,” Simon said—and damn if he didn’t sound like Finn. “You
were lost when you decided the Zone was a good idea. You were
lost the second you lied to the police, didn’t tell the truth about the
accident and the boat and Penny.”
“Don’t you think I know that?” A shout boiled in his chest.
Don’t,
don’t, don’t, can’t scream.
He bit the soft flesh of his cheek, really
ground down. The pain was bright but not nearly enough, no sir.

“Then do something, Peter,” Simon said. “Stop Finn. Make a
move. Do
something.
”
“Shut
up
!” Snarling, Peter flung that left foot across his cell. “Shut
up, Simon, just shut up!”
“Hey, hey!” Lang said.
“Please,
God.
” Groaning, Peter struggled upright, hooked his fingers around the iron bars snugged against the wall, and hung on, fists
working the metal against another wave of pain. “No no no, Peter,
don’t scream, Peter, don’t scream.”
Not for the first time, Peter wondered how long and hard he’d have
to whack his head for his skull to crack and his brain to squish out like
runny yolk. Or he could let himself drift close to the bars where the
Changed waited. Thread his hands through and pull Kate close, let her
sink her teeth into his throat, give her the first taste. It would be over
before the guards could beat her and her cellmates back. But he was a
coward; he couldn’t let himself die. He wasn’t ready, and there were
Penny and Simon to think about. There was Chris.
Count; he should count. Counting was good.
Ten cells, there are
ten. . . .
His feverish gaze touched on one after another.
Five to a side,
one two three four five
. . . “This little piggy went to market, this little
piggy stayed home, this little piggy had roast beef . . . help me, help
me, help . . . bong, bong, bong . . .”
“Okay, that’s pretty crazy,” Jug Ears said.
“No, no, no, nononono,” Peter chanted, knuckling his temples,
shaking his head back and forth. “Eight . . . eight eight eight eight
days since the bells, but ten cells ten ten ten, ten little piggies, wee,
wee, wee . . .” He heard his voice rising to a cracking falsetto. “Wee,
wee, wee, weeweewee . . . no, stop! Stop,
stop
!” He wasn’t aware he
was punctuating the word with a punch to his jaw until his knuckles
barked with pain.
“Shouldn’t we do something?” Jug Ears asked.
“If he starts digging out his eyes or something,” said Lang.
“He ever done that?”
“Only once.”
“Stop,” Peter panted, but he was no longer sure to whom he
spoke. He had to let go of this, get control. He punched his jaw again
and again, harder,
harder!
This time, the soft inner flesh of his cheek
ripped against his teeth. His mouth flooded with the tang of metal
and swamp water—
the boat, deep in the dark
—a taste he now knew
very well.
But this is me, this is good.
He drank himself back.
This is my
blood; it’s not anyone I had to eat—
“No.” He straightened abruptly as if a hidden spring had suddenly
released at his waist. “I’m not going to think about
that
either. I’m
going to think about something else. I’m going to think think think.”
He began to pace the limits of his cage, past the eyes of the Changed
but well away from their grasping hands and Kate, Kate,
Kate
, around
and around and around.
Count, do something, do
anything,
but get a
grip
. “Get a grip, get a grip, I’m Peter, I’m in a cell, I’m in a camp . . .”
“You’re Peter, you’re in a cell, you’re in a camp.” Simon was an
echo, a ghost from the graveyard of Peter’s memories. “You’re in a
cell, this is hell, and I’m Simon, and it’s ten little piggies and they
went wee wee wee . . .”
“I’m not listening to you.”
“You’re talking to me.”
“I’m not
hearing
you!” Peter shouted, over the
bong-bong-BONG
.
“Jesus, please, let me go!” The top of his head hurt so much it felt like
someone had cratered his skull with a brick.
Please, God, please. Why
won’t you let me die?
“Because it’s not your time,” Simon said.
“But I can’t take this anymore.” Peter ran his tongue over his upper
lip, skimming a rank and now very familiar lace of dried copper and
old salt. “Please, Simon—”
“Simon?” said Jug Ears.
“Old rev’s grandson,” Lang said, bored. “Kid he was real close to.”
“Grandson? I thought Chris Prentiss was Yeager’s grandson.”
“Him, too—which is weird, ’cause the old guy had only one kid.”
“So how’s that work?” asked Jug Ears.
“Beats shit out of me,” said Lang.
“You’re not allowed to die yet, Peter,” Simon said. “Penny and I
need you.”
“Don’t you think I
know
that?” Raging, he whirled, trying for a
grab, coming up empty as Simon danced away, always out of reach.
“
You
need me,
Penny
needs me. But I can’t help you right now—don’t
you get that? I can’t even help myself !”
“Who’s Penny?” Jug Ears said.
“His sister. Guys from Rule said she was a real looker. Just”—Lang
cupped his hands in front of his chest—“
fine
.”
“Shut up!” Peter whipped his head so fast bloody spit flew. But in
his heart, he was also glad because it gave him someone else to hate
other than himself. “Don’t you say my sister’s name! Don’t you even
think
it!”
“Gone by the time I got there. Heard she maybe went native.”
Lang kept talking as if Peter wasn’t there—and this was so true, in so
many ways. Lang skimmed the pale pink eel of his tongue over teeth
stained black with decay and ancient nicotine. “Damn shame. Be real
sweet to show all those girls what a
man
can . . .”
“Shut
up
!” Fisting the bars in both hands, Peter cranked his elbows
like a chimp. “Shut up, Lang! I’ll fucking
kill
you if you don’t shut up
shut up
shut up
!”
“Yeah,
yeah
?” Scraping back his chair, Lang reached for his scabbard. A whip of his wrist, and twenty-six inches of black chromed
steel snapped into place. Lang advanced half the distance to Peter’s
cell, smacking iron with sharp, clanging
bang-bang-bangs
that somehow synchronized to the
bong-bong-bongs
. In the other cells, the
Changed cringed back. “You getting tough, boy, huh? You going to
kill
me? Like to see you try.”
Yes! Go ahead, split my skull, pulp my brain, kill me kill me kill me!
“Bring it,
bring
it!” Peter howled. “Come on, you prick,
come
on!
You’re brave out there; you can talk about showing girls what kind of
man
you are, so come on!”
Lang’s cheeks flooded scarlet. “Don’t think I won’t—”
“Lang!” Jug Ears was on his feet. “I don’t think this is a real good—”
“Shut up!” Advancing, Lang cut iron with a vicious
BAP
. “You little
pissant—”
“Peter.” It was Simon—and then it wasn’t. Calm and small, this
voice was nonetheless powerful, a kick in the gut that knocked the
wind right out of him. “Peter, don’t.”
Like that, Peter felt the fight drain away, leaving him boneless,
water-weak. He looked to his right, where Simon always hovered out
of sight, then gasped as the air suddenly split—and Chris, shimmery
and bright, slid into being.
“Peter.” Chris’s face was a white blare. “Stop. You can’t beat them
like this.”
“Chris,” Peter breathed. His knees tried to buckle. The sight
rocked him back so hard that if he hadn’t been clinging to the bars,
he’d have crumpled to the filthy concrete. Chris couldn’t be here; he
knew that. The fact that Chris
was
. . .
What if he’s dead? No, please,
God.
Peter’s throat knotted with grief. His vision clouded, and he
squeezed his eyes tight. “Chris, you can’t be here. I can’t be seeing
you. I’m
not.
”
“Yeah?” Lang barked. When he whapped the bars again, the sound
was much weaker and didn’t hurt Peter’s ears as much. Why was
that? “Look at me when I’m talking!”
“Open your eyes, Peter,” Chris said. “Look at me. Let me help
you.”
“No.” He was trembling and cold, so cold. “If I do . . . if I can see
you, it means you’re dead, or Changed and . . .”
“See me,” Chris said. “Hear me.”
He couldn’t help himself. His lids crept open, and then he cried
out. Chris’s face was chalk-white, his eyes not black but a stunning,
glistering violet. He shouldn’t look. He ought to cover his eyes. Keep
this up, he’d go blind. But he was also afraid that if he took his gaze
elsewhere—if he looked for Simon or doe-eyed Kate or Lang or even
Finn—the sight would destroy him completely. The dark was its own
terrible light.
“I see you.” This was a hallucination, a vision conjured by a
fevered mind because he had nothing else, no hope.
I’ll never wake up
from this, because I never sleep.
“Chris . . . God . . .
help
me.”
“
I’ll
help you.” Lang whapped the bars again.
“I will.” Always the calm one, Chris’s voice was a cool cloth on
a hot brow, water in the desert. “But you have to listen. You have to
trust me and do what I say.”
Chris wasn’t here any more than Simon was real. They were hallucinations. They were symptoms of the past and his choices and eyes
like holes in stone and black water as deep and still as the grave. This
was a conscience divided against itself. Yet if Chris was the voice of
sanity, a piece of real estate in Peter’s mind no larger than a dime
trying to talk itself down and help him survive . . .
Listen to this voice,
listen hard.
“What?” Peter said. “What do you want me to do?”
“Step away from the bars, Peter,” Chris said. “Don’t let them hurt
you anymore. You’re not strong enough yet.”
“I’m not
anything
anymore.” A slow, hot trickle leaked down his
cheeks. “I’m not strong. Simon’s right. I’m nothing.”
“
Now
you’re learning,” Lang said.
“You can be strong again,” Chris said. “You will. But you must be
brave enough to let go of this fight for now.”
“But I’ll fall,” Peter said.
“Only to the floor,” Chris said. “Trust me, Peter.”
“Oooohhhh,” Peter moaned. He retreated four blundering steps
before his joints completely unlimbered, and he sank to his knees.
“See?” Lang broke down his baton. “Can’t let the little shit get on
top of you.”
They’re already on top of me.
Bowing his head, Peter screwed his
fists to his eyes like a weary child, and then he was choking, his pentup grief and guilt a terrible sound that still, somehow, seemed to
quiet those damn
bonging
bells, just a little. Or maybe Lang was right,
and whatever Finn had done would pass into something much worse,
if that was even possible. He thought it might be, and he was afraid.
Maybe it was good he couldn’t sleep, because when he woke, what
would he be then?
I’m sorry, Chris, I’m so sorry, I’m so—
“It’s okay,” Chris said, as if soothing a little kid who’d scraped a
knee. “Shh, it’s fine. You did the best you could. You can’t give up.”
“But what I’ve
done.
” Peter covered his face with his hands.
God,
you’ll never forgive me.
“You have to forgive yourself first,” Chris said, and hallucination
or not, this is what Peter needed to hear. Much later, in fact, Peter
wondered just who had answered.
“Help me,” Peter whispered.
“Help yourself.” It was Chris’s voice, and it wasn’t. It was a little
of Simon, and it was not. It was small, the calm at the center of the
storm, the eye of a hurricane where the air is still as glass, a bubble
out of time. “Control yourself. Find a space to hide.”
“Space to hide?”
“Yes, a special place only you know about. Put Peter there and
I’ll find you again. Wait for the right moment.” A pause. “Now, eat,
Peter. Forgive yourself, and live.”
“Okay.” The word was salty and his voice faraway. Knuckling away
tears, he shuffled on hands and knees over dried urine and desiccated
feces to the foot, which lay on its side like a forgotten shoe.
“Go on,” the small voice said. “Do what you have to.”
“Okay,” Peter said again. The stump above the ankle was edged
with clot, scanty shreds of raw muscle, and ratty gray tendon.
Clamping his front teeth on a flap of loose skin, Peter gave a careful,
experimental tug. There were an initial, slight resistance. He used his
hands to help, stripping foot meat like barbecue from a rib. The skin
gave with a soft
riiippp
, a sound that reminded him of his mother
tearing his old cotton underpants into dust rags—and then Peter
began to chew.
The taste was indescribably vile, like rotting liver left to turn
green. That taste was his life.
“Now
that
,” said Jug Ears, “is so fucking gross, I cannot tell you.”