Gossamer Falls

by European P. Douglas

  “It’s always hard to get back up,” Chuck smiled at him and let himself drop the last few inches to the ground.

  “Don’t worry, he gets a lot of practice sleeping in the supply closet at work,” Eustace Farmer, a guy Lawrence knew a little from the factory, laughed. Chuck only smiled at this; Lawrence had never seen Chuck get annoyed at anything anyone had ever said to him.

  “You’ll probably sleep for a week after this is over!” Lawrence smiled. Everyone laughed save Harry. Lawrence glanced his way and saw he was bending over looking at something. Lawrence couldn't see what it was, but he was sure Harry would tell them about it if it was interesting.

  The sudden cease of movement made Lawrence very aware of how full his bladder was and the need to pee came over him like a sudden pain. He hobbled over to the large rock and stood to the side of it. All the extra clothing was making the process all the more difficult and by the time he freed himself it was with only a second to spare.

  “I think I’d rather stay down here on the ground than continue on with you fellas,” Chuck said from his spot on the ground, “Why don’t you guys go ahead and wake me up on your way back down.”

  “How about that, Harry?” Eustace said. From where he stood, Lawrence saw Harry turn back to the group and there was a strange look on his face.

  “What’s that?” he asked, but his voice was different too, not in a way you could put your finger on, but definitely different.

  “Chuck wants to stay on the ground until we get back,” Eustace said, smiling. Harry looked down at Chuck and it all happened in an instant.

  Harry shrugged and said,

  “Alright,” and suddenly his gun was in hand levelled at Chuck. There wasn’t even a moment for everyone to feel uneasy before the gun went off, and Chuck’s head exploded all over the ground and brains and skull splashed all over everyone’s feet. In one movement, the gun then aimed and fired into the stunned face of Eustace, and his head too exploded everywhere before his body dropped to its knees and keeled over.

  Lawrence was gone and never saw this last part happen. He heard more shots and screaming, but this was all behind him. His heart pounded and tears filled his eyes as he ran. What the hell had just happened? His brain had yet to make full sense of it, but he knew he was in great danger. The crashing thunder of his heartbeat filled his ears, and he had no idea if Harry was coming after him or not. His legs kept pumping like they had a mind of their own, and Lawrence was only glad he’d not seized up in shock and been shot back there.

  On and on he went, down the mountainside. Though his lungs and thighs ached from the effort, Lawrence wouldn't allow himself to stop moving. As far as he knew there had only been a brief flurried couple of seconds of gunfire and nothing after that, but his senses were so warped by what he’d seen and the strain he was putting on his body that he simply couldn’t be sure.

  The slope under his feet suddenly became much sharper and he slipped, first one foot and then the other as he tried to balance, and he went crashing down into a fast-steady roll before coming hard into contact with a downed tree trunk.

  The impact knocked the breath out of Lawrence and his back ached from it. For a few moments all he could do was lie there writhing in pain. Everything seemed silent then and he listened. How long had he been running for? How far down had he come? It felt like a long time and a long way.

  Vomit rose in his throat suddenly as he heard footsteps shuffling around nearby - he had been followed closely all along! Struggling to regain his breath, Lawrence did his best to get up, but the pain in his back was still too severe for him to move. The idea that he had broken his spine came to him and it seemed possible, but then he found his knees in the dirt and was able to start rising slowly. Just as he got to his feet, Sheriff Schall came rushing out of some logs and stopped nearby, looking at Lawrence warily.

  “Sheriff!” Lawrence said, almost falling towards the man in his happiness to see him, “Deputy Sanders has gone...” Something was terribly off about Anderson too. Tears filled his eyes and Lawrence saw with sickened dread that he held his gun in his hand as Harry had. What the hell was going on? Anderson looked down at his gun as though Lawrence's gaze had reminded him it was there. He looked back to Lawrence and raised it and for the first time in life Lawrence Karrier looked down the barrel of a loaded gun. This was the end. Tears flowed at what might have been as mixed ideas and images came to his mind.

  Anderson’s hand was trembling, and tears were flowing freely from his eyes too, and the moment seemed endless. Then the barrel was slowly moving away from Lawrence and he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Had he thought about it, he would have run off as soon as the gun no longer pointed at him, but something made him stay rigid to the spot and he looked on helpless as Anderson pointed the gun at his own head. Lawrence knew what was going to happen, knew there was no way to stop it. He saw the tears of utter anguish in Anderson’s eyes before the Sheriff said,

  “Mind Spiders!” and pulled the trigger.

  Lawrence closed his eyes as the spray of blood came over his face like a wave of heavy rain. When he opened them, Sheriff Schall’s body lay on the ground and blood soaked everywhere.

  Panic gripped Lawrence at once, and he was terrified this gunshot would bring Harry down after him. He bent over and took the fallen gun into his hands and started away. The thought came very clearly then that he had no way of getting back to town except on foot, and that would take him a full day at the very least. He went back to Anderson, and though he loathed the idea, he went through his pockets until he found the keys to the cruiser. Now all he had to do was find it! Just before standing up, Lawrence was aware of something white moving from what was left of Anderson’s nose. He only glanced at this as he left, but he felt sure it was tiny white spiders marching out like ants in formation. But that couldn't be.

  Moving as fast as he could with his now hurt body, Lawrence made for the police cruiser and Gossamer Falls with the idea of getting everyone the hell out of there, but especially Tammy. He needed to make sure she was safe above all else.

  Chapter 22

  Tammy’s evening in the police station had been so far fairly uneventful. There had been a couple of calls about kids messing about, and she radioed them on to Deputy Garrick as he drove around town keeping an eye on things. Her mind wandered to the idea of working for the Sheriff’s Department full time, but her worry about Lawrence didn’t let the fantasy go too far.

  Now approaching midnight, it was something else that gravely worried her.

  Sheriff Schall had radioed from the car to say that he was now proceeding on foot to follow Sanders and the others. He said he had a transportable radio with him, and he would be in contact every half hour or so. He had checked in twice and now it was close to an hour since that last call. She’d held off worrying Garrick about this, but now she felt it was time.

  “Deputy Garrick, come in, over,” she said, somewhat used to the way of radio talk now but still finding it frustrating.

  “Garrick here, what’s up, over,” the Deputy crackled back after a few seconds.

  “It’s Tammy,” she said and then wondered why she’d said that - who else would it be! “I just wanted to let you know it’s been an hour since the Sheriff called in. Over.” The silence was longer this time,

  “I’m sure he’s fine,” Garrick’s assured tone came back, then, “Let’s give him a little more time before we start worrying unnecessarily. Over.” Tammy sat in the silence of the station. She didn’t like the sound of this, but what did she expect? Garrick couldn’t run off after them too at this time of night. He was the policeman after all; he was used to things she’d consider out of the ordinary. It was probably best to go along with him. But then, Deputy Sanders was a policeman too and he’d made a mistake...

  “Okay, over,” she answered Garrick.

  “I’ll swing by soon for some coffee, over and out,” Garrick’s voice came back, and it seemed crisper than at any point this evenin
g.

  Tammy gave it two full minutes after talking to Garrick to start trying to raise Sheriff Schall again. Over and over she called and listened to the static response, a noise that had always reminded her of snow for some reason. This made her think of the snowstorms that had engulfed the mountains at the time Mercy disappeared and this scared her more than ever. What if Lawrence disappeared? And everyone else?

  ‘I should have gone with him,’ Tammy thought. They should have stuck together during all this chaos.

  The door opened and it seemed like the power of thunder in the silence. Tammy jumped as Garrick came in.

  “What is it?” he asked, looking oddly at her.

  “Sorry, I didn’t hear your car pull up. The noise of the door frightened me.” Tammy had almost said over at the end of the sentence and just managed to stop herself. That would have been embarrassing.

  “It can be scary sitting here in the night all alone,” Garrick smiled at her as he walked over to the coffee pot. “You want one?” he asked, holding it up.

  “Why not,” she answered, getting up to go over to him.

  They sat at a table that served as a break area by the pot and a small refrigerator. The minutes seemed to Tammy to be passing by excruciatingly slow. Garrick filled these minutes with some small talk about what he’d encountered out in the night, but Tammy could feel his growing anxiousness and noticed his eyes glance towards the radio more and more frequently. At last he got up and went to it.

  “Sheriff Schall, this is Garrick, come in, over,” he said, standing here looking back to Tammy hopefully. Tammy leaned forward expectantly, but only the hiss and crackle of snow came over the airwaves. Garrick tried again and the result was the same.

  “Deputy Sanders, this is Garrick at the station, do you read, over,” Garrick tried. Tammy knew Sanders didn’t have a radio as she’d heard Anderson complain about it before he set off. She was sure Garrick knew this too and she didn’t correct him. He was clutching at straws, and that was the worst sign yet.

  “Goddamn it, where is everyone!” he said, slamming the radio receiver down harshly. Tammy winced, afraid he’d broken it, but Garrick didn’t seem worried about it.

  “What are we going to do?” she asked him. For a moment he just looked at her and said nothing. Then he rubbed his temples with the spread fingers of one hand and sighed.

  “I don’t know yet,” he admitted. “We can’t do anything until morning. Why don’t you go home and try get some sleep,” he suggested. Tammy shook her head; there was no denying she was exhausted, but she knew going home and lying in bed only to stare at the ceiling wasn’t going to do her or anyone else any good.

  “I won’t be able to sleep,” she said. “Should we call the mayor?” she thought out loud. Garrick looked at his watch.

  “It wouldn’t be worth my job to call him at this hour without an emergency,” he said.

  “Isn’t this an emergency?” Tammy asked, shocked.

  “No, Tammy, this is very far from an emergency. At the moment we know there is a group of men up in the mountains with no radio, and that the Sheriff went up after them and hasn't checked in for a while.”

  “A while! It’s been an hour and a half now; he should have checked in three times by now,” Tammy complained.

  “His radio might be down, or maybe he has them in his sights and he’s trying to catch up. There could be no reception where he is now; there’s a thousand reasons to explain his not checking in for a bit,” Garrick seemed flustered as he said this, and Tammy wondered if he was trying to convince her or himself.

  “Something’s not right!” Tammy said. “I can feel it and so can you!” Her hot eyes challenged him, and Garrick stared back with black anger of his own. He was about to say something when the sound of a car engine floated on the air. Tammy heard it too, and it was too late for any regular driver to be out. They moved to the window and looked out, and to the relief of both they saw the Sheriff’s cruiser coming down the street towards them. Only, perhaps it was going a little too fast.

  Chapter 23

  Clinton Scarrow knew the owner of the Clear View Hotel didn’t believe his name was Edwards Dobbins. What did he care though, he obviously didn’t know who Scarrow really was, or what he was about to become. He watched the couple leaving the bar to go back to their room as Landy poured him a drink. The wife had been nervous, and the husband looked like he planned to take advantage of that.

  Once Landy had left on his false errands, Scarrow downed both drinks and took a walk around the ground floor of the hotel, making note of the rooms and entrances and looking out the windows to get a better lay of the land outside. When done with this, he did the same on the first and second floors, though there was little to see save hotel room doors with a window looking out over the grounds at either end. He hadn’t seen Landy, but there were steep stairs up to an attic room and the door was ajar, and someone (he assumed Landy) was moving around up there. Scarrow wondered where the owner’s room was. He guessed it would be on the ground floor away from the rest of the guests, but there was no way to be sure.

  Now, in room seven - a lucky number wasn’t it - Clinton Scarrow sat on the dull mattress and waited for the full depth of night. He felt the new power surge inside his head and it felt good. His car outside had not been cleaned since taking Danny out of the world last night. He’d hoped Danny might join him, but he saw the fear in his old friend’s eyes and that was what had done for him. No room for cowards on Scarrow’s team. It looked like he was going to have to go it alone; if he could truly call himself alone now.

  When the time felt right and no sound stirred anywhere in the hotel for a long time, Scarrow got up and made his way silently down the hall.

  Had he looked at his watch, Scarrow would have seen it was just coming up to three-thirty in the morning, but time was of no interest to him now. His focus was solely on the couple from the bar earlier. It shouldn’t be too hard to find them.

  The sighing of the night-time building was pleasing to Scarrow as he made his way down to the front desk. He treaded carefully to avoid loudly creaking floorboards that might give him away, but he didn’t think he had to be completely silent. This was the middle of the deep sleep time of night when it took most to wake people. Scarrow had seen this hour many times before.

  At the front desk, Scarrow was surprised to find the wall-mounted metal box that held the room keys was locked. It hadn’t been earlier in the evening when he was on his walkabout. Had he taken the key then, though, it would most likely have been noticed missing when the box was locked.

  Looking down at the desk, Scarrow turned the registry book around to face him and opened it. He scanned the names and found the couple - the only couple staying here tonight as it happened - and noted the room number. Then closing the book, he replaced it as it was.

  His attention turned back to the metal key box and he stepped behind the desk to feel it. His mind searched for a way to get into the room of the couple without the key, but there was no way that wouldn’t run the risk of waking others up at the same time, especially in an old wooden building like this one. He needed the key.

  Scarrow carried out a quick search of the desk and drawers underneath for the key to the box but came up empty. He could probably tear the thing open with his hands, but the noise that would make would surely raise the alarm. On the desk he noticed a letter opener and took it up, turning it over a few times. This might just work.

  Scarrow spent the next couple of minutes first trying to use the letter opener as a replacement key and then changing tactics to try use it to get between the metal and lift the latch inside. This was the process that proved to be the more successful, and there was a hollow ping as the latch lifted inside and the door of the box fell open. A large grin played on his lips as he took the spare room key into his grasp.

  Very soon after, Scarrow was standing at the door of the couples’ room. He listened and the sound of sleeping filled his ears. He slid the key into t
he lock so slowly he never even heard anything himself. After waiting a full minute with his ears cocked for any sound from within, he turned the key as slowly as he could. There was a click as it unlocked, and in the silence of the night it sounded to Scarrow like a thunderclap. He caught his breath and waited, listening for the tell-tale noises of waking or someone coming from one of the other rooms to see what the noise had been.

  But nothing happened. He waited a long time before opening the door and stepping inside. Standing there a moment he looked on the couple sleeping soundly in the bed only feet away. Something tried to rise in his mind, like something he’d heard from long ago, and though he didn’t know what it was, in that moment he didn’t want to go through with killing these people.

  ‘Leave. Run.’ the ideas came to him, but he couldn’t understand them. Then a new thought came that turned the tide. Scarrow looked on the couple again, and now instead of seeing the people who actually lay there before him, he saw Lawrence Karrier and Tammy Dern. His teeth clenched, and he took the long knife he had tucked into his belt in one hand while he closed the door softly with the other.

  Standing over the bed, he looked from one to the other in increasing fury, trying to make up his mind as to which one would go first.

  Karrier he thought, and the knife lifted high into the air.

  Chapter 24

  Lawrence was frantic as he rushed through the trees. His back ached and his body was clammy with sweat. His stomach felt empty, like it was sticking to his spine and yet he felt the need to vomit every few minutes. Nothing would come when he tried though, and it just made him sweat more and drain more of the precious energy he needed to escape.

  He stopped to catch his breath, leaning against a tree. He felt a little safer now that he was no longer in the barren area where the Mercy fire had once raged. The forest felt cool and offered more hiding places. But then, that went for anyone who might be coming after him as well.