Descending Son

by Scott Shepherd

  “I actually kicked him in the balls and left him groveling on the floor.”

  Jess raised an eyebrow, eliciting a smile from Tracy.

  “You never knew that, did you?”

  Jess told her no.

  Tracy proceeded with the rest, the stuff he never knew.

  She talked about the night they first met and why she was crying her eyes out on Palm Canyon Drive when he almost ran her down. He felt horrible hearing how she went to see Walter after the surprise party; declaring her love for Jess and standing up to the man he had spent most of his own life trying to get out from under.

  Jess realized she was still suffering because of what had transpired between her and the Stark men—and might very well continue to do so now into eternity.

  “Why didn’t you tell me once we got involved?” he asked.

  “Because I was afraid that you’d look at me like you did when you saw us in the office that day, and walk out of my life like you did.”

  When Jess spoke next, his voice was soft and laced with a trace of shame. “You’re probably right. Not that I’m proud to admit it.”

  Tracy took some solace in that admission. “You never thought about me?”

  “Of course I did. For a while, I thought of nothing else.”

  “But you couldn’t bring yourself to get in touch.”

  Then Jess told her what he never imagined sharing.

  “I did come to see you once.”

  “You did? But I thought you never came back to Palm Springs before this.”

  “At Dartmouth. A few months after you went back.”

  “I had no idea.”

  “I realize that.” Jess struggled with the admission. It was difficult to reveal this vulnerable moment. “It was during that weeklong party in January where everyone gets really drunk and does crazy things in the snow…”

  “Winter Carnival.”

  “Yeah, that’s it. I headed up then. I sat parked in a car I’d rented, freezing my ass off because the heater wasn’t working, watching your sorority house.”

  “Wow. My very own stalker.”

  “Do you want to hear this or not?” Jess immediately regretted snapping and tried to take the edge off by shrugging it away with a smile.

  But Tracy looked like she’d been stung. “Of course I do.”

  “I guess I wanted to see if you were suffering as much as I was.”

  “More. If that was possible.”

  “Well, it didn’t look like it.”

  Tracy recoiled, like she had been slapped. “What are you talking about?”

  “I was working up the nerve to go bang on the door when this older guy, I don’t know, he looked like a teacher, came by and you got into his car and took off.”

  “Oh my God. Was he in his fifties, receding hairline?”

  “Yeah. Sounds right.”

  “That was Professor Tiltson, from the science department. He’d convinced me to help him work on one of those giant ice sculptures for the Carnival. He’d noticed me moping in class and suggested I get off my butt and do something. That’s all it was.” She laughed. “Me and Tiltson, that’s a good one. Believe me, Jessie, your father cured me of older men.”

  Then her eyes misted. “The only thing he didn’t cure me of was you.”

  Jess had no response. It just plain hurt.

  “So you left without ever seeing me?”

  “I was so fucked up by that point, I needed to get away,” said Jess. “I ended up hiking my way through Europe for a while, eventually made my way back to Los Angeles. You know the rest.”

  Tracy eked out the saddest of smiles. “Talk about star-crossed lovers.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Now look at us.”

  Tracy reached out and took Jess’s hand. He started to shy away, not out of fear or from Tracy’s intent, but because it was so cold.

  Tracy was well aware. “It’s the first thing I had to get used to. Your body temperature drops really low.”

  Jess didn’t let go, but her icy grip brought everything into focus. She couldn’t have been more right. Fate had dealt them the cruelest of hands and there was nothing to do about it.

  “I know we’ll never be together now, Jessie. I get that. But know that I love you and always will. Most of all, I’m sorry. So terribly sorry about everything that happened back then.”

  “Me too,” Jess said.

  And he meant it.

  Footsteps approached and Jess dropped Tracy’s chilled hand just as Maria rounded the corner. Jess wasn’t sure if she saw anything but knew he would rectify the situation later. He had learned the hard way about not coming clean.

  Maria didn’t let on either way and used the solar flashlight sparingly, making sure to keep its beam off Tracy.

  “It’s getting dark,” Maria said.

  The statement filled the cavern with dread. Jess realized decisions needed to be made.

  Right away.

  3

  The arguments started almost immediately. The first was whether Tracy should remain in the cavern or come with Jess and Maria. Tracy wanted to stay; she was still terrified about the threat of sunlight and the blood spring at least curbed her hunger. Jess had no intention of leaving without her because despite her best intentions, Tracy was too much of a threat on her own. He said she knew where the cavern was and could always return if necessary, but they would make sure to provide her a food supply. To prove the point, Jess emptied a couple of gasoline cans from the rental cars, returned to the blood spring, and filled both cans to the brim. Tracy, realizing neither Jess or Maria would let her stay behind and could force their mandate with the solar flashes, reluctantly agreed, but not before taking a healthy last gulp of sustenance from the blood water.

  The second battle was basically over before it began—one car or two. Since Jess wasn’t letting her out of his sight, Tracy driving by herself was a nonstarter. He finally agreed they should all pile into the pickup truck; that way there was no debating who would sit in front or guard the vampire in back. They would all sit together and there was more protection from the sunlight with the pickup’s closed roof than the jeep’s exposed overhead window.

  Jess urged Tracy out of the cavern, saying the quicker they left, the more time they could travel under the cover of darkness. Tracy was reluctant to leave the safety of the spring. She had been lured there by the whispers which promised salvation lay in the cavern depths. Jess argued it didn’t provide the cure she had been hoping for and promised to take her somewhere safe. Afterwards, he and Maria would hunt down Walter and her father to get the answers she so desperately desired.

  Minutes later, with Tracy looking nervously at the field of glass glistening in the moonlight, the two jutting rocks beckoning her to return to the cocoon of the spring, the three of them squeezed into the front of the truck and headed back into the jungle, intent on getting Tracy to safety before the emerging dawn.

  The ride back to Santa Alvarado was treacherous. Nothing much was said inside the pickup. Jess was behind the wheel, with Tracy squeezed between him and Maria. Occasionally, one of the women would point out an obstacle in the dirt road and a couple of times Jess needed to pull over so that Maria could use the solar flash to illuminate the landmarks on Tag’s makeshift map. Luckily, a full moon was in the sky and between the lunar light and pickup’s headlights, they slowly but surely made the trek back to the village.

  Jess thought back on his heart-to-heart with Tracy. It had been a long time coming and though there was a sad but wistful air of What-Might-Have-Been to it, he figured it could have been a whole lot worse. Tracy, the ultimate scorned woman, could have literally ripped his head off and feasted on his remains. But here she sat, still hoping for some miracle to reverse her horrible fate.

  Jess wondered about his own culpability in what had befallen Tracy. Numerous scenarios and plenty of “what if’s” peppered his brain. Suppose he had never walked in his father’s office seven years ago—would he have e
ver found out about them? Would he and Tracy be approaching a decade of wedded bliss together? But going down that road wouldn’t have stopped Walter from digging up the conspiracy at Meadowland and being turned by Clark James. What was to say Walter wouldn’t still seek vengeance against the actor by going after Tracy anyway?

  Jess tried to concentrate on the matter at hand. Tracy physically separated him from Maria. Perhaps it was only right that Jess do whatever he could to find some peace for the woman he had once loved in order to clear a path so he might try and find happiness anew. He began asking Tracy questions that might steer him in the right direction.

  “Do you have any idea where my father is?”

  Tracy shook her head. “The last time I saw him was when you were taken from my house.”

  “What about Clark? Would he know?”

  “If I had to guess, I’d say no. He was so upset about Walter turning me, I’m sure he would have gone directly after him if he knew where to look.”

  The mention of Walter turning brought a question to the surface that had been nagging Jess. “What about the Civatateo? That was what attacked your father five years ago, right?”

  “That’s what he said.”

  “Whatever happened to it?” Jess couldn’t affix a gender to the creature that had emerged from the cavern. Not to mention that he didn’t want to humanize it that way.

  “Dad told me not to worry about it anymore.”

  “It’s dead,” Jess realized.

  “That’s what he said. I tried pressing him, but he refused to say anything more.”

  Tracy looked out the pickup’s rear window, as if she could still see the field of glass. When she turned back, her expression was as forlorn as Jess ever remembered.

  “I thought it was the Civatateo whispering and it was still down here, where it all started. I hoped it was luring me back to give answers so I could move on with whatever this new life is.” She lowered her eyes, not wanting them to see the pain there. “But you saw the place—nothing had been down there for a long time.”

  Surprisingly it was Maria, not Jess, who took Tracy’s hand this time. If fazed by the icy flesh that now carried the bloodline of the Civatateo, Maria didn’t show it. “Don’t give up hope, Tracy. Not yet.”

  Maria glanced over at Jess. He nodded in agreement.

  “What she said.”

  Jess offered up a smile of thanks to Maria; he was amazed and thankful for her graciousness.

  They drove in silence until they reached the outskirts of Santa Alvarado. Jess steered the pickup away from the center of the village. Tracy was immediately alarmed.

  “Where are you going?”

  Jess asked her to be patient.

  Ten minutes later they could see the glass house on the hill, lit up in all its solar glory.

  Even though Jess parked the pickup at least five hundred yards from the breadth of the solar panels, Tracy began screaming.

  “What are you doing? Why are we here? What is this place??”

  She tried to scramble over Jess to get out of the car. He gripped her tight and urged her to be calm in his most assured tone. “I’ll get them turned off.”

  He looked to Maria with an unspoken question in his eyes. Was she all right being left alone with Tracy? A slight nod and seeing the solar flashlight was in her lap, inches from her right hand, gave him the answer he needed.

  “Take her back to Sophia’s if I’m not back soon,” Jess told Maria. He turned his attention back to Tracy. “Tag’s a good man. You’ll see.”

  Tracy was still shaking, but knowing she had to trust Jess, she forced a compliant nod.

  Five minutes later Jess was pounding on Tag Marlowe’s door, his eyes practically blinded by the light, begging to be let inside. Eventually, a sleepy-eyed Marlowe appeared in the doorway.

  “It’s three o’clock in the morning,” Tag scolded.

  “I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t an emergency.”

  The screenwriter gathered his wits—enough to comprehend someone was missing. “Where is your friend?”

  “Down in the car waiting.”

  “How come?”

  “That’s what I need to talk to you about,” said Jess.

  “You’re out of your fucking mind.”

  Jess had expected this reaction from Tag and launched into why it was the only choice. He rushed through the explanation, worried Tracy wouldn’t last long in the pickup without totally freaking out, but he made sure to fill in all the necessary information for Tag. Jess had to hand it to the writer; he didn’t kick Jess out on his ass but was still showing more than a little reluctance.

  “There has to be another option,” Marlowe said.

  “I wish I could come up with one.”

  Jess had no choice but to play his trump card. He reached into his jeans pocket and pulled out one of the items he had picked up off the ground in the cavern beside the blood spring. It was a simple chain with a small gold “P” hanging from it. Jess handed the chain to Tag and told him where he had found it.

  “This belonged to Penelope,” Tag murmured. “I gave it to her right before she disappeared.”

  “I thought as much.”

  The ensuing quiet might as well have been a funeral dirge. Both men knew Penelope was never coming back.

  “Whatever you’ve been hearing in the middle of the night is something screwing with your head, man,” said Jess.

  Tag closed his fist around the chain. His grief was already starting to give way to anger and revenge.

  Jess pointed out the multicolored window. “I owe that girl down there my best shot. I figure you might want to give yours the same. Let’s get rid of this fucking thing once and for all.”

  Tag put the chain in his pocket.

  Then, he shut down the lights.

  When Tracy James and Tag Marlowe first met five years before, she had been fresh out of college and bored out of her mind for the entire week she spent on the location shoot. Tag had barely said hello because he was frantically rewriting The Seventh Day, serving every whim and fancy of Clark and the mercurial director.

  Once reunited, they held a morbid fascination with each other. Tag could see a woman who was decent, sad, and lost, but now borne of the same creature that had killed his beloved Penelope. Tracy only had to glance around the room to appreciate the screenwriter’s brilliant mind, the very same brain that had constructed a house that was deadly only to Tracy and her unholy kin.

  Both kept their guards up, Tag explaining in very specific terms what he had constructed and why. Tracy responded with minimal words and nods. But Jess could see her paying rapt attention to Tag, something he had counted on, and it allowed Jess to excuse himself for a moment and return to the pickup truck.

  Once there, he uncovered the tarp of the truck bed and picked up the two gasoline cans full of blood. As he lugged them up the hill to the house, he thought them heavier than he remembered. Maybe it was just exhaustion from a long day and harrowing night, but Jess suspected the real burden came from what he was about to do.

  The moment Jess reentered the glass house, the solar lights flared back on. Artificial sunlight flooded every inch of the property for at least a good hundred yards. Tracy stifled a scream but Tag told her to relax. He toggled it on and off with the remote in his hand.

  “Did you tell her about the override?” asked Jess.

  “I was just getting to that.”

  A look passed between the two men. Maria caught it first. “What override?”

  Jess placed the two gasoline cans on the floor next to the door as Tag pushed a code on the remote. The lights came on once again. Tracy backed away from the door.

  “It jams the signal so the lights can only be turned off by this remote,” Tag told them.

  Jess immediately pulled Maria toward the door.

  “C’mon…”

  Maria realized what was happening and shook him off. “Jessie, you can’t! She’ll be trapped.”

  “It�
�s our only choice.”

  Before Maria could respond, she was dragged out the door by Marlowe. Tracy started screaming.

  “Jessie!”

  He lingered in the doorway, making sure he was bathed in enough solar rays to stay out of Tracy’s reach.

  “I’m sorry, Trace. I really am.”

  “Don’t leave me here!”

  This time there was a guttural sound buried in the scream. It was the first time since they found her groveling in the cave that the beast within struggled to gain control. But the same feral survival instinct kept her away from the light.

  Jess slammed the door shut. He stood outside it bathed in faux sunlight, yelling at the top of his lungs.

  “There’s enough in the gas cans to last at least a week, maybe two if used sparingly. I will be back before that!”

  A howl came through the door. It almost shook the house off its foundations.

  “Noooooo!”

  “Tracy, we need to end this! Once and for all. This is the only way I know how!”

  Jess’s words were spoken as much for Maria and Tag, who were huddled together a few yards behind him.

  “I will not leave you here! I will be back! I promise, Tracy!”

  Jess’s eyes welled up. Maria stepped forward and put her arm around him. She nodded, a tacit understanding and agreement, and began leading him away from the house. They hurried down the stairs to the pickup truck with Tag hot on their heels.

  Tracy’s cries echoed into the night.

  “Jessie! Jessie!”

  He knew he would still hear her later—that night, to the border, and beyond. Jess suspected her screams would ring in his ear long after he had returned to the desert.

  EXCERPTS FROM THE JOURNAL OF EDWARD D. RICE

  May 28

  Getting a helicopter to airlift Clark out of Santa Alvarado turned out to be no small task, starting with finding a phone in the tiny village. Eventually we located one in a café operated by a man named Angel, who for a price would let you call the States. After lots of pleading, a few rounds of mistranslations, and the healthy weight of Clark James’s checkbook, a Medevac chopper was finally chartered and due to arrive within the next twenty-four hours.