The Passage

by Justin Cronin

  A familiar sadness washed over him. “I’m sorry, Auntie,” he said after a moment. “You’ve made a mistake. She must have meant Theo.”

  But she shook her head. “No, Peter.” She smiled a toothless smile; her vaporous cloud of hair, backlit by the spots pouring down outside the windows, seemed to glow around her face—a halo of hair and light. “It was you. She told me to give them to you.”

  Later Peter would think: how strange it was. How, standing in the quiet of Auntie’s room, among her things of the past, he had felt time opening before him, like the pages of a book. He thought of his mother’s final hours—of her hands, and the close heat of the bedroom where Peter had cared for her; of her sudden struggle for breath, and the last imploring words she’d spoken. Take care of your brother, Theo. He’s not strong, like you. Her intentions had seemed so clear. And yet as Peter searched this moment, the memory began to shift, his mother’s words forming a new shape and emphasis and, with that, a different meaning entirely.

  Take care of your brother Theo.

  His thoughts were broken by a burst of knocking from the porch.

  “Auntie, are you expecting anyone?”

  The old woman frowned. “At this hour?”

  Peter quickly returned the maps to the box and slid them beneath the bed. It wasn’t until he reached the front door and saw Michael standing behind the screen that he wondered why he’d done this. Michael eased himself into the room, darting a glance past Peter to the old woman, who was standing behind him, her arms folded disapprovingly over her chest.

  “Hey, Auntie,” he said breathlessly.

  “Hey yourself, rude boy. You come knocking at my door in the middle of the night, I expect a how-do-you-do.”

  “Sorry.” His cheeks reddened with embarrassment. “How are you this evening, Auntie?”

  She nodded. “I’m expecting I’m all right.”

  Michael directed his attention to Peter again, lowering his voice confidentially. “Could I speak to you? Outside?”

  Peter stepped onto the porch behind Michael, in time to see Dale Levine appearing out of the shadows.

  “Tell him what you told me,” said Michael.

  “Dale? What is it?”

  “Look,” the man said, glancing around nervously, “I probably shouldn’t be saying this, and I have to get back to the Wall. But if you’re planning on getting Alicia and Caleb out of here, I’d do it at first light. I can help you at the gate.”

  “Why? What’s happened?”

  It was Michael who answered. “The guns, Peter. They’re going to get the guns.”

  FORTY-ONE

  In the Infirmary, Sara Fisher, First Nurse, was waiting with the girl.

  Amy, Sara thought. Her name was Amy. This impossible girl, this one-hundred-year-old girl, was named Amy. Is that you? she’d asked her. Is that your name? Are you Amy?

  Yes, her eyes said. She might have actually smiled. How long since she had heard the sound of her name? That’s me. I’m Amy.

  Sara wished she had some clothing for the girl, instead of the gown. It didn’t seem right for a girl who had a name not to have clothing to wear, and a pair of shoes. Sara should have thought of that before returning to the Infirmary. The girl was shorter than she was, lighter-boned and slimmer-hipped, but Sara had a pair of gaps she liked to ride in, snug at the waist and seat, that would fit the girl well enough if she cinched them tight. She needed a bath, too, and a haircut.

  Sara didn’t question anything Michael had told her. Michael was Michael, that’s what everyone said, meaning he was too smart by half—too smart for his own good. But the one thing he wasn’t, not ever, was wrong. There would come a time, Sara supposed, when this would happen—a person couldn’t be right all the time—and she wondered what would become of her brother on that day. The ceaseless effort he applied to being right, to fixing every problem, would suddenly collapse inside him. It made Sara think of a game they had played as Littles, building towers of blocks and then pulling them away from the lower tiers, one by one, daring the whole thing to fall; and when it fell, it happened swiftly, all at once. She wondered if that’s what would happen to Michael, if there would be any part left standing. He would need her then, as he had needed her that morning in the shed when they’d found their parents—the day when Sara had failed him.

  Sara had meant it, when she’d told Peter she wasn’t afraid of the girl. She had been, at first. But as the hours and then days had moved by, the two of them locked away, she’d begun to feel something new. In the girl’s watchful and mysterious presence—silent and unmoving, and yet not—she’d begun to feel a quality of reassurance, even of hope. A feeling that she was not alone, but even more: that the world was not alone. As if they were all waking from a long night of terrible dreams to step back into life.

  Dawn would soon come. The attack of the night before had evidently not repeated; Sara would have heard the shouts. It was as if the night were holding the last of its breath, waiting for what would come next. Because what Sara hadn’t told Peter, or anyone at all, was what had occurred in the Infirmary in the moments just before the lights had gone out. The girl had suddenly sat bolt upright on her cot. Sara, exhausted, had just lain down to sleep; she was roused by a sound she realized was coming from the girl. A low moaning, a single continuous note, rising at the back of her throat. What is it? Sara said, rising quickly to go to her. What’s wrong? Are you hurt, has something hurt you? But the girl gave no reply. Her eyes were very wide, and yet she seemed not to see Sara at all. Sara had sensed that something was happening outside—the room was strangely dark, there were shouts coming from the Wall, the sounds of a commotion, voices calling and feet racing past—but while this seemed important, a fact worthy of her attention, Sara could not look away; whatever was going on outside was being waged here also, in this room, in the vacancy of the girl’s eyes and the tautness of her face and throat and in the mournful melody that she was playing from somewhere deep within her. Things continued this way for some unknown numbers of minutes—two minutes and fifty-six seconds, according to Michael, though it felt like an eternity—and then, as quickly and alarmingly as it had begun, it was over; the girl fell silent. She lay back down on the cot, pulling her knees to her chest, and that had been the end of it.

  Sara, sitting at the desk in the outer room, was remembering this, wondering if she should have told Peter about it, when her attention was taken by a sound of voices on the porch. She lifted her face toward the window. Ben was still sitting at the rail, facing away—Sara had carried out a chair for him—the end of his cross visible where it protruded from his lap; whomever he was speaking to was standing below him, Sara’s view obscured by the angle. What are you doing there? she heard Ben say, his voice gathering into a tone of warning. Don’t you know there’s a curfew?

  And as Sara rose to her feet, to see whom Ben was speaking to, she saw Ben rising also, sweeping his cross before him.

  Peter and Michael, moving through the trailer park, darting from shadow to shadow: they made their final approach to the lockup in the cover of the trees.

  No guard.

  Peter gently pushed open the door, which stood ajar. As he stepped inside, he saw a body pushed against the far wall, its arms and legs bound, just as Alicia, moving from his left, dropped the cross she was pointing at his back.

  “Where the hell have you been?” she said.

  Caleb was standing behind her, holding the blade.

  “A long story. I’ll tell you on the way.” He gestured toward the body on the floor, which he now recognized as Galen Strauss. “I see you decided to get started without me. What did you do to him?”

  “Nothing he’ll remember when he wakes up.”

  “Ian knows about the guns,” said Michael.

  Alicia nodded. “So I figured.”

  Peter explained the plan. First to the Infirmary to get Sara and the girl, then to the stables, for mounts. Just before First Bell, Dale, on the Wall, would call sign. In a
ll the confusion, they should be able to slip out the gate, just as the sun was rising, and make their way down to the power station. From there they could figure out what to do.

  “You know, I think I misjudged Dale,” Alicia said. “He’s got more stones than I thought.” She looked at Michael. “You too, Circuit. I wouldn’t have figured you as someone ready to storm the lockup.”

  The four of them stepped out. Dawn was fast approaching; Peter didn’t think they had more than a few minutes. They moved in quick silence toward the Infirmary and circled around to the west wall of the Sanctuary, giving them cover and a clear view of the building.

  The porch was empty; the door stood open. Through the front windows came a flicker of lamplight. Then they heard a scream.

  Sara.

  Peter got there first. The outer room was empty. Nothing was disturbed except the chair at the front desk, which was lying on its side. From the ward Peter heard a groan. As the others entered behind him, he raced down the hallway and tore through the curtain.

  Amy was huddled at the base of the far wall, her arms folded over her head as if to ward off a blow. Sara was on her knees, her face covered in blood.

  The room was full of bodies.

  The others had burst in behind him. Michael rushed to his sister’s side.

  “Sara!”

  She tried to speak, opening her bloodied lips, but no sound came. Peter dropped to his knees beside Amy. She appeared uninjured, but at his touch she flinched, pulling farther away, waving her arms protectively.

  “It’s okay,” he was saying, “it’s okay,” but it wasn’t okay. What had happened here? Who had killed these men? Had they slaughtered one another?

  “It’s Ben Chou,” Alicia said. She was kneeling by one of the bodies. “Those two are Milo and Sam. The other one is Jacob Curtis.”

  Ben had been taken on a blade. Milo, face-down in a spreading puddle of blood, had been killed by a blow to the head; Sam appeared to have gone down the same way, his skull caved in from the side.

  Jacob was lying at the foot of Amy’s cot, the bolt from Ben’s cross jutting from his throat. A bit of blood was still bubbling from his lips; his eyes were open, wearing a look of surprise. In his outstretched hand he was clutching a length of iron pipe, smeared with blood and brain, white flecks among the red, clinging to its surface.

  “Holy shit!” Caleb said. “Holy shit, they’re all dead!”

  Everything about the scene had taken on a horrifying vividness. The bodies on the floor, the pooling blood. Jacob with the pipe in his hand. Michael was helping Sara to her feet. Amy was still cowering against the wall.

  “It was Sam and Milo,” Sara croaked. Michael had helped his sister onto one of the cots. She spoke haltingly, through cracked and swollen lips, her teeth lined in crimson. “Ben and I tried to stop them. It was all … I don’t know. Sam was hitting me. Then someone else came in.”

  “Was it Jacob?” Peter said. “He’s lying dead here, Sara.”

  “I don’t know, I don’t know!”

  Alicia took Peter by the elbow. “It doesn’t matter what happened,” she said urgently. “No one will ever believe us. We have to go now.”

  They couldn’t risk the gate; Alicia explained what she wanted everyone to do. The important thing was to keep out of sight of the Wall. Peter and Caleb would go to the Storehouse, for ropes and packs and shoes for Amy; Alicia would lead the others to the rendezvous.

  They crept from the Infirmary and fanned out. The main door to the Storehouse stood ajar, the lock hanging on its hasp—an odd detail, but nothing they had time to worry about now. Caleb and Peter moved into the dim interior with its long rows of bins. That was where they found Old Chou and, beside him, Walter Fisher. They were hanging side by side from the rafters, the ropes tight around their necks, their bare feet suspended above a bin of crated books. Their skin had taken on a grayish cast; both men’s tongues were hanging from their mouths. They had evidently used the crates as a kind of stepladder, assembling them into a pile and then, once the ropes were in place, kicking them away. For a moment Peter and Caleb just stood there, looking at the two men, the improbable image they made.

  “Fuck … me,” said Caleb.

  Alicia was right, Peter knew. They had to go now. Whatever was happening was vast and terrible, a force to sweep over them all.

  They assembled their supplies and stepped outside. Then Peter remembered the maps.

  “Go ahead,” he told Caleb. “I’ll catch up.”

  “They’ll already be there.”

  “Just go. I’ll find you.”

  The boy darted away. At Auntie’s house, Peter didn’t bother to knock; he stepped inside and moved straight to the bedroom. Auntie was asleep. He paused for a moment in the doorway, watching her breathe. The maps were where he’d left them, under the bed. He bent to retrieve them and slid the box into his pack.

  “Peter?”

  He froze. Auntie’s eyes were still closed. Her hands lay still at her sides.

  “I was just lying here to rest some.”

  “Auntie—”

  “No time for goodbyes,” the old woman intoned. “You go on now, Peter. You’re in your own time now.”

  By the time he reached the cutout, filaments of pink were rising from the east. Everyone was there. Alicia was climbing from under the trunk line, dusting herself off.

  “Everybody ready?”

  Footsteps behind them: Peter wheeled around, drawing his blade. But then he saw, stepping from the undergrowth, the figure of Mausami Patal. A cross was slung from one shoulder; she was wearing a pack.

  “I tracked you from the Storehouse. We better hurry.”

  “Maus—” Alicia began.

  “Save your breath, Lish. I’m going.” Mausami focused her eyes on Peter. “Just tell me one thing,” she said. “Do you believe your brother’s dead?”

  He felt as if he had been waiting for someone to ask him this very question. “No.”

  “Neither do I.”

  Her hand moved toward her belly, an unconscious gesture. Its meaning came upon him with such completeness it felt less like something discovered than remembered, as if he’d known all along.

  “I never got the chance to tell him,” Mausami said. “I still want to.”

  Peter turned to Alicia, who was studying the two of them with a look of exasperation.

  “She comes.”

  “Peter, this is not a good idea. Think about where we’re going.”

  “Mausami’s blood now. It’s not a discussion.”

  For a moment Alicia said nothing; she appeared to be at a loss for words.

  “The hell with it,” she said finally. “We don’t have time to argue.”

  Alicia went first, showing them the way. Sara followed, then Michael, then Caleb and Mausami, dropping into the tunnel one by one, leaving Peter to guard the rear.

  Amy was the last. They’d found a jersey and a pair of gaps for her, and a pair of sandals. As she lowered herself through the hatch, her eyes found Peter’s with a sudden, beseeching force. Where are we going?

  Colorado, he thought. The CQZ. They were just names on a map, bits of colored light on the screen of Michael’s CRT. The reality behind them, the hidden world of which they were a part, was nothing Peter could imagine. When they’d spoken of such a journey earlier that night—had it really been that same night, the four of them crowded into the Lighthouse?—Peter had envisioned a proper expedition: a large armed detail, carts of supplies, at least one scouting party, a meticulously plotted route. His father would spend whole seasons planning the Long Rides. Now here they were, fugitives on foot, scurrying away with little more than a pile of old maps and the blades on their belts. How could they possibly hope to get to such a place?

  “I don’t really know,” he told her. “But if we don’t leave now, I think we’ll all die here.”

  She ducked into the tunnel and was gone. Peter tightened the straps of his pack and scrambled in behind her, pulling
the hatch closed over his head, sealing himself in darkness. The walls were cool and smelled of earth. The tunnel had been dug long ago, perhaps by the Builders themselves, to make it easier to service the trunk line; except for the Colonel, no one had used it for years. It was his secret route, Alicia had explained, the one he used to hunt. So at least one mystery was solved.

  Twenty-five meters later, Peter emerged into a copse of mesquite. Everyone was waiting. The lights were down, revealing a gray dawn sky. Above them, the face of the mountain rose like a single slab of stone, a silent witness to all that had occurred. Peter heard the calls of the Watch from the top of the Wall, sounding off their posts for Morning Bell and the changing of the shift. Dale would be wondering what had happened to them, if he didn’t know already. Surely it wouldn’t be long before the bodies were found.

  Alicia closed the hatch behind him and turned the wheel, then knelt to cover it with underbrush.

  “They’ll come after us,” Peter said quietly, crouched beside her. “They’ll have horses. We can’t outrun them.”

  “I know.” Her face was set. “It’s a question of who gets to the guns first.”

  And with that Alicia rose, turned on her heels, and began to lead them down the mountain.

  VII

  THE

  DARKLANDS

  I saw eternity the other night

  Like a great ring of pure and endless light,

  All calm as it was bright,

  And round beneath it time in hours, days, years,

  Driven by the spheres,

  Like a vast shadow moved in which the world

  And all her train were hurled.

  —HENRY VAUGHAN,

  “The World”

  FORTY-TWO

  They reached the foot of the mountain before half-day. The pathway, a switchback zigzagging down the eastern face of the mountain, was too steep for horses; in places it wasn’t a path at all. A hundred meters above the station a portion of the mountain seemed to have been carved away; a pile of rubble lay below. They were above a narrow box canyon, the station obscured to the north by a wall of rock. A hot, dry wind was blowing. They climbed back up, searching for another route as the minutes ticked away. At last they found a way down—they had drifted off the path—and made their final, creeping descent.