by David Simms
“The lady asked, ‘When do we go?’ “ Otis sometimes wavered in his bravado, but never his straightforwardness. “I think we’ve got ourselves a mission.”
The old man stared at the group for a tense moment then spoke. “In time.”
“What?” Muddy spat. “We just agreed that Zack might be, well, he’s not going to last long there on his own. You’ve made that clear.”
“You’re not ready. I said that already. You go there now and people will die.”
Corey’s head shot up. “You don’t know that. If we don’t go there, someone will definitely die.”
Silver Eye shook his head slowly, as if he held a deep, dark secret. “You’re not going. Said and done. Remember the ‘respect your elders’ thing? You need training. I’m not about to sacrifice four pains in the butt just because they want to go, go, go. This ain’t some videogame where you can read a book of tricks and beat the thing! People who know what they’re doing sometimes don’t come back.” He let his gaze hit the floor.
“Houston’s still there, isn’t he,” Muddy asked. “That’s what you believe, isn’t it?”
A wave of an old hand cut the air. “Probably nothing left of him now. Stupid greedy fool. He had to go. The place is magnetic—it pulls you in—you’ll see.”
“When did you last see him?”
Muddy swore a tear formed in that one eye. “In nineteen-sixty-nine. He desperately wanted to do Woodstock and blow the place wide open.”
“Like Hendrix did,” Corey added.
“Yep, like Hendrix.”
“But, he never returned.”
Sighing, Silver Eye continued. “Nope, and people here thought he’d just picked up and headed for Chicago or New Orleans or some blues capital. I knew the truth.”
“What happened to him? Was it the Dark Muse?”
The others turned to him, a million questions in their eyes.
“You think he’s still alive? Him or the muse?”
Silver Eye’s head turned toward the wall of photos. “The Dark Muse…it ain’t always the same. I think the River—and what rules the other side wears them out from time to time.”
Muddy felt worry wash over him. “They grow evil of that magnitude there?”
“Doesn’t every world? When Hitler died, we got a whole slew of new demons, no shortage of them. Did it stop when Bin Laden got killed?”
“There’s darkness everywhere,” Muddy said, understanding.
“You got it, boy. Sometimes people even go looking for it.”
“So what do you think happened to him?”
That eye, the silver one, seemed to come alive and bore straight into him. “Probably the same thing that’ll happen to you if you head over there before you’re ready.”
“Okay,” the boy replied, even though he didn’t know to what he was replying.
“So, you’ll complete your training with me?”
His lips released the words before Muddy’s brain registered the question. “Of course.”
* * * *
The moment they left the house and crossed the street, Otis spoke. “So, when do we leave?”
Muddy didn’t hesitate. “First thing tomorrow morning. Pack your gear.”
“We’re skipping school?” Otis sounded giddy at the thought.
Muddy grinned. “No one will notice. Besides, remember what Silver Eye said? Time acts different there. We could be gone a week and still make math class.”
“Let’s not.”
“Still,” Poe said. “You don’t know that for sure. I can’t deal with a suspension.”
“Trust me, we’ll be back in time. Why do you think Silver Eye looks so young?”
Corey put a big hand on his friend’s chest. “I’ve got a bad feeling about this.”
“Stop quoting movies.” Muddy’s focused stare rivaled Silver Eye’s. “Even Han Solo wouldn’t turn down this adventure.”
“But we’re not heroes. We’re the ‘The Accidentals.’ “
* * * *
Morning came without incident, but also with little sleep. No strange sounds. No mud-caked shoes. Yet Muddy would have liked to have encountered his mother, real or the dream version, one last time. Their little group of misfits were about to embark on a journey without permission into a land, or world, that none of them understood. In a few hours, Poe, Otis, Corey and he would disappear at the crossroads—to hopefully return—and not alone.
Muddy and his dad exchanged morning grumbles, typical of a school day morning. He headed for the cereal and coffee, hoping to get through the meal with little or no conversation. Despite the friction between them, he couldn’t bring himself to lie to the man who never failed him. If Muddy did, it hurt, and as his father often told him, guilt sprouted in neon letters all over his face. Great writers understood characters and everything that went along with it. Reading his expressions must have been akin to flipping through those “See Dick Run” books.
“How’s the prepping for the big battle going?” his father asked, the man’s face behind his laptop reading the news.
The teen’s fingers nearly launched the coffee mug into the ceiling. Nerves would kill him one day, he thought. Thankfully, he thought before freaking out. That was hard to accomplish with his anxiety running rampant.
“Uh…yep,” he replied in a voice he hoped sounded normal. “Just one more rehearsal before the shindig tonight.”
Crap, he thought, realizing that before they’d decided to save his brother’s life, or attempt to, that they’d auditioned and had to perform at eight o’clock tonight! The order of the bands wouldn’t be determined until the lottery before the show. Hopefully, they’d get a later slot. Just in case one of them had to be replaced.
Bad joke, he thought, chiding himself. Don’t even think that.
“Ed? Edgar? You there? I asked if you were ready.”
“For what?” His mind spun, hoping the truth had remained beneath his flesh. “Oh yeah. The battle. We’ll be set to kick serious butt tonight.”
What did Silver Eye say about time behaving differently over there? Oh yeah, he didn’t. They’d assumed and hoped they wouldn’t return to a world which had aged centuries without them.
Then his father flashed the knowing smile, which always worried the boy.
“So, who’s the victim tonight?”
“What?” Shards of ice rained down his neck.
His father tossed his hands in the air. “The bassist who’s enemies with fate and good luck. Did you find anyone brave enough to pull duty who’s not worried about electrocution, impaling themselves on a string, or drowning in the crowd surf?”
A laugh escaped Muddy’s lips. One thing about his father, no matter how scary his stories were, he could always get people to laugh. Most horror writers could. He often stated that being scared and laughing your butt off were two sides of the same coin.
“Yep. Leo offered. Not the most amazing player.”
“He’s the only one left?”
“Just about.”
He shot Muddy his best evil eye. “Better stop killing off the four-stringers.”
The laughter came as a release, even though Muddy couldn’t shake the bad feeling brewing inside him.
“Now hurry up and eat. You’re gonna be late for school.”
Man, he hated lying to his father. “Hopefully not,” he replied, crossing his fingers that his words would be partially true.
The rest of the meal ensued without discussion. His dad checked the message boards on his writers’ site, whining and moaning about sales, the classics and other stuff he usually did before he sat down to write in his “zone.”
Muddy wondered if writers ever went over, or was it just for musicians. Words could be just as magical as music, in a way, but he couldn’t wrap his mind around how the curtain would part for a story. Weird. Too bad one of Dad’s conferences wasn’t soon. He’d bet money that if a passage were possible, one of the serious writers already found it.
Grabbing
the strange guitar Silver Eye gave him two nights ago, he headed toward the door, half wishing his father would have asked where he really was going and forced him to stay home. His hands shook so hard the case nearly slipped from a sweaty grasp.
* * * *
The group met at the corner of Muddy’s street with quiet excitement, three of them bouncing on their heels. Even Otis remained relatively mum that morning. Muddy figured that fear had found its way into everyone’s heart sooner or later. Only Poe appeared gung-ho, but after a fifteen-plus-year sentence in her home, not much would scare her. Hopefully, that would stay true, at least for today.
He wondered how they’d managed to avoid the school bus. Otis insisted on hitching a ride with Muddy instead of riding in his mom’s convertible. Poe always walked and had Corey as a bodyguard.
“Leo?”
The tall player in the role of karmic misfortune smiled. Somehow, they had all doubted he’d go along with the idea, but he’d showed up anyway. “Hey bud. Heard you needed a hand. Since you didn’t have an actual bass yet, I borrowed Poe’s whatchamacallit thing. I can lay down a mean low line on that for you.”
How Otis got Leo to come, Muddy would never know. He probably didn’t believe much, if any, of the story, yet by the strained look on his face, something had clicked in his brain—something he’d sensed wasn’t right.
“Thanks, Leo. Trust me, we appreciate any extra hands we can get.”
The journey took only a fraction of the time it did the other night, or so it seemed. In the daylight, shadows still existed in the Iron section of town, but didn’t pose as much of a threat. In no time at all, The Accidentals found themselves out of their neighborhood and scaling the hump of the landfill, peering over the top as if a tiger, or other beast, waited on the other side because the real dangers lie behind the barrier they couldn’t see. But reality ceased to exist over there. That was the problem.
The group walked the path to the crossroads as though they were simply following a well-traveled trail. Under the protection of the sunlight, the “X” of the passing lines seemed to be as imposing as an intersection in the middle of nowhere. Long grass streaked down each of the four lanes, but lay trodden to the ground and devoid of any natural color. Wind failed to reach inside the amphitheater of waste and forgotten land, lending a silence to the setting that coaxed the fear back into Muddy’s veins. Sometimes, the absence of a threat frightened a person much worse than when it was shoved right into your face; especially when that fear had seen your face and many more lurked behind it.
Forming a cross, they unslung their instruments and gazed at each other, waiting for the word.
“Well,” Corey said, “are we just going to stand here like idiots or are we going to play to get our butts over there?”
“Well, what do you suggest we play, sax man?” Otis chimed in, possibly feeling a little more brazen. “We don’t know how the old man got the ball rolling the other night. Once it rolled, it was pretty easy to join in, but how do we start?”
“Muddy?” Corey turned to the guitarist. “You really turned it on with him and sent us over. Can you do it again?”
“Do what?” Leo asked. No one answered him.
Truth was, Muddy had no idea what Silver Eye did last time. He’d just followed the old man’s lead until the music flowed from his veins. “Umm….”
“I know,” Poe said, sounding impatient. “While you three were jacking around with ol’ one eye, I paid attention to the music. It’s pretty simple—in theory.”
“Theory?” Otis squawked in a high-pitched whine. He’d inhaled like someone had just taken a vacuum cleaner to his lungs.
Poe raised her hands in mock surrender. “Listen, if you’re too—”
“Don’t you dare say the word.”
She smiled as though she could see his pained expression. “Okay, I’ll shut up, but we’ve gotta get going here.”
“Otis, give me the rhythm.”
He opened his mouth to inquire which rhythm, but then zipped his lips and took hold of the sticks. Gripping them tight, he twirled them once, loosening his wrists and fingers slightly before rapping on the top of the drum skin. In a matter of seconds, a boogie-like, two-four beat echoed through the garbage canyon. His eyes closed and he hung his head back, drowning in the pattern.
A deep fog horn bellowed beside Muddy. He turned to see Corey sound a low D and hold it over the drummer’s syncopation. The bigger teen inhaled, almost in a sonorous tone like what emanated from his sax. He sank—deep—into that zone, even with a dearth of notes. The way he played said it all. The sax became a voice that invited them to join.
Even Leo, the bassist du jour, hopped in on the fun and laid down a serpentine line that shook the dirt upon which they stood.
Muddy shivered.
They all seemed so focused. So determined. So…brave.
And where was he?
No matter how much he missed Zack, no matter how much he wanted to be the next Rambo, Luke Skywalker, even Harry Potter, he hadn’t been born with a lightning scar on his forehead or Jedi blood coursing through his veins, so he was definitely out of luck in that department. He wondered if Poe knew what lie ahead. Or what lay hidden in his own heart.
She hummed, loud enough to cut through the others’ noise, the voice of an angel who’d seen way too much hell in her short life. He wished he could tell her all, tell her how he felt, but his mom, her dad, both their lives’ baggage—it served as an easy out. Maybe one day he’d have the strength to knock down those walls.
Sucking it up, Muddy gripped the neck of his guitar until his fingers hurt and slipped a pick into place. Taking a deep breath, his thumb and forefinger plucked the first magical note. He thought it was magical, but knew there was some rational, scientific reason for what happened in the next couple of minutes.
The bends which rode Otis’ rhythm slithered around Corey’s sax line and answered Poe’s call, wafted from the strings as they vibrated. Muddy spun a web of blue that made the antiquated oddity of a guitar seem like a vintage Les Paul. How Silver Eye got his hands on that musical contraption that no guitar luthier had ever imagined was beyond him, but none of that mattered now.
As the waves of melody and rhythm grew, the curtain once again parted.
He tried his hardest to keep his eyes open, to see what lay behind this reality and the one they’d visited—and were headed to again. Yet, whatever power controlled the front stage of life to the back lowered the drapes on his lids. He saw something that he would never, ever forget, but then it dissipated, just like the images of his friends traveling next to him. The last picture his open eyes saw was the peaceful, closed ones of the band.
Chapter Ten
Fear reared its head again as they came to, the other reality now theirs.
“Where the heck are we?” Leo began to freak out a bit. “I didn’t sign up for this. Otis! What did you do to me?”
Poe gave her death stare to the little guy. “You didn’t tell him?”
He shrugged. “He’s a big boy. Besides, I didn’t think we’d get back here to tell you the truth. Sorry, Leo.”
The bassist began to freak. “Sorry for what? For where?”
“Guys, be careful. We don’t know what’s lurking around this place.”
Leo’s issues were suddenly forgotten. In all the turmoil, nobody had even bothered to check if those ape/oaf-like things were nearby. Everyone swung their heads back and forth, checking for the creatures that had nearly crushed them with their percussive bodies the first time. Ears cocked, the band listened, looked, even felt the ground.
Nothing.
But no one had warned Leo about the dangers here. If they had, he probably wouldn’t have come. Actually, Muddy knew he wouldn’t have believed anything they said, so leaving out a few key details was not the worst thing they could do. Unless...something happened.
But this wasn’t the stage. It wasn’t Star Trek. He wasn’t just an add-on who was destined to bite the b
ig one the moment the team landed, was he?
“Look, this path leads somewhere,” Leo said. “There’s a marking. I found something. He might be down this way!”
Then it happened. Muddy doubted Leo even saw it coming.
One moment, the bass player skipped along the path, side-stepping long plants and weeds jutting into his way, giddy with the excitement of finding a clue. The next moment, something exploded out of nowhere. Leo screamed, more out of fright than in pain, but it still sent sheets of ice down Muddy’s back. From the looks on the rest of the band’s faces, they felt the freeze, too.
“Oh, crap—” Corey whispered.
Poe covered her eyes. “Not another one. Please, not another.”
* * * *
As Leo stepped off the path to the “sign” he’d believed would help, the entire ground leapt to life. The long, thick blades of grass took shape in the form of things that looked like a massive smorgasbord of linguini. Really thick, long, green linguini.
It sprang at his legs and spun around them, very much al dente. The bi-color tendril-noodles slapped his flesh in a resounding thump due to his loose jeans. His scream echoed through the clearing, recalling classic Led Zeppelin howls. The three strands mocked angry pythons, squeezing the circulation and blood from his limbs. They yanked like eager fishermen with a winner on the line, except they were the line. Leo wind-milled his arms to counteract the grass linguini’s pulling which made him appear a trapped duck, complete with sound effects. Then two more blades of the stuff recoiled and aimed higher, much higher.
To his credit, his spastic nature and lack of coordination probably saved his life. Only a moment after the pasta-like things clamped around his jean-clad legs, he panicked and fell backwards, straight onto the path.
The others surged forward, expecting the worst, when Otis drew his oddly-notched sticks and slammed a one-two-three-four that shook the entire floor of land. Muddy, Poe, and Corey somehow managed to remain standing, but Leo visibly vibrated free. The living linguini slunk back into the mass of grass, if any of it actually was grass. Not knowing if it reacted due to fear or the vibrations, no one acted like they wished to find out. A collection of hands replaced the grass and pulled him clear.
