by David Simms
“Okay, you go first. In the meantime, I’m gonna give them a little entertainment,” he said, unslinging his odd guitar and swinging it into position.
“No.”
But Muddy turned to the crowd, pick twirling in his hands. “Get. Out. Of. Here.”
Something in Muddy’s voice must have reasoned with Otis as he began to amble backwards toward the forest. The mob of townsfolk advanced with each step. He gripped both sticks and tapped them nervously.
I hope these guys like Ozzy. Off the rails?
Muddy’s fingers went into motion and the famous riff roiled out in the crowd’s direction. The low, train-sounding melody boomed, the leaves of the trees brushed back by the low pitches. The suddenly people halted, as though in shock over hearing music in an existence that obviously did without. He finished the two-bar-part and repeated it.
“Hey!” He called to the drummer. “I think it’s work—”
The throng of people began moving again, this time with an angry purpose to their steps, though no one uttered a word. It was as if someone else thought for them.
“Run, Muddy!” The voice came from within, not from his friend and he sensed an urge to head to toward the forest.
Not one to argue with reason, Muddy did what the voice told him. He pumped his legs as hard as he could and reached the beginning of the trail where he saw Otis and slid to a stop.
“Duck!” A new voice rang in his ears.
Something sailed through the air from the left side of the woods, through the trees and over the crowd.
It struck the prism hard, sending a shower of sparks into the villagers. The softball-sized rock careened off it and knocked out one of the guards. Colors of the entire box of Crayola Sixty-Four and more wafted over the village and shook the ground beneath them. If they weren’t already on the forest floor, the percussion would have knocked them head over heels.
“What?” Muddy clung tight to the grass. “Who? Did they break that thing?”
Lyra looked up at both boys, smiling.
“I had help. Not all of us here follow the rules. Some of us were born after the change.”
Otis looked back at her. “Before I ask or seem to care about whatever you’re talking about, can you get us back to the crossroads? Leo’s hurt and Corey can’t maneuver both Poe and him through that killer linguini stuff.”
Again, that smile. Why did females always shut him up with a great smile?
“Already done. I headed them off and made sure they navigated safely to the cross-trails.”
“It’s called the crossroads,” Otis corrected.
“Whatever,” she waved him off. “Regardless, they won’t be safe forever in that forest. Get your butts in motion and play your song to get back home.”
“But—”
“Now!”
“We can’t leave until you tell us what happened back there, what’s going on in your town.”
That smile. “Next time.”
Otis laughed an uneasy laugh. “Honey, we ain’t coming back here.”
Muddy slapped his chest. “Zack’s still here, somewhere. We’ll be back,” he replied to Lyra.
“I know. I knew that before you even got here.”
“But, why did they want us? At least tell me that.”
Her face turned to stone. “They believe you bring the Dark Muse. Your friend once did.” She turned and pushed him away. “They’re coming. Both of us will be here to help you next time.”
“Both?”
As much as Muddy wanted to interrogate the annoying, enigmatic girl, he knew he had to get home ASAP. They followed her nymph-like movements through the trails, careful to step where she stepped. They saw glimpses of “things” in the trees, in the grasses and bush.
Around them, they heard a rising wave of “things” coming that didn’t sound happy. Hungry maybe, but not happy. Were they those drummer trolls? Or worse?
“Muddy,” Poe pulled Muddy out of la-la-land. “I think you should play now.”
“Yeah,” Otis chipped in. “I don’t want to be something’s finger food here.”
Corey’s big hand landed on Muddy’s shoulder. “Send us home, man. Please?”
Someone below him grunted and moaned. Leo. Muddy gazed down and was afraid of what he saw. “Sorry, bud. First stop is the ER.” The unlucky bassist du jour looked horrible.
The second would be to visit someone and apologize for their stupid mistake.
Muddy began the song, the same one they’d played when Silver Eye helped them leave the first time. The others joined in once the scene began to shimmer. All at once, Lyra disappeared into the underbrush, the drummer beasts burst through and something else that would haunt the band for many nightmares to come.
Muddy clenched the vision out of his mind and played until he felt the familiar pull of home.
The journey back took less time than the first.
“Is that all?” Corey asked. “Seems like something’s missing.”
“Like a wasted trip.”
Muddy stood firm. “No. We learned that we could cross over by ourselves. When we rest up, we plan this out. Now we have an ally over there. Maybe she can help lead us to Zack.”
Poe wrapped herself up in her arms. “It does feel weird, Muddy.”
“Aren’t we back?” he asked. “And safe?” He looked down at the wilting bassist. “Okay, almost totally safe.” No one complained. It had been a harrowing experience, but they’d made it back in one piece and made a new friend. Or two?
Otis fetched the backpack with their stuff.
“You’re not going to believe this. It’s only five minutes after eight.”
Classes began at 8:30 A.M. every morning.
“Then it’s all gravy. Let’s get Leo to the hospital and then meet during fourth period to debrief.”
But he knew the song would not remain the same.
* * * *
Muddy floated through the school day on an air of confidence. After surviving the morning, he was charged up and ready to return to the Crossroads to save his brother. Before first period, they had called 911. Otis had volunteered to stay with Leo, assuring the band that he’d make up a story about a dog attack. The rest of them managed to make the late bell with no one suspecting a thing. Nothing that any of the bullies or moron teachers did in periods one through three could burst Muddy’s bubble.
Then he stepped through the door of Room 201 and everything changed. The group sat waiting for him, faces tight with stress. Otis had his phone in his hand, shaking.
“What,” he said. “Is it Leo? He’s not…”
Poe gripped the edge of the table and sighed. “No, Edgar.”
She called me Edgar? Why?
“He’s still alive,” Otis said. “He managed to avoid the weird questions the doctors asked, but he’ll probably never have the nerve to play bass again.”
Like he would want to after our trip?
Poe looked him in the eye. “Corey rode his bike to see Silver Eye before school today.”
“Oh-oh.”
Corey shivered in his seat, a sight Muddy had never witnessed before.
Poe’s knuckles turned white with tension. “Besides being PO’d at us for being stupid and arrogant, he sat quietly for a long time before asking Corey one simple question. A question that he already knew the answer to.”
“Which was?” Muddy wanted to end this mystery, now.
“You—”
Otis broke in, his face whiter than normal. “You forgot to close the door last night.”
Chapter Twelve
“What did you say?”
“Dude,” Otis said seriously, “you forgot to close the crossroads when we came back.”
A waterfall of ice chased Muddy’s blood up his arms and down his back.
Close the crossroads?
“But we played the same song as the first time. I made sure of it.” Yet his voice lacked the strength he’d built through the morning.
Corey stood up. “Man,
you screwed up. We all did. None of us should’ve gone there without the old man.”
More ice slid down his back. His face burned with fear. “What did we forget to do?
The sax player sat back down. “So simple, but so elusive. A blues scale in reverse, ending in a true blue note. Remember now?”
“Oh no,” Muddy said to no one. “I’m the king of accidentals.”
Poe looked dead on at him and said, “Silver Eye said one thing to Corey. Just one.”
“Which was? Please. Tell me.”
She caught a shaky breath. She was obviously scared, not an easy feat after what she dealt with at home. “He said, ‘imagine what would happen when you left the door open if your house sat in the heart of a jungle. What would come inside?’ “
Oh, crap. What did I do?
But what came out of his mouth was, “What’s the worst that can happen?”
Before the period ended, the screams outside began.
“What the heck?” Otis tumbled out of his seat and slammed into the window. “I can’t see anything.”
Muddy sidled up next to him and peered out the wide, multi-paned glass. “All that construction stuff is blocking our view. So much for making the front courtyard pretty for us.” His hands shook the frame.
“Let me in,” Poe said. Despite her disability, she could hear a mouse fart a block away. Students learned not to whisper and gossip in her classes. If they were foolish enough to talk about someone she knew well, she retaliated online. She turned her left ear to the glass before Corey reached over them and lifted the window open.
“That better?” he asked.
“Thanks,” she replied, leaning outside.
Then her face darkened. “Oh, no.”
“What?”
Mrs. Berg crowded in with them and craned her neck for a glance over the mess of wood and metal that littered as far as the eye could see. “They were supposed to be done six months ago. I knew someone would get hurt out there. That darn superintendent.”
“What is it, Poe?” Muddy needed to know. She sounded scared, yet something told him that it wasn’t Dr. Scitz’s fault this time. The second scream rang much louder. It actually sang, he thought.
With a massive backup band.
Rumblings of music followed the obviously female voice. Not a school band sound, nor a rock band sound. It was…different.
“What the heck is that?” Mrs. Berg’s voice shook. She hadn’t experienced any of the weird stuff at the crossroads so Muddy wondered what she thought it was. “Did something blow up?”
“No,” Poe replied. “It’s worse.” She turned to Muddy with a knowing look. “You didn’t close the door.”
He was so distracted he didn’t even recognize who’d said it. The dread that poured over him like wet concrete made him feel two hundred pounds heavier.
Silver Eye had warned them. They all heard him—yet none heeded his words.
“The door—it’s still open,” Corey repeated.
I didn’t play that song. The one that closed the door. But I didn’t…know.
Oh, but he did. He simply forgot, caught up in the moment.
All of them gazed at him, save for their teacher. They all knew.
Corey sighed. “All of it’s our fault, not just yours. We decided to go there alone. None of us knew.”
Poe placed her hand on Muddy’s shoulder. “And I don’t know about you, but I was so scared, I couldn’t remember anything.” She gazed back out the window. “Silver Eye should’ve been with us.”
Their teacher screwed up her face. She usually did when the band started in on one of their weird talks. “Silver Eye? Close the door? Did someone forget to give me a clue?”
“Well,” Otis said, tapping his fingers as he always did when trying to talk his way out of something, “you see—”
“Oh, crap. I’d better go out there and make sure our principal doesn’t do anything stupid—again.” She hurried to the door, but stopped before pushing through it. “I’m going to hear this whole story of yours later, right? I don’t like being kept in the dark. I have a feeling about this one.”
Didn’t they all? Muddy thought nervously as he watched her run to the scene of the screaming.
“Shouldn’t we go?” Corey didn’t like to wait. “I have a feeling—”
“That it’s something due to what we did? Or didn’t do?” Poe knew each of them too well. “Okay. Guys, grab your gear and let’s go.”
Muddy flinched. “The real instruments or the ones we used over there?”
“How would I know?” Corey stammered. “Both, I guess. Better to be safe.”
“But, they’re all at Muddy’s,” Otis said.
Corey looked at him. “And your point is?”
At Muddy’s house, the quartet gathered up Muddy’s acoustic guitar, Otis’ marching band snare drum and Corey’s sax. They also strapped the odd instruments from the “other world” to their backs. The school seemed miles away despite the brisk pace all of them set during the four-block jaunt from the rehearsal basement.
“Do you think this will work?” Corey asked. “Normal instruments here?”
“Does it matter?” Poe began their march toward school. “It’s not like we have a choice—especially when it’s our fault.”
They broke into a full-out run when they heard the chorus of screams.
Within seconds, they turned the corner and saw the cause of those screams.
Corey stared. “What did we do?”
The most frightening song imaginable echoed down the street in front of the school. A snake or something like it, but much bigger, slithered down Carteret Avenue. The biggest street in the entire town appeared to be a mere sidewalk under the beast.
“Dang,” Otis said. “It must be a half-block long.”
Scared out of his mind, Muddy stared, transfixed by the sight.
I know where you came from because I let you in. What did I do?
It wriggled on the blacktop with rhythm.
“Is that thing throwing down a beat?”
It was tossing around a syncopated groove that left the people on the street hypnotized, paralyzed. Onlookers stuck like glue to where they were with expressions of fear and confusion frozen on their faces. The more the thing moved, the crazier the rhythm became. Its undulating body shook most people out of their minds, transfixing them. When the band crept closer, hiding between a pair of school vans, it became clear that the creature was anything but the garden variety of basic giant anaconda-type serpent. Like one of those cheap toys a crazy aunt buys at a dollar store, it was constructed of several connected segments. When those segments rubbed against each other, the sound resembled maracas that island dancers shook. But this didn’t inspire people to get up and shake their butts; instead, they became frozen where they stood.
“Corey,” Muddy called, but the big teen simply stood there, eyes glazed over.
“Poe?” This time his voice rose to a pitch that sounded like it did pre-puberty. She remained silent and glued to where she stood.
“Otis?”
The drummer stared ahead for a long moment. “Right here with you, man. That thing is wicked! I wish I could play that.”
“Otis!” Muddy slapped his friend’s shoulder, immediately regretting the action.
“Sorry,” they said in unison.
“Look,” Muddy said, pointing at the others. “They’re not moving.”
Otis poked Corey and almost touched Poe before he appeared to think better of it. “Wow, that thing has them stuck like that. I wonder why?”
“Predators do weird stuff to their prey.”
The smaller boy shook and dropped one of his sticks. “Prey? You mean, like, it’s going to eat somebody?”
Muddy shook his head. “Look, it’s not the body. It’s the fangs.”
Jutting from the snake’s refrigerator-sized mouth was a pair of long teeth that extended then clashed together. The noise rang out in an odd, exotic-sounding chord in
high-pitched tones that were both metallic and organic at the same time.
“It’s just like the tuning forks that Satch uses in class,” Otis said. “Except, we usually ignore those.”
“It must be hypnotizing everyone around here. Man, I hope this thing is gone before they let school out.” Mrs. Berg allowed them to run to their lockers, not thinking her star pupils would temporarily ditch class. “It’d turn this street into a buffet!”
“Oh, no.” Poe sensed what she could not see. The thing slithered right into the path of a group of pedestrians huddled on the corner. With a few shakes of its head, the spot emptied.
“What happened to them?” Corey squinted, hoping to find a survivor. “Did it roll over them?”
“No,” she replied. “They became brunch.”
A numbness Muddy hadn’t felt since the funeral filled him inside. His fingers tingled with pins and needles. Just a moment ago, people had been there. Now they were inside that...thing. He looked at the others standing on either side of it, oblivious to it all.
Muddy’s face twisted at the thought. “But, how come we’re not like them? We can move, and talk.”
“Well, simple. I’m a drummer. I’m immune to it. I get lost in my own rhythms, but focus too much on others to let myself go. It sucks.”
“Well, why isn’t it freezing me up?” Muddy began to shiver.
Otis just gave him that deep, open-eyed stare that sometimes scared the heck out of him. “Man, I don’t know. Maybe something happened to you over there. Or maybe, it’s something else. Worse, I mean different.”
Ice ran down Muddy’s back. Why didn’t it affect him?
“Maybe something did happen to us over there,” Poe said. “I still can’t see, but the blurs mean something now.”
Otis brought them back to focus on the problem. “We’ve gotta kill it. I think I know how.”
“But Silver Eye said the instruments didn’t work that way on this side.”
The drummer smiled. “They don’t need to. I’ve got this one.”
He slung the drum in front and twirled his sticks of bone. Both of them ran out to face the adversary as it slunk toward them. It hesitated for a moment, lifted its head, swung it back and forth then did something that sealed the deal for the group.
