In This Skin
Page 29
***
The sun broke over the horizon. Downtown Chicago glinted in the dawn light. Arms folded, preoccupied with thoughts of what had happened just a couple of hours ago, and a nagging worry of what might have befallen Benedict West, who'd been dragged through that pearl-white doorway to who knows where, Robyn Vincent stared without really seeing the world outside. Noel dozed on the couch. Ellery had gone to check that no one had tampered with the apartment doors.
When he returned to the living room, he whispered to her, ”Nothing.”
She took that to mean the door was untouched, and that there was no sign of Benedict, the creatures, or the two hoodlums who'd sprayed the dance hall with bullets.
Ellery's calm presence reassured her. Once more the thought occurred to her: I know him. I've met him somewhere before… The bruise on his forehead from the tussle earlier had faded a little, while the graze on her own back had subsided from soreness to a tingle. They'd been lucky to escape largely unscathed. But what now? She knew they should check on Mariah Lee in the under-stage void, only the idea of venturing beyond the locked door to the lobby was a real no-no. For God's sake, what on earth lurked down there? Or waited in the shadows of the dance floor? She remembered the creature that had torn the T-shirt from her body only too well, the way its eyes burned with”Robyn.”Ellery broke into her thoughts. ”The crows have returned to the roof and the trees.”Again when he spoke to her, the stammer vanished.
”They have not dispersed… this means someone else will die, soon.”
***
Benedict West couldn't have known that the crows had only moments before (on a different physical plane) pursued the fleeing soul of the guy who had been dragged here by his ankles.
All Benedict could see of the man who had once possessed the shriveled face of a heavy-duty drug user were separate mounds of wet meat and internal organs that still steamed in the cold air of this gray forest.
Benedict lay on the ground. Bonds of dirty rags still secured his arms and legs. He would run nowhere fast in a while, he knew that for sure.
Cold numbed him now. Damp leeched from leaf mold into his skin. Above him the branches stirred with a whisper as a chill breeze blew through them. In the distance he heard the harsh cry of a bird. He'd swear no human ear was familiar with that alien song. When he closed his eyes to avoid gazing at those piles of human meat and bone, not to mention the pool of blood that soaked into the earth, leaving a muddy brown residue, Benedict still recalled with sickening clarity the creatures tearing the man's skin from his body. They'd peeled him alive, removing his face and scalp of ratty hair in one piece. Then they'd rolled the skin from his arms as if easing off long over-the-elbow gloves. The skin of his torso they split (using their fingernails) along a line just below the navel, then up the center of his chest before following a course around his collarbone. This piece they peeled off as if it were a tight-fitting vest. The rest of the skin came off in glistening red scraps. Surprisingly the man had survived a long way into the ordeal, screaming with ear-splitting power for whole minutes after they'd removed his face. Death had only come quickly when they tore open the belly area. The man's guts and skeleton didn't interest them and they left them just feet away from Benedict.
Benedict lay there, trying not to inhale the organic smell oozing richly from the human spoil heap. A spicy undertone suggested the dead guy's last supper might have involved teriyaki sauce in the mix. Benedict's throat twitched convulsively Don't vomit, he told himself. Not while you're lying here. You'll choke on it. Numb with cold, he tried to move a little to ease the pressure of wet earth against his side and maybe encourage his circulation to move faster. All he succeeded in doing was rolling onto his back. Once more he could see the creatures that had skinned the young man. Although they stood with their backs to Benedict, he could see arms moving as they worked at a task he couldn't quite see.
Then one must have sensed it was being watched. It paused before turning to look back at Benedict.
Benedict stared. He was looking into the face of the guy who'd just been skin-stripped. Cold pooled in his belly as he understood what he was seeing. One of the creatures wore the dead guy's face as a mask. Red monster eyes glared through the eye sockets. The ratty scalp of hair rested on the creature's head; now caked with drying blood, the hair stuck up in crispy points.
One by one the monsters turned to watch Benedict. Then that pool of ice grew outward through his body. They weren't merely glancing back at him.
They were sizing him up. When the others turned, he saw each one wore scraps of the man's bloodstained skin. Some pieces had been stretched too tightly over muscular shoulders so they split. Others had been roughly tugged on like a young child would pull on a sweater, wrinkling it, leaving a collar or a sleeve rumpled. After looking him over they took a step forward.
And that's when Benedict West thought: Now it's my turn.
***
They came in their scrappy pieces of skin, wearing them like ill-fitting clothes. A creature with a strip of silver hair down its spine wore the man's peeled face as a mask. Blood had dried in tiger stripes across it, while the mouth formed a misshapen grin because the skin had been pulled over tight across its jaw. A monster wore arm skin like a sleeve.
Another wore torso flesh like a ripped vest. Another had tied a bloody strip that Benedict didn't even want to identify around its head, bandanna fashion. Bound as he was with strips of rag, Benedict could barely move; even so, he did his best to squirm away from them through the mat of rotting leaves, his mobility reduced to nothing faster than worm. All the time he kept his eyes on the advancing creatures in the breathless hope that he could somehow stare them down.
There was no staring these monsters into retreat. He realized that as they reached him. They bent down, extending their hands, and Benedict saw that the thickened fingernails were sharp as blades. His heart pounded; he breathed so hard his vision blurred as he bordered on hyperventilating. Above the monster heads he saw gray branches forming vein patterns against a bone-white sky. He clamped his teeth together, anticipating that first sharp nail to saw through his skin.
A shout of frustration as much as fear began to build in his throat, but the cry he heard when it came didn't erupt from him. It was an aggressive yell. The kind of noise you might make at a strange dog that had prowled up, snarling. Suddenly the figures around Benedict were moving fast, only they weren't attacking him. They blundered away with their arms raised to protect themselves from a long object that swished violently through the air. And that object didn't merely part cold forest air, but made contact with a shoulder or arm accompanied by the sound of a batter striking a home run. Squealing a braying hurting squeal, the creatures scattered.
Benedict rolled on his side. A tall guy with an astonishingly handsome face plunged into the gang of murderers. He wielded a branch that must have been eight feet long. Clubbing, slashing, jabbing, he drove the pack away Benedict stared. The man was naked apart from a pair of faded blue jeans. His skin shone a hard bluish-white, reminding Benedict of polished marble… no, more than mere marble, but marble sculpted into the form of a warrior hero. A living statue? Benedict shook his head, trying to collect his breath as well as his scattered senses.
When the man bent down and effortlessly snapped the rags that bound Benedict, he saw his rescuer had human hair that surrounded a human face into which were set two very human eyes that revealed both intelligence and concern.
”We'll have to move fast,”his rescuer said. ”Those are slow-witted but they're smart enough to reach the conclusion that there are two of us and eight of them.”
”They'll come back?”
”Certainly. They want your skin.”
After being tied for a couple of hours at least, Benedict's limbs were numb, alien things that didn't belong to him. He stumbled repeatedly (even falling on all fours, worryingly close to the steaming mound of internal organs that had once been sheathed within the dead guy's hide).
Where now? Was his rescuer leading him deeper into the forest? Maybe his rescuer wasn't the benevolent kind but a human hyena that stole the prey of other predators? Maybe here in The Place, man-skin was a commodity to be fought over? ”Where are we going?”
”Ah.”The man stopped suddenly, then continued, but limping painfully ”What's happened?”Benedict asked as the man tried to carry his weight on his left foot.
”I'll be all right. We must get away from here… uh!”
Without a shadow of a doubt, he wasn't all right. Pain hardened his face. Benedict looked down at the man's feet, which were part hidden by fallen leaves. He was barefoot… no… Benedict saw that wasn't exactly true. The man didn't have any feet at all. His legs ended in a pair of hands, not feet. They were palm down, fingers pointing forward as toes, yet splayed out wide. By now, Benedict had learned not to be surprised by what anatomical oddities presented themselves in The Place.
Hands instead of feet? Go figure. One of the hands didn't make contact with the ground; obviously the man found it too painful to put his body weight on it.
”Hurry! We can't wait here,” the man urged.
”You're not moving anywhere fast like that. Let me check your…”Benedict nearly said ”foot.”Instead he crouched down with a curt, ”Raise your leg.”
The man bent his knee, raising his calf and uncanny foot-hand behind him. Immediately Benedict saw the problem.
”A thorn,”he said. ”Dirty great big one. This is going to sting.”
The man merely nodded his head-as good as a go on, get it over with.
Benedict gripped the thorn-a monster thorn; what else would you expect in this weird, monsterized forest? The size of his little finger, the thorn had buried itself nearly up to its hilt in the lined palm.
”Hurry,” the man said. ”They've gotten around to deciding they outnumber us.”
Benedict glanced back through the trees. A hundred yards away striding around the tree trunks, came the skinners. They looked determined. Their eyes were locked on Benedict. One still wore the drug guy mask, neck skin flapping in the breeze.
”OK.”Benedict gripped the thorn hard as he could between finger and thumb, then pulled. It slipped smoothly out, followed by an upswell of blood from the wound. ”Wait… it's bleeding.”
”It'll be fine,”the man insisted. ”Move as fast as you can.”
Benedict raced after the man. He-it?-moved swiftly, with no trace of a limp now that the thorn was out. Benedict found himself gazing at him in wonder as they ran. Not because that blue-white man possessed the magnificent physique of a warrior hero, but because of what Benedict had just seen when he'd extracted the thorn. There had been a distinctive pattern on the huge thumb that helped the man balance with consummate agility. The words of old Benjamin Lockram came back to him from the video recording. Lockram had sat in the spotlight, speaking about his kidnapped son. “On the thumb of Nathaniel's left hand is a brown birthmark that resembles the Man in the Moon.”
Despite everything, Benedict felt a shiver tingle his spine as he told himself, if not the lingering ghost of the former owner of the Luxor.
”Mr. Lockram, I've just gone and found your only son.”
CHAPTER 31
Benedict West ran hard. The man who had rescued him was none other than Nathaniel Lockram, the son of old Benjamin Lockram. Here, running effortlessly on big muscular hands instead of feet, was the adult of the baby who'd been abducted all those years ago.
Benedict perspired. His throat narrowed from the exertion of the chase.
Breathing grew harder and harder. His heart pounded. What's more, running through the gray forest wasn't easy. The rug of fallen leaves was slippery. Knots of roots erupted from the ground to form sudden obstacles that he had to leap over. Here, branches hung so low that he had to stoop double to run beneath them. And then there were the Skinners. Yes, the Skinners. The nickname came easily enough when he thought how they'd peeled the guy alive. The Skinners followed at a full-blooded run, easily weaving around tree trunks, their eyes gleaming, no doubt lusting after Benedict's epidermic covering.
”I… I.. ”I can't run much farther were the words he was aiming to pant out to Nathaniel, only exhaustion robbed the air from his lungs.
The big guy didn't appear to notice the broken start of Benedict's sentence. Instead he pointed to a screen of undergrowth.
”Go through there. Keep running forward. Don't stop for anything. Don't look back. Don't fall.”
Jesus Christ. That's a tall order. It's all I can do to keep my footing on this slippery mush.
On glancing back now, he saw that the Skinners were only fifty yards behind. And, boy, were they coming on strong. They'd got the hunter's fire in their hearts now. They would not stop until they had their fingers under his face, ripping… peeling…
Benedict put his head down to charge through bushes into a clearing.
Before he could even interpret what he saw, a block of mist standing in the clearing engulfed him. Cold and warm air currents moved the air in turbulent twists. Drizzly rain wet his face. There was a sense of the ground being dropped away beneath his feet, so like one of those cartoon characters sprinting over a cliff edge, suddenly his feet paddled air, not solid ground. Immediately his balance was shot. He felt himself stumbling. What's more, he could see nothing but pearl-white mist pouring against his face. Then his feet slammed against a surface. Not spongy, not uneven, but still slippery as hell. Arms flailing as he tried to regain his balance, he spun, fell butt first, then looked around. Absolute dark. He saw nothing. Heard nothing. And yet, he knew immediately where he was. The warm dry air bearing a smell of dust gave it away. The Luxor.
”Give me your hand.”Nathaniel's voice was evenly balanced. No sign of exertion.
Benedict held up his hand and felt another close around his.
”Stand. I'll lead you.”
As well as freaky feet, the guy had perfect night vision, too.
”Where are we going?”
”The apartment. I know your friends are there.”
”How do you know that?”
”We've been watching.”
Benedict allowed himself to be led through absolute darkness that pressed with velvet softness against his eyes. ”I know something, too,”he said.
”Oh?”
”Your name is Nathaniel Lockram. Your father once owned this place.”
”You're right,”Nathaniel agreed. ”I have plenty to tell you, too…
Careful of the door. We're moving into the lobby There, do you see?”
Benedict saw. The security boards didn't quite cover the glass panels over the front entrance. Here and there, morning sunlight formed rods of gold that shone through cracks to illuminate areas of carpet or fragments of tomb paintings on walls. Benedict saw Nathaniel pause to look at the reproduction mummy painting, then raise his head to gaze at the eye of the sun god on the ceiling.
”What about those things following us?”Benedict regained his breath.
”They'll catch up soon enough.”
”No. I closed the doorway as soon as we passed through. They'll still be running in circles in the clearing and screaming at each other, wondering where we went.” He shrugged, then added, ”Like I say, they're not very bright.”
”But very dangerous?”
”Yes.”
”What if they reopen the doorway?”
That they can't do.”
”I'll see if I can raise my friends.”Benedict walked to the door that led to the apartment. He knocked.
”Before I share information with you, perhaps there is something you can tell me…?”
”Benedict.”
”Benedict. I'm concerned for my friend. I haven't seen her in a while.”
”Oh?”
”You might have encountered her here.”
The blood drained from Benedict's face as he realized what the man would say next.
”Benedict. I'm looking for a woman called Mariah Lee.”
***
Logan had considered blasting the two men into the hereafter as they crossed the dance floor. Only when he fired next, he was keen that Ellery Hann would be the numero uno in his sights.
The first he knew about the arrivals was a scuffling sound, as if one had fallen. He chose not to use the flashlight; instead he relied on a dim light that came from a source he couldn't identify Strangely though, there looked to be a mist on the dance floor that just for a second glowed with its own radiance. Then it had gone, returning the building to darkness. Logan couldn't see anymore, but he'd glimpsed enough. One big guy built like a pro wrestler along with his smaller amigo. Logan had recognized neither. Unless they were armed he didn't see that they posed a threat. And at that moment Logan had no fear of them using a cell phone to contact the cops. They were up to something freaky. No way were they going to bring the forces of law and order here.
Soon those two, along with Eh-Eh-Ellery's buddies, would know the feel of red hot metal boring holes through their bodies. Logan kissed the barrel of the submachine gun, then settled down to wait some more.
***
Opening the door to a man with blue-white skin, the same smooth shining texture of marble, and who stood close to seven foot and weighed perhaps in excess of two-fifty pounds, came as no surprise to Ellery. He'd seen him before. He'd even seen that his muscular legs, clad in denim, ended not in feet but hands. Ellery had believed he'd watched the man during an excursion into imagination, only now he knew differently. The man and the gray forest he, Ellery, called The Place, and the shining city on the hill were as real as the skyscrapers of Chicago.