I’m too late, Tom thought, wanting to burst into tears. David has already died.
Was he seeing David’s ghost?
“Dad?” the ghost said again. He now stood only a few feet away.
He looked so real, so solid, but Tom didn’t want to reach out and touch his son in case he vanished or his hand went right through him. Was this another trick of the Shadows, like the flies? He was terrified he would dispel this illusion and it would be the last time he ever saw his son.
“Are you...” Tom couldn’t bring himself to say the word.
“Dead?” his son finished with one eyebrow raised.
The sight made Tom want to cry. David had not had any eyebrows or lashes for several months now.
But David shook his head. “I don’t think so. Part of me is still in the hospital—the sick part of me. But the real me—the bit that’s still good—is here now.”
Tom mouth dropped open in amazement. “How do you know that?”
“I don’t know,” David shrugged. “I felt something inside of me, something watching, and the only way it wouldn’t know I was here was if I left my body in the hospital bed. The rest of me came here to help you.”
David looked and sounded so real. Part of Tom’s brain screamed at him not to believe the trick, but the other part just couldn’t help it.
Finally, Tom let himself reach towards his son. His hand didn’t pass straight through him. Instead, his fingers met with skin and cloth, as real as anyone he’d ever felt. Before he could stop himself, a moan of relief passed his lips.
He pulled David towards him in a fierce hug and his son’s small arms wrapped around his waist, squeezing him tight. Tom bent his head to touch his lips against the boy’s head. David smelled as he always had, of soap and grass and potato chips. He was like a tonic against the fetid stench of the Underlife—the rotting vegetation and stagnant water. He didn’t know how this was possible, how David could be in two places at the same time, but he was insanely grateful to have his son by his side. This didn’t feel like bad magic, it only felt good. Tom was only too aware that he may never see his son again in the real world and he intended to grab this opportunity for what it was—a blessing.
Only when Tom pulled his face away and felt the dampness on his skin, did he realise he was crying.
David stared at his father, his eyes widening in surprise. “Don’t be sad, Dad. I’m here to help.”
Tom nodded, not trusting himself to speak for a moment. He cleared his throat, composing himself.
“I’m not sad, kiddo. I’m just really glad to see you.”
“I’m happy to see you too, Dad. It’s scary down here on my own.”
“Yeah, I know. I’ve been scared too.”
David laughed. “You don’t get scared.”
His son’s total trust in him both broke his heart and made him feel like a different person all at the same time. It was the first time someone’s faith in him had made him think he might be strong enough to take on what lay ahead.
Tom was not a brave person, but his son made him want to be one.
“What is this place anyway?”
Tom didn’t know how to explain. He wasn’t even sure himself.
“It’s the home of an ancient creature—a bad creature—and I’m here to stop it from hurting people.”
“You mean the black stuff?” David asked. “The stuff with all the voices?”
Tom’s heart practically stopped. “You’ve seen it?”
David nodded. “Yeah. That’s the thing back in the hospital bed with me—the thing that’s been watching me, or taking over me, or... something.”
“Jesus.” Tom ran a hand through his hair. Of course he’d been told the Shadows had something to do with making David sick, but it never even occurred to him that David would have been aware of it too. He must have been so scared. Tom’s heart broke for him.
“You can’t stay down here, David,” he said. “Something is going to happen and you shouldn’t be here when it does.”
David shook his head. “I can’t go back, not yet. The stuff inside me is waiting for me to appear. I can hide from it down here, but I couldn’t in the hospital.”
Tom wanted to cry. He didn’t want David to experience any of this, but what was worse, him going back to the body inhabited by both cancer and the Shadows? If David felt safer down here than who was he to argue.
He reached down and ruffled his son’s hair. It had been a long time since he’d been able to do that.
“I can’t say I’m not happy for the company, kiddo, but you need to be careful, okay?”
“So do you, Dad. No one is safe down here.”
Tom smiled. “When did you get so smart, huh?”
David grinned and blushed pink in the gloom.
Together, father and son continued on.
David moved easily through the tunnel, sloshing through the water as though splashing in puddles after a brief, but heavy rain. He was relishing his new found health and Tom found himself drawing strength from his son. Watching David run again, even in these bizarre and frightening surroundings, warmed him to the soul and kept out the horror of the Shadows.
How easily David accepted what was happening amazed Tom. He had none of the questions or disbelief of adulthood.
A giant segmented earthworm wriggled out of a crust of mud in the roof and plopped into the water in a coil. A huge, black beetle scurried across David’s foot and he kicked out. The bug hit the wall before falling back into the water and scurrying away.
He laughed. “It’s not quite football with my friends, but I’m not complaining.”
Tom couldn’t help but smile. “So you feel better then?”
“Yeah, I do.” His face grew dark. “But the part of me still in the hospital bed isn’t doing so well. I stopped being able to talk to Mum and I don’t remember when I last woke up. That’s not good, is it?”
No, it isn’t, Tom thought, but he couldn’t say so to his son. His natural instinct was to always protect him, even when it meant not telling him the whole truth.
“I expect your body is trying to save its energy,” he said instead. “You’re going to need it when you go back?”
“I don’t want to go back.”
“I know, kiddo, but if we’re going to get you better again, you can’t stay down here.”
“I guess,” he said, but his shoulders sagged, as though Tom had taken the wind out of his sails. “I just hate the thought of going back to feeling so sick again.”
“It won’t be for long.”
David nodded. “We’re getting closer,” he said. “We’re nearly there.”
“How do you know that?”
“I can feel the Shadows. Like it’s calling me.”
His words chilled Tom to the soul. “Do you think it knows you’re down here?”
“Oh, no.” David seemed certain. “It still thinks I’m in the hospital, but I can’t help being pulled to the main part down here.”
A weight clutched Tom’s heart. He didn’t want David anywhere near the Shadows.
A dark shape on the ground ahead of them looked horribly familiar and Tom’s stomach flipped in anticipation.
David ran forward. “Hey, Dad, look!”
“Wait, David!” he called, reaching out an arm to his son, but he was too late. David had reached the object and bent down.
“Look, it’s a doll. Someone left a doll down here.”
“Don’t touch it!” He couldn’t hide the high-pitched, panicked tone in his voice.
It couldn’t be the same one; it wasn’t possible. He had left that doll far behind. Yet the doll looked exactly the same, with its blue cloth body and disjointed heavy limbs. Also, the toy lay in exactly the same position Tom had dropped it in.
Am I walking around in circles?
Was the whole tunnel running in a loop, so he’d never get out of here? He tried to think of anything he might have noticed that differentiated this part of the tunnel fro
m any of the rest since he had last seen the doll, but nothing came to mind. With only the dim green light lighting the way, the whole tunnel looked the same.
He grabbed David’s arm, pulling him along. “Just leave it.”
David looked at his dad in confusion, but allowed himself to be pulled along.
They kept walking, but something moved in the water behind them.
“Ha-ha-ha,” came the voice. “I love you…”
Every muscle in Tom’s body froze and ice-cold fingers slowly worked their way across his shoulders and down the back of his neck.
Slowly, he turned around.
The doll-baby walked down the tunnel towards him, tottering on its dislocated legs. It laughed again, insisting it loved him. The doll’s head lolled to one side and its arms flopped uselessly by its side.
“Oh, my God.” Terror gripped Tom’s heart. He didn’t want to believe what he saw.
“Dad? What’s wrong?” David stared back down the tunnel.
Tom shot his son a glance. The boy’s gaze travelled past the horrifying doll, skirting the expanse of the tunnel. He didn’t see what Tom did. Despite this, Tom didn’t intend on hanging around long enough to allow this thing to reach them.
“Just move!” He pushed David ahead of him, trying to get the boy to go faster.
“What is it?” David asked again, peering back over his shoulder.
The doll kept walking towards them, taking step after step on its bowed legs, its head resting on its shoulder as though someone had broken its neck.
“Run!”
David started to jog down the tunnel, but Tom still couldn’t tear his eyes from the freak of nature lurching towards him.
He was stuck in the middle of a nightmare that was all too real.
Tom turned to run, to follow his son down the tunnel, only to find his path blocked.
Abby stood before him, her head lowered, staring at her hands which were cupped in front of her. Her hair hung down either side of her face in lank, lifeless curtains. Slowly, she held her wrists out to him, her arms shaking.
With horror, Tom saw blood coated the whole of her lower arms and hands. Inverted crosses slit her skin; separating flesh, arteries, and veins.
“Why?” she cried. “Why did you do this to us?”
“Abby?”
Blood spilled from her wrists into the stagnant water. In the florescent green light, the bright red blood appeared black. She sobbed, her head bent, but then she lifted her gaze to him. Tom jerked back in shock. More blood ran from her eyes like tears.
“This is your fault,” she screamed at him, her bloodied eyes filled with rage. “You abandoned us when we needed you most and now David is dead! It’s all because of you. You killed us both!”
“Abby, no! David isn’t dead, he’s here.”
But doubts entered his mind. What if she told the truth? What if both of them were dead and he now faced their ghosts?
David yelled from deeper down the tunnel and Tom’s gaze flicked over Abby’s shoulder, towards his son. “It’s not real, Dad. Whatever you can see is only the Shadows trying to make you turn back. You’re so close now. Don’t believe its lies!”
Tom’s eyes moved from his son to the horrific monster that had taken on the form of his wife.
What did Sky say? It’s magic—and not the pulling rabbits out of hats kind either—it’s bad shit.
He shook his head, and closed his eyes, trying to dispel the image. When he opened them, Abby still stood before him.
“I don’t believe you,” he said, as firmly as he could. “Abby is not dead. David is not dead. This is all lies.”
Behind him, the doll still stood, swaying.
Then the laughter started, coming from the walls. The laughter of a thousand voices, each one of them more insane than the next.
Tom clamped his hands over his ears and squeezed his eyes shut.
“I don’t believe you!” he yelled, like a child trying to deny the existence of monsters in his closet. “I don’t believe you!”
Suddenly, the strange slipping motion overwhelmed him—the sensation of falling back in time and leaving his adult self behind. Tom panicked. He didn’t want to leave David and he scrambled mentally to get back. Then, just as abruptly, he fell back again and when he opened his eyes all of the horror had gone.
He was back in a still and silent tunnel with David standing in front of him, looking at him with wide, curious eyes.
“What happened, Dad? One minute you were stood there shouting and then you kind of went all faint.”
Tom took a moment to get his head straight and process what his son had said. The tunnel continued to feel as though it moved around him, like he’d stepped off a fairground ride.
“Faint?” Tom said. “What do you mean—like I lost conscious?”
“No!” David’s voice grew higher in his excitement. “You actually went faint. I could see right through you.”
Tom stared at David. The feeling of movement, of dropping back in time, wasn’t only in his head. Did something physical actually happen to him? Yet none of the others had mentioned anything like that before. Was it because he was in a different place now? Had the magic down here given him an actual physical ability to drop back in time?
The thought was crazy, but no less crazy than anything else happening down here. After all, he was talking to his son, who, right at this moment, lay in a hospital bed in London.
Tom shook his head at the thought. “That can’t be real,” he muttered.
“It is, Dad. I saw you!”
He shut his eyes briefly, trying to get his head around things. Perhaps none of this was real. How could he believe something his son told him when David might be a figment of his overwrought imagination?
No, David was actually here. At least some part of him was; the part that made him David. What lay in the hospital bed was no more than his shell; the thing he needed to inhabit the real world.
“We’re real,” Tom said, holding his hand out to his son.
David slipped his small hand into Tom’s palm and Tom squeezed it tight.
“We’re real,” he said again and together, hand in hand, they continued on their journey.
* * *
AHEAD, THE TUNNEL disappeared into total black.
The darkness was absolute. The phosphorescence stopped cleanly, as though someone had drawn a line through it. To Tom, the total dark looked like a wormhole in space, as though light could not exist in whatever lay beyond.
“We’re here,” David said.
Tom took a deep breath, trying to calm the fear crawling up his throat, making him sick to his stomach. He crouched so his face was level with David’s and put his hands on his son’s narrow shoulders.
“I don’t want you to come with me, do you understand?”
“But, Dad,” David protested. “It can’t sense me. It doesn’t know I am here.”
“Don’t argue with me. I still have no idea what is going to happen, but whatever it is I am sure I don’t want you involved. You’re a strong kid—hell, you’re braver than I ever was—but you’re still a child, and, more importantly, you’re my child. At least let me protect you from some things. Got it?”
David nodded, his eyes downcast. “You’ll come back though, won’t you? You won’t leave me here?”
Tom swallowed. He wanted more than anything to be able to tell his son that he would be back and everything would be all right, but he couldn’t bring himself to lie to him. Not now.
“I will do everything in my power to get back to you, but if I don’t...” David’s eyes filled with tears and his own throat clogged with a big, hard lump.
He cleared his throat and tried again. “But if I don’t, you must go back to your mother. Go back to the hospital and fight this thing with everything you have. Okay?”
David nodded again.
“And David, tell your mum how much I love her and that I never meant to leave her alone.”
“
I will,” he said, his voice tiny.
Then he and David clung to one another, saying their goodbyes.
Chapter 22
TOM PLUNGED INTO the dark.
The darkness was thick enough to be palpable, like a fog pressing against his skin, filling his lungs. It swallowed the light from his torch. Though the small bulb emitted some light, it did nothing to penetrate the dark. He realised for the first time he could not hear his own footsteps—in fact, he couldn’t hear anything! Stepping into the black had also meant stepping into a sound vacuum.
He stopped walking.
He got no sense of David waiting behind him and he was certain if he tried to shout out to his son his voice would simply be swallowed. The thought scared him, the panicky claws of claustrophobia climbing up his chest. Would he be able to get back again? If he turned around and walked back, would he simply pop out the same way he’d come in or would the darkness never end?
Tom forced his legs to keep moving. Going back wasn’t an option. He took comfort in only one thing—this ordeal was almost over.
He was scared for David and felt wretched for leaving the boy alone. He still struggled to get his head around the idea that, even though David waited for him, it wasn’t really the whole David. If David didn’t get back to the body lying in the children’s hospital bed, he would never have a life and the thought of him being stuck down here didn’t bear thinking about.
Tom’s heart thudded and he consciously took slow and steady breaths to stop from hyperventilating.
Just think about David, think about Abby.
He tried to block the fear from his mind, terrified it would overwhelm him and he would lose control. He thought of Abby with tears in her eyes, telling him she was pregnant. He thought of David as a baby, when they’d gone on their first family holiday to Spain. He thought of Christmas when David had been three years old—the first year he had really understood what was happening. David had been so excited they had been certain he would be waking them up in the early hours. But in the morning, Abby had been the one who’d leapt out of bed first thing, waking David to open his presents.
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