him as all the others had. He sort of . . .
drifted into it, deeper, deeper. And the further he went, the more he
suspected that this time he would not be pulled rudely back from that
realm of higher consciousness. From now on he Would be a resident of
both worlds, which was how the great $spirits themselves lived, with
awareness of both the higher and lower states of existence. He even
began to think that what he was undergoing now, spiritually, was a
conversion of his will, a thousand times more profound than that which
the citizens of Moonlight Cove had undergone.
in this exalted state, everything was special and wondrous to Shaddack.
The twinkling lights of the rainswept town seemed like jewels sprinkled
through the descending darkness. The molten, silvery beauty of the rain
itself astonished him, as did the swiftly dimming, gorgeously turbulent
gray sky.
As he braked at the intersection of Paddock Lane and Sadd back Drive, he
touched his breast, feeling the tele he wore from a chain around his
neck, unable to remember what it was, and that seemed mysterious and as
wonderful, as well. Then he recalled that the device monitor and
broadcast his heartbeat, which was received by a unit at New Wave. It
was effective over a distance of five miles, an would work even when he
was indoors. If the reception of his heartbeat was interrupted for more
than one minute, Sun was programmed to feed a destruct order, via
microwave, to the microsphere computers in all of the New People.
A few minutes later, on Bastenchurry Road, when he touched the device,
the memory of its purpose again proved elusive.
He sensed that it was a powerful object, that whoever wore it held lives
of others in his hands, and the fantasy-tripping child in him decided
that it must be an amulet, bestowed upon spirits, one more sign that he
stood astride the two in the ordinary plane of ordinary men and the
realm of the great spirits, the gods of the cactus candy.
His slowly phased-in flashback, like time-released medication, had
carried him back into the condition of his youth at least to those seven
years when he'd been in the thrall of runningdeer. He was a child. And
he was a demigod. He was the favored child of the moonhawk, so he could
do anything he wanted to anyone, with anyone, and as he continued to
drive, he fantasized about just what he might want to do . . . and to
whom. Now and then he laughed softly and slightly shrilly, and his eyes
gleamed like those of a cruel and twisted boy studying d effects of fire
on captive ants.
moose padded around them and wagged his tail so hard it seemed in danger
of flying off, Chrissie waited in the kitchen for Tessa and Sam until
more light bled out of the dying day.
At last Sam said, "All right. Stay close. Do what I say every step of
the way.
He looked at Chrissie and Tessa for a long moment before suddenly
opening the door; without any of them speaking a word, they hugged one
another. Tessa kissed Chrissie on the cheek, and Sam kissed her, and
Chrissie returned their kisses. She didn't have to be told why they all
suddenly felt so affectionate. They Were people, real people, and
expressing their feelings was important, because before the night was
out they might not be people any more. Maybe they wouldn't ever again
feel the of things real people felt, so those feelings were more
precious by the second.
Who knew what those weird shape-changers felt? Who would Want to know?
Besides, if they didn't reach Central, it would be because one Of the
search parties or a couple of the Boogeymen nailed them along the way.
In that case this might be their last chance to say goodbye to one
another.
Finally Sam led them onto the porch.
Carefully, Chrissie closed the door behind them. Moose didn't try to
get out. He was too good and noble a dog for such cheap tricks. But he
did stick his snout in the narrowing crack, sniffing her and trying to
lick her hand, so she was afraid she was going to pinch his nose. He
pulled back at the last moment, and the door clicked shut.
SAM led them down the steps and across the yard toward the house to the
south of Harry's. No lights were on there. Chrissie hoped no one was
home, but she figured some monstrous creature was at one of the dark
windows right now, peering out at them and licking its chops.
The rain seemed colder than when she'd been on the run last night, but
that might have been because she had just come out of the warm, dry
house. Only the palest gray glow still illuminated the sky to the west.
The icy, slashing droplets seemed to be tearing the last of the light
out of the clouds and driving it into the earth, pulling down a deep,
damp darkness. Before they had even reached the fence separating
Harry's property from the next, Chrissie was grateful for the hooded
nylon windbreaker even though it was so big on her that it made her feel
as if she was a little kid playing dress-up in her parents' clothes.
It was a picket fence, easy to clamber over. They followed San across
the neighbor's backyard to another fence. Chrissie was over that one,
too, and into yet another yard, with Tessa close behind her, before she
realized they had reached the Coltranes' place.
She looked at the blank windows. No lights on here, either which was a
good thing, because if there had been lights, to, that would mean
someone had found what was left of the Coltranes after their battle with
Sam.
Crossing the yard toward the next fence, Chrissie was overcome by the
fear that the Coltranes had somehow reanimated themselves after Sam had
fired all of those bullets into them that they were standing in the
kitchen and looking out the south windows right this minute, that they
had seen their nemesis an two companions, and that they were even now
opening the door. She expected two robot-things to come clanking out
with metal arms and working massive metal hands, sort of like versions
of the walking dead in old zombie movies, miniature radar-dish antennae
whirling around and around steam hissing from body vents.
Her fear must have slowed her, because Tessa ran into her from behind
and gave her a gentle push to hurry her. Chrissie crouched and hurried
to the south side of the yard.
Sam helped her over a wrought-iron fence with spear points on the
staves. She would probably have gored herself if she'd had to scale it
alone. Chrissie shishkebab.
People were home at the next house, and Sam took careful -M - 393 and
some shrubbery to study the lay of things before con g. Chrissie and
Tessa quickly joined him there.
While clambering over the last fence, she'd rubbed the abraded her left
hand, even though it was bandaged. It hurt, but she gritted her teeth
and made no complaint. through the branches of what appeared to be a
mulberry bush, He peered at the house, which was only twenty feet away.
She saw four people through the kitchen windows. They were getting
dinner together. A middle-aged couple, a gray-haired gran
dfather and a
teenage girl.
She wondered if they had been converted yet. She suspected Doll but
their was no way to be sure. And since the robots and boogeymen
sometimes hid in clever human disguises, you couldn't trust anyone, not
even your best friend . . . or your parents. Pretty much the same as
when aliens were taking over.
'Even if they look out, they won't see us," Sam said.
"Come On.
Chrissie followed him from the cover of the mulberry bush and across the
open lawn toward the next property line, thanking God for the fog, which
was getting denser by the minute.
. Eventually they reached the house at the end of the block.
The south side of that lawn fronted the cross street, Bergenwood Way,
which led down to Conquistador.
When they were two-thirds of the way across the lawn, less than twenty
feet from the street, a car turned the corner a block and a half uphill
and started down. Following Sam's lead, Chrissie threw herself flat on
the soggy lawn because there was no nearby shrubbery behind which to
take refuge. If they tried to scramble too far, the driver of the
approaching car might get close enough to spot them while they were
still scuttling for cover.
NO streetlamps flanked Bergenwood, which was in their favor.
The last of the ashen light was gone from the western sky mother boon.
As the car drew nearer, moving slowly either because of the bad weather
or because its occupants were part of a patrol, its lights were diffused
by the fog, which seemed not to be !reflecting that light but glowing
with a radiance of its own. Oh*it in the night for yards on both sides
of the car were half lighted and weirdly distorted by those slowly
churning, groundluminous clouds.
When the car was less than a block away, someone riding in the back seat
switched on a hand-held spotlight. He directed out his side window,
playing it over the front lawns of the houses that faced on Bergenwood
and the side lawns of houses that faced the cross streets. At the moment
the beam was pointed in the opposite direction, south, toward the other
side of Bergenwood But by the time they had driven this far, they might
decide to spotlight the properties to the north of Bergenwood.
"Backtrack," Sam said fiercely.
"But stay down and craw crawl. " The car reached the intersection, half
a block uphill.
Chrissie crawled after Sam, not straight back . the way they had come
but toward the nearby house. She didn't see anywhere he could hide,
because the back-porch railing was pretty open and there were no large
shrubs. Maybe he figured to slip around the side of the house until the
patrol passed, but she didn't think she and Tessa would make it to the
corner in time.
When she glanced over her shoulder, she saw that the spotlight was still
sweeping the front lawns and between the houses on the south flank of
the street. However, there was the side-glow effect of the headlights to
worry about, and that was going to wash across this lawn in a few
seconds.
She was half crawling and half slithering on her belly, moving fast,
though no doubt squashing lots of snails and earthworms that had come
out to bask on the wet grass, which didn't bear thinking about. She
came to a concrete walkway close to t house-and realized that Sam had
disappeared.
She halted on her hands and knees, looking left and right.
Tessa appeared at her side.
"Cellar steps, honey. Hurry!"
Scrambling forward, she discovered a set of exterior concrete steps
leading down to a cellar entrance. Sam was at the bottom, where
collected rainwater gurgled softly into a drain in front of the closed
cellar door. Chrissie joind him in that haven, slipping below ground
level, and Tessa followed. About four seconds later a spotlight swept
across the back of the house and even played for a moment inches above
their heads, on the concrete lip of the stairwell.
They huddled in silence, unmoving, for a minute or so and the spotlight
swung away from them and the car passed Chrissie was sure that something
inside the house had heard them, that - 395 the door at Sam's back would
fly open at any second, that something would leap at them, a creature
part werewolf and part computer, snarling and beeping, its mouth
bristling with both teeth and programming keys, saying something like,
"To be
eaten press ENTER and proceed."
She was relieved when at last Sam whispered, "Go."
They recrossed the lawn toward Bergenwood Way. This time the street
remained conveniently deserted.
As Harry promised, a stone-lined drainage channel ran along Bergenwood-
According to Harry, who had played in it when he was a kid, the channel
was about three feet wide and five feet deep. Judging by those
dimensions, a foot or so of runoff surged through it at the moment.
Those currents were swift, almost black, revealed at the bottom of the
shadow trench only by an occasional dark glint and chuckle of swirreling
water.
The channel offered a considerably less conspicuous route than the open
street. They moved uphill a few yards until they saw the mortared, iron
handholds that Harry had promised they'd find every hundred feet along
the open sections of the channel- Sam climbed down first, Chrissie went
second, and Tessa brought up the rear.
,Sam hunched over to keep his head below street level, and Tessa a bit
less than he did. But Chrissie didn't have to hunch at all. Being
eleven had its advantages, especially when you were on the run from
werewolves or ravenous aliens or robots or Nazis, and or another during
the past twenty-four hours, she had been On the run from the first
three, but not from Nazis, e too, thank ."*God, though who knew what
might happen next.
The churning water was cold around her feet and calves. She was
surprised to discover that although it only reached her knees it had
considerable force. it pushed and tugged relentlessly, as though it
were a living thing with a mean desire to topple her. She was not in
any danger of falling as long as she stood in one place feet widely
planted, but she was not sure how long she could maintain her balance
while walking. The watercourse sloped steeply downhill. The old stone
floor, after several rainy seasons, was well polished by runoff. Because
of a combination of factors, the channel was the next best thing to an
amusement-park flume ride.
if she fell, she'd be swept all the way downhill, to within a block of
the bluff, where the channel widened straight down into the earth. Harry
had said somethi about safety bars dividing the passage into narrow
slots just before the downspout, but she figured that if she were swept
down there and had to rely on those bars, they would prove to be missing
or rusted out, leaving a straight shot to the bottom. The channel came
out again at the base of the cliffs, then led part of the way across the
beach, discharging the runoff onto the sand or, at I tide, into
the sea.
She had no difficulty picturing herself tumbling and twisting
helplessly, choking on filthy water, desperately but unsuccessfully
grabbing at the stone channel for purchase, suddenly plummeting a couple
of hundred feet straight down, banging against the walls of the shaft
when it went vertical, breaking bone smashing her head to bits, hitting
the bottom with . . .
Well, yes, she could easily picture it, but suddenly she didn't see any
wisdom in doing so.
Fortunately Harry had warned them of this problem, so Sam had come
prepared. From under his jacket and around his waist he unwound a
length of rope that he had removed from a long unused pulley system in
Harry's garage. Though the rope was old, Sam said it was still strong,
and Chrissie hoped he was right. He had tied one end around his waist
before leaving the house. Now he looped the other end through
Chrissie's belt and finally tied it around Tessa's waist, leaving
approximately three feet of play between each of them. If one of them
fell-and face it, Chrissie was far and away the one most likely to fall
most likely to be swept
to a wet and bloody death-the others could stand fast until she had time
to regain her footing.
That was the plan, anyway.
Securely linked, they started down the channel. Sam hunched over so no
one in a passing car would see his head bobbling above the stone rim of
the watercourse, Chrissie hunched over a bit, too, keeping her feet wide
apart, sort of troll-walking as she had done last night in the meadow.
Per Sam's instructions, she held on to the line with both hands, taking
Dean Koontz - (1989) Page 52
