by Mike Allen
The rustling of his feet through the damp grass grows muffled in the dense mist, then fades altogether. It’s as if his steps alight on the fog itself.
He takes ten strides, twenty, thirty, and then abrupt as a bird striking glass the fog ends. His land ends. The entire world ends.
Beyond the edge: an ocean of inhuman flesh, seen from undersea.
Just as the protective circle he drew in his horribly failed attempt to save his wife and daughter gave rise to a clear fishbowl barrier against the things it was intended to keep out; so does this island of sanity built from his daughter’s blood and his father’s rambling stories terminate at a barrier, one that shuts out the madness that swallowed the Earth whole. He and what’s left of his family—that disgusting black thing, forced to take the form of his wife when the spell touched her piecemeal remains, but not enough of his daughter left to take form too, only a voice—he and his family dwell now in this single pocket of peace, a bubble in the belly of the all-consuming beast.
On the other side of that barrier, pressed hard against it, pink translucent ropes thick as tanker trucks pulse and swell as rivers of ichor flow through their veiny channels. These titanic kraken tentacles move, slowly, like slugs on glass, and plasma churns and boils in the spaces between them. Sometimes the bubbles look like faces. Sometimes smaller things squeeze in between the vast squirming limbs, enormous urchins with eyes lining and crowning the spines, or amoebic creatures that spontaneously form mouths or multi-jointed arms as they flow bonelessly through the cramped liquid spaces. Sometimes gray skinless beings, sculpted crudely humanoid, emerge and scrabble desperately against the invisible barricade before the currents sweep them back into the sickening organic soup.
Delmar understands all now. If the clouds ever parted above and around his farm, these sights would form his heaven and his horizon.
He stares into the nausea-inducing chaos, unblinking, and speaks. “I’ll keep them alive, as long as I can.” He spreads his arms. “I’ll keep this alive, as long as I can. I’ll never, ever give you what you want.”
Behind the sliding pink tentacles, a vast eye peels open. Even through the layers of wormy flesh, he can see it.
And when it opens, pores gape all along the massed coils of pink, translucent flesh. They gape and flex like octopus siphons sucking water. Perhaps it’s these that make the noise Delmar hears as countless whispers speaking in one voice. Inside your shell, time still flows forward, but that time will end. Outside, time is still. Outside, your future is now. Outside, you are with us and have been forever and will be forever. Your future is our now.
While the orifices whisper, an immense mouth yaws apart above the eye. Things crawl inside its lips. And somewhere inside the crawling darkness, a man screams. He howls in such a magnitude of pain that Delmar can’t begin to imagine what’s being done to him. The man screams, and screams, over and over—then perhaps there comes a fraction of respite, for the howls crumble into high-pitched and pathetic sobs. Maybe there are words, repeated pleas, but Delmar can’t make them out before the screams start again, and the mouth closes, sealing them away.
The voice of the screaming, sobbing man—it is his own voice. The voice of his future self, once his safe haven has perished.
Delmar’s eyes are wet and bright and knowing. But his voice doesn’t waver. “I’ll keep them alive. As long as I can.”
As he retreats into the fog, the million-strong voice whispers back. We wait.
* * *
Light streams through the open kitchen window as Delmar slices onions for the omelets. The soothing breeze accepts his invitation to drift inside.
Delmar has the vaguest memory of an upsetting night, but a voice whispers in his ear, his own voice, telling him he has to forget for now, compartmentalize, or the weight of knowledge will keep him from what happiness he has left, with what’s left of his family, in the time he has left.
Whatever it was, it hardly seems to matter now. He breathes in the warm, sweet air that mingles with the smell of his own cooking and knows he can handle whatever life has to throw at him.
The sizzle of the bacon in the skillet doesn’t completely drown out water rushing onto tile as Lynda showers. He can do this almost without thinking: the bacon first, then eggs to soak up the flavor. Lynda always tsked him for that vice, frying eggs in bacon grease, but she can’t stop herself from wolfing down the results. Just an evil way to show my love, he likes to tell her.
He raises the knife above a helpless onion, then stops short. There’s singing, coming from the shower. He freezes, listening, because it’s Meaghan’s voice that sings, and that doesn’t seem right, and part of him knows the many, many reasons it’s not right, but that part of him refuses to share its concerns aloud. And so he shrugs it off. It’s not important.
Back to his task. He realigns the onion and steadies it for the killing stroke. Then something catches his eye. He lifts his hand to his face. His heart starts to pound.
A black growth shivers on the back of his ring finger, just below his wedding band. It extends as he watches, reaches out with twin protrusions akin to a snail’s eyes. They twitch toward him. He feels a painful, pricking sensation, but under his skin, and for a brief flicker another vision imposes over his own, a vision of his own face, monumental in size and monstrous. The inner voice he always hears, the one that comforts and warns him, speaks again, but only says, We wait.
His wife’s singing has stopped. The bathroom door opens.
“Sweetie,” Lynda calls from the shower, “can you bring me a towel?”
“Sure,” he answers, as he positions his hand on the cutting board. “In a minute.”
AN INVITATION VIA E-MAIL
From: Giles Milko
To: Miranda Statzler
Subject: Excellent piece in the Critic!
Date: Wed, 5 Nov 2003 11:12:03 -0500
X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (4.4.1545.48)
Hello, Ms. Statzler, Giles Milko here. Hopefully you remember me from the conversation we had last Thursday at the after-hours faculty party.
I have to say, I really enjoyed your essay in the newest Fairleigh Critic on the subjective nature of fear. I’m very much in agreement with your contention that the most extreme phobia or paranoia, no matter how crippling, can be overcome through the gradual building up of confidence. I must say that aside from being informative, I found your piece also to be quite entertaining, especially the self-deprecating wit you used in describing your efforts through therapy to overcome your fear of spiders. In my head I could hear the mental squeals of horror as Dr. Sherrill placed the tarantula in your hand; then feel the overwhelming burst of triumph as you set the spider gently on the table and realized: I did it! I did it!
Some of the asides in your article made me realize (Gods, can I be dense sometimes) that when you spoke of concerns about “arcane rites” in response to the invite to my Halloween party the next evening, that you possibly weren’t kidding and perhaps had some genuine anxieties. I really should stress that my wife and I had planned for the Halloween party to be occult-free—no spirits other than the liquid sort!
I realize I’ve gained a facetious reputation among students over the years, usually for little more than addressing poor Giordano Bruno’s attempt to understand the world through sorcery in a History of Science class! (I must say though, Bruno did have a knack for concocting ominous-looking magical symbols—it’s no wonder the Church made kindling out of him.) Obviously some such rumor reached you long before our first encounter in the flesh—so as soon as I finished your essay I felt compelled to write you and set things to rights.
The thaumaturgical ceremonies conducted in my home are not fearful, black-robed affairs reserved for special nights. They’re actually very casual things, held Sunday mornings or the occasional Saturday if someone wants to see a football game instead. They’re not geared toward any more sinister a purpose than furthering the ca
reers of the participants. (I, for one, need the boost. Consider that I teach nine credits a week, write a column for the town paper and complete a new book every two years. Do you really think I could do all that without “outside” help?)
A few faculty members take part, as well as one freelance writer from town who needs to combat his “day job brain drain.” Sometimes writers or artists from out of town make “guest” appearances. It’s all quite open and friendly. No one dresses up—T-shirts and sweats, in fact, are perfectly acceptable attire.
Of course, there has to be a sacrifice. Our ideal choice is one of those horribly misguided individuals (sadly, almost always a parent) who goes to the school board wanting to ban this book or that book, or goes whining to town council to cancel Halloween as a Satanic holiday. Unfortunately for the world, but good for us, there seems to be no shortage of them (though we’ve done our best, I swear). And if we can’t get our hands on an adult, one of their children will do the trick—those sorts of genes don’t need to spread.
The sacrifice doesn’t need to be conscious, but he or she does need to be alive, so that each of us can take a small bite of their still-beating heart. Making the proper cuts to remove a heart this way is frankly rather tricky, though we’ve all gotten well-practiced. Of course we have to pass a “chalice” around—a coffee cup will do, really—for that token chaser of blood. Then we summon the “outerdimensional persona” (that’s the politically correct term these entities seem to prefer nowadays.) Now at this point you might experience some of that anxiety you discussed in your essay, but there’s no need to worry. We’ve drawn the right symbols and circles so that the persona (our favorite is a fellow with a pleasantly dry wit named Mephisto) can’t do anything other than talk. Once we see his (its? Gender is never clear with these things) disembodied head hovering over the remains of the sacrifice, we pepper him with questions about the status of his labors with regard to our projects (in the ears of which editors or agents has he whispered, what bargains has he struck, did he give an appropriate nightmare to the woman who wrote that rude rejection, etc.)
After we get our update, he heads back to New York. Really, that’s it. He (it?) takes most of the sacrifice for sustenance until next weekend. We knock on my study door so my wife knows we’re done, and she’ll usually bring in something like sweet rolls and hot chocolate, so we dig into those while we sit around talking shop. What’s left over of the sacrifice we give to the new puppies, who love their weekend meal (it’s usually cooked a bit as a result of the persona’s presence.) Of course, the cat doesn’t want to be left out, but her teeth have gone bad, so she just gets a little saucer of blood.
You’re probably wondering why the authorities have never barged in on us. Well, as a condition of this arrangement, Mephisto or whichever persona we happen to dial up, erases the memory of the sacrifice from the minds of everyone who ever knew them (except for us.) So if no one remembers their existence, no one misses them. (And we’ve managed to improve the gene pool a tad in the process.) Of course, if there’s a lot of physical evidence left behind, like, say, wedding albums or newspaper articles, the entity will have to work a bit harder to make sure everyone’s curiosity is sufficiently dulled. But overall it’s a very efficient system.
I’m not sure how close the lot of us has gotten to achieving our ultimate goals, but these weekend get-togethers do seem to help. You’re certainly welcome to come by this weekend (or any weekend of your choosing, there’s no hurry) and join in. Perhaps we could help you to produce more wonderful essays like the one I just read. Or maybe there are some solidly grounded fears (I hear rumors of a troublesome ex-husband?) that we can help put to rest for good.
I hope all of this helps to reassure you.
Yr obt. servnt.,
Milko
* * *
From: Giles Milko
To: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]
Subject: Apology Date: Mon, 11 Nov 2003 7:48:03 -0600
X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (4.4.1545.48)
To all,
My sincerest apologies!
Ms. Statzler seemed like an intelligent, inquisitive woman who would understand the benefits of our arrangement. How could I have predicted she would interpret my explanatory e-mail as a joke? Henceforth I promise to be more careful when screening new members.
I’m still not precisely a master of this new e-mail system, so if you received this message in error and have not a clue to whom I’m referring—well, just take comfort that things are exactly as they should be. :-)
All best,
Milko
lacing over hidden wounds
THE HIKER’S TALE
Help me! yelled the boy.
No noise disturbed the steep wooded incline where I froze, my heart dancing a crazy flatfoot. A distant catbird screeched above the flying saucer whine of the cicadas; that was all.
Yet the boy’s voice shrilled again in my head, loud as a rifle shot. Please help me!
I dropped my aluminum hiking staffs. One of them tumbled down the bank, right through the place where the boy crouched, right through him.
Nothing more than an outline sketched in the furrows of bark, the cross-hatching of pine needles, yet clearly there, cowering amid the trees about ten yards below the trail. A slender boy, maybe ten or eleven, muddy face streaked with tears, his sweatshirt ripped, one jean pocket torn open.
Through him, the late summer sun dappled knotted branches, twisted ropes of creeper, glistening pine.
His lips parted, and in my head I heard his voice: Don’t let it get me.
I felt as if someone dropped a boulder in my backpack. I staggered—swooned, my grandmother would have put it—and grabbed at a birch sapling to keep myself from tumbling down the slope.
A commotion erupted below the pines, in the brambles at the bottom of the gully. It sounded like a deer, like a herd of deer, trying to fight a path through the tangled thorns.
The boy ran at me.
I raised my arms to block him, but he ran through them, through me. I howled as a cold electric jolt galvanized me from inside.
When I screamed, it wasn’t just from the sensation, but from a burst of impossible recognition. I’d felt this before, this ice lightning. Suddenly I was terrified as a five-year-old shut in a cabin full of ghosts. My sinuses seared with the reek of copper. Static blasted in my ears. My skin curdled in goose pimples.
Then the hallucination vanished, quick as it had struck.
Whatever made the commotion in the brambles then crashed away through the brush, out of earshot in seconds. A stench of rotten eggs drifted past me like seeds on the wind.
Then all was calm. No sign of a boy. No sound of running footsteps. A distant cicada changed its pitch from whine to buzz.
To my right, the slope descended to the impassable brambles where I’d heard the deer moving. To my left, the ground rose even steeper in a mad, rocky quest to reach the mountaintop. I stood on a wide hump in the trail, gasping as if I’d sprinted the last quarter-mile. My mouth felt desert dry. I thought of sipping from my canteen, then decided otherwise, realizing that the sulfurous taint still lingered in the air. My stomach twinged.
I denied that shock of recognition with every fiber of my being. I told myself that my imagination had run haywire, that I’d never encountered anything like that in my twenty years of life. I took a step, then bent over and dry heaved.
As I squatted there, eyes shut, a phrase repeated in my head. Leave it alone, little panther. At first the voice was unfamiliar: old, dry and crackly as fallen leaves just before the first snow. But then, like twin muted beacons, I pictured my grandmother’s eyes, her sky-blue stare clouded by cataracts. The voice was hers. When had I heard her say that?
She had died thirteen years before, when I was only seven. It was a miracle I remembered the sound of her voice at all, and so strange that I remembered it then.
The rustl
ing continued—at first I thought her voice had somehow escaped my skull, but as I recovered from this odd spell I noticed motion at the edge of the path. A large, grey spider, a wolf spider, its leg span as wide as my palm. Tiny brown young clustered on her back. She was so large that as she crawled across years of shed leaves they whispered beneath her weight.
Leave it alone, little panther.
I told myself that nothing had happened, that maybe I just needed fresh water. It was easy to buy into my own sales pitch. All in your head. Thirst and exhaustion. Just need to find a good resting spot.
