by Brian Keene
“I warned you,” Anna said. “Nobody touches me like—”
Russ punched her square in the mouth. He moved so quickly that at first, I didn’t realize what had happened. One moment he was standing there. The next, he was swinging. He threw all his weight into the blow, his entire body moving in tandem with his fist. Teeth and blood flew through the air. Shrieking, Anna stumbled backward. Her hands fluttered to her ruined lips. Blood spurted from between her fingers. Russ examined his still-clenched fist. A broken shard from one of her teeth jutted from his knuckle. Wincing, he pulled it out and stepped toward her. Blood welled up in the wound and dribbled across his fingers.
“Damn,” Stan the Man murmured. “Homeboy just smacked that old bitch right in the mouth.”
“Word,” Mad Mike added. “That’s some cold-ass shit right there.”
The rest of T’s group nodded in agreement. I resisted the urge to shoot the teens. Apparently, Drew felt the urge, too, because he pulled his pistol out of his wais-tband. It had been hidden beneath his flannel shirt. But instead of pointing it at T’s crew, he aimed it with one hand, alternating between Russ and Anna. The barrel bobbed up and down in tandem with his shaking hands. Drew’s eyes were narrowed. His lips were pressed together in a tight grimace. Clay stared at us, wide-eyed, trying to control the black-and-tan, whose howls had turned to growls. Drew’s aim returned to Russ. He seemed to have forgotten all about the dogs. He held the beagles’ leashes in one hand, and the dogs strained the leads to their limit.
“Hey!” I yanked out my own handgun and pointed it at Drew. “What the hell are you doing? Put that away, man. The fuck is wrong with you?”
With one hand clutching her face, Anna grabbed her knife. The blade shone in Olivia’s flashlight beam.
“Ya’ll get ready to jet,” T muttered to his friends. “Shit’s about to go down hard.”
“That’s not going to help you,” Russ told Anna, nodding at her knife.
He reached behind him and produced his gun. Anna whimpered, and her eyes widened. Russ grinned.
“Jesus,” Clevon gasped. “Oh, Jesus Christ…”
“Shoot her, man,” Cranston moaned. “We don’t need her kind around here. Especially not now. She’s part of the problem.”
“Nobody is shooting anybody,” I yelled. “Let’s all calm the hell down. Right fucking now.”
“Stop it, please,” Olivia cried. “What are you doing?”
“Shit is whack,” T observed.
I ignored them both. “Put it away, Drew. Come on, dude. There’s no need for this.”
Drew’s aim turned to me. “Put yours away first.”
“Like hell I will.”
“Your choice, Robbie.” His aim didn’t waver. His hands no longer shook. The barrel of his gun looked very large and round, and it was full of darkness.
“Stop it,” Olivia screamed again. “What is wrong with you people?”
“YO!”
We all turned. T stared at us with an expression of bewildered amusement. He shook his head and smiled.
“Every one of you motherfuckers are tripping. Ain’t none of you remember what we said before? It’s that stuff out there—the motherfucking dark. It’s fucking with your heads, ya’ll. Know what I’m saying? It wants us to do this shit. It wants us to kill each other. Shit ain’t right.”
“Word,” Mario agreed. “Shit is fucking seriously whacked.”
We all stared at them in stunned silence. Then Clay said, “Do any of you boys speak English?”
“We are speaking English, dog,” T said. “You just ain’t listening. Now let’s get this shit over with. The darkness is fucking with us. I say we fuck it right back.”
“He’s right,” I said, and lowered my gun. After a moment, Drew did the same. Russ hesitated, eyeing Anna suspiciously. Then he put his pistol away as well and retrieved his flashlight.
“Sorry,” he muttered, but it was unclear who he was apologizing to.
Clutching his stomach, Clevon turned away and vomited his candy bar into the weeds. Everyone stepped away from him. Mad Mike wrinkled his nose in disgust.
“Anna?” I stepped toward her, my hands outstretched to show that they were empty. “Put the knife away.”
She glared at me with tears in her eyes. Blood streamed down her forearms. It looked strange in the dim light. Suddenly, Anna turned and fled back toward the strip mall.
“You’ll all be sorry,” she shrieked. “Mark my words. You’ll be sorry!”
Olivia called after her to come back, but Cranston told the teacher to let her go.
“It’s better anyway,” Clay said. “Before we were unlucky thirteen. Now we’re an even dozen.”
“Not if you count them dogs,” Irish pointed out.
Clay shrugged. “They’re just dogs…dog. Did I say that right?”
T’s friends laughed as if this was the funniest thing in the world.
“You learning,” Irish said. “There might be hope for you yet, dog.”
Clay grinned, then spat another stream of tobacco juice. The dogs continued baying.
“Can’t you shut them up?” Russ asked. “They’re making my head hurt.”
“I thought they were just worked up over your fight,” Drew explained, “but something else must have them spooked. Their bark is different, too. Don’t sound like they do when they’re tracking a rabbit.”
“They sound scared,” Clay said.
“It’s that.” I pointed into the darkness. “They sense the same thing we do.”
“Maybe they’re smarter than we are,” Clevon whispered. “After all, they don’t seem inclined to get any closer to it.”
“If you want to go,” I told him, “then go now. That goes for the rest of you. If anybody else wants to leave, do it now. I won’t think any less of you. But you all see what’s happening. It’s just going to get worse. If we don’t do something soon, it might be too late.”
“I’m staying,” Drew said. “But I’ve got to be honest. I’m still not sure this will help us get a handle on our situation.”
“Maybe not,” I admitted, “but it’s a start. It’s something.”
We strode to the edge of the barrier and gathered around the symbol in the dirt. The dogs refused to go any farther. Drew and Clay had to grip the leashes tightly to keep them from running away. The dogs strained against them and whined.
While we were still huddled together, I asked once more if everyone was sure they wanted to go through with it. Figured I’d give them one last chance. They all nodded, signaling that they wanted to stay. A few seemed more scared now that we were actually at the dark’s edge, but they didn’t back down. We pulled out the ropes and tied a length around each of our waists, making sure the knots were tight. I hadn’t accounted for various waistlines and stuff, but we kept about two feet of slack between each of us.
“We can go twenty-four feet max,” I said.
“That ain’t far,” Stan the Man said.
“It’s far enough. If something is going to happen to us in there, I imagine it will happen right away. Me and Russ and my girlfriend watched some firemen drive into it out on 711, and they started screaming right away. So if we make it the full twenty-four feet, we’ll know we can go farther next time. Maybe try it with a vehicle or something.”
Stan the Man shrugged. “Sounds stupid to me.”
I sighed, trying to control my temper. “Then why are you doing it?”
“Because T said we got to. Why you doing it?”
“Because I want to help. I want to do something—anything.”
“But why?”
I paused before answering him. “Because nobody else is. Somebody has to.”
“So let’s do it already, man,” Cranston said, “before we talk ourselves out of it.”
“Okay.” I took a deep breath and exhaled. “Who’s going first?”
Before they could answer, a twig snapped. We all spun around and shined our flashlights back at the strip mall.
I figured it was Anna returning—maybe to apologize or looking for more trouble—but Dez stepped into the beams, shielding his eyes with one hand.
“Hey,” he called. “Listen for a second. You can’t go any farther! You really can’t.”
“Look who’s back,” Clevon said, rolling his eyes “What’s he want now?”
“Oh for fuck’s sake,” Russ muttered. “We don’t have time for this shit.”
“Be nice,” Olivia said. “He can’t help the way he is. If anything, we should be watching after him.”
“Screw that,” Clay said. “We got enough problems.”
“Go on home,” I told Dez, speaking calmly and slowly, as if he were a little kid. “We’re okay. Don’t worry about us. We’re not going to go far. We just want to try an experiment.”
“Experiments are bad.”
“No, they’re not,” I reasoned. “Look at all the good things in life that have been the result of an experiment.”
Dez shook his head. “The Black Lodge men tried all kinds of experiments and look what happened. There was a Philadelphia experiment. The Havenbrook experiment. Mount Saint Helens and Mount Shasta were both experiments. South America. That incident in the Pacific during World War Two.”
We glanced at one another in confusion and shrugged.
“Although,” Dez continued, “some of those didn’t happen on our world, so maybe they didn’t happen at all. It’s hard to say sometimes. If something happens on another Earth but didn’t happen here, then did it really happen? If another you dies but you’re still alive, then what does that mean? It makes my head feel funny if I think about it for too long.”
“Anybody know what he’s talking about?” Cranston asked. “Because I’m lost, man.”
“I do,” Clevon said. “At least part of it—Black Lodge. It’s a conspiracy-theory thing. There’s all kinds of stuff about them on the web. They’re supposedly some kind of black-ops division. An international paramilitary group that deals with the paranormal. At first they were American. Then they fell under the auspices of the United Nations. And then, finally, they supposedly branched off on their own.”
“Yeah,” Russ agreed. “I’ve read about that, too. The same people who believe in them also believe that the royal family are lizard people and that the New World Order controls everything and that FEMA has death camps scattered across the United States and that 9/11 was an inside job.”
“9/11 was an inside job,” Drew said. “Our government did it. First step toward turning us into a communist state.”
“Do you really believe that?” Olivia asked.
Drew nodded. “Watch the footage. Ain’t no way those planes did all that damage. And it was a missile that hit the Pentagon.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Russ said, sighing. “People believe in this stuff because they need a reason to be scared. They need something to focus their fears on. There’s no such thing as the NWO or Black Lodge. It’s all bull crap.”
Mario elbowed Stan the Man and whispered, “You hear this crazy shit?”
“Motherfuckers be tripping,” Stan the Man agreed.
“Listen,” Dez said, interrupting them all. “You can hear the darkness breathing.”
I shivered. Suddenly I was overwhelmed with a desire to flee—convinced that my idea would never work.
“He’s confused,” Olivia whispered. “This situation can’t have been easy on him.”
“Confused, my ass,” T said. “Motherfucker be—”
“Tripping,” Clay finished, eliciting another round of laughter from the homeboys.
Dez shuffled closer. His movements were timid, and he looked like he was ready to cry again. He glanced down at the runes and then back up at me.
“Hush,” Olivia whispered. “You guys are hurting his feelings. Have some compassion.”
I started to walk toward him but forgot about the ropes until I felt them tug at my waist. I held out my hand instead.
“Look,” I said, keeping my voice calm, “this is important. We have to try this. I know you’re scared of the darkness. So are we.”
“Yes,” Dez agreed, “but I’m scared of it for a different reason than you are. Like everyone else, you’ve been scared of the darkness since you were a baby. But you don’t know why. Not really. I do. I’m scared of the dark because I know what it is. That’s why I wrote the words. I used up twelve whole cans of salt, too. It doesn’t like salt.”
He pointed at the symbol in the dirt.
“You made those?” Russ grunted. “Did you spray paint the ones out on the highway, too?”
I started to speak but then remembered that Russ hadn’t overheard Dez tell me that earlier. He’d been farther ahead with the rest of the group.
Dez nodded. “And behind the gas station and up on the hill above the high school. Four of them. That kept it out. Then I put little ones between them, at different places. I used a lot of salt.”
“You didn’t happen to take all the shaving cream, too, did you?” Cranston asked.
Dez frowned. “No. That’s just silly.”
“So,” Clevon said, “why did you do this again?”
“Because,” Dez answered impatiently, “when the lines connect, they form a barrier. It keeps the dark out.”
“It keeps the dark out,” I repeated. “But does it keep us in? Can we go out?”
“Sure. But you’ll die if you do.”
“Why? What’s out there, Dez? Do you know?”
“The dark.”
“Yes, but I mean in the dark. What’s in it?”
“There’s nothing in it. It’s just the darkness. That’s enough. That’s always been enough. The things we fear spring from the darkness. It gives birth to them. It knows what we’re afraid of and what we want most in life, and it makes us see those things. It is the oldest and most powerful of the Thirteen. It is He Who Shall Not Be Named.”
“Listen,” Russ said. “Either start making sense or shut the hell up.”
“There’s no need to speak to him like that,” Olivia protested. “Can’t you see he needs our help?”
Ignoring her, Russ continued. “If you want to help us, Dez, then you can hold the end of the rope and pull us back out if something happens. How’s that sound?”
Dez glanced down at the rope around our waists, then out into the black void, and then at each of us. He seemed to be studying our faces. He shuffled closer, knelt, and patted the dogs. All three of them seemed to like him. They whined softly and licked his face. Their tails, though still cowed, wagged.
“Okay,” Dez agreed. “I will help.”
And then we were unlucky thirteen again.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“Drew and Clay should go first,” Cranston pointed out. “After all, they’ve got the dogs, and we said we wanted the dogs to lead us, right?”
“The dogs won’t enter,” Dez said. “The dark has already tried showing them its visions. It wants them to come in, just like us. But they’re too afraid.”
“Bullshit.” Clay spat tobacco juice and scratched his black-and-tan behind the ears. “Steakhouse ain’t never run from anything in his life.”
Olivia frowned. “You named your dog Steakhouse?”
“Sure did. It’s his favorite thing in the world. Mine too. Ain’t been to a steak-house yet that I wouldn’t eat at.”
“He’ll run away,” Dez said. “You’ll see.”
Ignoring him, I turned to Drew and Clay. “You guys okay with this? If not, we need to know now.”
“I’m fine with it,” Drew said. “I’ve never been afraid of the dark, not even as a little kid. I don’t see any reason to start now. Right, Clay?”
Swallowing hard, Clay nodded.
“I’ll take one of the walkie-talkies with me,” Drew said. “We’ll give the other one to whoever’s on the end.”
“What order are the rest of us going in?” I asked the group.
“How about the order we’re already tied in,” Olivia suggested
. “That would be a lot easier than untying everyone again and rearranging ourselves.”
“True that,” Mad Mike said.
“Sorry,” I apologized. “I wasn’t thinking. Just nervous, I guess.”
“I think we all are,” Russ said. “The sooner we get it over with, the sooner we can go home.”
Drew handed the other walkie-talkie to Cranston. They turned both units on and made sure they were working.
“Testing, testing, one, two, three.” Cranston grinned, then continued. “Breaker one-nine…”
“Stop it,” Russ told him. “You’ll run the battery down.”
“Dez,” I said, “you stay on the end and pull us out if we need you to.”
He nodded but didn’t respond. His eyes seemed sad and frightened.
“You better recognize,” T told him. “Don’t leave our asses hanging out there, yo. Know what I’m saying?”
Dez nodded again and stared at the ground. “I think so.”
“Well, that makes one of us,” Russ said.
With that, we turned toward the darkness. Drew and Clay prodded the dogs forward. Clay held Steakhouse’s lead, and Drew held the leashes of the two beagles. Tails between their legs, the dogs lowered their noses to the ground and skulked toward the blackness. They made it past Dez’s symbol and sniffed. Steakhouse snorted as if he’d inhaled pepper. Then, as one, they locked their haunches, lowered their heads, and whined. One of the bea gles cast a mournful glance back at Drew.
“Go on,” he urged. “Get up after that rabbit. Mind me, now! Go.”
The cringing dogs refused to budge. Drew prodded them with the toe of his boot, but still they held fast. He took a step toward them and jerked on the leash. Steakhouse growled, low and vicious.
“Steakhouse,” Clay exclaimed. “What the hell’s got into you, boy?”
The black-and-tan growled again, baring his teeth this time. Then he snapped at Drew’s foot. The big man jerked his leg away just in time.
“Goddamn it,” he cursed. “That’ll be enough of that.”
