Drynn

by Steve Vera

  Noteworthy as his resurrection was, it was what had transpired within that thirty-seven minutes of twilight between unconsciousness and death that was truly significant.

  Like fingers curling around a closing elevator door, the presence had slipped through the cracks of his fractured psyche and settled at the fringes of his temples. He’d awoken to a world inhabited by fields and prisms of ethereal light surrounding all living things—trees, fish, pigeons, people—like Kirlian photography.

  Overwhelmed at first, Donovan did what he always did: he mastered it. Defining what each color meant, classifying the different hues and shades and how the outer bands of colors would shift to reflect a state of being. He learned how to dim the lights, to shut them off if he desired (he usually didn’t) or illuminate single objects at the exclusion of others. He dubbed it his “Othersight,” and it was like adding a rocket booster to a Lamborghini. Unnecessary, but awesome to behold. Donovan could now see souls.

  Of course, such dark gifts did not come without a price.

  The pressure was slight at first, just inside his temples, but as the days and weeks moved on, it spread insidiously across his mind—an unfolding carnal blossom with petals like poisoned honey.

  First came the dreams. In them, he was not himself, but a creature that would mount the stairway currents of the sky, using thick, powerful wings that rasped like leather with every flap. Beneath him was alien land, vividly colored with swaths of creeping mist and forests of trees he had no name for. Like some estranged twin of Earth, unscarred by the rise of industrialism.

  His dream-hands were huge and grotesque, the pale color of an albino crocodile. He would swoop down on his victims, some human, others unnamable, but their terror was always the same. They would scatter before him like cockroaches in light, and then—only then—he would feed. This was how Donovan had learned what human flesh tasted like—slightly sweet, mild and dense, like maturing veal. It would linger on his palate hours after he awoke. Wafting through his nostrils whenever he caught the scent of meat.

  He reached over and grabbed one of the three chocolate bars resting on the passenger seat of his black Challenger. He much preferred Baby Ruth. He ripped the end of the wrapper off with his teeth and bit down a third of the way, ignoring the crumbles of chocolate that fell on his lap. One perk to once again having access to his emotions was regarding food and taste; Baby Ruth bars pleased Donovan very much. He held the bite in his mouth and dissolved the sweet outer layer of chocolate, grinding it between his tongue and the roof of his mouth, then the caramel, and finally he cracked whatever peanuts remained into paste before swallowing.

  Like the marrow and bones in the prey of his dreams.

  The whispers didn’t come until later. At first they were vague and amorphous, like the distant din of a crowd or waterfall, but as time had passed they’d become more pronounced, more directed, as if their orator were awakening from a slumber. Donovan remembered (as he remembered everything) the first words that were spoken to him within his own mindscape that were not his own. “Kneel, and I will show you mercy.”

  Kneeling was not in Donovan’s repertoire of acceptable behavior.

  He pulled his Challenger over into a small plaza featuring Bob and Lisa’s Eatery. He didn’t get out, content to tear into another Baby Ruth and scan the radio waves with his index finger. The creature had stopped, had found an abandoned barn a few miles north of the highway down a gravel road. It was finally resting. And feeding.

  He found a song he liked and locked the station. It was dark and heavy, with guttural notes of electric base intertwined by the distinct sound of an angry electric guitar. He leaned back in his seat, put his hands behind his head and let the rifts of the music seep into his pores. Like his new affinity for chocolate, music was a welcome delight.

  The presence had presumed to simply barrel into his thoughts, strangle them out of existence and usurp his mind to do its bidding.

  Donovan’s lips twisted upward.

  That was not what transpired.

  Once the initial shock wore off, Donovan had attacked like a rabid wolverine.

  He was the master of his mind. Whatever it was, wherever it came from, whatever its story was—it had chosen the wrong fucking brain to lay siege to.

  But it tried. Every moment of those first few months of healing in room 229 of St. John’s Medical Center were a test of his mettle. A constant tempest of malicious hunger raged against the barriers he’d erected like a fortress around his mind. The hurricane never subsided, was relentless in its fury; if ever there were a time where his sanity would have crumbled, it would have been then. He’d lie alone in bed at night, muscles tensed and sweating, forcing his vitals to remain even while his mind careened like a crashing jetliner. In that whole time he hadn’t had so much as a single visitor. He’d left that hospital with the knowledge that he was insane. What else could explain the whispers? Demonic possession?

  In habit, he traced the outline of the metal embedded in the flesh of his chest beneath the black tactical shirt he wore. It had been there since his first memory, composed of a material that did not appear on any periodic table of elements, and though he couldn’t know for sure, he was confident it was the connection with the Presence. Coarse and silvery green, the metal was in the shape of an amulet or medallion. Most of it was visible, but there were parts that disappeared into his skin, concealing its complete shape. But his fingers were as familiar with it as a blind man’s were with a Braille board. He gripped the end of it, just below his nipple, and wiggled the coarse substance with his thumb and forefinger, as he’d done his whole life when in deep contemplation.

  He thought back to mere hours ago and brought his considerable photographic memory to bear on the image burned into the cell lining of his brain once again.

  Bone thuds. He’d never heard anything like it, bone against stone, and bone winning. He conjured the memory of that first clawed, unexplainably familiar hand as it punched through the black, metallic stone that had served as its prison. In an explosion of black, nameless fragments, another fist had burst through and in moments, like a warped butterfly emerging from a cocoon, the Presence had stretched its enormous, leathery wings, a glistening membrane around its body as if it had just passed through a placenta.

  The Speaker of Whispers.

  With large, mucousy eyes set too wide on a face that although was bestial, projected cruel cunning and malevolent appraisal, the Whisperer had glared at him.

  Donovan remembered raising both of his pistols, arms calm but trembling, mind reeling as if a flash grenade had gone off in the middle of his brain. It was in that moment that he realized that the voices were gone. Sucked out of his head like a hull breach in outer space.

  And then he fired.

  His first shot had been perfect. It caught the Whisperer right between the eyes and rocked its head back. Slowly, the Presence had straightened his head, eyes alight with angry amber luminance, an ugly boil welling from between its eyes. Donovan didn’t need to see its soul to know it had to die. Pulling the triggers in rapid succession, Donovan emptied both pistols in a storm of bullets. Its rumpled wings snapped up like a Japanese fan and absorbed the rest of his fusillade before its whole body exploded into a black cloud of vapor. Even Donovan’s hyper-developed sense of sight lost the creature to the vastness of the night and spiraling snow. A guttural whisper floated behind it, within Donovan’s mind. “When next we meet, I feast on your flesh.” And then it was gone.

  Not if
I feast on yours first. At last, Donovan had purpose. Hunt down and kill this fuck who’d tried to take over his brain. No longer would he prowl this world like some rogue demigod in search of a destiny not yet revealed to him. After he’d killed it and spilled its entrails, he’d cut off its head and leave it on the steps of some museum. Let them figure it out.

  Donovan caught a whiff of blackness. He sniffed. It was on the move again—done feeding. He put his car into first gear, turned up the stereo and accelerated east onto the highway.

  Where the Whisperer went, Donovan would follow.

  Chapter Six

  “I don’t need a babysitter, you know,” Stan muttered as he drove. The dark-skinned FBI agent riding next to him stared through the windshield, rubbing his chin thoughtfully.

  “I’m just observing Officer Stewart. Pretend I’m not here.”

  Yeah, whatever you say, Stan thought as he continued to drive. Ever since early Tuesday morning, since the “incident,” as it was now referred, he’d had a statey or a fed attached to his hip like a damn parasite; he couldn’t take a whiz without someone wanting to watch.

  “I do this at least once a month, Ahanatou. It’s just another Blackburn goose chase because Mrs. Blackburn’s daughter hasn’t called in the last fifteen minutes. Certainly beneath your lofty position.”

  “I’m sure it’s nothing,” Ahanatou replied, eyes fixed ahead. “And that’s Special Agent Ahanatou.”

  Stan rolled his eyes.

  It had been a hell of a sixteen hours. Dead bodies, unconscious chiefs and secretive federal agents coming out of his ass. Although he’d been complaining nothing ever happened here in Rolling Creek, he sure wished things would go back to being boring again.

  “How much farther?” Ahanatou asked, gripping his door handle as Stan sped down the contoured road with enough g-force to do an F-18 pilot proud. He wasn’t scared of a little snow.

  “Not far,” Stan said in concentration. He enjoyed making Ahanatou uncomfortable. It was the least he could do after the man had effectively taken over his life. For the seven hundredth time, Stan wished he’d kept his damn mouth shut about what he’d found in those trees last night after discovering his chief bleeding to death in the snow. All he’d needed to do was be quiet, but nooo, Stan wanted to impress the big, bad federal agents, and now it appeared he’d have Big Brother looking over his shoulder for the rest of his life. They’d probably bugged his toilet.

  After a particularly tight turn and a disapproving grimace from Ahanatou, their destination came into view.

  “There it is,” Stan said as they approached the base of the tree-covered hill, on which the Blackburn home rested.

  The house sat majestically on a thick outcropping of pale granite, overlooking the valley that was Rolling Creek. To the west was the Flathead River, rippling gold from the afternoon sun, and to the north, the Rocky Mountains themselves. Quite an expensive view.

  “So this is the Blackburn home,” Ahanatou observed.

  “One of them. This is where their daughter, Joanna, lives now. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been here at the ‘polite request’ of Mrs. Blackburn because her daughter had the audacity of not calling.”

  Stan had always envied this house; for all intents and purposes, it was his dream home. It was big, but not grandiose, simple yet elegant, and the view…most definitely worth the money.

  It looked different today, though. It seemed abandoned somehow.

  Stan’s Police Chevrolet Impala climbed the sinuous curves of the hill with familiar ease until they were closing the gap toward the Blackburn House.

  “What is that?” Ahanatou asked, leaning forward suddenly. “Is that a little girl?”

  Stan looked closer and blanched.

  Standing in the middle of the asphalt, not a hundred feet from the front door to the Blackburn house, was a little girl, clutching what looked to be a headless doll. She made no attempt to move out of the way of the approaching car, gave no indication that she was even aware of them. She simply stood in the middle of the street, melting snow scraping around her, a blank, dazed expression on her gaunt little face.

  The moisture from Stan’s tongue evaporated.

  “Do you know her?” Ahanatou asked.

  Stan nodded slowly, his stomach sinking into his ankles. “Ava Blackburn, Joanna’s daughter.” He slowed the cruiser to a jog.

  “Why is she standing in the middle of the street?” Ahanatou asked, looking around, his dark eyes suspicious and alert.

  “I have no idea.”

  Stan stopped the car and opened the door. He was surprised at how still and quiet everything was. The landscape knew something that Stan didn’t. A secret. “Hi, Ava,” he said, walking up to her in a casual, unassuming gait.

  The child made no movement, save a small lean backward.

  “Are you all right?” he asked her gently.

  Her delicate little shoulders were slumped, eyes downcast, but at the sound of Stan’s voice she looked up. Stan was horrified at what he saw. Eyes that should have been sparkling with innocence were dull and listless, sunken into a cherub face half-covered by wispy brown ringlets that hung dead by her cheeks. Tiny rivulets of dried tears ran through smears of dirt crusted on her face. Her heart-shaped mouth was tinged blue; who knew how long she’d been standing out here? From behind him he heard Ahanatou get out of the car.

  “Why are you in the road, Ava? Where’s your mommy?” Stan continued, bending down to one knee. She whimpered like a kitten then timidly glanced back at the house, clutching the headless doll to her trembling body.

  Stan stood slowly and took another look at the house. Ahanatou joined him just then and for a moment the two simply stared, shoulder to shoulder, a sense of dread settling around them like a cloud of mustard gas.

  On the broad side of the roof, splinters of support beams and the tinkling of shattered glass jutted into the house, as if it had been hit by a meteorite, giving the impression of a skull with a hole in its head.

  “How long ago did Mrs. Blackburn speak with her daughter?” Ahanatou asked.

  “Last night,” Stan answered. “About nine-ish.” As the words came out his mouth, he realized the timing. It was Tuesday afternoon, around…sixteen hours after the Black Grave “incident.” In fact, the Black Grave rested on Blackburn ground. He should have already put that together. Chief would have. He looked at the house again and shuddered.

  There was something unnatural about that hole, something terrible about it.

  “That is more than just dirt on her body,” Ahanatou whispered into Stan’s ear.

  Stan glanced down, closed his eyes and did his best to keep composed. “C’mere,” he said, kneeling and reaching out toward her. Cool and calm as a gunfighter at a showdown, Stan smiled and opened his arms to her. “C’mon, let’s go in the police car, where it’s nice and warm. Do you like blueberry muffins?”

  The little girl looked at him for what seemed like an eon and then slowly nodded. “Are they low-fat?” she asked in a small voice. “I don’t like low-fat muffins.”

  Stan barked out an involuntary laugh, nearly blowing out anything that might have been in his sinuses. His voice seemed to carry on for miles in the eerily still air. “No way, it’s the real deal. I even have some cream cheese to smear on it. C’mon.” Gently Stan scooped her up and carried her back to the cruiser. “I’m gonna put you in the back seat, where it’s nice and warm, okay?”

  Though her movements were still trancelike, there was a glimmer of life in her face.

  “Do you remember my name?” Stan asked her as she accepted
the blueberry muffin.

  She began unpeeling the ridged paper from the bottom. “Yes,” she said, taking a sniff of the muffin. She nibbled at it, intently focused at the task at hand.

  “And what’s my name, Ava?”

  “It’s Officer Stanney.”

  Ahanatou peered inside. “Where are your parents, child?” he asked. His deep voice boomed within the confines of the cruiser.

  Ava flinched and immediately looked down.

  Stan glared at him and waved him away. “Don’t worry about him. He’s just a big grump. Nobody likes him very much.”

  Ava risked a glance back up at Stan.

  “How long have you been in the street? It’s cold outside,” he asked in the most casual voice he could muster. “Brrr,” he said, shivering. “Ava?”

  Another nibble on the muffin, then, “Mommy was crying.”

  “Why was mommy crying?”

  Ava didn’t answer but instead remained fixated on the muffin.

  “Ava, why was mommy crying?”

  “Because the monster ate her.” Ava’s little chest expanded and suddenly she was hyperventilating, twisting and crushing her doll to her chest as some memory descended on her tiny mind. A pitiful, low-pitched mewl squeezed through her lips.

  “Whoa, whoa, it’s okay, sweetheart. It’s all right, I’m here now. It’s okay.”

  It was too late. She screwed her eyes shut and melted into the farthest corner of the backseat, crying so fast she sounded like a wounded animal.

  “Stewart, let’s go,” Ahanatou barked from outside.

  “We can’t just leave her in here.”

  “She will be safe in the car.”

  “Ahanatou, that’s crazy. She needs us.”

  The FBI agent glared at him. “Do not question my orders. Crack the window and let’s go. The perimeter is not yet secure.”