by Graeme Hurry
‘What?’ Holly said.
‘We’re going up to the mountain, you coming?’ he said, and carried on running.
Without hesitation, Holly sprinted after him.
After a couple of minutes of ducking and running up the road, she was close enough to hear them distinctly.
‘Ain’t nothing here,’ Mickie said.
‘Are you crazy? Look! Bulldozers twenty feet high! A burnt out reactor! This place is cooler than anything,’ Sherlock said, who at least shared with Holly a respect for the beauty around them.
‘Ain’t nothing here,’ Mickie said again, missing the point. What was he expecting in the dead mines? A bowling alley and a cinema? Hot popcorn and frozen coke on demand?
Fontaine marched ahead of the pack, leading the way like a captain. Conversely, Darren skulked at the back with his head down, looking over his shoulder constantly, giving Holly a hard time staying hidden. He looked nervous.
Soon they reached the bridge that joined two of the mountain range’s smaller peaks at the end of the road. The wood was beyond rotten. Rope that looked like withered vines in autumn tied cracked black wood together. The boys surveyed the death trap as if it were a closed sign in front of a candy store.
‘That’s not happening,’ Sherlock said, poking the first plank of black, dry wood with his little finger.
Fontaine shook his head.
‘We’re going across.’
‘No way man,’ Mickie said, jittering. Fontaine grabbed him by the throat, making Mickie’s eyes bulge halfway out of their sockets. Fontaine’s sudden rage was felt by everyone.
‘We’re going across,’ he repeated, spraying venomous saliva into Mickie’s eyes.
Fontaine put him down, straightened himself up, and took a confident step onto the bridge, then another, and another, until he was pacing undeterred by the drop beneath him or the odds he was mocking. The other boys looked at each other aghast for a few moments, before sheeping their sheepish frames like sheepish sheep, following the leader as always.
Holly was embarrassed for them, but as she saw a black shadow at the other end of the bridge, embarrassment shifted to a sudden fear. She feared for her enemies lives and she shielded her ears as a dreadful noise came from across the bridge. The roar was deafening, a piercing explosion of sound that rebounded off the mountains and stilled the air.
A creature stood tall on hind legs at the other end of the bridge, claws facing up at them. Yellow jagged teeth dripped below its wet snout. It wasn’t a bark she had been hearing in her room, but the distant cry of a beast.
The boys’ screams were muted in comparison as they clung to the bridge, and were silenced as the creature took a step onto it. The wood snapped beneath its huge paw, and started a chain reaction that snapped rope and broke wood, sending the entire thing falling to the ground below in a second. Holly couldn’t see the boys land. She broke cover and ran to the side of the road next to a steep decline in the rock. The drop was fifteen feet. The boys had landed in a pile on top of a damp stretch of sand, littered with puddles from a leaking water pipe.
Holly looked up for the creature, and saw a tail disappear behind the rock. Whether it was fleeing or running for its prey below, Holly had to try and get to the boys first. She took uneasy steps down the rocks, the most direct route. She was surefooted and got to the bottom without falling, with one hand on her helmet to keep it balanced.
Unsheathing her corkscrew, she approached the boys. Darren was huddled up in a ball, crying. Mickie was face down in a puddle that had started turning red, so Holly didn’t bother checking him. Sherlock was standing, trying to look in every direction at once, shaking like a lettuce leaf.
‘What are you …?’ he said, as Holly approached.
‘I was looking for Genghis.’
The panic on his face mixed with confusion.
‘What?’ he said.
Holly easily kept up with Darren’s not-exactly-lightning pace as he ran to the foot of the mountain, to a narrow crack in the rock that was next to the Mayor’s mansion on the edge of the village. It was only three feet wide, but opened up into a valley that stretched toward the ancient miners’ passages; dark corridors that led nowhere. The area was fenced off with wire meshing between the mansion and the crack. Holly had watched cats come and go through the fence. She figured that if cats could do it, why shouldn’t other organic life forms?
The boys, all three of them and Darren, had congregated at the fence.
‘What’s she doing here?’
Fontaine was the biggest and the oldest at 13, but inexplicably going bald. He spoke with the guttural twang of the poorer kids, had hands as big as his head and wore his tracksuit like a true degenerate. Fontaine, Mickie and Sherlock looked at Darren expectantly as he realised his mistake.
‘She just followed me, I don’t know why she’s here,’ he lied.
‘I was invited,’ Holly said.
‘Shut up Holly,’ Darren replied, in a way that sounded more like an apology than an order.
‘What do you want to find up there?’ Holly asked.
‘None of your business, retard. Go back to the bins with your stupid mutt where you came from,’ Fontaine said, and turned away.
Holly straightened her pith helmet as her top lip curled with anger. She took a breath, and stopped herself from clawing the back of his neck with her nails as the boys huddled together, hatching a plan. Holly would have left, but her curiosity was too great. This could be the lead she was after. If cats went up the mountain, maybe beautiful, lovely dogs called Genghis did too.
‘We’re going up,’ Fontaine said. It was a good plan.
‘Why?’ Sherlock asked. He was the smart one, had nicely combed hair that always surprised Holly considering the company he kept, and wore an old hockey shirt with a pair of padded, insulated white trousers issued by the school for trips to other moons.
‘We’re bored, right?’ Mickie said.
‘Yeah,’ Sherlock replied.
Mickie was excitable and boring. The most interesting thing about him was his glow-in-the-dark trainers with dinosaur tracks on the soles, which stood out from the rest of his black football gear. Holly liked the trainers.
‘Well this is the only place left to go! There’ll be things to jump off and things to slide down,’ Mickie said, quivering.
Holly was sick of the conversation already so started slowly walking around them.
‘But it’s dangerous, right?’ Darren stuttered.
‘We’re going up.’ Fontaine said. ‘If we don’t I’m stuck eating my nan’s preserves, and she’ll make me have a bath.’
‘I heard there are lemmings up that mountain. Lemmings freak me out,’ Sherlock said.
‘I heard there are zombies,’ Darren said.
‘They don’t exist, you midget,’ Mickie said.
‘We’re bloody explorers aren’t we? We’re men, aren’t we?’ Fontaine said, pointing at himself as if he were a prime example of manhood. ‘Let’s go.’
Holly was nearly two thirds up the fence when Fontaine caught sight of her. His jaw slackened and then froze. She guessed he wasn’t expecting to see her there.
‘Oi!’ he said, already angry. ‘Get down from there!’
He shook the fencing with brutish strength, Holly lost her footing and she fell.
She grunted as she landed awkwardly on her left hand and scraped her knee on the concrete. As she looked at the dirt on her hands and blood on her legs, a boot struck the side of her head with full force.
‘We’re going first, retard!’ Fontaine said, and kicked her in the head again. He waited a few seconds, perhaps for Holly to cry. Instead, she rolled onto her front, pressing her forehead into the ground, gripping her sprained wrist. Eventually she turned on her back, and realising she couldn’t feel the right side of her face anymore, she laughed.
Holly only caught glimpses of what happened next, but she definitely saw Mickie and Fontaine kicking her head. She felt someone pulling on
her hair and figured it was Sherlock. When her hands were in too much pain to shield her face, that’s when her eyes stopped working. Her ear popped, a few clusters of pain appeared across her body, and she coughed a couple of times when her lungs were having trouble. The coughs probably saved her life - they were the sign of weakness the boys were looking for.
‘Come on, let’s go,’ Fontaine said, leading his troupe of explorers over the fence as Holly lay bleeding.
She was groggy for a couple of seconds, but soon got her senses back. Her head pounded with an intensity she hadn’t felt before. She didn’t have a mirror, so felt each part of her face and checked for blood. Her lip was cut, and her ear was bleeding, but her nose wasn’t broken again; that much she was thankful for. As her sight straightened and got its focus back, she watched the boys disappear through the crack in the mountain, onward into uncharted territory. They would get there first, and Holly would just be a visitor to land they had claimed. The taste of disappointment was sourer than that of the blood. The last thing she saw of the boys was Darren turning back to look at her, he mouthed a ‘sorry’ and then they were gone.
Holly got to her feet with a stumble, picked her helmet up off the floor and shook herself all over until she realised something was missing.
‘Oh no.’
Her disc necklace was gone. She had been mugged as well as beaten. She checked the right pocket of her shorts, and breathed a small sigh of relief. The corkscrew was still there.
She took another minute to get her breath back and wiped the blood from her face with the back of her sleeve. She climbed the fence, took the corkscrew in her right hand, and followed the echoes of the boys’ chatter.
‘I’m coming, girl. I’m coming to get you.’
Fontaine was the last Holly checked on. He was rocking back and forth, holding his shoulder and weeping uncontrollably. It was one of the best things Holly had ever seen.
‘I just want my mummy! I want my mummy!’ he screamed.
‘Give me my necklace,’ Holly said, holding out her hand in front of him.
‘Mickie’s got it,’ Sherlock said, pointing at the body.
Holly couldn’t quite bring herself to turn his carcass over, so just checked his damp pockets instead. The left, no luck. The right – success! Holly pulled out the spiky disc and held it up like a gold medal.
‘I want my mummy,’ Fontaine said again.
‘Your mummy’s not here, you idiot,’ Holly said, grabbing him by the shirt and pulling. He wouldn’t budge. ‘Get up now or die when it comes back.’
It was too late. The creature had found them and was ten feet away in the damp sand. It was staring at Holly with dark yellow eyes like broken street lamps. Its incredible legs crept forward as its eyes stayed fixed on her. It didn’t make a sound as it moved, sizing up the prey, weighing up the options. The corkscrew Holly had coveted would be no good against this thing. She had to try something else.
The beast bolted for them. It moved so fast that Holly had no time to react as it passed her.
‘Oh God!’ Sherlock said, as he, Darren and Fontaine scrambled backwards. The beast went for Mickie, and bit into his wrist. Blood welled up over its teeth, and ran down Mickie’s arm into the sand as it pulled his body back a few yards. It violently shook him like a rag-doll for a moment, breaking bones in his limp body. When Mickie didn’t move, it soon lost interest and slowly turned to look back at the group.
Instinct took hold as Holly dropped the corkscrew and raised her hands. She kept them up, keeping her fingers outstretched and her eyes concentrated on the creature’s.
‘It’s okay, girl. It’s okay. We’re not going to hurt you.’
Holly wasn’t sure it was a girl, or a lady, but all the dangerous people she had ever met or read about were female, so she followed the trend.
‘What are you doing?’ Sherlock said, taking a few steps back, catching the beast’s eye.
‘Stay still!’ Holly ordered. She took off her pith helmet and waved it while taking a step forward to get the creature’s attention. It worked, and the yellow eyes were fixed once again on hers. It snarled, making wet noises in its throat. She dropped the helmet, and raised her hands again, urging the beast to stop.
‘You’re alone, like me,’ Holly said to it, attempting a tone of authority. ‘But no-ones going to help you unless you can behave yourself. Sit down.’
What a terrible introduction, she thought.
‘My name’s Holly,’ she added.
‘You’ve gone mad. She’s gone mad,’ Darren said between the sobs as the three remaining boys watched.
The wolf-like creature’s snarling didn’t relent, but it did lower its head. It looked at her as it licked its bloody nose, and lowered its belly to the ground. A terror took hold of Holly, but she refused to show it. As the beast lay on the sand, Holly didn’t see an animal anymore, but a machine waiting for the right moment to pounce; coiled, ready to gut her and use her arms as toothpicks, but she took deep breaths, closed her eyes, and carried on. Soon she could feel the heat of its breath on her hands, until her index finger hit something wet. She opened her eyes to see her right hand resting on the creature’s nose. It stuck its head out forward, sniffed her, and then rubbed its snout across her fingers, covering her in Mickie’s blood. Holly laughed away the terror, placing her left hand on her chest to calm her thundering heart.
‘That’s unbelievable,’ Sherlock said, aghast.
‘Mickie? Mickie, are you okay?’ Darren called.
‘Get away from that thing,’ Fontaine said. ‘We gotta kill it.’
‘Holly, what have you done?’ Darren said, perhaps only just recovering from the fall. ‘This is Holly’s fault!’
‘She’s saved our lives!’ Sherlock said.
‘But Mickie’s dead!’ Darren screamed, his eyes resting on Mickie’s carcass as he burst into tears.
Holly placed her other hand behind the beast’s ears and scratched hard, so that it could feel her touch through its thick fur. She could feel its warm blood pumping beneath. The boys were back in the beast’s line of sight. Holly grabbed a piece of fur on top of its neck and clung on tight as it growled at the sight of prey. The boys cowered, except one.
‘We’ve got to kill it,’ Fontaine said again, the terror transforming into anger, standing with clenched fists.
Holly locked eyes with him and shook her head with a smile. She knelt next to the beast-creature’s head and whispered in its ear.
‘I’m going to call you Genghis 3,’ she said, savouring the moment. She took a few steps forward, recovered her pith helmet from the sand, dusted it off and pulled it down tight over her hair. She laughed at the boys, pointing her finger at them and holding her sides, roaring harder and harder, letting the emotion spill as the boys finally started thinking about running.
‘Now,’ Holly said, pointing at them and releasing her grip on the creature’s fur. ‘Go get ‘em!’
The beast pounced, and the boys didn’t have a chance to run. Holly pulled Mickie’s dinosaur-print shoes of his feet and held them next to her own. They were a size too big, but they’d do.
RED INK
by Joyce Carpenter
You don’t forget a face like Larry Angelo’s. Lumpy and misaligned, with pits and scars from ear to ear. There was a whole terrain there, and if you followed it up and under and back around, you could read the story of a youth spent in bar brawls and knife fights. That was the beginning of Larry Angelo, but if you travelled the rest of the way to his pure silk tie, custom tailored suit and Italian shoes, you’d know it didn’t end there. The first time I saw that face, he was asking me to investigate some threatening letters his wife had received.
The air conditioner was broken again. I’d left my office door open, hoping to catch a phantom breeze. He moved like a prizefighter; I didn’t hear him come in. I was deeply engrossed in a file when the letter dropped on my desk. ‘YOU HAVE ONE MONTH TO LIVE.’ That’s all it said. Calligraphy on parchment paper
- fancy script in dark red. Splotches of spilled ink surrounded the message, suggesting drops of blood.
‘Came in the mail. Somebody’s threatening my wife.’ I looked up - way up - at the hulk with the roadmap for a face. ‘Larry Angelo,’ he said, extending a hairy paw that gripped mine so hard he could have broken a finger. ‘She didn’t want me to come. Thought we should go to the police. Police ain’t gonna do nothing.’ I thought I read a subtext there. You’re mobbed up; last people you want to see are the police.
I was hot and tired. I’d always steered clear of the mob; I planned to keep it that way. I’d spent the last hour showing my previous client, Connie Nelson, the photographic proof her husband was cheating. She decided to kill the messenger. She’d screamed and pounded on me with her fists. My nerves were raw.
My shirt was stuck to my back. Sweat ran down my forehead. A sharp pain between my eyes would be a migraine by nightfall. All I wanted was a cool shower and a long nap.
‘Go home, Larry. Make a list of people who might want to hurt you or your wife. Give me something to go on, and I’ll think about it.’ I figured that would be the end of it.
He was back two weeks later. His wife came with him, and I did a double take. Lisa Angelo was a looker - too good for that Sicilian ape. Bought and paid for, I figured, but it didn’t stop me from being attracted. Blonde hair, delicate features, a small, almost frail build. Everything about her, from her beautifully tailored suit to her perfect nails, was just so. A china doll, the kind I always go for. She sat next to her husband, his hand resting on her shoulder. Something about that crude appendage on that delicate shoulder offended me in a primal way.
‘YOU HAVE TWO WEEKS TO LIVE’ said the latest note. He’d enclosed it in a plastic bag with the envelope. Addressed to Lisa. No return address. Postmarked Jacksonville, Florida. That’ll narrow it down, I thought grimly.
‘Mr. Alteri, you have to help me.’ Lisa said. Me, not us. A detective notices how people phrase things. It gave me hope she wasn’t totally committed to the gorilla beside her. ‘This isn’t just a prank. Someone wants to kill me.’
