Bitten

by K. L. Nappier

  Max heaved a sigh, glanced at the starburst clock on the wall pointing toward 2:00 a.m., and that was the last he saw until sunlight and the smell of bacon grease woke him.

  Chapter Twenty Two

  David Alma Curar's Ranch Compound

  South of Tohatchi, New Mexico

  Spring, 1950

  Night. New Moon.

  David sweats in his dream. He is in Stanislov's cage again, the cot gone. The chain that had bound the door has been undone by bolt cutters. Naked, he feels the cold steel flooring all along the length of his back, buttocks and legs, feels the shackles on his wrists and ankles. Cold, cold sweat. He's trembling so hard the chains connecting his limbs to the cage bars chime against the flooring.

  Standing over David, Stanislov is gripping his silver dagger in his right hand. That dagger and Stanislov's pitiless eyes. Over twenty years ago, they were the last thing David saw before losing consciousness. By the time Stanislov had driven it in, David had already been overcome by the Beast's emergence; the iron shackles, meant to restrain any last minute panic in him, in tatters.

  But in the dream, David is conscious and sees Stanislov bring his left hand up to join the right on the dagger's hilt, sees him brace, then sees him drop all his weight, use all his strength for the plunge.

  David screams and bolts upright, clutching his gut. The shackles are gone. The cage is gone, but he's still dreaming. A fluorescent glow begins fluttering and a chemical tang causes him to turn, hands still mashed against his abdomen, as he sniffs for the source. He's sitting on the prep room floor of Truman and Sons. He sees an ornate, open coffin in the middle of the morgue. He hears the singing and drum of a Navajo funeral.

  He won't stand, terrified his intestines will spill from the dagger wound. But when he looks down he sees no blood. When he opens his hands, there's only the jagged, ropy scar he's carried for two decades.

  So he stands and walks to the coffin, shameless in his nakedness even though there are people holding vigil just behind the raised casket lid, singing with the drums. He's not surprised to look into the coffin and see Stanislov's pallid, hawk-nosed face. He lifts his eyes to the people. Expressionless, his wife, Yazhi, looks back at him. Mezz, too, beside her. There are two of the orphan boys he slaughtered so long ago. And Sister Veronica. Beside her is a man that David recognizes because of a picture in the Springfield News-Leader . Lloyd Stonehill.

  Yazhi says, "He didn't save you because he loved you. He saved you because he loved us."

  Mezz drops his gaze to the coffin and says, "Look at there."

  So David looks. Stanislov's lips are stretched and bleeding, his mouth too small for the fangs pushing through the gums. There's something jammed between his jaws. David peers more closely. It's a vertebra, perfectly notched where the upper fangs brace it.

  Now, a man with only half a right arm stands next to David. A Dominican. David says, "Papo?" The man's shoulders are draped with fishing net. He twists away from David, then wheels back and David bellows as the net, wet and reeking, stings his skin, covering him and the others, Stanislov and the coffin, forcing him face down against the fangs of the corpse ...

  David jolted from the nightmare to find himself propped on his elbows, cotton sheeting bunched in both hands. He blinked, then realized someone was at his bedroom door. He sat the rest of the way up with a start. It was Mina.

  "What is it?" she asked, sounding breathless, still tugging on her bathrobe. "You were screaming. You called out for me."

  David struggled for breath. He mopped his face with the bed sheet then said, "I've got to get into town. I've got to call Max."

  Chapter Twenty Three

  Doris Tebbe's House on Mission Avenue

  San Buenaventura, California

  Spring, 1950

  Morning. New Moon.

  Max followed his nose to the kitchen, where Doris was making pancakes in one pan and frying bacon in the other. She must have heard him shuffling over the threshold, because she turned to look at him. She was dressed and looked tired. She turned back to the stove.

  Max sat down at the table. "Where'd you go?"

  Doris flipped a pancake before replying. "Walking around."

  "I didn't hear you leave. Or come back."

  She nodded toward the kitchen door without turning from the skillets. "I went out the back."

  "When'd you get in?"

  "Two-thirty ... maybe three o'clock." She cooked for a while, then: "Did you sleep okay?"

  "Listen ... the whole day yesterday ... it was stupid .."

  With her back still to him, she said, "Max ..."

  But she didn't finish. No one said anything for a while. Then Doris laid a few pancakes on a metal cookie sheet, covered them with Reynolds Wrap and put them in the oven. She started on another batch. Max looked down at the table and fiddled with the pepper shaker.

  "Y'know, when David and I first started hunting, I never thought I'd last this long. I figured we'd be lucky to make it through a couple of hunts before one or the other of us went down. Maybe both ..." He stopped fidgeting with the pepper shaker and took a deep breath. "Where we went this time ... there's a lineage ... I don't know how to describe it. It's a greater incarnation than anything we've seen." He looked up. "It went after its own kind , Doris. It attacked the same one we were hunting. It ripped the other's chest wide open and why it didn't take us, too ..."

  Max leaned on his elbows and gripped the back of his neck with both hands. "We left those people to fend for themselves. We left them that god awful mess. A whole town is in ruins. There was this nun, a young woman, not much more than a girl, probably barely out of the convent ..." His throat felt thick and tight ".. and there was a pilot we hired, thought he was a real hep cat, this kid, and ... we told him to stay put, but he must've followed us, got into some sort of trouble with some bad ass robbers, I guess, and this ... mutant must've sniffed him out, found him bound up and just ... just ..."

  He moved his hands fast to his forehead, pressing his thumbs against his temples and squeezing his eyes shut until the burn faded. When he looked up again, Doris stood quiet over the stove, the heels of her hands braced on its corners, her head bowed, her back still to him.

  The phone in the living room rang and scared the wits out them both. Doris took a quick swipe at her eyes, turned off the burners, then hurried out. Max heard, "Yeah, this is Mrs. Tebbe," then an awkward, "Oh. David. Hello, how are you ...? Sure ... no, I understand, let me get him. We'll catch up later."

  As soon as he heard David's name, Max headed to the living room. He was already walking toward Doris as she covered the receiver with one hand and turned to call him. She handed him the phone.

  "David?"

  "Max, I've figured something out. About the connection between the Beast's lineage in southern Missouri and the Lesser Beast in Luperón ..."

  One side of Max wanted to tell David where to go, but the other side kept him on the phone. David described a dream about Stanislov and Stonehill, Mezz and Papo. When he got to the part about Papo casting a net over them all, Max interrupted.

  "Yeah, I get the picture, David. You're thinking the net means you're connected to all these people. So what? Hell, everybody who's been bitten is connected. You're just shell shocked right now and putting too much into --"

  "Let me finish, Max. The connection is the vertebrae. Remember? The ones we saw in the dead Beast at Branson. In my dream, Stanislov had the fangs of the Beast. They held one of the vertebras between them. The notch in the vertebra fit the fangs."

  The remains in the funeral home flashed into Max's mind: the dead Beast's throat and jaw ripped away. His stomach knotted. "Wait a minute. Wait a minute ... are we talking about ... talking about another Great Incarnation?"

  "I'm sure of it."

  "Jesus. Oh, Jesus." Then Max got a crazy idea. "What if it's ... whatdiya think if it's the same one that we saw in Luperón?"

  David went quiet on the other end of the line. Probably thinking it ove
r. Finally he said, "No. Plenty of lesser incarnations on the main lands of North and South America. Why would the Greater lead its host so far out of the way? They must be two different lineages."

  David was right. Max just didn't want to believe there was more than one Great Incarnation. The thought of it made his blood rush to his belly. Especially knowing that he was too worn, too slow, his brain too jammed with failure to think of such a future.

  David said something and Max asked, "What?"

  "You need to come back."

  Max shook his head, as if David were standing in front of him. "Why?"

  "Why?!"

  "This doesn't change anything. It just proves my point. We couldn't even stop the Lesser Beast when we were in Luperón, let alone the Greater. We're too old and worn out for this --"

  "Stanislov wasn't when he saved me, and he was older than either of us --"

  "Yeah, he was , David. He was too old and too slow to get out of the way and you bit him!"

  There was quiet on the line again. Then David, his voice tight, said, "He wasn't too old, he was too old-fashioned. That's why he was bitten." Then he said, as if he couldn't believe what Max was telling him, "You have got to come back."

  Max sighed and looked up at the ceiling. "I am coming back. When I'm ready, for my stuff. David ... let Amy and Paul handle this. Let Samuel. Call them in. Get 'em up to speed. Go ahead and be a coach, but it's time to let them run the race."

  David didn't reply. Max rubbed his eyes. "Have you heard from Samuel yet?"

  There still was no reply. Max said, "David?" There was an almost inaudible click; the receiver on the other end being set in its cradle. He looked over at Doris. She stood watching him, pale and fighting back tears as hard as any man.

  * * *

  Max went to put on a shirt while Doris reheated the bacon. They sat at the kitchen table without saying a word, eyes fixed on their breakfast as if they thought they'd forget how to eat if they looked up. They stayed like that for a while until, just at the edge of sight, Max saw Doris put her knife and fork down decisively.

  "Max. Maybe you should go back to Tohatchi."

  Max chewed, swallowed, then reached for the percolator sitting on the pot holder. As he refilled his cup, he said, "Kind of screwed up my welcome last night, didn't I?"

  "That's not what I'm talking about."

  He lifted his coffee and blew on it, swiveling his gaze to her. "It's not?"

  Color crept up her neck. That nice neck of hers. She got busy with her pancakes again. "You're needed there."

  Max kept his eyes on her. He said, "Doris?" And waited until she looked at him. "Did I cross the line last night?"

  She held his gaze a moment, her neck still flushed, then went back to pushing her pancakes around. "I don't know."

  "Yes, you do."

  Those small, cool eyes of hers came back up flashing. She pointed her butter knife at him. "I know that what you did last night was avoid something you couldn't handle. Just like you are now."

  "We've got that in common, you and me."

  For a minute, she looked like she was figuring out how to slug him from across the table. Then she smiled a little, set down the knife and topped off her own coffee.

  Max said, "I'll make you a deal. We'll each take a topic we're avoiding, okay?"

  Doris sipped her coffee and said, "Okay," as if they'd just signed on the dotted line.

  Max smiled. "Ladies first."

  "Suddenly Captain Pierce is a gentleman."

  "I have always been a gentleman and used to be an officer." He repeated, "Last night's line ... crossed or uncrossed?"

  She set her cup down, stood and began clearing the breakfast dishes. "You don't really think it's as simple as that."

  Max nodded, watching her. "Yeah," he conceded, "I know. But, over the years ... you must've sensed ... I mean ... last night couldn't have been that much of a surprise."

  "Look, with the monk's life that you and David lead, you'd probably grope a Scotsman in a kilt if you were drunk enough and he had nice legs."

  "Bullshit."

  Doris pushed the soggy pancake scraps into the trash can, set the dishes in the sink and turned toward him. She leaned against the counter. "Yeah, bullshit. But... the way my life's become ... the way yours is ..."

  "Not anymore. That's not how my life is anymore."

  "Max ... even if I take you at your word, even if you really believe it yourself ... our history , Max. Yours and mine." She watched him steadily now. "You know I don't blame you for what happened at Tulenar. You know I don't hate you. All that left me when I saw you come back to the world, when I watched the Beast fall away and you emerge. But ... still ... all that happened before that night ..."

  It was Max's gaze that faltered. He looked back at the table and reached toward his cup, rotating it slowly. The only sound in the kitchen was the scrape of its bottom on the table's wood. "You still think of him?"

  She bristled a little, crossing her arms. "He had a name. You can say his name. Arthur. Of course I think of him. And the others. Don't you?"

  He nudged the cup away. "I live with them. And with my wife Annie. And all the ones that came between."

  Doris sagged a little and her gaze drifted away. "I don't know if people like us can ever have what others have, Max. We've made decisions. We made them a long time ago."

  The drift of their lives meandered past them right there in the room and they both watched it go for a while before Max cleared his throat, and then asked, "You want me to go back to Tohatchi?"

  "I think you need to be there."

  Chapter Twenty Four

  Doris Tebbe's House on Mission Avenue

  San Buenaventura, California

  Spring, 1950

  Midday. New Moon.

  They checked the flight times. Doris offered to drive Max to the airport, but he refused. She said, "You're going to deny me a good excuse to get behind the wheel? How can you turn down a ride in a ragtop?"

  She patted the Rambler's pearly white hood, but it was clear she was just trying to mask how awkward they were both feeling. When the cabbie pulled up, it was relief.

  Max looked at Doris. "Friends, still. Right?"

  "Don't be an idiot." Doris pulled him into a hug.

  But it stung to see how relieved she looked to watch him go. He got in the cab, Doris waved and said, "Write when you get back," and he nodded, even though he wasn't going back. Not yet. But he wanted to leave without any new arguments between them, so he clammed up about that. Once he figured out where he was really going, he'd drop both her and David a note.

  As the cabbie pulled away from the curb, Max said, "Change of plans. Where's a good place to hole up and catch the sea breeze? Little bungalow, maybe, with a kitchenette ...?"

  He didn't have to go far. Twenty minutes north of Ventura was a seaside row of little brick stand-alones called the Sandman Motel, built facing the bluffs over the ocean. Sooner or later, Max would have to go back to Tohatchi for his things. But, for now, this was all he needed while he thought about what came next.

  He got a rental car, spent the afternoon driving the coast and spent his first night on the Adirondack chair outside the little bungalow's door. He ate a couple of grilled cheese and bacon sandwiches, washed down with a six pack of Schlitz, and let the land breeze flow across him on its way down the bluffs to the ocean. Cocooned in the dusk and a nice beery haze, he felt as if his future was as spread out, fresh and open as the Pacific beyond the bluffs. He thought about where he'd like to settle, what he'd like to do. Rosemary Clooney crooned something sultry on the radio just inside his open door.

  The second and third nights, he ate grilled cheese and bacon again, drank more beer and sat in the Adirondack until he caught himself watching the moon rise, beginning its first quarter. He forced his thoughts back to fantasies about where he'd like to settle, what he'd like to do.

  The fourth night, he was pissed at himself for milling around, waiting on the moon.
He was tired of grilled cheese and bacon, but not beer, and took his drinking to a dark, local tavern. He spent his fifth night there, too, shielded from the moonrise but not from his reflection in the mirror behind the bar. The more beer he drank the more questions the reflection asked him.

  Look at you. What the hell are you gonna do? Get a job? What kind? Nice, easy office work? How? You're legally dead.

  That wasn't a problem. He and David had been making fake I.D.'s for years.

  How're you gonna fake experience? Who's gonna hire a man that's been out of touch with the normal world for nearly ten years?

  Okay, so a cushy office job was never a real option. Max wasn't afraid to work with his hands. He could learn a trade.

  Who'd apprentice a man face-to-face with fifty?

  There was always ...

  Construction work? What have you ever constructed? Handy man? How many years do you have left before your back gives out or arthritis sets in? What'll you live on then, your social security? What social security? The government says you're dead!

  Doris might know somebody, she might know a place ...

  Doris doesn't want you. That door closed eight years ago when she left you and David in that shack and went back to Tulenar. Leave her the hell alone.

  "... Another ...?"

  It took a second for Max to realize that last voice was outside his head. He looked up at the bartender. "Sorry?"

  "You want another?" The bartender's eyes darted to the empty Schlitz bottle on the cardboard coaster. His expression said he thought Max had had enough, but, hey, none of his biz.

  "Nah. Thanks," Max said. He stood, pulled out his wallet and paid.

  He kept his eyes riveted to the road as he drove, resisting, feeling the pull of the moon on them. He went straight into his bungalow, closed the door and kept his eyes down as he tugged the blinds over the window. He turned on the radio for company and the light beside his bed, so the glow of a quarter moon moving into half-full wouldn't seep through the shade.