Staggering under this tremendous burden, Rick bumbled through life in perpetual fear of being nabbed, shot, wiretapped, burned alive, tortured, maimed, killed in an earthquake, or simply dropping dead from fright. The short trip from his car, a pitiful old Chevy Nova, to his front door was a journey of some twenty feet. This was a bad thing, because you never knew when something or someone would jump out of the bushes and scare you to death. The only weapon against such attack was booze, and of course the Valium. After Durant destroyed his prescription bottle Rick had gone screaming to his doctor for a new prescription. It was necessary to toss some greenery the doctor’s way, about thirty or forty bucks per three-month prescription. Rick didn’t mind. Durant paid him plenty.
For these reasons, and others even more horrifying, Rick sat in his car slugging down cheap bourbon, looking hard at the bushes, ready to dive under the seat if anything jumped out. Nothing did, and the wind blew alternately soft and hard, kicking up autumn leaves that looked soggy and black. Rick shivered in his lightweight jacket. God, but did those twenty feet look long, and God, did he have to take a leak!
His bladder finally convinced him to get out. Rick knew that it was essential to walk slowly while looking carefree; roving dog packs had less of a tendency to attack and kill. Rick had never seen a roving dog pack but knew they were out there somewhere. He capped his bottle and stuck it under the seat, then put his feet on the ground, already reaching for his new pill bottle. He shook two out and popped them under his tongue. They worked faster that way.
He took a step, then another. He reached back and eased the car door shut. The hinges made enough noise to wake the dead. He took another step, looking around with huge eyes. His muddy brown hair was tossed back and forth on his head, revealing a receding hairline. With all his worries he was amazed that his hair had not yet turned white.
The bushes were dancing and swaying. Leaves clattered down the street on their hasty journey to somebody else’s lawn. Rick took another step, gathering the ruined remains of his courage. Then he heard the noise: a footstep on gravel.
Everything in his body froze up at once. If he fell over, he knew he would shatter into a million pieces. His terror was so complete that he wet his pants. Hot urine sprayed down his legs and soaked his slacks, adding to the fun. He began to cry.
A shadow zipped across the narrow strip of weeds he called a lawn. Rick whirled, his heart booming and filling his ears with noise. His body temperature sank below normal. He knew he was going to die.
He wasn’t, but it was easier to move now that death had placed its cold bony hand upon his shoulder, waiting impatiently for him to surrender his life and his soul. Rick only wished that it be swift and merciful.
In this strange condition, he stumped to his front door, unlocked it with hands that no longer trembled, and went inside. He had left his television on to scare the ghosts and act as a night-light. It was full of electronic snow now. Its flickering blue light splashed on the walls, forming patterns and shadows.
“Who’s in here?” he called out in a tiny voice.
Nobody answered. The cameras and wiretaps and monsters had not conspired to kill him, after all.
He breathed a huge sigh of relief. “Silly me,” he said aloud, and took off his pants. One benefit of this catastrophe was that he no longer needed to use the bathroom, where spies lurked behind the shower curtain, where the Tidy-Bowl man rowed around in the toilet tank plotting mayhem and new leaks. Rick took his soggy Fruit of the Looms off and tossed them in a corner. His shirt went into the foul-smelling pile of old laundry. He got his jammies on and toddled into the bedroom, unable to believe he had survived another day on this terrifying planet. Foppishly proud of himself, he gave himself a mental handshake, turned on his Snoopy night-light, flopped onto the bed, and began to drift away toward sleep.
Four minutes later he awakened with new terror piping through his veins. In his agony he had forgotten to lock the front door. He flew out of bed and into the living room, locked the door, threw the dead bolt, snapped the padlock, hooked the chain, put the steel bar in place, locked it, too, stuck the wooden wedge under the door, and propped a chair against the knob. He dusted his hands, satisfied. But then—
A blast of wind came through the picture window—covered with cardboard to foil spies—and made the wooden shutters rattle.
He chewed his tongue, once again dying of fright.
He never opened his windows.
Someone had been here.
That someone might still be here. Lurking.
His brain turned into a whirlwind of hideous thoughts. He nearly passed out as new visions of destruction crossed the inner screen of his mind.
He raced to the bedroom and dived into bed. He covered his head with the blanket. It came to him that he had left the window open, so he raced back and smashed it shut. Back to the bed. Pillow and blanket covering head. Knees knocking together, mouth dry as sand, sweat beading up all over his body. A quaking portrait of misery and terror.
No, he told himself. You have been frightened to death every time something unexpected comes up, and the nightmares never come true. You are alive and well and nobody is in here, nobody at all. There are no dog packs or cameras or wiretaps or spies or monsters under the bed, so cool down and sleep.
Almost convinced, he breathed a small sigh of relief.
A bony hand reached out from under the bed and caught his ankle.
“Wahooooo!” he screamed as he was dragged under the bed. “Help Meeee!”
Nobody was around to help. Rick thumped to the floor and was pulled underneath, shrieking and screaming, his well-chewed fingernails scratching across the tattered carpet as he tried to claw his way to safety. Snoopy watched all this from his safe perch in the wall socket, not seeming very interested, casting a light that now seemed far too dark.
With his last bit of reason Rick decided to beg for mercy, no matter what kind of arsonized monster this might be. He rolled over and discovered, without much joy, that he had been dragged under the bed by a mummy.
The mummy peeled back the section of dirty gauze that shielded its mouth. Rick saw a gaping maw of sooty bone and naked teeth.
“You always knew there was something like me under your bed,” the mummy said raspily. Its breath was like burned hair and doom. Rick’s eyes nearly blew out of his head, so large were they. The mummy stroked his cheek with what appeared to be a large white back scratcher.
“I believe,” the mummy said, “that we have a lot to talk about.”
Thus they chatted for a remarkably long time, cozy and close under Rick’s smelly mattress, and all the while the remainder of Rick’s sanity was steadily eroding, until none was left at all.
17
Lab and Light
ON THE FOLLOWING Monday morning the reborn apparition that had been Peyton Westlake was up by dawn. He had gotten barely an hour of sleep in the soap factory, the squat, dirty, two-story building that had seen the rise and fall of the Fresh Splash soap empire. Darkman had found a roll of ancient fiberglass wall insulation in the debris and had converted it into a bed of sorts. No one ought to be required to sleep in fiberglass, because every movement gives rise to dust clouds of itchy insulation. If Darkman had had sufficient feeling left in his body after the Rangeveritz process, he would have been scratching like a sufferer of the heartbreak of psoriasis while tiny red sores opened up all over his body. As it was, he could take a bath in the stuff and love every minute. If sores were there, then so be it. His body no longer transferred unnecessary information like that to his brain.
After spending most of the night with Rick, he had sneaked into the parking lot of an all-night grocery, found an abandoned shopping cart, and borrowed it forever. Pushing the ratty thing through the city, he was glad that no one was awake to see him, a bandaged cretin straight out of a Boris Karloff movie, a shambling thing too ruined to show its face. From the burned-out shell that had been his old laboratory he had brought several crucial it
ems down the blackened stairs and put them in the cart. The Bio-Press was accustomed to extreme heat and had fared well. The microscope was missing entirely; no problem. The computer was obviously junk. The holographic plate where Yakky’s nose had appeared in 3-D splendor was a bit warped but ought to work. The ThinkTank-PinkTank was a miserable pile of glass shards and burned goop. No problem again. Bosco had brought a new one, and a microscope and a new and even better computer as well.
Back home, if one could call a drafty, former soap factory home, he had found useful items. Old doors unpinned from their hinges were hooked horizontally to old chains, becoming irritably swaying lab tables. The skeleton of an old office chair with squeaky wheels became a lab stool. Out of raw computer cable he formed a crude interface, the link between the master computer and the burned-up, scavenged machinery from the old laboratory.
This was all quite nifty, but there was one crucial item missing.
Electricity. The transformer to the tank alone had to have at least two hundred forty volts so that it could build up its charge. Pink liquid was just pink liquid without a massive charge of two-thousand-volts, bullet-style. The computer and Bio-Press only needed one hundred twenty, but one twenty was one twenty more that he had. He had heavy electrical cable, thanks to Bosco—eighty yards of it. But where to hook it up?
He stood now in the dark guts of the factory with dawn providing feeble light through the broken-out windows, holding one end of the cable, wondering what to do with it. This whole area was dead. Redi Kilowatt had long since absconded. Darkman had found the power room that had once provided the juice for the machinery here, but under its inch-thick layer of dust the connectors and insulators were cracked and dead, the fuses long since stolen, the wrapping on the wires broken and crumbling. Even if it was still functioning, a man would have to be an idiot to try to use it. Death trap, just like the old lab’s stairway had been.
He stood in the dim light, frowning under his bandages with eyebrows that were no longer there, a forehead that was only scarred bone; the memory of a frown, then.
Were any of the abandoned buildings here still wired to power?
Not a chance.
He stood and thought about this with his finger bones tapping idly on the thick wire. How the hell do you make electricity?
The solution hit him and he almost laughed. A generator, of course. There were dozens of brands on the market, even Honda generators, and you could bet they were good if the Yakkies of the world made them. Darkman grinned without facial muscles. Just find a phone and order one, he thought, just like you did with the other stuff. But that had been ordered at night, when no one was awake, in a phone booth clear over on Ackurd Street. Anyone could dial 1-800 anytime of the day or night.
He dropped the wire and thought it over. What was the risk of going out in daylight? Would people recoil in horror, scream, call the police? Well, they didn’t do it when other human tragedies passed by in their wheelchairs or on their crutches. They didn’t do it when paraplegics were wheeled around on hospital grounds for a bit of sunshine, their faces waxy and pale. They didn’t call the cops when a flipped-out punk rocker ambled past with his hair all orange and sticking up, chains dangling from everywhere, three earrings in each ear. So why should they go berserk if Darkman happened by?
It struck him that he needed to make more than just one call. God, he had to buy wigs, makeup, maybe, something that might resemble eyebrows, some pale shade of lipstick for the illusion of lips. What else? Some cigars. A briefcase. A tape recorder. A camera with a telephoto lens. Some way to develop pictures. Who knew what else.
He dropped down in sudden misery and sat on the dirty cement floor, where old pigeon droppings were thick and rat droppings had long since lost their aroma. Everything was dust and bad light. How in the name of heaven was he supposed to get all this stuff? Even Millings Supply, that warehouse of wonderful everythings where Bosco no longer worked—even they couldn’t handle this order.
He would have to go shopping. Encased in dirty bandages, he would have to go shopping.
Unless Julie did it for him.
He hung his head, aware that he was in the midst of a catch-22 with no way out. Julie couldn’t see him until an artificial Peyton face, guaranteed to last ninety-nine minutes, was molded and set. For that he needed electricity, which he did not have. In order to get it he would have to use Julie as a mouthpiece.
He hung his head, assailed by new memories, new doubts. Why not just take a hike to the pier and plop himself into the river? It should have killed him last time. Why it hadn’t was a fact too astounding to wonder about. His own memory of that day was sketchy. Suffice to say it was a bad day.
He sat in silent misery, the new king of a failed soap dynasty, thinking idly that if someone passed by, it would feel good to strangle that someone. He wondered briefly why he was having such homicidal thoughts, then remembered good old Dr. Robinson and his damn Rangeveritz procedure. Anger welled in his mind, sudden and startling, almost too powerful to reign in. He could see himself smashing the doctor’s face in, strangling him, stabbing him with a knife, gouging out his eyes, shooting him. All manner of unusual tortures came to mind, clear visions too real to ignore.
He clutched his knees with the claws that had been his hands, shaking, ready to scream. But why the doctor? Why the doctor? It was that piece of human garbage named Durant he wanted. Robert G. Durant. Thank you very much, Rick, for the info. Too bad your brain shorted out.
He straightened, anger draining, departed eyebrows coming together in a huge but invisible frown. That Rick guy . . . what a basket case. There was little doubt that he was insane by now. Toward the end he had started flopping around like a beached trout, hyperventilating, crying, screaming. Sure he had shot Yakky, but the punishment was probably too excessive to fit the crime.
Ridiculous, his inner, angry voice shouted. You let the murderer off too easy.
Judge, he thought. Judge and jury, Peyton Westlake. How nice to meet him. Got somebody you want trashed? No problemo, señor. Mr. Westlake is our judge and our jury in these parts. Not only that, he’ll even become the executioner if the price is right. World, say hello to justice as it should be. No crime too big or too small.
Darkman began to weep, making foul slobbering noises. Invisible tears flowed from destroyed tear ducts. He brought his claws up and wrapped his head with his arms. Why had this happened? Was he at fault in some way? Why hadn’t he remembered from the start that he had had the memo in his pocket? Here you go, Mr. Durant, here’s your frigging memo. Don’t thank me. Just use that door and remain a stranger.
Too late now, though. Peyton’s face was gone and his fingers were abominations. He was entombed in darkness now, Darkman was, and there he had to stay, hidden from the world. He even had to wait for sundown and its protective darkness before emerging from this hole.
He cried some more, then quit, knowing this wasn’t getting him anywhere. He stood up, swaying with fatigue, knowing what he had to do.
He would brave the light and the humiliation, make his way to that phone on Ackurd Street and call Julie.
Because he trusted her. And more than that, he needed her.
She wouldn’t be frightened by a simple phone call from the dead.
Would she?
The kids were the worst. With his hands buried deep inside the pockets of the raincoat and his head swathed in drooping bandages, Darkman forged his way through fear and nineteen blocks, not seeing a soul, if you discounted gutter winos who looked very dead. It was at the Martin Street crossing, block number twenty, that the first child screeched and pointed. The mother towing him by the hand looked over to Darkman with an apologetic expression, one that rapidly became a mask of shock and revulsion. Darkman wished he could suck his head inside his body, but since that wasn’t possible, he decided to be casual and to whistle, as if everything were good indeed.
It was hard to whistle without lips. He wound up emitting a dry, catlike hiss, which s
ent the mother and boy hurrying to get away. Welcome to the world of the burned, you miserable bitch, Darkman thought.
No, no—no need to get angry. Plot your course by the sun and the stars and get yourself posthaste to a phone. Julie awaited, and with her the future of Peyton Westlake. He forced his numb feet and battered shoes to move faster, and left the frightened mother and the brat behind.
More trouble loomed as he was within a block of the phone booth. This time it was kids again, but they were older. Not wiser but older. Stupider, probably. They wore leather gloves with no fingers, sparkling chains, menacing hairstyles. Darkman’s footsteps slowed as he approached them. The last thing he needed that morning was a brawl with three punks, one of them with green hair sticking out of his head like colored wires. Darkman’s own sloppy, bandaged head was torment enough. He tried to cross the street but they had already seen him.
They nudged each other, grinning with inner secrets, not about to let this opportunity pass by. They smirked at Darkman, the tallest one flashing buckled teeth, the guy in the middle picking his nose and smirking, the smaller one smiling a cruel smile. Take the leather off them, Darkman thought, and you would have the three bears—Daddy, Mommy, and Baby, out for a walk in the cement-and-metal forest, ready to scratch and bite and kill.
He made himself move faster. The bears started after him, sauntering, looking casual. Darkman heard a click and knew it was a switchblade.
No, please, I’m just a college professor in a world of hurt. Give up on me and find some junkie to work over. Please? Pretty please?
He heard them coming closer, feeling like a scrawny kid in a strange school where the toughs ruled and the nerds crawled and begged. Was he a nerd? He probably was, not that he cared, but there was no more Peyton, only Darkman. And by no means was he a nerd. He had joined the ranks of the tough.
He stopped in place and turned around, hands still deep in his pockets, expression irrelevant because there was no face to form it. The bears stopped and leered at him. Mama Bear flipped a booger his way.
Darkman Page 10
