by P. T. Hylton
“And what’s that?” Sophie asked.
“Listen. There are things in this world that don’t belong here. Terrible things.”
“The Ones Who Sing,” Frank muttered. He wasn’t even sure he’d said it out loud until he saw Zed’s face darken.
“They’re merely a side effect. The Ones Who Sing are nasty creatures, but they do what they do because it’s their nature, as twisted and tainted as it is. We can’t hold that against them. Not really. The things I’m talking about are worse. They too destroy, but they destroy for a purpose. They will destroy us all, and they’ll start with me.”
Frank leaned forward and looked into the bald man’s eyes. “Zed, so help me God, if you keep talking in puzzles I’m going to take your steak knife and put it through your eye.”
Zed grunted. “Puzzles? You want me to be more straight forward? Okay, I can do that. You remember that man in the forest, the one with the beard?”
“The one whose arms you tore off?” Sophie asked. “Yeah, I seem to vaguely recall that.”
“His name was Vee. He’s one of them. There are three others like him. They are not happy with me. Vee least of all.”
“You think he survived?” Sophie asked.
“Their kind is very hard to kill.”
“Maybe you should try talking to them,” Frank said. “I thought you were mister persuasive.”
“Don’t think I haven’t tried,” Zed said. “But they’re stubborn. They won’t even consider my way of thinking. So first, we kill those four…they call themselves Exiles.”
“First?” Frank asked. “What’s second?”
Zed’s smile widened. “We save the world.”
4.
Alice heard a knock at the door. She rolled over and pushed the button on the pink alarm clock next to her bed. It lit up with a bright blue glow. 3:23.
She’d been dreaming she was on her way to the beach with Mom and Dad. She didn’t know which beach—hopefully not that stinky one over by the river that smelled like fish—but she’d been excited. She’d had on her swimming suit under her clothes. There was a bag on the seat next to her, and she saw a bottle of sunscreen and a towel sticking out of it.
Mom and Dad had been laughing and playfully arguing about who sang the song playing on the radio. It was some old-fashioned sounding song, something about Paradise City. Yuck.
The car pulled to a stop and Alice felt her heart leap. She saw a large blue lake out her window, the surface so still it looked like glass. She waited anxiously, and as soon as Dad opened his door, she opened hers. When she stepped out of the car, she felt something cold on her sandaled feet. She looked down and saw she was standing in six inches of snow.
That was when the pounding on the door woke her.
No one had ever come to the door this late. Not that she could remember, anyhow.
She heard her parents’ voices in their room down the hall, talking fast, sounding worried. The pounding on the door came again, louder this time, like the person at the door was growing impatient.
She heard her father’s heavy footsteps as he walked across the bedroom, through the hallway, and down the steps to the front door. Alice slipped out of her bed, tip-toeing down the hallway after him. She knew he wouldn’t be happy if he caught her—little girls were not supposed to be out of bed at three twenty-three in the morning, except to go pee or maybe get a drink of water—but she couldn’t help herself. She had to know who was at the door. She crouched in the shadows at the top of the stairs, her favorite hiding spot when she wanted to spy on what was happening below. Looking through the wooden railing, she had a clear view of the front door.
Dad flipped the switch to turn on the porch light and peeked out the window. He paused for a moment and sighed, as if whatever he’d seen out there didn’t please him. Then he twisted the deadbolt lock and pulled open the door.
The man on the other side of the door was someone Alice had never seen before. She would have remembered. His hair was bright red and it hung down to his shoulders. It was curly, like the way Mom sometimes wore hers, but only if she got up early and spent forever-and-a-half in the bathroom. The man wore a windbreaker and jeans. He was shorter than Dad, but he was thick, like someone had pressed on the top of a tall man’s head and smooshed him.
Her father said, “What is it?”
“Can I come in?” the man asked.
Dad paused, then nodded and stepped aside, letting the man through the door.
Alice huddled close to the floor, her hands clutching the rail and her face scooted forward just far enough to see the men standing almost directly below her. Her heart was still racing from the dream and from being unexpectedly woken at three in the morning. She had the feeling it wouldn’t slow until she knew what was going on.
The red-haired man said, “It’s started, Matt.”
Dad chuckled. “You think I don’t know that?”
The man sighed. “Jesus. Why you gotta be such a dick lately?”
“I’m being a dick, Willis? You show up and knock on my door at three in the morning to tell me something I already know, and I’m the dick?”
“Okay, geez, sorry.” The red-haired man shuffled his feet. “Tomorrow’s clutch. And it starts early.”
“So you thought waking me up in the middle of the night was the best way to make sure I’m prepared?”
The red-haired man paused. There was something he wasn’t saying. Alice leaned out a bit further.
“No, man. It’s just…some of the guys are worried. You haven’t seemed yourself. And I thought—we all thought—it might be better if you had someone with you.”
There was a long pause before Dad spoke again. “Explain how that works.”
“I’ll just, you know, crash on your couch. Come with you in the morning. Instead of meeting you there.”
Dad leaned close to Willis and spoke softly. “You think I’m gonna flake?”
“No, man. That’s not it.”
“Yes. I think that is exactly it.” Dad was talking louder now. He was getting mad, Alice could tell. “Have I ever flaked? In all the times we’ve done this? Have I ever been the reason it failed?”
“No. I mean, not that I know of. But things are different now. And people are worried. We can’t let Zed down.”
Dad leaned even closer. The two men’s faces were almost touching now, but Dad was still shouting. “Don’t you say that name in my house. I don’t care what that man thinks.”
Alice had never heard of this Zed before, but Dad sure didn’t seem to like him.
The red-haired man took a step back. His face was growing red now, not as red as his hair, but enough to let Alice know he wasn’t taking Dad’s yelling very well. “Even still, he runs the show.”
“Yeah, he does. And how far’s that gotten us?”
The other man shook his head. “You really gonna ask that question? It’s gotten us far enough. It’s gotten us here. We ain’t dead yet.”
“No,” Dad said, a wicked grin on his face. “Not yet. Not for a couple weeks.”
The skin on Alice’s arms broke out in goosebumps. What could Dad mean by that?
“So that’s it? You’re giving up? The solid and dependable Matt Campbell is giving up?”
“You know I’m not. I’m just starting to question the sanity of this plan.”
Willis took a deep breath and put a hand on Dad’s shoulder. “Think of your kid, man. Think of your wife.”
Dad brushed off the hand. “It’s time for you to leave.”
The red-haired man looked around the room, drawing out the moment as if he didn’t want to say what he would have to say next. Finally he said, “I can’t do that.”
Now Dad took a step back. “That’s how it is? And what if I say you aren’t allowed here? What if I make you leave?”
Suddenly there was something in Willis’ hand. Alice realized what it was, and her mouth went dry. It was a gun. Just like bad guys carried in the movies.
“T
hat’s not gonna happen,” Willis said. “Zed needs us tomorrow. I’ve got to—”
Dad moved before the man could finish the sentence, rushing Willis. He tackled the man, and they wrestled on the floor. It was too dark for Alice to make out exactly what was happening. All she saw was a dark mass with a streak of red running through it wiggling around on the floor.
Alice felt an arm around her shoulder and almost screamed. She looked back and saw Mom behind her. Mom pulled her close in a hug, her eyes glued on the scene below them.
The world shook as a gunshot rang out. Mom screamed and Alice thought maybe she did too. A grunt and a moan came from the floor below, and one of the figures rose, the gun in his hand. It was Dad.
Dark blood stained the carpet around the moaning man on the ground. The dark spot was growing at an alarming rate.
“Oh, God, Willis, I’m sorry,” Dad said. “So sorry.”
He let out a sobbing noise, and Alice realized he was crying. She’d never seen her father cry. He staggered backwards. The gun slipped out of his hand and hit the floor with a thump.
Alice whimpered. She scrunched her eyes shut and thought of the rope. Dad had shot someone! If she let this stand, he would go to jail!
She grabbed the rope inside her mind, but it was slippery. She couldn’t hold onto it. That happened sometimes when she was upset. It wasn’t fair. The times she needed to use it most were when something upsetting happened.
With her eyes still closed, she drew a deep breath and let it out slowly. She imagined her emotions as a ball of something wet and slimy in her hand. She imagined putting the ball of messy emotions into her pocket. She could deal with them later. They’d be waiting for her when she was ready.
Her mother’s arms were still wrapped tightly around her. That, too, calmed her.
She clutched the rope and tugged.
As the blinding pain rocketed through her brain, she had two terrifying thoughts. First, she knew she’d pulled too hard. She’d gone back hours instead of the fifteen minutes or so she’d intended. Second, she had the realization that she might just return to her sleeping body. If she was asleep, she might not wake again until three twenty-three when it was too late to stop this from happening. Worse yet, what if she remembered exactly what she needed to do but was trapped in a dream and unable to wake up?
As those thoughts passed through her mind, she felt the familiar wave of vertigo as her body changed positions without her physically moving. She lay in her bed, her eyes open, staring at the ceiling. A wave of relief washed over her. She was awake.
She rolled over and punched the button on her alarm clock, washing the room in soft blue light. 10:09. Geez, she really had gone back farther than she’d intended.
Still, there was no time to waste.
She hopped out of bed and raced to her parents’ room. The door was only open a crack. She could hear them talking softly. And another sound beneath that; she wasn’t sure, but it sounded like her mother was crying.
She tapped on the door with her knuckles and went in without waiting for a response. Both her parents’ faces swung toward her, and she saw immediately she had been correct. Mom was crying.
Now that they were looking at her, she suddenly had no idea what to say.
“Hey,” Dad said. “What’s up, honey? Can’t sleep?”
Mom quickly wiped at her face with her hand, as if she could hide the tears Alice had already seen.
“I…” Alice started, but then stopped. She never talked about Pulling Back. She hadn’t for years now. But she was almost certain they knew. Maybe they didn’t know exactly what she could do, but they had an idea. They didn’t talk about it, either. It was like the family had made a silent pact to never speak of how much of a freak Alice was.
But this was different. This was a matter of life and death.
She started again. “There’s a man coming here tonight. Willis. He’s got red hair. Long, like a girl or a rock star.”
Mom looked at Dad. “Willis Eddy.”
Dad nodded.
Both their faces were pale as they waited for her to continue.
“He wants to stay here overnight. So he can make sure Dad does something he’s supposed to do tomorrow.”
“Jesus,” Dad whispered.
“And he has a gun!” Alice said. She could feel the tears welling up in her eyes now, as if they’d been bottled up until now and the words were the cork that let them loose. “Dad fights him and gets the gun and shoots him.”
“Honey,” Mom says, her voice calmer now, “what time does this happen?”
Alice whispered, “Three twenty-three in the morning.”
“Holy hell,” Dad said. He looked sick.
Mom turned toward him. “Should we leave?”
Dad shook his head slowly. “That wouldn’t help. Where would we go? We can’t get out of what I have to do tomorrow.” He slammed his hand against the mattress. “What the hell have we become?”
Mom put a hand on his shoulder. “No, this is good. We have…” she glanced at the clock by the bed, “…over five hours to get ready for Willis. We can plan what we’re going to say. Hide anything we don’t want him to see. He wants to stay the night, let him stay the night. Let him report back to Zed on how we’re playing our parts perfectly.”
Dad nodded. He leaned forward and gave Alice a tight hug. “You did great, honey. So good.” He let go and held her at arm’s length, looking at her with a serious face. “You have to go to bed now. Mom and I…we have work to do.”
Alice wanted oh-so-badly to ask what the work was, who that red-haired man was, what this all meant, but she knew she couldn’t. They wouldn’t answer her. At best they’d scold her for asking and at worst they’d make up some lie. So she just nodded, put on a brave smile, and went back to her room.
She lay awake watching the clock until three twenty-three when the red-haired man knocked on the door.
THE BOY WHO FOUND THE WATCH (PART ONE)
Topeka, Kansas
May 1948
The boy sharpened a pencil with his pocket knife.
The process had been going on for quite some time. First, he’d spent a good five minutes meticulously sharpening the knife. He’d used a whetstone he’d found in the shed, doing it just the way he’d seen his father do it. His father had been gone two years now, since the boy was nine; just up and disappeared in the night. The boy got up one morning, and his dad was gone. His mother hadn’t seemed all too interested in finding her husband, either. She got angry when the boy brought it up. It had taken the boy a couple weeks to come to the realization that his father had disappeared on purpose. And he wasn’t going to find his way back. As soon as the boy had the realization, he’d promised himself he’d put his father out of his mind. If it didn’t bother his father to leave, then the old man wasn’t worth any thought. The boy had done an admirable job of keeping to his word, too.
After the knife was sharp enough to slice clean through a falling piece of paper, the boy had set to work on the pencil. Truth be told, the pencil wasn’t all that dull. But the boy liked to write with a pencil so sharp he was liable to draw blood if he poked himself with it. So, he spent the next ten minutes shaving away tiny bits of wood, watching them curl and fall to the floor as he gently moved the blade back and forth.
The work soothed him. He let his mind go. Part of him was completely engaged in the task, locked in concentration on the pencil and the blade. But another part of him was shut off altogether. It was a pleasant feeling, to be both present and absent at the same moment.
“Zedidiah!”
His mother’s voice startled him out of his working daze, and the blade slipped, gouging the wood. Zedidiah let out a quiet curse. Ten minutes’ work ruined in a moment by his mother’s shrill, demanding voice.
“Zedidiah!”
He threw the pencil on his bed, then folded the knife and slipped it into his pocket. It always made him feel better to know it was there, that the razor sharp weapon
was within reach at any moment. He paused, then brushed the wood shavings under the bed. That wouldn’t hide them permanently; his mother would find them the next time she cleaned in there. But it would save him from being hollered at if she happened to peek into his room tonight.
He left the room and made his way down the wide stairway.
His family wasn’t rich. In fact, according to his mother it was a miracle they were able to keep food on the table and clothes on his back with her measly teacher’s salary. But their house was the house of a rich family. Not Rockefeller rich, but rich enough that a maid wouldn’t have looked out of place. The house had been in his mother’s family for more than a hundred years. It was a lonely place for a family of two, and it always felt drafty and cold, even in the summer.
Zedidiah paused halfway down the stairs. His mother sat in the chair near the door, the one she never used unless there was company. She was on the edge of the chair, leaning forward. Her legs were crossed and her hands rested primly on her knee. Most disturbing of all, she was smiling.
In the other chair, the one directly across from his mother, there sat a tall, impossibly thin man. He wore a brown, rumpled suit that looked both expensive and unkempt at the same time. The man looked too tall for the chair; his sharp knees and elbows stuck out at odd angles.
Zedidiah’s mother hadn’t seen him. Her gaze was glued to the man in the chair. And the man’s gaze was glued to her. “Zedidiah!” she yelled again.
The boy slowed his descent. “I’m here, mom.” He said it in a soft voice, meant to contrast with her needlessly loud calls.
His mother and the man both turned toward him, their heads moving in unison. The effect was disturbing. There was something odd about his mother’s eyes. They seemed a bit glassy, but there was an energy behind them, too.
“Zedidiah, we have a guest.”
The boy could think of no response that wouldn’t earn him a wallop, so he stayed quiet, instead focusing his energy on coming down the rest of the steps. He stopped directly between the two chairs.
