by Mark Lukens
* * *
Inside the cabin, Needles sat at the edge of his recliner, his elbows on his knees like he was ready to pop up onto his feet at any second. He was on edge, like he needed to get up and move, like he had something important he needed to do very soon.
And he did have something important to do.
What he’d seen last night had been no nightmare – it had been real. And he’d been given instructions. He knew what he needed to do. Maybe if he did what the devil told him to do, then the devil would let him go.
David sat on the couch, his notebook beside him. He wasn’t drawing right now; he was watching every move that Needles made.
Needles glanced at the front door. He could see that it was still slightly ajar. He thought about getting up and closing the door, and then locking it. He could lock them outside with the devil that they didn’t believe in.
Needles jumped to his feet. He only had a short time to accomplish his task, and he couldn’t waste time running for the door, it might spook the kid and he would run for the door or run to the back or scream. Instead of walking to the door, Needles walked into the kitchen. He glanced at the freezer for a second. He could imagine Tom Gordon’s body thawing inside the leaking freezer.
A thought occurred to Needles: maybe Tom Gordon wasn’t a demon, maybe he had been sent by God to give Needles a message. Maybe Needles was the only one who could see, maybe Needles was the only one who could carry out God’s plan. God had given Needles a warning through the old man in the bank, and Needles hadn’t meant to shoot the old man; he was truly sorry about that, he didn’t even remember pulling the trigger.
But now maybe Needles was getting a second chance. God was giving him a second chance to carry out this mission. Maybe the demon wasn’t out there; maybe the demon has been inside with them all along – the demon was David. And Tom Gordon had been sent to tell Needles what to do, to kill this demon.
Needles rubbed the gold crucifix that hung around his neck. He opened the kitchen drawer and rummaged around until he found the biggest kitchen knife he could find.
Needles turned and walked into the living room. He watched David who stared at him. David saw the knife in his hand, Needles was sure of that, but David didn’t try to run for the front door, or even try to scream. That had to mean David was a demon, and that was proof enough for Needles.
Thank you, God, Needles whispered in his mind. Thank you for giving me this chance to carry out your wishes.
So crafty the devil was, Needles thought, hiding inside such an innocent-looking child. Nobody would ever suspect what this child really was. But Needles could tell, Needles could see. Oh yes, he could see right through David.
Needles walked towards the couch, the knife in his hand; he didn’t even bother to try and hide it now. The light from the windows winked off the long blade of the knife. David just watched him with his large dark eyes. David knew what was coming, Needles was certain. And David knew that he couldn’t win. Evil couldn’t fight goodness – it was no match for it.
When Needles stepped onto the area rug, the Native American rug with its colorful patterns, David suddenly got to his feet; he glanced at the front door, but he didn’t run for it, he just looked back at Needles like he was frozen with fright.
Needles smiled at David. “You know what I have to do, don’t you?”
CHAPTER THIRTY
“Eyeballs?!” Jose yelled out in disgust at Frank. Jose stood on the front porch, his hand itching to draw his gun and run out into the snow and charge Frank. But for a few seconds he was too shocked to move, he could only stare at Frank. “Eyeballs?” he spat out again. “What the fuck?”
“You have to give him what he wants,” Frank said, and that plastic smile was back on his face.
Jose jumped off the porch and down into the snow; Cole didn’t even have a chance to stop him. Jose ran through the snow right at Frank as he howled a scream of fury.
Cole raised his gun, aiming it at Frank, ready to cover Jose.
But there were no shots fired at them from the trees.
And Frank wasn’t turning to run. He wasn’t pulling out his pistol. He wasn’t doing anything except waiting patiently and motionless as Jose ran right at him.
Jose reached Frank, his gun aimed right at Frank’s head. If anyone was going to start firing at him from the woods, Jose thought, then he was going to make damn sure that he blew Frank’s head off first. Frank watched Jose with no expression in his eyes, that plastic smile on his face. Jose wanted to smash his face in with the butt of his gun; he wanted to wipe that stupid smile away.
Jose stood in front of Frank, his gun aimed at his face, at that stupid grin. “You’re coming back inside, motherfucker,” Jose growled, and he moved around to the back of Frank to march him to the cabin. “You’re going to give us some fucking answers. You’re going to …”
Jose’s words died in his throat when he got around to the back of Frank. There was nothing there – no back to Frank at all. It looked like Frank’s back had been sliced off and his torso had been scooped out – muscles, bones, organs, blood, all of it gone. He was completely hollow inside. Even part of the back of Frank’s head was gone and the inside of his head was hollow. There were only the glistening red walls of flesh inside of his hollowed-out body.
Jose couldn’t understand what he was seeing. Frank couldn’t be alive. No one could be alive like this.
Cole stood at the edge of the porch, his gun still aimed at Frank. He was ready for the barrage of gunfire to begin from the woods, but nothing happened, nobody was shooting. There was no wall of snow, no sudden blizzard, nothing.
But something was wrong with Jose. He had gotten behind Frank to march him back to the cabin, but then he stopped cold, staring at the back of Frank in horror. At what? What had he seen?
Cole heard a sharp inhale from Stella. He managed a quick glance at her, and he saw her body stiffen, her eyes on Frank. Did she know what had stopped Jose? Did she know what Jose was seeing?
“Jose!” Cole shouted, trying to break his paralysis.
But Jose wasn’t listening, he wasn’t moving, he wasn’t answering. He only stared at the back of Frank.
Cole was about to jump down into the snow, but then Jose stumbled back around to the front of Frank, staring at him.
Jose moved back around to face Frank. His gun hand had dropped down to his side, and his body had weakened so much that he barely held onto his gun. He stared at Frank’s face.
Frank was still smiling. He spoke, and when he spoke Jose could now see the barest traces of light coming through his mouth from his hollowed-out head. “Go,” Frank whispered to Jose. “Go back and tell the others what you’ve seen. Tell them that they have to give him what he wants. There is no other way.”
Jose took a step back, then another. Then another. He backed up through the snow, away from Frank, but he didn’t take his eyes off of Frank.
Frank just stood there in the snow, still smiling, his head still cocked to the side.
After five backwards steps through the deep snow, Jose turned and ran for the cabin. He’d never been this frightened in his life. He never knew anyone could experience terror like this. He ran in a blind panic. He ran towards the only safety left that he knew of right now – the cabin. But even in his white-hot panic, he knew that the cabin wasn’t safe anymore. Nowhere was safe anymore.
Jose stumbled up the porch steps, gibbering, not even sure what he was saying, not sure what he was thinking, everything was just a blur of white panic. It was like his brain had seen something so horrible and unimaginable that it was beginning to shut down.
Cole helped Jose up the steps. Jose’s gun slipped from his fingers and clunked down onto the floorboards of the porch. Cole picked up the gun while still holding on to Jose.
“What’s wrong, Jose?” Cole asked. He could hear the panic in his own voice. “What did you see?”
“He … he … he’s not …” Jose stammered. He couldn’t get the wo
rds out. “Insides …” he whispered.
Just then they heard a scream from inside the cabin – David’s scream.
“David!” Stella yelled and she bolted for the front door.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Stella rushed inside to see Needles chasing David with a gigantic kitchen knife. Needles sliced the knife down through the air, stabbing at David. But David managed to duck out of the way of the deadly swing just in time.
Stella didn’t even think about it, she rushed right at Needles and slammed into him.
Needles was thrown off balance from both surprise and because Stella had hit him that hard.
“NOOO!!!” Stella screamed as she tackled Needles and drove him back into his recliner. They both fell over the recliner and Stella heard the satisfactory sound of the knife clattering to the floor.
Cole was inside the cabin right after Stella. He saw Needles try to stab David with the knife, but Stella had reacted a split second before Cole had, and he watched her tackle Needles over the recliner. Both of them fell to a heap on the floor on the other side of the recliner and Cole was sure at least one of them had fallen on the knife, but then he heard it drop on the floor
Jose stumbled inside the cabin and shut the door. He fumbled with the lock with his shaking hands. He knew the locks wouldn’t hold back whatever was out there, but he locked the door anyway. He stumbled over to the dining room table, oblivious to the fight in the living room between Stella and Needles. Jose plopped down in one of the dining room chairs as his mind replayed what he’d seen out there in the snow – Frank’s hollowed-out body.
On the floor beside the recliner, Needles kicked Stella off of him. He had been surprised by her strength, caught off guard for a moment, but Needles was stronger than she was and his kick sent her through the air where she landed on the Native American rug in the center of the room. Needles rolled over in a quick movement and grabbed the dropped knife from the floor.
As Stella struggled back to her feet, Cole shot across her vision like a blur of movement. She watched Cole punch Needles in the jaw as he tried to stand up. In less than two seconds Cole hit Needles again and again in the face until he dropped the knife.
Cole tackled Needles, who was already woozy from the punches to his face, and then he drove him into the wall. They both slid down the wall to the floor as pictures crashed from the wall to the floor all around them. Needles fell over onto his stomach, and before Needles had a chance to turn over, Cole crawled on top of his back like an MMA fighter; he held him face-down as he wrenched one of Needles’ arms behind his back and held it there. Needles wailed out in pain.
“Get me something to tie his hands with!” Cole yelled at Jose.
But Jose wasn’t listening. He stared down at the table, his mind tuning out everything around him. He kept seeing Frank’s body in his mind’s eye, his hollow body, the red and glistening walls of flesh inside of his torso and head.
Stella jumped up from the floor. Her stomach hurt from where Needles had kicked her, but she could tell there was no serious damage. She ran to the kitchen counter and grabbed the balled-up telephone cord Cole had tossed there what seemed like so long ago. She grabbed it and ran back to Cole.
“Tie it around his wrist!” Cole screamed at Stella.
Needles tried to fight back, but he couldn’t buck Cole off of his back. Cole had a handful of Needles’ hair in his other hand and he slammed Needles’ face down onto the wood floor, nearly knocking him out, definitely dazing him for a moment.
Stella tied the cord tightly around Needles’ wrist, a double knot.
“Hold the cord,” Cole told her as he grabbed Needles’ other arm. Needles tried to struggle, but he was too dazed and Cole was too strong. Cole brought Needles’ wrists together and he didn’t even have to tell Stella what to do – she wrapped the cord around both wrists several times and tied it tight.
Cole tested the bonds and after he was satisfied that they were tight, he sat back on his butt on the floor as Needles writhed beside him and worked his way up into a sitting position, his back and bound hands against the wall. There were tears in Needles’ eyes and blood trickled from his nose down into his mouth. “You don’t understand,” he told Cole. “I had to do it. I had to.”
“Shut up,” Cole said as he exhaled a long breath.
“David,” Stella whispered. She ran over to the couch but David wasn’t there. “David!” she called out. She went to the end of the couch and found David crouched down beside the end of it, hiding from Needles. He looked up at her with his dark eyes full of fear.
She dropped down to her knees and reached out for him. “It’s okay,” she told him. “He’s tied up now. He won’t get you.”
David jumped into her arms and hugged her.
Stella cried as David held onto her. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m sorry I left you in here with him. I should’ve known.”
David pulled away from Stella and he nodded at her. “It’s okay,” he told her in his soft voice. He smiled. “I’m okay now.”
Stella let out a laugh even though she was still crying a little bit. She wiped away at her tears. She looked him over quickly even though he told her he was okay; she didn’t see any wounds of any kind on him. “You’re not hurt anywhere, are you?”
“No. I’m okay.”
Stella exhaled a deep breath. “Thank God.”
Cole watched Stella and David for a moment, and then he looked at Needles who was still sitting against the wall. Needles looked at Cole with his tear-streaked face. “You don’t understand what’s going on here, Cole. That kid’s a demon. He’s doing all of this on his own. He’s not a child, he’s a monster.”
“Shut up, Needles.”
“He’s the devil. He’s the one you should be afraid of, not me.”
“I swear to God, Needles, if you don’t shut the fuck up …” Cole let his words trail off.
Needles became very quiet and suddenly calm. A strange smile appeared on his face. “You’ll see,” he whispered to Cole. “You’ll see soon enough.”
Cole walked away from Needles – he had to get away from him or he was afraid he was going to hit him again. Besides, Cole had another concern at this moment – Jose.
He walked over to Jose and stared at him.
Jose sat in the dining room table chair, his body slouched, his eyes distant, his head hung down.
“Jose,” Cole said in a soft voice. He pulled out a chair and moved it over so that he sat down right in front of Jose.
Jose didn’t respond.
“Jose!” Cole said a little louder.
Jose looked at Cole. “We have to give him what he wants,” Jose said in an emotionless voice. “We have to give him anything he asks for.”
“What’s wrong, Jose?” Cole asked. “What did you see out there?”
“Frank’s not real,” Jose said, and then he thought for a moment. “He’s not alive. He can’t be.”
“What do you mean?”
“There’s nothing inside of Frank anymore.”
“Nothing inside?”
“He’s been hollowed out,” Jose said quickly. “He’s like some … some kind of puppet. His back has been torn off and something scooped out all of his insides. Everything’s gone. There’s nothing in there.”
“Then how – ”
“I don’t know!” Jose snapped. He shook his head. “I don’t know,” he repeated in a softer voice. “He’s just a puppet for whatever’s out there.”
Cole glanced at Stella; she had taken David to the couch and sat him down. David grabbed his notebook and pen right away, and he held them protectively on his lap. They both looked back at Cole and Jose.
Jose startled Cole by grabbing his arm hard, Jose’s fingers dug into Cole’s flesh. But Cole didn’t pull away; he stared into Jose’s unblinking eyes of terror. “We have to give him the eyeballs. We have to give them to him.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
“It can do anything it wants to,�
�� Jose continued as he stared into Cole’s eyes.
“No it can’t,” Cole answered him, “or we’d all be dead already. If this thing can come in here anytime it wants to and take all of us, then why hasn’t this … this thing done that yet?”
Jose startled Cole by jumping to his feet. He paced around for a few seconds, like he wasn’t sure where he was going to go or what he was going to do, he was like a caged animal that knew it couldn’t escape but couldn’t help running around the cage and searching for a way out. Jose dashed to the kitchen and grabbed the bottle of whiskey off the counter. He spun the lid off and drank down a few long swallows of the bourbon, something to numb him from the horrors that waited outside for them.
Cole watched Jose for a few seconds, but he knew he wasn’t going to be able to get through to Jose right now – he was too frightened by whatever he’d seen out there, by Frank’s hollowed-out body? Cole couldn’t believe that, he couldn’t wrap his mind around that. It had to be a mistake; Jose had to have misunderstood what he’d seen out there. There was no way that could be possible. This couldn’t be happening. This couldn’t be real.
Cole looked over at Stella, and then he walked towards her. “Why eyeballs?” he asked her. “If all this … thing that’s supposed to be out there wants is eyeballs, then why doesn’t it take Frank’s eyeballs?” Cole hesitated for a second before finishing the rest of his sentence, like it was painful to get the words out. “Or Trevor’s.”
Stella stared at him with unwavering eyes. “Because it wants us to do it.”
“Why? Why would someone want us to do this?”
Stella didn’t answer, and Cole could see that she wasn’t going to answer. She was guarding some of the information, Cole could see that now. And in a way, he couldn’t blame her. But he didn’t think she was hiding things because she was a part of what was going on out there, more like she knew who was out there and she was strategizing to save David and herself.
Cole sighed. Eyeballs. They couldn’t just take someone’s eyeballs, could they? And whose eyeballs? Cole wasn’t going to volunteer. Neither was Jose. Cole would not allow them to take Stella or David’s eyes. That only left one possibility.
