Nightworld ac-6

by F. Paul Wilson

  Damn you!

  He wanted to scream, to charge the derrick cab and wrest the controls from the operator and drag that bell back up to the light. But he had about as much chance of succeeding in that as he had of leaping to the far side of the hole itself. So he stood among the crowd of privileged onlookers and silently endured the clawed terror that lacerated the inner walls of his heart.

  Finally, the cable reached its end. No matter what the voice told them, the bell could descend no further.

  But the voice was silent.

  Bill noticed a flurry of activity in the control area. He sidled in that direction through the crowd. He intercepted a student hurrying away from the area and caught his arm.

  "What's happening?"

  "The Triton—they're not answering!"

  Bill let him go and stood there feeling cold and frightened and useless as the derrick reversed its gears and began to reel in the Triton at top speed. The rewind seemed to take forever. During the interval an ambulance and an EMS van roared into the Sheep Meadow with their howlers going full blast. Finally the bell hove into view again. When it was swung away from the hole and settled onto the platform near the edge, the people from the control area surged toward it.

  Bill pushed his way to the front of the crowd until his belly pressed against one of the wooden "Police Line" horses that rimmed the area. He watched them spin the winged lug nuts on the hatch, swing it open, and peer inside.

  Somebody screamed. Bill clutched the rough wooden plank of the horse and felt his heart double its already mad pounding. A flurry of activity erupted around the bell, people running for phones, frantically waving the EMS van forward. Good God, something had happened to Nick! He'd never forgive himself for not getting here in time to stop him from going down.

  A pair of EMTs, stethoscopes around their necks, drug boxes and life packs in each hand, rushed forward as a limp figure was eased through the hatch. Bill craned his neck to see through the throng. He sighed with relief when he saw that the injured man was white haired and balding. Not Nick, thank God. The other one. They stretched him out prone on the platform and began pumping on his chest.

  But where was Nick?

  Bill spotted more activity around the hatch. They were carrying—no, leading—someone else out. It was Nick. Nick, thank God! He was on his feet, coming out under his own steam.

  Then Bill got a look at his face. Red. There was blood on his face, on his lips. Blood dribbled down his chin. He'd cut his lower lip—looked more like he'd chewed it. But it was Nick's eyes that drove the air from Bill's lungs in a cry of horror. They were wide open and utterly vacant. Whatever he'd seen down there, whatever had happened, it had driven away all intelligence and sanity, sent it fleeing into hiding in the deepest, most obscure corners of his mind.

  "Nick!" Bill cried.

  He bent to slip under the barricade but one of the security cops was watching him.

  "Stay back there, Father!" he warned. "You come through there an' I'll have to toss you in the wagon."

  Bill ground his teeth in frustration but straightened up behind the barricade. He'd be no help to Nick in jail. And Nick was going to need him.

  He stood quietly as they led a stumbling, drooling Nick Quinn to the waiting ambulance. Those mad, empty eyes. What had he seen down there?

  And then, as Nick came even with him, his eyes suddenly focused. He turned his head to stare at Bill. Then he grinned—a wide, bloody-mouthed rictus, totally devoid of humor. Bill started in horror, pressing back against the people behind him. And then as suddenly as it had appeared, the grimace was gone. The light faded from Nick's eyes and he stumbled on, away from Bill, toward the waiting ambulance.

  Bill watched a moment, weak, trembling, then he fought through the crowd and began to follow the ambulance on foot as it headed east across the grass. Finally he saw the name on its side: Columbia-Presbyterian. He ran for Fifth Avenue, looking for a cab to take him to the hospital, all the while fighting the feeling that he'd lived through this horror once already. He didn't know if he could survive a second round.

  WNEW-FM:

  FREDDY: Bad news from Central Park, folks. Those two guys who went down into that big hole in a diving bell ran into some trouble. JO: Yeah. One of them had a heart attack and the other got pretty sick. They're saying they think there was some problem with the air supply. We'll let you know more about it as soon as we hear. FREDDY: Right. Meanwhile, here's a classic Beatles tune for all those people working out there in the Sheep Meadow.

  Cue: "Fixing a Hole"

  "When's this other fellow arriving?"

  "I'm not sure," Glaeken said.

  He looked up from the couch at Repairman Jack standing at the picture window staring out at the Park. Everyone who came to his apartment was drawn to that window, including Glaeken himself. The vista had always been breathtaking. With that hole in the Sheep Meadow now, it was captivating.

  Jack intrigued him. He wore slightly wrinkled beige slacks and a light blue shirt with the sleeves rolled half-way up his forearms. Average height, dark brown hair with a low hairline, and deceptively mild brown eyes. You would not pick him out of a crowd; in fact his manner of dress, his whole demeanor was geared toward unobtrusiveness. This man could dog your steps all day long and you'd never notice him.

  Glaeken liked Jack, felt a rapport with him on a very fundamental level. Perhaps because Jack reminded him of himself in another era, another epoch, when he was that age. A warrior. He sensed the strength coiled within the man; not mere physical strength, although he knew there was plenty of that in his wiry muscles, but inner strength. A toughness, a resolve to see a task through to the end. He had the strength, too, to question himself, to examine his motives and actions and wonder at the wisdom, the sanity of the life he had chosen for himself.

  Glaeken wondered if Jack might prove to be the one he was seeking.

  He saw a downside to Jack, though. He was unruly and untamed. He recognized no master, no authority over himself. He followed his own code. And he was angry. Too angry, perhaps. At times the cold fire of his rage fairly lit the room.

  Still, Glaeken desperately needed his services. Jack was the only one in this world who had any chance of retrieving the ancient necklaces. Glaeken knew he had to tread carefully with this man, and be at his most convincing.

  "How long are we going to wait for him?" Jack said, turning from the window.

  "He should be here by now. I have a feeling he might have been delayed by a sick friend."

  Glaeken had watched on TV as the diving bell had returned from the depths of the hole. It continually amazed him how much one could experience through television without ever leaving the living room. When the first footprints were stamped into the surface of the moon, he had been there watching via television, just as he had been watching an hour or so ago when Bill's friend and the other scientist had been removed from the bell. The other man, a Dr. Buckley, was dead of cardiac arrest, and Dr. Quinn had been rushed to an emergency room in shock. Glaeken assumed that Bill had followed.

  Too bad—for Bill's friend and because Glaeken had wanted Bill and Jack to meet, perhaps become friends. He'd have to save that for another time.

  Jack dropped into a chair opposite Glaeken.

  "Let's get on with it, then. You mentioned the necklaces again. You're not still set on getting ahold of them, are you?"

  "Yes. I'm afraid they're an absolute necessity."

  "To prevent 'the end of life as we know it,' right?"

  "Correct."

  Jack rose from the chair and stepped to the window again.

  "I still say you're crazy," he said, looking down at the Park again. "But the damn Park is smaller, isn't it? I mean, it's lost whatever amount of surface area that hole swallowed. So it has shrunk, just like you said." He turned and stared at Glaeken. "How did you know that hole was going to open up?"

  "Lucky guess."

  "Yeah. Right. But you're going to need more than a lucky guess to fin
d Kolabati and those necklaces."

  "I've learned exactly where she is."

  Jack sat down again.

  "Where?"

  "She's living on Maui, on the northwest slope of Haleakala, above Kula. And she has both necklaces with her."

  "How'd you find that out? Two nights ago you hadn't the faintest idea where she was."

  "I ran into an old acquaintance who happened to know."

  "How convenient."

  "Not really. I sought out this acquaintance."

  Glaeken allowed himself a tight little smile and said no more. Let Jack assume that the acquaintance was a person. He could hardly tell him about the Dat-tay-vao, at least not at this juncture. He wasn't ready for it. But the truth was that when he had touched that boy Jeffy yesterday, he had made contact with the Dat-tay-vao, and in a flash that contact revealed the location of the necklaces. For the Dat-tay-vao always knew the whereabouts of the necklaces. They had been intimately linked once. Hopefully, with the cooperation of men like Repairman Jack, they would soon be reunited.

  "And you want me to go there and convince Kolabati to give them up so she can turn into an old hag and die as a result."

  "I want you to get them. Simply get them."

  "Well, since she won't part with them willingly, I'll have to steal them. I'm not a thief, Mr. Veilleur."

  "But you do steal things back for people, don't you?"

  Jack leaned back in the chair and tapped his fingers on the arms.

  "On occasion."

  "Very well: those necklaces—or rather, the metal they were made from—originally belonged to me."

  Jack shook his head slowly. "Uh-uh. That won't fly. I know for a fact that those necklaces date from pre-Vedic times, and that they've been in her family for generations. And believe me, hers is a family with long generations."

  "Still, it is true. The source material was stolen from me long, long ago."

  Jack's eyes narrowed. "You're telling me you're a couple of thousand years old?"

  Glaeken sensed that he had pushed Jack's credulity to its limits. The whole truth might make him walk out again as he had from the tavern the other night. Probably wise to back off a step for now.

  "Let's just say, then, that some time in the dim past a member of her family stole it from a member of mine. Will that do?"

  Jack rubbed his eyes and shook his head as if to clear it.

  "Why do I believe you?"

  "Because I'm telling you the truth." Or something reasonably close to it.

  "All right," Jack said after a lengthy pause. "I'll think about it. I'm not committing yet. I could use some detailed drawings of the necklaces, though. Got any?"

  "I can have them for you tomorrow. Why?"

  "That's my business." He rose to his feet. "You know my fee, and it doesn't look like you'll have any trouble meeting it, so—"

  "Fee? I assumed you'd do this because you want to."

  "Now why would I want to?"

  "Your own self-interest. That hole out there is only the first. Many more holes will follow—countless holes. Those necklaces will go a long way toward stopping them."

  Jack smiled. "Sure. Look, Mr. V. I'm in business, but it's not the business of saving the world. I'll be by tomorrow to pick up the drawings. And the down payment. See you then."

  "It's almost sundown," Glaeken said as Jack headed for the door. "Go straight home."

  Jack laughed. "Why? Vampires on the loose?"

  "No," Glaeken said. "Worse. Do not go out after dark, especially near that hole."

  Jack just smiled and waved at the door.

  Glaeken hoped Jack heeded him. He truly liked the man; and he needed him. He didn't want him killed.

  WPIX-TV

  This is Charles Burge reporting live from the Sheep Meadow in Central Park. It's been quiet here since the tragedy this afternoon, but that doesn't mean nothing's been happening. If you look behind me you'll notice that the crowds are gone. That's because along about 5:30 or so, the downdraft that's been flowing into the hole changed to an updraft. And boy, let me tell you, it doesn't smell good here. A rotten odor permeates the air. Anyone who doesn't have to be here has gone. And I'll be going too. See you in the studio soon, Warren.

  2 • DE PROFUNDIS

  Washington Heights

  "Physically, he checks out fine," the neurology resident said. "Overweight, cholesterol and triglycerides on the high side, otherwise, all his numbers, scans, and reflexes check out."

  Bill swallowed and asked the dreaded question that had plagued him since he'd seen Nick's blank expression and empty eyes. It reminded him too much of a similar case five or so years ago.

  "He's…he's not hollow, is he?"

  The resident gave him a funny look. "Hollow? No, he's not hollow. Where'd you get an idea like that?"

  "Never mind. Just a recurring nightmare. Go on."

  "Right. As I was saying, he checks out physically, but"—he waved his hand before Nick's unresponsive eyes—"the Force is definitely not with him."

  The name-tag read R. O'Neill, M.D. He wore an earring and his hair was braided at the back.

  Not exactly Marcus Welby, Bill thought, but he seemed to know what he was about.

  "He's in shock," Bill said.

  "Well…shock to you isn't shock to me. Shock to me means he's prostrate, his blood pressure's hit bottom, his kidneys are shutting down, and so on. That's not our friend here."

  Bill glanced over to where Nick sat on the edge of the bed. He'd trailed the ambulance up here to Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center. The emergency-room physicians and the consultants had unanimously recommended at the very least that he be kept overnight for observation. The university had wrangled a private room for him, very much like a sitting room, with a small picture window, a sofa, a couple of chairs, and of course, a hospital bed. Nick looked a lot better. His lower lip had been sutured; he'd been cleaned up and fitted into a hospital gown. But his eyes were still as vacant as a drive-in theater on a sunny afternoon.

  "What's wrong with him, then?"

  "Hysteria. Acute withdrawal. That's for the Psych boys to figure out. I'm here to say it's not medical, not neurological. It's the windmills of his mind—they aren't turning."

  "Thank you for that astute observation," Bill said. "How about the other man who went down in the bell with him?"

  Dr. O'Neill shrugged. "Haven't heard a thing."

  "He's dead, you know."

  Bill started at the sound. It was Nick. His eyes weren't exactly focused, but they weren't completely empty. And he wasn't grinning as he had before when they were leading him to the ambulance. His expression was neutral. Still, the sound of Nick's voice, so flat and expressionless, gave him a chill. Especially since there was no way Nick could know Dr. Buckley's condition.

  "Great!" said Dr. O'Neill. "He's coming around already." He picked up Nick's chart and headed for the door. "I'll make a few notes and let Psych know."

  Bill wanted to stop him, make him stay, but didn't know how. He didn't want to be alone with Nick. A moment later he was.

  "Dr. Buckley's dead," Nick repeated.

  Bill came around the bed and stood in front of him—but not too close.

  "How do you know?"

  Nick's brow furrowed. "I don't know. I just know he's dead."

  The fact didn't seem to bother Nick and he sat silent for a a long moment. Abruptly he spoke again in that affectless voice.

  "He wants to hurt you, you know."

  "Who? Dr. Buckley?"

  "No. Him."

  The room suddenly seemed cooler.

  "Who are you talking about? The one you…met down there?"

  A nod. "He hates you, Father Bill. There's one other he hates more than you, one he wants to hurt more than you, but he hates you terribly."

  Bill reached back, found a chair, and lowered himself into it.

  "Yes, I know. I've been told."

  "Are you going to stay with me tonight?"

  "Yes. Sur
e. If they'll let me."

  "They'll let you. It's good that you're going to stay tonight."

  Bill remembered the bespectacled nine-year-old orphan who used to be afraid of the dark but would never admit it.

  "I'll stay as long as you need me."

  "Not for me. For you. It's going to be dangerous out there."

  Bill turned and looked out the window. The sun was down, the city's lights were beginning to sparkle through the growing darkness. He turned back to Nick.

  "What do you—"

  Nick was gone. He was still sitting on the bed, but he wasn't really there. His eyes had gone empty and his mind had slipped back into hiding.

  But what of his mind? What did it know about Rasalom—the Enemy? And how did it know? Was Nick somehow tapped into a part of Rasalom as a result of whatever happened in that hole?

  Bill shuddered and gently pushed Nick back to a reclining position on the bed. He didn't envy Nick if that were true. Simply to brush the hem of that sickness would mean madness…

  And that was precisely where Nick was now, wasn't he?

  Bill stood over Nick's bed, wondering if he should stay. How much could he do for Nick? Not much. But at least he could be here for him if he came around again, or came out of this mental fugue and wanted to know where he was and what had—

  Something splatted against the window.

  Bill turned and saw what looked like a softball-sized glob of mucous pressed against the outer surface of the glass. It began to move—sideways.

  Curious, he stepped closer. As he neared he heard an angry buzzing through the glass. The glob appeared to be encased in a thin membrane, red-laced with fine, pulsating blood vessels. It left a trail of moisture as it slid slowly across the glass. But the buzzing—it seemed to be coming from the glob.

  Bill picked up a lamp from an end table and held it close to the window. He spotted a fluttering blur on the far side of the glob. Wings? He angled the lamp. Yes, wings—translucent, at least a foot long, fluttering like mad. And eyes. A cluster of four multi-faceted eyes at the end of a wasp-like body the size of a jumbo shrimp, lined with rows of luminescent dots. Eight articulated arms terminating in small pincers were stretched across the mucous-filled membrane.