The Dark Ones

by Anthony Izzo

  Seeing this, Mike said, “I thought we were staying put.”

  “Just going to take a quick look outside. See what we’re up against.”

  “Makes sense,” Mike said, and joined him at the door.

  Milo opened it and stepped outside. He was not prepared for what he saw.

  CHAPTER 18

  Frank heard a voice, far off, distant, say, “Frank, you okay? Frank? I think he’s coming to.”

  He opened his eyes to see the red-haired woman—Ruby, wasn’t it?—from the diner. She crouched beside him. A look of concern, as if she had just found a stray puppy, crossed her face. He sat up a bit, propped himself on his elbows. His head felt like glass had broken and splintered inside his skull. A greasy sensation arose in his stomach.

  Don’t let me puke in front of the pretty redhead.

  After a moment, the nausea died down. It didn’t go away, but at least it wasn’t at volcanic-eruption level.

  All he could think to say was, “Where’s Roddy?”

  Ruby said, “Who?”

  “One of the bikers, he was chasing me. Where is he?”

  Ruby, kneeling on the bank, looked over her shoulder. “I think we took care of him. Looks like you took out the others.”

  It came back to him. Taking the stone from the clubhouse. Running into the woods. Digger dying. Frying the rest of the bikers.

  Frank sat all the way up. Ruby took his arm to steady him. He saw the remains of the bikers near the streambed. Frank clasped a hand over his mouth. He hadn’t wanted to kill them. What would be his punishment for this? Would God look upon him with fury or mercy? The Light had never been meant for this. It was a weapon designed to slay demons, not mortal men.

  “Who else is here with you?”

  As if on command, three men sauntered down the trail, all of them wearing some combination of blue jeans, work boots, and camouflage jackets. They formed a loose semicircle around Frank and Ruby. One of the men said, “We found Digger back there. The Warlords’ place is empty.”

  “Frank, can you walk? The attack’s begun.”

  “I most certainly can,” he said, getting to his feet. Again, the stabbing pain radiated through his skull. He touched the side of his head. A nice size goose egg was forming near his hairline.

  Frank felt in his pocket. He touched the smooth coolness of the Stone. He must have slipped it in there before blacking out. With it, they had a chance.

  They started back down the trail. Roddy’s corpse lay slumped in the bushes, and again Frank lamented using the Light on a human being. He pretended not to smell the scorched flesh and stink of blood as they left the stream bank.

  It will be up for God to decide, he supposed.

  Back in the parking lot, a row of bikes remained, along with the truck Frank had borrowed. A dark spot soiled the ground beneath the truck; vital fluids had seeped underneath from the gunshot wound. He spied Digger’s body.

  Removing the stone from his pocket, he stood over Digger.

  Ruby joined him and said, “We really need to get going.”

  “I want to see something.”

  Frank crouched next to Digger. He placed the stone on Digger’s blood-soaked chest. It glowed faintly, began to pulse, but after a moment, the Light dissolved and faded. Nothing.

  There was something he hadn’t told David about the stone, something only he and Charles knew.

  Frank felt a tiny hand on his shoulder. “Frank, they need us. What is it?”

  “The stone is capable of healing, at times, even mortal wounds. It won’t work on everyone,” he said, and removed the stone from Digger’s chest. He placed it in his pocket.

  “I’m sorry it didn’t work.”

  In the distance, he heard rumbling, the sound of big Harleys or Indians chugging down the road. “We’ve got trouble.”

  “Let’s get back to the truck,” Ruby said. She turned to the group of men, who stood at the edge of the parking lot near the woods. “Y’all ready?”

  Y’all. She was as charming as she was pretty. Ruby was bound to make some young man very happy someday.

  If someday came.

  They piled in the Ford SUV, Ruby behind the wheel, Frank in the passenger seat, and the other three in the back. He jerked his head toward the backseat and said to Ruby, “They Guardians?”

  She nodded.

  Ruby started up the truck and pulled to the edge of the lot, where the road came out of the woods. Frank looked in the rearview. A few of the dead bikers lay slumped on the former inn’s porch. They looked like piles of dirty denim from here. God help him, he had helped kill them.

  The bikes—five of them—cruised down the road. He guessed it was the last of the bikers that called the former inn their home. Their engines blatted in the night. Dust clouds kicked up around their bikes. They may have been mounted Tasmanian devils, whirling down the road like dervishes.

  Seeing the Ford, they slowed, and the one in the lead raised his hand. The pack came to a halt.

  “We can’t wait for them,” Frank said.

  “What do you suggest?” Ruby asked.

  “How about a game of chicken?”

  He looked at Ruby and she looked back as if he just suggested she stroll down Routersville’s main drag in the nude.

  “Have you slipped a gear, honey?”

  “My gears are intact. If they get too close, the truck will be surrounded. If we back up we’ll be in the parking lot with no way out unless this is one hell of an off-road vehicle and I’m just not seeing it.”

  Down the road, the biker in the lead revved the bike’s engine. He began to roll forward.

  “They’ll move,” Frank said. “We’re bigger.”

  Ruby eyed him wearily, then turned and said to the men in back, “Y’all strap in. You, too, Frank.”

  The bikers gained speed. There was perhaps a hundred yards separating the SUV and the bikes. On either side was a slight drop-off and beyond that trees and shrubs. Whoever went off the road would be feasting on a pine bark sandwich.

  Frank reached back and pulled the seatbelt across his chest. Then he snapped it home.

  Ruby accelerated. In the headlights, the truck seemed to chew up the ribbon of road at a terrifying speed. The bikers seemed up to the challenge, jetting down the road. They rode in a staggered formation, the hum-blat of their engines filling the night.

  Ruby closed the gap. A hundred feet. Fifty.

  Frank gripped the dashboard with both hands, realizing it would be fruitless and would not stop several hundred pounds of chrome and steel from smashing through the windshield. It was something, though.

  At twenty-five feet, the lead biker lost his nerve. His front wheel wobbled. He turned the handlebars to his right and the bike skidded out of control and he went down, the bike on its side and flying around the side of the truck. The other bikers peeled off, the four of them managing not to dump their bikes.

  Ruby hit the gas. In the side mirror, Frank saw one of them stop, climb off the bike, and help up the one who had wiped out. The other three turned around in the lot and were now speeding after the Ford.

  If the bikers caught up to the SUV, he didn’t know if he could use the Light on them again. He felt like a coward, but still hoped it wouldn’t come down to a showdown. There had been enough death and blood spilled, with more to come in Routersville.

  Ruby turned on to the road headed toward Routersville. When they were on the road for a moment, Frank looked in the side mirror and saw the bikers following.

  “Had to run into them, didn’t we?” a voice said from the backseat.

  “They’re speeding up,” said another.

  Frank peeked in the mirror. Sure enough, three headlights buzzed toward the truck. The bike’s engines screamed louder as they neared the SUV.

  Frank turned around. The three in the backseat had their heads craned, looking out the rear window.

  “Get ready for a fight, guys,” Frank said.

  The one in the middle, a husky g
uy with a full beard, said, “They get close, we’ll flash fry them.” Apparently the man didn’t share his reservations about using the Light on another person.

  Ruby pressed on the gas. The Ford sped up, but soon denim-clad bikers flanked both sides of the vehicle, while the third lagged behind. The road was a two-lane, and the biker on the left danced with the yellow line, while the one on Frank’s side straddled the shoulder’s white stripe. He waited. Let them make the first move. He could urge Ruby to swerve and run them off the road, but he wanted to avoid more bloodshed. On the road in the woods, he had guessed (correctly) that the bikers would blink. Here, it almost seemed too easy, running them off.

  Frank looked at the biker to his right. He was fumbling with something on the other side of the bike, one hand still on the bars. He pulled up parallel to Frank’s door. Glancing at the speedometer, Frank saw the truck was doing seventy. He looked back at the biker.

  The biker whipped his arm across and something hit the window with a flat crack, leaving a jagged break in the glass. The biker pulled back again and Frank saw the chain uncoil like a snake and bust the glass. It gave and splintered into a mosaic of shards. Frank recoiled.

  Ruby edged the SUV to the right, attempting to run the biker off the road. The biker dropped back, and the truck sped forward, but there was still one on the driver’s side of the truck.

  Frank heard the mechanical whine of the window lowering and turned to see the man behind Ruby getting ready to conjure a beam. He cocked his hand back, and his palm began to glow.

  “Wait,” Frank said.

  Beyond the man in the backseat, the biker brought his arm around, across the handlebars. In the dark, Frank made out a shape. Gun. He squinted. Sawed-off shotgun. Double barrel. He jammed the barrel in the window and a blast erupted from the gun. It was as if someone set off an M-80 in the truck. Fire licked from the barrel and Frank watched with horror as the head of one of the Guardians exploded. Frank felt something warm and wet against his face. Flesh and brains now decorated the interior of the Ford. Ruby screamed.

  The bearded man in the center of the backseat howled. Frank looked at him. His arm was peppered with buckshot, and the smell of gunpowder and burned flesh filled the vehicle.

  The victim of the shotgun blast—Frank never did learn his name—slumped forward, his ruined, smoking head leaning against the rear of the driver’s seat. Frank thanked God at least the man’s passing was quick.

  Ruby hit the gas, edging forward and pulling slightly away from the biker with the shotgun. Mewls and moans came from the backseat. Frank turned around. The biker with the chain edged up to the window. He cracked the chain against it and this time the glass sprayed across Frank’s lap. Through his beard, the biker grinned. The cool air knifed into the truck, making a mournful hissing sound.

  Up ahead, about a mile in the distance, Frank made out the first of Routersville’s homes. If they could make it into the town, the Dark Ones might actually act as an ally and slaughter the bikers.

  “Faster, Ruby.”

  “I’m already going eighty-five!”

  “Go ninety.”

  The truck accelerated and Frank expected at any moment to hear another wicked boom and this time it might be his head that was vaporized. He looked behind him. The wounded man slumped against the remaining live one in the back. The man who sat behind Frank was tall and gaunt. He wore a John Deere cap pushed back on his head, revealing a clump of black hair. His eyes were glazed over with shock. The man was on another planet.

  The shotgun-wielding biker pulled parallel to the truck again. The double-barrel weapon would have another shell ready to fire.

  If he tries again, I’m going to have to fry him.

  “Almost there,” Ruby said.

  Frank turned to check their position and saw the biker on the right whip ahead of the SUV. He cut across the bumper, maybe three feet from the front of the truck, sped over the yellow line, and stayed in the opposite lane. His maneuver caused Ruby to jerk the truck to the right. The Ford’s tires kissed the rumble strip and it shook with a series of vibrations. Ruby pulled farther onto the shoulder, the truck juking and jiving like a dancer in a conga line.

  She braked and the tires screeched. Frank put his hands on the dash. The truck hurtled forward for what seemed like an hour but was really no more than seconds before spinning around and coming to a halt on the shoulder. They were now facing the opposite way. The two bikes whizzed past. They would no doubt turn around and head back this way.

  To his surprise, Ruby unfastened her seatbelt and got out of the car. Frank was more surprised when he followed suit. The two men in the back, the gaunt fellow and the one with the beard, stumbled out. The bearded one, leaking blood, leaned against the gaunt man. All four of them hunkered down in front of the truck’s grille. The truck now shielded them from the bikers.

  The bike’s engines settled to a low hum. Frank guessed they had gone a mile or so down the road. Soon he would hear them accelerate, and the one with the shotgun had a shell left, assuming he didn’t stop to reload the other barrel. Who knew what other weapons they carried?

  Frank was vaguely aware of the blood and brains on his face. Lowering his head, he used his shirt to wipe off the carnage. Ruby did the same, although a streak of blood still decorated her cheek.

  The wounded man leaned against the bumper, deep wheezes coming from inside him. The bike engines drew closer. Ruby stood up, peered over the hood. Coming fast, they whipped past and a blast echoed. Shotgun pellets struck the truck. Ruby ducked. The bikers tore down the road.

  The truck would be damaged, if not useless. In the distance, the bikers stopped. Frank saw the silhouette of one reach into a saddlebag and pull something out. Then he opened the shotgun’s breech. He was loading shells.

  “They aren’t getting another crack at us,” Ruby said, and walked out in the road.

  “Get back here!” Frank said.

  The gaunt man said, “Ruby, you listen to him.”

  Now the bikers puttered forward, gaining speed. A gust of wind snuck under the truck tires and nipped Frank at the base of his spine.

  Ruby flicked her hands toward the oncoming bikers. Twin streaks of Light crackled through the air. One biker—the one with the shotgun—flew backward off the bike. His Harley skidded, spitting sparks on the blacktop. The second one’s gas tank erupted and he was blown forward, over the bars. He cartwheeled on the blacktop with a disturbing array of pops and splats. Neither one of them got up.

  You did what I couldn’t do, Frank thought.

  Ruby passed the men in silence. She got in the truck. The engine coughed as she tried to start it, but would not turn over. It had suffered the same fate as the truck back at the Warlord’s clubhouse. These guys really didn’t like anything with four wheels.

  Ruby climbed from the truck.

  Frank went into the road. He heard the sounds of the attack in the distance: crying, screaming, things being smashed.

  “What do we do now?” Ruby asked.

  “We walk. You and me.” He looked at the wounded man and his gaunt companion. “Stay here, in the truck. We’ll send someone.”

  “You can’t leave him here,” Ruby said. “He’s hurt.”

  “We need to get the Everlight there. We can’t very well carry him.”

  “I don’t like it.”

  “Time’s wasting. We’ll send help,” he said, and started down the road.

  The bearded man, the one who took the buckshot, said weakly, “Just a few pellets, honey. I’ll be okay for a bit. Go take care of business.”

  “I still don’t like it,” she said, but followed Frank down the road.

  Jenny watched from the tower. In the streets, the black mass fanned out. Two groups split off and headed down the side streets and moved among the houses. The winged creatures periodically swooped low and snatched people from the sidewalks.

  The main force, one she counted as several thousand strong, shambled up Main Street. They smas
hed windows, broke streetlights, and hacked parked cars to pieces with their dark weapons. The pattern of destruction was mindless, savage. It was as if not having flesh to cleave, they chose the nearest target.

  Now, the mass of them came within a hundred feet of the armory’s front doors. Still no Frank. The group stopped. Overhead, Jenny heard the shrieks and whoops of the winged creatures. She looked up and saw dozens of them silhouetted against the clouds.

  From her perch, she watched them. They held exotic-looking spears, axes, and swords, all forged from the darkness. One of them held a severed human arm over its head and shook it, as if in triumph. The ones around it grunted with pleasure.

  Jenny turned to the others and said, “Get ready.”

  From above came an ear-piercing shriek and Jenny looked up to see the winged creatures spiraling toward the roof. On the ground, footsteps roared against the pavement as the Dark Ones charged the armory.

  Gunfire erupted below. It would slow but not stop them. It had begun.

  CHAPTER 19

  David pulled away from Laura’s apartment building. He hit Delaware Avenue, looked right, and saw a police car speed past, sirens blaring. The cop car turned down a side street, nearly going up on two wheels. David saw why. The cloud that hid the Dark Ones rolled down Delaware. It was blocking the way. He needed to get to Charles’s house.

  Realizing he had to outrun it, he turned left on Delaware. In the rearview mirror, the cloud rolled ahead like a wave breaking onshore. It was fast, and it dawned on him the cloud would overtake the truck.

  He spotted a two-story commercial building. He pulled the truck over, grabbed the keys and his revolver, and got out. He tried the building’s glass door and was not surprised to find it locked. He fired the gun. The glass blew out. Immediately an alarm blared from inside the building.

  He kicked the remaining glass from the frame and, crouching low, moved into the lobby of the building. A reception desk was straight ahead, and to one side stood plush chairs and a coffee table covered with magazines. Next to the desk was a hallway and he hurried down it and found a door marked STAIRS. That door was unlocked, and he took the stairs to the second floor. The alarm howled, but he doubted any police would come. They would be busy with other emergencies.