Doing so might lead whatever had taken this dead man’s eyes to him, and he did not want that. Instead, he made his way blindly around the body, feeling for the wall, and moved again to the right, in search of the button for the lights.
As he moved he thought about the dead body, about how it would feel to die himself. He didn’t think he would feel much pain if it happened. Ever since that one mission a few years ago when he had gotten his central nervous system damaged he could no longer feel pain. He was able to push himself harder than almost anyone—or anything else. Sometimes it was a blessing, but it did have its drawbacks. Luckily for him he was rarely aware of what they were.
Finally, after about a minute, his hand came in contact with a familiar button which turned on the lights. For a moment he did not see who was dead behind him. He was afraid to look into the face, into the face of a now dead friend, and see both eyes missing. In addition, his imagination began to play, to speculate what else might be missing from the body. If the eyes were gone, what else might possibly have been taken?
“I don’t even want to know,” he muttered, and quickly pressed a button for the lights.
There was only darkness.
“No,” he said, discouraged, and pressed the button again, and again.
Still, there was no light.
“Damn it.” He slammed his fist into the cold hard wall. In a normal person pain would now have been racing through his body, but he felt nothing. This was one of the brighter sides of his damaged nervous system, though he probably wouldn’t find out until later if he had broken anything. At least he got his anger out; that was good. He tried the lights one more time with no luck.
God, don’t let it be the power source, he thought as he stood in front of the door. Without the power source they would be stuck on this planet until someone else came along, and the chances of that happening were slim. It had been his idea to travel out this far, about ten light years father than they were supposed to. This sector wasn’t even on most of the universal maps.
He stood in front of the door for a long time, waiting for it to open. It usually took a moment or so for the motion detector to kick in and open the door. But, he now realized, without the power source this would not happen. Opening the door could be done manually, but it would take some strength. He reached out and found a grip on the door he could use.
With a breath he began to pull to the side, where the door normally slid into the wall. Slowly, it began to move, little by little, until there was enough space for him to get through.
There was no light in the corridor, and it was even colder than it had been in the room. Faintly, in the distance, he thought he heard some kind of tapping, like something with long nails walking swiftly across the metal.
“Hello?” he called out, his voice sounding tired and somewhat frightened. “Can anybody hear me?”
He looked down the corridor and then up, hoping to hear a sound that could lead him in a good direction. What he heard was that faint continuous tapping sound. What is that? he thought, then heard the quick footsteps and the frantic breathing behind him. He turned and said, “Who’s there?”
The footsteps halted and there was a gasp. He could tell almost immediately who it was. “Jenny,” he said, relieved, “what’s happened? Has the power source been damaged? Why aren’t there any lights?” He could hear her breathing, and in his mind pictured her standing there, mouth open, waiting to say something but finding she didn’t have the strength.
Softly, she said, “Captain …”
“What?” He took a step forward.
The faint, distant tapping seemed to be increasing. It sounded as if it were close.
“I thought … you were dead,” she whispered.
“What are you talking about?” he said, taking another step forward. “What’s happened?”
“I don’t know, sir,” she said, and he could tell she was shaking her head. In his mind he saw tears falling down her cheeks. “Sir, are you all right?”
“What do you mean?” He then remembered punching the wall. Maybe he had broken his hand after all, maybe it was busted up in a bloodstained mess. Then he thought again about the power source and asked if it was damaged.
“Yes,” she said hesitantly, “it’s been damaged.
The tapping was getting closer, louder.
“Look, sir,” she said, “we have to get out of here. Quickly.”
“Why? This is my ship, what’s happened to it?”
“I … I don’t know, sir. But—”
“Can the power source be fixed? Can we at least get some light in here?”
The tapping was louder, closer, but he still heard her sudden gasp.
“What is it, Jenny?” he asked.
“Sir,” she said, “we have to go. They’re coming.”
“Who’s coming?”
“I don’t know, sir, but—”
“What about the lights?” he demanded suddenly. He was tired of this darkness, wanted nothing more to do with it. He thought briefly of the body he had found, of how awful it must look, and decided before he did anything else he wanted to see Jenny’s face.
“Sir,” Jenny said, “the lights …”
“Yes? What about them?”
The tapping was very close now and it seemed to come from everywhere. In his mind he could see Jenny’s expression of horror as she wanted to get away from there. Whatever the tapping was it had something to do with what had happened after they had landed.
“The lights are on, sir,” Jenny said, quickly, and he could feel her grab his arm and begin to pull. “Now come on, sir, we have to get going!”
“But—”
The tapping became even louder. He could hear breathing now, too, breathing that sounded inhuman, alien. He felt his face for just a moment, just an instant, and remembered when he had first woken up, remembered the two small things stuffed down his throat.
Jenny’s hand was no longer on his arm, and somewhere behind him in his own darkness, she began to scream.
Continue reading for an excerpt from Robert Swartwood’s supernatural thriller The Calling.
When eighteen-year-old Christopher Myers’ parents are murdered, something is written on his bedroom door, a mark in his parents’ blood that convinces the police the killer has targeted Christopher as the next victim. To keep him safe, he travels away with his estranged grandmother and uncle to the small town of Bridgton, New York. And it’s in Bridgton that he meets an extraordinary young man who has come with his father to stop an unrelenting evil. Soon Christopher learns of the town’s deep dark secret, and how his parents’ murder was no accident, and how he has been brought to Bridgton by forces beyond his power—forces that just may threaten the destruction of all mankind.
Praise for The Calling
“The Calling is a powerful, gripping and terrifying novel, the sort that possesses your whole life while you’re reading it; it’ll stalk you through the day, and inform your dreams. Swartwood has delivered a novel that will become a classic.”
— Tim Lebbon
Prologue
Life isn’t fair.
It’s an old adage, a tired cliché, but you know this to be true. You’ve known it all your life, ever since you were a boy.
Like when you were forced to eat all your Brussels sprouts before being allowed to leave the dinner table. Or when you twisted your ankle on the first day of middle school practice and couldn’t play soccer for the rest of the season. Or when you asked Lydia Mynell out and she said no and then avoided you for the next two weeks, which you later admitted was a pretty impressive feat in itself as your lockers stood side by side.
Life isn’t fair, but who said it would be?
Your parents certainly didn’t.
Not your father, an intelligent, hardworking man who has been laid off three times from jobs at which he excelled. A college graduate, he now works as an assistant grocery manager at the local Giant, earning much less than he did at all of his pr
evious jobs.
Not your mother, a smart, compassionate woman who teaches children with special needs. You were thirteen when she was diagnosed with breast cancer. You were fourteen when she began her treatments, when she lost her hair and over the course of five months went through at least a dozen different wigs.
Your parents are a testament to the fact that life isn’t fair, yet they’ve never complained. Even when your father worked at a temp agency to help make sure the bills were paid on time, even when your mother lay in what everyone believed was her deathbed, they never said boo.
They always stayed positive, no matter what happened. Always smiling. Always holding hands. Always telling you they loved you.
It’s because of them you began to understand it doesn’t matter that life isn’t fair. No matter what it throws at you, how many curveballs, it’s your job, your purpose, to do your best. To never complain. To always put one step in front of the other and keep walking.
Then one morning, the day after your high school graduation, you wake to a faint distant buzzing noise. You open your eyes, roll over in bed, and look at your alarm clock. It’s eleven-thirty. The distant buzzing is coming from your parents’ room. You’ve heard it for as long as you can remember, and it’s okay, because soon the buzzing will be turned off.
You roll back over, reposition the pillow, and close your eyes.
And still the buzzing continues: a repetitive bwaamp-bwaamp-bwaamp-bwaamp that has begun to drill into the side of your brain.
You sit up, propping your elbow on the bed, and yell for someone to turn it off. You wait a few moments for a reply, maybe even silence, but all that answers you is the buzzing.
You yell again, louder this time, and glance back at your own alarm clock. This early morning insanity has been going on now for five minutes. It feels like an hour. Grumbling under your breath, you throw off the sheets and get out of bed.
Opening your door, you yell for your father. No answer, so you yell for your mother. No answer still, none except that annoying low bwaamp-bwaamp-bwaamp-bwaamp, which is much louder now that you’ve stepped into the hallway. You call out one final time, but when still no answer comes, you start to make your way toward their bedroom.
Their door is closed. You knock, once, and call their names. Once again, no answer comes, and for the first time in the couple of minutes you’ve been awake, you begin to worry.
Placing your hand on the doorknob, you notice you are shaking.
When you open the door the first thing that hits you is the smell. Like a massive fist, it knocks you back just a couple steps, and for a moment you aren’t even aware of what you’re staring at: you aren’t aware of the two bodies on the bed, of all the blood.
Your stomach tightens. The house begins to spin. Putting your hands to your mouth, you back away. You realize you’ve stopped breathing and in your throat bile is rising, and you look around the hallway, at once feeling frightened and alone.
A dream, you tell yourself, this is just a nightmare, and any moment now you will wake up, you will open your eyes to the sound of a distant buzzing coming from your parents’ room—the same very buzzing now crying out inches from their dried blood and cold flesh.
Bile is still in your throat, but you’re able to keep it down, you’re able to start breathing again. Lightheaded, disoriented, you turn away and head toward your room, the only thing you still know and trust.
And you see it.
On your door, you see the thing that will no doubt haunt you for the rest of your life. You see it and you know that this is no dream, that this is no simple nightmare. All this is real, all this is reality, and you are left standing there staring, trembling while your parents’ bodies lie motionless behind you.
Only later does the nightmare begin.
Chapter 1
The church parking lot was deserted. I parked in the handicapped space closest to the entrance. The trailing police cruiser parked in the handicapped space beside me, and for a moment I expected the officer behind the wheel to shake his head, motion for me to back up and park in a regular spot. But when I looked over at him he had already shut off his car and had this morning’s paper open in front of him.
Pastor James Young was waiting for me at the entrance. A man in his early fifties, with light brown eyes and a round, pleasant face, he wore chinos and a red polo shirt and shook my hand the moment I stepped inside.
“Christopher,” he said solemnly, “how are you doing?”
“Honestly?”
He nodded.
“Honestly, I’m exhausted.”
It was June 6, 2003, and my parents had already been dead for a week.
Without a word Pastor James Young led me toward his office. The hallway was long and deserted, its carpet shaded midnight blue with a design of blood red diamonds scattered throughout. Just as we entered the lobby, I glanced up at the support beam in the ceiling and saw a body hanging from a noose.
“Christopher?” The pastor was a few paces ahead, looking back at me with a frown. “Is everything all right?”
I blinked and the body and the noose were gone. It was just a normal support beam, thick and wooden, its weathered look clashing with the flawless white paint.
“Ever wonder the truth?”
“It’s just a story,” I said, because I knew it was just a story, some ghost story a kid no doubt made up one day during service because he was bored. But ever since I was young I’d heard the stories, the rumors, the myths of that crossbeam.
Staring up at the ceiling, Pastor James Young said, “The way I heard it, when this place was built fifty years ago, a local man came late one night and hung himself there. Supposedly he had done something awful, something he thought was unforgivable, and figured killing himself like that was the only way.”
I wondered briefly how many times the pastor had told this story. For as long as he’d been here, he was no doubt asked about the beam. Did the story change slightly every time he told it—did he add something new? Or did he have the thing memorized and got so bored with the telling after so long that it was like saying one of the many Bible verses they make children learn in Sunday school?
“The only way for what?” I asked.
“Forgiveness. Redemption, maybe.” He shrugged. “Who really knows?”
Then we were walking again, down another hallway, and seconds later we were in his office, Pastor James Young behind his large oak desk, me in one of the two chairs facing him.
“Now,” he said, “what is it I can help you with?”
“To be honest, I’m not really sure you can help me at all.”
He forced a smile. “I can always try.”
Despite the church’s size—its attendance for both morning services was close to one thousand on any given Sunday—his office was tiny. Besides the desk, which took up a good quarter of the room, there were three filing cabinets huddled in one corner, and a large bookcase that covered nearly an entire wall. Books mostly on theology filled the shelves. A bonsai tree sat on a table behind his desk, and while it was positioned to receive sunlight from one of the two opened windows, it looked as if a few of its tiny branches had begun to wither.
“How much do you know about what happened last week?”
He looked down at his desk, moved a stack of papers from one side to the other, and sighed. “Just that your parents were murdered. That you found their bodies. That the police first suspected you of doing it but then cleared you.”
“That’s it?”
He nodded.
So that sounded about right. Those were the key facts, the essential information, that was put in the papers. Not about what was painted on my bedroom door. Not about how it was supposedly a calling card from the killer saying I was next.
“I’m going away for a little,” I said. “For a week or a month, I don’t know how long. Steve … well, he wanted me to talk to a psychiatrist before I left. Wanted to make sure I’m okay in the head.”
The frow
n appeared on the pastor’s face again. “So then why did Police Chief Carpenter ask that I speak with you?”
“Because I told him I’d rather see you instead.”
“Why?”
I glanced away, toward the wall that had random pictures of different sizes scattered all over a large corkboard. Many were of Pastor James Young and his family—his wife and two sons—while others showed him together with various church families. One of those church families was my parents. Taken at what looked like a church picnic, the pastor standing between my father and mother, all three of them with their arms around their shoulders, smiling at the camera.
“Christopher? Why did you want to see me instead?”
I leaned forward in my seat. Opened my mouth but didn’t say anything.
“Are feeling okay?” James Young asked. “You look pale. Do you want something to drink? I can get you a bottle of water. Or—” His eyes shifted to something on his desk. “How about a lollipop?”
It was then that I noticed the jar of lollipops on his desk. Together they created the color of the rainbow. I remembered it was one of Pastor Young’s trademarks, to always have a lollipop or two in his suit jacket every Sunday morning. Oftentimes a child might start acting up, begin crying, and while he was in the lobby he would hold out a lollipop and say, “Hey now, no need to be sad.” It was the same thing he’d said to me the day I was baptized. I had been five years old. I was nervous, having to go out in front of a full congregation of strangers, and began crying. And James Young, the good pastor that he was, pulled out a red lollipop and leaned down, smiled and said, “Hey now, Christopher, no need to be sad.”
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