The Darkest Corners

by Barry Hutchison

  It had been a man, I guessed, although I couldn’t say why. There was something vaguely male about the scraps of humanity it had left, but then that may just have been my imagination.

  It bounded like a big cat along the aisle, its glossy black eyes trained on my throat. It wanted to kill me, this thing. It wanted to open my neck, spill my blood across the floor. It wanted me dead.

  But I could not die. If I died, he got away with it.

  I raised a hand, felt the sparks flash. When I clenched my fist, something inside the screecher went krik. Blood burst on its lips as it let out a pained yelp. The next bound was its last. It slid to a stop at my feet, and it didn’t move again.

  My eyes raised to the next screecher. It didn’t hesitate as it closed in for the kill – but neither did I. With a single gesture I hurled it backwards into the others. The sparks crackled like lightning inside my head. My hands moved like a conductor leading an orchestra and, one by one, the screechers fell.

  In seconds there was only the echo of their screams around the church, and then there wasn’t even that.

  The door behind me opened with a creak. I heard Billy draw in a sharp breath.

  ‘What… what have you done?’

  ‘Someone had to,’ I said, not looking round. ‘Someone had to stop them or we’d all have been dead.’

  ‘But they were people,’ Billy protested.

  ‘Were. Past tense.’ I turned to face him. He led Ameena in by the arm. ‘And how come you care anyway? You were all “destroy the brain” earlier. What made you start giving a damn?’

  He looked me up and down. ‘What made you stop?’

  ‘Whoa.’ Ameena was staring down at the screecher by my feet. She shrugged free of Billy and took a few tentative steps towards it. ‘It looks dead. Is it dead?’

  ‘It’s dead.’

  ‘He killed it,’ Billy said.

  Ameena’s eyes met mine. She cocked her head to the side a little. ‘You killed it?’

  ‘I killed it.’ She kept looking at me. ‘It would’ve killed us,’ I felt compelled to add.

  ‘Yeah,’ she said at last. ‘I suppose it would at that.’

  ‘How do you feel now?’ I asked her.

  ‘This is the church,’ she said, ignoring the question. ‘Where you blew up the donkey.’

  Billy frowned. ‘You blew up a donkey? What, like…?’ He formed a pea-shooter shape with his hand, raised it to his mouth and puffed out his cheeks.

  ‘What? No, I didn’t blow up a donkey,’ I said. ‘I blew a donkey up. As in exploded it.’

  Billy lowered his hand. ‘Oh. Right. Why did you do that then?’

  ‘It wasn’t a real donkey. It was concrete.’

  ‘Right,’ said Billy. He thought about this. ‘I still come back to “Why did you do that then?”.’

  ‘Forget it. Doesn’t matter.’ I turned back to Ameena. ‘You should sit down.’

  ‘I don’t need to sit down,’ she said, then she sat down anyway. ‘I’m… fine. I think.’ She looked at me with hopeful eyes. ‘Am I?’

  I gave a nod. ‘He could’ve been lying,’ I said. ‘He was probably lying. He does that. He—

  ‘He wasn’t lying,’ she said. ‘It was true. Everything he said – it was true. I can see that now. Before I found you fighting Mr Mumbles… there’s nothing. I don’t remember anything. Not properly anyway, just… images, like photos someone’s shown me.’ She shrugged and shook her head. ‘Hell, I don’t even know my last name. But then that’s because I haven’t got one. Because you never gave me one.’

  I suddenly felt guilty for that. ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it. You were being murdered by a maniac,’ Ameena said. She jumped up and clapped me on the shoulder. ‘That sort of thing can be distracting.’

  She gave her arms a shake and kicked out her legs, and with that, the tension seemed to leave her. ‘So,’ she said, cracking her knuckles. ‘I’ve changed my mind on the whole killing-myself thing. Sorry about that. Such a drama queen sometimes.’

  ‘No problem,’ I said.

  ‘Good. Now what’s the plan?’

  ‘I find my dad,’ I said. ‘And then I kill him.’

  She nodded slowly. ‘OK, well that’s a plan. That’s definitely a plan.’

  ‘What about them?’ Billy asked. He pointed back towards the door. ‘What about them out there?’

  ‘They’re not my problem,’ I said.

  ‘And what about us?’ Billy asked. ‘Are we not your problem either? Look, I know you’re angry at your dad.’

  ‘Angry?’ I said. ‘Angry? He killed my mum, Billy. Don’t you get it? He— The words caught in my throat. My eyes went hot and the room began to spin. I reached for a pew to support myself, but missed and dropped to my knees on the hard floor.

  ‘He killed my mum,’ I croaked as tears rolled like raindrops down my cheeks. ‘He killed my mum.’

  A bubble welled up inside me. It tightened my chest and pushed down on my stomach. I tried to speak again, but the pressure inside me made it impossible.

  Ameena knelt beside me. Without a word, she wrapped her arms round my shoulders and pulled me in close. We sat there rocking back and forth, my tears coming in big silent sobs.

  When the tears finally stopped I just sat there, feeling nothing but empty. But then even that moment passed. I pulled away from Ameena, unable to look at her, and stood up.

  Billy cleared his throat. ‘You OK?’

  I nodded quickly to hide my embarrassment. ‘Fine.’

  Ameena got to her feet and I realised she had a smear of my snot on her shoulder. I couldn’t quite bring myself to tell her.

  ‘So, what are we going to do?’ Billy asked.

  ‘I told you. I’m going to find my dad and then I’m going to kill him,’ I said.

  ‘Right. So we’re sticking with that one then, are we?’ he asked. ‘You know you’re playing right into his hands, don’t you? He wants you to do your… magic, or whatever.’

  ‘Well,’ I said. ‘Looks like he’s going to get what he wants.’

  ‘Then he wins,’ Billy said. ‘And you’re right, he does get what he wants. Whatever he’s done to you – your mum, your nan – he did it all to make you do what he wants. He’s manipulating you, and you’re going to let him.’

  ‘Check out the voice of reason,’ said Ameena.

  ‘I’m right, though. If you keep doing your thing then the barrier breaks down and suddenly we’re up to our eyes in monsters.’

  ‘We’re already up to our eyes in monsters,’ I reminded him.

  ‘Yeah,’ Billy conceded. ‘But you and I both know there are worse things waiting over there. We’ve seen them. If they get through, they’ll kill everyone.’

  ‘Everyone important is already dead.’

  A thud against the front doors cut the argument short. A muffled screech filled the church. A few seconds later there was a chorus of them howling out there as they hammered and pounded against the doors.

  ‘They’re going to get inside,’ Ameena said. She released Billy and he stumbled out of her reach, nursing his arm. ‘Decision time, kiddo. What’s it to be?’

  The sounds of the screechers seemed to be inside the church now. I could almost picture them, their deformed heads forcing their way through the splintering wood, their teeth chewing hungrily at the air. It was Billy who made a decision.

  ‘Help me block these,’ he said, hurrying along the aisle to the inner swing doors. ‘It’ll buy us some time.’

  Ameena looked to me. I nodded, and she headed off after Billy. There were two large tables by the doors, one stacked upside down atop the other. They grabbed each end of the top table and began moving into position in front of the doors.

  They were right in front of the doors when they began to open. Teeth flashed in the gap. Billy and Ameena leapt back. A hundred thousand sparks filled my head and an invisible force pushed the door closed.

  ‘Stand back,’ I told them, and they darted ov
er to join me. The table moved with just a thought from me. It tilted and fell so the top was up against the doors, which I was still holding closed.

  Next I pictured the back pews sliding across the floor. The metal bolts holding them in place groaned, then snapped. I felt my brain tingle as the heavy wooden benches fell into place behind the table. Only then did I let the sparks fade away.

  The doors swung inward a few centimetres then hit the barricade with a loud thud. Screeches of frustration came at us through the wood, but the barrier held steady for the moment.

  ‘Nice work,’ Ameena said. ‘That was close.’

  ‘Uh, guys.’ Billy’s voice was a low whisper. I turned to find him nodding at a spot several metres behind me.

  Something stood there. Or rather, something flickered there. It was faint, like the outline of a ghost. A large ghost, with too many limbs. We watched it pacing towards us, then it faded away completely.

  ‘OK,’ Ameena muttered. ‘So what the Hell was that?’

  I turned, casting my gaze around the dimly lit church. There were half a dozen or more figures dotted about, half appearing and fading before my eyes. I recognised some of them as the things that had surrounded me in the Darkest Corners.

  ‘It’s happening,’ I realised. ‘Like he said. The barrier’s weakening. They’re going to come through.’

  ‘Not necessarily,’ Billy said, although he didn’t sound convinced. ‘I mean, you can just stop, right? If you don’t do your mojo any more, they can’t come any further.’ He glanced from me to Ameena and back and swallowed nervously. ‘Right?’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said, but the doubt in my voice was obvious. ‘If I don’t do anything else, the barrier will stay standing.’

  A soft hissing and crackling noise began to echo around the church. I looked up to the source of the sound and saw a speaker mounted high on the wall behind the pulpit.

  The next sound I heard made my skin crawl.

  Fiona, it’s time to get up now.

  That was my dad’s voice. My dad’s voice from the recording he had played me earlier.

  ‘No,’ I said softly. ‘N-no, please.’

  The hospital machines beeped on the soundtrack. I heard my mum rouse and my dad smile. Even on the tape, I heard him smile.

  That’s my girl. Open your eyes now. Open your…

  My mum gave a groan. Ameena reached for me, but I pulled away. I stared at the speaker, and I stared, and I stared.

  Wh-where am I? My mum’s voice, shaky and weak.

  Look at me, Fiona. Look at me.

  On the tape, my mum gave a gasp. ‘No,’ I whispered. ‘Don’t.’

  As if echoing me, she cried out, and I could hear all the fear and the panic in her voice. I raised my hands, stabbing them towards the speaker. N-no. Please, no, don—

  ‘Kyle, no!’ Billy cried.

  ‘Do it,’ Ameena urged. ‘Shut it up.’

  BANG!

  The speaker exploded before the gunshot had a chance to ring. Before he had a chance to kill her again. The sparks buzzed across my head, then receded again, leaving only the charred remains of the speaker behind.

  ‘What did you do?’ Billy groaned. ‘What have you done?’

  ‘Leave it, Billy,’ Ameena said, and this time I let her press her hand against my shoulder.

  A sudden fluttering up by the rafters made us all jump. A small black shape flapped around at the ceiling. We followed its flight until it landed on one of Christ’s outstretched arms. A beady black eye gazed blankly down at us.

  Billy let out a nervous laugh. ‘God, that nearly gave me a heart attack,’ he breathed. ‘Just a bird.’

  ‘Not just a bird,’ I said, trying to keep my voice low and controlled. Ameena and I both stepped back, our eyes never leaving those of the bird. ‘It’s a crow.’

  Billy shrugged. ‘So? What’s so bad about crows?’

  ‘Obviously you’ve never met the ones we’ve met,’ Ameena told him.

  And he hadn’t. He hadn’t been there at Marion’s house when the Crowmaster attacked. He hadn’t seen Marion’s skeletal remains, the skin, muscle and sinew torn off by a murder of flesh-eating crows.

  But I had seen it. And it was something I’d never be able to forget.

  ‘He’s dead, isn’t he?’ Ameena whispered.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘He died here in the real world. That means he was reborn over there.’

  ‘Oh, now that’s just cheating,’ she protested.

  ‘No argument there,’ I said. The bird wasn’t moving, just watching us in silence. ‘I couldn’t agree more.’

  ‘What’s the problem?’ Billy asked. ‘However mean and scary you say it is, it’s just one bird.’

  The cries of the screechers were louder than ever. The table and pews groaned against the floor as they were pushed back.

  ‘No,’ I said quietly. ‘It’s never just one bird.’

  And then, in a heaving torrent of squawking black, the space inside the church was torn in two.

  We ran for cover as the crows came. They surged in their hundreds through a hole in reality itself, filling the church with the thunder of their wings.

  Ameena pulled me down behind a pew as Billy took cover behind the one across the aisle. The crows were a dark tornado around us, squawking and cawing as they circled the inside of the church.

  A figure stepped through the cloud of birds, short and stocky, his face hidden beneath a rough brown sack. Back at Marion’s house the Crowmaster had been revealed as nothing more than a little man called Joe Crow, who liked to dress in a scarecrow costume. The costume was gone now, but Joe was doing everything he could to maintain the Crowmaster act.

  ‘I see you, boy,’ he said. His voice was still like fingernails down a blackboard. The tattered eyeholes in the sack turned in my direction. I raised my head to reply, but a crow swooped down at me, forcing me to duck again. ‘You thought you’d seen the last of the Crowmaster,’ he said, and then there was that laugh of his again, audible even over the screechers and the birds: SS-SS-SS-SS. ‘You thought that your nightmares was over, but, boy, they’s just beginning.’

  ‘Shut him up,’ Ameena said.

  ‘How?’

  She glanced along at the barricaded doors. It took me a moment to realise what she meant. Her eyes drilled into me, urging me on. Along the aisle, Joe Crow paced towards us on his tiny legs.

  I nodded. The sparks lit up the inside of my head and the doors flew open. Joe Crow stopped advancing as the screechers burst through. Their eyes locked on him. Their jaws gnashed.

  ‘Aw,’ Joe groaned, ‘crap.’

  They were on him before his birds could react, ripping and tearing at him, their teeth already slick with blood.

  His command over them broken, the birds began to thud against the walls and fall to the floor. I moved to run for the door, but there were more screechers rushing through.

  Ameena and I began clambering quickly over the pews in front, and Billy raced to do the same. The screechers were still busy with Joe Crow, and we hurdled our way to the front without them noticing us. Together, all three of us ran for the back room and hurriedly closed the door.

  ‘This way,’ I said, making for the rear exit that led out into the graveyard. As I pulled it open a hand clawed through the gap. Billy and Ameena rushed over and threw their weight against the wood. Between us, we forced the door closed, but the screecher on the other side was already trying to break it down.

  ‘What now?’ Billy yelped.

  ‘Magic them away,’ Ameena told me. ‘If you’re ever going to do your thing, now’s the time.’

  ‘Don’t be stupid,’ Billy told her. ‘You saw what happened. Those things are starting to come through.’

  ‘So what do we do, Billy? Just wait here to die?’

  ‘What’s it matter to you?’ Billy asked her, and I could see his old wicked streak shining through. ‘It’s not like you were ever alive to begin with.’

  ‘Ladder,’ I said, pushing betwe
en them. A metal ladder was attached to one of the walls. It led straight up to a hatch in the high ceiling. ‘It must lead to the tower. We can hide there.’

  ‘For how long?’ Ameena asked. ‘Up there we’ll have nowhere to run to.’

  A clawed hand punched a hole through the back door. There was no more time to make plans.

  ‘Go,’ I said, gesturing for Ameena to lead the way up the ladder. She hesitated, but then set off at a breakneck rate. By the time Billy was halfway up, she was already at the top, pushing open the hatch and clambering through.

  I went last. When I got to the top, Billy reached down and helped pull me up into the tower. The hatch closed over just as the back door came down, and we heard the screecher howl in confusion.

  ‘We’re safe,’ I whispered.

  ‘Maybe for now,’ Ameena added quietly.

  The inside of the tower was dark and gloomy. There had once been a bell up there, but it had long since been removed. The rectangular openings in each wall that would once have allowed the chimes to ring out across the village were boarded over, letting only scraps of light seep through. The floor was thick with dust. Mousetraps were dotted here and there around the little square room. Billy kicked one to the side and it snapped shut with a clack.

  ‘Sssh!’ I hissed. I pointed down at the floor, and to the screecher that lurked below.

  ‘That’s our plan then, is it?’ Ameena asked. ‘We stay up here and keep quiet?’

  ‘You got any better ideas?’ I asked.

  ‘What happened to finding your dad? When did that plan stop?’

  Billy answered for me. ‘When he realised he was playing right into his dad’s hands.’

  ‘We don’t know that’s true,’ Ameena protested. ‘Kyle, if you want to get him for what he did, you’re going to have to use your abilities. That’s just how it is.’

  Billy looked Ameena up and down. ‘Why are you so determined he should go all Harry Potter all of a sudden? How come you’re acting so weird?’

  Ameena bit her lip. ‘What can I say?’ she muttered. ‘It’s been a weird day.’

  Weird day? That was an understatement if ever I’d heard one. It had been a weird month. The weirdest, worst month of my life. Possibly of anyone’s life ever. And even that wasn’t doing it justice.