The Shadow Men hc-4

by Christopher Golden

  But even as he spoke, Jennifer shook her head, backing away from him, broken glass crunching under the soles of her shoes. “Jesus,” she said, putting a hand to her temple. “I don’t think I can take much more of this.”

  And Jim knew he was wrong. He wanted to scream in frustration, but knew he would only chase her away. “Jennifer,” he said, keeping his voice low and steady enough to draw her attention. “Why don’t you tell me what’s going on?”

  She let loose a frantic little laugh. “You mean other than the earthquake?”

  “I’m getting the idea you already know it wasn’t just an earthquake,” Jim said.

  That snapped her out of whatever hysterical slide she’d been in. She looked around the glass-strewn street, glanced over the tops of buildings at the altered cityscape, and then started again for the door to the restaurant. “You’d better come in.”

  Jennifer used her shoe to brush away some of the glass that her mother’s broom had missed, and led the way into what had once been a quaint little restaurant with the best steaks, seafood, and desserts in Boston. Her father, Tad Garland, had been the mastermind behind the desserts. To the amusement of many customers, it was his wife, Rose, who had made it the place to go for steak and seafood. People craving a good meal came to Junction 58.

  The interior of the place looked much the same as it had in Jim’s Boston-or it would have, if not for the crack in the ceiling and the shattered glasses and bottles behind the bar, and the pictures and other hangings that had fallen off the wall. Junction 58 was some kind of train reference-Tad Garland loved trains-and there were tracks that hung from the ceiling, a whole maze that a pair of model trains and their passenger cars and boxcars steamed through over and over again during lunch and dinner seatings. The track was still there, but the trains had fallen, and lay smashed to pieces on the floor.

  Tad Garland sat in a chair, staring at the broken remains of one of his model steam engines, which he had arranged on a table before him.

  And a different Tad Garland-slimmer and better dressed, with round eyeglasses and a long gash on his left cheek-stood over by the bar, gazing wide-eyed at Jennifer’s mother, as though Rose Garland might be a ghost.

  Jennifer moved toward her father, the Tad who was sitting with his broken train, and glanced meaningfully back at Jim. “Dad,” she began.

  Both Tads looked up.

  Rose Garland went behind the bar, moving past her husband’s doppelganger as though she wanted to pretend he wasn’t there, and searched until she had found five glasses that weren’t broken. A little more fishing turned up an undamaged bottle of Jack Daniel’s. The woman responsible for the best steaks in Boston wasn’t going to screw around with wine or margaritas. “I’m pouring myself a drink,” Rose said. “Anyone doesn’t want one, I’ll drink yours for you.”

  Strangely, it was the other Tad-the one who obviously didn’t belong-who first spoke to Jim. “Who might you be?” he asked.

  “His name’s Jim Banks,” Jennifer answered for him.

  Her mother and father both looked at her like she’d cussed in church. Rose threw back two fingers of Jack Daniel’s, then poured a little more. No one else made a move for the glasses she had set out, at least not at first. But after a few wordless seconds, the other Tad moved down the front of the bar, righting a fallen stool, and picked up a glass of golden brown whiskey. He sipped it, looking at Jim over the top of the glass and touching his cut. “You have any idea how any of this is possible, Mr. Banks?” he asked.

  This question got all of their attention. All four Garlands-the ones who belonged here and the one who didn’t-narrowed their eyes. Jim studied the two Tads and wondered where the other Rose might be. Was she dead, or had she divorced Tad and left Boston altogether? He decided she must be dead. It would explain the way the other Tad looked at Rose, and there was no way that the Rose Garland he knew would’ve let her husband keep the restaurant if they’d gotten a divorce. Just the fact that the other Tad had been here when the two Bostons merged meant he still owned the place, at least in his city. And how the hell would that work, now that there were two Tad Garlands in this version of Boston, but only one Junction 58?

  “I know a little,” Jim admitted.

  The Tad who belonged swept the pieces of his train off the table in front of him, and they clattered to the floor. “Well, spit it out, then, buddy. ’Cause my head’s splitting in two.”

  As if realizing what he’d said, Tad flinched and looked over at the other Tad, who laughed and toasted him with glistening whiskey. “Something’s splitting in two,” the other Tad said. With that, he grabbed another of the glasses Rose had poured and walked across the bar to his double, setting the drink on the table.

  Tad looked at the glass for a second, then shook his head with a dubious chuckle and picked it up, sipping the whiskey just like the other Tad.

  “Actually, it’s not anything splitting in two,” Jim said, glancing around the bar, worried about what he ought to say and what he ought to keep to himself. “It’s two things coming together that shouldn’t.”

  Jennifer hugged herself. Jim wanted to do it for her, to embrace her and make her feel safe and warm, but she didn’t know him.

  “You want to explain that?” Rose asked.

  “It may be hard to believe-”

  “Are you kidding?” Jennifer said. “After the past couple of hours, what could be hard to believe?”

  Jim nodded. She was right. No use trying to break it to them gently. “Short version,” he said. “A long time ago, an asshole named McGee fucked around with magic and basically broke Boston into three pieces. Not pieces. That’s wrong. Three variations. Three possibilities. All three were real, side by side… well, in the same space, I guess. And part of the structure that held them apart gave way tonight. Two of the cities crashed into each other. Places where they were the same, like your restaurant, were affected the least. But in other places, where the cities differed the most…”

  “The cathedral,” Jennifer said, her eyes haunted as she glanced out through the shattered windows at the street. “We saw.”

  Jim gestured at the two Tads. “You guys aren’t going to be the only ones dealing with this tonight. My bet? A huge percentage of the city are meeting their twins right now, or they will be soon.”

  “Not me,” Rose said, pouring herself another splash of Jack and staring into the glass. She smiled bitterly. “Turns out I’m dead.”

  “You’re not dead, Mom,” Jenny insisted. “You’re right here.”

  “Be glad you don’t have to deal with this,” her husband said.

  “Glad?” the other Tad said, looking at his double in disgust. “Glad that my Rose is dead?”

  “That’s not what he meant,” Jennifer said quickly, trying to stave off an argument.

  “How the hell do you know all this?” Rose asked, staring suspiciously at Jim.

  He hesitated. No way could he tell them that he had anything to do with this devastation, with crashing their worlds together, with the death and destruction around them. Jim and Trix had been Veronica’s pawns, nothing more. He wouldn’t take the blame for her madness.

  “There’s a woman who wants to undo what McGee did. She’s screwing with the same kind of magic. But there’s no way to undo it, not really. Just by her trying… well, you’ve seen the result. And there’s a third Boston out there. If she has her way, that one’ll be merged in with all of this, and even more people will die. Maybe a lot more, because I have a feeling that if all three cities are forced into the same space, the quake could be much stronger.”

  “Jesus,” Rose whispered, staring at him.

  “Okay,” the other Tad said. “But how do you know?”

  Shit. Think, Jim.

  “I’m looking for my wife and daughter. I went to see a man named Peter O’Brien-a guy who knows some of that magic-because I was told he could help me find them. He told me all of this, but he died in the quake.”

  He hated lying.
Jenny had always known when he wasn’t telling the truth, and now he looked at Jennifer to see if she could tell, too. But she had something else on her mind. “When you showed up here…,” she began. “You were looking for me.”

  Jim nodded slowly, glancing away for a second and then back. “My wife, Jenny Banks.” He smiled weakly. “Jennifer Anne Garland Banks.”

  Jennifer stared at him for a second, then looked around the room as though searching for something, as though she could see a million possibilities flitting in the air around her head. She strode over to the bar, picked up one of the glasses, and knocked back two fingers of whiskey before staring at him again. She wiped her lips with the back of her hand. “We have a daughter?”

  Jim shook his head. “No. Not ‘we.’ ”

  Wonder and curiosity and even a glint of happiness had appeared in her eyes as she’d spoken those words, as she entertained the notion of this other version of her life, but his words snuffed out that spark. He regretted them instantly, hating to see the pain of reality settling back into her expression. How could he explain to her that he didn’t exist in the Boston she knew, that they couldn’t have met? What other questions would that lead to?

  “Look, I’m here because I thought Jenny and Holly-my daughter-might have come here, just to be somewhere familiar. Obviously they haven’t, or at least they didn’t let you see them if they did. I need to get out there and keep looking, so-”

  Tad pointed at him but turned to the other Tad. “So this guy is married to your Jennifer?”

  “No,” the other Tad said. “I’ve never seen him before.”

  Rose gestured toward him with the Jack Daniel’s bottle. “Which means either you’re lying, Jim Banks, or you’re from the other Boston. The third one.”

  “Yeah,” Jim agreed. “That’s right.”

  “Well, if all this magic stuff is true-” the other Tad started.

  “Gotta be,” Tad said. “How else do you explain all this shit?”

  “Then we get how it is I’m here,” the other Tad continued. “Our two Bostons crashed, right? But if you’re from the third one, the one that’s still out there like the iceberg that hit the goddamn Titanic, then how did you get here? How did your family get here?”

  Jim felt like shouting. He fidgeted, looked at Jennifer as if she might rescue him, and then remembered she didn’t know him. He couldn’t take responsibility for these people. Back in his own life, his own reality, they were his in-laws… and Jennifer was his wife. But this wasn’t his world, and he needed to find his real family. “Look, I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ve got to find my wife and daughter.”

  “Jim,” Jennifer said. Her tone was soft and kind, and banished any tension from the room. “You were right. If it was me… if I was the one lost… this is where I would come.”

  Jim glanced at the door, wanting to run but also knowing she might be right. Jenny and Holly had been here for half a day, at least. They would have had time to come by the Junction already, and maybe they had but had been too weirded out by everything to go inside. Or maybe they’d gotten a glimpse of Jennifer and that had freaked them out even more. But now, in the aftermath of the quake, if she and Holly were still alive-and they had to be-there was a strong possibility they would come here. On the other hand, if he stayed and waited, and they didn’t come here, he might never find them.

  Had coming here first been a mistake? Being so close to the restaurant, he had been unable to resist the urge to see if Jenny and Holly were there. But he had let Trix go on ahead to the Oracle’s address. He had tried to lead the wraiths away, and some of them had followed him, but they had quickly vanished, leaving him alone.

  Shit, he thought. Trix. He had been so caught up in the shock of seeing Jennifer and her parents, and the presence of the other Tad, that he hadn’t been thinking enough about Trix, and the Oracle, and the wraiths.

  “Maybe you’re right,” he said. “I hate the idea of me leaving, only to have them show up here. But I’ve got a friend with me, helping me search. She’s gone to ask for help from someone not far from here, someone else who knows some of this magical crap. I’ve got to go and get her, and then I’ll figure out what happens next. But if Jenny and Holly do come here, and I’m not here-”

  “We’ll look out for them,” Rose said. “I’ll make sure they wait.” She pushed the whiskey bottle away. Now that she had a purpose, she wasn’t interested in drinking herself into oblivion.

  Jim looked at her. “Thank you.” He looked at the two Tads, and then at Jennifer. “I’ll be back.”

  “Wait,” Jennifer called as he started for the door.

  Jim prepared himself to argue, focused now on catching up with Trix, making sure she was all right. But Jennifer walked over and kissed her father’s cheek, took the whiskey glass he had been sipping at, and drank down the rest.

  Then she looked at Jim, eyes gleaming with determination that was so very Jenny. “I’m coming with you,” she said.

  And as with his Jenny, there was no arguing with her.

  Float

  Back at your house, you knew my name,” Trix said, catching up. “How?”

  Sally didn’t slow down or even look at her. “I’m the Oracle of Boston, honey. I’m the soul of the city. I feel every brick and beam. Every birth and death.”

  Trix thought about that, about what it must have felt like for Sally when the two cities collided, people dying and buildings crumbling, other people and buildings appearing. “It must be agony,” she said.

  Sally paused and caught her breath, and for a second Trix saw the pain she had been hiding all along. The girl looked at her without replying, but her eyes were troubled.

  “But what about the Irish Boston?” Trix went on. “Parts of this”-she gestured around them as she ran-“it’s not your city.”

  “It is now,” Sally said. “It’s like waking up with limbs I didn’t have before. But I’ll learn to use them quick enough.” She started running again, darting across an intersection and barely pausing before a tumbled facade. Three stories of the damaged building were revealed, its insides were open to view, and Trix suspected the whole city felt so exposed. She paused to look, but Sally called back over her shoulder, “There’s no one left inside.”

  “Right,” Trix muttered as she followed the girl again. “You’re the Oracle.”

  They ran through the shaken city. Trix half expected Sally to be stopped by every wandering, terrified person they saw, but no one seemed to recognize her. But if everyone knew the Oracle, the girl would never have time to sleep.

  “You had so many people seeing you, so quickly after the quake,” Trix said. “With Veronica, there’s ritual, and time.”

  “I don’t go with those old-style customs,” Sally replied. “If someone knows about me, why make it hard if they need my help?”

  “Yeah,” Trix said, and they ran on.

  A few minutes later, running past a small park where the ghostly lights of mobile phones lit disembodied faces in the darkness, Trix asked, “Have you found them yet?”

  “No,” Sally said. “But I haven’t started looking.”

  “What? I thought-”

  “You need to trust me,” Sally said, panting. “Told you, gotta get her mark off you. Her Shadow Men will come after us, following the mark, and when they find us again they’ll be expecting more than humans.”

  “But your No-Face Men, they fought them off, killed them.”

  Sally chuckled-a terrible knowing laugh. “Element of surprise,” she said. “And you can’t kill what isn’t alive.”

  “Ghosts?”

  “I didn’t say that. Now, come on. The less we talk, the quicker we get there.”

  “Where?”

  “You’ll see,” the girl said.

  So Trix ran on in silence, trying to imagine what mark Veronica might have put on her, and how, and when. And it took only moments for her to realize what this meant. If Sally cleaned her of the mark, there was one other person
still lit up like a Christmas tree for the Shadow Men to track.

  But for now, Jim was on his own.

  The exercise went some way to tempering her shock at what was happening, and her fear of what was to come. She’d had terrible destruction wrought upon the city she so loved, and now the heartache that had brought. But she had also seen people killed by something other than the earthquake. She wasn’t sure she would ever forget the image of those bodies, bloodied and deformed by the forces that had destroyed them, strewn around Sally’s building and street where they had come in their desperate search for loved ones. She wondered how many of those loved ones were still alive, and what they would think when they saw the manner of their friends’ and relatives’ deaths.

  Muscles burning, chest heaving, she concentrated on matching Sally’s surprising pace. Worse to come, she thought, and though she had no idea where that had risen from, she couldn’t shake it.

  Another ten minutes of running, and at last Trix recognized their destination. She’d been to the old Granary Burying Ground once before, walking around on her own, reading the grave inscriptions and admiring the unusual tombs. Leaving the cemetery, she had felt displaced, as if she had just arrived in this city after a very long time away. What she’d thought had been half an hour had really been three, and she’d found a Dunkin’ Donuts and sat there for some time, musing over the walk and trying to pin down just why it had felt so weird. She’d lost the memory quickly as life intruded again, and the next day she had barely remembered any of her visit to that place. But it all came flooding back now.

  “There’s something…,” she said, standing at the cemetery gates.

  “Come on,” Sally said, and grabbed her hand. It elicited a gasp of surprise from Trix, and Sally grinned as she walked them both through the gate.

  “I’ve been here before,” Trix said, aware as she spoke that this might not be the exact cemetery she had walked around that day several years before.

  “Safe,” Sally whispered, and she let go of Trix’s hand, sank slowly to her knees, and leaned forward until her forehead rested against the ground.