Underground

by Craig Spector

  …and then before their eyes he began to change, his visage rippling and distorting as electric tendrils of energy arced from to blade to glass and back, pulsing across his flesh then seeming to burn inward, pallid skin bubbling and charring and dropping away in molten chunks, revealing something bestial and putrid. Jimmy Joe Baker gnashed and howled in inchoate rage, transforming into something grotesque and inhuman, monstrous and deformed, less a man than a thing.

  But it was still alive. And it was pissed.

  The Jimmy Joe-thing whirled, its mouth distending into a raw and gaping hole, its eyes black and sunken. It snarled and lurched toward her…

  …and that was when the shots rang out, round after round after round pumping into the creature. It stumbled forward, puppeteered by leaden death, then crumpled and collapsed to the floor at Amy’s feet. She looked up to see Zoe standing at the door, Louis’s gun in her hands, the magazine emptied. She sneered defiantly.

  “Fuck this,” she said. “Let’s kick some cracker ass.”

  Amy nodded, shivering. Louis looked at her.

  “You’re bleeding,” he said.

  Amy looked at him and down at her hand; in the adrenaline-fueled shock of the moment she had not noticed that the shard of mirror had lacerated her badly, an angry wound now gaping across her palm, blood dripping off her fingertips to spatter the floor. She hissed in shock and anticipation of pain. But as they watched the edges of the laceration seemed to glow: dimly at first, then brighter.

  Amy held her hand out, as if afraid of it. The glow peaked and faded. Amy wiped the blood away. The wound was gone, leaving only a faint mark, like an alternate lifeline, criss-crossing her palm.

  “Whoa,” she murmured.

  Back at the Tabb house, something slammed against the pantry door, then again, then again. Wood cracked and splintered, finally giving way as Kevin came tumbling out, flushed and royally pissed. Doris emerged a moment later as Kevin grabbed the phone.

  “What are you doing?” she asked.

  “What I should have done a long time ago,” he told her. Kevin punched three digits and listened.

  “Operator,” he said. “I need to report an emergency…”

  39

  Chief Jackson had his hands full when the call came. The circuit had been getting rowdier by the hour, as nightfall combined with alcohol and attitude to ratchet up the evening’s festivities. Up and down the boardwalk came reports of crowd control growing edgier, with an increasing emphasis on “crowd” and a decreasing grip on “control”. Kids were swarming the bars, sidewalks, and boardwalk; Jackson’s nightly tally thus far featured some twenty-three drunk-and-disorderlies, four more fights, and a record twelve indecent exposures, which ranged from errant beer-sodden youth peeing off the pier to kids mooning from cars on the strip to a bit of freelance Mardi Gras flashing by a gaggle of Sigma Delta sisters on the seaward balcony of the Riptides Inn. And whereas most of the kids present were there to have a good time, the problem was that some people’s ideas of fun left much to be desired.

  Case in point, one Clifton Webb.

  The young black man stood cuffed and fuming, leaning against Jackson’s patrol car as Jackson finished running his name for priors and outstanding warrants. It came back clean. His age was twenty-one, but Jackson pegged his emotional maturity level at half that, and astonishingly enough he really was a junior at Washington Carver. Webb’s frolic of choice featured cruising Atlantic Avenue with a pack of his fratboy homies, setting off car alarms by smashing the windows of a stray half-dozen vehicles parked along the strip. When the cops arrived, Webb’s pals bolted in all directions, though Webb, being full of large quantities of both alcohol and attitude, had paused to relieve himself on a storefront window.

  “This is police brutality!” Webb bitched loudly to anyone who cared. “This is inhumanity!”

  “Shut the fuck up,” Jackson muttered. Just then his cellphone rang. Jackson picked up.

  “Jackson,” he said, then stopped. “What?! When?”

  Clifton Webb watched as Chief Jackson began to pace, cellphone plastered to his ear. Then Jackson hung up and fished out his keys.

  “Your lucky night, asshole,” Jackson muttered, uncuffing him. “Get the hell out of here.”

  Clifton Webb looked at him warily, suspicious at his strange good fortune. “I’m pressing charges,” he began. Jackson glared at him.

  “NOW!” he growled.

  Webb thought better of it and scrambled off into the night. Just then Jackson spotted a patrolwoman named Penny Marsh. She was young, some two years out of the Tidewater Police Training Academy and recently re-assigned to his command. He waved her over.

  “Who do we have available?”

  “No one, sir,” Marsh replied. “It’s pretty crazy out there. Is there a problem?”

  “Dispatch just got a call about a possible incident at Custis Manor,” he said, trying to downplay his unease. Officer Marsh whistled, low. Just what the evening needed.

  “Do you want me to go check it out?”

  “No,” Jackson shook his head. “I’ll go. Could be a crank call.” He smiled gamely. And desperately hoped he was right.

  40

  Friday, August 29th. Custis Manor. 8:50 p.m.

  In the grand ballroom, any sense of relief was fleeting and quickly subsumed by despair. Half of their team was dead or missing, the other half was on the other side — the side now shut off by the destruction of the portal. Then Louis checked the timer on the detonator and things went from very bad to incredibly worse.

  “Fuck,” he muttered. Amy and Zoe came over in time to see the little LED display on the detonator click from 30:00 to 29:59 and counting. “It’s not supposed to be on yet,” he said. Amy looked at him incredulously.

  “Can’t you turn it off?”

  “Not without blowing everything up,” he said flatly. He looked at Zoe. “I’m sorry…”

  “Sorry?” Zoe exclaimed. “You’re fucking sorry? My family is in there!” She gestured to the broken mirror. “What are we supposed to do now?”

  And that was when Amy hushed them. She was staring at the ragged fragments of glass littering the floor as the tiny hairs on the back of her neck prickled. Zoe looked at her.

  “What is it?”

  Amy ignored her and moved to the center of the room. As she watched the scattered shards they faintly glowed like fireflies, first one, then another, and another. “Do you see that?”

  Zoe and Louis looked at her, perplexed. “See what?” Zoe asked.

  Another fragment flashed. “That!” Amy said. She scooped it up and gazed into it.

  And for a fleeting moment, something within gazed back.

  “What is it?” Zoe asked.

  “The mirror,” Amy murmured. “Something’s in there!” She shuddered, remembering dark figures writing on tenement walls. From the corner of her eye she saw another shard flash and fade.

  “There!” Amy cried. “Pick it up!”

  Zoe did so. Amy took it in hand. The two pieces fit together perfectly… and as they peered into them the reflection went dark and they saw a glimpse of a hand beckoning.

  Across the room, another piece sparked and glowed. They rushed to scoop it up; it too fit perfectly. Another flashed, and another. Amy knelt and began to assemble them on the floor like pieces of an arcane puzzle, calling out each next sparking fragment as Zoe ran to grab them.

  And the timer counted 28:00…27:59…27:58…

  “Hurry!” Louis called out as they madly scrambled.

  “Last one!” Zoe answered, handing Amy the shard. She fit it into place, and they could see Joya floating in the darkness as if beneath the surface of an icy pond. She pressed against the other side of the glass; it moved but would not yield.

  “There’s still a piece missing!” Amy hissed, and then realized where it was. She scuttled over to the bestial remains of the former Jimmy Joe Baker, Joya’s blade still wedged in his lumpen back. She pulled it out and rolled the body
over. Then, taking a deep breath, she took the dagger and dug out the missing shard. As they fit it into place, the cracked surface rippled and went liquid and dark, then bright with ethereal light.

  And from deep within, Joya’s hand emerged.

  Just as quickly as it had appeared, the hand faltered, began to slip beneath the surface. Amy grasped it and pulled with all her might. It wasn’t enough. Zoe joined in, and then Louis, reaching elbow deep into the glimmering pool of light…

  …until at last Joya emerged, shivering and shaken but alive.

  They hugged her fiercely and helped her to her feet. Joya stood on unsteady legs and explained in halting tones of Henri starting the timer and the resulting argument in which they failed to notice the stealthy appearance of Jimmy Joe Baker. She recounted the attack, of diving into the portal as the first shots rang out. As her head cleared she saw the remnants of the slaughter… and the body of her brother.

  “Henri,” she murmured. Joya’s eyes glistened with tears for a moment as she touched his prone, still form, then she shook it off. “How much time do we have?” she asked. Louis checked the timer.

  “Not much. Twenty-five minutes.”

  Joya nodded and turned to the fragile outline of the re-formed mirror. Its placid surface trembled ominously, a psychic seismic shudder.

  “The magick will not hold much longer,” she warned them. “We have to go back through.”

  The others traded uneasy glances; their apprehension, which was legion, was dispelled by the look in her eyes. It was now or never.

  So in they went. While behind them, the timer ticked away.

  41

  Custis Manor. Underworld.

  And this is how all Hell at long last broke loose.

  In the grand ballroom they emerged from the mirror one after another: Louis first, then Joya, Amy, and Zoe. The house seemed to shudder at their presence, beams creaking behind the pallid walls as the floors groaned beneath their feet. A strange light glowed beyond the windows, radiating out from the distant slaves’ quarters.

  Come, Joya urged. We must hurry.

  As they moved into the great hall and toward the entrance, they looked back and saw that Amy had stopped at the base of the staircase, staring upward as if hearing something else entirely. Her skin was pale and clammy, her eyes wide to drink in the darkness.

  What is it? Zoe said. Amy looked at them, incredulous.

  Don’t you hear it?

  They all listened, and there it was: a high keening moan, distant and piteous, soon joined by another, and another. The cries conjoined like a doomed chorus of madness and lament, each voice melding together yet utterly alone. It was the sound that had burned itself into Amy’s neurons decades ago. The sound of the imprisoned Custis women. She had never really stopped hearing it.

  But they could all hear it now.

  Amy started moving up the stairs. No! Louis said, gripping her arm. We’re not here for them!

  They're suffering too! Amy twisted in his grasp, her eyes blazing. He uses their pain too! We have to free them!

  Louis tried to pull her back, and Amy suddenly pulled Joya’s dagger and held it up, not so much a threat as a warning. Louis let go, and Amy fled up the stairs, heading for the attic. Zoe watched her for a moment, and then she too was running up the stairs.

  There was nothing else to do. They followed.

  By the time they caught up Amy and Zoe had used Joya’s dagger to pry open the attic door, revealing the blind and long-tormented souls of their enemy's own doomed family tree: the tortured wives and mistresses, the abused children, the unfortunate in-laws dragged into Silas's hellish domain. The spirits milled and clawed at the walls, oblivious to all but their own suffering.

  Amy turned to Joya and Louis. We have to help them, she said imploringly, her own eyes wet with tears. Please…

  Joya looked at Louis, and he nodded; and like Lucas and Josh had instructed the others, she showed them the way. Zoe and Louis watched for a moment. Then they too joined in. Working together.

  Working to free them all.

  Seth, Caroline, and Josh ran through the fields. Behind them lay the slaves’ quarters and the growing beacon of light, now visible in the distance as a spiraling ethereal pyre reaching up into the demented heavens. They had watched in awe as dozens became hundreds, became thousands: each freed slave spirit, thus empowered to free yet another, fed into the whole, their numbers swelling like some grand cosmic display. It was altogether glorious. But it could not help but attract attention.

  Indeed, as they had retreated Caroline heard a distant snarl behind her and the clank of heavy chain; she turned to see a line of spirits being driven forward by ghastly guards bearing sickly glowing lanterns, hellhounds snapping in tow. The spirits were bound together in a coffle, each one manacled to the next, wrist to ankle, in double file: hundreds chained together as they had once been in life as they were driven to market. As they were now being driven mercilessly forward by the lash.

  The guards saw the rising beacon, their faces twisting grotesquely as they barked orders in guttural tongues and drove their prisoners relentlessly into the heart of the camp, their hounds savaging those who fell, ravaged limbs dragged on by the sheer momentum of the march, as the guards tried to comprehend the wrongness of the light in their dark realm. But as they did, the freed spirits set upon their brethren, the liberating spark traveling down the chained line like lightning, the manacled slaves rising up into the air and swirling around the beacon, then swinging down like a vast bullwhip of bodies and iron, cutting a swath through their tormentors. Guards and hounds scrambled and were pounced upon by their former captives, who tore and sundered them as the great spirit chain rose and fell and arced up again, glowing in the beacon’s light.

  A light that began to take on not merely the color of liberation but of righteous fury. And vengeance.

  It was at that moment that Seth, Caroline, and Josh had fled, like children who had played with fire and accidentally burned down the world. And in a sense they had, for it seemed that for every spirit who released and flew up into the light, another ten descended to lay waste to their captors.

  Caroline, Seth, and Josh watched in horror. What they had started, they could not stop.

  They could only run.

  And run they did, hearts pounding as they crossed the open field, Seth in the lead, followed by Caroline, then Josh. But they weren’t heading for the house.

  They were heading for the barn.

  Where are we going? Caroline called out desperately, trying to keep up. Seth!!!

  But Seth just kept going, legs pumping furiously as he covered the distance. Seth was big but fast, and as they tried to keep up, Caroline suddenly stumbled, ploughing into the wild and uneven earth. Josh caught up to her, wired and winded.

  Are you all right? he asked.

  Yeah, she said. But where the hell is he going?

  But before he could answer, a strange breeze stirred the air around them, leaves and twigs and tiny stones tumbling past as if pulled by some unseen force. They watched in horror as a dark cloud began to form on the far side of the barn, looming like a thunderhead, threatening to engulf the structure.

  And Seth right along with it.

  Oh no, Caroline gasped. Please God no…

  But God was far from this forsaken place. Josh helped Caroline up, and together they ran, frantically calling out the name of their friend.

  For Seth’s part, it was not that he could not hear them or did not care. He was a man in the grip of a flashback in reverse, the terrifying memories cascading through his brain and filling him with cold dread. He had seen this before and knew how it would end. He had seen it replayed in ten thousand nightmares since. But this time he wasn’t having a dream, the dream was having him. And he was determined to end it.

  As Seth ran to the doors of the barn he heard the swell of galloping hooves, the clank of bit and bridle. The storm swept over the roof and around the sides, swirling around hi
m. He pounded on the doors. I won’t let you burn, he cried. I won’t let you burn again! Seth placed his massive hands on the heavy wooden beam that held the doors shut.

  And the barn burst into flames.

  No! he screamed, as tendrils of fire crept up and he heard the cries of the spirits trapped inside. NO! he wailed and pressed harder as behind him the ghostly militia swirled, red-eyed phantoms on horseback caught in the grip of their fevered apocalypse. Torches glared in bony hands as the riders circled through blinding smoke. At first they could not see him, lost as they were in their grim machinations. But as he strained against the beam, the spectral mounts snorted and bucked, suddenly aware of his presence. A rider in tattered Confederate battle garb spied him and snarled, drawing its rusted saber and raising it high.

  NO MORE! Seth roared.

  And threw the beam free.

  The doors blew open and out they poured, the wretched flaming souls of those who had perished a million times over, released from their damnation. They spun past Seth like dervishes, throwing him back with the force of their exodus. Seth landed hard in the dust as the rush of freed souls roared forth from the burning barn…

  …and straight into the path of the ghostly riders.

  The impact was an earthquake avalanche of rupture and chaos. The whirlwind howled up, taking slaves and riders alike into the vortex, which spread across the sky. Within the boiling clouds, lightning clashed, and Seth could hear horses, and sabers, and screams.

  The whirlwind moved away on its own dread course. But unlike his nightmares of flashbacks past, the barn was still burning… and emptied. Bruised and exhausted, Seth struggled away from the flaming wreckage.

  And into the arms of Caroline and Josh.

  Zoe’s hand was deep in the dead woman’s chest when the first tremor hit. The house lurched like a living thing, plaster cracking and raining in ragged chunks around them as the foundation groaned and rumbled. They did not know what had happened, did not have time to find out. There were too many spirits still needing to be freed.