by Aric Davis
“Drive,” growled Darryl, pissed at his stalled-out friend, but also feeling a rising surge of elation. He’d fucking caught one. This would be worlds better than anything that could be done on a computer. North Harbor had offered up a lovely parting gift: his own little monster, right here in their truck.
“Terry, fucking drive,” said Darryl again, but Terry remained transfixed by the man dancing on the pavement.
Then both of them were looking past him at the broken old woman, who was somehow trying to rise.
“Drive, Terry!” shouted Darryl, this time smacking him across the head, jolting both Terry and the truck into motion.
Darryl cradled the little girl in his arms, knowing that she’d be back soon. Her topknot was asleep because she was gone, and he began to bend his way into her, already preparing for her to attempt to reject what was happening to her.
CHAPTER 69
The dogs had been with her. Cynthia remembered feeling the dogs scratching and biting alongside her at the ugly strands above Dad, and then not only could she feel them, she could see them. The dogs were an opaque brown, there but not, and they were digging their teeth in with relish against the black strands. Cynthia urged them on, soothing the dogs as she chopped at her father. It was hard work, awful work, only made worse by the gunshot that was still echoing in his mind and through the strands. Cynthia refused to look over her shoulder, refused to look at the dogs at their work, and refused to look through Dad’s eyes. Instead of looking, she cut, and it took very little time to realize that this was what she was born for.
Then the world had begun to swirl as Cynthia worked, and she’d felt like she was being yanked underwater. Dad began to fall away. Cynthia was being torn away from him, the dogs still visible and then gone. She saw the map, and then the world snapped to black. Cynthia couldn’t breathe. She was trapped underwater, frozen in a dream that refused to end.
Now Cynthia came to on the bench seat of a truck. She had no idea where she was or what was happening, and then she looked to her left and saw that the man from the apartment, the one with all of the purple, was driving. Turning her head the other way, she saw the other man—the computer man who could weave—staring down at her.
“We need to talk,” said the man. “Why don’t you start by telling me your name?”
“Cynthia,” said Cynthia, her voice felt like it was coming from a million miles away, and she had the beginning stages of a whopper of a headache blooming, but none of that was important. Dad killed Mom, and I killed him, thought Cynthia, and the realization was hell. She felt adrift, utterly lost, and suddenly her presence in the truck with the two strangers didn’t matter at all. I may as well be dead, too.
“Nice to meet you, Cynthia. My name’s Darryl. Terry is driving.”
Darryl smiled at her, and Cynthia felt tears begin to streak down her cheeks. She hated that she was crying, hated that she was in the truck, and she hated these men. Most of all, she hated herself. If she’d thought more quickly, worked faster, Mom would be OK. If she’d been able to help Dad at Maryanne’s birthday party, they might both still be alive.
“No tears,” said Darryl, wiping her cheeks with his fingertips.
Cynthia felt a glowing wave pass over her, soothing her headache and making her misery feel like just a passing thing.
“That should help a bit,” said Darryl, smiling down at her, and Cynthia realized with a start that he was weaving with her.
“Stop,” said Cynthia. She wanted to feel sad—that was what was supposed to happen. She thought about Mom and Dad, about the fight at Nan and Pop’s after the stupid trip to Vegas that had started it all, but none of it mattered right now. She felt good, oddly placated in the middle of the front seat.
“More cops going the other way,” said Terry.
“Fine with me, as long as they don’t turn around,” said Darryl as he stroked Cynthia’s hair. “That is just fine by me, but we’re going to need a new truck very soon.” He looked down at Cynthia and said, “Somehow, I don’t think that’s going to be an issue.”
“I won’t help you,” said Cynthia, smiling despite the pain, her lips pulled back from her teeth in a grin even though she hated these men.
“Well,” said Darryl, “you really won’t have a choice, but we’ll get to all of that later. What I’m really interested in, however, is why in the fuck you and that old woman were watching me.”
Cynthia shook her head, not only because she didn’t want to tell him, but because she couldn’t. She’d had no good reason for looking into their apartment in the first place, except out of curiosity, and it seemed ridiculous now.
“I don’t know,” said Cynthia, and Darryl nodded.
“I’ll expect a better answer later,” said Darryl. “I know you’re upset, both with us and the situation, but I need you to listen to me. Do not under any circumstances try to bend Terry or myself. If you do, I will kill you, and it will be bad. Do you understand?”
“What’s ‘bending’?”
“That crap where you broke into my mind,” said Darryl. “All that sneaking around you and that old witch were up to, that’s bending.”
“Mrs. Martin called it weaving.”
“Oh, honey, it doesn’t deserve a name nearly as pretty as that,” said Darryl. “Bending is lying, cheating, and stealing, and nothing else. Your friend might have wanted to paint a big bow on it, but that doesn’t make it anything better than what it is.” Darryl paused as two more police cars rocketed past them, followed by three black Suburbans and a black cargo van. Darryl shuddered slightly as they passed and then turned to watch them in the back window of the truck. When they were out of sight, he turned back to Cynthia. “Anyways, no bending, no weaving, none of that shit unless I tell you to.”
“Or I do,” said Terry, and at once Cynthia could hear Darryl in her head. / You don’t listen to him / You listen to me /
CHAPTER 70
Mrs. Martin stared at Cynthia’s bastard father, at rest at last on the pavement. He was dead, there was no question of that—not that it was going to do her or Ruth much good.
Mrs. Martin could feel that things in her were broken, badly broken, and she knew that she needed to go. They were coming. She’d known they would when she’d used the phone, but she’d thought she and the girl might have been able to hide. Now the girl was gone and the sirens were getting louder and louder, closer and closer, and it was all Mrs. Martin could do to prop herself into a sitting position and pull her clove cigarettes from her pocket. She lit one, stuck the thing in her mouth, and drew off of it, unable to tear her eyes away from the bodies of Cynthia’s parents.
“Shit,” said Mrs. Martin, blood speckling her cigarette.
The sirens’ din was growing in the distance, but there was nothing to do about that but wait—wait and hope that whatever was broken in her could be fixed.
At last Mrs. Martin saw the first responders pulling in, men dressed in blue carrying guns and running about. She drew off of her cigarette and then felt it fall from her lips. It didn’t matter. The world was going black, but that was all right; it was her time.
“I’ve got three over here,” cried one of the cops. “Three down!” Mrs. Martin saw him through blurry eyes, watched as he came to her, knelt down. “Help is on the way,” he said. “Hold tight.”
Mrs. Martin didn’t say anything in response; she just released the last of her smoke. Ambulances, more policemen, and a fire truck pulled into the apartment parking lot, and Mrs. Martin watched as EMTs ran to the Robinsons and then to her. The EMTs sounded like they were speaking in code, and then one of them gave her a shot, and Mrs. Martin felt the left side of her body go numb. That fucker ran a number on you, the verdammter Jude, thought Mrs. Martin, the old words mixing with the new ones, and memories of the camps coming back through the pain.
Mrs. Martin watched a stretcher pull alongside of her and then
felt them lifting her onto it. Her head lolled to the side, the pain coming in diminishing waves now, and she glanced back to the parking lot as she was drawn to the ambulance. Mrs. Martin watched three black SUVs pull into the lot, followed by a van, and she could feel her heart rate quicken. After a moment’s discussion with these interlopers, the pilots of her stretcher pulled her past the ambulance and toward the gaping maw of the back of the van. It was full of noisy and festively lit medical equipment, and two men wearing foreign yet terrifyingly familiar visored helmets were hunched over within it, waiting. Mrs. Martin tried to weave one of the men pushing the cart, tried to tell him that she was the wrong one, that the dead woman was who they wanted, but she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t connect.
The EMTs pushed her stretcher with rather cruel, rattling abruptness into the van, and then the doors slammed shut.
“Please let me go,” said Mrs. Martin, but instead of answering her, one of the visored men turned to her with a syringe full of purple liquid. “Please,” said Mrs. Martin, and then the man stuck the needle into her arm and pushed the plunger. “Please,” said Mrs. Martin again as the world went gray and then faded to black.
CHAPTER 71
“How long are you going to let her sleep?” Terry asked, and Darryl sighed at the question. Terry had asked this at least three times, and Darryl was tired of hearing it. The little girl had lost her parents, been kidnapped, and been snapped out of a bend by being yanked out of range. Any one of those things could have shut down the most robust adult for a good long time, and Darryl knew firsthand how painful the last of the three could be.
“We’re going to let her sleep until she wakes up,” said Darryl. “It’s not like there’s some rush to get her up.”
“I know, but we need to switch cars soon. Everybody and their mother is probably on the lookout for us.”
Darryl grimaced. Terry was right. They’d only turned on the radio for a minute, but that was long enough to confirm that the wolves were already out, claiming that he and Terry had killed the two people back at the apartments and had taken a little girl hostage. Darryl hadn’t expected any less, but it was still troubling to hear. As was the fact that the body count only totaled two. The old woman was completely still—how could she possibly be alive?
Darryl felt sick when he thought about the black trucks and van that had passed them on the way to the apartments. They might as well have crawled directly out of his nightmares. And if they were that secret group he’d imagined snapping at their heels, they had to be pretty happy about seeing their net tightening around their prey.
Twisting away from that vision, Darryl looked out the window, and what he saw flashing past made him want to scream. A parked state trooper was sitting in a speed trap, and even though Terry was watching the limit, Darryl knew the cop was going to pull out.
“Shit,” muttered Terry, eyes wide in the rearview.
When Darryl turned, he saw the flashing lights behind them, the siren already starting to wail.
“Pull over,” he said, “and don’t say a word. I’ll do all of the talking.” Oh fuck, thought Darryl, you are done.
Terry did as Darryl said, and Darryl watched the cop roll up behind them and then shut off the sirens, leaving the lights on to alert other drivers. The cop opened his door slowly and began walking toward them, his semiauto visible in his hand.
“He knows it’s us, Darryl,” said Terry. “He knows who we are, and you need to do something!”
Darryl shoved the cop and the man staggered, and then Darryl hit him again, making his legs march him across the two southbound lanes. The cop made it across both of them but didn’t have the same luck with oncoming northbound traffic. A semi whose driver was insufficiently impressed by the cop car’s flashers across the median came ripping toward him. The driver tried to turn at the last second, and Darryl watched the scene in what felt like slow motion. Its grill suddenly covered in cop and its driver working the wheel with decidedly limited results, the semi slid hard to the far shoulder before lurching back across the road in a horrible overcorrection and then blowing over the median and into oncoming traffic. Another oncoming truck blared its horn, and then the two trucks collided head-on. Their trailers buckled like massive accordions, the cabs all but disappearing between them. The noise of it was louder than anything Darryl had ever heard, the sound of gods fighting, a world war on the highway. Cars began to pile up behind the wreck, minor accidents resulting from the trucking cataclysm, and then Darryl was pounding Terry on the shoulder, begging him, “Drive, drive!”
Terry did as he was told, and a few seconds later they were the only moving car in sight. Good Samaritans from both sides of the highway ran toward the trucks, while less civic-minded motorists could be seen shouting at one another on the side of the gridlocked road. Darryl looked back to stare at the wreck, the sight of it almost as awe-inspiring as the mess at the docks, and then the twin trucks fireballed in a massive explosion. Even across the hundred or so yards they’d put behind them, he felt the hot wind buffet the car. Darryl could see people in the median begin to stand, lucky folks who had been blown clear of the blast. I bet there are a lot of them who weren’t so lucky, thought Darryl. When he looked down at Cynthia, he found the little girl somehow still sleeping.
“You just want me to stay southbound?” Terry asked, startling Darryl into breaking his gaze from the slumbering bender next to him.
“Yeah, keep on south,” said Darryl. “The sooner we’re out of here, the better. At least that mess back there should slow things down.”
“It might,” said Terry, his eyes locking with Darryl’s in the rearview mirror. “They’re going to look at that cop’s dashboard footage, and they’re going to know it was us. I don’t think it matters anymore, but they’re going to know we’re going south.”
“We change trucks, head east once we’re out of this fucking hellhole, and we’re gone.”
“They’re going to catch us, Darryl,” said Terry, sounding somber and oddly calm. “We took it too far when you grabbed that girl. That’s the kind of thing that the media will never let go of. Nothing we do can make that go away, especially when they come up with more ways to tie all of this to us. I don’t want to turn myself in, but I don’t want to die, either.”
“We’re not going to die, and we’re not going to be turning ourselves in.” Darryl was stroking Cynthia’s hair. She was going to make all of this worth it, he knew it. If she can get in your head, she can do anything.
Darryl could see his friend shaking his head, and though he wanted to remind Terry how this whole mess was started, he kept his mouth shut. There had been too much blood spilled since then to worry about old transgressions.
“Yeah, you’re right,” said Terry. “Just head south. We’ll be fine.”
Darryl frowned at Terry’s bizarre change of heart and then looked at the air between them. He and the girl were bending—Or weaving, she called it weaving—Terry without even realizing it. Darryl closed his eyes, relaxed into the seat, and hoped the peace would last for just a few more minutes.
CHAPTER 72
1945
My dream is impossible, for in it I can see. As I wake, however, I realize that this is no dream. Katarina is kneeling over me, my face grasped in both of her hands, and I can see her as plain as I can see the moonlight through the slats in the timbered walls. I’m frozen there in the hayloft where we have hidden, frozen and waiting for her to say something, to explain my sight the way that she has been able to explain everything else in my life that has never made sense.
“Katarina, what are you doing?” I finally ask her when she doesn’t volunteer the information, but she just clamps my head tighter in her hands, and then I feel her thumb wavering over my neck, dancing there over my throat. Fear races through me, a rocket of terror unlike anything I have felt since Dachau, even when the war was raging around us.
“Our jou
rney is done,” says Katarina. “Your war is over.”
“What do you mean?” I ask, but I know the answer already. The camps have taught me that. Edna Greenberg, my mother, my family—all the dead and nameless, ever-filling pits with their twisted bodies and endless buckets of ash, have taught me never to trust one of these devils. I did, though. I trusted Katarina, and now I am going to suffer for this mistake.
“I mean, I need you, Ora, more than ever before,” says Katarina.
I struggle against her, but the woman has an iron grip, and what I’d mistaken for a slim, almost frail body is actually very powerful.
“Hold still, kike. You need to hold still or things will get very bad for you.”
/ They can’t be any worse / I send the words like a missile, my lips never wavering as the thought leaves my mind. Katarina felt it, though. I think she expected little Ora to just roll over, do as she wished and then die, but I still have some fight left in me. I am exhausted, weakened from the years in the camp, starving, and dehydrated from our run from Dachau, but there is one thing I have been practicing every day.
Before Katarina can recover from the shock of my scream in her mind, I blast her as hard as I can, shoving her with my mind exactly as she’d been showing me. The second the wave of energy hits her, I lose my vision—it is as if I never had sight at all. Scrambling to my feet, I use what for most would be a second sight but for me is the only sight I ever really had. Katarina is struggling to stand, and I can see her pain in the pulse of her tendrils. Most of them are purple and red, but there are a few black ones, and some of the black ones are dead looking and limp and hang from her like thick braids. As Katarina works her way to her feet, I hit her again, even harder this time, and she shrieks both in my ears and between them.
I fall to my knees at the noise, willing myself to recover more quickly than she does, but as I look up, Katarina is already closing in on me, her threads filling the space between us with an ugly mass of fear and rage. I suck in air, ready myself to shove her again, hopefully to kill this monster and send her to the hellfire that she so rightfully earned, but before I can do so she is on top of me.
