Smiggins was the first to react. “Stop him!” he yelled.
Lucky for Louis, the archway was only a hundred or so yards away. He had sprung them by surprise and opened up enough of a lead to know he couldn’t be caught. He was going to do it. He was really going to do it. He was going to keep running and running and running until… BAM! Instant obliteration. It was the only way out.
Smiggins shouted again, directly to Louis. “Stop! Let’s talk! You don’t know what you’re doing.”
Louis didn’t look back. The archway was now less than forty yards and nothing was going to get in his way. Light was streaming through. He could feel its warmth caressing his cheeks, liking the way it made him glow from the inside out. I’m going to do it. I’m really going to do it.
Smiggins shouted again. “Louis, stop! You’re being unreasonable!”
Twenty yards now, and he could read the inscription on the golden arms. HEREBY LIES THE END OF THE WORLD. TRAVELERS PASS AT THEIR PERIL. He could almost take a flying leap and dive straight through it, but Smiggins had one last roll of the dice. “Louis, stop! You’ve signed a contract!”
Louis stopped in his tracks. He was less than five yards from the wall of shimmering light; if he tripped he’d fall into it. Damn it! He couldn’t believe he had forgotten about the contract.
“Don’t do it, Louis,” Smiggins said, closing in behind. “Think about what you’re doing. We need you.”
Louis turned his back to the Fires of Oblivion. Smiggins, Flash Freddy and the peelers had caught up but not one of them dared to come any closer. A good old-fashioned Mexican standoff, Louis my boy. As long as you keep close to the archway, they won’t dare make a grab for you.
Smiggins could sense the hesitation on his face. Not taking his eyes off Louis, he flicked his paw toward Flash Freddy. It was a few seconds before the lizard cottoned on to what he wanted. Hugging the briefcase to his chest, he removed the contract and handed it over. “That’s right, Louis,” Smiggins said, holding the thick wad of paper forward. “The contract you signed at the hotel. You’re an employee of LeMont International Enterprises. For eternity. It can’t be broken.”
Smiggins dared to take a step forward. Louis instinctively stepped back, keeping the distance nice and safe at three yards.
Smiggins froze. “Stop!” he squealed, then recovered himself. “Come now, let’s be reasonable about this. Obliteration isn’t any good for anybody. Nobody wins.”
Suddenly, making him jerk with a start, Louis felt something brushing the back of his legs. Something fluffy and soft, like a cat rubbing itself against him. He assumed at first it was one of the peelers creeping around him while his attention was on Smiggins and Flash Freddy. “What the…” he began to say, then stopped. He was staring into the beautiful dark eyes of the White Rabbit. Although the bell atop the arch remained silent, she must have emerged from the light behind him.
Be not afraid, she said. Her mouth didn’t move. He heard her voice telepathically inside his head, one he knew all too well.
“Dianne?” he said. “You… you’re an angel?”
Be not afraid, she said again. Follow me. It’s the only way.
Louis glanced at Smiggins and Flash Freddy. They and the peelers hadn’t moved. “Do you see her? She’s goddamn real. I’m not making her up. I’m not crazy.”
“What are you talking about?” Smiggins said, and sniggered.
It’s no use, Louis dear. They see what they want to see. Come, follow me. We must go now.
Louis glanced out of the corner of his eye at the White Rabbit (his ex-wife, a goddamn angel?), then again at Smiggins. Though the rat was staring back with savage intensity, his eyes shifted subtly toward Lady Di, a faint twitch, no more than a blink, then refocused onto Louis. Louis could feel the hatred in that stare, but he could also feel something else. Fear. “You see her, don’t you?” he said. Flash Freddy was deadpan. “You’re a goddamn liar.”
Louis then felt the White Rabbit brush against his side. “See what?” Smiggins said with a grin Louis didn’t like. “There’s nothing there.”
Louis followed his stare and saw the empty space by his side where the rabbit had been. Or where you thought she had been, Louis my boy. He glanced over his sagging shoulders at the white light streaming through the archway. Had he just made her up? Had he made goddamn everything up? Was this all just a figment of his pathetic, weak mind?
Smiggins sniggered and held up the contract. “Come now, Louis. Let’s stop all this nonsense and get back to reality. You’ve signed a contract with LeMont. It’s your legal obligation to work for the corporation.”
Suddenly, Louis felt the shackles of legality loosen its strangle hold. In a flash of instant enlightenment, everything made complete and utter goddamn sense. He felt light and free, like it used to when he sat on the back of his grandfather’s tractor while he plowed the cornfield, the sun shining down on his hair, the breeze licking the freckles on his face, the feeling that something greater was nurturing and sustaining his very being, something joyous and strong and completely accepting. “You said it yourself,” he said. “Like everything else in this god-forsaken city, the contract has an inbuilt obsolescence. It’s only valid for as long as I work.” He smiled and stepped back, welcoming the heat that flooded through him.
“NO!” Smiggins yelled. “You can’t!”
“I can, and I will,” Louis said. Two peelers made a desperate snatch for him, but they were too late. Their claws ripped the lapels of his jacket just as he fell into the abyss of light.
Obliteration was instantaneous.
EPILOGUE
Lo’ Thou Art A Dance
LOUIS jolted awake at the sudden loudness. Goddamn warbling again. Drilling its way into his skull, shredding in his ears like an angle grinder.
WOOOO-WEEEE. WOOOO-WEEEE. WOOOO-WEEEE.
His eyelids flung open. He was flat on his back, lying on something covered in plastic sheeting. Two rats were ripping open his jacket, tearing the buttons on his shirt, yanking his tie out of the way. Trying to stick something on his chest, electrical leads or something. They’d been torturing him! That’s why his chest was on goddamn fire.
WOOOO-WEEEE. WOOOO-WEEEE. WOOOO-WEEEE.
He flung out a numb left arm. It was heavy and awkward, but he managed to hit one of the dirty rats in the head. “Keep your goddamn claws off me!” he shouted, but his voice was muffled. Something was over his face, gagging him. A mask, like Santosa’s, hissing and gurgling and making it impossible to speak. He tried to rip it off.
“Keep it on!” one of the rats said, grabbing his arm. “It’s for your own good.”
“I’ve heard that before,” Louis shouted, fighting back control.
“He’s confused,” the other rat said. He was holding a syringe and needle. He depressed the plunger and a mist of fine droplets sprayed from the tip of the needle. “I’ll give him this to calm him down.”
WOOOO-WEEEE. WOOOO-WEEEE. WOOOO-WEEEE.
Louis struggled even harder, thrashing his head from side to side, wrenching back his arm. He suddenly stopped. On the end of the arm was a fist. It was unmistakable. A goddamn hand!
“That’s better Mr. DeVille,” the rat with the syringe said.
Louis opened and closed his fingers, counting them. One, two, three, four… five of them! Goddamn it, he had fingers. He brought his other hand up to his face and stared at it. Un-goddamn-believable! He opened and closed that one too, now racked with hysterical laughter. He then saw a clear plastic tube worming its way into the crook of his left elbow. It was attached to a bag of fluids above his head on a drip stand. “What the hell?” he said to himself. “Where am I?”
WOOOO-WEEEE. WOOOO-WEEEE. WOOOO-WEEEE.
“I think you’ll need something stronger,” the first rat said.
“Nothing stronger than this,” his mate replied. “It’s morphine.”
Louis tore his gaze from his hands. They weren’t rats. They were goddamn humans! Paramedics. In gre
en overalls. Green! Not sickly gray-green, but beautiful goddamn green, like the grass, like the leaves on a tree. He wanted to kiss them. He wanted to shout for joy. He was in an ambulance on his way to hospital. He was back! Goddamn it, back in the Big Apple, good ol’ New York, New York, back where he belonged. It was too glorious to be true. “Give me all the morphine you’ve got!” he screamed with laughter. “Give me everything! Absolutely-totally-undeniably everything!”
The bag above his head swayed with the motion of the ambulance while the rat with the syringe (He’s a paramedic, dear, he’s saving your life) punctured the needle through the rubber stopper, administering the drug. “I’ve never seen anything like it,” he said.
WOOOO-WEEEE. WOOOO-WEEEE. WOOOO-WEEEE.
“I have,” the other paramedic said. “Post Traumatic Hallucination Syndrome.”
Louis squealed with laughter and told them to keep pumping the morphine into him. After less than half a minute, he could feel it doing its work on his body. My overweight, aging, glorious human body! But there was one last thing he had to do. Lifting the oxygen mask an inch from his mouth, he took a big sniff. The horseshit was gone. Just the smell of disinfectant and traffic fumes. Sighing, he let his head sink into the pillow and gestured for one of the paramedics to lean forward. “Do you think it’s possible to turn off the goddamn siren?” he asked.
The paramedic nodded, and said, “We’re almost there. Shouldn’t be a problem.” He then disappeared, and after a few quick words with the driver the sirens fell blissfully silent. In the background, Louis caught a familiar tune on the radio, and chuckled. The Carpenters were singing with a plee-zant sense of happiness, I’m on the… Top of the world, Lookin’… Down on creation… And the only explanation I can fiiiind…
The paramedic returned, squatting next to Louis’ gurney, and said, “You’ve had a heart attack, Mr. DeVille. We’re taking you to St. Mary’s. You’re going to be just fine.”
Louis nodded through the morphine haze. He was so goddamn tired he could hardly open his mouth to speak.
“I know… I know,” he said. “We all are.”
THE PILGRIM CHRONICLES
SAMANTHA HONEYCOMB
Scott Zarcinas
“Enchanting and full of joy.” Inner Self magazine
Wrongly punished for breaking the ancient laws, Samantha Honeycomb is incarcerated in Hive Prison and then banished by the queen to the Crazy Lands, a land of maddened beasts and wild and unforgiving terrain. Her only hope of redemption is an impossible quest – to find the fabled hive of Beebylon and its secret of Infinite Richness. But there are others who would see her fail.
Please visit www.samanthahoneycomb.doctorzed.com for more details.
THE GOLDEN CHALICE
Scott Zarcinas
Fleeing the dreaded plague that has struck his village, the orphaned Giacomo heads to the mountains and its mysterious Golden City in search of the Elixir of Life, the only thing that can save the village and the woman he loves. His quest brings him face to face with the Six Thieves, cunning enemies who will stop at nothing to see him fail, and even with the Angel of Death herself. In the tradition of The Pilgrim Chronicles set by Samantha Honeycomb, The Golden Chalice is a compelling adventure story of self-discovery.
Please visit www.thegoldenchalice.doctorzed.com for more details.
DeVille's Contract Page 29
