Neo’s phone rang, and he snatched it from his belt. After a couple of grunts and a “yeah,” he ended the conversation. “Maybe not is right,” he agreed. “Walkingman’s parked east of West New York along the river.”
“Then let’s go.” Nick flicked on the strobing blue flashers and screaming siren and flattened the accelerator as they entered the Midtown Tunnel. It would be a hair-raising trip across Manhattan to Jersey.
Nick missed the gated entrance twice before Neo located it in the gloom of the substantial pines flanking the road. Nick switched off the Navigator’s lights, eased between the rusted, crumbling gates in the impenetrable blackness, and followed the crushed grass and gravel lane toward the river. The monstrous, baleful pines towered above the Navigator like ominous sentries awaiting the command to strike. Neo placed the phone to his ear and listened to the instructions from the FBI command center.
He glanced at Nick. “About sixty feet to Walkingman’s car,” he whispered and disconnected the transmission. “There’s an old asylum ahead. The boys say it’s been abandoned for fifty plus years.”
Nick nodded and slowly depressed the brake pedal to effect a silent stop. They waited noiselessly inside the SUV and listened through the open windows but heard nothing but the shrill cacophony of crickets and tree frogs, small animals crunching their way through the dry underbrush, and an occasional yelp from a distant dog.
“Time to move,” Nick said quietly. He swung a small black rucksack over his left shoulder and motioned for Neo to get out.
After drawing their guns and raking the slides, they exited from the Navigator and made their way warily down the narrow lane beneath a moonless, overcast sky. Neo clung to the dark cover of the pines hugging the left side of the drive, while Nick stealthily crept along the right.
Neo grinned. The sweet scent of the pine sap recalled pleasant childhood memories of the annual Doss family pilgrimage to an upstate New York Christmas tree farm where they would select and cut their own tree. It was always cold as hell, but somehow he never felt the stinging wind or the chilling wetness of the snow. There was just something about being together as a family at that special time of year that insulated him from nature’s worst.
Suddenly, something heavy dropped on Neo’s back with a startling slap; he spun in circles, desperately groping for his mysterious attacker, but it remained out of his reach.
Nick noted Neo’s agitation; he swiftly crossed the drive, grabbed Neo’s forearm, and hissed, “Stop.”
Neo froze as Nick examined his back and plucked a large tree frog from his shirt. Nick held it in front of Neo’s drawn face, careful to direct its urine spray toward the woods. The former NFL All-Pro grinned sheepishly at the bloated, squirming critter with the twiggy, suction-cup fingers. Neo was enveloped by an embarrassed flush at his panic over a harmless tree frog.
Nick flipped the frightened creature onto a pine bough, patted Neo on the shoulder, and resumed his position across the drive. He listened closely for any telltale signs of Walkingman before advancing toward the Hudson again.
Even though the surveillance team back in Washington had declared this place abandoned, Nick remained alert for security devices and booby traps. He intermittently utilized his hooded flashlight to scan the copper pine needles on the ground for pressure and trip sensors, and then to inspect the pine boughs for laser motion sensors.
The trees parted abruptly, and the daunting shadow of the boarded-up asylum blocked the softly lit eastern horizon and sent chills streaking across their flesh. The four gables facing the west were scowling brows above eyeless sockets. The peeling gray floor and roof of the immense smoking veranda resembled a pair of pale, malevolent lips, with the derelict railing akin to a mouthful of broken teeth. The freighters meandering along the Hudson River released mournful wails that heightened their edginess.
The stolen Mercedes with the GPS burglary system was parked to the left of the veranda on the unkempt circular drive. Its warm engine ticked in the cool night.
They wordlessly split up, a familiar tactic learned from years of field teamwork. Neo slipped into the tangled undergrowth to the south to begin his perimeter check, while Nick approached the front door. He tried the corroded brass doorknob, but it wouldn’t turn. Locked or frozen from age? The answer would be palpable in a minute.
Nick withdrew a small packet of lock-picking tools from the rucksack and quickly defeated the lock. After returning the tools to the rucksack, he drew his gun and opened the door.
Blackness. Silence.
Nick took a small step forward, then another. He flipped up the hood of his flashlight just as something heavy collided with the back of his skull. He bounced on the tile floor once before succumbing to utter darkness.
Nick blinked repeatedly as he tried to regain full consciousness. After the dizziness passed, he found his wrists and ankles shackled to a thick wooden chair in what appeared to be the asylum’s basement. His chair was bolted to the floor in a three-sided, plywood cubicle. He strained against the stout manacles, but they held firm.
His head ached as if split by Paul Bunyan’s axe, and the putrid stench of human decay certainly did nothing to subdue his queasiness. Somewhere in a distant, cobwebbed corner, a fifteen-watt bulb glowed just brightly enough to cast an aura of fear. It revealed the horrible pile of human bones ahead but cloaked the far recesses of the basement. Nick ignored his occasional eruptions of panic. Fear was counterproductive. He needed to stay calm and alert. And most of all, he needed to find a way out of there.
He gazed at the rank bone pile again. It was obvious that there had been many other prisoners down there, and they hadn’t survived the experience. From the condition of the corpses, it appeared as if their bones were broken before they were eaten alive. After its meal, the barbaric beast tossed their bloody remains against the cement block wall facing his cubicle. Now, it looked like he was on tonight’s menu.
Well, Nick had some bad news for his hostile host. He planned to walk out of there alive. All his bones intact.
A scuffling of feet interrupted his reverie and launched vicious waves of pain inside his tender skull. Nick attempted to refocus his thoughts – his resolve – before confronting his captor, but it was a tough challenge.
Two men appeared before his cubicle. The first man he immediately recognized as Jay Walkingman, but the other concealed his identity beneath a black hood. Nick noticed that Walkingman’s hands were cuffed behind his back, and a rag had been stuffed into his gaping mouth. The terrorist’s black eyes were ablaze with fear and anger.
“Good evening, Nick,” the muscular, hooded man said in a pleasant voice. “I hope you’re comfortable.”
“Thanks, I am,” Nick shot back in an equally, amicable tone.
“This is the terrorist you have been searching for, I believe. A Mister Jay Walkingman.”
Walkingman struggled, but the Hood retained his crushing grip on the Indian’s biceps.
“While we’re making polite introductions here, may I ask who you are?” Nick asked.
“You may, but I’m afraid I can’t grace you with an answer.”
“How convenient.”
“So is this your fugitive or not?” Hood asked again.
Nick nodded.
“Well then, since I was the one who arrested this sleazy terrorist, I should be the one to mete out his punishment. Don’t you agree, Nick?” Hood waited for a response, but Nick remained silent. “So, here’s my proposal. I have injected Mr. Walkingman with a full-strength dose of what he refers to as water from the infamous fountain of youth. He should begin his transformation within thirty minutes, I should imagine. Meanwhile, you will have a front-row seat from which to witness this extraordinary spectacle. You’ll see things that haven’t occurred in hundreds of years, Nick. It should be rather exciting, I should think.”
“Yeah, Jay and I’ll have a real swinging time down here.”
“Yes, until Mr. Walkingman completes his transformation. Then, I�
��m afraid that he – or should I say it – will eat you alive, Nick. Once your frail, human body is history, then it will proceed to eat itself. Nasty little creatures, really.”
“Sounds like a barrel of laughs. But, hey, since I’m about to be the main course here, I have a last request.”
Hood bowed slightly. “Within reason, of course.”
“I’d like you to explain the mysterious demon guardian that protects the fountain of youth and what that water is used for.”
“Demon guardian? Are you referring to the Zyloux that protects Tobhor’s little fortress?”
“That’s the one. I have a feeling that what I’ve seen so far is just the tip of the iceberg,” Nick said, stalling while he tried to think of a way out of this unpleasant mess.
“It is a fountain of youth, Nick, but not for your kind. And yes, there is much more that you don’t know, but I fear that with your diluted heritage, you couldn’t begin to grasp it. Let me just add that Gabriella isn’t here to rescue you this time around, and that your friends in Duneden are in for a bit of a surprise.”
The diluted heritage insult rankled Nick. “What kind of a surprise?”
“Revenge for a murder that happened a long time ago where justice was not served.”
“Who was the victim?”
Walkingman moaned and twisted in Hood’s grip, but to no avail.
“Let me just say that Gabriella’s father, Yorick Wolfe, was responsible for the death of someone close to me, and leave it like that.” Suddenly, Hood sucker punched Walkingman in the temple, and the small-time terrorist crumpled to the dank stone floor. Hood cuffed Walkingman’s ankles and stood.
Nick was puzzled by Hood’s actions.
Hood noticed Nick’s bewilderment “When Walkingman transforms, he will become much smaller. The cuffs will fall away easily, so it can find its way to the Bellamy buffet.”
Nick glowered at him. “Don’t count me out so soon, asshole. When I get out of here, I’ll look you up and make you as dead as your old friend.”
Hood threw his head back and laughed – a hauntingly, humorless laugh. “Goodbye, Nick. You and your brother, Thomas, will meet again in the great mutant hereafter,” he said, and gradually faded away into the dusky basement air.
Nick ignored the impulse to question Hood’s magical, vanishing act and studied Walkingman’s prone, unconscious form instead. There were already subtle changes in his appearance. His feet were barely discernable at the bottom of his pant legs, and his lone, exposed arm shriveled before Nick’s eyes.
Nick tried to muscle his way free from the manacles again, but he was too weak. Walkingman groaned. Nick’s head snapped forward expectantly.
There wasn’t much time left before Walkingman became Eatingman. Nick had to think of something.
Then it dawned on him. Where the hell was Neo? Was he lying dead outside, or was he searching for his partner?
Nick called Neo’s name at the top of his lungs several times, but stopped abruptly when the shouting expedited Walkingman’s revival. Most of the young terrorist’s hair had abandoned his skull and fallen to the floor in clumps, leaving wispy strands dangling at the edges of his scalp.
Walkingman stirred and lifted his head, but he wasn’t Walkingman anymore. The thing’s unblinking green eyes sized Nick up for dinner as thick saliva drooled through its black, pointed teeth. Its forked, serpent’s tongue shot from its mouth, curling and uncurling obscenely in Nick’s direction.
Nick turned his face away from the grotesque creature and imagined a dinner bell pealing ominously in the distance. If he was ever going to devise an escape plan, now was the time.
There was no guarantee of later.
36
M
indy Landers awoke in a moonlit rift between shadowy hulks, her head as thick as the curdled milk inside the dumpster behind Ari’s Carryout. She found herself reclining on several plump trash bags in an alley along her nightly route; the garbage cans surrounding her oozed a foul stench from steaming liquid rubbish that watered her eyes and gagged her.
Mindy propped her hands behind her and pushed forward into a sitting position, an old trick to compensate for the budding arthritis plaguing her back. To her surprise, she nearly pushed herself into a forward somersault. Her mental haze thinned some, and she studied her hands in the faint silver glow for a long while to be absolutely positive that she wasn’t dreaming. The four thin, jagged scars on her left palm were missing, as well as the scaly calluses and desiccated skin.
Her hands groped wildly in the darkness for her neighborhood-travel handbag, and they quickly pounced on it a foot away. She fumbled recklessly inside the bag’s yawning gullet, her quivering hands spilling its contents into the discolored seepage. But Mindy could’ve cared less. She felt younger and more alive than she had felt for several years.
After retrieving the objects of her search, she flung the bag aside, flicked her butane lighter several times before a flame sparked to life, and slammed her eyelids shut in prayer, begging God not to dash her hopes with yet another of life’s cruel twists. Reluctantly, Mindy’s eyelids fluttered open, and she unconsciously held her breath as she gazed upon the youthful visage in her cracked compact mirror.
Tears rained into her lap as she laughed and cried at the miracle that recovered her lost youth. She was twenty-something once more! Her face was smooth as cream with peach blush painting each cheek. Her sable lashes were lustrous; the crow’s feet and deeply etched age canals were absent from her complexion. She massaged a breast and found it to be firm and perched high, with her nipples now positioned front and center and ready to say “howdy-do” to every passing man.
She used the flickering flame to inspect her legs. The bulging varicosities and purplish-red spider webs were gone, displaced by supple, satin skin that gleamed in the bathing moonlight.
Suddenly, a cloud darkened her thoughts, staining her joy just when Hope had come in like a long shot at Belmont. All the years of pain, ruin, disappointment, and anger swelled into a roaring tsunami that flattened her precious miracle in seconds. There was much work to be done. Tricks to be turned. Money to be saved. New clothes to be purchased. Hair to be styled. Nails to be manicured.
And most important of all – a very special meeting to arrange.
Janet Staley watched the strange woman stumble and sway in the shadows along the darkened storefronts, ricocheting off the shabby brick walls and grimy display windows, but never falling. As the woman staggered into the streetlight’s yellowish cone in the prostitutes’ staked-out territory, Janet’s jaw dropped. The broad, and stoned out of her mind at that, was wearing Lurdene Walken’s raggedy duds!
Janet doubled her fists, kicked off her high-heeled, fuck-me pumps, and sprinted angrily toward the woman. The spaced-out bitch must have rolled poor Lurdene and stolen her clothes. Well, Janet planned to fix her wagon but good!
The lurching woman reached the loading access drive, a dark break between the storefronts, and toppled headlong into the gloom. The three other prostitutes ceased their jiggling parade and watched Janet disappear into the deep shadows. They were too frightened to join Janet and too broke to neglect any tricks that might happen their way.
Janet dived onto the muttering woman and pinned her arms to the cracked pavement.
“Why are you wearing Lurdene Walken’s duds, bitch?” Janet bounced her bony ass on the stranger’s stomach a few times, hoping to knock the wind and fight out of her.
The woman panted like a dog in heat, unable to form words.
“Speak up now, or I’ll pulverize you!” Janet growled breathlessly, adding a couple more bounces to emphasize her point.
The woman’s lips moved noisily for several moments, then they exploded with, “Janet . . . it’s . . . me!”
Janet leaned over to get a better look at this woman’s face in the weak light.
“I don’t know you, bitch liar!”
“Yeah . . . ya . . . do. Lurdene.”
“What
do you take me for, a blind bat?” Janet snapped.
“I’ve . . . changed. Youn . . . ger.”
“Yeah, and I’m one of the Olsen twins.”
“Git off . . . me, and I’ll prove . . . it.”
Janet considered the woman’s request for a moment, and then warily released her arms and stood. “This better be good.”
Lurdene sat up, massaged her ribs, and tugged up her top.
“Jesus!” Janet turned away.
“Look, goddammit! Tha tattoo on my titty.”
Janet peered down. “Lean into the streetlight a little more.”
Lurdene scooted toward the street.
Janet moved lower and examined the tattoo on the woman’s left breast. It was a pair of roses, one red and one yellow.
“Damn!” she exclaimed. “It is you.”
Lurdene slipped down her top, slowly rose to her feet and propped a hand against the closest brick building.
“I was kidnapped.”
“What?”
“That asshole that picked me up tha other night at the curb.”
“The Cadillac?”
“Yeah. Anotha guy and him did some weird shit to me and some otha broads.”
“No shit!”
“I couldn’t see ‘em, and they couldn’t see me, but I heard ‘em. Then, thar was some kind of fuckin’ monster that . . .” Her eyes filled with tears, and sobs wracked her throat.
Janet wrapped an arm around her. “Take your time, honey.”
Lurdene nodded, and wiped the wetness from her cheeks. “This thing – I couldn’t see it, eitha – murdered some of tha others. Oh gawd, it was horrible. Just horrible.”
“Murdered them? How?”
“It . . . ate ‘em. Tore them ta pieces.”
“Eeew.”
“And tossed thar gawddammed bones against tha wall. Those I could see. It was fuckin’ . . . horrible. That’s tha only word I can think of ta describe it.”
“C’mon up to your apartment, honey, and get some rest.”
The Ancient Breed Page 23
