Nightworld (Adversary Cycle/Repairman Jack)

by F. Paul Wilson

“Thank you, Bill.” Glaeken turned back to his audience. “My wife is ill.”

  “Anything I can do?” Alan said.

  “I’m afraid not, Doctor Bulmer, but I thank you for offering.” Alan saw no hope in the man’s eyes as he spoke. “She has Alzheimer’s disease.”

  Alan could only say, “I’m sorry.”

  But Sylvia shot to her feet. “Now I get it!”

  “Get what, Mrs. Nash?” Glaeken appeared confused.

  Sylvia was leaning forward, jabbing her finger toward him over the coffee table. Her core of anger had fully uncoiled, baring its fangs, lashing out.

  “I should have known! Do you think I’m an idiot? You want Jeffy here so you can use him—or rather use the power you think is in him—to cure your wife!”

  “Not at all, Mrs. Nash,” he said softly with a slow, sad shake of his head. “The Dat-tay-vao will not work against a degenerative process like Alzheimer’s. It can cure disease, but it can’t turn back the clock.”

  “So you say.”

  Then Jeffy tugged at Sylvia’s sleeve. “Don’t yell at him, Mom. He’s my friend.”

  That did it. Alan saw Sylvia wince as if she’d been jabbed by a needle.

  “We’re leaving,” she said, taking Jeffy by the hand and guiding him away from the sofa.

  “But Mrs. Nash,” Glaeken said, “we need Jeffy to reactivate the focus. We need to reunite the Dat-tay-vao and the metal from the instrument.”

  “But you don’t have the metal, do you.”

  “Not yet, but—”

  “Then I see no point in discussing this further. When you’ve located this magic metal, call me. You have my number. Then we’ll talk. Not before.”

  “But where are you going?”

  “Back home. Where else?”

  “No, you mustn’t. It’s too dangerous. It’s better that you stay here. I own the building. You can have your choice of the empty apartments. You’ll be safe here.”

  “Here?” She stopped at the door. “This place is practically on top of that hole out there—all but falling into it. I’ll take my chances in Monroe.”

  “This place is protected, in a way. It will be preserved until the end. You and Jeffy and your friends can share that protection.”

  “Why? What’s so special about this place?”

  “I’m here. I’m to be saved until the last.”

  … and then he plans to make you suffer the tortures of the damned!

  Alan remembered Nick’s words and wondered why the old man didn’t look more frightened.

  “Toad Hall will be protected too. Alan and I have already seen to that.”

  Alan turned his chair and wheeled it toward Sylvia and Jeffy. He’d been on the phone first thing this morning and called around until he found a contractor who could immediately start installing steel storm shutters. He’d offered a substantial bonus if the job was completed by sundown. Now he wondered if shutters would be enough.

  Why not stay here? It might be a good move. Alan felt at home with this group, had a feeling they’d find safety here among this disparate, unlikely crew.

  Something going on here. A subtle chemistry, a subliminal bond.

  But Sylvia seemed oblivious to all that. When her anger-core broke free and took the helm, she’d dig in her heels and refuse to budge. Alan knew he couldn’t talk to her when she got like this. Nobody could. He’d learned to recognize the signs and—when the storm came—to sit back and let it have its way with her. When the clouds and winds had blown past and she was cooler, calmer, she’d be a different Sylvia, and able to discuss it.

  He might be able to change her mind later.

  Sylvia’s anger could be inconvenient, frustrating, even infuriating at times, but the anger was part of what made Sylvia who she was. And Alan loved who Sylvia was.

  Jeffy, though, clearly wanted to stay.

  “I don’t want to go, Mom.”

  “Please don’t argue with me, Jeffy,” Sylvia said in a low voice. “It’s time to go home.”

  He tried to pull away from her. “No!”

  “Please obey your mother, Jeffy,” Glaeken said softly.

  The boy abruptly stopped struggling. The look Sylvia threw Glaeken was anything but grateful.

  “There’s something you should realize, Mrs. Nash,” Glaeken said. “The creatures that attacked your house last night are active only in the hours between sunset and sunrise. They must hide from the sun during the day. However, as I’m sure you are all aware, the daylight hours are shrinking.”

  “But that can’t go on forever,” Alan said. “Can it?”

  Glaeken nodded. “The pattern will continue. And accelerate. Sunrise was late again today. Tomorrow it will be even later. Sunset will keep coming earlier and earlier.”

  “But if that keeps up…” He looked at Sylvia.

  “You see the pattern?” Glaeken said. “Shrinking daylight hours, lengthening periods of darkness. The hole creatures will have progressively longer time for their feedings, and shorter periods when they must be in hiding. And when daylight is gone completely…”

  “They’ll never stop,” Jack said in a hushed voice.

  Alan knew from looking at him that no matter what terrors he and Sylvia and Ba had experienced last night, Jack had seen far worse.

  Glaeken nodded. “Correct. We are headed for a world without light, without law, without reason, sanity, or logic. A nightworld from which there will be no dawn. Unless we do something.”

  “Call me when you get the metal,” Sylvia said.

  Alan reached out and shook hands with Glaeken as he wheeled past, then guided himself to where Ba stood holding the door.

  “Don’t leave,” said a strained voice.

  Alan turned at the door and saw that Nick had stepped out of the kitchen. His eyes were bright again, and alive with concern as he stared at Alan.

  “Why not?”

  “If the four of you leave here today, only three will live to return.”

  A chill swept over Alan. He glanced out into the atrium and saw Sylvia, Ba, and Jeffy standing before the elevator. As he watched, the bell dinged and the doors slid open. Sylvia and Jeffy stepped inside. Ba stood waiting, restraining the doors with one of his big hands.

  Alan was paralyzed for a moment. The three outside were waiting for him; the four people in the apartment were staring at him. He wanted to stay, but wouldn’t—couldn’t—without Sylvia. And no way was Sylvia moving. Not yet, at least.

  He shrugged and flashed what he knew was a weak grin.

  “We’ll see about that.”

  Then he headed toward the elevator, feeling as if he were rolling himself toward an abyss as deep and dark as the one in the Sheep Meadow outside.

  As the door closed behind Dr. Bulmer, Carol said, “I should go too.”

  So soon? Bill thought, returning from Magda’s room.

  “Why don’t you hang out for a while?”

  She shook her head. “I’d better get home. Nelson will be back soon.”

  She waved and let herself out. Something going on there. Bill would have followed, but he had Nick.

  He guided Nick back into the kitchen. Carol’s behavior disturbed him, but Nick’s even more. He was acting like some sort of Delphic oracle, transmitting threats and predictions from beyond. Was it madness or had his brush with the abyss left him connected, as Glaeken had said, to the chaos encroaching on all their lives?

  “Are you trying to frighten people, Nick?”

  “No,” he said as he resumed his seat at the kitchen table. His eyes were tortured. “They’re in danger. One of them’s going to die.”

  “Who, Nick? Which one?”

  If Nick was actually tapped in, maybe Bill could get something concrete out of him before he went catatonic again. Those four people from Long Island—the woman, Sylvia, was a bit of a bitch, but he didn’t want to see harm come to any of them, especially the boy.

  “Who’s going to die, Nick? Who’s in danger? Is it Jeffy,
the boy?”

  But Nick was gone again, his face empty, his eyes blank.

  “Damn it, Nick!” Bill said softly. He gave the slumped shoulders a gentle squeeze. “Couldn’t you have held on a few minutes longer?”

  No reply, of course.

  He felt a surge of anger, but not at Nick. That Nash woman—talking to Glaeken like that. He was only trying to help, and all he was asking was her cooperation to save their own hides. But Bill had to keep reminding himself that the truth was so difficult to accept. He remembered how he’d fought it for years—decades. And Sylvia Nash was afraid of something. He didn’t know what, but was sure he’d seen fear in her eyes as she walked past on her way out.

  He heard an amused voice rising in the living room. He went to see what was up.

  “Do you hire out?” Jack was saying as he clapped the old man on the back. “I mean, if I ever have guests who won’t leave, will you come over and get rid of them for me?”

  Glaeken smiled, and as concerned as Bill was about Carol and Nick and the whole situation, he had to laugh. It felt good, especially since he wasn’t sure when he’d have cause to laugh again.

  Preparations

  Manhattan

  “Well, what do you think?” Thompson said as Ernst accompanied him along Central Park West.

  He’d called this morning and asked Ernst to join him to discuss “matters of mutual interest.” Having little else to do, now that the Change had begun, Ernst agreed.

  Thompson seemed more composed this morning. Perhaps because the “birds” were gone. But they’d certainly left their mark on this part of the city.

  “About what?”

  Thompson gestured toward the park. “About this. About everything that’s happening.”

  The police weren’t letting anybody into the lower end of the park, and they’d closed off the streets adjacent to it. He and Thompson were able to walk down the center of CPW. But yesterday’s carnival atmosphere was gone. Fewer street vendors cluttered the curbs, and far fewer sightseers milled about. Plenty of curious standing outside the yellow tape, yes, but less noisy and jocular than yesterday.

  The hole had been an event. What had issued from the hole had been a horror.

  The deadly depredations of what were described as new breeds of insects had been all over the news this morning. The fatalities had been carted away but the damage to the buildings overlooking the park remained in evidence—hundreds, perhaps thousands of torn window screens and even some broken glass. All except one building. Ernst noted the number: 34. It appeared to have suffered not one iota of damage during the night. He wondered why.

  The sun was high and warm. His three-piece suit was white, as usual, and reflected some of the heat, but still he wished he’d worn a lighter-weight model.

  “We couldn’t have discussed this—whatever it is—in my office at the Lodge?”

  Thompson shrugged. “Maybe. But the sun rose even later this morning, and I figure I might as well snag a few rays while I still can.”

  Not a bad idea, Ernst supposed.

  They passed the barricades and began to see traffic again.

  “Well, what’s on your mind?”

  Screeching tires and cries of terror brought them up short. Up ahead, a yellow cab began rising off the street, trunk first. The driver opened his door, hung by the seat belt, then dropped to the pavement. A woman and child leaned out the rear window and screamed for help.

  “My God!” a nearby woman cried out. “Can’t somebody do something?”

  Thompson’s face was a study in vulpine fascination as he watched the cab continue to rise, beginning a slow rotation as it cleared the tops of the surrounding buildings and kept on falling up.

  “What the fuck?”

  “The laws are changing,” Ernst said, trying to sound calm and composed despite his suddenly dry tongue. “That’s why it’s called ‘the Change.’”

  The Order’s lore was skimpy and vague about what exactly would happen during the Change.

  Thompson looked at him. “The laws? But—”

  “The laws of physics among them.”

  Finally the car drifted out of sight past the building tops. Good. Ernst had felt rather ghoulish watching it.

  “Stay close to the buildings,” he said as they began to move again. “That way we’ll have something to grab on to if it happens to us.”

  Ernst stepped gingerly, wondering if a gravity hole lay in wait a few steps ahead.

  Thompson glanced at him as they crossed the sidewalk. “You know what? I don’t care what this One guy promised you, I think he’s gonna fuck us over.”

  He had just verbalized Ernst’s greatest unspoken fear.

  “He owes us.” He owes me. “He couldn’t have done this without us.”

  “Yeah, well, maybe, but even if you get an invitation to the party, I got a bad feeling he’s gonna leave me out in the cold. So I gotta consider all possibilities. If he brings me along, cool. But if not, I need a backup plan.”

  Thompson wasn’t educated—high school dropout was probably an overestimation of his level of formal education—but Ernst had come to appreciate his native intelligence, and his particularly well-developed survival instinct. He would probably last longer than most in the post-Change world, but eventually he would succumb, no matter how elaborate his strategy.

  Ernst had a simpler strategy if he found himself left behind: a hefty dose of cyanide waited at home.

  At Eightieth Street they hurriedly entered the park and walked along the traverse past the budding Shakespeare Garden, keeping close to the trees. The sun shone, birds sang, bees hummed … just another spring day in Central Park. Nothing hinted at the changes Ernst knew were coming.

  “Any ideas yet?”

  Thompson nodded. “Yeah. Been thinking. If the Change works, things’ll be a mess. But even if it fizzles out halfway through—”

  Ernst doubted that. “I don’t think—”

  He stopped and jabbed a finger at Ernst. “It ain’t over till it’s over, and I don’t hear a fat lady singing yet. Your One fella’s got people and things working against him, right?”

  “I suppose, but they haven’t a chance.”

  “So you say, but shit happens on both sides of the fence.” He started walking again. “Here’s my point: Even if the Change stops half done, the world’s gonna be messed up. Whether completely messed up or only half messed up, either way I’m gonna need an edge. Part of that edge is someone taking your back. I got a lotta someones.”

  “Your followers … of course.”

  “Right. Kickerdom’ll do what I say. But that’s not enough. We’ll need an edge.”

  He stopped again, but this time he looked at the sky through the trees.

  “What are you getting at?”

  Ernst sensed a strange new intensity about Thompson. His eyes had taken on an almost feverish glow.

  “Sunlight, Drexie. What needs sunlight—regular, measured doses of sunlight—more than anything else?”

  As much as he loathed the insulting nickname, he wondered where this was going.

  “I suppose I would have to say plants.”

  “Exactly! And right now, in the spring, they need sunlight for sprouting and seedling growth.” He glanced at Ernst. “I worked a farm with my mother when I was little. So, if the daily dose of sunlight gets smaller and smaller over the next few weeks, we’re gonna see huge crop failures all across the globe.”

  “When the Change is over, crop failures will be the least of the world’s problems.”

  “But even if the Change fizzles, we’ll still be seeing worldwide food shortages, maybe even famine. You agree?”

  “Why … yes.”

  The realization startled Ernst. He hadn’t bothered to think that far ahead or consider that contingency. Yes … if the One failed, and the Change—to use Thompson’s term—fizzled, billions would starve in the aftermath. Even if the Enemy managed to stop the One, it would be a Pyrrhic victory.


  He had to smile through the bitterness: Otherness über alles.

  “Damn right, yes. So I figure I’d better start making plans for that. Those who can suss out the future can profit from it.”

  “I hope you’re not thinking of the futures market or anything like that.”

  “Shit, no. We lose much sunlight for any length of time, I don’t see there even being a stock market. Futures will go through the roof, but what are you going to pay with?”

  Ernst saw it all: In the face of worldwide crop failures, money—currency—wouldn’t be worth anything.

  “Certainly not money.”

  “Damn right. Money’s just paper, and you can’t eat paper. When the crops fail and the grocery shelves are empty, we’re going to see food riots in this city—in every city. The only thing that’ll be worth anything is food. And the guy who’s got the food—and the manpower to protect it—will rule the roost. That’ll be me.”

  “That’s your plan?”

  He nodded. “Yep. Stock up—canned and bottled stuff, and things that’ll keep a long time, like pasta. Nothing that needs refrigeration. We’ll clean out every store in town.”

  “Do you have enough money for that?”

  He gave a derisive snort. “Don’t need money. We’ll get a bunch of charge cards and max them out. Buy everything on credit.” He grinned. “Odds are the credit card companies won’t be around to collect.” He glanced at his watch. “Gotta get my people to start stocking up.” He grinned again and winked. “Before the hoarding starts.”

  CNN

  —same in country after country around the globe: gigantic holes, seemingly bottomless, averaging two hundred feet across, opening one after the other throughout the day. The governments of Iran, North Korea, and China deny the existence of any such holes within their borders, but aerial reconnaissance says otherwise. And the question on everyone’s mind: Is each of these holes going to release a horde of vicious creatures like those that were loosed on Manhattan last night? And if so, what can be done to stop them?

  In Manhattan, preparations are under way for—