by TJ Klune
“Wait,” he said, taking a step toward the house.
A low rumble came from his right.
He turned his head.
An old truck was coming down the road. Its headlights were on, but dim. He recognized that truck, didn’t he? Yes. The last time he’d seen it, it’d been at the bottom of a ravine, right? After—
It pulled up to the curb in front of his old house.
His father sat inside.
He looked… older. Far older than he’d been when Nate had seen him last, screaming at him in the cabin in the woods that he’d never have a faggot for a son, that he needed to get the fuck out and never come back. Time hadn’t been kind to him. His face was craggy and heavy. The bags under his eyes were purpled, like bruises. Nate watched as his father looked up at the house, fingers tightening around the steering wheel.
And then he got out of the truck.
Nate knew then what this was. He tried to move forward, but it was like he was underwater. His limbs were heavy. It hurt to breathe.
“No,” he said. “No, no, don’t do this, Dad, don’t do this—”
“He can’t hear you.”
A little girl stood at his side, staring up at him sadly.
Artemis Darth Vader.
“He can’t hear you,” she said again. “Because this isn’t real.”
“No,” Nate said. “We’re here. He’s right there.”
And he was. His father had closed the door to the truck before he made his way up the short driveway to the house. There was a light on inside that Nate had missed before. His father pulled the collar of his jacket up around his neck as he reached the porch.
He took each step slowly.
Nate screamed at him to stop.
He didn’t.
He tried the handle to the front door.
It was locked.
He knocked. And waited.
The door opened.
He couldn’t see past his father, but he knew his mother had answered the door.
His father began waving his hands wildly.
He was shouting, but Nate couldn’t make out his words.
His mother tried to shut the door.
His father pressed a hand against it.
“We need to go,” Artemis said, tugging on his hand. “We have to find Alex. Nate, we have to find Alex before it’s too late.”
Nate shook loose from her. He managed another step forward, but the pavement beneath his feet started sucking him down like quicksand. He struggled against it but only made it worse.
At the house, his mother had managed to close the door.
His father was going back to the truck.
Nate knew what came next.
He shouted at his father. Begged him. Pleaded with him. Told him to stop, don’t do this, please don’t do this, it’s not too late to stop this, Dad, please.
His father ignored him.
Nate sank farther into the road. It was up to his knees now.
Artemis said, “We have to hurry. Peter is going to—”
His father opened the truck.
Pulled out a shotgun.
And for a moment, for a brief, shining moment, he hesitated. Nate could see it. That look on his face. That look of comprehension. Of horror. As if he understood right then and there what he was about to do. What he was truly capable of. And Nate had hope. He had hope that things could change.
Nate, can you hear me?
He ignored the voice from the comet. It couldn’t help him now.
“Yes!” he cried. “That’s right. Dad, that’s right. This can’t happen. This can’t happen.”
The look slid from his father’s face. His jaw grew slack, mouth opening slightly.
He turned back toward the house.
He left the door to the truck hanging open.
He carried the shotgun in one hand.
Up at the house, Nate saw the curtains open. He saw his mother in the window. She was crying. She had a phone pressed against her ear. She disappeared, and the curtain fell back against the window.
The door was locked again when Mitchell Cartwright stood on the front porch. His ex-wife, now Linda Cook, had locked it before getting on the phone with the police. His brother, Ricky, had told him this… after.
His father pulled shells from his pocket. He loaded the gun.
He aimed at the door.
There was a concussive blast. A lick of fire.
The door fell open.
His father went inside.
Nate was up to his waist in the road. Art stood next to him, staring up at the comet bursting through the cloud cover. She told him she couldn’t help him. Not with this. Time didn’t move backward, she said. Forward, yes. Even side to side. But never backward.
Inside the house, on the second floor, came another shotgun blast that echoed throughout the neighborhood, and Nate knew that was the moment his father murdered his mother.
He howled up at the gray sky above, the comet heading straight for them.
From the house, the shotgun fired again.
His father, blowing his own head off.
He did it, Ricky had told him, voice thick. Didn’t leave a note. Didn’t say why. He just killed her. And then he killed himself.
Nate, I need you to listen to the sound of my voice, the comet said.
“No,” Art said, sounding urgent. “Nate, I need you here with me. Please. I need you to help me. To help Alex. He needs our help. He needs you. He loves you, can’t you see that? He loves you, and I need you too—”
“Yes,” Nate said. “Yes, yes, yes.”
“Good,” Artemis Darth Vader said, and there was a great white cloud of something floating around her. It pulsed brightly with a kaleidoscope of colors, some that Nate wasn’t sure existed in his world. His mind wasn’t capable of comprehending what was in front of him, and when Art reached for him, her hand wrapped in the beautiful sheen that was swallowing her whole, he understood that this was what she really looked like. This was who she really was, and it was more than he ever expected, more than he ever thought possible, and when their hands touched, it was like a miniature sun had gone supernova in his chest. He was engulfed by it and—
They stood on a rain-slicked road.
There was a snarl of metal in front of them, wrapped around a tree. It took a moment for Nate to understand what he was looking at had once been a car. It was barely recognizable aside from a single tire that somehow had remained intact, spinning lazily.
Alex Weir was on his knees in front of them, pounding his fists against the road.
He was screaming.
Art tugged on Nate’s hand.
He looked down at her.
“Do you remember what I told you?” she asked. “About how he’ll need you after I’m gone?”
“Why do you have to leave at all?” Nate demanded. “Why can’t you—”
The tree cracked and fell.
There was a dull fwump as fire began to spread along the car.
Alex tried to crawl toward them.
His hands sank into the road.
Nate took a step and—
“There you are,” Peter said, a smile on his face. “Hello, Nate. I’m glad you—”
The rain beat down from above. Alex was snarling as he tried to get to the car.
The pavement beneath Nate’s feet began sucking him down.
Nate. Nate. Open your eyes. I need you to open your eyes.
“Alex,” Nate said.
Alex turned and looked over his shoulder. Nate’s heart broke at the anguish etched on his face. “Nate?”
Nate nodded. “Listen to me. This isn’t real. None of this is real. Okay? I know it hurts. I know you feel helpless. But we can’t go back. We can’t change what’s already happened. You have to remember that. This isn’t real, but I am. And Artemis is too.”
Recognition flickered across Alex’s eyes. “Artemis.�
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“Yes. Yes. Artemis. Art. She needs you. Okay? I need you. Something’s wrong. Something’s wrong and we have to—”
Nate’s head snapped to the side as if he’d been slapped.
He opened his eyes.
Oren Schraeder stood in front of him. He wasn’t smiling. “You will listen to me,” he said, voice flat. “Wake up. Wake up. Wake up.” He raised his hand and slapped Nate across the face again and—
Alex was trying to get to Nate. The car burned behind them in the rain.
Nate looked over his shoulder, wanting to shout at Art to help them.
She was gone.
“Fuck,” he whispered.
Nate. Nate. NateNateNateNATENATENATE—
Alex ripped his hands free from the ground with an angry growl. He stood up. The road was solid beneath his feet. He ran toward Nate.
Nate tilted his head back toward the falling rain. Water sluiced down his face.
“I’m here,” he heard Alex say. “I’m here, and we’re gonna get out of here. We’re gonna—”
Everything exploded in white.
Nathaniel Cartwright opened his eyes.
His thoughts were fuzzy and loose. His head felt as if it were stuffed with cotton. He blinked blearily, trying to get his eyes to focus. It almost worked. He saw through a filmy haze, the edges around him blurred.
There was a metal table in front of him.
On the other side of the table was Alex.
“Alex,” he said. Or at least he tried to say. In the end what came out was a garbled sound that didn’t resemble Alex at all.
Alex was awake, though his eyes were vacant.
Nate tried to lift his arms.
He couldn’t.
He looked down.
He was seated in a chair. His arms were sitting on the rests. He wasn’t secured to the chair. There were no manacles around his wrists. His legs weren’t bound. He was free. He was free to move.
He tried to stand.
He understood the concept. He told his body to move. The synapses fired. His arms twitched. His toes shifted in his boots.
But that was it.
“Are you here?” a voice asked.
He slowly looked back up.
Peter stood off to the right of the table. He was frowning. Nate didn’t like that.
He said, “What the fuck did you do to me?”
What came out was just a low groan.
Spittle dribbled onto his chin.
“It’s difficult,” Peter said, nodding slowly. “Or so I’ve heard. Scopolamine. It’s also called Devil’s Breath. It’s derived from a flower that grows on a shrub. Strange little plant. Only found in Colombia. The natives used it in their rituals for centuries. Burundanga poisoning. Sometimes it’s a powder that can be blown into your face. Other times it can be made into a liquid and injected.”
Nate didn’t understand what Peter was talking about. He tried to get up again. Tried to raise his arms so he could wrap his hands around Peter’s neck and choke the fucking life out of him. But the very idea of attacking Peter seemed so irrelevant, so far away, that it was just easier to let it go.
“It causes hallucinations,” Peter said. “And for that, I apologize. I know they can be… so lifelike. Seeing things that you don’t want to see. I can only imagine what it was like for you. I never like to see suffering if I can avoid it. But this… I think this was unavoidable.”
Peter was wearing what looked like a white dress or a sheet. Nate didn’t know why it mattered. Why he focused on it. Maybe it was because he’d only ever seen Peter in jeans and a white shirt. Like everyone else at the farm. But now, the white fabric was sitting loose on his shoulders and billowed around his body.
It was… odd.
He tried to ask Peter why he was wearing something so ridiculous, but his mouth only twisted, and his tongue barely moved.
“It’s almost time,” Peter said. “I don’t expect you to understand. How could you? You haven’t seen the things I have. You haven’t had it inside of you. I argued at first. I fought against it. It took me a long time to figure out I wasn’t dreaming. And when I did, I railed against it. This… this thing inside of me. Oh, it said it came in peace. It said it wasn’t going to hurt me. It had just gotten separated from the others and had gotten scared. It was almost… childlike. This spirit. This ghost. I was haunted. And I had no choice.”
He smiled ruefully. “But… eventually I stopped and started to listen. And it was only then that I understood that I’d been chosen. Out of all the people in the world, out of all six billion people, it had chosen me to act as its vessel. It had chosen me to bring enlightenment to the world. I felt… powerful. I felt loved. I felt joy. And I promised myself that I would never forget the lessons I learned. That I would do what I could to spread the gospel of the Seventh Sea. And when it was torn from me, when they took it from me and then discarded me as if I were nothing, I knew what I needed to do. I knew what it was asking of me. Which is why I made this. This place. These people. The Light of Eve. It was my way of spreading the gospel of the Seventh Sea, of trying to make the masses understand that we are not alone. That we have been lied to, and that there are gods among us.”
“Alex,” Nate tried to say. “Alex. Alex. Alex.”
Alex blinked slowly, mouth slack. He didn’t appear to be tied down either.
“Nate,” Peter said. “Turn your head to the left.”
Nate said, “Fuck off.”
But in reality, he said, “Mmph,” and slowly turned his head to the left, just as Peter had asked. In fact, doing what Peter asked seemed like the best thing to do. It felt good to do what he asked. It felt good to have Peter telling him what to do.
And no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t fight it.
To his left, near the table, was a video camera set on a tripod. It looked to be the same one Nate had seen in Peter’s office the day before. A red light on top blinked on and off, on and off.
It was recording Peter’s sermon.
But the camera fell away when he saw where he was. And what lined the wall.
The floor was a large concrete slab. Exposed fluorescent lights flickered overhead. The walls were made of wood.
And lining those walls, all around them, were white metal bunk beds, stacked two high.
On each of the beds lay a person dressed similarly to Peter. All white. Their feet were bare.
There was a difference, though, between them and Peter.
The people lying on the beds had black velvet cloths covering their faces.
None of them moved.
“They have chosen,” Peter said quietly, “to put their trust in me, to allow me the honor of releasing them from the shackles of their humanity. They will rise from this plane of existence, their souls like gas, and they will follow the Seventh Sea to where it will take them into the tail of Markham-Tripp. We will give ourselves to the gods that are coming for us. We will be rejoiced. We will be revered. You may look at me again. Nate, look at me.”
Nate turned his head. It felt as if the muscles in his neck were seizing. “What… you… done?” Nate managed to ask.
“The void, Nate,” Peter said. “The call of the void. L’appel du vide. They felt it. They were lost souls. They had nothing. They were drug users and whores and degenerates. They were being taken advantage of. They were the discarded. The forgotten. All of them had stood on the edge of that cliff, looked over, and thought about jumping. But for what? What purpose would it have served? What would it have done? Their life would have had no meaning.” Peter walked around the table behind Alex. Nate tracked every step he took. Peter stopped next to a bed. The person upon it was smaller than the others, and plumper. It was a woman, and she was still breathing, though it was rapid and shallow. Peter smiled down at her lovingly. He fell to his knees next to the bed. The bottoms of his feet were dirty. “I took them in. I gave them a purpose. I showed them that th
ere was… more to this world than they could ever understand on their own. I told them I would lead them to salvation, and the only thing I required from them was their trust. The only thing, Nate. I promised them I would never hurt them. I would never call them names. I would love them as if they were my own. Because in the Light of Eve, they are my own. My people. And soon, they will enjoy their reward.” He reached under the bed.
And pulled out a gun.
A pistol. An old six-shooter. It looked like every clichéd gun Nate had ever seen in a Western. Art would love it. Down that old dusty trail, partner.
Dolores took in a deep breath. Her fingers shook. “Shhh,” Peter said. “It’s all right. You will reap your reward soon enough. Shhh.” He pressed a hand against her forehead. “A cocktail. Ketamine with fentanyl. They took it voluntarily. They slept and dreamed of stars, knowing I would give them peace. I need you to remember that. I didn’t force them. In the end, they chose this.”
Nate could do nothing as Peter raised the gun and pressed it against the side of Dolores’s head. He pulled the trigger. There was a muffled crack as her head jerked to the side. She didn’t take another breath. Nate could barely see any blood at all.
“There,” Peter said quietly as he lowered the gun to his side. “There. Almost done. She… she was one of the first to join me. In her previous life, she was a retired teacher. A grandmother. She was being used, of course. Her children only came to her when they needed something. Her grandchildren only told her they loved her when she gave them presents. She was lonely, Nate. She was very lonely listening to the call of the void. I don’t know how much longer she would have lasted if I hadn’t found her. But I did, and I gave her a purpose again. I told her of the things I’d witnessed. Of the god that had been within me. That I was going to share it with her, and the only thing I required was that she come with me. That she give up her empty and meaningless life and come with me.” He leaned over and kissed what seemed to be the tip of her nose under the black fabric. “Do you know what she said to me? She said thank you. I will never forget that.”
Peter stood back up. He looked around the bunk beds. No one else was breathing. He must have killed everyone while Nate was caught in a dream. He felt a tear fall down his cheek. He couldn’t raise his hands to wipe it away.
