Closed at Dark

by Rob Blackwell

Sara watched Ken point the gun at Soren.

  Neither man said anything. Ken moved in slow motion and she watched Soren raise his hands in the air just as slowly. Their actions reminded her of marionettes, except there were no strings.

  “How do you like my little play?” Richard said, still holding her with the gun pressed against her head. “It’s harder than it looks to pull off. You have to make sure they move only when you want them to. And it’s not easy to induce just the right amount of fear and guilt to have them do what you want. It’s more of an art than a science.”

  Richard eased up just enough that Sara could look to the side. He was barely paying attention to her any longer. He seemed to be concentrating hard on the two men in front of them.

  But what drew her attention were the gashes on his face. They seemed to be pulsing at a high rate of speed. It was like watching a fish gasp for breath on dry land, gills flaring.

  “Let them go,” she said. “You’re finished. Didn’t you hear them? The police know who you are.”

  But Richard just laughed.

  “I wouldn’t worry about that,” he said. “If I have to, I can disappear again. But I don’t even know if that’s necessary. I could shoot both of your would-be heroes myself, of course, but that won’t do. I need at least one of the bullets to come from the cop’s gun. When the police eventually find you, they’ll assume it was some kind of shoot-out. They won’t know what happened to the boy. And I’ll have an alibi that I was really in Baltimore.”

  His voice sounded oily and overly familiar, but also strained. Though he was talking to her, his focus remained on Ken and Soren, neither of whom had moved. They stood there as if they were a movie that was paused, with Ken aiming his gun at Soren.

  Yet she had the sense that both men were fighting what was happening to them. Ken’s face was covered in sweat and the arm holding the gun was shaking. There was no physical signs from Soren, but she thought when he had raised his hands, he was moving even slower than Ken. She hoped it was a sign of resistance.

  She needed to do something, but she was still trapped in Richard’s grip. She felt it loosen slightly again, but not quite enough.

  He had stopped talking to her and was looking at Ken and Soren. The gashes on his face were moving even faster now. They repulsed Sara, but she was beginning to wonder if they were the key to what Richard was doing.

  Maybe the gashes were connected to his ability to induce nightmares. When she’d first seen him walk out of the forest, they’d been pulsing slowly. But now they were going full tilt. Aside from the shade, this was the first monster she’d ever encountered. Yet she couldn’t shake the feeling that the gashes were the key to its powers.

  “Enough chit-chat, boys,” Richard muttered. “Fight each other.”

  Soren and Ken responded instantly. It was as if Richard had released some invisible grip on them both. Ken aimed his weapon, but Soren crossed the distance between them in a flash. He launched himself onto the cop and the two began struggling on the ground.

  “That’s it, that’s it,” Richard said.

  Sara decided to use Richard’s distracted attention to her advantage, trying to elbow him in the stomach with her left arm. But Richard easily stopped the blow, and grab her tightly.

  “No, no,” he said, whispering fiercely in her ear. “Your death will come, but first you have to watch your two boyfriends die.”