Waking Light

by Rob Horner

  We ran blindly down the midway, ducking and dodging through the crowd, trying to put as many people between us and the pursuing carnies as we could. No screams sounded behind us. The carnies hadn't transformed; they probably wouldn't unless they had no other choice. They couldn't risk scaring away their prey.

  More loud music surrounded us. We passed a Twister-type ride, where three cars were attached to long, spinning arms, the kind of ride that slings you first one way, then the other, before approaching the Steeplechase on the right. A Haunted House loomed across from it on the left, fanciful ghosts, goblins, and skeletons in luminescent paint brought to life by strategically placed black lights. Taking a quick look back, seeing nothing with that characteristic red glow following us, I pulled the girls around the back of the Haunted House, crouching with them in the darkness.

  I tried to orient myself with where we were and where we needed to go. I've described the midway like a horseshoe. The entrance was in the middle of the rounded part, and we'd been running up along the right leg. The bigger attractions occupied the center line, spilling into the area between the legs, while the smaller outfits kept to the outside. I figured we were maybe three-quarters of the way along the track now, not much farther until we reached the end. The trailers would be back there, forming their own little village between the two legs.

  Letting go of the girls' hands, I eased around the Haunted House in the direction we needed to go. Through the chains of lights and streams of people I could see an end to the midway, where one last ride stood like a final beacon of light before the darkness took over beyond it. It was The Klystron in all its laid-pipe glory, sprawling into the central area between the legs of the horseshoe. And beyond it, barely visible because of the intervening splash of light from the midway, stood the first boxy shapes of the carnies' homes.

  "Oh my God!" Crystal whispered.

  "Johnny, you have got to see this," Tanya said, her voice sounding just as amazed as Crystal's.

  I turned around. The two girls had risen from behind the Haunted House and were staring back the way we'd come. Without the benefit of Crystal's sight, I couldn't see anything special going on. Maybe there was more movement, more people streaming one way or the other, a little more light in that direction, but it was just a guess. It could as easily have been because one of the food trucks announced a new batch of barbecue was ready.

  As I moved back to them, Crystal took my hand, and my sight filled with color.

  Most of the milling people remained, with no tell-tale glow to identify them one way or the other, though yards of red like a new line of running lights appeared whenever my eyes passed over a game. The people began to move, first congregating in small groups, then flushing out to the sides of the carnival midway, like quail scared out of hiding. I'm not sure what awaited them out the right side, whether the landscape would allow them to escape back to their cars, or if it would prove impassable and force them back onto the midway. There might even be more carnies out there, wary for escaping victims and eager to claim more souls.

  Those heading for the center would have to twist and wend their way through the various rides and attractions, dodging stakes and guy wires, but they might have an easier time getting back to the entrance, if that's the way they chose.

  With Crystal's ability enhancing my sight, it was clear something big was happening. It was on our leg, no longer confined to the center of the horseshoe. Assuming this was a continuation of what we saw earlier back by the entrance, it was a fifty-fifty chance they'd have chosen the same direction we went, so there was a possibility it wasn't following us.

  I doubted even a hardcore gambler would take that bet.

  Forms outlined in red surged against a wall of white. Not people glowing white, but a literal wall of white light that shone exactly as Tanya did, and as I did to her, presumably. Behind the wall were forms, moving, shifting around, though if they had a color surrounding them, it was impossible to tell.

  The demons did...something...and the wall shattered, breaking apart into brilliant shards like a stained-glass window after a rock sails through it, except these shards flared and vanished without a sound. The red forms moved forward, dozens, maybe a hundred of them, and now the sounds we'd heard before reached us, the rat-tat-tat of machine guns, the smaller, singular pops of less powerful weapons. In addition to the sounds, new elements of the conflict were visible from our vantage point. Flames sprang to life in a dozen places, some of them obviously demons, for a form glowing red would suddenly erupt into a moving, dancing bonfire, flailing helplessly until it fell to the ground. Fireballs arced into the masses of demons, like a scene right out of a medieval siege, flaming balls of pitch landing amongst enemy infantry. The balls sprang to life in midair, at the highest point of an invisible arc, growing and expanding as they fell.

  And through the red forms and the flame, through flashes of blinding blue-white streaks like horizontal lightning, there were forms rushing to meet the demon charge. Forms we hadn't been able to see for the brilliance of the wall.

  Forms outlined in white.

  And in yellow.

  Just like in the footage outside the Vatican, the yellow forms fought side by side with the white forms against the demons. From this distance, it wasn't possible to tell if they wielded any powers like ours, or if they were the ones with the guns. The color-outlined shapes were too small and too clustered to make out anything else.

  We weren't the only ones storming the carnival, which gave me a surge of hope. The girls felt it as well, judging by the way their hands gripped mine. What began as a small incursion, a possibly insignificant skirmish in a much larger war, had grown into a full-fledged conflagration.

  We were the tip of the spear, beyond the battle lines and deep in enemy territory.

  And we had a hell of a diversion working in our favor.

  Chapter 30

  Chaos by the carnival lights

  We watched in wondering silence for several minutes longer. We couldn't look away, despite the near-audible sound of a clock ticking in my head, seconds flying by, time we shouldn't be wasting.

  As the conflict raged, with neither side gaining a clear advantage, something happened near us. Hoarse shouts of alarm rang out from the nearby carnies, red forms in blue shirts jumping out from behind the counters of their games, leaving their posts at the rides, some of them with customers still latched into their seats. Thankfully it didn't look like they left any rides running, or if they did, perhaps the engineering included a safety feature that automatically stopped the ride after a set period.

  One carny from a side by side set of games, the kind that takes four or five people using water guns to race a boat or a rocket across a horizontal board, reached up and grabbed armfuls of stuffed demons, throwing them out into the crowd as he passed.

  Across from us, a tall young man took the opportunity provided by the absent carnies to climb over the wall of another of those Quarter Pitch games, standing atop the rail and dragging down one of the largest stuffed animals I'd ever seen.

  More flashes came from the battle lines. The wall of light returned, bisecting the force of red-glowing demons, trapping half of them with the white and yellow forms. The remaining demons fell into seeming disarray, some of them banging ineffectively on the white wall, while others wandered away. Those that were trapped with the gifted people and their yellow-glowing allies were overrun. The rest, seeing their force halved, began to disperse, running away from the well-armed force, coming right up the midway toward us.

  All along the midway, small flashes of red heralded another demon being born, as people took a moment to examine their prizes, whether won legitimately or not. These new arrivals didn't take long to get acclimated to their new surroundings. It was like they had an instantaneous grasp on the situation, as though instructions or orders were being transmitted to them even as they transformed. As soon as the flash faded, leaving behind the steady red glow, off they ran to join the demon force
streaming away from the conflict.

  More screams reached us, people fleeing in terror from the sight of demons, or of seeing their own loved ones transform. The midway near us became a bubbling cauldron of chaos about to boil over. The demons regrouped between our position and the fortified place of conflict, their ranks bolstered by the new converts, while bystanders rushed to the sides, screaming, desperate for escape. The wall winked out and another one formed a few yards closer to us, a battle line moving forward, the white and yellow forms drawing nearer, preparing to engage the demons again.

  Our path to the trailer park might never be easier.

  With a gentle pull, I got the girls turned around. Still holding hands, we eased back out from behind the Haunted House. Moving quickly but not furtively, we hurried along the inside of the horseshoe, passing a last soft-serve ice cream stand and finally the entrance line for the Klystron.

  There were still some people here, though none of them glowed, just a few groups of three or four standing around, figuring to be the first in line when the ride started operating again.

  With fewer people clogging the lane between attractions, the lights seemed brighter. Though the rides no longer spun or dipped or soared, the music still blasted out of those large speakers, louder now with no crowd noise to compete against.

  Moving past the roller coaster, we reached the end of the midway. Though the trailers had been visible as vague shapes at this end, the roadway itself was curtained off. I'd seen the trailers by looking across the middle and past the roller coaster. It didn't make any sense that the carnies would have to duck and dodge the thousands of pipes which made up the rails of the ride, not when it was obvious the concrete continued past the curtain. Crystal's power gave no hints; there wasn't some red-glowing portal that would give us access to the demon home world, or anything.

  Then the curtain lifted, like a heavy roller bar at the bottom working its way up. The persistent light on my right, the glow of Tanya's ability, intensified. As the curtain rose further, folds and flaps revealed themselves, showing the path through the canvas. We no longer needed it; all we had to do now was follow Tanya through.

  Ducking under the canvas, we stepped off the brightly lit midway and onto the same concrete, only now with much less light. As the canvas dropped slowly back to the ground behind us, the light dimmed even more. The sounds of the carnival faded, the general hubbub of voices silenced. The music lost some of its sharper edges, and we could hear nothing at all of the fighting.

  Though the midway was set up like a horseshoe, the concourse itself was an ellipse. Here, on this side of the barrier, the ellipse continued, though our primary sources of light now were the moon above, the dim, sporadic points of light that shone out from some of the trailer homes ahead of us, and the ambient glow from those lights behind us high enough to be seen above the curtain.

  And there was something else, ahead of us but not directly visible, hidden behind uncounted rows of mobile home and recreational vehicles, staining the night sky a lurid red. All we could see of it was the aura, like the light of a fire seen from around a corner, except this didn't flicker.

  The sheer number of trailers was daunting, but not in a how are we ever going to find it kind of way.

  "How will we find the one we want?" Tanya asked.

  "It shouldn't be hard," I said, pointing at the distant glow.

  "That can't be the trailer, can it?" Crystal asked. "It just can't be."

  "Probably not the trailer," I answered, "but the box inside of it."

  From the light visible in the distance, finding it was the least problematic aspect of the huge trailer park. Getting to it, navigating around and through the hundreds of boxy vehicles with an untold number of demons out to kill or convert us--that was the problem.

  Perhaps twenty yards of bare asphalt separated the backside of the carnival from the first of the trailers. Holding hands, we walked a slow but steady pace forward.

  The sounds of the carnival faded behind us, the lyrics of songs no longer distinguishable from the synthesizers and drums, as we entered the warren of twisting trails that wound around and through the mobile living quarters. The shadows deepened, some trailers so close together that no moonlight reached the ground between them, and only by moving slowly were we able to avoid the tripping cables and aluminum overhangs waiting to gouge our skin. We pressed forward, blind to the physical but still seeing and seeking the hell-light that marked our destination.

  Unlike a fire, this light didn't illuminate anything around it. If anything, it made the darkness everywhere else seem more complete, like it sucked away even the moonlight, so we stepped into darkness colored with darkness which led only to an even deeper darkness.

  We took slow, shuffling steps, using our toes to feel for obstructions, not wanting to trip over any power lines. Tanya and I kept hands out, feeling our way around trailers, slipping ever closer to what I hoped was only the center of the gathering, and not the far end.

  My eyes ached from staring into the shadows, wary for some sign of hidden enemies, just waiting to spring a trap. Linked with Crystal, it should be impossible for anything to sneak up on us, but this close to the trailer--and getting closer foot by painful foot--we were crossing into an area where red was the dominant background color, not black, so it might provide a perfect cover. Our one consolation was that there was no way the demons could know we'd be visibly hampered by Crystal's power. They shouldn't even be aware that she could distinguish them from normal people. They would need to be as cautious stalking us as we were in our approach.

  Moving around and between trailers we continued forward, the red glow permeating everything, until we turned a final corner, and saw it before us.

  Unlike four nights ago, when I foolishly allowed my curiosity to draw me to a strange sound, The Trailer (capitalized for emphasis) was no longer just one vehicle in a train somehow making up the side of a street. It had moved up in the world, as though being the birthplace of Armageddon afforded certain privileges.

  As we came fully into its glow, we saw it waiting for us across a wide expanse of open asphalt, like the house at the back end of one of those courtyard kind of streets, where the narrow road opens into a circle big enough to turn around in, where houses march in a line up each side, then curve around, all of them paying homage to the biggest house at the center. We stepped out from between two trailers like breaching one of those courts from the side. The lane running between the rows of trailers was at a diagonal to our left, while the road opened in front of us. Looking back, the glow from the carnival, what should have seemed like a bright nimbus in the distance, an oasis of light in a sea of darkness, was lost in the pervasive redness surrounding us. Even Tanya's bright glow seemed diminished when my eyes passed by her.

  We stood for a moment, struck dumb by what should have no power to affect us in such a way. It was just a trailer, a dusty 1985 Alpha that didn't seem as large on this second encounter as it did in my memory, not even large enough to have a hallway, or much of a living room. Yet it exerted a hold over us, drawing us in while simultaneously repelling. The light bathed me, welcoming, warming. Yet even as I basked in the warmth, my soul quailed, remembering the demand to surrender. It was fire without heat, but it burned. Light without illumination, but we were blinded.

  Like soldiers in formation given the order to march, we moved forward as a unit, left leg, then right, one step, then another, pulled as if by a string tied through our middles.

  A third step. A fourth, and we'd covered half the distance to the trailer, now standing in the open circle of asphalt, three little ducks lined up in a row. Except, strangely, there were no hunters.

  My biggest concern had been this part of the mission. This was where the demons would be strongest, where'd they'd concentrate their defenses. This was their fortress, their stronghold, and it worried me that there didn't seem to be any defenses at all. And maybe the confusion is what fueled my initial willingness to be drawn in. I
can't speak for the girls, or for what they felt. All I can attest to is that neither of them tried to resist; neither of them held back.

  I'd felt this pull before, four days ago, when the red light reached into me, showing me the pleasure of causing pain. The white light saved me then, but there wouldn't be a second miraculous intervention. Nor was one needed. Maybe the first time had inoculated me in a way, so this time I was able to find my own form of resistance.

  A picture of the little boy flashed through my mind, all of ten years old and excited to have won a prize. He'd given a whoop of delight, then had all his innocence stolen in a red flash that lasted a heartbeat.

  Why were we walking boldly up to The Trailer like cattle through the chute? Were we that eager to join the horde?

  I didn't have an answer.

  When the girls tried to move forward another step, I resisted, planting my feet and holding my ground. Crystal pulled against me and was stopped until Tanya pulled against her.

  It didn't take much, just resisting one step, that one time, and the spell fell away.

  "What were we--?" Tanya started to ask.

  "I don't un--" Crystal said at the same time.

  "We need to get inside," I said quietly, "but we need to do it on our terms."

  "It was like it wanted us to come inside," Tanya whispered, awed.

  Crystal let go of my hand for a moment, and the red light disappeared, the night suddenly much darker. Not that the aura seen through her power gave off any illumination, but it did give an impression of lessening the darkness. She let go of Tanya's hand as well, using the moment to run her hands through her hair, fixing her ponytail. Tanya moved closer to me. Though her touch didn't provide the auras, it was immeasurably more comforting.