It ain’t right, what you’re doin’.
“Shut up, Mama,” he whispered. “You ain’t real anyway, so just shut up.”
Bad enough you did for your Daddy an’ me the way you done.
T.R. wound his fingers into his greasy hair. “Shut. Up.”
Now you gotta’ go and hurt this poor lady, too? And for what?
T.R.’s voice was getting smaller and higher pitched, as if he were aging backward. “Please be quiet. I just need some rest is all.”
You think some heavy-metal rocker gawd is gonna make you into a prince?
“Outrider’ll reward me.” T.R. grimaced as soon as he said it, remembering Maggie Owens raising her dress over her scabby knees.
Sure he will. Just like the devil always pays up on his debts. You just have to say goodbye to your eternal soul.
T.R. squeezed his eyes shut. “You,” he said, “are dead. I killed you myself. I shot you with Daddy’s rifle and it sounded just like the fucking screen door slamming!” He took a deep, shaky inhalation. “Now, I may not be able to get you to shut up, but that don’t mean I have to listen to you, you nagging bitch.” He flapped his hands in an expansive gesture, “So go on! Talk all you want. I just won’t hear you no more.”
T.R. cocked his head, his eyes wide open but there was no retort. There, ha, he’d done it. He’d even managed to silence her goddamned ghost. He blew a long, stinking breath out into the dark. Hadn’t even realized he was holding it. He barked a screamy little laugh into the gloom. Erica gave a tiny moan from her prison. T.R. guessed his laugh had worked its way into whatever dreams she was having. He hoped for her sake they were good because he didn’t expect she’d find life on this side of consciousness very appealing. His cracked lips pulled back, revealing a smile in the same way wriggling white things are revealed when you tip over a rock. “Just you an’ me, good lookin’,” he said.
“YOU HAVE BETRAYED ME,” Chorused throughout the cellar. T.R.’s heart slammed in his chest. The voice, its voice, came from all around him. He panned around and saw them: they’d pivoted their heads so their faces stuck out of the cells, some of them were upside down, others sideways, all of their mouths hung open, unmoving. And all those empty white eyes. The Outrider’s voice issued forth as though they were little more than an organic PA system.
T.R. stood up and held out his hands. “I don’t understand,” he cried. “I’ve brought you the woman. I shot the man she was with, the drunk.” But he understood his failure the moment it was out of his mouth. Back in the movie theatre, the Outrider had given him specific orders. He’d been told to use his knife on George Rhodes. His knife. “I killed him, though,” he said. “I put him down like a—.”
“Quite.” The Outrider’s whisper, harmonized through the strange chorus, silenced T.R. even more than a roar would have. “Your new weapon is a poor substitute for the old blade. The drunk draws breath. He searches for my prize with the child and his mother. Go to your temple and find them there. End them there.” The voice ceased with a sigh and a low rasp as the chorus turned their faces back into the earth.
T.R. stood. His temple. The theatre. There were plenty of knives in Najarian’s kitchen upstairs. He whimpered aloud at the thought of rising back into the buzz, but it had to be done. Denying the Outrider would be like denying the coming of a hurricane. For those foolish enough to do so, no mercy.
* * *
The last time George had been inside the old movie theatre he had been younger than Childe Howard was now. He remembered it fondly: the rows of red velvet seats, the old-fashioned stage before the modest-sized screen. You could still smoke in theatres back then. The story from the projectionist’s booth wafted down on a cone of swirling blue-white. Shard didn’t get a lot of first-run pictures, so his mother took him to see The Ten Commandments with Charlton-cold-dead-hands-Heston his own bad self. They played it every year a few weeks before Christmas.
Now, the beam of George’s flashlight wafted on swirls of sulfur fumes and dust. The reek of mildew and old spent matches replaced buttered popcorn. George played the light down the center isle. A black strip ran along the middle of the ancient red carpet. The flashlight’s white disk flared over the stained canvas movie screen and for a moment George could almost imagine Moses shielding his eyes from what was then an extremely cool special effects burning bush. Old Chuck Heston’d be proud of George now. Just look at that big machine gun he was toting. “From my cold, dead hands indeed,” George muttered. Something skittered in a far corner. The rats hadn’t left Shard just because of some little underground fire. People should be so resilient.
Erica wasn’t here. She could be up in the projectionist booth, the offices, or behind the screen, but that was pretty much it. He’d already checked the offices and the booth—nothing but cobwebs over cobwebs—so that just left the maintenance space behind the screen. He already knew she wasn’t there either. If Erica was in here, even if she couldn’t talk for some reason—yeah, for some reason—George knew he would just feel her somehow. It didn’t make any rational sense, but the days of wine, roses and rational thinking had joined the Dodo in the lounge of Ain’t Ever Fucking Coming Back to Shard. George sighed in the dark. Somewhere under his feet a dragon—even he was still having trouble with that particular gem—slept and kept watch.
He should just beat feet back to the car and regroup with Kiddo and Loraine. He’d left them there and told them not to come in under any circumstances. Will might think that they need to stay together in little fire teams just like something from one of his adventure novels, but George wasn’t about to go waltzing around in the dark with an M16 and the Howards to worry about as well. It was too easy to imagine blasting a few rounds at some noise and realizing he’d just blown off Childe Howard’s left arm. Nuh-uh, no way. The kid had whined a little about it, but Loraine had been perfectly happy to stay put.
Didn’t matter anyway. This place was as dead as dead could be. And not the kind of dead where you get up and walk around with wasps in your head. A flash of goosebumps zipped up his back and George began to shake a little. What if there were more of those things waiting for him behind the screen? Will had said that everyone in town, everyone was missing. What if missing meant they were like those things at Loraine’s house? An image of the Sams boy flashed across his mind, his eyes whited out, that giant hornet riding his tongue. George heard a strange clacking noise and realized his teeth were actually chattering. His feet had frozen him about halfway down the isle. The circle of illumination from his flashlight wiggled on the screen.
Okay, okay, he was being a bit of a chicken-shit here. But part of his mind had injected the idea—no, the absolute certainty—that at least ten of those (oh, go ahead and think it) zombies were waiting for him in the dark. That little fat boy had gotten up after George put three rounds in him at no more than six feet away. He’d gotten up. Howard Sams had gotten up. Will had taken the top half of his skull off with that giant hand-canon of his and Howard Sams had gotten up. The circle of light on the screen was really juking and jiving now.
“Cut it the fuck out!” George hissed at himself. Being scared like this for himself was one thing, but he had Erica to worry about. If their situations were reversed she wouldn’t just stand here shaking, trying not to piss herself. She’d storm back there, check that George wasn’t shoved in some corner somewhere and leave so she could continue searching. He was wasting time, hiding behind his own cowardice. He was better than that. Jesus, he’d quit drinking almost cold turkey not a week and a half ago on the strength of his own will. He could get control of himself now and go find his woman. George took a deep breath. It shook going in but came out smooth and even. He set his jaw and took a step forward.
A pale hand shot out from between the seats just above the floor. It was filled with a ten-inch carving knife. The blade sliced through George’s left Achilles tendon like piece of wet cord. White phosphorous flared up his leg and blinded him. George shouted a nonsense syl
lable and pitched forward, the flashlight rolling out of his hands. It caught on a chair leg a few feet away and stopped, throwing a weird jag of light up the aisle. George managed to roll over on his back while he struggled to unsling the rifle, but he was tangled in the shoulder strap. His eyes widened as T.R. crawled from between the rows of empty seats where he’d been waiting, half his sallow face illuminated by the flashlight. He didn’t waste time getting to his feet, but scrambled over George’s body. He pressed the knife-edge to George’s throat, his face hanging in the dark over George’s like a malevolent planet. George could feel the blade part the first layers of skin with a thin sting. Worse he could feel the club-hard erection in T.R.’s pants pressing against his thigh.
“I told you she ain’t yours.” T.R.’s breath, stale and wet, gassed over George’s face. “She’s the Outrider’s.”
George didn’t speak. His muscles were locked with adrenaline, the pain from his severed Achilles tendon threatened to take his consciousness. More than anything, he was afraid to move his Adam’s apple with the slightest whisper. T.R. was practically leaning on that knife. His body felt fevered and wire strong. George was afraid that if he talked he would cut his own throat.
“Oh, you ain’t got nothin’ to say? I guess you shoulda’ died the first time I came calling.” He smiled and leaned in even closer, his hard-on digging into George’s leg. “I’m kinda happy you didn’t die, really. The Outrider told me to use my knife on you, but I didn’t listen. The Outrider always knows what’s best.” T.R. reared up and held the knife two-handed over his head. “Now I’m gonna—!” A loud thock! like a baseball thrown hard against a brick wall and T.R. tumbled to the side.
* * *
Loraine was just fine with George’s decision to leave her and Childe in the car. Kiddo had of course protested at first, saying that he and Darwin could help sniff Erica out just like in the movies, but she was having none of it. (He’d caught her tone and shut it down fast.) It was reckless enough to be sitting curbside while George went into the theatre to search. She had half a mind to just slide over, turn the key and get the hell out of Dodge. But, as her beautiful, wonderful and now a little scary son had said, things were different now. They couldn’t leave Shard. She knew that as surely as she knew the sun would come up in the morning. The world wasn’t as she thought it had been. There were monsters and, it seemed, heroes to fight them. And frumpy, fifteen pounds overweight, middle-aged Loraine Howard was one of them? Seriously? Oy.
Well, as far as that went, she could be the hero who stayed in the rear and kept watch. It wasn’t quite as glamorous as charging in with the light brigade up front, but hell with that. She had a twelve-year-old and a beagle to look after. Hanging out in the car and trying to remember what Constable Will had told her about handling the shotgun was about the most heroic she felt like being at present. Pump it once all the way up and back. Hold it in tight to the shoulder, aim and squeeze the trigger. She kept remembering that scene from Aliens where the good-looking solider teaches Sigourney Weaver how to use a gun. Loraine laughed to herself. If this little script was relying on her to save the day by blowing away all the bad guys, they were just royally fucked.
“What’s funny?” Childe asked from the back seat, sleep pulling at the edges of his voice.
“Nothing, honey. Just thinking ‘bout a few things.”
“Yeah,” Kiddo said. He stretched and turned around to look out the back window. “How long’s mister Rhodes been gone do you think?”
“Oh, the grammar. I’m guessing no more than five min—.” A shriek ran up out of the door of the theatre and into the night. Loraine and Childe stiffened. Darwin lifted his head, ears perked. Loraine’s eyes flicked off the car keys dangling from the steering column. She turned around and grabbed Childe by his shirt. “You will stay right behind me, understand?” Childe had never seen her like this before. He smiled. “Yes, ma’am.”
* * *
There was no Special Forces flourish to their advance. Loraine ordered Childe to hold onto the back of her belt while she marched them straight past the empty lobby and into the theatre. (Darwin had stayed in the car without a whimper of protest. He’d never seen Loraine like that either.) She held the shotgun in front of her more like a big stick than a rifle; her face was set, brow drawn down, teeth clenched. She waded into the gloom and saw that creepy Columbine wannabe’ Dalton kid lying on top of George. Loraine Howard, frumpy, fifteen pounds overweight, middle-aged screenwriter from Hollywood California assessed the situation in about a half a second. Dalton knew where Erica was; they needed the little fucker alive. She pulled back and let fly with the stock of the heavy rifle. It connected (thock!) against the back of T.R.’s head and sent him sprawling. George looked up at the valkyrie outlined in the white glare of his flashlight. “Holy shit, Loraine.”
* * *
Getting knocked out is often more of a gray-out than a total loss of consciousness. When Loraine walloped T.R. he’d gone sprawling and all the juice had run out of his muscles, but he was still aware. That little bitch-boy, Childe, and his mother set T.R. up in one of the movie theatre seats. Every time they moved him it felt like liquid metal sloshed around inside his head, but he was still too out of it to yell out from the pain. Worse still, the damn buzzing was still there. In fact, being half unconscious was like turning down the volume on everything else in the world so he could really appreciate that godawful sound.
While Loraine and Kiddo busied themselves with T.R., George worked on his tendon. (Kiddo had run back to the car and come back with Darwin and the first aid kit.) It hurt like a smoldering coal under his skin, but he breathed through it. That realization he’d had about giving in to the misery of not drinking seemed to be working with the pain as well. He just didn’t fight the flaring stab in his ankle and that made it somehow manageable. That and a few extra cc’s of adrenaline can do a world of good. (And to be honest, a part of him was wondering if he could get away with taking a swig from the isopropyl alcohol in the kit.) He sloshed some rubbing alcohol over the wound, expecting it to retaliate with a fresh onslaught of hurt, but it just cooled his skin. He guessed his pain sensors were overloaded. The bleeding was minor, just a slow seep. T.R.’s cut had been surgical and deep, but George didn’t think it severed the tendon all the way through. If that had been the case it would have rolled up behind his calf under the skin and so far the back of his leg was still normal. George wrapped it up with some gauze and an ACE bandage.
Loraine had just finished binding T.R. to his seat with a length of orange extension cord Kiddo had fished out of the office. His head lolled on his neck like a milkweed pod in the wind. George tossed the kit over to Loraine. “Here, smelling salts.” She rummaged, pulled out a little ampule and cracked it under his nose. The ammonia hit and T.R. rolled his head to one side, “Buhhhh,” he slurred. Loraine chased his nose with the salts and he jerked away. “Buh!” His eyes blinked and focused. “Fuck outta my face with that shit!”
Loraine hopped back a step. T.R. took in all three of them, yanked at his bonds a couple of times to test them and sat back. He smiled at Childe, “When I get loose? I’m gonna fuck you in your eye socket.”
Loraine saw fear stain the edges of on her son’s face. She drew back and delivered a resounding smack to T.R.’s cheek.
“Ow!” T.R. stretched his neck at her like a snapping turtle, eyes just as reptilian. “Bitch, I’m gonna—”
She turned her hand over and backhanded him. The sound bounced around the empty theatre, a single clap. Tears squeezed from T.R.’s eyes. Loraine held her reddened hand up and a question on her face. T.R. flinched away, “Okay, okay.” Loraine lowered her hand and soothed in an airy, 1950’s flight attendant voice, “Tell us what you did with Erica, or I’ll dig your eyes right out of your skull.”
T.R.’s lips pressed together and turned white. He looked at George, Childe and finally Loraine. They were serious; they meant to have the information out of him. And as if to dispel any dou
bt he might have, Loraine added, “Childe, honey, see if you can find your old mother a bucket and a rag. I’m pretty sure I saw a closet marked ‘Janitor’ back behind the candy counter.” Childe took off up the aisle without a word.
“What you gonna do with that?” T.R. asked. “Clean me to death?”
Loraine tilted her head to one side and bestowed her best Mother Teresa smile, “No sweetheart, I’ve been working on a screenplay about Guantanamo Bay and I’ve been itching to see if waterboarding works as well as they say it does.”
“Hey!” T.R. shouted, “That’s against the Geneva Conventions!”
George barked a laugh. “Are you for real?” He shook his head. Nothing was for real anymore. Stupid question. He pegged T.R. to his chair. “Where’s Erica, you little creep?”
T.R. turned his head away. Thought about it and turned back to George. “You think I’m more afraid of you,” and to Loraine, “or of you, than I am of him? Of the Outrider?” He chuckled. “You don’t know what you’re dealin’ with.”
Loraine recognized the crappy bravado for what it was. How many times had she written that line or ones like it? Childe’s voice floated back to them, “I found a bucket, but I don’t know where we’re going to get water.”
“Try the little bathroom next to the projection booth,” Loraine called. “Just turn the faucet and wait; sometimes the water will take a long time in an abandoned place like this.”
“You ain’t gonna get no water outta ’ them pipes,” T.R said.
“He’s right,” George said. “Closest water’s probably going to be that creek in the woods a few hundred yards across the meadow.”
“I know,” she said, toying with the broken smelling salts ampule, testing the edge against her thumb. She winced as a drop of blood bloomed. She showed it to T.R. “I just wanted to get Childe out of the room for a minute. He doesn’t need to think of his mother this way.”