I thought Rosalie was all right.
It was only as I reached the top of the stairs that I realized she had not followed me.
I looked out over the ornate old banister, down into the hallway where shadows played and cast false impressions on eyes 1 could barely trust anyway. At first I thought I was seeing things because Rosalie was not stupid; Rosalie was cynical and bitter, but never stupid. She would not do such a thing.
She stood by the open front doors. How I had not heard her unbolting and opening them I do not know, but there she was, a stark shadow against white fluttering snow, dim daylight parting around her and pouring in. Other things came in too, the whites, slinking across the floor and leaving paw prints of frost wherever they came. Rosalie stood with arms held wide in a welcoming embrace.
She said something as the whites launched at her. I could not hear the individual words, but I sensed the tone; she was happy. As if she were greeting someone she had not seen for a very long time.
And then they hit her and took her apart in seconds.
"Run!" I shouted, sprinting along the corridor, chasing Ellie"s shadow. In seconds I was right behind her, pushing at her shoulders as if this would make her move faster. "Run! Run! Run!"
She glanced back as she ran. "Where"s Rosalie?"
"She opened the door." It was all I needed to say. Ellie turned away and concentrated on negotiating a corner in the corridor.
From behind me I heard the things bursting in all around. Those that had slunk past Rosalie must have broken into rooms from the inside even as others came in from outside, helping each other, crashing through our pathetic barricades by force of cooperation.
I noticed how cold it had become. Frost clung to the walls and the old carpet beneath our feet crunched with each footfall. Candles threw erratic shadows at icicle-encrusted ceilings. I felt ice under my fingernails.
Jayne"s voice called out behind me and I slowed, but then I ran on once more, desperate to fight what I so wanted to believe. She"d said we would be together again and now she was calling me... but she was dead, she was dead. Still she called. Still I ran. And then she started to cry because 1 was not going to her, and 1 imagined her naked out there in the snow with white things everywhere. 1 stopped and turned around.
Ellie grabbed my shoulder, spun me and slapped me across the face. It brought tears to my eyes, but it also brought me back to shady reality. "We"re here," she said. "Stay with me." Then she looked over my shoulder. Her eyes widened. She brought the gun up so quickly that it smacked into my ribs, and the explosion in the confined corridor felt like a hammer pummeling my ears.
I turned and saw what she had seen. It was like a drift of snow moving down the corridor toward us, rolling across the walls and ceiling, pouring along the floor. Elite"s shot had blown a hole through it, but the whites quickly regrouped and moved forward once more. Long, fine tendrils felt out before them, freezing the corridor seconds before the things pa.s.sed by. There were no faces or eyes or mouths, but if I looked long enough I could see Jayne rolling naked in there with them, her mouth wide, arms holding whites to her, into her. If I really listened I was sure I would hear her sighs as she f.u.c.ked them. They had pa.s.sed from luring to mocking now that we were trapped, but still...
They stopped. The silence was a withheld chuckle.
"Why don"t they rush us?" I whispered. Ellie had already pulled down the loft ladder and was waiting to climb up. She reached out and pulled me back, indicating with a nod of her head that I should go first. I reached out for the gun, wanting to give her a chance, but she elbowed me away without taking her eyes off the advancing white ma.s.s. "Why don"t they...?"
She fired again. The shot tore a hole, but another thing soon filled that hole and stretched out toward us. "I"ll shoot you if you stand in my way anymore," she said.
I believed her. I handed her two cartridges and scurried up the ladder, trying not to see Jayne where she rolled and writhed, trying not to hear her sighs of ecstasy as the whites did things to her that only I knew she liked.
The instant I made it through the hatch the sounds changed. I heard Ellie squeal as the things rushed, the metallic clack as she slammed the gun shut again, two explosions in quick succession, a wet sound as whites ripped apart. Their charge sounded like a steam train: wood cracked and split, the floorboards were smashed up beneath icy feet, ceilings collapsed. I could not see, but I felt the corridor shattering as they came at Ellie, as if it were suddenly too small to house them all and they were plowing their own way through the manor.
Ellie came up the ladder fast, throwing the shotgun through before hauling herself up after it. I saw a flash of white before she slammed the hatch down and locked it behind her.
"There"s no way they can"t get up here," I said. "They"ll be here in seconds."
Ellie struck a match and lit a pathetic stub of candle. "Last one." She was panting. In the weak light she looked pale and worn out. "Let"s see what they decide," she said.
We were in one of four attics in the manor roof. This one was boarded but bare, empty of everything except spiders and dust. Ellie shivered and cried, mumbling about her dead husband Jack frozen in the car. Maybe she heard him. Maybe she"d seen him down there. I found with a twinge of guilt that I could not care less.
"They herded us, didn"t they?" 1 said. I was breathless and aching, but it was similar to the feeling after a good workout; energized, not exhausted.
Ellie shrugged, then nodded. She moved over to me and took the last couple of cartridges from the bag on my belt. As she broke the gun and removed the spent sh.e.l.ls her shoulders. .h.i.tched. She gasped and dropped the gun.
"What? Ellie?" But she was not hearing me. She stared into old shadows that had not been bathed in light for years, seeing some unknown truths there, her mouth falling open into an expression so unfamiliar on her face that it took me some seconds to place it- a smile. Whatever she saw, whatever she heard, it was something she was happy with.
I almost let her go. In the s.p.a.ce of a second, all possibilities flashed across my mind. We were going to die, there was no escape, they would take us singly or all in one go, they would starve us out, the snow would never melt, the whites would change and grow and evolve beneath us, we could do nothing, whatever they were they had won already, they had won when humankind brought the ruin down upon itself____________________ Then I leaned over and slapped Ellie across the face. Her head snapped around and she lost her balance, falling onto all fours over the gun.
I heard Jayne"s footsteps as she prowled the corridors searching for me, calling my name with increasing exasperation. Her voice was changing from sing-song, to monotone, to panicked. The whites were down there with her, the white animals, all animals, searching and stalking her tender naked body through the freezing manor. I had to help her. I knew what it would mean, but at least then we would be together, at least then her last promise to me would have been fulfilled.
Ellie"s moan brought me back and for a second I hated her for that. I had been with Jayne and now I was here in some dark, filthy attic with a hundred creatures below trying to find a way to tear me apart. 1 hated her and I could not help it one little bit.
I moved to one of the sloping roof lights and stared out. I looked for Jayne across the snowscape, but the whites now had other things on their mind. Fooling me was not a priority.
"What do we do?" I asked Ellie, sure even now that she would have an idea, a plan. "How many shots have you got left?"
She looked at me. The candle was too weak to light up her eyes. "Enough." Before I even realized what she was doing she had flipped the shotgun over, wrapped her mouth around the twin barrels, reached down, curved her thumb through the trigger guard and blasted her brains into the air.
It"s been over an hour since Ellie killed herself and left me on my own.
In that time snow has been blown into the attic to cover her body from view. Elsewhere it"s merely a sprinkling, but Ellie is little more than a white hump on the floor now, the mess of her head a pink splash across the ever-whitening boards.
At first the noise from downstairs was terrific. The whites raged and ran and screamed, and I curled into a ball and tried to prepare myself for them to smash through the hatch and take me apart. I even considered the shotgun... there"s one shot left... but Ellie was brave; Ellie was strong. I don"t have that strength.
Besides, there"s Jayne to think of. She"s down there now, I know, because I have not heard a sound for ten minutes. Outside it is snowing heavier than I"ve ever seen, it must be ten feet deep, and there is no movement whatsoever. Inside, below the hatch and throughout the manor, in rooms sealed and broken open, the whites must be waiting. Here and there, Jayne will be waiting with them. For me. So that I can be with her again.
Soon I will open the hatch, make my way downstairs and out through the front doors. I hope, Jayne, that you will meet me there.
The Unfortunate
"Oh, look," said Adam, "a four-leaf clover." He stroked the little plant and sighed, pushing himself to his feet, stretching his arms and legs and back. He had been laying on the gra.s.s for a long time.
He walked across the lawn and onto the gravel driveway, past the Mercedes parked mock-casual, through the front door of the eight-bedroom house and into the study.
Two walls were lined with books. Portraits of the people he loved stared down at him and he should have felt at peace, should have felt comforted... but he did not. There was a large map on one wall, a thousand intended destinations marked in red, half a dozen places he had already visited pinned green. Travel was no longer on his agenda, neither was reading, because his family had gone. He was still about to make a journey, however, somewhere even stranger than the places he had seen so recently. Stranger than anyone had ever seen to tell of, more terrifying, more final. After the past year he was keener than ever to find his own way there.
And he had a map. It was in the bureau drawer. A .44 magnum, gleaming snakelike silver, slick to the touch, cold, impersonal. He warmed it between his legs before using it. May as well feel comfortable when he put it in his mouth.
Outside, the fourth leaf on the clover glowed brightly and disappeared into a pinp.r.i.c.k of light. Then, nothing.
"Well," Adam said to the house full of memories, "it wasn"t bad to begin with... but it could have been better."
He heard footsteps approaching along the driveway, frantic footsteps crunching quickly toward the house.
"Adam!" someone shouted, panic giving the voice an androgynous lilt.
He looked around the room to make sure he was not being observed. He checked his watch and smiled. Then he calmly placed the barrel of the gun inside his mouth, angled it upward and pulled the trigger.
He had found them in the water.
At least he liked to think he found them, but later, in the few dark and furtive moments left to him when his mind was truly his own, he would realize that this was not the case. They They had found had found him him. G.o.ds or fairies or angels or demons-mostly just one or another, but sometimes all four-they appeared weak and delicate.
It was not long, however, before Adam knew that looks counted for nothing.
Put on your life jackets, the cabin crew had said. Only inflate them when you"re outside the aircraft. Use the whistle to attract attention, and make for one of the life rafts Only inflate them when you"re outside the aircraft. Use the whistle to attract attention, and make for one of the life rafts. As if disaster had any ruling factor, as if control could be gained over something so powerful, devastating and final.
As soon as the 747 hit the water, any semblance of control vanished. This was no smooth crash landing; it was a catastrophe, the sh.e.l.l splitting and the wings slicing through the fuselage and a fire-brief but terrible-taking out first cla.s.s and the c.o.c.kpit. There was no time even to draw away from the flames before everything fell apart, and Adam was pitched into a cool, dark, watery grave. Alison Alison, he thought, and although she was not on the flight-she was back at home with Jamie-he felt that she was dead already. Strange, considering it was he who was dying.
Because in the chaos, he knew knew that he was about to die. The sounds of rending metal and splitting flesh had been dampened by their instant submersion into the North Atlantic, but a new form of blind panic had taken over. Bubbles exploded around him, some of them coming from inside torn bodies, and sharp, broken metal struck out at him from all around. The cold water masked the pain for a while, but he could still feel the numbness where his leg had been, the ghostly echo of a lost limb. He wondered whether his leg was floating above or below him. Then he realized that he could not discern up or down, left or right, and so the idea was moot. He was blinded too, and he did not know why. Pain? Blood? Perhaps his eyes were elsewhere, floating around in this deathly soup of waste and suffering, sinking to the sea-bed where unknown bottom-crawlers would snap them up and steal everything he had ever seen with one dismissive that he was about to die. The sounds of rending metal and splitting flesh had been dampened by their instant submersion into the North Atlantic, but a new form of blind panic had taken over. Bubbles exploded around him, some of them coming from inside torn bodies, and sharp, broken metal struck out at him from all around. The cold water masked the pain for a while, but he could still feel the numbness where his leg had been, the ghostly echo of a lost limb. He wondered whether his leg was floating above or below him. Then he realized that he could not discern up or down, left or right, and so the idea was moot. He was blinded too, and he did not know why. Pain? Blood? Perhaps his eyes were elsewhere, floating around in this deathly soup of waste and suffering, sinking to the sea-bed where unknown bottom-crawlers would snap them up and steal everything he had ever seen with one dismissive clack clack of their claws. of their claws.
He had read accounts of how young children could live for up to an hour submerged in freezing water. They still retained a drowning reflex from being in the womb, their vocal cords contracted and drew their throats shut, and as long as they expelled the first rush of water from their lungs they could survive. Body temperature would drift down to match their surroundings, heart rate would halve, oxygen to the brain would be dramatically lessened, brain activity drawn in under a cowl of unconsciousness. So why, then, was he thinking all this now? Why panic? He should be withdrawing into himself, creating his own mini-existence where the tragedies happening all around him, here and now, could not break through.
Why not just let everything happen as it would?
Adam opened his eyes and finally saw through the shock. A torn body floated past him, heading down, trailing something pale and fleshy behind it. It had on a pair of shorts and Bart Simpson socks. No shoes. Most people kicked off their shoes on a long-haul flight.
The roaring sound around him increased as everything began to sink. Great bursts of bubbles stirred the terrible* brew of the sea, and Adam felt a rush of something warm brushing his back. A coffeepot crushed and is spewing its contents A coffeepot crushed and is spewing its contents, he thought. That was all. Not the stewardess holding it being opened up by the thousands of sharp edges, gushing her own warm in-sides across his body as they floated apart like lost lovers in the night...
And then he really really opened his eyes, although he was so far down now that everything was pitch black. He opened them not only to what was happening around him, but to what was happening opened his eyes, although he was so far down now that everything was pitch black. He opened them not only to what was happening around him, but to what was happening to to him. He was still strapped in his seat. One of his legs appeared to be missing... but maybe not, maybe in the confusion he had only dreamed that he had lost a leg. Perhaps he had been dreaming it when the aircraft took its final plunge, and the nightmares-real and imagined-had merely blended together. He thought he felt a ghost ache there, but perhaps ghosts can be more real than imagination allows, and he held out his hands and felt Doth knees intact. him. He was still strapped in his seat. One of his legs appeared to be missing... but maybe not, maybe in the confusion he had only dreamed that he had lost a leg. Perhaps he had been dreaming it when the aircraft took its final plunge, and the nightmares-real and imagined-had merely blended together. He thought he felt a ghost ache there, but perhaps ghosts can be more real than imagination allows, and he held out his hands and felt Doth knees intact.
Other hands moved up his body from his feet, squeezing the flesh so that he knew it was still there, pinching, lifting... dragging him up through the maelstrom and back toward the surface. He gasped in water and felt himself catch on fire, every nerve end screaming at the agony in his chest. His mind began to shut down- yes, yes, that is the way, go to sleep, be that child again.
-and then he broke surface.
The extraordinary dragged his sight from the merely terrifying. He was aware of the scenes around him- the bodies and parts of bodies floating by, the aircraft wreckage bobbing and sinking and still smoldering in places, the broken-spined books sucking up water, suitcases spilling their insides in memory of their shattered owners-but the shapes that rose out of the water with him were all that he really registered, all that he really comprehended. Although true comprehension... that was impossible.
They were fairies.
Or demons.
Or angels.
Or G.o.ds.
There were four of them, solid yet transparent, strong yet unbelievably delicate. Their skin was clear, but mottled in places with a darker light, striped like a gla.s.s tiger. They barely seemed to touch him, yet he could feel the pinch of their fingers on his legs and arms where they held him upright. The pain seemed at odds with their appearance. He closed his eyes and opened them again. The pain was still there, and so were the things.
They were saving him. He was terrified of them. For one crazy moment he looked around at the carnage and wished himself back in the water, struggling against his seat restraint as it dragged him down, feeling his ears crunch in and his eyeb.a.l.l.s implode as awful pressures took their toll, sucking out the last of his air and flooding him and filling him. Perhaps he would see Alison again- she"s dead!
-love her as he had always loved her, feel every moment they had shared. He thought it was a fallacy that a drowning man"s life flashes before him. But it was a romantic view of death, and if he had to die then a hint of romance...
"You are not going to die," a voice said. None of the things seemed to have spoken and the voice appeared in his head, unaccented, pure, like a playback of every voice ever saying the same thing.
He looked around at them. He could see no expressions because their faces were ambiguous, stains on the air at best. He reached out and touched one, and it was warm. It was alive alive. He laid his palm flat against its chest.
"That is all right," the same voice intoned. "Feel what you must. You have to trust us. If you have to believe that we are here in order to trust us, then make sure you do. Because we have a gift for you. We can save you, but... you must never forget us or deny us."
Adam held out his other hand. "You"re there," he whispered as he felt a second heartbeat beneath his palm. For some reason, it felt disgusting.
"So pledge."
He was balanced on a fine line between life and death. He was in no condition to make such a decision. That is why all that happened later was so unfair.
He nodded. And then he realized the truth.
"I"m dead." It was obvious. He had been drifting down, down, following the other bodies deep down, perhaps watched by some of them as he too had watched. He had known his leg had gone, he had felt the water enter him and freeze him and suck out his soul. He was dead.
"No," the voice said, "you are very much alive." And then one of the things sc.r.a.ped its nails across his face.
Adam screamed. The pain was intense. The scratches burned like acid streaks, and he touched his cheek and felt blood there. He took his hand away and saw a red smear. He looked down at his legs; still whole. He looked back up at the four things that were holding him and his wrecked seat just out of reach of the water. Their att.i.tude had not changed, their unclear faces were still just that.
He saw a body floating past, a person merged somehow with a piece of electrical paneling, metallic and biological guts both exposed.
"We have something to show you," the voice said.
And then he was somewhere else.
He actually felt the seat crumple and vanish beneath him, and he was suddenly standing on a long, wide street. His clothes were dry and whole, not ripped by the crash and soaked with sea water and blood. His limbs felt strong, he was warm, he was invigorated. His face still hurt____________________ The four things-the demons, the angels, whatever they were-stood around him, holding out their hands as if to draw his attention to this, to that. They gave the impression that they lived there, but to Adam they did not seem to feel at home.
"Where is this place?" Adam said. "Heaven?"
"How is your face?"
"It still hurts." Adam touched the scratches on his * cheek, but the blood had almost ceased flowing now, and already he could feel the wounds scabbing over. They were itching more than burning. He wondered just how long ago the crash had been.
"You are alive, you see," the voice said, "but we brought you here for a while to show you some things. And to give you a gift. Come with us."
"But who are you? What What are you?" are you?"
The things all turned to look at him. They were still transparent but solid, shapes made of flowing gla.s.s. Try as he might, he could not discern any features with which to distinguish one from another, yet they all acted in slightly different ways. The one on his far left tilted its head slightly as it watched him; the one to his right leaned forward with unashamed curiosity whenever he spoke.
"Call us Amaranth," the voice said, "for we are eternal."
Adam thought about running. He would turn and sprint along the street, shout for help if the things pursued him, slap off their hands if they chose to grasp at him. He would escape them. He wanted wanted to escape them... even though, as yet, they had done him only good. to escape them... even though, as yet, they had done him only good.
Am I really here, he thought, or am I floating at the bottom of the sea? Fishes darting into my mouth. Crustaceans plucking at my brain as these final insane thoughts seek their escape or am I floating at the bottom of the sea? Fishes darting into my mouth. Crustaceans plucking at my brain as these final insane thoughts seek their escape.
"For the last time," Amaranth said, and this time two of them attacked him. One held him down, while the other reached into his mouth and grasped his tongue. Its hand was sickly warm, the skin-or whatever surface sheen it possessed-slick to the touch. It brought his tongue forward and then p.r.i.c.ked at it with an extended finger.
The pain was bright, explosive, exquisite. Blood gushed into Adam"s throat as he struggled to stand. The things moved aside to let him up and he spat out a gob of blood, shaking with shock and a strange, subdued fury.
"You are alive," Amaranth said, "and well, and living here for now. We shall not keep you long because we know you wish to return to your world... to your Alison and Jamie... but the price of our saving you is for you to see some things. Follow us. And do not be afraid. You are one of the lucky ones."
Adam wanted nothing more than to see his family. His conviction that Alison was dead had gone, had surely been a result of his own impending death. And Jamie-sweet little Jamie, eighteen months old and just discovering himself-how cruel for him to suddenly be without a father. How pointless. Yes, he needed to see them soon.
"Thank you," Adam said. Thank you for saving me."
Amaranth did not reply. Adam was truly alive, the pain in his tongue told him that. This was unreal and impossible, yet he felt completely, undeniably alive. As to whether he really had been saved... time would tell.