In Constant Fear (23 page)

I awoke the following morning grateful for the fact that my mind still seemed to be my own, but still feeling that bit ill. I lay there for a while, telling myself I had to get up, but the next thing I knew I was waking up again, and again, and it kept happening, over and over, 'til finally I forced myself up, getting halfway, balancing on my creaking old joints, then just about managing the rest.

I ate a little food, chewing slowly and thoughtfully, trying to clear my head. I needed to get on the tandem, make my way to the far side of the woods and head off for the day, but before I did, I had to have the reassurance of taking one more look at the farm.

I made my way over as carefully as I could—the last thing I needed was to be spotted. As I approached the tree line, as the daylight began to seep into the woods, I could hear someone singing—not proper singing, not like Lile, but more like they were intent on keeping a rhythm. I wasn't in the least bit surprised to find it was Hanna, though I
was
a little surprised to see what she was doing.

She was up on one of Lena's guide wires, the one that led to the woods, using it as a tightrope, humming and singing, half-walking, half-dancing along it.

I stopped, even backed away a few paces, nervous of how I'd react to her, that something might've changed. Was it really possible that
I'd ever want to harm Hanna? That I'd rush over to that non-imp, wrench her off that wire and twist her graceful long neck until it snapped?

I gripped the tree nearest to me, holding it tightly like I was securing myself, and stood watching her. Occasionally she would sway a little but she always kept her balance, humming that bit louder as if it helped, and I heaved a long sigh of relief on appreciating that nothing had changed between us—at least, not yet.

Having said that, I was still kinda relieved to hear Gordie call to her, for her to jump off the wire and make her way over to the vegetable garden. Gigi came out of the house carrying a tray obviously intended for the Doc, ignoring Hanna as the two of them almost crossed paths. I s'pose I should've been surprised that amongst everything that was going on, they were still continuing their feud, but I wasn't. You might argue with it, especially at their age, but Love goes deeper than a dagger sometimes, and I wouldn't have minded betting that Gigi would carry that grudge as long as she lived.

I was disappointed, but yeah, also that bit relieved not to see Lena and Thomas. There'd been no response from my implant to Hanna, and presumably there'd be none to them, but I didn't want to put it to the test. Not to mention that with Lena's sense of smell, if anyone was gonna pick up on the fact that I was still around, she would.

I returned into the woods, mounted the tandem and headed off, riding alongside the creek for a while and then down to the road. It didn't really matter where I went, only that I got well away from the farm in case I was being tracked.

Irrespective of my situation, the fact that I wasn't feeling so good, I gotta say, it was one helluva perfect day for a bike ride. There wasn't a cloud in the sky, the sun was taking full advantage, and though the wind occasionally whispered, it never spoke louder. My eyes slid along the chain of the mountains into the far hazy distance. Just as they'd once kept the countryside from the worst of the hydrazine-derivative poisoning and the subsequent fires, now they were all that stood between us and total submission.

To tell the truth, I only glimpsed it for a moment, and it was so far away, I couldn't even be sure it was there. I braked the tandem to a halt, hoping for a better look, but whatever it was had disappeared. I know what I
thought
I saw: over on the other side of the valley, slowly moving across the hills, was this big black shadow.

It had to be a plane, there had to be something up there, but when I looked, when I attempted to correlate the sun to where the shadow had been, there was nothing.

I tried to tell myself I was just getting older, that it was one of those spots I sometimes get before my eyes, but I knew it wasn't: a shadow had moved across the land as if it was searching for something, and I had a terrible feeling it might be me.

I didn't see it again that day, and on my journey back to the woods, I began to think that maybe I
had
imagined it, that I was just on edge 'cuz I knew I was ready to be keyed.

All told, I must've covered thirty miles or so. It wasn't my kinda exercise, and I still didn't feel a hundred percent, but I was getting used to it. More than anything there was this need to exhaust myself, to arrive back at the woods well and truly spent, fit only for sleeping—though whether by accident or design, after having something to eat, there was just enough light left for me to head over to the farm for a short while, and you won't be surprised to know I took full advantage of it.

I approached the edge of the woods, peering around tree after tree like some nervous animal. But ya know, all that caution was forgotten when I looked over toward the house and saw Lena sitting out on the front step with Thomas in her arms. I couldn't see clearly, not from that distance and in the withering day, but I had the feeling she was crying and it damn near broke my heart. I would've given anything to have run over there and told her it was gonna be all right, that we would prevail, the way we always had, but, of course I couldn't.

I stayed 'til the light went altogether, finding myself holding a conversation with her the way she apparently used to have conversations
with me out on the Island, before we'd actually met, when she'd secretly followed me around the Old City. I told her about where I'd been on the tandem earlier and how it wasn't the same without her on the back. Occasionally I'd put in her side of the conversation, smiling at the things she “said,” 'til finally . . . I dunno, I just lapsed into a kinda helpless silence.

Something about her sitting out on that step on her own, the baby in her arms, night falling, was starting to gnaw at me. There could be anyone around—crazies, whatever. She should be more careful. I'd always thought Lena was the perfect mother, but as soon as I was outta sight, she was acting that bit foolishly.

As if she sensed my worries, she got up and took the baby inside. Despite how dark it was, I waited for a while in case she reappeared, all sorts of thoughts going through my head, but with no further sign, I gave up and headed back into the woods.

I hadn't gone more than a couple of dozen paces before it hit me what'd just happened back there. When Lena and Thomas had disappeared inside, a thought had gone through my head so rapidly, it was only afterward that I appreciated it'd been there: all about her, and whether she was the mother I'd always assumed her to be, and what I could do about it if she wasn't. That sometimes, to preserve our young, difficult decisions have to be made.

God help me, it
was
a thought, and it
had
been in my head, but I swear it hadn't been mine. I knew immediately what it was, and what'd come next, what that implant would bid me do, and just the thought alone was enough to tip me over the edge.

I'd always known it was there, that at some point I'd be driven to it: I took in as much breath as my old lungs could contain, threw my head back, and just like all those other animals, gave out with the loudest, most tortured howl you could ever imagine. It was pain-stricken and primeval, half animal, half something unidentifiable, but I had to let it out, to keep going and going 'til there was nothing left inside me, 'til I didn't have the strength left to do what that implant would tell me I must.

In the end, I fell to the ground, stunned and sickened by what had been in my head. I couldn't hurt Lena and Thomas!
Never!
And suddenly I remembered what the Doc had said, about different people reacting in different ways. No way would I let that thing take me over.
No way!
You wanna fight—? I'm your man.

I dragged myself back up and returned to the scene of the crime as if determined to confront the enemy head-on, daring it to try to put another evil thought in my head. There was a light in the house, and one in the barn, which I guessed meant the Doc was still working, and the moment I saw it, I headed off in his direction.

The thing was, I was no danger to him—he
had
an implant. So who better to talk to about whether I'd been keyed or if this was just the final stages of the implant configuring itself. I also needed to check if he was making any progress with how to remove one—and, of course, to make sure he was behaving himself.

I didn't go directly over, instead following the tree line, heading toward the road, so that when I emerged, I could approach the barn from the opposite side to the house.

I'd only made it a few paces out of the woods when the light went off. Damn, he must've had enough for the day. I began to trot over, hoping to catch him before he went to the house, when I heard the Bentley start up in the lean-to at the back.
What the hell?

Now I was running, desperate to reach him before he pulled away, but the Bentley had already nosed out and was heading toward the track. What the hell was he doing? Running out on us? I risked a bit of a shout, gaining on him a little as he took it easy on the heavily rutted track, but I was still a good fifty or more yards behind.

“Hey—!
Hey—!
” I called.

I didn't know if I imagined it or what, but I sensed a momentary hesitation, like he'd seen me in his mirrors and was checking, but if that was the case, his immediate reaction was to speed up. Or maybe it was just that he was approaching the road and the ground had leveled out.

I watched helplessly as he pulled out, as the Bentley rapidly accelerated away into the night and the silence of the country returned like calm to a disturbed pond. Where the hell was he going? I hadn't seen anyone in the car. Mind you, if he had Thomas, I wouldn't have been able to see anyway. Maybe he'd convinced Lena that it was safe for him to do some research with the little guy on his own? Maybe he'd won her confidence and now was taking unfair advantage?

I couldn't go over there—I couldn't go to the house and find out, so what the hell was I gonna do? In the end, I came up with what I felt was quite a neat solution. I had this old stub of a pencil I always carried with me, and after a little search, I found a scrap of paper blown up against the side of the barn.

I kept it as brief as I could:

I then went to the wire with the cans tied on it, getting as close to the house as I dared, put the note inside the nearest one to the front door and quickly retreated along the wire to the furthest point and gave it a good hard shake, setting the cans all chinking and rattling away. If there was one person in there I was sure would hear it, it would be Lena. It might take her a while, but she'd find the note, of that I was certain.

I ran back to the woods and waited, wanting to see what the reaction would be to my note. If Lena got all upset, for sure it'd mean that the Doc had somehow managed to sneak Thomas away from her—but as it turned out, she came outta the house with him in her arms.

The others soon followed on behind, turning on the porch light, Jimmy waving a laser around—I guessed they thought it was crazies,
or even worse, the Bitch and some of the Bodyguard, but when they saw no one they started checking around, maybe looking for animals.

It wasn't long before Lena broke away from them, getting that slightly obsessed look about her—dammit, could she smell me? Almost immediately she started to work her way along the wire, locating the first can and then the note inside, handing it to Delilah to read.

You could see their mood change almost immediately. They turned to look over toward the woods, and even though I couldn't see their expressions, I sensed a certain apprehension about them.

I was still there, no more than a few hundred yards away: the big old ex-Mob heavy who'd gone a little insane.

I was up at first light as strings of misty mackerels started to appear in the glowing sky. I knew what Lena was like, how she'd react to my note, that she'd probably reply, and sure enough, when I crept over there I found a sheet of neatly folded paper inside the can.

I grabbed it and got away as fast as I could, not stopping 'til I reached the refuge of the woods. The first thing I saw as I unfolded it was a lot of cartoon characters on the writing paper—she'd obviously found it in the house, left there by the former owner's kids—the second, that it was her big sprawling hand-writing (as long as she keeps it to a minimum, she can write a note) so I guessed she'd written it while the others were sleeping.

How I would've loved to have done just that: to have run across there, through the house and leapt into bed with her—but, of course, I couldn't. I didn't share her conviction that I wouldn't hurt them (or more accurately, that this
thing
inside me wouldn't).

Most of the time I felt okay, as if I was still functioning normally, but I was having to scrutinize each and every one of my thoughts so closely, just in case it turned out there were those smuggled in by someone else. Maybe it would start with Jimmy—how difficult and childish he could be, Delilah, too, and before I knew it, it would be old folk in general: how selfish they were, interested only in their own survival, no longer caring about the needs of society. What did they expect other than to become estranged and discarded? People like them—non-imps, those too old to change—it was only right to eradicate them . . .

And then I'd stop, realizing what had crept into my head and forcibly ejecting it, but fearing that I wouldn't have the strength to do it forever, that maybe that was what my tiredness was all about.

A little later I was out on the tandem, bumping down the slope to the road and turning in the direction of the pass, cycling along there for a while and then taking a detour: up into the hills, through the forest, the mountains always my reference point, making sure I didn't get lost.

It was when I paused at the top of a hill, puffing and blowing from the long climb, that I saw it again: sweeping across the valley floor toward me like a huge bird of prey. I dropped the tandem and ran toward some nearby trees, but how fast that thing was shifting, I knew I wasn't gonna make it. I could feel it surging up the hill, chasing me down, swooping on me—
Jesus, I was about to be keyed!

Suddenly day seemed to turn into night, like a heavy cloak had been thrown over me. I swear I could feel the weight of that shadow pressing down, darkening every corner of my mind. I turned and looked up, at least expecting to finally discover what it was, but d'you know what? There was
nothing
there. I mean, Jesus—can a shadow exist independently?

I thought I'd feel it happen, like the turning of a switch, some kinda activation, but there was nothing; in fact, that pool of darkness
around me suddenly turned and veered away as if it'd changed its mind, leaving me staring dazedly after it as it slid across the ground and over the trees.
What the hell . . . ? What just happened?

I remained in hiding for some time in case it came back, at one point convinced I glimpsed it again further up the valley. I just didn't get it. What was going on here? Had it changed its mind about me? Had it been looking for someone else? Exactly how many were there of us hiding out in this area, knowing we'd reached our “key by” date?

I spent the rest of the day riding from one source of cover to another, keeping an eye out for that shadow, anything moving across the land. It was almost dark by the time I got back and I was so tired I was concerned it might make me more vulnerable to having my thoughts perverted, more open to that thing gathering up madness and momentum in my head.

The irony was, after what I said about no longer feeling the need to dwell on the past, I was beginning to understand that one of the ways of fighting the implant was by dragging up memories, the more vivid, the better. It didn't matter what it was of: my folks, Mr. Meltoni, my brother Don, my half-brother Ray, and, of course, if I could bear it, even dear little Arturo, the Mickey Mouse Kid. I had no idea why; maybe it was some kinda “system restore” thing: taking me back to a point when I was confident my thoughts and senses were entirely my own.

I ate a little, then settled down for the night, as if sleep could somehow halt the battle going on inside me, but if anything, it made it worse. With all the barriers lowered, the situations became more bizarre, the characters more evil.

It must've been the implant, but as I flitted from one side of the unconscious to the other, I became aware that I wasn't alone. Talking to Father Donald at the side of my old man's grave, I noticed this shadow lurking behind a gravestone; helping Don to learn to ride a bike, I was aware of someone chasing up behind us, as if they wanted him to fall and hit his unhelmeted head; and when getting my first real view of the Island from the boat the day I was sent over, someone was standing beside me on the rail, as if whoever it was had been
one of the first invited to participate in that particular experiment, that without Death, there'd be nothing.

It took me a while to appreciate they were all one and the same person, and when I did, my heart began to race so fast it almost became a single tone.

Down in the Crypt I demanded whoever it was come out of the darkness; listening to their heavy breathing, the scraping of the stone lid of the tomb as they emerged. At the home of the enticer who'd kidnapped Gordie to steal his organs I threw open door after door in my search, and each time was confronted by a pale, naked, freshly scarred and sometimes still bleeding child. But the person orchestrating it all was nowhere to be seen.

As it turned out—and as I guess I always knew—it wasn't the Devil, but it
was
his sister. I immediately knew where she was and set off over to the farmhouse as fast as I could. Even before I got there I could see this looming shadow going from room to room, sucking out all the life, leaving nothing but a vacuum of smudged waste.

I stumbled in to be greeted by the most sickening sight imaginable: she'd beheaded each and every one of them: Jimmy and Lile, Nick and Miriam, the kids. I ran into the bedroom, shrieking out in protest, but no one had been spared. Lena's headless body was lying on the bed . . . even little Thomas had been torn apart and discarded like so many soggy crimson rags. Nora Jagger—“the Bitch” as Gigi had so rightly christened her—stood in the middle of all that carnage looking so pleased with herself, those prosthetics of hers flexing and unflexing like they were somehow breathing.

“
Why?
” I screamed. “Why did you do it?”

She stared deep into my eyes for a moment, her face breaking into the most chilling and vicious of smiles. “
I
didn't do it . . .
You
did.”

I awoke with such a start I damn near levitated three feet into the air, gasping for breath, sweat coursing down the sides of my forehead.

Jesus
! Had that been real? It was too vivid for a dream, surely? Nora Jagger had been real, I'd swear it—and, oh dear God, what had I done?

I jumped up and headed through the woods as fast as I could, bludgeoning my way through trees and darkness.
I didn't!
I
couldn't
have! But shit to admit, maybe that thing inside me could and had.

Apart from a slowly charging moon, the house was in deathly darkness, which didn't do a lot for my peace of mind. I ran over, telling myself I was being irrational, that everything was fine, but I needed to prove it to myself. I'd just about made it to the porch when a light went on in the kitchen and for one truly horrific moment I thought it must be Nora Jagger, still reveling in the massacre—
my
massacre—of my innocents, but it was merely a sleepy-eyed Jimmy getting himself a glass of water.

Thank God and Amen! It
had
been just a dream. I was that relieved, I tell ya, I could've screamed out with joy, though if I had, the little guy might've thought a massacre was in the cards anyway.

I turned and crept away as quietly as I could, feeling so relieved, I can't tell ya. Those images had been so
real!
—especially Nora Jagger—I couldn't get them outta my head . . .

The moment that thought occurred to me, I finally realized the obvious significance: of course, I couldn't get her outta my head! That was exactly where she was; that was where that thing was, lodged somewhere deep in my brain sending out horrific images like Lena and Thomas lying in bed with their heads ripped off, blurring my reality and fantasy.

I had to stop for a moment to take in several lungfuls of cool night air. I stood gazing across at the mountains in the growing moonlight, trying to calm myself down. Then suddenly I stopped and stared . . .
What the hell was that?

There was this really bright light, way over to the right, on the next mountain. In fact, it was more like a
square
of light—like a sports field or baseball diamond, maybe.

I knew I had to investigate, that it was far too important to be left to the morning—but I had to let the others know too.

I wrote another note, not sure if I should ring the cans or not, in the end just leaving it there poking out for them to see, then hurried back to the woods to retrieve the tandem.

It wasn't easy, not in the early hours and on a crazy homemade tandem without any lights, but thankfully, that moon was now well up and casting out as much light as it could. I was so convinced it was the Bitch and the Bodyguard, it went through my head that maybe there'd be a reaction from the implant if I met her face to face? Would it speed up the process, the damn thing finally keyed? Jeez, maybe I'd end up throwing myself at her feet to pay homage?

It took me several hours to get partway across the basin of the foothills, that square of light getting bigger and brighter the closer I got. I came to this long cut that appeared to go almost all the way up and headed off up there, the climb becoming so steep I had to abandon the tandem; finding a hiding place amongst some boulders before resuming my journey, all the while wondering what the hell was going on up there.

It must've been going on four by the time I approached the top; the glow of light now so strong it was almost blotting out the night sky. I clambered out of the cut and scrambled up the last bit of the slope, grateful it was a much gentler incline, finally getting to peer over and see what was creating all that illumination.

At first I didn't get it. There was an area maybe eighty or ninety yards square lit up brighter than day. A couple of tents in the middle, large metal posts that looked a bit like aerials at each corner of the lit portion, and a coupla guards patrolling the perimeter. Though the really amazing thing was, that took me a while to register, the source of the light wasn't
above
the ground, it was
below
: the actual ground itself was glowing.

For a while I stayed where I was, having no idea who or what I was confronting. I could hear this kinda faint throbbing noise that seemed to be in some way connected with the corner posts, as if they were picking up on a pulse maybe generated from one of the two
tents—but what was the point? Just to make the ground glow? To give them greater light and security? And how the hell did it work?

I wanted to get a closer look at one of the guards as they patrolled the perimeter, but when they met—at the right-hand side of the square to me—they stopped to discuss something, one of them glancing at his watch. They were wearing a uniform I didn't recognize, a bit like Infinity's but smarter, with a lot of gold braid, and I had a pretty good idea I was getting my first sighting of the Bodyguard, also that—if it even needed saying—we were in a whole lotta trouble.

I started to crawl toward them, hoping to check them out, but hadn't gone more than ten yards when the light went out.

With all that glow around me, I'd missed the clouds covering the moon, and got a bit of a shock to find myself plunged into such darkness. What had happened, why the light had gone off, I had no idea. Maybe it was the hour? It wasn't that long 'til daybreak. What I
did
know was that I'd been presented with a golden opportunity to slip over unseen to the two tents and find out what this was all about.

I made my way over as quietly as I could, taking a bit of a detour to avoid any possibility of bumping into the guards. It was so uniformly black it took me forever to locate the tents, in fact, I was almost starting to think better of the idea when I heard muffled voices in front of me, obviously from inside a tent. I paused, wondering if I should go any closer, having no idea what I was up against.

“When you're ready?” I heard a voice say.

Jeez, what the hell did that mean? Was something about to happen? I took a step back, then another, and realized someone had left one of the tents. Worse still, I immediately recognized that unmistakable slurping mechanical stride of Nora Jagger-style prosthetics. It
was
the Bodyguard, and it sounded like they were heading my way.

I don't know what I'd been hoping for by going over there . . . maybe an opportunity to do something at last, to strike a blow while I still could? But now all I wanted was to get away. Whether the Bitch was there or not, I didn't know, but for sure the Bodyguard were, and I suspected in far greater numbers than I could cope with.

I thought I was heading in the direction of the cut, but I was a long way from sure. My eyes were getting a little more used to the darkness and I could see that bit more, but it wasn't helping much. Again I heard a voice, and this time it sounded like they were right behind me.