Forever Never Ends (26 page)

Her mind turned cartwheels as she covered her first quarter mile with darkness falling like a dark shroud from above. She was out of immediate range of whatever had clogged her senses, the raging mountain that had croaked its appetite upon the world.

She tried to understand what could have brought something like that into the world. But maybe it had always been there, somewhere across a billion skies, across the not-quite-endless universe.

And it was not only growing, it was
learning
. It had adapted to the strange environment and was evolving in order to survive, assimilating itself into the biosystem. Or, perhaps, it was assimilating that system into itself in a mutual transference, a symbiosis where both predator and prey were the same.

Because it knew her name . . .

She was so lost in her thoughts that the car was almost upon her around the bend before she saw it. Its headlights washed over her as she jumped to the side of the road. Her ankle twisted as she fell in the ditch. The car slid to a halt, tires rasping on the gravel as they grabbed for traction. A door opened, lighting up the passenger compartment.

"You okay?" called a voice. She counted the heads of three men. Risky, even here in the low-crime region of the mountains. Still, she didn't have much choice, if she wanted to get home before the sun rose. Before the Gloomies swarmed.

"Uh, sure," she said, limping cautiously to the open door. “Had a breakdown up the road.”

“Yeah, saw the car,” an old man in the front seat said. He talked with the rural drawl that marked him as a native. “And the . . . uh . . .
boy
. . .”

Under the interior light, she made out the faces of the men inside the Mercedes. The man in the back seat, who looked to be in his fifties, was well-dressed and had friendly blue eyes. The driver wore an expensive suit, his styled blond hair trimmed evenly three inches above his collar. He seemed a little nervous. She watched in the rearview mirror as his eyes kept flicking to the leather-faced old man beside him.

"Hop in, young lady,” said the man in back. “You don't want to be out there on a night like this.” He slid over behind the driver. “I’m Herbert DeWalt. Your chauffeur is Kyle Emerland and that there’s Chester Mull.”

“Tamara,” she said. “Tamara Leon. Thanks for the lift.”

Tamara got into the seat he’d vacated and looked at the two men up front as the Mercedes pulled away. They had driven out into an open stretch of valley, with hay fields on both sides. The rising moon bathed the valley, making the distant ridges look creamy and vague. She almost relaxed. Then she saw that the old man in the front passenger seat had a shotgun.

"Don't be alarmed, ma'am,” DeWalt said. “Nobody's going to hurt you. We're on a little business trip here."

Chester turned and grinned at her, showing his few teeth as if they were precious jewels. A dark knot of tobacco was lodged in one jaw. He smelled as if he had crawled out of a whiskey barrel.

"Ain't a fit night for man nor beast. Nor woman, for that matter," he said, glancing appreciatively at her face. "We don't mind the company nary bit. You got green eyes, but they're the
right
kind of green.”

"Hush, Chester," DeWalt said. "We don't need to frighten her any more than she already is."

The driver glanced at the shotgun. Chester tilted the gun toward him. "Nothing to be scared of, Emerland, as long as you don’t drive over any big potholes and make my trigger finger slip," he said to the driver.

"Emerland," Tamara said. “You’re the developer.”

Emerland beamed a little at the recognition, even though his eyes twitched with anxiety.

"Nothing personal, but I heard you were a real jerk," she said. DeWalt and Chester laughed. Emerland seemed to shrink in his seat a little.

"Goddamn, look out!" Chester yelled. Emerland yanked the wheel, dodging the figure that seemed to have risen from the roadbed out of nowhere. Tamara heard a thump against the rear quarter panel.

“Did I just hit somebody?” Emerland’s eyes were wide in the rearview mirror.

"It was a frigging mushbrain," Chester said, gurgling from a mouthful of brown saliva. He relieved his burden onto the Mercedes’s burgundy carpet. "Saw its green eyes flashing. Sonuvawhores must be all over the place by now. Keep driving before it decides to stand up again.”

Chester pointed the shotgun again for additional encouragement. Emerland floored the Mercedes and kicked up a rash of gravel. Emerland’s cell phone rang, and Chester lifted it from the seat, cracked open his door, and chucked the phone out of the car. “Don’t want you blabbing to your buddies before we’re done,” Chester said to Emerland.

"We were right, Chester,” DeWalt said. “I don't know if it's a disease, but it seems to be spreading. That's what—the fourth one of them?”

Tamara startled them by saying, "There are dozens by now."

DeWalt and Chester turned to her and Emerland dared a glance in the mirror.

“It’s up on the mountain, whatever it is,” she said. “The thing that caused all this.”

"Hey, that's what
we
was thinking . . ." Chester trailed away.

"I know about them," she said, not sure how to begin. “They’ve been in my head . . . I see things.”

She knew she sounded insane, but the
world
was insane, as if God had tipped the universe upside down and shaken the laws of existence. And right now, she needed allies. Some madnesses were best shared. Robert was miles away, safe with the kids. At least, she hoped they were safe. She’d have to trust Robert to take care of the family while she dealt with this.

“You
see
things." Emerland shook his head. “Christ. I’ve been kidnapped by a traveling freak show."

"Shut up and drive,” Chester said. "And don't open your yap till we get to your dynamite shed. You seen them things as plain as we did." He turned to the back seat, giving Tamara his wet, crooked smile. "Go ahead, now. We're listening."

She told them about her knack for seeing the future, the quick version, no frills and no embarrassment. It was the first time she'd ever told anyone besides Robert. It gave her confidence somehow, to tell a bunch of strangers who weren't in a position to be skeptical. But it also made the clairvoyant gift seem more real than ever before, as if she could no longer deny it, even to herself. They didn't laugh once.

As the Mercedes slid through the greasy night onto the main highway, she described the
shu-shaaa
, what she had sensed from the forest and the boy. She told them about its "cosmic mission," realizing as she explained it just how farfetched it sounded. They didn't interrupt, only nodded and grunted. When she finished, DeWalt told her about the Earth Mouth they had found.

"That's it," she said. "The strange music I heard that wasn't really music. It's the source. Its voice.”

“You mean it
talks?
” Chester said.

“It called me by my name. Through the boy.”

Chester had lowered his shotgun so that the occasional passing motorist wouldn't see it in the flash of headlights. He said, "Ordinarily, I'd call it a bunch of hippie claptrap and think somebody's been smoking some funny weed. But I seen it with my own eyes, and ain't no dope ever filled this old head. But
something's
as fucked up as a football bat, and it ain't just me. They’re like zombie creeps in some picture show."

"Well, it's got its ‘mission,’ as you say, Tamara," DeWalt said. "And we have ours."

He told her about their plan to dynamite the cave. "We know it's probably a job for the military or the FBI or whoever has jurisdiction over alien invasions—"

"But it would take days, maybe weeks, before you convinced somebody you weren't crazy,” Tamara said, the resident expert in being called crazy. “And it’s getting stronger by the minute. I can feel it. It’s learning about the world, growing, getting smarter."

Chester peered at her with one bleary eye, crow's feet crinkling as he squinted. "One more thing's bothering me. Hell,
lots
of things is. But what’s this ‘
shu-shaaa
’ business?"

"Maybe it absorbed the sound from some life form in the woods. Something it converted. But the boy tried to talk to me. So it must be learning language. Human language."

"I expect it already knows tree talk, then. And the talk of pigs and chickens and whatever rot Don Oscar’s head was filled with. Maybe that explains why old Boomer was trying to bark but kept on making them swampy sounds."

"And the people who have turned, they still have some of their own thoughts, but the thoughts are trapped and mixed in with the parent, the
shu-shaaa
."

"I'm no Einstein," DeWalt said, "but what you're saying doesn't really follow what we know about physics."

"Well, Einstein didn’t know about this thing, either," Tamara said. “Rules are made to be broken.”

DeWalt thought for a moment and nodded, then looked out the window.

Chester turned to her again. "You say there's more of these dirt-bag zombiemakers up in the sky somewhere?"

Tamara nodded. "All heading for their version of heaven, nirvana, whatever you want to call it. This may sound corny, but each is like a spirit energy going home, and one day, maybe ten thousand, maybe ten
million
years from now, they'll join together and . . . "

Emerland shook his head again. Chester looked out the window at the stars. DeWalt said, "And
what
,
Tamara? You're preaching to the converted here. You’re the closest thing to an expert we might ever have."

"They'll become a god."

“Shit fire,” Chester said.

They rode on in silence as the pavement sloped up toward Sugarfoot.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

"Why didn't you tell me about this sooner?" Virginia Speerhorn pressed a polished thumbnail into her palm until the pain helped her control her anger.

"Didn't think it was any big deal. Just a report of attempted assault. And you've got plenty to worry about as it is, what with Blossomfest and all."

"I might be worrying about finding a new police chief, Mister Crosley,” Virginia said into the phone. She couldn't use her withering glare, but she could drip the sarcasm. “You know I want to be informed about such matters."

"Sorry, Mayor. I hate to bother you at home—"

"You're just afraid you'll piss me off. Don't want to rile the Virgin Queen, is that it?"

There was silence on the other end of the line. Virginia knew Crosley was rubbing his fat belly with his free hand.

Blossomfest was barely nine hours away, and she wanted to appear fresh and vigorous in front of tomorrow’s crowds. Even though she enjoyed the iron grip she kept on Windshake, she hadn't completely ruled out a run for state office. Crosley had called shortly before midnight, interrupting her wardrobe reverie.

"And now you have some missing persons reports?" she said, prompting his attention away from his gut.

"Uh, yes ma'am. Kyle Emerland, for one. You know, that bigshot developer?"

"Of course I do.” She made it a habit to know all the big shots.

"His assistant called in about seven o'clock. Said Emerland missed a board meeting and a dinner date with some out-of-town investors. The assistant said Emerland never misses a board meeting. No answer on his cellular phone, either."

"When was he last seen?" Virginia was glad that the local paper was a bi-weekly and wouldn't have an edition out until after the weekend. And Dennis Thorne at the radio station would hold any story if he was afraid somebody might give him a bad job reference. No negative publicity until
after
Blossomfest.

"The assistant says he was planning to visit a fellow named Chester Mull this afternoon to discuss a business proposal. Mull lives out on the top of Bear Claw."

"That’s outside the town limits. Have you contacted Mr. Mull?"

"No signal on his phone, either. I sent a black-and-white up there to check it out, even though it was county jursidiction. Officer found an overturned vehicle, but it wasn't Emerland's. Belonged to a man named DeWalt. No sign of any people on the premises, though. Just the truck. I ran the plates, and it checked out as Mull's."

"Something sounds fishy. I presume you're still searching.”

"Yeah, but we've only got three men—I mean,
officers
—on duty. Two are keeping watch downtown over all the setups. Everybody else has the night off because of having to patrol Blossomfest tomorrow."

"Call in a couple. I'll authorize the overtime. Who else is missing?"

Virginia hoped this didn’t turn into an epidemic. Most missing persons showed up the next day with a sheepish grin and a hangover, or sometimes were traced to motels that rented rooms by the hour.

"A Mrs. Tamara Leon," Crosley said. "Teaches down at Westridge. Her husband says he hasn't heard from her all day. He tried the university and all their friends, but nobody's seen her. Whereabouts unknown. Plus there's a high school kid. But he's a regular. Likes to take little trips, if you know what I mean. Drugs."

Virginia allowed herself a sigh of relief. At least those two were nobodies. She wondered if there was a connection between them and Emerland. It seemed unlikely.

"Concentrate on Emerland, and keep an eye out for the other two. But they're strictly back burner for now.”

"Yes, Mayor," Crosley said. "Oh, and there's one more thing."

She listened as Crosley explained the case of the mysterious Melting Man, the one that had "disappeared," leaving behind only some dirty clothes and a Red Man cap. By the time he had finished, Virginia decided that she was definitely going to have to find a new police chief.

"I'm not in the mood for games, Chief. Call me if you get something."

"But I
saw
it . . . uh . . . good night, ma'am."

She hung up the phone and thought for a moment. Three people missing in one night, when Windshake usually might expect one every six months. Something was going on that was beyond her control. She hated that feeling. She wondered if it would dampen Blossomfest, then decided it wouldn't. She wouldn't let it.