The Hole (26 page)

He peered closely at one of the pages, scanning over the lines of text. “It says, ‘For those-’ No, no, it says, ‘For the ones-’ That’s it. I can read it,” he said again, looking up and grinning, like a child who’d just figured out long division. “I’ll read it to you.”

Evajean and Elliot walked over and sat down on either side of him, leaning in to look at the pages. Melvin studied the book for a moment more, whispering under his breath, and then sat back. “The Ones Mighty and Strong,” he said. “That’s who this is for and, if I’m understanding this all correctly, the book and the dreams, they’re you. Elliot and Evajean,” he said, “the Ones Mighty and Strong.”

They looked at each other.
More gibberish,
Elliot thought.
More useless information that did nothing to sort out their mad situation.
And so he laughed.

“You think I’m joking?” Melvin said. He held the book close to his face again and read. “
They will come, woman and man. They will come at the start of the age of ascension, when the Mad King Moroni spreads his arms across the world and the ancients return to the land. They will come, the Mighty and the Strong, and they will banish the darkness and end the Mad King’s reign.
“

“That’s bullshit,” Elliot said.

“Let him finish,” Evajean said.

Melvin read. “
A woman and a man, saved from desolation, alone in a world consumed by Moroni’s madness-
“

“That’s the name!” Evajean said and Melvin stopped, looking up at her. “What the crazies said in the warehouse. Moroni. That’s what they told us, Elliot.”

Elliot was quiet, thinking back. The woman in Wal-Mart, the first crazy they’d seen, what had she mumbled before she died? More. Except it hadn’t been “more,” but “Moroni.” She’d been unable to speak through the pain and injury, but she’d tried to tell them, too, just as the crazies had eventually. Moroni.

“I don’t understand,” he said.

“You think I do?” Melvin said. He set the book down. “Look, okay? I got my PhD in antiquities, in ancient languages and cultures. It’s what I taught for a lot of years, until- But I kept up with it, even after, and then-I don’t know how long ago, maybe around the same time everyone got themselves sick-then the dreams started. I saw this book and the two of you and I
knew
what I had to do. See, it’s my job to make sure you get this and that you know what it says. I hid out when things got dangerous, even when they came after me-”

“Who?” Evajean said. “The crazies?”

“They weren’t crazy,” Melvin said. He shifted in his seat, nervous. “At least I don’t think they were. Just men. With guns. Six or seven of them broke into my house. I was sleeping, but I heard them and I hid. I was in the closet, the kind with the slats on the door. That sort of thing never works, but this time it did, and I looked out and saw them. Huge men and I think they had rifles. They were looking for me, but eventually they left. That’s when I ran away, and I just kept running until I was here.” He held out his hands, encompassing the full sweep of the small church. “They never did find me,” he said.

“I’m sorry,” Evajean said.

Melvin shook his head. “You’re hear, like the dreams said. That’s really what matters, isn’t it? That the dreams came true?”

“What else does the book say?” Elliot asked.

And so Melvin Werner read it to them and Elliot came slowly to realize just how insane the world had gone.

A lot of it made little sense, the language unreadable, the letters just squiggles Melvin insisted had no meaning. But the parts that were intelligible spoke of a war that had been brewing for countless generations, one between the being known as Moroni and some other, unnamed party. Moroni was set to return and, in fact, would already have at the time the book was discovered by the Ones Mighty and Strong, a pair who would survive the initial attack and, with the help of “outcasts,” banish Moroni. All of that was too vague for Elliot to make much of, but the book’s concluding pages were of immediate interest. The Mighty and the Strong needed to travel to “city by the dead lake” and venture into the “place of many artifacts” to recover some item or items that would reveal the whole truth and allow them to defeat Moroni.

“It’s Salt Lake City,” Elliot said. “It must be.”

Melvin nodded. Evajean said, “I bet you’re right. Yeah, Salt Lake City. It’s got a dead lake and that’s where all the Mormons are, right? Like the ones in Nahom, who were
definitely
involved in all this.”

“Nahom?” Melvin said. “That’s familiar. I’ve heard of that before.”

“Where?” Elliot asked.

“Sorry, I can’t remember. It’s just… something I remember hearing, is all.”

“What’s the ‘place of many artifacts?’” Evajean said. “A museum?”

“It could be,” Elliot said. “A museum. I guess that right.”

“You have your mission,” Melvin said. He was smiling as wide as his mouth would allow. “And all with my help. One of the outcasts, that’s most definitely me.”

“But that thing is in the way,” Evajean said. “That barrier.”

“What barrier?” Melvin asked. But before either of them could answer, he clapped his hands together. “I know!” he said.

“The dreams?” Elliot said.

Melvin nodded. He went into the side room and came out with a folded and worn paper map. “You know how I said I’d seen this all before? It’s not all I saw. There was another thing, a dream of a house, a big one. I woke up-this was a day before the those men broke into my house, so I remember it well-and I ran to my car, got this out, and circled it.” He held up the map. A location was marked in bright red ink. “It’s not far from here,” he said. “If you hadn’t shown up, that’s where I would’ve eventually gone, just to see.”

“A waypoint,” Elliot said. Evajean glanced at him and he shrugged. “What you said in Nahom. A waypoint.”

“Okay,” Evajean said, though she sounded confused. “Okay, that’s where we’re supposed to go.”

Elliot walked over and looked out one of the church’s windows. “I think they’re gone,” he said.

Melvin set down the book. “The creatures, yes,” he said. “I haven’t heard them in a while, you’re right.”

“We should get out of here,” Evajean said.

Both men agreed. Melvin set about gathering his belongings, stuffing them into a large duffle bag. Evajean tracked down Hope, who’d run off to explore while the three of them read the golden book.

When this was done, they stood by the front doors of the church. These were closer to the truck’s location than the side entrance, making their escape slightly safer if the creatures were still outside-though each of them had stopped by the windows several times while packing and no sign of the creatures had been seen or heard.

Elliot put his hand on the heavy latch. “Okay,” he said. “On three. Be careful and be ready to run if you see anything.” And then he was swinging the doors open, the hinges sticking, cracking, and finally screeching through their orbit.

The truck was only a dozen yards away, the passenger side toward them, unlocked the way Elliot had left it. Outside the church was quiet, the creatures nowhere in sight. Elliot took a step, then another, Evajean and Melvin close behind.

They’d covered half the distance when the creatures returned. One must have been hiding behind the truck, its body flattened impossibly thin, because it now rose up, huge mouth opening and contracting with the sound of lips smacking. Melvin screamed, falling backwards away from it, but Evajean reached out and grabbed him, pulling him towards the truck. The creature vanished again, sinking low, and then rolled, coming out behind the cab and rearing up again.

On the other side of them, around the corner of the church, the second creature appeared, calling out to its companion in a deep moan. Melvin dropped his duffle bag, turning to look at it, and Evajean shouted at him. Elliot ran the rest of he way to the truck and opened the door. He had the rifle in his hand and, as soon as he was inside, turned around in the seat and fired out. The first shot went wide, but the second bullet clipped the creature by the church in the soft grey flesh of its belly. It moaned again, a sharper sound than before, and rolled away.

The one by the side of the truck twisted around and lowered its head until it was only feet from Elliot. Behind it, Elliot saw Evajean trying to pull Melvin up while he scrambled for the bag, grasping for the straps but missing. The creature Elliot had shot was writhing, its head high, several sets of legs suspended and kicking in the air.

The one in front of him hissed, pulling back, its muscles tensing beneath its skin. Elliot swung the rifle up and aimed at the half open mouth. He fired and the creature jumped back, lifting its face to the sky. Elliot didn’t know if he’d hit it or just scared it, but he took the opportunity to take another shot at the one by the church, and missed again.

Melvin and Evajean were up, having recovered the bag, and now ran to the truck. Elliot hopped over into the driver’s seat, leaving the passenger door open for them. They’d almost made it, Evajean’s hands reaching out to find purchase on the door’s rim, when the creature by the truck recovered. Faster than Elliot would’ve imagined it capable, it lashed forward, bypassing Evajean and going directly for Melvin.

The man screamed and held his arms up as the mouth closed over him. It stopped its fall with just his legs still visible and then that lip smacking sound game again. Evajean turned, starting to go back to help him, but Elliot leaned out of the truck and grabbed her, pulling her inside. She fell backwards across the seat just as the creature lifted its head up and away from Melvin. His body stopped at the shoulders, arms and head gone, but from the waste up was only a saliva slick knob of muscle and bone and organs. He tottered and fell, hitting the ground, his top half flatting noticeably with the impact. Evajean coughed and retched, but managed to recover enough to yank the truck’s door closed after Hope had jumped inside.

Elliot started the truck. The creature not occupied with Melvin’s remains twisted at the sound to look in their direction. It hissed and started forward, slower than before, cautious of the gun. Elliot slammed down the gas, Evajean shouting at him to “go, go!” and he pulled the truck away. The monster that had devoured Melvin looked up now, following the vehicle’s progress. But, just as quickly, it returned to its prize and its companion, after a final screech, snaked its head in and made a grab for Melvin’s legs. The two began fighting then and Elliot kept his foot down, accelerating the truck away from the horror behind.

“Jesus-” Evajean said. “Did you see that? I can’t believe I
saw
that.” Her voice was small and she looked out the window while she spoke. The church had fallen out of view some time ago. Somehow, through outright luck, Evajean had Melvin’s map with her and she’d silently handed it to Elliot shortly after they were back on the highway and the threat of the creatures was, at least momentarily, gone. Now he drove in the direction indicated, hoping that it meant a way through the barrier-or anything that would help them do what the book had told them must be done.

“That was the worst thing I’ve ever seen,” Elliot said.

Evajean nodded. She was crying.

“I hate all of this,” he said. But he didn’t, not all of it. The truth was that he felt driven now. The words in the book, the story Melvin had translated, resonated with him. The quest laid out was
right
and everything he’d been able to think since their escape only made him more sure. It was like discovering you could paint and becoming immediately convinced that the only course of action left to take was to put brush to canvas, abandoning all else.
If it’s true,
he thought,
if that book is right that we’re these mighty and strong people, then it only makes sense that that’s what I need to do. It’s what I was meant to do.
 

“But we have to keep going,” Evajean said. “We can’t stop-we know what we have to do now.”

Elliot looked at her, startled by the repetition of his own thoughts.
It’s true. All of it.
“We do,” he said. “We’ll follow the map and hope it can find us a way through to Salt Lake City. And then we’ll find museum-or whatever place it is we’re supposed to find-and… I guess we’ll just take it from there.”

“We don’t have a choice,” she said. “But, you know what, Elliot? I don’t think I want a choice. I mean, even if I had one, if I could maybe just walk away from all this, turn around and go back to Charlottesville, I wouldn’t. I have to see this through.”

“Yeah,” Elliot said. “Me, too.”

“It didn’t say anything about Hope,” she said. “The book, it didn’t say anything about dogs.”

Elliot laughed. “He’s in there,” he said. “I’m sure of it.”

The house stood alone in a field of wheat. A dirt road cut through the crop to its front door and it was this Elliot followed as Evajean gazed out the window at the barrier.

The curtain of light came down directly on the house, cutting it in half. But where it should have pierced the shingles and wood, the barrier sizzled a brighter yellow and pulled back, just far enough to see through. Elliot stopped the truck in the small drive and turned off the engine. He got out, leaning on the open door, and stared at the house. “Melvin was right,” he said.

They’d driven for several hours, heading northwest as the map indicated, taking the tiny two lane roads that split off from the highway. Eventually, they drove away from everything and entered a wilderness of farmland, without houses or town, gas stations or streetlights. Evajean had spotted the house first, a speck of black on the horizon, standing out against the orange of the barrier and the brown of the land. Elliot drove toward it and Evajean checked the map again and again, making sure this was the right place.

Now they were here, looking up at the three story dwelling, with faded black walls and a black roof, the windows dark and the porch sagging. This was the way through. It would mean abandoning the truck, however, and whatever supplies they couldn’t carry. And it would mean dealing, in their unequipped state, with whatever lived on the other side of that impossible wall of light.