A Tear in the Veil

by Patrick Loveland

  He just sat there shaking some and looking through the Controller in front of him like he was just rattled by the gunshots.

  The Controller bought it and turned to walk back down to the first van at the end of the alley. Felix caught just a slight impression of detail on its head through the black mirror effect of the faceplate and it wasn’t pretty. Like looking at a negative image of a decayed corpse head swirling in smoke or murky liquid, only this one still had empty eyes and moved too much. Like… more than not at all.

  All the controllers left and Felix sat there and drank some more, mind racing at this new development. The drink slowed it a bit but there was still unstoppable rumination.

  So there are special, secret monster police just for keeping people from seeing the truth. At least they seemed uninterested in harming the guy. Although, who knows where they took him really?

  So Felix started taking more pills to make sure they couldn’t take away his true sight with that green gas. The thought of going back to not seeing what’s really there terrified him for a few reasons so now he takes pills on the regular.

  As for how he’s three bullets down from the four left after he shot– …after he left his apartment weeks ago; which is semi-related to his drinking and taking too many pills soon after the alley incident.

  When he first started taking the pills and hadn’t stopped drinking so much, he would get pretty damn fuzzy. This was before the combination became almost instantly nauseating. On that particular day, he was getting a nice wave of euphoria as he walked down Willow Pass Road, a two-lane blacktop on the way out of Concord. He had decided to walk northeast to Bay Point because he’d been walking a lot recently and it had become meditative for him.

  Grieves had been walking with him and babbling like he always does but something snagged his short attention span and he disappeared into a hill on the way out of Concord.

  It was also real crisp and nice out too. Between late afternoon and evening. Patchy fog. The weather made him glad to have a good jacket but happy he had to wear one if that makes any sense. This was before his surplus disguise run and he was wearing well-worn work pants, a couple undershirts, a thick light blue flannel shirt, and an orange hooded Carhartt jacket all acquired at a thrift store. He already had the SF Giants cap, Australian Army rucksack, and also a bedroll at that point.

  So, he was walking down the road and watching the dark chunks of vague strangeness glide through the sky above on to the horizon when it struck him how quickly it went from pretty dense suburban sprawl to rolling hills of grass and not much else. The road was lined on each side with fences topped with barbed wire to protect all that nothing presumably. He stopped and did a slow three-sixty to get a panoramic view of the area. In the failing light the fog banks sliding over the grassy, almost featureless land all around gave it a kind of dreamy, magical quality. Yeah, he was pretty high.

  Felix saw a swarm of spiderflies fluttering and bobbing in the distance near a string of old power line poles. The poles and the spiderflies disappeared over the top of a hill, a bank of fog rolling behind them. Felix felt a powerful urge to see what was over that hill.

  He looked around again. The sun had gone down and it was getting dim pretty quick. He looked at the fence on the west side of the road to his left. It’s not that high… I could probably pull it off, he had thought.

  Felix crossed the road, removing his secured bedroll from the bottom of his rucksack. He waited for the closest cars to pass then threw his bedroll up onto the barbed parts of the fence. He pulled himself up onto it and tried to get footholds but didn’t succeed at first. He finally hooked his Adidas into the fence and thrust himself up and over, flopping down onto the grass on the other side. The bedroll was torn in a few places but still mostly intact so he rolled it back up and walked with it in his hand.

  Having successfully completed phase one of dreamy land adventure, Felix hurried on toward the hills and the place where the power lines disappeared.

  As he crested the grassy hill, he took in the view and wasn’t entirely disappointed. In the distance he could see Highway 4 and bits of north Concord peaking between more hills. There was also an old asphalt road curving through the area he overlooked. Those things weren’t so exciting but they weren’t enough to break the spell this strange new land over the hill had put on him.

  The area between the hills was elusive in its purpose at first. The grassy hills gradually rolled like waves in the open ocean. Then he saw the cutouts in the hills and the tracks leading to them.

  Like train tracks?

  Felix walked down the hill a ways and saw that the cutouts were indeed manmade parking spots for resting train cars. Mostly old shipping cars. The visible tracks started from around a bend to the north and there were two main sets. They sprouted off into the cutouts in the hills and terminated there at a wall from what he could see. He was still coming in from above so he was looking down at them.

  His high was smoothing out a bit and a dreadful thought began tickling the back of his mind but he was still high enough that it didn’t crystalize fully.

  There was glow on the grass at his feet that seemed to come from behind. Probably more spiderflies.

  He looked back up and studied the strange train park and grassy expanse that stretched to the bay in parts.

  Wait… Oh shit, you faded idiot! You’re in part of the old Port Chicago Naval Base! Shit-shit– Okay, keep calm. Isn’t it like a park service property now? Yeah, but that’s still federal trespassing not to mention your unregistered firearm which is also almost definitely illegal in this state! Get the fuck out of here!

  Felix turned to sneak quickly back to the fence and hop over to Notgoingtoprisonland and almost stepped headlong into a glowing, translucent six-legged creature that was loping over the hill behind him out of a low-lying fog bank.

  The visible parts of the creature’s legs were long and thin and it seemed to walk through the hill on a level plane that would have been ten feet below its surface. This gave it the appearance of wading through the hill like a convex pool of liquid matter.

  Its neck was a few feet long and full of pumping viscera much like its long, horse-sized, tailless torso.

  The head at the end of its neck was a mess of piercing red eyes, teeth, and a gaping, dripping maw. The maw was actually a few different crooked mouths one inside the other and filled with jagged, hooked teeth and it all worked together in concert to sickening effect. The half-dozen eyes were asymmetrical in their growth pattern and a set of opaque, wet lids closed over them from their sides sporadically before quickly opening again to reveal the intense stare of a weird predatory beast.

  It lunged toward Felix and he tried to dodge its attack but the horrible head and tooth-filled mouth bit through him, passing through the desired flesh and blood harmlessly. He tried to swat it with the bedroll but it passed through making no contact. Felix couldn’t stop his momentum and fell back, dropping the bedroll as he rolled down the hill in an accidental series of backward somersaults.

  After flopping onto his back and sliding to a stop in the wet grass, he fumbled with his pistol under his jacket and shirts and wrenched it from his waistline.

  The thing had to crouch on its spindly legs as it stalked down toward him for another attack.

  Thinking back on it, Felix doesn’t really know what his actual logic was. Something like, Even if it doesn’t hurt it, it might scare it away!

  Then he remembers that it bit through him so it was probably harmless in his… phased… layer… thing. Not for lack of trying, though.

  So he aimed the pistol shakily up the hill at the creature and fired three wild shots. One might have passed through it. He was still pretty stoned at the time.

  The bright flashes had caused it to draw back for a moment but it recovered and lunged for him again–

  But in a blur it tumbled to the side, its long, thin legs whipping into view out of the hill as it rolled.

  Felix had to let his eyes re
adjust after firing the gun in the deepening dark. The only light now was from the glowing entwined bodies of the creature and whatever had…

  Grieves had thrown himself out of the hill onto the thing’s body and wrestled it to the ground of our layer. The thing gnashed and twirled, trying to bite Grieves with its grotesque mouths but he got the better of it. It had occurred to Felix watching Grieves practically toy with this monster that Grieves must have incredible control over his… “phasing” abilities.

  The creature would lunge and Grieves would let it pass through him then step out of its body and kick it flat-footed against the gut or push it over with both hands, sending it sprawling again. Grieves had also seemed careful not to hurt it. Like most other things, Grieves seemed to see it as a game. Eventually, the monstrous animal gave up or was shamed into leaving. It looked almost sad as it loped away then into another hill out of sight. Grieves had waved to it until it was gone from view, a big smile stretching his visible facial muscles from ear to ear.

  Crazy fucker… Although, really, I’m the one firing that aforementioned illegal, unregistered pistol in the air on a piece of federal land. Yeah, I should probably hide.

  Felix had decided to investigate the train parking slots, hoping he could avoid arrest and incarceration. The fenced road he had come from was probably the worst place to be at that point if anyone hand been patrolling in search of the source of gunfire.

  It had started raining so Felix set up camp under an old train car in his slot. Grieves had hummed to himself, apparently quite pleased with life after his game of grab-ass with the deadly looking abomination. Felix had wondered then if Grieves could see things that he could not, even with the Wahrheit pills. His eyes constantly danced around when there was nothing to lock his piercing, leering stare onto. Like can he see the strange world all those glowing, translucent creatures must inhabit in a more solid, tangible way. Or are they from different, over-lapping realms? Wahrheit gave me so little to go on.

  Felix eventually fell asleep and slept a good while. When combined with alcohol, the pills would knock him out instead of jacking him up so much.

  The next morning, Felix crept through the rain back to the hill. He found his torn bedroll a ways away snagged on an old, rusty piece of rebar, probably carried by the wind. He bee-lined for the fenced road and hopped it quick as possible and continued on toward Bay Point like nothing was janky.

  Grieves followed, looking around mournfully and mumbling about playing. He seemed to be looking for another long-legged monster or something else to entertain him. Felix imagined he must have become a little boring as a companion just videotaping, drinking, smoking, walking, and sleeping. He honestly didn’t understand, then, why Grieves was always around or quick to return.

  Felix had caught himself envying Grieves’s simple, almost childlike nature. Whatever happened to him… whatever made him how he is, he must have gone so crazy that he cracked and this is what’s left. I can’t believe I was so scared of him. Although, he is pretty freaky looking before you get used to it and I still wouldn’t want to make him genuinely angry. He could probably reach into my chest or head, phase his hand half in, and squeeze. Or like take part of my intestines out and laugh as he pulled continuously like a magician. It’s best not to think about it. I just won’t piss him off.

  Back in the Panhandle and the now, Grieves is sitting up in the tree Felix was sleeping at the base of and he’s lambasting the two young street-punk thugs for trying to make off with Felix’s property.

  “Steall-ing isz wronhng… thie–vhz arestealerstha-t’s– wraaauuung…”

  He assumes Grieves can still see them from his higher vantage point and imagines him “crushing their heads” with his index finger and thumb in a little vertical pincer motion in front of one of his big, wet eyes. Felix slings the camera bag over his shoulder and puts the rucksack on. He flips the hood up over the SF cap and puts on his other surplus store accessory: a pair of mirrored aviator sunglasses to complete his little Uncle Salty costume. He has been going pretty home/free of late, after all.

  Felix says, “Good morning, Grieves.”

  “Nammesnaught that. Ayethink so nn-ot. Or maybee…” Grieves keeps babbling while watching the thugs, but trails off into a quieter volume thankfully. He does that sometimes. He’ll start to whisper things while he stares at you. He seems to think you are still in the conversation and will even make little jabs about how you are rude for not responding.

  Felix looks up at the fluffy, patchy clouds then to the horizon. A wall of huge, dark thunderheads are coming in from the west. Hella rain coming in. Should be a big one. Maybe even some lightning.

  He starts walking east toward the end of the panhandle and says to himself, I guess the early bird stays the driest?

  As he walks, he looks back over his shoulder and watches Grieves mumble up in the tree. Grieves looks down and sees that Felix isn’t where he was. He looks all around, his neck phasing a bit into itself and rotating past a natural turn. He looks like a damn owl when he does that. Looks even more freaky. Especially the first couple times.

  Grieves sees Felix walking away and frowns. A frowning owl.

  Felix waves for him to follow, knowing he would anyway but it never hurts to make Grieves feel wanted. It’s better than when he gets all sullen and butthurt that Felix doesn’t seem to want him around every second.

  Grieves’s body rotates to line up with his head as he descends into the tree trunk, disappears completely for a moment, then strolls out of its side at ground level smiling like a puppy.

  He follows Felix out of the Panhandle and down Oak, heading east toward downtown.

  24

  Colorful tentacles and bulbs and knobs of translucent, glowing strange- ness filled with little organs and fluid conduits pulse and slither on most of the people in the area. People covered in small patches on up to whole planters worth of the glowing flowers and as many little bee-like buzzers.

  Almost every person driving down the street or walking or riding a bike has some form of hitchhiker or growth in them or on them. Spiderflies, slints, burrowpedes, little see-through crab things Felix first noticed a couple weeks ago he calls “grabbits”, and moving, organ-filled ooze blobs Felix just calls “amoebas” because that’s pretty much what they struck him as.

  The amoebas are Gargantuan by regular amoeba standards but similar in look and movement. A girl walks down the sidewalk with one in her face, dense enough that her left eye can’t be seen through it as it writhes and undulates. Another person with one in their head and neck passes her and the two amoebas stretch to reach each other, successfully intermingling their long, bulbous pseudopods for just a moment before being pulled apart like parent and child or star-crossed lovers or street fighters. Hard to say which.

  Felix cruises east through the intersection at Divisadero and Oak and watches two swimmers play with each other under the overhang at a gas station. They twist and whip around, chasing each other and nuzzling their head regions together when they make contact. It’s like a dogfight between squishy, organic jets. They interact with each other just fine, colliding and such but they glide clean through the bored and impatient people pumping gas into their cars.

  Felix chuckles to himself. I wonder if the fumes get them worked up? Like… high and shit?

  He’s tempted to take out the HDV-426 but the drive is almost full. Yes, the terabyte drive. He’s been busy-busy these past weeks in-between stoned accidental trespassing adventures and narrowly escaping the secret monster police. That’s actually what brings him back to the city.

  A young woman almost hits him with her candy pink, week-old Bentley Continental as she blows through the red light from the north. Felix is pretty sure the interior is black and pink zebra striped. Zebra of all things. She’s talking on her mobile phone and seems oblivious to anything else. He tries to kick the rear panel of her lovely, expensive automobile to wake her up but she’s going so fast, he misses and stumbles and has to take a
few steps to regain his footing.

  The woman never stops.

  Felix yells, “Crazy bitch!”

  She’s almost through the next intersection down the way.

  Felix shakes his head and continues on. He hikes the gradual slope up to Fillmore then over the hump down toward Market.

  Blimpwhales moan and sing to each other in the sky above downtown and a few of them are swimming through the air between a patch of the dark chunks of asteroid belt weirdness.

  Different sets of chunks seem to revolve around different unseen points of what Felix assumes are gravity wells from objects in different… layers? Yeah, I think he called them layers. Either one of the layers has a well similar to ours, or the ones the blimpwhales are flying around are being affected by Earth’s gravity. Or… our Earth’s? Science isn’t my thing.

  The different layers have different patterns of the dark chunks. Depending which layer they are in, the chunks rotate and revolve quickly and bounce off each other violently, medium quick and they bunch up, or slowly, almost lazily, and rarely coming in contact. There are several different patterns but those are the main differences. The slower ones are larger as well.

  About the time he started taking too much medicine with his Irish, Felix could swear he saw a tiny silhouette of a human shape standing on what looked like an artificial cutout part on one of these larger, slower ones. He was drinking still as well and just lying down on the side of a small mountain above Colma watching all the different chunks glide and slam around amidst fluffy thunderheads. He was whistling the tune of “Voices” from Macross Plus for some reason he couldn’t place.