Wetbones

by John Shirley

  The bed, the cobbled body parts of the furniture, were leaping in the electric galvanization pervading the air, tearing free of one another, twitching with the damaged reflexes of some half-rotted nervous system. A spasmodic tarantel of dis-juncted body parts.

  Constance stood near the door, unable to move, paralyzed with the immense psychological gravitation of what she was seeing.

  She saw Ephram rigid, shaking, his eyes rolling back in his head. The Magnus reeled him toward it. He staggered its way. Shouting over the roaring wind something Constance recognized from one of the evenings he'd made her read to him from Nietzsche: " The beauty of the superman… "He paused to gasp for air, then went on, "… came to me as a shadow…" He paused to clutch at the twitching, preserved leg that had been part of the disassembling bedframe. Then seemed to make a decision and deliberately let go, shouting, finishing the quote: "… what are the gods to me now!"

  Ephram was sucked slowly toward the Magnus, as blood ran down from new wounds opening on his skull and neck, a hundred little rifts giving up brain and blood to accompany soul through the feeding tendrils of the Akishra Magnus…

  As the great one tilted toward him, its mouth opening.

  Constance thought she caught a glimpse of a single opalescent eye in the writhing tendrils of its lower parts; maybe even a fragment of a desperate face; a visage that might once have been human, millennia ago, the remains of something that now suffered enormously in the aching, interstellar void of hugely imbecilic hungers.

  Ephram glimpsed this face too, and seemed to sense its implications. Now he tried to hold back, shrieking. She could see his face contorting as he attempted to use his talent to disentangle himself from it. But it drew him nearer, with little effort. Constance almost felt pity for Ephram…

  And she felt herself drawn after him. She felt a jolt of Reward as she staggered toward the Magnus, transmitted through Ephram but originating in this Lord of Akishra itself. She was connected to Ephram – she had to go with him. It was that simple. It was not to be questioned…

  No. Go your way, my dear. More than me, it wants you. Go. Ephram's voice, from nowhere. Let us take some comfort in frustrating it, a little.

  And then she felt Ephram withdraw from her. His psychic fingers slipping out of their sockets in her brain. She felt cold and strange and sick and relieved.

  Ephram tried once more to hold himself back. Shouting: "Ich bin der Ubermensch!" (Hearing that, the Handy Man laughed).

  Then Ephram was drawn up inside the Spirit -

  Constance found her will to move again; she turned and jerked the black girl to her feet. Denver and the Handy Man had gone ahead of her, fled from the room.

  Constance pulled the sagging girl along with her, out into the hall.

  The wind roared through the door, behind them, banging it open and closed, open and closed, and open again. Denver and his wife's servant were waiting for her, the Handy Man weeping now, calling softly, "Elma… Elma…"

  Constance felt it when Ephram exploded. She felt it as a release of hatred: her own. And suffering: his. Her own buried hatred; his buried suffering. She screamed like a vivisected cat. She bared her teeth at Denver – preparing to lunge at him. Sink her teeth into him.

  Then a mountainous pressure vanished completely. It was just gone.

  There were two sickening squelching sounds. Out of sight, in the room behind them: Two bodies pulverized to lumps of mush, dropping from midair to splash over the remains of the bed and the dead boy. Constance looked through the open door. The room was empty, except for the absurd tumble of body parts and the fresher, steaming, unrecognizably pulped heaps of what had been two human bodies. The ceiling was in place again, with the same cobwebs.

  I ought to be happy Ephram's dead, Constance thought. She smiled wearily. And I sure as Hell am.

  The Spirit – he Magnus, the Akishra, the godsized predator of Astral places – was gone, for now. It had withdrawn.

  Constance's rage floundered and lay sodden in her. She swayed, feeling as if the floor were rocking under her, though in fact the house had settled to a new quietude.

  Slowly, she turned toward the front door. It was very easy to figure out, she told herself. You just go away. Just walk away…

  "No," the More Man told her. He took a gun from his coat pocket. The tendrils, the thing on his head, were no longer visible. But she knew it was there, too, cocked as much as the gun.

  "No," the More Man said. "You will stay with us. And play."

  13

  The Hills near Malibu

  "He's out there, talkin' to nothin' again," Lonny said.

  "He do that a lot? Prentice asked, wearily. He was pressing an old towel soaked in cold water against his battered head. "I did some of that myself, lately."

  He and Lonny were sitting in the best-lit corner of the old shack. Prentice propped up on the bed, Lonny sitting on the rocking chair next to it. The dog paced restively near the closed wooden door, growling softly to itself.

  "It's almost dawn, too," Lonny went on. "Fuckin Drax's been out there since midnight. Smokin' weed and chewing those cactus buttons and talking to those dolls on their posts out there. It's trippin' me out. Like he might geek out and come in here and smoke us with that shotgun. You sure you can't sleep? You oughta."

  "Sure, like I can sleep when you talk about how this fuckin' crazy old hippy is going to come in and waste me while I'm sawing logs. Shit! Anyway, I think I remember something about how you're not supposed to sleep for a while if you get a concussion. If that's what this is."

  "So let's get you to a doctor, dude."

  ''No. Drax says he's got a way to beat them. Let's check him out."

  "If he's not just, like, hallucinatin' it."

  Wincing, Prentice got up and walked to the window, and peered out at Drax. He was squatting between two of his kerosene lamps. Small white insects flung themselves at the lamp, drew back, and flung themselves again. The dawn was just adding aluminium filings to the blue steel of the sky. Drax said something inaudible, then cocked his head to listen. He rocked back on his heels, laughing, reacting to something that was said. By no one visible. Then he stood up, and stretched. Looked at the horizon. He stared into the white crescent of sun that showed over the hills. Then he turned, picked up a kerosene lamp in one hand and the shotgun in the other, and strode back to the shack.

  Drax shouldered through the door, hands laden with gun and lamp – and paused to glare at Prentice as if he'd never seen him before. Then he seemed to remember, and grinned. "Yore wife got a great sense of humour. Says some damn funny things." He stalked past Prentice to the woodstove in the corner, hung the lamp on a nail, and dumped water from a bucket into a coffee pot sitting on the stove's white upper shelf. Some of the water spilled onto the stove griddle, and it sizzled into steam.

  Prentice stared at him. After a moment, not caring much about the shotgun that Drax had leaned against the wall near the stove, said, "You're full of shit."

  Drax nodded, his beard wagging. "Her name's Amy, am I right?"

  Prentice shivered. "You found that out from someone else."

  Lonny snorted. "You never told me her name. He be talking to Orphy, too, and he came back with some shit only Orphy know about."

  It wasn't that Prentice disbelieved in the supernatural. Not after what he'd seen in the car. But he didn't want to believe Amy was… so close.

  Drax took a brown sack of coffee from one of six stacked crates, all of them containing coffee, and dumped an unconscionable amount in the coffee pot. "Fuck you if you don't believe it, pal," he said cheerfully. "But how you think you found your way here? Luck? No more'n this boy did. I've been working on these here friendships for a while…"

  They drank coffee and Prentice ate a plate of stale Oreo cookies, which Drax also bought by the crate. He declined marijuana. After drinking a cup of acrid coffee with a thoughtful look on his face, Drax hurried to the door, ran outside, and vomited explosively. Then he came back in, wip
ing his beard with the back of his hand, muttering, "Damn peyote do it to me most every time, when I drink coffee." And to Prentice's amazement poured himself another cup of coffee.

  After they'd eaten, they went outside to pee. Prentice was feeling better. He pissed toward Denver's house, though it was hidden by the swell of a hill and trees and distance, and pissed toward Lissa's wrecked car, and spat once in that direction too. It did him good.

  Then Drax said, "I want to show you what I got to kill them things with. If we got time to do it."

  "What's this about 'time to do it'?" Prentice asked, walking with Drax and Lonny through the blue light of early morning, around the side of the shack.

  "They going to reproduce like a motherfucker, so to speak," Drax said, "and if they get too far along we're dead meat. A wright. Here we go. What do you think?"

  He flapped a hand in the general direction of the battered red '59 Ford pick-up. It was scored with rusty dents. Its front window had been knocked out. Its crooked hood was wired down. It had oversized tyres with big, stand-out tread. Some sort of old tractor tyres, never meant for a pick-up.

  "What do I think of what?" Prentice asked, his headache beginning to pound again.

  "The truck!" Drax said, impatiently, eyes wild. "That's how I'm gonna git 'em! What do you think?"

  A Highway near Malibu

  Garner was tired. He thought he could feel his bones bending with each wrenching turn the Cabriolet made as it shot along the freeway. Now and then the rising sun strobed in the hollows between hills and caught him a blinding flash in the eyes. He turned toward the west. His eyes were tired. His ribs ached. He was a mess.

  But he was psyched, too. He might be close to Constance. Jeff Teitelbaum, at the wheel, was fresher than Garner. But Garner was less afraid. Garner was afraid of nothing but his addict.

  "You know, Jeff," Garner said, "they might not be there. Your Mitch. My Constance. You could be wrong. Blume could be wrong. We could get trigger happy and kill some people who have nothing to do with this."

  "Who killed Kenson?" Jeff demanded. "He mentioned the More Man. Denver is the More Man. Blume connected the More Man to Wetbones. It's that simple."

  "I hope it is simple," Garner said. "But I doubt it will be. I really do doubt it."

  If they were wrong, Garner thought, someone innocent could get killed. But he had a feeling – and it was something he hadn't felt so assuredly in years. A sense of guidance. Even the return to using cocaine had been guided, he suspected. He had to hit bottom again and see the true horror of it again. He had to come face to face with his own shrivelled faith, side by side with his bloating addict. He had been guided through that particular circle of Hades, through the Projects, through its punishment, and brought out again, and when he'd nearly stumbled back into the pit, he'd been saved first by a rip-off artist, who'd done him the favour of selling him bunk crack, and then the presence of another pastor out doing street work. And hearing the phone message at Blume's.

  You should know, Brick had said, God's the only one who can arrange coincidences…

  He was being guided here. He was sure of it. But he knew that being guided here was no guarantee of success, or safety.

  The sad truth was, God was not all powerful. Not in Garner's estimation. God just did the best He could. And lots of the time it wasn't enough.

  The Doublekey Ranch, near Malibu

  It was neither day nor night, here. It was dark, but not dark as true night. It was dark as the dirty fog…

  A thick, oily fog had gathered around the Ranch. Constance hadn't noticed it coming. Now, she watched it thicken as she sat on the wooden lawn chair, near the brick barbecue. Near the pool. The black girl, Eurydice, sat on the terrace beside her, nude and shivering, hugging her knees. Constance hadn't been able to get her to say much except her name. That was okay, too.

  She wondered at the fog. She knew it was no natural fog. She could feel it on her skin, sliding over her with exquisite subtlety. A slithering feeling. And it was so thick and so dark overhead.

  She saw, now, where it came from. It seeped upward from the pool. The glossy surface of the pool, so green it was black. Something seethed just beneath that surface. It was getting impatient. It was getting near time. It was nearly there…

  There were others. Two women and three men, standing around near the door. They were just gray-black silhouettes in the fog. One of the men was playing with the buttocks of the shorter of the two women; another man was playing with himself. She thought they were looking her way, but she wasn't sure.

  Music started up behind her, making her jump a little. She turned and saw the More Man and the Handy Man standing by Ephram's old ghetto blaster. Thudding, foreign sounding music. The two men had been standing there for awhile, she decided. Staring at her from behind.

  What were they planning to do with her?

  She had been thinking about killing herself, off and on, in the hours since Ephram's death. She was free of him. Denver had certain psychic powers, but nothing to compare with Ephram. He didn't have Ephram's power to paralyze her with a look. She could find something, something sharp perhaps, and kill herself before they began to use her. The More Man frowned, looking at her, as if he guessed her thinking. She spoke quickly, to distract him, said the first thing that came into her head. "This… this fog. What is it?"

  "It's to keep the daylight from irritating the incubation," he said, nodding toward the pool. "Not that daylight would hurt them. It just irritates them, might spoil the timing a little."

  She tried to remember what Ephram had said about the Akishra. "How come… how come they're, um, incubating here? I mean – they're not exactly from… from this world. Are they?"

  "Oh but they are," Denver said. "They live in two worlds at once. Till now, though, they've been more physical in the Astral plane." He looked down at her maimed hand. Stared directly at the stump of her missing finger as he said, distractedly, "That's changing, little Constance. The Akishra's rootedness in the farther world. After this, they'll be quite physical here.'' He said it with wistful resignation. "And they'll be everywhere…" Adding softly, to himself, "Just everywhere…"

  She supposed that ought to frighten her, but she couldn't see how anything mattered, except getting away for a little while. She tried to think of something else to say. And wished that Ephram had showed her something. Taught her something. But there just hadn't been time.

  Now and then, she could see the worms. She saw them now, around Denver and the Handy Man, a wriggling corona picked out against the fog.

  She grimaced and turned from them, to Eurydice. Said to Denver over her shoulder, "Can Eurydice have a blanket or something?"

  "No," Denver said. "I think not."

  "Oh, don't be stupid," someone else said, strolling up to them. "Give the plaything a blanket."

  Constance turned to look, and didn't recognize the man.

  "Constance," Denver said, "This is our friend Mr. Arthwright. Mr. Zack Arthwright."

  "Such thorough introductions are really not necessary," Arthwright said, looking annoyed.

  "She's not going anywhere. Where's Lissa?"

  "I was hoping you knew."

  Denver shook his head. "Haven't heard from her. And the others?"

  "They're in the front house. Getting fucked up. Dilettantes! They'll be here, in a few minutes."

  "Good," Denver said. He looked at Constance. "It's almost time."

  The ladder was made of roughly-sawn, irregular tree-branches. Trying to climb it, Prentice felt like one of the silent movie comedians he'd seen in the book about Hollywood parties. He slipped and tumbled his way up the ladder, at last achieving its top, and the top of the fence, as Lonny trudged up pulling the cable. " I got it all worked out, " Drax had said. Prentice snorted. If he'd thought this thing through the way he'd put this ladder together, badly lashed, of twine and pine branches and two by fours, they were in deep shit.

  "We're in deep shit no matter how you look at it,"
Prentice muttered.

  He thought he heard Amy say, You're doing the right thing.

  He'd imagined her at his elbow for an hour now, urging him to do as Drax said…

  Now, looking over the fence into the mist around the Doublekey Ranch, listening to the eerie, wailing, alien music from beyond the trees, Prentice thought: Maybe, after all, he ought to get down the road to a phone. Call Jeff. Call the cops…

  But, no. Not after what Lonny had told him. There was no time to talk the cops into getting a search warrant.

  And Lonny hadn't been making any of it up, Prentice knew. Kenson had told him. Lissa had shown him. And Amy whispered to him. There was no turning back.

  Prentice paused a moment at the top, balancing precariously on a crooked branch, peering into the foggy underbrush. "There's… some kind of smoke around the house…" He whispered down to Lonny. "Maybe it's on fire. But… actually it doesn't look like smoke."

  "The sick fuckers are probably barbecuing some poor asshole," Lonny said, a little too loud. "Yo, go on over and take this fucking cable, I can't hold it no more. It's heavy."

  Prentice winced. Go over? He wasn't looking forward to it. "Maybe they hired a new security guard."

  "I don't think they got it that much together. They're too caught up in their own weird shit, man. Let's get it over with."

  Prentice sighed and took a moment to bend the wire ends at the top of the fence downward, so he wouldn't snag on them. Then he slung a leg over, braced, slung the other leg over, cursing under his breath. He was using muscles he'd forgotten about.

  He lowered himself to the end of his arms and then dropped to the dirt, half expecting to be shot in the back or to feel a dog's jaws close over his throat. But nothing happened, and there was no sound, except the distant, dissonant music. He turned and looked at Lonny; he was hoping Lonny wasn't as scared as he was. The kid's expression was controlled, but his fear was there, in the tension of his hunched shoulders. He wanted to bolt, too.

  Instead, Lonny pushed the cable through. It was an old, rusty cable four inches in diameter, thickly coated in rubber insulation, its nearer end covered with a homemade cap of rubber and black electrical tape. Touching the cable, Prentice could sense the electrical field around it; the suppressed power coursing through it. It ran twenty yards back behind Lonny to a spindle that Drax had set up, an hour earlier, that acted as a roller; there was another one in the brush, and from there it stretched to the electrical tower Drax had patched into.