FROM AWAY ~ BOOK THREE

by Mackey Jr. , Deke

  Behind an aluminum slide and monkey bars, the sun dips its toes into the ocean. Readying itself to submerge. “All right... What have you heard about the Broken Girls?”

  “I think the time has come for you to answer that question.”

  “Look, Ren... It’s just that these cases are... Unusual. There’s an unwritten protocol we follow when dealing with family members.”

  “And I don’t warrant something more than that?”

  “Frankly? No.” She crosses her arms. “Why would you? Because of our past? Because you’re a Lesguettes? Exactly which special privilege have I forgotten to extend to you, Ren?”

  He has no answer.

  “We don’t tell the victims’ loved ones about the others. There’s nothing to be gained. It’s only ever made things worse.”

  “You said you were investigating. That you had leads. Was all of that just--”

  “It was bullshit. Absolutely. We go through the motions. Only what’s necessary, for show. No point in doing more than that.”

  “Don’t you even want to find out who’s responsible?”

  “Ren, that’s just it... We know who’s responsible.”

  “You...” Ren can’t believe his ears. “I’m sorry, what are you telling me? You know who did this to Paula? They’ve done it before and you don’t do anything about it?”

  Netty just looks away.

  Ren is shocked: “Good God. This didn’t need to happen... You could have stopped it.”

  “We’ve tried.” She removes the keys from the ignition. “There is no stopping it.” She gets out. Circles around the front of the patrol car. Rests her butt on the hood.

  After a minute, Ren joins her.

  They watch a young mother push a two-seater stroller through the playground gate, following an energetic five year-old. One at a time, she unbuckles her twin toddlers. Deposits them in the playground sandbox. Their older sister is already climbing up the slide.

  “All right... A woman shows up at the hospital,” Ren begins. “Somebody dumps her. Takes off. Nobody ever sees who it is. But she’s badly beaten. Tortured. On the edge of death. Hospital does what it can. Stabilizes her. Patches her up. But she’s non-responsive. Doesn’t regain consciousness.” He taps the hood twice. “What happens next?”

  “One of two things.” Netty sighs. “Depending.”

  “On what?”

  “On police involvement. Whether or not we take action.”

  “All right, so, I’ve seen what happens when you do nothing, right?”

  “Basically. After a couple weeks, she spontaneously wakes up on her own. Her personality is... Different. She claims no memory of what happened. The family celebrates. Briefly. A few days later, she disappears. No witnesses. No clues.”

  “Paula followed the pattern, then.” Ren nods. “But, say you interfere.”

  Netty watches the little girl slide. Run back up the ladder. Slide again. “We station guards. Pose as staff. As patients. Hide bugs and cameras. Cover all angles. Every cranny. Full round-the-clock surveillance.”

  Sick of the slide, the little girl takes to the swings. Has a hard time getting herself up onto the rubber seat.

  “Weeks pass. A month, maybe. Only now? The woman never wakes up. And eventually... She goes into prolonged, agonizing seizures. Until she dies.” Netty looks at Ren. “When the family knows... About the others - the Broken Girls? They demand police presence. They insist their wife, sister, or daughter be protected. And I don’t blame them. I would, in their place. You would have. Right?”

  “You’d better damn well believe it.”

  “Of course! But if we intervene, she always dies. So we let the family believe it’s an isolated incident. We pretend to investigate and we stay out of the fucking way. And you know what? The woman wakes up. Her family shares some last moments with her that otherwise would never have happened. And, Ren, that’s the better option, I swear to Christ it is.”

  Netty turns back to the playground as the little girl shouts for her mother. Wanting a push to get started. The woman stands. Brushes sand from her pants. Heads for the swing set.

  “By the time they get dumped at Midgate, it’s already too late. I struggle with it every time, but what it comes down to is: I can’t watch another one die. I can’t.”

  “Even if it means whoever’s responsible gets away with it?”

  “Ren. They always get away with it. No matter what. That’s a constant. No evidence. No witnesses. No noteworthy connections among the victims. We’ve never even stumbled across a crime scene. At least this way, the families get them back. Long enough to say what needs saying. Reconnect. Get some closure, before...” She waves off the rest.

  Ren considers. “That’s it? They just disappear? Never to be seen again?”

  The little girl shrieks with laughter. Squeals on a particularly high push, as her mom ducks under the swing.

  Netty throws up her hands. “I don’t know what to tell you, Ren.”

  “The truth.”

  “You won’t accept it.”

  “Of course I will. Why wouldn’t I?”

  “Because it won’t be enough. Not for you. You don’t want to know the truth. You want to know everything.”

  “There’s a difference?”

  “Of course!” Her laugh is fragile. It breaks apart in the air.

  One of the twins starts screaming. Hurt by the other. Sand in the eyes or something. No one was paying attention. Mom goes to fix it. The little girl’s swing slows to a stop.

  “All right, then. The truth...” Netty gathers herself together. “The truth is: Paula is alive. The truth is: She’s okay. She’s safe. She’s even happy, if you can believe it.” Netty grips Ren’s shoulder. “But the truth is also: She doesn’t need you anymore. She’s fine without you. She’s maybe even better off than she was.”

  Ren’s eyes flash. Netty’s seen it before: If there’s a place she’s been taken, there’s a place from which she can be rescued.

  “I promise you: If you go after her, you will find nothing but pain and heartache. She will not leave. She’ll never explain. Never implicate anyone. Never come home to you. None of them ever has. It’s better, far better to know she’s okay, and leave her be.” She lets it sink in. “I know it’s hard to accept, but... That’s the truth.”

  The young mother buckles the twins into their stroller. The fun is over. She pushes them through the playground gate, then looks back. Her daughter still on the swing. Refusing to leave. Forcing her mother to come back and remove her.

  “You’re right, Antoinette...” Ren turns away. “It’s not enough.”

  Netty closes her eyes. Nods.

  And tells him everything.

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  Elsewhere. Suddenly. Submerged, somewhere deep below.

  Overtaken by cold: An all-over, bone-quivering numbness. The shock of a fall through ice, but sustained. A hopeless cold. Inescapable.

  Wanda can see nothing. Isn’t sure her eyes are even open. Or if she has eyes at all anymore. Surrounded by an utter absence of light. Somehow she has found herself in a deeper place than light can possibly hope to penetrate.

  An enormous force pushes in from every direction. Holds her. Caught in the ocean’s fist. Squeezed. At this depth, floating is little different than being embedded in rock. The water pressurized to almost the point of being a solid.

  She is not alone. Around her: The others who are not other. Their presence recognized through some ancient sense long-withheld from man. Her mind accessing them in a radiating wave. Pinging through each. Creating a mental map, superior to anything merely visual. Locating herself in the center. All the other selves forming a network around her.

  As she finds them, they reach back for her. There is comfort in the connection. Relief. Not separate... Parts of a larger whole. No longer does she fear for her own existence. Her singular experience no longer matters. She can be shed without loss, because the others will continue on. She will be conti
nued, in them.

  Her desires are not for her own satisfaction, but to sustain the whole. Her needs are not her own, just as theirs are not outside of her. All at once, all greed and want is subsumed by the urge to continue the entirety. The others-not-other are in agreement. It can be no other way. Operating together. As one. In service of all.

  All attuned, currently, to a single goal: Listening.

  Far from passive, the vigil is an act of anticipation. Their bodies are tuning forks. Sensitive to the slightest vibration. Waiting on one sound in particular. Prepared to act, the moment they feel it: The Call.

  The wait will not be much longer. The Call will come. Soon. Their time in stasis will end. They will move as one. Out of the depths. Against the world above. They will take it. For the entirety.

  And for this one moment, there is no Wanda. She’s with them. Of them.

  Then, she’s pulled away. Sliced off from the entirety. Utterly alone. As only someone who’s experienced true convergence can be. Rocked by withdrawal unlike any she’s ever known.

  The deprivation is deep and total. Wanda is reduced once more. Detached from the whole, she becomes nothing at all.

  ~

  Coming back from absolute darkness, the light is blinding.

  Even through closed eyes, Wanda can’t escape it. Dark red inside her lids, not the black she’s always assumed. Only now realizing how much light is in the world. Now that she’s been briefly deprived of it.

  Mercifully, the sensitivity dims. Pupils contract from saucers to pinpricks. She opens her eyes to thin slits. Above her, a circle of brilliant bulbs blaze.

  She lets her head loll to one side. Takes in the space. Gauzy. Glowing. Overexposed. She’s still strapped down. Now, in a new operating theatre: Pristine, shining surfaces. Polished white tile. Gleaming steel instruments. Immaculate. Through a window in the wall, she sees them: Miss Phillips. Mr. Bolton. Mr. Rothstein. Not making eye-contact. Focused. Intent. What has them so interested?

  “Ah! So happy you’ve rejoined us, Wanda.” Dr. Ramsey is at her side. Suited up for surgery. “Now we can really get down to business.” He pumps the pressure cuff around her upper arm. It squeezes tight. Cuts off circulation in the limb. Her still-heightened senses feel the pressure acutely. A throbbing ache draws her attention past the cuff. To her lower arm. Its skin reduced to charcoal.

  Telling her fingers to move achieves nothing. And it’s a shame... That was her favorite arm.

  She slow-blinks. Observes from slightly outside the situation. Curious about what happens next. Wishing she could skip to the end. See how things turn out. Unable to intercede, regardless.

  Dr. Ramsey takes up the scalpel. Uses it to draw a red line. Just below the elbow. Above the blackened forearm. Where the still-pink skin is brittle. It crackles as he circles the limb. Connecting the end of the line with the beginning.

  The bleeding is minimal.

  He sets the scalpel aside. Digs his fingers under her crispy flesh. Pulls. It comes away with little strain. Revealing her gleaming musculature beneath.

  The pain is the worst Wanda can remember feeling, until he sprays the area with goo. Burning the newly exposed tissue as he had its protective covering. A new bar set for pain, even as the ichthyoplasm sends her into new heights of euphoria.

  No visions this time. No trips to the bottom of the sea.

  Wanda remains entirely present. Utterly aware. Unable to do more than watch as Dr. Ramsey methodically peels away pieces of her perfectly good arm.

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  Mr. Hunter bursts out of the hole. Into the clearing. Breath coming in ragged rasps. Veins standing out in harsh relief. Running on pure adrenaline.

  Disoriented by the onset of dusk while he was underground. Sliding on the grass. Spinning in place. Seeking out the Jeep: Now little more than a shadow against the darkening woods. He runs for it. Stomps the winch release on his way past the hood. Throws himself behind the wheel.

  The Jeep grinds to life. Its headlights blare across the dig site. Light up piles of supplies. The hole. The makeshift pipe pulley system. Thrown into gear the vehicle leaps forward. Screams right up to the edge. Nose out over it. Front wheels dangerously close to the lip.

  Barely in park, the man is out. No time for stairs. He leaps into the hole. Grabbing for the pipes. Swinging from them. Landing hard.

  The metal hook hangs from the pulleys. The end of the tow-line. He grabs it on his way past. Snaps it free. Yanks it into the tunnel behind him.

  The winch drum spins on the front of the Jeep. Clattering loudly. Letting out cable by the yard as the man pulls it underground.

  ~

  He charges down the corridor. Flashing from one patch of LED light to the next. Feet cracking against the dirt floor. Muscles screaming. His progress only slowed by the resistance of the cable. Moving as quickly as the unspooling tow-line will allow.

  An eternal nightmare loop of plywood walls, the tunnel has never felt so long. Not even while towing thirty-gallon garbage cans full of dirt behind him. The distance they’d burrowed through the ground is nothing less than staggering.

  Finally reaching the top of the stairs, he gives the cable a mighty pull. Gets some slack before barreling down the steps.

  Below: The water has reached the grate. Begun to pour over its edge. Out of the chamber. Into the cave. He splashes down into a foot of it. Momentarily blinded by shock. The water: Icy cold.

  Regaining his senses, he looks to the grate. Buoyed by the rising water level, his wife’s white fingers grip the bars. Her beautiful face peers out at him. Lips purple. Teeth chattering madly.

  He lurches towards her. Only to have the cable run out. Its sudden lack of give jolts him onto his butt. Drops him into the frigid water.

  He scrambles to his feet. Pulls on the tow-line with everything he has left. Muscles quivering. Tendons popping. Mouth full of grit as he grinds the enamel from his teeth. Reaching out his free arm. Grasping towards the grate. As though he himself might somehow provide the final link in the chain. For all his effort, his fingertips just barely brush the bars. The slightest possible contact. The cable too short by the length of his arm span.

  It can’t stop him. Won’t. Nothing can keep him from saving his wife from this watery grave. If he must, he’ll keep pulling until he drags the Jeep into the hole. Nothing less than complete success can stop him now.

  Nothing... Except the touch of her hand.

  Mrs. Hunter reaches through the grate. Her thin arm sliding easily between the bars. She grips her husband’s wrist. Squeezes.

  He refuses to look at her. But from the moment of contact, the battle is over. The fight flows out. His muscles relax. The full extent of his exhaustion is a cloak lowering over his body.

  He dumps the cable. Kneels down in the water. Its surface now even with the window frame. Level inside the chamber and out. He turns his face to hers. Pressed to the gap. Inches away.

  She reaches through. Grabs his hair with both hands. Slams his face into hers. Kisses him through the bars. Hard. Lips splitting. Teeth clinking. Tongues tearing. Only as the water reaches their chins do they part.

  Dying inside, he opens his mouth to speak.

  She grabs his lips. Pinches them together. “Shhhhh.”

  Without further fuss, she lets go. Swims away. Toward the far wall of the chamber. The open alcove revealed when she turned the bronze plate. Diving beneath the surface, she vanishes. Mr. Hunter’s last sight of his wife: Kicking feet. Foam.

  There he stays. As the water rises. Until he’s sure she isn’t coming back. Until the water climbs past the top of the damned iron grate entirely. Until he’s forced to hold on to keep from floating away.

  With no other option remaining, he saves himself. Climbs the stone staircase. Rescuing the tool box from the fifth step, just as the water reaches its open lid. Leaving the ladder where it fell. Trudging back along the corridor they’d built together. Toward the light at the end: The Jeep’s headlamps shining into
the hole. A beacon. He aims for it on autopilot. Out of the tunnel. Up the staircase. Into the clearing.

  There - utterly depleted - he collapses on the grass. One leg still hanging over the edge.

  Later, he regains consciousness when the icy water reaches his foot. But even then, only long enough to pull it out before exhaustion overtakes him again.

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  Atop the pile of ancient porcelain dolls, two in particular stand out. One blonde. One brunette. Sitting almost upright. Stiff organdy dresses water-stained. Faded and drab. Powdered grey with mildew.

  Their faces: Craquelure maps. Veined with hairline fractures. One of the blonde’s gravity-operated eyelids closed long ago. Deceived by the tilt of her head. Spider-leg eyelashes now pasted permanently shut. The brunette’s eyes both remain open. Watermarked. Milky. Cataracts betraying her age.

  Seen at a distance - through the broken display window - they appeared in much better shape. Caught Dawn’s eye. A potential perfect apology to Mandi and Allison: Presenting them with their doppelgängers. Ideal mementos to make up for her vandalism.

  She’d regretted the words even as she wrote them. Unable to stop herself. Needing to lash out. Damning the consequences. Now, hoping to make some sort of amends.

  But up close? The two dolls are no better than the mass of rotting doll siblings on which they rest. Creepy and broken. Cracked and yellowed. The girls could only be insulted by the comparison.

  On entering the shop, Dawn realizes her mistake. Pulls back her reaching fingers. Doesn’t want to touch the dolls, much less carry them away. Left to rot for decades. Exposed to the elements. The things would probably just come apart in her hands on contact. No good could possibly come of agitating the fungal ecosystem flourishing around them.

  Looking for alternatives, Dawn finds herself stymied. A toy shop in its day, the store has faced a series of disasters since the departure of the town’s residents. The evidence of leaks, floods, and black mold obvious on every surface. Its former treasures disintegrating slowly in the penetrating dampness of the misty seaside town.