The strange thought helped block out the fear, but Denton never seriously considered it. The time for answers and theories were over. This was the cold, brutal moment when only actions were left and there was not even time for very many of those.
He reached the trench and leaped over it, even though it was less than two feet deep. He landed on the slick tarp, and hovered with his arms outstretched and wavering. He held there for a moment like a tightrope walker contemplating a fall, before regaining his balance and continuing on. The snow sank beneath the cloth and the fabric threatened to tangle his feet, making the simple act of walking a challenge.
When he reached the center of the circle, he began lighting the four kerosene lamps he’d left there. The lighter, in its florescent yellow case, ignited on the third swipe of his thumb against the gritty wheel.
The lamps were the cheapest The Home Shop sold. Made to mimic antiques, the base was a squat sphere with etching to make the thin glass look like cut glass. He removed their narrow chimneys and lit the wicks one by one. Then he positioned them in a diamond pattern and waited in the middle of it. In a more magical realm they might have formed a protective barrier around him. In this world, he needed no magical protections; he wanted his pursuers to reach him.
The warm orange glow made the rest of the world dimmer, and his eyes had trouble picking out the men as they made their way down the slope.
The night grew oppressively still. The frigid air cycled out from the glade, through the sky, and up into the barren universe. Denton’s heart was thrusting his blood through him as if it were trying to make up for all the years it knew it would be losing, trying to fit half a lifetime of beating into the next five minutes. The three infected beings were moving in slow-motion. He wished they would just get there so he could end it. The waiting was the worst part. He knew once it was over, he would never feel scared again.
Radnor was the first to reach the eight. As he neared Denton, his earlier sluggishness was forgotten, and he galloped across the intervening space like a warhorse. He cleared the trench with a bounding leap, but when he hit the canvas, his foot slipped. He dropped to one knee, and a hand shot out to prevent him from toppling over. Adjusting his weight on the slushy snow beneath the tarp, Radnor drew back his hand, suspicious of the moisture covering it. He brought it up to his face and recoiled when the strong odor of gasoline hit his nose. Alarm was just begin to register when Denton picked up one of the lamps and threw it at him. It sailed through the air, with the flame drawing a spiraling streak against the dark sky, as it missed and flew over Radnor’s head.
Kaling and Strasser dodged the splintering pieces of glass that shattered next to them in the trench.
“Missed me,” Radnor said with schoolyard petulance. “You’ll have to do better than that.”
He rose and stalked toward Denton, twitching like a fox cornering a chicken. The other two rushed to climb up onto the tarps. They raced to come to the aid of Radnor, but once their feet were on the fabric, they froze, examining the strange setup.
Radnor was just about to pounce on Denton when he turned to see the source of a loud whoosh coming from behind him. The flames were spreading out, filling in the ring they were all standing in the middle of.
At the bottom of the trench were more painters’ tarps, twisted like ropes and soaked in gasoline. Denton had emptied out the gas cans on them, then went back to the Buick and used a siphon he had bought to refill them from the gas tank. When his initial supply ran dry, he went back to the gas station and refilled all of them. Well over a hundred gallons were poured out into that glade.
The fire spread quickly, trapping them within a wall of flames.
“What the hell are you doing?” Kaling screamed.
“Ending this,” Denton said. Fire was the only way to stop this from spreading.
“You’re insane!”
“You’re one to talk.” Both men were yelling over the powerful grumble of the inferno, their voices frothed with raw fear.
Radnor dove for Denton. Denton backed away and launched a second lamp. It broke against his shoulder. Flames burst out down his sleeve and across his coat.
Strasser made a dash for it. Desperate to escape, he ignored the flames and pushed through with his arms wrapped around his head for protection. Just as he was crossing the trench, the first of the gas cans blew. There was a loud pop and a ball of fire burst into the air, knocking him to the ground. Fingers of flame swiftly began clawing at him, eager to claim its prize.
Back when Denton had taken a few chemistry courses in college, he never suspected that anything he had learned would come in useful. But as he devised his plan, his study of the expansion of gases returned to him. He decided to leave about half-gallon of fuel in each of the gas cans and bury them around the perimeter like points of a clock. Hours sitting under a thin layer of snow and the afternoon sun would let the vapor pressure build up to explosive levels.
Radnor flailed as the fire scorched the coat off of his body. Clearly panicked, he waved his arms around hysterically, trying to get it off. Kaling turned his back to Denton and scanned the glade. Somewhere, there was a way out.
Two more cans exploded, one after the other. Puffs of smoke and flame shot into the air like rock concert pyrotechnics, and red plastic shrapnel showered the area. The flaming shards lit the tarps that covered the circle and the wall of flame began to creep in.
“Cole, roll on the ground to put it out,” Kaling called out before making his getaway. He headed for the spot of the first explosion. The flames were beginning to fade there. He must have calculated that if there had been any more bombs nearby, they would have gone off already.
Denton tried hitting him with one of the remaining lamps, but it fell short and set the fabric between him and Kaling ablaze and accelerated the encroaching circle.
Kaling dove straight over the pit. He landed on his belly. Fire spread across his clothes and he immediately began rolling in the snow.
Radnor pulled a tarp from the ground and threw it to the side. The action burned his left hand and ignited the gas on his right. He dove into the snow that the fuel had turned into an icy slurry and followed Kaling’s example.
Denton grabbed the last lamp and made for Kaling; he couldn’t let him escape. The thought of crossing the inferno made his knees lose their strength, but he pushed his legs forward.
More explosions erupted around them. Never had Denton fully imagined the intensity of the blaze. The bursts of light made the terrain an uncertain place of shifting shadows. Radnor crashed into him knocking them both to the ground. Their bodies slapped the fabric covered surface, sending up a spray of gasoline. The lamp crashed next to them. The thin chimney cracked, and the flame began to lick its way along the glass, seeking the rainbow glitter of liquid beneath it.
“You fucking idiot,” Radnor said through gritted teeth. His face was badly burned. On one side of his mouth, his lips were curled back revealing several molars. “Why couldn’t you just leave us alone?”
Denton didn’t struggle as Radnor hammered his fist against his cheek bone. The end was near. It wouldn’t be long before they were engulfed in the fire. And when that happened, the flask of kerosene in his pocket would surely end it for him. Pressed against his heart, it was Denton’s assurance that he would not escape his own trap. Now Radnor’s heart was next to it too.
“I couldn’t let this disease spread,” he answered.
“There is no—” He was cut off by a massive bang that filled the night. It was far louder than any of the earlier explosions. The world began to tilt. Too shocked to continue their fight, both men called a wordless truce and cautiously got up. Radnor stood glancing around. Denton stayed on his haunches trying to make sense of the shifting equilibrium.
Could there be an earthquake? Was the world ending? Was some elder god rising to express its anger?
Denton spo
tted Kaling still on the ground outside of the circle of fire. Wisps of smoke drifted off his body, but the flames were out. There was another Earth shattering crack and the ground beneath him shifted, sending him rolling back into the ring. He screamed in terror, as his hands uselessly clawed at the snow trying to slow his progress.
A rift of black, seething death ripped the ground apart. A thick, dark line formed across the surface of the clearing. Comprehension dawned on Denton: it had never been a glade. It was a small lake.
The inky, gurgling water seeping through the crack had no chance of putting the fire out before it consumed them all. The noose was closing in fast and pulling tight to choke out all life.
Radnor was shrieking in pain and horror. Denton could feel the heat biting his feet and shins. He dropped down, exhausted and resigned to his fate. Better to die now than to let the organism inside of him seize power over his mind. The flames were all round him. He took a breath that choked him with intense burning heat. He tried to inhale clean air but found that his lungs refused to work. Everything went white and the sounds of the fire and the screams drifted away, just as all the cares he ever had. He tried to think of his wedding day and Linda, but the images floated around him and slipped away every time his waning consciousness got close to them.
Shocking cold pulled him out of his last thoughts and back to stark reality. The warmth and the light disappeared, as he found himself plunging into freezing darkness.
Chapter 38
The Truth
THE HAZE OF THE MILKY WAY gauzed over the night sky, as the last of the flames died out. The cool mountain air carried away the lingering odor of gasoline, replacing it with a fresh smell of cold and pine. The silent forest looked on and waited.
Denton lay on his back, feeling his body temperature fading. He had climbed out of the murky water and collapsed on the bank. The cracking and crumbing of the ice had saved him from the fire. It seemed as though destiny had decreed he would die from the burning cold, not the burning heat.
How much longer before hypothermia set in? It couldn’t be long, unless his body refused to quit. Could the cold kill him now? Would it have killed Kaling or Radnor, if they had made it out of the fire? But he wasn’t completely taken over by the virus yet. Who knew what protections the alien organisms in his blood granted him at this stage?
The infinity of stars stared down at him, but all he could see was the glob of the moon. His glasses were lost at the bottom of the lake. If the disease was curing his eyesight, it still had a long way to go.
He held his hand up in front of his face. Frost was forming on his trembling fingers. They were blotched with red and white and ached with a searing pain. He had heard once that pain was good; it meant frostbite hadn’t fully set in. He wished he could dry them, but he was soaked to the bone. Rubbing them against his coat only released the icy water and gasoline trapped in the wool, drenching them anew.
The legs of his pants were in tatters. He tried to feel the burns on the raw skin of his legs, but it was numb flesh on numb flesh. His skin was so devoid of sensation, he might already be a corpse.
Despite the red welts, Denton was able to twirl his ankles and bend his knees. Perhaps he could make it to the car. But that wasn’t the point, was it? He was the last link. Everyone else was gone. Even Kaling hadn’t been able to escape. Fate had stepped in and drew him back to the flames.
Denton raised his head and, with his limited vision, searched for any sign of the men’s bodies. The lake was a black void in the middle of the snow. Chunks of ice and burnt debris floated in its waters. It was so quiet and peaceful it was easy to forget the violence that had taken place there. The carnage that had consumed Stephen and Cole and the disease with them.
Now it was Denton’s turn. It was time to turn out the lights and let the infection disappear with him. He closed his eyes and sunk deeper into the snow bank. He could feel darkness welling up inside of him, grabbing him from the inside, and pulling him down into the deep abyss of oblivion.
His eyes flickered open in panic. He sat up, breathing raggedly, overcome with nausea. He tried focusing on the light in front of him to avert the sensation of vertigo.
Light? There was a light in the woods. Could the fire have spread to the trees? Through tightly squinted eyes, Denton saw that the light was small and stationary. It hadn’t been there earlier. Someone else was out there.
He should run in the other direction. Flee all other people. He couldn’t risk being rescued or accidentally contaminating any others. But the longer he stared at it, the more convinced he was that it was there for him. Somebody was in the woods waiting for him.
Denton managed to pull himself out of the snow and stand, channeling some power—some strength—he never knew he possessed. Trudging toward the light, his overcoat weighed him down as if it were made of lead.
His feet stumbled onto the trail leading back to the road. The light must be coming from the shed. He staggered toward it, each footfall feeling like a marathon.
There was a rusty oil lantern on a hook by the shed’s door. Its small flame shone out into the darkness like a great beacon, warning sailors off the rocks, drawing moths to their demise. The lamp’s fire was protected from the wind whistling through the trees by a dome of warped glass.
No, it wasn’t the wind whistling. It was a tune. Oh! Suzanna. Someone was inside.
Denton pulled open the door, too physically and emotionally numb to have any fear of what was behind it.
The whistling faded and switched to a murmur of singing, “…so hot I froze to death, Suzanna, don’t you cry.”
In the open doorway, Denton blinked at the blur of light and shadow. He was looking into the unknown, the other side of the looking glass.
“Come inside and close the door,” the voice said. “You’re letting all the heat out.”
Wasn’t that something his father used to say? Probably something everyone’s father used to say. Still there was something about the phrase that made him follow the directions unquestioningly and feel small and childlike in the process.
“There’s a heater in the corner. Go warm yourself.” A hand rose up and provided a sign post for Denton to follow. The man spoke with a voice that was smooth and strong, like a beam of polished oak. He couldn’t be a young man, but there was no trace of age weighing down his words.
Ignoring the directions, Denton went closer and inspected his host. He peered at the short man standing before him. The lines on his face placed him somewhere in the neighborhood of fifty. His hair was black with streaks of gray. It was long and slicked back with natural grease. His skin was filthy, and he wore dirty, battered clothes. Behind him was a bed or something that resembled a bed. Lost in the shadows, blankets and rags pooled over a hidden base that might be a mattress, or a pallet, or maybe just more blankets.
Was he one of the men from the shelter? No, there was nothing familiar in his features.
“Do I know you?”
“In a way. But we’ve never met, if that is what you mean. Go,” he said again, handing him a ratty, old blanket. “Warm yourself. Before you catch your death.”
This time Denton did as he was told. In the far corner, crammed in a space between the wall and a table, there was a small propane camp heater giving off an ozone smell. Grateful for the soothing warmth, he crouched down in front of it and tried not to knock over any of the spare canisters of fuel with his knee. There were four of them by the legs of the tall, narrow table that at one time may have been a workbench.
Denton started undoing the buttons of the coat with clumsy fingers, anxious to let its weight drag it to the floor in a sloppy, wet mess, and eager to wrap the dry blanket around him despite its scratchy texture and odor of mildew.
“What are you doing all the way out here?” Denton asked.
“Living. Waiting.” He answered simply.
“Waiting
for what?”
“Visitors like you.” He took a breath through his nose that sounded like a sniff. “You,” he repeated.
“Me?” Denton turned to face him. The coat’s third button was undone. His hand felt the weight of the flask in the breast pocket pulling against the fabric.
“I’ve been calling to you since last night.” Teeth flashed in the light, possibly a grin at Denton’s confused expression. “Come now. Did you think it is a coincidence that we are both here tonight?”
“Calling me? What do you mean?”
“That’s a long story.”
“I have time.” The answer tumbled from his lips without thought, a cliché reply to a cliché statement. How much time did he have?
The man stood silently, his presence filling the space, making Denton feel claustrophobic. The only noise was the hum of the heater and the occasional flicker from the lantern, which sat on the table and cast a yellow light over the gray-green planks of the shed. The flame crackled on the wick, sucking at the room’s musty oxygen.
“Who are you?” Denton pressed.
“My name is Ray.” With that declaration, he sat down on the bed, putting his face level with Denton’s.
“Ray,” Denton repeated, as though it were some foreign word. Something from some mystical volume of lore passed down since Aramaic times, translated from tongue to tongue but never spoken in any modern language.
Ray living on Mt. Nazareth, he thought. That night in St Fillan’s, the coughing man had said something like that. What was it he said?
Under the bridge, Ray had told him he was leaving and could be found on the mountain.
But he never left. He had stayed behind and was killed at his camp.
Or was he?
The man at the shelter had been adamant, it wasn’t him.
He kept saying it. I wasn’t listening to him. I only heard what I wanted to. He wasn’t telling me the man had been changed by the virus. He was telling me it was a different man.
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