Last Playground

by Geoff North

  “There are a lot of wannasee. They may not contain much in the way of nutrition, but they’re dim-witted and slow-moving. And well…I am a rat, you know. Sometimes my eyes are bigger than my stomach—I just can’t seem to say no.”

  “Did you and Neal actually…play together?” Oscar asked.

  “Lord above, no.” Fredrick spat up another wannasee wad, smaller this time, not much bigger than a golf ball. “He avoided me like the plague—which by the way, I believe I may be carrying. No—when he was a very little boy, Neal saw a nest of rats in his grandparents’ cow barn. It frightened him terribly. At night, he would picture them before he went to sleep; they would visit him in his dreams and terrorize him in his worst nightmares. I am the ultimate manifestation of those nightmares.”

  “Poor kid,” Brinn said under her breath.

  Fredrick’s hearing was exceptional. He looked at Brinn and wriggled his pink nose. It caused the four-foot-long whiskers on his face to whip through the air like stiff pieces of wire. “I may have been a nightmare, but I was still his nightmare. I am his creation, and I would never hurt him…much.”

  “No one can hurt him now. He’s dead.”

  “That’s a pity. I suspected as much. I haven’t sensed his fear in a very long time.” The rat backed away a few feet. His nose continued to wriggle, the whiskers whipped and hummed. He studied them suspiciously. “So why have you come here? Are you exterminators of some kind?”

  “We need to get up into the S.S.I.A. building,” Oscar said. “Brinn here is going to help us stop Pipes from destroying the world.”

  “That sanctimonious do-gooder.” Fredrick Pink spat again. No hairballs, just a bit of black fluid. “I never cared for him.”

  Lowe finally holstered his rifle. “Take us to him and maybe you won’t have to eat any more wannasee. Maybe the world can be as it was and you can start dinin’ on cats and birds again.”

  Fredrick Pink remained quiet for another moment, considering things. “I’ll help you on one condition.” No one wanted to ask what it was. “I get to eat one of your feet.”

  “Any one of us in particular?” Lowe’s hand worked its way back to the gun handle.

  “No! Any of you—all of you! I don’t care who—I just need something other than wannasee. It’s been so long.” The rat wheezed excitedly. He rubbed his pink finger-claws together in anticipation, the razor-sharp ends clicking and scratching.

  Oscar stepped in front of Fredrick. The other rats closed in behind, making escape impossible. “So if I offer myself up, will you promise to leave everyone else alone?”

  “Yes, yes! I promise!”

  Oscar removed his muddy shoe and stuck his foot into the rat’s face.

  Fredrick sniffed at the wet sock. The whiskers vibrated. The hairy brow above his eyes dropped down in puzzled concern. He sniffed again. “It isn’t real! You’ve tricked me!”

  “You gave your word.”

  The giant rat squealed and lunged forward. Its jaws clamped around Oscar’s ankle and the teeth sank into artificial skin. Fredrick twisted his head; he shook the android back and forth in an attempt to snap the foot off. There was a loud cracking sound. The rat released its prey and howled. Brinn could see three bloody gaps in its mouth where teeth had been.

  Oscar squatted down and removed them from his ankle. He moved his foot around experimentally. Besides another gash to his exterior the ankle still worked fine. He put his shoe back on and stood to face the rat once again. “Take us to Pipes.”

  “You cheated.”

  The android’s hand shot out so fast, Fredrick didn’t have time to blink. Oscar tore one of the thick whiskers from its face and Fredrick howled even louder. “You can’t hurt me. Now unless you help, I’m going to pull the rest out, one by one.”

  Fredrick pushed past him. The others stood aside and the rats squeezed up against the tunnel walls, allowing their leader through. “I’m not the only horror Neal imagined,” he pouted. “There will be others along the way... There will be others.”

  And so they went into the darkness—the two girls, the lawman, the android, and the rats—led by the biggest rat, wearing his tighty whities and missing a few teeth and a whisker. Emma’s lantern gave out after the first two hours and they had to carry on in pitch blackness. Fredrick assured them he could see just fine—the others trusted more in Oscar’s infrared vision to guide them.

  Brinn longed for Reginald. His blinking lights could have lit the tunnels for them, and he would know exactly how much further they would have to travel. How far had he said on the city outskirts? Over twenty kilometers? It felt as if they’d been beneath the city for days instead of hours. Reginald had saved her life more than once. And he was funny. She missed him. Oscar had been the most affected, and Brinn sensed that even Marshal Lowe was saddened by the loss of the robot. He probably missed the singing.

  Fredrick came to a halt and hunkered down into the ground. The other rats did the same.

  “Sssshhh…” he warned with a low whistle. “Don’t make a sound, don’t move…just let it pass.”

  They waited. Brinn heard a dull rattling sound from up ahead. She took Fredrick’s advice and pressed up against the cool wall. She closed her eyes—even though she couldn’t see a thing with them open—and held her breath.

  Oscar watched it stumble and lurch towards them, a seven-foot-tall human skeleton with a big yellow plastic pail for a skull. The pail scraped along the low ceiling; it wobbled and clunked on the wide collarbones. An iconic Happy Face had been smeared messily on one side. It came to a halt beside the android. The pail turned, and the thing looked at him. The fluid of one eye had started to run when it was fresh and dried long ago, as had one corner of its mouth, making it appear as if the thing was smiling, frowning, and crying at the same time. Oscar was certain it had been painted on with blood. Its boney forearms and fingers were stuck with dozens of rusty razor blades. What horrible event had happened in Neal’s young life to come up with something so frightening, he wondered? How terrible could a little boy’s nightmares be? Oscar had only seen the good side of Neal—the happy, adventurous side of Neal—the safe side. If only he’d known of these inner torments. Perhaps he could have made a difference.

  Like I made a difference that day at the pond.

  There was a part of the small boy that resided somewhere inside him. This creature could do Oscar no harm—of that he was almost certain—but still, it frightened him.

  And Oscar felt the skeleton knew this as well. It could sense the android’s fear and feel his guilt. It moved on after a few more moments, wobbling, clunking, and scraping along the way.

  “Told you,” Fredrick whispered before setting off again.

  The rat had spoken the truth. There were more horrors waiting in the tunnels ahead. Things scuttled by them. They scuttled and scraped and scurried. Others hopped and crawled, and the most unsettling things of all were the ones they couldn’t hear or see, but those they could smell. These foul creatures didn’t want to be discovered. Oscar could see them, however. So could Fredrick. Their silence frightened Brinn, and as much as she didn’t want to see what was in the tunnels with them, the claustrophobic feeling of stumbling in the dark scared her even more.

  “I can’t take it anymore,” she said finally. “I’m not going another step without light.”

  She felt Oscar’s hand on her shoulder. “You don’t want to see these things, Brinn. Trust me.”

  Brinn was determined. “Not one more step. If you want me to help save this city, at least let me see what we’re facing.”

  The group came to a stop. “I got matches,” Lowe offered. He struck one and lit a cigarette. Brinn watched him inhale from the glow of its orange tip. Even that small amount of light was comforting. Emma shook her lantern. “Too bad there isn’t anything to refill this with. It can burn any kind of fuel—gasoline, diesel—anything flammable.”

  Lowe took another drag and Brinn saw his eyes light up. He dug into his back pocket
and produced a dented silver flask. “How ’bout liquor?”

  Emma took it from him and went to work refilling the lantern.

  Brinn had her doubts. “I don’t know…there would have to be an awfully high amount of alcohol in it to burn.”

  The marshal chuckled and handed his matches to Emma. Seconds later the little lantern roared back to life. She gave the flask back to him. “Here—I saved you some.”

  “Much obliged.” He sipped the last bit back.

  “Thanks,” Brinn said to the lawman. “But don’t be so pleased with yourself. Drinking can turn into a real problem.”

  “I like to drink. Where’s the problem?”

  “I’m quite sure Neal didn’t imagine you as a chain-smoking alcoholic. If he could see you now, I don’t think he would be very impressed with what you’ve become.”

  “Don’t you go lecturin’ me.”

  Fredrick giggled. “Well, aren’t we just one big happy family. Can we carry on?”

  Emma handed the lantern to Brinn. “Not me. This is as far as I wanna go.”

  “You can’t be serious.” Brinn was stunned. “We can’t leave you down here all alone in the dark.”

  “I can look after myself…been doin’ it for a long time now.” She pulled the cowl up over her head and started back the way they had come.

  Lowe called out to her. “You sure, kid? Nothin’ but wannasee back there.”

  The yellow eyes were all they could see of her. “They’ll have moved on by now. I have to try and salvage what I can of the Gloom Room, maybe relocate it.”

  Brinn was close to tears. “Please, Emma! Stay with us.”

  “I’ll be okay. You go fix things on your end. When this city recovers, it’ll need a new crime-fighter to carry on where The Gloom left off. I’m thinking I might call myself Moon Woman.” The eyes vanished and they heard the flutter of her cape as she disappeared into the shadows.

  Oscar grabbed Brinn before she could set off after the girl. “Let her go.”

  They followed after the rats. It wasn’t long before Brinn had a good look at some of the terrors waiting ahead. A glistening red scorpion with lobster mandibles clung to one side of the brick wall. It made the members of Fredrick’s brethren look small by comparison. They had to duck as they passed under its quivering tail. Flaming blue wads of poison dripped from its stinger and sizzled and smoked when they hit the wet ground. A thousand more little scorpions trailed after the big one. Their tiny claws clicked and their tails vibrated a group warning in unison. It sounded like wind blowing through tall grass.

  They rounded a corner and came across a bloated carcass blocking their path. Fredrick turned back to the humans. “Move it out of the way.”

  Oscar went ahead of the rats and picked one of the thing’s limbs up. It slipped out of his hands and plopped back down with a wet splat. It was a purple and green mass with five other appendages sticking out on all sides. He tried again, gripping it tighter, but when he tried to pull, it slipped free again. There was nothing solid to it.

  “I can’t get a good hold,” Oscar complained. “It’s like trying to move a ton of jelly. We’ll have to climb over the top of it.”

  The rats scrambled over it easily enough, but the others had trouble. Lowe’s boot heel sunk in too far at one point and ruptured the gelatinous flesh. It made a sickening pop, and the lawman sunk down into it up to his knee. The entire thing began to shake and groan.

  “It’s alive!” Brinn screamed. A three-foot-long slit appeared near her left shoe and it opened further when she took another step. It became a milky gray eyeball, tracking her movement across its face.

  Oscar helped Lowe and Brinn across. They half ran, half rolled to the other side where the rats were waiting. Fredrick was wheezing with laughter. “You might want to empty out your boot, cowboy. The gunk inside will turn your skin black within an hour. Leave it longer than that and your foot will fall off.”

  Lowe took the rat’s advice and poured the syrupy yellow goo out. When he was satisfied, he pulled the boot back on and they continued. They saw more families of scorpions along the way. They stepped around writhing worms the size of anacondas with festering sores on their orange-ringed bodies. Around another corner they came across a dirty little pig with a runny nose and red eyes. It asked if any of them had seen its mother.

  And on it went, tunnel after tunnel, mile after mile. The creatures became more absurdly disturbing. Flocks of bats with screaming monkey faces fluttered over their heads. A headless lumberjack strode by, carrying his monstrous axe over one shoulder.

  Furry blue spiders the size of dinner plates scrambled between their feet. They were being pursued by a two-hundred-pound toad with oily brown skin freckled with black spots. Its long tongue licked out in search of tasty arachnid meat.

  A small person—a child perhaps—covered over with a white bed sheet regarded them soundlessly halfway round another curve. There were jagged holes cut out for its eyes, but they could see only blackness inside. It smelled like something dead.

  “This isn’t possible,” Brinn said. “Uncle Neal’s imagination couldn’t have been so…twisted.”

  “It wasn’t,” Fredrick wheezed. “The S.S.I.A. is responsible for most of it. They’ve been experimenting on the wannasee for months—trying to re-create life and use it for their own purposes.”

  “That’s not the Agency I worked for,” Oscar said defensively.

  “I’m not surprised. They’ve evolved drastically these last few months. They’ve become more…grown up.”

  The curving tunnel ended. They came to a stop before a large black steel door.

  “Is this it?” Brinn asked.

  Oscar ran his hand down a line of large rivets. He rapped against the metal with his knuckles. “Titanium, over a foot thick—definitely manufactured by the S.S.I.A.”

  “Can you bust through?” Lowe asked, not sounding very hopeful.

  “A tank with missiles couldn’t blow its way through.” Two of his fingertips rested on a small round lock. He looked at Fredrick. “You have a key?”

  The rat shook his head.

  Lowe was infuriated. “Why the hell did you bring us all the way here if you can’t get us into the building?”

  “I don’t have a key, cowboy. I never said I couldn’t open the door.”

  The rat sniffed the key opening for a few moments then drove the end of a whisker deep inside. It poked and prodded. “Ahh…just about.” He sent another whisker after it and they heard a muffled click from within. “Bingo.”

  The door swung open slowly and a hiss of stale air rushed out. “This is the very bottom level, a forgotten sub-basement a dozen floors beneath the ground.” Fredrick scurried back and the other rats nestled into the folds of his orange sweater. “End of the line for us.”

  Brinn didn’t plead for the rat to stay like she had Emma. None of them did. They slipped in through the crack between titanium and brick and the door thudded back into place behind them.

  Fredrick Pink smiled fiendishly at his friends. “End of the line for them as well.”

  Chapter 20

  Erin Stauch had developed a cramp in her neck from holding the rifle up for so long. Every time she went to lower it, the four remaining creatures would begin to move in once again towards the outcrop of rocks she had climbed up onto with her grandson. The night had been mercifully short—two hours at the most, she figured—and the weak little sun painted the desolate landscape around them once again in brown and gray. It was a dreary setting, but being able to see the creatures again was preferable to listening to their paws padding and scraping steadily in the dark.

  “Why won’t they just up and leave?” she asked again. Logan shook up against her leg and whimpered. She didn’t expect him to answer. Erin hollered and waved the gun above her head in both hands. The wannasee trotted back out to a safe distance. They continued a slow orbit around the rocks, their faceless snouts turned towards the two humans. They couldn’t see, hear, or
smell, but they sensed the two up there.

  Erin thought back on the last twelve or so hours and realized she was lucky to be alive at all. When Michael had called and told her Logan was missing, she knew the little boy must have followed his sister. She had almost told her son-in-law—she should’ve told her son-in-law—but how would she have explained it? Oh, Logan must have followed Brinn into that other dimension my little Neal used to play in. Don’t worry—Brinnie will have him back before the weekend is over.

  No. That only would’ve made matters worse. Michael already thought she was batty. He had enough to worry about. It was best to let him try and find his son the way any sane parent would—by contacting the police, by phoning around the neighborhood and starting street-by-street searches. It sickened her. They had done the same thing with Neal over thirty years ago. And they never found a trace. He had simply vanished. It had broken her husband’s heart and led to his early death, of this Erin was certain. She had battled the loss in a different way. She held on to the hope Neal had disappeared with those ‘strange’ people he used to play with. They were strangers to Erin, perhaps, but they were known to her son. It was a silly belief she clung to throughout the years. It staved off the unthinkable and kept her going.

  That silly belief was now a reality. She had gone into the old house after Brinn—and hopefully Logan—and found nothing. She had almost fallen through the hole in the staircase and screamed loud enough to wake the dead. As embarrassing as that had been, it gave her hope. Someone had obviously been along that way, and they had made it to the second floor. She had checked Nancy’s old room first. The plywood covering the window had been pushed out from the inside. The other rooms were dilapidated and in ruin, but the windows were still covered. Erin looked in on Neal’s room last. Herb Stauch had sealed that one off the most with plywood and two-by-fours.

  Nothing was ever meant to enter that room again. But someone or something had. She suspected the big woman with her niece was capable enough until she saw the poster lying across Neal’s desk. That man crashing through the brick wall with all his robotic parts showing had seemed familiar to her. Erin had seen him in the past—she was almost certain—and when he showed up with Brinn, he became real. She said his name was Oscar.