The ten-inch-thick vault door suddenly bent in its reinforced frame. This time, a weld broke somewhere with the sound of a shotgun blast. Dean and Gloria backed away on the floor toward the door leading to the outer room.
“Jesus, we’re all alone here,” Dean said. “Everyone’s either at the plant working their second shift or at Newberry’s or the spook show at the Grenada. Fromm, do something! Get Gloria out of here.”
Bang! The frame rattled again, and this time, they saw the upper-left corner of the vault being pushed outward. Dean saw the thickness of the steel as it was wrenched forward by something on the other side of the thick door.
“Alley, stop it!” Gloria shouted above the noise of escaping mercury and air and also of the horrid wrenching of hardened steel.
“I don’t think it wants to be in there anymore, Gloria, and frankly, I don’t want to wait around to meet your buddy Alley.” Dean stood with renewed strength and pulled Gloria to her feet. He turned and stared at Fromm, who still had the gun pointed their way. Then, as if he knew what was coming, Fromm turned from the startled teens and ran for the door.
Gloria spun on her saddle shoes and pulled Dean’s hand as she turned for the inner door to the basement. The roar of a caged and enraged animal sounded as the bent section of steel thrust forward even more.
“Alley Oop is pissed!” Dean said as he and Gloria broke through the door and made for the stairs, close behind Fromm.
Behind them, they heard the ten-inch steel door explode outward and smash into and then through the reinforced inner wall of the basement.
Gloria and Dean knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that hell had just escaped from its confinement and wanted to avenge a brutality that had occurred during a distant war.
John wanted to stay and see the entity. He found he had less control of what he saw. Even though the entity had been explained by the nutcase Fromm, John was not at all convinced that this threat was the only one the Dean of the future faced. He felt his body was being dragged through the lower basement just as the entity made its first appearance. Now he knew the importance of mercury to the town of Moreno; it was meant to protect, and that was the reason for the abnormal amount the factory went through. It was for electrical fencing that enclosed a nightmare. His body was now flying past the laboratory at great speed as events started to pick up.
Behind him, the entity was free and was now roaring its pleasure. The old winery shook, and pieces fell from the ancient adobe walls and ceiling.
Halloween was now rockin’ and rollin’.
22
Gabriel tried to get some light onto the second floor, but every time someone lit a match or flicked a lighter, the flame would just die as if the oxygen were being sucked out of the room. Damian stood apart from everyone to keep an eye on the street below. Thus far, he had counted twenty-seven children ranging in age from a few years old to twelve or maybe thirteen. Their black eyes never left the second floor of Newberry’s.
The statement Harvey and Casper had made earlier about their sudden remembrance of the strange trick-or-treaters that night in 1962 played heavily on all their minds. For Damian, this was a far worse scenario than even Summer Place had been. At least there, it was confined to a house; here, it spanned not only time but had conquered an entire town. He wiped away some condensation from the window and peered into the night, trying to see if the agents that had been trapped inside the telephone exchange had made any progress in escaping. He saw the same frightened faces as they too watched the strange crowd of children.
The lights inside Moreno were restricted to the buildings in the downtown area now. No longer were the lights shining inside the old tract homes that circled Moreno. The old and fallen marquee of the Grenada Theater that lay in a heap near the sidewalk was flashing her brightly colored neon as if the old girl was showing her best films from a bygone era.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
Startled, Damian took a deep breath. He shook his head as Gabriel stepped up to the window. The dark eyes of the children adjusted to him.
“My thought processes abandoned me right around the time we lost George,” he said as he again faced the window.
“I mean the theater. Did you notice anything in the past hour?”
Damian turned his head and tried his best to peer down the street toward the Grenada. Thus far it had only been the flashing of her neon that could be discerned. The rain and lightning didn’t help him any.
“I only noticed because the only thing of the Grenada we could see from this floor was the remains of part of the marquee that lay on the sidewalk. Remember when we toured this town we had to step over the debris to move down the street? Now that debris is gone.”
“What are you saying?” the former state police detective asked.
“Don’t try to see the theater from here; just look across the street at the building there. I think it’s the old TG&Y Dollar store. The reflection, see it?”
Damian adjusted his view and then froze. What the fuck? he thought. The marquee was fully functional and back in its original place atop the theater entrance. Damian could even see the AIR-CONDITIONED FOR YOUR COMFORT banner flapping in the storm. The box office, at least from their poor vantage point, looked new and open for business. Harvey Leach joined them at the window to report that all attempts to get light had failed. Damian pointed out what they had discovered. Harvey’s face went slack. The bright plastic magnetic lettering was plain to see and read even through the thick rainfall.
“Goddamn Vincent Price,” he said as he quickly stepped away from the window.
Gabriel saw the terror in his eyes and reached out to steady the old man. “Hey, take it easy,” he said as he became worried about a possible heart attack.
“My pa let me out of work early. I waited in line to see them movies, but I went more for the same reasons we all did back then. The girls would be there. I wish I had worked that night.” He left the two men standing there as he walked away and sat heavily into a chair next to John Lonetree. Jennifer was there and took pity on the old guy and handed him a bottle of whiskey. Casper came to offer him a glass. Harvey waved away the glass, taking a long pull from the bottle.
Gabriel turned to face Damian. “That theater is a key part in all of this. The heaviest death toll outside of the factory explosion was right there, at least a full mile from the plant. The same goes for the Bottom Dollar. Exploding mercury covered most of the town, but only the theater and the bar were directly destroyed by it. There has to be a reason for it.”
“What are you suggesting?” Damian asked worriedly.
Gabriel smiled. “I’m suggesting we go and see what in the hell is so important about those locations.”
“What’s this we stuff, Bwana?” said Jackson only half jokingly. “In case you haven’t noticed, it looks like we have the cast of Children of the Corn out there.”
“Yeah, but they haven’t moved since they killed those two agents. If we wait too long, the rest of the rescue team may come back and walk right into this nightmare with no warning.”
“You know they are just feds, right?”
Gabriel smiled as he realized Damian agreed that they had to go. He always joked when he was scared.
Outside, the lightning flashed, and Gabriel noticed that half the children had vanished while they had been talking. He decided to keep his observation to himself for the sake of Damian’s piece of mind.
In the darkness of the room, they heard John’s voice for the first time since he went under with the powerful dose of the Demerol kicker. The single word did nothing for anyone’s confidence as his deep voice cried out. The whiskey bottle slipped from Harvey’s hand and crashed to the floor.
“Run!”
The single word echoed in the nearly empty space of the second floor.
* * *
As they hit the steel doorway, Dean froze when the handle refused to turn, and then he let out a girlish yelp when the handle was suddenly p
ulled from his hands. Gloria clung to Dean as they came face-to-face with the two security men who had come to investigate the horrific sounds coming from a supposedly soundproof basement. The roar of something not of this world sounded behind them. This spurred Dean forward, crashing into the first guard and knocking him into the second. Both men went down.
“Come on!” Dean said as he pulled a stunned and frightened Gloria forward on and over the two downed men. Still, Gloria shouted for Alley Oop to stop behaving like it was. Dean tried to set her straight as they made the staircase. “I don’t think your friend in there is what you think it is.”
As they went up the steep stairs, they heard the security men gaining their feet. One was in pursuit, and the other was left to face Alley Oop all on his own. The security men were told many years ago that the thing they had been guarding was long since gone from this ancient wreck of a mission and its adjoining winery.
“Hey, you two!” the first security man shouted as Gloria and Dean gained the upper level of the staircase.
The second security man was almost to his feet when a sudden stench blasted into his nostrils. It was if he had entered an old and filthy slaughterhouse. The entity consisting of swirling dust and moisture from the damp and filthy basement stood before him, coalescing into an almost solid form and then breaking apart as if the strength to hold the vision together was too much to maintain. The blackness shed a shiny material from its form, and then the image reconstituted itself once more, gaining strength every time the mercury was dispersed.
The security guard’s eyes widened in shock as the breathing came unbidden into his ears. His heart was beating so fast that he was surprised he could hear any external noise at all. He had been through the invasion of Saipan as a younger man, so he very much knew what fear was, but this thing standing over him was something altogether different. It wasn’t of this world. The man tried to scramble back on his haunches, but he immediately saw and then felt the enormous foot come down on his lower half. His eyes widened, and his pain sensors shut down as he watched everything from his hips to his ankles condense as the weight of three elephants came down to stay his retreat. The man couldn’t even scream as the swirling blackness momentarily took full form. The security guard’s heart exploded in his chest as the entity casually stepped over his thrashing form and took the steps, bending and grinding them as it moved upward toward freedom.
The beast was free for the first time in more than twelve years, and Gloria’s childhood friend, comically nicknamed Alley Oop, was about to descend upon the small and unsuspecting town of Moreno, California.
The quest for vengeance from an artificially created entity was just beginning.
* * *
Frank saw the man again in his quest to find Gloria. This time, it was a fleeting glimpse. He saw the shadowlike form duck in between buildings, and he was sure that it was Fromm. Frank slammed on his brakes, and his Dodge pickup fishtailed and then came to a stop. He jumped from the truck and began the chase. The old man was swift. It was as if something from hell was on his tail. Perry lost him somewhere near Rackley’s hardware store. He knew that Rackley’s was the only store not open that night for the benefit of the trick-or-treaters. The old man who owned the store was the bah-humbug type who never participated in town functions and hated children as much as a commie hated Yankees.
Frank grew mindless with anger at Robert and himself for what was happening. He searched the alleyways and the rear of the store but finally gave up in frustration. He needed to find Gloria; he knew she was in trouble. As long as she was with Dean, he feared for her safety, because he wasn’t exactly sure what the colonel was capable of to keep his little secrets. He ran back to his truck.
Dr. Fromm watched from behind a Dumpster as Perry roared off. With a tentative look around, he moved to the back of the hardware store. Using his elbow, he smashed the rear window and then braced himself for a ringing alarm to sound. He didn’t know it, but old man Rackley was as cheap as he was hateful of all children. There was no alarm.
“I will make sure the world knows of what I have done. You won’t be using its weakness to stop it.”
As he unlocked the door by reaching in through the broken glass, Fromm found what he was looking for almost immediately. His smile grew as he saw the metal locker lining the far wall. The cabinet was well marked by bright red lettering. The lock that secured it was old and easily broken.
It warned that the metal cabinet contained construction explosives.
Fromm snarled in German, “You won’t be able to hide or harm my children now, you bastards!”
* * *
Dean and Gloria had eased over the alley fence behind the Mighty-Fine Donut Shop and eased toward the street after their flight from the winery.
“What now?” Gloria asked.
“Whatever that Nazi creep invented is out here somewhere. You’re friends with Alley Oop; you tell me.”
“I didn’t know what was inside there. It never once gave me pause not to be its friend. Until today, it had never done anything to scare me. It was always kind and gentle.”
“Hey, take it easy.” Dean looked around the dark alley and saw that thus far all the Halloween activity was still centered on Main Street. “Maybe if I had paid attention in life, you wouldn’t have had to go seek monsters for friends.”
Gloria laughed and grabbed her stomach.
“You know, now’s not the time to go all Anthony Perkins on me.”
Gloria finally got herself under control as she placed her small hand on Dean’s chest to steady her shaking legs. “I’m sorry, but this is so damn Twilight Zone that I expect Rod Serling to step out of the darkness and look into a camera and say, ‘Submitted for your approval, the small town of Moreno, California, one quaint and full of charm, now the epitome of hell itself.’” She laughed again.
“The Twilight Zone? I knew you were strange,” Dean said as he pulled off his leather-armed Chino letterman’s jacket and then tugged at the remains of Gloria’s sweater. “Here, try this on; people might get the wrong idea of me if they see you only half-dressed.” He watched her as she tore away the last of the knitted green sweater. She eased her small arms into the jacket and pulled both sides together for Dean’s warmth that still lingered in the jacket. She raised her head and then half smiled. It faltered and then she looked down at her muddy saddle shoes.
“Does this mean I’m your girl now, Rebel without a Cause?”
Dean smiled when he saw the embarrassment come to her face from the weakened light coming from the street. He knew the tradition in high school of giving your girlfriend your letterman’s jacket and class ring, the latter of which would inevitably be wrapped in yarn, or maybe angora, if the love was that serious. He could see that Gloria had never expected to get either a jacket or a ring maybe in her entire life. The thought of her isolation and of basically being ignored by him and everyone else made him sad. He slowly reached out and took her into his arms, and she in turn buried her face into his white shirt, sobbing. He decided not to comment on it since she would only step back and try to punch his headlights out. He just held her and was happy for the respite of being chased by monsters and madmen. It was normal, and right now Dean and Gloria needed a lot of normal.
Finally, he parted and held her at arm’s length. “Yes, you are my girl, at least until you murder me for being stupid or something. And by the way, Perry, I am now a Rebel with a Cause.” They started for the street and as many people as they could get around. The noise of the Halloween festivities was a welcome one.
* * *
A quarter mile away, looking down from its high vantage point over Moreno, the darkness gathered its form. The image looked like a blur of deeper, sparkling blackness highlighted against a dark sky. With the lights of the town to guide it, the entity moved toward the activity below. Many small voices, jabbering excitedly, were barely audible as they moved down from the hills.
As John Lonetree watched, he felt his hold
on the dreamwalk slipping. He was losing his ability to see into multiple memories from differing subjects. He tried to concentrate as he watched Dean and Gloria move toward Main Street. His attention was drawn to the speeding pickup he recognized from his walk that morning. It was Frank Perry, and his Dodge truck sped recklessly down Main Street, barely missing several onlookers and bystanders. He saw the pickup truck speed past the very alley that Dean and Gloria slowly stepped from, and the chief of police was right behind him. John closed his eyes and thought deeply about Frank. The next thing he knew, part of his mind came back to the two kids and the other half sped after Frank.
He had a feeling that everything he searched for was about to be uncovered.
* * *
Gloria’s father knew after he had discovered the two dead guards that Dean and Gloria had been where they shouldn’t have. He saw the mangled men—one at the bottom of the stairs inside the old winery, the other torn to pieces on the gravel drive—but the footprints in the soft mud concerned him even more than the bodies. He found two sets of prints with a flashlight toward the back of the fencing that surrounded the winery and mission, and then a moment later, the one set of larger prints next to them. He knew without a doubt that Jürgen Fromm was definitely here in Moreno, and he knew about his daughter. He had a gut feeling that he knew where Fromm was going.
He had sent his pickup halfway onto the sidewalk and ran into the police station next to the courthouse and public buildings. He could only shake his head in anger when he found Chief Thomas sitting on an unmade bunk in the cell area. He released him and ordered the chief to go with him.
The truck once more slid into the parking area of Hadley Corp Gauge and Meter Company, screaming past the startled guard at the shack, even crashing through the yellow barrier gate that had never been raised. The police car was soon to follow, making the guard jump clear as its rear tires barely missed him.
In the Still of the Night--The Supernaturals II Page 38