Frank saw Robert’s slim form stop and stare at him and the police chief as he walked toward his parked Cadillac. Perry slammed on his brakes, and the truck almost slid right into the black Caddy, making Hadley drop the case he was carrying and jump back, falling onto his expensively covered backside. Frank was out before the colonel picked himself up from the wet asphalt.
“I told you that son of a bitch was here!” Perry said as he took Hadley by the lapels and shook him. The colonel angrily tore Frank’s hands away and looked from him to the chief of police.
“Did you see him, Chief?” Hadley asked Thomas as he came up to them, out of breath.
“No … I … uh—”
“No, he was too busy sitting in one of his own jail cells.”
“Yeah, and I wouldn’t have been there if it hadn’t been for your two brats. Your son drew a gun on me!” he said, pointing a finger at his former commanding officer in the army.
“What are you talking about? You phoned me and said you had him in custody. Now you’re saying Dean is out there somewhere?” Hadley said, fearful for his son and looking from the chief to Perry. He knew the captain was telling the truth. Fromm was here; his gut told him so. Now all he could think of was his son running into that crazed doctor. “Come on,” he said to both men. “If that bastard’s out for revenge against us—or me—there’s only one place he can exact it, and that’s right here. He could poison half the hills in the valley if he wanted to.”
“I knew when we shut down Operation Necromancer we should have had all that mercury trucked out of here, but you were too cheap! You wanted to keep it on hand!” Thomas said in anger. “We’ve been following your orders for so long we have become blinded by your bullshit! We should never have—”
The slap across the chief’s face stopped him cold. “If you had done that, you wouldn’t be sitting pretty on that little nest egg I gave you. Now shut the hell up and earn your bloated paycheck for a change!” Hadley said, spittle flying from his mouth. He turned and started for the double doors of the plant.
Frank grabbed him, stopping him cold in his tracks. “Don’t you want the rest of the good news, you son of a bitch?”
“What are you talking about?” Robert said, shaking Perry’s hand off his arm.
“It seems the crazed little butcher wasn’t lying; those things inside that cursed vault are still viable!”
“You’re insane!” Hadley stepped back from an insane-looking Frank Perry, the man who had been against their grandiose plan since they first discovered Fromm in 1945. “The last activity recorded from the vault was in April of 1947. Those things are long dead, or deader, however you want to look at it.”
“You think this is a joke?” Perry said, taking a menacing step toward his former commander.
“Then the two dead security men inside the winery, they just were torn apart by Fromm. And I mean torn apart!” Frank tried to regain some calm. He placed his hands on his hips and looked at Hadley. “That thing is after our kids!”
This seemed to have the desired effect on Robert. He froze as he tried to see the lie in Perry’s statement. It wasn’t a lie—just cold truth.
“You’d better hope that thing hasn’t grown immune to mercury, because if I estimate its size correctly, it could take all forty-five hundred gallons we have on hand to stop it.” Hadley swiped angrily at the blood coursing from his nose, he was grabbed again by Frank and turned him so he could see down the hill. He gestured to the bright lights beyond. “That nightmare you brought here has only one place to go, and that’s right down there!”
This time, Hadley did move. He started running for the plant’s front doors and the monster-killing mercury stored there.
* * *
In the darkness and without being able to warn anyone, John Lonetree saw the dark form of a man enter the back through the loading dock area.
* * *
Gloria clung tightly to Dean’s arm as they stayed on the opposite side of the street from the Grenada Theater. They paused by the brightly illuminated window of the doughnut shop as kids came out in full costume with freshly baked goodies. Dean pulled Gloria close to him, and they tried to look as normal as they could. Still, they garnered enough stares that they knew they must look a sight. Gloria never felt more helpless in her life, not knowing what was happening around her. She had always been hesitant to depend on anyone outside of her father. Now she relied on Dean, a boy who had never paid her any mind, for protection.
“Music is everywhere,” she said as she brought a hand up to her ear and pressed.
“Freekin’ Rowdy Rhoads is right across the street, broadcasting live. Everyone has their radios on. It just seems loud.” He held her tighter. “Come on; the line at the Grenada is gone,” he said as he watched the area across the street closely, making sure Chief Thomas wasn’t lurking nearby. “I’d feel safer over there and farther from what’s behind us. Maybe it will stay away from this many people.”
Dean saw a break in traffic and then eased Gloria into the crosswalk with about thirteen children and their escorting parents. A little girl of about ten looked up at the disheveled teens. She wore a Sleeping Beauty costume, one of those cheaply made sets that came complete with a plastic mask that had the creepiest eyeholes Dean had ever seen. As they moved slowly across the street, another child came up from behind and took Dean by his free hand. He stopped when the smell hit him. Gloria stopped with him and tilted her head.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, not liking the fact that she felt the traffic all around her.
The small child who grabbed Dean’s hand smiled up at him. He quickly shook his hand free and grabbed Gloria and stared at the kid. It was dressed in a ragged bag of a smelly dress, and her head was shaved. It was cut to the extreme so much so that he could see the scars from where she had been nicked by whatever it had been to cut her hair. It was the eyes. They were blank and dark. He couldn’t see any pupils, only blackness. The child had no shoes, and her skin was whitish in color. Her teeth were broken, and her nails were gone. She smiled up at him again right there in the middle of the crosswalk as drivers honked horns at the slow-moving teens and the children now gathering around them.
Dean didn’t answer as he pulled Gloria away without saying anything. What good would it have done? He looked back and then slowed as he saw that the child was not there any longer. The crosswalk was clear.
A horn blared, and Dean looked up to see man leaning out of the window of his 1952 Chevy. “Get the hell out of the road, you little punk!” The car screeched and swerved but made it around the startled couple, who made it to the relative safety of the sidewalk. They tried their best to blend into the many trick-or-treaters on Main Street. He pulled Gloria into a small alcove in the jewelry store next to the theater. He took a deep breath and tried to get his heart rate under control.
“Are you going to tell me just what in the hell has you so scared, outside of something from Forbidden Planet chasing us?” Gloria asked.
“Nothing. I guess all these Halloween costumes are getting to me.” He watched the kids as they walked by in front of them, searching for any more of the realistic ghoul makeup he had seen a moment earlier.
“One thing you should learn, Mr. Hadley—I can smell a lie a mile away.”
“I’m just trying to think,” he said to buy time.
“From the hills overlooking Moreno to the dairy cows in Chino, this is Freekin’ Rowdy Rhoads coming to you live from Spooksville, USA.”
The sounds were coming from radios the business owners had placed near their doorways so all who were partying that night could hear the live remote they had paid K-Rave for. Dean and Gloria stood motionless, tucked away in the alcove on that side of the street. The speakers on top of the K-Rave remote van pumped out the sounds of rock and roll for the men, women, and children strolling the streets looking for treats. Dean saw Freekin’ Rowdy look once more their way.
“Now here’s one dedicated to Dean and Gloria, who have
had the day of days in Moreno. This is for you, my haggard friends—Paul Anka from 1959, ‘Puppy Love.’”
The song began, and Dean had the distinct feeling that everyone out that night was aware of what Dean and Gloria had been doing. He held her close as the song played and Freekin’ Rowdy smiled at them.
“He plays the best music, but that man can be so irritating,” Gloria said as she embraced Dean even tighter just as the second refrain from the Paul Anka hit began.
And they called it puppy love … Just because we’re seventeen … tell them all, oh please tell them … it isn’t fair to take away my only dream …
Freekin’ Rowdy smiled even wider as Roberta handed him a cup of whiskey-spiked coffee. The smile remained even as Dean shot him the bird.
“We have to get off the street,” Dean said even as his eyes remained fixed on Freekin’ Rowdy.
“Where are we going? We can’t even get the journal until they close up the box office. Without that, no one will believe us.” Gloria swiped at a tear and turned away angrily. She was feeling far more helpless than she ever had just being blind. She was scared.
Dean held her and felt horrible seeing her only vulnerable moment. It brought out something inside him he hadn’t even known existed. He felt empathy for Gloria … and also love.
“Let’s hang out inside the Grenada. There, at least, we can dodge someone who’s looking for us, and we can get you cleaned up some. Right now, you look like something that washed up on the beach in a Frankie and Annette movie.”
“Thanks a lot!” Gloria said, only half-angry as she realized she must look terrible.
Dean looked around and saw that there were still too many people nearby to move without being further noticed. He saw the same emaciated little girl he had a moment before. She stood across the street just in front of the doughnut shop, and she was looking right at them. He wanted to jump when he saw she was joined by more of the ragamuffin-looking children. They stood in a group, and he saw that he wasn’t the only person seeing them. Parents with their children in hand walked past them with looks of bewilderment. Some of the mothers instinctively drew their kids closer to them as they tried to avoid the look and smell of the strange-looking children. He quickly counted six of them and then he saw twelve more coming down the same alley they had used earlier.
“Oh, shit,” Dean said only loud enough that he thought wouldn’t be heard, but of course Gloria had.
“What?” she asked, far louder than she had intended.
“Either someone brought in a busload of kids with the best costumes I’ve ever seen, or we have company fit for that nutcase Rod Serling you admire so much.”
“Children?” she asked.
“Yeah, and I don’t think they look that damn friendly.”
His heart skipped for just about the nine hundredth time that day as he saw another group of the children enter Main Street from the side of the Pacific Bell telephone exchange.
“I think now is a good time to see how the Monster Mash is going.”
“The spook show?” she asked as he pulled her along. “Oh, yes, that will settle our nerves.”
The children of the dead flowed onto Main Street and moved into the crowds and the neighborhoods surrounding Moreno.
All Hallows’ Eve was up and running at full power as the entity spread its wings.
23
Gabriel stood still with Damian close by his side as they stared out of the double doors of Newberry’s. They watched as the children watched them. The tallest of these was a boy of near thirteen. He stood much taller than all the rest but looked far more disturbing. Both men noticed the fingers of both his hands were worn down to the last knuckle on each. Every time lightning flashed, the brutal fate of these children became apparent. Each was ragged in dress, and each had exaggerated features. They were more of a charcoal rendering of humans rather than flesh and bone. It was surreal to the point they thought they may be looking into the darkest depths of the darkest of minds. Damian was in line with this sentiment as he swallowed.
“Now we know what Edgar Allan Poe saw in his worst coked-out nightmares.”
Gabriel could not agree more as he opened the door only to have the rushing wind snatch it from his grasp. The door rebounded so hard that it slammed into the sidewall and shattered. Both men jumped back. The children, however, never moved. The three agents watching from the Pacific Bell telephone exchange cringed and shook their heads, thinking these two men were nuts in braving the gathering of the dead waiting for them outside. Gabriel gathered himself and took a step into the stormy night.
They were inundated with rainwater as they tried in vain to shield their faces from the worst of the windblown storm. Gabe pointed to his left, and Damian nodded as he pulled out his nine-millimeter from its shoulder holster. He pulled up short and grabbed Gabe’s arm, gesturing ahead of them. Standing in front of Red Goose Shoes was the tallest of the children, now across Eucalyptus Avenue, staring at them. As they watched, he raised his right hand and gestured at the two men as if telling them it was safe to cross. Kennedy started to move, but still Jackson’s hand held him in check.
“Look,” Jackson said before the wind and rain could snatch his words.
Far beyond the teenage entity was the brightly flashing marquee of the Grenada Theater. Gabe saw the strobe-light effect as the lines of neon swirled and eddied into curlicues and ribbons of light. The buildings next to it were in the same shape as they had been before. Each was still a wreck of disuse and ill repair. The only difference was the Grenada; it was brand new in appearance. As they studied the change in the atmosphere of Moreno, the blue banner that hung under the marquee announcing that the Grenada was AIR-CONDITIONED FOR YOUR COMFORT flapped in the heavy wind, popping every time the wind struck the hardest. It was like it was also indicating an invitation.
“Whoever is producing this one knows how to add the little effects that make it real, don’t they?” Damian said, trying to joke his way to being brave.
“Well, feel like touring one of the great movie palaces of the past?” Kennedy shouted as he started walking across the street even as the federal agents trapped inside the phone exchange started pounding on their window to stop them. They froze when one of the smaller apparitions, a girl of about four years, turned and shook her head at them.
As the two men approached the cement fronting the theater, they saw the brightly lit pagoda-style box office. It was empty. The banner flapped as they drew closer, and the teenage entity stood there and pointed toward the eight-doored front entrance.
Chain lightning flashed brightly across the entire length of Moreno, making Gabriel and Damian duck. The rumble of thunder was immediate.
“The storm is breaking right over Moreno!” Gabe yelled as loudly as he could. “Come on, Damian! Let’s at least get out of the rain!”
“If I ever hear anyone that starts out a story with ‘It was a dark and stormy night,’ I swear to God I’ll shoot them right between the eyes.”
Damian followed Gabriel, holding his fedora tightly to his head, and they ducked under the relative safety of the giant marquee. Kennedy looked back and saw that the entity had vanished. He chanced a look a block back and saw that all the children had gone. He looked both ways and saw the deserted town and its dilapidated buildings—like the caesura before the main musical act, the pause before the big reveal. This wasn’t lost on either man. Gabriel thought the analogy would even have pleased Bobby Lee McKinnon.
He and Damian turned, and a quickly moving force slammed into them. The object hit so hard they thought they were under attack, and Damian, convinced at the very least that the creature from the Black Lagoon was at hand, managed to get a shot off. The assault quickly ended when Gabriel grabbed the offender.
“Goddamn it!” Damian said when he saw what was in Gabriel’s hands.
“Nice shootin’ there, Black Bart,” Gabe said as he held the object up so Damian could see the still-smoking hole he had placed right into
the chest of the life-sized cardboard cutout of John Wayne, a lobby advertisement for his 1962 African adventure film, Hatari! Gabriel shook his head and then laid it down on the indoor-outdoor carpet.
Damian had nothing to say; he shrugged and looked smug, proud that in his haste he was still able to shoot old John right in his chest.
“Let’s go see if we’re late for the coming attractions.”
Damian followed Gabriel inside to the smell of freshly popped popcorn and the sound of a distant movie playing in the auditorium.
It was now showtime at the Grenada.
* * *
Freekin’ Rowdy Rhoads stood in front of his step van and watched the kids and parents as they strolled by, all of them curious about the live remote. Freekin’ Rowdy thought these rubes would be fascinated by cockroaches racing across a hot metal plate. This burg was anything but sophisticated. Roberta was handing out candy as the kids came up to the K-Rave live event. Freekin’ returned to his small portable desk and the one turntable they had dedicated to this night. He started another record and watched it spin as he calculated the time he had for his intro into the song.
“From El Monte to Pomona, from Chino to San Berdoo, this is K-Rave 106.5 on your dial coming at you with fifteen thousand watts of ghoulish power. The festivities have just officially started in Moreno, and by the looks of it”—he watched as a small girl in a poor man’s Depression-era raggedy dress walked by while looking at the gathering by the van—“we have a lot of out-of-towners on hand, so come and join the Halloween fun. After all, with the Soviets letting go of their dream of a Cuban missile base down the block from Miami Beach, why sit at home? Get out and live!” He looked up and saw Roberta handing a piece of candy to a child wearing the most disturbing Halloween makeup he had ever seen. He cringed as she looked back at him with wide eyes, took the candy with absolutely filthy hands, and silently walked away, joining the amazed pedestrians who stepped aside as she approached.
“Now here’s an oldie but a goodie, a man who was in on the start of it all, Mr. Bill Haley and His Comets, let’s ‘Rock Around the Clock,’ people!”
In the Still of the Night--The Supernaturals II Page 39