One, two, three o’clock, four o’clock rock … five, six, seven o’clock, eight o’clock rock … nine, ten, eleven o’clock, twelve o’clock rock … we’re gonna rock around the clock tonight …
As Bill Haley played on, Rowdy failed to see the strangely dressed and filthy children as they emerged from the hidden alleyways of the town and roamed the streets in force.
“I don’t know how much more excitement we can wring out of this,” he said as she turned to face Roberta, who was still upset about the small girl from a moment before. She didn’t say anything but grabbed the bottle of whiskey she had on hand for Freekin’s coffee and took a long pull to the gasping horror of two passing women in tent-sized dresses.
Freekin’ watched the strange children as they stepped past the box office and the sickened ticket seller and walked straight into the theater. He noticed Gloria and Dean as they ducked into the first-floor auditorium. His eyes went to the kids, who once inside just stood there in front of the snack bar, where fifty teenagers were trying their best to order snacks as the harried concession workers struggled to keep pace.
“Man, this weird shit really makes you homesick for Chicago. I always heard that Californians were really out there, but damn!” he said as he quickly snatched the bottle of Wild Turkey from Roberta while giving her a dirty look. He was about to drink when he saw a dark cloud seemingly pass before his eyes. Many of the children who had joined the crowds on the street had gone. The passing wind of the darkness indicated it was heading down Main Street toward the factory. Freekin’ shook his head, turned his back to the onlookers, and took a long pull from the bottle.
The speakers atop the van blared out “Rock Around the Clock” as the streets filled with revelers and trick-or-treaters alike. Freekin’ Rowdy let the image of the dark cloud fade from his mind as the warm whiskey absorbed all unwanted thoughts of dead-looking ragamuffins wandering the streets of Moreno.
The stab to the heart of Moreno would happen in exactly one hour. That assault would result in fifty-five years of horror for one man and a night of death for others.
The Monster Mash of 1962 was about to begin.
* * *
Gloria held tightly onto Dean’s arm as they stood near the twin doors just inside the first-floor auditorium. She felt the excitement coming from the two hundred teenagers here and the one hundred and fifty upstairs in the balcony. This was only the second time in her life she had been in a movie theater without her father there to describe in quiet whispers what was being shown on the screen. Now all she heard was the voice of Vincent Price welcoming his guests to the House on Haunted Hill. What she heard primarily was the noise from the audience. She realized few were actually watching the movie.
Dean was amazed at the number of cardboard popcorn boxes being thrown toward the screen. It reminded him of bats flying through a darkened cave. He saw many couples necking in the seats in front of them. He shuffled his feet and shook his head.
“Look, it’s too crazy down here. Let’s go to the balcony.”
* * *
As they moved to the lobby and then toward the right-side winding staircase, Dean flinched at every dark shadow exposed by the brighter lighting from the concession area. He shook his head, unable to get the sight of what he had seen not only inside the strange vault but what came out of it. He half expected the black mass to be waiting at every turn they had made since escaping the winery. The prospect of running into that maniac Nazi doctor wasn’t that far removed from his mind either. He was beginning to think that they could never get this done without some serious help. He knew asking his father was out of the question, but if he understood what he learned today, Frank Perry might be the key. All he knew was he was slowly losing his nerve and the reserve of bravery he had unleashed for Gloria’s sake.
They climbed the stairs and passed one of the ushers, who gave them a wary look. His flashlight was held like some sort of talisman against the evils of teenagers. Dean spied two seats just below the projection booth. They finally made it after squeezing past two couples trying for the world record for necking.
They managed to get to their spot and they sat. Gloria leaned her head on Dean’s shoulder, and after only a second’s hesitation, he placed his arm around her. Dean was content with the silence as his eyes saw the film but his mind rejected all images except for the image of Gloria. He looked over and kissed the top of her head and wished he was with her for other reasons than what they were hiding out for. He wanted this to be a normal thing, not one that forced feelings from her. After all these years, the teenage boy realized he was afraid of rejection—rejection from real people, not those of his father’s variety.
Dean was relaxed, and Gloria placed her arm across his chest. His eyes started to slowly close as he felt the touch of her hand. He closed his eyes. The excitement of the day had finally caught up with them. They held each other and dreamed of nothing more than this moment.
* * *
Steve Cole jabbed Jimmy Weller in the side and nodded to the back. Jimmy looked, and in the briefest moment when the light from the projector dimmed and the theater was near dark, he saw Dean and Gloria sitting about fifteen rows up. He sat back and smiled.
* * *
The children moved up both sides of the winding stairs. The kids in the lobby for the most part stopped their yelling and ordering their snacks when they saw the procession of six kids dressed in rotten rags and another six dressed the same move away from the lobby and start up the staircases. Their filthy appearance made for nervous laughter from some but silence from others. Then the spell broke, and the shouting for speed from the attendants began in earnest. They didn’t want to miss the best parts of the movie.
The entity from the vault sensed that the only living person that had shown them kindness was in trouble. That, they wouldn’t have.
* * *
John became confused as both scenes from the past played out in fantastic speed. What felt like hours was actually only twenty minutes to his sleeping mind on the second floor of Newberry’s.
He felt the end was near for both the small town and his ability to see what the truth behind the disaster really was. He mentally tried to picture the factory on the hill. He was now high above the plant, looking down. He saw the town in the distance, and it was still brightly illuminated, the ant-like forms of its citizens still in plain view. Then he felt himself start to sink once more. Evidently, when Dean and Gloria had fallen asleep, he had lost his connection with one or the other. It was Gloria, he assumed. Now that he had temporarily separated himself from the two teens, he was able to control his other task better. He felt his body and soul streak back to the manufacturing plant.
* * *
Frank Perry and Robert Hadley went through the back way through the loading dock area, sending the security man to round up the employees and keep them on the first floor. They were now searching for Fromm all on their own.
Ever since the government had cut funding to the project back in 1958, the plant itself had become the real moneymaker for Hadley Corp. The mixing and manufacture of gauges and meters was nothing compared to the mining of one of the world’s most expensive heavy metals—mercury. The second-shift employees, under the supervision of Casper Worthington’s father, were all on break downstairs as Robert and Frank made their way to the second floor where the storage tanks were anchored to the concrete floor. Forty-five hundred gallons of mercury were stored there after mixing on the third floor above them.
They met the shift supervisor, Went Worthington, in his office, and Hadley ordered him to get everyone from the third and fourth floors down to the first until they found what they were looking for, which they didn’t tell Worthington about. As soon as the supervisor did what he was supposed to do and all employees were cleared from the upper heavy metal floors, Frank saw the motivation in not explaining to Worthington they had a nut on the loose. The Colt .45 had come out of Hadley’s pocket before Frank knew what was happening. The
overhead lights flickered but then steadied. Perry was the only one to notice.
“You want me to turn my back to make it easier for you?” Perry asked.
“That’s a little melodramatic, isn’t it?” Hadley said as he moved past Perry and went to the supervisor’s door.
Hadley raced through the door, and Frank felt foolish for thinking the absolute worst about his former colonel, although most times he did not deserve the benefit of the doubt.
As they commenced the search of the heavy metal floors, the sounds of the live remote filtered through the air. The employees had been following the Halloween activities they had been missing. Freekin’ Rowdy Rhoads was his vintage self as Connie Francis serenaded the empty floors.
Perry froze when Hadley held a finger to his lips and came to a stop near the containment vessels where the mercury was stored. The bright yellow warnings were marked no less than fifty times on each stainless steel tank. When Frank reminded himself what their use had been originally for, he shuddered.
“So, for the second time, you seek to murder me?” Hadley turned, but before he could shoot the figure standing only twenty feet away, he saw the twin of his own weapon pointing at him and Frank. “Lower the weapon to the floor, Colonel, or I will take the extreme pleasure of shooting you in your face. And you, Captain Perry, can join him.” The .45 waved Frank over near Hadley as the colonel lowered his own weapon. “And to kill me on this night of triumph?”
Frank looked from the barrel of the semiautomatic weapon to Hadley. “I told you that even if this man is insane, his experiment is still very active. Those things are loose down there, and our children are in the line of fire.”
“Very good, Captain Perry, a true believer. You have seen the power that I have created, have you not?”
“I’ve seen the results, you madman,” Perry said as he lowered his hands but raised them once more when Fromm raised his brows in an invitation for him to try something dramatic. “Now if you want credibility, you’ll help us contain this thing before more people are hurt or killed.”
“Contain it?” He laughed. “Fools, I’m out to free it. Acknowledgment of my breakthrough is now no longer viable. I will die here tonight if I have to. After all, I’ve been dead since that day in 1958 when you decided to kill me at the airport in Ontario. But when it comes to predicting violence, it is always good to have the German point of view. Isn’t that right, Colonel Hadley? You have taken what I gave you and have become a very rich man, but rich for all the wrong reasons. This experiment would have achieved things no military in the world could have fathomed before 1943. Now the world will learn another way. When I am finished here and my creation is no longer in danger from this town, I will send my journal to the newspapers. I know my life is over, but my work will continue, gentlemen.”
Hadley smiled as he lowered his hands, knowing Fromm wouldn’t shoot him until he said all he had to say. He had seen the two fire extinguishers at Fromm’s feet, and he guessed at their nature when he saw the silver mercury running from the hose of one of them.
“So, you came all the way to my business to steal fire extinguishers?” Hadley asked with a hint of a smile.
Fromm glanced down at his feet. “Oh, I think you know what I have planned, Colonel; you have that devious mind about you. I must have proof even if I am no longer alive to receive the credit. After my creation rips this town apart, I will then contain our little friends from the vault. I will produce my journal, and I will finally have the evidence to prove to the world that Operation Necromancer was the supreme achievement produced for the war on any side.”
He saw the smile on Robert’s lips, and then he became concerned.
“You stupid bastard,” Robert said as he took an arrogant step forward. “The journal was stolen. I don’t have it. Your plans for making true believers of the world will never fly with just your word, or even that of Captain Perry here, so you may as well leave that mercury here.”
“Colonel, I will destroy your new town. I will take from you the riches you have gathered from the sweat of my brow. Well, that has already been taken care of, and no matter what you do to me or my children, your town dies. Produce my journal, and I will tell you how this will be achieved. If not”—the smile grew—“my killing will truly begin. As I said, my sweat, your money.”
“You mean the sweat it took to kill all those innocent people?” Frank said, despised by both men.
“Yes, that is what I mean. Those that made my experiment work were never innocents, Captain Perry; they were bugs to be examined.” He looked at a pocket watch he produced. “In about five minutes, other bugs will be exterminated.”
“What do you mean by that?” Hadley asked, finally becoming concerned about Fromm’s confident demeanor.
“You will find out soon. Now the journal!” The last word was shouted.
Hadley was about to laugh in the scientist’s face once more when his jaw went slack. His eyes moved beyond Fromm to something behind him. The former colonel of the OSS and United States Army stepped back, as did Frank Perry.
“I guess we may owe you an apology, Doctor,” Hadley said as the gun in Fromm’s hand faltered.
Eight of the many children stood behind the German. Hadley could see that the dripping, leaking mercury from the two pressurized cans kept them at bay.
“It’s too late, Fromm. Your children are here,” Frank said as he took another step back as well.
Finally, Fromm turned and saw the children. They were as he always knew them to be. They were ghostly white, and they had no eyes except for the reflection of the orbs that no longer saw the light of the world, only its darkness. They were unmoving.
The gun lowered. “My children. You must leave now. Go with the rest,” Fromm said. With his free hand, he felt behind him for the two fire extinguishers. His hand hit empty air, and as he turned, he saw Frank with both extinguishers. The shadows from battery-driven emergency lighting made the children even ghastlier than they were.
Jürgen Fromm raised the gun once more but froze in sudden shock as the bullet struck him in the chest, sending him reeling backward and straight into the arms of the waiting children, who fell upon him like a pack of crazed wolves.
Frank turned. “Come on! We can still get those things contained,” he said as his eyes fell on the gun pointed his way.
The sound of Fromm being torn to pieces was sickening. He had stopped his screams, and there was now only a gurgling noise from the pile of blackness covering him.
Perry raised the rubber hose on one of the extinguishers and depressed the handle. A pure stream of silver fluid shot straight out and covered the children as they screamed as if burned. They diminished in size and shape. Still Frank held the handle down. Finally, the blackness covering Fromm lifted and vanished. The overhead lights flickered and then came back on. Frank faced Hadley once more. The brightness of the return of light was nearly blinding.
“Robert, our kids, the people in town, we have to get that mercury down there and contain this before the whole world knows what we’ve unleashed.”
“No matter what, old friend, they will never know. And as for our children, yes, that is my intent. Place the extinguishers on the floor, please, and back away.” The gun moved menacingly. Frank did as he was ordered. “All of this was started by your daughter trying to get her little hooks into my son. My son!” he said loudly, as if the mere thought of Gloria being with Dean sent the man into a rage. “My plans for him justify what I will do tonight. I would sacrifice this entire town for my boy.”
“Robert, you’re as insane as Fromm. His children, your children—what is the difference?” His foot hit the pile of mush that had been Fromm, and he stopped moving back. “If you try to hurt Gloria, there won’t be a place on earth you can hide, you merciless son of a bitch.”
“I know your dedication, Frank, my boy. That’s why”—the explosion of the gun sent the bullet straight into Frank’s stomach—“I have to do this.”
&nb
sp; Frank went down to one knee and looked up at Hadley. The second shot caught him in the forehead, and he rolled over on top of the remains of Jürgen Fromm.
Hadley gathered up both extinguishers, and he turned, he tripped over something. He straightened, cursed, and then left the floor, taking the route they had used to get there.
If he had taken a moment, he would have seen the wooden box he had tripped over had the words EXPLOSIVES written in bright red lettering. The remains of the detonation cord were lying next to it.
Somewhere inside the expansive area of Hadley Corp Gauge and Meter Company, forty sticks of high-grade dynamite were slowly burning down to nothing.
Outside, the clearing skies clouded over once more. The death shroud was ready to be laid.
24
Gabriel and Damian eased themselves past the ghostly lobby. The scene was perfect, a true blast from the past. The red carpet covering the floor was no longer burned and scorched; it was bright with newness. The smell of freshly popped popcorn wafted throughout the lobby, and they even heard the rumble of a movie deep inside the auditorium. Gabriel examined the area and froze, unsure how to proceed. He looked at the winding twin staircases to the right and to the left of the concession stand. He shook his head.
“Well, what now, Doc?” Damian asked, his gun pulled free of its holster.
“I don’t know.”
“Maybe they have an idea,” Damian said as he gestured to his right.
Children stood at the bottom of the stairs and near two doors labeled MANAGER and STORAGE. The tall child they had seen before on the street in front of Newberry’s was pointing at the left-side door they could see through a red curtain.
“Another basement?” Damian asked, his eyes on the skeletal child in rags. Its blackened eyes were unmoving, as were the nubs of his pointing fingers. “Why does it always have to be a dark and dank basement with you people?” Damian wanted to turn and leave, but Gabe held him in place.
In the Still of the Night--The Supernaturals II Page 40