The wheezing sound was coming from the thing’s shoulder-lump. A gummy flap opened, and James looked with fascinated horror into the fluorescent green throat. Tonsils dripping with foul nectar wiggled in the back of the dark opening. Gray thorns rimmed the edge of the flap and it clamped shut with a sigh of longing.
No. James, you are not making this up. Four beers don’t make you hallucinate. A HUNDRED beers couldn’t summon this out of your imagination.
James was frozen, his synapses hot-wiring his reflexes, beaming an urgent message through the hellish insanity that his visual perception had cursed him with. The message was: haul ass and don’t spare the gas.
Except his foot was caught in the godforsaken railroad trestle, hooked in a hollow place in the timber where a coupling joined two rails. He almost snapped his ankle trying to lurch away.
The thing slugged closer, its arms jutting ahead like gnarled tree branches, pungent foliage pluming from their tips. While James worked to free his foot, he got a close look at the thing’s head. Closer than he wanted, close enough to guarantee him a lifetime’s supply of nightmares. If he even had a lifetime left.
He could see the gill-like ridges in the thing’s throat as the thorny flap opened again. Inside was a pulpy mass that looked like a cow’s well-chewed cud. Then the flap worked again, and swampy steam rose from the mouth. Worst of all was the Red Man cap perched atop the bristled lump, because it made the horror all too human.
The thing was oozing noise, spraying sibilants into the night air like the blowholes on those whales James had seen on The Discovery Channel. Only this thing was trying to form syllables.
James knelt, tugging at his foot, feeling the skin scrape from his ankle as he twisted. Gravel dug into his flesh, but he barely noticed the pain.
“Shu-shaaa . . .”
The fucker is NOT talking to me. Please, Lord, don’t let it be talking to me.
And now it was close enough that James could smell its tainted raspberry breath, an acrid minty fog. Suddenly his foot came free from his shoe and he rolled over, then was hobbling down the tracks, one white sock flopping in the darkness. He dared a look back to make sure the vegetative nightmare wasn’t gaining on him. The thing wasn’t fast, but it sure as hell looked determined.
The thing in the Red Man cap misted a final plaintive call after him, like a child left all alone on a playground.
“Shu-shaaa . . .”
CHAPTER NINE
“Working late tonight?”
Nettie jumped. Preacher Blevins had crept up behind her without her hearing. She thought he had left hours ago.
Her heartbeat pulsed against her eardrums. The preacher always moved with meek, reverent steps, as if noise brought chaos to the House of God. Still, he could have at least knocked on the vestry door.
“Oh, I didn’t startle you, did I?” he said, the filament of his smile beaming from the lower portion of his pale light-bulb head.
She put a hand to her chest in exaggerated fear. “I thought it was the devil himself.”
“The devil will never touch one as pure as you,” the preacher said, resting a hand on her shoulder. He bent over her, his necktie curling out and brushing her hair as he looked at the papers covering her desk. “I was watching television over in the rectory when I looked out the window and saw the lights on. What’s so important that it’s got you working this late?”
“Just these figures I was telling you about. I can’t make sense of them.”
“Oh, the money. You shouldn’t worry your pretty head about a few missing dollars. I’m sure the Lord’s put them right where He wants them.”
Nettie could smell tuna and onions on his breath. She said, not turning because his face was so close she would have had to bend her neck away, “Well, since you’re here, maybe you can have a look. See here, in the column marked ‘Miscellaneous Charities’—”
She ran a finger down a row of numbers. “I’ve been through the entries covering the past two years, but almost every entry is incorrect; for example, last June twelfth we have a donation of $1,000 recorded to Windshake Nursing Home’s ministry fund. But I was a volunteer there, and I remember the gift being $500. I know because I ordered hymnals and paid to have the piano tuned.”
Preacher Blevins nodded gravely, his smooth light-bulb features furrowing.
“And here,” Nettie said. “September twenty-third. A $350 withdrawal to pay the Baptist Convention. I checked with their office, and membership dues are only $200.”
He peered over her shoulder, and Nettie was struck with the notion that he was sniffing her hair. Then he straightened up and crossed his arms. “I’m sure there were administrative fees and that sort of thing. And a lot of that money is earmarked for little things, like helping out widows and buying refreshments for church socials. It’s hard to keep track of every little dollar. And it all comes out in the wash, anyway. The bottom line is that we’re a growing enterprise. It’s the Lord’s will for us to flourish and share the church’s blessings.”
Nettie’s head itched, as if the preacher’s breath had deposited nits and fleas in her hair. She turned and looked up at him.
The preacher spread his hands in supplication. “I used to do the books before we hired you. I’m not too good with numbers. The Lord didn’t bless me that way. I’m sure I made some errors along the way. But as it’s written in St. Matthews, ‘When thou dost give alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth, that thy alms may be in secret, and thy Father who seeth in secret will repay thee.’”
“But so much is unaccounted for.”
“Worry not, my child. I’m sure you’ll get everything straightened out.” He lowered his eyes. “Well, I believe I’d better go say my prayers and get some sleep. Might have a big congregation this weekend, what with Blossomfest and all, plus Easter’s coming up.”
He yawned and tilted his head back, his pungent exhalation rising beneath his beaver teeth.
“Preacher, can I ask you something?”
“Certainly, honey.”
“When I got hired as church secretary, whose decision was that? I mean, was it the Board of Deacons’s?” She prayed that Bill hadn’t been involved.
“Well, they made recommendations, but the decision was entirely mine.”
Nettie sagged in relief.
The preacher must have noticed. “Why do you ask?”
“Just curious, is all.”
The preacher stepped toward her, hovering, and put his hand on her shoulder and gave it another squeeze. “I think I made a good decision, don’t you?” he asked, and again he lowered his eyes.
Nettie felt them roving over her skin as if they were tongues. No, just her imagination. She had been working too long, that’s all, stooped over the church accounts until her guts were tied in knots. All this needless worry had put her on edge.
“Good night, Nettie,” Preacher Blevins said, giving her a final pat on the head. “Lock up when you leave.”
Nettie nodded at his flashing light-bulb smile and began clearing her desk. “See you tomorrow, Preacher.”
“May God keep you and watch over your sleep, my precious child.”
“Thank you. Same to you.”
She listened for his footsteps as he left, but he was as silent as a mouse, as if he were walking on air. After a couple of minutes tucking papers in drawers, she switched off the light and headed into the worship hall.
A dark church is kind of spooky. She stepped under the hushed arches and walked down the aisle.
###
“Police Department.”
“Listen, I want to report . . .” What the hell did James want to report?
“Yes, sir?”
“Uh—downtown, I saw . . . I was nearly attacked.”
“In Windshake?”
“Yeah. On the back street, behind the hardware store.” He tried to muffle his voice. Not sure just how black I sound.
“ID the perp?”
“What’s that?�
��
“Identification. Did you see the perpetrator’s face?”
Oh, yes. Unfortunately, I got up close and personal. “Yes, Officer, only . . . I’m not sure what it was.”
“Sir, have you been drinking? You’re starting to slur a little.”
“I’m fine. Listen, could you just take a look?” Because I need to know that I’m not losing my mind.
“We have an officer on patrol. I’ll give him a call.”
“Thank you.” And you, too, sweet Lord.
“Do you want to come down to the station and file charges?”
Wasn’t there something in the U.S. Constitution about the criminal getting to face his accuser? “No, I’m okay. I just thought you might want to check it out.”
“You were nearly attacked, you say? Were you threatened in any way? It’s not against the law for someone to be out at night, I’m afraid.”
Oh, Officer, this thing was definitely breaking some laws. Maybe not the laws of humankind, but certainly the laws of nature. “Well, just check it out, okay?”
“I need your name for my report.”
James hung up. The sweat from his frantic run had dried but the fear still clung like salt. Fortunately, Aunt Mayzie had already been asleep when he got home. At least he didn’t have to offer her any explanations of things he didn’t understand himself.
James checked the locks on the doors and windows and went to bed, praying that Aunt Mayzie would be safe. His sleep was shallow and restless, disturbed by animated cauliflower nightmares.
###
The alien felt the mist of its spores scatter in the night. A tingle of air pressure altered its surface chemistry, took shape, and imprinted sound vibration on the creature’s skin. The symbol throbbed against its heart-brain, causing a disturbance in the pacific state of healing.
May-zee.
The creature analyzed the symbol, and compared it to the “shu-shaaa.” No connection. No pattern. No hint of higher intelligence.
The creature fed and rested.
CHAPTER TEN
“What do you make of it?”
“I ain’t touching it.”
“Looks like some kind of jelly to me,” Chief Crosley said. “When did you find it?”
“This morning. Dispatch got a call last night, some drunk said he was nearly attacked back here.” Arnie McFall ran his sleeve across the sweating bone of his forehead. The sun glinted off the car windows into his eyes. “Sent Matheson out, but Matheson didn’t see nothing. I figured I’d poke around this morning, in case we had a bum hanging out back here. A bum could live in style, what with Sonny’s dumpsters and all.”
Crosley looked down on the milky pool of slime that even now was congealing and crusting under the warm sun. Ordinarily, he would have figured it for a chemical spill or some kind of underground leak, nothing that would hurt anybody. But it was the clothes splayed out in the middle of the foamy gom that was the mystery.
He didn’t like mysteries. Mysteries were for those cop shows on TV, the kind that you watched while you put up your feet and killed a cold one or two. He didn’t need any mysteries in Windshake, because he didn’t have any snoopy writers or doctors or priests who could solve them like they did on TV.
“Maybe somebody just put these clothes here for a joke,” Crosley said. “When I was a kid, when we went to the beach, I’d sneak off at night and make weird tracks coming up out of the surf, twisting my hands and feet and crawling on my belly. So whoever saw it in the morning would think a monster had crawled out.”
“Might be shenanigans, Chief. But it looks kind of natural.”
The Chief had to admit that the clothes covered the ground in the shape of an actual person. The angles of the knees and elbows were curved instead of bent like a stick figure’s. Dingy white socks jutted from the cuffs of the jeans, their bottoms worn completely through. A Red Man baseball cap had rolled a few feet away, where it leaned against a rusty transaxle.
Somebody had gone to a lot of trouble for a prank. And who’d want to waste a good pair of Levi’s like that?
“Looks like whoever it was came down the tracks there into these old junk cars.”
“You’re calling it a ‘who,’ Arnie. I don’t like the sound of that.”
“Sorry, Chief.”
“I don’t see no shoes nowhere.”
“I’ve looked all over the back street. Nothing out of the ordinary. Besides this, I mean.” Arnie pointed to the imprint.
Crosley rubbed his belly the way he always did when he was uneasy. He looked around the car lot, at the water tower and the weedy train tracks. The backs of the buildings were streaked with tarry runoff and fire escapes clung to the bricks like giant broken spiders. Traffic echoed off the storefronts from the jams of people pouring in for Blossomfest.
“You want me to scrape up a sample to send to the SBI boys down in Raleigh?” Arnie asked.
“No, let’s just keep this to ourselves until we know more. Run a missing persons check and that sort of thing.”
“The way this is drying out, it looks like it’ll flake off in the breeze. Won’t be much left soon.”
Good, thought Crosley. He said, “Who called in that report last night?”
“Didn’t give his name. Like I said, Dispatch thought it was a drunk.”
“The Virgin Queen is going to love this,” Crosley said, referring to Mayor Speerhorn by her departmental nickname. “Especially right here at Blossomfest and all. She’s going to shit a silver teapot.”
Crosley resumed rubbing his ample stomach.
###
Chester didn’t see Don Oscar out in the farmyard.
It ain’t Don Oscar, Chester told himself. Let’s just call it ‘Mushbrains’ from now on.
Because the last time Chester saw Mushbrains, about an hour ago, it was looking kind of milky and droopy, like a mushroom did after the steamy sun had worked it over. Sort of wilted from rot and turning to gooey liquid.
Yeah, like that, except this fungus thing used to be your drinking buddy.
Chester tongued his chaw and flexed his arthritic joints, grateful that the Lord had seen fit to throw down a sunny day. If it had been raining, Chester probably would have laid in the hay till the storm passed, his muscles cramped up like a pine knot. He tiptoed down the stairs, grimacing at every squeak of the dry chestnut.
He pulled the twine strap that lifted the corncrib latch from the inside. If Mushbrains was outside the door, Chester knew he was done for. He kicked open the door and bounced out onto the packed matted dirt of the barn floor, arms up like a karate fighter. Nothing stirred but a scrawny rooster that hobbled out of a stall, its red comb quivering as it swiveled its head.
Chester clung to the wall as he edged toward the barn opening. He didn’t know what was safer, the cool dark shadows or the sterile exposure of daylight. He was debating a run for the farmhouse when the decision was made for him. Swampy breathing came from the far side of the barn.
He bolted across the yard, his limbs flailing like a crippled hay rake. Forty feet of fiery lung pain later, he was on the porch, kicking aside the broken screen door. He staggered into the living room, blind from sunshine, and bumped into the splintery carnage that DeWalt had strewn. He felt along the wall for his thirty-caliber, then decided on the shotgun.
He wanted whatever corpse old Mushbrains left behind to be unrecognizable.
He thumbed back the triggers, comforted by the feel of the cold steel. Mushbrains was easy meat now, if “meat” was the right word.
“Old Mushy ain’t moving too swift lately,” he said, his spirit soaring now that he was armed. He peered through the door, waiting for Mushbrains to slog within range. Toenails clicked on the floor behind him. He turned and saw Boomer.
Good old Boomer.
Good old Boomer, his fur now bristles, his spine bowed from the weight of whatever roiled in his bloated belly. His old stringy eyes had flowered into purple hyacinths, and the nose resembled a moldy peach. The dr
ooping leathery tongue was veined like a maple leaf. Stinkweed thorns crowned the forehead and his grapevine tail wagged in stupid joy.
Chester jerked one trigger and his hound dog shredded like a December jack-o’-lantern. Chester wiped at his eyes, eyes that were too dry and tired to make tears. He opened a bureau drawer and filled his overall pockets with twenty-gauge shells. It was time to deal with the mushbrained monster that had pissed on his corn flakes and crammed grit in his craw.
Chester walked into the sunlight, feeling like Bruce Willis in “Die Hard.” Mushbrains sloughed toward him, leaving behind glistening clumps of itself as it closed. Chester looked into the glowing, scallop-edged eyes to make certain there was nothing of Don Oscar left inside.
The thing tried to lift its arms, limbs that were like a wet scarecrow’s. The moist flap in the middle of Mushbrains’s face lifted. Milky bubbles spewed into the air.
“Shu-shaaa,” it was saying, but a fistful of number ten shot peppered into its pulpy flesh and made its own sibilant splash.
The soggy stump of the creature remained upright, and Chester reloaded and gave it another double helping of hot pellets. Still it stood, a fungus leeched onto the earth and quivering like a windblown cornstalk.
Chester flipped out the spent shells, the acrid tang of gunpowder suffocating the scents of spring. He was sighting down the barrel again when he heard a revving engine. Somebody was coming around the bend toward the farmhouse.
DeWalt’s Pathfinder came roaring out of the pines and down the red dirt road. At the same time, a loping hunk of something that might once have been a buck leaped out of the woods and cut in the path of the sport utility vehicle. The sport utility vehicle swerved, then its front left wheel dipped into a rut. The bumper glanced the deer-thing and caused an explosion of foul green fluid. The Pathfinder bounced once before going over on its side.
The fallen beast shook itself, shedding the antlers that sprouted like dead shrubs from its head. The back end of its body had disintegrated from the impact of the vehicle, but the deer-thing rose unsteadily on its front legs. Then it skittered into the woods on the other side of the road, pieces of its spongy flesh and organs dribbling out behind. Chester glanced at Mushbrains and saw that it wasn’t going anywhere, so he jogged painfully up the road to the Pathfinder, his gun at his hip.
Scott Nicholson Library Vol 2 Page 12