Deep and Dark December

by Paul Cave

  “Up north. People got hurt.” He looked to her. Eyes direct and filled with inner turmoil.

  “I killed someone,” he said.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  The deputy was just about to ask who. And then it became suddenly clear.

  “You robbed that bank? It was you.” She looked at him incredulously. How had he managed to keep up such a pretence? What sort of cold-hearted bastard could do such a thing?

  Rivers stood there silently.

  The deputy was surprised when she felt her gut twist slightly, her chest turning momentarily heavy. Betrayal is what she felt. Foolish, but true, nonetheless.

  “Well?” she demanded.

  Rivers held one hand out. “It’s not how it seems.”

  “It’s seems pretty clear to me. You tried to steal someone else’s money and then shot a person.”

  Rivers’ face became a mask of bitter amusement.

  “Something funny – Rivers?” she asked.

  “The guy I shot was no – person – as you referred. A callous monster is more likely true.”

  The deputy could feel her anger growing. He didn’t even seem that remorseful.

  Rivers said, “I had no choice. He was going to shoot the bank guard. Could see it in his eyes. Had to act. To save a life.”

  “Regular hero,” Anderson snapped back. “Who did you shoot – to save this life?”

  “Sergeant Magnotta was his name,” Rivers replied. The name had been said with distain clear.

  “Sergeant Magnotta and Lieutenant Meadows. Sounds like bullshit to me,” the deputy said.

  “It’s the truth,” Rivers replied.

  “So you shot a friend, to save an innocent bystander?”

  He shook his head. “No. Not a friend. I should never have agreed to go in the first place. It was wrong. Foolish.”

  “Then why?”

  “I owed Meadows my life. He came to me asking for help.”

  “And you decided to rob a bank as support?”

  “Wasn’t my idea.”

  “Not the brains of the operation?” she mocked.

  Rivers smiled again, angrily. “Magnotta’s idea. Something him and Meadows had planned before seeking me out.”

  “Really,” Anderson said. “And what was your role in this sordid tale of reunification and retribution?”

  He looked to the floor, seemingly embarrassed by the answer that her question demanded.

  “Well?” she pushed.

  “The getaway driver,” he said softly.

  The deputy barked a short, brutal laugh. “In that pile of shit Ford you’ve been driving..?”

  Rivers looked up, some of his initial poise returning. “Like you said – not the brains of the outfit.”

  “Don’t get wise – Rivers.”

  Both hands were spread out. “I’m – was – a local boy, knew the layout of the town. All the side streets and dirt roads. I wasn’t even carrying a weapon.”

  “You didn’t kill someone with your razor-sharp wit,” Anderson ridiculed.

  “True,” Rivers conceded.

  The deputy had heard enough. She wasn’t interested in his reasons or excuses – whether he considered them to be somewhat justified or not.

  She pulled a set of handcuffs from her belt – held Rivers in place with her firearm.

  “You serious?” Rivers asked incredulously.

  “Put them on,” the deputy ordered.

  “Fuck – no,” he responded.

  “Do it,” she ordered.

  Rivers looked stunned. Hurt even. He took the cuffs from her, eyed her for the longest of moments.

  Anderson held his gaze. Her weapon solid. “Put them on.”

  Rivers snapped the first cuff over his wrist. They made a distinctive clicking noise as he tightened them.

  “The other one, too.”

  He paused. “You sure about this? Tonight of all nights, you want to play cop?”

  “Now,” she simply said.

  “Okay – it’s your party,” Rivers said, snaping the remaining cuff over his other wrist.

  The deputy grabbed the chain that linked the two cuffs together, pulling Rivers away from the wall. She had expected some resistance, but he followed her into the front of the diner willingly, before she ordered him to take a seat, on the floor, next to the counter.

  Ben turned to see them. “What the fuck is this?” he asked.

  Anderson stepped over to the trucker. “Rivers isn’t part of the team anymore. We’re on our own.”

  Ben shot Rivers a glance.

  Rivers simply held his cuffed hands up.

  “What the hell happened?” he asked.

  Anderson said, “He forgot to mention he was a bank robber and a killer.”

  The trucker’s jaw dropped open. “The heck?”

  “Yeah – regular hero, our Rivers,” the deputy snarled.

  Ben looked to the seated man. Rivers just dropped his head, shoulders hunched over.

  The trucker turned to Anderson. “What the fuck do we do then?”

  Anderson held his gaze – green eyes bright and fully focused. “We get the fuck out of here, is what we do. I’ve had enough of this hiding for one night.”

  The thing called Meadows had not returned. Nor had Maggie. Rain was the only constant, a continual blanket that fell from the heavens in a never-ending shower.

  The deputy and Ben were sat at the furthest table from the entrance, giving them a vantage point, and time, to see, and react, if either of the two infected appeared from out of the shadows.

  Rivers was still sat with his back to the counter. He was either dozing, or, doing a good job of pretending.

  “You understand the plan?” Anderson asked Ben.

  The trucker nodded, reluctantly so. “You sure about this?”

  “What other options do we have?”

  “What about him?”

  Anderson glanced to Rivers. “He’s coming with us. Whether he wants to or not.”

  The trucker nodded.

  To the side of them was the odd contraption that they had been working on for almost an hour. An umbrella initially, but reinforced now with duct tape, that had been layered over the thin waterproof membrane, and the handle had been removed, replaced instead by an 18-inch cooking fork. More tape had been used to hold the fork in place, with the two prongs pointing downwards. The final modification came in the way of 4 cans of foodstuffs that hung from the end of the opened umbrella. The last of the duct tape had been used, twisted into a makeshift rope, to hang the cans a foot or so from the edge of the umbrella, spaced out equally around its circumference.

  To Ben it looked something between an early attempt at a flying machine/helicopter, and a large hat an Australian would wear to keep off flies.

  Madness gone mad, in other words.

  The deputy seemed confident in the contraption though.

  “It’s time,” she said, standing.

  Ben groaned.

  Here goes nothing, he thought miserably.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  A burning pain had spread throughout Rivers’ body. It had started at his side, the bullet wound hot like white fire, which had spread into his flesh and bones with an overwhelming heat.

  The part of his brain that had not yet been affected by this sudden fever, understood the seriousness of his predicament. An infection had him, and this microscopic, unseen threat were far more deadly than any blade or crazed lunatic could be.

  He slipped into that horrible place between being awake and trapped within a nightmare. One second, he was here inside the diner – monsters and beasts seeking out his blood, in the next, he was back inside the bank, watching as Sergeant Magnotta drifted towards the bank guard, his arm stretched out, weapon gliding silently towards the guard’s head.

  “No!” Rivers screamed.

  Magnotta turned towards the sound, eyes dark and menacing. He smiled, although the mask he wore hid the gesture, his black eyes still sparkled with il
l intent.

  Rivers had a weapon in his hand – Meadows’, and he tried to bring it up to fire before Magnotta did, yet the gun weighed heavily, too heavy to lift.

  A flash of gunfire and Rivers was back in the diner. The resultant bang of the gun broke out above him, as thunder rumbled noisily across the sky.

  Rivers tried to gather his wits. Took a breath. Where had the deputy and the trucker gone? Why had they abandoned him – here, alone, cuffed to the counter. No, not cuffed to the counter, his arm had gone dead, only wrists bound together.

  Voices came to him, whispers and worries, and they drifted to him in snippets and scrapings.

  Anderson? Ben?

  Maybe, he could not tell.

  A bout of dizziness forced him to squeeze his eyes tight, and then in the next second he was back in the bank.

  The guard lay dead. Blood leaking from a chest wound. Wait, not the guard, but Magnotta. His body had slumped into a sitting position, back against the wall, legs half bent.

  Those hideous black orbs of his were still fixed to his killer’s eyes.

  Rivers had to look away. He felt the child slip from his arm. He turned his attention away from the dead sergeant and focused on the child at his side. No child there, but a man, seemingly as light as one, and just flesh and bones.

  Meadows could barely stand. The guard’s aim had been accurate. Blood poured from his skull, turning the mask he wore into a bloody red fright.

  Rivers was dragging Meadows towards the exit, the glass doors retracting further away the more steps he took to reach it.

  Another pistol crack and this time Rivers felt something take a bite out of his side.

  His mind cleared.

  Voices coming to him again. Clear and loud this time.

  “Keys…” someone said.

  “Hurry,” another spoke.

  The wound at his side tore sharp claws into his skin. Hands were patting him there, before moving to another part of his body. The hands felt red-hot. Or was that his skin? He could not tell.

  He drifted again, this time he was sat back in the diner, at the table he had initially occupied, in conversation with the teenager – Maggie. She was telling him the cook’s ‘special of the day’. Her face was openly animated, and her words were clear and concise. Rivers looked at her for a long moment – her face younger than he remembered, and she was holding this conversation without the need to read his lips.

  He tried to open his eyes. Something had become clear – his delirium offering the answer he sought, rather than tipping his mind into oblivion.

  The rain.

  He needed to tell them – it was the rain.

  And not injury, as he had first thought.

  But illness.

  That was the connection which had eluded him.

  It was illness and the rain, a combination of the two, that would turn man into monster.

  Chapter Thirty

  Deputy Anderson was at the entrance; the odd umbrella thingy just to her side. Ben was stood over near the panel box, the one the cook had used earlier to activate the gas pumps.

  Rivers was still out for the count.

  Let him sleep, the deputy thought, less of a pain that way.

  He must have been out of it though, as she’d had to rifle through his pockets to find the keys to the Ford. He had not stirred in the slightest. The shotgun shell that he had taken from the table earlier was also in Ben’s possession. The shotgun itself was still nowhere to be seen – the cook had done one hell of a job in securing it safely. Just their luck. She would welcome such firepower.

  Anderson glanced towards Ben. She nodded. As did he. And then she was pulling the door open and making her way silently outside. She used her body to hold the door open, and dragged the modified umbrella behind her.

  Outside, she quickly made her way to the closest fuel pump. She crouched low, stopping there, allowing herself to scan around the motel area. Nothing moved. Thankfully. The windows were a total blackout. The rain harboured no dreadful images of ghouls or spectres, or otherwise. All quiet.

  The deputy moved to the other fuel pump. A couple of short steps and she was hunkering down at that one. Still nothing moved. Her hand sought the jerrycan that had been left by Rivers. Fuel sloshed about inside. She looked towards the diner. Gave a thumbs up gesture, and waited. A second later the lights to the overhang died.

  A moment of panic, as she became suddenly blind. The night drawing in with absolute totality. Pitch-blackness that covered everything in sight.

  Anderson took a breath, filling both her lungs and settling her racing heart. She closed her eyes, allowing her sense of hearing to take over.

  Just the rain.

  Nothing more.

  No sudden screams of bloodlust or cries for mercy. The night had seemingly had its fill of such horrors already.

  The deputy opened her eyes, and the darkness around her had retracted slightly, offering a faint suggestion of the things around her.

  She moved.

  To the end of the overhang.

  Just a moment of doubt held her there – before her sense of confidence took her hand and guided her into the rain.

  The umbrella came to life. A drumming of noise as the rain battered against it. A gust of wind blew across the opening, but the counterbalances did their job, as the cans of food kept the umbrella level. The deputy had hold of the makeshift handle with both hands, her head bowed and shoulders as tight to the inside membrane as she could get them.

  Anderson half walked, half crawled, towards the outline of the stationary Ford. As she made her way across the opening, the rain continually battered the umbrella, a constant drizzle that dispensed all around her, and a threat that sent the deputy’s heart racing.

  Keep it together, she told herself. Almost there.

  The last few yards were the hardest. The darkness around her throwing threats and suggestions of failure from every corner.

  Her next step brought her to the Maverick..

  She paused there for a moment, taking shelter from the downpour and the tensions that threatened to unravel her.

  Once she had regained her composure, she jammed the forked end of the modified handle into the small gap between side window and panel.

  The prongs punctured the rubber seal that separated the two.

  It held.

  Hunkered at the side of the Ford, under the safety of the umbrella, Anderson felt for the fuel cap. Found it. She unscrewed the cap, and the gas tank released an exhalation of compressed air. Just fumes to be found within.

  It took a few precious moments for the deputy to fill the tank; the jerrycan chugging noisily as it filled the tank.

  Anderson did not wait for the can to empty. She did not need a full tank – just enough to escape this god-awful place.

  Once satisfied, she dropped the fuel can and then screwed the cap back into place.

  Phase one complete.

  Next, the deputy pulled the umbrella free, the prongs retracting easily, and she moved around to the front of the Ford.

  Only a few feet bridged the gap between the refuelled vehicle and the motel’s ground floor overhang.

  Anderson vaulted over the white picket fencing that ran along the front of the motel. In the next second, she was under the cover of safety.

  So far, so good.

  Anderson left the umbrella there, choosing to leave it behind, as the motel offered all the safety she required.

  She stood to her natural height – her thighs and back stiff with exertion. Satisfied that she had made it this far without detection, the deputy headed towards the staircase that led towards the second floor.

  She took them effortlessly. Adrenaline now flowing throughout her body. And reached the top level in just a few seconds.

  The balcony was deserted. No lights coming from rooms found here, or anything else. Thank God business had been scarce.

  Anderson moved swiftly as she traversed the second floor. She found herself at th
e last room, dark windows and secured doorway. Room #12 had not been graced with any occupants this night.

  A godsend.

  She pulled a bunch of keys from her pocket. The trucker had acquired them, found within the small workspace where he had housed Cal.

  The deputy flipped the keys over until the one with the tag #12 came to view. Inserting the key into the door, she slipped inside. A simple motel room was to be found. Bed, side dressers, TV and a doorway which presumably led to the washroom and a shower.

  Anderson crawled across the floor. She reached out, her fingers finding the controls to the TV. A simple press of a button and the TV cracked with sound and light.

  The picture flickered and flashed to life. A cop show – of all things – played across the screen. Starsky was throwing the distinctive Ford Gran Torino around the tight streets of Los Angeles – Bay City.

  She twisted the volume – and the program’s opening theme tune blared out. The deputy was moving quickly, heading back the way she had come. She hit the main overhead light on her way out. The room burst alive.

  Anderson closed the door behind her. She ran as fast as she could to the stairwell which led to the lower level.

  Descending the steps, two, three at a time, she reached the ground floor before the opening credits to the cop show had finished.

  The music reached out beyond the hiss of the rain. The TV loud and demanding, as the noise granted the listener a direction to follow.

  Anderson found herself back at the battered Maverick. She waited. Watched for anything that moved. A few moments dragged on, and then the night parted to reveal a shadow, tall and ungainly, and walking with a mechanical gait that reminded the deputy of something uncoordinated.

  Meadows had taken the bait. He was ascending the steps that led to the second floor of the motel.

  Anderson waited as he reached room #12. The Lieutenant entered; the glint of razor-sharp steel still present in his hand. Something about his movements sent a shiver down her spine.

  The deputy watched on with a sickening interest. Meadows disappeared over the threshold. She bolted into action.

  The umbrella was back in her hands. She cranked open the driver’s door to the Ford and climbed inside. The modified umbrella dropped towards the mud, as the cab of the Maverick gave her all the protection she required.