The Man Who Vanishes_a gripping horror thriller spanning 3 timelines_One Man. Everywhere.

by J M Gonzalez Riley

  Frank scowled at him, wondering at his meaning.

  ‘You know Liz?’

  Adain raised his eyebrows.

  ‘Know her? Why, it was she who told me what you were up to here, in a fashion. That’s where I figured I’d find Kayn. But not both of them, mind you. That is a bonus. Now I just have one more to find.’

  ‘Jesus!’ Frank cried. ‘What are you?’

  The barn door was open. Simmons thought of making a run for it, but he couldn’t drag himself away from this. He needed to know.

  Adain smiled, then fell deadly serious.

  ‘Can you cope with the knowledge, if I tell you?’

  Frank swallowed hard, glancing quickly over at Simmons.

  Adain smiled. ’We’re angels,’.

  Frank stared at him, his mouth open. He didn’t realise he had lowered the gun. Simmons gasped, riveted to the spot. His legs felt weak. Angels. I knew it. I thought this!

  ‘Do you want to know why we’re here?’ Adain asked next. The men were unable to speak. ’I’ll show you,’ he continued. ‘But you will not disclose any of what you see to anybody. Ever.’

  Adain put his hand in his pocket.

  Frank raised his gun, gritting his teeth, shaking.

  Adain looked at him hard, eyes narrowed.

  ‘Do you want to see?’ he asked him, moving the object about inside his pocket.

  ‘Let him, Frank,’ Simmons said. ‘Please.’

  Frank looked over at him. He was sweating profusely, scared shitless.

  Simmons swallowed. His throat was parched.

  ‘Let him show us, Frank. I want to see.’

  I want to see what the angel has in his pocket. I want to know why he’s here. I want to see and understand.

  Frank looked back at the angel, at the hand in his pocket. He nodded, slowly, his eyes wide in anticipation, his nostrils flaring like a bull.

  The sedated Kayn looked on passively from the chair. The second Kayn was still thrashing on the floor.

  Adain smiled. His smile was perfect.

  ‘Very well,’ he said, and pulled the object out. It was oblong, smooth, metallic. Adain pressed it and placed it on the floor, then stepped away from it. A led green display shone out of the device. It was waking up.

  Simmons gritted his teeth. He knew what was about to happen.

  The object pulsed. A small voice sounded from the device, audible in the silence. It sounded like Clara’s voice.

  Frank’s mouth fell open.

  It was Simmons’ cell phone.

  ‘What the-'

  But before Frank could finish the sentence, both Kayns and Adain became a rush of colours, hurtling toward a pinpoint just above the cell phone, wavering for a moment, like dancing lasers, before disappearing with a pop.

  Frank did not even think to fire the gun once.

  Frank’s head hung low. ‘They’ve gone,’ he said, his voice breaking. ‘He tricked us to the last. I can’t believe it.’

  Simmons smiled tiredly.

  ‘Good, I'm glad.’

  Frank shook his head. He was on the brink of tears.

  ‘It took me a few moments to recognise my own phone,’ Simmons admitted, retrieving it from the floor and looking at it in wonder. ‘I was expecting something else, something heavenly,’ he laughed, shaking his head. ‘The surveillance men must have left it behind when they rushed off.’

  Frank looked up at him. His eyes were bloodshot and tired.

  ‘Why are you still here?’

  ‘I’m going now,’ Simmons told him. ‘I just want to see the news,’ he said, thumbing his phone. A news reporter read silently over the news heading “Mystery of the vanishing man.”

  Simmons turned up the volume. The camera panned and a pale-faced reporter appeared, standing in the city square, her hair blowing in the evening wind. The spot was surrounded by people and noise. The reporter was describing how, earlier that afternoon, a man standing on the roof of the main shopping precinct had grabbed shoppers’ attention by shouting down at them and waving. A huge crowd had gathered below, looking up at him in wonder.

  The window around the reporter shrank to the top corner to make way for the helicopter footage taking earlier that day. It showed the police arriving on the scene and pushing the crowd back to clear the way for the fire engine that followed. Firefighters stood around the bottom of the building, stretching an inflatable platform on the concourse down below, in case the man should fall or dive. Meanwhile, the fire engine’s ladders were unravelling toward the rooftop, guided by a lone fire fighter who stood inside the cradle.

  The camera shot panned and picked up the man on the roof. It was Adain. He was smiling and waving at the helicopter. Then he jumped off the roof, arms outstretched like a diver, plunging down into the horrified crowd.

  Screams rose as people down below scattered everywhere. Shoppers fell and were trampled, bags ripped open, spilling their contents across the concourse.

  The man fell at sickening speed. But then, on his headfirst rush, something incredible happened. It was as he passed the overhead power cables. His body seemed to break up into fragments, like a puzzle, caught up in some current that seemed to emanate from the power cables themselves. And then, in a strange shower of bright blue sparks, the diver vanished into thin air.

  14

  Present Day

  Simmons drove in the rain. The worn window wipers struggled to keep the thin film of water from forming on the windscreen. He drove carefully, comforted by the thought that he would soon be with Clara. He couldn’t wait to see her again, to share with her all that had happened.

  He felt tired and worn out, but he also felt strangely at peace with himself. As he drove, he felt a certainty that he hadn’t felt in years. He knew that he loved Clara and that he would marry her one day soon. He also knew that he would shut the practice up for good, and never practise again.

  As he drove, he thought of Kayn and Adain. There was no doubt in his mind that he would never see them again. Adain had been a showman, playing many games with them from the start, until he found Kayn. And then he had left, as suddenly as he had entered their lives, in his unique style. Confident as ever, knowing that he would snatch Kayn from Frank’s claws, he had performed his ultimate stunt in the city centre, in front of the television cameras, for the whole world to see.

  Simmons sighed. There were a million questions that he would never know the answer to, and he felt saddened and weighed down by the thought.

  Outside, the rain abated.

  Adain had said there were three Kayns. So where was the last one? Was he wandering around, lost, like the other two had been? It was something he would wonder time and again for the rest of his life.

  At least, he felt happy in the knowledge that Clara would be able to see for herself in the news – if she hadn’t already done so - what he had been at pains to describe to her. Thinking about it now, he was amazed that she had ever believed him at all.

  She had given him purpose once again, with her trust and her love. This whole experience had been the catalyst that lead him to her arms. He now knew what he wanted, and what he had to do.

  He also knew that he would never see Frank again.

  15

  Middle ages

  Struck by thunder, he was,’ said a voice, heavy with awe, somewhere above him, close by.

  He opened his eyes and saw faces looking down at him like moons hanging on a grey-black sky, pregnant with the promise of foul weather. Somebody else was screaming, the words thick and incoherent in the howl of the wind that pushed the dark clouds overhead into disarray.

  A lightning bolt flashed out of the black and struck the top of a nearby tree, covering it in a shower of sparks. In an instant, the flash ripped apart the higher branches and scorched the thick trunk into a char-blackened stump.

  ‘Almighty God!’ cried one of the faces, looking toward the tree. ‘Let’s get us all away to safety!’

  There was the rumble of thunder in t
he wind, loud and threatening, and Kayn felt the sudden rough pull of hands, lifting him inches off the ground and carrying him like a sack over the muddy terrain. His limbs felt stretched by the pulling, streams of pain coursing along his joints. The rain fell hard on him as they carried him. He felt cold and wretched.

  There came another dangerous flash, lighting up the night and the forest beyond. For an instant, Kayn saw with clarity. He saw the backs of the squat men that carried him in haste, dressed in skins and rags, and the irregular ground beneath him, which was thick with mud and dirt and fast turning into a bog. The image remained in his mind long after the light had faded and he wondered where he was, and where these men were taking him.

  His limbs were growing numb. On occasions, the carriers lowered him slightly, struggling, exerted. On those occasions his head and back would scrape the muddy ground, sometimes hitting a rough lump of rock.

  ‘He came from the thunder!’ screamed a voice behind him. It as the thick, mumbling voice he had heard earlier, shouting above the din of the elements. A dog barked in the night.

  ‘Hurry,’ whispered one of the carriers in front. His tone was urgent. ‘And do so, before he gets hold of him. He’ll tear him apart.’

  Kayn suddenly felt they were running away from the thick voice and grew anxious, willing the men on to their destination, away from the voice.

  Just then, one of the carriers fell away with a yelp and Kayn’s right leg fell, unsupported, to the sloppy ground, almost sinking into the mud.

  A huge hand reached across his field of vision and closed around another of the carrier’s shoulders. The man screamed as the hand squeezed, and then fell away, pushed like a rag into the mud. The remaining two carriers fled and Kayn dropped, back-first, into the mud with a thick squelch.

  Blood flowed into his limbs at once, tingling, almost exhilarating in the wake of the numbness.

  He looked up and saw a big bearded face peering down at him. The face orbited his field of vision dizzily until he was facing it squarely, the right way up. The forehead was low and weathered, framed by huge, bushy eyebrows, tinged a fiery red. The eyes in the face were small and set too close together over a thick nose and ample lips, open in a strange shape of curiosity. Thick long hair, shaded red like the eyebrows, hung over and down the face in a long, dull tangle, dripping under the falling rain. When the face looked up at the men around, Kayn saw a powerful jaw protruding from a thick neck.

  ‘He came from thunder!’ the man growled, speaking slowly and thickly at the other men.

  He looked back down at Kayn, eyeing him strangely, prodding him curiously. A sticky stream of warm saliva dangled and fell from the man’s open mouth, landing across Kayn’s face. Kayn grimaced, and the man became infuriated at once.

  ‘Devil!’ he spat, and delivered a hard kick to Kayn’s torso. Immediately, his side flooded with angry pain, like a burst pipe. He creased up in agony as another kick caught his drawn-up knees, making him cry out. Voices coloured the night, multiple, varied. As he made himself small on the ground, readying himself for another assault, he wondered fleetingly where they had come from, these sudden sounds.

  A bolt of lightning flew across the sky, illuminating the muddy plateau, and Kayn saw the crowd gathering under the rain, dirty faces and ragged clothing, briefly exposed in the bright flash. But in the dark, moments later, all he could recall was the bright look of expectancy in the many eyes of the crowd and he was dismayed by the thought that they had gathered solely to watch and to cheer at the unravelling spectacle.

  Hands, huge and strong, closed around his shoulders and lifted him easily off the ground, on to his unsteady legs. When he opened his eyes, he found himself facing his attacker, and he finally realised the man’s true size. He was huge, standing almost half a metre above him, thick and powerful. Kayn stood uncertainly, held at arms length like a marionette, unable to wriggle free. He waited for the final strike, breathing raggedly, helplessly, when everybody around his periphery seemed to suddenly fall silent, parting to let somebody through. Only the ogre was making noise now, ugly grunting sounds as he prepared to pound his fist into Kayn.

  A voice snapped then, out of the forced hush, crackling like the thunder in the sky.

  ‘Fürgos! That’s enough!’

  The ogre fell back, as if stung. Kayn collapsed, unsupported, back to the muddy ground, on to his hands and knees.

  ‘Devil!’ the ogre shouted, pointing down at him.

  ‘Be done!’ crackled the voice. ‘And leave us be.’

  Kayn was squinting into the crowd, trying to see his saviour, but the man stood just outside his field of vision, masked by the heavy rain and the darkness.

  ‘He was struck by thunder, sire,’ said one of the carriers coming forward.

  ‘Pick him up and take him to the steeple,’ ordered the voice. At once, the carriers were back, handling him roughly and with haste. But this time he managed to stand on his own two feet, and so only two of the carriers were required to steady his weight. They held him under the armpits and pushed their way under the torrential rain.

  They moved along under the lightning strikes, followed by the leering crowd. His torso, where the brute had kicked him, felt sore each time he took a step. When he looked up, he saw a small pose walking in front. His saviour lead the way, flaked by men. Up ahead he saw a tall, dark structure guarded by two men.

  Under the moonlight, the guards moved aside at once, giving way to the sire and the procession. Kayn returned the guards’ curious gazes as he was taken past them, seeing that they were armed with steel swords. When he looked back, he saw that the crowd was no longer following, denied passage by the guards who were closing the tall wooden doors behind him. Kayn watched the faces disappearing in the closing gap, followed by a great wooden bolt being driven through the lock.

  They carried him toward a looming, dark building where small candle fires lit up stone-rimmed windows all along the facing wall. When they finally reached it, they moved under an archway of grey, weathered stone, into a cold, dark hall, where he was dropped onto the stone floor. There he lay awhile, watching the flames dancing on the walls, almost unable to move and gaining little comfort from the chill that was spreading inside him, yet glad and reassured by the diminishing pain in his tired joints.

  His eyes still stung from the rain and had not yet adjusted to the lesser gloom of this new place.

  ‘Do you think he might be the General?’ one of the men in the room asked of the others.

  He looked up as a second man stepped into his vision. The man was small, stubby, dressed in long black robes. His face was hard, without compassion. His eyes were small but sharp, almost cutting. His shadow fell across Kayn, sending a shiver through his cold, trembling body.

  It was his saviour.

  ‘Are you the General?’ he asked him, raising a dark, bushy eyebrow, as if he were suspicious of what he might hear. Other faces swam into his vision, staring at him, eyes narrow, faces hard.

  He stared back at them, paralysed.

  ‘Are you the Witchfinder General?’ the portly man asked again. His voice was crackly, authoritarian, as hard as his features.

  ‘He doesn’t look like a General,’ one of the men remarked.

  The portly man looked up from Kayn, back toward the door. ‘Go and see if he has any belongings out there in the mud,’ he barked. And at once, the men hastened outside into the rain.

  Kayn tried to sit up, propping himself up on his hands. His midriff throbbed.

  The portly man scowled at him, his face cold, unwelcoming. Kayn looked up wearily, but could not find the strength to speak.

  ‘We can’t find anything, sire,’ one man said when they returned. ‘It looks like he has no belongings with him.’

  The portly man looked down at Kayn. His face eased a little at the news, an expression of smugness playing on his features.

  ‘I thought so,’ he said at last. ‘Throw him out, beyond the wall.’

  The men obeyed
at once, pulling Kayn roughly up onto his feet and carrying him hastily out of the cold building, back into the pouring rain. They carried him over the squelching mud, almost dragging him as he quickly became heavier and even more awkward to hold. The thunder had died down by now, leaving only the incessant pelt of rain.

  As they approached the guarded doors, somebody moved in the shadows.

  ‘Who goes there?’ shouted the unseen presence.

  ‘Open the door,’ growled one of the carriers. ‘The sire ordered we throw the stranger out.’

  ‘Give me a hand here,’ said a man, coming out of the dark.

  Kayn was dropped unmercifully, splashing in the mud, whilst the long, wooden bolt was slid out of the door. Finally the doors were pushed out wide and Kayn was dragged roughly beyond them.

  He lay in the mud, feeling the rain falling hard on his face. He felt weak and wasted, his mind and body dull and numb. He looked up into the rain, squinting, and glimpsed the black, starless sky, thunder-scarred and ominous, glad that none of the crowd remained to see him now. Perhaps they were lying in wait somewhere for the next commotion to arise.

  Then he thought of the brute and stiffened. What if the brute came again?

  Suddenly, he heard small scratching sounds nearby, somewhere to his left. He rolled his head in the direction of the sounds. Something was coming nearer, hidden in the darkness. He felt fear but he was too tired to move. Then, whatever it was that moved toward him finally reached him, but by then Kayn had mercifully passed out.

  When he next woke up, Kayn found himself inside a musky place, atop a small pile of dry straw. There was a terrible stench about the place, of dirty cowhides and pigskins. He propped himself up and looked around him, wondering where he was. His body felt tender and bruised, but his mind was clear.

  A face, hard-skinned and etched with deep lines, hovered inches away from his own, small dark eyes watching him intently.

  Kayn flinched, surprised, and rolled away in the straw, pressing himself into the corner.