Forever Man

by Brian Matthews

  Izzy’s gaze was drawn to the body and she immediately recognized the billowy shirt, the jeans, the white Sketchers, though the clothes were stained with dirt and sweat and far too much blood. Wanting to deny what she was seeing but knowing she couldn’t, Izzy took in every familiar feature and angle and nuance—all in one unkind, unforgiving moment.

  She had found Natalie.

  Her beautiful baby girl, cold and lifeless—

  On the ground beside her, Jack moaned and began to stir. Opposite his father, Kevin maintained his peculiar emotional detachment, humming quietly to himself as he acknowledged no one and nothing.

  No time. She had no time. Rolling onto her side, Izzy dropped her shoulders and tried to work her bound wrists down beneath her hips and bring her arms to her front.

  “Shut up!”

  Izzy froze. That was Webber’s voice, coming from outside the cave. If he returned before she got free….

  Desperate to escape, spurred on by her urgency, Izzy wrenched her shoulders lower and pulled her wrists forward. But whatever bound her arms—she had to believe it was the same duct tape that secured her ankles—had been fastened above her wrists; there wasn’t enough room to clear her hips.

  Coughing and sputtering, Jack lifted his head from the ground. The flesh around his hate-filled eyes was already bruising from the blow to his face.

  “Bitch.” He spat the word at her. “Miserable fucking bitch.”

  Nearby, Kevin began humming louder, a melody as disjointed as his personality.

  Izzy gave Jack a sharp kick to keep him at bay. Then she brought her knees up hard against her chest as she jerked her arms down. With her muscles corded from the strain, she pushed, pushed, and was rewarded when the bound juncture of her arms slid under her left hip. Grinning, she heaved her arms forward—

  —and found they wouldn’t move.

  “No,” Izzy cried. “Please, no.”

  Outside the cave, Webber was yelling again.

  “Quit talking about my sister!”

  Jack reached out and grabbed her ankle. “Time’s up, you whore.”

  Standing near Natalie’s body, Kevin’s humming grew until it couldn’t be contained. His mouth opened and he let out a cracking, disharmonious wail.

  With her heart laboring in her chest, Izzy tried to yank her feet free. But Jack clung stubbornly to her ankle.

  “Come here, Morris.” Jack wrapped his other hand around her leg. “We have unfinished business.”

  She ignored him, started to straighten her back. Wedged as they were under her hip, her arms were pulled tight, the duct tape that bound them digging sharply into her skin. Then she lifted her shoulders, straining, the pressure building as her muscles and tendons were stretched, drawn taut. The pain grew, a hot agony—hotter than grief, hotter than hate—building and building, until she cried out through clenched teeth and then—

  Pop!

  She’d dislocated her shoulder.

  Two quick, hard kicks to Jack’s face freed her from his grip. With another cry, Izzy wrenched her arms forward, the added space from her torn shoulder enough to bring her arms under her hips and in front of her.

  Before Jack could react, Izzy brought her hands to her face and started tearing at the tape with her teeth. The movement made her injured shoulder burn like a piece of iron in a forge.

  A new voice from outside—Bart Owens.

  “No. Don’t!”

  She couldn’t waste time wondering what was happening outside the cave. She needed her hands free. Her teeth worked at the tape.

  Kevin’s wordless singing scaled the cave’s walls, climbing dirt and frost and despair.

  With fresh blood dripping from his mouth, Jack surged to his feet and spit. A tooth fell to the dirt. From his jacket pocket, he withdrew his .38 and pointed it at her.

  His hand wavered as he said, “To hell with Webber and his orders. I’ve had enough of you.”

  He brought his other hand around to steady the gun. But before he could squeeze the trigger, Webber charged into the cave. In his hand he held a small white knife, its blade coated with blood.

  Seconds passed as Webber stared at Jack, then Izzy. Frowning, he threw an irritated glance at Kevin, whose voice continued to buffet their ears.

  Turning his attention to Jack, Webber said, “Put away the gun.”

  “She broke my fucking teeth!” Jack shouted.

  Izzy grabbed a frayed edge of duct tape with her teeth and yanked. The gray tape ripped like a noisy zipper and suddenly her hands were free.

  “I’ll do more than that,” Webber warned, “if you don’t put that gun down.”

  With a dislocated shoulder, her wounded arm hung uselessly at her side. So Izzy reached down with her good arm and tried to tear the tape around her ankles. But it was hard to find a purchase with one hand.

  Eyes darting between Webber and Izzy, Jack seemed to weigh the consequences of his choices. He lowered the pistol.

  “That’s good,” Webber said. “Very good.”

  Sweat slicked Izzy’s skin. Her fingers kept slipping, couldn’t find a firm grip on the tape.

  Like some kind of insane opera singer, Kevin’s melody was reaching a crescendo.

  Webber turned to Izzy. “Oh, no you don’t,” he said, racing over to Izzy. Placing the knife at her throat, he added, “Hands off the tape.”

  Izzy ignored him. He was responsible for Natalie’s death. She was going to kill him.

  “Don’t try my patience, Morris. I will cut your damn throat.”

  “Go ahead,” Izzy choked out, her hand still working at the tape. “I can’t hurt more than I already am.”

  “Crazy bitch, I tried to warn you—”

  Webber didn’t get a chance to finish his sentence. Three things happened at once.

  Bart Owens emerged through the narrow crevasse, his face a mask of anger.

  Jack pivoted and raised his gun, pointing it at Bart.

  And Kevin Sallinen stopped singing. From his place near her dead daughter, he spoke. His voice was high and clear. Two syllables were all he uttered, but they chilled Izzy to her core.

  “Uh-oh.”

  Chapter 36

  “Watch out!” Izzy shouted to Owens. “It’s—!”

  “Jack,” Webber yelled. “Kill him!”

  Grinning, Jack fired, the sharp crack of the pistol turned explosively loud in the confined space of the cave. He wasn’t used to gunfire; the barrel lifted and his shot went high and wide.

  Owens rushed Jack. At the same time, Izzy tried to roll away from Webber, but he reached down, gripped her hair and jerked upward. She cried out. He yanked again, and she had little choice but to work her legs beneath her. She stood awkwardly, her balance hobbled by the duct tape binding her ankles.

  Once she was on her feet, Webber dropped his knife, drew a gun from his waistband. He jammed the barrel hard against her temple.

  Without hesitating, Izzy dropped her good hand to his groin, grabbed a fistful of denim and squeezed. When she felt his testicles come together in her clenched fist, she wrenched her hand around, bearing down with all the strength she could muster.

  Webber paled, his Adam’s apple stuttering as he tried to expel air. His knees buckled as if he’d been felled by a sledgehammer. In his pain, his hand clenched reflexively. The gun fired, but his collapse had pulled the barrel from Izzy’s head. The round grazed her arm, tracing a line of fire along her flesh

  Owens slammed his body into Jack’s, his open hand smacking the man’s arm upward. Another gunshot shattered the air. Dirt fell from the ceiling. Tiny fissures formed along the uneven surface.

  Next to Jack, Kevin stuffed his fingers in his ears and began to cry.

  Izzy was hindered by the duct tape around her ankles and couldn’t prevent herself from tumbling to the ground with Webber. She landed on her injured shoulder, this time almost passing out from the pain.

  Webber, writhing on the ground, clutched at his groin. In his agony, he’d dropped his
gun. It lay on the ground on the other side of him, out of Izzy’s reach.

  Fighting back waves of nausea, Izzy watched as Jack tried to bring the gun down, tried to get a shot off at his attacker. Owens, his lips pulled back from his teeth, had grabbed hold of Jack’s wrist, forced the man’s arm down and sideways, away from his body. Both men shook from the effort, and Izzy wondered how Jack could continue wrestling with Owens. How he could endure the pain?

  With a frustrated cry, Jack drove a heel into Owens’s instep. Then he followed up with a stinging blow to the old man’s jaw.

  Owens grunted, shook his head. He drove a fist hard into the banker’s gut, doubling the man over, then brought his knee up to connect with Jack’s cheek.

  All the while, the old man never let go of the arm holding the gun.

  The blow hardly seemed to register with Jack—he fought with the frenzy of a rabid animal. Pulling himself upright, blood seeping from a cut on his lip, he latched onto Owens’s throat with his hand. His eyes bulged as he tried to choke the life from his foe.

  This has to be it, Izzy thought. There was no way Jack could take much more of the pain from Owens’s defenses. Now she would get the opportunity she wanted, the opportunity she needed: the chance to put down Webber and Jack forever.

  The chance to avenge her daughter’s death.

  Instead of releasing Owens, Jack levered his taller frame over the other man. Owens gripped Jack’s wrist and twisted, trying to break the chokehold on his throat. Jack simply redoubled his efforts, his thick fingers pushing deep into the dark flesh of Owens’s neck, closing off his airway, cutting off his circulation.

  Stunned, Izzy couldn’t understand how Jack could withstand his attack. The escalating agony coursing through Jack’s body should have incapacitated him, but the bastard showed no signs that he felt anything.

  She was going to be robbed of her vengeance.

  Webber stirred next to her. Using her good arm, she drove an elbow into his jaw and felt his teeth come crashing together. He grabbed her bad arm and twisted—but she was so far gone into a fury that the pain barely registered.

  Then they both lunged for the gun.

  * * *

  Thunder pealed through the dark clouds surrounding her.

  Run. She needed to run. She had to run. Only she couldn’t remember why. She ran anyway. She ran as if her life depended on it.

  She felt no ground under her feet, could not discern a sky above. Nothing. Only clouds. Or perhaps it was fog. Thick whorls of putrid-smelling mist swirled about her, spinning wildly like a cyclone, making her dizzy, making her weak.

  And cold. Oh God, she felt so damn cold, as if the marrow in her bones had frozen solid.

  Still, she ran.

  Memories threatened her, floating out from the grayish mist. But no, the memories were the mist. Nebulous vapors came together to form a monstrous head.

  A face. Unfriendly, angry, screaming silently, its mouth gaping impossibly wide and dripping red saliva like arterial blood—Jimmy Cain.

  Then he was gone, swallowed by the fog.

  The head swirled, turning madly, and a second face emerged on the opposite side, wide and smiling, familiar wrinkles etched in the mist. It was her father.

  She wanted to call out to him, but like Jimmy, he was consumed by the mist.

  The head rolled and spun, a mad carnival ride, and another face surfaced, eyes wide with concern, panic flowing through the fluid swirls of fog. Her mother’s searching face.

  The head pulsed and her mother’s face was gone, dissolved. In its place, a monstrous shape, lupine and feral, formed. It loped along on swells of foul fog, pursuing her, huge jaws snapping soundlessly at her heels—

  Her mind skittered away from the terrifying image. She didn’t want to remember.

  Still she ran.

  Another thunderclap tore through the air, louder this time, cascading down from the mountainous heavens that weren’t there. Not really.

  Then the shape dissolved back into the mist.

  She could now hear voices. Whispers. Susurrations which beckoned to her, far in the distance—whatever distance meant in a place like this. And while she couldn’t make out the words, she knew they were important: they were the first remotely human sounds she had heard in how long?

  Running, running, she tried to locate the voices, but they surrounded her, echoing through the mist. When she turned—or did she? It was hard to tell in this shapeless void—the voices remained diffused, directionless. She pushed herself faster, chewing up ground that didn’t exist. Fog parted before her.

  Ahead, she spotted a bright spot, brighter than the fog. She bolted toward it.

  Closer. She was closer.

  The mists thinned. The light grew like a nascent star. The light exploded into a supernova—

  —and Natalie pried open her eyes.

  * * *

  “Mom?”

  Startled at the sound of the voice, Izzy stopped struggling and looked toward the back of the cave.

  Webber snatched up the gun and pushed Izzy off him. As he got to his feet, Owens released Jack’s wrist and drove his knuckles into the man’s throat. The impact stunned the banker into releasing him. Owens began retching, trying to draw breath into his lungs.

  Removing his fingers from his ears, Kevin walked over to Natalie, knelt down, and ran his fingers through her hair. Brushing a few strands from her face, he said, “Pretty lady.”

  Natalie, her eyes open, drew in a shuddering breath, then blinked.

  “Oh God. Mom.” Her voice was weak, trembling. But she was speaking.

  Her daughter was alive!

  How? No, she didn’t care how.

  “Say goodbye, Bartholomew,” said Webber, leveling the Glock at the old man.

  “No!” shouted Izzy and kicked at Webber. Her heel connected with his thigh just as he fired, shoving him off balance, causing him to almost shoot Jack. The smell of burnt gunpowder filled the cave. Her ears rang solidly.

  Webber spun to face her, eyes wide with rage. Then she was looking up the barrel of a .40 caliber death sentence.

  “Mom!” cried Natalie.

  “Shut up, kid.” Then Webber jerked his head at the banker. “Let’s do this different. I still need you, Jack. So, step away from the old man. Now.”

  Rubbing at his throat, Jack threw Owens a baleful glare and then backed away. As a parting shot, he said, “I don’t know why everyone’s so afraid of you. I almost killed your ass.”

  Owens, his face bruised, his lip bleeding, returned Jack’s glare. The man was breathing heavily, his shoulders bent. Fatigue deepened the lines on his face. For the first time since Izzy had met him, he truly looked like an old man.

  With the gun still pointed at her, Webber said, “Wrong, Jack. If it weren’t for your son, you’d be in worse shape than him.”

  “Kevin never touched him,” Jack said. “All he did was stand there.”

  “All he had to do was stand there.”

  Lying on the ground, Izzy knew she had to do something or they weren’t going to get out of this alive. She edged herself closer to Webber, drawing her knees up. Her eyes sought Owens. She’d only have one chance—

  From the other side of the lanterns, he met her gaze, gave her an almost imperceptible nod. Then he focused his attention on Jack.

  “Your son,” Owens said. “He has von Kliner’s Syndrome.”

  Jack frowned. “What does that matter?”

  “You know it’s a rare condition.”

  Webber’s lifted the gun, aimed at Owens. His knuckles whitened. “Shut up, ‘Forever Man’.”

  Jack glanced curiously at Webber. “What—?”

  “It’s so rare,” the old man continued, “that Darryl and I have only seen one other von Kliner child. And that didn’t end well.

  “That person was Darryl’s sister, Jesse. He killed her for having it.”

  Webber’s eyes flew wide with rage and he fired. At the same instant, Izzy drove her legs
forward and smashed Webber’s knee back at an unnatural angle. Cartilage shattered and Webber collapsed to the ground.

  Take out the knee and you take out the man.

  Webber lay on the ground, his mouth gaped open, the veins in his neck throbbing. But his eyes had gone strangely blank.

  Izzy looked over at Owens. He was on the ground, blood seeping from a gunshot wound to his chest.

  With his recuperative powers, he should be fine. Then again, why hadn’t Jack invoked the old man’s defenses? What if his other abilities weren’t functioning? Were they somehow lies?

  A shadow moved across her. She looked up to see Jack standing over her, his gun pointed at her head.

  “That wasn’t nice, Morris,” he said, gesturing to Webber with his gun. “He’s my ticket out of this place. And I’m not going to let you ruin it for me.”

  Izzy scrambled for an idea. She couldn’t let Jack win. Natalie depended on her.

  Owens, his voice weak, called out to Jack. “Wrong…. Darryl never wanted you. Your son…has powers. Abilities. Darryl…I don’t think he ever planned on taking you with him.”

  Jack’s face spasmed in rage. He spun and aimed the gun at Bart.

  “No, it’s me! This is about me!” Jack was snarling now. He straightened his arm, the hand holding the gun trembling.

  Before Jack could shoot, Izzy propped herself up with both hands—her left shoulder hurt, oh damn it hurt—and dug her bound heels into the dirt. Then she launched herself at Jack. He saw the movement and spun, snapping the gun around and firing.

  The round punched into her side like a fist of burning coals. But she wasn’t going to let this bastard get her. She wrapped her arms around Jack’s waist, her good hand gripping the bad, her dislocated shoulder screaming in agony. She shoved hard against the ground. The momentum threw Jack off balance. But his stance was too strong. He remained standing. He aimed the gun at her head.

  Izzy loosened her arms and slid down to Jack’s knees and his shot missed. Before he could fire a third time, she squeezed again, twisted, rolling, dragging Jack’s legs with her. His knees buckled and he fell. He squeezed a fourth shot, but the round impacted into the cave’s ceiling. Dirt fell onto the lanterns. More cracks spread along the surface.