by Neil Spring
I tried but came up with a mess.
‘That would make your premonition a shadow of one future reality. Our reality. But equally,’ he smiled, ‘there could be other realities, dimensions in which your friend is still alive.’ His academic’s eyebrows drew together. ‘If there are other dimensions, it’s certainly conceivable that the human unconscious might glimpse them or even influence them.’ He told me then about clairvoyance, psychogenesis and other psychic phenomena, and I was enthralled until an unsettling thought broke in.
‘If other dimensions exist it follows that other life forms exist . . .’
His smile faded. ‘Your grandfather believes that the entities plaguing this community originate in hell. He thinks they are demons.’
‘And you?’
‘I don’t care where they come from or what they’re called.’ His intelligent eyes met mine. ‘I care about what they want from us.’
*
When I opened my eyes, the others were fast asleep, the television flickering its harsh light across Araceli’s face. A local news reporter faced the camera; behind him the scene reminded me of Guy Fawkes night: groups of excited youngsters and people with flasks of coffee, binoculars and cameras.
‘I’m here in Little Haven, where a group sky watch has been under way for the last forty-five minutes,’ the reporter said. The grin on his face was saying, Stay with me, folks. We all know this is a bit of fun.
As I shifted in my seat something made me turn my attention towards the window – a slight movement, a flicker of light. No more than that.
I held still, really focusing on the window. Lightning? If so, it would come again. But I couldn’t hear thunder.
Your imagination. You’re seeing things that don’t exist.
There! I definitely wasn’t imagining it: a light had flashed in the bottom of the window.
Don’t respond, I reminded myself. The more you indulge your fears, the more they will rule you. Just a day earlier my response to a strange light would have been totally different. I would have been on my feet, checking and checking, until my paranoia turned to anger at myself and finally guilt. Not this time. I squeezed my eyes shut, yet even as I did the air hummed, vibrating. I opened my eyes again. The urge to wake Araceli or Dr Caxton was almost irrepressible.
How are they sleeping through this? And why are both of them asleep? That didn’t seem right to me, didn’t seem natural, somehow. Unless something was making them sleep.
The light came again, and again.
Just ignore it. Nothing will happen. Nothing will happen.
But something was happening. There was a heaviness in the air and the flickering light was getting brighter.
My heart was thundering now as I sat upright, frozen, on the edge of the sofa. The ice-white glare shimmered at the bottom of the window. Determined. It wanted my attention. It wanted me to look. I wrenched my gaze away.
Suddenly I found the strength to move again. If there had been any curtains I would have shut out the light by dragging them across, but as there were none I turned to face Dr Caxton. I whispered, ‘Wake up.’
His eyes fluttered as he surfaced from sleep. Then he saw it. He leaned forward out of his armchair. ‘What on earth . . .?’
I raised a hand. The doctor nodded in understanding, his eyes as wide as saucers.
I tracked his bewildered gaze back to the window. ‘What do you think it is?’ I whispered. I felt a panicky twist in my gut. ‘Can you feel that tremble in the air?’
Dr Caxton nodded. ‘I can see it too.’
The window’s single pane of glass was trembling. Rattling now. The silvery light on the other side had begun to shift and swirl, slowly, slowly . . . solidifying.
Dr Caxton was staring into the room across the hall. ‘Robert! Oh Jesus. Look!’
The Welsh dresser in Grandfather’s study was pushed aside and the carpet on the floor was rolled back, light spilling in and flooding the floor.
That was when Araceli woke. She jumped to her feet and stumbled, disorientated, releasing a startled cry. Any nightmare she had been having had fused with waking reality. ‘What is it?’ she managed to say. She was pointing at the window.
An awful figure was framed there.
The glass rattled even harder and the television hissed snowy static.
The three of us fell silent.
It was huge. Wide shoulders seemed to fill most of the window. It was pressed right up against the glass and at least seven feet tall. ‘Spaceman’ was the word that came to mind, but at no point did I think this was an alien; rather something or someone that was trying to look like someone’s conception of an alien. It wore a one-piece silvery suit similar to the sort of protective gear worn in a nuclear plant. Its arms were disproportionately long, its neck too short, and the head wasn’t round, but rose to a peak. I caught myself staring at where its face should have been and knowing I could not look away. There were no features – none at all – just a convex black visor framed by a silver helmet.
This is what Selina was looking for. This is what Martin Marshall saw. This is what appeared at RAF Croughton in 1963. I didn’t know why it was there, but a sickening thought occurred to me: It’s come for the child.
Araceli looked at me with sudden horror.
‘Go to Tessa,’ I shouted, and she darted for the stairs.
Dr Caxton was paralysed. There was no sign of Frobisher.
I turned back to the window. The figure was still there, motionless, menacing, its whole body emitting a shimmering white light.
One day, Robert, the giants will return. Randall’s warning from my childhood rattled in my head. If Grandfather was here he’d know what to do. But Grandfather wasn’t there. And whatever this entity was, I was certain of one thing: it wanted to get in.
I thought desperately, almost with relief, Thank God for the bars over the windows, but then I remembered what had happened at RAF Croughton. If these entities could pass through chain-link fences then bars and glass wouldn’t stop them.
My stomach rolled, and I thought I might pass out.
Suddenly, the beat of feet on the stairs. Frobisher burst into the room and immediately staggered back, falling against the wall, arms outstretched as if to push the frightful vision away. ‘What the hell is it?’ he yelled.
I couldn’t speak, couldn’t move. Evil was everywhere, corrupting and persuasive.
That glass is going to shatter. Those bars will bend, and that monstrous thing will get in here with us. And some part of me thought that was all right.
‘Robert, listen to me.’
Was that Dr Caxton speaking? I thought it might be.
‘You remember what your grandfather told us? They can’t get in unless they’re invited. Don’t look at it. Turn your back. Deny it!’
The giant silver figure, standing like a statue, began to glow an eerie red and raised an arm. The temperature had rocketed. My face was burning and the rank smell of sulphur filled the air.
I took a step forward, weakening. I wanted a closer look. I wanted to let it in. The black space where its face should have been was mesmerizing. It’s easy, a voice in my head said. Just unlatch the window and push it up.
‘Robert, what are you doing?’ It was as if Dr Caxton was calling to me through a dream. ‘Get the hell away from the window!’
Suddenly I thought of the incantation that Father O’Riorden had allowed me to copy down, and something in me snapped free. Without a moment’s hesitation I bolted from the living room into the study and to the top drawer in Grandfather’s desk.
Locked, of course.
The picture above the mantelpiece fell from the wall with a thump. A moment later I had retrieved the key from the back of the picture. The lock turned and the desk drawer slid out.
From the front room I could hear nothing but silence now, but wh
en I went into the hall I saw the Watcher again, its broad shoulders, wide chest and one enormous gloved hand extending between the bars and pressed against the rattling window. And I saw Dr Caxton and Frobisher. Their eyes were fastened on the giant like a magnet, their feet taking small steps towards the window.
‘Both of you get out!’ I yelled into the sitting room. ‘Take your eyes off it!’
Then I lurched forward with the same urgency I had experienced on the roof at the hotel. I felt feverish, the way you do when you have a terrible shock, and without thinking I held up the paper on which the incantation was written, thrusting it towards the glimmering Watcher as though it was a weapon. I did it without thinking, as though unseen hands had done it for me, and I screamed the words, ‘Gha D’rcest Cthasska, Gha D’rcest Cthassiss.’
I didn’t pray to God but put my faith in the power of the document between my fingers. I called on the power and knowledge within those words, crying aloud my defiance of evil, and before my eyes the enormous Watcher seemed to fade. I struggled to focus on it, uncertain for a few brief seconds whether it was even there at all.
Suddenly there was a blinding white flash, and even as I shielded my eyes with my right arm I knew what was about to happen. When the light dimmed and I looked again, I saw that I was right.
The figure had vanished.
*
My hands were shaking as I dialled Father O’Riorden’s number. When he answered, it wasn’t just his panicked voice I could hear. Somewhere in the background were voices and cars. Sirens.
‘What’s happening?’
People are leaving their houses, heading for the beach. They all look so dazed.’
‘Something’s influencing them,’ I said. ‘Something’s trying to take control of them. Have you seen Randall?’
‘No, why?’
‘Father, we need your help.’ I shot a glance at the nearest window into the yard. That Watcher is still out there and it could come back at any moment. ‘Ravenstone Farm. Come now!’
‘What do you expect me to do?’
‘Pray. We can defeat the Watchers with faith.’
A pause. Then Father O’Riorden said, ‘My God, I can see them. In the sky. Thirteen. There are thirteen of them! They . . . they’re so beautiful.’
‘Don’t look at them,’ I said, ‘not even for a second.’
‘You were right, my son. Dear Lord,’ he said, his voice a shuddering whisper. The line crackled and went dead. I banged the phone down.
Frobisher had appeared at the study door. His face was naked with shock. ‘Rob . . . she’s disappeared. She’s gone.’
The thought that Tessa had been stolen from our protection made the bottom drop out of my stomach. ‘That’s impossible. There’s no way Tessa could have got out.’
‘Not Tessa,’ Frobisher said. ‘Araceli.’
– 49 –
Despair made me freeze. And that paralysis was hardened by fear, the same fear that was growing in the eyes of the gruff journalist who blocked my way into the hall.
‘So what next?’ Frobisher asked.
I didn’t speak. The only answer was one neither of us wanted to hear.
When the Watchers are seen, disaster surely follows.
Finally I found my voice. ‘We have to do something . . . We have to get away from here.’
A shuffling sound made me turn my head towards the door. Dr Caxton stood there with Tessa at his side. Her eyes were sharp with interest, or suspicion.
‘Who did you just call on the phone?’ the child asked. She didn’t seem in the least distressed that her mother had vanished from the house. And that was alarming.
‘The police,’ I lied. ‘Where did your mother go, Tess? What happened to her?’
‘I don’t know,’ she said.
Too calm. She’s way too calm.
‘So when are they coming?’ she asked. Her body was perfectly still, arms rigid at her sides, but her voice had an edge.
‘Soon.’
‘When are they coming?’
The nearest light bulb popped. It was the bulb fitted in Grandfather’s desk lamp, and it didn’t just pop, it exploded.
‘He did it,’ Tessa said. Her gaze pierced me.
‘We all need to remain calm,’ Dr Caxton said, glancing warily at the window. ‘It’s a little power surge, that’s all.’
‘That doesn’t seem likely,’ Frobisher said. ‘The other lights are fine.’
‘Let’s go into the kitchen, where we can keep warm next to the Aga,’ Dr Caxton suggested. I promptly agreed, though Tessa was still looking at me doubtfully.
‘When are the police coming?’ she said again.
All along, from the first encounter – the ‘flying football’ that had chased Tessa and Araceli in their car on a lonely country road – to the UFO landing at the primary school, the phenomena had targeted this child. And now she wanted something from me. What?
Perhaps Father O’Riorden would have the answer. If he made it here. Grandfather had said we were dealing with demons. Well, weren’t Catholic priests empowered to defeat such forces? I had very little time to find out.
‘The police station is about the same distance as your mummy’s hotel,’ I said to Tessa, trying hard not to betray my rising fear. ‘They’ll be ten minutes. No longer.’
‘Do you think I am stupid, Robert Wilding?’
‘What?’
‘The kitchen?’ Dr Caxton said again, his voice tight with tension. ‘I really think—’
‘Because that’s what it feels like to me,’ the child said sweetly. ‘It sounds like you, Robert Wilding, think I am a gullible little bitch.’
Dr Caxton shot me a glance that was alarmed enough for me to read his concern.
‘Tell me who you really spoke to on the phone,’ Tessa demanded. ‘Was it your drunkard boss, Robert?’
The sneer in those words stung me.
‘Or did you phone your filthy murdering grandfather?’
‘Why don’t we put Tessa back to bed,’ I said, hearing the strain in my voice.
‘Or why don’t you tell us what you are up to?’ She gave me a razor-sharp smile, keeping her lips together. Then her gaze dropped to the jagged remains of the light bulb.
There was a long moment of silence.
Abruptly, Tessa pinned a stare on Caxton and Frobisher. Their eyes were rolling back in their heads then closing as if they were going to sleep standing up. Suddenly their eyes snapped open in unison. Both men faced me, their faces masks of agitation.
‘Why don’t you answer her, Robert?’ Frobisher said.
‘Frank, now wait a moment. Let’s go into the kitchen and—’
‘I’d like to know too,’ Dr Caxton said.
The light above us flickered.
‘I was talking to the police.’
‘That’s what you said,’ Frobisher responded. His eyes were sharply scrutinizing. ‘I wonder, are you lying? What other lies have you told?’
‘I think we all need to sit tight and remain very quiet, all right? For all we know that . . . silver giant is still out there.’
‘And for all we know,’ Tessa said in a delicate voice, ‘you are on its side.’
I faced the child. It was clear that there was very little of the old Tessa behind those eyes, but I could think of nothing else to do at that moment except try to reason with her . . . or it. ‘I’ve already explained to you, I’m trying to solve this. The Happenings have nothing to do with me.’
‘But these events occur when you’re around. You can’t deny that,’ said Frobisher.
‘Frank, you’re being unreasonable. Something is disturbing your judgement.’
‘You’re not above suspicion either, Frank,’ Dr Caxton said.
‘Or you!’ Frobisher said, wheeling to face Caxton.
Just then a burst of static made us all jump. All except Tessa.
I turned my head to Grandfather’s radio set by the window. It was the old square sort from the ’60s, with a protruding rectangular handle, two dials and a slatted front.
‘The Met Office has issued a severe weather warning,’ said a husky voice from the radio. ‘Areas particularly at risk include parts of Pembrokeshire near St Brides Bay in Wales. In other news, Prime Minister Harold Macmillan has declined to comment on rumours of his imminent retirement.’
I pulled the radio’s power cord from the wall just as I registered what had been said. I realized my mouth had fallen open. ‘Harold Macmillan was prime minister in 1963!’
Frobisher took a step towards me. ‘News broadcasts out of time – whatever next?’
‘I have no idea how it did that,’ I said. ‘I swear!’
‘This is madness,’ Frobisher shouted.
‘You’re right,’ Dr Caxton said. ‘Madness is precisely what it is.’
I raised an apprehensive hand. ‘Look, we need to stick together. Whatever the hell is out there could come back at any—’
Another burst of sound from the radio. We all stared at the power cord on the floor. Unplugged.
‘Officials at the Ministry of Defence as well as the RAF have confirmed that unusual aerial phenomena have been reported in west Wales and that this activity is not attributable to any military operations. Reports are also coming in of strange lights and objects over London which are not visible on radar . . .’
‘Whatever you are,’ I said to Tessa, ‘however you’re doing this, just stop.’
A foul odour filled the study. The radio buzzed.
‘I don’t think you look very well,’ Dr Caxton said. It took me a second or two to realize he was talking to me.
Frobisher was nodding at me. ‘Doesn’t he look shifty?’
‘Yes, he looks strained too,’ Tessa said in a sweet voice. ‘I imagine this is a great strain – for such a forgetful man.’
I doubt my heart really missed a beat, but I thought for a moment it did.