by Mark Parker
Once the laughter subsided, Mr. Trueheart placed a thin-fingered hand on Warren’s shoulder and said, “We must hurry. You have to be there before the start of the parade. Otherwise people might ask questions. They might spot you and put a stop to the whole thing.”
Warren nodded. “Okay.”
“Come.”
They returned to the foxhole and knelt down before the Maxwell House contraption.
“Look here,” Mr. Trueheart said, and he pointed to a small toggle switch poking through an eyelet at the back of the coffee can. Warren hadn’t noticed it until now. It was switched down, presumably in the “off” position.
“You flip it up to turn it on,” explained Mr. Trueheart. “Then it will be alive.”
“Will the light on the top come on?” Warren asked, pointing to the darkened Christmas bulb.
“No. The light was there only for the test runs. It wouldn’t be prudent to have it lit up like a...well, like a Christmas tree, considering what we’re trying to do. Am I right?”
“Sure.”
“You’ll need to switch it on once you’ve placed it in its spot. Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
“And then you need to get far away from it.”
“How far?”
“Back to the street, at the very closest. But you should probably just go home after switching it on. You don’t need to be there when it happens. It’s on a timer.”
“How long is the timer?”
“It’s set to go off exactly three minutes after it’s turned on.”
“Alive,” Warren said.
“Yes. Alive.”
“I can do it.”
“Yes, Warren. I know you can.”
Because they’re monsters, Warren thought, and they need to be stopped. They can fool everyone else but they can’t fool us.
He wanted to get outside and try out the mask.
***
Mr. Trueheart helped him slide it into his backpack. He helped Warren tug the straps up over his shoulders. The thing inside the backpack wasn’t hardly as heavy as Warren had been expecting. He’s spent the better part of the year buying supplies for Mr. Trueheart—everything from powdered dish detergent to fertilizer, from soap to nine-volt batteries—but he didn’t know exactly how Mr. Trueheart had built the contraption. What was inside the coffee can?
At the front door, Mr. Trueheart said, “I would do this myself, you understand, but I can’t, Warren. I’ve grown too conspicuous after all this time to be out there among them.”
“Out in the open for anyone to see,” Warren added.
“That’s right. No amount of face paint will protect me. No mask, either. Not anymore. So, you see, I must remain in the house. But that’s okay, because this is where the second phase of the plan must take place. Phase one involves you at Kennedy Park. Phase two involves me right here in my home. Do you understand?”
He really didn’t, not fully, but he trusted his friend so he said, “Yes.”
“Excellent. Now run along, Warren. You’ve got a job to do. And you can’t be late.”
Out on the street, Warren pulled the mask over his face. It stank of mildew and it was hard to breathe through the tiny slits in the rubber, but he felt safe wearing it. The greasepaint hadn’t been as effective as he had hoped—those sixth graders on the porch had noticed him—but the mask felt right. As if he could walk around all night, right through a crowd of people, and never be noticed by anyone.
This theory was reinforced when he arrived at Kennedy Park. It was still early, but there were already a few kids and their parents milling about, waiting for the Halloween parade to start. No one paid Warren any mind as he hurried across the field to the baseball diamond. Near the bleachers, he wedged himself between two of the bushes that made up the hedgerow. He was careful sliding his backpack off and unzipping it. He was even more cautious removing the Maxwell House contraption from it, and settling it down in the dusty sand behind the bushes. The thing was incredibly light. He wanted to shake it and see if things rolled around inside—he’d also purchased ball bearings, screws, and nails at the hardware store in town at Mr. Trueheart’s behest just a few weeks ago—but he was afraid the thing might blow up in his hands. Instead, he covered it up with some dead leaves then climbed up into the bleaches to wait for the crowd to grow.
The mask still over his head, he watched the children execute cartwheels in the grass, watched a group of young girls play hide and seek behind a copse of trees, watched parents talking and smoking and looking at their cell phones. Despite whatever power the mask might have, they all still looked like regular people to him. Mr. Trueheart said it would take time—
It’s not instantaneous. It will take some time to...well, to grow on you. But soon you’ll see them exactly as I do...
Warren would wait.
He had always been a patient child.
***
Just about everyone has been replaced, Warren. Replacements fill your school, replacements walk up and down your streets. Let me ask you, Warren—have you noticed anything peculiar about your mother lately? No? Well, that’s good. That’s good. Maybe there’s still time to save some of us, yeah?
***
At eight o’clock, the children gathered along the third-base line of the diamond at Kennedy Park, all manner of ghoul and goblin and witch and mummy in attendance. They kicked up plumes of dust with their sneakers, laughed raucously, swatted at each other with ninja swords, zapped random strangers with ray guns, whose barrels lit up with sparks of flinty fire. Their parents climbed up into the bleachers, some taking photos of the festive lineup, others still busy on their cell phones. An infant’s plangent cries echoed out across the darkening park.
No one noticed Warren Enck.
The mask was protecting him, just as Mr. Trueheart had promised, though whether it was actually hiding him from the horde, much in the way an invisibility cloak might work, or if it merely made him blend in with the rest of them, Warren didn’t know. Maybe it didn’t matter.
Someone blew a whistle. The costumed children grew quiet and listened to instruction from a large woman wearing bunny ears. They would march down Windell and through the town, trick or treating. The costumed children—the replacements—cheered. A few parents snapped photos and the baby continued to cry.
Warren clambered down the bleachers and crept behind the hedgerow unnoticed. Crouching down, he brushed the dead leaves from the Maxwell House contraption—
(the bomb)
—and slid his hand around the base of it until his small fingers found the toggle switch. He did not hesitate to switch it into the “up” position. Despite Mr. Trueheart’s assurance, Warren held his breath, anticipating the Christmas light to wink on and give away his location. But it didn’t. Relief washed over him.
Three minutes, he thought, crawling out from beneath the hedgerow. He could make it to the street with no problem, but he wouldn’t go home. He wanted to watch the bomb go off, wanted to see the replacements, the monsters, die in the blast. With the mask on, he felt certain he would see their true selves as they writhed and died in the fire.
Warren ran across the park toward Windell Street. Streetlamps blinked on in the dark, as if to illuminate his approach. Cars swooshed by, their headlights overly bright. There was a bench at the corner of the block, directly beneath a BUS STOP sign. Warren sat, readjusted his mask so that he could see better through the eye holes, and waited for the explosion.
He wore no wristwatch, but counted out the seconds, the minutes, in a low whisper. Three minutes. Many of the costumed children in the park had flashlights, and they switched them on now—dozens of bright little diodes fireflying in the darkness. They began to march toward Windell.
Warren counted out all three minutes.
Waited.
Nothing happened.
Recognizing that he could have been off by a few seconds, he waited, his palms sweating on the knees of his cargo pants, his sour breath filling
the rubber mask. He could feel droplets of perspiration trickling down his temples, his forehead, his cheeks. His respiration sounded like an asthmatic’s wheeze.
And still—nothing happened.
The queue of children—
(replacements)
—spilled out onto Windell, led by the large woman in rabbit ears. Parents followed. No explosion detonated by the baseball diamond. The world was unnaturally silent.
Warren watched the parade stomp by him. He took note of each costumed doppelganger, how they moved so convincingly like children, how their shrill voices sounded no different than they had a year ago. They were good at masking themselves and blending in. Mr. Trueheart had warned Warren that they would be.
After the parade had moved on down Windell and vacated the park altogether, Warren got up from the bench. Hesitantly, he crossed the field and approached the baseball diamond. Beneath the moonlight, the bleachers looked shiny and polished. The pitcher’s mound was like a ghostly white humpback rising out of the earth.
Warren crawled through the hedgerow and stared down at Mr. Trueheart’s bomb. He stared at it for a long, long time. He counted out 180 seconds, mumbling the numbers inside the mask, and still the bomb did not go off.
Summoning some courage, he flicked a finger against the side of the coffee can. It made a hollow dong sound. He lifted the whole contraption and shook it gingerly. Nothing rattled around inside. When he finally decided to pry the can off the wooden board, a part of him felt like a traitor to Mr. Trueheart. He also worried that the thing might blow up in his face.
But it didn’t blow up; it came away from the board with little resistance, having only been tacked down with small, thin nails. Warren peeled the can off the board completely, the spools of wires pulling taut—Warren held his breath—and then he tipped the can upside down and peered inside.
It was empty.
The wires had be soldered to the interior of the can, but they weren’t attached to anything. Similarly, the Christmas bulb poking from the base of the can was connected to nothing: it was simply held in place by two pieces of masking tape. The toggle switch was constructed in a similar fashion, having been pushed through a hole in the can but held in place by several bands of tape. There were no wires connected to anything. It was just a tin can nailed to a board.
Warren shoved the contraption further under the bushes then stood up. He remained standing there for some time, uncertain as to what this all meant and wondering what his next move should be.
“Phase Two,” he muttered to himself eventually, recalling that Mr. Trueheart would be in the process of Phase Two at his house right now. Whatever Phase Two was...
***
I was overseas the first time I noticed something was off. We grabbed someone from the nearby village—someone whom I had been spying on, keeping tabs on, someone I recognized wasn’t quite right—and we tied them up in a shed. Even when he cried and begged and screamed, I knew it was all a facade. Do you know what a facade is, Warren? It’s a mask, just like the kind children wear on Halloween. This monster was wearing a mask, Warren, a human mask, but he hadn’t fooled me. He hadn’t fooled any of us.
Do you know what we did?
Warren does not.
We removed the mask, Warren. We cut it right off him and exposed him for exactly what he was. And that’s when I was convinced. They were among us but they couldn’t hide, not if we’re vigilant and pay attention and have no fear. Do you have any fear, Warren?
Warren shakes his head.
Good, says Mr. Trueheart. I didn’t think you did. That’s good. Because we’ve got a mission, you and me. Something we need to do.
Warren asks what that is.
To save the world, Warren. To save the world.
***
He had to muster up some courage to mount the porch steps and knock on Mr. Trueheart’s door. This wasn’t one of their scheduled meetings and he’d never stopped by Mr. Trueheart’s house unannounced before.
There were no footsteps on the other side of the door.
Warren knocked again.
He was perspiring like mad beneath the mask, but he felt calm inside it, protected, and he didn’t want to take it off.
Warren waited, but there were no footsteps. No Mr. Trueheart. He began to worry, and wondered if something terrible had befallen his friend. Had the replacements caught on to their plan? Did that explain why their homemade bomb was nothing but a hollow shell? Had they gotten into Mr. Trueheart’s house without him knowing?
This last thought sent a chill down Warren’s spine. All species of terrible thoughts filled his mind. What, exactly, were the replacements capable of? Mr. Trueheart said they were terrible creatures that paraded as people, but what exactly made them so terrible?
For the first time, Warren’s confusion bordered on self-doubt.
He reached out and turned the doorknob. Pushed. Mr. Trueheart’s door eased open with a squeal.
The smell of tomato soup struck him as he stepped inside, just as it always did...but now, there was something else. Something more rank.
It smells like a toilet, Warren realized as he walked slowly into the house.
“Mr. Trueheart,” he called.
Paused.
No answer.
He peered into the darkened rooms as he passed by them on his way down the hall. They were all empty. He glanced into the kitchen and saw the cone of paper still rolled up on the kitchen table. Warren’s empty drinking glass still stood at the edge of the table. Nothing looked unusual or out of place.
“Mr. Trueheart? Are you here?”
Mr. Trueheart was here: Warren found him in the foxhole, right in the center of the floor, in the spot where the Maxwell House bomb—
(not a bomb)
—had been earlier. He was sprawled out on the carpet, his body strangely crumpled. The smell of feces was stronger here. There was something on the floor near Mr. Trueheart’s right hand. There was something on the carpet by his head, too. Warren crept closer for better inspection. The item beside Mr. Trueheart’s right hand was a gun. The something by Mr. Trueheart’s head was actually a puddle of blood, so dark in the poor lighting of the foxhole that it looked as black as velvet.
Warren stood over Mr. Trueheart and looked down at him. He was startled to find Mr. Trueheart’s eyes still open, though there was an absence in them, something missing. There was also a small dime-sized hole at his temple from which two delicate streamers of blood issued. There were hunks of matter in the blood and on the carpet and, Warren noticed when he looked up, along the cushions of the nearby loveseat, too. Some of the chunks had Mr. Trueheart’s hair stuck to them. Warren was suddenly grateful that Mr. Trueheart was facing the ceiling, for he feared the opening at the back of his friend’s head was much larger and messier than the one at his temple.
Warren stared down at his friend’s body for some time. He didn’t count the seconds, the minutes, so he would never be sure how long he stood there, sweating inside that mask. Then, after a while, he adjourned to the kitchen, where he located the bottle of liquor on the counter—the bottle with the bright red turkey on it. He saw that there was only a little bit left in it.
Warren peeled the rubber mask up over his face, luxuriating in the way the sweat on his face grew instantly chilly in the air. He gathered up the bottle in two hands and brought the spout to his mouth. When the liquor hit his throat, he gagged and dropped the bottle on the floor. He thought he might throw up, and dropped to his knees, coughing.
After the feeling passed and he didn’t throw up, he swiped tears from his eyes and, using one of the kitchen chairs for support, climbed unsteadily to his feet.
Before leaving the house, Warren peered back into the foxhole, though he didn’t dare go down there again.
“I’m sorry,” he called out to Mr. Trueheart’s body. “I’m sorry they got you. We should have done something sooner.”
In the foyer, Warren pulled the mask back down over his face a
nd slipped out into the night.
***
He screamed when we cut his face off, Warren. But underneath! Oh, Warren, there was no hiding what that monster truly was! And we made him suffer. Yes we did, son. Yes we did.
***
It was late by the time Warren arrived home. The TV was still on in the living room, but his mother was passed out on the couch and snoring like a locomotive. Laddie was in her lap; his tiny black head popped up as Warren approached and, possibly because the dog did not recognize Warren in the mask, or possibly because he simply did not like or trust Warren, he began yipping shrilly.