Darkest Minds

by Bacon, Stephen

  Whitey drew his Smith and Wesson and touched his heels to the sorrel. He rode in fast and as soon as he was close enough he threw a .45 slug into the dog closest to him. He expected the dogs to scatter but they did not. They bit at the sorrel, at Whitey’s legs and continued to work Ignacio.

  Finally a dog crashed into Ignacio and bore him down to the dirt. The young Mexican flipped himself quickly and worked the knife into the dog’s belly dragging it up as hard as he could, knowing he was fighting for his life. He knew Whitey was close – he had heard the hoof beats and the boom of his .45. Hard teeth tore into his cheek. Ignacio punched and then bit back as growling bodies crowded him.

  The .45 boomed again and Whitey was forced to pull the horse clear of the leaping dogs. He watched Ignacio fall and knew there was nothing for it – he had four shots left in his revolver and the hooves of the sorrel, he used both. A whistle cut through the grunts, growls and screams. Three more dogs stayed in the dirt as the remainder of the pack scattered for the open desert. Whitey looked up and saw the man sat on his haunches watching the floor of the canyon. The hair rose on the back of Whitey’s neck. Although the man was perhaps eighty yards away he could make his features out clearly; paler than any Texan had a right to be, hawk-like nose, slit of a mouth and eyes straight out of a hog that had tasted the flesh of man. Whitey aimed the Smith and Wesson and pulled the trigger. Click, the hammer fell on an empty chamber. By the time Whitey had holstered the pistol and drawn the Marlin the man was gone.

  Ignacio was a mess; the wounds on his arms and legs were on the whole superficial and even the bite that had ripped his cheek away while a horrific wound was nothing compared to those torn in his neck and gut. Dark blood blacker than ink on a quill leaked out of ‘Nacio to stain the sand. Whitey wrung his hands.

  “Shit, boy” There were tears in his eyes.

  Ignacio coughed, a wet sound that Whitey had heard in Lorrie’s hospital room near the end. He had his hands pressed to his neck and gut.

  “No paso mucho tiempo dejo, eh Whitey?”

  “No, son, not much time at all.”

  “You roll me one of those horrible little cigarettes you smoke?”

  Whitey took out his papers and pouch and tried to concentrate through the clouds in his vision. By the time he had rolled it the young man on the ground was silent. Whitey looked down at him for a moment and then sat himself down in the dirt. The storm clouds were above them now and dropped rain like Comanche war arrows down onto the desert. Whitey took Ignacio’s hand and held it for a long time.

  #

  Digging the grave didn’t take long in the soft ground. Whitey dug it deep. He wrapped the boy in his sleeping bag and then filled the dirt back in. He piled rocks on top hoping to keep the coyotes away from the corpse. Whitey had no prayers left so he simply wished his friend an easy passing. He had cleaned the wounds on the sorrel but rode the horse that he had lent to Ignacio. The dogs had scattered but they had headed south so that was the direction he travelled in.

  Days bled into each other, Whitey hardly slept, just switched between horses and pushed deeper into Mexico. He passed a group of Chinese with dusty hair and dry mouths on the second day but they kept their eyes fixed on the dirt as he rode past. Whitey didn’t speak to them. He simply rode and smoked and thought – thought of ‘Nacio, of Lorrie eaten alive by her own body and of his son Scott dead in the dirt of a far off land. The grullo went lame on the fourth day and Whitey put a 30-30 round through its head. He loaded the gear onto the sorrel but left the saddle where it lay.

  In a roadside cantina frequented by bikers and long distance truckers he heard tell that a child had been taken by dogs out to the west and so he bought another bottle of mescal and headed west. He sold the sorrel, his kit and Ignacio’s Ruger which gave him enough to buy a battered Mitsubishi pick-up truck. It looked like shit but it allowed Whitey to move quicker down the highways and drew fewer looks from the locals.

  ***

  Eventually they found him. The trail had drawn Whitey further west but back up towards the north. In Juarez he sold the truck. He had felt the eyes on him since he reached the forsaken border town where women were murdered and dumped in ditches in their hundreds and headless bodies were hung from motorway bridges.

  Whitey bought himself a fresh white shirt and a pair of knock-off Levi’s. He walked down and looked over the border at El Paso. He stared for a while at the lights of home. Then he went and got himself a steak dinner, had a few beers and bought the company of a young woman. Her name was Alejandra and he walked beneath the moonlight with her – past half-finished buildings and dark side streets.

  “Whitey, look at that dog!”

  “Yep, I see it.”

  “I’ve never seen one like it, so dark.”

  “You should leave now.”

  Her hands ran over him.

  “But there is so much of the night left.”

  “Well the night might be young but I ain’t. You need to go, girl.”

  And then Whitey saw it was too late. There were two more dogs at the end of the street blocking her way out. The dog in front of them who had been rummaging through a trash can stared at them, ears twitching. A high whistle cut through the night air and the dogs stopped moving.

  “Should’ve left while you had the chance, senorita.” Muttered Whitey as he pulled the Smith and Wesson from beneath his jacket. His first shot took the dog in front through the eye.

  “Run, girl! Or I’ll put the next one through your skull!”

  Alejandra tottered away on her high wedge heels as Whitey turned on the two dogs behind him. He fanned the pistol and sent the dogs scurrying away. As soon as they were out of sight he clambered over a fence onto a construction site and ran through the piles of sand, iron rods that stabbed out of the concrete and through doors into rooms that had not been built. The whistling followed him as he ran.

  For a moment he thought he heard the pitter-patter of paws on concrete and he stopped to reload the six-gun. He listened and heard nothing in the night but as soon as he moved the shrill whistle cut through the humid air. Whitey ran and slid through a hole in a wire mesh fence. He slipped his hands under a tarpaulin and retrieved the Marlin he had cached earlier. He worked the lever and climbed the stairs of a half-built apartment block to take up position on the second floor.

  From above the dogs were easier to see, although their pelts still made them little more than moving shadows. Whitey could see that they had him boxed in. There seemed to be more dogs in the pack now than there had been at the canyon. The whistle came again. Whitey tried to locate it but the sound simply echoed off the concrete and naked steel.

  “To hell with this.”

  He sighted on one of the hounds and dropped it with a single shot. He worked the action and a spent cartridge rang out as it bounced away on the bare concrete. Whitey moved positions and fired again turned and snapped off another shot. Claws skittered on the stairs and Whitey turned just as the dog emerged from the stairs. The bullet took it through the eye and threw its brain and the back of it skull out across the wall.

  “How you like them apples, huh?”

  Whitey chambered another round and scanned the rooftops around him.

  “Gonna get you, bastard.”

  “You look for me I think” Whitey froze.

  He took a breath and turned. The man sat on his haunches with six dogs around him.

  “Put the rifle down, if you please.”

  The dogs growled and Whitey carefully placed the Marlin at his feet before straightening back up.

  “You come so far looking for death, gringo. Why, when it is all around you?”

  Whitey shrugged.

  “Guess you’re fitting to set those dogs on me?”

  “Of course! You killed so many of their brothers, tried to hunt their father. What did you expect?”

  Another shrug.

  “Mind if I roll a cigarette?”

  “As you will. But one whistle and my childr
en will rip you worse than they did your friend.”

  Whitey nodded conscious of the weight of the Smith and Wesson at the back of his black market Levi’s.

  “Wish I had a sip of Wild Turkey to go with this” said Whitey as he sparked the cigarette.

  The man shrugged and Whitey thought for the thousandth time of Ignacio, Lorrie and Scott. Whitey held the cigarette between his fingers for a moment.

  “You gonna whistle the Mexican hat dance or set them dogs on me you son of a bitch?”

  Whitey flicked the cigarette towards the man and went for his six-gun – the man whistled in the same moment that Whitey fired and in the second before the teeth of half-dozen hounds bit into him. Whitey smiled – he had seen the bullet punch into the space between the man’s piggy eyes in a blossoming of crimson. Even as he screamed Whitey knew he’d hold Lorrie’s hand again, hug his son close and ride the trail once more with ‘Nacio.

  Benedict J Jones is an author of crime, horror and western fiction from south east London. He has had more than thirty short stories published in numerous publications. Most recently a collection of his short fiction, "Skewered; And Other London Cruelties", and his debut novel, "Pennies for Charon", were published by Crime Wave Press.

  Bothersome

  Andrew Hook

  When I wake I remember that I used to be. Someone.

  My joints ache. I slowly sit up on the bed and reach out one hand, feel my way around the walls. The paper is embossed, like some alien Braille. My eyes are open but the patterns, shapes, are unfamiliar. The room isn’t quite how it was meant to be.

  But me. I have this recollection. Sunshine on my face. My brother, teasing me because I’m a girl. Throw the ball. Catch. Drop. Throw the ball. Catch. Drop.

  That was how it used to be.

  More than that. In the lab. Looking for something amongst the rats. The mole rats. Looking for the secret of longevity.

  I never used to be much trouble.

  #

  I kick at something with my feet. As I bend down my back gives way and I stay like that.

  Sometime later I bend further. Pick up a circular bowl containing yellow liquid. As I swirl it first one way then the other I recall the conundrum about which way the water spirals down a plughole on the other side of the world.

  There weren’t many female scientists when I was young. I used to urge women to do things. Remember: a horse threw itself under Emily Wilding Davison for you. It usually got a laugh, but not always the right kind. I made a play of being different, but it was a cocoon, a shield behind which the real me could function without being seen.

  Like a controlled experiment.

  As I return the bowl to the floor it tips and stains the carpet. Where are the windows in here?

  Sometime later I wake up and remember I used to be someone.

  But I never used to be much trouble. Kept myself to myself. Hands in my pockets.

  I watch my brother run over the dunes. Sand flicks up from his heels. See where it lands! There’s broken glass hidden there. My foot on a stool in hospital. Grains and blood and pale white skin. It’ll be alright. There’s a hand on my shoulder. I know I’ll be alright.

  It’s all a matter of knowing where to look.

  I bump into something else, feel my way around it. A large rectangular object made with wood, standing vertical. There’s a key which I turn and when I reach into the interior it’s like fumbling inside the stomach of a knitted animal.

  There’s a musty smell too. This object hasn’t been opened for a while.

  I try to get inside, but there isn’t enough foot space. Tugging on something my balance goes and I tip and it tips and the next thing you know I’m lying on the floor and the object has enclosed me with an almighty bang like the closing lid of a coffin.

  #

  When I wake up I remember.

  I visited a zoo inhabited by balloon animals.

  At the centre of the earth, I once postulated, was a giant mole.

  No one ever knew if they should take me seriously.

  I knew that they shouldn’t. Except when I was being serious.

  I laboured the point. Just to be obtuse. I often found it was at the wrong angles where truth was to be found. Just like the fountain of youth. But no one understood that either. Unlike me, who knew it was sometimes in the fifth bottle of a six-pack of Evian water on the third row of the seventh aisle in Morrisons.

  Once, I drank from it.

  If I listen very quietly I can hear voices through the floorboards. Which floor am I on? Top or bottom I suppose it doesn’t really matter. There’s a murmur but nothing distinct. No words. I crave words. I suddenly and absolutely crave words. I need to be fed.

  Running my hands over my legs I feel shocked at how old and waxy the skin appears. Pulling at the sides of my thighs near the bone it almost peels away, like unfurling a sail. When did this happen?

  I continue feeling my way around the room, avoiding the wooden rectangular object which has been returned to its place.

  Why aren’t there any mirrors?

  I could ask, but I really don’t want to bother anyone. I don’t want to be of much bother.

  My hair is brittle. Both on my head and between my legs. There’s my brother again, laughing. A semi-circle of his friends stand around me and I’m too young to understand. I don’t understand why I’m naked. Nothing happens, they just look like all boys like to look and then he tells me the facts of life and I’m dumbfounded and know immediately that I want to know more I don’t want to experience more I just want to know more I want to know all the secrets of the universe and suddenly I realise I have the power to know what ticks inside each and every one of us.

  I’ve aged. Somehow, when I wasn’t looking, I’ve aged. And my work is far from complete.

  #

  When I wake I realise I am already awake.

  I’m standing beside another rectangular wooden object, flat against one wall. There’s a round porcelain handle that’s gripped within my arthritic right hand, but however much I try to twist it’s just my hand that moves and not the knob. When I push it doesn’t budge. There’s the potential of movement there, for sure. I must be doing it wrong.

  On the other side of this object I know someone is holding their breath. A shadow moves in the light underneath the door, recedes. Everything is receding.

  I find my way into a corner. It’s all angles, all the wrong angles. I won’t find the answers here.

  Is there a clock somewhere?

  I invented something and I no longer know what it is.

  They laughed, eventually, at the mole in the middle of the earth. It tugged at my mind until I realised that hot mole centre was an anagram of the molten core. They didn’t believe it was coincidence, thought they had been tricked. But the trick was only with the words that played out in my mind and made me see that there are signs in everything.

  I reach out and touch things with my hands because I can’t trust my eyes to see.

  There’s pain in my stomach. When did I last eat? Again, I move sideways, knock into the headboard of the bed. Full circle then, full square. I’m lost.

  I lie across the bed sideways but it hurts. My body can’t be at every angle anymore.

  My memories are a dandelion clock. Each time I take breath, some are blown further away. Yet. Yet. There are always some which cling resolutely. Which just won’t go.

  #

  I wake a younger self. Watch me as I kiss the shoulder of the sleeping man beside me, his musculature firm and exciting under my lips. I sit up, run a hand through my short hair, stand, get dressed. Put on socks whilst balancing on alternate legs. Without holding onto anything. I’m an acrobat. I urinate almost clear. Clean my teeth. Open the refrigerator and bathe in the yellow light, cast a shadow of myself on the floor behind. The milk is cold. It courses down my throat. I remember my mother telling me never to drink from the bottle. I always did.

  I see myself take my keys, slowly close the
door to the apartment. Descend the interior lift of the building to the underground carpark. My car makes an electronic sound as I press on the fob and suddenly I’m inside and feeling the engine hum beneath me as I maneuver this steel machine between the concrete pillars and merge into daylight as though being absorbed.

  There’s laughter in the office which continues as I enter. I’m well-liked. They can take the nonsense about my balloon zoos and hot mole centres because they know it’s a side effect of being a genius. A quirk. My intellect is in the motorbike, my peccadilloes are in the side car. It balances me. Keeps everything at one level, one angle.

  I am the bent paperclip that isn’t meant to be straightened.

  I watch closely as I lean over a test tube. I am about to discover something important. Really, very, important.

  #

  I make another circuit of the room. What’s happening here? There’s something I can’t grasp. I know what it is, but my brain won’t allow me to remember. What I mean is that I know I know the answer. But I don’t know the answer.

  I could knock on the walls, on the wooden objects, but I just don’t want to be a trouble to anyone.

  It’s only after I’ve been to the toilet in one of the corners of the room and thrown a towel over the top of it that I see the metal circular bowl beside the bed.

  When I sleep someone enters. I’m not sure if that’s physically or spiritually, but what I am sure is that they’re standing over me and saying something like she’s got lost in her own room again.

  And if that was the case. If that was the case. Then why don’t they leave the door open?