by Hamill, Ike
Brad caught up with Robby and they shuffled along together, looking straight down and hoping to bump into the final member of their party. When Robby stopped and turned back uphill, Brad stopped as well.
“If I get entranced, knock this out of my hand,” Robby said. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out the Volvo visor mirror. He aimed it over his shoulder so he could scan for Christine.
“Robby? Are you still with me?” Brad asked.
“Yes,” Robby said. “The reflection isn’t affecting me.”
“Do you see her?” Brad asked.
“No, not yet,” Robby said. “Wait, I think that’s her. I’m not sure.”
“Let me see,” Brad said. He reached for the mirror, but Robby wouldn’t relinquish it. He tilted it so Brad could see and Brad looked over Robby’s shoulder to get a better look.
“Yes, that’s her,” Brad said. “See the blood stain on her sleeve?”
“Okay,” Robby said. He walked backwards, holding the mirror and using it to navigate towards Christine. When they got close enough, he and Brad spun, grabbing Christine by the shoulders and wrestling her away from her march.
“Let go!” she screamed.
“No Christine,” Brad said. “You’re hypnotized by the light. You can’t look at it, or you’ll walk right into it.”
“Maybe I want to walk into it. Did you consider that?" Christine asked.
“What you’re seeing isn’t real,” Brad said. “It’s some kind of trick.”
“There’s no trick,” Christine said. “Everyone I’ve ever cared about is in the light.”
“Even so, it’s not your time,” Brad said.
“Says who? You? Why shouldn’t it be my time?" Christine asked.
“Go up the hill and we can talk about it,” Brad said.
“We’re not going to let you go,” Robby said.
“It’s not your decision,” Christine said.
“I know,” Robby said. “Please?”
Behind them, down in the crater where the ball of light met the ice, a sound rang out accompanied by a flash of bright blue light. Robby couldn’t decide if it sounded more like thunder, or a giant piece of paper tearing. Either way, the sound seemed to be inside his head—he felt it more than he heard it. The flash of light threw their shadows up the icy slope and reflected off a million edges of broken ice crystals.
Robby jerked the mirror back up in time to see the next flash. It erupted when one of the eyeless, lumbering corpses entered the ball of light. The corpse raised its hands with its last step and was absorbed by the ball of light. Christine clutched her hands to her ears in a fruitless attempt to muffle the sound.
Two more dead entered the light and the sound sent a double shot of pain through Robby’s head. The corpses weren’t deterred; they kept marching in a shuffling column towards the flashing ball of light.
Robby and Brad grabbed Christine by her arms and hauled her uphill, away from the light. They veered away from the corpses, which seemed surefooted despite their lack of eyes. Christine didn’t struggle, but she twisted her head around and tried to watch the light recede as Robby and Brad dragged her up the hill. She sobbed and wailed until they reached the top, and then silent tears still leaked down her face.
The sound of corpses entering the ball of light erupted so often that it became like a constant hum instead of individual explosions.
“Everyone was in the light,” Christine said to Robby. “Everyone I ever cared about.”
“They’ll always be there,” Robby said.
Robby and Brad escorted Christine to the others who formed a small knot away from the tractors, and sleds, and throngs of dead. Pete and Romie approached and Robby ran forward to warn them to shield their eyes.
“Is that all of them?” Brad asked.
Pete answered—“There are a few dozen more still coming from the last sled. They were caught in the straps, but they got free.”
“What’s that smell?" Romie asked.
A sour wind from the south brought the smell of decomposition. The group faced south, looked away from the ball of light, and tried to place the source of the odor.
“It almost smells like rich soil,” Brad said. “You know how it smells when you first turn it over in the spring?”
“Where’s Brynn?" Nate asked. His voice rang of panic immediately; this was no idle question.
“Brynn?” Robby called. Glancing around the group, he was careful to not look back at the ball of light.
The wind picked up and carried Robby’s voice down towards the light.
Robby pulled out his mirror again.
“Oh shit,” Robby said as he picked out the form of a young person sprinting and ducking between the shuffling corpses. Brynn was already halfway down the hill to the ball of light. Robby looked straight down and ran. He stretched his young legs out as far as they’d go as he ran down the ice, trying to catch Brynn before he got to the light. Before Robby saw him, he heard Brynn giggling. His voice sounded out of place as it bubbled up between crashes of thunder.
“Brynn!” Robby yelled. “Stop!”
He both heard and sensed others from his group running behind him. Nate ran by. Robby looked up to see Nate sprinting for Brynn with his arms outstretched. Robby couldn’t watch Nate’s progress without looking at the ball of light, so he put his head down and tried to run even faster.
“Brynn, I’m coming,” Nate yelled up ahead. “Wait for me.”
“Try not to look at the light, Nate,” Robby yelled at the ground. “Just focus on Brynn.” His voice was swallowed by tearing thunder from the ball.
Robby could tell he was getting closer to the light because his shadow was shortening underneath him. The sound crashing through him felt like it could split his skull. Feet and legs appeared in front of Robby, and he recognized Nate’s boots and green pants. Robby reached for the man’s hand and pulled. The thunderous sound of corpses being absorbed into the light died away and a peaceful silence settled around him.
“Nate,” Robby whispered. “Did you catch up with Brynn?”
“Yes, Robby,” Nate said. “He right here.”
“Great,” Robby said, still looking down at his feet and holding Nate’s hand. “Back away from the light and let’s get back to the others.”
“No, Robby,” Nate said. “We’re all here. Look around you.”
Robby shook his head. Cold glare from the massive ball of light glared off his cheeks and reflected off the snaps and zipper of his jacket. If he looked up at all, he knew he’d catch sight of the light and then perhaps become entranced, like the others. Instead, Robby looked to his sides, where he was surprised to find people all around him. They weren’t all exploded-eye corpses, either. A man on his left wore a brown suit and white shirt. He stared up towards the light with tears streaming from his intact eyes. At his feet a toddler, wearing just a diaper and a shirt, giggled around a pacifier as it looked up towards the light. Just behind them, a dirty woman, completely naked held her hand up towards the light as if she could grip it in her fist. As Robby watched she brought her hand down to her face, like she was trying to taste the light.
Robby tugged on Nate’s hand and tried to pull him backwards. Nate wouldn’t budge. In fact, Nate tightened his grip and started to pull Robby forward. The grip stung Robby’s lacerated hand.
“What are you doing? Let me go,” Robby yelled.
“Come on, Robby,” Nate said. “We’re home.”
Robby dug in his heels, squeezed his eyes shut, and tugged on his hand, trying to pull it from Nate’s. The man locked an iron grip on his hand. Pain flared from Robby’s palm as blood began to ooze from his recent wound. Finally, his hand popped free and Robby fell sprawling to his back, with his arm up to shield his eyes from the light. He flipped over and pushed to his feet, fighting against a thick stream of people, who walked towards the light.
He saw one or two corpses with missing eyes, grinning as they trudged ahead, but mostly Robby saw n
ormal-looking men and women of all ages, locked in shuffling trances. They walked shoulder-to-shoulder, and Robby squeezed between them to make his retreat. He burst through a line of tall men, dressed in identical gray pants and white shirts, and finally got a glimpse of the magnitude of the mass of people trudging towards the light. The landscape sloped upwards from the light and people shuffled towards him as far as he could see. He spun as far as he dared to the left and right, and saw the same thing in every direction—endless people. Their faces wore broad smiles; their eyes sparkled with the light from the ball of light that drew them. Nobody spoke or made any noise. The only break in the silence was the gentle shuffle of feet.
What he didn’t see was equally amazing—no snow; no road of ice; no tractor perched at the top of a hill. His adventure in central Maine transformed somehow into this climb through an endless crowd of people. Up ahead, perhaps fifty paces from Robby, a hand shot up and waved.
Robby’s jaw fell open as the shout carried through the thick air.
“Robby!”
It was his father’s voice calling and his father’s hand waving. Robby shut his eyes fast, but before he did he saw that his father was flanked by his mother on one side and grandmother on the other. They all smiled at him with the same blank look.
“No, no, no,” Robby said as he shook his head. Tears leaked out of his squeezed-shut eyes. He both waited to hear his father’s voice again and prayed it wouldn’t come. Robby reached out and pulled himself through the crowd, pushing through the shifting flow of people. They didn’t care. Their rapture took all their attention away from Robby plowing the wrong way through their migration.
“No, no, no, no,” Robby repeated again and again as his hands turned to fists and he blindly smashed through wave after wave of people. When he ran out of people to pull against, Robby kept running with his eyes shut, now yelling, “No!”
Another earsplitting crash of thunder from behind him drove him to his knees. Robby clutched his ears, his eyes still shut, and collapsed to the ground. He curled up in a ball as two more explosions burst through his head.
“Robby? Robby?” a voice asked.
Robby shook his head and some part of him registered the cold surface pressed against his face.
“Let’s go, Robby. We should get moving,” the voice said.
It took Robby a second to recognized Brad’s voice. He opened his eyes slowly, not quite willing to trust his ears.
Brad was holding out his mirror.
“You dropped this,” Brad said. “The ball of light looks like it’s collapsing. We should go.”
Robby took the mirror and held it up. It took a second to orient himself, and then another to understand what he was seeing. Only a couple of eyeless people still marched towards the light, and they had farther to go than their predecessors. The ball shrank down and developed continents of splotchy brown spots, which swam over its surface. Another peal of thunder rolled across the ice and blue light flashed as an eyeless corpse merged with the light. Robby saw the ball expand a tiny amount and then contract as it absorbed the body. The massive throng of smiling, migrating people was gone, replaced again with the cold icy road.
Robby let Brad help him to his feet and they jogged up the slope towards the tractors.
✪ ✪ ✪ ✪ ✪
AT THE TOP of the hill they found Pete, Romie, and Lisa at the back of the second sled. They had one snowmobile on the ice and were wrestling a second down from a trailer.
“Robby!” Lisa shouted. She grabbed Robby up into a big hug. “We didn’t think you were going to come back out.”
“Come back out of what?” Robby asked.
“We need to pull down a third snowmobile,” Pete said. “We shouldn’t ride three on one of these.”
“It’s okay, Pete,” Romie said. “We’ve made it this long. What’s makes you think we don’t have time to pull another snowmobile.”
“Who knows how much time we’ve got?" Pete asked. “We’re rolling the dice, is all I’m saying. After all this, we’re just standing around?”
“Then get moving,” Romie said. “I’ll finish unhooking this one. You and Brad get down to the next one.”
Brad and Pete took off down the ice and doubled their pace when they heard the next blast from down the hill. The sound crashed louder, and rumbled longer, than the earlier explosions. Lisa straddled a snowmobile and motioned for Robby to get on behind her. Romie fired up the other one and drove it down the ramp to the ice. Together, they caught up with Pete and Brad and helped them unstrap the third snowmobile. Soon, without any gear except what Pete lashed to the snowmobiles before they left Portland, the five people streaked away on their snowmobiles.
Robby rode behind Lisa. He gripped her around the waist, and looked back over his shoulder for the first few miles. He tucked his gloveless hand in a fold of her jacket. The glow from the ball of light was barely visible against the clouds now. Somewhere on the other side of the clouds the sun rose. Robby thought he saw a couple more blue flashes radiating from under the ice, but it was hard to tell if it was real or just an illusion created by his over-tired eyes.
Soon, Robby rested his head against Lisa’s shoulder and hoped she wasn’t as tired as he was. It had been a long night of fighting for their lives and driving. It would be so easy now to just drift off to sleep and lose control of the snowmobile. Robby thought he should offer to switch positions with Lisa and take over the driving for a while, but before he could will himself to tap her on the shoulder, he nodded off.
✪ ✪ ✪ ✪ ✪
“WHERE ARE WE?” Robby asked.
“Welcome back to the Dead Ferret,” Brad said. “You’ve been here before. In fact, this is where I first met you, remember?”
“Vaguely,” Robby said. He sat up on the couch and glanced around the dim living room. His boots, glove, hat, and jacket had been removed, but he was still dressed. Someone had draped a warm wool blanket over him and in the corner a kerosene stove radiated heat. “We’re here because of Buster and Glen?”
“Yes,” Brad said. “We figured it might not be safe over at the apartments. We don’t know if there are friends of those guys still wandering around.”
“Where’s Christine?” Robby asked. “She wasn’t with us on the snowmobiles.”
Brad looked down at the floor. He was sitting in the chair over by the big window. “She went in right after you. With all the confusion, I guess we forgot to hold her back. As soon as nobody was looking, she went.”
“That’s too bad,” Robby said.
“She was troubled,” Brad said.
“Where are the others?” Robby asked.
“They’re getting some food together,” Brad said. “I didn’t leave much to eat here.”
“You’d think they’d be tired,” Robby said.
“They were. We all were. We left the snowmobiles out on the highway and Pete carried you over here. Then we slept most of the day. We ate what was left of the food and slept the night through. You never woke up through any of it. You’re finishing up about a twenty-four hour nap.”
“Really?” Robby asked. “That’s hard to believe. I’m still so tired.”
Brad smiled and stood up. He dug in a box and brought Robby a bottle of water and a couple granola bars.
“So what was in there?” Brad asked.
“What? In the ball of light?” Robby asked.
Brad nodded.
Robby chewed a mouth full of granola bar and washed it down before answering. “Was I really in there? I never thought I actually went in.”
“Nobody saw you go in,” Brad said. “I was still coming down the hill and I was looking at the ice when I found your mirror. I picked it up and scanned all around and I didn’t see you anywhere. That’s when I saw Christine go in. She mingled with a bunch of the dead people and slipped right by me. I sat there for a long time waiting to see what would happen. Pete and the others went up to get the snowmobiles ready because we all thought it was all over
. Then, right before the last of the eyeless people went in, you came out, yelling ‘No, no, no.’ So what were you yelling at?”
Robby shut his eyes and remembered his time in the big crowd of people.
When he spoke again, his voice was lower and sadder than Brad had ever heard it. “I was yelling at my dad. He was calling me to join him, to join my whole family, but I’m not ready to go yet. To answer your question—everyone was in there. I think everyone who ever lived and died.”
“How is that possible?” Brad asked, his voice just above a whisper.
Robby shook his head.
“I understand why Christine wanted to go back,” Robby said. “It’s lonely to stay out here, knowing they’re all inside. But it’s what I have to do. We owe it to them to do what we can.”
“So you think that’s where people go when they die?” Brad asked. “They get absorbed into some alien creature?”
Robby shook his head and thought for a while before answering—“No. People don’t get absorbed, but maybe that thing comes from where we all go.”
“So it’s a portal or something?” Brad asked.
“Or something,” Robby said.
The door burst open and hadn’t finished its swing before Pete started talking.
“Well it’s a good thing we didn’t go back to the apartments,” Pete said. “Hey! Robby’s awake.”
Pete, Romie, and Lisa came through the door, each carrying plastic bags, full of boxes and cans.
“You guys have to see this,” Pete said. He dropped his bags on the floor and beckoned Brad and Robby over to the door. Robby shook off his blankets and shuffled on stiff legs past Pete and out onto the porch. He shivered at the crisp air and followed Pete’s pointing finger to the northern sky.
“Wow,” Brad said, joining Robby on the porch. “I almost forgot what sky looked like.”
To the north, a big hole had opened in the clouds and for the first time in months they could see clear blue sky.
“It’s been getting bigger all morning,” Pete said. “I think we’ll have clear skies by the end of the day.”
Lisa appeared in the threshold.
“You’re going to catch your death out here,” Lisa said. “At least put some shoes on.”