“Frost,” Griffin said, without hesitation. “It’s what Rule wanted, and I can’t think of any reason not to agree. She’s going to need help, and I expect nothing less from all of you.”
“Where is she?” someone asked.
“At the station,” Griffin said. She’d told him she wanted to come up with an organized response plan, and to do some research, but he’d suspected she just needed time to mourn. Griffin did too, but his military training was kicking in. He’d mourn later, when things cooled down. If things cooled down. “She’ll be here soon.”
“We’ll do what we can,” Sam said, volunteering Jimmy and Dana along with himself. “Where do we start?”
Winslow stepped forward. “Let’s start with what we know. Facts,” Winslow said. “Not speculation. No theories.”
“And what exactly do we know, beside bup and kiss?” Sam asked.
“Well, for starters,” Griffin said. “We know that its dark, snowing some sort of ash. So far, this world has been pretty benign, but we can’t afford to assume it will remain so. Wherever we are, it’s not home, and we need to treat it as such. Foreign and potentially hostile territory.”
“Cell phones, landlines and the Internet are all shit,” Jimmy said. “None of it works.”
“Do we have any communication at all?” Sam asked.
“The two-ways are working,” Griffin said, motioning to the device attached to his belt. “I can check in with Frost, get any spare radios the station has. That’s a start anyway.”
“I suggest we compile a list of places of interest,” Winslow said. “Locations that seem connected to what’s happening.”
“The church,” someone from the crowd called out. “Start with the church.”
Ken Dodge stepped through the crowd.
“The church bell rings each time one of these...shifts, for want of a better word, occurs. I would like to believe it’s a warning. A tool for good, but... I suggest we start there.”
No one argued the point. That Dodge was casting suspicion on his own church building was surprising to Sam. He’d had more than a few harsh thoughts about the pastor as of late, losing sleep to fantasies about kicking in the Church door, finding the pastor with his wife and then proceeding to bludgeon the man with an offering tray.
“Church it is,” Griffin said. “Pastor, you know the building. Winslow...” Winslow just nodded. If anyone could figure this mystery out, it would be him, and everyone, including him, knew it.
“For now,” Griffin said, looking at Mary, who had taken a time out from serving to listen in. “We’ll use the Market as a temporary HQ.”
Mary smiled. “You do whatever needs doing. Just promise to please be safe.”
“We will—” Griffin started.
“Hold on,” Sam said. “Phones don’t work, but the two-ways do?”
Griffin didn’t reply. He just waited for Sam to get to the point.
Sam looked to Jimmy. “You still have your HAM radio?”
“Nah, gave it to Tommy up at Piece of Shit.”
“Piece of shit?” Winslow asked.
“WPOS,” Sam explained. “The radio station.”
“You don’t suppose Tommy still has it up there?”
Jimmy shrugged. “He could. He liked to mess around with it on the weekends. Could be worth a shot.”
“How many watts does the average station put out?” Sam asked.
“Average?” Winslow thought for a second. “Probably around 15,000.”
“How far do you think 15,000 watts will get us?” Sam asked.
“On a clear night, I can usually get WXZM up in Bangor,” Dana said.
“Exactly,” Sam said. “I think we need to try for the radio station. If that’s still working then we might be able to reach help. Maybe the world beyond whatever is out there is still normal? Could be just the Lakes Region that’s affected. Or maybe just New Hampshire.”
“That’s good,” Griffin said, and looked at Winslow. “We hadn’t thought of that possibility.”
“I’m in,” Jimmy said. “We can take my truck. It’s back at the hardware store.”
“Let’s go,” Dana said.
“Be careful,” Griffin said. “I think the station is inside the border, but it’s not far. You guys want to wait for a two-way?”
“Won’t matter if we have one,” Sam said. “Once we get behind that ridge line out past the water tower, it’ll be useless. We’d be too low. Hell, nothing works there. We’ll call you from the radio station once we get there—assuming we can.”
“Any hint of trouble you turn tail and head back,” Griffin said. “Got it?”
“Got it—”
A silver Land Rover pulled into the parking lot going a little too fast. Any local would recognize the pricey vehicle as belonging to Julie Barnes. Hell, even the newcomers to town would know. It had her face, agency name and phone number plastered on the doors like a mobile billboard.
At thirty-five, five-foot eight and with the bluest eyes Sam had ever seen, it was no wonder why most of the residents had signed on for the retrofit program she’d shilled. She was easily one of the most attractive women in town—it was with a bat of an eye and the illusion of sex that she did her business—much to the chagrin of many a wife and girlfriend.
Sam watched with appreciation as Julie stepped out of the Rover, one well-toned, tanned leg at a time. She was wearing her standard attire: short, tight skirt, buttoned blouse—with just enough left undone for the imagination—and heels that looked lethal.
Julie joined the group .“Hey,” she said, brushing fallen ash off her blouse. “Am I interrupting?”
Griffin squinted at her. “I...was just leaving. I haven’t seen you since the bar. Are you okay?”
“Fine, hun,” Julie said with smile that might have been forced. Her feathers had certainly been ruffled, but she was doing a commendable job of looking composed. “Thanks for asking, and before you ask, the safest place in town, in my opinion, is by your side. So, where are we headed?”
Griffin looked about to argue, but just shook his head. “The sheriff’s station.” He started walking toward the parking lot exit. The station was a quick walk.
“Wait up,” Julie said, stumbling in her heels. “I’ll go with you.”
Sam chuckled. Everyone could see Julie was hot for Griffin, but he’d been spurning her advances. So far.
Jimmy slapped Sam’s arm and motioned to the side, where Tess approached with the kids. “Catch up.” He and Dana started across the lot to the park, and the hardware store beyond. The ash still fell from the sky like tainted snow.
“The kids wanted to see you off,” Tess said.
“We’re making a run up to the radio station, see if we can’t get some help.”
“Can I come?” Wyatt asked.
Sam mussed Wyatt’s hair. “That’s up to your mom.” He wasn’t convinced it was the best idea, but spending time with his son was a rarity these days. He wouldn’t turn down the chance, and honestly, in a situation like this, he thought the kids would be safer with him, Jimmy and Dana, rather than with their mom. He knew Tess would never agree to Ellie tagging along, so he didn’t even bring it up.
“Can I, Mom? Can I go with Dad?” Wyatt pleaded.
Tess looked at Sam. “Do you think it’s safe?”
“You let him snow plow around town with me last winter.” Sam looked up at the ashen sky. “That had to be worse than this. And we’ll be in Jimmy’s truck. Thing is a tank.”
Sam took Wyatt by the shoulder and pulled him close. “It’s just a quick trip there and back. Won’t let him out of the truck.”
“Not even once,” Tess said.
Wyatt understood that this was essentially permission and pumped his fist.
Sam gave a nod. “Not for anything.”
7
Charley Wilson had been a lot of things in his life. A drunk being at the top of that list. A drunk, with no future to speak of, whose wife had left him for a postal
worker up in Maine.
That’s not all she’d left him with, though, no. She’d left him broke, turned him into a drunk and deemed him a total asshole (which he freely admitted). She’d also left him with their son, Joshua—‘Radar’ to the locals. The nickname had come from his cousins, on account of his clumsiness, because, they said, he’d need radar to avoid bumping into things. He wasn’t actually that clumsy, but it had stuck. Even Charley called his son by that name. The boy had turned out pretty well in spite of his influence. Was he fit to be a dad? Probably not. He wasn’t fit for a lot of things.
But he also knew more than most, and that was something that would change his standing before long. Not necessarily with the town, or with his son, but with the people who really mattered. The people—or was it person?—who had power.
He shook his head, clearing his thoughts and vision. He grabbed a can of Coors from the passenger seat, snapping it free of its plastic ring with the skill of an experienced professional. Probably couldn’t walk a straight line for shit, but he could decimate brain cells like a champ.
Charley glanced into the rearview mirror, half expecting to see Frost’s cruiser lit up like Christmas, but he was startled to see Radar staring back at him. He swerved into the oncoming lane, narrowly missing a silver Land Rover, before regaining control.
“Sheeit! The fuck you doin’?” Charley shouted, tossing his half-empty can of Coors out the window. He rubbed at the spilled beer on his jeans, willing his heart back into his chest.
Radar only stared. No reply.
Charley’s expression turned hard and calloused, the look of a man haunted by too many ghosts to care.
“Go on, get outta here, why dontcha? I sure as fuck don’t need no shit from you right now.”
“What are you doing?” Radar’s reflection asked.
Charley refused to meet his son’s gaze.
“What I shoulda done a long time ago. Settin’ things right for me,” Charley said.
“You’re wrong,” Josh said. “You’re wrong and you know it.”
“The fuck you say?” Charley shouted. “You don’t know nuthin ‘bout nuthin, boy.”
Charley grinned, revealing a dental hygiene regimen that would make Steve Buscemi smile. He reached over and grabbed another can of Coors, popping the top and drinking half the can in one long gulp. He followed with a satisfying burp, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.
“Why fart and waste it when you can burp and taste it?”
Josh’s reflection stared back blankly.
“Oh I see,” Charley said, agitated. “You don’t agree, so conversation over, right? Just like your mother—”
“You’re wrong,” Radar said. “You’re going to get people hurt, Dad.”
Torn between years of outrage and love for his son, Charley struggled to respond. He wanted to listen to the nagging voice that had crept up inside him, tickling the back of his brain through the ghostly apparition of his son conjured by his imagination. He wanted to, but—
Charley grabbed hold of the rearview mirror and ripped it from the Ford. He chucked it hard out the window, and heard it shatter against the blacktop.
“When I want your ‘pinion,” Charley said, feeling manipulated, “I’ll give it to ya.”
He finished the can of Coors and tossed the empty out the window. ‘Nother dead soldier. He grabbed hold of the steering wheel with both hands and sat up straight. The Ford’s headlights lit up a green road sign. A white arrow pointed left with big block letters that read:
LAKE HUDSON 2.5 MILES
Charley Wilson stared at the sign, knowing who he needed to see, for answers, and to be told what was coming next. But he didn’t feel ready for it yet. After chewing on his lip, he slowed to a careful stop, performed a three-point turn and headed for the place where he felt most comforted.
8
“You sure you don’t want to wait at the bottom?” Pastor Ken Dodge asked, as he paused halfway up the steeple stairs.
Winslow Herman caught his breath and shook his head. “What good is having a scientist along to inspect things if he can’t even make it up the stairs? Besides, it’s my knees, not my heart. I can handle a little discomfort.” To prove it, he started up again, wincing with each step, but managing the pain through a stubborn determination that sometimes drove his Carol crazy, and sometimes made her proud.
They continued to the top, slower than some, but they made it all the same. Dodge buzzed around the steeple top, searching for anything unusual. The man spent more time at the church than anyone and clearly felt comfortable in the space, despite recent unnatural—supernatural if you asked the pastor—events.
Winslow, on the other hand, stopped to admire the view through the open, three foot section of ventilation slats. Well, ‘admire’ was really the wrong word. While the steeple might normally provide postcard worthy views of town, it was now a bleak, gray shrouded landscape. Visibility was poor, the air rank with ash. Winslow had to admit, despite his issues with religion, the world outside had become hellish, and he’d begun to ponder the pastor’s beliefs.
“See anything?” Dodge asked.
“Nothing good,” Winslow replied, closing the slates.
“I don’t see anything different.” Dodge lifted one of his shiny shoed feet up. “Here, give me ten fingers.”
Winslow clasped his large hands together and bent low. His back groaned, but he didn’t complain. The pastor, who was now leaning against the bell and inspecting its top, over an open, three story drop, had the worse of the two jobs.
“Not a thing,” Dodge said, and carefully hopped down from Winslow’s boost.
“You sound disappointed,” Winslow said.
Dodge clapped some dust off of his hands. “I am.” He looked over the bell again, but his expression was less focused. “You think I want this to be supernatural? That I’d prefer to find out the Devil was ringing this bell? I’m a believer, not a masochist. But do I think it’s possible? Yeah, I do. And until you can say to me, ‘here’s the observable and repeatable proof against the supernatural,’ whatever that might be, I’m open to all possibilities.”
Dodge went back to scouring the bell tower. Winslow just watched him. His job wasn’t necessarily to look, but to inspect once something was found.
“That’s the funny thing about you science types,” Dodge said. “You think I’m the one who’s closed-minded.”
“You’re not?” Winslow asked, curious about where Dodge was going. “What about evolution? The big bang?”
“Well, aside from neither of those theories being observable or repeatable, who am I to determine exactly how God formed the universe? It’s interesting to speculate, I suppose, but I’m not as interested in his methods as I am his results, and his mission.”
Mission? Winslow thought, wondering if the pastor was going to get fanatical. “And what mission is that?”
“Good news,” Dodge said. “There’s nothing up here. Nothing I can see, anyway. Could be something behind the walls I suppose, but they look intact, and—”
Thud.
Dodge’s voice hiccupped and fell silent.
“Was that from outside?” Winslow asked. He turned toward the ventilation slats. Still closed.
Thud.
The two men looked at each other, eyes wide, sharing the same reaction to the mysterious noise, despite their opposing views on the universe.
“Do you have a gun?” Winslow asked, thinking of the giant bird-thing that had been killed at the Sheriff’s station.
“Not yet,” Dodge said. “But I’m thinking a handgun might compliment the armor of God.”
Winslow turned to the pastor. Was he serious?
“Sorry,” Dodge said. “Bible humor. I’m used to talking to parishioners instead of heathens.”
Winslow let out a chuckling laugh. He’d never really spoken to the pastor, but the man was sharp, if misguided. Bolstered by humor, the pair crept toward the hatch.
“Just a quick
peek,” Dodge said.
Winslow nodded and took hold of the small handle. He glanced at Dodge, who nodded, and then pulled. Together, they looked out and saw nothing beyond the bleak sky.
“Chunks of ash, maybe?” Winslow postulated.
“Fire and brimstone?” Dodge said, raising his right eyebrow and right side of his mouth in tandem.
Winslow caught the joke right away this time, but didn’t get a chance to laugh. A scratching noise locked the sound of his voice just beneath his Adam’s apple. Both men looked down and tensed.
The scratching grew louder as three black talons slid over the chipping white paint of the steeple’s overhang, five feet below them. The clawed foot belonged to a creature perched on the gutter, its back to them.
“What is it?” Dodge asked, but Winslow had no idea. He’d never seen anything like it. It looked like a large bird, dipped in oil and dried in an oven.
Before he could reply, the black creature’s head began to rotate slowly. It continued turning until it had spun 180 degrees and craned upward. Two, large, round eyes, black as night, stared up at them.
“It’s an owl,” Dodge said.
“Not anymore,” Winslow countered.
The bird chimed in by shrieking at them, it’s voice dry and haggard. Both men leapt back. Winslow slammed the hatch shut and leaned against it. He half expected the bird to attack, but he could hear the beat of its wings flying away.
Winslow put his hands on his knees, catching his breath. He looked up at Dodge, “No offense, Pastor, but I really hope we can prove your whole hell theory wrong.”
Dodge nodded, his face slightly paler than it had been a moment ago. “Me too.”
9
Sam thought about Tess as he and Wyatt climbed up into Jimmy’s pride and joy, a Ford Phantom 350. It was one of the largest trucks (probably second after Quentin Miller’s mud-spattered monster truck) that graced the streets of Refuge.
Jimmy flicked his cigarette butt out the window. “Mind if we stop by the garage first? There’s a few things I’d like to pick up.”
Refuge Book 2 - Darkness Falls Page 3