And on, through centuries and millennia.
Changelings tire. Humanity tires. Same thing, just longer.
Rhodesia. British empire. The Indies. A mercenary bathed in blood diamonds, a soldier in the depths of the Congo. But small times, too, that somehow seemed just as important when men and changelings were there, living inside them.
One minute, hard-rock African lands with names that changed through centuries; the next, Carlos remembers hunting a bear for three days with a flintlock pistol in heavy rain and just an oiled pouch to keep the powder dry.
Small times, important times, big things, small things. The things that make a life, no matter how long or short.
Life does not have to be long, thinks Carlos. But that isn’t his thought.
Or perhaps it is.
Outside the farmhouse where they sit, Carlos bound and Michael free to leave, the summer comes around again. At such a lofty altitude the air remains cold and the family propped against the house walls now grin like their teeth have become longer, though it is just that their flesh is receding. Their faces wear away as time moves on.
“Rest,” says Michael.
“I won’t,” says Carlos.
Outside, the dead stand watch and will until they crumble, but such things as seasons and centuries are just a blinking eye to the eternal.
***
Something of humanity in him, thinks Carlos. Greed, but hubris, too.
Michael thinks he is strong. He is strong. He’s strong because he wants to be.
I am stronger, Michael thinks.
I am.
Michael looks down and sees the bonds are not around Carlos, but around his chest and his arms and thighs and ankles.
Under the face he once wore, his flesh is tender and it’s still cold enough that the bodies against the wall of the house don’t smell no matter how long dead they are. Carlos rises and moves briskly from the chair, free, then pauses at the door. That dark-skinned face of his that is so expressive seems sad.
“Funny,” Carlos says. “Seeing what’s inside us.”
Michael struggles to answer. Lips form many words. Some slithering and lisping sound is all that comes out.
Carlos shrugs. It doesn’t matter what Michael says.
“I told you I don’t like games,” says Carlos. “I don’t enjoy them. You do, because you know you will always win. I do not like games for exactly the same reason.”
Carlos doesn’t feel the need to say anything else, and Michael is hard to look at now that his face is wiped clean, leaving just the thing below.
The wolven man steps out into a day waiting for snow, higher than the sea someplace on the border between countries in a continent where places can sometimes remind him of an old world long gone by. He shrugs inside his skin.
For a moment, he wonders who he is, why he is. He wonders if he’s the same inside as Michael.
Or Carlos?
He’s not sure, walking into the snow, whose face it is he wears. After so many borrowed faces, how can a thing even know what it is anymore?
Maybe, he thinks, I’m just human and the creature I left behind is what we all look like inside.
The family against the wall of the house stare with blood frozen on faces skinned and switched. None quite fit right.
They never do quite fit, thinks Carlos. Maybe he hopes he’ll find one that’ll fit just right and he can settle. Maybe not. He’s not human, but only because he takes what he needs, not what he wants. A predator, and…
Carlos pauses for a moment, hunched against the rising cold on the plateau. He frowns, confused. He runs his tongue over his teeth before he’s sure, and though the face on his flesh has yet to settle, he can smile just fine.
Everyone’s wearing a borrowed face, he thinks. What does it matter which one I wear?
Knackered by Skip Novak
Rob downshifted into eighth gear. He reached over, turned off the repeat of the ‘Paul Harvey Podcast’ on his iPod. Country music from the late 1970s and early 1980s filled the cab of his White Freightliner. He braked and downshifted again. He looked into his passenger side mirror and saw the hitchhiker picking up his bags. “This night just got a whole lot better,” he commented to the empty cab as he opened the armrest console, pulled out a bunch of porno magazines and tossed them into the passenger seat.
The hitchhiker, a young male with a back pack and a duffel bag, caused him to slow his rig down in the middle of the Arizona desert. The hitchhiker was already jogging towards where Rob was pulling the eighteen wheeler over. The young man’s gait and the way he held his head straight forward made Rob think of his family back in Wisconsin.
Rob’s wife, a vice president of a furniture company, was a youthful thirty-six. Mary didn’t mind that Rob was twenty years her senior. She had three kids from a previous marriage, all of whom were in high school. Rob met Mary not three years after her divorce from her first husband, a deadbeat who never paid his alimony and had, according to the government, only paid into the tax base for three quarters. Meaning, he’d been working under the table for cash since he’d gotten out of the Army in 1972.
When Rob met Mary, her twin girls, Lucy and Matilda, were just going into high school and the boy, Jordan, was in middle school. Rob had tried not to think too much about the kids and what stage of development they were in. Besides, Mary was one repressed and horny woman. She was more than willing to try anything he suggested.
If he wanted to get laid while they were watching a movie, she was game. If he wanted a blow job after a night out at a fancy restaurant, she complied. Hell, she was a real wildcat when it came to adult relations and exploration. It was a great relationship. That is, until she had started getting serious.
Rob had explained to Mary that his first wife, Sheila, was in a vegetative state caused by a car accident that had damaged her brain. Sheila had been in a coma for five years and Rob had seen each of his three kids through their high school years by himself. He had two daughters – Wendy, the oldest, and Anna, the middle child – as well as a son, Larry. Larry had joined the Navy and had been accepted into the SEAL teams, but never seemed to be able or willing to communicate with his family. Wendy had developed Alzheimer’s at the age of thirty-eight. Anna had moved to Seattle and had not communicated with him in ten years.
Mary hadn’t cared about his previous life or why his children almost never kept in touch with their father. All she’d seen was an opportunity to improve not just her life, but the lives of her children as well.
Their wedding had been held in a mutual friend’s back yard. It was a great day. The sun shined and the stress of life was held at bay by the happiness of the attendees. Rob’s urges that insinuated themselves into his life seemed to be at bay that day too. Of course, a pre-marital romp in their friend’s master bedroom had helped alleviate the tension.
Yet it wasn’t long before his more obscure tastes started to betray him. Urges he’d learned to enjoy while he was in Southeast Asia in the 1970s. Hedonistic tastes unacceptable in America but readily fulfilled in third world countries. He’d been lucky enough at the time of the wedding to be a sales representative for a large car manufacturer.
They would send him on week-long trips overseas where he could immerse himself in any and all strange fantasies that popped into his twisted and perverse mind. Trips that he came back from feeling extremely sated physically and only a bit guilty.
Though Rob had woke up every morning to his beautiful newlywed wife lying next to him, all he’d been able to think about was his newly betrothed wife’s offspring: two daughters, both of whom were in the budding stages of their pubescence, and a young boy who was just then starting to experience the uncontrollable nocturnal emissions of youth. What were they doing? Were any of them sexually active? Did any of them ever step out of line and need a stern hand to punish them?
Such thoughts had made Rob anxious, which hadn’t helped him and his condition at all.
Soon after the wedding, he’d had closed circui
t television cameras installed in the new house he had moved Mary and her kids into. The monitors had been built inside a secret panel behind his suits in his large walk-in closet. He’d often found himself there, watching, even after having had his way with Mary. He’d hoped to catch the kids masturbating or dressing and going about their daily grooming rituals, but more often than not both girls were sleeping, and the boy was jumping up and down spastically in the middle of his room.
He’d wondered if any of the kids would appreciate his advances when the time came. Would they shun his bald, pink scalp and the stark white hairs covering his chest, which reminded him of a small polar bear? What of his toes? Ugh, they looked awful. The nails were an ugly yellow-and-green color. He’d picked up a fungus during his army career – something he couldn’t shake no matter what sort of anti-fungal treatment the podiatrist prescribed him. His feet smelled like rotten eggs, and yet the nails always grew like little daggers.
He’d known, though, there’d eventually be an opportunity to test their reactions. And if an opportunity didn’t present itself, he’d always be watching. That was what digital recording was for.
Over the course of the next three years of marriage, he’d had plenty of opportunity to take advantage of his new wards. It had started simple enough: give them a few drinks at dinner, and when they got silly, he’d carry them to bed, accidently brushing against their privates. This activity soon escalated, and Mary was none the wiser.
The cab door opened, interrupting his reverie. A young man with long dark hair and a ratty old army coat started climbing in. “Man, thanks for stopping. I’ve been trying to get a ride for hours.”
“Not a problem. Everyone needs help now and again. I’m Rob.”
“Joey. I’ve been trying to get to California. You going there?”
“I am, actually. Got a load of tires in the trailer headed for San Diego.”
“Awesome,” Joey said as he placed his bags on the floor of the cab. Which was when he noticed all the porn magazines on the seat. He started to push them aside and then said, “Man, you like porn.”
“Need something to pass the time besides music when I’m stuck on the side of the road.”
Joey closed the door to the cab, fastened his seat belt and started to stack the magazines next to him. The kid seemed completely uninterested in paging through the stacks of naked women and men doing all sorts of bedroom activities with each other. “So, you pick up hitchhikers often?”
“Once in a while, when I’m feeling generous. Say, you want a drink? There are some Pepsis and beer in the cooler in the sleeper.”
“Thanks, man,” Joey said, unbuckling his seat belt. He crawled into the sleeper compartment and emerged with two cold Budweisers. “Grabbed one for you.”
“Thanks. Not supposed to drink and drive but I ain’t stopped this rig in almost eight hours,” Rob said. He popped the top of the beer, took a sip and then set it in the cup holder. He shifted the rig into gear and started back down the interstate.
An hour later, Rob pulled the rig onto a siding to get some sleep. He’d only taken one sip of the beer his passenger had given him. The young boy had drank three of the cold beverages and had fallen asleep with his head resting against the window.
Rob unbuckled his seat belt, nudged Joey a bit and got no response. He then crawled into the sleeper and stripped out of his clothes, took a syringe and leaned back into the cab of the truck. Which was when the lights went out.
***
Rob’s head lolled to the left and right. He opened his eyes and was greeted with blackness. His head throbbed like ten jackhammers were inside his skull trying to break out. He tasted dust and grime in his mouth.
He tried to gain his bearings. He was seated with his back against a wall and he was naked. His hands were bound behind his back, but not with rope or metal. It was plastic. Zip ties, he thought. He tried moving his feet; they were bound at the ankles with the same tight plastic. After a few moments, his eyes adjusted to the blackness and he saw a sliver of light to his left. The light was thin, tall, and didn’t cast enough light into his cage for him to see any of his surroundings.
There was a low rumble coursing through the floor of his cage, which told him where he was, locked in the back of a tractor. Presumably the one he’d been escorting to San Diego before he’d been taken captive by his hitchhiker. Within a few minutes he realized the truck was moving and, by the feel of it, traveling at high pace.
He bent his legs, placed his feet flat on the ground, and scooted forward. As he did so he lost his balance and tumbled to his right, causing him to fall into something hard and wrapped in plastic. This was when the smell of the trailer became apparent.
It was earthy, with a chemical overtone. Almost damp, like a newly opened can of oil. Rob smiled a bit. He was in the back of his own truck. New tires always had the same smell.
He tried to right himself, but he was canted over at such an awkward angle that he wasn’t able to find any traction. Well, that, and the years of eating greasy fried food at truck stops had not been kind to his waistline, or his muscle mass. He tried to use the leverage of his head on the edge of the shrink-wrapped tires, but all he managed to do was slip further down on his right side.
Once he was fully on his side, he tried to push himself back toward the wall where he’d woken up. Within a few minutes, he found himself in a worse situation. The top of his head was resting against the side of the truck, his face pressed up against an old wooden pallet, and he had several splinters stuck in his cheek and nose. He wasn’t sure but he felt a wetness and stinging in his right hip. He could feel blood dripping off his face and the coppery scent of his own fluid filled his nose.
With no logical means of escape, Rob did the only thing he could do: he fell asleep.
***
In the cab of the rig, Joey drove east toward the rising sun. He knew of a place in Illinois where he could get rid of the load of tires in the trailer. Before he did that, he’d have to find a quiet, secluded place to get his captive back inside the sleeper. He didn’t look forward to transferring the son-of-a-bitch again.
With great care, Joey took his left hand and reached under his right shoulder to pull a small medical hose out of his sleeve. He removed the bulb of the makeshift siphon and the large water bag that held the contents of the beer he had supposedly drunk. He then rolled the window down and tossed the contents out into the night air.
He reached down, picked up his back-pack, unzipped it, and rooted around until his hand felt a piece of hard plastic about the size of a satellite phone. He pulled it out and held it in front of his lap near the steering wheel. Two metal probes on the end of it glimmered in the morning light. He depressed the trigger on the side and bright blue and white sparks danced between the poles of metal. Joey smiled.
His Taser had helped him out of more jams than any gun or knife could. Not that he didn’t know how to use those tools, he just found it much easier to stun and knock out his target before the real work began. If it had been up to him, he’d sooner have just taken care of this asshole in the desert and left different parts of him buried over a hundred square miles. But, his contractor had been very specific about not killing the guy and where to deliver him.
Oh well, no biggie, he thought. Easy payday for him. The hardest part had been tracking the guy all over the southwest and pinpointing exactly which route he would be taking to San Diego.
Joey had tracked him through three states before an opportunity had presented itself. Rob had gotten arrogant or sloppy; either way, when Rob had pulled into a truck stop in Western Texas with a parking lot full of trucks and cars, he’d been forced to park his rig near the back of the lot.
Joey had known that was his chance.
Of course, he’d had to wait because Rob had taken advantage of two of the lot lizards’ night time offerings. It took forty-five minutes before he’d left his cab with the two hookers. His teeth had gleamed in the bright lights of the parking l
ot as his two temporary concubines, who had suddenly developed slight limps and grimaced with each step, tried to hurry away from the man they had spent some very painful time with.
When the coast was clear, Joey had walked around to the front of the truck stop, stood next to an SUV, and scanned the patrons on the other side of the glass. He’d soon spotted his prey. He’d been sitting at the counter, slowly sipping out of a coffee cup while a grey-haired waitress stood in front of him patiently holding a pen in one hand and a pad of paper in the other.
Joey had quickly moved back to the man’s truck, tested the door locks and was surprised to find out it was unlocked. Too fucking easy, he’d thought. He had climbed into the cab and was greeted with the sour, stale scent of sex. He’d grimaced at the thought of what had happened inside that metal beast.
He had pulled out a pocket flashlight and looked around the cab. Within a few minutes he found what he was looking for: a Garmin GPS navigator. He’d pushed a few buttons, and the driver’s route appeared. Not trusting his memory, he’d written down all the directions on a note pad. When he was done, he placed everything back where he had found it, exited the cab, and went back to his car, where he placed a copy of the driver’s route in his own GPS unit. He’d spent the next fifteen minutes searching for the right place to get picked up as a hitchhiker.
Four hours later, just east of Concho, Arizona, Joey had ditched his car, put on a stringy black wig made of real human hair, a false nose, and colored eye contacts, dirtied his face up with some dust which clung to the spirit gum on his face, and changed his clothes. He’d gotten the clothes from a thrift store, and before he had put them on, he kicked them around in the desert sand so they didn’t look so clean.
Then he’d started walking. He’d walked about five miles before his target spotted him and pulled to the side of the road. “Let the fun begin,” he’d said to the empty landscape as he trotted toward the rig.
It had been almost too easy.
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