Offspring

by Liam Jackson

  "You're just paranoid, Sam," he muttered under his breath. "This cat and mouse game is playing hell with your nerves. Just keep walking." No! Turn around! The Voice was seldom this insistent, but Sam tuned it out. He wanted off the bridge and the sooner the better.

  As he walked toward the waiting figure, his sense of discomfort grew until it was almost choking him. Something was terribly wrong with the whole picture. The mysterious person hadn't moved so much as an inch. He just stood there like a beige statue, watching. Waiting.

  Maybe it's time to consider hitchin' a ride.

  Sam paused and looked behind him. The eastbound evening traffic had all but dried-up. The rush hour must be over, he thought with rising panic. Not that it really mattered. Who in the hell would stop on a foggy winter night, in the middle of a bridge, just to pick up a scruffy-looking hitchhiker? He was on the verge of turning around and backtracking, when the trench coat suddenly moved in his direction.

  Run! screamed the Voice.

  "Oh, Christ," Sam groaned.

  He tried to turn away, to run, but Sam's feet were rooted to the causeway. His green eyes were now wide with alarm, as the figure in the trench coat shuffled methodically forward.

  Sam felt certain that he was about to die. Helpless and hopeless, he could do nothing except watch the object of his imminent demise draw nearer with each passing second. As he looked on in despair, the air distorted, rippling like a disturbed pool of water. He bent over and retched, suddenly overcome by an intense wave of nausea.

  Seventy-five feet. Step, shuffle. Sixty feet. Step, shuffle. Fifty feet... I'm dead....

  The shrill blast of a truck horn startled Sam from his trance.

  "How do, son. You look like you could use a ride. Hop in."

  Sam peered through the rolled-down passenger-side window of the battered, old pickup, and into the smiling face of an elderly black man. "Come on, son. This bridge ain't no fit place for decent folk on a night like this."

  Stunned, Sam nodded, then cast a quick glance back along the causeway. Gone! Trench Coat had vanished. Dumbly, Sam pitched his duffel bag into the bed of the truck and climbed into the front seat beside the old man.

  "Th—that guy back there... I think, I think..."

  The old man chuckled. "Don't you never mind that. You're on the right road now. You got a name, son?"

  "Uh, yeah ... yes, sir. Sam... Conner. And thanks for stopping."

  The old man grinned, revealing a mouth full of perfect teeth.

  "Sam," he repeated. "That's a fine name, son. That's in the Bible, you know."

  Sam nodded nervously. The old man reached over and fiddled with the dash radio until he located a station. The static was terrible, but Sam could make out a vaguely familiar oldies tune. He thought it might be Andy Williams, singing "Moon River." Satisfied that the station was as clear as it was going to get, the old man glanced over at Sam.

  "Anyways, I'm pleased to meet you, Sam. Folks call me Horace."

  Sam glanced over at the smiling old-timer and started to speak, but the words died in his mouth. He quickly turned away, then cast a discreet, sidelong glance at Horace. Perhaps it had been an act of his stress-fueled imagination, or a trick of the light from oncoming headlights. Either way, he was certain the old man's eyes had changed color, from dark brown ringed by angry, broken blood vessels to a brilliant blue-white, the color of summer lightning. Now, they appeared a normal, if glassy, shade of brown. Sam snuggled deep into his coat and sighed. I'm cracking up.

  The thought was immediately followed by the melodic tinkling of wind chimes.

  CHAPTER 8

  Knoxville, Tennessee

  The empty whiskey bottle smashed into the wall and shattered into a dozen jagged pieces. Mark Pierce sat on the rumpled bed, staring blankly at the mess and wondering if housekeeping would report him. He chuckled at the thought. The motel maids might report him ... had there been any motel maids.

  He looked around the pigsty that passed for a room and laughed, a cold, mirthless sound. "Piss on 'em," he said with a slight slur.

  "Let 'em throw me outta this rat hole. Don't wanna be here, no way," he groaned. "Don't wanna... be... here."

  Rolling over onto his back, he pulled a beer-stained pillow over his face. "The fuckin' army was better 'n' this," he lamented. "Hell, prison was better 'n' this!"

  For the hundredth time, he asked himself why he had endured the eight-hundred-mile bus trip, and for the hundredth time, he asked himself why he stayed. In his heart, he knew he could save the questions because the answers were always the same. Something told him to come, and now that he was here, something told him to stay. And, for the hundredth time, he wished that something would just shut the fuck up.

  Mark struggled back to a sitting position and pulled open the top drawer of the bedside table. Reaching in, he felt the checkered walnut grips of the .45 automatic pistol. He was a convicted felon of a violent crime, and the gun was more than enough reason to send him back to the Central Florida

  Correctional Institution. Mark was long past caring. In some ways, he even missed the joint. At least in prison, you knew exactly who the enemies were, and where you stood with them.

  In both the army and in prison, he could tell the good guys from the bad guys. No decisions to clutter up the day. No hassles with hard-ass employers, shady landlords, or ex-girlfriends screaming for child support. Things were different on the outside. In the free world, he knew from experience that a guy would smile in your face while picking your pocket or sticking a shiv in your ribs. And there was another thing about his former places of residence; there were no imaginary voices telling him to pack his bags and travel eight hundred miles to a place he'd never been, and wait there for someone he'd never met.

  Most of all, Mark missed the army. After pulling a six-year hitch, he had opted out. Later, he came to regret that decision as the biggest mistake of his young life. He had been a damn good soldier, earning his airborne wings and eventually achieving the rank of staff sergeant. For a while, it seemed a sure bet that he would spend the next dozen years of his life in the military. Then he met Sarah.

  The daughter of a local minister, Sarah was both intelligent and smart, with a quick smile and flashing hazel eyes. She was also a devout pacifist and abhorred anything having to do with the military. Mark met her while standing in line at a local movie theater. He was instantly smitten.

  Despite her prejudice against the army, Sarah had been equally enamored with Mark. The courtship was a storybook, whirlwind affair, culminating with Mark's promise to ask for an immediate discharge. Within four months, he was out of the army, married to Sarah, and working for a commercial trucking company near Fort Benning. A year later, Sarah gave birth to twin girls.

  On the eve of his third wedding anniversary, Mark accepted a haul, delivering a load of produce to Philadelphia. The pay was good with the promise of a nice bonus if the load arrived within a specific time frame. My fault. All my goddamned fault.

  Sarah had been less than enthusiastic when he told her of the assignment. She had practically begged him to turn down the job, and stay close to home for a few days. Mark had refused to listen, reminding her that the rent was past due. The next morning, Sarah asked him again to stay home, that she had a "bad feeling" about the assignment. Mark just smiled, and gave her a quick kiss. "Don't worry, baby. I'll take care of everything, I promise." That had been the last promise Mark Pierce ever made to anyone.

  Two days later, he was unloading the trailer in Philly when he received a call instructing him to park the rig at a local dispatch company and catch a flight home. There was no explanation given by the company dispatcher, but he could tell by the quiver in the man's voice that something was terribly wrong.

  He immediately tried to call Sarah, then her parents, but received no answer at either home. Seven hours later, Mark stepped off the plane in Atlanta where he was met by his boss and Sarah's grieving father. Standing in an airport terminal, he learned the truth. Sar
ah was dead. Goddamn me to hell, all my fault.

  Police speculated that it had started out as a burglary, turned rape, turned homicide. After the suspect had finished with Sarah, he had bludgeoned her to death with a heavy, blunt instrument. The forensics specialists theorized that the wounds were consistent with those made by a ball-peen hammer. The weapon was never found. Sarah had died from massive head injuries. The twins were found unharmed in an adjacent room.

  Brokenhearted and on the verge of a breakdown, Mark had been unable to look at the girls without conjuring up images of Sarah. Sarah's parents took in the girls and Mark hadn't seen them since.

  For Mark, the next two years were little more than a drunken haze; black-and-white fragments of nothingness.

  His sister, whom he hadn't seen in a dozen years, finally tracked him down and offered to help. His first reaction was to lash out, demanding to know how anyone could possibly think he could be helped. But her offer ignited a long-buried self-awareness. He looked inward at the man he used to be, and the man he had become. Loathing what he found there, Mark began to fight, to pull himself out of the wormhole of depression. Still, despite his efforts, there was something missing in his life and in him.

  What followed was an endless string of menial jobs and one ratty, roach-infested apartment after another. One night, full of tequila shooters and painful memories of another life, Mark took out his frustrations on a belligerent, beer-bellied security guard in a local nightclub.

  The guard had been full of self-importance and pseudo-authority and tried to bully the wrong guy. While not a particularly large man, Mark Pierce packed considerable muscle onto his six-foot frame. Before several patrons combined to pull him away, Mark nearly killed the guard, repeatedly bashing his head against a men's room toilet. It didn't help Mark's case that he referred to the victim as "Mr. Shit-for-brains," during his trial.

  The result was a conviction for aggravated assault and attempted manslaughter. Seven years of his life spent caged with the worst society had to offer. The way he looked at it, he was a perfect fit.

  During the first week of prison life, counselors gave him a battery of psychological tests. They explained that the results would help to determine if he was "rehabilitation material." Mark figured the whole notion of rehabilitation was a real hoot. Why in the hell would he be interested in "reverting to his original state?" he asked. He figured he had already "been there, done that and got the prison T-shirt to show for it."

  Still, Mark took the tests. The results were no real surprise to him. Introverted, above-average IQ, antisocial with latent homicidal tendencies. One of the counselors, another wiseass in a long line of bureaucratic wiseasses, cracked that

  Mark was the perfect poster child for "Sociopaths 'R' Us." Mark calmly split the man's lip.

  The tests also established another fact, that Mark Everett Pierce was anything but crazy. No paranoid delusions, no signs of schizoid behavior. He was as sane as the next guy. Of course, considering his associates at the time, that wasn't saying a hell of a lot.

  Once granted his parole, he soon fell back into all of the self-destructive habits that had first landed him in prison. All of this served to make Mark's actions of the past two weeks seem all the more irrational, even to him.

  Three months out of prison, Mark had caught a break and landed a job with a small construction outfit. He was on the job, cleaning brick, when the voices first appeared in his head. The message was simple and insistent. He was to pack his meager belongings and travel to this town, to this motel, and wait. From that moment forward, the voices were unrelenting.

  Go. Others... coming, go! Go now... now!

  At first, Mark figured that the wear and tear of his life had caught up with him, and that he was simply losing his mind. However, the voices were persistent, compelling, and when the message remained consistent after a week, Mark began to listen. Finally, he surrendered.

  Okay, Okay! I'm going! I'll pack back my shit and go there and... and... do what? Meet who? Of course, the voices declined to share that information.

  Knoxville. Of all places. And hiding out at the Blue Bird Motor Court, "home of the hourly rates." How fuckin' crazy is this? There was more. Throughout the entire trip, Mark had the inexplicable feeling that he was being followed. Not that anyone had a reason to tail him. He knew it couldn't be over money. He didn't have any. Nor did he owe any money to anyone... well, not any serious money. And he wasn't banging any married women, at least, none that he knew of. Still, he couldn't shake the feeling.

  Mark left the gun in the drawer and lay back on the bed. No sense worrying about any of it, he told himself. He had listened to the voices and he was here, and that's all there was to that.

  Yeah, he thought, I may not be all the way to Crazyville, but I'm sure as hell on the right road.

  CHAPTER 9

  Seattle, Washington

  An icy rain pummeled the ferry as it made its way across the choppy waters of Puget Sound. A small number of passengers huddled inside the spacious interior, sipping Starbucks, and waiting patiently for the ship to dock in Seattle. Outside, a man dressed in leather and denim stood at the bow of the ship, seemingly oblivious to the inclement weather. No, not oblivious, but rather, immune to the elements. Despite the deluge, the man and his apparel remained dry. Impudent raindrops that dared fall in his direction immediately disintegrated with a sharp crackle before touching his person. He was tall and tan, with a runner's lean physique. Shoulder-length hair, the color of summer wheat, whipped about his near-perfect face as he watched the approaching shoreline. Only a jagged scar running the length of his jaw marred otherwise perfection. Steel-gray eyes stared across the bay at the growing shoreline.

  To the casual observer, he might have appeared stem, or perhaps, intense. A more careful study might suggest a predatory nature, as evidenced by the steel-gray eyes that seemed to bore through human flesh and strip away the chaff. Eyes that exposed every conceivable vulnerability, every flaw.

  A second man stood at his side, the kind of fellow that rides the subway for an hour, then exits, leaving people to wonder if he had been fat or thin, short or tall, or if his hair had been brown or blond. Or they might wonder if he had really ever been there at all.

  The Runner stared vacantly out over the churning water, oblivious to the spray and bitterly cold wind. "I've tired of the game, Theo. And why would I not? Why should I continue to play by rules that I never agreed to in the first place? And at no time in the history of Creation has the timing been better."

  Theo cupped his hand around the butane lighter, and lit the cigarette dangling between his thin, bloodless lips.

  "The laws exist for a reason. Both sides benefit from observing them and you should know that better than anyone. Besides, what has it cost you? Nothing! Not a damn thing! But what you propose to do, now... you risk everything."

  A trace of a smile played along the Runner's lips. Theo may have cut an obscure presence, but his voice was undeniably unique. The pitch alternated between that of gravel in an empty beer can and the screech of tires on dry pavement.

  "What has it cost me? Oh, dear Theo, you of all my Brethren should know the price I've paid. It's not a matter of if I do this. It is my right to do with this world as I choose. Did God himself not crown me Prince of the Air by his own hand?" The question was rhetorical, a mockery, and the Runner did not wait for an answer.

  "Besides, it's already begun. The first of our new allies have already crossed over into this plane. The Eye of God is corrupt, and even now Greater Demons enter into the plane of Man. Oh, don't act so disturbed! You're as tired of the status quo as I. But it ends now!" The Runner spread his arms in a grand gesture and said, "Take a good look at the world, Theo. Commit this scene to memory, for it will never be the same."

  The Runner lowered his arms and placed his hands on the ship's railing. Looking out over the churning water, he added, "And you're with me, or you're not. It's really all very simple."

  T
heo hung his head and pinched the bridge of his nose. "There is nothing simple about what you propose. If your plan succeeds, the balance is destroyed. Legion will wreck havoc on this planet, and you will rule over a burnt shell of a planet, inhabited by semi-intelligent monkeys.

  "Once you commit to this course, there'll be no turning back. Is this truly the world you envision, the world you aspire to rule?"

  "You know so little, sweet Theo," the Runner gently chided. "The Veil can be closed at a time of my choosing, though not easily, I grant you. However, I'll not allow it closed until it serves my purpose. Though, you are correct in one respect, in that what's done is done. Dozens, perhaps hundreds of Lesser and Greater Demons have already passed into this plane.

  "I will use them, Theo, as a carpenter uses a hammer. Remember, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. With Legion augmenting our numbers, I will drive Heaven's Host from this planet for all time. Thinking themselves abandoned by an indifferent God, men will curse His name for eternity."

  The bow of the ferry broke through a cresting wave, and Theo turned his face away from the Runner and the cold mist. When he turned back, the Runner's lean, muscular body had been replaced by a broken, arthritic shell. Tanned, blemish-free skin now hung slack from brittle bones, and cancerous melanoma covered the Runner's face and hands. Full, sensuous lips were eaten away, revealing rows of gleaming, serrated bone in place of teeth. When Theo blinked, the illusion was gone, and the Runner was once more the picture of youth and health. Or was it an illusion? Which was the real Runner? After all these many millennia, not even Theo was certain.