The Nightmare Frontier

by Stephen Mark Rainey

  “Yeah, I’m still here.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Just sitting on the stairs here.”

  “Malachi, you know this isn’t right. Please…let me go.”

  “Don’t think you understand, Miz Harrington. Can’t do that. Sorry you’re uncomfortable and everything, but it won’t be for much longer. That’s what my daddy promises.”

  “Malachi, your daddy is wrong. You’ve got to understand that.”

  “Don’t you say that. He ain’t, neither.”

  “Look at what’s happening to the world around you, Malachi. Is it the kind of place you want to live in?”

  “It’s gonna be better for us, Miz Harrington. It’ll be better for you too, if you just accept it, like Daddy says.”

  “Do you really believe it’s going to be better? After you’ve seen what its masters do to people?”

  “They not the masters, we are,” he said harshly. “My daddy and my great-granddaddy say we ain’t got nothing to fear and never will. You calling them liars?”

  “Maybe they’re just mistaken, Malachi. Think about it.”

  “You can’t do what my great-granddaddy done by mistake, Miz Harrington. Everybody always thought we was all so stupid, but now look at us. You oughta be glad to be where you are, Miz Harrington. Sorry if that sounds ugly and all, but it’s true. You show us all respect now, and you’ll be just fine, you hear?”

  “Do you think it’s all right to kill people who don’t respect you?”

  “Well…I don’t know that it’s ‘right,’ Miz Harrington, but you can bet people are getting what they deserve—for being like they been to us all these years. Treating us like dirt and such. Everybody calling me ‘Malarkey’ all the time. That kinda talk is over now. Hell, a lot of ’em ain’t gonna be talking no more at all.” He laughed nervously. “I know that worries you some, but Daddy’ll make you understand. Just listen to him, and respect him, and you’ll see him different than you do now. He thinks you’re an angel, you know that?”

  “He’s got a fine way of showing it.”

  “Miz Harrington, it ain’t us killing nobody. Them ones is doing it because they want to repay us for what Great-Granddaddy done for them. Bringing them across from wherever they live, and all.”

  “Malachi, do you trust me?”

  He hesitated. “Well, I reckon so, Miz Harrington. I mean, you always give me a chance where none of them others ever did.”

  “I know it’s been hard for you, and I’ve tried to treat you fairly. I think you understand that. If you’ve ever trusted my word about anything, I want you to trust me on this. Those creatures…they’re no friends of yours. They’re very likely going to turn on you, and you’ll be no better off than any of the people they’ve killed. You have to believe me.”

  He didn’t like to admit it, but Ms. Harrington seemed to be making sense. Still…nobody’s word could ever mean more to him than his own daddy’s, or even Great-Granddaddy’s. Then he thought of something. “How would you know anything about them Lumeras, Miz Harrington? Nobody else knows anything about them. Only my folks know.”

  “That’s not entirely true, Malachi.”

  Just then, the upstairs door creaked open, and a rectangle of light appeared above his head. He stood up as his daddy came down into the darkness, his booted feet clumping heavily on the wooden boards. Levi tugged the little chain hanging over the stairs, and the exposed 40-watt bulb came on, bathing the stairwell in dull, copper-colored light. Malachi could just make out Ms. Harrington huddled in the corner a few feet away, her eyes widening with fear as his daddy reached the bottom.

  “You two having a good talk?” Levi asked.

  “I reckon so.”

  “Good, good. It’s about time for me and her to have a little talk too.” Malachi noticed that his father’s face appeared shadowed with concern. “I just checked on Granddaddy, and he still just sleeping away. Your uncle Joshua ain’t got home yet, though. I want you to go upstairs and keep an eye out for him. When he gets here, you tell him to get his ass down here.”

  “Yessir.”

  “Well, get on, and me and Miz Harrington gonna work on understanding each other a little better.”

  “’Sir.”

  Malachi went up the stairs, but something about the way his daddy spoke made him feel anxious. He knew Daddy would never hurt Ms. Harrington; after all, he meant for her to stay with them from here on out. Course, he also knew his daddy loved him, and sometimes the way he showed it weren’t too pleasant.

  In the kitchen, he closed the door, but instead of going on up to Great-Granddaddy’s room, he stayed put, contemplating what Miz Harrington had said to him. She was wrong, simple as that; Daddy’d make her see things right, sure enough. Still, he couldn’t help worrying about her, so he slid up beside the door and pressed his ear to the rotting wood, knowing that if he got caught, it would mean big trouble for him. Still…his curiosity burned hotter than his fear.

  “So, Miz Harrington,” he heard his father said in an uncharacteristically soft, almost meek voice. “I know you uncomfortable, so I’m gonna untie you, okay? I know you know better than to do anything stupid. Anyway, you got nothing to be afraid of here. Don’t nobody mean you any harm.”

  “After what you’ve done, how could I trust anything you have to say?”

  “You just not understanding yet, and I don’t fault you for it. It’ll take some adjusting and all. I mean, the whole world is changing for all of us. I reckon we’ll all have to get used to different things. Hold still now.”

  A long silence followed, and then his father grunted.

  “Watch it now. That’s good, you just be calm. Good girl.”

  Another long silence.

  “So you and Malachi getting along okay?”

  “I feel sorry for him.”

  “You been good to him, and I do appreciate that, I hope you know. Them others…”

  “It’s not because of the ‘others’ that I feel for him. You’re a bastard, you know that?”

  Malachi felt a jab of fear in his gut. It wouldn’t do to rile his daddy, not even for her.

  But in a placating voice, Levi said, “Let’s just be calm, Miz Harrington. You know what…I’m gonna start calling you Debra now, okay? Cause if you gonna be part of the family, we not gonna stand on formality.” He chuckled. “Now, let’s get back to Malachi. He’s a smart boy, as I’m sure you know. He cares about you, and he’ll listen to you. That’s why it’s so important that you tell him the right things. Like I said, there’s gonna be some adjustment, so at first, it’ll be kinda hard. But it’ll get easier as time goes on, and you’ll get to caring for him—and for me and Joshua and Granddaddy too. Right now, though, Malachi’s most important. You’re here for him, and that’s because you done proved what kind of heart you have. You got a good heart, Debra, and that boy needs a good heart looking after him. Mine’s just…well, it’s had to get hard over the years. So I’m gonna count on you. I gotta be able to count on you. Okay?”

  “You know what you can count on, Levi? Me slitting your throat at the first opportunity.”

  Silence.

  Finally, Levi said, “That’s your frustration talking, and I don’t hold that against you. It’s natural. But I can’t have that kinda thinking last for long. I’m sure you understand.”

  “Tell me what you’ve done with my mother.”

  A pause. “Let’s just say that, if you do right, you’ll get her back, safe and sound.”

  “What’s about Russ?”

  “That fellow that’s been with you? We ain’t gonna talk about him. Let’s just say you don’t never have to think about him ever again.”

  In a steel-edged voice that Malachi had never heard her use, she said, “I am going to kill you. You know that, don’t you?”

  Then he heard her gasp suddenly.

  “Jesus, that hurts…”

  “I can cause you pain without ‘hurting’ you, Debra. I don’t wanna do this, but somet
imes you gotta inflict a little pain to make a loved one understand.”

  “Stop…please. Please.”

  “That’s better. Being polite is a good first step.”

  “Levi, look. I tried to explain this to Malachi, and now I’m going to explain it to you. You’re living on borrowed time. Those things…”

  “You’re not gonna start on ‘those things’ because I know them a lot better than you. Matter of fact, I bet I know ’em better than Granddaddy. I even talk with them, you know that? I understand just what they doing and why. So don’t you start trying to turn us against ’em. It’s a waste of your breath.”

  “You don’t understand.”

  “I’m afraid it’s the other way around, Debra.”

  Malachi heard a metallic clink and then a rough sliding sound. His breath caught in his throat because he knew that sound all too well.

  “I’m gonna start doing a little adjusting of my own here. I know somebody like you knows about what they call tough love. I’m gonna show you some of that, just so you know how important it is to understand everything I’ve told you. So let’s start by getting them pants off.”

  “What?”

  “Go on. Take them pants down. Right now.”

  “You’re out of your damn mind.”

  Malachi’s face began to burn, for he could just picture what his daddy was doing down there. He heard her gasp again, and then she suddenly yelped.

  “That’s better,” Levi growled. “Good. Now, let’s you get on your knees right here. Yep, yep. Now you just bend on over. Yep, bend on over.”

  After an excruciating silence, Malachi heard a sudden, loud crack, followed by a sharp, agonized hiss, as if Ms. Harrington were trying to hold back a scream.

  Another crack followed, and another, and another. With each blow, Ms. Harrington exhaled harshly, until finally, the pain became too much for her. It came out first as a pitiful sob, then as a long, mournful cry.

  Unable to take the sound any longer, tears streaming from his eyes, Malachi turned and fled upstairs, caring little whether his father heard his thudding footsteps. He raced down the hall, past a new tangle of thorn-covered, metal-skinned vines, which writhed violently in recognition of his presence, and then closed himself in Great-Granddaddy’s room. With a little sob of empathy for Ms. Harrington, he slid weakly to the floor with his back against the door.

  He knew the caress of his father’s belt all too well.

  The Lumera curled at his great-grandfather’s feet began to glow softly and lifted its huge, skull-like head, electric blue eyes within the deep, shadowed cavities studying him coldly.

  When the voice that wasn’t a voice, like a musical tone ringing somewhere in his head, said to him, “Hello, Malachi,” he screamed like a terrified girl.

  Chapter 20

  Some distance from the cabin, Carolyn said to Copeland, “I have to wonder. How do you suppose the Barrows get around even when the landscape changes?”

  “They must have some foreknowledge of the alterations…or something. Who the hell knows?”

  “Or they’re able to bypass the changes in some way,” McAllister said. “When we were trying to get to the cabin, we drove for miles and miles, and I’ve got a keen sense of direction. Several times we ended up somewhere that we’d already been, even though there’s no way we could have made a loop. It’s like we were in a piece of Asher artwork or something.”

  “I think you mean Escher,” Copeland said.

  “Whatever. Anyway, maybe they can somehow go straight from place to place, regardless of the alterations.”

  “Like they have a key or something,” Carolyn suggested.

  “Or a guide,” Copeland said. “I think that’s it. Those creatures guide them where they want to go.”

  “All I know is that, for now, everything looks normal,” McAllister said. “Let’s hope it stays that way.”

  Copeland thought for a moment. “I imagine it means Amos is awake. And that tower—their ‘gateway’—hasn’t fully anchored yet. Which means they still don’t have a complete foothold here.”

  “That’s good, right?”

  “I hope so.”

  As they drove down the deserted road, the darkness seemed as tranquil and benign as it would on any cool spring night; but that fact did nothing to assuage the bitter knowledge that Debra remained at Levi’s mercy. If anything, with every passing mile, the ache in Copeland’s gut grew sharper, exceeding the pain of his wounds. Over and over, he saw Levi and Joshua bursting in and taking them down, virtually without a struggle, their vow to fight to the end rendered meaningless. If only he had bothered to rig the cabin’s doors and windows with some sort of alarm—anything that could have given them an additional moment’s notice—then both the Barrow brothers would probably be dead now. He should have applied the same thoroughness seeing to their security that he did with the computer systems for which he was responsible, back in his everyday life.

  But if he had succeeded, wouldn’t the Lumeras have killed both him and Debra? Perhaps they were alive now only because he had failed.

  That bleak realization hardly dulled the sting of his failure. Or his guilt.

  The truck rolled into a seemingly dead town. Not one vehicle moved on the roads, nor did a single living human being appear on the streets.

  However, the Lumeras had left behind profuse, ghastly evidence of their recent passage. At the gas station where he and Debra had encountered the large gathering of people, several blackened, smoldering masses of hideously suggestive size and shape littered the parking lot. There were more near at the grocery store, the bank, on the lawn of the Baptist church. If any doubts lingered in Copeland’s mind that the alien creatures were agents of indiscriminate rather than selective destruction, this appalling carnage removed them. He gripped the rifle tighter as the truck made its way to Yew Line Road, his nerves so taut he had to keep his finger outside the trigger guard for fear of accidentally squeezing off a shot.

  They were ascending Yew Line and had almost reached the site where Rodney had been killed when the transformation began.

  At first, it looked like a searchlight beam climbing slowly into the sky above the dark trees. Gradually, the beam assumed depth and dimension, as if it were solidifying; then, when it resembled a vast spire reaching for the stars, its surface slowly turned black and reflective, as if it were made of onyx. Finally, numerous pinpoints of light ignited at its apex, like flickering candle flames. Almost instantly, the sky exploded with thousands of swirling, spiraling fireballs of many colors, which spread from the tower in every direction, like troops given the order to disperse.

  Copeland became aware of a low, almost subliminal vibration—not much more than a subtle change in the atmosphere—which seemed to seep into his body and close around his heart, causing his pulse and respiration to accelerate slightly. Had he not witnessed the night’s transition from ordinary to extraordinary, he might never have sensed the strange physiological effect. But he knew that, over time, the insidious vibration might come to wear upon him, dulling his senses—maybe affecting his thinking.

  Another weapon in their supernatural arsenal?

  “Good God,” McAllister said, glancing back through the open panel. “I think we’re in for it here.”

  The trees, already tall and dense, had become huge, monstrous things, hundreds of feet high, gray and metallic-looking, now obscuring the Dream Frontier’s distant, lofty centerpiece. Hordes of flying Lumeras soared into the monolithic forest and swirled among the rafter-like limbs, some settling into the canopy, presumably to watch the lone, tiny intruder determinedly making its way through their midst. To Copeland, they resembled decorative lights on monumental Christmas trees, winking gaily but mockingly at those who dared to trespass in their domain.

  To the right, a single ball of fire came drifting toward them, its blazing body painting the giant boles the color of burnished copper. Copeland raised the rifle to fire, but the thing did not attack them; inste
ad, it remained perhaps a hundred yards away, pacing them as McAllister picked up speed. Ahead, the road extended on and on, its sharp, winding curves completely obliterated: it was now a highway leading straight into a bizarrely beautiful, fatally alluring otherworld.

  “Can’t we go back?” Carolyn cried.

  “It wouldn’t matter if we could,” Copeland said. “Back, forward, it’s all the same. Where we are, space is completely different than what we know. You’ve been there already. You saw it happen earlier tonight.”

  “Not like this,” she said with a shudder. “Not with all those…things…out there!”

  “We keep going,” McAllister said, shoving the accelerator to the floor. “One way or the other, we’ve got to finish this.”

  Copeland hunkered down behind the cab to keep the wind from buffeting him mercilessly. Another airborne Lumera zoomed above the truck and stationed itself directly overhead, just beyond the range of his fire. And now, far to his left, a third one appeared, passing like a brilliant ghost through the trees, keeping pace with the truck. After a minute, he realized that the creatures seemed intent not on stopping them, but on ensuring that they arrived at their destination.

  “I guess we’ve got guides of our own,” McAllister quipped, apparently having reached the same conclusion.

  “They seem to enjoy toying with us,” Copeland said. “I almost wish they’d come at us outright.”

  “No,” Carolyn said, giving him a reproachful frown. “Every minute they give us, that’s another minute in our favor.”

  He nodded to her in acknowledgment; under his breath, he said, “You’ve been married to that man way too long.”

  Soon, he saw that the road curved to the left, and the huge trees began to give way to mundane pines. The lay of the land here looked vaguely familiar, and he realized that they were coming out right at the edge of the Barrows’ property. He reached in and tapped McAllister on the shoulder.

  “Slow down. You know where we are, right?”

  “Holy shit, yeah, I do.”

  The truck emerged from the forest at high speed, but McAllister slowed it to a crawl as the nightmarish hulk of the Barrow house appeared around a curve to the left. A single, murky yellow light burned over the front door, but all the windows were dark.