by Tom Leveen
“So now what exactly happens when you get in there?”I ask as Prinn starts decking himself out for the hike. Watching Prinn gear up makes me feel, if it is possible, even more ashamed. He has lights, glow sticks, ropes, carabiners, a helmet, and other tools I can’t even identify. What had we been thinking, running through those tunnels in gym shoes, holding discount plastic flashlights?
“It needs my blood,”Prinn says.
“Blood? Why?”
“You saw yourself. Blood is what opened it. It needs my blood to close it.”
“Okay, but why?”
“It’s all about sacrifice. Sacrifice dates as far back as we can date. We begin to recognize that we are dependent on forces beyond our control. The sun, the rain. It doesn’t take long to realize that the things we are dependent on come from up. Somewhere ‘up there’ are the beings who control our crops. Our cycles of birth and death. We need to keep them happy. So we start giving them some of the crops. We say, ‘Here! We recognize your generosity, let us give something back to you!’ Then a drought happens. Well, obviously, we haven’t given enough. So we give more of our crops. And more. Still no rain. What else can we give? What’s left? What is left?”
“Our children?”I say, thinking of the maternity ward in Tucson I’d seen attacked.
“Exactly. Maybe that will prove how serious we are in our devotion and gratitude to these beings. You ever hear of Abraham and Isaac?”
“Vaguely.”
Selby pipes up. “God told Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. One reason among a bazillion that belief in God is so stupid.”
Prinn laughs out loud. The sound strikes me as being laced with something jagged. Maybe insane. I’m not sure I could I blame him.
“God tells Abraham to sacrifice his only son, that’s right,”Prinn says. “But if you read the text closely, you’ll find something a little surprising. God never tells Abraham how to do it. Abraham seems to know already where to go, and how to do the deed. Abraham knows what he’s doing.”
“That’s unsettling,”I say as I consider it.
“Yeah, ain’t it, though? See, there’s ‘Oh, I’m readin’ the Bible,’ and then there’s really reading it.”
“Why your blood?”Selby says.
Prinn shrugs. “There’s nothing else left. We humans learned a long time ago that blood must be connected to our life somehow. That’s what it wants.”
“Yeah, but that thing . . . whatever it was in there forced me to gut myself. Why didn’t it make Abby’s mom do it, or one of the other guys? Where’s the logic?”
“That, I don’t know. But from what you describe, I’m guessing they were just worker bees. Some power in the ark, held down there all these eons, it could only seep out so much. I think we were the first to get so close to it, honestly. Maybe if we’d chosen another tunnel, we could have dodged its power completely. But it didn’t need blood first. It needed to be . . . well, cleaned off.”
“That’s it?”Selby says. “That’s your theory?”
“It’s a work in progress,”Prinn shoots back. “Sorry there’s not a doctoral thesis on this anywhere, I’ll be sure to write one when this is over. Now, are you girls coming?”
“Psh, I’m not,”Selby replies immediately.
“Yeah, I don’t know if I can go back in there,”I say, mostly to Charlie.
“I don’t know if I can do it without you,”Charlie counters.
“And I don’t care what you do, but we need to move, now,”Prinn says. “Charlie? Let’s go, son. We got a long hike and it’s already been a long day.”
He’s right about that. An eight-hour drive is a long haul, even on the best of days.
“Please, Abby,”Charlie says softly.
“What about Selby?”
“Oh, don’t worry about little old me,”Selby says. “I’ll keep the home fires burning right up here under the relatively clear albeit smoky sky. Or maybe I’ll just drive off with all your shit and find somewhere else to live the rest of my short-ass life.”
“That’s not funny,”I say.
“No, it’s not,”she snaps.
“You’re not serious, are you?”
“Probably not.”
“Sells—”
“Just go,”she says. “I’ll be right here. But I swear to God—perish the thought—I swear to God, if you all aren’t back out here by tomorrow afternoon, I’m out. I’m gone.”
I reach into my hip pocket and dangle Mrs. Brower’s keys in front of my face. Selby’s expression sours.
“Well, shit. Maybe I didn’t exactly think that one through. Fuckin’ Girl Scout.”
I walk back to her and hand the keys over.
“It’s okay,”I tell her. “It’s fair. You can’t go down there with a hole in your gut. Wait as long as you can, and if something shows up to come in after us, then go. Fast.”
Selby closes her fingers over the keys, then looks at me like she can’t believe I mean it. But I do. She seems on the verge of saying something, then simply nods once.
I nod back, and, since there’s no reason not to, I lead the way into the cave.
If she shares a moment with Charlie, I don’t see it, because I don’t look. And I don’t look because I don’t want to know.
We make good time, the three of us. It’s easier now because it’s not my first time, and Prinn’s extra equipment makes some of the more difficult places easier. But being back in the dark again, after everything we’ve seen . . . I can’t help imagining the body of my father waiting around the next turn, the pulverized face of Dr. Riley peeking from some black crevice, or Mom’s dried, mummified corpse skittering toward us. In reality—there’s that word again—the only thing I recognize as we hike is the crushed plastic bottle Selby had emptied and left behind.
We reach the steep hill leading into the pit. Into an ark where some force once locked up creatures that had no place on this Earth, and which I had unlocked.
“All right,”Prinn says, taking off his backpack. “This will do.”
“Good,”I say. “Because I don’t think I could go any far—”
His gloved fist smashes square into my nose. I fly back several feet and land on the ground, barely breaking my fall with my hands. Exquisite pain forces water from my eyes and my spine to lock straight.
“Dad, what—!”Charlie screeches, then grunts.
I force myself to roll onto my backside. Prinn has unsheathed a wicked knife, serrated on one side, and is trying to drive it into Charlie. Into his son. Charlie has caught Prinn’s wrist with both hands and is trying to steer the weapon away.
“Sorry, son,”Prinn grunts, sliding a little on the gravel floor. “It wants my blood. You’re my blood. You and Stephen.”
The knife inches nearer. Charlie’s eyes are wide and sickly in the glow of Prinn’s headlamp and Charlie’s dropped flashlight. Both men strain against each other. Prinn is stronger.
“I would have taken him. He’s the firstborn. But you showed up on the road. Dumb luck that was. God told Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. Now he wants my son. I’m sorry.”
“Dad . . . ,”Charlie wheezes, but the blade comes closer. The tip is now hidden behind a fold in Charlie’s shirt.
I’m beside the smashed boulder we found when we first climbed out from the pit. The boulder, crushed to rubble. I find a large stone that fits in my hand, slide to my feet . . . and hurl it as hard as I can at Dr. John Prinn.
The rock thunks him on the side of the head. A serious blow, if not for his helmet. But the impact is enough to rattle him, and he drops his arms away from Charlie. Without thinking, I scream and lurch at him, shoving both hands out. He makes an attempt at cutting me, and the blade slices across my left forearm.
Then he’s gone. His arms pinwheel and his legs scratch for purchase, then he’s falling backward into the darkness, screaming. A scant few seconds later, and the light from his headlamp is swallowed. His screams echo, but fade.
Fade . . .
And end. Not abruptly, b
ut slowly, like turning down a volume knob. How long will he fall? I don’t know.
I crash to the ground, weak and sick, gripping my cut arm tightly with my right hand. Charlie has backed up against the rock wall, staring down toward the ark.
Something must happen.
That’s the only thought I can manage to string together with any coherence. Something must be about to happen: a dragon comes flying from the pit, or we’re engulfed in green flame, or some tentacled thing comes and wraps us up and takes us down to wherever the immeasurable darkness leads.
But it doesn’t. None of it. I have no idea how much time passes, but absolutely nothing comes up from the ark. What’s possibly more frightening is that the darkness doesn’t bother me quite so much anymore.
“You’re bleeding.”
Charlie’s voice is raw and vacant.
“It’s not bad.”I stand up, shaky. “Charlie, I’m so—”
“No. Just don’t. Let’s get out of here.”
He picks up his father’s bag, and together, we begin the arduous hike back out of the cave once again.
We don’t talk. Not even Watch your step or Careful right there. A disquieting sense of familiarity takes over, like how you can find your way to the bathroom in the middle of the night when you’re at home.
Home. Where exactly is that now?
I’m sure the truck will be gone when we stumble out of the cave, but there’s Selby, in the cab, reclining against the driver’s-side door. Seeing us, she starts to hurry out, then slows as her injury reminds her of its existence.
“Just the two of you?”she says. She doesn’t seem surprised.
I nod, and Charlie and I sit on the ground near the truck.
“So now what?”It’s the first thing I’ve said to him in hours.
“I don’t know.”
“How did he find us?”
“He said it was dumb luck.”
“After everything we’ve seen, are you willing to believe that? What are the odds we’d just run into each other like that?”
Charlie doesn’t answer. Maybe there isn’t an answer to be had.
“He was the threat to them,”I say. “At my house, my dad . . .
the animator had you there, but it didn’t attack you. You were never the threat to them. Maybe it’s over now, somehow.”
“Yeah, maybe. Maybe not.”
“Want to take the Hummer?”I say.
“Fuck that thing,”he says, not sounding like Charlie at all. But I wonder if I’d recognize me, either. Then Charlie adds, “But we should totally take all of his shit.”
So we totally take all of his shit. It’s tight, but we’re able to tie down the whole load with a tarp and elastic cords. Since everything’s quiet, we decide to eat a small meal, sitting in a circle with one another and studying our food much more closely than is really necessary to avoid looking at one another.
“The army will probably wipe them all up,”Selby says at last.
“Uh-huh,”I say. I don’t believe it. Neither does Selby.
“Where do we go?”Charlie says. “Riley’s? It’s close. It’s known territory.”
“No,”I say. “Let’s see if we can find a . . . a line in the sand, a front line of some kind. Maybe the army’s been able to hold them somewhere. Maybe that’s New Mexico, or maybe that’s Boston, I don’t know. But I say we go that direction.”
Charlie and Selby agree. There doesn’t seem to be much point in arguing, anyway.
We climb back into the truck together, but this time, I let Charlie drive. I get the sense he needs something to control right now. Selby sandwiches in between us, wincing.
“How you holding up?”I ask her.
“Still hurts. But maybe not as bad. Hard to tell.”
“Can I take a look before we go?”
“No, no. I’m fine. I want to get out of here.”
So we go. When we get to the highway, Charlie surprises me by saying, “You should’ve let him kill me.”
Selby looks between us, then sinks a little in the seat, not wanting to get involved. She knows she’ll get the story eventually.
“Something put those things in the pit,”I say. “Now I don’t know if that was God or Godzilla. But something put them all in there once before. That means there’s a way to do it again. We’ll find it.”
“This whole thing might be over right now if you’d just let him—”
“No. How could a violent act end violent acts? People have been trying it for thousands of years and it’s never worked. I don’t see that this would’ve been any different.”
“Abby—”
“Listen to me, Charlie. Any god or gods who demand we go around killing each other are welcome to destroy this world if they want, because I won’t bow to them. Not if those are their rules.”
“Amen,”Selby mutters.
“All right?”I say to Charlie.
He considers it for a while, then nods once, stiffly.
A few minutes later, the sun kisses the tops of the mountains behind us. It will be dark again soon. So, so soon. I hope wherever we end up, there will be light. Lots of it.
“Remember that whole riding-into-the-sunset thing?”I ask them.
“Yeah, sure,”Selby says.
“Do you guys know what it’s from?”
“It’s a Hollywood thing,”Charlie says, checking the mirrors. “From old Westerns. You know, John Wayne and cowboys and stuff. They beat the bad guys, and at the end of the movie, the good guys ride their horses into the sunset.”
“Have you ever seen a movie where they did that?”
“I think maybe one of the Indiana Jones movies. Why?”
I gaze into the mirror, reflecting a golden red sunset. “We’re going east.”
“So the good guys lost?”Selby says. “Nice. Very inspiring.”
“Or maybe the story’s not over.”
“Oh,”Selby says. “Okay, or that. Girl Scout.”
The last bit of sunlight disappears behind us.
We keep driving into the darkness.
We drive into the darkness together.
Take courage, mortal,
death
cannot banish you
from the universe.
—Benjamin Franklin
TOM LEVEEN is also the author of Random, Party, Zero (a YALSA Best Book of 2013), manicpixiedreamgirl, Shackled, and Sick. A frequent speaker at schools and conferences, Tom was previously the artistic director and cofounder of an all-ages, nonprofit visual and performing arts venue in Scottsdale, Arizona. He is a native of Arizona, where he lives with his wife and young son.
SIMON PULSE
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ALSO BY TOM LEVEEN
Party
Zero
manicpixiedreamgirl
Sick
Random
Shackled
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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First Simon Pulse hardcover edition March 2017
Text copyright © 2017 by Tom Leveen
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ISBN 978-1-4814-6633-2 (hc)
ISBN 978-1-4814-6635-6 (eBook)