Nicolette said. “That’s low.”
“It was in my mind ,” Andrew whispered. “The... beast. And I was in its mind, sometimes, and I knew I couldn’t fight it. The beast is old, older than almost anything, it lived here when this was all underwater, when this desert was an ocean, and it hunted, and it fed. Some people managed to trap it, for a while in the cavern, under the stone, but... I don’t know what those people knew! I couldn’t stop it, I could only –”
“Collaborate?” I said. “Shit, Andrew. You sacrificed your family so you could live. But what the hell are you living for ? You killed the reason you had to stay alive. I will say this, though. Meeting a piece of shit like you makes me feel better about my own horrible mistakes. I’ve done some bad things, but you’ve got me beat.”
“It will be dark soon,” Andrew said, winning the Stating the Obvious challenge. “There’s fresh blood on the table – my blood. That’s what calls it. The beast will come. For me.”
“Couldn’t happen to a nicer asshole.”
“Are you going to let this beast eat him, Marla?” Nicolette asked.
I sighed. “Of course not. I’ll kill the monster, then call the cops and let them know there’s a guy locked to a table, and they might want to inquire about what happened to his wife and kid, and maybe check the table for lots and lots of DNA.”
“He’d let you get eaten,” Nicolette said, joining the state-the-obvious party. “That was the whole point.”
“Yes, Nicolette, but my whole point is that I’m better than him.”
“Aw, I wouldn’t go that far,” Nicolette said. “You’re just horrible in a different way.”
“You have to let me go,” Andrew said. “You can’t possibly fight it, you have no idea what –”
A shadow passed over the sun. I looked up as Andrew whimpered. There were no clouds, no birds, no airplanes – the sky was just dimming , as if we’d been placed under a smoked glass dome.
I drew my dagger, and after some thought, reached into my coat for the silvery axe. The blade glimmered, like a fragment of moonlight, something I’d noticed it doing before, though I hadn’t yet figured out what it meant.
“Is that an eclipse?” Nicolette demanded. “Damn it, not having a neck sucks, I can’t even tilt my head back.”
I rolled my neck around on my shoulders. “No eclipse, but something’s coming. I guess the beast didn’t want to wait for natural nightfall, so it brought its own.”
Andrew was openly sobbing, but I didn’t have much sympathy for him. He’d made his bloody altar, and now he had to lie on it.
Something approached from the north. I squinted, but that didn’t help my vision much, especially with the still-diminishing brightness. The vestiges of bedbug-potion were no help, either, since it didn’t give off any heat I could detect. The thing seemed to be a bodiless ball of writhing wires or tentacles, limbs crossing and recrossing, the whole moving by some form of locomotion that defied analysis.
I grunted. “Your beast is only a little bit in this world, Andrew. It’s operating in dimensions we can’t see. That explains its ability to turn this neighborhood into a Mobius strip – it’s some kind of dimensional manipulator. Sure makes it hard to tell what we’re dealing with, though. We might as well be in Flatland here, perceiving a bouncing ball as an expanding and contracting circle.”
“Nerd,” Nicolette muttered.
Still, there were parts of the beast projecting into this reality, and I didn’t see any reason I couldn’t chop all those parts off and hope some of them were vital. I rushed around the table and ran toward the thing, silver hatchet in one hand, knife in the other. Within seconds one of the – tentacles? Bones? Appendages? – was in reach, so I lashed out with my dagger.
The supernatural blade sliced cleanly, and the limb – a glossy black thing segmented like a scorpion’s tail – snapped like a wire under
“It was in my mind ,” Andrew whispered. “The... beast. And I was in its mind, sometimes, and I knew I couldn’t fight it. The beast is old, older than almost anything, it lived here when this was all underwater, when this desert was an ocean, and it hunted, and it fed. Some people managed to trap it, for a while in the cavern, under the stone, but... I don’t know what those people knew! I couldn’t stop it, I could only –”
“Collaborate?” I said. “Shit, Andrew. You sacrificed your family so you could live. But what the hell are you living for ? You killed the reason you had to stay alive. I will say this, though. Meeting a piece of shit like you makes me feel better about my own horrible mistakes. I’ve done some bad things, but you’ve got me beat.”
“It will be dark soon,” Andrew said, winning the Stating the Obvious challenge. “There’s fresh blood on the table – my blood. That’s what calls it. The beast will come. For me.”
“Couldn’t happen to a nicer asshole.”
“Are you going to let this beast eat him, Marla?” Nicolette asked.
I sighed. “Of course not. I’ll kill the monster, then call the cops and let them know there’s a guy locked to a table, and they might want to inquire about what happened to his wife and kid, and maybe check the table for lots and lots of DNA.”
“He’d let you get eaten,” Nicolette said, joining the state-the-obvious party. “That was the whole point.”
“Yes, Nicolette, but my whole point is that I’m better than him.”
“Aw, I wouldn’t go that far,” Nicolette said. “You’re just horrible in a different way.”
“You have to let me go,” Andrew said. “You can’t possibly fight it, you have no idea what –”
A shadow passed over the sun. I looked up as Andrew whimpered. There were no clouds, no birds, no airplanes – the sky was just dimming , as if we’d been placed under a smoked glass dome.
I drew my dagger, and after some thought, reached into my coat for the silvery axe. The blade glimmered, like a fragment of moonlight, something I’d noticed it doing before, though I hadn’t yet figured out what it meant.
“Is that an eclipse?” Nicolette demanded. “Damn it, not having a neck sucks, I can’t even tilt my head back.”
I rolled my neck around on my shoulders. “No eclipse, but something’s coming. I guess the beast didn’t want to wait for natural nightfall, so it brought its own.”
Andrew was openly sobbing, but I didn’t have much sympathy for him. He’d made his bloody altar, and now he had to lie on it.
Something approached from the north. I squinted, but that didn’t help my vision much, especially with the still-diminishing brightness. The vestiges of bedbug-potion were no help, either, since it didn’t give off any heat I could detect. The thing seemed to be a bodiless ball of writhing wires or tentacles, limbs crossing and recrossing, the whole moving by some form of locomotion that defied analysis.
I grunted. “Your beast is only a little bit in this world, Andrew. It’s operating in dimensions we can’t see. That explains its ability to turn this neighborhood into a Mobius strip – it’s some kind of dimensional manipulator. Sure makes it hard to tell what we’re dealing with, though. We might as well be in Flatland here, perceiving a bouncing ball as an expanding and contracting circle.”
“Nerd,” Nicolette muttered.
Still, there were parts of the beast projecting into this reality, and I didn’t see any reason I couldn’t chop all those parts off and hope some of them were vital. I rushed around the table and ran toward the thing, silver hatchet in one hand, knife in the other. Within seconds one of the – tentacles? Bones? Appendages? – was in reach, so I lashed out with my dagger.
The supernatural blade sliced cleanly, and the limb – a glossy black thing segmented like a scorpion’s tail – snapped like a wire under
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