—I’m only going to say this once.
Go back to the wall where you were before.
He didn’t move. She began to count in her head, wondering would she scream at ten, at twenty? She wasn’t sure. She wasn’t sure she could do it, trade a known threat for an unknown. The important thing though was for Pete to believe she would.
At twelve he hesitated, lurched and crawled back to the wall in reverse. Once he reached it she continued the conversation as if he never moved.
—Just because you’ve known him longer doesn’t mean a thing. Who makes pillow talk with him? With whom does he share his deepest fears? Who knows his dreams? Do you know how he got that scar high up his right thigh? Do you know where his mother moved after she left them? Did you ever suck his cock? I doubt it. I know how he acts, what he’d do in this situation.
But
did
Ron have a chance? Or did that thing outside snap him up before he knew what got him? Slow streams of tears oozed down each of her cheeks. Perhaps their argument had no purpose other than to make her cry. She knew Ron was dead, despite all her hopes. She didn’t know if Pete could see her crying, but she didn’t dare look away. That might be a giveaway as to her emotional state, and if he saw her as vulnerable he might take it as another opportunity to advance. She knew now how fast he could move. He was in excellent shape.
She fought her tears back till she thought she could speak clearly and returned to their conversation. —Look, Pete, let’s not fight. It’s not helping.
—No shit.
—Yeah, well I agree with you we’ve got to work together. We should talk about how we’re going to get out of here.
—We’re not going anywhere as long as that thing’s outside. At least I’m not. You can do whatever you want I guess, but personally I’d prefer to have a witness when I tell this story to the police or the FBI or whoever. It’s going to be way worse if I come back alone.
He had a point there. She imagined herself the sole survivor, telling the story to some detective in a gray room with a two-way mirror. Mental hospital, jail for life—that’s how a lone survivor would likely end up. She considered again the possibility that Pete somehow sacrificed Ron to the monster. If he’d thought out the aftermath it would explain why he left her alive. One explanation anyway. Was it even the kind of monster that accepted sacrifices? And if it did, would that make it a god? She wondered what wishes or prayers it granted in response to a successful sacrifice. Wasn’t Pete already looking for a pot of gold? Was this his plan to get it?
All this sacrifice stuff was pretty far out though. It was hard to picture Pete as any kind of priest or wizard. And what did she know about monsters anyway? Probably Pete’s original story was true, how he’d gone to the cave mouth looking for Ron and spotted the gigantic night-obscuring thing instead. In that case she maybe should be grateful it hadn’t been her—she might’ve rushed up there shouting Ron’s name and that would’ve been the end for her
and
Pete as well. Disintegrated like the bat. Or maybe worse. Who knew what the unseen parts of this enormity might do, what claws and jaws were hidden in its shadow?
—Hey. Pete spoke in a stage whisper. —Hey.
—Hey what?
—Why don’t you come away from the entrance. You’re going to attract that thing’s attention. I don’t think it even knows we’re here so far. You don’t need to be that close to the edge.
When she didn’t respond he added —I’ll stay right here. I promise I won’t touch you.
—Yeah right.
—Honestly. Cross my heart and hope to die.
—Maybe you shouldn’t hope that out loud.
—Whatever. Come away from the edge. It’s not safe for either of us, you being there.
So far Pete’s advice, his grasp of the situation, had actually been good.
Except for the attempted rape and all.
But he seemed to understand the monster situation. His plan to wait till morning made sense. If the thing didn’t fade away with sunrise, they’d at least get some better sense of its dimensions, maybe spot some escape route or weakness. The ranchers might even report them missing if they didn’t return to their truck by the end of the day. Or not—she pictured the hired hand using a backhoe to bury their truck in a trench. Next to a dozen others, all the way back to Model T’s. . .
—Oh shit.
Don’t move.
Damn. What was Pete pulling now?
—Wha—?
—Shhh! Don’t say anything,
and don’t turn around
. There’s something behind you.
Seriously? Just when she was ready to grant him a smidge of credence, he had to go and spring the oldest trick in the book? Yet he spoke slower and slightly louder than before, as if to give his words more gravity. And wasn’t the point of that trick to
make
her turn around? Had Pete messed up his scheme or was there really something. . .
She turned. And saw the new thing approaching. Was it a
thing
, or an
effect?
An
event?
She could not be sure. It didn’t help she’d turned from the wrong shoulder so she had to twist further at the hips to see it better. Now she was sideways to Pete, facing away, an alarm bell ringing in the back of her brain so long as he was out of sight.
Drifting in the air behind her came a . . . ripple. A blur. She lacked the words. Approximately twice the span of her torso, the whatever it was had no distinct outline or shape. Or color. It hovered and twisted up the limited light like the air over heated pavement, the view through fountain glass. Not that there was much to see beyond the distortions themselves. It was as if a translucent flag drifted on its own, free of any pole, flapping in a nonexistent breeze.
Then as if she’d made eye contact or somehow caught its attention, it locked on a course and approached. She thought to scuttle backward but her muscles refused to respond. In seconds the region of ripples reached her . . . and passed right through her, so far as she could tell. She felt nothing as it struck, but immediately after she was convinced her flesh bore a coat of flat waxy scales, even beneath her clothes. She glanced at her bare forearms, saw nothing, ran her hands down them, felt nothing. By then the impression was gone.
She spun and saw the ripple or disturbance hovering some two meters past her, advancing no farther. Pete was huddled as far back in the cave as he could manage.
—Pete. Hey, Pete.
He did not respond.
—Pete, it’s safe. It went right through me and I barely felt a thing. Don’t worry.
He didn’t answer, didn’t move. She could see his face but couldn’t tell if he was watching her or the drifting ripple. It hung a bit to the north, didn’t seem interested in Pete at all—at least not yet. As she watched he raised his left hand just a few inches slowly and pointed toward her again. Then he hissed out one word —Others.
Sue-Min spun again and this time had to throw her left hand down to keep from losing her balance. It slid a few inches through the little cobbles till it found purchase then held.
Now she glimpsed a scatter of pinkish hovering blobs, varying in size but all smaller than her head. A dozen, maybe two dozen. They advanced slowly, swirling about each other, swelling and distending, dumbbell to sphere to sausage and back. Flattening into discs. Other shapes. Flashing pink to gray. When they reached the entrance they passed all around her on either side. None of them struck her or even came close.
Pete continued staring in what she presumed was terror— at the ripple, at the oncoming blobs, at her—she could no way tell. Once inside the little cave the blobs wandered about while the ripple came to rest above the graveyard of moth wings. One blob drifted toward Pete and he contorted to avoid it, slouched backward to his elbows, almost to the ground. It exhibited no interest in him, stretching to a cylinder before reaching the wall above him instead and blinking out as it struck. But not quite all at once—it seemed to suck into the stone like a sloppy eater’s spaghetti noodle. As she watched, the blobs all met the walls or floor or ceiling and disappeared one by one. One of the last wandered back, and before she could dodge, it struck her left shoulder. This time she felt a faint dampness, and the feeling lingered longer than the waxy sensation she experienced earlier.
The second the last blob was gone the ripple blinked out as well, sudden and complete, like a flat screen TV blinking off for the night.
The feeling of damp in her shoulder remained, though fading. She ran her hand over her shirt but it felt dry.
She found herself shaking. Maybe it was the encounter. Maybe it was just the early morning chill—no matter where you were, desert or jungle, it got really cold right around 4:00 a.m. Fieldwork taught her that. New Mexico, Utah, Turkey, Belize—always the same, that’s when the chill came. It was cold like that right now, which at least had to mean the dawn was almost upon them. She looked at her sleeping bag crumpled against the wall. If she started to shiver it was going to be hard to stop.
She brought her knees up, hugged them again to her chest. —Well Pete, you’re the expert. Any idea what those things were?
A long moment passed before he answered —I dunno. Pause. —They must have something to do with the thing outside. Its breath, its spit, something it sheds? Its babies, its eggs? Some kind of parasites that slid off its skin? Hallucinations it caused us to see?
—Two of them hit me. The big flickering thing and one of the blobs. They all went right through me. I felt them though. I can still kind of feel where the blob hit. It feels wet but it’s not. Whatever they were I don’t think they were hallucinations exactly. Not the way I felt them.
—Whatever they were I think you attracted them sitting where you are. I wish you would come away from there before you attract something worse.
—I already did. I attracted
you
. Better I take my chances with this monster and its friends.
—Don’t talk that way Sue! I’m not like that! I swear.
I swear on my mother’s grave.
I swear on the American flag. If you come back here I
will
leave you alone. No means no,
I get that
, I know. I was lonely, that was all. And scared. I admit it, I was scared. I’m still scared. We’re both scared. Not all men are what you think. I just had a bad moment. I’m OK now. You’re safe with me.
—I’m scared of
you
, don’t you get that? And I have very good reason.
She couldn’t see his facial expression but she saw him hang his head. Bullshit acting.
—I’m sorry. I’m really sorry. Please come back this way. I won’t touch you again. But we’ll both be safer if you come away from the cave mouth. That much I’m sure of.
She regarded his vague huddled form in the rear of the space, tried to gauge his sincerity, his acting ability, the ratio of one to the other. His fear, hers.
A leopard doesn’t change its spots
, something her adoptive father used to say. Fear could do a lot though.
Sue-Min glanced outside and up. Was the bat-melting blossom really closer now, larger? How much longer before it reached out for her? Her gut told her Pete was right at least about the danger of her location. Hadn’t Ron most likely attracted its attention simply by standing in this very spot? She envisioned the pinwheel dipping and spinning, licking her up with a flick of one immense petal. . .
—Please Sue-Min? Please come away from there.
She waited, considered, weighed her fears. —Okay. First off you understand I’ll scream as loud as I can
the second
you come near me, right?
—Yeah, no problem, I’ll leave you alone, just like I said. I swear.
—Second, you need to move as far as you can into that sort of alcove behind you.
He immediately began wriggling the final few feet into the last rounded extremity of the shelter. He had to hunch just a little once he was all the way in.
She took a deep breath, said —All right. Not one move or I will scream like nothing you ever heard before.
—Yeah, yeah, okay. I get it. Just come away from the entrance.
She began to crawl toward the rear of the cave, the dusty cobbles wedging beneath her kneecaps again. She wished she had her kneepads in her pack, but she hadn’t expected to do any caving on this hike so she’d left them behind. Not that this dinky rockshelter with no real dark zone counted as a genuine cave. She kept Pete in the corner of her eye the entire time, flicked glances at him every few feet.
At the wall she considered her sleeping bag. Her bag and Ron’s, still zipped as one. She eyeballed Pete, looked back at the bag, decided not to slither inside. Instead she sat in the gravel with her back to the wall and tugged the bag up over her knees to her neck, smoothed it down along her sides. She wasn’t going to get trapped again. Using it as a blanket, if she had to she could jettison it as a decoy, a distraction, like squid ink, a lizard’s tail. If he just didn’t get hold of her head or her hair. . .