CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT
"Ghost Who Walks in the Sun"
When he got to the rim Summer was already hunkered down behind one of the tooth-shaped rocks, balancing the binocs via her elbows. Beadles stared west into the blazing heat trying to discern what it was she saw. He thought he saw a flicker of motion but he couldn't be sure. It could be distortion rising from the desert floor.
"What?" he demanded.
She handed him the binoculars and pointed. "There."
It took him a minute to adjust the lenses and another to sweep them left to right across the barren landscape. He swept by a quavering parentheses. He swept back. He zeroed in. He couldn't believe his eyes.
There was a man out there walking toward the butte. He had to be at least five miles away. As Beadles zeroed in he saw that the man was tall with long hair, bone-thin, wearing only a loin cloth. No equipment. No water bottles. Just walking.
An iron burr enmeshed itself in his guts.
Maybe it just wants its skull back!
He giggled.
"What is it?" Summer demanded.
"I don't know," Beadles said, afraid to speak his mind. He really didn't know. He was an anthropologist, a scientist trained in rational inquiry. There was no room in his portfolio for ghosts, demons, bugaboos and things that went bump in the night. The unreality of the landscape, so different from his regular habitat, gave rise to craziness. Beadles understood why many early pioneers went insane traveling through the vast, desolate landscape, terrified of unseen eyes and Indian attacks.
"It's him!" Summer said with a note of desperation and hopelessness.
"Don't be absurd. It's just some lunatic tripping in the desert. We'll probably have to go out there and rescue him when he collapses."
"Why isn't he carrying anything?" Summer said. "No hat, no water, no guns! What is he doing there?"
"Chill!" Beadles barked, irritated. She mirrored his misgivings and it made him mad. At himself, her, Liggett, Betty, Ninja, the press, the whole damned world.
It wasn't in the script!
Seriously. It had to be some lunatic. In fucking broad daylight. Maybe it was an hallucination. He turned on Summer.
"What did you do with those acid tabs?" he hissed.
Summer backed up, shocked. "Nothing! I still have them. Why?"
"You didn't put them in the drinking water? In the pond?"
Summer half guffawed in disbelief. "Come on! I would never do that!"
"How do I know you're not lying?"
"Because I love you!" she said, shocked.
Beadles tried to stop the words from coming out. "Love me?! We've only known each other for two days!"
Summer crossed her arms and cried. He never could tolerate a woman crying.
"I'm sorry!" He tried to take her in his arms but she twisted away and ran off.
"Go fuck yourself!"
Beadles panted, took a drink from the bottle clipped to his belt. Give her a little time to calm down. Give them both time. Surely she could see the absurdity in her declaration. What really troubled him was the weight. He wasn't ready for another serious relationship. Was it wrong to deny unconditional love?
Or was it? She could be an awfully good liar. Vince had said so. Summer didn't come straight from the convent. She'd been a stripper and a hooker. Everybody lied. Especially hookers.
But what did she have to gain from such a declaration? His trust? For what?
The gold, dummy.
The big score
.
If they lived.
He was afraid to look. A ferret clawed at his heart. And yet he must. He looked up. The figure was still miles away, a tiny wavering line in the sand. The ground at its feet had darkened and seemed to ripple forward like time lapse creeping fungus. The figure strode at the head of a wavering darkish blob that spread in a delta behind him. With each step the blob seemed to grow.
Beadles brought the binocs to his eyes. For a minute he didn't understand. This writhing, rippling thing on the ground. He adjusted the focus.
"God, Jesus God," he said as the sun drilled into his skull.
Scorpions. Rattlesnakes. They followed the grim man like children after the Pied Piper.
Beadles stared grinding his teeth. They would be at the butte in an hour. Beadles recalled seeing two gas cannisters in the back of the Hummer. They had to prepare. He needed Summer.
He ran after her.
Summer sat cross-legged by the pond weeping. Beadles knelt next to her and put his arm around her.
"I'm sorry. I didn't know what to say. I need your help. They're coming here. We have to get down to Vince's car and back up again before they arrive."
"Who?" Summer said. "Who is coming here?"
"That thing and thousands of scorpions and rattlesnakes."
Summer stiffened into a leaf spring. "What?"
"Whatever it is, it commands the scorpions and rattlesnakes. That's how it got Vince in the middle of the night. It sent scorpions. We've got to get the two cans of gas in Vince's car to stop them from crawling up here."
***
CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE
"The First Assault"
They shot the chute accompanied by rockslides and clouds of dust. Beadles' hands were raw from applying the brakes. From the ground they couldn't see the creature, hidden behind waves of diffraction.
They approached the Hummer, shadows clinging to their feet like ink blots.
"Don't look in the front seat," Beadles said.
Summer ignored him. She gazed over the sill and stared at the grotesquerie behind the wheel, a buffet for insects and snakes. A straw-colored centipede crawled out of Vince's open mouth. Summer turned away.
Beadles opened the tailgate and threw everything within reach on the ground. There were two five gallon gas cannisters. Beadles also found a box of .45 cartridges and emptied the contents into his pockets. He cut up a rope for straps for the gas tanks. They slung the tanks across their backs and returned to the chimney.
It was almost noon.
The climb was much harder this time. The gas cans caught on rocks and banged against Beadles' ribs. The smell gave him a headache. Summer was above him climbing like a rhesus monkey. By the time she reached the top he was only halfway up, breathing in wheezing gasps. He stopped to catch his breath, balanced precariously on two jutting rocks. He twisted the can around so it hung on his chest.
"Hurry!" Summer called down the chimney.
Groaning Beadles resumed the climb. His arms screamed with pain. Sweat streamed into his eyes. Tiny insects hovered around his eyes and mouth. Each step was a titanic effort. One after the other. At last he heaved himself up into the bubble, Summer holding his arm. He unstrapped the gas tank and sat gasping. Summer handed him a bottled water. He twisted off the cap and drained it in nine gulps.
They stood, climbed out of the bubble. Beadles put his gas can next to the other on the flat next to the bubble. "If they come, they'll come this way. We'll pour gas down the tube and light it."
He headed back to the lookout perch, Summer right behind.
"What if there's another way up? What if they just climb right up the sides?"
"I don't know. I don't think they will. We went all the way around. There's no other way up." He put his hand on the gun butt. What if he shot that thing through the head?
Maybe it just wanted its skull. He retrained the binocs.
The glare coming off the desert floor was almost too much. The thing had a head surrounded by long, stringy flaxen-colored hair. Its face remained in shadow beneath the zenith sun. The weird pulsating wave followed, scorpions leaping like spawning salmon. The ground writhed and pulsed like an acid flashback.
They watched in dread silence. Five hundred yards. Three hundred. One hundred. The dark wave rippled and gleamed, a roiling sea of poison. The Giacometti-like creature advanced, thin, dark, tensile, its head tilted slightly forward so that its face remained in shadow. Fifty yards from the base of the butte it stopped, put its hand over its eyes and looked up. Beadles watched through the binoculars.
They stared at one another for ten seconds. Ten seconds in which neither Beadles nor Summer drew breath. The longest ten seconds of their lives.
The creature extended an insect-like arm and its venomous army surged forward. But not in a blind rush. They did not surround the butte and mindlessly attempt to scale it. They headed for the chimney.
"Let's go!" Beadles yelled racing back to where they'd left the gasoline. Timing was everything. At this height the gas would mostly evaporate by the time it reached the bottom. They only had ten gallons. They needed to wait until the snapping, clacking, clicking wave of vermin surged to within twenty feet of the top. He felt in his pocket. He still had matches from The Last Chance.
He grabbed a can, loosened the lid and got on his knees. Sound rose from the chimney-- a filthy white noise like a hornet's nest. Chittering and slithering. It was something he could never unhear. It seared itself into his brain, an aural petroglyph on the inside of his skull.
Summer crouched opposite him on the bubble's rim, six feet away gripping a gas can, her lovely gray eyes in a warrior's squint.
"Come over here and take the can when I'm ready," Beadles said.
Summer came around and crouched next to him. Beadles removed the cap and handed it to her.
The hissing skittering sound grew louder, amplified by the tube. The soundtrack of hell. It filled the sky, that awful sound.
Beadles sloshed a gallon into the tube a split second before the first wave of vermin bubbled up. Beadles shoved the can at Summer, picked up the matches, lit the book and tossed.
The tube erupted with a satisfying whump, shoving Beadles and Summer back. Beadles' eyebrows crackled. He scrambled on his ass up and out of the bubble. He watched in astonishment as burning insect parts rose like soot from a chimney and wafted across the plateau. The wind shifted and the noxious black grit blew on them leaving a greasy, acidic deposit.
He half ran, half-stumbled back to his previous perch and grabbed the binocs. He looked down. The figure watched stoically arms at its sides. It raised an arm and made a circling motion. The tide of vermin receded, pouring around the gaunt man.
Beadles waited. Would the thing go after its skull? Was it even its skull? And if that was its skull in the back seat, what was that on its shoulders? Summer peered down next to him, tugging her hat down low.
"Is he leaving?" she whispered.
The creature turned and walked into the sun.
***
CHAPTER SEVENTY
"Raiding the Dead"
They watched until it disappeared in the quavering heat.
"Oh God!" Summer cried. "What if it comes back?"
"Not today. Maybe we can drive out of here."
If we can dislodge that thing behind the wheel.
"What makes you so sure it won't come back?" Summer whined. It was an unattractive sound.
"It only appears in the sun! Its strength peaks at mid-day. It was killed in the sun and can only walk in the sun."
Summer slumped in despair. Beadles put his arm around her.
"Come on. If we move right now we can be back in Gap by sundown."
"How?" she wailed.
"Vince got down here. We can find our way back. I'll use the GPS."
"What if we go by it?"
"I don't know! How's it going to stop a two ton vehicle going sixty mph?"
Hurriedly they gathered their things, the guns, the canteens, the binoculars, packed them up and descended the chimney. A ten foot section near the top was covered with a greasy black soot which clung to their hands, feet and clothes. It had an acrid, acidic smell. They reached the desert floor shortly before one and headed for the Humvee.
Beadles opened the driver's door. The sack of putrescent flesh wedged behind the wheel looked immovable. Beadles got in the front passenger seat, closed the door, braced his back against it and tried to shove Vince out with his feet. The thing bulged with his efforts releasing a stench from hell's sewer. Drawing his feet back he lashed out, shoving with all his might. A yellow eye popped loose and dribbled down Vince's shirt. The thing budged. It had the consistency of a beanbag chair.
Struggling and sweating, Beadles strained with all his might, both feet up against the corpse's thigh, sweat streaming down into his eyes. Grunting, he ejected the horrendous corpse. It fell with a dull whump releasing a blast of ordure. Beadles used a cloth from the back seat to wipe a disturbing brackish fluid from the driver's seat. He tossed it, grabbed a towel and rubbed some more. Finally, when the seat was bone dry, he slid across. The key was in the ignition. He turned it.
No response. No lights came on, no dials budged. The electricals were dead. He reached down and found the hood release. It let go with a thunk. He got out the passenger door and opened the hood. The wiring was disconnected and stripped. Insects and snakes had chewed through everything. An electrocuted rattler hung from the battery, a streak of burnt black flesh running down its belly. The stench was unbearable. Beadles slammed the hood in disgust.
"We're fucked!" Summer said.
Beadles fell into a sinkhole of despair. But he was the man. He was the scientist. It was up to him to take charge and find a way out of this mess. There was no way they were walking out. Not today. They had to retreat and survive another day.
"We're going back up," he said.
"What's the point? We're going to die sooner or later."
"No we're not! I've got an idea. I'll come back down here tonight and torch the vehicle. With any luck someone will see the fire and investigate. Now let's go through the vehicle and salvage anything usable."
He went around to the back, both of them avoiding the mound of swollen flesh on the ground. It had burst its seams, spilling out of shirt and pants like some morbid fungus.
They took Vince's sleeping bag, knife, matches, an NDuR water purification system, a tiny camp stove with a propane cylinder, dehydrated food, trail mix, beef jerky, a box of Snickers bars. Beadles found an old copy of
Western and Eastern Treasures
dated July of the previous year and a metal detector. With a start he realized the date.
It was June 20.
Tomorrow was the summer solstice--the longest day of the year.
When the creature's power would peak.
He kept this fact to himself.
Muscles screaming in protest, burdened with straps that cut into his seared flesh he followed Summer up the chute. Acid sweat stung his eyes. His mouth was as dry as the Sahara. The pain of reaching for the next handhold left him gasping. He had pushed himself too far but there was no place to stop, no time to rest. He came to the blackened throat. A slick patina of arachnid and snake parts clung to the rock, little flecks of snakeskin and bristle-like mandibles. His foot slipped and for a blind instant he was caught in a terrifying nanosecond of freefall. He struggled to find footing and slipped several times, each time saving himself at the last minute, finding purchase in one of the hand-hewn slots. An inert stinger penetrated his thumb, striking out in death. He strained every muscle wedging himself in place, unable to stop the sweat from streaming into his eyes. He clawed upward like a scorpion.
Summer reached down to help him with the final step.
Beadles staggered to the pond and put the water purification filter to work. It sucked wtaer with a hand pump and passed it through a series of filters. Of course to be certain there were no harmful bacteria they would still have to boil it. He collapsed by the pond and fugued. When he sat up he had a splitting headache. Summer watched him with a crease of concern.
"Are you all right?"
"I think so," he croaked. "Can you get a fire going and boil this water?"
"Sure. What are you going to do?"
"I'm going to photograph what we found."
"How can you even think of that right now?"
"What else am I supposed to do?" he snapped. In a softer tone, "Don't worry. It's not coming back today. We're safe until tomorrow."
He set off toward the ruins. Summer watched him dully.
***