Authors: T. Michael Martin
Its circle was tightening.
The click of its claws was a race of scorpions across the tops of tombstones.
“You guys are butt-monkeys,” Patrick said.
At Patrick’s voice, the Shriek came at last into a jag of light.
The Shriek was wearing torn, striped track pants.
“Hank?”
Michael gasped.
It wasn’t Cady Gibson. It was
Hank
.
If you hadn’t known Hank had been mauled—if you’d just been looking for Hank, and
seen this Thing—you wouldn’t have known they were the same.
Hank’s face was rivuleted, as if he had been dragged across a field of razors. Cady
must have bitten Hank after Hank’s death, for Michael saw a bite point above his ear.
He could see the black brain.
Hank.
Dead.
Changed.
Alive.
Mutated.
The ramifications went like chain explosions in Michael’s mind.
The Bellows outside.
All those
Bellows outside.
Cady bit Hank, and Hank came back.
Cady bit the ones outside. And they’re
all
going to come back—
“Haaaaaaaaaaaannnnk!”
The word, coming from Hank’s throat, was like hearing your own ghost call a warning
from beyond the grave.
“Patrick?” Michael said. All things considered, he thought he sounded good: his voice
trembled only horribly. “Get ready.”
“I’m—not—” Patrick replied, singsong, “—
listening
—to— the—buuuuutt-monkey—”
“Hey, Hank,” Michael said softly, sliding his feet over the floor. He was inching
diagonally toward the counter. If he moved any quicker, it wouldn’t work; the Shriek
would spring.
Michael felt the tarp-man’s fingers whisk his scalp. Hank’s spirals tightened. . .
.
The gate that led behind the counter swung open at Michael’s hips, like doors of an
Old West saloon. A pneumatic tube tangled between his feet. For one electrifying moment,
he thought he would fall.
He moved toward his brother. Patrick, beside him, still had his hands cupped on his
head, grooving back and forth to his tune, now a club mix:
“Listening—not—listening—not—not—not
list
en
ing—
”
Hank’s stalking circle ceased.
The Shriek hung upside down, watching.
It hung over Patrick, luminous like a guillotine blade.
Black blood dripped from Hank’s forehead. It struck the crown of Patrick’s head. Patrick’s
face raised up slowly, still vaguely singing, now to Hank.
And Hank: he smiled.
“
HEY, COME EAT IT, YOU NEEWWWWWBB!
” Michael roared.
The Shriek burst from the ceiling with the fused strength of four coiled limbs. The
frozen wind of its hypersonic monster-cry slammed into Michael like a blast of cold
bullets. The computer monitor beside Michael shattered and exploded.
Midair, the Shriek’s jaw unhinged like a python’s. The back of its throat was brilliantly
white. Suddenly, Patrick’s song died. And now he was screaming and so was Michael,
and the Shriek flying more quickly than seemed possible—
—
and so was Michael
—
—dodging himself to the ground and to the left, tackling Patrick alongside him—
And the Shriek bayed while whipping through the empty air and it crashed into the
mouth of the vault—a drumroll of bones—slinging against the far wall, and safe-deposit
boxes sprang open, like surprises.
Michael rushed his shoulder into the vault door.
But the door did not swing with crazy ease. Slow, nightmare slow: it began to inch.
A ruined arm shot through the opening, Michael thrust harder—the dead arm snapped—the
Shriek cried out, withdrew the limb. Michael closed the door, swung the pirate-wheel
locked, and slid to the ground.
Patrick, freshly tackled, looked at the vault. At him. At the vault. At him.
“Hey,” breathed Patrick. “You
triiiicked
him.”
And gave a tiny gobsmacked, admiring smile to the “Betrayer”—to his brother.
Just a smile, that was all, but it was better than his satisfaction at outsmarting
Hank the Shriek; better than his almost-insane gladness that he had not, in fact,
been eaten. Yes, it was something so much finer.
So Michael hardly heard the sound at first, barely audible through the steel door.
Then he paid attention to it; and everything within him tumbled.
It was the shattering of the vials of the cure being destroyed by the Shriek.
Everything you do will be worth it in the end: You can control it.
One belief. One point on a compass. One guiding Instruction.
The belief had been Michael’s comfort, and his weapon, for a very long time. He’d
walked with it inside himself through mountains that roared and hungered around him.
He’d lain with it on nights Before, when he had to wrap a pillow around his head to
erase the sounds of slamming doors or crashing dishes or tears. When Michael knew
so many secret pains that he could share with no one, the thought, the belief, had
talked to
him.
Comforting him unconditionally. Like a best friend. Or like a mother.
You can control it,
Michael thought.
As he sat in the bank, the thought seemed far away. Weak. His ears were filled with
roaring wind, like a television with the AV wires cut.
Glass breaking.
Vials
.
Day 27. Dear Diary, Today I was a foot away from the cure.
I almost made everything okay. I almost changed
everything for—
—for myself—
—for Patrick. But then I kind of messed up. LOL, actually, when you get right down
to it, I pretty much effed the world.
No,
said the thought.
It will be okay.
Really?
Yes.
What about the shattering?
Michael screamed and roared and kicked at the money-cast floor, as if afraid the world
would open a pit underneath him and swallow him whole. The oxygen vacuumed out of
his lungs. His tongue was cracked sandpaper.
I’m Freaking,
Michael thought.
“WHAT THE?!” Patrick shouted.
Michael’s head turned slowly, as if on a screaming rusted hinge.
He looked past Patrick. The vault door. His blurry reflection. His own black mouth
and screaming face, pale and blank as the moon. Michael saw himself and his throat
tore with his scream and oh my God stop, Michael, seriously stop please, stop Freaking.
Gone,
he thought.
I lost. It’s gone it’s GONE.
Patrick scrabbled away from his brother. His mouth was quivering, his hands went to
his hair.
“Michael, you okay?” he said. “Hey, are you—?”
Michael stopped screaming, not because he’d regained control, he’d just run out of
breath.
Tell Bub everything is okay
,
even though you just accidentally locked the monster in with the only things that
can save you and Bub,
his mind said—
Instructed
.
Patrick blinked at Michael, then yanked, hard, on a hunk of his own hair.
Tears leapt to Michael’s eyes. He shot to a stand, his stomach going hot and loose
with shame and terror. Patrick ripped at his hair again. He whined in his throat,
his face smashing down in pain.
Yes, tell him everything will be okay, Michael. You’re so good at
promising
, aren’t you, asshole? But how are you going to lie your way out of
this
?
Michael lifted a hand that seemed to weigh seven tons. He made a thumbs-up.
Inside the vault, he could hear Shriek-Hank really going to town.
“Don’t do that, Bub,” Michael said. It was all he could manage.
“Why’s you screaming?” Patrick looked him up and down, as if trying to decide if he
recognized a stranger. “Why’s . . . ? Did you get a splinter?”
Michael clapped a hand on his mouth. Hysterical laughter had nearly ejected. Then
he understood Patrick’s question, and felt like doing anything but laughing.
Asking if I got a splinter because he’s never seen me like that. He thought I was . . . his
Safe Zone. He didn’t know I
could
lose it like that
.
Oh,
his mind hissed,
but there’s a
lot
Patrick doesn’t know about you.
Suddenly, Patrick looked away, turning toward the tunnel across the dark of the lobby.
“Hey, Game Master!” he called.
“Bub, wait.” Michael’s voice came out as a croak.
“But . . . you’re hurt?” Patrick began. He uncertainly stepped away as Michael came
closer. He gulped, and now his voice was a little plea:
“
Michael, you’re
hurt
, right
?”
Everything is still okay, right?!
“I—”
“Michael!”
Holly.
Small and muffled from beyond the mountain of rubble. She’d never made it through
the tunnel.
Patrick stood there between his big brother and the tunnel, and he shifted foot-to-foot,
in a heartbreaking dance of gathering dread.
“
Michael got hur
—
I mean,
the Betrayer
got hurt, Holly!” he called desperately to the tunnel. “Time out, Game Master!” Whispering:
“And we can still quit real soon. Right? Michael?”
And when Michael didn’t reply, Patrick pivoted and cried toward the tunnel, “Can we
time OU—
?” and Holly replied shakily, “Patrick, hey,” and Patrick went, “Where’s the Game
Master?” and Holly asked, “Jopek?” and Patrick said, “The
Game
Master!” and Holly answered, “R-right,” and paused.
“The Game Master’s out, Patrick,” Holly finally called.
Patrick asked, “
Timed
out?”
Silence.
“
Out
out,” Holly replied.
Patrick’s face grew slack. Ghostly. He looked at Michael, his eyes going wide . . . and
also, far away.
“Oh no, Michael,” he moaned softly. “Ooooh, what did you
do
?”
Michael tried to take another step toward Patrick, but he was so sick with adrenaline
and fear that the step wound up being more of a lunge, like a kid’s pantomime of a
monster.
Patrick ducked back through the saloon doors to the front side of the counter, color
draining from his face.
“Michael, there’s something freaky going on out here!” Holly called.
Oh God
. “Are the Rapture here? The Bellows?” Michael asked.
“No, it’s . . . I don’t know
what
it is!”
Patrick paled even more; Michael remembered the Bellows in the city streets with dark
bites in their skulls: bites delivered by the new kid, by the changed one, Cady Gibson.
How long until the other Bellows came to life, like Hank? How long until all the bitten
creatures sat up in the streets, their hollow eye-pits blinking, their skeleton fingers
uncurling? How long until their thousands of shrieks raved in the night like sirens
on a raid from Hell?
Better question: How long until
you
change?
“It’s not safe out there!” Michael shouted, panicked, his voice cracking.
“Michael, listen—” she called. “Jopek’s—he’s—
something weird is—
”
“Now!”
“But—Christ!” she said, frustrated and afraid. “Fine!”
The mountain of rubble clattered as Holly entered the makeshift tunnel.
And what will you do after she gets in here, Gamer?
What are you going to do? Use them magic protectin’ words to make some more cure,
Mikey?
“Bub. Listen to me. When Holly gets in, we’re going to have to . . . to . . .”
“We were supposed to work together. You said we could just play. You can . . . you
can . . .” Patrick paused.
He’s starting a sentence and hoping I finish it.
And with a wave of self-hatred, Michael realized that that was the way it had always
been
.
Patrick would start to feel something and look to Michael to make sure it was okay.
That was his world: trusting Michael, playing The Game.
’Cause even if he didn’t know I was the Game Master,
Michael thought,
he still thought I was in charge
. Michael had forged that world for him.
And now the apocalypse had come.
Michael looked toward the sound of the shattering behind the vault door again, and
his reflection looked back. He could not tell what he looked like, but he did know
the truth.
I . . . I can’t lie anymore.
It won’t work. There’s no secret passage and no code; there are no alternate endings.
I
can’t
control this,
Michael thought
. Why did I do this? Why did I think I
could
do this? Who the hell did I think I was?
“Bub, I’m sorry,” Michael said. “God, I—”
“NO!” Patrick wailed, bringing his knuckles into the soft flesh of his cheeks. “DOOOOON’T
TELL ME STUFF! IT WON’T WOOOOOORRRRRKKK!”
“Bub, please—”
Patrick’s face screwed into a vicious mask of anger and desperation. “
You
said The Game would be fun! The Game Master said I just hadta get the elixir to win—I
thought I could
WIN IT IF I WAS BRAVE—
but I’m
nooooot BRAVE, Michael, Daddy’s right, I’m NOOOOOT and I CAN’T BE—”
“Bub, it’s not your faul—”
“NO! BETRAYER, YOU CAN JUST
HAVE IT
!”
Patrick reared back one tiny fist. For a single second, Michael thought his brother
was going to hurl the hand into the marble counter beside him, to strike it hard enough
to shatter his small bones as he had done in the psychiatric hospital. And this time
there was no Atipax to help him.