X's for Eyes (11 page)

Authors: Laird Barron

Tags: #epub, #ebook, #QuarkXPress

“Presumed dead,” Mac said. The hospital lay far behind them. The path curved along the edge of a real forest that extended up into the Catskills. “Laws of physics, causality, have been satisfied. Besides us, no one ever saw an actual body. We don’t count due to special circumstances. Therefore, it is possible he never died. If he never died, from a quantum perspective it isn’t important where Arthur was for those months the world thought him extinct. Now he’s back with his loving family. Amnesiac, bedridden, emotionally fraught, but alive. Ultimately, that’s what counts. Arthur is alive.”

“His bothers aren’t. Hera drove Hercules mad and he killed his family. Afterward, he dwelt in mortal agony until his betrayal and murder. Will it be the same with Arthur? Will he wander the earth seeking redemption?”

Neither boy mentioned a dream they’d shared between semi-consciousness within the womb of the whale and snapping awake in the hospital. In the beginning, there were three human boys nestled together inside that whale—Mac, Dred, and Crabbe. Arthur had emerged
fromthem
and separated unto his own fully-formed entity. Regarding the details of this particular matter, perhaps the less said the better.

“And what about Big Black?” Dred said. “Gotta figure it’s corrupted, right?”

“I’m operating on the assumption our family and everything we touch corrupted at every level. Big Black is touched by evil, no mistake.”

“Cheery.”

They walked on, dressed in hospital linen and slippers; a pair of children or little old men preoccupied with the woes of the world.

“The doctors will spring us sooner or later,” Dred said.

“Granddad or Dad will okay the papers, sure.”

“This has been a nice break. What happens next might not be as pleasant. Frying pan, fire.”

Mac shrugged. “A Star Chamber hearing doesn’t seem particularly frightening at this point in my career.”

“Nah, life ain’t bad. We’ve our health, our looks, and loads of money. Could be worse things than belonging to a family whose patron is an alien god . . . ”

“Could there be?”

“Hey, I doubt the subject comes up every day. It’s probably like mass—you go on Easter.”

The boys exchanged smiles and an uneasy chuckle. An orderly in white approached them, cutting across the slavishly manicured sward. He didn’t seem to be in haste, yet closed the distance swiftly. He whistled a soft, repellent tune.

“Hello, Tom.” Mac stepped forward to shield his brother.

“
Tom
is it? No more Mr. Mandibole? My, my, how quickly they grow up these days.” Tom stopped short and gave a half bow with the grace of a medieval troubadour.

“I recognize ya from somewhere, pal,” Dred said. “Drivin’ a giant bulldozer . . . ? Weren’t ya dead?”

Tom Mandibole brushed imaginary lint from the breast of his ill-fitting uniform. Stitched letters on his breast pocket spelled J.R. LEGRASSE. Traces of blood spackled the cuffs. “Chauffeur, pilot, health inspector, slaughterhouse exsanguinator, nursery attendant, and whorehouse piano player. I am a man of many hats.”

“Ya ain’t wearing one now,” Dred said with a sarcastic smile.

“Ah, I shall rectify. Your gape-mouthed head will serve nicely as a bonnet.” Tom’s smile was
not
sarcastic in the least.

Mac nodded. “Full circle. You enabled our journey to fulfill a purpose. What
is
your agenda, Tom?”

“Agenda . . . You’ve been talking to the Roller of Big Cigars. Well, my agenda is the same as it ever was. Picture the way a powdered
whale
of a high society dame will gulp her weight in prawns.
My
weakness is the life essence of primates who take a swim in the Great Dark and return, brimming with eldritch vitality.”

“Our rosy cheeks are indeed irresistible,” Mac said, casually reaching for a knife that wasn’t in his pocket.

“In short, I will knock your heads together and eat you alive, dripping cocktail sauce.”

“That was the plan all along,” Mac said. “To devour us.”

“
Allll
along. My . . . master promises and promises, yet seldom delivers. I have determined to make my own fun from here on.” Tom cracked his knuckles and yawned, very wide. “Scream, struggle, run . . . I care not.” He spread his arms for a hug. His midsection punched inward simultaneous with a rifle boom behind the boys. He flew backward and lay supine, inert. Small flames nibbled fabric around the charred hole in his chest.

Mr. Kowalski hobbled from the bushes. He worked to reload a double barreled elephant gun. The man wore a nondescript gray suit and homburg. His face and hands were heavily bruised and pink with sutured cuts. He sucked air through his teeth in the manner of one who’s suffered grievous injuries. Getting stabbed by a platoon of Spetsnaz couldn’t be salubrious. “Best to get behind me, lads. Tom won’t go quietly.”

“Mr. Shrike, we are in your debt,” Mac said as the puzzle pieces snapped into place. He recalled how the man had shrugged off death blows to wreak havoc among the Russian mercenaries at the glacier. The bland “Mr. Kowalski” and his vague job attachment to the expedition had proven the perfect cover for the legendary assassin.

“Hardly. Your grandfather paid through the nose for me to be a watchdog. I see why he didn’t haggle over my retainer. The old bastard.”

Tom sat up like a switchblade snapping open. The hole in his chest coagulated and began to knit. “Holland and Holland 500 Nitro, unless I miss my guess. Damn bracing!” He regarded Mr. Shrike. “Dear man, fire that weapon again and I’m going to shove it as far up your—”

“Brother, cover your ears. Excuse me, Tom?” Mac pursed his lips. The maggoty scribbles the black sun had whispered into his subconscious aligned, lethal as a spearhead.

In the instant before it started, Dred slapped Mr. Shrike’s gun aside and said, “Trust me!” He hunkered and covered his ears. The man emulated him.

Mac emitted a piercing whistle. The blast went on for no more than three seconds and no less than an eternity.

Tom Mandibole’s smile slithered away. He shuddered. His arms thrust upward, jittering in Pentecostal fervor. He pirouetted to invisible music that carried him off toward a wall strewn with creepers. Tom climbed the wall with three convulsive gestures and teetered atop it, eyes streaming black tears. He performed a backward somersault and was gone.

Mac collapsed to one knee. His senses swung on a pendulum to and from an abyss. He gagged until a handful of fragmented black crystals pattered into the grass. These he covered with a swipe of dirt and twigs. Slightly recovered, he stood and attempted nonchalance. His skull felt warped as taffy on a hot day.

“Mac, are ya okay?” Dred scrutinized him intently.

“Right as rain, brother.” It had taken Mac considerable effort to recall the proper idiom.

Mr. Shrike shook his head as a klaxon began winding from the hospital proper. “Whole institution will be on the way in a minute. You lads want to come with? I’ve a rope ladder on a section of the wall, just past the woods . . . ”

Mac waved him off. “Thanks anyway. We’ll go take our medicine.” After Mr. Shrike had departed, the brothers walked toward the buildings where staff gathered. The siren continued to blare.

“Sure we shouldn’t have gone with him?” Dred said. “Laid low a while? That Tom Mandibole fellow might double back for another go at us . . . ”

“What, and miss my four o’clock sponge bath from Nurse Carruthers? Be serious, kid.”

“Good point. Objection withdrawn,” Dred said.

The sun slid from behind a low bank of clouds and burned white. Mac half expected it to speak to him, but it didn’t.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Laird Barron spent his early years in Alaska, where he raced the Iditarod three times during the early 1990s and worked as fisherman on the Bering Sea. He is the author of several books, including
The Croning, The Imago Sequence, Occultation, The Light Is the Darkness
, and
The Beautiful Thing That Awaits Us All
. His work has also appeared in many magazines and anthologies. An expatriate Alaskan, Barron currently resides in upstate New York.

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