Out of the Black - Lee Doty [169]
Something had changed as he burst into the room. It took him a second to notice, but the room was silent except for their labored breathing and the slow click-click of the rocking lamp as it settled on the floor. "Scott?" His wife said, uncertain.
He thought he saw movement on the dark bed. Not looking away from the bed, his hand reached for the light switch by the door. As his hand found the switch plate, he heard a slow guttural growl from across the room. As unnerving as it was, it only became more so when he realized that it wasn't a growl... it was a laugh.
He slid his hand up the wall and the lights snapped on. Thankfully, what happened next was so fast that there was room for the mind to be convinced that it was misperception.
Crouched on Scott's bed. Black eyes and wicked grin. Sheets and mattress slashed through by black claws. Staring directly at them with eyes the color of slugs. Blood from broken lips. Hissing roar, part lion, part lizard- then gone. Blur of motion and shattering glass.
His wife screamed, both hands over her mouth. He felt like he'd been punched in the face. The thing that had just smashed out their fifth floor window was wearing Scott's favorite T-Shirt.
Wearing his boy's clothes...
He rushed to the window and thrust his head out into the chill night air. Dawn was still perhaps an hour away, though he could see the first hints of morning in the sky. About fifteen meters down, on the street, he saw the thing in his son's clothes streaking into the darkness with unbelievable speed. There were other sprinters on the street. He counted five- no, seven- all streaking southward, toward downtown.
From this height he couldn't make out many details, but most of the runners seemed to be in sleepwear. Others looked like they were at the end of a hot night out, but all were running faster than traffic usually flowed. As he watched, other sprinters came around corners and from other buildings, joining the lemming run to the south.
He followed their path with his eyes, but didn't see anything special... no strange lights or hovering spaceships, no beckoning devil atop the flaming pit of hell's newest extension campus.
A little over two kilometers to the south, the taller buildings thrust themselves toward the predawn sky. Unnoticed among them was the smaller brown stone structure of Mercy Memorial hospital.
***
"So, if this thing is everywhere you go... you're saying it's here now?" Alex's eyes moved to survey the hallway's few shadows.
"Ah... too correct. Not its power, but its presence." Issak said.
"So, didn't you just spill the beans?" Alex looked around, "Doesn't it know your plans now... wait- I don't know your plans now. What were they again?"
Kaspari smiled. "I'm going back, but this time, I'm going to drag that thing with me."
"That's suicide." Anne said.
"That's life." Issak said, returning to his dry butler irony. "Maybe not mine, but it's everyone else's."
"Isn't it going to try to stop you now?" Alex said, still looking around nervously.
"It's got a choice," Kaspari said, "It can try to get more backup from Asado, it can try to stop me in person, so to speak, or it can sit idly by and hope I fail."
"You hear that?" Kaspari shouted to no one in particular, then he lowered his voice again and continued, "None of its options are good. Asado is probably too far away, and if not, their efforts are rather laughable from my point of view. They don't have any time for sneak attacks or backstabbing. If it brings its puppets, it will succeed if it can get close enough in time. However, the closer it gets, the more likely that my Cast will succeed. If it does nothing, I'll probably still succeed."
"No." Anne said, "There's another way."
"Now you sound just like Dek," Kaspari said, "...and what is that other way?"
"I didn't say I knew what it was," Anne snapped, "just that it exists."
"Look, this thing's power is growing. Now it can hold onto hundreds of puppets at a time. When it tried for Ivo, it could control only about fifteen puppets." As he spoke he looked at each