Borderlands 5 (37 page)

The Canucks came close again, hitting a post, and the drill probed deeper into Edward’s mind, stirring Slipknot up even more.

A big, fat Sabres fan—a Mike Peca jersey pasted to his sweaty back—leaned over in his seat one aisle up from theirs and threatened Edward, telling him to lay off the kid. Edward ignored him.

Stephen’s face had gone slack at the word ‘accident,’ but Edward simply could not stop. “We didn’t want you. No one wants you. You were an accident. Just a fucking stupid accident.”

Edward felt something release from inside him. The headache started to fade, slowly, in increments. Waves of nausea passed over him and he fell clumsily into his seat. He started to cry.

The Canucks slammed their third straight goal through Hasek and the crowd erupted. Stephen remained seated, staring at nothing, wishing he were dead.

Edward woke from the dream, sweating, head pounding. His sheets were soaked through. Breath coming in raspy, choking gulps, he looked up to the ceiling and saw the shadows stretching themselves along the ceiling again, pulsing in time with his breathing. He had only ever seen this in dream before, but now it was real. Dripping onto his sheets. Slithering between the folds of his crumpled quilt. The hushed whisper,
I’m inside you,
slinking through his mind like a back-alley whore
. You can’t kill me ’cause I’m already inside you.

The shadows seeped under the covers and into Edward’s pores. Flitting images and vague feelings of broken promises and forgotten dreams: the back of dad’s head splashed across trees, the dull thump of his body hitting the leafy ground; Chumbly twisting in his red wine prison; Gramps with his brains splattered all over the oak table and mantelpiece; Edward’s wife leaving him after two years of marriage, lurid scenes of the infidelity that had caused it; Stephen at the hockey game, the flat, stone look of worthlessness, of being loved by no one. “I do not want to kill you,” Edward mumbled, dream becoming reality, the words untrue, but practiced, ingrained nonetheless. Guilt tightened, became a machine, thrust forward, immutable. Parts of it became a hard, cold stone in his chest. Other parts swam through his veins, burning, congealing, solidifying. Frozen Pompeii, an ashen statue of grief and guilt.

Then Slipknot told Edward his name.

“Slipknot,” Edward whispered, the beginning sibilant like a razor deep and hard across his tongue, the word itself a poisonous miasma drifting through his psyche, ripping out memories like talons tearing at clumps of soil.

When the pain had subsided and only a dull throb remained, Edward slept, and dreamed about Stephen.

S
tephen walked through the front door of his house to see his father standing in the hall, a gun pointed at his son’s head. He dropped his overnight bag on the floor and tried to think of something to say.

Edward felt the knot tighten. He was sweating from everywhere a human being can sweat from, his entire body drenched, the exposed parts—arms, hands, face—glistening. His whole frame trembled, but his gun hand was steady. He could feel Slipknot racing around inside him, shooting random images of betrayal, regret, and loss through his mind. With each image, each impression, the trigger bent back that much further.

In his son’s face, he saw Gramps, saw his father, saw himself … and squeezed a little more.

He tried to say he was sorry, that Stephen
wasn’t
an accident, that he’d wanted him, loved him, still loved him, would always love him. But Slipknot pulled tighter, securing itself against the accumulated guilt/ betrayal of the centuries before him. More images seared synapses, burned grooves through rational thought. Images two, three hundred years old of people Edward did not know, but knew were his blood. Their faces sliced through his will, their deeds crushing it to dust.

The hammer of the gun cocked back slowly as the pressure on the trigger increased. Shades of grey wrapped in shadows in the shape of tears rolled down Edward’s cheeks.

Slipknot smiled, and waited patiently for the back of the boy’s head to open up all over the screen door.

F
inally, Stephen found words. Words he had no right saying. Words he didn’t understand, and had no idea from where they’d come. “Pull the slipknot, dad.” His eyes were locked with his father’s, somehow, perhaps through the song of their blood, sharing the visions.
“Pull it.”
Some rules are universal, and with no one to appeal to, they sometimes change on their own, or bend to the will of one stronger. “Pull it. Pull the knot.”

Edward flinched at the words—y
ou can’t fucking kill me

—shook more violently yet, his gun hand finally becoming affected.

The disease within him screamed—I’
m already inside you

—pressed harder at Edward, but Edward understood his son’s words, and he let it all go.

He just l
et. It.

Go.

Stephen watched his father raise the gun to his own head, the hand holding the weapon now steady again. Something flickered momentarily beneath the skin of Edward’s face, something black and seething, something trying like mad to get out.

Stephen Curtis closed his eyes.

Magic Numbers

GENE O’NEILL

Gene O’Neill’s stories have appeared in a wide range of genre magazines from SF to crime fiction. The story which follows does not easily fall into any such neat category … which is exactly the way we like it.

TODAY, THE NUMBER IS SEVEN.

D
espite common belief, late night sounds are not really muffled in heavy fog, quite the opposite: A siren shrieks sharply in the distance, a dog howls mournfully, nearby music is crystal clear, and a car roars by on Jefferson Street, its tires making sticking sounds on the wet pavement. Forgetting about the fog creatures, you stop, cock your head, and enjoy the night sounds, watching trails of mist swirl about your legs, which reminds you of a neighbor’s gray kitten that arches its back, puffs up, and rubs against your ankles.

You almost expect to hear—

Instead of the anticipated purr, you hear a gasp of surprise as three figures materialize out of the fog like black phantoms, their faces momentarily startled by your sudden appearance. Then quickly their expressions turn blank; and for a moment they stare at you in dead silence.

Your heart thumps rapidly and you begin to hyperventilate.

But thinking quickly, you extend all five fingers in the left pocket of your coat; and in the right pocket, you extend two fingers, the tips pressed down into the stolen silk panties at the bottom. The number seven restores your courage, your breathing and heartbeat quickly returning to normal.

“Whatcha doin’ here, man?” the short, stocky one on the left asks in a deep voice thick with menace. He’s wearing a Raider’s windbreaker, the collar pulled up against the misty chill, his hostile black eyes peering at you directly.

For a moment your legs weaken, lose tone, but you repeat the number in your head: Seven, seven, seven.

“Yeah, white boy, whatcha doin’ here ‘cross Jeff’son?” the big guy in the middle says slowly, his speech softer, less measured, but the sentence full of implied threat. There is a sharp meanness to his features. And he is indeed huge, his shoulders wide, his white football jersey bearing the black number 66; but there is easily enough chest for another 6, which makes you shudder.

The guy on the right is wiry, his partially hooded gaze making him appear sleepy, except his speech is hyper and jumpy. “M-m-may-bb—” He stamps his foot, which breaks the stutter, “Maybe this white boy t-t-that Lil Bo Peep dude, Leroy.”

Oh, no, you think, closing your eyes for a second, hoping one of the fog creatures will swoop down and swallow them up. Seven, seven, seven.

You blink, but they are still there.

“Yeah, whatta bout that, boy?” the big guy, Leroy, asks. “You awful funny-lookin’. Now, you ain’t that dude from the newspaper, one been sneakin’ and prowlin’ ’round over here, scarin’ all of the womenfolks, is you?”

“This little sucker him, alright,” the one on the left butts in, before you can think of any answer.

“How you know, Sidney?” Leroy asks, challenging the husky guy’s statement.

“‘Cuz, my lady friend, Clorinda, she done tole me what the muthafucka look like, man.” He glances at you disparagingly, then nods his head. “Dude ripped off some of her stuff when he peepin’ in her backyard last week, but her dog, Spike, he starts barkin’, and she see him ’fore he do his Carl Lewis outta there, you know what I’m sayin’?” Cautiously, you push the panties deeper into your right jacket pocket with the extended two fingers, hoping they won’t think to search you.

“T-t-t-t—”

Leroy turns to his left and snaps sharply, “Spit it out, Replay.” Then he reaches out and puts his arm gently around the thin guy’s shoulder. “C’mon, man.”

“This is the dude, L-L-Leroy,” he says, almost flawlessly with his friend’s arm around his shoulder.

But Leroy lets the arm slide away. “F-Fits the paper’s d-d-d—”

“Description,” the one on the left fills in impatiently. “Yeah, Replay’s right, Leroy. Just like Clorinda say. Real short … kinda lopsided, you know, with a little-dude body, big-dude head. This here Lil Bo Peep!”

Despite the seven fingers extended in your pockets, your bowels feel loose.

“O-kay,” Leroy says, stretching the word into sentence-length with the finality of a court judgment. He withdraws his hand from his pants pocket and flicks his wrist, the light glinting off the opened straight razor. “Let’s carve us up a Lil Bo Peep turkey.” He grins evilly, taking a step toward you. Then he stops, turning left, “What kinda meat you like, Replay?”

“I-I likes w-w-w-white—”

Even though you are protected by the aura of the day’s number, you feel a strong surge of panic that enervates your legs; and as Leroy waits for Replay to finish the joke, you suck in a breath and dart away as fast as you can, leaving the trio of blacks standing in the fog.

You cross Jefferson Street heading west, and even though you can not see the goals, you know you are on one of the basketball courts of Olympic Park, the boundary separating black and white housing, because your feet slap against sticky blacktop, the sound rebounding in the mist, giving your location away.

The three must be able to hear it, too. And you realize they will follow.

You weave erratically as you run across the grass beyond the courts, whispering and scattering sevens in your wake, hoping to attract at least one fog creature to cover your escape.

At last, ahead in the mist, the glowing orange streetlights of Franklin Avenue appear like blurry Japanese lanterns. You are finally back in the white business district, but too far from home. You must find somewhere close to hide and catch your breath.

Crossing the street, you spot the red neon of the Leaning Tower of Pizza blinking in the mist. You slow as you reach the sidewalk, debating the wisdom of seeking sanctuary in the restaurant. Looking through the window under the neon sign, you see no one in any of the booths, only a pair of tired young men leaning on the order counter, their dirty, striped-red aprons and wrinkled, chef hats looking anything but gay this time of night.

You shake your head and trot by, ignoring the closed Starbrite Videos next door, gazing ahead to the bright green, orange, and red sign glaring like a beacon in the mist: 7-Eleven.

You cry out with relief, almost stumbling into the convenience store. But you come to a sudden stop in the doorway and glance back toward your unseen pursuers, realizing that you will be trapped in any store if the blacks catch you inside. So you take seven more steps up the street and pause at the mouth of the dark alley running between the

7-Eleven and a boarded-up storefront.

Suddenly, her voice speaks in your head.

Robert, this way, Robert.

It’s the Lady of the Numbers!

And she seems to be directing you up the alley.

You move cautiously, the light here off the street very dim, only one shaded bulb over a side entrance to the 7-Eleven about halfway up the alley, doing little more than casting shadows, scary shadows.

Here, Robert, back here.

The voice leads you to the end of the alley, behind a dumpster. You peer warily around the container piled high with refuse.

Nothing.

Only a brick wall, its graffiti obscured by heavy shadows, the smell of urine strong in your nostrils. Yuck.

Then, you hear footsteps coming to a halt at the mouth of the alley. Quickly you squeeze back behind the dumpster, ignoring the smelly mess, trying to conceal yourself.

After a moment you peer back around the dumpster, out toward the street, and even though you cannot see them in the fog, you know who has cornered you in the alley.

The Black Phantoms.

“L-L-Le—” a voice stutters in the mist, confirming your suspicion. “Shhhh.”