The Turtle Boy

something hard, something unmoving. He could stand and did so falteringly, his chest full of red-hot needles as the water shifted around him, trying to reclaim him. It rushed from his stomach, his lungs, his mind and he vomited, vomited until he felt as if his head would explode, then he staggered in the storm-induced current, his face raised to the rain.

A splash behind him. Timmy turned, blinking away tears, rain, pond water and trying to focus on something other than his own lingering blindness and trembling bones.

The Turtle Boy stood before him, unaffected by the tumultuous heaving of the water. He looked as he had when Pete and Timmy had found him, his face mottled and decayed. He wore a coat now and the coat moved. Timmy stepped back, the bank so preciously close and yet so far away.

“You saw it,” Darryl croaked, the shoulders of his coat sprouting small heads that sniffed the air before withdrawing. “You stepped behind The Curtain and you saw what he did.”

Somehow Timmy could hear him over the storm, over the churning of the water, though Darryl did not raise his voice to compete with them. He nodded, not trusting his voice.

“You don’t know who did it. When you do, remember what you saw and let it change you. There is only time to let one of them pay for his crimes tonight.”

“I don’t understand!” Timmy felt dizzy, sick; he wanted to be home and warm, away from the madness this night had become, if it was really night at all.

“You will. They’ll explain it to you.”

“Who?”

“People like me. The people on The Stage.”

Darryl swept past him and in the transient noon of lightning, he saw the coat was fashioned from a legion of huge, ugly turtles, their shells conjoined like a carapace around the boy’s chest and back. Wizened beaks rose and fell, worm-like tongues testing the air as Darryl carried them toward the bank and the figures who fought upon it.

From here, Timmy could see his mother and Kim, huddled at the top of the rise, his mother’s hand over Kim’s face to keep her from seeing something. He followed their gaze to the two men wrestling each other in the dark.

Dad! Possessed by new resolve that numbed the flaring pain in his feet and the throbbing in his chest and throat, he thrashed to the bank and reached it the same time Darryl did. They both climbed over, both paused as the storm illuminated the sight of Wayne Marshall punching Timmy’s father in the face—

Just like he punched Darryl before he killed him

—and stooped to retrieve something he’d dropped as the other man reeled back. Over the cannon roar of thunder, Timmy heard his mother scream his name and resisted the urge to look in her direction as he slipped, slid and flailed and finally tumbled to the ground between her and where his father was straightening and bracing himself for a bullet from the weapon in Wayne Marshall’s hand.

In the storm-light, Mr. Marshall grinned a death’s head rictus, his skin pebbled with rain. He raised the gun. Timmy’s father cradled his head in his arms and backed away.

Mr. Marshall pulled the trigger.

And nothing happened.

He jerked back his hand and roared at the gun, fury rippling through him. “No, fuck you, NO! ”

He thrust the gun out, aimed it at Timmy’s father’s head and pulled the trigger.

Nothing.

Again and again and again, nothing but a series of dry snapping sounds.

“Goddamn you!”

“No!” Timmy yelled, then realized it hadn’t come from his stricken throat at all. It was Darryl and his cry had not been one of protest. It had been a command.

And it was heeded.

The ground beneath Timmy’s hands moved, separated into ragged patches of moving darkness, slick and repulsive against his skin. He jerked back and rose unsteadily, eyes fixed on the moving earth, waiting for the lightning to show him what he already knew.

The turtles. An army of them. All monstrous, all ancient. And all moving toward where his father had his arms held out to ward off the bullet that must surely be on its way.

“Timmy…son, stay back,” he said, risking a quick glance at his son. “Just stay there.”

“Dad!” This time Timmy knew from the pitiful croak that it was indeed his own voice.

He ran, halted, drowning again but in fear, confusion and the agony of uncertainty as the creatures Doctor Myers had introduced to his pond all those years ago trudged slowly but purposefully toward their prey.

“Darryl,” Timmy cried, scorching his throat with the effort to be heard. Darryl looked toward him, the coat slowly shrugging itself off to join its brethren. “Darryl, please! Make them stop!”

Another shadow rose from the pond.

Timmy felt a nightmarish wave of disbelief wash over him. Even after all he’d been through, was still going through, he felt his mind tugging in far too many directions at once.

But there was not enough time to dwell on it.

He looked away from the new shadow and ran, skidding to the ground before his father. Darryl turned to look at him.

The turtles slowed.

“You’d die for your father?” Darryl asked, his voice little more than a gurgle.

“Yes!” Timmy screamed, without hesitation. “Yes! Leave him alone!”

“Why?”

“Because I love him. He’s the best father in the world and I love him. You can’t take him away from me. Please!”

“Maybe he deserves to die.”

“Don’t say that. He doesn’t! I swear he doesn’t!”

The storm itself seemed to hold its breath as Darryl stared and the impatience of the turtle army stretched the air taut.

A gentle pulse of lightning broke the stasis.

Darryl turned to regard the shadow standing in the water next to him. Pointing to Mr. Marshall, he asked the same question: “Would you die for him?”

Even Mr. Marshall seemed intent on the answer the shadow would give.

But it said nothing. Instead, it gave a gentle shake of its head.

“No!” Wayne cried as Darryl turned back to face him.

Slowly, Timmy’s father lowered his hands and after a moment in which he realized Wayne Marshall’s attention was elsewhere, he moved away into the shadows of the pines, his face a pale blur of horror as he saw what had his neighbor’s attention.

Darryl turned back to watch the turtles advance. The first of them found Mr. Marshall’s leg and after a moment of stunned disgust, he aimed his pistol downward and in his panic, tried the weapon again.

This time the gun fired.

A deafening roar and the gun let loose a round that took most of Mr. Marshall’s foot away with it. He shrieked and dropped to the ground, then realized his folly and scuttled backward on his hands. The dark tide moved steadily forward.

Timmy’s father burst from his hiding place and ran the long way around the pond, through the pines, the marsh and along the high bank until he appeared through the weeds on the far side of the rise. His wife released Kim at last and ran to him.

Multi-colored lights lit the sky in the distance, back near the houses. Timmy guessed the police had arrived and were now searching for the woman who had summoned them. He silently begged them to hurry.

A guttural scream was all that could be heard from the shadows as the tide of turtles progressed ever onward and engulfed their victim.

A single flicker of lightning lit the face of the shadow in the water and Timmy felt a jolt of shock.