He threw open the driver’s door and, issuing a muttered war cry, clambered out into the falling snow with his gun and with a lifetime of experience surviving hopeless situations. He heard Bryce getting out of the passenger door, and he thought,
He was almost disappointed when, before the battle could begin, the Builders collapsed simultaneously into apparently inert piles of what appeared to be, but certainly wasn’t, gravel.
With the rattle of gunfire at the farther end of the building, Chief Jarmillo and Deputy Nelson Sternlagen reached the back door of KBOW, the two Builders immediately behind them. Jarmillo handed the key to Sternlagen — he wasn’t quite sure why — and Sternlagen handed it back to him, and they both stood for a moment, staring at the key in the chief’s hand. They never did get it in the lock.
The face in the abdomen of the headless woman declared, “I am your Builder.” The mouth stretched wide, and from it came a jet of silvery gray sludge — that halted inches from Rusty’s face, quivered in the air, and fell to the floor, as did the headless woman. This once phantasmagoric and threatening figure was now an apparently harmless pile of … something.
Heart racing nonetheless, Rusty noticed that the fragments of the glass-faced man had continued fracturing until they now formed little mounds of what might have been sand but probably wasn’t. And the door chimes were not ringing.
He switched on the porch lamp and hesitantly put his face to the window. The porch seemed to be deserted.
When he opened the door, the handsome man with the I-can-sell-you-anything smile was gone. Nothing remained but another strange pile of … something.
Rusty stood in the cold, on the porch, listening to the night. He heard no gunshots. No screams. No cadres of models were marching in the street. The handsome pair of German shepherds appeared, no longer fleeing in terror, wandering aimlessly, smelling this and that. One of them abruptly dropped and rolled onto its back in the freshly fallen snow, kicking its legs joyfully in the air.
As suddenly as the nightmare had begun, it was over.
Returning to the house, Rusty called, “Corrina, Corrina,” all the way up the stairs. By the time he reached the master bedroom, he was
At the core computer in the Hive, in a room littered with the bodies of Victor’s people, for several hours Deucalion worked as a man possessed, which in a way he was. In his state of possession, he performed miracles with the trove of data, eliminating everything that revealed
Unlike those in Rainbow Falls, the telephones in the Hive still functioned. With an ease that further suggested that he did not work unaided, Deucalion was able to make online contact with a trustworthy reporter at a major cable-news network, to whom he opened all the many digital files that he had just redacted.
Carson and Michael had to get out of that house of grief, in which four members of the Riders in the Sky Church had died — two men, one woman, and a child. Carson knew, as did Michael, that they could not have saved the little girl, that no one could have, not when their enemies were two colonies of nanoanimals against which no weapon could defend.
They walked together in the post-dawn shadows under the immense evergreens that shrouded the Samples property. Early light, clear and golden, speared down here and there between the laden boughs of the trees, spotlighting those portions of the ground where falling snow had reached, leaving dark those areas carpeted with dead needles.
The storm ended before first light. Now the chattering rotors of a helicopter grew louder, louder, and passed overhead, out of sight above the trees. She supposed the aircraft must be from the Montana State Police or another state law-enforcement agency. Soon the sky would be full of helicopters and the highways into town choked with the vehicles of first responders and the media.
Carson was inexpressibly grateful to be alive, hand in hand with Michael, but as never before in her life of close calls, she felt to a degree guilty for having lived when so many perished. Her sweet and thoughtful husband, usually quick with a funny line, was unable to amuse her now; but she would have been lost entirely without him at her side.
They passed between the massive trunks of two alpine firs, and ahead Deucalion walked toward them where he had not been walking an instant earlier. They met in a shaft of light.
“It’s over forever this time,” the giant said.
“We thought so before,” Michael reminded him.
“But this time, there is no slightest doubt. None whatsoever. I feel myself being … called back. I should have realized after New Orleans that if it was really over, my journey on this world would have come to an end, as well.”
“And now it will?” Carson asked.
“It is ending even now,” he said. “I’ve only returned to put your minds at ease, to assure you that Frankenstein is history and that your lives will never again be braided into his. Be happy, be at peace. Now I must go.”
Michael reached out for Deucalion’s hand.
The giant shook his head. “I didn’t come to say good-bye. There is no such thing as parting forever.”
A cloud occluded the shaft of sunshine, and shadow fell upon them.
Deucalion said, “Until we meet again,” and turned away from Carson and Michael.
She expected him to vanish in the turn, but he didn’t take his leave in his customary fashion. He walked away into the early-morning gloom beneath the trees, although he did not fade as a shadow into shadows. Instead, as he receded through the woods, a luminosity rose in him, soft at first but then brighter, brighter, until he was a shining figure, an apparition of pure light. When he reached a shaft of sunshine in the distance, he melded with it — and was gone.
Chapter 65
Nine nights after Deucalion delivered the truckload of children to St. Bartholomew’s Abbey, and five days after they were bused home, shortly before seven o’clock on that cold October evening, Brother Salvatore, also known as Brother Knuckles, went into the yard outside the guest wing and stood staring at the night sky, where no stars twinkled. Snow began to fall precisely on the hour. He stood in it for a while, feeling no chill.
The five weddings were in early December. Originally, they were supposed to be separate ceremonies, but in the wake of 3,298 deaths, the town of Rainbow Falls needed to be lifted up and motivated to get on with life. Who first suggested a group ceremony and how it came to pass, no one could quite remember. Clergymen of different faiths agreed on the manner in which the rites would be administered, the church was filled to capacity, and over two thousand gathered in the square outside to listen to the portable loudspeakers that had been set up to share the moment with them.
Sully was too old for his bride, a fact no one would dispute, but neither of his best men — Travis nor Bryce — would tolerate anyone saying so aloud, which no one did. All the brides seemed beautiful, not least of all Grace, and Addison Hawk’s Erika. By God, Sully’s favorite moment of the whole affair — aside from Grace’s “I do”—was when young Rusty Billingham sang the song he had written for Corrina.
Because he was one of the heroes — and so colorful — Mr. Lyss was in demand for interviews. People wanted to pay him to tell his story, but he told it for free. This made Nummy proud of the old man.
They sold Grandmama’s little house. When it was learned that Mr. Lyss once was something called a certified public accountant and hoped to return to that work, Grandmama’s attorney, who looked after Nummy’s inheritance, wasn’t so suspicious of the old man. Besides, Mr. Lyss cleaned up really well. Sometimes Nummy thought Mr. Lyss almost didn’t look like Mr. Lyss anymore, but kind of like Mr. Chips in that old movie about a boys’ school.
So first Mr. Lyss took Nummy to see somewhere warm, with palm trees and everything, which was called California. They stayed in a little motel where everything was amazing to Nummy, until Mr. Lyss bought a lottery ticket. He’d always said he had a winning ticket in his wallet, but that was a lie. No surprise. Mr. Lyss tried not to lie
