The figure did not speak.
'What are you?'
Gordon was aware that the figure moved, but he could see no movement and it scared the hell out of him. He turned to run away, and ... he was standing in the middle of Old Mesa Road, staring around him at the wreckage of Randall. In front of him, the Valley National Bank building was demolished, large chunks of concrete and metal protruding from a pile of charred ash. Two people, dressed in torn rags and leaning on one another for support, were staggering away from the smoldering hulk of what had once been the Circle K store. Further up the road, people were running as fast as they could away from him, away from the center of town. Above everything, high on the Rim, an enormous black storm cloud grew ominously, slowly shaping itself into the form of a gigantic clawed hand.
Something bumped against his leg, and Gordon looked down. Something that looked like a large rat--a rat as big as a small dog--was crouched on the asphalt in front of him, grinning up in malevolent glee. Before he could react, before he could kick out at the animal or even scream, the creature had leapt up and attached itself to his face, clawing wildly, its carnivorous teeth biting with relish into the soft flesh of his cheeks. He could feel the blood gush warmly out of his face as the skin was ripped apart. Trying to pull the creature from his face, he fell backwards and .. . landed with a soft thud on a pile of wet garbage. Stunned, it took him a moment to get his bearings. When he realized where he was, he sat up and looked around. It was morning, and the sunlight glinted brightly off strips of chrome and shards of steel in the pile of metal next to him. On the other side of him, the pile of wood and combustibles was burning, and the air around the fire shimmered in liquid waves of heat. Gordon stared at the burning pile, transfixed. Though he did not want to, he could see within the fire strange shifting shapes. Figures. Faces. The figures were almost but not quite human, and the faces were known to him but not immediately recognizable. Though he tried to concentrate on one face at a time, he could not. They changed too rapidly for him to get a fix on them.
Out of the bottom of the burning pile crawled a charred, smoldering baby. The infant was blackened almost beyond recognition, but Gordon could see that even if it had not been burned, the baby would have been horribly deformed. Its bones were heavy and oddly formed, and as it crawled out from under the fire, pulling itself over stray pieces of garbage, it smiled, revealing unnaturally long and crooked teeth that stood out in white relief against its scorched skin.
The baby looked up at Gordon 'Daddy,' it said.
Without thinking, Gordon jumped to his feet and grabbed a long broken stick from the pile on which he was standing. He shoved the pointed end of the stick with all his might into the center of the infant's back. He could feel the point piercing the tiny body. The baby emitted one long loud shriek of sudden pain, jerked once and was still.
Gordon looked up and saw in the fire the wavering figure of Marina. Her face was unclear and indistinct, but it seemed to him that she was crying.
He glanced around and saw, to his surprise, a ring of people surrounding the fire. Some of them were holding long sticks similar to his own. Many were not. He recognized among the faces Father Andrews and the sheriff. Standing next to the sheriff, looking up at him with something like admiration, was a young teenage boy with dirty clothes and greasy unkempt hair.
The boy from his previous dream.
He stared at the youngster and the boy smiled at him, nodding in recognition.
Gordon walked across the gravel toward the boy and the sheriff and grabbed both of their hands. Across from him, he could see the face of Char Clifton, and, next to Clifton, Elsie Cavanaugh from the drugstore.
Something large rose up from the fire .. . and Gordon was standing before the black metal smelter of the sawmill. He was alone. Around him, the wind whistled and howled, driving the dried leaves on the ground into a frenzy. The door to the smelter slowly opened.
And out rushed the massive head of a raging demon, babbling incoherently in the tongue of the damned.
Gordon sat bolt upright in bed, a scream caught in his throat.
Marina held tight to his shoulders, hugging him close. 'It's okay,' she murmured reassuringly. 'It's all right. It's just a dream,'
He clasped her hard and said nothing.
She let her hands wander up and down his back then lightly caress his sleep disheveled hair. 'Are you okay?'
She felt him nod against her shoulder, but still he said nothing.
'Do you want to talk about it?'
He pulled back from her and looked her full in the face. His eyes were worried, scared. 'You have to leave,' he said. 'You have to get out of here.'
She held him and said nothing.
'You have to get out of here,' he repeated. 'Before morning.'
'I'm not leaving,' she told him.
'I'm serious.'
'I'm serious, too,' she said. She sighed and kissed him lightly. 'Look, let's get some sleep, okay? We'll talk about it in the morning.'
Gordon started to protest, but she pulled him to her, holding his head tightly against her breast. In a few moments he was fast asleep, and she carefullylayed his head upon the pillow. She stood up slowly, so as not to disturb him, and moved in front of the window, not exactly sure why she suddenly felt so frightened and alone.
Something large rose up from the fire, and Jim was standing before the black metal smelter of the sawmill. He was alone. Around him, the wind whistled and howled, driving the dried leaves on the ground into a frenzy. The door to the smelter slowly opened.
And out rushed the massive head of a raging demon, babbling incoherently in the tongue of the damned.
Jim awoke gasping into his pillow, his hands clutching the pillow's fluffy edges, his mouth opened against the cotton material of the pillowcase. He was drenched with sweat. Beside him, Annette still slept, though she tossed fitfully. He was tempted to wake her but decided against it. She would be leaving early in the morning and needed all the sleep she could get.
They had argued long and hard over her leaving, and finally she had said, 'I'm not setting a foot out of this house until you tell me what this is all about. Are you in danger? I don't want you pulling any High Noon crap on me.'
'I just want you to leave town for a few days,' he'd told her.
She'd just stared at him. 'Why can't you at least have enough respect for me to level with me, to tell me the truth instead of treating me like I'm one of the kids?'
That had gotten to him. He'd apologized and meant it, then had lied to her and told her that they were closing in on the murderers, a cult, and that as the family of the sheriff, she and the kids might be prime targets. She'd seemed to buy the story, or at least had realized that the children probably were in real danger, and she'd agreed to visit her sister for a few days.
She'd made him promise that he would be careful, that he would let someone else play hero, and he had lied again and said okay.
He pushed a wisp of hair from her face. He felt isolated, alone, in the quiet darkened house. But he was isolated neither by the quiet nor the dark. He was isolated by his knowledge.
He closed his eyes, trying to will himself back into slumber.
Across town, Father Andrews slept peacefully and without dreams.
Brother Elias stared at the bare wall of the lighted conference room, wide awake.
Gordon awoke well before the alarm went off at four. Next to him, Marina had kicked off the covers and lay unmoving, her face half buried in the pillow, her arms resting at her sides. He watched her back move slowly up and down as she breathed. He should have made her leave. He should have forced her to go.
But she did not want to go. And trying to force her would have made her all the more stubborn.
He had to convince her to get out of town, to at least go down to Phoenix for the day and shop. What he and the sheriff and Father Andrews and Brother Elias were going to do was dangerous. There was a strong possibility
