Jack wiped his brow with the back of a bony hand and stared out the window. It was beginning to cloud up again, although the air appeared still.

Glen walked over to the window and stood to the side of it, looking down at the now-silent streets. His voice was low as he spoke. "So what you and Rick call Clickers, which are in reality a form of crustacean long thought extinct, are still alive somewhere deep in the bowels of the Atlantic. And they come up to breed and every four hundred years, when the earth's position in s.p.a.ce shifts, the ocean currents shift with it, bringing them to these sh.o.r.es. And every time they drift on sh.o.r.e to breed, they are followed by their natural predators which modern man never knew existed-The Dark Ones."

There was a short pause as both men stared out the window at the ravaged town, taking in the aftermath of the Dark Ones' destructive path. The few bodies that could be seen from the window resembled nothing but piles of cloth-covered, b.l.o.o.d.y slabs of meat, but Glen thought he recognized one, a man lying face up across the street from Gerber's Drug Store on the Corner of Main and Hill. That would be James Hemsath, the local preacher. Glen had recently referred James to a Gastroenterologist in Bangor that specialized in ulcerative colitis. Now Reverend Hemsath was dead.

Glen turned away from the window, putting James Hemsath out of his mind. Couldn't let the emotions get to him now, not while the town was still in danger. He needed to teach Jack the basics of what they were up against. The more they both knew about the situation, the better they would be equipped to handle it.

"So the whole Lost Village legend stemmed from the last-and ultimately fatal-incident of the last time the Clickers came to these sh.o.r.es to breed," Glen said. "The Indians at the time knew what was happening, and retreated inland. While the settlers..." he shrugged. "Well, you know the story. The closest description we get that anything horrific is happening is that hastily scrawled message."

"*Demons from the sea,'" Jack said, quoting the message verbatim.

"Exactly." Glen said. "And because it was so long ago and the village was essentially wiped out, the settlers that came afterward and made the discovery of the Lost Village treated the Indian legend as nothing but a tale designed to scare children." He sighed. "But every legend has its basis in fact."

"What do you think happened to those settlers?" Jack asked.

Glen was about to answer when a faint noise from the east caught his ear.

He perked up, grabbing his firearm and moving back to the window. Jack rose clutching his weapon and the two men crouched in the shadows, barely breathing as the sound grew louder. It sounded like footsteps, only these were different. They were a kind of wet, shuffling gait that got closer.

And closer.

And closer.

Chapter Twenty-Three.

Multi-colored bolts of lightning shot up from the nearby hillside and danced through Stacy Robinson's living room window.

Stacy squirmed in her torn and stained easy chair as the thunder rolled. She hugged the terrycloth robe she was wearing tight to her body and, for perhaps the tenth time that evening, thought about getting dressed in something warmer. At one point Stacy started to get up when she realized her clothes were wet. The power had gone out while they were in the rinse cycle in the washing machine, and she didn't want to rummage around in the closet for something else. It was too dark. She thought she had a flashlight around somewhere, but it was nowhere to be found. She'd been trying to remember where the flashlight was while she sat in the chair listening to the lightning flash and the thunder rumble as the latest storm rolled in from the ocean.

She settled back into the warmth of the chair and thought about calling the power company when another lightning flash flickered across the ocean. The acid she'd dropped thirty minutes before accented the effect nicely; more multicolored electricity bolts erupted over the sky. This time the colors were psychedelic. They swirled and became huge walking pumpkins with glowing umbrellas and big smiles. The last forty-eight hours were forgotten as Stacy looked out the window at the rapidly darkening sky and laughed as the walking pumpkins began to dance and sing. She smiled and thought briefly about getting dressed. But then another lightning bolt flashed and the colors sparkled again, merging into even more dancing pumpkins. Life was sure grand!

Things were better today then they'd been last night. The terrifying memories of the crab-creatures and Kirk's death had yet to be forgotten in her confused maze of a mind, but she wasn't as hysterical as she was last night. She'd been convinced that the things that killed Kirk would come to get her. This morning she actually had a chance to think. She had chilled out in the living room, listening to Pink Floyd's The Wall as she thought about what to do: get some laundry done, pack some things, close out the bank account. Then take what was left of her money and take off in her Trans-Am. f.u.c.k the house and the rest of her stuff. That was the ticket.

Only that hadn't happened. She'd dozed in the living room and woken up at one in the afternoon. She took a leisurely shower, then began rummaging around for clothes. She stopped intermittently for hits off her bong, a few beers, another tab of acid. By the time the storm really hit and all those gunshots started going off (don't those f.u.c.king redneck a.s.sholes know that hunting season starts next week?) she was peaking and starting the laundry. So she was behind schedule. Stacy always found that things worked out best when she worked at her own pace and that when s.h.i.t happened, it happened. When you rolled with it, you came out still rolling.

She'd put a Nirvana CD in her boom-box, began doing laundry, singing along with Kurt Cobain and mirroring his tortured voice perfectly, his angst matching hers, his pain touching hers. And just as the clothes were in the rinse cycle, the power went out.

She screamed, threw a box of Tide at the washing machine, spilling powdered soap all over the washer and dryer and the floor. She cried hoa.r.s.ely, her chest hitching with a frustration that came so deep within her that she didn't know how to quench it.

When the crying fit subsided, she flicked the light switches off and on. The power was definitely out. Great! Just f.u.c.king great!

She crossed the darkened living room and picked up the phone. No dial tone. This is just my f.u.c.king day.

Might as well make the most of it. The hit of yellow-blotter she'd taken earlier that afternoon had worn off, so she took another. Then she retreated into the living room dressed in the terrycloth robe because all her good jeans and sweaters were in the f.u.c.king washing machine, and she popped another top off a bottle of beer and sat watching the lightning roll across the ocean.

It was a nice way of escaping. She learned early on that the best way to make problems go away was to alter her perception of them and their effects on her. This especially became useful after Mother died (you mean after you killed mother. Isn't that right?). Through some metaphysical teachings she learned from an old boyfriend, she'd come to the conclusion that problems and negativity were caused by people who were not in tune to her world view, which was almost everybody.

She tried altering other people's way of thinking, but that hadn't worked. They just weren't worth the trouble or ha.s.sle. When the act of denial was too difficult, she discovered that LSD helped; by dissolving other peoples' personalities and reaffirming her sense of righteousness. Dissolving...just as Kirk had dissolved.

Stacy sat back and smirked as the realization of Kirk's disappearance became crystal clear in her mind. He hadn't died. She'd simply dissolved his negativity and thus, removed him from her world.

She sat back in her chemical haze and let the pumpkins finish their dance and take their bows.

After the finale, the pumpkins did a very strange thing. Stacy wasn't sure if it was her imagination, so she rubbed her eyes and looked out at the ma.s.s of clouds again. The pumpkins had lost their electric sheen and grown dark and wet. They twisted and became hunched and ugly. She squirmed in her chair, wondering what the pumpkins were up to now. They'd put on such a great show, but now the act was definitely lagging. The new pumpkins were sort of hopping and clawing through the muddy hill behind her house, making strange bleating noises. The rain melted away the last of their disguises. A strong musty odor rolled in through the cracked side window. Not only were the pumpkins now ugly, but they smelled bad too.

Stacy sat and waited for them to do something fun and exciting, but nothing happened. They continued to rummage through the mud. She sighed, suddenly feeling cold goose b.u.mps rise along the flesh of her exposed forearms. The pumpkins were still being boring, and she'd had enough of their lagging performance. She stood up, marched forward to the window and pounded her palm on the inside of the window to get their attention. "Hey! What's wrong with you guys?"

The creatures turned and Stacy saw red eyes glow a deeper shade of crimson as they focused on her. The bleating croaks rose once again, this time filled with a tinge of excitement, and then they began to slither toward her.

The rational side of Stacy's consciousness suddenly jumped into the driver's seat. The primal emotion of terror ripped through her body. She took an involuntary step back as the nearest Dark One banged its scaly nose on the window gla.s.s.

Stacy stumbled back, her breath hitching in her throat as her terror rose. Needle-sharp nails scratched the gla.s.s as the creature seemed to study the transparent barrier with a scaly, webbed claw. The sound reverberated through Stacy's ear painfully. The creature gave a firm push and the gla.s.s shattered into thousands of wet, razor-like projectiles. Stacy jumped back from the sound of the blow and fell on her skinny a.s.s, looking dumbfoundedly at her naked legs. A few small gla.s.s slivers had lodged in the smooth flesh and blood was quickly running down her limbs in tiny red rivers. She stared in numbed amazement at her legs, as if trying to make sense of why this happened, when the pungent fish smell wafting in from outside hit her like a sledgehammer. She looked up to see the creature curling back its lizard-like lips, hissing through rows of serrated teeth. A few of the gla.s.s fragments from the window fell to the floor from the upper frame as the creature stuck its head through the opening and began pushing its bulk through.

Stacy screamed and scrambled to her feet. She turned and began running out of the kitchen, down the hall, trailing blood from her cut legs behind her. Terror drove her forward as she rounded the living room, tripped and almost fell sprawling on the floor, up the stairs, down the hall to her bedroom where she ran to the window and looked out at the ma.s.s of creatures that were a.s.sembling on her back lawn.

The window was open, bringing in the cold air along with the smell of the ocean and the musty aroma of the creatures. The combination of the cold air and the intermingling scents had driven the effects of the LSD and the beer out of her system; she was cold sober. Four more of the creatures were making their way from the beach, and one of them appeared to be carrying some kind of long, thin object. A stick? A piece of driftwood?

A m.u.f.fled whimper rose from her chest as she raced out of her bedroom to the second floor landing. She peered over the balcony, getting a clear view of the living room and the kitchen. The monster that smashed the window was now in the kitchen and moving toward the living room. Two more were squeezing their scaly bodies through another window in her living room, the sound of the destruction crashing through the house, drowning out the sounds of the pouring rain outside. The couch was positioned beneath that particular window, and the creature trying to enter swiped at the furniture with its claw. Suede fabric and stuffing flew through the air as the seat cushion was disemboweled. It swiveled its head toward Stacy and grunted. She stiffened like a rodent freezing in the sights of a bobcat, and the creature swatted the sofa aside with one arm, batting it against the wall where knickknacks fell with a crash. Stacy screamed and bolted back into her bedroom, then shut and locked the door behind her.

OmiG.o.d what am I gonna do now? She backed away from the door and tried to think. Downstairs she could hear one of the creatures crashing through the living room and down the hall toward the stairs. She backed toward the window and stole another quick glance to check the status of the creatures outside. The backyard looked deserted now. Maybe she could edge out on the roof, climb down the trellis and escape across the beach.

A heavy crash thundered downstairs. It sounded like the creatures below were making progress in their search for her. Their fishy odor was already seeping under the locked door, a.s.saulting her nostrils. She opened the window all the way and was about to scamper onto the roof when she saw three more of the hulking beasts make their way to the backyard.

One had torn down the fence connecting to Mrs. Caulder's yard. Stacy had never liked Mrs. Caulder; the old lady always complained about the music being too loud, and the kind of people she had at her house, and all the men coming and going, and she thought she could smell them smoking pot over there. This is a peaceful town and no place for hooligans to run rampant, she was fond of saying. Stacy wondered what Mrs. Caulder would think of these hooligans.

Speaking of Mrs. Caulder, one of the creatures was clambering over the demolished fence dragging a b.l.o.o.d.y corpse behind it. Stacy knew it was Mrs. Caulder before she got a glimpse of her. One look was enough. The elderly woman had been savagely mauled, several large bites taken out of her body. The creature stopped, lifted the body up to its face, probing and sniffing it. Its jaws opened and it tore a ma.s.sive chunk out of the dead woman's head. Thick gray matter oozed down into the muddy puddle that covered most of Stacy's backyard. The Dark One gulped and the flesh slid down its gullet, smearing the scaly face with dark crimson gore.

Stacy backed away from the open window, gagging loudly. She would never be able to erase the picture of Mrs. Caulder's brains sliding out of her skull. No matter how much acid she took to dissolve the image.

She backed away and gagged again, almost throwing up. Downstairs she could hear the creatures crashing and blundering their way up the steps. Her heart beat wildly in her chest and she was about to scream again when her mind flashed-the closet! There was a small crawl s.p.a.ce above this room, and the entrance was through the top of the closet. If she could just get up there she could hide until the monsters got tired and went away.

She dashed to the closet, opened the door and tugged at the chain of the lightbulb. When it did not go on, she realized the power was still out. "f.u.c.k," she muttered. She began pushing aside clothes on their hangers. The small closet was nearly filled to the brim with old clothing, a vacuum cleaner, boxes of science fiction magazines, paperbacks, old bedsheets, a battered Les Paul imitation electric guitar, a crate of old p.o.r.n magazines and a.s.sorted videos. She heaped the clothes down to the floor, moved a box over that contained some stereo equipment and stood on top of it, feeling along the ceiling for the panel. She felt it yield at her pushing hand, and she pushed harder until it plopped over. She scrambled up through the opening, wriggling her legs through and then hurriedly replacing the panel into the slot just as she heard them tear into the upstairs hallway.

Once inside, she held her breath and tried to keep still. It was pitch dark and cold in the crawl s.p.a.ce. The roof of the house was only three feet above where she sat, so she couldn't stand up. She scooted down the crawl s.p.a.ce over what she a.s.sumed was the center of her bedroom. The fishy smell became stronger as the things hammered at the door and walls of the bedroom. She thought maybe if she crept along the attic crawl s.p.a.ce, she would reach the other opening into the guest room. She knew the things probably couldn't hear very well (what little she knew about reptiles and amphibians, which she a.s.sumed they were, stemmed from two snakes she used to have; a Boa Constrictor and a Burmese Python that an old boyfriend helped himself to when he left her). Even then, she was still careful to evenly distribute her weight on the plasterboard so it wouldn't come crashing down through the ceiling. Every time she shifted her weight, tiny creaks and b.u.mps echoed through the enclosed s.p.a.ce, but these were m.u.f.fled by the sounds of the destruction below. She got no farther than the center of the s.p.a.ce when she heard the door crash open.

She froze. They began moving through her bedroom, tearing apart furniture in their search for her. She remained frozen as the skin on her face p.r.i.c.kled; she recognized the sensation of a spiderweb across her face. She bit her lip, a tear rolling down her check. She hated spiders, and the thought of not being able to move because those things might sense it made the ordeal even more frightening because what if the spider in question was one of those large garden spiders that she detested and it was now crawling around in her hair?

Don't think about that!

She remained motionless, trying to quell her fear as the crashing below suddenly evaporated into total silence.

The creatures had destroyed everything in the room and were now silent, sniffing at the air. The scent of blood was in the room, and it was strong. The squealing prey was still somewhere in this s.p.a.ce, and they could sense it. The scent of it was strong, its blood scent was strong, its- One of them raised its webbed, scaly hand and pointed at the open closet. The others followed it to the small opening.

Stacy heard the creatures move below her toward the closet door. She shivered, her brain telling her to move now. She obeyed, crawling again toward the inner reaches of the attic.

The creatures hissed at the bloodstains dotting the floor and clothing in the closet. They tore through the clothes in search of the squealing prey, knowing that nourishment was there somewhere. One of the creatures carried a rusted whaling harpoon it had carried from the ocean floor, and used the sharp instrument as a prod, poking it into the boxes and clothes, tearing the contents to ribbons. The squealing prey wasn't hiding amid the rubble.

The creatures turned to each other and bleated, their communication strong and singular. The one clutching the harpoon looked toward the ceiling and spied smears of blood around the square panel. Its olfactory senses picked it up even keener, the taste of the blood on its Jacobinson organ creating a mad blood l.u.s.t. It reached up and touched the panel, pushing it up. It opened and fell into the crawl s.p.a.ce. A grunting of what appeared to be satisfaction welled from the rest of the creatures and they surged forward...

Stacy was almost where she thought her bedroom ended when she heard a sound behind her. She stopped and turned around. The door to the panel had been flung aside and she gasped in horror as she saw a green-scaled hand clawing at the edges of the tiny trapdoor. She squealed and scrambled frantically down the crawl s.p.a.ce, heading into the farther recesses of the attic.

The Dark Ones sniffed at the cold air, grimacing at the open s.p.a.ce in the ceiling. They could sense the blood stains around the opening, but their heat sensors weren't picking up the prey. It had moved elsewhere.

The Dark One that thrust its arm up eased itself down and grunted. The creature with the harpoon jammed the instrument through the hole, stabbing at the air. There was nothing up there. The prey had moved away from the opening. They moved away from the closet, eyes trained on the ceiling, trying to get a read on any heat that may be radiating out, as well as the taste of blood...

Stacy saw the harpoon poke through the attic entrance and she whimpered. She scuttled along the attic, her back aching from the confinement of the crawls.p.a.ce. The splintered wood from the crawls.p.a.ce floor barely registered in her brain as she crawled along her stomach. The dripping blood from her leg wounds mingled with the dust and cobwebs underneath her. A small drop of blood found a tiny crack and seeped in.

The creature with the harpoon sensed it first. Tiny dots of blood, barely discernible to the naked eye, were sensed by the Dark One's immense olfactory nerves. The trail was faint and led away from the bedroom. They followed it, and the creature with the harpoon stopped and stood underneath the scent, staring up.

Nostrils dilated and gills slapped like wet leather. They could sense that the prey was right above them. A chorus of eager croaks and hisses rose in the air.

The Dark One with the harpoon hissed and thrust the weapon up into the plasterboard ceiling. Chips of paint and plaster dust rained down on the pack of slithery beings.

As well as something warm and wet.

Stacy didn't have time to react as the sharp end of the harpoon came punching up through the floor of the crawl s.p.a.ce and into her stomach.

She started, trying to crawl away. There was no pain, but she felt paralyzed. She couldn't move. She tried to scream but no sound issued from her throat. She felt her mid-section grow numb, as well as the slight sensation that her mid-section had been snagged on something sharp. The taste of bile rose in her throat and her energy was momentarily zapped as she tried to move away...

The Dark One yanked the harpoon down violently and was rewarded by a red-hot shower of delicious human body fluid. The creatures crowded around, webbed claws scrabbling up, lapping up the blood that poured down. The creature with the harpoon moved the tool around as if it was stirring a vat of food and tugged. A smidgen of blood-crusted pink emerged from the hole the harpoon had punched through, and the Dark Ones emitted a throaty chorus of approval.

The creature with the harpoon noticed it and tugged again, revealing the object to be a piece of intestine. Webbed claws shot out and gripped the hanging morsel tightly. The creatures tugged and fought over the intestine, pulling it down as they scrambled for it, some yanking pieces off and stuffing them into their mouths.

The largest one looked up at the quivering rope. More of the organ came spilling through the ragged six-inch hole with each tug. The Dark Ones bleated and croaked in frenzy. The large creature pulled again. More intestine slithered down like a b.l.o.o.d.y, skinned snake.

Stacy screamed as her guts were yanked painfully from the wound in her belly; the numb sensation had now turned into a fiery burn that was hot and painful.

She managed to get up on her hands and knees, looking down in horror as more of her came sliding out and down the hole. It looked like a huge piece of spaghetti going down a drain.

Razor-sharp pain exploded in her body. Her senses fought for control with the residue of the many acid trips she'd taken over the years. It was as if her synapses were exploding in bright ranges of colors and sensations all at once, only to be overruled by the here and now. She wanted the acid side to win, wanted to retreat into the nice, colorful world that the drug created. She wanted to nestle in the electric fields with the dancing pumpkins and friendly clockwork animals.

Unfortunately, the other side won.

Stacy felt each rip and tug with crystal clarity. Each jolt of pain shot through her like a bullet. The coppery taste of her blood filled her mouth as the overpowering stench of rotted fish, seaweed, and excrement invaded her nose.

In a final desperate attempt, Stacy grabbed onto the rope of intestine with both hands. The gushing blood made her fingers too slick, and the organ wiggled through her fingers like a soaped-up eel.

A few agonizing seconds later, the last few feet of her small intestine left her body. She felt empty, the pain becoming white hot, then blossoming into another feeling, one of numbness again. She marveled at the amount of guts tucked into her small frame and wondered if a doctor would be able to pack it back in. An involuntary giggle died as blood spilled from her mouth.

The connecting tissues in her body pulled taut. Stacy felt her body lurch forward, and then she was abruptly jerked face-first into the dust. A moment later there was a snap as the tissue broke.

Her senses began to dim. She heard the plasterboard under her crack and give way. Another pull. Her spine snapped as her body folded in backwards. She felt herself falling, and the m.u.f.fled feeling that was coming over her blossomed with bright flashes and colors and muted sounds. A face swirled in the fog that was rapidly swirling around her, enveloping her like a blanket.

Kirk.

He was smiling.

She smiled back.

The shadows from the fog engulfed her.

Chapter Twenty-Four.

At some point he must have fallen asleep.

Rick awoke with a start, eyes blinking rapidly as he took in his surroundings: the gray walls of the cell, the grimy bars that kept him from the outside world, the huddled figures outside the cell...

He lurched up, swung his legs over the cot and rose to a wobbly stance. The air was still and cold. It was still dark outside and he had no idea what time it was. How long had he been asleep? He rubbed his eyes and made his way to the bars. Janice and Bobby lay huddled together on the floor on the other side of the bars. Rick checked them out, fear rising sharply as he realized that they could be dead. He'd fallen asleep and the Dark Ones had broken into the office and slaughtered Janice and Bobby. They'd tried to burst through the bars of the cell to get at him, but the stainless steel bars thwarted them. That's why he was still alive and Janice and Bobby were- Lightly dozing.

Janice sensed Rick standing there and got to her feet. She rubbed her sleep-crusted eyes. Her features were heavy with fatigue, yet she offered him a smile. "I must've dozed off."

Rick returned her smile. "Guess we all did. I didn't think that was possible, but..."