Russ started to stand. "Then I'm going with you."

He scooted his chair back from the table and rose to his feet. His knees popped.

I held up my hand. "Not this time. One of us needs to stay here and guard the building. Plus, I've talked to Dez more than you have. If he's going to trust anybody, it'll be me. And besides, what if we get mad at each other while we're out there? What if whatever is influencing our f.u.c.king emotions makes us turn on each other? What happens to Cranston and Christy and Dez then?"

"Good point." Russ sat back down with a sigh. "I don't like it, but you're right."

"Okay. I'll sneak out the back and head over to the church. Maybe Dez is still hiding out in his shed. If not, maybe someone has seen him."

"And what are you gonna do when you find him?" Christy asked.

"I don't know. Like I said, I'll warn him, at the very least. Maybe invite him to stay here where it's safer."

Christy bristled at that. "I don't want some weird homeless guy living in our apartment, Robbie. We don't have enough food and water for the two of us the way it is."

The darkness played my emotions, and I felt that familiar, sudden anger begin to rise. I wanted to shout, Well, maybe we wouldn't be low on food if you didn't sit around and stuff your f.u.c.king face all day, Well, maybe we wouldn't be low on food if you didn't sit around and stuff your f.u.c.king face all day, but I managed to squash the urge and bit my lip instead, hard enough to draw blood. but I managed to squash the urge and bit my lip instead, hard enough to draw blood.

"I don't want to argue, honey."

"Well, there's another reason, then. We've been stuck in here together, trying to avoid each other as much as possible so that we don't f.u.c.king kill each other. How much harder is that going to be with a third person living in the apartment?"

"He can live in the bas.e.m.e.nt," Russ suggested. I wondered if he could sense the tension building inside of me.

"Exactly," I said. "Nothing down there but mice and c.o.c.kroaches. He'll probably feel right at home. h.e.l.l, it might be a step up from that shed he's living in now."

Christy rolled her eyes and pursed her lips.

"What if he's not there?" Russ asked. "What then?"

"I'll leave him a note. Warn him somehow. Hopefully, he'll see it."

"Well, you should get going then."

"Yeah. I guess I'd better."

"You still have the handgun?"

I nodded.

Surprisingly, Christy didn't argue anymore. Maybe she was busy trying to rein in her own violent emotions, as well, or maybe she just saw that I was right. In either case, she stayed quiet.

Russ made me wait long enough for him to run upstairs and get me some extra ammo for the pistol. I dropped the bullets in my pocket, and my jeans sagged a little lower. I hitched them up and tightened my belt. Then I kissed Christy good-bye and went downstairs, past Cranston's apartment, to the bas.e.m.e.nt door. It was dark and dank down there, and my flashlight barely penetrated the gloom. I didn't care. By now, I was used to walking through darkness. What I minded more was the musty, cloying smell of mildew. It seemed to hang in the air like fog. I could almost feel it on my skin and taste it on my tongue. Water dripped somewhere in the shadows, and I thought I heard something scurrying-a rat or a bat, maybe.

I hurried over to the storm door and pushed it open from the inside. Flecks of rust rained down on me. Blinking, I brushed them away and then pushed the door the rest of the way. The hinges creaked and groaned, but the alley behind our building sounded quiet. I peeked outside and verified that the coast was clear. Then I climbed out. m.u.f.fled hip-hop music blared from the front street-which meant that T and Mario were probably somewhere nearby. Cranston had been right about that at least.

I tiptoed down the alley, giving our street a wide berth, and made my way to the church. I didn't turn on the flashlight. Didn't want to attract any attention if I could help it. I tried sticking to the shadows as much as possible, which was pretty easy, considering our circ.u.mstances. Everything was one big f.u.c.king shadow.

There weren't many people on the street, and the ones who were out and about looked dangerous or blitzed out of their G.o.dd.a.m.ned minds. Each time I encountered them, I hid until they'd pa.s.sed by or snuck around them as best I could. One guy wore a length of baling twine around his neck. Attached to it were about a dozen human ears-a grisly necklace. A teenage girl approached a fluttering bird with a broken wing. She carried a cinderblock with her, grunting and straining at the weight. The bird flopped around in the street, squawking with fear. The girl laughed as she smashed the cinderblock down on it. An old man stood on the sidewalk. Next to him was a plastic storage tub filled with nothing but Barbie doll heads. He'd reach into the tub, toss a head at the windows of a nearby house, and then repeat the process over and over again. He sobbed the entire time. A naked fat guy stood in the middle of the intersection at Second Street and Sycamore Lane. He was jerking off, literally yanking his d.i.c.k so hard that I thought he might pull it off. He was so into it that he didn't see the two people who snuck up behind him and then stabbed him in the a.s.s with sharpened broomsticks. The man fell over, screaming. His attackers leaned on their makeshift spears and shoved the weapons deeper. I thought about getting involved-opening fire and putting them down like mad dogs, but I resisted the urge. I couldn't afford the attention and didn't want to waste the ammo. I saw a junkie shooting up with heroin. His right knee and lower right leg looked swollen-straining at the fabric of his dirty jeans. He stank-not just body odor but a deeper, danker reek. The smell of infection. Of rot. Then I realized that it wasn't just him.

It was the town.

And Walden wasn't the only thing dying. I noticed something else as I walked. The plants were starting to fail, too. With no sunlight or rain, they'd begun to wither and die. Their limbs drooped listlessly and once-lush leaves were now curled. This was the time of year they'd have started to change color anyway, but instead of going from green to red, orange, and yellow, they merely turned brown. I wondered how the lack of sunlight was affecting us. A sharp decrease in skin cancer seemed to be the only positive, but instead of dying from melanoma, we'd just get eaten by the darkness-or killed by somebody it had driven insane. The sun had to be up there somewhere above the black curtain. If it wasn't, we'd have all frozen to death by now. But if it was there, we weren't getting the full benefits. Scientifically, it made no sense-at least, not to me.

I made it across town without any altercations, and I approached the church ruins with caution. The smell of smoke and burned wood was still noticeable, and even though there was no wind, I could taste ashes in the back of my throat. The ruins were deserted, except for a skinny cat, prowling through the debris. It ran when it saw me. I debated whether to turn the flashlight on, now that the coast was clear, and decided to keep it off.

The dilapidated utility shed that Dez called home stood on the far corner of the property, just beyond the church's parking lot, bordering a back alley. The building had seen better days. If the fire had touched it, instead of the church, it would have been a blessing. Four layers of paint had peeled away in various sections, revealing gray, weather-beaten planks, as if the building had leprosy. Entire swaths of roof tiles were missing, and a groundhog hole marked the spot where varmints had tunneled beneath the wall and gotten inside.

The door wasn't padlocked or barred. I crept up to it, listening for any sign of nearby activity, but the back alley remained silent. There was some faded graffiti painted on the door. I didn't recognize it, but it was vaguely similar to Dez's runes. I wondered if he'd painted this as well, and if so, what it meant.

Taking a deep breath, I knocked quietly, and then waited. There was no response, so I knocked again-louder this time. Still nothing. My fingers closed around the door handle, and I pulled, gently at first, but more firmly when it wouldn't open. I turned on the flashlight and shined it on the door, but couldn't see any kind of blockage. I tugged harder, grunting with the effort, but still the door wouldn't budge.

"What the f.u.c.k," I muttered. "Must be locked from the inside."

"No," said a voice from behind me. "It just doesn't know you. It won't open if it doesn't know you."

I spun around, nearly dropping my flashlight and the gun. Dez stepped out from beneath the shadows of a broad, dying oak tree.

"Jesus f.u.c.king Christ," I gasped. "You scared the s.h.i.t out of me, dude."

"Sorry. I was watching you. I didn't know what you wanted. But then I remembered who you were. You were the man who was nice to me."

"I...guess so."

"You were," he insisted. "I remember your face and your colors-the colors most people can't see. Your name is Robbie. Robbie Higgins. You were nice. You didn't call me names or throw things at me, like some of the other people do. That's nice. But the door won't open for you, no matter how nice you are."

"And why is that?"

"Because it doesn't know you," he repeated, pointing at the symbol. "You see that?"

I nodded. "Yeah."

"That's like a special lock. It only opens for me."

"More runes and magic pictures, huh?"

Dez shrugged. "They're words. Just a different kind of words. Words are important. Words and names. They're everything. If you know something's name and you know the words to make it go away, then that's a good thing, right? That gives you power over it."

"Sure. If you say so."

"Do you want to come inside? I have soda pop, but no ice."

I nodded. "That would be cool, man."

"No, it's warm. Like I said, I have no ice."

I suppressed a smile. "Warm is fine."

Dez glanced toward the black horizon and shuddered. "He's watching us."

"Who?"

"He Who Shall Not Be Named! It's like a big tumor, infecting the universe. And now it's here. Don't you understand anything?"

"Not really. That's why I'm here. I'm hoping you can explain to me just what the h.e.l.l has happened. And I've got something to tell you, too."

"Inside. We shouldn't talk out here. He'll hear us."

Dez pulled on the door and it opened without re sistance. He walked inside and after a moment's hesitation, I followed. The door swung shut behind us. I shined my flashlight around. The shed's interior mirrored the outside. It was full of junk-old lawnmowers, gas cans, shovels, pickaxes, rakes, garden hoes, pruning shearers, canisters of weed killer and rat poison, plastic floral arrangements and tiny American flags for the nearby cemetery, holiday decorations, a child-sized plastic wading pool, and other debris. In one corner of the shed-the section with most of the roof still intact-six wooden pallets had been lined up side by side and covered with thick cardboard, forming a square platform. On top of this platform was a half-deflated air mattress, some dirty pillows, sheets and blankets, a Styrofoam cooler, and a small kerosene heater. While I waited, Dez lit the heater, and its orange glow filled the shack. His features seemed less grizzled in this light. Softer. I turned off the flashlight. He rummaged in the cooler and handed me a warm can of generic-brand ginger ale.

"Thanks."

"You're welcome."

"So...you live here all the time?"

He nodded. "Yes. The people in the church were very kind. They didn't mind me staying here. And now most of them are gone-and the ones who aren't gone don't come here anymore. So it's just me."

"Well, listen, Dez. I'd like to ask you some questions about what happened to us. Remember? The darkness?"

"I saved you."

"Yeah, you did. You saved all of us. Our a.s.ses would be gra.s.s right now if not for you. Like I said outside, I don't really understand what's happening. I need to learn more. I'd like to talk about it, if that's okay?"

He frowned. "You won't call me a witch?"

"No. Why would I do that?"

"The woman who was with you called me a witch. And she's telling other people that, too. She doesn't think I know, but I do. I stay hidden and I hear things."

"Well, screw her. As far as I'm concerned, this town owes you. Her, too. I don't even want to think about what would have happened if you hadn't shown up out there. You seem to be the only person in town who's got a handle on this whole thing."

"You mean the darkness."

"Right. What is it? Obviously, it ain't an ordinary darkness."

"No, it's not. It has a secret name, just like everyone else, but we can't speak its name out loud. If we did, that would bring death and destruction to us all. Some people call it He Who Shall Not Be Named."

"So that's what is inside the darkness? A thing? A...person?"

"No. There's nothing inside it. It is what it is."

"I don't understand."

Dez smiled sadly. "The darkness is just...darkness. But alive. It doesn't always look like darkness, though."

"Yeah," I said. "We ran into that ourselves. It looked like my grandfather at one point."

"It can look like more than that. It can look like whatever we're afraid of. And other things, too. A goat-man, fire, a storm cloud, a big snake-all kinds of things. If you're afraid of something, the darkness can see it in your mind and then take that shape."

I nodded, thinking about how the figure in the darkness had kept changing form and shape.

"Each time it disguises itself as something like that," Dez continued, "it frightens somebody and feeds off their fear. The darkness has unlimited shapes. More than infinity. And it has different names, too. Othel. Verminus. Nuada. Lud. Nud. Shub-Niggurath. Pahad. Lilitu. Lamashtu. The Father of Pan. The Living Darkness. The Sire of Kali. A whole bunch more."

"But none of those are its real name?"

"No. Those names are just ones that people invented over time. None of them are its real name. None of them give us power over it. That's why knowing its real name is important."

"But if you can't say its real name out loud, then what's the point of knowing it at all?"

"You can use its real name in written words. Not spoken words. You can bind it and banish it if you know the words. Like I told you, words are important. Words and names."

I paused, trying to decide if he was crazy or if he really knew what he was talking about. When we'd confronted the darkness and Dez tossed the salt at it, he'd really seemed to know what he was doing. But now, sitting here in his hovel, I was starting to have doubts again.

Something skittered and scratched in the shadows. It sounded like a rat or mouse. I glanced around. There was a mildewed cardboard box in the corner that I hadn't noticed before. It was overflowing with books. I peered closer. Some of them looked very old, and judging by their covers, some weren't even in English. There were pentagrams and other occult stuff on the covers. Weird symbols and drawings.

Dez followed my gaze. "You like my library? I've never shown it to anyone before."

"You've read all of those?"

"That's where I learn the words from."

"Okay," I said. "So this darkness is a living creature and we can't say its real name. But that doesn't tell me much, Dez. What is it, exactly? Where the f.u.c.k does it come from and, more importantly, how the h.e.l.l do we get rid of it? Do those books tell us any of that?"

"Sure. To answer your first question, the darkness is one of the Thirteen."

"The thirteen what?"

"Just the Thirteen. They are the oldest things in the universe. Some people think they are demons or G.o.ds, but they aren't. They came from a universe that was around before this one. The Bible tells us that G.o.d created the universe, but it doesn't tell us that in order to have the power to do so, He had to destroy the universe that existed before this one. He needed the energy."

I groaned. "G.o.d, huh? I've got to be honest with you, Dez. I don't believe in G.o.d."

"That's because you don't understand Him. He's not just the G.o.d of the Christians. He's the G.o.d of many. Yahweh. Allah. He has many names, and most of what you know about Him is probably wrong. They did that on purpose."

"And G.o.d, or whatever you want to call Him, killed an entire universe to create ours?"

"Right. Everything in that old universe was used to make this one. It was completely wiped out, except for the Thirteen. n.o.body knows how for sure, but they escaped the destruction, and they've been the enemies of G.o.d ever since. They blame Him for what happened to their universe, and they've sworn to destroy our universe in revenge. They go from planet to planet. They use floods or plagues or bring the dead back to life-whatever they can do to destroy things. Sometimes they work together, and sometimes they don't. After they've destroyed a level, they move on to the next one. That's what He Who Shall Not Be Named wants to do when he's done here, but I've stopped him. He won't leave till he's finished us, but he can't finish us. He's stuck."

"You're talking about the devil, right? Satan and his demons?"

"No. I said, they aren't demons. They're worse than that. There is a real Devil, of course, but he's not the one you have to worry about. Even Satan isn't as strong as the Thirteen. You should learn their names. Ob, Ab, Api, Apu, Leviathan, Behemoth, Kandara, Meeble, Purturabo, Shtar, Kat, and..."

Pausing, he scrunched his face together, frowning in concentration. Then he sighed.

"Oh, shoot. I used to be able to remember them all, but I'm forgetting one. But it doesn't matter. What was I saying before?"

"That these Thirteen are stronger than the Devil."

Dez snapped his fingers. "That's right! They are very powerful. But the most powerful among them is He Who Shall Not Be Named. It is alive-a living darkness, and it goes from world to world, gobbling each planet up like gumb.a.l.l.s. That's what happened on Mars, you know. It used to be just like Earth. People lived there, and they were shiny and happy, until the darkness came and sucked their planet dry. A few of them made it out before the end, but not many."