The Outkast

Chapter 19

He stood in the doorway for a while, casting a darkly suspicious gaze at the boy, who was still snoozing. Apparently, he had gone through a screaming bout while still asleep.

Something wasn’t right, but that something had nothing to do with the boy’s susceptibility to attacks from the enemies. What The Outcast felt was more intense.

Right now, he began to experience the level of polarity that had played between the impure blood of Ogre’s Pond and him for so long.

All of a sudden, his subsided shivering resumed.

What the problem was-what he had felt at the boy’s house and in his own chamber-no doubt, was the foul spirit of betrayal.

He was just about to scream in infuriation when the engines rumbled across the quiet night, the sound swelling from the woods towards his abode.

As lightning cracked the face of the sky, Allan and Dwayne crouched behind a huge log of wood in response to Dwayne’s observation.

“Do you still notice any movement?” Allan asked in a low, quavery voice.

“Not anymore. Maybe it was just a figment of my imagination,” Dwayne said, whirling his head around to scan the whole area, as if he found it hard to convince himself by his own words. “I saw it through the corner of my eye, after all. Might even be a trick of the light.”

An insect lost its bearings and buzzed right into Allan’s nostril. “Shit,” he muttered as he blew the critter out. “I hate this.”

“How did we wind up here by the way?” Dwayne said.

Allan was still fuming at the winged creature’s intrusion on his mucous membrane-like it was a sacred land that an infidel had just desecrated.

Dwayne added, “I mean, how exactly did Sheriff Stack figure out this place is the criminal’s hideout?”

“Robert Smallwood.”

“Huh?”

“The boy keeps the record of his nightmares.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“I have no idea. And even for a boy his age, if you ask me, makes it weirder.”

“But what has that got to do with us hunkering down here with our asses getting wiped by the itchy brushes?”

“Well, he says he sees this place in his shitty dreams. The kid’s fucked up,” Allan said, and quickly added: “And so is his mother.”

“So, do you believe in that?”

“In what?”

“That what the boy claims to have seen is real-and that this is it?”

“Fuck, no. I’m not that superstitious and stupid. Imagine how much of realness it must have held for us to have missed our way so many times.”

Dwayne kept silent.

Allan said, “But tell you what? Although I don’t believe the boy’s writing is anything more than a sick kid’s report, I’m scared all the same.”

“You’re scared?” Dwayne said, stressing the last word with disbelieve. “Now, that doesn’t make any sense, does it? If you don’t believe in what you’ve read, and you don’t believe we’re in the place described by the boy, why’re you worried?”

“I dunno. Probably doesn’t make any sense to anyone, including me-but whenever I remember that thing and how badly it stabbed Crawford repeatedly, it makes my blood curdle.”

“Nonsense. If I were you, such reflection would only make me wanna leave the son-of-a-bitch torn to ribbons. And I’m damn sure I will do that at some point. If not here, then wherever he is, we’ll track him down.”

They studied the night ahead of them and, having decided the coast was clear, they moved on, dodging behind big tree trunks from time to time, never staying more than six feet apart.

There was another flash across the sky, and at that instant, it was the familiar horrible face that Allan saw first before he even noticed the rest of the figure in black coveralls, whose arm was already coiled around Dwayne’s neck.

Allan watched in awe, thinking, I’ve been in this situation before. This is like lightning striking the same damn place two fucking times.

In the blink of an eye, Dwayne had been lifted off his feet, legs flailing in the air, neck still strangled by the sturdy arm.

What happened at Holly’s cottage was a slow-motion version of what Allan was about to witness. Just as he got over his awe and decided it was time to do something more productive than gawking, the monster flung Dwayne at him, knocking him down to the forest floor. Allan’s gun slipped off his hand and flew away, probably taking refuge underneath a pile of leaves or hiding behind a fallen trunk. Dwayne landed beside him, motionless at first, but then began to jerk his right leg, digging his heel against the dirt as he screamed.

Allan quickly drew out his second gun, and shot straight ahead before realizing the thing was no longer in front of them. He began to rise up, shooting as he did, aimlessly, not giving a damn that he was acting like a lousy amateur. Beside him, Dwayne dug some more and let out a cry-a sonorous, pain-filled shriek. In the flood of the moonlight, Allan could faintly see blood seeping out from underneath his partner. Within the brief time his eyes roamed across his comrade’s body, he saw something sticking out from the side of Dwayne’s chest, along his rib cage. A knife, Allan assumed, and squeezed another aimless shot into the air.

He was all the way up on his feet now. He whirled around in search of his target, but he didn’t have to look for long. The huge thing pounced from Allan’s left side, kicked the gun out of his hand, and slapped him so hard he found his butt on the ground one more time.

Allan cried. He scrambled to his feet again and ran. Ran very fast. Away from the battle front.