"I don't know," I told him. "It's just real exposed out here."
"Yeah." He tightened bolt two and went on to three. "Believe me, I'm feeling it."
Lightning stabbed again, so bright it practically sizzled my eyeballs. Close, too, real close. It must have struck a transformer about a block away; I saw something flare up in hot blue sparks.
Our streetlight went dead with a sad little fizzle and zap.
"Shit," Shane said. "Can't see a thing! Flashlight!"
I grabbed one from the back, but that meant dropping one of my two weapons. I debated, then left the stake on the seat. The flashlight worked, at least, and I focused it so he could continue bolt three.
By bolt five, I was feeling pretty good. We were almost back on the road. Yes, we were - yikes - half an hour late, but at least we were in one piece....
I felt something brush past me.
The wind was blowing, and rain was thrashing, and the feeling was so subtle, I shouldn't have been able to pick it out of the general chaos around us, but there was something about that touch. Something very bad.
I spun around, throwing the light all directions, but I didn't see a thing.
"Sorry," I said, and turned back toward the car, and Shane, who was - against all character points - waiting patiently for me to stop freaking out.
Only he wasn't waiting.
He was standing up. The light hit his face, and it was pale, dead pale, his brown eyes almost all pupil.
I yelped and scuttled back, and the light slipped and lit up someone standing behind him.
My mind fried, just like the streetlight, as if it couldn't make that work, couldn't process, couldn't deal. It was like a shadow, but -
"Hey!" I shook it off, mostly by refusing to look at whoever that was behind Shane. "Shane, get out of the way. What the hell are you doing?"
He just stared at me. It was as if he was gone, like Claire had been gone, only he was still standing there.
Then he turned and started to walk away. He passed the shadow, which rippled black like a standing-up puddle of oil, and I felt something horrible and cold well up inside me.
Whatever this thing was, it had Shane, and now it was taking me, too.
Hell with this.
I yelled, closed my eyes, and lunged.
It was a perfect lunge, the fencing move of a lifetime - razor-straight extension, weight balanced, every bit of my reach forward into the silver-coated steel of the sword.
And it caught the thing dead center.
Problem was, it didn't feel like I'd punctured anything real. It was more as if I'd hit a balloon, one filled with gelatin and water. The give was way too easy, way too wrong, and I snapped my head up to see the thing - because it damn sure wasn't a man, and wasn't a vampire - collapsing in on itself.
Whatever was inside it splashed to the wet ground a second before the thin, empty oil-black skin collapsed.
I shrieked and scrambled backward, shaking my sword free of the ick. There was no sign of blood on there, or anything I could see in the dim light from my fallen flashlight.
The black stuff was flooding away in the water.
Shane had fallen face-first to the street, as if he'd just been turned completely off. I gave that dead skin a wide margin of respect as I ran for him and grabbed his arm. "Shane! Shane!" God, flashbacks, I couldn't lose him, too. I couldn't. . . .
And I didn't, because in the next instant he coughed, spraying water, and rolled up to his feet. He almost went down again, so I steadied him. "What the hell was that?" He vomited, and way too much water came out of him. It was as if he'd been drowning, which he couldn't have been, could he? No way.
"I don't know what that was," I said. "But I like it like cancer. Come on, we have to get out of here!"
Shane definitely didn't argue. I dragged the skin-heap over to the side, well away from us, using only the point of my epee. That was more sickening than your average vomit-inducing event. Seriously, I would rather kiss Monica, or lick a toilet bowl, than ever, ever do that again.
Shane tightened the fifth bolt and got the sixth in and tightened in less than a minute, hit the release on the jack, and thumped the car back to the pavement, fast. He grabbed all the tools and tossed them in the back, yelled, "Go!" and I didn't wait for a second opinion. I was in and starting up the hearse before his door was closed.
And now I could hear something. It sounded like - singing? Confused, I fiddled with the stereo, but it was off. Nothing coming out of it.
I realized, as I accelerated, that Shane was trying to get out of the car. Holy floating Moses, that was - insane. I grabbed him by the hair and pulled, hard, and he yelped and slammed his door again and turned to glare at me. "What?"
"You were leaving!" I shouted back. He looked utterly lost for a second, then nodded, as if he'd just realized something. "God, what is going on? Because even for Morganville, this is totally whacked!"
Shane, ever practical, reached in the glove compartment, pulled out some tissues, and tore them into strips. "Can you hear it? The music?"
I nodded. I could, and it was making me sweat. Hard to keep my hands on the wheel, my foot on the gas. I was feeling more and more - relaxed. Distracted.
"Here," Shane said. He was jamming rolled-up pieces of tissue in his ears, and handing me some. I didn't really want it, but I took one and stuffed it in on the left.
I instantly felt better. Sharper. And much, much more scared. I grabbed the other piece and got it in my right ear, pressed the accelerator, and ripped through the red light at top speed. Bill me for the ticket, Morganville, because I knew that stopping right now was an insane idea.
Shane was breathing easier now, too, but he looked pale and wild-eyed. We didn't talk - well, considering we'd just jammed up our ears, it probably wouldn't have been productive, either. I drove too fast for the heavy rain, but the streets seemed deserted, and anyway, I was way too freaked-out to slow down.
Lot Street showed up suddenly, and I swerved into a left turn, tossing Shane into the passenger's door (but not, thankfully, out of it). When I slithered the hearse to a stop in front of the house, we looked at each other, and Shane pointed from me to the bag in the back, then from his chest to the items scattered on the backseat. I nodded and did a silent three count.
I hit the back, grabbed the weapons bag, threw the stake inside, and raced through the gate and up the walk. I fished for my keys as I ran, and had them out and ready. The door swung open right on cue as Shane pounded up the steps behind me carrying his load, and we rushed inside, slammed the door, and locked it, hard.
We stood there breathing hard for a few seconds; then Shane yanked tissue out of his ears and turned away. When I got mine out, I heard him yelling for Michael as he carried his items toward the living room.
There was a black doctor's bag and two bottles of liquid sitting there, and damp footprints on the carpet - but no Michael. "Michael!" I yelled up the stairs, adding to Shane's voice as he checked the kitchen. "Michael, we're back - "
No answer. I tried not to look directly at Claire's still form as I headed to the kitchen. I met Shane as he came out.
"Nothing," he said. "He's not here."
"He went out after us."
"Yeah."
"Well - we should - "
"Nothing," Shane said. "We should do nothing but wait. Eve, it's really freaking nuts out there. He'll have to get back on his own. Look, he'll be fine; you know Michael. He's tough."
I nodded, but I felt short of breath. We were more than thirty minutes late. Even if he'd gone out, surely he should be back soon.
But he wasn't. The minutes slid by, greasy and way too fast, and with each one, my panic got a little stronger. I kept wanting to fiddle with my cell phone, but there was no point; the lines were still out. The TV stations were dark. What I could pick up on the radio were ghostly out-of-town signals, nothing local.
It had been an hour when Shane said, very quietly, "I think we have to assume something happened."
I was trying very hard not to lose it. "Then what are we going to do?" I asked him. "Please. Tell me. We can't call for help. It's too dangerous to go out there. What the hell do we do? Jesus, Claire is - Claire is right there on the couch. What are we doing, Shane?" That last tipped over from distress into real terror, and Shane grabbed me and held on for both our lives. He was scared, too. Really scared.
There was a knock at the back door.
We sprang apart like we'd been caught doing something totally illegal, and I felt a surge of relief so intense it was like being soaked in a hot bath. "Michael," I said, and raced to let him in.