Deep in the woods of Zarephath, the Door hummed.
What was left of Ed Richter in this world was tugged at by winds that kept sending the oak trees above into a nervous rustle and made the ropes that hung from them, the ones that had strung up Ed for a while, creak like old bodies.
There wasn’t much of Ed for the winds to play with, just some scraps of flesh and a few bones that had been pulled out of his right leg. The animals, few that there were in the vicinity of the Door, might drag them off soon enough, but not while the Door emitted that hum that was almost words.
There was a little blood too. Not much, not anymore, but a smattering on the fallen leaves which, this close to the Door, were in a perpetual state of late autumn.
What was left of Ed on the other side of the Door screamed until his face changed into something that was nothing like a face and the soft parts of him were devoured by hungry, impatient gods.
* * * *
When Kathy, Bill, and Toby arrived at the Heritage Center, they were glad to see Sheriff Cole’s patrol car among others already parked. They were even happier to see the man himself in the basement, sitting on folding chairs with two women who he introduced to Kathy as Kari Martin and Cicely Robinson. The rest of the room was more sparsely filled than Kathy would have liked—maybe thirty-five of the sixty or seventy that had shown up for the town meeting. Odds were that far more people had used the Door, and thus were in danger of backlash, than the small group gathered and milling about the basement. What Kathy supposed the number meant was that a small town had grown somewhat smaller, and quickly.
She recognized a few faces from the town meeting, including the lady with the alien shirt (now in a checkered pink and blue blouse), a few middle-aged men, and the little girl and her mother. It pained Kathy to see the little girl there and know that she still couldn’t follow through yet on her promise to protect the town. What bothered her even more was the idea that, given their presence, either the girl or her mother had used the Door, or both. All three prospects were equally horrible to Kathy.
She set the toolbox at her feet and sat in one of the folding chairs behind the women. Toby sat behind her and Bill sat behind Sheriff Cole. Kathy’s presence drew the others in the room closer. Townspeople took seats in the surrounding folding chairs or hovered nearby in the aisle.
“Hello, ladies,” Kathy said to the two women. “It’s nice to meet you. I’m glad Sheriff Cole was able to get you here safely.” To the others, she added, “Everyone, I’m happy you all made it here. I choose to find it encouraging that there are some of you, rather than discouraging that there aren’t more of you.”
Her statement was greeted with cool stares and unsure grumbling. They were waiting on her for answers. Many looked exhausted. Some looked physically hurt.
Cicely shivered, pulling her sweater tighter around her. Kari looked miserable. She also looked just about as badly beaten up as Kathy felt. Her face was an assortment of bruises and she clutched the side of her ribs as if trying to massage a persistent pain.
“I got your message,” Kathy continued, looking at Kari. The other woman began a jumble of half-started sentences, mostly apologies and explanations, and Kathy held up her hand.
“Look, it’s okay, Kari. May I call you Kari?”
The other woman nodded. Kathy continued. “I figure you had your reasons, and I’d even go so far as to guess they were good ones, or seemed good at the time.”
“What does she mean?” Cicely asked, looking at Kari. “Your reasons for what?”
Kari’s eyes, red already from crying, spilled new tears. “I opened the Door.” There was a surprised gasp from those assembled nearby. Cicely in particular looked especially wounded.
“Sugar,” she said, and there was the slightest ice-sharp edge to her voice, “I told you that rule number one was that you never, ever open the Door for any reason. Ever.”
“I was forgetting her,” Kari said softly. “My own daughter. I was forgetting all my memories of her because of how I worded the letter and I just wanted to get it back. I begged with them behind the Door, really pleaded for my letter back. I asked them to cancel it. I tried to bargain, offered a trade, anything. I even tried to dig under the Door, but I couldn’t reach and I thought, if I just opened it for a minute—”
“So this is her fucking fault all this is happening? ’Cuz she opened the fucking Door?” one of the middle-aged men said. He was a big guy with an unruly gray beard and an ample stomach over which was stretched a T-shirt and flannel. The T-shirt read SEX MACHINE.
“Sex machine, you got a name?” Kathy turned to the man.
“Ted,” he said.
“Ted. Easy does it. This is no one’s fault, okay? All of you have to understand something right now. If you blame or judge anyone in this room for their involvement with the Door, for whatever they asked to be undone or taken away or given to them, then we won’t need to worry about the Door killing everyone. You’ll do the job yourselves.”
Again, the chilly silence, but Kathy could tell from their expressions that they knew she was right.
“No blame, no judging, do you understand? The day after all this is fixed, you can go back to your lives and hate each other as much as you like, but tonight, and until we resolve this problem, no one here has any higher moral ground than anyone else. You need to work with me. We need to work together. I don’t care what bad you did. I want to see what good you can do.”
Nods and murmurs of approval from the crowd satisfied her, so she turned back to Kari.
“I need to know how long the Door was open and what you saw. I need to know what came through.”
“It…it was only open a few minutes. Maybe five or six minutes, tops, and probably not even that long. It took some effort, but I got it closed again. I swear, I never meant for any of this to happen.” Her pleading gaze swept the assemblage. “I swear I never wanted anyone to get hurt.”
“We know,” Kathy said in her best attempt at sounding soothing. “Tell us what you saw.”
“It was…another place. Another world, I think. Outside of our universe.”
“What makes you say that?”
Kari’s hands fidgeted in her lap. “Everything was different in that other place. The air felt different. It was so quiet, except for the hum. The ocean, that limitless ocean, was so quiet, even though it was raging. And there were no stars in that other sky, just an endless expanse of black….”
She thought a minute, then added, “Well, it was more like purple, but a shade so dark that it was just about black. There was nothing familiar about that sky. Nothing. Nothing at all.”
“Did you see anything else?” Kathy asked.
“A tower,” Kari said. “A dark gray tower with carvings on it. It had to be huge. I think it was the tower that created the humming that ate all the sound.”
“Did you see anything living?” Bill broke in. “Any people?”
Kari chuckled, but the sound stuck in her throat. “No people. Nothing like people at all. If those things I saw are the gods behind the Door, then we’ve been laying our secrets and sorrows and fears on an altar built for monsters.”
“Can you describe them?” Cole asked. The others in the room were dead quiet, hanging on Kari’s words.
“Brownish. They didn’t really have one consistent shape. I think their bones moved by themselves under their skin. And their eyes and mouths appeared and disappeared at will. They could reshape themselves as needed, to create parts like tentacles or…or wings.”
She shook her head, the tears dripping off her chin. “I closed that damned Door before they flew out. I’m sure I did. Closed it right on one of them before it could push through. I swear not a one of those things crossed through that opening. So…how did they get here?” Her tear-streaked face held an expression so broken and confused that Kathy genuinely felt sorry for her.
“Well,” Kathy said gently, “other dimensions are not beholden to the same rules of time and space that we are. Their physics and ours don’t always work the same. They could have come from under the Door, after some seal had been broken in opening it. Or you could have seen their escape out of order, chronologically. It’s hard to say for sure. But you’ve done really well here tonight. You’ve given us a lot of useful information.”
“I have?”
“Yes, you have,” Kathy said. “I’ll add what you told me to my notes, do a little comparing, and hopefully we’ll find a way to get everything back to normal, okay?”
She glanced at the little girl as she picked up the toolbox and rose. “There’s a room in back here, an office, that we can speak to each of you privately in, if you have anything at all to contribute about the Door. Even if something seems little or unimportant to you, let us know anyway. It could be that little, seemingly unimportant detail that serves as the last piece of the puzzle. As for the rest of you, I would caution that at least for the next few hours, you remain here. Make yourselves comfortable. We’ll put a pot of coffee on. Kick off your shoes. But please stay here. We’re pretty sure that these things are more likely to attack when you’re alone, or in small numbers. Bill, Sheriff Cole—a word, please?” She indicated the office and the two men rose to follow her.
Once inside the office, she set the toolbox down on the desk next to her file on the Door of Zarephath. Mrs. Pulaski of the Historical Society had been kind enough to lend both her office and her desk to the three of them as a command center. Kathy was going to need it now more than ever.
The men sat in chairs opposite the desk and Kathy sat behind it.
“Those things Kari Martin was describing—I saw one,” Cole said. Kathy and Bill gaped at him, but his gaze was fixed on the toolbox. “When I went to pick her up. I heard noises in the house and went to check it out. She was in the back of the cruiser then. And when I came out, one of those things was on the hood.”
“Did you kill it?” Kathy asked.
“Tried to,” Cole replied. “I don’t know if I killed it or hurt it or just pissed it off. The first few times I shot at it, nothing happened, but then I nailed it right in the mouth, and that got the thing all bothered. It sort of…well, it’s tough to explain, but it sort of sucked itself up into itself. It disappeared.”
“So they have weak spots, at least,” Kathy said. “Good work, Sheriff Cole.”
“Thanks,” Cole answered, looking surprised. “I was just focusing on how to get it off my car and get Ms. Martin here safely. Now, I gotta ask—what’s in the toolbox? Seeing as how you look a bit worse for wear, if you don’t mind my saying so, I figure it’s important enough. Me, I’m hoping it’s some kind of interdimensional rocket launcher.”
“Nothing as fun as that, I’m afraid,” Kathy said. “We found it in the Kilmeisters’ garage. All we know is that Grant Kilmeister was in possession of this thing, and that it comes from the other side of the Door. I’m not sure how it got here, and it looks like the only people who can tell us are dead or missing.”
Cole looked floored. “The Kilmeisters?”
“Both dead,” Bill said.
“And Ed Richter?”
“Toby Vernon says he was taken. By what or to where, we don’t know.”
Cole frowned. “This is turning out to be one hell of a shit show.”
“No kidding,” Bill agreed.
“And what’s in this box,” Kathy said, “could make things much worse. We need to keep it locked in this office until we figure out what to do with it. There’s an inscription on the box inside this toolbox, and it would be useful to know what that inscription means.”
She opened the file, stuffed with papers messily paper-clipped and stapled to each other or the folder itself. Flipping through the pages, she unclipped a packet with runic writing and handwritten notes on it, turned it around, and slid it across the desk to the men.
“What’s this?” Bill asked, leafing through the packet.
“As much of the language carved in the stones around the Door as some colleagues and I have been able to decipher. As you can see, we have most of the inscription figured out, thanks to a faint second set of characters, almost like a shadow to the prominent ones.” She handed them a close-up photo of the Door and pointed to the stonework surrounding it. “Your Door was never meant to be a wishing well. In fact, it came with a warning; the first few words are essentially Enter not, nor give your soul to them behind this Door. It’s a rough translation, of course. The word soul is probably closer to the idea of essence, and them may be a more literal translation than a pronoun. Anyway, there’s this missing piece here, and the words key and lock and what we think might be some sort of time frame.
“We aren’t sure, of course, who inscribed the stone or why—clearly, it wasn’t our god-monsters warning people away from feeding them. More likely, these inscribers built the Door or were Travelers who used it. That second set of inscriptions we discovered,” she explained, pointing to a thinner, fainter set of runes around the Door’s frame, “were actually Latin words, while the primary runes were in an alien tongue. It was like whoever inscribed them wanted to make sure that no one from either side made the mistake of opening the Door. And the aspects we can’t translate are the parts where the Latin version is too faint or worn away completely.
“Now, my guess is, if those inscribers built or used the Door and even they couldn’t remove it but only warn others about it, then we don’t stand much of a chance of getting rid of it, either. Your town may be stuck with the structure itself. However, the inscription does mention a lock and key. My theory is that however this box got here, that process triggered the unlocking of the Door. Maybe it was a letter some unthinking, curious individual wrote asking for a little keepsake or knickknack from that other dimension. Maybe it was a remnant of those ancient Travelers, unearthed somewhere and then forgotten about in an attic until the Kilmeisters came to be in possession of it. But I think its materializing in this world may have acted as a sort of key. And maybe none of it would have mattered if Kari Martin had never actually opened the Door. But she did. My hope is that we can use this thing to relock the Door. I just need to work out how.”
The men were quiet for several moments, thinking about what she had said. She thought she read a lot of mixed feelings into their expressions, and so kept quiet, letting them process. Confusion led to panic and she needed them to be clear and in control.
Finally, Cole broke the silence. “We need to ask that Toby Vernon fella everything he can remember Ed telling him about this box. Bill and I could talk to him while you work on whatever’s written on the box in there.” He gestured at the toolbox. “In the meantime, I’ll call my deputies back in and have them guard this place. Guns…well, they don’t do much other than scare the things off, far as I can tell, but at least that could buy us some time, keep those things at bay for a bit.”
“And after we talk to Toby, I think we ought to round up these other folks and give them something to do. Keep their minds occupied,” Bill said. “We don’t need any nervous breakdowns. Asking them about the Kilmeisters might be helpful. Putting them to use in some plan I hope you’re forming in that pretty little head would be better.”
Kathy winked at him. “Great ideas. I’m genuinely glad you two are on this case with me. You’ve both been invaluable.”
The men looked pleased, even if they did their best to mask it behind fidgeting and clearing their throats.
“Hey,” Bill added, “I saw that guy Ted sitting with the Latin teacher from the local high school, Rob Sherman. I can give him the heads-up that you might need his expertise, if you want.”
“I’d appreciate that,” she said.
The men got up to leave. At the door, Cole turned and asked, “Is, uh…is that thing poisonous? I mean, is this a quarantine type of situation?”
Kathy said, “At the moment, no. If there was a biological threat, you’d have all been infected long ago. It’s not dangerous like a disease, locked up like that. It’s more like…a caged tiger. If we open it, though….”
“Got it,” Cole said with a nod, and he and Bill let themselves out of the office.
Kathy sighed as she sank into the desk chair, her injuries howling and her body exhausted.
It was a valid concern that Cole had raised. What had been happening to Mrs. Kilmeister’s body before she died suggested it was more than probable that something inside that box could change people into…something else. In most cases she had consulted on, contamination of that sort hadn’t been an issue. Many of the dimensional beings she had dealt with were not capable of introducing alien pathogens except possibly when solid, and most chose not to be. Post-case scans of people and objects for trace remnants of other worlds returned negative results. Occasionally, she did find herself wondering if her very fiber, physically and mentally; her mind, heart, and lungs; her flaws and abilities; her thoughts and dreams, were impacted somehow by her exposure to elements from other dimensions. She was fully aware intellectually that every case she took on might be exposing her body, mind, and soul to a kind of supernatural radiation and that over time, it might very well change her. It was an occupational hazard, but generally not a serious consideration for the people in affected interdimensional hot spots. She didn’t often let herself think of being caught decades from now in the grip of some alien cancer or mutation, but once in a while, it crept into her thoughts. It was one reason she had never had children—one of many, given her family’s history, as well as her profession—and one reason that until Reece, she had never been much inclined to settle down. The doctors gave her a clean bill of health every year or so; sure, they told her to cut down on her drinking, but invariably, they were amazed that the amount of alcohol she admitted to consuming had done no discernible damage to her body. Both the drinking and the stunning lack of liver damage she believed to be by-products of her job, and so far, the only qualifiable or quantifiable effects. All those other worlds and other dimensions and the denizens within that she had pissed off were going to make damned sure she could never drink herself to death, at least until they could get a crack at her again. Lucky her.
She stared at the toolbox for several minutes before finally undoing the clasp and opening the lid. The blue glow was fainter, as if the thing inside the wooden box was sleeping. She reached in and very carefully, took the wooden box out and placed it on the desk. She frowned. There was a symbol carved on the lid that she couldn’t believe she hadn’t noticed back in the garage. It was crudely carved, an oversimplified pictogram, really, but it looked very much like the Door in the woods. Had that carving been there before? Or were the contents of the box so malleable as to be remaking themselves into what she needed them to be? Was that it? Did the Kilmeisters open the box expecting a monster, and so they found one?
Kathy shivered. It was the first artifact she had dealt with that genuinely scared her.
She turned the box over, copied the inscription along the bottom onto a piece of paper, and then put the box back inside the toolbox, closing the lid and fastening the clasps.
Then she got to work.