Hell on earth, Max thought as he moved among the Pitch. Here along the edge of town he was seeing the infernal as fact. Men dressed for the outdoors wielded instruments of warfare and the hunt. He watched a man in a motorcycle helmet club a woman in her front-yard nativity scene while blood-speckled wise men looked on. He didn’t turn to see what the man was doing with the body. He walked. Face forward. Negotiating a path through the mob. The screams. Chaos. Everything happening too fast. He couldn’t process it. Didn’t want to. He drifted like a specter on a battlefield. More surreal than any LSD or mushroom trip he took in his L.A. magical mystery days. Pure terror powered him. His heart boomed. Alive, in revolt, the organ wanted to escape the cage of his chest. If Max could have spoken a word, he would have said he was dying.
He walked instead.
Placed foot in front of foot. He had no choice and he didn’t quite know why. Only he had to go to the motel. He had to do something there. He couldn’t remember what. But he knew it would be awful. They were killing people for no reason. Flames tongued skyward. No, they had reasons. The windmills are burning, Max thought. My mind is on fire. Fear chokes me. It was the old Frankenstein movie finale in reverse. The monsters had the torches and pitchforks, and they were destroying the village.
Though the villagers weren’t going down without a fight.
Shotgun blasts ripped the night.
Trucks and cars roared down the highway, scattering the marauders.
It was only a matter of time before those vehicles had to stop. Snowbound, forced to turn back on a midnight road, or surrender up their passengers to wind-whipped fields strangled with ice. The hunched figures were waiting for them.
He saw the ambulance drive up and keep pace with him.
No siren blared.
The cherry light swirled red loops around him.
He did not turn to look at the driver.
Eyes on him, he felt their scalpel chill.
The ambulance picked up speed. Passed. The tires threw a fan- tail of gray slush across his path. Through the rear windows, a faceless face peered back.
Horrid, mummified. Jolly.
Bound to a stretcher, with a bag of ebony blood swaying from a hook above, the Elder wagged its fingers at him. The voice ice- picked his brain.
The church.
The Steeple.
All the people ...
Max walked on to the motel.