26

There was nearly nothing left.

A residue. There was only the Voice, and yet I stayed away, wanting what little that was left, and also because even then with His strength in me I was afraid.

But I came at last. The camera around my neck, running through the dark as a dog might run. I flung myself over the gate, and the iron I carried rang against it, just once. The long cold iron, the crowbar.

You won’t have to wait, I breathed. Not much longer.

And the ecstasy blossomed in me, His Voice. The long, powerful Yes breathed into me and through me.

I was cold. This was the night everything would change. I would have to think clearly, even though so close to the Voice I was trembling, and my breath came and went out of me in bursts.

Headlights. So suddenly, puncturing the dark.

A black silhouette crossed before the headlights, far off, and a distant gate clanked open. I huddled. Small, I thought.

Small and invisible.

A car’s engine, and the scent of exhaust, just barely. The headlights grew, and then they stopped, and a terrible thing happened, something that slammed me hard into the dark grass.

Be still, breathed the Voice. And watch him. This man—how little he sees.

A beam of light played over the stone monuments. The ugly glare bent and straightened as it stroked the stony shapes.

Then the light fell, and formed an oblong pool. And the pool shifted along the ground, coming closer. The wobble of light was approaching, and there was nothing I could do.

You see, said the Voice. You see how they are? That is the world of the living. That is the world you and I will escape. Look at how unseeing he is. Unless the light finds something, he will spy nothing but black.

The light made a sharp hole in the dark, matched by a tear-shape of light on the ground. The footsteps crackled along the sidewalk, and the man—because it was a man, a human, unseeing—passed within an arm’s length of where I had become shadow.

The man stopped. The light swung far, and then it swung very close, so bright that it seemed to make a sound. The man’s breathing was loud.

Loud, and slow. The man smelled of cigarette smoke. And I surprised myself by feeling something I would never have anticipated.

This man, this unknown nightwatchman, this ordinary human, could save me. Even now. If I reached out my hand, or if I said something. Even a whisper. It would only take a whisper.

Don’t betray me, whispered the Voice. It was more than a whisper. It was a current, and it swept me before it like the briefest scum.

We belong together.

Stay still.

The flashlight traveled through the dark, and the steps receded. The man’s pace, and the slow swing of the pool of light from side to side, spoke of boredom. The man had no special reason to suspect that I was here. He made his way back to the headlights, and then there was only the dark.

There, said the Voice. You see how he is. A living man, an ordinary human.

He is not like us.

A thought flickered in me: I’m human, too.

The Voice swept me. Even when you were a boy I called to you. Even then I had faith in you. And at last you have come to me. How I love you, Len.

You have never forsaken me.

I wept. I was not worthy of His faith in me.

Come to me, Len. Don’t hesitate another moment. You have made me wait too long.

But still I did not move. I wanted to be what I was, what I had been, for a few more heartbeats, even as I begged Him to forgive me. I was not worthy of such love.

Come.

I trembled.

Come now.

The camera was heavy at my chest. The crowbar was black ice. My fingers could not grip it.

Come, beloved.

I crawled through the darkness to where He was. To the iron fence that held Him, and the iron gate. I did not know why I wept. I shivered, and, gasping, I worked the heavy, cold crowbar into the gate, and it rang against the black spears. I wasn’t strong enough. No one was strong enough.

And then I was.

The gate opened, but caught, and I used all his strength, and then something else, strength that was not mine. With a noise like a bell, the gate opened, and I stumbled inside.

Come quickly.

There was a door, a simple, metal door. There was a keyhole. It was nearly too dark to see, but I was not using my own eyes, now. I had the power of the finest lens, a power no human could have.

Quickly.

I battered the metal door. It was bright where the iron splintered the coat of paint and rust. I heard my body panting, even growling, with the effort. The door would not give.

The iron punctured it, and then punctured it again. The door buckled, and the crowbar, knowing exactly what to do, worked its teeth into the bend in the door, and the broken thing opened easily.

Don’t wait. Hurry.

Even now, at this last moment, I remembered enough to hesitate. Something held me.

Hurry.

It was cold. The floor was slippery with algae and water. I splashed, fumbling; and found the great bronze cold Secret. I fell over it, and wept. I was here.

At last I was here.

We will not be mere man. Men are nothing. We will be something supreme over death.

The iron, the bronze casket, the air were all cold, but I did not shiver. I found the smallest crack, where the Secret was sealed. I leaned against it, panting.

It was bolted.

You can do it. You have my strength in you. They are merest slugs of steel, not even threaded. Why are you hesitating?

The iron did its work. A black split appeared in the casket. A bolt lifted itself out of its socket, and chimed on the floor. Another joined it. These were not human arms. This was not human strength.

Over death.

Hurry.

Another bolt. Until all around the bronze hull there were empty holes where bolts had worked free. I collapsed against the wall. My arms were numb.

Now.

The iron clattered where I dropped it. I put both hands against the top half of the husk, and pushed. It did not move. I heaved against it, groaning.

It did not move. I pushed from all sides, straining. I slipped, and found new footing, but the lid did not move.

Until at last it squeaked. Just that—a squeal of heavy metal shifting just slightly. Another push, and the lid shifted completely, with a musical, grinding sound.

At last.

I trembled.

Don’t be afraid.

The camera clicked. This was a good thing—to keep this forever.

You know what to do now.

I let the camera fall to the extent of its loop around my neck. But I did not hesitate. I was empty, now. There was nothing left.

I bent over the casket, and leaned down into the dark Secret. And it was not a secret anymore. I saw what had called me all those years. All those boyhood years, and into manhood.

Kiss me.

I kissed the lipless mouth, and reached around the damp body to embrace it. And something breathed from the body into me, and ate through what was left of me, a fire consuming spiderwebs.

And I would never die.