They ran until they couldn’t run anymore. Elliot heaved, bending over, staring at the dirt. Evajean stopped behind him and sat down. “Jesus,” she said.
Elliot coughed. He turned and looked at her. He started to say something, but couldn’t. That thing, the odd mass the children carried, was still visible, a ghost before his eyes. Shaking that image proved impossible and it only rolled closer, the children carrying it laughing as they giggled. He felt sick–and terrified to a level beyond anything they’d encountered so far. He retched again, holding his head near his knees.
“Is that what happened to all of them?” Evajean said. Hope had caught up them and was now in her lap.
Elliot shook his head. He didn’t understand.
“The children,” she said. “Is that what they all became?”
Elliot sat down next to her. His head was clearing. “Could be.”
“Jesus,” she said. “You think it gets worse now? On the other side of the barrier? You think the barrier keeps things like that in?”
Elliot shrugged, and remember the glasses in his pocket. He pulled them out and, holding them up to his face, stared through.
“What’s that?” Evajean said.
“What I found inside, in the basement. Is it what you sent me down there for?”
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“No,” Elliot said. “No, that’s unfair. It’s not your fault. Goddamn, how could anyone have known that thing was in there?”
“What thing?”
Elliot realized she didn’t know. She’d only seen the children as he came up the stairs and when they both ran out the back of the house.
“It was in the basement. I can’t really describe it, Evajean, but it was like the master of those kids. They were its servants, helping it.”
Evajean blinked, her face pale. “What was it? Was it another of those creatures that killed Melvin?”
“No.”
“What was it?”
Elliot shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said. “It was terrible. This thing, coming at me, moving across the floor– But I don’t know how it was moving, because it didn’t seem to have any arms or legs or– or features, even.”
“But you got out,” Evajean said. “I’m so sorry for sending you down there.”
“I found these,” Elliot said and held up the glasses.
Evajean took them and looked through the lenses. “It’s just blurry,” she said. She put them down. “They’ll have a use later, though, I know it.”
“So we find a car,” Elliot said, “and we drive to Salt Lake City. We get there and track down this museum or whatever it is and we somehow use these things.”
“Yeah,” Evajean said.
“And we do this because Melvin read in that book that we’re supposed to, that we have to stop Moroni from doing something. Taking over the world, I suppose.”
“The Mad King.”
“What?”
“That’s what Melvin called him. Moroni. He called him the Mad King.”
Elliot continued. “And we do all this not just because Melvin read it to us in that book but because we both know–somehow know–that it’s what we have to do. Everything’s–”
“For a purpose,” Evajean said. “Like finding the waypoints.”
Elliot nodded. “But how’d we get this purpose? Who gave it to us?”
“I don’t know,” Evajean said.
“Honestly, I’d be inclined to think it was all shit, brought on by stress from what we’ve been through. Not all of it, of course. Stress wouldn’t explain the crazies or the creatures or what I saw in that house. I couldn’t possibly explain all that. But it’d be awfully nice to think the rest–this quest, this purpose–was only our brains trying to make sense of things, like a mass delusion. Except I can’t, because of what–”
“Because of what happened in Nahom,” Evajean finished. “Because you saw me–” She stopped.
“Because of that,” Elliot said.
“I think what I really want,” Evajean said, “is to know. Before this ends, I want to know all of it. Whatever chose us owes us that, at least.”
Elliot stood up and wiped his palms off on his pants. “Then let’s go find the answers. At least now we know where we’re going and there doesn’t look to be anything in our way.”
Evajean pushed herself to her feet. “Right,” she said. “Let’s go.”
They walked in a direction they thought would take them to the road. Hope chased along behind.
