Shifting Read online

  Vance leaned his head back against the headrest, rolled up his eyes and sighed hugely. “Okay, okay, I give the hell up. I’m giving you five minutes.”

  We got out of the Durango and headed into the woods.

  We found nothing right away, and he demanded to see the map. I showed him the unconfirmed green line that ran down to the lakeshore.

  “So where is it?” he asked.

  “Right here, as close as I can tell.”

  “What?” he choked, stopping dead. He looked around as if expecting to see a shimmering haze nearby.

  “You can’t see the line. At least I don’t think you can. Don’t worry, we’ll be okay, just keep going.”

  “Look the whole point of those lines is to avoid them,” he said in exasperation. “What is the bloody point of mapping these lines if we go messing with them?”

  I sighed. I checked the map again and this time I had to use one of the flashlights we had brought from the truck. It was getting dark. “See, here’s the line, we won’t have to cross it, and we are on a parallel path.”

  “It’s a green line, man,” he complained. “Don’t you get it? Green means the old man wasn’t sure if it’s really there, or where it is, or what the hell direction it goes. It’s a guess and I’m not betting my balls on a guess!”

  “Well, what do you want to do?”

  “I’m heading back to the road, getting in the truck and I’m leaving your butt out here if you don’t come with me.”

  I nodded. “All right.”

  “That’s it then?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I need to go closer and see if I can figure anything out about this line. That’s the whole point of my scouting job anyway. This is an opportunity to do some of that scouting.”

  Vance looked at me in dead silence for a few long seconds. “You crazy bastard, you are as bad as the Preacher himself. What’s the point of putting down warning lines if you are going to go play around with them?”

  “Someone has to figure this all out or we are all dead in the long run, Vance.”

  “You said that already,” he looked troubled. “Okay, so we split up. Do you have a gun at least?”

  I nodded.

  His eyes slid to the bulge in my coat pocket. “Good, good.”

  “I’ll see you at the center in an hour.”

  “Sure thing,” he said in an odd voice. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking.

  And we split up. The world seemed much darker after his flashlight vanished into the trees.

  Nine

  I walked pretty far downhill and had to be getting dammed close to the lakeshore. I couldn’t hear the water yet, but I could smell the lake and the cold, fresh breeze out there. Lake Monroe was big, the biggest body of water in Indiana. It covered more than ten thousand acres and like all big bodies of water it had its own ambience.

  But there was something else out here with me besides the lake. I could feel it. Maybe I had been feeling these fissures to god-knew-where all along. Usually, when I had that funny feeling one of the changelings showed up. Maybe all along it had been because I was near their home turf. These thoughts opened up new doors in my mind, but I wasn’t sure where any of it led. I was excited, however, at the very idea of understanding the cataclysm that had stricken my world. How do you deal with events you really didn’t understand? It had been a terrifying ordeal for all of us who had managed to survive this long.

  I was drawn out of my thoughts by a sudden wrongness. I halted and peered into the night off to my left, to the west. I felt I was becoming more sensitive to it, and whatever it was, it was too close for comfort. I took out the map and held the flashlight pinned under my arm while I made a tiny fractional change to the Preacher’s green line on the map, extending it closer to the lakeshore than it originally had been. I wished I had one of those geomapping gizmos that used satellites to pinpoint your position. Of course, it wouldn’t have worked.

  A light mist was rising up from the lake as I scrutinized the map, and my flashlight grew dimmer, as if the batteries were dying. It wasn’t the mist affecting the flashlight I knew, or the batteries. I had put fresh ones in it before leaving home. Looking at the yellowing light of the dying bulb, I began to sweat. The sensation that something was near grew stronger. I snapped the light off, drew my saber and waited in the dark, listening.

  My eyes adjusted to the light of the half-moon that shot silver threads down through the leafless trees. The forest was a gloomy dark purple with overlapping black shapes.

  Slowly, I became aware of a deep purple glow in the direction of the shift-line. At first, I thought it was just an effect of the moonlight and the trees. But it persisted, and after a time, it moved. Obeying a feeling I didn’t completely understand, I followed the movement. It headed north toward the lakeshore. I matched it, walking slowly and trying not to stumble in the dark as I took a parallel path.

  At times, the mist-like glow died down, at others it brightened. Perhaps this was the effect of intervening tree trunks. At the points where it brightened, it took on the shape of a human figure, I was certain of it. I kept shadowing it, certain that it was as aware of me as I was of it. Whatever it was, unlike the changelings I had met, it showed no signs of launching an attack. Was it hoping I would come closer? Was this dream-like experience what happened to everyone before they turned into a wild monster?

  After a while we came into sight of the lakeshore. The figure halted and I halted too. I had hoped it would come out into the open on the shore and let me have a look at it. Apparently, it had no such plans.

  I felt scrutiny, and I turned to face the thing that stood perhaps fifty yards to the west. The breeze coming in off the lake was cold and fresh and felt good. I felt an urge to speak to it, but didn’t.

  “You trouble me, shadow,” came a voice from the forest. It was a woman’s voice, soft yet clear, despite the distance between us.

  “Do you want me to leave?” I asked. I was startled at the idea. All the shifted things I had ever encountered only wanted to attack and destroy, not chat and enjoy the solitude of the woods.

  “Would it matter?”

  “No,” I admitted. It was all I could do to keep my emotions from coming up in my voice. This was the first conversation I’d ever heard of being struck up with a changeling, which she so obviously was.

  “You don’t approach me. Aren’t you curious?”

  “Very much so.”

  “Are you afraid then?”

  I thought about that for a second before saying, “I am patient.”

  She paused a second, glimmering. I’d seen some of the changelings glow a bit in the dark before, but usually everyone was trying to put as much light as possible on them when they showed up. I was drawn to her in that moment. I really wanted to see what my eyes were straining toward in the somber night. I kept my feet rooted, however. All I could make out was a vague figure, outlined in a lavender-blue haze.

  “Do you know the one who slew your father?”

  My jaw tensed. Was the thing taunting me? I decided to taunt it in return. “Yes, the Captain blew its jack-o-lantern head off.”

  “And do you wish to know of the one that slew your mother?”

  I sucked in a gulp of cold air.

  “I know the one who did it,” she said.

  She almost had me then. I lifted my right boot and placed it down one step closer to her. Then with a great effort of will, I stopped.

  “Was it you?” I hissed. I felt a rage come over me, but I held myself in check.

  “Come to me, and you will know the truth.”

  My feet wanted to move, but I held them firmly. I reached into my pocket and groped for the pistol the Captain had given me.

  “Why don’t you come out on the shore so I can get a better look at you?” I asked, angry now. I pulled the .45 out and thumbed off the safety. I doubted I could thread a slug through all the trees, but then again, maybe it was worth a try.

  “The time is not right for y
ou to walk the waters of the lake,” the apparition replied. Perhaps suspecting my murderous thoughts, she turned back into the woods and began that slow processional walk again along same the path we had taken down to the lakeshore. I fell into step again, shadowing her. The gun was in my hand, but I restrained myself. We needed information more than we needed vengeance.

  “You are indeed a patient one, my shadow,” she said after a few dozen more steps. “Patience is one of the rarest of virtues.”

  I said nothing and concentrated on not tripping over the roots and undergrowth. My eyes had grown accustomed enough to pick out obvious obstacles. It seemed I could see in the gloom where before I could not. My heart quickened in my chest, could it be she had changed my vision somehow? Was I even now shifting into something? Was this how it happened? Imperceptible changes at first, monstrosity to inevitably follow? I looked up at the moon and it still seemed to shine with the same silver-white light. I took a deep breath and calmed myself.

  When I looked back for the figure, it was gone. I stopped dead and scanned the forest quietly.

  “Changeling? Are you there?”

  The breeze stiffened up from the lake and made the highest branches waver and rattle like black fingers beseeching the skies, but there came no answer, no hint of any presence. I had lost her. The natural thing to do was to walk to the spot where she had been, to look about for her, but I held back the urge. Perhaps this was another trick.

  I retraced my steps to the lakeshore, and then quietly moved along it to the spot where I thought she might have stood. There, I found a loose pile of stones. My heart accelerated when I noticed that one of the stones was glowing. I reached down and touched it. There was an impression in the stone, like that of a three-pointed hoof.

  I gazed at the faintly glimmering stone for a few moments, uncertain. It had a light blue haze about it. The odd thing was that if you looked at it directly, you couldn’t really see anything unusual. Only if you focused your eyes on something else to one side of it did you notice the soft glow.

  I took the imprinted stone. It was about as big as my palm. I slid it into my pocket where it felt faintly warm.

  Using the rest of the stones, I formed a small pile to mark the spot. When I had finished, I turned and followed the lakeshore eastwards toward Redmoor.

  I thought about the thing I’d met in the woods tonight and how in days gone by it would have been described as a succubus, or a ghost, or a siren, or perhaps even a mermaid if found at sea. I wondered about men who’d walked lonely spots like this one in centuries past and encountered such strange things, things I myself would have called a myth or a legend just a few months earlier. It seemed clear to me now that all of those ancient stories and legends were true and full accountings. I felt pity for all those who had been ridiculed and disbelieved throughout time.

  Occasionally, my hand strayed to my pocket and I touched the flat, rounded, rough stone. It was still slightly warm.

  Ten

  The old medical center looked more like a makeshift internment camp than a fortress, and it was only about a quarter of the way finished at that. The Redmoor Medical Center itself had never been much to look at. It was built in the sixties with that cheap cinderblock construction they were so fond of back then. The roof was nearly flat and covered with white gravel and the pinkish-brown trim needed a paintjob. The trees in the parking lot had outgrown their small squares of earth long ago and now their roots lifted up large sections of asphalt like tentacles heaving beneath a frozen black sea. I supposed the place had all looked cool decades ago, but now it was just plain ugly. But for all that, the walls were thick and strong and the few windows it had were high and small and full of reinforcing wire. It was big and probably the sturdiest structure in town, making it a good choice for defensive purposes.

  I noted as I walked through the abandoned parking lot that they were planning to make the parking lot and the grassy areas in front of the center all part of the compound. They had made it about a third of the way around with chain link fencing. The fence had been strapped to the line of lampposts and trees that bordered Hagen Street. Big spools of barbed wire lay about the place, I’m sure they planned to decorate the top of the chain links with a generous spiral of wire.

  I made it about half-way across the parking lot before a sentry challenged me. It was Erik Foti, he had been sitting in a police cruiser with a shotgun. He wasn’t a real cop, but I think he liked being in the cruiser.

  “Hold it!” he shouted, seeing me and scrambling to yank his ear buds off. I wondered if he would go bats when the last cassette player in town died on him. All the digital music players had already died, of course, but the cassettes still worked, I guess because they were simpler. I’d spent years in school with Erik and he’d never been without portable sound of some kind. He had the cruiser door open and his shotgun out before he realized who I was.

  “Ah, hello Gannon,” he said relaxing somewhat. He still held his shotgun to his chest, watching me. Good boy, I thought, no wonder you lasted this long.

  “Hello Erik, you got guard duty eh?”

  Erik made a face. “Yeah. Go on in, they are expecting you.”

  I made my way into the large waiting room, which was full of neglected potted ficus plants, torn up magazines and vinyl furniture. The fish in the aquarium were all dead but for one feisty-looking tiger barb. I was sorry to see the fish go. I had spent a lot of hours poking at that glass when I was a kid.

  There were three different nurses stations, one for the dentist, one for the doctor and one for the optometrist. The dentist and the doctor were dead, so I headed for the optometrist’s office. I found from Carlene Mitts, who was playing receptionist, that the optometrist was dead as well, and our pharmacist Beatrice Wilton had taken over the office. Lots of people were in the center and each family was bedding down in a different examination room. It was only about 10 o’clock but most people were quiet and trying to sleep on sleeping bags and cots.

  As I walked around the offices, it felt good to see so many people. I hadn’t seen more than a handful of people in one place in a long time. It felt right to form a community like this. I suppose it’s only natural for humans to do so. I hoped with all my heart it wasn’t a big mistake.

  “Gannon!” said Vance, coming out of a door marked private. “You made it, buddy.”

  “So you finally got the Durango to start, huh?”

  “Yep,” said Vance, still talking in a breezy way, but looking a bit guilty. We both knew he’d run out on me back there. “I bet Doc Wilton is going to want to talk to you.”

  “Is she in there?” I asked him, indicating the private room with a nod.

  “Yeah, that’s her office and kind of a conference area. Guess all the medical types used to share it—back when we had them. Hey, listen, before you go in, did you find anything out there?”

  I nodded.

  Vance lit up, but looked apprehensive. “Anything really freaky?”

  “Yeah, something new.”

  “Oooo,” said Vance, licking his lips. “You’re in once piece though, right? Cool, cool.”

  He lowered his voice to a harsh whisper and scratched at his neck nervously, “Sorry man, to run out on you I mean—but you’ve got the real balls here. I mean it, man, I’m just not like you.”

  I nodded without feeling. Vance often complimented people after pulling a fast one. It was pretty effective. Still, I couldn’t really blame anyone for not wanting to wander into a known area that made changelings.

  “Where’s Monika?”

  “Sharon Hatchell is giving her the whole psych-trauma thing she likes to give everyone after something goes bad. You know.”

  I nodded. I knew. Mrs. Hatchell was our town counselor. She had been the counselor at the local school. She was one of those types that volunteered for every community service job the town had and when she ran out of those, she made up some more of them. I’d always thought she was a bit spooky herself, but her heart was in
the right place.

  “Talk to the Doc and I’ll catch you later,” said Vance, slipping by me. I had an unpleasant thought that he was off to make some quick time with Monika. I tried to shake off the idea, but I couldn’t.

  I had never needed glasses or much teeth drilling, but my parents had dragged me in here at least twice a year just in case. In all that time, I’d never been into the back offices. I pushed past the door marked private and walked inside.

  * * *

  “Gannon! Excellent of you to come, take a seat,” said Doc Wilton when she recognized me. She was surrounded by a mass of graph paper and a ruler and a lot of pencils and erasers. All of that old stuff office people used to work with before computers.

  “Sure thing, Doc,” I said walking in and sitting down.

  Doc Wilton was a squat woman with a gut that ballooned out over her pants. Her hair was cut short, the way a lot of older professional women like to style it, but maybe a bit shorter even than that. She had a quick laugh and an even quicker smile. I’d always liked her.

  “So, what’s the word up there from the Reverend?”

  I looked over the papers she was working on. There were colorful lines on them and landmarks. “Working on new maps? I’ve got some information in that area.”

  That got her attention. She listened to my story about what the Reverend had said and about the changeling I’d found and talked to. That, of course, is what interested her the most.

  “So you are sure you heard the voice? It wasn’t just in your head, but in your ears?”

  “I’m pretty sure about that.”

  “And you think she was trying to get you to come to her, to where she walked?”

  “It seemed like that is what she wanted.”

  She nodded and sat back. She knitted her knuckles together over her beach-ball stomach and concentrated. “Hmm. What worries me the most is that she knew things about us, like about your parents. That means one of two things, either she has been watching us from the woods, or she has walked among us.”