There were other signs, too, that he did his best to keep at bay. The ground under his feet seemed to brighten and shift when he looked at it, as though it was trying to flow towards the middle of the crossroads.
And there was a brightness in the air; gossamer shapes moving across his field of vision, shedding beads of light. There was more here than an invocation, he knew; far more. Reality was soft here, and getting softer. Things meeting, intersecting, trying-perhaps-to flow together.
If so, he had no doubt as to who was masterminding the affair. It was the man he'd just shot, who now, with consummate indifference, had actually turned his back on Harry and was studying the departing crowd.
Harry turned his gaze on Tesla, who was lying quite still. Don't be dead, he said to himself, and almost closing his eyes completely to fend off the blandishments of sky and street he stumbled on towards her.
The avatars were here. Owen knew it. He could feel their eyes upon him, and it was a feeling like no other he knew. Like being spied on by God. Terrible and wonderful at the same time.
He wasn't the only one feeling such confusions, he knew. Though the crowd scattering around him did not possess the knowledge he possessed, they were all of themeven the dullest and the dumbest-sensing something untoward. The shot that had wounded him had wounded them too, in a different fashion: loosed a flood of adrenaline rather than blood, thus alerting their staled senses to signs they would have otherwise missed. He could see the recognition in their faces, wide with awe and terror; he could read it off their trembling lips. It wasn't the way he'd intended things, but he didn't care. Let them gape, he thought. Let them pray. Let them tremble. They'd have to do a lot more of that before this Day of Days was done.
He gave up on looking for the avatars-as long as they were there, what did it matter what shape they'd taken?-and went down on his haunches to touch the ground. Though there was blood running into his right eye, he could see better than he'd seen in his long life. The ground was turning to ether below him, the medallion buried far below him blazing in its bed. He pressed his hand against the ground, and let out a low moan of pleasure as he felt his fingers slip and slide down into the warm asphalt, towards the cross. There were phenomena on every side. Voices speaking out of the ether (revenants, he thought; and why not? The more the merrier), vague, wispy forms riding on the air to left and right of him (too perfect for the past, surely; perhaps the future, coming to find the moment when it ceased to matter), agitations in the ground and sky (he would paint the heavens with stone,' when he remade the world, and make the earth sprout lightning). So much happening, and all because of the object that lay inches from his fingers, the cross that had accrued the power to change the world, buried here at the crossroads.
"You're beautiful," he murmured to it, the way he might have cooed to a pretty boy. "So, so beautiful."
His fingers were almost there. Another foot and a half, no more Erwin had followed Tesla as far as the edge of the crowd, but then-seeing the chaos in front of him-had held back. It was no use trying to speak to her in the midst of such tumult, he'd realized. Better to wait.
Dolan had not been so reluctant. Ever eager for fun, he'd slipped through the barricade and out across the melting ground. He'd been inches from Dorothy Bullard when her blouse tore (cause for much hilarity), and had actually stood in the path of the bullet that had struck Buddenbaum, amused to see it pass straight through him.
Suddenly, the clowning had ceased. From his place on the sidewalk, Erwin saw Dolan's expression becoming troubled. He turned to Nordhoff, who was bending over the fallen Tesla, and let out a moaning word,
"Whaaat-?"
Nordhoff didn't reply. He was staring down at the wounded man, who was plunging his hand into too solid ground. And as he stared, his face grew longer, as though he was about to be transformed into a dog or a camel. His nose lengthened, his cheeks puffed up, his eyes were sucked from his sockets. "Oohhh Heilli.. Dolan moaned, and turning on his heel started back towards the sidewalk. It wasn't safe terrain. Though Erwin was a good deal farther from the source of this phenomenon, he too felt something plucking at his selfinvented flesh. The pockets of his coat were torn off, and a number of the keepsakes carried away towards the epicenter; his fingers were growing longer; his face, he was sure, the same.
Dolan was in even worse condition. Though he was further from the hub than Nordhoff, Dickerson and the rest, the claim of whatever force had been unleashed there was irresistible. He dropped to his knees and dug his nails into the ground, hollering at Erwin for help as he did so, but his matter had no purchase on the asphalt, and he was dragged back towards the hub, his body growing softer and longer, until he began to resemble a stream of melting flesh, coursing across the street.
Erwin covered his ears to shut out the din of his shrieks, and retreated back down the rapidly emptying street. It was hard going. The power at the hub of the crossroads was growing apace, and with every step he took it threatened to overwhelm him and drag him to his destruction. But he resisted its claim with all his will, and after twenty yards he began to outpace it. After thirty, its hold on him was dwindling rapidly. After forty, he felt sufficiently confident to slow a little and look for Dolan. He'd gone. So had Nordhoff, so had Dickerson, so had they all; all melted and run away into the ground.
The sound of sirens drew his gaze off down the street. Jed Gilholly was getting out of his car, along with two of his officers, Cliff Campbell and Floyd Weeks, neither of whom looked very happy with their lot.
Erwin didn't wait to see what the trio made of the forces awaiting them at the crossroads-or indeed what those forces made of them-but instead slipped away while the going was good. He had believed in the law once; valued it, served it, and trusted its power to regulate the world. But those certainties belonged to another life and, like that life, had slipped away.
When Telsa opened her eyes, d'Amour was already hauling her to her feet.
"We've got more problems," he said, nodding down the street.
She started to follow his direction, but her gaze was distracted by the strange sights surrounding them. The band members, crawling away on all fours like beaten animals. The remnants of the crowd, many of them sobbing uncontrollably, others praying the same way, standing or kneeling in a litter of forsaken belongings: purses, hot dogs, baby carriages. And beyond all this, the police, approaching the crossroads with leveled guns.
"Stand still!" one of them yelled. "All of you, stand still!"
"We'd better do it," Tesla said, glancing back towards Buddenbaum. He had both hands in the ground, up to his elbows, and he was working them in and out, in and out, with a motion she could not help but think of as sexual; easing open this hole in the solid world. The air around them all was as hazy as ever, and its contents as incomprehensible.
"What the fuck is he doing?" D'Amour murmured to her. "He's after the Art," Tesla said.
"You two, shaddup!" the lead officer yelled at them. Then, to Buddenbaum, "You! Get up! I want to see your hands!"
Buddenbaum showed no sign of even hearing the order, much less obeying it. The order came a second time, with little variation. Again, it was ignored.
"I'm going to count to three-" Jed warned.
"Go on," Tesla muttered. "Shoot the fucker." "One-"
Jed continued his steady advance as he counted, his officers keeping place with him.
"Two-"
"Hey Jed?" Floyd Weeks said.
"Shaddup."
"I don't feel so good."