"That's right," she said.
"And is this person who wants you Fletcher?" Tesla said, trying-and once again failing-to fix her eyes on the shadows.
"It doesn't matter what his name is," Phoebe said.
"It matters to me," Tesia replied. "Maybe you can ask him. Would you do that for me?" Phoebe looked back towards the darkness. She seemed to have no difficulty focusing upon it.
"She wants to know who you are," she said.
"Is he Fletcher?" Tesla said.
"Are you-?" Phoebe didn't finish the question, but listened, head slightly cocked.
There was silence, but for the crackle and spit of the fire. Tesia glanced back down at the hearth. There were pools of melted wax or fat around the branches, and in the grate itself a stone or "If that's what you want," Phoebe said to the darkness.
Tesia looked back at her. She was reaching up to unbutton her blouse.
"What are you doing?" Tesla said.
"He wants to see me," Phoebe said simply.
Tesla crossed to her and pulled her hands from her blouse.
"No he doesn't."
"Yes he does," Phoebe said fiercely, her hands going back to her buttons. "He says... he says-"
"What's he saying?"
"He says... we shouldfuckfor the millennium."
Tesla had heard the phrase before. Spoken once, and dreamed a thousand times.
Now, at the sound of it, the floor seemed to pitch beneath her, as if to tip her into the darkness at the other end of the room.
It was five years since she'd first heard the words spoken; five years in which she had many times thanked God their speaker was dead. Her gratitude, it seemed, had been premature.
"Kissoon she murmured, and leaving her lips the syllables took on a life of their own. Kissss-sssoooon. Kiiisssssoonn. Shimmying around her.
She'd met him in countless nightmares-run from him, succumbed to him, been judged, murdered, raped, and eaten by him-but she'd always woken from those ordeals, even the most terrible, with the comfort that one day the memories of him could recede, and she'd be free.
Not so. Oh Lord in Heaven, not so.
Here he was, come again.
She reached down to her belt, pulled out her gun, and pointed it at the darkness.
It isn't Fletcher then-Raul murmured. He sounded close to tears.
"No."
You think it's Kissoon.
"I know it's Kissoon," she said, leveling the gun.
Suppose you're wrong.
"I'm not," she said, and fired, once, twice, three times. The din careened around the room, coming back an instant later, bruisingly loud. But there was no gratifying cry from the darkness; no spillage of blood, no death-rattle.
The only effect the shots seemed to have was upon Phoebe, who began to sob pitifully.
"What am I doing?" she gasped, and reeled away from Tesla's side, as if making for the door.
Testa glanced after her in time to see Phoebe coming back with her arms outstretched. She struck the gun from Tesia's fist with one hand and caught hold of her neck with the other. Tesla's breath was summarily stopped. She reached up to wrench Phoebe's hand away but before she could do so the woman's sobs-which had gone on unabated through the assault-stopped dead. "Go to him," she said, her voice monotonal. "Go to him and tell him you're sorry."
She started to push Tesla back towards the far end of the room, towards the darkness and whatever form of Kissoon it ntained. Tesla kicked and flailed but Phoebe's weight, eled by her possessor's will, was not easily resisted.
"Phoebe! Listen to me!" Tesla yelled. "He's going to kill us both!"
"No-"
"You can fight him, I know what it feels like, having him sitting on your head"-this was no lie. Kissoon had worked this same trick on Tesla in the Loop: pressed on the top of her head to subdue and control her-"but you can fight it, Phoebe, you can fight it."
The face in front of her showed no flicker of comprehension. The tears just continued to fall. Tesia reached down to her belt. The Florida gun was there. If Phoebe wouldn't listen to reason, maybe she'd respond to the business end of a.45.
As she grabbed the butt however, Phoebe let her go. Tesla drew a grateful breath, bending over as she did so, and as her gaze met the floor she saw a dark, serpentine form wiggle into view from behind her. She pulled her second gun from her belt, and was stepping out of the Lix's way to fire when she sensed that the darkness at her side seemed to be unfolding; she heard it shifting, and felt the air around her disturbed by its motion.
She looked down at the ground again. The Lix at her feet had been joined by several of its siblings; piffling little horrors, by comparison with some she'd seen, the biggest eighteen inches long or so, the smallest as fine as hair. But they kept coming, and coming, some of them no longer than a finger, as though one of their nests had been overturned at her feet. None of them seemed much interested in doing her hann. they squirmed off across the debris-strewn floor towards the last of the fire.
The only threat lay in the person of their maker, in whose direction Tesla now turned her gaze. This time, though her eyes remained incapable of fixing upon him, she caught a glimpse. He was sitting on a chair, it seemed, but the chair was hovering three or four feet off the ground. And though she could not look directly at him, he was not so restricted. She felt his gaze. It pricked her neck. It made her rattle.
"It'll pass he said, and with those words any last hope that she'd made a mistake, and that this was not Kissoon, vanished.
"What'll pass?" she said, fighting hard to look at him. Doubtless he had good reason to prevent her laying eyes on him, which was all the more reason to defy the edict. If she could just distract him for a few moments, perhaps he'd drop his guard long enough for her to get one good look at him. "What'll pass?" she asked him again.
"The shock."
"Why should I be shocked?"
"Because you thought I was dead and gone." "Why would I think that?"
"Don't try this."
"Try what?"
"This stupid game you're playing."
"What game?"
"I said stop it!" As he yelled, she looked at him, and for perhaps the length of two heartbeats his irritation made him careless, and she had plain sight of him.
It was long enough to see why he'd kept her from looking at him. He was in transition, his skin and sinew drooping around him, gangrenous and fetid. Enough of his flesh remained for her to recognize his face. The post-simian brow, the wide nose, the jutting jaw: All had been Raul's, before Kissoon had stolen them.
Jesus... she heard Raul say, look away. Forpity's sake, look away... As it was, she had little chance. She'd no sooner registered the sight than Kissoon became aware of her scrutiny, and his will, sharp as a blow, slapped her sight aside. Tears of pain sprang into her eyes.
"You're too curious for your own good," Kissoon said.
"You're getting very vain in your old age," she replied, wiping the tears off her cheeks.
"Old? Me? No. I'll be new forever. You, on the other hand, look like shit. Were your travels worth it?"
"What do you know about my travels?" "Just because I've been out of sight doesn't mean I've been out of touch," Kissoon replied. "I've been watching the world very closely. And I've reports of you from a lot of grubby little corners. What were you looking for? Fletcher?"
"No."
"He's gone, Tesia. So's the iaff. That part of things is er. It was a simpler age, so I suppose you felt at home there, but it's over and done with."
"And what follows?" Tesia said.
"I think you know." Tesia said nothing. "Are you too afraid to say it?"
"lad, you meant'
"There. You knew all along."
"Haven't you seen enough of them?" Tesla said. "We've seen more than most, you and 1. Yet we've seen nothing. Nothing at all." There was excitement in his voice. "they will change the world out of all recognition." "And you want that?"