Ralph studied its blank, staring windows for a moment, then turned away and hurried down one of the streets leading from it. There was no way of telling if the slithergadee would be aboard the jet, but for now he fervently hoped it wasn’t. Somehow he felt sure Sarah wasn’t in there.
Only dreaded things, he thought.
He ran down the street, gripping the altered rifle in one hand, past the empty buildings and out of sight of the jet. In the middle of a crossroads he stopped and looked at the dial Spencer had strapped to his forearm. It was impossible to tell how far the tiny hand had travelled toward the red since he had left the line shack. My time sense is warped, he realized. The mounting energy on the field was disorienting him in every dimension. At his core fear mixed with the nausea. He ran on, the buildings heaving alongside him like slow waves.
There was no sign of the slithergadee. Ralph squatted down in the middle of the street and panted. He was afraid to look at the dial now—it seemed as if hours of running had gone by, with nothing but an infinity of small-town store fronts entering his vision. They should’ve known, he thought bitterly, staring at the asphalt with his head lowered in exhaustion. They should’ve known it wouldn’t be just waiting here for me to find. Either it’s hidden where I’ll never find it, or it’s on Muehlenfeldt’s jet—and how can I get at it there?
Something moved in the buildings to his right. He saw its motion from the corner of his eye. Gripping the gun tighter, he rose and walked slowly towards the drugstore where he had seen it.
Inside it was dark, the racks and counters arrayed in oppressive silence.
He walked farther into the building, until he stood in its center. As he pivoted slowly around, a figure rose from behind the cash register. “You,” it gasped, stretching an arm of fire toward him.
He stared at the swaying apparition for several moments until he realized what it was. One of the children from the Thronsen Home, he thought, dismayed. Burning up. The dream image seemed to be that of a boy sixteen or seventeen years old, but with the skin bursting into glowing heat. Red eyes, crazed with fever, stared at Ralph. The facial bones looked as if they were about to break through the incandescence. “You,” the image repeated, then flowed around the end of the counter and leaped at Ralph.
Its heat scorched his face as he dodged to one side. The glowing image rolled on its shoulder and clutched at his ankle. Frantically, he kicked free and ran for the door. It’s on the same level as me, he realized. Where it can reach me.
A pair of arms encircled his neck and he was thrown onto the sidewalk.
Another burning face hissed above him, pressing him into the ground with its heat and weight. He brought the rifle butt against its chest and pushed it away. Its shrill cry rang after him as he got to his feet and ran down the sidewalk.
The minds of the juvenile delinquents, with no existence now except on the dreamfield, had burnt out with the overloads of psychic energy, leaving nothing but the raw circuits of hate and fear. The street itself seemed to be on fire as more images emerged from among the buildings.
Their garbled shouts coalesced into one sound in the air. Ralph eluded the outstretched hands of one only to be tackled around the waist by another.
He beat at the radiant hands but more figures clutched at him, until he seemed to be at the core of some burning pit. The heat dizzied him, until the blood rushed into his head and he vomited.
Somehow his finger found the trigger of the rifle. He pressed the altered barrel down into the massed figures scrabbling at him, and fired. A roaring noise mixed with the suddenly deafening cries of the dream figures. He fell to the ground, clutching the gun to his chest. The burning hands were no longer tearing at him.
For a moment he was unconscious; then with one hand he lifted himself onto his side. The figures were scattering from him in all directions, heading for the darkness inside the field’s buildings. A few feet away something with the shape of a human being jerked and sputtered on the ground, dissolving into white-hot sparks.
The dial on his forearm was smashed, the needle dangling and useless.
He sucked in breath until his lungs stopped aching, then looked up and across the roofs of the buildings. Far away, the topmost part of the tail on Muehlenfeldt’s jet could be seen. He gripped the rifle and started toward the silver beacon, running past the buildings and ignoring the fiery eyes that watched him from within.
The plane’s bulk shielded him from the yellow sky. “Hey!” he shouted up at the curved belly. A panel shifted and slid open. He stepped back as the stairs slowly lowered, the bottom step finally grinding against the street’s asphalt.
No one stopped him at the top of the ramp. He walked cautiously into the silent interior.
The fish in the cabin’s huge aquarium was dead, floating at the top of the water. “Ralph,” came Muehlenfeldt’s voice as he stepped around the tank. “Come on. You can’t avoid this moment forever.”
The senator was sitting in the high-backed leather chair. His white hair no longer lay smooth against his skull but stood on end in a corona.
Ralph stood a couple of yards away and pointed the gun at him. “I need to know where the slithergadee is.”
“Don’t be stupid,” said Muehlenfeldt. “Stop waving that thing about. I know what it’s for. You can’t hurt me with it.” He paused, smiling. “Come on. Nothing to say now?”
“Where is it?” Ralph lowered the gun.
“It’s no use to ask. You’ll never find it.” The smile grew wider and more wicked. “You’ll never find Sarah either. She’s not here—you’ll die universes apart from each other. Sad, don’t you think. She really is my daughter, you know.”
“No,” said Ralph. “She isn’t.”
Muehlenfeldt laughed. “Oh, but she is. Though perhaps spawn is a better word. We reproduce asexually—ah, yes, your friend Spencer was right about me. Very intuitive of him. Sarah told me all about his theories.” He tilted his head to one side. “Sharper than a serpent’s tooth—isn’t that how it goes? I was very surprised when she turned against me. But then maybe she was sick in some way. Maybe she forgot what she was and now she really believes she’s human. This taking on other creatures’ identities can be a dangerous business. So let it be that way, then. She can die with her adopted species.”
Lying, thought Ralph. His hands sweated on the gun stock. Confusion.
“Still nothing to say?” Muehlenfeldt leaned forward in his chair.
“Nothing to ask? Before it ends?” He sighed. “That’s the trouble with you—all of you. Too easily distracted by trivialities. Like that military nonsense in South America. That Ximento business. I instigated that—money in the right places, and enough of it. Just as a distraction, otherwise I’m sure my real purpose would have been exposed much sooner. Perhaps even delayed.”
One of his wrinkled hands described a sphere in the air. “Think of it as a work of art,” he said. “The transformation of your meaningless and dirty little lives into pure light. Perfect and intense. Like a star—that’s how it’ll look from far enough away. Don’t you think that’s worth more than the mere continuation of your petty existence?”
“You’re insane,” said Ralph. “You’ll die, too.”
“Fool. As if this were the only place in which I exist. I’ll be watching from out there when this poor husk is consumed with everything else.” He gripped the arms of the chair and laughed with his head thrown back, the cords in his neck beating.