The creature’s human face was gone, and the silver needle-teeth were gleaming golden in the firelight. The last shreds of stolen hair and scalp were being carried upward by the rising heat, brushing lightly against the smoke-darkened ceiling and then drifting away, to fall as fine ash.
The skirt of Hanna’s housedress was blackened and smoldering, the bodice gone completely, and as Sandy watched the remnant slid down over the thing’s hips and fell to the floor, revealing white panties that were already darkening with the heat, heat that was spilling out in waves, pouring into the living room, forcing Sandy to take a step back.
And the thing was smiling silently at him, just smiling, red eyes like hot coals in the fire, smiling, smiling, smiling.
3.
Maggie turned to watch the thing burn, leaning around the corner of the arch and trusting Smith and Khalil to warn her if one of the others made a move toward her. She saw the dress fall away, saw the skin shrivel and darken, the hair drift away as ash, and she saw the thing smile.
She saw it smile, and saw it step forward toward Sandy, who stood there, frozen.
“That’s the second time you people have ruined a perfectly good skin for me,” it said in Bill Goodwin’s voice, and it reached out through dying flames toward Sandy. “I think I’ll just have to take yours.”
Sandy stepped back and drew his hunting knife, so quickly that Maggie didn’t see him move; just one moment he held a lighter in one hand and the other was empty, and the next moment the lighter was still there, and the other hand held a knife.
“Fuckin’ A you will,” Sandy told the thing. “I’ll see you in hell first!”
The thing just kept smiling, and it came forward, seeming to step out of the fire as the last fluid burned off, the last tatters of cloth and skin falling away. Sandy stepped back again, and the thing lunged for him.
It lunged, and it got him.
The pair fell past Maggie into the living room, the thing on top, Sandy underneath, and she could hear Sandy grunting as he hacked at the thing with his knife, but she couldn’t see any blood, couldn’t see anything but the smoldering grey flesh and a few charred black flakes of skin, and then it reached up with both hands and dug its thumbs into Sandy’s jaw, and its head dipped down to kiss him, the way the other one had kissed Elias, and Maggie found herself screaming.
“No!” she shrieked, “No, no! No!”
She dove on top of the thing, her hands curved like claws, like talons, but she’d cut her fingernails, because who needs long nails in the summer? She couldn’t claw the thing, but she grabbed its still-hot shoulders and tried to pull it away, and she heard Sandy shriek as it did something to him, and then his shriek was muffled, and she couldn’t stand it, she couldn’t.
She’d seen Elias die that way. She’d seen this thing, this same one by the voice, walking around as a parody of Bill Goodwin, who she thought she might even have been in love with. She was not going to let it get another of her friends!
She forced an arm around its neck in a chokehold that would have stopped anything human, ignoring the heat that singed the fine hairs on her forearm, but it didn’t even notice, and she flung herself forward again, desperate, and closed her teeth on the thing’s ash-streaked shoulder.
It let out an eerie wail, a sound like nothing Maggie had heard before, and erupted beneath her, flinging her off to the side and releasing Sandy.
Sandy seized his chance. He rolled aside, leaving a smear of blood on the carpeting, and staggered to his feet, running toward the sliding glass door that led out onto the deck, one hand on his mouth, blood oozing between his fingers.
Confused, unsure what was going on, Smith followed him.
Khalil leapt forward and picked Maggie up from where she had landed, threw a quick glance around at the three nightmare people, and then dragged her, too, toward the back door.
Maggie looked, trying to understand what had happened.
The burned nightmare creature was cowering in a corner, pawing ineffectually at one shoulder; the other two were standing over it, doing nothing.
And the important part was that none of them was paying any attention at all to the four humans.
Sandy had the door open, and the four of them spilled out onto the deck, then down the steps to the back yard, and then Maggie led them around to the street and away. She resisted the temptation to run home; her parents could not deal with this. Annie McGowan might.
She led the way to Sandy’s car.
4.
Sandy couldn’t drive; he was bleeding from the mouth, and the hand that had been bitten the day before was bleeding again as well. His shirt was scorched and blackened, and he had minor burns on his arms and face.
Smith seemed dazed; Maggie was incoherent. Khalil took the wheel.
They only had three long blocks to cover to Annie McGowan’s house, but as a group they weren’t fit for walking or running.
Besides, the car would be harder to follow, should the nightmare people attempt pursuit.
Khalil pulled into the driveway at 706 Topaz Court, parked the car neatly on the apron, not blocking the garage, and then turned his attention to getting his passengers safely into the house.
The first step was to get the door open, so that no one would have to wait on the porch. He hurried up the steps and rang the doorbell while Smith helped the burned and bleeding Sandy out of the car and up the walk.
Maggie followed, slowly; now it was she who seemed dazed, while Smith was largely recovered.
Annie answered, and Khalil shushed her before she could exclaim over the sorry condition of the group. He then acted as doorman, herding the others inside before he entered himself.
He made certain the door was locked, and glanced around to reassure himself that there were no open windows before he followed the others into the living room.
Sandy was sitting in one of the armchairs, his head tilted back, while Annie held a cold towel to his lower jaw; the bleeding seemed to have stopped, finally. Maggie was huddled at one end of the couch, curled up in foetal position. Smith was standing by the window, looking out at Annie’s flower garden.
Annie looked up as Khalil entered. “What happened?” she asked.
Khalil shrugged.
“What did happen?” Smith asked. “Sandy, I thought it had you; why’d it let go? What did you do?”
Sandy tried to speak, and almost choked on a fresh flow of blood. He desisted, and managed a half-shrug. He pointed to the knife on his belt – he had managed to sheathe it somewhere along the way – but followed that with another shrug.
“You stabbed one of them?” Annie asked.
Sandy nodded.
“He stabbed it a dozen times, at least,” Smith said. “He cut its throat, tried to cut its head off, and it didn’t even care. And then when it was attacking him he stabbed it in the chest over and over again, and it didn’t seem to notice at first, but then all of a sudden it screamed and let go.”
Annie swallowed, looking at the sheathed knife. “I thought you were going to burn them?”
“We did,” Smith said. “Sandy set one on fire, and its clothes and skin burned off, but that didn’t seem to bother it any more than the knife did.”
Annie shuddered. Maggie curled herself more tightly.
“Maggie,” Khalil said.
Smith looked at her, then at Khalil. “You think it was something she did?” he asked.
Khalil nodded.
Sandy turned his head long enough to glance at Maggie, and then he nodded, as well. “Knife didden’ do nuffin’,” he said, trying not to move his lower jaw as he spoke.
Smith crossed to the couch and sat down. “Maggie?” he said. “What did you do to it?”
“Go ’way,” she said, not moving.
Smith blinked, and wished he’d had more sleep.
“Maggie?” he said again.
“Go ’way,” she repeated, with more emphasis.