Jeff Rovin - Vespers

“Man, you sure? The two of us stand a better chance up there-”

“I’m sure,” he said. “Just be ready to turn the transformer on when I give you the word.”

“It’ll take me about five minutes,” T-Bone called after him. “Just don’t bring that motherfucking bat with you!”

“I’ll try not to,” he called back.

It was dark inside the statue but not black; the earliest rays of dawn were beginning to filter down from the statue’s eyes and from the windows in the crown.He heard the sound of grinding metal and he saw several vespers flitting above. He also saw the body of Sergeant Gilheany crumpled on one of the rest platforms off the staircase.

There was a slight breeze coming from above. The statue had obviously been breached somewhere, which was how the bats were getting in. But there was no way he was going to let the vespers stop him. As his heart and legs pumped ferociously, as he prepared to take the pain of the vesper attack to do whatever it took to draw the big bat away, Gentry had just one concern.

That he wasn’t too late to help Nancy.

When there was nowhere left for her to go and nothing else she could do, Nancy Joyce had become surprisingly calm. It wasn’t peace but a combination of things that gave the semblance of that state: being drained, frightened, numb, and resigned.

She had climbed to the top of the arm and was standing on a small platform beside the highest rung of the ladder. There were two handrails, and there was room for only one person. Above her was the solid base of the torch. Behind her was a steel door. The door obviously led to the small balcony that surrounded the torch, but it was double-locked. And even if she went out there, what would she do? Jump?

Perhaps. She’d rather leap than die under the hooks and teeth of the bat. And if she jumped she would live an extra-how long would it take to fall? A second or two?

Why not? Right now that seemed like a lot. She might also black out as she fell and die painlessly. That was a comforting thought, given the alternative.

So was this, a non sequitur which came to her in a flow of thoughts. She hadn’t had time to contemplate death up at the museum. She’d been too busy surviving. Now that she did she was surprised to find herself not bitter but grateful. She was happy to have had the time she had, the life she did, the experiences.

The entire arm shuddered, and she squeezed the handrails. For some reason the thought of death wasn’t as scary as the thought of being vulnerable like this. She wished this part would pass.

It was dark below, the entrance to the forearm stuffed with the giant bat. The creature was no longer trying to get up here. Rather, it would enter, hack, back down to the second landing, then twist around and enter again. Each time it did, it tore at the support structure, trying to rip the steel beams, steps, and ladder out of its way. Every now and then the hint of sunlight entering through the crown gave her a glimpse of the giant’s face. Motherhood had not softened the creature’s disposition. If there could be such a thing as hate in an animal’s expression, it was there. Joyce could also hear the giant even after it stopped wailing aloud and began panting in long, chilling, hisses. She knew that each suspiration was comprised of hundreds of high blats, the barely audible aspect of her echolocation.

Steel support struts buckled. Rivets strained and the copper plates that comprised the skin of the statue popped on one or two sides. After a short time the smaller vespers began returning to the statue; Joyce could see them outside through the broken seams in the arm.

That was it,she thought. Gentry was on his way from the communications center, and the giant bat must have heard him coming. That was why it was echolocating. The scientist in Joyce found it an amazing synergy. So simple, yet so effective that nothing-no living thing other than a bat-could get near the creature. Not even an insect.

She prayed that Gentry would have the good sense to turn around. If the bats came back in force he’d never make it.

The young woman felt the arm sag and rotate slightly. The platform she was on angled backward so that she was leaning more than slightly against the door. She heard it squeak.

Then she heard something else.

Her name.

And all the calm, all the pensive resignation, was gone in a finger-snap instant as she gripped the handrails and screamed,“Robert-go back!”

About midway up the twelve-story statue,vespers had begun swirling around Gentry, scratching and biting. The detective ducked his head into his arms and continued running up. He didn’t have to see where he was going in order to get there. All he needed to do was keep his right side pressed to the railing and follow it up. The pain in his ankle had become a constant ache, which was preferable to the sharp jabs he’d been suffering before.

Every once in a while he shouted Nancy ’s name, hoping that she might hear him and respond. Hoping that she might find a way to buy herself another second or two until he could get to her.

It wasn’t until he was near the statue’s shoulders that he heard a response. He also heard something else: the continuous grind of metal against metal. He felt gusts of fresh air. Still holding the crowbar, he crouched when he was just below the landing. With his arm slung across his face to protect it from the vespers, he raised his eyes above the crook of his elbow. He peered through the crisscrossing support beams.

He saw the bat on the staircase of the upraised arm. She was tucked up in the folds of the bunched sleeve. All around her, copper plates had been torn away while others were swinging on single rivets. Though none of the support beams were broken, several were bent, and the arm was tilting slightly toward the front of the monument. He could tell because the stairs had torn away from the landing and were leaning seaward.

The belligerent vespers forced him to move before he’d had more than a moment to reconnoiter. He clambered up to the landing, leaning as much as possible on his right leg. God help him if the bats hobbled that one too. His immediate goal was to try and get the big bat away from the statue’s arm so Joyce could get out.

As the detective began to move forward, the creature dropped from the stairs, landed heavily, then turned slowly. The animal was bowed very low, its chin nearly on the platform. It was bleeding from its neck. Swatting vespers away from his face, Gentry watched as the wounded giant crept slowly across the broken body of Officer Berk. The bat inadvertently dragged the corpse several feet as it crawled toward him. Berk’s shredded belt came off. Blood-soaked shreds of his uniform stuck to the landing.

Gentry backed away as more and more vespers picked at his arms, his shoulders, his legs. He held the crowbar in one hand and clawed desperately at vespers with the other. Between close-up glimpses of tiny white teeth and velvety wings he thought he saw movement behind the giant-

The giant bat heard it and turned, still low to the ground. As she did, her head snapped to the side as Joyce smashed it with Officer Berk’s nightstick.

The creature reared up, shrieking, its huge body centered on the tripod of its powerful legs and thick tail. Its head and shoulders pushed against the top of the statue’s sleeve. The copper bulged and broke as the creature rose into the dawn sky.

“ Nancy!”Gentry cried. He motioned her toward him.

“No, go back!”

“Not without you! Comeon! ”

The young woman hesitated a moment longer. Then she tossed the stick aside, scrambled around the bat, and ran toward Gentry. An instant later the creature came down hard, causing the metal landing to bend in the center. The floor tilted and seemed to suck Joyce back; she grabbed the handrail of the spiral staircase to keep from sliding toward the creature. The monster swept at her with its hook, but Gentry had dropped the crowbar and pulled Joyce up and over the railing just as the claw sliced by. Roaring with rage, the wounded creature hunched its head deep in its huge shoulders and charged forward.