Стивен Кинг - Cell

"It's like with the Head," Jordan said, and took Clay's hand.

"That's the power of their minds," Ray said, "and Dan thinks that's part of what's sendin everybody north to Kashwak—maybe part of what kept us movin north even when we told ourselves it was only to show you this and persuade you to hook up with us. You know?"

Clay said, "Did the Raggedy Man tell you about my son?"

"No, but if he had I'm sure it would have been that he's with the other normies, and that you and he will have a happy reunion in Kashwak," Dan said. "You know, just forget about those dreams of standing on a platform while the President tells the cheering crowd you're insane, that ending's not for you, it can't be for you. I'm sure by now you've thought of all the possible happy-ending scenarios, the chief one being how Kashwak and who knows how many other cell phone dead zones are the normie equivalent of wildlife refuges, places where folks who didn't get a blast on the day of the Pulse will be left alone. I think what your young friend said about the chute leading to the slaughterhouse is far more likely, but even supposing normies are to be left alone up there, do you think the phoners will forgive people like us? The flock-killers?"

Clay had no answer for this.

In the dark, Dan looked at his watch again. "It's gone three," he said. "Let's walk back. Denise will have us packed up by now. The time has come when we've either got to part company or decide to go on together."

But when you talk about going on together, you're asking me to part company from my son, Clay thought. And that he would never do unless he discovered Johnny-Gee was dead.

Or changed.

" How can you hope to get west?" Clay asked as they walked back to the junction sign. "The nights still may be ours for a while, but the days belong to them, and you see what they can do."

"I'm almost positive we can keep them out of our heads when we're awake," Dan said. "It takes a little work, but it can be done. We'll sleep in shifts, at least for a while. A lot depends on keeping away from the flocks."

"Which means getting into western New Hampshire and then into Vermont as fast as we can," Ray said. "Away from built-up areas." He shone his light on Denise, who was reclining on the sleeping bags. "We set, darlin?"

"All set," she said. "I just wish you'd let me carry something."

"You're carryin your kid," Ray said fondly. "That's enough. And we can leave the sleepin bags."

Dan said, "There are places where driving may actually make sense. Ray thinks some of the back roads could be clear for as much as a dozen miles at a stretch. We've got good maps." He dropped to one knee and shouldered his pack, looking up at Clay with a small and bitter half-smile as he did it. "I know the chances aren't good; I'm not a fool, in case you wondered. But we wiped out two of their flocks, killed hundreds of them, and I don't want to wind up on one of those platforms."

"We've got something else going for us," Tom said. Clay wondered if Tom realized he'd just put himself in the Hartwick camp. Probably. He was far from stupid. "They want us alive."

"Right," Dan said. "We might really make it. This is still early times for them, Clay—they're still weaving their net, and I'm betting there are plenty of holes in it."

"Hell, they haven't even changed their clothes yet," Denise said. Clay admired her. She looked like she was six months along, maybe more, but she was a tough little thing. He wished Alice could have met her.

"We could slip through," Dan said. "Cross into Canada from Vermont or New York, maybe. Five is better than three, but six would be better than five—three to sleep, three to stand watch in the days, fight off the bad telepathy. Our own little flock. So what do you say?"

Clay shook his head slowly. "I'm going after my son."

"Think it over, Clay," Tom said. "Please."

"Let him alone," Jordan said. "He's made up his mind." He put his arms around Clay and hugged him. "I hope you find him," he said. "But even if you do, I guess you'll never find us again."

"Sure I will," Clay said. He kissed Jordan on the cheek, then stood back. "I'll hogtie me a telepath and use him like a compass. Maybe the Raggedy Man himself." He turned to Tom and held out his hand.

Tom ignored it and put his arms around Clay. He kissed him first on one cheek, then the other. "You saved my life," he whispered into Clay's ear. His breath was hot and ticklish. His cheek rasped against Clay's. "Let me save yours. Come with us."

"I can't, Tom. I have to do this."

Tom stood back and looked at him. "I know," he said. "I know you do." He wiped his eyes. "Goddam, I suck at goodbyes. I couldn't even say goodbye to my fucking cat. "

Clay stood beside the junction sign and watched their lights dwindle. He kept his eyes fixed on Jordan's, and it was the last to disappear. For a moment or two it was alone at the top of the first hill to the west, a single small spark in the black, as if Jordan had paused there to look back. It seemed to wave. Then it was also gone, and the darkness was complete. Clay sighed—an unsteady, tearful sound—then shouldered his own pack and started walking north along the dirt shoulder of Route 11. Around quarter to four he crossed the North Berwick town line and left Kent Pond behind.

There was no reason not to resume a more normal life and start traveling days; Clay knew the phone-people wouldn't hurt him. He was off-limits and they actually wanted him up there in Kashwak. The problem was he'd become habituated to a nighttime existence. All I need is a coffin and a cape to wrap around myself when I lie down in it, he thought.

When dawn came up red and cold on the morning after his parting from Tom and Jordan, he was on the outskirts of Springvale. There was a little house, probably a caretaker's cottage, next to the Springvale Logging Museum. It looked cozy. Clay forced the lock on the side door and let himself in. He was delighted to find both a woodstove and a hand-pump in the kitchen. There was also a shipshape little pantry, well stocked and untouched by foragers. He celebrated this find with a large bowl of oatmeal, using powdered milk, adding heaps of sugar, and sprinkling raisins on top.

In the pantry he also found concentrated bacon and eggs in foil packets, stored as neatly on their shelf as paperback books. He cooked one of these and stuffed his pack with the rest. It was a much better meal than he had expected, and once in the back bedroom, Clay fell asleep almost immediately.

There were long tents on both sides of the highway.

This wasn't Route 11 with its farms and towns and open fields, with its pump-equipped convenience store every fifteen miles or so, but a highway somewhere out in the williwags. Deep woods crowded all the way up to the roadside ditches. People stood in long lines on both sides of the white center-stripe.

Left and right, an amplified voice was calling. Left and right, form two lines.

It sounded a little like the amplified voice of the bingo-caller at the Akron State Fair, but as Clay drew closer, walking up the road's center-stripe, he realized all the amplification was going on in his head. It was the voice of the Raggedy Man. Only the Raggedy Man was just a—what had Dan called him?—just a pseudopod. And what Clay was hearing was the voice of the flock.

Left and right, two lines, that's correct. That's doing it.

Where am I? Why doesn't anybody look at me, say "Hey buddy, no cutting in front, wait your turn"?