Mike Lancaster - 0.4

Every parent knows the magic gesture that chases the monsters away.

Click.

Let there be light.

Here, though, light was kind of the problem.

It looked wrong and I suddenly remembered what Mr Peterson had said earlier, about things from this world looking like they belonged in this world; that they followed rules that allowed us to recognise them, allowed us to understand them.

It had sounded like mad ravings at the time, but now I knew exactly what he had been talking about.

The light we were walking into didn’t look as if it belonged here at all.

I had no idea how we should be approaching the silos, how much stealth we needed.

In the end, however, we just walked perfectly normally towards them.

Ordinarily, light illuminates pretty much everything in its path, but this seemed more selective in its illumination. It clumped around objects and highlighted them, while leaving empty areas relatively dark.

Intelligent light? I remember thinking. How is that even possible?

‘Look,’ Lilly said, and showed me her arm. ‘Look at this.’

I could see Lilly’s bare arm, but I could see more than that. The particles of light had clustered around her limb and I could see dark lines running along the skin, branching off, connecting to other lines, filling Lilly’s arm.

Then it became clear to me exactly what the light was showing me and I felt a little sick.

I was seeing through Lilly’s skin to the veins and arteries beneath. I looked closer and could even see the blood pumping through her.

‘You have to admit,’ Lilly said, ‘that this is pretty damned cool.’

I nodded, suddenly mute.

‘I reckon we’re in the right place,’ she said. ‘Let’s go get a look inside those silos.’

We were about twenty metres from the first of the silos when a group of people appeared around the corner in front of us, heading the same way. I gestured for Lilly to get out of sight and jogged for cover at the side of the yard.

As the group drew closer to us I realised that I knew most of them. Five members of the Naylor family, including old man Naylor himself, were leading a young woman towards the silo.

Lilly was pointing at the young woman, mouthing something, but there was a rushing sound in my ears and a cold, leaden feeling moving swiftly down my spine.

I recognised her.

I recognised her all too well.

I’d lived next door to her my whole life.

It was Annette Birnie, Danny’s sister.

She didn’t look like she was doing too well. Her hair, normally straight and neat and perfectly arranged, was a wild tangled mess, and the face it framed was pale and drawn. Dark skin ringed her eyes. She was moving in a halting fashion, as if she were in shock, and every few steps one of the Naylor family would push her forwards to hurry her up.

‘She’s one of us,’ Lilly whispered, with horror in her voice. ‘She’s one of the 0.4 and she’s been alone since it happened. We had each other, Kate O’Donnell, Mr Peterson. She had no one. No one at all.’

I knew that Lilly was right and felt a horrible pang of sympathy. To have been completely alone through all of this, I couldn’t even begin to think how that must have felt. She must have thought she was losing her mind.

‘We should have found her, helped her,’ Lilly said.

‘We didn’t know,’ I said. ‘We just didn’t know.’

‘Danny hypnotised her too,’ Lilly said crossly. ‘We should have known.’

‘He hypnotised her days ago,’ I countered. ‘Why would that have affected her today?’

Lilly shook her head.

‘We have to help her now,’ she said, and there was a steely tone to her voice that told me she wasn’t taking no for an answer.

‘If you’ve got a plan, I’m all ears,’ I said.

‘I distract them, you save Annette,’ she said, as if it were the easiest thing in the world she was laying out. ‘Just like in one of your comic books.’

‘You read comic books?’

‘No, but when we’re out of this I’ll let you show me a couple of comic books to convince me they’re worth my time. Deal?’

‘Deal.’

‘Now stay here. I’ll get them looking the other way.’

‘I should be doing that part of the plan.’

She shook her head.

‘Annette knows and trusts you.’ She smiled wickedly. ‘She has a lower opinion of me.’

‘Sounds like there’s some history between you.’

‘There’s always history. You know that. Now let’s do this.’

‘You take care of yourself,’ I said, but it didn’t seem like enough, and then I was leaning forwards, taking her face in my hands, and kissing her on the lips.

She kissed back and then it was over and we were both standing there, wondering what had just happened.

‘A kiss for luck?’ she said.

‘We’ll call it that for now,’ I said. ‘Now go. Distract. We’ve got a friend to rescue.’

Lilly clung to the shadows and made her way quickly up the side of the yard, past a row of dilapidated barns, while I just stood there waiting for a chance to get to Annette. I could still feel the ghost impression of Lilly’s lips upon mine.

The Naylor family procession had paused next to the closest silo and old man Naylor was standing in front of the structure. He extended his arms before him and a whole load of those weird filaments tore loose from his hands and adhered to the front of the silo. Suddenly, the surface of the structure started to glow, then peel back, creating an opening, then a door.

Hell of a way to make an entrance, I thought, and then the new door swished aside.

The alphabet of hooks and eyes that we saw on Kate O’Donnell’s computer was floating in the air inside the silo, as if the symbols were being projected on to the air itself. They twisted and curled and looked sort of brownish to my eyes. But, even as I said the word ‘brownish’ to myself, I realised that was about a million miles away from describing the actual colour.

I watched in fascination as the characters of that alphabet changed and mutated before my eyes. I was wondering how it was possible that there could be a language written across the air, and I felt myself taking a step forwards, towards the silo, without meaning to, as if my body had suddenly broken free of my mind’s control.

I felt my foot rising up to take another step. I couldn’t stop it.

And I couldn’t take my eyes off the symbols in the silo.

My foot took another step.

I knew that I would be in the sightline of the Naylor family any second, but my body still wasn’t listening. I felt my foot readying itself for another step.

No. No. No, I tried to tell my foot.

The foot started moving again.

‘HEY!’ I heard Lilly’s voice and it snapped me out of it. I managed to drag my eyes away from the silo and my foot back from its forwards course.

I saw the Naylors turn to find the source of the interruption and there she was, Lilly, standing about fifty metres away in the middle of the yard, hands on her hips. I actually smiled when I saw her, she looked so composed and… well, heroic, I guess.

I saw the Naylor clan react to her arrival with surprise and old man Naylor even stepped away from the silo towards her. His… filaments retracted so fast that their movement was a blur.

Annette just stood there, looking dazed and lost.

‘HEY!’ Lilly shouted again. ‘Any of you weirdos know where a nought-point-four can get a bed for the night?’

The Naylors looked at her and seemed to confer, although I’m not convinced any of them actually spoke. Then old man Naylor nodded his head at Lilly.