Dean Koontz: Anti-Man

"What are you going to dig with?" I asked. "We haven't any shovels or tools."

"Wait," He said.

The wind howled above. A gust of it blew a film of snow over my face.

He removed His gloves and stripped off the insulated jacket and undershirt beneath. His chest and shoulders and arms bulged and rippled with fantastic muscle development. These were muscles the size of those you can get lifting weights every day until you drop, but they were not blocky like weight-lifting muscles; they were leaner, giving hint to a usefulness that a muscle-bound exerciser can never know. The cold should have had Him huddled and trembling, but He didn't even seem to notice it. He was the supreme study in detachment, in nonchalance. The snow fluttered down and struck His bare shoulders and chest, melted and ran off Him in cold streams of glistening water.

He held His hands out before Him as if doing a stretching exercise, held His fingers close together, closed His eyes and stood solid as a great pine, unmoved even when the wind suddenly picked up and began howling again. I could see very little in the dim light, but I could make out that some transformation was taking place in His hands. When He finally opened His eyes and set to work making a sloping path into me, I saw that the transformation was startling. The fingers had fused together so that the hands were flat scoops. The palms had broadened and lengthened until they were as large as the blade of a spade. He turned and walked out of sight to begin work. Working quickly, He removed the crust from the snow twenty-five feet away and began angling toward me, packing the snow in steps. Two hours later, after a second minor cave — in that required Him to reclear an area of His path, we were both on top of the drift, suited again, and headed toward the woods at the end of the field.

When we reached the trees, I stopped and looked at His hands but could find no trace of the previous transformation. His fingers were back in place, five to a hand, all perfectly formed. "How much of your body can you change when you want to?" I asked. I had been afraid, back there when I had fallen through the crust, that He would just leave me there. What did He need me for, after all? It seemed that, already, He was going to be too much for World Authority to handle, even with their superior fire power and all their cunning little think tank men. There did not appear to be any need for me, even though He assured me there was.

Of course, that was not His way, abandoning someone to die.

"I can change most of it," He said matter-of-factly.

"Your face?"

"I'm working on that."

"And how far have you progressed?"

"I need to be able to exert more delicate control on the bone tissue. It, too, must be changed along with the facial features of the flesh."

"When you control that, we can stop running," I said. "You can change your face and go unrecognized." Indeed, He could assume a different face every few weeks, every week if necessary, and be always a few steps ahead of the authorities with no fear of their ever catching Him.

"Someone would recognize me sooner or later, Jacob. It isn't just my face. It's everything about me that singles me out, makes people suspicious of me. I'm — well — different." He grinned that damned infectious, winning grin of His and spread His hands in a show of helplessness. All for my benefit. He was about as helpless as a full-grown bull elephant.

But what He said had some truth to it. He would always be an outcast. There was an indefinable, unscientific aura about Him that gave Him an indisputably alien air. I knew what it was. He was alien, in that He was a superman, a supergenius too, who could no more pass for a man than a man could pass for a monkey in some jungle ape society. "But a change of face could gain you time to complete your evolution," I said.

"Get me to the cabin," He said, gripping my shoulder in His mammoth hand, "and I will only need the three days you promised. Then face-changing won't be necessary."

I put on my goggles and mask, for my face was already prickled with numbness that felt like a huge injection of novocaine had been rammed into both my cheeks. I fumbled the compass out and read it, pointed straight ahead. He took the lead, breaking a trail, spraying the snow to both sides, tramping it down, charging through it at a brisk pace. As we walked, I noticed something new about Him. His hand, when He had gripped my shoulder, had been enormous, not just large. Now I saw that He was enormous in every respect. An insulated suit, meant to be bulky, was strained to bursting with His giant body. His head seemed higher, larger, with a much greater expanse of forehead. His footprints were half again as large as mine. He lumbered through the dark woods like a fairy-tale giant, crushing or thrusting aside all that got in His way, silent, somewhat mysterious. Again, I was conscious of that part of His personality that always remained shrouded, the eerie side of Him that I had never been able to understand.

It was not exactly the result of the wind or the cold, but I shivered.

Half an hour later, He stopped and squatted in a small clearing, wiping snowflakes from His face and looking about as if He were searching for something He had left behind on a previous trip through these same parts, though He could never have been here before. His head tilted, swayed from side to side like a pendulum through molasses, His lips compressed and bloodless.

"What is it?" I asked, coming up behind Him. "I'm not tired yet, if that's what you're troubled about."

"How far to the cabin, Jacob?" He asked anxiously, His voice closer to a show of emotion than it usually got. It was the first time I had seen anxiety in Him; He was usually the pinnacle of patience, easygoing and willing to wait for all things.

"Well — " I took the map out of my coat pocket, unfolded it, and squinted to see in the gloom. After a moment, the glowing characters were clear and easy to read. "We're right about here somewhere," I said, pointing to a shaded forest area. "Halfway through this section of the forest. Then we have to cover this series of foothills, not rugged but quite steep in some places. Skirt this final copse, and we're there. Maybe two and a half hours yet."

"That's much too long."

"It's the shortest way. I checked it several times in San Francisco when we ate dinner, remember? And again in the movie theater when that damned show became intolerable. This always measured the shortest and easiest route. Less hills than if we moved east to take advantage of that temporary ravine, less forests than if we went west along the ridge here." I pointed to the corresponding portions of the map.

He didn't answer.

I sat down next to Him. The snow was falling harder now, though it still might be only a local storm or even a short-term squall. He didn't speak, and I didn't feel like interrogating Him. We sat for about five minutes until the warmth we had gained from marching drained out and the cold began seeping back into my bones. He had given way completely to that unknown part of His personality, and I could not see how to approach Him, how to ask what was the matter. When another five minutes passed, I decided on the blunt route. "What is it?" I asked.

"Jacob, I am sitting here in a quandary, faced with two decisions, each of which will be in some way unpleasant." He spoke in that same, deep, even tone that denied emotion. That was what a machine should sound like — not like a seductress. "One of the courses of action that is open to me will end with your becoming a little less sure of me, a little frightened of me."

"No," I said.

"Yes, it will I know. You will be slightly disgusted, and it will have a bearing on the way you feel about me. Maybe small, maybe large. I don't want to lose your friendship."