F. Paul Wilson - All the Rage

"Have you seen it?" Oz's voice seemed to come from everywhere in the room. "Isn't it magnificent?"

"What did you do to it?"

Oz stared at him, as if genuinely puzzled. "Why, my good man, now that I know what it is, I know how to treat it. I looked up the proper care and feeding of rakoshi in one of my books on Bengali mythology and acted appropriately."

Jack felt a chill. And it was not from his soaked clothing.

"What… just what did you feed it?"

The boss's large brown eyes looked guileless, and utterly remorseless. "Oh, this and that. Whatever the text recommended. You don't really believe for an instant that I was going to allow that magnificent creature to languish and die of malnutrition, do you? I assume you're familiar with—"

"I know what a rakosh needs to live."

"Do you now? Do you know everything about rakoshi?"

"No, of course not, but—"

"Then let us assume that I know more than you. Perhaps there is more than one way to keep them healthy. I see no need to discuss this with you or anyone else. Let us just say that it got exactly what it needed." His smile was scary. "And that it enjoyed the meal immensely."

Jack knew a rakosh ate only one thing. The question was: who? He knew Prather would never tell him so he didn't waste breath asking.

Instead he said, "Do you have any idea what you're playing with here? Do you know what's going to happen to your little troupe when that thing gets loose? I've seen this one in action, and trust me, pal, it will tear you all to pieces."

"I assume you know that iron weakens it. The bars of its cage are iron; the roof, floor, and sides are lined with steel. It will not escape."

"Famous last words. So I take it there's no way I can convince you to douse it with kerosene and strike a match."

"Unthinkable."

Jack flashed on something a couple of the troupe members had said the other night.

"Why? Because it's a 'brother'?"

Oz didn't flinch from the term. "In a manner of speaking."

Jack leaned back against the door frame. This was beginning to make some sense, but not much.

"This is all related to the Otherness, isn't it."

That got a reaction. Oz did a long, slow owl blink and sat down. He motioned Jack toward the room's other chair but Jack shook his head.

"What do you know about the Otherness?"

"I've had a couple of people lecture me on it."

The Otherness… a force, another reality, inimical, implacable, impinging on this world, hungering for it. It had spawned the rakoshi and had almost killed him—twice. Still he didn't quite understand it, but he believed. After what he'd seen since last summer, he had no choice.

"And I've been up close and personal with a few rakoshi." He gestured through the door, toward the tents. "Your cast of characters out there—they're all…"

"Children of the Otherness? Not all. Some are merely accidents, victims of genetics or development gone awry, but we do feel a certain kinship with them as well."

"And you?"

Oz only nodded, and Jack wondered how the Otherness had marked him.

He took a gamble and said, "How did Dr. Monnet learn about the rakosh?"

"He received a call that—" Oz broke off and exhibited his crooked yellow teeth in a sour smile. "Very clever."

Jack pressed. "A call. Maybe from the same person who tipped you off about where to find the rakosh?"

"Perhaps yes, perhaps no."

Jack was pretty sure it was perhaps yes. Which gave everything that was going on a shape, the semblance of a plan: save the rakosh; cull a chug from its blood; spread that drug everywhere to cause a slow tsunami of violence and chaos.

And chaos was a bosom buddy of the Otherness.

"Does Monnet know about the turnaround in the rakosh's health?"

Oz shook his head. "Not yet. He finds its blood… interesting. He's terribly distraught over the fact that he's losing the source of that blood." He smiled. "Somehow I just haven't got around to telling him yet."

Leave him twisting in the wind, Jack thought. Serves him right.

"You seem to be remarkably well informed about this," Oz said. "But I don't sense that you are one of us. How does an outsider come to be so involved?"

"Not by choice, I can tell you that. Just seems that everywhere I turn lately I keep bumping into this Otherness business."

"Does that mean that you were here in Monroe last month when something… something wonderful almost happened?"

"Don't know about you, but I don't call a house disappearing 'wonderful.' And it didn't 'almost' happen—it's completely gone."

"I was not referring to the house but to what took it."

"Yeah, well, you might have a different opinion about that if you were there." Jack studied Oz's bright eyes. "Then again, maybe you wouldn't. But we're straying from the main subject here. It's got to go."

The boss's face darkened as he rose from his chair.

"I advise you to put that idea out of your head, or you may wind up sharing the cage with the creature."

He stepped closer to Jack and edged him outside. "You have been warned. Good day, sir."

He reached a long arm past Jack and pulled the door closed.

Jack stood outside a moment, realizing that a worst-case scenario had come true. A healthy Scar-lip… he couldn't let that go on. He still had the can of gasoline in the trunk of his car. As soon as he was back in Manhattan he'd return to Plan A. And if he had to take the whole tent down to get it done, then that was how it would go.

As he turned, he found someone standing behind him. His nose was fat and discolored; dark crescents had formed under each eye. The rain, a drizzle now, had darkened his sandy hair, plastering it to his scalp. He stared at Jack, his face a mask of rage.

"You're that guy, the one who got Bondy and me in trouble!"

Now Jack recognized him: the roustabout from Sunday night. Hank. His breath reeked of cheap wine. He clutched a bottle in a paper bag. Probably Mad Dog.

"You look like shit, man!" he told Jack with a nasty grin.

"You don't look so hot yourself."

"It's all your fault!" Hank said.

"You're absolutely right," Jack said and began walking back in the direction of town to meet Abe. He had no time for this dolt.

"Bondy was my only friend! He got fired because of you."

A little bell went ting-a-ling . Jack stopped, turned.

"Yeah? When did you see him last?"

"The other night—when you got him in trouble."

The bell was ringing louder.

"And you never saw him once after that? Not even to say good-bye?"

Hank shook his head. "Uh-uh. Boss kicked him right out. By sun up he'd blown the show with all his stuff."

Jack remembered the rage in Oz's eyes that night when he'd looked from the wounded rakosh to Bondy. Now Jack was pretty sure that the ringing in his head was a dinner bell.

"He was the only one around here who liked me," Hank said, his expression miserable. "Bondy talked to me. All the freaks and geeks keep to theirselves."

Jack sighed as he stared at Hank. Well, at least now he had an idea as to who had supplemented Scar-lip's diet.

No big loss to civilization.

"You don't need friends like that, kid," he said and turned away again.

"You'll pay for it!" Hank screamed into the rain. "Bondy'll be back and when he gets here we'll get even. I got my pay docked because of you and that damn Sharkman! You think you look bad now, you just wait till Bondy gets back!"

Pardon me if I don't hold my breath.

Jack wondered if it would do any good to tell him that Bondy hadn't been fired—that, in a way, he was still very much with the freak show. But that would only endanger the big dumb kid.

Hank ranted on. "And if he don't come back, I'll getcha myself. And that Sharkman too!"