Scott Sigler - Nocturnal - A Novel

Bryan Clauser stared back. Angry green eyes glared through slits. The skull-smile grinned. “Fuck it,” he said. “Not like I’m going to need this thing anymore.”

He reached into a pocket and handed over his badge. Aggie took it, amazed that his bluff had worked. Now all he had to do was stay alive just a little bit longer.

“Time to go,” Clauser said. “Everyone follow me. If you fall behind, you’re on your own. Aggie, you stay with me, and don’t try anything.”

Doors opened. Out of the black station wagon stepped two men in hooded cloaks, two men in black peacoats and black masks, and a scared-shitless black man with a gun and a badge. They crossed the dark parking lot to the brick sidewalk, then to the U-shaped concrete wall surrounding the escalator down to the subway.

Terror tried to tangle Aggie’s feet. He felt like his head might explode, like he might go crazy at any moment.

He was going back down … maybe he was already insane.

Aggie kept moving for one thing and one thing only: for the baby .

Clauser went down first.

Everyone else followed.

Innocent Until Proven Guilty

The biggest man Pookie had ever seen held Jessie Sharrow tight, only it wasn’t a man, it was two men, one with a professional wrestler’s size and a tiny head, the other with a withered body, a huge head, and a tail wrapped around the bigger one’s thick neck.

A bunch of monsters stood on the shipwreck’s prow. The snake-face; Tiffany Hines’s dog-face, who wore a too-small tuxedo jacket and orange Bermuda shorts; a black-haired girl with a pair of chain whips curled on her hips; a tall, black-furred, cat-faced man wearing jeans and a black-fur cape; the wrinkled old babushka lady; and a little guy with wire-rim glasses and an obscenely distended belly who kept flicking a gold Zippo lighter. These creatures, along with the two-men-in-one, seemed to have some privileged standing with Rex.

Rex stood on the prow’s farthest point, arms again raised to address the audience. “You have heard the arguments. Now, we must pass judgment.”

There hadn’t been any arguments , just a long list of accusations against Sharrow — accusations like aiding and abetting murderers, conspiring to kill people, being a bully , and hating on us like a dick . They were the accusations of an awkward teenage boy who suddenly had all the power in the world.

Rex raised his left fist, his thumb pointed in parallel to the ground.

The crowd roared guilty! guilty!

Jesus … the kid thought he was a Roman emperor or something, and this was his coliseum. Rex turned slowly, letting everyone see his fist, his thumb. He gazed up at his people, his eyes wide with murder, his upper lip curled and his teeth gleaming in the lights of the ship’s skull-encrusted mast.

Guilty! Guilty!

Rex lifted up on his toes, then pointed his thumb down.

“Sir Voh,” he said. “Carry out the execution.”

Pookie shook his head in denial, pulled at the ropes, wished for a miracle.

The big one lifted Sharrow and set him down on the deck. A sprawling right hand the size of Pookie’s chest pressed down on Sharrow’s stomach, holding the police captain in place. Sharrow’s blue uniform — which had always been so clean and perfectly creased — was covered with dirt from the long haul to the ship.

“Please,” Sharrow said. “Please!”

The little one crawled higher to perch on the top of the big one’s head. Tail still wrapped around the big one’s neck, he stood on emaciated, spindly legs. He looked down at Sharrow. “For the king. Fort, finish him.”

The big man raised his left hand to the sky and made a fist.

Guilty! Guilty!

“No!” Sharrow grabbed at the hand on his stomach, he punched, he scratched, he even lifted his head to bite but his mouth wouldn’t reach.

The fist slammed down onto Sharrow’s chest, crushing him like a fluid-filled lightbulb. Blood sprayed out of his mouth, the droplets arcing high into the air to fall on the deck, the dirt, and on Sharrow himself. His legs and arms spasmed briefly, then fell limp.

The monster stood. Sharrow’s bloody chest had been smashed flat. He didn’t move, didn’t twitch — he was just gone.

Rex pointed at the corpse. “Remove the criminal!”

White-robed men scrambled out from somewhere behind Pookie. Four of them lifted the shattered body, which flopped in the middle as if the chest were the broken spine of an old blue book. As the masked men carried the body past Pookie to somewhere behind, Pookie closed his eyes.

Jesus save me from this madness .

“Him!”

Rex’s voice again. Pookie couldn’t look — was Rex pointing his way? Would he be the next one to face the boy’s judgment?

“No, leave me alone!”

The voice of Dr. Metz.

Pookie opened his eyes to see the white-robed men dragging the silver-haired medical examiner up to the prow. Rex was watching, nodding, smiling wide with a closed-jaw grin.

“Bring that bully here,” Rex said. “Let the next trial begin!”

Can’t You Smell That Smell?

It was four in the morning and the Muni station was empty. The only obstacle had been a pull-down gate, which Bryan had attacked with his gloved hands, bending and twisting and snapping until he and the others could slip through. From there, they’d hopped turnstiles and headed down unmoving escalators. Even Alder made good time, fast-hobbling on his cane.

The Muni platform spread out in front of them, a long, empty, light-colored floor with deep, blackish tracks below on either side, tracks that led into shadowy tunnels. Aggie led them off the platform and onto the tracks. Adam pointed out the third rail, told everyone it had nine hundred volts, four thousand amps, and to steer clear.

Bryan wasn’t sure if Aggie would make it. The man was literally shaking. On the drive here, Aggie had told his story of a white dungeon, of masked men, of an old shipwreck buried deep underground and a bloated nightmare known as Mommy . With all Bryan had seen and experienced in the last few days, he had no reason to doubt Aggie’s story. There was no question that Aggie believed every word of it — you couldn’t fake that kind of fear.

This had to work. He had to find these things, find the one with the chain-whips, find Pookie.

They walked through the tunnel, along a narrow ledge that paralleled the rails. Flashlights played off grimy white-tiled walls and cinder-filled tracks. They didn’t have long before the station opened again for morning trains. Bryan led, followed by Aggie and the others. John Smith brought up the rear.

Only five minutes into the tunnel, Aggie tapped Bryan on the shoulder.

Bryan turned. “Is this it?”

Aggie’s hands shook, making his flashlight beam jitter on the white tiles. “I don’t know, man. I think I walked about this far. I can’t really remember.”

“You better,” Bryan said, “and fast.” Aggie looked up the tunnel, down the tunnel. He looked at the walls, searching for something.

That scent …

Had Bryan imagined it? He breathed deep through his nose … there it was again, the smell that made him want to do something, made him want to protect .

He put a hand on the tile wall, then knelt on one knee. He looked left, sniffed, paused, looked right, sniffed.

Stronger to the right.

He stood and gently pushed Aggie behind him, then walked on. Yes, stronger .

Footsteps behind him.

“Yo, pig,” Adam said. “What is it?”

Bryan sniffed deep, kept walking. “Aggie brought a baby out of here last night. I think I can smell it.”