Edward Lee - Creekers

“Ugly me,” she wisped. “I know.”

“No, you’re not, Honey,” he said. “You’re just different.”

“Iffer-dent.”

“Yeah, you’re different, that’s all, and there’s nothing wrong with that.” But these words of consolation were hard to form looking at her. Here was proof of what a monster nature could be. It was difficult for Phil to absorb all at once.

She tied the sash of her robe and quickly brushed her hair back in front of her face.

“What about you wanna talk?” she asked.

Crickets trilled in his ears, backed by the bizarre words he remembered. “I want you to tell me about…Ona,” he said.

Suddenly the silence seemed to ooze from another world. Phil thought he could hear the girl’s heart beating.

“Ona,” she said.

“Tell me about Ona. It’s a demon, isn’t it?”

“Ona,” she repeated. Then her hair-cloaked face turned to him—she seemed about to speak.

Holy—

Phil didn’t have time to complete the thought. Shadows jerked and fluttered, maddeningly fast. At once his door was yanked open; misshaped hands reached in and hauled him out of the car. Can’t get to my piece! he realized; one guy had Phil’s arm twisted behind his back, and another had him in a half-nelson.

Creekers.

Phil’s captors held him up on his feet beside the car. The more Phil struggled, the tighter they gripped him. Two more Creekers pulled the girl out and shoved her forward.

Then another figure advanced, a huge figure…

“Welcome to our world,” a voice intoned. The voice was resonant, heavy as lead. “How do you like it?”

Phil squinted up. Standing before him, tall and still and frightfully gaunt, was Cody Natter.

“Tell these fuckin’ apes to—let me go!” Phil shouted.

“In time. But first, I understand you’ve been making some inquiries about my proud family, hmm?” Natter’s cracked face turned toward the girl. “Tell him, Honey. Tell our friend here about Ona.”

The girl, still backed by two Creekers, shivered in Natter’s presence.

“Go on, Honey—”

Then one of the Creekers put a buck knife in her hand.

“—our friend wants to know.” Natter was staring intently at the girl, his smile like a canyon gouged across his face.

“I-uh-yuh—” the girl muttered.

“Go on.”

“I—”

“Go on.”

Natter held his stare.

The girl raised the knife, croaked, “Ona-prey-bee,” then—

“Noooo!” Phil screamed.

—dragged the knife so deeply across her throat that her head fell back as if hinged. She collapsed to the gravel immediately, blood pouring from the wound freely as water from an open spigot.

“You motherfucker!” Phil exclaimed, wincing at the downward pressure on his neck. “You ugly sick Creeker son of a bitch!”

“Really now,” Natter chuckled. “I should think a police officer would be more politically correct.”

I’m made, Phil realized. “Who fingered me?”

Gravel crunched. Natter laughed softly as another figure stepped out of the bank of shadows.

“Hey, bub.”

It was Sullivan, his beady eyes fixed, his grin cocked.

“How the hell did you get out of jail?” Phil demanded.

Sullivan pinched Phil’s face between his fingers. “Well, see, bub, that no-call order you slapped on me didn’t wash with the public defender. He got it pulled. So I gave Mr. Natter here a call, and we had a nice long talk. And he was kind enough to post my bail.”

“Natter, you asshole,” Phil said. “Sullivan’s the one who’s been cornering your dust operation.”

“My ‘dust’ operation, oh dear,” Natter replied. The permanent smile seemed to appraise Phil with hilarity. “So you’re the best that Mullins could summon? Such a sad state of affairs for our local law enforcement contingent.”

“And, bub,” Sullivan added, squeezing Phil’s face harder, “I owe you a couple, and I think I’ll pay ya back right now.”

“Don’t be a fucking id—” Sullivan rammed his fist into Phil’s solar plexus. All the breath in his chest exploded out his throat, and his knees gave out.

“Hold him up. Lemme take a few more pops.”

Phil was hanging by his elbows; his two captors hoisted him back up where his face was suddenly on the receiving end—

whap! whap! whap!

—of Sullivan’s fists. Each blow jarred Phil’s brain.

Then he fell to the ground.

His vision wobbled, his head reeled. Spitting blood, he managed to raise himself to hands and knees, and gasp, “You assholes, I’m a fucking cop, you can’t do this to a cop!”

“Oh, but we can, my good constable,” Natter informed him. Then—

crack!

Sullivan kicked Phil square in the chin. Phil’s upper body snapped back, flipping him completely over in the gravel.

“No witnesses, bub,” Sullivan said, wiping his hands.

Phil was close to passing out. He wasn’t seeing stars, he was seeing galaxies. Footsteps scuffed around him in the gravel; chuckles and crisp laughter fluttered like birds. I’m losing it, Phil thought…

The Creekers picked him up and threw him into the car. Sprawled on the front seat, he sidled over, limp. He sensed more than saw Natter’s big warped face leaning over.

“Go home, officer. And don’t come back.”

“Yeah, later, bub,” Sullivan added. “Hope ta run into ya again sometime. Let’s make it soon.”

“But before you leave,” Natter went on, “don’t forget your prize. It’s well earned.”

More shuffling. More chuckles. Then a squeal…

A sudden weight landed on Phil’s back. Someone else had been tossed into the car. The figures were walking away, their laughter fading. Eventually Phil was able to lift himself up. He turned his head, drooling blood, and saw that the other person they’d thrown into the car was Vicki—

Those sons of bitches…

And he could also see that she’d been beaten considerably worse than he had been.

— | — | —

Twenty-Nine

Somehow, Phil managed to drive back to his room; he didn’t know how he was able to do this—instinct, perhaps. He’d practically had to lug Vicki down the hall. Blood dripping from her mouth left a trail along the floor. But—

Aw, no, he thought once he got her inside and had the door locked. His consciousness tripped around in his head like a rummie about to stumble and fall.

Eventually, and before he could tend to Vicki’s wounds, he did indeed fall.

He fell into the cloaks of his past…

He was ten years old again, on the stairs of the House and running for his life. He’d just seen the whore-girl’s big doglike teeth, and that was all he needed to know that this was the last place in the world he should be. His sneakered feet pounded down the stairs, his torn Green Hornet T-shirt hanging in flaps. Then he stopped short—

Halfway down the steps, he saw the figure.

It was a big figure, big as a wall, and it was just standing there, blocking his way out.

It stood in shadow, backlit. He couldn’t see any features, just its shape, and just that it was big.

“Young man,” it said, “curiosity is a commendable trait, but I think you and I have some talking to do.”

Phil ran back up the stairs, his feet pacing with his heart. When he turned back right, he saw the whore-girl standing there cockeyed and grinning, and the fat guy holding Dawnie, and he was grinning, too…

So he turned again.

And raced back up another set of stairs to the next floor.

He was so scared he couldn’t think. All he could reckon was the necessity of getting away from the giant figure on the stairs. And running up those stairs was like running through a swamp, it was so hot and humid.

A window, he thought mindlessly. Find a window and climb out!