Geezer
by Paddy McRexer

They were drawn together like maggots to a piece of meat - and none of them knew why. They were drawn together to fight an ancient evil, hunched and horrid, smelly and snot encrusted - and none of them knew why. They were drawn together as destiny's children, born to save the world from certain doom - and none of them knew why. Ten people, fighters all, on a journey... a journey to Hell. Some would make it, some would not - and none of them knew why.

* * * *

ADVANCE PRAISE FOR GEEZER

"I have seen the future of horror and it is named Paddy McRexer... this time I'm sure."
      --Stephen King

"Boy oh boy oh boy!"
     --Joe R. Lansdale

"After reading GEEZER, I decided to quit writing. Why bother? What's left?"
     --Robert R. McCammon

"Sure wish I'd writ it!"
     --Dean R. Koontz

"GEEZER was nothing short of inspirational!"
     --Tammy Faye Bakker

"I cried, I laughed, I had a beer, I cried some more... it was an exhausting and moving experience. If you don't read GEEZER you're a real asshole!"
     --Dave Hinchberger

* * * *

Don't miss these other thrilling Paddy McRexer books:

NOONIES

AUTHORS' NOTE

Yeah, it kinda got outta hand. We admit that, okay? It wasn't supposed to be this big and it wasn't supposed to take this long. Sorry sorry sorry. "Geezer" was originally planned as a fairly short offering written to sorta pay homage to various people we care about (it was also great gettin' in a few digs now and then). But it kept growing and growing, like a rotting pumpkin, gettin' all swollen and bloated and squishy to the touch. Yeech! We think we finally stopped it just before it was about to burst.

Maybe not, though. You be the judge.

Thanks are due to all the great friends and relatives written into this work. Our apologies, as well.

Okay, lean back, put your feet up and prepare to be entertained. It's GEEZER time!

     --- Paddy McKillop, Warwickshire, ENG
          Ray Rexer, Essexville, Michigan
          December, 1989

* * * *

GEEZER
is dedicated to Chuck, the Woodchuck

* * * *

This limited first edition is one of only twenty-six copies in existence, all signed by both authors and lettered from A-Z. What a rarity! Oh, you lucky dog, you!

* * * *

GEEZER (c) 1989 by
Paddy McKillop and Ray Rexer

* * * *

- Part One -
The Coming of the Geeze

- ONE -

A strange thing happened to David Hinchberger on the final day of the three-day bookseller's convention he attended in Augusta, Georgia. Stranger things would follow, but he had no way of knowing that, of course, and perhaps that was for the best.

Dave Hinchberger had been known simply as "Hinch" for most of his 29 years. Once in a while, for reasons he couldn't fathom, his wife would call him "Hooter" (and when she did this she would smile a secret smile and look at him so openly that he would blush to the roots) and in college he had been pegged "The Bear" because of his shaggy brown hair and dark full beard, but mostly it was just "Hinch." And Dave liked it that way. He was 6-2 and somewhat over 200 pounds. He looked more like a football player than a book dealer and had, as a matter of fact, played semi-pro ball one season for the Georgia Stingers, until a teammate with the unlikely name of Tyson Blue snapped his leg during a scrimmage. It wasn't a bad break, at least as far as football injuries go, but it didn't quite heal right and at odd times it bothered him still.

At 29 Hinch was exquisitely content with his life. He loved his job, he loved his wife and he loved everything in between (that being Ian and Johnathan, the two Hinchkids). His job was selling books, which he thought of as selling happiness. He did this through his own thriving mail order business, The Overlook Connection, an idea conceived in the hospital while the plaster dried on his mangled leg. His wife was the former Laurie Pike, whom he sometimes called "Lauriecakes" - but only when the guys weren't around. They had met, absurdly enough, while flying kites one fine and blustery day in R. Jeff Wood Memorial Park. Their strings had become entangled and Dave did the decent thing: he married her. There wasn't a day gone by that he didn't bless the gust that blew their lives together. Not a day.

Yes, at 29 David Hinchberger - call him Hinch or call him Hooter but don't call him late for lunch - was a happy man. Life just seemed to be going his way. Things could not be better. But sometimes late at night, with Laurie snuggled close and the sweet Georgia air drifting warm through his open bedroom window, he thought things could be worse. And he wondered how long before they would be.

As it turned out, it wasn't long.

The convention hall was nearly deserted. Dave looked around and counted less than half a dozen booths still open. A trio of customers wandered listlessly about for a few minutes and then left the hall. He noticed an old man with a dirty gray beard staring at him from three booths down. Dave nodded and smiled. The old man lifted a scrawny arm as if to wave and then... it looked like he flipped his middle finger at Dave in a well-known obscene gesture. But surely that was wrong. The old guy just waved, that's all. You're tired, Dave old sack, your brain's going goofy on you. When you start seeing old men flipping you off, when you start seeing guys old enough to be your grandfather flying the almighty bird your way, well then it's time to boogie on, it's time to punch the clock and crack a beer 'cause you've been working too hard.

Dave shook his head and started to pack.

The dealers on either side of him had bugged out at noon, leaving him all alone in his section of the convention hall. Dave hadn't been sorry at all to see the dealer to his right leave. The man had an attitude problem. More than once during the weekend, when the pompous jerk started going on and on about how much profit he was pulling in off his books, Dave had to restrain himself from reaching over and swatting the guy a good one upside his bony little head and telling him he weren't no better than a Chicago pimp, whoring his books the way he did. "If you do it for the money, you're a monkey." He had read that somewhere a long time ago and finally he'd said it to the guy, who had just looked at him like he had a worm wiggling out of his nose. But at least it had shut the moron up.

Dave himself did it for the books. Sure, the money was nice, and to be honest, it was pretty darn important (kinda hard to EAT a book - although Dave had once tried it on a drunken bet). But it wasn't THE reason he did it. THE reason was the books. Dave loved them. He treated them just like what they were to him: his friends. He dealt in a wide variety of titles but specialized in hard to find volumes. Most people called the types of books he sold "horror novels" or less commonly "dark fantasy." Dave just called them "good reads." There were several of these displayed on the table before him, books he had yet to pack away. Books by Robert R. McCammon and Dean R. Koontz. A limited edition Stephen King book that was bound in heavy stainless steel and listed at over twenty-two hundred bucks. Titles by Steve Spignesi, Ray Garton and Joe R. Lansdale (Dave's personal fav). All good reads. All well worth the price of admission.

He continued to pack. It was four o'clock. If he left Augusta by five he could be home in time for popcorn, the Sunday Night Movie and Laurie. He bent to his task, carefully wrapping the books he packed in protective plastic before easing them into cartons. He was hunkered down behind his booth, totally absorbed in the job, when he heard a sharp noise. He looked up, startled. The old man he had seen earlier was standing before him. He looked at Dave sourly and slapped the top of the counter again with an open palm. He was a short man permanently bent at the waist. Up close his beard was more nicotine-colored than gray. It corkscrewed from his chin in all directions like a wildly sprung wire brush. His face was cracked with deep wrinkles that stretched unpleasantly when he spoke. He carried a spoiled odor with him.

"Oh, hi," Dave said, looking up. "How can I help you?"

"You can slit your throat for starters," the old man croaked.

"Huh?"

"Whattaya deaf AND ugly?"

"I'm sorry?"

"You sure as hell are."

Dave got up, puzzled. His bad leg shot a spear of pain at him and he winced. "Is there something you need?" he said through the pain.

The old guy screwed up his face in a parody of Dave's. "Is there something you neeeeed?" he mocked. "Is there something you neeeeed?" He picked up a book - Lansdale's "Act of Love" - and threw it at Dave with unexpected force.

"Hey! Jesus, mister!" The book struck Dave a stinging slap in the face. "What the hell-"

The old man, cat-quick, whipped another missile, this time a boxed set of McCammon paperbacks. Dave ducked but the corner of the box caught him a ringing blow in his right ear and the paperbacks scattered behind him.

"I hate you!" the old man screamed. It was a piercing schoolgirl scream and it floored Dave with its intensity. For just a second the old man LOOKED like a schoolgirl, a corrupt, wrinkled-up schoolgirl. "I hate yooooou!" The voice was a shrill siren.

Dave was stunned. He quickly looked about the hall for help, his head jerking from side to side. The place was deserted. He was alone with this nut.

"Now calm down, mister." Dave made placating gestures with his hands. "Just calm down."

"I'll give you calm down, you weasel-dicked moron. I'll slice out your liver is what I'll do!" The old man grabbed the stainless steel covered King book and brandished it in one hand like a knife, swishing the thirteen-pound book from side to side. "I hate you! Now and forever!"

"Jeeze, mister. Come on..." Dave kept a wary eye on his twenty-two hundred dollar book. The old man whipsawed the heavy book through the air effortlessly. "Calm down. Come on, I don't even know who you are."

"I'm your worst nightmare, you shit-eating punk! I'm a lunatic with a book. I'm the Devil with a blue dress on. I am the walrus. I am woman, f'r crissakes, hear me roar!" With that the old man reared back his grizzled head and let loose a hideous shriek. Dave stepped back against the sound and tripped over a carton. He landed hard on his tailbone, the back of his head snapped into the cinder block wall behind him. His teeth came together with an audible click and he bit his tongue. He saw stars the same time he tasted blood.

Almost immediately he was yanked upright by the collar of his shirt, in one fluid motion. A seam ripped with a purr. His tongue ached. He blinked hard to clear his vision and found himself within kissing distance of the old man, staring into yellow rheumy eyes, smelling the old man's cloying breath, feeling its sickening warmth on his cheek. The old man inched him closer, moving Dave's 220 pounds effortlessly. He looked at Dave fiercely.

"If you go there, I'll kill you," he said with soft assurance. There was no insanity in his face as he spoke. His teeth shown yellow and rotted. "I'll kill you. I will."

And then he was gone. He gave Dave a final shake, dropped him, and walked out of the room as cocky as Billy-be-sure. Dave winced at the pain in his swollen tongue and watched the old man go.

If you go there, I'll kill you.

* * * *

- TWO -

Tim Titus stood oblivious to the fierce Tucson sun as it burned into the back of his tanned neck. Raised here in Arizona where constant heat was a way of life and "snow" and "wind chill factor" were, at best, abstract concepts, Tim was a child of the blazing desert. He was also decidedly "hip," a "now" teenager, a "with-it cat." Tim was the "grooviest" thing in all of Tucson.

And did he know it!

"You handsome some of a gun," he told himself as he admired his reflection in a downtown Tucson shop window. He thought he was probably as near to perfection as the human race is likely to come, and he didn't mind sharing the secret with the rest of the planet. Hell, when you've got it, flaunt it, that was Tim's credo. Today he was flaunting it in a natty pair of predominantly purple beach shorts, a lime green T-shirt, and brilliant white sneakers with scientifically molded insoles for whole foot comfort and optimum sweat dispersal.

It was not easy for Tim to maintain his culture-vulture status in a town like Tucson, which boasted a completely "hip"-less population (Tim observed that not all of Tucson's pricks were to be found on cacti). If it wasn't for John's Fashion Emporium And Dental Surgery, the only store for 200 miles with any sense of style, he would be condemned to a future of drab denim, corduroy, and apparel woefully unsuited to one of his bounteous physical attributes. John's stocked a snazzy line in clothes and Tim idled away many an hour riffling through racks of the latest designs, to the sweet background music of teeth being pulled.

With understandable reluctance, Tim broke away from his self-admiration. He had a hot date lined up for the evening and he needed a new outfit to compliment his aforementioned perfection. John's would have something exciting and different, he was sure.

He was right.

"Oh, hi Tim," gushed Mavis McNichol from behind her cash register as he entered the store.

"Yeah," allowed Tim, instantly dismissing the mousy woman. He was aware of the lust, in her eyes and knew that she - like soooo many others - had a crush on him, but he was only one guy, one guy in a world of desperate women and mindful of not spreading himself too thin, he rejected advances from anyone less than an eight on the official Tim Titus Ten Scale. He saw himself as a precious resource and dare not spend himself on the first resident of Uglyville to throw herself at his feet.

Leaving Mavis to stew in her smitten juices, Tim strolled through the store, browsing amid the racks of multihued shirts and jackets and beach shorts. One particularly vivid pair of beach shorts caught Tim's eye (caught it, gripped it, and squeezed it dry, such was the colorful splendor invested in the material). He knew instantly that only HIS frame could do justice to such a garment.

He summoned plain Mavis with a click of his fingers and she raced toward him knowing that he probably only wanted a little assistance, but praying in her heart that he really wanted to take her in his manly arms, grind his lips against hers, caress her trembling body, proclaim his undying love and plunge her into wild ecstasy. Oh, which would it be? Which?

"You got these in my size, Mavis?" asked Tim.

Surprise, sur-friggin'-prise, thought Mavis. Ah well. "Yeah, sure."

"I'm size..."

"Oh, I know your size, Tim," interrupted Mavis. She knew his size, all right. Every classic inch of his entire body was imprinted on her brain as if carved on stone tablets. She could tell you his every measurement down to the smallest fraction. Well, almost every measurement - there was still one or two she desired (and how!) to learn. "I'll get them for you," she said and slinked away to the stockroom. Tim ignored her as he did most plain-Janes.

When she returned with the shorts, Tim took them from her and dismissed her with a curt "That'll be all, thanks." Mavis returned to her cash register to nurse her wounded ardor.

Tim held the shorts to his waist and stood before the mirror, trying to gauge how they would look. Seemed okay, but he needed to try them on to get the full effect. He retired to the changing booth. As he forsook his purple shorts for the new design - a complex pattern employing, it seemed, every single color known to mankind - he heard the counter telephone ring. That usually signaled some minor crisis back in the dental part of the store needing Mavis' helping hand, and Tim was not surprised to find himself alone when he exited his booth, resplendent in his-new outfit. And a dashing figure he cut and make no mistake. He looked terrific, even if he did say so himself. "Man, it's no wonder the girls go wild over you," he told his reflection in the mirror. "What a sight."

"Why, thank you very much, kind sir," came a hoarse voice from behind Tim, somewhere back in the shadows. "I do try to look my best."

Tim whirled around. "Who's there?" he demanded, his cheeks flushing at having been overheard talking to himself. How embarrassing. "Who's there, dammit, show yourself!"

"Oooh, take it easy, fella," answered the disembodied voice.

Tim repeated his demand.

"Okay sonny, here I come, ready or not. You wanna gimme a fanfare?"

"I'll give you more than that in a minute, now get out here!" His blood raced and he'd unconsciously clenched his fists. Tim was very touchy about being caught talking to himself, every since his high school English teacher, Mr. Bacon, had been dragged from class by three burly white-robed gentlemen and taken to a special kind of farm for talking to himself (he also sometimes wore his underwear on the outside of his pants during class). If the stranger wanted to make cheap cracks about Tim, he'd better be ready to face the consequences.

"Okay, so no fanfare," lamented the voice, "although I honestly think I deserve one. But no matter." There was a slight pause before the voice said, "Here I come, angel face," and a rack of Italian suits was cast aside, and out jumped the closet comedian.

Tim's initial reaction was to burst into gales of derisive laughter, but even as he drew in the breath to execute the reaction, some deep-rooted self-preservation instinct clamped his mouth shut. It was a certain quality in the man's stare which suggested to Tim that this was far from a laughing matter.

"Handsome bugger, ain't I?" said the man, probably in jest but possibly, just possibly in dead earnest. Of all the words Tim might have chosen to describe the figure which now stood less than three yards from him, "handsome" was the furthest from his mind.

For a start, the man was old, very old - Tim guessed eighties but it could have been nearer three figures. He was bent at the waist as if the weight of the years was too great a burden for his scrawny shoulders to support, and his wizened face played host to a grizzled, discolored beard. But it was the old geezer's clothing which convinced Tim that this was a fully paid up, bona fide, card carrying Loony Tune. Except for a pair of grubby beach shorts, the man was buck naked, robed only in the filth and grime of countless decades of soap avoidance. His body stench blended with the exotic aroma wafting from his shorts, which Tim first took to be printed with a convoluted, haphazard pattern, but quickly discovered were decorated with a pebble-dash of vomit and human excrement. Tim gagged.

"Don't be shy now, I can see you're attracted to me. Everyone tells me I ooze sex appeal." The gnarled figure assumed a body-builder's pose.

He oozed something, all right, but Tim doubted it was sex appeal. "Jesus," he whispered.

"No, I'm not Jesus, though I can understand your mistake, I do have a sort of beatific air to me, don't I? The man wiped his snot-dripping nose on his forearm, a model of good manners and breeding.

"Whaddaya want?" Tim asked uncertainly.

"Well, what I REALLY want is to take this here coat-hanger" - he reached out and plucked one from a nearby rack - "use it as a grappling hook, and go fishing for your intestinal tract. That's what I really WANT to do." He grinned.

"You wha...?"

"You bet yer beauty kit I 'wha...,' and I'll 'wha...' even more when I'm wearing your lower bowel for a necklace. C'mere!"

The old man lunged at Tim whose reflexes were too slow to avoid the bony, grasping fingers. The pair tumbled to the floor, the old man landing on top of Tim in a parody of a lover's embrace.

"We really must stop meeting like this," cooed the geriatric weirdo and planted a sloppy, germ-infested kiss on Tim's nose.

Only the fear in Tim's soul prevented him from throwing-up into the man's steel-wool beard.

"Like I told you," continued the semi-clad nutcase, breathing noxious breaths right into Tim's face, "I'd LIKE to make a fishin' pond of ya, and I WILL if I'm forced. You hear me? If you FORCE me, that coat-hanger is gonna boldly go where no man has gone before. So take warning if you wanna walk like a man the rest of your days - don't you go there! Got that? Don't you go! Or you'll know how an apple feels when it's cored. Kapeesh?"

Tim didn't kapeesh what day of the week it was but he nodded furiously anyway, like a woodpecker on PCP.

"Terrific," said the old guy, jumping to his feet and skipping toward the exit, an absurd but mortally threatening figure. As he reached the door he turned back to Tim. He lasciviously kissed the hooked end of the coat-hanger and mouthed the words "don't you go" before disappearing out into the mid-day heat.

The tinkling of the bell above the door brought Mavis back into the clothing department where she found Tim lying bewildered on the floor. She knelt beside him but he stared right through her. As he gradually came out of his fugue he looked down at his shorts. What he saw pitched him once more into ga-ga land - some of the putrid filth and slime from the old man's shorts had rubbed off onto Tim's own. In a frantic, frenzied blur of whirling limbs he wrestled his way out of the infected shorts and hurled them twenty-feet away. He sat on the floor in just his T-shirt and skimpy mock-satin underwear, breathing heavily.

But not as heavily as Mavis McNichol - she thought her time had come at last and started discarding items of her own clothing. For the second time that day Tim Titus found himself fighting off unwelcomed advances.

* * * *

- THREE -

"I'm the funniest guy I know," Officer Leonard J. Norman said to his reflection in the rearview mirror of his parked patrol car. He grinned a maniac's grin, overbite flashing white rabbit's teeth back at him in the soft glow of the early morning sun. He pushed his thick glasses down to the end of his nose, waggled his prematurely graying eyebrows up and down Groucho-style and said, "Ah-yup. That's wight, wabbit. Fun-nee." Len laughed a good one and shook his head. "Man, oh, man, sometimes I crack me up."

He was happy because his latest "command bash" was going so well. He had just finished attending a particularly satisfying roll call session with a certain irate patrol sergeant that proved just how well the "bash" was going. The sergeant was pissed, and wasn't that just fine? Wasn't that what it was all about? You bet. Well, the sergeant may have been pissed but Len was happy, and that, my friends, was a rare emotion for him lately. Leonard Norman hated police work.

He had been working for the Bay City Police Department for fifteen years now, which was the equivalent of 105 years in a dog's life and since police work WAS undoubtedly a dog's life, he should have been allowed to retire years ago. At least that was his argument. But Leonard wasn't an unreasonable man. He'd be willing to take his pension today and boogie on his way - no hard feelings - if they'd just let him. But unfortunately it didn't work that way and the sad truth was he had ANOTHER fifteen years to go before he could hang up his rusty-trusty six-shooter (and it really was rusty, a fact that the station commander had pointed out to him only yesterday) and put his badge to rest. Fifteen years. Not unlike a life sentence, as far as he was concerned. The thought of it was almost too painful to contemplate.

But he had learned to cope and "command bashing" was one way. A command bash was simply a prank - and the nastier the better - pulled off anonymously on one of the department's command officers. The bosses. Weasels was more like it, according to Leonard who referred to them collectively as "a bunch of empty-headed dickless wonders with rat shit hearts and chicken guts." To be successful, a command bash had to drive its victim completely batshit. Len's bash was doing just that.

He had targeted Sergeant Thomas Williams, a ruddy-faced, stubby runt of a man who thought he was just about the hottest cop to ever have strapped on a sam-browne belt. Williams was known throughout the department as "Longneck" because of his well-known penchant for bottles of the same name - or rather the liquid contained within those bottles. His breath was a constant disaster of cigarettes, Old Milwaukee, Dentyne gum and God only knew what else. Len sometimes wondered how Longneck's wife could bare to kiss such a toxic waste pit. Maybe she didn't. Longneck's hair was short and waxed, the color of moldy hay. He had a nose like an over-ripe pomegranate and Len had a theory that if anyone ever smacked him in that ugly bazoo it'd probably burst like a cherry tomato. He also thought he'd like to be the one to test that theory. He hated Sergeant Longneck Williams as much as he hated police work itself. Williams was a badge-heavy brute, quick with the stick and fast with the boot. Many a prisoner found himself sporting morning bruises after a booking session with Longneck. If anyone deserved to be bashed it was certainly him.

So Leonard didn't feel the least bit guilty about farting over the air at the sergeant. It was his way of telling the world that Longneck Williams was an amazing turd. And it was a great command bash besides. It was driving Longneck perfectly batshit. He had been farting over the radio at Longneck for about a week now. He didn't actually physically hold the mike to his ass and crank one off, that would be a bit too crude for even Len's decidedly bizarre ways. What he did do was produce an amazingly realistic farting sound by keying the radio mike and rubbing it across the finger ribs on the patrol car's steering wheel. The result was a satisfying ffurrrp! And if he did this while turning the steering wheel briskly in a circle and letting it spin back on its own, he could generate an impossibly long fart. Fffurrrrrrrrrrpppp! It was great.

Leonard Norman was a very creative cop.

Sergeant Longneck Williams was not amused.

Yesterday, Longneck had gotten into his squad car and had called in service to Central Dispatch as usual. He did this in a nauseatingly superior manner which made Leonard want to sic up his breakfast (four egg McMuffins and a large OJ). Len knew the sergeant had the hots for the morning shift dispatcher, a sexy-voiced vixen Longneck was always trying to impress.

"Command-one to Central," Longneck Williams intoned in his clipped, professional voice.

"Go ahead," the vixen purred.

"Ffurrrp!"

"Repeat?"

"Ffurrrp!"

"Unable to copy."

"Ffurrrp!"

"Central to command-one, do you have traffic?" She sounded indignant now.

"That was not me, Central! That was-"

"Fffurrrrrrrrrrpppp!"

There had been silence for a moment and then a gasping unidentifiable voice came over the radio and said, "Gawd! Somebody open a window!"

So this morning at roll call Sergeant Longneck Williams had declared war on the phantom farter. He'd lined up all eight sleepy officers who had gathered in the squadroom to start their morning shift and he stood before them like a miniature general. His problem nose seemed almost ready to explode on its own; his face was ruddier than ever.

"I want the farting to stop," he said sternly, directing the command to all in the room but looking right at Leonard as he spoke.

"Tums works for me," Richard Greene, a dumb but happy 19-year veteran quipped.

"Not funny," the sergeant said, peering at Greene. "Not funny at all. Police work is for professionals." He looked back at Len. "We don't need no stinkers on this department."

Len almost laughed. Stinkers? Did he say stinkers?

"And I promise you this," - now he was within inches of Len's face and his fetid breath flowed in oily, sickening waves - "I WILL catch the offending party and he WILL suffer for his actions."

Leonard yawned.

Sergeant Longneck scowled, staring hard at Len with his patented killer-cop look for a moment. Then he backed up a step. "May I remind you all that farting over the radio airwaves is a federal offense according to the FCC." This brought on waves of barely stifled laughs from the "professionals" in the room. "This is not funny!" Longneck shook his head, seemed about to say something more, looked at Len again and then stalked out of the room.

Len had parked his patrol car in a nice little nook that ran partway under a bridge on the west side of the Hoffman River, a semi-polluted waterway that divided the town of Bay City pretty much in half. It was his favorite spot to sit and hide, well out of the way of the prying eyes of the public and the black soul of his miserable sergeant. He liked to look at the river as he drank his coffee, polluted or not it was pretty in the early morning sun. The nook was also a fine place to catch up on his reading, his one great joy in life. Len loved horror fiction, and a day when he could put in a hundred pages with Stephen King or Joe R. Lansdale or Ric McCammon was a happy day for him. He called these "century days" and his wife Meg knew a century day when she saw it the moment he walked in from work. It was on his face. The kids knew it too, and seeing it, they would relax a bit, Luke going back to his Sports Illustrated, Mandy to her telephone.

Len unscrewed the cap from his battered old thermos and poured himself a cup of coffee. "Quality time," he said and tipped the cup to the river, "courtesy of the City of Bay City." He took a sip, smacked his lips, decided the coffee was too good to savor and downed it in three large gulps. He set the cup down - it was a brown porcelain job he had picked up at a truckload sale and it had served him well over the years - and was reaching for his book when the police radio crackled to life.

"Shit," he muttered. It wasn't even seven o'clock. People had no business calling the police until at least after nine. He watched the radio as the red signal light came on and then incredibly he heard his OWN voice over the air.

"Number-seven to command-one."

Len stared at the radio. It was clearly his own voice. He blinked twice in dumb wonder.

"Go ahead, number-seven," Sergeant Longneck Williams spit out, his tone plainly caustic. He hated Leonard as much as Leonard hated him.

"Yeah, just wanted to tell you that you're a real dickhead," the phantom Leonard said. "A real tosspot of a dickhead."

Len barked a laugh in spite of himself, sitting wide-eyed in his patrol car staring at the radio. What the hell was going on here?

There was a pause before Longneck replied and then it was with the unmistakable tone of victory in his voice. "Number-seven," he said almost gaily, "return to the station at once."

"Command-one," the Leonard voice said mockingly, "eat my shorts."

There was another pause, shorter this time, and then Longneck's voice came back sharp. "Officer Norman, I said return to the station. Now!"

"Suck my fat one you cheap dime store hood."

Len couldn't believe what he had heard. You can't talk like that over the air...even he wouldn't do that. But he just had...or at least Longneck would think he had, which was just as bad. Oh, man, if farting over the airwaves was a federal offense...

"I didn't say that," he muttered to the radio, "that wasn't me."

This would've been the all-time great command bash under different circumstances; even in his distressed state Len could appreciate that. But as it stood now, he was knee deep in day-old shit and sinkin' fast. He had to do something to save himself. He reached for the mike. He'd call the sergeant and tell him, he'd say someone had pulled a classic on him, he'd say--

The radio suddenly burst into an ear-piercing squeal that shook all rational thought from Len. He clamped his hands over his ears instinctively and screamed, almost matching the radio's incredibly high pitched note. Blood trickled from his nose. His brain slammed in his head. The radio screeched on and on. Alongside him the porcelain coffee cup suddenly shattered in a violent spray of glass, cutting his face in a pattern of bloody dots. "Jesus!" Len cried. "Jesus!" His stomach reeled, he tasted bile in his throat. He had to get out. His head spun. He was going to throw up, he was going to--

The noise stopped, just as suddenly as it had begun. Len felt dizzy. His eyes watered. The radio emitted a final abrupt burrrpt! and he recoiled, wincing.

And then a clear voice, strong but old, came over the radio and said, "Now that's entertainment!"

Len moaned and held his gut.

"I guess maybe I'M the funniest guy you know now, hey hotshot?" the old voice said and cackled. "I got a million of 'em. A friggin' million."

Len groaned. What was going on here?

"And here's one. What did the homicidal old man say to the pecker-headed cop? Give up? Huh? I asked you a question, Len-ny!"

Len shook his head dumbly, barely aware of doing it.

"He said - and get this, it'll slay you - he said, 'If you go there, you're dead.' Get it? DEAD!"

The radio speaker blew with a pop. Len's stomach heaved and he couldn't help himself, he threw up on his baby blue uniform shirt.

* * * *

- FOUR -

Mary loved her apartment. The owners took great care of the building (they had recently repainted and newly carpeted all of the hallways), the rent was reasonable for a college town like Ann Arbor where one-bedrooms sometimes went as high as four-fifty a month, her neighbors were friendly and best of all, the security was good. Very good. The owners were quite safety conscious. The doors to every apartment were solid steel outfits and sported heavy-duty Masterlock deadbolts. No one got into their apartment without having two separate keys, one for the building's exterior door and one for the individual apartment itself. Yup, Mary loved her apartment; she felt safe there. Cozy.

So it was a great surprise to her, after bounding up the three newly carpeted flights of stairs one day after work and opening up her heavy apartment door, to find a smelly old man lying on her couch watching her TV. He was munching on the chocolate chip cookies she had baked for her brother and drinking low-fat milk right out of the carton. Crumbs and melted chocolate stuck to the old man's wild beard. Milk dribbed through his whiskers and soaked into the couch cushions. He had his grubby barefeet propped up on the arm of the couch; the pads of his feet were yellow and callused, the toenails long and curled, the stink was incredible. He held the TV remote control in his hand and he pointed it at Mary as she stared at him, one hand still on the apartment door.

"Bang! You're dead," he said and pushed the remote's channel button. "Bang!"

* * * *

- FIVE -

Clint Strohman was an amazing package for a four-year old. He had come into the world a nine- and a half-pound whirlwind, every bit the match of the wild hurricane named Hugo that would blow the dickens out of his Laurel Bay, South Carolina neighborhood just one month later.

His development, both physically and mentally, was a medical wonder. He was a prodigy in everything he did. He could read at college level and sometimes devoured as many as a dozen books a week. He could play the piano like Van Cilburn - and not better ONLY because his fingers were the short and stubby appendages of a four-year old. He could dance with the skill of Mikhail Baryshnikov, jumping and spinning his little legs around with incredible coordination. He could sing like Frank Sinatra, when the mood struck him anyway (sometimes he would break into his baby-voiced version of "New York - New York" while his mother Mary Jo bathed him and she would laugh fit to split and barely be able to finish the job). He spoke six different languages, did five-figure math in his head and could tell you the outside temperature to the tenth of a degree simply by holding his wet index finger up to the air.

Clint Strohman was a wonder, all right. Quite a kid.

He was built like a miniature working model of his father Jeff, a muscular Marine who sometimes called his son "Bam-bam" (after the impossibly strong cartoon baby of Barney and Betty Rubble), and who often wondered, while watching the muscles ripple like small twisted cables under Clint's footie-pajamies, just how long it would be before Clint could whip him in a fair fight. Not long, he thought. Not long at all.

He had his mother's golden face and easy smile and people couldn't help but love him the moment they met him. He possessed an amazing amount of natural charisma, powerful enough to someday take him to the top. In years to come, he would slay the ladies.

Mary Jo thought her son was just about as close to perfection as a son could be. Whenever he looked up at her with his angel eyes and loving innocence, she thought she might just split with the amount of love she felt for him. She found herself smiling a lot, thinking how lucky she was to have him. What a perfect little boy! What a treasure! She would never let anything bad happen to him. Never.

But, she wasn't aware that Clint knew how to drive. She didn't know he had been collecting maps of Colorado for several weeks now. She knew nothing about the strange invitation he had received, nothing about his plans to attend the party in Boulder.

* * * *

- SIX -

Herbert Aloysius Fockley was speeding along the Wisconsin backroads as fast as the travel-weary Ford pick-up would allow, churning up a roiling cloud of dust which followed his progress as he raced against time, never too particular about sticking to one side of the highway. He was intent on getting Eddie to the hospital. Eddie and his arm.

Eddie Fockley was just plain stupid. No one disputed the fact - stupid is stupid and Eddie was stupidity personified. The stupid thing he did that day was to think that Evangeline Watts - the busty daughter of Zeke Watts, on whose farm Herbert and Eddie were helping out all week - lusted after HIS body as passionately as HE lusted after HERS. Now, Evangeline regularly fetched a nice cold pitcher of milk to the men working in the field, waiting on each in turn as they drank their fill. Eddie tracked her every move with the ope-eyed gaze of the hopelessly smitten, and when she approached him and uttered the eminently mis-interpretable line "Wanna sip of my milk, Ed?" something inside him just snapped and the stupidity monster went on the rampage.

Eddie immediately struck a pose which might have been intended as a John-Wayne-only-tougher but to the un-stupid eye looked more like a Gabby-Hayes-only-constipated. Then he reached out and grabbed Evangeline's wrist to crush her ample bosom against his yearning chest - make that MANLY chest. He misinterpreted her resistance as girlish teasing and planted a huge, moist smacker right on her ruby-reds. Well, needless to say Evangeline was not pleased. She viciously raised her right leg and Eddie crot a knee's worth right where no man, not even one as plain stupid as he, welcomes hostile attentions. Then she swung the pitcher and Eddie found himself wearing a brand new tin hat. And finally she landed a devastating right upper-cut which came from so deep there was magma dripping off it. Eddie caught it square on the chin and it sent him staggering back, arms flailing.

Alas for poor Eddie, he staggered into the threshing machine and when he came out there was one less arm flailing.

All hell broke loose, naturally. Eddie got kind of upset; and Evangeline's rage, which had been replaced by shock when she saw how Eddie was becoming a lesser person in the thresher, returned with a vengeance when the gore-spraying stump made brief contact with her treasured chest in what she perceived as an accidental-on-purpose cop-a-feel gesture. Armless he may be, but harmless he ain't, thought Evangeline, and rewarded him with a second upper-cut. Eddie was saved another amputation when he tripped on the FIRST severed arm which the thresher had found not to its taste and vomited out onto the dirt. Eddie landed in a heap, screaming; Evangeline stood nearby, screaming; most of the other workmen were screaming with laughter; and Herbert was struck dumb, awe-inspired by the amount of pure unadulterated stupidity housed within Eddie's cranial cavity.

Eventually, Eddie was helped into Herbert's truck, his loose arm jammed into the glove compartment for safe keeping ("Take it to your Ma, Ed," cracked Ben Salzmann, "It'll make a great stew."), and it was off to the hospital in nearby Oshkosh for a bit of doctoring.

When Herbert, Eddie and Lefty (for 'twas his left arm that had become detached) reached the hospital, a very attractive young nurse loaded Eddie into a wheelchair and propelled him at break-neck speed into the emergency room, where better qualified medico's took over. The nurse, now redundant, chatted amiably with Herbert. She had a sweet voice, the type that cries out for someone to take it in their arms and whisper tender oaths to it. Come to think of it, her face and body supported that impression, too. For the first time in his life, Herbert Fockley began to entertain the concept of love at first sight. Yes, she was certainly something rather special, this angel of mercy. Herbert kept her in conversation for the better part of twenty minutes, breaking off only when Eddie's wail of "Oh no!" and the beckoning wave of another nurse reminded him of his reason for being there. He excused himself and went to attend Eddie.

Eddie had remained conscious throughout, though in a state of shock. After a lengthy examination and some swift action to tend his wounded stump, things seemed to be stabilizing quite nicely. Then Eddie asked the doctor, "Is it serious, Doc?" Somewhat taken aback by the slightly stupid question, the doctor told him that yes, it WAS pretty serious, he'd lost his left arm. "And you can't stick it back on, Doc?" The doctor was sorry but no, it was off for good, but given time Eddie would learn to adapt. The word "time" sent another stupidity synapse triggering inside Eddie's head and he looked round frantically for the severed arm. It was lying forlorn and lonesome in a shiny steel tray and when he saw it he yelled "Oh no!" and began to blubber like an upset child. Only the appearance of Herbert could persuade him to calm down. "For Heaven's sake, Eddie, what's wrong?" implored Herbert. "Oh Herbie, Herbie," sobbed Eddie, "Pa's gonna kill me, he's gonna crucify me!" "But WHY, Eddie?" Eddie's face was grave. "I was wearin' HIS watch when I went through the thresher and now it's GONE!" He pointed with his one remaining arm to the bare-wristed arm-that-was. Herbert reassured him that he would square its loss with Pa, don't worry. When Eddie was finally sedated and safely asleep for the night, Herbert returned home, wondering how the hell he was going to explain THIS one back at the ranch.

The upshot of Eddie's unfortunate encounter with Evangeline "Slugger" Watts and his subsequent hospitalization was that Herbert got to see a lot more of the sexy nurse. It became quite a serious relationship, with many a weekend dance date and the odd midweek movie date. Long after Eddie returned home, now possibly an armful less stupid (but possibly not), Herbert continued to court the fair maiden. Over a period of months it became obvious that they shared many interests and that they were beginning to feel quite close to each other. Whenever people saw the couple out walking hand in hand, it was instantly apparent that there went a couple destined for a long and fulfilling life together.

And so it happened. Herbert Aloysius Fockley married Margery Elyce Armstrong five months to the day since Eddie's accident. Eddie lost an arm, Herbert found a wife, and though no one yet knew it, the animal conservation movement received into its number a duo who would rock the world with their meet-like/with-like philosophy.

Thirty years on, Herb and Marge's love for each other had grown even stronger, their commitment to nature ever more resolute. So when, one bright Summer morning, Marge threw open the bedroom drapes to welcome in the golden sunlight and discovered instead the atrocity laid out on the back lawn, both she and her darling husband dedicated themselves to the apprehension of the foul perpetrator of this most dastardly of deeds. Whoever it was who had thought that such a stunt would cow the Fockleys into trembling submission had made a gross miscalculation.

To warn the Fockleys "DON'T GO" is to simply arouse their curiosity. "DON'T GO" Where? To what? And why not.? Hmm, intriguing.

And to spell out that warning on their back lawn, written in giant letters in that disgusting and depraved fashion is to arouse their FURY.

Whoever had cautioned "DON'T GO", forming the giant letters with the corpses of 37 murdered woodchucks, would come to rue the day he ever crossed the Fockleys and incurred their WRATH.

THE WRATH OF HERB AND MARGE!!!

* * * *

- SEVEN -

Dan Schroeder, known as "Mr. Dan" to his thousand or so employees, lined up a putt on the eighteenth green of his private golf course in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and smiled the smile of a happy man. When Dan smiled his eyes disappeared into happy little slits behind their fashionable wire-rim glasses and he looked not so much like the Great American Businessman he was, but like a horny little Chinaman with Geishas on the brain. When he smiled his face shifted and turned, the skin tightening and crinkling into a multitude of tiny character lines as dozens of finely tuned muscles worked a feat of facial magic to create a Daniel R. Schroeder original. It really was something to behold.

He wouldn't be smiling much in a few minutes, as a matter of fact he'd be doing a bit of screaming, but until then he was as happy as a maggot on a turd. And why not? Danny had it made. He had grabbed the proverbial brass ring and had held on tight. He had won the game of life. For one thing, he got play golf whenever he wanted - which was nearly every waking moment. For another, he was rich. His gross annual income had just topped the three-million dollar mark and this, for some reason, caused him untold joy. Success, riches, good looks (he couldn't deny it, he was a hunk) and only 36 years old. Yeah, Dan Schroeder had his reasons for being happy.

So he went on smiling the smile of a happy man as he surveyed the putt he knew he'd make. He surveyed it with the lazy confidence of someone who knew he was the best, simply the greatest putter in the world. No question about it. The absolute best. No one even close. Not even that Jack Nicklaus guy, who could knocked the dimples right the piss off a golf ball and make it look easy, but who lacked the finesse to be a truly gifted putter. Like Dan. "That hot-cock couldn't knock a three-foot putt into a four-foot hole," Dan had once sullenly proclaimed while watching Jack miss a short putt during a televised tournament. After tipping back a few with the guys Dan sometimes referred to him as "Jack Dick-a-less."

Dan Schroeder was the largest distributor of specialty golf equipment in the world. His stores, known as "Mr. Dan's," were in all fifty states and nine different countries. It had all started as a small operation in his basement workshop with him designing and manufacturing wooden putters for his friends. Wooden putters were a thing of the past but Dan, with great business aplomb, made them a profitable thing of the future. The putters were wood in their shaft only; the blade that struck the ball was metal. But Dan was able to turn them into a thing of beauty as a whole, beauty unmatched for putting accuracy. Within months he was swamped with orders and within a year he had opened his first store. The first "Mr. Dan's." Four years later he was well on his way to becoming a rich man and his stores carried not only putters but a full line of golfing equipment.

But it was the wooden putters that made him what he was and they were still his best seller. They were known as "woodies" in golfing circles and all the pros had one and all the Joes wanted one. During his meteoric rise to fame and fortune, several major publications had heralded Dan as "The Donald Trump of golf." Sports Illustrated ran a cover photo showing Dan using one of his "woodies" to sink a forty-foot putt. The caption underneath read "A Stroke of Genius!" Business Weekly touted him as "The man with the golden putter" in one issue, showing Dan seated behind his desk with several Wells-Fargo money sacks in front of him and a putter mounted above his head. Time magazine introduced "A Man and His Woodie" to the world with a cover shot of a smiling Dan proudly showing off his putter. And even the National Enquirer got into the act with a small article proposing that Dan Schroeder was really the "illegitimate son of Chi-Chi Rodriguez."

The putt Dan now prepared to sink with such lazy abandon was an embarrassingly easy one for someone with his incredible talents. Five feet straight into the hole with no break at all. An easy plop. A "gimme" for crissakes. Big deal.

Bill McMurphy stood watching Dan with rapt attention from ten feet away. He and Randy Johnroe were regulars at Dan's private little resort. They were all close friends. Randy was nearby but was not paying attention. He was intent on a group of bikini-clad girls prancing their way to Dan's private swimming pool on the other side of the compound. He recognized most of them as friends of Dan's wife Debbie, who no doubt was already lounging at poolside, resplendent in that skimpy white bikini she liked to wear.

Randy elbowed Bill and pointed to the girls as they walked by. "Hubba-hubba, hey Bill?"

Bill ssshed him and whispered, "He's about to putt."

It was a strikingly beautiful day. Clouds hung like marshmallows in the superbly blue sky. The sun shown through Dan's thin curly brown hair and glinted playfully off his bald spot. Spears of light danced off the steel blade of his woodie as he brought it back slowly then stroked it smoothly forward to strike the ball with a solid PING.

"Man, I love the way you handle your putter," Bill said and shook his head with genuine admiration.

Dan looked up. "And I love it when you talk like that," he said as his ball headed for the cup. It rolled on a true course straight for the cup, like a little round guided missile, dimples spinning dizzily in the sun. it slowed, hit the edge of the cup, spun around the rim to the backside of the hole, rocked teasingly at its edge...and stopped. It didn't drop.

Dan had missed.

A short easy putt - an embarrassingly easy putt - and he had missed. The greatest putter in the world had missed.

For a moment there was nothing by silence. A squirrel chittered in a nearby fir tree, working his acorns. A blackbird swooped overhead, its plane-like shadow crossing the surface of the green. In the distance a car backfired.

Then Bill barked in a shocked voice, "You was robbed! Damn! You was robbed!"

Randy turned his attention away from the receding forms of the water bunnies at the sound of Bill's excited voice, calculated that Dan had made his easy putt and said enthusiastically, "Great putt, Dan, really. Great putt."

"He missed," Bill said.

"You was robbed," Randy said.

Dan stood silent. He looked at his putter, repulsed, like it had just sprouted a penis and wet on him.

"I missed," he said looking from Bill to Randy and back again. His eyes were vacant, like a shell-shocked GI's. "The mighty Casey has struck out."

Randy and Bill exchanged worried glances. "Aw, big deal," Bill said, "everybody misses once in a while."

"I don't," Dan said simply.

"Hey, it's too hot to golf anyway," Randy said. "What say we all go swimming?" He raised his eyebrows.

Dan looked at his putter again and threw it down in disgust. "My woodie pissed on me," he said, sounding genuinely hurt. "It's never done that before."

Suddenly he remembered a bizarre phone call he had received two days ago. The gravely voice of an old man had crackled over the phone and said, "You'll NEVER sink another putt if you even think of going there. NEVER!" It was like a curse - or the threat of a curse to come. The phone was slammed down hard enough to hurt Dan's ear.

It hadn't seemed important then - just a crazy who had somehow gotten his private phone number - but now... Dan shook his head. Coincidence, that's all. Missing the putt was pure coincidence. And if he got anymore prank calls, he'd just get in touch with his buddy the cop. Lenny Norman would know what to do.

Dan looked up from the putter that had served him so well, feeling a tad bit guilty and a whole lot embarrassed by his display. He shook his head again and smiled. "Aw, what the hell. Let's go swimming."

"Hot damn!" Randy said, smoothing his mustache and looking a bit like a young Clark Gable.

"Well, gee, I guess," Bill said, pushing up his glasses and looking a bit like a young Clark Kent.

Dan bent down to pick up his putter and something hit him in the butt hard enough to make him cry out and fall face forward in the grass. "Hey!" A golf ball rolled by his eyes. He propped up on his elbows, a quizzical look on his face.

"What the--" he began, and then a second ball struck him a glancing blow to the back of his head and ricocheted up at least thirty feet in the air. He was knocked flat again and saw stars. He heard Randy cry out in pain and turned his head in the grass to see him jumping around clutching one elbow.

He could hear golf balls whizzing by him. One struck the grass inches from his face hard enough to dig a crater and spray him with dirt. Randy and Bill were both yelling now. Balls were flying. Dan shook off his stars and got unsteadily to his feet.

"Jeezus, Dan, Jeezus," It was Bill. He had a round welt under one eye. His red hair blazed in the sun. His glasses were cracked. He looked wild.

Golf balls flew like hard white bullets. The three of them ducked and danced and bounced out of the way.

"What the hell's going on?" Randy asked and then he yelped as a ball hit his shin. "God-DAMN!" Golf balls littered the grass around them like eggs in a psychotic hen house.

For a few minutes there were so many balls in the air that it was impossible to tell where they were coming from. Then Dan looked due east, shielding his eyes from the sun, and saw a solitary figure standing on a small rise some eighty yards away. Dan squinted. The figure waved what looked like a putter at him and then incredibly, began whacking ball after ball with the putter with a speed and strength that was truly amazing. It was a man, an old man. Dan could see his wild beard flash electric in the sunlight. He was absurdly dressed in a parody of golfing clothes: puke-green cap, vicious purple shirt, bright yellow knickers that flapped wildly as he swung the club, argyle socks pulled up over his bony shanks, blood-red golfshoes the size of duck feet. The old man cackled crazily as the balls flew.

Randy and Bill took off running like twin rockets for the clubhouse. They were allowed to leave. Golf balls continued to fly - but only around Dan, only on either side of him. None hit him. He tried to make a move for the clubhouse himself but the shots brushed him back. He had to stand still. As long as he stood still he was safe. And trapped.

Suddenly the barrage stopped. The figure on the hill stood poised over a ball, aimed and ready to fire. He cocked the club back. "Death to those who go!" he shouted with unbelievable volume and he walloped the ball. It came with blinding speed straight at Dan and struck him smack in the forehead with the sound of a billiard ball dropping on a concrete floor.

Dan crumpled like a rag and said one word: "Woodie."

* * * *

- EIGHT -

He was surrounded by the high-tech tools of his trade, positioned like he was at the core of his all-encompassing Steelcase 22A work center, comfortably ensconced in his two-thousand dollar custom-built Ergo-Dynamics desk chair, his thin frame stretched out, arms locked behind his head, tears trickling down his face and glowing amber in the soft light thrown from the state-of-the-art Wang 11000 multifont word processor before him. The last issue, he thought, then bucked himself up straight in his chair, sniffed back the tears and scanned the text on the screen one last time. "Let's get it right, Sprucy, old boy, let's make it a good one," he said out loud.

He had been working on the final issue of "Castle Rock" for nearly three full weeks now, sometimes pulling straight stretches of ten or twelve hours non-stop at his Wang. It was the final issue, after all, the final issue of his treasured newsletter, and this one, above all, he wanted perfect. The final issue.

He was ending the newsletter - which catered to the wants and needs of Stephen King fans - after five amazing years during which time he and his crack staff had won seven Pulitzer Prizes for outstanding small press reporting. It was Chris himself who rocked the world with the discovery that Stephen King did not even exist. Never had. He had unveiled King as a hoax, an industry, not a man, a book-writing factory consisting of over two-dozen of the world's finest horror writers created by some conglomerate to produce monthly bestsellers. The public had been flim-flammed. The author photos on the back of King's books turned out to be of some Wisconsin dairy farmer no one had ever heard of. Chris had often wondered how King could be so damn prolific yet so damn good. With a little bit of luck and some chicanery of his own, he had found out. The discovery had caused two things to happen: number one, it won Chris his final Pulitzer, and number two, it put him right out of the newsletter business. What was a Stephen King Newsletter without a Stephen King? Pretty much a waste of time, that's what.

The issue was perfect, even through the blur of his misty eyes Chris could see that. His goodbye editorial was nothing short of brilliant. Pulitzer time again. "That's it, then," he said and held a trembling finger over the print key. "That's really the end." Chris Spruce sighed deeply, closed his eyes and depressed the key. The word processor was interfaced to a Benindick hi-speed laser printer which sped into instant action the second Chris pressed the key, coughing out a blur of printed work. Chris opened his eyes and watched the action in a semi-daze, hardly believing it was over.

Then something happened, something Chris thought was pretty darn funny - at first. The printer kicked itself into overdrive and started spitting copies of the final "Castle Rock" issue halfway across the room. Chris laughed. "Figgers," he muttered and reached over to shut down the printer. But his hand froze, suspended over the kill switch. One of the papers had gotten stuck while flying out of the printer and it hung by a corner, print side up, facing Chris. Something was wrong with it; the printed words were too...uniform. He plucked the page off the printer and held it up to read. The paper was slightly warm to his touch and the new print smelled fresh and alive. The Benindick ran on with a steady whir and paper began to accumulate at his feet at an astounding rate. Chris read the page in his hand. "What the hell?" He dropped to his knees and grabbed another page out of the pile, looked at it and then grabbed another and another, flinging them away as fast as he read them. They were all the same. Paper rained down upon him from the out of control printer but Chris didn't seem to notice. He was stunned. His hard work was ruined, somehow it had all been ruined. Written on the hundreds of pages surrounding him, line after line after line, were the words: IF YOU GO YOU DIE IF YOU GO YOU DIE IF YOU GO YOU DIE...

Suddenly a scream - no, a laugh, high and maniacal - erupted from his work station. Chris whipped his head around, eyes wide, papers still flying about him. On the screen of his Wang word processor was the face of a hideous old man, glowing amber and eerie, like the words of the final issue had done only minutes before. The ancient face sported a full beard and rheumy eyes. It smiled a rotted tooth smile. "Whattya think, shithead? Ya like it?" the old man said and nodded toward the mess on the floor. "I couldn't print it if it wasn't true, you know." He laughed again, a screech really, and the screen suddenly imploded with a deep sucking cough. Smoke bellowed out. Papers flew. The office smoke alarm triggered on and blared a shrill horn. Chris stared at the screen, stunned, slack-jawed, amazed and scared.

* * * *

- NINE -

He had a face like a wet weekend in New Jersey, an outlook on life which never improved on gloomy, and the cast iron conviction that life was a real bitch. Other than that, Barney Barnhardt was quite a nice person. If you were to ask him why the word "happy" had been crossed out of every dictionary in the Barnhardt household, he would answer you in eight sneered words: Grover Deluca High School For The Mentally Disadvantaged. Barney was a teacher at the school and to say he hated his work would be to grossly understate the issue. He didn't really know why he loathed the job when so many of his colleagues seemed to get a great deal out of it, but he suspected his dislike of children might be at the root of the problem. Whatever it was, his days in school were a living nightmare, rewarding him with nothing but ulcers and a receding hair line. God, how he hated being a teacher.

Barney yearned for that final bell to ring each day even more than his miserable students did, and he would pack his books away and be off the premises yards ahead of the swiftest one. He would drive home like a man possessed, sprint like a madman to his front door, and enter his own little world, locking out the trials and tribulations of modern society.

In his free time - as opposed to the periods when he was a captive of the G.D.H.S.F.T.M.D - he read horror books, taking comfort from the supernatural problems which beset the characters within. He also dabbled in book dealing, hoping to make enough money to retire from his hell-on-earth job, but as yet his bank balance disallowed the possibility of an early release for good behavior. But he still struggled to build his fortune. It was through books that he became friendly with David Hinchberger, a local kid made good in the book business. Whenever he was feeling particularly blue, Barney would drive over to the Hinchberger house and drown his sorrows in whatever they had at hand. He liked visiting Dave and Laurie and the kids because it gave him a chance to bemoan his lot AND it didn't cost him a dime in drinks.

Today's afternoon classes had been particularly taxing for Barney, thanks to young Pam Hanson. She was a slight, nervous girl who was prone to self mutilation unless kept under constant watch. Barney got tied up with another student and didn't see Pam begin to sway in her seat and pull at her hair. Whoever it was who gave her the pocket knife, Barney never discovered, but by the time he had dismissed the student he was talking to, Pam had already carved half of her boyfriend's name onto her left wrist. Bruce, the smitten boyfriend, objected when Barney forced her to stop and a shoving match ensued and punches were thrown. There was much scratching and spitting and gnashing of teeth and the whole situation got rapidly out of hand. And by the time Barney had given his statement to the police and had his wounds stitched closed, he was feeling pretty depressed and in need of a drink or ten. He checked his pockets but he only had two dollars so he thought it might be an opportune moment to pay a visit to his old friends, the Hinchbergers. And if they offered him a beer, he wouldn't put up too much resistance.

When he arrived at the Hinchberger domicile, Dave was not yet home from work. But Laurie and the kids were there and they knew where the beer lived, so Dave's absence was not important. Popping the top of his first beer of the day, Barney slumped down onto the Hinch-sofa, rested his blood-spattered sandals against the Hinch-table, and sighed hugely. Some of the day's tension sloughed off him and he thought another six or seven beers might put him in a bearable frame of mind.

Laurie joined him some time later, when he was well into his sixth drink and on the borderline between tipsy and intoxicated. Laurie was counting her calories and never drank anything stronger than Diet Coke. "So, how's work going, Barney?" she asked in her lilting southern drawl. She had grown up in the deep south, where people eat alligator steaks and fish no one has ever heard of. Laurie not only knew but UNDERSTOOD all the words to Jambalaya - all that "crawfish pie in your eye, me-oh-my-oh" actually MEANT something to Laurie.

"Horrific," groaned Barney in response to her question. "A nightmare. I don't think I can take another day of it, they're killing me. Them damn kids is killing me."

"Gee, that's too bad," sympathized Laurie. She'd heard these Barney Barnhardt Blues countless times before.

"I mean it this time, Lindsay."

"Laurie."

"Huh?"

"It's Laurie."

"Oh no, no, it's not you, Lottie, it's them damn kids. No it's not you, you shouldn't blame yourself."

Laurie gave up and left Barney to cry in his beer while she fixed supper. She thought she'd treat them to a tasty lasagna tonight. She called through to Barney and asked did he want to stay for supper? He told her he had nothing else left to live for and one last farewell meal might be nice. He asked what was planned. She told him lasagna. He mumbled, I shoulda guessed.

Barney had eaten with the Hinchbergers many times so he knew that although Laurie made a terrific lasagna, and could boil chicken like no one else on earth, those two dishes comprised the sum total of her cooking ability. You could have anything you like as long as was lasagna or boiled chicken. First time visitors thought the two dishes were the tip of an enormous culinary iceberg, but Barney had been around long enough to know different. But if lasagna was all she had, he would bite the bullet and tuck in with as much gusto as he could fake in his present delicate condition.

While Laurie was constructing supper, the kids tried to engage Barney in conversation. Ian wanted Barney to explain to him why he got paid for going to school while Ian had never made diddly-squat from his school career to date. And Johnathan wanted to tell Barney all about the school-play he was going to star in. But the prospect of school-anything started Barney cursing and frothing at the mouth and the two youngsters gave him up as a bad lot and went out to the pond to look for their duck.

By the time the man of the house arrived home, the lasagna was almost cooked and Barney was almost pickled.

"Oh, hi Barney," said Dave.

"Hi Pete," slurred Barney.

"Dave."

"I'm sorry?"

"I'm DAVE."

"Barney Barnhardt, pleased to meet you." Barney offered his hand and Dave shook it, feeling slightly confused. But when Laurie motioned toward the collection of empty cans at Barney's feet, Dave finally understood. "Ah, another tough day at the office, eh?" he said, humoring his guest.

"You wouldn't believe it, Pete. I was just telling Loni about it, wasn't I?"

"That's right," said Laurie.

"You got another beer, Loni?" pleaded Barney with abandoned-puppy-dog eyes.

"Sure, Barney, another beer comin' up. Er, you wanna help me get it Dave?"

Dave caught her sly wink. "Oh, sure hon'. Back in a sec' Barney."

"No rush, Pete. You go help Loni."

The Hinchbergers discussed the situation whilst in the kitchen and they decided they would let Barney stay for dinner and then drive him home. And no more beer! Laurie suggested they put some lemonade in a can and give him that - he was too inebriated to tell the difference between beer and battery acid by now, let alone lemonade. She handed Dave a can and a bottle of lemonade and he carefully began pouring the latter into the former. Barney had grown blissfully quiet since his hosts had adjourned to the kitchen, but suddenly he shook the house with and ear-piercing scream. Laurie jumped and Dave did the same, upsetting the lemonade and splashing the front of his jeans with the fizzy liquid. "Shit," he muttered as Laurie wondered aloud what in God's name was wrong with Barney. They both rushed out of the kitchen to find out.

They found Barney trembling on the sofa, his eyes wide in terror and his mouth agape. He was deathly pale.

"Barney, what is it?" snapped Dave, both concerned for his friend and for the sticky patch of lemonade on his jeans. "Barney? Barney?"

"Th-th-th-the w-window," he sputtered and pointed a shaking finger at the big pane of glass looking out onto the balcony. "A f-f-f-face!"

They all looked at the window but there was no one there. "What face, Barney? There isn't anything there now." Dave gave him a gentle shake but Barney was too scared to express himself. Laurie ran back into the kitchen and grabbed the first bottle she could find in the drinks cupboard. She poured a slug into a glass and took it back to Barney, who knocked it back in one anxious gulp. Whatever it was, the magic elixir calmed him to a degree and he went on with his tale.

"It was THERE, honest. God, I nearly wet myself."

"Yeah?" said Dave, subconsciously rubbing his lemonade stain. Barney noticed the movement and grew very excited. "Wow, did you see it too, Pete?"

"Huh? Oh, no, I spilled some lemonade, I was pouring some lemonade and..."

"Not now, David, please,"

"But Laurie, I was just..."

"PLEASE, David." Laurie fixed him with one of her stern looks, and Dave went into a sulk. "Go on, Barney," she urged.

"It was the Devil," he told her, "the Devil come to get me. Ooh, horrible it was, all crooked and twisted, and it had lightnin' in its hair, it did, spittin' sparks everywhere. It grinned at me and then it pointed at me with its knife. No, not a knife, a SWORD, the DEVIL'S sword, huge great steel thing it was, I swear. And then..."

"Go on."

"Then it showed me the sign," he said in a barely audible whisper. "It said IF YOU GO, YOU DIE. He waved it at me, he did, the Devil. IF YOU GO, YOU DIE."

"And then?"

"Then he flew away," Barney finished and his face went blank.

Laurie was baffled, and Dave could shed no explanatory light on the crazy situation. They thought it was probably the work of the countless drinks Barney had put away, and they decided to take him right home and put him to bed. Laurie would take him in her car and Dave could follow in Barney's.

All the way from the Hinchberger place to Barney's residence, Dave was mulling over what Barney had said. it seemed ridiculous, but upon examination there were aspects to it which rang bells with Dave, rang bells and set his heart beating that tiny bit quicker.

A devil, Barney had said, crooked and twisted-

(like a stooped old man?)

-his hair spitting lightning-

(wispy, silver-gray hair reflecting the hard balcony light?)

-brandishing a huge steel sword-

(a common kitchen knife made frightening by a drunken mind?)

-and offering the cryptic warning, IF YOU GO, YOU DIE-

("if you go there, I'll kill ya").

It all sounded too familiar to Dave, too similar to an incident at a recent book convention when he had an ugly scene with an old nutcase who must've been on a day-trip from the funny farm. Dave hadn't mentioned the incident to either Laurie or Barney, and yet tonight's excitement was too much like a rerun to be passed off as mere coincidence. If it WAS the same old guy in both cases - and in his heart, Dave didn't doubt that it was - what on earth could he be wanting? And what might he do to ensure he achieved his aim? It weighed heavy on Dave's mind.

When they finally got home, the lasagna was burned to a frazzle so they went to bed without any supper. Laurie thought her husband looked preoccupied, probably due to Barney's touch of the screaming meemies, but she was sure he'd snap out of it. "G'night, hon'," she said and turned out her light.

"G'night, Lucy," Dave said in a far-away voice.

Hmm, Laurie wondered.

* * * *

- TEN -

"Bang!" the old man said and Mary shook off her momentary paralysis and dove for the hallway, instinctively slamming the door as she did so. She executed a stunning triple-roll designed to take her away from the door, shot to her feet, vaulted down the stairs and was outside the building in seconds.

Ann Arbor had its share of weirdoes and through the years Mary had learned to deal with them. Escape first, ask questions later.

When the police got there the old man was gone and at first sight everything appeared to be in order. Sure, the cookies she had baked were all gone and the couch would have to be cleaned (Mary would later decide to fumigate the entire apartment but it would forever stink of dirty feet) but other than that, all seemed okay. Nothing was missing. The cops dismissed the incident as harmless and actually told Mary she was lucky - the old kook could've trashed the place. She didn't feel so lucky but she thanked them as they left anyway.

Mary was always polite.

Five minutes later she discovered her underwear gone. Every pair. The drawer-drawer was empty - except for a few cookie crumbs. She debated calling the police back but decided against it when she thought of the entire Ann Arbor Police Department on the look-out for her dainties. That would never do.

Instead, she conducted a thorough check of the rest of her apartment. She didn't find anything else missing but she did locate her underwear. They were frozen en masse in a large plastic Tupperware bowl of water in the freezer compartment of her Frigidaire. A skivvie iceberg. She had to microwave them to get them free (she needed a pair for morning) and then microwave them again to dry them off.

When the bell on the oven rang for the second time, Mary opened the door to see if they were done.

They were overdone.

"Dammit!" She had only set the temperature control to defrost (there was no "knicker" setting) but apparently even that low setting was too high for 100% nylon.

She had burned her BVD's.

"Dammit all to hell!" This was a phrase that Mary had learned well from her Mother. "Boy, this really frosts my ass!" Another Mom-phrase and somehow appropriate.

Mary tweezered out a pair of her knickers with thumb and index finger and held them up to view. The burn marks were distinct, charred and ashy but very distinct. Almost too distinct. She blew away some of the ash. The blackened marks took on shapes, the shapes formed letters, the letters became words. Somehow, written on all eleven pair of her undies (even the worn pair with the nasty hole in it that she wore only in emergencies), burned right into the nylon, were the words DON'T GO. One word per cheek.

Don't go, my ass! she thought, yet another appropriate phrase. She'd go if she damn well WANTED to, and you better believe it! Too bad she didn't know where she wasn't supposed to go...then she'd make it a point go even if she DIDN'T want to (Mary had been known to cut off her nose to spite her face many times in the past, and had actually become quite good at it). That'd show 'em. But she really didn't know what the charred message meant. The only thing she'd been invited to of any consequence lately was a party - and that certainly couldn't be it, the party was way off in Colorado and she wasn't planning on going to it anyway (too expensive). Now she was glad she'd decided to stay home this weekend. Maybe she'd just cook up a little surprise of her own to serve to a certain smelly cookie thief, that perverted old geezer. She'd be ready for him this time. Ready and waiting.

Mary had lived in Ann Arbor long enough to know how to deal with sickos. She had several pair of steel-toed shoes and one hell of a strong kick. She might miss the party but she wouldn't miss the fun.

* * * *

- Part Two -
The Journey

- ELEVEN -

Old Splitfoot was dressed in a dark gray Gabardine suit. His Gucci-clad feet were propped up on the solid oak desk before him and he was smoking a gigantic Cuban stogie. The air conditioner hummed full blast behind him, blowing a halo ring of spinning smoke around his head.

"You're not doing so hot, Geeze, my friend - if you'll forgive the pun."

The Geeze was sweating buckets - and not just because of the tortuous heat the air conditioner didn't seem to touch. He was scared spitless. He never felt comfortable around the Devil - or safe, for that matter - even though they'd been getting together for years. The Geeze mopped his brow with a dirty rag plucked from the back pocket of his bib overalls. "But Lou," - the Devil had insisted Geeze call him this - "I'll stop 'em. I still got time."

The Devil sighed expansively, took a deep drag of his cigar and spoke as wispy little tendrils of smoke curled out of his nose. "Time is such a relative concept, Geeze. Why, down here a second's a lifetime, a minute's forever, an hour's eternity."

Geeze gulped.

Lou smiled. Not a pretty sight.

* * * *

- TWELVE -

It was a grisly task and several times during it Herb had to break off his shoveling to comfort Marge, who would burst into loud braying sobs and cry, "Why, oh, why?" her face a twisted mask of anguish. It took the rest of that morning and most of the afternoon before Herb and Marge had put to right the hideous surprise they had found in their backyard - about an hour a letter, as it turned out. By eleven, the grotesque message that had read DON'T GO was reduced to N'T GO, by the time "Days of Our Lives" came on, it was down to just GO, and two hours after that, the message was gone, the awful deed was done. There was nothing left but matted grass, bloodstains and thirty-seven tiny graves.

Marge had insisted in a decent burial for each and every one of the mutilated woodchucks that had been cruelly arranged into letters to make the warning sign. Herb agreed wholeheartedly. It was the least they could do.

They had lined up the dead woodchucks in a neat row along the privet hedge that bordered their backyard, and while Marge tenderly bathed the blood and gore from each carcass, Herb dug thirty-seven chuck-size holes, using a spade his father Kenneth John Fockley (sometimes also known as John Kenneth Fockley, for reasons lost in time) had given them as a wedding present some three decades ago. After each of the dearly departed was carefully sealed in industrial size Zip-lock bags - Marge gagged at the thought of maggots and worms feasting eternally on the dead, defenseless woodchucks - they were gently interned one by one into their forever-holes. Words were said over the tiny graves and when Marge spoke at the end of it all, her voice cracking with plaintive emotion as she haltingly proclaimed, "May you all romp forever in peace in woodchuck Heaven," it was Herb's turn to break into sobs and Marge's turn at comfort.

Finally it was over and grief turned to rage. "We'll get the low-life scum who did this, Marge," Herb announced with a confidence borne of righteousness while they sat facing each other over half eaten dinners later that night, "I promise you that."

Marge looked at her husband adoringly. "I know we will, Herb, I know. God would not allow such a fiend to go unpunished. He will deliver him onto us and we will take action."

"We'll kick his ass is what we'll do!"

"Herbert Aloysius Fockley!" Marge scolded, but she understood. He was upset. And Herb and Marge HAD kicked ass before. They had kicked some righteous ass before. They were, after all, champions of woodchuck justice and as such they did what they had to do.

"You think it was that writer fella from Maine?" Herb asked, bushy eyebrows raised. "That guy we...almost got rid of?"

There had been a mistake several months ago, an honest mistake, but a mistake nonetheless. Herb and Marge had vented their wrath in a particularly painful and ultimately lethal manner upon a man whom they had THOUGHT was a certain writer, an evil writer, a menace of a writer from Maine who abused woodchucks to no end in the godawful, heathen books he wrote. It HAD been an honest mistake - the man sure did look like the dust-jacket photo - and Herb and Marge felt they had learned from the mistake. They didn't really feel bad; the man who had died did so for a good cause.

"Well, Marge said after a fashion, "just maybe we'll find out this weekend, just maybe we'll find out at the party. He's bound to be there - and so will we."

"God help him if it's true," Herb said softly and his eyes went stern. "God help him."

To look at Herb and Marge Fockley you would never think them to be horror fiction readers. They struck one as the "Farmer's Almanac" type or perhaps "Reader's Digest" regulars. But the truth of the matter was they both read horror fiction voraciously. They also subscribed to various magazines and newsletters dedicated to the genre, such as the classy "Fear" magazine and the wonderfully informative "Castle Schlock" in order to keep up to date.

It began when Marge discovered, quite by accident, the terrible things a certain horror writer from Maine was doing to her beloved woodchucks in his books. She had been shopping at the big Harley Ames Shopping Center over near Droptiny Lake when the cover of an audio version of one of the writer's books jumped out at her. She gasped out loud and dropped her bags. Pictured on the cover was a dead woodchuck, comically flattened and stuck to the grill of a car. Marge could've wept. The story was called "Mrs. Todd's Shortcut" and Marge thought that maybe she and Herb could show both Mrs. Todd and her smart guy author a little shortcut of their own - a shortcut to Hell, that is! Every since that time she and Herb had made a study of such books to find other offending authors who needed...correction.

Herb pulled his old Ford pickup truck around to the front of the house and he and Marge began loading up for the trip. As they finished, Marge came out of the garage carrying a weighted baseball bat. Herb nodded at her and she tossed the bat in the back of the truck. Herb got in and adjusted the mirrors. He buckled his seatbelt, checked the gas gauge, put the key in the ignition. Marge slid in beside him. She pulled her blue plaid skirt down over her blue veined legs and clasped her hands primly in her lap. They both looked straight ahead.

"Ready Marge?"

"Ready, Herb."

He started the truck with a roar and a misfire, ground the old gearshift into first, eased up on the clutch and bucketed off into the night.

It was time to find them a woodchuck killer.

* * * *

- THIRTEEN -

It was just like the day Kennedy was assassinated. No one talked of anything else. It was "hey, did ya hear what happened?", it was "gee, unbelievable", it was "impossible, simply impossible, couldn't happen", it was "where were you when you first heard the news?" It was THE topic of conversation in Michigan.

"Mr. Dan" had MISSED a "gimme" putt.

You could count the number of witnesses to the tragedy on one hand, but to hear the barroom gossips you'd think half the state's population had been in attendance. There was a rumor going around that when Dan missed the shot, the Heavens opened up and it rained golf balls - GOLF BALLS, can you believe it? It was like something out of "Carrie." But whatever way you look at it, the ball still failed to drop - unlike Dan's standing in the community. With one missed shot his status in society slipped countless places; his name was taken off many a Christmas list; invitations to social functions were canceled; even his tailor snubbed him, refusing to monogram each article of Dan's clothing with the distinctive squiggly DS motif.

There was nowhere for Dan to escape the whispers, the stares, the pointing fingers - "that's him, that's Dan Schroeder, missed a sitter, practically in the friggin' hole, it was, and he puts it wide. What a maroon!" In the office, the mechanical clacking of massed ranks of typewriters could not block out the giggles. At home his so-called friends treated him now as a mere mortal. Debbie had the good grace never to mentioned the incident to him but she began spending more and more time at poolside. Kristy had just patted him on the back like you would an old man and had said, "It's all right, Daddy," but he saw her roll her eyes at Mom as she said it. It was a living nightmare. He had to get out, get away from the constant reminders of his fallibility. He didn't care where he went, just so long as it was beyond the scandal-zone.
That's when he remembered the invitation. Hmmm, did they play golf in Boulder? He thought probably not. Perfect!

When he reached the airfield, there was a problem waiting. "You Mr. Daniel R. Schroeder?" asked an officious looking man in dark suit, dark shades, dark demeanor.

"Who wants to know?"

"Are you Mr. Daniel R. Schroeder?" the android in black asked again, totally ignoring Dan's question, as if programmed only to respond to a negative/positive input.

Dan hadn't time to play games with some refugee from a G-man flick so he allowed as to how he was indeed Daniel R. Schroeder, guilty as charged, J. Edgar, now what's the deal? To Dan's surprise, the Hooverite said nothing more, he simply nodded, thrust a piece of paper into Dan's hand, and marched off, all stiff in back and resolute in stride. What the...? wondered Dan and opened the piece of paper to see if it shed light on any of this business. He read silently. One section he read four times. John Gustafson, chief technician in keeping "Mr. Dan's" company Lear-jet in tip-top order, walked over to his boss and said "She's ready when you are, Mr. Schroeder." Dan just glared at Guts - as the tech was known - his eyes spitting brimstone. "Cancel the goddamn thing, just cancel it. Burn the sucker for all I care. And get outta my way. Go trim your bushes or go to a family reunion or something, just get outta my way. I'll be taking the Mercedes." And with that he stormed off, Gucci loafers clocking his exit. Guts was lost for words. He'd heard about Dan's golfing mishap - who hadn't? - but for his boss to react like this? No, it wasn't right somehow, it just wasn't like him.

A cooling breeze stirred a piece of paper at Guts' feet. It caught his eye and he stooped to retrieve it. He was a slow reader and mouthed everything he read but he eventually got a flavor of what it all meant. It was some legal thing. Guts scratched his head and frowned deeply. An injunction, was that what they called them? Yeah, that was it. He nodded dumbly. This injunction apparently forbid the flying of "Mr. Dan's" company jet until they changed the jet's name. Apparently, some other fella had got dibs on the name and they were pissed at Schroeder for stealing it. Guts didn't know anything about stealing no name, all he knew was that his crew had just wasted over two hours readying the airplane for a flight to Boulder. Shitsticks! He slouched back to the hanger to tell his guys to take it easy and put the jet back to bed. The Dan Quail-One wouldn't be flyin' today.

Ask Dan Schroeder about Fate and he'd likely tell you it's all a pile of bushwah. In the golf match of life, you swing your own "woodie," he might say (he was a whiz at making golf clubs but he talked kinda corny at times). But still, a favorable bounce might mean the difference between reaching the green or ending up in the sand-trap. He didn't know it, but he'd just been given a favorable kick that morning by the android in black, the stone-faced injunction server, good ole Jokin' Jerry Justice, purveyor of legal papers to harried executives.

Had Dan arrived at the airfield an hour earlier, he might have recognized the overall-clad mechanic attending to the Lear's jet engine, placing a little surprise package in that engine, the kind of surprise package you spell B-O-M-B. The mechanic was a short, slightly hunched old duffer. And come to think of it, he left the hanger long before flight preparations were completed. He left at something of a run.

Dan was thirty miles from the airfield when the Quail-One blew apart. He didn't know it of course, but Fate had steered him around that particular sand-trap and the green on the 18th hole beckoned.

Life looked brighter the further Dan made it away from that five feet of finely manicured turf back in Grand Rapids. That traitorous turf, where he had MISSED a putt.

What he really needed to cheer him up was a hassle free, worry free, drinks for free, GOLF free party weekend. This was gonna be good, he felt it in his bones. This was gonna be good.

* * * *

- FOURTEEN -

Leonard Norman wasn't wildly enthusiastic about going. He was a ho-hum kinda guy not given to making any decisions without infuriatingly lengthy consideration. Right up until Sergeant Longneck Williams started dishing out the punishment details, Len was decidedly undecided. But seeing the letters CW beside his name on the duty roster made up Len's mind in a shot.

"CW" stood for Cranks-n-Weirdoes, a catch-all section encompassing every oddball case likely to be encountered in your average small town police department. It was not a highly sought after duty. The guys who swabbed the toilets looked down on CW cops. It was a moot point who was worse off, the handcuffed fruits/flashers/loonies or the poor sap assigned to their cases. Len had spent two nightmare months with CW in his rookie year, and now he was up for it again, thanks to a third party's malicious shenanigans over the police radio. Longneck, that scum-sucking pus-ball, had rewarded Len, poor, innocent (for once) Len, with Hell on Earth. CW.

"Look," Len barked, his temper strained almost to its limit, "you can't bring charges against yourself, it's impossible."

"Not for me, grinned the balding, fat fifty-year-old nutcase across the table from Len. "You see, I'm not ONE."

"One what?" Len didn't want to ask but there was something hypnotic about quizzing this kind of noodle-brain, something that draws you in til you're too far gone to be rescued. These guys were like tar pits of illogicality and Lenosaurus was lumbering blindly nearer its sticky end.

"One PERSON."

"Ah. So how many ARE you?" Tar pit? I don't see no tar pit.

"Seventeen," said the odd little fella with pride.

"Longneck, you shitheap," muttered Len under his breath. "Who told you you're seventeen, Mr...."

"Beech, Ralph Beech."

"Yeah, who told you, Ralph?"

"Ralph number eight."

Len looked perplexed.

"My eighth personality, officer. He's a psychiatrist. He says I have multiple personalities, and he should know, huh?"

"Oh shit," bemoaned Len as the tar sucked him inexorably down. His hand went unconsciously to his service revolver and the phrase "bite the bullet" insinuated itself into his brain. "Okay, Ralph. let's skip that crap for a minute. What's your complaint - legally, I mean?" He felt a nasty headache coming on.

"I've been battered!"

"You've been battered..."

"Oh, it shows, doesn't it?" Ralph moaned.

"What shows?"

"My bruises...that's how you knew."

"Knew WHAT?"

"That I've been battered!"

"You've been battered..."

"Yes, I have! I knew you knew. You're very perceptive, officer. And quite stunning in that uniform, if I may be so bold." Ralph looked at Len with a little bit more than respect in his eyes. "I just wish you'd been around when he hit me."
"Who hit you?" Len asked, rubbing his temples. His headache was a black thing now. He didn't think he could take much more of Ralph.

"Ralph number twelve - that's Ralph the adolescent, he can he so crude sometimes, officer. Ralph number twelve hit me 'cause he's jealous of my good looks."

"I AM NOT!" another voice suddenly boomed. It was coming out of Ralph's mouth but it sounded younger than his earlier voice.

Ralph cocked his head to the right. "You are so! You always were!"

Ralph cocked his head to the left. "LIAR!" the younger voice screamed. "LIAR!"

Head right. "I don't lie. You're jealous."

Head left. "And you're full of it, you crazy bitch!"

Head right. "Bitch? Why you...you snot-nosed brat!"

Left. "I'd rather be a snot-nosed brat than an old trouser pilot like you!"

Right. "Trouser pilot? Don't you call me that! Don't you dare!"

Left. "Trouser pilot! Trouser pilot! Trouser pilot!"

This was too much for Len. It wasn't enough that he should get the entire population of Kookville passing by his desk today, but now he had to referee a fight between two Ralphs - and they were both crazy. If he didn't do something quick, he might just have another FIFTEEN Ralphs to contend with. He couldn't handle that. His neck was already sore from watching the heated argument go back and forth. His head pulsed with pain, even his eyes hurt.

"ALL RIGHT!" he shouted, jumping from his chair. "ALL RIGHT! You're BOTH under arrest!"

When Len brought the handcuffed Ralph Beech upstairs to be booked, he had a strange, jittery look in his eyes. And he was blinking a lot. He told the duty officer to make seventeen copies of everything - mug shots, fingerprint cards, the whole works. "But we're only charging those two." Len pointed at Ralph, who stood quietly nearby, his head hanging down in shame. "I want the extra copies in case the other fifteen of him start acting up."

"Right," the duty officer said, eyeing Len's gun, "sure, anything you say."

It wasn't long after that when a man in a white coat and an ill-fitting hair piece came for a private meeting with Leonard. A spot of R and R was prescribed for Len and he complied. Sergeant Longneck Williams knew true happiness for the first time in his career and for two weeks solid his face would wear a sappy smile as he cracked jokes about Len's hasty departure from CW duty. "Lasted about as long as a fart in a hurricane," Longneck would say to anyone stupid enough to stop and listen.

Once home, Len had a choice - explain to his wife Meg the reason for his newly acquired extra vacation time, or head for Boulder and PARTY-time. It took him five minutes to pack and he was Rockies bound.

As he sat in his window seat waiting for the flight to Chicago to take off, Len tried to figure out the concept of time zones. He knew that when traveling west into another zone, he'd gain an hour, and that he'd lose an hour coming back. What bothered him was this: what if he didn't come back? What if he decided to stay? Who would he have to see about returning the extra hour? He just wouldn't feel right about taking an hour that didn't really belong to him and not returning it, or at least declaring that he had it. He wondered if it would affect his credit rating.

By the time he'd come to a conclusion ("I'll ask Meg"), they were over halfway to Chicago. Len struck up a conversation with the man in the next seat. They talked of inconsequential things, as is custom on short flights. Touching down at O'Hare, Len bade his friend a pleasant trip and went in search of his connecting flight.

By a coincidence that even Len found unnerving, the same fella sat next to him on the Chicago to Denver plane. "Well well well," said Len, "we meet again," and the pair picked up where they had left off earlier, deep into a critique of the pro's and con's of artificial limbs. "I knew a guy once," the old gentleman told Len, "he had a wooden leg that he had to screw into its socket every day." "You don't say?" "Oh sure, but it didn't affect him in the least, he could get about just like you and me." "It's marvelous, ain't it?" "Oh it is at that, it's marvelous. 'Course, he wasn't allowed to dance on it." "No?" "Uh-uh. One time he forgot and did a flashy spin - poor jerk's leg unthreaded itself and he fell and broke his other leg." "Gee, that's too bad." And so the exchanges continued. He sure was a talker, this old guy. Had a voice you'd swear you'd heard before somewhere, but Len couldn't just place it. Ah well, it would come to him.

It would if the chatty old geezer had any say in things.

"Lord, I'm famished," said Len, his stomach rumbling agreement.

"Well allow me to get you something," offered Len's new friend.

"Oh no, I couldn't."

"Nonsense! I was going to stretch my legs anyway. I'll see what I can find. Don't go 'way now." The funny little man heaved himself out of his seat (Len could swear he heard the guy's back creak) and tottered off to track down some munchies. Len busied himself flicking through the in-flight magazine. An article of Great Air Disasters In History caught his eye and he was engrossed by the time his food bearing pal returned. "Oh, you found something."

"Yes indeed," said the elderly waiter, "I sure did."

Len accepted the tray of sliced fruit, salad (with creamy Italian dressing), Oreo cookies and a yellow lump of rubber masquerading as cheese. It all looked more surreal than real, but any port in a culinary storm and Len, who never turned down free food once in his entire life, set to work on cleaning the tray. "Mmm, funny how food tastes different at 15,000 feet, huh?" The old man agreed, he'd noticed that too. "Even the Oreos have a lingering aftertaste," Len observed, although the way he gulped his food, it was a wonder how he tasted ANYTHING.

"Shall I get you something else?"

"No, no, it's not that unpleasant. It's fine, really. Yummy-yum." He polished off every scrap, even the pseudo-cheese. "There. Lovely. Thank you very much. I feel better now."

Not for long, the old guy thought. "The pleasure was all mine, my friend," he assured Len, "all mine."

That voice, it sure did sound familiar to Len. Where had he heard it? He thought long and hard but it would not come. As he pondered, his fellow traveler studied him intently, looking for signs of sudden unexplained illness. He figured another two minutes before the drug immobilized the boring fool. He would make sure the moron was dead and then kick up holy hell when they landed. While everyone was running round like blue-assed flies, he would sneak away for a celebratory brew or six. Any minute now the guy would slump face first onto his flip-down table. Any minute now. Lou would be happy. The Geeze shuddered as he thought of his fiery acquaintance. He couldn't help it.

Len belched. "Oops. Sorry. Must've been something I ate." He gave his stomach a rub and then went back to his magazine, oblivious to the old coger's shocked expression. The attempted murderer couldn't fathom it - he'd loaded enough poison into Len's food to put the Chicago Bears six feet under. And yet the idjit was sitting there happy as Larry, a stoopid childlike look of wonder on his face as he read of aviation mortalities by the dozen. It had to be a mistake, maybe he hadn't used the right ingredient, or maybe he hadn't used enough. Well never fear, he had 'til touchdown to finish the job. He'd try another track.

"Mint?" he asked Len, offering the roll to the soon-to-be corpse on his right. "Well, don't mind if I do," said Len and took one.

It should have taken twenty seconds to turn Len into an ex-Len.

Not a damn thing happened.

The Geeze couldn't figure it. The guy should be dead twice over by now, yet he still lived, his disposition unruffled. Time for the big guns, time for the Hiroshima Gut Wrenchers. He waited until the official in-flight meal was served and ingested before digging into his portable poison factory and springing his final trap. "Indigestion tablet?" he offered. "This airline food has a way of repeating on a fella, you know? These little marvels work wonders for me. Take one. I'm sure you'll notice a difference."

"Hmm, can't hurt," said Len, rushing in where angels fear to tread, "I'll take TWO."

"And you're welcome to them," the old man told him. Len extracted two of the tiny pills from their packet - Super Gastric Bubble Bursters it said on the side - and popped then into his mouth. He washed them down with a gulp of Dr. Pepper and settled back for a quick snooze before landing.

The Geeze had turned away the second the pills were in Len's mouth, expecting a muffled explosion as his target's innards were radically rearranged by the concentrated destruction capsules. But there was nothing. Zip. Zilch. The most powerful weapon known to nibble-nodders and it had absolutely no effect on Leonard Norman. Could it be his stomach was as dumb as the rest of him and didn't know when it was under attack? Geeze just didn't know. But he was out of ideas now, they'd be landing soon, and he wouldn't get another shot at this particular party-goer. So to hell with it, he'd let this one live, concentrate his efforts on the others. Lou said the book dealer from Georgia and his family would be in Nashville right about now. He would hurry back there and put some lethal holes in the guy's plans to attend the party. They were traveling with that goofy teacher friend of theirs so he could take them all out at once. And as luck would have it (although when dealing with Lou it was always BLACK luck), not too far away would be that little four-year-old snot who thought he was so damn smart, knowing how to drive and all, sneaking his Mom's car keys like he did. That should be an easy one, although the Geeze didn't think the kid really needed snuffing, didn't think he was a serious threat to their operations. But you didn't argue details with the Devil. Not if you didn't want to go through life wearing asbestos jockey shorts, that is.

The plane reached final approach to Denver. Geeze looked over at Len, who sported a big-toothed grin on his dopey, still sleeping face. Not even a little sick. He'd sure like to know why that numbnuts hadn't been reduced to a steaming piled of chopped intestines. He sure should've been.

Worry was the answer, and Leonard's savior. Len worried about everything - the bomb, pollution, third world hunger, socks, wildlife, work, women, size, food. Food especially. He'd seen a program on TV which said people didn't know when they had "anorexia nervosa," the slimmers disease. So if they didn't know they had it, they wouldn't know they needed help. Len was worried that he might be anorexic and not know it. It was a big worry to him. So just in case he WAS anorexic and ignorant, he ate like food was going out of fashion. He didn't put on any extra weight because all those extra calories were shed through worrying - a hard think about the Middle East (he couldn't figure how a place could be east but yet in the middle) and he would worry away more pounds than a roomful of Fonda disciples. His internal workings had adapted to almost a constant supply of foods and they could cope with anything that found its way down the Norman gullet. He had a stomach of iron. The last thing to bother his belly was poison. His was a gut trained on the kind of slop veteran Mexicans rejected as too hot. Anyone intent on dispatching Leonard Norman to the here-after would be advised to steer clear of his digestive system. His was a kick-ass stomach and make no mistake.

When Leonard woke from his nap, the plane was on the ground, the majority of its passengers disembarked. The little old guy was gone. Pity, Len had taken a shine to those indigestion tablets. They sure worked good.

* * * *

- FIFTEEN -

Chris Spruce was not the type of guy to beat about the bush. If there was a decision to be made, he'd by Christ make it! So when it came time to resolve his Boulder party dilemma, he didn't shirk, he jumped right in with both feet and made his mind up - he would ask his sister.

When he called Stephanie, his beloved sis, she was in her gymnasium sweating up a storm, pumping iron like a madwoman, making herself hurt so good. Grunting. Groaning. Lifting. Moaning. It was an awesome sight to behold. As she spoke with Chris, she continued to pump iron one-handed. "What do you want 'Pher, I'm busy?" She grunted to prove her point.

Chris outlined his problem, the weird Wang manifestation and all, and confessed he didn't know whether to attend the party or not. What did she think? He spilled his beans in a whining, wimpy voice, his normal tone when addressing his sister, whom he looked up to and secretly feared. When he finished, Stephanie paused to reflect on the options open to him. A light sheen of perspiration coated her brow, probably more the product of her furious iron-pumping than her reflecting on the problem, but you could never tell with Steph. At last she delivered her verdict. "Well, 'Pher," she said, "I think you should go."

"Do WHAT?" This wasn't what Chris had expected to hear. "But the threats..."

"Were just that, threats. Are you gonna let some malfunctioning Wang dictate your life to you, 'Pher, or are you gonna grasp it by the ole hairy gunnysack and squeeze it 'til your destiny pops out?"

"Huh?" Stephanie always did have a way with words - not the RIGHT way but you kinda grew used to it.

"Pull your thumb out and be your own man, 'Pher. Be an ass-kicker and not a kickee. You follow?"

He didn't know if he followed or not, but answered in the affirmative. And if Stephanie said go for it - he thought that was the general thrust of her answer - then by Jimminy he'd go for it. Yee-harrrr!

His mind made up for him, Chris now threw himself one hundred percent into the trip. Look out Colorado, here I come! He jumped into his blood red Ferrari - a going away present to himself from the "Castle Rock" profits - slammed the bitch in gear and floored the accelerator. The wheels spun, rubber smoke billowed, and the car shot backwards at high speed...slap bang into a truck transporting lavatories to Canada. It was a new car, he was unfamiliar with the gear layout, it was a mistake anyone could make. But it cost Chris Spruce the use of his hands and the loss of his left leg. As he lay amidst the wasteland of porcelain bowls, all in lovely pastel shades, he felt momentarily ticked that he would miss the fun and games in Boulder.

Little did he know he'd be better off neck deep in shattered shitters than partying in the high, cruel Rockies.

* * * *

- SIXTEEN -

With one hand on the wheel, one eye on the road, his nose bandaged in white gauze and most of his concentration missing somewhere in action, Tim Titus absently piloted his sleek red Fiero through a miserable Colorado rain as he headed east on highway 119 toward Boulder. The windshield wipers beat a hypnotic rhythm back and forth across the wet glass, back and forth, like the clocking of a metronome. The sound of the car's well-tuned engine droned low and steady, sounding like the contented purr of some great mechanical beast. The car's tires cut a hissing path through the rain slicked pavement, spraying up rooster-tails of water with great abandon.

Tim yawned.

He almost didn't go; he almost canceled his plans. And after his terrifying run-in with that crazy old codger in the clothing store, no one would've blamed him. That episode scared the "go" right out of him - and Tim was a go-type person, always here, always there, always ready to enrich with his presence the dozen or so social gatherings he was called to each week. But this was one he almost missed. This was one that almost went from Tim-Terrific to mediocre-at-best because of that...that thing, that grizzled maniac with the bent coat-hanger, that bugshit old man. The fact that he had even CONSIDERED missing an opportunity to flaunt his stuff at a free-for-all party showed just how much the episode had upset him.

The first thing he had done after the incident - the first thing after separating himself from poor love-sick Mavis, that is - was to run in a panic straight home and take a scalding hot shower. It was amazing he had even made it home, running like he did down East Jacinto Street wearing nothing but his satin undies and a terrified expression. Under different circumstances, he later pondered legions of screaming women would have chased him, what with the raw animal sexuality he exuded in his daring bikini briefs with his finely muscled bare shanks pumping up and down for all they were worth.
But he had made it home, taken a long hot shower and scrubbed his nose where the old man had kissed it until it was raw and bleeding. And then he had taken ANOTHER shower because he imagined he could still smell the ripe grime of the old cocker on his skin.

But miss a party? He had lain awake for hours thinking about that, and with dawn creeping through his massive custom-made bedroom window, he had decided no, his conscience wouldn't allow that. After all, what was a party without Tim Titus? Boring, that's what.

The rain continued, steady and monotonous. Tim rubbed his weary eyes, unconsciously taking his lone hand off the steering wheel to do so. The car drifted off to the shoulder of the road, tires biting on the hard-packed gravel and spitting out rocky chunks to the rear. The car bounced and jolted. The shoulder gripped the car and jerked it hard to the left before shoving it violently back onto the roadway. Tim grabbed the wheel with a start, suddenly alert. "Whoops," he said. He eased back on the pedal, dropping the Fiero's speed from 70 to 60, determined not to let his concentration slip again.

What happened next was not his fault, what happened next had nothing to do with his concentration. In the rain, there was just no way he could've seen the hunched figure standing by the side of the road some 100 yards ahead. No way. In the rain, there was just no way he could've seen what the hunched figure was swinging by his side in a wide, looping arch, no way he could've known that the twenty-two pound object was about to be thrown in a high underhand lob timed perfectly to collide with his oncoming car.

What he did know bare seconds later was that some ghastly monstrosity had smashed into his windshield, spider-webbing the glass and splattering a massive amount of gore all over it. He had the brief, crazy thought that he had just driven smack into an impossibly large insect and that it had exploded upon impact with the Fiero's windshield. Then he was fighting for all he was worth with the jitter-bugging steering wheel. He had time to see two beady gray eyes staring dead at him through the cracked glass, time to catch sight of a pair of horribly broken and misshapen claws seeming to hold onto the windshield in a frantic sort of death grip, before he lost complete control of the car. He couldn't see where he was going - not with the splattered gore on the glass. The car hit the shoulder of the road again and in a panic Tim over-corrected, jerking the wheel violently to the left. The Fiero performed a stunning double-donut and began skidding backwards on the rain slicked road. Tim fought desperately for control, spinning the steering wheel in mad half-circles, craning beyond the mess on the windshield in a last ditch effort to see. The ruined object finally slid off the car, leaving a grotesque smear of blood and entrails that did nothing to improve the view. In desperation Tim slammed on the brakes - not the thing to do on wet pavement at 60 miles per hour - and the car bucketed crazily for fifty-feet or more before ramming backwards into a highway sign, humping over it and hanging up on the sign's bent post with a screech of metal like a thousand fingernails on a hundred blackboards.

"Holy jumpin' uterus!" Tim proclaimed, the nonsensical phrase popping out of nowhere. "Shit in a porcelain bucket! Flyin' horny cow turds!" Having exhausted his supply of exclamatory phrases, he slumped forward in the Fiero's seat, banging his forehead on the steering wheel several times in frustration. It wasn't a comfortable position to be in - the car now rested in a nose-down attitude - but Tim sat there for a moment letting his heart decelerate from the maximum overdrive rate it was trip-hammering at to a less than lethal rate.

After a bit he got out of the car, having to stretch his legs to reach the ground. He was immediately soaked. "Shit!" he said as he surveyed the damaged. The car was hooked, no doubt at all, its ass end a good three-feet off the ground. Any thoughts Tim entertained about muscling it back onto terra firma were soon dashed. This was wrecker-city here. He kicked the blasted highway sign hard with one wet Reebok-clad foot. It made a dull sound in the rain. "Shit," Tim said again and he bent his head sideways to read the mangled green sign. BOULDER 14 MILES. "Well ain't that just great? This is just great, just friggin' great." Tim spun around to face an imaginary audience, his arms spread wide. "Ain't this great? Huh? Ain't this something?"

He walked around to the front of the car and looked at the windshield. Now here was a total loss. Even if he had been able to get the car back down to firm ground, he wouldn't have made it far with that mess. The entire driver's side was crisscrossed with cracks spreading out from a large caved-in area at eye level. The rain had washed off most of the gore from the glass but Tim spotted something stuck in the caved-in area. It jutted out several inches and at first he thought it was a small branch stuck there. Then he noticed it was covered with fur and saw what it was, and that the reason it still clung to the windshield was that one long claw of the amputated animal leg was imbedded deep in the broken glass.

"What IS this shit?" he said. He scanned the ground around the car until he spotted a mangled lump the size of a flour bag some thirty feet away, lying at the very edge of the shoulder. He walked over, knelt next to it and with rain running like tears down his face he examined the object. "A 'chuck," he announced, "a friggin' goddam Colorado woodchuck." He shook his head, then turned it suddenly to the sound of an approaching car.

His hopes rose, his mind shifted gears, his hormones kicked in. Maybe it was a flashy babe come to his rescue. Sure, why not? After all, babes WERE attracted to him like moths to a 1000-watt light, and even in this gloomy weather he would stand out like the gorgeous hunk he was. That's it. Gotta be. A flashy babe. He would let her take him inside her nice warm car and she could dry his wet bones and work the aches out of his joints. A soft towel, a flashy babe and a gorgeous hunk. This was a day that might just yet be saved. A smile worked its way to the surface of his rain streaked face. Even under the worst of conditions, Tim's libido could rage out of control. He stood up and struck what he thought was an alluring pose, hip cocked to one side, chin jutted out, face held defiantly up to the rain.

The car pulled to the break-down lane and stopped twenty feet from him. It was a white Mercedes convertible, an older model but in fine shape. Hot damn, Tim thought, a flashy RICH babe. The best kind. He walked over to the car, brushing back his dark wet hair with his hands. The driver's side window purred down three or four inches and stopped. Tim stuck his face in the crack. "Man, it sure is nice to see such a pretty face on such an ugly day," he said, the master of cool.

Dan Schroeder let the window roll down the rest of the way, looked up at Tim's frozen smile, smoothed his thick mustache and said, "Well, I do so try to look my best."

* * * *

- SEVENTEEN -

Ted Davenport was young, blond, fit, and ready to kick some ass. He was also a rookie cop - just another over-anxious pup much too green to be trusted, according to his training partner John Nagy. Ted couldn't believe the State of Tennessee actually PAID him to have eight hours of fun each day. He loved the dog-gone job. Gee, he got to wear a gun and a real sharp uniform with stripes down the pants and everything, just like the guys on "Hill Street Blues." He got to drive fast and squeal his tires if he wanted and run right through red lights whenever the urge struck him. He got free donuts at Dawn's. He thought the siren was really neat.

Ted Davenport thought police work was just about the greatest thing since Nintendo.

John Nagy thought Ted was full of the stuff every baby-faced recruit was full of: rookie doo-dah.

So when the little black Brat pick-up truck sped by them and clocked in on radar at 41 miles-per-hour - a full 11 miles-per over the posted speed limit - Ted threw down the ordinance book he was studying, looked at his partner and said, "Hot diggity-damn!"

Nagy looked up from his sports section, sighed, looked at the kid, sighed again, shook his head, set the paper down and dropped the patrol car in gear. Yeah, right, hot diggity-damn. Christ, jeezus!

Ted reached over and flipped on the overhead lights and cranked the siren to wail. Yeah! That's neat stuff.

Nagy rubbed his temples.

The big Chevy closed the gap between it and the Brat pick-up in no time at all. The quicker the kid got to write his ticket, the quicker Nagy could get back to the important stuff - his sports section (he also had a fishing magazine he hadn't even cracked open yet). Nagy eased the patrol car alongside the pick-up and Ted motioned stiffly, professionally, aggressively for the driver to pull over. Just like on Hill Street.

Problem.

No driver.

Damn, Ted thought, there goes my ticket.

But the Brat did pulled over to the shoulder of the road and stop. Nagy slid the patrol car up behind it. "Better let me handle this, kid. You cover from the car." It was standard procedure but it still pissed Ted off. He wanted to approach the vehicle, that was where the action was. He couldn't wait until he was senior officer on patrol and could do all the neat stuff.

Nagy got out of the car and unholstered his gun, silently thanking the department for switching to 18-shot semi-automatics. He wondered how many shots it took to kill a ghost. He wondered why he ever decided to become a cop. He wondered what the hell the kid had gotten him into. He wondered if he'd ever get to read his fishing magazine.

His worn boots crunched gravel as he slowly approached the truck, gun held to his side. He scanned the bed of the pick-up as he neared and then moved carefully to the driver's side. He snaked his free arm out to the door and grabbed its handle. With a quick jerk and a sideward hop, Officer John Nagy flung the door open, pointed his gun inside and yelled, "FREEZE!"

Clint Strohman raised his short little arms as high as he could possibly get them. He knew when the jig was up, Clint did. He didn't need any explanations. He'd been had. Boy was Mom gonna be mad.

* * * *

- EIGHTEEN -

Laurie Hinchberger was boiling chicken when Dave crept into the kitchen, grabbed her from behind and passionately nibbled her neck.

"Not now, Clyde, Dave'll be home soon."

"Huh?"

She whirled around. "Oh, Dave, it's you,"

"Yeah, it's me - who's Clyde?"

Laurie giggled desperately. "Joke, Dave, you big lummox."

Dave WAS big. And he WAS a lummox. "Ohhh, good one, babe," he laughed, "good one."

Laurie scored an eight on the sigh-of-relief scale. "Would you call the boys?" she asked, her heartbeat going like a metronome on PCP. "They're down by the pond."

"Sure, hon. 'Clyde' - I like it."

Dave lumbered off to fetch the boys. They returned looking the picture of innocence, which meant they'd been up to mischief again. Lord knew what they'd done this time, probably teasing the ducks with rubber bread. Dave was constantly suspicious of Ian and Johnathan, convinced of their duplicity in every thing from staining the house carpets Georgia-Dirt red to the destruction of the Brazilian rain forest. If only he could catch 'em in the act, maybe then Laurie would let him give the little monsters the whuppin' every pre-teen deserves.

"What's for dinner, Mom?" the boys chorused.

"Boiled chicken!" enthused Laurie.

"Gee, terrific," they chorused back, their gusto severely deflated. Ah well, at least they'd be spared the dreaded lasagna til tomorrow. Ian asked if he could have a Dr. Pepper and Laurie said he could have half - she didn't want to spoil him. Ian was just opening the huge refrigerator door when Dave stopped him with a commanding "Hold it!"

"Oh Dave, we can afford a Dr. Pepper, it's no big d-" He cut her off mid-protest.

"We don't have time for drinks, Laurie, or boiled chicken for that matter." The boys' eyes lit up. "We have to pack right away. Laurie, kids - we're going to Colorado!"

Nothing that Dave did these days surprised his wife and kids, they had learned to live with his unpredictable nature, his tendency to act on the slightest whim. When he declared his intention to become the world's foremost book-dealer, they said Okay, go for it, we're right with you. When he flirted briefly with a song-writing career, they backed him to the hilt (well, except for Laurie who dismissed it as a foolish waste of time from day one. She had killed that babe in it's early infancy. Dave had penned a song intended for a Madonna type, in which every line ended with an "oo" word - true, you, who, too. It was to be the all-time greatest pout song and with the right lips it'd drive the kids wild. But when he sang it for Laurie, giving it his puckering all, she broke down in a fit of giggles and said he looked like he'd been sucking lemons. (Bang went that vocation). And when he announced the trip to Colorado, all for the sake of a party, they just shrugged, said Why not? and went to pack their boogie shoes.

Van loaded with merry-making baggage, seatbelts buckled, they struck out for Colorado and a Rocky Mountain High old time. Under mild protests from the rest of the Hinchclan, Dave insisted they stop and pick up Barney on their way out of town. He knew Barney had received the same invitation he had and felt he owed it to his old buddy to get him there safely. He sure didn't want Barney driving on his own. "He'll sleep all the way there anyway," Dave said and indeed they'd no sooner loaded Barney's nearly inert form in the back when the rough, deep sounds of his hangover-snoring began echoing off the van's metal walls. "See," Dave said. Laurie gave him one of THOSE looks and he turned back to his driving.

Dave had mentioned nothing of the old man who had caused a scene at the recent book convention, throwing his threats around like so much matrimonial confetti. In the first place, the old guy was obviously fresh out of the nuthouse, and in the second place, how could the old kook know about the invitation which would find it's way into the Hinchberger mailbox two days AFTER the weird encounter? The answer's simple, he couldn't have known, his warning "If you go there, I'll kill you" was related to nothing but some imaginary world festering inside his ancient, deranged skull. So having dismissed the guy as a freelance loco who happened by pure chance to unleash himself on Dave, well then there was no point upsetting Laurie and the kids with the crazy tale. This trip would be good for the family, he believed, and he'd be damned if he'd let one lone loony-toon's ghost haunt the next few days. He would forget the old fool and concentrate on enjoying the good company and great scenery on offer. Forget it, Dave.

The Hinchberger clan were tooling along I25, zipping past the endless parade of fast-food joints lining the route to Nashville, and Dave was out of sorts. It was a combination of having to drive all the way to Colorado (he had the constitution of a bear but like many an ursine mammal, flying wasn't really his scene. The meal had not yet been invented which could remain safely stowed in the Hinchberger intestinal baggage hold at 30,000 feet), and the nauseating preponderance of country music flooding the airwaves. He twiddled his knob til his twiddle-digits ached but every station assaulted his rock-trained ears with non-stop tales of lost love, lost trains, lost cows. Every singer's name sounded like the product of a Waltons episode. A guy could go crazy. Laurie rather liked it all and wouldn't let Dave put on a tape instead. Add to that the un-civil war that had been raging in back off and on every since they'd left Georgia between possessor of the pornographic playing cards, Johnathan, and would-be possessor of said cards, Ian, and Dave could see Migraineville getting rapidly closer. And now Ian was complaining that he was getting car sick because Barney kept farting in his sleep.

"Well just roll him over," Dave snapped, his headache a black cloud on the horizon moving in fast, "and point him away from you."

"I ain't touching him. Johnathan's bigger, he can do it."

"No way!" Johnathan barked. "Uh-uh!"

That's when they heard the wailing siren and noticed the flashing lights tailing the Hinchmobile.

"Oh great, guys, now look what you've done," moaned Dave.

"Mom," whined the boys as one, two enemies united against a new foe.

"Honestly, Dave," she chastised, liberally sprinkling tut-tuts about the van and giving him her fiercest matronly stare. God, he hated it when she did that, when she looked at him as if he were a child who still wet the bed, when in truth he hadn't had one single night-time mishap for over a year now. He pulled the van over and sat perfectly still, eyes closed, taking deep, calming breaths. No sense getting tense and wound up. Relax, loosen up, take the ticket and try not to murder Laurie and the kids in a fit of nonpareil pique.

Dave heard the patrolman tap-tap-tapping at his window.

In Dave's line of work - showbizz, kinda - life was lived hard and fast. It was pedal to the metal, tote that bale and giddy-up-a-ding-dong all the way, so Dave had picked up more than his fair share of traffic violations. Traffic cops fell into two distinct categories, in Dave's experience: the bored, disillusioned, "it's a shitty job but I got a wife and four kids to feed" type who is very nearly begging you to give him an excuse, ANY excuse, that would save him having to write the ticket; and the gung-ho, go get em, "make my day, punk," upholder of the law type who churned out tickets like Stephen King does books - many and often. Dave wondered now which subspecies of wheely-cop was requesting his attention.

He looked.

Ah well, so much for that theory, Mr. Smart Ass. Bang goes that "I can spot em a mile off" boast. Which category does THIS one fall into, huh Dave, pray tell? Hmm, well, if Dave was not very much mistaken, this particular officer of the law fell into an entirely different category, what you might call the Lunatic Psychopath Masquerading As Policeman category.

Dave was face to face with patrolman Geezer...and his trusty .45.

"Jeezus!" he screamed and ducked the merest fraction of a second before the window at his left imploded, struck with the butt of the maniac cop's huge weapon. Tiny fragments of glass showered Dave in a razor-sharp blizzard. Laurie's instinctive piercing shriek galvanized Dave into escape action, slamming the idling van into gear and flooring the accelerator harder than he'd done since his teenage years, when burning rubber was considered a surefire way of impressing the chicks. Bucking and hitching, the van leapt ahead, leaving the old psycho fuming in a cloud of dust and gravel. Dave hadn't time to smile or feel elated, he was too wrapped up in keeping the van on the road and moving at top speed. He looked in his rearview mirror but saw no sign of the murderous old lunatic.

It was five flat out minutes before his heart rate returned to anything like normal and he was able to slow the van's speed and try to explain the situation to his family. It had been a close shave but it appeared that the incident was now behind them.

And then the interior of the van lit up red and blue as the murderous geezer's cop car reappeared on their tail. Dave had barely time to utter a frightened "Shit" before the rear window shattered under gunfire. "Down!" he yelled and fought to steady the van which had veered crazily to the right when his adrenaline boosted reactions had over done the avoiding action.

KA-Pow-ping! Another shot ricocheted against the back of the van and Dave battled to wrest more speed from the bulky, cumbersome Hinchmobile. But it was asking the impossible to expect the van to outrun a super charged patrol car (and where does a geriatric weirdo get hold of such a thing? he wondered in hasty passing).

The patrol car came level with the van, it's siren sounding like the prehistoric cry of some long forgotten dinosaur. Laurie and the boys accompanied it with moans and laments of their own. Barney snored and farted in the back.

There was a thump and the sound of metal scraping against metal as the patrol car deliberately steered into the Hinchmobile. A weaker man than Dave might have lost it there and then, totaling van and all four frantic occupants, but Dave managed to hold onto the wheel, to keep control of the rushing vehicle. He knew that he couldn't keep it up for long, however, and was desperately trying to think of something to save himself and his family when CRUNCH, another side-swipe from the madman in the cop car. The van went careening across the highway, mercifully missing a Volkswagon crawling along at a sedate 45. Again Dave managed to stay in control, God alone knows how.

The geezer in the cop car was held up momentarily by an old, battered station wagon and Dave seized the few seconds of opportunity offered, pulling out a few hundred yards on his pursuer. Laurie and the kids were through the business of screaming and acting hysterical - now was not the time for tantrums, now was the time for holding tight and praying to whatever religion you'd lapsed from.

The patrol car was gaining.

Dave asked the van for more speed but it had none to offer.

KLANG. The cop car rear-ended the Hinchmobile. And again, KLANG. Dave held it. The crazy old speedster pulled out a few feet and hit the van a diagonal blow, skidding the back end askew. Fight as he might, Dave could not resist the urge of the van to spin. All he could do now was sit tight and wait for the angels to come fetch themselves a Hinchberger four-pack.

With near balletic grace, the out of control van pirouetted its way across the blacktop, waltzed down the grassy verge at the roadside, and went dipsy-doodle onto its roof two feet from a deep drainage ditch. Dave surrendered consciousness before dipsy made it to doodle.

He was only out for about a minute and the dust had not yet settled after the kerfuffle. The radio was still on, spewing out some garbage about Billie Joe taking a dive off the Tallahachie bridge. Dave's concern was more for Laurie, Ian and Johnathan than the suicidal Mr. McAllister. From what he could make out, they were all just about in one piece and there was certainly no great amount of blood evident. He only hoped there were no internal injuries for anyone. He could see that Laurie was coming round and he thought he heard the boys groaning along to Bobbie Gentry's singing. Barney was still sound asleep. Please God everything was okay.

"Hiya, Davey."

"Yah!" cramped as he was, Dave nonetheless jumped at the sound of the crazy old man's voice. The reason for their being upside down in a ditch not far from Nashville came flooding back to him. The nightmare was not yet over. Maybe it had just begun.

"You really ought to pay attention when a fella tells you to do something, Davey. This "screw-you" attitude of yours is not healthy, believe me."

"I'll go back," he pleaded, desperate to postpone the inevitable.

"I don't give second chances, dogmeat," said the old man through gritted yellow teeth. "You can kiss your keister goodbye," and the gun barrel homed in on a spot right between Dave' s eyes.

There was a terrific explosion and the smell of cordite filled the air. Blood splattered over a four yard radius and countless millions of brain cells ran like soup onto the thirsty grass.

The smell of fetid body gases suffused the van and made Dave sneeze. He wiped his nose.

His nose?

Disbelieving fingers felt the Hinchberger proboscis and saints preserve us, there it was, right in the middle of the face where he had always kept it! His nose was as good as ever - probe fondle explore - there was no gaping hole in his forehead. Dave's eyes popped open. "He missed!" he whispered in stunned amazement. "Damn it, the old cockhead MISSED!"

"Yeah, but I didn't."

Dave spun round and saw Ian hefting a very large revolver, its barrel still smoking. Ian nodded to the ground besides the van...and the blasted body sprawled in a growing pool of red.

Ian had blown away the Geeze.

In perplexed wonder, Dave struggled out of the wrecked van. He managed to get Johnathan and Laurie out while Ian performed his own escape. With a little tender encouragement, both mother and son regained consciousness and confirmed that they were basically fine. Dave then went over to Barney, who was curled up by the side of the road hugging a mile-marker and sleeping like a babe. "Get up, Barney." He nudged him with his shoe. "Up."

"Are we home yet? Are we home..."

"Shut up Barney."

Dave turned his attention to Ian. "And just where the hell did you get this?" He waved the gun which he had confiscated from the diminutive sharp-shooter.

"Grandpa," confessed Ian. Of course, Dave should have guessed - Laurie's father was gun crazy. If it moved, Laurie's dad would shoot it (rumor had it there was more than one vacationer mounted above gramp's fireplace), and he believed that anyone old enough to spell "gun" ought to have one strapped around their waist. He was forever giving the kids pocket weapons come birthdays and Christmas time despite Dave's request that he quit, "at least until they can spell 'manslaughter'." Obviously Grandpa was slipping them pieces on the sly. Okay, so it paid off this time, but Dave vowed to have a real heart to heart with the old Quick Draw when he got home.

While Laurie cleaned the boys' faces with spit and a handkerchief (which neither boy appreciated - having your face washed is bad enough at the best of times, but SPIT?), Dave fished an old blanket out of the up-turned van and covered the gory corpse. He was about to rejoin his family when an agonized, halting hiss came from beneath the blanket. He swallowed hard. "Sassssss." There it was again. Fingers trembling, he reached down and pulled back the blanket.
To say he froze is to call Dan Quayle the foremost intellect of the twentieth century. Every fluid in Dave's body became instantly solid, from the blood pumping through his big toe to the squishy gunk filling his eyeballs. He became a Hinchcrystal. And all because the dead man's shattered jaw shifted the tiniest fraction of an inch, a barely noticeable movement. But Dave saw it...and he heard the impossible sound which struggled out from deep in the very blackest recesses of the old guy's bloody frame.

The man whose brains were even now hardening to form a gray crust on the rocks at Dave's feet spoke four impossible words, four words which nearly plunged Dave into total madness.

"Don't go. Kill ya," vowed the voice of a dead man, and as Dave watched in terror, the yawning chasm in the old geezer's skull, looking like the all-time radical part-line, began to fill with new matter, BRAIN matter. Impossible. You get one shot in life at growing a brain, not two. But his eyes saw it happen and Dave could not dismiss the evidence before him.

The geezer was regenerating.

With sick fascination Dave watched the unearthly process, from the agglomeration of brain matter to the rapid growth of pure white bone, the knitting of new flesh and the weaving of new hair onto scalp, completely covering that grotesque radical part-line. The geezer was almost back to his old inglorious self before Dave recognized the danger developing not three yards away from him. Thanking providence that he still had Ian's gun in his pocket, he whipped it out, leveled it at the brand spanking new pate of the born again murderer, and fired, fired until the gun was empty and crashing reports had given way to dry clicks.

Every shell blasted away a portion of the geezer's head until all of the skull had been blown apart.

And yet still a nerve in the neck twitched.

Dave needed no more that that - he turned on his heels and raced back to Laurie an the kids. "The patrol car, now," he ordered, letting them know through his stern tone of voice that that was not a proposition up for debate. Even Barney stumbled in without question. The keys were still in the patrol car (Dave thanked God he didn't have to go back and search the pockets of the re-assembling geezer) and no sooner was Johnathan's door shut than they were speeding down the road.

The patrol car flew past the exit ramp. "Dave, where are we going, you missed the turn."

"I told ya, we're goin' to Colorado."

"But Dave, we have to call the police, that madman back there..."

"...is history and we're going to Colorado if it's the last thing we ever do. End of discussion." Laurie hadn't heard Dave talk like that since he'd called Reader's Digest to cancel a subscription. She kinda liked it. "See if you can't get some music on that radio."

She did as ordered, was wary of refusing her husband anything right now. She fiddled about with it but got nothing besides country music. Juice Newton was giving her everything to Angel Of The Morning and Laurie moved to turn it off. "Leave it," said Dave, "I like it."

Laurie didn't fully understand what had happened back at the van, but if it had turned Rockin' Dave Hinchberger into Billy-Joe-Jim-Bob-Hinchberger, the Nashville Cat, it must've been really sumthin'.

Dave joined in with Juice while Laurie pondered.

* * * *

- NINETEEN -

The Devil twisted away from the screen before him, shaking his head in disgust. It looked more and more like the Geeze would have to go, and that was too bad. Not that he cared much for the old grouse - the Devil didn't give a blind squat for anyone - it was just that replacing Geeze would be hell, so to speak. He was a rarity, a truly despicable person totally lacking in conscience, a man with the God-given talent (and wasn't THAT ironic?) for spreading misery on contact. There just weren't that many bad guys that good around anymore. It was really kinda sad. The Geeze had been a fine operative over the years and had served Lou well, performing some first-rate devil stuff for him as his earthly emissary.

But he was slipping. Even with the supernatural power boost the Devil had given him, the nasty little grab bag of talents Lou had endowed him with, the Geeze still couldn't get the job done. Lou had made it possible for Geeze to jaunt from spot to spot almost instantaneously so he could stay one step ahead of the travelers. A lot of good THAT had done. He had given the Geeze the ability to perform amazing feats aimed at scaring the travelers into immobility, feats like that video-apparition trick pulled on the newsletter Editor or that sporty little golfing demonstration put on for the benefit of Mr. Hotshot Businessman. Great stuff, wild stuff, but ultimately wasted stuff. He had even gone out on the limb and empowered the Geeze with the incredible one-time-only not-to-be-repeated ability to regenerate himself. That was an exceedingly difficult power to transfer to a human and it had taken a lot out of the Devil. And for what? The Geeze had had to use the power after a young boy - a boy! - had shot him point-blank in the head. What a waste. Lou was still weak from that one. Being the Devil was had work, people just didn't realize. Keeping Hell running took a lot of energy.

It was all very depressing. The Geeze had succeeded in stopping just three of the targeted travelers - and those mostly on luck alone. That dopey cop from Michigan turned out to he an iron-gutted moron completely unaffected by the massive doses of poison the Geeze had slipped him. The golfer's Lear-jet had been blown to pieces but he wasn't anywhere near it at the time. That cocky kid from Arizona had walked right away from his car crash, a crash that was meant to kill him and would've if he hadn't hung up on that highway sign. The animal activist and his wife had been incited NOT dissuaded by the slaughtered-woodchuck message Geeze had left for them, And even that simple-minded bookseller and his simple-minded friend a pair who should have been easy as Gypsy pie to take out had survived the armed geezer-cop attack on their van and were nearing Boulder even now.

Yeah, the Geeze would probably have to go. The Devil sighed. His sharp features fell into stark relief as he swiveled his chair back to face the orange glow of the Earth screen at his desk (he sometimes wondered how the hell Hell ever survived in the days before computers and high technology). Well, if he had to go he had to go. But Geeze did still have one trick left in the bag of talents Lou had given him. One trick - not much, but it was something. It might just be enough to eliminate those pesky mortals, those troublesome travelers. Maybe. It was conceivable. But not very likely. Still, it'd be fun to watch. There was bound to be a whole lotta suffering goin' on.

The Devil pulled a massive cigar from his front shirt pocket, sniffed it mightily and blew once on its end. It flared bright red and the tip began to smoke. He stuck the stogie in his mouth, leaned back in his chair, put his feet up and prepared to watch the fun.

* * * *

- Part Three -
The Party

- TWENTY -

When Dan and Tim pulled up to the Stanley Hotel in Dan's bone-white Mercedes, they were directed by signs to a parking lot reserved for the McREXER PARTY. There were only two other vehicles in this lot, a dirty black and white police car and a red VW bug with an Alamo Rental Car sticker on its back bumper. "Hmmm," Dan observed as he scanned the nearly empty lot. "Yeah," Tim agreed. Pondering done, they parked next to the VW, got out and crossed the short distance to the Stanley's front step.

The Stanley was a storehouse of old fashion elegance. It stood massive and white against the stunning backdrop of the Rocky Mountains. Thick Ionic pillars stood in pairs like giant guards along the entire length of the hotel's long front porch. Ornate vertical windows flanked the huge wooden doors at its entrance. Dan and Tim stepped out of the chill of the wet Colorado air and into the well lit, open lobby of the hotel. A group of women, finely dressed in flowing gowns and high heels, walked by, chatting and sipping drinks.

"Babe-o-rama!" Tim proclaimed as he watched the ladies disappear into a room to their right - the "Torrance Ballroom," according to a plaque above its door. "This is gonna be a PARTY!"

Tim started for the ballroom after the woman; Dan put a restraining hand on his shoulder. "Whoa, hold on. Wrong way."

"Huh?"

Dan jerked his thumb left. "We're over there." A small free-standing sign - the kind with little white plastic letters you push into slots to form words - stood in front of a door to their left. The sign read simply: McRexer.

"Aw," Tim said. And they went through the door.

Leonard Norman had just cracked a Coors when he saw his old friend Dan Schroeder walk into the room with a young fella wearing stone-washed jeans and Reeboks. As soon as Dan looked his way, Len tipped his beer to him and beckoned him over. Dan smiled in recognition and started over, Tim in tow.

Leonard and Dan hadn't seen each other in years, not since their college days together at Grand Valley State where both ran weekly, in-depth studies on the affects of copious alcohol consumption on student grades. They had kept in touch only off and on, through the occasional phone call or postcard. Dan knew Leonard was a cop, Leonard knew Dan was rich (he had seen the magazine covers), but neither knew of the other's proclivity for horror fiction or the fabulous writings of Paddy McRexer.

"Long time no see," Leonard said pumping Dan's out-stretched hand like a politician.

"Long time no care," Dan answered in the traditional Grand Valley State College greeting. The two men shared a laugh over the memory.

"You're lookin' good," Len said, privately thinking, Danny boy's lost some hair.

"Well, you're lookin' good yourself," Dan replied, privately thinking, Lenny my man's gained some weight. "What brings you here?"

"Same thing as you, I 'spect, free food and Paddy McRexer. It don't get no better than this."

"You got that right."

"What say we go sit down."

"After you, my friend, after you."

There was a large round table in the center of the room prepared with place settings labeled with each guest's name. Dan and Len took their respective seats; Tim followed suit, head scanning the room for chicks.

David Hinchberger seated his family at the round table at about the same time Dan, Len and Tim were sitting down. Laurie and the kids were in seats reserved for other people (MARY, CLINT and CHRIS, according to the little tented signs in front of their places) but Dave figured they could move if and when those people arrived. Barney plopped in the chair to Dave's right and immediately put his head in his arms and fell asleep. Snores purred from his lips. Regular life of the party, Dave thought and shook his head. Next to the snoozing Barney were two empty seats labeled HERB and MARGE. Following these were the seats now occupied by Tim, Dan and Len. Ten places in all, two of them empty.

Everyone sat relatively quiet for a bit (even the Hinchkids for once) waiting for the hosts of the party to arrive. It was seven o'clock, the exact time the invites had said the party would begin. Dave thought maybe he should introduce himself to the others while they waited and he whispered as much to Laurie. "Be a good time to plug the Overlook," he said. He had brought several catalogs from his mail order business with him to pass around. Laurie nodded her consent and Dave smiled happily (it seemed Dave coveted her approval for almost everything lately - Laurie sometimes felt like she had three kids instead of two).

Dave stood up and cleared his throat. "Hi! I'm Dave Hinchberger from the Overlook Connection and I'm damn glad to meetcha!" He turned and pointed to his left. "This is Laurie and this is Ian and Johnathan." He explained that Laurie and the kids were not MARY, CLINT and CHRIS like their signs said. He then pointed to Barney. "Sleepin' beauty over here's name is Barney Barnhardt. He came with us. Believe me, it's best just to let him sleep."

Barney stirred at the mention of his name and muttered, "Howdy-doody," into his arms and then picked up his rhythmic snoring again. This was greeted by general laughter and actually served as a great ice-breaker. The others introduced themselves, Len, Dan and Tim, and all wondered about the missing guests. Pop tops snapped - a cooler of Coors and Coke had been set up in the room - and the conversation took on an eased, relaxed atmosphere. The talk soon turned to horror fiction and how great it was going to be to finally meet the two authors who jointly wrote under the name Paddy McRexer.

Someone suggested that "Noonies" was McRexer's finest piece of writing to date, and this was enthusiastically agreed upon. "Noonies" had sold over two-million copies in hardback and the bidding war for paperback rights had ended up in six figures. The movie was due out next summer and Hollywood insiders predicted record box office takes. Robin Williams was slated to play the lead. Dave mentioned that in his work as a book dealer, he had heard rumors of an even greater piece of work due out from McRexer soon, a story of a group of travelers and the problems they encounter with the Devil himself. All agreed that this really sounded like something to look forward to.

"The Devil!" Barney suddenly raised his head from his arms, eyes wide with fear. "Is he h-h-here?"

Dave patted his friend's shoulder. "Just talk, Barney, nothing more. You just wanna go back to sleep." Barney nodded dumbly and put his head back down on his arms and was soon snoring again.

"Kid's carryin' quite a load," Dave said by way of explanation. "W'all had a kinda terrifying experience on the way here and it took a lot out of him." Dave didn't mention the fact that Barney had slept through most of the ordeal. "Actually," he went on, "that's how we ended up driving here in a police car." Dave then related the story of what had happened to them on their trip, slowly at first, choosing his words carefully so as to not make a already unbelievable story any more hard to swallow. He told of the grizzled old man masquerading as a cop who had pulled them over, he told of the gunshots, the chase, the van crash and their harrowing escape in the police car. He told it all (except the part about Ian blasting the old guy away with gramp's gun, which he edited out for decency's sake). After all was said, he looked at his audience and he saw...belief? was that what he saw in their faces? It was, and he felt relief flood over him. And then for some strange reason he shivered and felt a bit scared.

Tim Titus was nodding vigorously. "Yeah," he said, "I met that old cocker, too! The same dude!" He was excited. "He threatened me with a...coat hanger, he did."

Dan Schroeder rubbed his forehead as Tim spoke, feeling the bump that was still there. "Yeah, uh-huh. Me too - I mean, he didn't threaten me with a coat hanger, but I think I ran into him, too."

They each in turn then related their own nightmarish run-ins with the old madman and the strange warnings that sometimes followed. Tim told of the incident in the clothing store back in Arizona and then mentioned the crash he suffered in his Fiero on the way to the hotel, wondering out loud if the crazy old man had anything to do with it. "All I know is that it was caused by a woodchuck," he said, "and that ain't normal." Len said that he thought maybe the guy they were talking about had sat right next to him on the plane coming in, and wasn't that scary? And finally, Dave told of his first run in with the old man, how the guy had actually attacked him with books at a convention in Georgia some weeks back. Laurie looked up at him puzzled - and just maybe a little pissed for not being told this earlier. Dave could only shrug in his big, sheepish way.

"What the hell's going on here?" Dave wondered. "Why would some old nutcase want us dead? And how could he be in so many places at once?" The relaxed fun that had been present in the room only minutes before dissipated like smoke in a snowstorm and gave way to a feeling of restrained nervousness.

"Whattaya think happened to them?" Dan asked and everyone looked at the two empty seats reserved for HERB and MARGE. "Or to the three who are supposed to be sitting over there?" He indicated the seats Laurie and the kids occupied.

"Oh, they'll be here," Dave said quickly, trying to sound casual. "Or maybe they just couldn't make it, who knows?" The others nodded but the reasoning sounded weak. Everyone still looked at the two empty seats.

For a minute there was silence in the room; even Barney's snores quieted. Then there was a sound from outside the room, the sound of heels clicking on the marble tile in the lobby. It was a sharp, steady clocking sound, ominous in its actuality. It loudened as it neared the door. Dave gulped audibly. Someone else hissed air. The doorknob turned. The door began to swing slowly outward. Shadows could be seen...and two men entered the room.

"Wonder which one's Herb and which one's Marge," Johnathan said to Ian and both boys giggled. Laurie shushed them as the two men walked past and up to the front of the room where a small podium had been set up.

The taller of the two had stylishly long dark hair and a mustache, the other man had slightly lighter hair that was closely cropped. Both were fairly young and quite good looking, make no mistake.

The short-haired man spoke into a microphone at the podium. "We're Paddy McRexer," he said. He had Irish features but spoke with a distinct English accent. "First of all, I'd like to thank you for coming; I don't think you'll be sorry you did. We've got a story to tell you, a confession to make."

"We are coming clean," the darker-haired one put in with some fervor. "A new beginning. We're gonna need your help to spread the word of what we're about to tell you."

There was a moment of silence, then the Irish-looking one went on. "My name's really Paddy McKillop and my partner here's Ray Rexer. I think you can probably figure out where the Paddy McRexer pseudonym came from."

There was polite laughter from the audience. Barney farted loudly in his sleep and the laughter turned hearty.

"A bloody critic," Paddy said. He smiled. The laughter died down. Paddy looked at Ray, somewhat sadly. Ray nodded once. Go on, the nod said, get to it.

Paddy took a deep breath. "We are not writers," he said. "We wrote not one single word of what you people and countless other Paddy McRexer fans give us credit for. We are nothing but a fraud, And I'm afraid we're responsible - at least in part - for some pretty awful things."

Ray took over. Most of the group stared on in puzzlement. "That's why we invited you here today. Like I said, a new beginning. We're coming clean and you're gonna help us spread the word. Paddy McRexer is really-"

Ray broke off. Barney began moaning in his sleep, deep and undulating. It was an awful sound. Everybody froze.

"He's baaack!" Barney said, seemingly still asleep, his head still buried in his arms. The voice was childlike and eerie. "He's baaaa-accck!"

The air in the room suddenly dropped twenty degrees. Paddy uttered a simple, "Oh shit" and stared at Barney.

"Get the kids out of here!" Ray yelled at Laurie. "Now!" He pointed to a service entrance in the back of the room. Laurie grabbed Ian and Johnathan and pushed away from the table.

She turned to yell at her husband. "Come on, Dave! Let's go!" Dave didn't move. "Dave!"

Dave's eyes stared blankly forward. "Yo! Have I got the books for you," he said.

"Dave?"

"Leave him!" Ray yelled, and pushed her and the kids toward the door. "Get the kids out of here!" She hesitated only a second - the kids were her first concern - and then bolted from the room.

"Books books books!" Dave chirped.

Tim Titus suddenly sat up erect in his chair directly across from Dave's and said, "Hey baby, wanna boogie? Boogie, boogie, boogie with me!"

Then Dan Schroeder yelled "Fore"' and shielded his eyes with one hand to watch an imaginary golf ball in flight. "Fore! I said. FORE!"

"I'm funny!" Lenny Norman shouted. "Me! I'm funny! "The funnee-est!" His voice mixed in with the other three in a pandemonious babble. "Fun-nee!"

"Books!" Dave continued to scream. "Books books books!"

"Boogie!" Tim blared.

"Fore!" Dan yelled.

"Fun-nee!" Len shouted.

"Oh, shit." Paddy said.

In the open doorway, a hunched figure stood smiling like an idiot Saint, smiling a proud smile. It was an old man with a wild beard and yellow teeth. He was wearing a gore splattered cop's uniform, but instead of a police hat, he wore a gutted animal on his head. The animal's tail hung down and mixed into the old man's clotted gray hair. Had Tim Titus been coherent at this time, he may have recognized the dead animal as the Colorado woodchuck that had hit his Fiero earlier and caused it to crash.

"It's showtime, boys and girls." the old man said and immediately Dave, Tim, Dan and Len rose from their seats as one and became silent. They all had the same mechanical, vacant looks on their faces. Barney had collapsed back into a deep sleep and didn't move. "I'm the pied-friggin'-piper," the old guy gleefully announced, "come to kill me some rats." He began to march in place, his bony legs poking like sticks at the thick material of his uniform pants. The four men followed suit, marching in place as they stood at the table.

"Pretty good, huh?" he asked, looking at Paddy and Ray. "Pretty neat."

"Don't do this, Geeze," Paddy said. "We can work something out."

"Now just be patient, Padddeee. It's not yer turn yet. I'll be back to take care of you and Ray-Ray in just a minute."

Paddy gulped. Ray gulped.

"Be good boys while Daddy's gone, now."

Dave, Tim, Dan and Len continued to march in place. Geeze waved his arm in an exaggerated "over-here" gesture and the four began to slowly walk toward him, lining up single-file. "Wagon's, HO!" Geeze yelled, and prepared to lead the four lambs off to slaughter.

* * * *

- TWENTY-ONE -

The five made for a strange spectacle as they marched single file out into the hotel lobby, the grizzled geriatric in the lead, ahead of four guys straight out of a George Romero flick. Kinda fitting really - Romero was lined up to direct the forthcoming "Noonies."

Out past the antique steam-powered car by the entrance the snaking line went, descending the wooden steps to the gravel path on pure instinct alone. The four followers never once dropped their gaze from the magnetic attraction of the Geezer's scabrous, wrinkled neck as he led them toward the hotel's empty concert hall some two hundred yards distance.

There was a jaunty spring to the old man's step as he strutted his malodorous stuff past fragrant bushes that seemed to wilt as he neared them. Things hadn't panned out too successfully for him 'til now, thanks to that loathsome old bitch, Lady Luck, shafting him every which way and back again. And possibly one or two minor - MINOR, mark you - errors on his part hadn't helped. These people ought never to have been allowed this far. Lou was ticked off, that much was obvious. And heck, Geeze was none too pleased himself - he did have his pride, after all. If only Lou could see how hard he had been trying, pulling out all the stops, pulling stops out of places where nobody knew stops stopped. Only it hadn't stopped them.

Ah, but now he was finally winning. He would dispose of the four pieces of ambulatory trash currently following his every footstep and then re-negotiate his agreement with the dipso duo, Mc and Rexer, two guys who wouldn't know talent if it set their shorts on fire. Maybe he'd made a mistake teaming up with those two? Maybe he should get a new, more intelligent partner? "Yeah, like a three-toed tree sloth or a common garden slug," Geeze said out loud and grinned. "Funn-eee, huh, Le Nerd?"

Leonard did not respond, just kept plodding along, a sappy smile plastered across his aging visage.

They reached the concert hall unmolested. The Geezer manhandled his docile charges through the door into an ante-room, then through black drapes into the hall proper. "Sheesh," gasped the hunched leader, "cold enough to freeze the you-rine in a bishop's bladder." The four did not notice the cold - whatever their current perception of reality, it equated not at all with Colorado in the season of the Geeze.

"Would you fine fellows kindly mount the stage?" the murderous old fart requested, his tone dripping gobbets of false charm. "We got us a show to do!"

The fab four followed their master's instruction without hesitation. Apparently their brains were not party to whatever was going on inside their heads. They were moved by another's will, and that other was beaming with undisguised elation as they took up their positions center stage. "Okay guys, pay attention to your director now. It's time for humiliations galore!" He chuckled like a sewer pipe. "I want you all to drop your pants, shorts, the works."

Four various styles of pants and four assorted designs of shorts (Tim's the most stylish, Len's the most dated, Dan's the most expensive and Dave's the most expansive) pooled around four pairs of feet.

"Beautiful," announced the near ecstatic Geezer, "bee-you-tee-full! Now hold hands!"

They held hands. They looked like overgrown toddlers off to kindergarten...but without pants.

"Freakin' perfect!" screamed Geeze, his yowling laugh echoing around the cavernous concert hall. If this venerable old building had ever seen such shenanigans as this before, well it must've been one hell of a wild party, that's for sure. The Geezer was beside himself. He had to give credit to Lou, the old Devil had certainly dished up some nifty tricks for his devoted helper - the ability to jaunt across space in the barest fraction of a second; the capacity to reconstitute dead tissue; the Devil's hatful of assorted gimmicks he'd used to scare the proverbials out of the massed ranks of the McRexer appreciation society. Now all but one of his Lou-given talents was exhausted. All he had left was that old chestnut, mass hypnosis. He could hypnotize a room full of people in one fell swoop and get 'em to do any damn thing he pleased. You want proof? Check out Messrs. Norman, Titus, Schroeder and Hinchberger, the Fabulous Flashing Four currently letting it all hang out for an audience of one. The Geeze.

And that audience of one was loving it. Humiliations galore! "Now, crow like roosters, you little darlin's," Geeze yelled and it was no sooner asked than granted as all four screeched and howled as if born to the role. Their arch nemesis could hardly stand up, he was laughing so hard. This was great! This was priceless!

And the fun was only beginning. The Geeze rummaged around in his trouser pocket and finally found what he needed. It was a dainty little tool, made of bright red plastic and sharp, VERY sharp, stainless steel. A potato peeler. A simple but effective little gem of a tool. And he was gonna have some fun with it, yessiree. Fun. Geeze held it out in front of him and walked forward.

"Okay, boys, gimme some skin!" The Geeze giggled like a schoolgirl as the four unclothed men clucked and crowed and cock-a-doodle-dooed in blissful ignorance.

* * * *

- TWENTY-TWO -

"Okay, three kamikazes, two Dr. Peppers, and one 'anything wet and windy.' Who gets what? Call 'em." The waitress was a slight girl, all teeth and ponytail. Her badge declared her a "Jamie."

"We're kamikazes," said Ray, motioning to himself, Paddy and Laurie.

"And we're Dr. Peppers," - the kids.

"So you must be 'wet and windy,'" Jamie finished, handing Barney a ginger ale. He'd been insulted by better people than her in his time so he let the crack slip. Besides, he had other things on his mind.

They all did.

Immediately following the Geezer's theatrical entrance and exit, right after he'd led the four budding Foghorn Leghorns off to their poultry debut, Paddy and Ray shook off their paralysis, decided that decisive action was called for, and pretty much began running around like headless chickens. So much for the poise and understated sophistication which were the hallmarks of their pre-Geeze lives. It was as if Mr. G, as they first knew him, had touched their lily-white souls and blighted them, sucked the very moral fiber out of their bones. They felt empty and useless, ashamed and shot through with fear. If it wasn't for their stubborn male pride they might have crumpled to the floor and wailed like disaffected two-year-olds. Instead they just babbled a great deal, dashing hither and yon and getting nowhere fast. Their hullabaloo woke Barney.

"Siddown and shuddup," he mumbled dozily, "'fore I fetch the Principal."

His outburst brought a degree of focus to the McRexer duo's hysteria and they homed in on him as a beacon in a sea of insanity. Barney hadn't a clue what in the world was going on - one minute he was peacefully ensconced in Slumberland, dreaming of a classroom full of students with their lips stapled shut, and the next he had two freaked-out simpletons asking HIM what to do! By God, he'd TELL 'em what to do if they didn't calm down, and how!

Well, when the trio, under the confused guidance of Barney, finally got their shit together - and there was a Rockies avalanche worth of the stuff to get gathered - they came to the conclusion that their best bet was to adjure to the bar. Not that they'd have any clearer idea of how to proceed once there, but at least they could get sozzled while they fretted.

The remains of the Hinchberger clan were there before them (when searching for Dave, Laurie always checked out the nearest bar first) and as soon as Paddy, Ray and Barney entered the room, Laurie started flinging questions at them, questions to which THEY had hoped SHE would have the answers.

With the entire assembly floundering in the same swamp of ignorance, life-lines in the form of liquid inspiration were called for.

When "Jamie" had delivered the drinks, along with a check that would make Donald Trump feel nervously for his wallet, the unhappy band of travelers set about thinking.

They had no choice but to assume the worst and plan a response accordingly. Paddy and Ray's "worst" was the worst "worst" because they knew how thoroughly evil the Geeze was. They had been fronting "McRexer" for a number of years now and were intimately familiar with the writings of their joint alter ego, writings which actually spilled from the profane pen of good old Mr. G. You only had to read the stories to realize a sick mind was at work in them (according to a Time magazine survey, 62% of readers felt physically ill after reading the scene in McRexer's "Ploppies" where the spunky heroine, Tracie Matthews, loses all the fingers of her left hand to an electric pencil sharpener). Paddy and Ray could only guess as to the terrors being visited upon their four absent fans.

"We gotta go look for 'em. Rescue 'em." It was Barney who broke the silence. For possibly the first time in his tormented life, Barney was biting the bullet and standing up to a challenge. Who'da thunk it?

Ray shook his head violently. "He's dangerous, you don't know. He's liable to kill you, them, Laurie, even the kids...especially the kids! Maybe Pad and me'd be spared but I wonder about even that now."

"I don't care, Ray, it's something we have to do. Those guys, they aren't just anonymous book collectors with a taste for classy writing, they're PEOPLE, with families who love them. Take Dave Hinchberger - with Dave gone, Laurie loses everything, her kids lose their example in life, I lose my free beer supply. We GOTTA save 'em!" There was real desperation in Barney's words.

"Well I guess you can't argue with sentiment like that," said Paddy, and so three of the world's foremost cowards, plus a Hinchberger trio, found themselves committed to a fight, good against evil, with just possibly the fate of the whole world at stake.

Gee, is that all? thought Ray. And here's me making a big thing out of it.

* * * *

- TWENTY-THREE -

The Colorado Rockies Rooster Quartet were still crowing in four part harmony, not following any particular melody, simply improvising around a basic "cock-a-doodle-doo" theme. It wasn't jazz, but for chickens it was a pretty fair effort.

Geeze didn't appreciate their gusto - humiliating them was one thing but these numbnuts were enjoying themselves! "Okay, dickheads, quit the squawkin'."

They wouldn't stop.

"Cock-a-doodle-doodle-oodle-oodle-oo-eeee."

"Dammit, I said shut up!"

As one they launched into a rousing chorus of squawks and crows and cluck-cluck-clucks, and the Geezer grew mad enough to spit bullets.

"SHUT THE CLUCK UP!!!"

The song died - exact time of death, "seven o'cluck."

The Geeze was breathing fast and hard, his fists knotted into tight white bundles of knuckles. For a minute he had lost control of his charges, let the mental chains which shackled them slip dangerously loose. He thought back to what Lou had told him about the special powers - "Use 'em, don't abuse 'em, Geeze. Screw around with 'em and they'll turn tail and bite a chunk outta your ass, y'hear?" He heard all right, and he chastised himself for not protecting the Geeze posterior. But not to worry, he'd survived un-nibbled this time and he would put the mistake behind him. Like Lou always said, "To err is human, to forgive ain't my department." Lou came out with a lot of stuff Geeze didn't understand. But back to the matter at hand.

"Okay you buncha losers, the fun part's over with, now we get down to bizz. Arms above your heads."

There was a momentary delay suggesting the Geezer's domination was not as total as it might be, but then all assumed the classic stick-em-up posture.

Geeze walked along the line, waving the potato peeler under the nose of each surrendering McRexer fan. "So who wants to go first, boys?. You, 'Nerd? Mr. Macho Cop who sneaks behind Decker's Hardware to read horror books while Bay City wallows in a mire of lawlessness and crime, tsk-tsk. Or how 'bout you, Danny Boy - wanna put your precious "woodie" up against my stainless steel peeler, huh? Or maybe you, Hinchberger?" Geeze stood before Dave and glanced downward. "Better make that HALFinchberger." He shook his head. "No, not you." He paused, looking at each man with unbridled contempt. And then slowly, very deliberately, his rheumy eyes scanned across to the fourth in line, to Tim.

Geeze sighed. "Ahhhh. Timmy. Timmy Tit-us, All American Boy. Arizona's Finest. A man's man and a chick's idea of slap 'n' tickle Heaven. Yeah, it's gotta be you, Timmy, it's just GOT to be you. Come to Papa."

The Geezer beckoned with the potato peeler and reached out his other hand to take hold of Tim.

Something buried deep inside Tim Titus died when the Geezer's filthy, tainted flesh touched his own.

The pores all over Tim's body opened and evacuated their cargo in a fruitless defensive reflex.

With an exhilarated buzz he hadn't experienced since his days as a backstreet abortionist, Geeze slowly raised the potato peeler.

Tim's inner voice screamed.

The Geezer's lascivious voice squealed.

And a booming voice from the heavens exploded-

"GET YOUR HANDS OFFA HIS DIDDLESTICK!!!"

When the Devil, Lord of Darkness and as loathsome a critter as was ever kicked out of God's summer camp in the sky, is top of your Christmas card list; when you've been boating on the boiling river Styx; when you've feasted at diabolical dinner parties and stoked the coals of Beelzebub's barbecue; when you are to Old Splitfoot what Nancy is to Ronnie...well your fear threshold is pushed way up and your knees no longer knock upon hearing a strange voice calling you out of the blue.

So thought the Geeze.

He was wrong.

When the holy command echoed around the chilly concert hall, Geezer's black heart skipped more than one beat and he knew grave apprehension for the first time in a long time. It was something in the tone, some righteous, almost saintly quality that disturbed him. His grip on Tim tightened in a reflex reaction. Tim remained perfectly still, the only show of life a single tear dripping from the corner of one eye.

The Geezer let go and crouched in a semi-stoop ready to spring to safety. "Show yourself!" he yelled with false bravado. Until he could pinpoint his new foe (or just possibly it was a familiar, timeless one), the Geeze was at a distinct disadvantage.

Up in the balcony, Herbert Aloysius Fockley was still and silent. A wealth of experience in tense situations similar to this (well, not EXACTLY similar) had taught Herb the wisdom of resisting the enemy's efforts to psyche him out. You don't become a legend in counter-terrorism woodchuck-style by polite persuasion and an irate letter writing campaign. Nope, Herb knew what was what. He would win Marge the time she needed, sure as God made marmots.

Marge Fockley. Even now she was nimble-toeing her way around the outside of the concert hall to creep up on the old tramp from the rear. Sneaky, yeah, but necessary. The very thought of that old man's hat...strings of woodchuck intestine trailing from it like fine red ribbons...ooh, it quite turned her stomach. And it made her furious, and that was good, that put a vital sharpness and edge into her movement. She knew the rear entrance was open - when they arrived three hours ahead of the other guests, Herb and Marge had made a quick, efficient study of the hotel and its out-buildings. Their plan was to give the party time to warm up, to let hosts and guests alike get pleasantly plastered, and then make their grand entrance. They would catch the anti-woodchuckists in the group with their guard down and in true Fockley fashion, they would dispense a little cold justice. But all that had been superseded when him with the hat walked into the concert hall.

The commotion had jolted Herb from his light doze and he peeked over the rail to see what was afoot. Hell's bells if there wasn't the most bizarre procession coming through the black drapes. There were four guys who looked liked they'd sprinkled a couple dozen sleeping pills on their morning cornflakes, and a bent and twisted Rumplestiltskin type in a gore stained cop's uniform, with a woodchuck - a WOODCHUCK - on his head. Call him naive but Herb hadn't been expecting anything like this here in Colorado. He nudged Marge. She looked and could not hold back a tiny squeak of shock. No one heard. The hideous troll continued to lead his followers to the front of the hall, right up to the stage. Herb and Marge didn't need any more convincing - there went the guy who made a slaughter ground of their lawn; there went a guy whose exploits made the literary excesses of Stephen King and his ilk look like petty misdemeanors; there went a guy who needed his butt kicked, and how!

Herb and Marge Fockley would do that chore. Just try and stop 'em!

Quiet as a mute church mouse, Marge crept into the back-stage part of the hall.

The Geezer's nerves were wound tighter than the insides of a golf ball. Listen as he might, he could not hear a thing except the occasional pathetic whimper from Tim. It seemed that Mr. Arizona was levering at the corners of the Geeze's hypnotic hold. The Geeze wasn't concerned. Top priority now was to second guess whoever - or whatever was out there.

"Out there" meant the concert hall, unless the voice came directly from Angeltown, thought Geeze. Otherwise, the interloper had to be in this room. There was no one visible at the sides of the hall where the chairs were stacked, nor at the entrance, unless they were spying on him through the curtains. But no, it sounded like a voice from above, from the rafters...or the balcony.

The balcony! Touchdown Geeze!

It was obvious really - that's where Geeze would have holed up himself. Chances were good he'd find Mr. Diddlestick frequenting that upper gallery. Okay.

"You either show yourself right now, buster, or I'm comin' up them stairs after you...and I'm bringin' my peeler with me!"
Herb's spirit deflated. He'd been had. Fiddlesticks! But Marge still needed more time. He'd have to stall. Herb gulped and stepped into view.

"Ah, the old Geeze was right, as usual."

"Very astute," said Herb, trying to flatten the nervous peaks and troughs in his speech. The old duffer was the length of the hall away but murder in his cloudy eyes was clearly visible.

"Elementary my dear...er, what was the name again?"

Herb paused, counting off more precious seconds. Hurry Marge, hurry!

"You deaf as well as doomed, Mr. Mystery Man?"

"I ain't deaf."

"Behold, it speaks! Now if we can only teach it to tap-dance we got us a SHOW." Herb didn't take the bait and the Geezer got mad. His voice cast off its sarcastic garb for cloth of a harsher, keener cut. "Quit pullin' your pud and gimme a name."

Herb didn't honestly want to say the words, but he had to. "Only if you say please."

Ooh, bad move. The Geezer looked like he was gonna melt. "In two seconds I'll use your lungs for toilet paper! Now - GIVE ME YOUR NAME!"

"H-h-h-herb. H-h-h-herb F-f-fockley."

"Harry Fartbucket, huh? Say, why not join me, Harry? Why don't you 'come on down'? Ladies and gentlemen, a nice big round of applause for Harry Fa...Hey, wait a sec'. Did you say Fockley? HERB Fockley? Like in Herb and--"

"--Marge," a voice hissed from behind him. "Marge Fockley. And you can eat led, sucker." Marge swung the weighted baseball bat in a beautiful, graceful arc. The Geezer jumped at the very last moment but the blow caught him in the small of his hunched back, sending him flying from the stage in an artless swan dive.

Herb bolted from his eyrie to help.

Marge leaped from the stage and landed square on the Geezer's right leg. The snap-crackle-pop of splintering bones was a balm to her wounded feelings. The bits of leg that survived Marge's crash landing were quickly reduced to a pulpy mush by repeated blows of the heavy bat. The old dried gore stains on Geeze's uniform were engulfed in a tidal wave of fresh blood and multi-colored body fluids. By the time Marge tired of clubbing the leg, it was little more than a warm puddle.

Understandably, Geezer squealed like a stuck pig. But if he thought Marge would heed his pleas, he was stupider than Herb's stupid cousin, Eddie. In a strange way, Geeze and Eddie were two of a kind now - each scored only three out of four on the how-many-useful-limbs-do-you-have? scale. But unlike old Eddie, Geezer's losses were just beginning.

Herb tried to stop his wife but she was too single-minded to be swayed from her task. Ray Rexer and his five fellow sleuths burst in, ready to lock horns with the evil Geezer no matter what, ready to battle the Devil's pawn in order to save mankind from the gaping maw of Geezerdom. But they found Marge Fockley instead. Mephistopheles would he a push-over compared to Marge in a fit of pique.

In his dim, distant past, Ray had once been a police officer and he tried to recall and execute some of the combat techniques familiar to all in that profession. Quick as you like, he grabbed the baseball bat, intent on ripping it from Marge's grasp. If Marge noticed him, she didn't show it. She swung the bat AND its passenger and buried the whole shebang into the much pummeled chest of the barely breathing old man. For a few nightmare seconds, Ray was face deep in Geezer-guts. Then Paddy, ever the hero, rushed in where Barnhardts fear to tread and dragged his partner out of his other partner moments before another blow pulped the very spot where Ray had lain. Ray left a steaming trail of viscera as Paddy hauled him clear.

Marge was oblivious to it all and she continued her bludgeoning with unwavering resolve. Swish-whoosh-splodge, again and again and again. She was mincing the Geeze.

The crowd looked on in stunned stupefaction. It was a grizzly display. Incredibly, Marge was actually smiling as she worked. Hubby Herb couldn't believe his eyes. To think, all these years he'd been living with Attila the Hun in drag. It kinda put a new perspective on their marriage. Next time she served up chicken broth when he specifically asked for chunky vegetable, would he rebuke her? Or would he remember the baseball bat in the garage? He would remember, is what he would do, believe it!

Barney edged forward once he was sure there was no risk to himself. He nudged what was left of the Geezer with a nervous foot. The Geeze twitched and Barney jumped as if someone had goosed him with a garden hose. Not that he was afraid, you understand - just caught off balance, that's all.

"Yo, neat!" said Ian. "The old booger's still alive!"

"Wanna bet?" said Marge, acknowledging her audience for the first time. She stepped over the Geezer, positioned herself beside his right knee, and took a few practice swings worthy of Dan Schroeder.

"Oh, no," groaned Barney. This he could NOT watch.

"She wouldn't," said Ray.

"She would," said Pad.

"But she won't."

"She will."

She did.

Bat connected with Geezer's most precious preserve in an excruciating explosion of gore. The men looking on cringed in sympathy for one of their gender; Laurie thought, Gee, I bet that smarts.

The Geezer was a ruined man. That which was - was no more.

Marge crouched to look her opponent in the eye. "Mister," she said, "don't you EVER wear a woodchuck hat in my presence again." And he wouldn't.

The Geezer was dead.

With his passing, the hold over the four ice sculptures on stage was broken and all were restored to a very chilly, confused and embarrassed mobility. The frantic scurrying and wrestling on of clothes was reminiscent of a whorehouse raid.

The Geeze oozed in death as he had done in life, spreading himself in a sticky smudge over much of the concert hall floor. The coppery tang of spilled blood was strong in the air, but beneath it still lingered the unique stench of "eau de Geeze." Suddenly, that which had been the Geeze began to sputter and sizzle like bacon on a grill. Wispy tendrils of steam rose from the splattered Geeze-gore on the floor. The stunned group of onlookers backed up. The hissing sounds continued for a few more seconds and then abruptly stopped. The floor was bare. The Geeze had evaporated.

It was only a matter of time before explanations were demanded, and like it or not, Paddy and Ray had a heap of confessing to do. They all adjourned to the main hotel and several rounds of stiff drinks. The truth would finally come out.

* * * *

- TWENTY-FOUR -

"You wanna tell it?"

"No, you do it, Pad."

"Okay." Paddy McKillop downed a shot of whiskey - Irish, naturally - to steady his nerves. "Truth is this," he said, "it was all Rexer's fault!"

"Was not!"

"Was so!"

"Was not!"

"Was so! You got me into this; you started it all!"

"Well...yeah...but..." Ray fell silent, head hung low. "Sorry."

"Sorry don't feed the bulldog."

"What in the hell are you two talking about?" It was Dan. He was getting pissed. "How 'bout you guys knock off the damn bickering and tell us what this is all about?" He meant the whole shebang, the entire catalog of crazy events that had brought them to this very moment.

Paddy sighed. "All right. Pornography," he said softly.

Barney blushed.
"Not to mention booze, gambling, cigarettes, shoplifting...even littering. The whole bloody lot. An evil litany of decadence."

"Decadence?" Leonard said, scratching his head.

Paddy went on. "It started when Geeze made my partner here" - he shot Ray an acid glance - "a little proposition. Ray, that slime, was KIND enough to let me in on the deal." Paddy paused and shook his head. "The deal was simple: instant fame for Ray and me - celebrity status, mind you - in exchange for a few minor services rendered. It seemed harmless enough at the time."

"Yeah, harmless," Ray agreed in pitiful eagerness.

"What we would do," Paddy continued, "was sell and promote the stories written by Geezer as our own work. We got real good at it, made a lot of money for him. We'd process all the checks and pay the Geeze a lump sum of cash on the third Thursday of each month."

"Let's get back to this decadence thing," Tim said.

Barney blushed again.

Leonard frowned again.

"What's that got to do with anything?"

Shame robbing his words of their vigor, Ray took over the story. "By the time we found out where the money went, we were trapped. Geeze was using the cash we made for him from his books to finance his own corrupt publishing business. He put out a line of slick magazines and distributed them free to children's homes, orphanages, schools - even dentist offices. The magazines all carried subtle, hidden messages - subliminal messages, they're called - that led children into depravity. The kids were urged to drink, smoke, lie, cheat, steal...even litter, f'r chrissakes!"

"My God," gasped Barney - FREE magazines and he hadn't gotten a single one!

"Wherever young, impressionable minds were open to evil propaganda, that's where Geeze sent his magazines. Me and Pad, we acted as front men for Geeze, we were 'Paddy McRexer.' We did the book deals, raked in all the cash advances we could secure, and passed it all on to him. Just for the fame of it, just so we could live life in the limelight. And all the while the Geezer was eating away at the moral base of the next generation. And we knew something was wrong. We knew."

"Yeah." Paddy's anger had subsided and now he felt only shame and guilt. "Yeah, we knew. And finally we did try to put an end to it, but then Geezer introduced us to his boss." Paddy visibly trembled. "The Devil."

"Lou." Ray was ghostly pale.

"Piss up a rope!" said Johnathan. This story got better and better. Wait 'til he told the guys at school!

Everyone spent a few seconds digesting this latest nugget of information. Len was still trying to figure out what "decadence" meant, silently mouthing the word.

"If the 'Devil' is such a badass, how come you guys are spillin' the beans now?" Good old Dan, always first with the incisive questions. What an annoying habit.

"We're a lot of things, Dan, a lot of not so nice things. We've lied; we've cheated; we've conspired to corrupt minors; we put friends and strangers alike in mortal danger; one of us even appeared under false pretenses as a 'Guest of Honor' at a local convention. But we know when enough is enough. Yellow-bellied no good bungwipes we may be, but now we're trying to do right. For once."

"Pad's right. We're shit but we're sorry shit." That didn't come out quite like Ray meant it, but that's all he knew to say.

Paddy and Ray had spoken their piece, there was nothing more they could do.

David Hinchberger stood up, shaking his head. "I looked up to you guys," he said, "you were my HEROES." There were tears in his eyes as he turned his back on Paddy McRexer forever. His family and Barney Barnhardt followed him out of the room. One by one, the others left too: Tim strolled away unconsciously rubbing himself where the Geezer had grabbed him; Dan said nothing as he headed home to problems rendered insignificant by this day's startling events; Len wanted to stay and have someone fill him in on this decadence thing, whatever that was, but convention demanded he abandon Paddy and Ray just like his peers had done. Only the Fockleys were left. In a moving gesture that lifted the two men's crushed hearts, Marge embraced them both and told them she forgave them their sins. She smiled and allowed Herb to lead her away.

Paddy McKillop and Ray Rexer were alone in the empty concert hall. Friendless.

After a moment, Ray turned to Paddy. "Y'know, we could try to make it up to them."

"How?"

"By really writing a story."

"You mean us?"

Ray nodded.

"You mean a REAL 'Paddy McRexer' story?"

Ray nodded again. "Yeah, we could dedicate it to them, maybe even write them into the story or something."
"Think it'd work?"

Ray paused in reflection. "It might. Stranger things have happened, haven't they?"

The two looked at each other and burst into laughter. It felt good. Clean. They walked out of the hall together and into the new Colorado sunshine. Partners.

* * * *

- EPILOGUE -

Eternity is a bitch of a long time. Lou knew that. And he knew from countless eons of experience that "you win some, and you lose some." It was a pity that the Geeze had stumbled at the final hurdle, but how was Lou to know the old scuzball had a chicken fetish? To be fair, Geezer had been a big help over the years so Lou couldn't really grumble. He wasn't down-hearted, he had plenty of other irons in the fire (okay, so his televangelists weren't doing so hot lately, gettin' sent to jail and all, but he'd beat 'em back into line, never fear).

Lou's secretary interrupted the great one's pondering. Her gravel-in-a-tin-bucket voice coughed at him over the intercom. "Two visitors to see ya, chief."

"Who the hell are they? he barked.

"How the hell should I know?"

Terrific! The one thing that bugged Lou about being lord of the underworld was that all the decent secretaries got drafted upstairs. He just couldn't find good help anywhere these days. "Okay, send 'em in, Miss Strissel."

Lou's office door opened.

A pair of frumpy looking clodhoppers walked in. One of them had a baseball bat.

"Hi, I'm Herb Fockley, this is my wife, Marge."

"Hi," from Marge.

"We'd like to have a little chat with you about your policy on woodchucks."

Oh-oh.

Did somebody mention WRATH?

THE END

* * * *

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Ray Rexer is the creator/publisher of the wildly funny and amazingly informative Stephen King parody newsletter, "Castle Schlock." He was the fan Guest of Honor at "Horrorfest '89," the first ever Stephen King fan convention held at the stately Stanley Hotel in Estes, Park, Colorado. Paddy McKillop was green with envy. Ray is 36, married and has two children, so-he's no stranger to horror. Donations may be forwarded to:

Ray Rexer
Essexville, Michigan

Paddy McKillop is the author of the stunning short story, "The Wrath of Herb and Marge." He contributes regularly to England's number one horror magazine, "Fear." He attended "Horrorfest '89" and earned recognition as being the person who traveled the farthest to get there. Ray Rexer was NOT green with envy. Paddy is 23 and lives with his pet woodchuck, Chuck. He moves quite often but may currently be contacted at:

Paddy McKillop
Warwickshire, England

- The Authors -