June 15, 10:20 pm
Richard ran, and Billy followed.
Richard ran as if all he cared about was putting as much distance as possible between him and Keith; as if he feared his will would snap like a rotten branch if he so much as looked back over his shoulder.
Billy wanted to tell him to slow down, or to stop and try to calm himself. But he knew that Richard's only chance of living with the devastating choice he had just made was to get as far away from the source of his anguish as he could. So Billy just ran behind, until Richard finally slowed to a jog, and then to a walk.
Not only did Richard not look back, but he also barely looked around him. And thus he seemed oblivious to the death and devastation that was claiming their city. Richard could sense nothing beyond the loss and the ruin of his own soul, but Billy saw it all, and his heart broke with each fresh horror they passed. The devastation was already numbing, and the nightmare was continuing to unfold—and even accelerate—with every passing moment.
At first, they had headed east, and Billy wondered if Richard was trying to get back to the University—perhaps hoping for a familiar place in which he could hide. But then he turned south, on 7th East, and the pair proceeded past Trolley Square.
The iconic water tower of the old trolley station, now an upscale shopping center, had been toppled at some point earlier in the day. Someone had rammed a delivery truck with a huge and colorful Safeway logo into the supporting struts, perhaps repeatedly, until the tower came down, crushing a VW Beetle and blocking 7th East like a downed alien walker from War of the Worlds.
Trolley Square itself was on fire, and it burned lustily in two separate locations, with no sign of a fire engine or even a police car, anywhere to be seen.
It wasn't that the streets were completely deserted. Billy noticed that small groups of soldiers and police officers were roaming about, looking shell-shocked and terrified, their long guns at their shoulders, and their backs to each other as they crept, like strange and spiky viruses, floating down the veins and arteries of the city. Billy also saw an occasional civilian—a furtive shadow, darting from building to building, or through the penumbras of light cast by the streetlights that had not been shot out or toppled.
But mostly, Billy just saw the bodies.
Old bodies, young bodies; men, women, and even children. Some had suffered incredible violence, and some looked as if they had simply died of fright, or laid down peacefully to close their eyes for a moment. There were bodies in smoking cars and bodies lying alone and in pairs in the streets, some mangled, some burned, and many suffering what looked like knife or gunshot wounds. Some were so obliterated by blunt instruments or vehicles that they scarcely looked human. And then there was the blood. Rivulets running across the streets and the sidewalks, blood splattered against car windows and trees and storefronts. Blood running like thick syrup into storm drains where it would be carried away and forgotten.
Billy paused and looked down at the bodies as they passed, but Richard did not. He stepped over the bodies with barely a glance, and then Billy had to hurry to catch up.
To his surprise, Billy saw far fewer of the Wanderer's angels than he had expected. A half dozen times he saw them, dashing at top speed, as if they were late for appointments, or had urgent tasks to accomplish. He knew they were hurrying from the last deaths they had caused, and rushing headlong toward the next. And although Billy knew there had to be far more innocent ghosts than the Wanderer's dark angels, he saw almost none of them. It was as if they, like the living, had gone into hiding.
Like hibernating bears, or like terrified children fleeing from a raging storm, Billy thought.
Strangest of all was the silence. To Billy's ears, these streets had not been this quiet at night for a century or more. No cars sped by on the roads, and the air was as still as death. The smoke made it hard to see the stars and made even the streetlights and the light thrown by random windows seem as if it was tinged with brimstone. And yet through the murky air Billy could still hear the soft sounds of a city dying: Distant sirens. Explosions. The crackling of a fire two streets away. All punctuated by brief and interrupted screams from houses both near and far.
The vengeful angels were hunting in stealth now, creeping through solid doors and walls, and making their selection from the terrified bodies they found huddling there—looking for the ones that seemed the strongest, or the most capable of destruction. Fathers and older sons. Single mothers. Wild children with the gleam of rebellion strong in their eyes. Five minutes in the hands of the Lord's dark angels and the house would be silent, and blood would be pooling on the carpet, or drying on family portraits that hung on the walls.
Hundreds of predators, Billy thought. How many families can each dark angel kill in a single night? Ten? Twenty?? How long will it take Drouillard's minions to cleanse all life from this city? Is that the ultimate goal? How can anyone possibly hope to stop it?
These thoughts tortured Billy's mind, as he walked a dozen steps behind Richard, wondering if the man's mind would ever recover enough to be the savior than Tuilla had been so certain he was destined to be.
It was clear that Tuilla had taught him much. The ease with which Richard had entered the big man, wrestled Justin into submission, and then expelled him, gave Billy hope. But it was hope belied by the near zombie-like quality the man was projecting now.
Has she taught him enough? And where is she now?
There were so many things Billy needed to ask Richard, and he knew he could not wait forever for the man to emerge from the shocked trance that had claimed him.
Eventually, after wandering at random for what seemed like hours, they reached Liberty Park. Richard walked them into the darkness of the unlit park, guided by a familiarity that was now a part of him. He stopped to stare for long moments at a grove of trees that overlooked the lake, gazing into its depths as if the place had some special meaning to him. Finally, Richard tore his eyes away and continued walking.
He finally stopped at a playground, and Billy realized that this was where Richard had seen Mattie for the first time, and where he himself had first seen Richard Pratt. That had been less than two weeks ago, Billy realized, although it felt like a lifetime. Finally, after several minutes of silence in which he wasn't even sure Richard was aware of his presence, Billy risked speaking Richard's name, quietly and gently, hoping to break his reverie. But the man made no sign of hearing. His eyes had focused on a shape on the dark hillside, just down from where they stood.
Slowly, Richard walked down, and then knelt beside what Billy thought at first was just a pile of debris. As he got closer, he could see it was not debris. There were two more bodies here, their blood darkening the grass like chocolate syrup in the meager starlight.
One was the body of a young man, and Richard had tears in his eyes as he stared at him. A girl about the same age was lying dead just two feet away, on a blanket. Finally, Richard sighed deeply and sank down onto the grass. He gently touched the boy's shoulder and said, "His last name was Kimball. He must have come here often."
Billy thought he had misheard Richard. This boy wasn't Justin Kimball. Justin was a ghost, and his body had died a long time ago. This boy had just died earlier that day. He must have been here with his girlfriend when some unknown violence claimed them both. Their bodies now lay exactly where they had fallen. Nobody had come to claim them in those few hours when the city still retained a whiff of sanity. It was unlikely now that anyone ever would.
Richard was looking at the body, and had placed his hand atop the boy's pale, stiff, and claw-like fingers, which lay upturned in the grass.
"His last name was Kimball," he repeated, and Billy thought that finally Richard was speaking to him, and not just to himself. "I didn't know his first name. He wanted to leave Salt Lake City. He wanted to get out. His girlfriend used to read him Emily Dickinson. He said Dickinson was a witch, with all her talk of death."
Billy noticed that a paper binder of college ruled pages lay nearby, open, and already the paper was curling from the dew. It was too dark to read the pages, but he could tell they were filled with incredibly neat, tiny writing. The words looked like runes in an ancient manuscript.
Billy looked up at the night sky. He had no idea how long it had been since they'd left Richard's house. He guessed it was likely now well past midnight, and perhaps later. Even though Richard wasn't making sense, it was the first time the man had spoken, and it gave Billy a tinge of hope. He decided to try to engage Richard in conversation.
"Richard, can you tell me what you learned? Can you tell me what Tuilla taught you?"
Richard didn't seem to hear. But he was softly whispering to himself, over and over. "His last name was Kimball. How weird is that? He had Justin's last name..."
"Richard, this isn't Justin. Do you remember who Justin was? He was the one that killed you. You expelled him from Pil, Keith's friend. Do you remember?"
To Billy's surprise, Richard looked up at him, and even in the dark he could feel the man's eyes on him like razors.
"I remember, Billy. I'm not crazy. I may be broken, but I'm still in here."
Billy sighed, a wave of relief passing over him.
"Then you remember Justin?"
"Yes. I picked him up and threw him through the window. I remember."
Billy didn't completely understand that, but he decided to accept it.
"Yes, you threw him out of Pil. He crashed against the wall of your house."
"Do you know where he went?" Richard asked, his voice quiet now; almost meditative.
Billy paused a moment before he answered. "Yes. He was... reset. Actually, Howard reset him. He had a piece of metal. I think it was a tire iron. He attacked Justin as soon as you threw him out. So he was reset."
"Back to where he died?" Richard asked.
"Yes."
Richard started to rise.
"Then I need to go to him. I need... I think maybe he's my only chance. My only chance for..."
Billy put a hand on Richard's arm, and the older man sank back to the grass. He had very little strength to resist anything, it seemed.
"No, Richard, he won't be there anymore. I'm sure that he's fled somewhere. He's hiding out. I think he's traumatized."
Perhaps as much as you, Billy thought.
Richard sounded sad and resigned. "He was the only link we had to finding Drouillard." That was what Billy had been hoping Richard would remember, but the man's voice sounded so dead that he wasn't sure if Richard was really ready to rejoin the struggle.
Silence fell over them both for a time. Two dogs raced through the darkness nearby, silent and afraid, heading east. Richard's despair crept into Billy from the very act of sitting near him. He could feel the man's deep resignation, and it was seductive. For a moment, Billy wondered what it would be like to no longer fight; to just accept that the Wanderer had won. And then sit and watch the city burn around them until nothing was left. The thought of it was darkly attractive.
After a century and a half of struggle, to just let go...
It was Richard that finally broke the silence.
"Do you think Justin is heading back? Do you think he's going to attack Keith again?"
Billy had to consider that for a moment before he finally said, "No, I don't think so. At least, not tonight. From what I saw, there won't be much fight left in him, at least for a time."
"Maybe I should go back," Richard said. But Billy could tell that too was just a reflex. Richard knew that going back would do him no good. His heart could not bear it, and would be of no help to Keith.
"From what I saw," Billy said, trying to sound calm and reasonable, "Keith's best protection is Howard Gunderson. That boy can do far more for him now than you can. You've left him in good hands."
Watching Richard's silhouette in the dark, Billy saw him dip his head and stare at the ground. There was so little of the man left that any hope he had of Richard being their savior seemed foolish.
"Billy, I'm lost. What do we do? I don't know. I don't know..."
"Richard, we're not defeated. Not yet. Can you tell me what you learned from Tuilla? What did she tell you to do?"
Slowly and painfully, Richard recounted what had happened since he and Billy had last been together. He told the boy about the gathering of angels on the plaza outside Temple Square, and how he and Tuilla had actually seen Drouillard, now occupying the body of an old military man. He told him how enraptured his hundreds of followers had been during the speech that he and Tuilla could not hear.
"Did you say hundreds," Billy asked, feeling suddenly cold in the night air.
"Yes. I'd estimate there are probably eight or nine hundred. But I don't know for sure."
"I used to think there were only dozens," Billy said. "I knew there had to be more, based on what has happened to this city tonight. But close to a thousand? It's worse than I ever dreamed it could be." In his mind Billy tried to do the math again, thinking of the number of households in the Salt Lake Valley. If each ghost invaded even ten of them tonight, that would be ten thousand families that would never emerge again from behind their locked doors.
"Did Tuilla give you any hope? Did you learn anything from her that would help you stop Drouillard?
Richard told Billy about his "training." The way he could now see the Hereafter as a golden ocean, full of turquoise and red stars, and that he had tried to track Drouillard in that vast expanse with no success. He told him how the Wanderer had tried to tempt him, to invade his consciousness, but how he had been ultimately powerless to do so. And he told him that Tuilla had been terrified when he had been lost for so long in the recesses of his own mind.
"But when I came out," he finished, "she told me I had everything I needed. That was the last thing she said to me. After I realized what was happening in the city I left her, to find Keith."
Billy sensed Richard's shame in that last detail, but didn't pursue it.
"Richard, did you believe her? Do you think you have everything you need to defeat the Wanderer?"
Richard's voice was weak, "I don't know."
Billy waited until Richard finally looked up and met his gaze. "I don't know how to ask this question delicately, Richard, so I'm just going to ask it. Do you still want to try?"
If he had expected an answer, even a negative one, Billy was disappointed. Instead, Richard just put his head down again, and clasped the fingers of the dead boy on the grass even tighter. Billy could sense the war that was going on in Richard's mind. He knew Richard wanted to give up, with every fiber of his being. Indeed, he was actually trying to give up—relentlessly working to find a way to walk away from this struggle that had never been his to begin with. Even in the darkness and the silence, Billy could sense the battle raging inside Richard's mind. He knew that if Richard's despair won this battle, then they had lost everything. What small thread of hope that remained was all in this sad, crushed, and broken man.
As the night deepened, Billy sat vigil by Richard, saying nothing, and just waiting anxiously for the battle inside his friend to be won or lost. It was the longest hours of his life, knowing that the future of this city and everything Billy loved and cared about was riding on the ability of Richard Pratt to find a level of inner strength Billy was unsure any man, living or dead, possessed.
By the time Richard finally spoke, Billy was in his own black pit of despair. And Richard's voice was so quiet, he had to ask him to repeat what he had just said.
"I said," Richard sighed, his voice weak and shaking, "just let me go mad. Or let me possess someone about to die and try to cross over. I'm done. Billy, I can't stay here. This world is too full of pain. I've lost everything. It's my fault that Justin became what he is. Keith is gone forever. I have nothing. I just need to... rest."
Billy drew closer to Richard and wrapped his arms around the man's hunched shoulders. He laid his cheek on Richard's firm back and just held him for a time. Finally, he said, "Richard, if you give up, there won't be anything left of this city. Not by the time Drouillard is done with it."
"I don't care," Richard said, seeming to not even feel Billy's arms around him. "Keith will leave. Thanks to Pil, Michelle, and Howard, he'll get out. And once they're gone, then the rest of this city can join me in hell, for all I care." His voice was weak now, and there was nothing left of the Richard that Billy had known these past days. All he heard was the pain and the anguish and the need for it all to end.
"You've won," he continued. "Nothing I have done has mattered. I've lost everything and everyone I ever cared about. If you can bring me peace and end this, then you can have me. I'm yours..."
With horror, Billy realized that Richard was no longer talking to him.