D A Novel (George Right)

In this face there were no eyes at all.

A disgusting musty smell which had spread in the air distracted Logan's attention. He looked askance at the squashed bag–something whitish and lumpy had been squeezed out of it, and Tony had not the slightest desire to examine, what exactly. When he raised his eyes again, the bus was not visible anymore. Either it had turned somewhere–meaning that there finally was a crossroads ahead–or it had completely sunk into darkness and fog.

After returning to the sidewalk–no more adventures in the street, however deserted it looked–Tony hastily walked in his former direction. Though he felt less and less desire to go farther, at the same time, having gone so far already in this direction, he did not want to turn back. When you do not know where to go, the silliest idea is to beat about. And besides, in the depth of his heart, he was not sure at all that the place where this bus came from was any better than where it was heading.

Soon his decisions were rewarded: ahead in the fog a crosswise sign loomed–a crossroads at last... Tony, hurried already by cold and fear, still quickened his pace; probably, he would even have run, but he did not like at all the idea of his noise echoing all through the empty street.

And then he understood that he did not have much desire to approach the sign.

Something hung from it. Just from that part which designated the cross street. For an instant, Logan had a wild thought that it was a monkey which had seized the sign with its tail. But, after stepping closer, he realized that it was a cat. A cat which had been hung by its own tail... Dead cats and dogs always caused insuperable disgust in Tony, but he still needed to read the sign, and so he came even closer.

Now he saw that the situation was even worse. It was not a tail. The unfortunate animal hung by its own gut, stretched from the ripped up belly and, apparently, nailed to the sign. And, judging by the look and smell of the corpse, it had hung here for many days already...

How had anyone gotten the cat up there on the sign–by a fire ladder? Tony had heard about firemen rescuing cats, but not...

He painfully swallowed a lump which had risen in his throat and forced himself, straining his eyes in the dark, to read the sign. Amazingly, the street along which he had come, appeared to be Broadway. However... despite all Tony's efforts, he could not discern the first letter. It was either erased or splotched by dirt, resulting in "ROADWAY". A senseless tautology, if taken literally... On the sign for the cross street, there was no name at all. Only a black arrow with the inscription "ONE WAY." The usual road sign designating one way traffic. But Tony could not stop thinking about the literal meaning of the words. "The only way"... Logan completely disliked persistence of this instruction and turned in the opposite direction as a matter of principle.

Especially since the cat hung closer to the sharp end of the arrow.

Shortly afterwards, he praised himself for making the correct choice: though the new street was just the same–deserted and dirtied (perhaps, there was even more litter on it) without a single working street lamp or a lit window–but, seemingly, from a kingdom of wooden ruins, Logan was returning to a stone civilization. Houses on both sides of the street were becoming higher and more modern, and ahead a bus stop with a billboard appeared. Tony had seen this poster many times: at the left, the face of a little girl, and on the right, the face of an old woman–both, of course, smiling. Apparently, it was something about medical insurance, along the lines "we care for your health at any age..." The billboard, naturally, did not interest Logan at all–he wanted to see a listing of the numbers of routes stopping here. He, now, with great pleasure would take any route if only it would take him away from this terrible place.

M13, the sign said. M13? Tony could not remember such a bus. In Brooklyn, yes, there is a thirteenth route; it passes through the cemetery area of Cypress Hills–but in Manhattan? Alas, where there should be a route diagram, Tony found only an empty frame.

And then he almost physically felt someone's glare. A glare full of hatred and rage.

Tony involuntarily held his breath, afraid to turn back. There was no sound behind him. Tony stood dead still for several seconds, and then, having realized that to stand with his back to danger was even worse, turned sharply back.

Behind him there was nobody. Only this stupid poster.

Nerves, Tony told to himself. Some hell on wheels had plagued him this whole damned night... And then he looked at the advertising more closely.

The faces were the same he had seen many times before, but their expressions were absolutely different. The girl stared into nowhere with the vacant look of a mentally retarded child; her face was wreathed in a senseless smile, her tongue hung out, and saliva flowed down her dropped chin. The face of the old woman was completely mad, too–and much more terrible. It was deformed by a grimace of fierce hatred; the muddy running eyes glared with a fury as stunning as a blow to the solar plexus, and the smile was actually a spasmodic grin which had bared rare teeth and naked gums where teeth were missing.

"It's impossible to feel a picture's gaze," Tony told himself. Oh yes, and the gaze of a living person–is it really possible? Science, anyway, does not know about beams or anything else that eyes could emit and influence another person...

But anyway–who could order and place such a poster? Even if the mentally retarded girl could be explained as a paroxysm of political correctness, that mad old woman...

Tony tried to dismiss his uneasiness and to appeal again to his common sense. Certainly, there can not be such a poster, as well as there can not be such a Broadway and such a business area of Manhattan... But since they do exist, and since a bus does go here–probably, after all it is more reasonable to wait for the bus and ask the driver about the route...

If only this bus would not be even worse than that school bus.

He stepped under the bus stop roof where the darkness was even more dense, and shivered in fright. It seemed to him that in a corner someone was squatting–someone thickset and twisted, with broad shoulders... and with no head.

In the following instant Tony, who already felt arrows of icy horror piercing his stomach, understood that he was looking at a wheelchair. A simple one, without a motor. Empty.

Well, a wheelchair abandoned at a bus stop is probably not the most usual object... but also not the most frightening, is it? There could be plenty of reasons why it had been left here... however, none of them came to Tony's mind. Anyway, he did not believe that a miracle of healing had happened here. Anywhere, but not here.

He moved closer to the wheelchair. In the darkness he could discern only its black silhouette, and hardly even that. Tony extended a hand and touched the back. His fingers immediately came across some slits... long vertical cuts. The wheelchair's back was not simply cut–it was slashed to pieces. And.. the torn matter was sticky.

Tony hastily jerked his hand back. His fingers came unstuck with an unpleasant sound, as if the mutilated wheelchair did not want to release them. He reflexively tried to wipe them against the seat... But there it was even worse.

A whole pool, yes.

Cold, thickening, but still not dried up completely.

Tony looked around in panic–and his eyes again found the billboard.

The faces had changed again.

The girl's face now expressed a spitefully malicious triumph. The triumph of a very bad, very spoiled child who for a very long time, probably weeks and months, had thought over and prepared a delightfully vile dirty trick–and who had succeeded with it at last. And the old woman... on her face an expression of incomparable horror stiffened. A horror from which even young and healthy people lose control over their intestines and bladder–and old people usually just do not survive such horror. Actually, Tony was not sure at all that he was looking at a picture of a living person, instead of a posthumous grimace disfigured by an agony.

And at this moment he felt almost the same horror. Horror at the sight of faces on paper, which live–and die...

But from the depth of his consciousnesses came a saving thought–"What if it was not paper at all? Modern technologies, a superflat display–OLED or electronic ink... But no"–he pushed his face up to the billboard–"It's not any kind of display, it's the most ordinary poster..."

"Rotten hell!" he thought. What an idiot he is! He was simply looking at the other side of the billboard from within the bus stop! Obviously, different posters were placed on different sides!

Yes, of course. Everything has a reasonable explanation. And we will ignore questions about who needs such advertising–either one, or another variant of it...

And now go and look at other side of the billboard.

"What for?" Tony objected to himself. He knew, yes, knew already that it was the same picture which he had seen approaching the stop. Because anything else is simply impossible. So, there is no need, absolutely no need to look there. Only he will not wait for the bus at this stop. (Tony once again looked askance at the wheelchair.) No, he will not.

He wiped his hand against a glass wall. Despite the darkness, long traces of bloodstained fingers appeared quite distinctly. And now he noticed that they were not the first on this wall. And it was unlikely that all his predecessors simply wiped soiled hands. Some, seemingly, limply fell with bloody palms against the bus stop wall, and some vainly tried to catch hold of smooth glass when they were dragged...

"Perhaps, it is just ordinary paint," Tony told himself. "Local guys having fun..." Nevertheless, he quickly walked farther along the street without looking back. The bus still could come from ahead–if indeed there was one-way traffic and if the M13 bus operated at night...

"That's the wrong question," a malicious internal voice noted. "Certainly it operates at night. The question is whether this bus operates in the daytime..."

Ahead in the gloom two shining eyes appeared. Yellow. Round. Unblinking.

"Headlights," Tony told himself. "This must be the bus. But it stops only at bus stops."

But one could not say that Logan regretted it. To tell the truth, with each second he desired even less to meet this bus, whether it intended to stop or not. Partly because again he did not hear any engine noise. And also because he could not even discern a silhouette. The headlights–if they were headlights–were approaching absolutely silently.

Tony understood that if he turned back and ran, this thing would overtake him somewhere right near the stop. But ahead one more crossroads loomed. If he managed to get there first, he would have a chance to turn...

But he still did not run. He yet remained too sane a person to run away from a bus. He just quickened his pace. Even so, the headlights neared not as quickly as could be expected of a bus. But also not so slowly as he would like.

As he walked closer, he felt he wouldn't be in time to reach the crossroads.

"What nonsense," he told himself, "this just a bus, or, well, maybe, some other vehicle... And even if there are any nasty guys inside, they hardly have any business with me..." But at the same time, another voice in his brain named an absolutely different reason not to run: he should not show that thing that he is afraid.

Now he discerned a vague silhouette in the darkness and fog. It really seemed to be the bus. Without any light, except the headlights–without even a route indicator in front. And still approaching completely silently, without even a garbage rustle under its wheels.

Only several yards remained to the crossroads. And only a few more–to the bus. Tony broke down and ran.

They reached the crossroads simultaneously. Logan jerkily darted round the corner, quickly moving to the left. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the long dark frame (unlike usual New York buses, this one obviously was not white), square holes of black windows, dimly glowing symbols "M13" on one side, and lower–an inscription along the side: "ARE YOU FREE FROM SIN?" The bus was so close that Tony felt a wave of warm air coming from it. For a moment Logan was certain that the irreparable had happened, he had given himself away, and now this thing would turn and pick up his trail...

No. It just passed by. Of course, it is simply a bus following its route, and it is silly to addle his brain with any nonsense... Curiously enough, the stern inscription on the side of the bus convinced him more than anything else: it was simply an advertising of some religious organization. Tony had seen it several times in the daylight, in a normal city. And, unlike other posters in this weird night, it looked the same then as now.

But had he just imagined it or had he really seen at the last moment vertical pupils inside the headlights? Pupils which turned in his direction?

And that warm wave that had poured over him... in it there was no smell of gasoline and oil which could be expected from a working machine. It resembled much more the hot stinking breath from the chops of a big animal. And more likely a scavenger than a predator.

Tony ran for about hundred yards, then slowed to a walk, panting and telling himself that there were no grounds for panic. Everything has an explanation, even in this crazy place. Perhaps, after sunrise, he'll even laugh at his fears. (The thought that he would have to stay here until morning did not pain him as much as earlier–not because Tony began to like this place any better, but because he had started to get used to the inevitability... or to that which more and more seemed inevitable.) He darted a glance along the street stretching into fog–as empty and dark as as previously, then listened–it was absolutely silent. However, this silence was not calming. It seemed deliberate, unnatural–he realized that he was not hearing even his own footsteps, as if fog, like cotton wool, absorbed sounds. Tony stopped and forcefully stamped his right foot, wishing to overcome this oppressive silence. Old asphalt under his foot cracked, crumbling to pieces, and Tony fell knee deep in the wide open hole.

"Shit!" he muttered, having fallen to his left knee and trying to pull out his right leg. This, however, was not so easy. Apparently, underground water approaching close to the surface had affected the street from below, and his leg plunged into a dense viscous dirt, dirt which, without asphalt above, would be a real bog... Logan, still feeling more rage and vexation than fear (now his trousers were ruined for sure!), pulled his leg harder, then, without having succeeded, rested both hands against the asphalt–and felt it continue to break and crumble under his palms, like thin ice on a swamp surface...

"Hooey!" Tony thought. "I can't sink in the middle of a New York street!"

But he felt the real horror only in the following instant when he realized that his leg had not simply got stuck in a cold dense bog–but was being pulled downwards. He felt something blunt and strong (fingers? tentacles? jaws?) close on his ankle and drag it deeper...

His leg was already sunk to the groin. "Help," Tony desperately shouted, though several seconds ago the notion of calling for aid in this area would have seemed a bad idea to him. Even now, having heard the hoarse sound of his own voice, he looked around with more fear than hope.

And saw in the fog two burning eyes–headlights. Approaching.

"Bus M13," Logan thought. "It's followed me. Or I've just called it and now it'll come for my soul..." Tony realized, though too late, that, while running away, he had again jumped out from the sidewalk to the middle of the street. And now this damned bus does not need to do anything supernatural, it will simply squash the helpless victim in a trap...

Tony lay down on the street, seizing the unbroken portion of asphalt, and furiously heaved his body in an attempt to free his right leg. It looked as is he might even win back some inches, but the headlights behind him were inexorably closing. There was no engine noise so far, but the crunch and rustle under its wheels became clearer and clearer. One more jerk–horror on the verge of madness gave extra force to Logan–and he succeeded in freeing his leg almost to the knee. At that moment, right behind him, something crunched with an especially vile sound–probably, the bus had crushed a dead bird–and Tony understood that he wouldn't be in time. He screwed up his eyes, expecting the blow...

But no blow followed. Wheels rustled to the right of him and stopped. Logan opened his eyes without believing that he was still alive.

The vehicle stood opposite him and it was not the M13 bus. It was much smaller white truck. With improbable relief, Logan recognized a USPS truck, with a blue eagle head and the motto on the side.

Tony did not ask why a postal truck was driving at night. Express delivery–what could be easier and more commonplace? Everything has a reasonable explanation and that thing holding his ankle is simply heavy dirt. The driver of the truck will now help him to get out and will explain how to reach normal transportation. Maybe the driver will even agree to give him a lift, though this is against the rules... And all this idiotic phantasmagoria, at last, will end!

The driver's door lock clicked and a foot in a laced boot stepped onto the roadway. And at the same moment Tony noticed that the motto on the side of the truck differed a little from what he had gotten used to.

Instead of "We deliver for you," was written "We deliver you." To be more exact, "We de·liver you," with either a dot or a tiny hyphen separating "de" from "liver."

We rip out your liver.

And the eagle's head looked too predatory and spiteful. Logan at once remembered the myth about the eagle tormenting the liver of Prometheus.

The door opened more widely with an unpleasant scratch. The driver, a bulky bald Negro, got out of the truck. And turned his face to Logan.

Or what he had instead of a face.

Seeing it, Tony screamed... or rather, squealed, without controlling himself at all. A high cheekboned white skull looked at him. At the same time, there was black flesh on each side of the head and Tony distinguished the silhouette of chubby cheeks and a fat neck. But between them there was only the deathly whiteness of bone, long ago and completely cleared of flesh either by knife or by decomposition. However this skull had a nose–bone white too, but a nose, instead of a triangular hole appropriate to a decayed corpse.

"What's wrong with you?" the dreadful driver inquired in a sepulchral, but almost friendly voice. And Tony, as frightened as he was, noticed that on this terrible whitish mask there was not only a nose, but also lips moving to shape words. Nevertheless he could not squeeze out of his throat anything articulate and only spasmodically twitched, trying to free his leg.

"Oh, I guess, my face," said the Black man (or whatever he actually was). Tony had a flashing thought that this...this being was looking for an occasion to be aggressive, and he pitifully waggled his head.

"Everything is all right, sir," the driver continued just as amiably. "Many people are frightened when they see me for the first time. It's a skin defect called 'vitiligo'. Don't worry, it's not infectious."

"My God, what an idiot I am," Tony thought, again relaxing with immense relief (which allowed his leg to be pulled several inches deeper at once). Certainly, vitiligo, a pigmentation disorder. He had seen people with this skin condition before, but they were white. On a black face it looks particularly terrible... Especially when the spot is shaped exactly like a skeleton’s face. Moreover, taking into account the existing circumstances...

"Sorry," Tony murmured confoundedly.

"You need help," the driver said more affirmatively than interrogatively.

"Yes, my leg is stuck, and, in general, I'm in a stupid situation..."

"Now we'll relieve you of it."

But the motto? What about the motto? Could it be a one more trick of imagination which caused him to not see the preposition "for"?

No. There was no "for." And "de" was quite distinctly separated from "liver."

The driver stepped towards Tony and Logan saw his right hand that had been hidden by the truck door before. No–the hand itself was okay. No pigment spots and the fingers were not decayed. But these fingers clenched the handle of a huge butcher's hatchet, devilishly sharp even by sight and with a brown-stained blade.

"What... are you going to...?" Tony, who had instantly lost all his newly found calmness, plaintively exclaimed.

"To relieve you of it," repeated the Negro, taking one more step towards him, and Logan understood that "it" meant not his trouble, but his leg.

There was not the slightest chance of releasing himself in the remaining seconds. But when the driver had already raised his weapon, Tony seized the largest piece of asphalt and with all his might threw it right in the terrible white-black face.

The sound of the blow turned into a wet crunch. The jerked back and fell, hitting his head against the edge of the opened truck door (it slammed with a scratch)–and then finally tumbled down on the asphalt, still clutching his hatchet. Logan heard a new crunch and at first thought that it was one more sound of a breaking skull. But then he saw a new crack that ripped the asphalt from the edge of the hole into which Tony had slumped to the front wheels of the truck, having passed under the driver's motionlessly stiffened body.

And in the following instant something moved under the asphalt, heavily rolling towards the vehicle–or, maybe, towards the bald head from which, probably, blood exuded? Tony felt the grasp on his ankle weakened. Having gathered all his strength, he jerked once again–and his right leg broke loose with a viscous damp sucking sound. Without a shoe and all bedaubed with mud, but those were insignificant details. Logan jumped up and rushed farther along the street. He did not even try to pick up the postman's hatchet (let alone getting behind the wheel of his truck), as he was not sure at all that the asphalt under him wouldn't break again.

Or that this guy won't come to senses at the most inopportune moment as always happens in movies.

"Well, it's unlikely," Tony told himself (while still maintaining his pace). "His skull was broken in two places at least, and however sturdy he seemed..."

A familiar scratch came from behind. And then–a door slam.

Tony looked back over his in shoulder in panic and saw headlights again. Actually, they were not switched off even when the truck was standing. But now... they, seemingly, were approaching again.

Logan ran to the nearest house and hastily tugged at the door handle. Screws pulled from the mouldering wood, leaving the handle in his hands. The door had been locked. Having rejected his "trophy," as useless as a weapon, Tony rushed off farther along the street. How many seconds are left to him?

From the fog a traffic sign appeared. A rhombus with an inscription "DEAD END." Holy crap!

However, he guessed there was a certain extense of free space beyond the sign. While it still could be nothing. There could be a fence blocking his path...

Without stopping, he threw one more glance back. The headlights were definitely closer. Tony again looked forward and saw a metal fence. But, no, it was not too high. And the main thing–there was a semicircular gate in it and it was open. And beyond the gate something like a town in miniature appeared in the fog: rows of low stone structures stretching into the gloom and silent pale figures erect between them...

Crypts. Tombstones. Monuments.

If this nightmare were in Manhattan, Tony remembered, south of City Hall would be the Trinity Episcopal Church cemetery–the only one active on the island. But it is is apparently much closer and very small, not comparable to this huge necropolis lost in the fog. Here, perhaps, it is not hard to lose one's way, especially at night... And why is the cemetery open at night? Though it is, of course, good that it is open, considering the vehicle which has almost overtaken him already... But still, though Tony did not consider himself superstitious, he, as well as the majority of people, somehow did not find the idea of night visits to cemeteries appealing. Especially–after everything that has already happened this night.

Here truly–dead end. Tony thought again about the literal meaning of this ordinary expression.

And, having run closer to the gate, he got an additional reinforcement to his fears.

It was one more dead bird. A swan, like those populating city ponds and Sheepshead Bay. It was impaled on several rods of the cemetery's fence, piercing it through. Feathers, once white, were stuck together with blood and cadaveric putrilage, shabby wings and the semi-decayed neck hung powerlessly downwards. The rotted head had fallen off and lay near the foot of the fence with a wide open blackened beak.

No "No entrance" sign would have dissuaded Tony from entering more convincingly. But still, choosing between a dead swan and a live maniac with a hatchet... Tony hastily ran in the gate and turned into the first lateral walk, and then–into a narrow passageway between a crypt and a marble angel. Hunkering down, he hid.

All was silent. Indeed–silent, as a cemetery... Probably the maniac had lost his trail or not followed him here at all. Logan remembered some scraps of a horror film in which, contrary to the most widespread genre cliches, the cemetery was the safest place, since the evil spirits could not pursue characters there because of its consecrated soil. Certainly, Tony had never before believed either in evil spirits, or in consecrated soil... But he hadn't believed either in USPS trucks driven by fans of cutting out livers and other body parts.

Fans who could not be stopped even by a broken skull.

Tony waited a little longer, then, trying not to make a sound, slowly stood up, noticing for the first time the discomfort of his right foot being wet and clad only in a sock. He did not dare to go back; such a big cemetery for certain had more than one exit.

He carefully moved along a passageway between tombs, fearfully looking around. This whole place made the heart sick, and the darkness and fog, which were getting even denser, did not add enthusiasm at all. The cemetery was old, very old. It did not resemble an active one–at least, one where somebody looks after tombs. Gravestones and monuments were decayed, fissured, fouled with dirt and some wet muck–more probably a mold than a moss. Many slabs and stone crosses were dangerously tilted and looked ready to fall. It was almost impossible to discern inscriptions, especially in the dark, but those which Logan nevertheless managed to read confirmed the antiquity of the burial places: the beginning of 19th century, the middle of the 18th, even one thousand six hundred-and-some years, combined with the obviously Dutch surnames...

But the worst of all were the statues. At first, Tony paid attention only to their condition, as pitiful as all the rest here–fouled, lop-sided, collapsing. Here a stump of a broken off hand stuck out, there a hole of a broken- off nose blackened, and here a long-ago fallen head had grown into the ground. (Tony shuddered, almost having stepped with his unshod foot on a face poking out of the earth; at first it seemed to him that it belonged not to a sculpture at all.) But then he began to look closely at faces.

No, these were not the muzzles of demons. Silent sculptures represented figures quite traditional for old cemeteries: angels, grieving maidens in long gowns, and sculptural doubles of the dead towered in the fog. But the expressions! These stone faces were not grieving at all. Angels grimaced in mischievous triumph and twisted their mouths into mocking grins of sadistic pleasure; faces of maidens wore expressions of all kinds of perversity and corruption and, moreover, they were mostly not maidens, but dissolute old women, and the older and uglier their faces were, the more lusty and obscene. Faces of sculptures and portraits on headstones, representing those buried under these stones, were disfigured by eternal horror and pain.

And even worse–Tony could not shake the growing sensation that all of them were continuously looking at him. Looking from all directions. No, stone heads did not turn when he passed by, he did not see and did not hear any movement. But when he turned his head he met blind eyes full of rage, scorn, or unbearable torment, for which even death was not the resolution, but only the beginning.

"What are you staring at?!" Logan lost his temper, looking in the face of an angel who was stretching stone stumps towards him–the left hand of a sculpture had fallen off at the elbow, the right one–at mid-forearm. "I'm not afraid of you! You're just a piece of marble!"

The statue remained silent and motionless, as a statue should. Tony turned away and walked on.

Behind him a rustle sounded.

Tony sharply turned back.

The angel was moving. His head was turning and sloping, and stumps were drawing toward the man. Then Logan, frozen with horror, saw a crack separating a head from a neck, and two others, running through the stomach and knees of the statue. He hardly had time to jump aside, when the stone figure, falling to pieces already in air, crumbled with a roar across the passageway. The head rolled to Tony's feet and stopped dead, face upwards.

Logan took a breath. Of course, simply everything has decayed and is collapsing here. No mysticism. But all the same, he had to get out of here as quickly as possible before the next ton of marble falls right down on his head...

But only–Tony once again looked downwards–he was ready to swear that when the angel was whole, the expression on the marble face had been different. A spiteful triumph, instead of powerless fury. And the mouth had not been open then.

Put a finger in. Reach right in here, doubting Thomas.

"To hell with you," Tony thought, hastily walking away. "Night and fog play tricks on the mind. There is nothing to stare at all in these figures... It is best to get out of here as fast as possible... But where is that damned exit?" He had walked a long distance already. How long can a cemeterial avenue be? It was not a straight line as could be expected, but probably was nevertheless not so curved as to misguide him... or it just seemed to him in the absence of distinguishable reference points? What, if he wanders here in circles? Or even not in circles–he definitely had not passed again by the same crypts and statues–but in some devilish labyrinth...

It seemed to Tony that he heard steps.

He stopped dead. No. All is silent. Perhaps, his own echo... He walked farther.

More sounds again. Surely, echo, what else? The sound is reflected from all these crypts and gravestones...

Only why did he hear only his left, shod footsteps, and the "echo" had sounds from both feet?

He stopped again, listening attentively in fear to darkness.

Bommmm!

Tony shuddered so violently that he almost bit his tongue. From the fog came the second sound of a large bell ringing, and then a third... The lingering, dreary, and at the same time aloof and indifferent sounds floated from the darkness, bringing even more dread than mysterious steps among tombs and spiteful faces of statues.

"Somewhere this cemetery there is a church," Tony thought. "Well, it is absolutely logical. But this bell is unlikely to be a call to a vigil. If any vigils were kept here during last two hundred years... (still, why is the obviously abandoned cemetery open, moreover at night?) And if it is the striking of a clock bell, isn't the number of strikes too much? Five, six... If it is six o'clock in the morning now, it should be dawn already... Seven... Eight..."

Bommmm.... The sound of the last, twelfth blow slowly faded away in the gloom.

Not morning at all. Midnight.

"What the crap?! It should be, at least, 4 a.m. already!"

"If only I could understand where this damned church is," Tony thought, but in a fog he could not identify the direction. The sound seemed to come from everywhere. "If there is a priest there or... at least anybody–though it could be a mechanical chiming clock..."

And by the way–he had already seen the postal employee. Who says that the priest would be any better? Perhaps an upside down crucifix is mounted over his altar and to it, tied head-down by his own torn out veins... or guts... hangs a stray night traveler. A traveler who counted on a help from a church and whose blood drips into the ritual vessel below... This picture so clearly appeared before Tony's eyes as if he was really looking at it. He desperately needed to get out of this cursed cemetery while he still can!

Steps. Definitely not an echo. Shuffling, but at the same time resolute. Approaching. And again he could not tell–from where.

Tony rushed, having turned into a narrow lateral path. Probably–straight to who (or what) was wandering here at night. But better that, than to stand still, struck by fear. A sharp stone splinter stuck into his right foot, but Tony did not slow down at all. From gloom and fog silent figures of statues emerged–if, of course, they were simply statues. Logan tried not to look at them.

At last he felt himself absolutely chilled and exhausted–and the rows of abandoned tombs and collapsing gravestones still showed no end. Tony dropped into a walk, then limply leaned against a cold wall. Listened. No, apparently, there is no pursuit behind. Well, so it is possible to rest, and then...

Scraping, scratching sounds.

And now Logan had no doubts about their source–they came through a wall. Tony hastily recoiled, looking at what he had leaned against. It was the sealed door of an old crypt.

The sound came from within.

Till now Logan's body had adequately reacted to danger, be it true or imaginary–namely, answered with mobilization of all forces. But now his knees became weak and he had to lean again on the crypt door in order not to fall down. His ear was flat against a rough cold surface, eliminating any chance to write off the scratching to a flight of imagination or acoustic strangenesses of a fog.

"Some animal has gotten inside," his common sense supposed in despair. "A dog... or a cat... had dug through a hole into the crypt, and now cannot get out..."

"But isn't it impossible to dig into a crypt from outside? Isn't there a stone floor?"

"I don't know," Tony answered himself. "I never was in a crypt. Besides, if everything here is so decayed, a wall could fracture... And then it would fill up with earth, and..."

The thing inside moved more actively, as if it has scented the person from whom it was separated by only few inches. Well, why shouldn't a dog scent... Only it was scraping obviously not at the height of a dog or, especially, a cat...

"Who is here? Sir?"

That reached through the door. The voice sounded obtuse (and how it could sound through such obstacle?), but definitely belonged to a woman. More likely even–to a young girl. Tony did not have enough strength even to recoil from the door–the horror paralyzed him so that he could not move, and the comprehension of his state only increased the fright.

"Sir, I beg you, help me. There was a terrible error. I was buried alive..."

"After all everything here has a reasonable explanation," Tony exhaled with great relief. True, he believed that such gothic stories belonged in the time of Poe. Modern diagnostic aids exclude... On the other hand, he did not know, what kind of cemetery it was. Judging by the crosses–Christian, but there are different sects of Christians, too. If this girl is from any sect which does not approve of modern medicine, like Jehovah Witnesses...

"Sir, please! Let me out! I am so cold..."

I'm cold too, mechanically noted Tony, while after all this activity he should be warmed...

"I'll call for help," he promised aloud. His knees did not shiver any more. "As soon as I reach a pay phone., my cellphone..."

"Sir, do not leave!" in the voice from the crypt a genuine horror appeared. "Do not leave me! It is so dark and terrible here..."

"But I don't know how to let you out," Tony answered. "I can't open this door," he even pulled it several times for persuasiveness. "Is there another one?"

"Another? Whence could another door in a crypt appear?" Surprise in her voice was replaced again by begging tone: "I pray, sir, I need your help..." While talking, she did not stop scraping and scratching from within.

"She called me 'Sir,'" flashed in Logan's mind, "before I had started talking. How did she know that I am a man?"

He silently looked at the barrier dividing them. At spots in the layer of dust and dirt where he had leaned. At the moss-covered bottom of the door which had tightly grown into the ground. It seems that it has not been opened for a very long time...

"When?" he asked in a flat voice."When were you... eh... locked here?"

"On the eighteenth of November," reached from within.

The year was not required. Even if it was last year–it was quite obvious that in the crypt sealed ten months ago there could be nothing alive anymore. Though, most likely, this funeral had taken place much, much earlier...

"I'm sorry," muttered Tony, moving back away from the crypt.

"No!" arose following him. "Do not leave me here... with them!"

And then Tony saw–not only heard, but also saw–the very heavy door grown into the earth violently shaking from blows from within. As if a hundred pound linebacker thudded against it, instead of a fragile girl.

Logan stumbled against a tomb behind him, but managed to keep his balance. And then he ran like mad again.

He did not try to keep to avenues and paths any more, feeling confident that they would never bring him to the exit. At the best case–they would bring him to the dismal church in the center... if only it was possible to say such a case was the best. He jumped over graves or ran directly on them, expecting every moment that the earth under him would open and bone fingers would seize his feet and drag him downwards. But this horror only made him run even faster. Then he stumbled and fell, his trouser leg seized by a hand sticking out of the earth. But before Tony had time to yell, he realized that it was the hand of a statue. At first he thought that it was one of the broken off fragments, but the hand sat in the earth so firmly that he understood that, seemingly, someone had buried an entire statue here. Tony did not ask any more questions about by whom and for what purpose a sculpture was buried here; having freed the torn trouser leg (this time the left one suffered), he ran farther.

And suddenly from the fog ahead, the black rods of a fence, and a bit more to the left–a semicircular arched gate, appeared. "It's locked," Logan thought hopelessly.

But the gate was open. Nothing prevented him from leaving the cemetery. And even no dead birds could be seen nearby.

To the right of the exit some poster hung on the fence. Tony thought that it was, most likely, a schedule of cemetery open hours. This question did not interest him much–and its words probably could not be read in the dark–but, nevertheless, he mechanically ran his eyes across the piece of paper.

It was not a schedule. There were only two sentences–large and distinct enough.

Sentences appropriate for an exit from a shop, but not in any way for a cemetery.

"Thank you for visiting us. See you soon!"

"Probably, some pranksters must have stolen a poster from a shop to hang it here," Logan thought. "Pranksters, yes. Teenagers having a good time. They got into a cemetery at night, hid in the old abandoned crypt–probably, there is really a fracture in its back wall–and are frightening casual passersby. Now, I suppose, they are rolling with laughter, remembering how I rushed away..."

Oh yes. Only what is the probability, that in a huge desolate cemetery a casual passerby will approach a certain crypt? What, in general, is the probability of meeting a casual passerby here at night? Personally he has not met any. Though, apparently, has heard one...

If that was a passerby.

And the statues. And all the rest. And the fact that on Manhattan there is, and can be, neither such a cemetery, nor such a Broadway, nor such a City Hall...

But then Tony, who at last found himself on the other side of the gate, saw in the street stretching away from the cemetery something that allowed him again to sigh with relief. White-blue letters shone "CHASE." Though Logan was not a client of this bank, this picture was so natural and ordinary that it was difficult not to believe that the nightmare had ended, he was again in the real world. And, in general, the street along which he hastily walked had a normal appearance at last–no ominous stone slums and decaying wooden wrecks, only the usual multistory buildings with shops and offices in the ground floors... At night, of course, all of them were closed with metal shutters hiding front windows, but signs over many of the shops still had eye-catching neon lights.

Passing by the branch bank–one of few offices where windows and doors were not closed by shutters since ATMs operate round the clock–Tony gave it a captious look. What if it also is like those posters... or the postal service motto... But no, the lit sign differed in no way from the familiar. Through dark glass the hall with ATMs was seen; if Tony had had a Chase plastic card, he could have entered there. For an instant an absolutely wild thought flashed in his mind–to break the glass and to wait for the police to arrive, and let the officers completely return him into reality. Eventually, he would need to contact the police, to tell them at least about the postman with a hatchet. But, no, certainly, this is a silly notion. He simply needs to find a pay phone, since his cellphone does not work right. If he reached normal bank offices, he will reach normal phones as well.

Tony darted a last glance at the dark Chase windows. In the right one there was an employment announcement. "Well," Logan thought gloomily, "if they kick me off my current job, maybe I can get a job as a bank teller... "–though such a career did not entice him. Or, probably, they have also programmer vacancies here?"

He peered at the announcement–and stood rigid, feeling his belly again fill with sharp ice crystals of fear.

The announcement said not "NOW HIRING," but "NOW FIRING." Discharging from employment. And that is the best case. "Firing" can also mean "shooting".

And, by the way, the literal meaning of "chase" is "pursuit" or "hunting".

Whom exactly was discharged or shot here, Tony could not discern in the dark and didn't even especially try. He quickly walked farther, looking around like an animal at bay. Only now he was paying attention to the absence of light in the windows of the upper floors where, normally, there should be inhabited apartments. Certainly, it was a late night, but it never happens that there is not a single lit window anywhere... And signs...with growing despair and fear he read the signs above those offices and little shops that had encouraged him so much.

"Low Office"

"Fool Market"

"General Sore"

"Moans"

"Trash Harm Food"

"MEDICAL SCARE CENTER"

"DECORATION." At least this sign seemed normal to Logan, but, having looked narrowly at the non-illuminated letters, he understood that actually it was "DEGORATION". Though behind windows it was dark and no movement could be seen, he hastened to cross over to other side of the street.

Farther ahead, there was a crossroads without traffic lights (for unknown reasons since Logan got out of the subway, he had not seen any traffic lights). Carefully, like a soldier in films about street combat, Tony looked around the corner–and saw on the right in the cross street the lit letters "CAR SERVICE."

Taxi! And the office was open at night–anyway, there was light behind the windows! Would he really leave this place at last?

Taught by bitter experience, Logan peered closely at the sign. No, "CAR SERVICE," and nothing else. He turned the corner, crossed the street and walked fast toward the taxi office. His intuition was telling him that at the last moment something would prevent him from leaving, but he drove away these panicky thoughts.

Nothing prevented him from reaching the desired location. Tony belatedly remembered how he would look to the dispatcher–in dirty and torn trousers and one shoe, with hands soiled by the devil knows what... However, don't night taxis exist to help people who have gotten into trouble? At worst it would be necessary to show in advance his solvency (Logan anxiously touched a trouser pocket: the wallet was in its place). He had already taken hold of the handle of a door with matte glass through which a dim light shone, had already even started to pull this door (it moved easily), but suddenly, obeying an abrupt impulse, once again looked at the sign.

And Tony understood that the office that he so aspired to get to was not CAR SERVICE at all. Over the door was written SCAR SERVICE, but the first letter was not lit.

Slowly and carefully he closed the door and hastened away almost on tiptoe, hoping very much that his attempt to enter had remained unnoticed.

"Though it could be, of course, just a tattoo and piercing parlor behind that door," Logan thought. "Aha, and all the other signs mean only that in this area business is done by excentric people with a perverted sense of humor. Do you really believe that?"

Something made him to look back. Perhaps, it was the mad hope that now his troubles would vanish, and he would see a normal street with normal signs... or, at least, something that would help him to explain what was going on...

Instead he saw the door into which he had almost entered was opening. It was opening as slowly and silently as he closed it. For some reason this frightened him even more than if it had sharply swung open and on a threshold a huge fat Asian with a curved knife in hand had appeared.

Tony rushed away without waiting until the door opened completely. Fortunately, a crossroads was nearby, not more than twenty yards. Logan dove around a corner to the right and immediately slowed to a furtive walk, sensitively listening to the night.

All was silent. It seemed he was not pursued... however, that door had opened silently and if he had not looked back... Though–was it certain that behind the door there was a real danger?

But Tony was no longer in the mood to argue abstractedly about the logical validity of his fears. He hastily looked around. Right opposite him there was a sign for the next business. "Nails." Manicure & pedicure salon. There was no light there. Of course–such salons are not open at night. But nevertheless Tony distinguished well enough the dark letters forming the word "Nails"–this time the word was perfectly right, without any surprises. He also saw the classic picture which was always present at the window of such shops–a woman in an armchair, with polished finger- and toenails.

Only the expression on the woman's face disturbed him.

Tony stepped nearer to the dark glass. Yes, no doubt–the drawn face was deformed by a grimace of an intolerable pain. And only then he moved his gaze again to her nails. Actually, there were no finger- and toenails–they had been pulled out and steel nails had been hammered into the blood-stained meat which he at first accepted as red varnish.

Everything had been drawn with great skill and attention to detail–much more carefully than an ordinary advertising picture. The artist, seemingly, enjoyed the process.

And, probably, drew from nature.

And, Tony heard sounds causing frost to settle again in his entrails.

Though, actually, in these sounds there was nothing awful. Nothing connected with pain, death or even mystery. These sounds are perfectly familiar to millions of Americans and, to tell the truth, pester many of them.

The simple melody played by ice cream trucks.

Surprisingly, devised to attract children and not at all to frighten them, this melody always seemed ominous to Tony. He did not know why, but he heard something insinuatingly eerie, mystical, otherworldly in it. Certainly, being a sane person, he never had been actually afraid of ice cream trucks (though, even in his childhood he had not been a real fan of their goods, and almost never bought from them). He only thought sometimes, hearing this tune, that in a horror film it would come in handy. Clowns, also apparently intended only to amuse, for a long time held a firm place in such films. Why are ice cream men worse?

And it seemed now he would learn why.

Certainly, these trucks aren't out late at night, especially with the sound on. But this one was.

Judging by sound, it moved–slowly as they usually do in search of clients–on that street from which Tony had just escaped. Logan flattened himself against the glass of the ominous nail salon, hoping that the truck would pass by without turning into this street.

But it turned.

Tony saw it. To the sight, it was the usual angular white truck with a serving counter on the right side surrounded by posters with pictures of different kinds of ice cream. Even the headlights burned, as they should. And the sign on the roof said "ICE CREAM"–not "I SCREAM" or anything like that. But Logan still mentally begged it to go farther along the street without stopping.

The truck passed him by a couple of yards and stopped. The music played several more bars and ended. Only the taillights silently flickered.

"Well, and what to do now?" Tony thought. "To go back to that street with the hospitably opened door of Scar Service? To go forward in order for that truck to follow me again? But to be at a stop, apparently, is the silliest..."

"Mister," a quiet hoarse voice, almost a whisper, came from the truck, "you want ice cream."

It was a statement, not a question.

"No," Tony squeezed out. "Thanks, but I already feel cold."

"Cold," repeated the voice as a sad echo. "Always cold. Nobody wants ice cream. A bad business."

He became silent, and Logan wanted already to sympathize politely about his problems, but the ice cream man started talking again:

"Then a hot dog?"

"Hot dog?" Tony was surprised. Usually they are not sold from ice cream trucks, though, of course, there were trucks that sold all kinds of food... "Is it indeed hot?" Logan felt that now he wanted to eat something warm and with meat. Perhaps at least this would help him to get warmed up at last. Though one hot dog is probably not enough for this purpose...

"It's my hot dog," the driver answered in the same sad and low voice. "I took it for myself. But I can sell it to you. And I'll eat ice cream."

"Mmm..." Logan was not inspired by this suggestion, "I think, you'd better keep your meal for yourself."

"Don't worry, mister, I haven't touched it yet," simply answered the driver. "It's a good hot dog. Even still in a bag. Only one dollar."

"Perhaps, I'd better take it or he won't get off my back," Tony decided. "Eventually, I always can throw it away, and one dollar isn't a lot of money."

"All right, give it," he approached the window. There was not any light in the truck, but Tony could hear the driver move from the front of the truck to the serving window. Then he began to rummage in the depths of the truck body; Tony heard a muffled gnash, like a sound of a blunt knife on something firm. Though, probably, it was just a squeak of an opening box.

"Tell me please," Tony decided to use the situation, "What is this place? Looks like I've lost my way. Is it Manhattan?"

"It's Downtown," hoarsely reached from darkness. Logan had a quick thought that the ice cream man is, seemingly, chilled–possibly, from recently eating too much of his own goods.

"Downtown of Manhattan? " specified Logan. Brooklyn has its own downtown, which, however, is not a bit like what Tony has already seen this night...

"Downtown of New York," the ice cream man obstinately answered; a low buzz similar to the sound of a working microwave reached Logan's ears. Tony decided not to engage in geographical disputes and asked a more practical question.

"How I can get from here to Brooklyn?"

"You can't get anywhere from here except in the morning."

"And what time is it now?"

"Midnight."

Have they all agreed together on the time or what? Tony angrily thought, but aloud he only politely said:

"I'm afraid your clock is slow."

"I don't have a clock," the ice cream man objected and rustled with something. "Your hot dog, mister."

Though Tony was not a prudish adherent of formalities, this vulgar "mister" without a surname began to irritate him. They haven't spoken this way in God knows how many years, he thought. Wasn't he taught to say "sir" when addressing a customer?

From the dark window (why doesn't he turn on the light?) a plastic bag emerged. Tony, reaching in his pocket for his wallet, remembered his newly gained wisdom of thinking about the literal meaning of words. What if he indeed was going to be fed a piece of dog? Although Koreans and Chinese eat dogs, they also eat insects...

With some caution he took the parcel. No, inside was apparently quite an ordinary hot dog, warm to the touch and generously covered with ketchup splotching the package from within. Tony, holding his purchase in the left hand, began to roll back the bag neck with the right one–carefully in order not to touch his meal with dirty fingers. Feeling how hungry he indeed was, he brought the hot dog to his open mouth and...

A moldy smell stopped him. And just in time to understand that the dark red was not ketchup at all. Now Logan saw that the "sausage" sticking out between two halves of a roll was crowned with a dirty chewed nail.

Tony reflexively flung away the "hot dog," struggling with an emetic spasm which had rolled up his throat. The chubby cut-off finger fell to asphalt separately from the moldy bread. Logan backed away from the truck, but a hand shot the window with surprising quickness and seized his wrist.

"Hey, mister!" The voice was still hoarse and low, but all melancholic grief had disappeared from it at once–now it was a spiteful hissing. "Who's gonna pay?!"

But neither the intonation of this voice, nor that he had almost become a cannibal, made Tony stare in mute horror at the hand holding his wrist. The wooden-rigid fingers of the ice cream man were not simply cold–they were literally ice cold. And his hand–it was clearly visible even in the dark–was absolutely white. Not just pale, but white.

Because it was all covered with hoarfrost.

Tony, acting reflexively, not rationally, pulled his hand at first upwards, and then sharply and with all his force–downwards, striking his opponent's wrist against the window edge. Subconsciously he expected that it would weaken the ice cream man's grasp, but the effect surpassed expectations. The crunch of breaking bone sounded–and, obviously, not only bone–and then the frosty hand simply severed, still hanging on Logan's wrist like an ice handcuff. There was not any blood, and could not be–only dark frozen shards scattered every which way.

Tony raced down the street in sheer terror. Raced like a cat with a burning rag tied to its tail by gooder children–only the role of a rag was played by the hand of the frozen corpse dangling on his wrist. There could be no doubt that this hand had been dead before separating from a body, and no rational hypotheses helped any more. Tony shook his arm while running, trying to get rid of the dreadful "bracelet," but the dead fingers held firm. As if they had been frozen in this position, as if he had not seen and felt how they moved, and rather quickly...

Was the truck pursuing him? Tony ran without looking back, but, anyway, behind him there was neither light of headlights, nor a familiar melody. Possibly, that... that thing could not drive the truck with one hand. Nevertheless, Logan turned at the first opportunity, and having reached the following corner, turned again, already almost convincing himself that he once more had safely escaped the chase.

But, hardly had he left behind the third crossroads, when his shadow forward in the light of headlights approaching from behind him.

"The ice cream truck," Tony helplessly thought. "Or the postman with a hatchet. Or the bus. Something or someone has caught up with me..."

He was absolutely exhausted and had no more energy to run. And how could he escape from a vehicle? The last few times it had been possible to escape because he had found somewhere to dive. But now ahead was only a straight street with closed rows of houses on both sides...

Tony stopped and turned towards what was overtaking him from behind.

"My God," he exhaled in the next moment, "At last!"

A police car was slowly approaching him.

Logan had no idea what the officers could do about a dead cannibal driving on the streets and how to explain events to the them without being considered a complete loony, but it was not the most important thing. The main thing–for him personally–was that the nightmare would end now. Let those who are obliged by their duty deal with all the problems. He was ready to rush towards the police with open arms, but understood that it was not a good idea. How would a cop react, seeing in the middle of a night street a suspicious person in dirty clothes with a torn off hand on his wrist? It was better to remain on place and to behave as calmly as possible. Otherwise he could get a bullet from his saviors.

Meanwhile, however, the patrolmen did not seem concerned. The car came nearer without a siren or flashers and without any commands through a loudspeaker. Though, probably, they still simply have not made out the details. Tony stood motionless, stretching his face in the most friendly smile–which, in fact, did not require any special efforts from him.

"And maybe I am indeed a loony," Tony thought, continuing to smile happily. "And they'll take me away, give me a nice little injection, and the next morning, I'll wake up in a warm cozy mental hospital in the normal world."

The car slowly approached closer. Tony saw that there was only one cop inside, and he was white. Logan never considered himself a racist, but at this moment he was pleased that in a dodgy situation he would be talking with a person of his own race. Then the car drew up next to him. Tony saw on its doors the familiar abbreviations NYPD and CPR. And... the car passed Tony at the same leisurely speed.

Tony could not trust his eyes. Didn't the cop see what was dangling from his wrist?! This, after all, was not Halloween night! Or simply had the cop not made it out in the darkness?

"Hey!" Logan shouted, swinging his hands and running after the car. "Officer! Wait!"

The car stopped. Tony heard the door lock click, but the policeman did not exit the car. Logan, out of breath, ran up to the front door.

"Officer... thank God! I understand how what I am going to tell you will sound, but..."

Words got stuck in his throat.

For he saw that the letters "CPR" written on the door represented something different than what he was used to. Not "Courtesy - Professionalism - Respect."

But "Cruelty - Profanity - Rampage."

The door swung open and the policeman stepped out onto the sidewalk.

When somebody shoots his own temple, he is actually exposed to a significant danger. The danger is that he will survive. And more often than not, the survivor will suffer consequences that disrupt very different brain activities (not to mention purely cosmetic effects, of little matter to a corpse, but not palatable for a survivor). Professionals dealing with gunshot wounds–including, certainly, policemen–know this very well. Therefore, when they decide to end it all with the help of a bullet, they select a more reliable way. Shooting not to the temple, but to the mouth, while directing the barrel upwards and slightly back, to the soft palate. This way, the brains are knocked out in the most literal sense that gives an absolute guarantee of resting in peace.

Or not so absolute.

Anyway, the condition of policeman who got out of the car refuted this guarantee.

The top of his head was gone. The upper part of his skull had been blown away entirely, having left on its place a grinning hole, with everted edges of sharp bone shards to which shreds of hair were stuck. Lower down, whitish lumps of brain, similar to dead slugs, and black gore clots were caught in his remaining hair. The right eye had fallen somewhere inside the skull, leaving a dark pit in its place; the left eye had slid down the cheek and hung on it as a round drop spotted with bloody streaks, still held by a string of nerves stretched from the eye socket. From his nose something hung down like dense bloody snot–probably, also brain remnants. The upper jaw was broken up, and to the right, cracked teeth on bared gums stuck out from under a crooked upper lip. The lower jaw was intact, but powerlessly drooped and slightly rocked when the cop was moving. The chin was wholly covered in blood with small lumps stiffened in it.

But the uniform and the badge were in perfect order. At least, as much as it was possible to judge in the dark.

And the handle of a pistol–most likely the very same–stuck out from an unbuttoned holster.

"E-everything is all right, officer," Tony squeezed out of himself, moving back. But it was too late–the incarnate horror in an uniform stepped towards him. It moved quickly enough, contrary to zombies in movies.

And then the corpse started talking. It was not very good at it because of the condition of its jaws, so it had to help itself, propping up the lower lip with its left hand. Judging by how dexterously it managed to simulate an articulation, it already had had enough time to adapt to this manner of speech.

"You have the right to scream," it said, putting its right hand on the holster. "And it can and will be used against you."

Having heard this version of the Miranda warning, Tony took one more step back. And at the very same time something cold and wet–he felt it even through his trouser leg–touched his leg from behind.

Tony shouted and jumped aside more than two yards; he had not known before that he was capable of such standing side jumps. But the landing was not so successful–under his foot was some slippery rubbish which caused Logan to fall to hands and one knee and tear his palms against the asphalt. In the next instant he understood that, stepping back, had simply bumped into a leaking fire hydrant. But he understood also something more important: the dead cop twisted his head around awkwardly, seemingly having lost his prey.

"His eye!" Despite the nightmarish situation, Logan's common sense nevertheless got into gear. "It isn't connected anymore to the eye muscles, therefore, it can look only in one direction. And, to look around, it has to turn its head... or to turn its eye with its fingers..."

However the policeman, it seemed, had not figured out the last method of seeing and did not notice Tony on the ground. But Logan understood that this would grant him only a short respite. There was no place to hide on this street, so sooner or later this... this thing will manage to see him. And the farther Tony runs, the more likely he is to be seen. He did not know, of course, how accurately the cop in his present condition could shoot... but he had no desire to test it.

Therefore Tony, with a heroic effort, overcame his instinctive desire to get as far as possible from the cadaver. He rushed on all fours directly at it.

Several hours before, even in a ghastly dream, the idea of attacking a policeman would not have come to Logan's mind. But then even in a ghastly dream he could not imagine such a policeman... And no act in all his previous life had demanded even a tenth of such boldness–and not at all because it was necessary to overcome a taboo of a law-abiding citizen...

Tony had flung himself at the cop's boots (they were covered either with dirt or blood), still remaining out of its sight. And then he jumped sharply up right before its face, seized its terrible eye, and pulled with all his might, simultaneously clenching his fist. The sphere of cold slime burst in his hand, like a huge rotten grape.

Logan immediately jumped back, at the same moment fastidiously shaking the lumps of the squashed eye from his palm. The cop's fingers fumbled at Tony's shirt and scratched his shoulder, but could not hold him. Tony ran down the street towards the nearest crossroads, zigzagging from side to side since he wasn't sure that he wouldn't be targeted by sound. But, apparently the blinded cop tried to get back into the car–probably to call for reinforcements–bumped into the half-open door (Logan heard it slam), and then, unable to find the handle, began to punch the glass.

Tony turned at the crossroads and realized that he had already been here, but this time he ran in a new direction.

However, he quickly regretted his choice.

Ahead, blocking the left sidewalk and half of the narrow street, a garbage truck stood. Stood with extinguished lights, without any signs of life. Very recently, of course, such a sight would not have frightened Logan at all and would hardly have drawn his attention. Well, he would have been surprised that the driver had left the truck turned slantwise across the street, abutting its nose against the building at the left and causing an obstruction for both traffic and pedestrians. Though, here and now, there were neither pedestrians nor traffic...

Now Logan trusted no municipal motor vehicles anymore.

However the danger behind him was more real, and there was no way to turn anyway, so Tony continued to run forward. During the next few seconds, he understood that the garbage truck had been abandoned long ago. Its body, once white, was eaten with rust, its cab gaped with the blackness of broken windows, and tires hung on rims like the rotten flesh on bones of a corpse. More surprising was that nobody had moved this wreck out of the way... however, this did not surprise Logan now. And then he saw that, before turning into garbage itself, the truck had spilled its contents out onto the road. Black plastic bags lay behind it on the street and on the right sidewalk. One bag still hung down behind from the truck. The appeal not to litter on a door–one of the few places on the truck body where the paint had escaped the effects of corrosion–looked in this surrounding especially incongruous.

And having run yet some yards more, Tony understood that these were not the usual garbage bags.

They were twice as long as normal and each was bound by rough ropes from outside. And the outlines of the things inside resembled human bodies.

Logan stopped so sharply that he almost fell. And at the same moment he heard the sound of a police siren behind.

In despair he rushed forward again. The only possible path was through the black bags. Logan hoped that he could jump over them, but in one place they lay too densely, and he had to step his unshod right foot on one of them. Under his foot something soft squelched and the bag made an unpleasant sound, similar to an exhalation of a choking asthmatic. Two more jumps–and Tony darted to the left, trying to hide from a probable pursuit from behind the garbage truck.

And understood that he tried in vain.

Ahead, the street came to a dead end at the brick wall of some huge uninhabited structure–either warehouse or factory. On both sides of the street there were only closed doors of offices and shops. There was no place to run anymore.

But that was not what filled Tony with the greatest horror. He was struck dumb looking not at the wall blocking his way, but above and behind it.

The fog was vanishing, its muslin thinned and torn like a decaying shroud. And, appearing from gloom, over a wall, over jagged silhouettes of roofs behind it, over all Downtown there rose two giant pillars of Twin Towers, their windows glowing in dim, unsteady crimson light.

The sound of the siren again howling behind Tony jarred him out of his stupor. His eyes feverishly swept around. Under the truck? No time to hide in its bed... maybe in the cab–but he wouldn't be well concealed there... But, having darted a glance towards the cab, Logan saw that the truck nose not simply abutted its right corner against a wall, but had pushed through the glass storefront of some shop. And to the right, behind the glass, motionless figures stood and stared straight at Logan.

But Tony wasn't frightened, since he understood at once that they were mannequins. The idea of standing among them was born instantly. During his university days, he and a fellow student once had had a lot of fun in Madame Tussaud's New York museum. In a dimly lit room representing a party, where wax figures were not lined up along walls, but settled down in easy poses around the room near visitors, the young men had posed motionlessly. When some visitors began to photograph them, the students suddenly moved and enjoyed the reaction. Probably, this trick would work now, too–the creatures pursuing Tony wouldn't guess that he stood right before their very eyes. His clothes were not in the proper condition to look like those on a mannequin, but inside the shop it was much darker than in the museum. But the shop door, naturally, was closed. Would it be possible to squeeze through the broken glass storefront, between the garbage truck cab and the rapaciously grinning splinters of glass?

But there was no time to reflect further. He did not hear the siren any more, but the shimmer of police car lights already lit up the street, shining feebly from under the truck. Tony darted to the store's front window and had time to notice that the broken glass had a thick layer of dust. However, it was no wonder, considering the aged condition of the truck... And only thanks to this dust was Tony able to discern in the dark the sharp glass tooth ready to rip his throat. A wider splinter lower down was ready to stick into his belly, leaving no chance of climbing in through the narrow gap without damaging his intestines.

At this instant, Logan felt the dead fingers on his wrist weakening their grasp. But against the backdrop of the night's nightmarish events, this movement did not frighten him. On the contrary, he thought with spiteful pleasure, he had been given an opportunity. He seized the wrist of the rigidly frozen hand and used it like a stone to strike the glass splinters blocking his way. Glass collapsed with a wallop on the sidewalk. Tony had the impression that it would be heard not only in the police car, but in the neighboring blocks as well. It was, however, too late to change plans. He slipped into the store display window to the right and stiffened behind the glass between the mannequins of a young girl and a little boy. But that damned hand marked him nearly as much as his torn and dirty clothes... Tony made a new attempt to unclench its fingers and realized that they had no will of their own. Obviously, they had simply begun to thaw, making the grasp weaker... Tony wanted only to unbend them, but they started to break with a crunch, though their skin did not tear anymore. He hardly had time to fling the maimed hand somewhere deep into the dark interior of the shop, because the police car appeared from behind the garbage truck, driving directly on the black bags. And Logan was struck dumb staring at it.

It was not the car which Tony had already seen. Probably the eyeless cop really had called for reinforcements, or perhaps the arrival of this car was simply a coincidence. It had rolled off the production line, at the latest, in the early seventies, but it wasn't that which caused Tony to stare at it without trusting his eyes. The car's lights had been broken long ago and the fluctuating orange light did not come from them. The car was burning. The whole back half of it was conflagrant. Tony looked in horror at the tongues of flame licking the gas tank cover and waited for the explosion at any second. But there was no explosion. The car slowly moved forward, as if nothing was happening (even in spite of the fact that its back wheels had become shapeless charred rims, stinking of burned rubber). Its driver seemed unaffected by the events right behind his back. (This time, as far as Tony could make out through a dirty glass, it was a black man at the wheel, but Logan was not sure that it was the color of his skin from birth.) Even in the front seats the heat should be intolerable; what would happen to an arrested person in the back seat was terrible even to imagine. Tony stood not breathing, trying to resemble a mannequin more than the real mannequins.

The car slowly passed by and moved farther without stopping. But Tony understood that the danger had not passed at all–now the police car would go to the wall and turn back. The light from the flames shone through a glass door onto a dusty poster lying on the floor. Once, probably, the poster had hung on this door or in a store window nearby. Before the shimmering light dimmed again, Logan managed to discern large letters: