More people. Wow. It was like a parade of angels and prancing devils and dogs walking erect, and ooh, even a walking fish with gossamer fins.
Red dust floated up from them, thickening as more of the kids came together. The red dust began to pulse, like a heart, like a slow strobe.
Cigar felt fear squeeze his heart.
Oh, God, oh, no, no, no. Fear. The red dust, it was fear, and look, it was coming from him, too, and when he looked close it wasn’t particles of dust; it was hundreds and thousands of tiny, twisty worms.
Oh, no, no, this wasn’t real. This was one of Penny’s visions. But the red dust flowed over the heads and sank down into the mouths and ears and eyes of all the prancing, twirling, skipping, running, mad assembly.
Then Cigar felt its presence. The little boy.
He turned to see it but it wasn’t behind him. Or in front. Or on either side. It was somewhere no eye could turn to. The little boy was there, though, in the space just to the side, just not quite where his eyes could see, in that sliver of reality that was not where you could see.
But could feel.
The little boy was really not so little. Maybe he was vast. Maybe he could reach down with one giant finger and twist Cigar inside out.
But maybe the little boy was as suspect as everything else Cigar saw.
Cigar followed the crowd that was heading toward the plaza.
Lana stood on her balcony. There was just enough light to see the black stain that had painted most of the sky black. The sky high overhead was actually beginning to turn blue now. Sky blue. The dome was like an eyeball seen from the inside: where it should be white was opaque black, but with a blue iris up above.
It filled her with rage. It was mockery. A fake light in a fake sky as darkness closed in to shut off the last of the light.
She had had the chance to destroy it. The Darkness. She was convinced of it. And every evil thing that later had flowed from that monstrous entity was on her shoulders.
It had beaten her. It had overpowered her by sheer force of will.
She had crawled to it on hands and knees.
It had used her. Made her a part of it. Made its words come from her mouth. Made her point a gun at a friend and pull the trigger.
Her hand strayed to the pistol in her belt.
She closed her eyes and could almost see the green tendril reaching to touch her mind and invade her soul. Taking a shaky breath she lowered the wall of resistance she had built around herself. She wanted to tell it that she was not beaten yet, that she was not scared. And she wanted it to hear her.
Now again, as had happened from time to time recently, she felt the hunger, the need of the gaiaphage. But she felt something else, too.
Fear.
The bringer of fear was afraid.
Lana’s eyes had closed. They snapped open now. A chill went down her spine.
“Afraid, are you?” she whispered.
It needed something. Needed it desperately.
Lana squeezed her eyes tight again, willing herself to do what she had refused to do before: to try to reach back across the void and touch the gaiaphage.
What is it you want so terribly, you monster?
What is it you need?
Tell me so I can kill it and you at the same time.
A voice—Lana could have sworn it was a real voice, a girl’s voice—whispered, My baby.