Read Online Crawlers by John Shirley - Free Book Online Page B

facilitate speed, their arms and legs seemed to come apart and grow; their limbs
sectioned and extended
on ratcheting metal linkages. Their mouths opened—all three at once—and silvery tendrils extended from between their lips, wriggling toward him as if to sniff the air.
    The dog was barking frantically.
    And then Larry turned and ran, yelling, “Dad Dad Dad Dad
DAD
!” Half dragging the dog behind him till the leash suddenly went slack in his hand—but he didn’t turn to look. Some distant part of his mind was amazed at his own speed, his legs outpacing the thumping of his heart as he ran through to the street, around the corner toward home.
    The dog somewhere behind him barked wildly, yelping. Then . . .
    Silent.
    He heard a siren whoop briefly behind him, as he ran up to the porch. Then his dad was on the porch, and a police car was pulling up in front of the house. Dad was opening the front door, frowning.
    Larry collapsed against his dad, gasping for air. His skin flickered with points of heat as his lungs tried to catch up with the demands of his astonished muscles. Dad was staring at him.
    “What the heck, Larry?”
    “Dad.” Panting. Trying to speak. “The . . . in the cemetery . . . people. Things. Crawling. Chased me.”
    “What?”
    Then the cop was there, coming up the walk. A tall, blue-eyed white guy with a lazy, unconcerned manner as he took out his report book. A name tag on his uniform shirt said J. WHARTON, QPD. “Evening. Had a call about people running through the park? Vandalism, something like that?”
    “You saw them?” Larry asked, peering past him at the street. He saw no one back there except Mrs. Solwiez, in her nightgown, gaping out her front door across the street. The police car’s lights were flashing silently.
    “I saw you, in the cemetery, is what I saw, son.”
    “Well, something—someone was chasing me.”
    He rattled out a version of what he’d seen—he found himself toning it down from what he remembered, afraid it would sound like he was lying—and the cop and his dad exchanged looks. Especially at the naked-girl part. The cop skeptical and amused; Dad puzzled, annoyed.
    “That your story?” the cop asked.
    “Yes. It’s what happened. You could go see the hole in the ground yourself.”
    “I’ll go take a look. But you know they were replacing some stones in the cemetery earlier this week. That might’ve made the hole.”
    Larry’s dad turned to him with a suddenness that made him jump. “Son, where’s the dog?”
    Larry blinked. He looked at the broken leash still clutched in his hand. “The dog? He . . . got loose. Oh, no. Oh, God, Buddy.”
    The cop shook his head sadly. “Have you ever searched your son’s room, sir? I have to say that we’re having a real problem with teen drug use here in town.”
    Dad scowled. “Not Larry. Uh-uh. He’s got his vices, but potato chips don’t make you hallucinate. I mean, I’ll look, but . . . I have to assume there was something out there, Officer Wharton. I’m going to go take a look.”
    Suddenly Larry felt a flush of love for his dad, a feeling he hadn’t had for ten years or so. The old man was okay.
    Wharton shook his head ruefully. “Well, I don’t think you should walk around in the cemetery without permission after dark, sir, especially if they’ve been digging the place up. You might step in a hole. But I’ll tell you what, I’ll look for you. We’ll swing by and see what we see and I’ll come back later. But in the meantime, why don’t you come with me to the station, to make a report, and the boy here—I think we should have him looked at. There’s a doctor at the hospital, on call, for psychiatric issues.”
    Larry was outraged, but all he could do was gape and say, “Oh, Jesus, I mean—I’m not—I mean, jeez—”
    It took Officer Wharton a few minutes, but he talked Larry’s dad into it. They got in the patrol car—which made Larry feel kind of important, though he knew that it