Read Online Lucretia and the Kroons by Victor LaValle - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Victor LaValle
Ads: Link
away somewhere. Together. And that sounded a lot better than being alone.
Loochie stood again. She located the Unisphere on the landscape. It loomed larger than it had before. Maybe a hundred yards away now. She walked to the edge of the playground and strolled along the fence line. She didn’t want to go back out the gates she’d walked through. Maybe the Kroons couldn’t come into the playground any more than the wind or the rain, but they could be waiting right on the other side of those gates. In the real world this playground had two entrances. Maybe this one did, too. She’d walk along the fence line until she found the other one and hope none of the Kroons was waiting there. She put out one hand and ran it along the fence as she walked. The tips of her fingers felt slightly numb, in a good way, as she made sure to brush every pole she walked past for good luck.
Because she was concentrating so hard on finding the other exit she didn’t immediately notice the sound of thunder rolling toward the playground. But as the sound got louder, Loochie looked up. The rain had already stopped throughout the rest of the park though the skies remained as gray as before. Loochie tried to track the clouds. She missed one fence post then another as she moved. Loochie saw only one cloud in the distance. It was enormous. That deep gray that signals a serious downpour is coming. The cloud glided across the closer meadow but it looked like the wind would carry it elsewhere.
But then the cloud shifted. She watched it happen and couldn’t quite understand what she was seeing. It wasn’t like when wind directions change and a cloud moving east begins to slowly move northeast. No. As Loochie watched the great dark cloud seemed to
bend
. There was no way of mistaking the movement. The cloud turned.
It steered toward the playground.
Toward her.
And once it changed direction it seemed to increase speed. Moving so quickly that Loochie barely stumbled back five or six steps before she could understand what that noise in thesky really was. Not a thunderclap but the beating of wings. Like she’d heard when she passed that lopsided door in the hallway of 6D. Hundreds of wings. Maybe thousands. She’d passed the room and felt lucky she didn’t have to know what was causing the sound. But now she could see.
A cloud of rats. No, that’s not quite right. A flock of rats. The worst of the New York City varieties. The kind that plague subway tunnels and platforms. The kind that live in building basements, in the deepest cracks, and come out late at night to gnash through heavy-duty plastic bags of trash left on the streets for pickup. These were the big, bulky rats. Their fur was as gray as ashes, and their long thin tails as pink as torn flesh. She could already see their small, black, expressionless eyes. How many pairs? Too many to count. In every way they were familiar to her, every way except one: These things had wings.
Pigeon’s wings. Loochie had always found New York City pigeons’ wings to be quite pretty. The blend of dark gray feathers with nearly white ones, the iridescent rainbow flashes, made patterns that she marveled at. So it only horrified her more to see the rats bobbing on such beautiful wings. Each time the wings flapped the rat’s claws scrambled in the air, as if they were galloping through the air.
Loochie hurried along the fence line again but she couldn’t find the second set of gates. Instead she found herself slowing down. She kept looking over her shoulder as the cloud of rats drew nearer. As she ran she ducked down and threw her hands up over her head.
The rats were almost directly overhead now. Under the flapping of their impossible wings, she heard them squeaking, high-pitched shrieks volleying back and forth. A sound that burrowed under Loochie’s skin and made the sides of her face itch. New York City rats could chew through sewer pipes and industrial wiring in record time, so how hard would it be
Loochie stood again. She located the Unisphere on the landscape. It loomed larger than it had before. Maybe a hundred yards away now. She walked to the edge of the playground and strolled along the fence line. She didn’t want to go back out the gates she’d walked through. Maybe the Kroons couldn’t come into the playground any more than the wind or the rain, but they could be waiting right on the other side of those gates. In the real world this playground had two entrances. Maybe this one did, too. She’d walk along the fence line until she found the other one and hope none of the Kroons was waiting there. She put out one hand and ran it along the fence as she walked. The tips of her fingers felt slightly numb, in a good way, as she made sure to brush every pole she walked past for good luck.
Because she was concentrating so hard on finding the other exit she didn’t immediately notice the sound of thunder rolling toward the playground. But as the sound got louder, Loochie looked up. The rain had already stopped throughout the rest of the park though the skies remained as gray as before. Loochie tried to track the clouds. She missed one fence post then another as she moved. Loochie saw only one cloud in the distance. It was enormous. That deep gray that signals a serious downpour is coming. The cloud glided across the closer meadow but it looked like the wind would carry it elsewhere.
But then the cloud shifted. She watched it happen and couldn’t quite understand what she was seeing. It wasn’t like when wind directions change and a cloud moving east begins to slowly move northeast. No. As Loochie watched the great dark cloud seemed to
bend
. There was no way of mistaking the movement. The cloud turned.
It steered toward the playground.
Toward her.
And once it changed direction it seemed to increase speed. Moving so quickly that Loochie barely stumbled back five or six steps before she could understand what that noise in thesky really was. Not a thunderclap but the beating of wings. Like she’d heard when she passed that lopsided door in the hallway of 6D. Hundreds of wings. Maybe thousands. She’d passed the room and felt lucky she didn’t have to know what was causing the sound. But now she could see.
A cloud of rats. No, that’s not quite right. A flock of rats. The worst of the New York City varieties. The kind that plague subway tunnels and platforms. The kind that live in building basements, in the deepest cracks, and come out late at night to gnash through heavy-duty plastic bags of trash left on the streets for pickup. These were the big, bulky rats. Their fur was as gray as ashes, and their long thin tails as pink as torn flesh. She could already see their small, black, expressionless eyes. How many pairs? Too many to count. In every way they were familiar to her, every way except one: These things had wings.
Pigeon’s wings. Loochie had always found New York City pigeons’ wings to be quite pretty. The blend of dark gray feathers with nearly white ones, the iridescent rainbow flashes, made patterns that she marveled at. So it only horrified her more to see the rats bobbing on such beautiful wings. Each time the wings flapped the rat’s claws scrambled in the air, as if they were galloping through the air.
Loochie hurried along the fence line again but she couldn’t find the second set of gates. Instead she found herself slowing down. She kept looking over her shoulder as the cloud of rats drew nearer. As she ran she ducked down and threw her hands up over her head.
The rats were almost directly overhead now. Under the flapping of their impossible wings, she heard them squeaking, high-pitched shrieks volleying back and forth. A sound that burrowed under Loochie’s skin and made the sides of her face itch. New York City rats could chew through sewer pipes and industrial wiring in record time, so how hard would it be
Similar Books
