The Winter People (2 page)

Ellis quickly got
to his feet and threw down the 2x4 mounted to the wall next to the door on a
bolt.  It pivoted on the bolt and fell into the metal L shaped brackets on the
door, and wall on the other side of the door.  His heart had caught in his
throat and he just stood there, listening.  All he could hear was the wind. 
Then the door banged loudly and it caused him to jump back.  It banged again
and caused it to shake on its hinges.  It banged a third time, sounding like a
tree trunk was being thrown against it.

Suddenly, it
stopped.  To Ellis the silence was more maddening than the pounding the door
had just taken.  Ellis wasted no time, he turned and moved quickly to the
hearth and took down his 30/30.  He cocked back the hammer and saw that it was
indeed loaded.  Ellis was trembling.  He had never been afraid like this
before.  Not even in Korea had he been this scared.

He went to the
lanterns on each wall and blew them out.  The only light in the room was what faint
light was granted by the fire.  Everything was in shadows.  He turned and saw
Jynx sitting in the corner by the sink, trembling and wild eyed.  It seemed to
Ellis that the world was an unearthly quiet.  The fire made no sound, the wind
was non-existent, and all of his efforts were trained on what lie beyond the
door.

Jynx barked once
then growled a deep, low, throaty growl.  Ellis leaned forward, toward where
Jynx was looking, towards the door.  He heard nothing.  Jynx growled again and
this time Ellis heard it too.  It was the sound of nails on wood, claws
scratching against the wood of the door.  Not the fast, light scratch of a dog
wanting in, but a slow and deliberate, hard scratch, like that of nails on a
chalkboard.  It was a tormenting scratch from top to bottom.

Ellis was
shaking.  He waited for the sound again but it never came.  Instead, his ears
picked up on a different sound.  This time, it came from the window over the
couch.

Tap.  Tap.  Tap.

It was as if
someone were tapping a metal rod against the window pane.  Ellis raised the
rifle and squeezed off a shot at the window.  The blast was deafening in the
tiny room and his ears rang in defiance to the roar.  The window blew outward
and disappeared into the darkness beyond.  Ellis wasn't sure, but he thought he
heard a cry of surprise, or pain.  Either way it made him feel somewhat
triumphant.  The blue smoke from the rifle quickly dissipated with the draft
from the opened window.

Ellis re-cocked
the gun, ejecting the spent cartridge and replacing it with another.  The old
cartridge clinked onto the floor and rolled away.  He peered out into the night
through the broken window and could only make out the distant form of trees;
tall thin shadows that he could not get to come into focus.  Beyond those closest
to the house was only blackness, and bitter cold.

The temperature in
the room had already dropped nearly fifteen degrees in the few moments since
the window had been obliterated.  Ellis could feel the cold on his face and
hands, and strangely, he thought, down his right leg where the wet material of
his pants lay against his skin.  He stood there for what seemed like eons, the
rifle raised and sighted on the opened window, his finger on the trigger.

There was nothing
but the constant cry of the wind.  Ellis exhaled slowly, and could see his
breath.  It billowed out before him in a dense fog that sat heavy in the air
until the draft from the casement carried it away.  There was a whimper from
the corner where Jynx sat, rigid, staring at the wall as Ellis did.  Ellis
ignored it and concentrated on what he could hear beyond the walls.

He thought he
heard movement.  His left cheek twitching twice, he stood as still as he could
and forced his senses to be more aware.  His efforts were rewarded with the
sound of a floorboard creaking on the porch, a light sound that he might have
missed had he not been so intent.  It was shortly followed by another creak
several feet away, moving in the direction of the front door.

The room's
temperature had dropped another ten degrees and Ellis's hands were beginning to
ache.  His cheeks were flushed and his nose was starting to run.  Jynx let out
another guttural growl, long and deep.  Ellis turned briefly to regard him, an
action that probably saved his eyesight.  At that moment the door exploded
inward spraying the room, and Ellis, with splinters of wood.  Jynx yelped and
darted towards the back room.

Larger chunks of
the disintegrating portal bounced across the floor and struck the far wall. 
Ellis was hit in his left temple with a section of the 2x4 which snapped his
head to the right.  He winced in pain and a trickle of blood began to flow from
the three inch gash it had left there.  Behind him he could hear the chime of
the metal L brackets as they bounded off of the floor and wall and struck each
other or some other debris.

To Ellis it seemed
that an Arctic blast was carrying the remnants of his front door into the
room.  Biting hoarfrost, mixed with rubble, stung his hands and face.  The room
had grown unnaturally frigid.  Ellis turned to face the door and view his
assailant, but the cutting wind that now roared through his home blurred his
vision with its force and chill.  Together with the poor lighting, he could
only see a shape.

A large hulking
figure, like that of a man, filled the splintered doorframe.  Ellis squeezed
the trigger instantly and the ghostly figure jerked backward with the bullet's
impact, but stayed.  Ellis cocked the gun again, the spent cartridge striking
him in the chest.  The apparition let out a shriek that melded with the wind
ringing in Ellis' ears.  His drums felt as if they would burst from the
pressure of the high pitched wail on them.  He winced, and then pulled the
trigger again.

There was a barely
audible
click
, but to Ellis, it was deafening.  The hammer fell on a
hollow chamber.  The gun was empty.  The dark figure took a step towards Ellis
and actually had to duck under the doorway.  Snow crept in behind it and
circled its legs like an affectionate cat rubbing up against its master.  The dim
glimmer from the hearth cast an orange glow upon it but could offer no
definition.

Ellis Campbell
knew that he was staring at death.  He had seen death many times during the
war, but not like this.  This was death personified.  It was a cold and heartless
thing, indiscriminate and hateful.  Had he not emptied his bladder earlier, he
would have done so again.  Suddenly, his entire body ached and his limbs grew
heavy.  Ellis then quickly turned the rifle around and grasped it by the
barrel, holding it like a baseball bat.  In a voice as determined and defiant
as any he had ever used, he spoke the last words he ever would.

"All right
you
BASTARD
come and get me!"

***

Jynx cowered under
the Man Thing's bed, trembling, as much from the cold as from fear.  He had
chased many Animal Things in his day and some big ones too.  Although he was
usually wary, he had never been scared.  But this thing smelled very, very
bad.  Jynx had never had a scent like it before.  Jynx was scared now.

He knew his Man
Thing needed his help but his own insides had told him "NO". 
Somewhere deep inside him something was ruling his actions as surely as if the
Man Thing was giving him a command.  It wouldn't let him go, no matter how much
he wanted or needed to.  He heard another voice, of an old owner he had never
seen, and it commanded him to stay away from the…DEATH THING.

Suddenly, the
Death Thing's scent was much stronger, overwhelming almost, and Jynx knew that
it was very near.  Next, he heard a loud bang and he knew too that his Man
Thing had used the kill stick.  It was followed by the cry of the Death Thing
and it made Jynx want to howl but his other voice wouldn't let him.  The scent
was still there and getting stronger.  Jynx's lip curled in disgust and hatred,
and his nostrils flared as they did to a repulsive smell.

He then broke out
in a wave of tremors that coursed through his old body.  He heard his Man
Thing's voice and recognized the commands, "come", and,
"get", but simply could not move.  Then Jynx heard a grunt and a
thud, a crack, a snap.

"AAAAHHG!”
the Man Thing screamed.

There was a
gurgle-slurp sound as though caught in the throat.  A horrible ripping sound
followed that, punctuated by a loud pop!

"AAAHHGGGGrrrrrglp!"
his man screamed again.  Then there was a loud thud followed by silence.

There was an
anxious moment of dead silence.  Jynx sat there trembling in fearful
anticipation but would not move.  He listened intently to the room beyond, not
quite sure what he would do if he heard something.  Finally the silence was
broken with a light sound on the hardwood floor.

Scrape.  Scrape. 
And then there was the distant sound of laughter, carried off in the wind. 
Then there was no sound but that of the wind, and the scent of the Death Thing
was gone.  All Jynx could smell was his man’s blood.  With his head hung low,
he padded slowly into the other room to search for his Man Thing.

The wind was
desolate and strange, with an unearthly quality that invoked a sense of dread. 
As it howled across the land in angry blasts, it sounded more like the wail of
some creature in agony with just a note of hatred in its voice.  Along with it,
the wind carried feral snowflakes in closely knit groups that resembled
phantoms as they crossed the beams of the headlights.  Ghosts that quickly
crossed the road from one dark void to the next, illuminated only briefly on
the highway in between.

There was no moon
to lend its glow to the landscape and what little could be seen was a distant
haze of unrecognizable shapes, fading quickly into nothingness.  It was a
lonely place, devoid of life or substance.  Beyond the edges of the road was
simply vacuous.  Even the myriad of stars in the clear black sky did nothing to
abate the sense of emptiness.  They, in fact, enhanced it.

It was difficult
to see the road; it was snow packed and icy and melded with the surroundings
and spectral flows of drifting snow.  All that he could see ahead of him was
varying degrees of white, then blackness.  Marty strained at the windows of his
old Jeep to see the road, and slowed the vehicle to compensate for the poor
conditions.  Again he heard the forlorn cry of the wind and it sounded louder,
closer somehow.  This made the hairs on the back of his neck raise inexorably.

Because he had
already been pulled out of a snow bank twice this trip, earning the new
nickname SB (Snow Bank), he had no desire to find a third one.  So Marty
prepared himself for the buffeting the Jeep would take.  With its high center
of gravity and large flat surfaces, it was rather unstable on these slick roads
and the wind seemed to catch it like a sail.  But, the wind's impulse never
came.  He thought it odd for a moment then brushed it aside.

Marty afforded a
glance to his companion, asleep in the passenger seat with his head against the
door glass.  His breathing had fogged the window entirely and Marty couldn't
see out.  Not that there was anything to see.  During the day it was a
beautiful winter landscape and made you think of Christmas even though it was
nearly February.  There were fields of snow as far as the eye could see, virgin
snow broken only by an occasional tree or snow-mobile track.  The fences that
normally covered this area were several feet below the surface of the crisp
white covering.

However, at night
it was a lonely and barren land.  Even if there were a moon to lend its faint
glow, the scene would still be desolate.  But now, without benefit of a moon,
it somehow seemed ominous.  It was all a mysterious void between dimensions
where reality was subjective.  Marty shivered.

Taylor stirred but
did not wake.  He adjusted himself slightly in his sleep but kept the same
basic position.  Marty turned to regard him again briefly.  That man could
sleep through anything.  Of course it had been a very long day.   They had been
skiing on Mt. Werner all day, and then hit the natural hot springs in Steamboat
for a swim.  By the time they had finally gotten dinner at Hobies', they had
each put away a couple of drinks.  Marty realized now how tired he really was.

Again there was
the cry of the boreal current, and this time it was deafening.  It seemed to
Marty that it was right in the cab with him, in his head.  He winced at the
sound and his heart skipped a beat.  His skin broke out in gooseflesh and he
was suddenly afraid.  Again, the hair stood up on the nape of his neck.  Only
this time it would not go down.

Taylor awoke with
a start, "What the hell was that?" he managed above the shriek.  Just
as Marty was about to answer him, he caught movement in the road ahead.  For a brief
instant he saw what appeared to be a man crossing the road in front of them
just at the edge of his headlights.  Marty instinctively slammed his feet into
the brake and clutch simultaneously, sending the Jeep into a slide as the tires
locked up on the icy surface.

Taylor's eyes
widened in surprise and he grabbed on to whatever he could to brace himself. 
They turned sideways and began to angle for the side of the road and a large
drift that had wandered out onto the roadway.  Marty was turning the wheel
violently in a vain effort to regain control.  They slid into the bank at about
a forty five degree angle to the road and the front tires dropped off the
pavement into fluff.

The vehicle had
stopped but Marty's grip on the wheel held firm and both men were breathing in
quick, shallow breaths.  Their adrenaline was pumping wildly and so were their
hearts.  Taylor began to calm down and regain control, and then turned to
Marty.

"Well S.B.,
looks like you found another bank without any money in it.  You got a real
knack for that lately."  His fear ebbing towards humor and disbelief, he
chuckled slightly, "Jesus!  You nearly made me piss my pants."

But before Marty
could reply, the Jeep began to rock from side to side.  He turned to look out
the side windows but they were fogged and in the darkness, whatever lay beyond
them was lost.  He could, however, make out indistinct shapes of white on
either side.  Forms that appeared spectral and unreal, moving like the wind. 
The rocking worsened so that they were now rising up on two tires.  Balanced on
the right two, then bang!  Down on all four, then just as quickly balanced up
on the left two tires.  Then bang!  Down on all four, and then back up on the
right two.  Teeter, bang!  Totter, BANG!

"What the
hell is happening?"  There was fear in Taylor's voice, his words trembling
as they hung in the frigid air of the cab.

Teeter, BANG!

Ahead of them was
a blinding light cast by the reflection of their headlights in the snow bank a
few feet from the bumper.  To the sides lay darkness and faint shapes of men
outside in the darkness.

Totter, BANG!

But not quite men,
these shapes were much larger.  They had to be tricks played by the night and
the snow and the wind.