TUN, Part the Fourth and Fifth
While I catch up on my wordcount, here's the fourth part of
Even though Morrisburgh was a city of only ten thousand souls, it had enough vandalism to justify a night guardsman for the oldest cemetery in the city limits. Young teens and drunkards would find their way to the cool, stone crypts and express their distain for the dead by pulling down tombstones, scrawling signs of hatred upon walls, or adding their excrement and bile to the moldering tombs. And more than once young lovers had been ousted from within the cold steel fences while trying to consummate their inflamed lust.
Morton Guyver had been the night guard for more than 10 years, and he was well aware of all cemetery superstition. The tales told by his grandmother to him made him chuckle, and he never put any stock in rumors or old wives’ tales. However, he had no illusions that some wild animal might break into the cemetery and become lost or confused in the maze of grave markers; bobcats, coyotes, and even cougars weren’t unheard of in the mountains around Morrisburgh, and so he always went armed with a weapon.
With one hand on the holster of his .45 caliber pistol, he swung his flashlight from headstone to headstone searching with eyes still keen despite age. At 58, there wasn’t much he hadn’t seen in the cemetery and out of it. But what he saw in the starlight, flooded with the halogen bulb of his Magnum flashlight was something that pissed him off.
“God damnit! When the hell are these kids going to learn to leave the dead in peace? And stop destroying municipal property.”
Taking a small notebook from the breast pocket of his uniform coat, he started to write, muttering to himself. “September 8: Vandals hit Harlow tomb. Tore lid off.” Lifting his flashlight higher and approaching the Angel of Justice, he peered down into the marble coffin. “What the . . . now that’s just wrong.” He leaned over the edge to get a better look. “They took the body!”
Just then Arkady felt something shift inside him. This man was inspecting his crypt, his home! He had to do something about it. No one was allowed in his resting place, it was sacred. Kade felt like it was absurd to be thinking of that dark place as home. He could still feel the pain and weighty cold that he had forced himself out of to escape it. But now he wanted to go back and fight off this intruder.
He struggled against this urge, but it was growing stronger and he couldn’t explain it. Gripping the crumbling stone he was hiding behind, he strained to keep himself hidden. That man had a gun, and in the one zombie movie his parents had let him see, the guy with the gun always wins.
Then he remembered; this was a dream. He could win! He liked that idea. A dark laugh slipped through his lips, creeping across the twilight to settle in the ears and mind of the security guard. Jerking around, Morton swung his light in a wide arc, scanning the graveyard.
“You kids had better not be hanging around or you’re in a world of trouble! You’ve gone and torn it this time. The police are going to be banging on your door in the morning.” He was bluffing, and he knew it, but there was always the chance that he might get someone to show themselves. “Now come out and we’ll talk this over.” A movement made him swing his flashlight towards the back of the graveyard, towards the oldest section.
“You just walk over here slowly and we’ll talk about this like normal human beings.” He said again. But nothing moved. Penetrating the gloom with his flashlight, he couldn’t make out anything in the shadows that shouldn’t be there. Slowly he put his pen and pad down by the tomb and started to ease his way forward. Trying not to step on anything that might make noise, he glided stealthily forward. Slowly he unsnapped his holster and gripped the butt of his pistol. “It’s okay now, just come out easy.” A thin quaver started to form in the strong voice of Morton Guyver, and he told himself mentally that there was nothing there, probably just a wild animal.
Stopping and bobbing the light to the left and right he tried to see around corners and over headstones, but nothing showed itself out of the ordinary. Shrugging, he turned to go back to the sepulcher angel and then go make a report about this. But as he approached where he left his pad and paper, he thought something looked out of place. Swinging his light through the night like a sword, he speared the angel on its beam. But a demon stared back at him.
Thin remnants of papery flesh hung to its bones while tattered fragments of cloth and leather were all that remained of the burial clothes of Martin Harlow. His once full pate of silver hair resembled a cobweb of fibrous strands. But worse of all were the eyes. Shriveled and blind, they glared into his soul, the void where life once was. An utterly petrifying laugh escaped the desiccated mouth of the creature, and it scurried down from where it had perched on the upstretched arms of the angel.
Morton’s hand went to his pistol, but it was too late. The creature flashed onto him and the wet, gurgling cry of help died into silence and sound of cracking bones and smacking teeth.
Arkady had jerked upright in his bed, screaming and flailing. The needles feeding him intravenously and the wires monitoring his vitals tore from his arms and chest and whipped back as he thrashed. Immediately a siren sounded and a light outside the hospital room began to flash.
Hunter and Diana had sprung back, momentarily stunned as their comatose son had awoken violently, and by the time they had recovered enough to rush to his side and try to calm him, the crash cart, doctors, and nurses were already through the door, pushing them out of the way. Reaching out for each other, they watched with silent horror as their child was restrained and injected, prodded and patched. When the responding nurses had cleared the room however, the doctor sat with them and watched Arkady’s once again unconscious form breathe with peaceful precision.
“Well, it looks like the fever had broken. He’d sedated now, but I think he’ll recover by tomorrow. This is a good sign.” Doctor Febro said, holding the progress chart of Kade’s statistics in one hand and a pen in the other. He filled in some last blanks and replaced the pen in the breast pocket of his white coat.
“A good sign?! Doctor, he was screaming and thrashing, how is that good?” Hunter didn’t even try to keep the anger out of his voice. The fear was still fresh in his system, along with the adrenaline that was fueling his anger.
The doctor nodded, “Yes, and I think that was an indication that his fever had broken. When a human body has to endure high fever, it can sometimes cause hallucination and involuntary movement. In low grade fever, this is shown by shivering. As the temperature rises however, the muscle spasms can become more intense. Your son has had one of the highest body temperatures that a human can endure. That he wasn’t having these involuntary spasms and was unconscious was a sure sign that his body was using all its resources to fight whatever has been causing this. This break is a sure sign that his body is recovering.”
Diana spoke up, her eyes red and face set with determination, “What is causing this doctor? If the fevers gone down, why now?” Her eyes returned to her sleeping child.
“We still don’t have any positive test results. Perhaps when he wakes up we can find more answers. It’s possible he was bitten by something, although we haven’t found any histamine responses to venom or toxin. He could have eaten something that would have caused this type of response, but then again, there are no allergy indicators present. Just a high grade fever and unconsciousness. There are no signs of infection and his blood work came back clear for immune system response.” Sighing, not for the first time during the last few days, the doctor ran a hand over his receding chestnut hair. “I wish I could be more helpful, I really do. We do know however that it’s not contagious. Otherwise you two would have been in beds right beside him by now.”
Shaking his head back and forth, Hunter grimaced, “I still don’t like it doctor. This was so sudden. It was his first day at school.”
“I don’t like it either, but so far it looks like the worst of it, whatever it is, is over. His temperature is already down three degrees from his last check three hours ago. I would say that is a very good sign.” Standing up, the doctor went over to the boy and ran a hand over Arkady’s forehead, letting it rest there. “Get well son, get well.” He turned to the parents as he walked quietly towards the door. “You two should get some sleep, go home. Tomorrow your son will probably be awake. He’ll need you then.”
“Thanks doctor.” Diana said quietly, watching as he left, and then looking back to Arkady. Hunter put one arm around her and hugged her tight.
“He’ll be fine.” Running the other hand over the back of Diana’s hand and arm, he echoed “we’ll all be fine.”
“I hope so.”
Arkady slowly stretched his legs out in front of him. The hot water was making him feel nauseous, or maybe that was the pain. No more blood ran from his face or hands. Mark had beaten him before, but nothing like this. The bruises were already beginning to show on his forearms where he had taken most of the blows. When he got home, he would have to explain what happened to his family, and he knew he was running out of good excuses.
Carefully examining his face with his fingertips, he felt a tender swollen lip, bruises around his eyes and over his cheeks. His thin fingers were trembling with pain and anger. He was beginning to understand the anger now. It had started in that dream, that terrifying dream that wasn’t a dream. Morton Guyver had been found dismembered and partially eaten in the cemetery, covered by the remains dragged from a vandalized crypt. There was still an ongoing investigation into the event, but no one had been found that could be pinned to the blame.
Dragging himself up by grabbing the shower knobs, he stood on thin, shaking legs. The shock of the beating was gone now, and his body was recovering slowly. Fighting the urge of vomit as the nausea increased, he turned off the water and forced himself to walk to the toilets. Dizziness pulled at him, swaying his steps, but with determination he set his jaw stiffly and pulled himself to a stall. Collapsing in front of the commode, he retched and emptied his stomach as stars streaked through his vision and high pitched ringing filled his ears.
Minutes passed, or hours. He lay with his stinging face on the cool plastic of the toilet seat. The vomiting had brought with his a pounding headache, and all he wanted to do was pass out, sleep it off. But Arkady knew he had to get cleaned up and leave the school before someone came in. It was good he had gym class last thing of the day, but he knew the junior varsity school teams would be coming in soon. Using the stall walls to pull himself up, he staggered to the sink, rinsed his mouth out and washed his face. When he saw the damage, the haunted face, the pale, bruised, and scrubbed skin he knew there wasn’t anything he could do that wouldn’t make his parents wonder what was happening. He had explained the last beating as damages from dodgeball in gym, but this time he knew there wasn’t anything he could do.
Sighing, he found his locker, pulled out his dry, clean change of clothes and dressed. Putting his bloody and drenched clothes in a plastic bag he tried to put his backpack on, but his arms were stiffening up with the bruises. Hanging it off one shoulder, he held the bag of wet clothes with the other hand and slowly walked out of the locker room. Without looking up, and just focusing on moving forward, he managed to get out of the school by a backdoor and avoid anyone. Knowing he couldn’t take the bus home, he cut out across the back exercise field of the school and headed towards the woods behind it. There was a small swatch of forested land on the school’s grounds that they preserved against development. Since the Morrisburgh Middle School was near the outskirts of the city, there wasn’t too much of a problem, but it did mean that Arkady would have to walk for more than an hour to get home. He should make it before dinner, and he would have plenty of time to come up with a story for where he was. Hopefully Charles could cover for him again . . .
The woods had been cool and refreshing after so many days stuck in bed. Arkady had finally been allowed out of the house, and it was near the end of September. The school had sent a tutor every day that Kade was in bed at home, so he wasn’t that far behind the rest of the students, but it had been taxing mentally on him. Sometimes he could barely make it through an hour before his head started to hurt, and he ended up taking a nap through most of the day. The fever had burned through most of his body’s resources, and it was proving difficult to recover quickly. The day he was allowed outside however was a double celebration for him because of that. Not only was it his birthday on September 28th, but he got to enjoy the sunshine on his face and smell the trees in the wind.
Kade’s family lived on the outskirts of Morrisburgh, on the east side of town. His parents had chosen the location because they knew a young boy would need room to play, and inside a city there wasn’t much to do except get in trouble. But they needed something close to where they could work. They opted for a fringe of houses between the city and suburbs. Luckily, Arkady had been experiencing an almost idyllic childhood. Now it see it seemed like it would never return to that, but he stilled hoped to be running around again with his friends soon. He even expected it.
For almost an hour Arkady wandered through the trees, feeling the wind tug at his jacket and bring a shiver with it. After one particularly sharp blast of wind, he stood with the goosebumps on his back of his neck and the trembling of a late fall day forcing his teeth to chatter slightly. Suddenly he felt something familiar in the air, like the smell of apple pie at Thanksgiving or the texture of a favorite storybook in his hands before he fell asleep. However, this was a darker feeling that tumbled into his mind on the wind. He felt it entering in through the shivering that was slowly growing more evident. It wiggled and squirmed through his skin until he felt it more as an urgent call than a familiarity, and his feet were suddenly taking him off along a trail he hadn't noticed before.
Hearing the fall leaves crunch underfoot as he walked down the new path, he admired the flaming reach of a tall burning bush and the amazing gold of a late forsythia that would soon be bare of flowers for the icy winter. The untrodden forest gave him its secret views like a giddy friend showing off brand new Christmas gifts. Following an instinct, he wound slowly through the bracken and dormant underbrush that had already succumbed to the cooler temperatures of a New English autumn. Gradually the trail he chose drew him uphill and eventually high above his house into some of the lower foothills that encased the valley. He was so wrapped up in simply enjoying the feeling of unrestrained freedom after being bed-ridden house bound for so long that he didn't notice the change in terrain from soft, earthy loam to harder, unforgiving scree and slate. And it was almost too late that he noticed the fragility of the rock he walked on.
Approaching a downhill slope, he slipped and caught himself in time. Small fragments of shale skittered down the hillside and skipped out into space as the encountered a small cliff. A natural landslide some time ago must have riven the ground and left a ten or fifteen foot drop-off. Slowly and carefully navigating his way down to it, Arkady stood and admired the view from that height above the landscape below. The last of the fall colors were still in most of the trees, and it was a welcome sight to his starved eyes.
Then the feeling, familiar and urgent returned in overwhelming force that made his head swim and his stomach churn. Clutching his abdomen, he dropped to his knees and tried to take slow, even breaths. By the time he was recovered enough to make his eyes focus, he realized he was staring down over the cliff at something that brought the nausea he'd just fought back with a vengance. Vomiting profusely onto the ground, he tried to shut the image out of his head. But the swollen, pallid corpse at the bottom of the fall wouldn't leave.
As Arkady trudged through the fresh January snowfall towards his house, he found himself suddenly standing at that same cliff. Inspecting the berimed forests and drift swollen hills, he let puffs of frosty breath escape his chilly lips. The hiker who had lost his life to the tricky slope had been missing for a week. Arkady still wondered what had drawn him that direction, and it worried him. Lost in his thoughts, he didn't notice the sky darkening, or the fresh clouds bearing heavy loads of powdery precipitation with them slowly rolling through an already overcast ceiling.
The first flakes of snow from the covering clouds snapped him out of his morbid reverie. It was funny, but he hadn’t even felt the cold. Even as he stood there with a harsh wind biting at his chapped and swollen lips, nothing of the chill touched him. Turning, he started working his way through the icy trees to his home.
Approaching his house, he steeled himself for what was sure to be a combative welcome. The lights were already on outside his house, a testament to the shortening days and inclement weather. Knocking the snow of his shoes he opened the outer door and stepped into the coat room. He put his winter coat on the peg left open for him and left his shoes on the stone floor. Shoulder his backpack on strangely mobile shoulders, he walked through the living room hall and headed up the stair at the end towards his room. There wasn’t any noise in the house, but he knew his parents were most likely home since there were lights on in the kitchen and upstairs office. Probably where is mother and father were respectively.
Managing to make it into his room without being seen or hopefully heard, he stripped off his clothes and went to search for something warm to wear. It was only as he was reaching into his dresser draw for a pair of sweat pants that he noticed his fingers were the wrong color. Instead of a frosty pink or even red with chill, they were sickly gray. The tips were almost blue. He stared at his hand, holding it close to his face. Touching his skin, he still had feeling, so it wasn’t frostbite. He’d read that frostbite is painful as your fingers and toes thaw out, and you lose feeling early on. Checking his toes, they were the same color, and it seemed to be completely covering his body. Grabbing some clothes quickly, he ran into the bathroom to check out the larger mirror there.
Staring back at him in the viewing glass was a nightmare. His eyes were red, the blood vessels were swollen and his skin was a grotesque flat gray with purple and blue mottling. His brown hair seemed flat, with no shine to it as it usually had. The only positive thing about the image was that nothing shown of the beating he had received at school. Both of his lips seemed whole and unblemished, and the bruises had either never begun to form, or had vanished along with all the normal color of his skin.
The bad news was there was certainly no way to explain this to his parents.
Three hours later in the emergency room Arkady, his mother, and father sat in the waiting room for the doctor to bring the results of the tests and scans that he’d been put through.
“Nothing strange happened at school?” his mother asked for about the twelfth time.
“No, I told you, it was just a normal day. We had chicken nuggets for lunch, and I avoided the peach crisp because it always tastes too sweet. Gym was mostly running and basketball.” He sighed, glad he had brought his homework with him. Mostly it was done during the first wait to be seen. Now he was getting the third degree.
Mr. Harris spoke up, “Well, at least this time you don’t have a fever. And you’re still awake.” He patted Arkady’s shoulder as he hugged him one-armed.
“Yeah, small miracles.” Arkady gave a lop-sided smile that he really didn’t feel.
Mrs. Harris patted his hands, smiling. “It’ll be okay. You don’t feel bad, do you?”
“No, I feel great actually. Not even tired.”
“Hey, that’s great! Listen, we know how hard it’s been getting well again after the first time.” Mr. Harris paused as if the memory was still painful for him, even though Arkady had been hospitalized. “And with this, we think that maybe there’s something we can do to make things a little bit better.”
“Yeah, we know how hard you’ve been working to catch up in school and that it’s been hard missing so much school earlier this year.” Mrs. Harris added, “So we thought we’d get you a month of snowboarding lessons.”
Arkady’s mouth dropped open. He stared at his mom and dad, swinging his head back and forth. “Really!? No joke! Wow!” Arkady had been bugging them about learning to snowboard since last winter. He loved skiing, so it had been natural for him to want to learn something new, and much cooler.
“Yeah, think of it as a late Christmas present.” His dad said, hugging him tightly again. “But we have to figure out what this is first.”
Dropping his expression a bit, Arkady sighed, “Oh.”
“Hey, don’t get so down Kade, it’s not like we said absolutely not. But we’re just worried this will turn into something like last time.” Mrs. Harris said.
“It’s okay. I understand Mom, Dad. Thanks a lot.” Arkady meant it when he said it, and smiled again. “Do I get to pick out a snowboard for my lessons?”
“Well, I think we’ll have to stick with a rental first son. But if you don’t break a leg the first week, we’ll consider it.” His dad chuckled a bit while his mom scowled at her husband. Arkady just grinned. He was much happier.
Finally, the doctor returned. By sheer chance, it had been Doctor Febro who was on Emergency Room duty. He smiled when he saw the family, and waved them over to a free physical room. They picked up their coats and bags and headed across the waiting room. When Kade was seated on the examination table and his parents occupying the two chairs in the room, he closed the door and stood by the desk.
“Well, good to see you all looking much happier than when you got here.” They had been significantly stressed out when he had spoken with them first, and the initial examination had been tense.
“Yeah, I guess so.” Mr. Harris said.
“So, there’s nothing wrong with Arkady here. There are some things that I think we’ll need a specialist’s opinion on though. The MRIs show nothing wrong internally. Everything is as it should be. His temperature is perfectly normal, and everything else seems fine. Although I do have to say I think that you should make an effort to eat more young man.” Doctor Febro looked meaningfully at Arkady. “Your weight is a bit on the low side for your age and height. By now you should have put on a few more pounds after your last hospital stay.”
“I’m just not hungry much Doctor.” Arkady said, shrugging his thing shoulders.
Mrs. Harris chimed in, “We make sure he eats at home. But sometimes he doesn’t finish everything.”
“Well, I think you should start making him eat a snack or two extra each day. Maybe some peanuts, carrot sticks with peanut butter, cheese, yoghurt. Anything with a good dose of calories and protein. He needs to rebuild a lot of muscle.” Picking up the chart he had with him, he also commented, “And I have a referral here for a Doctor Kanton. He’s a dermatologist/Endocrinologist. We went to pre-med together, and he’s a top notch guy in his field. Unfortunately, he lives over in Midvale. However I think it would be worth the trip to help figure out what, if anything, is seriously wrong with Arkady.” Passing the slip over to Mr. Harris, he continued, “the preliminary tests say nothing is wrong. However, I disagree. There obviously is something going on here, and I don’t think it’s puberty.”
“Thank you Doctor.” Mr. Harris accepted the referral slip, “but is there anything we can do now to fix this?” He looked at Arkady with a slightly worried frown hovering on his brow.
“Actually, I don’t think you’re going to need to do anything. I’ve noticed already that Arkady’s eyes are almost back to normal, and if you’ll let me do another examination, I’d like to see if it’s actually fading.” He looked back to the parents.
“Sure Doc, if you think it’ll help.” Mrs. Harris said.
“Well, I don’t know if it’ll help tell us what it is, but I think it will help us all, including Kade, feel better.” He turned and picked up an otoscope, fitted a disposable speculum on the end, and looking into each of Kade’s ears. Picking up an opthalmoscope next, he checked his eyes, focusing specific attention on the inflamed blood vessels in the whites, and then checked his throat, and reflexes. Finally, he had Kade take of his shoes and ran a tongue depressor over the middle of each foot to make sure he had complete sensation.
“Yep, everything looks like it’s still in full working order. And the whites of your eyes are much clearer now than when you first arrived. You’ll also notice the faint purple patches on your skin are gone. And the tips of your fingers and toes aren’t blue anymore. I think by tomorrow morning you’ll look like your good old self again. If not, give me a call and we’ll work out something.” Doctor Febro smiled at all of his patients. Despite the fact that he was over fifty, he still had a youthful vibrancy to him. In many ways, it was itself an infectious disease. The Harrises couldn’t help smiling too.
“Thank you doctor, we can’t say how much of a help you are.” Mrs. Harris said, as they stood and gathered their things.
“It’s no problem. I’m just glad that even though it is a bit bewildering, that I can honestly say I don’t think Arkady has anything to worry about in the health department.” Shaking hands with everyone, even Arkady, he watched as they headed the front desk to settle the payment issue.
“I just wish I knew what was going on.” He sighed, shaking his head and running his hand over his steel gray hair. “I wish I knew.”
Sure enough, the next morning Arkady woke up feeling and looking as good as new. Even what had become the usual pale hue of his skin was gone. He was bouncing and laughing and acting like he had never been sick. He felt so good he even ate three helpings of scrambled eggs and toast with raspberry jam. No signs of the ugly discoloration from the previous day were visible anywhere, and he didn’t even have to worry about the bruises he had feared so much.
Grabbing his black backpack from where it lay by the hallway door, he waved to his dad as he headed for the Friday morning bus to school.
“I’m really glad to see him smiling today. I was so worried.” Hunter said to Diana.
Diana grabbed some plates from the table while Hunter scraped the leftovers into small Tupperware containers. “I know. You’d almost think nothing had happened.” She kissed Hunter on the cheek. “Let’s hope it keeps up.”
“Hey, don’t go getting all cynical on me now.” Hunter said, poking playfully at Diana with a fork.
“Watch out with that thing, or someone else is going to be in the hospital.” She stared at him intensely. “And it’s not going to be me.”
“Oh ho! Really now. And what if I do this?” He jabbed her in the ribs with a finger and she flinched. “And this!” He poked her other side. “And this, and this, and this.” Before fifteen seconds had gone by they were both laughing and giggling and chasing each other around the kitchen like teenagers.
Yeah, the first is super short, the second is super long. Shows how my week goes in Nano, I play catch up a lot.
Even though Morrisburgh was a city of only ten thousand souls, it had enough vandalism to justify a night guardsman for the oldest cemetery in the city limits. Young teens and drunkards would find their way to the cool, stone crypts and express their distain for the dead by pulling down tombstones, scrawling signs of hatred upon walls, or adding their excrement and bile to the moldering tombs. And more than once young lovers had been ousted from within the cold steel fences while trying to consummate their inflamed lust.
Morton Guyver had been the night guard for more than 10 years, and he was well aware of all cemetery superstition. The tales told by his grandmother to him made him chuckle, and he never put any stock in rumors or old wives’ tales. However, he had no illusions that some wild animal might break into the cemetery and become lost or confused in the maze of grave markers; bobcats, coyotes, and even cougars weren’t unheard of in the mountains around Morrisburgh, and so he always went armed with a weapon.
With one hand on the holster of his .45 caliber pistol, he swung his flashlight from headstone to headstone searching with eyes still keen despite age. At 58, there wasn’t much he hadn’t seen in the cemetery and out of it. But what he saw in the starlight, flooded with the halogen bulb of his Magnum flashlight was something that pissed him off.
“God damnit! When the hell are these kids going to learn to leave the dead in peace? And stop destroying municipal property.”
Taking a small notebook from the breast pocket of his uniform coat, he started to write, muttering to himself. “September 8: Vandals hit Harlow tomb. Tore lid off.” Lifting his flashlight higher and approaching the Angel of Justice, he peered down into the marble coffin. “What the . . . now that’s just wrong.” He leaned over the edge to get a better look. “They took the body!”
Just then Arkady felt something shift inside him. This man was inspecting his crypt, his home! He had to do something about it. No one was allowed in his resting place, it was sacred. Kade felt like it was absurd to be thinking of that dark place as home. He could still feel the pain and weighty cold that he had forced himself out of to escape it. But now he wanted to go back and fight off this intruder.
He struggled against this urge, but it was growing stronger and he couldn’t explain it. Gripping the crumbling stone he was hiding behind, he strained to keep himself hidden. That man had a gun, and in the one zombie movie his parents had let him see, the guy with the gun always wins.
Then he remembered; this was a dream. He could win! He liked that idea. A dark laugh slipped through his lips, creeping across the twilight to settle in the ears and mind of the security guard. Jerking around, Morton swung his light in a wide arc, scanning the graveyard.
“You kids had better not be hanging around or you’re in a world of trouble! You’ve gone and torn it this time. The police are going to be banging on your door in the morning.” He was bluffing, and he knew it, but there was always the chance that he might get someone to show themselves. “Now come out and we’ll talk this over.” A movement made him swing his flashlight towards the back of the graveyard, towards the oldest section.
“You just walk over here slowly and we’ll talk about this like normal human beings.” He said again. But nothing moved. Penetrating the gloom with his flashlight, he couldn’t make out anything in the shadows that shouldn’t be there. Slowly he put his pen and pad down by the tomb and started to ease his way forward. Trying not to step on anything that might make noise, he glided stealthily forward. Slowly he unsnapped his holster and gripped the butt of his pistol. “It’s okay now, just come out easy.” A thin quaver started to form in the strong voice of Morton Guyver, and he told himself mentally that there was nothing there, probably just a wild animal.
Stopping and bobbing the light to the left and right he tried to see around corners and over headstones, but nothing showed itself out of the ordinary. Shrugging, he turned to go back to the sepulcher angel and then go make a report about this. But as he approached where he left his pad and paper, he thought something looked out of place. Swinging his light through the night like a sword, he speared the angel on its beam. But a demon stared back at him.
Thin remnants of papery flesh hung to its bones while tattered fragments of cloth and leather were all that remained of the burial clothes of Martin Harlow. His once full pate of silver hair resembled a cobweb of fibrous strands. But worse of all were the eyes. Shriveled and blind, they glared into his soul, the void where life once was. An utterly petrifying laugh escaped the desiccated mouth of the creature, and it scurried down from where it had perched on the upstretched arms of the angel.
Morton’s hand went to his pistol, but it was too late. The creature flashed onto him and the wet, gurgling cry of help died into silence and sound of cracking bones and smacking teeth.
Arkady had jerked upright in his bed, screaming and flailing. The needles feeding him intravenously and the wires monitoring his vitals tore from his arms and chest and whipped back as he thrashed. Immediately a siren sounded and a light outside the hospital room began to flash.
Hunter and Diana had sprung back, momentarily stunned as their comatose son had awoken violently, and by the time they had recovered enough to rush to his side and try to calm him, the crash cart, doctors, and nurses were already through the door, pushing them out of the way. Reaching out for each other, they watched with silent horror as their child was restrained and injected, prodded and patched. When the responding nurses had cleared the room however, the doctor sat with them and watched Arkady’s once again unconscious form breathe with peaceful precision.
“Well, it looks like the fever had broken. He’d sedated now, but I think he’ll recover by tomorrow. This is a good sign.” Doctor Febro said, holding the progress chart of Kade’s statistics in one hand and a pen in the other. He filled in some last blanks and replaced the pen in the breast pocket of his white coat.
“A good sign?! Doctor, he was screaming and thrashing, how is that good?” Hunter didn’t even try to keep the anger out of his voice. The fear was still fresh in his system, along with the adrenaline that was fueling his anger.
The doctor nodded, “Yes, and I think that was an indication that his fever had broken. When a human body has to endure high fever, it can sometimes cause hallucination and involuntary movement. In low grade fever, this is shown by shivering. As the temperature rises however, the muscle spasms can become more intense. Your son has had one of the highest body temperatures that a human can endure. That he wasn’t having these involuntary spasms and was unconscious was a sure sign that his body was using all its resources to fight whatever has been causing this. This break is a sure sign that his body is recovering.”
Diana spoke up, her eyes red and face set with determination, “What is causing this doctor? If the fevers gone down, why now?” Her eyes returned to her sleeping child.
“We still don’t have any positive test results. Perhaps when he wakes up we can find more answers. It’s possible he was bitten by something, although we haven’t found any histamine responses to venom or toxin. He could have eaten something that would have caused this type of response, but then again, there are no allergy indicators present. Just a high grade fever and unconsciousness. There are no signs of infection and his blood work came back clear for immune system response.” Sighing, not for the first time during the last few days, the doctor ran a hand over his receding chestnut hair. “I wish I could be more helpful, I really do. We do know however that it’s not contagious. Otherwise you two would have been in beds right beside him by now.”
Shaking his head back and forth, Hunter grimaced, “I still don’t like it doctor. This was so sudden. It was his first day at school.”
“I don’t like it either, but so far it looks like the worst of it, whatever it is, is over. His temperature is already down three degrees from his last check three hours ago. I would say that is a very good sign.” Standing up, the doctor went over to the boy and ran a hand over Arkady’s forehead, letting it rest there. “Get well son, get well.” He turned to the parents as he walked quietly towards the door. “You two should get some sleep, go home. Tomorrow your son will probably be awake. He’ll need you then.”
“Thanks doctor.” Diana said quietly, watching as he left, and then looking back to Arkady. Hunter put one arm around her and hugged her tight.
“He’ll be fine.” Running the other hand over the back of Diana’s hand and arm, he echoed “we’ll all be fine.”
“I hope so.”
Arkady slowly stretched his legs out in front of him. The hot water was making him feel nauseous, or maybe that was the pain. No more blood ran from his face or hands. Mark had beaten him before, but nothing like this. The bruises were already beginning to show on his forearms where he had taken most of the blows. When he got home, he would have to explain what happened to his family, and he knew he was running out of good excuses.
Carefully examining his face with his fingertips, he felt a tender swollen lip, bruises around his eyes and over his cheeks. His thin fingers were trembling with pain and anger. He was beginning to understand the anger now. It had started in that dream, that terrifying dream that wasn’t a dream. Morton Guyver had been found dismembered and partially eaten in the cemetery, covered by the remains dragged from a vandalized crypt. There was still an ongoing investigation into the event, but no one had been found that could be pinned to the blame.
Dragging himself up by grabbing the shower knobs, he stood on thin, shaking legs. The shock of the beating was gone now, and his body was recovering slowly. Fighting the urge of vomit as the nausea increased, he turned off the water and forced himself to walk to the toilets. Dizziness pulled at him, swaying his steps, but with determination he set his jaw stiffly and pulled himself to a stall. Collapsing in front of the commode, he retched and emptied his stomach as stars streaked through his vision and high pitched ringing filled his ears.
Minutes passed, or hours. He lay with his stinging face on the cool plastic of the toilet seat. The vomiting had brought with his a pounding headache, and all he wanted to do was pass out, sleep it off. But Arkady knew he had to get cleaned up and leave the school before someone came in. It was good he had gym class last thing of the day, but he knew the junior varsity school teams would be coming in soon. Using the stall walls to pull himself up, he staggered to the sink, rinsed his mouth out and washed his face. When he saw the damage, the haunted face, the pale, bruised, and scrubbed skin he knew there wasn’t anything he could do that wouldn’t make his parents wonder what was happening. He had explained the last beating as damages from dodgeball in gym, but this time he knew there wasn’t anything he could do.
Sighing, he found his locker, pulled out his dry, clean change of clothes and dressed. Putting his bloody and drenched clothes in a plastic bag he tried to put his backpack on, but his arms were stiffening up with the bruises. Hanging it off one shoulder, he held the bag of wet clothes with the other hand and slowly walked out of the locker room. Without looking up, and just focusing on moving forward, he managed to get out of the school by a backdoor and avoid anyone. Knowing he couldn’t take the bus home, he cut out across the back exercise field of the school and headed towards the woods behind it. There was a small swatch of forested land on the school’s grounds that they preserved against development. Since the Morrisburgh Middle School was near the outskirts of the city, there wasn’t too much of a problem, but it did mean that Arkady would have to walk for more than an hour to get home. He should make it before dinner, and he would have plenty of time to come up with a story for where he was. Hopefully Charles could cover for him again . . .
The woods had been cool and refreshing after so many days stuck in bed. Arkady had finally been allowed out of the house, and it was near the end of September. The school had sent a tutor every day that Kade was in bed at home, so he wasn’t that far behind the rest of the students, but it had been taxing mentally on him. Sometimes he could barely make it through an hour before his head started to hurt, and he ended up taking a nap through most of the day. The fever had burned through most of his body’s resources, and it was proving difficult to recover quickly. The day he was allowed outside however was a double celebration for him because of that. Not only was it his birthday on September 28th, but he got to enjoy the sunshine on his face and smell the trees in the wind.
Kade’s family lived on the outskirts of Morrisburgh, on the east side of town. His parents had chosen the location because they knew a young boy would need room to play, and inside a city there wasn’t much to do except get in trouble. But they needed something close to where they could work. They opted for a fringe of houses between the city and suburbs. Luckily, Arkady had been experiencing an almost idyllic childhood. Now it see it seemed like it would never return to that, but he stilled hoped to be running around again with his friends soon. He even expected it.
For almost an hour Arkady wandered through the trees, feeling the wind tug at his jacket and bring a shiver with it. After one particularly sharp blast of wind, he stood with the goosebumps on his back of his neck and the trembling of a late fall day forcing his teeth to chatter slightly. Suddenly he felt something familiar in the air, like the smell of apple pie at Thanksgiving or the texture of a favorite storybook in his hands before he fell asleep. However, this was a darker feeling that tumbled into his mind on the wind. He felt it entering in through the shivering that was slowly growing more evident. It wiggled and squirmed through his skin until he felt it more as an urgent call than a familiarity, and his feet were suddenly taking him off along a trail he hadn't noticed before.
Hearing the fall leaves crunch underfoot as he walked down the new path, he admired the flaming reach of a tall burning bush and the amazing gold of a late forsythia that would soon be bare of flowers for the icy winter. The untrodden forest gave him its secret views like a giddy friend showing off brand new Christmas gifts. Following an instinct, he wound slowly through the bracken and dormant underbrush that had already succumbed to the cooler temperatures of a New English autumn. Gradually the trail he chose drew him uphill and eventually high above his house into some of the lower foothills that encased the valley. He was so wrapped up in simply enjoying the feeling of unrestrained freedom after being bed-ridden house bound for so long that he didn't notice the change in terrain from soft, earthy loam to harder, unforgiving scree and slate. And it was almost too late that he noticed the fragility of the rock he walked on.
Approaching a downhill slope, he slipped and caught himself in time. Small fragments of shale skittered down the hillside and skipped out into space as the encountered a small cliff. A natural landslide some time ago must have riven the ground and left a ten or fifteen foot drop-off. Slowly and carefully navigating his way down to it, Arkady stood and admired the view from that height above the landscape below. The last of the fall colors were still in most of the trees, and it was a welcome sight to his starved eyes.
Then the feeling, familiar and urgent returned in overwhelming force that made his head swim and his stomach churn. Clutching his abdomen, he dropped to his knees and tried to take slow, even breaths. By the time he was recovered enough to make his eyes focus, he realized he was staring down over the cliff at something that brought the nausea he'd just fought back with a vengance. Vomiting profusely onto the ground, he tried to shut the image out of his head. But the swollen, pallid corpse at the bottom of the fall wouldn't leave.
As Arkady trudged through the fresh January snowfall towards his house, he found himself suddenly standing at that same cliff. Inspecting the berimed forests and drift swollen hills, he let puffs of frosty breath escape his chilly lips. The hiker who had lost his life to the tricky slope had been missing for a week. Arkady still wondered what had drawn him that direction, and it worried him. Lost in his thoughts, he didn't notice the sky darkening, or the fresh clouds bearing heavy loads of powdery precipitation with them slowly rolling through an already overcast ceiling.
The first flakes of snow from the covering clouds snapped him out of his morbid reverie. It was funny, but he hadn’t even felt the cold. Even as he stood there with a harsh wind biting at his chapped and swollen lips, nothing of the chill touched him. Turning, he started working his way through the icy trees to his home.
Approaching his house, he steeled himself for what was sure to be a combative welcome. The lights were already on outside his house, a testament to the shortening days and inclement weather. Knocking the snow of his shoes he opened the outer door and stepped into the coat room. He put his winter coat on the peg left open for him and left his shoes on the stone floor. Shoulder his backpack on strangely mobile shoulders, he walked through the living room hall and headed up the stair at the end towards his room. There wasn’t any noise in the house, but he knew his parents were most likely home since there were lights on in the kitchen and upstairs office. Probably where is mother and father were respectively.
Managing to make it into his room without being seen or hopefully heard, he stripped off his clothes and went to search for something warm to wear. It was only as he was reaching into his dresser draw for a pair of sweat pants that he noticed his fingers were the wrong color. Instead of a frosty pink or even red with chill, they were sickly gray. The tips were almost blue. He stared at his hand, holding it close to his face. Touching his skin, he still had feeling, so it wasn’t frostbite. He’d read that frostbite is painful as your fingers and toes thaw out, and you lose feeling early on. Checking his toes, they were the same color, and it seemed to be completely covering his body. Grabbing some clothes quickly, he ran into the bathroom to check out the larger mirror there.
Staring back at him in the viewing glass was a nightmare. His eyes were red, the blood vessels were swollen and his skin was a grotesque flat gray with purple and blue mottling. His brown hair seemed flat, with no shine to it as it usually had. The only positive thing about the image was that nothing shown of the beating he had received at school. Both of his lips seemed whole and unblemished, and the bruises had either never begun to form, or had vanished along with all the normal color of his skin.
The bad news was there was certainly no way to explain this to his parents.
Three hours later in the emergency room Arkady, his mother, and father sat in the waiting room for the doctor to bring the results of the tests and scans that he’d been put through.
“Nothing strange happened at school?” his mother asked for about the twelfth time.
“No, I told you, it was just a normal day. We had chicken nuggets for lunch, and I avoided the peach crisp because it always tastes too sweet. Gym was mostly running and basketball.” He sighed, glad he had brought his homework with him. Mostly it was done during the first wait to be seen. Now he was getting the third degree.
Mr. Harris spoke up, “Well, at least this time you don’t have a fever. And you’re still awake.” He patted Arkady’s shoulder as he hugged him one-armed.
“Yeah, small miracles.” Arkady gave a lop-sided smile that he really didn’t feel.
Mrs. Harris patted his hands, smiling. “It’ll be okay. You don’t feel bad, do you?”
“No, I feel great actually. Not even tired.”
“Hey, that’s great! Listen, we know how hard it’s been getting well again after the first time.” Mr. Harris paused as if the memory was still painful for him, even though Arkady had been hospitalized. “And with this, we think that maybe there’s something we can do to make things a little bit better.”
“Yeah, we know how hard you’ve been working to catch up in school and that it’s been hard missing so much school earlier this year.” Mrs. Harris added, “So we thought we’d get you a month of snowboarding lessons.”
Arkady’s mouth dropped open. He stared at his mom and dad, swinging his head back and forth. “Really!? No joke! Wow!” Arkady had been bugging them about learning to snowboard since last winter. He loved skiing, so it had been natural for him to want to learn something new, and much cooler.
“Yeah, think of it as a late Christmas present.” His dad said, hugging him tightly again. “But we have to figure out what this is first.”
Dropping his expression a bit, Arkady sighed, “Oh.”
“Hey, don’t get so down Kade, it’s not like we said absolutely not. But we’re just worried this will turn into something like last time.” Mrs. Harris said.
“It’s okay. I understand Mom, Dad. Thanks a lot.” Arkady meant it when he said it, and smiled again. “Do I get to pick out a snowboard for my lessons?”
“Well, I think we’ll have to stick with a rental first son. But if you don’t break a leg the first week, we’ll consider it.” His dad chuckled a bit while his mom scowled at her husband. Arkady just grinned. He was much happier.
Finally, the doctor returned. By sheer chance, it had been Doctor Febro who was on Emergency Room duty. He smiled when he saw the family, and waved them over to a free physical room. They picked up their coats and bags and headed across the waiting room. When Kade was seated on the examination table and his parents occupying the two chairs in the room, he closed the door and stood by the desk.
“Well, good to see you all looking much happier than when you got here.” They had been significantly stressed out when he had spoken with them first, and the initial examination had been tense.
“Yeah, I guess so.” Mr. Harris said.
“So, there’s nothing wrong with Arkady here. There are some things that I think we’ll need a specialist’s opinion on though. The MRIs show nothing wrong internally. Everything is as it should be. His temperature is perfectly normal, and everything else seems fine. Although I do have to say I think that you should make an effort to eat more young man.” Doctor Febro looked meaningfully at Arkady. “Your weight is a bit on the low side for your age and height. By now you should have put on a few more pounds after your last hospital stay.”
“I’m just not hungry much Doctor.” Arkady said, shrugging his thing shoulders.
Mrs. Harris chimed in, “We make sure he eats at home. But sometimes he doesn’t finish everything.”
“Well, I think you should start making him eat a snack or two extra each day. Maybe some peanuts, carrot sticks with peanut butter, cheese, yoghurt. Anything with a good dose of calories and protein. He needs to rebuild a lot of muscle.” Picking up the chart he had with him, he also commented, “And I have a referral here for a Doctor Kanton. He’s a dermatologist/Endocrinologist. We went to pre-med together, and he’s a top notch guy in his field. Unfortunately, he lives over in Midvale. However I think it would be worth the trip to help figure out what, if anything, is seriously wrong with Arkady.” Passing the slip over to Mr. Harris, he continued, “the preliminary tests say nothing is wrong. However, I disagree. There obviously is something going on here, and I don’t think it’s puberty.”
“Thank you Doctor.” Mr. Harris accepted the referral slip, “but is there anything we can do now to fix this?” He looked at Arkady with a slightly worried frown hovering on his brow.
“Actually, I don’t think you’re going to need to do anything. I’ve noticed already that Arkady’s eyes are almost back to normal, and if you’ll let me do another examination, I’d like to see if it’s actually fading.” He looked back to the parents.
“Sure Doc, if you think it’ll help.” Mrs. Harris said.
“Well, I don’t know if it’ll help tell us what it is, but I think it will help us all, including Kade, feel better.” He turned and picked up an otoscope, fitted a disposable speculum on the end, and looking into each of Kade’s ears. Picking up an opthalmoscope next, he checked his eyes, focusing specific attention on the inflamed blood vessels in the whites, and then checked his throat, and reflexes. Finally, he had Kade take of his shoes and ran a tongue depressor over the middle of each foot to make sure he had complete sensation.
“Yep, everything looks like it’s still in full working order. And the whites of your eyes are much clearer now than when you first arrived. You’ll also notice the faint purple patches on your skin are gone. And the tips of your fingers and toes aren’t blue anymore. I think by tomorrow morning you’ll look like your good old self again. If not, give me a call and we’ll work out something.” Doctor Febro smiled at all of his patients. Despite the fact that he was over fifty, he still had a youthful vibrancy to him. In many ways, it was itself an infectious disease. The Harrises couldn’t help smiling too.
“Thank you doctor, we can’t say how much of a help you are.” Mrs. Harris said, as they stood and gathered their things.
“It’s no problem. I’m just glad that even though it is a bit bewildering, that I can honestly say I don’t think Arkady has anything to worry about in the health department.” Shaking hands with everyone, even Arkady, he watched as they headed the front desk to settle the payment issue.
“I just wish I knew what was going on.” He sighed, shaking his head and running his hand over his steel gray hair. “I wish I knew.”
Sure enough, the next morning Arkady woke up feeling and looking as good as new. Even what had become the usual pale hue of his skin was gone. He was bouncing and laughing and acting like he had never been sick. He felt so good he even ate three helpings of scrambled eggs and toast with raspberry jam. No signs of the ugly discoloration from the previous day were visible anywhere, and he didn’t even have to worry about the bruises he had feared so much.
Grabbing his black backpack from where it lay by the hallway door, he waved to his dad as he headed for the Friday morning bus to school.
“I’m really glad to see him smiling today. I was so worried.” Hunter said to Diana.
Diana grabbed some plates from the table while Hunter scraped the leftovers into small Tupperware containers. “I know. You’d almost think nothing had happened.” She kissed Hunter on the cheek. “Let’s hope it keeps up.”
“Hey, don’t go getting all cynical on me now.” Hunter said, poking playfully at Diana with a fork.
“Watch out with that thing, or someone else is going to be in the hospital.” She stared at him intensely. “And it’s not going to be me.”
“Oh ho! Really now. And what if I do this?” He jabbed her in the ribs with a finger and she flinched. “And this!” He poked her other side. “And this, and this, and this.” Before fifteen seconds had gone by they were both laughing and giggling and chasing each other around the kitchen like teenagers.
Yeah, the first is super short, the second is super long. Shows how my week goes in Nano, I play catch up a lot.