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Floating in gray dimness, she heard a clock strike three
Wake up, she thought, but she didn’t want to She floated for a while again
No, wake up, she thought That’s the alaro see Zach
Zach
She ake
She was lying on the cold floor of her cousin’s garage, chilled and stiff but bee-less She looked at her hands and bare ankles Not a mark Julian hadn’t let it happen
But now she was stuck in a garage without a door The light trap had only a curtain All the other doors-the large one for cars and the regular one to the house-were si, their spaces filled in with blank walls
She had no idea what she was supposed to do next, and it was after three in theand she was tired
Jenny looked at the corner of the studio where Zach took pictures Zach’s casten floodlamp was turned on The backdrop was a sheet of seamless paper from a rollpaper like that black and throwing handfuls of white flour at it The result had looked a little like the Milky Way-white splashes on infinite space Very strange and futuristic; Zach loved that kind of stuff
This backdrop, though, had a door painted on it, too
A knob protruded froht as she went over to it, but so inside her wasn’t so sure For some reason this black-and-white door made her chilled flesh creep
What choice have you got? her mind asked si out She stepped inside
It was like being suspended a the stars The door closed behind her, but Jenny scarcely noticed The sky see white splotches The ground was a velvety black dropcloth that went on forever in all directions
It ful, this sense of infinity all around, pulling at her It reround stretched on endlessly, but the sky was close and solid overhead Did Zach have the
sahtmare?
The only landsten floodlamps like the ones Zach used They forhtness here and there, so out into the distance
Jenny pivoted, trying to get her bearings-and drew in her breath sharply The door was still behind her It hadn’t disappeared She could walk right out again
But if this was Zach’s nightmare, he must be in here so for him
After a moment’s hesitation she headed for the nearest floodlae to step away from the security of the door, and once she did she kept her eyes fixed on the island of light ahead The black velvet ground was perfectly shtest wrinkle She could practically skate over it in her flats
When she reached the floodlamp, she saw it had a pink filter just like the ones Zach used He got thehts burned out And the scene it illuminated was exactly like a print Zach had rass The print had been weird and high tech, like all Zach’s photos, but Jenny had always liked it Just now the coyote-shape standing alone with pink light blazing on it was unnerving
Waiting for the photographer, Jenny thought It gave the disquieting i there forever
She headed toward the next floodlae distance here
This one was shining on a wall, a single wall standing alone, its s broken out Silver dots and swathes decorated the wall Zach had gone into deserted houses in Zuraphed them Vandalism, the police said, but Zach insisted it was art
Jenny looked on both sides of the freestanding wall It was unnerving, too Everything was so quiet here
Just as she thought it, she heard a faint clanking noise
The light fro had passed in front of it Standing rigid, Jenny strained her eyes in the darkness She couldn’t see anything , either
Just your iination, she told herself-but it was hard toback frequently, she walked to the next lae filter A few years ago Zach had photographed baking soda thrown in the air under colored lights The proble orange cloud suspended-by nothing Jenny could see individual et me out of here
She backed away froot closer her heart skipped and she began to run There were two blue floodlaether Zach was under one
Jenny opened her mouth to shout to him, but stopped at the last minute What if it wasn’t Zach? She’d been fooled once
She approached cautiously and looked down at the figure in silence
Same flannel shirt over same T-shirt Same deni a fist-size rock over a gray canvas painted with silver streaks He put the rock down, looked at it, picked it back up He put it down again in al to call it ’Rock on Water,’" he said He looked up "Because rocks don’t really float"
"Zach," said Jenny She knelt down and put a hand on his shoulder His gray eyes were abstracted and a little glazed, just like the other’s had been But so told Jenny this was really her cousin
A stealthy noise in the endless dark ht winked out, went back on
"Zach, we’ve got to go," she said and tightened her grip "I’ll explain later-but there’s soet back to the door"
Zach just gave her one of his absent smiles, the kind that didn’t reach his eyes "I know it’s out there," he said "It doesn’t matter It’s all part of htain, shifted it slightly, considered it "I’ve known for a long tienuinely astonished "You kneere going to get kidnapped by the Shadow Man?"
"I kneas going to go crazy" Then, adjusting the rock fractionally, he said, "Actually ’kidnapped by the Shadow Man’ is a really interesting way of putting it Really i insane?"
Jenny could feel heropen Then she shut it with a snap and took her cousin by both shoulders
"Zachary, you are not insane," she said "Is that what your probleht you’d gone crazy?"
"Brain kidnapped by the Shadow Man," he told her "It was bound to happen sooner or later It runs in the family"
"Oh, for God’s sake, Zach!" She had no idea what he was talking about
The orange floodlamp, the next one out, seemed to flicker
"Don’t worry," Zach told Jenny "You’re just part of my hallucination It won’t really hurt"
"What won’t really hurt?"
Zach was gazing at the rock on his canvas "It’s about dimensions See? The canvas is two dimensional and the-"
An arrow shattered one of the blue floodlalass
No, a bolt, Jenny thought, stunned A bolt fronized it because Zach’s father had made it to the National Crossbow Cha Bolts were even more lethal
than arrows-and this one was metal and looked allass off his canvas "Zach, get up!" Jenny was frantic Another bolt shattered the second blue floodlight Jenny jumped away from the sparks Zach hunched protectively over his rock
"Zach, listen to me! This is not a hallucination, it’s real, and you can die for real here, too! You can bring your rock if you want, but we’ve got to leave this minute-this minute!" Her voice rose hysterically at the end
It got through to hilow of the white-splattered sky, but he got up-still holding the rock-and here she was pulling hie, and then white, and then pink The door should be beyond that
The orange laot to it "Zach, who’s after us? No, don’t stop, coed at his elbow He’d turned around to look thoughtfully behind thehtened "Me," he said
They reached the freestanding wall by the white floodlamp Jenny felt somewhat safer behind it She looked at her cousin "You?"
"It’smyself"
"Oh, Zach," she said helplessly Then: "Zach, it’s not a hallucination The sa to all of us-we’re all here Dee and Mike and Tom and
Audrey and htmare killed her because she couldn’t cope So you have to cope, because if you don’t" Jenny’s eyes et
Zach blinked "We’re all here? It’s real?"
"It’s real It really happened, the Ga It’s not in your head It almost drove me crazy, too, but you can’t let it"
Zach blinked again, then looked through the emptyof the wall, out into the darkness "If it’s real" he began slowly, and continued in a voice with th, "If it’s real, then who’s that?"
Jenny inched over to take a cautious peek A-person-was standing at the very edge of the light that went through theHis crossboas futuristic-looking-and so was he Cyberpunk, Jenny thought He earing black body ared his lean body sleekly, and he had one nor steel and cables There was soh
He wore a helmet with a mirrored face mask that completely obscured his features
Jenny leaned back against the wall
"Oh, terrific," she whispered
"I figured he was my dark side The part of me that wants to destroy h the -Jenny felt the wind of it-and shattered the white floodlamp
"Co
The Cyber-Hunter got to the pink floodlight before them
He couldn’t have, but he did anyway He stood, backlit by the neon pink glow, a dark silhouette as they approached
"This way! We have to get to the door!"
Jenny veered sharply, circling to get to the other side of the pink laot to the place where the door should have been, it wasn’t
"It’s gone!" Jenny turned to look back The Cyber-Hunter was facing thelow
And what on earth are we supposed to do with hiht Kill him? Bash hi she’d learned-the nightet out, even when there didn’t see
So what could they do with the Cyber-Hunter? How could Zach face his fear?
"Zach," she said hesitantly, "you haven’t seen his face, right? You don’t know if he looks like you"
"No, I just figured He’s like the high-tech stuff in et me"