Tales from the Canyons of the Damned: Omnibus Read online

  TALES FROM THE

  CANYONS OF

  THE DAMNED

  OMNIBUS No. 1

  Tales from the Canyons of the Damned Omnibus no. 1 Copyright © 2016 by Daniel Arthur Smith. All rights reserved. This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. Your support and respect for the property of this author is appreciated. No part of this book may be used, reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without written permission of the publisher, except where permitted by law, or in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, contact [email protected]

  This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. The characters are productions of the author’s imagination and used fictitiously.

  Collection Copyright © 2016 by Daniel Arthur Smith

  Thoughts as Water by A.K. Meek Copyright © 2016 A.K. Meek. Used by permission of the author.

  Natural Born Alien, Razor by Will Swardstrom Copyright © 2016 Will Swardstrom. Used by permission of the author.

  Smoke, Magenta by Bob Williams Copyright © 2016 Bob Williams. Used by permission of the author.

  Sandhogs, The Penthouse, The Harbor, Tesla, The Blue Orb, The Tombs, Eye in the Sky, The Park by Daniel Arthur Smith Copyright © 2016 Daniel Arthur Smith. Used by permission of the author.

  Float by Ernie Howard © 2016 by Ernie Howard. Used by permission of the author.

  Ledge Town by Jason Anspach Copyright © 2015 by Jason Anspach. Used by permission of the author.

  Sole Survivor by Jon Frater Copyright © 2016 Jon Frater. Used by permission of the author.

  The Hereafter by Hank Garner Copyright © 2016 Hank Garner. Used by permission of the author.

  Bloom by S. Elliot Brandis Copyright © 2016 S. Elliot Brandis. Used by permission of the author.

  First Edition

  Formatting by Daniel Arthur Smith

  Cover Design by Daniel Arthur Smith

  Special thanks to Jessica West

  Published by Holt Smith Limited

  ~*~

  For Susan, Tristan, & Oliver, as all things are.

  ~*~

  SANDHOGS

  Daniel Arthur Smith

  ~*~

  Six hundred feet beneath the gray streets of midtown Manhattan, below the parking garages, the basements and subbasements, far deeper than the winding nests of electric conduits and gas lines, a tiny electric bulb slowly came to life with a dull honey glow, three feet above the head of Jed McGuire. The small bulb appeared to float, the wire it dangled from hidden in the too thick mist.

  The blow­pipes were deafening. That’s what he figured was producing all of the mist– the moisture, the heat. They’d blasted air and water into the tube for hours, and in those hours, Jed’s vision was knocked out. Not only him, all of the guys.

  Jed squinted to gain focus. Yes, the cavern was mistier than he’d seen it in fifteen years as a sandhog. But he was seeing again. Glowing halos hovered around him and below each, larger glossed beacons began to appear. The other sandhogs were turning on their flashlights. Below the dim bulb, he could make out the top of the hospital stretcher propped against a wall. He had his bearings, his location. He was in the middle of the deep tunnel, a tight twelve-foot circle of cave that ran a hundred yards to either side from where he stood.

  And it was hot. It had been hot since the lights went out, since everything went black. The humid mist had brought the temperature up from the usual seventy degrees. Way up.

  Something had gone wrong. Jed couldn’t fathom what. There hadn’t been an explosion. No charges were set.

  Only the instant blackness – the lights had gone out.

  The radios worked on their end, but no one answered on the other.

  Jimmy had made his way to the cage. The call buzzer didn’t sound. They all made their way around all right, even without sight. They were sandhogs, the six of them, all third generation. Except Jonesy, he was second.

  But there was no doubt in their minds that they were alone down there in the hidden caverns beneath the deepest, darkest, dankest, section of the city. No doubt, that is, until Lenny screamed, “Get it off me! Get it off me!”

  The other five men circled around the shaking lights. Up close, they could see the terror on the man’s aged face. A tough man, a large man, a man that could hold a jumping jackleg straight into a wall while the hammer was at full bore, without flinching.

  And he was screaming a wretched painful torrent of a scream. A scream that bounced and echoed and returned to their ears with cutting force.

  “What is it?” Cal asked as he and the others washed their lights across Lenny’s bulk of a chest. Nothing on his dirt-covered Carhart seemed flawed, no tears.

  “Down there!” he screamed again. “Down there! Get it off me!” hopping to the side until he fell upon a buttress.

  That was when Jed saw Lenny’s foot, the thing on Lenny’s foot, the purple and crimson streaked gelatin mass that oozed around the stump where the boot had been, where the toes had been, the thing sucking up the canvas of his leg.

  “What the hell is that?” Jimmy yelled.

  “Shit,” Jonesy chimed.

  “Aarrgh!” Lenny yelled, no longer making words.

  The steam from the jelly was thicker than the mist, and the smell was acrid, rancid.

  “What do we do?” Markie asked.

  “I dunno,” Cal said. “I think he’s goin’ into shock.”

  “Cut it off ‘em,” Jed said.

  “What?” Jimmy asked.

  “Cut it off!” Jed yelled.

  “Yeah,” Cal said, “get the med kit.”

  Lenny’s scream had turned into a constant loud agonizing moan.

  “Shit,” Jonesy said again. “We’re gonna help you, Len. We’re gonna help.”

  Markie drug the plastic case close—but not too close—to Lenny’s leg then opened it wide so they all could see.

  “Okay,” he asked. “What now?”

  Jed pointed his finger toward the kit and then jerked it half back. “That bottle there,” he said, “that’s rubbing alcohol. Pour it on.”

  Markie pushed the case toward Jed. “I’m not touchen’ it.”

  Cal swiftly dropped to one knee, swiped the bottle from the side of the case, twisted the cap, and tossed it away. “Here goes,” he said, and began to pour the clear liquid across Lenny’s shin where the purplish jelly burned against the flesh and frayed canvas pants.

  Lenny let out a deafening howl that brought Cal’s free hand up to his ear, causing him to cast his weight closer to the goo. The hand that held the bottle dropped nearer, almost touching the mass. Only a flinch, a shift for a second coinciding with the yell, the reaction to the pain, and that’s all it took, a second, and in that second, Cal realized, Jed realized, whomever else in the group who was watching realized, that the gelatin mass on Lenny’s foot was not some chemical mass he’d stepped in, was not some spill or compound. No, the blob was organic, and the blob was alive, and this they saw when the blood crimson-streaked creature lashed out with a protruding bit of translucent matter, latched onto Cal’s fingers, and then sucked itself up onto his hand.

  Lenny’s horrendous roar had fallen to a whimper. But Cal wasn’t paying attention to him anymore, and neither was Jed or any of the others. Cal was being t
ugged, a kitten caught on a string, he couldn’t shake the thick purple jelly loose.

  “It’s glued to me,” Cal said.

  The others said nothing. There was nothing to be said. It was glue and behaved the same. The more Cal twitched, the further he entangled his hand.

  Jed saw the worry in Cal’s tightened face.

  “It burns,” Cal said with a flick of his wrists, and then the surprise, when the jelly surged up toward his forearm. “Ah!” Cal yelled.

  “Shit,” Jimmy said. “That thing is growing.”

  And Jed could see that thing was growing. The mass hadn’t displaced onto Cal, rather had grown onto him, and was constricting, pulling Cal’s arm in, in toward Lenny’s leg.

  Jed slipped from his moment of stupor. “Let’s pull them apart.”

  “What?” Jimmy asked.

  “Grab Lenny. I’ll grab Cal. Markie, help him out.”

  Jed hunched over behind Cal, slipped his arms beneath his shoulders, and with a hefty thrust attempted to lift him away from Lenny.

  “It’s no use,” Cal said between gritted teeth.

  He was right. The two didn’t separate. The mass appeared to fight the attempt, to pull them closer, tighter.

  “Hell!” Jonesy yelled.

  The others’ eyes darted to Jonesy and with them their headlamps. Lenny had kicked his foot up, the goo-covered foot, and caught Jonesy on the calf.

  “How’d that happen?” Jimmy asked.

  “Get your pants off,” Cal said, in pain, yet still in charge. “Quick!”

  Jonesy fumbled to unzip his Carhart jacket and the vest beneath to reach his belt. He slid the leather from the buckle, ripped at the button of the Levis, tucked his thumbs into his waists, and pushed down his pants. They were as far as his knees before he yelped and bucked forward, falling over onto Lenny’s leg, Cal’s arm, and the crimson purple jelly goo.

  Jed propped his back against a four-hundred-million-year-old chunk of black schist. The sparkles that reflected from the rock were the same as those in his eyes.

  There was nothing to say.

  Jimmy and Markie’s lights became foggy glows as they eased away from the three knotted men on the floor. Lenny had stopped making sounds, Cal was moaning, and Jonesy was convulsing, just a little, but vibrating just the same, as if there were something in him, and there was, something hungry, something growing.

  Jed watched until he couldn’t. He watched the jelly bubble through the back of Jonesy’s canvas jacket. He didn’t want to see the blob dissolve his friends altogether, so he climbed up and made his way further into the cave, and then rested just far enough away that he could still see everyone’s lamps through the fog.

  Until one by one, their lamps went out.

  ~*~

  THE PENTHOUSE

  Daniel Arthur Smith

  ~*~

  The K-cups that Jack remembered seeing in the drawer were gone. That girl he was dating, Jan, must have drunk them. He didn’t remember the last time he used the countertop one-cup-atta-time Keurig. Breakfast usually meant a coffee on the street. But no power for another day meant no elevators, thus no coffee. But all was not lost. There were two bottles of scotch on the counter and a bottle of Drambuie. He opened the bottom freezer drawer of the Sub-Zero and knuckled into the ice bin. Though the bottom was a puddle, there were still a ton of cubes left. Jack cinched the sash of his lucky red robe and did the only thing a man could do alone in the penthouse of his glass-towered building. One Rusty Nail coming up.

  He tossed two cubes in a rock glass, topped them with the scotch, and the filled the rest of the glass with the Drambuie. All he needed was a lemon, a little tart to curb the honey heather sweet of the Drambuie. He opened the dark empty fridge, already stale without the coolness to mask the odor. There was food inside, no lemons or limes, all sauces, spreads, and condiments. The pantry wasn’t looking much better. His diet was take-out. The only thing on the shelves were almonds, cookies, cheese puffs, and pretzels. There was a box of German chocolate cake mix in the back, and a container of frosting to the side. Jan must’ve bought it. And it wasn’t of much use. Short of eggs and oil the mix was just powder.

  None of that sounded appetizing, except for that fresh Rusty Nail.

  The refrigerator was not totally empty. The door was lined with two kinds of BBQ sauce, Worcestershire, A1, Dijon, a green bottle of lite soy, a short jar of maraschino cherries, and yes, to the rescue, the plastic lemon. Just as good, the same thing as far as the scotch and Jack were concerned. He grabbed the plastic lemon from the fridge door and shook it near his ear – empty, a lemon of a lemon. He flung the empty plastic into the dark recess of the top shelf and swiped the maraschino cherries from the door. The cherries weren’t tart, but you work with what you got.

  He had to exert a couple of waist-level thrusts onto the lid before he heard the POP release, and then he was a go.

  By the stem a cherry for him, two cherries for the glass, and… Why not? A dash of juice too, and voila, a Bloody Nail. Not exactly, it was cherry juice, not cherry brandy, but you work with what you got. A sip of the cocktail… and… Jack swished the sweet liquor through the front of his mouth, and then swallowed. “Aah,” he said. “Not bad at all.”

  He reached for the fridge handle with his pinky, caught himself, and then set the cherry jar on the counter next to the booze. The temperature was about the same inside as out.

  The small kitchen was the only shadowy spot in the penthouse and thus depressing, so Jack slipped his hand into the pocket of his lucky red robe and strolled across the chocolate board flooring to the milk-white glass wall.

  Cocktail—scratch that, Bloody Nail—in hand, leisurely day, as good as it gets. Jack sucked a deep breath in through his nose and then let it out. A drink. If things were so great, why then… He leaned close to the glass to see if he could catch a glimpse of the street, or even the apartment below. Nothing. The fog was so thick. The outside of his apartment could have been white smoke, white steam, whatever the difference, it didn’t matter.

  He paced toward the glass coffee table. Gazed at the brown leather loveseat and the matching sofa. He had only sat on the loveseat twice. Once when he purchased it, and then once after it was delivered. Jack stared at it for a moment—another sweet pull, another swish—and then decided to sit down on the chocolate leather.

  So he did.

  Right in the center. And the leather was nice, sucked him in. He raised his brow, satisfied, and ran his left hand across the top of the leather. He wondered for a moment what kind of leather it was. It hadn’t occurred to him before. The salesman in Soho had said Italian leather and then charged four thousand for the sofa and two thousand for the loveseat. But what did that mean, Italian leather. He had assumed bovine. Cow leather. He pivoted his head to the right to meet the rock glass raising in his hand, and that was when he saw it, from his peripheral, out the windowed wall. A few feet, maybe a yard or two away. There had been a red flash.

  Had there been?

  Jack’s neck crooked forward. Alert, watching.

  Nothing.

  The muscles near his spine relaxed and he finished his attempt at taking a drink.

  “Whoa,” he said aloud, because he saw it again. Directly in front of where he sat. There was no doubt this time. Something red was out there. And it hadn’t passed by his apartment, flown by. Whatever that red blur was, out there in the fog, just beyond his view, it was hovering. The glimpse he caught was thin, horizontal, not a bird, but not a balloon, at least not a round balloon. Jack shuffled his shoulder blades into the back cushion. Finally, some entertainment.

  Jack didn’t have to wait long. The red line zinged by again. This time he noticed though, that whatever the red thing was, it was long. Because his gaze was set on a small foot-and-a-half wide window in the fog, and he could see – the tube – sliding left. So it was a long red tube, and real long, because it slid past through that little hole in the fog for a good forty-five seconds before disappeari
ng again. He did the math, sort of, a couple of feet going by per second would be… Jack tilted head to the side and saluted the outside vapor with his rock glass.

  He waited for his gleaming red friend to reappear, either in a glimpse or at length, but the long tube did not return.

  Jack rose from the loveseat, circled the glass-topped teak coffee table, and approached the transparent wall.

  Nothing.

  He peered deeply into the glowing white void, the creamy swirl of endless vapor. Whatever he saw out there in the mist, as long and large as it was, had passed.

  And so had most of his Bloody Nail.

  Jack shook the cocktail to knock the cubes together, a subconscious attempt to leach the last of the booze from the ice. And then he pivoted toward the interior of the apartment and raised the drink high to swill down the remainder.

  Jack may not have seen anything out into the beyond. But something saw him. And while the last of the sweet Maraschino Drambuie scotch concoction drizzled onto his tongue, the long tube that was not a tube returned, unfurling, reaching, lashing for Jack.

  He did not see the massive tentacle hurl into the transparent wall a foot to his back, nor did he see the thick glass shatter to shards.

  It was the wall that saved him from the blow, forcing him onto the chocolate board flooring. It was the loveseat that was his demise. Because when that long gleaming red arm swung into the hollow of Jack’s penthouse to search for him, it found the small sofa instead, and dragged the two thousand dollar Italian leather piece right out into the abyss.

  And Jack, because he was between that piece of furniture and the outside nothing, peeled away from his penthouse as well.