The Grip Read Free

inside the hole. He waited patiently. He would wait as long as he needed to. Finally he saw. And that’s when he screamed.
    •  •  •
    Alone at the edge of the universe, long after the screaming had finally subsided, after Cready had been alone with the soft rhythm of his own breathing for an unknowable length of time, there came a sound. The sultry quality of a woman’s voice. A beautiful woman.
    Hello, Captain.
    Cready looked up. There was doubt on his face.
    You seem upset.
    “I thought you left me.”
    Why would I ever leave you?
    A pause. Acute distrust as he searched the question for some note of irony. Finding none, his distrust gradually ebbed, and then dissolved altogether. “I know, it was silly.”
    You and I are the only ones left.
    Cready’s eyes slowly sharpened, like a man coming out of a long dream.
    “Gone?”
    Yes.
    “All of them?”
    Uh huh. Just you and I now. No one else to bother us, ever again.
    Cready’s face seemed on the verge of clearing, threatening a return of the old Cready, the take charge Cready. Cready the problem solver. That moment of uncertainty seemed to linger—an hour, maybe a month—before his eyes dulled and became cloudy again. He slid back into his chair. His blood flaked hands resting peacefully at his sides. On his lips was the faint hint of a smile. Just then a thought passed through his synthetic mind. “How long is an eternity?” he wondered vaguely. He wasn’t sure, but something inside told him he was about to find out.

Chapter 1
    T he stranger grinned and his sunken cheeks made his face look like a skull.
    “Go on, Lysander,” his father, Glenn, scolded. “Shake the man’s hand.”
    Lysander Shore’s family hadn’t been in Millingham longer than a week, but he was sure somehow he had met this man somewhere before. Maybe filling bags at the grocery store or delivering mail down the street? This was going to torture him the whole day.
    Lysander stuffed his lunch into his knapsack and then slowly held out his hand. The cold palm that slid into his a second later made Lysander’s stomach turn. His father must have noticed the discomfort on Lysander’s face, because Glenn’s cheeks flushed with embarrassment. At least for once it wasn’t about Lysander’s black nail polish or matching combat boots.
    “You’ll have to excuse the mess,” Glenn said, clearing a place on the couch where the stranger could sit. “We’re still getting settled.”
    A pin on the lapel of the man’s suit jacket read “Peter Hume” and below that “Zellermann’s.” He was probably an insurance guy, Lysander thought, here about the fire that had destroyed their old house in Hayward.
    The two men spoke about how the house was a complete write-off, his father running through a list of things that were destroyed, when Peter Hume peered up at Lysander. The odd glint in his eye instantly made Lysander uneasy.
    “Do you have any pictures?” Hume asked Glenn. “So we can take inventory of what you lost.”
    “Yeah,” Glenn said, looking at his watch. “You need those now? I gotta leave for work.”
    Hume smiled apologetically. “I’m afraid so.”
    Glenn sighed, as he always did when asked to do something menial but necessary, and headed for the kitchen. “You want something to drink?”
    “Earl Grey would be nice.”
    “That’s the only tea we have,” Glenn said robotically. He seemed dazed. Or was he hypnotized? Lysander couldn’t tell which.
    Hume’s eyes were shining. “Legend has it an old Chinese man gave Lord Grey the recipe for saving his son’s life, if you believe that sort of thing.”
    His father shrugged and disappeared into the kitchen.
    Now Lysander and Peter Hume were alone and the air in the room seemed to drop ten degrees. Slowly, the smile disappeared from Hume’s face.
    “You were warned not to come here,” Hume said, his voice gravelly, almost hoarse. Lysander peered down at Hume’s scalp and saw the man’s translucent flesh