No Darker Fate Read online

  NO DARKER

  FATE

  JOHN CORWIN

  Copyright © 2011 by John Corwin

  Kindle Edition

  All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  LICENSE NOTES

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please go to Amazon.com or Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Books by John Corwin:

  Seventh

  No Darker Fate

  Outsourced

  The Next Thing I Knew

  Connect with John Corwin online:

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  Blog http://johncorwin.blogspot.com/

  Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/John_Corwin

  NO DARKER FATE

  When Lucas Fowler receives the image of a stranger on his cell phone from an unknown sender, his ordinary life takes a plunge into the bizarre.

  He gains new abilities: superhuman strength, speed, and the ability to shift into an alternate reality called the Blight. But these powers come at a cost. Someone is pulling his strings and forcing him to murder other people with abilities like his. These people call themselves Scions. They have their own secret society and rules.

  Now they know who he is.

  Lucas discovers he isn't the first person coerced into murder and if he can't stop whoever is controlling him, he won't be the last. But the police are searching for him, the Scions want him dead, and time is running out.

  Chapter 1

  One year to the day after dying, Lucas decided to go home. Calling the cab service had been easy, leaving the apartment, not so much. The waiting cabbie honked his horn for the fourth or fifth time, the sound edged with impatience. Lucas stared at the locks on his door, willing himself to open the last one, but cold sweat chilled his back and fear cradled every nerve. How stupid to think he could visit that empty dead place when mustering the courage to go outside proved impossible.

  A tire chirped in the parking lot. Lucas opened the blinds and looked out the window. The yellow cab screeched out of the apartment complex. Relief shivered through his limbs but shame replaced the fear. He sat in his computer chair and let the shame roll over him in a melancholy wave.

  He tried to remember what home looked like, that cozy place in Grant Park on the east side of Atlanta. Tried to remember a happy moment with his parents and sister in that warm place. His hand went to his neck, feeling for a wound no longer there. His throat had been crushed, an arm broken in two places and he didn't even have the scar tissue as proof. The doctors had called his recovery miraculous, but the memories had never healed. How different things would be if he'd taken ten steps and grabbed his father's gun on the day a maniac, stoned out of his mind, had taken everything from him.

  His left pants pocket vibrated. Adrenaline spiked. He rocketed back in his computer chair. The rollers couldn't keep up and the chair flipped. His head thudded against the hardwood floor. It took a moment for his senses to return.

  Lucas jammed his hand into the pocket and pulled out the culprit, his cell phone. He never set his phone to vibrate. A picture had arrived in the inbox from an unknown sender. His thumb hovered over "Delete". No telling what sort of virus lurked inside. A brush of static whispered in his hair and his thumb lowered. The image pixelated on the screen.

  What the hell? He'd pressed the wrong button. He examined the image, expecting his phone to lock up as a virus destroyed it. Instead, it simply displayed the picture of a man walking down a sidewalk with a red brick wall in the background.

  The tiny screen made his eyes struggle for detail so he forwarded it to his computer, displayed it on the monitor. The photographer had snapped a high-megapixel shot. Lucas magnified the image. Though the subject seemed unaware of the photographer, his head was turned in three-quarters profile displaying enough features for a solid identification if Lucas had known him. Recognition tugged at his mind, but neither name nor recollection accompanied the sliver of familiarity Lucas felt for the man.

  The air around the stranger glowed white like a cloud of radiation. Photoshopped most likely. The man had curly brown hair, shaggy and past the ears. An average-sized nose perched above thin lips. Dark designer jeans, a graphic t-shirt, and black leather shoes adorned his lanky frame. Maybe he was a celebrity. Maybe Lucas had seen a picture of this man on the Death Watchers website.

  Someone had painted silver graffiti on the brick wall behind the man. Lucas further magnified the photo and was able to make out the pattern. It looked like a circle of number eights, or possibly infinity symbols. He gasped and looked at the silver ring on his thumb. It too bore a pattern of linked infinity symbols. But the picture was fuzzy enough that he couldn't determine if the symbols were the same.

  Where had the picture been taken? The bricks behind the man looked cracked and worn, possibly part of a crumbling downtown structure. Maybe Midtown Atlanta, maybe the Highlands. He wondered why anyone would send him this. Must be a mistake, he figured. Wrong phone number. He closed the image and disabled the vibration feature on his phone.

  Lucas walked into the kitchen, his mind fixated on the symbols. Maybe he shouldn't have deleted the picture. He glanced at the ring on his thumb again. His heart ached at what it might represent. If the two were connected…

  The air pressure in the apartment plummeted. Lucas's ears verged on popping. The feeling vanished. But he sensed something else. A presence. He dropped to the gritty vinyl floor and bit back a grunt. Sweat beaded on his forehead. Dread constricted his throat. An unseen intruder displaced the silence. He crawled to the edge of the kitchen counter. Poked his head out of the entrance. The den was empty. Music thumped from a neighboring apartment. A car horn honked in the parking lot. Otherwise, nothing. He took a deep breath. Isolation had eroded his sanity.

  He pushed himself up and peeked around the corner again. Still nothing. He walked around the apartment and concluded he must be going mad. He returned to the kitchen and made himself a peanut butter sandwich then plopped down in front of the computer to browse the Death Watchers website. An anonymous member had posted a series of engrossing video documentaries about close encounters with death and near-death experiences. Lucas had been watching them off and on for the past few weeks. The current video told the story of a woman who'd survived a violent home intrusion. The rest of her family had not. It hit so close to home that he had trouble watching it.

  Spattered blood, broken bodies, the malevolent face of insanity snapped into his mind. The sweat-soaked odor of fear, like armpits and shit, crept into his nose. He almost looked away from the screen, but checked the impulse. Fear tightened his throat and snaked into his bowels. These simple chemical responses had trapped him, imprisoned him. He could visualize a part of his brain maliciously squirting fear potion into his blood. And no matter how logically he approached it, that cocktail of self-made chemicals trapped him in this apartment.

  The desk buzzed. Flight reflexes coiled Lucas's muscles tight. Then he realized it was his phone, vibrating again. How was this possible? Hadn't he disabled it? He flipped the phone open. A text mes
sage had arrived.

  Look under your desk.

  Frost seemed to blanket his limbs. His breath caught on a knot in his airway. Pushing his chair back a few feet, he noticed a red leather case on the floor under his desk. The next few seconds were a blur. He barely remembered the frantic dive he took over his mattress and into the corner of his bedroom. Barely remembered impacting the drywall, denting it with his shoulder. Lucas cowered in the fetal position, for how long he didn't know. With every bit of certainty in his body, he knew someone had planted a bomb in his apartment.

  He checked the clock after a while. An hour gone and nothing had exploded. If it had been proximity triggered, he'd already be splattered all over the den. Come to think of it, if whoever had put it there wanted him dead, he'd be dead whether by bullet or bomb. To have broken into his apartment and planted the case without him hearing a sound was the mark of a pro. Or a ghost. That earlier presence. Was no place safe or sacred? Of course not. He should know that better than anyone.

  The red case still sat where the intruder had left it. Lucas prodded it with a baseball bat a few times then picked it up. The first thing he noticed was the symbol, a circle of silver infinity signs stitched into the leather. Identical to the graffiti in the picture. Identical to his ring. The lid popped off easily enough. Inside was a stainless steel cylinder. He lifted it out, hefted it in his palm, and noted that it was much lighter than it looked. Altogether it measured about a half-inch in diameter and six inches in length. One end had a small hole, but the rod felt too dense to be hollow.

  He rapped it against the hardwood floor. A deep thump answered. His fingers rubbed against an imperfection in the smooth cylinder. Rotating it, he found another symbol identical to the one on the case. Had the killer discovered he'd left unfinished business behind and decided to kill Lucas? Or was this a cruel joke? Lucas clenched the cylinder in his hand and walked to the front door. He twisted the two deadbolts, unlatched the chain, slid back a straight bolt, and flicked the lock on the door knob. Hand on the knob, he hesitated and took a deep breath.

  He flung open the door. "Leave me alone!" His desperate scream echoed in the empty parking lot. The stench of new asphalt assaulted his nose. Nobody answered. He cocked his arm and launched the cylinder into the woods that bordered the apartment complex. He slammed the door, relocked everything, and latched the chain. He propped a chair against the handle to be sure the intruder couldn't return.

  Security checks consumed the next hour. Every last window was still nailed shut. There was no back door to worry about. He conducted a painstaking search of every closet and inch of floor space to make sure there wasn't a hidden trap door. He found a few loose boards, but nothing a person could fit through. The building was old and the plaster ceiling would keep anyone from getting through from above without a sledgehammer.

  Unless the intruder had picked his way through the front door and somehow slipped the chain without him hearing it, the apartment seemed impenetrable. He slumped into his computer chair and stared out the windows. It was dark outside. He jumped up and pulled the blinds, shuddering at the thought of the intruder spying on him from the cover of night. All at once, exhaustion hit him. It had been a confusing day. A frightening day. Maybe his apartment was haunted. Maybe he'd finally gone mad. He idly twisted the silver ring on his right thumb. His lip curled into a silent snarl for a moment before he realized what he was doing.

  He stared at the ring and fought back the memories that came with it. The memory of where he'd found it. He shuddered. It was time to go to bed.

  After brushing his teeth, he locked and bolted his bedroom door and flopped onto the mattress on the floor. His hand felt the reassuring presence of the bat next to him before unconsciousness took hold.

  * * * * *

  Vivid as real life, the man from the picture stared at Lucas. But the man remained still, his pose precisely as in the picture. A lucid dream, Lucas realized. His hand wrapped around something cool and metallic. Not his bat. He lifted the object and recognized the brushed stainless steel surface of the cylinder he had thrown into the woods. Something tugged at his guts. Something urged him to get up and walk. The bedroom door stood unlatched and open. He stood and noticed he was in his boxers. Even if he was dreaming, it was a good idea to dress. It was embarrassing to run around in striped boxers.

  After throwing on a t-shirt, jeans, and tennis shoes, he followed the urge toward the front door. Toward the outside. It was a dream. It didn't matter. Nothing could harm him here. Besides, this dream seemed calmer than his usual night terrors. Any dream was better than the one that repeatedly tortured him night after night.

  The desire to leave grew almost unbearable as he dithered at the doorway. He thought of viruses, slick concrete steps, drunk drivers, strangers with guns and knives. If he died in his dream he might die in real life. Better to be safe, even in a dream.

  Almost of their own accord, his hands came up and twisted open the locks. Removed the thick chain. He was outside and in the parking lot before he tried to take control of his body again. His body resisted him.

  The air pressure swelled. Pain stabbed into his ears. He dropped to his knees, hands clamped to head, eyes squeezed shut. The pain abated as quickly as it had come. He opened his eyes. Dim orange light bathed the parking lot. He looked up, expecting to see the sun, but it wasn't shining overhead. The light didn't seem to have a source. The asphalt beneath him was cracked and grayed. Every car in sight, even the newer models, looked beaten and worn. Rust snaked along their frames, leaving patches of faded and peeling paint in its wake. Dry rot had claimed the tires. Grime and dust coated the windows and chrome.

  Lucas stood, twisted toward the apartment building. Dead vines clung to the crumbling brick. The paint had lost what little luster it possessed. It had chipped and curled. Mottled brown leaves hung from trees. Damp brown grass rotted in place of the usually well-manicured lawn. In fact, all the nearby vegetation looked withered and putrid. A foul, moldy odor assaulted his nostrils. The air stank like garbage. He could almost taste it in the air.

  He backed away. The urge to continue his outdoor adventure had vanished. He wanted to wake up. To be back in his barren white-walled apartment. Back to normal. Agony wrenched his brain. He clamped his eyes and staggered into a car. In an instant, his head felt better but an alarm pierced the air. A car alarm. The car he had bumped looked fine. No rust. No rotted tires. No filth. He turned toward his apartment. Took a step toward home. But an invisible puppeteer jerked his limbs. Spun him around. The urge to resume his previous course overwhelmed everything else. He had no choice but to follow.

  His legs pumped harder, faster. He crossed an empty highway and felt his muscles tighten against his pants. His pulse pounded in his ears. The street beneath flowed past. He'd had dreams like this before. He'd always obsessed about super heroes and super powers. If only this could be real. A car turned onto the road ahead of him, its tires squealing as the driver rammed the gas. Lucas zipped past it and turned right onto a side street.

  What a thrill. Everything seemed so vivid. Even his sense of smell had sharpened. Though his thoughts were lucid, his body was not under his control. He didn't care. All he cared about was reaching his destination, wherever that was.

  A steel door loomed before Lucas. He'd arrived at his destination but didn't remember doing so. In fact, the last thing he remembered was the road. Loud music thumped from the other side of the door accompanied by laughing and shouting, like a huge party waited inside.

  Pain ratcheted in his head. The air in front of him seemed to crack with silvery-white streaks. Streaks of rust raced down the door. The smooth coat of paint fractured like sun-baked mud. Brown vines crept up the red-brick wall. Dust thickened in the air. Rancid odors invaded his nose. Silver paint seeped from the pores of the brick to form a pattern: the infinity circle. Lucas clenched his teeth against the pain, like a brain freeze he got from eating something cold too fast. Just as it grew unbearable, it abated.
<
br />   If this was a dream, why did his head hurt? Why did it stink? This was too real, too bizarre to be a dream.

  He inspected the symbol for a moment. He ran his fingers over it and felt the rough texture of the ancient bricks. His ring clinked against the bricks. The uncanny resemblance was too great to be a coincidence. Maybe the answers were on the other side of this metal door. He opened it. A low static hum interspersed with squeals of feedback had replaced the thumping music, like a crackling radio grasping at a weak signal. Lucas took one step inside the night club and choked back a cry. The interior was filthy. Dirt encrusted the tiles and the blackened sagging ceiling looked ready to collapse from damp rot. Rancid fumes, like sour beer and body odor hung in the air. But that wasn't what frightened him. It was the man just inside the door. More precisely, what appeared to be a man.

  Bottomless black eye sockets gazed back at Lucas. The man's toothless mouth gaped, the lips blistered and gray. His ears, withered nubs, clung to the sides of his head like overgrown warts. Scraggly hair sprouted from a waxen scalp. A filmy coat of slime coated his skin. His ratty clothes clung to the slime as if thrown on without drying after a swim in the stuff. The man, creature, or whatever it was seemed unaware of Lucas's presence. He gesticulated and lurched, never finishing one move without convulsing into another. Moans and grunts emanated from his mouth. Had the zombie apocalypse arrived while he'd been hiding in his apartment?

  Oddly enough, Lucas felt no fear, only disgust. He looked past the first creature. A horde of them danced spasmodically on the center floor beneath a dysfunctional disco ball. Ghastly females clad in rotted fishnet stockings and tiny skirts twisted and vibrated atop tables at either end of the dance floor. The dancers flailed mottled extremities, a few grinding their nightmarish bodies against one another. Some of their movements skipped their natural flow, looking like a horror film cut and spliced for a strobe effect.