The Escape
Ethan emerged from the hotel with Erica to see the Challenger's headlights shining directly at him.
Sarah was at the wheel, Rory was leaning out his window, while Benny was standing impatiently. He had lost the chin-strap cap, but of necessity was still wearing his bellboy uniform.
"It's about time" said Sarah. "The doors were locked, we were about to try breaking them down."
"Ethan, where were you?" asked Benny, who, Ethan noticed, seemed to be relishing his ability to move around the restored pupils of his eyes. "And what's with Erica?"
"She's in a trance" said Ethan. "A good one. But that's a . . . story" Ethan finished lamely. "What counts is we get out of here . . . fast! Help me put Erica in back."
"Why!' asked Benny.
"I have an idea my great-great grandfather doesn't want me to look at what's going to happen until we cross the border" said Ethan.
"Huh?" said Rory.
"Uh . . . never mind" said Ethan. "But we can't wait. And . . . ." Ethan grimaced, and gave a wry expression. "These stones hurt my feet. I haven't any shoes to wear."
It was strange to have Erica sitting between Rory and Benny. She opened her eyes for a second, looked about, actually looked relieved, and fell asleep.
"Are you sure she's okay?" said Sarah.
"She's had a . . . shock" Ethan repeat.
"Erica doesn't react like that" said Sarah.
Ethan opened his mouth to explain, but shut it quickly as he changed his mind.
"Sarah . . . just step on it" Ethan begged. "Please, just step on it. We have to get out of here. To the railroad tracks and south across the trestle."
"To the states?" asked Benny. "Is there a crossing open this time of year?"
"It's the fastest way out" said Ethan, who looked at the speedometer and the clock.
"I dunno how it got so late" said Rory, as the car finally sped away.
"Pocket dimension" said Benny. "Dude, Erica's . . . asleep again?"
"What happened to her?" said Sarah.
Sarah had started the car, and accelerated as she left the fog-bound lawn of the hotel. She sped up on the road to Leeblaine proper, going up the hill. Sarah had no intention of taking the "scenic road" by the cemetery and the lake, but driving the road past the gas station directly to town.
"I'll tell you later" said Ethan.
"You'll tell me now" said Sarah sternly. "I'm the one who's driving."
Ethan said, in as few words as he could, what had happened in the hotel ballroom. There was stunned silence, and, as Ethan expected, Sarah let her pressure on the gas pedal ease.
"We have to get out" said Ethan.
"Sorry" Sarah said briefly, and she sped. "But will she be all okay?"
Ethan looked at her, and by the unexpected glow in his eyes, knew that he would have no problem being a seer again. This vision was one of those symbolic, esoteric ones.
It starred, appropriately enough, Erica. She appeared to be riding a car, one of those toy carnival rides on wheels. A woman in early middle age, who it was Ethan didn't recognize; a thin, tall blonde with high cheekbones, pulled a switch that put Erica's car on another track with a sudden jolt.
Sarah was watching; looked a little jealous. But she applauded.
"It gives me what I wanted most for her" Sarah said, with a shrug.
"Very okay" said Ethan.
By this time the Challenger had gone over the hill, leaving the castle-like hotel behind him. They sped into town passed the Esso station and the corner. There was certain noise down that road, like scratching and digging.
"The zombies, the skeletons, they're going back to their graves" Benny said matter-of-fact. "That's what old school zombies do if they're already dead and their curse has been lifted."
"It doesn't seem fair" Rory objected, as he thought about it. "They got brought back to life, and they have to go bury themselves in their graves."
"You've got to remember" Ethan explained. "It's just their bodies that've been stolen. Not their souls. They're returning to where they were put to rest."
"Okay, Ethan" said Rory. "Makes more sense that way."
The Challenger roared down the empty street. Past the mist-shrouded church, the school with red ensign still flying, the general store where Ethan bought his suit and the day's edition of the Winnipeg Free Press. Sarah slowed to manoeuver through the rail tunnel, but bounced off the road by the station with the decorative turrets, and onto the bouncing tracks. Southbound.
"I think we only have until the snowmobiler's body leaves town" said Ethan, thinking. "Until he goes back to where the Windego killed him."
"I hope someone finds him soon and tells his family" said Sarah solemnly.
After passing a couple of short sidings, the rail-line rose to a high level above the village and the rocky, forested landscape. In another moment, fog on either side made it look like they were bouncing unevenly above a lake of swirling white smoke.
Then, the embankment was replaced by a wooden trestle as the stones beneath were replaced by tracks and tries resting on wooden supports. No car could cross this . . . that is, without the magical spell keeping the car from getting stuck on the rails or falling between the ties.
Beneath them was the dark, lapping water as it appeared in the August of 1957.
This was the lake, the border. Not just the international border, but the border of this perverse echo of 1957.
It was about a mile later, when, at once, the rails ended and the roadbed had been planked for the benefit of hikers and snowmobilers. The water lapped against a frozen overcropping. The mist ended, leaving the Challenger to drive smoothly the rest of the way across the trestle.
"My great-great grandfather" Ethan said. "He said we could look once we're out."
The teens, except Erica, left the car.
It was a cold wind, and cold, clear night. Except for the bank of mist shrouding their view of the Canadian side of the lake.
The moon had waned to its last quarter. Ethan looked at it, wondering how it weird seemed that ever had any power over him. Besides, indirectly of course, the effect its gravitation pull had on the tides, stabilising the orientation of the Earth on its axis, and gradually slowing its rotation!
"What do you think will happen?" said Benny, looking toward the large fogbank with anticipation. "I bet huge explosion."
"No" said Rory. "I think fade away into the fog."
"From what you told us" said Sarah. "I think it'll sink."
"Where?" asked Ethan.
"To Hades. Like in Edgar Allan Poe's City in the Sea" said Sarah.
Sarah looked to Erica. There was a time when she could or would recite a good deal of poetry.
"No" said Ethan, thoughtfully. "It wasn't an evil town. It was just the weird pocket dimension that Stephanie created. When my great-great grandfather took me through the hotel lobby, he showed me what it had been like in the old days. I think he was showing me it to remind me that."
"He may have been showing you even more proof that evil's no match for good" said Sarah. "Stephanie's spell couldn't hold when he came to rescue you, it went off like a switch. What was he like, was he really your guardian angel?"
"It depends if angels are separate beings, or if you call someone who looks after you . . . up there . . . a guardian angel" said Ethan. "But he was an awesome guy, though it was a little hard to relate to him . . . he lived a hundred years ago. He's very . . . stiff and formal. But very calm."
"Now I know I you got to be so uptight" joked Benny.
"Yeah, but I'm betting that dude kept the Jesse and the vamps out while he was alive" said Rory. "It'll explain why Jesse called him a loser."
"I'm betting that" said Ethan. "Or at least keeping them away from innocent people."
"What did he say to Erica?" asked Sarah.
"Nothing" said Ethan. "She's been like this since the demons were sent back to where they belong."
"Yeah, pal. Speaking of back to where they belong . . . ." said Benny impatiently. "I'm not going to wait here forever . . . ."
And then something began to happen. A rumble, like an earthquake. It grew louder, and some stones at the side of the embankment began to slip into the earth.
Then, at once, the mist glowed red. There was an enormous bang that rattled the windows of the Challenger and sent Team Sabre scrambling behind the car, half-ducking for cover.
Then the rumble continued as the red mist transformed to smoke, rising high and quick, in a column of smoke and spreading out flat above high in the air.
A cloud shaped very much like a mushroom.
"Whoa!" said Benny bantering. "If I didn't know better I'd say it was nuclear. The forces of evil are really not happy to fold their extra-dimensional circus tent."
"Is it nuclear?" asked Sarah sharply.
"No" said Ethan. "Then we couldn't be this close."
"We'd all be dead" said Benny bluntly. "It's not going be like Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls."
"Yeah, it wasn't realistic Indiana using the fridge as a nuclear bomb shelter" Rory acknowledged. "But way awesome . . . Your . . . great-great grandad knew you'd want to see an explosion like that."
"Yeah, I'm sure he did" Ethan agreed.
This mushroom cloud didn't stay as long as a "natural" atomic bomb.
A strong gust of wind dispersed what was left of the cloud. When the four strained their eyes to looked across the lake at Leeblain, nothing was left beneath the moonlit sky except for the dark battered church, a clearing, and many young firs that had grown in the breach.
"I guess we're back in the real world" Sarah observed.
The fact they were in the real world was emphasized when Ethan noticed the shed at the side of the trail, with instructions to report to U.S. customs under penalty of law.
Inside the unheated building, there was a video phone. Ethan contacted a bored guard stationed at International Falls, a hundred miles to the west. She demanded all five report to the phone in the shed.
It took some doing as the shed was small and Erica was groggy and still stunned. But all five went in to report. All five held up their passports to the video phone in turn.
"Reason for travelling to the United States?"
"We're taking a shortcut back home" Ethan said.
"Where?"
"Whitechapel, Ontario."
"You can go" she said.
"Aren't you interested in why we're dressed like this?" asked Rory. "And what we're doing out here in the middle of the night?"
Everyone in the cramped shed gave Rory a glare.
They were a sight. The only one dressed normally in a coat and jeans was Sarah. Erica had a coat on over her cheerleader outfit and miniskirt. Rory still had his lumberjack flannel jacket, which at least fit the area. Benny, in the middle of the wilderness, was still dressed as an old school hotel bellboy.
And Ethan had on suit and tie, with the now clunking, oversized boots he had purchased at the 631 Lodge. He had lost two pairs of boots the two times he turned into a werewolf, and one pair of dress shoes to the forces of darkness.
"No" said the woman. "If you had meant any trouble you would have tried to go on without checking in. And we would have booked you for a felony. But I'll give you a warning. If you drive a car on that trail again, they'll be a $1000 fine."
"Which way to the interstate?" asked Benny.
"You're at Gunflint Lake, right? Across from . . . the ghost town of Leeblain. Drive to the road, take the Gunflint Trail to its end, and follow the highway south to Duluth where the I-35 begins."
"Thank you" volunteered Sarah.
"Don't mention it. Good night."
With that, the screen went black.
All in all, Ethan considered their getting past the border without any more questions to be a minor miracle in and of itself.
To be continued.
