Reginald Atkins, Pickett Meade's esteemed librarian and founder of the town historical society, sat at the cluttered desk in his cramped office and studied a tome by low lamplight, a magnifying glass held up to his face. Tall and gaunt with a sharp features, a graying mustache, and glasses perched on his beak-like nose, Atkins was an intellectual and antiquarian who lived alone - happily - among old books and ancient history. Unmarried and uncomfortable in the presence of others, Atkins relished his own company; he could pass many happy hours with a good book and a hot cup of tea as his only companions. Man, he had read, is a social creature, but not he; he preferred being alone.
That didn't mean he was a bitter old hermit, heavens no, quite the contrary, he liked people. Absence, they say, makes the heart grow fonder. Were he perpetually bombarded by people, he would likely be a cynic, much like a city dweller. Instead, he was a country man, the peace and tranqulity of solitude purging the toxins of human interaction so that he would be refreshed and ready for next time.
Not that he got much of a chance. Between his studies and running the library, he was far too busy to socialize. Not many people came into the library anymore - they borrowed books on their iPods now - but there was always something to be done, like reading the stock. Hey, if no one else is going to do it…
The only person he saw on a regular basis was Alex, the girl who came in and helped out in the afternoons. Reginald liked her. She was happy, upbeat, and filled with life. She was maybe a little too flippant for her own good, but whereas he typically found that an off putting trait, he found it endeering in her. He also thought her cute. Not in a perverse sort of way, but in a grandfatherly way - sometimes it was a battle to keep from pinching her cheek.
She had been coming into the library once a week since she was twelve. Reginald remembered his surprise when she came to the counter, a wholesome Latina with her hair done up in white ribbons, and a stack of Stephen King novels in front of him. I'll take all of this, please, she said. He adjusted his glasses and tried to reconcile the juxtaposition between the child smiling up at him and the...the 'literature' she intented to read.
Those are mighty grown-up books, he warned.
They can't be worse than Saw II, she said.
She slowly worked her way through King and moved onto Dean Koontz, John Saul, Peter Straub, Richard Laymon, Robin Cook, and H.P. Lovecraft. She would browse the aisles for hours on end, judiciously comparing titles, considering texts, and selecting only the three or four that captivated her most. There was always a look of religious wonder upon her face when she walked the rows, and Reginald greatly enjoyed seeing it; not many kids her age read, which disheartened him.
By the beginning of last year, she knew the place well enough that she routinely moved misplaced books to where they belonged. He asked her if she wouldnt't mind helping him out once or twice a week, and she readily agreed. He did it not because he needed asistance - he did, quite honestly - he did it because he liked having her around.
Presently, Reginald licked his trembling thumb and turned the page with a crisp sound. He was half way through an engrossing ten volume work on the manufacture and history of chalk. He had been reading for seventeen hours straight, with only infrequent bathroom breaks, and planned to read for another few hours before retiring to his apartment upstairs. He glanced at the clock on the wall, and was shocked to see that it was almost 9pm. Night pressed against the window pane and dense gloom pooled in the corners.
Concentration broken, he became aware of the aches and pains riddling his elderly body: His back twinged and when he moved his head, his neck twanged. His dry and grainy eyes throbbed with exhasution and his lids fought to stay open.
Closing the book, he got to his feet with a pained grunt. He stretched, rolled his neck, and turned out the lamp.
In the main room, the dim overhead lights hummed a toneless tune and tall bookshelves cast long puddles of darkness across the floor. Reginald shuffled to the light switch and reached for it, but stopped when a floorboard creaked. His heart skipped a beat and his fingers twitched.
Just the house settling, he told himself. The building, an American Foursquare near the railroad tracks, was nearly a hundred years old, and made noises all the time. He uttered a nervous laugh in an attempt to lighten the mood.
When the creak came again, just on the other side of a bookcase, his laugh died.
"H-Hello?"
His eyes went to the bottom shelf. Between the tops of the books and the bottom of the next shelf up, a flicker of movement.
Someone was here.
An electric jolt of fright burst in Reginald Atkins' chest.
A soft, deliberate footstep sounded, and a man appeared. Tall, emaciated, with curly blonde hair and hollow cheeks. The hem of a black coat rustled around his knees, and the light sheened his wan face. Reginald's heart dropped into his stomach and he swallowed a startled gasp. "W-We're closed," he stammered.
The man made no sign that he heard. He took a threatening step forward, and Reginald's paralysis broke. He turned to flee by into the office, but impossibly, the man was there, filling the doorway, as tall as a skyscraper. His lips peeled back from his teeth, and he grabbe the front of Reginald's shirt, lifting him off his feet. A strangled cry escaped Reginald's throat and he reflexively closed his hands around the man's in an attempt to dislodge them.
Icy.
Like the dead.
The man's eyes, clear to the point of translusce, flashed red. "Where is it?" he hissed.
Reginald swallowed.
"Where is the book?" He shook him back and forth like a rag doll, and Reginald wailed in terror. "Tell me where it is."
Reginald stiffened.
"W-What book?" he asked innocently.
The man's face darkened. "Don't play dumb with me. The spellbook."
"It's not here," he lied.
The world spun and his heart blasted into his throat. The man slammed him hard against the wall and the air exploded from his lungs. "Give me the book or I'll pop your head off like a tic."
Reginald gulped. The spellbook, passed down through the ages by a succession of devil-worshipping witches, was a powerful and arcane font of dark magic that, in the wrong hands, would brng about the apocalypse. He couldn't let this cretin get his paws on it. He wouldn't. He would rather die.
"The b-book isn't here," he said and braced himself for whatever horrors the man would visit upon him.
Growling, the man let him drop, and he fell to the floor in a panting heap. Turning with a floruish, the man went to the bookrack, his footfalls heavy, and Reginald drew himself to a sitting position. The man took a thick book from the shelf and opened it.
What was he doing?
"Reeling in the Years," he read, "An Epic Saga."
Without further ado, he ripped a page out.
Dear God!
The man tossed the book over his shoulder and slid another out. "Huckleberry Finn."
"No!" Reginald cried. He scrambled to his knees, wobbled, and reached imploringly out. "That's a classic!"
An evil, Chesire grin spread across the man's lips. "I'll offer you a trade," he said. He held Huckleberry Finn up. "A book for a book."
Reginald started to agree, but he couldn't. He loved the written word and the tomes here were like family, but the spellbook was too dangerous. He would simply have to endure. "I don't have the book," he said.
The man sighed in disppointment. Holding the book so that Reginald could see every terrible detail, the man ripped it down the center, cover and all. Dizziness crashed over him he nearly fell over in a dead faint. The man threw back his head and uttered rich laughter. He was enjoyig this! The fiend!
Moving on, he chose another book. "Anna Karenina."
Reginald froze. The man's smile sharpened, and Reginald shook his head.
The man nodded.
"Please," Reginald said, "not Tolstoy."
The man looked from the book to Reginald. "You know what I want."
"I don't -'
Rip.
A screaming lament tore from Reginald's throat, and he flopped his head back in surrender.
"The book?"
"Yes!" Reginald sobbed. "Just don't hurt my babies." His voice cracked on the word babies.
The man strode over like a boastful villain in a Bond movie. "The book?" he asked.
Defeated, Reginald struggled to his feet and lead the man downstairs, his eyes darting to the ruined remains of Huckleberry Finn and Anna Karenina as they passed.
I'm so sorry. So, so s-sorry.
"It's down here," he said dully. His was the flat, shell-shocked tone of a man who had just watched his loved ones die a protracted and excruciating death. The man followed close behind, the stair tread moaning beneath his steps. Reginald glanced at him over his shoulder. Who was he? What was he?
And how did he know the book was here, in Pickett's Meade? The last time its existence appeared on the record, it was being held under lock and key at Miskatonic University in Arkham, Massachusetts. After that, it disappeared.
At the bottom, he flipped on the light switch, filling the basement with white, chilly glow. He went to the storeroom door and dug in his pocket for the key, accutely aware of the man looming over him. "I've been looking for it for a very long time," the man said in answer to Reginald's unspoken question. "I knew it was in Arkham, but when I went there, it was gone."
Reginald's brain tingled as if being combed by questing phantom fingers.
This man...this thing...was reading his mind.
"Only a few people on the college's faculty had access to it," the man said. "I listed them and investigated each one. I found out that you were from Pickett's Meade, where the book originated, and I knew."
Reginald sighed. He taught history and folklore at Miskatonic from 1988 to 1993 and spent many evenings and weekends studying obscure texts. The spellbook, bound in human flesh, fascinated him. Ellie Rimbaugh, its last owner, had always held a special interest for him, as they were distantly related on his mother's side, and to actually hold her spellbook in his hands was nothing short of staggering.
Before he left the university, he smuggled it out.
Almost instantly, the terrible visage on the cover began talking to him.
Oh, come on, burn down that church over there, it'll be fun; hey, that guy who just cut you off in traffic? Curse his ass; use me, please, I'm so boooooooored.
At night, it whispered dark secrets no sane man was ever meant to know and sang Satanic songs of its own devising. The subject matterdidn't bother him, it was the book's inability to carry a tune. It sounded like a cat being raped. After three months, he finally saw why they kept it locked away, and he put it in a strongbox and stowed it in the storeroom, where it had been sitting for almost thirty years.
He unlocked the door and opened it. He yanked the pullcord, and murky illumination skimmed the dusty space. He spotted the box immediately: It sat on top of a plastic tote, the lock facing away.
The man saw it too, and excitedly shoved Reginald out of the way to get to it. "At long last!" he cried and sank reverantly to his knees. "I have waited a hundred years for this very moment, this victory, this triumtpth. All my hard work, all my suffering, all of it has paid off. The world is mine now."
He lifted the lid…
...and sputtered. He shot Reginald a withering look, and Reginald's heart dropped. "It's not here."
Not there? "That's impossible, I swear, it -"
The man was already on his feet, already snatching Reginald up by his shirt and pressing him against the wall. "You liar! What have you done with the book?"
"I swear, it was in there, I don't know -"
Letting out a cry of fury, the man turned and flung Reginald across the room; he hit the wall and slid to the floor, pain eveloping him. The man lashed out with his foot and kicked a cardboard box. It tipped, and a wave of brown pellets swept across the floor. The man sputtered, and his pupils dilated. His hands trembled slightly, and sweat sprang to his forehead. He looked like a drug addict in the grips of an unspeakable craving. "Rat droppings!"
He knelt and began to pick them up one-by-one, counting each and placing them in the palm of his hand. Reginald blinked. "Just as soon as I'm done with this, you're a dead man," the man sneered.
Reginald's stomach clutched, and he stumbled to his feet. "Stay right there," the man cried. "I'll be done in a moment...then you're in for it."
He went on counting, and for a moment, Reginald gaped at him, then fled.
"Wait...eleven...come back here...twelve...nooooo...thirteen."
Reginald pounded up the stairs and pushed through the side door. He stumbled on the steps, fell to his knees, and staggered to his feet. Snow crunched under him and a frigid breeze sliced through his body. At the car, he slid in behind the wheel, jammed the key into the ignition, and started the engine. He threw it in reverse, shot out into the street, and hung a random left. He cast one last look at the library.
No sign of the man.
He hit the gas and took off like a rocket, his mind racing. Where was the book? Who had it?
Then it hit him.
Only one person had access to that storeroom.
At the next street, he turned left and started for Alex Warner's house.
John Carver emerged from the house fifteen minutes later, shoulders slumped in defeat. His breath did not puff out in front of him because he did not breathe; he also did not cry, yet there were tears in his eyes anyway.
He trudged through the snow, leaving the door open behind him, and walked the block to his car. Inside, he sat behind the wheel, hung his head, and took a deep, watery breath.
His one chance at world domination had been frustrated, and now he was back to square one. He was so happy...so excited...he was going to rule the world. Right now, he should be whipping people's asses with his sepcter and ordering nuclear airstrikes, instead he was here...alone...sad...cucked.
"Alexa, play something for a man…" here his voice hitched… "who tried his best, but whose best was not good enough."
"Playing Loser by Beck."
As the music started, John Carver began to sob.