Shadow Walkers Read online

  Shadow Walkers

  R L Delaney

  Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.

  © 2020 PureRead Ltd

  PureRead.com

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Guardians of the Light Chapter 1

  Chapter One

  Harrison Ames was bored.

  Actually, he was not just bored, but frustrated as well. He had been at the police force now for at least ten years and what did he have to show for his efforts?

  His heroic deeds in all these years, included not much more than an unsolved burglary in Sunset Acres; the local nursing home, a seven-year-old that went missing for two days, but had not been missing at all, since he had gone fishing with Grandpa, a fight between neighbors over a dog that had made a hole in a fence, and most exciting of all, a few arrests for drunk and disorderly behavior.

  Nothing ever happened in Dewsbury, and while that should be a good thing, Detective Harrison was desperately hoping things would change. After all, this was not why he had gone to the police academy.

  He had finished his training with flying colors and was a full-fledged detective, but all he did now was to help the local police by passing out parking tickets, writing out useless reports about the illegally dumped garbage bags on the empty plot behind the bus station, and making sure rebellious teenagers didn’t skip school.

  Such was life in Dewsbury.

  The small town west of the Wintervale Mountains and east of Butterpond lake was generally considered to be one of those sleepy towns where time had come to a standstill, and the feverish madness of the real world had not yet infiltrated the minds of its peaceful inhabitants. It was the sort of place where people still left their car doors unlocked, and where everybody knew the key to someone's house was hidden under the doormat on the front porch, or in case someone was especially security minded, it could be found under the nearest flower pot.

  Dewsbury had never been the center of any major news report, nobody great had ever been born there, and the local football team was the laughing stock of every self-respecting sports team in the minor league. It was the sort of place that old people moved to, so they could retire in peace before they were shipped off to Sunset Acres, and where young people moved from, since life was just too slow. At least, too slow for people pushing for careers and those that were in love with the pressure-driven life of the big cities.

  Here, the air was fresh and clean. Here, the rolling hills were full of swaying corn and grain and the skyline was not dotted with dark smokestacks belching out smog, and monstrous industries that polluted the ground or the babbling brooks.

  If Harrison Ames would have been an artist, a farmer or just one of the old folks battling arthritis, he would have loved it in Dewsbury. But he was a detective, and detectives solve crimes. They secretly open locked doors with a hairpin, join the local Mafia as an undercover agent, arrest killers and thieves, and keep everybody in town sleeping safely.

  But in Dewsbury, everybody was already safe and sleeping and that’s why Uncle Harry was bored. So bored, and so dull in fact, that the hefty detective with his enormous handlebar mustache, short cropped hair, and intimidating sun glasses, didn’t even react when a black Chevrolet Impala roared by his shiny squad car on Chestnut Avenue, and was clearly breaking the speed limit.

  While he was sitting alone in his car, chewing gum and sipping a can of Creamy Sky, the soda pop that supposedly should help you lose weight, he stared blankly at the disappearing cloud of dust. Sure that car was going too fast, but why even bother? He was sick and tired of writing out speeding tickets, and today he was going to take it easy. Again.

  But when only minutes later he received a dispatch of a bumper crash on Squirrel Road, the country road leading away from Dewsbury to Butterpond Lake, he knew he needed to move.

  Squirrel Road? That was close to where he was parked. He turned the key and the car sprang to life.

  One mile down the road he saw the black Chevrolet Impala again. But now it wasn’t driving. It was pushed into the tractor of Joe Mills, its hood half opened by the impact of the crash, and smoke from the motor was twirling up into the blue sky.

  Joe Mills, a friendly farmer with a weathered face and a scraggly white beard, stared helplessly at the scene while another fellow, presumably the owner of the black Chevrolet, stood before him and was waving his fist in the air, hurling curses at the old man.

  Harrison stopped and stared at the scene for a moment before he got out of the car. Even without knowing the full story, he was pretty sure what had happened. The Chevrolet had been going too fast, misjudging the speed of the slow moving tractor, and this was the result. He contacted the office to let them know he had arrived, and climbed out of his car.

  Joe Mills seemed relieved to see it was Harrison walking up.

  “Gentlemen,” Harrison said, as he tipped his hat in a greeting. “What happened?” It was very clear what had happened, but of course, this was the only sensible thing to say at this moment.

  “Hello, Harry,” Joe Mills stammered. “We… eh… have a problem.”

  The driver of the Chevrolet turned an angry, red face at the detective. Harrison blinked as he stared at the furious fellow. A strange man he was, dressed in a grimy, white lab coat and his uncombed hair stuck out in all directions. His flashing, dark eyes seemed void of the least bit of sympathy, and could be best described as dark little openings in his bloated face that gave the impression they were gateways to a deep and swampy darkness.

  Harrison had never seen the fellow, but his mind was already made up. He didn’t like the guy, and regardless of what had happened, he was going to ticket the creep.

  “This idiot,” the man in the lab coat hissed while pointing a bony finger at Mills, “doesn’t know how to steer a tractor. Look what he has done. But he will pay.”

  Mills was a picture of misery. His drooping shoulders and the lost expression on his face suggested that tears were closer than laughter.

  “It will work out, Joe,” Harrison said in an effort to bring comfort to the troubled soul of the aging farmer. Joe Mills would not hurt even a fly, and the detective had to repress the urge to push that weird man in his lab coat to the ground. After all, police officers are not supposed to do such things.

  “What happened Joe?”

  Mills looked up, and pressed his lips together. “I was just riding my tractor, Harry… I swear to God, I wasn’t doing anything. All of a sudden there was a crash, and… this is the result.”

  “Are you deaf, old man?” Lab coat hissed. “You heard me coming. You knew I was there, and you should have given me the room I needed, but you didn’t want me to pass.”

  “Papers, please,” Harrison said in his most threatening police voice. “License, registration of the car, Diner’s card… anything.”

  “What for?” The man now turned his anger to Harrison. “I have a meeting. What you need to do…,” now he pointed his finger at Harrison’s belly and hissed the words, “... is write a report about this dumb farmer for my insurance company.”

  “Papers. Now!” Harrison leaned forward and his nose almost touched the nose of the man in the lab coat.
The man uttered a curse and walked over to his car. There, he opened the glove compartment and fished out his papers and handed them to Harrison.

  Harrison studied them for some time and nodded. “Your name is Mr. Sternfoot? Richard Sternfoot?”

  “That’s what it says, doesn’t it?”

  “You are a chemistry teacher at Dewsbury High?”

  “So?” Sternfoot was not in the mood. “Is that a crime?”

  Harrison licked his lips and handed the papers back. “If you are a chemistry teacher, you must know my nephew. He’s taking chemistry in Dewsbury High.”

  Sternfoot scowled. “Who is your nephew?”

  “Justin Ames? Last year, he is in senior high? Happy fellow… cheerful and bright?”

  Sternfoot shrugged his shoulders. “Not sure. Can I go now?”

  Harrison turned to Mills. “Joe, is there any serious damage to your tractor?”

  Mills shook his head. “A few scratches, Harry. Nothing to lose sleep over.”

  Harrison nodded, satisfied with the answer. “I thought so.” He motioned with his hand for Joe to disappear. “Then be on your way, Joe. I’ll handle Mr. Sternfoot.”

  Joe heaved a sigh of relief and looked up with grateful eyes. “I can really go?”

  Harrison nodded, and before the eyes of the bewildered Sternfoot Joe hopped on his tractor, started the beast, and rode off.

  “W-What… Where is he going?” Sternfoot growled.

  “I am going to ticket you for speeding,” Harrison answered and he pulled out his notebook. “You were driving at least a hundred miles an hour on an two lane road where you are not allowed to go over forty-five.”

  “You are going to ticket me?” Sternfoot’s face was no longer red, but turned a deep purple. “Do you know who I am?”

  Harrison frowned. “I think I do. You are Richard Sternfoot, the chemistry teacher at Dewsbury High, and you are not above the law.”

  Harrison wrote down the offense, ripped the ticket out of his notebook and handed it to Sternfoot. “I would advise you to pay within a week, or we will double the fine.”

  Sternfoot accepted the fine with trembling fingers. It was clear he was just about to go crazy, and Harrison figured it was high time to leave the scene.

  Without further ado, he tipped his hat again in greeting, and walked back to his car, leaving the chemistry teacher steaming and fuming.

  When he had closed his door and was sitting again in the familiar surroundings of his car, he heaved a little sigh of relief. Somehow, it felt good to sit in the safety of his own squad car. What a weird fellow.

  Harrison started the car and as he passed by the damaged vehicle he cast a last glance at the scene.

  The man was shouting something in a weird language and hurled curses at him that were clearly heard through the open window. “Paenitet te messed eris mecum.” Was that Latin?

  Harrison decided not to stop, but when he looked back through the rearview mirror, his heart skipped a beat.

  That strange man in his white lab coat did not look at all like a strange man in a white lab coat anymore. He now looked a hundred times worse. His eyes seemed to be glowing red coals, and even though his hair was still wild and unkempt, his face seemed leathery and scaly, almost as if it had changed into a creature that belonged to another world.

  Harrison blinked as a sense of dread was choking him and he began to breathin short gasps. He pushed on the accelerator and almost began speeding himself.

  When he came to the crossing with Chestnut Avenue, the strange man was no longer in sight. Harrison calmed down and began to chide himself. Of course he had not seen what he thought he had seen. That was not possible. It had only looked that way because of the glaring sun that had distorted his view. Still, deep inside, Harry wasn’t sure what to believe and he was glad when he drove up into parking lot of the police station. After he parked, and walked up the steps leading to his office, he decided this would be a perfect day to file meaningless reports until he could go home.

  But not matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t get the image of the owner of the Chevrolet out of his mind. Maybe he should talk to his nephew about this strange man. Surely, Justin would know more about him. He grunted as he tried to concentrate on filling out a report he should have filled out days ago, but all he could think of were those strange, red glowing eyes that had been so full of hate and had stared at him as if he had been the lowest creature on the planet.

  Yes, the strong, hefty detective of Dewsbury had to admit it… he was scared.

  Chapter Two

  Justin was certain it wasn't because of that greasy pizza he ate just before he had gone to bed. And it wasn’t because of the gripping episode of Murder AtDawn he had seen either. Pizza's don't cause nightmares, however greasy and rubbery, and he never had nightmares after watching a TV series, not even after watching the Return of the Killer Zombies. It had to be something else that had caused him to wake up with a sweaty brow and a pounding heart.

  He brushed a sweaty lock of dark brown hair off his forehead and switched on the light next to his bed. Seeing his familiar surroundings helped to calm his nerves. His computer was still where it always was, right in the middle of his cluttered desk, and the faces of his favorite country band, The Pure Outlaws, were still grinning at him from the poster that was nailed to the closet door.

  After he threw off his blanket, and had swung his legs over the edge of the bed, he raked both of his hands through his hair in an effort to shake off the heavy feeling that was still lingering in his mind. It was strange he’d had a nightmare. In fact, he couldn’t ever remember having a dream. He had once boasted in biology class that he had never dreamt, but people said that was nonsense. According to Miss Minty, their biology teacher, everybody dreamt and so she said, he just couldn't remember.

  But this dream he would remember for a long time.

  In his dream, a dark cloud hung over Dewsbury. It had thundered in the distance, and a storm was approaching. Justin had been walking down Main Street, and had stopped right in front of the police office. The sky was growing darker and darker, and the feeling of oppression had been so vivid, so tangible that it felt like it was choking him. And then, out of nowhere, a burst of cackling laughter reverberated right behind him, and sent shivers up his spine. He turned and was shocked to see the face of his chemistry teacher, Mr. Sternfoot.

  As far as Justin was concerned, and maybe with the exception of Miss Minty, any dream in which the teachers of Dewsbury High would make an appearance could be classified as a nightmare, but having a dream about Sternfoot took the cake. Although the man in his dream did not look at all like the real Sternfoot, somehow Justin knew it was him all right. The chemistry teacher was waving his fist in the air and smirked like a demon with a bloated, reddish face. His teeth resembled the fangs of a wolf and strangely enough, it even appeared that smoke was coming out of his ears.

  “It’s time, Justin Ames,” he bellowed with a hoarse voice.

  “Time for what?” Justin remembered asking, and he shuddered again as he relived the scene.

  “I am as one crying in the desolate places, preparing the way for the Master. The portal will open, and we will prevail.” Sternfoot hissed the words, and right after he had spoken them, he lifted his hands, or rather his claws, for that was what they looked like, and brought them forward as if he was planning to strangle Justin.

  "Get away from me, you foul beast. Stop spouting out your moronic acid,” Justin screamed… and that was the last he remembered, for then he had awakened, his heart pounding.

  What a weird dream. And so vivid. And why did his chemistry teacher play such a major role?

  It was true that he hated chemistry, mostly due to Sternfoot’s presence, but that was not enough reason for a nightmare. Now, it was no secret that Sternfoot didn’t like him, and never seemed to let an opportunity go by without trying to belittle him. Well, he didn’t like Sternfoot either, so the feeling was mutual.

  St
ernfoot’s wild, uncombed hair stuck out on all sides, he never smiled, and he always wore that same smelly white lab-coat. He was practically married to that coat, and what was worse, the expression that was plastered on his bony face looked as sour as the acids that he was using smelled.

  Tomorrow he would have to face the man again, as he would have the all-important end-of-the-year test.

  He would probably fail. But he could care less. He could risk failing chemistry, as his other grades were fine. He had even done his best for it, and faithfully stared at his textbook for hours, a book that carried the enlightening title, 'Concepts to chemically mold the young mind.'

  What hogwash. His mind wasn't molded at all. In fact, it turned blank whenever he opened the accursed book. He had finally resorted to practically memorize a whole chapter, but he was hopelessly aware of the fact that he didn't understand any of it. What to make of sentences like: 'Equations for which you are responsible include E = hν = hc/λ, c = νλ, KE = (½)mv2 , and p = mv.'

  Responsible? Why was he responsible for such nonsense? He would forget all that stuff as soon as he closed the school doors behind himself.

  He glanced at the giant alarm clock with the Mickey Mouse design right next to him on his bedside table. Three o'clock. Way too early to get up. Maybe a glass of milk would calm his nerves.

  He reached under the bed for his slippers, and once he had found them he stuck them on his feet and yawned.

  Getting up in the middle of the night was not his favorite pastime, and it certainly wasn't the best preparation for his test later that day.

  When he opened the door to the hallway he stopped. Light was streaming out of the kitchen, down below.

  Light? At three in the morning?