I could see what had happened, too. Like me, he'd bunny hopped over the initial chunk of driftwood but, going faster, his hop had carried him farther, into the next strategically placed driftwood. It had been too much to recover from. He'd probably fallen over sideways, slapped the concrete of the trail hard, but he was going fast enough that instead of splatting into a skid, he bounced, he cartwheeled. And his bike was right there with him, coming apart at its welds, components spinning up into the night sky.
Specifically, his seat.
Only, the clamp hadn't let go. The seatpost, it had snapped. A carbon-fiber seatpost, it would have splintered, would be showing thread. An old-style aluminum post like he was running, though, it'll snap off up near the saddle, leave a ragged tube, a hollow spear.
The night cyclist had hit the tree with his back, hard, and an instant later his bike's seatpost, still extending from the bike itself, had jammed through his sternum.
The blood around that wound, it was black, even at this distance. Not red like the blood at his mouth.
I adjusted the strap across my chest, only just then realized I had my knives with me.
They were clean, like always, but I could tell from the flare of his nostrils that he knew what I was wearing. That this was just one more insult the night had for him. One more stupid thing between him and wherever he was going.
His lips thinned, his teeth baring, but before he could complete his display, he whipped his head over to the left.
I looked too. Nothing. No sound.
And then there was.
Not voices, but brush and branches, parting.
At first I thought it was the two dead boys from the creek, risen. But one of them had shaped sideburns this time, the other a shaved head. Different college kids. What they were carrying was a double-bit axe and a camp hatchet, one of those kinds with a textured hammer on the back side.
And then I realized exactly where we were: at that bend in the creek. It's why I'd thought they were the dead boys, risen.
These were their friends, then. The other night, they'd tried to muscle that big log up onto the trail. This night, they'd come back with proper tools. To finish the job the night cyclist had interrupted. And to avenge their fallen comrades, as they probably saw it.
When one of them dragged a flashlight up to the night cyclist, I saw that his chin and mouth, their redness wasn't from himself.
That Double-Bit and Hatchet were still standing, that meant that, a few minutes ago, they'd been three.
I finally tracked down to the night cyclist's feet, and there was the body that had to be there. The boy who had stepped too close, to taunt.
At which point his two friends had decided to go for tools. For weapons.
And they still hadn't seen me. Because bicycles, when properly greased, they're quiet.
I laid my bike down into the grass, unlimbered my roll of knives, spread them out before me.
I didn't know for sure that Double-Bit and Hatchet could kill the night cyclist like they wanted—they'd still have to get close—but the sun would be coming up eventually, and if he was still pinned to the tree, then they might as well have killed him.
The night cyclist saw me stepping forward but didn't move a muscle on his face. And, because his eyes showed so little white, even if he was watching me, the two still coming at him wouldn't have been able to tell.
Double-Bit hit him once, swinging his great axe like a baseball bat into the night cyclist's shoulder, and then Hatchet came not at the night cyclist, but the bike. He caught it on the bottom bracket with the hammer side, the full force of his impact traveling up the aluminum frame, driving the seat post deeper into flesh.
The night cyclist didn't even grunt. The black blood just slipped from his mouth, oiled his chin and chest.
He did smile, though.
"What do you have to smile about?" Hatchet screamed, bouncing like a boxer on his toes, wrapping up to swing again.
Double-Bit smiled, seemingly pleased with how the night was falling out, but he caught me in his peripheral vision, too. At the last possible instant. He turned away just fast enough that my paring knife caught him across his open mouth, instead of his temple, like. The blade crossed between his upper and lower teeth, the dagger-point nicking the bunched-up jaw muscle at the back of his mouth on both sides, I was pretty sure.
He reeled back, away from the pain. Into the mouth of the night cyclist, open just as wide as his now was, like a snake about to swallow an egg.
When the night cyclist bit in, some of the blood spattered onto my face. I was wearing my backup clear glasses, but still I flinched, blinked.
This all in a moment cut so thin it was nearly transparent.
In the next moment, Hatchet was turning to me. I flipped the paring knife around and grabbed it by the tip, as if to throw—on the cycling team, we'd fake-lob a water bottle high to someone, then spray them hard with the water bottle we secretly had—and while Hatchet had his arms raise to protect his face, I drove my eight-inch knife up into his belly, digging for his diaphragm. Maybe I got it, I don't know. He fell back into the night cyclist's bike, fell back hard enough to crack it to the side, out of the night cyclist, and then the night changed.
The night cyclist slumped down, free of the seatpost, his hair hanging over his face, and inside I was screaming at myself to run, to ride, to leave this place. But Hatchet was already coming for me, holding his guts in with one hand, his weapon high in the other.
He would have got me, too, if the night cyclist hadn't stabbed a hand forward, dug his sharp fingers into Hatchet's calf.
Instead of pulling Hatchet's throat to him, instead of climbing hand over hand up to Hatchet's throat, he simply pulled that calf to his mouth, and, with Hatchet facedown in the muck now, he drank, and drank deep, his Adam's apple working up and down with each swallow.
His eyes, they never left mine.
When Hatchet was drained, just his foot spasming, the night cyclist pulled himself over to Double-Bit, drank some more there as well.
And then he rolled over, convulsing in the mud, holding his shoulder.
I could have run then, I know. But I didn't.
When he could, he stood weakly, looked up the path the way I'd come, then back the other way.
We were alone.
He lurched forward, for his ruined bike.
"No," I said.
He stopped, studied me, his eyes showing real fatigue for the first time I'd seen.
Shaking my head no, I pointed with my paring knife back to the bike in the grass, the one he could surely smell.
He looked into that tall grass, then back to me.
"Take it already," I said, and nodded down to his bike. "Need to put this one out of its misery."
His front wheel was taco'd, one drop was lower than the other, and one of the cranks had bent in under the top chainring.
I couldn't imagine going that fast through the darkness, alone.
It was a rush just thinking about it.
"What the hell are you?" I said when he took that first step bike-ward, though I knew.
In reply, he took my paring knife forearm in the cold grip of his good arm, pulled the meat of my hand right up to his mouth.
He opened slow. His teeth were impossible.
I had my big knife in my other hand, but it might as well have been someone else's hand.
He lowered his teeth to my skin, his eyes never leaving mine, and I understood what he was offering.
Eternal youth. Night rides forever. Going faster than I'd ever dreamed.
He was offering to share the night with me.
What had my scent told him, revealed to him? Standing in the living room of my apartment, had he smelled the flavor of Doreen's last accusations?
I don't put anything beyond him. Or his kind.
When his teeth brushed my skin, I didn't jerk back, but I did hear myself say it, my eyes welling up: "No."
He stopped, looked up into my face.
"I'm going to call her back," I said, trusting that he knew what I was talking about. Who.
He held my eyes for a moment longer, long enough for me consider exactly what I was giving up here, then he nodded, pushed my arm back to me. He licked his lips, dabbing at a bit of dried blood, and then his eyes snapped up to the path.
Company, soon.
"Go," I told him, and when he walked by I smelled it on him, from him. The decay. If he ever peeled out of his suit, it must smell like the grave for acres in every direction.
Partway to my bike, he scooped up my leather roll, slung it back to me as if it was something any chef could possibly ever just leave lying there. Then he leaned my bike up from the grass, stepped across the top tube then back off, to adjust the seat. Not with a multi-tool, but by pinching the clamp's bolt between his fingers. When he stood into the pedals, the bike was dialed perfect for him. He clipped in with both feet, just balancing there, getting the feel of this new machine—he liked it, could sense the speed locked in its geometry—and then, without looking back, he powered away, into the silhouette of the Flatirons, which, at night, are the maw of a great cave.
Who he must have passed, who showed up two, three minutes later, it was a pregnant woman and a guy. They were bundled up, both crying over something—I'd never know what.
He'd let them pass, though, the night cyclist.
He surely needed even more blood to rebuild himself, but he needed worse to ride.
I understood. With every part of myself, I understood.
When the couple got to me, the pregnant woman yelped, stumbled back—I was standing in the gore of three more college kids, both my knives dripping, bug-eyed under the clear glasses, my face spattered with blood—and, and this is why I love the world, why I'm going to cook Doreen's favorite meal tomorrow, just take it to her: The man, scrawny and useless as he was, he stepped in front of her, to stand between her and the monster I looked to be.
"There's no compulsion to hide the bodies," I said to them like a joke, spreading my arms as if to showcase my night's work—words and a gesture that would be on the national news by morning—and then I bowed once and stepped back into the darkness, and came out onto the path a half mile later, walked up onto the plank bridge, my knives cleaned and in their roll again.
The waters were surging beneath me, inexorable, going for miles and miles, for centuries.
I patted the rail's cold steel and walked on across, home.
( THE END )