CHAPTER 21

WAKE COULDN’T SEE a thing. Blind drunk, that’s what he was. That was just part of it, though. He had been drunk before, plenty of times, too many times, but it wasn’t like this. Never… never drink moonshine made by crazy people. That was the lesson here.

But where was here?

All he knew was that he was standing up and that he was so angry that his ears ached. He was always angry, seemed like it anyway. He reached out into the smoky-gray haze that surrounded him and felt nothing. The last thing he remembered was sitting on the couch with Barry, the two of them guzzling moonshine as a record skipped and skipped and skipped. Caught in the groove of an old LP was the Andersons’ message to him, a song they had written years earlier, a song that pointed the way to get Alice back. The song had been a message from the Anderson brothers, but their homebrew had been a bonus, a ticket that took Wake back to a place he needed to go.

Light flickered beyond the veil and Wake could hear something now. A voice, faint but still… it was a woman’s voice. Alice’s voice.

“Alice! ” His voice sounded like a snarl, revealing not a trace of the relief and eagerness that he felt. In fact, his voice sounded exactly the opposite. “Dammit, Alice, mind your own business! ” No, Wake hadn’t said that. He couldn’t have said that… but he had.

The haze was thinning out. He could make out someone standing in front of him. “Just leave me alone! ” It was his voice, but it wasn’t what Wake wanted to say, and again he was aware of the rage boiling inside him, ready to explode.

Alice looked up at him. “I… I was just trying to help. ”

Wake wanted to embrace her, hold her close, kiss her, but he couldn’t move. Couldn’t control his arms. Or his words. “I didn’t ask for your help. ”

Tears ran down Alice’s cheeks, but she raised her face at him, defiant. “That’s your problem, not mine, Alan. ”

Wake looked around. It was night and they were upstairs in the study of the Bird Leg Cabin. It was their first night in Bright Falls. Over there under the window was the desk, Thomas Zane’s desk, although Wake hadn’t known it at the time. Wake’s typewriter was on the desk, his old manual typewriter that Alice had secretly brought with her from New York. A surprise for him. Something to please him. The typewriter meant to encourage him to work in this new setting, this new place, away from the pressures and temptations of the city. A fresh start. Not just for the work, a fresh start for them.

Instead of pleasing him, the sight of the typewriter had enraged him. Wake’s selfishness and arrogance had ruined everything, made him lash out at her, accusing her of trying to manipulate him. He remembered the sound of Alice crying out in the dark, remembered running toward the cabin, trying to save her. He had failed that first night, but now… now he had a second chance, a chance to make things right, a chance to stop fighting with Alice and take her off the island.

“I’m tired of fighting with you, Alan. ”

“You have no idea what I have to deal with, ” barked Wake. “You haven’t got a goddamned clue. ”

“Then tell me, ” said Alice.

Wake understood now. That wasn’t him yelling at Alice, it was another Wake, the Alan Wake he had been before she disappeared. He was dreaming. He was a ghost in this world, a doppelg& #228; nger, unable to speak or to stop his former self, unable to warn him. Wake was trapped in the dream, forced to relive all his mistakes, but maybe, just maybe he could follow the dream to its conclusion and find out what had really happened that night.

Alice took his hands. “Tell me, Alan, ” she said gently. “I want to know what’s bothering you. I want to help. ”

For an instant Wake actually felt her, felt the warmth of her skin, and he squeezed her hands back, started to speak, to beg her forgiveness, but then the connection was gone, broken.

Wake was condemned to watch as his former self stormed down the stairs and into the darkness. He was carried along with his former self as though on a tether, carried along out the front door and down the long wooden bridge connecting the cabin to the mainland. He stopped at the moonlit footbridge and laughed at his own folly.

Alice screamed, the sound shimmering like moonbeams on the lake.

Wake’s past self turned around just as the lights in the cabin went out, then ran back toward the cabin, running so hard that his feet cracked the worn planks. He ran faster, but it seemed as if the bridge was elongating in the moonlight, slats being added with every step, the cabin receding farther and farther into the lake. Too late, Wake wanted to tell his past self, it was too late when you took the key from the woman in black, a key to a cabin that no longer existed.

“Alan, where are you? ”

“Wait! ” cried Wake’s past self, and it was his own voice, the words and passion his. “I’m on my way! Stay inside! ”

Fireflies flitted across the bridge, flashing a secret semaphore, distracting him as he raced for the cabin. Easy to lose his footing, and once he did… the lake was deep.

“Please… please don’t, ” said Alice.

“Alice, I’m coming! Don’t go… don’t go out onto the balcony! ”

Too late. Too late. Too late.

“Stop! ” shrieked Alice. “Don’t come any closer! ”

Wake’s past self stumbled, but kept running. He jumped off the bridge and onto the island, Diver’s Island, the ground strangely yielding underfoot. The feel of the place made Wake queasy, but he hurtled up the steps onto the porch, threw the front door open.

“Alannnnnnn! ”

Wake heard the sound of rotting wood breaking. Alice’s scream echoed, then a splash. He ran up the stairs and out onto the balcony. “Alice? ” The railing was broken. “Alice? ” He stood there, staring into the lake, looking for her. A single firefly made lazy circles over the water, dipping among the stars reflected in the lake, and it was the saddest and loneliest thing that Wake had ever seen.

Wake stood beside his past self as he looked closer. There … there was something in the water, a dark shape, sinking deeper and deeper. Wake dove into the lake, swimming down toward that dark shape that had to be Alice, but she sank faster than he could swim… and he lost her. Just as he had that first night. Wake felt himself floating slowly toward the surface.

Diving after Alice was the last memory Wake had of that night. After that, the next thing he could remember was waking up behind the wheel of the crashed car, his head throbbing and wondering how he had gotten there. He had set out across the woods toward the light of the gas station in the distance, Stucky’s gas station. It was on the way to the gas station that Wake had found the first manuscript page. Light-headed now, Wake struggled to reach the surface of the lake. He broke through, gasping, pulled himself onto the dock. He shivered under the stars. Even in his dream he couldn’t reach Alice, couldn’t save her. He couldn’t save anyone.

The dock trembled, then rocked back and forth as a rumbling started deep underwater, the surface of the lake vibrating. Wake staggered up, walked unsteadily on the bridge back to the island, the wooden planks groaning. Large bubbles rose from the depths of the lake, bubbles the size of beachballs, black and shiny in the moonlight. He collapsed as he reached the island, saw the woman in black on the balcony, Barbara Jagger watching him with eyes cold as the lake.

Jagger, or the darkness that wore her face, had been there every step of the way, at the diner, perhaps even earlier. She had orchestrated it from the beginning and she was here now, watching Wake relive it. Jagger walked down the steps to where Wake lay. For a moment her black veil slipped, the horror of her ravaged features on display before she covered herself again. She bent down beside him and Wake smelled toadstools and rotting meat. “Look at the cabin, ” she whispered, pointing. “Is there someone in the window? Maybe it’s your wife. Maybe your lovely Alice didn’t drown after all. Maybe she’s inside, alone in the dark. ”

Shadows flickered over Wake’s past self.

“Hurry, you fool! ” hissed Jagger. “What are you waiting for? ”

Wake got to his feet. “Alice? ”

“Hurry! ”

Wake felt Jagger digging its nails into his flesh, felt it using him, pulling his strings. He knew all this, but he also knew that Alice needed him. He ran up the stairs to the cabin.

Jagger smiled and followed him.

It was dark inside the cabin, streaks of moonlight through the windows the only illumination. Wake looked around, worried.

Jagger was right beside him. “Your lovely Alice must be here somewhere. Maybe she’s upstairs, in the study? Yes! That’s where she is. You can apologize to her for all the ugly things you said. You can tell her how sorry you are, how you’ll never do it again. You’ll laugh about it and put it all behind you. ”

Wake saw shadows flickering on the walls, a deeper darkness that the moonlight couldn’t reach. He rushed upstairs to the bedroom. She wasn’t there. He walked slowly to the study, his footsteps heavy. If she wasn’t here… if she wasn’t here, then where was she? “Alice? ”

Jagger followed him.

Wake looked around the study.

“She’s not here. ” Jagger glared at him from the shadows. “Did you really think there was going to be a happy ending? ” Her laugh was like the sound of a rusted bedspring. “Your lovely Alice is dead. She drowned because you walked out on her. She’s lying there in the filth at the bottom of the lake, making friends with the bloodworms and crabs, and it’s your fault. You’re responsible for her dull eyes and cold blue lips. All she wanted was to help you write, but you wouldn’t let her. You might as well have killed her yourself. It would have been kinder to the poor dear. ”

Wake’s past self leaned against the desk, sobbing.

“Hush, now. ” Jagger stroked his hair, and her touch was like seaweed. “There’s still hope. Cauldron Lake is a very special place. Here, you have the power to change things. Alice wanted you to write. That’s the only way you can bring her back. ” Shadows were piling up in the room, slowly blocking out the moonlight. “I can give Alice back to you, just the way you remember her. Better, even. I’ll help you. I’ll tell you what to do. You can write her back. A creative fellow like you can do anything here. You’re so lucky to be here. The story you write will come true, and all will be well again. Isn’t that wonderful? ”

Wake felt the darkness gathering around his past self, and it took all his strength to remind himself that it was a dream, a memory that he was recovering in bits and pieces. The Dark Presence had brought him back to this place to torture him, but the darkness had miscalculated. Wake felt the pain and the overwhelming loss of that first night, just as the Dark Presence wanted, but he was able to stand back from himself again and finally understand what had really happened that night. This was how it had happened. This was how he had written the manuscript. Jagger had Alice, and the manuscript was the ransom for her.

Wake saw his past self nod at Jagger. “Yes… yes, I’ll write what you want. I’ll fix it. I’ll do anything you ask, as long as you bring her back. ” Wake saw himself sit down at the typewriter and start writing, fingers pounding the keys, the sound like thunder in the study. Wake remembered that sound, he had been hearing it for days now, the sound so constant that after a while he almost forgot it was there. Wake stared at himself banging away at the typewriter while Jagger hovered over him and he remembered …

In the dark, Wake had written for days—a week—written almost a complete manuscript of a novel entitled Departure. Touched by the Dark Presence, trapped in a nightmare, he’d thought he was saving Alice, convinced it was the only way to bring her back. Jagger had stoked his fear, whispering to him as he worked, making sure that the unfolding story would make the Dark Presence more and more powerful.

Wake watched as his past self worked in the darkness, barely sleeping, manuscript pages piling up on the desk. His past self slumped over the typewriter and Jagger prodded him with her bony fingers, urging him to write faster.

Jagger cocked her head.

Wake stopped breathing as Jagger scanned the room, as though she was aware that someone was watching. The lake rumbled, the darkness stirring, stretching, and then Jagger was gone, attending to other business. Wake’s past self kept typing, oblivious.

Through the window, Wake saw a light bloom in the night. He watched it slowly enter the cabin through the balcony. Yes, he remembered the light too. The Diver, Thomas Zane, who had saved him after Wake hit the hitchhiker. He was aware now of the light moving upstairs toward the study, sensed it beside him now.

“I brought the light to set you free, ” said the Diver from inside the light. “That’s what you wanted. ”

“That’s what I wrote, ” said Wake, putting more pieces of the puzzle together. Wake’s past self had been compliant and desperate, but in spite of the cobwebs Jagger had put into his head, Wake had sensed the Dark Presence’s plan. Even under Jagger’s watchful eye, Wake had managed to write an escape hatch into the story, a light that had entered the cabin before he finished, a light that had freed him. Zane was weak and far away. But the light had interrupted the horror story, the terrible ending where darkness consumed everything and everyone.

“You have to go, Alan, ” said Zane. “It will know that I’m here. ”

The Dark Presence roared outside, beating against the windows.

Wake awoke from behind the typewriter, and it wasn’t his former self, the dreamer. Wake was there now, still groggy, still weak, but he knew.

Zane reached out from the light and lifted the manuscript from the desk. “It stole the skin of my Barbara a long time ago, ” he said. “I knew it wasn’t her, but I wanted so much to believe…”

The windows of the study went dark, turned to dust that floated onto the floor. Barbara Jagger stood there.

“You! ” Jagger shrieked at him She strode toward Wake in a billow of black, wagging a finger in his face. “Aren’t you a clever boy. ”

Her eyes were empty, bare sockets of bone, and Wake had to force himself not to look into them or he would fall forever into the darkness, fall so far that no light could ever reach him.

“Such a strong mind, ” clucked Jagger, rubbing her hands together, “so creative. I knew it the first time I sensed your presence. Oh, we’re going to have such fun together, you and I. ”

“Get away from him, ” said Zane.

Jagger glanced at Zane. “You’re dead, Thomas. Did you forget? ”

The light flickered, held steady. “You’re not Barbara, ” said Zane. “You never were. ”

Jagger’s black dress flapped around her as though she were in a storm.

“Get out of here, Alan, ” said Zane, trembling in the light.

“Stay! ” ordered Jagger. “You have work to do! ”

Wake stumbled down the stairs and out the door of the cabin. He looked back over his shoulder at the light in the study, saw the light in the study flare, then start to die. The lake was rising, breaking over the planks of the bridge to the mainland as he splashed across. Out of breath, he jumped into the rental car, started it up, his hands shaking.

The week in the cabin had taken its toll on Wake. Barely able to keep his eyes open, he floored the accelerator, gravel flying as he peeled off down the narrow road. He was driving too fast, outrunning his headlights, but he was afraid to slow down, afraid of what might be pursuing him.

He dozed off for an instant, the car swerving onto the shoulder. He steered back onto the road. There was something else he needed to remember, something just beyond reach, something that was about to happen…

His eyes were so heavy, too heavy to hold up. He thought of Thomas Zane. It must have cost him terribly to help Wake, must have thrown him even deeper into whatever nightmare he now haunted, but he had managed to weaken the Dark Presence and allowed Wake to escape that night. He jerked as the car veered off the road, crashing through a guardrail. He held on tight as the car bounced down the embankment, and, too late, Wake realized what he had been trying to remember.

It was the accident, this accident where everything had begun. In a few minutes, he’d come to in the wrecked car and have no idea of how—

Wake’s head banged against the steering wheel as the car slammed into a tree.

Wake opened his eyes a crack. He wasn’t in the car, steam billowing from the radiator, his forehead bleeding. No night. No woods. No Stucky. The car crash had been days ago.

He was in the Anderson brothers’ living room, squinting in the soft morning light. Barry lay snoring on the floor, curled up on the carpet, the empty jar of moonshine beside him. Wake closed his eyes again, feeling sick as he remembered Bird Leg Cabin, Barbara Jagger, and Thomas Zane.

It was no moonshine-fueled dream. He wished it were. “I wrote it, ” he mumbled. “It… it’s my fault. ”

“You got that right, Wake. ”

Wake looked up, saw a man with a gun standing over him.

“It’s all your fault, ” said Agent Nightingale, “and you’re going to pay for it. ”

When he stopped the car at the Anderson farm, Walter felt relieved; oblivion was close at hand. The brothers wouldn’t miss a jar of moonshine, or two, in the booby hatch. But then he saw the man on the porch, and he knew who it was. Driving for his life and knowing it was useless, he didn’t realize he was crying until he couldn’t see the road for the tears.

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