Free Halloween IV: The Ultimate Edition by Nicholas Page A

drove away, off and into the distance like a bat out of hell. Loomis was left alone, angrily beating the dirt from his clothes and the coat he carried in one arm.
    As he looked up the road he noticed what appeared to be a beat-up old pick-up waiting in the center of the asphalt up ahead. An older man lifted his head out from the driver’s side window and yelled to him.
    “Get it in gear, old man, I ain’t got till Judgment Day. An’ my ass is stayin’ smack down on this seat where it belongs.”
    Loomis approached the vehicle, walking a bit too fast and almost staggering, until he came up to the passenger’s side, opened it, and climbed inside.
    “Thank you,” he told him gratefully, panting, still unconsciously wiping dust from his shirt.
    “Anything for a fellow pilgrim,” the old man replied. “We’re all on a quest. Sometimes we need help getting where we got to be. Milk Dud?”
    “Excuse me?” Loomis saw the small yellow box on the man’s dashboard, and shook his head politely.
    Occasionally, Loomis would glance at the old man, each glance revealing something different and curious. He appeared to be in his late sixties, with wheat textured tufts of whiskers and scalp hair. The man wore a preacher’s collar around his neck, and he was holding a fifth of corn whiskey in each hand, one appearing as if he were on the verge of spilling it as he steered. And his name was ”
    “Jack Sayer. Just a pilgrim trodding this here Earth in the guise of an old country preacher tryin’ to save a few poor damn bastards from takin’ a dive into hell. And you?”
    “Uh, Loomis. Doctor Sam Loomis.”
    Sayer motioned to shake his hand, then declined, not knowing where to rest the corn whiskey. Loomis felt slightly uncomfortable, and at first he feared the man would run the truck off the road at any moment; but it was a fear that subsided as the miles steadily went by. The man was definitely a preacher. A crucifix hung from his rear view mirror like a guardian angel. Dangling by invisible fishing line, it appeared to be floating there rather than hanging suspended. There was a Gideon bible on the dashboard near a small box of tissues and the Milk Duds.
    A moment of quiet passed, the man apparently in thought. Then, “Yeah, you’re huntin’ It all right. Just like me.”
    Loomis looked at him. “What are you hunting, Mister Sayer?”
    “Apocalypse. End of the world. Armageddon. It’s always got a face and a name.” He took a slow, easy drink of his whiskey. “Been huntin’ the bastard for thirty years give or take. Come close a time or two. Too damn close.”
    Loomis studied Sayer for a second, detecting a certain sincere firmness in his voice. Sayer glanced back at him, and in his long glance he appeared sober as ajudge.
    Then Sayer said to him, “Can’t kill damnation, mister. It don’t die like a man dies.”
    “I know,” Loomis told him, speaking from experience.
    “You’re a pilgrim,” Sayer said. “I seen it in your face back there in the dust. I seen it clear as breasts and blue suede shoes. Drink?”
    At first the doctor’s impulse was to decline, then, he figured, on second thought, he might as well. Jack Sayer handed him one of his fifths, and, hesitatingly, he managed a sip. The old man then flipped on the A.M. radio to an all gospel station and began to sing along with an unseen choir at the top of his lungs, proudly but off key.
    When the roll…….is called up yonder, when the roll...is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder, when the roll is called up yonder I’ll be there....
    Loomis gazed out the window, his thoughts wandering while the old man missed all the right notes.
                 
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chapter Ten
    Doctor Hoffman had been dialing his desk phone for centuries. At least, it certainly seemed like that long. He sat there, in his office, and he knew he