Chapter 4

CHAPTER 4

Five minutes before Danny Hopkins nearly twisted a bully’s thumb clean off, he had been reading a novel. The novel was, in fact, the very same book which, twenty years later, a Russian named Ustinov would single out as a personal favorite: Desperation.

The plot is relatively straight-forward. A bunch of travelers, which include a family of four, are taken prisoner by a policeman from the tiny town of Desperation, a blip on the map of Nevada that also just happens to be home to a gold mining company. The policeman, whose name is Collie, has been taken over by a demon, Tak. Tak can control animals and make people kill each other or go berserk. Tak’s only real problem is that his evil is so intense, so monstrous, whatever body he inhabits wears out fast. Still, he is pretty powerful, and in the end, the novel’s plot really boils down to a classic morality tale: not just the difference between right and wrong, but between greed and self-sacrifice. Between the allure of supreme evil and the demands of supreme good.

In John’s opinion, the book remained an underrated masterpiece. He’d read it a couple two, three, maybe five times. Even listened to the audiobook on several occasions—the original, with the author narrating. He still loved it because the book’s central theme—the struggle between contradictory but very human inclinations—was one to which he could relate. The book was about warring gods and sacrifice: about the needs of the many being far more important than the needs of the few or oneself. Even though the boy in the novel was chosen and prayed and had prophetic dreams and held to the belief that his god was more powerful than Tak…the kid wasn’t given any kind of reward, unless you counted getting to live while most everyone else died.

And wasn’t that a kicker? Here, the boy did all the right things, held fast to his belief, and still lost his whole family. At the end, all he had left were his faith and a best friend he was told to make his brother.

Why Ustinov chose that book, what signal he was trying to send…John hadn’t been sure. Now, though, as he guided the bukhana through that storm, he realized two things. No, three.

One: Ustinov knew that John was a fake. A fraud. A legend. Ustinov had to know what John had done when his name had been Danny Hopkins. There was no other explanation. Otherwise, why pick that book ?

Two: The town of Desperation was, in essence, done in by a mining operation that, in its quest for gold, inadvertently opened a portal to Tak’s world. Ustinov said that the Taliban were mining for gold’s twenty-first century equivalent, lithium. Was there a subtle message there? Had Ustinov been hinting at a location? Given the climax of the novel, which happened deep in that gold mine, was Ustinov insinuating that there was a show-down still to come?

There was yet a third reason, though, which clinched it. Convinced him that Ustinov did indeed know who John really was and what he had done. It was all in the name: that boy in Desperation , the kid in the story who lost so much even though he was on the side of the angels.

That boy’s name was David. Which had also been his name.

Once upon a time and long, long ago.