They Came With The Snow Box Set {Books 1-2]

by Coleman, Christopher

  They hate fire. The thought suddenly comes to me like a message from the ether.

  Of course they do. They’re snow monsters. If I was a snow monster, the one thing I would definitely hate is fire.

  I open the door to the RV and step inside, clutching the keys from the dashboard and turning on the vehicle, still holding the flare in my left hand, now feeling almost invincible with the torch in grasp.

  But before I start the engine, I de-press the button to roll down the passenger side window, at first just a crack, and then fully. And I listen.

  There’s only silence now—no sounds of footsteps or flowing hordes, no clamoring for position at the head of the door to Gray’s Grocery. I turn on the headlights of the RV and they light up the large pane of glass that forms the front window of the store, as well as the front door. There isn’t a single crab still standing on the sidewalk between the shopping carts and the door; only the dismembered corpse of Stanton remains.

  I start the engine now and put the RV into drive, moving it slowly forward as I turn the wheel to the right, angling it so that the headlights are shining in the direction of where the group of crabs descended on the shovel.

  Not surprisingly, they’re still there—maybe seventy of them now—each one stooping like monkeys, staring at the oncoming RV. I can’t know by simply studying the expressions on their faces, or even through their body language, but there is a sense of fear emanating from the pack now—even dread—as I approach.

  I pull the RV a few yards closer, and then closer still, and finally, before the crabs in the front begin to feel the push of the giant steel grill, the pack begins to move backwards, quickly now, nervously, never taking their eyes away from the vehicle.

  The RV is enormous, and I could obviously run several of the down with almost no effort, and do quite a bit of thinning of the horde’s numbers before they ever had a chance to retaliate. But still, I don’t think it’s the brawn of the RV that has made them start to retreat. After all, we’ve been driving past crabs since we left the Clam Bake—and my group from the diner and I drove past dozens of them in our box truck—and most of them paid us little mind.

  But I already know what it is they see. I know exactly what the source is of their growing terror.

  I put the RV in park and leave it running, headlights shining brightly on the pack of white bodies in front of me, the crabs all huddled together tightly like a mischief of rats.

  I grab the satchel containing the Bowie knives and place my flashlight inside of it, and then I open the door and step down from the RV. I reach the pavement and hold the flare out like an offering to the crabs, daring them to take the gift.

  Almost the second I lift the flare in front of me the first of the crabs—those furthest away from me, in the back of the horde—begin to flee, scattering like beetles into the trees on the north border of the store and the interstate to the west, the direction from which these crabs all came originally.

  And then the chain reaction occurs.

  The next layer of bodies from the back begins to dissipate, and then the next, and suddenly the sea of white becomes a sprinkle in the black night, a light dusting of confectioner’s sugar atop a cake of dark chocolate.

  Until finally there are none.

  I follow the last one, casually walking in its wake as it runs from the store toward the interstate, watching it as it drifts out of the range of the headlights. I turn back to the store to see little evidence that any of them had ever been there at all. Other than the body of Mr. Stanton.

  I do a quick check around the side of the building, just to make sure there are no lingering crabs who may have wandered off to the back of the store during the chaos. But it’s a formality, really; I already know the answer. I’m beginning to understand how it works now. Just as the crabs are drawn by other crabs towards the action, so too do they flee danger with the pack. And with the flare still shining brightly, and likely capable of being seen for miles, I have little to worry about for the moment.

  With the parking lot and the surrounding area now empty, I head back to the front door of the store, passing the body of Stanton as I go. I don’t look down at him. It feels like a cold move on the surface, as inhuman as the crabs that killed him, perhaps, but there’s nothing to do about it now and only time to waste.

  I pull open the automatic doors and push my way inside, and immediately run toward the back of the store and the receiving area where I last saw the remaining survivors of my new group.

  I glance at the flare as I lightly open the swinging door and notice it’s starting to diminish, but I hold it out boldly, expecting to see carnage and chaos, preparing to fend off an attack. With the flare dwindling and three people in distress, four including me, I can’t be overly cautious; whatever I decide to do once I get through these doors will need to be done with haste.

  I see the blood first, a sparkling pool of it shimmering in the halo of the fading flare, puddled at the threshold of the back room. Behind the puddle is a long slick that trails back into the rear of the receiving room.

  I look to the left of the pool now and see a lone boot lying on its side. Sticking out of the top of it is the lower half of a man’s leg; judging by the length of the bone and crooked fragments, it looks to have occurred somewhere mid-shin.

  I put my hand to my mouth, stifling what was sure to be some hybrid of a scream and a gag, and I force myself to march further in, my head on a swivel. I fumble in the satchel and pull out the flashlight now, and then click it on nervously with a press of my thumb.

  The beam explodes forward and the first thing that appears is a pair of eyes. Not the black eyes of death, but light brown, human. They’re wide, disbelieving, and framed above and below, left and right, by long, thick bars of metal shelving.

  “Oh my God, it’s Dominic!” a voice calls from behind the bars. It’s Smalley, and I can see the fear in her eyes has been diluted slightly with hope.

  “Dom?” It’s Jones now, his voice sounding almost delirious, disbelieving. I can’t see any part of him from where I’m standing, but his voice is coming from the same general area of Smalley’s. “Watch out, Dom. It’s...I think it’s behind that stack of pallets by the loading door. It’s trying to find a way in here.”

  I move into the room a few more steps, trying to get my bearings as to what type of contraption Jones and Smalley are in exactly, wondering where the creature is trying to enter. I note the stack of pallets Jones has just referred to, and then I start to place the pieces together. Jones and Smalley have created a metal protective cage using three or four industrial trailer carts, the kind that come from the warehouse to the store, loaded to the top, full of supplies waiting to be unloaded. These carts are empty, but the structure is effective. Their arrangement is like some kind of small prison, Smalley and Jones the inmates, intent on keeping out the ghostly warden milling around the outside.

  “Where is Abramowitz?” I ask, looking to the stains on the floor.

  There’s silence at first, and then from Jones, “He’s in here. He’s alive, but he’s bad.”

  I assumed the boot was Abramowitz’s; he was the one standing guard by the door when I left.

  “Holy Jesus, Dominic,” Smalley says, “I can’t believe you made it out. And that you’re still alive.”

  “I can’t believe you came back,” Jones adds soberly. And then, “There’s a shovel just to your left, right beside these carts. If that thing—”

  Before Jones can finish his plan, I hear the crab scurry from behind the pallet and I catch it immediately in the beam of the light, lucky to have detected it before it got too close. I take a step forward, gripping the flare like a samurai sword, horizontally in front of me, the flashlight pointed low and straight.

  “Dom what are you doing? It’s too late to get the shovel now. Just get out of here and find another weapon. This coop is pretty good. We can hold that thing off for a few minutes longer.”

  “I have a weapon,” I say, and
then I take another step forward.

  The crab stares at me for a beat, but then, as instinctually as the others did when I stepped down from the RV just a few minutes earlier, it begins to walk backwards, lurching, ungraceful in its movements. The wrinkle of terror that shone in the eyes of the outside crabs appears above the one I’ve got in my sights now.

  And for this crab, there is nowhere to run. He’s trapped.

  It starts to move quickly now, stumbling over its bare feet, and then it turns to run forward and, not seeming to understand its environment, slams shoulder-first into the giant receiving door, the rattle of metal ringing through the cavernous room like a gong.

  The crab loses its footing and falls to the ground, slipping at first as it scrambles back to its feet, wheezing in fear, growling in terror at no one in particular.

  “Dom!” Smalley screams.

  I’m only a foot away from the crab now when it finally looks up at me, its expression morphing entirely into anger as it bears its teeth, threatening.

  “Bring it, bitch,” I say, barely whispering as I mouth the words.

  The crab lunges at me, erupting from its crouching position like some giant albino frog, its arms stretched, fingers grasping as it reaches for my throat.

  I feel the cold tips of thin fingers brush against my Adam’s apple, but they never find their aim. I dodge them with a confident bob of my head, narrowly escaping the grip of the crab’s talons as I lean back, my feet never moving from their spot, avoiding the full reach of the crab’s arms like a boxer avoiding a wild left hook.

  The crab stays on its feet, and its momentum sends it stumbling toward me. But having missed its mark, it’s now off balance, out of control, and almost falls face first. It places the palms of its hands on the floor to stay upright, and I turn toward it, pivoting so that the back of the crab’s head is now directly below me. For an instant it looks as if the creature has bowed before me in defeat.

  But that isn’t what the position means at all. There is no submission coming from this monster. Feeling trapped, unable to escape the fire of the flare, its only instinct now is to kill the threat. To kill me. And I can see in the veracity of its movements that it will continue to fight until either I’m dead or its path to safety is clear.

  But I have no intention of allowing the beast to leave, and I’m willing to take the challenge to the death. But I know it won’t come to that. Not today. I’ve discovered something. I know something about their weakness that I didn’t know an hour ago. A new hope has sprung up within me, a new hope about survival and escape from this prison camp of Warren and Maripo County.

  And the only way I can be sure that my new weapon is as powerful as these creatures would lead me to believe is to use it.

  These thoughts all occur in a fraction of a second, and the crab is still bent down in front of me, its face to the ground, exposing the back of its skull and neck to the sky. Finally, it turns its head up slowly toward me, inhumanly twisting its neck until the ghost’s eyes are staring up at me, shimmering in their sockets, vibrating with anger.

  I see the tension in its thighs as it makes a move to stand straight, to lift its head back up to eye level. Its mouth is fully open, teeth chomping like a piranha, exactly like the crab locked in the cage of the gift shop.

  Without an utterance or a breath or a single moment of doubt, I plunge the flare down into the thing’s forehead, stabbing the sizzling fuse directly between the crab’s eyes. And then, with the strength and will of demonic possession, I twist the tip of the flare back and forth, drilling it as far as it will go into the beasts head, finally extinguishing the flare on the surface of the crab’s skull like a giant cigarette.

  I rotate the stick of fire several more times, even after the crab’s destruction is inevitable, just for good measure. But there is only silence now. There are no sounds of screaming or growls of rabidity; there is only the burning sound of flesh devouring the final cells of life that still remain.

  But the crab isn’t dead. Not yet. What the creature has abandoned vocally, its face displays in the form of true pain. It flails its arms desperately toward its head, trying to locate the source of the pain, but not quite able to find it.

  I stop rotating the flare and then push on it with all my weight, forcing the crab down onto its back before finally releasing the tube of death.

  The crab’s arms still wave impotently over its face, but the eyes of anguish and facial expressions of disaster are gone. It has reverted back to its default manner of being, cold and lifeless, detached from the horrors of its situation.

  I stand up straight and stare down at the red cylinder that now rises from the center of the crab’s face like a rocket ship, one that has crashed on the surface of the moon perhaps, the black burn mark in the center of the crab’s head the crater.

  There are a few more timid waves of the crab’s arms before it finally drops them to the side where they smack to floor like wet eels. These are the final movements of the thing before it finally dies.

  And then something bizarre begins to happen.

  The round black crater mark in the center of the crab’s head begins to grow, the entire circumference of the ring expanding on the crab’s forehead like an oil slick in the ocean. There’s no more heat coming from the flare—the flame has been extinguished by the blood and fluids inside the crabs head—but the damage created by the fire seems already to have been done. I continue to watch the spreading virus of char, which has now covered the cheeks and chin and neck of the crab. Within seconds, the entire upper body of the dead beast is as black as coal.

  And it continues to spread.

  I hear footsteps behind me and I pivot toward them, my arms raised in a kung fu pose, flashlight in hand, ready to take on the next crab in line, now feeling a particular sense of power over this new species of murderers.

  But it’s only Jones and Smalley that have arrived. They’ve extricated themselves from their makeshift fortress and are now standing beside me, watching the growing disintegration of the crab lying at my feet.

  “Damn professor,” Smalley says, “you got a knack for this. You’re like Van Halen or something.”

  “I think you mean Van Helsing?”

  “That’s what I said, right?”

  “We have to go,” Jones says, not offering his comments on any of the events that just occurred over the last few minutes. He lowers his voice a notch. “We have to get Bram to a doctor.”

  I return my gaze to the crab and am instantly mesmerized by the sight. The burn created by the flare has consumed the entirety of the crab, and it begins to fall apart—quite literally—its face and entire upper body now little more than a pile of ashes.

  “Dom, did you hear me? Bram needs a doctor now.”

  “What doctor?” I ask, barely processing the words, confused and saddened by the impossibility of the statement.

  “I don’t know. We need to try to find one though. He’s dying.”

  I break my fixation on the crab and walk with Smalley and Jones over to where Abramowitz is sitting up against the rear of the trailer cart. He’s still conscious; his eyes are open and he’s breathing, albeit with great effort.

  Jones and Smalley somehow managed to tie off the wound with a tourniquet—a feat that I’m astounded by, given the fact that they were being hunted during the process—but there is still an extraordinary amount of blood beneath Abramowitz’s severed leg. And sweat falls of his face in large drops, like a tropical waterfall, despite the chilly air that hangs in the receiving room.

  He lifts his head, struggling to meet my eyes, and when he does, I look away.

  “Doesn’t look good, does it professor?”

  I look back at him, locking in on his stare, feeling it’s the proper thing to do for a military man at the brink of his death. And it’s also proper to tell the truth. Or at the very least not lie. “No it does not, Bram.” My voice is stern, unsympathetic. “But there’s no sense losing hope. There’s some good
news: I cleared the storefront. Got all those sons of bitches to flee.”

  Bram raises his eyebrows, impressed. “How’d you manage that?”

  I pull my shirt sleeve up to my shoulder and flex my rather unsubstantial bicep.

  Bram coughs out a laugh. “I see.”

  “The RV is ready to go. I can pull it around back and then we’ll get you loaded up inside. I don’t know that doctors are the most plentiful these days, but we’ll do our damndest to find you one. We’ll get you some help.”

  Bram smiles again, and I can tell that if he had a little more energy the smile would have been a full-throated laugh. “Help? Well geez professor, that’s just wonderful!” Bram’s voice is raspy and wet, terminal.

  “It’s gonna be okay,” I say, regretting the lie immediately. It’s almost instinct. They’re the words I’ve heard said to a hundred actors in a hundred movies, and I can’t help repeating it now. It’s an impulse, I suppose, to offer whatever comfort is available in the moment, even if the situation is as hopeless as it is now.

  “What’s in the bag?” he asks, noticing the satchel across my shoulder.

  “Couple of knives I found in the rigs out back. A couple packs of cigarettes.”

  He smiles again. “You don’t say?”

  I return the smile. “I do say.”

  “Bum a smoke?”

  “Bum the pack if you like.”

  “Let’s start with one and see where it leads.”

  “You’ll get hooked on ‘em is where it’ll lead. Trust me, I’ve been there.”

  “I’ll take my chances, amigo.”

  “We have to go, Dominic,” Jones commands. And then, despite Abramowitz’s presence, says, “He’ll die if we don’t get out of here.”

  “I’m dead or I’m not, Jonesey. What’s been done is done. And me leaving here isn’t going to change that. I’ll just die in the RV.”