After a brief tour of the cabin's interior, Megan led Alayna out to the back deck that was perched high above the lake below. “Breathtaking, isn't it?” she asked.
Alayna sidled up next to Megan at the edge of the guardrail and peered out across the surface of the glasslike water. “It's . . . beautiful,” Alayna said, completely awestruck by the view.
“I'm glad you approve,” Megan said as she leaned in and kissed Alayna on the lips.
As Alayna sat on the bench overlooking the park, she remembered the feeling of Megan’s lips pressed against hers as if it were just that morning. Suddenly, she sat up on the park bench and wiped her eyes dry. That's it! I know where she went! Stay where you are, baby. I'm on my way!
Alayna, full of vigor once again, ran as fast as her feet could carry her back to her cruiser and back on her chase. Her chase for Megan.
Chapter 45
Brittany sprang from her seat, shrieking, and lunged after her grappling brother. Clay tried to grab her as she passed, but she was too quick. She reached Daniels before Clay could stop her and began to pummel his sides, trying to force him to release her brother. But Daniels marched through the front door and back to the cruiser, pushing them both into the back seat and slamming the door. He turned toward Clay, who was trailing out the front door. “Let’s get on with it,” he boomed. “We’re losing time.”
Clay felt numb as he drove away from the house, the two teenagers howling with anger.
“YOU SHOULD HAVE LET US STAY. WHAT ABOUT OUR CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS?” Brittany screeched, grasping at the inoperable door handle and gazing out the window, tears swimming down her cheeks. “THIS IS FUCKING MESSED UP, YOU KNOW THAT? A FUCKING TRIP!”
Clay pursed his lips together, feeling more anxious with each of her pleas. Daniels pressed his fingers into his ears, throwing an apologetic glance at Clay. Clay nodded and gunned it, guiding the cruiser ahead, toward their original destination.
After several minutes of no reaction from Clay or Daniels, Brittany finally dialed her tantrum back to mere whimpers. Brandon, clearly the older of the two, sat with his arms crossed and a dazed glimmer in his eyes. More evidence of his drug euphoria, Clay considered as he took several glances in his rearview.
The minutes silently crept by, and Daniels continued to scan the landscape whisking by the side window, looking for more survivors. None were in sight.
Finally, Clay screeched the cruiser to a halt in front of Megan’s place.
“Um, just where are you taking us, anyway?” Brandon asked, gazing out at the abandoned streets.
Clay gripped his door handle, then paused. He contemplated how much he should tell them. “Eventually we’re going to get you to the hotel at the center of town. That’s where everyone else is. But first we need to track down a few people that—”
“Cool! Is this a bust? Can we come?” Brittany begged, suddenly showing interest as opposed to mere agitation.
“Not this time, kids,” Daniels said firmly. “We’ll only be a minute. You two can wait here.”
“Fucking pigs. Can you at least roll our windows down so we don’t suffocate?” she said, throwing an evil glare at Daniels.
With an irritated sigh, Clay keyed the controls and lowered the back two windows several inches. “Better?” He didn’t wait for a response.
Moments later, Clay and Daniels stepped up to the front door. It was open a crack. Clay rested his hand on his holster, thumbing the leather strap free before gently nudging the door fully open.
“Hello? Is anyone here? Alayna, it’s Clay,” he said as he strode into Megan’s living room. He scanned the room as Daniels blasted by and began searching the rest of the house. Clay sensed something was not right, but he couldn’t put his finger on it. He continued to scrutinize every detail of the scene when Daniels returned from the bedroom hallway.
“I got nothin’, boss,” he said before moving into the dining room and then into the kitchen. Clay noticed Megan’s letter and began to read when suddenly Daniels called out. “Sherriff! You’ve got to see this!”
Clay quickly finished the short note to Alayna then hurried to see what Daniels was carrying on about.
“Something went down here,” Daniels said as he pointed out the shards of splintered wood near the back door. “Looks like somebody wanted in that wasn’t supposed to be here.
“Doesn’t add up,” Clay said. “The house is nearly cleared out of personal belongings, and then this? Do you think Alayna found Megan already and took her back to the hotel?”
“If she did, you’d think they’d have radioed us to tell us as much.”
Clay nodded silently and stepped out into the backyard. As he did so, he heard an ear-splitting crash echoing between the houses. Before he could react, Daniels ran by and shimmied up next to the edge of the house, his weapon drawn and the safety off. Slowly, he inched his face around the corner and peered into the side yard.
“Are you kidding me?” he bellowed.
Chapter 46
Clay rushed ahead and saw what Daniels was so exasperated about. The back door of his cruiser was ajar, and broken glass was scattered about the ground.
“Those stupid kids,” Daniels yelled.
“Easy, Adam. They’re just frightened and are probably in some form of mild shock. They did just lose their parents in a really gruesome way, remember?”
Daniels sighed. “Yeah, I suppose. But this is something we don’t have time for. We need to find those girls and get that device.”
“We will. But first things first. Let’s round the kids up and drop them at the hotel before we go back out,” Clay said, his mind reeling with thoughts of Alayna. “And if we can’t find that damn device, we’ll just have to figure another way out.”
Without time to completely analyze Clay’s thoughts on escaping the containment zone, they returned to the cruiser and began searching for the teens.
“We really should split up and search through the nearest houses. That’s where I’d go if I was wanting to hide,” Daniels said.
“Normally I’d agree with you, but I don’t think that’s where they’d go. I think it’s much more simple than that. They’re stoned off their asses and probably not able to think straight,” Clay said as he steered the cruiser onto the roadway.
“Stoned, like on drugs?” Daniels asked, apparently shocked at the concept.
“Didn’t you see the signs? Eyes dilated, the mood swings? They’re probably both so high to try to deal with the severity of this entire fucked-up situation.”
Daniels sat in silence as Clay’s words sunk in. “Hell, maybe we should find some drugs and take their approach.”
Clay chuckled. The thought certainly had its merits. “If only it were that easy,” he said, the memories of the previous night flooding his thoughts.
Over the next few hours, the duo searched. They slowly drove up and down every street in the vicinity. They’d occasionally see what appeared to be movement in the distance, but each time it turned out to just be the rustling of trees or shrubs caused by the unusually harsh wind.
When all appeared to be lost, Clay changed directions entirely. He pulled out of Megan’s subdivision and headed to the far side of town.
“So, we giving up, then?” Daniels asked.
“Not quite. If you were alone and afraid, where would you go? Someplace familiar—someplace safe. We’re going back to where we picked them up.”
Several minutes later, they turned onto the street where the teens had lived, and sure enough, two people were walking along the middle of the road, just a few houses away from their destination. Clay noticed Daniels nodding his head, relieved. “Now what?” he asked.
“Now we grab them again, and this time we don’t let them out of our sight.”
Clay glanced at his watch and was surprised just how much time they’d already spent away from the hotel. It was nearing three in the afternoon, and he hoped the teens would not try to evade them, wasting more precious time.
“Just so you know, we’re only going with you because you’d keep coming for us otherwise,” Brittany said, her face screwed up into an ugly frown. “And as soon as we’re out of this town, we’re on our own again, you hear?”
Clay pursed his lips together, feeling more anxious with each of her words. Daniels remained stoic, staring ahead. Clay simply nodded as he eyed the gas station on the main road, noting he needed to fill his tank before roving the rest of the way through town. He pulled over, grateful to be outside of the car, doing something as familiar as filling his gas tank.
Daniels appeared beside him, his eyes on the horizon. Always, it seemed, they were watching for danger. “That was easier than I’d expected,” he whispered.
“I think they’re still in shock,” Clay muttered. “I didn’t know so many people had been killed already. We haven’t seen many dead bodies, and they’re probably scared of being alone.”
“Could be hidden, I guess,” Daniels said, nodding. “Hard to say.”
Suddenly Brandon began pounding on the window, his eyes popping wide. “HEY!” he cried. “HEY!”
Fuel continued to pump into the gas tank. Clay turned toward them, rolling his eyes. But he popped open the back, his fingers tracing his gun in his holster. “Hey there,” he said. “What seems to be the problem?”
“Brittany has to pee,” Brandon said, scoffing. “We’re allowed to do that, at least, aren’t we?”
Clay eyed the empty gas station. “Will you walk her in?” he asked Daniels, shrugging. “We can’t take the chance that they’ll escape again.”
Chapter 47
Daniels walked with Brittany toward the entrance, opened the door for her, and took a position outside. As they waited, a wind blasted from the west, whipping at Clay’s face and causing him to feel strained, fatigued, like all they were doing was for naught.
“You can’t keep us like this,” Brandon called from the back seat again, a final plea.
“I think you’ll like the others,” Clay said, trying to be reasonable. “We’re all in this together, now. Nobody’s getting left behind.”
“Ha,” Brandon said, punching the back of the front seat violently. “You say it like you know how to make it all go away.”
As Clay stared at Brandon, realizing the truth of his statement, he heard a gut-wrenching scream from deep inside of the gas station. He rushed toward the door, listening as the gas pump began to spurt gas onto the pavement. He hadn’t bothered to click it off. Brandon chased after, his tennis shoes sloshing through the river of gasoline and his voice ringing out, “BRITTANY!”
Daniels entered the gas station first, Clay and Brandon following close behind. They gasped for air as they stood near the window, watching as several of the crazed swarmed around Brittany, tearing into her shoulders, her stomach, her thighs. She screamed with panic, grasping at their faces and hair, tossing their dead curls to the ground. She’d popped one of them in the eye with her finger, and the eye was now bobbing along on the floor, coating the tiles with slime.
“NO!” Brandon cried, thrusting himself forward.
Clay gripped him and forced him back and out of danger. Panic then drove him forward, reaching for his gun. Daniels followed. As they entered the chip and pretzel aisle, a few of the crazed separated from the gluttonous horde and began to charge toward them. Clay and Daniels lifted their guns to the crazed monsters’ freakish heads, shooting them swiftly in succession, causing them to crash against the pile of melting ice in the corner. As the thunderous shots echoed throughout the confined space, Brittany couldn’t maintain her defensive stance near the bathroom. She bucked back against the wall, her skull bouncing dully, before she slid down the white wall, trailing a stark, crimson line. The moment she landed, her jaw dropped open, revealing a dollop of green goop on her sickish tongue.
Clay reached her first, noting the depth of her injuries. Her brother, Brandon, was in a heap near the doorway, screeching. “THEY GOT HER, TOO! THEY GOT HER.” He wept, clenching his hands together, making one giant fist. “NO!”
Daniels knelt beside Clay, checking the girl’s pulse. He dropped her chilly arm quickly, making a motion toward the door. “I didn’t know they were in here,” he muttered. “I made a quick check before I let her in.”
“Were they hiding?” Clay asked, wondering what kind of intelligence they were dealing with. “Did they see us coming up the road?” He eyed the almost-humans splayed in bloody heaps around them. “Jesus. This is too fucking much.”
“I don’t know,” Daniels whispered. “I just don’t know.”
Behind them, Brandon had stopped screeching. His inhales came sharply, cutting into their ears. “We should get him back to the hotel,” Clay said, jolting to his feet. “Out of here.”
As they gathered Brandon and eased him back toward the car, he fought against their restraining arms, attempting to lunge toward his sister’s dead body. But Clay and Daniels held him firmly.
“She wouldn’t have died if you hadn’t made us leave,” Brandon whimpered, leaning heavily against the car. Around them, the gasoline had split into many different rivers and capillaries, churning toward the road. “She never would have died.”
“Kid, that’s where you’re wrong,” Daniels spouted. “She would have, and so would you. Now you owe it to her to keep yourself alive.” He prodded the kid’s chest with a dominating finger before shoving him quickly into the Naugahyde-covered seats. “Clay. We should go.”
Clay nodded, rushing toward the driver’s seat. As he ran, he heard the familiar beeps of his walkie-talkie, still attached to his side.
“Sheriff? Clay?” The voice was familiar, causing his heart to warm instantly. “Are you there? Over.”
Clay lifted the walkie-talkie, making momentary eye contact with Daniels. “Alayna. Copy. God, it’s good to hear from you. Where the hell are you?”
“I’m fine. I’m fine,” she said, her voice sounding haggard. “I need to make this quick. Clay, you need to gather everyone from the hotel and bring them out to the edge of town. That’s where the energy field is.”
“Which edge of town?”
“Out past the Crawford farm. Where it all began,” Alayna said. “Clay. Come quickly. I can’t stress this enough.”
In that moment, the walkie-talkie halted its crackle and an eerie silence settled in. Before long, the glare from Lieutenant Daniels and the teenage boy howling with pain and terror in the back seat finally spurred Clay ahead. Without wasting another moment, he shoved himself into the front seat and floored the accelerator, pushing them back toward the hotel, all the while praying, inwardly, that nothing else had gone wrong since they’d left.
Perhaps the nightmare was nearly over.
Chapter 48
Clay and Daniels arrived back at the hotel minutes later, leaving the car idling outside and popping open the back door, allowing Brandon to exit. He had grown catatonic in the moments after his sister’s death. His jaw was clamped shut. He shivered, his eyes searching the abandoned road as he followed Clay and Daniels into the gleaming hotel foyer. Clay felt as if ages had passed since they’d left the hotel.
Norah sat in the foyer, her aging, grey eyes turned toward them. She sighed as they entered. “They’re all upstairs at the bar. The doctor—he isn’t going to make it. He’s shivering, sweating, losing blood from his nose, mouth, and eyes.”
Clay nodded, taking the information in stride. He gripped her forearm gently, feeling the dryness of her skin. “I understand, and we can sort him out in a bit. But right now, we need to go see Alayna. Can you head to one of the cars? We found another holdout, and he’s already waiting out front. I’m going to gather the othe
rs.”
She nodded without protest, rising to stand, her knees creaking beneath her. “The deputy. Did she find her girlfriend?”
“Don’t know yet,” Clay said, turning toward the steps. He felt he was living a dream, pounding from the first floor to the second, discovering Ralph and Connie pointing at each other and rehashing some argument from their past. Their eyes flashed as they screamed. They looked like raccoons.
“The doc’s not doing so hot,” Connie said, her voice blaring. It seemed she was tattling, like a girl in school.
“So I’ve heard,” Clay said. “But right now we have to get to the edge of town. Get out front. Lieutenant Daniels will drive you.”
Connie rolled her eyes but shot down the steps, racing her husband. They burst past Norah, who was still easing toward the sheriff’s car. Clay took a final look down the empty hallway, which reeked of mold and age, before skirting into the doctor’s bedroom. He quivered beneath his sheets, wrapped like a burrito and sweating profusely. His forehead and nose poked out from beneath the damp sheet, each a pale green. Clay knelt beside him, noting the terror in the doctor’s eyes. He looked like a man on the brink of insanity.
“How’s it going, Doc?” Clay breathed, reminded of the morning he’d spent with his wife the day she’d delivered Maia. “I’d say we’ve both seen better days, wouldn’t you?”
The doctor couldn’t speak. His eyes, bloodshot and irritated, fixed on Clay’s. They alone spoke volumes, and Clay knew Norah was right. He just hoped that that whatever this infection was would take the doctor peacefully, but he sensed it was a futile wish.
Humanity's Edge- The Complete Trilogy Page 13
