by Anthony Izzo
She kicked at it but the creature grabbed her by the legs and pulled her from the truck. Her back slammed against the ground. It stood directly over her and lowered itself. Donna swung the shotgun up and stuck the barrel in its guts. She pulled the trigger and blasted it backward. Then she rolled twice, trying to dodge in case it attacked again.
She got to her feet and saw it had gotten between her and the truck. It stood. Even in the darkness she saw murder in its yellow eyes. Black, viscous fluid dripped down its legs. Its grayish guts hung from its abdomen.
It hissed at her, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw two more of them, bigger than the first one, step into the clearing.
She racked the pump on the Defender and grunted “motherfuckers” under her breath, trying to be brave and screw up her courage.
The wounded one grunted, and two more of his buddies materialized out of the fog like wraiths. Now the wounded one was in front of her, two were off to her left and another two on the other side of the pickup.
If she waited for them, she’d be dead; she had to make a move.
Letting out a war cry, she charged the wounded one, shotgun raised. It actually took a step back. She aimed high and pulled the trigger, fire blazing from the barrel. The shot tore off the left half of its skull.
It gripped its head, letting out a wail as it fell aside that made Donna’s teeth hurt.
She threw herself in the truck, slamming the door behind her. She started the Ford up and frantically engaged the electric locks.
The other ones slammed into the truck, one leaping onto the hood, two more into the bed, while the one she wounded pressed its ugly mug against her window. Drool flecked from its lips, and it bared its teeth and clacked them together, as if trying to intimidate her.
Sensing that the wounded one was the most immediate threat, she decided to do something about it.
She reached for the Colt, but before she could draw it from the holster, the rear window smashed in and a clawed hand gripped her wrist. Her wounded arm sang out in pain, and she bit on her lower lip, drawing blood.
The wounded one at the driver’s side window smashed its head through the glass and brought its face inches from Donna’s.
She might be joining Dominic at the pearly gates sooner than she thought.
Matt didn’t like the fog creeping in on them like this; he kept imagining that someone was watching him and he couldn’t see them back.
Rounding the front edge of the cabin, he shivered, amazed at the drop in temperature from the sweltering heat that had been engulfing western New York. He had on a short-sleeved polo shirt. Deal with it, Crowe, he told himself.
It was nearly eleven o’clock when he heard gunshots from down the hill.
The flare hadn’t gone off yet, but that didn’t mean anything, for they might have attacked Donna before she could get off the warning.
He ran inside and shook Jill awake, who lay in the bed, hands together and pressed underneath her head. She awoke, fuzzy and mumbling. “They’re here,” he said.
Harry was in a sleeping bag on the floor, snoring softly. Matt shook him. “Hurry! Hurry!”
Harry jerked awake. He unzipped the bag and climbed out. “What? What is it?”
“They’re here. I heard gunshots.”
Awake now, Jill sprang out of bed.
Matt gave Jill his M-16, and Harry took the other one and a Defender shotgun. Tucking his own nine millimeter into his belt, Matt slid the panel in the ceiling aside and pulled the ladder down. He patted his side to assure himself the knife was still there too. Harry had insisted Matt take the M-79 grenade launcher, and encouraged him to rain hell on them.
Harry kicked the throw rug aside and pulled on the rung that led to the tunnel and the bomb shelter.
Matt started up the ladder.
“Keep sharp,” Harry said.
Jill took a position by the right front window, Harry by the left, holding onto the M-16, with the shotgun and a supply of Molotov cocktails lined up. He had given some to Jill, telling her to throw them hard at the ground to make the bottle break.
Matt got up into the crawl space, and he heard Harry say, “Wish I had a flamethrower.”
He kicked up dust in the attic, and the musty stuff got into his nostrils and made him sneeze violently. He sprawled out onto his belly and readied the gun, prepared to fire and make a sweep across the front yard if he saw anything. He had only fired an M-60 one other time, in the Rangers, and he hoped he would remember how to use the weapon properly.
He cleared dust from his throat and spat.
And waited.
CHAPTER 27
Jill drummed her fingers against the handle of the M-16, waiting for something to come out of the woods at them.
Harry was hunkered down, but every few minutes, he got up and peeked out the side window, looking out on the driveway.
They had opened their windows to allow themselves to toss out the Molotov cocktails, and milky fog crept into the cabin.
“Could’ve done without the fog,” Jill commented.
“Looks like it cleared up a little,” Harry said.
Very little, but at least she could see out into the front yard of the cabin, maybe fifty or sixty feet.
“Harry, what do you say we barricade the door?”
“That won’t stop them.”
“I know. But it might buy us some time if we need to get out through the tunnel.”
The glow from the spotlight allowed her to see Harry frown in thought. “You’re right. If we have to hightail it out of here, it might slow them down.”
He stood up and went to the bed. Grabbing the mattress, he dragged it and flipped it up against the door. He then pushed the kitchen table over to the bed and flipped it up onto the mattress. Then he grabbed the kitchen chairs and tossed them on top. Jill supposed it was better than nothing, but it seemed incredibly inadequate.
“Five more minutes and I’m going after Donna,” Harry said.
“That’s noble, Harry, but it’s thicker than milk out there. You’ll never find your way down the hill.”
“I’m not gonna leave her down there.”
“But we need you here.”
“We’ll see.”
Men are so stubborn at times, she thought.
The one behind her pulled her arm backward, pressing the forearm against the seat, straining her muscles and tendons. She thought it might tear her arm off if she couldn’t get loose soon.
Pain bit through her shoulder and she jerked her head around to see the wounded creature sinking its teeth into her, right around the collarbone.
She screamed in pain and anger, expecting her arm to be ripped from the socket.
She looked at the one in the back. Her barrel was lined up with its face.
Stupid bastard.
She squeezed the trigger, and its head snapped back, but more importantly, it let go of her wrist.
The recoil from the Colt and her weakened wrist caused the weapon to clatter onto the floor of the cab. The thing to her left had its teeth locked into her, and she felt herself being lifted off the seat.
She hooked her arm around the steering wheel, realizing it might snap, but not willing to give up. It was the only thing keeping her inside the truck.
It pulled, and she felt her collarbone snap. The pain was enormous. Her stomach felt as if she’d swallowed ants, and her head spun like she just got off the Tilt a Whirl at Six Flags.
Still have the shotgun.
The stock was pointed at her, the barrel pointed at the gas pedal. She had one chance to free herself before she was dragged from the pickup and killed.
It meant unhooking her arm from the steering wheel and giving the beast leverage for a second, but she had no choice.
She let go.
For a moment, her rear end left the seat, and the heels of her shoes dragged on the floor mat. But she managed to grip the stock of the shotgun, pull it toward her and point it at the roof of the cab.
Again her head swirled, and for a second, everything went black, the light disappearing like a fade-out in a movie.
When she came to, her torso was halfway out the window. She brought the shotgun perpendicular to her body, barrel pointing back over her head. She moved her head to one side and squeezed the trigger, hoping she wouldn’t take the side of her face off.
The blast shut off sound in her right ear.
The teeth came loose from her shoulder, and then she felt the blood skimming down her chest and arm. For the moment she was free, but she could hear the bastards on the truck bed, bouncing it up and down like a demented child with a pogo stick.
She wriggled back in through the open window.
One of them reached a greedy claw inside the cab and grabbed blindly for her, and for a moment she just sat and watched it, wondering if it were real, feeling detached and fuzzy. It was like being on cold medicine, the feeling that your head was floating three feet above your body, everything moving in slow motion.
Monsters are here, the bogeyman’s here, they’re going to get me, get me, take me away.
The claw swiped at her hard enough to make air whoosh and tore into the seat cushion, exposing snowy stuffing.
She brought her good arm (or better one, for they were both hurting) up and gave herself a stinging slap across the cheek.
Snap out of it!
She took a quick peek to her left to see the monstrosity that had bit her flailing away on the ground, its head a charred mess from the shotgun blast. She must’ve hit it dead center with the shotgun, for after a few seconds more of flopping around, it lay still.
Hey, I got one.
She fired the ignition and stomped on the gas pedal, the truck lurching out of the clearing. A quick look in the mirror revealed three of them in her truck bed, the one that took the shot from the Colt laying prone, and the other two coming toward the cab.
She stepped on it, and the truck responded, growling up the hill like an angry bear.
The searching claw came through again, this time swiping her on the arm just above the elbow, taking a cut of flesh an inch deep. She yelped.
She had to get rid of her passengers, because she was giving them a free ride right to the cabin, and that wouldn’t do. She fought the truck, which seemed to sway left and right, a symptom of her wooziness and blood loss.
Hit the brakes, like they do in the movies. They’ll go flying!
She gripped the wheel, white-knuckle tense, and stomped on the brake pedal, the tires kicking up dirt. Donna lurched forward and rapped her head on the steering wheel.
The passengers in back slammed into the back of the cab, squealing in anger, but remained in the truck bed, shooting her plan to pieces.
She considered just turning into the woods, taking them with her and buying her new friends a little more time.
A claw shot at her, but missed, tearing off the rearview mirror instead.
Dazed, shaking her head, she put the truck in reverse. Sticking her head out the window, she looked behind her, the rearview mirror being only a memory. One of the creatures lay still, its arm hanging over the side of the truck.
Was it dead too?
The other two glared at her, hissing.
She gave it gas, driving backward down the hill. She sensed that she was over to one side too far, but couldn’t be sure due to the fog and the cloudiness in her head.
Again she hammered the brakes, and this time her passengers lost their balance, windmilling their arms, which would have been comical if they weren’t so hideous.
They flopped over the tailgate, and Donna heard a thump as the truck backed over them and lurched to her right, the rear end out of control.
The next thing she knew, up was down and down was up, and it was like being in a steel garbage can while someone beat it with a baseball bat.
In the midst of being jostled around the cab, she realized that she had come too close to the side of the road, where the ground sloped off, and the tires on that side had gone down the embankment, causing the truck to flip.
It rolled three more times before coming to a halt and pinning her between the passenger seat and the dashboard.
The passenger side window had busted, and now her cheek was pressed against the dirt on the forest floor, with tiny pebbles digging into the skin.
Her body hurt everywhere, and she could feel the blood running down her arms and covering the tops of her hands. Her stomach lurched; she vomited down the front of her shirt.
Grunts and growls came from outside the truck, her attackers coming to deliver the coup de grâce. But hey, she’d done all right, and had taken one, maybe two of them along for the ride, she thought.
One of them stuck its face in the windshield, now cracked in a spiderweb pattern, and she could swear the thing was smiling at her. It punched out the glass and diamond-like fragments exploded into the cab.
Her eyes half closed, she looked at the creature. Its face was all jutting angles. The nostrils were large and porous, the mouth and jaw wide and filled with grayish teeth honed to a point. It had bat-like ears, flattened against the sides of its skull. Spittle dripped from its jaws, giving the mud-colored skin around the mouth a shine, even in the darkness.
God didn’t make you, did He?
The blackness came again, but this time it became lighter and lighter, first charcoal, then light gray, then transparent, then white. There was dazzling light, so bright it hurt to look at it, might take your sight away if you did.
She saw a white castle keep, its stones whitewashed, reflecting the light, set upon clouds. A drawbridge lowered, and a figure approached.
Dominic approached her, his skin flawless olive, hair blow-dried into a perfect wave. He had on a white Nehru jacket and matching pants, and white beads hung from his neck.
“Waiting for you, sweet thang.”
He reached his hand out to her, and for some strange reason, as he unfolded his hand, she saw that his fingernails were painted white.
Was she seeing heaven, or was her brain so overloaded with endorphins that she was hallucinating? Dominic would never have anything to do with religion, so the fact that she was seeing him in some type of quasi-heaven made no sense.
He smiled and his teeth dazzled, reflecting beams of light back at her. Her eyes ached from looking at him.
With his smooth skin and slick pompadour, he reminded her of an old crooner from the forties who made the bobby-soxers swoon, like a young Sinatra.
“C’mon, Donna. It’s time. Even though you let me down, you can still come to the castle. Let go.”
He reached out and touched her arms with his fingertips, and warmth spread through her like whiskey on a cold day. She felt all her limbs start to relax, as if they were turning to liquid. I’m dying. But it feels so nice and warm.
“I’ll forgive you, Donna. You knew I had the brain tumor, but you didn’t tell me. But that’s no problem, sweet thang.”
“I couldn’t have known,” she said to hallucination Dominic.
“Oh, but I think you did. Just like you knew that Rhonda would die.”
“But I didn’t.”
Was she at war with her own conscience? Or was she really dying and was her dead husband giving her grief about his death?
“It wasn’t so bad, Donna. The tumor only hurt most of the time. Morphine doesn’t last forever, you know.”
“Stop it!”
There was a whumpf! The entire truck shook.
She opened her eyes to see the creature face-to-face with her, but now it turned its ugly head outside the truck and left her alone. There was another Whoosh! The ground shook again.
Light flashed, like being in a storm cloud when lightning popped. She closed her eyes again, and for a moment all she could see was the reflection of the trees imprinted on her
eyelids like a negative.
There was a shriek, and she smelled something like rotten meat burning.
Her arms felt like they were made from lead, and her head filled with helium, ready to float from her body.
“Holy shit, she’s in a bad way.”
“You got that right,” she whispered to the voice.
Then she passed out as something hauled her from the truck.
If there was one thing the Rangers drilled into Matt’s head, it was that you didn’t leave a man behind. Ever.
While Donna was on the hill and trying to shake off her unwanted passengers, he had heard the sound of metal being rended, the big crash that came from down the hill. Donna was in major trouble, maybe already dead, and if they didn’t get to her soon, her death was a certainty.
Matt scooted down the ladder and yelled to Harry, “I’m going after her.”
“Not if I get there first,” Harry said.
Like Matt, Harry had been a military man and in all likelihood had the same credo drilled into his head, to never leave a comrade behind. Military or not, Matt wouldn’t have let someone die down there alone on the hillside. The training the Rangers gave him had only strengthened a belief that already existed.
“You both can’t go,” Jill said.
“Someone should stay here. No sense of us all getting killed down there,” Harry said.
“Why don’t Jill and I go? She can drive while I fire.”
Harry got a wounded look on his face.
“Harry, we need you up here. You know these weapons better than anyone, and I don’t want to lose you down there.”
“Yeah, I guess I do know them better than anyone,” Harry said.
“Let’s go then.”
They rounded up an M-16, some grenades for its launcher, and Matt’s nine millimeter, which felt woefully inadequate against the enemy they were facing.
Matt and Jill stepped into the fog, now deteriorating into yellowish wisps, allowing them to see patches of trees through the murk.
They climbed into Harry’s Lincoln, Jill behind the wheel, Matt leaning out the passenger window, ready to fire the M-16 at the first sign of movement in the woods.
