Barry utters a childish laugh that remembers me of a nervous schoolboy.
“Men”, he says, shrugging his shoulders. But then he at once becomes earnest again.
We quickly had become aware of the fact that we might have been the only survivors throughout of Boston or perhaps even of Massachusetts. Because let alone of the second day of the catastrophe, when we had all arrived at the hospital, no other survivor had turned up with us. And we all, even Demi, were dealing astonishingly calm with this fact. I up till now wonder how we had managed to do so. But none of us went off the rails. Perhaps this was partly due to the evenings we shared sitting together and talking. Because when our daily labor of barricading was done we used to meet in the lobby of the hospital, to sit down at the heavy leathern armchairs, which before had been reserved to visitors and waiting patients, each of us narrating about his former life. We talked about old friends and the forlorn family, in doing so having visibly been envied by Jerry, Becky and Mark for not having lost our family.”
Barry pauses for a short while, glancing at me guiltily.
“In any case we had to try to bring some order into our small community. Out of some reason I, without any voting, was made the leader of the group. Perhaps it was because I was the oldest of us or because the others believed that I, as a helicopter pilot and ambulance man, was outclassing an assistance doctor, like had been Mark, in skills.
I don’t know.
But I had accepted our silent voting equally wordless and soon assigned everybody to their part. Becky and Shelley were to look after Demi and, in addition to that, after the food and the supplies. Jerry and Mark were seconded to secure our site. This meant they every morning had to control the condition of the boards in front of the windows and doors plus of the fence around the ground, because one each night could see these ghastly creatures creep around the hospital and hear them hitting against the wire fence. They seemed to have known that we had barricaded inside the building. Perhaps they smelled us, I don’t have an idea. But every morning Jerry and Mark had their hands full. These beings each night tried to break down the fence or they dug their claws into the boards in front of the doors and windows.”
I lift my hand, like one if knowing the right answer to a question in former times had used to do at school. Only that this time I got the question and wait for my son to give the right question to it.
“These creatures”, I begin after Barry has interrupted his report, looking at me inquiringly. “These monsters do also exist here in the hillside. I call them Shoggthen.”
Our eyes meet, but Barry doesn’t go for asking why his old father had given a name to those beings.
I either wouldn’t know what to answer him. That his father is senile? Or that he just is as afraid of these ghastly creatures like hadn’t been of anything before and is trying to gain control over that fear by giving it a name? And may it only be a name that got nothing in common with the original Shoggothen out of Lovecraft’s books?
But in Barry’s face I don’t see as much of a surprise over his father’s words than rather a deep fatigue.
“What about these beings?”
Barry shakes his head.
“Let me first tell you about Boston, Dad. Perhaps we can talk about these monsters later, when you have heard what they are able to.” He lowers his eyes, his voice becoming a whisper. “I also want to tell you what happened to Shelley.”
I recognize the bond that through these words and Barry’s gaze is building up between him and his daughter, even if the girl still is fast asleep.
Barry needs to be able to tell about what had happened in Boston. He has put his experience into words, just like I had named the creatures from the woods for being able to understand them. This was his way to come to grips with the horrible memories of the last days and to not let the insanity inside of him prevail. And perhaps it also does me some good to hear the horror of the last days put into words, instead of always hearing them only as silent thoughts inside my head. That’s why I silently nod and lean back into my chair. Without looking up but constantly caressing his little daughter’s hair Barry finally continues to narrate.
“While all were working to full capacity on their duties inside the hospital, I, being the only one, who had the permission to fly an airplane, every day flew away with the rescue helicopter to look for survivors in or around Boston or to refill our supplies.”
He looks at me and suddenly an elfish grin decorates his face.
“This was the best about Boston having turned into such a deserted place. A man can touch down his helicopter wherever he wants to, without an importunate officer obtruding a parking ticket on him.”
I try to join in Barry’s grin by shrugging my shoulders and letting a smile shoo over my face that resembles me as faked as nothing before in my entire life. But the imagination of a silent concrete jungle named Boston in no way is able to make me grin.
When Barry continues he is earnest again.
“I want to make it short. I throughout the whole city found no survivors; at least almost no survivors. Two times I saw somebody in panic flee the helicopter and then disappear between two houses. One time it had been a woman and one time a man. I hadn’t been able to find the two of them again. Even when I had landed the helicopter in the middle of the crossing, calling out for the two survivors with my hand held up and revealing me as one of them, they didn’t come out of their hideouts. Also when I had lifted off with my engine again, in doing so raising a lot of dust and old paper from the street, no one came running desperately waving for me. The two of them had simply disappeared, as if they had never existed. When I the next days had again and again flown over this special crossing they didn’t show off, too. In the end I had given up hope to find them or other survivors and turned my attention onto the acquisition of supplies. If while I was doing so one of the two would have crossed my way so much the better. But they didn’t and stayed concealed. Or they in the meantime had been found by these monsters – how do you call them? Shoggothen? I don’t know.”
Barry pauses shortly, looking over to the window as if listening to a sound.
Being constantly alerted by the incidents during the last days – especially in the Miller’s house – I follow his lead.
But outside everything is silent.
“It wasn’t difficult to obtain supplies and medicine”, Barry then continues in a lower voice. “I after all had a whole town with all their shopping malls and factories for me alone. I only had to be cautious because the town lacked energy and therefore the shopping malls were dark. We didn’t know where these beasts were hiding by day. This is why I at the nearby military base, where I also could refuel the helicopter, at first stocked up on some weapons.”
He is looking at me like he as a little boy had just revealed me his most intimate secret.
“Don’t be afraid, Dad. The weapons are in the heli. But you will surely accept that in this world they can mean the difference between life and death. Even if none of us had had any experience with the handling of firearms I had obtained weapons for us all. But having a rifle – even if I didn’t know its brand – in my hand I felt safer when creeping through the dark corridors of supermarkets.”
He looks at me again, in doing so revealing a sardonic smile.
“These monsters however seem to shy at buildings that had been fabricated by man. Because in all the houses, which I had looked over I hadn’t seen or heard one of these beings. They probably are satisfied with woods and parks, or they hole up inside the sewage water system, we didn’t find out that. Nevertheless it probably had been my weapon that had prevented me from some time walking through the supermarkets screaming and from at any unusual noise taking my heels. One simply feels safe with it, you know? As we all didn’t have experience in the handling of weapons we instilled us one another how to aim and to shoot and to take into account the ricochet.”
Barry for a long time looks down at Demi and then with his eyes showing
off a dark earnestness looks into mine. I know his words even before he can vocalize them.
Demi had also got a weapon, Dad. You have to understand this.”
I don’t like the image of my little granddaughter walking about like a child soldier with a weapon and learning to shoot; if possible even to kill, and might it be only for the safety of her own and the group. This thought doesn’t suit me at all. But I understand and accept Barry’s decision; even if I’m against it to the core. I nod at my son without speaking a word.
“You don’t have to be worried about Demi”, Barry continues in an empathetic voice. He knows his father’s thoughts. She thinks the same about firearms like you and me. But she realized that this measure in our situation had been necessary. Just like I told you before our small group had astonishingly fast acclimatized to the changed conditions. This is also true for Demi.”
Barry grabs his empty glass and turns it between his hands. His gaze reveals me how eagerly he would have longed for filling it up again just to be able to bear the rest of his narration better; to perhaps being able to see it in that milky light, which only alcohol can create and in whose glow many things are losing their thread.
But he puts the glass back onto the table, for a while regarding the candlelight flickering inside it and again begins to caress Demi’s hair. The girl shortly stirs, murmuring some incomprehensible words. This is another aspect of this new time, because my granddaughter never had been talking in her sleep before. And to be honest, I’m glad that I don’t understand what she says.
“Our group in fact was very functional. We had sufficient of food and medical care and Shelley had even begun to teach Demi with some textbooks I had obtained. ‘You never know how life will turn out’, she used to say. I think they both of them needed that kind of distraction. The lessons, to which they used to withdraw themselves into one of the sickrooms, showed them that there still was a bit of normality from the olden times that this new world couldn’t take from them. They both clung to it and it did me good to see how my two girls were positively revived by these lessons. I don’t know if Demi had really been concentrating on the things her mother had tried to teach her. I rather believe that my little one simply had enjoyed spending these hours with one of her beloved and familiar persons. She sucked up this time. Even when Shelley had announced the end of the lessons Demi often had refused to already quit them.”
Barry utters a short laugh and proudly looks at his daughter. But I know this laugh. It’s only for disguising his tears, trying to make their way up outside.
“You know, Dad. Disregarding the horrors that these days had ready for us, the people in our small group had soon found common ground and a strong solidarity. This was something that in the olden times would nearly have been impossible, at least to such an emotional extend. They clung together. They knew that each of us had to rely on the other, and they all knew that they were an essential part of this community. I even believe…”
Barry falls silent and glances scrutinizing at Demi. Then he looks at me with this whimsical smile that I had used to love about him.
“I even believe that Becky had carried on with Jerry. They both were young and from the same area. Something like that welds together.”
He winks at me. I can’t help responding his smile. But then Barry abruptly gets earnest. In a second his face gets overshadowed and his eyes lose all the gleaming that Jerry’s and Becky’s assumed love attachment had brought to them right before.
“Everything was fine”, he says in a monotone voice. “But then we met Alicia.”
His dull eyes shortly look at me before he then looks shifty-eyed around the room. I can recognize mighty emotions beginning to fight inside of him. The smiling boy, who had just revealed me Becky’s and Jerry’s secret disappeared, leaving behind a person, who within seconds seems to have aged for years. On his thigh Demi turns murmuring to the other side, so that I‘m not longer able to see her face.
“Had she been a survivor?” I only ask to cut in on the back-breaking silence that followed Barry’s narration like a flush of ice cold air.
“A survivor …”
He seems to think about my question, caressing Demi’s hair and apparently fascinated regarding the wall behind me. Inside the candle light his eyes in his dark face are glowing like pitch black pieces of coal.
“Not a survivor”, he finally says in a low whisper.
He takes a deep breath, shakes his head and closes his eyes.
“I found Alicia the seventh day. She was standing in a bookstore as I went in there to find us all some books; for if not being occupied the long days and the even longer nights in the hospital could drive you insane. Alicia was simply standing there next to the cash point, frightening me to the bones. I almost had shot her, a fact that proved to me how frayed my nerves had really been on my reconnaissance flights. But the girl didn’t even give a jerk when she saw me; much less when I had aimed my weapon on her. She was a young girl, hardly older than Demi. And she looked terrible. She was none of these beings we had been able to see in front of the fence of the hospital at night and that robbed us of our sleep. But she somehow also wasn’t … a human being … anymore.”
Barry looks at me as if waiting for me to declare him insane. Perhaps in that moment I even would have done so, hadn’t there been the horrible sight of Cindy Miller inside my mind.
“She was looking like a girl, who hadn’t eaten for days. Her cheeks were cavernous and her pale skin like gauzy paper tightened over her bones. Even her hair was just gray streaks hanging into her face like cobwebs. And her eyes …”Barry looks at his hands, as if there had been written an answer to everything. “Her eyes … they were the most horrible thing about her, There was nothing … spirited. I had the impression of looking into the eyes of a blind man. As if someone had pressed grey stones into the girl’s eyeholes. But nevertheless I felt her eyes set on me. As I was slowly orbiting her with the weapon she followed my every move. And then she spoke; very quietly; with a voice that was dead. Can you imagine this, Dad? Her words came from somewhere inside this dead, limp body.”
I can imagine very well.
“She told me her name was Alicia and I should help her. She begged me to shoot her. In doing so she had reached her haggard arms out for me. And everywhere on her skin were these brown spots – as if her skin anytime could fall from her arm.”
Barry still regards his hands, holding them before his face and hiding his eyes behind them. Demi again begins to murmur. This time I’m able to understand the word ‘mama’, which squeezes all the breath out of me.
“I took Alicia with me; what turned out to be a deadly mistake. In the hospital we tried to cure the girl with medicine. We gave her antibiotics and some medicine to build up strength. But her condition didn’t change. She hardly spoke a word and was lethargic. She often was only standing there like a zombie, her cold stone-eyes staring into space. But the sparse she said curdled our blood. Alicia said she at night had been bitten by a creature, which had intruded into the cellar of the bookshop that had been her hideout. This had only happened two days before I appeared. And since then she had felt changes going on inside her body. With its bite the being had instilled her something that let her step by step mutate to one of these beings. We in fact found deep bites in her neck. But at that time we disbelieved her words. We still believed in the wonders of medicine. Demi had tried to make friends with Alicia – since she had only been a few years younger than the girl. But she wasn’t able to reach her, too. Alicia only again and again repeated her begging to let her die. Each time she saw me she reached for me, asking me with that toneless voice to shoot her.”
Barry is looking at me for a long time; his glance revealing me that I’m sitting opposite to a man, who for a long time had been on the ropes.
“We had brought death to our group”, he whispers as if speaking to himself. “It had been two days ago, in the early morning, when we in addition to the still familiar clamorin
g noise coming from in front of the fences of the building had been wakened by a terrible scream. When we had come out of our rooms we soon found out from where the uproar came. I was the first to reach Mark’s room. And what I saw there curdled my blood.”
He falls silent, longingly looking at the empty glass before him. Without saying a word I get up, take his bottle of whiskey and pour him a glass. Barry nods shortly. Then he with his hand shaking grabs the glass and avidly empties it half. He meanwhile closes his eyes, resembling to enjoy the heat that spreads inside his stomach. I again sit down to my armchair, regarding Barry with a fierce inexpressiveness but at the same time feeling how this new world – this new reality – not at least through Barry’s words encloses me tighter and tighter. Just as if it was trying to get hold of me and wanting to blanket me beneath its dense shroud. Nothing stayed like it had been. And Barry’s narration would disconnect this world even a bit more from reality. We all become the apathetic audience of our home made, grotesque stage play.
“Mark with blood all over him was lying on his bed and Alicia was leaning over him. When she noticed me she fast as lightening turned around and came running towards me, in doing so roaring like an animal. At the same time I could recognize rags of flesh between her red lips. The attack came all of a sudden. As apathetic Alicia had been the days before, as fast and driven by an inside bestiality she now ran towards me. And she without any effort would surely have lacerated my throat wouldn’t Jerry have torn me back the last moment. We both fell out into the corridor. But instead of attacking me Alicia threw herself onto Jerry and with few bites lacerated his stomach, so that I was able to see his bowels springing out from his abdominal wall. Jerry screamed with might and main. I never had heard a human being scream that way before. I thought of animals getting slaughtered and stared at the massacre Alicia was now wreaking at the young man. It was only for Becky screeching that broke away my rigor. I swirled around, pushed her back into her room and shouted at her to block it up from inside. After that I ran back to our room – the room Shelley, Demi and I were living in – took up my weapon that I up till then had never needed to use against any creature and instructed my girls to barricade the door behind me. I ran back to the corridor without losing any thought upon what I was doing or what was actually going on. I acted mechanically, feeling like a robot that couldn’t get harmed. With my weapon, which promised me that I was safe, I ran back to Jerry. But Alicia had long before desisted from the bloody bundle that had become of him and with an almost unhuman power had forced her way into Becky’s room. I heard the girl scream, in tones that were similar high and hysterical like had been the tones of her friend a short time before. In between I heard Alicia roaring like an animal. It sounded hungry and intoxicated. Even before having reach Becky’s room I knew that each helps would be late. I just heard the girl firing a single shot from her weapon and the bullet bang into the door case. Then there was only a damp tearing and smacking and Becky screeching sharply, which died down within seconds. When I had reached the room I could only recognize Alicia’s back, leaning over an unshaped, dead body onto the bed. I with the purposefulness of a desperate man shot two bullets into the girl’s body. I then without turning around again ran back to our room and pounded my fists against the door. It took Shelley long to open it to me. Her whole face was congealed in fear. I tore her from her room, searched for Demi, who desperately aimed her weapon onto me. I tore the two of them behind me while already being able to hear Alicia’s horrible screams from the corridor. As I turned around to her she like a wild beast, covered with blood and with a greedy hunger in her glowing eyes, came running after us. I hustled Shelley and Demi before me, shouting at them that they should flee up to the roof, where there was the helicopter. Then I made a stand against Alicia, shooting the rest of the bullets into her body until the weapon was empty. But my pops didn’t make an impact. The beast didn’t stop running towards us. Our only choice was to flee and so we ran and stumbled upstairs to the helicopter. While I was tearing Demi at her hand behind me towards the helicopter Shelley suddenly stopped and aimed her weapon at the quickly nearing creature. I stood rooted to the ground, shouting at her that she should stop this nonsense and climb into the helicopter. But Shelley didn’t react on my and Demi’s shouts. She instead began to fire. I could clearly see some bullets hitting the girl’s head. She from their impact got set aback but not held back. Though rags of flesh were ripped off from her body and her head turned into a bloody lump she ceaselessly went towards Shelley, who was firing one bullet after the other into the beast’s body and in doing so was shouting out so loud that she drowned out the girl’s pained screaming. For some few moments I actually had hoped that we once again could have escaped this harm. These moments were deceiving and made me forget about all my caution. I hustled Demi into the helicopter and instructed her to keep the door of the cockpit shut until I would come. Then I even if I lacked ammunition wanted to go to her mother and come to her aid. I thought that Shelley in the end had run the thing to earth. But at that horrible morning this had been another mistake. For Alicia lunged at her with a frantic lust and within a second lacerated her before my eyes, even before she had been able to fire more than one shot. I can still see her weapon spinning through the air, the silverware of its muzzle spotted with blood. I heard Demi scream behind me. She was crying for her mother. And the she cried my name. She was screaming in a sharp, nearly frenzied tone, I won’t be able to forget for the rest of my life. It all happened so damn fast. It was like running through a nightmare, in which one was a giant, who with only one step was leaving entire continents behind. Suddenly time didn’t matter anymore. On the one hand I had the impression that each of these horrible seconds was extending to infinity; like in a dream, in which you run towards a door that with every step you take towards it seems to remove itself even farer. But otherwise time rushed me by like a spitting storm, leaving me behind almost unable to move. It was the sharp odor of vomit coming to my nose that tore me out of my nightmare, which had infiltrated me to the marrow.
A World of Darkness Page 15
