by Tim McBain
“He’s right,” Chloe said. “I was just thinking. We’ve seen the clowns almost exclusively near the trail, right?”
“Right,” Phillip said.
“So let’s go to the trail. In the car.”
Phillip’s jaw clenched out of reflex. It was a hiking and biking trail, and signs were posted up and down it declaring that vehicles of any kind were forbidden. His mouth wanted to point this out, lip twitching. Twice. Three times. It made him so uptight, so uneasy, but…
“Ah, fudge it,” he said, after a long pause. “Let’s do it.”
He watched Chloe place a cigarette between her lips, her lighter flicking to life and turning the tip of the paper tube bright red. For the first time in his life, he wondered what smoking was like, tried to imagine the feeling of smoke rushing into his lungs.
She whipped the car around in a U-turn then, and they sped toward the mouth of the little asphalt path. Clouds of dust kicked up around the car as they passed through the place where tires had worn the grass down to dirt by people parking at the trailhead.
And then they eased onto the path, the front tires lifting onto the asphalt lip and then the back, the front end just avoiding the yellow post meant to deter automobiles – a bollard he somehow knew this to be called. The reflective paint caught the headlights, making the post seem to glow. It felt funny to be driving here, the woods practically right on top of the car, and they took it slow at first.
Phillip swung the barrel of the shotgun out the window, finger at the ready on the trigger guard. He took a deep breath and exchanged a glance with Chloe, nodding that he was ready. They picked up speed until the car rocketed along, the driver’s side teetering off of the asphalt and juddering on the bumpy dirt and rocks along the edge now and then since the trail was barely wide enough to accommodate a sedan. Some of the stones spat into the wheel wells and undercarriage, ping-ponging out strange tones like some Caribbean instrument.
Phillip adjusted his grip on the gun, staring into the gloom shrouding the woods. Part of him wanted her to go faster, making the prospect of catching the clowns totally unaware that much more likely. Another part of him was scared to death that they’d flatten some pedestrian out here, flying along like this on a footpath. It was a somewhat irrational fear given how late it was, but anything was possible.
No one spoke for a long while, and his focus on the task before them only intensified in the quiet. Cruelty had taken much from him in his life. It had beaten him and bloodied him and punched a hole in his heart, had hurt him until he felt worthless, but he had one last chance to strike back at it. He needed to make it count.
No one cared, it seemed sometimes. No one in the world. But he knew it wasn’t true. He cared. Chloe cared. They would find the clowns, and they would kill them. And the world wouldn’t reward their service. The universe would remain impartial. Uncaring. The people would barely even notice, but that was fine. They didn’t care when he was alive. They wouldn’t care when he died. He never expected them to.
He didn’t take up this battle to preserve this fucked society. Maybe it was never about civic duty after all. It was something else, something they weren’t teaching in social studies. He did it because he knew it was the right thing to do. That was enough.
The notion that he’d used a swear word in his thoughts didn’t occur to him until after the fact. Oh well. It didn’t matter anymore.
Nausea roiled in his gut, strangely cold and slimy like a pile of shelled oysters and clams thrashing into each other, weird wads of snot and pink muscles all writhing around in there. Was it just nerves, or was he spiraling toward his end? He didn’t know.
But in a way, he was glad it would be over soon.
Chapter Twenty
October 30th
11:08 PM
The clown appeared in the middle of the trail, smiling madly, headlights reflecting off his moistened teeth and gums. Phillip recognized this one right away. It was the one who’d bit him. It was Moffit, those braces on his top teeth once more the telltale sign. He could see the resemblance beyond the braces some now, too, looking past the makeup at the shape of the eyes and jaw, the single eyebrow stretched beneath the forehead.
Chloe put all of her weight onto the pedal, the surge pulling Phillip back into his seat. He grimaced as he braced for impact.
The car bashed into the clown, tossing it out in front of them, an impossibly limp thing that arced back to the ground and skidded over the asphalt. There was a loud sound upon impact, a crunch, but the car was otherwise unfazed. Not slowing a bit. And seconds after Moffit’s flight had turned into a slide, the wheels of the Le Baron finished him.
THUMP-THUMP.
They hit another clown then, this one immediately sucked under the tires to replay the sound.
THUMP-THUMP.
Phillip verified that the skull had been crushed in the rearview. The neck shearing off into a flattened smudge of orange hair that made him think of a smashed jack-o’-lantern.
He turned around just in time to see a clown leap onto the hood of the car, arms wide, fingers hooked in the opening between the hood and the windshield. The smiling face hovered before them, its body blocking much of their view.
Phillip swiveled the shotgun inside the car, moving to shoot it through the windshield. The thing scrabbled up onto the roof like a spider. Its hands and feet clubbed at the metal, the roof buckling under them.
“Christ,” Chloe said.
Phillip angled the gun out the window, firing blindly at the space just above the roof. He reeled it back in to pump it, the spent shell tumbling to the floor.
Chloe pointed her pistol at the ceiling and shot straight up, the gun blazing and popping, the bullets thwacking through the metal, the saggy fabric fluttering.
They held still for a beat.
“Did we get it?” Phillip whispered.
The thing lurched into Chloe’s window, gripping the arm she had on the wheel, the car careening off to the left.
She slammed on the brakes, and they jostled forward in their seats as the Le Baron jerked to a stop. The clown gripped tighter around her arm, but inertia wasn’t having it. He flew, tumbling end over end into the woods and splatting against a large maple tree. His head had busted open like a smashed melon.
And then the other clowns were there, just along the trail, turning to flee. They pulled up alongside one, and Phillip blasted it, the shotgun barrel flaming up, and the clown’s back flapping open in red tatters, swinging wide on both sides like someone pulling open a pair of batwing doors that exposed his ribcage. The fallen thing held still for a moment, and then it lifted its chest from the bed of dead leaves and tried to crawl forward. It looked so wet, the heaving piece of meat sprawled out on the ground.
He wheeled and fired at another, this time blowing out the neck, the clown head swinging down, dangling as though hung from a string, which it pretty much was, Phillip thought. This one went totally slack upon landing, arms folding up under the torso in an awkward heap in the leaves, the most-of-the-way decapitation apparently finishing the job.
He pumped, aimed at another, fired. Head shot. A mist of blood and brains sprayed over the rear end of the car, and the thing buckled at the knees and went down. Phillip watched it in the red glow of the taillights. It didn’t move.
“There are more now. A lot more,” he said, as he shoved more shells into the magazine tube.
“How many, do you think?” Chloe said.
“Not sure. They mostly seem to be sticking together, at least.”
He turned, trying to line up another shot, the clowns all running up a little slope away from them.
“End of the line,” Chloe said.
Phillip glanced over to see the matching yellow bollard marking the trail’s end. The car slowed, stopping just shy of the post. After a beat, she turned the key, and the LeBaron’s rumble died all at once.
The first beat of silence was strange and somehow terrifying, almost unbearable, Phillip though
t.
“Better to save gas, I guess,” she said, and he was somehow certain that she spoke only to shatter the awful quiet.
Phillip squirmed in his seat. After a moment, he could hear the leaves crunching out there in the dark, the loud pop of the periodic twig snapping.
“Should we get out?” he said.
She hesitated, nodded, pursing her lips, the pistol rising out of the shadows, seeming to appear next to her face out of nowhere. Her index finger stroked lightly at the place where the barrel and stock met, the rest of her hand snaked around the grip.
“Malcolm,” she said.
There was no response from the backseat.
“Is he…” Phillip said.
Chloe leaned back into the shadows, holding her breath as she patted around.
“Here,” Phillip said. He opened his door, and the dome light flicked on, lighting everything up.
Malcolm lay in the backseat with that Hello Kitty blanket snuggled up to his chin, eyes closed. His chest rose and fell in slow motion.
“Useless junkies. He’s sleeping,” Chloe said. “What the hell?”
“Should we wake him up?”
Chloe shrugged.
“Let’s just lock the car, I guess. He should be fine.”
They rolled up their windows.
“OK, let’s finish this,” she said, and he could see those muscles along her jaw pull taut.
They stormed out of the car, Phillip waiting a beat until Chloe was at his side before moving out into the woods. They’d discussed the importance of staying together earlier, and it was never more crucial than now. Venturing into the shadows of the woods, friendly fire became a serious threat if they lost track of one another.
Chloe jogged over to put a bullet in the head of the one who’d gotten his back blown out. He had seemed immobile, but it was better safe than sorry when you’re wiping out homicidal clowns like this, Phillip figured.
Again, they coordinated, positioning themselves shoulder to shoulder before they ran out into the dark.
Phillip stayed light on his feet, his ears focused on the sounds further out. Most of the footsteps seemed very far away, a stampede of thunderous crashes that sounded tiny from this distance. They’d be out of earshot soon, perhaps moving out of the woods altogether.
At least one clown was closer, though. It seemed slowed somehow.
Chloe held up her phone as a flashlight, sweeping it back and forth over the wooded terrain. Based on the way she did it, Phillip assumed that she heard the nearby clown as well and was looking to reveal it.
There it was, a hunched-over figured hobbling.
The old lady ran on a broken ankle, her foot bent at an angle damn near perpendicular to her leg, the jagged bones sticking out of both sides of the wound like toothpicks sticking out of an hors d'oeuvres. Even with her face painted, Phillip could tell it was the one they’d seen hours earlier, the one whose dog tried to save her.
She hissed at them, her tongue flicking out of her toothless mouth, seeming pointy and strange like a serpent’s, though it may have been a trick of the shadows. When they closed to within point blank range, the thing lunged at Phillip, and Chloe shot it twice, the first hitting the clavicle, the second blowing out the back of the skull.
“Yikes,” Phillip said, wiping more spatter from around his mouth.
Chloe looked out at the woods.
“I think I know where they’re headed,” she said.
Chapter Twenty One
October 31st
12:13 AM
“You were right,” Phillip said, gesturing to an upper level window. “Look.”
A clown glared down at them from behind the glass before stepping back into the gloom.
Chloe tucked her pistol into the back of her pants and unscrewed the spout on the red plastic gas can. For once she was actually thankful that her car was such a piece. Among other things, the gas gauge was broken, so she always kept a little spare gas in the trunk.
“Are you sure about this, though? Isn't this, uh... arson?” Phillip rubbed at the place where his neck and shoulder met. A nervous tic of his, she'd noticed.
“This place is practically asking to be set on fire. You said it yourself, Phillip. It's not structurally sound. Besides. It's Devil's Night. Do you know how many fires happen in this city the night before Halloween?”
She stepped closer to the ramshackle house, lifting the container to sprinkle gas around the perimeter, trying the splash the vertical surface of the outer walls. Gas slapped into the wood siding and dribbled down, turning the weathered grain a shade darker in the wet.
At the side of the house, she tossed a brick through a window. Phillip boosted her up so she could soak the moldy and now bloodied recliner inside. She made sure to douse the entry points with extra gas, just in case. She held the can aloft, watching the golden liquid spatter and soak into the astroturf on the front stoop and a ragged welcome mat at the back of the house. She cough and gagged a little from the fumes.
“That should do it,” she said, setting the can down in the grass.
Phillip cleared his throat.
“I just wanted to tell you that I, well... I think you're a pretty cool chick.”
“Right back at ya, Burkholder. Well, not the chick part. You're a cool dude. Are you ready?”
Phillip nodded. Chloe pulled a pack of matches from her pocket. As she walked up the path of the house, she tore a match loose and folded the book closed. Exposing the strike strip on the back, she dragged the tip across. Just shy of the front door, she stopped, lit match raised in the air, poised to drop. Her fingers let go of the flaming stick, and she watched it tumble end over end toward the wavering fumes of gasoline. She didn't think it even hit the ground before there was a loud WHOOMPF! She squinted against the blinding light, and then a blast of hot air slammed into her, knocking her flat on her ass. At the same moment, the front door burst open.
A wave of clowns poured out, seeming to not care about the flames now engulfing the front of the house. She must have been a bit dazed from the explosion, so she just sat there. She watched the first go down under a shotgun blast, and that jarred something loose inside her. Her survival instinct. Her hands flailed around behind her, reaching for the gun tucked in her waistband, but it was too late. The clowns cascaded out of the house, quickly overtaking her, and then she was surrounded by a flaming mass of polka dots and ruffles and curly rainbow-colored hair.
They didn't seem to notice that they were on fire, and she wondered if they'd swarmed out of the house because of the flames, or because there was fresh meat standing in the front lawn. A white-gloved hand, spattered with fresh blood, wrapped around her ankle. She tucked her knee to her chest and kicked, her boot slamming into the clown's face and knocking it backward.
She managed finally to get her pistol free, and she shot at another clown that was scrabbling at her abdomen with its claws. She missed, striking the kneecap of a different clown in the writhing crowd surrounding her. The ear-deafening report of the shotgun rang out, and she saw one of the clowns go down.
The clown was pressing its face to her belly now, trying to rip through her clothing with its teeth to get at the tender flesh beneath. This time, she pressed the barrel of the gun directly to the clown's greasy white face and pulled the trigger. Its head exploded in a fine mist of skull fragments and brain matter. Chloe's eyelids pressed shut on reflex, and just then she felt a strange pressure on her thigh. She screamed as the teeth pierced the flesh, and somehow, though she made no attempt to avoid shooting herself, she managed to only strike the clown with a rapid fire bam bam! Two shots and the clown was dead.
A dark stain spread over the fiber of her pants, jagged flaps of denim where the clown's teeth ripped through. But she didn't have time to mourn her mortality. There were more clowns to kill.
She scrambled backward and rose to her feet, taking stock of her surroundings. Some of the clowns had finally succumbed to the flames, lying in the grass in fier
y heaps of flesh and polyester. It seemed impossible but still more spilled out of the house. She tried to take them out as they appeared on the threshold, gun cracking in a steady rhythm. But there were so many. Cascading out the front door and tumbling down the front steps, spewing from the lower level windows. She couldn't help but think of a clown car, and she chuckled.
The sound of her laughter was drowned out by another whoompf. A gust of hot wind buffeted her face as the recliner in the living room went up.
Her gun clicked, chambers empty.
Phillip took out two more with the shotgun, earning Chloe enough time to reload her pistol and start again.
One righted itself after Phillip blasted it in the gut. It's lower half was on fire, but still it kept moving. Bam.
Chloe put a bullet right between its eyes.
Another advanced on Phillip while he had his back turned, trying to line up a kill shot on a clown that was tangled up in the boxwoods next to the house.
Bam.
Dead.
The one she'd got in the knee earlier was dragging itself over the lawn, slithering almost, like something reptilian. Chloe hobbled after it, the wound in her thigh throbbing with each step. She aimed at the frizzy cloud of blue hair and pulled the trigger.
Breath puffed in and out of Chloe's lungs. She could feel the heat coming off of the house at her back, but steam still coiled out of her mouth with each exhale into the cold autumn air
The house was burning in earnest now, flames twisting up to the roof. Black smoke billowed out of the windows in a putrid cloud. What struck Chloe even more than the brightness of the blaze or the ripple of heat or even the choking smell was the sound. The roar was deafening, punctuated by sharp, percussive cracks and pops.
It was the only sound for a moment, the roiling of the fire the only movement.
“Did we get them all?” Phillip asked.
Chloe was about to answer when the noise of glass shattering interrupted her. A clown, completely consumed by fire, burst through a second-story window, landing with a crunch and a thump in the grass in front of them.
