by Eddie Patin
“It’s coming!” Ramon screamed. “Megan!”
“Run, Ramon! We’re almost in town—don’t slow down!”
She could hear the beast’s rhythmic panting snarls as it gained ground on them! She heard its breath like a locomotive; its claws scratching at the pavement with each deft spring of its legs...
How had the thing not caught them by now?? It it was a bear or something—such animals were far faster than humans! Over twice as fast as an Olympic sprinter!!
Megan and Ramon dashed past endless dark cars and trucks and SUV’s, all pulled to the side of the road or left where they died; abandoned. In the lack of light, Megan was surprised that she couldn’t see the big building of the theater on her left, but her heart brightened a bit when she flashed past the “Giant Screen Theatre” sign off of the edge of the road.
Springdale.
Just ahead was the first of many buildings off of the side of the road—this one was some sort of cafe...
“Oh my god, Megan!” Ramon screamed. His footsteps slamming on the asphalt behind her turned erratic, and the monster let out a wet, snarling sound that jolted Megan with fear!
But it was too late.
It was right behind them!
There had to be people everywhere up ahead, hiding and surviving in the darkness of the shops and restaurants and hotels and tourist traps just before the residential homes began, but no one would be able to help the her and Ramon—not unless they had guns...
Oh yeah...
Megan imagined the monster making short work of Ramon, then turning on her. If that’s what was about to happen, then she wouldn’t have much time—she’d have to make every instant count. Her body would freak out when she stopped suddenly—she knew—but she had to...
Megan put her hands together, holding the revolver, wrapping her left hand’s fingers over her grip. She took one last deep, slow breath, then spun suddenly, changing direction and jarring herself to a stop!
As she turned to face the beast, extending the pistol away from her chest and aiming at the darkness, Ramon yelped with wide eyes as he vaulted past her, his face almost comical with terror...
She tried her best to take another deep breath, and pointed the weapon at the dark night behind them, expecting the creature chasing after them to be in her sights at any instant...
Megan panned the gun a little to the left and to the right...
Her heart hammered in her ears...
But there was nothing.
No monster.
Her head reeled and threatened her with dizziness as her body recovered from sprinting several hundred yards, and the adrenaline made her sick, her chest heaving with massive breaths that made the gun’s front sight bob dramatically up and down...
But she was only aiming at empty darkness!
There were lots of abandoned vehicles.
But no monster.
Megan listened as Ramon’s splattering footsteps continued, pattering wildly off down the road behind her...
She tried to calm down.
“Ramon!” she called, still focused on the highway toward Zion.
That thing was still out there, somewhere. It must have peeled off of its pursuit just as they made it into town!
The breeze flowing through the valley suddenly made the sweat that drenched Megan’s body turn cold. She lowered the weapon and turned to Springdale, looking for her boyfriend in the darkness ahead.
“Ramon, come back! It’s gone!”
“Where should we go?” Ramon asked, walking along with her, his feet heavy and sloppy on the road. The guy must be exhausted. Megan ran a lot. Almost every day. Her body was a well-oiled machine. Her boyfriend—not so much. “I can’t keep going,” he said. “We should stop at a hotel or something—do you think?”
“Yeah, I guess so,” Megan replied.
She had shoved the revolver into the thick waist strap of her backpack. Once they started running into people and didn’t have to worry about big, black monsters in the dark anymore, she’d move it to inside the pack so she wouldn’t make a scene.
They walked along the Zion-Mount Carmel Highway, slowly, in between the lines of vehicles that were starting to thin out the further away they traveled from the toll booths. Megan’s body buzzed from the excitement of sprinting for so long with the additional weight of a backpack, but she was otherwise okay. Ramon was really dragging ass...
There was a Thai restaurant. And another food place—maybe some kind of health food store..? It was hard to read anything in the dark. A world without electric lights was so bizarre...
“What about that place?” Ramon asked. “The Cliff Rose Lodge...”
A long, skinny structure with a taller central building ran along the road on the other side of a parking lot. It was dark, but Megan could hear quiet voices and the sounds of people moving around down there in the shadows.
“Let’s find something more in town,” Megan replied. “This one’s too close to the park.”
“Okay,” Ramon replied, staring at the building she rejected like a thirsty man longing for water.
When the full, round moon emerged from the clouds, it became a lot easier to see. They passed an art gallery and kept moving as the road sloped a long way past a concrete barricade on the right side, and Megan didn’t stop to start considering the various buildings until power line posts, street signs, and regular structures started popping up all around them.
The young woman saw people sitting around outside on restaurant stoops. Tiny, shack-like houses that looked squeezed in between the tourist-centered business buildings showed the glow and flicker of candlelight inside. Small groups of people or pairs of friends (travel in groups in the stoneage to keep the tigers away, Megan thought) passed them from time to time on the road, or peered at them in curiosity and suspicion as they crossed the street from one quiet house to another. Sometimes, Megan heard raised voices and arguments. Once, a bottle broke somewhere in the distance. Another time, she and Ramon both flinched when they heard a gunshot pop off down a side street!
How far did this power outage go? she thought. If Springdale was dead, and everyone was trying to survive without electricity and emergency services, what about St. George? Was her home sitting in the middle of a big black desert, just as quiet and chaotic as here?
Eventually, they stopped to examine what was obviously another motel. It was too dark to read the entire painted wooden sign from a distance, but Megan could definitely make out the word “Lodging”, and she thought she saw something about a spa and a salon underneath...
But as they approached the pavement circle drive-thru of the check-in area, Megan paused when the two men smoking outside stopped talking suddenly and met her gaze with an intensity that made her feel uncertain about her safety. Ramon followed behind, seemingly oblivious as the two men stood at attention, one of them taking his foot off of the wall he was leaning against, and they stared at her with dire faces and twitchy fingers.
Their eyes ... were gold.
Shit, Megan thought. Here, too...
As she turned to walk back to the road, Megan heard the golden-eyed men following her with determined steps, and she quickened her pace, regretting that she secured the revolver so deep into her backpack!
“What—?” Ramon stammered. “Where are we going??” He watched, confused, looking up at the men, then back at Megan.
“Somewhere else,” she said. “Come on!”
He followed.
At the edge of the property, the men broke off and went back to where they were, and Megan continued leading Ramon down the street, deeper into Springdale, the terrible, cold dread welling up in her chest—last bothering her back in the park—returning.
The two of them eventually took a turn onto an obvious residential street, Zion Shadows Circle.
“Where are we going?” Ramon asked.
“Let’s find a house where they might take us in.”
“Okay, if you think that’s best...”
She approached a doublewide trailer with the glow of candlelight or a lantern shining through the curtains of the front window. There was an old, little sedan parked out in front with a ‘Zion National Park’ bumper sticker on it, as well as another sticker of some sort of Native American design...
“Think they’re home?” Ramon asked, walking up behind her.
Megan smirked back at him.
“What do you think?”
In the glow from the windows, she startled a little at the solid-gold irises of her boyfriend’s uncertain eyes...
When Ramon didn’t answer, Megan walked up to the front door, paused to listen, then knocked. Her boyfriend walked up behind her.
A few seconds went by, then the deadbolt unlatched, and the door opened. Megan found herself face to face with a very old Native American man dressed in a well-worn dark grey sweat suit. He held a Coleman lantern in one hand, which was blinding to Megan’s eyes after spending so long adjusted to the darkness, and his long, wavy white hair cascaded down around his shoulders.
The old man looked at her without expression, his eyes mostly enveloped in the deep wrinkles of his skin. He didn’t speak.
Megan smiled and laced her thumbs into her backpack straps.
“Um ... hi!” she said. “We’re making our way back to St. George from the park, and we were wondering—I’m sorry to inconvenience you—but do you know of anywhere we could stay for the night?”
The old man muttered something in a language she didn’t understand.
Megan tried to make out his words, couldn’t, then smiled again. “Would it be possible to stay here, maybe? I can pay you—I have some cash...”
“Yeah,” Ramon piped up from behind her. “We wouldn’t get in the way or be any trouble...?”
Megan suddenly felt annoyed with him. The tone of his voice was awkward, and he would only make this more difficult.
The old man muttered something else, then, raised his lantern. The propane light source hissed and droned, burning its fuel as the man tried to light up Megan and Ramon’s faces. The young woman saw the glint of the man’s dark eyes as he peered at them more carefully. The old man looked at her without expression, then, looked over her shoulder more closely at Ramon...
Megan was relieved. There was no gold in his eyes...
The ancient resident lowered the lantern, muttered something a little louder, obviously in his Native American language, then, shambled away into the dark house.
Only an instant after Megan was left standing at the door, wondering what to do, another man slipped past the meandering old guy and into the doorway. He was a teenage boy, tall and wearing a red t-shirt and shorts, with dark skin and long, jet-black hair pulled into a ponytail. The kid had strong Native American features as well, and smiled sideways at Megan with bright eyes.
“Hey—hi!” the young man said with a smirk. “Sorry—that’s my grandpa and he doesn’t really speak English...”
“What’d he say?” Megan asked, watching as the old man set the lantern back on the kitchen table behind the boy, casting the young man’s face into shadow.
“Oh, he called your friend a skin walker,” the boy said with a chuckle. “Anyway, I heard everything you said. I guess we have some spare room for the night. How much cash are we talkin?”
“Um, well,” Megan said, looking down and fumbling for her wallet. She unzipped the pouch where she kept the cash and coins, and her fingers found the bills, but it was too dark to see. “I’m not totally sure—I’d need some light to see and—”
She and Ramon were surprised suddenly when the young man was pushed roughly aside, and the old man reappeared at the door raising a shotgun! The white-haired Indian said something firm in his language, and Megan watched in shock for a moment as the big, black barrel of the 12 gauge rose up toward them, pointing past her ... at Ramon...
“Whoa!!” she cried, and suddenly found her reflexes alive again! She backed up, quick like a cat, and pushed Ramon to the side as she fell the other way...
BOOM!
The gun went off in their faces, and the concussion of the blast slammed Megan like a hot wind!
“Holy shit!” Ramon cried, struggling to keep his balance and not fall down to the gravel driveway.
“Run!” Megan shouted, and dashed back to the road, holding her wallet tightly in one hand. She looked over her shoulder again, and saw the old man aiming down the barrel for a follow-up shot. “Move it!!”
Ramon stirred out of his surprise and sprinted back to the road.
The shotgun went off again like a thunderclap, and Megan shrieked as the window of the old car in the driveway exploded!
11 - Tommy and Jody Shelton
Flagstaff, AZ
Chaos.
Panic.
The smaller Zahnan scrambled across the pavement, abandoned cars, and neighborhood yards to the east of the high school with the ease and the casual urgency of animals rushing toward spilled food! Their pale, wiry bodies moved like rapid, long-legged insects, all sharp-angled knees and elbows and whipping, lashing tails. The creatures’ elongated heads with beady, black eyes above closed mouths were held low to the ground like their bodies, except for when they paused to perch on a vehicle or while scrabbling down the side of a house.
Behind them, surrounded by furious, red flames, the gigantic monster sauntered its way toward the survivors...
Tommy felt the blood run out of his face, was afraid for an instant that he would piss himself, then grabbed his sister’s little hand and led her, running, back into the school!
“Tommy!!” Jody cried, her voice jerking with their frantic steps against the pavement.
“Come on!” he cried. “We’ve got to hide again!”
“They’re going to eat us like Mommy and Daddy!”
“No they’re not!! We’re gonna get away!”
The kids exploded past a group of refugees huddled near the double-door entrance of the school, looking out into the hazy outside with expressions of curious dread and wonder. Those people only heard the roar of the giant—they didn’t see all of the monsters rushing in to tear everyone up; to pull them apart with their teeth and claws, to set fire in between meaty bites with the gouts of flame from their alien backs...
Focus, Tommy thought.
The children darted through clusters of people and their kids, winding through bodies and packs and piles of clothes and junk down the hall past lockers and open classrooms. They ran past the gym.
Tommy didn’t go to this school. He didn’t know where everything was.
But it was a big kid school, and the halls just kept going and going...
If he kept them moving away from the Zahnan, to the other end of the school, maybe they could find a place to hide! Maybe after the monsters attacked the huge group of people and ... had their ... fill ... they’d leave. Just like they did with Mom and Dad...
Tommy stumbled and let go of Jody’s hand for a moment. His eyes quickly scanned the hall past the gym, and his feet pounded the school floor as he hurried to a big, black plastic trashcan he saw near the wall. It was almost full of trash from the hundreds of people living here for the last day or so.
Grabbing the plastic edges of the can, his left hand hitting something wet, Tommy pitched his head in and vomited into the pile of plastic wrappers, discarded drink bottles, baby diapers, and everything else that suddenly hit his senses like an oncoming truck.
He heaved again, and out came the eggs.
“Tommy!” Jody cried, running up behind him.
The boy coughed, then, took his sister’s hand again, violently wiping his face with the back of his jacket sleeve.
Where did that come from?
They both looked back toward the entrance of the school when the screaming began.
A mix of wails of fear and pain, followed by shrieks of panic and stampeding, preceded the first alien roar of one of the monsters. Its metallic voice rang down the hall, scratching at Tommy’s eardrums!
“Oh god,” the boy said. “Come on!”
He led his sister further down the hall, spurred on by the sounds of many, many frantic footsteps pounding at the floor behind them. The screams of the refugees drowned out the sound of the people fleeing, and another monster called out with its own strange and terrifying screech that sounded like a mix of a bear’s roar and the shrill cry of an eagle.
Tommy didn’t want to think about what was going on back there...
As they ran further into the depths of the high school, the boy noticed that the classroom doors weren’t open anymore, and other than occasional spots of light from skylights and open blinds on the doors to the individual rooms, it was getting darker and darker!
The chaotic din of the creatures tearing their way through the crowds—the screams and animal cries and crashes—was gaining on them it seemed, and it wasn’t long before Tommy saw the shadows of frenzied human forms appearing behind them, silhouetted by the brighter light back down the hall toward the gym.
Then, the white light of day coming from down the hall where the kids came from turned red and orange along with the whoosh sounds of burgeoning flames...
The two children gasped and froze and held each other when the sound of crashing bricks and a massive wall collapsing somewhere suddenly smothered the clamor of panic. Tommy felt the floor shake under his feet, and all of the lockers buzzed as the walls shuttered!
The giant monster roared again, its voice overpowering the whole world it seemed, the blast making the building shiver and the children cover their ears! When the assaulting sound stopped, Tommy realized that he, himself, was screaming...
The boy stopped, and looked down at his sister’s terrified, wide green eyes. Her little hands were clamped over the sides of her head, and her face was pale with fright.
