Raptor Apocalypse

by Steve R. Yeager

  She exhaled, whistling through her lips. “No, I can’t go. I’m banished now, thanks to you.”

  “Banished?” he asked, standing and brushing off his hands. “Why?”

  “Why do you think?” she said. “I screwed up. You were supposed to stay. I got blamed. Simple.”

  He said nothing.

  “So, not even a ‘sorry’? No apology for leaving? No apology for getting me kicked out of my home? No apology for my best friend dying?”

  He said nothing.

  She frowned. “It’s your fault he’s dead, you know.”

  He ignored her accusation. “I better find a way to get us down from here. Unless, you already have a plan.”

  This time she said nothing.

  He went to the side of the structure. It was at least a twenty-foot drop to the hard concrete below. Should be easy enough, he thought. He lay down on his stomach and scooted his feet over the lip. Letting himself drop until he was hanging on by his fingertips, he glanced down and let go.

  He landed harder than he had anticipated. His right ankle buckled sideways. Pain shot up his leg. He muffled a yell and rolled onto his side.

  “You okay?” she said from above, peering over the edge at him.

  “Fine,” he replied through clenched teeth.

  He waited a few seconds for the initial shock to wear off before getting up and putting weight on his ankle. It did not fold under when he tried to stand, so it was not broken, but it did hurt.

  Limping to the storefront across from the pumps, he tried to think of something he could use to get her down from the roof. He entered through a door that had been ripped from its hinges. Inside, he noticed the sharp odor of raptor urine. They had been circling all night and some had gone into the building and pissed all over everything. Bloody streaks led into the building, too, where some had dragged something inside to feed on, but there did not appear to be any raptors in there now.

  Not much of anything was left. Eventually, he located a canvas tarp and some old tires stashed behind looted refrigerator units lining the rear walls. The tarp was being held down under the weight of a couple of sets of tire chains in canvas bags. He tossed the chains aside, pulled three tires from the pile, and rolled them out through the doorway.

  “Thank you, come again,” he said to himself as he exited.

  He continued rolling the tires until they were below the canopy. He then tipped them over so they lay flat. Returning to the store, he fetched another set of tires, came back, and dragged the canvas tarp out, stacked the tires into three piles, and tossed the tarp on top to cover them.

  “Hey,” he said.

  She was already on her hands and knees, peering over the edge at him. “That’s a long way down,” she said.

  “Then make sure you land here.” He pointed to the canvas covered tires.

  “I can’t do that.”

  He shook his head. “You said you did not want me to treat you like some helpless woman, right?” He pointed at the pile. “So, jump.”

  “Isn’t there a ladder somewhere?” she asked.

  “No,” he said. “No ladder.” His ankle did hurt and he had to shift his weight to his other foot.

  “I don’t want to jump. I might break something.”

  “You could stay there if you want.”

  “No, please. There’s got to be another way.”

  He did need to get going. She was only holding him up, but her mention of the ladder generated another idea and he went back into the store.

  “Here,” he said when he returned. He held out a set of tire chains for her to see.

  “What am I going to do with those?”

  “Make a ladder.”

  “A ladder? How?”

  “Okay, stay there then.” He threw the chains on the ground and walked away.

  “No, wait,” she said. “Come on, please, don’t leave me here.”

  Grumbling, he returned, picked up one of the chains, and began swinging it back and forth.

  “Look for something to hook these onto. You can use them to climb down.”

  “Okay.”

  “Now back up.” He tossed the single tire chain up to the roof, followed by another. She disappeared for a few seconds, and then returned to the edge.

  “Okay, now what?” she asked.

  “Find something to hook them onto, anything strong enough to hold them.”

  She left and returned a few moments later.

  “There’s nothing close enough to the edge. They won’t reach.”

  “The ladder was your idea.”

  “No, it wasn’t,” she said.

  He was growing increasingly irritated. “Figure it out,” he said and waited with his arms crossed.

  She did not do anything for almost a minute. He was about to give up when she surprised him by stabbing her spear into the side of the roof repeatedly until it sunk in and became wedged there. She attached the chains to the spear and unrolled the makeshift ladder over the side. It draped down and hung about six feet above the pavement.

  “I’m afraid of heights, so don’t let me fall,” she said as she crawled to the lip of the canopy and carefully put her feet on the chain ladder. It swayed and clanked beneath her as she found her footing. He watched her descent while holding the chains to keep them steady.

  After climbing to the end of the ladder, she let go, dropping easily to the pavement and sliding into his arms.

  “Thank you,” she said and gave him a kiss on the cheek. He let go and stepped away without comment.

  Another spear lay on the ground near the bloodstains on the concrete. It must have belonged to the guy who died there. He bent to pick it up and handed it to her to replace the one she had left stuck on the roof.

  Instead of taking it, she hovered over the bloodstained spot and bowed her head in prayer. He recognized some of the words, but not many. Finishing, she took the spear from him and pointed to the building he had leapt from. “I left my stuff on the roof up there.”

  He nodded and tried to keep up with her as she rounded a corner and went down a concrete sidewalk to where a busted piece of plywood lay on the ground. He examined the hole, thinking he would follow her in, but the pain in his ankle convinced him to stay where he was.

  She climbed through the gap. “Coming?” she asked.

  He shook his head and sat down on the concrete curb. He bent and rubbed his ankle. It was already swelling.

  “When I get back, I’m going to look at that,” she said.

  He shook his head. “It’s nothing.”

  She disappeared into the building and returned with two packs a few minutes later. Both appeared undamaged. She removed items from one, clothing, food, and some basic medical supplies. Discarding items from one, she combined the rest into a single pack. When she was finished, she tossed him an apple, one of the freshly picked ones she had given him earlier.

  Biting into it, he turned and started limping away. “Come on,” he said, chewing. “I need to get my stuff.”

  It hurt to walk, but he managed to make it across the parking lot and into the building where he had left his bag high up on one of the racks. When he got there, it seemed a lot higher than he remembered.

  His ankle throbbed, and he realized there was no way he could make the climb and fetch it on his own. He was forced to do something he had not done in a very long time, something he was loath to do, but he had no other choice.

  “You said you could do things on your own, right?” he asked.

  She nodded.

  “Then you need to do something that I cannot do, okay?”

  She stared at him as if he had said something odd. Then she nodded again, slowly.

  He looked at the top of the storage racks. “I need you to climb up there and get my pack.”

  She flashed him an awkward grin and held out her hands for him to see. They were scraped raw with cuts and abrasions. He shrugged and pointed to his ankle, making it obvious that he could not make the climb.
Frowning, she massaged her shoulder, glanced at him, then up at the top rack, and started to climb.

  -31-

  OUT OF THE FRYING PAN

  JESSE WOKE IN a fit of coughing, which alone was barely enough to prove to himself he wasn’t dead, or at least, not yet. His mind was fuzzy, thick, as if full of half-melted wax. His throat was dry and feeling as though it had been stuffed full of cotton. And, wherever the hell he was, he couldn’t see shit. Was it day? Or night? Previous events returned in flashes, the deafening pops of the shotgun, the running, the fear, and the ultimate resolve. Through the haziness shrouding his thoughts, he remembered the girl. She was the reason he was here. She was trapped, and he knew what he had to do.

  Save her.

  He raised a hand and cleared away the crust from his eyelids. His head was pounding and he saw tiny flashes of light in the blackness. A faint glow arose from his watch. It was now mid-morning, the precise time being something he had lost track of years ago. He’d slept through the night.

  The fire had burnt itself out before suffocating him, or he had somehow extinguished it before he’d blacked out. He didn’t know which. The room still smelled of smoke and char, but the air was breathable. The raptors were gone, too. Where? Where could they have gone?

  He listened further, but didn’t hear them.

  His head hurt and he stopped to rub his temples. Trying to protect his injured shoulder, he was reduced to using one hand to push himself around on the floor. Various objects jarred and poked him as he moved. Eventually, he ran into a wall and felt his way along it until the texture changed from rough to smooth. The smooth surface let him know he had found the door. He propped himself up against it and waited for the throbbing pain from his injuries to lessen.

  With a trembling hand, he touched his wounded shoulder. It didn’t feel wet, only a little tender and crusty, so the bleeding must have stopped. He had no way to assess the damage or to quell the pain, but he would have to tend to it soon lest it became infected.

  “This isn’t the worst shape you’ve been in, Jesse, but probably counts somewhere among the top three,” he mumbled to himself, which brought on another fit of coughing. Once the coughing ceased, he became aware of the eerie silence in the room again. The raptors had left which seemed odd, as they could usually keep him pinned down for days before giving up. He patted the floor around him, searching for the shotgun. Finding it, he tried to remember if he had reloaded it or not, but seemed to recall doing so. He tapped his pockets to be sure, locating no other shells.

  He fumbled for the rubber-coated button on the flashlight affixed to the gun. When he pressed the button, the light failed to come on. On further inspection with his fingers, he discovered the battery cap had come loose and the batteries had fallen out. Whatever he was going to do, it would have to be done completely in the dark. Turning, he put an ear to the door and listened for a few seconds.

  Clear.

  If he remembered correctly, he’d stuffed two shells in the gun before blacking out. They could not be squandered. He pulled on the slide to eject them and make sure he had the count right, but the pain was too great and he was too weak to do so. He would have to chance it. He moved to the right of the door. Slowly, he cracked it open. Through the gap, he shoved the shotgun, barrel first, and listened for sounds of movement. When nothing immediately happened, he swung the door open and stuck his head into the hallway, straining his ears to pick out the slightest noise. Nothing, but it was hard to tell with the ringing in his ears and his head pounding horribly. He did hear something, though, the faint sound of water dripping in the distance, but not the tell-tale sounds of clicking raptor claws or heavy breathing. Sniffing the air filled his nose with the foul stench of raptors. He had grown accustomed to the odor over the years, and it no longer made him want to retch. However, smelling it without the benefit of sight made his heart beat even harder.

  He pushed himself up on wobbly legs and entered the hallway. Feeling light-headed, he slapped a hand against the wall to steady himself then used it to guide him along as he stumbled forward. Not being able to see the way ahead was disorienting. Cramps suddenly wracked his stomach and a wave of vertigo overcame him, forcing him onto his knees.

  “No, have to.”

  Fighting against the pain and dizziness, he rose again and took another labored step. This time he did not fall, so he took another, then another, and after a few more stumbling steps, he could walk without falling over.

  With his left hand outstretched as far as the pain in his shoulder would let it go, he made his way along the wall. Gradually, his mind began to clear and he could think about more than not tripping over his own feet.

  A faint light appeared, giving him barely enough illumination to make out the vertical sides of the walls ahead. A corridor to his left looked slightly brighter and upon reaching it, he reoriented himself and could recall how to get to the room where he had left the girl. Along the way, he picked out the signs raptors had left behind, but none of the creatures remained, which was doubly strange. Even the bodies of the ones he had killed were missing. Judging by the streaks left on the floor, they had been dragged off somewhere.

  After a few minutes, he arrived at the room where he had left the girl.

  The door was ajar.

  He felt a sudden blip of panic. Using the shotgun, he opened the door all the way and pointed the gun inside the room.

  Nothing moved.

  “You there?”

  No response came, but he smelled blood.

  Had days passed? He checked his watch again, thinking back, concluding that it had only been a matter of hours or, at most, half a day since he had left her behind. Where was she? Did she get away in time? She had to have. She had to have gotten away.

  He felt his way inside the room and worked his way along the wall to an alcove where he had stored some supplies. When he reached it, he searched the stash until he found another disposable lighter. A few flicks and the flame caught.

  Inside the room were the obvious signs of struggle. The table was skewed and what had been on it had scattered across the floor. The supplies from his nylon backpack were dumped out into a loose pile, and fresh blood stained the walls.

  No. Not again. There had been so many deaths. So damn many. He had tried. Each time he had tried. But he had failed, again. He rested the shotgun against the side of his head. He was almost happy she was gone. Now, he no longer needed to care. Was she only a dream? A nightmare?

  “You’re losing it, Jesse,” he said. “There never was a girl.”

  Trembling, he set the shotgun down and withdrew the pouch hanging around his neck. He fondled the lump inside. Maybe, he realized, he was never meant to find Hannah. With as much as his body ached, he was now thinking with utter clarity again. Something he had not done in a long time. Everything he had striven for over the past five years had been for naught, broken, bent, torn asunder, every false start, every hope, and every goddamned dream. But, through it all, one thing real remained, the raptors. Christ, how he hated them. Maybe, just maybe, it was finally time for him to leave this world and enter the next, to stop being such a coward and end his life his own way and on his terms. However, he wanted to do that with the Beretta, and not the shotgun, but the M9 was hidden away four stories up in his shelter. To get to it, he would have to climb the elevator shaft. He was in no shape to do that.

  There was another way, though.

  Digging through a pile of rumpled blankets on the floor, he located an aluminum canteen. It still had water in it. He tilted it back and drank. The water felt cool against his parched throat. He gulped it down until the canteen was empty and then tossed it aside. Like most of his other stuff, he would no longer need it.

  He pried open a metal panel set in an alcove in the wall. He had stashed some ammo there. It was only a scant few shotgun shells, but that was eight more than he’d had earlier. Three additional rounds fit into the magazine, and there was already one chambered. That gave him si
x shots total including the ones in the gun before he’d reloaded. The remaining shells he stuffed into a pocket.

  Leaving the relative safety of the room, he walked to the stairs, through the lobby, and exited onto the street. There, the morning sun greeted him, casting a beam of light through the clouds that seemed to fall directly on him. He squinted against it. The warmth comforted him. He was happy to see it, feel it, one last time before he died.

  Because of his decision, everything felt new again, fresh. Everything around him seemed unique and interesting, a flower growing in the broken sidewalk, the blue sky filled with drifting clouds, birdsong off in the distance, and it all smelled fresh too, as if it was about to rain. This would be the last time he experienced the world as it was. Now, without the burden of surviving to see another day, he had finally found the peace he had sought for so many years. He had finally given up and given in totally and completely to his fate.

  His head throbbed, his shoulder throbbed, and his empty stomach seemed a foot closer to his teeth, but that would all pass soon. He drew himself up straight, taking in a deep breath of the morning air. Subtle hints of lavender on the moving breeze reached him along with a slight hint of pine.

  From off to his left, came a scraping sound. He turned his head slowly, looking up the street for the source. Someone darted between a decaying Honda and an overturned taxicab.

  -32-

  CORNERED

  ALTHOUGH HE COULD see only brief glimpses of her, Jesse was certain it was the girl. In one crushing blow, the sight of her shattered his inner resolve. Was she real? Turn back, run away, one voice in his head said. She’s a ghost of the past. She’s not real. Another said she was real, that he needed to do something. He didn’t know which to believe. Still another wondered if he had lived too long already and had been a coward since he had not stuck a gun in his mouth and blown his brains out when he had found Cheryl, and when he had found… When he had found…. He’d found…

  Hannah.

  She’d been dead the whole time. He knew it but rarely could he see it. Every so often, he had moments of clarity that let him see the truth. The phantom he’d been chasing through the city was not her, it couldn’t be, but he could not let it go. Some small part of him wanted to hope, to believe, just a little that she was real, for there was little else to cling to besides his hatred of the raptors.