And he didn’t see any other course of action.
Wayne Raylens was howling at the moon. There was no doubt on that score. He made king crazy of the clan crazy look like the last sane man on earth.
It may have been caused by the catastrophe, but Pearcey had a feeling that good old Wayne had been wearing tin foil hats long before the Collapse event.
Chapter 12
On Foot
Wayne Raylens led them through two dark doorways.
Into a storeroom that was darker and dingier still. Racking crammed into the space without any suggestion of logic or planning.
The shelves were piled high with of an assortment of stock. The floor was strewn with cardboard boxes and old style mouse traps.
Two of the traps held mice. Desiccated dry things that were pinned on the spikes of the traps.
It occurred to Pearcey that he hoped Mr Anwar’s pricing policy had been competitive, because his housekeeping and hygiene standards left a lot to be desired.
Irrelevant thoughts when he had weightier matters to worry about.
He needed to focus.
Raylens stood by a heavily bolted door.
Old but sturdy.
Timber reinforced with steel plates.
It had the look of homemade. That would be about right.
Mr Anwar watched the pennies so that the pounds could look after themselves. Do it yourself was usually a popular option when your gaze was continually drawn to the bottom of the balance sheet. When you couldn’t resist a regular glance at the growing pile of pennies.
In the short term anyway.
Pearcey thought that cutting corners had a habit of catching up with you at some point.
A small bunch of keys were already hanging in one of the two locks. Raylens unlocked those and slid back the bolts.
The porcine mask swung around in their direction.
“Are you ready?”
All three of them nodded but didn’t speak.
<><><>
What struck Pearcey as they emerged was that it really was getting dark.
He was expecting to be half blinded after the gloom of the storeroom, but it wasn’t any great shock.
The light wasn’t that strong. In fact, it was worryingly weak. Clouds obscured the May brightness,
The sun was low, and it was only going to get lower. The light was slanted, casting huge shadows.
He mentally brushed it away, the concern about the light. He’d get it done as fast as he could and that was all he could do.
The door squealed as it opened to its full extent.
They were in a gated yard. Enclosed by crumbling brick walls. High enough to prevent you seeing over. Punctuated by old wooden gates.
They heard the scuffling sound first.
Then the talons as they appeared at the top of the wall.
For a few seconds, it was like some hideous guessing game. What’s on the end of these corded clawed hands?
The moment was blissfully brief.
There was a scrabbling sound.
Claws on brick.
It vaulted on to the narrow top of the wall.
Perched there on all fours.
Fixed them with an utterly animalistic stare. A hunting thing regarding potential prey. Food that hadn’t been caught yet. There was nothing human in that stare.
Its mouth chittered.
A twitching chewing movement. As if it could imagine the taste of their flesh and blood and desperately wanted it. Hungered for that taste the way a parched throat hungers for water.
Whatever unknowable thoughts were drifting through its head, it made a fairly quick judgement.
Pearcey didn’t really think there’d ever been any doubt.
It dropped into the yard and came at them.
<><><>
However crazy Wayne Raylens was, and Pearcey was pretty much convinced that he was nuttier than a bar of fruit and nut, the man acted decisively.
There was no delay.
No hesitation.
Before Pearcey could move, the man had jumped in front of them. Not graceful or practised, just fast.
Scarily fast.
There was a fearlessness, a certainty, in that speed. It unsettled Pearcey as much as the lethal weapon and the ridiculous but nevertheless intimidating mask.
The rifle was shouldered as he moved.
The bayonet was in his hand without Pearcey seeing how it got there. It seemed to simply appear from inside his parka.
<><><>
And of course, what else would it be but a bayonet?
An antique bit of ephemera salvaged from God knew where. Blade sharpened and polished, handle stained with old sweat.
Some relic from some conflict somewhere in space and time.
Like the mask.
Crazy Wayne was an eclectic collector, so surprise was the order of the day. He’d surprise you at every turn.
He collected conspiracy theories like stamps and hoarded weapons like life insurance policies.
He may have been scared of things, but they weren’t the things that normal people were scared of.
He was concerned about aliens reading his thoughts and whisking him up into the sky to probe his private parts with phone home fingers. Probe his mind with organic filaments thinner than the finest strand of hair.
He thought the streetlights moved and watched him as he walked down the road. Recording his movements and thoughts. Sent those recordings to faraway galaxies and puppet clones in positions of power. Leaders that could unpeel their faces and reveal Cthulhu reality beneath the human façade.
He worried where the next invasion was coming from, not the next meal.
For Pearcey, he’d become another unknown quantity in a world that was now dominated by deadly unknowns.
Pearcey was sick beyond words of unknown quantities.
<><><>
Raylens dealt with the creature with ruthless efficiency. A minimum of fuss. Despatched it without pause.
As it ran towards him with the yearning, hungry gait that Pearcey had already come to recognise, Raylens went to meet it.
There was no fear or hesitancy.
No lack of confidence in his movement.
The antique bayonet flashed forward.
Raylens seemed to almost embrace the creature as he buried the blade into its gaping mouth.
Slid it between bared teeth and punched it out of the back of its skull.
A splash of maroon and a strangled squeal of inhuman agony.
Pearcey filed the technique for future reference.
<><><>
Wayne Raylens stood back, withdrawing the long blade in the same motion.
Accomplished and competent.
Let the creature fall, weakly jerking and thrashing on the ground.
Pearcey tried to balance conflicting emotions.
Tried to calculate their survival chances factored in with the fluctuating elements. Looked round and assessed the others.
Angela, the girl woman in black, hiding by the door.
Ready to bolt back inside.
Gallagher gaping, the steel bar dangling from his hand, limp and unready.
Raylens turned to them all. Walked a little closer.
“They’re not reading our thoughts anymore or abducting us. They’ve learned all they need to know. This is the battle now. The invasion. Clever that they’re using our own bodies.”
He fiddled with the mask and spoke again.
Muffled speech.
“Clever, dirty alien bastards.”
Gallagher looked to Pearcey. Perplexed.
Pearcey ignored him. He’d made his own assessment of Raylens and Gallagher was welcome to do the same. It didn’t change the fact that, as of that precise moment, Raylens was their best shot at getting to Gallagher’s home.
And, more importantly, his daughter.
Besides which, he really didn’t want to upset Raylens. The guy was clearly insane, had an automatic weapon, and seemed partic
ularly adept at handling sharp implements.
That added up to think twice before offending in Pearcey’s book.
Especially when you needed the nutcase in question.
<><><>
Raylens indicated the gate to the yard and they trailed after him.
He produced a key to the padlock and chain that secured it. Clicked it open and pocketed the padlock along with the key.
They emerged into a dingy alley that must have served as a service road for the shops. Littered with rubbish and empty boxes. Black plastic bags that were split and spewing their contents.
Raylens turned left and started walking.
Stopped and turned back to them when they didn’t immediately follow.
“Keep up fuckers. We don’t want to get separated out here.”
Pearcey, despite any number of misgivings and an urge to smash the mask from his face, had a tendency to agree.
They’d taken twenty paces when the two creatures appeared in front of them at the end of the road.
One huge.
Naked.
Hideous and hairless. A body that looked hard and terribly thin. Criss-crossed by thick tuberous lines below the surface of a skin that held an aspect of cured leather.
Another smaller creature at its side.
Dressed in the tattered remnants of what might have been business trousers and a work shirt. Hanging off it like skin that was shedding.
Slow, skulking movement that stopped abruptly as they caught sight of possible prey. A momentary pause, stock still and poised, as they evaluated the potential.
Decision reached, they ran at them.
From behind him, he heard Gallagher curse.
Pearcey glanced over his shoulder and his heart fell. A sudden sinking despair added to the apprehension at what was in front of them.
There was another.
Running at them from back where they’d come from.
Gallagher moved to meet it, blocking its path to the girl who stood rigid, frozen against the high brick wall of one of the yards in the alley.
“Worry about the other two, I’ll do this.”
Whispered, barely spoken as Gallagher clutched the steel bar and braced himself to battle the beast.
Pearcey swung back and was amazed to see that Raylens was twenty feet away, jogging towards the first two creatures that had appeared. The antique bayonet back in one hand. With the other, he unshouldered the rifle.
For one awful moment, Pearcey thought the man was going to start shooting. It would have been understandable, those things were like the worst wild animal you could imagine.
And more than that. A nightmare given substance, a bad dream rendered in strange flesh and buckled bone.
But the noise would be calamitous, bring more of them like rotten meat will draw flies.
It didn’t matter, Raylens was already too far away for Pearcey to change anything.
The creatures were slightly staggered in their approach. The larger one was faster, longer legs eating a little more ground with each loping stride.
Raylens met them at an angle.
Shuffled and dodged at the last possible second.
Drove the bayonet under the jaw of the first. Up and into whatever was beyond.
Used the rifle as a lance to fend off the second, deflect it as he turned and withdrew the blade from the first. It wasn’t pretty or graceful, just brutally effective.
The smaller creature stumbled, claws skittering and losing grip.
Fell and bounded to its feet again, savage and spitting.
It didn’t stand a chance. Raylens advanced and repeated the trick he’d demonstrated in the yard.
Slammed the bayonet between its teeth.
Stood and surveyed the damage he’d done. The two twitching things on the litter-strewn ground at his feet.
Pearcey shook off his paralysis.
Dismissed the sense of mild awe that Raylens inspired in him.
Dismissed the desire to go over and inspect the results of the man’s handiwork. Instead, he turned and ran to Gallagher.
<><><>
The girl in black, Angela, was where she’d been.
Leaned against the wall as if it might absorb her, camouflage her existence. As if crumbling red brick hues could mask the starkness of monochrome shrouded humanity.
Gallagher was on his knees. The steel bar held limply in his hands.
The creature lying a little further away.
Thick mutated blood spreading an unholy halo around its unholy head.
In his own way, Gallagher seemed as efficient a killing machine as Wayne Raylens.
Chapter 13
Home Run
Pearcey squatted by Gallagher, his attention switching between the nearby monster and his kneeling friend.
He laid a hand on the man’s shoulder and watched as Gallagher slowly lifted his head to stare at him.
A simple nod, and he helped him stand.
Pearcey wanted to embrace him. Opted for a supporting arm.
“Are you okay?”
Gallagher nodded again.
“Tired. Fucking knackered, if truth be told.”
That was good enough.
Pearcey was tired as well. He felt like eternity had passed by and left him behind to follow.
Faded and weary and running to catch up.
Wayne Raylens strolled up to them. Utterly incomprehensible and verging on indispensable.
It was ridiculous.
Pearcey felt holed below the waterline. Buoyancy leaking away and no way of plugging the leak. That this prick was his best bet was galling beyond words. Yet, he had no choice.
You played the odds.
Put your money on the horse that offered the best chance of a return. After that it was a pointless exercise. You embraced your selection and accepted the outcome.
It was useless to ponder. Worse than that, it was a distraction.
Gas masked head flicking backwards and forwards.
Unreadable.
“The aliens are here. It’s a real fucking deal. First, they read our thoughts and took us up to study our bodies. Examined us and decided to take over by the backdoor.”
A hideous gargling sound that might have been laughter inside the mask.
Hard to tell. It distorted sound, the mask.
“It’s taken them a long time and they’ve gotten careless over the years. Some of them crashed. That’s where the stories come from. Roswell and all of the rest. The vampires and the changelings. It didn’t matter by then of course, they could be as careless as they fucking-well liked. They had their mind claws into government and big business. Ran them like glove puppets. They controlled the influencers. They invented Twitter and Facebook. Did you know that?”
Pearcey could think of nothing to say that wouldn’t be antagonistic.
Gallagher stared blankly at the blank glass eyes of Raylens mask.
Angela Gacek muttered something. Pearcey scarcely caught it.
“You’re deranged.”
He wasn’t sure if Wayne Raylens heard her. He might have. His head might have twitched in her direction.
He didn’t say anything to her, made no sign that he’d heard her.
But it unsettled Pearcey, the girl saying that.
They couldn’t afford a confrontation. Not with an armed and clearly capable man, crazy or not. Not inside the store and definitely not out here, given the situation.
Gallagher changed the subject.
“Should we try and find another car?”
The same thing had occurred to Pearcey.
He wasn’t any car thief, but he thought he might be able to start something if it was old enough. Some junker from the nineties maybe.
But that route was fraught with difficulties.
They didn’t have the time or the option to casually stroll the streets looking for a likely candidate vehicle.
The clock was ticking.
Pretty soon it would be dark and that didn�
�t bear thinking about. He’d rather be stranded in Beirut on a bad night.
It struck him again that he was too old for this shit.
Nowadays, he was just a scary big black guy cut-out of a person.
Someone to stand by semi important people and appear intimidating.
A glorified driver with a gun who just happened to be able to shoot straight and punch hard if need be.
The army life was well behind him, along with most of his appetite for destruction. Now, his tastes ran more to slippers and sweat pants and a quiet evening in with a bottle of bourbon and a book.
Raylens pulled him out of introspection. The man shook his head, the swinging snout of the mask a darkly hypnotic fascination.
“If we’re careful and quiet, on foot is better. Even if we can find a car, the noise will alert them. By the time we get to your flat, they’ll be swarming us. I’ve seen it, their alien insect hearing is so fucking awesome. They’ve made us into killing machines to exterminate us. It’s a flawless plan. All we can do is resist”
Pearcey couldn’t agree the logic but the conclusion resonated with him.
The few of them that hadn’t undergone the mutation were up against odds that would give a bookie sleepless nights if he had any doubts about his reckoning.
Gallagher spoke and settled the matter.
“There’s a car at my place. In the garages at the back. We can use that to get back to the bunker.”
And that was that.
They followed the man in the mask because the choices had diminished with the light. In the new world, options narrowed in a heartbeat and outcomes were shrouded in veils of vaporous grey.
<><><>
A fever dream version of reality descended then.
Minutes, certainly less than an hour, that stretched like soft eternity.
A nightmare creep through darkening streets, along gloomy alleyways.
Wayne Raylens led them and didn’t falter.
Whatever he was beneath the disturbing mask and bulky coat, his instinct for survival seemed unquestionable. He demonstrated an uncanny knack for sensing trouble before it fully revealed itself.
Diverting them on to different routes before disaster could strike.
At one point, his instinct deserted him. They stumbled into some unknown square and he instantly herded them back.
Ferine Apocalypse (Novella): 4 Hours Page 7
