Extinction Gene | Book 2 | 5 Days To Endure

by Maxey, Phil

  She wondered how many more orphans there now were across the country, or perhaps they were already dead, taken by the…

  Images of what happened to Grace forced their way into Meg’s mind, making her waver on the steering wheel briefly. When the thing’s appendages crashed through the motorhome’s window, she had thought everyone had managed to duck in time, but she was wrong, and a bloodcurdling scream erupted from the doctor’s throat, which was smothered by tentacles of something which stretched from the end of the creature’s limb. Fingers sprouted then covered the doctor’s face and in an instant changed her features. An eye melted into a mouth, then into something that Meg couldn’t even describe and was almost too shocked to act, but act she did, raising her shotgun and blasting at the thing, trying to rid its grip from poor Grace, but the damage was already done, the doctor was obviously dead. Meg went to grab the woman from the creature, when more gunshots boomed out, and the thing pulled Grace and part of the motorhome away.

  Meg must have been knocked unconscious for she awoke on the sidewalk, half buried in snow, watching that thing tear the rest of the motorhome apart. She tried to get back up when an explosion sent her flying, ending up on her butt once more. She was ashamed to admit it, but on seeing other things moving in the glow from the raging fire, she turned and ran to the nearest building she could, which turned out to be the same one that Jess and the kids ran too, she just didn’t know it until she started to explore.

  You wouldn’t believe how things have changed Liam…

  She often talked to her dead husband in her mind. Sometimes even out loud when she was sure she was alone or with her dog. The company which she and he set up a few decades earlier was one of the first to offer adventures for tourists in the Rockys. Rafting, quad biking, hiking and fishing were the main ones that people visiting the small town would choose, and Liam would take small groups out, with a few others. Her job was to manage the finances, but sometimes she too would venture into the hills, ravines and woods. It had been over a year since the cancer had claimed him, and when he finally passed she knew he was ready, and that gave her some comfort. For the first few months after, she prepared his breakfast as she always had. Two eggs, hash browns, toast and some ice tea, freshly brewed then stored to chill. She would sit and look at it, then finally eat it herself while discussing the day’s business with him as she had always done.

  After a few months of relying upon others to fill in for her husband, and with it becoming harder to get up at 5 a.m. she sold the business and made plans to travel far and wide while she still could. Except none of it came to fruition, and instead she decided to spend some time researching her family’s ties to the local area. It was one such evening of delving into the archives when a certain Keller family stormed into her life with news that the world had ended.

  She checked the rear mirror again. The boy was sleeping now too.

  Need to protect them, Liam. Use all the knowledge you taught me, that you thought I wasn’t listening too. They need to get through this, especially since…

  Her eyes started to moisten at the thought of the other young boy being taken by one of those things, and the husband who seemed a good man.

  I’ll get them to Missouri. Get more of that stuff, and we’re find a place to hide out for a few more days.

  *****

  5: 23 a.m. Trailstone.

  “No, we have to go now, while it’s still dark,” said Landon. “The things, they don’t like the cold. It subdues them or something. That’s why they were drawn to the motorhome. If we wait until daylight it will be too late.” Arlene and Daryl avoided the former detective’s attention, both sat next to each other on the floor of the office, with their backs to the wall.

  “You don’t know what you saw in the car, could have been—”

  “I know my wife and child!” said Landon interrupting the young woman. “It was them. They’re heading east, and we can catch up with them. Or you want to stay in this infested town? You won’t last another night.”

  Daryl looked at her. “Maybe he’s…” He looked away from the eyes that burned with anger.

  She looked up at Landon. “And you think you’re going to survive, out there? In the storm, with those things everywhere? I say we wait until we can actually see stuff! Then we find a place to hide out, in this town. How much time we got left? Four and a bit more days? That’s easy, we can do that.” She looked at the young man next to her. “Ain’t that so, Daryl?”

  “Err…” He looked between the woman and the man, not knowing who to agree with.

  “Daryl?” she said again.

  “On my way back, I spotted some houses with their cars still in the drive. The keys have to be inside somewhere. Probably find some food, supplies as well. Just a few minutes walk from here, but we have to go while it’s dark. While the things are distracted by the few remaining fires in the motorhome.” Arlene folded her arms. Landon looked at Daryl for an answer.

  “Yeah, I’m going with you,” said Daryl.

  “What?! That’s not what we agreed!”

  Daryl got to his feet. “You’re immune. I ain’t. In just over half a day I become like the things outside. You want that to happen to me?”

  She looked away again. “I ain’t going anywhere.”

  “You can’t stay here alone!” said Daryl. “Landon’s right. You won’t be able to survive in this town. There are too many things.”

  “Reckon my chances are better than wondering around in the dark!”

  Daryl sighed, shaking his head. He looked back at Landon. “Sorry man, I can’t leave her.”

  Landon nodded. “I understand. Well, if you do decide to head east. We’re heading to Jefferson City.” He held his hand out and Daryl shook it.

  “I hope you find them.”

  “I will.” Landon looked at Josh. “You don’t let go of my hand. Got it? But if someone happens, you run? You run as fast as you can and get inside a building. Any building. And you hide. Okay?” The young boy nodded.

  Daryl gestured towards the flashlight, the only source of light in the room. “You should take that, it’s yours…”

  “Keep it. You’re going to need it.” Landon opened the only exit the room had and listened. On only hearing the sound of the distant wind, he offered his hand to Josh who took it, and led him outside. Landon had made sure to memorize the layout as best he could the first time he crept through the hallways, and with only the slightest bump into a potted plant and a glance off a water dispenser, he found the rear door of the building once more. He was glad it was a block away from the burned out vehicle, otherwise there would be no escaping. “How’s your eyes? Adjusted yet?”

  “I… think so,” said Josh.

  “Good. Outside, the snow makes the ground easier to see.” Landon placed his hand on the cold metal handle and slowly turned it. The icy cold air squeezed through the gap, and he extended his hearing and olfactory sense as far outside as he could, but if there was one of the foul smelling things hiding around the corner of the building, his nose, already burning from the cold wasn’t warning him of it. “We’re going to run straight ahead, through the parking lot,” he whispered. “Try and stay low, and keep to the cars. After that, there’s a road and some residences on the other side. We’ll head to those.”

  “Okay.”

  Landon pulled the door further open. He was right about the blanket of white that covered everything in sight. It gave him a pretty good indication of what was ground and wasn’t. The parking lot wasn’t far, but it was impossible to cover the fresh icy crystals that lay beneath their feet in silence. If there was something within ten… fifteen feet of them. It would know.

  He let out a breath, which made itself known as a cloud of mist and crept forward, bending over as was his son. The snow had stopped falling, allowing the forms within the dark to be more clearly defined, and they headed towards the first mound of metal and ice, moving around bushes and then a defunct street light.

  Not
wanting to waste any time, Landon kept on going. To their right were windows of some sort that were reflecting a smudge of light from the sky, but to their left was nothing at all, just a mass of black, with the lighter sky silhouetting buildings maybe a few hundred yards away.

  They passed a car, then a truck, a van and another car, each one seemingly abandoned, and made it to the last, a coupe. This one’s rear door was open. Landon started to detour in its direction, when a metallic stench hit him. He felt Josh pull on his arm and he moved with him, away from the fumes of death.

  They quickly crossed the road. A row of trees were obvious even in the almost complete black, and from the shapes that presented themselves, a long rectangular barrier and higher, triangular shapes, Landon realized they had arrived at the first of the houses he had seen earlier.

  He spun around, trying to get any sense of something following them, but it wasn’t possible to see further than ten feet. At least the creatures weren’t shy when they knew where you were. So he presumed so far at least, they had not been detected. He looked back to what must have been the sidewalk, and the fence which ran alongside it.

  Go around the front or over…

  He turned to his side, leaning closer to Josh. “We’re going to climb over this fence,” he whispered. “I’ll lift you up and you climb down the other side.”

  “Okay.”

  In one movement, he did just that. Josh grabbed the top of the wooden fence and—

  A noise echoed out, just as his son hit the ground on the other side. A sound Landon never thought he would hear again. Growling.

  In one leap he grabbed the top of the fence, pulling himself up and looked down upon an angry shape that was jostling forwards and back as if it were tied…

  A dog?

  The question as to how it could still be alive was to be answered another day. Right now he was more concerned with the increasingly loud grunts and snarls it was producing. He dropped down near his son, who appeared terrified. “It’s okay, Josh. It’s tied up. It can’t hurt you. Come on, we need to get in the house and find any car keys we can.”

  Both turned and ran as quickly as they could, leaving behind the growling animal.

  As Landon’s outstretched hands hit the wooden planks of a back wall, something landed with a clump on the snow behind him. He looked back in panic, waiting for an attack, but then realized Josh had fallen. “Are you okay?” he said to the boy was getting back to his feet.

  “Yeah.”

  “Come on. The door’s just—”

  A crash of something came from a few streets over, as if a wooden construction had just exploded.

  Landon swung back towards the house, feeling along the wall until he found the door, and then handle, which turned but did not open the door. Not wasting any time he slammed into it, breaking it open. A rotten, putrid smell escaped out into the night, and he flung his hand out behind him, stopping his son in his tracks from following.

  “I think it’s rotten food,” said Josh.

  He was right. Nothing moved inside the small space across the threshold. Landon pulled Josh with him, and they moved into a kitchen. “Look for flashlights, matches and packets of food, or tins in the cupboards. I’m searching in the hallway.”

  As Landon moved forward, feeling across the wallpaper then door frame, he was sure the silence in the streets was broken, and was in no doubt he and his son’s time was running out. He traced across the walls, finding frames of various sizes, then found a handle to a closet. He pulled it open, and quickly felt the pockets of the coats, but all were empty of any keys.

  Suddenly he could see. He turned around to the glare from a flashlight that Josh was holding. “Well done.” He took it from his son and scanned the hallway, instantly seeing a set of keys sitting on a small side table. He grabbed them and looked back to the boy who was holding a can of fish and a box of dog biscuits.

  “We shouldn’t leave him,” said Josh. “The monsters will get him.”

  As if the animal heard itself be mentioned, the dog started to bark.

  “We can’t take a dog with us, Josh! We have to…” The look of sadness on his son’s face was almost worse than what he knew to be bearing down on them outside. He ran forward, taking the box, and as he passed through the kitchen grabbed a large knife from a rack. “If he tries to bite me, I’m leaving him! Stay here!”

  As Landon ran into the backyard, the sounds of hoofs or clawed feet, he wasn’t sure which, were stomping through the snow of the surrounding town, breaking things as they made their way towards him and his son. He looked at the dog, whose growl and shadow in the dark made it appear a lot larger than it actually was. He guessed it was a kind of terrier, with brown and white markings. It continued barking and growling, its head shifting between the imposter in front of it and towards the fence. Landon pulled the box apart clumsily, grabbing a handful of biscuits and threw them forward. The dog snapped one midair and munched on it, then went to do the same to the others on the ground, when its head and tail stood erect, and it growled towards the fence again.

  Landon looked in the same direction, but moved towards the animal who now had no interest in him whatsoever. Carefully, he pulled the dog’s lead that was over a hook on its kennel and pulled it backwards, with him towards the house, while watching the fence. A smell started to drift on the light wind, which the dog obviously caught first. “Come on, we’re going.” Landon said. The dog turned and ran inside, almost pulling Landon with him. He closed the rear door with one hand, and moved quickly through the kitchen to the hallway, where Josh turned with glee across his face. “You got your dog,” said Landon. “And now we really need to leave.”

  Josh held up a plastic bag. “I put some more food in here.”

  “Great.”

  The dog let out a subtle bark towards the back of the house, which Landon glanced at then turned his attention to the street out front, which he was watching through the small panes of glass in the front door. It looked quiet. Suspiciously so, but the block like shape beyond the lawn suggested a pickup of some sort. He had no idea if the keys were for it, but there were no other vehicles in sight.

  Has to be it.

  If it wasn’t, they would be stuck out in the street. An easy target for anything out there. He looked back at Josh. “These keys are for that pickup outside. We’re going to run to it. When I unlock the doors, you climb in, or just jump in the back. Don’t—” The wooden fence in the backyard exploded in a clattering of planks and splinters. Landon didn’t bother finishing his sentence. He slid the latch aside and pulled the door open. “Come on!” he shouted to his son. Both of them sprinted across the foot of snow covering the lawn to the pickup, neither getting a chance to fully check their surroundings.

  Landon plucked the keys from his pocket, sliding them into the keyhole and with desperate hope in his mind, turned the keys. The door unlocked and he pulled it open, while Josh did the same on the other side. The dog jumped up inside, seemingly having done that before and Landon climbed in, placing the keys in the—

  “It’s coming!” shouted Josh, but Landon’s focus was on one thing only. The engine fired up, the headlights illuminating dark shapes lumbering towards them. He put it in drive and slammed down on the gas. The wheels spun, then the whole vehicle jolted forward, quickly gaining speed, as he steered left around something which lunged at them from the dark, then the same to the right, but this time the creature clipped the back and the pickup slid to the side, pushing them into the side of a parked car. As they scraped along it, Landon kept hard down on the gas, breaking them free. He had no idea what direction they were heading, but the street ahead lacked any unnatural shapes and that was enough.

  CHAPTER TEN

  5: 57 a.m. Highway 70, heading east.

  Jess’s sleep lacked dreams, being a void which she fell in and out of between glimpses of the four-lane road they were still driving along. Whispers at the edge of her mind talked of inconsolable loss and tragedy, but she fla
t out refused to listen to them. Her imagination was playing tricks on her, she would say to herself. Josh and Landon are ‘out there’, lost, but one day they will all be reunited. Meanwhile, she just needs to run, hide and survive. Be ready for when the virus had finished its course and the world could return to normal…

  Never return… all de—

  A green sign passed by mentioning another of the small towns they had already passed. She forced herself to imagine what it looked like. Not with unthinkable things living in the shadows, but when humans walked the sidewalks and drove the streets. Happy Sunday mornings with your children, or enjoying the evening, after a long day at—

  “We need to make a decision,” said Meg.

  “Uh? What decision,” said Jess.

  Meg gestured towards the fuel gauge. “Reckon we can do maybe another twenty miles before we’re out. There’s a small town, pretty remote, coming up. There’s bound to be a gas station at the entrance to it. This will be our best chance to fill back up without being attacked.”

  Jess heard Sam’s breathing increase. “Umm… yes, of course. That’s what we should do. We need…”

  Run, hide, survive…

  “We need to have fuel, so we can get to Missouri.”

  Meg steered to the right, following the sweeping bend. The landscape was almost completely flat, and the headlights on the old sedan allowed for a view of hundreds of yards. The flat, single story structures of a gas station soon became apparent. “There. Just what I thought. If we can’t get the pumps working, there should be some fuel in the store. Can get some water and food as well, hopefully.” She looked at Jess who smiled. The older woman was struck by the younger’s oddly detached behavior, but this wasn’t the time to pick over what was the right way to grieve.