Deadliest of the Species

by Michael Oliveri

  Finally the footsteps started again. Two steps came toward the cave, then he heard the person turn away and start back up the side of the sinkhole. He breathed a sigh of relief. “Sounds like they’re leaving.”

  “Who do you think it was?” Bart whispered.

  “Obviously nobody who knew about the cave. Let’s give it a few minutes for them to get out of range, then we’ll climb out. Hopefully, they won’t have set up camp to watch for us.”

  Bart agreed. “It’s a good thing Ed and Steve covered the entrance for us. We never would have been able to do a good enough job from the inside.”

  They decided ten minutes was more than enough time, and they checked the passage of that time periodically with brief flicks of the flashlight. Afterward, Tim pushed aside one of the boards and poked his head outside. He half expected a shout, or worse, a blow to the head, but nothing came. The sinkhole was clear and he did not see anyone moving along the edge of the trees. Satisfied at least for the moment, he pushed aside another board and hauled himself out of the cave. He reached a helping hand down to Bart, who tucked his pistol back into his waistband.

  As Bart dusted himself off, Tim bent to examine what appeared to be a set of footprints. Or, more likely, hoofprints. The moonlight would not give him a good look, so he took a chance and turned on his flashlight. As the beam played over the prints, he had little doubt who the prints belonged to. He crouched down and ran a finger along the front edge where the front of a cloven hoof left a triangular impression.

  “It was Sebastian,” he said grimly, turning the light back off.

  “The satyr?”

  “Take a look.” Tim turned the flashlight back on to give Bart a better look. “See that? What else would leave prints like a big goat? That sure isn’t a horse’s footprint.”

  “Jesus Christ.” Bart’s face paled. “I didn’t think he was real. I mean, you know, after living here so many years and having never heard of him,” he continued at a look from Tim. “I thought maybe you saw something out there, that night…But Jesus…”

  “Well, I wasn’t hallucinating. And now we both know it.”

  “Hey you guys!” a voice called. Little more than a whisper, it still startled the wits out of them.

  “Steve! God damn it, boy! You scared the hell out of me!”

  The young man jogged down the slope, carrying a bulging pack over one shoulder. In his opposite hand he carried what looked like a big metal suitcase. He breathed heavily and looked relieved as he set his burdens on the ground. “Sorry I took so long to get back,” he gasped. “Momma took the car, so I had to hike it.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Bart said, opening the pack. “We’re just glad you made it at all.” Inside he found a few cans of various soups, some bread, cheese, meat, and a few sets of utensils. In a separate pouch, Steve packed some basic toiletries like soap and deodorant. “Wow, kid. Looks like you thought of just about everything.”

  Steve handed the suitcase-object to Tim. “This here’s a camp stove. It’s been sitting in our basement for years. Momma’ll never miss it. There’s a canister inside that’s mostly full of gas. Should last you a couple days, I think. It won’t make any smoke, either.”

  Tim was surprised he did not recognize it sooner. His father had one almost like it when he was a kid. Turn the valve on the propane canister, light the burner, and you were all set. He hopped down into the cave entrance and stashed the stove inside. He then accepted the pack from Bart and set it beside the stove.

  “I have some news, too,” Steve said solemnly. “It’s Ed.”

  “Aw, shit,” Bart said.

  “On the way back last night, the cats were all watchin’ us. Lined up in the streets, like we were having a parade or something. Ed got upset, mumbled something about how he hated being spied on. Before I could do anything about it, he threw a piton at a couple of them. He hit one of the cats, probably hurt it pretty bad if he didn’t kill it. A little after noon, when I went to the market to pick up some of this stuff, Gus told me he’d seen Ed out in the fields. He was trussed up like a scarecrow, just like some of the other guys. Gus said the birds were already picking at his face.”

  “Oh, God,” Bart said, his voice thick with sorrow. “They killed him for a fucking cat.” Tears filled his eyes.

  “There may be more to it than that, though I think they would have done it anyway,” Steve continued.

  “How’s that?” Tim asked. Bart sobbed and turned away from them.

  “A few of them met us at the water works. Cassandra and Genevieve, Gretchen, Hera, and a couple of the others. They asked us a couple questions. You know, where were we, where were you guys, have we seen you, and so forth. Ed told them we were up fixing a bad transformer on the cliffs. He said you were supposed to meet us, but never showed. Then he made a rude comment to Gretchen. I thought she was going to kill us both.”

  “Any word on Jack?” Bart asked. He struggled to regain his composure and wore a stern expression.

  “No, sir. I asked Gus, but he hadn’t seen or heard from the boy. After that, I spent most of the day at home. Didn’t want Momma to get too suspicious.”

  “She lets you come and go as you please?” Tim asked.

  “More or less. She assumes I’m doing some work or other for the farm. I also help another guy on the other side of town. She figures if I’m not tending our field, I’m helping him. Besides, she doesn’t think I have the guts for this sort of thing.” He grinned proudly. “Speaking of which, you’ll have to make do with just the food for now. Without the car, I couldn’t carry all this and some bedding materials.”

  “That’s fine. I think I would rather have the food anyway. Come on. Let’s get back under cover while Tim and I eat. We’ll fill you in on some of our plans.”

  * * *

  Bart normally considered himself to be calm under any amount of stress. He had many lessons in doing just that. It started in high school, on the varsity wrestling team, struggling to keep his weight down without sacrificing strength, speed, and endurance. The competition in the state championship meets. A brief stint in the military, which included orders to go to Saigon in ’75, which were changed at the last minute when U.S. forces pulled out of Viet Nam. Teaching phys ed, and then coaching wrestling on top of it. His wife’s cancer and keeping up with the medical bills as well as house payments and other bills.

  Then the situation in Rapture came to a head. While most of the violence had, at first, been relegated to the background, he had been involved in a good part of it, alongside men like Ed and Father Mike. After years of political and physical fighting and a number of funerals, the real fighting broke out. For two weeks, houses burned and people died as what amounted to a full-scale war broke following what was intended to be a peaceful protest. While Bart had not been one of the leaders at that point, he played his part and saw his share of the action.

  After that came the day-to-day stress of just dealing with the witches. Once they conquered the town they enforced their control with harassment, cruelty, and violence. And, in some cases, the funerals continued.

  He never felt truly afraid then, either. He knew nearly every woman in town. He respected the power the witches wielded and accepted it as a part of life, both his and theirs. Secretly, he continued to assist people in trouble, people like Tim. He helped a number of people get out of town. Even when the mutilation of escapees began up on the ridge, he continued the work with Rapture’s “underground” and was among the first to check out the caves beneath the cliff wall.

  Now, for the first time in many years, he was fully in the grip of fear and stress. His life turned itself upside down over the past twenty-four hours. He lived in a cave, and doubtless the plans he made with this homeless stranger (who was also the father of the child of the enemy) were going to bring back all the violence and death.

  But he had a grip on all that. He accepted it as soon as he opened his door to bring Tim into his home, and his calm and his quick thinking a
llowed the two of them to escape.

  No, the problem was the hoofed creature that could be watching them right now. Every rustle of leaves, every snap of a twig, and his hand flew to his gun. He would simply carry it, but he was feared if he got startled he would shoot Steve in the back. Or, just as bad, he would accidentally fire at a small animal and the noise would bring the demon Sebastian down upon them.

  Bart had little doubt to Sebastian’s true origins. Tim, whether agnostic or atheist, fell back to his scholastic education for his explanation. When he first described the beast in the woods, he classified it as a “satyr,” the classic creature from Greek myth that lived in the woods and seduced or raped women.

  Bart, a devoutly religious man, rarely missed a mass, even during the worst times in Rapture. He had been part of masses where Father Tierney preached to only three parishioners. Even after the murder of Father Tierney he refused to let his spiritual self suffer. Thus, when he first heard Tim’s description of Sebastian, he reminded himself the satyr myths were just that: myths. The Greeks, though their society was great and prosperous, had still been spiritually immature and unenlightened. Like most primitive cultures, they assigned supernatural traits to unexplained phenomena. Bart first assumed Tim must have been mistaken as a result of fear and darkness, though Bart he never admitted as much to Tim.

  What he had not doubted at the time was some unseen force acting behind the scenes with the women. That was why he asked Tim to describe what he saw that night in the forest to Ed and Steve. Not so they would fear the satyr, but to confirm their suspicions.

  The hoofprints in the sinkhole shattered all that.

  Father Tierney showed Bart that while the witchcraft the women used was sacrilegious and heretical, it was not necessarily the work of the Devil. The pagan magic was the work of ancient, heathen religions. In theory, it was no different than the ceremonial rituals of Native American religion and folklore. As a result, he had not been overly concerned. He trusted that his faith in God would protect him from the works of dead religions.

  Now, it appeared the women crossed that line. They sold their souls to the Devil and consorted with demons. The beast Sebastian walked on cloven hooves, evidence of his Hellish origin. Summoned, Bart was sure, for the express purpose of hunting them down. And, because it was a creature of Hell, he feared his faith alone may not be enough to protect him. The fact gnawed at his spirit and he prayed silently for strength.

  He found himself questioning his faith. Why would God have forsaken the town of Rapture and its inhabitants? How is it He could turn his back while the women perpetrated their magic and violence? He even allowed one of His priests to be murdered at the hands of the witches, thus abandoning what remained of His flock in Rapture. With no spiritual leader and demons running free in the streets, what chance did an aged wrestler, a lost stranger, and a young farmer have?

  This fact terrified him most of all, and as he ducked through branches and around trees with his hand hovering over his handgun, he prayed more desperately than ever before.

  * * *

  When the group of men reached the fringe of the woodland scarcely twenty yards from the street, they belly-crawled beneath a hedgerow to watch the streets from concealment. Between their position and the street sat a small park and children’s playground, currently empty due to the late hour. They watched the street for several moments, but no sign of foot or vehicle traffic appeared. Three of the houses on the block had lights on in various rooms.

  “Let’s go. Stick to the shadows,” Tim said unnecessarily.

  They emerged together, spreading out a bit as they rounded the jungle gym and swing set, then crossed the street and moved for the nearest corner. They tried to act casual as they did so, but could not help looking over their shoulders every few steps. Thankfully they did not spot any cats or birds. Their destination, which Tim began to think of as their target, waited only a few blocks away.

  The power distribution center was not an altogether impressive place. Essentially, it was a small, fenced lot receiving the incoming power lines from over the cliffs. A cluster of metal towers dominated the lot, rising from the center. A tiny tool shack rusted in one corner, surrounded by large metal boxes painted in a drab green color. The entire collection rose from a foot-high concrete pad with a surface like sandpaper. The buzz of electricity moving through the lines came steadily from one of the larger boxes, mounted upon which were several large coils.

  For a moment, Tim feared they would have to climb the fence and wrestle the three rows of barbed wire topping the fence all around the perimeter. But, as they reached the gate, Bart pulled out his set of keys and flipped through them for a moment. He unlocked the gate and swung it wide.

  “Okay,” Bart whispered. “Let me get some things out of the shed. You two keep an eye out for trouble.”

  A fifty foot buffer zone of loose dirt and sparse grass stretched between the fence and the nearest yards in the event of a fire. Tim felt naked out in the open area, and he paced restlessly as he watched the nearby houses. His heart leapt as a light came on in an upper level window, but though a shadow passed across the drawn curtains nobody looked outside. Steve circled the lot, eyes alert. A sharp metallic clank startled both men out of their wits. They realized the tense situation artificially raised the volume of every little sound they made, but did not let their guard down.

  Ten minutes later, Bart called them back inside the fence perimeter and quickly showed them a few tools he laid out near the tool shed. Most of the tools looked like oversized wrenches, but Bart also pulled out a four-gallon can of gasoline. He explained they used it for fueling the old gas generator in the shed, but tonight it would serve to make their lives a little easier.

  Bart then briefly showed them which pieces of machinery did what, and how they needed to go about disabling the power center. While Tim and Bart went to work-disengaging the power boxes and circuit breakers, Steve went from door to door of the metal boxes, opening each one and splashing the insides liberally with gasoline. He left a trail of liquid between them so they would all go up with one match. Within the first few moments, they plunged the other side of town into darkness. As Bart finished up, the houses and streetlamps all around them went dark.

  “Okay, let’s get out of here before someone gets nosey!” Bart said. Steve passed him a book of matches. He struck a match and tossed it in one fluid motion. The flames immediately began to lick their way along the concrete pad, but Bart struck a second match and tossed it at one of the nearby transformer boxes. Within seconds half the machinery caught fire and the threesome sprinted for the street. By the time they turned the corner, the entire center burned furiously.

  Shouts arose behind them, from both men and women, but none seem directed at the runners. The Rapture Fire Department would be on the scene before long, but by then it would be too late to save most of the equipment. Furthermore, when they turned their hoses on the machinery they would likely cause as much damage to it as the fire. With Bart and Ed out of the picture, they would be hard pressed to get it repaired.

  Rapture’s political setup would then work in their favor. The women made sure they owned all the equipment themselves. Thus, though an outside power company sold electricity to the town, the people of Rapture were responsible for their own repairs and maintenance. Bart, being the town’s top maintenance man, talked to the power company’s safety committee to prepare emergency procedures in the event a situation like they just created arose. By the time they cleared out the ruined machinery and the new equipment was shipped in, installed, and operational, Rapture will have been blacked out for at least a week.

  Assuming all went according to Tim and Bart’s plans, a week would be plenty of time.

  Once they got several blocks away, Steve broke away from the other two men to begin the next step in tonight’s portion of the plans. He circled around a few blocks, then made his way back toward the fire. Once there, he would do his best to act the part of the Samari
tan, at the same time passing a message to the three firemen who could be counted on to be loyal to Bart and their plans. If they cooperated, they would do enough work to look convincing, but hold back enough to ensure the fire did its job.

  Tim and Bart disappeared into the trees, then moved around to the edge of Rapture where most of the businesses were located. They already huffed and wheezed from all the running, but this would be their last stop for the night. They saw no sign of anybody on the streets, nor did they spot any of the cats or crows lurking around. They assumed the fire created enough of a commotion to draw all the witches’ attention.

  Bart led Tim into a back alley, then to a narrow stairwell taking them up to a small apartment over one of the stores. Bart rapped softly on the door. They heard shuffling sounds and some mumbled curses on the other side.

  “Who is it?” a weak voice called through the door.

  “It’s Bart. Open the door, Gus.”

  A second later they heard the sounds of a chain being removed, a latch sliding open, a deadbolt disengaging, and the handle unlocking. A small, gnarled hand extended into the moonlight. “Come in. Hurry!” They barely cleared the threshold when the old man closed the door and re-engaged all the locks. “I take it you’re the ones responsible for the power problem?”

  “Guilty as charged.”

  “You know, they’re already going nuts looking for you two. They’re going to be real pissed tomorrow. Here, if you can find the couch in the dark, have a seat. I’ll try to find some candles.”

  “Don’t bother. We won’t be here long,” Bart said. “And I’d rather not draw attention to you until we’re gone.”