by Jerry Hart
Another thud.
A candle fell off a table. Nikki had no idea what was going on, but she didn’t like it. Another thud. It felt a lot worse than the previous two. Closer. Something big was coming.
That thought seemed impossible. Perhaps she was imagining it felt closer. To think that it was would imply that whatever was causing it was gigantic, like a monster of some kind. And monsters didn’t exist.
Oh, but they do, her mind told her.
Another thud, much too close.
“Let’s go,” she said to Darlington.
They ran out the rear exit, looking around carefully. There were no zombies or giant monsters of any kind. They ran around to the front of the store, heading for the park exit.
Then they saw it.
A large, dark shape stood just in front of the box office. Nikki almost hadn’t seen it at all. At first, she thought it was staring right at her and Darlington (they were standing in the open), but then it looked around, side to side, like it was looking for something. The creature looked frightening against the cloudy gray sky.
Nikki took a cautious step forward. The creature didn’t notice. Her heart was beating so ferociously that she feared the monster would hear.
But it didn’t.
A few more careful steps brought her and Darlington to the exit. Nikki looked up and saw that the creature was still looking around. Any moment and it would look straight down at them. The giant looked like it was made of stone, standing on two legs like a man.
They ran into the woods. There was an explosive sound and Nikki turned to see the giant had stepped on the box office, destroying it completely. It was walking into the park.
Looks like the show’s over, she thought. But it was a good run.
* * *
Police and medical examiners crowded in front of the house on Fairington Drive. The three bodies inside were being wheeled out. The two in the trunk of the old car had been handled carefully.
Patrick watched it all with a numb detachment. The first dead body he ever saw on duty had been pretty grisly. He’d been called to the scene of a suicide at a nearby train yard. A man had simply settled down on the tracks and allowed a train to sever him at the waist.
A man walked up to Patrick. He had short gray hair and a bushy mustache.
“What the hell happened here, Fisher?” the man asked. “It’s a damned massacre in there.”
“I couldn’t tell you, Chief,” Patrick said. “I’m still trying to figure it out myself.”
Police Chief Marcus Bowman shifted on his feet, clearly anxious. “You’re the one who called it in. How did you know this was here?”
Patrick grew nervous at the question. Though he was sure Doug Hudson had nothing to do with any of the deaths, he didn’t want to single out the boy to the chief. He wanted to keep Doug off the radar until he got answers himself.
The chief was waiting for an answer, though.
“Anonymous tip,” Patrick said.
“Is that so?” Bowman sounded skeptical. “Where did you receive this tip?”
“My cell.”
“We’re gonna have to check your records, see who placed the call.”
Patrick had been afraid of that and wished he’d lied about how he received the tip. Too late, now.
“What about the thing in the sky?” he asked Bowman, hoping to distract him. “Anybody know what that was?”
“What thing?” Bowman asked, looking up. The sky was clear now.
“Never mind,” Patrick said, deflated. He had thought people would panic at the sight of what looked like a spaceship in the clouds, but so far, nothing was coming of it. He’d asked several officers if they’d seen or heard anything about it, but they all shrugged and went on about their business.
Suddenly a young female officer ran up to them, out of breath.
“Chief Bowman,” she said, “you’re not going to believe this.”
“What is it?” he asked.
“Something’s going on in Baker.”
“Baker?” Bowman barked. “That’s not our jurisdiction.”
The officer was pale. “I don’t think that’s going to matter,” she said.
* * *
Officer Lindsay Walker had been sitting in her squad car when she heard on the radio the extraordinary events taking place in Baker. The dispatcher had announced it in a professional manner, but that hadn’t made the impact of the words any less terrifying. Any and all officers were to report to the area.
There was a monster on the loose.
Lindsay had to see for herself—words couldn’t possibly do this justice. She knew of one of the other officers, Jarrod, had a portable TV in his squad car. The two of them turned to a local station and saw the events unfold.
“Oh, wow” was all Jarrod could say.
That’s when she’d gotten the chief. Now pretty much every officer was crowded around the tiny TV, their jaws dropped.
Reporter Pamela Johnson was speaking as calmly and professionally as she could: “The town of Baker is in a state of panic. It is being reported that some kind of large creature has been spotted in a wooded area of the town. It has yet to be identified.”
Lindsay had her black hair in a bun, but a stray strand fell in front of her face. She swept it back as the reporter disappeared from the screen and was replaced by shaky footage of a street. There were large footprints in the asphalt.
Finally the camera settled down and a male reporter stood in front of it. His name read “Henry Atkinson.”
“This is as far as we dare to venture to this exciting event,” he said into his microphone. “From what we can tell, Pamela, the creature is over fifty feet tall. As of yet, no one knows what it is or where it came from.”
Henry’s face was lit up like a child’s, and Lindsay could tell he wasn’t scared but excited about the events going on behind him. The cameraman zoomed in to the woods that stood at the end of the street. It was hard to tell what was going on—all Lindsay could see were a dark mass of trees and a dark gray sky behind it.
Then she saw it. Something moved within the trees. A sound, very faint, came from the tiny TV speaker. The creature, whatever it may be, was roaring. And now it stepped into the street. The camera shook violently as the cameraman turned and ran away from the creature before anyone could get a good look at it.
“Holy monkey crap, run!” Henry Atkinson screamed.
Lindsay’s heart raced as she wondered if the monster was chasing the reporter and cameraman. Then the camera stopped shaking. The operator had stopped running. He focused the camera back toward the woods.
The behemoth was retreating into the trees once again.
“I apologize for my unusual choice of words,” Henry said off-screen. “It appears the creature doesn’t like when we get too close. One can only guess what it’s doing in there.”
“Have there been any injuries or fatalities reported, Henry?” Pamela asked from the safety of the news station.
“So far, no reports have come in. Baker is a small town, and it appears the creature took a less-populated route to get here.”
Lindsay looked to Patrick, who was standing a few feet away. He had gone completely pale. She was about to ask if he was all right when Pamela spoke.
“This just in: Another creature has been spotted just outside San Sebastian, in Hayden County…”
Another? Lindsay thought in horror. There are two of them?
* * *
The road was bumpy where Patrick was going. He and about a dozen police officers were heading to a field in Hayden County, not too far from where Patrick lived. He looked up at the sky. It was only slightly cloudy. He was fairly certain that whatever he had seen earlier had passed over this field.
What is going on? he asked himself. He believed in aliens, sure, but never in a million years did he ever think he’d see one. Is that what these things were? He thought about the thing he saw in the clouds earlier. A horrible vision came to mind of these creatures
flying around in the sky like spaceships. Was that the shape he saw? The shape, not of a ship, but of a monster? The thought was ridiculous.
The dirt road was getting bumpier, and the trees that lined either side of it were thinning. Patrick could see a field to his right, barely lit up by the moon. There were small shapes moving along the field, and it took Patrick a moment to realize they were people.
The field rose upward to a small hill. The people were running to the top of the hill, looking at something on the other side.
Patrick and the other officers parked on the field. If the monster was just on the other side of this hill, why were people running toward it?
He was running up the hill now, breathing hard, but it had nothing to do with the exercise. He was afraid of what he was about to witness. He was about to see one of these creatures up close and he wasn’t sure he wanted to.
Patrick was at the top of the hill now, and what he saw frightened him beyond belief.
There was a downward slope in front of him. At least two-dozen people were surrounding a large blue giant. Some of the people were taking pictures of it. The giant was lying on its stomach.
Patrick got a good look at its face. It looked as if were chiseled from stone, with a pointed nose and a square jaw. It looked like a giant man. It lay motionless, as if it were dead. There was a seam running down the middle of its scalp, and another running around the skull. The two seams joined right at the forehead.
No wonder everyone was so close to it, he thought. But how did it die? That’s when Patrick noticed the ground around the creature looked like it had exploded outward, as if the giant had fallen directly on the spot from a great height.
Patrick looked up to the sky again, the pieces falling together.
The thing I saw was a spaceship. Maybe it dropped this thing down, but it fell wrong and died.
That was quite a stretch, but compared to what he was seeing now, it wasn’t completely impossible.
Suddenly he remembered why he was here. He and the other officers had to keep the peace. They had to get these people back.
“All right, people,” Patrick said, his voice cutting through the goggle of onlookers. “I need you all to back away. It’s for your own safety.”
“Safety from what?” a young boy asked. “It dead.”
It dead? Patrick thought, and tried to hide a smile as he remembered fondly that he used to talk like that as a kid. Then the smile faded. He looked back at the creature, which was only ten feet away. Its gigantic blue stone eyes were staring at him, and he couldn’t shake the feeling it wasn’t actually dead.
“We don’t know for a fact it’s dead,” Patrick said to the crowd. “That’s why I need everyone to step—”
A gut-wrenching moan from behind him made everyone scream. Patrick turned around and saw the creature move. It pushed itself up with a massive arm. The crowd screamed again and ran from the scene.
Patrick watched as the giant slowly got to its feet. It was enormous. It was now standing and looking around. It let out a bizarre roar, though its mouth remained closed. The roar was deep at the beginning, tipping off to a shriek. Patrick’s eyes watered.
It took a step forward. Someone rammed Patrick, causing him to fall to the ground. The creature’s foot came down right where he’d been standing. He looked behind him and saw Lindsay with her arm around his waist, looking at the retreating monster.
“Are you okay?” she asked Patrick.
“Yes. Thank you.”
The two officers got to their feet and watched the giant chase the screaming crowd on the field.
“Come on!” Patrick shouted. They ran after the creature.
CHAPTER 7
It was nearly two in the morning. Doug was staring out the window as they traveled on the freeway. He’d been counting all the oil derricks they passed, but he was bored.
Suddenly he saw a road sign. It read “Now Entering Birch.” Finally! At that moment, though, the car started to sputter.
“What’s happening?” he asked Owen.
“We’re out of gas.”
The car slowed down. Owen pulled over on the shoulder and the car died immediately.
“What do we do now?” Curtis asked.
“Well, at least we’re in town,” Owen said. Then he got out and started kicking the car. The side dented inward, toward Doug.
After a moment, the kicking stopped. A long silence followed. Then Owen got back in the car. “The fuel tank is leaking. That’s why we’re empty.”
“Probably happened when your car fell in the hole,” Doug said.
“Well, this is your hometown,” Curtis said. “Is there a gas station or something nearby?”
Owen thought for a moment, then said, “Birch Plaza. It’s only a few miles away. We can walk.”
“Sounds like a plan. Let’s go,” said Doug as Owen let him out. Curtis waited for the robot to exit the car, but it didn’t, so he got out through the driver’s side as well.
“What are we going to do about him?” he asked Owen, looking at D.
“He’s going with us. Daniel,” Owen said to the robot. “Follow us.”
The robot got out of the car and followed, just as ordered. The four of them made their way along the dark freeway.
* * *
After twenty minutes, Owen turned back to look behind them. He had an uneasy look on his face.
“What’s wrong?” Doug asked.
“I feel like we’re being followed.”
Doug and Curtis looked back, too. They saw nothing but the road stretch on and on. Then they exchanged uneasy looks.
A short while later, they reached the plaza. It was made up of a large parking lot surrounded by poorly maintained buildings. There was a movie theater, a pet store, and a shoe store called Wonderland Shoe. Parked in the lot were two cars.
“This town’s pretty dead-looking,” Curtis remarked.
“It’s two in the morning,” Owen protested.
“Yeah, but still.”
“What are we going to do?” Doug asked, uneasy.
“I guess we can ask one of those guys to give us a ride. Or call a cab with their phones.”
“Hell, man,” Curtis said. “We could’ve done that with our cells.” He pulled his out but couldn’t get a signal. Owen grinned but kept his eyes straight ahead.
The plaza was at the bottom of a slight hill. The quartet jogged down and walked across the lot to the cars, which were parked in front of the shoe store.
As they approached the closest car, a silver hunchback, they saw something that froze them in place. A body was lying in front of the car. It was a middle-aged man with short brown hair. His eyes were closed, his head tilted to the side.
He had a terrible wound on his neck. A very familiar wound.
“Oh, crap!” Owen said without meaning to.
“What is it?” Doug asked nervously.
Owen looked at him and Curtis. “I don’t want to scare you guys, but I think there’s a monster here.”
“You mean, like a zombie?” Curtis asked.
“No,” Owen said. “But something equally bad.”
He checked to see if the man on the ground was alive. He wasn’t. Owen began walking toward the shoe store.
“Where are you going?” Doug asked.
“To see if there’s anybody in there who needs help.”
“What about that thing … the thing you were talking about? What if it’s in there?”
“I know how to deal with it.” Owen offered a kind smile. “I’ll be fine, you guys.”
“What about us?” Curtis asked.
“Wait in the car. I’ll be back in a minute.”
Owen opened the driver’s-side door, which had been unlocked, probably before the victim was attacked. Then he turned and ran to the store. D followed. Curtis and Doug watched helplessly, but did not get in the car.
“You know,” Doug said, “I think we should go and help him.”
Curtis stared at
him and said nothing.
“I mean, what if something happens to him?” Doug added.
“He said there was a monster in there,” Curtis said. “I’ve seen enough monsters today.” He looked away, as if to say the conversation was over.
“Well, what if the monster isn’t really in there?” Doug asked, regaining Curtis’s attention. “What if it’s out here, somewhere?”
Curtis’s eyes widened. He looked around the lot. Then he looked down. “I could use some new shoes,” he said, revealing the flip-flops on his feet.
* * *
Owen was inside the store, listening for any sign of life. The place wasn’t very big. There were four shelves in the center and shelves lining the walls. The lights to the store were off. D stood in a corner by the entrance.
In one of the center aisles, a few shoes had spilled onto the floor. Owen walked slowly to them, noticing something else on the floor. A dark shape was lying there. As he got closer, he realized it was another body, this one a young blond girl. She was lying on her stomach, her head turned to the side. Her eyes were wide open. Owen checked her pulse as well. She, too, was dead, but still warm, which meant she probably just died, like the man outside. Whatever did this was still around, and close.
The girl wore a blue shirt with tan pants, the same as the other victim. Clearly they both worked here. Owen stood, about to head to the storeroom in the back, when he heard something behind him. He spun around and came face to face with Curtis and Doug.
“What the hell are you guys doing?” Owen asked angrily, keeping his voice down.
“We came to help,” Doug said.
“It was his idea,” Curtis said, pointing to Doug.
“You just don’t know how to listen, do you?” Owen asked, but they weren’t looking at him. Instead, they were staring wide-eyed at something behind him.
Owen turned around but only caught a quick glimpse of a tall, dark figure before he was smacked hard against one of the shelves. The shelf tipped over, spilling shoes everywhere. Owen groaned as he sat up. A large, long-limbed creature stood over him. Its skin was tar black, its head round in the back, but with a flat face. Blond sprouts of hair stuck out of its head. It looked down at Owen and roared. Suddenly something hit it in the face. It was a shoe. Doug and Curtis were trying to get its attention.
