The Haunted Forest Tour

by Jeff Strand

But as she stepped into their shared office, all thoughts of bending her over his desk and pounding away vanished. She looked more stressed out than he'd ever seen her.

  "What's wrong?" he asked, standing up.

  "The shit has hit a million different fans. Main control room. Now."

  He followed her out of the office. "Seriously, what happened?"

  "Two of the cars haven't returned. One lost power completely and the other one went out of control."

  "Are you kidding me?"

  She turned around and glared at him. "Do I look like I'm kidding?"

  "Whoa, calm down. I didn't mean anything by that."

  "We have eighty-four people unaccounted for. All we know is that the trams collided. After that, we lost contact with the second vehicle as well."

  "How is that possible?" Mark demanded. "Those things don't just lose power. They've got backup generators, redundant communication systems, fail-safes out the ass...unless a nuclear missile plowed into one of them, there should be no way to completely lose track of them. There are military tanks that are less secure than our tram cars."

  "You're preaching to the choir."

  "Is Booth flipping out?"

  "Nobody knows where he is."

  "What?"

  Hannah nodded. "Nobody can reach him."

  Mark was so dumbfounded that for a long moment he couldn't even speak. How the hell did the head honcho of H. F. Enterprises go AWOL at a time like this? Unless...

  "You think it's sabotage? Maybe somebody kidnapped him?"

  "I'm not even going to pretend to speculate." She resumed walking down the hallway toward the main control room.

  "So what's Steve doing?"

  Steve Bradford was second-in-command at H.F. Enterprises, and the guy who presided over most of the day-to-day operations of the company. Mark liked him a lot. He was basically the rich kid who liked to share his playground with his employees, and as corporate superiors went, Mark had never had a better one.

  "He's called in the Security Detail."

  Mark nodded his head. The Security Detail was a troop of heavily-armed soldiers with the best body armor around and enough firepower to take over a small nation, at least according to Steve. They were all familiar with the Haunted Forest and had done duty inside of it. They were the guys who kept the construction crews safe when it came time to put down more tracks. Screw the National Guard. He'd bank on the Security Detail every time. The guy who was in charge of them, Hal Ordover, was as scary as half the monsters Mark had seen. Only half of them, true, but still an intimidating man.

  Mark and Hannah walked into the main control center. Steve sat there, his thinning hair soaked with sweat. The other H.F. Enterprises employees in the room spoke in hushed, panicked whispers, and several of them frantically typed on keyboards. At least half of the monitors were blank.

  Moments later, Ordover came into the room dressed in his heavy armor and carrying what looked like a howitzer on his shoulder. Steve moved in his direction quickly, not even acknowledging that Mark had joined them. Mark might have been offended under some other wildly different circumstances, but not these.

  "We're ready to go in." Hal's voice was as gravelly as ever, as if he'd been gargling with hot sand. Every time the man spoke, Mark wanted to offer him a cough drop, but it was just his natural voice, which seemed to feel the need to be as harsh as the rest of him.

  Steve nodded his head and shrugged his shoulders simultaneously in a gesture that looked uncomfortable as hell. "We've got to get those people out of there. Let's do this. Be safe, Hal."

  Ordover nodded and turned away, already speaking into the com-link he wore on his head. As he walked, he slipped his helmet in place. The uniforms were red, white, and blue, not your standard-issue military olive. Made them stand out better while they stood guard over the workers in the forest, giving the often-reluctant but well-paid employees a better sense of security.

  Mark watched the security team's progress on one of the working monitors as they left the western side of the building and marched toward the three trucks meant to take them to the tram line.

  The oversized trucks were gone from sight within four minutes.

  "Do you think they'll be okay?" Hannah's voice was very small.

  Mark looked at the entrance into the Haunted Forest and shook his head. He had his doubts. "Christ, I really hope so."

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Barbara and Lee paced around the building for a few moments, and while they did, Mindy did all she could to make Brad comfortable. He was looking anything but comfortable. In fact, he looked like a man who was half a foot away from death's door and about to step onto an oil slick. His skin was so pale that it almost looked translucent, except for the deep gashes on his face, which emphasized the sickly tone of the rest of his flesh.

  Lee came back into the room and stared at Mindy for a moment before turning his attention to the little boy who was currently drawing on the dusty desktop with his fingers. He sighed sadly and looked back at Mindy. "Listen, if you get too bored waiting for everyone, you can keep trying the computer and the light switches. A lot of these municipal buildings have backup generators or even bomb shelters. We're going to see about finding one of those while we're looking. Who knows, maybe we'll get lucky and find both."

  "Okay, Lee, I can see the generator, but why a bomb shelter?"

  The older man smiled. He must have been a knockout in his earlier days, because that smile brought back a ghost of his youth. "It's a stretch, but you never know. If there is a shelter, they might have bottled water or even some food. I don't know about you, but I could use a drink of water and some canned green beans right about now."

  Part of Mindy didn't think she'd ever be hungry again, but the idea of a glass of water was mighty appealing. "Well, good luck, and be careful, Lee."

  "Don't have to tell me twice." He looked away from her and focused on the boy. "Tommy, you take care of Brad and Mindy, okay? I'm counting on you."

  Tommy nodded his head a little listlessly but managed a weak smile.

  A moment later Lee was gone and she was alone with the boy and the man lying nearby, sweating and whimpering in his restless sleep. Mindy didn't like to think about it, but Brad's chances were not good. Not at all. Aside from the whole monsters-are-trying-to-eat-us issue, he was suffering from God alone knew what sort of internal injuries. Even if they were sitting in a top-notch medical facility instead of an abandoned building, she didn't think he'd make it through the night.

  Lee and Barbara were gone, and Tommy, bless his little heart, was staring into space and writing on the dust that covered the workspace as if his life depended on it. She didn't want to think about what scars his young psyche was already experiencing, and she definitely didn't want to be the one to pay the bills. Near as she could tell, that particular privilege was going to whatever state he was from, or to his next of kin. His dad hadn't gotten off the tram in time, and she hadn't seen his mother in a while.

  God, what if he'd seen his mother get eaten? The thought made her shiver.

  Mindy looked around the office space and tried to take in any details that could keep her occupied. There was mold in all of the corners, which wasn't very surprising for a water reclamation plant; the humidity almost guaranteed the growth of some sort of fungus. Water stains covered the lower edges of the walls, and if she dwelled on it, she could smell the musty odor of the black spots that were pushing through the paint. Four years of going unattended hadn't hurt the place too much, but there was no escaping mold and the like. They were almost as inevitable as death, taxes, and tedious celebrity scandals.

  Brad coughed violently, his face getting actual color for the first time in a while. He sat up long enough to heave a few drops of dark red spittle across the front of his shirt.

  He opened his eyes for a moment and called Tina's name. When he didn't get an answer, he settled back down and started whimpering again.

  Baby sitting. That's what I'm doing. I
don't mind really, but what if Christopher needs me? She pushed the thought away angrily. Her son was a grown man, and there was a little boy right over at the desk who needed watching. She turned to look at Tommy, who had already gone through so much in just a few hours.

  Tommy was gone.

  "Tommy?" Her voice was soft and scared. Mindy stood up quickly and almost lost her balance. Her heart was jack-hammering away merrily in her chest as she scanned the room and tried to see where he might have gone.

  She looked under the desk and saw nothing. Next she looked behind the two chairs. They were actually too small for him to hide behind, but it had been a while since she'd dealt with a five-year-old and anything was possible.

  She was turning toward the door when she spotted Tommy, his hands up against the wall, staring directly ahead as if the paint might reveal some deep, hidden secret.

  "Tommy? Honey, are you okay?" He didn't respond to her at all, and Mindy moved closer, wondering if he'd gone into shock. He'd already seen so much death...

  Mindy moved closer and put her hands on his narrow shoulders. He barely even noticed her, but his entire body was shaking.

  The wall under his hands was covered with the same black mold that ran along the floorboards and her heart stuttered beneath her ribs. God! What if that stuff was just another monster in this madhouse? What if it was eating the poor boy's hands even as she touched him?

  Mindy pulled him roughly away from the wall and spun him to face her, looking at his hands to see if there were any signs that the flesh had been marred. All she saw was that the mold was crusting over his fingers and palms, little more than dirt and sludge.

  Tommy sucked in a massive lungful of air and shivered, his eyes moving wildly in his head. And then he let out a loud, braying scream, not of pain, but of sorrow so deep it seemed to almost rip him in half.

  "Oh, baby boy..." Mindy's heart broke for him. None of them deserved this, but Tommy? He was a child, still with his baby teeth for Christ's sake. Mindy squatted until she was almost his height and he wrapped his arms around her neck, still crying out his anguish. He buried his face against her shoulder, his hot breaths washing over her as the sobs continued to spill from him.

  And what else could she do? She held him and made comforting lies come from her mouth, the sort that mothers always told children after a nightmare. The ones that promised everything was all right and would stay all right, even when the parent knew otherwise.

  He tried to speak, but the words came out as more muffled cries and gasps. She just nodded her head and said, "I know, baby, I know."

  * * *

  Behind her, on his back, Brad opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling. His skin felt wrong, tight and restrictive, and his arms, oh Lord, his arms were on fire, burning and throbbing with every pulse of his heart.

  Almost everything that had happened was a blur, from the time the obese, screaming missile had slammed into his seat to this very moment. He remembered Lee fixing his arms—that sort of pain, he suspected, was something he wouldn't forget anytime soon. He remembered Tina calling his name and holding him close when she saw that he was alive. He remembered her hot tears spilling down his face and chest as she praised God that he was alive, even though he was pretty sure he was in fact dead. But all of it was muted. The colors were washed away, and even the sounds of the things in the woods and his fellow humans perishing were bleached-out echoes.

  A black shadow slid across the ceiling above him, a shadow made of mold spores and rancid water. As he watched, the shadow took form, blistering the acoustic tiles and staining their lacquered finish until a lopsided face looked down at him. Funny how the mind could play tricks, wasn't it? Here he was, aching throughout every cell in his body and his mind wanted to make pictures out of the clouds. Of course, he was inside, so the water stains would have to do in a pinch. The notion brought a weak smile to his face. It was the best he could manage under the circumstances.

  Not far away, he heard a little kid crying, and the whispers of a woman offering comfort. Tommy, I think. And maybe the older lady is Mindy. Yeah, Mindy.

  He slid his eyes away from the stain above him and saw Mindy's hair, pinned as it was by the arms wrapped around her neck. Tommy's face seemed to almost sprout from her shoulder, and that was kind of weird-looking, but also kind of nice. He understood how the kid felt. Brad felt a little like crying himself, and he might have, if he could have found the strength.

  A drop of water fell down and hit his cheek. Brad looked back at the ceiling. The stain was bigger now, almost as big as a man, and shaped like one, too, if he let his imagination stretch a bit.

  It would have been funny if the man hadn't looked so sinister, with that wide, ugly smile and those splotchy patterns that almost looked like eye sockets above the grin.

  The tile split right where that mouth was, and a stream of water fell down, splashing into his mouth before he could turn his head away. The water was cold, colder than he would have expected, but it wasn't refreshing at all. It tasted like sewage, with a side of moldy bread.

  Brad tried to spit it out, but the stuff clung to the inside of his mouth with the tenacity of industrial adhesive. When he tried a second time, he must have moved his muscles the wrong way, because the foul-tasting piss-water slid into his throat and trickled down into him. He wanted to gag, but nothing happened. The smell and taste of the stuff was overwhelming, strong enough to make his eyes water. Still, he couldn't get up the energy to cough it out of his mouth and throat.

  Five feet away from him, Mindy held Tommy as he cried, and Brad lifted the hand closest to them, praying one of them would notice that something was wrong.

  Instead, Tommy cried harder and Mindy rocked him gently, with the practiced moves of a mom used to comforting a frightened child.

  Above him the water stain's smile grew even wider as the stream of nasty fluids poured down into his mouth and filled it completely. He couldn't cough, couldn't move at all, no matter how much he wanted to. He was completely powerless.

  Though he didn't swallow, Brad felt the cold water slip down into his throat, chilling his body as it descended.

  What a stupid way to die.

  The chills got worse, until he felt like his whole body had been filled with ice.

  Up above him the waterworks stopped.

  The water stain did the impossible—there was a lot of that going on as far as Brad was concerned—and grew smaller.

  A few moments later it was completely gone and even the mold that had started out as a shadow receded, sliding down the wall as silently as night falls.

  Brad stared at the ceiling, unable to move, and felt the new pains start in his body, pushing their way through the bitter cold and cutting like lightning strokes through every nerve in his body.

  I think I figured it out, he mused, still trying desperately to get his body to move, goddamn it, and give him a chance to fight back. Yeah, I did. I'm already dead. This is just Hell. One of those fucking things got me and ate me and now Satan himself is gonna come pay me a visit and tell me how it only gets worse from here.

  If he could have cried, he would have.

  Instead he looked back at Tommy, who was finally calming down a little. He'd left a trail of tears and mucus on Mindy's neck and shoulder.

  Tommy could still cry.

  The lucky little shit.

  Brad felt his chest rise and fall, heard his own heart beat, and struggled to do anything but just stare at the ceiling while wave after wave of pain chewed away his insides.

  I'm in Hell. I fucked it up good today and I'm in Hell.

  His pain got even worse, while not far away, Mindy laid Tommy on the musty carpet to sleep. She turned Brad's way and looked at him for a moment, her face showing nothing but concern for his condition.

  He'd have laughed if he could. He'd have cried. Deep inside, he did both. If Mindy noticed, she never gave a clue.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  As he walked through the forest, Eddi
e felt bad about leaving the others, but not too bad. They'd be better off hanging out at the water reclamation plant, and he definitely didn't need them slowing him down or doing anything stupid that would get him killed.

  Tina had scrambled down the tree, screaming that Christopher had been carried off by a giant bird. That sucked. It really sucked. But it didn't suck any more than what happened to the dozens of other tourists, so Eddie found it hard to get all choked up over this new development. Tina had been wailing, "We have to go after him! We have to go after him!" but that was ridiculous. What the hell were they going to do, sprout wings and fly after him? Swing from tree to tree like Tarzan? Jump really high? Jesus. If Christopher got out of that mess, great, Eddie would give him a high-five. If he was dead, well, it wasn't like their situation was all that much worse.

  Now, if Christopher had been carrying the last grenade when he got carried off, that would have been cause for panic.

  He'd wasted a couple of valuable minutes trying to calm Tina down, and then sent her back to the office where the old chick, the kid, and the half-dead guy were hanging out. Then he set off on his own. H.F. Enterprises would send help, and that help was coming on the tracks. So he'd return to the tracks and follow them until either the cavalry showed up or he wandered out of the forest on his own.

  As long as the others stayed put, he'd send the frickin' Justice League of America in to get them out of there. If they were dumb-asses, well, they deserved whatever they got. Shouldn't have gone on the stupid tour anyway.

  The forest was quiet. Almost peaceful. If Eddie had his iPod, this could've been a nice, pleasant walk.

  Okay, okay, he had to admit that he did feel bad about accidentally shooting Christopher. That wasn't very cool. But when you're up there climbing trees like an idiot, you can't expect completely proficient gun coverage, right? The guy was lucky he didn't get shot in the head.

  Eddie stopped walking for a moment. Had he heard something?

  He listened carefully.