A face and shoulder shot into sight, knocking Alex two steps to the side. I swung a baling hook in the Host’s direction, felt it penetrate flesh, jerked it free. We kept on, stumbling behind Patrick and Cassius.
The sounds grew louder, closing from behind and coming at us from both sides. I realized we were probably going to die here in the fields behind Jack Kaner’s barn. Patrick bowled a Host over, the stalks bending low for an instant. Before they snapped back up, I made out a caterpillar tunnel to our right.
“This way!” I shouted. “Follow me!”
Alex and Patrick fell behind me as I bulled through lanes of corn, swiping with the baling hooks, using them like machetes. The mouth of the caterpillar tunnel came up quicker than I’d expected, and I had to duck to avoid getting clipped on the forehead by the top of the arch.
I skidded in across moist dirt, the others piling in behind me. The inside of the tunnel looked like a giant intestine, the translucent white poly tarp fluttering and lifelike. It stretched five feet tall, so a worker could walk down the middle with only a slight hunch. The trapped heat pressed into our skin.
Keeping a low profile, I crawled a ways into the tunnel, the heels of my hands mashing kale and chard into the mud. A snapping sound turned my head. I froze to watch the outlines of the corn rows through the translucent tarp. Patrick banged into me from behind. A cornstalk bent forward and tapped the outside of the poly.
I dropped flat on my stomach, my cheek pressed into a knot of cucumber vine. Rustling sounds told me that Alex and Patrick had also gone flat. I could only pray that my brother could keep Cassius quiet. Patrick started to raise the shotgun, but I looked back at him over my shoulder and put my finger to my lips.
In the place where the corn had dipped forward, a form emerged. Its shadow, backlit by the moon, fell onto the tunnel right next to me. A head with two holes through it, grotesquely stretching up the curved wall of the tarp. As the Host lumbered forward, the shadow evolved, shoulders and torso and waist, until the entire outline seemed to hover over us.
Wind whipped across the mouth of the tunnel, giving off a low wail. We waited, trying not to move, trying to not even breathe. The smell of fertilizer burned my nostrils.
More crackling came from outside, and then other shadows played over the tarp all around us. Behind me I heard Cassius growl, but Patrick hushed him quietly and he listened.
The figures shuffled by, just outside the tunnel, their shadows flickering past the half hoops of PVC piping, riding the bumps of the segments.
The last Host finally ambled away. I stayed still until I could no longer make out the crunch of his boots in the rich soil. Then I sat up. Patrick and Alex looked at me, their faces drained of blood in the ghostly light of the tarp-filtered moon.
I said, “That was close.”
A Chaser shot through the wall on the other side, long nails tearing a dagger slit in the tarp. A tilted face, eyeless, covered by tangles of hair. She lunged forward, grabbing Alex’s ankles. Alex screamed and hacked at the skinny arms with her hockey stick, knocking them away.
The Chaser’s waist hung up on the tarp as she tried to pull herself through. Her head twitched; raspy breaths leaked through her cracked lips. Patrick rolled over and yanked a rebar spike out of the ground, the segment of tarp flapping up. Then he rolled back and drove the stake through the Chaser’s skull. She shuddered and went limp.
The freed segment of tarp snapped in the wind, straining the other spikes. Patrick hadn’t made a noise with the shotgun, but this wasn’t much better.
We ran.
Hunched over, barreling up the length of the caterpillar tunnel. The shadows reappeared, zooming in from our left. Three, then five, then eight. On the other side, there was no moon to backlight the Hosts and give us warning, but I had to imagine they were swooping in from that direction as well.
The Hosts started diving at the tarp, trying to break through. They dented the walls, which collapsed or puffed back into place. Stooped over, we sprinted through the gauntlet, heading for the barn on the far end. It was our only hope.
Patrick shouted something, and I looked back. The tunnel had been flattened behind us, but now the rear end of the tarp caught the wind. It rose, ripping segment after segment free, the destruction catching up to us. It felt like being inside a snake that was being skinned. Spikes flew, PVC pipes sprang free, and then the walls around us lifted up and away, leaving us running between Hosts on either side, fully exposed.
The tarp floated off toward the hillside, riding the wind like a magic carpet.
Some of the Hosts had run ahead, knocking free a few of the spikes from the tunnel next to us. As they turned for us, I veered between two of them and dove for the raised lip of the neighboring tunnel. I rolled inside and came up with blood dripping from my arms and chest.
Not blood. I’d smashed through a row of tomatoes.
Alex and Patrick sailed through the gap, and then we were running again, trying not to slip on the smashed tomatoes underfoot. On the left side, shadows zoomed along parallel to us, skimming across the poly. I made out Cassius’s bounding form among them, snapping and barking.
The Hosts’ numbers grew again, and they started pelting the poly with their bodies. This tunnel was going to give way just like the first one.
I halted and started burrowing through the far side.
“What are you doing?” Alex screamed.
“I have a plan!”
I rolled free of the tunnel’s right wall and saw with relief that there were no Hosts over here. Patrick and Alex appeared through the translucent poly, yelling at me, shadows massing at their backs. “We gotta go, Chance!”
Falling to my knees, I tore up the nearest stakes. Then I scuttled along the length of the tunnel, yanking rebar stakes free as I went.
When I risked a glance up, I saw the Hosts smeared against the far wall of the tarp, all distorted faces and fingers worming through rips. We were almost out of time.
Grabbing the edge of the tarp I’d just freed, I lifted it as high as I could, feeling the wind blast across my back.
At last it caught.
The lifting wall brought me face-to-face with Alex and Patrick. They watched with stunned amazement as the tarp flopped over, the sky opening above their heads. Rebar went airborne all around me, dirt peppering my face like shrapnel. The floating tarp wrapped around the mass of Hosts, blasting them back into the corn, clearing the row.
Only Cassius, low to the ground, remained, staring at us, as befuddled as a dog can get.
The tarp lurched and bulged like a living blob.
The barn was fifty yards away.
An arm tore free of the tarp, thrust up at the moon.
Shoulder to shoulder, we sprinted for the big rolling door. My footsteps jarred the dirt, my view of the barn rocking side to side. I could hear movement behind us, getting closer. That awful quick panting at our backs.
My breath fired through my lungs. Patrick bolted out ahead, shotgun swinging at his side. He slammed into the door first, then started rolling it open. We hurtled toward him. The gap wasn’t big enough for us to fit through, but there was no time to slow. Alex bladed sideways and skimmed by. I followed her lead, the door clipping my shoulder. I spilled onto the floor, somersaulting over in time to see Patrick slide inside after us. As he put his weight to the door, the gap filled with mouths and eyeholes, countless Chasers clamoring to get in.
The hefty door slammed shut, smashing a woman’s frail wrist. Patrick strained against the handle to keep it closed, cords standing out in his neck. “The truck!” he shouted. “Get in the truck!”
Jack Kaner, bless him, had an extended-cab Chevy Silverado pickup with diesel V8, four-wheel drive, and dually tires. A no-screwing-around farm vehicle, parked across from the stall doors like a mirage. I ran for the driver’s seat, gave a quick prayer, and reached for the ignition. The keys were there. Cassius leapt over the tailgate as he was trained, and Alex swung into the passenger side,
but I was accelerating before she could get the door shut. Patrick drove himself against the barn door, but he was losing the battle, his boots skidding across fallen hay.
As we neared, he let go. The barn door flew wide with the force of dozens of bodies, banging at the end of its tracks. Hosts tumbled over from the sudden lack of resistance. Aiming the cab at the opening, I sped past Patrick, who hooked the tailgate with his hand and swung himself into the bed like he always did when we repaired fence posts on Uncle Jim’s ranch.
I plowed into the Hosts, their heads snapping against the hood. Some churned under the powerful wheels; others flew off to the sides. For a moment the tires gummed up, and I was afraid the sheer mass of them would stop us. In the band of the rearview mirror, Patrick flashed in and out of sight, hammering the butt of the shotgun down into faces, Cassius snapping and clawing right along with him.
The V8 roared, and then we shot free. I drove straight across the field, throwing back rooster tails of mud and lettuce. A Host emerged from the cornstalks, and I smacked him with the grille, sending him bumping over the windshield and then up into the night sky.
The Silverado hammered across the roadside channel and then screeched sideways onto the highway as I braked. The engine shuddered, smoke wisping up from the tires.
We’d made it.
Alex shot me a look that might have held admiration. I waited for Patrick to hop down from the bed. As he came around the driver’s side, I slid over the console into the backseat, relinquishing the wheel.
He climbed in and stepped heavy on the gas, heading for the shadowy rise of Ponderosa Pass. Jack Kaner’s farm faded behind us.
“Nice job, Chance,” Alex said.
Patrick shot her a look of his own and kept driving.
ENTRY 20
Our excitement built as we neared the base of Ponderosa Pass. Maybe we were reaching the end of the infection zone, or maybe we had to get up and over to Stark Peak, but either way it felt good to be making progress. Deserted cars cropped up here and there on the road, spaced out far enough that we could steer around them. The highway was desolate under normal circumstances but looked even more so now. Few folks had been on the open road far from town two nights ago when the spores had blown across the plain.
The high beams gave us early warning of Hosts on the highway. We drove past a few stragglers. Twice we saw a horde up ahead, but Patrick had plenty of time to veer into a field and cut around them. A mile or so from the base of the pass, we came upon a dark gas station, the pump area littered with abandoned cars.
Patrick eased the truck in, aimed for the open road. He kept it idling and hopped out. I started to follow, but he shot me a wink and said, “I got it from here, little brother.”
He headed over to check the pumps. Cassius sprang from the truck bed, keeping pace at his side. Patrick coasted between cars, his head dipping from view as he peered through windows. Then he ducked behind a minivan and didn’t come back up.
Alex’s fingers tightened around the door handle. Through gritted teeth she said, “Chance.”
I braced myself to go with her, but then Patrick’s head popped into sight again. He gave a wave and jogged over. Beside me Alex blew out a breath.
With a scraping of claws, Cassius jumped into the pickup’s bed. Patrick slid into the driver’s seat, locking the door behind him. “The power’s out here, too. Which means the pumps won’t work.” He shot a nervous glance over at the dark windows of the store. “I’m sure they have a backup generator somewhere for emergencies. The problem is getting to it.”
I leaned between the seats and peeked at the dial. “We have a quarter tank. Will that get us there?”
“It’ll get us up but not over,” Patrick said. “Last thing we need is to be stranded on the pass.”
“I suppose we could coast down.”
“How about getting back?”
“Hey, dummies,” Alex said. She pointed to the cab of a semi truck parked off to the side of the gas station. “Ever heard of siphoning?”
Seconds later we were idling next to the semi. Alex unscrewed an air hose from a nearby pump, ripped the nozzle off, then unscrewed the gas cap on the cab and stuck one end in. She sucked the hose a few times, spit out a mouthful of diesel fuel, and sank the streaming end into the Silverado’s waiting tank.
She wiped her chin on her shirt and gave a little smirk at our expressions.
A few minutes later, we were back on the road with a full tank.
The country thickened up with brush, then trees, and soon the mountains resolved from the darkness. Leaning between Alex and Patrick, I marveled at the green peaks, granite showing through like old castles or giant’s teeth. The pass had never looked so beautiful before.
Soon we’d be in Stark Peak, where Patrick would be safe. We’d find police stations and scientific experts and put matters where they belonged—back in the hands of grown-ups.
We barreled toward the mountains, our headlights boring through the darkness, when all of a sudden a jumbled rise of green and brown appeared where none should be.
Patrick stomped on the brakes. The seat-belt strap cut into my lap, and my arms braced against the headrests for the collision. As the locked tires screeched, trying to halt the two-and-a-half-ton Silverado, I caught streaked glimpses of the view ahead. A pile of fallen trees barricaded the road haphazardly, rising twenty or thirty feet. One of the biggest trees had smashed across the rear of an old-fashioned station wagon. A Host tilted through the shattered windshield, his face raised so our headlights shone right through his sightless eyes.
We were going to smash right into him.
The Silverado skidded, skidded, and finally stopped, the grille almost kissing the hood of the station wagon.
For a moment we sat there, staring at the Host as he stared back at us, the smoke from our brake pads and tires drifting past us, joining the streamers of fog.
We lifted our eyes to the cause of the landslide. Farther up the pass, an eighteen-wheeler had careened off the road, smashing into a shelf of trees. The last falling pine had caught the station wagon, trapping the driver even as he transformed.
There would be no getting our Silverado through the barricade. We’d have to progress on foot, which put Stark Peak farther away.
Right now we had a bigger problem, underscored by the rasp of the Host’s hands as he tried to pull himself through the mouth of the shattered windshield. He’d snapped off most of his nails, lifting them right out of the beds. Judging by the bloody scratches in the hood, he’d been trying to claw free for a while. The steering wheel had broken from the impact, one curved edge gouging him between the ribs, holding him in place. But it looked like he might tear himself free soon.
The headrest behind the Host and the passenger seat hung in tatters. He’d also tried to pull himself toward the back of the station wagon. Why?
We climbed down and fanned out around the car. Cassius started to bark, backing up and stomping the ground like a bull. I hushed him.
“What do we do?” I asked.
Patrick hopped onto the hood of the station wagon. The Host’s focus shifted, his bloody hands grasping for Patrick’s ankle. Setting his boot on the nape of the Host’s neck, Patrick pinned the twitching face against the metal. Then he drew the butt of the shotgun back over his shoulder and hammered it down, pulverizing the Host’s head.
Patrick jumped down. “We’re on foot from here,” he said. “At least until we find another car on the far side of the barricade.”
“I’ll pull the truck off the highway,” Alex said. “Stash it for our drive home.”
She held up her hand, and Patrick hit it with the keys.
A thin voice called out from behind us. “Wait! Don’t leave me!”
I whirled around, catching movement in the station wagon’s backseat. A hand held up, the palm facing us. Another palm rose barely into view and then a boy’s face, squinting into the glare of our headlights.
“Please help me out,�
�� he said. “And hurry. There are tons of them around here.”
“How long have you been trapped in there?” Patrick asked.
“I lost track,” the boy said. “My seat belt got pinned in the crash. And then my dad, he just changed. He … he could almost get me.”
To keep out of reach, the kid must’ve stayed balled up on the seat, cramming himself down into the footwell as much as his seat belt would allow.
My eyes moved past the body to the tattered headrest and passenger seat. What had it been like for him hiding here, mere feet from a Host bent on destroying him? A Host who was also his dad?
“I’ll get you out of there,” Patrick said.
He nodded at Alex, who jogged back to the truck behind us. As I watched her go, a blocky form glinted in the darkness a good ways from the side of the road. A commuter bus lay on its side, half sunk in the marshy reeds. Decaled on the back, the giant logo from the Lawrenceville Cannery. Lawrenceville was little more than a cluster of lean-to houses around the factory perched on the highest shoulder of Ponderosa Pass, so they bused in most of their work staff from the valley. The windows were tinted. There was no telling who was inside.
Patrick said, “Go check out that bus, Chance.”
Thumbing up a folding knife, he leaned into the windshield past the dead Host and started sawing off the kid’s seat belt. The rear of the station wagon looked caved in and claustrophobic, but the kid seemed to be uninjured.
Alex pulled the Silverado around onto the reeds in front of the rocky brink of the pass. When the headlights swept the bus, the dark windows reflected back the glare, giving up nothing. My boots sank into the reeds as I walked over. Using the tires for holds, I climbed up onto the side of the bus and crouched for a moment, my baling hooks ready. Below, Cassius took up a guard posture, aiming his snout at the darkness.
The Rains Page 14
