Devoured (The Hunger #1)

by Jason Brant

  The spectral wail of the infected stabbed at Lance’s ears.

  He jumped out of the recliner, confused and disoriented. His foot throbbed when he landed on it.

  Agonized screams and bloodcurdling cries for mercy came from the window. He hobbled over, shoulders tensing as he reached for the taped curtains. He paused before opening them, realizing the television blared behind him, and turned around to shut it off. Any light visible from his apartment would give away his position.

  Flashes of mutation skirted along the edges of light provided by the streetlamps. Lance saw glimpses of massive musculature and distended arms and fingers.

  Bile stung his throat as he watched a woman get torn apart at the waist, two of the creatures fighting over her flesh.

  They’d grown larger and faster.

  Meaner.

  Hungrier.

  People fled in all directions, chased down by the beasts.

  A man stood in the window of an apartment across the street, firing a shotgun at the infected as they ran by. He stepped back when he ran out of ammo and reloaded, shoving shells in as fast as he could.

  Lance watched, horrified and awestruck, as one of the brutes lunged from the sidewalk, grabbing hold of a window ledge on the first floor. It leapt to the second story window with ease, climbing the building like an acrobat from hell.

  The shotgun-wielding man never saw it coming. Lance wanted to shout a warning, but dared not give away his position.

  It burst through the window as the man shoved another shell into his weapon. His cries of agony carried to Lance from across the street.

  A car dirt-tracked around the corner, barreling through an intersection at an uncontrollable speed. It sprinted forward, engine growling, and smashed into one of the mutants, metal and meat crushing under the impact. The car veered from the collision and ran onto the sidewalk, hitting a garbage can before ramping up the steps of a building.

  Two more of the infected leapt from shadows as the driver opened the door. He didn’t get out of his seat before they were on him, claws tearing at the interior of the car.

  His screams only lasted a few seconds.

  “My god.” Lance gaped at the havoc for a couple of moments before covering the window up again.

  He paced around the apartment, hands shaking, teeth chattering like he had hypothermia. It didn’t seem fair. He fell asleep under the impression that the Xavier virus had burned itself out. Now the infected stalked the streets like a nightmare.

  “They’re dying out,” he said, mocking the Pentagon official. “My ass. They’re climbing the fucking walls.”

  Where had they been all day? Lance saw one of them shy away from a light in the hospital, but it hadn’t meant much to him at the time. Did they not like light?

  He went over to the window again, peeling back just enough of the curtain to stick his head through. He focused on the area under the streetlights, doing his best to ignore the insanity that pervaded the night. They occasionally ran under the lights, but they never lingered. Usually, they skirted the illuminated area, wailing into the night like hellhounds.

  An explosion rocked the neighborhood.

  The windows in Lance’s building rattled. Car alarms triggered. The beasts shrieked.

  A ball of fire licked the night sky, peaking over a large building down the street. Lance knew a gas station was nestled back there. He’d often thought to himself about the horrid location of the place as he drove by.

  Several of the infected poured from the mouth of an alley, fleeing the fire behind them, ducking into the shadows of cars and dumpsters and stairwells.

  Confirmation settled in Lance’s mind—they hid during the day because they feared the light. Did it harm them? He considered how their skin changed, growing gray and thin.

  His inability to defend himself thundered home as he watched the carnage. A knife wouldn’t suffice. They’d tear him apart with ease. He needed a gun.

  Though he and Liz had lived in the building for several years, they didn’t know any of their neighbors. They recognized some of them by sight and well enough to say hello, but he wasn’t even aware of their jobs. Could one of them have a gun in their apartment?

  If he tried to break into a neighbor’s place, the racket might attract attention. He decided to wait out the night, hoping the morning sun would send these bastards back to whatever hole they hid in yesterday.

  He looked back at the barricaded door. It might be strong enough to keep one of them at bay. His windows were the problem. They had no issues climbing buildings and smashing through glass. The thought of nailing a table across the window occurred to him briefly, but he figured they’d break through it like balsa wood.

  Turning the television back on, Lance lowered the volume to barely above a whisper. He stood three feet from the screen, staring at the warfare displayed.

  Tanks fired at a shopping mall in Boston. The front of a JC Penney exploded outward, showering the parking lot with debris.

  Apaches fired rockets into the entrance of a subway station in Washington D.C.

  Hundreds of the infected stormed down a street in Cincinatti, gunfire cutting them down as they plowed forward. They jumped off the sides of buildings and lunged from the hoods of cars. A line of soldiers waited for them at the base of a suspension bridge, loosing bullets at a maniacal pace.

  The beasts hit them like a tidal wave. One moment the soldiers bravely stood their ground—the next they were torn to shreds on national television.

  The camera cut to the studio, the newscaster sitting behind a desk, mouth agape.

  “Matt! You’re on!” The voice came from off camera.

  Matt snapped to, shuffling papers in front of him. An Alfalfa spike stuck out from the crown of his head. “Uhh—” He looked off to his right, holding his arms out, palms up. “I don’t know what to say! This is fucking crazy!”

  Lance could relate.

  Matt ran his hands through his hair. “We’re looking at… devastation. The sick that we were told had died during the day have reappeared. They’re attacking randomly… consuming everything in sight. I implore you to stay indoors, turn your lights off, and pray. The military is currently engaging them across the nation and—”

  A shriek came through the TV.

  Matt recoiled, his hands jerking up, the papers flittering through the air. “The hell was that?”

  Someone screamed off camera and Matt stood from his chair, his head snapping around as if on a swivel.

  A blur of muscle and claw flashed from the left side of the screen, pouncing on Matt and knocking him behind the desk. Lance couldn’t see what it did it to him, but the screams and arterial spray coming from the other side of the dark mahogany left little to the imagination.

  People ran past the camera, casting glances over their shoulders as something devoured their co-worker a few feet away. No one tried to help him.

  Lance changed the channel.

  The camera pointed at an empty set on MSNBC.

  C-SPAN ran footage of a massive battle in San Diego. A tank rambled down a street, rolling over the hood of a car as it headed toward the frontline, tracks sliding on the concrete. It fired into a group of the infected standing by a water fountain. Red mist sprayed through the air.

  Transfixed by the strife, Lance stood in front of the TV, unable to decide what to do next. He didn’t dare leave his apartment, but he also felt like a sitting duck by staying there. If anything came through the window, it would be game over.

  Needing to do something, he lit a candle and went into the kitchen, refusing to use any lights, fearing that something outside might notice. He checked the cupboards again, hoping that he’d missed some food in the back, but came away disappointed. If fear didn’t drive him from the apartment, hunger would in due time.

  If his theory was right and the infected didn’t like light, he might be able to go somewhere during the day. Maybe he could find a more secure location and stock it with supplies.

>   Maybe a pig would fly out of his ass too.

  He knew what would happen tomorrow. Those who survived the darkness would turn on each other, diving headlong into an every-man-for-himself mentality. The day would mimic the violence of the night.

  The freshly infected would roam the streets as well, their skin still thick, their minds not completely broken.

  Guns, water, and food would become the new forms of currency and security.

  Unfortunately for Lance, he had none of the above.

  He tried to call some of his old friends from college and past jobs, wanting to speak with someone he knew on a personal level, knowing this might be his last chance. He even dialed Liz’s number, but didn’t get an answer. Everyone was busy trying to survive.

  Or they were already dead.

  A series of the ear-piercing shrieks came from the floor above him, making him flinch. He changed his mind, deciding that talking on the phone would be too loud. Those things looked strong enough to tear through the damned floor and get him.

  Lance grabbed his laptop and went back to the recliner, fighting the urge to peek outside again. He spent the next hour typing a long, heartfelt email to everyone he could think of. His thoughts, desires, and regrets poured out in an avalanche of emotion. Apologies to those he’d done wrong or fallen out of contact with.

  He typed a fond story about one of the first dates he took Liz on. They decided to give ice-skating a try, even though neither had ever done it before. Liz twisted her ankle and Lance bruised his tailbone. Despite the pain they suffered through as they left, their smiles and laughter pushed them closer together and they hadn’t parted since.

  Until recently, anyway.

  He included her and many of her relatives, asshole parents included, in the recipients’ list. If his dying breath rapidly approached, then he needed to get everything off his chest.

  Wanting someone, anyone, to understand what drove him to the man he became. He needed his acquaintances to understand that he regretted the things he never accomplished.

  Liz should know that he didn’t blame her for the collapse of their marriage. He was still furious over the Don situation, but he left that out of the email.

  Once he got going, the words flew across the screen, his thoughts pouring out in a cathartic stream. When he finally hit send, he felt lighter, less frightened.

  Whether or not anyone would ever read it, he didn’t know. That didn’t matter though. Everything he’d thought of himself, his friends, and his family finally came out in semi-coherence.

  He closed the laptop and reclined again, lacing his fingers behind his head, content.

  That wasn’t to discount his fear of a painful death in the night. The thought of it loomed over his head.

  He closed his eyes, hoping to fall asleep. After a few minutes, he gave up and went back to the window, making sure to turn off the television again.

  The fire from the gas station still burned, though it had diminished significantly. No one milled about in the street. They were either hiding, or dead.

  He spotted a few of the infected as they dashed past lights, or illuminated windows. They often reacted to sounds, converging on the source of a scream or a pistol shot. Lance watched their movements, seeing how disorganized and aggressive they were. Fast and feral.

  He had no chance of fighting them off.

  When the sun came up, he would leave his apartment and never return. Staying there only delayed the inevitable.

  Taping up the window yet again, Lance decided to watch the world burn on live TV.

  Chapter 12