"She's supposed to be dead!" David screamed, making Sam and Todd flinch. Even the body stopped that crazy dancing and stood swaying looking over at the trio.
David leaped to his feet, the small ax in hand. "You're dead!" He raged at the standing corpse. Its arms were spread wide as if to say, doesn't look like it to me.
He ran after the body, screaming like a lunatic, the ax raised over his head. "David, no, stop!" Sam yelled, but made no attempt to go after him.
The face of the corpse suddenly folded inward with a sickening crack. Sam screamed.
David stopped in his tracks a mere ten feet away from it.
The face buckled and shifted. The color of the corpse's face darkened and coarse hairs grew quickly out of it. The black eye sockets stretched to the size of tea-cup saucers and became griddled like a bees hive. The jaw snapped in half at the chin. Sam screamed again. The two sides split far apart, the cracked bones sharpened into pincers, squeezing in and out.
The body followed the change. Snapping like dry branches, bones broke, shifted and reshaped, becoming solid again in grotesque, awkward positions. Knees bent backwards. Arms with two elbows.
Two straight thin rods shot out of either side Mary's stomach, completing, with arms and legs, a total of six limbs.
Papery wings unfolded from the shoulder blades.
Small black hairs grew out of every square inch.
Sam finally realized what it mutated into. A fly. Crude and malformed, but a fly for sure.
David broke out in sudden gales of laughter. Sam jerked her head from the fly to David who was bent over, hands on knees, laughing to bust a fit.
For a moment Sam seriously thought this whole thing was a joke that David couldn't keep secret any longer. She wanted to believe it was a joke. Hell, she probably wouldn't even be so mad, just as long as she could get out of there.
Ha, ha, funny guys. Nice plastic fly. Nice special effects. Where's the camera, guys? Funny, ha-ha, you got me.
But any notion of it being a prank quickly deflated when she realized that David's laughter was maniacal, not humorous. He fell to his knees still laughing like a hyena.
Transparent wings buzzed noisily, vibrating the air. It took a few cautionary steps, feeling its new self, like a moth emerging from the cocoon.
"C'mon David. Get away from there." Sam ordered when the thing took a few steps toward him.
Not realizing his perilous position, David neither looked up nor responded.
Oh my God. It's going to kill him. It's going to kill him like it did Mary.
"No!" She ran to David, grabbed the ax from his hand and lunged at the fly. But just as she reached it the paper-like wings beat faster, lifting into the air. The deafening hum of those moving wings filled the barn. The creature found the opened door and flew off into the night.
Sam stared into the darkness for many long minutes, listening for the creatures return. She heard nothing but the crackling of the fire behind her. She walked backward toward the others.
David had moved to the fire. He sat on his butt, arms wrapped around his knees pulled up to his chest. He rocked himself and hummed fragments of a song Sam couldn't quite put her finger on. Todd sat motionless by the fire, staring at Sam like a lost little boy. He hadn't moved at all.
Sam felt the sanest and strongest since the madness began. Are you sure that's it, Sam? Are you really sane, or are you losing it and don't know it?
"What are we gonna do?" Todd asked, looking up at Sam.
She looked back at him and saw the fear in his eyes. "We wait til dawn, Todd," She told him gently. "Only a few hours." She touched his shoulder then moved closer to the fire, her hand gripping solidly to the hatchet.
"What if it comes back?" David asked in a small, but audible whisper. He too, looked at her with sad, lost eyes.
"Then I kill it," Sam said firmly, but quietly.
***
For the next hour, Sam paced the length of the barn, being careful not to get too close to the open doors. Clinging to the ax with one hand, Sam stopped only to feed the fire.
David looked around quickly from time to time like a madman, making Todd who stared vacantly into the fire, appear peaceful.
It wasn't much longer that David lost his mind completely. Sam's strong, handsome salesman ran screaming like a banshee out of the barn and into the darkness. "I'm getting out of here!" He screamed. "I'm not staying here anymore! Nope! Forget it! This game is over!"
"David!" Sam screamed, but the blackness of night enveloped him. She stood in the threshold, hearing his footsteps tromp over twigs and branches. Periodically, he'd scream again. "No way! Some fun trip!" Then he'd laugh like a lunatic.
"David, come back!" Her voice wavered, scared. Because having him here - weird, tripped out behavior and all - was still better than not having him around at all.
After listening for a few more minutes, hoping and waiting for his return that didn't come, Sam returned to the fire. She flexed her jaw and gripped the ax even tighter.
Todd looked up at her as she approached, the firelight danced off his glasses. The dark circles under his eyes gave him a haunted look. "We're not going to make it out of here, are we?" He spoke softly.
"Just shut up, Todd!" She yelled, knowing her last companion was going soft in the head too. She felt scared. "Just shut the fuck up!"
Todd grinned sadly at her then turned his gaze to the fire once more.
***
David did come back, although not the same man that ran out, and a far cry from the man who began this journey.
Sam heard footsteps approaching what seemed like hours later. But damn, where was the sun? She rose wearily to her feet. It felt like days since she'd slept. Maybe that's what it wants. To wait until you're too tired to fight back. That fearful thought woke her up a little and the quick, hard slap across the face she gave herself woke her up even more.
Todd had fallen asleep by the fire, and she nudged him with her foot. "Wake up, Todd. Something's coming." Sam said, surprised to hear her voice sound passive. Todd continued to sleep soundly. She was about to give him a hard push when David came staggering into the light.
"David?" Sam warily asked, because this human form only vaguely resembled him. He was white for one thing. The bronzed skin from all the hours at the tanning booth now resembled the belly of a dead fish. His hair, too, was white, and it stuck up on end in all directions. His white polo shirt hung on him in dirty rags.
A giggle escaped Sam's lips. This is a joke. Someone has come up with some elaborate scheme to scare the almighty hell out of us . . . or me.
"It got me!" David staggered toward the fire. "Help me, Sam. Please help me. It got me."
"David, what are you talking about?" She took his arm and cringed when she found it to be ice cold. "What got you?"
David fell to his knees, his pupils so dilated Sam could barely make out the irises. He looked into the fire then up at her. "Oh, Sam, oh Sam. Don't go out there. Whatever you do, don't go out there."
"David, stop it!" She ordered harshly, revolted at what he had become. God, even his eyelashes are white. "What happened out there?"
"I'm afraid you'll find out soon enough." His face crumpled in agony and he began to sob. Sam looked at him with sick disgust as he curled up in the fetal position and cried like a baby. "There's no way out," he sobbed.
"David." She bent down and touched his shoulder. He quivered. "We'll get out of this, baby. I know we will." Sam realized her words weren't so much for David, but for herself. For her mind and sanity.
"Once daylight comes - "
"Daylight won't come until all of us are dead!" He screamed. Sam jerked her hand back. Scared silent, she moved away from him.
That's when Mary came back, too.
***
She stood in the threshold of the barn door, her body reverted to her nake
d human self. Like David, she was bleached white. The firelight made ghost-like.
David alternated between blubbering, sobbing, and laughing.
"I wasn't finished with you yet, David." The Mary figure cooed, black sludge rolled in its eye sockets.
"Oh, yes you are. I've seen you. I've seen the real you!" David cackled. Spit flew from his sneering mouth.
"Shut up!" Sam screamed trying to think, trying to reason.
David yelped and became silent. He fidgeted and squirmed and clawed at the ground, inching himself away from the thing.
Todd watched the whole thing like a passive spectator in a twisted three ring tennis match. No fear, no anger. Perhaps only amusement.
Sam slapped Todd across the face hard enough to sting her hand. "You'd better snap out if it, Todd! I need your help!"
His head rocked and rolled back as if it were on bearings. "Doesn't matter. We're all gonna die."
"You son of a bitch! We're not! I'm not!" She swung on the Mary-thing. "You bitch, leave us alone!"
"Doesn't matter." It replied, mimicking Todd's voice down to the exact tone and fluctuation. "You're all gonna die."
It chucked deep and guttural.
"Yeah?" Sam gripped the ax. "Let's just see about that."
She began marching over to the thing, ax raised over her head. Adrenaline pumped through her blood feeding her strength and courage. Have to kill it. Have to destroy it. When Sam saw its face cave in she began to run towards it. "Oh, no! Not this time, bitch!"
The change was swift. It wasn't a fly. This time it was the bat-like creature that took off Mary's face. Except now it was the size of a winter sledding saucer, about four feet in diameter. It lifted into the air as Sam approached it.
"No! Noooo!" She swung the ax wildly through the air and got nothing for her efforts except a bat-like wing across the face and head. She collapsed to the ground.
The thing floated in the air for a few moments as if contemplating who its next victim would be. This time it didn't flounder and wobble as before. Instead, it hovered like an albatross on the winds over the ocean. Then it struck. Todd spread his arms in welcome as the thing enveloped him. "It's beautiful!"
Sam pushed herself up on all fours and shook her head. Bright bursts of light danced in front of her. She put a hand to her face. Her nose was flowing blood.
When the suction-like mouth of the creature latched onto Todd's face, he screamed shrilly. The pain, evidently, wasn't so beautiful. He tried fighting it off using his arms and legs.
Sam grabbed the ax and staggered to her feet. The bright lights gave way for black dots. Todd's muffled screams under the creature rose octave after octave until it silenced.
Sam stumbling towards it, clenching her teeth against a scream. She had to kill it before it could flee. She hissed her breath in and out, sounding like a snake.
She let the ax fly, putting all her weight and strength into it, and at that point she did scream. The ax squished through the middle of its body then landed solidly into Todd's skull. Sam choked out the last of her cry.
The creature's loud squeal vibrated the air, forcing Sam to cover her ears. The wings beat like mad, sounding like bed sheets on a clothesline in the wind. In its attempt to fly away, it began lifting Todd's body off the ground because that ax so firmly attached.
Sam backed away, watching the monstrosity bleed black tar that bubbled out around the ax. It relented. The flapping wings slowed down. Todd's body lay back down with that thing on top of him. Finally it stopped moving altogether.
Sam turned, dropped to her knees and threw up fuzzy beer and bile. She retched dry heaves, her stomach in a vise-like grip. Too weak to stand, she stayed on her knees and breathed until her stomach muscles stopped their spasms.
She kept her eyes closed, praying this was all a dream. Willing it to be a dream. Attempts to grasp onto her comfort places of city parks and sidewalk caf?'s were futile. They were too far away and too long ago.
Sam became aware of David. He was still alternating between crying and blubbering. Occasionally he would bark laughter, making Sam cringe. In between he would hum snatches of that song. It suddenly dawned on Sam what it was. Pop Goes the Weasel. The jack-in-the-box song.
"Oh, Jesus." Sam sadly shook her head then jerked it up. A thought just occurred to her. After Mary was killed, she came back again. What if Todd did the same? "Oh, Jesus."
Gathering what she was sure was the last of her strength, she rose, pausing until the black dots and dizziness passed. Then she walked toward Todd on legs that felt like cooked spaghetti.
Sorrow washed over her as she looked down at him. Although the thing covered most of his body, she saw a dried, up scabby cut on the index finger of his left hand. Earlier that day, he explained that he had cut himself while slicing an onion.
When he told us that, he never thought he wouldn't live long enough for that damn thing to heal.
"Oh, Todd. I'm sorry." She covered her face for a moment. She hardly knew him, but she did know he was a sweet and kind man. One of the good guys. "I'm so sorry."
She took a deep breath and grabbed his ankles. Struggling, she dragged him to one of the steel stalls. Todd wasn't a big guy, but that thing on him must have weighed as much as him. It was a trial moving them. The beast's wings lay limp on the ground, but bounced as she pulled Todd over uneven ground. She kept an eye on them, in case they started to move on their own.
Once she got him confined in the stall, she clenched her teeth, not wanting to do what she had to do next. Golden firelight danced against the back of the stall, and across the creature attached to Todd.
Sam planted a foot solidly against the rubbery back. Gritting her teeth, she gripped the ax and pulled.
It didn't budge.
A sob of despair escaped her. Crying, she gripped the ax tighter and worked it up and down, prying it loose from Todd's skull until it finally broke free.
With the ax hanging limply in her hand, she backed out of the stall and shut the door. Sniffling and crying, she found a metal pipe, and used it to secure the door shut by sticking it through the padlock loop.
She turned around. David was gone. He must have slipped away while she dragged Todd to the stall. She didn't care. In fact, she felt relieved. That white hair and skin and maniacal behavior was too disturbing.
Her breath was raspy and her throat felt ragged and raw. Dried blood caked around her mouth from her nose-bleed, and when she raised a hand to her hairline, and felt a lump the size a walnut. In addition, her left eye began to swell shut. A keepsake from getting hit by the wing of the creature.
Sam barely had a chance to sit down by the fire when a skin crawling scream emitted from the stall she'd just secured. She cried out and covered her ears. Part man, part woman, and part beast, it was so loud it seemed to shake the air, rising into a crescendo and held there for many excruciatingly long seconds. Finally it warbled down until it ceased.
Breathing hard, heart pounding painfully in her chest, Sam brought her shaking hands down away from her ears. But before she could recover the thing in the stall began to throw itself at the walls with a force so strong, the steel began to buckle out.
"No more," Sam pleaded, crying. "Please, no more."
But the thing continued to ram itself from side to side and the ceiling!
"Please don't let it get out."
Whatever it morphed into was something much bigger than Todd's body. It growled, barked, and screamed. Finally after many minutes the banging became weaker until it stopped altogether.
"Oh, my God," Sam wept. Her body shook and her head pounded.
From the corner of her eye she saw movement by one set of open doors. Something ran by swiftly. Something white and flowing. A cape, or robe perhaps. Or maybe hair. Sam stopped breathing, waiting for it to come back and come inside. Another form ran by, a child-like
giggle followed in its wake. Then two more passed by the other end of the barn, one right after the other.
Sam swiveled her head, trying to watch both sides at once. They ran by so fast she couldn't make them out. All she could see was that they were white. Some were big, and some were small, but they all wore flowing white garments.
In the woods, she heard branches breaking, and bushes moving, and she imagined more were coming. A lot more.
She shook her head, barely having the strength for that. No more tears, no more cries. Surrendering, she lay down in the fetal position and waited. Waited for them to come to her. She began to close her eyes, but as she did she noticed something else. Something that lit a fire of hope inside her. Light had come outside. Finally, after seemingly years she finally saw daylight.
Now she did find the strength to cry, this time out of joy.
Remembering where the road was, she stood and took a few tentative steps the open doors, concentrating on the shapes of the trees. The light was dim, the sun hadn't broken the horizon, but that didn't matter. All that mattered was that there was light.
She stepped out of the barn and stopped. All the blood left her face and her legs began to buckle. On her right, standing in the depths of the woods were those white beings. Hundreds of them. White, bleached out skin and hair. They all stared at her without moving. Their bloodshot eyes looked lost and dead like the eyes of concentration camp prisoners.
Sam spotted David and Mary, bleached out like the rest. Mary leaned and whispered something in David's ear. They both looked at Sam and grinned as if they were plotting something sinister and final.
Sam turned left to the overgrown road, which was unbelievably empty. Taking a deep breath, she began to run, refusing to look back. If they were going to get her it wasn't going to be without a race and a fight.
For many moments she thought she was going to make it. Her legs felt strong, and carried her so swiftly, the wind made her eyes water. Then she heard the thunderous footsteps behind her, voices whooping, chuckling and giggling. They were gaining.
Sam didn't scream until the first hand scraped along her back.
Darkness came again.
Thank you for reading my short story, Wasteland, I hope you enjoyed it. I welcome any feedback. Please visit my site, www.deborahkrider.com Best Wishes!
Wasteland Page 3
