by Olah, Jeff
Through the gates and bounding off the sidewalk, she again avoided eye contact with Sean and pushed the truck along the open boulevard. She was surprised at how unaffected the city was beyond the field. Not a soul on the road and no cars or pedestrians. Megan could almost make out the entrance to the miserable train station her mother called home for many years. There only appeared to be one individual between them and the turn she needed to make into the parking lot and whoever or whatever it was walked in the opposite direction. From this distance, it wasn’t yet possible to determine whether or not it was human or something much more destructive.
Megan slowed the truck in anticipation of the right turn she needed to make and watched the solitary figure make its way into the packed parking lot adjacent to the train station. Turning her attention back to the right and pulling to a stop along the curb, she took a deep breath and turned off the ignition.
“Feeders,” Sean said.
She was elsewhere, the parking lot to the right and the train station just beyond had already been devastated by whatever those things were and although only a handful of them moved about in the yard, her brother’s voice didn’t register.
“What did you say?”
“Feeders, that’s what they were calling these things on the internet.”
“I didn’t hear that on the news,” Megan said.
“Yeah, I heard people calling them Feeders because they seem to be eating the people they attack. Weird… I guess.”
“Sean, I want you to stay here with the doors locked.”
“What are you… you’re not thinking of still going in there, are you? If she was here when those things came through, I’m sure there’s nothing left to find.”
“I’m going. I’ll get in and out fast. Those things, those Feeders here in the lot don’t appear to be moving very quickly. I can get around them and back in just a few minutes.”
“Are you kidding? You’re not leaving me here, if you’re going so am I.”
The ten year difference between the two often resulted in Sean trying to prove himself and exert his physical dominance. After his father began his second career outside the home, Sean felt as though he became the man of the house, although Megan could always see the hint of hesitation in his eyes and the lack of confidence when he tried to assert himself. She knew the real Sean even if he didn’t. He was terrified and it showed clearly beyond his words.
Instead of answering him, Megan opened her door, fumbled around in the cab and came away with both handguns. As her brother rounded the truck, his head on a swivel and eyes wider than she’d likely ever witnessed, the question came as he started to back away.
“What are you doing… and do you even know how to use one of those?”
“Sean, there isn’t time for this. Look around, we have to survive and there’s no one that’s coming help us. It’s you and me… no one else.”
“What about the police, the military? They have to be coming.”
“The police? Look over there,” Megan said pointing to the intersection at the next light. “Does that look like help is coming?”
The black and white cruiser came to rest against another vehicle with one of the officers still bucked to his seat, obviously overcome by the horde. From their vantage, it appeared that the second officer was able to put down six Feeders that attacked from the front before he was pulled down from behind and annihilated by the ravenous crowd. Neither man ever stood a chance.
“Sean, I need your help. We’re gonna have to do this on our own.” Handing him one of the guns, she continued, “No one is coming for us. Can you do this?”
128
The voices in his head screamed for him to return to the truck. Sean was convinced after sidestepping the lifeless bodies that he should have listened to his sister and stayed put. He couldn’t help her and he surely had no interest in helping the woman that once called herself a mother to him and Megan. His sister led the way and weaved in and out of the parked vehicles, their owners he assumed were either already on the train headed out of the city, dead or worse. Leaving the cover that the cars, SUVs and busses provided out in the lot, he followed her to the oversized archway leading to the main platform.
She readied her weapon and stepped to the end of the wall looking around the corner and into the station. A small group of Feeders moved about near the tracks at the far side of the building where her mother and other homeless often loitered. Megan didn’t have a clear vantage through the mess of bodies and garbage that peppered the area she vowed never to return to. She knew for years where to find the woman who’d once been a mother and only twice came this close to trying to find her. Two sets of legs jutted out from the wall, the feet covered in women’s running shoes that at this distance appeared to have been nearly worn through.
Megan couldn’t be sure it was her, although she also couldn’t clear her conscience without the knowledge that it wasn’t her. The risk wasn’t worth it for her to find out and she knew it. It also was foolish to have let her brother follow along, although after witnessing what those beasts did to a few innocent souls stuck in their cars in this very lot, this was probably the safest place for them. She would get close enough to confirm her mother wasn’t here and then get herself and Sean back to the truck and out of the city. Thirty minutes and they’d be out of this mess and on with the plan her father mapped out. Just get through this; it’s going to be fine…
“You ready?” she asked.
Sean shook his head. “Not really. She’s probably not even here. We don’t know if she’s ever been here, just those weird rumors from the neighbors. If she’s been out here on the streets for this long, she’d obviously look much different.”
“We have to try.”
“We? Don’t pull me into this. I think you’re crazy for even trying to find her, although it doesn’t look any better back there,” Sean said.
“We’re gonna get in and get out… fast. Stay right behind me and do not pull out the gun unless I tell you to. Let’s go.”
Megan stayed low and moved along the wall and for the first fifty feet the two went unnoticed as they reached the alcove that housed the station’s restrooms. The unexpected horde moved in quickly as they circled the tracks and came within twenty feet of the two bodies being mauled, neither of which were the person Megan was looking for.
Sean stood eight paces behind her, peering into the growing horde between them and the exit. “Megan, this isn’t good.”
There was no other way out and without enough firepower to go through the crowd, Megan began to panic, her brother frozen stiff. She did what came naturally. She withdrew her weapon and raised it at the horde. This caught Sean’s attention as he reached for the gun in an attempt to redirect her attention. “Over there,” he said pointing toward the two bathrooms. “Follow me.”
With those things beginning to close in, she couldn’t think of a better option than to move to the only area with a door that could be locked. With her brother already headed in that direction, Megan cursed under her breath and started after him. Sean still held the pistol in his left hand and nearly dropped it as he fumbled with the door handle and pulled it open, waiting for his sister to pass through the threshold.
Slamming the door behind them and throwing the deadbolt into the locked position, Sean let out a loud sigh as Megan hurried to each of the two stalls and pistol in hand, kicked the doors open. With not a single one of those things occupying the space and no one else hiding out, Megan let her shoulders slump as the pounding on the locked door began.
“Really Sean… now we’re trapped. This was the dumbest thing you’ve ever done. I realize I don’t have quite the same IQ as you, although fear is no excuse for you to get both of us killed and that’s exactly what you’ve done.”
The growls on the other side of the door increased as did the incessant pounding. This door could hold out for hours, possibly days, although Megan wasn’t sure they could. At some point they’d need food and with
no window to use as an exit, her mind began to tell her the story of where she’d spend the last days of her life.
“Megan… I’m sorry, but we are going to get out of here. We’ll get back to the truck. I have a plan… I promise.”
“Seriously? You have a plan? Is this part of it? We are stuck behind less than two inches of metal and from the sound of it; your plan has less than a few hours. What happens then? Do all these Feeders as you call them just disappear? Will we just walk out of here?”
“I said I was sorry, although really I’m not. It was your idiotic idea to come looking for her and as I already told you, she’s not here. It was a waste of time and could have gotten us killed. You couldn’t figure out how to get us out of here and I did. You can thank me when we get back to the truck.”
There were four separate sinks and four liquid soap dispensers. “Get into the stall and stand on the seat,” Sean said as he removed the containers and sat them next to the door. He stuffed each sink with handfuls of paper towels and opened the faucets. As the sinks began to overflow, he took the containers of soap and began to shoot the contents under the door as the water flowed in around him.
The obvious sounds of bodies slamming onto the floor out in the common area just on the other side of the door signaled Sean that his plan may just work. As his sister peered out of the stall, Sean said, “Stay there until I open the door, just a few minutes.” More thuds could be heard as Megan began to understand what he was doing.
Water now covered the entire floor and ran freely out into the station. He was terrified for what came next, although he knew they only had one shot. “Megan, once I open the door, those things are probably going to go crazy. Let’s stay put and wait for them to start hitting the floor before we try to make it out. The floor outside the bathroom will have much less traction, so have your gun ready… but don’t run. If we can’t stay on our feet, it’s over. Stay by the wall and don’t let them get ahold of you.”
“This is going to work Megan, it has too. We really don’t have any other choice.”
Stepping down from the toilet, Megan tiptoed across the wet floor, gun in hand, and leaned into the wall near her brother. They watched the door as the pounding had significantly subsided and was replaced by the sounds of wet bodies thrashing about only inches away.
“You ready?” Sean asked.
“No… but let’s go. If this works, you officially become my favorite person on the entire planet.”
“I thought I already was.”
129
The sound made by the deadbolt as it disengaged was barely audible over the thrashing sub-humans, although it was still too loud for Sean. He turned to his sister before twisting the handle and smiled at her. If he was about to be torn apart, he wanted something pleasant to remain in his last few thoughts. His sister meant everything to him and he never once told her. He needed her and depended on her every single day of his life. She woke him in the morning, drove him to and from school and attended every assembly where he received an award, even before his mother and father left. He admired her more than she could possibly imagine… She was his favorite person.
Megan’s shoulder length blond hair, freckled cheeks and nose gave the appearance that the siblings were much closer in age than ten years. Most guessed her to be in her early twenties and with her typical casual dress, she looked more like a surfer girl without a care in the world. Her career as a self-defense instructor and the fact that she was a major league tomboy surprised all who took the time to learn more about this young woman. Megan loved the contrast that was her life and often toyed with younger men that had the misfortune of testing her resolve.
As he began to pull the door open, the force from what was behind pushed it in and multiple Feeders tumbled to the white and black checkerboard tile. Megan shoved him backward into the door frame, narrowly avoiding the Feeders piling in, each falling over the one before and clawing at the siblings as they stepped out of the bathroom.
Sean fought the urge to run as one by one the creatures occupying the station started for them and were immediately thrown to the slick wet tile. His breathing rapid and shallow, Sean stayed against the wall and paused, letting his sister take the lead. With his focus on the horde only feet away and coming closer with each second, he pointed to the area near the tracks. “Megan, we have to get over there. It looks dry and it’s the only way we’re going to get away from these things.”
Their time ran out as the closest Feeder slid itself forward and grabbed a handful of the bottom of Sean’s pant leg, pulling him to the ground. He winced in pain as his head slapped against the wall behind. He came crashing down onto his tailbone on the hard wet floor below. Ripping away swatches of his pant leg with each pass, the beast quickly moved atop the boy and brought its head in, jaws snapping, going for Sean’s stomach.
Her brother down and as she struggled to find her footing, Megan braced herself against the wall. She planted her foot into the Feeders shoulder, shoving it backward as two more slid themselves in from behind. She pulled at Sean’s shirt, attempting to bring him to his feet in a perverted game of tug-of-war with the creatures scattered across the floor and she was desperately losing the battle. She needed him to snap out of it, to understand that this was it; with more Feeders heading toward them, their time for making it to the exit untouched was rapidly ending “SEAN, STAND UP NOW!”
Still trying to pull free and kicking at the creatures inching toward him, Sean backed into the wall. “Megan let go of my shirt, I can’t move.” Shaking free, he used his arms to push against the wall, pulled his feet in close and in an effort to stand the weapon fell from his waistband. Attempting to reach for it ahead of the oncoming horde, Sean nearly found himself on the floor a second time. Megan pulled him back and shoved him to the left as she withdrew her own pistol, leveling it at the crowd. “Go, get to the truck.”
“Megan, I’m not leaving you…”
“SEAN, JUST GO!”
He turned, walked carefully across the slick flooring and reached the unaffected area near the tracks without any trouble. He turned around to see Megan backed into the corner; arms raised and watched the first shot leave her weapon. She used another two rounds to level the original attackers and, picking up the gun Sean dropped, took out three more, giving her a few seconds of reprieve.
“HEAD SHOTS!” Sean yelled.
Moving away from the approaching horde, Megan looked back at her brother, obviously confused. “What are you talking about?”
“Megan, let’s go… like right now.”
With the crowd outside the bathroom fighting one another for position and attempting to move through the sloppy mess toward the pair, she reached her brother. The Feeders to the rear no longer a threat, Megan saw that they now had a straight shot through the parking lot and to the truck. After a final scan of the area, she shook her head and quickly moved toward the exit. Handing Sean the weapon once again she said, “Stay low and be quiet. And… thanks.”
They moved from the building and out into the mid-morning light. Sean looked skyward and squinted as he smiled at his sister. A moment of calm in what he was sure would end up being the worst day of their lives. These things weren’t real, how could they be? Everything he knew about the human body and the way it functioned caused the dull ache at the base of his neck to shoot into the back of his head. How could this thing have moved so fast from one person to another, let alone city to city? He needed to think about something else. For now he just wanted to get somewhere safe. The answers to the larger issues would come with time.
“Megan, where are we going?”
“Are you serious? We’re going back in the truck.”
“That’s not what I meant; Dad told you something… he told you what was happening, where to go and what to do. I think I have the right to know.”
“Right now all you need to do is…”
Caught off guard, Megan turned to see the large crowd of Feeders they’d just escaped was o
nce again mobile and beginning to exit the station. She leaned in, pulled Sean to her side and pointed toward the lot. The pair once again moved in and out of the forgotten vehicles, this time with the knowledge that many of their owners would never return for the commute home. Megan looked in each window she passed for any needed supplies. With nothing worth the risk of allowing the horde to gain ground, she simply followed the path to the last car and in peering out from behind, checked for the next threat.
The streets remained clear, save for the two random Feeders moving through the intersection that appeared to be headed away from the area. “Come on,” Megan said as she urged Sean forward. This time both siblings ran the short distance to the truck, jumped in and locked the doors.
“Head shots,” Sean said.
Fumbling to get the keys into the ignition, Megan cut a look at her brother. “What?”
“I was trying to tell you before. Only head shots work.”
As the engine rumbled to life, Megan pounded the accelerator and pushed the truck down the boulevard and away from the station. “Sean, what in the world are you talking about?”
“Those things… they can only be stopped with a shot to the head. The videos I watched this morning showed them being shot multiple times in the body and still getting up. The only way to completely stop them is to shoot them in the head. That’s what I was trying to tell you earlier.”
Sean still looked frightened and now she was too, more so than the moments after speaking to her father. If she didn’t believe him then, she surely did now. Megan knew she could take care of herself… well enough to get by anyway, although how was she supposed to keep the two of them away from harm as the days passed? “Good to know… And thank you!”