by Maxey, Phil
The inside of the store was quite large with a high ceiling, but natural light still had a hard time penetrating the aisles. Trolleys and baskets lay scattered around. Zach and Ray stood at the entrance waiting for their eyes to adjust.
“Looks like most things are still here. I expected we would find empty shelves,” said Ray picking up a basket and walking down one of the aisles.
“By time people realized they needed stuff it was already too late,” said Zach. He watched where Ray went then took a quick look at Dee in the truck to make sure he was okay. Walking along the ends of the aisle looking at the cans of paint and fixtures he smiled. It reminded him of his time as a teenager working in his parent’s hardware store back in Maine. Hammers He loved hammers as a kid. His father would take him with him when he did building work in the local area, and one of his favourite tasks was any kind of hammering. His old claw hammer was one of his favourite objects as a child. His mum used to scold him for sleeping with it under his pillow. As Zach stood there, admiring the rack of hammers a noise came from the back of the store. Grabbing one of them from the rack he slowly walked up the aisle trying to ascertain from where the noise came from.
“Ray?” he said in a hushed voice, but no response came.
A sound of metal items clattering against each other caused Zach to instantly raise the hammer. It appeared to come from out back of the shop in whatever rooms were there.
“Ray!” This time Zach spoke a bit louder, he didn’t want to accidently end Ray because the old guy was hard of hearing. Still silence. Zach took in a deep breath and looked back down one of the aisles to the light at the front of the store. He could just about see the back of the truck. Everything looked okay down there, it looked like the direction to go in. Turning back to the gloom at the back of the store Zach regretted not picking up one of the many pocket torches on special offer. As he stepped forward towards an open door at the back of the store he strained his hearing for any other noises or even the sound of breathing but he couldn’t detect either. Why would Ray be back here?
“Had to go into the room out back to get some parts,” said Ray bursting out of the darkness then raising his hand when he saw Zach had his arm raised. “Hey steady!”
Zach let out a breath and lowered his arm. “You got what you need?” he said looking at a basket full of wires, plastic tubes and various tins with skull and crossbones symbols on them.
“I’ll know later when I’m trying to put it together, but yeah I think so. Also found these out back thought they might come in handy.” Ray lifted up a box of four transceivers.
“Walkie Talkies, nice going,” said Zach, taking the box from Ray.
“And you got… a hammer?”
“We can get some more…”
The sound of the pickup’s horn bellowed from outside the store.
“Dee!” Zach ran down the aisle. Straight away he could see Dee pointing off into the distance. As Zach exited the store and stood on the sidewalk he looked to where Dee was pointing. A middle-aged man with glasses was running towards them down the center of the street adjourning the forecourt, but Zach realized that’s not what Dee was pointing at for behind the man was a large wolf like creature chasing and bounding from obstacle to obstacle.
Ray appeared behind Zach breathing heavily.
“How quickly can you make one of the devices?” said Zach.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Cal studied the roads around the building. He followed the pickup with the telescope as far as he could, eventually seeing it disappear behind some trees. As far as he could tell nothing had followed them. It felt good telling the group what he used to be before the incident that got him thrown into a hole in New Mexico. For most of the time he was in there he had tried to forget his military past, but doing that also meant he forgot the good times. He was also glad Zach didn’t ask him to recite his crimes. They all have done something bad he thought otherwise they wouldn’t have been in there. No reason going over the past. The early morning sun warmed his arms as he stood scouring the streets and buildings around him and for the first time in years he felt free.
“It’s a fine view up here,” said Jacob. Cal was a bit startled, as he never heard him approach, but did not show it.
“Yup.”
Jacob smiled. “You’re a man of few words, me too, although it can make conversation a bit hard going.”
Cal looked away from the telescope and smiled back. Jacob sat in the garden chair, pulling the back up. “How’s it looking out there?”
“Haven’t seen any movement. Whatever those things were they don’t seem to be bothering with us.”
“Nosce hostem tuum,” replied Jacob, before drinking the remaining fruit juice. “You know what that means son?”
“Yes, I’m not sure it applies to evolved super animals though.”
“Heck it applies to everything on God’s green earth. We learn what makes them tick, we learn how to defeat them.”
“Hopefully they are not thinking the same about us.”
“So what’s your view on Zach, everyone seems to be okay with him being in charge.”
“He’s got us this far,” said Cal still looking out with the telescope.
“That he has.”
Michael appeared from the stairwell, with a pen and paper in his hand. “I’m doing an inventory of all the food and liquid we got, just need to have a look in the storage they got up here.” He opened the first of the fridges they had on the roof. “Any sign of those wolfmen?”
“Nothing,” said Cal.
“I’ll be happy not to see them again, right that’s all that listed, from now on food, drinks and electricity will need to be rationed. Enjoy that fruit juice, Jacob, it might be the last for a while,” said Michael, disappearing off down the stairwell.
“Happy guy that one, I wonder what landed him inside,” said Jacob.
“Does it matter?” said Cal.
“I guess not.”
Fiona looked over the pieces of paper that were strewn across the living room floor as well as the table. Paper versions of their digital counterparts each telling the same story in a different way. She started to arrange them in chronological order, trying to decipher how things got so bad. Doing this helped. Things had changed so much over the past few days that there were times she wasn’t sure what was real and what wasn’t. As it turned out it was all real.
Michael appeared in the kitchen. “Rations from now on,” said Michael leaving the penthouse by the front entrance.
“Figures,” said Fiona looking down at the paper, the first of which was a report dated April first.
“STRANGE SPECIES OF BEE DISCOVERED IN AUSTRLIA
A twelve-year-old boy today was stung by a bee. Nothing strange in that you might think, except the bee that injured the young boy was very strange indeed. Apart from being slightly larger than its brethren this bee had what appeared to be plates of armor across its back.
‘I thought it was a beetle at first, but then I saw it was a Bee with armor!’ said Garry Pome. Local apiarists are baffled by this new creature with some calling it a new species altogether.”
The timing of the article was unfortunate Fiona thought, as well as it being posted on a well-known conspiracy theory site. Most of the early news stories about evolving creatures were from conspiracy websites and that must have been why they weren’t taken seriously by the mass media. Even though, she knew from her intelligence days that all news regardless of source is at least looked at by the various government agencies, so they must have known something was going on. The other news pieces showed the growing realization amongst the world’s population that something very serious was happening, but by time they truly got organized to try and stop it the ‘Cascade’ as it was termed was irreversible. Still the question of what the intelligence services knew of the event bugged her, as the world’s secret services were conspicuously absent from most news stories.
Were they responsible and wanted to try
and put the genie back in the bottle before it went mainstream? And if so, might have they had some kind of fix but couldn’t implement it before it was too late? It was an intriguing thought, not that she was in any position to act on it. Right now the most important thing was to find out if there were survivors and where was the most likely place for them to be. She pulled forward a large map of America that was once in a silver frame on the wall, and looked at the piece of paper from the newspaper office downstairs with the bases on it. Abbey had told her only two bases were sending back a message, Austin and Portland. She wondered if there was any method to contact them. She had done rudimentary radio electronics as part of her communications training and wondered if she could rig something from what they already had. Maybe with Abbey’s help, she pondered.
She stood up and stretched, pushing her arms out and arching her back. Walking forward to stand in front of the large glass window something caught her eye far off in the distance. She moved her face close to the glass window and squinted best she could to try to increase her focus. In another time and place something moving in the distance on rooftops would have been birds, but Fiona knew different. Whatever they were there were more than one and they were moving towards the building. Need to tell the others. She turned around and saw Cal and Jacob appear from the kitchen.
“We see them,” said Cal rushing past.
“What are they?” said Fiona. Cal tossed her the telescope. Placing it to her eye she looked again. Her arm dropped down her side still holding the telescope. Those things again. Putting the scope back to her eye she could see at least eleven of the wolf creatures jumping from rooftop to rooftop heading in their direction, at the speed they were moving they might have a few minutes max before they reached them. Fiona ran down the stairs to the floor below where she found Jacob and Abbey in the computer room.
“I’ve found how to lock the doors of the building remotely. The main doors are now electronically sealed, as well as the doors to the bottom stairwell. I’ll seal all the lowest doors once Cal and Michael are up here,” said Abbey.
“What about Zach and the others getting back in?” said Fiona.
“Right now they are better off outside if these creatures are intent in getting in here, once it’s clear I’ll unlock the doors. Cal and Michael are making sure there’s no supplies left on the lower floors then piling as much furniture as they can into the stairwell.”
“If we just had some weapons,” said Fiona.
Jacob reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out his handgun. “I’ve got this, it’s got ten rounds left.”
“If we can barricade ourselves on the top floors, and they can’t get in maybe they will give up and leave, they might be evolved, but they’re still animals. The cameras on the outside of the building work so we can see where they plan to get in,” said Abbey, bringing up the outside camera feeds.
Fiona ran down the corridor to the stairwell. “I’ll see if Cal and Michael need any help.”
Michael and Cal were dragging desks and chairs into the bottom stairwell as Fiona appeared above them.
“Grab anything of any weight on this floor and throw it down this stairwell against the ground floor door,” said Cal. Fiona grabbed two chairs and threw them down the stairwell. She then moved over to the windows and looked out onto the street. She couldn’t see the wolf creatures yet, but she felt unnerved by how close this floor was to the ground.
“I’ve seen those things leap twenty to thirty-foot, they could jump off the roof of the truck and through these windows,” said Fiona.
“We are working our way up, barricading as many as we can before they get outside,” said Michael.
“They are just a few streets away!” shouted Abbey down the stairwell.
“We need to get up to the next floor, now!” shouted Cal. He, Michael and Fiona ran up to the floor above, and manically started pulling and heaving as much furniture down the stairs as possible.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Ray frantically stuffed various components into a piece of the plastic piping he took from the hardware store. “He’s not going to make it.”
“He’ll make it,” said Zach, who was driving the pickup in reverse towards the middle-aged guy. They had opened the back so whoever this guy was could jump in. Dee was in a huddle in the foot space around Ray’s feet. “You okay down there, Dee?”
“Yes, sir,” replied Dee nervously.
“Don’t worry it will be okay, just going to pick this guy up and we are going to be off, which direction is it to your dads,” said Zach intently, steering the pickup the best he could while watching the middle age man stagger forward in their direction. The snarling vision of canine anger was only a few hundred yards behind him and gaining fast.
“Err, straight then do a left, then straight for a few mins,” said Dee.
“Hold on everyone.” Zach slammed on the brakes, making them all lurch forward. The middle-aged guy collapsed onto the flat bed at the back of the pickup and grabbed hold of the sides. Zach hit the gas pedal and the truck roared forward. The wolf creature bounded towards them for a few yards then skidded to halt. It then raised its head to the sky like something had called it, and turned and bounded off. They lost site of it when they turned the corner at the end of the street.
“Has it gone?” said Ray.
“Looks that way,” said Zach. Ray let out a sigh of relief and his arms collapsed in his lap while still holding the device.
“That thing is not live yet is it?” said Zach.
“No.”
A bang came on the cabin window, the middle-aged man with glasses breathing heavily, gave the thumbs up.
“Dee, can you sit up a bit I need directions of where to go.” Dee sat up just enough to see the surroundings.
“Hey watch it kid, I’m holding explosives here,” said Ray.
“Right, yes, oh I know where we are. Go down Malvern Avenue, then do a left and second right and you will be in my street.”
Zach caught sight of the road sign and proceeded down the Avenue as instructed. He kept looking around where they were driving as much as possible while still keeping his eyes on the road in case one of the wolf things jumped out in front of them.
After a few minutes they were in Dee’s street. “Fifth house on the right, it’s the one with the green door.” Dee’s head was still just high enough to see the houses, but Zach could tell he didn’t want to look. Zach rolled up to a decently sized single story house, with a fifties era red pickup in the carport.
“Now that’s my kind of pickup, not like these modern things,” said Ray.
“My dad rebuilt it,” said Dee in a subdued tone.
Zach drove onto the drive. “Dee stay here, I’m going to say hello to our guest and check things out, okay? Same as before you see something hit the horn.” Dee nodded. “Ray, you reckon you can finish that device outside of the truck? Maybe in Dee’s dad’s car port?”
“I’ll try,” said Ray, getting out of the truck carefully taking his components and the backpack full of other important items with him. The guy in the back climbed out the back of the truck, and approached Zach with his hand out.
“Names Brad T Crenshaw. Thanks for the rescue back there.”
Zach got out of the truck and shook his hand. “No problem, glad we were there when we were. I’m Zach, that there in the carport is Ray, Dee’s in the truck.”
“Actually, I knew you were there, my microphones picked up your truck moving down Shrove Drive, unfortunately so did one of the canine E.L.F’s as well, they have exceptional hearing and smell,” said Brad.
Microphones? Zach thought. “Great, well I have to check out this building, you can wait here if you want or you can come inside with me,” said Zach, backing up towards the front of Dee’s house, then turning and looking through the front window.
“Happy to help,” said Brad who was following, “Why are you here?”
“This is Dee’s house. He hasn’t been back here for a
while, and he’s not seen his dad since it all went down.”
“This whole area was cleared out by the army in the evacuation, I doubt anyone’s in this house, and if the kid’s dad never found him then the news is probably not good,” said Brad.
“Yeah well, I gotta look anyway.”
“Of course.”
Zach cupped his hands over his eyes and pressed his face up against the glass of the living room, inside it looked messy, but there was no sign of anyone. Turning back to the truck he gestured to Dee that he was going to go around the back. Moving through the carport, and past Ray who was sitting on an upside down bucket near a small worktop, Zach arrived at a shut gate to the backyard, which he opened slowly. Zach and Brad walked past a small empty pool.
“The canines drink the water from the pools. Here in Roswell we have a lot of them,” said Brad.
The patio doors at the back of the property were closed and locked.
“Going to have to break in,” said Zach, looking around for something to break the glass. Brad handed him a small boulder, “we want to try and do this as quiet as possible.” In one of the corners of the yard was a dog kennel and just inside of it Zach could see a blanket. He grabbed it, then placed it up against the part of the glass door near the inside latch, and hit it with the boulder, a small circular piece of glass fell onto the linoleum inside, Zach then reached through and opened the door.
“Hello?” said Zach and swore to himself that he never asked Dee what his dad’s name was. “Anyone home? I’m here with Dee.”
Brad stepped through the door and stood for a moment cleaning his glasses. He was wearing a light gray t-shirt with a hunter’s jacket on top, each pocket seemingly containing something. His combat pants pockets the same.
The interior of Dee’s father’s home was well decorated. Film posters adjourned the walls, and a large flat screen TV hung proudly on another. Zach picked up a picture of Dee and his dad that was on the floor and smiled, he then took the photo out of the frame and put it in his pocket.