by Ian Woodhead
“Good man. So why the fuck are we still here?”
Nelson looked at Andrew, winked, then cracked Damien on the side of the head with the pistol and pushed him forward with his foot. The beetle literally dived on the dazed banker and thrust its thick fangs into the man's back.
“Are you fucking insane?”
“He saw my face,” replied Nelson. “Are you going to stand there all offended or are you coming with me?”
He took one look at the beetle's mandibles stripping the wet flesh from the man's neck before hurrying towards Nelson's retreating form.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Another Secret Uncovered
The moment she looked over Jason's shoulder and saw they had the place to themselves, Ellis just knew that the shit really had hit the fan. What the hell were they doing in here in the first place? Marty needed checking out. It was obvious, even with her limited compulsory one day work’s first-aid course, that the poor guy was in shock. She wasn't the only one to pick this up. Lorraine had commented too but her so-called medical advice centred upon getting a stiff drink down his gob.
The others gravitated towards the bar leaving her next to the inner door, feeling a little confused, scared and alone. Watching Jason acting up in front of her workmates was not helping matters at all. Was she the only person in here who believed they stood on the edge of some unknown fucking disaster? Ellis collapsed into the nearest chair, took out her phone and placed it onto the table next to someone's half-drunk beer. She looked at the other tables and saw more glasses, most of them containing some kind of beverage. Ellis also noticed an untidy pile of coins on a table to the immediate left of the ladies, and even somebody else's phone on another table. That alone made the shakes return.
Lorraine grabbed the back of the chair opposite Ellis with one hand. “Girl, you really do look like shit. Here, this should help put you right.” She placed a glass down on the table with the other hand then scraped the chair back and sat down. “Come on, don't just start at it, get the stuff down your neck.”
It shocked Ellis to discover that she wasn't alone in thinking they were all teetering on the edge of disaster. Under that thin layer of compassion, she saw the same ragged and extreme emotions carved on Lorraine's face too. It smelled like scotch. Ellis hated the stuff but still dragged the glass closer. “I look like shit? Have you looked in a mirror recently?” She picked up the glass and downed the lot in one go. The contents burned down her throat but she hardly noticed.
Lorraine tapped the table next to the phone. “I tried mine while your fella helped himself to the drinks. There's nobody about you see. Marty tried too. There's no service. Marty thinks the last tremor must have knocked out the two transmission towers. Seriously, I ask you. Who in their right mind builds a town inside a deep valley?”
She folded her own hand over Lorraine's while pressing the menu button on the phone which Jason bought her for Christmas. Oh hell, she had no service either. Her phone had suddenly turned into a brick. “I think I need another drink, Lorraine.”
“You know, I expected this place to be full. Sure, I guess the place would have emptied when that quake hit, but I thought they would have returned, at least to pick up their dropped stuff. There's a wallet on the floor over there, Ellis.”
“You don't think they all went home, do you?”
Her friend shrugged.
“You think they're dead?” In her mind, Ellis pictured over a dozen drunk customers piling out of the pub doors and falling straight into that crack in the ground, like lemmings falling off a cliff edge. “No, forget what I just said, that's stupid. More than likely they'll be staggering home. They'll have probably already forgotten why they left the pub in the first place.” Ellis forced out a quiet laugh which sounded so fake, even to her ears. “You know what this place is like, Lorraine. The locals would have been lined up outside the door the moment they opened up.”
“We haven't passed a single soul since this tremor hit us though.” Lorraine stood up. “Not a single soul.” She gently pulled Ellis out of the chair. “Come on, we had better get to the bar before Marty drinks the place dry. Don't forget your phone.”
Jason had found the black leather wallet and had placed it on the bar along with several other items, including some coins, another three phones and a key fob. He looked up from his collection when Ellis approached and gave her a smile. “How are you holding up?”
“I've had better days. What are you doing?”
“I'm trying to figure out what happened in here,” he replied. Jason pulled a bank card from the wallet, read the name then put it back. “With little success. Nothing adds up.”
“What do you mean?”
“Come on, Ellis. We've been in here a few times after you've finished work. You know what this place is like. You know, loud, busy, and generally busy.” Jason walked over to Ellis and gently placed his hands on the woman's shoulders and turned her around. “Just look at the pub. Does it seem a little too neat?”
“Oh heck!” Marty put his drink down. “Why didn't I see this? Ellis. Picture this pub, happy pissed voices shouting for attention at the bar. Couples sat at tables, mixing with the under-aged teens and the groups of buddies, all generally having a great time.” He took a quick sip of his drink. “And then that tremor reverberates through the town. There would be panic, screaming, people running about, all trying to get the hell out of here before the building collapses on them.”
It finally clicked. “Oh, I get you now. Where's the tipped chairs and broken glasses?”
Jason turned her back around. “Not to mention the lack of blood and closed fire-doors. I seriously doubted they all trooped out of the main door as calm as you like.”
Lorraine checked her phone once more. “Jason, I don't think I'm all that turned on by your serious outlook. Look it's a bit weird, okay, I get it, but we're not the sodding Scooby gang.” She re-filled her glass and drunk it in one go. “I think I'm going to head home now. A hot bath, a bottle of wine and TV is calling to me.” Lorraine walked towards the door. “Catch you on the other side, kids. Marty, look after yourself.”
“What the hell was that about?” Ellis attempted to run after her friend, only for Jason to stop her.
“Marty, would you mind doing the honours?”
The older man gave Jason a salute, grabbed the bottle of spirits and ran after Lorraine. “I'll see you outside.”
“I should have kept my big mouth shut,” he muttered. Jason threaded his way through the tables, heading to the far side of the pub. He stopped, bent down and picked something off the floor before making his way back to Ellis. “She's scared. I mean, really scared.”
“And I'm not?”
“I know you are, honey, but you have always come across as a fairly stable person. Lorraine, despite the happy-go-lucky façade is nothing of the kind.” He examined what he'd found on the floor. “If I'm right about this, then that poor girl is about to find herself being pushed to the very edge of insanity.”
“If you are trying to scare me then it's bloody working!” The man she originally fell in love with had vanished. Everything, from his easy smile to his calm demeanour had changed. “Wait, what did you find over there? Another wallet?”
He shook his head. “No, not exactly.” Jason opened his fingers. “This tells me that we should get away from here as soon as possible. In fact, I think we ought to get to my place as quickly as we can.”
She looked at the object nestled in his palm and had no idea at all what it could be. It did look a little like a stick of raw asparagus but brown and segmented in the middle. An unpleasant smell drifted from it, reminding her a little of over-boiled cabbage mixed with wet dirt. “Do I even want to know what that is?”
He shook his head, dropped it on the floor, then reached into his inside jacket pocket. Before he pulled his hand out, Jason leaned forward and kissed Ellis on the lips. “I'm really sorry about this, honey. You really need to believe me on that.”
&nbs
p; “I don't understand.”
“There are some aspects of me that I hoped you'd never have to experience.” Jason slowly pulled out his hand which now contained a large black, automatic pistol. He took her hand then pulled Ellis over to the entrance, while looking over his shoulder. “Time to go.”
A dozen questions all fought to be heard but she couldn’t get even one out. A blistering scream coming from outside the pub shattered the relative silence. Both doors flew open and Marty ran inside, with Lorraine right behind her.
“You don't want to know what we just saw crawling out of the chasm!” he said, breathlessly.
“Do you think it saw us?”
Marty shook his head. “I don't think so.”
“What is it?” Ellis pulled her hand from Jason's grip and ran over to the window. She climbed onto the red leather seat, pressed her nose against the glass and immediately wished she'd stayed in the dark. Her worst nightmare personified were crawling out of the wide crack and moving, very slowly, across the empty roads.
Bugs, dozens of them, all types and all super-sized. The smallest, a bright yellow locust thing was about the size of a greyhound but that particular specimen was a dwarf compared to some of them out there. “What the fuck is going on?” She looked back at her gun toting boyfriend. “Did you know about this, Jason?”
“Come on, Ellis!” cried Marty. “What sort of a question is that?”
“Did you not notice the evil looking bang bang in his hand?”
“We really need to get away from here,” said Jason. “You have no idea how much danger we're in right now.”
Ellis turned back to the window. “Forget it. There's no chance that I'm going outside with those things running about. Anyway, none of them appear to be coming towards us.” The exodus from the chasm had slowed down. A couple more locust things crawled onto the road surface and skittered away, followed by a black beetle. That was about the same size as the locust thing but looked way more dangerous. Jason did have a point though, they couldn't stay in here for any length of time. Maybe they could escape those bugs? Despite their size, it didn't look like they were able to move with any speed.
Her hopes of escape were soon dashed when Ellis saw that the streets weren't as empty as she first believed. An old man pulled his body out from under a dark-blue delivery truck and slowly crawled on his hands and knees towards one of the town-centre's remaining telephone boxes. It took her a moment to figure out who it was.
David Hayes, a regular to the top market, not that any of the usual customers would normally see him. He was generally spotted going through the trade bins in the large compound behind the market. The only reason she knew of his nocturnal habit was because of listening to Aroon complaining about the mess he made, and the fact that his father always got him to tidy it up. Aroon once told Ellis that he believed that the tramp must have been a spider in some past life as it was the only thing that could explain how such a scrawny looking old man was able to scale a seven-foot stone wall, topped with razor wire.
Ellis soon understood how Hayes was able to scramble over that market wall when a green and yellow striped bug scurried close to the man. He raced over to the side of a double-decker bus on the other side of the road and, using the door mechanism, the side mirror and an open window on the top deck, was able to reach the roof before the giant insect had realised its food had just escaped.
Not that this helped David. As soon as he had gone from crawling to running, every insect in sight reacted and Ellis saw, to her horror, that the bastard things weren't quite as slow as she first believed. They rushed en-mass towards the stationary vehicle at an astonishing speed, surrounding the bus in seconds.
“Oh my God!”
Ellis hadn't noticed both Marty and Lorraine had joined her to watch this macabre show.
“We have to do something to help that poor man,” continued Marty. “It won't take them long to get to him.”
She believed that Marty could be right. A couple of the smaller ones had taken advantage of the predators squashed against the bus sides by jumping on their backs. David had to run down the length of the roof to escape their claws.
“What can we do?”
“I'm sorry, there's nothing we can do. It's best that you don't see this. Ellis, please, can you come away from the window?”
It looked like David could be safe after all as the large monsters hadn't taken too kindly to being used as ladders. They pulled the smaller animals down then savagely ripped them apart. Pieces of broken shell, torn legs and yellow and red fluid went flying. The new movement shifted the attention from David as the giant insects all converged on the shifting, wet mass of hard bodies, no doubt all eager to get a piece of their now deceased comrades.
Jason pushed in between Lorraine and Ellis. “Please, we so need to get away from here. I can't stress enough that moving from this location will be our wisest choice.”
“Are you having a laugh?” Lorraine pointed to the bus. “You saw how fast those things can move. We won't last five minutes out there.”
“Oh God! Please tell me that I'm imagining that!”
Ellis followed Lorraine's gaze and saw three of those giant locusts had flown up to the top of the Black Lotus bank. They perched on the roof edge and it was obvious they were about to fly next. Sure enough, they spread their wings and took off, heading straight for the roof of the bus. Ellis finally took Jason's advice and looked away but that didn’t stop her from hearing the poor man's frantic cries for help, soon followed by his very noisy death.
She allowed Jason to take her in his arms. “What are we going to do?”
“We do what we should have done in the first place.” He gently unpeeled her from his torso. “This is all my fault. I should have known they were going to emerge. It's...” he shook his head. “Never mind. Come on. Follow me.” He pulled her back through the pub. Lorraine and Marty followed.
For the first time in months, Lorraine actually kept her mouth shut. Ellis kinda wished her friend kept talking; watching Lorraine's face going through a kaleidoscope of expressions, all of them bad, fucking terrified her.
Jason took them through the bar area and into the reception. He stopped next to a code-locked door, pushed in a six digit combination, then pushed the handle down. The door opened. Ellis didn't bother asking how he could possibly know some random door code. Too much had happened already today and the whole situation stopped making much sense hours ago. Hell, once the giant insects made their dramatic entrance, everything went into free-fall.
Jason led them through the occupants’ private living room. Somewhere in the background, Ellis heard Rossini's Seramide symphony. Not that she was in any way familiar with classical music. The only reason Ellis recognised it was because her dad had it as a ringtone for years and it used to drive her mad.
It's a little weird how it was that particular song they were hearing. She wondered where it was coming from. Were Angie and Graham around here somewhere? If so, they needed to know what was going on, if they didn't already know that is.
Her boyfriend stopped outside another door. He slowly opened it an inch, peered inside then closed it. “Shit.”
“Oh God. Are the monsters in there?”
Jason shook his head. “If you mean the giant arthropods, Marty, no need to fret. It isn't them.” He pulled the door open again and looked inside. “Okay,” he whispered. “I need you to follow me and stay quiet! As for what's inside? It's far worse than a few giant beetles. We're about to enter the lair of their masters. The beings who control them.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Slamming the Gates Shut
If that kid of hers made another derogatory comment about his appearance, Gerald Dorset wasn't sure that he'd be able to control his actions. He slowed the red Ford and stopped a metre behind an old Ford Escort, waiting impatiently for the lights to change. Why had he actually thought that this trip would play out without incident? Ten minutes into the journey and he'd already felt like h
e'd swallowed a dozen large pebbles
Look at them, just look at those two little darlings in the back of that car, sitting quietly, behaving themselves and generally acting like little girls ought to. It looked like they were playing on their phones. Not that Gerald wholly approved of this insidious tech invasion but it did have its uses, on occasion.
She booted the back of his seat yet again. Of course the mother of the demon spawn hadn't seen the provocative action. The new Mrs. Dorset had her brain plugged into her tablet display. Demon spawn was no fool. The little bitch knew her game. She understood which buttons to press and when to press them. Gerald simply clamped down on his retort and gripped the wheel a little tighter. Despite the earlier promise he made to himself before his new family set off to go shopping in Bradfield's city centre, Gerald also knew how the game worked. If he even dared raise his voice to his new wife's little princess, then the eruptions really would start.
He had witnessed first-hand exactly what happened to anybody who dared to 'have a word' with Laura Dorset. The woman had gone fucking nuclear! The transformation from the ultra sexy thirty-two year old dark-haired beauty into a five foot three Tasmanian devil was scarier than the torrent of vile abuse which left her mouth. It sure did make a stark contrast to Laura and Gerald's first ever confrontation after the twelve-year-old girl poured green poster paint into his coffee cup. Now, how did that go?
“Tania does like you, Gerald. I'm sure of it. You just have to give her some time to come around, a bit of breathing space.”
The lights changed. He took his foot off the brake and followed the Beetle. He passed a couple of parked police cars on the left and three more on the right. Had there been a traffic accident? Tania booted his seat again. Once again, Gerald reined in his temper, partly thanks to Laura actually witnessing her golden child acting like the spoilt little cow that she was. He struggled to control the big smirk which threatened to explode across his face, secure in the knowledge that mummy would give Tania the biggest bollocking she had ever received. Hell, his new wife might even give the little bitch a well-earned slap!