by Platt, Sean
No one in the hall.
Paola’s door was closed.
Mary burst through the door, hoping it was only a seizure.
But her daughter wasn’t in the room.
Instead, there were two large men wearing blue Black Island Research Facility overalls. Behind them, the window was wide open, curtains blowing in the cold ocean breeze.
The men’s eyes were dark, their mouths agape, faces not at all responding to Mary’s gun. While their bodies were not decomposed or changed in any visible way, she could somehow sense their infection.
“Where the fuck is she?” Mary screamed.
Both men rushed her at once.
Mary shot the first in the gut and sent him to the ground. As he fell, she turned the gun toward the other man, but not fast enough.
The man grabbed the shotgun and whipped it from Mary’s hands with surprising speed and powerful force.
He tossed the gun to the ground and reached for her throat.
Desmond bolted through the doorway, pistol in hand, and fired point blank at the man’s face, shooting twice, not taking any chances. As the second man dropped, Mary pointed out the window, “She’s gone!”
Mary grabbed the shotgun and raced out the window.
“Paola!” she screamed repeatedly, turning in the loneliest of circles, desperate for any sign at all of her daughter.
Cabin lights lit up, shadows falling across windows as the island’s civilian residents looked to see what was going on. Mary scanned the windows, searching for anything that would lead her to Paola.
This can’t be happening!
Desmond followed her outside, on his phone, barking urgently into the receiver.
Mary cried out, “Paola!!” and listened, hoping her daughter was still close enough (or alive) to answer.
Desmond, now off the phone, set a hand on Mary’s shoulder. “Don’t worry, we’ll find her.”
“She told us The Darkness was coming!” Mary spat. “She told us, and we — no, you — ignored her.”
“I’ve got all available Guardsmen on this. We’re on an island, Mary. There are only two ways off, and we’ve both docks on lockdown.”
“They could’ve taken a rowboat for all we know!”
“There are two choppers on the way. There’s no way they could reach the mainland before we caught them.”
“I can’t believe this is happening again.” Mary shook her head. “We were supposed to be safe!”
“We’ll find her,” Desmond repeated.
Mary didn’t want to hear anything from Desmond. He said they’d be safe, and they weren’t. His words were empty and his promises hollow. She could count on no one but herself — same as it ever was.
Mary brushed by Desmond, back into the house, and threw on her black pants, boots, shirt, and jacket. She holstered a Glock to her hip, grabbed a few magazines, and shoved them in her pocket, along with a box of shells.
“What are you doing?” Desmond asked.
“What’s it look like? I’m going to find my daughter.” Mary marched toward the front door, stopping to grab a heavy black flashlight that doubled as a baton.
“I’ve got my people out. We should stay here in case she comes back.”
Mary spun around and met Desmond’s eyes. “Do you really expect me to sit here while my daughter’s out there with those … things?”
Desmond looked lost for words. “No. Of course not. I’ll come with you.”
Desmond was still in his pajamas, and Mary wasn’t about to wait for him to get dressed and ready. “I have my phone. You can come and find me.”
Mary slammed the front door then marched down the dirt road between the cabins. Guardsmen appeared at people’s doors, knocking, asking residents what they’d seen. She held no hope on someone seeing anything worth a damn. These things worked in the shadows, invisible to everyone — but Paola.
Maybe that’s why they’d come after her.
They knew she could see them coming, and that made her a threat.
“Wait up!” Mary heard a man calling.
She turned, expecting Desmond, but instead saw Brent, dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, holding a pistol. Jade was trotting behind him, in black leather pants and a matching shirt, flashlight in her hand and a gun on her hip.
“We heard someone took Paola. We’ll help you find her,” Brent said, catching up.
“What about Ben?”
“I left him with Teagan.”
Mary glanced up the dirt road and saw truck lights slicing the night to the east and south. Docks to the mainland were on the island’s south side. Another dock serving the ferry to Paddock Island was on the east end.
Both seemed like improbable places for the infected to take Paola, because they were on lockdown. That left the island’s west and north ends, the darker forested parts, left unaccounted for.
Desmond finally caught up with the huddle, holding a shotgun with a mounted light in one hand and his phone in the other.
“I just spoke to Bolton. He issued an emergency order to everyone in the facility. They’ll all be joining the search. We’ll find her, Mary.”
“OK, I think we should split up.” Mary swallowed. “Are you two OK to go on your own, either north or west?”
Brent said, “Yeah, we’re good.”
“Yeah,” Jade nodded. “We’ll take the west end, unless you want it.”
“That’s fine,” Mary said. “We’ll take the north end. And be careful, I think these people are infected — working with the aliens.”
Desmond said, “Be careful out there. I’ll let the Guard know not to go shooting civilians, but if you run into Guardsmen, don’t raise your guns.”
Mary turned to him, “What if the Guardsmen are infected? The two men who broke into the house were wearing facility coveralls. How do we know they didn’t infect Guardsmen, too?”
“It’s not likely,” Desmond shook his head, “but do keep a look out for suspicious behavior … from anyone.”
“Gotcha,” Jade said, and headed off.
“Good luck.” Brent turned to follow Jade.
Mary looked north into the dark woods and wished she could feel something, anything from Paola that might tell Mary if she were alive. Usually, she could feel her daughter, much the same way some twins were said to sense one another, or know when the other was suffering. Mary had that bond with Paola. She could often tell what her daughter was thinking, even if she was nowhere nearby. Mary could also tell when something was wrong.
But now, she felt nothing but a black vacuum where her child had been.
She headed north, shining her light into the trees, with Desmond beside her, flashing his alongside.
“We’re going to find her,” he said, as if repetition might make it so.
“We don’t even know if she’s alive.”
“If they meant to kill her, don’t you think they would’ve just done so and left her there for us to find?”
Mary hadn’t considered that. Perhaps. But it also begged another question. “So if they don’t want to hurt her, what do they want with her?”
A stretched silence, then Desmond said, “I don’t know.”
Mary wanted to yell at him some more, blame Desmond for not listening to Paola’s warning. She wanted someone to wag a finger at besides herself. But she had only herself to blame. Desmond wasn’t the boss of her. She could have demanded a ferry to the mainland. She could have left, but chose not to.
That was on her.
Mary prayed that her mistake wouldn’t cost Paola her life.
* * * *
CHAPTER 10 — BORICIO WOLFE
Boricio scrambled through the underbrush like an animal, ignoring the branches, brambles, rocks, and other sharp bits of debris that kept tearing into his naked flesh like a bitch in heat.
The hunters were close behind.
How close, Boricio wasn’t sure. He didn’t dare look back.
He could hear their footsteps like galloping thund
er behind him, along with the hillbilly hoots and hollers of fevered excitement. In his head he heard the sound of a half-wit strumming his banjo.
Boricio kept running, eyes darting across the landscape, searching for any possible advantage. He’d spotted a few large branches that looked like they could serve as a bo staff for close combat, but they were either too far out of reach or it would take too long to drop or wrest them from the underbrush.
He couldn’t stop.
Had to keep going.
Every time Boricio considered slowing down or reaching for something, the noises behind him grew louder — closer.
He kept running.
His chest burned like fire. His heart was an engine on the verge of blowing.
After days in a straitjacket, and without much sobriety prior, Boricio was surprised that his body was able to chug. His pursuers were more Special Olympics than Special Forces, but they had guns and if the dead fox was any evidence, the tater ticklers knew how to use them.
He’d managed to stay ahead, but Boricio wasn’t sure how long his luck would hold. They knew the woods better than he did. And the mere fact that they freed him for a hunt meant they were confident in their ability to track him.
And what then?
How many other prisoners had they brought out to the woods for their redneck reindeer games? There had to be a trail of paperwork. You couldn’t just go into a jail and vanish forever, could you?
Boricio had thought himself a ghost, but they had evidence tying him to crimes outside their little neck of the woods. Someone somewhere with indoor plumbing had to be looking for Boricio. The guards had to know that. They couldn’t just lose a prisoner as notorious as Boricio Fucking Wolfe without having to answer some questions.
But these guys struck Boricio as Idiot, USA’s bottom rung, so maybe they didn’t think past the longest toe on their ugly bare feet. Or perhaps they never made any official inquiries to let people know they had a gen-yoo-wine serial killer in lockup.
Maybe they wanted to keep this little treat for themselves.
Which meant he had to keep running.
As Boricio kept moving south, which he judged by the location of moss on the trees, he heard rushing water ahead.
That could be his break, assuming the body of water wasn’t too large to cross. Maybe he could pretend that he had, then double back on the fuckers and go north.
Too soon to tell, so Boricio kept running, trying to lay distance between himself and his hunters. As long as he kept moving, Boricio figured he was likely safe from a bullet. You couldn’t run and quick scope in real life. That was Call of Duty bullshit for sure.
However, if they came to a clearing or a large enough hill where the hunters would have the advantage of stopping and lining up their shots with his movement, he was fucked with a capital F.
The sound of water grew louder as he approached a steep incline that ran as far as Boricio could see in either direction.
As much as it promised to slow him, he’d have to ascend the steep hill. As he reached the peak, Boricio saw the stream of water rushing downward, heading east through trees so thick he couldn’t tell where the slope leveled off.
Boricio had no idea how steep the hill was, and didn’t have time to worry.
Without thinking twice he jumped into the river, hoping the rapids would carry him down the hill like a giant slide. But the water was moving fast, shoving him underwater as it carried him down the hillside.
The world disappeared under the surface. Boricio ignored the creeping panic, knowing he couldn’t flee the current without a clear head.
He gasped for the air as he broke the surface, his body bobbing up and down, head going back under water and hitting something hard — a rock, a log?
Above Boricio, the world went dark light dark light as the canopy of trees thinned and thickened, adding to his confusion. He fought to maintain his senses as pain spread from the side of his head and threatened to overwhelm him. He had to be bleeding.
The river continued to carry Boricio while he gobbled air, gulping as much as he could between dunks, his body rocked up and down, side to side along the river as it wound around the hill and through the woodlands.
Water roared as he continued downstream. Between dunks, Boricio’s eyes caught something he wished he hadn’t seen — a deep drop.
He was rushing toward a waterfall.
Boricio braced himself as he closed in on the drop, hoping that the water was deep, that he wouldn’t hit rocks, and that this was his chance for escape. There was no way in hell the hunters could catch him unless they all jumped in the river, and he doubted they’d do that.
Boricio went under again, then back up, gasping for air as the drop came.
Freedom!
The river below looked deep, with no visible rocks.
Holy shit, this might work!
If I don’t break my neck in the fall.
As he reached the drop, crippling pain splintered his back. Boricio had been shot in the spine.
The drop came, and the world fell out from beneath him.
**
When Boricio came to on the side of the river bank, facedown in the mud, he felt only cold. A deep and bitter chill that bit so hard into Boricio’s bones that it might as well have been freezing him from the inside out.
Boricio could feel nothing else.
His entire body was numb, as if the gunshot weren’t even there.
Did it sever my spine?
He panicked, trying to will his body into motion, and pull himself along the bank to safety.
Oh Fuck. Come on, move!
Boricio stared at his arms, like noodles before him, useless vestiges weighing him down.
From somewhere, a country accent shouted, “There he is!”
Oh shit.
Footsteps drew closer, alongside laughter.
Boricio couldn’t even turn to see his enemy approaching. He was a fucking vegetable, about to be slaughtered by a swarm of cousin fuckers.
No, no, no!
Suddenly his body was flipped over to face the sky, even though he barely felt the hand grabbing his hair and yanking him over.
Guard Tard stood above Boricio, smiling like he’d won the fair’s prize pig and couldn’t wait to get it home and fuck it into a banshee’s squealing.
“I’ll give this to ya, boy, you were a helluva hunt! Right, guys?”
The men shouted unintelligibly together as they circled Boricio’s body. He opened his mouth to say something and was horrified when no words would come.
Am I Silent Fucking Bob?
“Well,” Guard Tard said, kneeling down, pulling a blade from his belt, “should we gut him and let him bleed out slow, or put a bullet in his head?”
Guard Tard ran the blade over Boricio’s stomach, but Boricio felt only the faintest trace. Hell, he could’ve stabbed him already and Boricio might not have felt it.
He couldn’t believe that this was how it would end. He thought of Rose, wishing he’d taken her offer. If only to see her again, spend a few minutes together, even if an alien was pulling the strings. There had to be some part of his Morning Rose still inside, some part he could spend a few final moments enjoying. Anything was better than this.
Boricio thought back on how many lives he’d ended. How many he’d hunted without mercy.
Perhaps this was fitting.
But fuck it if it felt right.
Luca fixed me! That was the old Boricio! I ain’t killed anyone undeserving since.
If there was a God, which Boricio thought as likely as MC Hammer having another hit, then He was surely laughing now. Fix him up enough to make him care, then kill him for his sins.
“I got an idea,” Guard Tard said, “how about we all shoot him at once. Sort of a twenty-one gun salute, minus some guns.”
Boricio recognized some of the hillbillies as pigs from the prison. Others were maybe friends or coworkers from different shifts. Each seemed to like the idea. They gather
ed around Boricio, all taking aim with their rifles.
Guard Tard said, “Any last words?”
Boricio tried to open his mouth, but couldn’t feel his lips to know if he had managed to open his mouth.
He wanted to say Fuck you, cunt and go out in style, but couldn’t say shit and might have been drooling for all he knew.
“No?” Guard Tard laughed. “All righty then, on the count of three.”
“One … ”
Boricio closed his eyes, refusing to give them the pleasure of being the last thing he saw.
He remembered the first time he’d seen Rose on Paddock Island, on a Sunday morning at a restaurant called Schooner or Later.
Wait, no, that’s not how we met. We met at that bar. It was night.
Yet he was seeing her clear as day, in a memory that felt as real as any.
And then he realized. It wasn’t his memory. He was somehow remembering something that happened to that other Boricio — Boricio Bishop.
What the fuck? How can I have his memories?
“Two … ”
Memories flooded, none of them his. The old man, Will, who had adopted the other Boricio, along with the other Luca.
Then he heard the boy’s voice: Do you want to live, Boricio?
Boricio opened his eyes and saw every gun aimed at his body. The hunters appeared frozen, a collective second from squeezing the trigger.
“Do you want to live?” Luca repeated, his voice coming from Guard Tard’s tobacco stained mouth.
Lightning flashed across the sky, and rain fell, though Boricio could barely feel it pelting his body.
Boricio tried to say yes that he wanted to leave, but his mouth refused to move.
Damn it, work!
“It’s OK,” Luca said. “I heard you think it.”
Guard Tard raised his rifle and shot one of the hunters in the head.
None of the hunters reacted, all still frozen, even as the rain fell fast around them to prove that time still poured into the future.
Guard Tard shot the rest of the men. When his rifle was empty of ammo, he reached for a pistol and finished them off.
As corpses rained around him, Guard Tard bent over and gathered Boricio into his arms.