by A. P. Madden
And found a fat rat scuttling around in the shadows.
Luke let out a sigh of relief.
Naomi joined him. “Did you hear that? It sounded like something moving.”
“It’s not a mutant,” Luke said.
She frowned and stepped past him, peering into the corner. “Then what is-” She screamed and jumped back, colliding with his chest.
He caught her and tried not to laugh. “You’re scared of rats?”
Naomi was frozen for a moment, and then she looked up at him. “I’m not scared of rats. I just don’t like them.” She suddenly realised she was pressed against him, and she stepped back. “Besides, I’m sure there are things you don’t like.”
“I do, but they’re mostly things that can actually hurt me.”
“You think rats can’t hurt you? Think about how many diseases they carry. They’re disgusting.”
“Okay, okay,” he laughed, raising his hands. “If I see any other rats, I’ll warn you, alright?”
Naomi ran a hand over her hair and nodded, glancing at the now-empty corner. “Good. And if I see anything that can actually hurt you, I’ll warn you, too.”
“Thanks, I’d appreciate it.”
He was still grinning, and she deliberately ignored him as she walked away.
“Are you going to let me bleed out because I made fun of you?”
“It’s tempting,” she said. “But lucky for you, I have a soft spot for idiots. Sit down over here. I’ll wash off the dust and then clean the wound itself.”
Luke chuckled and sat down on the large rectangular chunk of stone. Naomi’s movements were practised and efficient, and he wondered how many times she had done this before. She poured something from a bottle over his arm to wash away the dirt and stone dust. When it was clean, she picked up a container of clear liquid.
“What’s-” Luke broke off and hissed in pain it poured over his wound. He glared at her, gritting his teeth to stop himself from making any embarrassing noises.
“Sorry,” she said. “But this is important. Getting out of here won’t mean a thing if you die from an infection.”
A few painful minutes later, Luke’s arm was wrapped up and Naomi slipped the extra bandages into her pocket.
“We’ll take what we can carry,” Luke said, looking at the pile of rubble again. “Weapons, supplies, anything useful. We don’t know how long we’ll be down here.”
“I think there are exits at regular intervals along the tunnels,” Naomi said. “For the people who used to work here. I don’t know how far apart they are, but I think there’s one that leads back up to our building. It shouldn’t take us all day to find it. And I have this,” she added, showing him the knife on her belt. It was about the length of his hand, and the sheath was scratched and worn.
“We need more. A single gun and a small knife aren’t enough. These tunnels are dark, cold and underground. They’re going to be full of mutants.”
“I’m surprised we haven’t seen any yet. When we fell, before I heard your voice, I thought I could hear things in the dark.” She shuddered. “I imagined them all around me. I thought I could hear them moving, and I couldn’t see anything.”
Luke knew how she felt. These days, every shadow was a potential death trap. No sane person would ever risk going somewhere this dark.
“I’m surprised, too,” he said. “I’m thinking maybe they’re not here because there’s nothing for them to eat. I doubt there are many people coming down here these days.”
“Or something bigger has been hunting them, so they stay away from this area. A bigger predator.”
There was a pit in his stomach. He had the same thought - a creature that had an intense reaction to the mutation, and it had started feeding on the other mutants. It wasn’t unheard of. They preferred non-mutated prey, but they weren’t picky eaters. Once they got hungry enough, everything became prey, even other mutants.
But something that was dangerous enough to clear out an entire underground area... That would have to be massive, lethal and starving. Something that belonged in nightmares, not real life.
“Let’s hope we’re wrong,” Luke said.
They searched the room. Luke saw Naomi picking up a medical bag, and she began filling it. He recognised some of the things she picked up, but others were a mystery. He found a couple of flashlights and tossed one of them to her.
Unsurprisingly, there were almost no weapons. Everything seemed to have come down with them from the doctor’s room, and they clearly didn’t store their weaponry beside the hospital beds. There were metal cabinets at the edges of the room, but they were old and rusty. It took several tries to get the first one open, but it was worth the effort - he found some rations that expired years ago, a few tools and two flare guns.
Luke had no idea why they would have had a flare gun down here, but he took both of them anyway. He ignored the rest, but told himself that he would come back for one of the heavy tools if he couldn’t find anything better. A metal wrench wasn’t his ideal weapon, but it would take down a couple of mutants if he had nothing better.
Luke walked towards the door, but he spotted Naomi on the highest part of the rubble, so he dropped off the things he gathered and started climbing up to her. Her back was to him, and her focus was on the contents of the medical bag.
“Hey.”
She startled and turned around, and her foot slipped on loose rocks. He quickly grabbed her hand and pulled her towards him before she fell.
“Careful,” he said.
Her eyes were wide, and she released his hand quickly. “Don’t sneak up on me like that.”
“I didn’t. You need to pay more attention.”
“I was checking our supplies,” she said, pushing her hair out of her face. “And there’s nobody here except for you and me.”
“And the rat.”
She narrowed her eyes. “I’ll let that one go because you caught me before I fell.”
He grinned and started to reply, but something caught his eye, and he stepped past her. It was a machete in a sheath, half-buried in the rubble. With a sinking feeling, he picked it up and shook off the dirt, and his mouth went dry.
“What’s wrong?” Naomi asked.
“This belongs to Caelan.”
“Your friend?”
“Yeah.” He wiped off the dust, trying not to imagine the unthinkable. If Caelan’s weapon was down here, almost buried beneath the stones and debris...
“He was in the room with us when it happened,” Naomi said.
“He’s alive,” Luke said. “It would take more than that to kill him. He must have gotten out of the room before the floor collapsed.”
“Okay.”
“Don’t believe me?”
She hesitated. “It’s just... I’ve seen too many good people die. It can happen to anyone. I’m sorry, I know that sounds harsh-”
“No, it’s okay. I know what you mean. I’ve lost people, too. But Caelan’s different. He’s a survivor. He’s survived things other people couldn’t even imagine. I’ve seen him do it. I’ve been with him for some of it, and he always pulls me out with him.”
“He sounds great.”
“He is.”
“Then let’s get back to him,” she said.
Luke nodded and led the climb down towards the door. He grabbed his gear and stepped up to the door, then he pressed his ear against it, listening. After a moment, he nodded. “Sounds quiet. You ready?”
She adjusted the strap of the medical bag on her shoulder. “Ready.”
Luke threw the door open, raising his gun, but there was nothing on the other side. The tunnel was empty.
“Weird,” he said.
Naomi stepped past him, scanning the corners with her light. “I should be relieved, but it’s just unsettling. There should be at least a few of them. What scared them off?”
“If we’re lucky, we won’t find out. Come on.”
***
Chapter 6 - Mutants
They walked for what felt like hours. He didn’t like being stuck in the darkness, it drew the things that had been twisted and mutated by the meteor, but this place seemed deserted. If they were lucky, they were alone down here.
“You said you still have your family,” Luke said, trying to fill the silence. “That’s good. Don’t see it very often anymore.”
“Not all of them,” Naomi said. “But I have my parents. My grandparents didn’t make it, and I haven’t seen my brothers in years. I have hope that they’re still out there, somewhere.”
Luke thought of his own brother, and as much as he wanted to share her hope, he knew how slim the chances were that he had survived. They were separated, and Luke never found him. Every time new survivors came to seek refuge with Caelan and Luke, he felt a small flash of hope that one of them would be his brother. It never happened, but he couldn’t stop hoping.
“Still, I know I’m lucky to have my parents,” Naomi said. “We were in one of the first fortified cities, right after the bombs fell. When that fell, a lot of the people migrated to another safe zone. We went with them. Those places got us through the worst of it.”
Luke thought of all the safe zones, fortified towns, cities and buildings that he had seen rise and fall since society collapsed. In the immediate aftermath, it was chaos. A few cities and communities survived longer than others, and sometimes larger cities would be resurrected for a few months, maybe a year, before falling again.
People struggled to figure out how to defend against something they had never seen before. Every kind of animal became a potential threat, both in the wild and in peoples’ homes. Not every animal turned, but it was impossible to predict which ones would be infected and turn into unnaturally strong creatures that grew to terrifying sizes and developed a ravenous need to feed on any living creature they encountered.
And that was just the beginning.
Over time, the mutations evolved. People were learning to adapt, but the mutations were faster, and it seemed like every day brought a new, unpredictable threat. The creatures were ravenous and insatiable, and they were attracted to anywhere with large groups of people. They hated light, but they learned to associate it with food, so they were drawn to cities and towns, first, and then they hunted anyone who left their house lights on at night.
Everywhere was dangerous, but the safe zones started to pop up. At first, they were installed by the government and the military, but those eventually fell, and people were forced to fend for themselves. Some communities came together and rebuilt their homes, adding security measures to keep out the mutants.
“I spent a few months in one of those,” Luke said. “On the shore of a huge lake. Used to be a small town, but the locals came together and built strong walls and gathered enough people to fight back against the mutants.”
“What happened?”
“What always happens. It fell.”
“Mutants or people?”
“Mutants,” Luke said. “The strong walls weren’t strong enough. They cut their way through a rusty chain-link fence - or maybe they chewed through it. Either way, they got in. The town was in ruins by the time the sun rose.”
“Did the people survive?”
“Some of them.”
“Where did they go?”
Luke shrugged. “No idea. They wanted to find another safe place, or build one themselves. I decided that hiding behind walls wasn’t for me.”
“Were you alone?”
“Sometimes. I met some people, helped others, made a few stupid mistakes, and then I met Caelan. We’ve been travelling together ever since. Started a settlement outside the city, or what’s left of it. It’s pretty safe, all things considered.”
“I thought hiding behind walls wasn’t for you.”
He caught her eye, and the small smile she gave him, and he laughed. “I guess I changed my mind.”
“What about your family?” she asked.
“They didn’t make it.”
“I’m sorry,” Naomi said.
Luke shrugged, trying to act nonchalant. “I lost most of them at the beginning, right after everything went to shit. My brother and I made it out, but I lost him eventually, too.”
Naomi began to reply, but Luke raised his hand to stop her. “Did you hear that?”
She frowned. “Hear what?”
Luke waited, holding his breath, and then he heard it again. They both did. Naomi stifled a gasp, and Luke checked his weapons.
They weren’t alone anymore.
Heavy thuds came from the darkness ahead. Each noise shook the ground beneath them and reverberated through the tunnel, bouncing off the walls and surrounding them from all sides. It was distant, for now, but as they stood there in frozen silence, they heard more. A low, rough scraping sound, like something being dragged along the ground.
Thud.
Thud.
Thud.
Footsteps, Luke realised. Footsteps from something huge.
“It’s big,” Luke said, lowering his voice slightly. “But it sounds far away. Unless it gets closer, we should be fine.” He tried to make himself sound more confident than he was.
“Are you sure?”
“Not really,” he admitted, “but it’s my best guess. I’ve never been trapped in an underground tunnel with mutants before.”
“Me neither,” she said, and shot him a quick smile.
He returned the smile, glad that he wasn’t alone down here. Neither of them mentioned the scraping sounds. Neither of them wanted to think about what was causing them.
“We should keep going,” Luke said. “We can’t go back. It’s a dead end.”
He expected Naomi to protest - going towards the noises sounded like a death wish - but she didn’t. “It might turn and go into another tunnel,” she said. “Or we will. There are a lot of tunnels down here, and we’re going to find one sooner or later.”
They started walking again, but they kept their voices low and their weapons ready.
“It’s probably some kind of mutant monster that used to be a snake or a crocodile or something,” Luke muttered, trying to take his mind off it. “Wait, do we even have crocodiles around here?”
“Crocodiles aren’t mammals,” she said.
“What?”
She was looking in the direction of the noises, and she seemed nervous, but when she answered him, her voice was calm and clear. “The mutation process is limited to mammals. They were the only animals that were infected and became mutants.”
“How do you know that?”
“Mom mentioned it. She’s been teaching me a few things, here and there, mostly about dealing with basic injuries. It’s come in handy more than a few times. The mammal comment must have come up in conversation.”
Luke thought about it. “Aren’t we mammals? Humans, I mean.”
“Not all mammals were affected, and not all of them changed in the way. Even within the same species, it can vary whether or not they mutate, and to what degree. I’m sure there’s a pattern, but we don’t have the time or the resources to figure it out.”
Luke started to ask another question, but the footsteps got louder and so did the scraping. The tunnel was filled with it. Quiet, constant scraping sounds, like something rough being dragged against stone. His mind conjured up a hundred nightmarish explanations for what could be making the noise.
They stood in silence, and the scraping got louder.
“Turn off your light,” Luke said.
“They probably can’t see,” she said, but she switched off the light. “There’s no reason for them to have eyes when they live in the pitch black.”
“I’d rather not test that theory,” Luke said quietly. His voice dropped to a whisper when they finally heard the heavy footsteps and scraping noises getting closer. “We need to get out of its path.”
“There are small recesses in the wall,” Naomi said. “Every twenty or thirty feet. I think I saw one just up ahead.”
; Luke had the same idea, so he started feeling his way along the wall in the darkness. His heart was hammering furiously in his chest, and he tried to steady his breathing. They kept walking, and the scraping and thuds got louder and closer. He told himself the opening was close, but he had no idea, and they couldn’t risk using their lights.
“Luke?” Naomi whispered. “Are you still there?”
He turned towards her voice and reached out. She was behind him, following the wall just like he was.
He brushed her arm, found her hand and put it on the back of his belt. “Hold on to me.”
The darkness was tight and suffocating, and every noise echoed and grew until it felt like the creature was on top of them. Luke felt sweat running down his face and his neck, and he forced himself to keep calm. He never had a problem with the dark or tight spaces before today, but this was starting to get to him.
By some miracle, they found the recess before they ran straight into the creature. It was a tight space, but they managed it. It was only a couple of feet deep and extremely narrow, and they had to squeeze in together. Luke’s shoulder was just inches from the opening into the tunnel, but he couldn’t force his body any further in. Naomi was smaller, but she still barely had room to breathe, and their bodies were pressed together in the small space.
“What if it smells us?” Naomi whispered.
Luke listened carefully to the noises before he replied. When he decided it was safe, he whispered, “Can it?”
“Maybe,” she whispered. “It has to find its prey somehow. Scent or hearing would make the most sense down here.”
“We don’t have any way to mask our scent, do we?”
She hesitated. “No.”
“Then let’s keep quiet and hope it uses its ears to hunt.”
The thuds and scraping got louder and louder, and soon Luke could hear its heavy, laboured breathing. It sounded huge. Bigger than any mutant he had ever seen. He was surprised it could fit in the tunnel, and he realised that some of the noises were probably its body scraping against the walls or the ceiling.
It passed their hiding place, and it stopped.
Luke’s mouth was dry as sandpaper. He held his breath and squeezed his eyes shut, but it made no difference to the complete darkness. His heartbeat was thundering in his ears, and he was sure that the creature would hear it.