Endless Night

by Warren Hately

  Flicking the catch on and off his rifle nervously, Day scanned from the desolate-looking bunker to his left, across the dammed river, and then to the right past the helicopters. He realised that, even if he couldn’t explain half of what he saw, he was looking at the supply depot for the farm.

  “This is where they run the operation,” Day said.

  “Or this is where the ghouls fill their orders,” Kvelda said.

  “They have to bring their supplies in from far and wide,” Day said, the dozens of different stories he had heard during his time as an internee coalescing as one.

  “A scavenging operation,” he said.

  With his eyes he followed the road back to where it ended amid the clutter of abandoned drums and wooden barricades. Looking closer, he saw the chain-link gate and the service road continuing on around the side of the canyon wall. It was half-concealed by the barricades and the scrubby growth clinging to the road’s edge. Though the road disappeared from view as it angled along the canyon’s curve, Day guessed it would connect eventually with the distant second section of dam and the hydro-electric plant.

  Turning and looking back over the railing, away from the water, Day looked past the shallow canyon and into the jagged tunnel mouth that had so recently enveloped him. Down below there were a number of what he guessed to be ghouls advancing on foot across the wet open ground.

  “This wall’s just to turn the river?” He looked back at Kvelda.

  “That’s my guess,” Kvelda said. “The river was forked perhaps. By blocking it here, they channel all the force of the water through one set of gates.”

  “You know about these things?”

  “Not really,” the young woman answered sheepishly. “I’ve had a mixed education. Everyone has to share skills where I’m from.”

  Day thought about Kvelda’s story about the derelict subterranean army base and nodded, knowing she spoke the truth. Presumably her home had electricity too, which was something Day had grown up without ever witnessing.

  Kvelda gestured behind them with her thumb.

  “Those caves look like an old underground watercourse, don’t they?”

  As Day started to answer, automatic fire sounded from the other direction. He instantly flung himself into cover on the reverse side of the open door. Bullets struck the ground like hot rain, sparking like matches on sandpaper. Within the entrance of the doorway, separated on the opposite side from him by the heavy-duty door, Day could hear Kvelda calling.

  “More ghouls coming from the other end, Day.”

  Day chanced a look back past the door. He saw a grey van moving slowly around the burning helicopters. Its door was open and he realised several ghouls were pushing it as a moving barricade. In front of the van, two ghouls jogged forward carrying rifles. As Day watched, one of them tripped and fell and then awkwardly righted himself. In the daylight they looked weak and almost ridiculous, yet their helmet-masked faces and the black clothes hiding their skin seemed to also lend them a more alien and sinister aspect.

  Several of the ghouls fired. Day snapped his head back barely in time. The thick steel door reverberated with shots.

  More cautiously, he moved back into position behind the open door. He lifted the muzzle of his rifle and laid it alongside the edge. Then he slowly angled his shoulders and moved around until the tip of the gun and then, beyond it, the advancing ghouls swung into view.

  He promptly fired a burst that disintegrated one ghoul’s skull and peppered another pair with bullets. One of the tumbling ghouls went under the wheels of the van, arms and legs askew. The van slowed too late. Day couldn’t hear the papery bones crunch at that distance, but he imagined them nonetheless.

  The magazine clicked emptily and Day backed off, switching guns from the scattered cache of ghoul weapons at his feet. Almost instantly Kvelda started firing in short bursts. Only return fire silenced her efforts as she too withdrew to shelter.

  “They’re still coming, Day.”

  Day unhooked a grenade and threw it over the door as far as he could, guestimating the distance but at least getting the direction right. The explosion went off nearly three seconds later, but when Day chanced a look he saw only a scorch mark on the pavement in front of the advancing van. Around the open van door, one or two ghouls squeezed off return fire as they continued forward.

  Day swore softly and looked across the street, over the metal guard rails thirty yards away and at the shining grey chrome expanse of the lake. Although it was a mighty risk, Day grabbed another rifle and then broke into a manic run across the tarmac. Machinegun fire peppered his heels, but between the curve of the dam wall and the wreckage afire on the road, when Day made the other side he’d achieved a modicum of cover.

  Instantly he crouched and fired half-a-dozen times from the new angle. A ghoul at the rear of the van sprawled backwards, arms windmilling as if for balance, leathered chest collapsed, back torn apart by exit wounds. A fleeting glimpse revealed a second ghoul who dropped back immediately, using the slow-moving van for cover. Across the road Kvelda resumed firing and after a moment, the moving van revealed another dead ghoul in its wake.

  As calmly as he could, Day threw another grenade. It hit the road surface and then rolled heavily in an arc under the wheels of the advancing vehicle.

  Though it exploded, the van was too heavy to move. It simply stopped, tinted windshield bursting outwards, smoke pouring from the cabin. The grille was covered in licking flames. One of the remaining ghouls appeared, dragging itself across the ground awkwardly and, in even the first few seconds after the explosion, it went still. Another dark figure behind the shattered windshield burnt like dry wood but it wasn’t still. It scratched at the opening weakly as if held back by a leash.

  Across the street, Kvelda came out of her foxhole like a professional, stalking forward at a quick pace without slackening the aim of the assault rifle raised at her shoulder. Day didn’t know if it was she or he who silenced the last of the miserable creatures. It’s brainpan spattered across the burning seats and then all was still except for the flames flickering in near silence.

  In the pause Kvelda reloaded. She looked across at Day while carrying out the practised manoeuvre, her expression hard but unreadable. It was quite a transformation, yet to Day it also did nothing to lessen all the different kinds of person she had previously been. She was a mimic, he thought. An innocent, drinking up the experiences of those around her. He imagined, at the same time, that he was also completely wrong.

  The moment seemed to obey a time all its own. When the bubble burst, it was as if welling sound that had been held back now came rushing forward.

  The helicopter swooped down on them from the direction of the depot. As before, it was fixed with .50 calibre machinegun turrets that smote the air with their hellish assault. Day was almost transfixed, watching the grey surface of the roadway buckling under the fiery attack like a thousand leaping grey frogs coming suddenly to life out of the earth. Kvelda crashed into him and the pair carried on to the other side of the nearest of the parked and smouldering choppers.

  The black bubble of the helicopter swept past. Day fancied he could see the ghoul drones tucked away behind the smoked glass piloting the deadly contraption. He felt for another grenade, but they had been scattered in the confusion. Kvelda continued plucking at Day’s arm until finally she got a handhold and practically pulled him upright. As the chopper flew off in one direction, the fugitive pair dashed madly the other way.

  The area was wreathed in oily black smoke despite the altitude and prevailing winds. They went as fast as they could across the ruins, noting the foot-long cracks forming in the concrete around the edge of the exploded helicopter at the same time as they fled around it. On the other side, they went straight for the troop-carrier, tipped over by the shockwave from the earlier explosion, it’s great blades snapped or buckled. Around its other side Day pulled Kvelda with him into sanctuary, the bulk of the fallen machine between them and the flaming d
ebris.

  “Can you hear it?” Day asked.

  Kvelda shook her head hard enough that dust rained from her knotted red hair.

  “I’m half-deaf now,” she said.

  “Me too.”

  The supply dump was another hundred yards away. The relatively narrow road broadened out into a warren of crates and stacks and drums. Kvelda nodded sharply to show she was ready and, each cradling their weapons, they broke into another run.

  Halfway there, the black helicopter came over the rim of the distant rocky rise and tilted forward, rushing to bear down on them. Kvelda gave a shout and then Day howled for her to keep up as he ran, without energy but full of fear, towards the nearest shelter. The palettes of boxes loomed as the machinegun crackle began ahead again. They literally threw themselves the last few paces and crashed to a halt as huge bullets chewed up the ground around and behind them.

  “Keep down! Keep low!” Day yelled, his voice cracking.

  In as much fear as they had ever felt, Day and Kvelda tried to crawl around the boxes. They both knew the helicopter pilot could choose to hover. The slightest wrong movement was a possible foray into extinction. Yet somehow they chose well. The helicopter lifted over them as they slipped down the side of the boxes and scurried behind the next pile. Pieces of wood and packing clattered and tinkled around them as the chopper changed orientation. It moved behind their old position without catching them out.

  The machineguns stopped, replaced only by the high-pitch whine of the rotors hacking the air to keep aloft. Without baring anything but his wrists, Day lifted his rifle over the torn crates and fired two quick bursts. Conserving ammunition, the helicopter held fire and eased slowly to one side, sighting down the path between the various palettes.

  “Trapped again,” Kvelda said hoarsely. Her tears were evident by the runnels cut by wetness trickling down her dusty cheeks.

  Day shrugged helplessly. “For now,” he answered without conviction.

  Kvelda kept low and moved towards one edge of the pile of boxes, poking her head around the corner. She caught a glimpse of the giant black insect contraption hanging suspended in the air and she pulled her head back as wood and bitumen came in splinters. It was a mark of the gunner’s quick reactions and the precision of the cannons that she survived only by a fraction of a second. Kvelda gave a choked sob and dropped onto her side behind the boxes, several of them crashing to the ground and spilling cans of dog food, many of which were without labels.

  As Kvelda wet herself, Day picked up one of the ancient dented cans and turned it over. He wasn’t insensitive to his partner’s plight, but he didn’t blame her for fear. It was only a single candle of hope – a desperate idea – that lit the darkness of their impending doom.

  “Help me,” Day barked in a dust-and fear-choked voice.

  He brought his arm back and threw the can high over the stack of boxes. Quickly a second, third and fourth can followed in much the same manner. Kvelda guessed his game by then and, wiping her bleary face with a slender forearm, laughed weakly and joined in his efforts.

  At least a couple of the cans came down in the whirling helicopter blades. Day imagined the tiny payloads exploding into mist and hoped the metal shards did their worst. The pilot’s first reaction was to machinegun the packing crates again. It only made for more tins, though a number of them were now torn to pieces. Many more seeped through the devastated boxes like grain from a burst sack.

  They’d thrown about eight cans each when they heard the helicopter rising. Its shadow fell across where they hid and Day and Kvelda looked up as the vehicle went over and past.

  “It’s circling again,” Day said. “Come on!”

  They ran as if the gods had given them new legs. With eyes crystalline sharp to everything they saw, the couple stalked between the aisles of competing objects disregarding almost everything before them. Day found it hard to believe they stood in the midst of the camp’s bounty and yet they not only had no chance to gorge themselves, but they had no desire for it. Their only concern was safety from the deadly aircraft. The stacks of cans, the sacks of cereals, the greening packs of meat bound with plastic twine to forklift crates barely registered.

  As they had seen before, the platform was home to a pair of large sheds. Day and Kvelda barely exchanged a word. The helicopter was circling audibly behind them and so they broke towards the nearest annexe. Day hurled the creaking tin-on-wood doors open and they rushed in.

  Light streamed in like thick fingers poring over the dingy chamber. Green-coloured trucks with canvas rear quarters and vans in various states of repair dominated the floor space. Two forklifts were parked to the immediate right of the door, their tines thrust out at a height for stacking palettes.

  “This way!” Kvelda shouted.

  Somewhere, the helicopter was emptying its machineguns into the shed. The sound of tin shredding carried from close by, but Day and Kvelda were moving too fast to notice any immediate threat.

  Kvelda grabbed Day by the wrist, pulling him along as they zigzagged across the huge floor without any sense of purpose but to get away. Inevitably, Day broke free of her hold by accident and he tripped and stumbled from exhaustion, slamming into a pile of crates.

  As he rose again, several heavy metallic tubes dropped onto the concrete as the stacked palette slewed crookedly. Day stared down and froze.

  The broken crates were loaded with military supplies. The helicopter missiles had black bodies with yellow points. Each was about the size of a gas cylinder but twice as long and they were imprinted with the words US ARMY in white.

  Outside, the high-pitched helicopter turbine returned like a mosquito in the dark. Despite his bludgeoned senses, Day registered the hissing sound of one of the very same missiles launching from the ghoul helicopter.

  “No!”

  “What?”

  He started running, collecting Kvelda in one arm, the second of his two weapons falling unheeded to the concrete floor. The breath exploded from the girl’s lungs as he carried her fifteen yards across the shed to one of the tin walls. The metal was rusted and pocked by age, corroded bolt-holes testimony to another life before being pillaged by the vampires and their servants.

  A gushing roar filled the shed as Day hit the wall. He turned as he made the impact, striking it with his shoulder, carrying Kvelda along but shielding her with his body. As the metal sheeting broke away and they tore through, battling sheet metal and classical physics, Day ducked his head to avoid the wooden beam at neck-height.

  The wall absorbed most of their momentum. Though they carried on through, they did little more than fall outside, Day underneath, Kvelda on top. She came down all elbows and knees as the far side of the shed erupted in white fire.

  The force of the explosion sent debris ripping through the structure. The panel of tin Day had shouldered wasn’t the only one to give way. The rocket’s impact echoed in the first moments, but was overcome by the sound of secondary explosions – the vehicles and fuel stores exploding in a rapid symphony. Through the concrete floor the entire depot shared the shockwaves carried to where Day and Kvelda lay half-covered by dirt and loose stones. The canyon wall that bordered the whole concrete expanse rose above their shallow ditch at a sharp angle.

  The wall closest to them remained standing, large sections of roof intact. Through the chaos Day could hear the whooping of the helicopter as it moved. He imagined the ghoul pilots targeting through the smoke and debris to ensure they’d made a kill. No risk seemed too great. To Day it was madness, but he knew simply disbelieving it wouldn’t work.

  He awkwardly helped Kvelda upright and instantly, he started conveying her along.

  “Move! Before they hit the stockpile!”

  The close side of the shed offered a temporary buffer, but Day knew they had to keep on. There were flames everywhere. Timber and tin were askew, flames dancing across them.

  They were both now completely brown with dirt. As they staggered along, Day gave a low mo
an and felt his left arm. Blood was gently pumping from a wound halfway between shoulder and elbow. A dozen other nicks scarred that side of his body. Kvelda was likewise bleeding from places on her legs and more freely from a wound to the scalp, the blood dyeing her hair darker red still.

  “Damn them,” Kvelda said in a shaky voice. Fear was evident in every line of her face.

  They were holding hands still as they wearily ran down the side and around the rear of the ruins.

  The helicopter lifted over the devastated site, black smoke coiling from a hundred locations. The wall on the side close to the chopper was gone and the majority of the roof had collapsed.

  That the chopper had a second rocket was as predictable as it was inevitable. Amid the soundscape of falling tin and wreckage, Day heard the missile’s release, its hiss like the gasp of an alien death god.

  Day and Kvelda ran out into the wide and unoccupied lot to the rear of the shed. The lake came into view as they staggered into the open. A few drums and faded crates stacked to one side were the only obstacles as Day and Kvelda forced themselves on. The slanted concrete bulwark of the dam’s inner wall hemmed them in, but they powered on towards it anyway.

  The concrete riser continued past and then, on their right, ended as it joined the canyon wall – an irregular surface which straight away rose to a height of two hundred feet or more, dotted with scraggly bushes that seemed unlikely to offer real handholds. Towards the top of the slope it became more broken and the footing became easier, but Day knew it was a long way to the top.

  Although they hadn’t agreed on any plan, neither Day nor Kvelda slowed as they shot towards the concrete riser with its metal guardrails. As they reached it, the first explosive went off behind them, shaking the ground and making Kvelda trip.

  “Over!” Day yelled. “Over!”

  He hardly hesitated. Tossing the remaining gun away and scowling as if it had been a nuisance, Day threw himself up onto the bulwark. One hand managed to grasp a support pole on the railing and with main strength he pulled his weight up onto the edge of the concrete where it began to angle like a shelf. In a fluid motion Kvelda grabbed Day’s dangling wrist and pulled herself scrambling up the concrete and over the metal restraints. Without hesitation she disappeared over the edge as the whole depot went up in a massive roar. Day had no chance to leap – a wave of force slingshot him from his awkward perch and he flew past the falling girl and out over the water. He was spinning as if from a giant’s slap. He barely had the time to draw breath before he smashed into the water like a fist and disappeared.