Emergence

by William Vitka

  The Hroza feels something else.

  The mad winged ones. The ones who went into the dark.

  They’re closer than expected. They know about the mammals. They’re interfering.

  The Hroza reaches out.

  Chapter 15: Home Again

  Pain flares in Jack’s brain. The Red keeps him from blacking out.

  One of the voices is back. The one that said all this horror was “necessary.”

  This time, it’s loud.

  Jack stumbles. Falls. The remains of the Slender Man flake into ash next to him. He crawls down the aisle toward the door. Men and women in the congregation free themselves from the barbed wire. It breaks away from them like withered vines.

  Jack chokes. Spits. He looks to the kids on the wall. Their eyes bloom back to normal.

  He hurls curses at the few parents who try to help him. “Get off me.” Jack scurries through congealing blood. “I have to get to my brother. Get the fuck off me.”

  The parents oblige. They run to their thankful kids.

  Jack stands. The words from the voice in his head aren’t clear. They sound angry. Sick Maybe afraid. He hears one word in the swirling, mental shouts, Awake! There are other noises. Dark things. Horrible, distant things pushing closer.

  He walks into the night’s cold air.

  Catarina is kneeling over Caleb.

  Jack’s heart stops.

  Catarina recognizes the terror in Jack’s face. “He’s awake. Don’t panic.”

  Zarifa and Akil stand behind her. So does the little girl Jack saved from the Slender Man. Her hazel eyes beam now that the beast is gone.

  Jack talks to her in a gentle tone. “Everything’s all right now. Get inside to your parents.” More than anything, he wants her out of the way. He hopes her folks are in the Orthodox church. And alive.

  The girl gives him a quick hug around his legs. “Thank you.” She scampers inside.

  Once she’s out of sight, Jack drops to the concrete. He catches himself with his hands. Skin comes off in pulpy shavings. He coughs twice. Hard. Droplets of blood burst from his mouth. He holds a finger against a nostril. Blows. Sending out a stream of black and red chunks.

  Zarifa groans. “Oh my God.”

  Jack crawls to Caleb’s side. He puts a hand on his brother’s rapidly pumping chest. “Caleb, is it talking to you? That voice from before. When Patrick died. Is it screaming in your head? The Red. The Red keeps me from...overloading. But you don’t have that, do you?”

  Catarina raises an eyebrow. Says nothing.

  Caleb nods to Jack. His contorted face glistens with sweat. His nose is bleeding. Endlessly. Just as the hemoglobin seems ready to dry out, blood flows again.

  Zarifa hands Catarina a piece of cloth torn from her Jasmine costume. Catarina uses the strip to wipe the blood from Caleb’s upper lip.

  Caleb’s voice is a whisper. “It doesn’t want to hurt us. The one here. The one under us. It’s curious. The bodies. It uses the bodies because that’s just how it works. The others. The others are bad.”

  To Jack, this all made a weird kind of sense. “But it attacked you. Your friend Johnny—”

  “It panicked.”

  “It jumped you and nearly crushed you.”

  “It doesn’t know how to use the body to talk. Not sure how we work yet.”

  Jack’s not convinced.

  Caleb takes a deep breath. “We have to trust it for now. There’s something worse coming.” Then the young Svoboda blacks out.

  Jack removes his hat. Leans forward. Holds his ear to Caleb’s nose. “Still breathing. Just knocked out from blood loss, probably. Shock. Exhaustion.” He rubs his face in a frantic fashion. He’s close to collapsing.

  Catarina says, “What is it?”

  Jack’s head pounds. Throbs. Burns. The words are getting clearer, but they’re taking their sweet goddamn time. The only good thing is that as the words emerge, the pain leaves. “The other things? I don’t know yet. I’m gonna find out. Maybe I’ll just kill them all.”

  He brushes the hair back from Caleb’s forehead. Plants a kiss there among the filth and grime and sweat and blood. He hoists an unconscious Caleb onto his uninjured right shoulder.

  Jack marches. Slow. Damaged. But he marches.

  Catarina takes to his side. Zarifa and Akil follow.

  “You’re telling me there’s some presence communicating with you, what, telepathically? You don’t believe in that shit,” Catarina says.

  The streets are quiet. The monsters have left. Or disappeared. Or whatever. Who can guess? Jack knows that the creatures are gone. He doesn’t know how he knows that, but he does. It’s like there had been an ‘on’ switch and ‘off’ switch in his head. Last night, it got flicked on. And he emerged from a cocoon. Not as a pretty butterfly. As a killer.

  What hadn’t disappeared was the monsters’ handiwork. All along the road are downed trees and torn power lines. Blood. Bodies. A police chopper whumpwhumpwhumps above. The Tribe watches an ambulance tear ass down another street. Sirens scream all over the area.

  Zarifa mumbles. “Now that the monsters are gone, maybe everything is back to normal. Like it was a dream. All in our heads. Maybe all the people will come out now. Maybe everyone will be okay. Maybe they’ll come back. Maybe Patrick’s at home with his parents.”

  The young girl’s words came out as heart-rending wishes.

  The sight of corpses ends that happy fantasy.

  Jack misses Patrick.

  Everyone is in clear, desperate need of sleep.

  Jack says, “What happened in the garage?” He shifts Caleb’s weight.

  “Dead people,” Akil says. His voice is flat. Monotone. “Dead guys tried to get inside.”

  Zarifa sniffles. “I killed someone.” She bawls. “I killed—”

  Catarina takes a knee before the little girl and hugs her. “We’re going home now. We’re gonna get you guys to your mom and dad. Just a few more blocks.”

  Zarifa nods. Akil stares into the distance.

  Jack taps Catarina. “Keep moving.”

  Catarina wipes her eyes.

  The Tribe walks five blocks before anyone speaks again.

  Catarina nudges Jack. “You didn’t answer me. I asked you about the voice.”

  Jack grunts. “Voices.” He manages to smoke a cigarette and carry the slack body of his younger brother at the same time. “Can you gimme a break? At least for now?”

  “Jack, please. I need something. We’re all close to cracking. Except you and Caleb. You two have been too calm. Way too ready. Give me something to go on.”

  Jack shifts Caleb’s weight. He doesn’t look at her. “No, I don’t believe in telepathy. It can’t be explained. Yes, something’s talking to us. But there’s the problem. It’s talking to us. We can’t talk back. It’s beaming into our heads. More at us than with us. Like little radio signals. Might be a clever use of quantum entanglement.” Jack chuckles. Smokes. Flicks the butt away. “Actually, that’s probably what the hell it is. Just some psychotic ancient creature with a quantum radio.”

  Catarina steps in front of Jack.

  He halts. Frowns.

  She puts a hand on his cheek. Her grey eyes flicks between the pupils of his own.

  Jack softens. A little. “It hurts. I can’t describe how bad it hurts.”

  Catarina wipes some of the blood from Jack’s cheeks. From his brow. From his lips. She gives him a gentle kiss. Hopes that will help her partner continue.

  “Thank you,” Jack says.

  Catarina pats his cheeks.

  They march.

  * * *

  The rose-tipped fingers of dawn aren’t clawing their way over the horizon yet. The sky is still a deep, inky indigo. But brighter rays will come before long.

  It’s almost five in the morning when they get home.

  They wait in front of the Svoboda house.

  Jack doesn’t know if he wants to open it.

  The parents of the Tribe coul
d be inside—or an absolute blood bath could be waiting.

  Jack imagines his mom and dad turned into furniture. Elie a skin lamp. Zarifa’s mother a cushion. Akil’s father a rug. Patrick’s parents a statue carved from their own bones.

  An NYPD cruiser screeches down his block.

  Catarina nudges Jack. “Let’s get this over with.” She knocks.

  There’s commotion behind the door. The sound of boards being lifted. Furniture being moved. And what’s undoubtedly Elie’s shotgun being cocked and readied.

  Viktor throws the front door open. He has Jack’s bat in his hands. Behind him is Elie, with his shotgun leveled.

  Both elder men are covered in gore.

  Jack puts a hand up. “Shit, don’t hit me.”

  Viktor’s jaw drops. “Jack? Jack!” He runs toward his sons. He caresses his youngest boy’s head. Wraps his arms around his eldest. “You made it. I knew you’d make it. I knew.” He looks ready to break down.

  Elie rushes past the Svobodas and embraces Catarina.

  Zarifa and Akil head inside. Jack hears hugs, kisses, and joy from the Dajanis.

  “Dad,” Jack says, “please let go.”

  Viktor does. He realizes at once that he needs to get his sons inside. That Caleb needs a soft surface to rest on. He slams the door behind them and secures it.

  Dierdra waits in the living room with Patrick’s parents. She bites her finger hard. Enough to draw blood. She can’t speak. She helps her teenaged son lay her youngest on the couch. Holds a pillow under Caleb’s head.

  Jack winces. Stretches his arms.

  He faces Patrick’s parents. His eyes bounce from Bill to Mary O’Connor. He shakes his head. “I’m sorry.”

  Mary falls to her knees. Screams. She buries her face in the floor. Her sobs are the worst thing Jack’s ever heard. Bill is quick to join her. He does his best, as a man, a husband, and a father who just lost his son, to comfort her. They rock back and forth. Each enveloped in the other’s arms.

  Everyone else is hit with the guilt for surviving.

  Jack kneels by them. He inhales once. Pained. Exhales. He puts a hand on each grieving parent’s shoulder. He tries. “Patrick... Patrick died well. He saved the children. All of—”

  Bill hits Jack in the side of the head with a solid punch.

  Of all the physical abuse Jack’s sustained, this is the most surprising. The most hurtful. He let his guard down. For a brief moment. A mistake he won’t repeat.

  The Dajanis jump. Benham places a protective hand on Akil’s chest. His wife, Afshan, guards Zarifa. If there’s gonna be more fighting, the Dajani parents aren’t gonna let their children take any part in it.

  Jack tumbles to the side. Coughs. Blood that had been settling in his throat finds freedom on the floor.

  Bill screams. “He died well? Died well?” He gets to his feet. “You stupid little shit, there’s no such thing as dying well. That was our son, not some goddamn puke in an army.”

  Mary shrieks. “Jesus fucking Christ, Bill. Stop.” She’s an emotional blender on overdrive. Both O’Connor’s are. But Bill won’t stop.

  He points to Caleb. Then Dierdra and Viktor. “Your kids are still here. Still alive. Jack and Caleb did such a wonderful job looking after each other. Who was looking out for Patrick? Who was looking out for him?”

  Jack wheezes. “I tried.”

  Bill raises his fist again.

  Dierdra punches him in the stomach.

  Bill doubles over. Viktor holds his wife back.

  Dierdra shouts over Viktor’s arm. “Can’t you see they’ve been through enough? It’s a goddamn miracle any of them made it back.”

  Bill slumps to the ground. Mary holds him while he shouts obscenities and sorrow. Shouts with the sounds of loss and defeat. He punches the floor. “No. No, no, no.” He punches until he runs himself dry.

  Mary clings to his neck. She shakes. Heaves.

  Jack watches them. His heart aches—but only momentarily. He fights off the urge to hurt Bill. Vengeance and revenge have always been a part of Jack, but the Red makes some of it harder to control.

  Bill moans. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

  “It’s all right,” Jack says. He nods to his mother and father. Leave the guy alone.

  Someone knocks at the kitchen door.

  Jack staggers to his feet. Oblivious to the pain. Happy for the Red. His hand hovers over the butt of the Colt.

  Viktor and Elie remove the boards from the door.

  Jack’s with both dads. Gun drawn.

  Viktor opens the door.

  Patrick stands before them.

  Chapter 16: Caleb

  He knows he’s unconscious.

  The signals from the monster underground batter his brain. They trip his mental circuit breaker. Overload him. Put him in something like a fugue state. Comatose, but dreaming. Thinking. Aware of something near him. Horrible kin.

  The Hroza.

  He’s a titan. Not like one of them—he is one of them. He struggles to locate the words in his own brain. To locate the right words to explain what he’s seeing. Experiencing. Living through new eyes.

  He’s below. In the dark.

  Caleb acclimates himself to the enormity of his form. His tendrils. His feelers.

  He’s hungry. So hungry.

  The world above is changing. Burning. Mutating. Evolving, in its own way, as his kin have forced themselves to. The extinction event is now. The asteroid has hit. The only game in town is adaptation.

  Caleb watches them. Watches the titans as they fight. Change themselves. Try to save themselves.

  Everything is falling down.

  Madness. Half the population has succumbed. Half of the Tribe. Half of the few that are left. The Hroza are not many, but they are strong. And every member lost is a strike through their hearts.

  The rebellious want to go into the dark. Into the black.

  They believe that the best way to serve the race is to seek out the strings. The energy that shapes reality. They will follow the vibrations they are so sensitive to. They will fly. They will leave their brethren behind, underground.

  There is no food left.

  What else can they do?

  Feed. They have to feed. Cannibalize. Almost everything above ground has died. There is no place left to look but to the elders. The ones nearer the end of their natural lives.

  The young and the children have to grow strong if there is to be anything left of them.

  Caleb bows over one of the elders who has given themselves as nourishment.

  He eats. He digs his tentacles in. He peels away the flesh. He feeds.

  Sacrifice. Sacrifice.

  That is the key.

  What are you willing to give up to save the future. To preserve knowledge. To keep the ideas alive. This is a race of librarians. Monks. Borderline psychotics.

  Or perhaps not merely borderline.

  A society in decline. Torn apart.

  Half want to study. The other half want to head into the black. Go off on some loopy god-hunt.

  Caleb watches it through his new eyes. A titanic species planning their end. The underground seeks preservation. The fliers seek...

  God. They exercise vestigial wings. Make them useful. Take to the dying skies and pump with air bladders. Keep themselves aloft. They screw and birth in the air. With every expulsion of spawn, they skim higher and higher. Closer and closer to the black that surrounds the planet.

  A total split. Degradation of the species.

  They hate each other.

  Enough.

  The eldest in the burrow speaks. The father of all the ones who will stay and study and learn. He speaks. And Caleb’s brain works overtime to connect the languages.

  The words are still not easy to find.

  We are dying. We no longer have a Choice when it comes to this. Whokhhu among is us isz to survive? Who will make the sacrifice so that the Knowledge can continue? And to stop them when they return?

&nb
sp; Who will sacrifice themselves to our hunger. The weakest weakest Of the six families so that the strongest Strongest will keep going Fam Famile famine family.

  Caleb’s arms reach out and…

  They’re not arms, they’re…

  tentacles.

  Chitinous extensions of his new (old) self. He wraps them around the extensions of others. His brothers and sisters who have given up their own lives so the knowledge and memory of his kind’s greatest can survive. His shape feels great sorrow. He kills those who offer themselves and does not approach to feed until he is nearly dead from starvation. He waits until there is no option left.

  Eat or die. He crawls over the bodies of his brothers and sisters. Crawls over them like some unworthy worm. Some barely-sentient carbon thing. He sees that they are preserved so well by the salt of the planet in which they all dwell and he…

  E A T S

  He eats of them,

  So that they can give him enough

  Life

  Energy

  He listens to the creatures growing and growling above. His mother and father wait next to him. They tell him of what is and what isn’t. Of what can be and what can’t be. Of what has happened to them and of what the mad ones have done.

  Until the elders and families can speak no more.

  When they are gone, he and his brothers slumber.

  The salts preserve the bodies so well.

  After he finds his five remaining kin have shuffled off and tunneled to new places, he talks to the bones of his elders.

  The loneliness is paralyzing.

  He talks to the skulls of his mother and father. Sometimes the skulls of his brothers and sisters. He wishes they were with him. Wishes the notes of the universe had played a different song.

  Eventually, he will devour the bones as well. He will seek the marrow and the calcium.

  Caleb digs. Burrows. Swims. He edges his way from continent to continent.

  He smells them. The hairless apes above. Idiots getting smarter. Learning. Talking. Always talking.

  After one of his slumbers, he finds that they bury their dead. He takes the chance to play with them. He is still so lonely. Some of the mammals hurt him. They use tools and weapons against the bodies he implants with his fine tendrils. He begins to hate them.