by Gina Ranalli
The forest was cool and dim, the buzz of insects all around. Jason felt himself relax. These woods were his sanctuary, his colossal green cathedral where no one bothered him and the pressures of being fifteen were left behind at its borders.
He walked for several minutes until he came to the place where he smoked the weed last night, half expecting the cocoon to be gone.
It wasn’t.
Still hanging high in the boughs, it had a ragged hole where the creature had made its exit. It looked even bigger in the daylight than he remembered.
He strolled around beneath it, studying it carefully, wishing he could get a closer look. He briefly considered trying to climb the tree it was attached to, or a neighboring one, but he quickly surmised it would be impossible. All the trees were pines and even their lowest branches were far out of his reach.
Once he’d seen the cocoon from every possible angle, he delved deeper into the woods, searching for others, convinced where there was one, there would be more.
Another five minutes journey and he found them. Dozens of them. He swallowed hard, now not daring to move, gripping the bat tighter than ever.
Most of the cocoons appeared to be intact. He only saw a few empty husks like the first one closer to the house.
Jason stared, trying to regulate his breathing and decide what he should do next. He knew he couldn’t keep his mouth shut anymore. That would be irresponsible and dangerous, probably for the entire town.
Were the moths sleeping? he wondered. They were nocturnal. Everyone knew that. Were they just waiting for sunset to be born into their new form? He thought it interesting that essentially what he was looking at was a new life form, basically babies.
A scratching sound made him look to his right at a huge boulder about twenty-five feet away. Jason gasped.
A man-sized moth was attached to the shady side of the stone, almost invisible, black against gray. It could have easily been mistaken for a dark patch of moss.
As Jason watched, the creature shifted ever so slightly. If it had been a man, it would have been laying on its belly, arms and legs tucked up beneath its body.
How it was in the position it was, vertical to the ground, clinging to the side of the boulder, Jason had no idea. It seemed to be defying gravity somehow.
The rounded black wings lay flat against its back and twitched a fraction when the breeze picked up.
Jason stood completely still, watching it for over five minutes. As the time passed, he grew less afraid and more curious.
Slowly, he took a step closer. Then another. And another until he was painstakingly moving nearer to the creature, occasionally looking up to be certain that none of the cocoons above were moving at all.
When he got within ten feet of the creature—he thought the news called it a mothman—he stopped and waited to see if it would do anything. Its head was turned away from him, which he found disappointing. He wanted to see the face up close. Would its eyes glow even during daylight hours?
Another five minutes passed and still nothing of note happened. Jason took a few steps closer and then searched the ground for something to toss at the creature. He spotted a pinecone, and bent to scoop it up while still keeping a firm grip on the bat.
He hucked the pinecone gently. It hit its target on the back and the moth shifted quickly, scurrying around the far side of the boulder, though not quite out of sight.
No further movement.
Strange, Jason thought, with a shiver.
He dared another couple of steps closer, slightly changing direction in order to move around the boulder the same as the mothman had done. The move afforded him another view of the boulder, the far side, which he’d previously been unable to see.
Another, larger mothman rested there, this one with its face perfectly exposed.
Jason had to stifle a scream.
It was something out of a horrible nightmare. Some terrible combination of human, insect, and alien with short hair covering the whole of the face—Jason knew there was a name for this kind of hair that insects had, but his brain had stopped functioning properly and he couldn’t think of the word.
The eyes were bulbous and appeared to be made of glass though they didn’t possess the eerie light they’d displayed in the darkness. There was nothing he could identify as a nose, but the mouth looked more like some sort of sucker, as black as the rest of the creature, but without the hair. It was small and round and oozing something too thick to be saliva, something chunky and clear.
Jason thought he could smell whatever the fluid was; it was foul enough to make him have to suppress a gag.
The hideous creature remained perfectly still, either blind to his presence or maybe, like himself, too terrified to move.
Jason assumed it was the former and scanned the ground for another pinecone, thinking perhaps moths were like bats and unable to see in the daylight.
But was that true? He seemed to remember learning something about bats in Earth Science class that said—his train of thought slammed full speed into a wall of granite, crushing it flat. He stood in the center of . . . he didn’t know what.
Things were crawling across the ground everywhere. Caterpillars, but unlike any he’d ever seen before. These were enormous, maybe five to six inches long and striped black and mustard yellow, with small red spikes covering their backs. They were big enough that Jason could now hear their dozens of tiny feet rustling through the leaves and pine needles.
One of the other-worldly caterpillars crawled over the toe of one of his sneakers and he held his breath. He looked back the way he’d come and saw he’d crushed one of the things on his way over here. He grimaced at the swirl of multi-colored guts which had burst from the creature under his weight and saw with some regret it was still twitching.
He had to calm his nerves and get out of there as quickly as possible. Studying a clear path, he carefully took a step back, amazed he had not panicked and just made a run for it the way he had last night. Maybe not being stoned was making him braver, and he vowed that he would flush what remained of his weed when he got back to the house.
Then, from somewhere high above, a crow cawed impossibly loud and Jason’s pent-up terror exploded outward in a scream that awoke the sleeping forest and all the creatures within it.
Chapter 22
John was relieved the damage to his truck was minimal. Mostly just scratches and dents—nothing too expensive to have fixed at some point, but he’d worry about that later. His main plan now was to go see Jackie at her house. When they’d spoken earlier, she still sounded pretty shaken up by last night’s ordeal and he wanted to comfort her as best he could.
His dad had dropped him off at the mechanic’s garage and now he was driving in his banged-up truck to the east side of town where Jackie lived with her mom.
He turned on the radio, hoping to hear more news about the thing that had attacked not only himself and Jackie, but several other townsfolk as well. Luckily, whatever the thing had been had eventually been killed by the sheriff’s department and was no longer a threat to anyone.
It was weird though. The creature—a mothman?—-was something he’d never forget no matter how much he wished he could, but the best thing now, he figured, was to try to put it out of his mind and focus on distracting Jackie as well.
Curiosity getting the better of him, he turned the radio dial, but couldn’t find any news. Snapping it off, he couldn’t help but think of himself as somewhat of a moron, on the one hand telling himself to forget it ever happened but on the other, searching for more news about it.
He shook his head at his own confusion and checked his hair in the rearview mirror. A plain, black sedan followed behind him. The car had lots of antennas on its roof, instantly identifying it as cops, but not local ones.
John combed his hair with his fingers and forgot about the sedan, his mind on Jackie once more. A couple minutes later, he pulled into her driveway, his tires crunching over gravel.
He was
surprised to see Jackie seated on the front stoop, as though waiting for him. She wore dark sunglasses, a white tank top and cut-off shorts. Her dark hair was pulled back in a loose ponytail.
Getting out of the truck, he smiled and said, “Hey.”
“Hey,” she replied and wiped her nose with a tissue.
Knowing something was wrong, he hurried over and sat down next to her, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. “What’s up, babe? Why are you crying?”
She sobbed harder, leaning her face into his shoulder. “John.”
Turning, John saw Jackie’s mother standing in the doorway behind them. Though her face was somewhat obscured by the screen door, he could tell just by the tone of her voice that something was up.
“Hey, Shelly,” he said. Jackie’s mom had always insisted on being called by her first name and although it was awkward for him when he’d first started dating Jackie, he was long since used to it now.
“You want some iced tea,” Shelly said. It wasn’t a question. “Come on in here and let me get you a glass.”
“Uh . . .” He looked at Jackie, who pulled away from him and blew her nose. “All right,” he said and stood up, lightly touching his girlfriend’s head before entering the kitchen behind Shelly.
She indicated the table and said, “Sit down.”
He did as he was told, feeling increasingly uneasy. It was starting to feel like one of those “stay away from my daughter, you no-good scoundrel” scenarios.
Shelly pulled a glass down from the cupboard and filled it from a pitcher of iced tea on the counter by the stove. She brought it to him and then took the seat across from him.
“Thanks.” He tried to smile, but his mind was whirling.
“Did they talk to you yet?” she asked.
He frowned. “Who?”
Shelly sighed heavily and leaned back in her chair. “That would be a ‘no.’” She glanced towards the screen door before continuing. “I figured they’d already talked to you even before they came here, but Jackie said you would have called and warned her if they had. After that, I knew they’d just gotten here first and you would be next.”
Completely puzzled, John repeated, “Who?”
“Federal agents. FBI.”
He could only stare at her. “Really?”
“Really. They were here not more than half an hour ago.”
“About what? What did they say?”
“About your little encounter last night. That was their word . . . encounter.”
“The FBI?”
“Yep. Two men, flashing badges, just like on TV. Said they needed to talk to Jackie, preferably alone. No way was I gonna let that happen, so I sat right where you’re sitting now and listened to them make their threats at my kid.”
“What? They threatened her?”
Shelly waved a hand. “Oh, not in so many words. Not really, but we got their meaning just the same.” She mimicked the deep voice of a man. “The immensity of this knowledge could prove devastating to the security of our nation. If it were to get out, there’s no telling what could happen. The entire country could be put at risk.” She switched back to her regular voice. “Stuff like that. Basically telling Jackie she could never breathe a word of what happened to you two to anyone. Ever. Even said something about prison, if you can believe that.”
John gaped at Shelly as if she was speaking another language. “They threatened to put her in jail?”
“Again, not in so many words, but it was implied. Very seriously implied.”
“Why? We didn’t do anything!”
Shelly drummed her fingers against the tabletop then looked at him, her eyes narrowed. “John, have you ever heard of Roswell?”
He paused, more confused than ever. “That old TV show?”
It was Shelly’s turn to be confused, but she plunged ahead anyway. “Roswell, New Mexico. Doesn’t ring any bells?”
John shrugged and waited.
“In the forties,” Shelly said, “a bunch of people who lived in Roswell claimed they saw a spaceship fall out of the sky. Crash-landed in the desert there. They said it was like nothing they’d ever seen before and most of them knew right away it wasn’t anything from this earth.”
To prevent himself from balking, John sipped his iced tea.
“Anyway,” she went on, “lots of people witnessed it. Some even said they saw the dead bodies of aliens. Martians, whatever they called them back then. It even made the newspapers in the area. Then, the next thing they knew, the government was all over them, saying what they’d seen was a weather balloon, yadda, yadda, yadda. All this nonsense. The government threatened them to keep their traps shut and the official report to this day is that what crashed in the desert was a weather balloon. Never mind dozens of people claiming otherwise.” She gravely studied his face as if looking for signs of comprehension. Scowling, she said, “Last night, Lockwood became another Roswell. Get it?”
This time, John gulped the tea, draining half the glass. “Uh huh,” he said just to say something.
Behind him, the screen door opened and Jackie walked in, the balled-up tissue in her fist. She took off her sunglasses and tossed them onto the table. “She’s telling the truth, John. I know it sounds whacked, but it’s true. I looked it up on the Internet. And you know what happened right in the middle of me reading about Roswell?”
He shook his head.
“The Internet went down and it hasn’t come back up since.”
“So?” he asked. “The Internet goes down a lot.”
“At the same time cell service goes out?” Jackie replied.
Scowling, he pulled out his phone and flipped it open only to find it was dead despite having it fully charged before he left the house. He looked up at his girlfriend and her mom, a feeling of dread beginning to unfurl in his stomach. “What about the land lines?”
Jackie said, “Working, but . . .” She looked at her mother.
Shelly cleared her throat. “Only as far as the town limits. I tried to call Jackie’s dad down in Tacoma and got a busy signal.”
“Maybe he was on the phone,” John said as if this was an obvious explanation.
“His cell phone?” Shelly said. “No. From the kitchen phone, I tried calling my own mother in Idaho. Same thing. Then I tried Ron and Barbara up the road. They answered right away and said they couldn’t make calls out of town either, and that their Internet was down.”
The three of them sat staring at each other for a long moment. It was then John remembered the black sedan that had been behind him on the road a little while ago. On a whim, he rose from his chair and brushed aside the window curtains to peer up and down the street. There was no sign of the sedan, but he suspected it might be nearby, just out of sight for the moment.
He told the others about it when he went back to the table, and Jackie and Shelly exchanged a worried glance.
“This is it,” Shelly said. “This is the real deal.”
“What does that mean?” John asked.
“It means we either play along with them or . . .” She trailed off, seemingly unwilling to finish the sentence, but the two teens got the gist of it.
They either played along or they found out just how serious the American government could be about keeping its secrets.
Chapter 23
A new map of the town had been pinned to the wall of Sheriff Collie’s office, red push-pins marking the sites of the attacks and sightings of mothmen.
Deputy Casper leaned against Collie’s desk, studying the map, her brows knitted together. “There’s no rhyme or reason,” she said. “No pattern at all. They’re just random.”
“In a town this size,” Dr. Quirk said, “that’s not surprising. Especially given that Lockwood is surrounded by forest on all four sides. Frankly, I’d be more surprised if there was a single hub where the attacks were taking place.”
The two women were alone in the office. Casper had no idea where Collie had gotten off to, but the Azure House agents h
ad said they wanted to interview witnesses and had taken off with a list of addresses, which included the tiny television station at the edge of town.
Casper had a feeling this was going to prove to be a very interesting day, and not the fun kind of interesting, either.
Burke was back in the pen once more, yawning, answering the calls that just wouldn’t quit. Now the townsfolk were demanding to know why their Internet and cell service had been cut off, and poor Burke was tasked with the job of feigning ignorance.
Casper didn’t like what was happening one bit, didn’t like lying to people she’d known her whole life and had sworn to protect. This whole thing was turning into a mess that would have repercussions for years to come, not that the agents cared about that. They would do their thing and be gone. They didn’t have to live here and face people who had previously trusted them, people who might never trust the sheriff’s department again after this.
And without trust . . . She didn’t want to think about it.
“Are the agents serious about capturing one of these things?” Casper asked Quirk.
Quirk sipped from a paper cup of coffee. “I’m sure they are, but I’m doubtful it will happen. They might take the one that’s currently at the morgue instead, or a different dead one, but a living creature? Highly doubtful.”
“Why is that?”
“You saw for yourself how fragile the mothmen are. They basically disintegrate upon contact.”
“But how can that be? If they’re basically made of tissue paper, then they wouldn’t be so dangerous.”
“I wouldn’t compare them to tissue paper, Deputy. They’re more like . . .” She thought for a moment. “More like they’re made of ash.”
“That makes it even more bizarre, not less.”
“Indeed,” Quirk agreed, “but it explains why they have been able to remain hidden for so long.”
“How so?”
“Well, they’re nocturnal, as we know. I believe they’re also not particularly social creatures. With each other, I mean. They mate, yes, but otherwise remain quite solitary. Usually, when I’ve studied such creatures, several people have seen what I believe is the same creature. Probably flown miles from where its cocoon was hidden. And most likely, not a newborn.”