“So, how have you been, Clark?” the woman asked.
“Umm.” Misha didn’t really know what to say. “I’ve been good.”
“Still seeing that whore?”
Misha nearly choked. When he started coughing, the woman got up and got him a glass of milk. She sat down and continued to scrutinize him.
“So, are you?” the woman asked again when Misha managed to stop coughing.
“Uh, no, I’m not,” he decided to answer.
“Good,” the woman gave a curt nod. “You’re too good for her.”
There was silence at the table once more. Misha cleaned off his plate and took half the pasta off the remaining plate. He scraped the other half onto Rifle’s.
“Why are you putting food on the floor, you naughty boy?” the woman frowned.
“I’m feeding my dog,” Misha explained.
“A dog?” The woman leaned over and looked down at Rifle. The woman and the dog stared at each other, practically nose to nose. “You are a dog,” the woman finally decided. “Why is there a dog in my house?”
“I’m sorry, but I had to bring him,” Misha told her.
“When did you get a dog, Clark? Why couldn’t you have gotten yourself a good woman, like that Rachael.”
Misha shrugged and continued to tuck into the food. He polished off the plate and downed the glass of milk.
“Who are you?” the woman asked again.
“I told you-” Misha started to tell his lie again, but was interrupted when the woman suddenly shot up from her chair.
“What are you doing in my house?” she shouted. “Oscar! Oscar, there’s a strange man in the house!”
Misha got up out of the chair. Rifle whined slightly and backed towards the open door, tail tucked between his legs.
“Get out!” she shrieked as she grabbed hold of her walker. She kept trying to pick it up and threaten Misha with it. “Out! Get out! Oscar!”
Misha quickly dashed out of the kitchen and into the backyard, Rifle at his heels. The woman hurriedly closed the back door and glared out at him. She wasn’t yelling anymore, but she was clearly still saying something, her lips moving near the glass.
“Thank you for the food,” Misha spoke in an indoor voice. He knew the woman couldn’t hear him, but he was afraid to speak any louder. “I hope you keep all your doors locked and that nothing comes through your windows.”
With that, he hurried around to the side of the house and made his way carefully to the front lawn. The woman’s neighbours had a line of short pine-tree-looking bushes growing along the edge of their yard to separate it from the woman’s driveway. Misha hurried over to them and lay on his stomach up against their stubby trunks. He couldn’t quite lay under them, but there was a bit of overhang that made him feel somewhat safer. Safer than being totally exposed, at least. The massive amount of food he had consumed weighed heavily in his stomach. He probably should have taken it easy, but he had been hungry. It seemed like ages ago that he had eaten his waffles. Of course, that was a time he’d rather not think about; he needed to focus on the now. Next to him, Rifle burped. He probably ate too much too. Misha never owned a dog so he had no idea how to take care of one. He figured splitting his food shouldn’t be too bad.
He rested for a while next to the brush. Not only was he letting the food settle, but he was deciding on the best way to cross the street ahead. This street, and possibly only one more, was all he had to cross, although he was guessing at where the numbers were placed and could be totally wrong. After his break, he inched toward the end of the scrub until he was at the bottom of the driveway and looked up and down the street. He saw nothing that appeared to be a threat. He then watched all the nearby houses, studying them carefully. Some shadows moved in a few of them, but for the most part, things were still.
Misha thought about the woman with Alzheimer’s. He wondered if the fact that she tried to attack him was related to what was going on out here or not. He had no idea what was happening to his neighbourhood. People just seemed to have gone nuts. He had seen a few attacks occur during his journey. They were excessively violent and were completely unprovoked. Misha figured that he had kind of provoked the woman and, therefore, her attack wasn’t related to the rest. Why the others were flipping out, he had no idea. He decided then to avoid everyone, even people that at first seemed normal. After all, Dean had been normal. Although, Dean also seemed to have died.
That thought was quickly pushed out. Misha studied the street again and decided that the best course of action was to make a mad dash across. He pushed himself up onto his hands and the balls of his feet. Both were cut and dirtied worse than the rest of him. Rifle seemed to sense what was going on and got up into a half crouch. After one last look around the area, Misha ran for it. Rifle bolted ahead, intuitively knowing where to go. Misha’s target destination was the porch of the house across the street. Most of the porches in this area were made out of slabs of concrete on top of brick, but this one was wooden and had a space large enough for Misha to crawl under. He squirmed his way inside and held his breath, listening. The only sound he heard was Rifle panting at his side. No shrieks, screams, or groans, no pounding of feet. Misha shifted around and peered out from under the porch. Nothing moved out there.
He crawled to the back of the porch and lay on his back against the house. His stomach didn’t appreciate the run and was making some upset motions. It was cool under the porch compared to out in the sunlight. It also smelled of dirt, dust, and cobwebs. There were bound to be bugs crawling around under there, but Misha didn’t think about them. Rifle lay up against his side and huffed. Misha put his hand on the dog’s head and scratched his ears a few times. The dog’s tail thumped lightly in the dirt. It was surprisingly comfy under the porch. The dirt was more mushy than hard, and the heat off the dog combined nicely with the cold house wall. He closed his eyes and sighed.
* * *
The next thing Misha knew, Rifle was licking his face. Misha spluttered and pushed his snout away. Rifle was standing as tall as he could under the porch, looking down at his face. He couldn’t remember feeling the dog get up. He must have actually fallen asleep. Misha tried to ask Rifle what was up, but his throat was so full of mucus that no sound came out.
This turned out to be a good thing because a creak sounded from the wood above. Someone was walking around up there. Misha couldn’t tell what they were doing or whether they were dangerous. The footsteps wandered from one end of the porch to the other and back. Misha slowly pushed himself up on his elbows and peered through a crack in the boards. He couldn’t see much more than part of the house’s outer wall and the eaves high overhead. He heard the footsteps coming closer, starting near his feet and coming toward his head. A bit of dirt fell between the boards and landed lightly on his bare stomach. Whoever was up there stopped right above Misha’s head. He couldn’t see what he or she looked like due to his very narrow field of view and some shadows being cast, but he could see that whoever it was, was a lot bigger than him.
Misha was guessing that the person on the porch was male. Probably a big muscular guy who worked in construction or something. Most of the guys in Misha’s college class looked like that, so he knew the type. His boots were big and heavy and clomped around. Eventually he stopped pacing. Misha didn’t know if that was a good thing or not. He could, all too well, picture the individual suddenly moving silently, sneaking up on him while he thought he was standing still. Misha turned his head to the gap in the boards and listened as intently as he could. He could hear the person breathing, but it sounded odd, as if he was wearing a mask of some kind. He then heard the screen door of the house open, and the person tried to turn the knob. It must have been locked because a loud crack came next. Misha assumed he had kicked the door down with his heavy boots. It sounded like he entered the house.
Rifle scooted away from Misha toward the front of the porch. He didn’t crawl out from under it though. Misha rolled slowly and made his way next to
the dog. He peered out from under the wooden beams. Judging by the amount of sunlight and shadow, he hadn’t been asleep for very long. However, it was long enough for some visitors to have arrived. On the street were three odd, big, white trucks flanked by a pair of covered military-type trucks. A few men and women in gear similar to the military’s stood around the vehicles with large rifles at the ready. Misha didn’t think they actually were military though. Everything they wore was completely black and there were insignia on the shoulders. The insignia looked familiar, even at a distance, but were too far to make out any real detail. They certainly didn’t bear the flag, which Misha thought all military uniforms were supposed to have. Of course, even if the gear was military, it was their stance that really made Misha think otherwise. They weren’t as crisp as real soldiers should have been; they had an almost relaxed stance. Every one of them wore full face gas masks.
Above, the porch visitor returned with several loud clomps of his boots. He went down the front porch steps and headed to the street. Misha saw that he was indeed a big man. He walked over to the vehicles and exchanged some words with the people there. He was clearly one of them. More people like them came out of other nearby houses and gathered with the rest in the street. Misha noticed someone come out of the house that the old woman lived in. Some soldiers, Misha didn’t know what else to call them, banged fists on the sides of the strange trucks. The trucks responded by having their back doors opened from the inside. Unidentifiable personnel in sterile, white suits hopped out of them and headed for the houses. The suited people were all accompanied by at least one soldier.
As they came to the house whose porch Misha was hiding under, he shrank away, deeper into the shadows. The big man returned and clomped up the stairs first, across the porch, and into the house. Following after him was someone in a clean suit. The shapelessness of the body and the shiny visor made it impossible for Misha to tell anything about the person. He couldn’t even identify gender. Gas masks Misha was more used to seeing, his father had even owned one, but the sterile suits were so strange and foreign to him. It reminded him of spacemen in their spacesuits.
Once the two of them were inside, Misha looked across the street again. Those that had gone into the old woman’s house came out, dragging her with them. Even from under the porch across the street, he could hear her confused and angry rantings. She clearly objected to what was going on, but no one seemed to listen to her. Misha watched as she was shoved into the back of one of the white trucks. A handful of people from other houses were also brought out. Some of them objected and some of them went along quietly. All of them were clearly scared, and all of them were put into the backs of the white trucks.
One man suddenly broke free of the arm that held his and made a run for it. A single rifle was raised, and a single shot was fired. The man’s head practically exploded off his shoulders. Misha’s eyes just about bugged out of his own head at the sight of it. The shooter was then lightly punched by one of the other soldiers and it looked like he was being scolded. Only scolded for shooting an innocent man in the head, when he should have been arrested or even beaten.
Misha figured the rifle shot would bring more attackers. He remembered the woman on the lawn. She had only left when she heard the gunshot in the distance. That shot was likely to bring more now. Perhaps that’s why the gunman was being told off? Either way, Misha didn’t like the idea of staying there any longer and crawled over to the side of the porch. He watched the people on the street and waited until no one was looking in his general direction. He then squeezed his way out and headed down the side of the house.
This house had a tall gate between the front yard and the back. Pulling on a string unlocked the latch allowing Misha to push open the gate. Rifle hurried past him. As Misha was about to step through himself, another shot sounded out on the street. He risked taking a few steps back to see. This time it looked like somebody had shot someone running at the group. Misha had been right about the noise bringing more.
As he turned to face the gate once more, Misha realized he was standing right next to a window. He also realized that the large military-like man was standing on the other side of it and, beyond him, was the suited individual. As Misha turned, so did the massive soldier and the suited person. Through the glass, Misha’s eyes met that of the soldier’s, who looked back through the pair of plastic windows in his gas mask.
“Stay where you are!” the soldier shouted through the window.
Misha had no intention of doing such a thing. He took off like a shot into the backyard. The soldier started shouting something else, but Misha couldn’t make out what.
When he got into the backyard, he saw that Rifle was pacing back and forth in front of the rear fence, whining. There was no hole to crawl through this time, and the fence was very tall. There was, however, a very large yet somewhat squat tree. Misha ran to the tree and called Rifle over. He hid behind the tree as the back door burst open, the solider shouting for him. Misha still didn’t listen. He heaved Rifle up off the ground and shoved the dog up onto the wide lower branches. The dog seemed very uncomfortable up there, but he started to creep along the branch that almost went over the fence.
“What the hell? A dog?” Misha heard the big man say, even through the muffling of the mask.
Misha climbed up into the tree himself and started following Rifle.
“Hey you! Stop!” the man shouted. “Stop or I’ll shoot!”
This just made Misha climb faster. Rifle reached the furthest point he could before it got too steep for him. Thankfully, it was far enough, and he was able to leap off the branch and over the fence. Misha scrambled like a monkey to the same spot and didn’t hesitate at all before leaping. It was a good thing he didn’t because something impacted the branch right after he jumped off it. Something like a bullet. Misha’s leg clipped the top of the fence, and he ended up tumbling over. He managed to get his arms out in front of him to catch his fall. Now would be the worst time to break something.
Without bothering to check the house for movement or sticking to the safety of bushes, Rifle and Misha ran around the side of this next house. He could hear the soldier cursing loudly as he gave chase over the fence. Misha needed to find somewhere he and Rifle could hide, but where? The front yard of the house offered no solutions, so he kept running. He didn’t think he would need to cross this street so he made a ninety degree turn and headed across the front lawns of the next houses. The loud crack of a gunshot sounded behind him and a bullet thumped into the dirt near his heels. The front yards were too open. Misha quickly cut to the side of the next house, going toward the backyard. Rifle suddenly stopped short though, ears laid flat, head down. His lips kept rising in a silent snarl as he sniffed toward the yard. Someone unpleasant was in that backyard.
* * *
The soldier was getting closer. Misha was trapped between him, and one of the weirdoes. He looked around the tight space frantically. He saw only one option. He patted Rifle to get the dog’s attention, and then went up to the side of the house. There were windows into the basement on this side that were down in window wells. Misha hopped inside one and curled up as tightly as he could. Rifle squeezed in next to him. With the two of them in there, the space was really tight, but it was deep enough for them to be below the surface. It only took a moment for the sound of the soldier’s heavy boots slapping the ground to fill the window well. Misha held his breath again and stayed as still as a statue. He didn’t need to though. The soldier had no idea that he had stopped and charged straight into the backyard. The next thing Misha heard was his startled cry, followed by a scream. A few gunshots went off, but a sickening crunch ended both them and the screams.
Misha turned his head and looked into the house. There were bars across the windows so he wouldn’t be able to get in, but he looked in anyway. It was dark inside and hard to make things out, but something was moving. Suddenly, a face slapped up against the window right next to Misha’s. It was a teenage boy pro
bably not much younger than Misha himself. He grabbed hold of the bars and was raging against them, trying to get out. Rifle whined.
The dog needed a small boost to get out of the window well, but Misha was able to climb out easily on his own. He looked toward the backyard and saw the soldier laying there, his head turned toward him with what looked like a small camera attached to the side of his mask. If that’s what it was, they now had a perfect image of Misha. A girl that looked to be the same age as the boy in the basement was perched upon him, eating his chest and belly. Misha immediately bent over and threw up all the pasta he had eaten. The girl looked at him, her eyes considering him from out of her red stained face. She then turned back to the soldier. Misha didn’t even consider trying to get the soldier’s gun. He made his way back toward the front of the house on shaky legs, his stomach still rolling, and his head still reeling. Once he reached the front of the house, he leaned against its brick wall and took several large gulps of air. Rifle looked up at him, his ears flat with concern.
“I’m all right, buddy.” Misha patted the shepherd’s head. “This day just isn’t going how I expected it to is all.”
He took another steadying breath and looked around. They were only about a block away from the street they were trying to get to. They would have to move fast too. Not only would the soldier’s gunshots bring more weirdoes, but also he, or the suited person, had probably called for backup, which would be on its way. Misha hurried along, being a little bolder about being visible because of the girl. He wanted to get far away from her before she decided he was worth chasing down. Or before more of those phoney military men showed up. The suited individual had probably told them what he looked like. Misha wondered what would happen to the old woman.
As Misha approached the house on the corner of an intersection, he became extremely cautious. Something didn’t feel right. Even Rifle was sniffing at the air, ears flipping between flattened and alert. He didn’t whine or growl though. Misha checked up and down the street but he didn’t see anything hostile. All was very still. He crouched low and ran toward a car parked on the street. Once he reached it and hid next to it, he searched the area again. There was nothing to indicate any danger, but the hairs on the back of Misha’s neck stood on end.
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