by Hunter Shea
Buck wasn’t so sure they’d made the right decision.
On the left was the preserved nature of Tibbetts Brook Park. When he was a teenager, he’d worked as a parking lot attendant there, guiding anxious swimmers into one of the three available lots. Sometimes, he was allowed to collect the parking fee—fifty cents a car—which was a high honor because he’d get to stay in the little air-conditioned booth. It was a much-coveted position on sweltering summer days.
The park was home to the largest public swimming pool in the county, ponds, playing fields, vast picnic and barbecue areas, and an almost-two-mile circular walking/running path.
On the right were rows of one- and two-family houses, each one as dark and still as the one before it.
It had been slow going. He wasn’t sure if they could make it to one of the hospitals by nightfall.
And now his biggest fear was nature itself. Tibbetts was home to swans, ducks, geese, squirrels, raccoons, skunks, stray cats, and sometimes even deer, not to mention every kind of rodent that scampered on four legs. If they had been affected like the rats and dogs they’d encountered, they’d have to smash their way into one of the houses and hold them back. And there was no telling what awaited them in the homes they passed. If the cop was right, each was an aboveground grave, an eternal resting place for untold corpses.
They were damned at either turn. Their only hope was to make it to the other side of the road that led to the main thoroughfare of Yonkers Avenue without incident.
He kept two grenades in his pocket. He was glad Alexiana hadn’t asked him where he’d gotten them. She, like the rest, was probably just grateful he had them. He wondered if the Vietnam vet who ran the army surplus store in White Plains had made it through everything alive. He was most likely still camped in his shelter, happy to bide his time.
“Keep your eyes on the trees,” he whispered to Alexiana.
“Why? Do you see something?”
“No. It’s just a feeling that if there are any surprises waiting for us, they’ll come from there.”
“Maybe we should have stuck to McLean.” She readjusted her grip on the pistol.
“It’s too late for that now. We need to get through here as fast as we can. If I remember, this part of Midland is a little under three-quarters of a mile. If we pick up our pace, everyone else will, too.”
The squeaking wheels of the shopping carts sounded like a clanging dinner bell to Buck. He didn’t like this at all.
He looked back at Max, his crimson-stained bat leaning against his shoulder. He looked like a soldier marching with his rifle. The kid was tough, but he’d lost some of his immortality yesterday. He was tempted to give him a gun, but he knew Daniel would be dead-set against it. At least Rey, crammed in the cart, could and would shoot.
Gabby pulled her bike slightly ahead of them and skidded to a stop. “Look,” she said, pointing up.
A lone hawk circled high overhead, probably searching for a tasty morsel in the trees and fields of the park.
Where would the ducks go when no one came around to feed them? Buck suddenly thought.
As if reading his mind, Alexiana said, “We should have brought some stale bread.”
When the weather was nice, they often fed the ducks at Tibbetts, despite the signs telling them not to.
“Hey, if we can’t have bread, neither can they,” he replied with a half smile.
Gabby stopped again.
“Are those all hawks?” she asked.
Buck looked up.
The sky was awash with the large gliding bodies of dozens of hawks.
“Where the hell did so many come from?” he said, craning his neck back as far as it could go.
“You think something’s dead in the park?” Max said.
“For a dinner party that big, I’d say so,” Buck said.
The sky was split by the screeching of the hawks. They rode the air currents, a lazy dervish of keen-eyed predators.
Everyone had stopped walking to take in the aerial display.
“You ever see anything like that?” Daniel said.
They were too spellbound to reply.
A lone hawk spun from the group, venturing outside of the park’s perimeter. It swooped low, skimming over the tops of the trees. It let out a piercing wail, angling down the side of an evergreen tree and pulling up at a ninety-degree angle. It made a pass over them, no less than thirty feet overhead, flapped its incredibly large wings, and headed for the circling mass.
“Shit,” Buck spat.
He looked to the nearest house, a split-level ranch with iron bars over the windows.
Bet the door is reinforced, too.
“I think we’d better get moving,” he said.
The swarm of hawks started to move, descending rapidly in a single, deadly formation.
72
“They’re coming!” Rey shouted. He aimed his rifle in the air, peeling off a shot. There was no way to tell if any of the approaching hawks had been hit. They’d formed an undulating, sinking cloud of brown feathers and fury.
“Save your bullets,” Buck said, pulling Gabby to him. Alexiana did the same with Miguel. “We have to take cover in there!”
He pointed at a tan shingled house to their right. It had a large bay window and a porch just big enough for two resin chairs and a blue cooler between them. They ran as hard as they could for the house. The wheels of Rey’s cart chattered in protest. His teeth clacked together when his father tilted the front up to hop over the curb, slamming back down on the sidewalk and lifting the rear.
The collective cries of the hawks were unlike anything he’d ever heard. All he wanted to do was hop out of the cart and save his father the arduous task of pushing him to safety, but his legs felt like overcooked spaghetti after walking so long.
Gabby let loose with an eardrum-rattling cry as one of the hawks swooped over her and Buck’s heads. Buck pulled her from her bicycle, jogging up the small lawn to the front porch.
“Max, look out!” Rey cried.
His brother turned in time to connect the barrel of his bat with a hawk that looked strong enough to carry a full-grown pit bull. The hawk spun to the ground, dead or stunned.
His mother pulled ahead of them, ramming the cart into the front step. Buck and Alexiana were already on the covered porch with Gabby and Miguel. Buck gave the doorknob a savage kick.
“Dammit!”
Rey’s father pitched to the side as a hawk grazed his head with its talons. A trio of jagged, bloody lines erupted on his cheek. Gathering himself, he tucked his hands under Rey’s armpits and yanked him from the cart. His mother did the same with Dakota.
The aluminum awning over the porch sang with the heavy thumps of dozens of hawks as they dove, their desire to attack blinding them to the barrier. Something heavy hit Rey from behind. His back felt as if it were on fire.
He turned to see two hawks heading right for Max. Rey fired over Max’s head. One of the hawks exploded, dousing Max with crimson feathers and tissue.
There was another loud crack. Rey turned in time to watch Buck kick the door open after blasting the lock with his shotgun. He practically threw his brother and sister inside.
Suddenly, Dakota screamed. A hawk had gotten its talons tangled in her hair and was attempting to lift her up. His mother swung wildly at the hawk, but it was joined by another, then another.
“Dakota!”
There was no way he could shoot them without hitting Dakota. His father pushed him along, tipping the cart forward carefully at the foot of the steps so Rey could get out. Rey stumbled up the three steps onto the porch, his forward momentum carrying him inside the dark and strange house. Miguel and Gabby rushed to his side. As much as he wanted to be outside helping his parents and brother, there was simply no gas left in his tank to make the effort. Keeping awake, despite the mayhem around him, had suddenly and scarily become a problem.
He turned onto his back and stared at the absolute horror.
The hawks were everywhe
re. And they were winning.
73
Alexiana rushed back outside after telling Miguel and Gabby to help Rey into the living room. The front door was wide open. She prayed that none of the hawks flew inside.
Dakota’s feet were several inches off the ground. Her screams were so loud, so shrill, Alexiana thought she was moments away from severing her vocal cords. Elizabeth fought as hard as she could, but she had been knocked down by a massive hawk as it knifed into the small of her back.
Buck and Daniel turned their shoguns around in their hands and swung at the hawks caught up in Dakota’s hair. The only problem was that concentrating on Dakota left themselves wide open for attack. Their shirts were torn, revealing blood-slicked flesh. One hawk grabbed hold of Buck’s cowboy hat, gliding away with it.
“You son of a bitch!” he yowled. He flipped his shotgun and took a parting shot, missing the hawk with his hat but hitting another.
Alexiana found a thick tree branch by the porch and grabbed it. She joined Max in trying to swat them away from Elizabeth, who was having a hard time getting up. She must have hit her head when she was bowled over.
“Get the fuck away from my mother,” Max howled, swinging the bat as he had with the dogs.
It was madness. She didn’t know this many hawks lived in all of Westchester.
Alexiana looked to her left and saw a steady stream of blood running down Dakota’s face as her hair started to pull away from her scalp. Daniel locked an arm around her waist, keeping her grounded while Buck slammed a hawk in the beak with the butt of his shotgun.
Something raked the top of Alexiana’s shoulder and she nearly dropped the branch.
It hurt like hell. She felt the hot wetness of her blood as it ran down her arm.
Max flipped onto his back as a pair of hawks went straight for his chest. His bat rolled away.
It was a hellish nightmare of flapping wings, wild screeches, and blood. The unbelievably strong force of a hawk snapped Alexiana’s neck forward as it found purchase with her hair. She screamed, but everyone else was too pinned down to help her.
I’m going to die!
Falling to her knees, she was sandwiched between two swooping hawks, each latching on to her shirt, pecking at her. She instinctively brought her hands to her face, desperate to save her eyes.
A loud, earsplitting squeal drowned out the mad shrieking of the hawks. Alexiana dropped onto her chest on the cold, wet grass. Dazed, she turned to find the source of the noise.
The hawks were leaving. Everyone had fallen to the ground, gasping.
Alexiana pushed herself up on her elbows.
A man wearing an oxygen mask stood on the porch next door to them. He held an air horn in one hand and the handle of a portable oxygen tank in another. Pressing the air horn again and again with two-second bursts, he drove the hawks back into the murky sky.
74
“Is everyone all right?” the old man gasped through the clear plastic mask over his nose and mouth.
Elizabeth struggled to her feet, then helped Daniel get Dakota upright. The girl was like a dead weight between them. Her eyes kept rolling to the top of her head. The poor girl was about to pass out.
“I think so,” Buck answered. “Here, let me help.” He took Dakota from her and he and Daniel walked her into the house. All of them were covered in deep scratches and blood, but Dakota looked to have taken the worst of it.
Max touched his mother’s shoulder. She pulled him into a grateful hug, thanking God for getting them through and sending help. To her surprise, Max gave her a fierce hug back.
“I thought they were going to take you and Dakota,” he said into her neck. “I’m sorry I couldn’t stop them.”
She broke their embrace, holding his gaze. “You have nothing to be sorry about. Only one person could have helped us, and he did.”
They pivoted to face the man next door. He leaned against the doorway, breathing hard.
“We’d better go over there,” Alexiana said. The three of them hopped over the low hedges separating the properties. Elizabeth made it to him first, offering the old man a hand to help him inside.
He waved her off. “I’m fine. Been locked up inside so long, it’s nice to get some fresh air.” He pulled the mask from his face. An elastic band kept it pinned to his neck.
“We can’t thank you enough for saving us,” Elizabeth said. “I don’t know what would have happened to us if you hadn’t come out.”
He nodded. “I know what. You would have been carried off like the others. The hawks like to take them high and drop them in the park, like the way seagulls drop clams to break them open. It’d been a few days since I last saw someone. Didn’t think there were any more left.”
“Hawks?” Alexiana asked.
“People.”
Elizabeth noted that he didn’t exhibit any of the signs of illness that Rey, Dakota, and the policeman had.
“You better lie low inside the Stevensons’ for a while,” he said. “Those damn hawks will be back. Them and all the others in the park. Found out the air horn puts a real scare into them, but not for long. Until they find other prey, they’ll just circle right on back. I used it to chase that damn flock away from flying off with a young couple a week ago. I couldn’t believe it actually worked.”
Max said, “So they’re all right, too?”
The man put the mask back over his mouth. “Not anymore. They were already pretty sick. They holed up and I assume died right over there.” He pointed to a multi-family house behind his own.
“What’s your name?” Elizabeth asked. “Are you alone? I’m Elizabeth Padilla and this is my son, Max. My neighbor, Alexiana.”
He shook her hand with a weak grip. “Ed Richards. Happy to see a smiling face that isn’t flush with fever. My wife, she’s inside.”
“I’d be happy to meet her. I’m a nurse. Does she need any medical attention?” She wasn’t sure exactly what she could give, considering the state they were all in. If she was sick, she could give her some antibiotics. But that would also mean less for her son and Dakota.
You don’t get to choose who lives and dies, she admonished herself.
She pictured Rey with his sweat-soaked skin and hacking cough. Yes, she would choose, and the choice was simple.
“I’m afraid she’s past that. She was in the garden when they hit us with the gas. She hung on for as long as she could. I’m keeping her in our bedroom until my oxygen runs out. Then I think I’ll just lie down and join her.”
He said it so matter-of-factly. It broke Elizabeth’s heart.
“I’m so sorry,” Alexiana said.
“She’s better off. I don’t know what the hell happened or who did it, though I have plenty of theories. What’s left is no place for people. If you’re not sick, you’re just walking bait for everything else that’s out there. I’m beginning to think my crazy sister and her Bible thumping about the end of days was right.” He shuffled his feet, leaning heavily on his oxygen. “Who ever heard of an attack out of the blue where no one, and I mean not a single overpaid public servant or self-serving broadcast network, can tell you a goddamned thing? Men, women, and children die and the damn animals are in control? Maybe it wasn’t some country or half-wit jihadists. Maybe it was God cleaning the slate, giving nature a chance to reclaim its place. And maybe I’m just an old man hoping that an act of kindness in the little time I have left will get me to a better place.”
Elizabeth didn’t know what to say. She didn’t want to acknowledge the small part of her that thought he could be right. She’d been a devout Catholic all her life, and it wasn’t as if the Church hadn’t warned them of a time like this.
“We’re holding out hope that there’s some order in this chaos, somewhere,” Alexiana said. “There has to be.”
The old man started to move back into his house.
“For your sake, and your kids’, I hope you’re right. Like I said, lie low for a few hours. If you don’t see them in the sk
y anymore, you can head out again. But stick close to the houses in case you need to make a fast retreat.”
“Why don’t you come with us?” Max asked in earnest.
He smiled. “If I was younger and stronger, I sure would. My days for adventure have come and gone. You all stay safe, and God bless you.”
The door closed with a gentle click.
“Come on, let’s go,” Elizabeth said, sad for Ed but encouraged by one thing.
He hadn’t been sick. Maybe because he was on oxygen, the chemical or toxin hadn’t gotten into his system. He couldn’t be the only one.
75
When Elizabeth, Alexiana, and Max walked in the door, Daniel jumped off the easy chair and ran to them.
“How bad are you hurt?” he said.
Elizabeth’s nose crinkled. She touched the nasty scratches on the side of his head. “About as much as everyone. What’s that smell?” Miguel rushed over, wrapping his arms around her legs, almost knocking her down.
“We would have gone over with you to thank the old man, but we had to deal with something else first. Miguel, can you please go sit with your sister for a second?”
The little boy reluctantly ambled back to Gabby, who was sitting by the empty fireplace, staring into it with vacant eyes.
“Buck and I had to remove a body that was lying on the couch,” Daniel whispered.
“Oh my God, did the kids see?”
“Unfortunately, yes. They were in here with it the whole time we were fighting off the hawks. I had Miguel take a couple of puffs from his inhaler. He was pretty upset. We put the body in another room down the hall. Just avoid the couch. The corpse was . . . leaking.”
Elizabeth’s hands flew to her mouth.
Daniel’s stomach churned thinking about it. The smell had seared an impression into his nose, deep into his brain.
“Buck found some sealed gallons of water. We should probably all clean up in the kitchen.”
“I also found a lot of cans of soup. I’ll start up the gas grill in back and heat them up,” Buck added, kissing the top of Alexiana’s head.