What Happens in the Darkness

by Monica J. O'Rourke

  She slept huddled in doorways, trying to keep warm. During the day she scavenged for food and basically just waited. There was nothing to do but wait. She had no plan, had no idea where to go, who to turn to, who to seek out for help.

  Another day passed—another day spent crying, wandering aimlessly, doing nothing much at all.

  She sat on the crumbling steps leading to what used to be Best Buy, pressed her head into her knees, and began to cry. She wished she was dead, because then at least this would be over. What was there to live for, really? If no one was alive … what was she supposed to do now?

  She tried not to think about the attack, about people who ripped out kids’ throats, about people who moved so fast it made her dizzy, and about children, dead children, dead babies with their heads nearly torn from their shoulders.

  She tried not to think about what kind of people those things really were.

  There was no such thing, what she was thinking of. Last Halloween her dad brought home a pile of videos: The Mummy, The Fly, and Dracula. Her mom had been royally pissed. Janelle had only been eleven at the time. But Dad was a true horror fan, and he and Janelle had stayed up until three in the morning watching those terrifying movies, even though it had been a school night.

  Janelle never told her mom, but she’d had nightmares for a week. For two days in a row, Brundle-Fly tried to scale the walls of their apartment building to get her, and for several days after that, Dracula had tried to claw his way in, staring at her from outside, hovering above the fire escape. Still, at the time she knew it was make-believe, and the nightmares had been worth it because it meant snuggling with her dad, a bowl of popcorn balanced on their knees, huddled on the sofa in a room where the only light was emitted by the picture on the TV screen.

  It was make-believe then, and it had to be make-believe now. The Mummy was fake. Brundle-Fly was fake. Freddie and Jason were fake. Dracula was fake too. Every kid knew that.

  So what the hell had attacked last night?

  Shouting a few blocks away startled her, and she ran off in the direction of the voices.

  And suddenly she knew where everyone was.

  People had been herded like cattle onto the backs of trucks, poked and prodded by sexless guards in dark-green uniforms. The uniform of the Global Dominion.

  Janelle had never seen the enemy before but knew who they were. There was no mistaking this uniform from the rumors and descriptions, although country of origin was impossible to know until a guard spoke or removed his or her helmet. Russian, Iraqi, Chinese, Greek … it didn’t matter. Practically every nation on the planet had united against America. Now they were collecting their prisoners.

  She ducked into a doorway and hoped she hadn’t been seen.

  Guards barked at the prisoners, people who looked tired and terrified. They were being dragged from their hiding places, from inside burnt-out buildings and bank-vault basements, pulled from upside-down cars and bombed-out bodegas.

  For a moment she wondered where the police were—why weren’t they helping?—and then spotted a man wearing the NYPD uniform being pushed onto the back of the truck.

  Why wasn’t anyone saving them? Truck after truck was being loaded with tired, dirty, and wounded people, even kids Janelle’s age. Why wasn’t anyone helping? She knew she wasn’t alone in this and figured they were hiding as well. No one was helping!

  Her great-aunt Mabel would be pounding the side of the truck with her cane. Janelle had heard Great-Aunt Mabel used to be close friends with Rosa Parks, and that she taught Miss Parks everything she knew. Aunt Mabel would dip a Zwieback into her tea, gumming it, and she would proclaim to anyone within earshot that if she hadn’t chose to walk that day because the damned bus had been too full, then Miss Mabel Brown would be the one being celebrated by history and not Miss Rosa Parks. Of course when it was pointed out to Great-Aunt Mabel that she had been living in Vermont that year and not Alabama, the woman would suddenly excuse herself to use the toilet.

  Janelle missed her great-aunt Mabel and hoped she was okay. She was scared for her whole family, who were scattered across the country. Somehow she would make her way to see them, to escape New York. If no one was going to rescue her—and rescue seemed less and less likely with each passing day—she would have to rescue herself. Somehow she would make her way down to Georgia or Florida.

  First she had to get past the guards.

  Chapter 8

  Patrick led the second strike, his group again making their way to Manhattan.

  Martin remained behind to begin training his new extended family, as he preferred to think of them. They were weak, still too weak to join in the hunt, but it wasn’t too soon to describe the plan of action. They would be receptive, he knew. Loyal. They would do what he demanded.

  Of course there were exceptions.

  The woman with the dark curly hair stood up during Martin’s speech on loyalty and honor. Doe-eyed listeners, yawning and stretching and trying to retain the information with some semblance of understanding stared at him.

  But the process had been quicker for her, the rebirth of knowledge and wisdom—the use of undiscovered parts of her brain. She raised her arms over her head, reaching toward the ceiling that was almost fifty feet away, elongating her lithe body.

  “And us,” she said casually. “What about us?”

  “You have a question?” Martin asked calmly. “The proper behavior is to raise your hand and—”

  “Proper behavior?” she cried, turning to face the crowd, now standing beside a stone-faced Martin. “You did this to us! Now I want to know—what’s in it for us? Are you a god? Why should we obey you?”

  The crowd stared in silent shock, unable yet to respond, to know how to respond.

  “What happens when this is over?” she demanded.

  “Sit down,” Martin said quietly. “You have valid questions, but this isn’t—”

  She wheeled on him, rushing him, now standing toe to toe, facing him. He smelled the fresh death on her breath, the fetid soil, rotting flesh. “We want answers!”

  His hand snapped out so quickly she didn’t have a chance to react. He grabbed her by the throat and pulled her in, sinking his teeth into the nape of her neck, tearing it out.

  Her hands flew to her throat, trying to staunch the flow of blood, a flow that would have ceased to be in another day, after her transformation was complete. She collapsed to her knees, staring up at Martin, gurgling a message that would never be understood, eyes large and frightened and pleading.

  Martin nodded toward Lana, who had stayed behind to assist with the training, and she dragged the woman’s body out of the room.

  Moments later Martin heard the pounding and knew Lana was completing the necessary task.

  Her blood still dripped from his muzzle. He absently wiped it away with the back of his hand. The stunned people in the crowd stared at him with those crazed doe-eyed expressions, but now they were tinged with fear and awe.

  Just as he’d planned. There was nothing better than a sacrificial lamb.

  It was a shame, having to waste anyone that way, but he couldn’t allow insubordination. It could be dangerous in such a crowd. Who knows what damage she might have been able to do? She was too much of a leader and too much trouble for Martin. He had enough on his hands handling the enemy.

  And she’d made a fine example. Chances were good no one else would try anything like that.

  He nodded to the crowd. “Shall we try again?” He resumed his speech, and this time he had their rapt attention.

  ***

  Luke, one of the twins sired by Patrick hundreds of years earlier, followed him on the scouting expedition. They moved unseen across highways and countryside, undetectable by human eye, until they arrived again in Manhattan.

  Patrick’s cheeks dimpled when he smiled, which unfortunately wasn’t often. His black hair was short-cropped, almost military.

  He smiled now, revealing white teeth that glistened under the mo
onlight, and he leaned against a lamppost on the corner of Fourteenth Street.

  Luke—chronologically hundreds of years old but looking not a day over his death age of twenty—watched Patrick’s lead. He hadn’t experienced much before his incarceration, and he was relishing this.

  Patrick closed his eyes, sucking in a deep breath, expanding his ample chest. “Can you smell them?”

  “No,” Luke said, sniffing hard. “I smell soil. And … something bad. Something like dirt. Only spoiled.”

  “That’s them,” Patrick said. “You didn’t notice this the other night?”

  Luke shook his head and then jumped up on the post, hanging from the dangling sign. “I was just following Martin. Didn’t try to smell anything.”

  Patrick nodded. “I smell it too. Something like sulfur. Gunpowder maybe?”

  “You think they have weapons?” Luke asked.

  “Let’s go ask.” Patrick led them down Second Avenue.

  A short while later they came across the first internment camp.

  Patrick stopped abruptly and ducked into the nearest doorway, signaling Luke to do the same. Face after face of terrified prisoners—tired, soulless eyes—stared out at nothing. They huddled together behind multiple layers of barbed-wire fencing.

  The soldiers carried the guns, of course, not the survivors as Patrick had assumed moments earlier. No one had guessed just how pervasive the enemy attack had become.

  He quickly guessed there to be about fifty soldiers and several hundred prisoners. How many could he and Luke safely overtake? If they attacked the soldiers head-on there would certainly be gunfire. He couldn’t get to the prisoners first because that would likely lead to hysteria.

  Of course he also had to consider this was a fact-finding mission, and he had orders not to get involved. Period.

  But he couldn’t stand by and do nothing. Not that Patrick was terribly altruistic, but this sort of bullying annoyed the hell out of him. He was hoping to find a way to distract the guards but couldn’t think how. He said, “Any ideas?”

  “Ideas?” Luke asked. “For what?”

  “Rescue mission.”

  “What? But Martin said—”

  “I don’t care what Martin said. I’m in charge here.”

  Silence. Luke seemed interested in his shoes. Then he said, “We have to get the soldiers. Have some dinner …” He smirked. “Then free the prisoners. Right?”

  Patrick nodded, staring ahead at the compound. “They’ll panic. Soldiers and prisoners. The prisoners may even trample one another. And there’s that barbed wire. It might get messy.”

  “Then why don’t we wait? Like Martin said.”

  Holding up his finger, pointing it in Luke’s face, Patrick snarled. “Enough!”

  Luke sighed and then nodded. “We have the darkness as an advantage,” he whispered. “We scatter their fires, and if we move quickly enough, they won’t know what hit them.”

  “Start with those,” Patrick said, pointing toward a group of about ten soldiers huddled around a campfire, briskly rubbing palms to keep warm, or wrapping their arms around themselves.

  “I’ll start with them,” he added, pointing to another group of about twelve guards. “When you finish, move in. Advance on the guards nearest the prisoners. Move fast, and be quiet. No gunfire if you can help it.”

  Luke nodded and they took off, tearing into the crowd of unsuspecting guards, who were foolishly complacent and relaxed in a night as dark as their uniforms.

  At first there was no noise, no shrieks, and no gunfire, but then the thick smell of blood and death filled the air, panicking prisoners and guards alike.

  ***

  This isn’t possible.

  Janelle stared in disbelief at the carnage. She crossed her hands over her throat, pulling her arms protectively into her body. The night was cold, and the jeans and T-shirt she wore were inadequate. The wind made her shiver, and terror made her teeth chatter.

  She’d been trying to think of a way to help those prisoners, but now it didn’t matter. One by one the guards were being killed, and she could barely see it happening.

  The screams came from terrified men and women soldiers being torn apart by unseen forces, chunks of flesh being ripped from their scalps and throats. Then the attackers slowed down long enough to lap at the flow of blood, smirking bloody grins, seeming to love the carnage.

  Guards dropped rapidly. Even in the darkness the prisoners sensed something wrong and began to panic. They kicked the wire fencing, but it was holding.

  The attackers had butchered more than half the guards, but there were still dozens left, and now they were screaming their commands in foreign languages. The shooting started, and prisoners began to drop, some from fear, some from being hit.

  “Get down!” the attacker in the red T-shirt yelled at the prisoners. “Get down!” He leapt at two guards still shooting into the crowd—and Janelle was sure she saw him get shot repeatedly by a semiautomatic machine gun—but he kept going, as if the bullets hadn’t hurt him at all, as if they had been shooting blanks.

  He landed beside them, grabbed the head of each one, and brought the guards together, their faces smashed together. Bits of bone and teeth shattered, flying between them. Their faces were bashed together with such force one head caved into the other, skulls exploding on impact, brain matter coating everything and everyone around them.

  The attackers dodged bullets or seemed unaffected by them. They tore through the remainder of the guards until they’d slaughtered every single one.

  Blood dripped from their bodies, their faces, from the bodies of the prisoners. It pooled around dead guards and prisoners. The air was thick with its coppery odor; Janelle could taste it in her mouth. She stared at the ground thick with shallow pools of blood-soaked viscera; stringy, ropey strands of intestine; and mangled body parts. Minutes ago those guts had been on the inside of the soldiers. Now they looked like something that belonged in a butcher shop.

  They didn’t even look tired, the attackers. They weren’t even out of breath.

  The one in the red T-shirt held his hands out to the crowd, the way Reverend Newman had so many times as he was about to start his sermon at Janelle’s church on 162nd Street.

  “People! Calm down,” he told the prisoners. “We’re going to let you out.”

  But Janelle got a closer look at the red-shirted guy and realized it was Patrick, the guy who had been in the bank vault yesterday. The other one had been there as well, but she didn’t know his name.

  “Oh no,” she muttered, near tears. She sucked in a breath and looked around quickly for an escape route, but it seemed safer to stay still for now. No one seemed to know she was there. If she moved now, they would surely see her.

  The attackers gathered near the gate, which was also covered in barbed wire and secured with massive chains and an enormous lock.

  Whatever they discussed Janelle couldn’t hear, no matter how hard she strained.

  They began to climb the barbed wire.

  “What are you doing?” someone screamed. People tried to shove them back out, over the barbed fence, but were unsuccessful.

  The prisoners panicked, almost as a whole. A few froze, stood with mouths hinged open, screams pouring out of their heads.

  The attackers were quick, moving amazingly fast from victim to victim, but the prisoners were hysterical by now, and they were oblivious to the pain of the barbed wire tearing through their clothing and skin as they desperately tried to clamber over the top of the fence.

  One unfortunate woman got trapped between the wire and the crowd and was being used as a makeshift door, her body grooved into the razor-sharp edges. She screamed so loudly Janelle covered her ears, but no one else seemed to notice the woman’s cries. The woman’s face scraped against the razor wire, gouging out chunks of flesh from her cheeks, her tongue protruding through the new hole in her face, one blue eyeball popping as it became attached to a curl of wire. Her hands became entwined in
the fence, and she tried to rip them free. Her fingers remained embedded in the wire, separating loudly from her hands as her body slid down the length of the fence under the relentless force of the crowd breaking free.

  The prisoners pushed against her, shoving harder, breaking through, and at least half a dozen walked over her chopped-meat body and fled into the freedom of the streets.

  Janelle ducked back into the doorway as the prisoners streamed past her, her vision clouded with tears and sweat, afraid the killers would pursue them and discover her.

  Instead, the killers had waited at the prison’s makeshift exit, catching anyone attempting to escape, attacking them, lowering them to the ground.

  Bodies of guards lay everywhere, like the attack the other night, but this time it didn’t seem like they were about to get up. Not like last time. But there was something different in the way the killers had attacked the prisoners, somehow less savage. They held the limp bodies and lay them gently on the ground while the guards had been discarded like trash.

  Huddled in the corner of the prison was a man holding a small child. At first Janelle thought they were dead, but the man was talking to the killers now. He lay pressed up against the barbed wire, and blood trickled everywhere on his body, but he shielded the child from the attack and from the wire.

  Janelle crept a few feet closer to the prison, not really wanting to but her overwhelming curiosity making her approach … wishing she would stop and at the same time hoping they wouldn’t attack because there was no way she was going to stop. She had to hear, had to see. Her stomach flipped, and her bowels cramped in terrified excitement. Like watching the lion tamer at the circus … it was safe but not quite. And sometimes … sometimes you rooted for the lions.