The Inhuman Chronicles (Book 1): Inhuman

by Feren, Todd C.

  The gun fired, and my ears instantly felt the concussive blast from being so close. Heat washed over my normally stone cold features. My hand twinged, and my entire body tingled with adrenaline.

  “Oh!! FUCK!” I heard from across the street. I looked to see Axel crawling back into Pete’s upstairs window, but before he disappeared completely, I could see him cradling his left hand. So I missed his chest. I was actually off by about two feet. It was my first time shooting. Give me a break. The fact that I hit anything was a miracle. I was pretty proud for hitting his hand. I’m sure it hurts like hell. I know he couldn’t see me, but I still stood up and flicked him off.

  “Fuck you, asshole!” I shouted. Then I slid down the roof and plopped down back to my group.

  “Did you kill him?” Jack asked handing me my bags.

  I shook my head. “I got his hand though.”

  “That’s gotta hurt.”

  “I hope so.”

  “What were you aiming for?” He asked as we pushed through the bushes that marked my property line.

  “I was aiming for his chest.”

  Jack shrugged his shoulders. “Well, it was your first time.”

  “Geez, how about a ‘At least you hit him, that was still a pretty good shot!’” I said, hoping for a little more praise.

  “Well,” Jack shrugged. “At least you hit him.”

  “Thank you.”

  “No.” Jack said. “Thank you. YOU let us into your house. YOU made the difficult decision to kill that man. YOU saved us.”

  I didn’t have the heart to tell him that I was ready to let them die outside when we first met, that it was the dog who was responsible for them finding safety.

  “Well, you would do the same for me,” I said.

  As we walked into the woods, I saw Rex look behind us at my house that was quickly becoming consumed by flames. He looked back at me, and I shrugged my shoulders. “What are you gonna do?” I asked. I couldn’t help but think about the previous day when I was trying to run out, and Rex stopped me. If it wasn’t for him stopping me, Sara and Jack would have died in my house. Then another thought hit me. If Rex hadn’t stopped me from leaving, I never would have gotten laid last night.

  “Good boy,” I said to him as we walked. He looked up at me with what looked like a smile. “That doesn’t mean I wouldn’t still leave you here in the woods.” I said in a much softer tone just for him. HE didn’t seem to mind the slightest. He continued to dumbly smile and prance as we pushed on through the woods and into the unknown.

  Chapter 18

  So these woods were a lot larger than I had thought. We’d been walking for about an hour before we found anything that looked a little more civilized. When we came out of the brush, I came face to face with an American dream. We were in the parking lot of a Home Depot.

  The parking lot itself was actually creepily quiet. There were only a few cars, but they were deserted. The building itself looked completely intact. There were no half eaten bodies in the parking lot. No bloody hand prints on the front window. There wasn’t even a single illegal Mexican immigrant standing by the bright orange Home Depot sign looking for work. Although now would be the best time ever to hire some cheap labor. Especially with all the lumber inside here… I stopped myself mid-racist rant when I realized. There were tools, lumber, and basic supplies. We could turn this place into a fortress.

  “I think we should check it out,” I said starting the trek across the vast expansion of empty parking lot.

  Rex let out a loud yelp to get my attention. When I looked, he made a show about walking the opposite direction.

  “Rex doesn’t want to go,” Sara said, putting her small bag down.

  “Well, he doesn’t have to stay with us,” I said walking over to the small dog. I stooped down and cradled his fuzzy muzzle in my hands. “It’s okay, boy. You don’t have to stay anymore. We had some good times…” I started to ham it up more than I should have. “You gotta go back where you belong now,” I said. “You gotta go.” I Dropped to my knees. “Please… Please! There’s no time! Don’t worry about us; we’ll be alright!”

  He cocked his head and looked at me. So I raised my voice. “GET OUT OF HERE! Can’t you see we don’t want you anymore?! Why can’t you go back where you came from? LEAVE US ALONE!”

  Rex sneezed and then jumped up to lick my face. I pushed him back, and then really hammed up the finale to my speech.

  “Goodbye…my friend.”

  Jack began a slow clap. “Harry and the Hendersons!” he proclaimed.

  “I always loved that movie.” I winked.

  “I don’t understand what’s going on,” Sara said looking between the two of us.

  “Harry and the Hendersons!” Jack said in a shocked tone. “The movie about bigfoot…”

  Sara shrugged her shoulders and started rifling through her bag. Jack turned to me.

  “I appreciated the performance.”

  “Thank you. I can do the whole ‘freedom’ speech from Braveheart too.”

  “That’s another good one!” He said, clapping his hands.

  “I wonder if Mel Gibson is still alive?”

  “Um…Guys?” Sara interrupted. “There’s a person.”

  Everything stopped, and we saw a little old man walking out of the store pushing a shopping cart with a ‘dead’ zombie inside it. He pushed it to the part of the parking lot that had a slight decline in it, and then let gravity do the hard work of taking the unwanted pile of dead away.

  “What do we do?” Sara asked.

  “Let’s introduce ourselves,” Jack said dropping the bag of guns in the grass and kicking as many leaves over the top of it as he could.

  Smart. I thought as I watched him. Leave the guns out here. People would be less trusting of strangers who come fully armed with their own small armory. Or if we get in there, and they try to rob us, we still have our weapons stashed outside.

  “Good idea,” I said to Jack as I moved my gun from my back pack to down the back of my jeans.

  Sara finally found what she was looking for and pulled out a small gun that still tiny tiny in her petite hands. She inspected it for a second before shoving it down into the back of her waistband.

  “Was that even a gun?” I asked.

  “Ruger LCR.” Jack beamed. “Holds eight rounds and fits almost anywhere. That one was my wife’s.”

  I didn’t need my super deductive powers to pick up on the “was” in his sentence. Sure, he could have gotten divorced, but if he was divorced, how did he get the gun back? No. It was more likely that she died at the hands and teeth of a zombie.

  Rex began to claw at my backpack and tried to chew his way in.

  “Nothing in there for you,” I scoffed. But he didn’t relent. He kept chewing at the bag in hopes that it would open for him and spill its contents out just for him. “Rex, stop!” I demanded.

  Sara was apparently more nurturing to Rex’s needs than I was. Understandably so because I was incapable of feeling anything remotely nurturing. She opened the bag, and he shoved his head in and immediately pulled out that fucking squeaky T-rex.

  “I didn’t even put that in the bag,” I said with genuine shock.

  Sara and Jack simply shrugged their shoulders and started to walk out into the vast concrete parking lot. I looked at Rex as though there was some explanation as to how his toy made it into my bag. He squeaked it once, and then trotted off happily after Jack and Sara. I went over and checked in the bag to see if there were any other surprises packed away. Content that the rest of my items were unsoiled by doggie slobber, I closed up the bag and kicked more leaves on it before jogging to catch up to everyone else.

  As we walked through the parking lot, I couldn’t help but feel like there were eyes on us. Jack must have felt the same thing because he physically moved Sara behind him so that he was essentially acting as a human shield for her. I could acknowledge that as a noble action, but the idea of taking a bullet for anyone was about as fore
ign to me as you could imagine. Rex could even sense something, because his peppy prance transformed into something with a more gingerly gait. As we approached the entrance to the gigantic store, I heard a voice call out from inside.

  “There are quite a few guns pointed at you. It would be wise if you don’t take another step.”

  We froze in our tracks. Even Rex had the sense enough to stop moving forward. Although he froze for only a few seconds, he took this short respite as a perfect opportunity to clean his balls. Through the silence of this standoff, all that could be heard was the sound of that damn dog licking himself.

  “Could somebody make him stop that please?” The voice from the building asked, obviously referring to the dog’s incessant licking.

  “Rex!” I stage whispered harshly. His head shot up to look at me for only the briefest of seconds before returning to his diligent duties of cleaning his nether region.

  “He’s apparently going to do what he’s going to do,” I shouted off to the unseen stranger while shrugging my shoulders.

  “It’s disgusting!” he shouted back.

  “I’m not disagreeing with you. I’m just saying, he’s in the zone.”

  “What do you want from here?” the voice asked seemingly trying to ignore the lapping sound the dog was making.

  “Want? Nothing. We just lost our home to a hoard of burning zombies. We thought this place was empty, but we will move on.” I started to turn away, but the voice stopped me.

  “You can stay here, but we don’t allow guns.”

  “Then what are you pointing at us?” I asked.

  “We keep some for protection, but we can’t just let unknown people like you in here with guns. It’s not safe.”

  “That’s fine,” I said. “We’ll find someplace else. I’ve always been more of a Lowes man anyway.”

  “No, no…I can’t send you out there…It’s not the Christian thing to do. Just put your guns on the ground, and we will let you inside”

  I held up my hands to show they were empty, but that did not dissuade the invisible sniper.

  “I saw you put guns down the back of your pants when you were in the back of the parking lot. If you try to deceive me, I will assume you are here for nefarious reasons, and I will gun you down.”

  I turned to look at Jack, and he seemed to have the same ‘this is a bad idea’ vibe that I was having.

  “It’s alright,” I answered. “We will be on our way.”

  “I’m not letting you leave.” The voice said. “You know where we are, and I can’t let you go off telling people about our little safe house here.”

  “So you’re going to kill us?” I asked.

  “If you don’t put your guns on the ground and come inside…yes.”

  “There’s the Christian spirit.” I muttered as I pulled my glock from the back of my pants and placed it gently on the ground. “You want to chime in here, Jack?” I asked as he and Sara also placed their guns on the ground.

  “We mean you no harm,” he called out with all the personality of cardboard.

  “Thanks, Jack,” I said. “That should do it. Next you should ask them to take you to their leader.” He looked at me quizzically, but I shrugged my shoulders. “Never mind.”

  “I’m sending someone out to collect your guns.” The voice shouted as the sliding glass doors were pulled open. “If you so much as scratch your nose, we will shoot you where you stand.”

  “Got it.” I said with a noticeable amount of annoyance creeping into my voice.

  A woman who looked only slightly older than time itself shuffled her way out of the store. Her face was covered with more lines than Google maps, and her skin had the slight translucent look that most centenarians were prone to. The dry cracks around her mouth were a dead giveaway to the fact that she had probably smoked for years, and the wafting smell of nicotine when she approached was a sure sign she hadn’t quit. She looked up at me with blue grey eyes and smiled just enough so that her fragile face didn’t shatter.

  “Be a dear and pick up that gun by the barrel,” She said with absolutely no emotion behind her words.

  “Do what she says or…” the man began.

  “Yeah, yeah!” I interrupted. “You’ll shoot. We got it!” I picked up my gun, and she held open her old lady purse for me to drop it in. She repeated the same transaction with Jack and Sara. Once they were certain they had everything, the old woman went back through the darkened doorway.

  “Okay, single file now…Come on in.”

  We walked in, and Rex began to bark as he saw the direction we were heading in. I bent down and scooped him up.

  If you are thinking, He picked up the dog. That must mean he cares for the dog and didn’t want to leave it or see it upset. Actually, I thought he might work as a small K-9 shield. If someone started blasting away when we walked in that door, I would have a small furry shield covering my vital organs. See? I was thinkin’!

  Once inside, my eyes adjusted to the small amount of light that came in through several dingy sunlights throughout the warehouse store. What I saw was actually a bit confusing. It looked like it was at one point a display advertising backyard barbecues. There was a giant patch of fake grass like the kind you would find on a mini golf course. A wooden gazebo sat on top of that, housing the largest cooler I’ve ever seen along with a small table all set for one hell of a picnic. In front of the gazebo, were a couple of fairly nice lawn chairs, and in the one on the left a man in his late seventies or possibly early eighties sat. He looked like he belonged in this scenic picture. It was as if Norman Rockwell painted him directly into this slice of Americana. He had a transparent green visor on top of his mostly bald head. Small black circle frame glasses sat at the end of his pointed nose, and his face was decorated with a multitude of liver spots. He wore a clean white tank top and khaki shorts. The son of a bitch even had the black tube socks with sandals. How traditional he looked was in stark contrast to the hunting rifle he pointed at me.

  I made slight adjustments to the positioning of Rex on my body according to where I thought the dangerous part of the gun was pointing. But it’s not like it mattered. The gun he was holding would blow through a deer, so what hope did I have shielding myself with this little thing. I put Rex down, realizing the futility of what I was trying. He immediately ran over to the old man and started licking his old man bruised legs.

  “Traitor,” I mumbled.

  The old man smiled as the ancient woman came over and sat down in the second lawn chair.

  “Awww. What an adorable dog,” she said clasping her cheap jewelry covered hands together.

  “Does he bite?” the man asked, pointing the gun at Rex nervously.

  “Only his own ass,” I answered. “But, even if he did, he’s nine pounds. Unless you are wet paper, he’s not going to damage much.” The more I thought about it, the skin of the elderly has about the same consistency of wet paper.

  He turned his gun back to me. “What are you doing here in my store?”

  “Like I said before, we thought it was empty. We were just looking for shelter.” He continued to stare down the barrel of his rifle. “So seeing as how we gave you our guns, could you stop pointing yours at me?”

  “Look, friend…It’s a scary world out there. We never know who we can trust.”

  “You can trust us,” Jack chimed in. “I’m Jack Hoffmen.”

  The old woman howled when he said it. I literally thought her face was going to explode.

  “This is Sara Clark. We are all good people here. We are just looking for a place to rest.”

  The old man turned his gun to Jack and looked him up and down. “He’s a big one, Amanda.”

  “Big as they come,” she nodded while lighting up a cigarette. “I don’t trust them.”

  “Look…” I said holding a hand out to the old man to get his name.

  “Jonathan,” he said as he turned his gun back to me.

  “Jonathan,” I dug deep into my emotional ma
sks and put on the most concerned one I could find. “There are men out there. They were following us through the woods.”

  “You led them here?!” Amanda stood up shouting.

  “We had no choice,” I lied. “There were about thirty of them! I don’t know how much time we have.”

  Jonathan looked at me suspiciously, and rightfully so. Had I known this was the direction our encounter would have turned, I would have started my lie much sooner. Amanda on the other hand believed me instantly. She was on her feet and looking out the front doors for an invading army.

  “Why didn’t you tell us about the men before?” Jonathan asked.

  “We were afraid you’d turn us away.”

  “Would have.” He nodded as Rex curled up comfortably on his lap.