by Geoff North
The thing stopped vibrating. The buzz in Abe’s brain ceased. The black slit at the center of its featureless grey face started to turn up at the corners.
The others are here.
The heavy thumping above their heads ended. Becky pointed to the sky. “The helicopter!” They watched as the blades slowed and the craft dropped. It smashed belly first into the field and exploded. A wave of heat and burning debris punched through the trees. Abe wiped the sting of smoke from his eyes and saw the clouds pushing down from above. A vessel a mile wide and twice as long started to descend through the grey. Its flat underbelly pulsed dull purple and snot green.
Becky was tugging at Abe’s arm insistently. “They’re everywhere.”
Grey figures emerged from the trees behind the man that had shot Sheila. One of them touched his face with its worm-like fingers and he surrendered his rifle without struggle, without uttering a single word. Everything and everyone was silent. More creatures appeared in the field, touching agents and scientists and lowering them to the ground. They trudged out on little legs from the distant forests as the smoke lifted, their black-slit faces bobbing back and forth in unison. The SUVs and unmarked cars rose slowly into the air. The unconscious bodies of the agents floated up after.
Two creatures came for Hank last. Their arms slithered around his waist and he felt his feet leave the ground. He yelled at the thing in its craft. “You knew we would come here! You knew all along. This wasn’t about a bunch of goddamn kids—it was about us, my agency.”
The goddamn kids… their mission will continue. We saw an opportunity to draw your entire organization here. There is an expression your species uses—killing two birds with one stone.
“You can’t do this!” Hank was screaming now. “I have a wife!”
It was if someone turned off a light switch and snapped it back on. Becky was sitting on the ground next to Abe and Sheila. The alien stood before them. The soccer ball was gone, and its little cube craft hovered behind, free of the earth and poplar tree branches. The ship in the sky was gone, and the clouds had cleared way for the stars.
The mission has failed. Your species populates the planet. Our kind will leave this place and try again. Perhaps history can be altered at another point in time. The three of you are free to go.
“Then send us back,” Becky begged. “Let us be with our son.”
The thing started for its craft. Abe yelled. “I won’t let you get away this! You gave us these powers and we crossed half a world to find you. We’ll find you again… I swear.”
“You won’t have to.” Allan staggered out from the trees, clutching his side. He was covered in blood from the waist down. He pulled a revolver out from his back pocket—the same gun his father had killed himself with—and jammed it into the black slit of the creature’s face. “Any last words?”
Don’t.
Allan tapped the crumpled tinfoil around his head with one finger. “You’ll have to do better than that.” He pulled the trigger and the thing’s brains splattered all over its little cube in a shower of yellow chunks. Some of it sprayed across Allan’s legs and feet. His pants and shoes started to smolder. It worked beneath and began to melt skin and bone.
Sheila tried crawling forward but Allan waved her back. He collapsed on top of the alien’s corpse. “Stay back… this shit will kill you.” His legs were already gone. The yellow stuff continued to crawl, burning into his buttocks and leaving a trail of white ash. “It’s okay, Sheila… can’t feel a thing no more.”
“Allan.” She had spent years growing to despise him. A lifetime of wasted torment. And in those final few seconds, she realized she still loved him. There wasn’t time left to say the words. Abe dragged her back as Allan’s body was consumed. It enveloped the alien and its craft. A minute later there was nothing left but a patch of white earth and a half-scorched poplar tree. The air stunk like cat piss and black pepper.
***
They watched as Abe, Becky, and Sheila left the woods, supporting themselves out into the field, back towards the old farmhouse. The alien had entered their minds one final time and planted the entire, grisly scene.
You would have killed us if we hadn’t entered your mind first.
“Yes, I would’ve,” Allan answered.
You expected that thin wrap of metal around your head to keep us out?
Allan nodded. “I was wrong. I’ve always been wrong, about everything.”
No matter. Your friends believe we are dead. Our species can continue work without interference. We would have preferred terminating them.
“Give me this at least, okay?”
Yes, we will let them live. Now are you prepared to travel back and finish what they began?
Allan looked down at his fully transformed body. His skin glistened grey and the muscles corded up in his arm when he made a fist. He was stronger than Abe and Becky combined. And he could still make anyone do whatever he wanted. All he had to do was say the words.
“Yeah, I’m ready. Send me back.”
Chapter 29
Illee sat on the cliff and watched her husband play with Adam by the ocean. Dar wasn’t actually her husband. There was no one to perform the marriage service or bestow titles upon them, but she thought of him as such all the same. It would have made her father happy, she liked to think.
Becky and Abe never returned from the dead forest. Within days the weather had taken a drastic turn. Becky once said she thought the alien might have had a hand in that. It may have stalled the Ice Age from advancing into the prehistoric plains to further its terrible agenda. It didn’t much matter. Adam’s parents had vanished. There had been no trace of the thing and its craft. Illee and Adam headed south. The Ice Age followed, blanketing the greater part of the northern hemisphere under sheets of ice. Time had corrected itself.
They found Dar in what would one day be called South Dakota. He was the last of a tribe that had left the mile-wide circle of stones up north years before. As they continued south, Illee taught him the basics of her language, and Dar taught Illee his. He shared his history of a people that worshipped the strange grey being and built monuments in its name. Dar couldn’t explain where his people had come from. Illee didn’t think he would have been able to grasp the idea the creature they worshipped may have been responsible for that as well, so she never shared the information.
Dar was gentle, and he was good with Adam. He had red hair like Illee, and his beard tickled her chin when they kissed. Illee came to love Dar but never really fell in love with him. They were together, and they shared a mutual interest protecting Adam.
It had taken three years to reach the Yucatan Peninsula, and another four months wandering south from its tip along the white sand beaches and cliffs overlooking the ocean.
This would be their home.
Tulum. Someday, somewhere in the far future, a civilization will prosper here and call it Tulum. They will build a city out of stone and they will worship different Gods. And they will be ancient history before my parents are even born… if my parents are born.
Illee spotted Maria running along the sand, her little feet leaving a trail for the gentle waves to wash clean. Dar scooped the four-year old up and spun her around until she squealed. He’s a good husband, Illee thought, and an even better father.
Around and round they twirled. Adam splashed the two with water and Maria squealed louder.
Illee had no idea what would happen in the future—whether the history she knew could be rewritten or not. She only cared about now, and the wellbeing of her family.
The human race was in good hands.
The End
Thank you for reading Children of Extinction
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Other Books and Stories by Geoff North:
Live it Again
&n
bsp; The Last Playground
CRYERS
An excerpt from The Last Playground
Available now in eBook and paperback
Chapter 1
The only contact Brinn Addam had with her dead mother these days was through her best friend, Selma Doudon. Brinn never had the chance to say goodbye to her mom. Her few friends and remaining family had assured her there was nothing she could’ve said during those final depressing days that would have made any difference. But Brinn had never believed in the power of words to change things. They were, after all, only words. There were other tools Brinn could call upon to make a difference, and she suspected her mother had known about them as well. She also suspected Nancy Addam knew how dangerous those tools could be and how they had to remain a secret—even between mother and daughter. When an unspoken secret is shared between two people it will inevitably fester after one of them passes on. Brinn never had the chance to say goodbye to her mom—at least not yet. That final moment still lay ahead of them.
Brinn stared down at Selma’s still form lying on the bed. The girl’s eyes were rolled back up into her skull. Brinn called it the white eyes stage. Selma referred to it as slipping into the cracks.
This peculiar contact had started two years earlier—right after Nancy Addam had lost her battle with cancer—the same day Brinn stopped playing with her imaginary friends. It had been time to grow up, time to let those friends rest and get on with her life. Brinn had less than a year to go before she graduated high school…if she graduated high school. Her grades had slipped substantially. The imaginary friends were gone, and even though she’d been through some awfully hard times, Brinn still had a lot of growing up to do.
Selma’s eyes rolled back down. The pupils were large and black, almost overwhelming the dull green surrounding them. Brinn waited a few more impatient seconds. Selma blinked and Brinn shook her by the leg.
“Did you talk to her? Did you see her?”
Selma sat up. “I never see her… But yes, she spoke to me.”
“And?”
Selma retrieved a hoodie from the foot of Brinn’s bed and pulled it over her head. “And she said we should go smoke a big fat joint.”
Brinn shook a fist at her. It wasn’t much of a threat. Selma was roughly Brinn’s size but her classmate was a lot tougher. Both girls were pretty; Brinn was just softer around the edges. Where Brinn had fallen in popularity at school and at home, Selma had already been unpopular for a long time. Both girls only had one parent. They made a good pair for all the wrong reasons.
“Be serious, will you? What did my mom say?” She knew her friend well enough to see beyond the humor. Something wasn’t right—something even more unusual than talking to dead people.
Selma left the bedroom and started down the hallway. She whispered back over her shoulder, “Someone’s coming after you, Brinn. She said he’ll be here soon.”
They made it to the kitchen before Brinn could ask another question. Michael Addam looked up at his daughter as the two passed through. “I just put a pizza in the oven. Are you going to be home for supper?”
Her father never asked Selma to stay. He refused to even make eye contact with the girl. Brinn saw the quick shake of her head. “We’re going to a friend’s place to watch movies. Maybe have a sleepover. That okay, Dad?”
It wasn’t okay, but Michael didn’t protest. “You want me to save you some?”
As hard as he tried to fill the role of two parents, her father was a terrible cook. “No thanks. See you tomorrow.” She hesitated between the kitchen and living room and ran back to her father. She kissed him on the cheek.
“Everything alright, sweetie?”
“I’m fine,’ Brinn answered with a laugh. ‘Can’t a girl kiss her dad?”
Michael looked down at the floury mess on the counter, unsure how to respond. Selma broke the silence for him. “Come on, Brinn, we have to get going.”
Six-year-old Logan Addam was sprawled out on the living room couch watching cartoons. “Where are you going?” he asked as the girls opened the front door.
“None of your beeswax,” Brinn said. She winked and stuck her tongue out at him before shutting the door.
She followed Selma up the path to the sidewalk and grabbed hold of her before she could take another step. “Hold on a minute. Who’s coming after me and where are we going?”
Selma looked down the street both ways. Hamden was a sleepy prairie town. What was she expecting to see? Brinn started to get more nervous.
“Your mom said a man was after you. She said he wasn’t from around here…not from anywhere around here.”
Brinn looked back to the house. Logan was propped up on the couch, staring back at them. Something caught her eye at the east side of the house. A man was standing at the corner—the corner where Brinn’s bedroom window faced out.
“Oh crap,” she said, shaking Selma by the sleeve. “Look.”
Besides the fact he had been lurking outside her bedroom window for God only knew how long, there was something not quite right about him. He was between thirty and forty. Prime weirdo age. He had a corny haircut, parted straight on one side and slicked back like her grampa used to comb his. This guy had more hair than her grandfather though, golden brown and wavy with big square sideburns. He wore tight bell-bottom jeans and a matching denim jacket. The lapels of his white shirt beneath were pulled up over the jacket collar, the buttons done up only halfway.
Selma pushed Brinn to the beat-up Mustang sitting along the curb. “Get in.”
“I can’t leave like this,” Brinn protested. “That guy’s in our yard. What if he tries to go inside? What if he hurts Logan and my dad?”
The man saw that he’d been discovered. He held a hand up, beckoning them to wait. He started for them and Brinn thought she could hear his knees squeaking. It had become more than just a question of who he was, but what he was.
Selma shoved her friend into the passenger door. Brinn didn’t need any more convincing. She fumbled with the handle and jumped inside. The car fired up and the girls sped away.
“Where are we gonna go?” Brinn asked. She was twisted around, looking out the back window. No one was following them.
“Your mom said to go to the old farm outside of town where she grew up.” She barely slowed as they rushed through an intersection. The tires squealed as Selma turned west.
“The old farm? Why would she want me to go there?”
Selma roughly shifted the car into fourth gear and shrugged her shoulders. “It didn’t make much sense to me. She’s your mom…was your mom. She said that’s where it all started and that’s where it would all end. She said you have to go there.”
Brinn was shaking her head and watching out the rearview mirror as Hamden receded behind them. “I don’t think we should go there. My gramma still lives in a trailer not far from the old house. If she catches us…”
“She’ll what? No offence, Brinn, but your granny’s an old woman.”
Your granny is nuts. That’s what Selma probably wanted to say. Everyone in town knew Erin Stauch had started to lose it when her nine-year-old son disappeared from the farm back in the mid-seventies. And things had only gotten worse when her husband had passed away a few years ago and her daughter—Brinn’s mother—had died shortly after. A wave of guilt washed through Brinn. She hadn’t seen the woman since her mom’s funeral. With the exception of her father, no one visited Erin. “It still doesn’t give us the right to trespass.”
“Who’s trespassing? We’re just going to poke around the place for a bit.” Selma pulled off at the end of a wooded lane. She got out of the car and Brinn followed. “Does this make you feel better? We’ll walk the rest of the way. She won’t even know we’re there.”
They started up the quarter-mile-long lane. Brinn took one last look back towards Hamden. Not a vehicle in sight. They hadn’t been followed. She breathed easier. “It all started here and it will all end here. What do you think she meant by that?�
��
“How should I know? Like I said, she was your mom.”
Brinn had met Selma during the summer before the start of tenth grade. Selma was new to Hamden back then, alone with her mother in a small town that didn’t warm too quickly to strangers. The girls smoked pot that very first day by the river in Hamden Park. It wasn’t the smartest decision Brinn had ever made and it wasn’t the ideal way to begin a friendship, but she had been looking for anything in those days to ease the pain of losing her mother. She didn’t have the stomach for alcohol like most of the other kids in Hamden High, but weed seemed to do the trick just fine. It was a painless escape and coming down didn’t result in puking her guts out. Her father had smelled it on her clothes, he’d demanded she stop—the two had fought, naturally—but the drugs had remained a part of her life. Besides, Selma could only contact Brinn’s mother when she was good and high.
“What’s it like?” Brinn asked.
Selma gave her a look.
“What’s it like talking to my mom? You always tell me what she says but you never tell me what you see…what it’s like.”
Selma made another noncommittal shrug. “I don’t see much of anything. She just starts talking in my head.”
“How can you be sure it’s my mom?”
“Not this again. I don’t know why she talks to me instead of you. I don’t know why I have to be stoned to hear her. To tell you the truth, it’s gone beyond creepy and weird. I wish she would just…you know…get on with her life…her afterlife…whatever.”
Brinn didn’t push her on it. Having any contact with her mother was enough. “Did you get a good look at that guy?”
“He looked like a reject from the seventies or something.” They rounded a bend in the road and saw the old farmhouse in the yard. The trailer Erin Stauch now called home was set behind it another hundred yards or so. “Was it my imagination or did his knees squeak when he started to run?”