Shriekers | Episode 1 | The Scarecrow Man

by Jay, Jess

  Aunt Emily

  Aunt Emily had once been beautiful. Years attempted to steal that beauty, adding lines to her skin, taking the striking edge off her features, but it couldn’t take the fierceness of her brown eyes or the gentleness of her smile. The green had taken those.

  “It won’t be long now,” Aunt Emily said, her voice a rasp, her throat and vocal cords as dry and brittle as the rest of her.

  Thea said nothing. There wasn’t anything to say—nothing that could make the situation better—so she said nothing. She felt numb, as if it was her soul being eaten by the green, leaving her a husk of a human being. She knew she should be sad—that she should cry, and scream, and lose herself in sorrow—but she knew that if she did, the emotion would be too intense. It would break her apart from the inside, so instead she felt nothing.

  The woman who had once been her mother, her sister, her friend, felt like a stranger. The woman who had taken her into her home, had raised her, had called herself Aunt Emily, felt distant. Thea had to force herself to look at the bones covered in withered skin laying on the salt bed, soaking in the sun—soaking in the last moments of its life. Her brain refused to view it as her aunt, but that was because in a few moments it might not be. She had seen the change before and knew what she had to do, her hand tightening on the gun in her lap.

  The husk sensed the action and said, “Don’t hesitate, child.”

  “I won’t.”

  “When I go, no matter what, you shoot.”

  “I know.”

  Minutes crept by as they sat on the dry, cracked patch of land set aside for disposing of fallen family members. Salt glittered along the teal soil, sparkling like blue-tinged diamonds. She had resalted the land herself, taking the precious resource and creating a bed for her aunt to die in. After the next rainfall it would dissolve, soaking into the ground, enhancing the greenish-blue of the soil.

  Thea knew she could end it right then: the waiting, the torture. She could shoot Aunt Emily and save both of them minutes of drawn out suffering. But she wouldn’t. These moments were precious. Underneath the numb calmness that had taken over, she knew that if she took these moments from Aunt Emily, from herself, she would never get them back.

  But what do you say in the last moments of someone’s life? I’m sorry? I’m going to miss you? I love you? That went without saying, and, though nice to hear, those words could only bring out the pain she was avoiding and Thea refused to let misery in.

  “You were our light.” The words were faint but clear. Thea looked down at the gun in her hands. “You were our everything.”

  Thea knew she brought something into the old couple’s lives that they’d been missing, but it wasn’t enough. Uncle Jeremy had been the first one to succumb to the green. It had to have been an accident—a careless, foolish accident—but she couldn’t be as certain that Aunt Emily made the same mistake.

  The moment Uncle Jeremy walked out of the shelter for the last time, something died inside her aunt. She went through the motions, did her daily tasks, but she was already gone. Part of Thea was certain her aunt getting infected was on purpose, but the other half of her refused to believe it. Her aunt was the woman who went out of her way to help others, who hadn’t wanted to stop even after Uncle Jeremy almost died, who talked about compassion and mercy and love. That kind of woman wouldn’t give up—couldn’t give up.

  Thea swallowed and said, “Thank you for everything.” She meant the words, though she couldn’t feel them at the moment. It had been a tremendous risk, taking Thea in; her aunt and uncle had given up a lot to do so. Their shelter had been built for two, the greenhouse large enough to feed two. Adding a third person—one that would only grow over time—forced them to recalculate, forced Uncle Jeremy to search farther to supplement their supplies. She was grateful she had them and their security for as long as she did, but she didn’t know how she would survive without them. Both tried to teach her what she needed to know before they passed, but there was so much to remember, so much to do. She was only fourteen.

  “Live.” The rasping sound forced itself out of the creature’s withered mouth. “The most important thing is that you live.”

  And then that was it.

  Thea stood up, her head buzzing, her vision blurry. Hands shaking, she gripped the gun, pointing it between Aunt Emily’s eyeless sockets and… did nothing. She waited for movement, waited for the ungodly shriek to burst out of the husk’s lungs, but nothing happened.

  Aunt Emily was just gone.

  Chapter Two

  From the Highway, the small patch of world that was Thea’s home was barely visible. From the Highway, she couldn’t see the cracked, teal soil sprinkled with salt to keep the green from infiltrating the buildings. She couldn’t tell that the rundown barn was a greenhouse or that the fragile-but-standing farmhouse had a survival shelter underneath. She couldn’t see everything she needed to do. From the Highway, everything appeared manageable.

  On days she found particularly difficult, she’d walk down the road to visit Tom. Though she knew better than to make the short trip during the night, or even as the sun neared the horizon, that evening she made the walk anyway, leaving behind the issues that built up over the last three years: the generator, her food supply, the coming winter, her infrequent nightmares. She was running out of salt, and thirty years of her uncle raiding the salt dome a few miles down the Highway left it practically empty. She knew there were others, her uncle told her as much, but she hadn’t found them. Granted, she hadn’t looked, not feeling comfortable enough to deviate from the straight shot through Town.

  Once she attempted to find a new source of salt, she would have to find the warehouses as well. Her uncle had written directions, but it was an overnight trip and she didn’t feel ready for that despite her need for supplies. She had run out of protein mix almost two years before and missed the disgusting soup it made. More than that, she needed cleaning supplies. She couldn’t put it off much longer.

  Pinks and purples seeped into the blue sky, taking daylight with it. The further she walked, the more the fading light cast the Highway into shadow. She could almost imagine what it looked like Before, but even dusk couldn’t take away the truth. The pavement was broken into pieces, small cracks making way for larger ones, plants weaving and snaking through, growing wherever they could. Cars—frozen in place, rusted and faded—were scattered along the road: some pulled over to the side, others crashed into each other or stopped in their lanes, all covered in the green. Some still had their drivers inside, dried out and brittle, vines growing out of their noses and mouths, breaking through their skin, digging into whatever they could. Leaves grew so thick they enveloped the person who sprouted them, but they were there, beneath the surface, forgotten by everyone but her.

  After her aunt passed, Thea went through the cars, looking through the belongings, taking nothing but forming stories about the inhabitants and putting together pieces of their lives. Frank and Karen were in the red convertible, hands held as they died, vines that protruded from both their bodies binding them in death as marriage had bound them in life. Thea liked to imagine they would always make time for each other, even when their lives became busy, and never missed an opportunity to slow dance. During the spring and summer, their leaves spread throughout the car, reaching as far as they could, almost as if a tree had grown from their love.

  In the silver minivan were Marie and her two daughters. The little girls, so close in size they might have been twins, had no identification, so Thea named them Stephanie and Sarah. They lay in the backseat with their mother in the front, frozen in place, looking back at them. In Thea’s mind, Marie read to her children every night, letting them fall asleep to the sound of her voice. Thea hoped it was that voice that lulled the two girls into their final rest. In the autumn, their leaves turned a beautiful orange, radiating warmth and the feeling of family.

  Closest to her home was a pickup truck with a man named Thomas. Thea sometimes talked to h
im, though she knew it was crazy. Perhaps it was because he was by himself, too. He was dressed in flannel and jeans, and his wallet had a few cards and his license, but no pictures of family. His hand had no ring.

  As Thea approached Tom’s resting place, she noticed the leaves reaching out through the broken window were closing, reinforcing that Thea shouldn’t be there. It was too late in the day, and she needed to get home before darkness fell, but she didn’t turn around, didn’t walk back. She could see Tom’s face. In the winter, when his leaves turned bright red and fell, she could see him whenever she wanted, but during the summer he was lost as his leaves soaked in the sun.

  “Hello, Tom,” she said, clearing her throat as she made the final steps toward him. She searched for something else to say, but nothing came to mind. It wasn’t unusual, as her ability to converse had been hampered by having no one to converse with. Lucky for her Tom didn’t mind—or at least she believed he wouldn’t if he had been alive. Which he wasn’t. She knew that. She knew how stupid it was to talk to a corpse, but she had no one else and in his death she could make him however she wanted him to be: patient, a good listener, her friend.

  “How are you today?”

  Had he been able to, Tom would have responded, “I’m dead, what do you think?” But then, being a good friend, he would ask how she was.

  “The night terrors came back,” she admitted, voice quiet, the sun gliding toward the horizon like a ticking time bomb. She had to head back before nighttime exploded on her. “I’m not sure how I’m going to survive the winter.”

  “Then what are you going to do about it?” Tom would have asked if he were alive. He was caring, but he didn’t baby her, which she respected.

  Thea sighed. She knew what she had to do, but she didn’t want to do it; didn’t know if she could do it. But it didn’t matter if she could or not, if she wanted to or not—she had to.

  Shaking her head, she said, “You don’t understand.”

  “Of course I do. I’m in your head.”

  Thea sighed again, looking at Tom. He was grotesque, a skull with withered skin and vines snaking through all his orifices. He had no hair, no defining features, but his license had the picture of a pleasant-looking man. She hoped he wasn’t alone in the world when he died, that he had family and friends, but as the last sliver of sunlight faded from his face, she feared he didn’t. That he was as alone as she was.

  A shriek burst out into the night sky and Thea’s head snapped in the direction it came from. A few hundred feet from where she stood, she saw movement and felt as if the world slipped from under her feet. With the sun hiding behind the horizon, she could see the silhouette of a creature waking up and stretching its limbs. She couldn’t believe she hadn’t seen it before, that she was so focused on her psychotic need for companionship that her awareness of her surroundings failed.

  She didn’t have time to berate herself—she could do that later. She had to focus on being quiet. If it didn’t hear her—if she could control her breathing—it would pass her and she would be fine. She had survived situations like this before, though always with her aunt and uncle to tell her what to do and keep her safe. Still, she remembered what she had to do, and she had to believe she could do it.

  Thea climbed into the bed of Tom’s pickup, the vines that grew from his body reaching through the back window of the cabin and throughout the entire truck, softening the sounds of her movement. Desperate to keep her mind calm and her body focused, she lay down as flat as she could and clamped her hand over her mouth, concentrating on regulating her breathing and forcing herself to look up at the night sky as stars twinkled to life. They were beautiful and the sky was so vast it made her dizzy. Uncle Jeremy had told her that Before it was difficult to see the stars because of the light people generated. Thea tried to imagine what it would be like to have so much light it blocked out the stars. It seemed impossible.

  A step close by jarred her back to the present and she closed her eyes. In the darkness of her mind, she saw her uncle, vines pulsing under his skin, his mouth opening and that horrible sound erupting from it. Her eyes flew open again, and she used all her strength to stop a scream in her throat. She had to think about something else. If she stayed quiet, if she stayed calm, it would leave her alone. It didn’t know she was there.

  Desperate, she looked up at the sky. She needed a memory, one she could lose herself in, and the image of her aunt and uncle dancing under the stars on their anniversary floated into her mind. Usually, when it was dark, they stayed indoors, but that night had been so beautiful, the sky so clear, it drew them into it. Thea had watched as they held each other and swayed, her uncle humming a song, and wondered if she would ever be held like that, be loved by someone like that. Over the years she realized that would never happen, but the memory of her aunt and uncle’s love for each other comforted her. Lost in that memory, her heart slowed and her breathing steadied.

  She clung to that feeling as the creature passed. Her mind tried to tell her it was slowing by the truck, that it knew she was there, that it would find her and everything would be over, but she stayed still. She stayed quiet. After a few moments, it passed.

  Tension left her with a silent breath. She had survived.

  As she lay in the back of the truck looking up at the stars, she felt small in the vastness of the world, but it wasn’t scary or overwhelming.

  “I know what I have to do, Tom,” she whispered, needing to say the words, needing to hear them. “And I’m going to do it.”

  She was going to live.

  Chapter Three

  As the sun rose, Thea walked down the Highway toward home. After spending the night in the back of Tom’s pickup, not wanting to run into the creature but unable to sleep, motivation surged through her. She seized it, using it to go through her problems and find solutions.

  Most of the answers were simple: she had to stop being a baby and do what she needed to do. She was running out of supplies, so she would go get them. Her generators were going to fail and she was struggling with gardening, so she’d find books on generator maintenance and how to garden. Her aunt and uncle didn’t have any resource material, so she’d go to the Library—one of the last of its kind. It was farther than Town so she never went on her own, but it wasn’t so far that it would be unmanageable.

  When she reached the blissfully cool air of her basement home, her body pleaded with her to sleep, but she refused. She feared her new motivation was fragile and wanted to start problem solving to take advantage of it, but as she went to get her pack she stumbled, her body protesting her stubbornness. She sat down on the couch to appease it, planning to regroup before heading out again.

  Thea woke up a day later feeling rested but frustrated.

  Worried she’d lose momentum if she faltered, she ate a small breakfast then left for Town. Dressed in her faded blue jumper and baseball cap, black ponytail threaded through the back, she armed herself with weapons she hoped she wouldn’t need and a hiking backpack she hoped to fill. In the salt that lined the safe entryway to the cellar, she pulled on her traveling boots and grabbed the shotgun hanging on the wall next to the exit. She had never used it before, knowing it would only momentarily stun what she needed it for, but after her recent encounter she felt safer with it. After all, she suspected her two pistols and army knife wouldn’t be effective on a creature older than a few hours.

  As she locked the three locks on the outer steel door and marched up the steps, she felt an odd sense of finality: as if she had come to a conclusion and the path before her was set, but she didn’t feel trapped. She felt optimistic and hopeful for the future.

  It was going to be a good day.

  * * *

  Or not.

  The first obstacle to Thea’s optimism stood a mile from her home by a yellow car with smashed in windows. The eyeless pits of its face stared up at the sun as if it could see it, as if it could feel it. She couldn’t tell if it was a man or a woman before it changed: its
body devoid of living tissue, a network of vines wrapped around bone covered in withered skin. Like the lifeless bodies in the surrounding cars, vines crawled out of its eye sockets, out of its mouth, through breaks in its skin. Leaves opened here and there, reaching for the sunlight but not covering enough to hide the shrieker’s gruesome features. Its hands reminded her of a fairy tale witch: fingers long and spindly, tipped with knifelike thorns.

  Keep going and don’t look back.

  Thea stared, her feet planted on either side of her bike, watching it, wondering if it could sense her somewhere or if its mind was completely gone, lost in reverie. She knew if she made a sound loud enough, the creature would hear and attack, but she wasn’t scared. Not really. She had seen many sun-dazed shriekers before—they showed up every once in a while, on the Highway and in the fields. During the day they were a harmless reminder of the green if you left them alone…

  It was at night they were dangerous.

  After Uncle Jeremy and Aunt Emily passed, it seemed like they appeared more often, but she couldn’t be sure. Since she was on her own she might be noticing them more. Every time they appeared, she had to make the decisions, had to decide whether to continue working or go inside and wait for them to pass through during the night. She had to decide whether to keep going or turn back. If she continued on, she would have to pass the monster later in the day when the possibility for problems was higher.

  It didn’t matter; she wouldn’t let herself falter. She left early and should be able to make it home with sunlight to spare. There were no clouds, no potential for an overcast day waking the creature early. She wouldn’t let herself put it off. She needed to handle things while she had the will to do it.

  But she didn’t continue on.