Monsters: The Ashes Trilogy

by Ilsa J. Bick

  “No,” the old man rasped, then sighed. “Not entirely, and not anything about this.”

  “You want to tell me what you do know?” At Weller’s silence, he said, “Am I not supposed to make it back alive?”

  The utter astonishment on Weller’s face was real. “What? Tom, that’s crazy.”

  “According to Mellie, I’m the resident expert on crazy.” Now he felt a simmer of anger, the sneak of a finger on his trigger guard. Take it easy. Don’t make a move you can’t take back. “What’s going on?”

  “I don’t know what’s going on here,” Weller snapped. “Whatever game Mellie’s playing, if she even is, I don’t have a clue. Now I’m putting my hands down.”

  Sentimentality aside, he wasn’t stupid. Tom took another step back. “You could put the rifle down, too.”

  “Not a chance in hell. I’d like to live to see tomorrow, thank you very much, and there is no way you’re taking my weapon. So either shoot me and go save those kids, or we get out of here now, together, because I do … not … like this, Tom. There is something going down, and we are in the wrong place to stop it.” When he didn’t move, Weller grated, “Jesus Christ on a crutch, Tom, I do not want you dead. I don’t want any more dead kids if I can help it. I will tell you what I know, but right now, all we got is each other, and we got to get to our kids. You’re going to have to trust me that far. You have my word on it, Tom, soldier to soldier.”

  That, he believed. “All right,” Tom said, breaking his elbow, hoping it wasn’t the last thing he ever did. “But I’m not sure we should race back. We need to think this through because it might be that what’s going down is going down now. We still need to find Cindi and Chad.”

  “I’m with you on all that.” Weller’s shoulders drooped with relief. “For what it’s worth, I don’t think Mellie would hurt the kids, not intentionally anyway.”

  “You don’t sound very certain.”

  “Because I’m not,” Weller said. “So let’s go figure out what to do next.”

  * * *

  They were halfway to the horses, Tom a step or two behind Weller because, soldier to soldier notwithstanding, it paid to be careful. All of a sudden, Weller came to a dead stop and tipped a look at the sky. “Where the hell’s my head?”

  Tom narrowly missed plowing into the older man’s back. “What?”

  “We’re going to need to scout things out, work some sort of angle, right? Well, I don’t have my binos. Do you?”

  “They’re back at camp. We can take Cindi’s. I’ll go back up—”

  “No, you go on, get the horses. It’s further, and I’m a lazy cuss.” Cracking a grin, Weller was already trotting back up the steps. “Won’t be but a minute.”

  It was when Tom was leading the horses back to the church that he realized what else it was that bothered him about that mess in the belfry.

  An overturned stool. A dropped book. The tipped thermos. And garbage.

  Cindi’s a neatnik. Whenever she visited him, she carefully refolded paper bags, waxed paper. Yet now there was trash, and not just anywhere, but—

  You’re startled enough to drop a book and your binoculars. You kick over the stool. There’s chicken soup on the floor, and litter. His eyes widened. But that one mound of trash is piled on the binoculars, and that can’t be, not if she dropped—

  “Weller!” Tom charged for the church. “Weller, no, NO!”

  94

  Click-click-click. Click. Click. And now a sputter, like a snake.

  Static. The hairs stood on Luke’s scalp. Mellie’s got a radio, and she’s talking to someone, in code.

  Against every particle of good sense, he eased down the hall. The clicks sounded at erratic intervals. His pulse banged in his ears. This was dumb; what could he tell Tom? Well, there was this funky clicking? But if there was a radio and someone spoke—

  From beneath his left boot came a loud, high squeal of a fatigued board: a real horror-show CREEEEE that made his brain freeze. A second later, he heard the telltale squall of bedsprings, and … “Hello?” The tone was sharp, the volume growing as Mellie moved for the bedroom door. “Who’s—”

  Get out, get out! Whirling for the front door, he stumbled onto the porch at the same moment a door slammed drywall and Mellie shouted, “Who—”

  Still running, he took the front steps in three leaping strides and plunged down the slope. What to do, what to do? Tom, Tom, where are you? Tom would know; Tom, he could trust. But Luke was on his own, and all he could think of was to run. He’d automatically headed toward the equipment shed, but now he thought, Wait, I’m safer around other people. He veered toward the cow barn and corral, steaming through the snow. Ahead, there were knots of kids, the bonfire. All the dogs had trotted halfway up the knoll past the far horse barn and were barking their communal yark-yark-yark. In the back of his mind, in that very last second before things fell apart for good, he thought, Wait, what’s got them all …

  There was an immense explosion: not a boom but a ker-POW that was so violent, he felt the sound rebound and bounce and barrel its way around and over him. The blast echoed and caromed off the buildings. Gasping, his heart fluttering into his throat, he spun and looked north.

  A pillar of smoke, a massive gray-black mushroom cloud, swelled and pillowed above the trees. Downslope, he could hear the other kids’ chatter suddenly cease. For a second, even the dogs fell silent, and he forget all about Mellie and her strange coded clicks.

  Because the only thing out there worth blowing was the church.

  95

  The church. Luke’s blood slushed. Cindi was on lookout, and Chad—and Weller had gone that way an hour ago; he’d taken off after … after …

  “No.” It was a broken sound, hardly a word at all, and then he was stumbling into an awkward, spastic run, aware that Mellie was shouting after him. He heard the bang of a door, and saw Jasper, face chalk-white, stumbling out of the equipment shed. Other kids were rushing for and after him because he was the oldest and if he thought there was something out there worth seeing … “No, no. Cindi, Cindi! Tom!”

  “What happened?” Jasper’s shout was a needle of sound. “What happened, what—”

  All at once, the dogs started up again, but that steady yark-yark-yark was now a yammer: a frenzied, rapid-fire staccato, as clear as any alarm. The sound pierced the bright balloon of his panic—of Cindi Cindi Cindi TOM—and he skidded to a stop so quickly he almost tripped and fell to his knees. He turned, wondering what could possibly be more upsetting to the dogs than the bomb that had just destroyed the church and killed his friends.

  From the east, still well beyond the staved-in barn, two horses bolted over the rise, scattering all the dogs but one, a blundering chocolate lab that just wasn’t quick enough. There was a high shriek as one horse plowed it under and then a second, longer scream as the horse’s legs tangled. Crashing to its knees, the horse turned a complete flip. Screaming, the boy—Luke thought from the cap of sandy hair that it might be a twelve-year-old named Colin—blasted over the horse’s head. The boy landed in a heap beyond his horse, which had already struggled up. Veering a sharp cut to the left, the other rider and horse only just missed the boy as they continued in their headlong crash down the hill.

  What the hell? Colin was still on the snow, trying to wallow to his feet, but his horse was losing its head, panicking, rearing and plunging down. “Colin, get up! Look out!” Luke screamed as the boy only raised an arm. “Get up, run, ruh—”

  The horse stabbed down, and Colin’s yell abruptly cut out.

  No. Luke clapped both hands to his mouth to hold back the scream. Both Colin and the dog were ruby splotches, like what was left after you swatted bloated mosquitoes. He scrambled to higher ground, not much caring anymore if Mellie snagged him or not, wallowing uphill until he had a good view to the east, the way the lookouts had come, wondering what in hell had scared them.

  And then he saw them, in the distance.

  Monsters, h
eading their way.

  96

  “Get in the barn!” Spinning on his heels, Luke waved the kids back. “Get in the barn! Jasper, everybody, get in the barn, barricade the doors, go, go!”

  He saw Jasper suddenly whirl in an about-face and streak for the corral. Other children, who’d been surging for him, abruptly changed course, only to pile into those just behind. The air prickled with panicky screams, and Luke could hear the horses in their stalls braying in alarm. Kids shot right and left, like a rack of billiard balls on the first break. Some—the littlest ones—fell, and Luke watched, horrified, as two other kids stampeded over a fallen boy until a third scooped the kid up on the fly. Some headed for the barn, while a ragged cluster scurried north, streaming past the equipment shed and on down the road toward the trees. This wasn’t a bad idea, but the forest was a good quarter mile distant and the kids would be caught out in the open, with no protection at all.

  He dropped his arms, stopped shouting. Useless to try and herd or head them off, and no way to gather them all together. This was something they’d never practiced or prepared for.

  But I can fight. Turning, he saw Mellie standing not thirty feet away. She faced east, watching that oncoming tide, her arms akimbo. Her .44 Mag gleamed in its holster. “Mellie, we have to unlock the guns! I need a gun!”

  “Can’t. Weller’s got the keys.” After a pause. “Church made a hell of a bang.”

  “You don’t have keys?” That couldn’t be right. He tried to think. Would she have them on her, or would she have left them back at the house? On her, he decided, somewhere. A pocket, in her coat, somewhere. But he couldn’t just take them. What was he supposed to do, knock her down? “Well …,” he fumbled. The guns were in an old olive-drab trunk, secured with a padlock. “Then … then shoot the lock off!”

  She didn’t look at him. “That only works in movies, Luke. You need bolt cutters.”

  “Mellie, you have to have keys. Open the trunk.” When she didn’t turn, he snatched at her arm. “We have to fight.”

  “No, we don’t. We can’t. Not against that many Chuckies. Go on, Luke. Get down to the barn. Keep everyone inside. I don’t want more kids to get hurt than absolutely necessary. Any who manage to get to the trees, we’ll gather later. They won’t get far.”

  “Are you—” He would’ve said crazy, but the word evaporated in his mouth as her words finally registered. “Later.” He let her arm go. “What do you mean, gather them later?”

  She didn’t answer but only stared at the advancing Chuckies. Given the shallowness of the snow, they were coming on pretty fast, but he had an idea of their numbers now. Maybe … thirty? Forty? Ten would’ve been too many. But what scared him more was how quiet they were. No shouts, no jungle screams. For an eerie second, he thought he might actually be looking at some kind of formation: armed Chuckies in front and beyond—

  Oh no. He felt himself back up a step, away from Mellie. Beyond these Chuckies were at least twenty horses a half mile back of the advance force, and they were gaining fast, blasting over the snow in a wedge. Without binoculars he couldn’t be sure, but he thought there were two distinct groups: men in gray and white winter camouflage—

  And kids. Kids in white, still too distant to see faces, but he thought some were girls and all were old enough to be Chuckies. No, that’s crazy. Horses didn’t like Chuckies, although some didn’t go as wild as others. Or maybe there’s something different about these Chuckies. There has to be. Because these Chuckies were riding, and they were with people. Men.

  He tried again. “Mellie, we still have time. Please, help us. Give me the keys.”

  “The best help I can give you is some advice,” Mellie said, with that eerie calm. “Get in the barn. Run, Luke.”

  For a split second, he almost did what she said, because she was the adult. But then, he did the unthinkable, what he’d never have dared with any adult, because good kids like him didn’t do things like this.

  He hit her.

  The move—a sudden punch to her chest—surprised him almost as much as her. Mellie was smaller but compact as concrete and no lightweight. Off-balance, Mellie only backpedaled. Now that he was committed, Luke stayed with her, grabbing her parka to keep her from falling, afraid that if she landed on her butt, he wouldn’t get the gun in time. The flash of shock in her eyes hardened to anger, and then her right hand was reaching for that huge, wicked .44 Mag. No choice now. Luke’s free hand jumped for the weapon. His fingers found the grip and yanked at the same moment that he gave her a shove that dumped her on her ass.

  I’ve gone nuts. Panting, he held the massive revolver in both trembling hands. The gun wavered in his grip. The thing was a cannon. He could empty this sucker and never once hit a target. It occurred to him then that if she hadn’t worn a cross-draw, he’d probably have a new hole in his head. No, two: front and back, and most of his skull gone, too.

  “Give me the keys, Mellie.” His stomach tightened as he cocked the revolver. “Please. I don’t want to hurt you, but …”

  “You’re going to shoot me, Luke?” She stared up with eyes so colorless and cold, he felt the chill wrap its fingers around his heart. “You won’t do it. You’re not a killer.”

  “But why are you doing this? Why won’t you fight?”

  “This isn’t a fight we’re going to win—”

  “But it’s better than just dying.”

  “No,” she said. “You won’t die, Luke.”

  Her certainty, that dead calm, scared him even more. “What are you doing, Mellie, what are you doing? Give me the keys, please, give me …”

  Over the raging of his heart, he heard a new sound: a steady, inexorable shush-shush-shush, the sound a hundred snakes might make over sand. His eyes jerked toward the rise. The Chuckies, that first wave, were just spilling downhill. Some carried clubs or bats, and sun winked off a few machetes. Most, however, had no weapons at all. Just their teeth, their hands. He could see it, too: Chuckies swooping down and tearing little kids apart, plucking off arms and legs as easily as the wings and drumsticks of tender young chickens.

  Something blurred to his left, a silent rush as Mellie shot up from the snow. Startled, Luke gave an abortive shout: “Mel—”

  He had no memory of squeezing the trigger. More than likely, it was a simple flinch. The Magnum bucked. The shot was a thunderclap. The recoil jammed his wrists. Even in the midafternoon sun, the flash was very bright.

  And he missed. Of course, he would. The gun was much too big, and he wasn’t prepared. In another second, Mellie’s fist drove into his stomach. Gagging and retching, he doubled over as the gun tumbled from his hands.

  “You’re lucky your brains are still inside your skull.” Mellie reholstered her Magnum. “Don’t try that again, Luke.”

  “Meh-Mellie …” His breath wheezed. “Wh-why are you—”

  A ferocious clamor rose from the dogs. Sprinting uphill, the three remaining animals bulleted past Colin and the trampled lab. At the point of the spear was a fast, lean border collie named Tess. Sick with horror, he watched as she launched herself at a girl with a whip of blond hair—and a bat. The Chucky sliced hard and fast. He doubted the poor dog ever really saw it. They had to be at least three football fields away, and still he heard the thunk as the bat connected while Tess was in midair. A spurt of blood jumped straight up in a startling exclamation point, and Tess’s head blew apart.

  At that, the other dogs broke. One, a flop-eared red and white pit bull, squirted left and then shrieked as a Chucky brought a machete down in a two-handed ax swing. The third, a square and sturdy elk-hound, got the message. Whirling in mid-stride, the dog zoomed back down the hill, careering past the barn and the corral, heading north for the road and, beyond, the cover of forest. That dog always struck Luke as pretty darned smart.

  Luke looked beyond the advancing Chuckies. From this vantage point, he could also see, much more clearly than before, the men on horseback—and one in the center, all in black, astride
a gleaming horse the color of a raven’s wing.

  “No,” he said, brokenly. The clicks he’d heard, the explosion, and now this … “No, no, no. What have you done, Mellie? What have you done?”

  “What needed to be done,” Mellie said, “to set us on the path for Rule.”

  97

  “Where’s Penny?” Peter tossed a wild look around the raft. “Where is she, where’s—”

  “I … I …” Chris was shivering. Icy water streamed from his dripping hair and down his neck. He was so numb with cold, he couldn’t feel his feet. He looked left and somehow wasn’t surprised to find Jess, regal as a queen, with her black-mirror eyes and Medusa hair.

  “What is this?” he asked her. “Why am I here? This isn’t my nightmare. It isn’t even my memory. This is Peter and Simon’s …”

  “I have to go back.” Peter ripped off his life vest. Beneath, he wore a pair of dripping camo over-whites, but there was something strange around his neck, a wide black … collar? “Penny’s still in the boat, she’s still—” Yanking an underwater flashlight from his belt, Peter threw himself into the water.

  “Go with him,” Jess said. “It’s dark down there, and cold. Even with the light, he’ll lose his way.”

  “No.” Chris cringed. His arms were pebbly with gooseflesh. “And don’t touch me again. This isn’t my nightmare. It’s his.”

  “It is also Simon’s.”

  “Then let them keep it. I have problems of my own. Please, Jess.” He closed his eyes, but he could still hear the cries of the gulls overhead and the slap of water on rubber. “I told Ellie the truth about Alex. I’m on my way to Rule. If I’m right, Lena’s following. So Hannah and Isaac are safe, at least from her. What more do you want from me? When will it be enough?”

  “Truth comes from water and blood,” Jess said. “If you truly care for Peter, then this is the only way, Chris.”

  “What does that mean, Jess?” He kept his eyes squeezed shut. He couldn’t bear to see what he looked like in those black mirrors: spidery and strange, both himself and something alien. How is this happening? Why? “Is Peter alive? Is that it?”