Bestial

by William D. Carl

  The others had made their way to the front of the boat, but they were all staring at what was happening aft.

  “I got the pumps on,” he said.

  “I don’t know if that’s enough,” Cathy replied, and he followed their line of sight.

  The back of the boat was attached to the first barge by a single cable, which was stuck in the pulley. As the next wave lifted the boat, then the barge, Rick desperately reached for anything that could steady him, finally clutching something metal. The others began to slide away from the cabin. Rick fumbled with the microphone of the radio. He kept hold of it as he slipped toward the hole carved in the side of the boat by the barge’s incessant pummeling. By the time he stopped, the mic cord was stretched taut.

  Then, with barely a clanking sound, the radio snapped from its moorings in the cabin. Rick raised his hands to his head just in time to deflect the flying radio box. It crushed two fingers and scraped the skin from the back of his wrist, then smacked into the railing and teetered into the river.

  “Radio’s gone!” he shouted.

  Nobody listened to him. They were all watching as another gargantuan wave raised the barge high above the little boat. The cable that had kept the barge connected snapped loose with a loud twang and whipped wildly through the air.

  “Get down!” Cathy screamed.

  Andrei was the last to drop. The cable traveled harmlessly over the heads of Cathy, Christian, and Chesya. When it reached Andrei, he was on his knees, and the cable lashed the side of his face, severing the top of his left ear and slicing a bloody path across his cheek. He fell to the deck with a howl, pressing his hands against his ear.

  Rick crawled over to him. “How bad is it?” he asked, and Andrei showed him the damage. Swallowing, Rick said, “I’ve seen worse. You’ll be all right.”

  “But … so much blood!”

  “Guys! The barge …”

  Rick looked up. Lifted to its highest point by the big wave, the barge began to descend toward the back of the tugboat.

  Beside them, something landed in the water, dropped as if from heaven.

  Chesya shouted, “What now?”

  One of the creatures broke the surface next to the tugboat. It grasped the railing with one clawed hand and launched itself onto the deck, two feet from Rick, halfway between him and the cabin.

  The barge crashed against the side of the boat with a noise that seemed to overwhelm every sense at the same time. It reminded Rick of when the hotel had crumbled to the ground.

  The lycanthrope roared, bared its dripping fangs, took a step toward Rick.

  The heavy coal barge caused the tugboat to tilt, the cabin rising to the sky.

  “Come on!” Cathy shouted, and she and Christian jumped over to the coal barge.

  Chesya also leaped from the tugboat, feeling a comforting weight beneath her feet when she landed. The barge seemed solid, stabilized by the heaviness of the coal, even if it was rocking and rolling with the waves.

  When Rick started to run forward, the boat inclined to an angle nearly perpendicular to the water, and he tumbled, slammed against the side of the barge and rolled onto its ledge. Andrei dropped beside him, blood from his wound spattering all over Rick’s face.

  The creature that had lifted itself onto the deck careened toward them.

  “Look out!” Andrei shouted.

  The two men dove in the opposite direction, leaping aboard the barge. The beast smacked into the metal rail with its head, which promptly crunched open, scattering its brains across the back of the sinking vessel.

  The group, brushing themselves off, backed onto the barge, watching as the tugboat sank, carried down by the weight of the water in its belly. The boat took less than a minute to disappear in a whirl of bubbles. When it was gone, Rick stood and cheered.

  “Did you see that? Do you even fucking believe we’re still alive!”

  Another wave tossed the barge onto its shoulders, spilling coal down the sides of the piles. Rick dropped to all fours, nearly losing his balance.

  “We aren’t safe yet,” Cathy said, holding her son. “We aren’t anchored anymore. We’re going to drift.”

  “We could end up back on shore in the city,” Chesya wailed. “What then?”

  Rick realized that he hadn’t thrown up in quite a while. He didn’t know whether to attribute this to his new sea legs or if he just didn’t have any time to think about being sick.

  Behind them, something landed on the coal pile with a soft thud. One of the monsters had flung itself from the Brent Spence Bridge to their barge, which was now positioned directly beneath the bridge and floating eastward.

  As the creature stood up, its right arm hung broken and useless by its side. Still, it advanced, fury in its eyes, its tongue waving around its black mouth, running against its teeth.

  Another fell behind it. When this one arose, it looked unscathed.

  Chesya looked up at the bottom of the bridge, where dozens of creatures were retreating from the military’s attack, the roar of automatic gunfire. More were leaping from the bridge into the water, sinking quickly beneath the waves. Some jumped for the safety of the barge.

  A third beast landed safely, rolled down the coal pile. The black lumps rattled beneath it, but it seemed to laugh as it stumbled toward Christian, who was the closest to it.

  48

  SEPTEMBER 18, 7:35 P.M.

  Glancing over his shoulder, Captain Taylor Burns shouted for Granger, trying his best to be heard over the volley; the troops were firing nonstop at the creatures swarming the bridge, the hairy corpses piling higher, reverting to their human form.

  “Sir?” Granger shouted. “Can’t hear you, sir!”

  Burns motioned his second in command closer and said, “I asked if that isolation tent was ready yet. Take a look out there.”

  Raising the binoculars to his face shield, Granger whistled. The tugboat was sinking under the weight of the first barge, its ass-end demolished; the group of refugees scrambled to get to a safe place near the piles of coal. Lycanthropes were leaping from the bridge, trying to escape the rain of bullets, some of them landing near the survivors. Licking their black lips, they approached the group.

  “Get me a sniper,” Burns demanded. “Someone really good.”

  “That’d be the Truitt woman, sir. Best eye in the unit.”

  “Get her here now, Granger. Before those things wipe out the only people we’ve seen who are probably immune to this virus.”

  Tom Granger ran to the rows of soldiers shooting the creatures as they attempted to cross the river. “Truitt!” he called. “Private Truitt! You’re needed here.”

  A tall, lean woman with high cheekbones and dark eyes stepped forward. Her face looked tired behind the screen of her face mask, and her suit was smudged with dirt. A thin line of smoke trickled from the barrel of her M16. Snapping a banana clip into the assault rifle, she asked, “Where?”

  Granger led her back toward the side of the river. “You might want to grab the transfer device grapnel cannon,” he told her. “That barge is caught in the current.”

  “Yes, sir,” she said.

  Burns was still watching the survivors through his binoculars, shaking his head. A single line of sweat dripped from beneath his hairline.

  Christian glanced up at the top of the coal pile as the beast landed, its claws scrabbling for a hold on something solid. With a roar, it faced him, its eyes glowing yellow in the darkness. Its fur was matted and wet against its thick hide, and its paws sank deeper into the coal, dislodging several pieces. When the rocks shifted, it lost its footing and slid feetfirst toward the boy, snarling.

  Christian reached into his jacket for a weapon, sliced himself on a knife. He had three blades. He pulled two out, one in each hand, just as the beast collided with him.

  They rolled across the deck of the barge, away from the coal pile, the beast’s jaws snapping as Christian tried to get into a better position. They stopped at the edge of the barge, and a
wave crashed against Christian’s face. It also soaked the creature, and the beast blinked several times, its triangular ears flapping as it attempted to get the water out of them.

  Taking advantage of the distraction, Christian rammed his knives into the creature’s eyes. A dark, jellylike substance squirted out of them, and blood trickled down its face like tears. The beast howled, lashing out at Christian as he tried to wriggle his legs out from beneath the monster. One of the beast’s claws scraped long trails on the barge, generating blue sparks.

  As the creature swung its head side to side, trying to shake loose the objects in its face, Christian dislodged the left knife and began stabbing it in the chest. It stood, relieving the pressure on his legs. Christian pushed himself backward as the beast blindly lashed out at the wind and rain.

  Cathy ran toward him, but the monster with the broken arm stood in her way. She brandished her only weapon, a pair of scissors.

  “Get away from him!” she shouted.

  The lycanthrope cocked its head at her, then leaned forward and roared into her face. She could smell its breath, the scent of dead things eaten and partially digested. Falling backward, she landed on her ass, wincing with the pain. The scissors fell from her grasp and slid away from her.

  The beast lowered its head, preparing to take a bite out of her face, when something blue and feathery stuck into its neck. It screeched, clawing at the thing, and another appeared in its side, near its chest. The beast howled once, then wobbled in the wind. Its eyes began to droop.

  “See … it’s good weapon, no?” Andrei said, brandishing the dart gun, his face scratched and bloody.

  Cathy kicked the monster’s unsteady legs and cheered when it dropped into the water, sinking without a fight. “Yes, Andrei,” she said with a smile. “A very good weapon indeed.”

  The Siberian beamed, then was knocked aside as one of the monsters dropped just behind him. It turned, grabbed his head in each hand, and looked him in the eye.

  Andrei saw the monster for what it was—another human under a curse. These Americans called it a virus or a disease, but those were just other words for “curse.” This beast could have been him until that evening.

  He swung the dart gun around to shoot the creature, but it slammed ineffectually against the thing’s side. Annoyed, the beast struck out at the gun, tearing open Andrei’s forearm and dislodging the weapon from his grip. It clattered across the deck.

  Rick rushed at the thing that was squeezing Andrei’s head tighter and tighter. He slipped on the rain-soaked deck, falling and taking Chesya with him as another monster landed atop the coal pile. It rolled down, somersaulting awkwardly. Chesya sidestepped it, but looked around and moaned softly. At least a dozen of the things were on the barge, with another ten on the second barge, making their way toward the humans.

  “Too many,” she cried. “Too many to fight.”

  Cathy ran for the dart gun, but another creature raised itself from where it had landed. Its legs seemed to be broken, but it pulled itself forward slowly with muscular arms.

  Andrei screamed in agony, and Rick waited for his head to burst like some overripe fruit. The Siberian shouted something in his native language, swearing or praying, Rick couldn’t tell.

  Then the beast fell, a red blossom expanding between its eyes.

  “They’re shooting at us!” Cathy screamed, rolling the already changing corpse of a fallen creature into the water.

  “No,” Chesya said, ducking as a bullet winged overhead, smacking into the face of another werewolf. “They’re trying to help us.”

  “Whoever’s shooting is a hell of a crack shot,” Christian said. “Can that just be one guy?”

  All of the creatures that had leaped onto the first barge, at least a total of twelve, were either lying dead, reverting back to human form, or sinking to the bottom of the river. Traveling slowly eastward on the current, the barge was clear of the bridge. There were, however, eleven more creatures on the other barge, which was locked to this one by a pulley-and-cable system similar to the one that the tugboat had utilized. Barely four feet separated the two coal-laden barges.

  “Guys,” Christian said as the first creature jumped over to their barge. “I think we’ve got company.”

  Cathy rushed over to Andrei, who was holding his head in his hands. “Are you okay?” she asked.

  He nodded, although she could see the lingering pain in his eyes. A trickle of blood seeped from his ear and down his neck. The creature had squeezed his skull so hard, she wondered if it was fractured.

  But there wasn’t time for that. She picked up the dart gun as a second beast leaped onto their barge from the other one. She wondered why the sniper had stopped firing at them; then she heard the bullet bounce off the metal. Sparks flew, and the pile of rags went up in flames.

  Rick ran toward the fire, thinking he could quickly assemble a torch to ward off the beasts, but Chesya yelled, “Rick, damn it, you have a gun. You always seem to have a gun and you forget to use the stupid thing!”

  He pulled the Black Widow from his waistband, appearing amazed that he had forgotten the weapon, small as it was. He fired at the first monster that had invaded their barge. The bullet went wide, but the second one entered the creature’s mouth and emerged from the back of its head. He didn’t have to be a good shot when the beasts were this close.

  “Three bullets left,” he cried.

  Chesya ran toward the fire, but Cathy got there first. The older woman looked around, seeming confused. Chesya grabbed a bucket of what looked like water and threw it on the blaze.

  “No!” Cathy screeched, but it was too late.

  The bucket had held grease, leftover from a recent lube job on the tugboat. When it hit the small flames, they shot up six feet high, knocking Chesya backward and singeing her eyebrows. The deck burned where the grease had spilled, and the coal ignited, turning red and orange.

  “Um … oops,” Chesya said. “Can we put it out with water?”

  “It’s a grease fire now,” Cathy said. “And the coal’s blazing. I don’t think there’s anything we can do.”

  Rick fired again, missed the creature running toward him. He shot again as it got closer, but the bullet only grazed its ear. When it was almost upon him, he held the gun between the beast’s eyes and squeezed the trigger. Skull and pink brains spattered the coal pile behind it, sizzling on the embers like eggs on a griddle.

  Shoving the body aside, he shouted, “Oh man, who started the goddamn fire? Like we didn’t have enough problems?”

  Chesya admitted, “I did it. Sorry.”

  “Sorry? You’re fucking sorry? Oh, that helps a lot!”

  Cathy shouted, “We can do without the sarcasm, Rick! Calm down.”

  “Calm down? We’re being attacked by those creatures, we’re on a runaway barge with no anchor, the fucking military’s shooting at us, I’m out of bullets, and now we’re on fire? Calm down? How in the fuck do you expect me to—”

  Cathy slapped his face. Hard. He stared back at her with something that resembled awe.

  Cathy said, “Another one’s just jumped on board.” She handed Rick the dart gun. “You’re a better shot than me. You put a dart in that thing, and we’ll drown it.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said, turning toward the creature rushing toward them.

  A blue dart appeared just above its right ear, and it cried out, fumbled with the dart, then slumped to the deck.

  Another creature made the leap from their barge, landing behind the fallen monster.

  “Where’s Andrei?” Chesya asked.

  “He’s back … oh my God!” Cathy shouted.

  Andrei sat on the deck, leaning against the pile of coal, his arms drooping at his sides. The fire was only a few feet from where he sat, and his eyes were closed.

  Cathy began to run toward him when she heard a whistling sound and a huge, four-pronged, fishhook fell two feet in front of her.

  She thought, That looks like the Bat-hook, a
whatchamacallit … grapnel hook.

  It snagged the cuff of Andrei’s coveralls and dragged the unconscious Siberian toward the railing.

  The group hurried after Andrei as he was dragged to the far end of the barge. He was slammed violently against the railing, then held there by the sharp points of the grapnel. He gave a single gasp of pain.

  “What the hell are they thinking?” Cathy wondered, kneeling next to the Siberian.

  “They’re going to pull us in,” Chesya said, smiling broadly. Behind her, another monster’s skull exploded, and it fell on its back, tongue lolling from its black mouth.

  “Andrei, buddy,” Rick said as he knelt next to him. He was troubled by the blood that still streamed from the Siberian’s ear. “Wake up, man.”

  Christian tore at the coverall material with his remaining knife, dislodging the cuff from the flanges.

  “Is he … ?” Chesya let the question hang in the air.

  Rick shook his head, “No, he’s still breathing, but … I dunno. He doesn’t look very good.”

  “That thing had him by the head,” Cathy said, a tear emerging from her eye.

  Rick slapped the Siberian’s stubbly cheek. “Hey, buddy, wake up. We’ve made it, man. I think we’ve made it.”

  The last creature on the second barge went down with a bullet to the head. It fell to its knees, wavered a moment, then collapsed.

  “Look up!” Christian shouted.

  They were being pulled backward against the current by the grapnel, which was tied to a pillar of the Brent Spence Bridge on the Kentucky side of the river. It stuck up several dozen yards away from the broken end of the bridge.

  The barges quickly approached the point where the beasts could leap onto them again.

  The fire was gaining strength, and the group began to make their way back to the second barge which held only dead creatures. They dragged Andrei, and the man groaned with every movement.

  The flames spread across the deck like tributaries from some hellish lake. One small section of the deck had burned through, and the heavy coal above it slid through the hole, spilling into the river.