by catt dahman
She made a noise, and the men sprinted, pulled her kicking, and stopped at times to sweep the bugs away, but the bugs were coming from everywhere at once, crawling from beneath the leaves, surging from the old wooden planks of the house, snickering, chittering, and clicking their little legs as they oozed and crawled menacingly from the fallen trees.
Fred and Andy tried to fight the bugs but were covered. A bug flew away, but two replaced it. Jack dug through the nasty crustaceans, but it was impossible to uncover the men; in fact, he was in danger of being covered as well. Fred’s hand, bitten to the bone, showed from the pile of wiggling bugs, his fingers among the dancing, small legs, but the hand was bloody and was soon lost as they filled his mouth. Andy’s body expanded as the creatures filled his body internally.
Jack mercifully hoped they both died fast.
Abbot and he ran as Marcus cleared the way, using a tree limb to knock the bugs back. Marcus stomped and slung bugs into the trees.
Jack and Marcus were the last to run into the water, splashing, slapping the bugs’ whole bodies, and trying to get to deeper water to get the things off. Evidently woodlice hated water and let go at once, floating away and presumably drowning as they floated on a soft current. The legs twitched as they drowned, but no one felt sorry for them.
Mali’s quick action left her with only one bite on her leg and left Dwayne only a few bites on his legs. They rubbed the dime-sized holes and grimaced. On the other side of the small pond, Mali and Dwayne fell onto the shore, and Mali yanked out a first aid kit.
Dwayne could wait. Mali knew some of the others might need first aid immediately. “You’re okay. Catch your breath. I have this,” Dewayne said as he nodded back, and Mali knew he trusted her. She wouldn’t let any of them down if she could help it; she was strong she told herself.
Abbott was bitten on the hands and legs, but he was okay, and like Dewayne, he would have scars, but his wounds needed only a good scrubbing and a few bandages. Carter was relatively unharmed but was wide-eyed and in shock, so Mali told him to sit down beside the other two men and warned them to watch him in case he were to become critical, “Hang on, and let me check the rest. I know it hurts, but give me a few minutes, okay?”
“We made it. Go to them, Mali. Thanks,” Dewayne said.
“Jack, Jack, Jack,” Mali said. He had numerous bites on his legs and arms, but like Marcus, he would be fine; so far, they both needed many more bandages than the rest.
“Got bitten, didn’t I?”
“Yup. I can’t wait to see Ruby’s face when we tell her they were bugs. She will make you wash in some really hot water,” Mali said.
“I know. I could have used John and the other micro raptors here to eat bugs though they wouldn’t be much bigger than those big things,” Jack said.
Shimei had a few bites on his legs, but he had a first aid kit out as well and smiled at Mali, “I got your back.”
“Thanks.”
Shimei went to Nedra who was in a terrible condition. Her nose, eyelids, ears, and lips were gone, and her skull showed on her forehead. Her arms were bitten, and in some places, the bones showed. Each finger was eaten to the bone, and most of her hands were gone; there simply was not enough flesh left on her hands to stitch, so back at the cave, they would have to be totally removed if she survived. Even in a fancy hospital, doctors wouldn’t be able to work with bare bones. Her legs were bitten badly, and blood pooled around her.
“We want to bandage her face and hands, okay?” Shimei asked Mali. When she nodded, they got to work, rolling gauze, thinking that cleaning the wounds could wait.
“What about Fred?” Dewayne asked.
“And Andy?”
“They didn’t make it. Joline didn’t either,” Jack said. Over time, he had seen many die, and it never got any easier.
Mali waved Shimei away, “I can do the rest; check Carter, Jack, and Marcus, please.”
Carter stood up, “I’m fine. No bugs are gonna stop me.”
“Good.”
“I’m going. I’m gonna make it. By myself.”
“Hey, we talked, you can rest tonight at the cave.”
Carter pushed past Shimei and said, “Stay outta my game. I’m gonna win.” He walked away, leaving everyone staring. Around the pond he went and then down another path away from the woodlice, never looking back as he left. He walked as if on a special mission.
“He won’t make it,” Jack said, wincing as Shimei cleaned and bandaged bites, “One guy and he’s bitten and needs the bite cleaned.”
“I dunno. That smell…cat pee…strong urine…Herr Doctor worked with bugs a few times, but they confounded him because they lacked intelligence. The stink was something that hit me. I remembered that exact smell with the musty undertones and scent of death. Wish I had realized sooner,” Shimei said.
“At least you realized it though. It saved us. This is stupid, but why did the nutty professor make giant woodlice?” Marcus asked.
“Why did he do anything? Because he could,” Shimei said. “Bastard wanted everything authentic like it was sixty-five million years ago.”
“Herr Doktor? Huh?”
Jack shook his head, “We’ll explain as we go back home, but you’ll get the short version which is still a lot to take in and explains Shimei being here. I promise you will be horrified.”
Dewayne grimaced, frowning hard, “I have no doubt. Seems I am at every turn.”
They rigged a litter and gently set Nedra onto it. Because she had no eyelids, they wrapped gauze about her face, covering her eyes so the sunlight wouldn’t drive her mad. Her eyes were already drying out, despite the blood. Blinded, she was more terrified, and the pain was intense, but in Mali’s med kit was a shot of morphine for emergencies; this was an emergency, she thought. Nedra fell unconscious after Mali gave her a shot, doing as Sandra had taught her. Thankfully, the drug worked fast.
In the cave, Sandra and Susan rewashed the bites, praising Shimei and Mali, declaring that Dewayne, Abbott, Jack, and Marcus would be fine. Shimei and Mali were cleaned up and treated as well. Ruby was, as predicted, horrified they had found bugs, and she petted John, saying the bugs might have gotten him and the other small raptors.
Everyone felt the loss of Andy even if he had only been there a short time.
With morphine and the supplies they had from the laboratory, Sandra and Susan regretfully removed both of Nedra’s hands, stitched her arms and legs, and pondered her face. Sandra used a slice of skin from Nedra’s thigh and stitched and glued it in place over her scull to cover the bones, doubting it would work, but it did work. But Nedra was left with a patchwork face along her forehead and cheeks. Her nose was closed except for a hole to breath from, and the skin about her mouth was glued. There was nothing left of her ears, so she had holes there and nothing else.
She was terribly disfigured, but they saved her life with the surgery. It was a shock that she lived.
Because her eyes would stay dry and the light would drive her mad, her eyes were covered by patches with tiny holes in the center so she could see just a little and determine where she was. It was the best plan they had.
Nedra recovered slowly and had trouble hearing. She had no hands to use, little eyesight, could smell nothing, and found it hard to speak well enough to be understood. Analisa showed her how to drape her face so she could hide her patchwork, Frankenstein’s creation-face. Analisa was Nedra’s strongest friend, talking her through the mourning of her losses.
One night, Analisa waited up for Bert, and when he joined her in bed, she hugged him; it was the first time she had ever initiated intimate contact. He was surprised but pleased, “This is nice. To what do I owe this change?” he asked and grinned.
His blood ran cold, as Analisa answered, “I suddenly don’t feel nearly as ugly. I am not the most hideous person in Asgard now. I’m after Wodanaz but before Nedra. Imagine that,” she said as she kissed him.
Bert kissed her back, but inside he shivered.
“When a couple more have bad times, I’ll be ready for the Miss Asgard Pageant.”
Bert sighed, “Don’t wish it on anyone.”
“Come here, Berty.” It was the night she got pregnant the first time, and while that didn’t work out for them, he had his woman laughing and giggling in bed.
Chapter Five: Norse is Norse Of Course
Wodanaz, in his wolf skins, led the group along the trail; it was the third day out, and they had gone far south of the area where they lived. Trevor, Shimei, Mali, Bray, and Mike followed, gun and clubs ready if needed. They paused a while, watching an omnivore that they called a tuskasaur for its unusual features. It had a little beak like many herbivores, but it also had flat, strong teeth for chewing, so they were able to eat the toughest plants they found.
While they stripped trees and shrubbery quite well, they loved insects, shellfish and fruit. The third row of teeth was actually tusks that jutted from the jaws of the males, and periodically they fought over females or territory with their tusks. It was one thing that made them interesting to watch. When they found food, they stuffed it into their cheeks like chipmunks and often looked as it they had fat little cheeks.
Larry, the wolf that followed Wodanaz loyally, growled a few times at the creatures but didn’t attack.
The dinosaurs were heterodontosaurs, but tuskasaurs was also a good name for them. Shimei laughed at them, “Those tuskasaurs are crazy looking with the tusks, looking like they could fight a big meat eater. Crazy things.”
Heterdontosaurs were black, dark purple, and dark brown feathered, swift, but grew no more than three feet tall. With their beaks, they stripped flowering pear trees, climbing up the branches and slinking around the ground. They looked at the humans, but weren’t curious as they perceived no known threat.
Wodanaz tightened the laces on his boots and led the group further along. He looked at the broken, dark stone steps that remained, fallen columns, and bricks. Long ago, SSDD cleared out the area of people, demolished buildings so they could not be used, and removed the bricks and material they could be used or that was rubbish.
“Watch for woodlice,” Shimei said, “I don’t smell them. But look at the rotten wood and junk in the stones.”
Mali bent down and frowned, “Books. I think this was a library once.”
Shimei frowned, “Seems sad that we’ll never have new books, not that they could write anything as amazing and terrible as what we’ve all seen in real life.”
A nigerasaur lumbered by with five or six in his little herd; he was what they called a shovel-mouth for lack of a better term because they had wide snouts full of teeth that they used to strip trees and plants. Each creature had hundreds of teeth and irritated the other plant eaters as they consumed more than their share. Several creatures bickered.
“Let ‘em fight it out. A big meat eater will come and get them all if they don’t watch out,” Trevor chuckled.
The humans picked their way through the remains of a small town with little more than the library, a few stores, a wrecked bar, and a few other, unidentifiable buildings. It was a lonesome spot, filled with leftover junk and broken bricks, stone, and warped metal. Wood was rotting away. Removing everyone and razing the town had taken a lot of energy so that the dinosaurs could take over.
Reasoning for this defied logic.
Further away, they stumbled onto the lawn of an old farmhouse that was still standing, in fair shape and seemingly lived in; the porch was swept, and sheets hung from a line to dry. To one side was a big cornfield, to another were green beans and tomatoes, lettuce, onions and potatoes, and in the back yard were fields of squash, gourds, and other vegetables. A few fruit trees remained.
“You’re trespassing,” a man called out, “we have you within gun sights.”
Trevor held a hand up, “I apologize; we didn’t know anyone lived here. We are from the rock caves. We come in peace. We’re travelling to find other people who trade if possible, but we are not hostile.”
“Peaceful, huh?”
“Don’t most people out here want peace after seeing everything out there in the other world?”
“Some are. Some are thieves and worse,” the man pointed. There were two posts, and on each, hung a man upside down, nailed and roped onto the post, long dead and rotted to mere bones. The ropes were rotted and frayed, the nails rusted, and the bones were picked clean, pitted after years of rain, and yellowed. The posts and bones had been there for years as a warning to those who opposed this man.
“What did they do?” Trevor asked.
“Raped one of our women. Tried to steal from us. Came like thieves in the night, slipping into our home. We gave them due justice.”
“Good for you.”
Mali spoke quietly, “A man named Preston raped me, and I killed him. I slit his throat with a knife. His friend Skate urged him on, so one of our friends shot him in the head. That was justice, too.”
“That was an easy death for an outrage on you.”
“Yes, it was. They were very bad men,” Mali said.
“You belong to one of these men?”
“No. I belong to myself,” she said.
“I am called Sam. What do you want here?” The man sounded less abrasive, but he was wary. Hidden behind ruins and trees, more held guns on the group.
“We wanted to know. We were seeking the truth whether there were others still out there or not. The government sent thirty at a time out here in a game, and sometimes we find the people and take them in. That’s how we came to be here,” Wodanaz explained.
“I have heard that. We found two of them that were part of what they called a game. One died. One is with us.” He made a motion and the guns vanished. He had decided these people were safe.
“Good. Have you remained here all this time?”
Sam frowned at Trevor and tilted his head, “Yes. They didn’t find us, but they destroyed our town. They gathered people and removed some by force, saying they had to relocate. Some people they just shot and piled into a mass grave they made: the little ones, the old, and the infirmed. They killed ‘em all, saying they weren’t worth the trouble of moving.”
“No one knew that.”
“I guess not. We stayed here, hiding from them. My relatives did, anyway. Better free than under the rule of tyrants. Then they brought those beasts from long ago to live here. The behemoth and leviathan came, just like it was always said they would come…hell on earth.”
“We know. We live in caves, and we call it Asgard after mythology. It wasn’t anything that serious; it was a bunch of scientists from many years back who brought them back with DNA from teeth and bones found in a cave.”
“Well, no matter what is real and what we believe, the giants still inherited the world and our people was tossed away.” He narrowed his eyes, “A wolf dog?”
“Yes, his mother took my eye protecting her pups. We raised them, and they are our family now,” Wodanaz said, stepping in front of Larry in case the men had an urge to shoot at him. Larry had protected the humans often enough that he had earned their protection in return.
“That’s strange. I ain’t never seen a wolf take to humans. Part wolf, maybe, but not a full wolf.”
“He and his siblings have always been with us,” Trevor said.
“We could trade. Do you want to trade with us? Do you have anything we want? Do you have any more wolf pups?”
Trevor suppressed a smile, “That gun you have…I can give you ammunition for it. I have a good knife, too, but no, we don’t have any pups.” He didn’t want to mention they had several generations of pups back at the cave; they were family, not creatures to trade.
Mali pulled a tarp from her pack, Shimei had some medical supplies, Bray offered a small handgun with ammunition that he carried, and Mike pulled out some sea shells, a packet of salt, and a few pairs of wool socks. Setting all that on the ground, they stood back and let Sam look it over.
He suddenly grinned, “We’ll be gla
d to trade. Even shells. Nice haul. Food? Do you want food? What will you have? A woman? We have a woman to trade. She’s a hard worker, and she minds well, and you can have her and her child.”
“A woman?” Mali asked. She immediately felt a dislike for Sam and his bunch.
“Yeah. She’s a hard worker, I swear, and you won’t regret it. She is a storyteller, but it ain’t her fault; she’s just one of those kind. Smack her if she don’t behave, and she’ll straighten up right fine.”
“That sounds good. We’ll smack her for sure if she is lazy,” Trevor said.
Mali looked questioningly at Trevor.
Sam turned, “Get corn for these travelers, and bring the woman and kid. Bring some blankets.”
Trevor shrugged and whispered, “It’s better if we take the woman and child than to leave them. Let’s take the trade.”
“We know there are others, but I can’t say I like their ways,” Wodanaz whispered back.
Sam said they could sit and motioned to some logs on the dirt-covered lawn, and he eased back to settle on the porch steps, saying it would be just a “little bit of time” before they had the trade ready.
Trevor said he would stand, and he, Wodanaz, and Bray stayed ready to draw their guns if the need arose. Mali and Shimei sat down, and Mike walked around, pretending to pick up sticks and looking around carefully.
Men brought a litter that could be pulled, and they piled a huge bag of fresh ears of corn on it, shucks and all. They had hand-sewn quilts that they folded and added to the pile, plus several skins of whiskey. The men strapped it all on with ropes. Across the top, they added two long handled farm shovels, a small bag of planting corn and some dusty books in another bag. Evidently, they thought the woman and child were the best part of the trade.
She was painfully thin, tall, and plain-faced, and Sam said her name was Imogene and the child was Isaac. She was dressed in a shapeless, threadbare dress with high topped, scuffed shoes, and the child was in faded jeans, worn-out sneakers, and a thin tee shirt. Neither showed any facial expressions and simply listened as Sam said they were being traded for things the community needed.