by Dan Padavona
The strange beast glared up at the blind man in the bedroom window, then slipped back into the shadow of a palm at the sound of the man’s voice through the window. In the sultry Florida air, the heat did not touch the beast. Twice the length and weight of a timber wolf, the beast’s paws left deep imprints in the grass as it crept from yard to yard.
It desired to kill the blind man; the monster’s heart rate quickened.
The neighborhood community unsettled the beast for some reason it couldn’t fathom. It sensed a powerful danger amid the white Victorians, just as its brethren had sensed before meeting their demise in Okbeth.
Like black silk on the bottom of the sea, the monster dissolved into the backyard flora. Facing another tall Victorian home, the beast’s fur stood on end as it crouched in shadow. A growl rumbled out of its chest. The air felt alive, as though the night bristled with static electricity.
A small animal scurried beneath a hedge, the beast’s eyes following its progress hungrily. A cloud converged on the moon, blotting out its light and plunging the backyards into a deeper darkness. Now a light shone from a second floor window, and as the beast watched, the shadow of a man hurriedly walking passed over the frame.
The monster moved ghost-like through the darkness, a black shadow among shadows. From one backyard, it spied a plain-looking brown-haired woman leaning over a bed to check on a girl pretending to be asleep. In the street-facing bedroom of another house, a pretty blonde woman with wavy hair lay curled within a man’s arms upon a bed. In the lighted downstairs of another home, two men talked across a dining room table.
Twigs snapped behind the beast, and a small shape bounded out of the dark, barking. Before the beagle could alert the neighborhood to the danger, the beast snatched it off the ground by its neck. The beagle yelped, then squealed as the beast’s jaws bit through the dog’s neck.
A porch light flicked on outside the house where the woman had laid the girl to sleep. The woman ducked her head out the back door and called.
“Sammy?”
Cricket songs swelled. The beast uttered a low growl, then went silent, waiting for the woman to follow the dog’s path. After a long time listening, the woman wrinkled her brow and shut the door, the click of the thrown deadbolt audible from several properties away. The beast crept into the dark of night.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
The Wolf Man
Mitch Bloom returned from the refrigerator with two cold beer bottles. Handing one to Don Plintzke, Mitch plopped onto a chair and placed his bottle on the dining room table.
“Thanks, Indiana.”
“Anytime, Don.”
Mitch popped the cap off with his thumb. While the beer bubbled and fizzed, he pressed the bottle to his lips before it overflowed. He drank the first third of the bottle in a few gulps, as Don nursed his bottle, sipping at it.
A small man with a round face and thick-lensed glasses that made his eyes appear bug-like, Don seemed skittish tonight.
“You really think Lance is right—there might be a hostile faction of survivors?”
“Who can say?” Mitch took another swig. “Lance is a smart guy.”
“But with all that stuff he went through, having to wade through a swamp just to get rescued, maybe he’s letting his imagination get the best of him.”
“Don’t forget he’s a marine. He’s the last guy I’d expect to wilt under pressure.” But Mitch wondered about Lance. He had been acting odd today, especially when he’d fixated—Can a blind man stare?—on Tori Daniels.
“Yeah, I suppose you’re right.” Don’s eyes widened, and with the magnification of his lenses, he looked like a frightened alien. “Hey, if Lance is right, maybe this whole idea of planting signs isn’t so smart. Do we really want to direct people to where we are?”
“Come on, Don. Darren’s and Carina’s signs directed you to the neighborhood. Everyone who has rolled in so far has fit right in—Dr. Erickson and those two kids, Hank Jenner, Sue Everett and her girl, Tori and Blake.”
“Sure. It’s already like a real neighborhood. But what if the next group is a couple of troublemakers? Druggies or thugs. Then what? Do we tell them they can’t live here? And what if they want to fight, or someone pulls a gun?”
Mitch hadn’t thought of that. Remembering Lance’s fear of an armed group attacking the neighborhood made his mouth turn dry.
But who am I to pass judgment on who belongs in the neighborhood and who doesn’t?
“All I’m saying, Mitch, is we have a good thing going at Florida Bliss. The weather is nice year round—winter here is gonna feel a lot nicer than it did in Massachusetts—and I trust my neighbors. But it only takes one bad apple to upset the applecart.”
Mitch stared out the window, where the night lay hidden behind the bright lights of the downstairs. The feeble glass of the window seemed to thin as darkness pressed against it. He felt suddenly exposed, pins and needles tickling his fingers and toes. Is someone watching us through the window?
“So you’re saying we shouldn’t place any more signs?” Mitch asked.
“If I had my way, I’d take the existing signs down.” Mitch scowled and stared at his beer. “Look, it’s not like we’re locking people out of society. We found this place, so it should be ours.”
“We didn’t find it. Carina’s company built it, and she and Darren directed us here. And thank God she did, or we’d all still be driving around the country with no place to go.”
“There are a million other places for people to live.”
“A million places with solar-powered electricity, warm water, garden plots, and an established orchard? Come on, Don.”
“I know, I know. But the orchard is good for what—one peach and one orange per person, per day? Even after the gardens are planted and producing, most of our food supply will still come from boxed and canned food out of the nearby supermarkets. It’s a lot of work to bring all that food back to the community every day.”
“And you’ve been busting your behind to get it here.”
“No more than anyone else. Just remember there is a finite supply. Eventually we’ll clear out the shelves, and that’s assuming rats or other animals don’t get to it first.”
“So we should take down the signs and hide from other survivors?”
Don leaned forward, clasping his hands together on the table.
“I think we should listen to Lance. Instead of inviting people to join us, we should set up watch posts to—”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa. That’s taking things too far. We aren’t at war with other survivors. I’m sorry, Don, but I can’t support setting up encampments. Besides, there aren’t enough people in the community to form a guard. Who are you going to send? Sue and her daughter? Doctor Erickson? Hank?”
Don cocked his eyebrow. “How about Viper?”
“What about him? He was pretty clear about wanting to live on his own by the coast. From everything Hank has said about Viper, the guy is a bit of a lone wolf. He’s not gonna agree to pulling guard duty for us.”
“I’d feel a lot safer with a guy like him around to watch our backs.”
“Maybe so, but—”
The words caught in Mitch’s throat as something huge bounded past the window. The blood drained from his face; he looked like a corpse. Don glanced between Mitch and the window.
“Mitch? Are you all right? You look like you just saw a ghost.”
“Jesus, Don. Something big just ran through the yard.”
“It was probably just a dog.”
Mitch rose from the chair and walked to the sliding glass doors, shaking his head. A meager pane of glass was all that separated the dining room from the outside world. “That was no dog.”
Twisting around in his chair, Don nervously pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “Lots of wildlife out there, Indiana. It could have been a bear. Hell, it wouldn’t surprise me if the animals started to move back in—”
“Shh.” Mitch cocked his head, his ea
r pressed against the cool glass. Through the doors he heard the muffled sounds of the night and maybe something else, slinking through the darkness. A chill ran down his back, as though a goose had walked across his grave. Worry began to etch creases into Don’s face, as he sat silently watching Mitch.
“There’s something out there, Don. And it ain’t no bear.”
The door no sooner closed behind Joline than Michael’s fears of something stalking the night were forgotten. Emboldened by his successful rebellion, with the excitement of creeping secretly through the night quickening his heart, Michael pulled Duncan down the sidewalk, away from the doctor’s house. Moths and big, black beetles winged around a lamppost, popping against the glass covering like hail stones.
“Hey. I thought you said we were supposed to go home.”
Michael grinned. “Where’s the adventure in that?”
The two boys cut behind Joline’s house, hugging the walls where shadows spilled across the grass. The lawn grew thick and long, nobody having mowed Florida Bliss in nearly two weeks, and fresh dew soaked into their sneakers. The Victorian’s upstairs light flicked off, throwing the yard into a sudden, Stygian darkness.
“Where are we going?” Duncan asked.
“Into the jungle.”
“It’s a field, not a jungle.”
“And you suck at pretending. Besides, I want to get a look at the hot girl who moved in this afternoon.”
Even in the darkness Michael saw Duncan’s eyes widen.
“Maybe she’s getting undressed.”
“Maybe, if you don’t move your ass, we’ll miss everything.”
The foliage seemed to swallow them as they ducked through a stand of ferns, and now it really did seem like a jungle, the fecund earth squishing under their sneakers. Somewhere in the tangle, a frog croaked, and a creek gurgled. Duncan stumbled twice, his footing blind to him in the descending black.
“Better not fall. The wolf man will get you.”
“There’s no such thing as a wolf man, Michael. Knock it off.”
“Oh yeah? Didn’t you ever hear about the thing killing people in Florida last year? I’m being serious. It was on the news.”
“Bullshit.”
Michael grinned, noticing Duncan had moved closer to him.
“Truth. Now, I’m not saying it was really a wolf man. That sounded hokey to me, too. But the murders really happened, and police found animal fur at the scenes.”
“What kind of animal was it?” Duncan’s voice trembled.
“That’s the thing. They ran all sorts of scientific tests on the fur, and it wasn’t a known animal.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. The whole wolf man rumor only started because of the clawed footprints the police kept finding near the bodies. But you’re right. There probably isn’t really a wolf man.”
“Of course there isn’t. Is there?”
“No. But the murders happened real close to here. One lady had her head bitten off at the neck.”
“Stop it, Michael. I’m getting scared.”
The creek gurgled louder, blending with the swish of ferns as they pressed through the foliage. They had to be close to Tori’s backyard by now, and there Michael would lead them out of the vegetation. A troubling thought tickled at the back of his neck. What if he had lost his way, and they were too deep into the foliage to find their way back in the dark? Michael thought he heard the plants whisper behind him, but that was probably just the wind.
Funny, since the wind is calm.
The sidewalk lampposts were no longer visible. The sense of isolation grew. Duncan’s hands gripped the back of Michael’s shirt, and Michael realized his story had scared himself a little.
This is ridiculous. Why would I be scared of something I made up?
In the darkness, leaning palms became monsters, hunched over and waiting for children to pass too close. Leaves swished like witches’ laughter.
The foliage rustled from behind, and this time Michael was certain it was not the wind. He wished he had not left the backyards or told Duncan the stupid story.
Twigs crackled down the path, back where the rustling sound had come from.
“Let’s go home,” Duncan said. “I don’t like it out here.”
“We’ve gotta be close to the new girl’s house. Let’s head toward the yards.”
Duncan gripped Michael’s shirt like a lifeline as they weaved through the morass. Fronds slapped at their faces, some splashing water against their shirts. They should have reached the backyards by now. When Michael stopped and looked around tentatively, Duncan began to sob.
“We’re lost. Aren’t we?”
“Don’t cry. We’re not lost. The backyards have got to be right around here.”
A branch snapped, the shotgun blast of a large bough splitting in two.
Michael’s heart pounded.
It’s probably nothing. Probably just a limb breaking off a tree that had been weakened by the storms.
He focused his thoughts on the future. At this time tomorrow night, they would all be in the park again, sneaking out for another midnight play date, and boy, what a heck of a story he would tell Joline about their adventure in the jungle. The backyards were just ahead. They had to be. All he had to do was walk a little farther.
Duncan squealed.
“The wolf man! I hear the wolf man, Michael!”
“There is no wolf man. It was just a story.”
Horror skittered down Michael’s back like swarming daddy-longlegs. His legs turned to rubber, and he nearly fell from Duncan pressing against him.
“I hear him.”
“I don’t hear anything,” Michael whispered. He swung his head, scrutinizing every shadow, of which the jungle stored an endless supply. His teeth chattered, and as he staggered through a clump of ferns that looked identical to the surrounding maze of vegetation, he tried not to listen, terrified of what he would hear.
“Oh, God, Michael. I hear the wolf man. It’s everywhere. I hear it everywhere.”
Michael focused on the sound of the creek, holding dear to his faith that the neighborhood was just ahead. But he discerned something below the babble of water, a rumbling growl, building and building as though a bomb might explode. A fierce odor swelled out of the darkness, mordant and unholy. Duncan’s eyes widened, threatening to consume the whole of his head. And then Michael was certain they were not alone.
“Run, Duncan.”
Michael’s legs were icicles. He could not move no matter how much he wanted to run. Duncan’s grip pushed beyond the back of his shirt, finding the skin folds across his back. The younger boy stood just as frozen, and then he removed one hand, pointing into the darkness. Michael tried to follow Duncan’s finger with his eyes, but all he saw was black. He looked, but couldn’t see. He looked and looked until his mind stopped blocking the truth of what his eyes saw.
“Run!”
The howling darkness bounded out of the jungle.
A loud noise jostled Blake out of sleep. He bolted upright in bed, searching the shadows for the cause. Had the noise been inside a dream? The bedroom was nothing but shadows and indistinct contours, the window awash with the black ink of night. Somewhere below—from the backyard?—trees and plants rustled, too loud to have been caused by wind. He imagined someone standing in the backyard, watching him from the trees. A chill crept down the back of his neck.
He started to push himself out of bed, his legs swinging off the edge of the mattress, when a hand pressed against his mouth. He screamed, but the strong hand stifled it. Turning his head, he saw the silhouette of a man leaning over his bed. Though the man’s facial features were lost to the darkness, Blake instantly knew it was the same man from the Georgia hotel room. The hand moved away from his mouth.
“How did you—”
“Blake, there is no time for explanation. You and Tori are in danger, and if you do not do as I say, you will both be killed.”
“Killed? Who’s in the back
yard?”
“Something you and Tori are not ready to face alone. Whatever you hear outside, you are not to leave this house. Do you understand?”
A cold sweat broke over Blake’s brow. Something outside his window pushed through a row of palms. He thought he heard distant thunder rolling across the peninsula but realized the sound wasn’t thunder. It was the growl of some monstrous animal, some unspeakable demon.
“What is that thing?”
Blake blinked. He stood alone in the room, no sign of the man. Blake spun in a circle, already knowing the man was gone.
The wind pressed against the house, trying to slither its way inside, as the darkness of the bedroom thickened. Palm fronds whispered, the susurrus of rats scurrying over ancient parchment.
Creeping toward the window, fretting each step might cause a floorboard to squeal and give away his presence, Blake looked out into the night. At first, all he saw were the swaying palms and the silhouettes of neighboring houses. But as he peered into the depths of the flora, he saw red eyes staring back at him, like twin hurricane lanterns. Whatever crouched in the shadows, it was humongous. A low growl rumbled out from the palms.
Blake stepped back into the shadows of the bedroom, assured he stood in total darkness, yet just as certain the beast could see him. Heart pounding, Blake turned for the hallway, calling Tori’s name. An unholy howl penetrated the silence of Florida Bliss. Porch lights flared to life up and down the street. A monster had come for them all.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
The Beast Arrives
The sound of a million insects singing to the night ceased, and in the murk descending upon the neighborhood, a woman’s scream tore the darkness asunder. Porch lights flickered to life up and down the neighborhood, the murmur of concerned voices swelling into panic as the residents tried to determine the source of the cry. A guttural roar emanated from the backyards, then a gunshot, and the terrible sound of a man crying for help while something vile dragged him into the trees.
When Blake burst into Tori’s room, she stood waiting for him, her eyes deep ponds reflecting the terror of the moon.