by Ike Hamill
JOHN RAN INTO THE woods and crouched behind a big oak. He lowered himself to the ground until his body was covered by the low bushes. He watched the family working on their bicycles. His eyes were drawn back to the house. They were trying to ignore it, but it was all he could think about. Those shifting bugs had swarmed over the clapboards. A few blocks away, they were doing the same to his own house. He struggled to come up with a reasonable explanation. There was none. The world was crazy and it was starting to take his sanity with it.
When he heard the girl scream, he nearly screamed himself. She yelled as she ran. John turned and waited. She eventually appeared between the trees. He recognized her. She was younger than his daughter, but all the local kids had played together at one point or another. Back at the garage, the youngest Hazard girl jumped on her bike and rode it towards the street to intercept the girl who had screamed.
John watched.
He couldn’t hear what they were saying for the most part. At one point, the one girl screamed, “Shut up!” at the Hazard girl. She ran away soon after.
Then something panicked the family. John strained to see what they were looking at. They were focused on the road. The leaves and trees blocked his view. He thought he saw a dark shape, but he couldn’t tell who it was.
They all rode off towards town and John waited. His eyes turned back to the house where the bugs still shifted. From his distance, he could almost convince himself that it was just a trick of the light. Maybe the heat rising from the driveway was making the air shimmer or something. He had seen them up close. He knew what he was looking at.
The house flashed. It changed colors to red and then blue. The hues were startling. They didn’t belong in a summer day—they were too bold to be natural.
John decided that he couldn’t hide forever, and he certainly didn’t want to be close the flashing house. He was going to have to run.
Somewhere his girls and his wife were shopping, at least he hoped they were. He hoped that all this craziness ended at the town’s border, and they were oblivious and safe. He had to find a way down there. If not to save his own skin, he needed to make sure that they didn’t come back to this mess. He rose to his knees and froze, waiting to see what would happen. When nothing jumped out to grab him, he put a hand on the trunk of the tree and rose to his feet.
John walked carefully through the brush until he got to the road. He turned away from town and walked as fast as he could south. As he went, he picked up speed. It felt good to be moving. A plan began to form as his panic quieted down—if he could get to Minot’s old place, then he could borrow one of the tractors there. They kept them for mowing the big fields out next to the grade school, and John knew where the keys were. People had said that the cars were dead, but maybe a tractor would work.
If nothing else, there were a couple of horses at the farm next door to Minot. John hadn’t ridden in a while, but he could figure it out if need be.
John liked having a plan. His plan made everything a little less scary.
He walked for a while, turning over the plan in his head. It was solid, and thinking about it made his feet move faster. He had miles to walk, but his goal was certainly achievable.
“John?” a voice called.
He stopped.
It was so distant. It could have easily been a bird or something. He listened for another second and then started walking again.
“John!” the voice called.
It was louder the second time, and he recognized it. That had been Rose’s voice. She was somewhere close.
He opened his mouth to call to her and stopped himself. It had to be a trick. Someone was trying to trick him.
“Johnny, please come quick!”
He turned and let his eyes shift over the houses. These were the houses of Summer People. He didn’t know any of them. Some people resented all the Summer People who flocked to the town for the good weather. They appeared from nowhere and clogged up the roads and stores. John liked them. They brought fresh ideas and attitudes with them each summer. For that, he would gladly stand in line a little longer at the market.
But he didn’t know them, and his wife didn’t know them either. There was no chance that it was really her voice coming from one of the places. He must have imagined it. It had been a stressful day. It shouldn’t be surprising that his tired brain was starting to play tricks on him.
He started walking.
“John, please?”
This time his eyes were already fixed on the place when the voice called out. He saw where it came from—the door to the A-frame house was wide open.
“Come quick!” Rose called from the house. “It’s Josie!”
John had a soft spot for his youngest. Ruth could take care of herself. Josie wasn’t as self-reliant. John picked up his pace.
He was still skeptical until he heard his daughter’s voice. It was Josie.
“Daddy? Please help me.”
John ran.
The front door was open. The door had been partially torn from its hinges and rested against the wall. He heard her sobbing coming from the lower level. John saw the blood at the top of the stairs and he practically flew down the staircase. At the bottom, he stopped and spun around. He could hear her sobs, but there was nobody in the room. His eyes fell to the floor, where three candles burned in the points of a pentagram.
His hand flew to his chest. He turned at the sound of a cabinet door banging open. John stumbled back towards the stairs as he saw a spidery robot about the size of a kitten emerge from the darkness. His eyes went wide as the thing climbed up the wall and hit a button on the stereo.
Moving backwards, John began to climb the stairs. His legs barely seemed to work. He stumbled up the first step and saw blood pooling in the center of the pentagram.
John turned and climbed with his hands and feet, like a little kid. As he made it to the top, he saw the door being dragged away from the wall by its lower hinge. It was trying to close itself. John ran and jumped easily through the opening. He ran out to the yard before he turned around and tried to puzzle through what he had just seen. It had to be some kind of trick—his family wasn’t in there. The sound of Josie’s sobs had been too loud. If she had been in here, he would have seen her. It was a trick.
John saw movement through the dark doorway. That was enough for him. He ran. He made it to the end of the driveway before he heard the voice.
“Stop,” it said.
John didn’t stop. He turned right and kept running.
A high, electronic whine sounded like one of those remote-controlled cars. John turned his head as his feet tangled on something and he went down. He slid to a stop on the pavement, leaving a streak of skin from one palm. John sucked in a breath as he pulled his lips into a grimace.
He barked out in pain as he pushed himself back to his feet.
This time he saw the thing with its whining electric motor. The black blur zipped out from the bushes and rammed into his ankle before it disappeared through the trees across the road. He tried to jump out of the way, but the impact sent him back to the ground.
As he got up again, he realized that there was a shape a few paces behind him. John looked around as he wiped his bleeding hand on his shirt.
The man was bloody too. More accurately, he was made of blood.
“I told you to stop,” the blood man said. “Now you’re damaged.”
“Damaged,” John whispered. He tried to back away. The thing’s eyes were black holes with infinite gravity. He could feel them pulling at him. John resisted and stumbled backwards.
“You could be a part of something great, John Alexander Endicott,” the thing said. Whenever its lips parted, he saw the blackness there too. He imagined drowning in there, in that bottomless pool of blood. The liquid swirled and frothed under what he imagined was its transparent skin.
“Join me, John Alexander Endicott,” the thing said. It reached out a fluid arm. The fingers shimmered in a patch of sunlight.
“No,” he whispered. John shook his head. His legs were numb. It was a wonder that he was still moving. They must have been on autopilot—he didn’t feel like he was controlling his limbs at all. With that thought, he stopped. The blood man didn’t stop. He kept coming, reaching with that wet hand.
“Come to me, John Alexander Endicott,” the man said. “You’ll live forever.”
John shook his head. It was the only part of his body he could still control.
“I’ll let you see your family again.”
His heart lurched at the idea. That was the one thing he wanted more than anything else. He wanted to see them. No, that wasn’t right, he wanted them to be safe. He shook his head and tried to take back the first thought. It didn’t matter if he saw them as long as they were safe. It felt like he had already made the deal by agreeing with the first thought. It seemed like the idea couldn’t be withdrawn.
The blood man was nodding and smiling, like he agreed with John.
John hadn’t said anything aloud.
Its mouth opened and John saw that blackness again. He saw that void and felt the pull of its gravity. He couldn’t run. The mouth got wider and wider. The wet hand circled around his back and pulled him into a wet embrace. John felt the blood through his damp shirt. He felt it soaking into his pants. The mouth closed over his head. He was consumed into the body of blood.
When John was gone, the thing turned around.
It faced downhill now, towards the town.
When it smiled, the void was covered now. The thing had a fresh new set of white teeth.
Chapter 44 : Dunn
[ Battle ]
“GOOD, MONKEYS!” MARY YELLED to the children. “Get them!”
The kids couldn’t break the little robots, but they were good at stopping them in their tracks. Mary finished off the one that had come at her and she turned to get the one that George had stunned. With that one done, she took care of Lori’s.
That made a dozen. At first, the attack had come only from the rear. But before long, the kids had been chased back to her by more of the robots. It almost seemed like they were being herded back together.
“Which way, George?” Mary asked. Her son pointed. “Okay, get moving.”
She put one hand on Lori’s back, guiding her forward. The other hand held her stick. She wasn’t about to give that up.
“They keep coming from this direction,” George said. “Mostly.”
“What’s that?” Mary asked.
“The spider bugs,” he said. “Most of them come from this way. We’re probably gonna hit more of them.”
Mary slowed down as she thought about that. The first few had come from behind, like they were being chased. If George was right—and it seemed like he was—then most of the robots were now coming from the south. Who was sending them? Were they being circled? Did someone know what direction they were heading?
Mary thought about those people on the road. Maybe they were responsible for this robot army. In the end, it might not matter how easy they were to destroy. Enough of the little buggers could prove to be a challenge.
“Is there another way around, George?” she asked.
“There’s a hill and then the lake,” George pointed. “And that way is the road.”
“Yeah, all right,” Mary said. “I guess we’ll just have to keep killing those things when we see them.”
George nodded. Mary looked to Lori. After a second, she nodded too.
“Good,” Mary said. “Keep those sticks up.”
She trusted George to lead the way and watch out for danger. Mary focused most of her attention behind them. She was horrified by the idea of a sneak attack. Another of the little cockroach robots came from the side. Mary hit it with a good diagonal swing and the thing stopped twitching as it rolled to a stop. They were easiest to kill with a good hit to the corner—it dented the metal in and snuffed something inside.
“Mom?” George said.
Her boy was pointing his stick a little east of south. She saw a line of twitching leaves. The bugs were coordinating a big attack. They would be surrounded if they tried to fight them off. She either had to outrun them, or get to one end of the line so she would only have to protect one angle. Mary scanned the line to try to see how far it extended. She was distracted by the buzzing sound of another drone. The things were pulling out all the stops. It was time to get going.
“Go right, George. Run away from them,” Mary said.
He was a smart boy, and sometimes he actually minded what she said. George tossed his stick, grabbed Lori by the hand, and veered to his right as he picked up the pace. She waited for him to turn back and wait for her. It was inevitable.
When he did, she called to him. “Keep going, George. I’m right behind you. I’m following your trail. I promise.”
He listened.
Mary saw the line of bugs stretch out as one side picked up the pace. The observation proved her conjecture. The things weren’t swarming, or trying to attack as quickly as possible. They were herding Mary and the kids. But they were also providing Mary an opportunity. Instead of following directly in George’s path, as she had promised, Mary turned more east on a track that would intersect the line of bugs where they had stretched out.
As their trajectories intersected, Mary planted her feet and swung. She took out one of the bugs in the middle of the line easily. She turned towards the arm that was closing on George and Lori. Ignoring the bugs that were pulling up behind, Mary overtook the line, smashing the one in the rear with a couple of good hits. Before long, she was panting like a sprinter and ignoring the heat in her ankle. She took the next one and moved up the line. Behind her, the little claws of the cockroach robots scrabbled through the leaves.
She heard the buzz of another flying robot and scanned the tree canopy to try to spot it.
George and Lori were easily outpacing her and the robots. Mary saw the end of the formation. She only had another four or five of the things to kill and then they could swing back on course.
Mary took out one more before she called to her son. “George! Veer left!”
Glancing over her shoulder, she saw that she was putting some distance between herself and the back half of the line. That was good—it meant that she could keep ahead of them. Mary took out another one.
She didn’t see the rusty coil of barbed wire that was poking up over the leaves. It caught Mary’s bad ankle and she toppled like a tree. Compounding her clumsiness, Mary tried to yank her foot free. The wire bit into her skin, tearing a hot gash in her swollen ankle. She bit down on the scream that rose to her lips.
The machines were making up time behind her.
She pushed herself up, spat out a leaf, and released her foot from the wire.
George and Lori were running back to the left. She spotted their shapes between the trees in the distance. There were still a few of the robots between her and her son. She had to bash them so she wouldn’t be fighting on two fronts.
Mary struggled to her feet, practically dragging her bad leg behind herself. The ankle was worse than ever. It would barely hold her weight. It wasn’t a matter of pain, the whole leg just felt mechanically unstable. She tugged herself forward, leaning on the stick and holding onto trees as she limped. It took a few strides, but she caught the machine in the rear and destroyed it with one blow. She stepped over the carcass and hunted down the next one.
In the distance, she heard George grunt and leaves fly as he contended with another one of the cockroach robots.
Her ankle rolled and her knee tried to bend the wrong way. Mary clamped her jaw shut so she wouldn’t scream.
“Ha!” George yelled. He must have taken one out.
“That’s it, monkey!” she yelled. George swung his stick like a little ape.
Mary managed to catch another of the things and crush it with her stick.
George and Lori weren’t moving fast enough. Even at her limping pace, Mary was catching them.
&
nbsp; “Faster!” she yelled.
“Hurry up,” George yelled back.
Mary stole a glance over her shoulder. She was only marginally faster than the robots.
“Of course,” she whispered. It made sense—she was struggling to catch up with the last robot ahead of her, so of course the ones behind her must be keeping up. She dug deep and limped as fast as she could. Finally, she got within reach of the last one between her and the kids. Mary beat the life out of the robot until its legs stopped twitching.
“Go to the cemetery!” she yelled.
“You come with us,” George yelled back.
It sounded like he was just on the other side of the little rise.
“Cemetery. Now!” she said. She turned back to the remaining robots. She had managed to get them all lined up so they would be coming one at a time. It was ideal. Even if she couldn’t kill them all, she would be able to delay them enough so the kids could get away.
Mary swung at the first. She stopped it. It was still clawing at the forest floor, but it wasn’t moving forward. The stick slipped from her hand. Mary let out a groan as she tried to lower herself down to pick it up again. Her leg was worse than useless. It was an anchor of pain.
The next robot got a claw on her hand before she managed to get up. It tore skin as she batted it away. Mary tried to stab the stick downwards. Her blow didn’t have enough force to disable it. Another of the bugs was closing the distance.
Mary swung the stick and crushed one of the robots against her good ankle. She almost lost her balance. She caught herself against a tree and stayed upright. One of the robots was trying to climb up her bad foot. Mary couldn’t swing the stick at that one—her foot would probably break off. She focused on one of the other approaching bugs and let the painful bastard climb her skin with its tiny claws.
Mary let out a triumphant scream as she killed another one.
A new pain flared in her leg and she looked down to see that one of the bugs was inserting a metal probe into her skin. When she hit it with her hand, it was stuck there, like a burrowing tick. The blow only hurt herself.