Clickers II: The Next Wave

by J. F. Gonzalez

  Officer Strong activated his siren once to scare them away from his car, and they scattered. The boardwalk was so thick with people falling all over themselves to get away that it was hard to move the car forward through them without hitting anybody. He activated the siren again, hoping the sound would be enough to part the crowd to enable him to drive away, but nobody paid attention. For the first time in his ten-year stint as a cop, Lyle Strong was afraid.

  A young girl who appeared to be no older than fourteen stumbled in front of him. Her face was streaked with blood. A lumbering fat man tripped over her and fell, sprawling face down. The girl climbed on him, using the hood of his car to hoist herself up. Somehow through all the noise of people screaming and yelling in their mad dash to flee, he made out what she was saying: “Something’s eating my boyfriend!”

  Officer Lyle Strong stopped the car and got out. He went to the young girl, trying to make some sense out of what was happening, paying no heed to the mass confusion around him, when suddenly it was on him. There was no time to run or draw his weapon. He saw the segmented tail jerk forward; felt the impact of its stinger jabbing him in the abdomen like a punch in the gut. The force of the impact sent him crashing against the squad car and he barely had time to scream before the thing snapped his head off with one blood red claw and began to feast.

  * * *

  Bobby Duncan was ten thousand dollars in the hole at the poker table and was trying to win it back, but he finally threw his cards down in disgust when the dealer left the table. “Aw, Jesus man, it’s probably just a bunch of fucking kids stirring shit up!” Bobby had been aware that something was happening outside for the past ten minutes, but he hadn’t gotten up from his game. The dealer had dealt him cards and chips and Bobby had been involved in his own little world, not even thinking about the screams and running feet of people outside, the sirens and the honking horns of vehicles echoing in the casino. Goddamn kids, probably. Maybe it was the god-damned Arabs finally starting shit over here again. Fucking towel-head motherfuckers blowing themselves up in the Sin Capital of the East Coast next to New York City, of course. Bobby didn’t give a shit if the entire

  September 11th scenario was being replayed three times worse. He had to dig himself out of this hole, had to at least double that to throw Eddie Marino some money so that crazy wop wouldn’t come sniffing around when Bobby wasn’t expecting it. And then when Marino was temporarily satisfied with ten Gs, Bobby was getting the fuck out of Jersey. Maybe even out of the country.

  “Walk away from this table, I’m just grabbing chips and cashing shit in!” he called to the dealer. The dealer wasn’t listening. He was looking outside one of the large plate-glass windows at whatever was going on outside.

  Bobby watched him for a moment, and then looked around at the now empty casino. The place had literally emptied out within the past five minutes as people began to be drawn out by the frenzied sounds from outside. The hardcore gamblers like Bobby had stayed behind, but eventually they, too, had been drawn away. Now it was just Bobby and a couple of guys in suits wandering around the casino floor—security probably. Bobby looked around, trying to see if anybody was watching him. If the dealer wasn’t coming back, then fuck him. Bobby was going to nab a couple of thousand dollar chips and see if he could cash out.

  He was just about to do it when there was a sound of shattering glass. Bobby looked toward the front of the casino. “What the—?”

  The dealer was on the ground, covered in glass, and a large black guy was on top of him. Some large red thing was on top of him, and Bobby sat there staring at the scene, trying to comprehend what was going on. For a minute he thought he was trapped in one of those CGI things in movies—Jurassic Park or some shit like that. It looked like some creature with claws and a tail like a scorpion was eating the black guy, and the dealer of his poker table had been unfortunately pinned beneath them as the creature and its meal sailed through the plate glass window. Time seemed to crawl for Bobby; he saw more people screaming, running back into the casino; he saw quick glimpses of more of those crab-things chasing people; he saw an old lady stagger inside the casino, her belly…well, the only word he could think of what was happening to her belly was that it was melting. She fell face first on the carpeted floor of the casino and that’s when Bobby’s paralysis broke and he turned and almost ran straight into Eddie Marino.

  Eddie Marino grabbed him. He looked past Bobby at the havoc unfolding behind them. “What the fuck’s going on here?”

  “Let go of me!” Bobby yelled and kneed Eddie Marino in the balls.

  Eddie howled, clutching his groin. He tumbled to the floor, his face ashen, as Bobby ran toward the rear of the casino, once again survival kicking in as he pushed past people in his mad haste to get the hell out of the casino.

  * * *

  Tony Genova and Vince Napoli were sitting in a beachside café, waiting for Frankie Spicolli to show up so they could make the exchange. Tony watched his obese partner shovel a chicken wrap into his mouth, and then inhale a second one. They’d been partnered for over six years now, and Tony was still amazed at how much food Vince could eat.

  He squeezed his feet together, making sure the briefcase was still between them under the table. Wouldn’t do to lose it now; not with all that junk inside. When Spicolli arrived, he’d give them another briefcase, this one filled with money. Tony preferred the latter. If the cops pulled you over, it was a lot easier to explain a briefcase full of cash than it was one full of heroin.

  “So what are we doing after this?” Vince asked, crumbs dropping from his open mouth. “We got time to hit the blackjack tables?”

  Tony shook his head. “Mr. Marano wants us back in York today. We still got to deal with the fucking Greek, and then we’ll pay a visit to our friend on Roosevelt Avenue. Drop the Greek off there. Our friend will take care of the rest.”

  “Yeah, but it’s the Fourth of July weekend.” Vince wiped a blob of mayonnaise off his chin.

  “We don’t get vacations.” Tony sipped his espresso. “You know that. Not in this line of work. Besides, the Greek is going to the fireworks. That’s where we’ll do it. They only got fireworks once per year.”

  “Won’t be no fireworks if it rains.”

  “You a fucking weatherman now, Vince? You want a job on the Weather Channel? The fuck you know about when it’s gonna rain?”

  “That hurricane. I saw it on the news. Said we could get over twelve inches of rain.”

  Tony sighed. “That’s down south, Vince. Hurricane Gary ain’t supposed to make it this far north.”

  “But it could still make it rain here, and if it did, there wouldn’t be no fireworks. What will we do then?”

  Tony sighed. “Lock the Greek in a room with you and let the two of you discuss the weather for an hour. That’s enough to kill any man.”

  “You ain’t got to be mean, Tony. I’m just saying.”

  Pouting, Vince picked up a pastry. Before he could eat it, someone screamed. Both men glanced out the window, their senses instantly aware, and hands automatically reaching beneath their suit jackets.

  “The fuck?” Tony gaped, processing what he saw in the street.

  Tony Genova had seen some weird shit in his lifetime—stuff he didn’t tell the other guys about (except for Vince, who’d been with him on many of those occasions). But what he saw now took the prize. The monster was the size of a VW Bug. He knew that because it was facing off against a VW Bug. The girl inside was screaming, pounding on the horn. The creature looked like a cross between a crab, lobster and scorpion. It had flattened the car’s front tires with its massive claws and was now smashing the windshield with its tail. Another crab-thing scuttled down the sidewalk, stinger lashing out and impaling fleeing pedestrians. More of the creatures followed along behind it, stopping to feed on the bodies. The air was filled with shrieks, tires screeching, horns blaring, alarms—and tearing sounds. Horrible tearing sounds.

  One of the things weaved towards the
café’s storefront, waving its claws in the air.

  “Fuck this.” Tony grabbed the briefcase and stood up, knocking his chair to the floor. “Drop the Danish and move your fat ass, Vince. We’re outta here.”

  Vince stared out the window in horror, the forgotten pastry still clutched in his fingers. “But what about Spicolli? What about the drop?”

  “Fuck Spicolli. Take a look outside. You think he’s really gonna show now?”

  The crab thing drew closer, only a few feet away from the large glass windows. Vince sprang to his feet, quick and graceful despite his prodigious bulk. He drew his Kimber 1911, and Tony pulled his Sig-Sauer. The other patrons cried out at both the things in the street and the two men with guns. Tony and Vince ran for the kitchen, hoping the things outside weren’t lingering around the café’s rear exit. Glass shattered behind them.

  “Not for nothing,” Vince panted as they raced through the back door, “but I’d rather be in Vegas right now.”

  * * *

  Linda Young was stressed. She was a police dispatcher for the Atlantic City PD, and since shortly after twelve hundred hours, the radio had been jammed with distress signals from officers down at the Boardwalk. Linda had talked to one of them—Burt Young—before communications were cut off abruptly. It appeared that the rest of her cohorts were going through the same thing. Her entire team had been briefed on the possibility of Atlantic City being in the path of Hurricane Gary. Over the last twelve hours, the storm had changed course. Some meteorologists were predicting the storm would veer off into the North Atlantic while others believed it would still hit the south. Still, some computer models hinted at the remote possibility it could veer yet again and make landfall along the Chesapeake Bay, plowing into Baltimore and Washington DC. Nobody seemed to be taking those models very seriously, but after New Orleans, it was good to be prepared in any event. They’d been briefed on procedure and protocol, and things had gone on normally until just a moment ago. Now phones were ringing off the hook and their supervisor, Ben Cordway, was huddled with the senior dispatcher, Ken Brown, both with worried looks on their faces. Linda moved her chair out of her cubicle into the middle of the room. “Has anybody talked to anybody else about what’s going on out there?”

  Ben Cordway looked at her and held his hand up. Linda could make out a voice on one of the frequencies that carried messages from the feds. She tried to make out what was being said. “…I can assure you that we’ll have the National Guard out as soon as—”

  National Guard? Linda stood up and took a step further into the middle of the action. Her co-workers were in various states of holding the fort down; some were actively talking to officers, others were on the phone with 911 dispatchers. All of them looked nervous and scared. Burt Young hurried past her, his face white. “We’re going on lockdown,” he said. “We’re under attack.”

  “We’re under attack?” Linda was instantly scared. Like millions of other Americans, she’d been transfixed with a mixture of awe and terror on September 11, 2001 when Islamic Terrorists had attacked New York City and Washington D.C. She was at work that day and had pulled a sixteen-hour shift. For the first time since her career in law enforcement started, she’d been in lockdown that day for the first eight hours until they got a handle on what was going on. Linda wondered how broad in scope the attack was this time. “Where?” she asked. “Is it airliners again? A car bomb?”

  “It’s nothing like that,” Burt said. He picked up the phone at his desk and dialed a number.

  “Well then what is it?” Linda asked.

  Burt looked at her, holding the phone to his ear. “Something’s coming out of the ocean…a whole bunch of them…and they’re…eating people!”

  * * *

  When Channel Four News Anchor Mike Baker and his cameraman arrived at the Boardwalk just south of Florida Street, he saw right away that this was a story that could make his career. He instructed his driver to pull in as close as possible, and when that proved to be fruitless they stopped in the middle of the street. Mike hopped out of the passenger seat and craned his neck to see what was going on. What they’d heard over the police dispatch lines were…well, it was crazy. When he saw what was happening, he turned and dived back into the van.

  “What are you doing?” Mark Adamson, his producer, had already gotten out of the van. Mike’s cameraman, Roy Billings, was still in the rear of the van gathering his equipment. “We’re the first News Team out here to cover this! Are you insane?”

  “Are you insane?” Mike yelled at Mark. “Look at that shit!”

  “I don’t care!” Mark jabbed his fat little finger at the closed passenger door window at Mike. As usual, Mark was wearing a beige suit that appeared to be two sizes too small for him. He looked like a cheap car salesman. “I’m here to push you, to shadow you on your job due to your crappy performance. You will cover this story, and you will do it now, or so help me God you won’t work in this market again!”

  Mark wasn’t looking at what was going on down the street. Mike could see it clearly from where he was sitting. So could their driver, who turned the vehicle back on and reached for the gearshift. “Oh Jesus,” the driver, Julio Romero, said. “We gotta get the fuck out of here.”

  “Turn the vehicle off!” Mark shouted.

  “Mark, this is bad,” Mike said, begging his producer to listen to him for once. “This is serious shit, get back in here, or—”

  Mark reached for the door handle on Mike’s side of the van and tugged. The door was locked. “Unlock this door!”

  Mike stole another glance toward the boardwalk. He’d seen people being overtaken by the creatures the minute they got there, and he thought he’d seen a kid crawling between parked cars toward them…it looked like the kid was falling apart. Sure enough, the creatures that were wreaking havoc were now heading straight for them. They were a good twenty yards away.

  Mike turned to Mark. “Can’t you see what’s happening? Just look!”

  “Get the fuck out here and do your goddamn job!” Mark yelled, pounding his meaty fists into the door.

  The creatures were ten yards away, heading straight for them.

  Julio’s face grew pale. “Oh shit, man!”

  Mike heard the frenzied clicking of the creature’s claws; saw them open and shut like double-blade scissors.

  Mark pounded the door, so wrapped up in his anger that the outside world was oblivious to him. “If you don’t come out of here in three seconds, you’re fired!”

  Roy Billings finally got a good look at the creatures. “Oh shit!”

  “Get us the fuck out of here!” Mike yelled as Julio popped the van into reverse and they sped backward.

  After that it all happened so fast that Mike didn’t even think of telling Roy to roll the camera. As they sped away from the scene, Mark fell down on the pavement and the things were on him. He caught a glimpse of giant claws dipping forward, deadly looking stingers jabbing downward and then Mark was all but buried beneath half a dozen of the monsters. Julio somehow managed to back the van far enough away to turn it around, and then they got the hell out of there.

  * * *

  Scenes from ground level.

  A woman in her mid-thirties who had shown up for a day of sunbathing on the beach with her teenage daughter and her friends lay dead on the sand, already partially eaten, those parts of her that were left now reduced to bubbling flesh as the venom from the creatures did its work.

  A twenty-year-old Princeton sophomore lay dead of a broken neck when he was trampled to death in the mad race to escape the beach. He lay on the boardwalk, eyes forever open, so far his body left uneaten and thus intact.

  Over twenty squad cars responded to various 911 calls and frenzied distress signals. The creatures killed fifteen of those officers. The five officers that survived fled, some in their vehicles, others on foot. They knew they were no match for the sheer volume of creatures that now littered the entire boardwalk and were now crawling toward the downtown dis
trict.

  Further inland, along the business district, things turned chaotic. People conducting their daily business began to flee at the sight of the creatures. Vehicles collided with each other as their driver’s attention was turned away from the road. Office workers watched in disbelieving horror at the spectacle unfolding below them. Some of those in office buildings were trying to call 911, finding the lines jammed. Others were glued to news websites to see what was happening—so far, the media wasn’t reporting on it; that’s how fast it was occurring. Still, others called friends and loved ones in Atlantic City, in nearby Baltimore, in New York City, and places even farther away:

  “…I’m looking at them right now! These things that look like giant crabs or scorpions are roaming down Florida Street attacking people…

  “…oh my God, one of them just…God, what is it doing? Oh my God it’s attacking a truck driver and it’s—

  “…yes Mom, I’ve been taking my medicine, but I’m telling you, everybody in my office is seeing the same thing I’m seeing…no, I’m not! Mom! Mom! No, I’m not doing speed again. I’m not hallucinating!”

  “…man, you should see ‘dis shit! These fucked up lookin’ things are like something out of some fucked up horror movie. They’s runnin’ up the street snappin’ people in half ‘n shit and I swear to God, man, one stabbed this muthafucka with this stinga it had on its tail and that nigga was hurtin’! He started swellin’ up and shit and he jus’ esploded!”

  “…just get the baby’s things, get my handgun and the ammunition and magazines in the closet and pack the car up and go! I’ll meet you at the cabin. I’m leaving now, and don’t stop for anybody! I mean it, Suzi! Don’t even stop if they say they need help, just keep going, run over them if you have to, fucking shoot ‘em if you have to, just get the hell out of…”