“Wow,” Alex said, “I am really glad that I have a dog.”
Nicole was about to reply when she heard a noise. An empty box fell over in the corner, followed by a rustling noise. All three of them jumped with a yelp.
“Is anything wrong?” Kaitlyn yelled.
“No,” Nicole shouted, her heart racing. “We found the cat.” She turned to the boys. “Okay, the two of you. You have to shut up. If you don’t, the cat will run away and she will leave.”
“Don’t we want HIM to leave?” Alex asked. “Then we can know where HE came from?”
“Yeah, but—”
“Hey, Nicole?” Kaitlyn called.
“Ugh. David? If I shine the light back to the stairs, can you get there without falling down? Tell them they need to be quiet, unless something is actually wrong.”
“Yeah,” David said, looking back at the space they had just covered. “Sure. I am a basement expert after all.”
“Whatever. Just do it, okay?”
Nicole watched her brother dart back to the stairs, avoiding pillars, boxes, and mouse guts. When he got there, he gave her a thumbs up and headed up the stairs.
“Okay,” Nicole said, shining the light onto the pile of boxes, “I’m gonna hold the light, you go in there—”
“—and grab him,” Alex finished.
“Right,” Nicole said. “Just don’t hurt him, okay?”
“Hey. I love animals, okay? Why would I hurt the cat?” He moved toward the boxes.
“I don’t know!” Nicole said in a loud whisper. “I didn’t think you would, I just—”
“Nicole!” David whispered very loudly from the stairs. “Nicole?!”
“What?” Nicole whispered back. “I said be quiet!”
“They have the cat,” he whispered back, his voice cracking.
Nicole was confused. “What? Who has the cat?”
“Hannah and Kaitlyn,” he whispered, his breathing becoming heavy. “Upstairs. They have it.”
Nicole froze, staring back into the darkness that continued to engulf her brother. If the cat is upstairs. “Oh crap, crap, crap, crap!” she whispered. Slowly she turned her head back to the light, where Alex had just been standing.
It was just a pile of boxes. He was gone.
“Alex!” she screamed. “Where are you?!”
From the top of the stairs, she heard David, Hannah and Kaitlyn calling down, but it was just noise. She had to find Alex. If he got taken—or killed—by something, it’s my fault! Not again! She had to find him.
“Alex!” she screamed once more into the pile of boxes. She couldn’t move forward, afraid of what she might find.
Suddenly, Alex stood up. Not hurt, not scared, not bleeding, just dirty and surprised.
“What the hell are—?” she screamed, her tone now one of frustration.
“There’s a kid,” Alex said, looking down to the boxes.
“What? What? A kid?”
“Yeah,” Alex said, crouching to the floor. “A little kid.”
“What’s happening?” David called from the stairs.
“Where’s Alex?” Kaitlyn asked, from the level above.
“He’s here,” Nicole yelled back, still unsure of the situation. She slowly worked her way behind the boxes, careful not to fall into them. When she saw Alex crouched over something, she shone the light onto ... a boy. A young boy. Around the same age as Ryan, she guessed. Great, someone else to take care of. But something was wrong. Something was off. She crouched low, next to Alex, making eye contact with him before she moved a little closer.
The boy was filthy. Covered in mud and blood and the black stuff they had regrettably seen so much of over the past week; all over his arms, his legs, his head, his clothes. His clothes were tatters. His face was blank. He had no expression at all. For a moment, she thought he looked dead.
He is dead.
“Oh, my God,” she said, scrambling to her feet. “Alex! Get away from him!”
Alex jumped, surprised by her sudden movement. “What? What happened?” he asked, frantically looking around.
Nicole kept the light on the little boy. “He’s ... one of them!”
“One of what?” he said, looking the boy over to see what Nicole was talking about.
“A mudman!”
Alex turned to her. “He is not.” He crouched back down to the boy.
“What are you doing?!” Nicole shouted, as she tugged Alex back up by his shirt collar.
“Ow!” Alex yelled. “What are you doing?”
“I’m saving your life, stupid! That thing—”
“It’s a kid!” Alex said, laughing at her. “Jeez, Nicole. It’s just a kid. Chill out, will ya?” He crawled back to the boy, rubbing his neck where his collar had just dug in.
“How do you know?” she asked, genuine fear in her voice.
“Well, for one,” Alex started, “he’s not trying to kill us. The mudmen that we have seen tried to kill us. Like you said, it’s their thing.”
For a moment Nicole’s fear was replaced by anger as Alex used her own words against her. She hated when people did that.
“Also,” he continued, reaching back, “gimme the flashlight.”
“No,” she said, gripping the light tightly, “you’re going crazy!”
“I am not,” he replied. “Just gimme the flashlight.”
She tossed it to him, not wanting to get too close to the little dead boy or Alex. Maybe he’s turning into one of them, too.
“Look at his eyes,” Alex said, shining the light into the boy’s face.
The boy stared forward, into space. He didn’t blink or flinch.
“They look pretty dead to me!” she replied, pulling even farther away from the two boys she now feared.
“Yeah, they look dead,” Alex agreed, “but they’re not. They’re just, like, somewhere else.”
“What?”
“The mudmen—their eyes,” Alex began explaining, “they’re white, all white, right?”
Nicole thought back to the creatures she had seen far too much of over the past few days. “Yeah,” she replied, “mostly.”
“Well, there are the ones with no eyes at all,” Alex said, “but they don’t count. This kid—his eyes are just ... I dunno. It’s like he’s in a trance or something.”
With only Alex and the boy visible to her in the darkness, she thought about what Alex said. She took a breath and said, “Can I have the flashlight back, please?”
He handed it to her.
She shone the light into the boy’s face and realized that, yes, though his eyes were not reacting to the world around him, they were not actually dead. She examined him a little bit closer.
“You probably should have mentioned that he was breathing,” she said.
“I didn’t even notice,” he said, looking at the boy. “Oh, hey, he is! Good thing, huh?”
Nicole shone the light back in his face. “You’re an idiot.” She stood up. “David!”
“What?” David replied from behind them. “What’s happening? Is there a kid or something?”
“David, your powers of detection are incredible, really. Get over here so we can help this kid upstairs.”
“Why do you need help?” David asked, a little closer than before. “What’s wrong with him?”
Nicole looked back at the little boy that Alex was whispering to in hopes of getting any response. The kid just stared at nothing. “I dunno,” she said. “Something.”
Moving the kid wasn’t actually as hard as Nicole initially expected. He was very frail. He was probably very small even before all this started. As she looked him over, she wondered how long he had been down there. How long was he on his own? How had he survived?
Cats don’t scatter what they eat, but a kid might.
Nicole and Alex dragged the boy between them, following David with the flashlight. The boy’s expression still hadn’t changed, as if he didn’t notice anything was happening to him at all.
“Give the flashlight to someone at the door,” Nicole said to David at the bottom of the stairs. “Kaitlyn. Give it to Kaitlyn. Take Hannah upstairs and get some mats ready for this kid to lie down, okay?”
“Sure,” David said. “Food, too?”
“Yeah, good.”
The stairs were more of a challenge. Making the boy lift his leg high enough to go up even one became almost impossible. Not only was he weak, he was also very stiff.
“Why don’t we just carry him?” Alex asked.
“Because, if he can do at least a little bit of walking,” Nicole replied, “then that’s a good sign. He needs to move if he can, or he’ll lock up or something.”
“But,” Alex looked at the boy between them, “does this really count?”
Nicole didn’t answer. She could force the boy to move his legs just enough to get up the stairs. Maybe they would carry him up to the second floor, but to get to the first floor he had to help.
“He doesn’t look good,” Kaitlyn said when they eventually reached the door.
“No crap,” Nicole said. “Keep the light on the hall and the stairs. Me and Alex are gonna carry him up to our bedroom.”
Kaitlyn hurried to the stairs, shining the light back for them to see as they awkwardly picked up the boy between them. Halfway up the stairs, Nicole volunteered to carry the boy herself. Holding him, she thought back to holding Ryan’s cat. There’s almost nothing to him. Just some bones and skin in a ripped up, dirty shirt.
She carried him straight into the room, where David had laid down a few mats for him. He also had two slices of bread, and a bag of chips. “There, um ... isn’t much else,” David said when Nicole glanced at the meagre meal.
“That’s fine,” Nicole said, thinking, who knows how long he was eating mice? Stale bread is great in comparison.
She picked up a piece of the bread, and tried to hand it to the boy, but he wouldn’t take it. Or couldn’t, she realized. She put it in front of his mouth and still got no reaction. “All right,” she said. “That’s okay.” She squeezed the boy’s mouth open and shoved in a piece of bread. Once she let go, he started chewing and swallowing on his own. “Okay, good,” she said, sitting back and relaxing slightly for the first time since she had gone outside to yell at Alex. This would be a challenge, but not impossible, especially if everyone helped. She also realized making that happen could be more difficult.
The group looked at Nicole and the new boy who apparently could not do anything on his own. Hannah let go of Kaitlyn’s hand and took a step forward.
“Hi, Kyle,” she said to the little frail boy.
His eyes flickered for the first time.
“Good job, Hannah!” Nicole said as the rest of the group cheered or let out a sigh of relief. “Do you know him from school or something?”
“Yeah, I—” Hannah started to answer.
Kyle lunged at her, growling.
It was fortunate they had opened the room at the end of the hall, as they needed a place to secure Kyle, away from others.
Hannah had moved quickly enough to dodge his attack, but Nicole became his next target. He clawed at her, and hit her in the nose as he yelled. David and Alex carried the kicking, screaming child to the end of the hall and held the door closed. Soon the rest of the group joined them.
“What was that?” Kaitlyn asked, holding a stunned Hannah. “Is he ... one of those things? Like the people out there?”
“No,” Nicole said, holding a tissue up to her bloody nose.
“Well, what just happened then?” Kaitlyn asked.
“There’s just,” Nicole pulled the tissue away, dabbing at her nose, “something wrong with him. I don’t know.”
“Clearly there’s something wrong with him,” David said, still out of breath from carrying the struggling boy away. “He just about killed you!”
“Oh, he did not,” Nicole argued. “He’s just scared. I mean, who knows how long he was down in the basement by himself? Or out there? Who knows what he saw out there, with those things?”
Nicole and Alex explained clearly to the group why Kyle was not a mudman. That he was on their side.
“Well,” Kaitlyn started, “could we, you know ... leave him locked in there, at least?”
“What?” shouted Nicole.
“You know, instead of making him leave or something,” Kaitlyn said, backing away from Nicole.
“Why would we make him leave?” Nicole asked. “He’s fine!”
“He tried to attack Hannah! We all had to pull him off you!”
“I could have taken care of myself.”
“But Hannah might not have,” Kaitlyn said quietly.
They all fell silent.
“It’s not a terrible idea,” Alex finally said. “I mean, if Shadow—”
“Oh, will you stop going on about your stupid dog being locked up!” Nicole yelled.
Alex stared at her for just a moment before continuing. “If Shadow attacked someone, I would not get rid of her. I would keep her away from people. At least for a while.” He put a hand on Nicole’s shoulder, which she immediately shrugged away. “We’re not going to leave him alone,” he continued. “We’ll visit him, and bring him food and make sure he’s okay. Maybe he’s just like the cat. Maybe he just doesn’t like crowds or noises or something.”
Nicole looked at them, moving from face to face. “Fine,” she said. “But people will have to feed him, you know that, right? You can’t be scared to go near him.”
“Okay,” David interrupted. “That’s actually another problem.”
Nicole sighed. “What’s another problem?”
“Well, when you brought Kyle upstairs, and I said that there wasn’t much other food? That’s the problem.”
Nicole headed to their supply room. “There was plenty of food—”
“Was,” David said, catching up to her. “Was. When there were three of us. Then there were four, then six, and now seven. Plus a dog and a cat. We ate all the hotdogs and the buns. All that’s left is some bread, chips, and a bottle of pop. Flat pop.”
Nicole stormed to the storage room and rummaged through their supplies only to verify that David was correct; they were almost out of food. “Well,” she started, frustrated at adding another problem to her list, “what do you want to do about it, David? Go to the store? I don’t know where the closest store is, but even if I did, I don’t wanna risk walking to it with all of those things out there! Do you? Do you want to do that?”
David shook his head. “We have to get food somewhere.”
“Where?”
“Across the street,” Hannah said from the doorway. “There’s all kinds of food across the street.”
“She’s right,” Kaitlyn jumped in with a smile. “They had stuff for sandwiches, and vegetables, and cereal and all kinds of food, and that was just in the fridge. The cupboards probably have all kinds of other stuff!”
“Probably in other houses too,” Alex added, as he nodded to Kaitlyn. “Stuff other than food, too. Like, blankets and clothes. Maybe a first aid kit.”
Silently, Nicole took in all of this information, feeling ashamed. Why hadn’t she thought of all that before? But she knew why. She didn’t want to go out there any more than she had to. Each time she had gone out was horrifying. The longer the door was closed, with her on the inside, the better.
She came back from her own thoughts when she noticed everyone else had stopped talking. “Okay. So, there’s food in that house. We know that. We don’t know about the other places, so we shouldn’t risk it yet. It’s gonna be hard enough to get over to that house and get stuff back here.”
“Plus,” Alex added, “there might still be some mudmen in there. There was a bunch when we left, remember?”
Nicole nodded. “So.” She slowly looked at each of them. “We need a plan.”
ALEX
They kept their plan simple: make a list, go to the house across the street, find as many of the items on the list as they cou
ld, come back to the community centre as quickly as possible.
A four-person team would go to the house: Alex, Nicole, Kaitlyn, and Hannah. Hannah was the key person as she was familiar with the house. She would know where supplies could be located. Kaitlyn was going because Hannah demanded it. As logical as the little girl had proven to be since the mudmen first showed up, she would break down if separated from Kaitlyn for too long. The two girls would be gatherers. Alex would move through the house with them. He would help them search and carry, but his main job was protection. Nicole would stay downstairs as a look-out. She was quite vocal that she did not want to do this job, but that someone had to—she had experience and vowed not to get caught with mudmen between them and safety again.
David would stay at the community centre as a second look-out, and also to open and close the door. If anything looked like trouble, he’d yell, Nicole would gather the team and head back. If Ryan somehow snapped into action again, it would make things that much easier, but no one assumed that he would. Kyle stayed locked in his room. Shadow could roam around the building. No one knew where the cat was.
The parking lot was empty, other than the dead-dead mudmen and their accompanying feasting crows. Beyond the visual and olfactory horrors, the walk across the street was quite easy. They looked up and down the street, scoping out other houses that they might visit in later days to find more supplies.
Pumpkins and plastic ghosts lined the walkways. Even the house they were approaching had a pumpkin with a severed hand stuck to it. Alex couldn’t tell if the hand was a prop or something thrown from the SMASHER! He hoped for the former. A thought occurred to him.
“What day is it?” he asked.
“I dunno,” Kaitlyn whispered. “Why?”
“Is it Halloween yet?” he replied, looking from face to face. It suddenly became the most important thought he’d had in days.
“Well,” Nicole said, stopping to think, “what day is it? Like, what day of the week?”
“I think it’s Friday,” Kaitlyn said, but she seemed to be guessing.
Rise of the Mudmen Page 24