by David Irons
Alex walked over to the Icebox and pulled open the door, his eyes lit up as the small 40-watt bulb popped on inside the chilled cabinet. 'Jackpot,' Alex said. Stacked in the bottom, were five six packs of Coors beer and on the shelf above an array of candy bars: Baby Ruth's, Hershey's, Reese's Pieces and Twinkies. Even though they had been in this monstrous, suspense filled hellhole, Alex's empty stomach grumbled as if giving thanks that its prayers had been answered.
'Look,' he said with a wavering smile on his quivering face, picking up a string of the ice cold Coors.
Kristi snapped her fingers and pointed at the cans, Alex pulled one from the plastic ring and tossed it to her. Grabbing it with perfection, she slipped it under her arm and gestured for another. Alex doing as he was told, tossed her another can. Catching it, she held it out in front of her dazed daughter's face. Kelly's eyes refocused from nothingness to the chilled beer can and absently made sense of it. She swung her head up to Kristi, her expression understanding that she, the child in their relationship, was too young to drink one. Kristi felt a flicker of relief; happy her daughter's mind was still able to attach itself to such ideologies as trivial as age restrictions on booze. It gave her hope that the jabbering wreck Kelly had become in the corridor was just a temporary thing.
'Take it kid, calm your nerves,' Kristi said. Kelly turned to Jennifer, looking for any approval, but she just shrugged a look that said: It's up to you. She grabbed the beer, pulled its ring pull and chugged away.
Alex threw handfuls of the candy onto the table, as various hands dived in for their fill. He tossed beers to Matt and Jennifer, offering one to Alison, not knowing if the straight-laced woman would finally show signs of loosening up enough by the night's horror to have what might be one last beer. Meekly, she took it.
'We've got to make a move,' Matt, said in-between sips of his beer. 'That's held those things for now, but who knows what's further ahead. This whole place is probably a damn labyrinth; maybe, they turned around to try and double back. At least if we keep moving, we're not just sitting ducks.'
'That asshole, Blitzer,' Alex growled. 'You think he put those things down here or found them?'
'They are what they eat,' Kelly said evenly, this time with no tremble in her voice. Everyone turned to look at her. 'Look at what they were eating — insects. Exactly like they are… so…what were they originally…'
'No insects are that big,' Alex mumbled.
'No insect we know of,' Jennifer said with wired eyes, the beer not having the relaxing effect she wanted it to.
Matt wiped his hands down his black pants, leaving a muddy smear from thigh to knee. 'That church, the graveyard, what that asshole Blitzer called the vampire bite of those things; I think it's just a coincidence to what we understand, playing into how we process things.'
'What do you mean?' Alison asked, snapping her head around to him in a wide-eyed wonder.
'I don't think there's anything supernatural about this, just unnatural to what we understand. No matter what the size of those things, they're just a swarm and we're in their hive.'
'What about the coffins? Why would anything live in those coffins?’ Kelly piped in.
'I don't think a coffin holds any otherworldly value to those things. All those coffins are just unturned rocks, a place that holds darkness for oversized bugs to hide beneath. We came up on a mountain road, the church at the top. I don't think this whole church is anything more than a glorified termite mound. One with things inside it that nobody’s seen before.'
'Until my dickhead ex-husband dug them up,' Kristi scowled.
Alison frowned. 'I think there might be more to those things than just bugs; look at the woman on the wall, what could make her so…'
Matt cut her off. 'Some kind of blood poisoning from those insects, it mutated her, who knows?'
Alex chugged his beer, tossed the can in the corner and rolled up his sleeves, 'Maybe the bitch is rabid, who gives a shit! All I know is they ain't getting me! That's for sure!'
'Let's just block that door off completely, we can take some of these benches and stack them against it like a barricade.'
'Yes!' cried Alex, 'Some sense, let’s do it.'
They jumped to work, pulling the cumbersome wooden workbenches in place and stacking them up. There was graffiti on the benches, all carved in with keys and coins. 'Johnny is a queer.' 'Fuck work in its ass.' 'Danny blows the bosses big one.' Legends from the minds of the men who once worked down here, maybe men who once worked for Blitzer, maybe men who were just meals of the past for the things that killed them.
That thought made Jennifer quiver, knowing they might be next.
CHAPTER 22
As Jennifer slammed a bench into place she turned and saw Kelly, the once well-groomed girl sat with her hair and clothes in disarray, shielded from everyone behind the Icebox, illuminated by a slither of its dim glow. She stared blankly at the dirt wall opposite, seeing beyond it, transfixed into some deep mesmerizing void that existed in the depths of her own mind. Jennifer stopped what she was doing and sat next to her, mimicking her position, sharing the same point of vision, staring at the wall adjacent; a moment away from the madness in silence.
'You okay?' Jennifer said after a couple of minutes.
'Yeah,' Kelly replied in a soft monotone.
'We're going to be alright you know. We can get out of this place. One way or another, we'll get out.'
Jennifer looked at the others barricading the door they came through. She stared at Kristi, the glamour puss status she adorned herself with had all but gone. The attitude-riddled woman, almost a caricature of the Hollywood starlet, was now a hands-on hardened woman. Wiping her muddy hands down her designer dress, her makeup smeared, fingernails like feral talons. All of her pent up negative energy being given a proactive current to streamline along.
It struck Jennifer then, with all of her temper tantrum, pseudo celebrity bullshit, underneath it all was a woman who cared not just for herself but her daughter too. This woman was a survivor. From what little she knew about Kristi's past, she understood she had pulled herself from the gutter into the gold, always climbing higher and higher reaching for whatever brass ring she could get her hands on. Breaking through any glass ceiling she could reach.
The man in her own past — Keith Connors, the man she once trusted, he climbed too, using anyone he could as a stepping-stone. But unlike Keith, Kristi's motivations didn't seem like selfish ones anymore. She didn't just do things for herself, to save her own ass. She did it for Kelly, too.
Jennifer turned to the girl, staring at her until Kelly broke her constant forward gaze and looked back at her.
'Why have you got that tattoo?' Kelly asked, reaching out an inch away from the grinning devil's face with a pointed index finger.
Jennifer taken aback looked down at the grinning face, stumbling through her thoughts, looking for something to tell the girl.
'Night Creepers — Night Creepers…' rolled through her mind. No, that wasn't why she got the tattoo. Then words came blurting from her mouth.
'My parents died a couple of years ago. A plane crash, a small private plane; their friend was a pilot. One night… the engine failed.’
She had never told anyone why she had the image inked on her skin, never really thought about it at all herself, but now memories of the past just came back to her as naturally as the present unfolding in front of her eyes. Somehow, everything linked.
'I'm sorry,' Kelly said.
'That's okay.'
Kelly pointed to the tattoo again, at the winking grinning face, 'It's really sore,' Kelly said.
'It goes like that sometimes.'
'Why?'
'It like… plays up a little.' She paused. 'If things start going bad.'
'What? How?' the girl asked.
'I don't know,' Jennifer considered what words should come next. She had never told anyone what she was about to say; she had ignored it herself. Yes, it was crazy. Yes, it sounded unbelievabl
e. But yes, in her mind it was the truth.
'The night the plane crashed, I went out that night in LA, I didn't know what to do… where to go. I'd been… bar hopping, and I went looking for an ATM. I found one outside a convenience store, and when I took my card out and stuck it in the machine, I felt something fall out my jacket.'
Jennifer screwed her eyes slightly at the memory, had it really happened this way?
'I… felt something slap against my ankle in the breeze. I looked down and… I don't know how it got there, but on the ground was the card with his face on… winking up.'
Jennifer rubbed the Devil's sore face, his mouth grinning, his horns pointed skyward like antennae of evil, putting out or picking up the bad vibes into the world.
'What kind of card? Was it yours?'
'Yeah, it was something I found years ago…'
Night Creepers — Night Creepers…
Jennifer swallowed, 'But I didn't know I had it on me…I stared at it for a second, wondering if I put it in my bag then dropped it, but … I just couldn't remember. So, I bent down to pick it up and as I did, a loud swish, just… cut over the top of my head. I spun around, and saw a figure with a pair of stockings over his face…he had just swung an iron crow bar at the same level where my head had been, a double handed swing — the kind of swing you mean. He wouldn't have just knocked my block off; he would have… smashed my skull into pieces.'
Jennifer caught herself, 'I shouldn't be telling you this…' she looked at Kelly, her own story drawing her from the horror around them, then continued.
'The guy fell off balance, let go of the damn crow bar and it went wild into the gutter. Then all I remember was a heavy hand tried to grab the back of my jacket and pull it over my head, a male voice screaming, 'Gimme that money'. But before he could finish, I reached for my keys, slashed them down his face. The mask tore open, just like his skin. He fell backwards straight on his ass, bleeding everywhere then got up and ran. Then I heard a beeping behind me, it was the ATM, and I plucked the cash from the machine, grabbed my card, picked the card with the face on it and... just ran.'
Jennifer looked at Kelly, her attention completely drawn to her words.
'The thing was, in my heart, I know I never took that picture from home. I never, I swear I didn't have it on me. It just… turned up. Then it just stuck in my head, that face, it…' She paused. She looked down in puzzlement at her arm. 'Next morning after a night on the town, I passed a tattoo parlour. Two hours later, that red face was now a part of me forever. If it wasn't for this guy, my brains would have been splattered.'
Not just that… a voice echoed in her mind… Night Creepers — Night Creepers…
Kelly looked at the tattoo again. She never would have imagined that Jennifer thought that maybe Old Nick was actually a saviour to her with his greasy car salesman smile, winking eye and corny slogan.
'It sounds odd, but now...' Jennifer went on, taking another drink, the alcohol and adrenaline rushing to her head, 'for some reason, I swear… every time something's up, the damn thing starts itching.’
'Like it has some kind of… sixth sense,' Kelly said, wide-eyed.
She nodded at Kelly awkwardly. Yeah it goes itchy, she thought, just like when I found out the man in my life was just another case of you pat my back, I'll stab yours. Just like when I was coming to this place today. The tattoo on her arm, just like the picture on the card it had come from, seemed to strangely intervene in her life for some kind of greater good.
'You slashed the guy’s face up who tried to mug you? You beat him up?' Kelly asked.
'Yeah, kinda,' Jennifer nodded.
'Well, I'm glad you're down here. You're like my mom — can take care of yourself.'
'I take that as a compliment.' Jennifer smiled.
'You don't really think these things are just insects? You're like me, right? You believe strange things could happen, don't you? Like your tattoo. The only time I've ever heard of something biting you and turning you into a monster is in books and… in the movies.' Suddenly, Kelly came to life, wildness in her eyes. 'We found them in coffins! Above us, the church, the way the driveway is laid out like a cross, the roses. Maybe, it's not decoration. Maybe it's there to keep them down here? They are what they eat!'
Kelly's eyes were bigger than ever, wanting affirmation that maybe the creatures down here were something she could somehow comprehend.
Jennifer's mind jumbled, a basic thread of understanding coming from the girl's words, a somewhat elaborate truth forming within them. The Devil tattoo pulsed again, sent a pinching twinge up her arm; her own beliefs of supernatural things entered her thoughts. 'Like you said, maybe they ate the vampires.'
A loud screeching voice broke next to them.
CHAPTER 23
Behind them, Kristi's voice rose: domineering, demanding, and leading the others as they barricaded the door. 'Come on! Let's get this reinforced and get the hell out of here, I'm not waiting around for those things to pop out again.'
Jennifer turned back to Kelly. 'By the way, I'm glad I'm down here with you too. It's not bad being friends with the drill sergeant's daughter.'
Then, for the first time since talking, Kelly's solemn face broke and a short bright smile flashed. They peeked over the open fridge door, two sets of wide brown eyes like twin pits staring at the black-garbed people, rushing and panicking to barricade the door they came through.
'Come on, let's get out of here,' Jennifer said.
They walked back to Matt and Alex.
'This should slow them down for a while. I just hope we don't have to get back through there ourselves,' said Matt, wiping sweat from his brow.
'We ain't going back in there for nothing,' said Alex. He stepped backwards, taking out the now completely soiled handkerchief and wiping his own dirt-smeared forehead.
'Let's just hope those things don't double back. It's taken us a good ten minutes to lock this place down, I don't want to risk my chances to get out of here any quicker,' Alex moaned.
'Come on we have to keep moving,' Jennifer said as Kelly embraced her mom again.
Matt nodded. 'Yeah let's…'
The calm that had drawn between them suddenly broke, a shuddering convulsion rippled through the room as the earth ceiling exploded. A cloud of dirt showered down over the spot where Alex was standing, covering everyone. Alex, surprised and glued to the spot, not knowing what was happening, looked upwards. Above him was a deep black hole. Then, penetrating the blackness, a glistening crimson circle filled with layers of daggered yellow fangs poured through the ragged hole. Alex let out a cold shriek, a noise that was quickly muffled as a gelatinous white globular frame enveloped his head; smothered him with a constricting wet stinking gullet. A giant eyeless grub had bored its way into the room, sinking Alex's entire head in to its wanton dripping mouth.
Everyone fell backwards, his or her screams making up for the lack of audibility from Alex's masked mouth. The creature, not looking like it could possess much in the way of vocal cords, let out a rumbling roar of its own; followed by a hideous dull chomping sound. Alex's hands reached forward, one grasping at thin air, the other still holding the Coors beer can he had been chugging from. His grip vice-like, squeezing its metallic sides in on itself as a quick cold rush of beer frothed over his pale white knuckles.
With a quick shudder from the giant-sized worm and a deathly quiver from Alex, the creature pulled its head back, creasing back into itself like an accordion. Alex began to stumble from side to side, suddenly twelve inches shorter; suddenly weighing less, now, suddenly headless; his neck a fast spewing fountain of coppery blood. Crimson rain dappled everywhere, covering the hanging white fat around the creature's neck, spattering the group’s exposed skin, and soaking invisibly into their black funeral clothes.
Alex's body clambered around the room; his legs twisting and buckling beneath him as he stumbled back and forth like the proverbial headless chicken. Thick cords were still attached from the bloody stump
on his shoulders, straight up to the creature's mouth above, making him look like a headless marionette manipulated by meat strings.
Everybody screamed as they all watched the protruding giant grub digest Alex's entire head in quick gagging motions. Then the thing slopped down into the room, its pale translucent pigmentation thickening with a more human skin colour. Its wide oval mouth closed to a long thin slit that pursed together becoming two thin lips. The shapeless form then blinked open two glowing yellow eyes, which seemed to swim together like two fried eggs in a greasy pan; a human nose protruded between them. In a quick flash the face of the giant thing took on another form, a form that everyone recognized. The thing that terrified them now looked like the person it had just killed, the head it had just devoured. It had become an evil caricature of Alex Lomax. And in a group union of fear, their minds fired with the same bloody red words from the mosaic room.
'THEY ARE WHAT THEY EAT.'
Stumbling backwards, they pulled each other towards the far end door, slamming it shut behind them and taking off into uncharted tunnels. The giant Alex faced blob moved further into the room, it reached for the body it had just decapitated. Lapping at the spraying stump that was Alex's ragged neck with his own blood drenched face. It looked in some mad bizarre cannibalistic way, like he was actually eating himself. Then from the hole in the ceiling behind, spindly legs reached down, as the rest of the night crawlers stepped inside for their first human feed in a long — long time.
CHAPTER 24
They ran further into the tunnel, terrified groaning and crying coming from each of them. Matt still gripped the gun with a cold, trembling hand, peppered with blood, knowing there was one less Alex Lomax in the world; fear drilling through him that before the night was over, there might be one less Matt.