Spores

by Ike Hamill

  Contents

  Title Page

  Confluence

  Chapter Two - Rescuing

  Chapter Three - Hunting

  Chapter Four - Meeting

  Chapter Five - Debating

  Chapter Six - Arguing

  Marie

  Chapter Eight - Research

  Chapter Nine - Cabin

  Chapter Ten - Site

  Chapter Eleven - Flight

  Chapter Twelve - Captive

  Resolution

  Chapter Fourteen - Lying

  Chapter Fifteen - Panicking

  Chapter Sixteen - Missing

  Chapter Seventeen - Traveling

  Chapter Eighteen - Escaping

  Chapter Nineteen - Dying

  Chapter Twenty - Living

  Chapter Twenty-One - Spreading

  After

  Chapter Twenty-Three - Working

  Chapter Twenty-Four - Leaving

  About

  More - Madelyn's Nephew

  More - Inhabited

  SPORES

  BY

  IKE HAMILL

  WWW.IKEHAMILL.COM

  Dedication:

  For Rocky.

  Special Thanks:

  Cover design by BelleDesign [BelleDesign.org]

  Thanks to Lynne, as always, for her edits.

  Thanks to Jackie for the last minute help!

  Copyright © 2018 Ike Hamill

  This book is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, and events have been fabricated only to entertain. This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part without the consent of Ike Hamill. (1)

  CONFLUENCE

  Chapter One - Hunting

  (Andrew)

  ANDREW CUPPED HIS HANDS together and blew into his orange mittens.

  “These things suck,” he said into the wind.

  Jake circled around him, put his field glasses briefly to his eyes, and then checked his watch again.

  “Why’d you wear them?” Jake asked.

  “Huh?” Andrew hadn’t realized that his friend had heard him. He looked down at the gloves and then shrugged. “I guess I figured that I should be wearing orange mittens. Plus, they have a little pouch in the back for heating pads, you know? What they don’t tell you is that after the heating pads wear out, the mittens feel twice as cold as not wearing anything at all.”

  Jake nodded with a sympathetic head tilt.

  Andrew frowned. He had known Jake for at least ten years, and they had been perfectly good friends. It was starting to seem like maybe the perfection of their friendship was based on the fact that they only encountered each other once a week or so, and always in the company of a larger group of friends. The past few days had given Andrew a big dose of Jake and he was learning to hate the man a little. Andrew looked down at the ground—hate was too strong of a word. He was starting to dislike the man a little.

  For one thing, Andrew hadn’t realized how much Jake liked to pontificate. He seemed to consider himself the Chief Pontificator in Charge. Now that they had spent a few days in close company, Andrew could sense when a speech was coming. Jake had a way of adjusting his neck and putting his shoulders back when he was going to deliver an important opinion.

  Andrew took a breath and consciously prevented himself from rolling his eyes when he recognized that an important opinion was going to be delivered right then.

  Jake adjusted his neck and put his shoulders back. “You know, it used to be that you could walk into Bean’s or even Cabela’s and you knew that all the gear there was hand-selected by hunters because it worked well out in the wilderness. Then, when all the tourists came in, they started putting anything on their shelves that could turn a profit. Now, they market everything as ‘tactical.’ You can get ‘tactical’ flashlights, mouthwash, and underwear.”

  Andrew nodded, hoping the onslaught of wisdom was drawing to a close.

  It wasn’t.

  “I still have the fur-lined hat my father bought me for my first hunt. He told me that I wasn’t allowed to wash the blood off the cuff. It would be disrespectful to the buck. You think they sell hats like that anymore? The ones you buy now, the fur will fall out in two years.”

  “I suppose if it already has blood on it, you don’t have to worry about someone shouting, ‘Fur is murder!’ and tossing blood on you,” Andrew said.

  Jake knit his eyebrows together.

  “What?”

  “You haven’t heard of those guys? I suppose they’re PETA or vegans or something. They throw blood or red paint on anyone who… forget it.”

  Jake raised his eyebrows, looked up to the sky, and then checked his watch again.

  “We should head back,” Jake said.

  Andrew flexed his fingers inside the inadequate mittens. Even if they did see a deer, he doubted he could trust his finger to pull the trigger or his hands to steady the gun. Even so, he didn’t like the idea of giving up.

  “What’s the rush?” Andrew asked. “They’ll be along soon, I’m sure. This is supposed to be a vacation, right? We shouldn’t expect them to stick to a rigid schedule.”

  Jake sighed. His shoulders went back—more pontification from the CPiC was coming.

  “When there are guns involved, it makes sense to know exactly where your party is going to be. We might hear something coming through the woods and assume its a band of deer. If we don’t know precisely when those guys are going to show up, it increases the danger slightly for all of us.”

  “They will be wearing tons of orange, as are we. I don’t think it’s going to be…”

  Andrew trailed off when he saw a serious look cross Jake’s eyes. The man raised his field glasses again and looked over Andrew’s shoulder.

  “What?” Andrew asked.

  “Shhh!” Jake hissed.

  * * * * * * *

  (Jake)

  Jake pushed the dial, focusing his field glasses on the edge of the hill. Over that grassy hill, about two kilometers to the east, there was a road. All he could think was that the person he had seen had broken down and decided to cross the field to look for help. But if that were true, why had the man been sprinting before he dropped out of sight behind the hill?

  “What are you looking at?” Andrew whispered.

  “Not sure,” Jake said. “Could be a…” His words dried up when the man crested the hill again. The guy was still at a full sprint. It was a cold November day, but the running guy was only wearing a t-shirt and jeans. From the corner of his eye, he saw Andrew raise his rifle.

  “What the fuck are you doing? Don’t point your gun at him,” Jake said.

  “The safety is on and there’s nothing in the chamber. I’m just looking through the scope.”

  There was nothing in the chamber? This statement raised questions and Andrew’s cavalier attitude warranted another lecture on gun safety, but that would all have to wait. Right now, Jake’s attention was focused on the man. His sprint couldn’t last—the field had been cut in the fall, but the terrain was far too rough for the man’s pace. Sure enough, as soon as the thought crossed Jake’s mind, the man’s foot caught on something and he spilled to the ground, out of sight behind a slight mound.

  Both Jake and Andrew said, “Oof!” at the sight of the man’s fall.

  “What is he doing?” Andrew whispered.

  “I have no idea,” Jake said.

  The running man was back up. He had a tear in his t-shirt and Jake thought that he could see a bloody scrape on the man’s head. It was difficult to tell—the man was running so fast that his head was bobbing like a cork on high seas.

  Jake heard the slide and click of a round being chambered.

  “What the fuck?” Jake asked. He lowered his field glasses. Beside him, Andrew dropped to one knee, bracing his elbow on th
e platform of his thigh to steady his gun. “Andrew, what the fuck are you doing?”

  “Shhh!” Andrew said.

  Jake recognized the signs a moment too late. Andrew’s orange mittens were off, hanging by their leashes from Andrew’s wrists. His finger moved from the outside of the guard to the trigger itself. The rifle’s safety was off. More importantly, Andrew was sighing out a long breath. At the end of that breath…

  “No!” Jake shouted. He dove to knock the barrel of Andrew’s weapon to the side.

  He hit the rifle just after the shot went off.

  Chapter Two - Rescuing

  (Leonard)

  LEONARD MOVED TO THE window and pushed aside the faded curtain with a finger.

  “Looks like it might snow,” he said.

  “We could stay here,” Patrice said. “It’s nice and warm in here. Don’t have to sit around on some platform, waiting for sunset.”

  Leonard smiled as he turned away from the window. When they had first arrived, the dusty shack had seemed like an abandoned mausoleum for dead spiders. Now, with the place swept and a fire going in the little stove, it felt almost too cozy to leave. Patrice had a point, they could stay and be comfortable, or they could spend all afternoon in some tree stand, waiting for the chance to plug Bambi in the head with hot lead.

  Leonard heard Jake’s voice in his head, “No, don’t go for the head shot. The chest is a bigger target and you’re less likely to leave the animal wounded and on the run.”

  His smile evaporated.

  “We can’t leave those two together,” Leonard said. “One of them will come back with a bullet hole in him.”

  Patrice laughed.

  “Did you see the look that Andrew gave Jake when he was talking about the dangers of ultrasounds on pregnant women?” Patrice asked, barely getting out the question as he laughed.

  “That’s what I’m talking about,” Leonard said, laughing too. “I swear, Andrew is at the end of his chain. He’s going to fly right over the edge any minute.”

  Their laughter died down as Patrice put up a finger and cocked his head.

  “What is that, a chainsaw?” Patrice asked.

  Leonard moved back to the window.

  “No, that’s a snow machine. Coming from the other side of the lake, I imagine.”

  “I hope not,” Patrice said. Leonard looked over to see that his friend was rushing to pull on his coveralls. Leonard blinked and then looked over to his own boots. They were supposed to meet Jake and Andrew in about thirty minutes. The rendezvous point was only about twenty minutes away. It took a moment for Leonard to figure out that Patrice wasn’t rushing to leave for the meeting.

  “Why’s that?” Leonard asked.

  Patrice looked up distractedly as he fished his arms through the suit and zipped it up.

  “For one, why is someone using a snowmobile when the nearest snow is half-a-mile north of here? Point number two, the trail on the other side of the lake goes straight into the lake. The ice isn’t nearly solid enough to hold yet.”

  “Oh,” Leonard said. He stood there, watching as Patrice grabbed a life jacket and raced for the door.

  “Oh!” Leonard said as he finally realized the implication.

  * * * * * * *

  (Patrice)

  Patrice was fat—he could admit it. He had left overweight in his rearview mirror about twenty pounds ago. Despite the belly that he carried around, he kept up with his cardio workouts. He had no problem gulping down enough air to keep his legs going at a decent pace as he ran through the brush on the shore of the lake. Leonard ran by him, half jogging, and half sliding across the ice.

  “Careful, that’s not safe!” Patrice called. A moment later, he changed his mind. The ice was thick enough to hold a person at the shore. It wasn’t really thin until about twenty yards or so towards the center. It was probably plenty safe enough to carry a person or two, as long as they weren’t riding a snowmobile.

  As if summoned by the thought, he heard the whine of the snowmobile again. Leonard was right, the thing was on the opposite side of the lake and it was coming right for the water. They were still much too far away when the snowmobile appeared at the edge of the woods, jumped over a small frost heave, and bounced merrily down the trail towards the shore. Leonard and Patrice both stopped, waving their arms over their heads and shouting. The strap of the life vest hit Patrice on his cheek every time his waving arm hit it. The person driving the snowmobile was oblivious. About a quarter of the way around the lake, the person didn’t even slow before the tracks of the machine hit the ice.

  Patrice held his breath, thinking for a moment that everything was going to be okay. As long as the rider turned left or right, they could hug the shore and maybe stay on the stable ice.

  The snowmobile kept going straight.

  Patrice shook his head.

  As the snowmobile raced towards the center of the lake, where there wasn’t even a hint of ice covering the dark water, Leonard said, “No, no, no.”

  Patrice realized that he had been chanting the same word.

  “Fuck,” Leonard said.

  Just after the word left Leonard’s mouth, Patrice cringed at a horrible sound. The crack ran through the ice like a white bolt of lightning and the sound echoed off the surrounding hills. A moment later, the engine of the snowmobile whined as the tracks hit the open water. In the hands of a decent rider, leaning back and perfectly balanced, a snowmobile can cross a patch of water a decent percentage of the time.

  This was not going to be one of those times.

  A spray of icy water splashed up from the right side of the snowmobile as the machine’s left side plunged in. The driver was still gripping the controls as the snowmobile flipped and Patrice saw the spinning tracks churning against the surface. A moment later, the engine was drowned by the lake and the two men stood watching in stunned silence.

  Patrice began to sprint-slide towards the center of the lake. For a couple of seconds, he was Scooby-Doo, running away from a cartoon ghost. His legs were churning but he wasn’t making any progress. Slowly his speed built. A few feet into his journey, a spiderweb of cracks shot out in front of him. He was already on ice that wouldn’t support him and he was still thirty yards away from where the snowmobile had disappeared.

  Patrice froze.

  Leonard was closer to shore, continuing to make his way around the circumference of the lake.

  “Throw me that,” Leonard said.

  Patrice looked down and saw the lifejacket in his hand. He tossed it to his friend without thinking. Only as the thing skittered across the ice did Patrice figure out Leonard’s plan. Patrice turned back for the cabin just as Leonard shouted, “Get a rope—a long one.”

  He slid carefully until he got back to the clear ice, then he picked up speed. Patrice kept his eyes locked on the cabin. It looked so different in the winter time. With all the leaves down, the place looked lonely and naked. Patrice reached the shore and sprinted. He turned once, when he reached the door. Leonard was down on his belly, pulling himself towards the open water carefully. There was nothing to show for the snowmobile except for a turbulence in the water and a few bubbles rising. Patrice threw open the door of the camp, grabbed the coiled rope that hung from a hook on the wall, and then pulled the door shut again before he sprinted back for the lake.

  * * * * * * *

  (Leonard)

  The ice hadn’t cracked under Leonard yet, but something told Leonard that it wanted to. It was springy, like it was under a tremendous amount of tension and it just wanted to break the chains of the cold. Leonard lowered himself down to a crouching position and then sprawled forward, sliding on his belly and trying to keep his momentum with a strange breaststroke. It didn’t work the same as swimming. After a few feet, he wasn’t moving forward anymore. He pushed himself up to his knees and elbows and adopted a sort of shuffling crawl.

  This wouldn’t be his first time in freezing water. In a way, that made it worse. He knew precisely w
hat to expect. Twenty-years before, when he was still a teenager, his father’s ice fishing shack had crashed through the ice when a spring current undercut their position. At the time, nobody had been inside, but the accident had put fear into his father. He signed up the whole family for a weekend class on how to survive falling through the ice.

  The course was taught by an ancient French Canadian man, whose thick accent required elaborate hand gestures to make himself understood. The main principle was easy to understand—stay calm to survive. With pants, boots, and a jacket, the old man had jumped onto a patch of thin ice and disappeared. When his head came back up from the depths, he was panting and looked panic-stricken. Leonard had moved forward to rescue him. The old man put up his palm and smiled.

  In broken English, he had said, “Stop. Take you a deep breath. Hold it. Let you out slowly like.”

  The old man’s expression became peaceful and serene, like he was bathing in a summer pond.

  “Body wants to tighten up and force out air. Don’t let it,” the old man had commanded. “Gots you fifteen seconds to breathe right, or you toast. Get control. Stay calm.”

  That’s what Leonard had chanted to himself when it was his turn to go into the water. “Get control. Stay calm.”

  He started chanting it to himself as crawled across the ice towards the hole. The snowmobile had torn up a few chunks of ice near the edge and it was still bubbling as it went down. In a few minutes, there would be no indication that anything had happened there. A few scuffs and scratches from the snowmobile would be the only sign.

  Leonard didn’t want to admit it to himself, but those bubbles popping on the surface were probably the last of the air from that poor bastard’s chest. He was almost to the edge of the ice when he heard Patrice behind him.