Eaters (23 page)

Aidan ran by her with a hammer in one hand and a pile of wood in the other. Two seconds later, she heard pounding coming from the bathroom. It was little comfort to know that he was in there plugging that hole when the entire cabin was simply made of sticks, like in the little pigs’ story.

As the din of the Eaters outside grew louder, she wondered what they were going to do. If they were up somewhere high and safe where they could look down and pick them off, one by one, it might be possible to kill them all, but inside the cabin, they were vulnerable. It wasn’t a matter of
if
they had to run, it was a matter of
when
. The thought of running through the forest, trying to weave through the dense trees with a horde of hungry Eaters on their tails was terrifying. Even if they had a head start, they’d be finished after the first inevitable trip and fall. Cheryl imagined how awful it would be to be eaten alive, feeling teeth ripping away her flesh, and knowing that her bones would be licked clean and then scattered all over the mountainside, ravaged further by scavenging raccoons and other creatures.

Running seemed futile. She liked the first idea better. If they could just get up on top of the cabin or high up in a tree where they could shoot from above like snipers…

Then she realized that she didn’t know if the Eaters could climb. Forward—towards food—was their only motion that she had witnessed. It did seem possible that they could take a tree apart one handful of bark and splinters at a time.

Through the din, she heard another noise that she didn’t like. It sounded like a large
CRACK
near the window. Were they yanking off the barbed wire and pulling at the wood?

Ohhh, she really wanted to be with Aidan
. Thinking about needing as much firepower as possible once they got up to their higher spot, she started throwing the guns and ammo on the coffee table back into the duffel bag. After it was filled, she picked the bag up and heard another loud cracking sound. She looked towards the window and saw bloody fingers poking through the wall underneath the window ledge.

The sight made her heart pound even harder. Shooting would be a bad idea, because she’d break the glass, and what if they came in faster than she could hit them?

“Aidan!” The hammering had stopped. Where was he?

With the duffel bag on her shoulder and her finger on the gun’s trigger, she watched the fingers fumble, and pull, and scratch in every direction. She was about to yell for Aidan again when a big jagged piece of the windowpane fell onto the floor. A bloated male arm with gray flaking skin and a road map of veins dangled through the opening, groping around, and painting the wall with bloody handprints.

She ran back towards the bedroom and smacked right into Aidan in the doorway. The collision of their skulls stunned both of them for a moment. Grasping her forehead, Cheryl said, “They’re coming in!”

“How?”

“They pried away the wood from around the windows then the glass broke!”

A hideous moan from the living room shattered any hope that they had a little more time to figure out what to do.

Aidan unshouldered his gun.

“No. There’s too many to shoot. We’ve got to get up somewhere high. A tree!”

The silhouette of a man appeared at the other end of the hallway, beginning to limp towards them as he uttered a deep growling sound.

Aidan fired once, and the body toppled over. But, another form, and another, appeared just behind it.

Instead of firing again, he pulled her inside the bedroom and slammed the door, locking it behind them. She didn’t like this. Now, they were trapped.

“What are you doing?”

“We’ve got to get to the garage.”

“How?”

He hopped over Pete’s body and ran back to the bathroom.

She realized that the only way out was the little window that he’d just boarded up. How in the world were they going to—

“Get away from the door. Come here!”

She followed him as the sound of beating fists began on the door.

He was already using the backside of the hammer to pry away the boards at the window that he’d just put up.

This is no good
, she thought. They were going to end up trapped in the bathroom and killed right there. They’d never make it out that little window and to the garage alive.
Unless…

…
there was some way to keep them at bay just long enough.

While Aidan frantically pried nails out of the boards, she opened the drawer underneath the sink and found a stack of fluffy towels. She grabbed one then went back into the bedroom, her eyes frantically searching. They lit on the lamp with the twisted bronze base on the nightstand, inches away from Kyle’s corpse.

She heard something that she really didn’t want to hear. It was a gurgle, coming from Kyle’s torn throat. Then she saw his head begin to twitch with the dead eyes staring forward.

Sorry, Kyle.

There was no sense in wasting bullets when she knew that she could take him another way. She strapped her gun to her shoulder, tore off the lampshade, and turned the base around. Kyle’s bloody torso struggled to work its way upright, and she slammed her club into his head, not once, but seven times, until he lay still and literally looked like half the man he used to be.

Who knew lamps could be so useful?

She noticed Aidan standing behind her with his shotgun pointed towards the bed.

“He turned. That’s the first time I’ve seen someone get attacked then turn so quickly.”

Aidan went back to his task, so she went back to hers. In the closet, she found a leather belt. She used the edge of the bedspread to wipe the blood off the lamp base then she used the belt to strap the towel around it. After a quick glance back to make sure that Kyle and Pete were still dead, she went back to the bathroom.

“What do you have that’s flammable?”

He stared at her for a second then seemed to realize that she was holding a makeshift torch in her hand.

“Under the sink. Way in the back. There’s an old can of wood stain.”

After a bit of fumbling, she found it. The lid was sealed tight, so she borrowed the hammer claw to pry it open then held the torch over the sink and poured the stain, soaking the towel until it was blackish-brown.

“Matches?”

“No worries.” She still had Mark’s lighter that she’d found in his shirt pocket and tucked away safely in a side pocket of her pants before washing the shirt in the fountain. She opened the flap and pulled out the blue Bic, thankful that it was full.

There were two boards left on the window. When Aidan got down to one, he stopped and looked over his shoulder, taking a deep breath.

“How are we going to do this?” she asked.

“I’ll look out and shoot anything that moves nearby. Then I’ll throw the bag out and go through quickly. You hand me the torch, then come through.”

Any ambiguous thoughts that Cheryl had in the past about God evaporated days ago. After the horrors that she had seen, she decided that it was obvious that He did not exist, because a supreme being with unlimited powers would never allow his precious creation to become man-eating beasts and destroy themselves. Nevertheless, she said a silent prayer that went something like…
dear God…please let me live through this. I’ll do anything you ask of me…

Aidan must have seen the faraway look in her eyes, because he said, “We can do this.” Then, he put his arm around the back of her neck, pulled her close and gave her a quick, firm kiss on the mouth.

She was too numb and full of adrenaline to process the kiss as anything more than a friendly wish for luck as he began to pry off the last board. But the thought did squeak in that it might have been the last kiss she’d ever receive from anyone.

“Light the torch,” he said, as the board loosened.

She flicked the lighter then held the torch away from her body and set it on fire. Bright orange and blue flames curled around it as black acrid smoke rose up. She stared at the glow for a moment, mesmerized.
Bad memories.

Aidan began to pry the last board from the window when they heard a loud crash from the bedroom. Cheryl turned around and saw that the bedroom door had been forced open. There were six hunched figures stumbling through.

“Hurry!” She slammed shut the bathroom door and locked it.

The last board flew to the floor. He looked at her as she stood there, holding the torch, and they heard the first moans and scratches on the door behind them.

“Ready?” he asked.

“No choice,” she said.

“Kill the light.”

Chapter Seventeen

Cheryl flipped the switch, shrouding them in darkness as the fingernails on the other side of the door, just inches from her back, continued to scratch.

Aidan took his gun, hopped up on top of the toilet seat, and looked out, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the dim light outside.

She braced herself for his inevitable scream if he found teeth inches away, ready to bite down. Instead, he said, “It’s quiet on this side.”

A breeze lifted the short blue bloodstained curtains on either side of him.

“Go!” she whispered.

He threw their guns out over the window and tossed the duffel bag after them, then he hopped up and hoisted himself through. Going head first, he dropped down, and out of sight, into the black night.

When he didn’t immediately call for her to come out, she called, “Aidan?”

“Shhh!”

She couldn’t see him, but she could see the faintest twinkle of stars above the spear-like shapes of the trees across the clearing behind the cabin. Inside the tiny bathroom, the flames from the torch made shadows flicker over the walls. Her own shadow body looked crooked and gnarled, a caricature from a story by the Brothers Grimm.

Monsters inside…and monsters out.

There was a loud
SLAM
on the door behind her and a quick splintering crack. The door wasn’t going to hold long. She knew she had to get out now, because she’d never make it out fast enough if the door gave way. They’d pull her back in by her legs.

She wanted to call for him again, but figured he’d shushed her for a reason. Was he just trying to make sure the coast was clear? Had he seen movement? Or
worse,
had he been spotted and was afraid to call her out to join him?

The door creaked and groaned. It was certain that she had just a few minutes, maybe even seconds to get out before the door burst open.

Standing on the toilet seat, leaning out over the ledge, she whispered this time, “Aidan?”

“Come on,” he said from below.

She saw him reaching up, and she handed the torch out to him.

Before she could leap onto the sill, a thunderous blow sounded behind her. She threw herself up and onto the window ledge, not daring to look back.

Aidan held a hand out to her. She grabbed it and tried to wiggle out but something was preventing her progress. Her shirt was snagged on something.

“I’m stuck.”

“Come on!”

“I can’t!” She reached back, trying to find the source of the hindrance as a voice in her head told her to leave it.

No
, she said to Mark’s voice.
It’s your shirt. It’s the only thing I have left of you.

She realized that she was caught on the window crank and fumbled to release the corner of the shirt when she felt something cool and clammy grasp her floundering ankle. Cold fingers caressed up her leg. Then, something wet. A
tongue
?

She screamed and kicked her feet back, swimming through the air.

Aidan yanked her arm hard. The edge of the shirt ripped and came loose, and she landed in the dirt below with a painful thud.

For half a second, she lay there, crumpled and feeling like she couldn’t move, wondering if the impact had snapped vertebrae and paralyzed her. Aidan didn’t give her any time to ponder it.

“Let’s go!” he said, yanking her to her feet.

She wrenched her sore neck back and saw a ghoulish face looking out the window. It looked silvery in the moonlight, an oval shape with dark sunken eyes, not seeing anything. Its hands seemed to function like its eyes as it floundered out, reaching for her. She stared at it, thinking how alien it looked. This thing had once been alive, but now, with its rotting flesh barely intact and its bony fingers grasping like crab’s claws, it was something neither alive nor dead. It was an automaton. A creature without a soul.
A death machine.

“Cheryl,” Aidan thrust her gun into her hands. “Come on!”

The cold metal in her hands woke her up. She looked up at him, standing with a gun in one hand, the torch in the other, and the bag over his shoulder.
Yes, to the garage. To the truck. We have to get to Aidan’s truck and get out of here. Go somewhere else. Somewhere safe.