The Dark Roads (18 page)

They walked north.

DeBolt, AB

May 12, 2021

4:01 AM  80*F

Changes in scenery were uncommon lately, as they traveled along I-43, and anything out of the norm was suspicious. Buddy had been the first to notice the latest change on the horizon and they decided to stop for the day before they got any closer to it.

The road was straight for some miles at this point and they could see for a long distance. The sight that greeted them at the end of this night was a monstrosity of a truck and trailer arranged to block both lanes of their road.

"How far?" Elvis asked as Buddy worked to jimmy the lock at the back of an oddly built service station.

"Gotta be about five miles from the look of it, but I'm not sure," Buddy replied as he fumbled with the deadbolt.

"You think it's anything to be worried about?" Amanda asked from a few feet behind them.

"I think we need to approach with the utmost caution," Buddy said.

"Are you going to be dicking with that lock much longer?" Richie asked.

"Do you want to do this?"

"He
is
better at it than you are," Amanda said.

"He is," Elvis agreed.

Buddy stepped back with a flourish and a cocked eyebrow, both of his hands pointing at the lock, palms up.

"Then be my guest, one-eye."

Richie took the tools from Buddy and set to work on the lock, grinning. He hadn't been allowed to pick a lock in quite a while and actually found that he missed performing the task. It could be tedious at times, but he'd gotten fairly good at it. It was also something from the old routine, much like keeping track of the time, and he felt a little more of his old self return when the lock twisted open straightaway. Buddy looked at him sourly.

"I loosened it up for you."

"Yeah," Richie said, "Same thing you said about your sister."

"Oh! Good one!" Elvis laughed.

"Bite me," Buddy retorted amiably.

With the door opened and the night close to its end they entered the gas station in a single file line, Richie in the middle due to his lack of a weapon, and cleared the main area. The doorway marked "storage" opened without manipulation. Richie and Elvis stood together outside of the stairway as Buddy and Amanda checked the place for inhabitants. None were found and they were able to set up camp in little time. They were in the middle of preparing the day’s meal when the sound of breaking glass filled the area above them.

Buddy jumped to his feet, the coach in his hands instantly, and looked to Elvis. Neither of the men spoke as they started up the stairs. Amanda stayed at the bottom of the steps, her weapon at the ready. Richie pulled a pocket knife out of his pack, wishing for the weight of a gun in his hands. The storage room was silent, but for the movements of Buddy and Elvis on the stairs.

Richie waited, afraid to breathe as if the sound of it would tell some intruder of their location. He watched his friends disappear through the doorway at the top of the steps with frustration.
He
should be the one going up, leading the group into whatever lay in wait.
He
should've been the one in danger, the first man through the door, able to protect the rest of them as they did him. His heart was beating too fast and his breath becoming too shallow. He knew what would happen in the next few minutes if he didn't calm himself.

Is it the dream?
his injured mind asked as the room began to blur.

No!
he shouted silently, grasping for the pocket watch and flipping the thing open to look at the message he'd left for himself. It was like leaving breadcrumbs along a trail into the woods. If he didn't look at it soon, the chance would be gone.
The night is real!

It
is
the dream,
his thoughts insisted, but he fought them, closing his eye and grasping the watch in his left fist, struggling with whatever this was as his friends searched for an enemy that may or may not be stalking them.

Amanda watched this struggle, knowing what it was without asking and began to nod. She knew what he was doing, knew that he had a chance, but that he may need something more than a picture to get him through it. She said nothing, hoping that Richie could hold on, praying for him to a God that might not be real or care to listen if he was.

She was amazed by the look on Richie's face, as it transformed from the scared frustration she'd seen time after time, whenever his fugues began, to the relaxed look of a man who'd pulled himself back to the world. His eye opened, showing an awareness of the here and now that she hadn't really expected to see. He was still with her. When he met her gaze, she didn't smile. She was too relieved for that.

"The night is real," he whispered.

I won this time
, he thought, elated by it, but tired from the struggle. He would get better at it, maybe not come so close to losing himself the next time, but he would need the time.

The night
was
real and he'd convinced whatever part of himself that had been damaged of that fact for the first time. His victory was a small one, but it was a victory nonetheless. He looked at the palm of his left hand and saw the imprint of the watch casing in his skin. He pushed out the breath he'd been holding and shuttered.

Elvis appeared as a silhouette in the doorway that stood at the top of the stairs. He looked to be uninjured, but Richie could tell from his posture that something
was
wrong. Elvis was breathing heavily and waving to them, trying to get their attention. Amanda ran half-way up the steps, listened to Elvis' whispering, and then ran back down to where Richie stood.

"We need bandages and water," she told him, opening up her ruck, "They have somebody up there who's hurt."

"Can't they bring them down?" Richie asked, perplexed, still recovering from his momentary ordeal.

"I guess not. Come on. We have to help."

Amanda quickly ascended the stairway, a pile of supplies in her arms, and Richie followed. His eye searched the opening at the top for some idea of what they were walking into. He felt the absence of his weapon, the pocket knife being a poor substitute for the shotgun he'd been carrying for so long. It was a useless feeling, but he couldn't shake it off. The door was open at the top of the stairs and he shuffled through it, trusting that his friends were protecting the area from threats. As he turned toward the front of the building, he saw the reason for which they'd been brought up.

***

A young girl sat in the corner of the store cradling the head of a grown man, both of them barefoot and clad only in dirty underwear. The man seemed to be bleeding from everywhere. The girl looked up at all of them, her filthy blonde hair barely hiding the tears streaming down from her wide blue eyes.

Help us,
those blue eyes told Richie.
Please help us.

Amanda was on her knees, checking the man for a pulse, trying to find a spot on him that wasn't covered in gore. She finally did, looking to Elvis who was on his haunches beside her, and nodded. The medical supplies were laying in a pile beside her and she reached into them for peroxide and gauze. Elvis handed her one of his many bandanas and she drenched it in a steady stream of antiseptic. Buddy was staring into the night, leaned against the frame of a large broken window with the shotgun held in both hands.

"Where in the fuck did
they
come from?" Richie asked.

"The truck," Elvis answered him from the man's side, "I think he broke the window."

Richie watched as Amanda swabbed the blood away from the stranger’s actively bleeding wounds. She concentrated on the worst of them, smearing the stuff away from it to see if the blood flow could be staunched. Richie knelt down, noticing something about the man's lacerations that caused him to look closer. His eye widened. He looked up to Buddy, who had yet to turn their way. He looked back to Amanda who had seen the same thing he had.

"We have to get them downstairs," Richie said, already pulling the unconscious man partway off of the ground, "Help me, Elvis."

"What is it?" Buddy asked, finally turning from the window.

"Bites."

"Bites? What do you mean?"

"They aren't cuts, Buddy," Amanda told him from the floor, "The blood is from bite wounds."

"Fuck," Buddy said, turning back to the broken window’s frame, "Hurry it up."

"Honey, you have to come with us," Amanda told the girl, "Is that your dad?"

"No," the kid admitted, "But he's my friend. He brought me with him. They were going to eat us."

Richie heard all of this as he and Elvis carried the man down into the basement and felt his stomach tighten. Bite marks meant cannibals. The girl had probably been one of their future meals and she was with them now. The feeders wouldn't be far behind.

"Get that kid down here!" Richie yelled up at them, "We need to get locked up!"

They lay the man onto a blanket, knowing that they wouldn't be able to use the thing now that it was covered in blood. It couldn't be helped. The man had bites all over him, including his upper back and shoulders, and the blanket would actually help to stop the bleeding from those.

Elvis ran back up the stairs as soon as they laid their passenger down. Richie stayed with him, waiting for his friends to join them. Soon Amanda was coming down with the girl in her arms. Richie tried to figure out how old she was and could only guess that she was between eight and twelve.

"We've got company!" Buddy shouted from upstairs, his voice straining.

"Stay with them," Richie told Amanda, before running to the top of the steps.

He flipped open the pocket watch, the lines of his drawing showing above the face of the clock, and saw that it was close to sunrise. Surely even
these
crazies wouldn't risk being caught out in the sun, but he couldn't know for sure how insane they really were. The sound of a pistol firing burst through the room above just as he reached the landing. Once outside of the basement, Richie slammed the door shut and ran to where he thought Buddy and Elvis would be.

They were there, shooting out into the shadows at running forms through the broken window. Without hesitation, Richie picked the coach gun up off of the floor where Buddy had set it before opening fire. Their targets were too far away to hit with the coach, so Richie fled to the door through which they'd entered. The entrance was still closed, but not locked, and he saw the doorknob turning just as he got to it.

Richie posted himself with the shotgun aimed at the doorway, both hammers cocked and ready. He hoped that there were shells in the breech, but didn't have time to check. When the door swung open Richie fired one barrel into the center of the opening without consideration, shoving a man back through it. A second man filled the doorway, his form thick from eating too well on his fellow man. Richie emptied the second shell into his midsection.

With the door cleared, Richie kicked it closed and ran the bolt. He turned to look for his friends, still hearing pistol fire, and ran to them. He was out of ammo because he hadn't been the one carrying the coach. Buddy would have more shells in his pockets.

He wiped sweat away from his brow, trying to protect his good eye, as he came upon them. Their pistols fired, one after the other, scattering bullets among the six or seven runners coming at them. Richie counted fallen bodies and saw that they'd taken out six men, so far. They were more than halfway through this if the assault was limited to those they'd already seen.

"Shells!" Richie yelled, noticing the temperature rise in the room.

"Right cargo!" Buddy directed, taking a bead on one of their assailants and shooting him down.

Richie pulled a handful of the twelve-gauge shells from the big pocket on Buddy's shorts and put two into the coach. The others he shoved into his own pockets as he moved. He cocked the hammers on the weapon and turned back to the entrance, the barrels propped on his left forearm. No one seemed to be coming from that direction, possibly weary of what'd happened to the last two that had, so Richie went back to the window.

It was getting warmer by the second and they would have to get down cellar as soon as possible. Richie wasn't eager to get another dose of daylight.

"Downstairs!" Richie shouted, taking a position at the window, "I'll cover!"

Buddy began to back away from the portal, firing the last few shots in his clip into the scattered group of runners, as did Elvis. The cannibals were running straight for them now, not bothering to dodge fire. Richie took aim on the closest as he began backing toward their sanctuary, and squeezed the trigger, taking the man down with a chest shot. Another came at him, almost at the window now, and he fired again. Another body fell, bleeding, to the ground.

"We're in!" Elvis yelled, holding the door halfway open for Richie, who backed into the doorway as he reloaded.

A shirtless man leaped through the window just as Richie closed the breech on his weapon and ran at them. Richie pointed the shotgun at his face one handed, and took off most of the man's head with both barrels, the weapon almost jumping over his shoulder. They closed the door, sliding the bolt on their side just as the sun was beginning to take the world again.