The Darkness (8 page)

Chapter
8

The solar light went out
and stayed out. The house and yard were dark—no sign of the things. Murphy
moved them to the front of the house where they hid on a large, open front
porch. A wood swing hanging from the rafters squeaked as the wind moved it.

“There,” Murphy
whispered, pointing in the distance.

Murphy held out his
goggles and put them to Jacob’s eye. Jacob blinked and let his vision adjust to
the optics. Up ahead, on the opposite corner, a light flashed. Jacob dropped
the goggles. Looking in the same direction, he now saw nothing.

“You can’t see it without
the NODs; it’s infrared. I have one just like it,” Murphy whispered while
removing a small chip holding a tiny bulb. Murphy manipulated the device
connecting the battery then held it over his head. “He’s in the scrub brush.
How well do you know that area?”

Jacob looked back at him
confused. “I… I don’t know it at all. I mean, it’s just a few empty lots… was
supposed to be developed—”

“Buddy, I don’t need a
real estate lecture. Do you know what’s on the other side of it?”

Jacob looked back to the
distant tree line. “It moves out from here. There is a railroad bed at the back
of the lots; that’s the reason they never sold… I mean, there’s railroad tracks
back there, then past that and through the trees is a two-lane highway.”

“Route 30?” Murphy asked.

Jacob nodded and watched
as Murphy pulled a small spiral notebook from a pocket on his sleeve. He began
to sketch their location, then scribbled notes that Jacob couldn’t make out.
Murphy folded over the page and stuck the notebook back in his pocket. “Okay,
that should bring us out on the approach to the safe zone. You ready to move?”

“What about the motion
light?” Jacob asked.

“Well, either those
things are gone, or the battery died. You can’t go home, and we can’t stay
here.”

“I understand.”

“Good; I’ll run with you
to the corner and stop. You keep going and head to the trees. Slow down to a
walk when you cross the street; Stephens will find you.”

Jacob nodded as a
response. Murphy slapped him on the shoulder and climbed to his feet. Slowly,
the soldier led them off the porch with his rifle up. They moved quietly,
walking a narrow path leading from the stoop to the main sidewalk. Jacob’s eyes
had adjusted to the moonlight, and he could see a good distance in all
directions. Murphy picked up his pace, and Jacob followed, running along and
staying just behind Murphy’s right shoulder.

Just as he’d said he
would do, Murphy stopped at the curb and quickly turned to cover the direction
they’d traveled. Exactly as he was told to, Jacob ran past him. Continuing into
the street and running for the wooded lots, his footfalls echoed off the
pavement. Halfway across, gunshots erupted from behind him. He continued on his
way and sprinted for the cover of the woods. When he hit the grass—instead of
stopping as instructed—he kept going, the adrenaline pushing him on. Muzzle
flashes from deep in the trees ahead blinded him as tracers cut just to the
right of his path.

Jacob ran on, his foot
catching in a hole and causing him to tumble forward. He dropped into a shallow
embankment. He instinctively lowered his hands to try to cushion his fall, only
to have them cut open on the sharp gravel. He ducked his head as he rolled,
crashing through a thorn bush at the bottom. Gunfire continued as Jacob crawled
forward deeper into the lot. Feeling cuts to his hands and face, he dragged his
battered body away from the sounds. Suddenly, a hand from behind lifted him
back to his feet and he heard Stephens’ voice.

“Run!”

Wet branches slapped his
face; thorns tore at his shirt and dug into his skin. He ducked and turned,
running for the open ground he saw ahead and praying it would be the railroad
bed that would provide cover. Bullets snapped around him; the sounds echoed off
the canopy of the trees as the muzzle flashes confused his vision. Jacob took
long staggering steps, struggling to put one foot in front of the other as his
lungs burned and he gasped for air.

He hit the railroad bed
and again fell to his hands and knees. Scrambling to the top of it, he ran
across the first rail, tripped over the second, and rolled down the other side.
He crawled forward; disoriented, gasping for air, bile in his stomach begging
him to vomit. He fought the urge to collapse as his arms and legs cramped from
fear and exhaustion. He crawled on until Murphy moved up beside him. He felt
himself being pummeled and pressed to the ground as someone dropped on top of him,
and a gloved hand cupped his mouth, forcing him to take whistling breaths
through his nose.

“Shhhhh, quiet,” Murphy
whispered in his ear.

Jacob closed his eyes,
trying to control his breathing. A crash of footfalls tumbled over the summit
of the railroad bed; stones clanged against the tracks as they ran across and
into the brush on both sides. Jacob’s body flinched uncontrollably from fear
and adrenalin. Murphy pinned him to ground tighter, and Jacob, putting trust in
the soldier, resisted the urge to break free. He forced his eyes closed,
allowing his face to be pressed against the dirt and tasting the leather glove
held tight over his mouth. The things ran to the left and right of him so close,
he could feel the breeze off their legs racing by as bits of mud and grass were
kicked onto his cheek.

They slowly faded away
with the sounds of the breaking tree limbs, moving farther east. Murphy rolled
off  him and popped up to a knee. Jacob saw that Stephens had joined them in a
small depression at the base of the embankment. Murphy and Stephens held their
rifles steady as they slowly scanned the area. Jacob lay silent, still catching
his breath, trying to control his heartbeat, and pushing back the pain
radiating through his body.

After what seemed an
eternity, Murphy looked down at him and asked, “Are you okay?”

“Hell, no. I’m not okay,”
Jacob responded.

“Good.” Murphy handed
Jacob a plastic bottle. “Drink some water; we’ll be moving shortly.”

Jacob took the bottle and
pushed himself up to his knees, then rocked back to a sitting position. The
rifle was still over his shoulder and  he’d somehow managed not to drop the
pistol through all of it. He lifted the bottle to his lips and took a sip.
Murphy looked at him, scowling.

“Finish it; you never
know when you’ll get another chance,” he said.

Jacob tipped the bottle
back, gulped the remainder of the water, and then let it rest in the weeds
beside him. He put his hand to his hip and moved his fingers over the medical
tape, feeling the curled edges and the dampness of the bandage. Jacob knew it
had come loose in one of the falls he’d taken, but it could wait; he wanted to
keep moving and make it to the park as soon as possible.

Without saying a word,
Stephens got to his feet then dropped a hand to pull Murphy up; in turn, Murphy
reached a hand to Jacob. They stood silently. For the moment, the woods seemed
safer than the neighborhood; the tall trees provided concealment for their
movement. Stephens, again, led the way, slowly stepping through thick cover
until he located a game trail. Jacob watched as he took careful steps, lifting
his feet and cautiously putting them down to avoid branches and leaves.

They stopped often to
listen, sometimes kneeling in the brush and vegetation waiting for a suspicious
sound to fade. They could still hear the black-eyes moving, although they were
far off. Jacob could hear the distant snapping brush and splashing of water as
the things continued searching for them. Stephens pressed forward until the
trio reached the two-lane highway, where he dropped to his belly and crawled to
the mowed shoulder of the road.

The moon was high in the
sky now; its bright face lit the blacktop surface of the road, making it easier
to see. Murphy pushed Jacob ahead, and soon the three of them were shoulder to
shoulder at the highway’s edge. It was surprisingly empty and devoid of
vehicles. Jacob expected abandoned cars and a deadlocked traffic jam; instead,
he looked over a silent roadway. The buildings on the far side all appeared to
be empty and surprisingly untouched. The road rose away from them and off to
the right. At the top of the hill sat a police patrol car blocking the road.

Stephens had his rifle to
his eye while inspecting the vehicle. He pulled his eye away from the rifle’s
optics and whispered, “There’s people in the car.”

Jacob twisted while trying
to get a better view of the vehicle that was a hundred yards away, but it was
hard to pick out anything in the dark. Backlit by the horizon, the light bar on
the top made it stand out from the grey-blue sky behind it. Jacob squinted; he
could just barely make out movement from inside the vehicle. Murphy scooted
back away from the shoulder, and then started to crawl in the direction of the
car.

“What are you doing?”
Stephens asked.

“Let’s check it out. Stay
close behind me.”

Murphy continued crawling
in the direction of the patrol car. Jacob felt a pat on his back and looked back
at Stephens who motioned for him to follow.

“You heard the sergeant;
we’re gonna check it out,” Stephens whispered.

Chapter
9

It was slow going
crawling through the tall grass toward the patrol car. Jacob watched Murphy and
tried to mimic his motions—every movement deliberate and quiet as they slipped through
the blades of grass. Murphy held his rifle in his right hand by the sling, near
the barrel. He would push his arm forward then slowly allow the rest of his
body to crawl ahead. He’d stay motionless, listening, and then lift his head to
survey the area before moving his rifle arm again to repeat the movement.

One arm length at a time,
they moved along the depression at the side of the road. Jacob didn’t dare lift
his head to look. He stayed as low to the ground as possible, trying to become
one with it, and wishing he were thinner so that he could bury himself in the
weeds. Every time he pushed himself ahead with his feet, he felt the wound on
his hip grind against the soil.

Keeping the pain to
himself, he didn’t yelp or cringe. He didn’t want to be a burden or give the
soldiers an excuse to stop. Jacob desperately wanted to reach the evacuation
site, and he knew he couldn’t do it without the men escorting him. Jacob
reached an arm out ahead and slapped into Murphy’s calf. In his agony and
trying to push his thoughts aside, he hadn’t noticed that Murphy had stopped.
Jacob pulled back his arm and waited.

Jacob heard the clunk of
a car door opening and heavy-soled shoes strike the pavement. They were close
now, and he wanted to look but didn’t dare. He didn’t want to give away their
position. The feet moved away; another clunk and another man caused sounds of
metal clinking together while heavy feet slapped the pavement. Jacob listened
to the sounds of the doors slamming shut.

Murphy didn’t move. Jacob
could feel Stephens behind him, lying almost on the back of his legs and could
hear the soldier breathing. Suddenly Murphy rose up to a kneeling position all
the while concealed in the high grass and the cover of dark. Stephens slowly
crawled past Jacob and rose up next to Murphy. Jacob remained lying in the
grass, not wanting to move as the two soldiers set out ahead, walking much
faster now while still crouched in the grass.

Frustrated and not
wanting to be left behind, Jacob lifted himself to a push-up position and
brought his knees forward. He climbed up and followed the other two. He could
see the patrol car clearly now. It was empty. Whoever previously occupied it
was gone. Murphy and Stephens moved quickly along the shoulder, then cut
diagonally across the pavement and crouched near the patrol driver’s side door.
Jacob knelt by the brush guard at the hood of the car while Murphy circled it
and Stephens moved around to the passenger side to look through the window.

“Keys are in it,”
Stephens whispered just as they heard heavy shoes striking pavement in the
distance and moving back in their direction.

Jacob ducked behind the grill
of the patrol car. Without speaking, Stephens and Murphy moved back to flank
him, where they watched and waited. As the footsteps grew louder, Murphy stood
straight up, holding his rifle in front of him, the stock in his shoulder and
the barrel still pointed down at the street. Stephens did the same, side
stepping and using the vehicle for cover. Stephens looked down at Jacob
cowering. “Stand up fool; get your weapon out,” he hissed under his breath.
“And be ready, just in case.”

Jacob forced himself to
his feet and raised the small rifle in the direction of the footsteps just as
two figures emerged from the shadows. Both were police officers wearing black
body armor; one cradled a shotgun, the other walked with an empty holster. They
continued moving forward then stopped as they saw the trio formed up around the
patrol car. The officers didn’t speak, or even as much as look at each other to
communicate.

Their movements were
jerky. One stepped awkwardly to the left, trying to focus on them while the one
with the shotgun took a quick step forward and brought the weapon up in his
arms.

“Stop; we’re with the
Army,” Murphy said in a commanding voice just loud enough to be heard.

Without any warning, the
unarmed officer ran at Stephens, a scream erupting from the man’s mouth.
Frightened, Jacob stepped back as the other officer raised the shotgun and
fired. Jacob could hear and feel the buckshot zip past his head. In tandem,
Stephens and Murphy brought up their weapons and fired. Jacob watched the
soldiers’ rounds tear holes through the officers’ vests. The policemen dropped
to the ground dead; the shotgun clacked as it hit the pavement.

“What the hell was
that
?”
Stephens said, moving forward and kicking the weapon away.

Jacob quickly rounded the
vehicle where Murphy was already leaning over one of the officers.

“Holy shit, you guys just
killed two cops!” Jacob said.

Murphy looked back at him
shaking his head. “I don’t think so,” he said, lifting his gloved hand. The
black oily blood clung to his fingers and dripped off in thick strings, like
heavy paint.

Stephens pulled out a
knife and cut a long gash down the other officer’s arm.

“No! Ahh, what the hell
are you doing?” Jacob gasped in disgust.

The skin split open,
revealing a dark oozing gelatinized flesh. “Yeah, these ain’t cops. We gotta
get the fuck outta here, Sergeant.”

Hearing the sound of tree
limbs snapping, Jacob turned his head toward the woods. More were coming, obviously
attracted by the sound of gunfire.

“I said we gotta go,”
Stephens repeated as he ran back to the patrol car.

Jacob turned and ran
after him. Stephens was already in the driver’s side with the car running
before Jacob jumped into the backseat. The passenger’s door closed with Murphy
slapping the dash and yelling. “Go, go, go!”

Stephens hit the gas, the
tires spun, and the car pulled away before the first of them broke the tree
line. Jacob watched out of the passenger’s window as several of them ran onto
the road and turned to follow the patrol car. They passed deserted cars rolled
to the sides of the road, houses with broken windows and doors left to hang
open, and the occasional abandoned body on a sidewalk. Stephens drove at high
speed with the lights off until he hit a side street and quickly slowed to make
the turn in time, the engine roaring with every maneuver. He drove for several
more minutes, pulled to the curb of an empty road, coasted to a stop, and cut
the engine.

Jacob looked out and knew
they were only blocks from the park. There were no homes here; it was a long,
empty street. A river ran parallel to the road on the left and he knew they
would cross a bridge ahead that would take them to the park’s main gate. To the
right stood a high “noise pollution” fence that sheltered the high-priced homes
on the other side from the traffic sounds.

Stephens pressed a button,
and the cars doors all locked simultaneously. “Looks like a nice enough
neighborhood, but why take any chances.” He grabbed the CB radio, clicked the
mic, and scanned through all of the channels only to receive interference and static.
“Nothing; we can’t get our comms on this radio without the frequencies loaded.
Cops must be off the net,” he said, clicking it off and letting the mic hit the
floor.

“What the hell happened
back there?” Jacob asked.

Murphy looked at him over
the backseat. “I’d say we got away. Were you hit?”

“No, I wasn’t hit… but he
shot at us!”

“Yeah, they do that
sometimes,” Stephens whispered. Keeping his hands on the steering wheel, he
continued looking straight ahead.

“What do you mean,
they
do that sometimes
?” Jacob asked, frustrated.

Stephens shook his head
and leaned back in the seat. “It’s like some of them know. Like if they was
cops, they keep doing cop shit. They get smarter the longer they’re out there.
I’ve seen soldiers still holding their rifles and walking patrol while surrounded
by more of the darkness. Carpenters holding hammers. Butchers with knives. Most
of ’em are like what we saw back there, you know… like zombies or something,
but sometimes… yeah, sometimes they shoot at us.”

Stephens let out a long
sigh. “But I don’t think they want to kill us,” he said. “I think they want to
take us; you notice they leave the people they kill? It’s only the living they
keep, and their own dead.”

“Why do you think they do
that? What do they want?” Jacob asked.

“Us,” Murphy said, turning
back and looking ahead to stare out the windshield. “They want to replace us.”

“You guys have lost it,”
Jacob said looking away; he knew they were right, but he wasn’t ready to accept
it. “What are we doing here? Why aren’t we going to the park?”

“Too dangerous,” Stephens
said. “We approach at night and the guards will light us up.”

“So we just flash the
lights or something… so they know we’re normal,” Jacob suggested.

“Bro, you ain’t fucking
getting it! The darkness has lights too. They have everything we have; the only
way to know the difference is to get up close. You gotta see the shit in their
eyes, man. Most of ’em scream and run at you, but some—like those cops back there—those
ones will wait until they’re close before they show any sign. No, we can’t go
to the park tonight. The park don’t allow any traffic in or out after dark
anyway.”

Jacob sat back looking at
his feet. He looked back up at the soldiers in the front seat.

“This isn’t happening; it
can’t be.”

“Oh, it’s happening,
Jacob. It’s happening everywhere,” Murphy whispered.

“Everywhere?” Jacob
asked.

Murphy reached down and
clicked on the car’s FM radio. It scanned over several stations before hitting
on one, another public service announcement in a monotonous voice warning
people to stay indoors. Murphy pressed the scan button again. The FM dial
scanned and hit more stations all relaying the same sort of recorded
messages—government spokesmen and small town officials reading prepared
statements of little facts and false promises. Murphy switched to AM, skipped
ahead, and stopped on a solemn man’s voice.

“
We’re all in a bad
way, folks. Judgment day is here. Satan’s army is marching on the White House
as we speak. There is still time to repent, people. Won’t you pray with me?”

Murphy hit the button
again. The digital numbers scrolled by and stopped. A man was speaking calmly
and reading a list of names, one after another, in a steady cadence.

“Davis, Martin, 4. Jones,
Douglas, 3, Roberts, Alice, alone.”

“What is he talking
about?” Jacob asked, speaking over the narrator.

“Those are the families
evacuated; the name of the sponsor and number of family members,” Stephens
answered. “With no phones, it’s the only way to get the word out.”

“Riley, Steven 3, Marcus,
Joseph, 2, Silvas, Richard, 2.”

“Evacuated where? The
park? Is that where they took my family?”

“No; the list comes from north
of here in Chicago. They’re taking the ferries out on Lake Michigan,” Murphy
said.

“Ferries? No way, too
many people,” Jacob said.

Murphy sighed and shook
his head. He opened a leather tool bag on the floor of the patrol car and found
two boxes of 12-gauge shells. He opened the box and started reloading the
shotgun he’d recovered from the dead officer.

“
Was
… too many
people; not anymore.” Murphy pressed the scan button again, finding a station
just as a fatigued voice was giving a graphic content warning to the listening
audience. The broadcaster’s voice faded to a recording filled with static and
crackles of background noise. A reporter was on the street, in the middle of
chaos.

Jacob listened to the man
breathing rapidly as he ran, the microphone clicking and banging off of
objects. He heard the man tumble, and the mic went dead with a loud crack
before clacking back to life.

“
This is real; they
are firing on us right now! Remnants of the Army National Guard are firing on
our position. I repeat… members on the Illinois National Guard have joined the
protestors and are shooting at us! Whoever—whatever—they are, they are
advancing! I don’t know how much longer I can report on this channel
…” The
microphone again faded in and out as gunfire erupted around the reporter’s
position. The sounds seemed to swallow the man’s voice.

“If anyone is listening,
we are located at Northerly Island. State Police and the Chicago Police
Department are here, but we need your help. You can’t hide anymore; you need to
fight. Get out of your homes and come to Northerly Island. Come to the Castle
and bring any weapons you have…”
More sounds of automatic
gunfire and explosions drowned out the recording and suddenly the sound went to
static. The broadcaster was back but Murphy reached over and shut off the
radio.

“It’s like this
everywhere. It started small, with the riots, and now it’s come to this,”
Murphy whispered. “When they called me up, they said it was for riot duty
downtown—we didn’t last more than a day. We were stupid; we came rolling into
town in our trucks. We put up yellow tape and wooden barriers, like it was some
kind of peaceful protest. At first they ignored the barricades and stayed away
from the roadblocks; then we watched them take down pedestrians and the weak
right in front of our eyes. They ignored us, just staying far enough away so that
we couldn’t stop them. We were ordered to hold; to contain the line… that the
police were supposed to do the arresting.