Nightwalk 2 Read online

  Lupe ducked in with his burden clutched tightly to his chest. I had no way to tell him we were about to be going right back outside but I guessed he would figure it out for himself.

  And since I had proverbially (and literally) lit a fire under our butts, I saw no point in delaying things. Turning back to the people trailing me, I decided to keep it simple and straight to the point.

  “Okay folks, listen up. I’m going to step out there and shoot out the window in the store on the other side of this firewall. Then I’m going to throw the flare in there to light it up. Justin, I want you to follow me with the torch. Hand it to me when you step out and then you lead the way into the other store. I’ll stay outside and cover people until they all get over there. You okay with that?”

  “Works for me.”

  Now to check with the professional.

  “Mickey, you okay with that?”

  “I’ll be right behind him.”

  “Good. Everybody else follow their lead.”

  By that time, smoke poured through the hole from the other store. Dark coils of it boiled across the ceiling and the fact both sources of light were flame-based only enhanced the menace of the scene. We needed to move.

  I ducked out through the blown window panel with my gun at the ready. Taking only a second to make sure the area around me was clear, I immediately turned to my right and shot out the window on the other side of the wall. No time for wasted movement here. I threw the flare as promised, then took a couple of steps to the side to get out of people’s way. Then I stood scanning the skies for any threats that might descend while everybody else transitioned to our new temporary shelter. I had to be ready for anything.

  What I wasn’t ready for was the first person to follow me outside.

  “Darla?” I wondered aloud as she hustled through the opening and immediately flattened her back against the store window. She clutched the shotgun to her chest while somehow managing to look both determined and absolutely terrified at the same time. “What are you doing?”

  “I told you,” she gritted out, “I’m sticking with you from now on.”

  Her answer, along with her unexpected presence, caught me so off guard I barely noticed Justin coming out. T-rexes, skeletal Neanderthal snakes, and flying abominations were one thing… but Darla Dower taking risks? Holy crap! Even if I were a little unsure of her reasons, this came as a hell of a surprise. But I damn sure didn’t intend to discourage her. I learned my lesson with Casey two years ago.

  “Okay, that works,” I replied. “You stay right there and watch the skies. I’ll scan for threats on the ground.”

  I took the torch from Justin and watched as he crouched and crab-walked his way through the opening on the other side of the firewall. He had his gun at the ready, and Mickey about a foot behind him still carrying my machete. They were doing their job, now I needed to get back to doing mine.

  Turning my back to the store, I scanned the parking lot visible in the torchlight for threats.

  There wasn’t much to see.

  The torch illuminated the storefront and a half circle of parking lot…a small asphalt island in a vast ocean of blackness. The bleak sense of isolation was crushing. Despite the fact I knew otherwise, I still found it hard to believe a world existed out there.

  I had come back better prepared and more heavily armed, but this was just so much bigger than me. I had forgotten how tiny we humans were in this thing.

  And it had gotten so quiet. Not even the distant crackle of gunfire sounded anymore. By then most of Coventry Woods’ survivors must have been dead or cowering in scattered hidey-holes in the dark neighborhood behind us.

  But isolated or not, we were not alone.

  “Hey! Up and to your left!”

  I automatically glanced back to see Darla pointing, wide-eyed, at the sky while the young mother crawled out of the window beside her and peered around the firewall into the space where Justin and Mickey had entered. Then I followed her gesture back up into the sky.

  A white curtain of tendrils descended silently from the night sky at an angle toward me.

  Death was dropping in for a snack.

  I hurried a few steps forward with the torch, and sure enough it altered course as it continued its descent. I definitely featured first on the menu. Maybe it was due to the torch, or maybe these things simply detected body heat beneath them and moved in. I could see the tendrils start to ripple as it drew close. They would reach me in the next few seconds. And above them a large pale mass I took to be the main body began to materialize out of the darkness.

  Stopping to brace myself, I raised my pistol to take aim at the distant bulk above me. I only had a couple of heartbeats to see if I could hurt this thing, or if I needed to start running in earnest. I fired twice, praying this creature had a vulnerable spot, while at the same time fearing this would be a monster my weapon could not effect.

  As it turned out, the effect was rather dramatic.

  The monster literally exploded above me.

  A roaring whoosh ripped the darkness and fire lit up the sky overhead. A large section of the main body ruptured in a thundering blast, raining bits of flaming debris around me. And then things got worse. A large jet of flame spewed from another section of the beast and it plunged toward me in a wildly spinning freefall.

  I spent a precious second gaping up at my handiwork before realizing Death still had me in his sights.

  I spun and ran blindly to my right in a desperate bid to escape. I only partially succeeded. The beast crashed down in a whirling maelstrom of fire and flesh behind me. But due to the spin of the monstrosity, its tentacles had splayed out and caused several of the appendages to slash me across the back as I dove clear.

  White-hot fire traced across my shoulders and lower spine. The backpack had protected most of the area from my shoulder blades to my kidneys, but the rest exploded in agony.

  I cried out in pain as I landed on the asphalt. Holy shit, it hurt! How bad was I wounded? Was I bleeding? Had I been poisoned? I struggled to focus through the pain and pushed myself up to my hands and knees.

  “Hey! Get up! You gotta get up! Now!”

  Sometimes, nothing pisses a person off like having somebody else yell at them while they are in serious pain. Having that person be Darla certainly didn’t help matters in my case. I gritted my teeth with eyes shut, trying to assess the damage.

  “Dammit! There’s more of them coming down! GET YOUR ASS UP!!”

  Oh.

  I staggered back to my feet and looked skyward, fearing the worst. Sure enough, the worst descended straight for me. At the same time the pain, along with Darla’s hectoring, now had my temper running high. I’ve heard fear and anger are really two different sides of the same emotion, and I was now pissed off.

  Royally pissed off.

  And the sight of the burning wreckage that had once been one of those sky-beasts inspired a scientific realization that filled my irate little heart with joy.

  “Of course! You bastards fly on hydrogen!” I panted aloud. The ramifications of that discovery took a second to filter though my brain, and then a nasty grin spread across my face. “Oh my! That’s not very good news for you guys. Nosiree! I’m afraid that’s not good news for you guys at all!”

  Yep, the time had officially come for Mark to work out a little anger.

  I opened up with the Coonan and the carnage began.

  Fire blossomed in the sky and the night rocked with the twin thunders of my .357 and the exploding beasts overhead. The sight was spectacular. These creatures were so large and slow I simply couldn’t miss. Flaming hulks of tentacles and pale flesh crashed into the parking lot around me at an impressive rate. The smell of burning meat filled the air. I emptied my gun, swapped magazines, and kept right on firing.

  I was in full-on slaughter mode, and I felt swell. In truth, they were probably mindless brutes that were no more guilty of what they did than an amoeba absorbing prey. But that didn’t matter one damn b
it. I had watched too many people die while I stood helplessly nearby. I had seen too much fear in the faces of those I cared about as I tried to get them out of this hell-beleaguered place. And I had two years of nightmares that needed to be answered for. Now I was looking to settle scores and these bastards would do just fine.

  I reveled in an orgy of destruction.

  Luckily, it was the minor disaster that brought me back to my senses right before the major disaster struck.

  I heard Darla squawk and looked down from my shooting spree to see her dodge a falling monster. She had been in the act of yelling something at me before being interrupted. I hadn’t really been paying attention to her. She staggered to the side, then stared the burning mess now blocking the windows I had blown out, before turning her glare back on me.

  At least by this time the others must have all made it through, which didn’t seem to improve Darla’s disposition any.

  “Dammit! Pay attention!”

  She yelled this as she edged around the flaming pile and started backing her way up the sidewalk toward the next store in line. For a second I wondered if she were backing away from me. I suppose my recent performance could have made her a tad nervous.

  “It’s okay,” I called back, my own fury dissipated by my little rampage. “I just got a bit carried away for a second. I’ll break another window and…”

  “No, you idiot! I meant pay attention around you!”

  She pointed a trembling finger toward the south and I turned to see what had her so out of sorts. As it turned out, her concern was justified.

  While in my temper-induced frenzy of destruction, I had forgotten there were other potential witnesses to the scene… in particular, a nearby witness who would find the noise and smell of burning meat very much worth investigating. Not to mention, a previously encountered witness who just might have a bone to pick with me over the small matter of shoving a road flare up its nose.

  Illuminated by a nearby pile of burning jelly-blimp, the T-rex stared straight at me from the corner of Madre Mona’s restaurant.

  Not at the few remaining monsters overhead…

  …not at the burning piles of dinner scattered around…

  …but at me.

  I don’t care what anybody says about how smart or dumb Tyrannosaurs may have been, I could tell by looking at him that this big bastard remembered me. Oh yeah, he remembered me just fine. After all, how many other idiots in fedoras were standing around tonight with bright lights and surprised looks on their faces? And since all these glorious piles of cooking meat weren’t going anywhere, he had obviously decided to have a word with me regarding my choice of places to insert emergency lighting.

  I had already hit full speed by the time I consciously decided to run.

  The asphalt trembled beneath me and I knew the chase was underway. I recalled the terrible rapidity with which this beast had closed the gap on me last time. I had to get to shelter fast.

  Since I had wandered out into the parking lot at a northwest angle during my killing spree, trying to return to the party store or the others didn’t make sense. Besides, those exits were now blocked. My only hope rested in one of the stores a few spaces to the north. And this time there would be no chance to duck under or climb over panels.

  I ran straight at the nearest door, firing ahead of me. It was a tactic not exactly conducive to great aiming. Fortunately, luck smiled. The door shattered as I fired my last bullet.

  The surprise came when I saw Darla run into my field of view and dart into the doorway ahead of me. She must have been running north along the front of the strip mall…which made absolutely no sense. Why the hell would she do that? Her smartest move would have been to smash a new way into the store where the rest of the group had gone.

  But I didn’t have time to worry about Darla’s decision making process at the moment.

  I shot through the door a second after her, with nine tons of death bearing down on me. And this time I knew the monster wasn’t going to stop.

  I had a brief glimpse of a small lobby painted with brightly smiling animals, an office window, and a dark hallway. I threw the torch through the open window into the office beyond and fled into the dark hallway before me.

  A split second later the glass exploded behind me.

  The Rex charged right in on my tail.

  In theory, the ceiling was too short for the thing. The monster’s highest point was its hips, which stood a good thirteen or fourteen feet off the ground. But I imagined it could ram quite a lot of itself in there if it really wanted to… and it really seemed to want to. Not to mention, maybe it could squat. I certainly didn’t intend on hanging around to find out.

  But that’s when something hit me in the dark.

  Hard.

  And then the wall fell on me.

  ###

  It was a miracle I remained conscious. Having said that, it was mainly a matter of me being conscious of the fact I was pretty much screwed.

  I now shared a destroyed room with a pissed off Tyrannosaurus Rex.

  The brute had forced its way in here and there wasn’t room for it. And I could barely see a damn thing. The inner walls of the place were simple drywall and studs, and it must have collapsed the lobby and hallway walls.

  The beast roared in the darkness, mere feet from me. Meanwhile I lay pinned under a wall. Thinking fast, I twisted the glow stick tube closed to prevent it from giving me away. Now I couldn’t see a damn thing, but took some small solace in thinking the same probably applied to the huge predator, too. At the same time, I suspected it had a pretty good sense of smell. If I didn’t do something quick, it might be able to nose me out of the rubble like a dog hunting a treat.

  Another loud crash sounded, and the weight on my back increased titanically. For a brief second it felt like my head would pop off from the sheer pressure on my torso. I almost died right there. Then more crashing announced the creature moving again, and suddenly I was free.

  Well, not exactly free.

  I still lay under a fallen wall, but now the weight had lifted and I found I had just enough room to crawl forward. I could only hope I crawled in the right direction. I barely had space to draw a deep breath, but I slithered through the blackness as fast as I could.

  Another roar shook the air, and I realized the great predator’s head hovered somewhere above and not far at all behind me. Another clatter of debris heralded its movement. I also heard the screech of bending metal, and the crunch of one of its huge feet stepping on lumber as it forced itself further into the building.

  Not good.

  The monster roared again, forcing me to fight down a shriek of my own. That was probably what it wanted. And damn, it was so close! Lumber and drywall splintered in loud cracks as it shifted its weight. That presented another danger. If this thing stepped where I hid, it would kill me just as surely as biting me. And it didn’t seem to be in a hurry to go anywhere else soon.

  It knew I was in here. It knew I was close. And it wasn’t giving up.

  Now I dared not make a sound. Not a whimper, which I really had to fight from doing… not a cough, especially from the dust-choked air… not a peep.

  Yet I still had to keep moving.

  I crept forward in the dust-clogged murk, one slow movement at a time. Arm first, then leg, then arm, then leg. Careful and slow.

  So slow in fact, it took me a couple of minutes to reach the branch in the hallway only ten feet onward. I felt the corner of the wall where it turned in the blackness. I could also tell by reaching up that this branch of the hallway hadn’t completely collapsed. The wall leaned but still stood erect…which only made sense. The farther away I got from the main body of the Rex, the less the damage would be.

  Moving with exquisite care, I pulled myself around the corner.

  For the first time since the walls collapsed, I saw something in the darkness. A small flame sparked alight about thirty feet away. It only showed for the briefest of seconds before winking out,
but I recognized it right away.

  Darla’s lighter.

  The fact that the Rex didn’t react to the flash meant she sat at an angle out of its sight. Not exactly surprising, given the situation. I now had a clear shot, and the time had come to risk it.

  I slithered out into the taller hallway in a quiet hurry. Or at least the best version I could manage in my current condition.

  My ankle hurt, my arm hurt, and it felt like my back had been sliced to ribbons. Then, to top it off, somebody dropped a wall on me. I hurt in ways I had never known possible.

  Yet silence was still of the essence here. So I choked down my whimpers and padded forward in the darkness, fearful each step would alert the giant behind me.

  Then another sound caught my attention from the rear, and it didn’t come from the T-rex. It was the muffled sound of a gunshot, soon followed by another.

  Somewhere to the south, the other group had a fight of their own on their hands. That hardly came as a surprise. We had been luckier than hell, but I knew the odds were going to eventually catch up with us and have something nasty waiting in one of these stores.

  I could only pray we didn’t have another guest sharing this pre-school as well. But for now, I needed to focus on rejoining my designated comrade for the evening. And the first step would be letting her know I was here.

  “Darla!” I hissed, “please don’t…”

  “Aieee!!”

  “…scream.”

  In the darkness behind me, I swear I actually felt the Rex swing its head in our direction.

  Sometimes you just have to marvel at the cruel unfairness of life. Seriously, what had I done to deserve this? How was this remotely karmic? A former juvenile delinquent like Justin gets Ms. Commando for a partner… but me? Oh no, I got nobody like that. Nope, nothing of the sort. I didn’t even have Casey this time. That would have been too easy, and apparently not nearly funny enough for the Fates to cackle at.

  Instead, I had been tasked with saving the world while Coventry Woods’ answer to Marie Antoinette tagged along as backup. And me without a guillotine in sight.