EPISODE FOUR.
BRENT FOSTER.
October 16 7:20 a.m.
New York City "Daddy?" Ben"s voice cried out through the old man"s face.
"Ben?" Brent said, eyes wide, staring at Joe in a mixture of disbelief, horror, and... relief. "Is that you?"
"Daddy?" His son again. Impossible as it was, it was without doubt his son"s voice escaping from the maintenance man"s throat.
"Can you hear me?" Brent asked.
Joe"s lids closed on his milky white eyes, then fell silent as his head dropped forward.
"Ben?!" Brent screamed, shaking Joe.
Joe was breathing, but he may as well have been dead.
Luis kept driving, navigating through the foggy streets of New York like a pro, though Brent was only slightly aware of anything beyond Joe.
"That was your son"s voice?" Luis asked.
"Yes." Brent said.
"How is that even possible?"
"How is any of this possible?" Brent said. "Is Joe okay, do you think?"
Luis looked Joe up and down, "I dunno; what the h.e.l.l is that splotchy s.h.i.t on his head?"
Brent looked closer. Dark, web-like veins were running in scattered lines beneath Joe"s skin, next to dark mottled circles that looked like bruising.
"Looks like some sort of ... infection or something." Brent said. "Did you see his eyes?"
Luis nodded, "Do you think he"s ... gonna turn into one of them? Like a zombie?"
The idea would have seemed insane a day earlier. Now, they were living an a world filled with insane.
"I don"t know."
Luis said, "If he shows any signs, any signs at all, we need to shoot him before he infects us."
"We can"t just shoot him."
"We don"t have to; I will," Luis said.
Brent paused for a long time trying to think of the right way to frame his words without sounding even crazier than their theories of alien zombies taking over the city.
"What if he"s connected to Ben somehow?"
"What?"
"You heard Ben, right? I mean, you don"t know Ben"s voice, but I do. And that was it. What if Joe is somehow channeling Ben from somewhere else? Maybe Ben is in trouble and somehow Joe, in a nearly comatose state, is able to pick up on the broadcast?"
"Sure, it may have sounded like your son, but all the old man said was "Daddy," not "Daddy, come save me" or anything like that."
Brent stared in the rearview, but Luis didn"t meet his gaze, his eyes fixed on the road.
"What are you saying?" Brent asked.
"I"m saying, and don"t take this wrong, but maybe you"re hearing what you want to hear. You want to believe your wife and son are alive and out there. h.e.l.l, I want the same thing for my little girl. But that don"t make it so. I don"t know why Joe sounded like your kid. It"s freaky as s.h.i.t, but I don"t think it changes a thing. We still need to head to Black Island and get the h.e.l.l outta here before more of those f.u.c.kers come at us."
Brent stared hard at the mirror, Luis"s words seeping in, though it was hard to ignore a message from Ben, even if it wasn"t the genuine thing. Even though he considered Luis"s logic, which rang loud and rational in the practical side of Brent"s brain, he still couldn"t shake the sound of his baby boy"s voice. It was as if Ben were there in the car riding right beside them.
Brent stared at Joe, wishing the man would say something, anything else that might part the clouds on some answers. Or h.e.l.l, even if it didn"t, just hearing Ben speak once more would be enough to feed Brent"s hope that his wife and son might still be out there somewhere.
He pulled Stanley Train from his pocket, stared at the smiling face, then clutched the train as if it were the last connection he had to Ben.
They"d made their way north to the Cross Bronx Expressway, still nearly three hours from East Hampton Docks, when Joe started to murmur again, head down and eyes still closed.
"This is..." Joe said, in a man"s voice Brent didn"t recognize.
Luis and Brent waited for the rest of the sentence, but Joe spoke in a woman"s voice instead. "We"re here."
Luis looked in the rearview, his eyes asking Brent if he recognized the voice.
Brent shrugged his shoulders.
"Where are you?" Brent tried.
"Daddy?" Ben"s voice again.
Brent"s heart leapt into his chest.
"Is that you, Ben?"
"Daddy, I"m scared."
"Don"t be," Brent said, tears filling his eyes at the sound of his son in fear. "Where are you?"
Joe murmured something else in a man"s voice, in a language that Brent didn"t understand. Another voice spoke over the first, in unison in what seemed like a Russian dialect.
Brent stared at Joe"s mouth, open and moving, but out of sync with the voices, like a badly dubbed movie. Or ... a radio.
The two voices speaking impossibly at once sent a chill down Brent"s spine even icier than the one he felt hearing his son"s voice.
"Where are you?" Brent asked again.
"Square ... Times Square," Ben said.
Brent"s eyes widened, his pulse quickened, "Times Square?"
"Square," another voice said, followed by three more, repeating the word.
Luis looked at Brent, shaking his head. "Don"t even ask."
"Come on, man, we"ve got to turn around."
Luis bit his lip. "Do you really think they"re there?"
"I don"t know, but I have to find out. Whether you want to let me out right here, or what, I have to go, alien zombies or not."
Luis spun the car around, and headed back as Joe continued babbling the word "square" on repeat.
They reached the corner of West 59th Street and 7th Avenue when they ran into their first major obstacle on the roads.
Rows of cars blocked 7th Avenue southbound. More cars blocked 59th Street going east, packed so tight they formed a sea of cars you"d have to climb over to cross. The cars didn"t appear to have been parked so much as placed to create a barrier. Luis spun the BMW around, but found both Broadway and 8th Avenue were every bit as barricaded.
"It"s like someone deliberately blocked all street travel to Times Square," Brent said.
"So, what do you wanna do?" Luis said, frustrated and driving back to 7th Avenue. "Lookin" at a mile walk with G.o.d knows what out there."
"I don"t have a choice," Brent said, "But you guys can wait here. I won"t take offense."
"Bulls.h.i.t," Luis said, "We"re in this s.h.i.t together, bro."
"What about him?" Brent asked, nodding toward Joe, pa.s.sed out and silent.
"He"s probably safer in the car. It is bulletproof after all," Luis said. "I"ll just park it up next to these others here so it blends in and maybe n.o.body notices him."
Brent grabbed a pen and paper from his duffel bag, leaving a note for Joe in the air conditioning vent. The note said not to leave the car; they"d be back soon. Brent was going to write something telling Joe to take the car and leave if they weren"t back by noon, but Luis only had a single set of keys and wasn"t willing to leave them in the car with a half-comatose old man.
They stepped from the car and into the murky city, holding their gun-heavy bags.
Seventh Avenue seemed less like a street than a long hallway with a low ceiling of fog pushing down on them from 20 feet above. A long maze, with all the cars acting as obstacles. Visibility was limited to 20 feet in any direction, giving them little time to see any threats, especially if they came from above again. The only advantage they had, if any, was that the city was still impossibly silent, meaning they"d be able to hear the creatures even if they couldn"t see them.
It also meant the creatures would hear them if they weren"t quiet.
They climbed over the first row of cars, careful to make as little sound as possible, watching for anything that might be hiding inside, next to, or near the vehicles. They were vulnerable; at least Brent was as he climbed over each car, awkwardly holding his gun so he could still climb without putting the gun away, and still managing to hold his bag of guns. Brent"s heart pounded in his chest, as he attempted to keep an eye on everything, in front of, behind, below, and above.
As they climbed over the eighth row of cars, Brent was out of breath and sweaty, wishing he"d been in better shape. He was relieved to see the barricade end. Though he couldn"t see more than 20 feet, it seemed unlikely they"d run into a second wall of cars.
The walk, which should have taken 15 minutes or so under normal circ.u.mstances, would likely take an hour at the pace they were going, treading carefully along the right side of the road. Luis stayed in front, alternating his shotgun"s aim straight ahead and above, depending on the sounds around him.
With the city so quiet, natural sounds seemed eerily amplified. Wind, birds in the distance - the first birds Brent could remember hearing, now that he thought about it - and other unfamiliar sounds he tried unsuccessfully to recognize. Sounds were all sinister when you couldn"t see their sources.
The duffel bag"s strap dug into his shoulder blade, so Brent stopped to switch shoulders. Ahead, Luis said, "f.u.c.k me."
Brent looked up - another wall of cars spanning the street"s width.
Luis went first. Brent followed, hoisting himself on top of the trunk of an old Cadillac and stepping gingerly on the roof, hoping he"d not fall through. The metal dented under his weight. He jumped from the hood. Luis was ahead, climbing the roof of a Hummer. Brent followed, just as Luis hopped down and onto the hood of a red BMW.
A high pitched siren wailed the minute Luis"s feet hit the metal. Startled, Brent raised his gun and fired into the fog above twice before realizing Luis had simply set off an alarm.
"Sorry," Brent said with a laugh.
Luis laughed, as the alarm continued to wail. "Dumb a.s.s."
As Brent climbed on top of the Hummer and was about to jump down, he saw Luis"s eyes widen, staring behind Brent.
The alarm! They heard it!
"Run!" Luis screamed, already hopping from car to car. Brent didn"t want to turn back to see what Luis saw, but couldn"t help himself. He glanced over his shoulder and nearly froze on the spot.
Dozens of the creatures came spilling from the wall of fog behind them: running, clicking, and shrieking.
CALLIE THOMPSON.
October 18 Mid-morning Pensacola, Florida Callie woke up feeling as though she"d been kicked in the head by a team of horses.
Dizzy and confused, she stared through the gauze of the faded white curtain blowing softly in the breeze thinking, for just a moment, that she was back home, the world hadn"t vanished and it had all been a bad dream.