Blackteeth Page 9

  Moss hesitated.

  Hesper shook her hands meaningfully at him. She had to move her butt. She needed to get out of her bloody clothing. She needed to douse herself in cologne or something that would obscure her scent. She needed to get away from the unstoppable source of water flowing so closely to them.

  “Sometimes,” she said slowly, “the hardest thing of all to do is the right thing.” She ought to know about that; she’d been struggling to do the right thing for the last two years. It was easy to wallow in safety and not take a chance at setting it all right.

  Moss rested his chin on his chest and looked at the knife in his hand. At last, he moved. His left hand grasped hers, and he sawed at the duct tape and the Plasticuffs. It took a full thirty seconds and it hurt Hesper, but the tape parted and was followed by the snap of the cuffs as they separated. He folded the blade and put it into his jeans pocket.

  Hesper didn’t wait. She checked her neck and found the chain still there and the pendant still attached. With a sigh of relief, she climbed to her feet and realized her shoes were gone. She looked around, but no New Balance cross trainers were to be found. She did realize that she was a little dizzy, and her knees were shaking. She’d skipped dinner, and Hesper couldn’t afford to skip meals because her blood sugar tended to drop sharply. “Something to eat?”

  Moss bent to the side and rummaged in a pack. He brought out a granola bar. Hesper snatched it out of his hand and ripped the plastic off. She shoved half of it in her mouth and winced as her movements emphasized all of the bruises and battered flesh. The nose was going to cause black eyes, if it hadn’t already, and it was going to hurt like hell until it started to heal.

  “You have my shoes?” she asked around a mouthful of granola.

  Moss climbed to his feet, snagging his phone as he went. “Sorry. I don’t know what happened to them.”

  Hesper finished the bar, swallowing furiously. “Do you have water that isn’t drugged?”

  Moss reached into the bag and pulled out a bottle. He handed it to her, and she looked to see that it was a SoBeWater Yumberry Pomegranate. The plastic seal around the lid was intact, and she broke it with a quick twist. She drank half the bottle before she took a break. “You have your car?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I need a ride away from here, preferably uphill away from water. Away from Portland, too. Just head east. Or south. Whichever is fastest.”

  Moss set his shoulders. “Yeah. I can do that. I’ve got a navigation system in the Jeep. We’ll just go into the mountains until we find a hospital or a police station.”

  “Hah. Bus station will work. Maybe the center of the state. What’s that? Bend?”

  “Bend is pretty much the center as far as it gets. But you need a medical doctor. Make sure you’re okay. You got tased. You got a nice bump on your head. Also, I’ve helped with some broken noses in my day, but you’ve got to know I’m not a medical doctor. And those scratches on your ankle could get infected because we don’t know what that was that attacked you.”

  “Oh, I know, but you can’t accept that.” Hesper finished the water. “Let’s go. Do you need to tell your dad anything?”

  Moss faltered again. It was evident that he didn’t want to tell his father he had just made a command decision.

  Hesper was abruptly conscious of many things. One was the sudden absence of exterior noise as if every living thing around was cognizant of something that they weren’t. She’d thought that with the passage of time she’d lose that sudden snap of awareness, but it was right back in her head as if it had never left her. She shot a glance over her shoulder at the roll up door that was still closed. She looked up and saw the small windows in the roof of the truck, and the blackness through the yellowed plastic was absolute. She glanced at his pack on the floor. She saw a cardboard box in the front corner of the truck with random items in it.

  There was a great clunk that came from the front of the truck. Her eyes shot forward past Moss’s shoulders, and the truck shifted a little as if a strong breeze had hit it.

  Moss was still stuck on what he was going to tell his father. He wasn’t focused on her at all but only what was going on in his mind.

  “Get your car keys ready,” Hesper said quietly.

  “What?”

  “Do you still have the Taser?”

  “I’ve got one in the bag,” Moss said flatly. “I’m not letting you have it.”

  “Fine. You need to get it and point it at the back because we’re going to need it.”

  “What?” Moss’s face contorted as he glanced at the roll up door at the back. “There’s nothing out there.”

  There was a thump on the roof.

  “Abel go to sleep with his window open?” she asked. Moss glanced upward as if a branch had hit the roof and nothing more.

  “Yeah, he likes fresh air, and it’s, like, sixty degrees outside.” Moss reached for his pack as if to keep Hesper from getting the Taser.

  “Sorry to hear that,” she said.

  “Why? What in Christ’s sake is wrong with you?”

  Hesper didn’t waste any more time. She went to the box in the front of the truck’s storage area.

  “That was here when we got the truck,” Moss said. “Crap people didn’t want to keep.”

  She swept her hand through bottles and cans. “Paint. Paint. Shampoo. Conditioner. Dog food.”

  “You want to explain this?”

  “Ah,” Hester said and grasped a can of aerosol hair spray. Furthermore, it was almost full based on its weight. She popped the top and tested out the spray. It worked so well that she almost prayed in gratitude. Instead, she asked, “Got a lighter?”

  “Yeah. Dad smokes sometimes when he’s stressed.” Moss fumbled in the pack and came up with a Zippo. He held it out to her, and she snatched it out of his hand, hoping it was full. Then he pulled out the Taser as if he couldn’t help himself.

  “I don’t know how to be tactful,” Hesper said as she put the hairspray in her left hand and the lighter in her right. “It’s probably because where I spent ten years until very recently, there wasn’t a need for that. So to sum it up, your dad is probably dead because they’re here. We’re going out the back directly to your Jeep, and we’re going to drive away like a bat out of hell because that’s the only shot we have. You’ll have to use that Taser because it sounds like there’s two of them. I’m going to improvise an incendiary device using the Zippo and hairspray. If we’re really lucky, we’ll get to your car, but you’re going to have to trust me on this.”

  She looked over her shoulder at his face and saw that he didn’t trust her and he didn’t believe her and he was having issues even getting past the whole dead-father thing. That expression was absolute disbelief combined with pity.

  “Okay,” she said. “Time for the big reveal, so we can move forward. Take your phone and point it up at the skylight.”

  Moss stared at her. Then his eyes flickered upward uncertainly. The phone was in his left hand. The Taser was in his right hand looking like a gun for all intents and purposes except that it had a nifty yellow trim. It also had a lightning bolt in the front that revealed its real purpose in life. He took his thumb and flipped a lever on the side of the weapon. Then he rotated the light from the flashlight app upward.

  The skylight was yellowed and cracked, but it was still clear enough to see the two pale faces staring down at them. Black eyes were hollow as an unending abyss, and the mouths were a nightmarish gash that moved restlessly. Claws scraped at the plastic, and when Hesper made eye contact, both of them smiled, the light revealing all those horrible black teeth in their enormous mouths.

  Chapter Eight

  Foolish fear doubles danger.

  – proverb

  Hesper almost wished that Moss would have screamed when he saw the things. He and his father had put themselves and her into this situation. Although it wasn’t their fault some supernatural creatures were out to get Hesper, it was their fault that
they knew where she was and were doubly intent on killing her. A little girly scream coming from a guy who stood a few inches over six feet would have made her feel better if only for a nanosecond.

  And as for killing me? Hesper yanked at Moss’s arm and got him out from under the skylight. The plastic was cracking as the two creatures pushed and scratched at it. I’ll probably wish for death by the time they’re through with me.

  “What the holy hell are those?” Moss asked numbly as if he was at a zoo and looking at something really peculiar.

  “No time to explain. As soon as I roll up the door, they’re coming for us. Whatever’s on the left you tase it. I’ll get the one on the right. Make sure your keys are handy.” Hesper yanked at his arm again even while she held on tight to the hairspray and the Zippo. Moss held onto the Taser and the cellphone with the flashlight still on, lighting up the cargo space and revealing the horrors above them.

  “My keys,” Moss repeated. The end of the Taser came up and was directed to the roof of the truck as if he could shoot it like a regular gun. Two little red dots reflected off the plastic skylight, and Hesper realized they were targeting lasers. Where he pointed, presumedly he would shoot.

  “Keys for your Jeep,” Hesper said.

  “How are you so frickin’ calm?”

  “This isn’t my first time, ten-dollar bill.”

  “I’m going for my father,” Moss announced.

  Hesper didn’t like that very much. Dividing and conquering was one of their preferred methods when attacking groups. They were like lions isolating one of the herd. They got close to their prey by using shadows and darkness to sneak up on them. Then they pounced. If Moss went for his father rather than the Jeep, he was dead. And while Hesper could sprint away, she couldn’t drive, and he wasn’t about to hand his keys over to her even if she could drive. Consequently, she would probably be dead, too.

  “It’s too late for your father,” Hesper said plainly. “That sound we heard was them getting to him. I’m sorry. Why in God’s name do you think I live all the way across country from my family?”

  “These things have been after you all this time?”

  There was more cracking from above. If the skylight held, then they would try to figure out how to open the doors. They could open doors because they’d seen humans doing it, but it wasn’t something they would think of right off the bat. It would take them a few precious seconds to come to that conclusion.

  “Yes. Listen, if we can get to your Jeep, we can get help. We can help your dad if he’s still alive.” He’s not alive. When has one of those things ever left anything alive when they didn’t have a need to? Why, I can’t remember, but then I’m not around them 24/7 because they’re all bitey.

  Moss kept looking upward. Fear of what he was seeing was freezing him into place. Hesper could understand that but it wasn’t helping.

  “You with me?” Hesper asked. She wanted to hit him in the back of the head, but on some deep level she felt a modicum of compassion. How many people had she seen killed by them? There were more than she wanted to admit, and some of those people had been good and kind and wholly undeserving of their gruesome deaths. “Moss!”

  Moss’s head snapped back to her. “He’s dead, really dead?”

  “Most likely. We got one chance here. They’re either breaking through the skylight, or they’re coming through the roll up door. I open the door, we wait until we see them, which is about three seconds tops. You tase the one on the left. I blast the one on the right. They won’t be expecting that. They know about guns, but they’re so fast and humans are so frightened they don’t get shot much. You with me?”

  Moss looked back up and saw the great chilling smile of the thing above him eyeing him and Hesper like they were pieces of candy. Hesper knew that they thought they had her. Maybe, but they’re not going to get me without being damaged.

  Thumps began to rain down from the roof of the truck. They were getting anxious. They could smell Hesper’s blood, and they had a taste for it. Sure, they liked children, but Hesper was oh so very special.

  “Yeah,” he said. He almost sounded normal for a moment. “My keys are in my pocket. We shoot, run to the Jeep, then drive up to the side to see about Dad. If I tase them, then we have a few minutes at least. Hopefully, if they can be shot with guns, electricity should affect them. They may be weird but basic physiology, right?”

  “I never stopped to ask them questions about their anatomy or anything else,” Hesper said, but that wasn’t exactly true. She’d asked why they were doing this to her when she was in a deep hole they used for storing their prey. They just hadn’t answered.

  “You roll it up,” Moss directed, “then jump back quick.”

  Hesper transferred the Zippo lighter to her left hand already holding the hairspray. She glanced upward. “As soon as they see me move toward the door, they’ll move, so we won’t have any time.”

  Moss swallowed as he glanced back up. The thumps continued above them. Plastic continued to crack. “Do it.”

  Hesper jumped toward the door, grabbed the handle, and yanked it upward. She could feel the pull on all her injuries as she moved. She pushed herself hard, but all she had left was adrenalin. She’d sincerely hoped that if she avoided fresh running water she could avoid them, but they never forgot. She had done something terrible to them, and they would never let it go.

  The door rattled upward. She let go of the handle allowing momentum to do its work and leapt backward, transferring the Zippo to her right hand. One thumb flicked the lid open and struck the flint wheel. The spark ignited the butane and she nearly smiled, but there was already a maddened scrambling from above revealing their movement toward the door.

  Moss stood next to her with the Taser held out like a handgun. The two laser points were lost in the darkness for a moment before a target presented itself.

  Hesper only waited a moment before she pressed the button on the hairspray, sending the mist outward. She brought the Zippo around and the entire stream ignited just as one of the things started to swing down into the door.

  There was a horrifying shriek as fire met flesh. There was one thing she was certain about: they were abnormally quick, and they slid across the shadows as if they were made from them, but they had flesh, and they could bleed like any human.

  One second after that the Taser crackled, and the barbs shot across the space. One hit the metal wall of the truck, but the other one found purchase in the thing. Electricity sparkled along the wire, and the fast clicking made it obvious that it was working.

  The thing dropped to the ground, one long-fingered hand clunking against the metal and then slowly following, the rest of the body.

  “Dang,” Hesper said. “Wish I’d had one of those before.”

  Moss was the one to recover first. He grasped Hesper’s shoulder and pushed her forward. “The Jeep!” he yelled nearly falling out of the back of the truck and pulling her after him. He pointed, and Hesper could see the vehicle’s chrome reflecting the flashlight’s light. Somehow, he’d managed to hold onto both the Taser and his phone, so the flashlight app was still showing the way.

  Hesper glanced over her shoulder and saw that one of the things had crawled to the edge of the road and was sliding into the shadows. The other one was a motionless lump under the back of the truck. That wouldn’t last long; they never left their kind behind.

  The monsters didn’t leave anything behind.

  Moss shoved Hesper forward, and she dashed for the passenger side of the Jeep. She yanked open the door and threw herself in almost at the same moment that Moss did. He dropped the Taser and the cellphone into her lap, while he dug for the keys in his pocket. She dimly realized that the wires that dangled across her lap over him and had been slammed in the door. One of the barbs had connected and then been yanked out as Moss had run.

  The Jeep started up with a roar, and Moss didn’t hesitate as he hit the gear with his hand. The vehicle shot forward, veering around the e
nd of the truck. He flipped on the lights and everything became illuminated.

  Hesper noticed many things at once. Most crucially, the creature at the back of the truck was moving again. It was sluggish, but it was on its feet. Hesper could hear a shrieking roar through the closed windows that she was all too familiar with. Both of the things were mad as hell. Abel Symmes lay on the ground beside the truck, and he was unambiguously dead.

  She registered that fact just as Moss did. It was unlikely anyone could live past his head being sliced away from his neck. The body lay facedown on the ground as if he had been pulled out of the cab. Five feet away, mercifully pointed in the opposite direction, the head sat just in front of the Jeep’s headlights.

  Moss had allowed the Jeep to slow for a moment as the horrid details sank into him, but then as shadows began to dart toward them on the side nearest the rental truck, he slammed his foot onto the gas. The Jeep surged forward, and Hesper allowed her head to swivel around to see what was happening.

  The two things stood there, their dark forms twisting and writhing against the whiteness of the side of the truck. Some of their movements might have had to do with being in pain, but Hesper thought it was more about rage. She had slipped through their claws again.

  The Jeep went around a corner, and she couldn’t see the monsters anymore.

  Hesper took a breath and then deliberately put down the Zippo and the hairspray. She turned off the cellphone’s flashlight app. Moss was already hitting eighty mph on the narrow two-lane road and she said, “Slow down! If we crash now, they might still catch us.”

  Moss made an incomprehensible noise and then the Jeep started to slow down.

  They started as the console started to beep at them. She looked and saw that it was the seatbelt warning. Hesper fumbled for hers and sighed when she heard the click. Moss watched the road while he pulled the seatbelt across his body. Hesper reached over and guided the buckle tongue into the female latch until it clicked.