Sam clicked the gear shifter to park and began checking over his rifle.
“I take it you think this place is too good to be true, too,” I said, following suit.
“Don’t know.” Sam pointed his finger at an approaching figure. “Looks like we ’bout ta find out.”
I told Avery and Quill to stay put while we felt out the welcome party.
“Whoa… whoa, fellas. What’s up with the guns?” the man said as he walked towards us.
“Who are you?” I yelled, much louder than I meant to.
He stopped and put his arms in the air like it was a traffic stop gone wrong. “This is my place, or at least this is where I work. Maybe you should be the one telling me who you are.”
“I’m William, and this is my friend, Sam. Yours?”
“Daunte, Daunte Green. What are you all doing all the way out here?”
“Well, Daunte, we just wanted to pull off the road a bit and rest,” I said.
“This isn’t exactly a rest spot, you know.”
“Yeah, but with the way things are at the moment, the rules have changed a bit—”
“Those things must be bad if they allow you to show up on private property with rifles?”
Sam let out a nervous laugh. “You don’t know ’bout what’s goin on?”
Duane nervously shook his head. “Apparently not.”
“You gotta place we can sit down and talk? I got a teenage girl and another friend in the truck who would like nothing more to stretch their legs and use the bathroom,” I said.
He ventured an untrusting glance towards the Shining before speaking again. “Yeah, well, I don’t know. I’m not supposed to let people come here who don’t have reservations.” He looked back towards a row of cabins, “Since no one else showed up, I suppose it wouldn’t hurt.”
I offered my hand for a handshake, but he wasn’t having it. Finally, I awkwardly said, “We would appreciate it.”
“I need you to put up the weapons, though. They aren’t allowed.”
“That’s not going to happen. Not until we know this place is safe and that you are on the up and up,” I said, “And you can put your hands down. We’re not here to hurt anybody.”
“Easy enough for you to say. Where I come from, you don’t bring guns unless you’re going to use them.”
“I assure you we won’t use them unless you make us. Take us someplace we can talk, and we’ll make you understand why we’re carrying these. I promise you.”
“I guess I don’t have much choice in the matter, do I?”
I smiled. “We could tell you here, but we’re cold and tired. We don’t mean you any harm.”
Duane thought a second. “Yeah, alright… just follow me, then.”
Duane showed us around the community center. “Bathroom is over there. Water and a few snacks in the fridge. Lots of places to sit over there. Make yourselves at home,” he said, not overly enthused about any of what he was saying. If it weren’t for our guns, we’d been out on our asses. I was pretty sure about that.
“Thanks,” I said, walking over to one of the walls. “Huh,” I said to myself. I rubbed the God-awful ugly wall covering. Bad memories seemed to greet me at every corner. The paneling on the walls of the community center was the same, even down to having the weird black faux wormholes as the single-wide trailer I grew up in. It was a 1979 Starlight single wide. I remember mom talking about how the guy who pulled the trailer to our lot marveled about how heavy it was. “Damn solid trailer you got there,” he’d said.
The clank of a serving tray broke my reminiscing. I grabbed one of the cups and poured it full of hot tea. A few sips and a couple minutes later, in the comfortable recliner, and I forgot about the damn horrible paneling. That was some of the best tea I ever drank.
Not everything was as good as the tea and recliner. By the way Duane nervously stared at Quill when he thought no one was looking, it was as apparent to him, as it was us, that something was wrong with her. That she had found a Miley Industries trucker hat in the Ripsaw and had it pushed down low over her brow trying to block light from her eyes only made things worse. At least with the trucker’s hat pushed down so low it was hard to get a good view of her eyes.
Duane motioned towards the guns. “You care to finally tell me what the world is going on?”
I told him he might want to sit down and get comfortable. He did so with a sigh, and I wasted no time explaining what had happened during the last couple of days. He sipped his tea as he listened intently; any reserve he might’ve had about anything I said wasn’t at all apparent, given the smile slowly forming on his lips.
“Is this a joke, guys? I know it’s my tenth anniversary working here, but that seems little too short a time for everyone to be putting this much effort into a goof. Shit, now, y’all.” He scooted back from the edge of his seat, apparently waiting for us to yell surprise. After seeing the looks on our faces, his smile began to fade.
“I wish ta hell it was a joke, son,” Sam said. “It ain’t, ’ough.”
Avery walked over to Duane and showed him the phone I told him about. The phone being a tangible connection to an otherwise unbelievable tale quickly eroded whatever notion that remained that what we were saying was part of an elaborate joke.
Duane sat there, shaking his head for a good while, trying to take in what all I had told him. “I guess I knew something was wrong when our replacements didn’t show up.”
“Our?” I asked.
“I’m camp manager here. We finished our three-month rotation and were waiting for our replacements, but no one showed up to replace us. Finally, I told my people to go ahead and go home to their families. I’d stay until our replacements finally showed up. Sounds like I shouldn’t have let them go.”
Duane was a big man, older, and had impressive cornrows. He reminded me of a soft-spoken version of Ving Rhames. “No way for you to have known what was going on,” I told him.
“Have you talked ta anybody outside here?” Sam asked.
“No. The internet went down almost three days ago. Nothing since. That’s the main reason people left in the first place. They don’t like it much when they can’t call back home, you know.”
Avery glanced at me. I shook my head. I assumed he wanted me to ask specific questions about the internet, but I shook my head. I didn’t want to throw too much on at one time.
Sam looked at me before saying, “’bout the same time the power went out back at the Patch.”
I nodded in agreement.
Duane had a seat and drank the last bit of his tea. Quill asked Avery if he wanted to play a video game. I hadn’t noticed the television and gaming systems until then. Avery mad-dashed a few more quick inputs into the phone before finally asking Duane if that would be okay. Duane nodded that he didn’t mind.
I waited for Avery and Quill to get settled in before saying, “I’ve noticed you looking at Quill.”
“Yeah… Sorry, I didn’t mean to stare. It’s just, well… is she okay?”
Sam looked at me, sighed, and shook his head. I assumed he was trying to let me know he thought we should keep what we knew about her under wraps.
Duane eyed us both nervously. “I take it that’s a sore subject?”
I savored the last couple of drinks of my tea as I tried to decide how I’d go about telling him about her. “Just with about everything else, there’s uncertainty in what I’m about to say. I’m pretty sure she was given the agent, but for whatever reason, she didn’t turn completely into a Gray. She’s something different…”
Duane’s eyes got huge. “What you’re trying to say without actually saying it is she’s one of the monsters?”