Emily’s vision, already half-obstructed by the creature’s huge corkscrew-like body, was blocked completely, her senses overwhelmed by the piercing screech of pulverizing glass.
She hit the brake rather than risk a collision.
A second later and a circle of glass fell away, crashing onto the dashboard. The reinforced glass of the windshield refused to shatter and fell to the floor. The creature eased its head through the newly opened space, swiveling back and forth as if surveying the cab’s interior. Its matte-black skin seemed to brighten as it touched the much warmer air of the Cat’s cabin.
Rhiannon was screaming over and over, “Emily! Kill it. Kill it.”
Thor was still trying, unsuccessfully, thank God, to push his way between the seats and reach the creature, which was already forcing itself through the portal it had created. Rhiannon had shrunk as far back into her seat as she could, trying to remain out of its reach.
“Thor. Get back,” Emily screamed as she twisted around and pushed herself between the dog and the seats, reaching for the shotgun. “Get back, Thor,” she yelled again when the dog continued to try to move forward. The dog finally acceded and wriggled free of the space. It was all the room Emily needed, and her fingers found the strap of the shotgun.
She pulled the Mossberg toward her, grabbing it with both hands. Swinging around, she brought the gun down to her side, aiming the barrel at the creature’s head.
It was halfway through the hole now, its eyestalks swiveling back and forth. Emily paused, her finger on the trigger. If she fired the gun in here, there was no telling what kind of damage the buckshot might do. It could ricochet around the cabin and maim her, Rhiannon, or Thor. The blast would surely kill the creature, but this close it meant an added danger from flying alien carcass. She couldn’t risk it.
Emily flipped the shotgun around and hit the creature between its two eyestalks with the butt of the shotgun.
The eyestalks shrunk back, and the thing’s buzz-saw jaws flew wide apart. It was, Emily supposed, the closest the alien could come to expressing surprise. But it didn’t back away, so she hit it again, this time aiming for the top eyestalk. It exploded into a mess of black goo.
That seemed to get the message across that it was not welcome, and the thing rapidly pulled back through the hole, skittering off the hood of the Sno-Cat.
With the alien gone, the cabin was now replaced with the rumble of the idling engine flowing in through the hole in the windshield. She was going to have to figure out some way to fix that.
“It’s the warmth of the cabin,” Emily said with sudden realization, more to herself than Rhiannon. “These things are surrounded by snow and ice. They must be extremely sensitive to changes in temperature. That makes the inside of this cabin the fucking Ritz-Carlton for them.”
Whatever weird weather anomaly had caused the sudden warming of the air outside had increased the ambient temperature on this side of the mountain enough to thaw the creatures out. Now they were instinctively looking for a way off the mountain. That meant Jacob’s observation was only half-right. The cold only stopped the effects of the red rain. It was going to take prolonged exposure to frigid weather to have the same effect on the creatures as she had seen with the aliens at the playground, back in Fairbanks.
The thought had no sooner entered her mind than Rhiannon screamed a warning, “Look!”
Emily followed the girl’s eyes. “Oh! Shit!” she hissed from lips that suddenly felt dry and cracked. Clambering over the sides of the big rig in front of them was another wave of spider-aliens. They leaped from the side of the rig, making a beeline for the stationary Cat, attracted by the plume of escaping warm air of the cabin.
Emily floored the accelerator, sending a spray of melting snow up from the tracks as the Cat began picking up speed. There were at least sixty of the little bastards heading toward them, Emily estimated. There was no turning back now, though; she had to keep plowing forward. Aiming the front of the Cat toward a space between the next two vehicles, Emily pushed the speed up to thirty-five.
“Hold on,” she yelled at Rhiannon over the roaring engine just before the Cat hit the leading edge of the onrushing aliens.
There were several resounding thuds as the machine met the monsters. The thuds were quickly followed by a series of satisfying pops and crunches as the tracks of the Cat crushed the carapaces of the first few unlucky creatures.
More tried to leap onto the Cat as it rolled over them, but they either bounced harmlessly off the sides or were caught by the four tracks and crushed to a purple pulp. One did manage to land on the gantry running alongside Emily, but it skidded and slipped along the metal surface, unable to find purchase, before sliding off the opposite end.
And then they were through the creatures. Emily gunned the engine, pushing the Cat up to forty in an attempt to leave the creatures behind. She gained some distance, but the things were persistent little buggers; she could see them streaming down the hill behind her even as the gap between them widened.
There was enough space between the next few vehicles that Emily didn’t need to slow down, and the distance between them and their pursuers grew even greater. One hundred, then two hundred, then three hundred feet separated them. But as she slowed the Cat to maneuver around a blind hairpin corner, she was forced to slam on the brakes again.
A truck, towing a thirty-foot flatbed, had come to a halt right at the apex of the turn; its cab took up the entirety of the center portion of the snow-covered road, leaving less than ten feet of space separating it from the right edge. Beyond the edge, an almost sheer drop fell the final sixty feet or so to the plain below.
Emily stared back through the rear window toward the summit. The creatures were still doggedly following her, swarming down the mountainside.
There was no time to lose. She had to risk it.
Emily reversed the Cat back until she was as close to the edge as she dared.
“Rhiannon, I need you to be my eyes,” Emily said, trying to keep the panic she felt from her voice. “Look out the window on your side and tell me how much space there is between us and the edge, all right?” Rhiannon stared blankly at Emily for a second, then nodded and scooted over a little until she was pressed tightly against the door.
“How much, honey? Quickly.” Emily could see the wave of creatures closing in on them in the side-view mirror.
Rhiannon turned and held her two hands up in the air to illustrate the distance. “This much,” she said. About ten inches. That gave Emily a little more room to edge over, just a couple of inches but no more. Rhiannon’s face was almost as white as the snow, and Emily could see a vein twitching convulsively in her throat.
As she edged the Cat closer to the lip of the road, Rhiannon reduced the gap between her hands accordingly. “We’re getting awfully close,” she gulped, glancing down at the drop just inches away from her side of the Cat.
Emily reassessed her angle of approach to the space between the stalled truck and the lip of the road. This was the best she could do without risking one of the tracks slipping off the edge. She wiped away a bead of sweat that had trickled into her left eye, then allowed her foot to caress the accelerator.
Gently, gently does it.
The Cat moved slowly forward, inching its way toward the gap.
The cab of the wrecked big rig loomed large on Emily’s left side as she eased the Cat gradually past it, the left rearview mirror scraping noisily against the front edge of the truck’s engine cowling. Emily ignored the screeching of metal against metal, focusing entirely on keeping the vehicle as far to the left as was possible.