“I crawled out,” Luke said. “One of them whoosh sounds went by as I crawled out from under the rock. The sun was up by then, but the sky looked funny. I ran through the woods as quiet as I could and tried to head for where I’d parked my truck. I got a hot stitch in my right side, and I could barely breathe, I was runnin’ so fast, but I didn’t slow down until I saw a little patch of my red truck through the woods. Then WHOOSH! One of those things came down right on top of me. I heard it comin’, and I got tangled up in a branch so I was falling when it grabbed my back. The thing lifted me about a foot or two by my back and then somethin’ off to the north exploded.”
Luke picked up his glass and took a sip of water. He ran his tongue over his lips while everyone watched.
“I guess it was just dumb luck that the thing got distracted. I suspect the loud noise drew it away. I never did find out what blew up, but it sounded pretty damn big. After the boom, I could hear stuff falling—crashing back to the ground—for several seconds. I figured out later that the way the thing picked me up was weird. It didn’t touch my jacket or my shirt, but it just grabbed ahold of me—just the flesh. I found three big scrapes and a chunk of meat missing from my shoulder, but my clothes weren’t ripped one bit.”
“Did you get a look at it?" Ted asked.
“I did,” Luke said. “I did. I don’t know what to tell you, though. When it let go of me, I was fallin’ back to the ground, but I flipped over enough to see. It was like a hole in the world. Wherever the thing was, nuthin’ else was. I can’t tell you more than that.”
Brad was watching Robby this time and saw him pass the notepad over to Ted. The older man barely glanced down and then asked a question—“What was the size of the hole?”
“It’s a good question,” Luke said, “but I can’t answer it. I’d hafta assume how far away it were, you know? If it were ten feet up, then I ‘spose it was only ‘bout five, six feet across. But if it were fifty feet up, then maybe thirty feet across. Because it wasn’t a thing, it was like a absence of anything.”
“But it had claws,” Ted said.
“I never said claws,” Luke said, wagging his finger. He turned his finger over to Robby and asked—“Boy, why don’t you just ask me your questions directly?”
Robby straightened up and tugged his shirt down before answering—“It wasn’t a question, and it wasn’t from me.”
“The hell it wasn’t,” Luke said. “I’ll finish the rest of my story without y’all questioning my account, if you don’t mind.” He paused and swept his eyes around the room.
Brad wanted to hear the rest of the story. He felt Luke didn’t have cause for indignation, but he really didn’t care either way. He just wanted to hear the rest of the story.
“Like I said, I hit the ground like a sack of dumbbells, but I didn’t even feel the pain in my back yet,” Luke said. “I rolled to my feet and got running again. This time I hunched over, kinda looking up over my shoulder. I drove the same way—I hunched down in my seat and looked up through the windows. Nearly ran my truck off the road a couple of times. I was so busy lookin’ up and drivin’ fast that I’m not sure how I made it down to the main road in one piece. I went straight for town; I didn’t even stop at my house. I didn’t know yet, but I was soaking my shirt with blood.
“When I got to the center of town, everything was deserted, but I didn’t think much of it. It was still early, a’course, and Thanksgiving and all. Down near the Sheriff’s office there’s a Sevum-’Levum—always open and always a deputy or two hanging ’round. Not this time though—the place was empty. Door was wide open, lights on, nobody home. I went back around the counter and I nearly jumped outta my skin when the light shut off. I figured someone out back shut ‘em, but then I saw out the window—everything had gone off. Exxon sign across the corner, red lights, everything was off. I figured the power went out.
“I went through a ton of buildings and I couldn’t find a soul. Hell, I couldn’t even find a dog or a cat. The whole town had just emptied out. I’ve got to take a break if y’all don’t mind,” Luke said. “My throat’s givin’ out.”
Luke got up and headed for the door. After a couple of seconds, Frank got up and followed him out to the parking lot.
Brad turned to Judy, who gripped her coffee cup with both hands.
“That’s crazy,” Brad said to her. “I can’t imagine what attacked him.”
“Sheila has a similar story,” Judy said.
“Oh? Who’s Sheila?” Brad asked. He glanced around the room. A few people left their tables to move around or wander outside, but most of the twenty-four people still sat at their tables. Several people who started out the evening sitting alone now joined one of the tables with two or three people. Brad sat with Judy, and on the other side Robby and Ted were loosely associated with their table.
Judy pointed her coffee mug at a woman who stood to gather some plates and take them to the kitchen—“She’s Sheila. See her limp?”
Brad couldn’t help but notice the limp.
“When one of the things grabbed her it nearly split her right calf in two. She’s got about three pounds of tape holding her leg together,” Judy said.
“Whoa,” Brad said. “The way you and Robby described it, it sounded like people were just vanishing into thin air.”
“Robby was on an island,” Judy said. “Sheila was down in Mass, and it sounds like Luke was down in Maryland or whatever. Who says they experienced the same kind of thing?”
“I guess,” Brad said.
“I saw a couple of people disappear with my own eyes,” Judy said. “I couldn’t begin to say what actually happened to them.”
“But I thought you were a proponent of the whole Rapture concept. If you knew about Sheila, then why all the talk about people being raptured?” Brad asked.
“How do you know the rapture doesn’t happen that way?" Judy asked.
“Swooping down on people and nearly tearing them apart?” Brad asked.
“Just their physical manifestations, right? Transformation can be both destructive and constructive, don’t you think?" Judy asked.
“I guess I’ve never thought about it,” Brad said.
“Isn’t it funny?” Judy spoke to her coffee mug. “The world ends and as far as we know every single person within a hundred-mile radius gathers at a shitty Denny’s for what amounts to a status meeting. I can’t tell you how many marketing campaign meetings I sat through just wishing the world would end so I wouldn’t have to endure even one more second of formless conjecture. Now I’ve willingly subjected myself to listening to some hillbilly messiah spin a yarn about his heroic journey.”
“Humans need human contact,” Brad said. “They can try to isolate themselves, but eventually they gather together.”
The door to the parking lot swung open and Frank entered, followed by Luke. They took their seats as the chatter at the tables died down.
Nobody spoke for a moment and then Ted broke the silence—“You have the floor, Luke.”
Luke nodded and cleared his throat.
“I wandered ’round for a few days ’fore I figured I should make my way to a city to see what’s what. I headed east through Maryland and parts of Virginia. I traded cars coupla times. The truck made so much noise that I just felt conspicuous. Down there the roads are empty. There’s no cars anywhere ’cept in parking lots and driveways, so it was pretty easy going. I din’t have any problems at all until I got to the suburbs of DC. I’d already been through Hagerstown and Frederick, and everythin’ was the same as out west, so I kinda figured nothin’ would be new. But I got up one morning to leave Gaithersburg and I realized there was a glow on the horizon in the direction of DC.
“There was no smoke at all, but this glow. And I know it couldn’t have been real, but I thought I could feel heat coming from that direction too. The first time I saw it I was crossing the Cabin John bridge. I mean, the whole time I was thinkin’ somebody prolly left a teakettle on or somethin’ and the city was burning down. I figured as soon as I saw flames or smoke, I’d just turn around. But when I saw those flames runnin’ up and down the Potomac river, I din’t know what to do.