The door splintered. This was an empty house; its occupants sheltering elsewhere for the night. Hayden walked over to the hatch they’d left open that led inside. “Shall we?”
Alicia grimaced. “I’d rather guard the roof.”
Drake made sure the man and woman were running safely and that the bulk of the creatures were heading toward their house. “Party animals are all here. Let’s do this.”
“Creature feature would be a better description,” Alicia pointed out.
Hayden walked into the house first. “Stay here, Alicia. Use the comms. We need to know if the villagers can’t handle the rest of them.”
Drake followed their boss, happy that candles still flickered to light their way. Down a short flight of stairs and into an attic, diagonal beams of wood holding the roof up and spiderwebs everywhere. A door stood open that led to another staircase and down to the first floor landing. He ran toward it, descended the steps and then froze, listening.
“What the—”
A scratching sound came from the closet to his left, fingernails or claw-tips being drawn slowly across a wooden surface. It was slow and deliberate and highly distracting. Hayden watched the landing as Drake flung the door wide open.
Darkness leapt at him, striking him hard and bodily around the upper chest. He toppled backward, staggering, losing his grip on the rifle. A slick, fleshy body landed on him, grease smearing his clothes and hands as he struggled, and giving him no grip whatsoever. The attack was soundless, but this close up, finally he knew that this was not el monstruo, not a creature born of a black pit.
It was human.
Skull, face and neck were covered by a thick, stretched balaclava with the tiniest of eye and nose holes, the rest of the body naked save for a pair of shorts, and covered in some kind of filth or gunk or oil. It slithered all over him, stinking, panting, striking and smashing at him. He pushed it away, but like an attack dog it was tenacious. Its fingers had some kind of material attached that gave helped them grip, same for the feet probably. Drake swiped out and caught a wrist that was quickly snatched away. But not before he saw the oddest thing.
“Hayden, it has…”
More then scuttled up the stairs, running low and fast — a nightmare swarm that belied human movement. They were trained, sticking together; they were violent, raised with cruelty; and they were driven. Somebody made them like this.
Drake punched swiftly, forgetting the grappling which clearly wasn’t working. These things felt pain then. His opponent flinched away, grunting.
Drake kicked out at what he assumed was the head, feeling relief when it smashed against a rail and then stopped moving.
Hayden faced the swarm. Drake shuffled to her side and the two stood together, filling the landing, as the creatures came up. Then they were scuttling and jumping, rearing off two feet and launching themselves through the air. Drake tried to bat one aside but the body was too heavy, smashing him to his knees. Hayden met another head on, striking it with her elbow and crying out herself with pain. But the blacked-out body fell away, not moving.
It was instantly replaced with another.
Drake felt a punch and then a two-fingered jab to the throat. When he caught the wrist he flinched again. The two-fingered jab had been done for only one reason.
This thing only had two fingers. The previous attacker had only four. Signs of battle? Another flailing about at Hayden did so with the stump of a wrist. A fourth appeared to possess only half a foot, but maybe that was an optical illusion.
This day just gets weirder and weirder, he thought. Not because of the missing body parts but because every single attacker was missing body parts.
He swiped another away, sent a creature tumbling back downstairs and taking another four out with him. Arms and legs waved, and greasy black stains marked the bare wood and walls. Drake found his Glock and fired another warning shot. This also had no effect whatsoever. Did they even know what guns were? Shit, that was not a good thought. Hayden fell back as a fist slammed her face. The figure jumped but Drake hit it bodily out of the air with his shoulder, sending it over the landing and crashing below. Bones snapped. Finally there came a noise, a scream, exploding from one of them; a high-pitched keening whine as if metal were being put through a wood-chopper. Drake saw blackened bodies shooting away from the screamer. He blocked another attack, fired the Glock again.
No response.
He kicked another down the stairs. Alicia’s voice came across the comms. “About eight of the mountain-spider-things are converging on the house where we stashed most of the bloody villagers. Shit, we need to move, guys.”
Drake stared hard at the crush of bodies and then nodded at Hayden. “Going through now. Come right down and join us, love.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Securing his weapons, Drake waited half a minute and then began to barge right through the middle of their attackers. The grease that coated their bodies, and an odor of stale sweat filled his nostrils immediately; their quiet grunting only accentuating his distaste. Hands and feet jabbed at him, each missing a finger or a toe. A tight black mask came down fast, striking his cheek, the features beneath flattened and obscured. The man might as well have had no nose.
Hayden came behind, flinging others aside and trying to keep up the momentum. They needed to be fast and hard, move without mercy to get through the crush. Alicia cried out as she raced across the landing and then hit the last of the climbers, fighting them for the first time and making her own characteristically loud impressions.
Drake winced as he reached the halfway point down and faced a woman, her right arm missing from the elbow. She swung it at his face, missed, and he threw her at the wall, seeing blood and oil spurt in an erratic pattern across the paintwork. He kicked the next man in the chest, using his height advantage; picked up another and upended him over the bannister. Hayden followed at his heels, clearing the way for Alicia who ended her opponent’s day with sharp, precise jabs, knees and kicks.
Around the bottom of the stairs and the crawlers were exiting rapidly. Like a swarm they poured out the front door, a few steps ahead of Drake. Revulsion stuck in his throat, but he knew what these things were now — just not what made them the way they were.
An errant creature rose up on two legs, black and jabbing like a rearing, threatened arachnid. Drake dove in with an elbow and was then rolling outside, into the street, among them. An elbow struck his face, a knee glanced off his ribcage. One of the figures crawled right over him without stopping. Drake rolled and rolled until he hit the grass verge on the other side.
Alicia, on her feet, offered a hand. “Playtime done for today?”
“Aye, love. How’s it looking?”
“There’s too many of them for this rough and tumble shit. We need to start tying ’em up or something.”
“Should have known you’d come up with that. What position do you prefer?”
Alicia ran at his side as they jogged quickly toward the supposed safe-house. “Oh, Drakey, don’t tempt me.”
Hayden caught them up. “No way could these guys have known which house we chose,” she said, catching her feet as the path sloped. “No goddamn way.”
Alicia made a squeaking noise. “Mountain spider!”
Drake kicked out at a black figure that sprang at them from the shadows, all raised elbows and knees, hands jabbing like fleshy daggers. “Fuck’s sake, Alicia. Stop calling ’em that. Makes it worse.”
Then he turned to Hayden. “You think there’s a spy in their midst?”