New "friends"...12 Kilos
Garrett was sleeping on weather worn planks of creaking pine wood. Wrapped up as best as he could be in thin, scratchy wool blankets and waiting for yet another day spent in dull agony and boredom. A day wasted watching the ancient go about her daily routine before leaving him with a bottle of bitter water and closing him outside yet again. Garrett was three days and night living out there on the covered porch when he woke to the sounds of grunts coming from just beyond the steps.
The ancient hadn’t spoke of any large animals, she made no mention of avoiding anything except for her constant remarks about hill folk. The sounds were that of mammals, larger ones, wild pigs perhaps. Something that was clearly bold enough to grunt, snuffle, and chew loudly on…
The ancient is always tossing fish guts and carrot heads off the deck and out onto the beach. The thought enters Garrett’s head and he contents himself with assuming that the nightly clean up crew has come by to remove offerings made. Maybe when I’m on the mend I can fashion a good spear out of some light metal and we can dine on something other than fish.Garrett contends with that thought and thinks to reposition himself slightly so he can keep an eye on the porch steps, just in case.
What he sees has him slowly reaching for the glass wine bottle full of water. Damn the old woman, it’s the closest thing to a weapon out there on the exposed porch. At first, he only sees one of them, its pale white rump caught in the moon light, then another, and then a face, if you could call it that.
The barking monstrosities of the Tumor Queen’s lair, those miserable, irradiated unfortunates limping along, covered in their horrific growths. They seemed suddenly mundane by comparison to what Garrett sees in the moonlight. These things aren’t human, certainly not entirely. They shuffle around and pass one another, circling and lunging at what the ancient woman had thrown off the porch hours before. They walk on all fours as though it comes naturally, but nothing about it looks natural at all. These creatures are pale as milk, their patchy body hair coming in blonde and white where it dares to grow at all. They stoop, not crawling on elbows and knees but walking crudely on hunched legs and wide splayed feet with their hands constantly one or the other making contact with the ground as they move until they stop and squat with handfuls of fish guts and carrot ends ready to be brought up to faces that are nearly as skeletal as not.
Garrett sees one terrifying face, waxy, paper thin skin stretched over a skull covered in open sores with spots of bare skull showing here and there. The awful thing chews absently on a mouthful of fish guts and dirt before grunting and pushing back into the endless circle being made around the trash being consumed.
There is no sleep to be had anymore and the endless headache suddenly doesn’t seem so important. The creatures, a most fitting word for what Garrett finds himself looking at, continue their circling feast until there is nothing left to be had and then one of them sniffs animalistically at the porch, daring to come closer to the steps leading up.
Fight or flight, the first and original instinct. The most important measure of any animals’ chances of survival. Were these things merely scavengers, opportunists, or predators stopping for a moment to take in an easy meal? Would letting one of the things ascend the porch steps and get within striking distance be the wise approach? Could it be dropped with a well-placed swing with the bottle, or would the ancient glass shatter harmlessly leaving Garrett with nothing but a sharp bottle neck in his hand to fend off the array of stopped horrors?
Garrett considered all those internal questions and dozens more besides as the thing continues to stoop walk over to the steps. One wide, white, boney foot lands on the porch step and another one of the things grunts loudly and speaks. A rasping voice erupts from the creature, sounding like someone speaking through a mouthful of river rocks.
“Danger.”
The one busy climbing up the porch nearly whispers in response. “Hungry.”
Another one of the creatures comes into view then, closer to the porch railing near Garrett than the others and he sees one pale, white eye peeking out underneath a mop of urine colored hair. “Awake, danger.”
The one that was busy coming up the steps stops then, the moonlight showing two rows of sharp teeth laid bare by the creature’s total lack of lips, resting below the flaky skinned remains of what was once a nose. The creature whispers again, looking directly at Garrett without seeing him with its useless white out eyes, “death, soon.”
The one waiting on the other side of the railing also whispers, “Yes, soon.”
The creature turns and carefully takes the two steps down the porch and out into the sand beyond and the others seem to close and circle around it for a few laps before the whole terrifying circus parades across the sand toward the acid eaten carcasses of the whales Garrett had pulled himself through to reach this new home.
Garrett loosens his grip on the wine bottle and slumps back against the light metal chair on the porch. He uses that already cold hand to press against the furnace that is his left cheek and also presses that cold hand against his eyes. He saw what he saw, no denying that, but what fresh hell is this? The walking dead? Some savage version of irradiated leprosy? These awful monsters look even worse than the Tumor Queen’s retinue yet these things can manage human speech, and they clearly have senses heightened by their obvious blindness.
With sleep being a terror spurned mistress Garrett sets out to focus on the bottle of bitter water. The unwillingness to eat or drink has to be put aside, the constant headache be damned, today has to be the day he shows the ancient that he is safe enough to house indoors, otherwise…