AWOL: A Character Lost (13 page)

It started off with a slow quick walk, which went to a trot, and then to a full out sprint. It leaped the porch steps and never broke stride.

*

The character was almost back to the couch when the alien came busting into the room, door debris and part of the door jamb flying and falling all around it as it slid to a stop, gun aimed and raised.

The character dropped the soda and froze where he was standing. The soda hit the ground, splashed, and exploded all over the character, and the wall beside him.

Johnny was also frozen like his dad.

The alien smiled when it saw them because the stories were true. The alien tightened its grip on the gun and the gun hummed, ready to fire.

Moments ticked off the clock – it was a momentary stand off.

“Run!” The character screamed, finally realizing the danger.

Johnny broke his frozen stare, rolled off the couch, into the coffee table (shattering it), and then onto the floor.

The alien blasted a yellow laser right above Johnny’s head as the kid got up, and ran for the safety of the bedroom. The laser shattered part of a wall, busted out a window, and destroyed the table and chairs on the porch when it missed its mark.

The character grabbed a small table and tossed it at the alien as it turned to fire on him. The alien ducked as the table went sailing over its head and bounced off the wall. The alien kept its hunter cool and rose back up. It aimed at the character and fired.

The yellow laser missed its mark, as the character ducked. The laser exploded in the kitchen, destroying the sink, most of the cabinets around it, and the wall. Canned food items sailed out of the cabinets and into the clearing outside. They came to rest in various spots on the snowy ground as a steady stream of water shot up out of the broken sink and flooded the counter and floor.

The alien knew where the character was going as the character took off for the bedroom where his son was now safely secured. The alien leaped across the couch with cat-like agility and nearly reached the bedroom door, but the character was just a tick quicker. He managed to get into the room and shut the door before the alien reached it. The alien slammed face first into the hard piece of wood, unable to stop in time, and then stumbled backwards. It stopped, and stood there for a second, shaking off the momentary stars. It could hear the two of them moving around inside, pushing something up against the door. It decided to find another way in.

*

The character sat down on the bed, which was now in front of the door to the bedroom. He felt confident they were safe for now, but not so confident that he let his guard down. They still needed to cover the window, in case the thing decided to come in that way. He tried to remember something, as he sat there. Did the cabin have shutters attached to it, shutters that could be closed during the most violent of storms? He was pretty sure it did.

The character got up, and walked across the room to the half-open window. He peered outside. The snow was falling heavy, and the darkness of the night pushed against the window like it was trying to get inside, trying to shut out the light. The character turned back to his son. “There should be a key hole in the door big enough to see through. Can you look through it and see if that thing is still there?”

“Seriously?”

“If it is still there then I know I have time to open the window, lean out, grab the shutters, and slam them closed, if they are not locked in place.”

“Nope, not doing that.”

“Look Johnny, I need you right now. You have to find some strength to do this, or we might not make it out.”

“I don’t.”

“Look, son, this is no longer a request. I need you to do it. Now move!”

Johnny did as his dad asked because when his father got upset, his father didn’t play games. Johnny climbed onto the bed, and found his courage. He was sure there would be an eyeball staring right back at him when he peered through the key hole, but there wasn’t. There was nothing at all to be seen.

“It’s clear,” Johnny replied, pulling his face away like it had just been burned. He hoped he would never have to do that again in his lifetime. That was way too intense for his young system.

“Shit,” the character replied, because he knew what emptiness meant. The thing was probably outside and on its way over to this window.

“Should I open the door and look out? I don’t hear anything moving around out there.” Johnny really didn’t want to do this, but he would if it was requested of him.

“No, just come back here. Stay close to me.”

Johnny moved over to where his dad was standing, as his dad grabbed the bottom of the window and opened it. He listened for movement, any signs of their intruder.

No sounds, nothing, stillness, even the forest animals had fallen silent as if they knew something was lurking within their presence, something not from this world. He drew in a deep breath of cool air and exhaled it in a plum of white. He started to lean out when a hand fell on his shoulder. He jumped and turned to face his son.

“Wait!”

“What Johnny?”

“What if it’s out there?”

“It probably is.”

“Then why are you doing this?”

“We have no choice. We have to secure the window.”

“Hold on.”

“What? I really need to do this.”

Johnny rummaged around for a moment trying to find a weapon. There was nothing they could use, but the rod in the closet. He broke it in half and brought part of it back over to where his dad was standing.

The character looked at the closet rod in his son’s hands. He was gripping it like a baseball bat, smooth end pointed down, sharp jagged broken end pointed up.

“Just in case, dad.”

“Are you ready now?”

Johnny took his stance and nodded.

The character turned to the window and listened again. There was nothing to be heard, so he leaned out, and didn’t linger. He pulled himself quickly back into the room and slammed the window shut. “They’re locked to the wall. We would need to go outside in order to unlock them.”

“No way, the key hole was one thing, but this is – no, not going to do it.”

“Let me finish. I was going to say I don’t think it is worth the risk. The door is blocked, and we can see the entire room. All we have to do is worry about this window.”

Johnny seemed to be okay with that as he released his grip on the weapon and tossed it onto the bed.

“Now we need to . . .” The character stopped and looked up at the ceiling. He thought he heard something.

“What’s that, dad?”

“I don’t know.”

They both were now staring at the ceiling as the sound of wood being burned fell into their ears and a smoky smell found their noses. A hole started to form, round, jagged, and crude. The character and his son didn’t say a word to each other; they just grabbed the bed, and yanked it out of the way. The character then flung the door open as a big chunk of the ceiling fell into the room, crashing hard into the floor, sending snow and wood debris flying. The alien leaped down a second later with the gun pointed towards them. As it fell, it fired; and this time it didn’t miss.

The character felt a tingling sensation rush over him, like a thousand electric ants had decided to go on the attack. He was losing feeling in his legs, and soon he would have to lie down. The bed, all he wanted was the bed. Like a zombie, he walked towards it, as the alien smiled, first piece of meat secured.

Johnny, who had made it close to the front door, stopped. He realized his dad wasn’t behind him. He turned and saw the alien step out of the bedroom. The alien fired before Johnny could react. The laser reached him and stunned him. Johnny began to slip away.

In the bedroom, the character fell forward onto the bed. The springs squeaked and bounced from the dead weight, then settled.

The character blinked a couple of times and then his eyes closed. He felt himself falling, tumbling, and spinning into some other world.

*

The character woke up on a bed, but he wasn’t face down, he was face up. Lights raced across the ceiling as a car drove by on the street. He heard his oldest son yell out down the hall. It sounded like he was waking up from a nightmare. Then he heard his youngest son do the same. The character tried to register all this, but in his sleep riddled mind confusion was creating chaos in his brain. Someone stirred beside him. He could feel her warmth, smell her sweet female scents, and safety, he felt safety as he lay beside her.

“Danny. The kids are up.”

He heard his name, and it sounded foreign to him. Why did it sound foreign? He didn’t know. He just knew that he had been lost in a nightmare, but now he was waking up. Waking up from what seemed like a long ago dream.

“Are you okay?” Sweet warm breath on his ear, comfort in her touch as she noticed something was wrong.

“I’m fine, bad dream.”

“Sounds like a dozy.”

“It was.” Danny sat up and put his feet on the floor. He looked at the soft white carpet, the furniture, the world around him. This was home. “I’ll go check on the kids.”

“We’ll talk when you get back.”

“Not sure I remember enough about it to talk about it.”

“You must remember something.”

“I remember being lost and being at my grandfather’s cabin with Johnny. That’s it.” He paused and looked at her. “I love you.”

“Love you too.”

He got up and shuffled towards the door.

Dawn’s early light was crawling out of the darkness and greeting the world at large as Danny stepped out into the hallway, stopped in front of the mirror, and shook the dream cobwebs from his head. He was sure something strange had happened in those dreams, but all he could remember about them was his grandfather’s cabin; and even that memory was fading, shimmering off into the distance.

He stood there a moment and looked at himself. He had shoulder length dark hair that had grey streaks in it, and he wore a goatee around his mouth. He was fit and muscular, wearing a pair of boxer shorts with hearts on them and a tee-shirt that had “Stud Muffin” written on it in big red letters. Below the centered lettering on the shirt was the imprint of a muffin with two arms sticking out of it, flexing muscles no muffin should ever have, even if it was chocolate chip, the toughest of all the muffins in the muffin kingdom.

He leaned over and rubbed his legs. They were aching and in desperate need of a good run. He felt like he hadn’t run in a very long time.

Why?

Why hadn’t he run in so long, when he rarely missed a day?

Something about that dream he couldn’t remember, something hidden in those dream fragments, something there had caused his lapse in running; but he was blank when it came to the reason why.

He could hear his boys talking down the hall, so that pushed him back into father mode. He decided to leave the mirror and go down to check on them, but something stopped him again; and it wasn’t the mirror this time. It was something else.

He walked over to a small picture that was sitting on a nearby table. He picked it up and looked at it. The image was an older photograph taken some time back in his childhood – the seventies, ugliest decade for mankind. In this picture, he was being held by his grandfather, and they were standing outside a small cabin. For some reason this cabin meant something to him, something about the dream he woke up from involved this cabin, but again, blank was the answer when he tried to remember anything about it. He held the picture a moment longer before sitting it back down. His eyes found his wallet lying beside his keys. He picked up this brown leather package, dusted off the dust, and opened it. He thumbed through it – mostly pictures of his family, useless credit cards, a few dollars, and a driver’s license. He took out the license and looked at it, held the square piece of yellowed plastic in his hand. All of the stuff was there – name Danny Tall, height 5’8, eye color brown. He also noticed that he was an organ donor with a class C license, all typical stuff.

He put the plastic thing back in its holder and made his feet move to the end of the hall where his boys were talking behind a closed bedroom door. Before going into the room, he checked a small thermostat like instrument attached to the interior wall. This instrument was a small white square box about 12 inches high and 12 inches wide. It had three small lights on it, green, yellow, and red along with a button that said: PANIC! Below this PANIC! button was a small speaker, which would sound an alarm if the lights decided to shift from green to yellow. This was supposed to give you enough time to get suited up before the red button started to flash; supposed to, though it had never been tested in this house.

Beside this box was a big cabinet that held four hazmat suits, two adult sizes and two kid sizes. There were four sets of gloves, four sets of boots, four bottles of air, and four breathing tubes each attached to masks, just in case that PANIC! button needed to be punched. Luckily the green light was flashing, which meant the air inside the house was still clean, everything was holding tight.

While he stood there, he tried not to think about the horror stories he had heard concerning homes that had lost their protective seal. Nuclear air can do a number on the human system, because we were never meant to live in air that toxic.

He turned away from the instrument panel and knocked on the door, which lead into Johnny’s room. When he got the go ahead, he entered.

The room held a single bed with Batman sheets and pillowcases, posters on the walls of favorite super-heroes and movies, a desk with a chair, a TV, DVD player, and a shelf full of books, DVD movies, and CD’s. Johnny, though young, hadn’t adopted the download philosophy like peers his age, or his brother for that matter. He liked to keep it old school.

Danny looked at Johnny and Michael as they sat on the bed talking. It warmed his heart to see them sitting there. Sometimes the greatest tragedies can do the best of things, so was the case for his two sons.

Johnny was four inches shorter than his brother, standing five feet tall while his brother Michael stood about five foot four. They both had dark hair like their dad, and it was long and shaggy. Both boys were in pretty good physical shape, but it was Johnny who had taken to running. Michael, on the other hand, didn’t care much for that activity. He spent most of his time playing video games.