Exodus (12 page)

“Rhiannon. Ben. Wake up,” Emily said, gently shaking the girl’s shoulder. Rhiannon opened her eyes and sat up, looking a little confused. She pushed her brother’s feet off her lap and scowled at him as his eyes fluttered open and he yawned. Rhiannon’s scowl grew deeper when she saw it was Emily who had woken them.

“Where’s Dad?” the girl demanded.

“Grab your jackets,” Emily said. “We’re going to go find him.”

By the time Emily and the children were halfway to the Jeffersons’ house, the sun had dropped closer to the crest of the valley’s ridge. In the rapidly dimming light, long shadows stretched through the woods, crisscrossing over the path ahead, and Emily was beginning to reconsider her decision to go look for Simon.

“I want my daddy,” said Ben for the umpteenth time since stepping outside. She couldn’t blame him, of course, but dear God, it was annoying.

“Shut it, dweeb,” his sister shot back.

Emily suppressed a smile. The banter between the kids was rather cute, she had to admit. The constant poking and prodding of egos that were as fragile and underdeveloped as the children themselves. That same malleability would ensure no damage was done…probably.

“Okay, you two. That’s enough. Let’s concentrate on where we’re going. This ground is pretty rough.” Emily clicked on her flashlight and shone it into the growing darkness ahead of them,
highlighting the uneven ground and occasional rock that poked through the earth. “The last thing I need is for one of you guys to trip and break something. ’Kay?”

Both kids nodded back at her.

“All right. Stay close to me and Thor.”

Emily was surprised when she felt a small hand reach for her own free hand, clasping it tightly in its soft warmth. She looked down at Ben; his full-moon face looked up at her with such utter trust. Her heart missed a beat, and for a second, the pain and loss of an entire race that was carried within her softened. In the eyes of this little boy and his sister resided the hope of humanity. If there was to be a future, it would be through these kids. And, who could tell, but if this family had survived the red rain and carnage that followed, there must surely be more survivors. More kids. Hope.

A fighting chance. Maybe. If she managed to keep them all alive.

“Dweeb,” she heard his sister mutter under her breath. Emily sniffed back a tear and replaced it with a smile. The moment was about as emotionally poignant as she had ever experienced. Leave it to the kid to go and ruin it.

The moment gone, Emily concentrated on maneuvering the group along the path she’d walked earlier in the day.

With the dying sun now lost behind the far horizon, a three-quarter moon had peeked through a break in the clouds, saturating the forest in a dim silver light. At the duck pond, a white mist wafted off the water, coating the ground in an eerie fog that almost came up to Ben’s knees. The kid was fascinated by the shroud of water vapor as he moved his free hand through it.

“Pretty,” he whispered.

More like spooky, Emily thought. But then, at his age did he have any idea of just how much trouble they were all in? Of
course not. Emily sensed Rhiannon step closer to her. The girl looked nervous. Good. She should be, and an extra pair of nervous eyes to add to her own and Thor’s could only be a good thing.

The ducks were nowhere to be seen. Probably huddled together deep in the reeds, if they had any sense. Even Thor was more subdued, pacing alongside Rhiannon’s right side, panting gently.

The path leading up to the Jefferson place was a lot easier to negotiate thanks to the moonlight lighting the way. As the house came into view, Emily felt her pulse begin thrumming in her wrists. What if Simon wasn’t there? Worse, what if something had found him before she did?

As they topped the steps, Emily saw Simon’s car parked off to the left of the house, just beyond the corner of the garage. So he had made it this far, at least.

A shape materialized just beyond the car, and Emily let out a sigh of relief as Simon stepped out of the shadows and onto the gravel path.

He was alive.

Emily’s feeling of relief disappeared as quickly as it had arrived.

There was something wrong with Simon. The way he stood, his hands draped at his sides, his eyes wide open, staring directly at them, his mouth a thin slit, the way his chest barely seemed to move. It looked like Simon, but it just didn’t feel like Simon. His energy just felt unnatural.

She felt Ben start to move from her side toward his father. Heard his ecstatic cry of “Daddy” as he took a step closer.

“Stop!” Emily yelled, her voice like a crack of thunder in the stillness of the virgin night, her hand automatically reaching out and grabbing the little boy’s shoulder, slowing him before he could get out of her reach. “Stop,” she said again, more gently this time, as she swung the boy around and dropped down to face him. “That’s not your daddy, Ben. That’s…someone else.”

“No!” he yelled at Emily while at the same time tearing loose of her grip. He turned and sped across the grass toward Simon, his little legs eating up the ground at a frighteningly rapid pace.
The spell that had grasped Emily so firmly broke; she was back in reality watching as the boy raced across the fifty or so feet separating them from Simon.

“Oh, Jesus,” she whispered, casting a quick glance over her shoulder. Rhiannon must have sensed something was not right with the scene because she seemed glued to the spot of grass she was standing on, a look of horror and confusion painted across her pale face.

“Stay here,” she ordered the girl. Then Emily was off, chasing after the kid, her feet sliding on the damp grass, searching for traction.

Simon did not move to intercept them; he stood as still as the trees behind him, his face expressionless and his hands resting flat against his thighs, like a soldier at attention.

There was maybe twenty feet left between the kid and his father when a blur of motion exploded past Emily on her right and made like a missile directly for the running boy. It caught up with him in a second, skidding to a stop between the child and Simon, blocking the kid’s path. Ben collided with the flank of Thor, bounced off him, and flew three feet backward through the air, a surprised “Oomph!” whistling from his throat as he landed on his butt on the grass.

“Bad For! Bad doggy!” the little boy cried, his voice a high-pitched wail as he struggled to get to his feet. Thor was back at the kid’s side in a second, dancing around the child and keeping him from standing.

It was all the time Emily needed to scramble after the boy and close the final gap separating her and Ben. She grabbed the spluttering kid with one arm under both of his shoulders, scooping Ben up in one fluid movement, even as he struggled and kicked against her, pulling him tight to her side.

Despite his son’s obvious distress, Simon did not move to help him.

“Daddy!” Ben cried, both hands reaching out to Simon. “Iwannnnntmyyydaddddddy.”

Perhaps the sound of his son’s voice struck a chord deep within Simon’s mind or perhaps it was simply coincidence, but as Ben’s sorrowful howl faded into the dark, Simon took a single jerking, almost robotic, step toward them.

“Oh, shit!” The first step was followed by another hesitant, wobbling step toward Emily and the boy.

Thor was back at her feet now, his attention focused on the boy under Emily’s arm, until he caught sight of Simon’s tottering steps in their direction. Snarling, the malamute turned and faced the advancing man.

“No!” Emily yelled. “Come here, Thor. Back up.” The dog threw a look at Emily, then back at Simon, who had moved another step closer. For a second, Emily thought Thor was going to disobey her and attack, but an instant later he was at her side.

She began to back away from Simon, unwilling to turn her back on him for a second. Ben cried his father’s name, both hands reaching out toward the shuffling figure.

Simon’s face remained expressionless, seemingly unmoved by his son’s dilemma, but with each step he took his head swayed slightly—first right, then to the left, as though the muscles in his neck were unable to hold the weight of his head. If it hadn’t been for the almost ramrod-straight posture of the rest of his body, she might think he was drunk.

With each faltering step forward Simon took, Emily managed two backward. If she didn’t have Ben tucked under her arm, she would have simply turned and run for her life, but she had to think about Ben and Rhiannon. She had no idea what was wrong
with their father, but there was no way she was going to let him get close to either of them until she figured it out. She didn’t want to hurt him, but if he had suffered some kind of breakdown or the red dust had managed to affect him in some way, then she was going to have—

Simon teetered out of the long shadows of the trees and into a bright pool of moonlight.

He was fully illuminated now, and Emily could see there was something very wrong with him.

Slick black tendrils, each edged with small wicked-looking barbs, glistened in the light of the moon. Emily could see two of them jutting out from either side of Simon’s spine just above his shoulder blades. They arced up above his head and back into the shadows, as though they sprouted from the very darkness itself. A third snakelike tentacle spiraled from the darkness and attached to the back of Simon’s head, terminating at the point where Simon’s spine met his skull. An instant before Simon took each step, Emily could see the barbed tubes pulse as though they were moving liquid under pressure from whatever was hidden in the darkness to Simon. Or maybe they were issuing instruction, she thought, as the tentacles throbbed again and Simon took another faltering step, as if on the command of some strange puppet master.

Emily swung a struggling Ben around so his head was pressed deep into her shoulder; there was no telling how he would react if he saw his father like this. The boy squirmed and complained, but she kept him pressed as tightly to her as she could without risking suffocating him. She took another step backward, then braced and forced herself to turn away from Simon and whatever was controlling him.

Standing in front of her, rooted to the spot, was Rhiannon, her jaw hanging loosely open, a look of abject terror spread across
her face. Emily could see the girl’s eyes were wide and fixed on her father; there was little doubt the girl had seen what Emily had seen. Well, there was nothing she could do about that now. She had no idea what had captured Simon, but, if her previous experience with the new life-forms wandering the planet were anything to go by, they weren’t there to say hi and invite themselves to a Mets game. The most important thing right now was to get them all as far away from here as possible. She could figure out what to do next when they were all safe.

“Rhiannon,” Emily said as loudly as she could without frightening the girl or the still-wriggling boy clasped in her arms. The girl didn’t even register Emily’s presence; she just kept staring back at her slowly advancing father. Emily chanced a look back over her shoulder. Simon had moved a few steps closer; he was near enough now that she could make out the bloodless pallor of his skin and the black pits of his eyes.

“Rhiannon!” Emily spat, her voice sharp enough to cut through the terror enveloping the girl. Her eyes flicked to Emily, then darted back to her father, then back again to Emily. This time they stayed fixed on her. “I need your help, baby. I can’t explain what’s happening to your dad, but we have to get out of here, right now, okay?”

Rhiannon’s eyes stayed locked with Emily’s for a second, then drifted back toward Simon. He was close enough now that she could hear his feet dragging through the damp grass, snapping twigs underfoot like a character from some bad zombie movie. It was all Emily could do not to scream and run. Instead she spoke as calmly as she could, “Honey, we have to get out of here. We have to get you and your brother to the Jeffersons’ house, now.” The words tumbled from her mouth in one breath, but still the kid refused to move.

Shit! Think. Think.

“We have to get the dweeb out of here, Rhiannon. Do you understand me? We have to save the dweeb.”

Recognition flickered across Rhiannon’s face for a moment; it wasn’t much, but it was enough. Emily shifted the boy from her right arm to her left, grabbed Rhiannon by the sleeve with her free hand, and pulled her in the direction of the house. The girl stumbled backward for a few paces, still looking back at her dad, but then she shook free of Emily’s grasp, swung around, and started to stride toward the house. Emily could see a glint of tears trickling down her cheek, but there was a resoluteness to her face now that Emily thought she had seen in her own face during the first few days after the rain. The fear was there, too, in her eyes, but the kid was doing her best to keep her foot firmly on its throat.