Released (4 page)

“What should we do?” I asked as I watched one of the birds jump to the top of the van to get a better view of us.

“I don’t know. Carter, wake up man. Wake up!”

Carter bolted awake in a sudden flourish. He was about to start shouting, but I clamped my hand down on his mouth and pointed out the windshield. When he nodded his recognition I released my hand.

“What do you think we should do?” I asked Carter.

“Maybe we should just drive through them?” Max offered. “I mean we can’t exactly go back.” I turned around in the driver's seat and watched the birds as Max and Carter tried to figure out what we should do. It seemed to me that at the moment the birds feast was more important, so that bought us some time. As I watched them something caught my eye, a movement. Not made by the birds, but by someone or something inside the van.

“Carter,” I said as loudly as I could, but he didn’t hear me because he was in a debate with Max about what we should do. Carter wanted to turn back and Max thought we should just put our foot on the gas and barrel through them. I thought that was a damn good idea, but with what I had to say, there might be a change of plans.

“Carter!” I grabbed him on the shoulder and waved my hand in front of his face to get his attention.

“What Abby?” he said annoyed and when he saw my reaction he immediately softened.

“Tel me what you see inside that van.”

Carter leaned over the front seat and rested his hands on the dashboard. He squinted hard and I silently watched him as a drop of sweat roled down his temple.

“Holy shit,” he said as his mouth dropped.

“What?” Max asked. “What do you see?”

“There is someone inside of that van,” I said. When his face stil looked confused I added, “alive.” Max’s eyes opened wide and he quickly pushed Carter aside to have a look for himself.

“Wel we gotta get them,” Max said.

That being his first reaction, made my feelings for him grow. He was so much like my father. Everything I respected in a man; brave, honorable and selfless. He always wanted to play the hero no matter what the risk.

“What are you crazy?” Carter said. “That might not even be a person, it could be a demon bird inside that van, or it could be something else. You realy want to take that risk?”

“Carter, you said yourself that the whole point of this trip was to kil every damn demon we saw, wel I see three right there!” Max said pointing his finger out the windshield.

“So do I.” I added for good measure.

After a short pause Carter gave in to our reasoning. “You’re right,” Carter admitted while dropping back into the seat. “What do you think we should do?” I watched him sit there for a moment, al our minds reeling, trying to figure out what to do. Carter picked at the little crocodile emblem on his polo shirt, while Max rifled through what weapons we had and mumbling about how much ammo was left.

“I think we should stick with Max’s idea,” I said trying to convey as much confidence as I could even though I was starting to feel the fear creep in. “I say we haul ass to that van and we each unload on a bird. There are three of us and three of them. Sounds pretty damn even to me. If there realy is someone inside that van, we take them with us.”

“Sounds good to me,” Max said quickly and I smiled at him.

“Carter?” Max asked for confirmation.

“Ok, but we need to plan it out a little better than that. We can’t al pick the same target. Abby you drive, stop at about twenty feet away and take out one of the birds on the body and I’l take out the other. Max you ride shotgun. Take out the bird on top of the van and jump out to see if someone is inside. Ok?” We both nodded and got into our positions. I looked over to Max before starting up the Bronco. “Your leg good to go for this?”

“Hel yes,” he said while he puled down the hammer on his gun. It was bizarre to me how at that moment, my body prickling with fear of what we were about to do that I found Max to be incredibly sexy. Leave it to me to think of something completely off the wal when my attention should be directed to more important matters at hand.

I took a deep breath and focused my thoughts before I put the Bronco in gear and slammed my foot on the gas pedal. As we came speeding down the road the demon birds started shrieking loudly and spreading their wings in an almost chalenging posture.

“Now!” Carter shouted as we got near the van.

The Bronco jerked to a stop and I puled my shotgun from off my lap and fired at the demon bird closest to the Bronco. The bird flew backward landing in a giant feathery heap. I saw one of Carter’s arrows land into the other bird with a solid thud.

The one I had shot was struggling to get up and it’s eyes locked onto me. I fired again the same time as Max shot at the one on the van and my ears rang from the assault on my ear drums.

Carter opened the back to jump out and retrieve the arrow and I ran to Max as he approached the van with his gun raised. His movements were unwavering and confident, taking the short strides to the passenger side door without hesitation.

As I neared the wrecked van I tried to peer into the windshield to see who or what was inside, but the cracked glass made it impossible to see. The spider web of silver lines completely blocked whatever was inside from view and I wondered how it managed to stay together.

“I’m going to open the door,” Max said. I nodded and took a position off to the side, so I could shoot at whatever came out. “We aren’t going to hurt you.” He spoke toward the van and then I heard him whisper under his breath “unless we have to.” As Max jerked the door open the windshield crumbled into a glittering heap on the dark pavement. I could immediately see the form of a girl sitting with her knees to her chest and her eyes frozen in terror.

“Hey,” Max said softly holding out his hand to her. “It’s safe now, you can come out.” The girl began to sob uncontrolably and Max got down on his knees to help her out. He nearly dragged her out of the van as she wailed. I thought for a moment that she would start thrashing him, but from the looks of her I was surprised she had the strength to even cry. Her body was frail and dirty and I wondered how long she had been in there.

“My…my mom.” She let out in blubbering gasps.

She clung to him weeping, not wiling to let go when he tried to pass her to me. He looked to me, confused on what he should do. I stuck my gun into the back of my pants and put my arms around the girl.

My arms felt as if they could wrap around her twice as I held her to me. I tried to think of things to say to comfort her, but al that came to mind were things my Dad would say and I did not think this scrawny, barely teenage girl in my arms could handle it, so I came up with the simplest thing I could.

“It’s going to be ok. You’re safe now.” I didn’t realy know if that were true or not, but at this point it didn’t realy matter. She wasn’t trapped in that van anymore, so that was an improvement for her.

“We gotta go,” Carter said as he came around the back of the Bronco. “Holy shit!” he stopped in his tracks as soon as he spotted the girl in my arms. “It realy was a person. What happened?”

“Carter I don’t think she can realy talk about it right now.” I directed his attention toward the body on the ground, but he stil wasn’t getting it. I then made a mental note to harass my brother about how dense he was.

The girl and I crawled into the back seat and she leaned against the side of the Bronco, silently crying. As Carter hopped into the driver’s seat he looked back at us.

“Is she ok?”

“I don’t know,” I said. He looked at the girl for a moment then started the Bronco. I wasn’t quite sure if he was glad we had found someone or not.

As we drove past the van I looked out the window and saw what had made the van flip. A giant hairy mass lay contorted in the road. They must have hit it I thought. I saw Carter look at me in the rear view mirror and I knew he had seen it too. Another terrifying beast to add to his book, but the more we added to it, the more I could tel he was starting to get realy scared. We were al starting to get realy scared.

After about forty-five minutes, the girl had falen asleep. I looked down at her and tried to softly pul away the hair that clung to her face, revealing tracks of tears that trailed down her dirty face. She couldn’t be much younger than myself, I thought, maybe fourteen or fifteen.

There were cuts and bruises on her arms and I felt an overwhelming urge to protect her. Realizing what she much have gone through, watching her mother get eaten by those demons. I couldn’t imagine the horror she must have felt. It made me think of Carter. He was the one that found our father and I knew that the image of that would haunt him the rest of his life. He had saved me from that pain.

It was late one night when we had heard the sounds of our neighbors screaming and my Dad rushed over there to help them. Carter held me back as I chased after my father begging him not to go and begging him to take me with him, to let me help.

But our Dad never came back that night, or that morning. We waited and waited and after two days Carter went next door to find him. I stayed in my room until I heard the sounds of Carter in the backyard and saw the contorted mass wrapped under a blue tarp lying on the ground beside him. We buried our father that day and neither Carter nor I ever went into the backyard again.

The crackling sound of gravel under tires shook me out of my trance and I saw that we had puled off the road onto a long driveway and passed a large wooden sign that read, “Camp Bug Juice” with the motto “Live, Laugh, Learn” painted underneath and bordered with a rainbow of handprints. It was strange to see something so cheerful after I had visited such a painful memory.

Max and Carter whispered as they tried to decide where we should stay. They had agreed upon a cabin near the camp office labeled the Eagle’s Roost.

“Abby you two stay here while we take a quick look around okay?”

“Okay, but be careful Carter. This place is kind of creepy.” I looked around and noticed that al the buildings had funny names like Rabbit Hole or Bear Holow. It was ironic how a place that would otherwise be ful of fun and happiness could look so ominous. It was winter when everything happened, so most likely there was no one here. I tried, but I could not find a drop of blood anywhere. The thought should have comforted me but it didn’t.

“Where are we?” the girl asked sitting up.

“Somewhere in Montana, I think, at a summer camp. We are going to stay here for the night,” I said trying to sound comforted by that fact. “I’m Abby.” I held out my hand to her and smiled.

“Taya,” she said as she tugged on the strings of her hoodie and looked down at my open hand but did not take it.

Her eyes shot around wildly, so I put my hand on her knee trying to comfort her. “You’re safe now.” She jumped at my touch, recoiling as if I was a monster touching her and I tried not to feel offended. “There’s no such thing as safe. There is alive and there is dead. Anything in between is just dumb luck.”

“Wel then, I guess we are pretty damn lucky,” I said and a tiny smile appeared on her face only to be quickly removed.

“Looks secure,” Max said as he popped his head in the driver’s window. Taya let out a quick shriek.

“Wel helo there, I’m Max,” he said with a toothy grin. He opened the door and pushed back the seat so we could exit. Taya was hesitant at first, but took Max’s hand when he offered it.

I grabbed my bag before leaving and folowed them up the steps into the cabin. It was a lot bigger on the inside then it appeared from outside. There was a smal kitchen area to my right, attached to a smal dining nook. Two couches faced each other in the living room with a large wooden coffee table in between.

The wals were covered with various artwork, many obviously painted by kids. There were large photographs of groups of people wearing the same colored shirt that I guessed were camp photos of years passed. The children’s happy faces smiled back at me and I felt myself grow envious of them, wishing I could feel as happy as they looked.

I saw that Taya had curled up in a chair in a far corner. She held her knees to her chest with one arm and was holding back a curtain with the other, peering out as if she was expecting something to come charging at us at any moment. I figured it was best to leave her be for the moment, so I continued on throughout the cabin.

I tossed my bag on the dining table and made my way to the back of the cabin. There was only one bedroom and one smal tiny bathroom, but it was nice enough.

“What do you think Abby?” Carter asked as he walked in carrying a bag he was bringing in from the Bronco.

“It’s nice, lots of windows though,” I whispered the last part not wanting to worry Taya any more then she already was.

“Yeah, I thought that too. Max went to find the maintenance building to see if he could find some paint.”

“Good idea. Have you checked the cabinets yet? Any food?”

“No not yet. So, how is she doing?”

“I’m not sure, she hasn’t realy said much.” We stared at each other for a moment, “I’l try talking to her. See what happened.”

“Ok.” He patted me on the back and headed for the front door. “I’m going to go find Max and see if I can help him before it starts to get dark.” I looked out the window and noticed the sky was starting to change color, signaling the setting of the sun. I sighed, grateful that the day was over, but this was our first night outside of our house and I wasn’t happy about spending the night someplace new.

As I walked toward Taya I tried to think of what I could say to her, then I tried to think of what Carter told me after we lost our father. The girl was obviously scared to death and honestly I was too, even though I tried my hardest not to show it.

I had an idea of something that might help keep her mind off of things, so I turned around and headed into the smal kitchen area of the cabin.

“Hey Taya,” I caled her from the kitchen, but she didn’t even flinch, just kept staring through the window.

I continued even though she had ignored me. “You want to help me make us some dinner?”