1.2 Escape

Drake spent a minute catching his breath in the woods. He was in relative safety now, but he had to think of where to go next. Where was safety? He thought of places close to Beil. The nearest city was Cyll, but it was a few hours' walk from there. Could he go back into the city and get a car? No. He wasn’t going to take the chance. Besides, if there were cars lying around, people would take them and drive to Cyll themselves. There was a road connecting the town and city, if Drake remembered correctly. Traveling on it would be safer and he could hitch a car heading in the same direction, however, Drake didn’t remember where it was. Drake could only head in Cyll’s general direction. It was to the East, the direction opposite whence he came and the crash site was, fortunately.

Drake looked beside him. About fifty yards away were a man and a young girl—possibly his daughter. They could perhaps all travel together.

Drake was about to go to them when the child started crying. The man, scared that the girl would attract the attention of mutants, tried to calm the child down. He clearly wasn’t the parent. Giving up on his miserable attempt, he ran deeper into the woods, away from the child.

Suddenly, a mutated toad jumped out of the shadows of the brush. It stared down at the man in front of it with its pitch-black eyeballs. The man, in a frightened state, fell onto the ground and put his arms out in front of him in a defensive posture.

This far from the crash site?! Drake watched from afar, unable to help.

The toad opened its mouth. Its long tongue wrapped around its victim. His screaming head went first, and his kicking legs last, into the toothless mouth of the toad as it swallowed him whole. It closed its eyes and started the digestion process.

Drake ran to the kid, who was watching, wide-eyed. Her crying had stopped; thank goodness for that. He grabbed the attention of the kid silently. He beckoned her in a friendly manner. They sneakily escaped the tragic scene, wincing every time they stepped on a twig or dry leaf. Looking behind him, Drake could see that, as with the other monsters, the toad seemed to be growing after eating. He gulped, thankful that hadn’t been the one to catch its attention. After traveling further into the woods, at a safe distance, Drake stopped and sighed.

“Seriously. Those things are everywhere! They can travel so fast!” They had to travel to the city quickly. Drake looked at the silent child beside him holding his hand. “What’s your name?”

The girl, who looked to be about 9 years old, thought about the question. She was either wondering whether to trust this stranger or still in shock from earlier. Finally, she replied, “Billie”.

“Well, Billie, I’m Drake. You’ll be traveling with me now. I’m going to take you somewhere safe,” he looked back, “from all this.”

“Umm,” Billie began, unsure of how to phrase it, “What’s going on? What happened to Mom and Dad and home? Who are you and where are you taking me?”

Many good questions. Drake didn’t know the answer to most of them himself, but he had to comfort the child somehow.

“I don’t really know what happened, but I promise I’ll take you somewhere safe: a nearby city, and then we’ll find out everything”.

Drake at least hoped to find out everything, but it was too bizarre to expect a proper explanation anytime soon. Also, Drake was almost sure the kid’s parents’ fates, but he didn’t want to break it to her, at least not now. Someone else would have to take the responsibility once they got to the city.

Drake looked in the direction they came from. It wasn’t just the kid’s parents; Drake’s mother was dead. His neighbors were dead—the Bakers, his few friends at school, even that crazy lady who lived down the street—they were all gone. The town, too. Beil was where Drake grew up. The town and everything in it—his house, his school, the library, the large corporate buildings and factories that he used to pass by so many times—they were all gone… destroyed. Forever.

It felt like a dream. There was no way everything could have just been destroyed by some monsters in the span of a few hours, right? But at the same time, Drake knew that it was reality. Behind his exhausted yet alert mind, he was heartbroken. But he couldn’t be. He had a task to do. A goal. Get to Cyll, to safety. Besides, he couldn’t look weak in front of Billie. He had to appear strong, as if everything would be alright.

Before continuing his journey, Drake swore revenge against all the monsters that he left behind:

“I’m going to come back with an army and kill every last one of you! Especially you, Crow!”

With that, Drake turned forward. “Let’s go, Billie,” he said confidently, “We have a long journey ahead of us”.

* * *

They headed East. From his calculations, Drake figured it would take until daybreak to reach Cyll by foot. It would be nice if they stumbled upon the road leading to there. Drake had lost his sense of where exactly they were. He just knew he was headed in the direction opposite of Beil.

If only I could read the stars and find out directions from them, he complained to himself. All he needed was to find Polaris, and then he would know which way was East. The problem was that the North Star was, well, all the way North. And the trees covered the sky in that direction. It was clear why it had been used mostly in maritime navigation, not that he would be able to spot it among the other stars, in the first place. Oh yeah, Drake realized, I’d never been able to see the stars back in Beil. This was due to light pollution. Was this his first time seeing them?

Billie, too, marveled at the stars above. The whole forest was quiet, save for the sound of their footsteps and crickets chirping nearby. It was just Drake and Billie. The whole scene was gentle and peaceful, contrasting the massacre that had just occurred nearby.

Drake and Billie talked during their journey to keep themselves entertained, and to keep their mind off their worries. Drake learned about what led to Billie’s situation and explained to her his plan. Drake realized he would sound crazy describing what happened to the police or army stationed at Cyll. Hopefully, a survivor from Beil had already called them, asking to send for help. In that best-case scenario, Drake could just provide some detail on what happened, deliver Billie to police custody, and then discuss with the officials about what to do after killing those things: research the crash, find out what to do with the survivors, and all. Once again, Drake wished he was on the road. If that best-case were true, then he’d be able to meet up with the army going in the opposite direction. Surely, they wouldn’t fight remotely using drones, right? There are too many civilians to bomb the area, and they’d need to do a proper, up-close analysis on the situation, so sending actual forces was the best option.

I should stop thinking about it, he was daydreaming yet again. I can’t do anything about it now. Just focus on the goal.

“What are you thinking about?” Billie asked.

“Nothing,” Drake replied, “Just wishing there was a road to be on.”

“Why do you want a road?”

“I don’t like all these insects. The mosquitos are biting me.”

“I don’t like roads. They’re always full with so many cars.”

That’s right, Drake realized, there are probably tons of people heading to Cyll on them. The roads must've attracted those creatures also. This route was full of inconveniences, but it was safer.

Drake smiled, “You’re right, Billie.”

* * *

Several tiring hours later, the two eventually reached a cornfield. Tall green stalks extended as far as the eye could see. The landscape was smooth, with a few rolling hills. Past the farm would be some more woods, and then the city.

Billie and Drake rested on a small incline right outside the field for a few minutes. Drake reached through the barbed-wire fence encircling the field to procure some corn. It wasn’t ripened enough, as it was still halfway through the season, but the two didn’t mind; they were pretty hungry. To their surprise, the color of the kernels was light green. They had never imagined corn being a color other than yellow.

I hope the owner doesn’t mind, Drake felt a bit guilty about stealing food, but he thought the farmer would understand given the situation. Still, the heavy-duty fence practically screamed, “Stay away from my crops!”.

It would be hard to get through the fields without any light source. Drake hadn’t brought any from home, and a fire seemed too hard to light. It was alright, though. If he had a torch, he would probably end up setting fire to the whole field.

“Think you can bear two more hours of this, Billie?” Drake said, enjoying the view of green fields in front of him from atop the hill.

“Ugh,” Drake heard a faint moan. He turned to Billie.

Billie had a long black stick protruding out of her chest. Drake quickly turned behind her to see the source. A gigantic spider stood behind them.

“Wha-” Drake dodged just in time as another of its legs tried to pierce his body. Drake stumbled backward and nearly fell. What just happened? Where did this spider come from?! Billie slumped.

The spider moved towards Drake, holding the skewered girl on one of its legs. Drake climbed over the fence, ignoring the pain from rubbing against sharp barbs, fell onto the ground with a thud, got up, and ran into the crops. He kept running until he was sure the monster wasn’t behind him and still some. When he stopped, he threw up the corn he had just eaten. He was in the middle of the cornfield, covered in scrapes and slashes from the crops and the fence.

Why was that thing there?! Did it follow our scent all the way from Beil?! Then why didn’t it attack earlier? Drake had dropped his guard, thinking they were safe this far from the meteorite crash. Because of his mistake, Billie had died. He remembered that he had promised Billie he would take her to safety. He hadn’t been able to hold his promise.

“Dang it!”

Drake didn’t know what to do now. The spider could find him through smell, right? Could spiders smell? He didn’t know enough about animals. Since he had lost his sense of direction running through the six-foot-tall corn stalks, eyes closed and arms in front of him, and it was too dark to see around him, and the stalks were too tall to look over, he didn’t know which direction Cyll was in, nor the monster. He was lost. He couldn’t run back to retrieve Billie’s corpse, even if he knew the directions back to the spider. It was too dangerous to face, even prepared.

“Hello?” A voice called out from nearby.

“Huh?” Another person? “Hello? Is someone there?” Drake shouted back.

The two made their way through the tall stalks, following the direction of each other’s voice. Eventually, they collided. In front of Drake was a young man, about nineteen years of age. Another person at last.