Silenced Genes

While everyone was distracted with the discussion, Skippy decided to creep downstairs and see if he could get Jeffrey to come back. The outside door was wide open. As he peered out, Skip noticed movement not far from the step. He peeked around the door frame as a neighborhood cat ran past him, inside the apartment and right up the stairs. Skippy jumped and leaned back against the wall a moment to compose himself. Heart racing, he realized his plan was a bad one. As he went to close the door and go back upstairs, he heard a scream. A single terrified shriek. It was a child's scream. Before, when it was all chaos, there were so many voices, he couldn't pick one out from the rest. This was different, the sound ran through Norman in a way he never knew fear could feel. It made him sick inside, he could barely stand. He realized he was trembling. Then he heard another noise, barking from up the stairs. Cedric wasn't too happy with the newest house guest. Norman heard Alice screaming, “Skip? Where is Skip? Oh no, oh no no no. Norman! Where are you?”

He was too terrified to make a sound.

Mack shoved Ricky out of the way, “or should we let him run off alone too?” Mack growled as he and Alice went running down the stairs. Their relief at finding Norman safe was short-lived. They had all heard the scream too. Alice noticed the movement out of the corner of her eye and turned to look directly out the window facing the rest of the housing complex. She could see the basketball court that Ricky and Mack spent so much time at. She and Mary played with them sometimes too, while the younger boys played frisbee or catch with Cedric. Now the court was littered with bodies and covered with blood. She saw her friend Sarah, Jeffrey's sister, running towards the apartment. She seemed to be ok, Alice wanted to call to her to come with them. But the crazed man grabbed her so quickly, so impossibly fast, Alice hadn't even noticed he was there until it was too late. Alice ran to the dining room window in tears as Sarah cried out. But the man bit into her throat and she went limp in his grasp. Then Alice noticed the blood on the window, she looked down as another man stood up. He was chewing on what was left of Jeffrey. The man was covered in blood, none seemed to be his own. He turned and looked directly at Alice. It was Mr. Gendron from the next building, Keeley's dad. His eyes were wild, and he screamed. For a moment, Alice found herself wondering if Keeley's mom and brother were OK, then Mr. Gendron punched the window. Glass went flying in every direction. Alice felt it biting into her arm as she threw her hands in front of her face. She felt little trickles of blood starting to wind down her arm, dripping off her bare elbow. Mr. Gendron had a huge shard of glass sticking out of his hand, but the bleeding was already slowed to occasional drips. He reached for Alice, but she was already backing away. She stepped onto a chair, then to the table as she looked for something – anything – she could use to keep him back. She tried talking to him the whole time, “Mr. Gendron, it’s Alice. Keeley is here, she is safe. Oh, please, Mr. Gendron, please stop this. Where is Mrs. Gendron? Where is Tommy?”

None of it registered. Alice realized the only reason he wasn't ripping her apart already was because he hadn't broken enough of the window yet to just climb through. He was working on that. All the noise drew the attention of the one that was dismembering Sarah, He dropped what was left of her as he screamed and ran at the window.

The boys saw Mr. Gendron break the glass and went in different directions almost in unison: Mack grabbed Mary's field hockey stick out of the closet, while Ricky ran to their room to grab their swords. As he was taking them off the wall mounts, Ricky realized he was never so grateful for parents who were into RPGs, video games and Renaissance Faires. Ricky ran down the stairs pulling one of the swords from its sheath as he rounded the corner into the dining room, he was assailed by the shattering of more glass. Alice screamed as the man that killed Sarah lunged through the remains of the window at Alice’s leg. Alice grabbed the vase of flowers on the table beside her and threw it at the man's face. She didn't recognize this man, but she hated him. He killed Sarah, and Alice was furious. The vase shattered over the man's head, bits of glass stuck out of his face, but it didn't even slow him down. The blood flowed freely for a moment or two then slowed quickly as it dried around the edges of the wounds. Mack was already at the window holding Mr. Gendron at bay with the field hockey stick. Alice was about to make a break for the stairs until the unknown man made it far enough through the window to catch the edge of the table and flip it up. Alice jumped backwards off the table, just as it sailed into the wall. Alice landed on her feet near the entrance to the dining room. Ricky grabbed her arm and went to push her behind him towards the stairs, but she was beyond angry, beyond scared, beyond any feelings of rationale. Before Ricky knew what was going on, Alice grabbed the sword, took a few steps and leapt at the man as he was climbing into the room through the window he had just finished destroying. She swung with all her adrenaline fueled strength, stabbing into the easiest soft tissue she could reach. Of course, the swords weren't real. Slashing with them would not have caused much damage, but the tip was sharp enough to serve the purpose. It bit into the man's throat, much the way he had bitten into Sarah's. Alice forced the sword the whole way through, but couldn't pull it out because it didn’t slow the man at all. He still came at her. She fell backwards as the man tried to grab her, sword dangling, blood already coagulating. Ricky ran up and grabbed the sword, dodging as the man was swinging wildly. He ripped upwards, opening the wound and pulling the sword out in the process. Blood sprayed across the wall. He quickly jabbed in again, this time into the man's eye. He forced the blade as far as it could go. The man dropped to the ground, he didn't try to get up anymore.

Alice was crying on the floor, Mack knew he had to do something fast or Mr. Gendron was going to get in and rip them apart just like he tore up poor Jeffrey. He saw Ricky and Alice kill that man, he knew they had to or the man was going to kill them. The same way Mr. Gendron will if Mack doesn't end it before Mr. Gendron finishes climbing through the window. But this was his neighbor. The man they killed was a stranger, and worse, a stranger that just killed a little girl. Mr. Gendron HAD a little girl, and she was upstairs playing with dolls, oblivious to the fact that her father was down here trying to kill them all. He remembered how Mr. Gendron, Mr. Clark and Mom helped them build a treehouse 4 or 5 summers ago in the wooded area just past the housing complex. Tommy Gendron was Mack's age, they had been friends a long time. He remembered playing in that treehouse with him, Ricky, and Josh and Luke Clark. Alice and Mary would try to come up once in a while, if no one else was around, Tommy and Mack would let them. The Clarks moved away about two years ago. He hoped wherever they were, they were safe. He hoped Tommy was still safe. He hoped Tommy would understand why Mack had to kill his father. Tears were streaming down Mack's face. “I’m so sorry, Mr. Gendron,” Mack apologized softly as he brought the field hockey stick out wide. He came in hard, shattering Mr. Gendron's right cheekbone and destroying his eye. It didn't stop him from coming. Mack struck again and again and again. He felt the stick snap with his fourth hit. Mr. Gendron lay quite still halfway in the window. Blood was pooling around him. Mack was sick to his stomach.

Ricky wiped the blood off the blade onto the unknown man's shirt. He helped Alice up and they went over to Mack. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” Ricky grabbed Mack and hugged him tight while Mack sobbed. Skippy came out of the kitchen shaking, silent tears rolling down his cheeks. Alice grabbed him and hugged him tightly, “please, Skip, don’t run off like that again.”

“I… I’m sorry, Alice,” Skippy stammered.

Alice took Skip by the hand and brought him back upstairs. Ricky and Mack stayed downstairs to make sure neither body moved again. “I get it now,” Mack said.

“You were right though,” Ricky replied, “I’m the reason Jeffrey is dead. I’m the reason we can’t stay here now.”

"You had already seen...this," Mack gestured at the carnage, "who can blame you for being scared?"

"Doesn't make me any less responsible for all of it"

“The only thing you're responsible for is that we're definitely not getting the security deposit back now,” Mack said.

Ricky shook his head; he couldn't help but chuckled, “you aren’t wrong.”

"So what are we going to do?" Mack asked.

“Well, we can’t stay here anymore, not with the dining room like this,” Ricky crouched down to look at the stranger, careful not to touch him. He still wasn't sure how the condition was transferred aside from getting bitten, which he had already observed. What he didn't know was how much saliva, or blood, was necessary or if it required being bitten as opposed to just coming into contact with the contaminated fluids. "What if we are infected now? Do you know if any blood got on you? Do you feel different?"

"I didn't pay attention," Mack shrugged in uncertainty, "nut I don't feel physically different, at least. How long do you think it would take for us to figure it out? Should we leave the house and hide in a garage or something until we know? Should we take Alice too?"

"And leave Mary in charge of all these kids? That doesn't seem like a good idea even for a couple of hours... besides, I don't even know how we would know for sure when it was safe. I mean it seemed to happen pretty quick when the guy that was driving got bit," Ricky reasoned, "but that may be from actually getting bit and it just takes longer to change from non-bite contact? Or maybe the whole process is different for everyone? We could spend two days in the garage only to find out it takes a week. or we could sit out there for nothing and someone else gets hurt because we weren't here to protect them. We'll just have to keep an eye on each other and say something if we're feeling weird, I guess?" .

The pair looked around at the blood and broken glass like confetti all over the floor. Ricky tried calling Dad first, then Mom. Neither parent had tried calling nor were they answering. Ricky found himself wishing he wasn't the oldest. He didn't want to make these decisions. Mack wondered, “how are we going to convince everyone to leave without their parents? Where are we going to go?”

“I’m thinking we need to try and reduce the number of bodies we are responsible for,” Ricky said as he walked into the living room and started pulling sleeping bags out of the closet. “See what we have that’s portable for food while I do this,” suggested Ricky.

Mack went to the kitchen and started gathering up food and making bags each child could carry without being overburdened. He walked back to see Ricky stacking rolled sleeping bags. “Alice needs to be cleaned up and checked to see if she needs stitches. She was bleeding a lot, now that the adrenaline has worn off some, she is probably hurting,” Ricky said when he saw Mack.

“Do you have any ideas about where we can go?” Mack asked.

“I was thinking we would find an apartment that was no longer occupied,” Ricky said as he made direct eye contact with Mack, “or maybe there will be an empty garage we can use for the night? I don’t know for sure. All I know is whatever we do, we have to move fast. Who knows if there are any other madmen around. If the noise we just made draws them over, we are sitting ducks now.”

“I agree that we first have to get the children back to their families, if they have any families left,” Mack stated. “I know now that we won’t be able to take care of extra children for very long. I’m not even sure how we’re going to be able to take care of the boys, especially Skip. He almost left to go after Jeffrey. We need help, Ricky.”

“I don’t think any help is coming, Mack,” Ricky softly declared as he looked at his phone again.

....episode 4 coming soon....

support is appreciated!