Chapter 42

  The sun was halfway below the horizon by the time they reached Stephen's street. Samantha had begun to lag behind, occasionally holding her side. Adam felt for her, miles of walking just days after being all but dead was a testament to the woman's will.

  Adam glanced at the windows of empty houses, the signs of evacuating humanity littering the street. He shuddered wondering what might come crawling out of their shadows after dark. He couldn’t help but let his eyes linger on the growing shadows, his mind drifting back to the darkness of the hospital.

  "Do you think he's still alive? Your friend,” Natalie asked, the question pulling him back into the present. He glanced at her and shrugged.

  "It's a little late to think like that." Adam winced. The words coming out harsher than he intended. "I'm sorry. I just meant… I have to check regardless."

  "No, I get it,” Natalie said, putting her branded hand on his shoulder. Her touch was unexpectedly warm through the chill in the air. "You didn't mention, but were you guys close? Sam and I didn't hear back from anyone we tried texting, so I wouldn't even know where to start if we went looking."

  "Honestly? Not really."

  Adam thought he caught a flicker of movement, the shape too fast and too low, but when he turned, a stray cat darted across a lawn and into an open door. Probably someone's pet left behind in the chaos, he guessed. "It's kind of sad, but we had beers after work a few times. That's about it. I've never even met his wife."

  "Don't feel bad, we don't have many friends. Sam is mostly happy just to be home, and I'm just happy to be with her." Natalie let her hand fall off of his shoulder, glancing back at her wife. "You're kind of our best friend at this point, and we've known you all of what, ten days?"

  "I mean, I did save your lives..." Adam said, doing his best to keep a straight face.

  "Oh shut up." Natalie gave him a playful shoulder check and they both laughed.

  Adam checked the pin again and Stephen's house was just ahead. He slowed, letting Samantha and Hector catch up. "We're almost there." Adam pointed down the street and to the left, glancing at the setting sun. "Before we go in, let's take a breath. Just in case."

  Samantha gave him a grateful smile.

  They made their way up a driveway and into a mostly empty standalone garage. The door hung half-open. Adam ducked his head under the door and scanned the open rafters. Satisfied, he stepped back outside. "Looks clear. Might even be a good place to hold up for the night."

  Samantha ducked inside and dropped heavily to the ground, drinking from her bottle of water. "It's been too quiet anyway."

  "The giant porcupine thing was quiet?" Hector said, pulling out his own bottle wetting his hand and lightly scrubbing his face.

  "When was the last time only one thing tried to kill us in a day?" Samantha asked, raising her eyebrows.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  "The goblins? No wait, there were a lot of them." Hector frowned, chewing his lip.

  Samantha gave him a crooked half-smile. "The question is: are we lucky or unlucky? Is two a lot, or... not?"

  Something in the way she said 'not' made Adam's skin crawl. He knew she meant it as a joke, but it didn't land right. It made him think she knew how lucky they had been so far.

  "Damn." Hector's shoulders slumped.

  Natalie pulled a small white bottle out of one pocket, measuring out two pills and dropping them into Samantha's hand. "Thanks," she said, swallowing them with a gulp of water.

  Adam sat near the door, watching the empty street. The wind had picked up, throwing trash across the pavement in little gusts. The silence felt heavier with every passing minute, as if the coming night was pressing down upon them, making the world hold its breath. He coughed, trying to clear the oppressive feeling, but the pressure stayed, like a hand pressed down between his ribs.

  Shadows spilled like ink across the driveway, stretching long fingers out from every place the light couldn't touch. Adam tried not to imagine something reaching back, reaching for him. He couldn't shake the sudden sense something was wrong.

  "Nothing is broken," Adam muttered, mostly to himself.

  "What?" Samantha's voice drifted over to him.

  Adam shook his head, glancing up and down the street. There were open doors on some of the houses, but not a single broken window. No broken walls like at Samantha and Natalie's house, no shattered windows, no corpses, nothing.

  "Natalie, can you get the stone out?" Adam stood up, keeping his eyes on the street.

  "What?" she said.

  "The Seeker Stone. Get it out and tell me what it feels like." He turned, daring to take his eyes off of the street.

  Natalie started to respond, but instead reached into her pack and brought out the case. She opened it and put her hand on the stone, eyes losing focus for a moment before her face went pale. He walked over and put his hand on the stone next to Her’s. Threads pulled at him from nearly every direction, the strongest leading through the back wall of the garage and beyond.

  "They're everywhere..." she said, yanking her hand away from the stone like she'd touched something hot.

  "We need to move.” Adam ducked under the door and rounded the side of the garage, keeping his eyes peeled. The stone grew warm in his hand, but he forced himself to ignore it, focusing on the pull in his mind, urging him into the backyard.

  "Wait!" Hector's voice came through the wall of the garage, but Adam didn't need to go further. The center of the backyard was gone, replaced by a perfectly circular hole. It looked like someone had taken a giant hole punch to the ground, slicing clean through the layers of dirt and sod.

  "I'm guessing that's not for a pool..." Hector said as he caught up, keeping his distance from the pit. "Is that what I think it is?"

  Adam nodded, picking up a landscaping brick and tossing it underhand into the hole. He held up his finger for silence as Natalie and Samantha caught up, counting the seconds under his breath.

  After nearly a minute he gave up. "I think this is where everyone in the neighborhood went." He handed the stone back to Natalie. "We need to check Stephen's house and then get the hell out of here. I don't want to be here when whatever crawled out of these holes decides to come back for seconds."

  Natalie shuddered as she put the stone back in the case. "Back up a second. Walk us through what you're thinking."

  "Come on,” Adam said, walking back to the front of the garage. The sun was dangerously close to setting and he knew they needed to hurry. "Look around. There's no damage. None of the windows are broken, nothing has smashed through the walls. None of the houses are even burned. It's as if everyone just walked out. Half of the doors are even open."

  "He's right" Samantha said, looking up and down the street. "Didn't the Salesman say some people had been taken, abducted?"

  "I don't like where this is going..." Hector glanced over his shoulder at the pit, his hand finding its way up to the bone pendant.

  "So, we check Stephen's and then we get the hell out of Dodge?" Natalie asked, nodding like she had already made up her mind.

  "That's the plan,” Adam said.

  "Okay. Let's move."