CHAPTER EIGHT
The move in had passed smoothly and the girls had gotten their things organized, the apartment fairly decorated, and were already planning a small party.
Though the place had not started out as they expected, both girls had wanted a much larger apartment, Cassandra smiled as she looked around the one room studio. They were happy with the apartment, already used to its size, and to both the girls, the place was home.
Cassandra had taken that first weekday off from work and both she and Stephanie, who sounded very ill on the telephone when she phoned into work, had spent most of the day finishing their decorating and headed out onto the town in the evening hours.
Cassandra could feel her own eyes drift nervously towards televisions as she walked down the city streets, but nothing abnormal was being shown. She had personally managed to avoid any thoughts of horrible animals causing deaths and laying eggs in secluded ravines since she opened her eyes on Saturday morning.
She was one step closer to starting her first semester of fashion school, it was less than eight weeks away and she could not wait. He kept her attention focused between the start of college, decorating the apartment, and planning a party for the upcoming weekend
The following morning, she found herself locked out of Hi Style at just before nine o'clock. The glass doors were dead bolted together and the bars behind them were down. She frowned and looked up and down the street.
The city roads were busy as usual with too many cars jammed together on too narrow streets. Pedestrians bustled past her, some carrying their newspapers under their arms, others chatting on cell phones or walking dogs. It was life as normal, but the store was locked, Dan wasn't there, and she could not stop her mind from thinking that something horrible had happened.
Just as she felt her heart uncontrollably start to beat faster, she saw Dan practically jogging down the block to her, splashing a cup of cappuccino around in one hand and jingling the store keys in the other. She felt relieved to see him and her mild onset of fear washed away.
"Morning!" She said happily. "Everything all right?"
"Yea, sorry about that dear. Just running late. I got a late start."
"You look upset... are you okay?"
He nearly looked as though he might cry as he twisted the locks to the store open and pulled back the security bars.
"I'm...I'm fine... I just had this huge fight with Robert last night...well, actually we've been fighting most of the weekend."
"What have you been fighting about?"
He shrugged idly as he placed his drink on the counter and dropped his belongings behind the front counter while Cassandra punched in.
"Oh, it's nothing, dear."
The two worked on opening the store as Cassandra pressed Dan for more information, certain that something awful had happened.
"He's just... he's never been a big supporter of this store, you know. He doesn't like how much of my time it takes up. He would just rather me be a stay at home mom or something. Sometimes I just don't know what he wants. I do everything I can to keep him happy, but it just isn't enough..."
Cassandra smirked. She felt bad for him, but she had always felt hat he could do much better than Robert.
"Oh, sorry, I don't mean to dump this on you... I think he's just on edge because of all of this... this...stuff going on." He tapped the newspaper on the counter top.
Cassandra shut her eyes. She had forgotten. She had wanted to forget. She tried very hard to ignore and tune out everything over this past weekend that did not concern her. Now she was drawn into the conversation and somewhere deep inside a morbid curiosity was turned on and she asked the question without any hesitation.
"What happened?" She asked without turning to face him. She kept her eye on the shirts she was straightening.
"You didn't hear?"
"Well, I mean... I moved into my apartment this weekend, you know... so I didn't really..."
"Oh! I forgot!" Dan seemed to light up. "How did it go? What's it like? And what color curtains did you end up, oh, and that sofa, what was like?"
Cassandra smiled. She was not quite sure if Dan was really that interested in her apartment, or just needed a distraction from the newspaper article and his fight with Robert. She described the new place to him and filled him in on all of the decorating details.
"Well it sounds lovely anyway. Maybe a little small, but lovely."
Jennifer and Risi entered the store just then and the topics of the newspaper were forgotten. It wasn't until Cassandra had slid behind the counter to ring up a customer hours later that her eye caught a glimpse of the newspaper. When the customer signed the credit pad and headed out of the store, Cassandra felt her hand reach for the newspaper. She glanced around to be sure no one was near then suddenly realized how silly that seemed.
Some subconscious part of her was acting like the newspaper was some secret document that no one should dare be allowed to peek over her shoulder and see. She glanced at the headline, which declared prominently that part of Philadelphia had been evacuated sometime late Friday night.
...no press are being allowed beyond any barricades and this reporter was able to discover that a no fly zone had been initiated sometime in the early Saturday morning hours. Local police have been on guard non stop around the area, which has grown in size from the original evacuation on Friday night, when only a ten block radius was cleared. Police have evacuated an even larger radius in response to concerns over natural gas leaking.
Local residents did report hearing high pitched hissing sounds and feeling ground tremos. Authorities attribute the tremors to leaks in faulty underground pipelines, and by this newspaper's press time this Tuesday morning, a forty block radius of Philadelphia neighborhood has been cleared.
Officials offer no correlation between these evacuations, the closing of the Mercy Hospital one week ago, and the dangerous new species of parasitic animal that has been threatening our lives for the last three weeks.
Citizens are being provided shelter in local churches, civic centers and any other area large enough to house those that had been forced from their homes.
The article went on to discuss much speculation. Cassandra never looked up from the paper as she flipped to page two, which offered editorials and commentaries that brought up some concerning points.
Local police maintain that an untraceable natural gas leak has forced the city to displace residents from the ever expanding area radius around Mercy Hospital. Authorities reassure use that crews are working diligently to trace the source of the leak, but will not offer any more information.
"It's weird isn't it?" Jennifer asked suddenly from behind Cassandra who jumped. "Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you! Are you alright?"
Cassandra nodded and forced a small smile. "Yeah, I'm fine... just didn't see you." Her eyes drifted back to the newspaper. "Weird."
"I think they're covering up something... something big," Dan added in as he came over to the counter. "The whole thing has everybody acting a little weird, I think. That's what I think is wrong with Robert lately. He doesn't believe the gas leak thing either."
"Don't you?" Cassandra asked.
"I've never heard before of a gas leak forcing forty blocks of people out of their homes."
"They're just trying to be safe," Cassandra shrugged.
Even with all the different opinions and speculations floating around that Cassandra had begun to hear as she tuned the world back in over the rest of the week, no one had any solid answers. By the end of the week, it had been reported that the military was involved in the evacuation of that part of Philadelphia.
Though many reporters seemed to question the necessity for a military presence for a simple gas leak, no solid answers were announced to the presses to completely define the ongoing problem.
Cassandra tried not to develop an opinion, she just preferred to tune the situation out, and keep on track with normal life. Philadelphia was a short drive from New York City, and it made her uncomfortable to think that it was possible that something related to the deadly animals was going on so close to home.
She ignored more reports about similar situations rising up in other cities. The reports of missing persons, heightened police and military activities were growing and perhaps only slightly overindulged by doomsday type scenarios.
It was hard to know what even real. Reports varied from talk of a disease to a parasite and anytime one story popped up about evacuations, military movements, fires, explosions, even suspected bombings, another ten stories came out saying none of it was true.
There had been no word throughout New York City about anything related to the animals that Cassandra saw, and for that she was thankful. The only thing she noticed were reports of growing numbers of missing persons, a few subways that had been shut down due to mechanical troubles which caused inconveniences for commuters, and many conspiracy theories which she tuned out.
It seemed like most of it was blowing over. There were no more wild videos of egg fields or talks about facehugging hatchlings.
Cassandra walked with Stephanie around a grocery store to stock up on foods and drinks for the party they were planning on having finally; a sort of one week anniversary of the new apartment.
It was going to be a small event, with only a handful of friends. Cassandra was nervous about seeing Kyle again, but Stephanie acted as though she was ready to have David move in with them.
They walked home with arms full of bags and treaded the stairs up to their top floor room, talking happily about tomorrow night's event. Stephanie tried to pry details out of Cassandra regarding her intentions with Kyle, but she avoided responded.
Ignoring her friend completely, but smiling all the same, Cassandra tucked herself into the daybed on one side of the room while Stephanie pulled a sheet around her on the white round couch bed near the large set of windows at the front of the room.
Cassandra woke with a leap from the bed. A loud crashing sound filled her ears. It sounded like a bomb had just been dropped in the living room.
"Woah!"
"Sorry!" Stephanie said quickly as she bent down behind the small kitchenette counter top.
"What are you doing?" Cassandra gasped as she caught her breath and started towards the kitchen.
"I just dropped... oh no..."
"Oh man, what happened?"
"I didn't think it looked good there, so I was trying to move it...oh geez." Stephanie said as she sat back on the ground, staring at the broken pieces of their large and ugly microwave.
Cassandra smiled and started giggling and Stephanie soon joined her.
"Well, it was ugly anyway." Stephanie said.
"You know what; I want to go out today, so I can buy a new one and get it delivered." Cassandra said.
She was going over her clothes in the armoire near her bed and suddenly decided that nothing she owned was good enough to be seen in by Kyle tonight. She wanted to give it another try with him, so a shopping trip would be in order.
After she woke fully and carefully dressed herself Cassandra headed off to find a perfect new outfit while Stephanie met with David for the afternoon at the apartment.
Cassandra spent over two hours going from store to store trying to creature the perfect outfit. She could not quite come up with the right set of clothes, and had so far only managed to buy a lovely little tank top.
She decided she would head to the fashion district to find the right material for a skirt, but first she stepped through the door into the Midtown Mall for a new pair of shoes and some quick lunch.
She pulled open the glass door into the mall, walked through a crowded glass lobby, and strolled along the walkways, weaving around kiosks selling miscellaneous clothing, perfumes, hermit crabs and cell phones. She diligently glanced through the display windows of the many shops along the lowest level of the mall, awaiting something to catch her eye.
With shoes on her mind, and shoe stores up on the second floor, Cassandra headed to the elevators. She shopped from store to store, browsing and contemplating the perfect outfit and just exactly her intentions would be with Kyle that night.
After a new pair of shoes, lunch, and a few other small purchases, Cassandra returned to the elevators on the top level of the mall and waited with a small crowd for the slow moving glass elevator to ding. She glanced idly around watching people pass by along the walkways, eyeing what each wore before she noticed a display window featuring a lovely evening gown on a mannequin woman.
As she stared off at the mannequin, she noticed to her left a man sitting on a small bench coughing ever more loudly as the seconds ticked on.
He was a rough looking man, with dirty jeans, a stubbly short beard growing in on his slightly heavy set face, and dark slicked back hair. His red, runny eyes were adorned with large black bags underneath, giving the impression the man had not slept for days.
He had the look about him like a construction worker, she found herself staring at him and she was not sure why. He kept coughing, breathing raggedly.
The elevator dinged and Cassandra jumped slightly at the sound, forced her eyes away from the man and waited as one cluster of shoppers departed the lift and some of the small crowd around her jammed themselves inside.
She stepped forward, but there was still a small crowd in front her, including a woman with a baby carriage and there was just no way she, nor anyone else, was going to fit into the packed tiny elevator.
As the doors slid shut and Cassandra she sighed and suddenly found her eyes drifting back to the scruffy man on the bench. Now she knew why she couldn't stop looking at him. She wondered if she was the only person that saw it.
Cassandra glanced at the small group near to her with wide eyes, a questioning look on her face, but the people around her seemed to be making sure they did not look in the direction of the sick man, as though it would cause immediate blindness to those who looked upon him.
Cassandra found herself watching him again. He kept his eyes to his knees and did not see her. She overlooked him once again, scanning from his muddy boots to smudged jeans and dirty green t-shirt, which he was stroking with his thick fingers as he coughed again.
She frowned and stepped forward, deeper into the small crowd, and closer to the elevator doors, pushing her way to be first in, eagerly awaiting its arrival. She glanced to the stairwell at the other end of the mall and decided she would take the steps up instead, but just as she turned the elevator arrived.
Cassandra pushed herself past the departing load and turned to watch the small crowd file in after her. The woman with the baby carriage entered followed by an elderly couple and two young boys. From just beside the door she could see the coughing dirty man from the bench get up.
She silently found herself hoping the doors would shut before he got on. She did not want him in the little glass tube with her, but the man's raspy voice called out to hold the door and he stepped over the threshold.
The doors shut behind him and the man turned around, back to Cassandra and coughed again as he tried to thank the old man that had pressed the door hold button.
"You ok?" The old man said to him.
"Need some water I think," the dirty man said as he reached forward and hit the number two, it had a little food court sticker next to the button.
As the elevator started down, the man's coughing grew worse. The woman shifted her baby carriage slightly trying to keep the sleeping child well away from the obviously sick man. The man's coughing worsened and Cassandra decided that the elevator's descent to the second floor was taking far too long.
The two young boys next to her exchanged glances at the man as he coughed harder and harder. Then they suddenly twisted their faces. As the man lurched forward and nearly toppled over Cassandra could see little speckles of blood on the elevator doors.
"He's coughing up blood," one of the boys said.
"Hey buddy, you need a doctor or something?" The elderly man said sharply.
The dirty man responded with only a groan of agony as his knees hit the ground and he coughed furiously. The elevator doors dinged open but only the woman with the baby carriage tried to make an escape. No one from the small crowd outside dared enter the elevator.
All eyes dropped to the ground and focused on the man that was now writhing and moaning in sheer agony, coughing up blood, half in and half out of the elevator. Someone shouted in surprise. Cassandra heard voices call out to dial 911.
The baby in the carriage that the woman was trying to shuffle out of the little elevator suddenly woke, crying terribly, obviously startled by the moaning man on the ground and the forceful shoving of her carriage out the door.
Cassandra could not move. She watched with wide eyed fear, next to the two young boys and the elderly couple. Someone outside the elevator shouted for help again and one man knelt beside the writhing and gagging man on the floor.
"Jesus! We need a doctor! Somebody help!"
Cassandra stared at the man on the ground as she started to feel shaky, flush, weak. She watched as his eyes rolled back into his head and a sickening gurgle rose out from his bloody mouth. Suddenly the man's dirty green shirt moved.
Cassandra jumped backwards into the elevator glass with a gasp. The man howled one time and throbbed wildly as though he was having a seizure.
She could not draw her eyes away from the man's green shirt. The center of the shirt was rising up as though a hand was underneath pushing it up in pulsing spasms. She did not notice that the man had stopped moving even as security officers came towards the elevator and the kneeling man shouted out to them.
"I think he's dead!"
Someone outside the elevator screamed wretchedly, and the baby in the carriage, still unable to get through totally cried harder than ever. Cassandra watched as the man's green shirt started to get a slick, wet appearance and turn very black.
She felt sick as she realized that his shirt was filling with blood. She could not stop her body from shaking or the tears from welling up in her eyes.
Suddenly, without warning, a tremendous crunching sound filled the small space as though everyone within earshot had grabbed a handful of dry branches and snapped them on cue, the loud sound filled all their ears.
Cassandra squeezed her eyes shut and jerked her head back as the people outside the elevator screamed. She lifted her shaky hands to her face and wiped away many drops of something wet from her cheeks.
She opened her eyes and saw her hands red with blood and she trembled horribly. A terrible hissing sound filled the air and the panicked screaming of nearly a dozen frightened people running away caught her attention. Her eyes dropped to the floor again and she saw a bloody, horrible head sticking up from a deep hole in the man's chest.
Cassandra could not well up enough power to scream. She watched the thing look around with black deep set eyes and saw the gleaming shine of metal looking dagger-like teeth in the things mouth. One of the security officers forcibly pushed his way towards the few remaining people that had not yet run off.
He shouted to them to clear the way. Trapped on the far side of the elevator with the dead body and horrible little monster in between her and her escape, Cassandra dared not move.
She did not hear the other security officer shout to her to get out and she barely felt his arm latch onto hers as he pulled her around the side of the elevator and shoved her out the door.
Suddenly the two men in the lift jumped back and pinned themselves to the wall, shouting. The worm like monster that had emerged from the dead man's chest pulled itself free from the body and jettisoned off with lightening quick speed.
It cleared a path through the screaming people at the elevator and darted down the hallway past the stopped shoppers who were watching from a distance.
Screams filled the hallway as people leapt from side to side, jumped through doorways and onto benches, scattering every which way to avoid the bloody little monster that sped past them. The thing turned suddenly down a corridor that led to restrooms and back rooms.
Several men, including some mall security darted down the hallway to follow the little thing. From the other end of the hallway, police officers came bolting through the crowds, some taking off in pursuit of the monster, following the trial of blood the thing left on the tile floor of the mall.
Other police officers stopped at the elevators and immediately began to push the crowds back. One officer came over to Cassandra. She could still feel herself shaking. The officer looked into her pale white, blood covered face and wide eyes.
"Hey, you okay?"
She shook wildly and the officer helped her sit on a bench.
"Jesus," another policeman said, kneeling next to the body in the elevator.
Cassandra glanced at the dead body and broke down sobbing as she watched the man who helped her down reach for his radio. Gun shots rang out from the back of the mall somewhere from behind the storefronts and panicked screaming people ran for their lives. Cassandra leapt up and stared off in the direction of the shots.
"What's going on Jack?" One of the officers next to her yelled into his radio.
The voice on the other end informed all that could hear, "I missed the thing. It's gone."
Cassandra tried hard to catch her breath and stop her body from shaking. She wandered off as the officers called into their radio. She did not focus on where she was going or where any of her shopping bags were. She just walked, slowly, away from the whole scene.
Cassandra found herself at her apartment door at nearly nightfall. She knocked on the door as though it were a stranger's house. A wide eyed and worried faced Stephanie tore the door open. Cassandra barely noticed.
"Oh my God, Cassy!" Stephanie reached her arms out to her friend as David and Kyle and other members of the band came darting forward.
Kyle grabbed hold of Cassandra and carried her to the sofa.
"I'll get a wet towel," Stephanie said and quickly headed off as Kyle wiped the blood on Cassandra's face with his hand.
"Hey? You there?" He said to her.
He snapped his fingers to get her attention. She shivered and shifted her body to a more comfortable position and tried again at wiping her face. Her hands shook furiously as she whimpered and saw the blood on them.
"Oh God," she whispered as she started to cry. "It was horrible!"
"It's been all over the news," Kyle said.
"We've been worried sick about you! You've been gone so long!" Stephanie said, sitting next to her and patting her face with a damp towel.
Cassandra looked into her eyes. "Long?"
"Yeah, Cass," Kyle said, "It's eight-thirty! What the hell happened? W here did you go?"
"I...I...," she tried hard to think of what had happened.
Her mind wasn't working right. She had no idea so many hours had passed. It was not quite noon when she stepped into the mall and now she was home so much later.
"I just walked home."
"Didn't anyone stop you?" Stephanie asked surprised. "You have blood all over."
"I do?" Cassandra questioned plainly as she looked down at her clothes.
She never noticed that her once yellow tank top and her well-tanned skin were covered in dried blood. She started to shake again and tried to wipe the blood away.
"I need to shower!" She said frantically, eyes red and dripping tears.
She pushed herself up from the sofa and tore her shirt off as she darted into the bathroom and slammed the door shut.
The water ran for close to an hour.
Outside the door, the group of friends watched the news reports and special reports that continued to fill the airway.
Every news station was broadcasting from the same location, outside the downtown Manhattan mall, where they all maintained that this was the first reported fatality caused by the parasitic animals in over two weeks anywhere in or near New York City.
They watched the reports silently and discussed what was going on during commercial breaks.
"Some party, huh?" Stephanie muttered.
"It's alright," David said.
"She okay in there?" Kyle asked, nudging his head towards the door the bathroom.
Stephanie smirked, "She always takes a while..."
Kyle got up and headed over to the door, he listened for a moment then knocked softly.
"Cassandra?" he called out. "You O.K.?"
"I'm fine," a distant voice from inside the small room said softly.
"You wanna...talk...or somethin'?" Kyle offered while the others in the room watched.
The door opened and Cassandra emerged wrapped snugly a cotton robe.
"I'm fine...I'll be okay. I just don't ever want anything like that to happen again."
"Hopefully it won't." Kyle said with a soft smile.
The group sat together and talked for a while. Periodically the phone would ring and Stephanie would cut the conversation short with the curious friends were trying to find out the details about Cassandra and what had happened.
"Did you call them all and cancel the party?" Cassandra asked after the third phone call.
"Well yeah," Stephanie shrugged. "We didn't know what happened to you."
"With the missing person alerts all the time, we got really worried," Kyle said. "Didn't know where to look for you."
"And you didn't answer your phone." Stephanie said.
Cassandra's eyes flickered wide. "Oh...oh no... I lost it..."
"Your phone?" Stephanie questioned.
"Everything, my purse... where's my purse? Did I have it on me when I came in?"
"No...no you didn't."
"Did you black out or something?" Kyle interrupted.
"I don't know." Cassandra whispered, staring at him.
"Don't worry, we'll get it taken care of, alright," Stephanie reassured her.
"Yeah, I just...really want to rest now." Cassandra said and she set herself into her daybed.
Stephanie rubbed Cassandra's shoulder supportively and looked over the boys.
"Maybe… maybe you guys should leave," she said with an apologetic grimace.
Without much complaint, the boys got up.
"Yeah, well, we're gonna' go hang out a bit," Peter and the rest of the band boys stood and said their goodbyes.
David sat with Stephanie for a while longer trying to convince her to go out with them and leave Cassandra to rest. After several refusals the boys left.
In the morning when Cassandra opened her eyes, she saw Stephanie sitting bolt upright on the couch and Kyle pacing the room behind herself and the television. Both looked as though they were watching the most intense movie ever created and seemed very concerned about it.
"What's going on?"
Both heads zipped towards her.
"You don't want to know." Stephanie said quietly as she turned her head back to the television.
"Hey, how you feeling, Cass?" Kyle asked.
"I'm..." she took a deep breath. "What's going on?"
She stood up and crossed the short distance towards the television. She stopped next to Kyle and glanced at the screen.
'SPECIAL REPORT' was written in very large red writing at the bottom of the screen and the woman reporting looked horrified at what she was reading.
"Once again," the woman said, "officials are warning everyone, affected areas or otherwise, to stay in their homes. Do not leave your houses until this situation can be controlled. We will bring you the most up to the minute information we can, but for now, it is being strongly urged that all persons seek shelter behind secure doors and remain there until further notice. We're now going live once again to Philadelphia."
Another reporter stood in the lobby of a large indoor stadium. Behind him, Cassandra could see through the double doors that led into the arena. The place was filled with people, but they were not getting ready for some big game; they were victims of a great disaster. The reporter's hands shook as he raised the microphone to his mouth and started his broadcast.
"It is important that viewers know that keeping calm is essential in a situation like this."
"A situation like this?" Kyle barked. "Like this has ever happened before."
"Shhh!" Stephanie waved her hand dismissively.
"Behind me is the Philadelphia Arena, where we have all been escorted to by local and government officials. There has been havoc here most of the week, and last night, a large group of these … these….mysterious animals…. forced many people off the streets and into the stadium as a make shift shelter. Many other areas of the country have reported large swarms of these highly dangerous and aggressive animals."
The anchor at the station interjected, "Michael, do you know what the animals are exactly?"
The man pursed his lips, paused, shook his head. "No, Marcia, reports are very conflicted. They aren't bees, or crabs, or spiders. It's hard to really know at this point if this is some kind of prehistoric dinosaur or something entirely different.
I've heard eyewitnesses report everything from snakes to terrible fanged animals bigger than a human being. At this point, I do know the military has moved into the area to contain the situation, not only here, but also in other parts of the country suffering large scale infestations. Out the door…"
The camera turned suddenly, and the reporter continued. "You can see tanks and military vehicles. Now, they're not letting us out of here at this point, but…"
"What the hell kind of animals need tanks to control them?" Kyle added in again.
"It's not to control the animals." Cassandra said shakily, the bloody images of the man's exploding chest filling her mind. "They're to control the people."
Silence filled the room for a moment before the reporter's voice registered again.
"I've been informed that Los Angeles, San Diego, areas of Arizona, Texas, Georgia, at least a dozen other states are receiving military help with this outbreak."
"They act like it's a disease," Kyle said.
Cassandra dropped to the ground and watched the television in horror.
"They're everywhere, Cassandra," Stephanie informed her.
"They've been waiting for this..." Cassandra whispered to no one in particular.
"What? What do you mean?" Kyle asked.
"All those missing person reports... it... it... makes perfect sense now." She started.
Vivid images rushed into her mind. She saw the eggs, the original reports from now three weeks ago, and watched that dirty coughing man drop to his knees in the elevator over and over and over in her mind and she began to understand.
"They're like...like...locusts or something. They need us, humans, animals...whatever, to breed in. Those eggs… the things that hatch out of them do something to whatever it attaches to. It implants the person... and then that worm thing comes out of your chest."
She pressed her hands to her chest as though one of those monsters was preparing to leap from beneath her ribs.
"Then it grows inside you, and hatches out. I know I saw it. I was a...hatchling... it was horrible. It just exploded out of the man's chest…." Her words drifted off and she began to shake and turn pale.
"Cassandra," Kyle asked quietly and slowly, "What did it look like?"
She lifted her eyes to him and took a moment to come up with the words.
"It was like... a snake with horrible sharp teeth and beady little black eyes. The thing hissed at us..."
"I don't get it," Kyle said, glancing to Stephanie.
"What? It makes sense," Cassandra said.
"Well..." Kyle started but drifted off.
"What?"
"Cassy," Stephanie said quietly. "These things don't look like snakes."
"What do you mean? I saw it..." her eyes grew wide.
"They'll probably show it again here real soon. Some army guys shot one I guess. They're...huge." Kyle added.
"Huge? How big?" Cassandra asked, but the conversation quieted down once again as their eyes fell upon the screen when the reporter said something about New York City, and Stephanie let out a loud, "Shh!"
"... with over five hundred confirmed on the missing person list, the Mayor is urging all resident to stay calm, remain inside and follow the official recommendations to remain indoors until the situation quiets down. The President is scheduled to address the nation in about thirty minutes."
They waited, watching the reports and listening to the list of the states affected. The news report switched to a local broadcast showing overrun grocery stores in Manhattan, police in full gear, SWAT teams, and military vehicles all lining the streets, prepping for major activity.
Panicked people were frantically running through the aisles, filling their carts with bread, water, other essentials, acting as though the building was burning down around them while a reporter interviewed them.
Thirty minutes dragged on. Cassandra found herself pacing the room right along with Kyle, sometimes glancing out the windows onto the streets below. People did not seem to be following the official advice to stay indoors.
Cars were driving up and down the streets hurriedly and midtown Manhattan was alive and bustling. Cassandra strained her eyes to see up and down the street from one side to another. She could see people walking around, traffic coming and going.
Despite the broadcast of completely frightened people being interviewed and screaming about the end of the world into the camera, life looked normal below Cassandra's window.
Perhaps if all of the normal living people down below had been at the mall yesterday afternoon, perhaps if they had wandered home in a state of shock, covered with a stranger's blood, they would pay more heed to the advice from the reporters and get indoors.
Cassandra glanced back at the television and watched a military official discuss the situation with the reporter.
Suddenly the screen flicked to a recognizable official room, the President's podium in the center of the screen, and an overfilled room full of reporters. The Secretary of Defense began with a small speech and a quick session of answering some questions before the President took to the podium.
"Good Morning." He started with a casual smile.
"Let me begin by saying that our Nation's military have been deployed to any affected areas needing assistance, and we are doing everything we can to bring this situation to a quick end. We expect to have all those citizens that have been evacuated to shelter areas back into their homes soon.
Meanwhile, I personally urge every American citizen to keep indoors, remain calm, do not panic, for there is no need. I understand that many people will want to stock up on food and supplies, this is not necessary, this situation is quickly coming under control, and I again urge all citizens not to panic. Simply remain indoors until this situation has passed."
"He's acting like this is a storm that's going to blow over," Stephanie whispered.
"Maybe it will," Cassandra added and fell quiet again to listen to the continued speech.
The President finished and allowed reporters to ask their questions. While some questions, regarding the animal carcass that had been displayed all over the media, he did not answer, other questions about quarantine, he strongly answered.
"Quarantine of any area at this time is absolutely unwarranted. There is no disease outbreak. This is a temporary situation, and people in affected areas have been temporarily evacuated to give our military time to bring this to a resolution. Quarantine is completely unwarranted."
The next reporter called upon asked the one, truly probably the most unanswerable, question on everyone's mind, and it quieted the room.
"Mr. President, do you still feel that these animals were strategically planted in this and other countries by terrorists?"
The President licked his lips and sighed deeply. Avoiding the question nearly completely, he responded, "We have been working on defining a point of origin for these animals to aide in their eradication. Thank you, that's all the time I have right now."
"What the hell does that mean?" Stephanie questioned.
"It means he has no clue." Kyle added angrily.
Cassandra fell quiet and turned away from the television. She watched the people in the streets below.
"Do you want me to stay?" Kyle asked her quietly, rubbing her shoulder gently.
"Won't your parents worry?" Cassandra asked.
"I'll call them, they'll be fine with it."
She smiled at him and he did head over to the telephone.
"So now what, Cass?" Stephanie questioned as Kyle walked away.
"What do you mean?"
"Well, what are we gonna do?"
Cassandra shrugged, "Just stay here for a while, hopefully this will all pass soon. Where's David?"
"Nobody knows," Stephanie answered warily. She paused for a moment before continuing. "Do you really think this is all going to pass over?" Stephanie asked pessimistically.
"I just want it to," Cassandra sighed. "That thing I saw yesterday, it was so horrible. It killed that man, he was in so much pain. Oh God Steph, it was awful."
"Well," she started but her eyes turned to the television and her words drifted off.
Cassandra looked at the screen and she felt her heart skip into her throat. There on the monitor, a ghastly image of a tattered black carcass lay strewn in a street. Military men in the background were scurrying about and one man came and shooed the cameraman away.
The reporter ran to the officer, asking so many questions so quickly it was hard to understand his words. As the camera backed away, it maintained a view on the tattered corpse.
The reporter came on after the camera lost its view of the carcass in the street in Philadelphia. She reiterated to the viewers tuned in that the animal was shot at some point undefined earlier in the week by a group of military stationed in a cordoned off area of Philadelphia.
"You know, the papers said that the area of Philly that's been evacuated is all right around that hospital hat was shut down last week. They had these...whatever you want to call them..." Cassandra added aloud.
"Well, it looks like they've overrun the area." Kyle said.
"This is really scary. I hope this all does end soon." Stephanie said.
"Yeah, I hope so too." Cassandra agreed.