When I awoke it was so blindingly obvious that I felt appalled at my own stupidity.
Steal the damn truck.
I look out the window; it was still sitting there in the moonlight, now looking oddly beautiful. Just sitting there, waiting for any one to just come along and take it. Waiting for me.
I can do this.
After a brief unbearably euphoric moment I stop as all the worries and logistical problems flood my mind. It's noisy, I don't know how to start, or drive it. I'm sure he can out distance a truck, even one as souped up as this one.
I can do this.
The temptation is too much though, this might be my only way out, I have to act now when I have the chance. If I don't-I conjure hideous images, me with him, forever, growing fatter, weaker, more complacent, and more docile. Losing the will to live, the ability to think.
Oh God please no.
Unless I get out. Now.
Trembling I get up, the world is surreal, for a moment I'm sure this isn't real. I'm in a movie. The truck continues to sit innocuously in the moonlight. Still shaking I set out to the front door. I feel like lightning will strike me dead any moment. I pray to God and the Virgin and all the saints I know. Shockingly, miraculously, the door is open.
The night is eerily quiet, not even crickets.
For a moment I just have to stand there. It might sound odd, but I had to be still to absorb the moment, so to speak. I had to listen, to make sure this was all real. That the Creeper wouldn't come bursting out any minute. I remember all my senses are heightened, I can smell dirt and vegetation and dew. The full moon cast strange razor sharp shadows on everything.
The unrealness passed a little when I took my first step. Surely the car door isn't even open. It pops open easily with a rusty squeak and I have to pause and listen in terror. I slowly ease my way in, there'll be no keys. The keys are in the ignition, in fact they don't even come out. I actually sat there, blankly staring out the windshield. I can run now, should I run now? Should I wait for a better time, get supplies? NO, RUN NOW!
I snap out of my trance, almost panicking. I turn the ignition, for one second it doesn't ignite, I almost feel like exploding from the tension, another twist a second later and it catches. The car gives a deep throaty roar and comes to life. The tension remains, now coupled with fear and joy and excitement.
The car is too big for me, I feel like I need a booster seat. The rear-view mirror is worthless, there's no way to look behind with the huge storage container in the back of the truck. I anxiously glance in the mirror on my left, in which I can see the bulkhead. All the while my right hand and feet are desperately groping around, to figure out how to get this thing to work. Like a nightmare the Creeper bursts out of the bulkhead, screaming and flaring his crest and charging straight at me.
I'm sure I was screaming too, but in my memories it was drowned out. I'm stomping the gas and yanking the stick. Oh right, clutch a small still working part of my mind intones. I find it and desperately wrench it out of park. Unfortunately and fortunately I threw it into reverse.
Unfortunate because now I was heading straight toward the Creeper, the last thing I wanted to do. Fortunate because I had forgotten about the old engine sitting just behind the truck. So did the Creeper. Somehow in my stupid panic I ran over it, maybe launched over it is a better phrase. In that moment I caught a split second of the Creeper's face, anger and rage replaced with shock and dismay. Terrified I shut my eyes; I only heard a loud THUMP and a screech.
Somehow I realized I had just ran over him.
Gasping in disbelief myself, I pulled the stick into some kind of gear, any gear that would go forward. The car groaned and I heard another scream, somewhat weaker this time. The rear left seemed to sag for a moment then the whole car righted itself, and I was out of there.
I lay there in shock, the agony overwhelming. I try to get up but can't. I heard the Breeder in a place where she was not supposed to be. I heard the ignition starting, and was confused at first, and then I realized and rushed up to the surface. I was angry but at first I thought she was just being errant again, playing around where she shouldn't be. Then I realized a moment later that she might be trying to run away.
Even that didn't worry me too much, not even my truck can escape my wings, so naturally I ran to the truck, hoping to stop it before she could get away without causing too much damage to it. What I didn't anticipate was that she would drive toward me.
It caught me off guard for a second, but before I had time even to recover from that I found my own truck leap off the ground and right on top of me. Involuntarily I screamed in pain, the Breeder was screaming too.
I could feel the massive weight on my stomach. Painful, but the truck jerking its left back tire off my stomach was even worse. One of my lungs refused to inflate, and my stomach and lovely new intestines were ruined.
I heard the sound of my truck, with my favorite little plaything inside of it, drive off.
Through the pain and immobility my mind tried to grasp this fact. It was…hard for me to understand. My Breeder, my property, just left, taking my second favorite possession with her. It was as if one of my knives got up and stole my truck, or one of my corpses. It seemed unreal to me, a feeling I am very, very unused to.
I felt like wailing, gnashing my teeth with rage. Yes it was true humans had minds and wills of their own-some of them do anyway- but it seemed particularly offensive that such a useful necessary thing, a breeder, would leave my necessary possession, with another of my belongings, with my child.
I looked up forlornly, the road was empty and the air quiet. My guts were spilling out. When I managed to finally get up I had to hold them in with one hand. Luckily my wings weren't too damaged, they were folded behind my back, but they had been delivered a nasty shock. They opened painfully. I ignored the pain. I now had to hunt for a human with guts. (I smirk to myself at the pun) She had driven the tire off in between my legs. Guts and nuts.
On the Road
I was so panicked, so manic, so frenzied to get away that I just pushed that truck out of there, not caring if I was in the right gear, or where I was going. I just had to get out.
I drove right out the schoolhouse, right passed the supermarket, driving down the same road the Creeper took me to earlier today. Wait. I didn't want to go there, it was a dead end. I stopped the car and tried to throw it in reverse. Nothing happened. "Right, clutch. Clutch. Who the hell drives stick shift nowadays?" I mutter to myself. I don't like going down the road I just fled from but I forced myself to control my panicky flight instinct. Back passed the supermarket, down to the main road. Once I'm on the nine I gun it.
It's incredibly odd driving stick, and the power of this truck is shocking, although not entirely unfamiliar. Gears grind as I struggle to remember half-forgotten motions. The truck bucks in resistance. I smile at the dream. I thank my older brother for teaching me to drive stick. I thank the little boy for the dream.
It frightens me a little, after a lifetime of speed limits and months of imprisonment, but driving away from the Creeper at well past 100 MPH feels undeniably wonderful. I don't know where I'm going. I don't care. After a while I can even see the sun start to rise in front of me.
I feel hope, I feel joy. I'm free. Nothing else matters. I actually roll down the window, being free feels so good it hurts. Tears stream down my face. I start screaming, I punch the air.
No one appears on the road. I don't necessarily consider this a bad thing.
Later
It was well after sunrise, the pedal was still to the floor. I sort of snap out of my trance, some of the overwhelming joy begins to ebb. I look at the gas meter, this car isn't terribly fuel efficient, and me pushing it mercilessly hasn't helped.
What will I do? I look around the landscape a little more, the very first edges of panic starting to grow. The landscape is very desolate looking. Not only that, it has a mind-numbing flat similarity to it. It looks the same as everywhere else he's driven me in the past few weeks.
What will I do if I run out of gas? I have no money; I curse myself for not planning this better. Still my mood is at this point still overwhelming optimistic. I just did what I though was impossible. I'm away from him. I look down, I still have plenty of gas, I told myself. I'm speeding away from that monster forever, and-I feel a perverse squirm of pleasure, I injured him. I don't know how badly but I know I ran over him.
I know that I'm a different person now, it disquiets me to remember that before I would have never taken pleasure by hurting anything. It would have appalled me to think that way. But I dismiss such a thought. He deserved it. I concentrate on the car.
I had gotten it to a point where I felt like I could drive somewhat comfortably. The car didn't groan or scream when I pushed it this much. I decided to slow down. I thought at that point maybe I was far enough, I didn't want to waste gas unnecessarily, not to mention I didn't want to be pulled over in this truck with God-knows-what in the back. I squint in the distance. There's a stop sign.
On this road? I ask myself incredulously. I haven't seen a car in-Yup it's a stop sign. I slow the car. It moans and I hastily try to shift into some lower gear. It vibrates in protest. I manage to hit the break and roll to a stop. I look both ways, raising myself over the dashboard. I feel like a child driving a car. No one as far as the eye can see. I sigh at the pointless stop sign. The car goes dead.
A drop of ice falls into my stomach, no, no, no, ok good I started it again. I just let it die accidentally, I've done that before when I've stopped, no big deal I assure myself. I look both ways, maybe I could go down a little side street? Would it be safer to travel in the back roads, twisting and turning so that he would have more trouble finding me?
Finally I decide no it's better just to travel down the only road I even vaguely know. Besides this place is practically a back road as it is. I'm sure that if I just follow it I can come to someplace. A little friendly town somewhere (The picture in my mind is of Mayberry from the Andy Griffith show). Once I get to that little outpost of civilization I'll be safe. I can call the police, or my family. I can figure something out, it'll be alright. Everything will work out somehow when I get to my little perfect town.
Since there's nobody around I allow myself to speed up a little. Where is everybody? I never imagined there was just big pieces of the country so empty like this. Of course the Creeper had driven me through it but I was wrapped up to much in my own misery to really notice or care, but now I wonder how a person can live all alone out here, away from civilization.
I'll find a small town, and everything will just work out.
Noon
It's fucking sweltering and I'm starving.
I'm still driving in what seems like forever and yet still no sign of anything it seems. I know there has to be a town, a police station, anything. Its worse with all the corn harvested because now there's a just a flat, dusty, desolate nothingness. I managed to get my coat off while driving (the car repaid me by dropping speed, grinding because it was in the wrong gear and swerving all over the road) but I couldn't stop. I managed to find an ancient window roller, and it snapped nearly in half when I tugged it too hard, leaving the window half way down.
It surprised me when I felt cool air rushing in, I keep forgetting its winter. I wonder if it snows around here. The dark shade of the truck absorbs the sun, making hotter than it should have been, or so it seemed to me. This truck really hates me.
What's more pressing is my hunger. I keep hoping I come across a gas station, a nice well-lit one with a store attached so big you can practically go grocery shopping in. Why didn't I bring food? Because I had to rush out and escape that why. I still keep hoping and looking for some place, even though I don't have any money to buy what I need.
Later
On second thought I wouldn't mind a police officer or highway patrolman or something. He could drive me back somewhere and understand and call my family for me.
I did see one car, I was so excited that I actually leaned forward over the dashboard, looking at it longingly, wondering if I should stop it and flag it down. It was traveling the opposite direction of me. I was so distracted that I might have driven a little too much on his side of the road, he swerved quickly away from me and sped off. I cringed at my stupidity and expected a honk yet none came. Was it my imagination or did he disappear more quickly than usual in my side mirror?
After some thought I realize I might be protected from all cops and motorists from the crazy creepy aura emanating from my choice of transport.
Once I find civilization everything will be alright. Things will just work out when I come to a town.
I'm still optimistic though! Although I'm pretty shocked how much the needle moves away from "Full" every time I see it. Its still just a little under half. I blink, no a little less than that, but that's ok because I'll find someplace safe soon enough.
I know I've traveled along way because it's felt like it's been hours. Mind-numbing hours. Yet at the same time I scarily feel like I've gotten no where, that's because everything looks fucking the same! Same bare fields, same poles. I once saw what looked like a barnyard, and I decided to go up to I, took forever to find the place the led up to it, but it looked and felt desolate and empty and abandoned so I just drove on, berating myself for wasting the gas.
What's funny is the idea of actually going somewhere some what frightens me. What will I do? I keep imagine walking into a room full of people and they all look at me and I just can't say anything. I can't because I don't know what to say. If I start babbling about monsters and bodies and all the awful things he's done what would happen then? They would walk around me with the same animal nervousness, like the car when it swerved around the BEATNGU
I remember my trip to the supermarket. How good it felt to be around humans and human things again. But how I felt horror and fear and how I just shied away from everybody after a while. How I just wanted to get out of there.
When in the schoolhouse I think of myself curled up in misery and entropy and how it took a lot to get me just to get up and to try to escape. In a way that was less frightening than the world, which now seems so desolate and big.
I snap out of my reverie when I see another car, for some reason this cheers me. To my surprise I see a big transport truck a little after that. Then another. Hmmm. It curves a little where they're coming from. Naturally I follow it down. It slopes down a hill gently.
Twilight.
The lateness crept up on me. I feel, and I know I must look like a person driving for hours straight must feel. Like crap.
I finally, finally found a truck stop. That's it. It's a few little buildings, grubby looking gas stations mostly. A small closed shop selling touristy stuff and "genuine Indian jewelry" or whatever. The BEATNGU gave me one last resentful shutter and jerk before I turned it off, and shoved the stick into what I hoped was park.
One truck rolled menacingly by and roared off as I got out of the BEATNGU, nearly fell to the ground. And stretched my legs.
It was cold out, I reached in and retrieved my coat, and set off with some purpose to the brightest looking building.
Ever since I walked out of the schoolhouse everything feels like a dream, sometimes a nightmare. Sometimes things slip into a better since of normalcy, especially during the long drive when I was hypnotized by the sameness and blandness of the road. Now everything is a dream again. For a moment all I could do was stare stupidly. Then walk timidly in.
As I predicted everyone inside the restaurant/shop stopped and stared. There was not a lot of people; but I nearly swooned at their gaze. Just now I remember I'm still wearing my pajamas from last night, after rolling around with the Creeper, tennis shoes with no socks and my coat. I still can catch a whiff kerosene. My hair and face are greasy after almost two days without bathing. I haven't combed my hair in probably longer. A little bit of my belly is already sticking out.
Like the grocery store I want to run out crying. I flinch and jump at everything especially when the waitress asks if I need help. The waitress, who looks remarkably like the grocery store lady, looks me up and down warily. I can feel myself being judged by all eyes in the room. I shrink back into myself a little.
"I"-no sound comes out so I clear my throat and try again "I need a telephone please?"
The waitress puffs her cheeks and blows out air, as if my request will be incredibly difficult. "There's a pay phone back there," she gestures, "don't know if it'll work or not."
I murmur some word of thanks and head toward the back, where there is indeed a payphone. I don't even have a quarter on me. I could call collect, or call 911. Would that help? I think dizzily. I doubted cops would be that effective against the Creeper. I could just say I was kidnapped, but then I would still have to explain what happened to me. I could lie of course, but I didn't have a story rehearsed. Besides I the idea of going into detail of what happened just terrifies me.
I chew on my knuckle until it bleeds, I can call collect to home, ask my father or someone to come all the way out here and pick me up. Surely they would miss me so much that they would hurry over and not ask any questions right away, wouldn't they? I just want to go home and lay in my safe familiar bed. Tears are threatening. Yes and I would never leave it again. I wish I had my mother, someone just o hug me. But she's dead. With a massive effort I hold my tears back.
When I pick up the phone my other hand slides absentmindedly down. Oh God! I think with a massive shock of horror. What will I say about this?! Tears drip down but I remain silent. There's no way I could hide this, at least not for long, I'm already starting to show, if that checkout lady was any indication. Then what will I do when it comes? Hysteria is beginning to overtake me, as it always does whenever I think about this subject. I can't cope, I just can't. II have no idea what to do, I just…I just wish I had someone, anyone. Someone to tell me what to do. I completely fall apart when there's no dial tone.
Everyone is now completely silent, staring at me; I can't stand it and I have to run outside.
The cool air feels good, especially when my skin feels hot and flushed with embarrassment. I simply cannot think rationally when it comes to- I put my hand over my stomach. With this there is no certainty or planning. Just blind terror.
The question forms of what my family would do if I managed to get to them and tell them. It feels reassuring to think my father or someone would come up with a plan. I want to go home.
Trouble is I won't get far without more gas. Without really thinking I head over to the well lit center in the gas station, where an incredibly bored looking man sits reading a newspaper.
He looks at me without any apparent note of my appearance. "What number?" he asks routinely, boredom in his one is clear.
"N-number?" I ask slightly dumbfounded. He glares at me, uncomfortable I suddenly remember. In another time, another universe I had a car and could buy gasoline for it without looking like an idiot. I glance behind me. In the station I can see pumps with numbers. Of course I've done this before. The BEATNGU sits some ways away in the dark, looking menacing.
"I," I take a breath and plunge ahead "I don't have any money." I admitted.
With a mix of anger and disbelief he heaves a heavy sigh he throws down his newspaper and looks at me. I'm sure I look dumb and pathetic and lost. Tempered just a bit by pity he says "Well I guess I can't help you."
I understand. I merely retreat into the shadows, feeling humiliated.
I cry of course, not really caring who sees or hears me. I think about just heading to the truck, but I actually fear it in the dark. So I just sit down on some porch somewhere and cry.
I don't know how long I cry. A lot of half-formed plans and ideas form in my head. Some worse than others. I can just take the car and drive as far as it takes me. (I imagine stranded on some desolate road somewhere) Or I can hitchhike (I imagine my corpse by the roadside, complete with an oddly distressed looking Creeper beside it.) I only have a vague idea of where I am, but I know the farther I get away the better.
I just have to get somewhere with a phone.
After a while I calm down a little bit. The more time I spend from the monster the better. I may have been like a bird the first time out of It's cage, confused and bewildered and actually preferring the initial feeling of safety, but with every passing second I grow a little more bolder and confident that I made the right decision. No matter how hard and scary it is I thought in misery.
Sometime after I hear a boot step behind me.
Instantly I'm up and pumped full of adrenaline. Despite my heavy stomach I manage to get up so quickly it surprises even me. I spin around and face whoever tried to sneak up behind me. The man is frozen, a little stunned with my sudden reaction. I study him, and recognize him from the restaurant; he was sitting at the bar. He wears cowboy boots and a big silver belt buckle. He's tall and thin and wears black. He looks friendly enough. I'm so shaken and suspicious of everything I immediately back away and go into defensive mode. I can tell he is surprised.
I don't care. I can't stand any strange men around me. I glare at him warily.
Finally he talks, in a not unkind tone. "I talked to the gas station attendant. He said you got no money."
I say nothing.
A little hesitant he says. "I thought I could help out."
Now I'm unsure, he wants to give me money? "I don't have anything." I say bluntly, unsure of why he's doing this. He merely chuckles. "This is jus' my contribution, darlin'." He pulls out some bills, leaving me sputtering; he waves away my protests with an airy hand. "Jus' hopes this gets you where you need to go." And smiles at me, I give a shaky smile back. He heads towards his semi.
"Wait!" I call out. He pauses. "Where are you going?"
He smiles his nice smile. "Well I'm goin' up a little further north then I suppose I'll be headin' west on the nine."
West on the nine, where I had just come from. "Be careful." I tell him. He merely nods. "No really! There's been a lotta, uh, weird deaths and disappearances." I don't mention the monster. "They say it's a serial killer." I added. He merely raises his eyebrows. "Thanks for the news, I'll be careful." He pauses, "where you headed?"
I pause, unsure. He gestures south, "there's a town down there aways, you could probably make it and find a phone."
I thank him profusely and warn him again. "Please, just be careful up there-" He smiles and waves away concern again. "I will be, always have been darlin'" He won't, I know he won't be because he won't know what he's dealing with. "Stay away from gas stations." I warn him cryptically, remembering my own horrible experience. I thank him again.
I pull around the truck, enjoying the uncomfortable look on the gas station manager's face. The money the trucker gave me was enough for around half a tank, plus some cheap gas station fare I wolfed down without tasting.
I feel better, energized, I now have a definite goal in mind: get to the town. I also feel so happy at the unexpected kindness, in a world filled with cruelty and evil and death. The trucker reminded me of Elsa Daniels, a sudden stab of sadness. I don't like to think about her, as mean as it sounds. What happened to her was just so unfair and awful. I pray silently for the trucker, hoping nothing happens to him.
I speed onwards, trying to find some way to turn on the headlights without crashing. It's very dark and scary, but as I speed off I sill have hope, thinking I'll see the town any minute.
Thinking of Elsa reminds me of something else. When I stayed with her I felt scared and unclean and just plain miserable it I had to resist the urge to lie on the bed all day,. But I had also felt like I had to get out, get out of her house and her little town and just leave. I was still in his territory, his country hunting ground. Everything felt like it was his.
I don't know where his range ends, I just know to get away, the farther the better. When I reach the human world everything will be better. When I reach the small town everything will be alright.
This prey wasn't very satisfying. Middle aged, not a good stomach, fat and slow and terrified.
However I wasn't hunting and enjoying it today. There was no sport in this, merely satisfying a need. I gathered what parts I needed merely to keep going. I grimace at the subtle bitterness in the lungs, he abused them sometime in his youth, not wonderful organs but they'll do. If that little breeder hadn't run over me-
I inhale, testing them out. I rarely feel like this. Anger, I'm angry. Normally it's an emotion I get over quickly. It's stupid to stew in it, it merely wears you, saps you, and makes you weak.
I want my breeder, I want my truck back. Humans might attack her and destroy her or the child. Or, as unlikely as it seems, she might just get away forever. Even if she does try to run away farther than I have ever gone than I will chase her anyway. Farther than anywhere.
I look down at the victim, no time to do anything with him, so I leave the rest of his useless body.
My wings still work, and that's all I have, more than enough.
The landscape unfurls itself to me, marred only by the grey ribbon of road. The only road, the one she must have take, and humans are so predictable. Like almost all others, she must long for the smell and cramped closeness of her own kind. She'll head to the nearest biggest human settlement, where she'll feel safe in their buildings.
I can detect just the barest whiff of her scent, a few delectable spore. It's very faint, I knew she must have passed here a long time ago, still I can seek her out. Find her scent and track it despite it being diluted in the air. Like a shark detecting a drop of blood in a million drops of seawater.
There's only really one road to follow, and no place to hide in my territory.
A/N: Sorry this chapter is so short, spring semester starting, getting a job buying a car, getting rid of the car, taking finals, quitting the job, buying another car, taking summer school, being asked back on the job, celebrating a birthday, my mom breaking the computer somehow, well… let's just say life just got in the way.
Maria's adventures with stick shift mirror my own recent attempts to learn. Mine didn't go this well though.