Chapter 48 - Petco Problems

A short while later, we were walking away from the mess we’d left behind. We were a little singed and smelled of smoke, but Kara’s antics had recovered all of the trapped skeletons, so it was probably worth it.

“You’re nuts, you know that?” I said.

Kara chuckled. “Nah, I figured we were good. Look, the webs burned, just like we thought, and the trees didn’t all go up. I’m bummed we couldn’t get the other crystals, though.”

There had been more spiders hiding in the trees. Half a dozen or so, all smaller ones like the few I’d seen in the kitchen the day of the Event. When Kara lit up the web, it spread rapidly along the strands until it reached the trees. Then the flames shot up webs draped around the trees and from tree to tree, turning the whole thing into a massive, brief firebomb. One after another, a bunch of dog-sized spiders caught alight and dropped from the branches to the ground.

I just ordered my undead to book it out of the trees and took off as fast as I could. I’d halfway expected all the trees to catch fire and burn to the ground, but Kara was right. Almost none of them did.

“With the fires still burning in the underbrush and a couple of the trees, it didn’t feel worth the risk trying to go in after them,” I pointed out.

“I agree. Still a bummer, though,” Kara replied. “Whoa.”

She put a hand against my chest, halting me.

“What?” I asked softly, halting the advance of my undead.

“There’s something on the rooftop over there. A lookout,” Kara replied.

I looked where she pointed but couldn’t see anything. The evening was dark enough that her Nightvision had to be giving Kara a serious advantage at this point. If she said there was someone up there, I had to take her word for it. I tried to remember what was in that building—it was a strip mall, basically. A string of stores in the same building. There was a Staples in there; I’d shipped stuff out using that store. What else? An art store and a pet store, if I remembered right.

We advanced with caution and halted in the shadows near a smashed up gas station. I was mentally cataloguing resources as we moved, and it occurred to me that each gas station still probably had a big underground reserve. While the gas wasn’t exploding anymore, same as the gunpowder, it probably did still burn. That could be useful for a variety of things, from fires to weaponry. Maybe for more, too—could we use gasoline to power a steam engine, for example? Air pressure seemed to work, so maybe steam engines would as well…

I snapped my attention back to the present. All of that would be important to figure out—later. When my life wasn’t in imminent danger from whatever it was lurking out there in the dark. I’d hoped to reach my little cottage base before it grew too dark, but with the spider delay, it was obvious that wasn’t going to happen.

“Can we slip around whatever it is?” I whispered.

“Probably,” Kara replied, her voice low, too. “Come on, we’ll go across Main Street to the north side and use those trees over there for cover.”

We did as she suggested, still using the undead to lead out. I’d seen the hard way how valuable that could be. If one of us had fallen into that web, instead of the skeletons, there’d have been no way to avoid the dropping spider. The trees gave us good concealment, but it wasn’t enough. As we passed between the hotel to our north and the Staples plaza to the south, I saw movement on both sides. Bipedal beings with weapons gathered at the entrance to the hotel on one side of us, and the pet store entrance on the other. It looked like a good squad in either direction.

I all but held my breath as we went by, wondering if we were about to get hit, but neither group rushed us. We continued moving toward the interstate, steadily chewing up the meters until we were past the danger area, and I heaved a sigh. “Holy shit, that was tense. Could you see what they were?”

“Yeah,” Kara replied, her face grim. “The group to the north? They were more goblins. I thought you said they had a fort in the forest?”

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

“They did. Or rather, there is a fort in the forest. I didn’t see the goblins there, but I’m pretty sure the wall I saw was their work. It had the same look as the other stuff they construct.”

Kara grunted. “Probably them, then. Well, it looks to me like they branched out. If they’re controlling a forest fort and the hotel, that has to mean there’s a lot of them. They’re probably slowly consolidating, bringing in more goblins as they run into each other. Just like we are.”

“Makes sense. What about the south group? All I could see were shadowy figures standing near the pet store entrance.”

“Was that a pet store?” Kara laughed. “Okay, that makes a weird sort of sense. They were rats. Like, rat-people. Rat faces, rat hands, rat bodies—just standing up on two legs and carrying spears and shit. I wonder if they used to be in cages in that store?”

“I mean, it could be. The first creatures I fought were cadavers that came to life in my anatomy class. Then spiders that I think used to be normal size that grew to be monsters. The snake we all ate for lunch that day.”

“That was good. We caught a couple more after you left, and ate them, too.”

“I was even wondering if the goblins used to be squirrels. Have you seen a squirrel since the event?” I asked.

Kara thought for a moment, then shook her head. “I haven’t, now that you mention it. That’s a scary thought. There were a lot of squirrels out here. If they’re all goblins now, or even if a lot of them are, we could be in a world of hurt.”

“All the more reason to gather more crystals,” I replied. “Only way to defend ourselves for sure.”

We pressed on north up the highway, staying off the road itself. By remaining close to the east side, near the trees, Kara was able to spot the break in the forest where I’d cut in toward the graveyard. It was full dark by the time we got that far, and I was halfway tempted to call a halt for the night. If Kara hadn’t taken the Nightvision crystal I probably would have, but with that she was able to guide our way well enough.

It was getting late by the time we made it out to Patchen Road. We popped out of the woods not far from that first cemetery I tackled. As we walked past, I noticed that there were two new skeletons inside it. I wondered why some had appeared right away, while others seemed to take time to pop out of the ground. Too damned many questions without answers. With luck and time, maybe some of them would become more clear to me.

I cast Control Undead on the two skeletons. They were only tier one, but I’d lost a few of them in the fight with the goblins, and this helped replenish my numbers some. Once they were under my Control, they could easily walk out of the graveyard gates and join us.

From there it was a short walk down the road to the old man’s house, where I’d spent the night before. “It was safe this morning,” I told Kara. “But we’ll want to clear it again now, just to be sure.”

“Of course. You like this particular house?”

I shrugged. “The man who’d been living there had good vibes. I’m wearing his watch. I buried him…”

Kara looked at me quizzically, so I explained the story about finding the old man, his failed pacemaker, the probable cause of his death, and how I’d take refuge in his home.

She nodded at the end of the tale. “Makes total sense to me. He didn’t need his stuff anymore. You did. But you did the honorable thing and took care of his body, too. It was a nice touch. I figure the world has gone to shit, Selena, but we don’t have to be shitty all the time too. If we can find ways to maintain our integrity, it’ll only help when we look back on how we lived through this.”

I stared at her. Was this the same woman who’d cackled as she lit a small forest fire? She was an interesting contrast—sometimes the joker, sometimes serious and smart.

“Yeah,” I said, simply. “That feels right to me, too.”

My undead warriors had the house cleared in minutes. There were no new opponents inside. I showed Kara a guest room. “Figured this would work for you?”

“Sure, since it’s upper floor. How are we managing security?”

“You okay with skeletons standing outside your door?” I asked. “I usually just set the undead into guard mode and go to sleep. I let them handle anything that crops up.”

She laughed. “Well, that’s a big change from the way we’ve been running things. We have like four people rotating on guard twenty-four/seven. I’ll take it, don’t worry. Having things that don’t need to sleep watching us while we do? Hell yeah!”

We got some dinner from the remaining household stores, chatting a bit about the things we’d seen together while we ate. By the time we’d finished eating, it was getting late enough we both elected to head to bed. I’d already had a lovely night in a real bed last night, but Kara hadn’t slept on a real mattress since the Event happened. She was thrilled to have a mattress, blankets, and a real pillow.

I set most of the undead in hiding positions around the house, set to alert me if anything approached, and attack anything that tried to enter the house. Then I sprinkled a few in the hallway outside each of our doors, and set a few on guard next to each outside door. I wanted us as secure as possible, and this time I had the troops to do that.

Short of a massive goblin army, we ought to be secure. And even if a massive army arrived, odds were we’d get woke up by undead fighting them off in time to vanish into the night ourselves.

Hope climbed up into my bed with me, her tail wagging away. I grinned at her.

“Yeah, girl. We’re back home again. But tomorrow we have more walking to do.”

She let out a short yip, spun around a few times, and then settled herself into a ball of bones. I stared, smiling at the sight. I’d always loved our dogs when I was younger. It was nice to have one again, and Hope acted just like a living dog enough of the time that it was almost possible to forget she wasn’t still alive.

I lay my head down on the bed and was asleep faster than I thought possible.