After covering up the tentacled body on the floor, Donnie wrestled the boat back to the main road. The corpse wobbled like jello, bits peeking out from under the tarpaulin. Currents picked up strength again. Rain lashed the vessel.
From the main road, where both Donnie’s office building and the mall were located, he could easily find his way home. He could follow the roads. He probably should have doubled back in the first place, he thought, instead of wasting time trying to find a route to the river. Not knowing what had already happened, Donnie wanted to stop and warn the others in the mall but he couldn’t risk the boat. He had to get back to Alessa. With the body in the boat, Donnie thought he might even be risking bringing the invaders down on them. He was sure he’d have to find a way to dump the body, or the boat, before he actually got home.
The tree Donnie originally climbed to get into the mall bashed against the broken windows. Debris filled the main avenue and seemed to be moving fast. It was almost like the flood was being sucked back out to sea, but if anything the water level was rising. Donnie opened up the engine a bit and moved faster. He watched for trash or anything suspicious in the water.
“Come on, come on,” Donnie said.
Donnie pushed the boat harder, trash and tree branches bouncing off the hull. Passing his building, he wondered if Peggy and Kellie were still inside. He supposed they would have to be since there were no signs of rescuers. As long as those monsters didn’t get to them, they had enough food and water to stay where they were. He steered the same way he would have if he’d been jumping in his car and heading home, albeit swerving back and forth across the flooded road above sunken cars and sidewalks.
Although he was on the right path now, the sky began to get dark. Lightning forked through the clouds and the endless rain kept falling. He squinted hard through the smeared windshield. A rack of headlamps was attached to the roof of the boat and Donnie found the switch for them. They popped on but barely penetrated the miasma.
A hard, angular shape loomed out of the dark but Donnie didn't see it coming until the boat hit. Even going slow, the nose of the boat rose up with a dramatic crash. He was thrown forward and only barely managed to grab the throttle, yanking it back to neutral. The boat wallowed and he struggled to maintain his footing. He waited for a minute, and then two, listening for the gurgling of water pouring into the boat’s hull over the pouring rain.
“Shit, I can’t-, I can’t keep going in this,” Donnie said.
Rain splattered the windshield. Another flash of lightning illuminated the canyon walls of the buildings around him, painting them blue. Off to one side of the road was an amphitheatre-shaped structure with water running in and out of it. Three levels of bars and restaurants formed a curving wall around a central courtyard. Donnie recognised it, having visited the restaurants there several times for work functions over the last couple of years. The entrance was a vertical cleft in the structure with a roof over the very top. He could steer the boat right into the courtyard. Cursing the weather, the creatures that had come with it, and everything keeping him from getting home to Alessa, Donnie steered into the bar and restaurant collective. More debris banged and scraped against the hull.
The interior of the courtyard looked like some kind of whirlpool. Currents ran rings around the bars and restaurants, picking up every loose object they could find and ejecting them into the flooded street. Donnie struggled to get the boat under control. Loose trash filled the water. The first two levels of bars, restaurants and cafes were underwater. Only the top level, dominated by several larger restaurants, was above the surface. Water lapped at the bottom of the third level’s walkway. Donnie tried not to think about how many bodies were stuck down below, drowned and pushed into corners by the currents.
“Fuck!”
Something raked against the bottom of the boat. Donnie almost panicked, clawing at the stubby shotgun, until he remembered the towering modern art sculpture in the middle of the courtyard. It was apparently still intact and he’d floated over the top of it. The boat turned, scraping some more as Donnie hesitated over what to do. The engine grumbled and he didn’t want to damage it.
Donnie grabbed the controls again and backed up. He reversed away from the sculpture and, squinting through the glass, steered toward one side of the courtyard. Lightning flashed, throwing the area into stark relief. He slapped the lever back to neutral just before the boat banged into the balcony near one restaurant’s entrance. Donnie rushed onto the wet deck, lashed by rain, and grabbed a coil of rope attached to the side of the boat. He slung a loop of it over the railing and pulled before tying it off.
It would be safer inside the building than staying in the boat. Donnie was hungry, wet, and tired. Badly as he wanted to make it home, if he kept going in total darkness he was going to kill himself, especially with those things in the water. Inside, he’d try to find something to eat, dry off if he could, and try to get a few hours of sleep.
Wrapping the Serbu Shorty shotgun in his clothes, Donnie climbed the side of the boat as it swayed and clambered up the slick railing. The boat thumped into the wall under his feet. He pulled himself over the railing and under the cover of the nearest restaurant’s overhang. For a few moments, he watched the rain fall in sheets around him. Once again he cursed himself for not going home early last night when he had the option, so he could be with Alessa now, instead of trying to selfishly sneak a couple of hours to himself. At the same time, he marvelled at it all. It had only been twenty-four hours. He was climbing out of boats and up railings like a swashbuckling pirate, shotgun wrapped in his clothes. There was a dead alien in his stolen boat. The city was underwater and Donnie was surprised how quickly he was adapting to it. He was scared, yes, of what he might find inside, but he was ready to face it.
Donnie tried the glass door of the restaurant. ‘Lombardo’s’ was written on the glass along with opening hours and phone numbers. The door was unlocked. Holding the shotgun in front of him like a pistol, heavy and probably likely to break his wrist if he tried to fire it like that, Donnie slipped inside.
“Hello? Is anyone there?” Donnie shouted into the dark. “Hello?”
Producing his flashlight, Donnie cast it around the restaurant. No light, of course, no power. Apart from the rain he could hear water running and trickling inside. The beam of light swept across empty chairs at empty tables. Napkins, utensils, wine and water glasses, undisturbed and unused. A wall of floor to ceiling windows overlooked part of the city but of course they were dark and murky with rain too. Part of the ceiling had collapsed in one section of the dining room, apparently due to the rain. It had dumped roof tiles, filth and debris, and gallons of rainwater, directly on top of one of the tables. Containers had been set up in several other places to catch leaks but they all seemed to be full and overflowing. On a table near the entrance, a large bucket sat catching a near-constant trickle from the ceiling. More like a running tap than a leak. Water ran down the sides of the container, pooling on the tabletop and then trickling to the floor.
“Hello?”
On another table at the back of the restaurant, near the kitchen, Donnie spotted signs of life. Several dirty dishes and used glasses were scattered on the tabletop, away from most of the leaks. Donnie scanned the table with his flashlight. Something crashed behind the kitchen door, muffled but unmissable. Someone or something was moving around back there. He pointed his shotgun and flashlight at the door, which wobbled in place.
“If there’s someone in there, please let me know! I don’t want to hurt you!” Donnie said. “But if you’re one of those things, well, if you don’t answer then I figure you might be one of them!”
The beam of the flashlight shook in Donnie’s hand. If he strained to listen, he thought he could hear whispered conversation. Gradually, the door shifted open. A skinny man in chef whites emerged, holding a knife. He looked Italian and in his late fifties, with a dark moustache and a horseshoe of almost black hair around the back of his head. The knife shook in his hand. Behind him, a woman about the same age, short with frizzy hair, followed. She was dressed in a dress and sweater. She cocked a metal pot behind her shoulder like a bat.
“Who are you? What do you want?” the man asked.
Donnie lowered the shotgun and the flashlight so it wasn’t in their eyes. “I’m sorry, I was just looking for shelter. I can go if it’s a problem.”
“How did you get in here?”
“The door was unlocked, sorry. And I have a boat.”
“A boat?” The man lowered the knife. “Oh, that’s okay then.”
“That’s okay?” Donnie asked.
“We thought you might have come out of the water, with them.”
“No, but you’ve seen them too?”
“We’ve heard them, and seen things in the water,” the man said. “I’m Al, and this is my wife, Rosa.”
“We’re the owners,” Rosa said.
“The Lombardos?” Donnie remembered the sign on the door.
“Mancini,” Al said. “We bought the place from Mr Lombardo.”
“I’m sorry to have scared you, I’ve been trying to make my way home. I was trapped in the office last night, you know? By the wave. This morning, I tried to start making my way back home, I found a boat and took it. But with all the damage, and no light, and knowing those things are out there, I decided I’d better find a place to wait out of the storm for the night.”
The older man nodded. “Last night, with all the rain the roof was flooding like crazy and most of our staff couldn’t make it in. We were just trying to stop the leaks from soaking everything, wondering if we should even stay open. Then, that part of the ceiling fell in. We had to cancel all the reservations, cancel shifts, so we were here alone when the wave hit. People in the restaurants below, we heard them drown. We couldn’t help anyone, they were all sucked under when the wave hit, and then-,”
“Stop! Listen, listen,” Rosa said.
Al immediately shut up. Donnie didn’t question it, and stayed quiet instead of asking what they were listening for. Rosa, holding her pot, sunk into an awkward squat with one ear angled at the floor, and Al and Donnie both followed her example. Donnie could hear rain splattering against the windows, trickling through the ceiling and falling into overfull containers meant to catch it. He could even hear waves slapping the building outside and causing the hull of his boat to thump against the balcony.
Something thudded against the floor, hard enough to make Donnie flinch. He got lower, until his ear was almost pressed against the damp carpet. A wet dog smell wafted off of it. Under all the other sounds, he could hear something swishing around and then banging, crashing, like furniture being tossed around, but muffled, only clear when something smacked against the ceiling. Something was moving down there, right under their feet.
“At first we thought someone might be trapped down there, in an air pocket,” the older woman, Rosa, said. “But it is underwater! And it moves around too much, banging and crashing. In the daytime, we saw things moving in the water, living things, but we didn’t get a good look.”
At that moment, lightning painted the city outside the floor to ceiling windows. Thunder rolled, distant, but caused the glass to rattle. Straightening, Donnie swallowed and nodded.
“I have a dead one in my boat,” Donnie said. “They’re-, they’re, I’m not sure what you think you saw, but they’re not animals. It attacked me with a spear-thing. They’re like some kind of alien, squid-things, all these tentacles, with arms and a face, a face like nothing you’ve ever seen.”
“Mother of God.” Al crossed himself forehead to waist, shoulder to shoulder.
“This rain, this storm, it’s unnatural. I think they caused it.” Another lightning flash split the sky, followed by thunder. “The wave wasn’t a natural thing, I think they’re invading us. I don’t know if they came from another planet or under the sea, but I think it’s all deliberate. Like a war.”
“Madness,” Rosa said.
“I can show you the body if you don’t believe me! I can show you-, it looks like an animal but I can show you the belts and tools it’s wearing, it’s clearly intelligent. I got lucky and managed to kill it with this shotgun.”
“Of course, I knew this could be no normal storm. That the tidal wave was no normal wave,” Al said. “We saw things, man-sized in the water, but didn’t know what they were. That’s why we weren’t so sure about you.”
“Do you think it’s stuck down there? Maybe it’s not one of the octopus people, maybe it’s something else?”
“We don’t know, it’s there from time to time. Maybe it is stuck?” Rosa said.
Donnie swept his flashlight back and forth. “Do you have any candles, or something?”
“Yes, we only put them out and hid when we heard-, I guess it was your boat engine,” Rosa said. “We didn’t know what it was so we put them out and hid.”
Al and Rosa Mancini went about setting out some candles and lighting them again. Their lonely orange glows glittered off the windows. Together, they produced enough light that Donnie could switch off his flashlight. The unlocked front door had been an oversight. Donnie returned to the front of the restaurant and locked it, but the glass panel in the door and floor to ceiling windows did not make the place feel very secure. He listened for the thing under the floor. Maybe it was one of those tentacled monstrosities, and if so they couldn’t be safe. But maybe it was another creature, a dumb animal that wouldn’t be able to leave the water. Or given the whirlpool out on the courtyard maybe it wasn’t anything alive at all. The windows down below must all be shattered. Maybe the currents were turning in such a way that every once in a while they swept through the other, underwater restaurant, picking things up and smashing them against the walls and ceiling like a temperamental toddler.
“Would you like something to eat, honey?” Rosa asked. “We have no electricity, no gas, but the walk-in freezer is still cold and we’ve managed to warm up some things and make salad.”
Donnie considered his options. “That would be great, actually, thanks.”
Outside, the arrival of the boat had not gone unnoticed. Rain pounded the white watercraft. The whirlpool currents caught in the flooded courtyard tugged constantly at the knots Donnie had used to secure it to the railing. Lightning forked the sky and thunder rattled the building. Inside the rocking boat, the dead creature languished under the tarp Donnie had covered it with. The scent of death emanating from the body reached the water outside.
Invisible in the dark water, a man-sized shape circled. A bluish, mottled tentacle slapped the side of the boat and crawled its way up. Another creature heaved itself out of the flood. Dripping, water ran off its slippery bulk as it slipped over the side and straightened. The creature looked the same as the one Donnie had killed, a torso-shaped mass of flesh with thick bundles of tentacles where the arms and legs should be, and two armlike limbs ending in flippers. Eyes ran down the sides of its vertical slit of a mouth. Under its tentacles, the creature wore belts lined with weapons and exotic tools.
Making its way inside the boat, in the dark, the creature found the body. It folded over the corpse, one tentacle stripping back the tarp. Ichor puddled where it had run out of the creature’s shattered hump. The living one’s mouth peeled open, revealing rows of hooked fangs. Although it wouldn’t be heard over the storm, it let out several angry hoots.
The kitchen at the back of the restaurant was cramped and lit by candles. Ovens and stovetops, and other workstations cluttered the long and narrow space behind a counter where wait staff would collect the meals. All of the appliances were cold and dead, but Al and Rosa had a small, propane-powered hotplate that they used to warm some pasta for Donnie. Beyond the kitchen was an equally cramped dishwashing pit, an open area lined with metal shelves used for dry storage, and the walk-in refrigerator and freezer.
“Thank you for this, I really appreciate it.” Donnie accepted a couple of bowls of food.
“Don’t worry about it, we made a big pot last night fearing we would be stuck here a while,” Al said.
Donnie carried a bowl of pasta and a simple salad back into the dining room. The pasta was little more than spaghetti and sauce but it tasted delicious. He turned it around on his fork and ate quickly. All three of them gathered at the table near the kitchen, dirty dishes piled on one end and candles dotting the surface. The Mancinis offered wine but Donnie stuck to water instead. That horrible fishy taste lingered in his mouth, as if he’d never be free of it, but the food and several glasses of water seemed to do the job of finally evicting it.
“You planned on just resting the night and continuing in the morning?” Rosa asked.
“Yes, my wife, she’s at home all alone,” Donnie said. “In the morning when it’s safer, I’ve got to get back to her.”
Rosa and Al shared a look. “Could you take us with you? Just to get clear of the flood?”
“Of course! Yes, of course, if you want I’d be happy to take you with me. It’s not even my boat, I just found it abandoned.”
“But you said you have one of the dead monsters in it?” Al said.
“Yes, we should get rid of it before we leave,” Donnie said.
Donnie’s meal was interrupted as the front door of the restaurant shattered. All three of them jumped. Donnie caught a glimpse of something flying across the room, like a swooping bird, and saw it strike one of the floor to ceiling windows. It stuck there rather than travel all the way through the glass, another short, black harpoon like the creature that had boarded his boat had used. It quivered, trapped half-in half-out of a crater it had created.
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
“Shit!” Donnie grabbed for his stubby shotgun, resting to one side of the table.
Rosa went to douse the candles but Donnie stopped her. Whatever was out there obviously knew they were there, there was no point in leaving them blind. He rose from the table, shotgun pointed at the door. The Serbu only had three shells. He had three more in his pocket but didn’t know if he’d have time to reload. The sound of rain got louder. Glass dropped and tinkled out of the door frame in large slivers.
“Stay back,” Donnie warned the others.
Al and Rosa picked up their knife and metal pot again, respectively. Donnie rounded on the doorway, gripping the hilt and vertical foregrip of the shotgun with both hands. He was wary of another black spear or some other weapon appearing from the darkness and missiling toward him. As he circled toward the door, however, the frame loomed empty, surrounded by broken glass. Rain fell in sheets beyond the landing. As lightning lit the sky, he could see the boat, the swirling waters of the courtyard, but nothing living.
One of the windows across the room exploded. Rosa screamed. Bits of glass hit the surrounding tables like shrapnel. As Donnie whipped around he saw a large, dark, tentacled shape hauling its way through the window. The powerful primary tentacles emerging from its ‘shoulders’ gripped the frame and heaved its mass out of the water. Red eyes glittered in the candlelight around a snarling mouth.
Acting on instinct, Donnie flung the gun around and fired. Shot cratered the window next to the creature as he squeezed the trigger too soon. Snarling, the beast moved inside with tentacles swarming. Donnie thwacked the Serbu’s pump-action back and forth, expelling the used shell. The creature picked up a couple of wooden chairs and flung them at Donnie. Panicked, he couldn’t help throwing his gun up and firing, uselessly, at one of the thrown objects. The recoil at the awkward angle nearly broke his wrist. Shot tore at the chair but he had to twist out of its path to avoid being hit. Two shells down, only one left. Both chairs smashed into the wall behind him and fell to pieces on the ground.
Al and Rosa just stood there by the table. “Get back to the kitchen!” Donnie shouted.
The older couple had been stunned into inaction by the monster’s appearance. They held their weapons limply. Hearing Donnie yell, they snapped out of it and Al pushed Rosa ahead of him as they started back to the kitchen. The creature turned its attention to them. A couple of tentacles produced shuriken-style weapons off a belt cinched around its large, fishy body, and flung them at the pair. The four-pointed blades sizzled through the air and narrowly missed the pair. One landed in the wall and the other in the kitchen door with a couple of solid thunks. The Mancinis disappeared back inside the other room.
“Jesus!” Donnie said.
Instead of expelling the used shell from his gun, Donnie sprinted toward the kitchen. His boots splashed on the wet carpet. The creature swarmed toward him. A table and set of chairs got in its way so it grabbed the table and flipped it, scattering the chairs like plastic lawn furniture. Wine and water glasses exploded like bombs as they hit the walls. Head down, Donnie raced forward almost as if tackling his way through the kitchen door. He smashed his way inside, stumbled, and managed to stand. Al and Rosa stood to either side of the doorway, weapons raised.
“Shut the door! Hold the door!” Donnie said.
Al and Rosa both fell on the door, holding it closed. Donnie threw his shoulder into the door as well just as the creature slammed into it. The three of them just barely managed to hold it shut, a gap appearing and bluish tentacles slipping inside, wet and slick, to lash at them.
“Where’s the lock?” Donnie yelled.
“There’s no lock!” Al said.
Screaming with the effort, Donnie tried to pin the door closed with one shoulder as he swapped his shotgun around in his hands. He pumped it, expelling the second used shell and chambering the last. Jamming the muzzle blindly through the gap with his left hand, he fired. The creature screamed and its weight flew off the door as it flung itself backward. Ichor sprayed the weapon. Pain tore through his left wrist but the shotgun caught on the side of the doorway so he didn’t take the full brunt of the recoil.
“Hold it! Hold it, I need to reload!” Donnie said.
More shotgun shells were buried under Donnie’s damp coat. He backed off, fumbling for the pocket where he’d put them. As soon as he did, the swinging door exploded open. Enraged, the alien beastie rammed into them from the other side with renewed strength. The older couple were helpless to hold it out. Al was hurled down beside the bench and Rosa was smashed between the door and the wall. Donnie was paralysed.
“God in Heaven!” Al said.
In spite of being hammered into the wall, Rosa was first to recover. She started hitting the monster with her metal pot. The pot made flat, wet smacks as it landed on rubbery flesh. The creature snarled, bundling her up and throwing her across the kitchen. Rosa spun, crying out, and hit the hood of their industrial dishwasher, banging and tumbling to the floor.
The alien lunged, shoving Donnie back and simultaneously tearing the shotgun out of his hands. It may have been injured but that hardly seemed to have slowed down at all. Recognising the gun as the source of its pain, it swept it around and tossed it into the dining room, into darkness, well out of Donnie’s reach. It drew itself taller on its tentacles. Donnie backed into the kitchen, past stovetops and appliances. Looming, he thought he could sense a sadistic satisfaction wafting off the fishy beast. It was taking its time, making him feel helpless, because he’d hurt it and made it angry.
“I don’t want to die, please,” Donnie whimpered.
Donnie looked around for a weapon, a knife or a heavy pot. All he spotted was a bright yellow can of cooking spray. An idea occurred to him and he grabbed the spray. Lunging in the other direction before the creature reacted, he grabbed one of the candles that had been placed around the kitchen. Hot wax stung his hand. He ignored it as he spun back around.
“Back off!”
Donnie popped the cap off the cooking spray and released a fan of aerosol oil over the top of the candle. A tongue of bright orange flame grew from the candle and licked at the beast. It shrieked and backed away, hooting in distress. Donnie came forward and hit it again, flame whooshing and lighting the kitchen, wafting to the ceiling and filling the air with greasy smoke. It wouldn’t hold the creature at bay for long though, it would soon figure out a way to take him down. Another thought occurred to him as he drove it back with a third jet.
“The fridge! Open the walk-in fridge!” Donnie shouted to the others.
Al had scrambled back to his feet and ran to help his wife. Hearing Donnie yell, he hesitated, torn. Donnie used his makeshift flamethrower to drive the creature back, back past the dishwashing pit and toward the rear corner of the kitchen. Heat was making the candle melt faster, and hot wax dribbled over Donnie’s hand. His hand and arm burned, and he could smell crispy, burnt hair. If he dropped the candle or it went out though, the creature would be on him in seconds. Al raced to get around him, hobbling a bit, to the walk-in fridge and freezer. He yanked the door open as wide as he could and hid behind it.
Producing a four-sided shuriken, the creature let the blade glisten for a moment then threw it. Donnie ducked and weaved, finger depressing the cooking spray. The shuriken hissed past Donnie’s neck and clattered on some shelving behind him. Fire spewed in several directions before Donnie got it back under control. The creature lurched toward him but then reversed again as Donnie aimed at it.
“Okay, motherfucker! Come on! Come on!”
Donnie charged forward, pushing the can of cooking spray at the tentacled monstrosity. Aerosolised oil splattered what passed for the creature’s face, aflame, burning and blinding it. The creature was too wet and rubbery to actually catch fire but it was unfamiliar with the heat and the sensation, and seemed to panic. Shrieking, it threw its tentacles over its face to protect itself. Donnie hosed it for a few more moments and then backed off toward the walk-in refrigerator.
“Come on!” Donnie said.
Enraged, the creature lunged, moving in snakelike, slithering movements over the nonslip tiles. Donnie backed through the open doorway, into the fridge. It was dark in there, no power, no light. A cold bite hung in the air although the electricity had been out for nearly twenty-four hours. The creature threw itself at Donnie, tentacles flailing. Donnie let himself fall sideways, hitting a shelf and nearly falling to the floor. The creature barreled past, half-blind and mindlessly angry. A couple of tentacles snatched at Donnie’s chest and arm, strong as pythons. Donnie gave it another quick blast with the oil spray and the creature released him. Its slick tentacles slid around on the glossy floor. Hitting another shelf, it upended a plastic container filled with chunky sauce and dumped it all over itself.
Donnie’s boots skittered on the floor. Head low, he shot back out of the fridge and nearly fell. The monster spun and flailed. Al stood beside the heavy door.
“Close it! Close the door!” Donnie said.
Al heaved the door closed, the latch engaging with a clack that echoed through the kitchen like a gunshot. Donnie reversed and threw himself against the door. Muffled screeching came from the other side as the creature hit it. It jumped in place but didn’t open. Al gripped the handle like his life depended on it. Rosa was back on her feet, limping but making her way over to help.
“Does it lock?” Donnie said.
“It doesn’t lock!” Al said.
“The shelves! Grab some of the metal shelves!”
Inside the walk-in refrigerator’s large, insulated door was a kind of paddle by the handle. Donnie had noticed it and knew that it was there so nobody could be locked in. But, in the dark even a human being might have panicked and thrown themselves against the door for a bit before discovering the paddle. Angry and unfamiliar with human technology as it was, the creature certainly hadn’t worked out the handle. The door bounced and jostled, but the handle didn’t unlatch. Donnie hoped they could count on that for at least a few seconds, time they needed to move one of the shelves. It took all three of them to shift one of the heavy shelves. Cans and boxes of gloves and napkins came tumbling off of it. They wheeled it around and dumped it across the refrigerator's doorway, blockading it. Not a moment too soon as moments later the handle unlatched. Either having worked it out, or thrown itself into the plunger on the inside of the door by accident, the alien opened the door a crack but hit the shelving.
“More, get everything,” Donnie said.
Panting, straining by the end, Donnie, Al and Rosa managed to shift all three shelving units in front of the refrigerator door. It banged and crashed, but the creature couldn’t get the door open. The three of them piled every loose, heavy item they could find onto the shelves, totally blocking it in.
The creature continued to bash itself against the door and shelves for the next half an hour. When it couldn’t get through, it hooted and smashed things in the dark in frustration. Eventually, the hits became weaker and weaker and just stopped. Donnie wondered if the cold or being out of the water for too long might be killing it. He wasn’t going to move the shelves and find out, though. Rosa had been battered, bruised, by being thrown by the creature, but although she’d injured her leg she was mostly fine.
“Maybe we should get in the boat and just go,” Donnie said. “If they have ways of communicating with one another, this one could call others down on us.”
“If it could call for help, surely they would have arrived by now?” Al said. “Maybe they can talk in the water, but not on dry land?”
“Still, others could come looking.”
“And out there is dangerous as well, moving around in the dark,” Rosa said. “What if there are more, and leaving just brings them to us?”
Donnie retrieved the shotgun from where the creature had tossed it, and reloaded it with the last three shells he’d found on board the boat. All three of them armed themselves with knives and makeshift weapons. Cooking sprays and candles were close at hand since Donnie’s makeshift flamethrower had been surprisingly effective. The old Italian couple made an unlikely pair of commandos but if any other creatures appeared they seemed willing to battle it out.
“I’m sorry, I brought this on you,” Donnie said. “If I hadn’t turned up in the boat with the dead one on board-, I don’t know.”
“Nonsense!” Rosa said. “We could be dead without you. If that thing had come here without you here, we would have had no warning, no chance.”
“Thank you, but still, even if you don’t think I attracted it, maybe I should go.”
“Please, stay the night with us.” Al grasped Donnie by the shoulder. “In the morning, when it’s safe, all of us will leave together.”
~~~
Alessa wasn’t sure what woke her, she was too groggy for the first few minutes. In the distance, loud, flat bangs pierced the white noise of the omnipresent rain. By the time she had come around the noises had stopped. A chill filled the apartment. Alessa gathered the blankets around her and listened to the storm pound the building. It was like it would never end. Maybe it had been thunder that had woken her, Alessa thought. Lightning lit her window.
Lightly drifting in and out, Alessa was pulled out of her sleep again by someone hammering at her apartment door. She couldn’t say how long it had been since she’d first been woken. She shot upright in bed.
“Donnie?” Alessa said.
Groping for the dressing gown by her bed, Alessa wrapped it around her pregnant body and stood up. She was already wearing pyjamas and thick socks. Without even trying a lightswitch, she took the flashlight from her bedside table. Using the light, she waddled through the apartment as someone hammered her door again.
“Donnie, is that you?” Alessa knew Donnie had his own keys but the thought he might have lost them was not impossible.
“No, it’s me! Harvey!” Harvey’s voice came from the other side of the door.
“Harvey? It’s-, it’s the middle of the night!” Alessa said. “What is it?”
“Can you open the door? There’s something I need to show you.”
Alessa hesitated, as she would for any man she barely knew hammering on her door in the middle of the night without explanation. A strange urgency filled his voice, however. Certainly, in these circumstances, he’d been good and helpful to her.
“Can’t it wait? I’m not properly dressed.”
“You have to see this.”
“Okay, I’m-, hang on a second.”
Since Alessa was already dressed in pyjamas and a dressing gown there wasn’t much else for her to put on. Instead, she awkwardly hung there for several long moments, flashlight pointed down, as if going through the process of putting on clothes in her head. Once she felt she’d stalled long enough, Alessa opened the door. Harvey didn’t try to push his way inside, however, which was good.
“Harvey, what is it?” Alessa said.
“You won’t understand, you won’t believe me unless you see it.”
“See what?”
“Just come with me, please? It explains the wave, this storm, the way the water doesn’t go away, everything!”
Against her better judgement, Alessa followed Harvey into the hallway and closed the apartment behind her. She was a little alarmed to see he was armed. What looked like a police shotgun was strapped over his shoulder and a pistol rode his hip. Of course, they’d talked about arming the guards at the meeting. Alessa thought of those flat bangs she’d half-heard when waking up. Harvey, dressed in black, walked on ahead to the stairwell.
“Harvey, what’s going on?” Alessa followed Harvey down the stairs. “You’re freaking me out.”
“It came out of the storm, killed two of my men,” Harvey said.
“Killed? Someone has been killed?”
“You have to see it.”
In spite of talking about two people being killed, Harvey sounded almost excited. The deaths were an afterthought. Whatever he had to show her had filled him with intensity and left no room for questions. They descended down and down, toward the lower levels of the apartment building where the flood had consumed everything.
“Where are we going?” Alessa asked.
“To the waterline, the lower apartments.”
Alessa hated herself for tailing after him like a sheep. It was late, just the two of them, but she didn’t want to be rude after Harvey had helped her. If he wanted to take her into one of the apartments abandoned on the lower levels then she would refuse though, she thought. Fortunately, when they left the stairwell on one of the lower floors, they almost ran right into a bunch of other people. Flashlight beams crisscrossed, throwing shadows in all directions. Voices spoke over one another in a babble. Alessa’s nose wrinkled as she picked up a fishy stink hanging in the air.
“This is what I needed to show you,” Harvey said.
As they got closer, Alessa noticed the voices talking over one another were frightened, or highly anxious, not excited like Harvey. At least half a dozen men gathered around something in the hall. They parted to let Alessa and Harvey see it. Alessa recoiled, covering her mouth.
Alessa had no idea what she was even looking at, although Donnie by this point would have recognised it immediately. One of the dark bluish creatures lay on the wet carpet, tentacles splayed around it. The fishy stench came from the creature. As it was laying on its back, Alessa could see its flipper limbs and the twisted face with its long, vertical mouth. Eyes open, mouth parted, the creature was clearly dead. Someone, or more likely several someones, had shot the shit out of it, probably ambushing it from both sides as it had lurched out of one of the apartments. Bullet holes puckered its flesh and big chunks had been torn out of its tentacles and sides by shotgun blasts. Brackish ichor leaked out of the body and puddled between the curls of its tendrils.
“Oh, my God! What is that?” Alessa said. “What is that thing?”
“It killed two of the men guarding this apartment,” Harvey said. “I shot at it in the water, winged it. It came after me and into the hallway here and we managed to nail it. Shot at it until it stopped moving.”
“Some kind of animal?”
“No, no, that’s it! It’s not an animal.” Harvey prodded at one of the large tentacles to reveal a weapon belt partly hidden underneath it. “It’s got tools, weapons, it can think!”
“It killed C.T. and Allan,” one of the other men said.
“It’s some kind of alien, or intelligent life from under the sea!” Harvey said. “Don’t you get it? The storm, the wave, they’re controlling the weather! They’re controlling what the water does!”
“It’s an invasion!” another man said.
Harvey still looked excited rather than disturbed or afraid. “I was right when I said we should arm all the men on guard duty. I didn’t know this could happen, but I was right!”
“If this is an invasion, Donnie was in the city when the wave hit,” Alessa said. “Even if he was safe from the wave, oh, God, these things could get him!”
Harvey looked nonplussed that Alessa’s first thought was concern for Donnie but Alessa didn’t really notice, stroking her stomach protectively under her gown. The other men talked in low, urgent voices. About others they knew who could be trapped out there or fears of an invading force of monsters.
“Harvey, can you take me back upstairs, please?” Alessa asked.
The walk back up the stairs took much more effort than the walk down. Alessa’s feet were swollen and sore. She waddled up flight after flight, holding her stomach, with Harvey behind her. But Alessa was too wracked with fear and worry to notice much discomfort. Putting one foot in front of the other, she almost went straight past her floor on autopilot before Harvey called her back.
“Thank you, Harvey, I just-, I don’t know what to think about all of this,” Alessa said.
Harvey slipped into the apartment behind Alessa. “I know, it’s a lot to take in.”
Slightly dazed, Alessa looked around and seemed surprised to find Harvey in the apartment with her. She gathered the robe around her chest. Harvey shuffled from foot to foot as if awaiting something.
“Why did you come get me to show me that, monster?”
“Everyone needs to know what we’re dealing with.”
“Yes, but, I assume you’re going to wait until morning to tell most people, why me?”
Harvey moved closer, almost pressing himself to her. “Well, you’re a trustworthy person, others will listen to you.”
“But you could show them the body, I’ve hardly talked to anyone.”
“I guess I was just, amazed, and wanted to tell you.” Harvey pushed closer.
“It’s-, a lot to think about,” Alessa said. “I think I’d better go back to bed.”
“Are you sure you feel safe, alone in here? Your husband is still out there, maybe, and with all this going on, it’d be understandable to be scared.”
Harvey moved as if to brush some strands of hair off of Alessa’s face. Alessa backed off quickly, looking away.
“I know I’ve got you and the others downstairs, for protection,” Alessa said. “Downstairs, guarding everyone.”
“I could stay out here on the couch if you want? Keep you safe?”
“No, I’m fine, thank you. It’s a lot but I’m okay.”
“But-,” Harvey started.
Alessa cut him off. “They need you, downstairs,” she said. “It’s like you said, you’re the only one who saw the need for guns. You’re the one who winged it, they clearly need you much, much more than I do, I’ll be fine.”
Harvey hesitated for a few moments, mouth slightly open, but then nodded. Reassuring her about her safety, he backed into the hallway. Alessa thanked him again and closed the door, locking it after Harvey was gone.
Getting out of her robe, Alessa climbed back into bed. It had cooled while she was downstairs. Her mind raced, thinking of the dead alien, the storm, and of Donnie. And Harvey intruded uncomfortably into her thoughts. Thankfully he had backed off when she played to his ego, but it had certainly felt like he was coming onto her, aggressively so. Alessa had no interest in him, no interest in cheating on Donnie in her current state or any other, handsome and confident as Harvey was, personable enough to take charge. She had been alone with him though, and he had been so intense. And with her heavily pregnant state, surely he had no interest in her either. Alessa scoffed at herself. A stupid thing to be hung up on with everything else going on. Probably, Harvey just saw her as helpless and in need of extra handling. He had been helpful and polite so far, and she was just letting her imagination run away. Dismissing it, she went back to worrying over the alien and everything it represented. Worrying over Donnie. If only there was something she could do.