I watch the customer in front of me exchange pleasantries with the cashier like they are long-time friends. The way the two women hold their genuine conversation prompts a small smile from me. Regardless of the role played, everybody acknowledged their neighbour in this town. Something that strikes me as unfamiliar where I’m from.
Soon I trundle along with my shopping cart for my turn, then began placing items onto the counter.
“Hi. How was your day?” the cashier asks as she starts scanning them.
“Oh.” I rarely get people to ask me that. The hustle and bustle of the city always seemed too flippant for such small yet meaningful exchanges. “Uh, good. It was good.” I nod politely. “Thank you for asking.”
She considers my face, regarding it curiously.
“I’ve never seen you before. You new here dear?”
“Yeah, moved in last week,” I say. “Wanted a fresh start.”
“Well, you made a good choice dear. Town’s a little rough ‘round the edges but it’ll grow on you, I can assure.”
After helpfully bagging my items, she’s about to hand me my change before her hand suddenly drops and she collapses onto the counter, eyes closed.
I let my wide eyes process the startling image before me, then just as I’m about to step closer to inspect her, I hear a series of thuds. I turn my head to look and see how one-by-one the bodies of every individual in the store, drop to the floor, without an explanation or further word.
Once everyone is down I sweep my eyes around my vicinity to drink in the sight of children and their parents, elderly people, and cashiers alike, all collapsed on the floor or counters, bodies perfectly limp.
For a while, I stand there, stunned. After many seconds of silence, I decide to speak up.
“Uh hello, you guys all ok?” My voice echoes through the dead quiet room.
Nobody stirs.
Okay?
I leave the aisle I’m in and amble around the store, carefully inspecting the scene around me.
Ever so faintly, I wonder if I can spot some of their chests rising and falling, or if it’s simply my mind playing tricks on me. It could just be the breeze, rustling their clothing, adding to the illusion of movement and life.
I step beside a body and kneel down to peer much closer at a middle-aged man’s face. His lips are set in a fine line, and his eyebrows are relaxed, unmoving, eyes closed. You could think him asleep, or perhaps dead. I’m this close to prodding him in the eyeball with a rude finger so he can jolt awake and explain what the hell is going on here. But then I’m interrupted by a voice shouting from outside.
“Hey!”
I stand back up and turn my head to stare at the ceiling-to-floor window showing the parking lot outside the store. There’s a man in a cap and baggy jeans walking briskly towards me, phone in hand. As he approaches I notice that laying on the ground outside are a few more bodies. I can’t believe it. Did everyone in this town just stop what they were doing to drop to the ground?
There’s a knock at the window from the man.
“Hey there,” he says. He is red-faced and podgy and he seems out of breath from the walk up here. “I’ve uh been trying to get some help around here and it seems like you’re the only sane one left in this town.” He chuckles nervously to himself, obviously referencing the situation around us. “Anyway,” he continues, “See I just made a short stop here to ask someone for directions since I’m a tad bit lost. I’m not really from here. So maybe you can help me out?”
“Uh…sure,” I shrug.
He types something on his phone and then begins showing me a map image directing him to his destination. He jabs his finger all over the screen and chatters away about his screwy GPS mumbling some words about the directions. But I am barely listening to him. Something feels distinctly…off. I feel a cold dread settling within my bones. Goosebumps erupt over my arms.
“Hey, can you feel that?” I mutter. However, the man is barely paying attention to me. He’s still on his GPS tangent, pressing the phone screen near the window closer to me.
That’s when the sky darkens as if overcast, though I swear there wasn’t a cloud in the sky before I entered the grocer just over twenty minutes ago. It’s not resolute darkness, just an unnatural dimness to the surroundings that shouldn’t be present during a bright midday. I decide to gaze up at the sky.
My eyes find a shadow. It’s the only word in my vocabulary I can think of to describe its form. A tar-black stain in the sky, nearly spherical in shape. It has four main, massive tendrils that sprawl out from opposite ends of the central body. The rest of its body is covered in hundreds of thinner elongated tendrils ending in sharp tips. The black tendrils sweep across the sky in elegant arcs.
There is nothing else on the creature’s body: no set of eyes or distinguishing features. Just a dark anomaly in the sky.
One of its slender appendages makes its smooth, silent descent upon the parking lot–near my location. Though I spot it too late as it plunges down right toward where the man still stands.
I don’t know what makes him turn to look behind him. Maybe he momentarily glanced at my eyes and saw the panic within them. Maybe he too instinctually felt that there was something wrong as I had.
Regardless, by the time he follows my cue and finally stares at the sky, face to face with what I see, it’s too late.
He only takes one stupefied look, and mutters “Holy-”, before the tendril rapidly slithers towards him at a low hiss. In a flash it whips itself around his legs, sweeping him off his feet in an arc until he hangs upside down from its hold.
The panic flashes in his eyes for a second, and just as he draws another breath–perhaps to scream, the thing slams his body into the pavement, over and over, starting with his head.
I am rendered into a catatonic state as I watch how his skull is made into a paintbrush, painting the pavement red.
Somehow, other than a flood of icy terror in my blood, I feel guilt staining my conscience. Because I did nothing to help him other than stand and stare until the hold the creature had on his mangled body is finally relinquished, and he is dropped to the floor.
Then the tendril does something even more disturbing. At its very tip, it splits open in some kind of hole, approaches the corpse then begins…sucking? I watch as the man’s viscera disappear into the orifice in a bulging swell. It’s as if his remains are being mopped up.
Not once have I screamed. It’s a subconscious response I’m thankful for. The better part of my brain has influenced me to not dare make a sound. After all, this entire time I’ve been standing statuesque, staring at the window. And in all that time, the thing in the parking lot didn’t seem to take note of me yet.
I wondered if it was only temporary. That after it finished its meal, it wouldn’t be distracted anymore. I’d be detected.
I need to play it smart somehow but I don’t know how to carry that out.
I can’t run. That’s an instant death wish. So I know nothing better than to simply stand still, knowing I’m only delaying the inevitable until it gets bored of its meal and turns on me.
Then something brushes against my leg.
I nearly gasp, though I make not even a peep of sound.
Ever so slowly, I trail my eyes downwards to find the source of the faint but unmistakable touch. It’s a woman, lying on the ground like everyone else in the store.
She’s lying on the side of her abdomen, arms sprawled out in front of her and legs splayed. A single eye of hers is open a sliver, peeking out cautiously at me.
Her lips murmur something inaudible, and I lip-read.
P-
…lay
…dead.
Play dead?
Then suddenly it all clicks. It’s exactly what she and everybody else is doing.
I decide to follow her lead and bet my life on her word.
Without making any sudden movement, I ease myself into a low position, then place my hands in front of me. I drop my stomach to the floor. In front of me, I can partially see that woman’s face, but her eyes are now shut with practiced stillness. I shut my eyes too and hope I can pull it off as well as her.
With my vision eliminated, my other senses are amplified.
I begin to hear things more acutely.
Outside sounds the sickly squelching and suckling noises, of that orifice consuming the last few morsels of that body. But worse yet I can hear more hisses, a chorus of them originating from multiple sources. More of them are here.
Then I hear the chime of the store front’s doorbell–the slow creak of that door opening.
They have entered. I can almost hear them slithering around the store, searching for bodies.
The still air above me ripples with disturbance as something heavy passes over me. I can somehow feel it. Then something cold touches me, followed by a steady hiss noise.
Shit.
I do everything in my power to stay frozen in place with bated breath. There’s pressure on my right arm as something prods me, then feels its way across my skin. I resist the urge to shiver.
After a while, I notice the creature isn’t hurting me. All it’s done is peruse my body curiously as if inspecting, checking.
After an eternity, the tendril finally uncoils itself from my arm and retreats as if giving up its probe.
I can hardly believe my luck, but I don’t let my guard down. I remain in position and wait.
The cacophony of hisses that were once there seems to quieten, and I can hear the hisses dampen and recede. It sounds like those creatures are leaving.
In my mind I celebrate. But in reality, I steel myself. Just a little longer. Nearly there.
Just as I begin to think we’re through this, just as the last hiss sounds, just as I think we’re safe, someone sneezes.
The sound echoes, sure and deafening.
I feel thrown into a turmoil of guessing what this means. There is a split second of a hushed state, like the calm before the storm, of a collective breath held.
A moment later, my agonized sense of suspense is sated, because the tendrils don’t enter through the door this time. There is no gentle jangling of the bell. Instead, one by one, the windows shatter in a violent burst, raining glass down on us. Every nerve in my body screams at me to instinctually shield myself from the chaos, but I refuse the urge.
Now more than ever, even as the stray glass shards cut and sink into my arms, legs, and face, I know that I cannot afford to flinch.
My decision was right because while countless tendrils race over my head, none of them touches me. It’s like they hardly notice me.
I’m not their target after all.
“No, no,” I hear the voice of a woman croak while sobbing. I hear the shuffling of feet as she tries to get away. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. Please I–” her pleading is cut short as I hear something being slammed against the wall, followed by a stomach-lurching crack. I fear to think what it was, though I know.
Then I hear a new sound assault my ears.
I hear multiple tendrils slither against some fabric. Then a sickening, continued crunch and set of snapping noises ensue, like frail twigs crushed underfoot. I hear a limp thump as something hits the floor, followed by a series of faint drips.
Then comes the soft, suckling noises again.
Since more of those things ganged up to ravenously feed on the remains, the feeding process goes faster than expected. To me, it’s a relief. When they are done, I can once again hear the hissing tendrils make the retreat.
I finally hear silence again, then the sounds of birds chirping outside.
More minutes after that, I hear the first person stand up, followed by others who join. I hesitantly open my bleary eyes to the commotion around me. I get myself into a seated position, but can’t manage to stand up. Then the tears come unbidden. I let myself weep into my hands.
I hardly know when, but eventually, someone helps me up from the floor and gently places my head against their chest. They begin caressing my hair and I don’t stop them.
“I’m so sorry you had to witness that dear,” she says with an elderly rasp to her voice.
When I angle my gaze up, I recognize the older cashier woman, staring down at me with a sad glimmer in her brown eyes.
I push away slightly.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I ask, incredulous, almost feeling betrayed. I know she knows what my question is getting at.
“We’ve tried to explain to newcomers before it happens, to prepare them. They never believe us anyway, just mock us when we try to help. Most of them never survive long in our town.” She lets a silence fall after that as if paying silent respect to those that apparently came before me. “If I told you about all this madness beforehand, would you have believed me?” she asks me pointedly.
I hesitate, knowing the answer is probably no.
“Precisely dear. Sometimes it’s better to let the new ones experience it first hand, let them believe it when they see it. Then they have to take a cue from our actions and do what we do without question in the event that this happens. That’s what you do, you watch and you learn from us experienced folk. That’s how you survive. That’s how you survived, even if it was the hard way to learn.”
Still feeling shaken, and doubting if her words were truly comforting, I have to politely excuse myself from her.
I notice a huddled crowd forming around one corner of the room. I wander towards them, wincing in pain from the shards in my skin. When I reach the group, I have to shuffle to make my way closer to see for myself. I know what I’ll find.
We silently stand looking over a handbag on the floor with its spilled contents covered in crimson. The walls and floor are stained. A nauseating reminder. Many in the crowd sob at the lost member of the community.
I learn that her name was Maggie, a name that will forever be engraved into my brain.
The crowd eventually disperses to the sound of ambulance sirens going off outside. I shuffle outside to receive treatment for my minor injuries.
The last thing I do before walking out is to revisit the now blown-out ceiling-to-floor window, rimmed with broken glass. It’s the one where I had spoken to that man. I gaze at the ground. The sight of the painted blood stains meets my eyes.
Then I gaze at the sky mocking with optimism. Gone…like it was never there.
I wonder not if, but when the shadow will return again.
I wonder if I’ll run from this fight. Or if I’ll choose to stay, find out more about this unsettling town, and be ready for it when it comes back…