Chapter 3
A siren screeched not far away, muted by the fog.
Alva drove as fast as she dared. Her motor was loud, so pedestrians would hear her. Not that anyone was out. She thought she heard a scream. She glanced sideways at Gruff, who was pale in the seat beside her.
The fog shifted to her left, a large shadow blocking what little light was breaking through. Even over Percival’s engine, she heard a loud thump and felt the ground shake. She slowed down, looking to the left at the large moving shadow.
“What the...” she began to say, but before she could finish, Gruff shouted.
“Look out!”
She swerved and narrowly avoided someone who ran screaming past. The fog swallowed him.
“I should check on him,” Alva said, but Gruff put his big hand on hers to stop her from putting the car in park.
“Just keep going, Al. Let’s get to the shop.” Al nodded, the movement feeling slow and clunky. Her mind was trying to process everything that was happening around her, but it seemed to leave her with some detachment from reality. She forced herself to focus on driving. The shop wasn’t far. Just a couple of blocks away.
Parked and crashed cars lined the side of the road. Something ran by in the fog, followed by a scream. Alva looked in the rearview mirror. She saw something large pass right behind them, silent, huge, dark. She pressed harder on the gas, but she only dared go so fast. She was glad for that as she skirted an abandoned car. Squeezing beside it proved a challenge that cost her paint on the right side of her car.
“Don’t worry Al. We’ll get Percival a new paint job.”
“I ain’t worried about that, Gruff. What’s going on?” Her voice was barely a whisper above Percival’s engine. She feared speaking too loudly would draw even more attention to them.
“Al,” Molly said from the back. “I can’t get through to anyone. The phone lines aren’t playing along.”
“We’ll be safe at the shop,” Gruff said with enough power that Al allowed herself to believe him. For now.
Al glanced back. Molly was alternating from looking puzzled at her phone to staring up, her already big eyes now impossibly large.
The mists licked Percival’s hood and caressed the windshield. Al felt like she was driving through a deranged car wash, everything seeming so close and intent on coating her car.
The shop was coming up on the left. The cemetery loomed on the right, the breaking mist now surrounding the tombstones, as though dancing with the dead. A shiver ran up Al’s spine.
“Al?” Molly said in a strangled voice.
Al glanced at her in the rearview mirror and then followed Molly’s gaze toward the cemetery. She didn’t notice anything at first, but then saw that the tombstones seemed to be moving. Nothing overt, but a tall obelisk shifted to the left. A smaller tombstone fell forward until it was at a forty-five degree angle, as though greeting the body it covered below.
“Is the ground shifting?” Al asked, Percival practically stopped now as she looked more closely. That might explain the damage to the road, but certainly not to the tow truck.
“I don’t think the angel would do that just for shifting ground,” Molly said, pointing to an angel statue. Al knew it well – it looked up to the sky, arms stretched out, wings spread out, as though greeting the light of day, even though trees had long ago ensured only shadow would reach it.
The angel’s wings shifted and cracked down, its arms curled in and its head lowered.
“Al, get us to the shop,” Gruff said calmly but sternly. “Now.”
Al stopped staring at the statue, closed her mouth and loosened her grip on the steering wheel so that she could turn it. The shop looked quiet from the outside. No lights were on. The mists licked the great bay doors and infiltrated them. The doors were open, blocked by a car that had been driven halfway in and then abandoned.
The lights flickered on and then off again. Al spotted an oil spill leaking out of the shop. At least she hoped it was an oil spill.
Not one of them made a move to get out. Gruff breathed hard beside her. She glanced at him. Sweat beaded on his brow and he was pale. He needed some attention for his wounds. She needed to get him to the hospital, but he would never leave without making sure every technician and apprentice was okay.
She let go of the steering wheel and turned Percival off.
“Molly, I’m going to go in and check it out. You stay here with Gruff. If you need to, the keys are in the ignition.”
She turned around to make sure Molly had heard her. Her best friend’s usually warm features were set in grim determination. She nodded and squeezed Al’s shoulder.
“Don’t worry about us. We’ll be fine. Make sure you take care of yourself, okay?”
Al managed to give her a grin. “I always do!”
Molly nodded again and put her hands around Gruff, to either comfort him or make sure he stayed there. Al wasn’t sure, but was grateful either way.
“Make it fast, Al. Get them out and get yourself out.”
“I will. Promise.” Al took a deep breath and stepped out, gently closing the door behind her. It still seemed to echo in the quiet mist. She couldn’t hear a sound. Either the entire town had gone quiet, or the mists were somehow absorbing the sound. No emergency vehicles sounded in the distance, despite the multiple accidents they’d witnessed.
Al took a step toward the shop, thought better of it and decided to head to the trunk first. She popped it open and grabbed Big Bertha. The cool metal of the wrench made her feel better, or at least more grounded. Like it was the one real thing she could count on in these surreal surroundings.
Her breath curled in front of her and she pulled her leather jacket closer around her. The day was growing unseasonably cold. The mist formed in tiny crystals, wisps she could actually see shifting in the air around her, not a blanket as usual but like tendrils.
Alva walked carefully around one. From up close, it shimmered like tiny snowflakes on a fresh bed of sunlit snow. Except the shimmer moved together, curling on itself and around objects. She forced herself to stop staring and avoided them.
She headed to the shop bay door, stepping over the liquid on the floor. It was dark, the sun blocked by the mists. Al debated whether or not to try to turn the shop lights on, but wasn’t keen on attracting more attention. She headed to her bench and grabbed her big flashlight. She clutched Big Bertha more tightly.
“Steve?” She called out softly.
No answer.
“Louise? Jack? Carl?” Her voice sounded small and afraid in her own ears. She shined her light to her left, to see the rest of the shop. A car was half jacked up, the front end fallen straight off. Al forgot her worries as she rushed over. Who the hell would put a car poorly on the jacks? That was Mechanics 101 – you didn’t mess around with safety.
She headed to the front and shined her light down. Carl was pinned down, his torso crushed by the large car. “Shit. Carl.” She knelt by him, but his eyes were staring up and the blood around his mouth was already hard.
“Steve!” She shouted this time, in her frenzy. Why hadn’t they helped him? He was just an apprentice. They shouldn’t have even left him alone to jack the car!
“Louise, Jack!” She looked back down at Carl but had to look away, his open eyes filled with the same mist as outside. She stood up, swayed, steadied herself. She fought through her nausea to find the others.
Maybe she could still help them. A noise in the break room caught her attention. She slowly walked toward it, forcing herself to keep her light ahead of her and not glance back at Carl. She didn’t want to look at him ever again, if she could avoid it.
The break room door was closed. Al tried to open it, but it was locked.
“It’s Al. Open up!” She heard a muffled sound, maybe crying. “I’ve got Gruff and Molly. The car’s up front and we’re gonna get out of here,” she said in her most reassuring voice, again forcing herse
lf not to look at Carl. “But I need you to come on out.” She paused, then added more urgently. “We need to go.”
The noise came again, this time as a more strangled cry. She thought she recognized Jack. “Jack? Jack. I’m coming in!” Al shouldered the thin door and it easily cracked and buckled, swinging in. Al practically landed on her face. She hadn’t expected it to give in so easily.
Jack was curled up in the back, behind the table and by the fridge.
“Jack, we have to go,” she repeated. He made another strangled cry, like a gurgling.
She took a step toward him. “Jack?”
His head was lowered on his knees. She repeated his name and he gurgled again but looked up. His eyes were white, and something was coming out of his mouth, like thousands of ants.
Al screamed and almost dropped the flashlight as she pushed herself back. She smacked into something and turned around. The thief from earlier was there, his eyes wide, looking from Jack to her. He grabbed her shoulders as though to snap her out of it.
“We have to go, now!” Al brought up her knee and connected with his groin. He folded in two and she brought up Big Bertha, connecting with his skull. He crumpled and she jumped over him, away from Jack. She skirted around Carl and ran madly, away from Jack. She almost dashed out of the shop, but turned back to grab first aid supplies for Gruff.
Something grabbed hold of her foot from under the sink. She screamed again and dropped Big Bertha as she fell back. The thief was beside her, bleeding from a cut on his scalp. He grabbed her wrench and hit whatever held her leg still, hidden in shadows.
“Come on!” He shouted, pulling her back up. She didn’t hit him this time and followed him out of the shop and into Percival. She pushed him into the back, threw the first aid supplies after him, slammed her seat back and flung herself in it. He landed hard in the back beside Molly.
“Al, what…” Gruff started saying, but the thief cut him off.
“Go! Go! Go!”
The mists around them uncoiled and lashed out at Percival, taking out a side mirror. Molly screamed. Al turned the car on and punched it in reverse, gears grinding and tires screeching as she threw it back into first gear and gunned it down the road.
To her right, the angel statue was now on its knees, its stone eyes watching them as the great branches of the cemetery came ever lower over the road, ever closer to touching the top of Percival’s hood.
Al stepped on the gas and clutched the steering wheel for dear life, mists be damned.
No one told her to slow down.