Time Riders

CHAPTER 51

2001, New York

Sal was running as fast as she could amid the rubble and blocks of crumblingmasonry, long ago collapsed across forgotten streets. She kept stumbling, losing her footing,barking her shins, scraping and cutting her hands.

Behind her the creatures — there seemed to be dozens now — kept pace with hereasily. There was surprising agility in those frail and pallid bodies. They were small likeundernourished children, but with faces that were lined with age… or grief. Theyfollowed her, keeping a wary distance, not closing, not falling behind… just intenselycurious.

For now.

She glanced up at the street ahead, little more than an undulating bed of shattered blocks ofconcrete and protruding spars of rusted metal. The frames of buildings either side were theonly visual clue that this had once been a street.

If this was Broadway… once, then she knew she needed to turn left at some point, lefton to East 14th Street. That would take her east towards the river and the WilliamsburgBridge.

If it’s still standing.

Another glance over her shoulder and she saw one of them had closed the distance between themand was right behind her, a long pale hand reaching out ahead of it, its bald head cocked toone side, eyes curiously regarding her long black hair.

‘Oh God!’ she screamed. ‘Leave me alone!’

She suddenly stopped dead in her tracks and spun round to face it.

The creature drew up short of her, the others coming to a halt behind it. They fanned outeither side, all of them studying her silently with eyes wide, a burning curiosity written onall of their faces.

Sal reached down for a length of rusty metal piping. Lifting it up, flakes of rust crumbledaway. She wasn’t entirely sure the thing wouldn’t crumble to dust the first timeshe swung it at something, but all the same it felt good in her hand.

‘Stay back!’ she snarled, her voice shrill and high.

The creature closest to her stayed its distance, standing low, crouching almost like aprimate. The silence was filled with her ragged breath and the mournful wind; she had time tolook at it more closely.

A pair of expressive eyes. Clearly a human. But it seemed such a pitiful-looking human. Ifshe wasn’t so terrified, she could almost imagine feeling sorry for it.

The creature nearest her took a careful, measured step forward, extending one hand towardsher.

‘No! You stay back!’ she barked, brandishing the crumbling pipe.

She heard the thing whine, a keening sound, like some pitiful dog behind bars in a rescuecompound. The pale skin — stretched across lean arms and legs, stretched across ribs anda pelvic bone that protruded unpleasantly — was so ghostly white it was almosttranslucent. She could see the faint lines of violet arteries beneath. Its mouth, eyes andnose oozed a bloody mucus.

The thing wanted desperately to come closer to her. The hand stretching further forward,wanting to make contact.

‘No! I’ll hit you!’ she screamed again.

It cocked its head again. The almost completely toothless mouth opened and closed with a wetsnapping sound.

‘Oh! Ahhh-iiittttt-oooooo,’ it uttered.

It was attempting to mimic her.

‘You… you… you can speak?’ she managed in response.

‘Ooo… ooo… ooo-annng-zbikkkkk?’ it gargled.

She noticed something in its face. Intelligence. Perhaps a long-faded memory stirring behindthose milky boiled-fish eyes. This thing was human, or at least it had once been human, shewas sure of that.

‘My… my n-name is Sal,’ she said loudly, for the benefit of the othersbehind it, gesturing at herself. When she had introduced herself for the first time to Bob, hehad cocked his head curiously, his lips trying crudely to repeat her name. These creatures, onthe other hand, cowered at the sound of her voice. Their dead eyes seemed less curious thanBob’s. They mewled and whined among themselves.

Is that their language? The whining noise?

‘Sal,’ she said again, encouraged that her talking seemed to be holding them atbay for the moment. ‘I’m Sal.’

‘Annng-aahhhh.’

‘That’s right.’ She smiled. ‘Sal.’

The hand, still reaching towards her, was now only a few inches away. She wondered whether toswing her pipe at it or let it touch her. There was no way of knowing whether these thingswanted to communicate in some way or were just attempting to test how much of a threat sheposed to them.

If I hit it…?

Then she suspected some kind of pack instinct would take over. They’d be upon her inthe blink of an eye.

Let it touch. Let it make contact.

She swallowed nervously as the tips of its fingers eagerly stretched outand brushed lightly against her hair.

‘Hair,’ she said.

The fingers curled through the strands, flicked at them, played with them.

‘It’s hair,’ she said again, softening her voice, trying to steal the fearfrom it.

The thing’s mouth seemed to widen, stretch, exposing a few snaggled teeth emerging frombloody gums.

My God… is that a smile?

A soft sing-song humming vibrated up from the creature’snarrow bony chest into its throat. It became an almost childlike cooing. Like the contentednoise of a baby suckling a bottle.

Sal found her hand stretching out towards it. Copying the gesture, showing the same curiosityseemed like the right thing to do. Her hand brushed against the thing’s forearm. Sheexpected it to be cold and clammy… but it was warm and dry. Just like any human’sskin should be.

And she returned the smile.

‘Pleased… pleased to meet you,’ she said.

‘Eeeeee… eeeee-ooo-eeeee-oooo.’

It was then she heard the clatter of rubble disturbed behind her.

‘You should keep very still!’

It was Maddy’s voice. Not a shout, but a coarse whisper echoing across thestillness.

‘No sudden moves. OK?’ That was Foster’s voice. ‘Keep your eyes onthat thing, Sal. Do not look away. Do you understand?’

She nodded.

‘All right, Sal, you should take a slow step back now.’

She wanted to look back over her shoulder. To see where her friends were, how far away theywere.

‘Don’t!’ hissed Foster. ‘Keep your eyes on it asyou back off.’

‘W-why?’ she managed to whisper.

‘Just do it!’

She did as instructed, taking one careful step at a time, feeling her way across the unevenground with her feet, keeping her eyes locked on the thing in front of her.

The Gollum frowned. The humming quickly became a frustrated growl as it shuffled forward,reaching again for her hair.

‘It’s — it’s not going to let me g-go,’ uttered Sal.‘Ouch! It’s got hold of my hair again!’

‘Just keep coming, Sal… Don’t stop,’ said Maddy. She sounded a littlebit closer.

The creature was holding tight to a lock of her hair, winding its claw-like fingers throughit to get a better hold. And then she saw something in its face, innocent curiosity vanishing,replaced by some dark instinct. It opened its mouth and let out a cry that almost soundedhuman, but certainly didn’t resemble anything like a language.

The other creatures suddenly surged forward.

‘Oh no!’ cried Maddy.

There was the deafening blast of a gunshot. The creature holding her hair was suddenly hurledon its back, spattering dark blood across the rubble.

‘Sal, quick!’

She turned and saw Maddy and Foster ten yards beyond, a blue veil of gunsmoke clearing asFoster pumped another round into the gun. She scrambled on all fours towards them, clatteringnoisily over a mound of loose bricks and masonry, expecting at any moment to feel claws in herhair again, yanking her off her feet from behind. Instead, a moment later, she was stumblinginto Maddy’s open arms.

‘Oh God! Sal! Are you all right?’

She was too frightened to answer.

‘Run!’ she whispered. ‘We — w-we should run!’

Maddy stood her ground, held her tight. ‘It’s OK, Sal… it’s OK.Look.’

Sal turned to look over her shoulder to find the creatures had gone. Every last one of themexcept for the twitching corpse in front of her had… simply vanished within the space ofa few heartbeats, as if they’d never been anything more than mere wisps of smoke,carried off by a gusting wind.

‘The noise of the gun scared them off,’ said Foster.

Maddy looked anxiously around at the dark husks of ruined buildings on either side of them.‘They’re hiding in there. We should head back while they’re stillspooked.’

Foster nodded and waved them past. ‘Come on.’

The girls stepped around him quickly and backed away. Foster followed, his shotgun stillshouldered and ready to fire.