Sara Reinke - Backwoods

Suzette offered a paper-wrapped packet of Extra-Strength Tylenol caplets. “Thanks,” he murmured, popping the pills into his mouth, letting them lay for the moment, bitter against his tongue.

“So the good news is you’re going to live.” She turned to a little corner sink and drew a Dixie paper cup from a dispenser mounted on the wall. “The bad news is you’re going to be here, at least for tonight.” With a wink and a laugh, Suzette passed him the cup. “Might as well get comfortable.”

“Where exactly is here?” he asked, washing the medicine down with a gulp of water.

“Didn’t Santoro tell you? The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency Appalachian Research Facility.”

That explains the DARPA, he thought, remembering the sign outside the lobby doors.

“What kind of research?” he asked.

She pressed her lips together and mimed turning a key in an invisible lock at the corner of her mouth. “Top secret,” she said. “Hush hush. If you found out, they’d have to kill you.”

He laughed. This time, she didn’t join him.

A loud scream startled Andrew awake. The infirmary was shadow-draped and dark, and for a few fleeting seconds, his mind still more asleep than awake, he had no idea where he was. Then he heard a grumble of thunder from overhead and remembered.

With a groan, he sat up on the exam table, grimacing at the aching stiffness that had seized his neck and spine. It may have been padded, but the table had been anything but comfortable. Suzette had given him a scratchy wool blanket to cover himself, and his bare arms beneath the cuffs of his short T-shirt sleeves still itched from the coarse, heavy fabric.

Again, another scream rang out, a shrill sound that seemed to be coming from outside, beyond the cinderblock walls of the compound. He thought of the thing he’d seen on the road out in the woods, the peculiar, human-like creature. It looked like it was screaming at me.

He swung his legs around, letting his feet settle against the cold tile floor. The electricity had been knocked out by the storm before his arrival with Santoro at the facility and apparently remained so. The door to his room stood partially ajar, but the only light coming through the narrow opening was the flickering, dancing strobe of a flashlight beam.

Andrew went to the doorway and peered outside. “Who’s there?”

A blinding glare struck his face, the flashlight swung to aim directly in his eyes. “Jesus!” Squinting, Andrew shrank back from the door. He stumbled over his own feet, then sat down hard, knocking over an empty nearby intravenous rack in the process. It clattered noisily to the floor and less than five seconds later, the door to his room flew open wide.

“Who are you?” he heard a man say from the other side of that dazzling glare, his voice loud and sharp. He heard a distinctive CLACK that he recognized instinctively: the sound of a gun made as it chambered a round.

Shit.

“Don’t shoot.” Andrew drew his hand to his face, trying to block the flashlight beam.

“Who are you?” the man asked again, more sharply this time. “This is a restricted-access installation of the United States Army. Identify yourself.”

“My name is Andrew Braddock.” Andrew squinted, both hands raised now. “Don’t shoot. A woman brought me here—Santoro. We almost crashed out on the highway.”

The blinding glare lingered a moment longer, then fell away to pool on the floor. Andrew blinked against residual pinpoints of light still dancing across his gaze. “Thanks.”

“Get on your feet,” the man with the gun said, coming slowly into clearer view as Andrew’s vision adjusted. Tall and lean, in his early- to mid-fifties, he studied the younger man from across the room with a decided frown, his brows furrowed slightly. “Keep your hands where I can see them.”

Still not entirely convinced the guy wouldn’t pop a round in him, judging by the fact he’d only lowered the chrome-plated pistol in his hand a halting measure, Andrew obeyed. He yelped in surprise when the man caught him by the arm, spun him smartly around and shoved him face-first into the nearest wall. Keeping Andrew pinned forcibly to the drywall with one hand, he then proceeded to clap and pat the younger man down with the other.

“I’m not armed,” Andrew said.

The man said nothing, as thorough and industrious in his work as Saint Nick from the old “Night Before Christmas” poem. His hand slapped against Andrew’s legs clear down to his ankles, then up again. Seeming thus satisfied, he released Andrew and stepped back. Andrew heard another quiet clack as he returned the safety on his pistol and holstered it.

“Who are you?” he asked, turning warily, keeping his hands raised.

“My name is Major Mitchell Prendick,” the man replied “I’m the commander of this facility.”

“I heard someone screaming outside,” Andrew said.

If this was a point of concern for the Major, he offered no outward indication. Instead, he said, “You may not leave this room, Mister Braddock. Is that understood?”

Puzzled, Andrew shook his head. “What, you mean until morning?”

Without another word, Prendick turned and walked back to the doorway.

“Wait. I need to use your phone,” Andrew said. “A radio. Something. I’ve got to—”

His voice cut short as Prendick slammed the door behind him. Before the residual bang had faded, Andrew heard a soft but distinctive click from the other side.

He locked the door.

Scrambling to his feet, Andrew hurried to the door, grabbing the handle, twisting it impotently between his hands. That son of a bitch, he thought. He locked me in here!

“Hey!” Balling his hand into a fist, he beat loudly against the wood. “Let me out. Hey!”

But the door remained locked and Prendick didn’t reply. When another scream came from outside, filtering through the walls, Andrew knew he wouldn’t get any more sleep that night. Drawing the itchy blanket around his shoulders again, he sat down in the dark, huddled in a corner, his knees drawn toward his chest while he waited for the dawn.

What the hell have I gotten myself into?

He hadn’t meant to fall asleep sitting on the floor in the corner of the exam room. When the fluorescent fixtures overhead flickered once, then twice, flooding the room with bright, sudden light, and the central air vents suddenly rattled and whistled into abrupt life, his eyes flew wide and he jerked in start.

“What the—” he gasped, disoriented and bewildered. Then, realizing where he was, he sighed, forking his fingers through the heavy crown of his hair. Shoving the blanket aside, he stumbled to his feet. Not only did his muscles feel stiff and sore, aching from his crash the night before, but now he discovered, he’d developed uncomfortable, even painful cricks in his hips, neck and shoulders.

Terrific, he thought, wincing as he tried to stretch those tight places loose once more.

He heard a soft tap at the exam room door, then a woman’s voice, hesitant and polite called out: “Mister Braddock?”

“I’m awake,” he said, and because his voice sounded little more than a hoarse croak, he coughed into his fist and tried again. “It’s okay. I’m awake.”

Opening the door more, the blonde doctor poked her head inside. “Good morning, sunshine,” she said, extending her hand in introduction. “We met last night.”

“Dr. Montgomery. I remember.” Andrew accepted the shake and was surprised by the confident strength in her grip as she folded her slim, cool fingers against his. With a glance at the ceiling, the fluorescent lights, he said, “The power’s back on.”