Ben Bedard - The World Without Crows

“Just some local wildlife,” said King Cobra. “We would like to put it back in its habitat. Let it live free.”

The others laughed.

Suddenly Eric was jerked away from the window. Brad was back with Sarah and Birdie. His eyes were wide with fear. “We have to go, Eric!” he hissed. “Get ready, get your stuff!”

“We can’t just leave them like this,” Eric said.

“Fuck them!” Brad said. He grabbed Eric and pulled him away from the window. “We have to go right now!”

“They’re talking,” Eric said. “Maybe they’ll work it out.”

“King Cobra don’t talk!” Brad hissed. “Get your stuff!” Brad pushed him again, and Eric almost fell.

“Stop pushing him, Brad,” Sarah said. She was close to tears.

“Well I’m trying to get the fat fuck to move!”

Then there was a piercing gun shot, and both Sarah and Eric let out a stunned cry. Eric went to the window, but he didn’t see anything but the Snakes.

“I think you should get out of here and don’t come back,” a breaking, scared voice called out. Eric didn’t know who it was.

“David! What’re you doing?” cried Sharif. “I said no guns!”

“You’re not my father!” exclaimed David. “You’re not the boss either!”

“Well, this just got boring,” said King Cobra. Smoothly he pulled out a giant revolver and fired. It was the loudest sound Eric had ever heard. There were shouts, screams, laughter. Suddenly Eric felt his face hum with pain, and Brad was standing in front of him. He had just slapped him across the face. Without having to be told what to do, Eric pulled on his clothes amid the turmoil, and then pulled out his backpack from under the bed. As he shrugged it on, he glanced outside. They were opening the moving van. The Snakes who had opened the door, their faces grinning in dark triumph, ran and dived back into the cab of the truck. There was another roar from the truck, and then a great shadow leapt from the back.

“Come on!” Brad grabbed him. Eric clutched Birdie’s hand and bolted out of the room. When they hit the steps, gunshots rang out downstairs. Windows shattered. As they ran downstairs, they saw Mary and Cecile at the windows with rifles. David lay in the living room, silent with shock, while Katie wrapped his arm in a white towel quickly blooming red. Eric realized numbly that David’s hand had been shot completely off. Sharif and Mark were grabbing guns.

As they hit the bottom of the stairs, the door shattered open, knocking Eric down. A darkness settled in the doorway. Eric stared up at a bear, it’s mouth oozing dark liquid and white, wriggling worms. Its eyes were dark with blood and the fur beneath them was matted with dried blood. The bear bled through a dozen holes in its body, a dark sluggish blood. It was crazed with the Vaca B. Looking at the assembled men and women, the bear stretched its head forward and roared, dark blood and white worms spewing from its open maw. Before anyone could do anything, the bear leapt on David, sinking its teeth deep in his stomach. David screamed an anguished, piercing cry. Katie pummeled its head, but the bear tugged and shook and David was ripped apart upon the floor and screamed no more. Then the bear rose up, its mouth dripping with David’s innards. Eric smelled the rank odor of its breath mixed with the moist, pungent smell of David’s body. The others, finally emerging from shock, pointed their guns and fired, but the bear swept across them with its paw. Eric saw Katie’s face disintegrate as the bear mauled her. Then it fell upon Sharif. Eric watched as Sharon lunged forward with a pistol in her hand.

“Come on!” cried Brad. “Get up! Get up!” He pulled Eric to his feet and they ran away through the house and out the back door. Behind them was the sound of gunfire and the crazed bear. They stumbled out the back door, and then sprinted toward the forest behind the farm. His lungs burned and his chest ached, but Eric felt he could run like this forever, as if he was no longer a part of the pain in his own body. He was a ball of fire, burning to live. He looked back over his shoulder and saw the Land Rover driving over the lawn toward them, honking its horn and flashing its headlights.

Eric turned back to the forest and tried to run faster. Brad and Sarah were already deep in the forest. As they hit the edge, Eric tripped and tumbled. Birdie tugged at him while the Land Rover came to a halt near them.

“Wait right there!” boomed Carl Doyle. “I want my medal back!” When he got out of the Land Rover, he had his samurai sword in his hand, unsheathed.

Eric tottered to his feet and ran into the forest behind Birdie.

“Wait!” cried Doyle. Eric heard him crash into the forest behind him. For a huge man, he moved with disturbing speed. “Wait!” he called. “Give me my father’s medal!” His voice was desperate and choked. Eric and Birdie ran faster, but the moon gave off little light in the gloom of the forest. As they moved, Eric saw a tree across his path. He tried to leap over it, but he was too slow. He hit his shins hard on the tree and tumbled forward, tasting dirt in his mouth. His vision swung from side to side as he desperately tried to raise himself. Losing his balance, he fell again. When he opened his eyes, he saw Carl Doyle standing over him, his eyes wide and white. His samurai sword, long, slightly curved and wicked, gleamed in the moonlight.

“I want my medal,” he said evenly. “That’s all I want, understand?” He had lost his fake English accent. Eric opened his mouth, but couldn’t speak. Doyle lowered the blade and pointed it at Eric’s gut. “I just want what’s mine.”

A cry went up then and Doyle vanished in a knot of legs and arms. Eric struggled to his feet. By the time he rose, he saw Doyle standing up tall. Brad stood beneath him, his face contorted in rage, his fists held tightly up. Doyle still had his sword in his hand.

“I want what’s mine,” Doyle growled.

“We don’t have your fucking medal!” Brad growled back.

“Oh, you have it,” Doyle said. He lifted his sword so that it looked ready to slash Brad in two. “I bet you took it, didn’t you? You foul-mouthed little reprobate.” Doyle’s eyes glimmered, and his hands adjusted on the sword.

“Why would I want your stupid medal?” Brad asked.

“Please,” Eric said, suddenly finding his breath. “Please, Mr. Doyle,” he pleaded. “We’d give the medal back to you if we had it. We would! But we don’t have it!”

Doyle’s eyes had not moved from Brad. He was focused upon him with an intensity that made Eric feel nauseous. Any moment now, he felt sure that Doyle would cut the sword across Brad. The sword was ivory in the moonlight. Eric’s heart thundered wildly in his body.

Doyle’s face grew calm then and his sword raised. Eric knew he had decided to kill Brad, to cut him down here, like an animal. Helplessly, he squeezed his eyes shut and turned away. There was a crashing sound in the darkness, and Eric’s eyes opened. Carl Doyle had whirled away from Brad just in time to see the diseased bear leap into the clearing where they stood. In the moonlight, the bear looked black as shadow. When it saw them, it roared, a sound that rumbled through Eric like thunder. The bear lunged at them before Eric could think. It rose up over Doyle and Brad.

Doyle didn’t pause. His sword flashed in the darkness of the bear’s shadow. The bear swiped at him with a paw that now dangled unnaturally. Brad suddenly tugged at him, and they sprinted away from the clearing. Behind them, through the sound of their pounding hearts, they could hear the bear scream.

They did not stop running when they came to Sarah and Birdie. All of them ran north, thinking of the devastation behind them. When they finally collapsed in exhaustion, it was far past dawn, and they were on a hill overlooking a farm. In the fields, they could see a Zombie lumbering back and forth between the barn and a rusted tractor. Back and forth, back and forth.