Ronald Malfi - Snow

“Next month. But Brendan says I should be prepared for the worst. He said the particles or pulses or whatever from those clouds could have caused…maybe caused…” Molly’s voice trailed off.

“Brendan shouldn’t talk about things he knows nothing about,” Kate told her. “He doesn’t know any more about what’s going on than we do. He shouldn’t have scared you.”

“He didn’t scare me.” Molly’s eyes were lucid.

“Do you know the sex?”

“No. We wanted to wait, to be surprised. Brendan says if it’s a girl, the electrical pulses in the air may have, uh, compromised her reproductive capacity. Those were his exact words, just how he said them—‘compromised her reproductive capacity.’ Brendan’s very smart.”

“Sounds like he’s been thinking a lot about things.” Then a notion came to her. “Brendan’s the father?”

“We’re not married,” Molly said defensively. “Not yet, anyway. We will be, though. We agreed the baby needs both parents. It’s important to have both parents be a part of a child’s life.”

Above their heads, doors slammed.

“Do you think they’re okay?” Charlie wanted to know.

“I’m sure they’re fine,” Kate said, when Molly wouldn’t answer.

“What if one of those things gets in here?”

“Nothing is going to get in here, Charlie.”

“But what if one does? ”

“Then we kill it,” Kate said.

“They didn’t know we were here until you and your boyfriend showed up,” Molly said.

So that’s what this is about, Kate thought. “We were careful coming here,” she promised Molly. “No one followed us.”

“You can’t know that.”

“It wasn’t even our idea to come here. It was Tully’s idea. We came with him, followed him.”

“Well, what do you expect? Tully’s a good man. Did you think he’d just leave the two of you out there to die?”

“Of course not. I just don’t know what you want me to say.”

“And now you’ve brought these things to us,” Molly went on, ignoring Kate now.

Kate knew there was nothing she could say to this woman. Molly had made up her mind to dislike and distrust her and there would be no convincing her otherwise. “If I did,” Kate said evenly, “then I’m sorry. It wasn’t deliberate.”

Visibly disgusted, Molly turned away.

There were footsteps on the other side of the door, along with the sound of muffled talking. Molly produced a revolver from under her pillow, surprising Kate. The pregnant woman held the gun in a shaking hand against the swell of her abdomen. Both Cody and Charlie looked up at the door, frightened.

The door opened. Todd, Bruce, and Brendan came in, their shirts half off to bare their shoulders. Molly relaxed and stashed the gun back beneath the pillow.

“What was it?” Kate asked, sitting up straighter.

“One of the skin-suits was outside by the front doors,” Bruce said, peeling his shirt off the rest of the way. It was wet with blood. He balled it up and stuffed it into the Superman backpack. He went over to a pile of clothes and blankets on a rolling cart, where he began hunting around for a fresh shirt. “We killed it.”

Todd sat beside Kate on the cot while Brendan, looking pale and out of sorts, leaned a shotgun against the desk. Then he stared down at his hands in near disbelief, watching as they vibrated like a pair of tuning forks.

“Where’s Tully?” Molly asked. She looked from Bruce to Brendan. “What happened to Tully?”

“The Tull-man,” Brendan said forlornly, his eyes distant and unfocused.

“He’s dead,” said Bruce, pulling on a clean shirt. There were dark smudges under his eyes.

Cody’s grip around Kate tightened. Kate rocked her gently, telling her that everything was going to be all right—such feeble, futile promises.

“This is their fault,” Molly said. That sharp look was back in her eyes. “Those things didn’t know we were here until they showed up.”

“Relax, Molly,” Bruce said.

Molly shook her head. “No. We should have never let them in here.”

Brendan sat beside Molly on the cot. He placed one hand on her knee but looked too preoccupied to offer her any worthwhile comfort.

“There was only one,” Todd assured her, “and we killed it.”

“You don’t know that! There could be more right outside, watching and waiting. There could be a whole goddamn army of them.”

Against Kate’s chest, Cody sobbed. “Stop it,” Kate told Molly.

“We’re okay for right now,” Bruce said. He went to the liquor bottles on the desk and selected some tequila.

“But what about later?” Molly protested. “Those things will come back, Bruce. You know they will.”

“And if they do, we’ll fight them off again, Molly.” Bruce leaned against the desk and unscrewed the tequila, took a swallow. “There’s nothing more we can do about that.”

“There is,” Molly said. “We can send them both back out there, let them fend for themselves.”

“Molly,” Brendan said, seemingly returned from his stupor. He rubbed her thigh.

But Molly could not be consoled. “We could send them out and make them lead those things away from us.”

“No one is going out there,” Bruce said. “We’re in this together now.”

“They brought those things—”

“They didn’t do anything!” Bruce yelled back. Again, Cody shuddered and Charlie gaped up at the sheriff’s deputy, a combination of fear and awe on the boy’s face. More calmly, Bruce said, “No one did anything, Molly. This—whatever this is—just happened. And now we’ve got to survive it. Together. We’re not doing anyone any good fighting among ourselves.”

“You’re not the law anymore, Bruce,” Molly grumbled. She placed both hands flat against her distended stomach. “There is no law anymore. Not in Woodson.”

Cody sat up. Her face was red from crying. “Please stop yelling,” she said.

Bruce looked down at the bottle in his hands while Molly, her eyes welling with tears, looked away from him and at the wall.

“Hey,” said Brendan, clapping his hands together and startling them all. Some color had returned to his face. “Who wants hot dogs?”

“I do!” Charlie boomed.

“I do,” Cody echoed, less enthusiastic.

Brendan stood, forcing a goofy grin. “Then let’s go, gang. Train’s pulling out of the station. All aboard!”

Charlie hopped up and Cody climbed down off the cot. Still grinning, Brendan opened the door and saluted Charlie, who giggled and saluted him back.

“Brendan,” Todd said, and handed him the pistol.

Brendan nodded almost imperceptibly, stuffing the pistol into his waistband at the small of his back. Then he barked at the kids: “Let’s go, soldiers! Left! Right! Left! Right! Forward—march!”

A smile beginning to overtake Cody’s delicate face, Brendan led the kids out into the hallway. Their footsteps receded into the darkness.

Bruce grunted his approval. Rubbing a hand along his bald pate, he took some more tequila from the bottle before handing it over to Todd. “I want to hear about this computer you mentioned,” Bruce said.

Todd chugged a mouthful of tequila, winced, and handed the bottle to Kate. “I had a laptop with me when we came into town,” Todd said. “If I’m right about what’s going on—about why my phone works while everything else in this town is going haywire—then my laptop should boot up and work fine, too. If you can hook it up to that modem of yours, Bruce, we can get online, maybe even make a phone call out.”

“Theoretically,” Bruce said.

Kate took a swallow of the tequila. It burned all the way down her throat before exploding in her stomach.