Ronald Malfi - Snow

“I don’t know, honey.” The things beneath the snow cut sharply to the right and began tunneling toward the street down below. Likewise, the remaining townspeople turned and looked at the flower of flame rising up above the treetops. They began moving in the direction of the fire, slowly at first…then graduating to a deerlike run, their feet cleaving the snow like knife blades.

“They’re leaving,” Charlie said, peering out the window over Kate’s shoulder.

“For the moment,” Kate said.

After Brendan had unscrewed the pickup’s gas cap, they’d emptied some of the extra fuel canisters down the side of the truck and, backing up through the snow, left a trail of fuel from the pickup to the opposite side of the street. Bruce had launched a blast of flame from the flamethrower to the fuel that was soaking into the snow. The fuel had ignited and traced across the street where it climbed up the side of the pickup truck and vanished into the throat of the gas tank.

The truck had exploded.

Now, the two men ran like bandits up Fairmont Street. White faces appeared in the windows of the surrounding houses. Behind them, the flames from the explosion burned like a holocaust at their backs.

On the front porches of the houses along Fairmont, the skin-suits emptied out of the houses and watched them run. On the lawns, the snow rippled and appeared to breathe. Whirlwinds of snow funneled up from the ground and speared into the sky. Around them, a whole invisible world was awaking from its slumber.

“Run!” Bruce shouted, slightly ahead of Brendan. “Don’t look back!”

But Brendan did just that—he staggered and glanced over one shoulder in time to see the skin-suits come streaming off the porches, giving chase. Brendan lost his footing and crashed to the snow. His tongue exploded with a sharp and sudden pain as his mouth filled with the taste of copper.

Ahead of him, Bruce skidded to a stop and began running back toward Brendan, who was already struggling to his feet. The ground vibrated with the pounding of countless feet closing the distance. Brendan propelled himself forward, managing to just barely duck out of the way as Bruce’s flamethrower belched out a stream of dazzling white fire toward the oncoming mob.

Blood seeping from his mouth, Brendan continued to run until the earth rolled and undulated beneath him. It shook him to the ground. Rolling over, he managed to swing the shotgun’s strap over one shoulder and rack the weapon. Behind him, the skin-suits cried out in agony as Bruce hosed them with fire…but they were still closing in, hungry to get at them both.

Directly in front of Brendan, the ground seemed to rise up—a white, formless monolith as tall as a school bus standing on end…

Screaming, Brendan fired the shotgun at the rising crest of snow. The blast was ineffectual: it rendered a hole in the center of the mass that quickly refilled with fresh snow. Brendan attempted to chamber another round but the shotgun jammed. He threw it to the ground and, on his hands and knees, crawled away from the looming snow-beast just as it began to take definite shape.

To Todd’s ears, it sounded as though World War III had erupted on the other side of the town square. Smoke blackened the sky and some of the trees behind the rows of shops at the opposite end of the square were on fire. An acrid stench simmered in the air.

The laptop secured against his chest with both hands, Todd raced back up the incline behind the storefronts, crashing through needling pine boughs. When he emptied out into the street on the other side of the trees, he could see the insanity and confusion working its way up Fairmont toward the intersection: townspeople on fire were dropping like uprooted fence posts in the middle of the street. There was what looked like a burning automobile on the shoulder of the road. And Todd caught the glimpse of a rising pillar of snow driving straight up from the ground, maybe three stories tall…

He didn’t allow himself more than that initial, cursory glance before his pumping legs carried him through the intersection and across the snow-laden lawns of apocalypse-dark houses.

Beneath him, the ground erupted. He was thrown into the air, his fingers digging into the fabric of the laptop’s carrying case. When he struck the ground, the force squeezed the air from his lungs and his head snapped back on his neck, striking the frozen pavement of the street. He felt the wound at his leg reopen.

Something big was crawling up out of the ground. Todd blinked, clearing the blurriness from his eyes while scooting backward on his hands and feet like a crab. The thing rose and blotted out the sky, a shaggy white behemoth with the body of a worm capped by a multitooth maw that reminded Todd of lawn-mower blades. Its sturdiness was questionable, as its body was comprised solely of snow, and, as it towered over him, its shadow like the shadow of a skyscraper, bits of itself avalanched down its cylindrical hide.

Paralyzed with fear, Todd could only stare up at it. He went instantly deaf, unable to hear any sound other than his own blood rushing through his veins—a sound like an old washing machine.

Above him, the thing swayed, unsteady. Todd could see the sheath of its snakelike belly threaded with thin silvery filaments of light. It’s a legion, he had time to think. It’s a bunch of those snow phantoms smashed together to make this monstrous beast.

The thing roared and Todd’s hearing returned, his eardrums nearly bursting.

Something clambered at Todd’s side and Todd cried out. It was Brendan, his face an O of terror as his eyes locked on the monster.

Todd managed to jump up. He faded in one direction, then took off in another, carving a swath of zigzagging footprints in the snow. There was a narrow pass between two houses; he shoved his head down and charged for it, hoping that the creature would prove too big to follow him through.

If I could just—

Something snagged his ankles, tackling him to the ground. Yowling, he rolled over on his side to see something black and snakelike, perhaps the thickness of a boa constrictor, come untangled at his ankles and bow up into the air. His first thought was, Tentacles! They have tentacles! But then he saw it for what it really was: the fallen power line.

The line swung and spat blue-white fire from its frayed end. Todd covered his face with his arms and rolled farther down the lawn, feeling every bump and crenellation in the snow through the threadbare fabric of his sweater. When he came to rest, he sat up on his knees, the entire world spinning on its axis.

The power line whipped against the ground until it swung around and connected with the base of the giant snow creature. Despite the creature’s appearance, its hide was made of something other than snow: the moment the electrical teeth of the power line bit into it, the snow turned black like burning paper, and Todd could then see the segmented plates that made up its belly. It caught fire and mewled with thunderous aplomb. It only managed to put the fire out by collapsing in on itself, showering the blaze in an avalanche of snow.

A second later, and it was as though the thing had never existed.

Across the yard, Brendan jabbed a finger at him. There was a wild, feral look in his eyes. “You!” he screamed, rupturing his throat by the sheer force of his excitement. “Get the hell out of here!”

That was the only invitation Todd needed. Again, he was on his feet and running to beat the devil. He did not dare look behind him to see what became of Bruce and Brendan, who were still fighting off the encroaching horde of townspeople; nor did he want to know if that giant snow-beast had rematerialized out of nothingness.

Up ahead he could see the woods they’d crossed earlier, and he knew he was halfway back to the station.