It Happened in the Night Ch. 04

He lit the wick and watched as it caught faster than he expected and nearly dropped the bottle in his surprise. Instead, he launched it through the front window and waited. At first, he was disappointed when he didn't see anything happen. Moments later he heard the whoosh as the fire took off and ignited the living room. Smoke billowed through the broken windowpanes.

The house was mostly solid wood inside and the finished floors burst into flames, pushing them past what he'd expected. He watched, captivated by the fire, drawn like a moth to a flame. His emotions were a twisted combination of hubris and disgust.

Brian stood in the middle of the road, having to back off from the heat and smoke, watching for what felt like hours. It was msybe only fifteen minutes before he heard a loud crash and watched in rapt fascination as Mr. Fixit dove out the upstairs bedroom window and landed on the gravel driveway in a heap.

He must be dead after that kind of fall, Brian murmured to himself. But something kept him away from checking on him. A few minutes later, Mr. Fixit started to move around. Brian was horrified. "Holy shit! Now what am I going to do."

Mr. Fixit managed to stand and glared at Brian. His face was a bloody mottled mess and the decay was obvious even from that distance.

"What the hell are you doing lightin my house on fire, you young bastard. I'll teach you a lesson." He was approaching Brian, walking with a heavy limp in his left leg. The snarl never left his face, the hatred evident.

Brian retreated, not looking where he was going, and bumped into the open back of his van. In his panic, he realized he'd almost knocked a basket of bottles on the ground. He grabbed one out of the basket, still holding the lighter in his right hand, and held it aloft for Mr. Fixit to see.

"Don't you think about it, you little shit. I'll kill you with my bare hands and then I'll come visit your little boys." He stumbled onto the street, his hands outstretched, reaching for Brian.

"No, you'll burn. It hurts you, doesn't it? That's why you jumped out the window to avoid the fire."

"Don't throw it or I'll burn you up too. Take you with me."

Brian lit the wick, waited until it was almost in the bottle and launched it at Mr. Fixit's feet. It exploded in an orange glow and he burst into flames.

"It burns! You little bastard. We're coming for you. There's no escape. Fly like a little birdy while you still can. Wherever you go, we'll be waiting." His wails echoed through the town. He flailed around screaming for minutes before falling in a heap in the middle of the road, still on fire.

The rotten stench of vodka soaked burning flesh was more than Brian could handle as he turned his head to the side and vomited his breakfast on the grass. That smell would linger with him for as long as memory served him.

Not wasting another second, he closed the van door and hopped into the driver's seat and sped out of his driveway, making sure he didn't drive over Mr. Fixit, and sped towards the new subdivision a few blocks away.

Beads of sweat doused his forehead, as he parked in the middle of the road at the end of a cul-de-sac. After the recent ordeal, he knew he needed to be quicker. There were still people in most of these houses, he was certain of it, and many of them would come after him if flushed out. He opened the back door and grabbed a basket of bottles.

Picking almost at random, he strode up to the houses one at a time and tossed bottles through the front windows. They all erupted into a plume of fire and smoke. Having hit most of the neighborhood, he drove around the block and repeated the same concept again. The wind was gusting heavily and looking back at the first area he'd hit, the fire was leaping from one house to the next.

After he'd tossed over thirsty bottles, he returned back to his house and noticed that the house beside Mr. Fixit's was also engulfed in flames. He stopped the van in front of his house and tossed a bottle inside. Mesmerized, he stood and watched his own home burn for too long. Sounds were coming from nearby houses as people fled the flames and ended up outside.

Looking down the road towards the subdivision, he could see a group of ten or so people coming towards where he stood. He reached into his basket, and lit a couple of bottles and tossed them towards the unsuspecting mob. The reaction was a quick burst of flames that engulfed the group, causing an ensuing panic. They raced around screaming, trying to put the fire out. In their panic, they were spreading it onto trees and other nearby houses.

Brian clambered into the van and sped away for the main street. He got out and lobbed bottles at the local businesses as he went along. In minutes the hardware store, local bar, restaurant and furniture store all burst into flames. Next, he stopped the van across the street from the gas station. Brian hopped out, looked around the deserted Shell station and attached auto repair shop.

"This is one way to get a fire going." He lobbed a couple bottles into the repair shop, watching as it lit up. On his way back to the van, he smashed a bottle on the gas pumps.

His final stop was the liquor store. By this point, he was almost out of bottles, so he restocked the van before breaking some bottles around the store and tossing a lit one in behind him. The fire roared almost too fast for him. The heat that it set off blew him back. Brian pulled the van out towards the road when he saw a pair of silver wolves running out of the grocery store with a large slab of meat dangling from the larger one's mouth.

He lost track of them when the gas station exploded. The blast shook the windows in his van and a large mushroom shaped cloud of fire and smoke shot into the sky. When he hit the highway, all he could see in his rearview mirror was a giant plume of smoke soaring up and away.

Brian drove over the hill and down into a lowered area, losing sight of the town he'd called home for the last year, certain he'd never see it again. The drive was a familiar scene for Brian since he went this way to work every day, but it looked so different with his change in perspective. The landscape seemed dead to him. Farmer's fields highlighted both sides of the road, with the occasional swampy section with some scrubby evergreen trees.

Where was he supposed to go? Brian knew he couldn't stay where he was but where could he go. His mind was roiling with tension as he put his home miles behind him. The road seemed to be slipping past, as if he drove in a dream world. It didn't seem real to him, not much did these days.

His hand turned to the radio, switching it on. Nothing but static. It wasn't a surprise to Brian, he'd tried it before. He turned it to CD, having no idea what was in his six-CD changer. The song that played got his pulse jumping. The words blared out 'I've been drivin' all night, my hands wet on the wheel. And it's a half past four and I'm shiftin' gear.' "Radar Love" by Golden Earring was one of his favorite driving tunes and it helped him forget about this morning, at least for five minutes.

By the time the song was winding down, Brian was driving into the next town. The sign read 'Haven', but Brian knew it as the place he'd grown up. His family moved to town when he was six and lived there until after he was gone to college. It was a small village with a few small businesses and not even a Tim Horton's coffee shop. Brian laughed when he thought of it, since that was such a big deal anywhere you went in Canada.

The town only had one traffic light and that's where Brian stopped. Haven had seen its fair share of fires over the years that he'd lived there. On one corner of the main intersection was an empty lot, the only remnants of the large hotel that had once stood there for decades. It had only been his first year in town when it mysteriously burnt to the ground in the middle of the night. Fire trucks responded from all the local fire departments and the downtown corridor remained cordoned off for days to deal with the debris that covered the highway.

On the other side of the street had stood a bar that was a local fixture for generations that burned down a decade before. Brian parked his van next to where it used to be. It had been the only place to find liquor in town and was a gathering spot for every possible demographic. In the interceding years, nothing sprang forward to fill the void.

"Hello! Is anybody here?" Brian yelled at the top of his lungs, standing beside the van. He held a bottle in one hand, the lighter in the other. His paranoia wouldn't allow him to think of leaving the vehicle unarmed. "Can anybody hear me?"

The once bustling highway was deserted and the traffic light long since stopped working. It was starting to hit home to Brian that he might be the only person left unaltered. "Somebody. Anybody. Please answer me." Brian was close to tears, he had a lump in his throat of epic proportions.

His mind was playing tricks on him again. He thought he could hear the sounds of traffic barreling down the highway, steps from where he stood. Late morning as it was, the streets would be full of pedestrians going from shop to shop. The bank that he took deposits to several times a week wouldn't be open for a few hours yet. "Stupid bank hours," he muttered to himself.

Brian could see the funeral home he'd visited his grandma in shortly after her death a decade ago. He wondered if he would join her soon enough. What was there to live for? Let these things have the world if they wanted it so much.

"Come on out and take me! I know you're here somewhere. If you're so strong, why don't you just kill me?"

He stood in the middle of the main intersection of town swinging his bottle of Smirnoff in the air. At that point, he really didn't care if he died. Everything and everyone he'd ever loved was gone. In some ways, seeing the town he'd spent the majority of his life growing up in turned into a ghost town was worse than his dead family. It was so tempting to douse himself with vodka inside and out and let the fire take him.

Instead, he lit the wick and tossed the bottle through the window of an apartment complex on the corner. Within seconds, it was burning, plumes of smoke wafting through the shattered windowpane. The screams came only moments later. He had no idea how many voices there were, and some seemed to be coming from inside his head even. The wires vibrated in his skull, he could hear the collective outrage to the pain he'd caused them.

One voice stood out above the rest of the associated noise. "Daddy ... run. Go now."

That little voice chilled his bones as he heeded the command. The sounds became louder as they approached the van. They were coming from all sides. He'd underestimated the danger he was in. They didn't want to come outside but they would if threatened. Mr. Fixit had made that abundantly clear.

Realizing the gravity of the situation, he sprinted to the van and turned the ignition. The engine drowned out the screaming as he raced out of town. One single look in the rearview mirror was all he allowed himself. It was all he needed to see. The street was filling up with people; some even ran after him. He put the pedal to the floor, going faster in town then he ever believed he would.

Things were unraveling fast. He needed to get somewhere he thought would be safe and find other people. If he didn't by the time the sun went down, he might never see morning. There was one loose end left. Work was on his route and he needed to see if his dad was still alive or not.

Minutes later, he pulled into the driveway. Tires crunched over the gravel as he stopped in front of his father's house, which was on the same property as the family business.

"This place feels like one gigantic tomb. Get in and out quick ... or not at all." Brian trudged up the front porch steps, admiring the gigantic house that he'd helped his parents build one summer so many years ago.

There was no sign of anybody, not even Simba, the family husky. Simba had once been Brian's dog when he lived in the city with his wife, before they were married. The aggressive husky nature couldn't cope with being tied up all day while she worked and he went to school, so his parents agreed to take him in. "Simba. Where are you boy?" Only the sounds of silence greeted his calls. "I hope you're okay."

His hand stuck on the doorknob, trying to force him to leave and never come back. The air hung like a damp rag, thick and heavy around him. Click. The door opened, giving him a vista of the foyer with no signs of life. Brian crept inside, hoping to avoid detection. "Shit. I forgot my bottle. I hope I don't need it," he chastised himself, walking into the main living area. The lighter was still in his pants pocket.

The 'pink' living room was empty. His parents had hired an interior decorator to pick colors for their house. She really loved pink, so now his dad lived in the house by himself with a main living room featuring three shades of pink. "How masculine", Brian said and smirked to himself.

Quick searches of the bathrooms and spare bedrooms revealed nothing either. Brian went to the cabinet above the fridge, where he knew he would find a can of bug spray. He knew if he sprayed that into the open flame of the lighter, he'd have a makeshift flamethrower.

He threw the door to the master bedroom open and leapt inside, holding the can in one hand, lighter in the other, ready to defend himself. "This is ridiculous! I'm jumping at shadows and looking for a needle in a haystack." The room was empty, having no signs of anybody around for days.

The house had a finished walkout basement with a plethora of windows. After he'd gotten married, they'd moved in with his father for a few months and their bedroom had been down there. Every inch of the basement still felt like home as he walked down the stairs. His kids would never play here or anywhere else again. A walkthrough of the basement left him bewildered. "Where the hell is he? At work? Wow, that would be impressive dedication to the job." Brian couldn't help but laugh in spite of himself.

The breeze was refreshing outside as his feet carried him across the parking lot to his work. He'd grabbed a flashlight from the van before he walked over, knowing it would be dark inside with a lack of windows. The front door was unlocked as he expected and he stepped in, brandishing the flashlight in front like a light saber.

The beam shone off wall after wall, looking for something, until Brian stopped cold in his tracks. He could see a figure standing by what had been his father's desk in the darkness.

"Brian ... son, good to see you," the figure said in greeting.

"Cut the shit. We both know you're not my dad. I know what you are."

"You don't know anything, kid. We're far beyond anything your puny mind can comprehend. You only get to see what we allow you to see."

"I know you feed off sexual energy and need it to survive or else you start to decay. I met Leilandra. She told me about the green light and Shalima." Brian tried playing possum, hoping the man would let something slip. He saw the figure's face recoil in shock.

"Leilandra. She told me you'd be coming. If she'd told you about the green light you wouldn't be here, you'd be looking for the source right now." The man paced back and forth in front of the desk, neither advancing nor retreating from his prior position.

"Enlighten me then."

The man laughed at Brian in uproarious guffaws. "You really think you have a chance. We were powerful beyond anything you humans can imagine and it crushed us beneath its might. The elders tricked us. By the time we learned of their deception it was too late."

"So help me fight it, maybe ..."

"No! I'm risking their lives by talking to you now. You know too much. I don't need your energy, their will be many to feast on soon enough. I'll let you go for now. You've angered many of my kind already today. You won't last long."

"Where do I find this green light? Are there others still alive?"

"Listen to the wires in your skull. You can hear them talking, I know you can if you pay attention. When the green light comes, follow it as if you're chasing the pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. It comes from one single source. There are others. Find them and the source of the light."

"Thank you. What's your name?"

"Halperion. If we meet again, I'll have to kill you, so be prepared. Fire is your only friend, Brian. Find the source. Now go." With that, he turned around and sat in the seat behind the desk.

Brian scrambled through the door and back to the safety of his van, buckling the seat belt up and leaving the parking lot like a bat out of hell. His work disappeared in a cloud of dust and he never even considered looking back. His mind was an ocean of ideas floating around trying to piece together the puzzle of what he learned.

* * * *

He drove down the highway passing through small towns and open countryside for what seemed like an eternity. It had taken a half hour before he finally was able to settle his mind from the last confrontation. When he looked through the windshield, he noticed a sign for the small town called Alma. It was a nondescript town with only a few shops on the main road, which he was traveling on.

"Another boring little town. This drive is taking forever."

With no traffic on the road, Brian's concentration had all but lapsed. His vision meandered across the countryside with very little consideration for the barren open road that lay in front of him. He slowed the van to take a right hand turn at the main intersection when he noticed something flash across his peripheral vision.

His attention turned to in front of the van and he slammed his brakes as hard as he could to avoid the girl running across the street. The van swerved and came to a complete stop only a few feet from where she stood. "That was close," Brian admitted to himself, relieved to have avoided an accident.

She stared through the windshield at Brian and he returned her gaze. They stayed that way, eyes interlocked, for a few seconds before he opened the door and got out to greet her. It was hard for Brian to tell much about her the way her oversized Northern Reflections sweatshirt covered her up, but her curves were evident through her ensemble.

"Hey Mister! My eyes are up here. My tits ain't going to shrink just from you staring at em."

Brian tried to respond, flustered and embarrassed at being caught checking out her ample breasts. "Uh ... sorry about that. What the hell were you doing out here? Trying to get us both killed?"

"I saw you coming. I hadn't seen anyone still alive in over a week and figured I'd flag you down. You damn near ran me over. What were you doing in there, watching porn or something."

"No!"

"Well you sure as hell weren't watching the road, that's for sure. So you're going to the city right? Mind some company. I'll even let you stare at my tits if that's your thing."

Brian tried to maintain his composure but the shock of the last week was overwhelming and her boldness shocked him. "Yeah, that's where I'm headed. You can tag along if you want."

She raced around to the passenger side and hopped onto the seat with a bounce. "Well come on, we ain't got all day. I reckon those things won't be napping forever. Let's haul ass!"

Putting the engine back into gear and easing out of town, Brian looked over at the young girl. She was clearly many years younger than he was; he figured she was just out of high school. Her shoulder length auburn hair shimmered in the sunlight. "So what's your name?"

She gave him an irritated glance and softened it into a toothy grin. "Name's Misty. Misty Clark. Yours?"