They weren’t.
19
The whole night had been a nonstop race through the woods. The monsters, faceless but always close, hounded and teased Brandon as he tried to get away, but every time he thought he was free, he would hear them again.
The forest seemed to go on forever. He knew there had to be a road somewhere, something that would lead him to others who could help protect him from the creatures hunting him.
A howl. Not a wolf, but something else, and so, so close.
“No!” he yelled. “No! No!”
His eyes shot open as the final shout woke him from his sleep. For several seconds, the terror of the woods clung to him as if it were the real thing, then it began to fade and the world came back into focus.
He was momentarily confused by how low the ceiling was above him. So low, in fact, he could reach up and easily touch it. But the air was freezing, and the last thing he wanted to do was pull his arm out from under his…sleeping bag?
The fire at the Ranch. The helicopters. Mr. Hayes. Oh, God, Mr. Hayes. The endless hours of trekking through the forest. The house. The garage.
The old station wagon.
Now he remembered, and wasn’t sure which was worse — the nightmare or reality.
Though he hadn’t wanted to expose himself to the frigid air, he had to check the time. If it was late enough, he needed to head out to the safety of the forest. Using the flashlight, he checked his watch.
Eighteen minutes to six a.m. Definitely time to get out of there.
He was about to turn the flashlight off when he realized something was wrong. The door to the car was open. He had shut it when he climbed in. He was sure of it. Had he woken at some point and opened it but didn’t remember? He didn’t think so. He’d never been the kind of person who’d get up during the night and forget about it like a sleepwalker in a movie.
He played the light through the door but didn’t see anything there. Feeling a bit of the panic he’d experienced in his dream, he scrambled out of his sleeping bag and scooted through the car door. He spun around, shining the flashlight through the room. It was exactly as it had been earlier.
Relax. Maybe you just didn’t shut it all the way and it swung open while you were sleeping. Just get your stuff together and get out of here.
After allowing himself another few seconds to calm down, he pulled his sleeping bag out of the car, rolled it up, and tied it to the bottom of his pack. He thought about eating a little bit, but decided that could wait until he was back among the trees.
He pulled his pack over his shoulder and headed for the door, but when he turned the knob the door only opened an inch before stopping. He tried again, and got the exact same results. Something was keeping it from moving any farther.
He looked through a sliver of space between the door and jamb, but it was still too dark outside to see much of anything. Putting his hand over the lens of the flashlight, he aimed it through the opening near the ground and moved it upward, looking for the cause. He found it at about eye level. A closed hinge held in place by a padlock.
He immediately shut the door and stepped back.
They know I’m here.
Whirling around, he looked toward the roll-up door. It was his only option.
There had to be a switch inside somewhere that would open it. It would make a lot of noise, but he didn’t care. He just needed to get out of there.
Usually the switches were near the door people used to walk in and out, in this case the one that had been padlocked. He moved the flashlight beam over the wall near it, but there was nothing that looked even close to what he thought the switch would look like.
He turned in a circle, desperate to find the button. Then, as his gaze passed over the car, he realized he was being an idiot. There would be a remote in the station wagon.
He pulled the driver’s door open and searched around. With a “yes!” he found the device tucked down next to the seat. He climbed back out of the car, and moved as close to the door as possible so he could make a quick escape.
He pointed the remote at the shadowy form of the motor hanging from the middle of the ceiling, and pushed the button.
Nothing happened.
He pushed again, then hit the back of the remote in case the battery wasn’t sitting right. That’s when he noticed the tiny green light next to the button. When he pushed, the light lit up. Apparently the remote was getting power, but it wasn’t turning on the motor.
The only possibilities would be either the motor was busted, or the power to the garage was off. It didn’t matter what the answer was. The problem was the same.
Wait, wasn’t there something about remote doors? Something his father had told him once?
He shined the light on the motor, and saw the wooden handle dangling from a rope a foot below it.
The emergency release!
After dumping his pack on the ground, he climbed onto the roof of the Subaru and stretched as far as he could, but his fingers just barely missed the handle. He hopped down and went to the storage area at the back. Half a minute later, he found a box that he was sure could handle his weight. He lugged it over to the car, and manhandled it onto the roof. Once he climbed back up, he scooted it until it was directly under the handle, and stepped on top.
This time he had no problem reaching the piece of wood. He pulled it down as hard as he could. There was a groan and a pop, then the door moved upward an inch or so.
Relieved, he jumped down and raced to the exit. Putting his hands underneath the door, he was able to easily raise it enough to get out. The noise was loud, but probably less than it would have been with the motor.
He pushed his bag outside, snaked through the opening, and stood up.
Keep moving. Get to the woods!
He picked up his pack and started to pull it on.
“You’re pretty smart for a kid.”
The voice belonged to a woman who couldn’t have been more than twenty feet away. Brandon turned slowly toward her, but all he could see was a shadow where she stood.
“Find everything in there you wanted?”
“What?” Brandon said. “I didn’t take anything. I was just—”
“Right. You left everything there.”
“Check for yourself. The only things I have are what I came with. I just wanted someplace where I could get out of the cold and sleep.”
“Then why didn’t you just knock on our door?”
“Because it was late,” he said quickly. “I didn’t want to disturb you.”
“Because you wanted to see what was in the garage.”
“No! I told you. I just wanted to sleep.”
The flashlight beam swayed just enough to the side that he could see the barrel of a rifle.
“Please,” he said. “I’m just trying to get to the highway, that’s all. I didn’t take anything from you. Please, just let me go, okay?”
“Not okay,” she said. “Before we let you do anything, we need to make sure we get all our stuff back.”
Brandon took the pack off and held it out toward her. “You want to check? Okay, check. There’s nothing there.”
“Oh, we’ll check. But first we need to do something about you.”
Sometime during the night, the icebreaker Danus Marko moved out from under the storm into a slightly less rough, open sea. Ash was unaware of this, though. After his radio conversation with Matt, he’d been given a meal and had fallen back into a deep sleep from which even the rising and falling and rolling of the ship couldn’t wake him.