On Blackened Wings
Michelle Ann King
ON BLACKENED WINGS
A short story
by
Michelle Ann King
‘On Blackened Wings’ is one of 12 short stories of science fiction, fantasy and horror collected in Transient Tales Volume 2.
Bats. The word was inadequate by a dozen orders of magnitude, but there wasn’t a better one. Whatever they were—aliens, demons, creatures from some unknown hell—they weren’t bats. But maybe it was the closest approximation the mind could stand.
Copyright 2013 Michelle Ann King
Table of Contents
Title Page
On Blackened Wings
About the Author
Other Books
On Blackened Wings
THEY’D BEEN DRIVING for at least four hours, maybe five. Dionne’s back ached, her bad knee throbbed and her eyes were dried out and burning. Time to get off the road.
The village was one of the empty ones—creepy, but better than the alternatives. Past the clusters of cottages, the tiny post office and dark stone church, she saw a big white building with wide leaded windows, three tall chimneys and a tangle of ivy climbing the brickwork to a sloping thatched roof. A wooden sign at the front called it The Willow Tree Hotel.
She knew the sort of place it must have been, once. Locals on their regular stools at the bar, visitors driving in for rustic, homely food and pints of amber coloured ale beside the fireplace. Music from a jukebox, maybe a live band on weekends. Good days.
Old days.
Dionne drove into the car park and waited for the others to catch up. For a moment it looked like Julian’s car wasn’t slowing, that he was going to carry on straight past. But at the last minute he turned and screeched through the gate.
Would she have been surprised, if he’d decided to drive on? No. Every time they stopped, she expected to find herself alone. Why should they follow her, these people? She’d survived by nothing but chance—just kept driving past the burning wreck that used to be her home. Her town. Kept driving, fighting panic with speed while the skies boiled. She’d picked up other people along the way, and every time it happened she expected them to laugh at her, demand to know what the hell gave her the right to make decisions for anyone. She’d waited for it, looked forward to it. She still did.
The rest of their pitifully small convoy filed in behind Julian and parked in a huddled group. Rachel helped her brother out of the van and he lifted his head, scenting the air. To Dionne, it smelled like all these places did—flat and stale. Old. Wrong.
Ben stared into the sky, unblinking. She wondered what he saw, with those clouded eyes. And was grateful that she didn’t know.
‘They’re gone,’ he said.
Dionne went around to those still waiting in their cars. ‘It’s clean,’ she said. ‘Let’s get some sleep, and in the morning we’ll stock up.’
Stock up. Such a harmless phrase. As if they were going on a camping trip, instead of looting the possessions of the dead.
The breeze whipped Ben’s hair back, exposing the scars. Julian, walking past with Lucas, shielded the boy’s eyes. Rachel glared at him until Julian turned away from her, too.
Dionne pulled her jacket closed. The wind was always warm now, but somehow it still made everyone shiver. Like the breath of ghosts.
Ben began to hum softly, an old pop song she recognised but couldn’t name. The weight of it, of everything that was gone, sat heavy on her chest. Rock stars and musicals and talent shows, things people did simply because they were fun. Things that had nothing to do with trying to stay alive.
‘It’s not fair,’ she said.
‘No, it isn’t,’ Rachel said, but she was looking at her brother.
‘How’s he doing?’ Dionne asked quietly. She wasn’t the worst off, here. It was a fight to remember that, sometimes, but she kept trying.
Rachel shook her head. ‘I’m worried about what this is doing to him.’ She put her thumb to her mouth, snagged the nail between her teeth. ‘They’re in his head, Dionne. The bats. Can you imagine, just for a second, what that must be like?’
‘No,’ Dionne said. She couldn’t. Didn’t want to.
Bats. The word was inadequate by a dozen orders of magnitude, but there wasn’t a better one. Whatever they were—aliens, demons, creatures from some unknown hell—they weren’t bats. But maybe it was the closest approximation the mind could stand.
‘I’m sorry,’ Dionne said. ‘I know what he’s been through, but we need him.’
Most people didn’t survive, and they’d all marvelled at how lucky Ben was. At first, anyway.
‘But what if it wasn’t always on him, Dionne? What if we could all take a turn?’
‘How could we do that? We’re not...’ she trailed off, groped for something that would not offend. Failed to find it, and went on, simply, ‘Like him.’
Rachel didn’t respond, just hugged herself and pushed her hair out of her eyes. She seemed more hard-edged, more brittle, than usual. How long since she’d slept?
Rachel watched the others shuffle inside the pub, then said, ‘Come on. I’ll show you.’
She opened the van’s back doors and pulled out a large metal toolbox. She flipped back the lid and for a second a humming sound arose, briefly harmonising with Ben.
Inside the box lay a mass of tangled metal and wires, wrapped around something that was twisted and stretched. Something that pulsed, glistening wetly.
Dionne covered her mouth. ‘What the hell is that?’
‘Last time we stopped, there were some... remains. Parts of bodies, parts of a bat. Ben used them to make this. I don’t think I can explain to you how—if I’m honest, I’m not entirely sure I know. But it acts as an external connector—it’ll give the rest of us a way to sense them, just like he can.’
Dionne swiped her forearm across her face, where a film of slick sweat had formed. Her stomach was turning over in loose, lazy rolls.
‘Put it away,’ she said. ‘Now.’
Rachel shot her an angry look. ‘It’s not right to make my brother be the sin eater for us all. We have to help him.’
Dionne held up a hand. ‘I know,’ she said. ‘I know. But—’
‘We have to try, Dionne.’
Dionne shook her head. Did she believe that Rachel and Ben had built some kind of psychic hotline to the bats, out of wires and roadkill? No. Not for a second.
But if, somehow, they really had—did she want to try it out?
Hell, no.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, and stumbled away.
