Cowboys, Trucks, and Bad Luck (Part II)

Brown looked down at his dying friend. After letting his smoking pistol topple form his fumbling fingers, Glen ignored the hole in his cheek and focused on the violent bite that had been taken out of his neck. After a moment’s hesitation, Brown hurried to his friend’s aid.

But Glen pushed him away with a bloody left hand. “Forget about me.  Grab my pistol. Figure out what’s going on. I thought I heard more of those freaks.”
Brown noticed how his fingers trembled as he picked up the slick pistol. Seconds later, Nick and Trevor came running up to him.
“I heard a shot,” the old trucker yelled before the pair had even gotten within thirty feet of them. “Oh my God! What happened?” He eyed the pistol and then the dead man who lay between the cowboys and the gas pumps. “Trev, call 911,” he ordered.

The teen had his smart phone out and was already making the call. “It’s not working. It’s busy or something.”
“That’s impossible,” his uncle insisted.
“Never mind that,” Brown said quickly. “Something weird is going on. There’s no one in the gas station. Nick help Glen. Trevor keep trying.”
Nick leaned down over Glen. “Crap this is real bad. Brown, he has already lost consciousness.”
“Well then fucking help him!” Brown yelled. “Trevor you—Look out!”
The teen cried out as a figured appeared from behind the pumps and pulled his head back by his hair. His phone hit the ground and bounced twice. Trevor fought back as Brown moved to his aid.
Like with Glen, the thing moved in and tried to bite the young man. This stopped when Brown planted strong kick to the man’s midsection. The figure fell back, but Trevor cried out again when it took a fistful of his long hair with him.
Brown still had his pistol in his hand, but felt unsure about shooting a man. That was until he got a good look at the thing, for it appeared more thing than man. What once might have been a middle aged trucker, now only possessed half a face. The rest was a red ruin of tattered flesh and gleaning bone. Much of its left hand and arm had been stripped away leaving little more than a gory skeleton.

“Shot it,” Nick screamed. “Shoot the fucking thing!”
Brown took a deep breath and then brought up the gun. He steadied it. “Stop or I’ll…” but he never finished for the bloody trucker’s moan was unlike anything he had ever heard and without conscious thought, Brown fired a bullet into the center of the man’s chest.

It kept coming.
“Holy hell,” Trevor gasped.
But then Nick was screaming again, but this was a different kind.
Brown looked on, in utter horror, as his best friend jerked forward and took a bite out of Nick’s forearm.
Nick started to swear, but it didn’t last long for two more figures emerged from the darkness behind the trailer and grabbed the back of the trucker’s shirt. Before Brown could even shout a warning, they had already joined Glen in the gruesome feast.

Brown wanted to help, but the one that he had already shot lurched in and grabbed for his face. The cowboy ducked down, dodged away, and turned just in time to see Trevor snatch up his smart phone and then take off running.
“Trevor wait!” he shouted after him.
“Screw that, they’re both dead,” he yelled without slowing. “Must be a nuclear leak or something. We need to get out of here!”

Brown wanted to stay, but saw that another two bloody forms came at them from down the road to the north. Nick had already stopped moving and when the one he had shot came at him again, Brown took off running after the teen.

To be continued next Saturday!


You can find out more about Brown and the Eternal Aftermath here!