“Look, across the street in the clearing,” Alice said, half guiding, half shoving him to the window. Quinn stepped close to the sill and gazed out into the night. At first he saw nothing, but then movement snagged his attention, flitting in and out of the shadows in the meadow before the neighboring street.
A pair of figures ran, except ran was the wrong word—they hobbled. And after a second of scrutinizing, Quinn saw they were elderly, their hair reflecting gray as they passed through shafts of streetlight, their steps unsure and slowed by the fact that they were holding hands.
“Oh no,” Quinn said, squinting, trying to see through the gloom.
The couple kept looking over their shoulders as they stumbled on, and that’s when the first stilt stepped from between the trees behind them. It was hunched over, as if arthritic, but still loomed well above the two people that scurried away from it. It made the deep burping sound that now brought the image of a thick swamp filled with reptilian life to Quinn’s mind. To the right, ahead of the couple, a loud bark came from the darkness and then a second stilt moved into view, this one much taller than the first, and healthy looking. It took a step toward the people, its thin arms stretching out wide as if to accept them into an embrace. It may have been a trick of the light, but Quinn could’ve sworn he saw a cruel smile flash across its misshapen face.
“They’re trapped,” Quinn said, gripping his rifle. “We have to do something.”
Alice latched onto his arm as he tried to turn away from the window.
“Stop. Look,” she said, pointing to the left.
Two more stilts approached from the end of the street, their long gaits pulling them toward the couple in flowing strides. Another appeared from behind the house to their right, unnervingly close and so tall it could have easily looked into the window they gazed out of.
Quinn leaned back from the glass, the sight of the stilt closest to them sending a freezing lance through his spine. They were so quiet. The elderly couple were in the center of the clearing now, the man’s arm tight around the woman’s shoulders. She was crying, long pitiful sobs of the hopeless that slid in through the windowpane. Slowly she sank to her knees, the man unable to hold her up any longer. He drew out something that glinted in the low light, bracing it with both hands at the hunched over monster closest to them.
A tongue of flame leapt from the pistol in his hands, and the stilt shaped like a question mark, straightened up and threw its head back. A deep howl of pain came from its mouth and it began clawing at its chest, but it walked on, closing the distance between it and the man. He fired again, this time at one of the stilts approaching from the left, but he must have missed since they barely broke their long strides and neither of them cried out. A warbling hiss, that sounded something like a cicada in the hottest part of summer, came from the rest of the monsters, the circle formed by their number growing closer, tighter, like a noose around the couple. The woman moaned, and Quinn could make out interspersed words of prayer between sobs. The man spun in a circle, aiming at each stilt but not pulling the trigger.
“We have to help them,” Quinn said, beginning to ease the window open.
“Stop. We can’t; there’s too many. Besides, the shots will attract more of them.” When he started to protest again, she squeezed his forearm. “We don’t have scopes on these. We’ll miss in the dark and they’ll overwhelm us. They’ll get inside. They’ll get Ty.” Quinn’s mouth opened to argue, but the pleading look on her face was like a shadow all its own.
Another gunshot pulled their attention back to the meadow. The injured stilt had been shot again and fallen. It crawled forward like some extended insect searching for a carcass to invade. The rest of the creatures didn’t appear to be afraid of the man or his weapon in the least. They moved closer, cinching the circle smaller until they were almost in reaching distance.