Suddenly, Alex stood up. Not hurt, not scared, not bleeding, just dirty and surprised.
“What the hell are—?” she screamed, her tone now one of frustration.
“There’s a kid,” Alex said, looking down to the boxes.
“What? What? A kid?”
“Yeah,” Alex said, crouching to the floor. “A little kid.”
“What’s happening?” David called from the stairs.
“Where’s Alex?” Kaitlyn asked, from the level above.
“He’s here,” Nicole yelled back, still unsure of the situation. She slowly worked her way behind the boxes, careful not to fall into them. When she saw Alex crouched over something, she shone the light onto ... a boy. A young boy. Around the same age as Ryan, she guessed. Great, someone else to take care of. But something was wrong. Something was off. She crouched low, next to Alex, making eye contact with him before she moved a little closer.
The boy was filthy. Covered in mud and blood and the black stuff they had regrettably seen so much of over the past week; all over his arms, his legs, his head, his clothes. His clothes were tatters. His face was blank. He had no expression at all. For a moment, she thought he looked dead.
He is dead.
“Oh, my God,” she said, scrambling to her feet. “Alex! Get away from him!”
Alex jumped, surprised by her sudden movement. “What? What happened?” he asked, frantically looking around.
Nicole kept the light on the little boy. “He’s ... one of them!”
“One of what?” he said, looking the boy over to see what Nicole was talking about.
“A mudman!”
Alex turned to her. “He is not.” He crouched back down to the boy.
“What are you doing?!” Nicole shouted, as she tugged Alex back up by his shirt collar.
“Ow!” Alex yelled. “What are you doing?”
“I’m saving your life, stupid! That thing—”
“It’s a kid!” Alex said, laughing at her. “Jeez, Nicole. It’s just a kid. Chill out, will ya?” He crawled back to the boy, rubbing his neck where his collar had just dug in.
“How do you know?” she asked, genuine fear in her voice.
“Well, for one,” Alex started, “he’s not trying to kill us. The mudmen that we have seen tried to kill us. Like you said, it’s their thing.”
For a moment Nicole’s fear was replaced by anger as Alex used her own words against her. She hated when people did that.
“Also,” he continued, reaching back, “gimme the flashlight.”
“No,” she said, gripping the light tightly, “you’re going crazy!”
“I am not,” he replied. “Just gimme the flashlight.”
She tossed it to him, not wanting to get too close to the little dead boy or Alex. Maybe he’s turning into one of them, too.
“Look at his eyes,” Alex said, shining the light into the boy’s face.
The boy stared forward, into space. He didn’t blink or flinch.
“They look pretty dead to me!” she replied, pulling even farther away from the two boys she now feared.
“Yeah, they look dead,” Alex agreed, “but they’re not. They’re just, like, somewhere else.”
“What?”
“The mudmen—their eyes,” Alex began explaining, “they’re white, all white, right?”
Nicole thought back to the creatures she had seen far too much of over the past few days. “Yeah,” she replied, “mostly.”
“Well, there are the ones with no eyes at all,” Alex said, “but they don’t count. This kid—his eyes are just ... I dunno. It’s like he’s in a trance or something.”
With only Alex and the boy visible to her in the darkness, she thought about what Alex said. She took a breath and said, “Can I have the flashlight back, please?”
He handed it to her.
She shone the light into the boy’s face and realized that, yes, though his eyes were not reacting to the world around him, they were not actually dead. She examined him a little bit closer.
“You probably should have mentioned that he was breathing,” she said.
“I didn’t even notice,” he said, looking at the boy. “Oh, hey, he is! Good thing, huh?”
Nicole shone the light back in his face. “You’re an idiot.” She stood up. “David!”
“What?” David replied from behind them. “What’s happening? Is there a kid or something?”
“David, your powers of detection are incredible, really. Get over here so we can help this kid upstairs.”
“Why do you need help?” David asked, a little closer than before. “What’s wrong with him?”
Nicole looked back at the little boy that Alex was whispering to in hopes of getting any response. The kid just stared at nothing. “I dunno,” she said. “Something.”
Moving the kid wasn’t actually as hard as Nicole initially expected. He was very frail. He was probably very small even before all this started. As she looked him over, she wondered how long he had been down there. How long was he on his own? How had he survived?
Cats don’t scatter what they eat, but a kid might.
Nicole and Alex dragged the boy between them, following David with the flashlight. The boy’s expression still hadn’t changed, as if he didn’t notice anything was happening to him at all.
“Give the flashlight to someone at the door,” Nicole said to David at the bottom of the stairs. “Kaitlyn. Give it to Kaitlyn. Take Hannah upstairs and get some mats ready for this kid to lie down, okay?”
“Sure,” David said. “Food, too?”
“Yeah, good.”
The stairs were more of a challenge. Making the boy lift his leg high enough to go up even one became almost impossible. Not only was he weak, he was also very stiff.
“Why don’t we just carry him?” Alex asked.
“Because, if he can do at least a little bit of walking,” Nicole replied, “then that’s a good sign. He needs to move if he can, or he’ll lock up or something.”
“But,” Alex looked at the boy between them, “does this really count?”
Nicole didn’t answer. She could force the boy to move his legs just enough to get up the stairs. Maybe they would carry him up to the second floor, but to get to the first floor he had to help.
“He doesn’t look good,” Kaitlyn said when they eventually reached the door.
“No crap,” Nicole said. “Keep the light on the hall
