“How did you find us?” Sineada finally managed to say.
Alan looked at her querulously for a moment but then glanced over at Mia. Sineada knew what he was implying but was still amazed. Who knew what other amazing gifts her great-granddaughter didn’t share with her abuela?
• • •
Big Time knew he was out of time, but he tried the cab door one last time anyway. Still locked.
“Hell’s bells,” he whispered.
Swiveling around in the water, he tried the passenger side door on the truck right next to him, but it was also locked. The pounding on the garage door was only getting louder as the metal began to give way. Big Time knew it was only seconds before the sludge worm got through.
As there were two trucks on either side of him, he knew the odds were even as to whether he’d find an unlocked door if he cut left or cut right. He also knew that if he chose wrong, there’d be no do-overs.
He cut left, came around the truck with the locked passenger side door, and tried the driver’s side door.
Locked.
As he turned to check the passenger door on the third truck, he heard the garage door finally give way. It splashed down into the flooded loading dock, sending waves under the trucks.
“It’s coming!” Zakiyah cried from the roof. “Get out of there!”
He grabbed the passenger door handle. Also locked.
“Shit!”
Out of options, Big Time scampered up the short ladder to the truck’s cab. He grabbed the smokestack and tried to lift himself out of the water and onto the roof of the cab. With only one arm, this proved near impossible until he got stable footing on the air brake hose. Launching himself upwards, he half-climbed, half-jumped out of the water and caught the side of the cab’s air dam.
“Gotcha!”
He was completely out of the water but saw three of the sludge worm tendrils cutting through the muck straight for him. He scrambled over the air dam until he was wholly on top of the cab, six feet out of the water.
It did no good.
As soon as the sludge worms reached the truck, the attendant poltergeist force hit him at chest-level, crushing all of the air out of his chest and throwing him in the water for the second time in as many minutes. It was shallow where he landed, which helped him get back to his feet. The first thing he saw were the tendrils of black coming up from under the tractor trailer to finish him off.
Still dazed, he turned and, believing it to be his last act, tried the driver’s side door of the truck he’d just tumbled off.
When it opened, his entire body reacted on instinct. Throwing it wide, Big Time launched himself in just as the first sludge worm lunged for him. He rolled over on the seat but found his right leg being tugged backwards. One of the tendrils had his foot and was already eating through his shoe.
That’s when he shot a hand under the seat, pulled out an aerosol can of WD-40, and flipped Scott’s lighter out of his pocket. The lighter flicked to life on the first try, and Big Time hit the button on the can.
Fire flashed through the cab, burning Big Time’s fingers but also his pants leg and shoe. The real damage, however, was to the sludge worm. Whereas the aerosol propellant ignited and was gone the second it burned off, the flames only had to touch the tentacle attached to Big Time’s foot to set it ablaze.
The tendril recoiled immediately, freeing itself from Big Time’s foot and sinking back into the water. The big man didn’t think twice before reaching over and slamming the cab door shut. He flopped back down on the seat, breathing heavily but not ready to assess his pain as he awaited his fate. A second later, the invisible force that had tackled him off the cab roof began banging on the side of the cab with such ferocity that it rose off its wheels on one side. When it came back down, it kicked up waves of water that splashed high on the window and windshield.
After three or four of these attacks, Big Time figured he was momentarily safe and brought himself into a seated position. His arm was broken, his fingers and a strip of flesh on his leg were scorched, but it didn’t look like the sludge had gotten through his shoe, though the sole was almost completely burned away.
He was alive and safe. He’d escaped the sludge worms three times now.
No. He’d escaped twice, but he’d beaten them once.
The battering against the cab grew stronger, but the safety-glass windows refused to shatter. Big Time took one more deep breath, reached into the console between the seats, and popped four of the ever-present Advil he knew drivers kept there in case they’d accidentally overdone it on the ephedrine. Having had to drive these rigs one or twice, generally just to rearrange them in the loading dock, Big Time knew the keys would be in the dashboard ashtray. He plucked them out, inserted them in the ignition, and waited for the little red bulb on the diesel’s dash to glow to life, indicating the battery was warmed up.
It took only a second, but now was the moment of truth. He turned the key the rest of the way, and the engine sputtered and chugged but didn’t turn over.
“Fuck.”
He tried the key again but got more of the same. The front of the truck was the least submerged part of the vehicle, and by his estimates, Big Time figured the engine block was still above the waterline. That said, he had no idea how much might’ve splashed up from the undercarriage.
He didn’t have to look in the side mirror to be reminded that he had three others and perhaps more with their hopes pinned to him. That’s
