Creepers (17 page)

It was so incredible; he thought, and wondered how the vines could be doing this.  Yancy wondered if this was happening or it was just some impossible nightmare.  That’s when the pain reminded him that this was no dream.  Enduring unimaginable suffering, Yancy lay in the kudzu and was slowly being dissolved.  Eventually, he was rewarded with the bliss that only unconsciousness could provide.  Either from the pain, the paralytic or the damage the vines were doing to his body, Yancy passed out.

***

“I was sure I heard something out here,” Terri said as she walked to the edge of the porch.

“I heard it too,” Jack affirmed, “around this side of the house.”  He pulled his flashlight from his belt and switched it on.  The bright beam cut through the blackness and found a car parked on the far side of the church parking lot.

“That’s Yancy’s car,” Terri said.  “What’s it doing here?”

“Are you sure?” Jack asked as he panned the light to the side of the house where they were certain they had heard a noise.

“Yes.” She said softly as she followed the beam of light with her eyes.  As they scanned the side of the house, Terri noticed movement all the way down at the end of the building.  Jack had noticed it too and focused his light on it.  It seemed that the kudzu was undulating.  Curious, Terri stepped off the porch and started in the direction of the motion. 

Jack grabbed her arm and said “let me go.  You wait here.”

Terri began to protest and thought better of it.  “Be careful.” She said.  She watched as Jack made his way around the edge of the vines to get as close as he could before he was forced to enter them. 

“There’s definitely something big moving around out here,” Jack said as came within ten feet of the surging mass.

“What is it?”

“I’m not sure,” Jack said, “but it’s big.”  He scanned the mass with his light and the beam found a bloodied hand sticking out from the vines.  Jack dropped his flashlight and waded into the vines.  Immediately he was hit with the same odor he had smelled in Sheila’s bedroom.  It was earthy and acidic, with a sweet note that he only now identified as kudzu blossoms.  The further into the vines he waded, the more acidic the smell became.

“There’s a person under here!” Jack called out.  He pulled a folding knife from his pocket and opened it up.  With its razor sharp five inch blade, Jack began to hack through the vines.  Knee deep in the kudzu, Jack managed to cut away enough of the vegetation that he could tell that it was Yancy Clower.  He was bloodied from cuts and gashes, some of them bleeding profusely, but he appeared to be alive.

Jack grabbed him by the exposed hand and his now freed arm and tried to yank him out, but Yancy didn’t move.  The vines were too entangled around the rest of him.  Jack started hacking at the vines again to try and free Yancy, and eventually he freed his torso and the other arm.  Jack grabbed Yancy by both hands and pulled, but he only managed to move him a couple of feet.  By this time, Terri had come up behind him and picked up the flashlight he had dropped.

She shone the light on Yancy’s face and let out a gasp.  “What can I do?” she asked with alarm.

“Nothing,” Jack barked, “and stay out of the vines!”  With urgency, he renewed his hacking at the kudzu and managed to free more of Yancy.  Jack was working on the vines wrapped around Yancy’s legs and noticed that his own arms and hands were starting to get small cuts on them.  Working frantically now, Jack barely noticed that his cuts were burning.   Nor did he notice the vines that were slowly encircling his own legs.

Terri kept the light focused on where Jack could see what he was doing.  She knew it must be a trick of the light, but it seemed to her that the vines were moving.  They seemed to be covering Yancy nearly as fast as Jack could remove them.  It was impossible, she knew, but that was how it seemed.  It was then that she saw the vines slowly wrapping themselves around Jack’s lower legs and panicked.

“Jack, get out of there!” she yelled.  “The vines are moving!”

“I’ve almost got him,” Jack replied as he dropped the knife into his shirt pocket and hooked a hand under each of Yancy’s arms.  Jack gave a mighty tug and fell backward, carrying Yancy with him.  The vines had held Jacks feet firm, and he had fallen on his back into the grass, just out of the kudzu.  Yancy’s limp form landed on top of him, and it knocked the wind out of Jack.  He immediately tried to push Yancy off to the side, but found it increasingly difficult to move.

Jack managed to roll Yancy off to the side.  With great difficulty, he sat up and tried to scoot backward out of the vines.  “Get Yancy,” he mumbled to Terri.  His tongue was thick, and his mouth didn’t want to work.  Jack tried to talk again, but nothing came out this time.  So he focused his efforts on backing away from the kudzu.

“I have him,” Terri said as she pulled Yancy away from the vines.  Trying to remain calm, she quelled the panic in her throat the best she could and said “move it Jack.”  That’s when Terri looked over and saw that Jack was just sitting there, his feet slowly being wrapped up by the vines.  She dropped Yancy and returned to Jack.  He was barely moving, and the panic welled up in her again.

Terri grabbed the knife from Jack’s pocket and started cutting the vines wrapped around his legs.  Without touching the plant, she managed to cut the bulk of the tendrils free.  Terri gripped Jack’s hands and pulled as hard as she could.  Slowly, Terri managed to move Jack.  He helped as best he could, but he had no strength or coordination.  She would move him a foot or two and then have to go back and cut a vine or two that had reached out to him.  Similarly, Terri had to do the same to Yancy.

As incredible as it was, the vines were moving towards the two men.  Eventually, Terri was able to move both of them out into the middle of the yard.  Far enough away from the kudzu that she figured she had time to go and get Jesse.  As reticent as she was to leave Jack, Terri knew that she needed help.  Her strength was nearly spent, and she needed to get them into the house.  Terri kissed Jack on the forehead and ran to the porch.

It was a very strange sensation; Jack decided.  Every part of his body felt as if it were weighed down by lead.  It took every ounce of strength he had, and every bit of focus he could muster just to move his hand a few inches.  He wanted to scream for Terri to get out of there, but he couldn’t seem to form the words.  In fact, his mouth didn’t seem to work at all, no matter how much he focused on that.  Another interesting item was that his eye movement was extremely sluggish, and blinking was a near impossibility.

With great effort, he managed to watch Terri as she struggled to move both Yancy and him to safety.  He tried to help; it was just that his body didn’t want to react to the commands he was giving it.  The other interesting sensation that Jack noticed was that he could hear and feel everything.  In fact, these senses seemed to be almost heightened.  That was when he noticed the burning pain on his hands and arms and ankles.  Jack knew that he was somehow being paralyzed, but he didn’t understand how.

Eventually, Terri stopped moving him.  She kissed him on the forehead and disappeared around the corner of the house.  Jack was on his back, laying in the yard and staring up at the sky.  He could hear the rustling of the leaves and knew the vines were coming after him.  He could just feel it.  He wasn’t sure how far away he was, but for Jack it wasn’t far enough.  For the first time in a very long time, fear found its way into Jack’s mind.

He heard excited voices coming from the house and knew that Terri was getting help.  In the dark pit of fear in the back of his mind, he hoped it would be soon enough.  Inching closer to him, Jack could hear the vines.  Their leaves rustled and scratched at the ground.  He wondered how close they were now, and panic began to surge in him.  Try as he might, Jack couldn’t seem to calm himself down.  The panic wanted to overwhelm him.  If only he could move.

***

Terri ran into the house screaming Jesse’s name.  By the time she made it to his bedroom door, Jesse had emerged wearing a bathrobe.  “Hurry,” Terri exclaimed, “I need your help!”

“What is it child?” Jesse asked concerned.

“Hurry Jesse, you have to help me.  Jack needs your help.”

“Slow down Terri.” Jesse tried to be calming.

“No time,” Terri interrupted, “I need you out in the yard right now.”

Jesse saw the panic on Terri’s face and said “Okay, I’m right behind you.”  As he began to follow Terri through the house, he asked, “What’s happened?”

“No time,” Terri managed, “got to get to Jack and Yancy.”

“Yancy,” Jesse asked as they came onto the front porch, “what’s Yancy doing here?”

Terri ignored Jesse and ran toward the two men lying in the grass.  Jesse was right behind her.  Terri passed Jack and continued on to Yancy.  He had been closer to the vines, and he was much lighter than Jack.  Terri knew she needed Jesse’s strength to help Jack.  As much as she wanted to be there with him, she knew that this was the right thing to do.  “Help Jack!” she blurted out as she passed him.  “I’ve got to help Yancy.  We need to move them as quickly as we can.  We need to move them away from the vines!”

Jesse didn’t quite understand what was going on, but he knew Terri.  He also saw the two men lying unconscious on the ground.  No, not unconscious Jesse decided.  However, they weren’t moving.  “I’ve got him Terri,” Jesse reported as he grabbed Jack by the hands and started to drag the heavy man around toward the front porch.

“Please get him into the house Jesse,” Terri begged.  “I’ll get Yancy.”  She reached down to grab Yancy by the hands just as a creeping vine found his foot.  Terri yanked as hard as she could and managed to move him before the vine had a chance to encircle anything.  She gave another hard tug and Yancy’s left hand came off in her own.  Terri fell backward and landed hard on her butt on the ground.  She gave out a scream as she looked down and saw that she was holding Yancy’s severed hand.  Terri couldn’t tell in the dark and beneath the blood, but it had been cut and dissolved to the bone all the way around the wrist.

Terri screamed once more and threw the hand aside.  She scrambled backward on her hands and feet and was about to scream a third time but caught herself.  She saw the vines inching toward Yancy, and it forced the panic out of her before it could grip her.  Terri clambered back to Yancy and grabbed his right hand and left forearm.  Struggling, Terri dragged Yancy a few feet and then paused.  The vines had found the hand she had tossed aside and were engulfing it.  Mesmerized, Terri watched as the vines cocooned Yancy’s hand and then started dragging it back to the larger mass of kudzu.

The ever creeping vines had found Yancy’s foot again, and urgency resurfaced in Terri.  She drug him a few more feet away but then had to stop to regain a little strength before she continued.  This process went on for an eternity, move a few feet and then rest.  Move him a few more feet, and pause again.  By the time she had made it to the front porch, she was exhausted.  With her strength spent, Terri called out for Jesse again.  She looked back at the vines; they seemed to be moving nearly as fast as she was and were only a few yards behind her.  Terri noted that they seemed to be following the blood trail that Yancy was leaving.

“Jesse,” she called out, “can you help me with Yancy?  I can’t move him anymore.”

Even as she finished saying it, Jesse had emerged from the house.  “Go into the house.” He said.  “Go see about Jack.  I have this.  Then maybe you can tell me what’s going on here.”

Terri only nodded.  She quickly returned to the house where she found Jack laid out on the sofa.  She checked his pulse and his breathing; they seemed good as far as she knew.  She looked down at Jack and held his hand.  Terri watched as a tear rolled down the side of his face.  Softly, she said, “You’re safe Jack.”

Jack managed to look up into Terri’s eyes.  He saw the panic there ebbing away, and it began to calm him as well.  He felt her holding his hand, and he wanted to hold her, to thank her, but all he could do was lay there like a lump.  Well, not entirely he decided.  Jack focused, and he was able to squeeze Terri's hand lightly back.  She smiled at him.

Just then, Jesse barged through the door with Yancy draped over one shoulder.  He made it over beside the sofa and let Yancy drop gently to the floor.  “He’s in a bad way,” Jesse managed between deep breaths.  He sat on the floor beside Yancy and looked the man over.  His left hand was missing, and he had cuts all over him.  Some were superficial, but some were quite deep, and all of them were bleeding.  His face and his arms appeared to have been badly burned, and there were even some patches of skin missing.

There were remnants of the vines that Jack had cut through still wrapped around Yancy’s legs and Jesse reached over to remove them.  Terri stopped him by grabbing his arm.  He was so engrossed in the man lying on the floor he hadn’t even noticed her come up beside him.  Startled, Jesse looked up at Terri.

“Don’t touch that,” She said.  “We’ve got to get some water.” Terri directed.  “We’ve got to get water and rinse these wounds as quickly as we can.”

“Shouldn’t we call an ambulance?” Jesse asked.

“Yes, we will.  But first we need to get these wounds rinsed with water.” Terri responded.  Then she added “and don’t touch them with your bare skin.  If you’ve touched them where they’re cut, you need to rinse it off immediately.”  Terri hurried to the kitchen and ran the tap.  She washed her hands thoroughly.

“Why,” Jesse asked as he followed her into the kitchen, “what is it?”  He followed her example and washed his hands as well.  Jesse was rinsing his neck and shoulder where he had carried the men before Terri responded.

“I think it’s a paralytic agent of some sort.” She finally said, “That and some kind of acid or enzyme.”  She started filling a large pot with water and grabbed a dish towel.  “We need to clean them up as soon as possible,” She continued.  “We need to get as much of it off of them as we can.  Then we can call for an ambulance.”

“Okay girl,” Jesse said, “don’t wait for me.  I’ll be there in a minute.”

Terri took her pot of water and knelt down on the floor beside Yancy.  His breathing was labored and raspy, and he was unconscious.  Gently but thoroughly Terri washed his cuts and open wounds, frequently rinsing the dish towel in the water.  Soon the water was pink, and she returned to the kitchen to dump it and get fresh water.  While she was doing that, Jesse was now working on Yancy.  The two of them continued this process until the water stayed largely free of blood, and then Terri turned her attention to Jack.

Although he was not in nearly as bad shape as Yancy, Terri took a goodly amount of time to clean his wounds.  Jack only had cuts on his hands and arms, and none of them was really very deep.  He also didn’t seem to have any chemical burns the way Yancy did.  Terri noticed that Jack seemed to be moving his eyes a little more than before, and she remembered how he had squeezed her hand slightly.  Satisfied that he was slowly recovering, she stood and turned her attention back to Yancy.

That was when she heard it, a light scratching on the walls.  Like that of tree branches being blown against the side of the house.  It had been so chaotic and noisy in the house since this began than no one had noticed it.  Shivers ran down Terri’s spine, and her skin broke out in gooseflesh.  She turned and looked out the window on the side of the house, and it was a writhing mass of green.  Terri let out a slight gasp as she watched the vines wriggle and coil at the window pane.  It was as if they were searching for a way inside.

Once again mesmerized by the plants, Terri stood there listening.  She followed the scratching sound all along that side of the house.  The more she listened for it, the more it seemed to be coming from the entire wall.  From the floor to the ceiling the scratching filled the wall on the side of the house.  Then Terri remembered how the vines seemed to be following the blood trail that Yancy had left, and she turned to face the front wall. 

The scratching was there as well.  Although it was not as high on the wall, it was louder.  Terri saw that the front windows and door were open with only their screens between the vines and them.  She immediately moved to close them all.  Terri looked out the screen door before she pulled the front door shut and locked it.  She could see the blood trail disappear into the darkness of the front porch, but nothing else.  Next she slid the sash closed on the windows on either side of the front door, and latched them. 

The vines were only at the window sill on the left side and just starting to test the screen.  Terri brought her hands up to her face and backed away from the window.  She backed right into Jesse.  He was barely aware of Terri walking to the front windows; he was so engrossed in caring for Yancy.  When Terri backed into him, they both jumped with a start.

“We need to hurry,” Terri said as she looked down at Jesse.  Jesse only nodded.

Terri saw that Jesse had bandaged the stub where Yancy’s hand had been.  He had moved on to some of the worst remaining wounds; so Terri bent down to help him.  That was when she saw that several of the wounds around his left arm and one leg were to the bone, and it made her gag.  Jesse was now using the dish towel to try and stop the flow of blood from those wounds.  He saw the look on Terri’s face and said “Go and get me some more towels.  I need to stop this bleeding.”

Terri was grateful for the diversion.  She went to the linen closet and retrieved all of the white towels she could find, and even a jar of burn cream.  She didn’t know if it would help or not, but it was something.  Back at Jesse’s side, she placed the stack of towels between them.  “Here you go,” She said.  “What can I do?”

“See what you can do for his face child,” Jesse said, “I’ll see what I can do down here.”

Terri had been avoiding it as long as she could, but couldn’t any longer.  She moved up beside Yancy’s head and leaned over him.  His face was raw and swollen and weeping.  Much of the skin was missing.  He had no lips, and his teeth hung out of his mouth like some twisted skeleton Halloween decoration.  One eyeball was hanging by the optic nerve and muscles, and the other eye was swollen shut.

Terri’s dinner tried to work its way out of her, but she swallowed it back down.  She would not allow herself to vomit, not now.  Yancy needed her.  She had to be strong for him.  She had to be stronger than she ever had before.  Resolved, Terri opened up the jar of burn cream and dug her fingers into it.  She used up the entire jar as she gently applied it to Yancy’s ruined face.  Then she tore a couple of towels into strips and bandaged up his head as best she could.

Terri was careful to leave his nose and what was left of his mouth as clear as possible so that he could breathe.  His breathing was raspy and wet, but he was breathing at least.  Terri tied off the bandages and already they were turning yellow from the body fluids soaking into them.  She looked at Yancy with pity in her eyes, and then it suddenly turned into anger. 

“What the hell were you doing out there Yancy?” she asked, even though she expected no answer.  Then Terri realized she was just angry at the situation, and not really mad at Yancy.  Terri stood, still looking at Yancy.  She felt Jesse’s hand on her shoulder, and she turned into him.  She rested her face in Jesse’s chest and began to cry.  Jesse wrapped his other arm around Terri and gently patted her back.

“There, there,” Jesse consoled.  “You just get it all out child.  As soon as you’re done we can call an ambulance.  They’re both safe now Terri.  You just take your time and collect yourself.”