1.2 Crappy Monday

Everyone was paralyzed by the unexpected scene.

Except me. My singular thought was, survive!

I bid my folded bike goodbye and rushed to the next train car, shifting my backpack to the front as a shield. I weaved through the people standing on the aisle. I had a couple of seconds lead before someone screamed, “Adumbrae!”

And all hell broke loose.

I got shoved hard against a pole by some idiot. My backpack protected me. Guess it was a frontpack now if that was even a word. A monster was on the train but my brain couldn’t help but think of random thoughts. I flipped through memories of the videos we were forced to watch in school, from elementary up to college, about what to do when an Adumbrae appeared.

Don’t panic. I wasn’t panicking. Run to safety. I was jostling instead of running. Where the fuck was safety supposed to be? We were inside a train inside a tunnel. Hide and find cover. Hide under the seats? Cover myself with what?

A large man pushed me aside in his desperate escape. I lost my footing, tangled my legs with others, and tumbled to the floor. I shielded my head with my arms and switched my frontpack back to a backpack. What a sentence! I was amazed at what my brain could come up with as feet stomped me. I ignored the pain and continued to crawl on my elbows, keeping myself small as I followed the strips of lines along the aisle to know I was moving straight.

“Argh!”

“No! No! No!”

“Mother Core, help us!”

Yells above me.

I pushed on with my best worm impression. Bright red splattered the floor. Plops of pinkish bits followed. Flesh? Was that an eye? I glanced up. Tentacles tore the people standing. That was what they got for pushing me down.

Crawl, crawl, crawl! I ignored the rain of blood and gore. Most people remained standing even if they had died, falling onto others instead of the ground. I could barely make sense of how, but I managed to emerge from the pile-up that clogged the way to the next train car.

The people there were confused but hadn’t fled yet. Some were backing away. Others took pictures with their phones. One loudly asked if a movie was being filmed. As I ran past, a few followed without knowing what was going on. They asked me but I didn’t answer. The more people who didn’t run, the more meat shields between me and danger.

“Is that blood on you, dearie?” a concerned granny asked.

“An Adumbrae attack!” yelled someone behind.

This train car erupted into panic too. Once again, I was squished by humanity. An asshole elbowed my face. Teary-eyed from the pain, I grabbed his collar and yanked him, putting my weight behind the pull. As he tipped back, I braced my foot behind his feet to outbalance him. That actually worked and he fell to the ground to be trampled by others. Rule #4 in action. I didn’t know what happened to him next because I squeezed myself past someone calling for help on the phone.

A new wave of shouting. That sounded like screams of pain. The Adumbrae went this way?

I didn’t dare check behind me but the ghastly roars didn’t sound human. Oh, and people yelling the Adumbrae was here really confirmed it.

Without a second thought, I dropped to the floor. Monstrous tentacles stretched above and whipped at the idiots still standing. A kid got flung out the windows, breaking through it. I thought of climbing out of the hole, but so did everyone else. Two people got stuck and skewered by the tentacles. I couldn’t go forward because it was so packed by both the living and dead. This was the time to use the ‘hide and cover’ advice.

I rolled under the seats and pulled a dead guy to cover me. A metallic scent filled my nose as blood oozed out the holes in the corpse that I named Bloody Cover. Sounds British. I scooped some of his blood and wiped it on my clothes and face. I had seen this a few times in movies, pretending to be dead and stuff.

So, this is how blood feels like? I had touched blood before. My own blood, like from wounds. Not this much blood. It wasn’t so sticky when it flowed out of Bloody Cover. Not disgusting either. Kind of fascinating, actually.

I should be scared. But I wasn’t.

I awfully wanted to get hysterically terrified like the girls in horror movies shrieking their heads off. How did that feel? My heart pounded so hard that my ears thumped along. Adrenaline rushed through my veins, making my body tingle. I didn’t want to die as much as the next person—well, the person next to me was dead—but this didn’t seem to be fear. Was it? More like stressed.

Peering over the shoulder of Bloody Cover, I spotted a woman also hiding under the seats opposite me. She closed her eyes tight as she muttered stuff. Prayers probably. Was that fear? A guy was writhing among dead bodies. He lost an arm but was still alive. Was he afraid? Maybe. But I bet that pain distracted him from feeling fear.

The Adumbrae came my way.

I clenched my teeth. I had zero plans for how to get out alive except hoping that it wouldn’t notice me. My heart raced more. I clutched the clothes of Bloody Cover as I pressed myself to the wall of the train. Only now did I notice that the train was no longer moving. Someone must’ve pulled the emergency brakes.

Go past me, go past me… I chanted as I watched a pair of legs with wriggling tendrils poking out of the jeans walk by. I’d fight if its tentacles came for me. I’d punch and kick and bite. Yes! Go kill other people there. What? Don’t stop so close to me!

The Adumbrae was a few feet away. It crouched next to Armless Guy. The Adumbrae’s head opened like a blooming flower and more tendrils wriggled out. It was hard to see from my position, especially with the Adumbrae’s back turned to me, but the Adumbrae seemed to eat the dying man. The screams that followed told me I was correct.

This was the first time I had seen an Adumbrae with my own eyes. If the threat of death wasn’t hanging over me, I would’ve found the experience fascinating. When I was a kid, I liked watching the Animal Channel, especially when predators ate their prey. It was my dream to go on a safari ride and watch lions eat gazelle or something. This was like that but way more interesting.

This Adumbrae seemed weak compared to the ones I’d seen on TV. It had tentacles and other weird appendages. The tentacles moved fast and were strong but nothing beyond that. It didn’t shoot lasers out of its ass or had other kinds of superpowers. This Adumbrae was probably just Tier One in terms of danger, just that it had already killed a lot because the train was full of people.

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The police could shred this Adumbrae with bullets from regular guns. No need to deploy Combat Exoskeletons. No need for the BID agents, and definitely no need for a Corebring to do superheroics.

So… I guess I’ll just wait? The police should be coming soon.

How did Fidgeting Hoodie get in the subway station anyway?

Right, the stupid bioscanners that never work. Fidgeting Hoodie got in before the repairs started and they cared to check people. There’d be a deluge of lawsuits after this. So many people dead. La Esperanza, priding itself as Adumbrae-free was negligent with bioscanners in crowded places.

There was no more shouting. Only the sounds of munching squishy flesh and crunching bones. This Adumbrae didn’t have table manners when eating people. Floor manners?

After what seemed like an eternity, but was more like five minutes, the Adumbrae pushed away the bodies and entered the next subway car. By then, it was already empty of people. The monster lumbered ahead and left us. Another minute and I could no longer hear it.

There were a few survivors with me but none of us moved. The woman under the seat across me sobbed uncontrollably, breaking the tense silence. I didn’t know where the monster was, but it didn’t come back.

“Everyone, get up!” A man helped the sobbing woman out from under the seats. Here was the character to take charge. “Let’s fucking go! Quickly!”

I pushed Bloody Cover away and thanked him for his help. Part of me wanted to look for my beloved folding bike, but another part of me wanted to escape fast. I needed to wash this blood out of my hair.

Five of us exited the door that In-Charge Man was able to open. I fake-limped as I passed In-Charge Man. Sure enough, he helped me, the helpless damsel in distress, holding my arm as he walked beside me. As much as I hated getting touched, I needed a protector in this dangerous situation.

“Okay, the Adumbrae went that way.” In-Charge Man pointed down the tunnel. “We go this way, back to the station. We’re not too far away, less than ten minutes. Move!”

“I think there’s a service exit up ahead,” someone added. “That’s nearer.”

“Thank the Mother Core we’re alive!”

Combing away congealed blood from my hair, I continued to hobble beside In-Charge Man, groaning a bit for realism. I reeked of blood. I had to get a nice warm shower before going to school. Attending first period was out of the question unless I suddenly gained teleportation powers. Such a hassle because the professor there was a strict prick. Even getting attacked by an Adumbrae might not be a valid excuse for him.

The tunnel had lights lining it. Together with the lights from the train, it wasn’t so dark. In-Charge Man checked the other cars for survivors and found something concerning.

“There are dead people here too!” he exclaimed.

The others jumped up to look into the windows. I didn’t try to see inside and embarrass myself.

“What do you mean? The Adumbrae didn’t go here.”

“Oh my! Blood everywhere!”

“A second Adumbrae?” I wondered aloud.

“That’s absurd,” said a bastard who should’ve shut up. “Two Adumbrae on the same train? What are the odds of that?”

“I’m not a mathematician so I won’t try to calculate,” In-Charge Man said.

Damn, that’s a good line. I filed it in my mental cabinet for banger one-liners to use. It would fit me because I hated math. That said, what kind of bullshit was this if there really was a second Adumbrae?

“But what I’m sure of,” he continued, “is there’s danger that way and also that way. We’re in the middle. Where do we go? I vote still head to the train station because the Adumbrae with tentacles might return.”

“I see a sign over there!” someone excitedly yelled. “It could be the service door. Our way up!”

“There’s someone on the roof!” I pointed up. My shout was embarrassingly lame and forced—I lacked practice pretending to be shocked. “Or something…”

I had wanted to use that line for a long time. I was glad I said it now because I might die soon. A person wearing baggy black overalls stood on the train’s roof. His face was a hole with a bouquet of tentacles.

There were really two Adumbrae on the train!

Baggy Overalls flicked both his hands to his sides and long spikes burst out of his palms, extending a couple of feet.

“Run!” In-Charge Man tightly gripped my hand and dragged me with him. I appreciated the chivalry, but I didn’t appreciate getting pulled along like luggage.

Still, I ran because I didn’t want to die. Remembering what the other Adumbrae did, I crouched and pulled In-Charge Man too. “Down, down!” I couldn’t have him dying early.

Something whistled past over our heads. Spikes struck the wall beside us. Screams again. Someone got hit. The rest of us continued as Baggy Overalls shot at us. The annoying Adumbrae ran on top of the train parallel to us, the sound of stomping feet on metal echoing in the tunnel.

Many movies showed that running while getting shot at was effective. How true was that in the real world?

We were getting closer to the service door.

Another person got hit. A sharp yell. And another.

Only me and In-Charge Man remained. We can reach the door!

Please be open. I’d be super dead if it was closed.

“Go ahead!” In-Charge Man pulled me forward and pushed my back. “Run fast! I’m right behind you! Ahh!” A whistle followed by a thump on flesh. In-Charge Man tumbled, fulfilling his purpose to save me.

I didn’t look back. Baggy Overalls jumped down from the train. I assumed so because it sounded like it. I could only hope the Adumbrae paused to finish off In-Charge Man.

“Shit, just a bit more,” I panted. Thank you, past me, for choosing to cycle instead of drive. I wasn’t an absolute weakling physically.

My hands grabbed the cold handle. I pulled the heavy metal door with all my strength—my arms felt like they were going to come off—and threw myself in. Close it!

“Lock, lock. How do I lock this?” I fumbled around. No lock. Where next? I was in a stairwell. Stairs! Upward to escape! Or do I hold the door here because the Adumbrae would follow me inside? Can it tear through the metal? I held my body against the door as I mulled my options. Which was a stupid thing to do.

Something hit the door on the other side. The sound of metal giving way reverberated in the stairwell.

Sharp pain! Something warm dripped down my back. I looked down. A spike pierced through the metal door, skewering my backpack and then me. Blood seeped through my clothes.

Eww, it’s touching my insides, was the stupidest thought my brain could come up with. Get this spike out of me! I gripped the spike with both hands and tried to push it back out of my body as I slowly stepped forward, away from the door. I gritted my teeth as the spike exited my body. I could feel its uneven surface scrape against my skin and flesh.

Escape. Do it!

Trying to ignore a level of pain I had never felt before, I limped to the stairs and gathered all my will to climb. My legs wobbled from the pain radiating from my abdomen. I hissed as I went up the stairs, breathing through my teeth, putting one foot in front of the other. Pain shot through me with each step.

The Adumbrae should be chasing me. Why hasn’t it opened the door yet? Did the spikes jam it? Or was it busy eating other people outside? I couldn’t hear what was happening on the other side.

Just keep going up! I’ll find help soon. I couldn’t pass out here and die from blood loss. So pathetic.

Damn it. This day was just the worst.