Atop the hill and staring at the Dash children was a dog. At least it had once been a dog; now, like most canines, it was something entirely different, a new species. Alex grabbed the rifle from Annabelle and targeted the mammal, getting a decent look at it through the scope. This thing resembled a boxer, but larger, and mutated. Spiked plates that resembled either tree bark or stone, or a combination of both, protruded from its back and hind quarters. The facial features were eerily…human.

From near the overpass, the fawn – itself an entirely new species separate from that of natural deer - issued a sound that was both a hiss and a chirp and the dog snapped its head in the direction the noise had come from. It then looked back upon the three siblings, perhaps deciding which prey was easier for the taking.

Dazed by the encounter, Alex lowered the rifle, his focusing fading. The sight of the thing had sent chills through him. It seemed ridiculous, but he had the distinct impression that it had gazed into him, anticipating his next move, his next thought. Most of the dogs he had seen travelled in packs. This one, a rogue, was likely far more dangerous, able of surviving without the aid of the group. It might possess superior intelligence and that was troublesome.

A bolt of adrenaline snapped Alex back to attention. Shit! He had taken his eyes off it. Even a moment’s inattention could prove fatal against these creatures. Alex refocused and brought the rifle back up to the top of the hill, but the dog was no longer there.

Fuck!

Another rush of adrenaline nearly induced full-blown hysteria until Alex spotted it scampering along farther down the hill, vanishing and reappearing amongst the overgrown grasses along the ridge. It appeared to have decided that the fawn was far less trouble than Alex and the twins.

“Alex?” whispered Henry.

“Yes?”

“Is it gone?”

“Not yet. It moved away but is still too close.”

“Will it come back?” asked Annabelle.

Alex was still mesmerized by the way the animal had studied him. Its face seemed to be a grotesque assemblage of animal and human elements. A snout that was not wholly a dog’s snout. Eyes seemed especially keen and aware.

“Alex?” insisted his sister.

“I don’t know, Annabelle. Hopefully not.”

“Will it eat the fawn?” asked Henry.

Alex watched the thing as it slinked through the wavy grass along the hillside. It appeared to be in full hunting posture. “Probably,” he said.

“Oh, no,” replied Annabelle. “I don’t want the fawn to get eaten.”

“I know, honey. But that’s just the way it is. Let’s go.”

Annabelle was standing on her tippy toes. “Go fawn. Run….”

“Now, guys. Move!” Alex urged.

The children did as they were told and after Alex witnessed the dog-thing pounce upon the fawn through the rifle’s site, he guided the children into the pickup. Referring to the folded map his father had given him, Alex determined that the road crossing over the interstate, the overpass, led north and that they would follow it until they came to their next destination, marked by a star. The next cache. Alex relished the thought of a good meal: some canned baked beans or canned beets, maybe. There would likely be some sort of canned protein, too. Anything would beat protein bars, although he was thankful to have them.

Their father had denoted several routes which could be taken to reach the caches he had long ago assembled and hidden. The underground stores had been plotted over a year’s time. Alex remembered driving with his father on the weekends to bury them. Inside of each cache were non-perishable food supplies, water, ammunition and spare filters for their respirators. When he took Alex along with him, which was as often as he could, their father would demonstrate exactly how and where the buried goods would be marked. Mr. Dash had inserted five-foot metal rods into the ground, each engraved with the letter “D.”

“Twenty paces from the direction the D is facting, Alex,” he would say. “That’s where you’ll start digging. Two feet down.”

Alex turned back and scanned near the overpass with the scope. The dog had been watching them. Blood dripped from its jowls as it chewed on severed flesh. Never deviating its gaze, Alex believed that the thing was trying to intimidate him. For a moment, he considered firing at it. Almost as soon as he had thought this, the dog stopped chewing and lurched its neck forward. Alex entertained the notion that it was aware of his intention and challenging him to take the shot.

That’s crazy. It’s just an animal.

But…what is it just an animal? He considered this, remembering the human-like facial features. Who’s to say in did not possess human-like intelligence, too?

After a lengthy pause, he decided that discharging the weapon was an unwise decision. To do so might alert other dogs and that would force them into a treacherous situation. More than he might be able to handle.

As if sensing that it was no longer in danger, the dog resumed its feast. Alex started the pickup and crossed the grass median to the oncoming lanes, keeping well away from the dog. Just past the overpass, he veered onto the off-ramp, cruising past the sign for Sunset Bay, NJ.

*********

As they approached the cache, Alex took his foot off the gas and coasted to a stop. Before exiting the truck, he needed to be sure no other people or animals were in the vicinity. He lowered the driver’s side window and listened. Only the sea breeze whistling through the marsh reeds broke the stark silence.

They were on the two-mile access road leading into Sunset Bay. Here, sparsely plotted houses lined the back channels of the bay. Insects buzzed in the wetlands. Waves gently lapped at the hulls of long-forgotten boats. The derelict homes seemed to study them as they passed and Alex felt like a stranger in unwelcome territory. Along with the grayness of the land, the overwhelming stillness fostered the notion that he and the twins were the only living humans left.

Maybe they were.

Why resist any longer? Why go on? These thoughts were ever-gnawing parasites, feeding on hope…sapping his strength.

You will have to resist the temptation to give in, Alex. His father’s words again.

You must fight. You must go on. If not for yourself, then for Henry and Annabelle.

Alex recognized their surroundings and stopped the pickup. After a quick scan of the road, they exited the vehicle. The onset of dusk had painted the land with a golden-orange hue and with the sun behind them, the three Dash siblings’ shadows became elongated phantoms creeping along the road before them.

Alex had miscalculated their journey and they had been away from the protection of the silo for far longer than he was comfortable with, so they would need to pick up the pace. Time seemed almost to have accelerated since their departure. This was not the first time Alex had experienced this impression. On more than one occasion he had lost his sense of the passing of the day, with whole chunks of their daily routine missing from memory. He tried to keep the idea that he might be unwell from infiltrating his mind, but the caustic notion breached his mental blockade, nonetheless. If something happened to Alex, the twins would be on their own. Even worse, if Alex began to…change…it might become dangerous for Henry and Annabelle to be in his company.

There was a good quarter mile between the last house they had passed and the bay bridge ahead, with dense marshy vegetation between. On the left was a path leading down from the road to what had once been a fishing spot. Here, they would find one of the caches their father had buried for them.

Alex had brought a shovel and a machete from the pickup’s toolbox, expecting the path to have become overgrown. He suggested the twins play a game of I Spy as he walked over to the path to begin clearing it.

Henry said, “I’ll go first. I seeeeee...something…orange.”

Annabelle tapped her finger to her chin, then replied, “The sun!”

“Yep!” Henry said, giddily. “You’re turn!”

“Don’t look at the sun, though,” informed Annabelle. “You can hurt your eyes.”

“I know,” replied Henry, rolling his eyes.

When he reached the spot, Alex was surprised to find that the path had previously been cleared. There were obvious slice marks through the twisting vines and branches, and they seemed relatively fresh.

“Okay,” said Annabelle, “I see something goldenrod.”

“Huh? What’s goldenrod?”

“It’s a color,” said Annabelle, grinning.

“Nut-uh! You’re cheating!” Henry frowned and balled his fists.

“No, I’m not,” she said, gleefully.

“Alex! She’s cheating!”

“Guys! Shh! Way too loud,” Alex scolded. “Annabelle, stick with normal colors.”

“But it is a normal color.”

“No, it isn’t Annabelle,” countered Henry. “I’ve never even heard of it before. Alex, you ever hear of it before?”

Alex felt his gut flutter as he imagined someone else having already found the cache and stolen the supplies within. He tried to massage the tension away in the back of his neck while he descended the path toward the bay.

Annabelle replied, “It’s a crayon color, so it has to be a real color.”

“Annabelle,” uttered Alex, blankly.

“Fine. Its yellow. I see something yellow.”

Grinning and appearing to bask in his victory, Henry surveyed his surroundings, then pointed. “That street sign!”

“Nope.” Annabelle smirked.

“Darn!” Henry swatted the air with his fist.

“Over there,” she quipped, signaling a large, heavily concealed school bus. Only a portion of its dulled yellow exterior was visible, the rest of it concealed by vegetation.

“Whoa!” said Henry.

The bus had not been immediately noticeable, and Alex’s pulse quickened as he recognized the vehicle as a potential shelter. There might be someone inside.

Alex stepped forward, studying the bus with the rifle in firing position. He quickly shouldered the rifle and withdrew the Glock. The vehicle appeared to have run off the road quite some time ago, the engine completely underwater and the front tires half-submerged in the dark water. Wild growth had climbed up and over the entire vehicle and at first glance, it looked like only a massive tangle of brush. Upon further scrutiny, however, Alex was able to identify a single, massive vine with smaller offshoots running in every direction. After ensnaring the bus, the vine wound down a dilapidated dock and into the bay. The whole mess looked like some strange, beached absurdity.

“This is just like the bus we took to school,” said Henry, excitedly.

“No, it isn’t,” rebuffed Annabelle. “That one had a flat front. This one has the kind that sticks out.”

Henry tapped his helmet with his index finger, pondering his sister’s assertion that he’d gotten it mixed up. “Oh, that’s right.”

At the left rear taillight, Alex stooped to the ground and peered beneath the bus. The vines interweaved throughout the underside and even up into the engine. Alex could see nothing hiding within the coils and determined that there were so many of the shoots that they seemed more akin to veins than branches.

With Henry and Annabelle behind him, Alex yanked open the bus door and it yielded with a creak. The massive vine pulsed, then like a colossal snake, constricted and the side mirror was torn free and pulled down into the bay.

Alex jumped from the bus and moved the twins away. He readied himself to fire his weapon, but after a few harrowing seconds ticked away, was confident that the plant’s movements had subsided. He decided however, that searching the bus was not worth the risk of being crushed to death. He had seen plants move with peculiar swiftness before, but nothing like what this one had just done. This one had reacted to touch, having sensed the vibration caused by opening the door. The fact that it possessed this level of awareness was terrifying.

Henry and Annabelle were startled, but only for a moment; the bizarre and fantastical had become more and more commonplace in their existence and until now, Alex had found it difficult being surprised anymore. He studied the twins and saw their composure had returned. Alex supposed that it was a positive sign that the children were becoming more resilient to these types of encounters, but he worried it could adversely impact their vigilance.

They’re eight years old, he reminded himself.

How vigilant could they really be? Alex expected too much from the children sometimes, but he knew of no other way to raise them. One miscalculation in this forbidding environment would almost certainly spell certain death for an adult, let alone young ones. Wild, deformed animals were just one of the dangers; now sentient plant life could be added to that list. His stomach growled and as he thought about how hungry he was, the idea of roving bands of starving survivors resurfaced. It was something he had considered before but forced into the dark recesses of his mind. Now, it returned, and it chilled him. He had seen no such beings in their time without his mother and father, but they had to be out there. People so famished that they would resort to cannibalism. He had seen plenty of movies depicting the sort of things people might resort to during societal collapse.

He flushed the thought from his mind and focused on the cache and located the metal rod his father had long ago driven into the ground, the visible portion standing two feet above the surface. After he located the "D" that his father had etched into the pole, he then measured twenty paces in the direction the letter faced, ready to dig up the buried treasure. Alex’s heart sank as he saw the ground had been disturbed. Obviously, the cache had been dug up and pillaged. After scouring the area, he saw the metal container in the underbrush. Alex went to it and lifted the lid. It was empty.

The twins resumed their game. After declaring it was his turn again, Henry said, “I see sumthin…shiny!”

“Shiny?” asked Annabelle.

“Yeah,” said Henry. “It’s like, twinkly.”

Alex stood to attention, repeating his brother’s words in his mind. Shiny…something shiny… The words chilled him to alertness. His arms were covered in goosebumps. “What did you say, Henry?”

The boy pointed in the direction they had come from. “There’s something shiny over there.” His voice sounded far off.

Alex felt sick and lightheadedness overtook him. His mind grew sluggish.

Annabelle, peered down the road, shielding her eyes from the sun. “I don’t see it.”

“Keep watchin’,” Henry advised. “It twinkles, goes away, then comes back.”

The children’s voices were distant, like he and they were not outside, but in separate rooms, at the opposite ends of a large building. He looked toward the twins and with the sinking sun behind them, their silhouettes became fuzzy, out of focus. He then checked the road, his pulse soaring and then…witnessed the shiny thing in the distance.

“Off the road!” instructed Alex. “Stay low.”

The twinkling reminded Alex of sunlight reflected off a metal object. He squatted, saw the quick flash again, then spun around and studied the opposite end of the road, awaiting a reply to its message.

Then he saw the girl. She was where she always materialized, off to the right, in Alex’s peripheral vision. She had appeared on two other occasions, but Alex, not wanting to scare the children, had not told them about the phenomenon. Alex looked past her, down the road, trying to ignore the otherworldly presence.

You’re just hallucinating. You’re hungry or dehydrated or something. She’s not really there.

That could happen, couldn’t it? Could those things cause you to see things that were not really there? The other possibility bloomed in his mind. The one he attempted to ignore on many other occasions.

Maybe you’re losing your grip, Alex. Maybe you’re going crazy.

When the children walked farther into the brush along the road, Alex went to join them in hiding, but discovered he was unable to follow, his head knocking against something hard. Clutching his aching forehead, he could find no obstacle that he might have bumped into. Henry and Annabelle continued moving away from him. Alex walked forward again, this time keeping his arms extended in front of him. He took two steps, then his fingertips made contact. Alex withdrew his hands.

What the fuck!

Defying reason, there was a barrier in his way and yet he could not see it. His heartrate climbing, Alex pressed his hands against an immovable, albeit invisible object before him. His fingers probed the thing, and curled around what felt like a metal tube. He let his entire arm slip between partitions in the object, while the rest of him remained constrained. He pulled his arm free and continued exploring what he now realized were vertical shafts, positioned five or six inches apart.

Bars, he thought. Invisible bars…

It didn’t make sense, but he tried over and over, each time his arms penetrating the open space between the imperceptible barriers. The lightheadedness swelled to dizziness.

“What is it, Alex?” asked Annabelle. “What’s that light?” There was an echo to her voice.

He did not want to frighten them anymore than they already were, but they needed to know.

“I think it’s another person," said Alex, in a dream-like mumble, his own voice sounding distant. He became unsteady and began to swoon. “Maybe two people communicating.” He grabbed the thin trunk of a nearby tree to steady himself. The peripheral girl was still there, watching him.

When he turned toward the children, they were gone. Dread seized him as he frantically searched the area. He returned to the bus, but realized the entrance was submerged.

The vine! Jesus Christ, the vine!

Alex darted for the water’s edge but slammed into the same unseen barrier again, smashing his skull against it. He stumbled backward, dazed. He felt something warm trickle from above his left eye, put a hand to the spot and came away with a smear of red across his palm.

Henry and Annabelle! Find them!

Blood trickled down his cheek as he attempted to squeeze through the invisible bars, but they were too close together. He felt for and found two parallel, imperceptible rods, and grabbed one with each hand, shaking as hard as he could, but they wouldn’t budge. Alex could not understand what these things were or what the hell was happening, but he understood that in order to find the children, he had to get past the barrier, had to free himself and therefore, refused to quit. Despite the intensifying pain in his head, he jerked and rattled the bars, quickly exhausting himself. He backed away, dizzy, and prepared to shoulder through the translucent obstacle, but instead, in his stupor, crashed to the ground.