Head Full of Ghosts

Chapter 27 - Dead House

Eli was the first to reach a door, mainly because most everybody else was still very confused about what was happening.

He grabbed the handle the moment it was in reach, but no matter how he pushed or pulled, twisted or turned, the door wouldn't budge. He stepped back and began kicking uselessly at the door handle, even though he knew there was no way it would do any good. The door handle was solid metal set in a solid metal door in a solid metal frame in a solid concrete and metal building. He had no chance of applying enough physical force to break anything open.

"Over here!" someone called from his left, and Eli looked over to see a set of double doors swing wide.

"Everyone, inside!" Eli shouted as loudly as he could.

The crowd swelled and crashed as it changed course to these other doors. Eli, on the outskirts of it, knew he would pretty much have to wait it out and go last. After a moment he realized with a start that Marissa was standing next to him.

"I don't get it," she said when their eyes met, "is whatever's coming really worse than vampires?"

"Define worse," Eli replied. She gave him a funny look so he added, "Zombies are bad. Vampires are bad. Gargoyles are also bad."

"Gargoyles? You can't be serious."

Eli turned and looked out at the fence line, hoping he could catch a glimpse of someone waiting out there. He saw no signs of movement.

"Call them whatever you will," he continued, still looking out the fence. "They have stone-like skin, they have wings, they can fly, and nothing we have can kill them. The zombies and vampires may be dangerous, but at least we have tools to use against them."

Eli knelt down and drew a big arrow in the dirt pointed toward the building. Next to it he drew an even larger fire symbol. He wasn't sure anyone outside would be able to see it, or even understand what he was trying to say if they did, but it was the only move he had.

He turned back toward the open doors and saw that the crowd had thinned out some, so he moved over to the doors to get ready for his chance.

The crackling of stone-like wings was even louder now, loud enough to be heard above the roar of commotion that was a mass of around fifty people as they pushed their way inside through the relatively narrow space of double doors. Eli looked up, and in the brightness of the night sky he could make out the shapes of gargoyles, just black silhouettes moving in eerie, irregular patterns across the midnight blue sky.

"Hurry!" Eli called, waving his hands in big circles at the remaining crowd, knowing it wasn't helping anything but feeling the desperate need to urge everyone on regardless.

"Oh God," Marissa said, and he turned to see her staring up at the moving shadows, "you weren't lying."

A few of the gargoyles were close enough now to dive down at the last few of the crowd. Someone cried out in surprise as stone claws grasped at their hair. Another screamed in pain as a similar pair of claws cut through exposed skin on their shoulder.

Eli leapt forward and grabbed the nearest one by the wings. Spinning, he sent it flying into the wall. It bounced off the hard stone surface and fluttered, a little disoriented, and then regained its balance and came flying back at them. Eli tried to grab the other one to do the same to it but it dodged out of the way.

"Look out!" Marissa screamed as the first gargoyle came screeching back at him. Eli dove for the ground, wrapping his arms around the woman who had her hair attacked and pulling her to the ground with him. The first gargoyle blasted through the air where they had been standing only a moment earlier and crashed into the other gargoyle. The two spun out wildly, but more gargoyles were diving down now to fill the gaps.