Westvale

VII

VII

The three paused in front of the house and stared at it. They looked at it as some sort of achievement, as if they had accomplished a three-thousand-kilometer journey on foot. The trio sat on the quiet street, as if having forgotten the reason they walked all the way to the house. Clara glared at her house thinking about the last time she had been in it, much earlier that morning, frantically packing her things up, with hopes of leaving town. Ben sat looking at the house, thinking about the last time he had been to his apartment, and whether he should go and check on it, or whether that even mattered anymore. Denny sat looking at the house, thinking about the next time he would be able to get back to his lab. Figuring they were wasting time, Denny broke the thoughtful silence.

"Clara. Do you have your keys?"

A long pause followed the question, as the three continued to stare at the house. A slow answer from Clara ensued.

"Yeah. They're in my bag."

Clara glared at the house for another three seconds before shifting her attention to her bag, in order to look for her keys. The other two persisted with blindly glaring at the house while Clara searched for her keys. She went up to the door with them in hand and with two turns of the lock she opened the door.

"Come on in."

Ben and Denny hurried through the door with their luggage and bags, while Clara went to get hers. She entered the house, dropping her stuff at the entrance, as the other two sat on the couch all worn-out. Clara sat next to Denny, sighing heavily as the only thing the three were thinking about was sleep.

"I suggest we all sleep for a while, and then get back to whatever it is that we're doing", announced an exhausted Clara, only awaiting confirmation and nothing else.

"I couldn't agree more", answered Ben, whose eyes were already shut.

"I'm sleeping on the couch" stated Denny, taking his shoes off.

"Ben and I will take the bed then."

They got off the couch and headed to the bedroom down the hall. Ben crashed on the left side, with Clara walking around the bed to the right one. It only took two minutes for the entire house to fall asleep, and another two minutes for Denny to start snoring. Another ten minutes and sunrise had commenced.

Peace and quiet overwhelmed this small house in the northern United States. The Sun's rays shined through the windows, a pleasant wind danced through the empty, yet dirty streets covered in corpses, while a semi blue sky dominated Westvale, bestowing its remaining miserable citizens with a somewhat sluggish mood. Several kilometers away, under a house engulfed by misery and squalor, several dangerous chemical reactions were quietly brewing, eventually causing a painful, irresistible noise inside Clara's house. Denny's computer screens and devices all began to sound, creating an alarm loud enough to wake up the entire state of Montana. The alarms, were all trying to sing together in harmony as Denny had jumped off the couch and onto the floor, hurrying over to his devices to type away some code that would make the alarms hush. Meanwhile, Ben's arm unintentionally hit Clara's abdomen out of surprise, causing Clara to wake up instantly and stand upright on the bed, yelling, looking over at Ben.

"What the heck is wrong with all of you! Can't one just rest serenely without one of you doing something imbecilic? What is that noise? Denny! Denny, I swear you're going to regret having those computers!"

She leaped out of bed and stomped her way to the living room. Denny was typing on an abnormally large keyboard that appeared to be foldable. All the screens he had brought with him displayed an alarm symbol that were also the source of the alarms.

"Denny! Turn those off for God's sake!"

Denny answered, calmer than ever, not taking into account Clara's paroxysm of anger.

"I am, I am. Hold on."

The noise stopped, and Ben joined the two in the living room, barely walking straight as if still asleep.

"What was that?" asked Ben, almost slurring his words.

"This is bad", answered Denny, panicked. "Those alarms are connected to the lab. Something overheated and might blow up. I need to make my way there right now."

Sarcastically, Clara overexaggerated her tone.

"Oh, someone help us. Something always has to blow up and something always has to go wrong."

"Clara, I just forgot to turn a few things off, I'm sorry, I'm going to go fix it now."

"Do you need help?"
"I'm fine Ben, thanks. I shouldn't take more than forty minutes. Most of the time will be spent on the trip over there anyways."

"Wait. What if that's the forces? They discovered their dead guy and now are trying to get your attention."

"No Ben, don't worry, these alarms have to do with the condition of the servers and what not in the lab. Something is up. Plus, if anyone made his or her way in, I would know."

"Grab something to eat before you go", suggested Clara, heading over to the bags to take something out. Shuffling through the bag that Ben used to put things inside from the store, she pulled out a bag of cashews, a bag of chocolate bread slices, and a water bottle, and handed them over to Denny.

"Thanks Clara", said Denny as he scampered out of the house, slamming the door.

"I'm not going to be able to go back to sleep."

"Like I am, Ben" replied a disappointed Clara.

He brought one of the bags with food inside and sat on the couch, with the bag on his lap. Clara sat alongside him, taking items out of the bag. She took out six packaged apples and tore the packaging open. Ben took out several energy bars along with a loaf of bread and did the same.

"I wish the TV worked" said Clara with her mouth full, looking over to the sink full of dishes she was supposed to wash. Like that mattered anymore.
"Whenever we didn't have electricity during the summer and we were with our grandma, she always made us play chess. We almost wouldn't do anything else but watch TV. Said the neurons will like each other more and get along better, make us smarter if we played. She then would cuss the TV and thank God we didn't have electricity" said Ben, staring at the flat screen TV in front of him.

"My grandma always used to say that the electricity was affecting her flowers in the garden and that they would eventually die because of the 'waves' being emitted". A frustration-filled sigh followed the short story. Ben looked around the couch to find a polaroid picture sitting on a circular table next to it. He picked it up and looked at it for a while before asking Clara about it. The picture showed a young girl, no older than thirteen, that resembled Clara terrifically, standing near a brick building in what looked like Westvale two decades ago. She had a yellow skirt that went to her knees, and jean overalls. Ben looked at it for around a minute, then asked Clara about it.

"Hey, check this out"

Clara turned to look to Ben, seeing the picture first thing.

"Oh that", said Clara, chuckling.