Once he found his way to the edge of the town Layan started to see the first signs that people had come this way. There was a bunch of discarded junk besides the sign declaring Welcome. Most of the stuff looked like electronics that would never work again. Stuff like portable computers and even an expensive looking hollow display unit.
'Looks like the town really did just leave and head towards the more populated parts of the state.' Layan thought as he sorted out what had happened at the edge of the town. The tracks were old at least four days. So, they must have left not long after the wave hit.
'There should be about a hundred of them from the looks of it' the tracks were from a large group with both women and children mixed in.
Feeling better about the state of things Layan immediately headed out to follow the road and the refugees heading down it. Settling into a fast ground eating pace that he could keep up all day. He should be able to catch up to the party ahead of him before they hit the next town down the road. It was something like a hundred kilometers to the next town and they would be moving much slower than he could.
----
These last few days had been the very definition of hell for the people of Ben's Hollow. The flux wave had stuck much harder than Layan who was used to living life without any need for power or modern devices could easily understand.
When the lights went off that first day it was just assumed it was a power outage. There were a few minor accidents as the moving air cars were suddenly grounded but they were only moving at a low speed in the town and so it was just chalked up to something wrong and not something dangerous.
When the people started to notice the Changed and the old and weak in the community disappeared there was a search, but nothing was found.When the power still had not come on and people were starting to be concerned the town leaders called a meeting. It was during a meeting in the diner that the first monsters attacked. They were fast and it was a complete shock to the unsuspecting towns folk. Suddenly being attacked by horrors in the night with only candles for light.
Worse those attacked then disappeared along with the monsters into the night. The people were tough and stubborn though they tried to fight back and organize a way to stay in the town, but the attacks continued the next night and most of those who were determined enough to fight it out were taken.
So, it was with desperation and fear that the people of the town that were still alive after the third night, decided to flee the horror as a group hoping to head to Morsville down the main road. There would be more people there and that's all the survivors had been thinking when they packed up and left. One hundred and thirty people mostly women and children with a few teenage boys and girls and a couple of men who had escaped being taken.
Hell had followed them down the road though. The monsters had attacked again the first night shadows flitting out from the woods too fast for anyone to deal with. It was by luck that one of the women discovered that she had changed. When the monsters attacked that night, her son was one of the first to be taken, the screams of the young boy only drowned out by the agonized sounds coming from his mother as she desperately charged after him.
When her fear turned to the rage of a mother losing her son she burst into flame. A massive angry red blaze leaping forth from her outstretched hands chasing down the fleeing shadow. Her son was saved as the beast who couldn't be clearly seen was scared off by the blast.
The days continued to be a grueling march down the road as they tried to get away from the horrors that came during the dark. During the last night they had ringed themselves with flames. The woman who found herself able to manipulate heat was quickly pushed to the front in the fight and they were able to hold off the monsters for the next two nights only losing a few people to random attacks.
The 73 people who were all that was left from the town of Ben's Hollow were limping and stumbling into their next planned camp site when Layan finally managed to catch up with them.