They left the disused ice cream parlor and stepped into the midday heat. Even through her sneakers, Vanessa could feel the hot pavement. Everything felt hotter, even for Texas. If this still was Texas. Whoever brought them to this place could've brought them anywhere. She didn't even know how long they'd been unconscious. The dregs of rat odor gave way to something earthy and humid. With the strange music gone, the footsteps of the six were the sole sounds. Lonely, lazy, arrhythmically percussive.
Other restaurants and snack bars stood alongside the ice cream parlor. The windows not busted out were whitewashed or smudged with gray grease. A trailer announcing fried Oreos and funnel cake on its sun-yellowed marquee sagged on flat tires. One of the structures had been completely reclaimed by vines. There was no wind, and all the dark leaves hung limp in the moist, stuffy air.
Kayson sidled up next to Vanessa and finished pulling on his shirt. He glanced around, eyes wide. Like her, he'd worked up a sweat while trapped by the rats. A faint scent of weed radiated from his pores. She'd have liked a few hits right now, were she not a hundred percent positive she needed to stay alert. Maybe she'd light up if she ever made it home.
If? No. When. When I make it home. When!
"So, what now?" Wendy asked. "Do we just find the exit?" She narrowed her eyes and grimaced as she scanned the others for answers, as she scanned her surroundings for some explanation. Pink blotches had flowered on her cheeks, and sweat pasted her bangs to her temples.
Vanessa wondered how long before the older woman would break, how long before any or all of them broke, and who would break first.
"No way it's that easy," Werth said.
Vanessa didn't like the bastard, but she found herself agreeing with him.
"Even so, we should at least look for a way out," Cullen said. "Every place has one."
Vanessa and Hannah nodded. Werth dipped his head once, not quite assent but close enough. His expression remained hard, glaring. Kayson kept a poker face mostly. Everything was unreadable but his dark eyes. Vanessa wanted to believe the grimness she saw in them was imagined, but what he said next brought leaden dread back to Vanessa's guts.
"Not gonna be a way out if we no-clipped," he said.
She remembered her gamer phase, moments she accidentally slipped into undeveloped sections of maps from old school action games like Metal Gear Solid and Siphon Filter. She'd found herself surrounded by blocks and pixels floating in the void. She was floating in the void.
She shuddered the memories away, but the dread remained in her belly, settled in like a weighty tumor.
"We can't just no-clip," Hannah said. "This isn't a video game."
"Why don't you ask the passengers of that Oceana flight if you can't no-clip?" Kayson said.
Hannah's brow furrowed and her mouth squirmed as it tried to find the right words. "Oceana? Are you talking about fucking Lost?"
Vanessa laughed at this. Kayson flicked her a brief hurt look.
"He means Malaysia Flight 370," Cullen said. "I think."
"Yeah, that's it!" Kayson said, brightening again.
"Man, you've really fried your brain on all those research chemicals, haven't you?" Werth said. "There's a ten-year gap between Lost and that flight."
"Not to mention, Lost is fiction," Hannah said.
"Yeah, whatever," Kayson said, his features now hardening. "Y'all knew what I meant."
"Well, those people on that plane didn't no-clip," Cullen said. "They're most likely at the bottom of the ocean somewhere. I'm sure divers will find them in a hundred years or so."
"Shit, I hope it's not that long until someone finds us," Kayson said. His jaw flexed and unflexed as he chewed on agitation.
"It won't be," Vanessa said, hoping this affirmation would stifle her fears more than anyone else's. Maybe it would eventually loosen the awful heaviness in her belly. It was the type of dread that felt almost like she needed to shit. The feeling didn't subside.
"Let's just keep moving," she said.
No one disagreed. Even though their steps took them further out in the open.
Vanessa tried not to think about it but kept her eyes out for any threats.
"I don't see any animals," Hannah said. She'd taken off her high heels when they started out of the parlor but quickly put them back on. The pavement was just too hot for bare feet. She winced with every step but stayed alert. "No birds or squirrels, nothing."
"The rats probably saw to that," Werth said with a grimace.
"Oh God," Wendy said. Her voice made a wet, heavy croak. She sounded like she might vomit after all. "Do you really think so?"
"They had to be eating something before we showed up on the menu," Werth said.
"Oh God," Wendy said again, this time quieter, exhaustion dragging her voice.
They passed a Tilt-A-Whirl. Some of the cups were broken, like chipped coffee mugs. A carpet of dark green ivy covered the platform. The chain-link fence around the ride had mostly fallen over, except for some of its metal poles. The tendrils of ivy had come from cracks and potholes to pull down the flimsy barrier like sea monster tentacles assaulting the hull of a barge. But instead of dragging the fence all the way into the earth, they'd stopped, creating a frozen moment of unfinished violence.
"Where do you think they are?" Hannah asked. "The rats, I mean."
Her eyes darted about her face. Their movements reminded Vanessa of two laser pointers wielded by unsteady hands. Hannah must've known as well as Vanessa that stepping out into the open put them all at risk. Everyone must've known those rats were only the beginning, and they were bad enough.
"I imagine they're hiding," Cullen said. "Plenty of places to hide here."
He gestured to shadows between buildings and under structures. A Gravitron lay tilted on its stand like a crashed flying saucer. All the lights were off, with some of the bulbs shattered, and its door hung ajar, another shadowy place to hide. Vanessa had been on one of those once. Puked her guts out too.
"They'll come back out again, I bet," Hannah said. "What do we do then?
"Stomp the shit out of them until we can't," Werth said.
"Like the roaches at Mom's place," Kayson said.
Werth and Kayson shared a look haunted by ghosts of long-lapsed affection.
So, they were brothers, Vanessa thought.
"I don't think I like that plan," Hannah said.
"No," Wendy said. "Not at all."
"Hopefully, without the music, they'll keep hiding," Cullen said, but when Vanessa surveyed everyone's faces, she got the impression none of them bought this, not even Cullen himself. His face looked a lot paler than it had a few minutes ago.
Hannah's eyes went still and zeroed in on Vanessa.
"You held onto that music player thingy, right?" she asked.
"Yes," Vanessa said. She almost patted her hip pocket where it sat uncomfortably in her tight jeans but thought better of it. Sure, the screen was locked, but no fucking way was she taking that risk. What if the rats kept coming this time?
They passed other rides—a bent and rusty Ferris wheel with some of its capsules crashed on the pavement, a bumper car station with its vehicles oddly undisturbed—some concessions, and a splintered wooden structure covered in lurid paintings. Men with fish tails. Women pale as bone. Children covered in leopard spots and alligator scales. Giants and dwarves and black-eyed twins conjoined at the hip.
"No way," Kayson said. "A fucking freakshow? They still run those things?"
"No one's run this place in decades, genius," Werth said.
Kayson flipped him the bird.
Everyone walked on, gravel crunching under shoes like bird bones in a predator's mouth. They rounded a bend, passing a tipped over concession cart. Plastic bottles and utensils littered the surrounding blacktop. Vanessa wondered what the last day of this place must've been like.
She didn't get the chance to finish the thought. The sight ahead made her stop in her tracks.
"It's the exit," Cullen said.
"Then, let's fucking go," Werth said.
Hannah and Wendy uttered their agreement.
"Wait," Vanessa said.
"What?" Werth asked, his voice seething with irritation.
A cinderblock wall surrounded most of the amusement park. Only a chain-link gate, mostly fallen off its hinges, blocked the opening. On either side, a hooded figure stood statue-still. Vanessa pointed at them. Werth squared his shoulders and stared the figures down.
"Do you think they're real?" Wendy asked. "They're not moving at all."
Their Van Gogh yellow cloaks hung limp. Black gloves covered their hands. Under the hoods, their faces were shadowed.
Kayson glanced around, spotted something, and walked toward it. He swiped a loose hunk of pavement from a pothole and hurled a fastball at one of the figures. The projectile struck its target in the chest, bounced off, and thudded to the ground.
"Shit, good enough for me," Kayson said.
"Wait," Vanessa said.
This time, she held out her arm and touched his chest. It was bony under his shirt but not devoid of muscle. He glanced down at her hand, then made eye contact with her. She took her hand away quickly.
"What now?" Werth said. Somehow, his irritation had tripled.
"They may not be alive, but it might be some kind of trap."
"She's right," Cullen said in a harsh, staccato whisper.
"Okay, so, what do we do?" Hannah said.
"Trap or not," Werth said. "We won't know unless we try. Past that gate, it's wide-open woods. There's a trail. Civilization can't be too far past that."
"I don't know," Vanessa said.
"Well, I can't stand to be in this place another second," Wendy said with a huff.
She marched toward the exit. Vanessa reached for her and missed. No one went with her, they just watched. Even Kayson and Werth, for all their bravado, simply waited as Wendy approached the opening and the two hooded sentries.