That thought fled between one breath and the next as two men strode into the barn. The tan leather pants they wore looked like nothing I’d seen before. Yet, a normal black t-shirt stretched across the broad chest of the first man, and a large jacket covered the other. The men themselves were far from normal, though. I frowned at the exposed arms then looked at their faces.
Grey skin.
Pointed ears.
These weren’t men but the things we’d heard about from other survivors. The things that killed people with simple ease.
My blood ran cold as I noted how much bigger they were than Adam. How would he and I stand a chance against them? First, the arm in the turbine, then the “smart” dead nosing around, and now these guys? Fate had to have taken my thoughts about surviving as a challenge.
I watched the pair enter the pen. The one wearing the jacket patted a heifer then hooked his arms under it and lifted. My eyes almost popped out of my head when I saw the animal come off the ground. He set it down again and shrugged at the other one.
“Adam,” I called, finding my voice. “We have a problem.”
He hurried into the control room. When he saw what I was watching, he swore.
We watched the grey men survey the barn. One pointed to the hay we’d just forked down, and the other ran his hand over the cow he’d picked up. The speculation on the pair’s faces was unmistakable.
The infected never wondered how the livestock were still alive. They just ignored them and moved on, usually. Except for the two this morning.
The grey man in the black shirt saw the camera hidden on top of a barn beam and stared directly at it. At us. There was something very weird about his eyes, and I leaned closer to the screen in an attempt to pinpoint what.
He spoke to his companion, who also looked at the camera.
“They know we’re here,” Adam said. His hand immediately settled on one of my shoulders. “It doesn’t matter. They can’t get to us in here. We’ll be fine, June.”
He wasn’t saying it to reassure himself. He was reassuring me. Just like he had since the moment we packed our bags. I reached up, set my hand over his, and gave his fingers a squeeze.
The kitten that had run from the infected strolled up to these creatures and rubbed against the jacketed one’s leg. They both looked down at it. Then the other one smiled broadly.
“Do you see his teeth?” I breathed. The sight of those sharp canines set my insides trembling.
The one in the black shirt picked up the cat and scratched it under the chin. They gave the space one last glance then left. With the cat.
“Do you think they’re going to eat it?” I whispered.
“I hope not.”
“What are we going to do?”
“We’re going to wait and see if they come back.”
We watched the cameras together after that. I took a quick break to make us lunch and returned to the control room. Everything remained normal, but after the morning we had, I didn’t trust it.
With each passing hour, the knot in my stomach grew. We were going to have to go out there again to feed the cattle at some point.
Adam ran a hand through his hair and leaned back in his chair.
“I can’t decide if we should go feed now, wait a little longer, or just forget it tonight.”
“The cows will get loud enough to draw the dead if they don’t get fed. And given how many infected we heard this morning, I don’t want to risk that if they’re still close.”
He exhaled heavily.
“Okay. We go now, and we work quickly. Just the cattle.”
I nodded and stayed to watch the monitors while he prepped our gear. When he called for me, he had two homemade knife harnesses for both of us. Adam’s kill speed was better when he could abandon the knife and grab a new one. I didn’t know my kill speed and didn’t want to.
“Just in case,” he said when he saw my hesitation.