Attack of the Town

Kearton Pennsylvania is a small arboreal town about two hours outside of Philadelphia. There are only about 9,000 people, most of whom have lived there for their entire lives. Life goes on normally in Kearton. The kids attend school during the day and help out with chores in the afternoon. The fathers work all day long, and the mothers stay home to tend to the gardens and babies. From the outside, Kearton seems like an average town.

Jon stepped carefully down the sidewalk, making sure not to step on any cracks. He was very superstitious. Today was a long day. He had three exams before lunch, and by the time the day had ended, Jon had managed to get detention from two of his teachers. Some would say the he had a knack for trouble, but then again, what fourteen year-old boys don’t get in trouble every now and then? As Jon hopped and skipped to avoid the cracks in the sidewalk, a beam of light glinted off of a coin on the ground right into his eye. Already annoyed, Jon wound up to kick the coin into a nearby yard. He stopped himself halfway through the rotation of his leg, as he had noticed that the coin did not look like any that he had ever seen before. It was about two inches in diameter, made of silver, and had minuscule specks of gold in it. There was an engraving on it which read, “Take No Prisoners” in bold letters. Intrigued, Jon pocketed the coin and headed home to show his brother.

The rest of Jon’s walk home led him through the dense forest surrounding Kearton. For about four miles, he saw virtually no sign of human life. Strangely, he also did not see any animals among the fauna either. There were no birds conversing with each other from the tree branches, no squirrels jumping acrobatically from tree to tree. This seemed a bit odd, but did not register as anything two suspicious. Jon kept on walking, thinking about what his father would do as a punishment for his two detentions.
Jon finally came out of the woods and stepped on to the road. Right away he noticed something odd; there were no cars on Main Street. Not one car was driving, stopped at a traffic light, or even parked in a parking lot. He looked around, confused at what was going on. All of the sudden, an immense heat began emanating from his pocket. Eager to stop the heat, Jon deftly reached his hand inside the pocket and pulled out its contents. A dollar bill, yo-yo string, a few pieces of lint, and the coin tumbled to the ground. Recovering from his shock, Jon bent down to take a closer look at the coin. At first glance it seemed the same, but after careful examination he noticed that the golden specks had turned a dark shade of red, and the inscription was different. It now read, “Success”. At this point, Jon was really beginning to get freaked out. He had no clue what was going on, and just wanted to get home. He hurriedly grabbed his possessions from the dirty road and sprinted off toward home.

All the way home, he did not see one person. He did not see a dog, or even a cygnet. He did not see anything except for deserted streets, empty restaurants, and vacant drugstores. By the time Jon reached his house, he was out of breath and covered in sweat. It took a moment to collect his courage, but Jon soon began taking tiny steps toward the front door of his house. When he reached the door, he grabbed the knob, took a deep breath, and opened it. Jon did not see anything at first. A rancid odor overwhelmed his nostrils though, and he immediately felt sick. Jon pulled his shirt up over his nose and mouth and continued to walk deeper into his house. When he entered the living room, he was appalled at what he saw. Lying prostrate on the ground, arms and legs out were three figures, one of which was quite pudgy. After a second, Jon lost his countenance when he realized that they must be his mother, father, and brother. He made a violent guttural sound, and then stood silently for a few moments, unsure of what to do. Looking at his father who was wearing very tattered clothes, he noticed that there was something clenched tightly in his fist. Jon bent down and slowly pried open his fathers hand, exposing a coin that was very similar to the one Jon had. All of the sudden, a figure swooped unheralded down through the ceiling and nearly hit Jon, but he manged to dive off to the left at the last second, and an eddy of cold air rushed past him. The figure quickly turned around and sped towards him once more. Immediately he was filled with compunction. This time there was no evading it. The malefactor went straight into Jon, who screamed for a split second, and then died very quickly. Jon was but one of the victims of an attack by the creature on the town of Kearton, Pennsylvania.