Free Mr Mumbles by Barry Hutchison Page B

But there was another question, too – one I hardly dare ask myself: had I done this? Was it all somehow my fault?
    It couldn’t be,
I told myself.
How could I have possibly done this?
No matter how much I tried to convince myself, though, the thought remained, lurking quietly at the back of my mind.
    I decided that what I needed was a plan. Well, what Ireally needed was a miracle, but a plan would be the next best thing. If I had a plan then I’d have something to focus on, other than the hundreds of creatures which lurked outside.
    First thing first – I had to find out if the rest of the village was like this too. Maybe whatever had happened was contained to just this one street. Maybe there were other people – real, normal people – just round the next corner. If I could find them, we could figure everything out together.
    So I had a plan, although admittedly it wasn’t without its problems. For starters, I could see thick plumes of greyish smoke billowing up from at least the next few streets over. That didn’t bode well for the theory that it was only this one which had been affected by…whatever was going on.
    The second, perhaps even bigger flaw in the plan, was that to get to the next street I’d have to get past this one. And doing that may well put me into direct contact with the monstrous things roaming about.
    Still, my mind was made up. Flawed or not, it was the only plan I could think of, and anything was better thansitting here, waiting to be found. Well, no, I could think of lots of things worse, but waiting to be found was still pretty grim.
    Moving as quickly as I dared, I crept on my hands and knees towards the back wall of the church, picking my path carefully through the overgrown undergrowth. Overhead, something swooped down low on large leathery wings. Not daring to look up, I listened to it circling round a few times, before, with a low gargling sound, it continued on its way.
    The back of the church led out into the graveyard. Normally, going into a cemetery in the middle of the night would be near the bottom of my list of Things To Do, but, spooky as the graveyard might be, it wouldn’t come close to what was going on at the front.
    When I reached the mound of bricks that used to be the back wall, I stopped and peeked outside. The graveyard was there, and, as I’d hoped, it was completely deserted.
    After pausing for a second to steady my nerves, I clambered over the rubble, slid down the other side, and began to run towards the wrought-iron fence which surrounded the burial ground.
    The grass crunched underfoot as I ran, my shoes leaving imprints in the frost. I realised for the first time that it wasn’t raining, and by the looks of things it hadn’t been for some time. Last I’d checked, it had been pouring for weeks. What was going on?
    There was no time to think about that now. Weaving and dodging past a dozen moss-covered headstones, I made it to the fence, and squeezed myself sideways through a gap where a bar should have been.
    I emerged into a thick knot of trees. Their spindly branches scratched at my face as I pushed my way through the foliage. This wasn’t right. The back of the graveyard should have brought me out on to Wilkinson Road. From there I was only along two streets and up the hill to my house. So where had the trees come from? Why was there a forest where a road should have been?
    I pushed through the undergrowth and took a few hesitant steps forwards, trying to get my bearings. Before I could figure it all out, something lurking in the brush a short distance to my left gave a low, threatening growl. I hesitated,all my questions already forgotten, as my survival instincts debated over whether to stand still or make a run for it.
    With a faint rustle of leaves and a snapping of twigs, whatever was hidden in there began to creep closer – slowly, at first, then gradually faster, until I could see the grass being pushed aside in its wake. A low, squat shape