The infestation begins

Chapter 20



Corey was waiting at the cabin.
He saw Nifty first.
Then Thicket.
Then the gremlin walking behind them.
Then another.
And another.
Corey slowly stood.
"Nifty."
"Yeah?"
"Whats going on, how many?"
Nifty looked over his shoulder at the line disappearing between the trees.
"I stopped counting."
Corey closed his eyes.
"Of course you did."

Corey watched the line emerge from the trees.
Thicket came first, followed by a pair of Bramblekin Nifty had found at the waterfall.
Behind them lumbered a Cragborn, nearly as wide as he was tall, his gray skin rough as broken stone.
A Rillfolk walked barefoot beside him, water still dripping from the fins along his arms.
Then came a Cinderback.
Corey stared at the faint orange glow showing through the cracks in its charcoal skin.
“Is that one on fire?”
Nifty glanced back.
“Technically.”
Corey waited.
“Is it supposed to be?”
“Probably.”
“Probably?” corey said shocked
“I don't know him.”
Corey rubbed a hand over his face.
More gremlins emerged from the woods.
Some Nifty knew.
Some he remembered seeing.
Some he had only ever seen on paper.
And some were complete strangers.
They built lean-tos from fallen branches, patched tarps into roofs, stacked stones around carefully hidden fires and carved paths that humans would walk past without ever noticing.
The woods around Nifty's cabin began to feel different.
Occupied.
Alive.
Food became Corey's first concern.
Secrecy became the second.
"No fires where somebody can see smoke from the road," Corey told them.
Several gremlins complained.
"No wandering into town."
More complaints.
"No stealing food off people's porches."
Thicket looked away.
Corey pointed at him. "That one was specifically for you."
"I did that once." Thicket said
Nifty coughed.
"Twice," nifty corrected.
Corey rubbed his forehead.
Nifty smiled.
For the first time, the cabin felt loud.
He liked it more than he expected.
Nobody officially chose Nifty to be in charge.
That was the strange part.
When two gremlins argued over where to build, they came to Nifty.
When someone wanted to know whether a human object was dangerous, they asked Nifty.
When food needed dividing, eyes found him.
When another frightened newcomer appeared after seeing one of the painted marks, someone brought them directly to the cabin.
Nifty complained every time.
Then he solved the problem anyway.
Corey noticed.
Thicket noticed too.
Neither said anything.
The computer kept chiming.
NFTs sold.
Messages appeared.
Humans talked about Nifty's drawings, shared them, collected them and joked about the growing gremlin infestation.
They had no idea.
Outside the cabin window, actual gremlins moved between the trees.
Some of the same faces humans were collecting online were now sleeping in makeshift shelters fifty yards away.
Nifty stood at the window one evening and watched the camp.
The word infestation had started as a joke.
It did not feel like one anymore.
The cabin had once been a place for Nifty to hide.
Then it became a home.
Then Corey found him, and it became a place where one human was allowed.
Then Thicket arrived.
Now trails spread outward from the porch. Shelters hid among the trees. Voices carried softly through the darkness. Gremlins who had awakened alone finally had others who understood what had happened to them.
Or at least understood that none of them understood it.
Nifty stepped onto the porch.
Conversation quieted nearby.
Several faces turned toward him.
He hated that.
He also understood why.
They were lost.
So was he.
The difference was that Nifty had been lost here longer.
For now, apparently, that was enough.
Thicket joined him at the railing.
"You're doing it again," Thicket said.
"Doing what?"
"Looking like you're thinking too hard."
Nifty glanced toward him. "I'm surrounded by gremlins living in my yard."
"Our yard."
Nifty stared at him.
Thicket smiled.
Nifty looked back toward the camp.
Beyond the trees were human roads, human towns and humans already whispering about strange creatures in the dark.
Somewhere beyond all of that, impossibly far and impossibly close, was home.
Rook was still there.
Thicket's wife might still be there.
And yet gremlins Nifty had drawn from fading memories were appearing here one by one, unable to remember how they crossed.
Nifty did not know why.
He did not know how to send them back.
But until he did, they needed somewhere to go.
Behind him stood the cabin.
Around it stood the beginning of something neither world knew existed yet.
Nifty looked across the camp.
"Guess we're going to need more food."
Thicket nodded.
"And more roofs."
"Yeah."
"And less humans."
Nifty glanced at him.
"Corey stays."
Thicket sighed. "Fine. One human."