Pack Animals [An Undead Post-Apocalypse Thriller]

by Cain, Kenneth W.

  Dale threw his hands up into the air, striding away from Clyde. He cursed quietly, maybe even at someone in particular. Allen had his suspicions. He spun back around and kicked his brother’s leg. “Get your goddamned candy ass up, you yellow bastard.”

  Clyde recoiled, his pain obvious, and tried to sit up. At this he failed.

  “Get up, I said.” Dale looked visibly defeated. “Please, bro!”

  Again, Clyde rolled over. He managed to lift himself to a half-sitting position. His lips trembled. “What?”

  “I’ll tell you what.” Dale bent over, dug through a pack, and produced a bottle of whiskey. He twisted the cap off and took a slug, pulling away satisfied. “We’re gonna get drunk off this here bottle, and you’re gonna survive this. Ain’t that right, Allen?”

  Allen shot a distressed look to the brother. What this really was, was one brother sending the other off in their own way. He owed the man that much. Allen took the bottle from Dale, hung listlessly in his hands as he considered the dangers of sharing swill with a man dying of such an infection, then something else took hold of Allen’s sensibility. It was that boyish freedom again, a feeling he longed to maintain. This was the Allen that lived in another time, one where the country as they knew it had not ended so abruptly. This was the Allen who had a beautiful wife, a kid of his own, and was still grateful. He took the bottle, lifted it to his lips with a light toasting gesture, and drank. The heat sank into his belly and it was good.

  He offered the bottle to Clyde. “Why, that’s right.”

  Clyde took the bottle, shaking as he brought it to his lips. Satisfaction spread across the dying man’s lips.

  Dale took the bottle next. They had another round, and another. When that bottle kicked, Dale dug up another. Then another.

  They would stay for the night, get drunk, and send a good man off to his death. In the morning they would start again, for as long as it took.

  God how Allen hated himself for the things he had done. For what horrors came at his hands.

  CHAPTER 21

  Melanie’s eyes filled with shock. The panic showed on her forehead, wrinkles forming there and at the corners of her mouth, forcing an instant frown that reminded Sydney of what an earthquake might cause to land. Melanie seemed to know her fate even before the creature struck her. They all did.

  If there had been time, Sydney might have tried to knock Melanie out of the way. Maybe she could have killed the creature before it got to Melanie, the one person with all the information Sydney longed to discover. But there was no time. Sydney barely had time for a quick glance to Melanie’s distraught face.

  Then the young woman was gone, over the edge of the building, her back scraping hard against the outside of the chute. The creature was a frenzy of activity at the woman’s flesh, seeming unaware of their quick descent.

  Isaac brushed Sydney’s arm as he moved in front of her in an attempt to protect her. “Another!”

  Sydney didn’t need protection. She edged around him, tearing her attention from Melanie’s fall and redirecting her frustration at this creature. Her sword glimmered, then sliced. The monster’s head rolled to one side, its body dropping the other direction.

  Before two more reached the rooftop, Isaac managed, “Not bad.”

  “Check on the others.” Sydney took a bold step forward. “I got this.”

  “They’re fine. We can both worry about us.”

  “Melanie’s not. Now check on the others, like I said.”

  “Nothing we can do for them from here, Syd.”

  She faltered at his words. Isaac had called her Syd.

  Her past flashed before her eyes, envisioning the only other man to call her by that name. It was a temporary distraction she hadn’t planned on and couldn’t prepare for. She stood in front of two creatures, stuck in her past, seeing the face of the man she once dearly loved.

  “What the hell you doing, girl? Syd!”

  Two shots blasted past her face. Both struck dead center in the forehead of each creature, leaving a thin trail of sludge splattered across Sydney’s chest. The creatures landed at Sydney’s feet, leaving her neither shocked nor surprised. She was sad, the urge to cry suddenly overwhelming her. Now she had doubts as to what circumstances were behind Allen leaving her.

  Or did I leave him?

  Had she? Long before he did, perhaps she forced the negligence on his part. And what if Melanie’s words were true?

  Another creature emerged from the ladder.

  Sydney could hear a mass of bodies down below, writhing and climbing over one another, trying to reach the rooftop. Though she couldn’t see them, it sounded like an awful lot of bodies. Now she worried whether they might be able to collapse the building, bring it down on themselves, taking out both Isaac and herself in the process.

  Isaac stopped reloading the guns momentarily to yank her arm, trying to pull her out of her thoughts. She swung her blade and severed a head off one, kicked out with her right foot and sent the headless body into the other creature, slathering her leg with a horrid streak of dark red as both collapsed.

  “We need to get off this building,” Sydney said.

  “That chute came loose when Mel bought it.”

  She cringed, not wanting to hear that. “They’re just gonna keep coming until this place collapses.”

  “I got it,” Isaac said. “We go at the same time. You and I.”

  “No! You go. I got this.”

  “Dang it, Syd! If either of us goes alone the whole thing goes with us. You know that. You can’t fight this shit alone. Now, we go together or we don’t go at all.”

  There was a certain kindness to his face among the troubled past. She saw it in his eyes. And he was telling the truth. “Fine.”

  Isaac took her hand, leading her to the ledge, both of them readying to jump into the chute. “When I say, we both dive in.”

  She sheathed her sword in preparation.

  He turned, aimed at the creature that had just emerged onto the roof and fired. Smoke burst out from the end of the gun and the creature’s head exploded. “Now!”

  The middle ribbings tore at Sydney’s shirt as she dove headfirst. Behind her, Isaac’s head crashed against her left foot, then her butt. As they shot forward, the entire structure shook and jarred loose from the building. The sensation of falling disoriented her. The plummet slowed only slightly as lag bolts caught then gave. When the chute freed itself from the building, Sydney and Isaac rolled in its girth, blind to it all. Though the last fastener slowed their decent, it wasn’t enough to make it any less excruciating. Sydney’s chin drove hard against the rusty metal, her teeth grinding together. A shockwave of pain ran through every nerve in her body, over her skull, and down along her spine.

  Isaac’s face was driven into her buttocks, his chin colliding against her pelvis. Even with the padding of her gluts, it hurt.

  There was no time to think.

  They both ignored their agony and army crawled out of the tube.

  Sydney was the first out, with Isaac right on her heels. Still dizzy, not yet able to see things straight, she almost fell. She observed her surroundings, seeing their displaced group standing in a circle around them, a look of pure awe struck on their faces.

  Then she saw Melanie. Though she and her attacker lay still, Sydney knew what would happen if they did nothing. Sydney drew her sword and held it over the girl.

  Gavin’s face flushed. “Do we have to?”

  “She’s a goner one way or the other.” Isaac said.

  Sydney’s cold stare fell over Melanie.

  What a waste.

  With her death, Sydney had lost more than the others would ever know. She lifted her sword, readying to strike. Some of the others turned away in disgust.

  Sydney wanted to turn away as well, but couldn’t. This wasn’t right.

  Nothing is right anymore.

  Before she could consider it any further, she let her sword fall in one hard, clean swipe. The blad
e made only the slightest noise against the paved ground.

  CHAPTER 22

  This hard exterior he had developed since the war began wasn’t so impenetrable after all. Maybe someday he would feel human again. If so, he hoped that day would come sooner rather than later. What he also realized was that he had stuck it out with these brothers for a reason. They had a way of making him feel like his old self again, the young man he had been years ago before any of the political bullshit. But he also knew the hard truth about who he was as well.

  Always lurking somewhere inside of that good man was another side to Allen, a much darker one. That part of him wanted to put an end to both Gollum and Clyde. There was an urge to right whatever wrongs had come of his doing. He pushed those thoughts away as often as he could, letting the irresponsibility of his youth prevail for now.

  A drunken Dale stood over Clyde. “How you feeling, bro?”

  No answer came.

  Clyde’s breathing had become difficult, and, at times, it was as if he was no longer exhaling at all. Most of the time a wheezy phlegm-infused sound ascended from his airway, indication enough how hard it had become for him.

  It won’t be long now.

  Dale kicked his brother in the ribs, though not very hard. “Get up.”

  Clyde didn’t even roll over this time. His eyes were closed and that horrid breathing infected Allen’s hearing, bringing back memories of watching his dad die from C.O.P.D.

  Dale kicked Clyde again, the look on his face turning from drunken playfulness to something Allen hadn’t seen in the man yet. The truth of what was going to happen had struck home with Dale. “Clyde? Clyde! Wake up, you dickhead! Please!”

  Allen had trouble watching this. “Dale, we should—”

  “He goes with us, in with Dillon.” Dale thumbed over his shoulder toward Gollum’s cage. Dillon was a much better name for the creature, should a name be given to the thing at all.

  Allen wasn’t so sure. “When we open that cage, he’s going to—”

  “I said, he goes with!”

  Dale kicked at his brother one last time, perhaps hoping to jump start something inside of Clyde. An image of an old television came to Allen’s mind, when he used to watch shows on a small black and white 13” TV with rabbit ears and the screen half-filled with static. Back in those days, a good whack to the side of the TV might clear up the picture, if only briefly. Dale seemed to hope a swift kick would have the same effect on his brother, but it didn’t.

  Then, that horrid breathing stopped altogether. Clyde was gone.

  “Whatever you say, Dale.” Allen said.

  Dale bent over, took the bottle that rested in his brother’s hands. He lifted it to his lips, readying for a drink. Allen believed he would be asked to join in, to toast Clyde one last time. Oddly, Allen felt more than willing to oblige. But Dale only stared at the bottle, swishing it in his hands, watching the dark swill inside swirl about.

  After a long moment, Dale threw the bottle aside. The glass broke on contact, the remaining contents soaking into the earth. Dale’s eyes remained focused on the dark stain left in the soil and a single tear formed in the man’s eye.

  Dale turned away, as if trying to hide the emotion from Allen. He wiped it away with his sleeve. “Let’s get the bas—” He stopped, visually choking back his tears. For a second, he remained silent. “Allen? Will you help me load my brother into the carriage?”

  “Yes, of course I will.”

  Dale moved behind his brother and supported him under his arms. Allen took hold of Clyde’s feet. Dale’s eyes never left Clyde’s face until they were at the carriage. Together, they moved him toward Dillon, reuniting father and son. Dale opened the cage without concern. Allen steadied his hand on his gun, making sure not to let Dale see, but he was sure Dale had. Oddly enough, Dillon didn’t spring out of the cage like Allen expected. Dillon almost seemed content with the gesture. They lifted Clyde into the cage.

  Not all the way changed.

  Wasn’t that what Dale said about Dillon. Was such a thing even possible? What might become of Clyde? After being bit by a creature that wasn’t all the way turned? Could either of them be turned back?

  The clang of the cage door shook Allen out of his thoughts.

  Dillon moved in on Clyde’s corpse. Allen anticipated the worst, an instant of tearing of flesh, blood strewn here and there, meat devoured. But that moment never came. Dillon huddled up close to Clyde.

  Their own little pack.

  CHAPTER 23

  It was close to nightfall when Clyde started to turn. There wasn’t much room for one being in the carriage, let alone both of them, especially once Clyde began writhing and jolting about, seemingly being shocked back to life.

  Allen had never seen this up close. He observed how the muscles of Clyde’s legs didn’t condense upon themselves and reform into some hideous powerful leg as he expected them too. This must have been what Dale meant by ‘not all the way changed.’ Dillon stood like all the others—legs bent, always crouching, ready to pounce when the opportunity presented itself. But he also lacked the definition in those legs to propel himself into the air like the other creatures, though some of this could have come as a result of the limitations of the carriage.

  Clyde appeared to suffer great pain while being brought back to life. Allen knew it was a silly notion because Clyde had already died, but he couldn’t help but feel sorry for the brother even then. No matter how cold Allen tried to be, his heart prevailed. And right now, watching Clyde change like this, stirred up all those feelings about what Allen had done to cause this to happen. Ultimately, this was Allen’s fault.

  The older brother’s head twisted sideways, Clyde’s mouth opening in a wide snarl. When Allen thought his mouth would open no further, it did, the sides of Clyde’s cheeks tearing as he strained. Spit dribbled out at first, then a frothy foam.

  Dale turned away.

  Allen kept watching, both fascinated and sorrowful for his role in this alteration.

  A scream escaped the dead man as his limbs shook with a force, reminding Allen of what electricity might do when passed through a human body. Clyde’s eyes sank inward, the cavity around them forcing the skin to first stretch, then tear, fashioning little patches of wrinkled bloody flesh.

  Clyde’s lips drew back in agony, terror struck even then in his dead eyes. His gums shriveled, turning a horrid dark purple. Two of Clyde’s teeth loosened in his mouth, one of them swallowed into vastness of his drying throat. The other fell to the ground.

  All the while, Dillon remained in one corner of the cell, observing his father’s transformation. It was almost as if Dillon was waiting to welcome his father to the undead life.

  Then again, they weren’t all the way dead, were they?

  Allen doubted the concept of being half-turned meant anything at all. Clyde had died. So had his son. There wasn’t anything that came in between life and death, only what came after.

  Then again, I didn’t check for a pulse after Clyde died.

  It hadn’t seemed necessary at the time.

  Did he really die?

  This created a great unknown to Allen. Might there still be hope?

  No, hope no longer exists.

  After a brief moment of promise, he refused to let himself succumb to the thought they might pull through this unscathed. Nobody could save them. It was silly to think otherwise. What happened, happened, and those who fell to its wrath were deceased and gone forever.

  Stop trying to make excuses. Accept your role in this.

  Wouldn’t he do the same, though, if this were his own child? Maybe even if it were Sydney? That answer troubled him.

  Finally, the alteration ended. A resuscitated Clyde rested on the floor of the carriage, his son watching over him. Soon, Clyde would be well enough to stand on his own. A looming thought came to Allen that at some point he would need to rid the world of the both of them. That time, however, remained in the future, but not so far ahead that he c
ouldn’t already see the scene playing out in his head. That might bring an abrupt ending to whatever bond Dale and he had formed, but he would do whatever was necessary when the time came.

  Dale reached inside his pack and withdrew a bottle of tequila.

  I could use a drink after that.

  He waited for Dale to ask him to join in, but that didn’t come. Dale stared not into the bottle, but through it, a distorted life he had grown accustomed to over a long period of time. It seemed Dale had lost his taste for it. That he could no longer hide behind the bottle.

  Dale tossed the bottle aside. It broke on a large rock, spilling its guts to the ground. Seconds later, another bottle followed. Then three more.

  Allen was sure there was a lot more stashed away. But this was the beginning of something. Dale had changed as well, because he needed to, for his own good.

  Dale headed off to his bedding and laid down, gazing up at the stars. Allen wondered if either of them would get much sleep. He knew how hard it would have been if someone he loved ended up getting bit. Just thinking about it haunted Allen.

  He found his own bed, lay down, and also stared up at the sky. There was a better life out there somewhere. This nation was lost to them. He wondered if he would ever see Orson again. Thinking about Sydney, the things that had transpired between them, he wondered whether they might somehow reconcile. He missed her with all of his heart.

  With memories of her ushering him to a slumber, Allen slept.

  CHAPTER 24

  “Take her to the car,” Landon said.

  If not for Allen, the girl would have been at home, safe in bed by now. He didn’t like the idea of any kid getting caught up in this, and instantly regretted having intruded on their night out to dinner.

  One of Landon’s thugs escorted the daughter to an even bigger man. This guy shrouded the young girl and escorted her around the dark limousine, where he opened the door and closed her inside.

  “Make sure she stays put,” Landon said. “I don’t want her involved with this anymore than she already is. It’s bad enough her mother got involved. Look where that got her, Forrester.”