Fall of Man | Book 4 | The Tide

by Sisavath, Sam

  “You want to take a seat too, old timer?”

  “I wouldn’t mind.”

  “You’ve been sitting for hours already. Or I think it’s been hours. Can’t really tell. This place is…wacky.”

  “That aside, sitting’s better than standing.”

  “So sit. No one’s stopping you.”

  “Maybe later.” Paul gave the teen a noncommittal shrug. He had probably come to the same conclusion that Emily had: He didn’t want to play, but wasn’t sure if he had any choice.

  “That leaves one other question,” Jeff said.

  “What’s that?” Belinda asked.

  The kid pointed at the door. “Do we close it or leave it open like that?”

  Fisher looked back at the door. Then, in a voice that convinced Emily the big man had temporarily—regardless of how short a time period it was—forgotten it was open behind him, said, “I guess we should close it.”

  “Can we?” Stacy asked.

  “Huh?”

  “Someone opened it.”

  “So?”

  “I mean, someone opened it for a reason. Are they just going to let us close it back up?”

  Fisher turned back to the door again. “Only one way to find out.”

  “Not it,” Jeff said quickly. Then, when everyone glanced over at him (except for Klein, who hadn’t opened his eyes back up): “What? What’d I say.”

  “I’ll do it,” Fisher said.

  “Good idea. He’ll do it.” Then, just barely hiding it under his breath, “Whew. Didn’t think that would work.”

  Fisher scowled at the kid. “Don’t be a smartass.”

  Jeff held up two hands in surrender, but wisely didn’t say anything else.

  Fisher walked the short distance over to the opening, one hand reaching toward the side of the steel door.

  “Fisher, wait,” Emily said.

  Or she started to say. She got the man’s name out, but before the wait part could leave her mouth, a scream startled her.

  Emily turned—along with everyone else.

  It was Klein. He was still sitting on the floor, but had slumped over while they weren’t looking. His face was buried in his hands, and Emily could only see the top part of his head. He was screaming, his body writhing violently as if thousands of volts of electricity were being shot through his body.

  Paul and Jeff, the two closest to Klein, rushed back. Emily did too. She nearly bumped into Belinda as the other woman scrambled to get out of her path.

  Stacy, for some reason, walked toward Klein.

  “Stacy,” Emily said. “Stop.”

  Either Stacy didn’t hear her, or she didn’t care because she didn’t stop. She kept moving toward Klein, reaching out a hand toward him.

  Not that Klein noticed. He was rocking back and forth, still screaming. It was a piercing, pained scream. A hellish, elongated shrill that shouldn’t be possible coming out of a man as big and strong as Klein.

  “Klein,” Stacy said. “What happened? Are you okay?”

  Klein stopped moving.

  He also stopped screaming.

  He remained bent over, his face still hidden from them. That was when Emily noticed the small patch of red on the back of Klein’s arched neck. It had slithered down the sides, moving in jagged fashion, and disappeared into his shirt collar.

  Blood. It was blood. Something had pricked Klein’s skin while he sat.

  “Stacy,” Emily said, just before Klein lifted his head.

  “Aw, fuck my life,” Jeff said. Whispered. Or maybe he’d squeaked it out.

  Emily didn’t blame the kid, because she was seeing the same thing he was. The same thing all of them were.

  “Get back!” Fisher screamed. “Everyone get back now!”

  Klein’s eyes were red. Bloodshot. Strands of red wetness dripped down his cheeks even as veins along his face pulsated underneath the skin. His mouth was clenched, the teeth pearly white against the suddenly pinkening flesh of his face.

  A maniac’s grin, impossibly wide, spread from cheek to cheek.

  Chapter Six

  Three feet.

  That was all that stood between a startled Stacy and a lunging Klein.

  Three feet.

  Thirty-six inches, give or take.

  It wasn’t very much space at all, but Emily could have still dodged Klein easily. Or, if not easily, then capably. Cole could, too. Even Fisher or Jeff or Paul or, hell, maybe even Belinda might have been able to.

  But not Stacy.

  Because the young woman was in no man’s land—caught between what she was seeing and doing something about it. Emily could see Stacy’s legs buckling as Klein jumped up from the floor and toward her, firing like a rocket at a diagonal angle. It was an amazing trick. The type of movement that shouldn’t have been possible…

  …unless you were a maniac with adrenaline pumping through your veins at a few thousand miles a heartbeat. Not that Emily knew that was the exact speed of Klein’s current infection, but it was probably a decent guess.

  Not that it was going to matter very much to Stacy, because three feet—or about thirty-six inches—wasn’t going to save her.

  In the next split second, Emily tried to decide what to do. To achieve those ends, she did what she always did. She considered the steps:

  Step one: Know your objective.

  Step two: Gather intel.

  Step three: Formulate a plan.

  And finally, step four: Execute that plan.

  Step one was the same it’d been since all of this began, however many days ago that was: Stay alive. For her. For Cole. For her baby.

  Step two was right in front of her: Klein was going to reach Stacy before any of them could get in his way, and he would likely kill her. Or if not, then greatly injure her. The crazies weren’t just faster; their speed revved up to seemingly supernatural levels by the flows of adrenaline, but that same adrenaline also made them seemingly (though not really) invulnerable to pain. Gunshots in the right places—say, the head—put them down quickly. But shoot, hit, or stab them in any other non-vital locations, and they kept coming. They could get to Klein in time to prevent him from killing Stacy, but she would still suffer. And how many of them would it take to stop the big man? Fisher might be able to do it. Might. Maybe all of them, together, could do it. Maybe.

  Step three was foggy. It would depend on her priorities—save herself and her baby, or try to save Stacy. Did she know Stacy? No, she didn’t. She didn’t know her or the other people in the room from Adam or Eve. They were strangers to her and she to them. Would they voluntarily put themselves between her and Klein if she were in Stacy’s shoes? Who knows. That was a question that couldn’t be answered at the moment, and right this moment was all that mattered.

  Step four…

  …Emily took a step back, away from Stacy, as Klein reached her.

  Or almost did, if Paul hadn’t thrown himself into the charging crazy’s path. The two men slammed into the floor together.

  Paul.

  Paul?

  That was surprising. Emily had expected Fisher to jump in to save Stacy, but of course he would have had to be fast to achieve that. Not only that, but the man, as far as Emily knew, was still behind her, and he’d have to get past her first to get to Stacy before Klein reached her. And there was no way in hell he could do that.

  Paul, on the other hand, stood closer to the young woman. So did Jeff, but it was the bespectacled Paul who took the, literally, dive.

  The two bodies sprawled onto the hard concrete floor, landing with a loud—and to Emily’s ears, pained—thwump! that seemed to bounce dully off the steel-constructed walls. Klein, not surprisingly, was the first one to his knees. He snapped up from the floor with the kind of ferocious agility that could only be possible for a world-class athlete, something that he wasn’t even close to being. But this wasn’t really the same Klein Emily had been seeing the last few hours.

  Minutes? Was it hours or minutes?

&n
bsp; Goddammit, time was weird in this place…

  But instead of going for Stacy, stumbling away from him, mouth slightly agape, the crazy whirled on Paul, who was, now, a closer prey. Paul was on his back, groping around for—

  His glasses. Paul had dislodged his eyeglasses during the save. Instead of turning to face the real threat—the nearby Klein—the older man was desperately palming the floor for his glasses.

  “Get back, get back!” That was Fisher again, shouting behind her. The big man snatched Stacy by the arm and pulled her out the corner of Emily’s eye.

  Emily remained focused on Klein, the thoughts He’s going to kill Paul, and I can’t save him. I can’t save any of them because I have to save my baby first.

  I’m sorry. I’m sorry…

  Paul screamed as Klein fell on top of him, the much bigger and stronger man immediately raining blows down on his victim’s face. Paul kept screaming as blood filled the air, and Emily thought she heard what might have been bones cracking. Then Klein grabbed Paul by the hair and lifted his head up from the floor, and he was about to slam it back down when Fisher threw himself into Klein, knocking the other man off Paul’s writhing body.

  Paul remained on the floor, bleeding. He was bleeding so much. Emily didn’t know how one man could bleed so much in such a short amount of time. She could still recognize his face, but his nose was broken and blood poured from his cheeks and forehead where Klein’s knuckles had cut through the skin.

  “Oh Jesus, oh Jesus.” That was Jeff, saying the same two words over and over like a Buddhist chant, as if he might achieve something if he said them often and loud enough. He was wrong.

  Emily didn’t bother with her own chants. She watched Klein and Fisher struggling on the floor, the two men attempting to get the upper hand. Fisher was by far the bigger of the two. He might have even had ten pounds over the crazy.

  And it wasn’t going to matter at all.

  Emily knew that without having to think about it. Fisher’s extra weight and height wasn’t going to do a bit of good. Because Klein wasn’t Klein anymore. Hell, he wasn’t even a man anymore. She’d seen it in Don Taylor and Mrs. Landry and all her other neighbors in Arrow Bay Colony.

  Klein was something else now. Something more. Something worse.

  It didn’t take long for Klein to get the upper hand. One moment Fisher was on top, trying to pin Klein to the floor by his arms, and the next, Klein had reversed their positions. Emily might have thought the man was a proficient wrestler, and maybe he was, but he didn’t have to be. At this very moment, Klein was just stronger, faster, and crazier.

  Fisher was going to lose. And it was going to be bad.

  Then, once Klein was done with Fisher, he would turn his sights on them.

  On her.

  Klein wasn’t growling like a rabid animal, but there was a sound coming out of him that wasn’t distinctly human anymore. Blood from his eyes dripped down onto Fisher’s cheeks, the other man turning his head to get away from the droplets. But taking his eyes off Klein just allowed the crazy to get more of the upper hand, and soon Klein had gone in for the kill—he gripped Fisher along the sides of both eyes and turned his thumbs into weapons.

  Fisher screamed. He screamed like a man about to have both eyes gouged out of their sockets. Not that Klein gave a damn. The maniac’s grin that had appeared on his face moments ago had gotten wider. His lips were cracked and bleeding, so Fisher hadn’t completely missed on his blows, not that that was going to save him.

  “Stop it! Stop it!” That was Stacy, shouting. The young woman had taken a few steps toward the fight but, because she wasn’t a complete moron, hadn’t continued all the way. She seemed poised between jumping into the fray and turning to run.

  Emily wanted to tell Stacy that demanding Klein “stop it” wasn’t going to work. Klein wasn’t listening. He only had (bloodred) eyes for Fisher, squirming underneath him. Klein had straddled his target’s waist, and he must have gotten heavier since his infection because it didn’t look as if Fisher could get him off, not that the other man stopped trying. Fisher’s legs thrashed, but they looked more like spasms than a coherent attempt to dislodge his attacker.

  “Stop him!” Stacy again, shouting at the top of her lungs. “Someone stop him! Oh God, someone stop him before he kills Fisher!”

  Emily took a step back. Just one. It was involuntary, and she didn’t realize she was going to do it until she did it.

  She thought about the baby inside her and could hear Cole’s voice in her head: “Save the baby, sweetheart. The baby is all that matters!”

  He was right. She had to protect their child. She had to ensure her unborn baby’s survival. That was what mattered. That was all that mattered.

  Then why was she moving forward instead of back?

  The solution came to her like a sudden ray of light piercing through a cloudy sky, even as Fisher continued to scream and Stacy did the same, begging someone to stop Klein before it was too late. The room had suddenly turned very cold, and the hairs along Emily’s arms stood up and every inch of her exposed skin pickled. Adrenaline poured through her veins, urging her forward against her own instincts to flee, to save herself, to save her child.

  Her eyes shifted, seeing everything, but not the one thing she needed.

  A weapon.

  She needed a weapon. It was the only way she could fight Klein. This wasn’t about saving Fisher, it was about stopping Klein. About putting him down like the rabid dog he’d become.

  There.

  Paul’s eyeglasses.

  It lay just a few feet from the man himself, who hadn’t moved from his spot on the floor where Klein was forced to abandon him. Paul bled profusely from cracked lips and the broken nose. His right eye was black and purple and both were open, even though Emily didn’t think he could see anything. It was hard to see when you were dead, after all.

  Emily went for the eyeglasses.

  One of the lens was cracked, and both thin metal temples were bent. She would have grabbed something else if she had the choice, but she didn’t.

  Goddammit, she didn’t.

  So it was the eyeglasses or bust.

  So make it work!

  Fisher had his hands up and was striking Klein in the face and chest—he was throwing wildly, with no real targets, just trying to get the crazy off him—but it wasn’t working. Maybe that was because Fisher couldn’t see what he was aiming at. Klein remained on top of him, thumbs digging, digging into Fisher’s eyes.

  And Fisher kept screaming.

  And so did Stacy.

  And maybe Belinda and Jeff, too.

  Concentrate on the threat!

  The threat was obvious. There was only one.

  Klein.

  Emily moved toward the crazy, going up to him from behind, beyond his peripheral vision. She wasn’t even sure if that was necessary. Did he even care that she was still in the room with him and his victim? Or that the others hadn’t gone anywhere either?

  No, it didn’t look like it. Klein only had bloody eyes for Fisher.

  Poor screaming, bleeding Fisher.

  Paul’s eyeglasses, like many, had metal temples that could be manipulated if you knew where to push. Emily did that now, straightening up one of the tips, then gripping the frame by the longer part as if it were the handle of a knife.

  Fisher continued to scream, his hands now grappling with Klein’s outstretched arms in further attempts to escape. It wasn’t working. He was a dead man.

  Or he would have been, if Emily didn’t grab Klein by the hair—they were damp and matted with blood (Probably Paul’s, or Fisher’s, or maybe some of his own.)—and lifted his head up, then back as far as she could. Only then did Klein abandon Fisher and raise his hands to grab at her.

  Emily didn’t give him the chance to fight. Once Klein’s head was exposed to her, she maneuvered her right hand in front of his face, then stabbed inward with Paul’s eyeglasses.

  Klein grunted (She was expecting
more than a grunt, but that was all she got. Klein’s response was akin to someone stepping on a piece of Lego.) and swung backward with his arms. But Emily had already let go and was jumping back. She retreated, but not very far. Three steps. It was enough space to set herself and launch forward.

  Crack! as the toe of her sneakers (Thank God she’d changed into something more practical) connected with Klein’s lower chin and his head snapped up and backward. Either his jaw had broken, or something else had come loose. Not that it mattered, because the blow did its job and sent Klein collapsing back to the floor on his back.

  But he wouldn’t stay down long.

  Not for very long at all.

  Emily jumped on top of him, straddling him the way Klein had done Fisher just seconds ago. Her eyes locked with his. Or his left remaining one, because she’d stabbed him in the right with the temple of Paul’s glasses and there was just a bloody, squishy mess there now. Whatever had infected Klein and flooded his eyes with blood, it now had a place to go: Out of the hollow mess that used to be Klein’s right eye.

  Klein lifted one hand as if to ward her off, but she slapped it away with her left while plunging down with her right.

  Plop! as the temple’s end popped Klein’s remaining left eye.

  This time, the crazy did scream.

  So that’s what it takes, huh? she thought even as she pushed down on the glass frame and the tip sank deeper into Klein’s eye socket.

  But it wasn’t going to reach its final destination without some help. So Emily cocked back her right hand, then drove it forward and down, striking her palm into the top of Paul’s glasses and plunging the glasses in even deeper.

  Chapter Seven

  She wasn’t sure when Klein finally stopped moving, but parts of his limbs were still spasming when she slammed her palm into Paul’s eyeglasses for the last time. How many blows had it taken to get the temple all the way through the eye socket and into the brain? Two? Three? Five? She’d lost count, but it’d seemed to take forever. For a while, she didn’t think she’d ever reach the promised land.

  Until, finally, Klein lay still.