“We can try,” Max finally acquiesced, earning him a smile from Jay. “But Chip told me about last time. You wear this.” Max handed him the helmet that was attached to the bars.
“Let’s see what we can do.”
A few hours later, Max understood the dilemma that Chip had gone through, as well as the hilarity. While Jay certainly had the drive to learn how, the overall mechanics of the bike seemed too great for his simple mind.
Max clutched his belly and laughed as Jay fell off once again, grateful for his foresight in the helmet. Each time he fell, Jay didn’t seem to mind, though. Max had already guessed that pain processing had somehow changed for their kind. However, he also understood that in itself could be dangerous as well. Max had tried to ride it and, while he was able to do it to a rudimentary degree, his reaction time wasn’t great and he didn’t have much confidence in how much faster it would really be.
After trying to help Jay get on and pedal for the dozenth time, he finally accepted that less capable infected like Jay could not ride bikes.
While it had been a failure, it had been fun for both of them. Max grabbed their bags and opened a few cans of cat food, which they both ate with gusto before preparing themselves to move onwards.
Max pulled out the map to check where they were, before confirming their route for the day. Luckily for them, Sue’s house was located in almost a straight line to where they were going, so as long as Max kept an eye on the streets (he still couldn’t read the signs but could match the letters well enough) and watched the sun, he had confidence they wouldn’t get lost. Based on what Sue had calculated, they should reach the trains by the next day.
CHAPTER 25
“Out?!” Seventeen whispered loudly, immediately being shushed by Three. Clara nodded.
After Rachel had informed Clara of her intention, she immediately asked that the rest of her caged counterparts be freed and that Three and Seventeen be allowed to come wherever Clara went. She knew this was the least she could do for the two of them to thank them for their support since being captured. If Nine or any of the other semi-smarts were able to, they could follow. Rachel had reluctantly agreed to release everyone but couldn’t guarantee how many she could get out of the compound safely. Clara understood this was a risk for all involved; however, so was staying and doing nothing. Once again, her hand moved to her belly.
Clara looked at Three to see what his response would be, knowing that Seventeen would go along with whatever he decided. No emotion or decision showed on his face, and Clara wondered what the man was thinking.
“Very dangerous,” he finally said. Clara nodded again. That much was obvious. Seventeen, unable to sit still anymore waiting for his decision, got up and paced the cage, ignoring the constant frenzy around them. After a few moments, Clara was beginning to get antsy as well, before Three opened his mouth again to ask one question: “How?”
“How?” Clara asked, looking to Rachel for answers.
“I am not completely sure yet,” Rachel responded honestly. “But you all need to be ready at a moment’s notice. I will need some kind of distraction to get the guards away from the cage, but I don’t know what yet. Releasing the rest should give us the time we need to get out.”
“And friends?”
Rachel smiled at the dedication of the woman in front of her. Nodding, she replied, “just make sure they are ready to go. We can’t wait for anyone, so if someone falls behind, we have to keep moving. Do you understand?”
Swallowing lightly, Clara nodded once more and put a protective arm over her belly. Yes, Clara understood. And as much as she wanted to save Three and Seventeen, her priority was right here.
Three spent the rest of the day in contemplative silence. Despite his refusal to speak to the doctor, he had gotten the sense that she wasn’t the same as the other humans that were keeping them captive. Regardless, his experiences with humans so far left a lot to be desired. As much as he wanted to believe the doctor, he still felt hesitant.
Three’s memories of before his awakening were limited, but he did get a sense that he was often alone even before. His sense of protection for the two women seemed familiar as well, but he held almost no memories of before he died. Sighing, he watched Seventeen comfort the pregnant woman and behind them, one of the soldiers looked their way, whispering about the interactions they were witnessing. Despite his misgivings, he decided it would be far more dangerous to stay.
While downstairs they were debating the wisdom of trusting Rachel, she was busy working on a plan to get them out. Luckily, the compound was not as well run as the previous one in Seattle, both due to lack of personnel as well as the overall layout. Trying to focus on planning, however, was proving difficult for Rachel right now. She was a scientist though, and was used to problem solving and thinking with logic. She just needed to apply the same principals to this problem.
At first, she had thought about a fire or even fire alarm, but she also worried that those inside wouldn’t take it seriously. After a zombie apocalypse, it was hard to be as affected by a mere fire alarm. She thought about using a more forceful method—grabbing a few guns and seeing how far that got her. Again, the problem was that the soldiers were not very frightened of guns and were much faster and more familiar with them than she was. Could she hope to overpower them all on her own? She tried to focus on her own strengths instead. What did she have that the others didn’t? What could she use to her advantage?
A few hours later, Rachel had the seed of a plan. It wasn’t overly elaborate or pretty, but she prayed it would work. She began to set it to action, trying to ignore the fact that she was about to unleash a lot of infected people.
CHAPTER 26
The rest of the day they made decent progress. It was unseasonably warm for September and Max’s spirits were bright despite the desolate state of the streets of Toronto. They had seen a few other small groups of infected, but none bothered them in the slightest. They did see one woman who was sitting in the middle of the street; however, she seemed to be like the man Max had met in the store. Max approached her and tried a greeting, but after a few minutes of complete unresponsiveness he gave up and continued onwards. Max noted how few people they had seen and wondered about it. Jay had told him Toronto was a large city, and while the scale of it seemed that way, the number of people they had seen didn’t give that impression. There was no way of knowing the level of devastation the FIRE virus had caused around the world.
It was only a few weeks since the first signs of the virus were spotted, and in that time, it had covered the globe. FIRE was fast, deadly, and contagious, and had left no stone unturned. Of the millions of people worldwide that hadn’t died from the virus, many had since died from direct infection caused by bites and the inevitable human element that came along with such massive amounts of death and destruction. The remaining population was spread out and hiding.
The effect of all of this was severalfold for Max.
First, it meant that the city was relatively quiet. While it wasn’t uncommon for a few bodies to litter the streets, they hadn’t seen a live person, infected or not, in hours. Second, the few people who did happen to see Max and Jay quickly hid to avoid them. The infected were widely considered savage zombies and either avoided or killed quickly and quietly. They had been lucky to meet Sue, who had given them a chance few others would have. While all did seem quiet, Max didn’t notice the eyes watching them through the blinds of some of houses as they walked by.
Happy with the progress they had made, Max began to look for a place to hunker down for the night. He wasn’t in much of a hurry but was keeping his eyes out for suitable places. As Max was scanning the buildings around him, a low rumble came from the ground, causing Jay to immediately start growling. Understanding that a potential threat was approaching, Max quickly pulled Jay off the street and into a nearby alley. They hid behind a dumpster but peered out from the edges, curious to see what this new thing was.
A moment later,
several large trucks came into view, stopping a few yards in front of the alley. Max held Jay back, sure that whoever would come out of the vehicles wouldn’t be friendly. The trucks were just out of view, but Max could hear doors slam shut and male voices float towards them.
“That was fucking hilarious, mate! Did you see the way that fucking zombie’s head blew up? It was like a goddamn watermelon!” Several voices laughed, and Max crouched down further. Max listened as the men spoke about what had been a recent raid and the occupants they had found within the store. Mockery and laughter continued, and Max knew they needed to get away. Leading Jay down to the other end of the alley, they crept away unseen. They stayed low and went a few streets over before hearing a gunshot ring out, echoing over the city. They hurried onwards away from the sound, constantly watching behind them.
After another night huddled up in another abandoned shop, Max was feeling antsy. For the first time since his infection, he had dreamed, and while he couldn’t remember what the dreams had been about, he woke with a stronger sense of urgency to get to Clara. He quickly woke Jay and had them eat on the move, anticipating reaching the train before midday.
The rest of the morning, Max couldn't take his mind off Clara, and for once he was grateful for Jay's lack of need for conversation. His thoughts were turned inwards, and it was comforting to have Jay's nearby presence with no demands on him other than to lead the way.
Max’s dreams of the night before plagued his mind, and tiny snips of images kept fluttering through his brain. It was little details, like that fuzzy robe she wore, and her beautiful skin. These were the impressions he clung to. In his dreams, however, she was in trouble, and he saw flashes of a cage, and her being surrounded by other infected. Of course, he knew these were only dreams, but he couldn't help but feel more anxious and went as fast as he possibly could.
Before leaving Sue's, Max had spent a lot of time looking over the map and the area directly around the train station. Judging by a few of the signs they had passed, he guessed they were getting very close.
"Jay, we almost at train. Understand?" Max stopped and looked at the boy. Jay gave no response but stared at Max with earnest. Max sighed but decided to try to explain anyways.
"We go train. Faster than walking. Get to Clara," his voice cracked, "and then we home."
Jay seemed to sense the sadness and urgency in Max's voice and smiled in understanding. Max nodded and grabbed Jay’s hand, leading him towards where he expected the station to be. Sure enough, around the corner stood a building with the letters Max was looking for.
TRAIN
Grinning, he pulled Jay forward, keeping an eye out both ways for any sign of people. Seeing no one, he rushed them into the building.
As he walked in, the immediate scent of blood, smoke, and human flesh struck him. Even with his reduced smell it was almost overwhelming. Holding out his arm, they stood in the doorway, waiting and listening. Something had obviously happened here.
In front of them were rows of benches with several glass booths behind them. A hint of smoke came from a pile of garbage off to the side, but no flame was visible. Bodies, at least a dozen visible, littered the ground in the immediate area. A large clock hung above it all and everywhere was blood.
Max could hear Jay sniffing and kept him at his side while he thought about what to do next. Whatever occurred here hadn't been long ago and he noticed the bodies still had the smell of ‘fresh’ protein. The train wasn't at the station right now, but he knew it was only a matter of time. According to Sue, several ran these tracks, and all would at least take him the direction he needed to go. If he was lucky, the first one would be the one all the way to Vancouver, and Clara.
Having heard no sounds, Max released Jay, who immediately rushed forth and pounced on one of the bodies. A happy groan rose up in the boy’s throat as he ripped and gnawed and chewed. While Jay was happy enough with anything that contained protein, and wouldn't attack those Max told him not to, he was still driven by basic instinct. That included his predilection towards fresh, human meat. While The Smell was still appealing to Max, the grisly scene in front of him inspired no hunger and he decided to use the time while Jay was distracted to look around.
Max wandered through the station taking in the details of the carnage, still on high alert with the scent of so much death around him. Several of the glass booths had blood on either side and a few also had bullet holes, some branching out like webs decorated with red and pink. Based on where the bodies were, it looked like two groups had met by accident. One side was obviously infected and based on the fact the uninfected were by the door, he guessed they had been hiding out here, not realizing it was a hub for human transportation.
He imagined the surprise of both parties.
Shock.
Screams.
Chaos.
Death.
He saw it all run through his mind and the realization that so much death could be caused by what was, at the core, just a big misunderstanding, was a painful one. If only people realized what we went through after being infected, Max thought. Maybe they wouldn't be so quick to kill us. And obviously even the infected with less functions like Jay can learn at least a bit.
Max wondered if things were different in Vancouver, and how Clara was faring. He still didn't know if she was infected, dead, or immune, and as much as he couldn't wait to find her, he was a bit afraid of what he might find. For the first time, a new worry about finally finding her occurred to him. What if she was alive and didn't trust him? What if he went all the way across the country and she couldn't accept him like this?
As much as the thought pained him, he knew there was no sense in dwelling on it. He turned towards the back of the station to see if anyone was hiding out in any of the offices or other closed doors.
Ten minutes later he had gone through the rest of the rooms and confirmed that nothing else was alive in the building. Evidence of some small nests, like the one he had seen in the store, were in several of the offices, indicating that he was correct; this had originally been an infected hiding place. The most horrifying discovery had been the corpse of a young boy in one of the offices. The boy was pale and had blood around his mouth, indicating he was infected, but it was a hole in the middle of his forehead that truly broke Max’s heart. Even the young had no reprieve from the terror their kind instilled in people. He closed the door behind him, hanging his head low to his chest.
He went back to Jay, who had gorged and was now snoring loudly on one of the bloody benches, oblivious to the aura of sadness that hung over the building. With nothing else to do, Max took a seat and waited for their train to arrive.
CHAPTER 27
Rachel knew that once or twice a week the cage was left with absolute minimal guards for meetings and status updates with Wolfe. After the poor reception she received in the last of these meetings, Rachel figured her presence wouldn’t be missed. This would be her best opportunity to free the infected with the least interruption. She knew after she released them time would be minimal to get away. Packing a bag, she took only what was necessary, ignoring things like food, assuming they could get that on the way. What was truly important, however, was her research.
Printing off reports wasn’t an unusual practice for her team, who had known from the beginning that should their generators fail all their work would be lost. They had been systematically backing things up onto external drives as well as paper records so that it would never be gone should there ever be a need for it in the future. While they had yet to come up with a cure, the information contained a lot about the progression of the virus and the effects on the human brain. Rachel hoped that one day the rest of humanity would see what she did when looking at this research. That the so-called “zombies” were simply infected, brain damaged people who needed humanity’s help.
Taking care to grab only what she could carry, Rachel informed her colleagues she would be attending the meeting, while also telling Wolfe’s men that she wou
ld be working in the labs. With the small amount of stolen time, Rachel made her way down to the cage.
Specialist Johnson didn’t mind being left out of the meeting to watch the cage and actually enjoyed the mindless solitude the zombies afforded him. After Captain Wolfe had taken over, he had lost all respect for the chain of command. Their previous leader, General Grant, had been a harsh man, but one with experience and a sense of right, even if that sense tended to be on the crueler side. Wolfe, however, was lacking in experience and was only in charge because the few superior officers between him and General Grant had died in the move to Canada. While Johnson had no care about the level of cruelty Wolfe displayed, he also had no respect for the man either. Sitting and babysitting a cage of zombies seemed preferable to listening to that asshole drone on about his so-called status updates.
Suddenly, the doors swung open as Doctor Samborski entered the room, a person Johnson was not expecting to see. He had never liked her self-righteous attitude and immediately scowled at her.
“Go to the meeting, Doctor,” He growled out at her as she approached him. As she walked towards him, a swagger in her step, Johnson got suspicious. He knew that walk; it was the walk of a woman who wanted him. It was a look he never thought he’d see on her, regardless of the fact she was an attractive woman.
“What are you doing here?” he asked warily.
Smiling coyly at him, she responded, “I heard you were all alone down here. I’ve been meaning to get you by myself for a while now.” She ran a finger down the front of his uniform before hooking it into his belt loop. Johnson smiled darkly. Even the good doctor couldn’t refuse him.
“Is that how it is, doctor? Well, it would be my pleasure to come visit your quarters later tonight,” he replied with a grin on his face.
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