by Dana Fredsti
A sound, maybe the wind, rose in the air.
Enfield Man’s face contorted in genuine fear as he shouted to his men, gesturing toward the hole and the boulders. Nathan bet that he was saying whatever was Kyrgyz for “close that fucking hole back up again!”
What the hell is in that cave?
Several of the men had actually started to try and hoist the large boulder back into its former place when people started clambering slowly out of the cave. Mostly men, but a few women as well, robes hanging in tattered shreds from emaciated frames, faces something out of a horror film—almost skeletal, dried black fluid outlining their mouths, although several had dark red smears on down their chins. But the eyes were the worst. The corneas were filmed over like those of a cadaver, and the whites were a ghastly yellow, streaked with red.
At any other time Nathan would have appreciated the sharp focus of the scope he’d found. Now he just wondered what the hell these poor bastards had contracted. Christ, he thought. What kind of screwed up government shuts its diseased citizens in a fucking cave?
The tribesmen who were trying to shove the boulder back in place scattered, letting the thing drop onto the ground. It rolled against one of the people crawling out of the cave. Although he couldn’t hear the crunch of bones as the boulder pinned the man against the cliff wall, Nathan had no doubt that pretty much everything in the poor bastard’s body had just been crushed. Only his head and one arm were still visible.
Except—
He was still moving.
Nathan stared in disbelief as the pinned man opened and closed his mouth, arm reaching out toward the tribesmen as if imploring them to set him free. One of the tribesmen stumbled back against the boulder, and the trapped man immediately seized his robes and yanked the fellow toward him in what seemed like an impossible feat of strength.
The man screamed and pulled away, leaving a swatch of his robe in the trapped man’s hand as he plowed into another one of the cave’s escapees—one of the few women in the group. She grabbed him by the shoulders as if to steady him... and then took a bite out of his right trapezius. His scream rose to an agonized pitch, cut off by the explosive percussion of a shot fired from the Enfield rifle, straight into the woman’s skull.
The bitten tribesman fell to his knees, hands clutching the bleeding wound on his neck as Enfield Man took aim again... and blew a hole in his compatriot’s head.
Things happened fast after that.
Gunfire mixed with the sounds of agonized screaming and the rising moans of the creatures from the cave, blending into a hellish concert that echoed off the mountain walls. Nathan watched as more emaciated people staggered out of the cave, and the tribesmen fired on them. He watched as bullets struck shoulders, guts, arms, and merely staggered the targets back a few steps. before they lurched forward again.
Enfield Man kept shouting something and pointing to his head, lifting his rifle to then put a round through the skull of a man so emaciated, it didn’t seem possible that he was mobile. The man immediately fell on his knees, then did a face plant on the ground.
He didn’t move again.
Still the other tribesmen fired wildly into torsos and limbs, fear overcoming discipline as the cannibals from the cave continued to advance and overwhelm them. Thrashing, screaming bodies were borne to the ground, blood flowing as their attackers tore chunks of flesh with teeth and hands.
Those tribesmen who tried to retreat down the path created their own log jam, effectively trapping them until they found their way blocked by yet more cannibals, who continued to pour out of the cave in a steady flow.
Nathan was frozen, his hands clamped around the scope as he watched the horror unfold. He thought he might be in shock. And wasn’t that a laugh. Jackson would rag on his ass six ways from Sunday if he found out.
Enfield Man was the last tribesman standing, wedged in between the mountain wall and the fallen boulder, making every shot count. When his gun ran out of ammo, he grabbed an AK47 from one of his fallen compatriots and opened fire in full auto, spraying bullets into the advancing horde, still aiming at their heads. Some fell as the projectiles hit their targets, enough that it looked like the guy might have a chance.
Then the man pinned by the boulder snagged Enfield Man’s shoulder with his free hand, taking his attention just long enough for several attackers to reach him. One grasped the AK47’s barrel in a claw-like hand. Another clutched at the tribesman’s robes, while the third grabbed an arm and promptly took a bite out of it. Enfield managed to get off one more round of ammo before he was borne to the ground.
Still unable to move, Nathan watched as the attackers proceeded to devour the fallen men. And as he did so, the partially-devoured tribesmen started moving... and staggered to their feet.
“Jesus...”
It was barely more than a mutter under his breath, so what happened next had to be a coincidence. One of the cannibals suddenly turned away from the body he was eating and looked up at the ruins where Nathan was crouching. Those milky eyes seemed to stare straight at him.
Nathan’s fingers unclenched and the scope dropped to the ground with an impossibly loud clatter. Even without the scope, he could see the figures turn toward the sound and start lurching their way in his general direction.
This is majorly fucked up right here.
Something scuffed up dirt and pebbles behind him. Nathan jerked around fast and hard enough to hurt his neck just as teeth fastened onto his left arm, and the smell of putrefying flesh assaulted his nostrils.
He screamed—the first time in his adult life he’d done so. A chunk of his arm tore away under the teeth of his attacker, and Nathan threw himself to the side, a shoulder scraping hard against a section of crumbling wall. He looked up in time to see an emaciated figure lurching toward him, with the same yellow whites and filmed-over corneas as the cannibals from the cave. Its teeth were coated with fresh blood, a gobbet of flesh and fabric hanging from the mouth.
Nathan fumbled for his firearm, but before he even managed to unsnap the holster, a gunshot cracked and a messy hole appeared in the thing’s head. It thumped against the wall, its slide down to the ground leaving a trail of stinking black fluid on the stones. It lay unmoving, Nathan’s flesh still clenched between its teeth.
He stared at the corpse, clutching his wounded arm with one hand. It hurt, burned like a motherfucker. His ears rang from the close proximity of the gunshot and if he hadn’t been in shock before, he sure as hell was now. ‘Cause he couldn’t be seeing a freshly killed corpse with flesh rotting off its bones, skin on its face so desiccated that it might as well be a mummy.
“Nathan?”
He turned bleary eyes toward the sound of Simone’s voice, seeing her standing in the entrance to the ruins wearing fatigues and holding a handgun in one hand. Somehow her presence here didn’t surprise him, even though it should have. He watched as she ran across the clearing, concern clearly etched on her features as she dropped to one knee next to him.
“Were you bit?”
“Huh?” Nathan couldn’t quite focus on the question. His arm felt as if there was acid running through it. No, make that acid lit on fire.
Simone’s attention focused on his arm. She gave an indrawn hiss.
“Oh, no.”
“Not. so bad,” Nathan managed.
Cool hands touched his face.
“You’re burning up.”
“You’re pretty hot yourself,” Nathan mumbled, inordinately pleased with his cleverness.
“And you’re delirious.”
“With love for you, ba—” Pain coursed through him, cutting off his words. Something sharp penetrated his arm above the bite. Almost immediately a blessed numbness chased the pain away, Simone’s face vanishing as his consciousness toppled down a very dark rabbit hole.
* * *
“He seems to be fighting off the infection.”
“Will he make it?”
“I... think so. I... I hope so.”
* * *
She was there when he finally did wake up, a few days later. He felt good. Really good. Probably too good to be real, which meant he would probably die in a day or so from some sort of infection. In the meantime, though, the soup and crackers Simone set down in front of him smelled better than any meal he could remember.
She sat quietly at his bedside while he ate. When he finally finished eating, he wiped his mouth with the napkin she provided, set it down on the empty tray, and looked Simone straight in the eye.
“You gonna tell me what happened out there?”
“You tell me,” she countered.
He rolled his eyes, not in the mood for the banter. “Please do not pull this psychoanalysis shit on me, Simone. I know what I saw. I just want to know what the hell it was.”
“Sick people, Nathan.” She looked away, then turned back to him with an almost defiant glare. “Quarantined, rightly or wrongly, like the lepers on Molokai.”
“So you’re saying they had leprosy?”
An almost imperceptible pause.
“Something like that.”
“You’re lying.” Nathan knew from the brief flash of guilt in her eyes that he was right.
Simone gave a shuddering sigh. She got up and looked out into the hallway, then shut the door to Nathan’s room and turned back to him.
“Look. I can’t talk about this. The organization I’m involved with... it’s about as black ops as you can get.”
Nathan stared at her coldly.
“Are the dead coming back to life?” Even as he said it the words sounded absurd. But real.
“What part of ‘black ops’ did you not understand?”
“Are the dead coming back to life?” he repeated.
“I can’t answer that,” she replied. “And even if I could, if something like this got out, do you have any idea what sort of panic it would cause—even without the religious implications—if rumors of the dead coming to life were made public knowledge?”
“That would be a ‘yes’ then,” he said.
Simone shook her head and left the room.
* * *
Nathan didn’t try to get any other information out of Simone. He let her take blood samples and monitor his vitals, but refused to say more than the absolute minimum required to facilitate his return to health. Their relationship died a quick death in an atmosphere of mutual distrust.
* * *
“So how did you control the outbreak?” I felt like a kid at story time—in Stephen King’s house.
“A very rare instance of the divergent political and religious factions in the area working together against a common foe,” Simone said. “The most difficult part was convincing the locals not to shut the infected up in the caverns.”
“What about the installation? How did you keep things a secret from all the incoming and outgoing military personal?”
Nathan snorted. He did that a lot.
“They shut it down, of course. Some bullshit story about how the U.S. and Kyrgyzstan governments couldn’t agree on the new rental terms.”
“That, actually,” Simone said, “was true.”
Nathan shot her a look.
“So zombies had nothing to do with it?” he countered.
“I didn’t say that.” Simone glared at him.
“So why didn’t you tell him he was a wild card?” I asked, fascinated by this glimpse into their past. It was better than a soap opera, especially considering how pissy the two behaved when they were in the same room.
Nathan made a sound between a snort and a laugh. For variety, I guess.
“Professor Fraser wasn’t telling me anything she didn’t have to,” he said.
I marveled at how Simone managed to look down her nose at him despite being shorter by a good half foot. He glowered back at her. I wished they’d just sleep together and get it over with.
“Captain Smith was one of the first people to show immunity to the virus.”
“Then why didn’t you tell him the truth about the zombies? It’s not like you kept it a secret from the rest of us after we got chomped.”
Simone hesitated before she responded.
“Back then we only recruited people into the Dolofónoitou Zontanóús Nekroús after several years of observation. Paranoia was high—”
“I’ll say,” Nathan muttered. Simone ignored him.
“—and secrecy was paramount. Higher authorities than I judged Captain Smith, and deemed him to be a potential security risk because of certain maverick tendencies displayed in previous missions.” She glanced over at Nathan before continuing.
“Had Captain Smith been less hostile and more cooperative—”
“In other words, a happy little lab rat.”
“—we might have learned more at the time. And perhaps eventually recruited him into the organization.”
“Not likely,” Nathan said.
“As it was,” Simone continued, “the Army retrieved him. Before we could take any steps, his term of service was up, and he vanished from the military’s radar.”
Nathan shrugged.
“No one would tell me the truth. Not much incentive to stick around, and lots of reasons to disappear. So I left—actually a little bit before I was supposed to.” Simone looked irritated that that little revelation. “Did my own research, and figured out what was what.”
“Couldn’t you have gone to prison for deserting?” I asked.
“If they’d found me, yeah.” Nathan’s tone implied that it would have been a long shot. From what I’d seen of him, I didn’t think his confidence was misplaced.
“Why aren’t you in prison now?” I asked. “Is there a statute of limitations for desertion?”
“Special dispensation for extraordinary circumstances.” Nathan grinned.
I had enough food for thought to keep me up all night.
“And now, young lady,” Colonel Paxton said, making me wonder if he could read minds, “you need to get some sleep before tomorrow’s work. Bright and early, you know!”
CHAPTER EIGHT
* * *
Morning seemed to come extra early the next day. I had to wonder if Colonel Paxton had set the alarms back.
Even after two cups of coffee, liberally laced with cream and honey, I was tired, heavy-lidded, and irritable when we pulled up to one of the last places in Redwood Grove where we had to search for zombies—and possible survivors. Back when the swarm had hit, you couldn’t swing a bat without hitting one of the undead. Now we had to go digging. But letting any of them slip through, well, it simply wasn’t an option.
The Redwood Trailer Heaven trailer park, located past a cul-de-sac at the end of Palm Street, should have been an idyllic location, all nestled in the redwoods. But zombie apocalypse notwithstanding, if there was a contest for the most cliché white trash neighborhood in America, I’d nominate Trailer Heaven in a heartbeat.
Rows of double-wides sagged on concrete block foundations, shabby and derelict. At least twenty or thirty trailers stretched back into the woods, on either side of a roughly paved road running vertically through the middle, and another bisecting it horizontally. Smaller dirt roads ran parallel in between the rows. Cars— mostly older models—hugged the sides of the trailers, a few under canvas lean-tos, some also on concrete blocks. The ground was littered with trash, including a truly frightening number of Pabst Blue Ribbon cans.
There was a stiff breeze, and the sound it made in the trees was loud enough to be annoying. Every now and then it would die down, then pick up again, rattling the empty beer cans.
“Let’s start at the far end,” I said after a moment’s thought. “When Team B shows up, they can start at the entrance, and we’ll meet in the middle. Kai, let �
��em know, okay?” He pulled out his radio and proceeded to do so.
It would have been safer to work in teams, one person opening the door and staying safely behind it, while the other stood back dispatched the zombie with a bullet to the head, but we had a lot of ground to cover, and I trusted Tony and Kai’s ability to handle whatever they came across. Unless they ran into some more Silly String.
“Let’s go.” I nodded to Tony. “Kai, we’ll see you back there.”
Kai nodded as Tony and I unslung our M4s and threaded our way between trailers to the far end of the park.
I took the one at the furthest point, nestled against redwoods on two sides. Some care had been taken with landscaping around it, planters with herbs and flowers bordering the edge of the trailer. The plants still thrived, even in the face of forced neglect, the damp weather making it easy to be a lazy gardener in Redwood Grove.
Ascending the steps to the front door, I listened carefully, trying to discern sound above the banshee howl of the wind. It was difficult, even with my enhanced senses, which picked up everything equally. So I cautiously opened the door, the creak of fog-rusted hinges loud enough to wake the dead. I took a step back and waited.
Nothing.
Stepping inside, I took a big old sniff. I smelled rotting food mixed with a musty smell of an enclosed space that hadn’t been aired out in over two weeks. Nothing pleasant, but after the crap I’d smelled around the undead, stenches were relative.
A quick scan of the interior from front to back revealed nothing more than the fact that its inhabitants had enjoyed the fine taste of cheap beer in large quantities, Domino’s pizza, and preferred Big Bob’s banana-flavored condoms as their birth control of choice. The box was sitting out on the bedside table. I hoped they survived to have many more banana splits.
Okay, just grossed myself out.
I used my extra-broad black Sharpie on the door, and moved on.
The next trailer was an eBay seller’s wet dream, with scads of Hummel figurines and Smithsonian collector’s plates displayed on doilies, all against a background of flocked pink wallpaper. It was like being trapped inside a tchotchke-stuffed Pepto-Bismol bottle. But at least there were no signs of body parts.