by Edward Crae
The creature howled and screeched as its body was consumed. Its demonic faces turned themselves toward the window, the fanged maws gaping like black holes of razor sharp death. It stumbled forward, reaching out with its claws in a fruitless effort to slice the two men to ribbons. Then, it fell to its knees—all four of them—each half of its mutated body trying to flee in a different direction.
Dan unshouldered his rifle, using the window sill for support as he held on with one hand. The creature pulled itself forward with its claws as the flames spread to the wooden floor boards. Dan zeroed in on the closest head, seeing the devilish eyes trained upon him in fury. He clenched his jaw, hoping the round would be enough to stop any further advance.
He fired.
The creature’s forehead split open, spraying black fluid and vile innards on the floor ahead of it. That half of its body slumped down, limp and lifeless. The remaining half continued to claw its way toward him, glaring with demonic hatred with those hellish eyes, and snapping its huge maw. Dan aimed again as the world wound down to a crawl around him. The flames that engulfed the creature burned in slow motion; every lick of flame taking on a life of its own.
He fired again.
The remaining head exploded in a cloud of slime and chunks of flesh that splattered the walls, and sizzled as it hit the flames. The creature pitched forward, its clawed arms falling limp, and the shattered remains of its heads splintering with the heat of the fires. It quivered and trembled for a moment before finally falling still.
“Got ‘im,” Dan said, shouldering his rifle again.
“Alright,” Eric said. “Now what?”
“Let’s get out of here before this church collapses.”
Dan let go of the window sill, using his heels to slow his descent as he slid down the peak of the roof to the gutter. Eric followed, and the two of them looked down at the ground below. It was about a twenty foot drop, surely an ankle breaker. But that wasn’t the worst part. Dozens of shufflers still mobbed the outside, and there were a few shamblers among them. Though the shufflers were unaware of their position, the shamblers glared up at them with their burning red eyes. They swiped their claws upward, and gnashed their teeth in hunger.
The ghoulish things were nowhere to be seen.
Suddenly, the windows on the first floor exploded outward, knocking away all of the mutants and setting them aflame. Those that still stood flailed and scrambled to extinguish the flames, leaving an empty space directly below Dan and Eric’s position. Behind them, another crash sounded, telling them that the upper floor had collapsed.
The rest would follow soon.
“I meant what I said earlier,” Dan said. “It was good to meet you.”
Eric smiled. “Then let’s get the hell out of here and have a beer.”
Chapter Thirteen
A gunshot sounded in Drew’s ears. He flinched. There was no pain. There was no impact. But he heard it. Slowly, he opened his eyes, wondering if maybe, just maybe, Mason had missed. Blood was splattered on the wall of the shed, right at the level of Mason’s head. Mason himself was slumped against the wall, slowly sliding down, a trail of blood and brains following him.
Drew turned to his right, expecting Cliff or Travis, even Max, to be standing there. It was Toby, wide-eyed, and holding a revolver. Drew’s eyes popped open fully, and he stood to face the boy.
“Jesus, man,” he said. “Thanks.”
Toby nodded, lowering the revolver. His eyes were wide as well, and his mouth hung open in shock. Drew went to him, holding his head, and turning his face upward.
“Are you alright, buddy?”
Toby nodded.
“Where’s your mom? Is she okay?”
“Yeah,” Toby replied. “She killed one of the guys. But she got shot in the leg.”
“Where is she? Take me to her.”
Toby ran off toward the office building, pulling Drew along with him. There were no more gunshots, Drew noticed, but he could hear Travis and Cliff shouting in the distance. He saw Max coming toward him, waving Travis along with him. Maybe, Drew thought, Max had seen Lena get shot.
When they arrived, Lena was leaning against a dumpster, holding her left shoulder. Blood ran from between her fingers, but she seemed to be alright. The body of one of Mason’s men was lying nearby, and his rifle, an SKS, was beside him. Drew knelt down as Toby hugged his mom.
“Toby,” she said. “Why did you run off? I told you to stay put.”
“I had to help, mom,” Toby replied.
“You could have gotten hurt,” she said.
“He saved my life,” Drew told her, just as Travis and the others ran up.
Lena looked at Toby with sad eyes. She noticed that the boy still held the revolver in his hand, and she took it gently. “Oh, Toby,” she said, teary-eyed.
“It’s alright, mom,” the boy assured her. “It was a bad guy.”
“The big guy,” Drew added.
Travis inspected her wound, smiling as he pressed against her flesh with his fingers. “It passed right through,” he said. “It didn’t hit anything important. It’s just a flesh wound.”
Drew shot Max a knowing look. Max grinned. He got it.
“Are they all dead?” Lena asked.
Cliff knelt nearby. “We got ‘em,” he said. “The gate is ruined though. We’ll have to fix that before sundown.”
“So,” Drew said. “What do we do with Melanie?”
“If you ask me,” Travis said. “We should just leave her in the shed. But I suppose we’ll have to have a vote.”
Cliff scoffed. “A vote? Give me a break, man. We all know it’s only a democracy if the vote goes her way.”
“Well, what then?” Travis asked.
Cliff shrugged. “Maybe when Dan and Eric get back we can all figure it out together?”
“Pardon me for interrupting,” Max said, pointing off in the distance. “But there appears to be smoke rising over there.”
They all stood, turning to the direction Max pointed. There was indeed a long column of smoke rising above the trees. It appeared to be coming from an area on top of a distant hill.
“What’s up there?” Drew asked.
“Nothing that I know of,” Travis said.
“I believe I have observed a church steeple on occasion,” Max said, “when the wind was right.”
A gunshot suddenly sounded, and Max gripped his leg as he fell. The others scrambled, and Drew reached out to drag Max behind the office building. Lena grabbed Toby and shielded him with her body.
“Come out where I can fucking see you!” a female shouted. It was Melanie.
“Goddamnit!” Cliff said. “Max, you alright?”
Max nodded.
“How the hell did she get out of the shed?” Drew asked.
“She probably walked through the damn walls,” Cliff replied.
Cliff stood up at the corner, keeping all of his body parts behind it. “Listen, Melanie,” he said. “We’re all a team here. There’s no reason to go all apeshit on anyone. Nobody needs to get hurt.”
“Go fuck yourself, Cliff!” she shouted back. “I’ll kill all of you worthless pieces of shit. You broke the rules. All of you. I want you out!”
“Put down the gun and we’ll talk,” Cliff said, calmly.
“I’m tired of hearing all of you talk,” Melanie responded.
Drew could hear the crunching of gravel as she came closer. Travis readied his shotgun, and Cliff flicked the safety off of his rifle.
“This is my place. My rules.”
“Clifford,” Max said. “I believe at this point you are allowed to use the phrase I told you so.”
Cliff shook his head, waving Max down. “Melanie,” he said. “Put the gun down. Lena is injured. We need to help her.”
“I don’t give a shit about Lena,” Melanie hissed. “Or her piece of shit kid.”
Mami came running around the corner then, stopping right in front of them, and baring her teeth. Cliff pointed
his rifle in the dog’s direction. “I got your damn dog in my sights,” he said. “I will blow her head off.”
“Don’t even think of hurting my dog!” she shouted back. “She’s worth more than all of you put together.”
Maybe to you, Drew thought.
He reached out to grab Max’s MP5, making sure it was ready to go, and pointed it at the dog. It backed away slowly, as if it knew what was happening.
“Take your fucking dog and go!” Drew said. “Or I’ll shoot her now.”
A gunshot sounded, throwing Drew off his game. Mami’s head exploded in a shower of blood and brains, and she fell to the ground in a heap. Lena had taken the revolver from Toby and shot her. She sat with her jaw clenched, and the gun still pointed in Mami’s direction.
Melanie screamed, firing blindly as she ran toward them. Drew raised the MP5, waiting for her to appear around the corner. Then, another shot came from behind them. Melanie’s footfalls stopped and she fell to the ground, her pistol bouncing past the corner. Drew turned to find the source of the shot. Dan and Eric stood there at the fence. Eric’s eyes were wide in shock, but Dan stood calmly, smoke coming out of the barrel of his rifle.
“What the hell was that?” Dan asked.
Dan and Drew stared at the demolished Hummer. Dan could hardly believe it was gone. The vehicle had been a godsend since the day they had procured it from the mercs. It was invaluable, and now it was a smoking pile of shit.
“Damn,” Dan whispered.
“Sorry, man,” Drew said. “I was trying to destroy Mason’s pickup. Those grenades are a lot more powerful than I thought.”
Dan shook his head in disbelief. “Well,” he said. “At least nobody was seriously hurt. You got all the guns out, right?”
“Most of them,” Drew said. “But all of the food was still in there.”
“We’ll just have to see what Melanie was hiding in that office.”
“What are we gonna do about the gate?” Drew wondered.
Dan sighed. “It looks like it’s fucked,” he said. “Maybe can all pitch in and fix it. We’ll need to do it soon, though.”
“Why?”
“There are a lot of strange things up there by that church,” Dan replied. “More of those creepy ghoul things, and tons of shufflers.”
Travis came up to them, joining them as they stared at the ruins. “Dan,” he said, clapping him on the back. “Thanks for making sure Eric made it back.”
Dan smiled. “No problem,” he said. “And you were right; he is a pretty good guy.”
“We found some shit in Melanie’s hideout,” Travis said. “You should come take a look.”
Everyone had gathered inside to keep warm. Melanie’s office had a few wall heaters, fed by the propane tank that was in the front parking lot. Cliff had gotten it started, and Max and Lena were huddled around it as the others searched through the garbage that was strewn around.
“She wasn’t a very orderly person,” Travis said as he led Dan and Drew into the main area. “But that’s not the kicker.”
Dan was confused. He knew right away that Melanie was a cunt, but what could possibly be worse?
“Look at this,” Travis said, laying a diary on a table.
Dan scanned the strange handwriting. Though there were no specific entries that were dated, or any other type of organization to speak of, there was one thing that was clear; Melanie had purposely killed Jesse and her sister, Megan. There were random statements of hatred against the two of them written in various places. Her words told Dan that she had gone over many different plans to have them “accidentally” killed in one way or another.
Strangely, one entry was dated and underlined with at least a dozen underscores. It was the day that Jesse and Megan were killed. Dan swallowed hard, looking up at Travis.
“Jesus Christ,” Dan said. “She really hated them.”
“There are other entries in there about the rest of us,” Travis said. “She was planning on killing Toby next, then Lena, then me. All of her plans got screwed up when you guys came. See?”
Travis turned several pages, pointing out some crude stick drawings labelled ‘Dan’ and ‘Drew’, with the words ‘fucking assholes’ underlined heavily.
“Wow,” Drew said. “You’re welcome.”
Travis smiled, shaking his head. “We dodged a bullet, so to speak.”
“So what the hell do we do now?” Cliff asked, searching through the cabinets. “There’s not much food here. It won’t last but a few days. And without any leadership, we’re just a bunch of lone wolves.”
“Not that there was any leadership before,” Eric said. “But maybe there’s someone who can help settle on group decisions. Someone with experience.”
Everyone looked at Dan, even Drew. Dan’s eyes went wide, and he shook his head slowly.
“Uh… no…” he said.
Drew clapped him on the back, grinning his Drewish grin. “Come on, man,” he said cheerfully. “I’d follow you, you fuckin’ cocksucker.”
Goddamnit, he thought.
“Look, Dan,” Travis said. “You’ve survived this long, and from what Drew says, you’ve been surviving on your own since before this thing started.”
“Haven’t we all?” Dan asked, shrugging.
“Not like you, man,” Drew said. “You did it all by yourself, with no one to lean on or ask for advice. Everything you did was all you.”
Well, Drew had a point. Dan didn’t think it was due to any special skills or anything; he just didn’t like people. These people, however, were alright in his book. Maybe he could do them some good. Or, maybe they would do him some good. Whatever the case, it was clear that from now on it wouldn’t be just him and Drew. It would be a clan, a tribe.
A family.
“Alright,” Dan said. “I accept. Let’s get this place cleaned up and repair the gate. We’ll stay in here tonight until everything is ready to go on the outside. If all else fails, we hit the road.”
“We don’t have a vehicle,” Cliff said.
“Not at the moment,” Dan said. “But that will be the focus of our first run. Until then, let’s gather some materials to repair that gate. Toby, you stay with your mom and Max and make sure they’re okay. Okay?”
Toby grinned. “Yes, sir.”
“Lena,” Dan said. “I know he’s your little boy, but he saved Drew’s life. The world is different now. There’s no need for those old ideas about kids and innocence, and all that other crap. He should be taught how to shoot properly… if that’s okay with you, of course.”
Lena nodded.
“Max, make a list of materials you need to get a small power grid going. I’m sure Drew showed you our big giant white binder.”
Max smiled, nodding. “I am familiar with the Apocalypse Compendium,” he said. “Brilliant work from your friend Jake. If I do say so myself I could—“
“I want you to add to it if you can,” Dan said. “It’ll get bigger and bigger as the years go by. Travis, you too. Everything a person would need to know about medical stuff in order to survive.”
Travis nodded.
“Eric, field dressing animals, gardening, lumberjack shit; anything you can think of.”
Eric shrugged. “Lumberjack shit?”
“Whatever,” Dan said. “Cliff, you’re former military. Anything you can remember from the TRADOC manual should go in there.”
Cliff nodded.
Everyone now had their jobs for the A.C.; everyone who could contribute, anyway.
“For now,” Dan continued, “Let’s get started on that gate. And once we find the keys for that tractor we should move the sheds into a circle, and slightly closer to the building.”
Everyone seemed to be in agreement. Dan, determined to make himself into a great leader, took his first step outside onto his new domain. As the others passed him to begin gathering materials, he looked around the camp. It was small and disorganized, to be sure. But, with a little work and cooperation, it could be
something great. It could be a place they could live together in safety, defending themselves against all foes—whether man or beast—and make something resembling a normal life.
Whatever that was.
Epilogue
There was pain; excruciating pain that blinded and deafened him. He could barely move enough to take a breath; could barely even feel his own heartbeat. He was in Hell. His head pounded, his ears amplified his heartbeat painfully—slow as it was, and his mouth was dry and cracked. He felt the chill of the wind and rain that had pelted him for days, and the uncomfortable sting of the asphalt pressing against his skin.
He groaned. It was all he could do. He couldn’t form any words; he couldn’t even move his lips, or his tongue. He was immobilized for the most part. The only thing he could move were his eyelids, and even that was torture. He fluttered them, trying to let in the dim light of the moon that shined above.
Everything was blurry. Everything was fuzzy. There were halos everywhere. Not the halos of angels, nor the halos of faeries—did faeries have halos? They were just the halos of weakened vision.
“Fuck,” he managed to mumble. In his ears, it sounded more like ffflllllrrrkkkk.
Was he alive? If so, how? Was he dead, rotting somewhere in alley but somehow still conscious? Is this what death was? No. He could smell something. It was rotting flesh. Was it him?
The halos began to disappear as he blinked his eyes. He could see that he was definitely in an alley, lying face down on the pavement. There was trash blowing by. A rat scampered around a few yards away. He smiled. The rat stopped, sat up on its haunches, and sniffed in his direction. He chuckled. He liked rats.
Rats were cool.
There were chunks of odd-looking material around him. The rat was sniffing around them when it noticed him. Now, the little rodent went back to its scavenging. As he focused, he realized that the chunks were flesh; body parts. There was a head, swollen, molded, and staring off into space. There was another head, staring at him, its mouth opening and closing as if it were trying to eat him from a distance.