by Kate Morris
“Jesus, Elijah!” she exclaimed. “There’s people in there!”
“What? Where?”
She pointed toward the large auditorium with several floor-to-ceiling windows. Wren was right. There were people inside pounding at the glass in one last-ditch effort to get out.
“We gotta help ‘em,” she stated and stepped forward.
Elijah grabbed her arm.
“Wait, Wren,” he cautioned as he peered closer. “Those… those aren’t people anymore.”
Even with the whole front part of the building ablaze and causing billowing black smoke to plume out all around it, Elijah could still see the people in the auditorium. They weren’t acting right. They were maniacal but not like people being trapped inside a burning building. They were slamming their heads into the glass, attacking it with their hands to the point of breaking fingers. It was grotesque and surreal, disturbing. One of them even bit another.
“Oh…” she murmured quietly and stepped back even further. Then she nudged against his side, and Elijah wrapped an arm around her lower back.
“At least we know what the fire was,” he acknowledged.
A deep rumble under their feet let him know that the explosions weren’t from the fire. Elijah indicated they should leave and got a curt nod from her. He led them toward the sounds of the bombings, or whatever was going on, and tried to keep out of neighborhoods and off the streets and sidewalks. The ground shook again as they climbed a grassy hill.
“There’s the rec center,” he pointed out in the distance.
“Oh, yeah. I have been by there. Guess I didn’t pay attention.”
“Let’s keep going,” he suggested. “I want to know where all that noise is coming from.”
“Me, too,” she agreed.
They moved out again and avoided the new development neighborhood ahead of them. Instead, Elijah skirted it and went northwest of the expensive homes. Jeremy lived in there, and he told Wren as much. They were getting closer because the next boom he felt in the pit of his gut. She did, too, by the expression she sent him.
Her phone buzzed, and he gave her a questioning eyebrow.
“It’s Jamie. He found out I went with you. He’s pissed.”
“That’s not good,” he said.
“Oh, no. He just said that we need to get away from here.”
Then her phone rang, and she rolled her eyes and answered. She told him she was putting him on speaker.
“Wren, Elijah, do not go into the hot zone,” he ordered.
“What’s going on, Jamie?” she asked.
“They’re chasing down the infected RF2 people and dealing with them, rounding them up. You go the wrong way, and you’ll end up in with the hoard. They’re dropping artillery rounds on them. Just get the hell outta’ there.”
“Yes, sir,” Elijah answered for them.
“How do you know?” Wren questioned him.
“I was just there. Wanted to talk to the military, see if they knew anything about this Russo guy or had seen him. I’m an hour south now.”
“Why would they tell you what they were doing?”
“I told them I was a cop,” he answered. “Just stay out of that zone. Anything past the school is a no-go, ya’ hear?”
“Yes, sir,” he said.
“Where are you now?” Wren asked.
The phone cut out with static for a second before coming back in. “On my way to Columbus. Meeting our team. They’ve sent special agents to help track Russo.”
“Oh, be careful,” she said.
“You, too. Head back to the house now,” he ordered.
“Yes, sir,” Elijah answered, feeling responsible for her. They disconnected, and Elijah said, “We should probably go back. This might not be too safe, anyway. Cops aren’t necessarily the cops anymore, the infected want to kill us, the military might accidentally kill us. Not a win-win for us.”
As they made their way back toward his house, Elijah wondered if her protector would find the man who tried to rape and probably kill her. Jamie was a tad on the rough side, a little rude sometimes, but he was fiercely protective of her and it wasn’t just because it was his job, either. There was something else there that Elijah had sensed on more than one occasion. Was it guilt? Did he blame himself for everything she went through? Probably. Sometimes when Elijah looked at Jamie and caught him staring at Wren, he thought he saw pain mixed with regret. It would be a horrible burden to carry that much guilt. Plus, Elijah thought Jamie really did love her, too. His brashness was in the service of her protection, but there was love in it, as well.
“Elijah!” she exclaimed and halted him as a light rain began falling. “Did you hear that?”
“No, what?” he asked.
“I heard something over there,” she said, pointing toward an allotment of apartment housing. It was definitely not the better end of town.
“Just keep moving,” he advised and took her upper arm in his hand to guide her forward as the rain turned more ice than water. Elijah noticed that a few dogs in that neighborhood were barking almost constantly. Ten steps into their retreat, one of those dogs let out a loud yelp as if someone had struck it, possibly fatally because it didn’t make another peep. The next thing they heard was the sound of a human scream. It was more of a howling screech.
“Run!” he whispered and followed after her along the slippery, wet grass that was already coated in a light dusting of snow from earlier. “Head for the rec center.”
She ran faster than him and didn’t turn around to make sure he was with her. That was fine with Elijah. He just wanted her to move. She was, too. Wren flew over the ground, not even slowing to go back down one of the hills they’d climbed. She was sure-footed. At the bottom of the hill was a concrete retaining wall about four feet high, and she simply jumped to the blacktop parking lot, landing gracefully and quietly.
Elijah could hear something in pursuit of them. It wasn’t being very quiet, though. Whatever it was- animal, night crawler, or violent citizen bent on robbing them- he wasn’t sticking around to find out. It crashed through the woods they left behind and followed. Elijah slid part of the way down the hill and didn’t land as delicately as Wren had. He kept going, though. She was almost to the building ahead of him as lightning cracked and it down poured now in a dense mixture of ice and rain and even snow.
As he ran to catch up, Elijah took his swipe card out of his wallet. Wren was pulling at the locked doors in frustration. He didn’t even pause. He slammed into the wall, braced against it with one hand and swiped his card across the sensor with the other. It turned red. He swiped again.
“Elijah!” she nearly screamed with her back to the door. He knew what she was seeing coming at them across the parking lot. He could see its reflection in the glass door to the building. He could hear its deadly pursuit of them as it recklessly ran across the lot. The light glowed red again. “Elijah, you’d better hurry!”
He swiped a third then a fourth time and got the green admittance light with a tiny beep-beep sound. She yanked open the door, and he pulled it as hard and fast behind them as he could. It was just in time, too. The night crawler that looked like a former pro linebacker ran himself into the glass doors. They both jumped back, she with a scream that died in her throat.
“C’mon, it’ll hold,” he assured her and tried to assure himself at the same time. “Let’s find somewhere to hide that isn’t so out in the open. Okay? Wren?”
Elijah turned to find her on the other side of the inner vestibule staring through the glass doors there. He went through the second set of doors and joined her as the man thing outside ran away in frustration. Then he reached up and set the lock that went through the top of the steel doorframe. Short of breaking the thick glass, it couldn’t get in this way.
“We should stay here till morning,” she said, nodding vigorously and searching his eyes for some sort of agreement.
Elijah nodded slowly and said, “Let’s check the other entry doors and mak
e sure they’re locked, too.”
He knew there was one at the back of the building because that’s where he and the rest of the guys from the team came in. They played basketball, video games, and used the water park during the off-season. The place also offered a lot of other programs like gymnastics, exercise classes, community events, and parties.
Elijah led the way, using the flashlight on his phone to light the path. The door was already locked, but he made sure to set the pin at the top of that one, too. They walked around the rest of the first floor and found two more doors, which he soon realized were locked with the pins set in place.
“What about the second floor?”
He nodded and led her up the stairs. Overlooking the basketball and volleyball courts was an oblong walking track with a rubbery floor. They found a door at the end of it that was set with different locks, which were already engaged. Two other doors on the second floor were similar.
“What about a basement?”
“I don’t think there is one,” he said.
“Wonder why your town didn’t make this into a temporary medical site.”
He shrugged. “The school’s bigger.”
“Seems like a cool place,” she remarked, looking through the long wall of observation glass overlooking the water park.
“Yeah, it used to be fun,” he said and swiped his pass card again. “In the morning,” he started and held open the door for her, “we should tell Alex and your uncle to come over with the vehicles so we can load this place up.”
“Yeah, maybe. I don’t think he’ll be too thrilled when he comes home in the morning and finds out I didn’t return to the house.”
“Send him a text,” Elijah said. “I’m sending one to Alex as we speak.”
She shook her head, though, “No, he wouldn’t find this acceptable, even if it is locked down like a military fort now. He has trust issues.”
“Yeah, I’m sure he does. Well, I let Alex know. He said to be safe.”
“He’s handling it a lot better,” she observed as they walked past the first tube slide that rose three stories high in the aquatics center.
“Alex isn’t stubborn. He’s just concerned. Doesn’t want me to get distracted by girls and blow my ride or anything.”
“Too late,” she remarked.
“Yeah, definitely too late.”
“What? No, I didn’t mean it like that,” she said with embarrassment. “I only meant that your scholarship is blown. What with everything that’s going on and all. Not because of me or anything. Obviously.”
“I meant it as too late for both reasons,” he said and stopped so that she would, too. “I’m already distracted by a girl, and college is out. At least, for now it is.”
“Right,” she said, totally ignoring the first part of his statement. “You don’t think this will be…forever, do you, Elijah?”
He didn’t know how to answer that. It was certainly something he’d been concerned about lately, too. Part of him wanted to lie to her and say it would all turn out fine in a few weeks, but the honest side of him, the side that looked deeper at the situation thought it might be years before this thing got turned around. Hopefully, just a year or at the most two.
“I’m not sure,” he said truthfully and strolled beside her as she walked under one of the thick tubes of another slide apparatus. “I hope it’s not long. I’d like to think my football career isn’t over before it got started.”
“Yeah,” she said quietly and peered up at the orange tunnel way above them.
“Water roller coaster. It’s pretty fun.”
“I’ve never been to a water park like this,” she admitted.
“Really? Never?” he asked, to which she shook her head. “That sucks. This place is a blast to come to with a big group of friends.”
“Friends. I don’t have those, Elijah, and I’m not allowed to go to places like this with lots of security cameras in every corner.”
“You can now,” he told her as she broke away from him and rushed over to the surfing simulator.
“Oh, cool,” she remarked. “I saw one of these once in California. Didn’t get to try it, though.”
“Did you surf when you were in Cali?”
She shrugged. “Few times. Water was really cold. Had to wear a wet suit. My mom was a surfer. Won a lot of trophies and stuff.”
“Really? Wow, that’s cool.”
“Yeah, she met my dad at a competition. He was there watching with his friends, scoping the hotties.”
He grinned, listening to her open up, which was rare for Wren. Elijah also liked it that she wasn’t trying to hide her accent anymore. It helped Alex understand better, too.
“He got her digits and asked her out. It was totally old school stuff,” she said with a fond smile. “She took him surfing for their first date.”
“Sounds fun.”
“Not to some prep school British boy who’d never surfed a day in his life,” she told him. “My mum’s family was from Cape Town, South Africa, so she grew up in the tube. She was such an awesome surfer.”
He wasn’t sure, but Elijah guessed ‘tube’ was a surfing reference. She shivered hard, her dark hair dripping on the concrete floor.
“Hey, let’s find some towels and get you some dry clothes,” he said, to which she nodded.
They set off to loot the gift shop. He wished so much that he could fire up the different slides, the surfing simulator, and the lazy river and have a night of fun with her, just the two of them, but then he remembered what was outside as something screech-shrieked loudly enough he could hear it through the thick glass. Wren slid her hand into his, and Elijah clutched it tightly.
Chapter Twenty-eight
Wren grabbed two towels and a pair of slim black athletic shorts. Then she added a tank top and zip hoodie to her loot. Her clothing was clinging to her, possibly turning her to ice, too.
“Hey,” Elijah said, tossing her some socks with orange and black stripes. “My team’s colors.”
She snorted but took them anyway. Her feet were wet and cold, too.
“Too bad we can’t find my jersey number here. You looked awfully cute in that,” he remarked.
She scowled. “I gave that back, remember?”
He sighed and held his hand over his heart as if she’d wounded him. “Yeah, I remember. You’re a real ego killer, Foster. Anyone ever tell you that?”
She smirked. “As if my comments could possibly hurt your giant ego.”
“Hey, I’m not just a pretty face. I’ve got feelings, too.”
She rolled her eyes and grinned.
“Let’s raid the snacks,” he said. “Hungry?”
“Sure, a little,” she admitted and walked beside him. “Probably not as hungry as you. You’re always hungry.”
“Yeah, well, maintaining my weight isn’t gonna happen now. No more special diets and calorie counting and protein shakes for me.”
“Sounds like a blessing in disguise.”
He chuckled. “Maybe.”
Elijah took her hand firmly in his like it was just a normal thing to do, but she tried to pull free.
“I’m not making a move on you, Foster,” he said impatiently. “I just don’t want to lose you in here or have you fall. It’s kinda’ dark, remember?”
“Oh,” she said, feeling stupid for reading so much into it. Elijah was just being a good friend. It had just been so long since she had one of those that it all felt off just a little.
“We need to find somewhere in this building to sleep so that we can hear a glass break if someone busts through to loot,” he said, all business.
Elijah kept his phone lit as they went to the locker rooms. She took one peek inside the women’s locker rooms and shook her head and stepped back onto his foot and rammed her back into his chest.
“Sorry.”
“It’s okay. Your little foot isn’t going to put a dent in mine. You good? Will that work to get changed?”
“No w
ay. I’m not going in there by myself.” She didn’t even care if he thought she was a wimp. In this case, she was.
“You can turn on the lights. I doubt there’s exterior windows. Nobody would see the light or…”
“Nope. Not doing it.”
“Okay,” he paused and sighed. “Um…wanna’ change in the men’s with me?”
She nodded vigorously, and Elijah led the way. It was really dark in here, too, but at least she wasn’t alone.
“Huh, there are windows in here. Kind of small and up high, though,” he said, pointing them out along the top of the wall. “We’ll leave off the lights just in case.”
“Alright,” she agreed, although she wanted every light on.
“There’s built-in blow dryers for your hair if you want to use them,” he said. “Over by the sinks.”
“Oh, yeah, maybe,” she said as her hair literally dripped rainwater down her back, soaking her jacket and hoodie. She didn’t feel like she was ever going to warm up. They’d lived outside Seattle for a few months three years ago, and it had been like this all too often. Jamie had had to make arrangements for her to see a doctor when she got really sick from the weather out there. Seeing a doctor was breaking protocol, but she had bronchitis, an ear infection, and sinus infection. It was a whole ordeal, her going to a doctor. Fake documents had to be made with printed medical records with equally fake names and new false i.d.’s for her and Jamie. Stories were memorized because doctors asked questions, a lot of them and snooped. It wasn’t their faults. They were just looking out for their patients, but for someone like Wren, it was complicated just getting a doctor’s care. Cold and rain combined were like some sort of twisted joke that Mother Nature liked to play on people, but for her, it was an even bigger risk being out in that kind of weather because doctor care was a difficult dilemma. Of course, now everyone was in the same boat. Nobody was getting medical care.
He set his phone down in the middle of the floor and aimed the light toward the ceiling, which gave off just enough to see by.
“Okay?” he asked, to which she nodded before he went into a changing stall with his own looted, dry clothing.