by Castle, W. A
We trot around a few shops and are able to collect some snacks and water bottles and we even score a first aid kit. This area of town is another dead zone and any real foods in the refrigerators have gone bad. So snack foods it is.
“What do you think happened to everyone here? They couldn’t all have become infected, could they?” Clara asks as I try to syphon some gasoline from one of the cars. We’d gone into a small mom and pop hardware store and found those red empty canisters used to store gasoline and even some tubes that Clara and I figured we could use to syphon the gas with. The movies make this task look much, much easier.
I sputter and gag when I accidentally swallow some gasoline, again. But finally this time I get a trickle of the stuff coming out of the tube and I immediately put the end of the tube into the canister. As I try to cough up all the foul gas I swallowed I glare daggers at Clara who is laughing her ass off.
“Yeah, yeah keep laughing, you’re doing the next car,” I sputter which makes Clara laugh harder and I can’t help but join in her mirth.
“And to answer your question, I don’t know,” I say once I can stop laughing and coughing, “it is very weird we haven’t run into more survivors. I mean really, there should be more people,” I scan my eyes over the street for the eleventh time in a row.
“Yeah,” Clara murmurs as she follows my eyes, “Let’s just keep looking for supplies down this street and then head back, my spider senses are tingling and not in a good way. Hey, maybe we can find some of those packaged chocolatey cupcakes somewhere.”
I chuckle at her scatterbrained train of thought and when the trickle of gasoline stops, I close the canister and haul it up, “Maybe we should’ve filled up after we finished scavenging,” I say.
Clara crosses an arm under her chest and rests the elbow of her other arm on it and scratches her chin “Hmm, didn’t think of that… maybe we can stash the canister somewhere and come back for it when we’re done?”
I don’t like the idea of leaving something so valuable out in the open… “I don’t know. What if someone comes and steals it? Not that we’ve seen anyone since we got here. But then again we never saw anyone in town back at the library...”
“Yeah, you’re right. I’ll carry it,” Clara says reaching for the red canister. She holds her hand up when I am about to object, “Really Maddie, I’ll carry it. I haven’t wanted to say anything but you don’t look too good.”
“Jeez, well thanks-,” I say flustered and embarrassed.
“No, no I mean you look flushed. Oh my god, do you have a fever?” she presses the back of her hands against my hot cheek and forehead. I have been feeling under the weather ever since the flesh eater bit me, but I didn’t know I looked as bad as I felt…
“Yeah, it could be the bite, I don’t know,” I shrug my bag over my shoulder and try to get off this subject, “I’m fine, I’ll be fine, let’s just keep moving,” I start walking, holding onto the canister.
We hit the jackpot and stumble across a small Rx building. But it is devastating when we break in only to find the pharmacy has already been ransacked. It couldn’t have been one of the others in our group; they had gone in a different direction than us.
“Well this incredibly sucks!” Clara groans and walks up to a shelf with a few knocked over pill bottles and picks up a few to read the labels and then stuffs them in her pack. When she turns around and finds me staring she shrugs and says, “They’ll be good for something.”
I walk to the other side of the counter, the door is wide open and I don’t miss that the glass window that separates the pharmacist’s side from the rest of the store is completely smashed. That is how the person or persons that ransacked this place must have gotten into that room where all the prescription medicine is stored.
“Why would whoever broke in here take all of the medicine?” asks Clara as she walks through the shop.
“Maybe it was a group?” I reply as I walk around the empty shelves. At the sound of loud banging I run out the room to find Clara trying to kick a door at the back of the store open. “What are you doing?” I ask with a startled gasp.
“Guys make this look so much easier,” Clara grunts as she kicks the door again, the wood beginning to splinter, “‘Employees Only’ maybe we’ll find something we can use in there.”
“Let’s do it together at the count of three,” I come to stand next to her and prepare to kick, “One, two, three,” Crack, the door splinters and busts open.
We fill our bags with some snacks that we find around the employees lounge and even score two bottles of aspirin.
“I really wish we could have found some antibiotics or something. Maybe they could have helped that woman who got bit,” I say with irritation.
“We should start heading back, maybe the others were luckier,” Clara says as she zips up her bag and throws it over her shoulders, “I really hope one of them has run into a fully stocked convenience store,” she says wistfully.
“Sure,” I sigh and pick up the gasoline canister. I’m too caught up in my thoughts of feeling sorry for that girl and feeling sorry for myself that when it happens it takes me a full second to realize what is going on.
“GET DOWN ON THE GROUND!” the soldier’s voice is so loud that it booms and reverberates around the room. I’m so startled I accidentally let the red canister fall to the ground, the nozzle becomes dislodged and the smell of gasoline soon fills the room as it pours out of the canister...
“What-”Clara begins to ask.
“Get down on the ground now!” A group of soldiers’ barge into the room with firearms pointed right at us.
I’m not sure what surprises me more, that I have a gun pointed at me or the sight of the soldiers.
One of the soldiers that flank us says something into his walkie-talkie and keeps his weapon on us. What in the world is going on?
“Look, we were just looking for some medicine, we’ll put the aspirin back and leave,” Clara says bravely from besides me.
“Are there others with you? Are you part of a group?” one of the soldiers asks.
“No, it’s just us,” my mouth says before my brain can tell it what to say. I should say we have a whole group up the road a ways so the soldiers can take us some place safe, they are military, and that means there is still a government. That should be good. But something in the way the soldiers avoid eye contact but keep their eyes on us, herding Clara and I closer together makes me keep my mouth shut. Clara sends me a look but doesn’t say anything.
The soldier turns to another and the other replies, “Just one vehicle was seen approaching. The drone was taken down after that.”
“You’re military right? Are you taking us somewhere safe?” Clara asks with hope in her voice.
“Yes ma’am we have a camp set up a few clicks away. I’m Sergeant Michael Kellan,” Sergeant Kellan’s demeanor changes and he orders his men to lower their weapons, “Sorry for the yelling madams,” he looks to Clara and me, “We didn’t know what we were walking into.”
“It’s okay,” Clara says, shifting anxiously, “Do we, uh, still have to get on the ground?”
Sergeant Kellan chuckles and shakes his head, “No that’s not necessary ma’am. Bran, why don’t you help these ladies with their belongings? We should get going,” he scratches the side of his nose and glances at the spilled gasoline that has our noses burning, “Ladies, I’m afraid that you will have to hand over any weapons you have.”
I hold my pack closer to me when one of the soldiers steps up to me and I glare at them with suspicion, “We can carry our own things, thanks. And I think we will be holding on to our weapons and be right on our way. It is great to know the military is out and about helping people, but there are others out there that need your help more than we do.”
“Maddie?” Clara shoots me questioning glance but then her eyes widen when she gets the memo: we aren’t going with this group of soldiers.
Sergeant Kellan looks taken aback but quickly recovers
. His easy smile fades into a forced one, “If you come with us you’ll have, food, shelter, protection. You’d be safe from the infected. Those are all the things you want, right?”
My heart is racing and I feel adrenaline pumping. I don’t know if it’s my heightened senses or a sixth sense entirely but Sergeant Keller and his men seem too eager and adamant to take us with them. I hope Clara can sense something is off with these people.
When neither Clara nor I move, he shoots a look to his men and immediately they seize us and start hauling us to the front of the store.
“Let go!” I yell, trying to break free.
“What are you doing?” I hear Clara yell.
I dig my feet into the pavement and scream as they half drag half push us to a blacked out van. This is not happening!
One of the soldiers holding onto Clara suddenly drops to the floor with a heavy thud. Immediately the soldiers not holding onto us become alert and scan the area with their weapons. One of the soldiers holding onto me drops like a sack.
“Run Maddie!” Clara hollers, ripping away from the soldier attempting to hold onto her and get his gun out at the same time. I don’t take two steps forward when I’m tackled to the ground by a tremendous force.
“Fall back! Fall back!” Sergeant Kellan groans from above me when a bullet grazes his temple. “Fuck,” he yells. He hauls my whole weight up by my arm before I can get my footing; the force of the action dislocates my shoulder. I whimper when he uses the same arm to shove me towards another soldier who in turn tries to shove me through the open van door.
If they manage to take me, what the hell is going to happen to me? Will they kill me and ditch my body somewhere if they aren’t who they claim to be?
Acting on pure instinct, I push into my dislocated shoulder, crying out, and twist my body to come face to face with the soldier. His eyes widen in surprise but before he has chance of much else I pounce. I bare my teeth and bite deep into the exposed flesh under his chin. He yells, and he paws at my shoulders, but I push forward until he trips over the side walk. I take the gun from his hands and without missing a beat I shoot two soldiers, one in the shoulder and one in the face. Bullets begin to rain in every direction, from the side of an invisible source who is taking down the soldiers to free us and from the side of the soldiers themselves.
I begin to separate from the soldiers when Sergeant Kellan and I make eye contact. I bare my bloody teeth in an angry snarl at him. He looks at me with open astonishment and as he and his men jump into the van he leans over to whisper something to one of his men, the soldier pales but nods and takes something from the Sergeant. I turn and break into a run in the opposite direction. But seconds later a deep burning spreads through my spine, I hunch over and then my spine snaps back to an unnatural angle.
I must black out for a few seconds because one moment I’m howling in pain and the next I am on all fours on the ground. I look up and the van is nowhere in sight.
A small gasp from under me has me snapping my head down. For a moment all I can see are the broad stripes on his military uniform.
Chapter Ten: Foe From Within
I stare at the soldier under me in horror.
His chest is ripped open, his heart is spurting blood with each pump and the man stares at me in true, unadulterated horror. I look down at my blood soaked hands, I’m still clutching to a chunk of his flesh… and… I have some of his half chewed flesh still in my mouth. I swallow the piece before I realize what I’ve done and a terrible shudder runs through my body.
“Oh…” I cover my mouth with my hands as the sob escapes, “What did you do to me?” my voice cracks. He lets out a final choking gasp and then his stare becomes vacant. “What did you do? What did you do?!” I yell angrily as I shake his corpse.
What have I done?
I hear Clara gasp as she steps from behind a building. She inhales sharply and takes a step back when I look up at her.
I swallow to clear out my throat and inwardly wince when I realize I could just as easily have spat out whatever was in my mouth. I grab the weird looking gun the soldier has in his hand and grab his Glock that is still in his holster.
“Take this,” I say to Clara and I try to stand up and hand her the gun, “Shoot me,” I wheeze. She reluctantly takes a few steps towards me and reaches for the gun then takes a few steps back when I fall against the wall and use the wall to keep myself upright.
Addressing the elephant in the street I say, “I did that,” pointing to the torn soldier lying in the middle of the side walk.
“Kinda figured that out,” Clara replies nonchalant, her eyes dancing between me and the dead man, “Dude, you have a little something here,” she points her chin and taps the corner of her mouth.
I run my hand across my lips and I cuss when my hand comes up covered in blood and pieces of minced meat.
“What did he shoot me with?” I ask as I lift the little metal gun thing up to inspect it.
Clara leans in and takes a good look at it and then turns me around and pulls something from the middle of my back, “It’s a dart,” she gasps, “Whatever it was laced with it made you go ape shit.”
“Fuck,” I exhale and am about to rub my eyes when I see my hands are still covered in gore.
“Are you guys alright?” Ulises yells as he hops down the emergency ladder between two stores and comes running to us. Ah, so he was the mystery shooter. He slows down as he takes in the sight of me, “What the fuck happened?”
“Those fuckers shot her with this,” Clara says raising the shiny gun, “and she just sort of went rawr,” Clara curls her fingers into claws and shows her teeth, mimicking a roar and tearing into flesh.
I look away but regret doing so when my eyes land on the dead soldier. Clara shows Ulises the dart and the weird looking shiny gun.
Ulises’s chest is heaving, and I feel his hot breath on my face when he stops in front of me and lifts my chin to inspect my face. He stares into my eyes so angry and so intensely that for a split second I can actually see him in my mind’s eye raising his gun to my head and pulling the trigger. But he shakes his head and pulls me into a hug instead.
“I saw the van pull out from the highway and when they started following you guys I tracked them and waited to see what they would do. I didn’t know they’d-”
“They were following us?” Clara scoffs and kicks a piece of trash away. Ulises pulls away from me and takes out a piece of cloth from his bag and starts wiping at my face.
“Yes. When I saw them hauling you into the van I realized what was going on,” he pauses as his eyes slide to the man I murdered…and ate, “I think I have a theory of why we haven’t come across more survivors,” he trails to a stop as he lifts my hands and begins to clean them.
“What do you mean?” my voice is hoarse when I ask.
Just as Ulises is about to explain we hear a yell and feet pounding on the pavement, for a split second I’m afraid that Sergeant Kellan and his men have come back but then we see Gary and Lexi running towards us. “Clara!” Gary yells and drops the bags he’s carrying and lifts Clara up when she runs into his arms.
‘What the fuck happened? We heard shots,” Lexi leans against an abandoned car as she tries to catch her breath, “we ran all over trying to figure out what was happening.”
“We were almost abducted, that’s what happened!” exclaims Clara.
“What? Explain sis,” Gary looks down at his sister.
At that moment Nadine and Luis come running full speed with their guns out.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Lexi says, eyeing me with narrowed eyes.
“We had a close call, excuse us for being a fucking nervous wreck, Lex. If it hadn’t been for Ulises we would be who knows where. We could be dead,” Clara snaps at Lexi. Lexi looks taken aback at Clara’s tone and I honestly am too. I look up at Ulises with questioning eyes. Are we not telling them what I have done?
“Were there flesh eaters here?” Luis nudges the dea
d soldier with his foot.
“We need to keep an eye out for others. They were wearing military uniforms and were driving an unmarked van but we don’t know if they are real military or just someone off the street with militia uniforms. I was saying just now, I have a feeling that survivors are being abducted, I don’t know why or for what purpose but from what I saw, it’s a valid theory,” says Ulises looking at all of us.
“What?” Gary runs his hand down his chin and looks up to the sky.
“This is so fucked up,” Lexi looks genuinely shaken up. Clara moves to her and wraps an arm around Lexi’s shoulders.
“We should get back,” I say pushing away from the wall, I hiss when I jar my dislocated shoulder.
“What is it?” Nadine asks worried.
“That Sergeant douche dislocated my shoulder when he tackled me down,” I say, “Can someone pop it back into place, please?”
“Take your jacket off,” Ulises says and sets his rifle down against the building. Hesitating only for a moment, I do what he says.
I make a noise at the back of my throat when I look down at my shoulder. The skin is already heavily bruised.
“It looks worse than it is. Brace yourself, this is going to hurt,” Ulises warns.
“Yeah, yeah,” I mutter grudgingly. To my surprise Lexi comes to my side and offers me her hand as I prepare myself for more pain. It’s been a day of surprises, today. I take her hand and press my lips into a line.
“One, Two…” Ulises pulls on my arm and pops my shoulder back on its socket before the count of three. I bite down on my lip and don’t open my eyes until the pain recedes.
“Thank you,” I sigh with relief when I move my arm around experimentally. “Sorry,” I say sheepishly when Lexi let’s go of my hand and she flexes her fingers.
“We should get back to the others. This town is not worth our lives,” Nadine mutters as she picks up her gear.
“Um… hello,” a soft voice speaks up just as we are all picking our gear up. Ulises and Luis both whips around with their guns ready.
“Who the fuck are you?” Lexi snaps at a heavily pregnant woman in a flowy sundress as she steps from within one of the shops. Her dress is torn and stained and her face is smudged with dirt. Ulises makes a small noise at the back of his throat and takes a step towards the woman.