Duncan hung his head and inspected the knuckles on his right hand. They were swollen and crisscrossed with lacerations. Without making eye contact, he said, “Where is she now?”
Sasha leaned close and inspected Duncan’s hand. “Shouldn’t be punching holes in walls. You could have broken some bones, you know.”
Still staring groundward, he said, “Where is Glenda?”
“Don’t know,” Sasha replied. “She changed Raven and Jamie’s dressings while breakfast was cooking.”
Duncan stood straight and sighed. “Suppose I should go and find her.”
Sasha made a face. “Glenda’s gone.”
He grimaced. One hand went to his head. Started worrying the wisps of gray hair there. “You said you didn’t know where she was.”
“I don’t.”
“Spit out the details. What do you know?”
“She had a pack and rifle when I saw her last.”
“Which direction did she go?”
Sasha pointed over her right shoulder. “She said ‘goodbye’ to us and stalked right up the feeder road.”
“Didn’t she say where she was headed?”
“Nope.”
Throwing his hands up, he said, “And nobody thought to ask her?”
“She didn’t appear too receptive to an inquisition.”
“Shit,” he drawled. “Looks like I’ve got some packing to do.”
Incredulous, she said, “Now you’re leaving because she’s mad?”
He looked at Sasha like she was crazy. Then he remembered she was just a teen and still saw some things in black and white. Apparently detecting nuance was not her strong suit.
“That’s not like you to cut and run.”
“X gets a square, little lady. I’m not scooting with my tail tucked. I’m fixing to mount a search and rescue mission.”
“For Daymon?”
He shook his head. “That’s what Cade’s doing, I reckon.”
She looked a question up at him.
“It’s Glenda who needs saving,” he said. Absurdly enough, From herself, is what he was thinking.
Chapter 2
State Route 39
The black F-650 filled up most of the two-lane, its headlights cutting a swath through the fog tendrils rising up from the shadowed dip in the road.
The moment Cade had stepped outside the hulking truck and shut the door behind him, Raven’s family of Zs had picked up their pace and struck out on two divergent courses. Both adults and one of the triplets angled for him at once, the female quickly taking the lead. As if some snippet of memory demanded it, the males fell in lockstep on her heels.
The other two undead tots were locked onto Raven.
Barely a yard of blacktop separated the trio of fresh turns as they tackled the incline left of the centerline. There was a bit more separation between the kids as they neared the transition a few feet right of the centerline. It looked to Cade as if the laggard of the group was operating on a bad wheel—something he had been dealing with off and on for months since injuring his ankle in the helo crash in Draper, South Dakota.
Just making the transition behind the adults was one of the triplets. Barely a yard tall and partially obscured behind the male Z’s filthy ski parka, the undead tot was near to overtaking what more and more looked to have once been his parental unit.
A quick flick of the eyes allowed Cade to pick up Raven. Pressed in tight against the Ford’s right front fender, all that was visible of her from his angle was the pointed tip of her slender six-inch blade and the bobbing red tassel atop her black stocking cap. Inching up onto his tiptoes allowed Cade to see her magazine-clad arms. As if sensing she was being watched, she turned her head and they made eye contact. If the girl was scared, it wasn’t showing. He did, however, detect the grim determination projected by her clenched jaw and tightly coiled upper body. Three-plus months of this new reality, coupled with the irreversible losses heaped upon her slender shoulders over the last few days, had her inching dangerously close to being one of those walking time bombs so prevalent in the news before the collapse. Only his girl wasn’t on the verge of committing an atrocity against unarmed helpless members of society; she was undergoing a sort of metamorphosis brought about by the crucible she was put through on a daily basis. Though Cade had no crystal ball, his gut told him Raven was going to give more than she got for a long time to come. Hell, wasn’t that why they were out here together in the first place? To further hone her survival skills so that when he was gone she could roll on. Maybe even live long enough to find someone with whom to settle down and raise kids of her own. His eyes misted over as the reality struck him that he would likely not be around to witness any of this, should it happen. A lump formed swiftly in his throat as he was struck by the thought that Brook would definitely never know any of it.
If he was being honest with himself, the reason they were dismounted and about to confront the Zs instead of just driving around them and continuing east was a direct result of his wife’s passing. It pained him to admit that finding Daymon alive was a very distant second on his give-a-shit radar. His plan, going forward, was to expose Raven to as much controlled adversity outside the wire in as short a time as humanly possible.
After surreptitiously pinching the tears from his eyes, Cade said, “Always choose where you want to engage your enemy.” He raised the black dagger to eye level and pointed to the guardrails lining both sides of the road. “If possible, learn the lay of the land before any engagement. What are you going to do here?”
“When I make contact,” she said, “I’ll use the truck and guardrail to my benefit. I’ll let the boys come down the chute toward me. Stick and move so long as my back … uh, my six is clear.”
Cade glanced behind them. Saw only open road and white-painted guardrails and verdant forest stretching away to the west.
“Do one of them and backpedal,” he instructed. “And don’t forget about having an escape plan.” Or three, he thought.
On the opposite side of the Ford, Raven cast a glance at the trio of identical-looking zombies. Their unblinking sharks’ eyes were locked with hers. Head tilted back slightly and with teeth bared, the boy in the lead was close to cresting the hill a dozen yards from the truck’s right front fender. Coinciding with the Z’s guttural moans increasing in volume, the Z’s lolling head came level with the flat and he somehow found a higher gear.
Cade’s eyes never left the female Z as he said, “Be loose. Fluid, like water. And stay on the balls of your feet, keeping most of your weight forward. Just don’t get ahead of your skis.”
No stranger to the slopes, the last part of her dad’s instruction painted the picture. So she bent her knees, rolled her shoulders forward, and bounced up and down a couple of times. Tightening her grip on the Toothpick’s bone handle, she took up station beside the Ford’s right front tire. It came nearly to her shoulder. She could feel heat radiating off the engine tucked somewhere up inside the darkened wheel well.
Suddenly the clouds shifted and bars of light painted the landscape all around in a soft tone of gold that made Raven think of a Hallmark card. But this was nothing of the sort. This was hell on earth in lipstick and a wig and the pale-faced kids lurching toward her wanted to bite her neck and wallow in her blood as they stripped the flesh from her bones.
Now to her fore, maybe five or six yards distant, it looked as if the little monsters would barely come up to her sternum. The one in the lead was missing most of his fingers. The thumb on his outthrust left hand had been severed with a blade, or, more likely, chewed off by a feeding Z. The gray winter coat the kid wore was now a short-sleeved item, tatters of fabric flicking to and fro as he tackled the last few feet of hill.
The undead kid behind the leader was dragging one bare foot. The narrow bones running from the toes to the base of his gnawed-on ankle were showing. Like ivory keys on a pianola, they pistoned up and down with each labored step. On the opposite foot was a yellow rubber boot. The s
ole up front was worn completely through, the heel but a rounded nub of rubber that went scritch-thunk with each footfall. Now and again the zombie kid’s matching gray coat would part and allow Raven fleeting glimpses at the torn dermis and hamburger-like flesh ringing a hollowed-out chest cavity totally devoid of anything resembling an internal organ.
“I have a plan,” she finally said.
Cade leaned forward and peered past the headlights. Breathing in the sharp tang of spoiling flesh coating the bumper and grill, he said, “Hit me.”
“If things go sideways …” She paused to think, but kept her gaze locked on the first little rotter. “What do you call that guy? The one who’s always messing things up for you?”
“Murphy,” Cade said, his eyes never leaving undead Mommy who, with less than a dozen feet to cover before reaching the truck, was beginning to look closer to thirty in age than forty. “What about him?”
“If he screws it up for me, I’ll drop and roll under the truck,” answered Raven. “And when I pop up on your side, I’ll just wait for the little dudes to crawl after me. When I see the whites of their eyes, I’ll set their souls free.”
Remembering a similar situation in which he was nearly trapped inside a hardware store east of Schriever, Cade nodded to show his approval. The snarls and moans and stink coming from the approaching dead made the memory of that near-fatal foraging mission snap into sharp focus. In his mind’s eye he saw the pack of dead things that had been hunting him that day worming their way underneath the F-650. He heard the tearing of fabric and chatter of teeth as the flesh-hungry first turns crushing against each other dragged themselves forward, the sharp items protruding from the truck’s undercarriage ripping clothes and flesh with equal impunity.
Quick shooting, a bit of blade work, and a hell of a lot of luck had gotten him out of that mess.
The scratching sound of shoes on blacktop sharpened his focus. The woman Z was now two, maybe three arm’s lengths away and staring the meat off his bones when the radio on the dash came to life. Over the clicking of teeth, Cade heard Tran’s voice, but couldn’t make out the words.
Ignoring the call, he grabbed a fistful of the creature’s coat and locked his elbow. With the Gerber held in a reverse grip, black pommel facing him, he stabbed down, head-high, the blade at a forty-five-degree angle to the ground. His aim perfect, the dagger buried inches-deep into the Z’s right temple. There was a soft squelch and Mommy Z went limp for the final time. When Cade let go of the jacket, the trip to the ground was instantaneous. Reduced to nothing but dead weight, the corpse rolled once, then came to rest, elbows and knees jutting every which way, directly in the path of the others.
Tran’s unintelligible voice was still coming from the radio when the male zombie reached the Ford’s front bumper, where a streamer of fabric trailing behind the tattered and torn parka somehow got snagged on the battered angular bumper, arresting all forward movement as if the proverbial hook had been administered from stage left.
Taking advantage of his good fortune, Cade lunged forward and delivered a well-aimed kick to the arrested Z’s sternum. Ribs crunched and the sole of his Danner soaked up the shock. With its coat still hung up on the bumper, the force of the kick spun the Z clockwise away from Cade, sending its head rocketing on a one-way trip to the truck’s grille.
With the solid thunk from skull impacting steel echoing across 39, Cade turned his attention to the final threat. As he was getting into a combat crouch to meet the undead kid at his level, a gloved hand shot out from the right and latched onto the gray coat.
Raven?
Newton’s Law in full effect, the undead kid was yanked off his bare feet and, without announcing her presence, Raven emerged and stood over him. She planted a boot on each flailing arm, pinning the kid to the road. Then, brandishing the Arkansas Toothpick two-handed, its blade aimed groundward and just inches from the squirming triplet’s face, she flashed Cade a look that screamed I got this.
Incredulous, he shot, “You’re finished with your two already?”
Slowly driving the blade into the Z’s darting eye, she said, “Finished the dad for you, too. His head hitting the grille didn’t do him in.”
Different but familiar voices joined the conversation on the radio with Tran. The exchange was brief, then the voices trailed off and the radio in the truck went silent.
Cade cleaned the Gerber with the kid’s coat and sheathed it. Looking Raven in the face, he said, “Thanks for getting your old man’s six. I must confess, though. I was half expecting to see you pop up behind me with the little demons in hot pursuit.”
“But I didn’t,” she said, her tone relaying a level of confidence commensurate with the deeds committed.
He said, “You dispatched them, Bird. That means you get to dispose of them.”
Raven cleaned her blade on the undead boy’s jacket sleeve and returned it to the leather sheath on her hip. “No way I’m going to be able to budge the dad,” she said, glancing at him.
Cade looked at the corpse lying face up and perpendicular to the Ford’s bumper. “I’ll take care of him for you.”
After scanning all points of the compass—a move that did not go unnoticed by Cade—Raven looped around front of the Ford.
Cade started with the mom, rifling through her pockets and finding only a small leather-bound notebook, a thick stack of trading cards still sealed inside colorful foil wrappers, and a multifunction pocket knife with the words Grand Teton National Park seared into its wood handle. After removing the Patagonia coat from the corpse, he searched the kid, finding in his pockets only Pokémon cards and colorful wrappers from small Halloween-sized Snickers and Three Musketeers bars. The cards were dog-eared. The one on the top was scuffed, the foil leaf rubbing off in places. The card on the bottom of the inch-thick stack was dotted with tiny bloody fingerprints, the papillary ridges on some clearly defined. That the cards were kept together with a thick rubber band spoke of their importance to the boy.
He rolled the tiny corpse out of the way then dragged the dad closer to the guardrail. In the pockets of the bloodstained parka he found some cereal bars as well as dozens of unopened packs of cards adorned with a cute yellow dragon-like looking creature. In the front pocket of the corpse’s damp Levi’s was a bi-fold wallet. It contained no cash. But it did have some of the proof necessary to settle the friendly father/daughter wager.
Cade put the booty in a pile then proceeded to manhandle the adult corpses off the road. It was clear to him the family wasn’t starving for food prior to whatever befell them. The woman, whom he figured to be at least six feet from toes to nose, weighed just south of what would be considered obese by the medical profession. He guessed her to be two, maybe two-twenty-five. Then there was the fact that she was fully clothed and dead. Cold corpses always seemed to weigh more than the living.
Though fairly thin at the wrists and around the waist, the man was tall and rangy. Taller than the woman by an inch or two. All arms and legs with a long neck and massive head that lolled around as Cade dragged him across the fog line to the narrow shoulder.
It took some doing, but after a minute spent nudging the corpses with the toe of his boot, the couple was through the narrow gap and sprawled atop each other at the bottom of the roadside ditch.
The boy weighed less than a big bag of dog food. Which was near the top of the foraging list for the day. Cade grabbed an arm and leg, lifted the body over the top of the guardrail, and flung it atop the other corpses.
By the time Cade had finished his morbid task, the low-hanging sun was again shrouded behind fast-moving clouds and a sheen of sweat was forming on his brow.
Her disembodied voice nearly drowned out by the rising wind, Raven said, “Too bad we don’t have the time to bury them.”
Cade turned to see her standing equidistant to him and the Ford. She had retrieved her M4 from the truck and was holding it at a low-ready, her muzzle discipline exemplary.
Speaking loud to be hear
d over a strong gust, he said, “We only bury our own.”
“Every one of these we put down deserves better.”
Rubbing his lower back, Cade said, “I know they do. But there’s waaay too many of them.” He paused and turned toward the ditch. Saw that the boy had settled face down in a puddle of water, hair matted to the back of his head. Mom was laying spread-eagle beside him, head rolled at an unnatural angle, mouth open and already the attraction of a single black fly. To add insult to injury, Dad had ended up face down with his gaping mouth precipitously near to the female Z’s crotch. Cade grimaced at their unfortunate final repose, then added, “And far too few of us.”
“We can say a prayer for them,” Raven said.
“That we can.” Cade surveyed their surroundings. Seeing nothing moving save for the tall grass beyond the ditch, he closed his eyes and bowed his head. “You doing it? Or do you want me to?”
“All yours,” Raven responded.
Cade cleared his throat. “God our Father,” he began in a soft voice. “Your power brings us to birth, Your providence guides our lives, and by Your command we return to dust. Lord, those who die still live in Your presence, their lives change but do not end. I pray in hope for my family, relatives and friends, and for all the dead known to you alone. In company with Christ, Who died and now lives, may they rejoice in Your kingdom, where all our tears are wiped away. Unite us together again in one family, to sing Your praise forever and ever. Amen.”
“Amen,” said Raven.
When Cade opened his eyes, he saw his daughter looking up at him.
“The bet,” she said. “I think I won.”
Already privy to the dad’s age, Cade said, “How do you figure?”
Raven was holding the journal in one hand.
“You were reading that while I was praying for their souls?”
She shook her head. “I picked this up right before you started. I heard something fall out about the time you were at the we return to dust part. Still, I didn’t open my eyes. That would have been very disrespectful to both you and the family.”
Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse (Book 13): Gone Page 2