by Jake Bible
All strapped down and walking in the middle of the tunnel, since there's no stream in this one, and it only takes us about ten minutes to make it a mile. We let the flares go dead so we aren't spotted by any guards and move as quiet as mice. Or rats. We're in a sewer, so we're rats. Although, Froggy Girl says it's a storm drain tunnel, but that's just a fancy sewer for rain water, right? Right.
There are cracks of light from somewhere, so the tunnel ain't all dark. One foot in front of the other, careful steps, is how we go. All it takes is a twig snap, and if there are guards, they'll know someone's down here. Shit echoes in empty tunnels.
The cracks of light are coming from an alcove on our left side. Steph steps to it and lifts her carbine. She has a nice M-4 that's tricked out. The great thing about the Stronghold being in Boulder is we have a few military bases within driving distance to pillage. Yeah, other folks had the same idea, but not many of them made it very far inside. Too many Zs stuck behind those chain-link fences.
But us? Yeah, we can get in and out without a problem. That means tricked out M-4s and a fine Barrett. I don't have an M-4, it's not my style. I do have a nice Sig Sauer P220 Combat .45 with a threaded barrel. I lied. I have two, one on each hip. I usually don't get them out of my pack because my blades work better with Zs. Less noise.
But we aren't just dealing with Zs now, so my babies are on my hips and ready to shoot some Doyles if those asshole shitfuckers get in my way. Or get in any of my sisters' way. Just talking about my .45s makes me want to get them out and shoot somebody. Where the Doyles at?
"Door," Steph whispers as she eases past the alcove. "Shut, but not sealed well."
"Stairs," Froggy Girl says. Her voice is so quiet I almost don't hear her. "They lead up to the Doyles' camp."
"Where's that?" Audrey asks.
"Up above us," Froggy Girl says.
"No shit," Steph says. "But where is the camp? In a store? In an apartment complex? On the street? Where?"
"Sports complex," Froggy Girl replies. "Indoor soccer fields and basketball courts. That kind of place. I used to play soccer there when I was real little. You know, before…"
"You know any of the Doyles?" Steph asks once we are all past the alcove. "You're from around here. Are they from around here too?"
"Some of them," Froggy Girl answers then shuts right up.
She doesn't want to talk about if she knows any of the Doyles. We all see that right quick. Steph wants to push her, but Marcie gives her a look and she stays quiet. Froggy Girl is already spooked to shit, ain't no need to make her more spooked.
"How much farther?" Audrey asks.
"Another mile," Froggy Girl says. "The kids are hiding in the courthouse. There's an access door down here."
"Courthouse? Good place to hide," Audrey says. "Easy to secure and always has good visibility for the sighted ones on the rest of the town. Nice choice."
"The kids ain't dumb," I say. "They fight Zs while blind. Nearly trapped us when we first got to Denver."
"That was a few years ago," Antoinette says. "They're even better now."
"Who are they?" Froggy Girl asks. "Why do you want these kids?"
"It's not about the kids," Steph says. "It's about the guy they follow. He's a slimy bastard called Kramer. He's all we care about."
"Bad dude," Marcie says. "Really bad dude that needs to die."
"Die hard," Audrey says.
"I like that movie," Froggy Girl says. "My dad used to watch it every year. You know. Before…"
"Before the Zs came and ate everyone," I say. "Yeah, yeah, yeah. We get it. That's how the world is now. No more before."
"True dat, sister," Steph says. "Now double time it, ladies. I want to have these kids bagged and tagged so we can get to the Humvees before dark. I have no plans to stay in this shit town one more night."
"We keep saying that, yet we've been here more than one night already," Audrey says.
"That's because Elsbeth got herself lost," Antoinette says, but she's grinning so I don't have to kick the shit out of her. Sisters like to joke.
"I ain't lost," I say. "I'm right here with you bitches. And it wasn't my fault we had to stay over last night. "
"Sounds like it was the Doyles' fault," Steph says." My guess is they sent all those Zs to trap us in that apartment building."
"That means they know we're here," Marcie says. "That's not good."
"No, it's not," Steph agrees. "Maybe we should triple time it."
We all groan because triple time is pretty much running and running in a dark tunnel that smells like moldy underwear ain't no fun.
Takes us like five minutes to reach the basement door to the courthouse. Froggy Girl looks like she's going to puke. So she pukes. It's bright red. That's easy to see even down here in the tunnel.
"Hold up," Antoinette says once Froggy Girl is done with the puking. "What's wrong with you? Why are you puking blood?"
"Not blood," Froggy Girl says. "Candy. I ate some candy this morning. I'd been saving it for a special day and wanted to eat it all before any of the other Inezes took it from me."
"Special day? What special day?" Steph asks. She's busy standing over Audrey as she checks the access door for booby traps. "What's so special about today?"
"It's my birthday," Froggy Girl says. "I'm seventeen."
"Jesus shit," Steph says. "You're only seventeen?"
"Happy birthday," Antoinette says. "Should we sing—?"
"No," Audrey growls as she stands up and gives the access door a shove.
We all jump back, even Froggy Girl, and wait for an explosion or poison darts or a shotgun blast. Nothing. The kids didn't set anything. That's good. Means they don't expect to be found.
"They could have been in too much of a hurry," Audrey says like she's reading my mind.
We all nod because we're pretty much thinking the same thing.
"Why were they in a hurry?" Marcie asks. "Were they being chased?"
"Stay tight and watch all angles," Steph says, her M-4 up to her shoulder. She sights through the scope and takes point. "No time to be sloppy, ladies. We do this by the numbers, sweep the building floor by floor, room by room. I want every closet searched and desk drawer opened."
"There's nothing in the desks," Froggy Girl says. "We've been through them all. Not even paper. We used that all up to burn."
"Good for you," Steph says and steps inside the courthouse.
It's only a few feet before we hit the rear access stairs. Metal stairs that ring out and vibrate as we walk up them. Even going slow they still make noise. Steph grumbles, but we don't stop. No point in stopping. If the kids are listening then they already know we're coming. The blind ones do. The deaf ones are probably staring out a window or something.
We hit the first door and Steph kicks it open. She steps through, still on point, while Audrey follows and takes the right with Marcie behind her taking left. Antoinette is next and is sweeping her rifle back and forth, while I give Froggy Girl a shove and bring up the rear. No way I'm letting an Inez stay behind me. That's how you get yourself killed.
"Which way?" Steph asks once we're certain the hallway we've stepped into is clear.
"What?" Froggy Girl asks.
"Which way are the kids?" Steph asks.
"I don't know," Froggy Girl says. "I just know they came here. You said you were going to search for them."
"We are, but it would be nicer if you knew where they were at," Steph says.
Froggy Girl shrugs.
Steph points at Audrey and then at a door to our right. Audrey moves fast and kicks open the door then hurries in and calls out, "Clear."
Marcie takes the left door and Antoinette moves ahead to the next left door while Steph takes the next right door. I keep my eye, and one of my .45s, on Froggy Girl. I don't think she's fucking with us, but she's a crazy Inez.
We clear the rooms in the hallway and move to another one then another one. It takes us an hour to clear the bottom floor. It's just a
n old basement with rooms filled with empty filing cabinets and shit. Froggy Girl was right, no paper anywhere.
We move up to the next floor, which is the first floor, and find Hell. It used to be Hell. Bloodstains everywhere, covering most of the wood floor. On the walls, on the doors, even on the ceiling. Half the doors have been broken apart and the other half are hanging by a hinge. Some folks tried to make a stand on the first floor and failed like suckers.
"Why didn't they go down into the tunnels to get away?" Antoinette asks as she nudges a skeleton with her foot.
"Maybe the problem was the tunnel," Audrey says, looking at Froggy Girl. "Might not have been Zs that did this. Could have been people that came up from below."
"That the case?" Steph asks Froggy Girl.
"I don't know," Froggy Girl says. "Could be. Lots of bad stuff has happened since the Zs showed up."
"People killing people," I say. "Humans suck shit balls."
"It was awful in the beginning," Froggy Girl says. "I didn't leave my house for two years. Mama wouldn't let me. Then I got to go out and that's when the Inezes found us and kept us from getting taken by the Doyles."
"They've been around that long?" I ask.
"Yeah," Froggy Girl says.
"Next floor," Steph says once we clear the first floor.
We move past the heavy barricade blocking the front entrances and take the stairs to the second floor. The stairs ain't much better than everywhere else. A lot of bloodstains. And a Z.
"Got it," I say and stab it through the head with one of my blades. It was a woman before it died. Old woman, maybe. A grandma. I don't remember my grandma.
The second floor is all offices, kinda like the first floor. We sweep, we clear, we move on. The courthouse is starting to get boring. Good thing there's the third floor.
The second Steph steps through the stairwell door and into the third floor, she drops. Not because she's been hit with anything, but because she sees the axe coming at her head. She rolls herself across the hallway and comes up firing. The kid with the axe screams then falls face first onto the stained tile. Half his face is gone from Steph's shots.
"On me!" Steph yells as she takes a knee and spins in the direction the kid came from.
We hurry into the hallway and take up positions, making sure every single direction is covered. No other kids come for us, but we stay still. We wait and we listen. Froggy Girl starts to say something, but I smack her on the back of the head and she shuts up.
"I don't think there are more here," Audrey whispers after at least twenty minutes go by. "We'd know. My gut says they're gone."
"This one was a distraction," Steph says, nodding at the dead kid. "So where are the others?"
There's a clang and a shout. Then screams. All coming from outside.
Steph kicks in a door and we hurry to a window in time to see a kid get buried under a pile of Zs down on the street. They start ripping him apart, yanking out guts and tearing off his arms and legs. He lives through all of it until his throat gets shredded by two Z mouths.
"The roof," Steph says. "That one fell from the roof."
We don't need orders and we don't need directions. We hit the stairs and sprint up to the roof. The sun is starting to go down by the time we get to the edge and see a cable stretching from the courthouse building to a different building across the street. The cable is just above a window and looking out of the window is one of the deaf kids.
She points up at us and claps her hands together, letting the blind kids know where we are. Then she's gone. Lost in the shadows of the building.
"Shit!" Steph shouts. A bunch of Zs below moan and groan up at her. "Oh, fuck off!"
"We have to go," Froggy Girl says. "Those Zs. Those are Doyle Zs. They sent them here. The Doyles followed us."
"Great," Audrey says as she scans the street for signs of living humans. "We know what that means."
"They have the tunnel cut off," Marcie says. "They're going to try to drive us out into the street."
"We can take those Zs," I say after a quick undead head count. "Not a problem."
"Then we better get to it," Steph says. "Time to bug out."
"You mean we're leaving?" Antoinette asks as we sprint to the stairwell door. "Getting the Humvees and going?"
"What about the kids?" Audrey asks.
"Fuck the kids for now," Steph says. "We don't have time to play games with crazies named Doyle. We get the Humvees, get out of town, and wait. Maybe the kids will leave soon and we can catch them out in the open instead of playing hide and seek in this shitass town."
She yanks open the stairwell door and we all hear the shot as it hits her.
Steph falls back, a large hole in her forehead, blood flying everywhere.
We scream. As one, we sisters scream.
Then we hit the stairs and open fire.
Chapter Seven
With a sister dead behind us, you'd think we'd go all crazy and shit, but we don't. We hit those stairs and do what we do best: kill some shitfucking assholes. This is how sisters deal with death. We make more of it.
The Doyles have no idea what hits them.
It's like surgery. That's what John always says. Surgeons don't just hack away at a body, they have to target the exact spot for the first cut then be thinking ten steps ahead to the next cut and the next. Your mind is locked onto what you're doing in that moment, but your subconscious is planning the next step. You go on skill and let instinct guide that skill.
His words, not mine.
My words would be: you shoot the first shitfucker then shoot the next shitfucker then shoot the shitfuckers after that and don't get yourself shot while you are shooting shitfuckers. It's pretty simple.
That's what we do.
I'm on point with both pistols up and firing. I have a bead on the first shooter, probably the one that took down Steph, and I put two slugs in his chest then one between his eyes. My attention moves to the next guy, but I don't have an angle so I dive to the floor and roll out of his line of fire.
Audrey comes in after me and she takes down the next guy, moves out of the way for Antoinette, and she takes the third guy. I'm back up and leaning over the railing, my pistols searching for guy number four. He pops his head out to see what's up. Guess what? I'm up and he's down because I blow his shitfucking head off.
Fifth guy makes an appearance and this guy has a shotgun so shit gets messy. 12-gauge buckshot. Stupid in a tactical situation, but not a bad idea in a defensive situation. And this shitfucker is on the defensive since he's now all alone and has four very, very, very pissed off rage chicks coming for him with automatic weapons.
And blades. If I catch this shitfucker alive, I am so gonna use my blades on his ass. I will also use my blades on his cock and balls. Possibly his toes and fingers, but mainly on his cock and balls. Snip, snip, motherfucker.
He is firing wild, just pointing the shotgun behind him as he races down the stairs.
"There'll be more down there waiting!" Marcie shouts as we sprint down the stairs, our feet only hitting every third or fourth step.
"That means more to kill!" Audrey shouts back.
"Roger that!" Antoinette yells.
"Fuck yeah!" I scream as we keep chasing the shotgun Doyle.
I assume they're all called Doyle. If this town is fucked up enough to have a bunch of Inezes then it is gonna have a bunch of Doyles. That's how crazies work in the apocalypse. Stupid, shitfucking crazies.
Second floor door bursts open and a shirtless man that has to weigh like four hundred pounds comes out like that Rambo guy from that movie when I was a kid. He's got an M-60 machine gun in one hand and he's feeding the belt of cartridges into it with the other. The concrete around us turns into shrapnel and we all throw ourselves over the railing and fall the last few feet to the ground floor.
The fat guy stops shooting and actually says, "Huh?" before he looks over the railing to see where we've gone. He does that. He looks over the railing. Doesn't
shoot at us, just looks. Hard to say which one of us fires first, but it don't matter in the end. His head turns to mist and he tumbles down after us, machine gun gripped in his dead hands.
"Dibs!" Audrey yells and slings her rifle as she yanks the M-60 from Dead Fat Boy's hands. She checks the action, makes sure the belt isn't tangled, and aims at the door to the first floor. "Ready!"
Marcie yanks the door open and Audrey opens fire. She walks slowly from the stairwell, spraying bullets everywhere. Marcie was right, they are waiting for us. Close to a dozen men, all with automatic rifles or shotguns, start to dance and scream as they are ripped apart by heavy caliber slugs.
Once there is room, we follow after Audrey, laying down some backup fire, making sure the ones that didn't go down right away for sure go down next. Blood splatters everywhere. The first floor is nothing but a pool of red by the time Audrey's M-60 clicks empty and she throws it aside.
"Where's Froggy Girl?" Audrey snaps, spinning about with her rifle back in her hands.
"Here," Froggy Girl whispers as she peeks her head out from the stairwell door. Her eyes go wide as she sees the corpses. "Oh…"
"Fucking A yeah, oh," Audrey says and points down the hall to the basement door. "How many Doyles are coming?"
"What?" Froggy Girl asks. "I don't know."
"How many Doyles are there?" Audrey snaps, her rifle pointed at Froggy Girl.
"Lots," Froggy Girl says. "More than I can count. There's always Doyles around. Can't ever get away from the Doyles."
"Fucking useless," Audrey says.
I think she's gonna shoot Froggy Girl, but she lowers her rifle and looks over at the rest of us.
"We gonna leave her here?" Audrey asks.
"Please don't!" Froggy Girl says. "You killed all the Inezes! If you leave me—!"
"Shut up!" Audrey shouts. "I'm not talking about you!"
I stop what I'm doing, which is stabbing Doyles in the brains. Just in case, you know. I look at the other sisters then we all look up at the ceiling. Up at Steph.
"If there are a ton more Doyles then her body will only slow us down," Marcie says.