“Well?” Oliver called out.
“We’re good,” was Daymon’s reply as he turned and padded back down the hall toward the kitchen. “Keep doing what you’re doing. But check the front stoop now and again, will ya?”
Oliver nodded. “The handle … it’s still moving.”
Nearly to the kitchen, Daymon slowed his gait and turned toward the front door. “I’ll fill you in on that piece of the puzzle before you go out to put them down.” He didn’t wait for the argument. Instead, he turned back to face the kitchen and saw that Wilson had thrown the lock and was pulling the back door inward. About to admonish the redhead for going outside without backup, he instead broke into a full sprint, holstering his pistol midway through the first long stride.
Hearing the rapid clomp of boot heels striking hardwood, Wilson spun around midstep and raised his arms in a defensive posture. Which did nothing to soften the blow from Daymon’s two-hundred-pound frame as it struck him chest-high and lifted him off his feet. Then, while the air escaped his lungs with a hollow whoosh, Wilson witnessed three things happen near simultaneously, seemingly in slow motion. First he saw the door jambs and kitchen cabinets fly by in his peripheral as inertia from the sidelong tackle set his body spinning on axis and tilting horizontal to the floor. Once fully airborne, his gaze went to Daymon’s contorted face, then moved on to the unlit porch light atop the door frame, and finally saw some unknown foreign object scything the air above both of their heads.
Though possessing a fair amount of give due to the recent snow and rain, the ground still was unforgiving when Wilson’s sudden and unexpected meeting with it stole what little air remained in his lungs. Consequently, a fraction of a second later when Daymon’s full weight came crashing down on Wilson’s fully prostrate body, there was nothing left in the lungs to purge, so instead his stomach gave up its contents, fully and also without warning.
Timing being everything for the second instance within the span of a couple of heartbeats, Daymon rolled off of Wilson a half-beat shy of being splashed by what remained of the younger man’s breakfast. And as he lay there in the crushed grass listening to Wilson retch, he stared past his boots and saw the four-foot-long section of tree trunk that had just missed them swinging pendulum-like outside the back door. Barely bigger around than his wrist, the length of aspen was shot through with a couple dozen of what looked to be six-inch-long 60-penny nails.
“That was close,” Daymon said, as Oliver came skidding to a halt, his body nearly filling up the door frame.
“What the eff?” Oliver mouthed as he reached out to arrest the contraption.
“Back off,” Daymon bellowed.
With a quizzical look settling on his face, Oliver did as he was told, both hands going up in mock surrender.
“How’d you know?” Wilson asked, his words coming out barely above a whisper.
“When I saw there were no cobwebs across the back porch I started thinking that whoever left the rotters in the body shop may have more tricks up their sleeve.”
“But how did you know?” Wilson asked, wiping the bile from his lips. “What made you drop everything and just act?”
“I saw you about to go through the door alone. At that point, seeing as how we already have a pair of Zs at the front door, I was a little concerned … and a little pissed-off.” Daymon bit his tongue and hung his head. “Good thing my eyes are better than Old Man’s … I spotted the twine stretched across the door frame when you pulled the door toward you. And luckily for you I ran track in high school.”
“You gotta see this,” Oliver called from the back porch.
Daymon rose and helped Wilson to his feet. “Anything broken?” he asked.
“I’ll be sore tomorrow,” Wilson answered. “But thanks to you there will be a tomorrow.” He slapped the taller man on the back and together they scaled the back stairs.
Chapter 24
Daymon was down on one knee at the top of the stairs inspecting the sprung trap, which at this point was no longer caroming off the door jambs and had come to rest blocking the doorway. Twine looped through metal eyehooks screwed into the door header kept the medieval-looking contraption suspended roughly knee-high to the shortest person in the group. A third length of twine that had triggered the trap now lay in a loose coil on the rectangular cement landing where a door mat would normally be.
Daymon took the slack length of twine in hand and followed it up the door frame to where it passed through a series of metal eye hooks identical to the ones securing the trap to the top header. Near the top of the frame, a knot stuck fast in the final eyehook had arrested the twine’s travel.
“Check this out,” Oliver said, pointing to one of the spikes.
Daymon called for Lev to join him outside. He moved out of the way as Lev stepped over the inert trap. Finally, after making room for the former soldier on the cement landing, he said, “Aside from a pretty elaborate shin sticker, what else am I supposed to be seeing, Oliver?”
“This,” Oliver replied, pointing to one of the spikes protruding from the tree trunk on his side of the doorway. “There’s a moist bit of flesh skewered on this one. And more on these, here … and here.” He lifted the trap to afford Daymon, Wilson, and Lev a clear view. “I’d bet this is what came out of Tom, Dick, and Harriet down at the body shop.”
“From their necks?” Taryn asked, peering over Oliver’s shoulder.
“Yep.”
“Motherfuckers were harvesting salivary glands,” Daymon said, his short dreads keeping time with his bobbing head. “That’s some devious shit right there.” He cast a furtive glance over his shoulder. “Whoever set this when they left didn’t want to kill any of us right away. Hell, this thing is so light it probably wouldn’t have killed Raven if she had sprung it.”
“When I was in Iraq, a staff sergeant leading our fire team liked to remind us before going out on patrol that a wounded man took more resources to bring in than a dead one.”
“So he wanted you to die instead of getting injured?” Wilson asked.
Lev stared at Wilson for a long second. “No, dumbass. He didn’t want any of us to get injured. That’s what this is here for. One of us gets infected and doesn’t realize it. Brings it home as a slow burn and then he or she turns and infects a few more of us. That’s some devious shit.”
Wilson stepped up to Lev. Glared at him for a second. “Take it back. The dumbass comment. Take it back.”
Lev merely shrugged.
Wilson shoved him in the sternum, knocking him off the short run of stairs.
Reacting instantly, Lev found his balance and threw a looping right that missed Wilson’s nose by a whisker. “You watered those balls alright,” he said, as Daymon leaped down and pulled him away.
“Name calling? That’s a first for you,” Wilson said, eyes narrowing.
Daymon stood facing Lev. “Stand down,” he said, moving his body to keep the shorter man from making eye contact with the redhead crowding him from behind.
Thinking boys will be boys, Jamie looked on indifferently.
Aiming to defuse the situation, Taryn poked her head out the doorway. Staring daggers at Lev, she said, “I found this in the attic,” She handed the empty cigarette pack to Oliver, who in turn passed it between the taut twine to Daymon.
“So what if the bleeder was a smoker?” Daymon said, inspecting the crumpled wrapper. “We already knew that by the stink in there.”
“Look inside the wrapper,” she said as Lev and Wilson seemed to forget about their beef and edged closer to see the item in Daymon’s palm.
Daymon inspected the pack closer and fished a worn book of matches from the crinkled cellophane sleeve. He spent a moment turning it over in his hand and reading the words encircling a catchy logo. “These came from The Lodge Motel in Bear River. A long time ago, from the looks of it. So what?”
“Take a closer look,” Taryn said.
He read the small print on the cover again front and back. “I sta
nd corrected,” he said. “These came from Bear Lake.”
Crouching next to Oliver and looking directly at Daymon, who had professed to have fought fires all over the west, Taryn said, “OK … so we all know where Bear River is. Can either one of you enlighten us as to where Bear Lake is.”
“Enlighten you? Hell no … I’m going to take you there,” said Daymon. “Stand back.” He rose and pulled a folding knife from a cargo pocket. After thumbing the knife open, he cut the trap down. Being sure to stay clear of the Omega-infected spikes, he took hold of all three lengths of severed twine and carried the trap to the nearby fence and tossed it into the brambles on the other side.
“What now?” Lev asked.
“Check the fence for signs of our squirter.”
“All the noise the trap made, if they were still hanging around I’m sure we’d have already started taking incoming fire.”
“Humor me while Oliver takes care of the heavy lifting,” Daymon said. He pointed at Wilson. “You initiated the physical contact with your friend. Time to apologize.”
“But he called me a—,” Wilson stammered.
“Sticks and stones,” Daymon said, cutting him off and folding his arms across his chest.
Reluctantly, Wilson made a quiet amends.
“Apology accepted,” Lev said as he headed off toward the fence line. “Sorry I swung on you.”
“Doesn’t that feel better?” Daymon said, directing the question at Wilson.
Wilson nodded and struck off after Lev.
Daymon turned back toward the door. “Oliver … come on down,” he said, trying to impart a little Price is Right-like enthusiasm into the request. “I want to show you something.”
Daymon led Oliver to the side fence he had spotted earlier from the sidewalk. He ran the folding knife across the rust-scaled wrought iron and began to whistle softly.
After a few seconds the sound of clumsy footsteps on wooden steps filtered around to the side of the house. A tick after the noises subsided, the bushes at the front corner of the house shimmied and branches cracked as the two rotters from the front stoop crashed their way through. Maws already pistoning open and closed on imagined flesh, they hissed and moaned and staggered toward the waist-high fence.
Daymon handed over his folding knife, blade already locked open. “What’s the easiest way to deal with these fuckers? I’ll give you a hint: I’ve put down hundreds of them this way.”
“Wait until they’re trapped on the fence, then stick them in the eye.”
“Now we’re cooking with gas, Oliver.” Daymon chuckled and stepped back from the fence. “We’ll make a stone cold killer out of you yet.”
The monsters hit the fence at a full shamble, causing the old iron to keen and groan and the entire ten-foot run to lean inward a few degrees.
Breathing through his nose and about to retch from the stench, Oliver thrust the locked blade into the male rotter’s eye socket, dropping the snarling beast vertically as if a trapdoor had been opened beneath it. The sudden second-death and subsequent instantaneous failure of everything keeping the two-hundred-pounder upright couldn’t have been timed any worse. For when the thing collapsed and was impaled on the spikes atop the fence, it pitched forward, the dead weight causing the entire run of fence to cant forward and stop at roughly a sixty-degree angle.
Damnit, Oliver thought, seeing the law of unintended consequences unfolding before his very eyes as the female rotter hit the fence and started the evenly spaced concrete footings to rise up from the soggy earth. To keep from being pinned to the ground by hundred-year-old iron, and who knew how many pounds of dead flesh, Oliver stepped forward and braced the fence with his left hip. Keeping free of the female’s snapping teeth, he grabbed a handful of greasy hair and drew her thrashing head toward his leveled blade.
“Not like that,” Daymon blurted, rushing to his aid. “You’re likely to get bit.”
Grimacing, Oliver said, “I can’t stomach stabbing them through the skull.”
Daymon shored the fence with his thigh, grabbed a fistful of hair, and then pushed down on the back of the flailing monster’s head. After getting Oliver’s undivided attention, he stabbed an index finger at the nape of its neck. “Right where the spine goes into the skull is where you want to do it,” he said. “There will be a little grating of bone and such. But nothing like when you do them in the temple or through the skull cap.” Finished delivering today’s lesson on how to effectively kill the undead 101, he pulled harder on the creature’s long auburn locks and increased the downward pressure on its skull with his other hand.
After a little probing with the tip of the borrowed blade, Oliver found the sweet spot between the C1 and C2 vertebra and put his weight behind the single thrust. As promised, there was a cold-shiver-inducing grating of steel on bone, but nothing akin to what Oliver had felt and heard when Daymon forced him to put down the rotters earlier.
Muted golf claps sounded from behind Daymon and Oliver as they let the female rotter down to the long grass.
Daymon let go of the thing’s hair then turned towards the others and smiled sheepishly. “Did any of you learn anything from today’s lesson?”
Taryn and Jamie shook their heads, the former nearly pushed to the point of rolling up another middle finger for Daymon.
Ignoring the quip, Lev said, “There’s nothing I can see by the fence. The trail in the grass continues west then goes cold.”
“As I suspected,” Daymon said. “I would have run, too, once I got an eyeful of this motley crew.”
“What next?” asked Wilson. “Are we going to investigate Bear Lake today or continue searching this booby-trap-infested town?”
“Bear Lake,” Daymon said. “I figure we can catch up with our Peeping Tom if we get going now. All in favor, hands up.”
“Five for, one abstaining,” Lev said after a quick head count.
Sounding a little irritated, Daymon said, “Come on, Oliver. Water your—”
“Balls,” Wilson finished. “Go with the flow, dude. I used to be afraid of guns. Shotguns, pistols, rifles … you name it, I wanted nothing to do with them.”
“And look at him now,” Daymon intoned. “He’s a stone cold killer. And you’ve officially been overruled, Oliver. Let’s go back through the house.”
Scaling the steps, Daymon paused and looked over the rigging used to suspend the spike-laden trunk off to the side of the door. Then he turned slowly, regarded Taryn and then settled his gaze on Wilson. “When you two get back to the Raptor, you better check the backseat for a stowaway.”
“What are you talking about?” Wilson asked, taking off his boonie hat and rolling it up, then nervously throttling it two-handed.
Looking up from the bottom step, Taryn added, “Who do you think snuck a ride with us?”
Knowing where Daymon was going with this, Lev smiled and simultaneously fielded Jamie and Oliver’s confused looks with a dramatic shrug.
“I figure since you two both almost bought the farm today, old Mr. Murphy has got to be tagging along with you.”
Wilson said nothing. He scrunched his hat down and brushed past Daymon, following the others into the house.
Shaking her head at the tough love Daymon seemed gleeful to be dishing out, Taryn let her thoughts on the subject be known by cranking up another middle finger for the man, then swung it to her right and targeted a retreating Lev with it for a brief second.
“Relax,” Daymon said, wearing a shit-eating grin. “I’m not picking on you. You just became the next victim of my equal opportunity ball busting. I still got both of your backs.” Lowering his voice on the outside chance their watcher was still nearby, he called ahead to Lev. “Fire up the handheld CB and call Eden. Tell ‘em where we are and what we found … or didn’t find. Then let whomever it concerns know that we’re pushing north.”
“With friends like these,” Taryn muttered, watching Daymon reenter the house with a certain spring in his step.
“Da
ymon’s a ball buster of the highest order,” Oliver said quietly. “Just be grateful you’re not our weakest link.”
***
Iris was rising up from the mound of grass clippings at the same moment in time that the dreadlocked man was tackling the redhead. While their hurtling bodies were clearing the steps on the way to a hard landing, she was edging into the dark shadows on the periphery of the overgrown bramble patch.
Feeling every bit the doer for the first time in a long time, she defied standing orders and stayed in the gloom long enough to see the tripwire snag on one of the men’s boots. Then, fingering the gold cross on the chain around her neck, she risked death at her own hand by remaining rooted long enough to see the slipknot dissolve and gravity take hold of Ratchet’s tainted trap. At first it had moved achingly slow. The first few degrees of the arc seeming to take half a heartbeat. In the second half of that perceived pause it picked up speed and scythed the air where the men had been, failing in its sole purpose: to infect living flesh.
With Mother’s final words echoing in her head, Iris rose and crept west toward the church, being mindful to keep her movement steady and fluid-like—as she’d been taught. With the harried voices of the two luckiest men in the world rising above the sound her soft footfalls made crossing the carpet of rotting leaves beneath the skeletal oak, she decided the bad news wouldn’t make it into her report. Then, as she padded across the lengthening shadow of the church’s steeple on her way to the caretaker’s outbuilding, she pulled out the radio and placed the requisite call.
Chapter 25
Sleep had come to Cade in the form of a half-dozen little two- and three-minute cat naps that were regularly being interrupted by Ari’s constant course corrections. The first few times he had been jostled awake and stole a peek out the window he saw mostly open range and the occasional low-rolling tree-dotted hill. The latter couple of times Cade had cast his gaze at the ground, the cover had changed from the sage and cactus that had dominated the high desert terrain in and around Grand Junction, Mack, and Mesa, Colorado to a more alpine mix of green pines and firs, from which white peaks jutted. In the low spots, the occasional snow-covered meadow or deep-blue jewel-like lake flashed by.
District: Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse Page 15