Well, this is going well.
It wasn’t, of course, but the snarky part of Smith couldn’t help but take it all in with a sense of resignation: The whole week hadn’t gone very well, so why would tonight be any different? Sure, he’d managed to skirt around Gaffney without getting shot and had even managed to thin out the Judge’s ranks some, but he had no illusions his luck was going to continue all day.
As it turned out, he was right.
Another boom! as Blake fired a second time, creating a hole in the sunken chest of the same ghoul that was charging her and sending the creature reeling backward on its heels. Not, Smith noticed with some amusement, because the blast had ended its life, but because the force of the 12-gauge shell had knocked it to the ground.
Not that Blake had any time to celebrate her sorta-victory. The other ghouls were already swarming, appearing over the top of the hill in front of her.
Christ, there were a lot of them. At least six that Smith could see, but the air was thick with their stench, telling him that there were a lot more in the area than just the ones he could pick out with the naked eye—
The hairs on the back of his neck stood up and Smith spun around, knife at the ready, as one of the three ghouls charging him from the base of the hill finally reached its target. He slashed, catching it across the bony chest. Normally that wouldn’t have stopped an attacking man, but this wasn’t a man. It was a ghoul, and to the creature, anything with silver was kryptonite.
It collapsed in front of Smith, going from lively (well, in a way) to lifeless in the blink of an eye. Frail legs ceased moving, and its thin body, the appearance of a malnourished child, tumbled to the grass in a heap of clacking bones.
Smith stepped to his right as the remaining two ghouls kept coming, even as Blake’s shotgun boomed once again behind him. Smith tuned her out and concentrated on the ghouls in front of him.
He stabbed a second undead thing in the face, the knife going right through the twin holes that used to be its nostrils and nearly out the back of its skull. Its bones were so weak, like papier-mâché, that it hadn’t taken very much force at all. Unfortunately, that wasn’t an advantage for Smith, because he’d struck with too much force and the knife went in too far and became lodged in the falling body, leaving him exposed as—
The third ghoul reached for him, icy cold fingers scraping against his right cheek as Smith jerked his upper body back to avoid it. He tried to pull the knife out of the second ghoul, but it was embedded too deeply, and ended up dragging the scraggly body with him instead. Thank God it was so light and weak, and it was like carrying a fake biology class skeleton instead of a real body, one that had some heft to it.
Smith lifted his right boot and kicked it against the dead ghoul’s chest—
Boom! from behind him, closer this time, as Blake fired again—
—and shoved it back, finally releasing the knife just as the third ghoul staggered toward him. It was having some difficulty maneuvering the incline up the hillside. Smith was too, but not nearly as much since he had two perfectly good working legs. The ghoul, on the other hand, was dragging its right leg behind it. Its face was smashed, like it’d been broadsided by a Mack truck before tonight. There wasn’t much left of its face at all except for two hollowed holes that used to house eyeballs, but no longer.
Goddamn that’s one ugly motherfucker, Smith thought even as he lunged at the ghoul and stabbed it in the chest, putting it out of its misery once and for all.
His right hand, gripping the knife tightly, was covered in black sludge. He wasn’t sure when that had gotten there. Probably when he’d stabbed one of the ghouls in the face, or maybe when he sank the knife into the third one’s chest—
Boom! Boom!
Blake, behind him, firing away.
Smith turned around just as she stumbled blindly into him. She was scrambling backward, not looking where she was going, only knowing that anywhere was better than the top of the hill where skeletal shadows were appearing, undeterred by however many shotgun blasts she’d sent their way.
“Smith!” Blake shouted. “I’m almost out!”
“Run!” Smith shouted.
She glanced over at him, eyes wide. “What?”
“Run!”
“Run?”
“Run!”
Smith ran, and Blake followed.
He hopped over two of the bodies, nearly lost his footing and fell on his face when he landed, but somehow managed to stay upright. Barely. The hill wasn’t very high, but it seemed to take way longer to get down to the base than it’d taken when they were climbing up it earlier.
“Smith!” Blake shouted.
Smith glanced over at her, running alongside him. She was reloading, shoving shells into the Benelli as she ran. And doing it very well, too, as if she’d done it many times before. For all he knew, she had, not that he wasted breath asking for confirmation.
“Where are we going?” Blake shouted.
“I don’t know!”
“You don’t know?”
“I don’t know!”
He shot a quick look over his shoulder at the dark figures pursuing them.
Five—six—ten.
He spent a second or two trying to comprehend their presence. How were there ten ghouls out here? And what were they doing out here in the first place? Did it have anything to do with the ranch? The creatures were drawn to human presence, but why hadn’t they attacked until now? Or did he and Blake just have the misfortune to stumble into their path while they were about to do just that? Why—
Two of the ghouls stumbled and lost their footing and began rolling down the hill. The sight would have been comical in any other situation, but not tonight.
“Watch out!” Smith shouted, pushing Blake out of the way.
He must have put too much effort into his shove, because she went down sideways on the grass even as one of the ghouls rolled between them and landed at the base of the hill. The creature unfurled its elongated limbs and snapped back up to its feet, turning just as Smith jumped down the last few yards and stabbed it in the forehead with the knife.
Boom! from behind him.
Smith spun around as Blake fired again—boom!—and tore a hole the size of his fist through the sunken chest of the second ghoul that had rolled down the hill after them. It staggered back but didn’t go down.
She fired a third time, and the creature’s head, already missing one side of its skull, vanished in a shower of buckshot.
“Blake, run!” Smith shouted.
She did just that, turning and following on his heels even as the rest of the ghouls came down the hillside after them. Another one tumbled down like a boulder, but the rest somehow managed to remain upright. They were fast, their lack of weight giving them additional speed, but Smith was in great shape, and so was Blake. He had no doubt they could outrun the creatures. Besides, even if they couldn’t, he still had the knife.
Smith clutched the blade, wishing badly he had silver bullets to use instead. A knife was fine, but he would have preferred to take out the ghouls from a distance instead of having to get up close and personal. All it would take was a bite or a scratch, and he could have easily been infected. Smith knew about men and women that went around the country killing ghouls as a profession. They called themselves slayers. It was a hell of a way to make a living and took some balls. Or a death wish.
“Smith!” Blake shouted.
“What?” Smith said.
“This is my last shell!” she said even as she shoved that last shell into the Benelli. She’d been carrying the spare rounds for the weapon in a pouch; that same pouch was bouncing freely and empty against her waist now.
He hadn’t seen it before, but there were speckles of black goo on Blake’s chin and cheek, and more clinging to the front of her clothes. He hadn’t realized how close the ghouls had gotten to her until now, but they’d been near enough for backsplash from the shotgun blasts to rain thick, coagulated blood on her. She l
ooked okay, though, and was keeping up with him just fine. In fact, she was barely breathing hard.
No, that wasn’t true. She was starting to breathe hard.
And so was he.
Smith threw another glance over his shoulder.
There were six of them that he could see immediately, more in the back that he could only glimpse because they were either crawling or hobbling, having lost limbs—some, their heads—to Blake’s shotgun fire earlier. The ones with all their appendages were still coming but not catching up. They were fast, but Smith and Blake were faster.
For now, anyway. Sooner or later, they were going to get tired. They were only human, after all.
Meanwhile, the ghouls…
Not humans. Not anymore.
That was fine, though. Smith wasn’t panicking. At least, not yet. He still had the silver-coated knife, and Blake, her shotgun. True, the Benelli wasn’t going to kill a ghoul, but it could slow them down, especially if the buckshot was aimed at the right locations—like their legs. Ghouls could keep coming without legs, but they wouldn’t be nearly as fast anymore.
“Blake!” Smith shouted.
“What?” she shouted back.
“Get ready!”
“Get ready for what?”
“Aim for the legs!”
“What?”
“Aim for the legs!”
She squinted at him even as her breath hammered out between pale lips. “Are you crazy? Just keep running!”
“We can’t outrun them forever!”
She opened her mouth to argue—but stopped short. She understood exactly what he was getting at. It had taken a few seconds, but she got there eventually.
“Shit,” Blake said.
“Ready?”
“No!”
“On the count of three!”
“Wait, wait.”
“What?”
“Is that one-two-three, or three-two-one?”
Smith couldn’t help but laugh. “One-two-three.”
“Okay. Gotcha. Just wanted to make sure.”
“You sure, now?”
“Yup.”
“Sure, sure?”
She rolled her eyes at him. “Just do it, smartass!”
Smith grinned, then glanced back again to check on their pursuers. He couldn’t smell them anymore. The air was too crisp, too clean, and the creatures hadn’t managed to taint all of their surroundings yet.
Four of the ghouls were getting closer. Close enough that Smith could see the black of their eyes widening at the sight of him looking at them.
Damn, they’re ugly.
“One!” he shouted.
He glimpsed Blake clutching the Benelli next to him, getting ready. Like him, she didn’t break stride for one second.
“Two!”
Smith mentally prepared himself, and thought, I hope this works.
“Three!”
Eight
Smith acted first, stopping on a dime and spinning around. The knife was already back in its sheath on his left hip even before he drew the SIG Sauer with his right hand. The gun came out smoothly, like it always did. The move was instinctive, like breathing. He could have done it in his sleep, with his eyes closed, and without any feelings in any of his extremities.
He shot the first ghoul while it was about fifteen yards away, and the creature stumbled as its right leg buckled underneath it, the tibia bone cracking audibly as the 9mm round shattered it on impact. The nightcrawler pitched forward and slammed into the ground on its face, and was instantly attempting to pick itself back up. He fired again, striking it in the kneecap of its other leg, and the creature fell back down on its chest.
Smith felt queasy watching it, once again, attempt to get up. Instead, it began dragging itself forward with its hands, its head angled and eyes glaring back at him almost accusingly.
He retreated even while focusing on the next ghoul as it ran past the first one.
Boom! from his right as Blake fired and the left leg of the second undead thing vanished in a shower of buckshot. The creature collapsed to the ground. Like the one Smith had fallen, this one quickly attempted to pick itself up but found the task difficult now that it only had one functioning leg to work with.
The ghoul raised its right hand as if to ward off Blake’s next shot. It didn’t work. Buckshot tore away its fingers and continued on, also taking most of its right leg.
The creature slumped harmlessly to the grass.
A third ghoul leapt over its fallen brethren, but even before it had landed back on the slightly damp ground, Smith shot it—and missed. The bullet pierced the creature’s left leg but missed the bone entirely, before exiting the other side.
Dammit, he thought, hating the very idea of wasting a bullet, even though the gun was still heavy in his hand with its mostly-full magazine.
Blake did the job for him, taking the speeding creature’s left leg out from underneath it. The emaciated figure fell five yards from Smith, who was still backpedaling. Before it could stagger back on its one remaining leg, Smith crippled it at the kneecap with, this time, a sure shot.
“You owe me,” Blake said.
“Yeah, yeah,” Smith said.
Two more, coming fast.
Smith pivoted and fired, and this time hit his target where he aimed. Even before the ghoul could completely collapse to the ground, Smith shot it again, taking out its other leg from underneath it.
Blake finished off the last one with two blasts, and it, too, fell in a pile to the tall grass. A brief second later it was trying to claw its way toward them, dragging its elongated form by its hands, one inch at a time.
“Go!” Smith said, even as he turned and went back to running.
Blake jogged next to him. She had already thrown away the Benelli and was now holding the Glock. Like Smith’s SIG, her pistol was loaded with regular bullets. That wasn’t going to help them if more able-bodied ghouls showed up.
Fortunately, Smith couldn’t see more behind, to the sides, or in front of them. That was the good news. The bad news was that they had made a hell of a lot of noise, and there was no way the people at the ranch hadn’t heard all the commotion. No way in hell. The shotgun blasts by themselves was bad enough, but Smith had joined in with his pistol.
Yup. They definitely heard that, all right.
Which left him with only two options that he could see:
One was to keep retreating and hope no one from the ranch pursued them. If there was even a pursuit, that is. At the moment, Smith wasn’t sure. Would the Judge’s men come out of their sanctuary in the middle of the night, or would they take precautions? People that survived The Purge, while still not fearing the night the way they used to, were smart to be wary of it.
The other option…
Smith began to slow down.
Blake didn’t notice until she was a few paces ahead of him. After a few yards, she slowed down too, and looked back at him. “What are you doing?”
“Wait.”
“Wait for what?”
“Wait a minute.”
“Why?”
Smith slowed into a walk. He turned around and looked back toward the pursuing ghouls. He could still see them back there, but the threat was gone. The one-legged ones were hobbling in their direction while the headless ones were still far, far away. So much so that Smith could barely make out their thin outlines in the background.
Blake waited for him to catch up to her. “What? What is it?”
“The ranch,” Smith said.
“What about it? They would have heard all that. We have to get out of here before they come out to check.”
“Right. That’s what I’m counting on.”
Smith turned and went up the side of the hill, back toward the top. He thought he might have heard Blake sighing, just before hearing her moving behind him on his heels. If she’d kept running, he wouldn’t have blamed her one bit because even he wasn’t entirely sure what the hell he was doing.
A
nd what was he doing?
Probably something stupid.
Again.
“Keep an eye on them,” Smith said even as he climbed the last few feet to the top of the hill and flopped down on his belly. He hadn’t bothered to elaborate on what “them” was. He assumed it would be obvious to Blake. He hoped it was, anyway.
Smith didn’t glance back to check on her but instead peered through the darkness at the ranch spread out about two hundred yards, give or take, in front of him.
Lights had come on along the house in the center, as well as around the big red barn nearby. He thought he could see shadows flitting across the windows of the two-story house but couldn’t be certain from this distance. He knew one thing for sure: His and Blake’s little adventure hadn’t gone unnoticed.
“Smith,” Blake said from behind him.
He glanced back at her. She was crouched a few feet away, the Glock in her hand, while her eyes were glued down the hill and toward the approaching ghouls. Smith couldn’t quite see them, but he thought he could smell them. Barely.
“What are we doing?” Blake asked.
“My guess is they’re going to send a party out here to find out what’s happening,” Smith said.
“So, shouldn’t we be running?”
“No.”
“No? What do you mean, no?”
“I mean, if they’re going to send people out here, there’s a good chance they might spot us, then run us down. I can’t outrun horses. Can you?”
“Of course not. I’m fast, but I’m not that fast.”
“It’s a big ranch,” Smith said, turning back around. He still couldn’t see anyone outside on the ranch property, but there was definitely activity happening inside the barn. He pictured the Judge’s men saddling up. Or maybe getting another car ready. How many cars did they have, anyway?
“And?” Blake was saying.
After The Purge, AKA John Smith (Book 3): Shoot Last Page 5