The Dead Collection Box Set #2: Jack Zombie Books 5-8

by Flint Maxwell

  “Jack?” Roland says, cocking his head. He pulls his punch at the very last second.

  Cringing, I say, “Yeah. It’s me.”

  “You’re…you’re alive?”

  “In the flesh.”

  He puts his hands under my arms and rips me up through the hatch. I didn’t think the guy had that kind of strength, but lo and behold, I’m on top of the rock platform.

  “What is it?” Mandy calls.

  “Roland?” Lilly echoes.

  It’s good to hear her voice. I’m glad she didn’t come after me and Abby.

  Roland lets me go, and I peer over the edge.

  “Jack!” Lilly says. “Oh, my God. I thought you were dead. Where’s Abby?”

  From behind me, Abby says, “Right here.”

  She has the ladder that attaches to the rock platform, and she hooks it over the hinge on the edge. It rolls out and reaches the bottom. Lilly is the first one to come. She wraps us all up in a hug.

  The rest come not long after.

  “We’re free?” Nacho asks.

  I clap him on the shoulder. “Free as hell, my friend.”

  He shakes his head. Tears pool in the corner of his eyes, threatening to drip down his cheek. “Gracias. Gracias!”

  “You’re welcome…o?” I say.

  “‘De nada’, Jack. ‘De nada’,” he corrects me.

  “De nada,” I say.

  Abby leads them through the hatch then pokes her head back up.

  I’m looking out over the platform at the milling zombies. Some have their heads tilted toward me, but most are busy bumping into each other and making that death rattle in the back of their throats.

  “You coming?” Abby asks.

  “I’ll be there in a second.” Now I’m looking at the last subway car. I can just see the top of the hobgoblin woman’s head, her graying hair.

  Abby must see this because she says, “That’s a lost cause, Jack.”

  I shrug. “She helped us. Now I’m gonna help her.”

  “How?”

  I raise my rifle and press down on the trigger. Heads explode, bodies fall, the undead become the dead once more.

  Abby does the same.

  The darkness fills with our gunfire, and the smell of cordite is thick in the air, but it is no thicker than the smell of death. We shoot until the ones that can still move, which is about fifty or so, don’t. And we shoot the ones that can’t move, too.

  As we put our weapons down, my ears ringing, my hands trembling with phantom vibrations, Abby says, “You’re too good for this world, Jack. The way it is now. You’re too good.”

  I say nothing.

  She leaves as I climb down the platform toward that last subway car.

  Thirty-Four

  The woman looks out the grimy windows as if she’s appreciating the first true summer’s day after a long and cold winter and a wet spring.

  “You killed them all,” she says.

  I stand atop her car, looking over the edge, down at her scalp. She looks like a woman in a dream.

  “I did. Now you can get out of here.”

  “Thank you,” she says.

  “You were right, you know,” I say, and she looks up at me. “About the doorway. There was one.”

  “I know,” she says. “That’s where the hobgoblins come from.”

  “That they do. Be careful out there.”

  I give the woman the rope Abby gave to me, hoping that she’ll climb out.

  “You be careful, too.”

  “Where will you go?” I ask her.

  She smiles somberly, and for a moment, I can see the woman she was before this world took her sanity. She looks like she might’ve been a schoolteacher, strict yet caring, always looking out for her students, both in the classroom and outside of it.

  I had teachers like that when I was growing up. They’re worth more than they think. I hope this woman knows she is worth more than she thinks, too.

  “Wherever the wind blows me,” she says. “But I presume I will go far, far away from here.”

  I nod. “Good. I don’t think this place will be around much longer.”

  “Are you going to destroy it?”

  “I’m going to do what I have to do,” I answer.

  “So yes,” she says. “More destruction for a destructive world.” She turns away from me, starts gathering up her things. I toss a knife through the opening in the top of the car. It lands a few feet away from her feet.

  “For protection,” I say.

  “I don’t need it,” she replies. “Not even from the hobgoblins.”

  I smile. “Take it, just in case.”

  She picks it up and puts it into the canvas bag with the rest of her things. “Happy?”

  “I am. Go someplace west,” I say. “It’s safer out west.”

  “Wherever the wind takes me,” she mumbles again. “If it is west, then it is west. If not…” She shrugs.

  Smiling, I leave her. I go back up the ladder, but I don’t take it with me, so she can use it whenever she is ready.

  Something tells me she will not leave, that she was just humoring me. She is at peace with death, and there’s nothing I can do about that, but this woman whose name I don’t even know has helped me more than she’ll ever know. I hope she finds peace. Whether it be out west, or in the afterlife.

  Thirty-Five

  On the surface, Mandy is bent over. She’s holding a stick and drawing some sort of map on the dirty, cracked concrete.

  “You sure?” Abby asks. “You sure that’s where they’re at?”

  Mandy brings her free hand up and makes an X over her left breast. “Cross my heart,” she says. “I pored over those schematics for hours.”

  “If they found out about you hacking in, surely they’d change them around, though, right?” Lilly says. She’s bent down and looking over the crude map. Now she looks at Mandy.

  “They didn’t know what I looked at. All they knew was that I was in a place I shouldn’t have been.”

  “Not to mention that they were betting on you being dead soon,” Roland says.

  Mandy nods. “And that.”

  I step into the circle. The map is actually pretty good, considering the circumstances.

  “They wouldn’t have moved an entire arsenal of armed weapons because a peasant—no offense, Mandy—hacked into their mainframe,” I reason.

  “None taken,” she says.

  “I agree.” Abby stands up straight. She reloads the rifle from a clip she took off of Bryan before we buried him in the trash. Click-click. “So you know where it’s at, for sure?”

  Mandy stands up. She points into the darkness, where we can just make out the broken black fingers of the few skyscrapers that once made up this city, whatever city it was. “Just over there,” she says. “No less than a mile in.”

  “Well, what are we waiting for?” Roland asks. “Let’s take these sons-of-bitches down.”

  I shake my head. “No, Roland.”

  His jaw is set firm, but at the sound of my words, it drops. “What do you mean?” he asks.

  I look at Nacho, then at Mandy. “You’re going the opposite way,” I tell them.

  “I know how to set the warheads off,” Mandy says. “I know how to get there. You need us.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong,” Abby says, but her tone isn’t hostile. “I know how to set off the warheads. It’s not difficult.”

  “And if she didn’t,” Lilly adds, “I’m sure we could manage. But I know where Jack is going with this.” She eyes me. “It’s not hard to read Jack Jupiter.”

  Gee, thanks.

  “It’s going to be dangerous. We’ve put you through enough danger as it is,” Lilly continues. “The rest of this journey is ours and ours alone.”

  Funny, I think. Not too long ago, I was telling you the same thing.

  I had tried to make Lilly go back the way she came because it wasn’t safe, because I knew that the only thing lying in front of me was
death, and there was no reason to bring anyone else down with me. That’s how I feel: those who walk with me only die. From Kevin, to my own wife and son.

  But Lilly is hardheaded. There’s no convincing her otherwise, no telling her no. She’s like Abby in that way.

  “But we want to help. We want to take down the District,” Roland says.

  “Si! Si!” Nacho says. “It is the reason we are here.”

  “Yeah!” Mandy adds.

  “No,” I say. I make sure my voice is heavy with finality. They seem to buy it by the way they shrink down before me. “This is our fight. There may be a time for you to make your stand, but it is not now.” I step forward. “Get out. Get out while you still can.”

  Roland steps to meet me. “Okay, Jack,” he says. “I’ll go. Godspeed.”

  “Roland,” Mandy says. “You can’t be serious.”

  Roland looks back at the tall woman, who somehow looks smaller than she has ever looked. “Can’t you tell? He doesn’t want our help. He saved our lives, and for that, I’m grateful. You should be, too. The least we can do is grant his wish.”

  Nacho sidles up next to Roland. “Si,” he says, somberly.

  Now they’re both looking back at Mandy.

  I glance at Abby. She averts her gaze from mine as if to tell me I’m on my own here. That’s okay. She’s right.

  Mandy throws up her hands. “Fine!”

  I stick my hand out for Roland. He takes it in his own.

  “It’s been great knowing you,” I say.

  “Great knowing you, too. Be careful, Meat.”

  I grin.

  Nacho salutes me.

  Then they are off, headed in the same direction as Cameron, toward the bridge and hopefully to safety beyond it in the west.

  “Well, that was…interesting,” Abby says.

  “You could’ve backed me up a little,” I say.

  Abby points to Lilly. “That’s what she’s for,” she says. “I do the shooting, and Lilly does the talking.”

  “I guess,” I say. “Whatever the case, I’m glad you’re both here for me.”

  Lilly elbows me in the arm. “Don’t go getting sentimental on me, Jack Jupiter.”

  “He’s actually pretty good at that. You should’ve seen him the first time I met him, back during one of the first zombie outbreaks. His fiancé, Darlene, was locked away in the Woodhaven Motel with that creepy guy that owned the place…and Norm.” She snaps her fingers. “I can’t remember his name. Anyway, every step Jack took, he couldn’t help but bitch and moan about getting to Darlene. He’s come a long way since those days, that’s for sure.”

  Lilly is staring at Abby with shock.

  Abby looks back. “What?” she says.

  That’s when she realizes her blunder. Darlene is dead, and it’s safe to assume I’m not over her. Because I’m not.

  “Oh, Jack…I’m sorry,” she says.

  I raise a hand. “It’s not a big deal.”

  “I didn’t mean to bring her up. I just thought that story was funny—no, I don’t know what I thought. I’m sorry. I know how much she meant to you. She meant so much to me, too. She was like the sister I never had. I don’t know where I would be without her.”

  I shake my head. “Seriously, Abby, don’t worry about it. I was young and scared back then. That’s all. It is a funny story, considering all the other crap we’ve gone through.”

  Abby smiles, but she doesn’t believe me; that much is evident in the way she won’t meet my eyes.

  “I’m sorry, Jack. Just know that.”

  “Actions speak louder than words. The Overlord killed my wife, he killed my son. Let’s make sure his empire can’t spread. Let’s make sure he can’t take anyone else’s wife and child from them,” I say.

  I turn toward the city. Looking at that diseased skyline, the rotten buildings, the memory of civilization, I feel, for the first time in a long time, fear. Pure fear. It courses through my veins, slows the pumping of my blood. Looking at that diseased skyline, I think there is a chance I’ll never look at another skyline again. We are talking nuclear weapons here. Nothing as small as guns and knives, but nukes. Yes, I’ve stopped the world from being reset before, when Doc Klein tried blowing the us all to hell, but even those bombs were far away. All that was in front of me was the big red button you’re not supposed to press.

  Tonight, I’ll be directly in the blast zone, whether I like it or not. Suddenly, I’m not so sure I’m prepared for that. Prepared to die.

  Still, I can’t let the others know how I’m feeling.

  Sparing one last look toward the bridge as the silhouettes of Mandy, Nacho, and Roland grow smaller and smaller in the distance, I turn back and face the city. Then I’m putting one foot in front of the other. I’m holding the gun out in front of me, keeping my finger close to the trigger. Ready for war. No less than a few steps later, I hear Abby and Lilly following me, and I think, if I’m going to die today, I’m glad I’m not going to die alone.

  Thirty-Six

  The farther into the city we get, the more the place crawls with District soldiers: men, women, and even boys and girls that look like they should be roaming the halls of a high school instead of carrying assault rifles nearly as big as they are.

  We stick to the shadows for most of the way. That proves an easy task. Inside the city, without most of the grid being back on, shadows are everywhere. There are lookouts built high above the streets, and each one has a spotlight, like the towers found on prison grounds in those old black and white movies, but the guards up there aren’t moving the lamp back and forth like they’re probably supposed to. With the bridge probably being the only relatively safe entryway into the city, I don’t think they’re too worried about guerrilla rebels infiltrating the place.

  “Up ahead,” Abby says. We are hidden behind the husk of an old Dodge—probably a minivan, I think, but who knows? It’s barely recognizable as a vehicle; if it wasn’t for the melted steering wheel, jutting up from somewhere in the front with its ram logo embossed in the middle of it, I’d probably never know it was a car, let alone a Dodge. “About a hundred feet up the road, we take a right, and we’ll be at a stadium.”

  “Like the one in Eden?” I ask, referring back to Spike and Butch Hazard’s place of torture, where we’d found ourselves all those years ago, back when we were whole.

  Abby shudders. “I’d forgotten about that place. Thanks, Jack.”

  I shrug.

  “But no, not like Eden. Mandy told me that this place is where college football games were played. Remember football?” Abby says.

  Lilly shakes her head. “Blah. Something I tried to forget.”

  “Such a girly girl,” Abby says.

  The spotlight atop the nearest guard tower sweeps the street. Lilly grabs us and yanks us down.

  The light doesn’t linger over the wrecked Dodge; it continues on up the road, makes another pass, then stops as it illuminates an equally wrecked storefront. The inside of the building is scattered with loose papers. A bookstore, probably.

  “I wonder how much longer they’ll think we’re imprisoned,” Lilly says.

  “Not much longer, if they haven’t discovered our absence already,” Abby says. She’s right.

  “We’ll have to take out the guard up there,” I say. “No way we’re getting past the tower without him seeing us.”

  “I know,” Abby says. “You got a plan, Jack?”

  I shake my head.

  “Well, there’s a first time for everything, right?” Abby snickers, sarcastically.

  “What about you?” I ask.

  She picks up a rock and steps out from the cover of the Dodge.

  “Abby!” Lilly hisses, reaching for her, but she can’t catch her sleeve before she’s fully visible in the street.

  I pull Lilly back and shake my head, telling her that we just have to let Abby do what she wants. That there’s no stopping her. Sometimes, her stunts work. Sometimes, they don’t. But most of t
he time they do, and Lilly will learn that truth soon enough. Let’s just hope whatever she’s doing works out this time.

  Thirty-Seven

  Abby cocks the rock back over her ear and launches it up toward the guard tower. As the rock flies through the air, I think how genius Abby is. She’s going to break the spotlight and shroud the whole street in darkness—

  Nope. I’m wrong.

  The rock doesn’t hit the spotlight, though it’s not because she missed her target. Instead, it hits the guard square in the back of the head. A hollow clonk fills our ears, then the clang of his gun hitting the metal railing as he stumbles forward and falls over. He screams on the way down, a short and sharp sound that is gruesomely cut off by the chorus of cracking bones we hear when he hits the pavement. He writhes there for a second, then the glow of the nearby spotlight illuminates the blood coming from his head.

  I don’t think he’s dead, but I also don’t think he’ll be getting up anytime soon.

  Abby looks back at us and shrugs. “I played a little softball in high school. Seems like I still got it.”

  Lilly and I look at each other, our faces masks of seriousness, then the seriousness crumbles, and we can’t help but smile.

  “Told ya,” I say to Lilly.

  We get more ammo off the guard, plus a handgun that we give to Abby, since she’s the one who knocked the guy out, and a hunting knife I strap to my leg beneath my pants because I gave my other one to the hobgoblin woman.

  The stadium stands at the end of a long road. There are two more guard towers in the distance, and their lights are on, but they’re not sweeping the perimeter. In front of the stadium, lit up by torches, are three guards.

  Our prospects are not looking good at the moment.

  “Plan?” Lilly asks. “I don’t think we can get close enough to hit them with rocks.”

  Abby grins as she rotates her arm in a circle. “Never say never.”

  I shake my head, pointing above us. A series of office buildings of nearly the same size surround the stadium and the watchtowers. We have weapons, now all we need is a vantage point.