Flesh Eaters

by Joe McKinney

  He began to whistle. The sound was not musical, but shrill. Loud and shrill.

  Eleanor saw movement out of the corner of her eye and glanced to the right. A zombie had stood up in the window of a home nearby, its eyes white and empty-looking against its mud-streaked face.

  He whistled again, and the zombie responded with a desperate sounding moan, which was answered by other moans from the opposite side of the street.

  “Stop it,” she said.

  He just smiled and went right on whistling, only louder now.

  Oh no, she thought. Officer Shaw, you crazy suicidal bastard.

  “I’m not gonna arrest you,” she said, hoping to make him stop. “You know that. Not the way things are.”

  The smile left his face.

  “Then why are you wasting my time, bitch?”

  “Because I want to know.”

  He didn’t respond. Instead he reared his head back and howled like a wolf in the night.

  Eleanor could hear splashing all around them now, and she knew what that sound meant. She had seen the way the infected massed on verbal cues. It would only be a matter of time before every zombie in the area was swarming on their location.

  “Stop that!” she said.

  “Stop what?” he said. “What are you scared of? Her?”

  He nodded to her right.

  Eleanor didn’t want to look. Anthony was smiling like a wicked child, and part of her knew that he was trying to trick her. How much more obvious could he be? She would glance to the side, then turn back to find him pointing a rifle at her. So she willed herself not to look, ignoring the splashing she heard over there.

  His smile widened.

  “Better tell your daughter to move out of the way. She’s about to turn into zombie chow.”

  Eleanor flexed her finger over the trigger. She was stuck, and she knew it. She couldn’t back down, and she couldn’t shoot him. Not another cop. Not this way. He would do it to her in a heartbeat, but damn it, she couldn’t. Not like this.

  And then the splashing grew louder.

  She felt the boat rocking as Madison moved to the port side.

  “Mommy . . .”

  And it was hearing her daughter calling her Mommy that did it. For the second time in just as many weeks she heard the helpless toddler calling through the voice of the girl. Eleanor turned, and saw a nearly naked woman with most of her face gone wading toward the boat. Her fingerless hands groped at the side of the boat.

  Eleanor gasped.

  “Mommy, shoot it!”

  Eleanor turned the rifle on the woman zombie and fired a single round. It hit her in the forehead and laid her back into the water with hardly a splash.

  A fast, simple death.

  But there were more zombies behind her, coming into the street from the spaces between the apartment buildings. At first five, then nine, then a dozen more. They were everywhere.

  She spun around, pointing her weapon at Anthony Shaw, but saw that he had beat her on the draw. He had his rifle pointed right at her, his finger tensed on the trigger. All he had to do was flinch, she realized, and she’d lose her entire family.

  “Officer Shaw,” she said, unable to keep the pleading tone from her voice.

  “Shut up, bitch,” he snapped. “Drop your weapon. Now! Put it down.”

  No way, she thought. I do that and you execute me and my entire family.

  She swallowed hard, suddenly aware of the sweat popping out all over her body. She was terrified. Her bladder began to ache. Her legs were weak, her hands numb. But he just stood there, smiling through his rifles sights, coldly indifferent to her fear.

  Off to her left, a spotlight beam came on.

  Out of the corner of her eye, Eleanor could see it flickering between the buildings over there, catching the shrubs and balconies in silhouette and throwing their shadows across the water. It was coming from a flat-bottom boat.

  And then a voice rang out.

  “Anthony, is that you?”

  “Yeah, Dad,” Anthony answered, without taking his eyes off Eleanor. “Come on over.”

  Eleanor saw Anthony’s eyes narrow, and she had just enough time to think My God, he’s gonna shoot, when the boat started rocking. She teetered, thrown off balance, and as she fell backwards she saw Jim leaping forward, grabbing Madison around the waist, and jumping into the water.

  Anthony started firing, and a line of bullets ripped through the hull where Eleanor had just been standing.

  Eleanor rolled over onto her back. Cold salt water was bubbling up through the holes in the bottom of the boat. It was already two inches deep and climbing up the sides of her body. Without even aiming she stuck the barrel of her M-16 over the gunwale and fired a three-round burst. From the other boat, Anthony screamed, and Eleanor felt a savage, primal yell rising up within her.

  “You bastard!” she screamed, and fired another burst.

  Her second volley went wide, but it must have come close enough to scare him, for he dove over the side. When Eleanor heard the splash she sat up and tried to find him. A terrible vision of him swimming back under the boats and coming up next to Madison and Jim flashed through her mind, but she suppressed it. Instead, she made herself take a deep breath.

  Slow down, girl, she thought. Scan the water. Go slow.

  Half a dozen zombies were already in the water, attracted by the noise of the fight, and there were more coming through the gaps in the buildings, but they weren’t close enough to be a threat yet. In the near distance, she could hear Captain Mark Shaw’s boat accelerating around the line of buildings to her left. But there was no sign of Anthony Shaw. She looked everywhere, but the dark water showed no sign of him.

  Then she saw his M-16 in the bow of his boat. There was blood on the stock, the shoulder strap caught on a cleat.

  The zombies were moaning now, their noise surrounding her. The nearest one was almost to Anthony’s boat, and she was running out of time. Another moment or two and she would have to start shooting or run away, and with Captain Shaw barreling down on them, they wouldn’t get far.

  Maybe I killed him, she thought.

  But even as the thought started to seem possible, she saw him surface. He was moving along the far side of his boat, his hand inching toward his rifle.

  “No you don’t,” she said, and fired at him.

  She missed, but got close enough to force him back from the cover of the boat. He stood up, and for a moment, she had him framed squarely in her sights. He was bleeding from a nasty wound on his right shoulder, the arm hanging limply by his side. But it didn’t seem to be causing him a lot of pain at the moment. To Eleanor, it looked as if he was debating with himself about reaching for his pistol. Would he have time to get off a shot? He was good enough to kill her with a single shot, but to do it he would have to draw his pistol across his body with his left hand.

  There was rage in his eyes. She had him beat, and he knew it. He glanced to his right and saw a zombie just a few feet from him. He turned back to Eleanor and she could just hear him mutter, “Fucking bitch,” before he turned and waded off toward a small, three-story apartment building on the other side of the street.

  Things happened fast after that.

  A few of the zombies were too close to ignore anymore. Eleanor shot three of them, then turned, and sighted in on a fourth. She pulled the trigger, but the gun was empty.

  “Shit!” she said, and quickly ejected the magazine and slapped in another.

  Captain Shaw’s boat was up near the head of the block now. She could see the searchlight dancing through the trees, and knew he’d be on them soon.

  “Jim, get Madison out of here!”

  “What?”

  “Jim, please, just do it! I’ll hold him off, but you have to get her out of here.”

  “No way. I can’t leave you here.”

  She pulled her pistol and jammed it into his hands.

  “Get her out of here. Protect my baby. I’ve got to cover you guys. Sh
aw will kill us all if you don’t get going now.”

  He seemed as if he was about to argue, but at that moment a zombie clawed its way over the gunwale of their sinking boat. Eleanor shot it in the face, blasting a spray of blood and bits of bone out across the water behind it.

  “Go!” she yelled at him. “Go, Jim, please.”

  “I love you,” he said, and grabbed Madison around the waist. She struggled against his grip, screaming not to leave her mother behind.

  “I love you, too,” Eleanor said. “Now get going.”

  She watched them slip away through a gap between a white concrete wall and an old gas station, then turned back to their boat. It was sinking fast now, its hull full of water. She waded over to it, grabbed Madison’s backpack, and then moved over to Anthony Shaw’s boat. It wasn’t much for cover, but it was the best she had.

  Captain Shaw was barreling down on her. She could see him up at the far end of the block, weaving between the roofs of submerged cars and trucks. She glanced over at the gas station, just to make sure Jim and Madison were out of sight, and saw more zombies entering the street.

  Oh God, she thought. Oh my God, this was a terrible idea. What the hell am I doing? Oh my God, he’s gonna kill me.

  Then she looked down.

  And saw the duffel bags.

  Mark Shaw had watched the fight through a pair of night-vision goggles. Somehow, that lucky bitch had managed to get the jump on Anthony. Mark Shaw had no idea how that could have happened, but he’d been a cop long enough to know that if something could go wrong, it would go wrong . . . and it sure as hell had gone wrong this time. He didn’t know for sure why they’d gotten into it with each other, but it wasn’t hard to guess. Somehow, she’d found out about the money, and that meant they were in trouble.

  But what was done was done. Anthony was hurt and pinned down somewhere. Shaw’s job now was to rescue Anthony and get them both out of here.

  He raised the night-vision goggles one more time and saw Eleanor hiding behind the bow of Anthony’s boat, her weapon aimed in his direction. The crazy bitch had even put a backpack on. What the hell was she thinking?

  He kept scanning the area, counting the zombies that were pouring into the street from every direction. There were at least sixteen of them. Damn, he thought, she’s in the thick of it, isn’t she?

  Shaw couldn’t see the woman’s husband or her kid, and though he hated to leave loose ends, he figured that was probably okay. From the number of zombies around their position, he’d be surprised if they weren’t dead. And that would be just fine as far as he was concerned. The less killing he had to do the better.

  But Eleanor Norton, she had to go.

  He traded the goggles for his searchlight, and gave the little outboard all the throttle it had.

  Eleanor adjusted her grip on the M-16. Her hands were wet and the gunmetal felt slick in her hands, like she couldn’t hold it right. Her fingers were tingling. Her face was flushed, sweat beading on her forehead. Every breath hurt. Her mouth had gone dry. First she felt hot, then cold. She kept her eyes at the boat speeding toward her, but all she wanted to do was lean over and vomit.

  Oh Jesus, she thought. Oh Jesus, I’m an idiot. I can’t do this. I can’t beat him. Not Mark Shaw. The man practically invented SWAT. Her breaths were coming in shallow gasps now. Dear God, please let me live through this. Help me. I want to hug my daughter again. I want to smother her face in kisses. Oh Jesus, please let me live.

  She raised the rifle. Sweat dripped in her eyes and she wiped it away with the back of her hand. Then she lowered her cheek to the stock and blinked until she had the boat centered in her sights. She was about to pull the trigger when Shaw hit his searchlight, blinding her with a glaring white light.

  The next moment he was firing at her.

  Anthony Shaw had commandeered a wooden-hulled boat, and when the bullets smacked into it, the air around Eleanor’s head filled with splinters. A big one snapped loose with a whistling zing and cut her cheek just below her right eye. Gasping in pain, she recoiled from the side of the boat and touched her hand to her face.

  It came away bloody.

  She saw movement to her left and for a second thought it was Anthony Shaw coming back to help his father. But the ghastly apparition standing there was definitely not Anthony Shaw. One arm had been chewed off just below the elbow. Bits of tendon and raw strips of muscle showed through the bite marks on its cheeks. The eyes were milky white and hazy, but it tracked her well enough. She backed away, following the hull, and it came after her. There was another zombie behind her, a woman with a nasty black gash where her belly should have been. Eleanor shot them both, then ducked under the water just as Shaw fired another burst.

  She crossed under the boat and came up on the other side, determined to give Shaw a taste of what he’d given her.

  Eleanor raised the rifle and started firing.

  The boat was moving from side to side, dodging through the exposed roofs of cars, but she wasn’t aiming. She’d flipped the selector switch to fully automatic and was determined to burn through the entire magazine, the old pray-and-spray approach to target acquisition.

  And she got lucky. Or at least she thought she did. The boat jogged suddenly to one side and smacked against the B pillar of the dark-colored passenger car with an audible thunk. The engine whined, then stalled, and Captain Shaw’s boat began to drift toward the side of a building.

  For a second, she thought she’d killed him. He was hunched over the motor, and seeing him that way, not moving, she let out a grunt of triumph.

  “Yeah, you bastard, I got you! Ha!”

  But the next instant he was standing up and yanking on the pull cord to restart the motor. It coughed, then roared to life.

  “No,” she said.

  A voice in her head told her to run, and she did. She turned and half ran, half swam through a narrowing crowd of zombies. They reached for her, their gore-streaked hands clutching at the backpack she wore, but she managed to thread her way through them. She scrambled toward the far corner of a white cinder-block building and got around it just as bullets from Shaw’s gun blasted a line of holes down the wall.

  Just ahead was a long chain-link fence topped with razor wire, and beyond that was a small white church.

  Mark Shaw cut the engine and let his boat glide into the street. He had his rifle ready and he was scanning the area just to make sure Eleanor Norton hadn’t doubled back on him. He never would have suspected it, but the slippery little bitch put up a surprisingly good fight.

  The funny thing was, though, that wasn’t the Eleanor Norton he knew. The Eleanor Norton he knew was one of the new breed of kinder and gentler cops, the kind who baked oatmeal raisin cookies for the men under her command and still met with all the victims’ advocacy people she’d dealt with back in her Sex Crimes days. She was more like a den mother than a frontline police supervisor, and frankly, he’d expected her to shrink up in a corner somewhere and beg for him to spare her life.

  But the kitten, it seemed, had claws. She’d surprised him going under the boat like she had, and she was evidently a better shot than he’d given her credit for. That burst she’d fired had knocked the throttle right out of his hand and stalled the engine. Hitting a moving target like that in low light and with zombies closing in all around you wasn’t the easiest thing in the world to do, and yet she had done it.

  Shaw had underestimated her, and he imagined Anthony had, too. That was the only explanation that made any sense.

  “Anthony! Can you hear me?”

  Several zombies were wading toward him, and at the sound of his voice, they began to moan. He scanned the area and counted thirty-one of them. There were more, it sounded like, just beyond the line of buildings to his left.

  “Anthony! Answer me, if you can.”

  There was a small apartment building to his left, the windows and doors blown away by one of the recent storms. He thought he heard a faint voice coming from inside the
re somewhere.

  “Anthony, is that you?”

  The voice came again, and this time he was sure. That was Anthony in there, but his voice was distant, muffled. When Anthony was fifteen, a kid from Friendswood High School had slid into second base with his metal spikes up in the air. He caught Anthony in the groin, and though he’d been wearing a cup, the spikes had still managed to cut a four-inch gash down the inside of Anthony’s thigh. Listening to the muffled voice inside that apartment building, Mark Shaw was reminded of sitting in the stands that day all those years ago, listening to the pain in his son’s voice as he fought with the runner who had just cut him. His son was hurting. A father could tell these things.

  “Hold on, Anthony. I’m coming.”

  He toggled the selector switch on his M-16 over to semi-auto and shot his way through the crowd of zombies. When he reached the door, he tied off the boat and went inside, lighting up the flooded building with the flashlight mounted to the barrel of his weapon.

  “Anthony?”

  “In here.”

  Shaw followed the voice down the hall and stopped in front of the door to 1-C. He tried to push the door open, but Anthony had it barricaded from the other side.

  “Help me get this open, Anthony.”

  There was a slight pause, and then the sound of debris and furniture being pulled out of the way. Shaw pushed on it, and a moment later he had it opened. Anthony was standing there, a pistol in his left hand, his right arm hanging limp at his side.

  “Did you get hit?”

  “Yeah, I can’t move it.”

  “You’re losing a lot of blood there. Lean up against the wall there and let me look at it.”

  Shaw inspected his son’s injured arm. The bullet had hit him high up, near the shoulder. Back in his SWAT days Shaw had been trained as a medic, and his first instinct was to check his son’s breathing and his pulse. He seemed to be doing okay there, and that was good news. If he went into shock here, without any proper medical treatment, Shaw would never be able to save him. It would be hard enough just keeping the wound clean.