by Raymond Lee
“That’s awesome,” Damian whispered as Elijah unlocked the door and opened it, freeing a stench they’d smelled before and dreaded locating the source of. As footsteps plodded heavily above them, they knew they had no choice but to deal with it.
They quickly entered the room and waited as Elijah flipped off the switch at the bottom of the stairs, hiding the passageway in darkness once again, and closed the door, locking it from the inside before flipping on the light switch on the inside of the room, next to the door.
With the area illuminated they could see they were in a wide room that served as a living space and kitchen area, with three closed doors on the left side of the room.
“Bathroom and two bedrooms,” Elijah explained, nodding toward the rooms. “Cousin Jorge wanted everyone comfortable in case they had to be down here long.”
“How is there power?” Raven asked.
“Backup generator,” Elijah explained, walking deeper into the room and nodding toward another door they hadn’t seen toward the back. “Back in there. He stocked up on gas to keep it running. It’s not connected to the rest of the house so no one up there will know there’s power and get suspicious.”
“Why didn’t y’all come here after the outbreak?” Cruz asked.
“My father didn’t talk to Jorge anymore. Something happened between them years ago and we weren’t allowed to see them.” Elijah lowered himself onto the brown leather couch in the sitting area, fresh tears filling his eyes. “He must have remembered this place. That’s why he was trying to get us here.”
“Is there a first aid kit?” Hal asked, “and somewhere Damian can lie down?”
“I’ll get the supplies you need out of the bathroom. Check the bedrooms.”
Janjai and Leah moved forward to check the bedrooms but Cruz grabbed them each by a shoulder, stopping them. “I’ll check.”
He moved forward and opened the first door on the left, quickly closing it after being hit hard with the overwhelming smell of death. He stood a moment, hand under his nose, and gathered himself before opening the middle door. He reached inside, hit the light switch and motioned Hal over.
“What is in that room?” Pimjai asked, holding both hands over her nose and mouth.
“I’d guess Jorge,” Raven said, cutting a glance toward the stricken boy who’d stepped out of the bathroom with towels, bandages, and a plastic kit to give to Hal.
Cruz stepped back into the room. “Hal needs sterile water.”
The twins joined him in looking around the kitchen area and a newly discovered pantry while Leah walked over to Raven.
“Are we safe here?”
Raven looked up to the ceiling, half afraid she’d see an eyeball watching her through a peephole, but the construction appeared pretty solid. They could still hear multiple footsteps above them and the elevated voices of their enraged enemies.
“Panic rooms are generally safe, although this one appears to be more of the homemade variety. I don’t see any video equipment or other technology a commercial company would use, but I don’t think most people would expect there to be a secret door in a pantry so as long as they can’t hear us down here we should be fine.”
“They have to know we’re in here. Like you said, the footprints. They’ll keep searching.”
“I know.” Raven shrugged. “Worst case scenario? We all face that door with our guns drawn and pick them off as they try to get at us. The stairwell is narrow. We’ll last as long as our bullets last.”
“Unless they decide to set the whole place on fire.”
“Well, shit. Aren’t you a merry ray of sunshine?”
Leah looked away. “Sorry.”
Raven removed her backpack and sheath before unzipping her coat. “Might as well get comfortable. We have nowhere to run, and at least it’s warm.”
Pain shot up Raven’s arm as she shrugged out of her coat. Blood seeped through the long sleeve thermal shirt and flannel she wore.
“The stove works,” Janjai announced, warming a pot of the water they’d found in the pantry.
Cruz searched through items on a metal shelving unit next to the couch Raven sat on until he found a roll of duct tape and walked over to the closed bedroom door with it. Raven watched as he used the tape to seal the door, sealing in the odor coming from within.
“Still stinks out here,” Leah observed. She’d shed her coat and gloves but held her wadded up scarf over her lower face.
“It does,” Raven agreed. “I’ll check the bathroom for candles or air freshener. Stay here and let us know if it sounds like we’ve been discovered.”
“I had no intention of doing anything but that for as long as those people are up there.”
Raven entered the small bathroom and found a spacesaver over the toilet with multiple shelves lined with bottles of alcohol, peroxide, towels, bottles of air freshener, and a small selection of scented candles.
“Jackpot,” she said, grabbing an apple cinnamon scented candle and turning for the door.
“Stay,” Cruz ordered, blocking her exit. He grabbed her injured arm and rolled up the sleeves on the two shirts covering the wound.
“It’s just a scratch,” she said.
“Scratches can get infected.” He studied the marred skin which resembled a serious rug burn and uncapped a small bottled water he’d brought with him.
“What happened to Damian? I didn’t see much, so much was going on.”
“He was shot in the shoulder.”
Panic seized Raven’s heart. “Is he going to be OK?”
“Bullet went straight through,” Cruz reported matter of fact, sparing no emotion as he rinsed her wound over the sink with the water. “Hal’s going to clean and bandage him up. We’ll have to wait and see.”
Raven leaned against the sink, her knees suddenly weak and allowed tears to flow down her face. Damian had been with her since early on and she’d grown closer to him than anyone else in the group, to the point she’d consider him a brother. If he died … She ground her teeth together and pulled back the sadness she’d allowed to spill out as Cruz dabbed her wound with an alcohol swab and blew on her skin.
“He’ll be fine,” she said. “I won’t allow him to die.”
Cruz looked at her, holding her gaze with the most sympathetic look she’d ever seen from him for a long moment before he retrieved what he needed from the medicine cabinet behind her and returned his focus to bandaging her arm.
“You don’t believe me?”
“I believe you would move heaven and hell before you allowed him to die,” Cruz said softly, “but what I know is that even if that were possible it wouldn’t be enough to make a difference. We have no say over when death comes.”
“We can pray for him.”
Cruz tensed, his body seeming to bristle. He taped the bandage and stepped back. “That should do it. Take some Tylenol.”
Raven watched, confused, as he left the small bathroom to rejoin the others in the main room. “Something I said?” she muttered to herself before remembering what she’d come into the bathroom for, as if the smell could be forgotten.
She grabbed a book of matches from the spacesaver and took the candle into the main room where she placed it on the small dining table.
“Oh, I hope that’s strong enough,” Leah said, waving her hand in front of her face. “I’m about to hurl.”
“It seems better since I sealed the door,” Cruz said, smelling the burning candle. “At least the guy didn’t off himself out here.”
“Was it Jorge?” Raven asked, glancing toward the bedroom Elijah, Hal, and Damian occupied.
“Most likely,” Cruz answered. “All I saw was what I assumed to be a man sitting in a chair with a shotgun at his feet. Some of his head was on the wall behind him and it looked like he’d been there maybe a month or more, I don’t know. I figure it couldn’t have been that long ago since the generator is still working. That was all the info I could gather in the second before the stench of him punched
me in the face and nearly knocked me out.”
“That is why you offered to check the rooms,” Janjai said, settling in at the table with her sister.
“Trust me, ladies, you did not want to see what was in there.” He shook his head. “I didn’t want to see what was in there, now it’ll probably be burned into my mind for all eternity.”
“So he killed himself?” Pimjai asked? “He had this place. He was safe.”
“He was alone,” Leah reminded them. “Loneliness is a hell of a thing in a world like this. If you had not found me, I can’t really say what I may have done. The loneliness creeps in and messes with your mind.”
“Where the hell are they?” screeched Dawn Peers’s girlfriend from above them.
“I’m telling you they pulled one over on us,” a male voice hollered back at her, his tone just as angry.
“You saw the fucking footprints,” the woman screamed back. “They are in this house somewhere. They have to be!”
“They’re going to find us,” Janjai said in a hushed voice, visibly trembling.
“They shouldn’t,” Cruz assured them as he shrugged out of his coat and gloves, already having removed his scarf and hood. “And even if they do, they can’t all fit in here at once. We have guns and enough ammo to take them all out.”
“We don’t know how many there are,” Janjai said. “What if what we saw was only a small portion of their group?”
Cruz paused to mull that thought over then shrugged. “Then at least we go out like this instead of getting eaten by the infected. It’s warm enough down here. Get those coats off, get comfortable. If this is it for us, we may as well make the best of it.”
“How can you be so nonchalant about your possible death?” Leah asked.
“What’s my other choice? Worry my ass off about it?” He pointed toward the sealed door. “I imagine he thought a hell of a lot about death while down here and look what it got him. I’m not going to sit here and worry about it. If I’m going to imagine anything, it’s seeing spring.”
“I’ve done all I can do for him for now,” Hal said, wiping his hands on a towel as he stepped into the room. He’d already removed his coat and gloves to allow himself ease of movement as he’d worked on Damian.
“Is he going to live?” Raven asked, rushing toward him. “How bad is it?”
“Thankfully I didn’t have to dig inside him for a bullet,” Hal said. “I don’t think anything vital was hit, but it is a gunshot which is always serious so we will have to stay right here where we are for a while and I’ll closely monitor him.”
She stepped toward the room to check on him but Hal blocked her.
“He needs rest, and right now we have a more pressing issue.” Hal looked up. “Everyone, get your guns, get them loaded, and stay on that door until we no longer hear them.”
“How long has it been?” Raven asked as Hal placed a cup of warm tea in front of her and took a seat across the table.
He looked up at the clock hanging on the wall behind her. “About four hours.”
“Shit.” She sipped the warm brew. “Why the hell haven’t they left?”
“They can’t figure out how we got past them.” Hal shrugged and took a sip of coffee. “At least they appear to have quit actively searching.”
“I feel like Anne Frank.”
“It certainly makes you appreciate what that poor little girl went through a whole lot more, doesn’t it?”
She nodded. “How long do you think they’ll stay up there?”
“Well, considering they shot out the windows, it doesn’t serve them any use as a shelter but there were a bunch of canned goods in that pantry. I imagine they’re clearing that out and whatever else useful they can find.”
“She still thinks we’re here, or I should say she knows we’re here. She’s waiting us out.”
“Well, we’ve already seen that we can’t stay trained on that door for long periods of time.” He tilted his head toward the three women sleeping on the carpeted floor. “As long as one of us stays awake to listen out for someone entering that passageway, we’ll be fine. They have one way in and that’s on the off chance that they even find it. We don’t have to worry about anyone sneaking up on us here.”
“Leah suggested they might burn the place down.”
Hal paused with his coffee cup half way to his mouth. “Let’s pray they don’t think of that.”
Raven looked over at the teenaged orphan sleeping on the couch. “I’ve been where he is right now. I lost both of mine at the same time, but still, I was the same age. I had a great-aunt who took us in until I turned eighteen and could be Sky’s legal guardian and then we were on our own. I imagine it’s hard at any age, but when you’re still a kid you don’t see it coming. It’s not fair, the way your childhood just gets taken from you and you’re a grownup before your time and there’s no one there to guide you. I did the best I could, but it wasn’t good enough.”
“Raven, don’t.”
“I got Sky killed, Hal, just like I got Carlos killed.” She wiped away the tears that had spilled over. “I saw her raising that radio to call in her group and I thought my katana would be quieter than a gunshot. I didn’t know it would get stuck and she’d pull her gun on me. I started that whole chain reaction.”
“She started it the second she raised that radio. We weren’t going to let her call in more of her people and the second any one of us opened up fire it was all going to go straight to hell. We knew that. Nobody blames you for what happened. It wasn’t any more your fault than it was Elijah’s for killing her.”
Raven stilled. “That was Elijah?”
Hal nodded. “He saw her raise the gun and he got his shot off before us. The two guys with her immediately returned fire and all we could do was shoot back. With it all said and done, one death and two injuries is far better an outcome for our group than I could have predicted. We weren’t walking away from that without a fight. Even if we’d handed over our stuff, they would have killed us.”
“You can’t know that for sure.”
“Carlos was going to die either way it went.” Hal placed his coffee cup on the table and leaned toward her. “Janjai and I both had dreams where he died. The thing with messages we get through dreams is they’re not always clear and they don’t always give us exact times or methods, but when we see the outcome, we understand. It was his time and he died protecting his son, earning back the respect he craved.”
“You dreamed that Carlos was going to die?”
Hal nodded. “In my dream I saw his dead wife kill him. I understand why I saw that now. He died after we came back to the house where she’d died.”
“You didn’t think to tell him that?” Anger flared inside Raven’s chest. “You could have warned us, stopped this.”
“I didn’t know what the dream meant until it happened.”
“What else did you dream? If you’ve dreamed someone is going to die we should know.”
“You have nothing to fear, Raven.” He smiled. “I assure you of that.”
“Who’s ready to be deeply disturbed?” Cruz asked, setting a leather bound book on the table before taking a seat next to Raven.
“I already am,” Raven muttered. “What’s up?”
“I’ve been checking things out down here,” Cruz said, flipping open the book and removing papers, “and I think I know why Carlos quit talking to Jorge.”
Raven looked at the papers he handed her and saw they were letters made out to a woman named Lupe.
“Lupe?”
“As in Carlos’s wife, Lupe.”
They exchanged a glance before she read through one of the letters, blushing at the flowery language Jorge used to described Lupe’s abundant curves and natural beauty. “Oy.”
“Yeah, it seems ol’ Jorge had a hankering for Carlos’s wife but she turned him down.”
“But Carlos found out about it?”
“Yep, severing the close relationship.”
; “Well, that would certainly drive family apart,” Hal said.
“The good news is we have something to give Elijah without having to go back to his house.” Cruz flipped some pages in the journal and pulled out a set of color photographs.
Raven flipped through them, smiling as she took in younger version of Carlos and his beautiful Lupe on their wedding day, Elijah’s first birthday, and a few random photos.
“Wait, this was from last year.” Raven showed them the photo Christmas card featuring the three of them.
“It’s addressed to Jorge, from Lupe,” Cruz told her. “According to the journal, she refused his attempts to woo her away from Carlos but I guess she felt they should all still be family.”
“Not easy being friendly with a cousin who makes a move on your wife,” Hal said.
“No, but I think Jorge wanted to be part of the family again. “The back door to this house was unlocked. Jorge left the key to this door hidden outside of it, and I discovered the generator wouldn’t run while the light switches were off, which they were. He came down here to kill himself but he made sure if his family came here, they could get in to his panic room and the generator would have enough juice in it that they wouldn’t b stumbling around in the dark looking for gas to get it working again.”
“More like a panic apartment,” Raven commented, “but why would he kill himself down here where they’d be forced to stay with his dead body?”
“That I don’t know,” Cruz said. “I don’t think people always think straight when they get to the point of killing themselves though.”
“Where’s his son? Elijah said he played with his cousin here, that’s how he knew about this place.”
“Dead. I found the obituary in the journal. He was hit by a drunk driver a few years back.”
“So Elijah has no one.”
“He has us,” Hal reminded her. “We’re his family.”
“Bad things happen to my family.” Raven got up from the table and walked into the bedroom. She curled up in the armchair next to the bed and watched over Damian, another family member who’d paid the price for being in her circle.