“Thanks,” Hector told Simon, panting for breath.
Simon nodded. The room went a decibel quieter. Outside, the groans of several other creatures echoed from the parking lot.
“How the hell are they getting in?” Simon asked in confusion.
“They must’ve slipped in before we got the gate closed,” Sandy guessed, gasping. “Either that, or they found another way.”
“All the commotion probably drew all of them from the area,” Simon said. “We need to get out of here before it gets worse, if they haven’t overrun the place already.”
Anabel let out a frightened sob as she knelt next to Finn’s body. In the frenzy of the attack, Sandy had momentarily been distracted. She looked back at her companion, but Finn had gone lifeless. His eyes were eerily vacant, as if he’d died hours ago instead of seconds. Sandy wrung her hands, wishing there was a way to revive the lifeless young man, even though he was beyond saving. She exchanged a desperate glance with Hector.
“I found some towels!” Marcia said, appearing from behind them a beat too late.
She dropped them as she realized there was no bringing him back. Sandy bent down next to Finn’s motionless body, a wave of guilt crashing over her. This was her fault. She’d told Finn to keep guard. But how could she have known? She wiped tears from her eyes.
A crash drew her attention back to the door. The door shook violently as more creatures threw themselves against it. Sandy pictured the things bashing their faces and bodies apart, willing to obliterate the last remnants of their humanity to procure a meal.
“We have to get out of here,” she said.
“Did you see how many of them were out there?” Simon asked, watching the door.
“I’m not sure, but Reginald will be back soon,” Hector said. “And then we’ll have even more trouble. We should see if we can make it to the truck.”
Sandy looked between Finn and the bags of supplies across the warehouse, listening to the cries of the creatures outside. Finn’s death couldn’t be for nothing. They needed to get out of the lumberyard.
“Maybe only a few got in,” Simon said with a shrug.
Sandy nodded, hoping to God he was right.
5
The creatures pounded the warehouse door as Sandy, Simon, Hector, Marcia, and Anabel ran toward the office. Sandy fought the grief in her stomach. Finn shouldn’t have died like that. But there was no time to mourn him now. They picked up the bags of food and water and ran into the next room, weaving around desks and chairs. When they reached the side door, they huddled next to it and regrouped.
“The pickup is past the next building,” Simon whispered. “We’ll have to go through the alley, into the parking lot to get to it. We won’t be able to fit by the fence in back.”
Sandy nodded, knowing that was true.
“Here,” Simon hissed, handing her something in the dark.
Sandy reached out and felt her knife. She took it appreciatively. He handed the blades back to the others. She still didn’t trust Simon, but he’d redeemed himself by saving Hector, and she didn’t have time to question his loyalty.
A few errant shrieks pierced the lumberyard, but none seemed close.
“I’ll go first,” Simon whispered, opening the door and leading with his gun.
Before anyone could respond, he snapped on his flashlight and crept into the alley. His body was little more than a silhouette as he took a few steps, casting light on the ground, giving just enough visibility to guide them. Gathering courage, Sandy and the others followed. They moved as a terrified unit, muffling the sound of the bags in their arms. Sandy snuck quietly over the gravel. The alley felt like it extended for miles, even though it was only a hundred feet.
Reaching the end, Sandy stared into the dusty parking lot as the shrieks grew louder. Some of the creatures were inside the fence, but she guessed more were outside of it, as well. Plenty of them would come. They always did. Sandy kept her eyes on Simon’s flashlight, hurrying after him.
A creature jumped from the blackness.
Simon cried out and raised his pistol, shooting it, sending it sprawling back into the dark. Marcia screamed as another creature emerged from the dust, latching onto Hector. Hector cried out and pushed it off, sending it tumbling to the ground. He knelt down and speared it with his knife.
Sandy looked around frantically. Before she could catch her bearings, another creature was scrabbling for her, arms outstretched. She raised her hands, dropped her bag, and met it with her knife, fending off its snapping teeth. Panic fought with survival instinct as the world became a vicious, biting mass and the creature overtook her. She smelled the dank odor of blood, sweat, and whoever had last fallen victim to it. Sandy tried stabbing, but the thing twisted one of Sandy’s fingers. She cried out and kicked it in the leg, freeing herself, leaping backwards.
With a scream, she ran at it and sank her knife into its forehead. She pulled out the blade. The creature’s eyes rolled back in its head and it fell.
Sandy breathed and stepped back.
“Are you okay?” Simon asked.
“I’m fine!” Sandy hissed, collecting her bag. “Let’s go!”
They raced through the parking lot and past the next building. The windows were dark and dirt-streaked, harboring who knew what manner of danger. Hector cursed as he tripped on a pile of loose stones. Marcia and Anabel ran next to him. Sandy clutched her knife and her bag. Hisses drifted from the blackness, as if the creatures were surrounding them in all directions. It was impossible to tell how many, or where they were.
Rounding the corner of the building, they came upon the white pickup. Simon shone the flashlight, searching for the door handle. He dug in his pocket for the keys.
“Get in!” he yelled, as he opened the door.
He jumped into the driver’s seat while Hector and his family tumbled into the back. Sandy raced for the passenger’s side. Dirty exhaust plumed into the air as Simon started the engine. The truck’s interior lights illuminated his hardened face.
“Drive!” Sandy shouted as she got in.
Simon clutched the wheel. He reached for the shifter.
Before he could drive, the driver’s side window shattered.
Glass sprayed the interior. Reaching hands groped for Simon. He craned his head away from the window, stomping the gas, but the truck was still in park.
“Dammit!” he shouted.
He grunted as the pistol was knocked from his hands. Sandy reached frantically for the shifter. She found reverse. The tires squealed as the vehicle careened backward. Sandy felt a jolt as they ran over something, and then they were backing wildly through the parking lot.
Sandy’s stomach plummeted as one of the creatures tore at the passenger’s side mirror. Simon reclaimed the wheel, but not in time.
“Look out!” Sandy screamed.
The rear of the truck collided with one of the lumberyard buildings. Sandy’s head snapped forward and she threw her arms in front of her, protecting her face. She flew back in her seat as the vehicle stopped. She sat in stunned silence while she caught her breath, listening to the moans of the oncoming creatures. Her body ached from the impact, but nothing seemed broken. At least, she didn’t think so. She looked over her shoulder, surveying the people in the backseat. Everyone was fine, except Hector, who had suffered a bloody gash in his forehead.
“Hector!” Marcia exclaimed.
The tires spun and stopped, spun and stopped. Sandy listened to the purr of the engine and the snarls of running creatures that were quickly catching up.
“Get out of here, Simon!” she shrieked.
The backseat came alive as Marcia and Anabel screamed similar things. Simon hit the gas. The vehicle groaned in protest as it unglued from the building.
The pickup flew forward.
; Several creatures emerged from the darkness, throwing their bodies at the vehicle and bouncing off the side. The headlights illuminated several snarling, vicious faces. The creatures’ eyes were jet-black.
Simon steered toward the gate, which was already open.
The creatures had knocked it down.
Sandy winced as a creature glanced off the front bumper. One ran straight for Simon’s window, but he turned the wheel and clipped it with the front of the truck, sending the creature reeling back with a screech. They plowed through several more bodies, each one causing enough impact to convince Sandy they were going to stall or stop.
But they didn’t. They kept going.
Soon, they were driving through the gates. And then they were away from the lumberyard, careening into the night.
6
Reginald’s blood raced as he gripped the steering wheel of the Buick. He stared into the dusty road as a few creatures emerged from the road’s shoulder, roused by the noise of the car’s engine. He could no longer see Dan’s station wagon. The fucker had gotten enough of a jump to lose him.
“Hopefully none of those things will show up at the lumberyard,” Billy said.
“Let someone else worry about it,” Reginald snarled, his eyes flitting back and forth across the road.
He felt a shiver up his arms as the meth he’d shot up coursed through his veins. His pulse was beating so fast he could feel it behind his eyeballs. He had a stockpile in the lumberyard, several boxes he’d tucked away in one of the furthest shacks. He didn’t think anyone knew about it.
That was the first thing he’d done when the shit hit the fan.
Get to the dealer…
Find the stash…
The motherfucker had already been dead, his face chewed off by one of the creatures.
That meant the stuff was Reginald’s. It hadn’t gone easily, though. Several others had had the same idea as Reginald. No sooner had he discovered the dealer’s hiding place than he’d been interrupted. Two people had come into the room, yelling and screaming. Reginald had pounded their faces in with the first thing he’d come across—a baseball bat. He barely remembered what they looked like, because the celebration that had ensued afterward had been enough to forget about what he’d done.
Reginald smiled. He’d do the same thing to Dan, once he caught him.
Anger overtook Reginald. He wanted nothing more than to find Dan and pay him back for everything he’d been through. Not only for escaping the lumberyard, but also for the things he’d done prior to the end of the world.
It’d been a year since Reginald had been released from jail. In the past decade, he’d wasted several years of his life in a cage, all because of Dan Lowery. Dan had first arrested him in 2008 for car theft, and he’d shown him no sympathy. Neither had the judge, who had given Reginald a strict probation that he’d unwittingly violated, landing him in jail.
To be fair, Reginald had learned a lot while in prison. He’d learned how to fight, how to steal, and how to survive a beating.
He wanted to share those lessons with Dan.
He’d kill Dan Lowery when he found him, and he’d make his daughter watch.
White commercial buildings lined either side of the road, illuminated for brief seconds by the Buick’s headlights. Reginald, Billy, and Tom checked the cross streets, parking lots, and main thoroughfare for signs of Dan. Reginald wasn’t sure how Dan and Quinn had escaped, but it didn’t much matter anymore. Dan’s escape was further proof of his guilt. That would give Reginald the excuse to kill him, no matter what the others said.
The meth running through his body was like a jolt of energy, revving him up and making him see more clearly than anyone else around him. Reginald wiped his nose.
“Reginald, watch out!” Billy shouted.
Reginald swerved around a creature that had stumbled into the road, black eyes flashing. He cried out and straightened the car, increasing speed.
7
Sandy gasped for breath as she looked behind them at the lumberyard, watching it disappear into the blackness. Wind whipped through the broken driver’s side window, reminding her of the hands that had been reaching for Simon just moments earlier.
At least we got away.
Hector groaned in the backseat.
“Hector, are you all right?” Sandy asked, turning her attention to the injured man.
“I-I think so,” Hector called over the wind. He ran his fingers over the gash in his forehead, smearing blood down his face. His eyes were wide and confused.
“My God, Hector,” Marcia said, shaking her head with concern.
Sandy reached up and turned on the overhead light. Hector looked between Sandy and the others. His face was a twisted mask of pain.
“I hit my head right there,” Hector explained, pointing at the back of Simon’s seat. Blood stained the metal bars below the headrest. “I didn’t have time to brace myself.”
“We need to stop the bleeding,” Marcia said, looking around.
Sandy dug through the glove compartment, searching for something with which to assist him. She found a few napkins tucked between some registration papers and handed them back to Marcia. Marcia held them against the wound. Sandy looked at Simon. He drove in grim silence, watching the road.
Sandy checked herself over. She was unharmed, except for some aches and a splitting headache from being jolted around during the collision.
Maybe it was the horror of what her life had become.
Ever since the start of the contamination, her life had been a flurry of running, fighting, and surviving, doing things she’d never thought she’d have to do.
A week ago, she’d been living in an apartment with her brother, Ben. On the day the world ended, she’d come home after her shift, finding him in the hallway of their apartment complex feasting on another tenant. He’d been infected. He’d chased her down the hallway. Frantic, she’d raced into their apartment, barely dodging his groping hands as he’d crashed through the door behind her. In a last, desperate attempt to get away, she’d locked herself in the bathroom, but he’d slammed against the door until he’d burst in.
If it weren’t for the hair dryer she’d left on the sink, Ben would’ve killed her. Sandy shuddered as she pictured what she’d done to her brother. His dented, bloodied face still haunted her nightmares. Ben had been her older brother, the one she’d turned to when life’s problems were too much.
And now Ben was dead.
When Sandy was twelve, Sandy and Ben’s parents had died in a car accident. The loss had devastated both of them. She’d considered dropping out of school, but Ben had pulled her out of her depression, convincing her to keep going. He’d supported her dreams, helped her pull her life together, and persuaded her to finish high school and college. After she’d graduated, he’d encouraged her to pursue her passion of becoming a hairdresser. She’d finished her training and obtained a job at a local salon in St. Matthews. Her goal was to one day own her own shop.
And now that goal was gone, and Ben was no longer there to encourage her.
Sandy pushed back the painful memory that Finn’s death had conjured. She didn’t have time for it right now. She needed to help the people in the truck. In the preceding days, she’d found ways to survive, scrounging for supplies in St. Matthews, hiding, avoiding the creatures. She hoped she could do the same thing now.
She tried to convince herself Ben would be proud of her.
“I don’t know where I’m going,” Simon said, interrupting her thoughts.
“You’re from Tucson,” Sandy recalled.
“Yeah, I’m not too familiar with St. Matthews.”
“Stay on 4th North.”
She surveyed the dark road ahead as Simon shook the broken glass from his lap with his pistol.
; Sandy asked, “Do you have any spare ammunition?”
“A few magazines,” Simon said, patting his pants. “Reginald, Billy, and Tom took the rest.”
Looking up the road, she pointed to a passing sign. “When we get to the intersection, take a left. We can decide what to do from there.”
Simon nodded.
Sandy turned off the overhead light and looked behind them again. She half-expected to see a pair of headlights following them, weaving back and forth over the road. But the road was empty. Where were Reginald, Billy, and Tom? She hoped that Dan and Quinn had gotten away.
Dan’s a police officer. He should be safe.
Sandy told herself that, even though she wasn’t sure. She had enough to worry about. At least she’d gotten the others out of the lumberyard.
She turned her attention to the people in the backseat. Hector’s eyes fluttered open and closed. It looked like he was fighting for consciousness.
“I think I’ve stopped the bleeding,” Marcia explained. “But he’s in pain.”
“I hope he doesn’t have a concussion,” Sandy said.
“How would we be able to tell?” Marcia asked.
“I had a bicycling accident when I was a kid. My parents kept me awake for twenty-four hours so they could watch me,” Sandy explained. “I don’t know much else, but I remember that. It’s probably a good idea to keep him alert.”
Worry creased Marcia’s brow as she nodded. “Stay with us, Hector. Don’t close your eyes. Okay?”
Sandy wished they had a place to lie him down, or keep better watch over him. One thing was certain: stopping wouldn’t be smart.
“There’s the turn,” Sandy said, pointing it out to Simon as he took it. “If we stay straight, we’ll hit the downtown area. I doubt we want to go that way. Our best bet is to head away from St. Matthews.”
“Over the mountains?” Simon asked, pointing in the distance.
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