“I’m getting bored,” Amanita said.
“Getting to my point, private. We contracted out to the best geneticists we could find, told them to do whatever they had to do to make it possible to put Humpty Dumpty back together again. Reattach arms, reattach legs. Attach somebody else’s legs and arms to someone in need. They gave us some gene drug, which was explained to me in chemical terms only moon men would understand but shit if it wasn’t getting damn close to working the way we wanted. Or maybe it worked too good. There’s a test subject in the lab in California whose body accepted foreign tissue with only minimal infection. A third arm. You believe that? They used snake toxins to combat the rejection process, least that’s what I heard on the plane ride. Fucking kid can move that arm too. Amazing stuff.”
Connor thought about the hissers he’d seen with extra limbs. It was starting to make sense now if you believed in science fiction and the Devil—whose face he was pretty sure he was looking at. “So what was on the plane?”
“That’s just it, Connor. I don’t know. Cute blonde lady, Dr. Haley, was being flown to DC and she had lots of different samples all packed up in little freezers and bio-transport suitcases. Said she had some new strains of her wonder drug but I’d talked to her this morning so I figured I’d seen the newest strains. Said something about finding an error in the chemistry while we were flying, too, but fuck if I know what she meant. She could have told me she had Adam and Eve’s bones in those cases for all I knew about how to verify her work. Wasn’t my job to know, just to make sure she got it done and that it worked the way we wanted.”
“What made the plane crash?” Nicole asked. Connor didn’t look at her face but could tell she was getting angry.
“What made the plane crash? Let me explain it this way, private. That plane doesn’t crash. It’s tended to by the highest paid engineers in the country. It flies the top brass back and forth across the country on a daily basis and can do a full barrel roll at thirty-thousand feet while spitting out chaff and flares. Question is what could make the plane crash?”
“I don’t get it,” Connor said.
“Hell, Connor, I don’t know. That’s what’s to get. An Act of God? A black-market anti-aircraft gun. One minute I’m having a highball and the next the pilot starts instructing us on an emergency landing. After that, the lights go out, the plane drops. I had my seatbelt on. Dr. Haley was across from me. She didn’t have hers on. She flew up and hit her head so hard on the ceiling I saw her skull cave in. Only thing I remember after that was my stomach in my throat and then the sound of God screaming. I woke up here, like this, and my gun is over there. See that black thing in the grass? Pretty sure that’s it but I can’t move to it. So I watch the plane and see the stewards running around biting people like they haven’t been fed in years. And I know that they’re really dead because nobody can survive that kind of crash.”
“You did.”
“Like I said, this isn’t survival, this is my punishment. To sit and wait for my turn to become one of those things. To know it’s coming, it’s always the waiting that’s the worst torture. But I know a bullet to the brain will stop it because I watched a cop take down two of those things with two headshots before he got tackled and shredded alive. Bam bam! And they both fell. Dead again. Headshots will do it. At least it’s a gamble I’m willing to take. Anyway, I can’t tell you what happened. Fate didn’t want that plane to reach D.C. Now, that’s what I know. You gonna keep your end of the bargain?”
The first drops of warm summer rain hit the ground.
Connor rose and looked at his friends, saw the disbelief and anger in their faces. Despite the inconclusiveness of everyone else’s parents’ fates, it was reasonable enough to assume the four of them were all now orphans, and the man on the ground was part of the reason for it. Maybe a day ago he would have ignored this man’s request and taken him to the hospital. A day ago he wasn’t driving underage. A day ago he hadn’t kicked, punched, stabbed, and run over other humans. A day ago he had dinner with his parents and played video games with Seth. A day ago Mom gave him ten dollars to go buy some pens and notebooks at the local Rite Aid. A day ago was another life.
He was about to propose a vote on what to do, but it never even got that far. It was decided with a simple nod from Nicole, whose once soft face was now caked in dirt and blood, whose hair had been done up hours ago in anticipation of a real high school party but was now matted with other people’s flesh.
Just hours ago, in the fort, he’d hoped to end this night with a kiss. He’d never had a real girlfriend before, and Nicole was so much more sure of herself than he was. He had no idea how to make the first move with a girl but she seemed to always find a way to push herself into what she wanted. He’d been eager for that moment.
It was a slight nod, but the meaning was clear. And he knew now that the two of them were on the same wavelength.
He looked at Am and Seth for good measure. There was no nodding, but there was no suggestion of benevolence either. They hated this man.
“Who’s got the flashlight?” Connor asked.
Amanita took it out of her waistband. “Here.”
“Thanks.” Connor took it and addressed the dying man on the grass once more. “Where’d you say your gun was?”
“That black spot in the grass. Over there. See it? If that ain’t it then just find a rock and bash my skull in. Doesn’t matter to me. Hurry up, private.”
Connor walked to the point in question, swept the flashlight around as the rain started to come down harder, running water into his eyes. The Lieutenant General must have had the best eyesight in the whole damn military, because he was right, the gun was there. Connor picked it up and walked back, held it up to show he’d found it.
“There you go, private. Now cock that chamber and put one round in my forehead. Put the next one through the middle of my skull. We call that a double tap kill. Hurry up, now.”
Connor put the gun in his waistband. The sound of hissing was drawing close. The Lieutenant General’s voice was carrying into the streets. Dark shadows were appearing at the edge of the park, moving quickly. “No.”
Lieutenant General Winston W. Davis’ eyes went wide. “What do you mean no? Shoot me! Or give it to me and I’ll do it myself. I can hear them coming already. Hey! You listening! We had a deal!”
Connor, Am, Seth and Nicole turned and made their way back to the SUV. As the vehicle started to move, as the rain finally began to wash the dried blood off the windshield, the first of the hissers came sprinting across the park lawn, making a beeline for the screaming man on the grass.
“It’s not a good enough death for him,” Amanita said.
Connor continued his drive around the perimeter with the lights off, the wipers on low, heading for the road, listening to the fading screams of a man being torn apart and eaten alive.
Sunday, 12:30
The rain was really coming down now, dousing any remaining flames on the mangled fuselage that blocked the middle of the street. Abandoned police cars and fire trucks continued to throw their lights across the surrounding homes and businesses. A massive river from a ruptured fire hose had formed around the plane. Water was still flowing out in a steady stream, supplied by a bloodied fire hydrant.
Amanita pressed her face against the SUV’s cool window and stared at the wreckage. A handful of bodies littered the ground. One of them missing a head, another lay in the water, lifeless. Two more hung from inside the fuselage, their flesh burned to a crispy black. Had they turned into hissers, she wondered. Or had the fire killed them?
They had seen a hisser go down in flames, hadn’t they? Isn’t that why they’d brought the lamp oil? She was having trouble remembering as she tried to take in the destruction around her. Wouldn’t matter now anyway with the way the rain was coming down torrentially. It beat the roof of the SUV almost as hard as the hissers had earlier. The entire moment was too surreal, too removed from reality. The swish swish of the wipers was hypno
tizing her, making her sleepy. She never thought she’d be tired enough to sleep while being chased by killers, but she was jonesing for her bed right now.
“I can’t see anything,” Connor said. “The rain is amazing. It never rains this hard.”
Nicole squinted up at the sky. “Summer storm. The heat’s been high and the roads are finally kicking it back into the air. I read last week the Gulf of Mexico was having some massive heat wave as well. We’re sucking the moisture from the Deep South back over Castor.”
Amanita wished Nicole would just read a Seventeen Magazine instead of textbooks and educational websites. The girl had been nervous about seeing Connor earlier and now she was going to ruin her chances by being a brain in front of the guy. Am wanted to hit her and tell her to knock it off.
Or maybe you’re just cranky, Am. Maybe Connor likes smart girls. Some guys actually do.
“What are you gonna do with the gun?” Seth asked. “Did you see how many bullets are in it?”
Connor kept his eyes on the road, tried to steer through the wall of water coming from the sky. “I don’t know. We’ll just keep it as a last resort, I guess.”
“Looks like a .45. They usually have fifteen shots.”
Am kept her face to the cool glass and watched the ruined plane disappear behind them. “Let me guess, you played a video game with one?”
“Quite a few, your highness.”
“Oh great, Star Trek references again.”
“Star Wars.”
“Same dif. Connor, do you even know how to shoot it? Does anyone?”
Nobody spoke up.
Am continued: “Then let’s make sure it gets put somewhere safe. I don’t want to get shot because we drive over a speed bump. And I don’t need baby Huey over here getting his hands on it because he kills space men on Nintendo.”
“Connor plays Halo, too, you know.”
“I don’t know what Halo is, and don’t care. Just please put the gun somewhere safe.”
“I did,” Connor said.
They were passing by the hill leading up to the fort, on the road that would become State Road 134, the road that wound through the dark woods for almost an hour before reaching the next town.
Nicole tried her cell phone again. “I still have no service. Unbelievable.”
“Could just be the rain now,” Seth said.
He might be right, but Am doubted it. There’d been something weird about the phone service since the plane crashed. Cell towers did not shut down because one plane took a nose dive. Not unless everyone in town was bogging down the system trying to call the police at the same time, but considering everyone in town was too busy eating each other’s faces off, she was disinclined to believe that theory.
Thoughts of cell towers and phones were abruptly cut off as Connor hit the brakes and they were all flung forward, seatbelts slamming them back into their seats.
Connor shouted: “Are you kidding me?”
Instantly, Amanita’s adrenaline pumped, anticipating another attack, wondering what window it was going to come from. The rain was so heavy now she couldn’t see squat outside.
“Look at that,” Connor said. “I can’t get around that.”
She let her eyes adjust to looking past the cascading water on the windshield, could see the several dozen crashed cars blocking the road. Just like the bridge. Like it was planned. She was at once extremely annoyed and absolutely terrified, because whatever had caused that destruction couldn’t be far away.
“Drive off the road and go through the trees,” Seth said.
“Are you nuts?” Connor replied. “The car’s sliding all over. We’ll end up in a ditch, overturned, and if those things are out there we’re toast. Plus if I drive in there I’ll have to turn the lights back on and anything hiding in those woods will see us in a second.”
“Just keep them on low and drive real careful,” Seth said. “We have the gun now—”
“Which no one can shoot,” Am interrupted.
“Well, look, it can’t take that long to get around that and we have to get out of here. I’m tired of all this. I know I sound like a baby but I want to get help and find my parents, Connor. So just do it.”
“He’s right.” Once again Am couldn’t believe she was coming to Seth’s rescue. “We have to risk it. Going back is suicide. And my head hurts and your leg is busted and probably infected. I can see the blood seeping through the bandages again. We need to find help.”
“I’m not talking about going back. I just can’t go forward anymore. This rain isn’t going to let up anytime soon and there’s no way we’ll make it around those trees, even with lights. You know it and I know it. Maybe if it wasn’t pouring like I’ve never seen in this fucking town! Why is it raining so fucking fuck ass hard!”
Am winced. Connor was losing it.
“The high school,” Nicole said. “We can go there until the rain lets up. It’s got a bomb shelter. They built it back in the fifties when the Russians were supposed to attack. My mom told me all about it. There’s probably tons of canned foods in it and maybe a radio. Plus we need a place with an infirmary that’s got thick walls and locks on the doors. It’s perfect. It’s just back a little ways, closer than our homes.”
“The high school is gonna have an alarm,” Seth said. “If we break in it’ll sound like the Enterprise getting fired on.”
Nicole shook her head. “Most alarm systems shut off after a minute. And no one is at the police station, we already know that. If any cops out there are still alive they’ll assume those things broke into it. Besides, the power’s off all over town, anyway. It’s probably not even on.”
Connor drummed his fingers on the wheel. “I don’t know, it could have a back up generator, like the police station. That scares me. What if it doesn’t turn off and this loud ass siren goes off? It’ll be like a giant announcement to every undead bastard in town.”
“Oh for fuck’s sake,” Am said. “I doubt every window is rigged with an alarm. The damn school is ancient. Maynard Drake and that idiot Jared from the 7-Eleven broke in last summer and stole a computer. Remember? It was in the paper. They had to pay for it and do community service. That’s why Maynard was always hanging around the super market smoking his crappy menthols. He was supposed to be handing out flyers for community fundraisers or something stupid like that.”
“I remember that,” Nicole said. “They really got in through a window? I don’t remember hearing that part.”
“I didn’t hear anything about a window. I just know how stupid boys think. They had to have smashed a window because it’s not like they’re gonna hack an alarm system. Jared can barely tie his shoes. And where my dad works they have alarms on the doors and ground floor windows but not the second story ones because they know no one is going to scale the building to a higher level when they can break in on the ground floor, grab what they want real fast, and take off.”
“I don’t want to go back,” Seth moaned.
“Okay,” Connor said. “It’s worth a shot. But just until the rain lets up.”
The first flash of lightning lit up the road ahead of them. Lit up the interior of the SUV and highlighted the blood on everyone’s face. Lit up the crashed cars and the miles of woods on either side of them.
And outside Am’s window, lit up the two yellow-eyed figures in the woods just a stone’s throw away.
They were running.
Am jumped into Seth’s lap. “Hit fucking Reverse, Connor, and drive!”
Sunday, 12:36
The lightning cut to black. The undead disappeared in the maze of dark tree trunks. But the heavens roared again and another bolt ripped across the sky, brighter than before. The zombies were closer, as if they’d jumped across time and space. Running around the trees, arms outstretched and mouths open wide.
The SUV peeled out and shot backward, drifting close to a speed limit sign which scraped its way down the door. The two zombies cut into the street and angled for the vehicle.
“Go forward!” Nicole yelled.
“What!?” Connor shouted back. “Why?”
Amanita pushed back into Seth’s soft belly, felt his arm around her waist, heard him shouting in her ear. He was overweight, but he was also big and she wanted to get behind him and use him as a shield.
You’re cruel, Am, this is why people don’t like you.
Screw those people.
“Go forward!” Nicole insisted. “Hit them!”
Obliging, Connor shifted, sped forward. The SUV hit the two nearest hissers and sent them flying toward the side of the road. They immediately tried to get up but fell over with broken bones.
They all watched as the two zombies writhed and twitched on the ground.
“They’re still moving,” Connor said, his foot on the brake.
“Bullet in the head will kill them.” Nicole added. “Somebody go do it. We’re gonna have to try it sooner or later, right?”
Connor took out the gun from the center console, made sure to keep it pointed out the windshield. There’s something scary about the way he holds it, Am thought. It was too big in his hands. It was too powerful for a boy his age, too powerful for anyone. And yet Nicole was right, it might be the best option.
Connor cleared his throat. “Anybody?”
After a moment of silence Connor swore and exited the SUV. He was lost in the rain almost immediately, and the ensuing seconds seemed to drag on for an eternity with nobody daring to breathe, but Am saw the two flashes of white through the windshield a moment later. Then the door opened and Connor was back, his hair soaking wet, his t-shirt stuck to his chest. For the first time she noticed that he had pretty good muscles for a fourteen year old. He’ll be naturally fit when he’s older, she thought, and not for the first time she was a little jealous of Nicole.
Connor said nothing, he didn’t need to. They knew he’d killed the creatures. If it hadn’t worked he’d have told them. Am saw him shaking as he started the SUV. She knew it had nothing to do with cold rain and his thousand-yard-stare confirmed it.
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