by Sam Sisavath
“They were executed,” Ana said.
“Yeah, it looks that way. But not before she got a piece of one,” he added, crouching next to one of the women. He picked up her hand, almost gingerly and with reverence, and showed it to Ana. Three of the woman’s five fingernails were red, and there were what looked like pieces of skin underneath them. The middle finger was the reddest.
“She got a piece of them,” Ana said.
“At least one,” Chuck said. He laid the hand back down and stood up. “I guess she didn’t get enough.”
“They still have their clothes on. The women.”
“Yeah. This wasn’t rape. This was just…”
“Murder.”
Chuck nodded and looked away.
“Not just murder. They also took their supplies,” Randall said. “Both tents are empty except for some sleeping bags. Guns, food—they’re all gone.”
“All this for guns and food?” Shelby asked.
“No,” Chuck said. “All this because they could.”
“I don’t get it.”
“You will in a few years, kid.”
Shelby didn’t look convinced, but kept quiet.
“What now?” Randall asked.
Chuck didn’t answer right away. He turned around and peered east in the direction the killers had gone. There was nothing out there for him to see except faded mountains in the distance.
“They couldn’t have gotten far,” Chuck said. “Maybe ten minutes head start on us. About thirty minutes, now.”
“They would have heard us coming,” Randall said. He was looking at Chuck like he already knew what the older man was thinking.
He does know, just like I know.
“Which means they’ll be moving fast,” Chuck said.
The older slayer looked back at the bodies. The two men and two women. Two couples. Maybe married. Maybe not. Not that a piece of paper made any difference these days.
“It’s not my call to make,” Chuck said. He turned back to Ana and Shelby, then over at Randall. “It’s all of ours.”
“Can’t just let this go,” Randall said. “This ain’t right.”
“No, it’s not. But there’s six of them, and they’ve already shown they don’t have any qualms about taking lives.”
“Silver bullets work just as well on a human, Chuck.”
“That’s true enough.” He looked over at Shelby. “What do you think, kid? If we’re gonna do this, we all have to agree.”
Shelby shuffled his feet. He was almost six feet tall but looked even taller standing next to her; despite that, Shelby didn’t come close to offering the same presence as the two older men waiting for his answer.
“Like you said, this ain’t right,” Shelby finally said.
“You have to be sure,” Randall said. “This isn’t ghouls we’re talking about. These are still people.”
“There’s a difference?”
“There’s a big difference, kid.”
“If you say so.”
“Shelby,” Chuck said, fixing the youngest slayer with a hard stare. “You have to be sure, you understand? If we do this, we do this.”
Shelby glanced over at Ana. “What do you think?”
Ana didn’t answer him. Instead, she looked over at Chuck and Randall when she said, “When we find them, what are we going to do?”
“We’re going to kill them,” Chuck said without a moment’s hesitation.
“Okay.”
“Okay?” Randall said, eyeing her curiously. “What does that mean?”
“It means okay,” Ana said. “But we should bury the bodies first.”
“We don’t have time,” Randall said. “They’re getting farther away as we speak.”
She glanced up at the circling vultures. “We can’t just leave them lying here.”
“Better the birds than the nightcrawlers. I’ve seen those bastards digging graves to get to the bodies underneath.”
“Besides, if they could talk, I’m willing to bet they care more about us catching their killers than taking an hour to bury them,” Chuck said. He turned and began walking back to the truck. “Come on; we got a lot of ground to cover.”
Ana looked after him, then up at the birds again. She thought about Mark, in the woods. He’d gotten a decent burial despite being a piece of shit human being, and she couldn’t give that to these four people.
“Ana, we gotta go,” Randall said. He was waiting for her. “Can’t let them get away with this. When we finish, we’ll come back. I promise.”
Not if the birds get to them first, Ana thought, but she nodded at Randall and followed him to the truck.
“You’re not carrying any guns on you,” Chuck said when they were back in the Ford and Randall had driven away from the campsite.
“No,” Ana said.
“Why not?”
“I never have.”
“And you said you’ve been out here for weeks? By yourself for most of it? Unarmed?”
“Correct.”
Chuck gave her a long look. She wasn’t sure if he was impressed, confused, or just amused. Maybe a little of all three, while leaning heavily toward the last.
“So how are you going to serve justice on these assholes when we catch up to them?” Randall asked.
“I’ll think of a way,” Ana said.
“We have spare guns,” Chuck said.
“I don’t want or need them.”
“I’m not asking if you need them. I’m telling you.” Then, before she could argue, “It’s either that, or we drop you off here and keep going. Your call.”
Ana sighed back at him.
“Well?” Chuck said.
“One gun,” Ana said. “And it has to be something I can hide.”
“Hand me the bag next to your feet. The red one.”
Ana picked up a red duffel bag. It was heavy, whatever was inside clanging together as she lifted it from the floor and handed it to Chuck. He turned around, unzipped the bag, and rifled through it.
“And here I was gonna give you Ol’ Pumpy,” Randall said.
“‘Pumpy?’” Ana asked.
“Good Ol’ Pumpy,” Randall said, patting the shotgun leaning against his seat.
“This should do,” Chuck said as he held a pistol out to her.
Ana took it. It was black with a rosewood grip and was surprisingly light in her hands despite already being loaded with a magazine. The weight threw her off, and she turned it over to make sure it was actually a gun and not some toy. There was writing along one side of the boxy barrel: SIG Sauer.
“That’ll fit in your pocket,” Chuck said. “The important part is the six rounds in the magazine.”
“Six bullets?” Ana said. “That’s it?”
“Not enough bullets for you?”
“I just thought these guns come with more bullets. Isn’t that why people carry them instead of the ones cowboys used to in Westerns?”
“Revolvers.”
“Yeah, those.”
“It’s the smallest gun we have. The big ones carry more rounds, but you said you wanted a small one you could hide.”
“Yeah, I guess I did.”
She searched for the safety and pushed it into place with her thumb before slipping the gun into her jacket pocket. It fitted almost too perfectly.
Don’t get used to it, she told herself. Guns are trouble. It makes people nervous.
“Hopefully you won’t have to use it,” Chuck was saying from the front seat. “If there’s shooting to be done, try to let us do most of it.”
“I’m not going to argue with that,” Ana said. “Shooting has never been my forte.”
“What is your forte?” Randall asked, looking at her in the rearview mirror.
Ana smirked back at his reflection. “I do what I have to do in order to survive. Nothing more, nothing less.”
“Don’t we all?”
“Some more than others.”
“I guess that’s true, too.”
Chuck
had taken an old, heavily notated map out from his pack. He unfolded it between the two front seats so she could get a look at it as he pointed out something.
“We’re here,” Chuck said. “And this is the closest town. Mayfield. Formerly O61.”
“It’s a former collaborator town?” Ana asked.
“Most towns are,” Randall said.
“If our killers keep heading east like they are now, they’ll run across Mayfield soon enough,” Chuck said. “If we don’t find them before then, that is.”
“How much farther?” Randall asked.
Chuck measured the distance on the map with his forefinger. “Five miles, give or take, and depending on how fat my fingers are feeling today.”
“You really think they’ll stop in Mayfield?” Ana asked.
“I don’t know,” Chuck said. “They must have heard our truck coming toward them while they were still at the campsite.”
“That’s a given,” Randall said. “Sounds travel these days. Hell, they could probably hear us on their asses right now. We’re probably the only engine running for miles out here.”
Now why does that not make me feel better? Ana thought when there was a sudden crack! from outside, followed by the Ford beginning to move erratically left and right.
It was a gunshot.
A gunshot!
At first Ana thought Randall was so startled by the gunshot and he was jerking on the steering wheel, but then she saw the perfectly drilled hole in the front windshield and realized that Randall had been shot!
“Chuck!” Ana shouted.
“Get down!” Chuck shouted back, even as he lunged across the front seats and grabbed the steering wheel with one hand while reaching for Randall with the other. “Take your foot off the gas, Rand! Take your damn foot off the gas!”
Randall’s back was to Ana, but she could tell he was barely in control of his body as blood pumped out from somewhere near his right shoulder. He was bleeding badly, a continuous spray of blood covering the upholstery and Chuck’s extended arms.
But Randall must have heard Chuck through the pain, because he pulled his foot off the accelerator and the truck began to slow down. At the same time, he all but slumped out of the driver’s seat, knocking “Ol’ Pumpy” to the floor by bumping into the barrel with his head.
Another loud, echoing crack! shattered the front passenger side window and sprayed glass over Chuck and Randall, with more than a few pieces coming dangerously close to cutting Ana’s face all the way in the back.
“Outside!” Chuck shouted. “Get outside!”
Another crack! and this time the small back window to her right—behind the front passenger side—was obliterated, and something fast and loud pekked! into the ceiling just two inches above her head.
Ana didn’t have to be told which direction to use in order to “get outside.” The last two bullets had come from her right, which meant the vehicle had somehow turned toward the shooter (shooters?) while Chuck was trying to stop it.
Chuck was grabbing the Ford’s gear and putting it in park as she crawled past him and opened the door and all but threw herself forward, landing in a pile on the hard, cold ground outside.
A thwump! as something landed beside her, and Ana, the SIG Sauer suddenly in her hand (When did I grab that?), almost shot Shelby as the slayer scrambled up, clutching his rifle in front of him.
“Holy crap, I guess this means we found them!” Shelby was shouting.
Or they found us, Ana thought when a fourth crack! broke the driver-side window next to her just before the door swung open and Chuck rolled outside.
Chuck was back on his knees a second later. He turned around, reached into the vehicle through the open door, and dragged Randall’s body out and deposited it alongside him. Ana flinched at the sound of Randall’s body slamming onto the hard dirt floor.
“Is he okay?” Shelby asked. “Is he dead? Chuck, is Rand alive?”
“Shut up and shoot back!” Chuck shouted.
“Shoot back where?”
“East! Let them know we can still shoot back!”
For a moment, Ana wasn’t sure if Shelby understood, but she must have underestimated the young man, because he lifted his rifle and squeezed off four quick rounds across the Ford—all in the direction the shots had come from. Shelby pulled his weapon down and slid behind the cover of the truck next to her barely a half-second after the last shot.
She expected return fire from the ambushers, but there was only the soft echo of Shelby’s fourth shot as it dissipated into the wide-open countryside. Soon, there was just their harried breathing—hers, Shelby’s, and Chuck’s as he tore off some gauze he’d taken out of a first aid kit (When did he grab that?) and tried to keep Randall from bleeding to death.
Chuck glanced over at her, and they exchanged a frenzied look. Ana thought she knew exactly what he was thinking, because it was the same exact thing going through her mind at that very second.
She and the slayers had, without even knowing it, become the hunted.
Five
I should have stayed out of the truck.
Randall, bleeding next to her on the ground.
I should have stuck to the plan.
Shelby fidgeting nervously on the other side of her, the muzzle of his rifle moving around a bit too much for her liking.
Dammit, why didn’t I stick to the plan?
She sighed before looking down at the small pistol in her hand. She still had no idea when she’d grabbed it while crawling out of the truck. But there it was, in her palm, with all six shots of it still in the magazine.
Maybe I should have asked for a bigger gun…
To her left, Chuck had successfully stopped Randall from bleeding out. He had wrapped gauze around the other slayer’s body while he was propped up against the closed driver-side door, and was now slowly laying him back down on the ground.
“He alive, Chuck?” Shelby asked.
“He’ll be just fine,” Chuck said.
I don’t know about that, Chuck, Ana thought. She’d seen worse bullet wounds, but “just fine” was never a phrase she’d use to describe any of them.
Chuck reached into the open back door and pulled out an old duffel bag. He unzipped it and extracted a camo-painted rifle similar to Shelby’s.
“Shelby, move closer to the back in case they try to flank us,” Chuck said. “Shoot anything that moves toward us. And I mean anything. Got it?”
The young slayer nodded before scooting toward the rear of the Ford. He leaned out to get a quick peek before pulling his head back behind cover a split second later. Ana wondered if he’d even seen anything at all, but she was impressed by how calm he was being given his age. But then he was a slayer, and she imagined he’d probably been in tougher situations than this one. After you’ve gone face-to-face with ghouls in their natural element, could a life-and-death situation with living, breathing human beings really top that?
“Anything?” Chuck asked.
Shelby looked over and shook his head. “Squaddush, man. I don’t see anything out there.”
“Well, there’s at least one of them out there.”
“I don’t see anyone,” Shelby repeated before reaching up to swipe at beads of sweat on his forehead.
I guess he’s human after all. Good to know, good to know.
Ana discovered that she was perspiring, too, which was surprising given how cold it was outside the Ford. She brushed at the wetness with her jacket sleeve before giving Randall a long look.
He was alive. Chuck had done a good job stanching the bleeding, and the man continued to lie peacefully on the ground.
Chuck, meanwhile, slipped a magazine into his rifle and shoved two spares into his pockets. The older slayer tossed the now-empty bag away and scooted toward the front of the truck and took his own peek before pulling back a second or two later.
“Anything on that side?” Shelby asked.
Chuck shook his head. “I don’t see anything but flat
country out there.”
“Can they shoot us under the car?” Ana asked.
“No,” Chuck said. “Angle’s wrong. They’d have to be closer than where they are now to even see underneath the truck.” He paused before adding, “No. We’ll be fine back here as long as we don’t let them flank us.”
Fine, huh, Chuck? Ana thought. You sure throw “fine” around a lot.
She wished she could believe him, but she had a hard time swallowing it. How “fine” could they possibly be? They were stuck in the middle of nowhere with at least one sniper (but probably more—like five more) out there waiting to pick them off if they wandered even an inch beyond the parked vehicle.
No, they weren’t “fine” at all. Not even a little bit.
She didn’t say those doubts out loud, though. Instead, Ana moved over to get a better look at Randall. She almost stepped on a used syringe on the ground next to a small bottle of morphine. When had Chuck taken that out and given it to Randall?
He’s definitely done this before.
She picked up both the syringe and bottle and tossed them away before checking on Randall. He was still breathing, even if it was hard to tell from just looking at him. His eyes were closed, his face covered in a sheen of sweat. She took out a rag from her back pocket and wiped at the perspiration, moving from his forehead to his face to his throat.
When she brushed aside the big collars, she saw what she had been expecting: bite marks. They covered both sides of Randall’s neck and were of different shapes and sizes, but had been put there by teeth. Twisted and deformed teeth that were feeding. Ghoul teeth.
She had no doubts that if she took off Randall’s clothes, she’d find more of the marks along his arms and legs. All over his body, in fact. The only slayer she’d encountered who didn’t have such reminders of the nightmares inflicted during the yearlong Purge was Wash.
“We’re not made in a factory,” he had told her when she asked.
So how were you made, Wash? How did you become what you are? How did you get so good at killing? Ghouls and people?
But she couldn’t ask him those questions. Not until she found him first.
Ana looked at the quick work Chuck had done to Randall’s shoulder. The bullet had gone through, but the bandages were expertly applied and he wasn’t bleeding anymore.