And Hell Followed: A Horror Novel

by Tatiana Xavi

  Closing my eyes, I visualized walking toward the farmhouse at site four. Everyone would be so happy to see Daddy and downright shocked to see me. I pictured Leo’s reaction at learning I was alive. While I didn’t want to think about Ryan and Leo meeting, I also tried not to wonder which of our stragglers would be dead by then.

  Chapter Eleven

  The dog creatures were on the hunt by the next day. This was what all the howling the night before had been about. Hunting us now, the enemy was reenergized.

  No patience for them or quiet anymore, Daddy fired on the monstrosities whenever they crept close. Abner was more careful with his shots, but only because he couldn’t shoot like Daddy. He did have the big gun though and enough bullets to scare away the creatures.

  Eating as we walked, the group only stopped for bathroom breaks. Then around noon, we noticed more zombie activity. A few hours later, the dogs and zombies fought. It took all our self-control to not stop and watch the battle. Glancing back, I saw the previously winning dogs swarmed by zombies. The tides turned swiftly in the monster battles.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” Daddy muttered when we heard cars approaching on the highway.

  Officially fed up by this point, Daddy didn’t think we would ever reach site four. We kept picking up stragglers, getting pushed off course, and now we had to deal with zombies, monster dogs, and scavengers.

  The group climbed into a ditch next to the highway to hide from the approaching convoy. Music played from the cars, and I was again shocked by how the scavengers weren’t afraid of the zombies.

  The hairless creatures along with the zombies moved toward the noise. A teen zombie dressed in a chicken suit stained down the front from his throat wound shuffled closer to the preoccupied dogs. Before the zombie kid could attack, the monster dogs whined and rolled around in the dirt as if covered in fleas. The zombies stopped walking while bobbing their heads to the music.

  Danny’s Song played from an army vehicle which pulled to a stop next to the ditch. When I felt her digging around in my head, I stood up and smiled at Bellamy.

  “Hello, friends!” she cried, giving me a wave. “Miss me?”

  Daddy exhaled next to me in a way which made me think he missed Bellamy more than anyone. A line of nine cars stopped and idled while Bellamy emerged from her lead vehicle. Grinning, she pulled off her mirrored glasses and gestured toward the cars.

  “Look at what the fine American government donated to the cause of returning Papa Evan to his precious site four.”

  A smiling Daddy walked up to Bellamy and hugged her. “Glad to see you in one piece.”

  Once Daddy let her go, Bellamy studied him then nodded. “My old dad had a bigger head than you, but I can see a resemblance.”

  Laughing at her comment, I giggled even more once I saw her twelve zombies. Wearing matching mirrored glasses, they looked like they were in a band.

  The new stragglers weren’t sure what to think of Bellamy. While Kiko and Kei were curious about her, they remained leery of the mustached zombies. Paige kept shaking her head as if she might be going crazy. Logan was stony-faced, but I knew he didn’t like Bellamy. I heard him muttering something about the makeup she wore.

  When Abner said something to Bellamy, she grew very solemn describing the hellfire on the government’s temporary camp. She acted like she was sad about the loss of life except she was the one who led the horde on the mission.

  With the cars, we no longer had to walk to the relief of Zippy, Morgan, and me. Still fuzzy from the day before, I looked forward to napping in the backseat of one of the Humvees. Before I got into the car next to Zippy, Bellamy stepped in front of me. Digging around in my brain, Bellamy smiled in a super crazy way.

  “Huh, maybe you won’t be my white horse, after all, Sub Sami. Maybe you’re my new Pestilence.”

  Just nodding, I knew the strange men did something to me. My body felt different now. Stronger yet weaker, more attuned to my surroundings while less grounded in them. The men changed me, but I doubted they changed me the way they hoped.

  Once on the road, we made good time. By sundown, we were less than a day from site four. With Bellamy leading us, zombies stayed out of our way. The dog creatures did too, reacting in pain whenever Bellamy was around.

  When we hit a traffic jam just before sunset, Bellamy summoned zombies from the nearby area to shove the cars out of the way. The zombies looked so pissed to let us leave. Many though were clearly excited to see Bellamy who was a rock star in the zombie world.

  Our group spent the evening in a subdivision with large homes. They had no power or running water, but they were big and pretty. Finding one that hadn’t been torn up when the plague hit, we settled in for the night.

  In the backyard, Daddy and Abner cooked on a big grill. Mostly cooking Twinkies and other non-grilling foods, they were having fun, and no one complained.

  The whole group sat in the backyard, drinking sodas, beers, and wine coolers. Paige liked wine coolers especially with the mustached zombies nearby. When Morgan fixed Paige’s butchered hair, the redhead cried with relief when she saw her reflection. Feeling a little more human again, Paige smiled a lot and even laughed a few times.

  We ate soups and raviolis we found in the house. Everyone was happy, and music played, and Bellamy was very loud. In a happy mood, Bellamy looked relieved to see everyone. I noticed her fingers stroking Ryan’s ponytail and rubbing Morgan’s belly. She also told Morgan the baby was a boy and his name was Titan. Morgan smiled and nodded like everyone did when Bellamy made an announcement.

  Bellamy later made another one of her announcements. This one was about her ability to speak every language ever used by mankind and a few used by creatures I’d never heard of. She then demonstrated by speaking gibberish to the amusement of most of us including the mustached zombies. Yet Logan had heard enough.

  Logan was a reminder of how the most dangerous time for a survivor was after they were rescued.

  Last fall, our group came upon a middle-aged couple trapped in their small house. Having stocked up when the plague began, they were safe with only one zombie wandering around outside. He was an old man with an arm missing and a bad leg, but the couple was too scared to face him. Instead, they remained trapped in their home.

  When we walked past their house, the group barely noticed the zombie. Yet he noticed us and followed. The group might have ignored him, but he was loud, and we didn’t want the attention. Nick killed him with an ax then returned to our group standing in the middle of the street.

  The weeping couple emerged, thankful to finally be out of the house. Even with food, occasional electricity, and running water, they felt trapped and prayed the zombie would leave or someone would save them. We were their salvation.

  They were dead by the next morning. After weeks of waiting for freedom, they realized outside their house wasn’t any better than inside. Finding them shuffling around in their bedroom, Paul said the couple had overdosed on painkillers. He also said some people just weren’t meant to survive.

  Suspecting Logan was one of those people, I figured after weeks trapped in one hell that he realized the whole world was just another kind of hell. Whatever brought him to this realization, he didn’t want to live anymore. Why else would he have screamed at Bellamy the way he did?

  “Shut up, you crazy piece of shit!” Logan screamed. “Shut up, or I’ll shut you up!”

  Bellamy didn’t react when he screamed in her face. She didn’t react when Logan threatened her or when the mustached zombies attacked him.

  The rest of the group froze and backed away from the feeding zombies. Kiko nearly screamed, but Kei covered her mouth. I thought to look away when the zombies switched from docile to violent. Instead, I watched them tear apart Logan and noticed how they didn’t kill him quickly. A small horde could have finished him off within a minute or two, but Bellamy didn’t want Logan to die too fast.

  Ignoring the zombies, Bellamy walked to the boombox Earl
usually carried for her. Finding a song she liked, Bellamy danced as the others focused on her and away from the violence taking place. Violence that we allowed because Bellamy mattered more than Logan in this new world.

  Jumping around and dancing wildly, Bellamy enjoyed the remake of a Barry Manilow song. As a group, we pretended the zombies weren’t feeding a few feet away from where we ate dinner. We also pretended like we couldn’t hear Logan’s screams.

  Bellamy danced for the whole song then turned off the boombox and returned to her seat. Once she did, the zombies stopped feeding and dragged the finally dead Logan to the front yard where we found his bones the next morning.

  “Death isn’t always fun,” Bellamy said to no one. “Death is necessary, though. Without death, how would we rid the world of its trash?”

  “He was an asshole,” Ryan said, holding Morgan’s hand and staring at the fire pit. “He would have gotten us killed eventually.”

  “He looked at the girls too much,” Abner added with a sigh. “Seen it too many times. Can’t trust a man like that.”

  When Zippy wrapped a blanket around me, I realized I was shaking. Not from fear or disgust, but from fighting the urge to join the mustached zombies.

  Standing up, Bellamy glanced around then back at me. “I’m going to bed.” Taking her Hello Kitty bag, she smiled at me. “Killing is fun, Sub Sami. You’ll see how much you love it and then you’ll be its biggest fan.”

  While I didn’t want to be like Bellamy, I wasn’t like everyone else either. Pretending otherwise was becoming more and more difficult too.

  Chapter Twelve

  Waking in the middle of the night, I was bothered by dreams of Bellamy and her sisters. In the dreams, I was one of the girls, and yet I was me. I didn’t understand what they were talking about or why they weren’t scared of the man with the snake eyes who kept feeding us candy.

  Downstairs, I found Kiko and Kei asleep on the floor. I tiptoed around them and into the kitchen where Ryan found me. He watched me in the dark, and I felt like I needed to comfort him. I wasn’t sure why, but he seemed lost.

  “We’ll rest at site four,” I whispered. “Daddy wants to convince the others to return to the townhomes. He told Zippy the place could be our paradise if we had Bellamy around to hold back the zombies.”

  As Ryan stepped closer, I remained nervous with him staring at me, so I kept talking.

  “At the townhomes, Morgan would be safe to have her baby. The store with baby stuff would make things easy too. Life can be good once we’re all back there.”

  “I can’t let you go.”

  Stepping back, I frowned. “What does that mean?”

  “The night with you, even though we didn’t mate, I bonded with you, and I can’t let you go.”

  “You have to. Both of us have to want to be together, and I don’t want that.”

  “Because of your precious Leo who abandoned you?”

  Frowning again, I moved closer to Ryan. “You’ve made him into something bad because he left me when he thought for sure I would die. You say you wouldn’t have left me, but to save Morgan, you did.”

  “That’s not fair,” he said heatedly, glancing out of the kitchen then back at me. “Everything happened so fast, and I needed to protect Morgan. Once she was safe, I came for you.”

  Sighing, I created room between us. “I shouldn’t have teased you. I shouldn’t have let you kiss me all those times, but I do care about you, and Leo feels so far away sometimes. I made you think we could be together and we can’t. I shouldn’t have done that. I know you’re lonely.”

  Ryan stepped closer and grabbed me around the waist. Hoisting me onto the kitchen counter, he gave me the look of a scolded child.

  “The night in the tent, I felt like a pervert. Like a monster raping a little kid. Then you told me you were older and I made it the best I could for you. As I held you in my arms, I felt different than I had before. I felt like I was home. I can’t give those feelings up because you have a crush on a guy who ditched you when things got hard.”

  “You’re being mean now,” I whispered, pushing him away. “You don’t know Leo or me. Leo’s known me since I was a kid and I know him. He’s hurting because he didn’t save me. You try to make him sound dishonorable, but the day I helped you and Morgan with those zombies, many people wouldn’t have. Some part of me didn’t want to help you either. I wanted to stay with Daddy and keep to my training. Leo would have helped you, though. He’s got a good heart so stop talking about him like he’s a loser.”

  Ryan glared at me, pouting really. When he took my hand, I nearly yanked it away.

  “I almost had sex with Zippy once,” he said, brushing hair out of my eyes. “She had become the pack’s mate, and it was my turn with her. I wasn’t sure how I felt about sharing a woman, but Zippy seemed fine with it. When she came to my tent, she was all smiles and relaxed. She was beautiful, but I felt weird, so she suggested we talk first.”

  Skimming my face with his fingers, Ryan smiled.

  “Zippy’s a sneaky chick. It’s her shrink abilities. When we talked that night, she caressed my head tenderly like my mom would. Pretty soon, I didn’t think of her as a sexy woman less than ten years older than me. I thought of Zippy as a mother figure, and I couldn’t have sex with my mom. She pulled that move on a lot of the guys at camp.”

  Even unsure why he told me the story, I still liked hearing it.

  “Maybe I want you because you’re all I’ve known since the plague,” he said, looking as if he didn’t believe his words. “Or maybe I want you because you’re mine and you just haven’t figured it out yet?”

  Grinning, I rolled my eyes. “I love Leo. Even if we get there and he says he doesn’t love me in the way I love him, I won’t turn around and want you like you want me to. Would you want me, if my feelings could shift so easily?”

  “If I got what I wanted, I wouldn’t care,” he said with a wink.

  “You need to be open to the girls in our group. I’m not pawning you off on them, but I want you to be happy. I want Morgan to be happy too so I’ll be setting her up with someone too. Just make everyone happy so we can sit around singing Kumbaya.”

  Ryan smiled, but he kept me stuck on the fancy countertop.

  “It’s not easy for someone like me to let go once I’ve bonded. Morgan still misses Jim, and she didn’t even like him. He was just the guy who climbed on her and used her. They bonded, though, and she keeps worrying if he’s okay. I hope he’s dead. Anyway, I’m just warning you how even though I won’t do anything to interfere with your fairytale crap with the awesome Leo, I can’t let you go emotionally.”

  “When you say someone like you, do you mean a man who turns into a beast?”

  Ryan’s gaze held mine then he smiled tightly. “If you tell your dad, he’ll send Morgan and me away.”

  “What about Zippy?”

  “She’s human through and through. Derek picked her up somewhere and offered her the deal he offered you. Basically, be the pack’s whore, and he’d keep her safe. Say no, and he’d toss her out to be eaten.”

  I glanced around the kitchen and then back at Ryan.

  “Those things on the road, the monster dogs, are they like you?”

  “Monster dogs?” Ryan asked with a grin. “Do they look like dogs to you?”

  “Yeah, big ones like you were.”

  Shaking his head, Ryan laughed. “You thought I was a dog?”

  “Aren’t you?”

  “No, Samantha.” Ryan paused and glanced back at where Kiko was snoring. His face hardened, and he sighed. When he looked back at me, his gaze softened a little, but not much. “I can’t protect Morgan on my own. The last two weeks have proven this much. I wouldn’t have even gotten her out of the camp if you hadn’t shown up. We need to stay with the group, and your dad won’t let us if he knows.”

  “Daddy doesn’t like you because of what happened the night at camp. He thinks you did something, but he trusts you to a certa
in degree. He also cares about Morgan. If it’s between saving me and saving Morgan, he’ll turn his back on her. He won’t just throw her out to die though, no matter what you are.”

  “And if you’re wrong?”

  “I’m not.”

  “What about his friends?”

  Grinning, I patted Ryan’s cheek. “Do you think after they see me alive and get a look at Bellamy and her fan club that they’ll care about you and Morgan?”

  Sharing my grin, Ryan kissed me quickly on the lips before backing up so I could jump down. By the time my feet hit the ground, Ryan’s smile was gone.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t get to you sooner.”

  “Did you kill those men?”

  Ryan shook his head.

  “Maybe it’s the zombie infection I had?”

  “You were also bitten by Soren. You should have shown signs of an infection from the bite. I’m not sure why you haven’t except you were infected by the zombie first.”

  “Those men bit me too,” I grumbled. “Everything keeps biting me.”

  “I need to get you somewhere safe because losing you would kill me.”

  “I’m feeling a lot of hope with Bellamy being back. We only lost Logan, and I’m not sure how he survived as long as he did. We’ve had good luck lately.”

  Remembering the good luck we encountered in Overton, Ryan looked at me with a disgusted frown. I gave him a little smile.

  “I’m alive, and they’re dead. We won, and they lost. You make things more complicated than they need to be. You can’t do that and survive out here,” I said, taking his hand and squeezing it. “I want you to survive so learn to live out here.”

  Ryan studied me then nodded. “Leo better be the sexiest guy on the planet, or I’m going to be pissed.”

  Covering my mouth, I laughed because Ryan was serious. He smiled too, but he already looked pissed.

  “Haley is really pretty, and Ava might be a slut so keep that in mind.”

  When Ryan laughed, he mellowed out. We started to leave the kitchen when Bellamy appeared without her entourage. Looking us over, she yawned.