Billy looked at the offer for a moment, then looked to Vanessa, who shook her head yes. Billy looked to Kyle and Kyle also nodded in the positive. Billy stood and shook the man’s hand.
“This is Charla,” the man said, indicating the woman. Charla gave a curt nod. “I’m Sergeant Dan Martin, Paragould Arkansas. US Marine Corps retired. Well, retired until I find a unit to attach myself to.”
Billy was thirsty, but he did his best to reply. “Billy. Uhh… San Francisco? Not retired, but willing to try. Second Dan I’ve met in two days.” He looked around the room. “Where are we?”
“Still in San Francisco,” Sergeant Martin answered him. “Two doors down from where you almost died. This building is infinitely more secure than the apartment you were in yesterday.” Sergeant Martin looked concerned and Billy suddenly felt woozy. “Whoa,” the newcomer said, “sit down before you fall down.” He helped Billy to the bed.
Billy sat on the bed blinking. “Thanks for saving the kids,” he said and let go of the sergeant’s hand.
“They tell me you’re going to Alcatraz. Are you sure that’s the right play?”
“Yeah, Rick and Pittsburgh will take them in for sure. They love kids and there’s a ton of them on Alcatraz.”
“Pittsburgh?” Sergeant Martin looked confused. “Wait, you’ve been there? You’ve been to Alcatraz?”
“Yeah.” Billy licked his lips. “Can I get a glass of water, or maybe an Orange Crush? None of that stinkin’ root beer.” He had pronounced root like you would soot, or foot.
Dan spoke into his radio, “Anders, can we get a bottle of water in here for our guest, please?”
The sergeant continued his questioning. “They’re good people? Those on Alcatraz? We were thinking about going over there until we had a gun battle with another group of scavengers.”
“Yeah, that was probably Cyrus and his group. Not great people. The folks on Alcatraz are great people. I got to the island with a few of them before I split. Rick was kind of the guy in charge and he had his dad and his daughter Sam with him. He picked up some more strays, including my friend Dallas and they got there safely. There’s a whole bunch of people there now and then there’s the sub.”
“The sub?”
“Yeah. The sub. It’s parked just offshore from Alcatraz. I’m guessing there’s a bunch of sub dudes there now, too. You know, cuz of the sub?”
Danny was dumbfounded, but so was everybody else when they first met Billy. “Wait, you mean a submarine? A US Naval submarine?”
“I guess. I left before that showed up, but they must be good guys because I met Tony and Dave when they were out foraging and they didn’t say anything about evil sub dudes. What do you call a sub dude? I mean, the real name?”
“A sailor.”
“Right,” Billy said a bit too loudly and winced. “Sailor. Duh.”
A younger man, maybe twenty-five, entered the room with a bottle of water. “This is Anders; he’s with us and there are two more on guard duty as well. You can meet them in a bit. Tell me more about the sub and her crew.” Anders nodded and passed Billy the plastic bottle.
“It’s big and black. I don’t know anything about the sailors.”
“Told you we should have checked out the Rock. We would have at least seen the submarine,” Charla said.
The sergeant threw her a sideways glance and was about to retort when his radio came to life with a woman’s voice, “Danny, we’ve got breathers. Ten at least, maybe more. Two vehicles. They’re going into the house we picked the kids up in.”
“Copy that, Joy. Is it them?”
“Definitely.”
“We’re on the way, out.” He looked back to Billy. “We’re going to have to move soon, will you be okay?”
Billy swallowed a big gulp of water, coughing once. “Right as rain.” He put his hand to his head and made a face. He stood back up, glancing at Tim. “You’re not going to shoot me, right?”
“Hope not,” answered Tim and he winked.
Danny gave a chin-wag toward the bedroom door. “Follow us and stay low.”
The group moved out the door and into a small hallway. Billy followed Danny and Charla, but Tim remained behind them. They emptied out into a large room, not unlike the living room of the house Billy had battled the undead in, except this room took up only one floor and had an eight-foot ceiling instead of the twenty footer in the other apartment.
Two women, both about forty, stood to the far-right, peeking through the blinds of a large window. The woman with the shoulder-length reddish hair wore a maroon T-shirt and shorts, the tattoo sleeve on her leg grabbing Billy’s eye. He thought it odd that a gas mask dangled by its hose from her belt. The other woman sported dark hair that Billy could tell had fought her since she was a girl on whether to be straight or curly. Both ladies glanced briefly at the troupe coming into the living area.
“More like fifteen of them,” the tattooed woman told them.
“Any heavy weapons?” Danny demanded.
Tattoos shook her head. “Nah, just pistols and clubs. One guy has a tricked out M4, but that was the only rifle I saw. Me and Tina are thinking they went in there looking to see what the dead were interested in.”
“This is Joy,” Danny pointed to tattoos. “And this is Tina.”
Both women smiled and nodded. Tina strode forward and shook Billy’s hand. “I think it’s wonderful you’ve taken these children in.”
“More like they attached themselves to me like a couple of ticks.” Billy thumbed at Kyle. “Can’t get rid of ‘em. They’re like…the plague.”
Vanessa gave a quick giggle. “We sic’d the zombies on him, but he tastes like poop, so they wouldn’t eat him.”
Kyle smiled and shook his head.
“Yeah, we’re going to have to visit that later,” Danny said seriously.
“Oh shit!” Joy blurted. “They’re coming out. One of them is holding his arm. He’s been bitten!”
Danny’s group jostled for window space, all peeking through the blinds. Tim remained behind. “Don’t tip them off where we are. You’re all attacking the window like a monkey shit-fight at the zoo.”
Billy laughed out loud, covering his mouth at the auditory transgression, but Tim silently chuckled too.
Billy moved up. “Mind if I take a peek?”
Joy moved to her left, using a grand gesture with her hand for him to look through the blinds. Billy took a peek and noticed that he was now in a house across the park from where he and the kids had tried to hole up before.
“Yup, that’s the New Society.”
The entire room shifted its gaze toward Billy. “The who now?” asked Tina.
“They’re a group of gangsters from L.A. who recruited a bunch of folks from all over. They moved into San Francisco at the start of the outbreak and set up shop someplace near the docks. Their leader is an old…acquaintance of mine named Cyrus. He’s nuts. Like, certifiable, shock-treatment, booby-hatch crazy. Wicked smart though and for some reason, all these guys are afraid of him.”
Joy pointed out the window. “Those are the dick-bags that have been shooting at us.”
“Yeah,” Billy stated, “they do that.”
Tina, the only one still spying on the group across the playground, drew a sharp intake of breath which came at the same time as a gunshot from down the street. She backed away from the blinds.
“They just shot the guy who was bitten…”
“They also just brought any of those things that heard the gunshot,” Tim added. “Hunker or move.”
“Move,” Danny replied immediately. “I don’t know how, but the dead always seem to find us when we’re hiding.”
“Yeah, so, about that?” began Billy. “I can sort of walk around through them without getting bitten. As long as there are no fast ones!” he added quickly.
“Wait, what? Walk through who? The infected?” It was Danny who had asked the questions, but everybody was looking at Billy.
Kyle sat
on a black reclining chair. He sighed. “It’s true. I’ve seen him do it.”
The entire room, with the exception of the kids and Billy, was dumbfounded.
“Bullshit,” Charla said, but it was easy to tell she was on the fence about believing. “They kill and eat anything they can catch. Nothing can just walk past them.”
“Except him,” Vanessa pointed at Billy.
Billy’s head was really starting to hurt from all the talking, the being vertical, and the sunlight. He visibly winced, but was determined to get the kids to safety.
“Look, they,” he pointed to the kids, “are going to Alcatraz. There’s nowhere safer around. You folks have taken my stuff, including my new gun, which I want back. I can get them to the island, but I need my stuff to do it. I’m sure you’d all be welcome there if you want to go. I want to have them there soon, so I can go back to my rescuing-people job. Technically, if you guys all go, then I can add you to my rescued people list. I mean, it was me who told you about it and it’s me who’s about to go out there and slay all the demons in a moment, so you’re all on the list. You’ll make…” he counted the folks in the room, “five, six…forty-four people. The bad guys are probably already in their trucks and driving away, but the creeps will be here soon. Gimme my stuff and I’ll take care of them for you. Then we find a boat and I get you to the Rock.”
Tim looked thoughtful then spoke up, “We did pull him out of a pile of corpses. He didn’t have any bites. I know it’s weird, but I think he’s on the level.”
The sound of vehicles driving past their hideout made everyone nervous for a moment. Tina and Joy both stole a quick glance outside. Joy sighed. “Breathers are gone, but the dead are on the way.”
“Actually, they’re here,” interjected Tina. “Look.”
“Shit, she’s right.”
Danny hustled back to the window, pulling a couple of blinds down with his index finger. “Okay, we move now. There’re only a few and no fast ones. Back down Pierce, down Perine, and cut through the gas stations to the bank. Billy can go first and we’ll see if he’s telling the truth. Tim, give him his stuff back. If we get separated, the Chase Bank is on California Street next to Mollies. We have an ammo and food cache there and it’s secure. Billy, you have a one-minute head start.”
Tim passed Billy his pack, knife, and rifle. “Good luck, buddy.”
Billy accepted the items and made for the door. He turned and walked back to Kyle, giving him a high-five. He got down and hugged Vanessa. “You two watch these guys. Keep them safe.”
“We will,” Kyle told him and Billy hurried out the door.
He moved down the hall, down the stairs, and out the front entrance. Six dead folks were ambling toward the building he had come out of. A huge smile split Billy’s face as he regarded this new threat.
“No way…” he breathed. “Just no way!”
Two dead men and four dead women shuffled toward him. Five of the six were unimpressive; same old same old. The larger of the two men, formerly an Asian man, but now part of a different species altogether, possessed an interesting item. A katana sword stuck out of the man’s chest. Billy rested his rifle against a street light.
He pointed at the skewered man. “I’ve seen you before! At a movie theater last year. You’ve been stumbling around with that stuck in you for this long?” He strode to the dead man, the other infected walking past him. “You mind?” he asked. He put a hand on its chest and yanked the weapon free. He hefted it for a moment, glancing back up to where his friends were undoubtedly watching his every move through the blinds. He flashed a wicked smile and fluttered his eyebrows. All six of the things stopped when he spoke, searching, but not being able to find anything to their liking, they moved on.
“Nope!” Billy said and they turned again. He strode to the heavy man he had removed the weapon from. Using two hands, he swung the sword in a sideways arc, hitting the dead man in the neck. To his utter disappointment, he was unable to decapitate the thing. It collapsed, the spinal column mostly severed, but the head remained attached to the body by some muscle. Billy extricated the blade as the creature fell and moved behind the next one. He brought the katana vertically down on the top of the skull of the first dead woman and the steel skipped off to the right, taking some scalp, plus her right ear and embedding in her collarbone.
“Crap!” he almost shouted. “This is harder than it looks on TV!”
The creatures once again rounded on him and he yanked the blade from the woman’s shoulder. He slashed at the back of her neck and she collapsed. He opted for moving to the front of the small pack and poking the weapon through the eyes and faces of the remaining dead.
In short order, they were all on the ground, one of the infected women moving slightly, but unable to stand. The other five had been destroyed.
He practiced being a ninja for a few seconds by slashing the air with the weapon then remembered he was being watched.
“Oh, yeah.”
He searched around for more infected in the area. There were sporadic infected down the streets and across the park, but none was close enough to cause trouble, although they were on the way. Billy made an exaggerated wave to the folks in the apartment, indicating they should come out.
He continued to slice and stab at imaginary opponents until the group of six adults and two kids met him.
“That…that was incredible!” Tina told him.
“Arigato,” he said and bowed. He grabbed his rifle. “Danny, you all set?”
Sergeant Martin was looking oddly at Billy, but Billy was so used to this, he brushed it off. He used the sword to point behind them. “Anytime…”
The dead had gotten significantly closer, but were still a few hundred yards away.
“This way,” Danny told him and they slunk down Pierce Street. There was little conversation as they moved, most of them choosing silence, but Danny and Billy began to talk.
“How do you do it?” Danny demanded in a hushed whisper.
“Well,” Billy began, extremely loudly in the empty street, “I just—”
“Shhhh!” everyone said at the same time. Billy looked around, eyes wide.
He made the classic Oops! face. “Sorry,” he whispered and they continued on, taking a left on Perine.
Danny strode next to Billy. “Quietly, how do you do it?”
“Dunno. They just seem to leave me alone. I’ve met a few others with the same…ability? Yeah, ability. It’s kind of my superhero power. I didn’t—”
A loud moan came from an open doorway to the right. A lone infected lumbered out of the open doorway to an apartment, heading toward them.
“Observe,” Billy told them and made a grand gesture with his hand. He passed Anders his rifle and moved off to confront the dead thing.
He bowed to it as it stumbled toward the waist-high wrought-iron gate of the tiny front yard. He put his foot against the gate, stymieing the creature’s exit. He was easily in reach of the thing, but it strived to get at the rest of the crowd of living people and ignored Billy completely
Doing his best impersonation of a samurai, he nodded once and said in a deep voice, “Watashi no hobakurafuto wa unagi de ippai desu,” and slashed sideways as the thing pressed against the gate. This time, the infected’s head leapt from its body and hit the concrete walkway with a meaty thud.
“Yosh!”
The group was flabbergasted.
“You speak Japanese?” Charla asked, her eyebrows impossibly high.
“Heck no. That phrase is in my favorite movie.” He rolled his eyes. “Like I have time to learn Japanese with a plague of the living dead on us. Sheesh.”
They began to move forward again, but dove for cover when gunfire erupted in front of them.
Charla was in the street, not moving. Her face contorted in pain, but her eyes moved to Danny, who was behind some overgrown shrubs and a blue mailbox. He used a hand gesture to tell her to stay still.
Tina and Joy were working on Tim
, who had taken a round in his left hip. The gunfire continued but mercifully did not hit Charla again. Anders and Danny returned fire.
“Those jerks just shot at kids,” Billy breathed in a non-believing voice. “Kids!” He stood, Danny grabbing for him but missing. Billy strode into the center of the street, between the gunmen and Charla and brandished his newly acquired katana. “Come on then!”
The gunfire stopped immediately.
“Jesus H Christ in a sixty-six Pontiac,” Joy exclaimed. She looked at the children. “He’s immune to bullets, too?
Next to the Fire Station Marshfield, Massachusetts
“You know,” Seyfert began through gritted teeth and short breaths, “when Boone and Pitt told me that there were going to be civvies on a suicide mission to rescue some scientists, I thought they were nuts. I thought you’d all be dead before we made landfall from Alcatraz. If we made it, I thought I would be babysitting you assholes the whole way and you’d get me killed.” He looked at Dallas in the darkness. “I was wrong. You guys have more than pulled your weight.”
“’Preciate that.”
“This is coming from a SEAL, Dallas. I’ve seen some shit and been in it too. These are not words I would tell someone if they weren’t true.”
“You wanna kiss me, too?”
Seyfert smiled in the gloom, the smile quickly turning into a grimace of pain. “Not yet. If we don’t make it out of here, I just wanted you to know.”
“Don’t make it? Son, do you know who that is out there? That’s Rick n’ Anna. They don’t fail. Hell, I’ll be surprised if they don’t show up with a damn limousine.”
Seyfert smiled again. The pressure in his chest was becoming very painful and he remembered his needle. He found it in the darkness and ushered a short hiss of pain when he bumped it with his hand. He twisted the small handle and a much louder hiss escaped through the contraption.
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