“Did you look along the ceiling when you came in?” Jason smiled as he fought to catch his breath.
“No.”
“Neither did those mindless corpses. They can’t read either.”
“Okay, I’ll bite. What would they read?” Murphy raised an eyebrow at Jason.
“Front toward enemy,” Jason answered with a smile.
A sudden shockwave rocked the moving vehicle as a series of explosions ripped through the early morning.
“Surprise!” Corporal Dunford chuckled.
Chapter 2
Adam’s eyes never changed.
Not like Katie’s eyes had when I was forced to tell her that her mother had gone to Heaven. That moment when I saw the innocent soul inside her get stomped out of existence and replaced with…I don’t know what.
Not like the fear I see in Rosa and Anna’s eyes when they look at me from across the house. Or the sorrow I see in Matt, Joe, and Lexi’s eyes. Not even like the cautious and questioning looks in Chris’ eyes when we run into each other.
No, that thing I sat in front of almost every hour of every day since Abby died, never changed. It stayed every bit the white-eyed monster that I dragged into the slaughter room after Katie had cried herself to sleep. I spent most of my time with it, when I wasn’t wiring something together in the bus, eating, or those few moments that sleep took me away from the nightmare of living and into the horrors of my unconscious mind.
I wanted to see it. I wanted to see the moment those eyes turned black. I needed to be the first one to see when Adam would finally look like the monster he was when he was alive.
But it didn’t happen.
Its eyes never changed. I didn’t know if it was a matter of time before it happened or if there was something different about the zombies that suddenly could see in the dark. The Adam thing was dead much longer than it had taken for Dale the biker’s eyes to turn. I was losing hope that his eyes would ever take on that marble black sheen.
My time was growing short. Not that leaving had been openly discussed with me, but too many of those things trickled out of the woods every day. It was inevitable, but I wanted to hold on to the farm as long as I could. When we left, I knew deep in my heart that we would never come back. I would be leaving Abby behind forever.
I didn’t want to leave before I made sure that everyone who stepped foot on that farm would know exactly what happened there.
I went to the far end of the room and kicked on the Briggs & Stratton portable gas generator Chris had procured on one of his scavenging trips. Those trips had all but ended after Adam had marched his horde right to our front door. Since that day Chris had only gone out once with Mark and Matt heading out two more times. No one else left the farm once they found what they were looking for.
I plugged in the rotary tool and went to work on the hood of Abby’s car again. After cutting away the crumpled and damaged portions, I was left with a decent sized piece of metal on which I would leave my message to the world.
Adam squirmed, snarling as I worked, but he had no chance of reaching me. I’d finished the job I had started with the shotgun by taking a hatchet to what was left of his arms. The creatures I’d fed Adam to had cored out his stomach down to his spine. I finished that too, and burned his arms and legs with the rest of the corpses, leaving him reduced to nothing more than a head and torso.
Sparks flew high into the air as I formed the last few letters into the steel. Each letter was cut straight through so the white stone of the century old silo would show. I zoned into my work, cutting and grinding until each letter was clean and perfect.
Before I had even started carving into the steel, I had already prepared the Adam thing for his final resting place. I bent a long piece of rebar into a U shape and drove one of the points through the stump at its shoulder. The bar continued through Adam’s chest until it poked out the other side. I continued to feed it into his body, cracking ribs and ripping through what was left of its organs until it looked like Adam was at the center of a giant rebar horseshoe.
It would hold him up for a long time.
“I was really hoping what you were doing out here didn’t look this crazy,” Chris said behind me.
I spun around and grabbed for my Glock, only to find the holster empty. My shock abated slightly when I saw his face peering back at me through the gloom.
He’d finally put away the fatigues, choosing instead to don his jeans and a heavy hunting jacket. Stress had taken a deeper toll on him than I’d realized. He’d lost weight, his face looking more gaunt than I’d ever seen before. Deep dark circles outlined his bloodshot eyes, hidden behind layers of grime and filth.
“If you didn’t want to see what I was doing, why are you here,” I replied, shutting down the generator. The loud hum of the gas engine gone, the growls of the monster suddenly overtook the silent room. Heavy boots clumped on the roof above me, pacing from one side of the long roof to the other as Mark kept watch over a field that had been ignored until it was too late.
“I wanted to bring this to you,” he said, holding my pistol out to me. “You shouldn’t be out here unarmed.”
“Thanks,” I replied coolly. Taking the gun from his hand, my eyes drifted to the phrase scratched into the slide.
“That’s got me a little worried, bro,” Chris said. He grabbed a chair from against the wall and sat with his elbows on his knees.
“What does?”
“Abandon all hope,” Chris replied, shifting in his chair. “That’s pretty ominous.”
A rifle cracked above our heads, followed by another from the house. We waited to see if there were any more before continuing our conversation.
“Only two this time,” I said.
“That’s the only reason I brought your gun to you. It’s too dangerous not to have it.”
“If it worries you so much, you can try to take it back,” I glared at Chris.
“That’s what I mean. Dan, my brother, would never make a threat toward me with a gun, no matter how slight. Dan, my brother, wouldn’t be doing this,” he said, sweeping his hand toward what was left of Adam. “Dan, my brother, would not abandon all hope.”
“Abby had hope,” I answered, turning my back to him. “How’d that turn out?” I paused, letting my words hang. “Katie had hope that her mom and dad would be there for her. How much hope do you think she has now? Abby was my hope, and I killed her.”
“No, you didn’t!” Chris snapped. “Adam did! He dragged those things here! He—”
“No!” I screamed. I snapped my gun from its holster, turning to face Chris again. “I chose wrong! Abby hoped that I could save her with this! I couldn’t! I let everyone stop me from killing Adam that morning! Never again!”
“Calm down, Dan!” Chris pleaded as he stood. “I understand—”
“No you don’t!” I shouted my throat raw. “This weapon could have saved Abby, but it didn’t! It could have killed Adam, but it didn’t! Abandon all hope is not a note to myself. It’s a warning! If anyone tries to hurt my family or friends, if anyone tries to take from us what is ours, if I have to draw this weapon on anyone…Abandon! All! Hope! Because I will not hesitate to pull the trigger again!”
Chris backed away, mouth agape and staring like he thought I might pop. He shivered, either from my tirade or from the bitter cold. His hands stayed in his coat pockets, so my guess was the latter. I honestly didn’t care either way.
“Is there anything else you need?” I turned away from him, stuffing my pistol back into its holster. I trembled, my blood pulsing through my ears with every thud of my pounding heart. My mind knew I needed to calm down, but my heart told my mind to piss off.
“Did its eyes change?” Chris exhaled, a slight tremor in his voice. He was changing the subject when I could tell all he wanted to do was leave.
“No. I don’t know if they will. It’s been too long already.”
“Maybe,” he said. “But I still wouldn’t count it out. I do wish y
ou hadn’t killed the other one, though.”
“I’d be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy doing it,” I replied. “It’s not every day I get to take the man who shot me and beat him to death with a hammer.”
“Still, we could have learned something from it.”
Heavy footfalls suddenly thundered through the room from above. It sounded like Mark needed to get to the other side of the roof in a hurry. His rifle cracked three times and fell silent.
“Call it a hunch, but I think you should be able to find a couple more bopping around out there somewhere,” I said as I started to sand away the imperfections around my lettering. The tan paint, the color that Abby fell in love with, faded under the rough sandpaper.
“Are you going to sleep tonight at all?” Chris asked.
“When I’m finished.”
“When will that be? The sun will be up in a few hours, and I thought you would want to be there for our first flight. I mean the drone was your idea.”
“I’ve only been in here a couple hours at most. The sun was still out when I got here,” I said.
“Dan, it’s almost two in the morning.”
“Hmm, I must’ve lost track of time.”
“You need to get some sleep. You can’t keep running like this. Katie needs you.”
“I’ll sleep when I’m tired. Besides, Katie doesn’t want me around anyway. She won’t even look at me,” I said, a sharp pang hitting me deep in my chest when visions of my little girl asleep in her bed danced through my mind. “She only wants Lexi and the kids, she doesn’t want me.”
“You’re wrong, Dan,” Chris said as he started out the door. “She’s confused and hurt, and you’ve been absent since that day. She feels abandoned—”
“I didn’t abandon her!” I snapped. “I just…I’m not good for her right now.”
“I know what you’re saying, Dan. I really do. Look, all I’m asking is for you to think about this. Katie’s already lost her mother, don’t make her lose her father too.”
My vision blurred as stinging tears welled up in my eyes. I swallowed hard against the painful lump in my throat as I fought back the sobs that welled up inside me. I leaned forward, my hands pressed against the cold metal as I hung my head.
“Chris,” I started, turning around in time to see the door closing. With the slam of the door, I was alone once more with the Adam thing.
“You just don’t understand,” I whispered.
I turned to Adam, narrowing my eyes as my hate for him surged through me, wiping away my anguish.
“Let’s go for a walk.”
Chapter 3
The howling wind slammed against Chris as he stepped outside, finally releasing his tight grip on the .380 tucked inside his pocket. The discomfort he felt in his gut did not wane despite the distance he had put between himself and Dan.
He pulled his thick woolen hat from his coat pocket, slipping it over his newly shaved head. Another blast of wind carried snow into his face, pricking at his skin like tiny needles. He drew his coat closer to his neck and trudged across the driveway toward his house.
He looked back at the slaughter house, seeing Mark pacing the length of its roof. The full moon shone down onto Mark’s face, casting its silvery light across his sullen features. There was a sadness in his gait, shoulders slumped and legs moving lazily as he plodded along. He nodded at Chris, exhaling a white cloud that enveloped his head before turning and walking away.
Chris started toward the house again, his mind moving at light speed as he processed the situation at the farm. Mark didn’t look good, but neither did anyone else. There was a happiness and warmth that filled his home once Dan and Abby appeared in their gore spattered Honda. Even though their little group was always in danger, that risk felt so distant then.
As it turned out, death wasn’t all that far away. Losing Abby was a knife in the hearts of their family. There was a hole in his home, a coldness that settled across the farm that could not be attributed to the frigid winds of the Midwestern winter.
Chris walked the length of the bus, running his fingers across the cold steel of the converted vehicle. Its matte black finish made it look more like an imposing shadow in the moonlight. Joe had finally cut rectangles into the corrugated steel covering the windows, giving them much needed shooting ports from any angle on board. He ran his fingers along the sharpened edges of the shark fin shaped blades along the vehicle’s sides.
If anything comes near us, they’re going to have a hell of a gash to remember us by, he thought. I hope it’s enough.
He stepped up onto his porch, stopping to run his fingers across the many splintery bullet holes punched into the wooden railings and supports. He sighed as he glanced back across the gravel drive at the broken barn door. Dan had destroyed the aging entrance not more than a couple weeks prior trying to get to his injured wife. The last time Dan stepped foot in through that door was to drag Adam to his death.
Chris shuddered as the memory of Adam’s shrill screams played back in his memory. He knew the man deserved it, but standing there and listening to a man being torn apart by the living dead just felt wrong. He wanted to go in and put a bullet in Adam’s head, but he had no idea what Dan would have done had he stepped in.
After seeing how far his brother was slipping, Chris found himself wishing that he had ended it anyway and just dealt with the consequences later.
Better to beg forgiveness than ask permission, he thought.
“You coming in?” Lexi asked, bringing Chris out of his thoughts.
She stood in the open doorway, the black barrel of her Ruger Compact Hawkeye rifle poking up from over her shoulder. Her auburn hair snaked out from beneath the bright orange hunting cap. She had traded in her jeans and winter coat for black cargo pants and hunting jacket, pockets weighted down with .308 rounds. Her pale face looked almost ghostly in the moonlight, dark circles ringing her hazel eyes adding to the effect.
“You’re too damn young to look so damn tired,” Chris sighed as he strolled inside. Weapon discipline, he thought, eyeing over the fresh sheen of oil on her rifle barrel. Good girl.
“Shh,” she whispered. “The kids just got to sleep.”
“How long?”
“Only a few minutes,” she answered. “You know, between the shots. I wish those things would forget we were here so we could go back to being quiet at night.”
“You and me both,” Chris replied, pulling his hat from his head and stuffing back into his coat pocket. “But they know we’re here. They’ve been nonstop since—”
“Since Abby,” Lexi whispered almost to herself. “How is he?”
“The same.”
“What is he doing out there?”
“I’m afraid to guess. I just hope it lets him heal a little.”
“Me too,” Lexi whispered, her glistening eyes cast to the floor.
“Where is everyone?” Chris asked, not even trying to hide the subject change.
“Rosa and Joe are asleep in the living room with the kids. Matt’s upstairs watching the back fields, and Anna’s in your room watching the road.”
“Okay then. I’m going to try and knock off for a couple hours. You should sleep too,” Chris yawned as he slipped off his coat.
“I’ll sleep when he does,” Lexi replied.
“Lexi,” Chris shook his head. “We’re all watching out for him. But I need you sharp and alert when you go on watch tomorrow. If you don’t sleep, I won’t let you up on that roof.”
“But…”
“No buts!” Chris snapped as quietly as he could. “Get to sleep or I’ll have Rosa give you something to make you sleep!”
“Fine. But only for a couple hours,” she pouted.
“That’s all I’m asking,” Chris gave her arm a squeeze. “Lexi, he’ll be okay. But it’ll take time.”
“Promise?”
“Promise,” Chris replied, hoping he wasn’t lying to the teen.
He followed Lexi into the living room to
check on the kids before he made his way to his own bed. The three little girls huddled together on an air mattress, a stack of heavy blankets mounded on top of them. Rosa was nearly lost in Joe’s arms as they held each other under several comforters on the sofa. Lexi sat back in Chris’ overstuffed recliner, wrapping herself in a thick quilt.
A low fire crackled in the fireplace, filling the room with the sweet aroma of burning maple wood. Chris inhaled deeply before leaving. It was the only room in the house that did not carry the sour tinge of a rotting planet wafting through the air. He glanced back over his shoulder at the kids, feeling an all too familiar emptiness growing inside him.
It’s not enough, he thought. They need more. How long can we keep doing this?
Chris topped the stairs, the thought of the kids weighing down on him like a lead weight. He glanced toward the other side of the house, seeing Matt sitting in an old rocking chair as he scanned the fields from his window. His elbows propped up on the sills, chin resting in his hand with the black outline of his rifle standing out against the white paint of the wall.
He looked back at Chris, a hopeful look painted across his otherwise sullen face. Chris dashed his hopes with a simple shake of his head. Matt let out an audible sigh before returning to his window.
Dan was on everyone’s mind.
He crept toward his room, carefully avoiding the loose board on the floor. As usual, he failed. He cringed at the loud pop of the wooden plank, waiting for the litany of complaints to hit him from the floor below. But no one stirred from their slumber. Everyone, including the kids, were at the limits of their exhaustion.
He slipped into his room, seeing his wife sitting in front of their bedroom window. Her blonde hair sat neatly tucked under her white knit cap. Her white coat zipped so far up that it almost covered the black scarf she had wrapped around her neck. Her hands were bare, refusing to wear her gloves, complaining that they impeded her ability to fire the Mosin-Nagant rifle effectively.
This Dying World (Book 2): Abandon All Hope Page 3