by TW Brown
Without another word, she slung her leg over the seat of her bicycle and began to pedal off. The other two looked at each other with long faces. Deep down, each felt very strongly that they were correct in their decision, but it did little to ease the gnawing pain on their souls.
Vix was struggling with her thoughts and emotions as well. She believed to her core that she would have gone into those buildings to attempt a rescue. Yet, she had engaged the others in her argument until it was a moot point. Had she done so intentionally? Had she secretly hoped that the situation would resolve itself before she had been forced to act?
She continued to war within herself as she wove through the dead streets on her way to a destination that she was not sure that she could actually find. And if she did…then what?
She tried to imagine setting up home in that little country cottage. She would live her days in that place that held so many magic memories for her as a child…
Her mind snapped out of its reverie as if splashed with ice cold water. She had no real idea of how long she had been riding. She also did not understand how she had ridden so close to the rear of a wandering mob of the undead without the warnings from her friends. Squeezing the hand brakes, she winced at the squeak from her tires as she came to a sudden stop. She glanced over her shoulder. She almost expected them to be gone.
Harold was standing up and pedaling like his life depended on it. The distance between her and her two friends had become enormous. At some point, she had simply left them behind. Gemma was no longer moving. She had indeed come to a complete stop. For a fraction of a second, Vix felt her anger stir. It was bad enough that they had refused to help a stranger; but now it seemed as if Gemma had extended that policy to include Vix as well.
A chorus of moans brought her back sharply to the task at hand. There were a good ten meters between her and the closest cluster of walkers that had broken away from the rear of the herd and headed her direction.
“It just never ends,” Vix sighed. A voice in the back of her mind told her to stop fighting. Perhaps it would be better if she were to simply wait for the swarm to overwhelm her.
***
Juan put one hand in the middle of April’s butt and shoved. She tumbled over the top of the fence and landed with an audible explosion of air. Juan didn’t hesitate a second as he pulled himself up, swung a leg over, and threw his body over. He missed landing on a sprawled April by inches.
She was not moving. Her mouth worked much like a fish as she tried in futility to suck air into her lungs. Tears were filling her eyes and she looked at Juan in pain and fear.
“Got the wind knocked out of you, that’s all,” Juan said as he rolled over and made his way to his knees. He took her hand and patted her a few times. “It feels like you will never be able to breathe again, but it will be fine in a minute.”
He stood up and looked back over the fence. At least a hundred deaders were coming his way. They would be slowed down by the fence, but it would not hold them long before they simply forced it to buckle over.
“On your feet,” Juan said as he reached down and grabbed one of April’s arms. He slung it over his shoulder as she continued to make hoarse wheezes and gasps. “Do what you can, but we gotta go.”
He started out across the overgrown yard. He was halfway there when a heavy thud sounded and made him stumble, dropping April in a heap. Spinning to the source of the noise, it took him a few seconds to realize that the sound was coming from a sliding glass door that sat in the center of the back side of the house that the yard they were crossing belonged.
“Damn,” Juan breathed.
Standing in the frame of the filthy, smeared glass were three children between the ages of maybe five and ten. One of them had the handle of a large kitchen knife jutting from the middle of her chest. That was upsetting, but it was the figure squirming at their feet that made Juan wince. It was probably the mom of the three children. She was missing one entire arm and the other was gone just around the elbow. It was also fairly obvious that her legs were missing as well.
April tried to look past him, but Juan lurched forward, jerking her along. By the time they reached the other end of the yard, she was almost able to walk on her own. Juan peeked over the wooden slat fence and was relieved to find that the way was relatively clear. He pulled himself up and over and then grabbed April’s wrists and helped her over. Just as her feet touched the ground, the splintering crash of the fence sounded.
“Not much farther and we can circle around and find a way down the hill,” Juan said as April waved away his attempts to help her walk.
“And what does that mean for me?”
Juan paused, at first confused by the question. He realized that he hadn’t really said anything to April after coming to her rescue back at the cut that led to the railroad tracks.
“Look, I don’t know how this shakes out,” Juan admitted, “but I couldn’t just leave you like that.”
“But if it would have happened a few minutes later when I was out of sight…” she let that statement hang in the air.
“I’m not that person you think I am. And no matter what you think you know about me based on some random event where we crossed paths, you got me all wrong.”
“You telling me you didn’t practically beat a man to death?”
“Is this really the time for this conversation?” Juan threw up his hands in exasperation. “We been on the run from deaders for at least an hour. I could have left you to your fate, but I didn’t. Doesn’t that count for something?”
April spun to face Juan. She stared into his eyes as if searching for anything that she could use to make her determination about who it was she was dealing with.
“If anybody here is a bit of a crazed killer…” Juan raised an eyebrow.
“That’s just it,” April fell in as Juan started to jog again in the general direction that would lead them to the river, “I had this urge to protect you that came out of nowhere I can understand. I want to like you, but I just saw so much stuff working that neighborhood.”
“So you just start killing people?” Juan asked, not bothering to hide how incredulous he was at her weak excuse.
April ran in silence for a while. They sped past a few single walkers here and there, but nothing as bad as what they had left behind. Juan was beginning to think that April was done with the conversation.
“I’ve had to kill a few people since this began…” Her voice started strong but grew faint and soft as she continued. “Like I said, I was working a pretty bad part of the city when this started. I ran into a few people early on who were taking full advantage of the chaos and lack of any viable law enforcement response.”
Juan knew just the sort of people she was talking about. He had run with a group led by one such man. His name had been Travis Reynolds, and once he rejoined his old buddy Gary Messer, things had gotten out of control in a hurry. If she had met anybody like those two…he shuddered.
“I was trying to hide from this pack of…deaders,” she used Juan’s word and shot him a slight smile. “I ducked into a ratty little apartment complex…the ones that every parole officer in the city knows because he has at least one person on his or her case load living there. I didn’t recognize where I was until I burst into the first door that wasn’t locked.”
They ran in silence a bit as April kept seeming to speak, but then stopping. By the time they reached the bottom of the hill and were traveling along the shore of the Willamette River back towards where he’d left the boat, she continued.
“I didn’t get away for almost a month.”
She let that statement rattle around in his head. Juan would not have blamed her if that was the end of the conversation. After all, it was absolutely none of his business.
***
“Jesus,” Glenn said with an involuntary gasp and shudder.
Ann’s face was beautiful if you could look past the hideous scar that ran across it at eye level. The left eye was missing,
leaving nothing but a horribly puckered hole that seeped a pus-like fluid that looked to be as thick as tree sap. That scar came from the left temple and continued across the bridge of the nose that sat crooked with a large dent and ended where the right eyebrow should be. While certainly not fresh, the wound did not look terribly old either.
Ann looked down and away, a slight flush coming to her cheeks. Everybody immediately did his or her best to wipe the look of horror from their face as they assumed they had just embarrassed their guest. Everybody that is except Mel. She was almost certain that what she saw on this woman’s face was rage, not embarrassment.
“Please, come and let me show you where we have all the clothes and the wash water so you can get cleaned up,” Glenn offered.
“That would be nice.” Ann nodded.
The pair left the room and Mel let out an exhale that she did not realize she had been holding. Xander wriggled to be set down and toddled over to his hammock and the few toys he had been sleeping with.
He pulled the stuffed rabbit that Uncle Glenn had brought back one day when he returned from a scavenging run. The stuffed animal had been far from new and Mel had insisted that it be boiled and hung up to dry before it was given to her son. Unfortunately, Xander had seen the toy and grabbed it from Glenn’s hands and promptly stuffed one ragged, floppy ear into his mouth. Of course all their worry had been for nothing, but Mel had not slept for three days as she watched and waited to see if her son would become sick…or worse.
That seemed like a lifetime ago. Now, as far as Mel was concerned, there was something far more dangerous in their midst.
Kyle walked along the rope bridge behind the diminutive woman. He was trying his best to prepare himself for the next time he saw her face. It was easy to see that she had been a beautiful woman once. And he was not versed well enough in Asian culture; she could be Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, or something else, but whatever she might be, he had barely been able to detect even the slightest accent—not that it would have helped.
Just as quickly, he decided that it was not worth being concerned about. Now that the dead walked, there were really only two “races” if you asked him: living and undead.
“You are all family,” Ann broke the silence. It was a statement, not a question.
“My wife, the one who was shot, is the sister of the tall fella,” Glenn said with a little bit of a laugh. “Most folks think that it is Kyle and I who are related. Personally, I don’t see it.”
“And the child belongs to Kyle and the blond woman? I do not recall her name.”
Ann opened the door of the second treehouse and paused a second before going to the basin and pouring water from one of the large plastic containers. Kyle closed the door and when he turned around, felt his heart leap to his throat. The woman had already peeled out of her outfit and was standing naked with her back to him as she began to dip a large piece of cloth into the basin and wipe at her arms.
“M-M-Melissa…but we just call her Mel.” Glenn spun back to face the door. “Umm, I will just step outside until you are finished.” He reached for the knob, but a hand on his shoulder made him freeze.
“I will not be able to reach my back. If you could do that before you go.”
Kyle felt his throat tighten and his mouth go dry. He squeezed his eyes shut and turned back around. He felt a wet rag stuffed into his hand. Then, a hand guided his up and placed it against soft, warm flesh. He winced just slightly, but tried to wipe at what he hoped was the woman’s back.
“Such a modest man…and a gentleman.” Ann’s voice was soft and held a hint of playfulness.
Kyle re-doubled his efforts to not think about the fact that he was standing in a room with a naked woman that was not his wife. He tried to bring the image of her ruined left eye to his mind in order to assure that his body did not react inappropriately. It was a difficult battle as he realized that he and his wife had not been intimate in quite a while. It was simply not a comfortable situation sharing a single room with her brother just a few feet away. It was not that the thought did not cross his mind, but there simply had not been any time that had offered itself in quite a long while.
The last time had been just after a fresh snow. They were still holed up in that cabin west of Denver. Mel and Kyle were both down with a bit of the flu and he and Cynthia went to get some fresh water from a nearby creek. The sun had peeked out and hit her face just as she looked back and laughed at one of his terrible jokes. He had been overwhelmed with just how pretty she was at that moment. One thing led to another and pretty soon he was—
No! he thought with all the force and energy he could muster. Already his body was trying to betray him.
“That should do it,” he blurted as he dropped the rag, spun and ducked out the door as quick as possible.
Left alone, Ann continued to clean herself up. Killing was always such dirty business. Once she finished, she went to her pile of dirty clothing and retrieved the Glock nine millimeter. Looking around, she discovered a secret compartment on the upper level that was disguised to look like a knot on the trunk of the tree that grew up through the floor and vanished through the ceiling. It was not perfect, but these people did not look like the sort to do a lot of snooping. They were just happy to still be alive.
As she climbed down and prepared to exit this treehouse and rejoin the others, Ann smiled. It was not something that would have brought warmth to any who saw it.
***
“This way!” Chad called over his shoulder as he waded into the brush.
Dustin climbed off his horse and quickly followed. He paused as he passed the downed corpse of the Madding family’s oldest daughter Kaja. Kneeling, he closed the eyes and whispered a quick prayer.
By the time he caught up with Chad, the man was at the top of a ridge looking down into a gated community. The undead roamed the streets, wandering in and out of houses in a twisted parody of a block party. Three of the houses stood out from the rest. They were surrounded on all sides by dozens of the undead.
Chad glanced at Dustin. “I am going down there. That is where Ronni is.”
“How can you know that?” Dustin grabbed Chad’s arm. The man spun on him with a look in his eyes that actually made the larger man let go and take a step back.
“I can’t be sure, but it is the closest thing to a chance that we have seen. Something has those walkers gathered around those houses.”
“Then let’s go,” Dustin said with a sigh after he looked down one more time. From this distance, it didn’t look like such a daunting task, but once they went over that wall, he knew that perspective would change.
The two men went back and got their horses. There was no fenced field close by that they could set the horses free in, but they could not just tie them up. If a zombie arrived, the animals would not have a chance. It was quickly decided that they would have to let the animals go free and hope for the best.
Both men checked their protective gear and slung their crossbows onto their backs. Each had two dozen bolts and would need to make every shot count. They reached the five foot wall that circled the entire development and Chad went over first.
Dustin followed and was dismayed to discover a handful of the walking dead already heading their way. He watched Chad head right for them with an axe in one hand and a machete in the other. All five were dispatched before Dustin could even catch up.
“There were three houses with crowds around them,” Chad said. “The best thing to do is just take the closest one first.”
Together, the men headed over to the closest house and moved along the wall. Chad led the way and raised his hand when he reached the end and peeked around the corner.
The yard was busy with a dozen or so zombies milling forward and scratching at walls and a boarded up picture window. The glass was almost ground to dust under the feet of the zombies, leading Chad to believe that the window had been busted out long ago. More zombies could be heard in the fenced back yard. Since
there was no gate on this side, the obvious assumption was that it was on the other side of the house and open—if it was still even in existence.
Chad held up his hand and pointed to Dustin, then scurried in a crouch to the car that sat in the driveway with all the doors wide open. Peeking inside, he could see a few suitcases and some boxes in the back seat of the Lexus. The keys were in the ignition. Looking closer, he saw a dark stain on the driver’s seat. It wasn’t hard to guess what had happened here.
Reaching the rear of the car, he was able to give the front of the house a good look. The upstairs windows were intact, but in one, a single figure stood. Chad didn’t need to look that close or that long. The filth that smeared the glass told him all he needed to know. He crept back to Dustin.
“This place is a bust. The zombies gathered around are probably drawn here whenever the zombie or zombies inside make a noise.”
“How do you know there are more inside?” Dustin whispered.
Chad explained about what he’d seen in the upstairs window. Dustin shrugged in a non-committal way that had Chad wondering how the man had actually lasted this long. It was obvious that the big man was not exactly understanding the dynamics of what he was being told about basic zombie behavior.
Taking a few seconds to gather his bearings and try to recall what he could remember seeing from the ridge above, Chad set off for the second house. It turned out to be more of the same situation. He tried not to be too discouraged. If the third house was a bust as well, they would be back to square one when it came to searching for his daughter.
The last house would take them the farthest into the development. They used the fenced back yards to travel in order to minimize the chances of being seen.
On a couple of occasions, Chad thought that their location might have been given up when a zombie trapped inside the house of the yard they were crossing would bang on a back window or sliding glass door. The first time it happened was the worst as both men let out a little shout of surprise. They were better prepared on subsequent events, but Chad was amazed at just how loud those poundings or slappings seemed in the near silence.