As I mused, the lack of sleep from the previous night began to catch up with me. Stifling a yawn, I tilted my head down to rest my forehead against Joss's back. I figured it best I take advantage of the lull in action and close my eyes for a second.
~ ~ ~ ~
I flinched awake as the four-wheeler shifted underneath me. My hands seized Joss's shirt tightly before I realized we were stable. Joss had turned us onto an exit ramp. The sun was bright in my eyes and it took a few seconds before I could focus on anything, but I caught the perturbed look Joss gave me over his shoulder.
Once my vision cleared, I looked around, not recognizing any of the landmarks from when I'd first closed my eyes. I huffed as I realized I had been asleep for more than just a couple minutes and was mildly irritated with my lack of discipline.
Joss slowed the four-wheeler as we exited the highway. It gave me a chance to shake off my drowsiness and refocus on the world. I glanced at the cart, making sure it was secure, even though I had no reason to believe otherwise. I hoped Stephanie had gotten some much needed sleep, just as I had.
As we rounded a corner, I caught the road sign that labeled it Flamingo Road, and Joss let the four-wheeler roll to a stop. The fog of sleep was clouding my mind, and the sight that greeted us was so absurdly macabre, I felt like I was dreaming.
The street wasn't overly crowded with freaks, but there were more than I had encountered in any one place since leaving Dallas. It wasn't so much the number of freaks that littered the road, but how they were dressed. There were just as many freaks dressed in suits and evening gowns as there were in Hawaiian shirts and shorts, but those weren't the ones that stood out.
Showgirls.
At least three out of ten were wearing feathers and G-strings, or at least what was left of their ensembles. A few even had headdresses fixed in place, although they drooped and wilted, causing the freak's heads to drag to one side or the other to a painful degree. It was a horrible decoration on their starved and boney bodies.
I spotted one that wore a hot pink bikini top over her obviously fake breasts. The star-shaped cloth that covered her nipples had long tassels hanging from the middle of the fabric. The skin of her breasts had shrunk down to fit the odd, bulbous shape of the silicone underneath, and it hung awkwardly off her emaciated ribs. The sight was grotesque.
When I realized my jaw had been hanging open, my teeth made an audible click as I slammed it shut. We had caught their attention and a few freaks had already started to amble our way, their curiosity drawn by the rumbling engine of the four-wheeler. I grabbed Joss's arm, breaking him out of his trance, and pointed to a small plaza in the shadow of a lumbering hotel. Joss visibly shook himself, and he aimed the handlebars in that direction. His thumb pressed hard on the gas switch, and the four-wheeler roared forward.
Starting the four-wheeler off at such a sharp angle while the cart was skewed behind us was disastrous. When the four-wheeler leaped forward, the pull on the cart jolted all of us roughly, and we jerked to a stop. The cart tilted dangerously, two wheels lifting off the ground, and Joss quickly straightened the handlebars to roll us forward. My heart jumped into my throat as the wheels slammed down hard against the pavement. A chill crept up my spine as Joss's head snapped around, staring wide-eyed at the cart. I held my breath. His reaction confirmed what I thought I'd heard. Stephanie's muffled gasp.
Both of our eyes were darting everywhere, looking for even the slightest hint of frenzy. My mind was racing, hoping that the rumble of the engine was loud enough to cover the slight sound. I wasn't even sure I'd heard it until Joss reacted, and I was closer to her than any of the freaks.
Time slowed to a crawl. My eyes flashed from one pair of red-eyes to the next in rapid succession, but their behavior hadn't changed. Joss was shifting in his seat, trying to look every way at once, and as he twisted to look over his shoulder, our eyes met and locked. We both heard it. The growl that came from behind the cart shattered the stillness, and I could see Joss's world crumbling in his eyes.
"Go!" I shouted, rolling off the back without a pause. I stumbled as I tried to get my feet underneath me, but I was racing to the back of the cart a second later, my knife already bared. During our indecision, a single freak had managed to slip behind us unnoticed. It was so close. It's dark, ashen skin was sickly and gray, and it smelled of piss and dirt. Its red eyes glared at me hatefully as I rounded the corner, and its chest visibly expanded with air.
The horrible grating sound erupted from it, raising every hair on my body on end. It was like a cold hand reached into my gut and twisted. I quaked as the effect run through me, and I growled as I twirled the knife in my hand and stabbed. The blade crashed through its open mouth, sinking into the soft flesh of its throat, and stopped only when the hilt crushed against yellowed teeth.
The call cut off abruptly in a bloody gurgle. The freak bit down on the blade and the blade bit back, blood oozing from the fresh wounds. I jerked the knife free, and the freak tottered backwards, enraged but obviously confused. It spat and hissed as it searched wildly for Stephanie, unconcerned with me or the fatal wound in its throat. Blood was pouring out of its mouth and nose, and it choked as it tried to draw another breath.
My next move drove the blade into its eye, and it twitched once before it crumbled backwards into a heap.
I spun, spotting another freak closing in fast. This one was a showgirl covered in a green sequined bodysuit. She was several paces away, well out of my reach, and I could only watch in horror as she opened her mouth and screeched. The frenzy spread.
And Joss hadn't moved.
I turned back to scream at Joss, my eyes scanning the area for somewhere safe, or even defensible, but all I saw were freaks converging on us. Other freaks were taking up the call, the horrible sound drilling into my brain, and I matched it with my own yell, trying to drown them out. It didn’t work.
"Go, goddammit!"
Finally, the four-wheeler lurched forward, jerking the cart behind it, and I turned my knife on the sequined showgirl. The blade easily found a home in her throat, but it wouldn't kill her immediately. At least it shut her up, and I didn't have the seconds to spare once she was silenced. My focus shifted to the two freaks that were following Joss as he pulled away. The others were fixated on my activity, confused by the bodies I had already taken down, and they rushed in instinctively. I slashed at them with glancing blows as I ran past, frantic to stall the ones behind Joss.
The first one was easy. She wore what was left of a blue satin gown, and wore only one high heel shoe. She tripped herself before I even caught her, and I quickly added her blood to the mess that already covered me.
The second one was escaping, running full out behind the cart in a limping stride. It screamed, releasing another frenzy call as it slipped further away from me. Determined to kill it, I set my feet to run but collapsed as a searing pain shot through my head. All the freaks that were surrounding me had thrown back their head and answered the call in unison. I crumpled under their rage, struggling to stay upright as bright flashes of pain shot off behind my eyelids.
My blade fell to the pavement as I tumbled forward, my weakened grasp no longer able to hold it. The wails sucked at my energy, and I slapped my hands over my ears as I writhed on the ground, desperate to shut out the pain. It seemed an eternity, but their cry finally faded as they continued to mass around me. They growled and snapped at each other, but couldn't find what had drawn them in. They were confused they had nothing to attack.
My cheek scraped against the hard concrete as I raised my head, and I scanned what I could see of the plaza, trying to find Joss and the cart, but he had driven out of view. Able to hear the rumble of the four-wheeler's engine, a fraction of desperate hope rose in my chest, and I reached for my knife. Maybe I could sneak away from the probing mass of freaks that surrounded me without drawing their attention.
Then, from the direction Joss had gone, another growl grew into the frenzy cry before I'd regained my fee
t. The mass of bodies around me surged toward the new call, and the hope inside me shattered.
With my hand around the hilt of my knife again, I fought the weakness inside me, lashing out at a freak that brushed against my shoulder. My lame attack barely slowed him down, and his rush knocked my hand away. Deja vu assaulted me as memories of the night I lost Seth sprang up unbidden, and it knocked me back down to all fours again, the knife clattering on the ground.
I fought for each breath even though there was nothing physically wrong with me, and I suddenly had the urge to vomit. Joss couldn't protect her, not against what was coming at him, and I had been too slow. I had failed again.
Get up! Get up! Get up!
The thought screamed at me, pleaded for me to move. Swallowing down the bile, I reached for the knife again as straggling freaks ran past me. The effort it took to pull myself up was almost as draining as the assault that had knocked me down in the first place. Every step forward was a new challenge, and my mind was already painting visions of a scene I didn't want to see.
But I had to keep going.
Pushing myself through each movement, I worked up to a run. My strength returned slowly with each footfall. Rounding the corner, my eyes fell on the four-wheeler and an overturned cart, but no Joss and no Stephanie. Dread knotted around my heart until I realized there was no blood.
"Joss! Stephanie!" I cried, my eyes raking through the mob of confused and frenzied freaks, but I couldn't find them. A freak spun on me, hissing at me as I added to its confusion, and I punched it in the face, screaming louder. "Joss!"
"Ali!" I whirled at the sound of Joss's cracking and panicked voice. Shoving a freak out of the way, I ran in the direction his call had come from and found myself in the center of the plaza, but couldn't see Joss or Stephanie. Instead, I saw a stream of freaks rampaging down the side of the building, and the dread swelling inside me gave my stomach another kick. Hardening my resolve, I followed.
Running into a tight alley, jostling freaks out of my way in my rush to get there, my jaw dropped in shock as I laid eyes on Joss. He stood atop a garbage dumpster, his shirt ripped and his chest dark with fresh blood, and he roared at the freaks pressing against the metal beneath him. The hatchet in his hands swung back and forth without pause, lashing out at each freak that got near him. The throng around him was already three bodies deep, and Joss was working furiously to keep them at bay.
The last of his innocence was falling away in front of me, and it was another vision that would be seared into my memories forever. Stephanie was nowhere to be seen, so I focused on Joss and pressed forward, ignoring the grim probability.
Choking back tears, I fought my way through the growing crowd. Freak after freak fell to the bite of my blade, but I wasn't making progress. As soon as I killed one, three more would rush past me from the plaza. There was no end to them.
The constant killing motion was draining, blade cutting flesh, dragging against unyielding bone, again and again. I quickly grew numb to the warm spray of blood and gore. More freaks came in and more went down one after another. Some in suits and ties, and others in t-shirts. Hawaiian shirts, evening gowns, or nipple tassels, it didn't matter. They frenzied and growled and died just the same.
I closed the gap to the dumpster but couldn't get past the tight pack of bodies that surrounded it. Joss was growing weary, disgust and exhaustion etched on his face, but he kept at it, knocking back every freak that laid a hand near him.
"Where is she?" I cried, regretting that I'd asked, but hoping he had heard me at the same time. Was she inside the dumpster, safe and unbitten? I couldn't bring myself to ask more.
"Safe." He paused to answer me, the hatchet held high over his head ready to swing again. "Maybe scratched up, but we made it ahead of them."
"Thank God," I muttered and felt a new energy surge through me. I continued to thin the crowd methodically, perfecting my death blows. Most of the swings from Joss's axe didn't kill the freaks but opened bloody, weeping gashes instead. Some swings did manage to land true, scattering bits of skull and brain along with feathers and sequin. Bodies piled on top of bodies until I couldn't stand on the pavement anymore and was forced to walk on a floor of flesh.
At one point, Joss fell to his knee, dry heaving. A freak next to his head hissed and growled at him, and Joss scowled back. A second later, his hatchet was buried in the middle of the freaks forehead, and Joss kicked it away. The nausea and disgust hampered me as well, and I swallowed it down as best I could. The crowd was thinning, and we were finally making headway. I had to climb over bodies to get to the live freaks, and I knew we were near the end of it.
Moments later, Joss crumbled to a sitting position on top of the dumpster, completely spent and exhausted. He had done his job well. No freak near him was moving. The few that were alive were confused rather than frenzied, and I easily finished them off.
When I turned to Joss, he was wiping tears, sweat and blood from his face as best he could. Dirty, brownish streaks smeared his cheeks, and neither one of us had a clean spot left on our body. There was no elation of victory, just weariness at the end of this battle before the next one inevitably started. Even though we had made it through, the defeated look in his eyes was devastating. His confidence that we could keep Stephanie alive was fading.
I climbed over the bodies, ignoring the uneven floor I was stepping on, and made my way to the dumpster. I inspected the wound across his chest, but it only looked like a scrape. Dismissing it and ignoring the plaintive look he gave me, I went on. The look in his eyes screamed of uncertainty, but I couldn't deal with it right then. There was an urgency bearing down on me to make sure Stephanie was okay with my own eyes.
Pushing the lid of the dumpster up, I looked in to see Stephanie laying atop five year old trash bags and sobbing. She cowered, holding her hands in front of her face to shield her swollen eyes from the light.
"I'm sorry." She sobbed, and her face crumpled. "I'm so sorry."
Then she slapped her hands over her mouth as if to trap the sound in. I huffed in disbelief and looked back down the alleyway. Any freak that would have heard her within a hundred yards was already dead. Looking back down at her, my voice cracked as I spoke. "I think it's clear."
She rolled to her side, curling her body around her swollen belly, and sobbed. I looked at the gore that covered me, then to Joss and the new slash that crossed his chest. Neither Joss nor I was in a state to comfort her, and all my energy was spent. I was out of ideas. Closing my eyes, I rested my head against my hand and searched for a solution to this mess. I came up empty.
During my pause, Joss was acting. He peeled off his filthy shirt and used the somewhat cleaner inside to wipe away some of the muck, including the fresh blood along his scrape. Then he pushed me gently to the side as he climbed down beside Stephanie and awkwardly pulled her to him. She wept against him, not noticing or caring that the blood and sweat that was covering Joss was rubbing off on her.
Joss had his eyes closed as he cradled her. For a moment, I tried to recall him as the boy I had saved in the supermarket so long ago, but the vision of him so young and helpless faded away. This new world would not allow him adolescence, and he had pulled through today where I had not.
Be my strength, Joss.
He didn't see it, but I nodded my approval. Joss could share in the burdens we carried now, for better or worse. I no longer felt alone.
Leaning heavily on the dumpster, I wanted to rest but knew I couldn't. Taking a moment to gather what drive I had left, I whispered to Joss, sure that he would hear me. "We need to find a place to rest for the night. One of these buildings has to be. . ."
My head snapped to the entrance of the alleyway, the smell of smoke invading my senses. Joss, having been listening to me, immediately set up when he saw my reaction. "What is it?"
"Stay here." I waved him back down, already stumbling and tripping over bodies as I hurried away. As soon as I found level footing, I raced to the entrance of th
e alley.
On the other side of the plaza, away from the hotel, a small bonfire blazed.
~ ~ ~ ~
The fire was not an accident. Intentionally set by human hands, it was small and controlled, and it gathered the remaining freaks that had not been caught by the frenzy. They milled around it predictably, and I dismissed them. Even with the looming threat of them discovering Stephanie, that was no longer the worry at the forefront of my mind. I was focused on discovering who had set the blaze.
Reed? Why would he toy with us instead of killing us? He couldn't have caught up to us that fast. I dismissed the idea. Someone else was here.
I squinted, scanning the area for a sign of someone living here, but the area was abandoned aside from the freaks. The four-wheeler's engine rumbled softly as it idled, and the cart lay on its side behind it. They remained untouched.
An exaggerated movement from the fourth floor of the hotel across the plaza drew my gaze upward. My eyes zeroed in on the thick curtains billowing out from an open window, and a small shape moved in the darkness beyond. My breath caught in my throat as the tension coiled inside me. I stared, waiting.
The body drew closer to the edge, masked in shadows, but I could see through them. It was a she, I was sure of it despite the close cropped dark hair, and she was young. Maybe a young woman, but I couldn't see clear enough to determine her age. She stared down at me for a long moment before she moved.
A slim arm shot out the window, pointing at the building to my right. I glanced over, trying to see what she was indicating, and when I looked back, she was gone. I sucked in breath, meaning to call out to her, but let the call die away in an exultation of air. I couldn't bring the freaks back down on us by doing something stupid like shouting after her.
"Damn it." I muttered, turning to the building on my right. I ran along the glass front, seeing rows of tables and chairs inside. The steaming coffee cup painted on the glass of the small café was flaking and peeling, but from what I could see of the interior, it looked safe. The entry door was also made of glass, and I grasped the long metal handle attached to its frame and gave a gentle tug, not really thinking anything would happen. I gasped when the door opened.
The Phoenix Curse (Book 3): After Page 8