by Riva, Aline
“Calm down,” Nick cut in, placing his hand on her shaking arm, gently lowering her aim, then he called out into the fog.
“Ben, stop pissing around, she's scared. As scared girl with a gun, you'll get your backside blown off, man!”
Silence followed as the fog still swirled and tendrils of mist crept about them ghostly, the paleness of the fog against the darkness of the night seeming eerie at that too quiet a moment.
“Put the gun away, Carrie,” Nick said, peering into the fog and seeing the fence beyond it as Ben stayed out of sight, “And stop being an idiot, Ben!” he called through the haze of fog.
Still there came no reply.
“What's he doing out there?” Rick murmured as he thought about his carefully designed bladed battle hand and wished he was wearing it at that moment, just in case this wasn't a joke...
“He did this to me the other night,” Nick said, “Vanished in the mist, made stupid noises... came out laughing. I could have killed the bastard!”
Rick stepped into the fog.
“I'll handle this,” he announced, then spoke sternly, “Pack it up, Ben. It's not funny. Get your arse back here or I'm telling Jason you're fucking about when you should be on watch, have you got that?”
No reply came back to him. Rick looked about the white haze, seeing nothing and hearing no sound.
“Don't take the piss,” he warned, “You're scaring that girl half to death! Get back here now!”
Then as something came hurtling through the bank of mist, he saw the shape of it and raised both hands, catching it with ease as both human and prosthetic hand worked with equally fine reflexes.
“What did you chuck a ball at me for?” he called out.
Then something dripped heavily, landing thickly, at the same that he realised he was not holding a ball, the object felt solid and heavy in his metallic hand but wet and fleshy in his human gasp....
He looked down into the dead eyes of Ben as his blood stained face stared up at him and blood continued to drip. Rick gave a startled cry and dropped the severed head, it hit the ground and rolled, coming to a stop at Nick's boot as he gave a yell of alarm and Carrie let out a scream.
As they stumbled about in the mist in panic, Rick reached for the others, but suddenly darkness had closed in around them as figures began to emerge from the heaviest of the fog, encircling them, dark figures clad in black armed with swords, with masks covering their faces fashioned in the style of grinning skulls. Then a tall man stepped forward from the others, he too wore black and a flowing cloak was wrapped about his shoulders. His head was also covered by a mask of similar appearance but with a more pronounced bone white skull and he carried a long dagger sheathed at his side. As he spoke his voice was heavy with an accent that was hard to define.
“I am Mortiz. I have come for the scientist. Show no resistance and you may live.”
Nick pulled his gun, but his finger didn't get to touch the trigger as his hand opened up in shock and the gun dropped from his grip as the swords of several men sliced through his body midsection, the gleaming tips of blades thrust all the way through, sliver tainted red as he gasped, staring into the mist as his body jerked. Then the blade thrust outwards in unison, slicing the body clean in half. Nick fell in two pieces, legs twitching as his upper body, a short distance away, leaked blood and steaming entrails as death claimed him quickly.
Rick was frozen with fear and shock as he looked on in horror. Carrie fell into a dead faint, Mortiz caught her and scooped her into his arms, chuckling beneath his mask as he turned back to Rick.
“One should live to tell the tale of Mortiz,” he said darkly, “Such a great shame that was not the case at the Fountain Plaza. They fought so very hard! But the mall, oh, it was like a treasure chest! How we enjoyed plundering the fine plaza...And my poor infected ones, but how they feasted with delight on those freshly killed!”
Then he laughed, turned away and his figure melted back into the mist as he carried away the scientist and his soldiers retreated, vanishing like ghosts back through the thick cloak of fog.
Rick fell to his knees into a pool of blood, oblivious to it and the body parts strewn about the ground as tears streaked his face and his eyes burned with grief and the need for vengeance for all those at the mall, his people, slaughtered by Mortiz and his men and then left as a hellish feast for the undead to enjoy...
“I'll kill you for this!” he sobbed as he looked into the swirling mist, “I'LL KILL YOU!” he yelled, his voice echoing about the night and through the fog and out into the darkness beyond.
Then he sobbed some more, weeping for the lives lost at the hands of Mortiz and his soldiers, and finally as he gave a cry of anguish, that sound brought the others to the surface. Rick was still weeping inconsolably as they joined him, then looked in horror at the scene of sheer carnage that had happened in their absence.
Much later, after the body parts had been buried deep and the blood washed away to be sure the undead would not be lured by the scent of it, a meeting was called in the dining area and all who were still alive were present, except for Maxie, who was still in the long process of recovery, and Rick, who was in his room, resting and feeling thankful for a sedative to calm his shattered nerves as Lois tried to comfort him. The shock of knowing the truth about how his people had really died was almost too much to take, but when his tears had stopped flowing and a cold, silent rage had burned at the back of his eyes it was clear that now he knew the truth, he wanted Mortiz dead.
“I want his blood!” Rick had said in a low voice, “I want his fucking blood and I won't rest until I get it!!”
Now as the others sat around the table as night stretched on, David looked to the man who had just lost three members of his group. With Cassie taken and Ben dead, only Kit remained - Jason had lost half his small group and the others had lost Nick, a loss felt equally by Rick and David as in the days that had passed, their two groups had merged closely as one unit.
“Jason, we need to make a plan,” David said, and as the man in the surgical mask shook his head, David felt his anger rising.
“Half your crew is gone, what's wrong with you?”
Jason's blue gaze cooled like ice as he gave his reply.
“We thought it was just a myth. Clearly that was not the case. I'm not risking another life out there, the undead are one thing, but now we have to watch out for the living too? No, I won't do it. We're safe underground here, and we should stay put unless we want to get hacked up by Mortiz or torn apart by living dead things!”
“We have to try!”
“No, we don't!” Jason replied firmly, “We need to stay alive! We've all fought out there and seen other people die, we carry scars, all of us do – mine are visible maybe yours are not. I know Rick's will never fade, I saw the look in that man's eyes when he realised Mortiz killed his people – not the dead, the living, humans did that! Maybe the undead have the right idea, David – this world's gone to shit, maybe humanity should perish! Either way I don't care because I'm not giving my life – I've no cause to give it for now, there's nothing left - and my own survival means far more to me than watching us all get picked off one by one!”
As he finished saying his piece, David looked at him in silence for a moment, then cast a glance around at the others.
“They took Cassie. Think about that for a moment. She wasn't killed, he took her because she has scientific knowledge. That says to me, she's still alive. And she needs to be found.”
“You saw the state of the remains of those bodies,” Toby reminded him, “David, you're the one who need to think about this – he's a fucking maniac who employs maniacs to stand at his side! We saw the bodies in the mall – his people killed them all and then he fed the corpses it the undead. He's a lunatic. If we go in search of him, we'll all be killed.”
“And what about Cassie?” David exclaimed, “He's got a live prisoner there. What the fuck will he do to that poor woman? There could be others like her, he
could have other prisoners...All that talk about Mortiz being an urban legend was wrong. He's as real as we are. They call him the Collector. He abducts scientist, right? So we have to assume he has more than one person held prisoner. Even if I'm wrong, one is too many. We have to get her out.”
Jason shook his head.
“I had a small group here, we were hoping for others to come along and now you have, it makes sense that we stay here below ground and build a community. It's a safe environment, we have to focus on survival!”
Davis stood up, his eyes blazing as he slammed his fist against the table.
“No, we have to do what's right!”
“Right for who?” Jason asked, “You might want to wage a war against every undead and living, raging psychopath to come out of this worlds end scenario, but I want to survive! I've been up to my neck in death since this nightmare started, I don't want to see any more or bury anyone else I know, don't you get that?”
David glared at the man whose face was partly covered by the clear plastic mask as blue eyes reflected a raging anger that matched his own that turned his dark gaze even darker.
“This world is sick to the core,” David said bitterly, “If we don't fight against it until the day we die, we become a part of the problem, don't you see that? Humanity is giving up. We can't let that happen!”
“And we are just a small group of people,” Jason replied.
“We can make a difference,”Toby added, speaking his mind and cutting between the bitter disagreement that was getting no where near resolution as Jason refused to cave in to David's point of view.
Then Tara spoke out.
“For every day we go out there and search for survivors, search for hope, search for anything that gives us the vague promise of this nightmare ending, its enough!” she exclaimed, “We have to do something, even if we get nowhere, we have to try or all the people who died, the ones who were killed by the virus or victims of the undead – their deaths mean nothing if we don't fight back - we have to do it for them and our own futures!”
David looked around the table at the others.
Lauren shook her head.
“I'm sorry David, but Maxie needs me. And with only Jason and Kit here to run things, I'm needed here to help out. If Maxie wasn't paralysed I would have agreed with you I would have said yes, let's do this – but you saw what Mortiz and his men did to Ben and Nick. I doubt if Cassie is still alive. He's probably killed her like he killed the others. You could be going into this for nothing, dying for nothing because there's no one to save.”
David looked at her intently.
“One day there will be no one on earth left to save, one day we'll all be wiped out if we don't fight back!”
Lauren got up from her seat.
“Maxie needs me,” she replied, “And I'm staying here, I'm sorry...” then she left the room and David cast his glance about the table, shook his head and got up.
“If there's no unity between us we really have lost hope,” he said, and as the others remained silent he left the room, as Tara hurried after him, suddenly it seemed as if the group had fallen apart after one death too many...
Rick was on the bed in his room, on his back on top of the covers, his jacket was off, his prosthetic was on the dresser and as he lay there and wiped his eyes with the back of his intact hand, he looked to Lois with tear filled eyes.
“I can't sleep,” he said, “I can't rest or think all I can do is see them...my people at the plaza, and Mortiz and his bastards... Oh god, he fed their remains to those creatures like it was fresh meat! They were people, they were my friends!”
As Lois sat on the edge of the bed she felt helpless. It seemed there was nothing she could say that could lift the grief from his heart, nor the burning need to take revenge.
“I don't know about the others,” Rick added, blinking away more tears, “Maybe they've had enough. I saw people hacked to pieces tonight I saw a man cut in half, and there he was, that bastard in the mask, laughing about what he did at the plaza! That was mass murder!”
“I know,” Lois said quietly, then she looked at him sadly, again wishing she could make the pain and rage go away – but it had settled there in his heart and now it reflected in his eyes as Rick spoke again as his eyes blazed with fury and fear gripped her hear as she realised this determination to make Mortiz suffer could well come at a price – Rick wanted revenge no matter what the consequence, even his own death....
“I will have Mortiz,” he vowed, “Even if I have to track him down alone, I'll find him and I'll kill him and I'll feed him to the undead. I'll have his blood. His blood for the innocent blood he spilled at the plaza. And I don't care if I die in the process. I just don't care any more...”
Chapter 12
“We can't just leave like this – David, are you listening to me?”
“We can and we are leaving right now,” he replied as Tara looked to the entrance of the building where the others were below ground and yet to emerge.
“There's so few of us,” she added, “And so many of them...”
He stopped loading the car as the sun rose on a bright day, following her line of vision where in the distance, figures moved in the gloom of far off woods, unmistakeably undead, but too far off to pose a threat, they would be packed up and left by the time they arrived and the safe house would be locked down once more...
“Don't worry about them,” Lauren said as he looked through the wire fence, “I'll take turns with the other two on watch. Nothing will get in...and Mortiz unfortunately got what he wanted. He won't come back, not now he has Cassie.”
David closed the boot of the car and turned to her, looking into the eyes of the only survivor of the group of students who had made it on to the plane and out of the Arctic.
“Take care of yourself,” he said to Lauren, “And look after Maxie, too.”
“You be careful,” Lauren replied, then she hugged him and then hugged Tara too.
“We'll get through,” Tara assured her, “It's what we do best!”
Then Lauren went back inside, Tara watched her leave and there was a trace of sadness about her voice as she spoke again.
“I hope she can cope...it's going to be difficult, looking after Maxie.”
“They've got each other,” David reminded her, and hearing him say that made her smile – having each other made all the difference in the world, she knew that was true because without David she was sure she would never have got this far, let alone summoned the strength to take on day after day in this terrible world...
Lois had packed an hour before, leaving Rick to sleep one more night in a comfortable bed before they hit the road again. Now he was up and dressed and ready to leave, he headed for the door at the end of the tunnel that led to the outside world on the upper level.
“Rick, wait -”
On hearing Jason's voice he gave a sigh, stopping short of the door and turning back.
“No,” Rick said before the other man could speak, “I'm not staying. I would have stayed until I found out about Mortiz....” anger burned in his soft brown eyes as pain cracked his voice, “He killed my people and now I'm going to kill him!”
“But Lois won't be in danger, right? I mean, you won't expose her to any risk, will you?”
Rick blinked, then stared hard at Jason.
“Don't do this,” he said in a low voice, “I've seen the way you look at her, I've heard how you speak to her, I know you like her -” he moved lightning fast, grabbing Jason by his shirt and slamming him against the wall, “BUT SHE'S WITH ME, HAVE YOU GOT THAT, MATE?” he yelled as a brief spark of madness reflected in his wide eyes.
Jason dragged in a lungful of air as a look of warning sparked in his eyes.
“We can all kick off if we want to,” he said as he struggled to stay calm, “Let go, Rick. I'm not after Lois, okay?”
Rick let go of him and Jason took an easier breath, pausing to smooth out creases in his clothing.
�
��I swear it's not what you think. I was just saying to you that she's not a fighter. If you go after Mortiz she's better off staying here.”
“And if she was here I'm sure you'd know how to take care of her,” Rick replied, making no secret of the hostility he felt towards him, “She's not interested in you, Jason. She doesn't even like you!”
“I'm glad to hear it. You're so paranoid, Rick!”
“I'm what?”
“Para- never mind - forget it. Anyway, about you leaving today -”
“I don't have time for this,” Rick replied, “Me and Lois are off now. Bye!”
Then Rick walked off and headed for the surface, giving Jason no time to explain exactly what he had wanted to tell him.
As they stood by their car, David and Tara watched as Rick left the safe house, and then Toby also departed. The two men came over and stood with them, looking to the entrance and wondering who else would emerge. Sandra was next, she left the building with Kit who gave her a hug and then he went back inside. A car door closed as Lois got into the passenger seat of Rick's car and waited there for him.
He glanced over at her, then looked to the others.
“I know this is a bad time, we've all lost people and I'm not saying my loss is greater than yours, every life matters and we all grieve in the same way because pain is pain at the end of the day. But... I'm doing it, I'm going after Mortiz and I'll do it alone if I have to.”
“You won't be alone,” David promised, “I'll be right beside you.”
“I'm in too,” said Toby.
“And if Carrie is still alive, if she can get her hands on Adrienne White's theories, maybe we're on the path to finding a way to destroy the undead,” Tara pointed out.
David nodded.
“We can all hope for that,” he agreed, “And no matter what happens, we stick together – to the end, how ever it turns out.”
Then as he gave Rick a hug, Toby put his arms around the pair of them, then Tara stepped in and smiled as Sandra joined them and the group stood together, hugging tightly as they bonded in a solid moment of promise that Mortiz would be defeated.