The two men didn’t waste any time. They rushed to the towers and after checking one guard, they found he was dead. The other guard was still alive, and very much conscious as Uncle Charlie dragged him into the clear.
My dad was very direct with the man. “My name is John Talon. This is Charlie James. This is a really big gun. I want my son and his daughter. Where are they?” My dad was kneeling on the man’s chest, holding his old stainless 1911 to the man’s sweating forehead. Uncle Charlie had drawn one of his tomahawks, and was staring at the man with such malevolence it was a wonder the man didn’t have a heart attack on general principles.
“Th...They’re in the l-l-lab. Basement f-f-floor.” The guard couldn’t keep his eyes off Charlie, who helped the man’s fear by smiling evilly.
My dad stood up. “Get lost. I see you, I kill you.”
The guard scrambled to his feet and shuffled off into the gloom. When he was near the edge of trees, he shouted out. “Ben’s ready for you! He’s going to enjoy killing…”
Whatever the man was going to say was lost as he crumpled to the ground. Another figure had stepped out of the darkness and had dropped the man with a brutal smack to the back of his head. I was surprised and relieved when my Uncle Tommy joined the fray.
“Hey, Aaron. Might want to close your mouth before you get bugs in it,” he said as he stepped over to us. “Like my distraction, John?”
“Love it. But they’re ready for us now. Let’s get in. You and Duncan take the high road, Charlie and I will take the low. Aaron, you and Kayla take the middle and get inside. Find Jake and Julia. If it’s not one of us, put it down. Clear?”
My dad was all business, but I could see the tension in him. If anything, Uncle Charlie was worse. That man was practically vibrating with energy.
“Go!”
Chapter 45
Just one word and the four of them were through the broken gate. Uncle Duncan and Uncle Tommy went through with their guns up, ready to fire at anything that moved. Dad and Uncle Charlie swept through the gate on the left side, separating and drawing their weapons with practiced ease. Kayla and I seemed to stumble along, bringing up the rear, but in truth, we were moving as fast as the others were.
I started towards the building when there was a large metallic crash behind us. I spun around and saw another gate had fallen down, closing off the main entrance. The lights that illuminated the yard and the space around the yard suddenly went dark, forcing our eyes to adjust quickly to the sudden gloom.
A voice came out of the building, somewhere on the second floor, laughing with barely suppressed glee. I thought I was only going to snare the one son, now I have the other and the father as well. And as an added bonus, I have another father and his daughter as well,” the disembodied voice cackled. “And what a delight she will be, I assure you!”
My Uncle Charlie said nothing. He just raised his twin tomahawks over his head and beat them together three times. The ringing steel echoed off of the building and sang out over the homes and the canal. He lowered them and stood with them by his sides, his head down as if he was praying.
My father explained this behavior to me once. It was Charlie’s way of signaling that this fight was to the end, either his or his enemy’s. No quarter would be asked or given, and there would be no holding back whatsoever. Uncle Charlie had just told everyone in that building were dead men.
Ben seemed unaffected, however. In the ensuing silence, he called out. “Allow me to greet you properly, John Talon. Let’s see if you’re still the killer you were after all these years!”
The piles of debris which made up the walls of the yard weren’t really piles of garbage. The flotsam and jetsam of civilization had been attached to hidden walls which swung upward, revealing dark recesses within. Inside those areas, little lights danced and swayed. Only they weren’t little lights. They were the glowing eyes of dozens of zombies suddenly freed from their prisons. It was a pretty simple thing to deduce they hadn’t been fed in a while. The purpose of the yard was suddenly clear. It wasn’t for protection. It was for feeding.
I reacted instinctively, pulling my falchion from its scabbard and preparing to deal with as many zombies as I could. I pulled my tomahawk from its sheath and held it in my left hand. I wanted to be able to kill with both hands swinging.
My father’s voice cut through the moans that were coming out of the containers as the zombies shuffled forward, their glowing, unblinking eyes fixated on their targets.
“Aaron! Take the center! Go now!” He yelled.
I understood immediately. He wanted me to get into the building while the group inside might be distracted with the spectacle outside. It would keep them off balance and might gain me some time to find my brother and Julia. He also didn’t want to announce what I was doing, either.
Uncle Tommy and Uncle Duncan began firing, and I noticed they concentrated their fire near the building, clearing a path for Kayla and me. I looked back at Kayla and nodded towards the building, and I was relieved to see she understood as well.
Chapter 46
We bolted for the glass front of the old school, jumping over dead bodies and gaining the door. I brought the pommel of the sword up and cracked the glass in one blow. Using my boot, I kicked a large picture window in, crashing glass all over the ground. Kayla was right behind me as we went through, and I quickly put away my sword and axe, replacing them with my M1A. I wasn’t going to waste time crossing blades with anyone. I was just going to blast them to hell.
The hallways were dark and the only light was coming from the rear of the building where the homes were on fire. I could hear steady firing from the front where my father and uncles were, which was a good thing, since it told me someone was alive and fighting. I needed to make the most of the time I had and find Jake and Julia quickly.
“Where do we go, Aaron?” Kayla asked, working the charging handle on her rifle and chambering a round.
I got my bearings quickly. Since we were in school, there was going to be a few hallways and a lot of rooms. I guessed that the upstairs would be devoted to Ben and his activities. He seemed to have the ego for it. On this floor would be some general living areas and supply rooms. I thought the interrogation rooms and holding cells would be where there would be no chance for escape, which meant downstairs.
“We need to find a way downstairs. If Julia and Jake are here, chances are they’re being held somewhere below,” I said, walking forward.
“What if Ben took Julia upstairs to his quarters?”
I didn’t want to think about that. “Let’s get moving and hope we can eliminate possibles.” I didn’t mention the obvious. That I wanted to eliminate Ben as well.
We moved down the hall, heading south, if my sense of direction was still working. We didn’t encounter anyone, and I thought that was fairly odd. I was wired as hell, and if something didn’t come out and play, I was going to start shooting just for giggles.
At the end of the hall, the route took a sharp left turn, and I walked wide, crouching low and trying to be a small of a target as possible. Kayla went to the edge of the corner and when I cleared the outside, she cleared the inside. If anything was unfriendly, it was dead.
That hallway was clear as well, and this was getting downright spooky. Ben went to the trouble of keeping zombies stored for intruders, yet once we were inside, we were free to move around the place? It didn’t make sense at all and I said as much to Kayla.
“Something’s not right here. There should be guards or traps and what else. These rooms were occupied recently and now they’re just empty.” I pointed to the room next to me and it was obvious someone had used it for a personal space.
“Well, maybe they’re all downstairs,” Kayla said. “The nearest stairwell is over there.” She pointed to a corner where a set of stairs peeked out at us around a half-closed door.
We crept over and I carefully moved down in the dark. I didn’t want to use my flashlight because I had this little phob
ia about making myself into a target for enemy shooters. At the bottom of the stairs was a set of doors, and a quick check proved they were locked. Likely, there was a crash bar on the other side, but we weren’t getting through this way any time soon. I tried to see through the small window, but it was no use. I might as well have kept my eyes closed for all I could see.
“Come on; let’s see if there is another way.” I led the way back the way we came, moving quickly because I knew it wasn’t occupied. That little feature of this place was still strange. We went into an office in the southwest corner of the building, and I risked a small light, cupping my hand over the beam and allowing only a small sliver through. The office looked normal enough, except for one little detail. Every single window had a large desk pushed in front of it. At first, I thought the people here just wanted to see out, but then I realized it was intended to keep things from getting too far if they broke in.
“What’s that?” Kayla asked, pointing to an area in the next office.
I looked closely. “Might be what we’re looking for,” I said.
We stepped over to the small bit of metal railing that was sticking out of the middle of the floor in the central office. I turned the light down to see a circular stairway leading into a very black hole.
“Guess we found our way down. Wonder why they have a stairway here?” Kayla asked.
“Probably to save time from running down the hall. These old buildings have all kinds of shortcuts and passageways. Lets’ go,” I said. “Maybe anyone down there will think we’re supposed to be here and not shoot us in the legs.”
“Christ, Aaron, did you have to say that?”
I moved as fast as I could down the stairs, letting the full beam of my light find the stair and area below. When I reached the bottom, I stopped suddenly. I let my light shine around slowly and it revealed about a dozen men lying on the floor. Most of them had been either stabbed or slashed to death. Throats had been cut, chests had been stabbed, and arteries had been severed. I began to suspect I knew where all the men had gone and why we hadn’t met with any resistance. Question was, what could have brought them all down here? This wasn’t a zombie attack; this was something else.
Chapter 47
Kayla came down quickly and stopped as suddenly as I had. Her light was on and added to the lit area. She moved it around and took in the grim scene.
“My God, what happened here?” She asked. Kayla shined her light through an open door across the slaughter and something seemed to catch her eye. She gingerly made her way to the room and looked inside. “Aaron, there’s two more in here. Wait!” She ducked inside and reemerged holding a backpack. “This is Jake’s! They must have held him in there! He must have escaped!” Kayla was excited and scared at the same time as she looked at the floor. “Is he here?”
I shrugged and started looking at the bodies. I turned over several, and was relieved each time that I didn’t find my brother, but I was getting worried, too. If he had escaped and managed to do this kind of damage, where was Julia? Did something drive him to inhuman rage? Did he see something that threw him over the edge? I was getting a really bad feeling and hoped with all my heart that I was wrong.
I stood up after checking the last man, and he wasn’t Jake either. I turned around to find Kayla shining her light down the hallway. From where I stood, I could see a small blood trail on the floor, as if something was bleeding, yet dragging itself along.
Kayla was shaking. In a small voice she said, “Jake?”
I bolted past her into the hallway and saw a small figure huddled into a ball on the floor. His eyes were closed and he was bleeding from a dozen cuts and stab wounds, but he still held a blood-covered knife in his hand. I checked his pulse and by some miracle, I could feel a faint, defiant heartbeat.
“Jake? It’s Aaron. I’m here. Kayla’s here. You’re safe now. Jake, can you hear me? Stay with me, brother.” I yanked my backpack off while Kayla cradled Jake’s head in her lap. I ripped open the kit, pulling out bandages and antibiotics. I pulled out a water bottle and splashed a little on Jake’s face, washing off the blood that was there. Kayla was quietly crying, stroking Jake’s forehead and mixing her tears with the water. She held her light to his face, helping me wash him.
Jake opened his eyes slightly and looked up at me, turning a little from the light. “Julia’s down the hall. You have to get to her before it’s too late. Too late.” He closed his eyes again and gritted his teeth in response to a new wave of pain from his wounds.
I was torn in half. My brother needed me, yet he was telling me to go save the woman I loved. I couldn’t leave him, yet if I didn’t go to Julia, she might die as well. I had to make a decision, because I knew I was losing time. Jake had fought to get to Julia, and he had bought us a way in by keeping the men occupied and dying. She was in obvious danger, so I couldn’t make that sacrifice in vain, but I couldn’t just run away from Jake.
Footsteps interrupted my thoughts and I swung up my rifle one-handed, ready to blast the life out of anything that came down that hallway. I nearly fainted when I heard a familiar voice call out my name.
“Aaron? You down here? Jesus, what a mess,” my father said as he discovered the carnage in the other room.
“Dad! We’re here! Jake’s hurt bad!” I yelled, putting down my gun.
Footsteps pounded down the hall and my father and Uncle Charlie swept into view. Dad dropped to the ground beside Jake, gathering him into his arms, and gently taking him from Kayla.
My father held Jake and lightly touched his cheek, whispering as he did so. “It’s okay, Jake. I’m here. I’ve got you. Daddy’s got you.”
I saw Jake’s body relax a little when my dad said those words. They triggered a long lost memory of my father coming into our rooms and holding us whenever we had a nightmare or something had scared us. It was such a comfort to know our dad was there and he was ready to deal with whatever was frightening us.
Jake opened his eyes and looked into his father’s face. He smiled slightly then said. “Julia’s down the hall. Couldn’t…couldn’t…get to her.”
My father looked at Uncle Charlie and me. “We got this, go. Kayla, I need your help, honey.”
I didn’t wait for Kayla’s response. I simply launched myself from the floor with quite possibly one of the deadliest men in the world right behind me. If Julia was in danger or had been hurt, I wasn’t sure even bullets would stop her father. All I knew was I sure as hell wasn’t going to get in his way.
Chapter 48
We ran down the hall and stopped by a steel door. I didn’t wait for anything. I just yanked the thing open and went inside. About halfway through the door I realized I had forgotten my rifle back by father and brother. As a precaution I pulled my tomahawk stepped into a nightmare.
I stopped about three steps into the room and it took a moment for my mind to adjust to the horror I saw all around me. There was a dim fluorescent light flickering intermittently overhead, and its pale light actually made things worse. I heard a sharp intake of breath behind me and I knew Uncle Charlie was seeing the same thing I was.
The room was large, about forty feet long and thirty feet wide. Arranged in rows were about twenty reclining chairs. In each chair was a young woman, ranging in age from fifteen to thirty. Their hands and feet were secured to the chairs, and their heads were secured to the headrests by leather straps. Each of them had a second leather strap that held their jaws closed, with a third going across their mouths.
Every single one looked at us, and each of them hummed a groan through their gags. All of them were zombies.
As I slowly walked forward, the horror intensified. Every captive zombie had a thin tube attached to the back of their necks, and those tubes were filled with a dark liquid which gathered in a small vial hanging off the back of the chair.
I finally understood where the zombie fluid we had been fighting came from. I looked around frantically, trying to identify Julia in the dim light, but it was di
fficult, since several of the women were young and blonde, and the leather straps obscured their features. Uncle Charlie went to the other side of the room, trying to find his daughter.
Both of us froze as a door on the opposite side of the room opened and a short man wearing glasses walked in. He didn’t notice the two of us at all. He just went over to a woman in the corner who struggled and was staring at him with big blue eyes.
As he approached her, the man pulled out a syringe from his coat pocket. I couldn’t see it very well, but I could tell it had something very dark in it. It didn’t take three guesses to figure out what it was. The man spoke as he walked.
“Well, I’m sorry it has to be this way, young lady. But Ben says he wants you converted for your reunion with your father, and that’s that. Too bad, though. I would have liked to have taken a turn…”
Whatever the man was going to say was lost to the world as two tomahawks slammed into his head. Mine took him by the temple and Uncle Charlie’s took him right behind the ear. The impact of the two axes was strong enough to knock the man off his feet and into the wall next to him. The syringe he was holding ironically wound up impaling his leg.
I ran over to the captive and with quick jerks of my knife, freed Julia from her bonds. She burst out of the chair and wrapped herself around me, alternatively kissing me and hugging me. I returned the favor with near desperation.
This went on for a minute until a grunt behind me made me realize who was still with me. I pulled Julia off me and turned around, facing my Uncle Charlie who stood with a second tomahawk in his hand.
Generation Dead Book 2: What You Fear Page 15