“It won’t be that easy,” Keith commented. “There are guards all over the walls, remember? Not to mention the infected.”
Sadie scoffed. “Psh. It won’t be that hard,” she said. “The infected are all down here, trying to get in through the hole in the wall. The guards on the top of the wall are probably on their way over here so they can try to stop the infected from getting through. The likelihood of the coast being clear is a hell of a lot higher than it would be if that explosion hadn’t happened.”
A silence fell between the four of them as they considered her proposition. Cade and Keith were exchanging a look like they were communicating telepathically, but Jude interrupted their staring contest by stepping forward and holding up his pad of paper for them to read.
I think it’s a solid idea, he’d written in the neat, blocky handwriting he used when he was trying to make sure his point was coming across clearly. And I’m not saying that because it was Sadie’s idea. I think it’s our best chance of getting to the other side of the wall without getting killed by either the infected or by the soldiers.
Cade read the words, her forehead wrinkling, and she nodded once and stepped away, moving back to the edge of the roof and staring out at the teeming mass several hundred yards away. “If we go with your idea, we’re going to run into infected,” she said.
“I think that’s a given,” Sadie said.
“We’ll have to do this quietly,” Cade went on. “No guns. Just knives. And as little noise as humanly possible.”
“I think that, too, is a given,” Sadie said, wondering what Cade was getting at.
“Is everybody here up for something like that?” Cade asked. “Staying quiet, killing up close and personal?”
“I am,” Keith spoke up.
“Me and Jude have been doing it since we started trying to survive out there in this shit,” Sadie added, thinking back to the days when neither of them had access to guns and only had bladed weapons, baseball bats, and crowbars to use for protection. “We can handle it,” she said.
Cade turned around then, looking back at them, acquiescence in her eyes. She blew out a slow breath and said, “Fine. We’ll do it your way. But if any of us gets killed, it’s on your head.” She motioned toward Sadie and turned away to gather her supplies.
“No less than it’s on yours for dragging us out here in the first place,” Sadie retorted, bristling at the suggestion that she would be held responsible if any of them died trying to get to the wall.
Cade whirled around to look at her, her eyes wide with amazement and anger at her words. “Well, you didn’t have to come along,” she snapped. “You two should have stayed behind with Derek and Isaac!”
Keith moved between them. “Stop,” he said. “Just stop. We’re not doing this, not right now. We have enough shit going on without bickering among ourselves.”
Cade looked like she wanted to continue to argue, but she merely turned away and picked up her backpack. She paced across the roof toward the far edge that faced the east.
Keith rubbed his forehead like he was stressed out and getting a headache. “Sadie, forgive her,” he said, dropping his hand to his side. “She’s under a lot of stress.”
“We all are,” Sadie replied.
“Not like her,” he said. “Her husband is missing, and she’s left her child behind. She might not ever see either one of them again. It’s weighing on her, and she’s scared she’s made the wrong decision. We have to do whatever we can to make sure that we get her through this and find Brandt again so they can be a family.”
Sadie gathered her own belongings: her backpack, her compound bow, and the eight arrows she still had left. She’d have to carefully conserve them and recover whatever she fired if she expected to have enough to make it through to the wall and beyond. She tucked the arrows into her backpack, leaving a gap in the zipper where the fletchings stuck out for easy access, using the backpack like a quiver—though she hated quivers with a passion, because they were useless and spilled arrows all over the place when the archer was forced to move quickly. However, it was all she had, so she had to work with it.
“When are we moving out?” she asked Keith as she tried to figure out the best way to carry her belongings so she’d have her hands free for usage of her machete.
“I’m not sure. As soon as possible, definitely,” he said. “We need to take advantage of the lull in the flood of infected while it’s actually there.”
“In that case,” Sadie said, “I’m going to look for a safe route to the ground. I’ll let you know the minute I find anything.” She crossed the roof to what was left of the fire escape and climbed over the edge, dropping down onto it with every intention of doing exactly what she said.
Chapter 53
It hadn’t taken long for the five of them to get their shit together, but once they had a plan in place and were on the move, Brandt found himself sitting in the passenger seat of Lindsey’s sedan, his sister in law in the driver’s seat, driving towards the Wall and all the activity surrounding the newly created gap in it. Over the roar of the engine, Brandt heard the rapid pop of gunfire ahead as the soldiers stationed at the Eden Facility fought against infected that were trying to get in through the Wall.
Brandt twisted around in his seat to look at the two people in the backseat of Lindsey’s car. Ethan’s face was stoic considering everything they were about to face. Kimberly sat beside him, directly behind Brandt, and she looked a lot more ruffled than Ethan did. Brandt noted the way the fingers of her left hand were tangled together with the fingers of Ethan’s right, her fingertips blanched with the force of her grip on his hand. “You two all right?” he asked.
“We’re fine,” Ethan said. “Trying to get our game faces on.”
“You look like you already have yours,” Brandt said.
“Yeah, we’re working on mine now,” Kimberly said, letting out a weak chuckle. “I haven’t been in many situations that involved me facing down a bunch of infected en masse before. When I was with Alicia and her people, they protected me and Derek and for the most part wouldn’t let us fight the infected often. I think there was only one time I ended up fighting them, and that was when the infected got into the hotel’s underground parking garage. I was just part of the shooting line, though, not actually in the fight.”
“Well, you’re about to be in one,” Brandt said. “You sure we don’t need to turn around and send you back to Jacob?” The scientist had opted to stay out of the fight, lacking any experience in combat, and had retreated to Lindsey’s apartment building with the idea of fortifying her place as a base of operations.
“No, definitely not,” Kimberly said. “My place is right here.”
“If you’re sure,” Brandt said uncertainly.
“I’m sure,” she said, her confidence evident in her voice.
Brandt slid back down into his seat and looked to Lindsey. Her forehead was creased, her attention focused entirely on the windshield in front of her, fingers wrapped in a death grip around the steering wheel. “And you?” he prompted.
“And me what?” Lindsey asked.
“Are you ready for this?”
“I was born ready for this,” Lindsey said, her words coated with steel. “I’m going to find my sister. I don’t care what it takes.”
“That’s the spirit,” Ethan said, prompting a small laugh from Kimberly.
The car fell silent, and Brandt stared out the window, watching the blocks pass by as they moved inextricably towards the massive wall and the mess ahead of them. The closer they drew to it, the worse the scenery around them became; rubble from the wall littered the sidewalks and street, forcing Lindsey to steer carefully around it all, and there were people walking toward the wall, drawn to the chaos like people inevitably were when something different or unusual was going on. Though they shouldn’t have been out at all, Brandt hoped that the people out there had at least had the foresight and common sense to go out armed.
“Hey,
Brandt,” Ethan said, rocking forward in his seat and pointing down the street ahead of them. “Is that what I think it is?”
Brandt turned back to the windshield, examining the cityscape ahead for signs of what Ethan was looking at. He squinted, trying to pick it out, and spotted several people making their way down the center of the street, grouped together, stumbling like they were drunk. They had that swagger, that distinctive walk so common among the infected they’d encountered over the past two years, and Brandt’s breath caught in his throat.
“Son of a bitch,” he said. “Stop the car.”
“What for?” Lindsey asked.
“Just do it,” Brandt barked. She eased the car to a stop, looking at him questioningly. “Infected,” he clarified. “Straight ahead. Six of them.” He twisted in his seat again, looking back at Ethan. “You and me,” he said, and Ethan nodded. “Lindsey, Kimberly, you two stay here.”
“What?” Kimberly cried.
“You’re our backup,” Brandt said, reaching for the door handle. “We need you to hold back in case you have to save our asses.”
“Right. Like that’s going to happen,” Kimberly grumbled, flopping back in her seat in frustration.
Brandt ignored her and slid out of the car; Ethan did the same, and they shut their car doors simultaneously.
Ethan grinned widely as they circled around to the front of the car. “Just like old times, huh?” he said.
“You act like old times were a long time ago,” Brandt said as he checked his pistol. “How do we want to do this?”
“Quietly,” Ethan said. “We don’t want to draw more of them with gunfire.”
“I figured that was a given,” Brandt said. He holstered the pistol he’d started to draw out and instead chose a couple of the military-style KA-BAR knives Lindsey had given him, palming one in each hand, holding them in a manner that would allow him to use them with ease. “Lead the way,” he said to Ethan. He wanted to see where the man was physically, how he was able to hold up after everything he’d been through over the past several months. He’d be right there to back him up if he got into trouble if it came to that.
Not that he expected it to.
There were six infected directly ahead of them, and beyond the initial group, Brandt made out three or four more. The people on the sidewalks, the ones who’d come to rubberneck at the aftermath of the explosion, hadn’t realized what was happening, that the people coming from the direction of the blast were a danger to them. He hoped they’d get moving once he and Ethan took care of the problem and that they wouldn’t contribute to it by interfering and putting themselves in harm’s way—and potentially getting bitten and becoming part of the problem in the process.
Ethan reached the leading edge of the group of infected while Brandt stewed on this. The infected simply parted and started to go around him, focusing on Brandt instead. Brandt raised his eyebrows, wondering how in the world Ethan had learned that particular trick, but he didn’t have time to dwell on it. He lifted his knives and tore into the first of the infected that grasped for him, a woman who looked like she’d seen better days. Her skin was weather-beaten and peeling, and her hair was falling out in clumps. She wore a dirty pair of light blue scrubs that were torn and stained with old, dried blood, and her limbs were thin and emaciated. When she reached for Brandt, he slammed the knife in his right hand into her temple. The body crumpled to the pavement, and that was when the screaming from the bystanders began.
“Ah, hell,” Brandt said, abandoning the body to its spot on the pavement and stepping over it to go to his next target. He and Ethan needed to take care of these things before they were drawn to the sound of the bystanders’ screams and shouts. Ethan hadn’t paused at the sound of the screams like Brandt had; he was still moving, stepping behind each of the infected and dropping them with a sharp, quick stab to the back of the neck, driving the blade of his knife up into their skulls to sever their spinal cords and pierce their brain stems. The infected were dropping around him like weeds, collapsing to the ground as he systematically worked his way through the group of infected. He was like a grim reaper swishing his scythe through souls that should have left the Earth long ago, gathering them to him so he could set them free.
Brandt shook himself out of his reverie and back to the task at hand, moving forward to help Ethan, who paced down the street toward the second group of infected moving toward them. He cast a quick glance back to assess everything behind them and saw that some of the bystanders had caught on to what was happening and had begun to flee in the opposite direction. Lindsey had eased the car forward, trying to steer around the bodies to stay close to Brandt and Ethan, the high beams of her headlights illuminating the scene before them.
He and Ethan had taken care of the few stragglers behind that first small group of infected when Lindsey and Kimberly jogged up to them, carrying backpacks full of weaponry and wearing anxious looks on their faces. “Why are you two out of the car?” he asked, keeping his voice short of demanding.
“The police are coming,” Lindsey said. “I can hear the sirens.” Brandt’s ears picked up the faint strains of the sirens in question, far off in the distance, getting gradually louder as they approached. “I think a bystander called the cops.”
“We’re leaving the car and heading out on foot from here,” Kimberly told him. “Lindsey says we’re not much further from the wall, so the going will probably get a lot tougher from here.”
“I didn’t think we’d have to ditch the car so soon,” Brandt said. “I thought we’d be able to get closer.”
“Me too,” Lindsey said, “but I suppose we thought wrong.” She patted at her sides, checking to make sure she had everything she needed, and handed Brandt one of the backpacks she had on her shoulder. He put it on, noting that Kimberly had given Ethan his.
“As usual, we have shit for luck,” Brandt said. “Come on, then. Let’s get out of here before those cops show up.”
Chapter 54
Her heart pounding, Cade raced parallel to the wall, her three companions spread out behind her, on the alert for any infected as they ran. They’d been going like this for almost thirty minutes now, hurrying through the dusky dawn. The destroyed, leveled cityscape had long given way to a wooded stretch that ran alongside the remains of a road that had been partially dug up by some sort of excavator, part of the two hundred-yard stretch of cleared land extending out from the wall. The same stretch of cleared ground that she’d have to figure out a way to get across without getting shot.
There was movement in the trees ahead. It wasn’t the first time she’d spotted something rustling in the bushes, but it was the first one she’d seen directly in their path. She raised her machete into position, and as she jogged past the infected man, she swung out hard, partially severing the man’s head from his shoulders. Behind her, Sadie completed the man’s destruction with a blow of her own, slicing the man’s head from his shoulders. He crumpled to the dirt. Cade and Sadie never broke stride, and neither did Keith and Jude. They continued on, repeating the process for three more infected.
One for each of us, Cade thought caustically.
She stopped after another twenty minutes’ jogging, panting as she slowed and nearly stumbling to her knees. She caught herself against a tree, her chest heaving, and leaned over, struggling to catch her breath. The other three were drawing to a stop around her, looking just as winded as she felt. Jude sank to his knees beside his sister, bracing his hands against his thighs. He looked like he was about to vomit, but he held it back.
“Everybody okay?” Cade asked once she recovered enough to speak. “No twisted knees, sprained ankles?” Everyone shook their heads, and she pushed away from the tree and started toward the tree line, intending to see how far away they’d gotten from the main mob of infected. Sadie followed her, her boots crunching on the dead leaves, a determined expression on her face. Cade asked, “What do you see?”
Sadie fished in her bag and pulled out a pair
of compact binoculars with red lenses. She lifted them to her eyes to examine the wall ahead of them. “I see…no guards,” she reported. “I guess we were right that they’d be drawn to the action and away from their immediate posts. I also see…” she trailed off, studying the wall, “the wall’s blocks are uneven.”
“Uneven how?”
“Like the wall was put up quickly and they didn’t have time to line up the blocks properly,” Sadie said. “The blocks are stacked unevenly, so we’ll have some handholds and footholds to climb with. Which would solve any problems with trying to figure out how to get a rope to the top and secured for us to climb.” She lowered the binoculars and looked at Cade with the utmost seriousness. “What happens when we get to the top?”
Cade gestured in the direction they’d come from. “We go back that way,” she said. She caught a glimpse of dread and exhaustion in Sadie’s eyes and added, “Don’t worry. I’m not going to insist we run all the way back.”
“Thank God,” Sadie said. “I like to think I’m in pretty good shape but—”
“No think about it,” Cade assured her. “You are in better shape than I am.”
Sadie smiled fleetingly. “Thanks. Even I don’t think I can manage another run like that. I can tell you that Jude definitely can’t. I’m amazed he didn’t throw up.”
“He did look a bit queasy, didn’t he?” Cade said with a smile. She considered everything that they were about to do, and she added, “Maybe he and Keith should stay behind.”
“Not an option,” Sadie said. “He stays with me. I can’t risk him getting separated from me and me getting killed. He won’t have a way to communicate with anyone then, not without writing. And that takes time.”
“Understandable,” Cade acknowledged. “We’re walking into a pretty dangerous situation, and I wanted to make sure you’re fully aware that there’s a chance he could get killed.”
The Becoming: Redemption (The Becoming Series Book 5) Page 31