by Peter Clines
Freedom felt a surge of suspicion again, but he knew it was foolish. It would be impossible to move all the crates in the few seconds he’d been fighting with George, let alone to do it without anyone noticing.
“What did you do with it?” Dr. Morris glared at the supermodel.
The woman and George ignored her. They were both looking around the recruiting office. “Our perceptions have switched back again,” said the supermodel.
“Yeah.”
Then Freedom noticed the office itself. The floor wasn’t carpet, it was a dark, industrial-looking tile. It was covered with faded takeout menus and drifts of broken glass.
One of the picture windows had a pile of tables in front of it, a makeshift barricade. The other one was cracked. A huge spiderweb spread across the glass. The threads at the center were blurred with dark brown smears he recognized as dried blood. The wooden walls were just a cheap laminate. It was peeling off in places. The recruitment posters were gone. A bland painting of yellow and blue flowers sat on the floor. Its frame was cracked.
His desk had vanished. In its place were a counter and the remains of a large glass case. A cash register sat on its side on the floor. The presidential portrait was now a large chalkboard. Half of it was a colorful menu of pastries and coffee drinks. The other half had been blurred into pale streaks and replaced with messy letters made of thick pink strokes of chalk.
END OF WORLD
SPECIAL
$6.66
Something dripped on his lips. He reached up and his hand came away red. His nose was bleeding, just like Dr. Morris’s was. He didn’t remember George punching or head-butting him. His mind flitted down a list of airborne toxins and the location of the pro-masks in the back room even as he registered that George and the women were fine.
Adams’s pen clicked away. And then Freedom realized Adams hadn’t come in yet. In fact, it was his day off.
He turned toward the sound.
Adams’s desk was gone. A table large enough to sit five or six people was there. It had been pushed back against the wall, pinning the one occupant in its seat.
It had been a man. It was wearing a threadbare, old-pattern camo jacket from the eighties that had faded well past cook whites. It had the same color hair as Adams, but much longer. A larger nose and wider jaw, too. Its eyes were dead white and its skin was gray. Settler gray, just like Freedom’s dreams.
The dead man reached for them across the tabletop, its dry fingertips drawing lines in the dust. Its mouth snapped open and closed again and again. The clicking teeth echoed in the room.
Dr. Morris made a low noise, something between a growl and a squeal. Her arms had wrapped tight around herself again. “What’s going on?” she hissed. “What the fuck is going on?”
Another half-dozen dead people crowded the door, and Freedom could see more in the street wandering toward the office. Or coffee shop. Whatever the place was. Some of the dead people were missing eyes or teeth. One looked like it had been scalped. A woman near the front of the group wore a shirt that said NAVY in large letters. It was splattered with blood. So was her mouth.
“Where in God’s name are we?” asked Freedom.
“We’ve switched back,” said George. “We’re seeing the real world now.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” said Dr. Morris.
“Look, you just have to trust us,” said George. “Someone’s been messing with our minds, making us see the world the way he wants to get us out of the way.” He walked over to the dead thing at the table and placed his hand on top of its head. Its neck flexed for a moment as it tried to stretch its mouth up to his fingers. Then George turned his palm and twisted the corpse’s head around like a man opening a bottle. The dead thing’s spine popped twice, like a log in a fire, and it slumped on the tabletop. Its jaws still hinged back and forth.
It struck Freedom he’d made no move to stop George, and had no reaction to the snapped neck. He knew on some level it hadn’t been a murder. It had been weeding.
“You both need to come with us,” said George. “We’re heading onto campus to pick up someone else, and then over into Hollywood.”
“Do you have a car or a truck or something?” asked Dr. Morris.
“We do not,” said the supermodel. “We are on foot.”
The redhead blinked. “On foot? With those things out there?”
The dead men and women pawed at the glass and banged their teeth against each other.
“We’ll be okay,” said George. “We can hold them off until we get to the Mount.”
The name resonated in Freedom’s head. “The Mount?”
“Our base of operations,” said the dark-skinned woman. “Your memories have been clouded so you do not remember. An epidemic has decimated the world. The survivors here in Los Angeles have formed a safe compound in Hollywood.”
“We need to find the armor,” said Danielle, wiping her nose again. Her hand was covered with blood. “I can’t go out there without the armor.”
“It’s probably at the Mount,” said George. “Waiting in your workshop.”
Danielle shook her head. “It better be,” she muttered. “If I find out Cesar went joyriding, I’ll … Who the hell is Cesar?”
“Good,” said George. “It’s starting to come back to you.”
Freedom closed his eyes and tried to will away the pain in his skull. “I need more than this, sir,” he said.
George glanced at the door and the figures pressed against the glass. “More than that?”
“You’re asking me to abandon everything I believe in,” said Freedom.
The dark woman’s gaze dropped to his chest, and her brow furrowed. “It would appear” she said, “that we are not.”
Freedom looked down. His ACU was old and worn. He could see two seams where it had been repaired, and recognized the careful stitchwork his mother had taught him as a boy. On his chest was a Velcro patch with two black bars on it, faded to charcoal.
His captain’s rank.
ST. GEORGE STARED at the exes outside the door. Another seven or eight of them had wandered over to the little coffee shop while he and Stealth convinced Danielle and Freedom. He counted fifteen out on the sidewalk now. Another twenty or so out in the street hadn’t figured out there was food in the café, but they would soon enough.
He looked back at the others. Stealth had found a broomstick somewhere in the back. It was one of the longer ones from the oversized, industrial push brooms, and there were a few swaths of duct tape on it. He wasn’t sure if she was planning on using it as a spear or some kind of fighting staff.
Danielle still had her arms wrapped around herself, but she didn’t seem quite as panicked as she had a while ago. She kept looking around the room. He was pretty sure she was hoping the armor cases would reappear.
Freedom walked up to him. The huge officer had pulled a thick pair of gloves from one of the pockets of his uniform and was working them tight around his fingers. “What’s the plan, sir?”
“Well,” said St. George, “I’m thinking we open the doors, I’ll push these first few back, and then we’ll loop around and head down Glendon Avenue back to campus.”
“Where Madelyn is,” said Freedom.
“Right.” He saw the officer’s expression. “She should be safe until we get there,” he added. “The exes probably don’t even know she’s there.”
“It would be safer to travel on rooftops,” said Stealth.
“It would.” St. George nodded. “But I think you’re the only one who could get up there. Danielle’s human, Freedom’s still a bit unsure of his abilities—no offense, Captain.”
“None taken, sir,” said Freedom.
“—and I still can’t fly for some reason.”
“I’m sorry,” said Danielle. “Did you just say ‘fly’? Like in, fly through the air?”
“Yeah,” said St. George. “Just like Superman. Sort of.”
“Yeah, right.”
“Sa
ys the woman with the computerized battle armor.”
She snorted and looked around the café again. “Not at the moment.”
“So we’re stuck on the ground,” said St. George.
“It is almost nine,” said Stealth. “I estimate it will take us at least seventy minutes to retrieve Corpse Girl. If our goal is to cross the city and reach the Mount before sundown, we should proceed.”
“Agreed,” said Freedom. “From what you’re saying, the last thing we want is to be out after dark.”
“Okay, then,” said St. George. “I’ll take the lead. Stealth, you follow. Freedom, watch our back. Danielle, stay between us and keep safe. We’ll have you back inside Cerberus before you know it.”
She grunted and forced her arms down to her sides.
“Everyone ready?”
They all nodded.
St. George shoved the door open.
The first ones were the easiest. He spread his arms wide as he marched out of the door and gathered them up. A few lunging steps carried the exes to the curb. It was a six-inch drop, but it was too much for the mindless dead. They stumbled and tripped and fell over. Two of them hit the pavement hard, skull first. Their teeth stopped chattering.
Out in the road, the other exes saw the movement. Chalk eyes turned to him. The dead all shifted their gait and staggered toward him.
He thought about setting fire to the pile of exes. In the back of his throat he could feel the light touch of smoke. He knew there was a trick to it, a way to make the smoke turn into flames, but he couldn’t remember it. Like getting off the ground, it was something Smith’s blocks were still keeping hidden from him.
He glanced over his shoulder. “Come on.”
The four of them worked their way down the sidewalk. St. George grabbed exes by their jackets and shirts and blouses and hurled them out into the street. Behind him he heard Stealth’s makeshift staff slice through the air twice, each time followed by the sound of breaking bone. Freedom let out two quick breaths—boxer’s breaths—and St. George heard two more bodies fall.
They made it to the corner and he looked down Glendon. There were fewer exes, but the street seemed a bit narrower. He risked a quick glance back. “How’s it looking behind us?”
“If we can keep up this pace, sir, we should be fine,” said Freedom. “We’re moving faster than they can catch us.”
St. George gazed at the zombies on Glendon. They were already shuffling in their direction. “It might be getting rough, then,” he said.
He looked around and spotted a 2 HOUR PARKING sign. He batted an ex away and heaved on the sign until something underground snapped and it came loose in his hands. He spun the square pipe once to get a feel for it. Then he brought it around like a club and crushed four skulls with one swing.
They moved down the center of the street. St. George took a few steps, shifted the pipe in his hands, and the steel sign changed from blunt instrument to edge-on blade. One swipe and it cut open three exes. A man and two women. Their clothes parted, their flesh gaped open, and their guts spilled out in front of them. Thin and thick intestines uncoiled onto the pavement. Stomachs, hearts, and other gray pieces of meat he couldn’t identify tore loose and splatted against the ground. The exes swayed for a moment, their center of balance gone, and then tripped over their own insides.
Another swing of his signpost-axe, a little higher this time, and two skulls spun into the air. They cracked against the pavement as their bodies slumped and fell. St. George swung again, aimed it better, and took off four more heads. One of the dead things, a man with an Arab scarf draped around his shoulders, was a little shorter. The metal sign smashed through its skull at eye level. Its teeth snapped three more times before it collapsed.
They passed a jeweler and a Christian Science reading room. A car had plowed into an overgrown tree. There was a skeletal body under the flattened front tire. On the opposite side of the street was a quartet of ragged pop-up tents and some cases with National Guard markings.
“Looks like a checkpoint,” said Freedom. “We should look for supplies.”
“Maybe on the way back,” said St. George said. “I don’t think we want to stop moving right now.”
“But, sir, there could be—”
“There will be nothing,” said Stealth. “The Westwood National Guard outpost was lost on July 27, 2009. Best estimates had it looted by August fourth. That was before the South Seventeens consolidated their territory to the east in Century City and looted the surrounding area.”
Freedom grabbed an ex by the arm, twisted it around, and slammed it back into two others. The trio of zombies stumbled and fell. “Very well,” he said. “Let’s move on, then.”
Half a block from the outpost, a pile of withered corpses dominated an intersection. St. George guessed there had to be at least two hundred of them. They all had head wounds. Mostly bullet holes, but a few caved-in skulls as well. The pile was marked off with bright orange cones and a handful of yellow sawhorses.
He glanced back and saw Danielle shudder. She was fighting not to curl up in a ball. He could see it on her face.
They passed a three-car collision and a row of stores with all the picture windows smashed. St. George put down another dozen exes with his signpost, and he was pretty sure Stealth and Freedom stopped as many between them. At Le Conte Avenue he glanced back at the group. “We’re about a third of the way to her dorm room,” he told them.
Danielle frowned. “How do you know she’ll be there?”
“I don’t,” he admitted. “I just don’t know where else to look.”
Freedom threw a kick that crushed an ex’s rib cage. “More important, sir,” he said, “how do you know where her dorm room is?”
“Relax,” said St. George. “She spent two weeks trying to get me to remember all this.”
Stealth lunged forward and thrust with her staff. The tip smashed through a dead woman’s teeth and up through the roof of her mouth. The ex closed its jaws on the broomstick once, twitched, and fell over.
As the body slumped, a breeze blew down the street. St. George heard a growl that grew into a roar. It took him a moment to recognize it. He looked up and saw Stealth focusing, trying to locate the sound.
Danielle took another step forward.
“Hang on,” he told her.
A bus plowed through the intersection. Its brakes hissed once and then it moved on. A poster for KTLA Channel Five stretched across the side of the bus.
A horn blasted behind them. A green Jetta was a foot from Freedom’s shins. The driver banged on the horn again and gestured them out of the street. It wasn’t a polite gesture. A few cars backed up behind him honked as well. The tail end of rush-hour traffic flowed around them while they stood in the street.
They glanced at each other and St. George took a step toward the sidewalk. Stealth gazed at him. “What are you doing?”
“Getting out of the street.”
“It is not a real car.”
“I know,” St. George said, “but it’s going to be easier to think without all the imaginary horns going off.”
They stepped out of the lane into a parking space. The Jetta driver blared her horn again as she drove by. The rest were more concerned with making the next light.
Freedom went to step up onto the sidewalk and Stealth grabbed his arm. A trio of men in suits walked toward them along the sidewalk. One was on a cell phone, the other two were talking.
“They’re just people,” said Freedom.
“No,” said Stealth. “They are exes we are being made to perceive as people.”
“Are you sure?”
The men got closer and St. George raised his signpost. They walked past without slowing. One of them glanced at St. George, then his gaze swept over to Stealth and her broomstick. They didn’t look back. The one on the phone swore as a teenager flew by on a skateboard. The teen didn’t even glance at the four heroes in the parking space.
“If all the people are �
��” Danielle closed her eyes and snapped her fingers three times. “If they’re all exes, why aren’t they attacking us?”
Another bus slowed and spat out a handful of people. They scattered in different directions. None of them glanced over at the heroes. A young woman in a UCLA shirt jogged past them, her headphones blaring. She glanced up at Freedom and smiled.
“That,” said St. George, “is a good question.” He lowered the sign.
“A better one,” said Stealth, “is why were we not attacked before?”
Freedom glanced over his shoulder, back toward Wilshire. “Before what?”
“Before regaining our awareness of the world,” she said. “If we have been wandering through Los Angeles for weeks under Smith’s influence, how are we still alive? St. George may have survived with his increased damage resistance, but the three of us have no such abilities. We should be dead.”
“Cheery thought,” Danielle muttered.
“She’s right, though,” said St. George. “Just because we don’t see them as zombies doesn’t mean they’d stop acting like them.”
“Maybe we just got lucky.”
Stealth shook her head.
“There were about forty of those things around this intersection,” said Freedom. “I’d guess there’s close to twice as many people now, not counting the ones in cars.”
“And there’s five times as many cars,” added Danielle. “Are they all just hallucinations or whatever?”
“Let’s keep moving,” said St. George. He lowered the sign a little more, letting it hang level with his hip. “Same formation. Don’t let anyone get too close.”
A crowd of students slid past them, heading onto campus. Most of them ignored the heroes. One looked at the signpost in St. George’s hands and grinned. He gave the hero a cheerful “Dude,” before continuing on his way.
“Keep a safe distance from them,” said Stealth. “They may appear benign, but they could be attacking us.” She shifted the staff in her own hands. It stayed out away from her body and extended back to help shield Danielle.
St. George led them past the medical plaza, then headed west. He glanced over at the facilities management building and wondered if Jarvis was there. At this time of day he’d just be finishing with all the new requests.