by R J Murray
“What’s wrong with you? You’re talking crazy, man.”
“Same with sex, right?” His mind raced as worked through the possibilities. “These creatures, what they are now, they aren’t intended to have babies. There’d be no point. They couldn’t take care of them, they’d just eat them.”
“Jacob?” Terri asked joining her boyfriend. “Are you okay?”
“I-I’m sorry,” Mandy cried as she staggered from the bedroom, one hand pressed to her throat.
Terri took one look at the woman clad in just bra and stockings, her makeup streaked around her eyes, and pulled the blanket from her shoulders and quickly wrapped it around her.
“What the hell’s going on!”
“Keep that cunt away from me!” Jacob snarled. “Lock her in the bedroom. She’s infected!”
“P-please,” Mandy pleaded, her eyes on Jacob.
There was a mixture of sorrow and loss there that was heartbreaking to see. Terri wrapped her arms around the weeping woman and shot a look at Clive before guiding her away, back into the bedroom.
“What do you mean she’s infected?” Clive asked.
“I mean, you fucking idiot, that when she was attacked in the cabin she was infected.”
“But she’s not like…”
“Yet,” Jacob interrupted. “You can see the infection moving up her arm though. It’s just a matter of fucking time.”
“Alright, I believe you. It’s not her fault though. She needs our help.”
“I went down on her!” Jacob snapped and understanding bloomed in the younger man’s eyes. “She didn’t fucking tell me. I should have killed her!”
“Christ!”
Clive pressed his hands to the sides of his head as he turned to look back at the room Terri had just taken her into.
“No, it’s fine,” he said. “You’re fine. She’s not turned yet. She’s still… well, her.”
“What?”
“You just said it yourself. You can see the infection moving up her arm, yeah?” The older man nodded. “Right and as far as we know, only people bitten by one that’s turned fully gets infected.”
“So I might be alright?” He wiped one hand down his face. “Jesus, I hope you’re fucking right.”
“Yeah, I am, I’m sure of it. She’s not turned yet, so I doubt she’s able to infect you.”
“She should have told me!”
“I know, I get that. She’s scared though. Who wouldn’t be, yeah?”
He hammered that point home with a pointed look at Jacob who shrugged. He was man enough to know when he was overreacting and to acknowledge he was wrong. To himself at least. He wasn’t going to admit it to anyone else though.
“Fuck! I thought I was a gonna for a minute.”
“Yeah, well, we’ll keep an eye on you. We know when people are infected they start getting sick.”
“Why isn’t Mandy then?” Elise asked and the others turned to her.
“She wasn’t bitten,” Jacob said musingly. “Looked like scratches from that infected woman’s nails.”
“Maybe it’s working slower as there wasn’t much of it, just whatever blood and crap was under her nails?”
Jacob nodded thoughtfully to the girl’s words. It made sense, but it still meant she was infected.
“What if it’s not all the way in her,” Clive said. “If it’s just in her arm and moving slow…”
“There’s a butcher knife in the kitchen,” Jacob said.
“No!” Elise stepped into the hallway fully, her hands on her hips as she glared at the two men. “You can’t just cut her arm off!”
“It’s either that or we wait till she turns and we kill her,” Jacob said matter of factly.
“Then you need to ask her,” she said firmly. “It’s got to be her choice.”
“Might not work anyway. Either way, you can deal with her. I’m fucking done.”
He turned and brushed past them as he went into the kitchen and moments later there came the sound of a pan hitting being taken from a shelf. He came back out, pan in hand and went to the front door. He opened it and scooped up a panful of snow.
“If you found any bleach out there,” he said as he brushed past them again. “I could use it to disinfect my mouth. It’s either that or just boiling bloody water.”
“There was some under the cupboard,” Clive said.
“Aye, that’ll do.”
He left them there in the hallway and Clive shrugged helplessly when Elise looked his way. She rolled her eyes and pushed past him to go into the bedroom that Terri had taken Mandy into. Clive scratched his head as the door shut with a thump and wondered how he was the bad guy when it was Jacob who’d behaved like he had.
Terri did her best to console the weeping woman. All the while, her eyes would drift to the red marks on her arm. There was definitely something there, but Mandy wasn’t behaving like she’d been told people who were infected behaved.
They got sick, flu-like symptoms that helped to mask what it actually was. Then they would slip into a coma-like state and when they emerged, they would be the barely human creatures that she’d seen.
So far, Mandy didn’t appear especially sick. More to the point, as the number of infected people had progressed, the time taken from being bitten to turning had dropped to hours rather than days. It had been more than twelve hours since she was attacked and she hadn’t changed.
The purple striations were moving up her arm, that was for sure, but they had barely reached her elbow. The possibility that it was moving slowly had to be considered, but if that was the case, she didn’t know what would need to be done.
“How is she?” Elise asked as she entered the room, closing the door behind her.
“Not great.”
The young woman’s eyes seemed to be fixed on the marks on Mandy’s arm and Terri felt an irrational need to cover them for her.
“They had an idea,” she said with a tilt of her head to the guys outside the room.
“Oh?”
“If the infection is contained to her arm, then we could still save her.”
“How… oh!”
She stared down at the weeping woman and wondered how that conversation would go. She was a vain woman. It was hard to deny that when she’d gone out, risking her life against potentially infected people that might be in the town, just to get some lingerie to wear when Jacob fucked her.
Those were not the actions of a woman who would deal with the idea of any imperfection, let alone the loss of an arm. But, it could save her life and Terri had the sneaking suspicion that it was going to be up to her to broach the subject.
“Mandy,” she said and sucked in a deep breath as the woman looked up at the sound of her name. “We need to talk.”
Chapter 12
Clive lifted the bottle of whisky to the screaming woman’s lips, holding it steady as she drank much like a baby would from its bottle. She gulped it down and as he pulled the bottle away, resumed shouting her curses in French.
He looked up and met Jacobs eyes before he nodded and put the bottle aside. He leant down over her, using his weight to push down on her shoulders and hold her in place. Elise grabbed her legs and pulled them down, holding her against the wooden table in the kitchen.
Terri pulled Mandy’s arm, keeping it straight and stopping her from yanking it away at the last moment. She looked away as Jacob made sure the blindfold was firmly in place. He didn’t want her to see what was happening and pull back when the blade descended. He needed his strike to hit just right.
He tightened the tourniquet around her arm and raised the meat cleaver high above his head. He aimed for the line he’d drawn around her arm, just above the end of the longest striation. He sucked in a deep breath and exhaled as he brought the cleaver down with all his might.
Her shriek was enough to wake the dead. She bucked and twisted as he raised the blade again, before slamming it down. The second blow severed the arm entirely just below the elbow. Mandy w
ent quiet as she passed out and Jacob set to work.
Terri dropped the arm and wiped at the blood that had spattered her face and clothes. She fought back against the nausea and staggered from the room, heading to the bathroom and the sink full of melted snow that had been set aside for cleaning up afterwards.
She used a rag that had once been part of a man’s shirt and dipped it into the cold water before scrubbing at the blood streaks that covered her face. Elise pushed past her and bent over the toilet, throwing up the contents of her stomach noisily and adding to the already repellent stench that filled the room.
“Sorry…” Elise said, wiping at her mouth.
“S’fine,” Terri said, clamping her mouth shut and swallowing back the urge to throw up.
“Was fine until that second cut, when the blood went everywhere and… oh crap! Sorry.”
Terri waved her away as she spilt the contents of her stomach into the rapidly filling toilet. She heaved several times, before spitting and wiping her mouth. She glanced at the younger woman and shook her head.
“Please, don’t talk about it.”
“Shit, yeah, sorry.”
“It’s fine. Just don’t remind me.”
She dry heaved once more and spat again, before wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. She went back to cleaning her face before reaching for the toothpaste. There was a distinct lack of toothbrushes and she was well aware that she was using one someone else had already used. Jacob had assured her he’d sterilized them but she couldn’t shake the thought all the same.
“The apocalypse is bloody disgusting,” she said before spitting the excess foamy paste into the toilet.
“Tell me about it,” Elise agreed. “I doubt I’ll ever be fully clean again.”
“Grab your gun,” Terri said as she headed to the living room to grab her own.
“Why?”
“That scream could have been heard by anyone.” She pulled back the bolt and checked that there was a bullet in the chamber. “We need to check it out.”
“Okay.”
The younger woman lifted her own rifle and performed a quick check before following Terri to the door. When they were both ready, Terri pulled it open and raised her rifle to her shoulder before stepping outside.
She reached the end of the garden and paused beside the gate, using the scope on her rifle to sight up and down the street. She swore softly.
“What is it?”
“One, no two infected headed this way.”
“Should we shoot?”
“That’ll make even more noise.”
“They’ve not seen us, we can hide?”
Terri crouched down behind the gate so that only her head was visible as she watched them through the scope. There were only two, they could hide from them, sure. But what if there were more behind them? That was the question that kept bothering her, so she watched and waited as they made their slow way through the snow.
“Go check the back,” she instructed and didn’t bother to look up to see the other woman leave.
The infected were curious. They were human in form, but they eschewed clothes and acted more like animals. Their primary motivations were the most primal. Eat, fight and fuck. They didn’t seem to remember much of their former lives and while they could perform simple tasks, most things were lost to them.
They might if given sufficient motivation, manage to open a door though that was likely more to do with dumb luck as they pawed at the handle. They could climb, she’d seen that herself and they would respond to sound.
She mused on that for a moment as she watched them. Perhaps, she thought, they could be lured with sound. Away from where her group hid. She had an idea that might work and she figured she’d bring it up with the others at some point, but it wouldn’t help just then.
There didn’t seem to be any others following them and they were halfway along the street towards where she crouched so she figured it would be a good time to move inside.
A thunderous roar filled the air followed by a yelp from the back of the house. It echoed from the rooftops and the two infected responded immediately.
Terri cursed and centred the crosshairs of the scope on the first running man. She breathed out as she squeezed the trigger and felt the rifle buck bruisingly against her shoulder. She hit him high in the chest and he dropped to the ground.
“What’s happening?” Clive called as he sprinted from the house.
“Check the back,” she snapped as she sighted on the second infected.
She squeezed the trigger and winced as blood spurted from the back of the running infected man’s skull. It dropped without a sound and she turned her attention back to the other. It was crawling towards her, leaving a bloody trail in its wake.
There was no need to waste a second bullet she reasoned, ejecting the spent casing and sliding another into the chamber. She rose to her feet and dashed around to the back of the house to check on the others.
Elise was shaking, her eyes fixed on the naked dead woman hanging halfway over the fence. Blood slowly ran down the wood to pool in the snow below. Clive was doing his best to comfort her and glanced up as she arrived.
“We need to leave,” he said. “Now!”
“What about Mandy?”
His face twisted as he tried to come up with an answer and she saved him the need as she said, “I’ll talk to Jacob. You two get the bags.”
They dashed inside and as the others went to the living room, Terri took a deep breath and headed into the kitchen.
Chapter 13
Jacob was tightening the bandage as she came running into the kitchen. He glanced up at her and saw the wild panic at the edges of her eyes. He nodded curtly to her.
“Make sure the bags are packed, I’ll get Mandy as ready as I can.”
“Huh?” She gaped at him for a moment, wondering how he knew what was happening but then nodded. “Sure.”
He ignored her response as he glanced down critically at the bandage around the stump of Mandy’s arm. It wasn’t perfect and it would be painful as hell, but it was the best he could do with the limited resources they had.
She stirred on the table, her eyes fluttering open as she sucked in a deep breath. He pressed his hand over her mouth quickly, leaning down to whisper to her.
“If you scream, I’ll leave you here,” he said, keeping his voice firm, almost harsh. “I know it hurts, but if you can’t be silent I can’t have you out there with us. You’ll bring every damned infected out there down on us. We clear?”
Eyes filled with pain stared up at him and her head shifted beneath his hand as she tried her best to nod. He paused a moment, watching her, before releasing his hold on her and stepping back. He lifted the cleaver from the table and wiped it brusquely with a cloth before sticking it through his belt. Not quite the same as a combat knife but it would do the job should he need it.
Mandy clamped her mouth shut, refusing to look at her mangled arm as she wiped away tears. Her stomach churned and her heart beat fast, thumping against her chest. She could feel the heat radiating from her skin and it felt like she was on fire.
“Here.” Jacob handed her coat over to her and she looked at it incuriously. “Put it on. We’re leaving.”
She nodded, blinking to clear the fog that seemed to be clouding her mind. He moved to help her put the coat on and she shrugged away his help. The memory of his hand on her throat was still strong and if she paused, just for a moment, she could still feel them and see the rage in his eyes.
Her arm burned where the cleaver had hit it. She couldn’t tell if that was because of the damage done or if the infection was still there. In truth, she didn’t want to know. She just wanted to weep and scream at the loss.
Jacob watched her as she shuffled across to the edge of the table. She swung her legs over the side and dropped off the edge, clamping her one hand to the wooden surface to hold herself steady as she swayed for a moment, eyes closed until she adjusted.
; “Good,” he said. His tone was that of a someone who had just watched their pet do a trick and she hated him for it. “Do you need help?”
“Fuck off!”
She pulled away from him as he held out his hand and he stopped, raising them before him as he took a step back.
“Fair enough, lass.”
Her eyes narrowed as he walked past her, the urge to lash out at him was almost overwhelming. He’d hurt her! And not only that, he’d taken her arm. She was sure of one thing and one thing only. He would pay for that.
Terri met her in the hallway, her rucksack on her back and rifle slung over her shoulder. She didn’t ask, just slipped one arm around Mandy’s waist and took some of her weight, supporting her. Mandy felt a moments guilt for the way she’d treated the English woman during their stay at the cabin, but it soon passed beneath a wave of fresh pain from her arm.
“We ready?” Clive called from the doorway.
“All set, lad.”
Jacob didn’t even look her way as he left the living room, his rucksack bulging with supplies and his rifle cradled in his arms. He brushed past the other man and the little English chatte, Elise. No doubt, that girl would soon find her way into his arms now that she had been discarded by him.
The cold barely touched her, sweat covering her skin and the heat from her arm spreading throughout her body. Everywhere she looked, the world blurred, in and out of focus, the colours muted.
She focused on putting one foot in front of the other, fighting against the foot or so of snow that covered the ground. She kept her head down, looking up only once as a gunshot filled the air. She narrowed her eyes to see, to try to bring everything into focus but soon gave up.
Her head hung loosely on her neck and she struggled to raise it when a distant voice spoke. She giggled as she listened. They sounded so very far away but were right beside her.
“I think it’s a fever,” Terri said.
“That’s all we fucking need.” That was Jacob, she was sure of it. “We’re almost at the edge of town. I haven’t seen a chemist.”