She nods nervously and looks to the television, as if hoping to find some sliver of assurance among the chaotic images, something that will tell her everything is going to be okay and that we don’t need to leave, something that says we can just stay put and wait for the government boys to come to our rescue. But there’s no one coming to our rescue, and if there were, it sure as hell wouldn’t be the government. I think back to the chopper flying overhead and the men on the guns, shooting indiscriminately into the small crowd of civilians screaming for their help. Nah, the government boys aren’t here to save us, they’re here to kill us, all of us, and I’ll be goddamned if I’m gonna let that happen to me and mine.
4
Me and Tasia are standing at the top of the stairwell; I’ve got the hatchet and she’s wielding a kitchen knife. She’s still breathing pretty heavy, but her tears have dried and she seems resolved to do what she’s gotta do in order for us to get out of here safe with my mom and our baby girl.
I’m looking down over the railing; the stairwell is empty. By now folks have either made it out, they’re dead, or they’re ducked down and hiding, waiting for the storm to pass. “Anything, babe?”
Tasia flips her cell phone closed and gives a frustrated growl. “Nothing, line is completely dead.”
“You try calling my mom?”
“You’re not getting it, Markus. The phone literally isn’t doing a damn thing, I hit the call button and nothing happens.”
“Alright then, I guess we’ll have to go take a look for ourselves.”
Tasia scoots in close behind me, getting up on her tiptoes to peer over my shoulder. “You see anything?”
I’m afraid she’s going to stick me with the kitchen knife so I reach back, grab her wrist, and take a step to the left, letting her come up next to me under my arm. “It’s quiet right now. Let’s start down. Step softly and try not to talk unless you really need to.”
She nods and crouches at the knees to match my posture.
Alisa is on the thirteenth floor, three landings and six flights of stairs away from us. We’re both holding onto the handrail as we move down, trying to support our weight and keep our steps soft and fluffy. But everything echoes in this chamber of metal and cement, even my shallow breathing sounds like waves crashing across a rocky shoreline.
We stop on the fifteenth-floor landing and just look at each other and listen. I don’t think I can hear anything but I can’t be sure. Maybe some distant shuffling? Maybe a door opening and closing? Tasia shrugs and shakes her head and we decide to continue on.
We’re five steps from the fourteenth-floor landing when the door flies open and a skinny kid—about fifteen I’d say—with a blood-soaked head of hair, comes stumbling out. He catches hold of the railing and catches sight of us. I recognize the face, but I don’t recall the name. I’ve seen him pushing dope for the Golden Boys before, but he doesn’t wear the grill or the shirts; far as I can tell, he’s just one of their runners. He starts pointing backwards into the hall, his eyes wide and fixed on mine, his lips moving but not making any sound. Clearly he needs help, but the ability to ask for it has been shocked from his body.
I jump the last two steps and get between him and the door. There are four of them in the hall and they are coming straight for us.
The group varies dramatically in age.
Two of them look like they are around Ms. Ruth’s age. The other two are much younger; a boy and a girl. The boy is probably a teenager. The girl is probably around ten, dressed up in a pink night gown with her hair all done up in pigtails.
Jesus Christ! Is this what it’s coming down to? Killing kids? I’m not sure I’ve got the stomach for this.
“That’s my family,” the boy finally speaks, sobbing between words. “Please, don’t kill them. They are just sick, that’s all.”
“I’ve seen this sorta sickness already, son. You kill them or they kill you.”
I’m getting ready, getting my center of gravity set up, spinning the hatchet in my right hand, deciding how I’m going to take down the two adults—they’re the ones leading the pack. I don’t remember committing myself to this fight, but apparently some deeper instinct that I’m not fully aware of decided for me, it’s kill them or let them kill the boy; I’m not letting them kill the boy.
Tasia steps in to help by trying to console the kid and keep him contained. She rubs his back and speaks in soft tones, but the quiver in her voice lets me know she’s just as shit scared as any of us.
I start trying to talk them down. Sure it didn’t work with Ms. Ruth, but that doesn’t stop me. These folks are sick, but they’re still human. That thing, that thing that makes…us…us, it’s still in there…it’s gotta be.
His parents are closing in fast. They seem to morph closer with each flicker of light in the hall. “What’s your pa’s name?”
The boy whimpers and squeaks something about me not hurting his family.
“What’s his goddamn name?” I’ve got the hatchet up and I’m ready to strike.
More whimpering.
“What’s his name, sweetie?” Tasia asks.
There’s no more time to wait. The boy’s father swipes for my face and flashes his bloody teeth, growling the same way Ms. Ruth did. I duck back and bring the hatchet down on top of his head, splitting it like a melon. The boy is screaming for me to stop, but I’m in survival mode and my focus is now zeroed in on his mom; her mouth is open and aimed directly at my windpipe. I punch her once in the nose, sending her stumbling backwards against her two kids, giving me enough time to dislodge my weapon from her husband’s skull. I come around on a backswing and take her head right off her shoulders.
The two kids at her back aren’t deterred by the death of their parents. Instead, they take advantage of the space that has opened up in front of them and continue to advance.
I hesitate, gritting my teeth.
These are kids!
Crazy ass kids with blood-drenched clothes, flesh under their fingernails, and wearing skin that seems to be sagging from their bones. Kids that I’m sure, if given the chance, would tear me limb from limb. But still, killing a kid, that’s some heavy shit.
All I keep seeing is my daughter’s face.
Could I do it to her?
What if she’s like this?
I jump back as the two kids snarl and snap.
Before I can finish working up the nerve, the boy breaks free from Tasia and throws himself between me and his brother and sister, shoving me hard in the chest. “No! Stop hurting my family!”
Desperate men are stupid men!
“No don’t!” Tasia, her motherly instinct on full display, tries to rush in to pull him out of harm’s way.
I wrap her up with one arm and spin her back against the railing. “There’s nothing you can do!”
The boy is screaming now as his sister tears his intestines from his side an inch at a time; she looks like a butcher with a set of sausage links. At the same time, his brother has his neck cranked back and is ripping into his jugular, sending blood squirting against the ceiling, where it beads and begins to fall back down like raindrops.
These aren’t children; these are rabid animals.
I don’t hesitate. I end it with two blows, one for each of them.
I drop the hatchet and catch the boy as he falls. The wound on his neck is still spraying blood with every beat of his heart, splashing the side of my face and dripping down and staining the neckline of my coveralls.
Tasia falls to her knees in front of me and presses her hand against the wound. “There’s got to be something we can do! We’ve got to call for help!”
“Who we gonna call? Phones aren’t working! Goddamn world’s falling down around our ears! Who we gonna call, Tasia?”
She’s crying, the blood from the wound escaping between her fingers.
The boy is thrashing in my arms, choking, trying to hold onto the life seeping from his veins. Soon he is still and Tasia is devastated. She falls back onto her butt
, weeping, her forehead against her knees.
I roll the boy to the floor, gather my hatchet, and stand. “We can’t stay here. This same shit is happening all over this building. Alisa is out there waiting for us.”
Tasia takes my hand and I pull her up to her feet.
“We did everything we could.”
She nods. “I know. I just…I don’t get it. What’s happening to these people?”
“They’re sick.”
We’re both looking down at the body of the boy; the blood leaking from his throat is starting to slow its flow.
“Let’s go,” I say, ushering Tasia forward.
Something grabs my ankle, firm and true. I kick my leg out hard, trying to break free, thinking that I’ve somehow gotten myself hung up on one of the bodies. Then I hear that familiar growl. I look down to see the boys’ mouth going for my ankle. He’s still ashen from blood loss, his intestines are still snaking from his side, and his throat is still torn open, but he’s moving, just as full of life as you or I. “Oh shit! Oh shit! Oh shit!” I start kicking him square in the face. His nose caves in from the impact of my boot heel and one of his eyes dislodges from the socket, but he keeps on going at me.
Tasia slides down to her knees and starts jamming the knife in his back, over and over and over again, her face is twisted up, and she’s screaming with each stab, “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”
“Jump back, look out!” Tasia rolls away and I swing the hatchet down and split the back of the boys’ head; it doesn’t break the skull. I didn’t put enough force behind the blow because I’m trying not to cut my fucking leg off; he’s still latched to my ankle, still trying to get his teeth in me. I swing again, harder. That does the trick. The boy shuts down a second after impact. I shake loose of his grasp and jump away from him. I watch him and his family closely, looking for any other unexpected signs of life.
“That boy was dead!” Tasia has a hand on her hip and tears in her eyes and is pointing her knife at his body. “He was dead, Markus! We watched him die! What the fuck is going on?”
I shake my head. “Some disease or virus or something, I don’t know, but I think I know who does.”
Tasia looks at me, question marks in her eyes.
“Them boys outside with the big guns, shooting everyone down in the streets, they know.”
“What makes you so sure?” She’s holding the bloody knife in a reverse grip, looking down the hallway and then walking over to the railing to check the floors below us.
“They got here too quick. Shit started popping off and they was out there, setting up roadblocks, fully kitted out in less than twenty minutes.”
“But how would they—” Tasia gasps. “The men I saw on the roof, that shit they were spraying, you don’t think…”
“It’s a possibility. One of the only ones we got at the moment.”
“But why? And how come we aren’t sick?”
“You said you saw them and immediately turned off the A/C and sealed all the windows. How many folks didn’t?”
“I just…wow…I can’t believe it.” She steadies herself against the railing. “People coming back to life and eating each other, what kind of fucked up shit—”
“Now is not the time. We just need to keep our focus on getting the hell out of here. We can ask questions later. What we do know is that we’ve gotta get them in the head. You stabbed that boy…what…a dozen times? He didn’t even flinch. We’ve gotta get the brain, put em’ down for good.”
She nods, still looking a little sick. “After you.” She waves a hand towards the stairs, eager for me to lead the way.
We make it down to the thirteenth-floor landing. We’ve got our backs on either side of the door. I look to Tasia. She gives me a weak smile, waiting for my lead. I wonder how Alisa is gonna react when she sees us like this; Tasia soaked in blood up to her elbows and me with blood all over my face, neck, and clothes.
“You know what apartment it is?”
Tasia presses a thumb and index finger against her eyes, thinking, her lips moving silently, rattling off numbers. “1310…I think?”
I sigh. “Well, we’ll keep kicking doors till we find her, ain’t leaving without Alisa.”
“Let’s get our baby girl.”
5
I open the door to the hallway, the low creak of the hinges announcing my presence. The hatchet leads the way for me, blade first. I’m not some great combat strategist; I’ve had no formal training, and have never been much of a fighting man in general. I don’t know the proper way to enter and clear a room. But I’ve gotten this far, so I must be doing something right. I’m not surprised to see that there are bodies spaced up and down the hall, missing various limbs and pieces of flesh; after what I just saw, I don’t think there’s anything that can surprise me at this point. Many of the apartment doors have been kicked in and are hanging from their hinges or are missing altogether. But I don’t see any sign of the sick ones. I don’t hear any groaning or growling either; just distant gunshots and folks yelling somewhere far below me.
“It’s clear, come on.” Tasia steps out behind me, knees cocked, a hand on my shoulder. “Put your back to mine. You watch that end and I’ll watch this one.”
It takes a few tries for us to sync up; I’m going too fast or she’s going too slow, or I get away from her and she starts stumbling backwards, trying to keep her balance. But eventually we get it right and soon we are moving like a couple of pros, covering the angles, speaking in covert whispers.
“You watching the numbers?”
“Yeah.” The door to my left says 1317.
There’s a wet roar and loud footsteps. Tasia screams. I turn to help her but find the attacker already impaled on the end of her blade; she managed to stick him right through the eyeball, first try.
“Nice work, babe. You got this.”
“Yeah…yeah, I got this,” she says between panicked gasps. She twists the blade free and the sick one slides down her legs to the floor.
I hear growling and footsteps again, this time they’re coming for me. I turn, swinging the hatchet blindly. I catch the sick one in the arm. I pull back, leaving the arm dangling by a thin sheet of tissue, just below the elbow. The next blow sinks into its temple; the killing blow. Apparently our noise has stirred up a bit of a hornet’s nest; they’re trickling from the open apartments in front and in back of us.
“Stay close to me.” I reach back and pull Tasia by the tail of her shirt, getting the upper portion of her back good and tight with mine. “We’re gonna keep moving, slow and smart. When they get close, go for the head, don’t panic. You need me, just holler.”
“You do the same.”
My wife has always been a tough woman and I’ve never been happier to have her at my back than I am right now.
I move and she moves, staying right with me. We’re both stabbing and swinging and grunting, downing sick ones left and right as we move steadily towards 1310. I keep waiting for Tasia to yell for my help, but the only sounds coming out of her are battle cries and profanity.
When we make it to 1310, there’s a line of bodies behind us and we’re both soaked in a fresh coat of blood. The door for 1310 is still intact and secured. I’m not sure whether this is a good or a bad thing. Every part of my being wants to bust through that flimsy ass wooden rectangle and get my arms around my little girl. But we’ve gotten this far by being smart. One slip up and me and mine could end up with a bullet or a set of teeth buried in our necks.
I put my ear to the door. I can hear what sounds like the drone of a television.
Tasia checks the handle. It’s locked. “Alisa!” Tasia whispers loudly, her lips almost touching the door.
I brace myself, nervous excitement rumbling around inside me, waiting for some type of response.
Nothing.
“Alisa!” Tasia raises her voice slightly. I look back, afraid that the noise may attract more unwelcome visitors.
“Hear anything?”
“I d
on’t think so.”
“We’re gonna have to break it down, move aside.”
“You think that’s—”
“I think our baby girl might be in there and she might need us. I’m not standing out in this hall anymore.”
She nods her agreement and takes two steps to the right.
I’m no expert on taking down doors, I’ve seen it done on TV a time or two and I’ve heard a couple little hooligans in this building brag about the techniques they use, so I go at it the only way I know how; shoulder first. I’m not a big man, so part of me expects to go tumbling backwards on my ass. But it gives straight away and a few seconds later, I’m standing in the middle of the living room.
There’s no time for celebration. Whatever rush of victory I feel is quickly washed out by a spine tingling chill of terror. There’s blood all over the living room: streaked on the walls, pooled on the carpet, speckled across the face of the television screen. There are signs of struggle everywhere: the couch is tipped over on its back with white swells of stuffing emerging from tears and slits in the fabric, the coffee table is on its side and is missing two legs, the end table by the recliner has been reduced to a pile of splinters.
For a moment, Tasia and me just stand there, frozen, taking in the scene, readjusting our hopes and expectations in light of this new information.
“Oh my god,” Tasia mutters as tears instantly fill her eyes.
I break from my trance and start storming through the apartment, hatchet up. “Alisa!”
Tasia is running behind me, echoing my calls, “Alisa! Alisa! It’s us, baby! It’s safe!”
The kitchen looks just as war torn and the refrigerator door is hanging open. When I get to the hallway leading off the kitchen to the bedrooms, I see them.
The bodies.
I catch myself against a door frame as the world around me momentarily fuzzes out of existence.
I can’t breathe. I can’t scream. I can’t cry.
“What is it? Is it Alisa?” Tasia squeezes past me, sees them, and screams. “No! Oh, please, no!” She doesn’t waver like I do. She charges in, not put off by the corpses and blood.
Tower of the Dead: A Zombie Novel Page 3