Morning came far too soon. Morgan wanted to say goodbye to her brother and the rest before they left. Everyone else had the same idea, and the dining room was packed. Delicious smells wafted through the air as Elise prepared a proper send-off for the heroes, and Logan’s stomach growled.
It was evident to everyone in the room that things between Morgan and Logan had changed. Whenever Logan looked at her, she blushed a deep, beetroot red. This caused much amusement among the observers.
“Guess the cat’s out of the bag,” Morgan said with a sheepish smile.
“Not like it was ever a state secret,” Julianne teased.
The only tense moment occurred when Joanna arrived. Morgan stiffened, and Logan removed his arm from around her shoulders.
Joanna forestalled Morgan’s stuttered explanation with a raised hand. “Morgan, dear, don’t apologize. It’sIt’s your life and your decision.”
She turned and made a dignified exit, leaving Morgan red-faced and guilty-looking.
“That went well,” Logan said.
Morgan swallowed, chewing on her bottom lip.
“It must be hard for her, losing her son, and seeing you with someone else.” He studied her stricken face. “How do you feel about it?”
“I feel bad. How can I not?”
“Are you sorry?”
“No, I’m not. I could die tomorrow and then what? Besides, this doesn’t change the fact that I loved him. He was a good man.”
“I’m sure he was,” Logan said.
“Thank you for understanding.” She kissed him on the cheek. “I’ll help Elise wash up. See you later.”
Slinging his rifle to its customary spot, he walked out into the chilly pre-dawn air. He nodded to Armand and Angie who stood off to the side. Max and the others were preparing to leave, and he ambled over to see them off. He could not help but notice the hostile look Armand shot him, though.
Angie whispered to him, but the boy ignored her, glaring at Logan instead. She tugged at his arm. With a violent pull, he shrugged her off. Tears shimmered in her eyes as she turned away. Stupid. Too caught up in his damn fantasies to see what’s staring him right in the face.
Logan shrugged. The boy would learn or not. It was no business of his what Armand did. As long as he stays away from Morgan. She’s mine, and I don’t intend to share.
Chapter 18 - Big Ben
It was well before dawn, and the road was dark and quiet, the only signs of life being the odd startled meerkat or guinea fowl caught in the headlights. Ben sighed and rubbed his eyes, tired from all the peering into the dark. His eyesight wasn’t quite what it used to be anymore, and a trip to the optometrist was out of the question now.
I’m getting too old for this. He shifted in his seat, trying to get comfortable. Strange how life takes the most unexpected turns.
When he was younger, he was a boxer. A good one too. But the injuries took their toll, and he retired early to open a gymnasium. He met and married a good woman and hoped for a family. It wasn’t meant to be. Mariana was diagnosed with cervical cancer a year after their marriage, and all dreams of children died with that discovery. Thankfully, Mariana recovered from the illness after treatment, and they spent many happy years together. Now he was glad they’d never had children. Losing his wife was bad enough. He still had nightmares of those first few days of the apocalypse.
He had gone to the studio at ten that morning. After class, he was perplexed to notice several missed calls from Mariana which was unusual since she didn’t like to bother him at work. He called back, but she didn’t answer.
Dismissing the next class, he jumped into his car and raced home, a feeling of foreboding gnawing at his gut. He found the streets in chaos and traffic jammed to a suffocating degree. The sense of wrongness intensified.
When he reached home, his worst fears were confirmed. Someone had broken into the house. The dining-room windows were smashed into pieces.
He followed a blood trail to the bedroom, finding the door open. More blood than he had ever seen before in his life obscured the room. It was splashed onto the walls, the ceiling, the bed, and soaked into the carpet.
He found his wife on the floor on the other side of the bed. He could barely identify her there was so little left. Only the blond hair and wedding ring confirmed his worst fears. Luckily or unluckily, depending on the point of view, her skull had been cracked open and her brain eaten, preventing her from turning and coming back as a monster.
Shocked and confused, it took some time to figure out what was happening and make a run for it. He picked up Angie and Susan along the way. They barely made it out of Bloemfontein alive.
On the road, they met up with the others and were chased from one place to the next. During that time, he grew fond of the girls, along with Armand and Jacques, coming to see them as his adopted children.
The night they ended up at Max’s place, they were attacked. Susan got bitten. He blamed himself for that. He should have been there for her and protected her just as he should have protected his wife. At least Angie was still alive, and he would make damn sure she stayed that way.
Up ahead, the other vehicle slowed down and pulled over to the side of the road. Max had briefed them all beforehand, and they’d decided to launch a surprise attack at dawn.
Joseph shot Ben a smile, his teeth gleaming pearly white against his ebony skin. Ben had grown to trust him after the many near misses they’d faced together in the past, and the two men were as close as brothers.
“Today, my friend, we might die,” Joseph said.
“Comforting,” Ben replied.
Joseph laughed, “Don’t look so sad. We’ve faced many dangers together, and if we die today, we go to meet our ancestors.”
Ben snorted, “Forgive me if that prospect does not excite me.”
Joseph clapped him on the back and walked ahead, joining the rest. Ben stretched out his stiff limbs, hoping to get the blood flowing again. He did not look forward to what awaited them. The idea of killing repulsed him, but he realized the necessity. What bothered him the most was the thought of the remaining girl. He hoped they weren’t rescuing a corpse.
They huddled together as Max dispensed last-minute instructions. Then they were off, jogging along the dirt track spaced loosely apart, each keeping a wary eye out for trouble.
The sun was rising which relieved Ben. It enabled him to see better. A light sweat broke out on his forehead, but his body moved with ease, and he enjoyed the activity. The gate appeared, the silver metal gleaming with dewdrops. They fanned out to the sides, hunkering down with their rifles ready.
Max cleared the area as they slipped through the gate in single file. Fanning out again, they approached the tree line, keeping low in the grass. They each chose a sheltered spot with a wide field of fire while Max reconnoitered to make sure there weren’t any surprises in store for them, either guards or infected.
Lisa had told them much about both the men they faced and the layout. She’d also told them the group sometimes captured infected, using them for sport.
Ben admired the girl for being so clear-headed despite what she’d been through. Her companion Michelle was both younger and more traumatized. They had not questioned her.
After a tense few minutes, Max gave the all clear and took up his position. Max exchanged a glance with each of them and mouthed, “Ready?”
They nodded. Max pulled the pin on a grenade and tossed it into the center of the buildings. It detonated with a terrific bang, sending up a shower of dirt and dust to leave behind a crater. Doors burst open, and figures spilled out, firing shots at random. The bright morning sun blinded them, and their bullets went wild.
“What a bunch of dumbasses,” Ben muttered. Clearly, intelligence wasn’t their strong suit.
He lined up his sights and squeezed the trigger, putting a bullet between the eyes of the nearest, a burly man with a bushy beard worthy of Grizzly Adams. He went down, twitched once and lay still. Joseph, Max, and J
acques each picked their targets, and two more fell while the third ducked behind a car, wounded in the shoulder.
That’s three down, Ben thought, with the fourth wounded. That leaves two, of which one is nowhere in sight, and the other is minus a knee thanks to Morgan.
Silence fell, overwhelming after the wild gunfire and grenade blast. It was broken only by the hoarse cries of the wounded man.
After a few seconds, Max spoke. “Drop your gun and come out with your hands in the air.” Silence met his demand. “If you don’t, I’m tossing a grenade over there.”
“No way. If I come out, you’ll shoot me.”
“He’s got that right,” Jacques muttered under his breath.
Joseph snorted.
Max silenced them both with a glance. “We won’t shoot you if you come out, but if you don’t, I’ll blow you to pieces. How’s that?”
A moment’s silence. “Fine! I’m coming out. Please don’t shoot.” He tossed his rifle away and crawled out from behind the vehicle.
Max motioned to the others to stand down. “Where’s the rest of you?”
“The rest?”
“We know there’s at least two more of you. Don’t play dumb with me unless you want a bullet between the eyes.”
“Okay, okay.” He raised his hands in surrender. “Gary’s dead. That bitch did him in with that shot to the knee. Cried for hours before he died.”
“The other one?”
The guy swallowed. “There isn’t anyone else.”
“Don’t talk shit. Do you want to die?”
“No.” He looked over his shoulder, his eyes straying to a cottage not far from him. “I swear I’m the only one that’s left.”
“You’re lying.”
“Okay, fine, he’s over—” A shot rang out, and he fell, red blooming on his chest.
Max looked around. “Who shot him?”
Ben shrugged, “Not me.”
The other two also shook their heads. Max looked back, scanning the grounds. “Must be his partner. He doesn’t want to be found.”
“Smoke him out,” Ben suggested. “Put those grenades to use.”
“Good idea.” Max tossed a grenade, followed closely by two more. Explosions rocked the ground, and the percussive sounds made Ben’s ears ring.
When the noise faded, Max shouted, “We know you’re in there. You might as well come out, or I’ll blow you into so many pieces there won’t be enough left for the ants to carry away.”
Silence.
Max looked at the others. “What now? If I keep throwing grenades, I risk killing the girl.”
“We hunt him down,” Joseph said, “like the animal he is.”
“It’s too dangerous. There’s no cover,” Max said, shaking his head.
“We don’t have a choi—” Joseph replied before being interrupted.
“All right. I’m coming out, but if you try anything, I’ll shoot the girl,” a strange voice shouted. They all looked down, trying to pinpoint its location.
Max narrowed his eyes. “Come on out. We won’t shoot.”
In the doorway of a cottage, the struggling figure of a girl appeared followed by a slender frame.
Ben blinked, surprised at what he saw. “It’s just a boy!” he exclaimed, exchanging incredulous looks with the others.
The last remaining survivor of the enemy group was still in his teens, seventeen maybe eighteen. Wide eyes and freckles dominated his features, lending him an innocent air; his red hair gleamed in the sunlight.
“What the fuck?” Max muttered.
The boy pushed the girl along in front of him. Ben focused on her. She wore a torn red dress. Her brown hair was unwashed and limp and shrouded her face. Duct tape covered her mouth. She wouldn’t stand still and fought against her bonds, utterly ignoring the gun trained to the back of her head.
“Let the girl go,” Max shouted.
“No,” the boy yelled back, defiant. “I’m taking her and getting out of here. If you shoot me, she dies.”
“No deal. Let the girl go, and…” Max hesitated, “and you walk.”
Ben shot Max a look. “Max, we can’t let him go. He’s a monster.”
“What choice do we have? We have to rescue her,” Max protested.
“I can take him,” Jacques said. “He won’t know what hit him.”
“It’s too risky. She’s struggling too much.” Max shook his head and turned back.
“I give you my word. Let her go, and you can walk free. No consequences.”
The boy thought about it, emotions flickering across his face in rapid succession. Ben found it hard to read him. The innocent looks threw him off. There was something there, though, something cruel and hard but most of all, devious. He can’t be trusted.
After a tense moment, the boy nodded, “I agree. If you give your word.”
“I give you my word and the word of my men.”
“You’ll have to come fetch her,” the boy smirked. “She might need some…assistance.”
Ben’s blood boiled, enraged at the thought of what the poor girl had been through. Fucker.
Debating briefly, Max stood. “I’m coming.”
Jacques jumped up with the eagerness of youth, “No, let me, Max.”
He started down the ridge without waiting for permission, and Max had no choice but to let him go.
Ben’s instincts screamed at him. Something was wrong. He looked at the girl again. She was still struggling, refusing to back down. As he focused on her, he noticed something off. A crescent bite mark peeped out from underneath the long hair over her shoulders.
“Max, stop him!”
“What’s wrong?”
“She’s a fucking zombie!” Ben shouted, raising his rifle.“Jacques, come back!”
Things happened so fast, it all became a blur. Jacques stopped a short distance away from the girl and looked back at Ben, confusion written on his face. The enemy boy reached over her shoulder and ripped off the duct tape, revealing torn and bloody lips pulled back into a snarl. He cut her bonds with a swift stroke and shoved her forward. She growled and reached for Jacques, her hands latching onto his shirt. His eyes widened in horror, and he batted at her face.
Ben aimed his rifle at her head, squeezing off a shot. It missed. She latched onto Jacques’ throat and tore out a meaty chunk. The boy screamed as blood spurted from the wound. Ben fired off another round, but shock and horror seized his muscles. He missed again.
Jacques tumbled to the ground with the girl on top of him. Hoarse cries bubbled from his lips. She tore out another chunk and reared up, throwing her head back. Red blood flowed down her milky white skin, blending in with her dress. Someone else took the shot, and her head exploded into a fine spray of red mist. She was flung backward and lay splayed, her eyes staring at the blue sky unseeingly.
Shots continued to fly back and forth. Joseph had pinned the enemy boy down behind a small wall. He appeared not to care about his life, having just screwed up his one chance to walk away. A final bullet fired from Max’s rifle shattered his skull, and the fight ended as quickly as it began. It was over, and the grass lay strewn with bodies, but Ben saw none of that.
Jacques had rolled over on the grass, choking on the blood that gurgled up his throat. His hands reached to Ben, and his fingers clawed at the ground. Ben dropped his gun and ran to him. “Jacques!”
He dropped to his knees and gripped Jacques by the shoulder. The boy’s eyes were glassy. His mouth worked, forming a word he couldn’t say: Armand.
Ben worked to stem the flow of blood even though he knew it was pointless. When the light left Jacques’ eyes, he grabbed the boy’s shoulders, shaking him back and forth. “Fight damn it. Don’t die on me. Fight!”
Joseph gripped his shoulder. “Ben. He’s gone.”
Sobbing bitter tears, Ben slumped to the ground. “No. God, please, no,” he cried, tears rolling down his cheeks, mingling with the blood on his hands. “It’s my fault.”
“It�
�s not your fault, Ben,” Joseph said, but Ben knew the truth. He’d missed. He’d missed his shot. A shot that could have killed the girl and saved the boy. His boy. Ben cried out as agony gripped his heart with vice-like intensity.
Max and Joseph searched the cottages and cleared the grounds, leaving him to his grief. They found no more people, either dead, living, or undead. They did find a burnt clearing filled with the remains of corpses, though.
A field of death, Ben thought with bitter rage as he fixated on the dead gang members.
“Burn them,” he said, his voice hoarse.
“What?” Max asked.
“Burn them,” Ben repeated. “They don’t deserve a burial.”
Max complied without argument, fetching a jerry can of fuel and lighting the bodies with a match. Together, they watched the corpses burn, acrid smoke stinging their eyes. The smell of burning flesh permeated their clothes.
The girl, Jackie, they also cremated. It was the accepted way to deal with infected as they did not want to bury the bodies and possibly contaminate the environment, but they did so with respect and a murmured prayer.
To Ben, it felt like the world had stopped turning. Not only had they failed to rescue the girl, but he’d also failed to protect his boy. I’m sorry, Jacques. So sorry.
They wrapped Jacques’ body in a sheet scavenged from one of the cottages and loaded him into the back of a vehicle, but only after they ensured he would not reanimate.
The sad little cavalcade drove through the gates, stopping only to secure it with a thick chain brought along for that purpose. The gunfire and grenade blasts would draw in any undead in the vicinity, and nobody wanted their new home to be overrun.
Ben was in a haze, his mind a mess of conflicting emotions. Scenes from the past kept flashing before his eyes. His wife, smiling at him on their wedding day, then the gruesome discovery of her body. Susan lost and scared until he found her, then the life leaving her eyes as she died from the virus. Jacques, so young and eager, then choking on his own blood. He had failed them all. Tears coursed down his weathered skin unheeded, and he ignored Joseph’s concerned looks. What was there to say?
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