Life Among The Dead (Book 3): A Bittersweet Victory

by Cotton, Daniel

  Though Vida has reduced her pace, Brad does not. He rams into the back of her stolen sedan. She hasn’t seen any indication that she’s passed Eagle Rock, nor any sign that it’s coming up soon. She has no choice but to floor the accelerator and hope for the best.

  The needle rises, but not fast enough, and she’s hit from behind once again.

  The jeep gains on the Taurus, creeping up along its left side. Instead of overtaking her, Brad paces Vida, keeping his front fender up against her rear end. He pushes her car, forcing it to skid.

  Vida is terrified as her back wheels lose traction and she is involuntarily spun around 180 degrees. She tries to speed off in the direction she has come from, but the jeep reverses and causes them to move diagonally along the road with a grating whine of steel on steel.

  Their tires squeal as Vida is forced to the shoulder, and the overworked wheels spew gravel and dirt when they leave the road. With no regard for his own safety, Brad causes them both to tumble down an embankment like toys.

  A stunned Vida finds herself on the ceiling of her vehicle. Though battered and dazed she is able to move, and realizes she must. It takes a moment of frantic thinking to remember how to open the door in its new disorienting position, but she manages to get out and scramble up the steep incline and back onto the road.

  Standing on the highway, she is at a loss as what to do next. She could start running, but doesn’t know where to run to. In the world before, she could flag down a fellow traveler for help, but not anymore. Scanning the area, she sees a sign for Fort Eagle Rock, though she is not certain if putting herself at the mercy of yet more soldiers is a good plan. However, it’s all she has. They can’t all be like him, she thinks as she heads for the long dirt road to safety.

  Vida looks over her shoulder to the scene of the accident, fearing she’ll spot Brad, her knight in sheep’s clothing, ascending the embankment. The jeep’s front end actually wound up on top of her overturned sedan. Brad is on the move, attempting to lower himself from the pitched back tailgate.

  Brad grunts and groans his way up the hill as Vida sprints towards safety. Once on level ground, he disregards his injuries to catch her, and the bullet fragments in his leg pinch and scrape the tender muscle that holds them. He surprises himself with his speed as he closes the distance and tackles Vida. They leave the dirt road and tumble onto a dusty field. A grey cloud stirs up, filling the air they breathe and making their teeth gritty. They fight, rolling along the rough terrain. She for freedom, he to subdue her.

  There is no way Brad can keep his prize if they go to Eagle Rock, but he knows just the place to take her, Fallen.

  He hasn’t set foot in the sleepy, sleazy town since the night he and a buddy got a little rough with a dancer on stage at the strip club there, and then got thoroughly pummeled by a guy twice their age. He’ll take Vida to a small shop in the town that sells sex toys--an array of devious devices to have fun with his new plaything.

  Brad pins her to the ground, and the tussle awakens more dark fantasies within him as he rubs his body pleasurably against hers. He forgets about quieting her and remembers how badly he wanted to take her earlier. His victim certainly has other plans, and is not about to go easily.

  Vida squirms beneath him, and the friction brings a smile to his face. She shifts her weight suddenly and reverses his hold on her, like a Mexican wrestler. In a flash, she’s on top and he is face down in the rocky soil.

  Vida’s grandmother taught her how to play guitar, but her grandfather taught her to fight. At this point, her grandfather told her to scream for help. If no one responds, she should slam her opponent’s head into the ground before releasing him, then run. So Vida pulls Brad’s head back and drives it into the hard packed surface.

  While dashing off of her limp opponent, her ankle becomes ensnared and she falls. The wind is knocked out of her, and it takes a second to realize Brad has grabbed her foot. The swirling dust chokes her as she regains her breath, and before she can come up with a counter move he flips her on to her back and places a long blade across her throat.

  The edge bites into her flesh just enough to let her know it’s there. All she can do is look up into his eyes and see his desire. His gaze could almost be mistaken for love.

  The loving look grows into an unsettling grin, and whatever his intentions Vida has no desire to surrender her will. She’d rather be killed than live out the rest of her days at his mercy.

  Still able to move her right arm, she finds the wound in his leg and digs dust caked fingers in. Her nails are short, but they might as well be razor blades. Brad lets out a wail as she penetrates his flesh with the same brutality he planned on showing her.

  She’s filled with contempt and disgust for her captor. “How do you like having things shoved into you against your will?”

  His wails of agony continue as he applies more pressure to the blade at her throat. Vida can’t speak, and she can barely breathe as the cold steel constricts her windpipe. If she so much as swallows the saliva accumulating in her mouth, the movement will cause an inadvertent slit. She no longer cares if he kills her, though. If only she could muster the strength to meet the knife and end this. She does manage to spit in his face.

  The urge to drag the blade across her supple neck is hard to overcome, but he resists. He refuses to give up his sweet reward by reducing her to just another body along the roadside. Besides, he can make her pay for it later. Brad drives his combat knife into the ground all the way to the hilt, right next to her, then he bites her instead.

  His teeth gnaw deeply into the tender spot where her neck meets her shoulder. She screams out in horror and shock as he tears into her flesh, shaking his head like a dog with a rawhide bone once he tastes blood. He makes certain to leave undeniable evidence of ravaging teeth before releasing her.

  He gets off of her after that, leaving her clutching her wounded neck while he stands over her. “There. It’s over. Now you have no choice but to come with me. We’ll get my jeep back on the road and go to base together,” he lies. “You’ll need me to tell them that it wasn’t a zombie that bit you. Otherwise you’ll get a bullet to the head.”

  She rises to her feet and bursts into laughter. “So… you’re going to tell them that you bit me? I’m sure they’ll be relieved.”

  “Don’t laugh at me!” he snarls.

  She knows he won’t take her to Eagle Rock. Her only recourse is to enrage him enough that he makes a mistake or kills her. “How’d you ever get into the military? I thought they had an intelligence test…”

  He charges at Vida, driving his shoulder into her stomach hard. Then he snatches his knife from the ground and straddles her body, holding the dirty blade high over his head.

  Exhausted, Vida waits for the dagger to come down and cease her suffering. She’s won. But after a pop in the distance, Brad falls off her torso. A single gunshot from the highway saves her as well as robs her of escape from the cruel world.

  She’s too weak to feel relief, even after seeing Brad’s head snap back in a puff of blood. She’s too tired to be afraid of what’s to come. All she can do is look up at the sky as shadows creep in around the edges. Vida surrenders to the darkness, thinking, What now?

  9

  While fleeing from the dead through the smoke filled streets of Worchester, Marko ordered his men to make for the hideout. They took the rural roads that Marko knows intimately to avoid any further tussles with soldiers. Now they stare out at the highway from the patrol office windows on the second floor, looking for movement.

  Marko’s dream of lawlessness has been challenged. He fears not being able to do whatever he wants and living like a king. The only way is numbers, he thinks. I have to get more subjects.

  “Why do you think that guy attacked us?” Biff asks again.

  “I told you, I have no idea!” Marko snaps, tired of repeating himself and agitated by the day’s events. “Just keeping the peace, I guess.”

  Draining yet another beer, Ma
rko tries to relax. He is fairly confident that they can’t be seen from the road, though they can see it just fine through the foliage. “You idiots get the trucks unloaded and the shit stowed. We’ll cool our heels for the night. Head back out in the morning.”

  Before the sound of automatic gunfire drew Marko from the gun shop, he loaded up several crates of ammo and a few armfuls of guns that now need to be sorted and stored. But Biff and Jessie hesitate in carrying out the order. Instead they look to one another with puzzled expressions, more puzzled than usual.

  Jessie asks, “Why are we going out again so soon? Shouldn’t we wait a few days for the heat to die down?”

  “There has to be more people out there,” Marko says. “The longer this goes on the less there’ll be. We need to recruit.”

  10

  Being lifted from the ground wasn’t enough to stir Vida from her slumber, nor was being lowered into the back of a car. She didn’t awaken when the vehicle started to move, but voices draw her back into the world.

  Three people speak, but she can’t make out a single word in her foggy return to reality. A deep, male voice calmly mumbles, while the other two squabble back and forth.

  All gibberish at first, but the closer she gets to consciousness the more she understands.

  “She’s been bitten, Dad!” one says.

  “He wasn’t dead,” the calm man says.

  “You don’t know that.”

  “Zombies don’t stab people.”

  “Then we should drop her off at that base back there, or go there ourselves instead of all the way south.”

  The other half of the quarreling pair, a female, says, “He just killed a soldier. We can’t go there, dumbass… Well, you and I can.”

  “You two, and anyone else, can go there if you want. But I am not going to lock myself away. Especially after seeing one of theirs bite this poor girl and try to kill her.”

  Vida groans and shifts against the plush seat. She has no idea where these folks are taking her, but the soothing voice of the man in back with her puts her at ease.

  “This is my car,” the female adamantly reminds the man. “I say we go to the base.”

  “As I recall, Gloria, I loaned you a substantial amount of money when you two found yourselves in a financial pickle…” the man tells her. “Enough to get your heads above water and put some aside for later. Instead of saving it, you both decided to purchase this car. Unless you have $30,000 on you, consider it repossessed.”

  “Aren’t you going to say something, Howard?” the one named Gloria asks. “Put your foot down?”

  “He’s my dad, honey,” Howard says.

  “You’re 35 fucking years old! Grow some balls!”

  Vida searches in the dark recesses of her mind for a way into the light. She can tell Gloria is driving and the one man, Howard, must be in the front passenger seat.

  “Are you looking at her tits?” Gloria says to Howard.

  “Fuck, Gloria! Really?”

  “You’re a married man! And she looks underage, pervert!”

  “I was reading her t-shirt!”

  “Shut up, you two,” the calm man scolds the couple up front. “She’s waking up.”

  Vida charges through the gloom. She forces herself to sit up in the backseat. The act of turning her head is painful, but she feels she must to guarantee safety. All she needs to know is that no one is planning on hurting her.

  “Easy,” the calm man tells her. The thick bandage he placed on her neck wound has come loose, so he gently re-fastens the tape. “You sure must have been through a lot. You didn’t even react when I cleaned this with antiseptic. They say human bites are particularly nasty. I didn’t want to take any chances with infection.”

  Cold and vulnerable, Vida wants to wrap Brandon’s sweatshirt tightly around herself, but finding the sentimental garment missing causes her panic. She wonders if she’s been disrobed, but her hands and eyes confirm she has clothes on. However the cotton and denim aren’t enough to relax her, and she covers herself with her hands.

  The man next to her makes a soothing sound. He keeps his distance and holds his palms up to let her know he means no harm. “We removed the sweatshirt to look for more wounds, dear. That’s all.”

  She stares into his kind blue eyes, ready to fight should she need to. “Where are you taking me?”

  “Anywhere you’d like,” the gray-haired man says. “My name is Gabriel. This is my son, Howard, and his wife, Gloria.”

  “Vida,” she says, yet doesn’t lower her guard.

  “You were near Fort Eagle Rock. Want us to take you there?” Gloria asks in a hopeful tone.

  “No!”

  “Is there any place else you’d like to go?” Gabe asks.

  “Somewhere safe.”

  “What a coincidence.” Gabe smiles. “That’s just where we’re heading. I have a place in Harrington, Florida. It’s quite a drive, but well worth it. I have lots of land, peach trees, and some livestock. You’re welcome to join us if you wish.”

  Something about this man puts her at ease. She doesn’t give his invitation a response just yet, Instead she looks out the back window and is surprised to find a train of vehicles following them.

  “We’ve assembled a convoy,” Gabe says with pride. “I was visiting my son and his wife up north when all this happened. We gathered all we could and hit the road this morning.”

  The blue car Vida currently rides in leads the convoy through the canyon she had driven through alone earlier. Not long after passing a sheer stone wall cut long ago to make way for the highway, the car pulls off the road.

  “What are you doing?” Howard asks his wife.

  “Your dad said to pull into the next rest area.”

  “Why?”

  “So we can all rest,” Gabriel says. “It’s a long journey and everyone needs to stay alert. We can gas up and catch some sleep. We’ll start out again at first light.”

  “We should keep moving,” Howard says.

  “It will be getting dark before long. Safer to travel in the light of day,” Gabe says.

  Howard surrenders the debate, and he and his wife launch into a fresh quarrel about how Gloria has parked their car. Gabriel offers Vida an apologetic shrug. She smiles in return, slipping into the sweatshirt that he gives back to her.

  The thin hoodie is all she has to remember Brandon by, along with the t-shirt she wears. These are now her only worldly possessions--two blood stained garments of sentimental value and the rest of what she wears. Somehow the fleece makes her feel safer as she pulls it tightly around her body. She’d rather it be Brandon’s arms, but this is as close as she’ll ever get.

  No one asks her about what happened back there on the road. Like some unspoken agreement, it is left as an off-limits topic. They must figure she’ll talk when she’s ready.

  They are all nice people, even Gloria and Howard with their near constant bickering, and everyone works together to orchestrate the pit stop. Some watch the road and perimeter while holding the only two rifles they have, along with an assortment of blunt weapons, while others babysit the children at the center of the rest area. Vehicles are fueled and people are fed. Then they prepare to hunker down for the night, trying not to think of what daybreak will bring.

  11

  Feeling less refreshed from the overnight rest then they expected, folks prepare for departure. They stretch out cramped muscles.

  The temperature dropped drastically during the night, and folks resisted the urge to turn on their cars for heat since gas must be conserved. A tense slumber and stress from the road have the survivors grumbling for their routine fixes of caffeine and tobacco. Only those in dire need are willing to satisfy their addictions with bitter instant coffee served cold and stale, plus weather-beaten cigarette butts from the rest area’s brimming ashtrays.

  Canned fruits, beans, and other non-perishables constitute the unsatisfactory breakfast they all share. This is what they could salvage from the food co
llection bin at the shelter up north in Manitoba before leaving.

  They had sought refuge in the basement of a recreation center that doubled as one of the community’s storm bunkers. Huddled together, they listened to events unfold on an emergency radio. This live broadcast turned to dead air when the man reporting the news shot himself. Then an incessant recorded loop of his voice took over, until the radio’s batteries finally died.

  The survivors saw no hope of lasting very long once the canned goods and emergency rations were depleted, so the consensus was to head off together. Some abandoned this initial plan when Vida was picked up from the road. Instead they decided to go to Eagle Rock, but the majority continues south.

  Vida turned down a change of clothes offered by Gloria. Not that she doesn’t like the woman’s style, but she just isn’t ready to part with Brandon’s things yet. Now she listens to Gloria and Howard’s constant fighting.

  “I’m just saying, you could have parked it between the lines,” Howard once again critiques his wife’s parking job from last night.

  “And I’m just saying, who fucking cares?”

  Vida whispers to Gabe, “Are they always like this?”

  “No. They usually throw things. You know, I don’t think I’ll be able to stand another day in a car with them. How about you?”

  Vida isn’t sure how Gabe earned the respect of the other survivors, but he’s clearly the one in charge of the convoy. His voice never raises or falters. It remains level and carries a certain gravity that lets a listener know they can trust every word. He’s the type of person that makes promises one can take to the bank.

  The survivors load themselves up and get ready for departure. Gabe strides back to his son’s car and leans down to the driver’s side window to speak with Gloria. Once again, his daughter-in-law will be driving. She and Howard argued about who would be taking the wheel, but she apparently won the debate. They may not be able to hurl objects at one another on the road, but their attacks and barbs have only gotten more personal. It is often Howard who instigates, as if not having control of the vehicle means he must gain control elsewhere.