by Jason Brant
She didn't respond.
McCall drew in breath to yell more warnings, when the moan escaped her.
Damn.
Her body pitched forward, propelling her through the door and into the office area. Paying no attention to the sheriff's body, she crossed the room and stumbled into the back of the deputy. The force of the collision slammed his head against the iron bars on either side of his face.
McCall watched closely, looking for any sign of anger or pain; anything that would come close to an emotion other than the empty, yet somehow ravenous, look that stuck there. Nothing registered on his face.
The woman managed her way around the deputy with a dearth of grace, settling in beside him. A massive hunk of flesh was missing from her neck. The front of her yellow dress was adorned with what had once been white daisies. Now that they were caked with blood and dirt, the flowers resembled something from an artist's nightmare. Large patches of blonde hair were absent from her scalp, some of which now stuck to her gore soaked clothing.
With two of these things in front of his cell, McCall decided that if he was going to get out of this mess, it would have to be soon. There was no telling how many more stalked the streets.
Thrusting his right forearm up, he slammed it against both of the deputy’s arms, pushing them high and away. Dropping to a knee, he reached through the bars with his left hand and grabbed the pistol that hung from Aaron's hip. As he pulled back on the butt of the gun, the hammer caught against the holster.
McCall yanked on the gun, jamming the deputy against the bars, but didn't free the pistol. Lifting up instead of back, McCall managed to pull the gun clear. As he did a pair of hands grabbed the collar of his shirt, reeling him forward. The brim of his hat struck the bars and toppled from his head.
The gaping mouthed woman pulled him closer. McCall grabbed onto her wrist, trying to wrench her hand free of his clothing. Separating them on his second attempt, he shoved her arm away just as Aaron got both of his hands around the back of McCall's neck.
Dropping the gun behind him, McCall put his left hand against the nearest bar and pushed himself away from Aaron's bloody mouth. The woman, seeing his hand on the bar, bobbed her head down, missing his fingers by inches. Her crooked teeth clanged against the bar, shattering several of them.
Jerking his hand away from the bar, McCall barely got it out of the way of her second attempt. Her mouth hit the bar again and her jagged teeth tore into her lower lip.
Without the ability to place his hands on the bars, McCall was slowly being pulled into Aaron's waiting maw. Struggling against his hands, McCall tried to pull them away from his neck, but couldn't break Aaron's grip. The only thing preventing his impending doom was one of the other men in the neighboring cell. He'd managed to grab onto McCall's shoulder and was pulling him in the opposite direction.
Swinging his head around in wide, frantic arcs, McCall looked for anything that could help him. A shaft of light glinted off a barely visible piece of the axe blade that was buried in the man's chest.
Reaching out with his right hand, McCall grabbed the handle of the axe and tore it from his chest. The blade scraped against the man's ribs as it pulled free, sending bits of white bone and red tissue falling to the floor.
Lifting the tomahawk above his head, McCall brought it down on the left elbow of the deputy. The blade was dull and didn't do the damage that the outlaw hoped for, but it was enough to loosen Aaron's grip a bit. McCall rained another blow down on the joint, cutting through most of the tissue. The grip strength in that hand evaporated and McCall was able to force himself away.
The other man's hand remained on his shirt, but McCall was able to extract himself from it with a quick jerk of his shoulder.
Falling back on his cot, he took long, deep breaths. In front of him stood Aaron, pressing against the cell, with outstretched arms. The one McCall had taken the axe to hung at the elbow. A patch of skin and muscle were all that held his arm intact with only a small amount of blood pattering the floor. No pain or concern registered on Aaron's face. Mad Dog McCall had never imagined, let alone witnessed, anything like this. He wasn't sure anyone had.
A moan from yet another source wafted into the cell. Movement caught McCall's eyes from behind Aaron's legs.
The sheriff, lying on the floor, covered in his own blood and organs, turned his head and looked at McCall with black eyes.
Chapter 7
"If you aren't going to be of use and fetch me a drink, then get away from me, you shitty haired whore," Doctor Randy said, glowering at Karen.
"Shitty haired−" Ellis said, before cutting himself off. "Are you drunk, Doc?"
The doctor looked up from Dave's wounded leg and gave Ellis a reproachful look.
"Just because I partake in the occasional spirit does not mean that I am drunk."
"Well, you look worse than Dave does and it seems like the Reaper's tapping on his shoulder."
Dave was lying on the bar; grimacing every time Randy touched his leg. He popped his head up at the mention of his name.
"Am I going to die?" he asked the doctor, his voice wavering with fear.
Anthony stood beside Randy, watching the work being done. "Nobody's dying. Especially not from a leg bite," he said as he cuffed Dave on the crown of his head.
"Don't hit me, boss! I'm not feeling so good."
Zed, the older man with the injured hand, took a shot of whiskey and stood from the table he sat at with his two sons. Dark bags colored the undersides of his eyes. Karen couldn't remember if they had been there before or not.
"I've never seen anything like that in all my years. No man can take bullets like that. Never seen anyone take an axe to the chest either."
Doctor Randy poured some clear alcohol over Dave's leg, causing him to scream out in pained shock.
Anthony slapped the side of his face.
"Don't hit me, boss!"
"What you're saying isn't possible," Randy said. He patted Dave on the thigh as he rose from his chair. "Just lie here for awhile and rest."
"He ain't lyin'. We kicked the livin' hell out of one of them, and he just kept gettin' up. We all saw it," Ellis said.
Walking over to Zed's table, Randy grabbed the bottle and took a long swig from it. Too long to please Karen, but she didn't want to start more bickering.
"You have to be over exaggerating how much damage the man took."
Holding the bottle in one hand, Randy reached out for Zed's hand. "Did the same man bite you?"
"No, it was the other one. They were both acting like rabid dogs, trying to bite everything in sight," Zed said.
After a few seconds of inspecting the wound on Zed's hand, the doctor poured some of the whiskey over it.
"That should take care of it for you," Randy said before drinking from the bottle again.
Karen couldn't take it anymore. "Is that all you're going to do? We could have done that ourselves and spared us the displeasure of your company."
"Watch your mouth with me, whore."
Barbara had been sitting at a table in the far corner of the room, batting her eyes at John, one of Zed's boys. Lauren sat beside her, sipping at a glass. She was the only other girl working that night.
"Don't act all holy around us. Just last week you came in the back door of this place and we had us some fun," she said. Apparently Barbara had enough of the doctor as well.
The doc's rosy cheeks turned a deep red as he looked around at everyone. He started to speak, but only managed a few sputters.
Ellis walked to the middle of the room and took charge. "Now look, I don't want to hear any more of—" he said before stopping.
Cocking his ear in the direction of the front door, he stood in silence for several seconds.
Rob, the bigger of Zed's sons, rose from his chair. "What is it?"
"Shhh!" Ellis said.
Everyone froze in place, listening. Then Karen heard them. Moans coming from the street.
Lauren walked over to whe
re Ellis stood, her knee high skirt pulling every man's eye in the place to her. She liked to call that skirt her 'money maker', because it always guaranteed someone would throw money her way.
Karen wasn't too surprised to see that it drew men's gazes even in a situation like this.
"What is that? Is someone sick?" she said.
Ellis took a few tentative steps toward the door. "That sounds an awful lot like those two men the sheriff just took away."
No one else moved a muscle. Karen felt her body tensing and forced her muscles to relax.
Peering over the top of the saloon doors, he stood there for several seconds, looking down the street to his left. The moans continued to grow louder.
"There are a whole lot of people walking around that look just like those men. I see Mrs. Armstrong walking this way. Her−" His voice caught in his throat. "Oh Jesus! Her eye is out! It's hanging on her cheek!"
Karen ran to the window and looked in the same direction as Ellis.
People littered the street. They moved about in a jerky fashion, as if their knees weren't bending properly. Most of them had blood caked to their clothing. Some were missing limbs.
"They're everywhere," Karen said, more to herself than anyone else. "I recognize most of them; they live in town. What's going on out there?"
Doctor Randy walked over to the door and stood beside Ellis. "What are you two going on about?" He must have seen Mrs. Armstrong because his tone changed from condescension to horror. "Oh my God. Ma'am, you need help! Come over here and let me help you!" he yelled through the door.
"No, you fool!" Ellis grabbed at his shoulder, trying to keep him from leaving the saloon. A raspy, wheezing sound came from the other side of the door, grabbing everyone's attention.
The man that stumbled into the saloon had been burned beyond recognition. His entire body was blackened, with bits of charred clothing stuck to oozing skin and muscle. The smell of burned hair and flesh emanating from him made Karen nauseous. Smoke rose from his head and shoulders.
He grabbed at the black, alcohol soaked robes Randy wore, but his fingers were too damaged to grip anything. Tripping over his own feet, the doctor fell to the ground and landed on his ass. He held his hands out in front of him, trying to ward off the monstrosity.
Ellis shoved the man in the chest, throwing him through the double doors.
From the window, Karen watched as his charred body fell off the porch, rolling into the street head over heels.
"Bring some tables over here, now!" Ellis said from the doorway.
"Impossible," Randy said from the floor. "That's impossible."
Rob and John jumped from the chairs, knocking them over behind them. Each grabbed an edge of their square table and tipped it sideways, sending its bottle and glasses crashing to the floor.
"Hurry!" Ellis said. "More of them are headed this way!"
Zed's sons dropped the table on its side at the base of the door and pushed it flush against the frame.
"We need another table and more weight," Rob said.
Karen grabbed Lauren by the elbow, pulling her from her chair. "Grab the other end of this table."
"I don't underst−"
"Just do it," Karen said.
Lauren seemed like she wanted to continue to protest, but a quick glance at Karen's face took the fight out of her.
As they lifted the table to put it on top of the other one, Karen could see Mrs. Armstrong on the other side of the door. Blood and pus ran down her cheek from the empty socket where her right eye had once been. The eye swayed back and forth with every step, smacking against her nose and cheekbone with a watery softness. A groan escaped her throat when she saw Karen and Lauren.
Known as the finest seamstress in Gehenna, Mrs. Armstrong had personally made several of Karen's favorite dresses. She specialized in working with fine stitching due to her dexterous hands and sharp eyesight.
When Lauren spotted Mrs. Armstrong, she dropped her end of the table and ran to the stairs, taking them two at a time, screeching the entire way. The weight of the falling table dragged Karen forward, pulling her within reaching distance of Mrs. Armstrong.
Karen could feel bony, jagged fingers snagging her hair and tugging at her scalp. Strong hands grabbed her shoulders and ripped her back through the doorway, sending her pinwheeling into the bar. Ellis punched the elderly woman in the face, mashing her dangling eyeball and knocking her out of the door.
As she fell backward from the force of the blow, Ellis took hold of both sides of the table and jammed it on top of the first, closing off the door.
Anthony came up behind him with several chairs under each arm.
"Those ain't heavy enough; we need−"
The tables pitched forward, falling against Ellis' back. Planting his feet against the floor, Ellis pushed back against the tables. Strands bulged from his neck as he struggled to block the door again.
On the other side of the table, Mrs. Armstrong and the burned man fought against his momentum, trying to force their way inside the saloon.
"Help me, damn it!"
John came up beside them and put his considerable weight against the tables, giving the extra push needed to put them flush with the door.
"Anthony, take my place. I've got a hammer and nails behind the bar," Ellis said.
The tables budged a few inches as they changed positions. Though Anthony wasn't a small man, he weighed much less than the rotund Ellis, and he struggled to hold the barricade in place.
Barbara stood by one of the windows, peering through a dirty pane.
"What's going on? Is everyone sick?"
In the distance, more screams could be heard above the faint moans and groans.
"We'll figure that out later. Get some tables against those windows!" Ellis said to Rob.
Squeezing his plump body around the bar, he started rooting around the shelving under the counter.
The thunder of gunshots filled the streets.
"That must have come from the sheriff's office," Karen said.
Dave lifted his head from the bar and looked at Anthony. "You think Sheriff Stanley is having trouble with those guys that bit us?"
"If I wasn't busy right now, I'd smack the hell out of you," Anthony said as he struggled against the table.
Zed watched the growing throng of people in the street as he worked at barricading the other window. "More of them are coming every second... "
Rob and Barbara were busy placing tables by the windows while Ellis came back to the front door with a hammer and canning jar filled with nails. He had to step over the doctor who was sprawled on the floor, watching the action with hysteria in his eyes.
"Hold it steady," Ellis said.
As he started on the first nail, Zed started teetering on his feet as if he'd lost his balance.
Karen slid a chair over and placed it behind his knees. "What's gotten into you?"
His skin seemed to have thinned, like it had been stretched too far, and his eyes looked like they were bugging out of his head.
"I don't know. I feel sick as a−" he said, before vomiting on the floor.
Standing with his hands on his knees, he tried to straighten his back before crumpling down. His body landed in a disturbing seated position with his head hanging down.
"Pa?" John asked. "Pa!" He stepped away from the table, intent on seeing to his ailing father. The moment he did, the table buckled in before John threw his back into it again.
Another shot barked from down the street.
Chapter 8
McCall watched in disbelief as the sheriff tried to sit up. Most of his midsection was gone, strewn around the room in every direction.
Sheriff Stanley struggled for several moments to get to a seated position, as he didn't have any abdominal muscles. Eventually he rolled to his side and pushed himself to his feet.
His torso wobbled as he walked to the front of McCall's cell. With every step it seemed like his body might break in half. A trail of intestin
es dragged behind him, cutting a bloody swath through the dust on the floor.
Everything McCall had witnessed so far today seemed impossible, but watching a dead man rise and walk was more than he could take. It felt as if the very foundation of his sanity was being eroded away by one event after another.
Looking at the massive hole in the middle of the sheriff's body, McCall could see the man's ribs and the column of his spine. As he watched, a chunk of one of his organs fell from the cavity and landed at his feet with a sickening plop.
He needed to escape before it was too late. Marshals or no, he couldn't stay in here, surrounded by walking corpses.
Picking up the deputy’s pistol from the floor, he stood and faced the sheriff. Fanning the hammer with his left hand, he put two rapid-fire shots into Stanley's chest, aiming for his heart.
The impacts sent the sheriff back a half step, his upper body bobbing precariously at its tipping point. But he pressed against the cage moments later, resuming his unsuccessful attempts at reaching McCall. Wisps of smoke emerged from the two holes in his chest, just above the gaping chasm that used to be his stomach.
McCall knew that these weren't men anymore, and at that moment he didn't care to know what exactly they had become either. The only information he wanted now was how to kill them.
He knew, from the two men to his right, that arrows and axes to the heart didn't do anything. The deputy's nearly severed arm told him that they didn't feel any pain. And the three holes in the sheriff's body told him that bullets and disembowelment had no effect.
Picking up the tomahawk, he looked at the dull, gore covered blade. If they couldn't be killed, perhaps he could dismember them, disabling their ability to attack him.
Too messy and tiring.
He'd be exhausted before he could finish the job. And he didn't know how many more of these things roamed the streets.
Then he thought of hunting. What do you do with a wounded animal? You cut its throat if you have a sharp knife, which he didn't. Or you shoot in the head if you could afford using the extra bullet.
Dropping the axe, he switched the pistol to his right hand and cocked the hammer back with his thumb. Lifting the gun, he aimed at the sheriff's forehead and fired.