I placed my palms flat on either side of the opening and hoisted myself up, leaning to the right and scooting over. I felt like my energy was completely drained, but I crawled farther away from the hatch until I felt the tell-tale softness of a mattress on the floor.
“Don’t get too comfortable just yet.”
“I need to sleep,” I protested.
“The hatch door swings upward. I want to put the mattress over it so no one can push their way in.”
“Sounds good. I’ll slide it over to you.”
I felt along the edge of the thin mattress, grabbing hold of it. I realized just how light it was; moving it toward Ellis was rather easy.
“I’ve got it,” he said quietly. “Give me a sec to center it.”
Along with the dark of night came a chill that began to seep beneath my skin.
“You said there’s a blanket?” I asked.
“Yeah I saw some. No guarantees they’re clean but they should help keep us warm. Okay, you can lay down.”
“Thanks,” I said as I slid by butt toward his voice and rolled onto the bed. “It’s lumpy,” I said with a yawn.
“I think it’s from a hide-a-bed. You can feel the springs.”
“It’s wonderful…”
“Here, cover up,” he said as he piled the blankets over me.
“It’s so cold.”
“We’re up a few hundred feet in elevation, close to the mountains.”
He settled in next to me on the mattress. I didn’t argue when he slid under the blankets; his body heat was very welcome.
“There aren’t any pillows. I can roll up one of the blankets for your ankle, but I think we need them just to stay warm.”
“I’ll be alright,” I said.
“Now, maybe, but we need your ankle to heal to get out of this damn mess.”
“The backpack. I can use that to elevate my ankle.”
“I’ll grab it. We need to hydrate, too.”
He shifted his weight, causing the blanket to move off my shoulders. I shivered and pulled the blanket closer. Dark clouds soon thickened and obscured the sky, robbing us of any light the moon had offered. I could no longer see any details of my surroundings, and by the sound of Ellis rummaging through the pack I assumed he was also at a disadvantage.
“You sitting up?” he asked.
I groaned, knowing that sitting up meant exposing too much of myself to the cold. Still, I pressed down on the mattress with my palms and scooted my but back until I was mostly upright.
“I am now,” I said.
“I can’t see a damned thing, but I’m holding a bottle of water out for you. We can’t risk using the flashlight in the pack. It might attract unwanted attention.”
“Thanks,” I said softly as I reached out into the darkness.
Once I had the plastic bottle of water in hand, I twisted the cap off and drank deeply.
“I’m going to set the pack near the end of the mattress. Hold still so I can find your leg. I don’t want to bump into it.”
I screwed the lid back on the bottle, saving part for Ellis. His hands found my good leg, and I was surprised by his gentleness.
“It’s the other one,” I said.
“Ready to lay down?” he asked as he switched to my other leg.
“Yeah.” I slid back to a laying position and pulled the covers tight to my neck again.
“Okay, lift,” Ellis directed.
I lifted my injured leg. It was sore, but bearable.
“Okay, lower it down onto the pack.”
I lowered my ankle. The backpack was placed almost perfectly, supporting my lower calf and leaving my swollen ankle untouched. “It’s good,” I said.
“Let me know if the blanket bothers it. I’d leave it off your ankle but it’s getting really cold.”
“It’s fine,” I said. “Warm is better.”
The mattress moved under his weight as he slid beneath the blankets with me. I did my best to not shiver but failed miserably.
“Let’s try and get some sleep,” Ellis said.
Sleep should have come easily but didn’t. Eyes open or closed, the dark brought images of horrible things. Karly’s split-open head. Mike’s slit throat. Hazel’s arm and the life leaving her eyes. The dead baby in the road. The look on Ellis’ face when his best friend died, and then his sister. My breathing became irregular several times as I struggled to keep my composure. I didn’t want to cry, even though I knew I needed to.
“Can’t sleep?” asked Mike.
“Not really,” I said, being honest.
“Do you keep seeing them too?”
“Mike and Hazel?”
“Yeah. And your friend. Just all of it.”
“I keep hoping I wake up. This can’t be fucking real.”
“I wish it was just a nightmare. I’m trying to not think about it, but I can’t get their faces out of my mind.”
I carefully turned onto my side, making sure the backpack stayed in place. While I couldn’t see the man next to me, I could feel his body heat radiating.
“What are we going to do?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.
“Take it day by day. Hour by hour if we need to. Try to get far enough away from whatever this is. Find help.”
“I’m so tired,” I admitted.
“It’s okay to cry if you need to.”
“Is it that obvious?”
“Yeah.”
I drew in a deep breath, still refusing to fall apart. I felt him scoot closer, until his breath was on my face. He wrapped an arm around me and held my head against his chest.
“If this is too weird I can back off,” he said quietly.
I shook my head side-to-side, my tears finally breaking free. “I keep seeing her face. She was so pretty, and I can’t get the image of her so…broken…out of my mind. She was so kind, so loving. She didn’t deserve to die like that.”
“Karly?”
I nodded into his chest and he used his free hand to stroke my hair, trying to soothe me. My body still shivered, despite the blankets and his body warmth. A light bright enough for me to see through closed eyelids flashed, and several seconds later thunder roared above. Rain began to fall lightly at first, bringing with it a transformation of my tears to an unending stream of misery. Ellis pulled the blanket up over our heads. Lightning and thunder continued to claim the night sky as if announcing the end of the world. All we could do was lay there and hope the rain would stop. Despite the wet and cold, at some point I fell asleep in his arms.
Chapter Nine
When I woke, daylight was just beginning to reclaim the night sky. Ellis still held me but was asleep. I twisted out from under his arm as my hip ached from laying on it for too long and I needed to move. The motion woke Ellis. He immediately sat up and was at-the-ready for whatever danger might be near.
“What is it?” he asked abruptly.
“I was just repositioning. I slept on my side for too long.”
Despite just waking, he looked winded. I carefully lifted my injured ankle from its perch on the back pack and joined Ellis in a sitting position. We were both still damp from the storm, but the rain had stopped. Gray clouds remained, and a breeze blew, causing me to shiver.
“We need to get somewhere dry.”
“I don’t want to go back down there,” I said.
“Me either, but we need to find somewhere more secure.”
I nodded. “I suppose so.”
I watched as he stood and stretched. Even though I had met him less than two days ago, he’d already changed in looks; he now had dark circles under his eyes, his dark wavy hair was unkempt and greasy, and his face bore a dark five o’clock shadow that made him look menacing.
“Let’s test your ankle?” he suggested as he held a hand out for me.
I gratefully took ahold of it and stood on my good leg.
“Take it slow.”
I carefully tested it, putting only part of my weight on it. It ached, but the
sharp pain from the day before was thankfully gone.
“It feels better,” I said.
“That’s good. Give me just a minute and then I’ll help you stretch it a bit.”
He walked the short distance to the side of the tree house. I looked away when I realized he was about to relieve himself over the edge of the short wall. The small space didn’t have much in the way of comfort. The mattress and blankets were weathered. In a far corner sat an old gray plastic milk crate, turned upside down. Several empty fast food soda cups with lids and straws lay in a loose heap to one side of the crate and words were written in Sharpie pen on one of the walls, but it was still too dark to make them out.
“Poppy,” Ellis called to me.
“Huh?”
“Come look at this.”
I turned to face him and carefully hobbled his way.
“See, there?” he asked as he pointed off in the distance. “Between those two trees.”
I looked, searching for whatever he saw.
“What am I looking for?” I asked, still not seeing whatever it was.
“It looks like a structure of some kind. It’s a brownish-red.”
I scanned the area again, and finally caught sight of whatever it was.
“Yeah, I see it.”
“We should try for it. It can’t be more than half a mile away. Up to it?” he asked.
“Do I have a choice?” I asked, only partly joking.
“I guess not so much.”
I sat on the milk crate while Ellis knelt and maneuvered my ankle gently with his hands, testing how well it moved. I flinched but didn’t let him know how much it really hurt.
“Okay. Let’s head out. Once we hit the ground I want to keep moving,” he said.
“Agreed.”
Ellis lifted our packs and swung them onto his back in one smooth movement. He descended the ladder first. I waited for him to look around, and once he waved me down I carefully lowered myself through the hatch and hopped down the best I could. My muscles ached even more than my ankle did. When I reached the bottom, Ellis was there to hook an arm around my waist. His other hand held his gun, and his face looked strained. I found my footing, but his arm remained around me.
“We need to head east,” he whispered. “That’s where the structure is.”
“Agreed,” I whispered back. “Ellis?” I lowered my voice even more.
“Hmm?”
“It’s too quiet.”
I didn’t hear anything that should have been routine: birds chirping, squirrels scuttling, not even a breeze blowing the leaves nearby.
“I noticed. I wonder what the hell is going on. Let’s get going. Don’t stop unless you have to.”
With his support, we left at a near-run. The sound of our footfalls in the wet leaves left me feeling near-panic, fearing monsters would home in on our noisiness. Time seemed to nearly stand still as we remained exposed to whatever horrors might wait ahead. Somewhere behind us, something began clicking in no particular rhythm. The hair on my arms stood on end and I felt Ellis tense as he pulled me faster.
It seemed an eternity until we finally made it out of the woods and into a clearing. It was then that the outline of what we’d seen from the treehouse became visible. We stopped only briefly to assess the situation.
“What is it?” I asked, staring at a large cylindrical structure made primarily of metal. It was the same color we’d seen earlier. Rust brown. Small windows ran the length of it, which looked oddly like portholes on a ship.
“I’ve heard about this,” said Ellis. “It’s a custom house built by this guy who recycles stuff. He made it out of the body of a Boeing 757 that skid off the runway in Vancouver B.C. back in 2003. It was on one of those Tiny House shows about a year ago.”
“Let’s see if he’s home, then.”
The clicking we’d heard back at the treehouse began again, and I looked at Ellis. His face was strained with fear.
“Something’s following us,” he whispered. “I don’t see an entry. Let’s run; don’t stop till we get to the other side.”
I nodded and tightened my grip on his shoulder as he did the same with his arm around my waist. By the time we made it half way there, we could hear someone – or something – running behind us. Ellis managed to swing me upward so that he cradled me in his arms, never missing a step. I made the mistake of looking back to see what pursued us. The woman from the woods, the crazy one who made no sense and looked through us with clouded eyes, was directly behind us, flanked on both sides by gruesome creatures that only barely resembled the living. One bore massive wounds to his face and chest, his cheek bones exposed. The other was a larger man, easily close to seven feet tall. His arms and legs were long, almost unnaturally so, and his jaw hung slack. From a distance, it left the impression that his mouth was a large gaping hole. I tightened my grip on Ellis’ shoulders and turned my head away.
“I see them,” he said.
“Hurry,” I mumbled into his neck.
While I had expected them to have gained on us, thankfully the two creatures flanking the old woman were slow and uncoordinated. We were still at a safe distance. Ellis reached a set of stairs and quickly ascended them. The steps were made of metal, steep, and seemingly endless. Wind blew toward us, carrying with it the horrific stink of death. Ellis set me on my feet as soon as we reached the top landing. A hatch built into the side of the object seemed out of place; it didn’t resemble an airliner door. Ellis pushed down on a lever on the hatch until it made a loud click.
He pushed the hatch open and I rushed into the opening. Only seconds later, Ellis nearly knocked me over in his rush to get to safety. As soon as he was through, he turned and pushed on the doorway to close it.
“Help me lock it,” he said in a hurry. “They’re at the bottom of the stairs.”
I rushed forward, searching desperately for a lock mechanism. Near the handle that Ellis still held tightly was a large pin and casing. I slid the pin to my right and felt it catch on its housing.
“It’s stuck. You have to relax the door to align it,” I urged him.
I jumped back when something slammed into the small round window in the center of the door.
“Can’t,” said Ellis, his voice strained. “Fuck, it’s pushing hard on the other side.”
I looked at the face that stared in at us while its hands clawed at the glass. It was the lanky man with long arms and legs. His mouth wasn’t agape as I had thought from a distance. Most of his lower jaw was missing…just…gone. His tongue was bloated and red-black with the shine of moisture. Strings of flesh hung downward, wiggling grossly as he moved. Molars that would have made up his back lower jaw stuck out at odd angles, their white a stark contrast to the darkness of the void. His eyes were bloated outward, like his tongue, making him look comical in a deathly and disturbing way. Brown sludge left a trail where his upper jaw continually stroked the glass. Each time the door lurched slightly, its teeth clanged against the small window pane.
“Fuck” groaned Ellis.
“Just a millimeter, just let it relax a millimeter,” I urged.
“I can’t control it that way,” he nearly shouted. “Get your gun ready.”
“Why?” I asked, fearing the worst.
“Because I need to let go. If I let go fast hopefully it’ll fall inward and give us just enough time to shoot it.”
I grabbed my pistol from my waistband and aimed it at the door.
“Okay,” I said. “I’m ready.”
“Stay back a few feet. As soon as I can steady myself I’ll help you.”
I mumbled the eff word under my breath but held steadfast in my position. I wasn’t the best aim to begin with, but with only putting my full weight on one leg I felt particularly shaky. Ellis looked at me and nodded once before letting go of the hatch handle. As Ellis had hoped, the lanky monster fell forward from its own momentum. I aimed, but my target moved too fast. In my peripheral vision I could see the creature struggling to rig
ht himself. Before it could steady himself, the old woman with long white hair who spoke gibberish rushed in through the open doorway. She stunk of body odor and greasy hair in the enclosed space. She lunged, crashing into Ellis and knocking him backward. She spoke no words but hissed and growled crazily as she put her hands around his neck and squeezed with inhuman strength. I knew in the close quarters trying to shoot the woman could prove fatal for Ellis. I focused my attention back to the jawless man at the entryway to the dwelling. It was already back on its feet and clumsily working its way toward me. I aimed my gun, steadied myself as best I could, and fired a shot. My bullet hit its intended target, the man’s chest, and he was knocked backward and to the side. He failed to go down and resumed his advance. Unlike the woman who I began to think of as a “witch,” the jawless man was slow and fumbling. I aimed again, this time higher, and pulled the trigger. A bullet through his temple dropped him in less than a second. Any farther to the left and I would have missed.
Without giving it much thought, I turned to face Ellis and the woman who still had her hands around his neck. His face was beet red and I feared he may pass out before I could help. I limped forward to close the small distance between us, brought my pistol up over my head, and brought it down on the witch’s head. She fell to her side, her hands still ensnaring Ellis' neck. He quickly maneuvered to get on top of her. Even as he used his own hands to gouge at her eyes, she wouldn’t release her grip on his neck. I dropped to my knees, placed the end of my pistol against her head, and fired. Blood and shards of skull and clumps of brain matter sprayed away from us, and at last she released her grip on him.
Ellis gasped for air. Unable to speak, he looked at me with gratitude in his eyes. We both turned back to the doorway when the shorter man missing most of his face appeared. He clicked rhythmically. While I had only heard that sound for the first time that same day, I knew somehow that he was calling for the others. I raised my pistol and aimed for his head and fired. He stumbled backward, and I watched as his body precariously bent backward over the landing rail. His arms hung limp, dangling downward.
“Holy fuck,” I said as I exhaled. “I thought you killed her back in the woods yesterday.”
The Rotten Series (Book 1): Infection Page 9