“We’re fine.” he said gruffly and pushed her away in frustration at their failure.
The first chance they’d had in nearly a year, the first time there was a break in the wall of dead, and they couldn’t get the truck started. If only they’d had a can of ether. If only they’d had time for one more try at push starting it.
He turned to look at the stranger who was wiping his blades clean and stashing them back in their half-hidden sheaths tucked under the dented shoulder pauldrons on his leathers. He saw the scar and recognized the big black dog from the radio stories. He’d just seen him jump into the fray and pull them out of a pretty iffy situation, they’d been nearly trapped by a mob that had stumbled out of an alley. He knew who he was and everyone knew he was supposed to be a bad ass but even he ran when the horde started pouring in. Even he couldn’t fight that many of them. Bitter disappointment was settling in. They’d been so close. They should have sent a team of runners out, they should have sent their fastest men to get far enough from the horde that they could still escape and figure out a way to rescue them. Anything would be better than being trapped again, this time maybe forever. Coulda, woulda, shoulda.
The boy was scratching the dog behind the ears, obviously happy to see him again but that didn’t help them. Now they had two extra mouths to feed and Cody was starting to get pissed. They’d been so close! What were they going to do now? Why was this kid even here? He’d just been rescued by a boy. It was a hard pill to swallow and his anger was rising up, he couldn’t stand being trapped anymore and he needed to lash out.
“WHY?” he yelled, pushing away from the wall, his breath still short but now in anger, not fear.
He brushed his girlfriend aside, stomped toward Jessie and Bob’s happy tail wagging turned to a low growl at the threat. Joshua started to say something but Jessie gave him a half shake of his head and the man quieted. He had read the group and had a basic understanding of their dynamic. Joshua was the brains. The man who knew things, the idea man. Cody was the brawn. The guy who got things done. The man who made it happen.
“Why couldn’t you keep them off of us for just one more minute?” he raged “We almost had the truck started, we could have got out of here! Now we’re right back where we started from. Trapped with no way out and we’ve got two more mouths to feed!”
Jessie let him yell, let him blow off some steam and kept a calming hand on Bob’s shoulder.
When he paused to start another rant, Jessie interrupted
“We’re not trapped.” he said “I can get you out.”
Cody wanted to scream. His face was red and his fists were clenched. He was ready to strike out at something. Anything.
HOW? He wanted to bellow into the kids face and shake him until his teeth rattled. If you haven’t noticed, we’re surrounded by eaters! We’ve killed so many they were climbing over the piles to get to the balconies! The more we kill, the more show up to replace them! They keep coming! They never stop!
He gritted his teeth and held his tongue though. The kid was so calm. So sure of himself. He said he could leave like it was so obviously easy he was surprised no one else had figured it out.
Cody was bigger than the rest of them, naturally tall and muscular, a fullback during his high school glory days. His blonde hair was as badly trimmed as everyone else’s with dull scissors and sharpened knives. It was a square cut with straight bangs that stopped just above his eyebrows. If he had a tan and a furry loincloth, he could pass for He-Man at a comic book convention. Everyone assumed he wasn’t all that bright because he liked to lift but it was just a habit he’d kept up since the outbreak. As a firefighter, he needed strength. He needed to muscle around hoses and wield an axe or carry heavy equipment for hours while wearing full protective gear. Since the fall, he’d lost weight but he still worked out, there wasn’t much else to do. Entertainment was a little lacking in the high rise unless you liked reading the same books over and over or catching up on gossip about long dead celebrities from old magazines.
He realized he must look like he was ‘roid raging with his fists clenched, his face a mask of anger and the way he was towering over the boy like he was. His nostrils flared and he forced himself to breathe. To calm down. To listen. He wasn’t an unreasonable man, hell, he’d been a fireman before the fall. He ran in when everyone else ran out. He helped people and now he felt useless, shown up by a boy not old enough to shave.
“Can you?” he finally asked, winning the internal battle and taming the fury inside.
“Yes.” Jessie said “But I need your help first.”
103
Jessie
Jessie quickly explained to them what happened and there were knowing looks, uncomfortable glances. They’d seen the cage used before. They’d had to watch in helplessness as it was displayed on the roof of the skywalk, one of their emissaries inside. They’d tried to save him, had gone after him with every able-bodied man but had been forced back to their side by flying arrows and a never-ending horde of undead running at them. The Larpers, as they called them, liked to pull the undead up through holes in the floor and use them as their guards. The lower floors of their building were filled with hundreds of them, many altered or changed in one way or another.
“Yeah. I’ve seen that.” Jessie said
Joshua and his people had searched every apartment in their building, had found a couple of guns but the ammo was long gone. They had nothing else to even the odds. They were stuck with a few fire axes and homemade spears to fight with.
“Everyone had worked together at first when we thought there was a chance of rescue.” he explained, giving Jessie a little background. “But when we heard the radio broadcast from a group of truckers headed to Lakota, there was a rift in the groups.”
Jessie knew the one they were talking about, the one his dad made in the beginning. The message kept repeating and was never updated. The people in the high rise didn’t know if they had made it or not. They were already surrounded by hundreds of undead, the sounds of them fortifying their positions and battling the zeds inside the buildings had drawn them in. Half of the people were desperate to leave, wanted to take a chance and go to Lakota. They would risk fighting through the horde. The other half were afraid, said there was nothing out there worth dying for and wanted to stay in the towers where it was safe. There was enough food in the apartments and restaurants on the first level to survive for a while, they could wait six months or a year if they had to. They could keep listening to the radio to see if the truckers made it. The horde might wander off.
The weeks turned to months and when they finally found Radio Lakota inviting people to the safe haven, it was too late. Thousands of undead had completely surrounded them. Tempers flared. Personalities clashed. Two very different leaders and their circle of followers separated into two different buildings. Hostilities followed when the Larpers decided to take whatever they wanted from the weaker group. Defenses were built, open warfare erupted, both sides had casualties and had fought to a stalemate. A wall was erected in the skywalk. One side used the undead as their guards, the other manned the posts with round-the-clock vigilance. It had been like that for at least six months and Jessie understood Cody’s anger at their one chance to escape being thwarted by a truck that wouldn’t start.
Jessie drew a quick map of the throne room and marked it with the cage and the location of the man who raised and lowered it. They spoke quickly, time was short and it didn’t take long to come up with a plan. It took less time than that for him to get a volunteer to help and gather what they needed.
“Why do they all smell like piss?” he asked as he and Cody waited on second-floor balcony around the corner from where all the undead were shuffling.
“Limited water.” Cody whispered, watching the horde make their way to the others who were calling to them and sprinkling fresh blood from shallow cuts on their upturned faces. The undead husks, frozen in the winter and baked in the summer, were working themselves into a f
renzy.
“That building is much more modern and luxurious, it’s why they chose it.” he continued. “It has a giant holding tank on top where city water was pumped and purified for the residents. Healthy water, healthy bodies was their slogan. None of the apartments have hot water tanks they could drain, it’s all on demand. Energy saving instant-on burners. Well, the water ran out about the time we were really starting to go our separate ways. They spent their time making monsters and basically pretending everything was going to be fine. They thought someone would eventually rescue them. They’re living in a weird fantasy world, I bet they all have the same STD’s by now.”
He shook his head in disgust. “Nasty people. When they started running out of everything, they wanted ours. Stuff we’d been busting our asses to build with cobbled together materials. Like our water collector on the roof. It’s made from a hundred different shower curtains all sewn together. We barely have enough for us, we weren’t going to give any to them.”
Cody kept talking in a low voice, telling him about the differences in the buildings and how even though theirs was much older it had been better suited for the zombie uprising. Jessie half listened and watched the last of the crawlers make its way towards the corner to join the rest. His mind was on Scarlet. More were coming in from across the road but in another moment, the service alley below them would be clear. They could climb down and get around to the far side of the Larper’s building without being seen.
“So anyway, that’s why they take splash baths in their own urine.” Cody continued. “I guess it’s filtered and they mix it with what ever rain water they can collect but still…”
He made a face.
“It’s still gross.” Jessie finished for him then asked “So, why do they dress like they’re going to a ball or something? It seems silly.”
Cody snorted.
“Because they’re stupid?” he asked. “I don’t know. We watch them with binoculars from the upper floors. For a while, they were trying to piece together costumes like they were in a dungeons and dragons game but we noticed they started wearing the fancy clothes a few months ago. Who knows why they do what they do? I hope they all choke on their neckties and pearl necklaces.”
The passage was finally mostly clear and Jessie vaulted over the railing, dropped to the ground in a parachute landing fall and rolled to his feet. Cody was only seconds behind him, sliding down the ladder and joining him, his fireman’s axe at the ready.
“Gonna mess up your knees, doing that.” he admonished in a whisper as they ran in a crouch towards the street, Jessie with his blades out and Cody with his axe. The nearest undead heard them and turned, started their keening and stretched out hungry arms.
“You sound like my dad.” Jessie said and pulled up short at the corner of the building and laid waste to the closest shamblers.
“Sounds like a smart guy.” Cody answered and started unraveling the rope for the home-made grappling hook.
More were coming from every direction. Thousands converging towards the scent of blood and desperate keens of hunger.
During the agonizingly long twenty minutes it took for Jessie to explain everything to them and to come up with a plan, the former fireman had shown himself to be quick witted, quick to act and quick to criticize. He wasn’t shy about speaking his mind but he wasn’t obnoxious about it. It wasn’t his way or the highway. He knew this kid could do things they couldn’t. Plans they’d made months ago while wargaming various scenarios, attack strategies deemed too risky, were remembered and revised. They needed Jessie to get them out and he needed them to get Scarlet. Cody had been the first to volunteer, his long hours in the gym making him one of the few who would be capable of scaling at the building.
He spun the rope and let it fly, the hook sailing through the air on the back side of the building and toward the lowest balcony, the one on the third floor. The hook was a good five feet short and clattered back to the ground. Cody was quick to recover and ignored Jessie’s flying fists. Ignored the husky whispers of hunger and the thunking sound of steel on bone. The squishing sound of rotting brains splashing to the asphalt. He spun and tossed again, this time actually hooking the railing for a second before it bounced free and fell.
“That was close. I think I’ve got it now.” he said, and spared a quick glance around and wished he hadn’t. They were closing in. The kid was fighting in a circle, moving like greased lightning, but there were too many. They were running and stumbling, tripping over bodies, but they kept coming. The sound of whispering blades slicing the air, the jingle of metal and plastic armor and the dull crunch of breaking heads surrounded him. Moans of blood lust came from cracked throats and if there was a place to run, he may have been tempted but there wasn’t. There was only up. He had time for one, maybe two more tries before they started dragging him down and he concentrated. He spun and flung, watched the bent metal arching up through the air, the rope trailing behind and smiled despite everything when it hooked with a solid sound of metal on metal.
“We’re good.” he yelled and started climbing, just like they’d planned. No matter what, Jessie had told him. No matter how much you think you can help, once you hook it, start climbing. You’ll only be in my way.
Cody believed him. He’d seen him move, seen him kill four or five of the things in the time it took him to kill just one. Hand over hand he pulled himself up, gripping the rope with his feet and not even thinking about what would happen if it broke. Or if the hook bent. Or if the railing tore loose.
He climbed.
They were reaching for him from all sides now and Jessie spun, slicing them wide open. They tripped over their own guts as they dangled from wasted bellies. He went low and slashed at ankles and knees causing more to fall and more to stumble over them. He whirled and killed, twisted and severed and when he saw Cody throw a leg over the railing, he ran for a stack of bodies, some still trying to move, and launched himself high into air. He caught the rope some twenty feet up and slammed into the building, his armored shoulder taking the brunt of the impact as he wrapped his leg into a foot lock to support his weight. Below, confused faces searched for him. The meat that was there one instant and gone the next. Jessie took a second to put his blades back in their sheaths, they made griping the rope nearly impossible. The one he held in his mouth pirate style left an acrid taste and he spit, a sour look on his face. One of the undead finally sensed him above them and they all started reaching, dirt encrusted fingers searching the air with a junkies need. Jessie climbed.
“Two more floors.” Cody said as he helped Jessie over the railing. “Unless they’ve changed things in the past six months. Once we get to the fifth floor, we can take the stairs. No more zombie guards.”
Jessie nodded as he repositioned the gear, getting it back in place and comfortable again. Hopping up to the next two balconies would be a breeze compared to getting on this one. If there were no more Frankenzombies, all they had to do was sneak up twenty-five flights of stairs, stop the bad guys and rescue the girl. Piece of cake.
Jessie boosted Cody up who in turn extended a hand to pull him skyward. On the fifth floor, the sliding glass door was unlocked and they slipped inside, leaving it open to let in light and let the musty room get some fresh air. The kitchen had been tossed, cabinet doors hung open and the refrigerator still had a faint odor around it, the food that had spoiled long dried out and unrecognizable. The rest of the luxury apartment was mostly untouched. Maybe some clothes missing from the closets, the expensive suits and dresses the people in the building favored, but paintings still hung on walls. Tiffany lamps still sat on Roche Bobois end tables and artfully placed throw pillows were on dusty leather couches. A broken vase of dried flowers sat on a bespoke teak dining table, the water frozen, thawed and long evaporated. Jessie ignored it all and went straight for the door, pausing to listen with his ear against it. It had already been nearly two hours. He wasn’t worried about Scarlet being able to stand in the middle and avoid the und
ead teeth. By now, none of them had fingers left to grip with. He was worried about the purple suited clown changing his mind and changing the game. Hiding her away or getting bored and raising the cage. They never would have been able to capture her if they hadn’t choked her unconscious, he was sure of that. Just as he was sure they wouldn’t hesitate to do it again.
He heard nothing in the hall, no guards living or dead so they made their way to the stairwell and started the long climb. His plan was simple: Free Scarlet and kill anyone that got in his way. Cody was the distraction, the guy with the guns. The guy they should all run from when the blasting started. All Jessie had to do was get down to the deep end of the swimming pool before the cage was raised and he wasn’t sure he would be able to stop that. He wished there was some way to communicate with her cat, tell it to jump on the guy at the lifting chains and distract him. If wishes were horses’ beggars would ride as his mom used to say. Or If wishes were horses, we’d always have steak his dad would add if he overheard. Jessie almost smiled. He needed to get down to Lakota, he wanted them to meet her. She would be fine. She would make it through this. She had to. There was no other option. He continued to climb, not feeling the burn starting in his legs.
Zombie Road: The Second Omnibus | Books 4-6 | Jessie+Scarlet Page 68