“He understands the science of fists, lieutenant. Use different tactics.” The Viking zombie relaxed its shoulders. Hector kept his guard up, visibly unsure of what to do. The Viking zombie lunged forward and grabbed onto him.
“Hector!” Ken cried. Ehsan glanced over his shoulder to see him and Sarah turn around to rush to help Hector, but the trenchcoat zombie sprinted past its officers with the focus of a jaguar sneaking up on its prey, silent, the sabre in its left hand slung over its shoulder. Ken only heard it at the last second and barely managed to dodge its attack. The two began trading blows, none of which landed for either combatant. The trenchcoat zombie’s fighting style reminded Ehsan of Manuel’s soccer style. It didn’t have nearly the same physical attributes as Ken, but it moved with such efficiency and deception that Ken never got in a clean shot.
Ehsan returned his attention to right in front of him, both to make sure the zombies on the other side of the table hadn’t gone anywhere and to see how Hector fared. Ehsan could see he and Fatima were safe, as the zombies on the other side of the table hadn’t moved, but Hector struggled in the grasp of the Viking zombie.
Suddenly, Ehsan heard a noise behind him. He turned around to see Sarah fleeing the six officer zombies to join him and Fatima.
“We need a plan,” Sarah declared without hesitation, looking to Fatima.
“Well…”
Before Fatima could formulate a sentence, Ehsan saw Emma sneak up on the Viking zombie with her knife. Unable to reach its neck, she drove the knife into its back. It let go of Hector and turned around. It hit her with the back of its fist with such force that she tumbled to the ground, dazed. She tried to stand back up, but had no balance. Her legs wobbled and she fell to the floor once more. Hector, his face contorted with rage for the first time since Ehsan had met him, hit the Viking zombie with a wide, powerful left hook to the side of its head. It stumbled, but hit Hector in the ribs with a right uppercut. Hector buckled. It followed up with a left uppercut to his stomach, which connected, then a right haymaker, which Hector dodged only by a fraction of an inch. It then grabbed onto him once more. Hector squirmed around, having no idea how to handle himself without the ability to punch.
“I’ll distract them,” Sarah decided, looking at the sprinters in front of them.
“Sarah, the library is too small to properly-”
“What else can we do?!”
Before Fatima could reply, Mateo entered the back door of the library and ran toward the Viking zombie. He jumped onto its back. He didn’t have his ax and had lost much of the color in his face. His clothes looked tattered. He wrapped his legs around the waist of the Viking zombie while using his left arm to wrap around its neck and his right arm to deliver elbows to the top of its head. He brought those elbows down with tremendous force, exhaling each time he did so. The Viking zombie stumbled around as it reached for Mateo, wincing with every elbow impact. Even when it got a grip on Mateo’s arms, it didn’t have the position or leverage to remove him. It eventually chose to sprint backwards toward a library wall as it continued to take punishment from Mateo’s elbows. Mateo, only realizing its strategy at the last second, braced right before impact. It hit the wall and Mateo’s grip weakened. It used that chance to peel him off and throw him to the ground. It tried to jump on top of him, but Mateo put his feet on the zombie’s hips. Mateo then grabbed behind its ankles and pushed forward with his legs, causing it to fall on its back. Mateo jumped on top of it and started hitting it, but it pushed him off. The two stared each other down as they returned to their feet.
As they fought, the two sprinters that’d charged Hector before getting pushed aside by the Viking zombie got up and resumed their attack. Hector continued his old strategy of light jabs and evasion, though he breathed hard and threw his jabs far slower than before. The physical and mental exhaustion of fighting the Viking zombie had caught up to him.
Ehsan heard footsteps behind him. He turned around to see the six officer zombies only a few feet in front of him. He nudged his sister, unable to form words. She and Sarah turned around. They were trapped by the officer zombies in front of them and the sprinters on the other side of the table. Ehsan stepped to the officer zombies and swung his shovel wildly as they approached. They calmly stopped their advance. Ehsan stopped his swings. They stepped forward. He continued, they stopped. He stopped, they continued.
Fatima started waving her machete around to help stop the advance of the officers. “Sarah, go help Emma. Get her to the study room. We need to start filing in there, one by one, to regroup.”
“Gotcha.”
Sarah ran over to help Emma to her feet, distracting the attention of the sprinters behind them as she did so, allowing Ehsan and Fatima to move away from the officer zombies. Fatima continued waving her machete as they walked around the table. Ehsan followed her, his eyes never leaving the zombies in front of them, taking over for his sister when her arm got tired. Ehsan could see from his peripheral vision the dance between Ken and the trenchcoat zombie still continued, a dance with no break, neither of the two hitting the other, both always moving.
Sarah made it to Emma, the sprinters right on her tail. Fatima picked up a book from a nearby shelf and threw it as far as she could. It succeeded not only in getting their attention, but the attention of the two trying to get into the study room where Julie and the kids hid. All of the sprinters started in their direction.
“Sarah, after you get Emma up, help Hector!” Fatima instructed. Fatima started running to lead the sprinters away from everyone else. Ehsan followed to help her, despite how little his feet wanted to move. Fatima beckoned Ehsan toward a bookshelf. She decided they should push it over. Not to trap zombies underneath this time, but to give the sprinters something to trip over. Ehsan gave everything he had to this last push, falling with the bookcase as he had the last time. He got up and rejoined his sister, backing away so that none of the tripping zombies would land at his feet.
He heard a door slam. He looked behind the zombies running toward them to see Sarah standing outside the study room, having slammed the door shut after Emma entered. She picked up a book from the ground and threw it in the direction of the zombies battling Hector. They hesitated long enough for Hector to land a powerful right cross on the nearest one, though in his exhaustion his punch lacked the speed and power to do serious damage. The zombie stumbled backward, but didn’t go down. Hector grimaced as he dodged the rush of the other sprinter. Sarah ran up and beckoned him to the study room while she distracted them. Hector gladly accepted.
The sprinters rushing toward Ehsan and Fatima made contact with the bookshelf. Only the two at the outside of the pack didn’t trip. Ehsan and Fatima ran. Ehsan hadn’t expected any to remain standing and hadn’t emotionally prepared for yet another chase. His legs ached, and his nerves couldn’t take the thought of another landing on top of him. The weight of Manuel’s shovel, far heavier than his old one, tempted Ehsan to throw it at the zombies chasing him, though he resisted that temptation.
“To the… study… room…” Fatima panted as they went around a bookshelf in an effort to lose the zombies.
Sarah clapped her hands with enough force to distract the sprinters chasing them. Ehsan and Fatima caught their breath while Sarah led the sprinters toward the six zombie officers, who’d started toward Ken in an effort to sneak up on him while he fought the trenchcoat zombie. Sarah shouted his name to call his attention to them.
Ehsan glanced toward Mateo, who kicked the Viking zombie in the leg then leaned back to avoid a punch. The Viking zombie tried to grab him, but he elbowed it in the face and circled away. He glanced over at Ehsan and Fatima as they made their break for the studyroom.
Mateo push kicked the Viking zombie away from him while it was still stunned. He rushed to the door of the studyroom to open it for the two of them. Seconds later, they made it.
“Sarah, Ken, come on!” Mateo called after Ehsan and Fatima ran through the doorway. He saw the Viking zombie char
ging toward him. He ran toward it, bracing himself for a desperation move. The air hit the fresh bites on his body as he sped up. He tried to push thoughts of his impending mortality out of his mind. At least he didn’t have much to lose if this gambit failed.
Just before making contact with the Viking zombie, he jumped shoulder first onto the ground and rolled into its legs. The Viking zombie tripped over him and crashed to the floor. Mateo took that moment to look over to Sarah and Ken. Ken had reluctantly agreed to retreat toward the studyroom while Sarah grabbed the attention of the six officer zombies. Mateo could barely stand to look at Sarah, the woman who just twenty minutes ago he thought he had a future with. He glanced over at the trenchcoat zombie. It’d stopped attacking, simply watching Ken and Sarah as they retreated. Mateo briefly made eye contact with it. It could tell. It then looked at Ken and Sarah as they backed into the studyroom.
“We already have one of their strongest members,” it informed the Viking zombie. “It would be best to finish them now, but regardless, they are no longer a threat.”
Ken and Sarah exchanged confused glances while Mateo ran to the doorway. He heard the Viking zombie moving right behind him. Sarah held the door open as Mateo sprinted toward it. He had no choice but to look at her now. In a matter of seconds he would need to tell her about the bite. No more future together. No more future for him at all. No watching Ana or Estefanía grow up. No kids of his own. No more laughter or tears; no more chats with other people, no more tranquil solitude with his thoughts; no more goals, setbacks, accomplishments, failures, dreams. A deep dread set in his stomach. He didn’t want to die. The thought of his reality shutting off, of possibly never seeing anything or anyone ever again, of nothing but a blank, gaping, empty void hit him in the gut harder than any zombie or MMA fighter ever could. He fought the urge to stop and collapse into a ball on the ground. He wanted nothing more than to see his mom, a woman both stern and warm, and lay his head on her lap while she caressed his back and comforted him with sayings in Spanish.
He made it through the door. It slammed shut the second he cleared the entrance. A second later everyone heard deafening banging, though the metal door held with admirable strength. After a few hits, the banging stopped. Mateo knew the trenchcoat zombie would come up with a scheme soon enough. He thought of Ana and Estefanía, whom he’d hidden in the dead bushes behind the library. They needed to be saved. He straightened up his posture and grinned his bravest grin while Sarah came to embrace him. She hesitated upon seeing the despair behind his grin, however, and froze when she saw the bites.
“M-Mateo…” Sarah stammered. Ehsan, who’d been checking in with Hector, turned around. Sarah’s jaw froze as tears formed in her eyes. Ehsan didn’t understand until he took a closer look at Mateo. Bite marks everywhere.
“Mateo, n-no….” Julie gasped. Her eyes welled up. “No. Mateo, please, no, God, no…”
“Mateo, is this…” Ehsan began, unable to finish. His throat swelled. “Is- did you… scrape yourself in the bushes, or…”
“Afraid not,” Mateo answered, his grin becoming both wider and sadder. Ehsan’s heart felt heavy enough to drop out of his chest. He looked at the ground as his eyes clouded. How could the group go on without Mateo? Ehsan thought of everything that could never be replaced: his combat prowess, his cheerful grin, his love for everyone at the school. What did they have left without him?
“But, y-you... W-we….” Sarah grabbed onto Mateo and tucked her head into his chest. She managed to hold in her tears, but just barely. “Mateo, you can’t…”
Mateo’s grin broke for a fraction of second as his eyes grew misty. “I’m not so crazy about the idea myself, y’know.”
“I was wondering how you got past all those zombies outside…” Fatima admitted.
“Yep. Pretty easy to take ‘em out when I didn’t have to worry about getting bit.”
“God, Mateo, I’m so sorry,” Julie cried as she walked up to Mateo and embraced him.
Mateo returned the hug. A few tears fell down his cheek before he wiped them away with his sleeve. He turned to Fatima. He spoke in a hushed tone. “Ana and Estefanía are outside, hiding in some dead bushes on the side of the library. Please get ‘em on your way out.”
Ken walked up to Mateo, his eyes misty and wide with grief. “Before you go, do you want us to… well, make sure you don’t-”
A loud knock on the door interrupted Ken.
“One of your two strongest warriors is bitten,” the trenchcoat zombie stated from the other side of the door. “Soon we will get the rest of you. Afterward we will collect those we turned at your school, then make our way to the fields. If you all agree to join us now, we will have our officers only bite each of you once. You can transform comfortably.”
“I’LL KILL YOU!” Ken roared. He turned around to open the door, but Mateo put his hand on Ken’s shoulder.
“He’s trying to draw us out, Ken. I’ll hold ‘em off. You’re too important to die. All of you are.” He turned to Fatima. “Especially you, Fatima. Cecilia got bit at the school. You’ll need to be in charge of planning from now on.”
“Cecilia too?” Fatima cried. “How do we- how can we…”
Mateo smiled and shook his head. “You’ll think of something. You always do.”
Fatima looked at the ground. Ehsan’s already sunken heart now felt dense enough to have its own gravitational pull. Cecilia and Mateo were the school. Manuel’s shovel fell from his hands. Fear gripped every part of him. What could he do that Mateo and Cecilia couldn’t? What could any of them do without those two, without Ryan, without Marcus, without Josue, without Manuel? It was as if a catastrophic earthquake had hit, tearing apart a continent and sending its landmass adrift.
The deafening banging from before resumed. The Viking zombie tried to break the door down. Fatima, despite her uncertainty, went about forming a plan. Speaking through tears in her eyes, she instructed Ken and Hector to break the window of the studyroom with the furniture around them and climb through to the sidewalk along the side of the library. They would lead the way, followed by Emma, who still had her knife, followed by Julie and the kids. Ehsan, Fatima, and Sarah would bring up the rear, ready to fight anything that slipped past Mateo.
“They’ll probably have some sort of trap outside,” Mateo warned. “Be ready.”
It didn’t take long for Ken and Hector to break the window. They hopped over without worrying about the glass on the windowsill. With one final glance back at Mateo, they used their gauntlets to sweep away the glass to allow everyone else to jump over comfortably. While Ken and Hector stood guard, Emma and Julie started to help the kids climb through the window. The pounding at the door stopped as they did so. Mateo realized that the trenchcoat zombie would go to intercept their escape.
“I gotta stop ‘em while I still have time.”
“Mateo, you can’t-” Sarah began.
“Sarah, we got ambushed. Everyone’s exhausted. You need to get ‘em outta here and regroup.” He kissed her forehead while she sank her face into his chest for the last time. “But thank you for everything you’ve given me, Sarah. I love you. So, so much.” His lower lip quivered. He kissed her on the cheek, more tears escaping his eyes. “I wanna kiss you on the lips, but I dunno if it’s, well, y’know, safe for you.” He wiped away his tears. “Please live a long, healthy life. Same goes for all of you. You’re all my living legacy.”
Lucero came up to hug him before climbing over the wall. “Th-thanks for everything, Mister Mateo. I’ll m-miss you,” she said with a facial tick.
Mateo knelt down and embraced her. “Lucero, you’ve done nothing but make me proud since I first met you and the other kids. I’ll miss you, too.” He stood back up and sent her on her way with a final pat on the back. She hurried to the window.
“How’re you not scared?” Ehsan blurted out, terrified on Mateo’s behalf.
Mateo chuckled. “Not scared? I’m fucking terrified.” He smiled and shook his head. “H
onestly, I just wanna curl into a ball and cry. Death scares the shit out of me. I’m not anything special, Ehsan. I’ve just always tried to push through my fears and keep growing, even when I wanted to run. Do that and you’ll be able to do anything I ever did. You’ve got it in you. Everyone does.”
Before Ehsan could respond, Mateo walked to the door and threw it open. About twenty feet away the trenchcoat zombie, Viking zombie, four of the officer zombies, and a handful of sprinters waited for him. The trenchcoat and Viking and zombies stood motionless, unaffected, examining Mateo as if examining a bug in a jar while the four officer zombies held back the sprinters.
“You three gotta get outta here,” Mateo told Ehsan, Fatima, and Sarah as he passed through the doorway. Ehsan and Fatima obliged. Sarah remained rooted in place, dazed, but Fatima grabbed her arm. Ehsan heard Mateo’s voice for the last time. “I’m taking all of you down with me.”
Ehsan, Fatima, and Sarah cleared the windowsill to join the rest of the group. Toward the front of the library, Ehsan could hear the zombies Deon continued to distract with his claps and yells, which had far less vigor than when he first started. Emma and Julie stood with the kids by the window while Ehsan, Fatima, and Sarah looked toward the front of the library to make sure nothing came their way. Ken and Hector, meanwhile, walked toward the back in order to make sure it was safe to swoop around and get Ana and Estefanía, who waited on the library’s other side. Ken and Hector stopped after turning the corner, however. Ken’s face became somehow became even graver while Hector looked to the sky while sighing before raising his hands to fight.
“Two of the officers are here,” Ken informed everyone else.
Sarah leaned in toward Fatima and whispered in her ear. Fatima nodded and whispered something back. Sarah ran toward the front of the library. Ehsan tilted his head in confusion as Fatima turned to him. She leaned over, her hair falling across her face as she did so.
The Human Spring Page 31