by Joe McKinney
The intensity in her stare held him against the wall as surely as her arm had.
He nodded.
Gabi fired again, this time at the bloody zombie staggering toward Avery and Sylvia.
“Get over there with Nate,” she said to Sylvia. “All of you, inside. Now!”
Nate helped them toward the door. Through the fog he caught a glimpse of Richardson in the back of the boat, burning his way through a magazine as he shot over the sides at anything that moved.
Zombies were pouring over the railing now, all down the length of the boat, rising out of the fog like demons. Gabi kept firing, her brown dress swishing with every move of her vast bulk, but to Nate it seemed like she was fighting against an inexhaustible force. There were just too many of them.
A woman was staggering toward Jimmy, her hands outstretched, the ruins of her dress hanging in strips from her waist. There were leaves and sticks caught in her hair. Her breasts swayed with every step, leaking mud. Her face was a patchwork of oozing sores and her back was covered with leeches. One ankle was almost certainly broken, the foot twisted under so that she hobbled forward on the blade of her foot.
Nate took a step forward, ready to push the woman out of the way, but his foot slipped on the blood and mud and viscera that had pooled on the deck and he went down hard on his butt.
“Jimmy, behind you!” he yelled, but the words were lost beneath the rattling guns.
The woman was almost on him. Her mouth was opening and closing, her fingers clutching instinctively, as though already pulling the meat from Jimmy’s corpse.
Nate looked around and saw Jimmy’s lawn chair folded up on the deck. He scooped it up, pulled himself to his feet like a man struggling to stand on wet ice, and swung it at the woman’s head. The flimsy chair bounced off the zombie’s head with the crunch of cheap metal, but it was enough to send them both sprawling toward the railing.
The next instant Nate found himself leaning over the side, staring down into water that was churning with zombies, all of them reaching for his face, the smell of death and rotting vegetation assaulting him like a slap in the face.
When he pulled himself back from the edge Jimmy was standing over the woman, slamming the butt of his rifle down on her face again and again, caving it in until it was unrecognizable.
Gabi looked back over her shoulder and found her husband. “Get us out of here!” she said. “We can’t do this much longer.”
Another zombie, this one a one-armed woman with half of her face bashed in, rolled over the railing, flopped awkwardly onto the deck, and then slowly climbed to its feet. Gabi shot her right through the damaged part of her face and flipped her backward over the railing.
“Jimmy, get movin’!”
“You got this?” he answered.
“Yeah. Go!”
She didn’t wait for a reply. She spun around to face the surge of hands and faces rising over the gunwale, rifle at the ready. Nate watched in awe and rapt fascination as she calmly flipped the weapon’s selector switch to BURST and went back to firing at a zombie less than an arm’s length away. Her bullets nearly sliced the man in half, causing him to slide back into the water that was rapidly turning to a bloody sludge.
Suddenly, and for no reason that Nate could see, an appalling collective moan rose up from the zombies still in the water, like someone had just turned on a switch. The sound made everyone pause, even Gabi, and in the momentary lull of the guns, Nate could hear countless hands slapping against the hull, searching for purchase to climb over.
“I’m out!” Richardson shouted from the back.
Gabi kicked a loaded magazine toward Nate. “Take that back there.”
Without saying more she brought her weapon up and emptied her magazine into three of the infected who had managed to hook their arms over the side. But there was a fourth behind her that she hadn’t seen, and that one was already over the railing and trying to climb to its feet on the blood-soaked deck. Nate yelled for her to watch out, but Gabi couldn’t hear him over the screams and barking of the guns.
The zombie, a fat man wearing nothing but shorts and the remnants of a tennis shoe on one foot, managed to get to its knees. Its gut swung out in front of it, its hands out of control, flopping around like wounded things on the side of the road. But it didn’t lose any of its momentum. The man’s right hand came down on the back of Gabi’s leg and she jumped.
She pointed the rifle at the thing’s head. It tried to twist toward her calf, but she batted the zombie’s hand away with the barrel and lined up her sights on the back of its head. But before she could pull the trigger the man grabbed the muzzle and pulled it down, using the counterleverage to climb to his feet.
Without thinking Nate rushed forward and kicked the zombie in the ear. It rolled over, emitting a noise that was somewhere between a growl and a feeding moan. It clutched at Nate’s foot, snagging the hem of his jeans. Nate tumbled down to the deck, landing face-first on top of the zombie. It raked its fingernails across his cheeks, cutting his skin deeply, though in the adrenaline rush that came with the fight he didn’t notice the pain. He jammed the heel of his left hand into the zombie’s mouth and pushed its head to one side. There was a brick next to his head, one of the ones Jimmy had used to anchor the lawn chairs in rough currents, and Nate balled his fist around it. The zombie turned its one seeing eye up at Nate and tilted its head to one side, as though questioning him, its mouth open and oozing fluid.
Nate slammed the brick down on the top of its head.
The zombie’s face bounced off Nate’s leg and its stare found him again.
“Fucking die already!” He slammed the brick down again and again, screaming with every blow until the zombie rolled off his legs, its head a caved-in mess.
Nate pulled his legs back. He rose to his feet.
Gabi Hinton was staring at him.
“What?”
She raised her rifle, the business end staring him straight in the eye.
“Whoa!” he said. “Hey, hold on!”
Without lowering the rifle she turned her head and said: “Jimmy, we need to go!”
“I’m working on it.”
Nate turned just enough to see Jimmy pulling himself over the flybridge’s railing. He grabbed the throttle and eased it forward, the engines responding with a sputtering gurgle that surged the boat forward.
Nate swayed with the sudden movement. When he looked back, down the length of the boat, he saw zombies losing their grip on the railing and falling back into the water. He saw Ben Richardson and Sylvia in the back of the boat, punching at hands with the butts of their rifles. They were moving now, pulling away from the cover of the willow trees and into the wider expanse of the river.
The zombies kept coming, but as they reached deeper water, they sank and drowned.
When Nate turned back to Gabi, he was still staring into the business end of her rifle, the hole at the end of her muzzle looking like an open, toothless mouth.
He blinked at her.
“You saved me, Nate,” she said. “But you’re infected. I’m sorry.”
He shook his head at her, held up his injured hand as though he could turn the bullets to one side.
She backed up, keeping her gun on him. “I’m sorry,” she said.
“Stop!” It was Avery Harper. She broke loose from Sylvia’s grip and jumped between Nate and Gabi Hinton. “Don’t shoot him. You can’t. He’s immune. He won’t turn!”
Gabi stared at her. The rifle didn’t move.
“Honey,” she said. “Move aside.”
“She’s right,” Richardson said. He was coming forward as he spoke. “She’s telling the truth. He really is immune.”
Gabi looked from Avery to Richardson, then slowly back to Nate, studying him. “No,” she said. “That’s . . . impossible.”
“They ain’t lying to you, Ma’am,” Nate said. “Those zombies, they can’t hurt me. They can’t turn me into one of them, anyway.”
“But . . .” Gabi stil
l couldn’t believe it. “How . . . why?”
Nate stuck his bleeding hand out between them, almost as though he was offering it to her as a gift.
“I don’t know,” he said. “But I’ve been bit plenty over the years. They don’t hurt me.” He pulled the flash drive from his neck with his uninjured hand and held it up for her to see. “All the answers are here.”
“Gabi”—this time it was Sylvia Carnes speaking—“he’s telling the truth. I don’t know the answers, and neither does he. But he’s telling you the truth. Please don’t shoot him. I’m begging you, don’t. Everything counts on this.”
The huge woman shook with indecision, all the while keeping a steady sight picture on Nate.
For a moment, the muzzle of her rifle dipped.
“Impossible,” she said.
“Gabi,” Sylvia said. She took a step forward. Sylvia held out her hand, but pulled it back when the older woman flinched, half turning the gun toward Sylvia. “Gabi, please, you have to listen to me. Around his neck he carries a flash drive. A military doctor used him to find a cure for this. Don’t you see?”
Gabi shook her head slowly, not understanding, or perhaps not wanting to.
“That’s what we’re doing out here,” Sylvia went on. “We’re trying to find a friend of ours. The Red Man has her, and we have to get her back.”
“You’re crazy . . .” Gabi said.
“No,” Sylvia said. “Gabi, this is the truth, every word of it. We have to find our friend. She’s been in contact with a doctor named Don Fisher. He can use the cure Nate’s got with him. He can—”
“Don Fisher?” Gabi nearly spat the name on the deck. “Fisher? He’s nothing but a myth. A pipe dream. You might as well be looking for Prester John.”
“He’s real!” Nate interjected. “I’ve seen him. I’ve met him. I’ve met his family.”
Gabi wheeled on him, gun raised high, her gaze narrowed down the length of the barrel.
“Nate, no!” Sylvia shouted.
Nate pushed the barrel of Gabi’s gun away with his uninjured hand.
“It’s alright,” he said. He turned his attention on Gabi. “It’s true. I’ve met him. He helped me when I was sick with the flu.”
“Why didn’t you give him the cure then?” she said.
She could have pulled the gun away. She could have taken a step back and blasted him, but she was battling more with herself now, her confidence wavering. She didn’t want to believe what he was saying. That much was plain from the look on her face. But somehow, and he didn’t know how he knew this, only that he did, she needed to believe. Something inside her needed to believe. Against every hard grain of doubt in her being, she needed to believe.
“Because I didn’t know who he was,” Nate admitted. There was a note of humility in his voice now. “And because I was scared. And stupid. I had the flu when I saw him and he helped me. He gave me medicine and clean water. I should have known he was a doctor.”
Just then Richardson stepped between them. He put a hand on the top of Gabi’s gun.
Gabi looked at him, and her eyes pleaded for direction.
“I didn’t believe it, either,” he said gently. “But I’ve seen the proof. He’s telling you the truth.”
He put pressure on the gun and she yielded. She lowered the muzzle to the deck. “So what are we supposed to do?” she asked.
“We find this girl, this Niki Booth, and then we find the doctor.”
“And then?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “I really don’t know.”
Without notice, the Sugar Jane rocked hard to port, throwing them all off their feet. Nate crashed headlong into the gunwale, hitting his head so hard his legs went numb. He sagged to one knee, looking around, blinking stupidly.
Gabi had lost her gun. She and Richardson were tumbled together in a heap on the opposite side of the deck. Sylvia managed to keep her feet, but only by holding on to the awning above her.
He couldn’t see Avery.
Gabi stood, looked around. The fog was thinning, but they still couldn’t see much beyond the Red Man’s compound rising above the next bend in the river.
“We’re turning around.”
The engines strained suddenly, causing them all to stagger.
Gabi caught herself on the gunwale and turned toward the pilothouse. “What are you doing?” she said.
But Jimmy was already climbing down. He looked upset, desperate.
“Jimmy? What’s going on?”
“We got trouble,” he said.
He rushed past her without explaining, unlocked an access panel near the bow, and threw open the hatch. Inside Nate saw what looked like scuba gear: tanks, masks, and hoses.
“Help me with this,” he said.
Gabi didn’t hesitate. She rushed forward and started pulling metal tanks out of the hold, lining them up against the railing. Jimmy brought out the regulators and together they slid them onto the tanks and screwed them down.
He tested one of the regulators and, satisfied it was working, turned to the others.
“We’re abandoning ship,” he said. “Everybody up front—fast !”
“What’s going on?” Richardson said.
“The Red Man’s coming. I caught a glimpse of them through the fog. There’s a bunch of boats.”
“You can’t outrun them?” Sylvia asked.
“Not a chance. Let’s go, everybody. We’ve only got the four tanks, so two of you will have to double up.”
Jimmy slipped a tank on his back and pulled the regulator over his shoulder. Then he helped Gabi into hers. Nate looked around. Sylvia and Ben were both putting on tanks, Sylvia pulling Avery over to her side as she did so.
Ben nodded at him. “Looks like you’re with me.”
Nate opened his mouth to speak, but didn’t know what to say. It was happening again, the confusion seeping into his head like a fog. This was coming at him too fast. He had so many questions buzzing around in his brain he couldn’t figure which one to ask first.
In the near distance they could hear the steady thrum of boat engines coming closer.
“Let’s get moving, people,” Jimmy said. “They’ll be on us any second.”
He climbed over the railing and looked back.
He caught Nate looking at him.
“What’s your problem?” he said.
“I . . .” Nate stammered.
“Spit it out, boy.”
“I can’t swim,” Nate finally said.
Jimmy laughed. It was a deep, phlegmy sound. Then he shook his head. “And here I thought you couldn’t get any dumber.”
He shook his head again and dropped overboard with a splash.
CHAPTER 17
The Red Man sat in the dark in the middle of the little cabin at the foot of the stairs. The young man who had been given the task to go below and deliver the news stood at the top of the stairs, not wanting to take another step.
He was more than scared. It was coming off him in waves, like heat shimmers rising from the highway pavement in the middle of the desert. The Red Man terrified him in ways he could not even express. He was sweating, unable to swallow the lump in his throat, a chill creeping over his skin with every moment he spent in this devil’s company.
“Well?”
The voice startled the soldier and he flinched. The Red Man was stirring, a darker shadow moving through a pool of lighter shadows.
The solder took a few steps down, stopping when the smell assaulted his nostrils.
“Sir,” he said, his voice faltering, “we’ve got the boat. We should be coming up on it any second.”
There was movement in the dark, and the next instant the Red Man was standing just below the soldier, staring up at him with eyes that were unblinking and insane. He didn’t speak, only stared at the soldier.
The young man wanted to back up, but didn’t dare. His name was David Cohen, and he had been a black shirt for a little over a year, ever since the Red Man
’s army swept over the Las Cruces compound where he’d lived since he was a boy. He’d been working the fields, harvesting squash, when the main attack started. The klaxons had sounded, but David and the three people with him never had a chance to take their stations. Zombies poured through a hole in the fence and overran the main part of the complex. He’d barely cleared the field when the rest of the defenders started running in full retreat toward him.
David was luckier than most. He and a handful of others managed to escape the compound, and he’d wandered, lost and confused, through the surrounding countryside for two days before the black shirts cornered him.
The Red Man had given him a choice: become a black shirt or a zombie.
At the time, the choice had seemed obvious. But the truth was, this was no way to live.
And still the Red Man stared at him, the thoughts behind his eyes and painted face completely unknowable.
Finally the young man could take no more and blurted out: “They asked me to come get you.”
The Red Man nodded. It was a subtle gesture, and the young man wasn’t even certain that he’d seen it, but he scrambled back up on deck just the same.
Back in the fog, the soldier quickly made his way aft.
This, he thought, was no way to live. No way at all.
But he had seen his compound razed to the ground by the black shirts, and those who refused to serve the Red Man either eaten alive by his zombie army or impaled through the ass on a forest of stakes outside the Red Man’s compound.
This was no way to live, to be sure. But he was living.
That much he would hold on to as long as he could.
The old trawler emerged out of the fog, its stern toward the Red Man’s approaching fleet. From the bow of his boat the Red Man studied the trawler. He could see at a glance that it was deserted, save for a few dead bodies draped over the deck fixtures. Its hull was dark with smeared blood and mud, but he could still see the name of the boat, the Sugar Jane, painted in solid block letters over the propellers.
“Doesn’t look like anyone survived,” one of the soldiers said.
The Red Man didn’t look at him. He studied the boat for a moment longer, then said: “Bring us alongside. I’m going aboard.”