by Amy Miles
“I’m so sorry,” I whisper.
“I’m not.” I lean back to stare at him and see that he is smiling weakly at me. “I got to see you again.”
I crush my lips against him, desperate not to let go but Cable seizes me by the hair and shoves me toward Liam. I embrace the boy, feeling the trembling in his body as he tries to be brave.
“It will be okay, Kid.”
He nods as his lower lip quivers and I press a kiss to his cheek then move on to Flynn. Despite facing death head on, he finds a way to smile at me.
“We gave ‘em hell, didn’t we?”
“We sure did.” I wrap him into a tight embrace and then say my goodbyes to Cyrus before I reach Hope.
“Oh, my sweet, sweet girl.” I take her into my arms and hold her tight. Her fingers claw into my back as she clings to me but she does not quake like Liam does. I pull back as I kneel in front of her and wipe her tears away. “Do you remember that I promised that I would keep you safe?”
“Well, I always keep my promises. You are a very brave little girl, aren’t you?” She wipes at her nose and nods. I lean down to whisper into her ear. “Of all of these men beside you, you are the bravest of all. I know in the end you will prove that to me.”
Taking ahold of her hand, I squeeze her fingers closed and shift her dress over top then slowly rise to my feet. I walk backward slowly until I am beside Cable.
“Well that was all rather revolting,” he says in a bored voice and then steps forward. He begins to walk in front of each of my friends, pausing to consider them. “I just can’t decide which one I want to eat first. My brother? No. He should be last. Let him suffer for thinking that he could steal you from me. The new kid? No. I don’t think you care enough for him.”
He turns and seizes Flynn by his hair and yanks him to his feet. “I remember you.”
“Stop!” I cry out and Cable turns. “You said the girl is sweetest and I would not wish for her to suffer. Let her go first.”
“Avery, no!” Flynn thrashes in Cable’s grip but is not strong enough to free himself. Nox stares hard at me and I can see hurt and confusion in Liam’s eyes before I look away.
Cable purses his lips. “I’ll admit I would have figured you would beg me to spare her life. I might have even considered it before the end, but this pleases me far more. All right, I’ll take the girl.”
Flynn cries out as he is slammed back to the ground. He tries to reach for Cable’s legs but the Flesh Bags nearest him instantly reach out and restrain him. My friend’s fight against their captors as Cable crouches down in front of Hope.
“Your friend thinks that your suffering will be less because you go first.” He reaches out and pats her cheek but she is staring at me instead. I can hear her little heartbeat thrumming in her chest. “Too bad she is wrong.”
“No!” Liam screams.
Cable shifts his smug gaze to look at the boy and then cries out when Hope slashes Kira’s knife across his throat. A thin line of blood appears along his adam’s apple and his eyes fly open wide with surprise.
“Very clever, Avery,” he seizes Hope by her good hand and squeeze. I hear her bone pop and the knife falls to the ground. “Let the innocent little girl do your dirty work.”
“She’s not.” He turns to look at me. “She’s just the distraction.”
Channeling all of my anger and hatred for the monster before me, I turn to look at the Flesh Bags surrounding us.
Kill him!
The color drains out of Cable’s face when he is blasted with the message that I send out to the masses, loud, strong and confident. The Withered closest to Cable attack without thought. His screams are drowned out by the sound of tearing and biting as other swarm to join in.
I seize Hope around the waist and shove my way out of the crowd as it surges forward, keeping a hand on Liam as I lead my friends to safety. The instant we emerge from the writing horde of frenzied zombies, I drop Hope into Liam’s arms and help Cyrus to the ground. Flynn escapes last with Nox in his arms.
“Nox!” I cry and race to him, pulling him from Flynn to hold him close.
“You did it.” He smiles and presses his hand against my cheek. “I knew you could.”
“I guess I just needed the proper motivation.”
I kiss his cheeks, his swollen eyes and his split eyebrows.
“Does this mean that you’re going to fulfill that whole promise thing to thank me for believing in you?”
“Really?” I pull back from him and laugh. “That’s what you’re thinking about right now? Sex?”
“Oh, Avery,” he grins and cups the back of my neck, “that’s all I’ve been thinking about since the day I met you.”
“You are completely hopeless.” I laugh and ignore the last of Cable’s moments on this earth as I kiss Nox and realize that for the first time since the world went to hell, I finally feel safe.
EPILOGUE
As the early morning fog begins to lift and the sun’s warmth returns, the war-torn compound feels too still. The sirens that blared long into the night have fallen silent and in its wake is an eerie calm that leaves me on edge. Though I never would have thought it possible, I would happily take the mechanical screams over this tomb-like silence.
Countless bodies lie strewn across the ground, some in pieces while others remain mostly intact with random mouth-sized holes gnawed deep enough to reveal bone. The odd pop of a pistol tells me that another victim has been put down and when I turn in a slow circle to look around me the death toll is staggering.
As I walk through a field of torn tents, trampled supplies and large pools of blood I feel a sense of hopelessness fall over me. Is this what my world has become? Nothing more than death and violence as far as I can see?
The mutations have spread much farther than any of us could have imagined and there is nothing that I can do to stop them now. Though my final order to the Withered after ending Cable was to kill each other, I know others will continue to sweep across the land, devouring and changing anyone in their path. As I stare down at a blood soaked teddy bear beside my foot, I wonder if anything I have done really matters.
Wiemann is dead but his work will live on in others. Every Safe Zone along the east coast will have been overrun with their own creations by now. How long will it be before the human race is completely wiped out by their own selfish greed?
“Hey you.” I look up to see Nox wearily picking his way through the mounds of bodies still waiting to be burned. He is slick with blood, both red and black but is still standing. His clothes are torn, his body weary and beaten from the events of the past two days but he is alive and that is far more than I ever dared to hope for.
We lost far too many good people tonight. Kira and Fletcher died honorably. Bo, Gentry and Phillip were found among the dead. I will make sure that each of them will be remembered.
I step around a cistern of drinking water, now murky with blood and floating bodies. A small three man crew attempts to lasso a female Withered with a rope and drag her out but it is a losing battle. The water is no longer fit to drink and this base is no longer inhabitable.
Those able to walk will begin the trek North to Nashville where our two communities will blend together and begin to rebuild. Perhaps in time we will be able to get the city repaired and expand our borders. The extra man power will definitely help to keep our people safe for the time being.
“How are you holding up?” Nox asks when he stops in front of me.
I don’t really know how to answer that. Too much has happened for me to ever be able to say that I am fine again. I feel numb.
“I just carried a boy to the fire over there that couldn’t have been more than five, Nox. I have no clue where his mother was or even what she called him. The one thing I do know is that those damn Flesh Bags ate him alive and he...he...” My throat closes, refusin
g to let me speak the words. “I can’t unsee any of this. How are we supposed to go on after tonight when we’ve lost so much?”
Nox instantly pulls me into his arms. I bury my tears into his chest and cling to him, needing his strength because I have saved little for myself.
“Shh.” He presses his lips against my sweaty temple and then pulls back to run his thumb down my cheek, tracing the length of my tear tracks. “We go on because that’s what we do. We fight and we survive together because we know now that we aren’t alone. There are other survivors out there that need our help. We have to do whatever it takes to find them and help them.”
“Is there really any point? There are others like me out there, Nox. Others like Cable who will seek to take control. In the end we will not have the numbers to fight back. We will be overrun.”
“Maybe, but that doesn’t mean I plan on giving up hope anytime soon. I’ve got a life to live for and I’ve got you. That’s all I need, Avery.”
I cling to him as tears fall freely from my eyes. The cloth wrapped around my nose does little to diminish the scent of burning flesh as I watch another body being dragged toward the funeral pyre over his shoulder and for the first time I realize the scent is no longer appealing.
There are ten fires in total spanning this side of the Safe Zone, each no less than thirty feet in diameter and rising higher than the perimeter walls. The enormity of loss sits heavily in my stomach as I force myself to look away from the flames.
“This mission wasn’t a failure. We did what we came here to do. Wiemann is dead and countless Flesh Bags were killed tonight. For every one of them that dies more people will live because of what you did here and that most certainly matters.”
“But we lost so many people.”
He tilts my chin up to look at him and gently tugs the cloth away from my face so that he can truly see me. “They died knowing they were helping to make a difference. That is all any of them could ever hope for.”
I steal a small, settling breath before I lift my eyes to meet his. He may be covered in gore from the crown of his head down to his military grade boots, but he is perfect. I love the man that he is, what he stands for and his willingness to do what is right no matter the personal cost. Cable was like that once. Perhaps that is why my feelings for Nox were confused for so long because the line between them blurred so easily, but not anymore.
Now there is only Nox.
“They lived well,” I whisper in agreement. “You should be proud of them.”
“They didn’t fight for me.” He smiles down at me. “Tonight, you were the leader they looked to and that led them to victory. You are the one who needs to be proud.”
Wrapping my arms around him, I allow myself to sink into his embrace. He squeezes me tight and together we stand and watch the fires eat away flesh and bone from the people that we fought to protect with every fiber of our being. We survived when others did not. I don’t know how or even why but I have to believe that it is for a reason.
There are answers out there that can give us hope and people still in need. I know that now. From here I will travel south to Charleston. If any of Flynn’s friends are left alive then we will find them and bring them home.
Maybe someday there will be one among us who can understand the mystery of the mutations in my blood and find a way to undo the perversion of this world. Flynn is living proof that there is a way to survive the transformation, to become something more without being tainted by the demons that will continue to haunt me. Perhaps when that day comes we will have the resources to find a true cure so that no one has to undergo that procedure, but for now we will live.
There is little doubt now that I will ever be truly free of the zombie mutations within me. In the end, Dr. Wiemann was right. I am special. For so long I have been chasing a ghost, trying to discover ‘why me’ but I realize now that was the wrong question.
What I should have been asking is “why not me?”
Human blood is the key. It is hunger filling and life giving, but I am no monster and I refuse to be an affliction to mankind. I will find a way to survive without feeding on humans because that is what I do.
I survive.