The Phoenix Trilogy (Book 1): World On Fire

by Scottie, Charles

  Playing dead was an excruciating experience; being forced to sit down and wait without knowing what condition their party was in or what was going to come next. Every second that passed brought a small respite from the intensity of her need to move, as well as steadily more apparent pain in her limbs. The detonation had showered her in debris, and she had no doubt that some portion of that had done at least superficial damage.

  Assuming I didn’t just get tagged with something that’s going to infect me. Or that I didn’t breathe it in before Marco wrapped my face, or get it in my eyes.

  Being forced to wait with no company but her thoughts was proving to be torture. She was alive, true, though she could also be infected. The others might be in worse shape, and they certainly weren’t going to magically be better off. Dully, she realized that the most she could wish for was that everyone would be equally screwed in their new predicament. It was an epiphany that did not provide her with a great deal of hope.

  Moment by moment, Natalie’s senses returned. The horrid odor blanketing the room only got worse as she improved, but at least her ears seemed to be working again. There was some kind of commotion going on… outside? She shook her head, trying to reorient herself, but her first guess seemed to be correct. The ruckus was coming from the direction of the street.

  Natalie tried to block it out, instead focusing on the sound of breath or movement, anything that would indicate BJ and Rico were safe. She couldn’t make out any other sounds, but noted that Marco was right next to her and she couldn’t hear his breathing, either.

  Even so, her impatience was growing. She needed to check on them, and then they needed to get the Hell out of this place. Natalie bit down hard on her tongue, trying to create a focus point that wasn’t centered on the mess they were in.

  Panicking wasn’t going to help, obviously, but she wasn’t making any headway explaining that to her baser impulses. The action in the street sounded like it was dying down, and Natalie nearly howled with relief as the men began to rise. Apparently that was their cue to get moving.

  “No more breaks. We’re getting to the outpost, now. Thirty seconds to get your gear and we’re gone.” BJ’s voice was hoarse, but Natalie couldn’t see if he was okay. There was the weakest of light filtering into the hall from the street, enough to make out vague shadows but little more.

  As Natalie set to work securing her gear as quickly as she could, she realized that the light was only visible because the entire wall had been destroyed, their heavy door lying flat now that its support had been removed. She’d always known grenades were destructive, but this massive collapse was unexpected.

  Not like the video games. Not at all. Jesus. Natalie’s hands had begun to shudder, and it became less and less likely that she was going to be able to finish packing in time for BJ’s ultimatum, especially in the dark. All of her supplies were accounted for and ready to go, but her sleeping kit was still unrolled.

  Natalie had no time to check on it when BJ grunted, a noise she took to mean that their time was up. Briefly, she contemplated saying something, but she let it go. It was more important that they get out, and if BJ was right, they were going to make it to the outpost before they made camp again.

  Natalie didn’t like the idea of leaving anything of use behind, and it bothered her that she was going to have to admit her novice mistake. She was halfway through picturing how BJ would react when a pack was pushed into her chest. It was her kit, rolled tight and ready to go, and it was followed by a supportive squeeze on her shoulder. Rico. Hah. Of course.

  A sudden flash of light ahead of her showed BJ had cracked the flashlight that sat on the top of his rifle, surveying the damage and verifying that they weren’t going to be in for any sudden surprises. It was a risky move, but trying to blindly pick their way through the carnage wasn’t a wise decision. While BJ seemed unfazed by their surroundings, Natalie had to do a double-take.

  The mess was too much to process, flesh and blood dusted along the ragged remains of the walls around them. The ceiling had been torn apart, and it looked like the building had suffered a cave-in. How they had managed to survive was beyond her, but what really threw her off had nothing to do with their environment at all.

  Rico was standing by BJ ahead of her, his eyes raking one end of the hall while their fearless leader examined the other, each ensuring that their pathway was clear. Just ahead of her, with his back now turned as he made his way toward the others, was Marco. Natalie might have smiled if she’d had the energy.

  With Rico nowhere near, that meant the man who had packed up Natalie’s kit and taken a moment to reassure her was Marco. She knew she shouldn’t be surprised that he wasn’t a complete asshole, but his nice gesture left her uncertain of what to make of him.

  Natalie suspected that Marco’s suddenly kind nature had more to do with their group’s constant insistence on being near death rather than anything resembling actual growth, but it was better than nothing. Even she had to admit that it was a lot easier to be sentimental when the odds for survival weren’t exactly in your favor. As Natalie tried to carefully pick her way through the wreckage, she found herself running low on hope. The situation outside of their apartment reinforced her concerns for the future.

  In the hall, the smell was even worse, regardless of how tightly her mouth wrap was pulled. She hadn’t been able to see what actually happened when the grenade detonated, and what little light that found its way into the building wasn’t nearly enough to give her a picture of their surroundings. Between the brief glimpse that BJ’s flashlight had provided and the overwhelming stench of gore, Natalie guessed that the zombies who had been outside the door were literally pulverized by the explosion.

  They had gone nearly to the entrance of the building before the debris started to clear. Every few seconds, another growl came from the street, fleeting and brief as the creatures they came from continued down the road. The explosive had no doubt drawn quite a crowd, though curiously, none of the undead seemed to be heading to the apartment building itself.

  Another rush of movement passing by the door ahead of them confirmed Natalie’s confusion. The zeds were heading toward another target, that much seemed obvious, but what? Maybe the mystery man had survived the grenade, too.

  For once, Natalie had a theory that actually made sense. The ghouls might have seen him in the street as he left and taken to pursuing him. If the unholy mob was anything like the one that Natalie had evaded before, then every capable hunter in the area would be joining in.

  Silver linings, huh? Psychotic asshole nearly gets us killed, but hey, at least he had the decency to provide us a distraction, too. A smile came over Natalie’s face, but it was cold and forced. It was no small part of her that hoped the man would be unable to escape his predators.

  Soon enough, they were at the entrance to the apartments and ready to enter the street. BJ leaned down, peeking his head out the door. He was using his rifle, but Natalie suspected he was more interested in its scope rather than its lethality. After a handful of tense seconds, he gestured for the group to huddle in.

  “We have about two miles to cover. Traveling at night is a goddamn mistake, but we don’t have a choice. We’re going to be moving fast and low. If you get spotted, start sprinting. Once we’re at the gates, we’ll be safe.” BJ’s speech stopped short, and though Natalie couldn’t make out his face, she suspected he was mulling something over.

  BJ peeked out the door again, trying to get as good a handle on their surroundings as he could, and when he returned his attention to the group it was easy to pick up on his tension. Natalie’s skin prickled. BJ being tense was not a good sign.

  “Weapons free until we arrive.” BJ growled every word, and when Rico started to protest his decision, he practically snarled. Rico fell quiet, and Natalie’s heart jumped into her mouth. Ohhh shit. Oh shit shit shit. This is bad. This is really really bad.

  String after string of curses and paranoia nearly overwhelmed her mind, bu
t none of it mattered. The situation was what it was, and they were just going to have to deal with it. Natalie slowly put her crowbar away, taking her shotgun into her hands with serious intent for the first time. It felt different. Heavier, colder. More foreign than she had expected.

  She wasn’t ready for this, but as the thought entered her mind, a vivid memory flashed back to her of the first zombie she had dispatched. She hadn’t been ready for that fight either, but she had won.

  Tightening her grip, Natalie let out a steady exhale. She’d won before, and she was going to win again. This wasn’t how she was going to die, and with the familiar surge of adrenaline pouring into her system, she felt the foolish confidence to dare any of these poor bastards to come challenge her conviction.

  Natalie knew it was bluster, but talking big had brought her nerves back under control. BJ walked out of the building with Rico at his back, and as Natalie followed after she recognized she was going to need any boost of courage she could get. There were countless shadows all around, any one of them hiding more monsters in the dark. Natalie’s lips curved into a grim frown.

  It was either going to be a very long night or a brutally short one, and neither sounded like a great option at the moment. Thankfully, this was not another slow crawl toward freedom. BJ was wasting no time, moving with decisive action. Natalie found herself having to work to keep up, but their pace sparked a brief pang of excitement.

  BJ had said they were only two miles out. If they kept this pace, they’d be there in no time. Natalie’s imagination ran amok with visions of what they’d find. Considering the last two places they’d visited were supposed to be secure, she was left to rely solely on BJ’s insistence that things were going to be okay.

  Ahead of them, Natalie heard the loud creak of wood under too much pressure, a short warning that they were about to have company. BJ ducked down, using a stoop for cover and the rest of the party fell in line with him. The groan gave way to a splintering crack; a small group of undead had finally escaped their prison and found their way into the road.

  Natalie had to wonder how long the monsters had been trapped before her arrival. She wasn’t exactly used to having great luck, but the timing here was almost comically bad. The dead had been stuck here long enough to miss joining the rest of the horde, but had managed to get out just in time to cut off BJ’s advance. A suspicious turn of events, to say the least.

  The end result was a group of walkers set on high-alert were now milling around in the street while they waited for something to give them direction. It was a situation that, at least for Natalie and the others, could all too easily take an even more dangerous turn for the worse.

  A garbage can lid went whizzing past Natalie’s ear, the unexpected blur of motion nearly convincing her to start shooting. Marco was the culprit, but Natalie felt nothing more than a sigh of relief as the improvised Frisbee rattled and scraped along the road well away from them.

  As always, the zombies were falling over themselves in their pursuit of anything that could be prey, a predictable pattern that Natalie resolved to never take for granted. With everything else that had a tendency for going sideways, at least she had one reliable fallback.

  BJ waited just long enough for the undead to pass before immediately resuming his vigorous pace. He hadn’t been kidding; they were definitely moving fast, even with their occasional setbacks. To Natalie, they couldn’t move quickly enough. Every few seconds there’d be another burst of movement or noise nearby, and while they hadn’t encountered any other threats directly, she wasn’t optimistic about that staying the case.

  The apartment was about a mile behind them, if Natalie had to guess. That meant another mile to go, but things had taken a turn for the unsettling.

  Nearer the apartment building, the hunters had been in a frenzy after the grenade had gone off. The noise and attention they drew was the perfect blanket for Natalie and the others to escape, but the further away they got, the less assurance they had that any coming zeds would be distracted. That meant they were facing quieter neighborhoods, and were more likely to be heard as they progressed.

  Curiously, Natalie noticed that cars were beginning to show up on the streets again, as well. They had come to a T in the lane, now given the choice of going left or right, and for the first time since entering the city proper there was a vehicle in the road.

  Natalie’s eyes narrowed in suspicion, realizing that there were actually two cars. One on the left path, and one on the right. They were even resting in the same place in the street. That was strange. Markers, maybe, set by the military or for some other purpose she hadn’t discovered yet. It was not a common sight, and Natalie felt the hair on the back of her neck rise.

  BJ was unfazed, advancing tirelessly down the left path after only a moment of contemplation, but Natalie doubted there was anything they could come across that would slow him down at this point. She was inclined to follow him. Even if things went wrong, and by this point she considered it almost a certainty that they would, they’d find a way to cope.

  They were passing a wide distance from the vehicle, the first sign to Natalie that BJ wasn’t comfortable with it after all. The darkness prevented her from getting a particularly good look at it, but it didn’t appear to be out of the ordinary, beyond its placement.

  It only took a few seconds for them to leave it behind, and Natalie almost stopped to breathe a sigh of relief before she heard the tell-tale chirp of a car alarm suddenly being set. BJ’s entire body whipped around so fast that Rico nearly barreled straight into his chest.

  “Son of a bitch. Son of a bitch!” BJ spit the last word, gesturing violently for the rest of the group to follow after him with full haste. Natalie didn’t need to be told twice. The alarm hadn’t gone off yet, but there was no way it being turned on was a coincidence. It would activate any second, and the more distance they had between them when it did, the better.

  Natalie never broke her stride as she heard the blaring begin to echo behind her. Her mind was dead to surprise at this point, all of her disbelief suspended in the wake of the impossible odds that had been constantly stacked against them. Ahead of her, Rico was shouting something to BJ.

  “What the fuck is going on, B!” His voice carried more frustration than fear, an emotion Natalie could identify with. After getting screwed over so many times by what appeared to be pure happenstance, bad luck wasn’t something she was afraid of anymore. Instead, it had become a growing annoyance that made her feel like screaming. Whether that was an improvement for her was yet to be determined.

  BJ had no time to answer Rico’s question as more corpses swarmed into the street. The alarm was still active, a small blessing since it gave the zombies around them a target to pursue. There was only a single alcove for them to hide in, and so it was their mandatory choice. Hunkering down, Natalie watched as an uncomfortable number of bodies continued to bolt down the road.

  If they could keep themselves out of the way, the walkers would pass them by and the way ahead would be clear again. All they had to do was wait, and let the car alarm do its job. They might actually be able to make it out of this one without more trouble being piled onto their plates.

  It was a brief hope, and it didn’t last. As quickly as it had come to life, the car went silent with another happy chirp, leaving a sizeable horde of on-edge undead to scour the street. Natalie laughed, more a giggle than anything, her head shaking as she felt it overtake her. Of course. Of course! What else? What happens next? I’m fucking giddy with excitement.

  If the others heard her laughter, they paid no mind. Zombies were everywhere, most of them slowly becoming eerily still as they settled from their initial frenzy. Now was the time for them to listen. Any noise, any sound of consequence, and they would descend upon it in a fury of snapping teeth and grasping hands.

  It didn’t take a genius to realize the street was no longer a viable option. They were in a dead-end alleyway, and the only choice they had left to them was a w
indow leading into the building they were butted up against. Slowly, they crept backwards, mindful of any garbage that they might step on that could signal their position to the enemy.

  Once at the window, Rico moved to open it before BJ caught his hand. Natalie was confused, and both cousins mirrored her uncertainty. There was no way BJ could see anything beyond the window right now; the alley was dark, and the inside of the building was pitch-black. They were flying blind, but this was the only path they could take, and hesitation wasn’t going to do anything but get them killed. One by one, BJ pulled them all close, clearly intending to take the risk of speaking.

  “We’re being hunted. I don’t know who or why, but somebody wants us dead. It isn’t just the car alarm, either. I spotted at least a half dozen other snares on our way here, and I doubt I caught them all.” Natalie’s heart sank, realizing that their supposedly poor fortune had nothing to do with luck at all. Just gets better every second, doesn’t it?

  “We’ve managed to get by so far, but we’re on their turf, and we’re playing their game.” BJ’s voice was a rough whisper, just loud enough for the group to hear, but Natalie was barely able to focus on it. Her attention was glued to the alley entrance, watching for any sign that they had been followed. Any second now, somebody was going to be there, ready to finish the job. Unaware of her growing paranoia, BJ continued.

  “I’d bet money this window is trapped. If we survive, the next path we take will be, too. We’re prey being guided, step by step, into a snare.” A scuffing noise drew their attention to the road, and BJ quickly fell silent. Natalie’s heart raced, expecting the noise to belong to their human hunter.

  Instead, a monstrous silhouette scraped past, and Natalie shuddered. She almost wished her first guess had been right, instead. Even with the dark obscuring most of its features, it was hard to imagine that thing had been human once, and she tried to prevent herself from picturing what it must look like up close. She was failing, morbid images beginning to pour into her mind, when BJ took the opportunity to finish speaking.