“What are the chances this thing runs?” John asked.
Frank aimed the beam of the penlight at the ambulance fifty feet or so off the road. The words ‘Strandville EMS’ stuck out in bright red lettering against a white background. “I’d say good, considering where it is. Had I not been upstairs, I wouldn’t have seen it. Means no one else has, either.”
“For our sakes, I hope you’re right.”
Frank glanced at sunken back tires, caught in two rivets of partially dried mud. “Looks like it might be stuck, but at least the fuel door is closed. Means no one’s siphoned the gas.”
“Now all we need are keys in the ignition and a working engine.”
Frank cautiously approached the driver’s side. A spotty film of mud covered the window and made it impossible to see in. He felt a run of palpitations in his chest as his hand closed around the door handle. He threw it open and coughed.
John bent over, his hands on his knees, and vomited the undigested remains of a sleeve of communion wafers and alcohol.
Frank grimaced and looked over the dead body in the driver’s seat. “You were hoping for keys, right?” He jingled the keys in the ignition, keeping his eye on the emaciated body of a distantly familiar man in the driver’s seat. Dressed in the requisite blue jumpsuit and boots with the nametag that said Carl, the body of the once hefty man whom he’d only worked with for a couple of months before retirement, had deteriorated to little more than bones and spotty patches of tissue.
“Help me get him out of here,” Frank said.
“I…” John’s cheeks puffed out and he continued vomiting, unable to finish a sentence.
“Never mind.” Frank opened the passenger’s side door and set his gun on the dash. His boot stuck in the mud and as he stepped up into the ambulance, his foot came out of it. His dingy, white sock dangled from the tip of his sweaty foot and he pulled it up before reaching for his shoe. “This is just great.” He took a long look at Carl’s remains, checking him for bite marks, and found none immediately visible. His eyes were closed, his pallor the ashen color of quick-dry cement mix. His left hand rested on the steering wheel and the flesh had all but disappeared, leaving his wedding ring circling the bone of his finger. “Poor son of a bitch.” Frank pulled on his boot and situated himself sideways in the passenger’s seat. He put his foot against Carl’s side and prepared to shove him out when his opaque, white eyes popped open. “Holy shit!” Frank fumbled for his pistol. “John, get the hell over here.”
Carl’s near-skeletal right hand grabbed Frank’s leg, and before John could even try and help, Frank put three bullets into Carl’s head. Black blood dripped from the gaping holes in Carl’s right temple. Frank kicked, hard, and ejected the body onto the ground in front of where John was standing.
“What the hell, Frank?” John wiped his chin and stepped back from the corpse at his feet.
“Thanks for handling that one,” Frank said, sarcastically, and climbed in the driver’s seat. “Get in.” He closed the driver’s side door and turned the key in the ignition. The engine spat and sputtered a few times before finally turning over.
John got into the passenger’s seat and immediately rolled down the window. “I don’t know how much more of this smell I can handle.”
“The body’s out. It should dissipate.”
“Think we can get this thing unstuck?”
Frank slammed on the gas and spun the tires. The ambulance pulled forward and settled back into the rut. A cloud of smoke wafted through the open windows with the smell of exhaust. “We can if you push.”
John’s expression said he’d rather not.
Frank wasn’t fit enough for that kind of strain.
“The faster you get out there, the faster we’re out of here.” Frank pulled a pack of Pall Malls from his breast pocket and struck a match. The sulfur smell, however unpleasant, temporarily masked the decomposition. He touched the flame to the cigarette’s tip and inhaled.
John finally conceded. “Fine, I’ll go.”
The passenger’s door slammed and Frank took a long, calming drag off the cigarette. “You ready?” He adjusted the enormous side mirror enough to see John chewing his lower lip and trying to get a hold on the back of the ambulance.
“Ready.”
John leaned into the ambulance, pushing with his shoulder like a plow horse while Frank accelerated and twisted the wheel. Mud sprayed up and John closed his eyes, shouting for Frank to stop.
“Almost there,” Frank called back. “Keep pushing.” John winced and Frank kept watch, careful not to back up over him. The tires caught and the ambulance went forward. “Thank God.” The knot in Frank’s stomach let go and his heartbeat normalized. “Get in,” he said and only turned around when he heard the rear doors open.
John jumped up on the bench next to the gurney that both of them had carelessly overlooked. A high-pitched moan escaped the mouth of an infected female struggling to get loose. The neck collar kept her from turning her head. Bruising and a deep gash extending from her hairline gave the appearance of someone who had been in a car accident and slammed their head into the dash.
John pulled his knife, holding it overhand as he drove it with impunity into the woman’s skull.
Blood sprayed the ambulance walls, growing darker and thicker with each subsequent thrust, and painting John in the process.
Frank watched as John pulverized the undead woman, who hadn’t been a threat after the first jab.
“Whoa, whoa,” Frank said, concerned more with the mess than the slaughter. “Overkill.”
John slammed the rear doors shut, wiped his face on his sleeve, and smirked as he climbed into the passenger’s seat. “Thanks for handling that one,” he said.
Frank couldn’t help laughing.
CHAPTER 26
Allison followed the creek as far as she could in the darkness and slept under a blanket of dry leaves in a cave a ways down the mountain. She didn’t freeze to death, but her mud-caked scrubs and slipper socks didn’t dry out either.
She shivered, stiff from the cold, and stepped into the light of the sunrise, savoring her freedom. Leaves crunched beneath her burning feet. Two of her toes were swollen, red, and discolored in a tip-first pattern she recognized as frostbite. She followed the stream and noted a thin layer of ice forming at the edges. She wasn’t sure she could survive another night. Her feet moved clumsily and it took some concentration not to fall. She stumbled into an old, white birch and recoiled when something sharp cut her.
“Ouch.”
A thin line of blood appeared on her thumb and she stuck it in her mouth to clean it. The copper taste upset her empty stomach. She looked up to see what had cut her.
The round badge on the tree said, “Marcy Dam.” She was on a hiking trail, though there was no clear footpath to indicate anyone had been through recently. She looked for the next trail marker and stopped at the sound of approaching footsteps.
Chains jangled and a familiar, male voice boomed through the forest.
She crouched behind a thick Oak and was careful not to be seen peeking around it.
“Get going!” Joe, one of Nixon’s nastier guards, held Ben at the end of an animal control loop and prodded him along with a handful of metal stakes whenever he slowed down.
Ben shuffled, chains dangling from his limbs and one around his neck dragging behind him. His left eye glowed pure white. The right one had been burned out, lid and all. A black, seared hollow took its place, weeping a thick, yellow liquid, which shimmered like resin in the sunlight.
Allison tried to make sense of what she was seeing, but she couldn’t understand what had happened to Ben, or why he wasn’t howling in pain.
“Stop.” Joe stood on the tail of the chain wrapped around Ben’s neck and yanked his head backward. He pulled a mallet from the loop on his uniform pants and staked Ben’s chains to the ground.
Allison turned away, the sight of Ben’s wounds making her even more nauseous. Sweat beaded
on her forehead and she wiped at it with the back of her hand.
A crow pecked a squirming grub from the moist ground in front of her and she shooed it away with her hand.
“Get,” she whispered.
The pounding of the mallet on metal masked the sound of her voice.
The crow’s black eyes bore through her, engaging her in a standoff that dared her to move him. He jumped, erratically, and sifted through the crunching, dead leaves for more food.
“Shoo!” She threw a small pebble and hit the bird in the beak.
He cawed and flew away. His shimmering, black wings beat the air and drew the attention she had hoped to avoid.
Joe looked almost directly at her. She held her breath and flattened her back against the tree. Her chest tightened and her head spun as she hyperventilated for the long minute that passed before Joe resumed his task.
He hadn’t seen her.
Ben, however, had.
He held up his arms, clawing the air in her direction. The chains rattled as he struggled to move his feet which were firmly held in place. He opened and closed his mouth, and his teeth snapped together on impact.
Allison wiped the tears spilling down her cheek. Whatever had happened to him was her fault.
Ben pulled one foot free and took a long step.
Joe yanked the chain and forced him back into place. “Hold still!” He drove a spike through Ben’s foot and laughed. Ben, determined to get to her, pulled the stake out of the ground and kept moving. The metal tip broke through the sole of his boot and dripped with blood. “I said, ‘hold still’.” Joe pulled a needle out of his shirt pocket and injected something into the back of Ben’s thigh.
Ben collapsed without so much as putting out his hands to break his fall. The stakes pulled from the ground and Joe shifted his position. Ben was dead weight and Joe took no care to check his condition. He cleared a blanket of leaves and dug a shallow groove with the heel of his boot.
He dragged Ben into the dip so that he was lying on his back and drove the spikes in place.
“That ought to hold you.”
He covered him up with dirt and leaves and headed in the cabin’s direction.
CHAPTER 27
Penny rolled her head to the side, the effect of the sweet-smelling inhalant making her woozy. The twin towers of the Nixon Healing and Research Center came into view and her spirits sank. A sense of dread gripped her and she feared she’d be sick. Returning to the place that had taken so much from her diminished her urge to fight. There was no way she could escape twice.
The truck rolled to a slow stop.
“Welcome back.” Reid took off the ski mask, folded to sit like a hat on his bald, tattooed head, and went around to the bed of the truck for the ladder which had been sliding around for most of their drive.
Penny pulled against the duct tape holding her wrists and ankles together, but there was no getting free. Even if she could, her leaden muscles, exhaustion, and the desperation of being right back where she had started, conspired to keep her in place. Reid picked her up and carried her over his shoulder. She couldn’t help thinking about how she’d treated Foster for doing what he had to.
No way was he coming after her this time.
“Why are you doing this?” She slurred.
Reid set her down in front of the elevator shaft and her emerging tears stung her eyes. He pulled a knife from his pocket and cut the duct tape. “Don’t even think about running. The harder you make this on me, the worse I’m going to make things for you.” He spoke quietly, as if afraid someone would hear him.
She teetered, unsteady on her feet, and was afraid to move.
“Get going.” Reid stuck the knife to her back. The sharp tip poked her sweatshirt and prodded her forward.
“Where?”
The knife tip advanced, an inch to the right of her spine, and split her skin. “Down the ladder.”
A warm drip of blood rolled down her back. “I can’t.” She cried, in pain and fear of what waited for her in the darkness. She looked down into the basement where Nixon kept his victims and shuddered.
Reid shushed her and lit a lantern. “Go.” His eyes widened as he issued the order.
There was no refusing him. She turned and stepped onto the ladder, each step punctuated by metallic groaning which seemed to make Reid more anxious. Her mind conjured a dozen fates and only stopped when she heard a distorted cry coming through a closed door. The noise started slow and intermittent, and then quickly became frantic. She held her breath, terrified to move, and stopped three-quarters of the way down the ladder.
“Move it.” Reid held his boot over the next rung, threatening to step on her hands.
Penny squeezed her eyes shut and forced herself to take the last few steps. The cement floor radiated cold through her feet, and cold as she was, she began to sweat.
Reid steered her down the dark hall and the screams grew louder. The cries changed pitch and there was an animal-like quality to them that sent a chill up her spine. The sound wasn’t entirely human. She had lost the baby, but others hadn’t been so lucky. She wondered who else was down there.
CHAPTER 28
A tiny lump, the baby’s hand or foot, moved across the strained fabric of Miranda’s blue, flowered maternity dress. “Are you sure this is a good idea?” She pulled down her straw hat until its floppy brim hid her face. “What if Michael recognizes us?” She stretched. Her body ached from sleeping all night in the rusted, old truck and her ankles swelled to the point that she wasn’t sure she could walk.
Scott holstered a pistol at his shoulder beneath his lined flannel. “He’ll know it’s us sooner or later. Besides, I don’t think there’s a choice. You need a doctor and I don’t intend to keep running.”
“What if he’s somehow back in with Nixon?”
Scott ruffled his shaggy, dark hair. “It’s a chance we have to take.” He smoothed his moustache, blending it into his patchy beard, and put on the aviator sunglasses. “Wait for me before you get out.” He kissed her cheek, tugged her hat down lower, and stepped around the front of the truck.
Miranda lifted her satchel onto her shoulder and, when Scott opened her door, let him help her out. A pain shot up her swollen legs as she stood. The cowgirl boots rubbed against her skin and clung to her calves so tightly she was afraid they were going to have to be cut off. She held the bag to her side, careful not to lose the manila folder of medical records they’d gone through so much trouble to get, and leaned against Scott as they made their way toward Michael’s office.
Plywood covered the broken windows and chunks of siding had been torn away. A high fence surrounded the postage-stamp lot and two armed guards monitored the flow of patients.
Miranda held her hand to her fluttering stomach when the infant rolled inside of her.
“Are you all right?” Scott asked, keeping his head down.
Miranda swallowed the vomit rising in her throat. “I’ll be better when we know that I haven’t made a terrible decision.”
Part of her wanted to turn around, to not have to face the truth, but when a third wave of cramps hit she knew she had no choice but to go inside.
“Keep your head down.”
They approached the gate and one of the guards put his rifle across the narrow opening. “Stop right there.”
Miranda tightened her grip on Scott’s hand and glanced at him from under her hat.
“We’re here to see Dr. Waters,” he said, still looking down.
“Eyes up and glasses off.”
Scott scratched his scruffy beard and peeled away the aviators, squinting as he lifted his head toward the guard with his back to the sun.
“This one’s okay,” he said. “Randy, let this one through.”
“What’d you say, Earl?”
The larger guard repeated himself. “I said he’s okay to come through.”
They were looking for signs of infection, the telltale white film Miranda had seen too many times at the
center.
“You, too,” Earl said. “Hat off.”
Scott lifted Miranda’s hat. She angled her head in Earl’s direction, briefly meeting his icy stare before grabbing the fence and vomiting near the side of the gate.
Scott set his hand on her back and rubbed the place where she had ached for the past two months from endless heaving. “She’s sick, man. Pregnant, not infected. She needs a doctor.” He put the glasses back on.
Miranda spat and struggled to stand straight. “Please,” she said. “I’m exhausted.”
Randy, the younger and smaller of the guards, waved them past.
Earl wrinkled his nose in disgust. “Rinse that with a bucket of water,” he said to Randy.
Miranda took a shallow breath to keep from throwing up again.
Scott pressed his lips to the top of her head and shifted her weight onto him. “I told you everything’s going to be fine.” He held out a red and white swirled candy.
The strong peppermint filled her nose, sweetened her breath, and settled her nervous stomach as they went inside, so far unrecognized.
A late-twenties man flipped through a water-stained magazine that was well over a year old. He looked up from his reading and smiled, but he seemed distracted, listening to what was going on behind closed doors. His gentle, green eyes held concern for whoever was inside the examination room with Michael.
Miranda lowered herself slowly in a chair next to Scott’s and rested her head on his shoulder. She closed her eyes and was startled when a young child howled in the examination room. The sudden jerking caused the infant inside of her to shift, and the movement made her queasy. She didn’t know how long she was going to be able to sit without finding something to be sick in.
Scott set his hand on her stomach. “Hang in there.”
His smile reassured her.
The examination room door opened and the man with the magazine stood up.
A young boy ran across the waiting room and collapsed into his arms. His face was red from crying and there were fresh tears on the verge of spilling.
Afterbirth: A Strandville Zombie Novel #2 Page 9