“I’m stuck,” I say, trying not to betray my terror. Once I hear the pitch of my voice, I know I’ve failed. “I need some help getting out. I need to get to Oregon.”
“Why Oregon?” the man asks with a slight Texas drawl. He wears a baseball cap, and when he tilts his face, I see dark eyebrows and a salt and pepper beard. He has to be fifty, and he looks like he doesn’t take much shit.
“I have family there. Can you help me?”
“What’s the situation?”
“What?” I ask.
“The situation.” The man gestures to the building. “Inside.”
“Not sure. I haven’t left my apartment. There are too many in my hallway to try. I understand that you probably don’t want to risk your life for someone you don’t know, but I—”
He holds up a hand to cut me short, then speaks softly to the woman, who nods. “We’re gonna check it out,” he says. “What apartment are you?”
“Fourth floor. Apartment G. 4G.”
“All right. Don’t go anywhere.”
The man laughs at his own joke. The woman smiles up at me, and I try to laugh, though what I produce is more of a baby hyena screech. The two cross to confer with the other two members of their group, then return to my building, where they disappear beneath.
My heart gallops in my chest. What if they decide it’s too much trouble? Will they leave me to die? If faced with a similar situation, I would likely apologize and run away. But that’s because I’m a pussy. These people, with their weapons and bikes, are not.
The man and teenager in the lot look bored. Bored. They alternate their time between sipping from cans of soda and having what appears to be an idle conversation. And though I want more than anything to be rescued, I’ve just realized that it means I’ll have to go out there. Outside. I’m not sure I can.
I gasp when a figure stumbles around the hotel building, heading straight for the parking lot. Those hisses, those groans, make me sick to my stomach. The man sets his can of soda on the ground as though he has all the time in the world, then starts forward unhurriedly. When he’s two feet from the zombie, he lifts a long knife and stabs it through the front of its face. The body, so menacing only a moment ago, falls like a rag doll. The man wipes his blade on its dirty clothing, heads back to the teen, and picks up his soda, resuming the conversation as though nothing has happened.
I leap into the air at a pounding behind me. The zombies are breaking through. Finally breaking through. “Are you gonna let us in or not?” a man’s voice asks with that same slight drawl.
I run from the balcony to the door, then look through the peephole. The man and woman are visible in the dim light from the one hall window. I flip the two locks with trembling hands and throw open the door. “Come in, quick.”
They step in with the same lack of haste as the man outside. The woman holds up a knife covered in reddish-brown gore. “Do you have a towel or something?”
“Sure, sure,” I say, trying hard not to shoo her inside. “Let me close the door.”
“No need,” the man says. “There’s nothing else out there.”
I peek out the doorframe. Three bodies lie in the hall. It took what, six minutes at most? And that includes walking up four flights of stairs.
“The stairwell and lobby were clear,” the man adds. “I guess most people took off.”
I nod dumbly. I’ve been trapped for a month by something they killed in minutes, a fact I probably shouldn’t find as surprising as I do.
“Towel?” the woman asks. A few drops of gore drip onto the foyer tile.
“Oh, right.” I head into the kitchen and hand her a dishtowel. “Um, thanks. Thank you. I’m, uh, Craig.”
“Troy,” the man says. He takes the towel after the woman is done, cleans the blade and sharp point of a deadly-looking axe thing, then snaps it to his side somehow. It’s impossible to see due to the leather coat he wears. “Nice to meet you.”
“Lana.” The woman offers me a smile. She has a round face and rosebud lips that bring to mind a silent movie star, though her leather coat, tight pants, and boots are Mad Max. She sticks her knife into the sheath on her belt. “Nice place.”
“Thanks.” I point to the remains of my water and four cookies on the counter. “I’d offer you something, but that’s all I have.”
“Thanks, but we can’t stay,” Troy says. “Just wanted to make sure you were good before we go.”
Hysteria races through my body and unsteadies my legs. These are the first people I’ve seen in a month and they’re leaving. “Go? Where are you going?”
Troy shrugs. “Heading north, don’t know where, exactly. We came up from L.A. Ran out of water there fast. Fucking water wars, man, along with Lexers? I wasn’t sticking around for that. We couldn’t get to the mountains—half the state went that way.”
“I need to go north!” I take a breath, calm myself. What I need is a freaking Xanax. “I have to get to Oregon. They’re okay there, right?”
Troy and Lana exchange a glance. The one parents share when their kid is living in a fantasy world and they want to let him down easy. “Hon,” Lana says gently, “no one’s okay anywhere. We heard it spread all the way to the East Coast. Canada, South America, Europe, Asia. Everywhere.”
My breath sticks in my chest. I won’t cry. I will not cry, if for no reason other than proving my father wrong. I hold on to this vow until the first tear works its way down my cheek. It’s over five hundred miles to Eugene. It’s three hundred to the border of California and Oregon, where I hoped to get to safety, and that was bad enough. But five hundred? I’m dead. Just as dead as I believed myself a month ago.
Now, if I even make it, which is looking more unlikely by the minute (and, let’s face it, was always in the realm of fat fucking chance) there’s no guarantee I’ll find Rose and Mitch. As far as I know, these are the last four people in the world.
“Please let me come with you.” I gulp back my tears. “You’re going that way anyway.”
The glance the two exchange now is full of reluctance. I know how I must look: a grown-ass man who couldn’t—wouldn’t—kill the three zombies in his hallway, who’s half-starved and throwing his shit off his balcony while he waits for help that’s never coming.
“How many Lexers have you killed?” Troy asks, mouth downturned.
“How many whats have I killed?”
Troy sighs. Lana pats my arm. “Lexers. Zombies. They were calling them Lexers for the LX in Bornavirus LX.”
“None.” I whisper my answer, but it still resounds like I’ve pounded the final nail into my coffin.
“Listen, buddy—” Troy begins, but Lana cuts him off with, “Let us talk to the others. We’ll be back in a few.”
She tugs Troy into the hall by his arm. I watch them walk the hallway and exit through the stairwell door. The second it closes behind them, I run for my closet. They’re going to leave me. I know they are. I’ll follow them if I have to. My older brother, Mike, called me Little Mister Tag-along as a kid. I have the experience, and I have the utter desperation.
I throw things around until I locate the Timbuk2 commuter backpack I bought to go with the bike I never rode. Into it goes a pair of jeans, two shirts, socks, underwear, and my spare pair of glasses. I race to the bathroom—toothbrush, toothpaste, Xanax. I decide I still need one of the latter and remove the lid with shaky hands. The bottle falls, scattering light blue pills on the tile.
“Fuck!” I shout. I drop to my knees, pack hanging from my shoulder, and scoop up every pill I can find. Then I pop one and dump the rest in the bottle.
Deodorant. I need deodorant. After that’s in the bag, I rush to the hall closet. It’s decent weather, but it seems leather coats are de rigueur for the apocalypse. I can see why: human teeth won’t easily bite through. I throw on my black leather coat, then stick my socked feet into boots I never wear. Mitch and Rose talked me into buying the black shitkicker boots, saying I looked tough. That’s a laugh—I neve
r look tough, and I haven’t worn combat boots since high school—but I bought them in the unlikely event I might be tough one day. Considering how sweaty I am, how terrified, that day is not today.
I run for the balcony, tripping over the untied laces, and stop with a short cry. The bikes are gone. The people are gone. Troy and Lana never intended to be back in a few. And though I hate strangers, avoid people, it feels as though I’ve lost my best friends. In a way, I have, because I’ll never get to Rose and Mitch on my own.
I choke back a sob. I knew they would leave me. Deep down, I don’t blame them. I’d leave myself if I could.
“Yoo-hoo,” Lana says from my living room. “Looking for us?”
I spin around. The four are gathered by my couch, leather-clad and prepared for anything with the gear they carry. I do my best to play it cool, walking through the balcony door without falling on my face. “You’re back.”
“Said we would be.” Lana’s smile adds that she knows exactly what I’ve been thinking. “This is Francis.”
She gestures to the big guy I saw in the lot. His skin is a deep brown and his eyes four shades lighter. He gives me a nod that isn’t unfriendly but says he isn’t entirely on board with a plan that involves rescuing a weakling.
I wave like a moron. “I’m Craig.” I may be tall, but between Francis’ and Troy’s girths, I feel like a ninety-eight-pound weakling.
Lana points to the teenager, who isn’t a teenager at all, but a very petite Asian woman in her early thirties. “This is Daisy.”
She’s cool with her short black bangs and the black tattoo that winds its way up her neck. The kind of cool that trips up my tongue. I felt the same when I met Rose years ago, was hopelessly tongue-tied by the funny girl with the red hair until I was comfortable. Rather than speak, which will come out even more moronic, I wave again. Daisy waves lazily in return.
“Ground rules,” Troy says. “You pull your own weight. If you don’t, we will leave you behind. That doesn’t mean we won’t help you, but we won’t die for you like your dear old mom and dad would, so act accordingly.”
“Okay,” I say.
Lana looks me over. “You seem ready to go. Except for the laces.”
“Right.” I sit in a chair to tie my boots, double knotting them so I don’t trip again. When I’m finished, I stand, unsure of what to say or do. Afraid to say or do the thing that will result in being left behind.
“Weapons?” Troy asks. At my mystified expression, he adds, “You got any? You’re traveling a little light for the zompoc.”
My entire body heats. Of course. Weapons. I’m going to have to kill zombies. I force myself to the kitchen. A knife would be good. I fumble at the knife block, eventually choosing a large chef’s knife.
Lana appears at my side. “That won’t work. Too wide. In the movies, they’re always sticking their knives through solid skull, but that’s the movies. You need something like an axe or a super strong knife and arm. Otherwise, you should go for a knife skinny enough to fit in an eye socket, by the ear,” she raises a hand to her ear, then touches the back of her neck, “here, or under the chin and up. Francis can get through skull with his knife, but even Troy has trouble with that.”
“Hey!” Troy shouts, his light tone making clear he jokes. “Don’t disparage my manhood.”
“You do that all on your own, honey,” Lana says. Troy laughs, as do the others. She pulls a thinner knife from the block and stabs it into a cabinet door with a mighty thunk. It sinks in a half-inch. “That should be good until we find you something better. Do you have a screwdriver? Those work, too.”
A small drawer in the corner cabinet holds my tools, of which there are few. I choose the longest screwdriver, and Lana nods. “Don’t forget your water.”
I shove the bottle into the water pouch on the side of my pack, then fill another for the opposite pouch. I put the screwdriver in my coat pocket. Far too long, it falls to the floor with a clank. At titters from the living area, I jam it into my pocket so that the metal rips through the lining and the handle is safely seated, and then I clutch the knife in my hand.
Lana moves for the door. “Now you’re ready.”
I follow the four into the hall, wondering how much it will hurt when the zombies tear me apart.
29
Craig
By the time we retrieved my bike from the storage area beneath the building and made it to the highway entrance seven blocks away, my hands trembled on the handlebars and my feet slipped off the pedals every fifth rotation. I wished for my sneakers instead of the clumsier boots. And, as long as I was wishing, I wished for all of this to be a horrible dream. We saw six zombies on the route to the freeway. Thankfully, all of them were at least a quarter-block away, but I almost careered into a building when I saw the first. The next five made me pedal like mad, until I was out of breath and covered with sweat in my cocoon of leather.
The freeway we’re on now is three lanes on both sides, with a shoulder on either side, making ten lanes in which to travel. Empty lanes. According to Troy, they shut it down the first night by blocking the exits, and the mass exodus the next morning mainly occurred on the streets—at least until people forced their way past.
“It’s as safe as we’re getting,” Troy assured me. “If we see a big group, we cross over the median. If it’s too many to mount a distraction, we turn around and take the streets to the next entrance.”
The plan is to ride this to less-populated territory and then take smaller roads. According to Troy, people fled north and east, and they heard it was a fuckshow all the way to Sacramento. Also according to Troy, the fact that people fled, didn’t listen to reports to stay inside, is why we’re in this mess. They left, they were bitten, and now California is crawling with zombies. The man seems to know what he’s talking about. Maybe we need to print up a pamphlet titled According to Troy: Your Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse.
I laugh aloud. Daisy, pedaling in front and to my left, glances over her shoulder and faces forward again. Is she shaking her head? Probably. The weirdo who’s deathly afraid of zombies is laughing for no apparent reason. What she doesn’t know is that another half Xanax has kicked in and this is my mellow. We stopped for a drink once we were on the freeway. I surreptitiously opened my bottle and palmed one out, then split it along the scored line before I took half. The other half waits in my jeans’ pocket for some indeterminate time in the not so distant future.
By the time we reach the San Rafael Bridge, everything has taken on a welcome haze, and I watch the bridge shimmer in the distance before the road turns. It’s a testament to how fucked up things are that this much Xanax only reduces it from shit-your-pants terrifying to piss-your-pants terrifying. I’ve taken this trip by car many times, and though my surroundings resemble the world before, it looks as though a post-apocalyptic movie crew has redecorated the set.
Below the elevated freeway, parking lots are strewn with broken glass, motionless bodies, and plenty of locomoting bodies, too. Starbucks and Mickey D’s are among the plundered, and though Lana gave me a protein bar and some diner food, my stomach growls after weeks of almost nothing. I wasn’t in tip-top shape before, but a month of hunger and inactivity have me perpetually winded and my legs struggling to keep up.
Stopped cars fill the streets beneath us. Some abandoned in the midst of a traffic jam with doors left wide open when the occupants ran. Others are massive collisions with cars wedged together at odd angles, like a frustrated toddler attempted to fit puzzle pieces where they didn’t belong. Jesse and Holly did that when they were small, and it always cracked me up when they proudly showed me the finished product.
I pray they’re okay. Rose, the founder of The Society of Overprotective Mothers, will make sure of it. Unless Jesse was still up at school. If he was, Rose is in Washington now, knocking down zombies—Lexers—in a quest to save him. I swallow hard when a sob tries to work its way out. I’ll seem even crazier if I cry after laughing like a loon.
I need to get there. Need to see if the kids are okay. If they aren’t, if I can’t find anyone, I don’t know what I’ll do.
“Watch out!” Francis yells from behind me.
The road slopes down here. With my mind elsewhere, I didn’t notice I’ve pulled ahead and am heading straight for nine Lexers who spill from behind an abandoned van. My boot slips off the pedal into my front wheel, stopping me short, and I fly over the handlebars onto the pavement with my arms out to break my fall. I kiss asphalt and land on my side, where my temple strikes with a decisive clunk.
Through a burst of white fireworks in my vision, I see four bikes stop, then eight feet hit the ground and move for the van. I roll to my hands and knees. Nine zombies. Four people. I know I should be with them—know I could fight off the pounding in my head and attempt to do my part—but Craig the Puss is on the scene, and I’m too scared to move.
I watch as the four perform a dance that seems choreographed. Take the closest first, always keeping backs to safety. Francis does indeed get one right between the eyes with his knife that’s more machete than culinary. Troy swings his arm to the side and slams his axe’s spike into an ear. Lana gets close, one hand on a bloody man’s shoulder, and strikes him beneath the chin with a quick upward jab. Daisy, small but speedy, kicks out a Lexer’s knee and bends to deliver a killing blow to its eye.
The Cascadia Series (Book 1): World Departed Page 25