by AJ Powers
Malcom’s eyes lingered on the rifle pointed at him for a few moments before finally turning to the other man and rolling down the window.
“Please turn off engine and step out of car slowly.” The man’s accent was heavy, though his words were well spoken, if not overly enunciated.
“Is there a problem, officer?” Malcom said nonchalantly, choking down the bile that was creeping up his throat. “I mean, I know I was speeding a bit, but that’s just because there’s a giant horde of dead people chasing us,” he chuckled.
As the man briefly turned his head to the east, Malcom looked at the patch on his arm. It wasn’t Chinese. And it wasn’t South Korean. Shit, Malcom panicked in his head. This is really fucking bad.
Malcom suppressed his angst and kept talking as if he wasn’t trying to figure out how best to kill every one of them. “Anyway, my kids and I are trying to get to El Paso, and it’s been a hell of a long trip. So, I would really appreciate it if we could just be on our way,” he said, mustering up a weak smile.
The man turned his head back to Malcom, giving him an icy glare. “You need to turn off engine and step out of vehicle.”
Malcom’s smile faded, and he traded his lighthearted tone for something more defiant. “Under whose authority?”
“I am Peacekeeper with United Nations.”
“And I am citizen with United fucking States,” Malcom replied, mocking the man’s broken English. He mentally rebuked himself for ramping up the hostile tone so quickly, but the passive, cross-country-trekking father approach hadn’t worked. “This is a sovereign nation, brother, and neither you nor the UN have jurisdiction here.”
The man looked over at the technical and nodded, prompting the gunner in the bed to dismount and move toward the truck, his rifle raised.
“You will comply with our orders, or else.”
“Or else?” Malcom shot back, his fuse dangerously close to being lit. “Dude, do you have any clue how fucked you are right now? You are harassing three US citizens, on US soil, really fucking close to a massive US Army base.” Malcom laughed sardonically. “You and your truck over there will be nothing more than a smoking crater if you don’t let us through right the fuck now,” he added, bluffing with intimidation. As the third man from the technical approached Naomi’s door, Malcom’s grip on the steering wheel tightened. He looked back at the officer. “You better call off your dog, friend.”
“Or else, what?” the man said with a sneer before giving an order Malcom couldn’t understand.
Naomi screeched as the soldier tore open the door and grabbed her by the arm.
“No!” Malcom shouted as he lunged for Naomi’s carbine on the floor.
Naomi’s desperate screams joined the flurry of unintelligible shouting between the soldiers. A solitary gunshot pierced through the cacophony, bringing the chaos to a standstill. The concussive effects from the pistol’s report dazed Malcom, leaving a terrible ringing in its wake. He momentarily froze, taking in a deep breath, but his lungs ached. The searing pain in his side grew hotter. He lifted his hand in front of his face and stared at the dark, sticky substance covering his skin, his arm trembling under the weight of the blood clinging to his fingers. Panic seized him in the silence of his shock.
Behind him, TJ’s screams for his sister were distant and muffled. Naomi called for him too, but Malcom couldn’t respond to them. He couldn’t help them.
As a pair of hands gripped Malcom’s shoulders and yanked him from the car, the world around him recovered from its slowed pace. A man dragged Malcom toward the hood of the truck as TJ continued to scream inside the cab. The soldier supported Malcom’s weight as the officer relieved him of his Glock and knife. The old man tossed the blade to the side of the road but kept the Glock in his hand in lieu of the Tokarev knockoff on his hip.
As the officer continued his pat down, Malcom’s eyes briefly met with Naomi’s. He expected to see terror... dread… defeat…
But all he saw was fire.
Naomi’s captor was sliding his hands all over her body, slowly climbing higher. As he reached her chest, he savored in the moment, fondling the teenager’s breasts.
“Stop it!” Naomi screamed.
“Don’t you fucking touch her!” Malcom yelled with all the might he could muster, furiously fighting the soldiers’ restraints.
Naomi’s guard laughed, yelling something Malcom couldn’t understand, but the tone of his message spoke louder than the words: “What are you going to do about it?”
The laughing soldier was too busy taunting Malcom to notice Naomi slip her hand inside her shirt.
It was a fatal distraction.
“Get the fuck off of me!” Naomi growled as she drove the punch blade into the man’s neck repeatedly.
The guard wailed in agony as he attempted to fight off his attacker before succumbing to his injuries.
Stunned by Naomi’s vicious attack, Malcom’s guards turned their backs to him just long enough for him to reach for the Sig Scorpion at his six o’clock. He flicked the safety off as he leveled the gun on the second guard, boring two devastating holes through the man’s back. Before the officer could react, Malcom hooked his left arm around the man’s neck and snapped the .45-caliber up to his head. “Drop the fucking gun,” Malcom snarled into the officer’s ear.
During the chaos, the driver of the technical leapt from the vehicle and grabbed Naomi, taking her hostage.
“You tell him to let her go or I paint the road with your brains,” Malcom said. His words were slow and slurred as he labored to breathe.
The officer remained silent.
Malcom forced the officer to walk, moving closer to the guard who was shaking and sweating profusely. He yelled for Malcom to stop, but Malcom didn’t listen. He didn’t care. He crept closer and closer until they were just a few feet apart. “Tell… him,” Malcom panted.
Nothing.
“You let her go, and I won’t kill you,” Malcom told the soldier, knowing his words would have little impact on the foreigner. He drew a deep, painful breath and let it out slowly as he attempted to quell the shake in his hand. “I’ll give you one more chance. Let her—"
Naomi rammed her elbow into the man’s solar plexus, creating the moment of opportunity Malcom was waiting for. Without hesitation, Malcom unleashed four shots from his 1911, each one fatal in their own right. The man fell backward, making no attempt to break his fall.
“Your turn,” Malcom said as he brought the pistol to the officer’s spine and fired the last three rounds.
The man’s body stiffened before his legs buckled and he dropped to the ground. He whimpered and cried as his lungs pooled with blood, slowly drowning him.
Malcom leaned over to pick up his Glock, nearly falling over in the process.
“Malcom!” Naomi shrieked, observing the damage on his abdomen. “Holy shit, Malcom, you need a doctor.”
“I’ll… I’ll be all right,” he said before dropping to one knee, his life, seemingly, leaving his body along with the adrenaline.
Naomi grunted and growled as she helped him back to his feet, assisting him over to the passenger’s door of the F-150. Straining every muscle in her body, she helped Malcom climb into the truck, a loud sigh escaping his lips as he settled into the seat.
She grabbed the t-shirt off the floorboard and pressed it against Malcom’s wound, causing him to wince. “Hold that there as tight as you can,” she said before slinging the door shut. She raced to the other side of the truck and jumped into the driver’s seat. Naomi’s body slammed against the seat as she punched the gas, the squealing tires leaving a trail of smoke in their wake. She cut the wheel hard, narrowly missing the technical still idling in the middle of the road and clipping a parked car on the other side. Regaining control, she straightened out on the road and pressed down harder on the pedal. As soon as Pecos was in the rearview mirror, Naomi headed straight for the highway.
Chapter Thirty-Five
35 – Van Horn, Texas �
�� June 23rd
It was dark. She could just barely see his lifeless eyes. A tremble ripped through her body as the pounding drums in her chest strengthened. She didn’t want to be there, but she had to be.
Malcom was counting on her.
It had been over an hour since the bastards in blue had shot him, and he was fading fast. The t-shirt and a few other articles of clothing Naomi found in the truck had helped slow the bleeding, but it wasn’t enough. If she didn’t get him more suitable bandaging soon, he would bleed out long before they reached El Paso. And she wasn’t kidding herself; she knew the chances of that were overwhelmingly high even if her shopping trip was successful. But, without it, he didn’t have a prayer.
Bracing herself for the inevitable aftermath, Naomi quietly drew a deep breath, letting it slowly pass back through her lips as her finger squeezed the trigger. The man’s head whipped back, and a spray of blood erupted out the devastating exit wound on the back of his skull. His limp body fell to the ground as the gunshot echoed throughout the store, sending the dozens of other crazed lunatics inside into a blood-thirsty frenzy.
Naomi took off toward the back of the store, keeping her Cx-4 ready to fire at a moment’s notice. It wasn’t long before she sent six more shots downrange, slaying two more infected while simultaneously exciting the others even more. Screams from behind forced her to swing her body around and drop a heavy-set man thundering her way. He let out a gurgling cry as he smacked face-first into the floor, his body squeaking to a grotesque stop a few feet in front of her.
Before she could turn back around, Naomi was knocked to the floor by another infected. Stunned from the impact, she struggled to locate the man in the dimly lit grocery store. Using his rasping growls, she zeroed in on him and opened fire, seeing his body flinching in the bursts of muzzle flash from the carbine. Uncertain she neutralized the threat, she scrambled to her feet and took off running, fumbling through a reload as she reached the pharmacy.
“Shit,” Naomi hissed under her breath as she stared at the empty shelves. Unsurprised and undeterred, she moved to the fallback plan she’d developed before even stepping into the store.
Picking up a bottle of children’s vitamins off the floor, Naomi crept out of the aisle and lobbed it as far as she could in the opposite direction she needed to go. Infected rushed out of the aisles, chasing the still-rolling bottle halfway across the store. Waiting just a moment after the last infected ran by, Naomi silently glided a few aisles down, hunting for the most absorbent pack of paper towels left on the shelf. She punched her thumb through the plastic wrap and quietly tore the packaging open. Tucking two rolls under her arm, she headed back down to the end of the aisle.
With the infected still investigating her diversion, Naomi took advantage of the opportunity and searched for the other item on her revised shopping list. Unfortunately, she was moving in the direction of the distracted group of infected.
Staying low and quiet, Naomi cloak-and-daggered her way to the other side of the store. The awful growls and moans of the infected grew louder with every aisle she cleared, wreaking havoc on her nerves. The overwhelming urge to cry had plagued her since she’d parked the truck outside, and the desire had grown exponentially since killing the man up front. But she swallowed her tears and concentrated on the mission.
Finding a shelfful of canning jars, Naomi once again played the diversion game, leading the pack away with an explosion of shattering glass on the other side of the store. As the infected chased the mystical ghost Naomi created, she moved in and located the aisle she was looking for.
“Yes!” she rejoiced quietly, reaching for the roll of duct tape hanging on a peg.
With the supplies she needed for a makeshift bandage, Naomi made a beeline for the exit. She was approaching the checkout lanes when a screeching cry from her right startled her. The gangly young woman, perhaps not much older than Naomi, let out another ear-piercing screech as she sprinted toward her. Unwilling to drop the items she came for, Naomi grunted and raised the 9mm carbine with one hand, firing a trio of shots that all went wild. The weight and recoil forced her arm to drop back down, but the slapping footsteps of her threat still approached.
“Son of a bitch!” Naomi growled as she did an about-face, making a mad dash for the exit.
By the time she reached the doors, half a dozen infected followed close behind her. Dashing outside, Naomi’s eyes squinted against the late, afternoon sun, temporarily blowing out her vision. Her sight crept back as she bolted to the F-150, tossing the tape and paper towels into the bed.
Spinning around, Naomi shouldered her carbine and opened fire on her pursuers, her bolt locking back just as the last of them hit the pavement. Without hesitating, she jumped into the driver’s seat and slammed the door shut as a fresh wave of infected fought their way to the parking lot. Dropping the truck into gear, she sped away from the violent mob.
Naomi stopped on the I-10 entrance ramp and jumped out of the truck. She hopped into the bed and retrieved the paper towels and duct tape before racing over to the passenger’s door. Malcom’s body slumped to the side as she pulled the door open, his seatbelt keeping him from falling out.
“Malcom… Malcom, stay awake,” Naomi said, her voice hoarse and full of distress.
Malcom’s eyes opened slightly, his head tilting to the side as he watched Naomi wind the roll of paper towels around her hand more than a dozen times. “Kenzie? Wh-wha-what are you doing?” he asked. “Did you spill something, sweetheart?”
Naomi swiped away her blurry vision with the back of her hand as Malcom continued to babble incoherently, regressing to a world that no longer existed. His skin was pale and his eyes, bloodshot. His voice was barely above a whisper. Naomi soaked up as much of the blood surrounding the wound as she could. Malcom’s body tensed, and he whimpered as a bolt of pain shot through him.
“Sorry,” Naomi uttered as she tossed the soiled towels over her shoulder onto the road.
She once again wound a couple dozen paper towels around her hand before setting the thick pad down the dash. She stretched out a long piece of tape, tearing it off with her teeth.
“What are you doing, Cameron?”
Naomi grabbed the pad of paper towels from the dash and pressed it against Malcom’s side, causing him to howl in pain. Holding it in place with her hand, Naomi ran the strip of tape diagonally across the pad of paper towels, securing it to his skin. She tore off another strip of tape and crossed it over the other. Spinning another pad around her hand, she repeated the process, providing another layer of absorption before wrapping the tape around Malcom’s abdomen several times to ensure the bandages stayed in place.
As Naomi fished the tape around Malcom’s back for one last pass, he spoke. His voice was weak, but his message was strong. “Damn proud of you, Naomi,” he said, the first signs of lucidity in his words. His glassy eyes looked deeply into hers as half a smile crept across his face. “Damn proud…”
Naomi pressed her lips together and mustered up a smile. “Thank you,” she said as she dropped out of the truck, slamming the door shut. She got back behind the wheel and hauled ass down the ramp, quickly reaching triple digits on the speedometer.
After twenty minutes of silence, Malcom spoke again. “You’re a hell of a fighter, Naomi… Just like your mother,” he said between heavy breaths, his eyes remaining shut. “Never doubt your strength, kiddo… You and TJ will be okay…”
“Malcom,” Naomi cried, splitting her attention between the road and her vanishing passenger. “Malcom, no… please. Please, God, no! I can’t lose you, too!” she cried, tears streaking down her cheeks.
“Sissy?” TJ asked from the back. “Is Mr. Malcom okay?”
Chapter Thirty-Six
36 – Near El Paso, Texas – June 23rd
Naomi’s eyes burned; she hadn’t blinked since Malcom stopped talking shortly after leaving Van Horn. She knew he was still alive only by the sporadic coughs and raspy sighs, but those stopped ten minutes
ago, plunging Naomi into a pit of sorrow.
TJ whimpered softly in the back, every few minutes stopping long enough to try to get Malcom to talk to him. The one-sided exchange was too much for Naomi’s broken heart, but there wasn’t a damn thing she could do about it. All she could do was drive…
And pray.
El Paso – 21 Miles a sign read.
Naomi had no idea where she was going. She followed the signs at the I-10 junction, knowing it would lead her into El Paso, but finding Fort Bliss was going to be more difficult. She’d never been to Texas before, much less driven on the roads. It might as well have been a foreign country to her. But she refused to give up. Not when they were so close.
She increased her speed, but only a little. Traffic got significantly worse over the past few miles compared to the wide-open roads she’d driven on since Pecos. Though most of the cars were pushed off to either side of the highway as if they had been plowed by a large truck, the path was still relatively narrow and provided little room for error. Naomi was forced to ease her foot off the gas a little more with each mile. As much as she wanted to keep up that triple-digit run, she couldn’t afford to make any mistakes.
She had just passed the San Elizario exit when she saw a sign on the side of the road.
MILITARY CHECKPOINT AHEAD: SPEED 45 MPH.
“No,” Naomi said quietly, picturing the men who shot Malcom. “I can’t do it again.” She let off the gas, allowing the truck to gradually lose speed over the next few hundred feet. “What do I do?” she asked herself, feeling trapped and out of options.
MILITARY CHECKPOINT AHEAD: SPEED 30 MPH, another sign read.
The truck was still coasting at well over fifty miles per hour as Naomi struggled with which pedal to put her foot on. Flashbacks of the UN soldiers pulling her from the truck, groping her chest… shooting her friend. She couldn’t handle that again. Not after the hell she went through last time. And certainly not alone.