“No, man,” he whispered. “Stay with me! Don’t close your eyes. You hear me? Vasya! Don’t fall asleep.”
Very slowly Vassili half opened his eyes and said something gibberish. Steve could not tell whether he was speaking Russian or was being delirious. After that, he closed his eyes again and stopped breathing.
“No!” Steve said in a loud whisper. “Oh, God. Please, no!” He rummaged in his pockets for the cell phone. His hand found nothing. Must have lost it in the confusion. Black fear was gnawing him.
He stood up in full height, waved his hands in front of an overhead camera and shouted. No one was coming to rescue. He looked desperately around. The crowd of psychos below started shaking the bus. He got on his knees, trying not to fall off the cold slippery roof. He wiped the foam off his friend’s mouth with his sleeve and was ready to perform CPR on him, as Vassili snapped his eyes open. They were bloodshot.
Steve let out a sigh of relief. “Shit, man! Don’t you fucking scare me again.” He smiled and said, “And don’t you dare die on me, you lazy Russian ass.”
A threatening growl formed in Vassili’s throat and he reached out to touch Steve’s face with his hand. Steve pulled away in shocked surprise. His fingers gripped the edge of the trapdoor to prevent him from falling off the roof.
He lost a second to adjust his spectacles on his nose, as Vassili lunged at him and tried to bite him. Steve gave him a hard hit with his elbow in the head. He clamped Vassili’s neck with both hands and threw him to the roof.
Vassili struggled, his fingers plucking at Steve’s torn shirt but Steve was holding him firmly.
There was half a second when Vassili’s neck muscles were relaxed, and Steve used that moment to make a fatal swift twist. The spinal cord snapped under Steve’s strong hands. Vassili’s body got limp, and he ceased fighting.
Steve held him for a while in his deadlock embrace and then pushed him off the bus top. Vassili fell to the ground like a sack of wet meat. On the ground, dozens of raving lunatics were scratching and hitting the bus.
Steve was on his knees, covering his face with his hands.
The lights went out abruptly, and the CCTV camera was unable to record Steve’s sobbing in the darkness, which enveloped the garage.
SEVEN
Ramses and Ksenia had grabbed their gear and jumped out of the car just in time before the tank rammed into it and crushed it like an empty beer can. The sound of metal scraping against metal was deafening. They ran down the stairs under the bridge. The tank rumbled above their heads without stopping. Then two more battle tanks followed.
“This city is a damn war zone,” Ramses said.
Ksenia’s face was pale. She did not believe they had just narrowly escaped from death. She just stood there, the freezing cold nibbling on her uncovered body parts.
Ramses shouldered the backpack. “We gotta haul ass to the hotel.”
Ksenia said nothing. Her body was trembling with cold. She nodded silently, and they started walking. They reached the river. The sun rays glinted on its snow-covered surface.
“The ice is still hard enough this time of the year,” Ksenia said. “We’ll get across safely.”
They started running across the river. Their legs got tangled in the snow, and Ksenia fell down twice. Ramses grunted heavily. The load on his shoulders was not too heavy, but he hated running. He was a fighter, not a runner. He remembered his days when he worked in a fire department. He used to carry heavy loads of hose during fire drills under the hot Californian sun. But running across a river on a winter morning with not many clothes on was extreme for him.
When they crossed the frozen river and came to a small supermarket, their feet were soaking wet. Ramses’s hair and eyebrows were covered with white frost.
“How much longer?” he asked Ksenia.
“The hotel is behind this supermarket,” Ksenia said. She started coughing.
“Let’s roll,” Ramses said, “or we’ll catch our death here.”
Or death will catch us, he thought gloomily.
He craned his neck around the corner of the building. A trash container was burning, and the black smoke blocked his vision. The stench of the burning trash reached his nostrils, and he fought to hold back the urge to throw up.
He was stunned by the sight. Through the curling smoke, he saw a large group of the undead moving toward them about three yards from them. He recoiled and made a gesture for Ksenia to halt.
“Step back!” he mouthed.
A male living dead staggered around the corner. Ramses hit the creature in the nose and knocked him off his feet. He didn’t have time to finish him, and they sprinted across the supermarket parking lot.
The monsters moaned loudly behind their backs. Other demonic creatures, which had been lurking in various places, crawled out and joined the sickening choir.
A female ghoul appeared from behind a stranded car. She tilted her head at a weird angle, staring at them and made a fast step forward, reaching her hands toward them. Ramses placed a bullet between her eyes. She fell on the ground with a heavy thump. Ramses jumped over her body without stopping. Ksenia was running behind him, panting. Her sweater was not much protection against the cold, which was burning her lungs.
They ran up to the street with paralyzed traffic. In the middle of the street, two deadheads got in their way. Ksenia shot a bullet and missed. Ramses fired and one ghoul collapsed like a bag of flour. Ramses relocated his gun to the other hand and pointed it at the next target. The shot knocked the creature down.
“Aim more accurately,” Ramses said to Ksenia. “You don’t want to become their breakfast.”
At this moment a corpse hiding under a car raised himself on his elbow and tried to bite Ramses’s ankle. Ksenia put the gun to the head of the dead man and squeezed the trigger. The head exploded like a rotten pumpkin.
“Lesson learned,” she said.
Ramses nodded and shifted the load on his shoulders.
When they finally got to the hotel, they saw that the front gates had been crushed. Crowds of moaning maniacs were roaming in the hotel yard. They were pounding on the closed doors.
“Damn!” Ramses said.
They were sitting behind an overturned car, their guns ready to spit fire. The morning sun was shining in the sky.
They saw a man wearing a brown overcoat moving toward them across the street. He was running, which meant he was alive. But he was shouting loudly and waving his hands, which was putting them all in danger. Which meant the killing creatures could get them sooner than later.
The man didn’t make it to them.
He slipped on the sidewalk and tumbled down. It took the swarm of the dead ten seconds to reach their prey and engulf him.
Ksenia looked away. Ramses looked at how the beasts feasted on the lying man, shredding his clothes with their claws.
The ghouls separated the man’s head from the body and started devouring his legs and arms, raging while having their breakfast and jerking their heads like hungry dogs over some chunks of beef.
“It’s hell on Earth here,” Ramses said, tightening his grip on his gun.
Ksenia hugged her elbows. She was shaking with fear and cold.
“Let’s run along the fence to the backyard,” she suggested.
At the back of the hotel, there was a small parking lot for employees. It was nearly empty, only four cars. Ramses took the backpack off his shoulders and threw it over the fence. It landed with a thump on the soft snow on the other side. He bent down, and Ksenia stepped on his back. She held the metal bars of the fence. Ramses stood up, and Ksenia shifted her position on his shoulders, pulling her body up and grabbing the edge of the fence. She thrust her body upwards and sat on the small column between the fence parts like on a horseback. She jumped down and looked around.
Ramses grabbed the bars and climbed over the fence.
There was a green armored cash-in-transit vehicle parked at the corner. They ran toward it.
An undead male appeared around the corner. He saw the humans and opened his slobbering mouth. A horde of the walking dead was catching up.
Ramses took out his gun and pointed at the coming crowd. “We ain’t gonna make it,” he said. “They’re too close, too soon.”
Ramses started firing. He was spending the rounds wisely, shooting only at the closest attackers.
A group of six creatures came staggering to the cash-in-transit vehicle. Eight shots, seven bodies down.
Ksenia heard dry clicks of her gun.
“I’m out,” she said.
Ramses gave her a magazine. “This is the last one. Let’s get to that van.”
Ksenia replaced the mag in her gun. She ran, slipped and fell to the ground. She winced in pain as she attempted to stand on her feet and fell again. A reanimated corpse was walking slowly toward the place where she was lying.
Ramses used his leg to sweep the monster and pressed him to the ground with his knee. He took the wriggling dead thing’s head in his hands and snapped its neck. The wild red eyes of the monster stopped moving in their sockets. Ramses bashed the corpse’s head against the ground to be sure and let go of it in disgust.
“You okay?” Ramses asked Ksenia, helping her to get on her feet.
Ksenia cringed with pain. “No. I think I’ve injured my ankle.” She rubbed her leg.
The moaning was getting louder. A score of things was walking up in uneven formation.
“Can you walk?” Ramses said, looking anxiously at the approaching threat. Ksenia tried to make a step and her legs buckled.
The living dead were getting nearer. And nearer.
“Come, quickly!” Ramses shouted. “Get into the van!”
He stood Ksenia up and got her hand around his neck.
Ramses pulled the door handle on the driver’s side. It was locked. They limped to the passenger’s seat side. Some luck was theirs. They had opened the door and crept inside just before a woman with a rotting face reached Ramses. He slammed the door in the undead thing’s muzzle.
“Not today, sister!” Ramses said. He locked the door and released a sigh of relief.
The dead driver of the cash-in-transit van occupied the driver’s seat. He was wearing a dark khaki uniform and a black woolen cap. A bullet hole yawned in the middle of his forehead. His stomach had been ripped open, and the spilled guts were all over the seat.
“Jesus and Mary!” Ramses said, looking at the corpse.
More automatons came up to the van and started pounding on the vehicle with their fists. The sounds of their hits were barely audible in the soundproof cab of the van.
“They won’t get in,” Ramses said as he looked at the inside of the van. “This baby was made zombieproof.”
He turned to Ksenia. “How are you?”
“Could be worse,” she said pointing to the sitting dead man.
The van key was in the ignition. Ramses turned it and set the engine in motion. This attracted more dead people with hungry eyes.
Ramses turned on the heater. The blessed warmth enveloped them.
Ksenia could not hear the ghastly moaning of the creatures, and she closed her eyes not to see them as well. In a couple minutes, her eyelids drooped, and she fell asleep exhausted.
Ramses drove the van, hitting the dead things with the bumper and rolling over them. When he turned the corner of the hotel building, he saw that he would not be able to drive around the abandoned cars and the fir trees lining the driveway. They were trapped in the backyard. He brought the vehicle into a halt.
Ksenia was sleeping, her chin on her chest and her matted hair covering her face.
At least we are inside a fortress on wheels, Ramses thought.
He searched the dead driver and found a plastic credit card, a wad of chewing gum wrapped into a sticky note, a passport, a bundle of assorted keys and a shiny separate key. No weapons. He took the items and shoved them into the glove compartment.
Then he pushed the corpse out of the van.
“Sorry, pal. Three’s a crowd.”
EIGHT
Room 317 was quiet, but it was not lifeless. Goran Pavic was lying in the bed, his hands clasped behind his neck. He was looking at the ceiling. A young woman was lying beside him. Naked. Her rosebud nipples were half covered with a cascade of red hair. His semen was drying on her belly. Her chambermaid’s black-and-white uniform was in a heap by the bed.
“Goran?” She stroked his raven black hair. He kept on staring at the ceiling. Saying nothing.
“Are we all going to die?”
He closed his eyes and said nothing.
“I’m scared.” She put her head on his chest. “Talk to me. Please.” He felt hot breath on his skin.
He sighed, and his hand touched the shock of her red fluffy hair. But he kept silent.
She looked at the watch on his wrist. “It’s ten already. We’re late. Everyone must be looking for us.”
His lips parted. “Let them.” He opened his eyes.
She smiled. She liked the way he spoke Russian with his funny Serbian accent.
Silence followed his words again.
“Was the war in Yugoslavia worse than this?” she said.
He looked at her but kept silent. It frightened her. A couple minutes ago he was so warm when he was inside her. Now he was as cold as an iceberg.
“Will you kiss me?”
His eyes turned into slits. He brushed her hand away and sat on the bed.
“Time to go,” he said, looking at his watch. “The meeting’s in the conference hall in fifteen minutes. And I need to check the things in the kitchen once again.”
“Goran … Won’t you kiss me?”
He went up to the chair where his clothes were hanging, and started to get dressed. He turned his back to her.
“Why are you so silent all of a sudden? You’re acting like I’m not here.” There was sadness in her voice.
“Can’t see anything wrong in silence,” he said, without looking at her. “Do we have to fill the air with chatter all the time?”
“It’s not just chatter.” She pouted, sitting up. “What kind of a man are you? Can’t you even pretend you have some feelings?”
He put his shirt down and turned to her. “I don’t love you, all right? Straight and simple. These are my feelings. Is that what you want to know?”
She looked at him with her big gray eyes. The right words died on her lips.
“And I don’t want to pretend,” he said. “It was just a fuck. Like a handshake. Now I need to go.”
His sperm was feeling cold against her skin now. She stood up, wiped her stomach and started putting her clothes on.
“Oh, you’re such a bastard,” she hissed through her teeth.
“Hey, woman,” Goran said and pointed his index finger at her. “You watch that mouth of yours! What the heck do you want from me, huh? I told you, I like you, but enough only to sleep with you. We’ve made an agreement, remember? That was pretty sincere. To my thinking.”
“I just feel like a whore.”
Goran looked up at the ceiling. “Nobody says you’re a whore.”
The cufflink he was holding slipped through his fingers and fell to the floor. He looked at her.
“Look, Marina, I am really sorry. I thought we had agreed.”
“You’re a freak. You know that?” Disappointment clouded her eyes. “A fucking freak.”
He sighed and looked at the ceiling again. “Oh, Lord! Chicks are just impossible sometimes.”
Marina adjusted her chambermaid’s uniform in front of the mirror and burst out crying. She was about to leave the room, when he came up to her and said, “Please wait.”
She stopped and turned to him. “What now?”
He took her by the hand. “You’ve taken the pill, haven’t you?”
Tears instantly smeared the mascara on her face. Without saying anything, she rushed to the door and slammed it behind her. The door banged shut like a rifle shot.
Goran stood in the sudden quietness of the room. He got on his knees and tried to find the cufflink but failed.
“Jebo te patak!” He took off his other cufflink and threw it against the wall.
Then he went into the bathroom.
“Ah, whatever,” he said and spat into the toilet bowl.
***
Andy was sitting at a desk on the stage of the conference hall. Diana Grinina, his deputy manager, was sitting near a flip chart opposite him. She was a cute young woman in her early thirties. It was unusual for Andy to see her wearing casual clothes today instead of a strict suit.
“You slept well?” Andy asked her, looking at people seeping into the spacious room one by one.
Diana nodded to a short Chinese man, who came into the room, escorted by a tall Chinese teenage girl, who had sunglasses on. They sat near Goran Pavic, who was having a lively conversation with a blonde woman.
“I was worried about my mother all night,” Diana said. “She lives in Yekaterinburg. I hope she’s well. But then I slept like a baby. All this stress and fear … My God.”
“Let’s hope this disaster is being stopped,” Andy said, putting his hand on her hand. “I saw tanks in the street. The military are trying to contain it.”
She nodded silently.
He looked at her scars. “How’s your cheek?”
She touched her cheek and said, “It’s all right. The pain is gone.”
“I hope it’ll heal before your wedding,” Andy said. “Is that the Russian expression?”
She smiled. “The doctor said there won’t be any scars left once the stitches are removed. Though, I have to look like Chucky the Killer Doll for a couple of weeks.”
Andy sighed. “It’s a miracle we’ve survived this nightmare.”
He flashbacked to the moment, when mutilated corpses started slamming against the main door, foaming at their mouths, and felt a snake of terror uncurling in his stomach.
Two big guys wearing camouflage uniforms sat in the front row. One of them had a snub-nosed Kalashnikov slung over his shoulder. Cash messengers. They were in the lounge removing the money from the ATM when the chaos broke loose, and they sealed the main entrance in time before the crazies could rush inside the hotel.
The Living & The Dead (Book 1): Zombiegrad Page 7