“Hey!”
None of them turned around to see who had yelled at them.
“Stop!”
A bullet hit the wall ahead of them, causing a shower of plaster.
They paid no heed. There was a door ahead, just around the corner that had a darkened exit sign above it. They headed for it as more bullets whizzed past them. Cheryl heard one buzz past her ear, dangerously close.
Then, Vinnie fell back a few steps, screaming. “I’m hit! I’m hit!”
Cheryl looked over her shoulder. She didn’t see any blood on him. He was slowing down, but still upright and running. “Keep going!” She reached back, grabbed his hand and pulled him so hard, she nearly knocked him off his feet. “We’re almost out!”
Were they? They were headed towards what looked like a side exit door. If it was locked, they were doomed—
Aidan slammed into the bar on the door. It flung open, and they were assaulted by blinding sunlight. “Follow me!”
There were no arguments there. Cheryl would have followed him into a pit of snakes if it meant escaping from the armed men chasing them.
He looked left and right then pointed at the letter opener in her hand. “Gimmee that!”
She hesitated a half second then handed it over.
“See that dumpster?” He pointed to an overturned bin near the front corner of the building. “Run there. Hide. I’ll be right there.”
They did as he said while he ran in the opposite direction. Cheryl glanced his way just in time to see him fling the letter opener towards the back parking lot. It was a good ploy to throw their pursuers off their tracks, but only if he ran like the wind and was able to hide before the gunman burst through the door.
When they reached the dumpster, they were relieved to see that it was a recycling bin. Instead of garbage, it was filled with cardboard and paper that hadn’t been picked up since the epidemic started last summer. It smelled musty, and it was obvious that some critters had been nesting inside because of the chewed corners on some of the boxes and the peppering of mouse droppings. Oh well, Cheryl thought. At least it’s not a pit of snakes.
They scurried into the bin and began covering themselves with the pieces of cardboard.
As Cheryl wondered why she didn’t hear Aidan running towards them, she heard the exit door slam against the outer wall and men shouting.
“Where’d they go?”
“Check the parking lot! We’ll go this way!”
One of her companions stifled a squeal. She knew why. They were not alone in the bin. There were things moving around their feet. “Shhh…” she said.
Footsteps ran towards them. They could hear heavy breathing near the bin. There was motion in the cardboard above them that seemed like someone was scooting the pieces around with rifle barrels. Cheryl held her breath and tried to scrunch down lower.
“Shit!” One of the searchers yelped.
“What?” the other man said.
“A goddamned mouse just ran over my foot!”
The other man laughed until there was a shout from the back of the building. The sound of their footsteps trailed off towards the back parking lot.
After a couple of seconds, Cheryl lifted some of the cardboard to get some air, and the guys did the same. Vinnie popped his head out right next to her. His eyes were wide, and his face, normally an olive tone, was sheer white.
“You’re bleeding,” she said as she saw the red-filled gash on the right side of his neck.
“So are you.”
She looked down then from side to side. There was a crimson stain on one shoulder. She lifted the sleeve and saw unmarred skin.
“It’s my blood,” Zach said, rising up right next to her. “I took one in the arm. I’m all right. It just nicked me.”
He twisted around, so she could see the back of his arm. It was more than a nick, but since it was on the outer part of his arm, the bullet hadn’t hit bone—it had just carved out a slice of flesh as it passed through.
“Hey,” Zach said as he put his bloody sleeve down. “Where’s Diego?”
They heard stirring underneath the cardboard and a moan. Diego emerged from the sea of cardboard, looking a fright. He was bleeding from the scalp where the Eater had yanked out a fistful of hair. Blood oozed from his right temple.
“You all right, man?” Zach asked.
“Yeah. Twisted my ankle though. I can’t put my full weight on it.”
The staccato sound of gunfire nearby made them all jump.
“Where’s Aidan?” Cheryl asked. “Why didn’t he come back and hide with us?”
There were looks of confusion and concern amongst them. A jolt of apprehension shot through Cheryl. Aidan had deserted her once before. She reminded herself that circumstances were different at Fort San Manuel. She hadn’t taken it personally back then. It really had little to do with her. Aidan just wasn’t the kind of man who didn’t like to be confined in the clutches of authority—any kind of authority.
Had fear of that made him abandon them now to try his luck on his own?
She didn’t want to believe it. He couldn’t do that to her. Not now.
“What do we do?” Zach asked, sounding just as confused as she was. “We can’t stay in—”
The sound of a motorcycle engine roared to life near the front of the building.
Cheryl “That’s Aidan,” she said. “Let’s go!”
“Wait…” Vinnie said. “You don’t know that’s him! How could you—”
“Nah, amigo,” Diego said. I think she’s right. That’s Aidan. He’s waiting for us.”
They started to get out of the bin, but Vinnie stayed where he was. “You don’t know…you don’t know!”
“Trust me!” Cheryl said, pulling on his shirt. “Or stay here and die.”
“Ohhh…” he wailed as he got out and followed after them.
They ran as fast as they could. Vinnie eventually caught up, but Diego lagged a little behind. They ran past a long border on the side of the building, landscaped with a hedge of junipers, rock, and driftwood. When they reached the front corner of the building, Zach said, “Get down!”
The junipers gave them some cover, so they crouched down as Zach crept towards the building edge. He peered around, looking to see if the coast was clear. The sound of the motorcycle was louder here, and Cheryl held her breath.
“It’s Aidan, all right,” Zach said, looking back towards them. “Come—”
As they stood to run, there was a shout from the corner of the rear parking lot. “Hey! You guys stop!”
Zach hesitated for just a second then told them, “When you run, zig zag.”
“What?” Vinnie asked.
“Run in a random pattern, not a straight line. It’ll make it harder for a bullet to find you.”
They took off as the Sheriff, the O.N.E. guards, and the men that had been in the parking lot with the dog pursued them with a cacophony of noise. There was barking and shouting, and a couple of loud gunshots blasted from the Sheriff’s shotgun.
As they entered circular driveway and rounded the flag poles, Cheryl saw Aidan. He was on the Black Road King, and he wasn’t looking towards them. He was staring straight ahead at the row of skulls. They ran towards him as he started backing out of the parking space. Panic and rage burned in Cheryl’s mind. Was he just getting a head start, or was he trying to escape by himself?
After rolling back a few more feet, Aidan spotted them. He paused and motioned for them to hurry.
They ran towards the remaining white Electra Glides while Aidan curved his steed further backwards, positioning it towards the driveway. With every step, Cheryl was certain that they’d get to the motorcycles and find that Aidan’s bike was on the only one that had keys in its ignition.
The noise from their pursuer’s shouts and the barking dog was louder by the time they reached the motorcycles. Cheryl cracked a smile in her head when she saw that every motorcycle had a key dangling from the ignition.
; “Let’s go!” Aidan yelled over the roar of his engine.
Cheryl, Zach, and Diego each hopped onto a bike and started their engines while Vinnie stood next to the last one. “I can’t drive one of these! Don’t leave me here! Please don’t leave me here!”
Diego offered to take him as a passenger, but Zach shook his head. “Get on!”
“There’s no s—”
“Just get on!”
Vinnie ran over to Zach, and said something that sounded like, “Whew! I thought I drew the short straw.” But, his face quickly soured as he realized that the police vehicle was a one-seater. He found it difficult to find a position behind Zach where he could hold on around his waist and not slide off.
Zach leaned back and said something to Vinnie, and he nodded in response. Then, the five of them on four motorcycles started down the driveway just as their pursuers rounded the building. The Sheriff and other men fired at them while the O.N.E. men ran towards their van.
With Aidan in the lead, they took off, trying to gain some distance before the van could catch up with them.
Cheryl glanced down at her gas tank. It was in the red, probably leaving her with little more than fumes to go on. She suspected that all the tanks were also on or near empty which might explain why the keys had been so carelessly left in the ignitions.
They were six blocks down the road with no idea where they were going when Zach and Diego simultaneously pointed towards their tanks, signaling that they were low on fuel. Despair settled over her like black rain pelting her with a foul shower. It did not look like they were going to make it out of Quimera after all.
Cheryl’s motorcycle sputtered first…then Diegos…then Zach’s. They pulled over to the side of the road, one by one, while Aidan kept going down the road. He was two block past them when he finally slowed, having apparently noticed that they were no longer in his rearview mirror He made a U-turn and sped back towards them.
“Out of gas!” Zach shouted as he pointed to his gas tank.
Aidan pointed towards the thick copse of Russian Olive trees in the ditch next to them. They understood his intent and quickly rolled their motorcycles towards the area where they would be hidden from the road. He joined them a few seconds later and also ditched his bike. Without pausing to consult each other, they all ran as fast as they could towards an abandoned strip mall.
They ran down the sidewalk and tried door after door on the long building that housed what had once been a check cashing business, a pizza delivery service, a liquor store, a dentist’s office, a nail salon, and a children’s clothing resale shop. Many of them had broken windows, and it wasn’t until they reached a beauty parlor that they found intact windows and an unlocked door.
Once inside, they locked the door behind them and ran to the back storage area, hiding amongst the stacks of boxes, discarded chairs, and an old neon sign with broken tubes.
They crouched there in the dark, hoping that the Sheriff and the men from O.N.E. had assumed they’d fled Quimera and were chasing some phantom trail down the road.
After a number of minutes had passed without any sound to indicate they’d been followed, Cheryl could no longer bite her tongue. She turned towards Aidan who was kneeling on the floor next to her. “Were you going to bail on us?”
“Seriously?” he chuffed. “I assumed you’d know where I was headed if I didn’t come back to the bin.”
“Assumed? How could I have—”
“When we arrived at the police station and saw that row of motorcycles, how could you have missed that they all had keys in them?”
She gritted her teeth. “We never discussed it.”
“We’ve never discussed a lot of things.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean!?”
Zach scolded them. “Shhh…keep your voices down.”
“I…waited for you,” Aidan said, returning to the argument.
“It didn’t look like you were waiting.”
He sighed. “Waiting as long as I could was my plan. If I had to go without you…my plan was to circle back and find you.”
“Before you told us to hide, you might have shared your plan.”
“I didn’t know what my plan was when we ran out of the building. I figured I didn’t have time to get to the dumpster and hide in it, so I just kept running. I figured when you heard the motorcycle…”
“That was a big assumption.”
“Will you two just knock it off?” Diego growled. “We got away. We’re safe…for the moment. Now, we need to figure out what to do next.”
Cheryl and Aidan went silent, glaring in opposite directions. She still felt heat coursing through her veins and wasn’t sure if it was leftover adrenaline from their escape or from her anger towards Aidan. Either way, Diego was right. There was no point in sitting around arguing—it was a stupid waste of time.
“We’re not going to be able to hang here long,” Zach said. “Sheriff’s going to know we couldn’t have gone far. They’re going to overturn every rock in this town to find us.”
“Those O.N.E. guys showed some kind of flier to the Sheriff. It could have been a wanted poster. I wonder if O.N.E. put a bounty out on anyone who was involved with the RT.”
Vinnie let out a nervous whimper.
“Could be,” Aidan said. “That might explain why Camacho took all the trouble to bring us here, and why the Sheriff kept us locked up until the goons arrived.” He turned towards Vinnie and nudged him in the ribs. “You got any other idea how O.N.E. found us here? Maybe you or your buddy Erik—”
“Don’t be accusing me of anything! I was just as surprised as you were when they showed up.”
An uncomfortable silence blanketed the room. The air was thick with their hot breath, and Cheryl felt like they could all lose it and break out into a brawl at any second. Lord knew it wouldn’t take much to get Diego and Zach going at it again too.
Vinnie broke the stalemate. “Guys…look where we are…”
Puzzled looks flitted from face to face.
“It’s a beauty parlor.”
“Right…” Diego scoffed as he patted the raw, bare spot on his head. “I’m really not in the market for a haircut right now, amigo. I just lost a chunk unexpectedly.”
“No…no. Well…maybe. What I’m trying to say is…what better place to change it up a little bit. You know…change our looks. There’s scissors, razors, hair dye…”
The storage room was dark, but they all looked around as if they could see what was on the shelves around them.
“He’s right,” Zach said. “If we have a little time in here, it wouldn’t hurt to come up with disguises.” He turned to Aidan, “You know, man. You could rock a Flock of Seagulls look with some hair down over that eye. You might not even know it’s—”
“Flock of what?” Aidan asked, with the edge still in his voice.
Vinnie chuckled. “You know that new wave band from the eighties?” He started to sing a few bars from one of their songs.
“Never listened to that crap,” Aidan said. “If it wasn’t ACDC or Skynard, I probably didn’t give a—”
“Guys…” Cheryl interrupted. “He’s right,” she said, nodding to Vinnie. “We get some dye, some scissors, change our look. It’s an easy switch, so if we are spotted before we get out of town, maybe we won’t be recognized right away.”
While sitting tight for a while to make sure they weren’t going to be surprised by a search party, they all agreed on a plan to get out of Quimera that started with some creative changes to their looks, but that mission was put on hold until they took care of two other things.
First, they had to investigate the shop, and make sure it was a safe place to hang out for a while. They looked in every nook and cranny, including the bathroom and were relieved to find no Eaters locked inside and no dead bodies. The place was surprisingly clean except for a single spot of blood on the floor behind the cash register.
Next, they looked for something to patch up their w
ounds. After rummaging around the shop and finding some antiseptic and gauze, Cheryl helped out with the wound on Zach’s arm, and Aidan started to patch up Vinnie’s neck. As she worked, Cheryl reminded them all how lucky there were to have gotten out of there without any more serious injuries. “I’d rather run into a horde of Eaters than be in that situation again,” she said. “I can’t fight bullets.”
There were murmurs of assent among them and admissions of how shaken they were after the experience. Vinnie told them he’d been so scared he’d almost peed himself in the dumpster and went on so long about his anxiety during their escape that Diego finally told him to shut up.
They shared some warm sodas and stale crackers they found in a bottom drawer at one of the hairdresser stations, and when they were done eating it only took them a few minutes to scrounge up some tools and some hair dye. Without any more delay, they got to work.
Aidan refused to color his hair, but he let Cheryl use some scissors to style it with some long bangs. A pair of black-rimmed glasses with a light tint completed his new look and helped to detract from the appearance of his wounded eye. Zach decided on a full shave from his scalp to his chin and did the deed himself. Afterwards, he admired the results in one of the mirrors closest to the window. Diego refused to do anything at first, but was finally persuaded to get a couple of inches cut off his dirty blond locks and have it styled to cover the bloody patch on his scalp.
Vinnie was game for anything. Fifty minutes later, his beard was gone, and with the help of some water from the cooler, his shiny black hair was nearly platinum blond which elicited girlish giggles from Zach and Diego. In response, he blew kisses at them until they walked away in disgust.
“What about you?” Aidan asked.
Cheryl finished drying her hands on the towel and laid it next to the sink. “What about me?”
“Don’t you need a makeover?”
“I’ve got it covered,” she said, holding up a box of that said, Dark Chestnut.
A half hour later, she was tired of sitting around waiting for the color to set, and they were all anxious to get moving, so she enlisted Vinnie’s help to rinse it out in one of the sinks. Then, she towel dried it and stood, looking in a mirror. Aidan appeared behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist.
Eaters: Resurrection Page 16