Heroes of the Undead | Book 1 | The Culling

by Meredith, Peter

  It was wishful thinking to believe otherwise, but the onus was on women to be taken seriously, not on men.

  “No, you’re right,” Maddy said. “I will take the lead.” She saw Bryce and Griff open their mouths to protest; she stopped them with a hand. “No. It makes sense. Griff is injured and Bryce is exhausted.”

  Griff swung the table leg in an easy arc. “I’m just a little stiff.”

  “And I’m good,” Bryce said. “I just needed a few minutes rest.” His eyes told a different story as did his reaction to Sid’s appearance. He had been truly shocked, while she hadn’t been. She had maybe a half-second of forewarning, which suggested that Bryce’s exhaustion was worse than he was letting on.

  She slid her ice axe from her belt. “No, I’ll go first. I have the best night eyes of any of us.” And the best sense of smell and hearing. She pointed to Griff. “Keep close enough to see me. No closer. We all good?” Everyone nodded, except Wilkes who hid his surprise at her reaction behind a half-shrug.

  Without any more talk, she went off alone into the smoke. The streets to the south weren’t quiet and empty. They were dangerous, every step of them. Zombies roamed the smoke, sometimes steps away, at other times they went unseen, but were heard by their gibbering laughter or soft moans.

  As she went, her heart, which was still racing at close to ninety beats a minute, jumped up to one-twenty. Her hands shook and her breath was quick and too light to grasp. The air zipped in and out of her, and suddenly her thoughts of proving herself for all womanhood seemed to go right out the window.

  She had to look back to calm her nerves. Griff was right where she knew he’d be, twenty steps away. He wasn’t exactly quiet. When the bombs weren’t thundering, she could hear the scrape of his fancy shoes, or his whispered curses when he’d turn an ankle on the unstable rocks. Seeing him helped and she turned south once more, every nerve on edge.

  The first zombie passed ten feet in front of her not long after. It went up the side of a crater, paused so that she could only see its piss and blood covered shoes, and then fell down into the pit, disappearing from sight.

  A second one came by within sight of the crater. She ducked down next to a yellow Prius and it went by, missing her by an arms’ length. It was slow, wobbling worse than Griff. She counted to twenty before it was out of sight, and the moment it was, she realized that she should have killed it. What if it turned around and stumbled into Victoria, and what if she screamed and what if they were charged by a hundred of them?

  There was no excuse not to have killed it either. It had been small… “A woman,” she realized. A small, broken twig of a zombie and she had been right there. Maddy vowed to kill the next one and was put to the test right away. This one was bigger, standing just a few steps away from the obvious path through the destruction. Be smart. Skirt around it and find a path… “No,” she whispered, under her breath.

  No. The smart move would be to kill it silently and march on—it would be smart only if she could kill it silently. One blow. One quick strike. One quick swing of her…she was procrastinating, because What if? The what-ifs raced through her mind and formed a useless pile in her consciousness for her to pick over. She was stuck in neutral for so long that she heard Griff coming up from behind. That got her moving and not completely because his presence was about to bring a hurricane of trouble down on them.

  It was also because he was simply there. Griff was a big athletic man, trained to kill, but unlike Wilkes, he was gentle and honorable as well. He wouldn’t leave her if she got in trouble. His presence was a comfort. It was a wonderful feeling to know he was there and she felt a new warmth, right up until she realized that she was being a pathetic weak little nothing. She had cowered until a man showed up—Wilkes would’ve laughed, and he would’ve been right to.

  Chapter 48

  I’m not weak, she told herself. I don’t need Griff to do this.

  Despite this, she still didn’t move. I am woman, hear me roar; the phrase she had repeated in college more time than she cared to remember was now an embarrassment as it rang through her mind. When had she ever roared? Once, she and dozens of others had screeched through a bullhorn trying to drown out the first amendment rights of a speaker she didn’t agree with.

  She remembered feeling so empowered, so brave, so virtuous standing up to him. In retrospect, what had been virtuous about two-hundred people screaming death threats at a bookish, nervous little man with an unfortunate little chin and a blob of a nose? Nothing. And where was the bravery? He’d been a guest speaker, not a dean or a professor. Screaming at him had been entirely without repercussion.

  It was a bit of a shock to realize that her one brave act hadn’t been brave at all. It had been vanity on her part and the bullhorn had only broadcast her own fear. She had been afraid that other people would hear the man and believe him and his outrageous point of view—in other words, she was afraid that she and the others around her wouldn’t be able to counter his ideas in a fair and open debate.

  The clarity at which these memories and thoughts buzzed through her mind was astonishing…and equaled to more procrastination!

  Before she could remember more, reconsider, or rationalize another thought, she forced herself forward, advancing on the creature, her lips pursed and her right arm raised. It was facing her, but its eyes were blank and staring off to her right. “Quick, quick, quick,” she whispered as she darted forward. With each step, the horror of the creature solidified in the smoke. It had been a man who had left his apartment two days before with a luxuriant brown beard that hung to the center of his chest, and a perfectly round knob of a man-bun sitting atop its head. The beard was now tangled in dried blood and straggly bits of flesh. The bun was unchanged and just as pathetic as it had been.

  The rest of the creature was covered in tacky black blood that glistened, catching the bit of light that made it through the smoke.

  Five feet from it, Maddy’s foot kicked a broken piece of cement and the zombie began what felt like a slow-motion turn, its black eyes coming to center on her, its huge hands coming up to grab her filthy sweater as she rushed in. Close, closer; they were almost chest to chest when she swung the axe down with everything she had.

  Its breath was pure sewage that washed over her just as the spike of the axe penetrated the top of its head and sunk five inches deep. The feeling that ran up the metal and into her hand was decidedly disgusting. It was like cracking a giant soft-boiled egg.

  A flash of surprise broke briefly over its slaggy dead face, then its eyes rolled down in their sockets and it began to collapse as every muscle in its body went limp. Maddy considered trying to lay the beast down quietly. Two-hundred pounds of dead flesh and bones was about a hundred pounds too much for her and it fell with a soft thud.

  Even before it thudded over, the axe handle was yanked from her hand and for a moment she was defenseless and she crouched, her eyes up and out as Griff had suggested. There were other zombies around, their moans drifting through the smoke. None were close. She bent to retrieve her axe and worked the pick back and forth. It was like unclogging a toilet, but in reverse. The moment the spike was free a vile black porridge squirted from the hole.

  A groan escaped her.

  “What is it?” Griff asked as he materialized out of the smoke. Further away, Wilkes faced to the right, his ears tracking another of the creatures.

  “Nothing,” Maddy whispered, wiping the spike on a strange mishmash of clothing that seemed to fill a nearby car. It was doorless on the side closest to her and it appeared that the bomb which had taken the doors and melted all four tires, had also exploded the suitcases inside. There were singed clothes from one end of it to the other.

  “You should give me a little more room,” she suggested, hitching up her pants. They had been tight two hours before; now they were in need of a belt. “You know, stay back a bit farther.” She glanced into the car and happily saw a thin brown belt.

  He stared as she worked
the belt around her now much thinner waist. “If you’re too far, I won’t be able to provide back up.”

  The fear that had kept her paralyzed was gone—she had roared. She had stood alone and unaided, and had slain a beast, one on one. If felt more than just good, it felt fantastic. “Just another twenty feet or so. I’ll let you know if I need you.”

  Already the others were close, stumbling through the dark. She patted Griff on his strong shoulder and left him. Now, instead of groping through the dark like a lost soul searching for light, she stalked on silent feet. For the first time, she realized that the dark was her ally. Except for smell, the average human had keener senses than zombies, and Maddy’s senses were far greater than any human.

  She had the next zombie she came across dialed in from forty feet away. Its moan was baby-soft and its step light. Maddy expected a female zombie but was surprised to find it was a teenage boy. It was more surprised when she suddenly appeared on its left. It looked blankly at her for the brief instant before the ice axe crashed into its head. Again, she had used too much force and had to wiggle the spike out.

  “Lesson learned,” she told herself. If she came across two, she couldn’t waste time cranking out the pick when the second was right on her.

  This problem came on her quicker than expected when she came across three at once. Wait for the others, a voice inside her said. A separate voice hissed, Let them hear you roar!

  She teetered between the two before she sucked in a harsh breath and began angling around the cars. There were three shapes in the darkness but they were not together and they did not act with one mind. She killed the closer one without mercy or fanfare. It never saw her coming. In her excitement, she again struck too hard and the spike went as deep as it could. Pulling the curved metal out was not nearly as hard this time.

  Her adrenaline was pumping like mad filling her arms and legs with nervous energy. When the thing flopped over, she stomped down on its head and ripped out the spike just as the second zombie attacked. Stumbling over the uneven ground, it lunged at her and grabbed the top part of her left arm in a sharp-nailed grip. Instinct made her lean back, while a lack of training had her attempting an attack with the spike while she was far too close.

  The strike was all wrist and the bloody tip penetrated half an inch. Not even close to kill depth, and now its teeth were driving in at her neck. She could do nothing but slam the ice axe into its mouth. At the same time, a rock under her foot tilted and she was falling back with the creature on top of her.

  Cat-quick, she jerked and spun so that they both landed on their sides. Neither felt the pain of the rocks digging into their flesh. The second they hit the ground, she was already moving, pushing off with an elbow and shoving it back with her opposite hand. Just like that, she was on top. She had lost her grip on the axe and it had disappeared, but her hand found a rock and she used it to smash the thing’s forehead in.

  One more blow finished the job. It was all she had time for as the third plowed into her. It was faster than the others; that didn’t make it any smarter. It crushed her into the rocks, but its momentum carried it over her and it lost flesh from its nose as the ground stopped it.

  Again, she was faster and twisted out from beneath it as it was still trying to get to its knees. A glint of metal caught her eye. The ice axe! She snatched it up and embedded it deep, once more as far as it could go.

  “Hmm,” she said, her lips pursed and pushed to the side in dissatisfaction. Although the creature was dead, she gave its head another thwack! This time she pulled back right at the end. That was better. She gave the other bodies a few more practice swings until she had the speed and timing down. The right depth called for a reversal of the downward sweep just at the point of impact. This arrested the point of the spike an inch and a half deep.

  “Uh, you having fun?” Griff asked. She had heard him coming and hadn’t given it a second thought. Now she froze and glanced back over her shoulder at his puzzled look.

  “I’m just getting the hang of this.” She straightened and tried to appear normal. Having just been locked in mortal combat with three zombies, all of which were bigger than her, it took more than pushing a stray curl of brown hair from her face. Her arms were bleeding, there was bright zombie blood on her shirt and the ice axe, and there was a look of triumph in her eyes.

  Even with the blood and the dirt, Griff was surprised to find her alluring. It wasn’t just that she was taller, far slimmer and fast becoming beautiful, she also radiated a new-found confidence that had nothing of her old smugness associated with it. He was still somewhat awestruck at this when, with a last ghostly smile, she disappeared back into the smoke.

  She left him not as Maddy Whitmore, PhD, but as Maddy Whitmore, Zombie Killer and it felt good. She moved quicker, now filled with confidence. There was no reason to go slow. There was no reason to size up every one of the creatures and formulate plans or lines of attack.

  In the dark, she was more than a match for those she came across. Like they were breadcrumbs, she left a string of bodies for the others to follow, and with each kill, her confidence grew. Then she smelled talc and fear. It was just a whiff beneath the chemical smoke, the endless zombies, and the new stench of decay that was beginning to rise up from the city streets.

  Maddy pictured an older woman. Was she lost in the smoke? Was she trying to escape the city? Was she… A new scent: guava shampoo but with earthy undertones. It made no sense until she heard a whining sound—the woman was out walking her dog.

  “In this?” Maddy had never been fond of dogs and generally avoided them at all costs. They were too needy and worse, they were a distraction, something that her former regimented life could not have borne. In the middle of an apocalypse they seem like even more of a nuisance. How would you feed them? How do you keep them from barking? And if they manage to help fight off zombies, how do you keep them from tracking infected blood everywhere? “No, thank you.”

  It seemed to Maddy that her best bet was to hunker down and wait for the lady and the dog to move along. She didn’t hunker so much as she slid her ass up onto the hood of a Jaguar. Beneath the dust and the dents, she could see the gleam of paint and could smell the layers of wax. It had been someone’s baby once. Now it was just another corpse. While sitting on the Jag, she ate the sandwich Bryce had made for her, and as she did she grew steadily more nervous.

  The dog had not moved and its whining had not varied. The scent of the woman remained unchanged as well.

  As the last of the sandwich disappeared into Maddy’s cheek, she picked up her axe and slipped to her right. Her steps were light and placed with care so that she came within sight of the lady and not even her dog was the wiser. The woman was indeed old. She had the shape and color of a marshmallow, and the soft consistency of one as well. However much she looked like a marshmallow, she was glazed like a doughnut with fear sweat.

  Biting into the soft folds of her neck was an extension cord. It ran up to a signal light but was just long enough that if she stayed perched on her toes she would keep from being strangled to death. Her hands were free and she had her fingers curled up beneath the cord. No matter how hard she tried, Maddy saw there’d be no pulling it over her head.

  Maddy took an involuntary step forward, drawn by the terror in the woman’s eyes and the sudden burning anger in her own heart. Someone had left the woman like this. Someone cruel and hateful.

  Someone or some thing.

  The thought stopped her. Where was the dog? Why was it unseen? It could’ve been trapped in the rubble. The same person who’d done this could’ve done anything to the dog. But the whine wasn’t one of pain. It was fear. The dog was afraid and now Maddy was too.

  She couldn’t smell the demon, but she knew it was here somewhere.

  Chapter 49

  The cold sensation of knowing swept her. She could try to deny it all she wanted, but it was fact. A trap had been set. It had not been set for just anyone. It had been set purposely ac
ross their line of march, which meant it had been set to capture, or more likely, kill her and Bryce.

  Subconsciously, her knees bent and she slunk low, her new finely tuned senses reaching out like fingers. Her blue eyes, now sharper than humanly possible, searched the shadows and found nothing, her ears, better than a fox’s listened beneath the explosions and the ever-present crackling of fire, and heard only the dog and the woman’s harsh breathing. Even her sense of smell failed to pinpoint a source of danger.

  The walking dead and their stench permeated the air. On this last part of their journey, Maddy had been able to narrow down the closer scents or those that had unique signatures, but in this case, there was nothing that stood out.

  And yet she knew the demon was there.

  “But which one?” As she pictured the fire-burnt magenta-headed one a shiver went up her back. When the insidious image of the black demon came next, she felt small and weak, just as she used to, and she wanted to scamper away and hide.

  “Where’s the roar now?” she asked herself.

  Her roar was locked in her throat, but that didn’t mean she was like she had been, all fluff and bluff. She was deadly now…just not stupid. As much as she wanted to help the woman, she slunk down and away, and in seconds was dashing back the way she had come.

  When she had asked Griff to give her more room, she expected him to be ten yards further away than before, instead, he and the others were a full seventy yards away, moving in a clump. Everyone was hitting the wall of exhaustion. The stress of fighting through such a deadly environment for hours on end was piling up on their shoulders and a few of them were bent at the waist as if they were hauling hundred-pound sacks of rice.

  Griff limped and dripped with sweat. Wilkes stumbled and cursed. Sid had lost his peak and felt terrible all over. Victoria walked in a pain-filled exhausted stupor, still moving only because she was driven by the need to find her family. Nichola was the freshest; she was also the youngest and had spent most of the last couple of days sitting at home watching TV.