Fire: The Collapse

by William Esmont

The parking lot was empty. Or, more accurately, it appeared empty. Megan scanned the storefronts one by one, plumbing the depths of the dark shops lining the strip mall, wishing she could see through the walls to spy the creatures that surely lurked within. The whole day had been this way, with very little undead presence to speak of. That bothered her. Typically, when you didn’t see them coming was when they would pop out of a dark corner and take a chunk out of your ass. She had seen it firsthand, had almost been dinner herself on more than one occasion.

  Something about this food raid was making her jumpy, like she felt when she had left the house and forgotten to turn off the oven. She turned to Cesar. “Do you—”

  Cesar shushed her. “I know. I feel it too. Something’s off...” She looked over her shoulder at the new guy, Kevin. He was going car to car, checking for trapped ghouls and ensuring the doors were locked. He’s thorough, she decided.

  It was silent in the grocery store parking lot, since all of the engines were stopped. That was often the worst part. The sounds of the heavy diesel engines would sometimes bring the undead out en masse, forcing them to abandon a raid. She and Cesar had experimented with using a decoy vehicle, sending it ahead to pull out the lurking ghouls and lead them away, but it seemed that no matter how many were collected, there were always more left behind.

  “Mo, you and Rich,” Cesar said, addressing the drivers of the chase vehicles. “I want you guys out here.” He turned to Kevin. “You, too. We’ll be quick.”

  The men nodded in agreement and set up positions on either side of the entrance with their weapons pointing out.

  Entering an abandoned building was one of Megan’s least favorite activities. Together, she, Cesar, and Pringle forced the front door as quietly as possible and crept inside. Despite the brilliant daylight only a few feet behind them, her eyes couldn’t penetrate the gloom of the interior.

  “Fuck,” she whispered under her breath.

  “Yes. Fuck,” Cesar agreed. Cesar wasn’t given to cursing, even in the most difficult situation, and that one word told her volumes about how he felt.

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” she asked.

  “Sí. Yes. The next one is three miles to the South. I don’t want to go that far into town. Not today.”

  “Okay then.” Megan took a deep breath. “Let’s get this over with.” Hauling her arm back, she lobbed a fist-sized rock deep into the store.

  The response was immediate. A cacophony of moans, the call of the undead.

  “Come to Mama,” she said under her breath. One of the creatures came blundering into her vision, getting hung up on an overturned shopping cart for a moment before knocking it aside and vectoring straight toward her position. It looked to have been a soccer mom in its former life. Thirty-something with a cute pair of yoga pants and nearly new running shoes, she was perfectly preserved except for the gaping cavity in her abdomen where all of the internal organs were supposed to be. The soccer mom staggered between a set of cash registers, bumbling and tripping, spinning around in its desperate rush to reach food.

  Megan felt the muscles in her neck tense, her jaw ached and her teeth ground relentlessly. She flexed her fingers and forced herself to breathe, to relax. She hefted her mattock, taking comfort at its solidity. At a little over five-feet-long, the device was one of Cesar’s finest creations, a cross between a shovel handle and a traditional mattock. Quick, quiet, and deadly effective at close range, it was the most practical way to dispatch the undead without the siren song of gunshots. Cesar had come up with the idea after a harrowing raid in which they had accidentally attracted half of Tucson’s undead. The blade of the mattock was perfect for slowing them down, removing limbs, and chopping them off at the knees. The spike was custom-built for the head. It was large and heavy enough to penetrate all but the thickest of skulls, able to drop a zombie with a single strike.

  Cesar carried a similar weapon, although a slightly beefier version. They also carried pistols in case they were overrun. Everyone carried one extra bullet, just in case. The guns were a last resort. Firing a shot was akin to ringing the dinner bell.

  As the soccer mom drew closer, she raised her hands like a baby seeking its mother and ground her teeth. She raced at Megan, a flesh-seeking missile full of deadly intent. Megan stepped to the side at the last second, removing herself from the woman’s direct path. Cesar stood ready to assist. The creature was slow to react, and by the time it realized dinner had moved, Megan was behind it, bringing her spike into its skull with a satisfying crunch.

  They took extra care to sterilize their weapons at the end of each engagement. As far as they could tell, the two surefire ways to get infected were to be bitten or to get infected brain matter into an open cut, or in an eye.

  “Nice!” Cesar said. Megan couldn’t help feeling a flush of pride at her handiwork. There was more shuffling from the aisles beyond the registers. More moaning.

  “Inbound,” Pringle said through clenched teeth.

  Next up were two young boys, no more than ten years old. They were faster than the woman, dashing out of the coffee aisle, pausing briefly to fixate on the raiding team, and then scrambling forward. Cesar held up two fingers. He pointed once to the right and once to the left. Then he swiped them straight ahead. A kill box. Megan and Pringle were to funnel the creatures into the center where they could concentrate their efforts. They used the ends of their poles to force the ghouls together, and then with a flash of their blades, sliced the tendons behind their knees. The creatures tumbled to the ground and began thrashing in frustration. With a stern look, Pringle stepped forward and smashed both diseased heads with his aluminum baseball bat, pulping both skulls on the dirty linoleum floor.

  They all paused to catch their breath. Aside from Pringle’s wheezing, the store was silent. No more moans. No more undead.

  “Here, zombie, zombie,” Pringle chanted, like the child he had just destroyed might have before he had been turned. “Come and get us.”

  Cesar gave him a wry grin.

  “Cesar?” Kevin sounded alarmed. Cesar held up his hand, motioning for him to wait.

  “We’ve got company,” Kevin insisted, the urgency in his voice unmistakable. That changed everything. Megan spun around and dashed through the front door.

  Undead were swarming the parking lot, filtering through abandoned cars by the dozens. More were arriving by the second from all directions. Megan’s bowels turned to water. Her pulse skyrocketed. “Cesar?” She croaked.

  This was their worst nightmare. This was how the best-laid plans became suicide missions. It was all in the numbers. Fighting one undead was easy. Pop it in the head and down it went. Fighting two was a bit more of a challenge; it could even be fun if you had the right mindset. Fighting dozens, and she noticed even more coming around the northwestern corner, was damned near impossible. They never gave up, never retreated. Their manual weapons lost almost all of their effectiveness when faced with more than three or four. It was time to bring out the guns.

  But guns were only so effective. It required a perfect headshot to drop a zombie, and this became exponentially more difficult when they encountered a runner. Up to about three or four meters, Megan could make the kill every time. Beyond that, her accuracy fell off a cliff. And she wasn’t alone.

  Cesar looked over his shoulder into the maw of the store and then back out to the rapidly-filling parking lot. “We’re leaving right now,” he announced. “Everybody out! Go! Go! Go!”

  They scattered for their vehicles. By this point, zombies were everywhere, blocking the exits, a seething mass of flesh-hungry monsters with one thing on their mind: Dinner.

  The truck roared as Cesar swung around looking for space to build up some speed. They were going to have to drive through the crowd, Megan realized with a sinking feeling. Kevin was straddling his motorcycle when one of the creatures reached for his shoulder. Megan watched in awe as he ducked down, drew his shotgun and placed it against the creature’s face. Its head d
isappeared into a gray-black mist, and the corpse tumbled away. Kevin re-holstered his gun, and ducking and weaving as he searched for a way out, he sped off through the mass of creatures.

  “Here we go,” Cesar growled. He punched the accelerator. and the tires squealed in protest. Megan pushed back in her seat, grabbing the armrest with one hand and her pistol with the other. The first couple of undead went down with no problem, bouncing off the hood and tumbling to the side. Then, suddenly, in front of them was a dense cluster moving as one toward the truck.

  “Hold on!” Cesar screamed over the roar of the engine, then he plowed straight into them. There was an enormous crash, and before she knew what was happening, the windshield was gone, and one of the things was in her lap. It thrashed wildly, its fetid stink choking her with every breath.

  “Get it off of me!” Megan screamed, disgusted at the feel of rotten skin sloughing off as the creature sought purchase on her body. Cesar swerved back and forth, shaking the other creatures loose from the hood, finally finding a gap. They were out of the crowd, and except for the ghoul in the cab with them, they had a clear shot at the road. Megan was frozen in place, watching in detached horror as the creature in her lap tried to bite into her leg.

  Formerly a large man in his thirties, the lack of arms, probably torn off during the impact with the truck, made him look like a fat mutant snake as he writhed around in her lap. It was only a matter of time before he got lucky and sank his teeth into her flesh. In a fit of panic, Megan placed her gun against the man’s temple, turned her head away, and fired a single shot. The report obliterated her hearing, turning everything to a low rush of muffled white noise. Cordite permeated the cab for a moment before it was washed away by the wind.

  Cesar slammed on the brakes, and they skidded to a stop in the center of the southbound lane. Megan leaped from the truck, and hauled the corpse out by its feet, dumping it unceremoniously on the side of the road.

  Then, as she climbed back into the truck, her heart nearly stopped. The entire side of Cesar’s face was covered in a sticky, black, syrupy-looking substance. Zombie brains. She felt herself go cold when she realized what had happened. Back-splatter.

  Cesar blinked, put the truck back in gear and started rolling as soon as she was back inside.

  “Oh, my God!” She reached for him, but he shrank away, not letting her get the toxic sludge on her fingers.

  He shook his head. “You did what you had to do.”

  “I didn’t…”she stammered.

  He laughed, a high pitched chitter she had never heard from him before. “We all have to go sometime, Megan.” Megan’s heart fell as the words sank in. Cesar didn’t have much time, hours, at most. Probably less.

  “Cesar. I’m so sorry,” she said again and again, repeating it as he drove, as if somehow it would undo things. They drove for the next fifteen minutes, weaving through town in a careful circuit designed to throw the undead off of their trail to avoid bringing them to their doorstep. Once they lost sight of the horde, Cesar slowed the truck and pulled to the side of the road. He shifted into Park and left the engine running.

  “What are you doing?” Megan asked, alarmed. “We’re nowhere near home.” She knew exactly what he was doing, but she didn’t want to acknowledge it. Cesar didn’t answer. Instead, he leaned forward and rested his chin on his hands which were still on the steering wheel. He stared out at the desert.

  The radio squawked. “What’s going on up there?”

  Megan answered. “Nothing. Give us a minute.” She threw the radio onto the dash. A bead of sweat trickled from beneath the brim of Cesar’s hat. It rolled down the side of his face and vanished into the collar of his shirt.

  “Cesar?” she asked tentatively.

  “Megan,” he answered slowly. “I’ve had a good life. Better than anyone...”

  “No! You can’t!”

  He turned to face her with profound sadness blanketing his face. “I… We have no choice now. You know that.” Megan shook her head, flinging hot tears from her face. Gravel crunched outside her window; instantly, she turned and raised her pistol.

  Pringle took a step back, arms raised. “Easy there, Megan. You almost—”

  “Mike. Now is not the time!” She turned back to Cesar. “There’s got to be a way. Maybe you’re not even infected.”

  “What’s this about infection?” Pringle asked, suddenly serious. He opened the passenger door and leaned inside the truck.

  “I got splattered. It got in my eye,” Cesar replied without emotion. “I can feel it inside of me. It burns, deep down.”

  “Maybe you’re imagining it?” She offered.

  “No. I’m infected.”

  “Holy shit, Cesar,” Pringle said. “How did it happen?”

  Cesar glanced at Megan. “It doesn’t matter now.” There was a long pause as they all considered the ramifications. The truck rumbled, the engine clattering in the heat.

  “I’d like to do it here,” Cesar continued. “This is my home.” Megan looked around. As far as places to die, she could think of a lot worse. They were on the outskirts of town, surrounded by low rolling hills studded with majestic saguaro, prickly pear, and cholla cacti. She bit back a sob.

  “We can’t do this without you, Cesar,” she pleaded, sneaking a glance at Pringle.

  “Yes, you can,” Cesar replied calmly. “You have to.” She opened her mouth to protest, but there were no more words. “You’re strong, Megan, stronger than you know.” He turned to Pringle. “And, Mike, you’re a good man despite yourself.” Pringle looked at the ground. “Megan, I want you to take over. You have to work together, to be strong, if you want this to succeed, if you want to survive...”

  He was sweating more, his shirt growing damp. His skin was sallow, his breaths becoming shorter and shorter. He didn’t have much time left. Cesar forced a smile.

  “Why not Mike?” Megan asked.

  “Yeah, why not?” Pringle whined. “I’ve been here as long as Megan. I know the people. I know everything.”

  Cesar shook his head. “Mike, you’re great at what you do. And you need to keep doing it. Megan... she has a special gift with people. They listen to her. But she can’t do it without you. Your role is essential to making this community work.”

  Pringle didn’t respond for a long moment. Finally, he nodded, but something in his eyes told Megan this wasn’t the end of the discussion.

  Cesar looked them both in the eye. “Okay, then. That’s settled.” He opened the driver’s side door and climbed from the truck. “I don’t want to put either of you through the trauma of killing me, so I’ll take care of it myself.” Megan moved to hug him, an involuntary response, but Cesar took a step back. He was already gone.

  He proceeded to strip off his extra ammunition, his boots, and his radio gear, placing it all in the bed of the truck. He ejected all of the ammunition from his pistol except one bullet, stacking the cartridges in a neat pile on the seat. With a final nod, he turned and strode into the desert, vanishing into the brush forever.

  Megan sniffed, wiped her eyes, and moved across the bench seat, taking her place behind the wheel. “You getting in?” she asked Mike. “It sounds like we’ve got a lot to discuss.”

  Mike waved his arm at the other truck to let them know they could continue without him, and then climbed into the passenger seat.

  With a last glance at the desert that had consumed Cesar, Megan put the truck back in gear and started driving north.

  She couldn’t stand to hear the shot.

  Twenty-Four