7
Chris feels more than sees Karen step inside and stop beside him. At first, the darkness is all-encompassing. He can't see anything but vague shapes. The sounds of his own breathing echo back to him.
Karen grabs his hand and he squeezes it to reinsure her. Taking a few more steps inside and away from the light polluting the doorway, his eyes adjust to the gloom. At first he thought the interior was devoid of light, but as his sight adjusts, he notices long, horizontal lines of light filtering through the exterior walls. There were seams between many of the wooden panels—gaps that allow light to filter through and illuminate the interior better than any candle could have done. He wonders if they intentionally included those lines of light. Spaced the way they were, he believed they were planned that way.
"What is it?" Karen whispers.
"It looks like a group of people lived here...it's a compound or something."
"A safe haven of some sort?" Karen wondered.
"I'm not sure," Chris responds, taking a few steps deeper into the complex.
They stood at an intersection of hallways. The longest stretching from left to right into the darkness while the shorter one lay directly ahead, leading toward the northern side of the overpass. Along both halls were a series of doorways leading to rooms built throughout the center. Stairs led upward to landings on top of the central complex of rooms. Wooden and metal poles stretched from the road to the underside of the overpass. Other beams crisscrossed everywhere, like the rafters of a barn, they supported more rooms and landings that filled every inch of the complex.
"It's a maze."
Chris had to agree. If this place were any larger, it would be easy to get lost.
"What's that?" she asks, a note of panic in her voice.
"I'm not sure...but I heard it too."
Something creaked in the gloom above them—near the top where the filtered light didn’t reach.
Chris moves toward the door and Karen reaches out to grab him.
"Don't leave me here."
"It's okay...I'm just grabbing something right outside the door. I'll only be a second."
He doesn't wait for a response, just slides from her grip and ducks outside. True to his word, though, he's right back inside. However, he stops just inside the threshold. He holds a tarnished metal disk from one of the wrecked vehicles—a hubcap. He holds it in the light and catches the sun’s reflection.
"Damn," Karen says, briefly blinded.
"Sorry," Chris apologizes. "Didn't mean to do that."
He adjusts the hubcap and directs the beam of light toward the roof.
"Oh, fuck."
Alarmed, Karen glances upward, mouth dropping open in horror and surprise. Hanging from the metal girders that support the underpass is a body. It floats there, as if by magic. Then Chris adjusts the light, and she sees now that it’s not floating—it’s hanging by a rope around its neck. The light sweeps back and forth, revealing more Tainted—each of them hanging by the neck, each of them reaching toward her, smelling her, knowing she's there but unable to reach her.
She moves toward the door when Chris grabs her elbow and forces her outside, pulling her along as if she’s not moving fast enough for his tastes. It doesn't bother her, she's ready to get out of there too.
"Go on," Chris says, waving her toward the eastern side of the interstate. "I'll grab Pete and be right there."
"Hurry," she says, eying the doorway nervously. In her mind, she sees the Tainted hanging there, struggling against their bonds as flesh and bone separates and one by one, they fall—their headless bodies rising and coming for them despite their decapitation.
Knowing that’s impossible, she shakes off the image and moves away.
A maze of twisted metal lies before her. By the looks of it, Chris will have to bring Pete a different way. To the south, the wreckage is more sporadic. It's not just the husks of twisted vehicles, there's debris spread all over the place—most of it hidden by weeds and grass. All it takes is one piece of metal slicing into Pete's hoof to take him out of commission. Most of the food they packed is in saddlebags on the horse—it would be unfortunate, although not devastating, if they lose Pete.
She turns toward Chris. "It's too tight through here...you'll have to take him further that way." She motions to the south.
Untying Pete, he makes a quick thumbs-up motion and begins leading the horse further down the highway.
Karen can't hide the smile and the lighthearted feelings that flood through her every time she looks at Chris. She's only known him for a short time, but it's as if she's known him forever. It’s funny how situations and circumstances can bring two people together. She knows how Chris feels about his father, but if it wasn't for him, the two of them might never have been brought together.
She turns sideways to squeeze between a car and a large pickup. Her ax brushes against the truck's bed, causing a hollow, metallic sound to reverberate around her. She barely notices it.
* * *
Unbeknownst to Karen, calling out to Chris had awoken something nearby and the sound of metal on metal alerted it to Karen's proximity. Karen's odor—that pheromone that seemed to attract the dead—verified in the thing's primitive mind that food was close.
Very close.
* * *
Chris's thoughts mirror Karen's. Scanning the ground for anything that might injure Pete, he kicks suspect items out of the way or leads the horse around ones that are too large, or too sharp, to risk moving. He stays well away from vehicles if he can at all avoid it. The unknown is risky and why risk your life when simple avoidance can save it?
In front of him is a large, rusted trailer that had been carrying metal pipes that were as long as the trailer and about as round as his fist. Most were still on the trailer, but a dozen or so lay strewn over the roadway. At the back of the trailer, a large passenger vehicle lay pinned underneath the trailer, the pipes having penetrated the windshield in three places. One was directly where the driver would have sat.
Chris approaches the car. He’ll have to pass within a few feet of it and while it doesn't appear to have any Tainted within view, he can't be certain they aren't lying dormant below the window line. He can't imagine how all this carnage happened and is glad he wasn't witness to it. The amount of death and dismemberment in just this one location makes him wonder just how bad it got in larger cities around the country.
He approaches the driver's side window. Ancient gore stains the inside of the windshield around the star-shaped holes caused by the pipes. Dark stains cover the steering wheel and the dashboard. The window is open, which makes Chris even more cautious. Based on just the evidence he's seen so far, the driver's body is more than likely still there.
Sure enough, as he gets closer, he sees the profile of a female. Her mouth opens and closes as if tasting the air. Her black tongue slips in and out as if licking lips with saliva that no longer exists. She's in full view now. Her head swivels toward him, yellow eyes roll toward him—looking for relief or food, he can't tell. An arm lifts and falls back below view as she tries to get it to work correctly. Her skin, so gray it's almost black, cracks like old leather that's been sitting for years. An oily substance oozes from the cracks—with it comes a smell of rotting eggs and death.
Her first death must have been horrific. Upon striking the back of the trailer, the pipe had shot through the window and into her chest, just below the hollow valley at the base of her neck.
Transfixed by her, he steps closer. Pete lifts his head, pulling the rope and snorting at the same time—he wants nothing to do with the dead woman.
A memory rises—one of the Picket Fence that used the impaled bodies of Tainted to protect the peninsula they called home. The Guardians—that's what his father had called them. They were Tainted, that was for sure, but they were once so much more—they were family. Family that, for a short time, also called Homestead their home. Every secret Chris has discovered about his father—to him, they can all be forgive
n—all except that one. To use your own family in that way—he shakes his head to clear the images in his mind.
Pete gives another tug.
"Okay, boy…I know, I know."
Placing the tip of the machete against the driver's temple, he thrusts it through the brittle skull and into the brain. The body slumps with a sigh.
As he turns to continue navigating the way across the interstate, Karen's screams cut through all thoughts.
Turning toward the overpass, he tries to look over and through all the vehicles at where he'd last seen her. He doesn't see her anywhere. In a panic, he runs toward the sounds of her cries, but something jerks his arm and almost knocks him off his feet—he still has hold of Pete's lead rope and the horse wasn't budging.
Dropping the rope, he takes off—he'll tend to the horse later. No longer heeding the surrounding field of debris, broken glass, and twisted metal, he sprints through gaps and openings between vehicles, searching for Karen.
* * *
It senses her nearby. It has no sight, having lost it during the initial accident at the time of its first death. But its hearing is beyond what it was before—as is its sense of smell. It tries to move, but something it does not comprehend keeps it immobile. It can reach though, its arms and hands still work fine—and reach it does, just as the living thing, the food, passes by. It catches ahold of something and pulls as its meal screams and tries to pull away.
The struggle only enhances its need to feed. To have food this close and escape is not an option. Something pierces its arm, but still it hangs on, holding it with one hand while searching with the other—looking for leverage to help bring it closer. Again, something stabs it, but there is no pain. Its capacity to feel pain died during the first passing—back when this body was fragile and less than perfect, back when it got tired.
It didn't get tired now. All it had to do was hold on—eventually, the food will relent to its fate.
* * *
There she is, between a large truck and a car—her back is to the truck's passenger window. Behind her, in the window, is a dead man—his upper torso leans outside the window, one hand twisted up in Karen's hair while the other tries to grab her shirt. Teeth snapping together, its mouth only a couple of inches away from the top of her head.
If Karen had been any taller, she'd be dead already. As long as she kept struggling, she'd keep the thing's other hand from getting a hold of her and lifting her to its mouth.
Still, he rushes toward her. He can imagine the panic she's feeling—unable to get away and, knowing help is near, but not knowing if it will reach her in time—it's enough to drive a person crazy.
Karen is strong though. She just needs to hold on for another minute.
* * *
Thank God, she thinks, seeing Chris approach even as she struggles against the grasping hands above her.
Then pain sears across her skull. Did it just bite her?
She twists and turns her body as a deeper ocean of panic fills her mind. More pain blossoms along her scalp and even though she still thinks it might be gnawing at her head, she recognizes the pain for what it is—it’s ripping her hair out at the root. She welcomes the pain. If losing some hair keeps her from becoming infected by its bite, she's all for it.
Welcome the pain, she thinks, takes a deep breath, and lifts her legs from the ground. Her weight is enough—her hair gives way, and she falls to the ground in a heap.
Then Chris is there. He plunges his blade into the Tainted's head and drives its body into the truck and out of sight. He falls down next to her. She clutches him, clings to him, not embarrassed at all by the sudden burst of tears.
"Come on," he whispers, kissing the side of her head and helping her to stand. "Let's get out of here."
They stumble through the maze of wreckage and half-way up the opposite embankment from where they came. She slides to the ground under a scrawny little tree. She's stopped crying now but hasn't been able to quit shaking.
"I'm okay," she states, trying to reassure him. "Go get Pete...I'll wait here."
He cups the side of her head, his stare intense.
"I'm good," she reiterates.
Satisfied, he moves away, skipping down the embankment to the road. She leans against the tree, thankful for its support—otherwise, she'd probably fall over and roll down the hill.
She watches Chris as he reaches Pete, then as he leads the horse through the tangled wreckage. As they approach, her legs still unsteady, she forces herself to stand. Once the shaking abates, she leans against the slope and climbs the rest of the way to meet them.
"Do you need to rest some more?" he asks, hugging her again and checking the raw skin on her head where hair used to be until a few minutes ago.
She shakes her head. "No...I want to get away from here."
"Carson's Crossing isn't far. We should be there by the end of the day. We'll find a place there to stop and rest."
She nods.
"You might need this."
She looks down at his hand—her pickax—she didn't even remember dropping it.
Taking it, she slides it through the leather loop attached to her belt. With Pete's lead rope in one hand and her hand in the other, Chris leads the trio east.
After several miles of silence, she starts feeling better. It's as if she avoided something tragic—something, she realizes, was avoidable. Voicing her thoughts, she says, "I think we need to come up with some rules to go by when we're on the road."
He makes a sound—a low, throaty acknowledgement.
"I don't want to go through that ever again."
"Me either, baby. Me either."
"I can think of three rules off the top of my head."
He looks at her, eyes encouraging her to continue.
She speaks, using the unoccupied hand to tick off each rule by raising a finger. "First, we travel quiet...Second, we don't separate..."
She pauses, not sure how to say what comes next.
He glances toward her again and quietly asks, "What about number three."
She swallows, holds up another finger and says, "Third..." only to have her voice fail again. Can she carry out what she's about to propose?
Chris stops and looks at her full on. She meets his eyes. The way he stares at her makes her believe he already knows what he's about to say.
She tries again, and it all comes out in a rush of blurred words. "Third...if either of us get bit, we end it before we turn."
There—she said it. After that moment, she can't help but think something has changed. Not with their relationship, but with the world around her. She'd been so protected in Martinville for so long that she really had no clue how bad the world outside could be. She couldn't imagine it getting any worse.
It would though...it would get much worse.
Part II
Carson’s Crossing
8
Carson's Crossing is small, but not so small that there shouldn't have been some distance between himself and the couple from the west. But as luck would have it, the couple took up residence in a house almost directly across the street from Zak's home. To say Zak was nervous was an understatement. He wanted to monitor them once they made it to town, but this was too close for comfort and not on his terms. He adapted, of course, he just had to be careful. He couldn't pass in front of a window without risking them seeing him. When he moved, he had to do so carefully, precisely, lest he alert them that someone is nearby. At all costs, he had to avoid that squeaky board between the front living area and the dining room. In the quiet of night, it would sound like an earthquake if he misjudged his footing and accidentally stepped on it.
Their horse helped, though. Even though they left it in a yard two houses down, it still made enough noise to mask him being here. It stomped its hooves when flies bothered it; it snorted from time to time; it chomped noisily on brush and shrubs. If Zak made an inadvertent noise, hopefully his new neighbors wouldn't notice and would chalk it up to the horse.
When he first stumbled upon the couple, he thought it was a good idea to have a horse—he could carry more, travel further, and be alerted to dangers he could neither hear nor smell. However, based on last night, he'd never have one. They were too noisy. If he hadn't cleared Carter's Crossing of the dead, they would have already descended on the horse. If there was ever a more natural form of bait, horses are it. If he revealed himself to them, one of his first pieces of advice will be that they get rid of the horse.
Maybe they will. And if they do, maybe they'll do it before leaving Carson's Crossing—that way he could kill it and dry the meat. He could survive months on the meat that one animal could provide.
Thankfully, the night went by without the couple discovered him; the horse attracting any roaming dead; or the Highwaymen deciding the time was right to make an unexpected visit.
Up early, the couple led the horse to an old enclosed sports complex then made their way south. This surprised Zak. He hadn’t expected them to divert from the road. He also didn't expect them to leave the horse. That only meant one thing—they were coming back to Carson's Crossing.
Zak was at an impasse. Should he continue following them to their destination or stay and wait for them to return? They left most of their provisions in the house, only taking with them a single backpack and their weapons.
You don't just go out for a stroll—there had to be a reason for the adventure they were about to undergo. The Machete Man, when he first saw him some months ago, must not have been just passing through. Maybe he lived around here somewhere. Was that where he was heading? Were there more like him? Was he part of a larger group of people, sent out to find more recruits to increase their numbers?
Tainted Souls Page 4
