When she looked up, there was a sign beside the road welcoming them to Oregon, Ohio. Finally, they'd gotten through Toledo. In much better shape than she'd anticipated, too. "The exit we need to get off on shouldn't be more than a couple more miles ahead," she told Chris.
Keeping his attention focused on the road to avoid another unexpected zombie collision, he gave her a thumbs up. "Just try ta give me a little warning," he teased.
"I'll try my best," she said, fervently scanning the signs as they came up on them. "Shit! Take this one!" she yelled, making him jump.
He jerked the wheel to the right, shooting her a chastising look as they just barely managed to get onto the exit ramp. "Sorry," she said, shrugging her shoulders. "Maybe we should slow down. There are going to be a lot of turns involved to get where we need to go," she suggested.
He laughed. "Sure. Now ya tell me."
As they made their way toward Katie's childhood home, she saw that much of the landscape had stayed the same over the past one hundred years. Occasionally they would pass a road or two that she didn't remember, but many of the buildings looked the same. There were a few newer ones, and a few older ones that had been updated, but overall it wasn't enough of a change to confuse her.
They snaked through the tangle of streets, eventually coming to the road her house should be on. It had taken a half an hour to get here, but now that they were only a couple of minutes from it, Katie was nervously chewing on her fingernails.
"It should only be about another mile or so before we get there," she told Chris, spitting a piece of her nail onto the floorboard. "Keep it slow if you can. I don't want to miss it. Who knows if it still looks the same."
Chris eased his foot off the accelerator a little, bringing the truck down to twenty miles an hour. He didn't understand why she wanted to go this slow. There wasn't a lot to see out here, more open fields than there were houses, it shouldn't be that hard to find what she was looking for.
A chill ran up Katie's spine as she looked to her left. There stood her old bus driver's house, where her life had irrevocably changed forever after Amber had led her and Julie to it, showing them where her killer lived.
Edward felt her trembling next to him. "Is everything okay?"
"Yeah. Seeing my old bus driver's house brought back some horrible memories, that's all," she told him. Katie glanced into the back seat for a moment, checking on Julie's reaction. Disturbingly, she didn't seem to react at all. Katie's brow furrowed as she turned back around. What the hell is up with her? Was her time on Desolace so traumatic that she forgot everything? Maybe they did something to her. Something to erase her memory, Katie thought, trying to justify Julie's inaction.
A few moments later, the trees on the right opened up, affording her a view of what should have been her old house. Everything seemed like it should have been—the barn, the shed, even the old pasture fence was still there—but the house itself looked different. Apparently someone had added on to it since she'd left. Her house had been a one story, ranch style home, this one had two, maybe three stories, and no longer looked like a farmhouse. It looked more like one of those rambling Victorian houses that she'd seen in movies, normally in the northeast somewhere, like Massachusetts or Maine.
"Pull in over there," she told Chris, pointing to the overgrown driveway.
Without a word, he complied. He pulled up next to the house and put the truck in park, then shut off the engine. He got out and looked up at the sky. "Looks like ya still got a bit of daylight left." He smiled, watching the rest of them pile out of the Raptor.
As Brian got out of the truck, Katie noticed that he was wheezing a little. "You okay?" She walked over to him with concern. He was acting like he had right before the zombies had appeared in all of their previous encounters with them.
"I think so," he said in an unsteady voice. "The feeling is stronger now than it's been in the past, but I seem to be controlling it better. As strong as my sense is right now, I would normally be on the verge of passing out from lack of oxygen."
"If your feeling is that strong, then perhaps Jack and Melissa should stay outside while we check the house," Edward suggested.
"No way! If there might be trouble, you are going to need my help. We can likely find someplace inside that I can set Melissa down and keep her protected," Jack protested.
"He has a point, Edward," Brian said. "It would be foolish to separate. That whole theory of strength in numbers. We surely don't want whatever may be in there to gain the upper hand."
"I guess you're right," Edward conceded. "At least stay in the back of the group until we get inside and find a safe place for you to put her down," he told Jack.
"I can live with that plan."
While they'd been figuring out what they were going to do, Chris had gone back to the truck unnoticed. As the group prepared to enter the house, they saw him running to catch up.
"Where'd you go?" Katie asked.
"I went back fer these." He grinned, lifting his shirt to reveal the pistol tucked into the front of his pants and raising his shotgun up from his side.
"Oh," Katie said with a sheepish smile.
"Are we ready?" Edward asked. Everyone nodded that they were, stern looks of concentration written on all of their faces as they readied their weapons. "After you, Katie. It is, after all, your house." Edward bowed slightly and swept his hand toward the door. Katie nearly lost her composure and started laughing when she watched the gesture.
Katie reached for the doorknob and turned it with a little effort. The rusted metal broke off in her hand and the door creaked open. The sound made her feel as if she were preparing to enter a haunted house. Not a real one of course, but one that you would pay to go into, having the crap scared out of you by the hired help.
The door had swung open no more than enough to allow them to enter when a groaning zombie began shuffling toward them. Katie froze in shock. What she was seeing seemed impossible. The visage of the putrid creature shambling toward her eerily resembled her mother! She shook her head, thinking that she was hallucinating. "Mom?"
At the sound of her voice, the zombie began moving more quickly toward her, holding out its decaying arms. One eye dangled and bounced upon its cheek, what was left of it anyway, swinging from the optic nerve. It opened its mouth, hissing at her as it reached out to grab her. Just as it latched onto Katie's shoulder, the barrel of a shotgun was thrust over her shoulder on the right, the end of it jamming into the nose of the zombie. A split second later the shotgun roared, kicking up and nearly hitting her in the side of her head, the proximity of the blast deafening her.
The face that had resembled her mother was now gone, splattered on the wall in front of Katie. Blood, brains, clumps of flesh, and bits of bone dripped down the wall. She turned her head and wretched, but thankfully it had been a while since her last meal. Nothing came up.
The blast had caused the zombie to stagger backward a few steps, but somehow after losing its head, it was still upright. Chris stepped past Katie and pushed it over with the barrel of the shotgun. It crumpled to the floor immediately. "One down." Chris grinned proudly. She briefly considered calling him an asshole, but realized it would be pointless. The vile creature, that had possibly once been her mother, would have killed her if he hadn't intervened.
Katie stepped aside to allow the remainder of the group to come inside. So far, there was no indication that there were more zombies in the house, but they were very crafty creatures, especially for being dead.
"Where is your bed chamber?" Edward inquired, touching Katie's back to get her attention.
"I'm sorry. What did you say?" Katie asked, her ears still ringing from the shotgun blast.
"Your bed chamber," he said again, gently. "Where is it?"
Everything sounded muffled to her, but she thought she understood what he'd said. "It used to be over there." She pointed down a narrow hallway leading from the room. "I'll show you." She started toward the hallway. When she didn't hear
them following her, she turned to see why. As she stopped to look, Chris ran into her, obviously not expecting her to stop suddenly. He backed off a step and mouthed the words, I'm sorry. At least, she hoped he had mouthed them.
She turned again and made her way down the hallway, stopping in the open doorway of what had at one time been her room. Unlike many of the other houses they'd been in lately, there was still furniture in this one. The room before her had a bed and a dresser in it. They were filthy, but looked like they were still usable. She motioned for Jack to come forward. "This is probably going to be the safest room in the house. There is a bed here that you can lay Melissa on."
Jack followed her into the room, walked to the bed, and gently laid Melissa down on it as Katie checked the rest of the room to make sure there wasn't a zombie or two hiding out and waiting for them to drop their guard. When she was satisfied that the room was clear, she returned to the doorway. Jack folded the blanket over Melissa, placed a light kiss on her forehead, and then returned to where the rest of the group was gathered.
"We should probably split up," Edward suggested, "to search the rest of the house."
"Do what you want. I'm staying right here," Jack said defiantly, grabbing a bat from Julie's hands.
He'd expected as much from Jack. Over the last few days he had grown increasingly protective of Melissa. "What I meant was that we could split into two groups. One to search the remainder of the house, and one to stay here. I know you can handle yourself well, but it would be nice for you to have help if you need it," Edward said, trying to calm him down a little.
His posture seemed to relax slightly. "That sounds acceptable," Jack replied, attempting a smile.
"I hate to interrupt," Brian said, "but there is definitely something else here. Even after killing the zombie when we came in, I still feel like evil is closing in from all around us."
"All the more reason to get busy clearing the house," Edward stated. He quickly considered how to most effectively split up the group. "Chris and Julie, I would like you to stay here with Jack. I'll take Katie and Brian with me to check the rest of the house."
Immediately, Chris and Julie moved to either side of Jack, while the others moved next to Edward as if they were choosing sides for a sporting contest. "If we run into anything we can't handle, we will yell for you. One of you should do the same if something happens down here," Edward said as he turned away, leading Katie and Brian deeper into the house.
As Edward continued down the hallway, he could see a staircase ahead. There were two more doors, one on either side of the hallway, they would need to check before moving upstairs. One at a time they cleared these rooms, which were both sparsely furnished like the one Melissa was resting in.
After closing the doors, Edward led them to the stairs. As they began to climb the staircase, which was flanked by ornate wrought iron railings on either side that were coated with thick cobwebs and dust, Brian's wheezing suddenly became worse.
Halfway up the flight of stairs, he stopped. "Wait," he gasped. "I can't catch my breath."
A shaft of light, coming from a window above the landing a few steps up from them, allowed Katie and Edward to see the pale blue hue of Brian's face. "Edward! I think he's choking!" Katie yelled in panic.
Edward hurried down the few stairs between them. At the moment he reached Brian, laughter began to echo through the house, bouncing off the walls and making it sound like it was coming from all around them. Brian grabbed onto the railing to steady himself.
As he did, the wrought iron came to life, pulling the posts free from the stairs. The handrail began to float in mid-air somehow, bending by some means they couldn't see. It took on the form of a giant mouth, the iron spindles becoming jagged teeth.
Katie was backing away to the other side of the staircase, not believing her eyes. The railing on the opposite side of the stairs should have stopped her, but it was no longer there. She fell over the side, falling about six feet before crashing onto the floor. Above her was another gaping metal mouth like the one she'd been trying to get away from. Out of the corner of her eye she saw movement. Chris and Julie were running down the hallway toward them after hearing Katie yell, assuming it was the signal that they needed help.
The two giant mouths turned toward the bottom of the stairs as Chris and Julie exited the hallway. Chris ran to Katie, helped her to her feet, and shoved her into the hallway behind him. He immediately took aim at one of the snapping mouths with his shotgun and pulled the trigger. The bearings from within the shell proved to be useless, ricocheting of the metal, harmlessly imbedding themselves in the wall.
Julie had darted up the stairs, doing everything she could to get Edward and Brian to go back to the hallway. As they finally got moving, the giant mouth closest to her snapped its enormous metal teeth around her right arm, completely severing it from her body.
"No!" Katie screamed from the hallway, seeing her friend's arm fall over the side of the staircase in a shower of sparks, which at first she assumed were caused by the iron spindles clashing together. As Julie turned to get away, Katie saw that it wasn't the case. The sparks were coming from the stump of Julie's arm.
Julie was doing everything she could to get back to the hallway, but it was no use. With her back turned, she didn't see the giant jaws preparing to snap at her again. "Look out!" Katie yelled a moment too late. The mouth snapped shut, slicing through her neck. Julie's head bounced the rest of the way down the stairs, flinging sparks into the air.
Somehow, the rest of Julie's body was still on the stairs, flailing at the giant mouth with the baseball bat in the hand it had left. As if things weren't already bad enough, Katie began to hear a loud cracking noise. As she stood frozen in horror, she watched as the staircase itself began to break apart, taking on the shape of a hideous wooden face. In a matter of moments, arms began to develop. One splintered hand reached out and grabbed hold of Julie's legs, the other clamped around her midsection. In seconds she was ripped in half by this new creature, sending a cascade of sparks flying into the hallway as the wooden monster flung the pieces at Katie.
That was enough to break Katie from her horrified trance. She bolted down the hallway and ran headlong into Chris, who was helping Edward and Brian back toward the front of the house. "Move!" she screamed. "We have to get out of here! Now!"
She glanced quickly over her shoulder to see if the creatures were still following. The metal ones were apparently too big to fit into the hallway, they emitted a strange sounding scream, snapping their massive jaws in frustration. The wooden terror was still coming though. It scraped against the walls of the hallway as it continued chasing them.
Hearing the plaster being peeled from the walls, Chris turned to see what was causing the sound. Katie brushed past him, trying to latch onto his arm and drag him with her. He shrugged out of her grip. "Go!" he yelled, his voice barely audible over the scraping. "I'll take care of this!"
Katie turned back and ran to help Edward and Brian. As they approached her old room, she heard Chris' shotgun go off. She looked back, hoping that it had killed the wooden monstrosity. It hadn't. There was a gaping hole where its misshapen head had once been, but it was still coming, and it seemed to be forming a new head from the plaster and lath boards that it was scraping from the walls.
Chris dropped the shotgun onto the floor and pulled out his pistol. As he began to fire on the wooden creature, an anguished scream tore Katie's attention back to the others. Jack had disappeared into the bedroom and Katie could only think that something similar was happening in there.
She got to the doorway in time to see Jack on the floor, changing into a wolf. Melissa was no longer in the bed. Katie stepped into the room to help while Jack was changing and immediately stumbled back into the hallway. Melissa had become a zombie! She'd lost another friend, but she couldn't begin to imagine how Jack was dealing with this, knowing that he would have to kill the woman he'd been protecting for days.
The gunshots in the h
allway suddenly seemed far away as Jack completed his change, howling in both mourning and rage as he made quick work of the woman that had once been very dear to him, shredding her to pieces with his claws.
"Come on! We have to go!" Katie yelled at Jack, who for the moment seemed caught up in his grief. The gunfire in the hallway had stopped, which was either a good sign or a very bad one. She poked her head into the hallway. Edward and Brian were gone, hopefully they'd made it outside. Chris was backpedaling down the hall, reloading his pistol. The splintery creature was still bearing down on him, so big now that it took up the entire hallway from floor to ceiling.
Katie yelled one last time for Jack, trying to get him moving, and then darted for the front door. When she got outside, she saw Edward standing near the truck. Brian was on his knees in the grass doing something, perhaps praying that God would listen to him, just this one time. She went to him and touched his shoulder. When he looked up at her, she nearly fell down in shock. His eyes looked like they were glazed over.
Her mind raced. Had Brian somehow been infected before they met him? Was he turning into a zombie like Melissa had? She shook her head in disbelief. No! It had to be something else! Something she didn't understand! She could hear him muttering something, but she couldn't make out what it was. It seemed to be another language.
A loud crash came from the house, and moments later, Jack bounded out the front door. Seconds later, Katie could see Chris, scrambling for the doorway. At the last moment, the doorway turned into a mouth, biting down as Chris attempted to leap from the house. Only half of him made it out.
His torso was shredded by the wood, just below his ribcage, exposing his innards. Even with half of his body missing, Chris tried to pull himself along with his hands. He collapsed a few moments later, a ten foot path of blood and entrails left in his wake.
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