by M. D. Massey
I swam over to the side of the pool and snagged a pool chair. I dragged it back over to the ladder, well away from the deaders, who were milling around with agitation and walking in and out of the water. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say they were working up their courage to come in after me. Yet after an hour or so of watching them wade in and out of the murky water, it was clear that I was safe where I was—for now at least. I began bending and folding a chair leg, back and forth, back and forth, until it broke off in a jagged edge.
One of the sentries must’ve noticed me and spoke up. “Hey, what’s he doing down there?”
Another sentry walked over to the edge and looked down at me. “The same thing you’d be doing if you was down there—trying to survive.”
“Yeah, but shouldn’t we stop him or something? I mean, he killed Carter.”
The second sentry shook his head and leaned back from looking over the wall. “Shit, nobody liked that asshole anyway. He was always cheatin’ at cards. Good riddance, I say. ’Sides, you know the deal: Once they’s in the pit, they’s on their own. Our job’s just to keep ’em from climbin’ out. No more, no less. ’Ventually, he’ll pass on, either get eaten or decide to drink that water and die of the runs. Seen it happen. So just make sure he don’t climb out.”
Sentry number one shook his head and kept watching me. I flipped him the bird and started working on a second chair leg. He spat at me and grabbed a lawn chair of his own, setting it down where he could keep an eye on me while giving his legs a rest. Good.
I got the second chair leg off and used the pocket knife to pry open the crimped end where I’d torn it off the rest of the frame. Tucking that leg in the belt behind my back, I started grinding a point on the other one, using the wall as a file. It was slow going, and it took me most of the day to grind it into a decent spear. After hours of work, I looked at it and decided it’d have to do; my hands were cramping and I was starting to shiver. It appeared that the chill of being immersed in the water as the temperature dropped and nightfall came was finally getting to me.
It was the best that I could hope for, given the circumstances. I’d wait until dark and make my move then.
As I suspected, the sentries got lazy as the night wore on. Why Marsh hadn’t sent anyone out to relieve them was a mystery to me, but I wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth. I could clearly see the guard sitting in the chair from my perch against the wall, and every few minutes his head would start to nod down onto his chest. The other guards were nowhere to be seen, but I could hear them bullshitting and carrying on down in the yard next to the wall. I waited for sentry number one’s chin to land on his chest and stay there, then lowered myself into the water as silently as possible.
Of course, it wasn’t like he’d be able to hear me over the low moaning of the deaders. They were still bunched up in the shallow end, bumping into one another and milling about. One of them had decided to camp out in knee-deep water, standing stock still and eyeing me with interest as I slipped into the water with my spear in my right hand. He was my target, and the fact that he’d stayed in the water was what had given me the idea in the first place.
I purposely hyperventilated and took one last deep breath, suddenly submerging completely under the water. I frog-kicked over to where I’d committed the position of the lone deader to memory and swam along the bottom slowly in that direction, feeling with my free hand until I touched slimy boot leather under the water. I grabbed his ankle and set my feet, driving his leg up as I burst from the water. I immediately pushed off and dragged him into the deeper area, going under again and coming up behind him to grab the collar of his fatigues while he thrashed and flailed about. I plunged the spear deep into the base of his skull, following the thrust with several stabs into his rib cage and abdomen, being careful to puncture both lungs and his stomach. I pulled the corpse down into the water and listened to the frantic yells of the sentry above.
Once I was sure the deader corpse had achieved neutral buoyancy, I flipped him over face down and pushed him to the surface. I then swapped out my spear for the other chair leg, placing it in my mouth and blowing out the water in the tube from under the deader’s ACU jacket. Once I had it clear, I kept it under the flaps of his jacket and continued breathing through it while staying hidden beneath the corpse. It was a bit like being waterboarded in an autopsy room in the dead of summer.
I’d once applied for a job as a tech at the Travis County Medical Examiner’s office, and during my interview the lead tech took me for a “tour” of their autopsy room. Believe me, it was nothing like CSI; there were body bags stacked one on top of the other in their meat locker, and the stench was repulsive. I’ll never forget the smell of dead, rotting human flesh in the heat of summer. Every breath I took in through the tube reminded me of the smell of that autopsy room, and it was all I could do to keep from tossing my cookies.
After a minute or so, the fetid air became more bearable as my olfactory receptors overloaded and began filtering out the stench. I could hear the muffled conversation of the sentries above me, and caught something about “drowning” and “goner.” I waited under the swamp-like surface of the water, counting my breaths as a means of tracking the time. I slowed my breathing and counted, four seconds for every breath. Staying under for at least thirty minutes, I waited long after the last bits of conversation faded into the distance.
I pulled the tube away from my mouth and slipped to the surface, barely allowing my head and eyes to come above the water to observe my surroundings. I noticed a dim illumination coming from the top of the wall, where the last embers of a fire were winking out inside an old chiminea that someone had hauled up there. The deaders were still shuffling around, moaning in that low keening wail that all humans had come to dread in the post-War world. I could also hear the sentries off in the distance, arguing about heading back to the compound.
I recognized the first voice as my friend in the lawn chair. “Uh-uh, no way, man. I’m not going back alone in the dark. I say we wait until morning and then we go tell the sergeant major that he croaked in the night.”
The voice of sentry number two replied, “You’uns can do what ya’ like. Me, Ima gonna head inside that house over yonder and get some shuteye.”
Then a third voice chimed in that I didn’t recognize. I assumed it belonged to sentry number three. “Roscoe’s right. Let’s just hole up in the house and wait ’til morning. No sense risking our asses to head back right now, and end up like that poor bastard in the pool.”
Sentry number one answered. “Alright, but I’m not taking the blame in the morning when the sergeant major has a case of the ass about us not reporting in.”
The sounds of breaking glass and a door shutting emerged from the other side of the wall. I waited for another half-hour in silence and then began climbing out of the pool, up the ladder and over the wall. The deaders only noticed me as I pulled myself on top of a shipping container, so I rolled over the edge and remained silent for several minutes, waiting for the additional noise they were making to settle down. Once they had calmed down, I low-crawled around the wall to the ramp and limped down toward the house, where I was certain the sentries had decided to bed down for the night.
My hope was to sneak in and secure a weapon, but as I made my way over I realized I was in a sorry shape and in no condition for a fight. I felt like I was burning up, but I was shivering at the same time. Apparently my wounds from the beating I’d received earlier had gotten infected, and I was sure I had picked up any number of parasites while under the water. I decided to simply head back to the Facility and take my chances against any deaders or patrols I might run into on the way.
With one last look toward the pit, I limped off into the night, hoping I could make it back to the Facility and meet up with Gabby, Bobby, and Captain Perez before I succumbed to my infected injuries. I only made it a few miles before exhaustion, dehydration, and fever forced me to rest in a dense stand of juniper trees. I cu
rled up in the detritus, under the low limbs of the scrub, and soon found myself passing in and out of consciousness as the fever took over.
2
Washed
When I awoke it was still dark. I still felt feverish, and my chances for getting out of this mess alive didn’t look good. The longer I waited, the weaker I got, so I needed to get up and push on if I was going to evade recapture by the militia. I pulled myself up to a sitting position against the rough bark of the juniper tree, and that’s when I realized I wasn’t alone; I could see the outline of a large figure crouching just a few feet away from me.
I reached back and pulled the makeshift spear from my belt, only to hear whoever it was call out to me in a whisper. “Now Scratch, there’s no need to get up on my part.” I recognized the voice; it was Donnie Sims, or what was left of him. Just like back at the winery, his voice was overlaid with another, deeper voice. Maybe it was the fever, but it almost sounded like several voices spoke to me all at once in some sort of hellish cacophony of jumbled syllables.
“I must say, I do believe thanks are in order.” I heard a slurping sound, and could barely see Donnie’s hand come up to his mouth; whatever creature was inhabiting Donnie’s body now was licking something wet and viscous from its fingers. “Those guards were delicious. Such fear.” Another slurp. Then it leaned toward me, whispering conspiratorially. “Such terror.”
Despite knowing I couldn’t fight off a dead raccoon in my current condition, I pulled myself into a sitting position and held my makeshift spear across my body. I doubted I’d get as lucky as I had back at Kara’s with that ’thrope, but it was worth a shot.
Donnie leaned away again and tsked at me from where he crouched. “Scratch, you don’t look so good. No, no, no, not good at all. I daresay, in your current condition, I’d not bother to make even a snack out of you.” I heard it inhale in a long, staccato sniff, as if it were a sommelier about to sample a fine wine. He continued. “That is, if I were so inclined. But even if I were, in your condition I’d simply be committing cannibalism, of a sort.”
I decided to try to get some intel, because on the odd chance that this thing didn’t kill me, and that I didn’t die of infection, I’d eventually have to hunt it down and destroy it. “So, what are you anyway? I know you’re not Donnie anymore, and I’ve never seen something like you, not in eight years of hunting occult creatures. You move like a nos’, and smell like a deader, but you’re not either.”
The thing that was once Donnie Sims scratched its head and chuckled. “Well, how very observant of you... Yes, quite the intrepid hunter you are, yes indeed.” In the dark it appeared as if it cocked its head to the side. “What’s that? Should we enlighten the dear man?” He paused, as if listening to a far off voice. “Well, that’s true, he doesn’t have much longer, not in his condition. Soon, he’ll know empirically what we are.”
He turned his head back in my direction, or at least I thought he did, and chuckled. “As for your question, I am known by many names. Flesh-eater. Soul-render. Mantequero. Witiko. Jikininki. Ithaqua. But for now, you can just call me Donnie, or Mr. Sims if you like.” He chuckled briefly, apparently amused at some private joke.
“You’re not Donnie Sims—not anymore. You might wear his flesh, but I know that Donnie’s gone.”
The thing covered the short distance between us in an instant, and I raised the spear in a feeble attempt to defend myself. It was batted out of my hands before I could make contact. Donnie froze in the dark, and then he lit a match, illuminating the space between us for a few moments. As my eyes adjusted, I could see that Donnie’s eyes were pitch black, and that he had new blood dripping down his jaw, over old blood that had crusted there from previous kills. He was also quite a bit thinner in the face and jowls than I remembered, and he had a lean and hungry look that he’d never had in his previous life.
“Oh, but that’s where you’re wrong. Donnie is still here, inside me. In fact, he wants to tell you something.” He gestured with the match and spoke, but this time it wasn’t the calliope-like voice; it was Donnie’s voice and his alone speaking. “Pull up your sleeve, Scratch. There’s something you should see.”
Surprised at this, I complied. I pulled up my right sleeve, which was the one the creature had indicated, and underneath the cloth I saw a familiar sight. It looked a lot like gangrene, but instead of the bluish-green creep of gangrenous tissue necrosis, these lines were darker and much more defined, almost like a tattoo.
“Ah hell. So that’s why you haven’t killed me. I’m already dead.”
The match went out, and Donnie Sims shuffled back a few feet to squat again in the dark. It was silent for a few more moments, and then it spoke, once more in the calliope voice. “Actually, I don’t want to eat you, no, not at all. That would be a singular waste, yes, yes indeed. And this—well, this just won’t do. The both of us, Scratch, we’re both pawns in something far greater than this current...” he paused, as if searching for the right word, “...quest, you’re on. And I, for one, have an interest in keeping you alive.”
“I’ll be dead within the day. Looks like you failed.” I was infected, and I knew it. Once the infection took hold, it spread and nothing could stop it. No amount of antibiotics or medicines could halt the spread of deader venom, once it got in your system. I figured I must’ve been bit when I took that thing under the water back at the pit. Hadn’t even noticed it in the struggle.
“On the contrary, I believe I’ve succeeded.” The thing perked up, cocking his head sideways again. “Yes, yes indeed. Help should be arriving shortly.” Donnie Sims turned and paused, and I thought I saw it looking back over its shoulder. “My advice to you is to say yes.” It scrambled off into the night.
I sat there, propped up against the tree, and considered my fate. I’d killed almost a hundred of the greater occult species, only to get offed by a deader. I laughed softly at my predicament and closed my eyes. I’d be no use to Gabby and Doc now.
Then, I heard a familiar voice. “Scratch, is that you?” It was Bobby, and I could hear him crawling through the brush toward me.
“Yeah, it’s me. What’s left of me, anyway.”
“You look like hell, boss.”
I smirked at that, knowing he could see my face despite the lack of light. “How’d you find me?”
Bobby chuckled. “When you didn’t show up, I tracked you back to the compound and to that pit. It took me a while, because there were militia all over the place and it confused the scent.” He stopped for a moment, as if searching for an apology. “Anyway, by the time I figured out where they’d taken you, it was already dark. I sniffed around and noticed that the soldiers had gone in that house, but when I went in, it was a slaughterhouse in there. I’ve never seen anything like it. Whatever killed them, it didn’t look like it did it for food—it looked like it did it for fun. I followed the blood trail here, and found you.”
I barked a short laugh, realizing that the thing that called itself Donnie Sims had purposely led Bobby here. “Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you’re about a dollar short and a day late. I’m infected. Happened down in that pit with the deaders.”
Bobby plopped down under the tree and let out a long breath. “Shit. Shit! No way man, no way I’m lettin’ you go deadhead on us. Uh-uh, no freaking way.” I heard him duck-walk over to me. “Show me the bite.”
“Bobby, there’s nothing you can do. I’ve seen a million of these bites, and it always ends the same. I’m done for, and there’s nothing that can be done for it, so don’t go blaming yourself for my screw-up.”
Bobby growled, and I swear his eyes glowed in the dark. “Show it to me!” The kid could be scary when he wanted, that was for sure. Not wanting to spend my last moments getting pummeled by a ’thrope, I pulled up my sleeve and exposed the bite for him.
I could see, or maybe sense him nod in the dark. “This is gonna’ hurt.” Then, before I could react he grabbed my wrist and laid the bite open with a single sw
ipe of one of his razor sharp claws. I won’t lie, it hurt like hell, but all I could do was just sit there; I had no fight left in me. Then I heard him tear open the flesh of his own arm with his teeth, and soon I felt hot wet fluid dripping into the gash he’d created over the deader bite.
As Bobby’s blood hit the open wound, it felt like someone had driven a red-hot poker into the flesh of my arm. I gasped, and then it felt like that fire was moving slowly up my arm, spreading throughout my body. I started convulsing, my arm and back muscles and jaw clenching as I arched against the tree.
I fought between jagged breaths to mouth out a question. “What...did you...just do?”
Bobby pulled me away from the tree, and cradled my head in his lap, turning me on my side slightly in case I vomited. “If we’re lucky, my blood will fight off the Z venom. If so, you just might live. I’ve seen this done once, but it was done by my alpha. So, I have no idea whether or not it’ll work with my blood.”
The spasms began to subside, and I started shivering uncontrollably. “If you turned me into a ’thrope, I’m going to kick your ass.”
Bobby laughed. “Hah! This is nowhere near what you have to go through to become a pack member. For that, you have to die—I mean, your heart has to literally stop in order for the ’thrope blood to take over. No, you’ll just have a bad hangover in the morning. If it works.”
I shivered and curled into a ball, partially because I was suddenly freezing, and partly because my stomach was clenching up like I’d just been punched in the diaphragm. “Great,” I managed to choke out.
Bobby chuckled again and picked me up in his arms, crouching as he left the cover of the juniper thicket. “Yeah, well, you’re not out of the woods yet. Probably best to haul ass back to where the Doc and Gabby are waiting on us and let her check you out.” Mercifully, I passed out as he took off at a dead run toward the Facility.
