Love and Decay, Volume One

by Rachel Higginson

  I stomped on his toes and didn’t speak to him for the next two days.

  That terrifying and irrational behavior…? Yeah, just more proof that he had indeed secured the Parker line.

  Sometimes I tried to tease him about that. He never got offended like I had hoped. Instead, he grew oddly confident.

  Anyway, it was for sure a Parker baby, since I had literally no other options. And Nelson’s for the same reason. The fact that I dreamed about this child being a boy also had to be accurate.

  Honestly, out of six children, only one of them turned out to be a girl. I didn’t know much about genetics and how all of that played out, but there was enough obvious logic in the existing five Parker brothers for me to believe that I had been dreaming about a baby boy for a reason.

  I chose to believe my dreams and bet on blue.

  So here I was, baby in belly, sitting in the middle of a slaving colony. My dreams for this child’s future just got more and more optimistic with every passing day.

  Or the opposite of that.

  I looked around at my cellmates and wondered what they thought about me. Remembering the cannibalistic psychos from a couple days ago, I wrapped my arms around my stomach and held my little boy protectively.

  Did everyone down here consider baby meat a delicacy?

  A full-bodied shudder tore through me. I couldn’t think those thoughts. I would have a complete breakdown.

  When we arrived in this place a couple nights ago, our newest set of captors had lined us up in front of a warmly lit, stylish Spanish bungalow and surveyed us closely.

  For long, unending minutes I had believed they planned to execute us. We stood there while they trained their guns on us and spoke rapidly in a language I could not understand.

  It had taken all of my will power to stand their confidently. All I wanted to do was collapse on the ground and beg for mercy. I had trouble differentiating which moments were scarier than others. All of the constant fear and trembling pretty much ran together.

  Although, the first night we were here ranked highest among them.

  After they had lined us up, they took one look at Adela and started shouting at her in Spanish. She did not answer them or even look at them. She kept her chin proudly raised and her shoulders squared.

  Eventually, they had grown sick of that. One of them, the one I assumed was Raphael, slapped her across the face and barked out an order. His men had dragged her away by her hair. She had fought and struggled without making much noise until they had enough of her behavior. Raphael walked over to her and hit her again, this time knocking her unconscious.

  We hadn’t seen her since.

  If there had been a small part of me that held hope, that one act of cruelty erased it completely.

  We had been in many horrifying situations. We had faced bad people before and we had managed to survive. But this time felt different.

  This time felt final.

  They separated us after that. There were enough metal cages to spread us around. They were already nearly filled with other people and not one of the current tenants noticed when we’d been shoved inside. Or maybe they were too afraid to acknowledge the new kids.

  In the last couple days, I had made efforts to reach out to my cellmates, but it was hard enough convincing one of them to look at me. Not one of them spoke English or at least wouldn’t admit that to me. Instead, they minded their own business and looked anywhere but at another human being.

  I didn’t have that kind of discipline.

  I stared across the gravel drive to where Nelson leaned against his own cage. His arms rested above his head and his forehead pressed into a crossbar. He stared at me with a fervor I could feel skitter across my skin and burn slowly and constantly inside of me.

  I wanted nothing more than to close the distance between us and wrap my arms around his lean, familiar body. I hated this separation.

  Loathed it.

  An acidic fury ate away at my patience. It was one thing to keep us trapped like animals or worse, like the Feeders we’d seen on our way to Diego’s village; it was another thing to keep me away from Nelson.

  That was just unforgivable.

  His chin lifted when he caught my attention. He had rarely moved from that spot since we’d been sentenced to these places. He watched me constantly… vigilantly. With his shoulders pulled taut and his spine straight, he never took his eyes from where I was penned in across the yard.

  I couldn’t do what he did or watch him in the same way. I had a hard time looking at him and not being able to be near him or speak to him. I needed to touch him. I needed to press my skin against his, my heart against his, my lips against his.

  His attentiveness was reassuring, but if I didn’t find other things to occupy my time, I would go crazy.

  I would lose my mind.

  This was killing me.

  I let myself stare at him now, though. I had to. I had to assure my heart that he was still alive and my mind that he still existed.

  We had only been separated for a little bit, but I ached to be with him again. It was a real, physical pain that pounded inside of me. My heart was pulled like taffy, stretched in every direction as I tried to console myself that he was still alive and that one day I would get to be with him again.

  I didn’t know how I would make it happen or how we would escape this god-awful place, but I was positive somehow we would. In the deepest parts of me, I knew we would be together again.

  My baby kicked in my belly, reminding me that he was there and hopefully healthy. I rubbed the palm of my hand over the place he pressed against, feeling the tiny body part he pushed against me.

  I dipped my head and smiled to myself, a secret smile I had only learned once I realized I was pregnant. I relished this moment, despite the danger and frustration of our capture. Despite my burned skin from the unrelenting sun, my blistered lips and my parched throat. This child was a miracle, this life that Nelson and I had created. I had a beautiful life growing and thriving and living inside of me.

  In this ugly, hideous world, I carried something lovely. And when all around me death ruled and decay spread, I grew life and miracles and hope.

  A clicking sound made me lift my head and return to awful reality. A woman stood over me, her frightened gaze darting between our cage and another one down the row. She grew increasingly nervous as I watched her. She tapped her broken fingernails on the hot metal and bounced from foot to foot.

  There were fifteen of these square cells, all packed with people. I suspected there were actually more than that, but I couldn’t see them from here. Every once in a while one of the men that worked for Raphael would disappear around the house, only to return with a beaten, bedraggled human being.

  There were not that many guards here. Adela had been right. But the entirety of Raphael’s slaves was also trapped in metal cages that seemed impenetrable, at least for now.

  The woman made a low sound in the back of her throat, something like a growl or a warning.

  The air stilled around us. The slight breeze, our only reprieve from the glaring Mexican sun, receded back to a distant corner of the world. Time seemed to freeze and my heartbeat picked up instinctively.

  Something was about to happen.

  The door to Raphael’s house opened, revealing his young, beautiful wife and the small children that sometimes ran around the yard. He kissed her fully on the mouth, holding her aggressively by the jaw with his bear paw like hand. I winced for her; that had to hurt. But her adoring façade never fell. She stared up at him like he was the sun and moon.

  And to her, maybe he was.

  Either she was too afraid to behave any differently or she was grateful enough for his protection to have actually fallen in love with him.

  I hadn’t seen much of Raphael since he brought us here. He wasn’t as engaged with his prisoners as Matthias and Diego had been. I was fine with that up until this moment.

  Now I realized I didn’t know this
enemy at all. I didn’t know what to expect from him or what to fear.

  I didn’t have to wait long to find out, though.

  He walked to one of the cells several down from mine. Everyone shifted as he went. Prisoners tracked his movements and rushed to the other side of their cells to get a better look.

  Raphael lifted two thick fingers to his lips and whistled loudly. His men responded, racing down to help him. He lifted a clunky set of keys and dangled them in front of the cell.

  Nausea twisted my insides. I did not like the way this was going or the delighted look my captors now wore.

  The prisoners in my cell huddled closer together and I wasn’t sure they meant to. They shrunk to the middle of this small space, their shoulders hunching over protruding rib bones. The woman that had first got my attention cocked her head, beckoning me to join them.

  While I had no trust left for humanity, some kind of new motherly instinct urged me to move. I pulled myself to my feet, wrapped my hands around my belly and stepped into the sweaty, petrified press of bodies.

  A swoosh of metal echoed through the wilderness and I jumped from the shockingly loud sound of metal clanking against metal. All of the slaves jumped and shouted in equal surprise. They clutched each other’s threadbare clothing and shook with palpable fear.

  I lifted up on my tip toes, anxious to find out what was happening. Silence prevailed for endless minutes, until the pounding of uneven footsteps racing against baked dirt finally reached us. A pit yawned in my stomach, opening up a chasm of terror I had not yet felt before. I didn’t jump when the first Feeder screeched loudly, tearing apart the muffled silence with his unearthly shriek.

  I didn’t jump because I didn’t need to. I wasn’t surprised anymore. I knew exactly what was happening.

  Raphael took one of the keys and moved to unlock the cell in front of him. The people in the cell fell to their knees, pleading desperately for him to keep their door locked.

  I couldn’t see his face from where I stood, but I watched his shoulders shake with laughter. I swallowed down the bile his amusement caused to rise.

  Just as he yanked the metal door open, twenty Feeders careened around the side of the house. They sprinted with their ungodly speed, hunting for the prey they knew they could find. Their stench rolled off of them in waves. I felt it curl around my nostrils and burn in my stomach. I wanted to turn away from their hideously rotten faces and those ominously crimson eyes, but I couldn’t.

  I had to watch this.

  I had to know what was to come.

  Some of the prisoners in that open cell shrunk back as far as they could go. They clutched to the hot metal like it would somehow save them. Others sprinted out of their cage, hoping to outrun the manic Zombies.

  Raphael and his men didn’t bother to run or even move out of their way. They lifted their guns and made sure their green armbands were showing. That was all it took to keep the Feeders from tearing them to pieces.

  The prisoners were not so lucky.

  I eventually had to look away. Their carnage was overwhelming. I buried my face in my hands and tried to think about anything… everything else.

  It didn’t work.

  I could still hear the sounds of flesh tearing from bones and the hungry chewing sounds the Feeders made when they devoured their prey. Necks were snapped, bones were broken, men and women screamed out as they were forced to die in the most excruciating way possible.

  I sunk back to the ground and clutched my knees to my chest. I rocked back and forth, back and forth, back and forth as I struggled to force the world to make sense again.

  This didn’t make sense.

  None of this did.

  People didn’t behave like this.

  Humanity couldn’t be this depraved.

  I lifted my eyes, searching for some kind of hold on reality. I was lost in the storm and in desperate need of a lighthouse to guide my way. I had started to drift off, through the atmosphere, into the space outside of this world and I needed a tether to keep me grounded.

  My gaze crashed into Nelson’s and I found the anchor I needed.

  His blue eyes held me with such a fierce intensity, I felt his love, his loyalty and his determination wrap around my skin and bring me back down.

  How could I believe we were hopeless, when I had a man like him to hold onto me?

  He was absolutely everything to me.

  If I lost him to that… to those Zombies because Raphael needed to feed them… Well, to be honest, I didn’t believe I would survive that.

  The Zombies were eventually corralled back in their pen. Or at least, I had to assume that’s where Raphael and his men were taking them when they shot their guns in the air. The Feeders hauled their prey with them. The sound of bodies sliding along the dirt would haunt me for a very long time.

  Some of them were still alive, screaming in Spanish. I couldn’t understand them, but I knew what they were saying. If I were them I would be begging for someone to kill me, to end the suffering.

  Nobody relaxed after the Zombies disappeared. I started to worry that Raphael was going to open another cell or start shooting people just for fun, but apparently there were worse things that could happen in Raphael’s territory than being chosen for Zombie tribute.

  I scrambled back to my feet when the bodies around me started shuffling nervously. I was worried someone would step on me. They weren’t exactly the most accommodating cellmates.

  My arms once again rested over my belly. I had never known anything like this before. I had never felt such a protective instinct to care for something so ferociously in my life. One day I had been happily selfish and carefree… or as carefree as one can be in a Zombie Apocalypse and the next, I realized I was pregnant and would kill, destroy, burn-to-the-ground-until-they-were-nothing-but-a-pile-of-ash anything that tried to touch my baby.

  The murderous thoughts for those cannibals that still drifted through my head scared even me.

  But I would always do whatever it took to give this little guy whatever chance he had to survive.

  Raphael started to move in our direction. The people around me grew jittery and frightened. I felt like a wild animal caged with rabid ones. They bumped into me roughly and didn’t seem to care when I was pushed against metal bars.

  “Back off!” I growled at them.

  They pretended not to hear me.

  We might not be able to speak each other’s language, but back off was a pretty universal sentiment.

  The anxiety in the cage sky rocketed when Raphael walked casually over to us. I was still pushed into the bars. I had managed to turn my stomach to the side, but still had to worry about my smooshed face.

  By the time Raphael stood in front of us, everyone had backed away again and I could peel myself off of the rusted bars.

  The dictator-at-large started speaking rapidly in Spanish to our group. I had no idea what he was saying, but I held hope that he wasn’t planning on feeding me to Feeders because he didn’t pull out his keys to dangle in front of us.

  Raphael asked a question and when nobody answered, he took a step closer and repeated it with less patience.

  Someone behind me finally spoke up in a voice just above a whisper.

  Raphael’s sharp eyes found me and he surveyed me from top to bottom. A lascivious sneer appeared on his face; his eyebrows shot up and disappeared beneath a full head of hair. He stared at my belly with a glint in his eyes that made me want to shove a knife through his jugular.

  He started speaking again and it appeared that he was speaking to me. I had just one minor issue with that. I didn’t speak Spanish. Not even a little bit.

  In high school I took German.

  Why in the world, did I take German?

  Oh, because half of the football team took German… God, boys ruined everything!

  He spoke more things I couldn’t understand and then turned around and walked into the house. His men moved into action. They descended on our cage with practic
ed efficiency. More keys were produced and soon our door was slid open.

  I shrunk into the corner, afraid of everything I’d already dismissed. I was about to be Feeder food after all.

  A truck, the size of a Uhaul, pulled up. Men jumped down from the cab and opened the sliding gate on the back. They want to put me inside of there, I realized, fresh panic spiking through me.

  Men waved impatiently at me with their guns raised and pointed at my belly. I refused to move though.

  Fear froze me. I had never been immovable in my life. My fingers wrapped around the hot bars and I jammed my foot through the small squares the metal made, hooking it firmly so that nothing could drag me away.

  I searched through the clustered crowd to find Nelson, to make eye contact with him so I could know I would be all right.

  But there was too much chaos. I couldn’t find him! My heart rate picked up until the pounding in my chest beat painfully. My stomach clenched tight enough that I was worried for the baby, but I had to find Nelson.

  I had to!

  Men pushed into the cage and started dragging my cellmates away. One man fought back and they shot him. They just shot him. There was no argument or struggle or anything. All the man did was resist someone manhandling him out of the cell and they shot him.

  Oh, god.

  For the first time in my chaotic life, I truly believed I would die from fear. I felt the sharp stabbing of terror lash through my body; I couldn’t catch a real breath. I started panting, desperate to pull in oxygen, but nothing helped. My peripheral vision started to darken. A high-pitched sound rang through my ears.

  I lifted my eyes again, more frantic to find Nelson than ever. A man stepped in front of me and gestured toward the door.

  I couldn’t resist him or I would be shot, too.

  The man’s gaze dropped to my belly. My t-shirt was stretched and torn, but it clung to my stomach, outlining the baby growing inside. I was too skinny everywhere else to be anything but obviously pregnant.

  Something surprising flashed in my captor’s eyes. It wasn’t quite sympathy, but maybe… pity? I expected to be pushed and beaten, but instead the man lifted his gun and pointed toward the truck. He didn’t touch me.