by Eli Constant
“Oh my god. Oh my god.” My throat was raspy. The monster inside gone, my only companion now was fear.
I waited for them to bite me, to sink their yellowing, busted teeth into my flesh.
For the death I’d been running from to finally come to fruition.
But they didn’t.
I rolled off the pile of zombies beneath me. They stayed against the ground, the seas of dead still standing moving around them as if my falling into their prison was barely a drop in the ocean. Nothing to care about.
Nothing to eat.
Staying as low as possible to avoid attention, I sneaked toward the shallow end. It was the only way out, from what I’d seen standing on the crates. If I could get to the vehicle, I could shimmy beneath it and be free.
Slowly, foot by foot, I army-crawled my way. Every few seconds, my eyes flicked to my knuckles and shirt. The man’s blood was drying, and I hoped the scent of it was too weak for the zombies walking around me to notice.
Just a little further.
I felt like I might die of fear before I found freedom.
And I couldn’t think on the fact that I was crawling through a hundred zombies…and none of them were attacking me.
What is happening to me? God, what is happening to me?
I was at the wall of the shallow end, the vehicle just above me.
I’d have to stand up now.
Bodies pressed against me as I lifted to a standing position. I waited, letting one of the dead dressed in a disintegrating floral dress push into me as it walked mindlessly. There was a gaping hole in her chest, oozing pus, and it slimed against me as she passed. I gagged.
Grabbing the side of the pool, I lifted myself onto the edge of it quickly. The gap in the cinder blocks was three feet wide. The vehicle was lower to the ground than was comfortable, but I managed to slide my body beneath it, back pressed into the hard surface that used to be the deck around the pool. I used the undercarriage to pull myself beneath.
The sun on my face as my head emerged from the other side was like fucking heaven.
“What in the actual fuck,” a voice boomed, so close I could feel the air circulate toward me as the person moved.
Hands gripped beneath my arms, pulling me the rest of the way out. He let go of me once I was standing, his features contorted, his words intimidating. “I told you to stay in the goddamn bathroom, Sam. I told you it wasn’t fucking safe. If you keep this up, I can’t protect you.”
“Barrett,” I breathed, relief flooding me. I fell against him, body shuddering. I didn’t even care that he was angry. Or that I was covered in zombie goo. I only cared that he was there.
He didn’t respond to me saying his name. His gaze was now fixed on the vehicle I’d just crawled under. And past that…the horde of zombies.
“You were in there,” he said it as a statement, not a question. Some of the menace in his expression faded. I nodded weakly.
“There was a man chasing me.” I was exhausted, but I forced the words out. “I kept running and I tried to hide, but he found me. We fought.”
“Yeah. I figured that part out when I tried to find you. Jackson looks like shit.” Barrett’s voice was stern, but his eyes were twinkling. “I found him cradled in a fucking ball near Nathan’s pool.”
“What did he say?” I asked quickly, mind racing. I meant it when I’d said I’d kill him if he touched me again, but his words also rang in my head.
Sins don’t turn against Sins.
“You think a man like that’s going to admit that a woman like you kicked his ass?” He chuckled, the sound a quiet thunder. “You’ve made an enemy though, Sam.”
“I’ll kill him if he tries anything,” I growled, feeling the monster inside tipping her hat in appreciation.
Barrett gripped my shoulders and stared at me, expression considering and thoughtful as he watched my face…my eyes. “I believe you. But we need to talk.” He pointed at the vehicle and cinderblock wall. “Because you just dropped into a motherfucking truckload of zombies and came out of it alive. That’s…”
“Not normal.” I crossed my arms, trying to hold myself together.
“Fucking impressive,” he countered, “but you’re also a goddamn idiot for leaving the bathrooms like that.”
I couldn’t speak, shoulders slumped and feeling the weight of that stupid choice like the world was perched against my body. Atlas at the end of the world.
Barrett spoke again, cutting into the silence. “Come on. You’re the one who needs a shower now. And we don’t want Smiley finding us here.”
“Smiley?” I smirked, despite the hollowed-out feeling in my body from the adrenaline subsiding.
“Runs the fighting arena. And you just fell into his pit of dead gladiators.”
I gaped, mouth hanging open. “He fights…zombies?”
“Against humans.” Barrett had me by the upper arm, his fingers digging into my flesh harshly as he led me away.
“Against humans…” I breathed out.
Just when I thought the world couldn’t get any sicker.
Just when I thought I’d seen the worst of things.
The apocalypse was the gift that kept on giving.
And what was I? Where did I belong in this apocalypse?
Not entirely human, but not entirely monster either.
Chapter Six.
Rose
“I’ll be right back, ladies,” Nathan said as he left the small room, locking the door behind him.
I immediately ran to the window, climbing up onto a small side table to get a better reach at the lock. It made no difference though; I could see immediately that it wasn’t going to open. Paint sealed it shut and bars were on the outside. That window hadn’t been opened in a long-arse time, if ever.
I jumped back down and turned back to the room, assessing every detail while ignoring the other women’s gazes on me. I went to the door, despite knowing it was locked because I’d heard the bolt slide across it, and I tried the handle. Of course it turned but didn’t open.
“Fuck,” I muttered under my breath. With hands on my hips, I turned to the other women who were quietly talking amongst themselves, wondering if I could rile them all up enough to help me charge the door and break the lock.
Sandra and Destiny were watching me, both with different expressions. Sandra had sympathy; she recognized the caged animal in me. She got it. But Destiny was the opposite. She just looked annoyed. As if my eye contact had set her in motion, she stormed towards me, hands on hips.
“You could have gotten me in serious shit out there,” she whisper-yelled, her furious gaze burning into me. “What the hell is wrong with you!”
It wasn’t a question, of course.
Little miss Destiny had her eyes on the main prize—Nathan—and she didn’t want me or anyone else ruining that outcome for her. Maybe she saw him as her way out of this life…the whoring life; maybe she genuinely liked him and wanted him for herself. Who the heck knew.
Before I could answer her, the sound of the lock sliding back across the other side of the door broke through the tension and I turned around as the door opened. Nathan was stood there, his handsome face looking surprised to see me so close to the door.
“You excited to get out there, Rose?” he asked, the hint of humor in his voice making me feel sick. He pointed at me with a wide smile. “See, I knew you were going to fit right in here with us. Like one big happy family, aren’t we girls.” He slung an arm over my shoulders and pulled me close. Nausea clawed my throat at his touch and I struggled to not show it on my face. Or maybe it was at the fear of what was going to happen next that had me wanting to puke my guts out.
How the hell was I going to get out of this?
I knew that my options were vanishing as quickly as the seconds—if there even were any options to begin with.
“All right, let’s get going out there,” Nathan said, his arm still holding me hostage as he stepped to one side to let the other women o
ut.
Another man was on the other side of the doorway and he nodded at Nathan before walking away, guiding the women with him. Nathan turned to me suddenly, pressing my back into the hard wall behind me. One hand came up to stroke down my face as his hazel eyes swam in and out of focus as I tried to hold back my tears.
“You remember our deal about you being a good girl for me, Rose?” he asked, his voice low.
I nodded like one of those little plastic dogs that you sat on your dashboard, their heads bobbing along with the movement of the car. That was me right then, bobbing along with Nathan because he scared the shit out of me. He was all handsome and charming, but I could feel the evil seeping from his skin, the darkness that surrounded him, shrouded by his beauty. He was bad through and through, dressed up as a prince.
Nathan smiled and leaned over, placing a kiss on my forehead that made me shudder right through to my bones. “That’s good. Because if you embarrass me out there, there’ll be hell to pay. Got it?”
I nodded, my mouth dry like I’d swallowed sand.
“You girls are for the aftershow,” he said, finally standing upright and giving me some distance.
“Aftershow?” I stupidly asked.
Nathan smiled wider. “Yeah, you get to watch the show before you earn your keep. See how good I am to you?”
His hand gripped my bicep as he led me from the room. My bare feet felt like they were walking through cement, each step forwards dragging more than the last. The sound of people cheering and the low growl of the dead brought my attention forwards and I cringed as Nathan pushed through a curtain that covered a small doorway leading out to an arena of sorts.
I winced against the brightness and the sounds and the smells before me, trying to take everything in as quickly as I could. Nathan shoved me down into a seat next to one of the other women, her attention rapt to the arena below us.
It looked like it used to be a wave pool or something. It was longer than it was wide, with high walls at one end and metal fencing fixed to the other end to stop anyone—or anything—getting out. Seating benches like those you would find at a dolphin show at a waterpark or concert were arranged at the shallow end, and that was where were all sitting, looking down on the manmade arena of sorts. I look around at the other people I was sat with to get a better sense on what my odds of escape were, but quickly decided that they were pretty crappy given that everyone there was armed to the teeth with guns and knives, and looking like they spent the night in a prison cell for murderers…
I looked back down into the arena, noticing the two large cages at opposite sides. Both were filled with people, though as I looked closer I realized that only one was actually filled with people. The other was zombies.
And then I realized it.
I got it.
The little alarm bell in my head went off like a siren.
I finally flipped the page and began to read the same damned book as everyone else…
This was a fighting arena.
A fighting arena for the living and the dead.
My heart started to beat heavily in my chest, the nausea back again. I didn’t want to be there. In fact, I wanted to be as far away from there as I could be. My body began trembling of its own accord—knees bouncing, muscles trembling, hands curled into balls to stop them from shaking.
I knew what I was about to watch and I simply couldn’t bear it. I couldn’t watch that again. I couldn’t see more death. More cruelty. More evil. I couldn’t stand the smell of blood and rot in the air, the taste of it on my tongue.
I was going to puke.
My stomach heaved.
I stood up, needing to get out of there. Right then I’d have done whatever Nathan told me to if I could just leave…just get away from that arena. Because I knew it wouldn’t be long before I watched man versus zombie in a bloodmatch to the death, and I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t.
“Rose,” Nathan warned as I looked around me, desperate to run. He was slouched in a chair, a beer in his hand resting on his jean-clad leg like a man with no concerns in the world.
The scent of death was so strong in the air now that I felt dizzy with it.
Nathan was sat with a group of men, one of them exceptionally large. Like, he made Jabba the Hutt look like he’d been on a slimming world diet. That’s how big he was. All eyes had turned to me, but it was Nathan that I focused on because only he could get me away from there.
“Please,” I begged, my voice quivering. “I can’t be here…”
His blue eyes turned a darker shade, and his handsome smile turned into a snarl. “Sit the fuck down, Rose.”
“Please,” I begged again, my gaze darting back over my shoulder towards the arena. “I can’t.”
His nostrils flared and he glanced over at the Jabba the Hutt lookalike, who smirked at me. “Sorry about this, Charlie, she’s new,” he apologized on my behalf. And I knew that that was going to cost me dearly.
The growl of the zombies below me seemed to grow louder and I glanced over my shoulder, watching as two men opened the gate and let one of them out. The zombie wore a pair of dirty pants that were torn up one leg to reveal a large gash so deep you could see right through to the bone. It was bald, like its hair had fallen out, and its cheeks were sunken in, making perfect concave holes in its face. It roamed aimlessly, its nose in the air while it tried to latch on to a scent.
That’s when they opened the other cage and dragged a man out of it. He was crying and fighting off the guards that were trying to evict him from his safe little cage, but he was thin and weak and no match for those men.
The guards let go of him.
The zombie shambled forwards, nose high in the air.
The crowd of people watching cheered and whooped like they were at a football game.
The man ran towards his now locked cage and shook the door in an attempt to get it open.
The guards had retreated somewhere and it was just the scared man and zombie.
Man versus monster.
The man pissed himself and I thought I might do the same thing.
I felt sick and dizzy and I turned back to Nathan as the zombie reached for the man and he screamed a scream so terrifying I decided that I’d rather be deaf than hear that scream again. It brought back so many memories of death and violence. Terror and pain. The screams and cries of so many people being torn apart by the dead.
And then his screams fell silent and the crowd cheered.
I sobbed and almost collapsed to the ground, my gaze pleading with Nathan.
“Sit the fuck down,” he ordered, his face not handsome at all anymore, but ugly and hateful.
The creak of another gate opening made me look back as another man was dragged out of the cage in preparation for another unfair fight with the dead. And that’s when I moved.
I dived forwards, my feet taking me stumbling away from the death below. Nathan dived for me, letting go of his beer. He’d already predicted my movement before I had even known I was going to do it. His arms latched around my waist, too tight, and I gasped for air as I lashed out at him.
“Tut tut, little Rose,” he snarled in my ear.
But I didn’t care. I didn’t bloody care. I just needed to get the hell away from that place. I couldn’t see another death. See the blood. Hear the tearing of flesh. Smell the death in the air.
“Get her out of here,” Jabba ordered, his voice angry but his face looking satisfied by my fear.
I managed to squirm around in Nathan’s grip until we were chest to chest, our bodies so close that we breathed the same air, and I clung to him like he was my savior instead of my tormentor. I looked up into his face, my body trembling.
“Please, get me out of here,” I begged. “I’m going to throw up if you don’t, I swear to God I will.”
Nathan’s face was still hard, his expression angry, but he obeyed…not me, but Jabba. He gripped my waist tightly and spun me away from him while still keeping a firm hold on me.
“Sorry about this, Charlie. She’s new, I’ll bring her to heel for you,” Nathan said, and Jabba—Charlie—nodded.
“Make it happen or I’ll find you a more suitable position,” he grunted, turning his gaze back to the arena.
Nathan pulled on my arm, tugging me out of there, but not before I took one last fleeting glance into the arena. I gasped as the curtain closed, hiding the view from me, and I followed Nathan back down the hallway quietly, wondering if I had really just seen Nolan being pulled from the cage, ready for battle. God, I hoped not. He stood no chance of surviving it.
The thought hit me hard, practically winding me.
I was going to lose Sam and Nolan.
I’d finally be all alone in this hell.
Nathan dragged me back into the previous room, shoving me so hard that I fell on the hard ground, crying out in pain as the floor scraped the skin off my knees. I scrambled to the other side of the room and started to stumble back up when Nathan slammed the door closed behind him.
He looked furious.
He looked worse than furious.
I had embarrassed him and made his boss doubt his control.
Threatening to put him in a different position than this. And if there was one thing I’d learned about Nathan in my short time of being there, it was that he bloody loved his job.
Nathan glared down at me, his jaw ticking in anger as his dark blue eyes assessed me, deciding what my punishment would be.
“I’m sorry,” I said, my words almost a sob. It was the only thing I could think to say, even though I knew it would be highly insufficient.
Sorry wasn’t the hardest word to say. It was the easiest.
“Get undressed and come here,” he finally said, his hands moving to his belt.
“What?” I squeaked out, my voice barely a whisper. I watched his strong hands move over the latch of his belt, unbuckling it without even taking his gaze off me.
