by Amy Miles
He gags again and cups his mouth with his clean hand. I pat his back as he gulps in huge breaths of air but that is a mistake. The instant he is assaulted by the pungent scent he throws himself to the side and wretches.
Sinking down beside him, I swivel my head back and forth, keeping a close eye on both directions to make sure that we aren’t about to be ambushed. I can feel the Flesh Bags in the distance but none is near enough for me to be alarmed yet. What does alarm me is the sheer numbers that we are approaching. It’s almost like they have congregated.
“How are you doing over there?” I whisper.
From somewhere down the hall I hear a groan and instantly tense. My fingers flex around the ax handle as I peer into the dark. I can’t see anything but there is something definitely alive down there but I can’t sense that it’s a Flesh Bag.
“I’m good now.” He wipes at his face and I don’t have the heart to tell him that he’s actually just smeared more of the gore across his cheek.
“Good, because we’ve got company.” Hooking my hand around his, I help hoist him to his feet. We’ve barely begun to move forward when I spy movement up ahead and shove Flynn back a step. He instantly drops to the floor, just as I told him to do if I alerted him to danger.
“What is it?” he whispers.
I don’t answer as I squint in an attempt to make out exactly what it is that I’m seeing. There is something moving on the floor. It is hard to see clearly from this distance but it looks like a snake.
“I’m not sure. I’m going to check it out.” Jiggling the door handle beside me, I open the door and peer inside. Rapping my knuckles against the door, I wait a few seconds just to be sure nothing is inside ready to charge us and then shove Flynn inside. “Stay here and stay down. If anything comes through that door without announcing their name first I want you to start swinging. Got it?”
“Wait, you can’t just leave me here! You need me.”
I place a hand on his shoulder, meaning the gesture to be reassuring but in my haste I slam him against the wall with a bit too much force and his head smacks into the drywall. “Shit, Flynn. I’m sorry. I guess that I’m more rattled than I thought. Just do me a favor and barricade the door so that I don’t have to worry about you, okay?”
“Avery, wait!” But I don’t wait. Instead, I turn and slam the door shut and hope that I haven’t just smashed his nose in when he tried to follow me. Kicking at the door across the hall from me, I slam my foot into it three times before it hinges give way and it slams to the ground.
“Well, if they didn’t know I was here before they sure as hell do now.” I grab the damaged door and shove it against Flynn’s, creating a temporary wedge brace that will not last long once the Withered catch his scent but it will maybe give me a chance to get back in time to help.
Inside the room, I can hear him pounding his fist against the door and messing with the lock.
“Stop making noise,” I hiss, pressing my face to the crack in the door. “Do you want to tell the whole floor where you are?”
“No, but I want to help you. That’s why I came with you, remember?”
“I know.” I sigh and wipe sweat from my forehead. It is too hot in this small space and I suddenly feel confined. I want to run, to climb, to fight and to kill.
Shaking my head, I shove aside those thoughts. They are not my own.
“I like you, kid. Just let me deal with what’s up ahead and once the coast is clear I’ll come back for you, okay?”
There is only silence in response for a moment and I’m about to walk away when I hear a hollow, “I’m not a kid anymore. You don’t have to protect me.”
I don’t know what to say in response since I’m not that much older than Flynn. A few years extra years is hardly enough to make seeing this shit acceptable. The horrors I have experience haunt my dreams and fill m waking thoughts. I would give anything to have someone willing to protect me from it all, but there was never anyone like that. Cable would have tried but in the end, it would have caught up with me all the same.
“I know, Flynn, but there are some things that can’t be unseen. You told me earlier that you lost your family and you’ve been fighting to survive ever since. Well, this is me giving you that chance. You can hate me later but just stay alive long enough to do that, okay? After this is over you and Nox can both take a swing at me.”
Jogging down the hall away from Flynn, I try to stretch out my senses to feel the Withered. Like a mental thermal blip, I sense several of them in rooms up ahead moving about but they are not in attack mode. They seem to be searching for something.
I can’t even begin to fathom what a zombie would need from a place like this or how a mindless creature could focus on a single task, but then a thought strikes me that make shivers run through my body...what if they aren’t really mindless at all?
The awareness that I sensed earlier was different from any that I had felt before. It bordered the authority that I felt from the alpha Flesh Bag that sank his teeth into my neck but this presence is something more, something both powerful and controlling. That is why the Withered are acting differently. They are being led.
An alpha on the premises is proving to be strong enough to send out a some sort of telepathic signal to coordinate the attack. I should have realized it sooner. This breach is too thought out and far too advanced for a Withered to conceive on their own. They may be intelligent but they are still ruled by their based instincts.
Someone has to be controlling them and the instant I allow myself to consider the possibilities I begin to wonder if that someone might just be like me.
As I round the corner and try to shove that disturbing thought aside, I spy the long snake wiggling on the ground and hurry to catch up, but it’s only when I’m right on top of it that I realize it’s not a snake at all but half eaten intestines trailing behind a dying man. The thick blood that trail he leaves behind like a slimy slug smears his pants and mingles with other puddles of blood as he weaves through fallen soldiers.
I pause only a second to check each face, praying that I don’t see Cyrus among them. The relief that I feel when I don’t is immense. That means Nox still has a fighting chance.
“Help me,” the man calls out when he hears my approach and I hurry to his side. Rolling him gently onto his back, I stare at the horrid gaping hole that was once his cheek. His skin and muscle have been gnawed down to the bone and each time he opens his mouth to speak, I can see his teeth clicking together.
The young man is dressed in a blue onesie maintenance uniform. Chunks of long white-blond hair have been ripped clean away, leaving patches of bare skin over his skull. One hand bears signs of nails chipped and torn away from dragging himself along the tile floor. His other is soaked in blood as he fights to keep his stomach inside his body.
“What’s your name?” I ask, glancing down the hall. There are four zombies less than fifty feet from me. I can hear their grunts and things being knocked over inside a room but none has taken notice of my presence yet.
“Henry,” he wheezes.
“That’s a nice name.” I press my knee into his chest and yank at the sleeves on his jumper but they have been mended several times and the knots hold strong. Slicing the cloth with my ax blade, I tear strips of cloth away. “I’m going to have to try to cover your wound.”
“No.” He shakes his head. “There’s no point. It’s too late for me.”
We both know that his fate is sealed. That first bite did him in but seeing the fear in his eyes won’t allow me to just give up. Turning into a zombie is bad enough but to allow him to lie there and be eaten is something I just can’t do.
“It will help with the pain until...” I can’t bring myself to say the words.
Rolling his head to the side, Henry stares at the ax lying on the ground beside my knee. “Please, help me.”
Whe
n he rolls his head back to look at me, I see the resignation in his eyes and know that he was never really asking for help. He was asking for a mercy kill.
“No. ” I back away from him when he tries to reach out for me. When he inches his torso toward my ax, I shove it away. “Don’t ask that of me.”
“You have no idea how much this hurts.”
Tears slip through my lashes as I close my eyes and am violently thrust back into the cave with Cable. He had asked of me the same thing—to save him from becoming an empty vessel and to give him the end that he wanted. This man might be a complete stranger but he is a life, a living breathing being. Ending him now might be merciful but it was also murder and I have buckets of spilled blood on my hands already.
“I can’t.” I push back from him. “I’m so sorry.”
Using the wall to aid my efforts to stand, I find myself weakened by the pain leaching from my heart. Damn you, Cable! You did this to me! You made me weak!
“Don’t leave me!”
The man’s cries follow me as I step over him and run. I don’t stop to think of where I am going or when I will stop. I run until a cramp pinches in my side and the man is long behind me. The Flesh Bags never try to stop me as I run past and I don’t slow down long enough to tangle with them. I can only hope that someone else will stumble across poor Henry and do what I could not.
It is only when I stop to catch my breath that I remember I left Flynn behind.
“Shit!”
I turn back to go and get him and slam straight into a tall fleshy chest. The monster standing before me is nearly a foot taller than me. His shoulders are broad and the tattoo on his upper right arm nearly indistinguishable under his peeling skin. Startling milky white eyes stare down at me, both unblinking and yet oddly focused.
A breath rattles in its chest as it blocks my path but it does not attack. Instead, it stands perfectly still.
Why did I not sense it sooner? In my panic to escape Henry, I must have blinded myself to its presence. Perhaps emotion drove me to distraction? Or, as a darker thought strikes me and chills race down my spine, I realize that somehow this particular Flesh Bag may have found a way to block my thoughts entirely.
With each step that I take backward, it advances, keeping pace with me without ever drawing too near. It ushers me down the hall with nearly silent footfalls.
From somewhere behind my back, I hear approaching voices. The zombie goes still and raises its head to sniff the air. Its cracked lips peel back over crooked and bloody teeth as a growl rumbles deep in its chest.
“I’m telling you it’s this way,” an unfamiliar voice echoes down the hall. “Cyrus said to follow this corridor on around and we would meet up with him at the rendezvous point.”
“How do we even know Cyrus is still alive? There are bodies everywhere and here we are playing tag in the dark.” This voice sounds higher in pitch and squeaky. I recognize it as Warren, the punk kid with a seriously annoying personality. Why Nox ever stood up for him I’ll never know.
“We stick to the plan until we hear otherwise,” a female voice barks out. From just around the corner I see the first flicker of light over my shoulder. The Flesh Bag behind me begins to weave and I’m suddenly caught up in a tidal wave of rage.
“Flesh bag straight around the corner,” I scream and dive for the floor.
The zombie screeches and makes a wild swing for me but it’s torso jerks and sprays blood as multiple rounds of bullets slam into its chest. I try yelling out to aim higher but my voice is lost to the ricocheting sound of gunfire. Still the creature struggles forward, slowed by the bullets but driven by unsated hunger. It reaches for me, sinking its cracked nails into my arm before I can get away.
It could have attacked me at any time. Why does it now decide to try to eat me? Has its rage overruled whatever is controlling it? Is it possible that mingled in with its anger is a spike of fear that makes it disobey?
Probing it’s thought to try to understand its reaction, I lick my lips and breathe in deep, smelling the small group of people behind me. When I feel my stomach clench with desire I slam my left fist into the wall and the flood of pain clears my thoughts.
Rolling against the wall, I kick my foot out and wrap it around the backside of the Flesh Bag’s knee to bring it crashing to the ground. The instant the gunfire ceases I bring my ax down over my head and sink it deep into the zombie’s skull. It splits with far more ease than I could have imagined and a blackish ooze seeps out onto the floor.
“It’s okay,” I call out, using the wall to prop myself up. “It’s dead.”
Several pairs of boots race around the corner toward me and I hold up my hand to shield myself from their lights.
“Holy shit, that’s a big one.” A man sinks down onto his haunches and pokes at the Withered with the tip of his gun then he turns to give me a hard look. “Are you with Cyrus’ group?”
“Hell no, she ain’t!” Warren says and pushes to the front of the group of six people. “She’s that girl I told you about who got Zoey killed and messed up Nox!”
The man beside me tightens his grip on his weapon. “That true, miss?”
Clutching my arm, I push back against the wall and look at the floor. It hurts too much to look anywhere near their lights. “I tried to save her.”
“I thought the girl from your story died, Warren. You said she got bit after she went nuts and jumped down into the hot zone and Cap had to put her down.”
I glance up at the girl who just spoke and make out shoulder length dirty blond hair falling around her shoulders from a tight bun. Her features are severe and her expression grim. Considering the hell they’ve just walked through I am surprised that she’s as clean as she is.
“That’s what I was told too, Hadley. It seems that someone has some explaining to do.” Warren stares down at me with mounting suspicion.
“Look, I’m not going to sit here and shoot the shit. Zoey died and that really sucks. I liked her and she didn’t deserve to go out like that. I am still alive and saving you asses. If you want more details than that then you’ll have to chat with Nox back at the armory. If you want to survive, I suggest you tell me how to get to the generator and then get out the hell of my way.”
“Whoa, easy there little lady,” the man beside me says, pushing back on my shoulder when I reach for my ax. The name on his camouflage shirt says Monroe and I realize that I’ve seen him before. He was part of the group that came to the farmhouse but I haven’t seen him since that day.
The bossy girl above him narrows her eyes when she sees me looking but Monroe holds out his hands between us as if he could prevent the oncoming fight. She might look tough but there is zero doubt that I could take her even before my mutations. This girl relies far too much on that fancy gun of hers.
“I think we all just need to take a breather and we can figure this out,” Monroe says.
I laugh and press my head back against the wall. “You have no fucking clue what you just walked into, do you?”
“What’s that?” Warren asks.
“A trap,” I smile up at him, feeling bone weary and resigned to my fate. “That Flesh Bag you just filled with lead wasn’t trying to kill me. It was ushering me.”
SEVENTEEN
Unease spreads through the small ground surrounding me as each of them begin to shine their lights in both directions down the hall. I know that it won’t make any difference. The Withered are coming.
“She’s lying,” Warren says in a high pitch voice that I’m beginning to realize he uses only when he’s terrified, which feels like pretty much all of the time.
“I’m not.”
Monroe shifts on the balls of his feet to stare at me, still crouching close enough for me to smell the stench of sweat and body odor on him. “Care to tell us why that thing didn’t just shred you where you stood?”
The punch that comes from my right catches me off guard and my cheek slams into the wall, bruising my cheekbone.
“That’s enough, Hadley,” Monroe growls and stares up at the girl.
When I roll my head back to glare up at her, I do not see fear in her eyes. Instead, I see rage but it is nothing compared to what the Flesh Bags live with. “She thinks this is some sort of sick joke. I say we leave her behind and let the Flesh Bags have her for a snack.”
“You could do that,” I muse, wiping the blood from my cheek. I’m not even sure it belongs to me but the girl sure packs a hell of a punch. “Or you could help me save your friends.”
“How’s that?” Monroe asks. When Hadley clenches her fist again, he shakes his head and she submits with a show of reluctance. “What are you doing down here all alone?”
“We have to get the lights back on.”
Warren snorts. “She’s afraid of the dark!”
“No,” I snarl back at him, annoyed with his attitude and persistent hatred of me. “Those things will be blinded. Why do you think they disabled the generator in the first place?”
Hadley scoffs and taps her gun against her hip. “The Flesh Bags didn’t do that. They aren’t capable of that kind of thinking.”
“Aren’t they?” I push myself to a standing position so quickly that the soldiers rear back.
“How did she—”
“Do this?” I cut Warren off by seizing him by the throat and lifting him high off the ground with his back pressed against the wall. Although he is slight in stature his weight should have still made it impossible to lift and yet I do so without straining. “You were right, Warren. I did get bitten. Funny enough, I seem to be the only person in this whole place who is immune to the virus so now I am special.
I know things that you don’t and trust me when I tell you we don’t have much time. Either stay and help me or get the hell out of my way because this place is swarming with Flesh Bags and without me, you don’t stand a chance. You are on their ground now and they aren’t here to play.”
