Suddenly, a horrific scream echoed down the hallway. It was followed by a choking gasp and then several sobs. A voice could be heard talking gently, soothingly. Then another scream raced to our ears.
“What the hell?” I said.
“That’s why we have to hurry. Come on!” Jake moved faster, nearly plowing into Josh and the girls. There was a hurried reunion between Jake and Kayla, and then Jake was moving again. I dragged Josh behind me as we moved towards the source of the screams.
At the end of the hall, a doorway led to a wide space, and there was a lot of light coming from there. Jake moved without hesitation and disappeared through the doorway. As shouting came from the room, I turned to Josh and slammed his head into the wall, knocking him unconscious. I didn’t need to be burdened with him right now.
I took out my ‘hawk and entered the room, not really sure of what I’d find. What I thought I might see did not match at all with what I eventually forced my eyes to see for real.
Chapter 36
Kayla and Julia were standing to one side of the doorway holding hands while Kayla’s other hand covered her mouth. Julia covered the corner of the room with my gun. In that corner, the father of the boys was sitting with his pants down, evidently getting his pleasure out of watching what was going on in the room.
On a metal table lay a man, or what used to be one. His feet had been secured to the sides of the table, while his legs had been tied at the knees. His arms had been pulled cruelly over his head, tied down to a metal ring in the floor. A lamp hung over him, and next to the table was a number of surgical instruments, most of them bloody. The table had grooves to collect the blood, and a drum was slowly filling with it. His chest had been cut open, as well as his abdomen, and he was slowly bleeding to death. His lungs filled with air, and it exited him in a raspy wheeze.
Large drums by the table were filled with blood and body parts, several were recognizable as female. In one, a small girl’s head looked out from underneath her severed arm, her unblinking eyes filled with horror and pain.
Jake was standing over a woman who was kneeling next to the table. His eyes went back and forth between the body parts and the thing in front of him.
The woman was about fifty years old, with steel grey hair and dark eyes. She was thin, but I could see her bare arms were strong. She wore nothing but a long black apron and her hands were covered in think rubber gloves. Obviously she got some sort of pleasure too from the pain she caused.
“I wish I was sick enough to do to you what you’ve done to this man and his family,” Jake said quietly. “But I’m not that sick. I am sick enough to do something else, something you very much deserve.”
The woman’s head snapped up and she eyed Jake with more than a little suspicion. Her hand moved slightly, but Jake was already on it.
“You’d never make it, and making you bleed would just help what I have in mind,” Jake said.
The woman stopped moving.
“Aaron? Take that thing in the corner, and put him in one of the cells. If the kid is still out there, put him in another one,” Jake said. He went over to the man on the table and gently released his arms and legs. The man whispered something to Jake, and Jake looked at him before nodding.
I took the big man into one of the room, and held the pointy end of my axe under his chin as I secured him in the cuffs. That didn’t stop him from sneering.
“Looks like yer bleedin’ again,” he said.
I flicked my wrist and the blade of my ‘hawk sliced a cut deep enough to scrape his collarbone. His sudden intake of breath made me smile.
“You, too,” I said quietly.
I left and dragged the still unconscious body of Josh into the next cell and secured him to the wall. When I got back in the hallway, Jake was dragging the woman down the hall by her hair. Her face was a mask of rage, and I didn’t doubt she would try something. I followed Jake into the cell next to her son and helped him chain her to the wall. She kept pulling and kicking, and Jake finally had to bounce her head off of it to stun her into submission, but he was past caring how she felt.
Once he was finished, we went back to the slaughter room. I didn’t feel the need to talk, and all this activity made my head hurt again.
“Jake! Come here!” Kayla said, grabbing his arm. Julia came back into my arms and helped steady me.
“Hang on,” Jake said. He went over to the barrel of body parts, and using a large knife, he plunged it into the little girl’s head that was in there. If I didn’t know better, I swear the eyes watched him do it. I mentioned it to Kayla, and she nodded like she had seen the same thing.
Holding the knife clear, Jake went over to the man on the table. He held up the knife, and the man nodded. He uttered one word.
“Thanks.”
Jake took the knife and stabbed the man in the leg, backing away as the man flinched and spasmed in fresh pain.
“Let’s get out of here,” Jake said, taking Kayla’s hand.
“Wait, what the hell?” I said, watching the man twitch. “We can’t just leave him alive and like this,” I said.
“We can and we aren’t,” Jake said cryptically. “We need to go, come on. I’ll explain in the car.”
I followed Jake out, and as I did I heard the man breath his last rattling breath. I followed Jake upstairs, and as I did, I thought I heard the sound of feet hitting a concrete floor. Shaking it off as imagination, I reached the hallway just to have Jake close the door and secure it with a chair.
“Are we just going to leave those people chained to the wall?” Julia asked as we left the building and climbed back into the Jeep. I fell into the back seat, suddenly very light headed and tired.
“After I tell you what I know, you’ll want to set fire to the place,” Jake said as he put the vehicle in gear and drove off. Julia broke out the first aid kit and carefully took off my bandana, wincing as she saw the wound.
“Good thing you have a hard head, babe,” Julia said. She smiled, but I could see the tears starting again. I figured she was thinking again of what might have been.
We drove out of the area, getting back onto the road that brought us here. Jake was concentrating, and when he was comfortable he told us his story.
“When they took me into that cell, I was ready to kill something, but since I had no way of knowing if anyone was alive I had to bide my time. After they left me, I realized there was someone else in the room,” Jake said.
“The man on the table?” Kayla asked.
“Yep. Turns out he had been living in the area and there used to be a lot more people. But one by one families were disappearing. No one could figure out how entire families could disappear, so the logical thing was people just up and left. No one figured that one family could kidnap another.
“Finally, they came for his family. He woke up one night to find three strangers in his house, and then he was hit over the head and blacked out. He woke up in the cell. The sons took a lot of pleasure dragging his wife into the cell and raping her in front of him. The dad never bothered, but he liked to watch. The man screamed his throat raw trying to find out where his daughter was.”
Jake paused, and I could hear the tension in his voice. “One night he heard his wife’s screams down the hall. The mother had finally started her work on her. The sons would bring in a piece at a time that the mother would cut from his wife. When they brought in her heart, he thought he would go mad, but he consoled himself that she couldn’t hurt anymore.”
Julia asked in a small voice. “What about the little girl?”
Jake took a second. “They brought her into the cell, chained her to the wall across from him, and then deliberately infected her with the Enillo virus. They turned her into a zombie in front of him. They left her there for two weeks, pulling at her chains, trying to eat her father. Then one day they came for her, and he knew he was all alone.”
We were all silent, trying to figure out how any one person could be so depraved, let alone an en
tire family of them. Jake finished his story.
“After they took him away, I didn’t know what I was going to do. When I saw Aaron I knew I had to let the man get his revenge. I had hoped we would be able to save his life, but that woman was thorough,” Jake said.
“What did he thank you for?” I asked.
Jake smiled. “Granting him last wish.”
“What was that? Killing him?” Kayla asked.
“No, letting him get his revenge. His daughter’s head was in the bucket, and still alive as a zombie. I killed her, and used the knife to infect him,” Jake answered.
We all thought about that for a second, and I replied first.
“Son of a gun! That’s why we chained those people to the walls! He’s coming after them as a zombie!” I was amazed at the depth of the vengeance.
“But they’re chained to the walls,” Julia said.
Jake took that one. “That’s right. They’ll stay there until they rot away or someone kills them.”
I smiled at the thought. “Too bad we killed the other son. He deserved to die like that, too.”
Kayla patted my knee. “He’s dead. Call it a win.”
I nodded, making myself dizzy again, and nestled back into Julia’s lap. I tried not to think this was the worst we could encounter, because I was always proven wrong.
Chapter 37
“Do we ever get a break?”
“Doesn’t seem like it. On your left.”
“Thanks. Ever since we crossed the Gate, it seems like. Right center.”
“Got him. How’s your head, by the way? Right side, now.”
“Doesn’t hurt as much as it did. That’s the end of these guys. I’m going to see how the girls are doing.”
“I’ll check with the locals and see if they need any more help.”
Jake climbed off the rock he was sitting on and headed off to see if he could help the resident inhabitants of Swan valley with a little zombie invasion.
We had arrived in the valley on the evening of the day we left the nightmare of the town of Victor. At first look, this valley was perfectly situated to withstand a zombie invasion. They were surrounded by mountains on three sides, and the north side, which was not mountainous, had a fast river blocking entry. We learned there was a road that went south through the mountains that skirted a large lake that way, and likely that was where the zombies had come from. They had blocked off the road, but a rockslide had provided a convenient ladder for the zombies, and so the fun began.
When we had originally driven into town, the place seemed abandoned, but then we found about forty people holed up in a building, mostly older people and kids. They told us where to go.
We reached the battle line and found a red-faced man trying to rally his troops. The zombies were making a pretty good advance, and his people were on the verge of breaking when we arrived. Julia and Kayla grabbed their rifles and just started going to work. Jake and I took up a position on the other side and started banging away with what we could reach. The red-faced man called all his people back and let us get to work.
Jake and I busied ourselves with stragglers, ones that tended to wander outside an attack before committing. Those were usually the older, more evolved zombies. The younger ones tended to just rush in.
The crack of rifle fire was a welcome relief to the townspeople, most of whom had been fighting with arrows and spears. Apparently they hadn’t gotten any ammo supplies in a long time.
As quickly as it had started, the attack was over. The remaining zombies had been put down, and Jake went with the repair crew to cover them while they took that rockslide apart.
I shouldered my rifle and walked back to the Jeep, keeping an eye out for Julia. The sun had dipped past the mountains, making this valley darker than the sky. It made for some interesting retinal adjustments.
Back at the Jeep, I put the rifle back and spent a moment reloading my magazines. I had gone through thirty rounds, and I hoped the others hadn’t gone through much more. A few more attacks like this, and we’d be using nothing but arrows ourselves.
I watched the townspeople drag the bodies of the zombies over to a pile, while a smaller group was respectfully laid to one side. Those would be the locals who had fallen to the zombies. They’d be buried, not burned.
Julia and Kayla came back and they refilled their magazines as well. Kayla looked over our ammo supply and gave it a half smile.
“Might be enough, might not,” she said. “At least Jake can make new arrows.”
“Might not be a bad thing to pick up ourselves,” I said. “Some of those crossbows are as accurate as rifles.”
Julia shook her head. “No, thanks. If I shot a zombie at a hundred yards, then I have to walk a hundred yards just to get my arrow, and then I have another hundred yard walk back to where I started.”
That was a good point, and we laughed about it, drawing some looks from townsfolk who passed by. Most of them nodded their thanks, and a couple shook our hands in gratitude. A half hour later Jake came walking back with the red-faced man, who wasn’t so red-faced anymore.
Jake introduced the man. “Everyone, this is Mark Loving; he’s kind of the mayor in this area. Mark, this is Aaron, my brother; Julia his wife, and Kayla, my wife.”
Mark was a smaller man, but he made up for his lack of height with intensity. Everything about him was severe. His eyes were deep blue, his hair was steel-gray, and cut spikey-short. His arms were strong, and hung out from his sides. His legs were slightly bowed, causing him to walk with a swagger. His grip was strong, but his smile was, too. It completely changed his face when he smiled.
“Pleasure for sure,” Mark said. “You folks came at the right time. Wouldn’t want to sell some of your ammo, would you?” Mark came right to the point, and I could see we might have some issues if we refused.
“I think we could spare a box. Rifles we have to keep though, it’s a long way to get back home,” I said.
Mark smiled. “I get you. Got any .30-06?”
I rummaged in the Jeep and came up with two boxes of twenty rounds. Mark’s eyes lit up, and he reached for the ammo.
I gave it to him, and he smiled.
“What’s your price?” he asked.
I looked at Jake. We didn’t need money, but I knew ammo was a valuable commodity. We carried extra rounds for guns we didn’t even have to trade for things we needed. Like now. None of us shot .30-06.
“Dinner for four, a place to stay, and breakfast before we leave,” I said.
Mark smiled again and held out his hand. “Done. I’ll put you up at the best place, and get you the best dinner you’ve had in a while.”
Jake put up a hand. “One other thing.”
Mark frowned, as if the prize might be taken away. “What’s that?”
“My brother took a bullet to the head this morning, he needs someone to look at it. You have a doc?”
“Good lord!” Mark exclaimed. “Let’s get you to the doc’s! Man, why didn’t you say so earlier?”
“We were kind of busy.” I waved a hand at the pile of zombies that was beginning to smolder as flames licked around the edges of the pyre.
Chapter 38
We got back into the Jeep and Mark pointed us to a small house set a little ways back into the trees. A young woman came out onto the porch, and when she saw me she went back inside. An older man followed her back outside, and it was to her that Mark spoke.
“Doc, these folks helped us out with the outbreak, but one of them was hurt earlier this morning. Can you look at him?” Mark said.
The doctor, a man probably around sixty, nodded and waved me up to his house. “Of course, young man. Of course. Glad to help. How in the world did you manage to get shot?” He looked at the wound. “More importantly, how did you survive?”
I followed the doctor into his home, and we immediately turned left into an examination room. The place was well stocked, with a sink, an examination table, and a wall of jars filled with herbs
and roots.
“I’m Doctor Harris, by the way, but they all just call me Doc. Theresa, hand me a flashlight, will you? This is Theresa, my granddaughter, by the way.” Doctor Harris slowly removed the bandanna I had been using as a bandage, tsk-tsking all the way.
“You’ve been extremely lucky so far, young man. Let me see if there has been any other damage.” Doctor Harris’s hands moved quickly and surely over the wound, putting slight pressure here and there. He nodded and went over to the wall of herbs, selecting a jar. Dropping some of the leaves in a mortar, he sprinkled in a bit of another herb and added some water. Scraping the paste into a small jar, he handed it to Julia, along with a bandage.
“Your hair will never be the same, but I’m going to do the best I can to make sure you don’t have too bad of a scar. Would you like a sedative?” Doc asked.
I was slightly stunned at the matter-of-fact way the doctor had, but I had to admit, things were different these days. I also had to admit that I would never take a sedative with Jake watching.
“Stitch me up, doc. I’m late for dinner,” I said.
Doctor Harris smiled. “I’ll do what I can.”
During the procedure, the doctor kept my mind occupied by asking me about my travels, and what brought me to my current state. When I described the events in Victor, he sat back for a moment.
“I had heard rumors of something like that happening over the mountains. Didn’t want to believe them to be true,” Doc said. He looked up again, and speaking more to himself than me, said, “If that’s what happened, please let them have gone quickly.”
“What?” I asked, thinking he had spoken to me.
Doc shook himself, then his shoulders slumped a little. “My son and his wife went north to see if they could find a little place of their own, maybe start a ranch for horses or something. I kept my granddaughter here, thinking it was just for a few nights. Never thought it would have been fifteen years.” He shook his head. “Now that you tell me this, I’m grateful I kept her back. God knows what they would have done to her.”
Generation Dead (Book 3): Beyond The Gates Page 14
