by Kate L. Mary
I ignored him and continued scanning the area, and when Christine caught my gaze, she rolled her eyes.
Like me, she had her gun out and her eyes open, focusing on the distance where anything could be lurking. Beyond the crumbling Wal-Mart, a cluster of roofs were visible, many of them missing shingles. The neighborhood used to be the most affluent one in town, full mansions that looked out-of-place among the other more modest neighborhoods throughout Altus, but money hadn’t done a thing to stop those people from suffering the same fate as the less fortunate, and now the houses were crumbling just like everything else.
Once the supplies were loaded, Scott and Kellan hopped down, and we all headed back into the store. We moved as a group this time, clumped together instead of spread out. Even Ernie, who looked like he wanted to spit every time he glanced Kellan’s way.
Back inside, the store seemed dark and oppressive compared to the hot afternoon. Here and there, beams of sunlight broke through the darkness, coming from holes in the ceiling, and dust motes danced across them like they were putting on a show. The deeper we got into the store, though, the darker it got. Back here, the roof was still mostly intact, and the shadows were black and thick after the brightness of the day.
“You four keep a lookout while we get more supplies,” Kellan said, his gaze moving from Christine and me to Scott and Ernie. “This store is big, and I wouldn’t be surprised if a zombie or two was hiding somewhere.”
I nodded while at my side Ernie let out a low grunt of annoyance. Scott, as usual, was too difficult to read to know what he was thinking, and Christine was already looking around.
Bill, Blake, and Kellan went back to digging through the fence posts piled up in the corner. With every move they made, the clang of metal against metal echoed through the store, and my heart beat faster. I had my knife out and ready, but when the hair on my scalp prickled and the dread in my stomach grew, I pulled my gun as well. I couldn’t pinpoint why—the store was quiet except the noise from the men—but I suddenly had a bad feeling, and I couldn’t shake it.
As if trying to fulfill a prophecy, the zombie came out of nowhere only seconds after I pulled my gun. Bill, Blake, and Kellan were loaded down with posts when it stumbled from the shadowy recesses of the store, tripping over debris but not falling. His arms were out, reaching for us before he’d even gotten close, but with the darkness hanging over us, I couldn’t tell if he was old or new, or how fast I could expect him to be.
“Incoming!” Scott, who stood to my right, called.
Just as the words passed his lips, two more zombies appeared.
“Shit,” Kellan muttered.
“We’ve got this,” I said as I shoved my gun in the waistband of my jeans.
We were four on three, making the gun more of a liability than an asset—we didn’t want to risk drawing more of the dead by firing a gun unnecessarily—and I was confident I could take one zombie out using my knife without a problem. Even if he was fast.
Scott was already going head to head with the first zombie, with the help of Christine—the thing must have been fast—and Ernie had moved to meet the second—a woman whose gray skin hung on her, giving off the impression that she’d been a few hundred pounds heavier in life. That left zombie number three for me. I gripped my knife harder as I moved forward, ignoring the way my heart pounded, my focus solely on the creature in front of me.
The thing lunged, faster than I’d anticipated, and I barely made it out of the way before he got a grip on me. He looked old and rotten, his skin ripped in multiple places and oozing enough black blood that the stench seemed to waft off him in waves. Even so, he was fast, much faster than any other zombie I’d ever gone up against, and every time I tried to dodge his advances, he seemed to be able to predict what I was going to do, cutting me off over and over again.
“Regan,” Kellan called.
I ignored him, too focused on the zombie.
The creature lunged, and I stumbled back, moving from the shadowy corner and into a beam of light that had broken through a hole in the ceiling. Now I could see how decayed the thing was. His skin was ripped and completely missing in places, revealing meaty insides and, in a few instances, bone. In one particularly deep wound on his head, a few maggots wiggled through the rotten flesh, making me gag. The sights and smells of zombies, I was almost used to, but my stomach twisted at the idea of flies using the dead to procreate.
Still, he didn’t slow, and the calculating look in his eyes turned my blood cold.
I looked past him long enough to see Kellan, separated from me by Christine and Scott—who were still struggling with the other zombie—and Ernie who, thankfully, seemed to have the upper hand in his fight with the dead. Bill and Blake, too, were in the back corner of the store, separated from us by the beams they’d already moved in preparation for hauling them outside, and like Kellan, they were unable to come to my aid.
The zombie growled and charged, and I managed to duck away from his outstretched hands by moving behind a rotten pile of animal feed. The paper bags had disintegrated, leaving piles of moldy pellets behind. Bugs crawled over the mounds, scurrying away as the zombie threw himself on the pile, trying to pull himself over it so he could get to me. He was dragging himself forward when I brought my knife down, but once again he was too fast, and my blade only made contact with his shoulder. It got stuck, and when the creature twisted away, the knife slipped from my grip and remained lodged in the zombie.
He crawled across the rotten pile of animal feed, and in desperation I tried to pull my gun, but it got caught on a belt loop, and when the zombie once again lunged, I found myself stumbling back, tripping over debris that sent me to the ground.
Behind him, Ernie had managed to get his zombie down, and even though the guy made me crazy, I found myself calling out to him. “Ernie!”
He looked my way but didn’t move, and although the sun reflecting off his lenses made it impossible to see his eyes, the hard line of his mouth told me he wouldn’t be coming to my rescue.
The zombie growled, hovering over me, and I kicked up. My boot slammed into his nose, which broke with a sickening crunch, but the thing still kept coming. It made no sense. I’d never seen a zombie this rotten that still had the ability to reason like this. He shouldn’t have been able to dodge all of my advances, shouldn’t have been able to keep going like this. Something was very, very wrong.
The zombie lunged again just as I managed to get my gun free. I whipped it up, hitting the creature in the nose, and a burst of black blood sprayed from his deformed nostrils. The creature’s head jerked back long enough for me to take aim, and when I pulled the trigger, his head exploded in a burst of black blood, rotten brains, decaying flesh, and bone.
I was panting and my ears were ringing, and every inch of me was covered in zombie pieces, but I was alive, and for that, I was grateful.
On the other side of the store, Kellan was pushing his way past Ernie, who hadn’t moved an inch since I called out to him. When Kellan shoved him, he stumbled, banging into a nearly empty shelving unit.
I’d just managed to get to my feet when Kellan reached me. “You’re okay?” His hands moved down my arms like he needed to touch me to reassure himself I was still in one piece.
“I’m okay.”
When I pulled my knife from the zombie’s shoulder, it slid out with a sickening sucking sound, and my gaze was once again drawn to the maggots wiggling through its head.
I turned away, focusing on Kellan. “Ernie.”
It was all I needed to say. He’d been there, he saw what that asshole had done—or hadn’t done, actually. Kellan’s jaw tightened as he turned his back on me and charged across the store, and seeing him coming, Ernie took a step back, but there was nowhere to go.
“What the hell, man?” Kellan slammed his hands into the other man’s chest, and he banged against the nearly empty shelf for the second time. “You couldn’t give her a hand?”
“She’s fine. She’
s immune, for God’s sake! It’s not like she was in any real danger.”
Ernie tried to shake him off, but Kellan had a handful of his shirt, and he couldn’t break free.
“I don’t know what your problem is, but this is the only time we’re going to have this conversation.” Kellan’s grip tightened. “If you’re going to be a part of our group, you better be a part of it. Do you understand?”
“Or what?” Ernie spit back. “You going to toss me out?”
Kellan’s expression was as cold as a wintry Oklahoma afternoon. “Don’t think I won’t.”
“Okay, now,” Bill said, pushing between the two men.
Kellan let go, but it seemed to take a lot of effort for him to step back.
He didn’t say a word, and he was still glaring when Bill gave Ernie a hard stare. “I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it one more time. That’s it. We’re a group now. Understand? I can’t have you not being a team player. Not in the shelter and not out here. Period.”
Ernie’s mouth tightened. “Nine years together, and you’re going to take his side?”
“I’m taking the side of the person in the right. This stops here. Now. You may not like taking orders from Kellan, but this is his deal. His shelter and his group. We’re along for the ride now, and it’s time for you to get used to that.”
“He’s a kid.” Ernie jerked his head toward Kellan.
“He’s a survivor,” Bill replied.
Ernie’s mouth scrunched up like he wanted to say more, but instead he shook his head and turned away. We all stood in silence as he picked his way through the crumbling store, heading for the door.
Bill exhaled, and at his side, Christine put a hand on his shoulder. “I thought he understood that I was serious. He promised me.”
“He’s a liability out here,” Kellan said.
“I know.” Bill nodded twice, his gaze moving to his daughter as he thought about the lives Ernie had just risked. “This is the last time he comes with us.”
“Good.” Kellan turned away from Bill and headed back into the shadowy corner of the store.
He passed Scott, who said nothing. Once again, he was wearing an expression that was not only unreadable, but totally devoid of emotion. It concerned me more than ever. We’d taken this group in, and for the most part things had been going well, but Ernie was definitely a problem, and there was a chance Scott might be too if things came to blows.
Blake was still standing beside the discarded fence posts, and when Kellan reached him, they wordlessly worked together to gather the supplies. Bill, too, went back to what he’d been doing before the zombies interrupted us, while Christine moved to my side.
“You okay?” she asked.
“Yeah.” I looked over my shoulder, toward the door Ernie had disappeared through, then to Scott, who stood a good eight feet from us. In a low voice, I said, “How well do you know Scott?”
Christine shrugged and shook her head at the same time, which didn’t give me a boost of confidence. “As well as you can know someone so quiet, I guess. He’s with Ellie, though, and I know her. She’s a good person.”
That was something, at least.
“Why?” Christine asked.
“Just wondering who will take Ernie’s side if he decides to challenge Kellan.”
Christine frowned but said nothing, and like me, she turned to look at Scott.
I glanced toward the door again, thinking about Ernie. Kellan was right. In the shelter, he was a nuisance. When we were out fighting the dead, he was a major liability.
24
Ernie was nowhere in sight when we made it out of the store, but no one commented on it. It was evening, meaning we only had a good two hours of sunlight left, and right now all we wanted to do was get the rest of the supplies loaded so we could get to the hangar. We needed to make it to the Altus settlement before it got dark.
Kellan, Blake, Bill, and Scott loaded the truck while Christine and I kept watch, and we’d nearly gotten everything loaded by the time Ernie finally showed up. He came from the side of the store, but wherever he’d gone hadn’t seemed to help him cool off at all. Not only did he not say a word to anyone, but the glare we were greeted with reminded me of a sullen child, and it wasn’t becoming for a man his age, not to mention the fact that it was downright annoying.
Bill’s mood had taken a downhill turn after the confrontation in the store, and the continued glares Ernie gave the rest of us only made it worse. By the time we climbed back into the truck, Bill’s expression was even graver than it had been the day the fire ripped through the hangar. He was rarely without a smile for long, and the serious attitude surrounding him now was almost as unsettling as Scott’s stoicism.
We said nothing on the drive to base, which took less than ten minutes, and this time Bill entered through the front gate instead of the back one. On the left, just inside the gate, sat the commissary, which was now missing a roof and one entire wall, leaving a gap that revealed dusty shelves long ago relieved of their contents. Beyond that, the other buildings hadn’t fared much better. Roofs had been ripped off and windows were broken, glass littering the ground and shimmering under the evening sun. The base was a shell, just like the rest of the city, its barbed wire fences and former status as a military facility unable to save it from the destruction the apocalypse had brought.
Weeks had passed since the fire, but the charred metal walls of the hangar were a reminder of how devastating that night had been. The door was still open, exactly how we’d left it, and the C-17 Bill and his people had been living in for more than nine years was visible through the gap. Like the metal walls, it was clear where the flames had licked at the side of the plane, leaving black lines behind, and even more disturbing were the pieces of twisted metal that had once been walls and beds, and who knew what else since they were now unidentifiable.
Bill parked outside the door and climbed from the truck before the sedan had even come to a stop. Kellan and I got out as well but hung back, wanting to give the others some space.
I was sitting on the hood of the car when Blake came over to join us, and the three of us watched in silence as Bill, Christine, Scott, and Ernie headed into the hangar. They were quiet, picking their way first through the hangar and then the plane. Now and then someone would kick at something on the ground, sending puffs of ash into the air. Even from here I could tell there wouldn’t be much, if anything, to salvage.
“Looks like pretty much everything was destroyed,” Kellan said.
I nodded but looked past the plane to the opposite side of the hangar. The outline of the table was visible through the shadows, seemingly whole, and beyond that more items stood undisturbed, but they weren’t the personal items these people had hoped to retrieve. Those had been in the plane, tacked to walls and sitting next to beds, treasured items that had faded over time but weathered the apocalypse with their owners. It was doubtful many had survived.
The corner with the shower was beyond the table and looked as undisturbed as the eating area. It seemed almost irreverent at a time like this, but thanks to my altercation with the zombie inside Atwoods, I was covered in black goo and anxious to get clean. There might not be a real opportunity in Altus. If we ended up in the hotel, all we’d get was a shared bathroom with a sink and toilet, but no shower, and if we stayed with Bill’s friend, I had no idea what the setup was going to be like. Now seemed like the best chance I would get.
“I’m going to clean up really fast,” I said, sliding off the hood of the sedan.
Kellan took one step after me when I started moving. “Need a hand?”
I shot him a look, but the expression on his face was sincere, and I thought about how difficult the poor water pressure had made getting clean the last time we were here, and nodded. “Come on.”
We headed into the hangar side by side, passing the ramp at the back of the plane where a few items sat waiting to be loaded into the vehicles. A couple pictures in blackened frames, some books
that had only suffered minimal smoke damage, a half dozen pairs of shoes, but not much else.
Bill came out, and we stopped as he set a purple stuffed bunny on top of the pile.
“I’m sorry,” Kellan said.
The other man nodded, but his expression wasn’t one of sadness. It was confusion.
“What is it?” I asked.
Bill ran his hand over his smooth head. “All the weapons we left behind are gone.”
“Someone probably saw the smoke and came to see what was on fire,” Kellan said. “Maybe they searched the place once the blaze settled down.”
“Maybe,” Bill said, but he didn’t seem convinced. “It still bothers me, though, how the fire started. How fast it spread and how big it was. It doesn’t make sense.” He looked over his shoulder into the plane. “Most of the stuff in the hangar was metal and cement.”
“Fires can start anywhere,” Kellan assured him.
“Yeah.” Bill blew out a long breath as he turned to head back into the plane, but he didn’t seem convinced. “I’m going to keep looking.”
We watched him walk away in silence, heading back into the ashes of the life he’d struggled to build.
At the back of the plane, the top of Christine’s head was just visible over a slightly warped divider, and beyond her, Ernie and Scott were in the middle of what looked like a very animated conversation, bringing all my worries back to the surface. Were they going to be an issue down the road, and what would we do about it if they were? We could kick them out, but that would leave us vulnerable.
I nodded their way, and Kellan exhaled before grabbing my hand.
He started walking again. “I see it.”
“Scott’s a tough person to read,” I said.
“I know. He’s been on my radar for a while. I thought he was just quiet until the last couple days, but now I’m not so sure.”
“You think he’ll back Ernie if there’s trouble?”
“Probably,” Kellan mumbled, keeping his voice low as the sound of footsteps pounded down the ramp at our backs.
