"That's all I found," David said, giving the box one last look.
"Okay," she said.
Before they left the tent, she looked at the grenade. She hesitated, but then decided that maybe the circumstances dictated that she should take it with her. She picked it up and held it carefully, not sure where to keep it. Ultimately, she just held it in her hand until she figured out what to do with it as they exited the tent.
The coast was clear and they didn't see anyone in sight. They passed a guard a ways up that had nodded off on watch, sitting in a chair overlooking the city below.
They came to a set of familiar sights: a circle of bandits sat around a barrel fire playing cards in a raucous palaver, and the end of the bridge sat just beyond them before it descended down into the city.
The men had already started bickering and looked like they were a few scurrilous words away from violence. Their focus on each other was intense, and the firelight flickered in their eyes, making the shadows around them hard for them to see.
Sarah held her breath and motioned to David to follow her. The two of them skulked along the far side of the bridge and passed the group of bandits. An argument ensued among them and they were none the wiser that Sarah and David had slipped by.
The two of them reached the three broken-down cars that marked the start of the bridge's descent. The dark city of Durham lay beyond, just as dead and unglamorous as the night before.
Three bandits walked around the bottom of the bridge ahead. The streets beyond them were empty, but they kept a tight watch on the bridge's entrance.
Sarah studied them, trying to figure out a way by. It was inconceivable that they could successfully sneak their way to the end of the bridge twice and be foiled at the last possible chance. But there was no cover to hide behind on the rest of the bridge, and the men never appeared to leave their spots. She knew what they needed was a distraction.
She still had the grenade clutched in her hand, still afraid of its awesome power. But it was the only answer.
She tried to determine the physics of getting the grenade down to the bottom of the bridge when she heard part of the conversation of the bandits sitting by the fire behind her.
"Did you get a piece of the new blond one?" she heard one of them say.
"Sure I did," another replied. "Still nice and tight, that one is."
"Shit, what time is it?" a third bandit asked. "Think Jericho will let us do it a little early tonight?"
"I don't know," the first one said, "but when we do, I'm having another go at the blond. I just love that look the new ones get when they realize they're never gonna be anything more than a slave for the rest of their lives and their eyes just sort of glaze over. You know what I mean? It's like you can watch the fire in them die."
Rage boiled inside Sarah. She never experienced anything like it before, but it was pure, uncontrollable rage. They took almost everything from her, and she could never get it back. They did it in front of her son. They beat her to within inches of her life, and they did it without remorse or pity. Her hand squeezed the grenade. She wanted revenge.
She went around to the rear door of one of the cars and opened it as quietly as possible.
"Get in," she told David. "Stay in there and wait for me."
He nodded and crawled into the backseat of the car, lying flat against the seat and looking over his shoulder at her, wondering what she was doing.
Sarah crept out from the cars a little ways, keeping low and moving slowly. She lined up her target and didn't take her eyes off it, feeling the awesome power that she carried in her hand. She was still terrified of it, but her anger superseded her fright.
As the bandits sat around laughing about all the girls they raped, she removed the pin and tossed the grenade into the middle of them. It sailed through the air and landed in the fire inside the barrel. Sarah ran back to the car.
One of the bandits got up from his seat, looking at the barrel. "The fuck was that?"
The barrel exploded, killing every last one of them. A blast of fire, shrapnel and body parts showered the bridge in every direction as the incredibly loud sound sent out a shockwave.
Sarah dove into the backseat of the car on top of David and pulled the door shut.
Bandits everywhere started coming out of their tents, wide awake with adrenaline coursing through their veins. They were confused and looking around in every direction, trying to understand what was going on.
Sarah pushed herself up in the backseat just enough to peek out the window and see the bottom of the bridge. All three of the bandits were running up, the beams of their flashlights bouncing everywhere. They passed the cars where the two of them hid and ran to the site of the commotion.
"Someone attacked us!" one of them yelled, though not sure by whom and from where.
As panic swelled across the bridge, Jericho stepped out of his tent. He'd been in a nice deep sleep, and he didn't like being disturbed. He watched all the men run around him in utter chaos as he stayed calm.
He looked toward the cages and saw the dead guard lying in front of the open door, and a wicked scowl marked his face. He knew exactly which girl was missing, and he set off along the bridge toward Durham. He would hunt her down like the wounded dog she was, never stopping until he found her. And when he did, she would pay for her escape endlessly.
Sarah and David ran down the bridge, no one in their way. The distraction had worked and they were home free. Dark streets stretched out in front of them, and they would weave their way through until they found a place where they were safe for the night.
"She's gone!" someone yelled from the bridge behind them. "She escaped! The new blond from last night!"
"I see her!" another voice yelled, this one a lot closer. "She's with someone! It looks like a kid!"
Sarah glanced over her shoulder as they ran and saw scores of bandits hunting them, their guns rattling and their flashlights piercing the night.
20
A Warm Welcome
The city blurred around them as they whizzed through the streets of Durham. They treaded upon their final prize, but they waited for it to be snatched away at any moment.
Gunfire tore out behind them through the night, accompanying the cries and yells of the bandits. The bullets zipped by and ricocheted all around them. One bullet hit a pane of glass in a storefront, causing it to shatter into tiny pieces and sprinkle onto the ground like a rustling of tinsel at Christmastime.
"Did I get them?" a voice yelled from behind, followed by a "Shit!", then more gun fire.
They came up to an intersection and turned the corner to the right. Sarah had no idea where they were going, except away from the bandits. The streets started to resemble a maze the more they ran through them and she worried that they would turn too many corners and end up right back where they started, at the foot of the bandits.
A bullet whizzed right by her head and struck a signpost as her and David rounded another corner and disappeared down the street.
She tried to glance behind her once or twice as they went, and she would periodically see a lone bandit who seemed to be closer to them than all the rest, trying to catch up to them. They came to a dead-end street and saw an open gate in the fence next to them, leading to the tiny back lot of a commercial property. They ran through the gate and shoved their way through the door of the building.
They ducked through a short hallway in what appeared to be the back of a restaurant, being careful not to hit their heads on the low ceiling. Sarah crashed through another door and they were in the kitchen. It was too dark to see and they tripped over a rack full of old pans and kitchen utensils, sending the metal clattering on the floor.
There was at least one bandit closing in from behind, his flashlight swinging across the walls behind them. Sarah pulled David through the swinging door leading to the dining room and they heard the bandit slide on the metal cookware behind them and crash into something heavy.
They pushed their way
through the dining room, Sarah plowing through dusty chairs and tables, clearing the way for David like he were a running back. There was a door at the end of the room, faintly illuminated from the gentle glow of the night coming in through the edges of it. The room itself was covered in darkness and there was no telling what was lurking in it. It could have taken just a single dead gray hand to reach out and grab either one of them to end it all.
The swinging door from the kitchen flew open and slammed into the wall. The bandit charged into the dining room just as the two of them fled through the front door and out onto the street.
"They're over here!" she heard the muffled voice cry from inside the restaurant. "I got her!"
The two of them slipped into another alleyway and ran down between two buildings. The narrow corridor was long and if they didn't hurry through, the bandit could catch up and shoot them like fish in a barrel. But when they reached the end, Sarah saw a door to her left and it was thankfully open.
They were in a small office building and she quickly searched for a place to hide, but it was no use; he would be on them in a matter of seconds and would find them. Their only choice was to keep running, but the bandit was relentless.
They shot into a tiny office at the end of a hallway and found that they had run into a dead end.
The sound of the bandit coming in the building from the alley outside echoed in the hallway. He shouted threats and obscenities as he ran, poking his head into each office in the hall.
Whoever was last in the room that Sarah and David had come to had shoved their desk and all their furniture into the corner of the room and hid behind it; it was like the adult version of a kid's fort, probably intended to hide away from famished zombies or bloodthirsty bandits. Behind the cluster of furniture, there was a broken window that looked like it led out back to the alley.
The desk was a huge slab of oak and Sarah flung a chair off the top of it and helped David crawl over it.
"Come on, love!" the bandit said from the hallway. "I'm not gonna hurt you. I just want to talk!"
Sarah clambered over the desk once David was clear and they both made their way out the window.
The door to the office was hurled open and the bandit came through just in time for them to catch a good glimpse of each other.
The bandit was tall and had an athletic build. Rough stubble sprawled across his chin and he had muddy brown eyes and exuded a sense of sliminess when they locked eyes for a brief second.
He tore through the room like a bulldozer and tripped over the desk, smacking his chin on a bulletin board and falling onto the floor on the other side, spewing a hailstorm of swear words.
Outside the window, Sarah and David found themselves back in the alley, and they continued to look for an exit leading to the street. She couldn't seem to shake this guy and he wasn't slowing down, either, nor was he giving up. She still had the gun on her, and flashbacks to working up the nerve to shoot Pete came back to her. But this bandit was no zombie; he was far more agile and intelligent, and she was virtually untrained and inexperienced when it came to using firearms.
The bandit flew out the window, bumping into the building on the other side of the alley as they disappeared through a door.
They were in a dark hallway, long and narrow. She was so worried about running away from their pursuer that she didn't even notice the pack of zombies that filled the hall in front of them. Their feet skidded along the tile floor as they came to a sudden stop. Their eyes went wide in fright as the congregation of undead turned to them.
The zombies started to walk toward the two of them, sizing them up and down. They all groaned and lowered their jaws, their saliva sliding down their chins and dripping onto the floor. Their groans were loud in the narrow space and echoed out the door to where the bandit approached from behind.
The bandit's footsteps outside slowed until he came to a casual saunter. "What's that I hear in there?" he asked. "You didn't happen to run into a bunch of dead skins, did you? That would be a terrible shame if you've got nowhere to go. Listen, all you have to do is come out to me, and you'll be safe from the zombies. I'm not gonna hurt you—none of us will." His footsteps came evenly, one after another, closer and closer to the door.
David suddenly grabbed Sarah's hand and started to pull her toward the zombies.
She looked at him like he was crazy. Even with his natural gift, the hallway was barely wide enough for two people to fit through. "What are you doing?" she said, frenzied.
He didn't say any words at all and dragged her toward the zombies, his face locked on them.
The undead picked up speed, breaking into a shambling trot.
"Come out now and nobody will get hurt," the bandit outside said. "You don't want to get into a tussle with those nasty things in there. I've seen them in action, they'll tear you up something good. Just come out now and we'll help you."
"David!" Sarah cried to him as she struggled against his hand.
He looked at her and simply said, "I can do this."
She made a split-second decision to trust him and stopped fighting against his lead. They walked calmly ahead toward the zombies, and the zombies finally slowed down until they stood on the spot, just looking at them.
"I'm asking you nicely," the bandit said as he crept toward the door from the alley. "If you be nice to me, I'll be nice to you. But if you're not nice to me, I'm gonna have to pull you out the hard way. Do you know what they call me? They call me Cutter, because you see, I fancy this long blade I have on me here. Real sharp, it is. It's really good at cutting meat away from the bone."
As David pulled her closer toward the horde of zombies, they started to bump around in circles, like the two of them weren't even there. But when they were a few feet away, Sarah started to panic. If David lost his concentration for one second, it would all be over in the blink of an eye.
But David remained calm as he led them through. They brushed past the zombies and she shuddered every time one of them came into the slightest physical contact with her. Their skin was cold and clammy, and the stink that came off of them was quite ghastly from this close up.
The bandit reached the door. "I don't like using guns, you see," he continued. "Awful violent, if you ask me. Don't have any use for them, myself. That's why everyone called me Cutter, and after that, the name sort of stuck."
He ripped the door open suddenly and pulled a gun out of his belt, aiming at them and firing his whole magazine down the hallway.
Sarah and David made it to the other side of the zombies and the bullets missed them and ripped into the rotting flesh of the undead or ricocheted off the walls.
"Or do they call me Shooter?" the bandit asked. "I can never remember."
The bullets made the zombies stagger a bit, and they turned their attention on him and lumbered after him. He retreated back out the door and tried to find another way out to the street where Sarah and David were heading.
The two of them had made it out the front of the building and crossed the street to a big courtyard in front of a courthouse. There was a big fountain in the middle of the courtyard, and there was a large park across the street to their right.
They stopped right in front of the fountain and Sarah hesitated, trying to decide where to go. Slipping through the zombies in that hallway bought them some time to get away, but the question was, should they keep running, or try to hide somewhere? They were both running out of breath, and she knew they couldn't go on much farther. The courthouse was huge and there would have been plenty of places inside to hide, but she knew the bandits that searched for her would be thorough. The park across the street was large, with trees casting heavy shadows in the moonlight. A small pack of zombies meandered around one part of the park about a hundred feet away, but not nearly close enough to see them from where they were and cause them trouble. But before she could make her choice, the bandit came up behind them.
"I know where you are!" he yelled from somewhere around the corner down
the street. "You can't hide from me!"
His footfalls came smacking down the street, and Sarah looked over her shoulder. She knew he was right around the corner and would come into view at any moment.
On a whim, she grabbed David's arm and pulled him toward the fountain that had sat dry and unused for eight years. The two of them climbed over the edge of the old relic and lowered themselves into it, pressing themselves against the inner wall and hiding, hoping the bandit would run past.
She held David to her bosom as she heard the bandit's footsteps stop near the fountain.
"Where did you go?" she heard him say to himself.
He stood in the courtyard, looking around. He knew they went in this direction, the question was where? Did they go into the courthouse, or did they try to run across the park? He knew he was still on their heels, but with the detour he had to take, he didn't know how far ahead they had gotten. He could go into the courthouse, but they could have run into the park and escaped by the time he realized that they weren't in the building. But if he ran searching through the big open park while they were hiding in the courthouse, they could escape like that, too.
He started off toward the courthouse, then hesitated. He turned and went off toward the park instead, but hesitated again. He looked all around him one last time and listened. The night was silent. Then he had a different idea altogether, as he realized that maybe the answer was far simpler than any of that.
He stared at the big fountain sitting in front of him, so lifeless and unassuming.
Zombie Apocalypse Series Books 1-3 (Zombie Apocalypse Series Box Set) Page 19
