The smoldering heat is too much to handle. I can practically feel it cooking my skin. I jump aside a split second before the beam tears the floor to shreds, opening a gaping hole into the basement. Flaming pieces of furniture rain down from above, disappearing into the blackness of the growing inferno. The fire is too much. It’s too hot. Display cases begin exploding, shooting tiny crystals of burning glass everywhere.
The hole is expanding. There’s nowhere left to stand. I can’t get to her. This isn’t like before when I didn’t want to but changed my mind at the last second. This isn’t that, I swear. There is nothing I want more than to save her, but I can’t do it. Felecia. No, you can’t do this to me. Please, no.
CHAPTER 15
The floor gives out. All I can do is throw myself through the wall of flames that separates me from the outside world. The outside world that’s no better than in here. There’s no safety. There’s no rest. No hope.
I land on the sidewalk in a heap, trying desperately to cough the smoke out of my lungs. The swords. Shit! The swords. I roll over and reach through the broken window, grabbing blindly for the stash that didn’t make it to the sidewalk already. My hands land on a pile of hot metal. I toss them without looking, burning myself in the process. Caylee and Tyrone must have retrieved the first batch but judging by the growing pile of bodies, sparing even a split second to grab the rest would have cost them their lives.
The floor collapses completely, taking everything down with it. Swords of all shapes and sizes, swords we risked our lives for, go sliding into the burning abyss. I reach for them but I’m too late, all I can do is watch as one by one they disappear into the flames. One more! There’s one left, teetering on the edge of the gateway to hell. It begins to slide but I grab the handle just in time. Whatever it is, it’s got to be more substantial than my baseball bat.
I’m holding onto the handle with all my might, I know that’s all it is, but all I can picture is holding Felecia’s hand. I don’t want to be holding the handle of some medieval weapon that needs to be sharpened if it’s going to do any damage at all. I want to pull her out of any situation she’s in.
God damn it, I just left her there. There must have been something more I could do. I could have jumped through the fire, I could have made it. I know I could. Why’d I let her talk me out of it? It doesn’t matter if I got trapped in there with her, I should have been by her side. She could be down there. In the basement. What if she’s still alive?
I peer over the edge and cringe at the destruction. The flames have engulfed everything. If she’s down there– no she can’t be down there. Maybe she made it into the backroom. Maybe there was an exit. A backdoor into an alley or something, for deliveries, like Harry’s Hardware. We take the bigger shipments in through the back. There could be a backdoor? She could be out there.
I roll over and jump to my feet, still wheezing, trying to catch my breath but I can feel the smoke circulating in my lungs. Holy shit. They’re everywhere. Tyrone and Caylee have been fighting them off as best they can but there are too many. They just keep coming.
Caylee’s jabbing at them with the pitchfork but I’ve used it before, I know how ineffective it is. She’s trying to hold three of them off at once. I think she’s screaming for me but I can’t hear her. Come to think of it, I can’t hear anything besides my heart pounding in my ears. Felecia’s last words echoing in my head. What was she going to say? She said I had to know. What was it I had to know? That she loved me? Somehow I know but knowing isn’t good enough, I need to hear it. I need to hear those words leave her perfect lips. She does love me. She has to. Had to. There’s no way she survived that fall. The beam came down too quickly, we never saw it coming. I should have jumped. What the fuck was I thinking? I should have jumped through the flames and held her tightly. Told her everything would be okay even though we’d both know it wasn’t true.
Caylee. No, I can’t lose you too.
I pull back whatever weapon it is I have in my hand, not caring that I need to use both hands and it hurts like hell. I swing it as if it were my trusty baseball bat, right at the zombie Caylee is trying to fend off. She must have taken out the other two already. The pyramid-like spikes rip through the creature’s face before the ball actually connects. What doesn’t cling to the medieval morningstar splatters the pavement in a flood of blood, flesh and bone fragments.
He doesn’t go down. I swing again and catch the other side of his face, ripping that half off as well. He stumbles but refuses to fall. Caylee jumps over, shoving a flaming board into the hole where his mouth used to be. I turn my head to avoid the disturbing image we’ve created. What’s left of his face melts off as he hobbles towards us and collapses in a heap of burning flesh, desperately clawing at our ankles.
“Are you alright?” she asks, stepping out of his reach. “It sounded bad in there. Where’s Felecia?”
All I can do is shake my head, coughing, tasting the smoke in my thickened saliva.
“No,” she whines, “no, she can’t.”
“The ceiling came down on us.” My voice cracks before I can get the words out. I take the opportunity to rub my burning eyes, hoping to wipe away the tears, the smoke and the heat that make it impossible to see. “The whole floor is gone. It’s all destroyed.”
“Oh my god.” Her hand shoots to her mouth, for some reason she cares more than she should. Felecia was stealing me away from her and all Caylee can see is the good. She really is a remarkable human being.
“Oh shit.” Tyrone’s mouth drops open. He’s staring past us.
Over the raging fire and the sounds of floors collapsing into those below them, I can hear the groaning of empty stomachs all harmonizing in unison. There’s nowhere to hide. They know we’re here. They’re coming.
I really don’t want to turn around but I have to. Damn it. I shouldn’t have turned around. They’re coming in swarms from both sides of the pileup, like a wave crashing around a rock, engulfing it, but always moving forward towards its destination. We’re its destination.
The leader of the pack breaks into a sprint. It doesn’t take long for the mob mentality to set in. The rest begin running as well, eager to devour the easy prey.
Inside the building, another support beam rips through the floorboards and tears a hole down to the basement. There’s no escape. We shouldn’t even be standing here, it could implode any minute and bury us in a pile of burning rubble.
They’re zombies, they’re fucking zombies, how the hell did they out-strategize us? There’s nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. The only thing left to do is stand and fight. I look at Caylee and Tyrone and realize these are the people I am going to die beside. We might as well make the most of it and take a couple of them to hell with us.
“Hurry, put these on.” I toss them each a shirt made of chainmail. “It won’t protect your whole body but it’ll help. The swords aren’t sharpened. I tried. Maybe if you stab them but it won’t do much.”
“Where can we get those sharpening stones?” Tyrone asks, pulling on his metal vest.
“That way.” I point towards the herd of approaching carnivores where the flames are literally shooting out of the buildings. “Take one of these,” I say, handing him a morningstar mace. “It’s better than a sword, for now.”
“We’re not walking out of this alive, are we?” he asks, already knowing the answer.
I ignore him and pull a headpiece of interlocking chains over Caylee. It drapes down her beautiful brown hair and dangles over her neck where they’re most apt to bite. It must have something to do with frail skin and heavy blood flow. They probably hear our hearts beating in our necks. I kiss her on the forehead after it’s on and her eyes close for a second. While preparing for the fight of my life, it dawns on me, we’ve never actually kissed. It was never the right time. And now it never will be.
I grab a sword from the pile, a weapon in each hand. If this is how we’re going out, I’m going out swinging, both hands.
M
y racing heart stops.
For a split second everything is peaceful. That moment of calm before the storm, and when the storm gets to its worst, that split second of tranquility will be all that’s left to guide me through.
With everything I have, I swing my sword and wish for that one, peaceful, moment.
It’s gone.
The blade slams into the closest zombie’s neck. I knew it wouldn’t go through but I was hoping for more than this. At least a little blood. But they’re made for display, not decapitating bodies. Not yet. If they were sharpened I’m convinced they’d slice right through.
Rather than swinging like I plan on lopping off his head, I stick it straight in. The point is sharp enough to pierce his skull, but not stop him. He leans into me, pushing the blunt blade further into his head without a care. He pushes harder until it punctures bone and pops out the other side.
Two more come from out of nowhere before I’m able to pull the sword out. Screw it, it isn’t doing any good anyway. I let go of the handle. With both hands wrapped tightly around my morningstar, I swing it at his head with everything I have.
The clang of metal against metal reverberates throughout my body. The spikes dig in so deep they strike the dull blade of the sword. I rip it out with so much force it drags his body with it, knocking him off balance. He hits the ground as I finally tear it away from his scalp and swing again like I’m bringing down a rubber mallet on a gopher in one of those carnival games. It sinks into his skull, crushing it beneath the force of the blow. My sword falls out and lays on the ground beside him. I swing again because this son of a bitch is still moving despite the gruesome fact that nine tenths of his head is missing.
I rip it out and swing at the next incoming target but there’s more after that. They don’t stop. Caylee and Tyrone have their hands full. There’s no one to help me. We’d need an army to make it out of this. I’m not sure why we’re still trying but as long as they are, I suppose I will too.
The spikes refuse to let go, bringing him closer to me as I try to retrieve my lousy weapon of choice. I need something more substantial, a tank maybe. A chainsaw would come in handy right about now. Even a gun would be better than this. But those sons of bitches at the back of the bus have them all. If I make it out of this, they’re the next ones to go.
I lift my leg and yank the handle as hard as I can, trying to separate his head from the spiked ball of my morningstar mace. But he comes toppling down on top of me. At this point he can’t even bite me so I don’t know why he’s trying. His entire jaw is stuck on one of the spikes. His mouth is missing. There’s nothing left, just a tongue flapping about, mangled beyond recognition. If it weren’t for its anatomical location, I’d probably never guess what it was.
He may not be able to bite me, but the two incoming cadavers definitely can. I try to swing the spiked scepter with my free hand, my right hand, but I barely have the strength to lift it. My wrist gives out mid-swing. It connects with flesh but I think it’s only his kneecap. I can’t rip it out. It’s stuck. I let go of the handle, needing both hands to try to push Tongue-o-saurus here away but it’s no use. The other one is inches from me. He’ll be throwing himself onto the pig-pile any second. And I don’t even have a weapon. I knew I couldn’t do this without Felecia.
CHAPTER 16
She wouldn’t want me to give up. There’s no way she’d let me go out like this.
I spot my opening. With everything I have, I kick at the kneecap my morningstar finally dislodged itself from. Over the sounds of their constant groaning I hear a pop and kick again. I can feel ligaments tear when his leg folds in the opposite direction. He drops to the ground, unable to walk on a leg that bends the wrong way.
With all the strength I can muster, I push Tonguey off me, tipping him onto Broken Knee and kicking at the woman coming in quickly with outstretched hands. I know it won’t kill them but it’ll slow them down. There’s still more coming. All I need is a second. Is that too much to ask?! If I can just get to the pile of weapons. Maybe if I jump.
The sword. I roll over and reach for the handle of the dull blade that was lodged in this thing’s head. Kicking at her knees didn’t stop her. She falls towards me, mouth wide open, strings of saliva dangling from her lower lip. I hold the sword upward as she comes at me full force. The tip of the blade disappears into her mouth before exiting the back of her skull. I tip her over onto the other two wiggling corpses, trying to pull the sword back out but I don’t have enough space to work with.
I leave it and scramble to my feet, slamming my heel into another kneecap as hard as I can. It buckles and bends the wrong way, sending the old man crashing to the sidewalk, bone showing through his skin.
The one with the sword lodged in her head can’t see me through the blood covering her face as she gets to her feet. I knock another one down and jump back. It’s not a graceful hop over a puddle but more of a belly flop onto the sidewalk. The heat from the flames burns at my back as I fall to the ground. We’re closer to the fire than we should be but there’s not much we can do about it. At least they can’t get us from behind.
My hard landing knocks the wind out of me. It all goes dark and fuzzy. I need a moment to collect myself. But I don’t have a moment.
I slam my hand down onto the nearest handle I can find. At this point I don’t care what it is, I just need something to swing. If Felecia were here she’d keep them off me for a second to at least give me time to stand up. My friends can’t help me, not right now. I don’t even know if they’re still my friends or if they’ve become the enemy in the past sixty seconds. All I hear is my deafening heartbeat over the faint sounds of groaning and metal hitting flesh. I hope that means I’m not alone.
Two more bend down to grab me before I can scramble to my feet. I don’t know what I have in my hand, everything is still too blurry to see straight. It doesn’t matter. There’s only one thing to do. I grab the handle with both hands and swing with all my might.
It’s lighter than I’d expected. It whips forward and I let out a panicked gasp because it’s too light to be anything useful. It feels like a rotted out branch with no real substance. It seems to magically get heavier, there’s resistance. Something scrapes the concrete. Whatever’s attached to the end of this handle swings into the air.
A spiked ball rips through one of their faces, leaving the flesh of his cheek attached to the sharp points protruding from it. A second ball smacks him again almost instantly, breaking off the bone and remaining shreds of skin. His tongue flaps around inside his unguarded, open to the world, mouth before a third ball rips it out of his throat. Jagged shards of bone expose themselves through the mangled flesh where his jaw should be.
It’s the other kind of mace, the flail I think it’s called. Marty would totally kick my ass for not knowing. The one that was on display with the three metal balls of spikes attached by chains. It’s hard to control. Like some fucked up kind of nun-chucks meant to dismember your opponent.
I swing at the other hungry corpse, aiming a little higher this time. The first ball misses but the second one scalps him, not only removing his hair but ripping off the top of his skull as well. The third slams into his eye socket, tearing it out of his face where it clings to the spike, flinging a white gooey liquid everywhere. He spins around and falls against a few more incoming zombies. If they were people it would look like they intentionally broke his fall but they don’t think like that, heaven help us if they ever do.
I push myself back to my feet, knuckles scraping the sidewalk. The balls don’t get a chance to stop swinging before I thrust them at the back of his head. The sickening crack reminds me of a baseball bat breaking when it connects with the ball, splinters flying into the air. It opens the back of his skull in a bloody explosion of stringy brain matter.
Something metal clangs off the ground. Someone dropped their weapon. I spin in the direction it came from but spin too fast, making myself dizzy. I must have bumped my head in the fall. Everything
goes black while I attempt to keep my balance. I must have a concussion. Or maybe it’s from the lack of food and water and sleep and the fact that my eyes burn so bad I can barely see out of them. Breathing has been reduced to nothing more than shallow gasps because anything more than that makes me cough until I puke.
My vision comes back quickly, along with a warm tingling sensation that makes my stomach rumble like I could throw up at any second, or worse, pass out. If I go down, I’m done for. Their teeth will tear into me before my body hits the ground.
I slam my eyes shut and force them open immediately, hoping to blink it all away. I lunge forward before I’m fully recovered, there’s no time to waste. If something metal hit the ground, it wasn’t a zombie. Someone either lost their weapon, or their life.
A distant high pitched scream pierces my ears. Felecia? Is she calling for my help from down the street? I haven’t heard anything else, not since leaving the fire. Everything’s muffled and far away like my head is underwater.
I send the metal spikes into the backs of their heads. It stuns them for a second before they turn around to see what struck them. They barely notice they’re being decapitated. I shake my head, willing my eyes to focus but all I can make out are three bloody bodies turning to face me.
I spin once to gain some momentum and swing again. Spikes tear through the first guy’s face but get caught on the second in line. They dig into the side of his head and send him flying into their battle ravaged ally. They go down hard, crunching one another’s bones in the process. I rip the balls out but lose control when it comes back towards me, all I can do is hope to stay out of its way.
By luck or perhaps some unseen force, it smashes into the still standing zombie yet again, removing what’s left of her unrecognizable facial features. She goes airborne and collides with a few more of her cannibalistic cohorts.
Blood Type Infected (Book 2): Fallen To The Flame Page 9
