The girls nodded and, one-by-one, they exited the small cabin. Chalice led them the way she had come, taking care to stay out of sight of any of the other buildings’ windows.
“Going somewhere?”
She whirled to see Dante leaning across the side of a building. “I didn’t give up the good life in the mall to bring you here just so you can get away.”
“Then why did you?” She asked.
He stepped forward. “They have my little brother and sister. If I don’t do what they say, they’ll use them as zombie bait.”
“They’re only children.” If he was telling the truth.
“That doesn’t matter to them. Obedience does. Take them with you.” Tears welled in his eyes. “I don’t care if you refuse to let me come, but please, rescue them. Otherwise, I have to cry the alarm.”
Chalice could just knock him out with the butt of the rifle, but the thought of leaving children behind stopped her. “Where are they?”
“Stay here.” He sprinted around the building.
Chalice led the girls deeper into the trees while they waited, and hoped he was telling the truth and not setting them up for a trap. Her trusting nature had already gotten them into trouble once, she wouldn’t let it happen again.
Approximately five minutes passed before Dante and two children under the age of twelve approached them. “Hurry.” He pushed his siblings forward. “A guard will make the rounds in a few minutes.”
“Come with us.” She laid a hand on his arm. “I’ll explain to Colton why you did it.”
He nodded. “Thank you. I’ll make it up to you somehow.”
They raced for the mine entrance. Dante stepped back and held the branches aside so Chalice and the others could go through. A shot rang out.
Someone shouted.
Dante jerked and grunted.
Chalice grabbed his arm and shoved him ahead of her. “Don’t stop now.”
“What’s he doing here?” Colton frowned.
“I’ll explain later.” She thrust her shoulder under Dante’s arm and helped him further into the mine. “We’ve got to go. They know we’re here.”
Amos cursed and took his position behind her, walking backwards. “I need some guns up here. Can’t hold them off alone.”
Chalice handed Dante over to Eddy. “Get him and the kids out of here. We’ll follow.”
Eddy nodded.
Four men squeezed into the mine entrance, pistols in their hands. One of them led two of the undead by steel poles attached to their necks. He hit a lever, releasing them. He laughed as the zombies lurched forward. The other three men ducked back outside.
“Suppertime!” The man laughed.
Chalice raised her rifle and fired. The sound echoed through the mines, startling bats from the eaves. The air filled with their screeches and the rustling of their wings.
Her shot took him in the throat. One of the zombies turned, throwing itself onto fresh meat. The other one continued toward her and Colton. Screams reverberated from further down the mine shaft.
“I’ve got this,” he said. “Help the others.” He raised his sword.
Chalice dashed the way the others had come. She skid to a halt. The group was surrounded by the undead. The children clustered in the middle, adults facing outward, weapons raised. Chalice rushed forward, severing one monster’s head, then stabbing it through the eye. Several of the zombies turned toward her as Colton moved to her side.
“Where did they come from?” She asked.
“There’s another tunnel. It must have been full of these things.” He pulled a knife from his belt. With a sword in one hand and a knife in the other, he stepped in front of her.
*
“We’re a team, remember?” Chalice squeezed between him and the wall.
The ground under their feet turned to mud from the pooling blood. Hanna slipped and went down. Marianne yanked her to her feet.
There were too many. They’d never all make it out alive.
Dante freed himself from the group, standing alone in the tunnel the zombies had come from. He lifted his pistol and fired. Half of the group broke off and followed as he limped away.
“Take care of Jamal and Shaunda,” he called. “If I can make it back, I will.”
“Don’t be a fool.” Colton headed after him, stabbing one of Dante’s followers through the base of his skull. “You’ll never make it alone.”
Dante shrugged. “I’m gut shot. I’m a goner anyway. Help the others.” He slid along the wall, staying just a few feet ahead of those who wanted to rip him apart. “I’ve got a bullet. They won’t take me alive.”
Colton noticed the spreading stain across his back. He was right. He wasn’t going to make it. His sacrifice gave the rest of them a fighting chance. He turned back to the others.
“Dante?” Chalice asked.
“No.” Colton bashed an undead with the hilt of his sword.
“We’ve got more company!” Chalice raised her rifle.
The men who had released the chained undead stepped over the bodies littering the mine floor. Colton turned and fired. Soon the walls rang with gunfire as the living and the dead fell.
When the smoke cleared, the enemy vanquished, Colton slumped against the wall. Blood dripped from Amos’s arm. Marianne tied a strip of torn fabric around Mychal’s bicep. Hanna screamed.
Eric stared at his hand missing his two middle fingers. “Sucker bit them right off. Good thing I’m not affected by their bite.”
“Hanna!” Marianne, finished with Mychal, noticed her youngest sliding down the wall. Blood spurted from her neck. Marianne pressed her hands against the flow. “Help me.”
Chalice rushed forward, trying to peel off her leather jacket. “Was she bit?”
“Shot. It’s her jugular.” Tears streamed down her cheeks. “There’s nothing I can do.” She pulled Hanna into her arms.
Mychal and Chalice fell to their knees beside her. Their sobs joined their mother’s.
“I’m sorry, folks, but there’s still a camp of men back there that want to kill us,” Bill said. “What would you like me to do?”
Colton handed him the bag containing the grenades. “Blow them to hell.”
“Gladly.” Bill raced for the exit.
Colton stiffened his back and followed. “Try not to blow up any supplies, if you can help it. The red building with peeling paint is the only one I saw no one come in or out of.”
“I’ll shoot first and save the grenades. Go back to your girl. Amos, Sarah, and the others can help me.”
Colton clapped him on the shoulder. “I’m needed here. Chalice would want me to stay.”
He’d no sooner spoke the words, then everyone except the youngest and Marianne had joined them at the mine’s opening. Colton nodded. “Let’s show them what happens when they mess with us.”
The nine of them stepped outside and formed a straight line. With guns drawn, they advanced forward, drawing the attention of the guards and three men around a campfire. As one, Colton’s group fired. Five men fell. Two more rushed from a building. They, too, fell under the group’s onslaught.
The slaughter churned Colton’s stomach, but these men had thought nothing of cornering them in the mines with the non-breathers. Their deaths would have meant nothing. These men’s deaths should mean nothing. Still, even with anger boiling inside him, his group’s forward march that left death in their wake, would not allow for an easy night’s sleep.
When no more living or dead appeared, the group split and searched the buildings, uncovering weapons and piles of food. The monsters corralled between the fences snarled at the sight of them going from building to building.
Amos climbed behind the wheel of an army transport truck and parked it in front of the supply building. “Fill it up, folks. This will keep us for quite a while.”
Chalice approached with two young women. “Found them tied up in a building. They’re all that’s left of their group.”
“Leave
them here and go get the others. We’ll give them a safe place.” Colton hooked his rifle strap over his shoulder and hefted a box in his arms. Grieving over Hanna would have to wait. Her immediate family wouldn’t be the only ones devastated. It always hurt to lose one of their own, but to lose one so young … it would pain them all for a very long time. Not to mention what Dante had done for them all. His sacrifice had saved them. It wasn’t hard to forgive him for taking Chalice. Any of them would have done the same under the circumstances.
He tossed a box not-to-gently into the truck and cringed at the sound of breaking glass. This world never gave anyone a break. Turn your back and you were dead. Just like that. No apologies, no second chances. He glared at Eric, whose hand was wrapped in his dirty tee shirt. He was probably the only living person immune to not only the virus, but a bite from the undead. Unless someone figured out how to make an antidote for the poison destroying the world, there was no hope for mankind.
“A bad day and a good day,” Amos said, leaning on the side of the truck. “We got our girls back, but lost one, and got enough supplies to feed us all for three months.”
“Losing Hanna overshadows the gift of the food.”
“Yes, it does.” Amos pierced him with his stare. “But, in this world, the bad come forth. The rest of us have to deal with that the best we can.”
9
Chalice stared at the grave of her sister. They’d chosen to bury her in a corner of the garden she had loved to work in. After three days, the pain was as real as it had been while watching her die from the stray bullet.
Mom stepped to her side and put an arm around Chalice’s shoulder. “This is the life we live now, sweetie. Things can change in an instant. I dread every time any of you leave the safety of the mall. We’ll miss our darling girl forever, but she no longer has to live in constant fear and danger.”
“We’ll be leaving again soon.” Chalice raised tear-filled eyes. “We have to see what’s at the facility that started this evil.”
“I know, but I don’t have to like it.” She wiped her thumbs under Chalice’s eyes. “I’m so proud of you. Half of these people wouldn’t be alive if not for you and Colton. No matter what happens, never forget that.”
Chalice nodded and watched as her mother headed back inside. Sometimes, Chalice didn’t care whether the others lived. What mattered most to her was her family and Colton. Still, she’d been placed on the path she traveled, whether she liked it or not.
With one last glance at Hanna’s grave, she turned and moved back inside. Shouts and laughter from the toy store reminded her that life went on. Not only was her group saving people, but they were doing their part in collecting those who would someday repopulate the world. And, they weren’t doing it by force. These people followed them by choice. She couldn’t let them down by hiding.
“Are you all right?” Colton met her at the entrance.
“I don’t even know what that is anymore.” She sat at one of the tables in what was once the food court and now served as their communal dining room.
He sat across from her and took her hands in his. “I’ve never had a family until yours, but the loss of Hanna aches to the bone.”
“We shouldn’t have slaughtered those in the camp the way we did, but I can’t help feeling a sense of justice.”
“They were bad people who would have continued doing bad. I’ve struggled with that myself.”
“Now what?” She stared into his handsome face. His hair had grown past his collar. Most days he wore it tied back with a strip of leather. Even rugged and sometimes filthy, he was the handsomest guy she’d ever seen.
“We make our plans for taking Rachel and Eric to the research facility. All our hopes lie there.”
She glanced to where her mother and Mychal kept watch out the front. “It could be a suicide mission.”
“Yeah.”
“When do we go?”
“Tomorrow. The days are growing shorter, and we don’t know how long it’s going to take us.” He squeezed his hands. “I’ll do my best to bring you back safe.”
“Now that she’s lost Hanna, Mom will insist on coming. She won’t let me and Mychal out of her sight for some time.”
Colton gave her a lopsided grin “Then we’ve got a total of six. Eddy can stay behind.”
“This is an important trip to take only six people.”
“I don’t want to risk more on what might be a fool’s errand.” Colton leaned over and kissed her, his lips lingering with the promise that life might get better after all. “I love you, my courageous girl. We leave bright and early in the morning with no more than our best fighters.” He straightened and headed down the mall toward the armory.
Chalice pushed to her feet, pushing heavily against the table top. A fool’s errand it might be, but she wouldn’t rest until they’d exhausted every avenue of saving mankind, especially those under the mall’s roof. With their numbers over thirty now, food was still a primary concern.
They needed a larger garden, something not possible where they lived; not with those things roaming around outside. Once the undead were gone for good, only then, could life resume in a safe manner.
She passed the toy store, trying not to dwell that Hanna was normally there, helping teach the children their alphabet and numbers. Teaching them songs to help pass the day. She’d wanted to be a teacher someday. She sighed. The older children needed teachers, too. How long until those who remained alive converted to mainly uneducated people? Natalie Reed had once run a daycare. Maybe she would be willing to be a teacher until someone more suitable was found.
Changing directions, Chalice located Natalie in the supply room of one of the department stores. “Natalie?”
“I’m so sorry.” Tears welled in the woman’s eyes. She pulled Chalice into a hug.
“Thank you.” Chalice stepped back. “I’ve come to ask something of you. I know you’re in charge of helping Grandma hand out clothing when it’s needed, but I was wondering whether you could be a school teacher instead? Maybe age six and up?”
Natalie twisted her mouth in thought. “It’s been a long time since I’ve worked in a classroom, but the bookstore might have enough materials for me to use.” She smiled. “It will be like the pioneer days, except for a one-room schoolhouse, we have a corner in a mall. Sure, I’ll start on Monday. The older children can help the younger ones. Who will watch those not old enough to attend school?”
“Leave that up to me. Grandma can help when she can. I’ll ask her to round up volunteers and make a roster.” Steps lighter, having fulfilled a wish Hanna would have loved to see come to fruition, Chalice headed for her corner of the world. She’d even name the little school after her sister. Something that could help remind the others of her sweet spirit for a long time to come.
She flopped across her bed and stared at the ceiling. Morning would come quickly, and she’d spent most of the day at Hanna’s grave. Now, she’d have to get up extra early to get outfitted for the dangerous trip.
She hadn’t prayed in a long time, not since the day of the fateful meteor shower, but that night, she prayed for God’s mercy on those leaving and those staying behind.
*
Colton met Bill, Sarah, Rachel, Eric, Amos, and Marianne in the food court, long after Chalice and Mychal had gone to sleep. The mall would be left in Bill’s charge in his absence. If anyone could keep those here safe, it was Bill.
“We’ll leave at sunup,” he said, glancing around the group. “We’ll take minimal food supplies, and hope we can find some things left behind at the facility.”
“Take the hazmat suits,” Bill said. “No sense risking yourselves.”
“No argument there. We’ll need ammo, but not to where we leave you low. We’ve got our swords and knives against the undead.”
“I don’t need a gun,” Marianne said. “I’m not as good with one as my children and would only waste bullets. Give me a hatchet.”
Colton grinned. “I’m
hoping we won’t need any weapons until we reach the facility.” He sobered. “I’m pretty sure it’ll be overrun.”
“Maybe not.” Rachel crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair. “That’s where everything started. The undead would have either decayed to the point where they aren’t any danger, or wandered off. There’s nothing else out there. No homes or businesses. I think that’s probably the safest place on the planet, except for the threat of the virus.”
“Hopefully, the suits will protect us from that.” Colton tapped the map on the table. “Once we get there, we can’t return here for a week. We’ll have to quarantine ourselves.”
“There’s living space at the facility. That won’t be a problem.”
“I guess if all of you die,” Eric said, smiling. “It will be up to me to bring back the sad news.”
Rachel punched him in the arm. “Not funny.”
“Coffee?” Grandma set a tray on the table next to them. “Looks like you’ll be up for a long time.”
“Just finalizing our plans.” Marianne stood and helped her hand out steaming cups of coffee. “This is just what we need. Thank you.”
Amos marched to them and pulled up a chair. “I’ve been thinking. You can use me out there. I don’t relish being left behind. I’ve always been a part of any scouting party. It’s what I do.”
Colton shook his head. “Bill can use you.”
“So can you.” Amos glared, his massive arms bulging as he crossed them. “I’m coming.”
“Fine. Leave me here with a bunch of women and children.” Bill ducked a punch from Sarah. “It’s okay, really. We’ll be fine here. Once the place is boarded up, no one even knows we’re here. They sure as hell can’t get in.”
“Then it’s settled. Seven of us will leave early in the morning. We’ll take the Hummer and the big Ford. That gives us room for supplies and they’re the best vehicles if we run into a herd of those things.” Colton stood. “Try to get some rest. It’s going to be a long week.”
He shuffled to where Chalice slept and stared at the face he loved above all else. He hated the fact she was going on such a dangerous mission in the morning. Yet, the Harts were stubborn, and all three insisted on going, fueled by the idea the trip might save the world.
The Zombie Awakening (Complete 6 Volume Series, plus prologue) Page 33
