Green Fields (Book 7): Affliction

by Lecter, Adrienne

  Or so I thought, until I came face to, well, teeth with a zombie’s snapping jaws. There was no time to roll, but I managed to get my Mossberg up between us. The shot went wide but that still left a physical lever between me and the undead heap of rags trying to gnaw my face off. I kicked, sheer luck getting my boot to connect with its legs as it tried to reach for me again. Scrambling backward, I got enough distance between us to roll over my shoulder and come to my feet, shooting as soon as I’d regained my balance. Once, twice—and then Charlie came barreling through the door, slamming right into me and sending me staggering deeper into the room.

  Cursing, I tried to steady myself, raising my shotgun to finish off the zombie gearing up for round two—only my shotgun was empty, the last slugs buried in its lower abdomen and hip. The voice at the back of my mind—this time sounding awfully like Nate—berated me for forgetting to count. Rather than let that distract me, I used the butt of the shotgun to come right for the zombie’s head, trying to bash it in. It was when on the second time I hit, the satisfying crunch of bones telling me that it had been a good one, that I realized something. First, the shots and blunt force trauma should at the very least have slowed a half-frozen, emaciated shambler down. And second, while its former clothes hung on its frame in threadbare rags, there was plenty of intact bruised flesh with flexing muscles underneath.

  Yup, we’d caught us a smart, strong one all right. And as if that realization had been a trigger, howls and groans of the decidedly non-canine variety started up from the other side of the room.

  “More juiced ones, watch out!” I called as I did my best to back away from the zombie I’d tried—unsuccessfully—to batter down, dropping the Mossberg on its sling in favor of drawing my Beretta. Two well-aimed shots in the smashed-in face did the trick, but that still left six—no, scratch that, nine—more shamblers coming for us. Backing up toward the door, I tried to get a good look outside without glancing away from the advancing zombies. Fuck, but I’d never seen them fan out in an approximation of a formation before. These were trouble.

  “How are the others doing?”

  Charlie was panting as he slammed a new magazine into his assault rifle, his focus on the undead. “They’re still a quarter of a mile out. Looks like the better deal right now, if you ask me.”

  “Yeah, no question. Can you cover me for a few secs?”

  Rather than reply, he sent a spray of bullets into the zombies, passingly hitting a few but mostly making them dive for cover. Brain-dead shamblers, ducking for cover. Now I’d seen it all. I didn’t hesitate but blindly holstered the gun, then reloaded my shotgun in record time while I started to back up toward the door. Rather than step outside, I slammed my back into the wood right next to the entrance, relieved when my thighs stopped quivering. “Go alert the others. I’ll hold them back for now.”

  Charlie backed up until he was right beside me, giving me a weird look. “If you stay here, they’ll get you. It’s only a couple hundred yards—“

  I shook my head to cut him off. “I pretty much used up all the energy still remaining in my body just getting to the lodge. I can’t run back out there, even if it was just fifty yards. But I can stay here and make sure you’re only getting attacked from one side until you can come and get me. Which is what you’re going to do now. Leave those undead fuckers to me.”

  I could tell that everything inside of Charlie was screaming to protest, but, if anything, he knew when to follow orders. “Will do. Just hold out for a couple of minutes. We’ll get rid of the wolves, and then we’ll take those fuckers down.”

  He briefly touched my shoulder to signal me that he was out. Then it was just me and the undead.

  Glaring into the dark room, I couldn’t help but scoff at them as I waited for their next move. “Why do you even come after me? Can’t you smell that I’m a scrawny, disease-ridden bag of bones? I get why you want to sink your teeth into a juicy hunk of human like Charlie or Burns, but me? Come on. If you’re smart enough to duck, you’re smart enough to know that you’re just wasting your time with me.”

  Apparently, maintaining a healthy work-life balance wasn’t a concern for the zombies, as the first one came at me as soon as I’d fallen silent. It got a slug straight through the sternum for its trouble, making it stagger to a halt. A second, aimed a few inches higher, did the trick and downed it for good. The closest two shamblers looked mighty interested in the carcass of their former compatriot, but they remained out of my line of fire. Or maybe it was the dim light spilling into the room, bathing the corpse in too much illumination. It wasn’t like any of them seemed to be in a hurry. As I studied the corpse, I could see why; it looked exceptionally well-fed, thick strings of muscle visible under the mottled, disintegrating skin—way more substance than I’d carried around with me since the shit had hit the fan. I found the likely cause of that lying in a torn-apart heap further into the cabin—the remains of what must have been a large deer, or maybe even a moose. As I kept surveilling the room, I found more remains of animals, small and not so small. They must have formed an active hunting pack, their location at the lake ideal for when animals wandered to the water to drink.

  “Because that’s exactly what we need—smart, resilient fuckers who compete with us for our food sources,” I muttered. None of the zombies replied, not even to hiss or groan in my direction. They just kept watching me, in silence. Eerie, creepy silence that made me feel exactly like their prey. And judging from the fact that only two of them had attacked, they must have learned what those acrid-smelling boom-sticks in our hands did to them. Considering all those clues, I was surprised that they hadn’t rushed me as a pack yet.

  The cacophony of shouts, shots, and yips continued outside. I felt my attention drift, which made me jerk upright once more when I realized I’d been about to doze off—with adrenaline still poisoning my veins and all. Shit. That run really had wiped me. And still, the juiced undead were watching me, gauging my every action. Part of me was wondering if this wasn’t the ideal easy way out. I’d just have to drop my gun, and they’d be on me within seconds. I might not even feel any pain if they were quick. Hell, even if they literally tore me limb from limb, I’d bleed out before my brain could realize what was going on. If they knew how to hunt moose, I was fair game.

  Yet as much as that option was tempting—and I hated myself for that fact alone—it wasn’t an urge I was willing to give in to.

  Shifting, I made sure to keep my shotgun pointed squarely into the center of the room while I turned my head to the side slightly until I could catch a glimpse outside. The wolves that Charlie and I had taken out remained dark lumps in the snow right outside the lodge. I could see the churned trail we’d left in the pristine snow, parts of it clearer where Charlie had made his way back to the others. Them, I couldn’t see as that would have meant taking my attention off the room, and that was a no-go. That they were still shooting was both a good and a bad sign; good for obvious reasons. Bad because we were needlessly wasting ammo, and if the wolves still kept coming, they must have been a lot more desperate than the shamblers to waste so many lives.

  More time passed, maybe five minutes. The frequency of shots tapered off, but those of snarls and howls increased. I tried chancing another glance, but beyond movement across the fields I couldn’t catch anything before the creak of a floorboard made me pull the trigger before I could even focus on what was coming for me from where exactly. The shot went wide, but the enterprising shambler ducked back behind what remained of an overturned, smashed table. The others kept watching. So they were testing me. Peachy.

  Exhaling slowly, I forced myself to push off the wall and test my own strength. My legs were holding me up, but I immediately felt the strain up my thighs and into the long muscles of my back. The lodge was a bust, so we couldn’t remain here. Even if we killed all the zombies, the insane stench inside made it uninhabitable, even for just one night, not to mention the contamination risk of those of us who had to care about that still
. I was well aware that going back out there might be my death sentence, but something about our strategy wasn’t working. It would be easier to regroup when we were all in one spot.

  As soon as I backed out onto the porch, the icy cold enveloped me again, making me realize how much of a shelter the lodge had been. Even in the dim light I lost my low-light vision immediately, casting everything beyond the dark rectangle of the door into impenetrable gloom. Any sounds the shamblers might have made disappeared underneath the howling of the wind. I remained facing the lodge as I stepped down off the porch and into the snow, carefully setting one foot behind the other. With the ruckus still going strong behind me, it wasn’t hard to aim for it. Hoping that no wolf would veer off the trail and come for my unprotected back was all I could do, really.

  Step after step after step. I made it maybe ten yards before I slipped, almost falling before I steadied myself. Still no movement from the lodge, but I was sure that, by now, they’d all crept up to the door. Maybe they’d get distracted and eat the corpses Charlie and I had left for them, wolves included. What I hadn’t met so far was a discerning zombie. I doubted that would work, though. The corpses would still be there after they’d hunted down the warm, fresh meat.

  I resumed my journey, excruciatingly slowly. The wind was enough to almost knock me over several times. The snarls got closer, and still no shambler in sight. I chanced a glance back over my shoulder. Maybe a hundred yards still separated me from the others, but I caught Nate’s gaze as he let a dead wolf drop from a choke hold. There were a lot of wolves dead in the snow, but all of the humans looked the worse for wear because of it.

  The moment I looked back to the lodge, I saw them—five zombies easing out onto the porch. As soon as they became aware that I’d seen them, they zoomed forward, howling and screaming like we all expected them to. I was almost relieved—at least that kicked my pulse into overdrive again and took the decision of what to do from me.

  Summoning strength that I shouldn’t have had left, I increased my pace until I was more staggering and crawling through the snow than attempting to run, but at least I was making progress. The screaming alerted both my people and the wolves to the other players entering the game, but rather than halt, it made both sides fight harder. As soon as I was close enough to hit, I picked off a few of the wolves, creating a hole in their line of attack. No longer having to fend off snapping jaws, Nate and Jason quickly cut a swath through the rest of the pack, making enough of a dent to break the deadlock. I shot my last slug into one of the smaller but no less lethal wolves before reloading, anxiously glancing back at the zombies. I barely managed to ready the last round before they were on us, the lead one eating lead just as it was about to jump me. Nate appeared next to me, the rapid fire from his assault rifle chewing through the next two shamblers, downing one while the other took cover behind the carcass.

  “The entire lodge’s full of them,” I huffed out, gasping for air. “Too many to take down. And they’re smart.”

  Nate’s blood-splattered face contorted into a grimace, but he didn’t protest my assessment. “Toward the lake then. In the open we stand more of a chance to lose them than in the forest. I’m sure they have no issues whatsoever tracking us by scent.”

  I had no clue who he meant—the wolves or the zombies—but judging from how we all looked, tracking us by the bloody footprints would have been an option as well. I didn’t waste the energy on a verbal acknowledgement, but instead remained glued to Nate’s side as he started off toward the lake. The others quickly caught up, forming a porcupine made of metal around our more fragile bodies. A few of the wolves continued the attack but most hung back, leaving a good twenty animals on our tail. Several more of the shamblers appeared from the lodge, swelling their numbers to seven. The wolves snarled at them but didn’t attack, making me wonder if they’d stopped chewing up the undead, at least unless they had other sources of food. The pack from last winter hadn’t had such qualms, but they’d been emaciated enough to attack virtually anything.

  We reached the edge of the lake with a few feet of buffer zone between us and our assailants that the odd well-aimed shot kept upright easily. “Think the ice is thick enough to hold us?” I asked, eyeing the invisible layer beneath the blanket of snow uneasily.

  “It was cold enough for the river to freeze,” Nate pointed out. “I think we’re good.” Glancing back at the wolves and shamblers, he scoffed. “Not like we have much of a choice.”

  We halted for a moment there, but only to shuffle places. “I’ll go first,” Gita volunteered, limping slightly but trying to hide it. “If it doesn’t hold me, the rest of you don’t even need to try.”

  “Lewis next, then Doyle. Burns, you cover them.” He nodded at Jason and Tanner, who gave similarly grim looks back. “We’ll bring up the rear.”

  The ice cracked menacingly as Gita inched out onto it, but held. I gave her a berth of maybe four feet before I followed, figuring that this way I would be close enough to make a grab for her should she break through the ice, but far enough away to rescue myself first if I’d need a rope for that. Not that I was sure I still had the strength for either maneuver. Just remaining upright and keeping my shotgun trained on the shamblers was hard enough. As he followed me, I saw that Charlie had a hard time keeping himself upright as well, his shoulder having given out completely now judging from the way he more clutched his weapon to his side than was able to use it. A long gash across his cheek was still bleeding, and he was favoring one leg over the other as well.

  I knew that it hadn’t been founded on anything but wishful thinking, but I’d kind of hoped that neither the wolves nor the shamblers would follow us out onto the ice. Both did, of course, because watching us limp away would have been too easy. They spread out, keeping more of a distance to each other than to us now. At first I thought that was because we were the bigger threat to them, but soon realized that they forced us to spread our focus too wide to maintain good coverage in all directions. Smart fuckers, the lot of them.

  “Bree? How are you doing?” Nate called out to me a while later, keeping his voice just loud enough for it to carry forward.

  I considered how to reply. I felt like my body was moments away from providing that answer all on its own. Gritting my teeth, I lied instead. “Still holding up. Why?”

  The pause that followed could have been due to him keeping his attention on the wolves, but I doubted it. “Because you’ve been pointing your shotgun at your own feet for the past five minutes. You need to eat something.”

  Shit. I quickly straightened, getting my weapon up to where it belonged. “Yeah, good idea in theory, but remember how that went last time?”

  A longer pause followed. “I have some dextrose in my pack.”

  The chuckle that made it over my lips was a harsh one. “Gee, so sick of me already?” I hadn’t forgotten about Bailey insta-converting due to eating a contaminated chocolate bar.

  “I’m overwhelmingly sure that it’s safe for consumption.”

  Now that was a phrasing that needed an explanation. “Exactly how sure?”

  “Eighty-eight percent?” Nate hazarded a guess. “I swiped it off the Cheyenne Mountain compound when we left. It came from the stocks that they were eating from, so I don’t think they contaminated their own food.”

  “Or they just made it look like they used it,” I voiced the part he left unsaid.

  “Hence the twelve percent chance you’ll kill us all before the wolves or shamblers get to us.”

  I tried to come up with a witty answer, but my brain drew a blank. “Not sure my body still has enough glycogen stored up for that.” And right there was my answer. “Gimme some sugar.”

  The situation couldn’t be dire enough that Burns didn’t laugh about a crack of mine like that, which was oddly comforting. I staggered twice until Nate had managed to get the stuff from his pack and it reached me through a line of tired, injured people fumbling with their weapons. That no one seemed interested i
n swiping any let me know just how much they trusted Nate’s assessment. Under different circumstances, I wouldn’t have chanced it, but if you don’t have any sane options left, any option will do.

  It was one of those packs that contained the single pieces wrapped individually. I didn’t try to unwrap it—my fingers were way too frozen and clumsy for that, gloves notwithstanding. So all it took was some fumbling to get my scarf off the lower half of my face so I could tear into the packaging with my teeth. I chewed it all as best I could before I swallowed, spitting out the inedible chunks I managed to separate from the rest. I had a moment where I thought it would come right up my esophagus again, my mind rejecting the possible danger after all, but it went down—and stayed down as well. I kept chewing, as best I could without taking my entire attention off my surroundings.

  “Are you dead yet?” Nate asked a while later. No idea how much time had passed, but considering how quickly Bailey had converted at that factory, I should at least have felt something by now.

  “Sorry to disappoint you, but hanging on.” I did a quick assessment. “Actually feeling just a little less like a slab of meat right now, but I doubt it will hold up for long.”

  “Only needs to hold up long enough,” Nate answered—and the zombies rushed us as one cohesive unit.

  Instinct took over—instinct crafted and honed last year—and I started running for the middle of the lake rather than try to make a stand. Long before my body had turned into my own worst enemy, Nate had drilled one imperative into me: run. My body lacked the reserves to go on for hours, but now it might just have a shot at a quick burst of speed, so that’s what I went for. Gita kept up with me, with Charlie lumbering after us across the bumpy but still surprisingly slippery ice. And it wasn’t like the wolves weren’t happy to give chase, another hassle to deal with.