by Sam Sisavath
“How the hell are we still alive?”
“Because I’m good.”
“Good, or just really lucky?”
Keo grinned. “Same difference. Bottom line is, we’re still alive.”
Norris’s eyes went from Lou’s body to the window on the back wall. He turned his head—or turned as much of it as he could, anyway—to look at the door Keo was leaning against, hands gripping the lever as if his life depended on it because, well, it did.
“I can hear them outside,” Norris said.
“That’s impressive. I’d have thought hearing was the first thing to go with old age.”
Norris grunted. “Wiseass.”
“Three hours,” Keo said.
“Three hours?”
“Until dawn. Three more hours until we need to get the hell out of here.”
“What about Pollard?”
“I don’t know. He might be dead or alive, or hiding somewhere. The shooting stopped hours ago.”
“Pollard’s too mean to die. You need to be careful.”
“You mean we, don’t you, old-timer?”
“No.” Norris sighed. “Remember when you asked me if I could move?”
“Yeah…”
“I lied. I can’t move.”
“I figured that.”
“I mean it, kid. I can’t even lift my arms.” He attempted to raise both arms, but his hands barely left the floor before he gave up. “I’m done. When the sun comes up, you need to get the hell out of here before Pollard’s people poke their heads out from wherever they’re hiding right now. That’s your only shot unless you plan to take on however many of his people are still left. Could be a few or a lot. Don’t take that chance.”
Keo stared at Norris for a moment. The older man’s eyes were on Lou, either because he found the dead body fascinating, or (more likely) he didn’t want to look Keo in the eyes.
“Are you telling me to leave you here?” Keo finally said.
“I’m telling you I’m no good out there. It is what it is. Look, I’m fifty-seven—”
“I thought you were fifty-six?”
“My birthday was a month ago.”
“Why didn’t you say anything? Happy birthday.”
Norris smirked. “Thanks. Anyway, as I was saying…”
“I’m not leaving you here, old-timer.”
“The hell you’re not.” He finally met Keo’s eyes over the very short distance. “Santa Marie Island. Remember? Gillian? Jordan? The others? You made a promise, kid. It’s your job to keep it.”
Keo didn’t answer him.
Norris smiled. “She’d kick my ass if she knew you were tossing your life away for someone who couldn’t even walk. I don’t need that little girl all up in my grill, kid. She can be pretty mean when she’s angry.”
Keo looked through the broken security glass. It was dark outside, but he could see their shapes moving about. As if on cue, the lever moved against his hand. It was very slight, almost tentative.
More probing…
“They’re out there?” Norris said.
Keo nodded. “They can hear us talking. It’s so quiet, they’d be able to hear from outside the building.”
“Remember, at sunrise, you need to get gone.”
Keo didn’t say anything.
“Kid,” Norris said. “You heard me?”
“Yeah, I heard you.”
“Head south. Find a map and a car and get down to New Orleans. Find a boat and get to Galveston. You promised her.”
Keo didn’t say anything.
“Kid,” Norris pressed.
“Yeah,” Keo said.
“Sunrise. In three hours. Got it?”
Keo nodded. “I got it.”
“Good,” Norris said, leaning his head back and closing his eyes.
Keo kept his focus on the hallway outside. Thinking. Trying not to think. But unable to stop himself.
Norris had a point. The chances of Pollard’s entire fifty-something men roster succumbing to the creatures in one fell swoop was too much of a best-case scenario to even bother hoping for. There would be survivors.
How many? That was the question.
He didn’t have a watch, but he could feel the encroaching dawn.
Two hours.
Two more hours until I abandon Norris to die in a stinking closet.
CHAPTER 14
At least Lou had had the decency to come try to kill him with a full tactical belt. Keo stripped the dead man of it now, including side holster and ammo pouches. He pulled the Ka-Bar knife out of Lou’s chest and put it back into its sheath, then attached it to the belt on his left hip. The sidearm was a Sig Sauer 1911 .45 semi-automatic, and he still had the AK-47. The assault rifle’s buttstock was cracked, but everything else was fine when he dry fired it to make sure. He was down to just one magazine, which was the problem.
There were no signs of Pollard’s people outside the hallway, dead or otherwise, so there was no scavenging for more weapons and ammo. He spent a second or two thinking about where the bodies went, if the creatures took them, and let it go just as quickly. It didn’t matter.
Instead, he concentrated on what did: Getting the hell out of the building without having to fight his way through however many of Pollard’s people remained.
How much time was left?
It wasn’t long now. He could feel the heat starting to fill up the hallway outside, the pool of light gradually creeping along the (bloodied) floor an inch at a time. The creatures, clearly sensing the coming morning, had left close to an hour ago. The sudden rush of bare feet slapping against blood-slicked tiles was a startling and wholly unique sound Keo wasn’t sure he wanted to hear ever again.
He waited patiently, watching as a small swath of light began to grow…
Now or never.
He threw the door open and stepped outside, swinging the rifle left, then right. He ignored the congealed pool of blood under his shoes, the plop-plop that filled the air with every movement he made.
The hallway was empty, and there was enough sun coming through the open window behind him that he could see the still-dark wall of trees across the side yard. It wasn’t completely light outside, but there was enough that birds had begun to chirp in the background.
Take your cues from the furry creatures in the trees. What could possibly go wrong?
Keo looked right again, just to be sure, before hurrying back into the closet.
Norris’s eyes were closed. They had been closed for the last couple of hours since their last conversation. Keo crouched next to him and felt his pulse. He wasn’t sure if he could even see the older man breathing under his shirt.
There.
It wasn’t much, but it was there. Norris was still alive, if barely.
“Old-timer,” Keo said.
Norris didn’t respond. His breathing remained shallow, labored, and his eyelids didn’t seem to be moving at all.
“Norris.”
Still nothing.
Keo tapped the ex-cop lightly on the cheek. When that didn’t work, he tapped harder.
“Norris. Wake up.”
Zero reaction.
Keo glanced up and out the security window and could see light beginning to spread along the ceiling in the hallway.
Time’s up.
He smacked Norris so hard he was sure he had rattled a tooth or two.
Norris’s eyes flew open and he glared at Keo. “Jesus, you’re still here.”
“We gotta go.”
“Go where?”
“Anywhere but here.”
Norris shook his head. “I told you, kid, I can’t move, much less walk—”
“Then I’ll drag you. I got at least fifty pounds on you. Most of that is muscle. You’re what, 150 of old man bones and wrinkled skin?”
Norris grunted. “You little shit.”
Keo grinned. He opened the door and peered out again, looked left then right, before sitting for a moment just to listen. He couldn’
t hear anything; just the birds outside the window. The entire building was dead quiet. Amazingly so. The pool of light had only reached a few feet beyond the closet door. Most of the hallway to his right was still covered in thick patches of darkness, with the turn at the very end indistinguishable.
He slung the AK-47 and positioned Norris away from the wall. “I’m going to be dragging you through blood and God knows what until we get to the window.”
“Just go, kid.”
“Shut up and play dead. Not literally, of course.”
Norris sighed but didn’t argue.
Keo wrapped his arms around the older man’s shoulders, heard him grunt with pain, then began dragging him to the door. He was grateful for the smooth tiled floor (covered in blood or not), otherwise the bruises under his clothes would be the last thing Norris had to worry about. Even so, it was like dragging a heavy bag of flour, albeit one that was just barely breathing.
In the hallway, he turned left and dragged Norris backward toward the window.
“Jesus,” Norris said. “Whose blood am I sliding around in?”
“I think it’s one of the guards. Barry something.”
“One guy?”
“Sure, let’s go with that.”
“Oh Jesus, kid, this ain’t right.”
The blood was everywhere, on the floor and along the walls. Just the red variety, because the tainted black kind, Keo knew, evaporated against sunlight. He could still smell some of it lingering in the air, like stinging acid.
There were dried, bloody prints along the walls and ceiling, which he didn’t know was possible. How the hell did they get up there? Were they running on each other’s heads? He would have dismissed that as the ramblings of a crazy person, but he had come to realize there were very few things the creatures were not capable of when they sensed prey. And last night there had been plenty of humans inside the building.
It must have been a feeding frenzy. Sucks to be them.
It didn’t take long to reach the window. There were no glass shards along the frames for him to worry about because all the windows along the building had been broken out months ago. There were just the repurposed countertops, most of them perforated by the two AK-47 magazines he had sent their way last night. There were only a few boards still hanging from nails along the walls, and it didn’t take much to slide them out of the way.
“You ready?” Keo asked.
“No,” Norris said.
“You’re gonna have to do most of the work here. Or I can just throw you out—”
Norris pushed his way onto his feet before Keo could finish. He turned around, Keo holding him up the entire time. He led Norris toward the window, feeling like a parent guiding a big and lumbering toddler.
“This is goddamn embarrassing, kid,” Norris grunted.
“Out you go,” Keo said.
“Wait—”
Keo didn’t wait. He pushed Norris through the wide opening, something that hadn’t been there last night. Norris disappeared through the hole and landed on the other side with a crunch!
Keo hoped he hadn’t landed on the back of his neck.
“Oh, you little asshole,” Norris said from the other side of the window.
I guess not.
He hurried out after giving the long (and dark, but brightening up fast) hallway another look. He went through the window feet first, landing on the other side next to Norris, who had managed to sit up on the ground, supporting himself with both elbows.
“You in one piece?” Keo asked.
“No thanks to you.”
“Can you shoot?”
“I need to?”
“Maybe.”
“Then I guess I can.”
Keo drew the Sig Sauer and handed it to Norris before helping him up and wrapping one arm around his waist. He hooked Norris’s left hand around the back of his neck, which left the ex-cop with his right hand free to hold the gun.
“Try not to shoot me in the leg,” Keo said.
“It’s tempting,” Norris said.
It felt like Norris had gained an additional fifty pounds since Keo dragged him out of the janitor’s closet. Of course, now he was shouldering the man’s entire weight instead of just pulling him around like a useless sack of meat, so that might have had a little something to do with it, too.
“Where we going?” Norris asked.
“Anywhere but here.”
He glanced back at the broken window and into the pitch-black hallway at the far end one last time, then began moving the two of them away from the building. Norris walked as much as he could, but Keo could tell it was taking a lot out of him even just to shuffle his feet one step at a time. It took Keo a few seconds to adjust to Norris’s non-existent pace.
“You sure it’s safe in there?” Norris said, staring at the dark woods in front of them. “I can’t see shit.”
Keo blinked at the rising sun, comforted by the warmth massaging his face. It wouldn’t be completely light for another five, maybe ten minutes. But there was enough to get by, or at least send the creatures back to their hiding places. For once, the bloodsuckers’ seemingly innate ability to sense the coming dawn, that allowed them to rush off well in advance of the sunlight, would work in their favor.
Unless, of course, he was wrong about the whole thing.
“There’s plenty of light,” Keo said. “We’ll be fine.”
*
He was hoping for an hour, but realistically only expecting thirty minutes. It turned out to be more like twenty before he heard the first burst of engines coming from behind them. It would have been nice if he had grabbed one of those. Of course, that would mean finding the key or hot-wiring one. Could you even hot-wire an all-terrain vehicle?
It would also have been nice if Norris could move a little faster, too. As much as he was pushing the old-timer, they made slow progress.
“Aw, dammit,” Norris grunted, when he heard the engines start up behind them. “You gotta go on, kid. I’m just slowing you down.”
“Shut up and keep moving,” Keo said.
“This is it for me. The faster you accept that, the better chance one of us will live through this.”
“You talk too much. Keep moving.”
“Kid—”
“Which part of shut up and keep moving don’t you understand?”
Norris sighed. “You damn whippersnappers. You never listen.”
They had only managed to put about a hundred meters between them and the clearing when Keo heard not one, but at least three, ATVs revving their engines. So that meant at least three survivors from last night’s attack. More, if they decided to ride piggyback. How many of the sports vehicles had he seen? A dozen?
Too many. Always too damn many…
“We gotta pick it up,” Keo said.
“I would if I could,” Norris grunted back. “I told you, just leave me here. I got a gun. I’ll try to give you some extra time.”
Keo said nothing.
“Kid,” Norris said.
“Shut up and walk faster.”
“What is this, a death wish? You did everything you could. You even came back for me, for God’s sake. I didn’t expect that, but you did, and I’m grateful—”
Crunch-crunch.
Keo didn’t so much as drop Norris as he simply cast him off to one side. Even as he was spinning toward the source of the sound, he was unslinging the AK-47 from his shoulder, praying that dry firing the weapon back earlier had been enough to make sure it was still in one piece and would work when he needed it, like now.
“Aw, geez,” Norris said as he landed on the ground with a thump.
Keo didn’t have time to make sure he was all right. He was already peering through the assault rifle’s iron sight at a large bush standing up next to a tree. It looked as if a part of the woods had come alive and were staring back at him.
Wait. Staring back at him?
“Goddammit, Zachary,” Keo said, lowering the rifle. “I almost shot
you.”
Zachary grinned, white teeth showing behind the layer of dirt and mud that covered his face. He walked toward them in his ghillie suit. “You look like shit.”
“You smell like it too, San Diego,” a second voice said behind him.
Keo looked over at Shorty, wearing his own ghillie suit, emerging out from behind a tree. Both men looked as if they had slept in the woods all night.
And Norris thinks I’m crazy.
“Holy shit, I think I’m losing my mind, kid,” Norris said, somehow managing to sit up on the ground, “because I think the forest is coming alive and talking to me.”
Keo smiled. “Don’t shoot. They’re friends.”
“Shoot? I can’t even lift my hands. I told you that.” Both of Norris’s arms were flat on the ground beside him, including the one holding the Sig Sauer.
“I guess you found him, huh?” Zachary said.
“Yeah,” Keo said. “What are you guys doing here?”
“Shorty and I were bored on the island, so we decided to come watch you get yourself killed.”
“Island?” Norris said.
“Long story,” Keo said. “Can you guys give me a hand with him?”
“Depends,” Zachary said. “Can he do anything other than look mostly dead?”
Norris grunted. “I’m way too old for this shit.”
*
With Zachary and Shorty’s help, they were able to cover more ground. The two men were racing through the woods, carrying Norris between them. Norris’s body had gone slack, though Keo couldn’t tell if he was just tired or unconscious. Keo trailed behind them, keeping his ears and eyes open. In less than five minutes, they had gone nearly 200 meters, five times the distance he and Norris had managed in the previous twenty minutes by themselves.
The continued roar of the ATVs had changed behind them, and Keo knew the vehicles were now moving.
He stopped, but Zachary and Shorty didn’t. The older of the two men threw a look over his shoulder and met Keo’s eyes.
“Go, I’ll catch up,” Keo said.
“Same place as last time,” Zachary said. “We’ll wait thirty minutes. If you’re not there by then—”
“Thirty minutes. Go.”
Zachary narrowed his eyes at him. Keo guessed the older man already knew what he was planning. “You’re insane, you know that?”
