Only The Dead Don't Die (Book 3): Last State

by Popovich, A. D.

  Yesterday’s pre-dawn escape hadn’t gone well. Ella had refused to climb out the window. She had been right as usual. Too risky. There had to be a way out. Justin eyed the desk stacked with the tubs of books. They had spent the last two days and nights playing whack-a-Z, waiting for gnarled blood-encrusted hands to reach between the tubs. One hard shove with the bat was all it usually took. Last night he had noticed a startling change. Zs had learned to hold on.

  It was time he found out exactly how many Zs were inside the cabin while Ella, Twila, and the Zs slept. Silently, he removed the tubs blocking the loft’s entrance. He shined his extra flashlight down the ladder and around the cabin’s front room. He stopped counting at thirty. All the squirming arms and legs looked like one super-ginormous creature with a ton of rotting heads. He was lost in his plan when Ella woke up about ten minutes too soon.

  “What are you doing?” she gasped.

  He rushed to her. “I need to go number two,” he whispered, not telling her his new plan. She might buy it; it was embarrassing using the tub he had renovated into a potty-tub, complete with a privacy curtain.

  Don’t you dare go out there, the terror in her eyes yelled. “We’re waiting for Scarlett. Remember?” She crossed her arms, determined. “Justin Luke Chen, you’re scheming something. I see it in your eyes.”

  Ella knew him too well. “Just checking it out.” They were almost out of food and water. He was done waiting. Besides, he was pretty sure the detached skull he had seen had been Scarlett. He couldn’t tell her yet. He needed Ella to be brave. And calm.

  “Yum, I’m craving garlic fries.” Her mood suddenly changed.

  He held up the garlic. “I’m trying it out.” He wanted to boost her courage before he told her his plan. He rubbed it on his skin. “Now I’m hungry for garlic fries,” he joked back.

  Ella giggled. “Do you think it will work?”

  “Sure, if Scarlett said it works, then it works.” Keep her calm and happy.

  Justin scooted over the desk. He climbed down the ladder, dreading the first tug at his feet. The Zs sprawled around the floor, crashed out in there morning restless state. He had timed them yesterday. They had slept for almost an hour. But it had been without any provoking. He was pretty sure the presence of food would motivate them out of their slumbering stupor.

  The next part freaked him out: stepping between the ghoulish bodies. With his zombie-slayer knife at the ready, he tiptoed between squirming arms, legs, torsos, and mangy skulls. He finally made it to the front door. It hung at an angle. The door Ella had nailed over the front of it lay on the floor. It had been a pretty smart idea. Only she had probably nailed it into the drywall.

  The Z leaning against the door flopped onto him, practically hugging him in his drowsy state. Ella’s gasp didn’t break his concentration. Shielding his eyes, he slashed its neck, severing its head. Any other day and he might have gagged or puked. Today was different. Courage pulsed through his veins like the blood squirting from the Z’s severed arteries.

  There was only one escape option. Run to the lodge. The Zs would track them there, but they had to get to a safer building. They wouldn’t last much longer with tubs of books as their only defense. These Zs were smart. What if the Zs just piled up against the side of the cabin until they reached the window like they had done with the tree? It was only a matter of time. And their time was almost up.

  Justin stepped over the ones on the front porch. He peered around the cabin’s corner where scores of Zs loitered under the loft’s window and around the base of the trees.

  The other side of the cabin flashed in his mind. There were less Zs, but it was a longer walk. Too long. He hustled to the tree side of the cabin. He roughly counted ten, twenty, thirty, forty . . . But if they could make it past them, it was a straight shot to the lodge. All they had to do was run—like hell.

  Justin climbed to the loft, stressing over the next part, the hardest part—convincing Ella of his off-the-cuff idea. He scooted back across the desk. Ella hugged him the second his feet hit the floor.

  “And—” Her eyes pleaded.

  He gave her the two thumbs up signal along with his trademarked smirk. He glanced at Twila sleeping on the floor with the star-like crystal thing on her forehead. Weird. He would have to ditch his backpack so he could carry Twila. The sleeping child might make it easier, but getting down the loft would be a PIA.

  “So, what did you see? Tell me already.” Exasperation exuded from her face.

  He began rubbing her hands and clothes with the sliced garlic. Even if it only gave them a five-second head start. Five seconds could mean the difference between being dead and un-dead.

  “What are you doing?” Ella’s brow knitted deeper.

  Don’t argue with Ella. He’d lose that argument. He knew that for sure. Justin bent down for the child.

  “Don’t wake her—” Ella started in her caps-voice. She quickly hushed.

  He grabbed the crystal from Twila’s forehead. It was so hot he bounced it in the palm of his hand to keep from burning his skin. It jumped out of his hands. He tried to catch it. The crystal clattered to the floor, shattering. He eyed the window. The Zs squirmed restlessly. The three of them wouldn’t last another twenty-four hours in the cabin. Somehow he knew, knew it more than anything he had ever known in his entire life. Dude, just do it. She’ll follow me. Weird, it was like he was having a conversation with his consciousness. And it responded with actual answers.

  “It’s time to leave,” he announced in a tone above a whisper.

  Ella gave him the most incredulous look, but it didn’t stop him. With Twila over his shoulder, he slid across the desktop until his foot found the loft’s first rung.

  “Are you cuh-ray-zee!” Ella shook her head no and tapped her foot.

  “If we don’t go now, we’re—dead.” His foot found the next step, and the next, until he couldn’t see Ella. Would she follow? Ella was stubborn, but she wasn’t stupid. His foot touched ground, and Ella hadn’t appeared. The Zs squirmed about making sickening suckling sounds as if they were eating in their sleep. Did they smell the garlic? Did it make them hungry for garlic fries? Focus!

  Ella’s foot reached the first rung. Yes! Then she disappeared back into the loft.

  Ella, c’mon! Justin screamed internally. His eyes darted around the cabin’s front room. How much time did they have? Seconds, his mind answered. Ella’s foot reappeared on the ladder. She’s coming.

  She finally touched down with hesitant feet. He motioned her to follow him as he selected the easiest path over the Z-covered floor. By the time they had made it to the front door, the first ugly sucker caught on to their escape. Its bulging eyeballs nearly took over its skuzzy skull like some overdone graphic comic. Luckily, it was trapped under a pile of Zs. It twisted around, groaning and reaching for them.

  Ella froze. That’s when he realized she had strapped on her backpack. He motioned for her to hurry. Running was going to be tough. And it was time to start running if only he could get Ella to stop freezing up.

  Feeling like a dweeb, he played his last card. Justin rubbed his belly and made a cheesy-woeful face, the expression their baby might have made if it understood what was happening. Ella looked around.

  “You can do this,” he mouthed. The two Zs crashed out in a standing position against the front porch gave him the willies. He was about to go by them for the third time when their eyes popped open. Yikes! In their excitement, they clawed at the air for him and Twila. The Zs stumbled back against the front door, ripping the last hinge from the doorframe. The door crashed to the ground with them on top.

  The crash sent the horde into a frenzy, squiggling around the floor, moaning. The two Zs who had fallen found their feet quicker than he had anticipated. The possibility of fresh meat had definitely wired them. With Twila’s weight impeding his agility, he couldn’t use the knife. The knife required precision. He grabbed the gun from his holster, nailing each one in the head. Game over, that frea
ky voice inside his mind chimed.

  “C’mon!” Justin shouted. Ella had to get her act together.

  “I’m trying.” It came out like scratchy sandpaper.

  “For our baby!” His eyes pleaded.

  They made it to the cabin’s corner. Zs wriggled about, staggering to their feet. He holstered his weapon. The only way he’d get Ella across the sea of Zs was to hold her hand. Otherwise, he was afraid he would turn around to find her covered in Zs.

  They walked between the cabin and the zombie-tinseled trees. Plop. One fell in front of his feet, snapping off its head.

  “Ew!” Ella shrieked and then stopped.

  He pulled her hand. Plop, plop, plop, it was raining Zs. “Run!” With one hand balancing Twila and one hand tugging Ella, he broke into a run. They jumped over the Zs coming to life under their feet.

  But there was one thing he had forgotten. Or had chosen to ignore. If these were the same strain that had invaded Last Chance, they were fast, faster than humans, once they woke up. And they were waking up. Holy shit!

  “Faster!” he shouted. “We can make it!”

  Ella held her belly with one hand and went into an awkward waddling run. She doubled over in obvious pain. “Just a contraction,” she moaned.

  “Now? you’re having the baby now?” It was his turn to rant hysterically.

  “No, silly. I need to rest—”

  Justin wasn’t listening. He shot at the Z reaching for Twila’s shoulder. The Zs were still groggy. They still had a chance to escape. He shifted Twila on his shoulder. And that was another weird thing. How was Twila sleeping through this? Rash thoughts raced through his mind. He could drop Twila and carry Ella. His love. But Twila was a child. She didn’t have a chance. The thoughts tormented his conscience.

  He kept pulling Ella along. He glanced over his shoulder. The first set of wide-awake Zs made a Z-line for them. Fuck! He shot the first six, no problem. It was the fifty-something a hundred yards behind that had him freaked as they stumbled over each other, racing to get the first bite.

  He wasn’t leaving Ella. No freaking way. He paused to rebalance Twila while he grabbed a fully loaded magazine from his jacket. Probably his only chance to reload. He slammed it into his Glock. With his arm around Ella’s back and his neck hunched to balance Twila, he urged Ella on and shot at the Zs lunging at their feet.

  Justin wasn’t sure when he first heard it. But soon, it was all he heard. The honking of a horn. A truck. Coming for us!

  Ella turned to him with her crooked-raised brow expression of “O-M-G—there is a God.”

  “Over here!” Justin shouted as if the driver couldn’t tell they were running for their lives from the horde of Michael Jackson’s backup dancers diving at their heels.

  Chapter 32

  Zac Padilla didn’t slow down as he drove past the lodge’s rear garage and outbuildings. He headed straight for the cabins, anxious to find Scarlett. It had taken them over an hour to get the clunker started after reconnecting the battery and distributor cap. It was one of several vehicles he had hidden at abandoned oil derricks about a five-mile walk from Last State’s end of the tunnel.

  He scoured the plains of the western panhandle while Luther, Krasinski, Peters, and Lopez hid in the back of the truck covered with a tarp. The young mother, Mindy, and her baby sat in the middle between him and Dean. It wasn’t smart driving a truck full of people in the Zhetto, but the plates were legal. The drone that had tagged them about ten minutes ago shouldn’t set off any red flags since the majority of Zhetts removed their CitChips. So, unless whoever was monitoring the drones was in a pissy mood, they wouldn’t send a team of Enforcers for legal plates.

  He turned the corner to the front of the lodge. “What the—” Zac stared at the people running from a horde.

  “Good God Almighty,” Luther bellowed from the back of the truck. “Is that—”

  “Hell’s bells,” Dean shouted. “That’s Justin and a very pregnant Ella. Looks like Twila, too.”

  “And Scarlett?” Zac’s pulse raced.

  A zomb latched onto the back of Justin’s legs. Justin flew to the ground. Twila somersaulted several feet from its grasp. Mindy screamed and hugged her baby closer. Dean was aiming for a shot, but it was impossible from his angle.

  “Do something!” Dean hollered.

  Despite the truckload of men, it was a race against time. Zac pounded his fists on the horn. “I’ll try to confuse the fuckers.” In the rearview, the men aimed their weapons at the horde. No one had fired a single shot. It was too risky with the truck bouncing over the rutted ground.

  Zac swerved the truck into a stop between the bulk of the horde and Twila, Ella, and Justin. Justin was going at it like a kickboxer on crack with an impressive set of moves, taking on the zombs closing in on Ella.

  “Keep the pickup running,” Dean shouted, bailing out of the truck, rushing toward Ella. Luther made a run for Twila, nailing three zombs at point blank range. The rest of the men in the back of the truck joined in the fight.

  Zombs body-slammed the truck. Aw shit, the passenger’s window was down.

  “Roll up the window!” Zac yelled to Mindy. It was an old truck, no buttons to push.

  Mindy sat there scared shitless, not moving. Impatiently, he pushed her head down, letting off rounds through the passenger’s side window. He couldn’t just sit there. Zombs clung to the truck. He skidded around the wet-marshy grass and cranked the wheel from left to right, trying to knock the bastards off.

  A half-dozen zombs slid from the truck’s roof to the windshield. Their hideous faces slimed the windows with streaks of black blood. One pounced in through the opened window.

  Bang! Dead. Zomb dead. This time, Zac reached over the huddled woman to roll up the window.

  Zombs pressed their faces against the windshield and slapped at it with their hands. One of them balled its hand into a fist. It punched the windshield. The other zombs stopped and watched it punch the windshield again. The rest followed suit. He had seen one of those before, a zomb who could think. Thinkers, that’s what Shari calls them.

  Zac stomped on the brakes. The zombs on the windshield careened to the ground in front of the truck. The truck rolled right over them. There were about a dozen in the truck’s bed. Zac caught a glimpse in the side-mirror. And he wished he hadn’t. Peters was a goner. The horde was eating him. Alive. The zombs in the back of the truck caught on and joined the buffet. When they were done with Peters, they would be back for more.

  Grabbing his weapons and patting down his pockets for extra mags, he yelled to Mindy, “Stay close to me.” He’d go out shooting like a bad-ass gunslinger without a care in the world. Because, he was so close to finding Scarlett, he wasn’t going to let an inconvenient horde stand in his way. He reached within the depths of his manifestation powers. Determined.

  Zac slammed open the truck’s door, knocking down four in the middle of their wolf-howling fit. Then he nailed each of them in the skull. Another pack rushed him. Too many. On a whim, he reached for the fire extinguisher behind the seat. He fired it, aiming for the eyes. It wouldn’t kill the fuckers, but it would give him an edge. Mindy had stayed in the truck.

  “Where’d they come from?” A half dozen, hell, who’s counting, lunged at him from the roof of the truck like Cirque du Soleil trapezists from Hades. He let off a spray of foam. “Aw, shit!” The nozzle jammed. He rammed the closest zomb in the face. It crumpled, face down. Aiming for its head—the round cracked open its skull. One grabbed his arm. He shot it, catching it in his eye.

  Zac’s spider senses told him to check his six. He spun around. Only two. Bang. Bang.

  Dean was suddenly by his side. “About time,” Zac said out of breath, reaching into the truck for Mindy’s hand. She looked up and finally seemed to realize it was time to get out of there. “Run for the lodge.”

  She nodded, clasped her baby to her chest, and ran.

  Zac and Dean danced the back-to-back stance, taking care of the
ones between the truck and the lodge. But the rest of the horde had just finished their appetizer and were ready for the next course. “Can you run?” Zac worried. Dean had taken a beating in Boom Town. Still, he was in incredible shape for a senior.

  “You betcha!”

  “Then what are you waiting for?” Zac shouted.

  They took off for the lodge. Luther ran past them like a wide-receiver dead-set on a touchdown with Twila over his shoulder. Justin half-carried and half-walked Ella toward the lodge. When Zac caught up to them, Justin yelled, “Take Ella. I’ll cover our asses.”

  No time to argue, Zac helped Ella. Dean lagged behind. Justin ran backward. “C’mon, Dean, you got this!” Justin cheered Dean on and let off rounds, taking care of the zombs closing in on Dean.

  The lodge’s door loomed larger and larger—the moment of truth. Was Scarlett inside? A few more strides to the door. Luther and Twila made it inside first, followed by Mindy and the baby. Krasinski and Lopez raced past him. He made it inside with Ella. Dean rasped through the door. And then Justin zipped inside like a crazed anime hero. Zac couldn’t believe they had made it.

  But where was Scarlett? And Shari? Were they too late? Of all the people he had saved, and all his narrow escapes, it still tormented him that he hadn’t been able to save the people dear to him: his brothers and parents. Scarlett? This new world was callous. “Don’t give up on her,” a voice inside his head urged.

  From the lobby’s window, he spied a convoy of three Humvees. Aw, shit! Enforcers. Can’t I catch a break? “Company!” Zac yelled out. “Women and children in the basement. Pronto! It’s the door next to the kitchen pantry.”

  “Justin’s on their Most Wanted list,” Dean hinted. “Say, where’s Peters?”

  Zac shook his head. “Didn’t make it. Justin, go with them to the basement,” Zac ordered.

  Krasinski and Lopez eyeballed one another. Krasinski pointed his gun at Zac. “I’ve been trying to get into Last State for over a year. I ain’t going back.”