Death & Decay (Book 2): Divided

by R. L. Blalock

  “You can go.” The corners of his lips turned up into a menacing smile. “But I’ll still find you. I’ll bring you back. You can’t just abandon us.”

  “No,” Colin stated flatly, his body relaxing as he realized what he had to do. Just one more time. “You won’t.”

  With that, Colin gently pulled the trigger on his pistol until he heard the quiet pop. Samuel’s head snapped back and he flopped back over onto the dirt. Colin didn’t look at him. He didn’t want to see what Samuel’s face looked like now, but he could see the pool of blood slowly spreading around Samuel’s head like a halo.

  Suddenly, Colin’s heart was racing again. It was hard to breath. He became aware of the dust coating the inside of his mouth, making his tongue a dry, gritty mass. His throat felt like sandpaper as he tried to swallow.

  Taking a deep breath, Colin wiped at the dirt on his face with shaking hands. They had to leave.

  They had to leave now.

  “We have to go,” Colin urgently whispered to Eric.

  Eric’s eyes darted around quickly to see if anyone else was close enough to hear. “We can’t leave yet. We aren’t ready.”

  “We don’t have a choice. We have to leave right now,” Colin insisted. “You get the others. I’ll get the boat ready.”

  “What happened?” Eric gave Colin a sidelong glance.

  Colin pressed his lips into a thin line before responding. “Samuel wasn’t going to let us leave…He wasn’t going to let me leave,” he corrected after a moment.

  “What happened?” Eric insisted.

  Colin sighed and rubbed his face. “Samuel is dead.” Eric drew back from Colin. “It happened so fast. We were arguing and he didn’t want us to leave. He attacked me. What was I supposed to do?” Colin hurried to explain, but the words sounded hollow and halfhearted, even to himself. “We need to leave now. Before anyone else finds out.”

  Slowly, Eric nodded. “I’ll go get the others. You go get the boat ready.”

  “Hey Colin!” Colin tensed at Ervin’s cheery voice. He didn’t want to talk to anyone. He just wanted to leave. To go find Liv and Elli. To make all of this go away.

  “Yeah,” Colin replied without slowing his pace.

  “Have you seen Samuel?” Ervin asked. “I want to talk to him about a few things. Just some ideas I had for making this place a little more secure.”

  “No,” Colin lied. “I haven’t seen him all morning.”

  “Oh.” Ervin seemed shocked. “I know he was looking for you earlier.”

  Colin shook his head. “Haven’t seen him. Sorry. If I see him, I’ll let him know you’re looking for him, though.”

  “Sounds good.”

  Ervin fell behind and Colin didn’t look back.

  Colin felt sick as the eight of them climbed aboard the boat. It wasn’t theirs. It belonged to the people of Thies, but they hadn’t been able to bring back their own yet. The people of Thies didn’t really have any need for the boat anymore, though. The Sovereigns were gone. The horde was gone. The threats they had been trying to flee were gone. They didn’t have a reason to leave.

  Rotna and Eric were there, along with five other people Colin didn’t know. A father with his teenage daughter. One of the pharmacists and two other men who had found their way to Thies in the first few days.

  “Hey!” Colin looked to the man who had caught his attention. He motioned back towards Thies. At first Colin didn’t see it. Slowly the shapes materialized.

  Shit.

  The figures were running straight for them. There were five of them, with Ervin in the lead.

  “Eric, we have company,” Colin yelled. “Let’s get this thing moving!”

  “Any minute now!” Eric yelled back from the controls.

  “This minute would be perfect.” Colin turned to the others. “Let’s get this thing in the water. Now!”

  He and the two younger men got behind the pontoon boat and pushed it off the sandy shore before hopping back on. The current nearest the shore was sluggish, but the boat began to slowly drift further downriver. But it wasn’t fast enough.

  “Everyone get down.” Colin gestured for the others to hide behind the boat’s bench seats and readied his rifle. The boat wasn’t moving fast enough, though pontoon boats weren’t typically very fast to begin with. The others were going to catch up with them.

  “Where you going, Colin?” Ervin shouted from the shore.

  “Away from here,” Colin said simply.

  “Like hell you are.” Though it was Ervin who said it, Samuel’s voice rung in Colin’s mind and he bristled at the words. “You shot him. I’m not going to just let that shit slide.”

  “He didn’t give me a choice,” Colin shouted as he looked over at Eric, pleading with his eyes for Eric to start the boat. “I wanted to go and he wasn’t going to let me.” Colin hunkered down behind one of the bench seats and peered around the corner at Ervin and the others.

  “Come out, Colin,” Ervin said coldly. “The others can leave but you have to stay.”

  Colin checked his rifle, ensuring that a round was in the chamber, the magazine was full, and the safety was off. The others on the boat were doing the same.

  “Alright,” Ervin said wearily. “This is the last time I’m going to ask nicely. Come out, Colin.”

  Colin caught Rotna’s gaze. She shook her head slightly, her lips forming the word don’t. Colin nodded and took a deep breath, stealing himself for what would happen next.

  Without warning, a shot pinged off the side of the pontoon boat. Colin pressed himself close to the seats as more shots struck the side of the boat.

  “Eric! Hurry up!” Colin shouted.

  “You aren’t helping!” Eric tried to rise next to the controls but ducked back down as more shots pinged off the boat. “Keep them off me!”

  Colin nodded and turned back to the group on the shore. Rotna popped off a few shots before ducking back behind cover.

  “Just keep them off Eric so he can get the boat started.”

  She nodded, blindly firing a few more times. Colin peeked up over the seats. Most of the men had scattered for cover as Rotna returned fire. Ervin fired a few shots from where he was crouching behind a tree.

  “It doesn’t seem like the others are firing much,” Rotna noted. “If we can keep Ervin pinned, we should be able to get out of here.” Colin nodded. “I’ll shoot. When I need to reload, you shoot. Got it?” Colin nodded again.

  Rotna popped up, her gun ready. A single shot rang out. Rotna’s head snapped back and she collapsed to the floor of the pontoon boat.

  Colin stared at his friend, her one remaining lifeless eye locked on him accusatorily, next to a gaping hole of ragged flesh and bone. Her mouth hung open in a silent scream.

  With a snarl, Colin stood up, firing before he was even fully up. The tree that Ervin was hiding behind was close to the shore and hard to miss, even as the pontoon boat continued to drift lazily down the river. Colin focused on that tree. No one but Ervin could have shot Rotna so quickly. No one else was that good of a shot.

  Ervin cried out, falling to the ground and out of the meager cover the tree provided. Colin kept pulling the trigger, but the rifle clicked. He didn’t have any more magazines on him. They were packed away in his bag.

  Another man ran out to Ervin’s side. Angrily, Colin threw his rifle to the ground. It clattered to the floor of the boat, sliding up against Rotna’s fallen rifle. Colin dove for her weapon. She had gotten a few shots off, but there should still be a few bullets left. He only needed a few.

  Colin snatched up her rifle and spun back to face Ervin. The boat rumbled to life.

  “That’s it! We’re out of here!” Eric hollered.

  Colin sighted down the rifle as the boat began to pull away from the shore. With one quick breath, Colin pulled the trigger, firing a three-round burst. The man hovering over Ervin fell to the side. Ervin pushed himself up, trying to get a look at the other man.

  Colin smiled, a twis
ted crooked grin, and pulled the trigger again.

  Day 36

  Seven days. Seven days they had been on the road. They were all weary. They were all ready to rest. But Colin couldn’t. Not yet. He gripped the steering wheel so tight his knuckles turned white as they rounded the last corner and faced the quiet street his house sat on. A breath caught in his throat.

  Everything was different. He could still picture the quiet street, with children playing in well-kept front yards, people walking their dogs, and neighbors out socializing with one another. Without the extra water that humans used to provide, the yards had been burned brown by the summer sun. Garbage caught in flowerbeds, on mailboxes, and in front of storm drains. One car had crashed into the garage door a few houses down, crumbling the sheet of metal in half.

  The freaks were here too, mingling among the houses. They were covered in dirt and blood. Standing still in the streets and on the lawns. Shuffling down driveways.

  But it was Colin’s own house that made his heart race and the air refuse to enter his lungs. The front door stood wide open, most certainly not how they had left it. Smeared gore and bloody handprints marred the light-gray exterior. The front window was broken in, a permanently dead freak draped over the windowsill.

  “Shit,” Colin whispered, his breaths coming quick and shallow. The freaks only would have flocked to the house if someone had been there. Someone like Liv and Elli.

  Eric looked to Colin and then followed his gaze back to the house. “David,” Eric spoke into the radio, “we’re going to pull up to the house. You lay on the horn and circle around the block and take as many of the freaks with you as you can.”

  “Gotcha.” The reply can from the second car.

  As they pulled into the driveway, the freaks immediately gravitated towards the car. The loud blare of a horn cut through the silence that had enveloped them. David laid on the horn and punched it half a dozen times. The freaks’ heads immediately snapped around to follow the noise.

  Colin clicked off his seatbelt and threw open his door as the freaks followed the slow progress of the other vehicle. He didn’t bother to close the car door. Colin’s vision had tunneled down to a single point. The front door. The door to his home. The one that stood wide open. The one caked in blood.

  The house’s interior was dark compared to the bright evening sun outside. Colin growled as he stood in the doorway, his eyes adjusting to the dimmer light. He gagged as the smell hit his nose.

  Decay.

  It wafted out of the door, permeating the house’s interior.

  Shapes slowly formed in the darkness. The couch was toppled over in front of the window. Bodies lay in heaps on the floor of the living room. Shards of glass glittered maliciously in the carpet as they caught a few rays of light that trickled in the broken window. The dining room table had been turned on its side to block off the hallway. It hadn’t lasted.

  “Liv!” Colin couldn’t hold back any longer. “Liv!”

  He pulled the table aside. It wasn’t very big or even very sturdy. Before it had been used as a protective barrier it hadn’t even looked very nice. Now the top was covered in blood and scratch marks. A fingernail remained in the wood where it had become stuck.

  Colin let out a whimper as he looked down the hall. Blood streaked along the walls.

  “Liv!”

  A growl from the master bedroom answered him. The hallway swam and twisted with each step he took toward the door.

  “Colin!” Eric’s voice sounded far away, but Colin didn’t look away from the door.

  “Colin! Let me check.” Eric grabbed ahold of Colin’s arm. Colin shook him off and bolted for the door.

  A woman clawed at the floor with the one arm. She was no more than a torso with a head and a single arm attached. Her guts were spilled out and splayed around her in a rotting mess. Her hair was matted and plastered to her face with her own blood.

  No. No. No.

  The word repeated over and over in Colin’s mind as he approached the freak. Colin knelt next to the woman, rolling her onto her back and pinning her one remaining arm across her chest. This sent her into a frenzy. She knew flesh was close, though she could not see it through her own hair. Colin struggled to keep her pinned as the nearly limbless torso bucked and squirmed.

  “Jesus,” Eric breathed as he stepped into the room behind Colin.

  “Help me hold her down,” Colin pleaded. “I need to…I need to see her face.”

  “Colin,” Eric’s voice was full of pain as he knelt down next to his friend.

  “Eric, please.” Colin could feel the tears welling up in his eyes, making it hard to see. “I just need to know.”

  Eric reached across and firmly held down the arm and torso. Colin let go. His hands shook as they moved towards her face. Before he could stop himself, he swiped the hair away from her brow.

  “Oh god!” He jumped back from the freak. A wild cackle broke free from his lips as he stared at the lifeless eyes and snapping teeth.

  “Colin?” Eric’s eyes grew wide at Colin’s reaction. He released the freak with one hand and pulled out his knife, quickly jamming it into the woman’s temple.

  “It’s not her!” Colin continued laughing wildly, a broad smile spreading across his face. It was the first genuine smile he had worn in a long time.

  A smile spread across Eric’s face and he tilted his head up towards the ceiling. “Man, for a minute there…” He didn’t finish. They both knew what they had thought.

  The smile quickly faded from Colin’s lips. Though the freak wasn’t Liv, he knew who the woman was. She lived across the street from them. Her daughter and Elli often played outside together. He was celebrating her death. He was celebrating her death because it wasn’t his family member who was dead.

  Colin swallowed hard around the lump in his throat. He wouldn’t wish this kind of death on anyone. And if this woman was dead, her daughter couldn’t possibly have survived either. But it wasn’t his family.

  “Come on.” Colin jumped to his feet, suddenly full of energy. “Let’s grab a few things and get moving. Most of the rest of the way is empty road and fields.”

  Colin glanced around the gore-splattered bedroom. Anything he had wanted to take from this room was ruined. Though having some of his own clothes would have been nice. In the struggle, the closest doors had been knocked off their hinges. Blood spray speckled the clothes that still hung on their hangers.

  Colin strode out of the room and promptly stopped. Across the hall was another room. Elli’s room. Cautiously, Colin pushed open the door. Despite the chaos of the rest of the house, her room was relatively untouched.

  Toys were scattered on the floor. The bed was unmade. One of the walls had colorful scribbles and circles about two feet off the ground where Elli had gotten ahold of a crayon when no one was looking.

  “Hey, Colin!” Eric called from the living room. “Come look at this.”

  Colin rushed into the living room. Eric stood before a wall that had once been covered in family photos. The photos were gone. All of them. In their place was a note that had been hastily scrawled across the length of the wall in the same dark-purple paint that had been used in Elli’s room.

  Colin sucked in a breath through his teeth as he read the first line.

  Welcome to our home.

  If you’re tired, we have beds.

  If you’re cold, we have clothes.

  If you’re hungry, we have food.

  If you need protection, we have walls.

  May you find the comfort here that we once found.

  Be quick. Be quiet. Be safe.

  He read the words over and over, Liv’s voice whispering them in his mind. Her words were warm and welcoming. Caring and thoughtful. Hopeful and strong. Everything she had always been. Everything she still was. Somewhere.

  “She was here.” His voice cracked as the words escaped his lips.

  “She was here,” Eric said excitedly. “Colin, she made it this far. If
she made it this far, she’s probably waiting at the farm.”

  “Yeah…” Colin’s thoughts swirled around in his head like a tornado.

  “What’s wrong?” Eric frowned, the excitement deflating from him as if from a balloon. “This is good. She made it this far. That’s amazing!”

  Colin smiled, but it was fake, forced. It felt like it might split its face in half.

  Colin laid head against the passenger-side window and watched the golden-brown fields of grass whiz by. The window was hot against his forehead. The whole inside of the car was hot.

  “Alright, I don’t get it,” Eric finally said. He pushed himself more upright in the driver’s seat as he quickly glanced over at Colin.

  “Don’t get what?”

  “We’ve had shit luck for over a month. We’ve been running and fighting for our lives. Beating back hordes of freaks. Fending off wackos.” Eric chewed on his lip for a moment before continuing. “We finally got the first good news that we’ve had in what feels like…forever now, and what do you do? You shut down. You should be freakin’ ecstatic. Your family made it pretty damn far. They might still be alive. We are so close to finding out. And instead of being happy, you’re moping. I don’t get it.”

  Colin sighed. “I am happy.”

  “Really?”

  “I am,” Colin insisted. “To know that Liv and Elli might still be alive is all I really want.”

  “But…” Eric persisted.

  “But even if they are,” Colin continued, “things can’t go back to normal after this.”

  “Well, of course they can’t. Nothing is ever going to be the same,” Eric laughed.

  “No, that’s not what I meant.” Colin sat up and rubbed his face. “Liv and I. We are dead.”

  “OK, I’m not following you.”

  “Too much has changed. Too much has happened.” Colin looked directly at Eric. “I’ve changed too much.”

  “We’ve all changed. We’ve had to.”

  “No.” Colin shook his head. “We all did what we had to do to survive. But…” Colin scratched his head. “But what will Liv think of me if I see her again? The outbreak changed everyone. Not just the freaks. If she’s alive, she rose above the chaos while I became a monster.”