BESIEGED (HUNGRY Series Book 2)

by Lawrence Herbert Tide

  "I... I wanted to help Red to get up," stammered the young man of color, and as he then remained silent, his father came to his level.

  "Let’s move quickly, this is not the time to daydream!" Harry shouted after grabbing the redhead girl by her other free arm, then putting her on one of his thick shoulders.

  Johnny released the other arm as he saw his friend Boris - Bo to his pals – come out of the van with a sickly face, white as a sheet. Looking around, the young muscular blond man stared amazed at the nightmare where they were.

  Grunts redoubling made him turn around and he saw the mass of creatures approaching them from all sides, beginning to encircle them.

  "Open the door!" Johnny shouted to the men standing on the ramparts, and one of them shouted to one of his colleagues, "Yes, quick, let them enter!"

  The two gigantic doors parted while the two young men and the colossus, with his two unconscious human loads, approached the gap beginning to form between them. They sighed with relief.

  Until they found that the door, barely ajar, had its movement slowing down.

  "Who stopped the opening of the doors?" They heard the captain of the guard shout over them.

  "Me," uttered a bearded guard, whose uniform showed that he was also chief of the guards of the ramparts. He had just come running on the rampart, joining his men, and he added, "They have been expelled out of the Community, as Administrator Adams has said..."

  "I don’t care what he said, anyway, he's dead!" shouted the other chief.

  "The Administrator Adams is... dead?"

  Surprise flashed on the bearded face which, after a few seconds, showed doubt. He mocked, "Who says that this isn’t a hoax? You trust these exiles? They are only trying to find refuge!"

  "I saw him get slaughtered," the other shouted back to him, continuing, "If you want, I'll give you the BlueRay for Christmas."

  "Really?" the bearded man asked, seemingly still skeptical.

  "Hey, guys," shouted Harry to them, throwing a glance at a more compact crowd of undead beginning to surround them, and he added, "Let us enter, we’ll discuss after, OK?"

  "Yes, open quickly!" shouted the other leader to his men.

  The colossus and his friends saw with relief the double doors begin to open again. They smiled at each other, preparing to sneak into the widening opening.

  A gunshot exploded in a spray of blood in Harry's chest who, surprised, fell back under the impact.

  "Dad!" Johnny cried.

  His father, a huge bloody hole at the level of his heart, tried to get up, Red and Hiroto still lying unconscious and motionless like puppets under his arms.

  A new shot hit him in the shoulder, making him fall back again in the dirt.

  Dark blood began to flow under pressure from the new wound. The injury weakened one of the man’s arms and he released the redhead teen, who collapsed on the ground, her face half in the dust.

  "What are you doing?" shouted one of the two leaders of the ramparts, who moved at the last moment the gun in the bearded man’s hand as he fired.

  This third shot reached a clod of earth, next to Harry, who was trying to get up again, helped by his son.

  He, like his father and Bo, paralyzed by fear, saw that the captain of the guard and the bearded man were now struggling on the ramparts. Each trying to take the gun for himself, they were struggling before the astonished eyes of their subordinates.

  The bearded man kicked the other guardsman’s groin who, with the pain, released the weapon. Looking satisfied while his colleague was bent in half next to him, the bearded man aimed at Johnny.

  The latter lifted Red’s blade that he held in his hands and prepared to, without much certainty, send it at the one who was going to kill him.

  The bearded man barely missed him when he was jostled by the other leader, who stooped down to catch him by the legs.

  He lifted him sharply up and swung him over the ramparts.

  The man fell with his rifle, screaming as he fell towards the group of refugees.

  His scream stopped immediately as he collapsed into the dust near Harry, whose son was finally helping him to get up. Then, seeing that the colossus was beginning to rise painfully, Hiroto still under one arm, he caught with both hands the immobile body of his friend, putting him on one of his shoulders.

  "No!” the chief of the guard who had fallen shouted, his eyes filled with terror. His head raised, he was now on all fours in the dust, which had miraculously cushioned his fall, and looked behind them.

  The others turned to watch in horror a crowd of undead surround the guard on the ground, who had neither time to get up, nor to look for his rifle which had fallen further away.

  The crowd of nightmarish creatures fell on him and hid him under their numbers. The man's scream tore the air, while the refugees who were closer to the door heard the horrible noise of flesh parting.

  Bo became pale when he saw the man’s arms and legs torn off, the creatures arguing, spilling blood during their struggle. And other undead arrived, finding that there was no room at this "banquet" for them, they returned their attention to the three men and their human burdens.

  He reached the huge double doors that were closing again, and he shouted to the leader of the remaining guards, "Do not shut up, soon we’ll not be able to get through!"

  "Pass quickly," replied the chief of the guards who had thrown down his colleague. "I'm sorry, I cannot let such a multitude enter the Community!"

  One could hear in his voice that he was sorry, but also that he was determined to fulfill, above all, his primary function, which was protecting the last haven of peace and security for Humanity.

  "Quick!" Bo shouted as he turned to Johnny, who was carrying Red with difficulty, who was like a dead weight, with his father, groggy, on his heels.

  He turned to the doors, just in time to see with horror the gap between them becoming too narrow to let a human go through.

  "Noooo, we're done!" shouted the young blond man, who was already hearing, very close now, the grunts of the nightmarish beings behind them.

  A miracle occurred when he saw the double doors stop and begin to open again.

  A louder growl made him turn around and then Bo found himself in front of Harry's impressive chest, his arms outstretched around him.

  The young man, who saw that Johnny was now struggling to support at the same time Red and Hiroto, saw that Harry was blocking the doors with his hands, forcing them to reopen.

  The black colossus with a sweaty face, deformed by the effort, grunted even more. The gap between the doors then widened a little more, while the moaning and suffering of the pistons and wheels making them move was heard, suffering because of the resistance.

  "Enter!" roared the big black guy, "I won’t last very long!"

  Bo finally had the presence of mind to catch Hiroto from Johnny's arms, putting the old man, still unconscious, on his shoulder.

  From there he sneaked not without difficulty into the crack.

  Johnny followed him, Red under his arm as he watched the horizon literally covered with undead.

  He slipped away and, in the crack that was tightening, he turned to his father.

  He was terrified to see dozens of zombies grabbing his father from all sides, who looked back at him while maintaining the opening, despite the swarming mass on him.

  Johnny yelled at him, "Quick, Dad, go!"

  "I'll never pass through, and I'm going to let go, Johnny," his father replied after he gave another grunt from the effort, splitting his eyes, but not only because of the pain of the intense effort he unfurled.

  The colossus' face looked reproachful as he looked up at Johnny and shouted, "Son, if you don’t want to be crushed, go back inside!"

  With this, Harry stretched one of his long and powerful legs and hit his son in the plexus, making him cross the opening and sending him a few feet further into the dust, inside the Community.

  Thanks to his practice of judo Johnny fell not too
hard on his back with the load that was his female friend and, head hunched by reflex, avoided being knocking out when falling on the ground.

  Leaving her still unconscious on the floor near him, he stood up abruptly and saw that his father was giving way under the teeming mass of the undead.

  No longer able to resist, he released the gigantic double doors, which began to close again. The relief that his efforts were over was read on his face, which was the only thing still visible for Johnny, through the diminishing cap.

  He looked back at his son and smiled at him, despite the multitude of zombies that were already beginning to bite his flesh, streams of dark red blood pouring out of his multiple wounds.

  Johnny tried to hold back the doors that closed more and more but his efforts were, of course, useless, and he shouted, "Please, reopen the door, let it go... Daddy!"

  "I love you, son..." Harry shouted, giving him a last smile, and then other undead came and covered him completely.

  "Paaaaaaaaa!!!" shouted Johnny, as he saw through the closing gap a mound teeming with hungry creatures, where his father had been.

  The young man had just enough time to withdraw his fingers when the doors finally closed tightly.

  Nothing else was offered to his eyes except the hard, cold metal surface of the doors now joined... and his deformed reflection, in which he could glimpse his face, discerning his sadness.

  Johnny collapsed on his knees, tilting his head to the ground and whispered, "Daddy..."

  Depressed by his sadness and grief, he didn’t realize when guards from the ramparts arrived, accompanied by several stretcher-bearers.

  The latter lifted Red from the ground next to him and laid her on a stretcher, doing the same for Hiroto, with Bo's help.

  While the emergency care personnel trotted to the Community Hospital with the wounded old man and girl, the muscular young blond man knelt close to his friend and, putting an arm around him, remained silent, head down too.

  A roar startled them.

  It was a half-human, half-animal cry and its intensity hurt their ears, which they protected by covering them with their hands.

  They saw guards on the ramparts pointing to something on the outside then, in turn, plugged their ears with both hands, while a rumor was added to the scream and a thud was heard.

  Before the staring eyes of all the humans, several undead appeared above the edge of the wall, rising to the sky as if, arms dangling, they were flying.

  "It looks like they're going to go over the wall!" shouted a guard with a stressed voice.

  What followed couldn’t be explained… with one exception.

  All the distant forms of zombies that were projected into the air began to fall, one of which reached a higher altitude than the others.

  Johnny and Bo widened their eyes when they saw that the different figure was falling while approaching the edge of the wall, while, on the other side of it, all the other zombies were falling, clumsily flapping their arms like inept birds falling to a certain death.

  The humans were paralyzed when they saw a great shape come over the wall and guards and fall heavily on his feet in front of Johnny and Boris.

  A large cloud of dust was raised by this fall.

  "Be careful, one of the zombies has entered!" shouted a guard, who, rifle in hand, descended quickly via a staircase along the wall to join the two young men.

  Arriving at their level, he saw the human form which, in the cloud of dust which was diluted, appeared from behind, while all heard the sounds of falling and grunts coming from the other side of the wall.

  "Don’t shoot!" shouted Johnny, who jumped from his kneeling position to get back on his feet.

  His friend Bo, heavier and less adroit, rose more slowly, widening his eyes despite the dust from the erasing cloud that was sticking to them, to see the thing standing before them, which was now clearly visible.

  "Dad!" exclaimed Johnny, sketching a big smile. He also had eyes reddened by the sand of the dust, which gave a light beige tint to the two streams of tears that ran down his cheeks.

  They recognized the face of Harry Jackson, but... What a face!

  The young African-American man frowned painfully as he watched his father's ravaged face, which included horrible bites on his cheeks, showing parts of flesh and bone of the jaw.

  In addition to all that, the color of the colossus' face had lightened, taking on a greyish color, close to that of the zombies which had cruelly bitten him.

  Most impressively, the irises of Harry's eyes were reddish, something typical of the undead.

  "Step back, it may attack you," cried the guard, who had drawn near with his rifle, targeting the head.

  "Do not shoot, I said, it's my father!" exclaimed Johnny.

  "It was your father, my boy," the man replied, glancing at him briefly before aiming at his target again.

  The young man and his friend Bo who was holding him looked angrily at the armed man who was about to shoot.

  But all at once the guard opened his eyes wide and was open-mouthed.

  The two young men saw him with surprise lower his weapon and, taken aback, they saw that he continued to look at Harry.

  They did the same and both had a shock.

  The face of the colossus had resumed its dark color. The cruel bites had disappeared, replaced by superficial wounds that were no longer raw, seeming to have begun to heal. Finally, the wounds disappeared in a matter of a few seconds, leaving Harry Jackson’s face intact, whose eyes had returned to their natural dark brown color.

  Harry turned his head to the armed guard and asked, "What's up?"

  "Oh, nothing," replied the man, who, his rifle now completely lowered, looked sheepishly. "I thought that..."

  "What?" the colossus asked dryly.

  "Uh, nothing... I'm sorry, I have to go back to my surveillance station."

  And, turning away his fleeting eyes, the guard went back to the level of the ramparts.

  "Dad!" exclaimed Johnny happily, rushing toward his father who laughed cheerfully, hugging him affectionately.

  The young man pulled back and said, "I thought you had definitely been turned into a zombie!"

  "Not quite, thankfully," Harry replied, a big predatory grin on his lips before continuing, "There was still Dr. Mengele's drug substance in my veins... But I feel I'm going to have to go quickly find him to "fill up."”

  "I'm coming with you," Johnny said cheerfully, and arm-in-arm they headed for the tall, white medical facility.

  Bo watched them leave, just smiling, but also... very intrigued.

  An animal clamor rising from the other side of the wall made him jump, making him say to himself, Weird things are happening… and with that, we are only at the beginning of our struggle for survival...

  ***

  Renaissance

  Red felt as if she was floating in total darkness...

  It was strange. It was as if she no longer had the slightest sensation, no more body, was an entity now disembodied.

  She felt good...

  Relaxed...

  Something sharp pierced her solar plexus.

  This made her scream in pain and open wide eyes that were dazzled by a strong white light.

  She closed her eyes as hard as she could, reddish gleams seeming to dance under her eyelids.

  Several minutes passed, during which she found herself plunged into a near darkness.

  She blessed it because it was less aggressive, this time, than the light that had dazzled her before.

  She slowly opened her eyes and saw the light again.

  It was a headlamp for medical purposes.

  Although still partially dazzled, she recognized the face that made her uncomfortable, as always.

  The face of the man so many called Dr. Mengele...

  She caught a glimpse of the scientist's hand, which seemed to be on something.

  With difficulty, lowering her head to the point of compressing her throat with her chin, she saw that
the man's hand was resting on the handle of a large syringe.

  And its needle was deep in her heart!

  The scientist sharply pulled the syringe upward, pulling it out of her plexus, causing a new pain that made her scream even louder.

  The pain passed quickly as she saw a smile widen on the man's face, who watched her with as much interest as an entomologist observing a praying mantis... as usual.

  Feeling terribly vulnerable, she quickly fell back into unconsciousness.

  ***

  Red woke up with a sudden jerk, abruptly moving into a seated position while pushing the doctor's mischievous smile with the flat of her hand.

  He was thrown back violently and crashed against a nearby wall.

  The girl, her heart pounding as she felt like choking, watched him stand back against the wall, head down, while he held his nose with one hand.

  She saw blood flowing down his closed hand just in front of his flawless white coat, while, uncomfortable, she realized she was not breathing.

  Still sitting, Red tried to inspire, but nothing worked, it was as if her lungs were not working. The air that they still contained became hot, her bronchi making her suffer more and more.

  I can’t breathe, I'm going to die, she told herself, opening wide, frantic eyes.

  A little laugh caught her attention, and she saw that the scientist standing against the wall had raised his head and was watching her, seemingly satisfied by the fear that was probably visible in her eyes.

  "Breathe," he said in a satisfied-sounding voice, though it was a little altered by the blood that was still flowing from his nose, which he no longer held with his hand.

  "You'll see, you'll eventually get to breathe," he added, a hint of mockery now in his voice.

  She made a new effort and finally her respiratory diaphragm unblocked.

  The girl pushed out a strange baby-like wail that allowed her to vent the little stale and burning air that remained, and immediately she inhaled fresh air.

  It was a delight that she highly appreciated...