Undead Ultra Box Set | Books 1-4

by Picott, Camille

  Frederico touches the side of my face, forcing me to look up at him. “This isn’t the end. Your ankle will swell up. That will act as a natural splint. You can run through this.”

  This time I do laugh, though it’s a pained noise. As crazy as it sounds, what he says is true. There are ultrarunners who have finished races with fucked-up ankles. Just not very many of them.

  “That’s the sort of thing badass elites do,” I say. “Not normal, middle-of-the-pack runners like me.” This wouldn’t have happened if I wasn’t so tired. It’s too easy to make mistakes when exhaustion sets in. “Carter doesn’t even need me. Not really.” I rub tiredly at my face. God, my ankle is on fire. “He’s a grown man. I need him, Frederico.” This is the naked, humiliating truth. “I lost Kyle and he’s all I have left. I’m out here running to Arcata because my son is the only reason I have to live.” Tears well in my eyes.

  “Fuck your twisted ankle,” Frederico says ruthlessly. “I lost my daughter. My baby. All I want to do is lie down on the side of the road and die. But I’m going to keep running. You’re going to do the same. Now, move. We’re finishing this run if it kills us.”

  I nod, pushing myself upright. He’s right. Despair and self-pity are demons that nearly devoured me when Kyle died. I can’t let that happen again.

  “Remember what Kyle used to say when he crewed races for us?” I ask.

  “What? The bit about suffering better?”

  “Yeah.” I swing my arms, pushing the agony of my ankle into a small part of my brain. “‘Suffer better, babe.’”

  Ultrarunners suffer better than most people. That’s what Kyle meant. You can’t take up a sport like ultrarunning if you aren’t good at suffering. It doesn’t matter how much you train; racing long distances hurts. Sometimes, it hurts a little. Usually, it hurts a lot. That’s what happens when you pound the hell out of your body.

  Which raises the question: why do something that hurts? On purpose?

  It’s a question all long-distance runners get asked. The answers are as varied as the people.

  “HEY, MOM.” CARTER GREETED me with a chipper smile at the forty-mile aid station on the Cactus Rose one-hundred-miler. He passed me a baggie of electrolyte tablets. “Guess what?”

  “What?” I dug around in my gear bag, looking for some disinfectant wipes. The desert plants had sliced the shit out of my arms and legs, and I wanted to clean the wounds before heading back out.

  “You’ve never been any closer to the finish line.”

  I pause, raising one eyebrow at my son. “I’ve got another sixty miles to go.”

  “Yes, but you’ve still never been closer to the finish line.” He made a goofy face, crossing his eyes and touching his tongue to his nose.

  It was impossible for me not to laugh. I leaned back in the collapsible chair he’d set up for me, letting the humor ripple through me.

  “Is this what you’re looking for?” He passed me a Ziploc filled with single-wrapped disinfectant wipes.

  “Yeah, thanks.” I rip open one of the packages, wiping the disposable cloth up and down my arm. My skin stung in response.

  The director of the Cactus Rose was famous for saying that everything on the course stung, scratched, or bit. There was no way to run this course without getting bloody. In fact, there was a demented pride that went along with getting beat up by the trail.

  “Where’s your dad?” I ask as I finished cleaning my arms. I leaned down to start working on my legs, which had twice as many cuts as my arms.

  “Napping in the car,” Carter replied. He watched in silence as I wiped up a long streak of dried blood. “Hey, Mom?”

  “Yeah, honey?”

  “Why do you do this?”

  “Do what?”

  “This.” Carter gestured emphatically to the surrounding desert. “Ultrarunning. I mean, you could run half marathons or things like that. Easier races. Why do you always pick the hard ones?”

  I took a long drink of water, considering my answer. Carter’s question was one I’d asked myself periodically over the years. Sometimes I ran to burn off stress; sometimes I ran to work off a particularly large bowl of ice cream; other times I ran for the sheer joy of the sport. But underneath all that was another, more profound reason.

  “There are a lot of reasons,” I said at last. “If I had to boil it down, I’d say I run ultramarathons to learn about myself. To find myself. You can’t run one hundred miles without learning something. Crossing the finish line of an ultra . . .” I shrugged, struggling to find the right words. “There’s nothing like it. I find new places inside myself on every race.”

  Carter took that in introspective silence, passing me a clean pair of socks. “You should put these on. Dad says you don’t blister as badly if you change your socks halfway through.”

  I passed the socks back. “I’ll get them at the next aid station.”

  TODAY, RIGHT NOW, I am running with a new reason. I run to find my son. I’m running toward Carter, toward my family. If ever I had a reason to suffer better, today is it.

  Perhaps the last twenty years have been nothing but a series of training runs for this, the ultimate run—the run to find my son.

  “I don’t think I really understood the meaning of suffering until today,” Frederico says. His voice is brittle, his face lined with grief and sorrow.

  I fumble with a front pocket in my pack and pull out a small paper towel filled with espresso beans. “Here,” I say, holding a few out to him. “I took them from the espresso machine in Rod’s Roadhouse. They’ll help us stay awake.”

  The corners of his mouth turn up, but the smile doesn’t touch his eyes. He plucks a few out of my hand and tosses them back like they’re pills. Then he starts to run.

  I fall in beside him. My body shrieks in protest. It’s a good ten minutes before things loosen up and I find myself slipping into a rhythm. The ankle, already swelling, tells me to sit the fuck down, but I ignore it. I push the pain to my periphery, focusing instead on putting one foot in front of the other. I hear Kyle’s voice in my head saying, Suffer better, babe. Suffer better.

  The road climbs away from Laytonville. Though it undulates, there’s a steady rise in elevation. We lean into the hills, pumping our arms to help propel us upward. The downhills bring some relief as we let gravity pull us forward.

  My calves burn. My lungs rasp. My arms ache.

  My ankle tells me I’m the biggest fucking idiot on the planet. I tell my ankle to shut the hell up.

  The sun sinks lower and lower. It becomes harder and harder to see. I lament the loss of our headlamps.

  “I think we’ve crossed into the part of the race where we can’t be wimps,” I say.

  “Are you kidding? I hit that point fifty miles ago. I’m just faking it till we make it to Arcata.”’

  Mile one hundred thirty-two.

  Pain is a state of mind. Running is a state of mind. I am the runner, not the pain.

  The road is dotted with big yellow and red signs advertising Confusion Hill. It’s one of the many tourist traps dotting the 101.

  Carter and I didn’t stop at Confusion Hill when I helped move him north to college. I’d battled a storm of emotions that day. Pride because I was sending a kind, responsible, hard-working young man out in the world. Joy because Carter was getting an opportunity I never had. Fear because I was afraid of how I would cope with being alone. Sadness because experiencing this day without Kyle felt fundamentally wrong.

  I dragged out the drive as much as I could. I forced him to stop at several goofy tourist traps, like the Drive-Thru Tree and the Chimney Tree. We hadn’t stopped at Confusion Hill, though.

  Tears well in my eyes. Why didn’t we stop? Why didn’t I insist on one more goofy memory before sending him off into the world? Why am I crying over some stupid tourist trap I’ve never been to? I don’t even know what Confusion Hill is.

  Mile one hundred thirty-four.

  It’s dusk. Another red-and-yellow sign looms
in front of us. It says, Approaching Confusion Hill.

  The road curves. The left side of the road drops off in a near-vertical slope; the right side, equally steep, is terraced with a tall stone retaining wall. Between the darkness and the curve in the road, our vision is limited.

  As we round the corner, my eyes are dazzled by a sudden brightness. Before us is a jumble of neon lights, eye-tingling red-and-yellow signs, and brightly colored flags strung through the redwoods.

  Confusion Hill. We have arrived.

  The tourist trap is nestled next to a bridge that spans the Eel River. The river lies just past the parking lot, down a cliff tangled with redwoods and ferns. Anyone driving over the bridge can’t help but get an eyeful of Confusion Hill. It’s a prime location for snagging tourists.

  There are a few cars in the parking lot. Bordering the asphalt lot is a chain-link fence, presumably protecting the secrets of Confusion Hill from the unpaying populace. Behind the fence are a few zombies. Lucky for us, it appears traffic was light when the zombie apocalypse came through.

  The tapping of our feet has alerted the zombies to our presence. Trapped behind they chain-link fence, none are in a position to come after us. They rattle the fence at our approach, moaning and snapping their teeth. One lets out an awful keen that raises the hairs along the back of my neck.

  An answering keen fills the night. But it’s not from an undead in Confusion Hill; it’s from somewhere off to our left, in the woods.

  Something large and black blots out the forest to our left. I’d been so focused on Confusion Hill I hadn’t paid attention to the other side of the road.

  “What is that?” Frederico whispers.

  The big black shape solidifies in my vision. It’s a big tourist bus. The reason we can’t see it very well is because its laying on its side, its dark undercarriage barely visible in the night.

  Several more keens rise up from the other side of the bus. Then a rush of bodies swarm around the vehicle toward the road—coming straight for me and Frederico.

  47

  Tourist Trap

  THE ZOMBIE TOURISTS are Asian, every last one of them sporting a camera around the neck. They rush en masse, cameras bouncing on their chests as they run.

  “Shiiit!” I squeal. “Run, Frederico!”

  I break into an all-out sprint, tearing toward the bridge. My fear numbs the pain in my ankle. Frederico hauls ass next to me.

  The foremost of the zombies—five of them altogether—come around the front of the bus and angle toward us at a run. Their blind trajectory will cut us off from the bridge if we don’t move faster. Another three dozen Chinese tourists pour around the back of the bus.

  Fuck. We can’t stop to fight the zombies in front of us to clear the path. If we don’t beat them to the bridge, we’re going to be trapped.

  “Faster!” Frederico yells.

  I pour every last ounce of speed I have into my tired legs. My arms pump. My breath rasps. My legs churn as I lean forward, straining toward the bridge.

  The first of the zombies reaches us, arms outstretched. With a feral shout, Frederico angles his left shoulder and plows straight into the beast. The monster flies backward, skidding across the pavement on his back.

  Frederico never slows. I maintain my course, sprinting beside my friend. We outpace the other four zombies, our feet hitting the bridge before they catch us.

  Behind us, an eerie keen fills the dusk. We have an entire undead tour bus on our asses. There’s no hiding from them. A few well-thrown rocks won’t save us this time.

  “Push hard,” Frederico says. “Push hard and lose them. It’s the only way.”

  Mile one hundred thirty-five.

  Despite the hangover I know he has, Frederico sets a grizzly pace. We manage to put a solid one hundred yards between us and the undead. We’re not sprinting, but we are running hard.

  I’m not sure how long we can maintain the lead. Their awful keening follows us through the night. They are hunters, and we are the prey.

  No pain no pain no pain.

  This mantra rolls through my mind as I run. Mantras are an ultra trick I picked up somewhere, though now I can’t recall who gave the advice.

  No pain no pain no pain.

  If you lie to yourself long enough, you actually start to believe it.

  Mile one hundred thirty-seven.

  My mantra changes.

  Don’t be a wimp. Don’t be a wimp. Don’t be a wimp.

  Hunger gnaws at me from the inside out. It battles with my physical pain. I battle both of them. I can’t remember when my hydration pack ran dry, or when I had my last drink.

  I’m bonking—again. The last two days has been an unending series of bonks.

  Don’t be a wimp.

  The zombies are still behind us. They aren’t gaining on us, but we aren’t widening the gap, either. Frederico keeps a close eye on the zombies. He pushes us hard, so hard.

  Mile one hundred thirty-nine.

  The zombies have narrowed the gap to seventy-five yards. They’re gaining on us.

  We’re high in the mountains, the darkness a deep umbrella around us. I miss our headlamps. If we had lights, we could take to the forest and try to lose the zombies. With only the stars and a sliver of moon in the sky, there isn’t nearly enough light for us to risk the woods.

  They’ve only been chasing us for five miles, which isn’t all that far. If Frederico and I were at the start of this insane junket, we could lose them. I’m sure of it. But we’ve been on the move for almost two days straight. We’re beat to shit and exhausted.

  One foot in front of the other. That’s our only option.

  Are we just delaying the inevitable?

  Mile one hundred forty-one.

  Fifty yards and closing. My whole body hurts, from the top of my head to the bottom of my toes, and everything in between. My head screams for me to move, to pick up the pace, but my body can’t comply.

  I begin to think death wouldn’t be a bad option. Yeah, it would suck to get eaten to death, but with the throng of zombies behind us, it would probably be quick. Running another fifty miles at this pace seems like slow torture.

  What if we just ran off into the woods? How far could we go before one of us fell and broke something? Maybe, if we were lucky, we’d both run straight over a cliff and break our necks. Death would be swift. That wouldn’t be such a bad way to go. At least we’d die running.

  If only we could find a cliff.

  Mile one hundred forty-two.

  I try to focus on the road, on my form, on mentally managing my hunger and pain. I feel like the unraveling hem on an old pair of jeans.

  My eyes flick out to the forest. Should we try it? Brave the woods in the dark? I imagine tripping on a log and breaking my other ankle or knocking myself out on an errant, low-hanging branch.

  In the daylight, we’d stand a chance. In the dark, we’ll be dead meat.

  “I hurt,” I gasp. “Everything hurts.”

  Frederico, eyes glued to the road, doesn’t look up when I speak. “Yeah,” he agrees.

  I recognize the set lines in the profile of his face. He’s bonking, too. He might not have a fucked-up ankle, but he’s got his own physical pain.

  Mile one hundred forty-four.

  Twenty-five yards and closing.

  The zombies are running us into the ground. Frederico and I are barely holding on. We’re hungry, tired, and hurting. We’re two steps short of roadkill. How much farther can we get before the undead catch us?

  We’re nearing another bridge. Maybe we should jump off. Throw in the towel and just end it.

  “Kate.” When Frederico says my name, I sense the depth of our friendship in the word. “You’re a finisher, Kate. Don’t let yourself forget that. You might not look pretty when you arrive at the finish line, but you always arrive.” He pushes a small bundle into my hands. In my exhausted, pain-riddled state, I take the objects automatically, barely noticing them.

  Frederico sm
iles at me. The moon and stars cast the lean angles of his face into planes of shadow and light. Strands of his curly gray hair, escaping from his ponytail, create a fuzzy halo around his face.

  “Tell Carter Uncle Rico says hi.”

  Then he does something strange. He lets out a long, loud, wordless holler. Then he turns and sprints away from me.

  His yell lashes the night with sound. The zombies, zeroing in on the sudden noise, let out a collective keen.

  48

  Run, Jackalope

  I SWAY ON MY FEET, staring stupidly after Frederico in incomprehension.

  To the right of the bridge is a small, single-lane road. I hadn’t seen it until now. It’s onto this road that Frederico runs. The tourist zombies stream after my friend in an undead rush.

  Frederico bellows into the night. “Run, Jackalope! Goddamn you, run!”

  His words are like a pair of jumper cables to my brain. Understanding fills me with horror.

  “Run, Jackalope!”

  I turn and run.

  Gone is the pain of my swollen ankle, of all the little aches and pains that have accumulated over the last one hundred forty-four miles. Gone are the fatigue and the hunger and the thirst.

  Crowding all of it away is frantic grief.

  “Run, Jackalope!”

  His words, faint in the night, drive me forward. My legs churn over the black asphalt. I sprint over the bridge and away from my friend, tears running down my cheeks.

  The bridge spans a wide gorge, crossing yet another section of the Eel River. Free of the trees, the landscape around me brightens under the light of the moon and stars. Something moves to my right, off in the distance.

  Without slowing, I turn my head. Half a mile away is the narrow, single-lane road. It leads away from the 101 and winds down to the river below the bridge.

  Frederico sprints down that road, the horde of zombies on his heels. His wordless yells and whoops echo into the night, a beacon that draws the zombies the way flowers draw bees. The intensity of the noise sets them into a frenzy. They keen, voices filling the air like a discordant church organ. Frederico, pouring on one last burst of desperate speed, has perhaps fifty yards on them.