Johnny shakes his head. “We lost power a few days ago. We knew it was going to happen, so we filled up everything we could with water. There’s also the water heater. We’ve been using that for the toilet. We should be set until help comes.” His eyes dart at this last statement, communicating his discomfort.
Until help comes. I consider my words carefully, not sure how well the young man in front of me has adjusted to this new world. “How secure is this building?”
He shifts, eyes once again darting away. “We haven’t cleared any other rooms, but we did the lounge on the bottom floor. That gave us a way in and out of the building.”
Apparently, they half-ass survival the same way they half-ass dish duty. This does nothing to calm my nerves.
A pretty Asian girl enters the common room, eyes widening at the sight of me.
“Mrs. S.,” she exclaims. “You’re awake! I didn’t think you’d be up for another two days.”
I half smile, half frown at the odd statement. “Why would you think that?”
“Carter said you always sleep a day or two after a one-hundred-miler. Since you ran two hundred miles to get here, we figured you’d need four days of sleep.” She speaks fast, her eyes never leaving my face.
“This is Lila, by the way,” Johnny says.
Lila and Johnny both stare at me like I’m some sort of strange, unexpected wild animal in their midst. It’s unnerving, only reinforcing the uncomfortable feeling of being under a microscope.
“How long have I been asleep?” I ask.
“Almost two days,” Johnny replies. “You didn’t even get up to pee.”
I can tell by my dry mouth that I’m dehydrated, which isn’t surprising considering how far I went on foot. It’s not unusual to be dehydrated after an ultra. It can be challenging to replenish water as quickly as it sweats out. Or, in my most recent case, it can be challenging just to find water.
“Are you sore?” Lila asks.
“Don’t be stupid,” Johnny says. “She just ran two hundred miles. Of course, she’s sore. Right, Mrs. S.?”
I wish he’d stop calling me that. It makes me feel old. I’m thirty-nine, not ninety-nine.
“Kate,” I remind him. “Please, call me Kate. Yes, I’m a little sore.” No need to tell them my body feels like it’s been worked over with a baseball bat.
Lila’s face brightens. “I have just the thing. Hold on.”
She returns from her room carrying a small glass jar filled with a pale-yellow substance. It looks like a candle, but when she opens it, the unmistakable smell of marijuana wafts out.
“I’m developing a cannabis salve for athletes,” she tells me. “This is a blend of coconut oil, beeswax, and cannabis oil. I also mixed in a little copaiba essential oil, which is great for reducing inflammation.” She holds it out to me. “Here, try it.”
Dubious, I take the jar. I don’t really want to walk around smelling like a marijuana plant, but the girl’s eyes are so earnest I don’t have the heart to tell her no.
The balm inside has the consistency of soft wax. I sniff it again, holding back a grimace. I’ve never liked the smell of pot.
“I’m getting a degree in chemistry,” she tells me. “I’m going to start my own cannabis company after I graduate.”
“Lila is always working on different balms and stuff,” Johnny says.
“Cannabis is good for so many things,” Lila says. “Pain relief, stress relief, skin care, all kinds of things. It’s not just for getting high.” She says this in such a way that leads me to believe she spends a lot of time defending her chosen career plan.
I decide not to point out she needs to work out a way to eliminate the stinky odor of this stuff if she wants to have a chance in hell at selling it.
“Thanks. I’ll try it.” I scoop out a lump. After a moment’s consideration, I decide to rub some on my swollen ankle. That particular part of my body can use all the help it can get. And it’s the farthest away from my nose.
“I should take a picture of it,” Lila says. “To track the recovery time as you use my salve.” Her face falls. “Too bad my phone is out of batteries. The guys stole solar panels to run the Xbox and ham radio, but we don’t have any other power. The solar panels don’t last long anyway.” She looks away, gaze shifting to her shoes. “Besides, until the government cleans up this mess, there’s no one to call.”
I note how both Lila and Johnny talk about our current state as if it’s temporary. Like we’ve entered a dark tunnel but will find our way back out in a few weeks.
How much have they seen? How much do they know about what’s happening?
I think back on my journey here, of all the death and desolation I encountered over the two hundred miles. The world I passed through isn’t one that will heal quickly.
I don’t say this. There’s no reason to upset these kids right now.
A weight settles on my shoulders as I think of Carter. I want my son here, with me, so I can see he is whole and in one piece.
“I’m going to go find Carter,” I say. “Do you know which floor he’s on?”
“I just saw him, Eric, and Jenna out the window,” Lila says. “They were hauling some bodies outside. They must have killed a few on their supply search.”
Jenna. Carter’s girlfriend. The one he never told me about. I stifle my irritation. It would have been nice to know my son had someone special in his life.
Johnny, watching my face, says, “Don’t worry. The army wiped out just about everything and everyone around here. It’s pretty safe out there.”
If his intent was to comfort a fretting mother, he failed. “What do you mean, the army wiped out everything?” I ask, voice sharp.
Johnny and Lila shift, exchanging glances. I can’t discern their expressions.
“Arcata was under martial law for a few days,” Johnny says at last. “Things ... got out of hand. They opened fire on everything. And everyone.”
I recall the carnage I saw on Granite Avenue, the long road leading to Creekside dorm where I am now. All the dead kids, many of them murdered with guns. The dead soldiers littered among them. The burned buildings. Out of hand doesn’t begin to cover what I saw. From the uncomfortable look on Johnny’s face and the way he avoids my gaze, I can tell he doesn’t want to talk about it.
Lila busies herself in the kitchenette, rifling through the cabinets. “Are you hungry?” she asks with forced cheer. “We have SpaghettiOs.”
My mind is sucked down a tunnel to the last time I ate SpaghettiOs. It had only been a few days ago. Frederico had still been alive. Exhausted, hungry, and desperate, we raided an RV for supplies after we killed the family of seven zombies inside.
I would prefer never to eat SpaghettiOs again. I wish Frederico was still here. A wave of sadness passes through me at his loss.
“No, thanks,” I say. “I’m going to go find Carter. I—”
Several gunshots sound from outside. I fly to my feet and half run, half limp to the balcony. I throw open the door just in time to see Carter, Jenna, and another boy disappear into a nearby dorm building across the way.
Carter!
His name leaps to my throat, but I swallow it back. I limp onto the balcony and crouch behind the railing, peering into the parking lot.
Two men run into view, guns in hand. They look like homeless vagabonds, the sort that live throughout northern California. Their clothes are faded and stained. They have sun-darkened faces and permanent dirt in the grooves of their knuckles and necks.
Anger rockets through my bloodstream. How dare these fuckers aim weapons at my son?
“Where the fuck did that little weasel go?” says one.
“I saw the others in the parking lot. He must be around here somewhere,” says the second man.
“They could be hiding in any of these buildings.”
“Mr. Rosario will be pissed if he gets away. You know how she feels about thieves.”
Mr. Rosario.
My anger intens
ifies, a hot coal in my belly. I’ve met Mr. Rosario. Why the plump, overweight woman goes by a man’s name is still a mystery to me. Some of her people found me and Frederico on our journey here. They held us at gunpoint, tied us up like prisoners, and carted us off to a remote, off-the-grid camp run by the drug dealer. We barely made it out of there alive. In fact, Mr. Rosario had done her best to kill us.
And now her people are downstairs, threatening my son and his friends.
To hell with that.
I snatch the disgusting wrought iron skillet out of the sink and march straight to the door in my bare feet. Well, I try to march. It’s more of a determined limp. Every nerve ending in my body complains and begs me to sit back down. I relegate the pain to a distant part of my brain and shove my way out the door.
“Kate, where are you going?” Johnny says.
“You can’t go out there,” Lila adds. “It’s dangerous!”
I leave them behind and head toward the stairwell. I didn’t run two hundred miles and lose my best friend to let that bitch’s goons kill my son.
5
First Kill
JENNA
Carter has me sandwiched between his back and the wall of Creekside. My scalp prickles with fear, and even though I want to shove him out of the way, I’m afraid any small movement may escalate the situation.
“I’ll give it back.” Reed reaches into his hair. He plucks out a small package with several clear plastic eyedroppers inside, looking chagrined as he tosses it at the feet of the men.
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen Reed hide drugs in his hair. It was a well-known phenomenon throughout the dorm. Reed’s eight-inch afro is infamous for a variety of things, but chief among them is its ability to conceal drugs.
It was funny before the zombie outbreak.
It was funny before drug dealers came after us.
Anger crests inside of me as I glare at the droppers of acid. I struggle to hold back my rage, knowing it has no place in our current situation.
Eric doesn’t have the same self-restraint. “You fucking idiot,” he bursts out. “You risked all our lives so you can get high?”
“I’m sorry,” Reed says. “I was being stupid. I didn’t think—”
“Yeah, you didn’t think,” says the tall man. “Where’s the rest of it?”
Rest of it?
I want to scream as Reed reaches into one of his large cargo pockets and disgorges another dozen baggies. Inside each one are more plastic eyedroppers filled with acid.
“How did you know where the stuff was?” asks one man. He’s the shorter of the two, with a scruffy beard and a black hoodie with a peeling Nike logo.
“Word gets around,” Reed says. “I overheard Jay talking to some guys at a party last week. I knew he kept stuff in his car. The way things are now, I didn’t think anyone would be coming for his stash.”
The pieces click together. Reed broke into one of the abandoned cars to get drugs and got caught by these assholes.
“The way things are now,” the shorter man drawls. “Just because we’re in the middle of the fucking zombie apocalypse doesn’t mean Mr. Rosario’s men let Granjero’s men steal from us.”
Reed pales, his expression bringing a feral smile to both of the gun-wielding vagabonds. “How did you know I worked for Granjero?” he asks.
“We didn’t,” says the second hobo. He wears fraying cargo pants and a rumpled peacoat. “It was just a guess.”
“A guess you just confirmed,” says the other man.
I have no idea what any of this means, though I can hazard a guess. Reed must have been selling drugs on the side.
“Let my friends go,” Reed says. “They haven’t done anything.”
“Sorry,” says the taller man, though he doesn’t sound sorry. “Mr. Rosario says anyone who works for Granjero has to be eliminated. Anyone associated with—”
Someone leaps around the side of the building, wielding a large cast iron skillet. The skillet connects with the man’s head with a dull, wet thunk. He drops without a sound.
The shorter man whirls around. The gun cracks once, the sound making me jump.
The person with the skillet is faster. She swings it, knocking the gun from the man’s hand. Then, like a pro tennis player, she backhands the guy with the cast iron pan. The side of the guy’s face is crushed.
The world stills, quiets. The woman standing with the food-encrusted skillet is Carter’s mom. Her eyes are fierce, her face blazing with fury and retribution as she gazes at the two men lying before her bare, battered feet.
Both men are still and unmoving. Blood gushes from the face of the man she backhanded with the skillet. A slow seepage of blood flows from the skull of the first man she hit. Behind her, crouched at the corner of the building, are Johnny and Lila. Their mouths hang open, eyes wide as they take in the two bodies. Reed and Eric stare at the scene, agape.
I blink, trying to reconcile the woman in front of me with the skinny woman who limped into the dorm parking lot two days ago looking like she’d been dragged across the grill of a semi. I can’t align this hard woman with the broken woman Carter described, a woman crushed by grief after her husband died. I can’t align her with the image of a loving and slightly exasperated mother who ordered hops for my boyfriend off the Internet before he was old enough to drink.
From the look on Carter’s face, I can guess he’s having similar struggles. The woman in front of us is strong and, if I’m being honest, a tad scary. Maybe a lot scary.
Carter’s mom looks at him, eyes hard and unapologetic. “Sorry you had to see that, baby,” she says. “These men would have killed you. All of you.” Her eyes take in the rest of us. “Frederico and I had a run-in with Mr. Rosario. She tried to kill us. We barely escaped.”
“Mom,” Carter blurts, “you killed them.”
She sighs, her face taking on the look of an overly patient parent who doesn’t have the energy to explain a universal truth to a child.
“Go inside, sweetie,” she says. “I’ll be there in a minute.”
She sets the skillet on the ground, pausing to flick ants off her hands and arms with a grimace. Then she picks up the legs of one dead man. She drags him around the building and disappears from sight. Reed picks up the legs of the second guy, eyes still wide. He trails Carter’s mom around Creekside.
The rest of us follow the procession. A few of the vultures spring in the air when Reed and Carter’s mom get too close, flapping and squawking. A swarm of flies buzz upward in a cloud, disturbed by the movement.
From the edge of the parking lot, we watch Reed and Carter’s mom deposit the bodies in a pile. I see Reed exchange a few words with her, but they’re too far away to hear. When Reed wipes at his face, she puts an arm around him.
“She killed them,” Carter whispers, still sounding stunned.
“I know.” I don’t know whether to feel relieved or disturbed or terrified. I decide that it’s okay to feel all three.
“They would have killed us,” Eric says, licking his lips as he stares across the lot. Carter’s mom still stands with her arm around Reed’s shoulder, talking to him.
On a fundamental level, I understand she just saved our lives. Those guys would have killed us. But knowing this doesn’t reconcile the fact that I just watched my boyfriend’s mom kill two people with cold, lightning fast efficiency.
My mother won’t even kill a spider; she makes us do that for her or, if she sees more than a few in the house, she goes to the nail salon and calls an exterminator. But Carter’s mom killed those two men as easily as all of us kill zombies.
That hadn’t been easy at first, either, I remind myself.
CARTER AND I REMAINED barricaded in the dorm room with Reed, Eric, and Lila long after the soldiers had left. Long after the slaughter ended. The sound of gunfire continued off in the distance, either in town or on other parts of campus, but they weren’t at the dorms anymore.
We watched survivors creep out of nea
rby dorms and flee. Some went on foot, some took cars. Those that took cars attracted herds of zombies, but they disappeared from sight before we could see what happened to them.
We stayed where we were because we were too scared to move. Too scared to do anything except sit around and be afraid together.
It didn’t help that outside the barricaded door came the soft moans of Jake and Chris. They were two guys who’d been passed out on the living room floor when we made our way here. Having seen bite marks on them, we left them where they were.
Now they were back, undead and hunting for us. The door vibrated from their scratching and pounding.
“What are we going to do?” Reed hissed. “If we go out there, one of us could get bitten.”
No one answered him. None of us wanted to be the one to say what we were all thinking: To get past Chris and Jake, we had to kill them. Really kill them.
We saw the soldiers drop zombies with headshots. We knew the stories. It should have been fiction, yet somehow it had become our reality. The only way to stop the monsters on the other side of the door was to bash in their heads.
Even though we knew this, none of us wanted to be the first to say it. None of us wanted to be the one to do it. Chris and Jake were our friends. Our dorm mates. The idea of puncturing their skulls with a sharp object wasn’t right.
So we sat in quiet, pensive silence, hoping they would go away.
They didn’t.
The frantic pounding died away, but they remained outside the door, moaning and scratching at the wood.
I eventually forced myself to move. I dug around under the beds and in the closets. To my relief, I unearthed a good supply of snacks. There were granola bars and bottled water. Carter even found a case of mashed potato cups on the top shelf in the closet, which we mixed with lukewarm water from plastic bottles.
After nearly eight hours, all of us had to pee. Really bad. Reed suggested opening the window and whizzing out on to the roof, but none of us was brave enough to actually do it. Eric came up with the idea of peeing in the empty water bottles after we made the mashed potatoes.
Undead Ultra Box Set | Books 1-4 Page 36
