Something is wrong with their faces.
Anne blinks, thinking: Impossible.
The cops raise their guns, grinning at her across the remaining distance.
“Go, Marcus!” she screams, taking aim. “Keep going!”
Marcus obeys instantly, throwing the bus back into its highest gear and stepping on the gas. The machinery roars in response, lurching as it accelerates. Anne loses her footing and falls hard onto the floor, the rifle clattering away from her.
BANG BANG BANG BANG
Bullet holes pop through the windshield, spraying the interior with bits of glass. The Rangers drop to the floor, wrapping their arms around their heads. Marcus bellows with rage and pain, half out of his seat and driving blind.
BANG BANG BANG BANG
The bullets shatter the windshield and rip through the air, thudding into metal and bursting through the seats, sending bits of stuffing swirling around them. Wind rushes through the open windshield, carrying the faint tang of rotting milk.
Anne feels the hard, dusty floor under her scarred cheek and wonders how many kids stepped on this spot on their daily commute to school. She pictures their little sneakered feet. She closes her eyes and remembers visiting one of the many orphanages at Camp Defiance. She wanted to see children again. Pastor Strickland gave her a tour and showed her the rows of boys and girls drawing on construction paper with crayons—art therapy, he called it, endless scenes of fire and slaughter, Infected mommies attacking crying daddies, children running through the woods, red eyes identifying the Infected, slashes of blue representing the tears of the victims.
Strickland asked about her spiritual health and she told him she was spiritually dead. He said she should return to her faith, which could serve as a source of strength for her as it has for so many others, reminding her there are no atheists in foxholes. Anne answered there are no believers either. There is just you, dying. And that is the true sadness of life.
You’re here, and then you’re not.
BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG
The cops step aside as the bus roars past, emptying their guns at point blank range, the bullets punching holes through the thin metal skin of the vehicle.
The firing stops. Marcus straightens in the driver’s seat, his face flushed with rage. Anne climbs to her feet and looks through the back window to see the two cops standing in the middle of the road, staring at the bus as it zooms away from them.
“Who’s hit?” Anne says. She has to shout to be heard over the rush of wind whistling across the seats.
“Just glass,” says Ramona. “Nothing major.”
“I’m all scratched up,” Marcus says. “I’m all right, but I’m bleeding.”
Evan and Gary tell her they are okay.
“Ramona, get the first aid kit,” Anne says. “Gary, take a look at Marcus and let Ramona know where he’s hurt and how bad. Ramona, patch him up first if you can.”
“Shouldn’t we stop?” Gary says.
“Not after that. Those people who were shooting at us were Infected.”
“How can that be?” Evan says.
“Ray Young,” Anne answers. “Evan, I need you to fetch the machine gun.”
Despite everything that has happened, Evan grins. The M240 is his baby. He hurries into the back, dodging Ramona, and returns with the gun.
“Where do you want it?” he says.
“We’re going to mount it right up there next to Marcus where the windshield used to be.”
“Hot dog,” Evan says. “Here, take the gun. I’ll go get the ammo.”
Their boots crunch broken glass as they lug the twenty-six-pound machine gun to the front of the bus and mount it on the hood, the barrel resting on the integrated bipod.
Marcus glances at them as they set it up for firing. Evan pulls the charging handle, locking the bolt to the rear.
“Give me the ammo,” he says.
Anne opens one of the ammunition boxes and pulls out a long belt of shiny rounds, which he connects to the machine gun, sliding the first round into the firing chamber. Locked and loaded.
“We’re in business,” he grins, the wind ripping through his hair. “It’s set for a cycle of eight hundred fifty rounds per minute. Just keep feeding me the belt.”
“Gary!” Anne calls out. “Sit right there. When I say so, get behind Evan, brace your back against the pole here, and put your hands against his back right about here. Keep him stable, okay?”
“I can do that,” Gary says.
“Good idea,” Evan says, hunched over the machine gun, one hand wrapped around the firing handle and the other hugging the gunstock.
“You’re a long way from designing electrical circuits now,” Anne tells him.
Evan laughs into the wind. “Seems like a dream.” Past or present, however, he does not elaborate.
“People in the road!” Marcus says.
Anne raises her rifle and peers through the scope. A crowd of some fifty grim-faced people, holding knives and baseball bats and hockey sticks, stands in a line across the road next to a massive billboard proclaiming, WELCOME TO SUGAR CREEK.
“Fire, Evan.”
“They don’t look Infected!”
“Fire!”
“Anne!”
“FIRE YOUR GODDAMN WEAPON.”
The machine gun fills the air with its loud chatter as fifteen rounds per second rip downrange into the crowd, every fourth a streaming tracer. Dozens of people crumple under the withering fusillade, body parts and guts torn and hurled across the asphalt, while the rest charge howling, throwing bricks and waving their weapons.
A rock sails past Anne’s ear and falls into one of the seats behind her. The town’s welcome sign collapses into pieces. The snowplow strikes a rushing knot of people with a jarring bang and sends them cartwheeling into the fields bordering the road. Next to her, Evan fires, his body shaking, Gary holding onto his back and trying to keep the man steady. Anne feeds the belt into the machine gun, which spits the rounds at a murderous rate. She catches Marcus’s profile while he drives, ramrod straight in his seat, gripping the wheel with white knuckles, bleeding from a cut in his forehead, tears flowing down his stubbled cheeks and drying in the wind. She knows how much he hates this. The endless slaughter. He hates all of it.
The bus zooms down the town’s main street, scattering garbage and scraps of paper. Hundreds of people emerge from houses and buildings, throwing rocks and waving homemade weapons. Stones and shards of brick clatter against the sides of the vehicle.
Evan continues firing, cutting them down and chewing up the fronts of houses. Anne eyes the ammo belt’s shrinking length with alarm. The sides of the bus thud and vibrate as the Infected throw themselves at it. The street behind them fills with clouds of dust. Signs flash past proclaiming zero down financing, world famous tacos, propane for sale.
“Reload!” Evan screams. “Reload me!”
Anne pulls out the second belt of ammunition as the bus approaches another mob of Infected at the other end of town, arrayed in ranks like a medieval army.
Ray
Ray awakens on musty sheets with a pounding headache and a mouth that feels coated with moss. Lola smiles in her sleep, and as Ray gets out of bed, yawning and rubbing his belly, she frowns, stirs, wakes up Infected. Feeling a little nauseous, he plods into the bathroom and pisses loudly. Then Lola pulls up her dress and sits on the toilet, and he thinks: At least I have her potty trained.
“I had the weirdest dream. Did you sleep well, honey?”
Lola barks, making him laugh. His body is paying for last night’s bender, but it did the trick. Overall, he feels better than he can remember.
“Today, we’re going to find ourselves some Feds and make a deal.”
He gives her some fruit juice in a plastic jug, which she gulps. While he brushes his teeth, he wonders what it is like to wake up every day driven by hunger and rage. Maybe a lot like my twenties, he thinks with a snort. The whole thing seems so pointless but th
en he remembers the Infected are just a means to an end. The bug’s real goal is to plant new life on the planet.
Ray lights a Winston and pats the lump on his ribs, which vibrates like a tiny hummingbird.
“This is not going to turn out the way you wanted, Mini Me,” he tells it.
We like this world just the way it is, and we don’t appreciate you messing with it.
He pulls on his T-shirt and steps into his jeans.
“Let’s go, honey. We’ll get something to eat on the road. The world’s our oyster.”
She takes his hand and he leads her outside into the bright day.
His guards step aside to let him pass: French, Anderson, Cook and Salazar. Ray walks to the edge of the balcony and waves at the Infected gaping up at him with hopeful expressions. The sun is already high in the sky. He overslept, and yet he is still exhausted.
Thank you for watching over me, he tells the Infected.
The sun’s glare makes his eyes tear up. He takes a last drag on his smoke and steps on it.
“There’s just four of us now,” he tells the survivors of Unit 12. “You’ve always been good guys, normal or Infected, don’t matter which. I’m taking you all the way with me. If they want me, they’re going to have to cure you too.”
He leads his entourage down the cement steps and into the parking lot, where he left his truck. The Infected stare at him, sweating and grunting, their skin burned red by the sun, their hair greasy and matted. They touch his shoulders lightly as he passes, growling deep in their throats. Some of them show him weapons they scavenged, baseball bats and shovels, while others try to give him gifts of food. The air is thick with their stench.
“Come on, now,” he says. “I ain’t the Second Coming.”
A massive vehicle rumbles past the motel. Ray freezes, watching it roll past. It is shaped like a school bus, painted in a camouflage pattern, with a large snowplow fitted onto its front, stained the color of rust, and metal slats welded over its windows and doors.
“Wow, what a great rig,” Ray says.
The bus stops with a squeak, idling before it reverses, stops again, and executes a slow turn into the parking lot.
Ray watches it turn with mounting terror until it faces him, giving him a clear view of the giant blond-haired driver, a skinny man with glasses hunched over a machine gun, and a woman standing next to him, pointing at Ray and shouting.
“You,” he gasps.
Even from this distance, he can see Anne Leary’s face shining with fierce excitement at catching her prey.
Of course it would be her.
He flashes back to sitting on the bridge, trying to hold onto a happy thought while she stood over him with a very large gun pointed at the back of his head.
Protect, Ray tells his cops.
The Unit 12 officers raise their weapons and fire as the machine gun opens up, it rounds hacking through the crowd and plowing into the Infected around Ray.
The firing stops. The dying Infected thrash and howl in their own blood. Someone screams on the bus. The air smells like smoke.
Ray emerges from his daze gasping for breath. He pats his body, amazed he got through the exchange without a scratch.
Lola.
She lies on the ground, her brains splashed across the pavement among old cigarette butts. Behind her, Cook crawls on his hands and knees, vomiting blood, his tattered shirt smoking.
Lola!
“Oh, honey.”
Oddly, she seems to be smiling.
There goes your second chance, bro.
As his rage mounts, the Infected around him tremble, shaking their fists and weapons, jaws snapping like animals.
Ray turns to the bus, where Anne is struggling to right the machine gun.
“Kill them!” he commands.
KILL KILL KILL KILL
The Infected howl as one and charge, surging toward the bus in a human flood. The driver puts the vehicle into reverse, inching away slowly, too slowly, making Ray laugh harshly.
Oh no, you don’t. You’re not going anywhere, Anne Leary. You’re going to stay right here and get what’s coming to you.
“Kill them all!”
The air fills with the pop of weapons as the Infected clamber onto the snowplow and force their way into the bus.
“Whatever you think is best, Ray!” he screams. “Whatever you think is best!”
Anne
The bus slowly reverses while Anne tries to pull the machine gun from under Evan’s legs. The Infected shot him. The man shakes violently, bleeding out, his eyes glassy and unseeing. Behind him, Gary sits with his back against the pole, wincing and licking blood from his lips.
“I can feel it in my lung,” he says. He sounds like he is being strangled. “The bullet. It went through Evan and popped into my chest.”
“I’m sorry,” she tells him.
Thrashing in his final death throes, Evan knees Anne in the face and pain flares through the lines of her scars. Above her, Ramona screams and fires her automatic rifle on full auto at the Infected clambering onto the hood of the vehicle.
Anne frees the gun with a final jerk.
“This is your fault,” Gary says. “It’s all your fault.”
She looks up in time to see Ramona fire her last round and slam the butt of her rifle into a man’s face before the hands reach in and pull her out into the mob, which tears her apart. Blood splashes onto Marcus but he ignores it, gritting his teeth, firing a massive handgun into the snarling faces with one hand while steering with the other.
“I’m scared,” Gary says.
This is what you wanted, Anne’s mind whispers.
Your murdered your own children through your stupidity and arrogance and you can never be happy so you kill and kill and kill the Infected in the hopes one day your luck will run out and they will tear you to shreds and eat you like you deserve.
That day has finally come.
“It’s going to be okay,” she says.
Gary does not hear her. He stares into oblivion, his eyes blank, his face pale, his final expression one of pure terror.
Anne glances down at the machine gun in her hands and realizes she could just drop it. Dying would be that simple. She has already gotten enough people killed. Let Ray kill the world. What does she care?
Not yet. Soon, but not just yet.
They can have me, but only after a fight. They have to prove they are stronger. They have to earn it.
The will to survive floods her body with energy. She stands and levels the heavy weapon, putting her back against the pole for support and firing from the waist, holding the ammo belt with her other hand. The barrel lights up with muzzle flashes that fill the air with hot metal.
Anne screams with something like joy. This is how she wants to die.
The hot metal slugs punch through skulls and torsos, spraying brains and guts back into the crowd. Soon she can no longer see individuals, just torn and charred flesh and muscle and clothing, shattered bone, ripped organs and blood.
Then she no longer sees even this, struck by a vision of a single face, watching her without expression, as if lobotomized, a human face with an alien mind.
A human face constructed entirely of seething maggots.
No, not maggots. Monsters.
The face snarls with recognition and hatred before it explodes into millions of howling things hurtling into the void.
“I am Life,” it tells her. “I am Life and you are the enemy of life. You are Death.”
Empty shell casings clatter across the floor. She grunts, sweat pouring down her face. Her arm trembles with exhaustion from the constant recoil.
The bus continues to gain speed. The Infected fall behind, howling and waving their weapons and shooting their guns. Anne lunges and slams the M240 down onto hood, hugging the stock and resuming fire.
The Infected collapse in waves under the withering fire of the machine gun.
“Come on,” she screams, her body jerking from the rec
oil. “Come and get it!”
The bus steadily puts more distance between them and the Infected. The tracers arc and drop among the crowd, punching more bodies to the ground. The ammo belt runs out.
Marcus stops the bus, turns and finds another way out of town.
Ray fled during the attack. The pursuit is back on. And Anne has survived again.
As with every other time, she is almost disappointed.
Cool Rod
Sitting in the shade of the Stryker, Rod watches his squad tear the plastic wrapping off their MREs and sink their hands into the yellow pouches, producing brown packets containing entrees and seasonings and HOOAH! energy bars. They compare meals and barter like Wall Street traders. Sosa trades a cigarette for Lynch’s hot sauce. Tanner puts his chicken fajitas on the market, but gets no takers. He takes a long pull on a stray bottle of water they liberated from the Walmart’s shelves and passes it on. Lynch suggests lighting some C4 to cook their meals properly, but the air is so hot the others do not seem interested. Sosa, constipated from the steady diet of MREs, calls his a meal ready for enema, making them laugh.
Rod joins in the laughter, enjoying the banter during this rare calm while Davis stands twenty meters away with his rifle providing security and Arnold monitors the recon equipment on the Walmart roof. He tears open his own MRE and inspects his beef brisket with mild disdain. It is not his favorite, but he needs the twelve hundred calories.
Hellraisers 3, this is Hellraisers Eyes, over.
That’s Arnold calling in from the observation post. Rod places his meal on the ground between his feet and keys the push-to-talk button on his headset, chewing. “Hellraisers 3 here. Go ahead, Eyes, over.”
Contact to the west. A uniform victor, moving fast, over.
An unidentified vehicle, Rod understands. “You got eyes on it, over?”
Not yet, over.
“Let me know when you get eyes on it. Hellraisers 3, out.”
The Killing Floor Page 28
