What Zombies Fear 3: The Gathering

by Kirk Allmond

  Renee looked at Max, opened her mouth to say something, but then changed her mind and closed it again. Kris was watching the whole scene while trying to clean herself up with baby wipes. She had been mostly covered in Victor's blood.

  "John," Tookes said, “they'll make it. We can be anywhere in the United States by train in three days. We'll start communicating with them more as we get closer, so we can coordinate where to pick them up. If we have to go all the way to Alaska, we'll be there waiting on them when the time comes. Ideally, they'll make it to a local air strip. There are several within an hour’s drive from the farm."

  "Tookes, do you really think you can make it across country in this train? You went eight hours south and ran into an ambush and a horde of zombies, and the biggest city you passed through had twelve thousand people," asked Kris.

  "Kris, I couldn't do it alone. But we can. This group of us, this team, or family, or whatever you want to call it, we can accomplish anything. When our loved ones are all safe, it'll be time to go on the offensive. For now, we're just playing defense. Reacting to the situation."

  "If anyone can get my family here, Sean can. I just worry because he can't hit a roo from five meters with a shotgun," John replied. "He always wanted to work on the truck instead of learning how to shoot."

  "We will be back in Charlottesville in a couple of hours. From the station there, we can switch tracks and get on a set that takes us within a mile of the house. I think we have at least a week before you need to leave," Vic said. This whole trip was kind of John's thing, and Tookes was hoping to let him take point on the preparations. "Why don't you and Marshall use that time to get the train ready for a cross-country run, just in case? There is a bunch more cars in the rail yard. Maybe we should even hook up a dining car and a fuel tank. You guys figure out what you think we'll need for the trip. We'll get them here, John, and we'll make it safe for them."

  "Thanks, mate," was John's short reply, barely audible over the loud clacking of the train on the tracks.

  Victor realized he had no idea how fast we were going or who was driving the train. The doors and windows of the cargo container were all closed. About an hour above Lynchburg, Virginia, the tracks went down a steep mountain. Someone would need to be inside the locomotive to slow the train when they came up on those switchbacks.

  "How long was I out?" he asked.

  "About forty-five minutes, give or take," Kris replied. "Leo got the train moving while I kept the artery in your arm together enough to allow your body to heal. That was an amazing sight, watching the flesh knit together like that. Of all the abilities, that's the one I might most like to have."

  "You probably do," he said. "Maybe not as fast as me, and certainly not as fast as Leo, but all of us who are proven immune gain the ability to heal faster than normal. I think I heal so fast because I use that particular ability so often. Leo uses it most of all. Has anyone told you about the time she tripped over a rabbit? You should ask her."

  "By the look on her face, I'm not asking her a thing about a rabbit."

  "I need to get up to the locomotive and figure out how close we are to the mountains. Leo, will you give me a lift to the locomotive, please?"

  "I might accidentally trip and drop you off a cliff," she said.

  "Or I might do something monumentally stupid, like run off and get myself killed. Oh, wait. That's your job."

  The cold and darkness hit him for a split second, and then the two of them were alone in the locomotive.

  Victor shuddered at what he knew was coming. He hadn't never really seen Leo mad. She seemed slow to anger, but once it was in high gear, there was hell to pay.

  "Victor, if you continue to treat me this way, I will leave. I haven't stuck by you all this time to be treated as a subject, someone for you to issue orders too. I've stuck by you because I believe in you. I've stayed here because I believe in what we're doing,” she said, pausing. "Or, what we were doing, before this became 'Victor's ego trip' or 'Victor's Vengeance' or whatever the fuck we're doing lately. I recognize that what we did on this trip was a good thing. But those men that tried to ambush us? The zombie ambush? You gotta start thinking clearly. This isn't just about you."

  "Ouch," he said. "I know I deserve that. I never intended to be a leader of a group of resistance fighters in the zombie apocalypse. I'm just trying to carve out a life for Max."

  "That's the problem, Vic. You're not trying to make life for Max. You walk around like you're ten feet tall and your shit doesn't stink. But the reason you can walk around like that is because you have us behind you."

  "I get it," he said. There was only so much ego bruising any man could take at once, and he was trying to keep from getting angry. "I get that I haven't been thinking about the people around me. I've never said I was cut out to be a leader like this. I was a middle manager in a minor software firm. What I don't need is for everyone to continually let me know when I screwed something up, especially when I'm well aware. Hell, even my dead wife sucked me into some limbo to yell at me. So if you have something to say that isn't designed to make me feel like shit for doing the best I know how to do, please share it with me. I'm struggling here, and I could use the help."

  Chapter 16

  Refocused

  Leo and Victor rode in the locomotive in relative silence, neither of them really knowing what to say. Victor rode the throttle and brakes of the train as if it was his job, happy to have the distraction of guiding the train along the rails through the switchbacks in the mountains. Most of all, he was happy that they got through the last of the switchbacks before the daylight faded.

  "Just about an hour into Charlottesville station now," he said.

  "I'm going to go up to the car and start getting everything ready to unload," Leo replied, standing on her toes to kiss his lips. "You're a big dumb oaf sometimes, Victor Tookes. But I still like you,” she said, swirling away up to the train car.

  When she was gone, he sighed and pressed the throttle forward, accelerating the train up towards fifty miles per hour. He finally had some time to think. The great part of these long trips, lots of time to think. It was also the curse of them. Victor sank into his own thoughts, planning and pondering for about thirty minutes.

  A ripping metal sound and a huge shudder in the train shook him out of his revelry. They hadn't hit anything; it felt like something hit the train. He pulled the accelerator back, slowing the train, and applied three clicks of brake before running out of the cab of the engine.

  “Daddy, she's strong. I can't hide from her,” Victor got from Max as he rounded the corner.

  He climbed the ladder in one bound and made the leap from the engine to the shipping container before he thought about everything that his friends had just told him. In an instant, he had an entire internal dialogue, second-guessing himself. Standing on the train car, he expanded his aura out of his feet to encompass the entire car.

  Victor could feel the power of the woman standing in front of him. She was on the tall side, about five-foot-seven with shoulder-length sandy brown hair. She was by all accounts quite beautiful, and she smelled like power. It practically poured out of her.

  "You must be Laura," he said.

  "Hello, Victor. You are correct - I am Laura Watson. You can lower that fe'nial you have surrounding the car. You don't have enough E’Clei to even inconvenience me."

  "I may not, but what I do have is amazing friends," he said as everyone in the car below except Maya and Holly appeared on top of the container in a big swirl.

  "Oh good. You're all here," Laura said, clapping her hands together.

  Kris and Renee stepped back with a hand on Max as Marshall, John, and Leo stepped forward. Vic walked slowly up towards Laura and was within arm’s length of her when he spoke next.

  "Laura, all I want is for you and your kind to leave my area, so I can raise my son. I've told every one of your lieutenants this same thing. I want the east coast of the former United States, from Pennsylvania do
wn to Florida, every state that touches the ocean. Remove all your zombies from those few states, and you can have the rest of the world."

  "You're in no real position to bargain. Your little crew here has been an annoyance, but you're like gnats to me. I could kill any one of you with a thought," she said, looking at Marshall.

  Marshall's feet lifted up off the top of the car. His hands went to his throat, and horrible gasps came out of his lips. His feet kicked in the air, and he slowly turned blue.

  Vic knew that he needed to distract Laura. He didn't particularly think about what he was doing. He closed the distance between himself and Laura and kissed her firmly on the lips. As he did so, he drove his aura into her. He invaded her as they kissed, probing her mind, looking for anything useful.

  In the course of an instant, he saw information streams flowing into her from thousands of sources. He focused on the first one; his brain was flooded with sensory information from some zombie in Aspen, Colorado. He was standing in a frigid beautifully-appointed lobby of the Aspen Mountain Lodge, looking out over a large group of super zombies. The freezing cold of the room registered but was unnoticed by the undead. The place was completely demolished. To the right, a huge beautiful deep brown leather couch was turned over, all four cushions slashed in one long cut. A samurai sword lying on a hand woven wool rug with its blade broken was the likely cause of the damage.

  At the center of the room was a giant fireplace, a large chunk removed from one corner. The missing stones were laying several feet away on the heart of pine floor, coated in blood. A severed arm, cut cleanly off just below the shoulder, sat on the andirons as if it were a log on the fire. The acrid smell of wood smoke permeated the surfaces all over the room, barely noticeable over the stench of blood and bile.

  On the far left side of the room was a pile of bodies and body parts. The carnage was stacked up like cordwood against the wall. Arms, feet, and heads stuck out of the stack, covered in blood. Vic counted twenty-two heads in the stack, but there was no way to know if that was a complete count of those who had lost their lives here.

  Nearer to him on the left was a huge cache of weaponry, rivaling the armory back at the house. Black assault rifles stood barrels up in the old snow ski rack. At the end of the rack was a wooden bench, worn from tens of thousands of skiers sitting on it to buckle or unbuckle their ski boots. He felt a moment of sadness; it was unlikely anyone would ever remove ski boots there again. The bench had been converted into an ammunition storage shelf. Countless boxes of bullets were stacked up on the bench, well past the height of the zombie that was broadcasting the stream. The ammunition was almost all 5.56 NATO rounds, indicating that this had probably been a National Guard unit.

  Tookes followed the stream backwards, towards the source, a thin light blue line travelling upwards to Colorado. In seconds, a small part of him arrived at the lodge. He focused his aura like a laser, driving it into the brain of the zombie. That data stream went black as he burned that lieutenant's brain out. One thousand-eight hundred miles away, a super zombie crumpled to the floor.

  Victor pulled back within her mind, once more seeing all the streams. There were way too many; he didn't have enough time to sever them individually. Victor decided to go for the receiver, the part of her brain that processed all of this information.

  He latched on to another stream, and in a flash, he was running through the streets of a modern-looking Old West town. The zombie was running very fast past a brick facade of a bank. The window proclaimed, "First Boise Bank, Highest Interest Rates In Town!" It was bitter cold. There was snow on the road, covering the few cars that had been parked on the street half a year ago.

  He heard a shot ring out through its ears. The zombie registered pain, then jerked and stumbled, tumbling into the snow. It got to its hands and knees as four more bullets impacted it, shredding its lower abdomen, knocking it flat again. Pain was muted; it seemed more like a damage report than what humans interpreted as pain. The sound of horses galloping behind spurred the zombie to its feet, and it was running again.

  Something flashed in front of its eyes, and then it was yanked off its feet onto its back by a lasso. The sky was crystal clear. The horses thundered up, six of them, surrounding the zombie. The men on horseback were all wearing authentic cowboy gear, long oilcloth duster coats, chaps, and ten-gallon hats. Each man pointed a revolver at the zombie and cocked the hammers back.

  Tookes knew this data stream was about to end. He sharpened his aura like a spear, pointing it down stream this time. He made the tip as sharp as possible while fattening the shaft. He imagined it as a flat, broad tip, barbed backwards, and drove it with all of his mental strength into the point at which all the streams converged right as the six men staring down at the zombie pulled their triggers.

  He pulled back, and all the data streams had stopped. He started driving his mental spear into her brain wildly, hoping to hit something vital. Victor had succeeded in stopping her communication, though he had no idea for how long, but it was a success. Maybe he could do some more damage while he was in there. He stabbed randomly, with no direction or idea of what he was doing.

  After a dozen thrusts, Marshall hit the ground. He gasped and drew a huge breath, panting on his hands and knees. At the same time, a mental sledgehammer hit Vic’s brain. Laura shoved his energy out of her head as his mind reeled from the blow. She exhaled into his mouth, holding his head firmly in her hands. His head felt like it was crawling, and his brain itched, then hurt. Then it was excruciating.

  "Laura!" said Max calmly. "Stop." He ran forward and put his tiny hand on her leg. She let go of Victor and screamed as smoke rolled up her leg, a spreading char mark on her leg shaped like his perfect hand. Victor fell to the top of the cargo container, breathing hard, feeling like daggers were poking the back of his eyes.

  She shoved Max; he went flying off the edge of the train. All in the same instant, Victor mustered all of his strength to crawl to the edge of the car to check Max. Marshall was on Laura, holding her head. his giant hands covering her ears. Vic watched Marshall's muscles ripple as he attempted to press his palms together. John fired all six bullets from his revolver, and Leo teleported over the edge of the car in an attempt to catch Max.

  Victor felt like he was on fire. His skin was so hot he felt the metal of the car warming instantly under his touch. He reached the edge of the train car to see Max floating in thin air, his arms crossed over his chest. He rose up over the lip of the train car as he extended his hand and pointed his finger at Laura. Victor rolled over to look at her and saw John's six bullets frozen, stopped directly in front of her face in a perfect line like school busses waiting for school to get out. Marshall was grimacing with the effort to squish her head, and Leo was swinging her kukris at Laura's head. Sparks were flying off the edges of the blades as she swung them.

  "Laura, you are a bad guy," Max said, shaking his finger. A blue line shot out of his index finger, piercing Laura's chest. The bullets moved, ever so slowly.

  "Bad! Bad! Bad!" Max said, each time piercing her chest. Blood spots appeared on her pale blue blouse where each had passed through.

  Victor felt a cool hand on his shoulder and the feeling of energy flowing into him, cooling him, putting out the fire that was burning in his head. Candi was floating above him, looking into his eyes. "See? You can't do everything by yourself. It’s going to take all of you. Even your sister," she said, pointing at Renee.

  Renee launched herself at Laura, a large chef's knife leading the way. She aimed for Laura's face. In an attempt to add one more thing to what Laura had to control, Victor pulled himself to his knees, coiled his legs like a spring, and jumped at her.

  He formed his aura into a literal spear in his hand, a glowing blue shaft tipped in a wickedly-spiked razor-sharp tip. Time slowed as he neared Laura. He flew through the air slowly, sailing the length of the car. Renee's kitchen knife slid through her target's cheek in slow motion, flaying her mouth open, splitting her chee
k from the corner of her mouth all the way to the back of her jaw. The force of her thrust drove Renee's hand into Laura's teeth, piercing the skin of her knuckles. Blood from the wound and from Renee's hand mixed. Renee landed on the roof, writhing in convulsions, screaming, and pressed her hands to her head.

  Just as his spear tip hit the top of her head, time sped up a little more, or slow motion wasn't as slow. The lead bullet was almost touching her forehead when she disappeared in a swirl of black smoke.

  “Next time, Victor Tookes. Next time, you won't be so lucky.”

  Chapter 17

  Back To the Train Yard

  With Laura no longer there to stop Victor's flight, he crashed heavily into Marshall as his hands clapped together. The noise of the clap was thunderous, and then the brothers crashed into the top of the train. Leo stopped swinging, but the last of her slashes caught Victor's arm as he flew past.

  He lay on top of Marshall, watching the wound from Leo's kukri on his arm close up like a zipper. He'd never healed that quickly before.

  "You could get up any time, Vic," said Marshall.

  He rolled off his brother and crawled two feet to Renee's head. He laid his hand on her forehead. She was burning up.

  "We have to get her cooled off. Do we have any aspirin or something in the med kit?"

  Leo disappeared and reappeared in the same black swirl, almost instantly. She was holding a red backpack like the kids used to carry to school. They'd turned the old pack into their first aid kit and loaded it up with whatever supplies could be spared whenever they went anywhere. She knelt down on top of the cargo container and started tossing out rolls of gauze and tape, packs of bandages, holding up a bottle of cough syrup.

  "This says it reduces fever, Vic,” she said.