by A. P. Fuchs
“I don’t know . . .” He furrowed his brow. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to say.” He suddenly looked scared.
“Don’t worry, Mark. You don’t need to say anything. I’ll take care of you,” she said. The words were out before she could truly think them over. Ever since her son died, she had made an effort not to get too attached to any one person in case the worst happened. It was also one of the reasons she made a good Black Lady: no personal ties to anyone at the Hub. “Here” —she stripped the cot of her blanket and pillow— “you sleep here.” She took Mark’s bedding from him and laid it out on the cot.
“You sure?” he said.
“Positive.”
“What about—” He pointed to her outfit.
“I’m in my clothes tonight. Bathroom’s just three doors down on the left, if you need it.”
He nodded and came over to the bed. He stood beside it for a few moments before lying down. Michelle tucked the blanket around him and assured him he could wake her at any time during the night if he needed to talk.
“Thanks,” he said.
She smiled, then laid out her own bedding on the floor. She lied down on the blanket, and didn’t mind sleeping without anything on top.
“Good night,” she said.
“Night, Michelle. Thanks.”
She closed her eyes and let the stress of the day begin to ooze out of her.
Her stomach growled. A moment later, Mark’s did, too, as if in response. They had missed dinner, and breakfast wouldn’t be served until morning in the mess hall. No problem. She knew he’d had many nights without food before and this was no different than any of those. But a bit of food would probably comfort his aching heart. Hers, too.
Michelle had to hand it to the kid. Eight years old, life hardly begun, and here he was immersed in a life where death was all around. He had hardly tasted anything normal before the Rain, and barring some miracle, would likely never experience anything normal again.
The thought made her heart ache for her own son. In a way, his passing was a way out of this mess and she hoped to God—if there was one—that her boy was in a better place now.
Eyes closed, she slowed her breathing, stretched, then rolled over onto her side.
The heaviness of sleep began to take hold.
36
The Shed
Tracy stood huddled up against Joe. The only light seeping into the shed came through the cracks in between the wood and the couple rotted holes on a few of the boards. Foot space was near nothing, maybe four feet by three. The shed walls were unfinished, the wood splintering in places. Some of the boards toward the front of the structure were stained a faint gray from the day of the Rain. Tools lined the walls; a few crowbars; a saw; an old hammer with a wooden handle; some electrical cords; a weed whacker; and a few buckets of paint.
She wrinkled her nose at how stuffy it was, amplifying the sharp stench of body odor and sweat from her and Joe.
“Hear anything?” she whispered.
“No,” he whispered back. He leaned against the door and seemed to press his face against it so he could get a better look outside between its slats. His hand held onto the interior handle so it wouldn’t swing open.
Tracy leaned toward the side wall. She couldn’t press right up against it because the tools lining it were in the way, but she felt she was able to get a better sense of what was going on outside the shed. She was also mindful to keep an ear out for any sounds coming from behind them as well.
The smell of their sweat grew thicker; she was warm from not only running, but from the confines of the small space, too. She wrinkled her nose again.
This is rough, she thought. She could only hope that—
A hard thud echoed throughout the shed. It had come from behind them, like a big hand slapping against the wood.
Joe turned around, one hand still on the door handle. He had the X-09 in the other. “Cover your ears.”
She did. He aimed past her to the rear wall, but didn’t pull the trigger.
Another thud rocked the shed and sent a pulse of fear through her heart.
Joe fired. Tracy turned toward the back. A hole the size of a golf ball was in the wood around eyelevel.
A low moan came through that hole then dead gray fingers with cracked yellow fingernails came through right after. The fingers wiggled around in the hole as if the zombie beyond was trying to get a good hold on the wood and tear down the back of the shed.
Joe fired again, creating another hole in the wood. The undead’s fingers kept wiggling around in the hole.
“You won’t find the head that way,” Tracy said.
She reached for a small crowbar hanging on the wall, grabbed it with hook side up, then raised it above her head. She aimed the chisel side at the dead finger and brought the crowbar down. Iron scraped against flesh and sliced it clean off the bone. The finger kept moving. This time she put more strength behind it and brought the crowbar down, this time wedging the chiseled side into the finger, severing it.
“That won’t stop it,” Joe said.
“I know. Just letting it know we’re serious.”
“Still won’t stop it.”
The zombie withdrew its stumped finger from the hole. The shed went quiet. Tracy waited.
“I can’t believe—” Joe started, but Tracy shushed him.
She listened carefully. The zombie was moving outside at the back of the shed, perhaps rocking on its feet. It didn’t try and round to the front.
Ever so slowly, she leaned forward, clenching the crowbar. She put her eye up to the hole in the wood. The angle made it too hard to see anything. The most she saw were the shadows of the branches and trees beyond, nothing more.
A dead face moved past the eyehole and Tracy jumped back. Joe caught her.
“Easy,” he said.
She huffed and lined up the end of the crowbar against the highest of the holes. She plunged it through, hoping to strike the dead person beyond. No resistance was met. She did the same with the lower hole and hit nothing but air as well.
The shed went quiet again; no movement outside.
She heard Joe adjust his grip on the X-09.
Is it just one zombie out there? she thought. Hope so.
The inside of the shed shook as meaty palms slammed up against the front of the shed. Even Joe’s shoulders went up and down with a jolt.
He leaned against the door, appearing to peek through the crack in between a couple boards. His other hand still held the handle firm.
“Right in front of us,” he said and raised the X-09 so it was level with his chin and about four inches away.
The door shook in its hinges and the hand Joe used to hold the handle jiggled.
“Grab the door,” he said.
Tracy reached forward and put her hand around his. His fingers were thick and it was hard to fully wrap around them before allowing him enough movement beneath her hand to pull his own hand out.
“Switch on three,” she said, then counted it off.
Joe slipped his hand out from under hers; her thumb and forefinger fell onto the handle, but before her other three fingers could wrap around the handle as well, the door was yanked open. A dead man with stringy blond hair stood on the other side. His body jerked forward as he lunged for Joe.
The X-09 went off.
The dead man folded backwards.
Her and Joe stood there for a moment, panting with panic.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
Joe let out a long sigh. “Be more careful next time.”
“I will.” Tracy couldn’t believe what happened. This was the first time she majorly slipped up in months. Aside from telling Andrew about the Hub, that was.
Joe stepped out of the shed, X-09 held out; she followed, crowbar in hand.
Up and down either side the gravel road was empty, but the strong stench of the dead still lingered.
Movement rose up in behind the shed; dead leaves crunched underfoot.
Tracy and Joe whirled around. Zombies stumbled out of the darkness, their heavy dead arms raised, fingers reaching. Their groans seemed to be the only sound.
Tracy and Joe backed up so they were on the road. Eight undead came out from behind the shed and the tree line on either side.
Joe fired off two shots, taking a couple zombies down. A weighty bald guy with a rose tattoo on his scalp hobbled over to Tracy. She brought the crowbar up like a baseball bat, hook end out, and drove the hook into the dead man’s skull. Black blood spurted from it and the zombie toppled to the side, his dead weight ripping the crowbar from her hands. The moment he hit the ground, she put a foot to his head and yanked the crowbar out, dragging a bit of skull with it.
A zombie grabbed her from behind, locking her arms down on either side.
Joe fired off another shot beside her, but not at the zombie that had her.
She stomped down on the zombie’s foot, pushed out with her backside, and loosened its hold on her enough so she could wriggle out beneath its arms and get a few steps away. The creature, now joined by another, came toward her, its white eyes seeming to bear more determination than before. She swung the crowbar at the one that just had her and struck it across the jaw. Its skin tore and a couple teeth flew from its mouth. She brought the crowbar back across its face, this time connecting squarely with its temple. The zombie stumbled to the side and bumped into the creature beside it. With a grunt, Tracy brought the crowbar down on the zombie’s head, embedding the crowbar’s hook into its forehead. The dead man looked at her squarely and as it fell to the ground, the zombie beside it moved past it and reached for her.
Another shot fired, then another and, like before, not at the zombie nearest her.
The undead man, who was more skeleton than man and wore a ’70s-style brown tuxedo with oversized lapels, was almost upon her. She swung out with her fist, punching the undead man in the face. His head snapped back, the neck breaking. She jumped up and let loose a sidekick into his chest, sending him flying back. He crashed against the ground and didn’t get back up.
Tracy wiped the film of sweat off her forehead then brushed her hands off on her thighs.
“You okay?” Joe asked.
“Fine,” she said.
They remained on the road back to back, Joe looking toward the way they had come and to his left. She looked the other way and to her left, this way covering all four sides. At least out here on the road they could get a clear view of things should the dead come calling again. They stayed that way for what Tracy suspected was a good twenty minutes. They didn’t speak other than the occasional encouraging statement to “Be ready” and “We’ll be okay.”
After awhile, Tracy asked, “We need to find a place to camp.”
“I know. That house is off limits.”
“Yeah.”
“Remember seeing any other structures nearby as we came up here?”
She thought for a moment. “No. Wait. Just a vegetable stand. Not really a place that’s covered up, though. I think there might have been another house, but I can’t remember how far off the highway it was.”
“We won’t find it in the dark anyway.” Joe’s body jerked. “Wait.” A second later the X-09 fired off a round.
Tracy turned around. “How many?”
“Just the one.”
She faced back down the road and resumed her watch, heart pounding. “The forest won’t work either.”
“I think we’re going to have to go back in the shed.”
“There’s next to no room in there.”
“We can shuffle things around and make some room.”
“Not to lie down.”
“No, but maybe enough so we can secure the door. One of us can keep watch through the cracks in the planks. The other can maybe sit and rest that way.”
“Fine.”
They surveyed the area once more then, both satisfied the coast was clear, went back to the shed.
Joe shuffled around the paint cans and opened up a few more inches by stacking them. To secure the door, he took one of the electrical cords, tied it around the door handle, then tied the cord to one of the nails from which a saw hung across the way.
“Not perfect, but it’ll buy us the extra seconds we need should it come to it,” he said of his handiwork.
He looked into her eyes and it was so dark in here she couldn’t see the green of his anymore.
“I’ll take the first watch,” he said.
“Thanks,” she said. “How long until you want to switch off?”
“An hour or two, would work, I think. We’ll play it by ear.”
She nodded. She didn’t know why—perhaps being far from the city and the stronghold beneath the Disraeli Bridge—but her heart picked up speed and she started to tremble.
“Tracy . . .” he said. He raised his hands slightly.
“I don’t know what . . . . Maybe it’s just being tired. Maybe it’s them. I don’t . . .” She shivered.
Joe took her in his arms. At first it was a loose embrace, but after she put her arms around his waist, he drew her close and gave her a gentle squeeze. Warmth flooded through her and for a moment there was safety.
He suddenly took his hands off her. She pulled away as well, but only because he did.
It was just a hug, Joe, she thought. Don’t freak out on me.
He stood there frozen, as if he’d just did something wrong.
“Thanks,” was all she said. Tracy sat down against the side wall, knees drawn up to her chest. She folded her arms across the tops of her knees then laid her head down on them.
Her heart still beat quickly, but not from the undead. She glanced up at Joe.
He was already facing the shed door, gun at the ready.
37
The Undead in the Woods
Zombies surrounded Billie, Nathaniel and Michael. They came out of the woods, stumbling out of the dark, heads dipped to one side, their gazes vacant. They moved slowly; many reached out as if already able to grab the three of them.
Bright flashes of light lit up the forest as Nathaniel and Michael transformed into their angelic forms. Michael moved in a whirlwind, sword aflame, cutting into the undead like a jet engine gone wild. Bodies dropped and blood and guts splashed against the dry grass and surrounding trees.
Nathaniel stayed close to home, protecting Billie, plunging his sword into any zombie that drew near. A part of Billie wanted to join in the fight, like she had many times before, yet another part was relieved at her being sheltered from the undead onslaught surrounding them.
Nathaniel cleaved off the top of the head of a skinny dead woman who tried to go for Billie’s ankles. He then stuck his sword between the eyes of a dead high school kid with curly hair and a ripped-to-shreds Superman T-shirt.
Michael fought just beyond, his sword a blur of heated steel and flame. Every zombie that came near him was cut up as if caught in a meat grinder. Billie had never seen someone move so fast, not even Nathaniel. No wonder Michael was in command.
A foul shriek rose from the trees beyond, like a thousand crows cawing at once. The smell of sulfur rose on the wind as did the sudden heat of flame, this kind of heat dry, like air in a sauna.
The shadows in between the forest trees grew darker, the charcoal black now as dark as oil. A sudden gust of black smoke burst from between the trees, surrounding Billie and the undead, blowing past them as if they weren’t there.
The angels’ light was extinguished, and all was as black as pitch. The rush of sulfuric air danced around Billie, its heat immediately drying the sweat upon her skin the moment it made contact, even through her clothes. She fell backward from the force of the wind, her body tipping to the side as the gust of air blew her across the ground until she slammed into a tree. The hard woody impact made her muscles lock and her skin sting.
She still couldn’t see.
Desperately, she wanted to call out for help, to ask the angels to come to her rescue, but the force of the wind wa
s so great that she couldn’t push out enough air from her own mouth to form the words. The thick and sharp smell of the sulfur on the air slammed into the back of her throat, filled her nostrils and made her gag. Choking, she pushed against the ground and rolled over inch by inch until she lay there with her face against the base of the tree. The wind pushed against her head and her plan to remove her face from the direct onslaught of wind fell apart. Instead, her skull was slowly being pressed into the tree trunk with such force it felt like her head would crack open front-to-back as it split against the wood.
She couldn’t move. Couldn’t think.
The wind howled and rushed past, pressing into her body.
She shook.
Then it stopped and she lay there against the foot of the tree, catching her breath. A few moments more and Billie was able to roll over . . . only to be greeted by a horde of the undead crawling toward her.
Quickly, she got to her feet, teetered a moment, then moved to run. A zombie came out from under the skeletal bush by her feet and grabbed hold of her ankle, tripping her. She clawed against the ground, everything still reeking of sulfur and decay. Dizzy from the smell, wanting to throw up, Billie kicked against the zombie at her ankles. She managed to slam her heel against its jaw, breaking it and stretching the decayed skin of the dead man’s face as the bone shifted far to the side underneath it.
