“Sorry,” I say as I still the fingers on my right hand and let them rest gently against the bit of metal that's attached to my hand with a strap. I've never shot a bow before, but it's actually kind of fun. Well, as fun as anything can be with impending doom crouching over it, just waiting to pounce.
“Okay,” Valerie says as the two ooze spitters start to tear apart a fresh wave of zombies. This group's bigger than the last, giving me some hope that maybe they'll be able to take down the two demons. If the ooze spitters actually get a chance to come at us, they could take down the whole building or at the very least, the doors. “You look good. You can shoot whenever you're ready.” I take aim and hope that when the arrow flies, that at the very least it hits something in the crowd. Most of the arrows that are actually in the ooze spitter's body are from Holly and Valerie. Dawson refuses to participate.
I press the release and the metal clip opens, releasing the string and sending the arrow into a mummy's face. Holly cheers and comes up behind me for a hug. I squeeze her back and act like that's where I was aiming all along, but Valerie knows better.
“Lucky shot,” she says as she takes the bow from me and readies her own arrow. Our goal right now is to shoot the ooze spitter in as many places as we can until we find something that kills it. We've decided as a group that we might as well give it a try. After all, if we don't figure something out, then the arrows are useless anyway. Plus, we're having fun doing it. It's a nice bonus, something to pass the time while we do exactly what Holly says and wait.
A new smell has ridden into us on the wind, one that sits on our tongues and makes us gag occasionally. It's a fresher smell, like newly butchered meat. Holly thinks it's Patricia's main horde, made up from people in the city. I think that's as good a guess as any and take her word for it. In the distance there's a sound, like the rustling of a thousand trees, a shuffling that tells us that they're coming. It's only a matter of time. What she's thrown at us thus far, that's nothing. Holly says we're in the eye of the storm and that when Patricia hits the refuge, the dead will surge around us, followed by the vultures that are feeding off of it: the demons.
I look up at the sky, at the sun that hasn't set yet, but in a few hours will, right about the time Holly thinks they'll get here. Zombies, demons, and darkness. Not a good combination.
“Are you sure you don't want to learn to shoot?” Valerie asks and I can see that she's trying to get Dawson out of his thoughts. He's so deep into them that it looks like he's drowning. He shakes his head.
“No thanks,” he tells her in the nicest voice I've ever heard him use. Valerie sighs and her and Holly take up parallel stances, loosing arrow after arrow into the rotten flesh of the two DeadBorn. Pustules burst and shower the surrounding lopers with gunk, but they don't care. None of them do. They're all too busy ripping at each other's faces and biting and screaming. They never stop, not even for a second. The sound's made all the worse by the water hags who seem jealous that they can't leave the lake, crowding together at the crest of the hill and swinging their arms around like animatronics in a haunted house.
I ignore them as I've done for the past several hours and move over to sit next to Dawson. He doesn't pay me any attention, eyes locked on Valerie's face, memorizing details with his gaze. It's a sad thing, really. He doesn't think we're going to live through the night, I can tell.
“Want to play a game?” I ask him and he drags his eyes away long enough to glare at me.
“No.” He looks angry, but underneath that expression, I see sadness.
“Are you sure? It's really easy. I make up a theme and then we take turns answering. Single sentences only, as fast as you can.” Dawson blinks at me and licks his upper lick unconsciously. It's scabbed over now and swollen, just like his eye.
“How do you determine a winner?” he asks and I have to think for a second because when Holly and I play, we don't care about stuff like that. Dawson though, Dawson does. I decide in advance that no matter what happens, I'm going to let him win. He'll feel better that way.
“Whoever stops first, loses, but the answers have to be genuine. You can't just make anything up.” Dawson nods briskly.
“Fine,” he says. “You won't see me cheating. I can win fair and square. Pick a theme then and make sure that it isn't fucking stupid. If it is then I'm not playing.”
“What I want to do after the apocalypse,” I say and Dawson opens his mouth to protest. “I want to marry Holly.” Dawson's eyes flicker with the briefest hint of a challenge.
“I want to fuck Valerie in a bed.”
“Nice,” she calls over her shoulder, but I can see she's smiling.
“I want to have four kids, preferably girls.” Holly whoops, and at first, I think it's because of something she's shot, but when she turns around and throws me a thumbs-up, I can see that she likes what she's hearing.
“I want to have two kids, preferably boys.”
“I want to order pizza and sprinkle chocolate chips on the top.”
“I want to bury my parents' bodies.”
I pause, unable to think of a thing to say. After a moment, Dawson lets out an aha and points at me.
“You lose,” he says with a grin. I smile back at him and am glad to see him break out a can of soda. He pops the top and guzzles it, the perfect victory drink. Holly comes over and kisses the top of my head.
“If we're having four children,” she tells me with all due seriousness. “Then you can birth half.”
CHAPTER 19
Legion
Sixty-Three Hours And Fifty-Eight Minutes After …
The horde has grown so large that the dead can no longer fit beneath the roof and are pressed against the backs of their fellow DeadBorn in a rotting, weeping mass that claws and shrieks and begs for us as they spill into the parking lot and the fields that surround the rest of the building. We haven't heard any windows break yet which is good, but Holly tells us that it's just a matter of time. Patricia isn't controlling these lopers directly. If she were, she could instruct them to punch out the windows and rip the boards down. Without her, they're kind of mindless.
We sit together in a row and hold hands while we watch the sunset. Even with the dark wave of zombies we can spot in the distance, it's beautiful. The sun looks like it's melting into the hills, settling into a blanket of pink and orange and sleeping while the round spot of the moon keeps a quiet vigil. Holly tells me that it's the prettiest sunset she's ever seen.
When the parking lot lights flicker on, we all startle like we've been slapped, waking from our dreamy illusion and coming face to face with the horrid reality. The ooze spitters are still there, still pacing around the building. They're mangled and bloody and one of them is even missing an arm, but they aren't dead, not yet. We don't bother to shoot them, trying to save the last of our bullets for emergencies. And we're now out of arrows, too. We have the two baseball bats and Valerie's nightstick and a whole bunch of axes, but those won't do us any good unless we're fighting up close. If it comes to that then we're dead anyway. Nobody says any of this aloud which is good because we all know it. There's no sense in repeating it.
“Should we sleep?” Valerie asks as she looks longingly at the pile of pillows behind us. I feel tired behind my eyes, too, but I know I could never sleep with my nerves strung so tight and the din of the undead loud enough to wake demons.
“No,” Holly tells her sadly, and I can see that Valerie and I aren't the only ones who are dreaming of feather pillows and handmade quilts, mattresses and that sense of security that comes when you're in your own room, in your own bed and you feel like there's nothing in the world that can hurt you. I know that's all a lie, of course. Most of the lopers that we see who are newly dead are wearing pajamas. They were in that safe place, thinking nothing could happen when the worst did. I wonder if I'll ever feel secure again. “This will all be over by dawn. If we just wait – ”
“Then we can sleep when we're dead?” Valerie asks and I think she's tr
ying to make a joke, but it doesn't go over well. Dawson slams his fists down next to him and screams again.
“Why can't I just put a friggin' bullet in my head and end it now? Why all this waiting? Why all of this fear? I'm telling you that I'd much rather use our last rounds to finish myself cleanly rather than try to fight off something that will never go away until I get ripped apart. Don't you think? Don't you?”
“Don't give up so easily,” Holly tells him as she searches the sky and squints her eyes at a speck in the distance. It could just be one of those Canada Geese that are featured in half the framed portraits in this place. But it probably isn't. Not unless it's the biggest fucking goose there ever was. “A slim chance is better than no chance at all. What did I already tell you, Dawson? You're not killing yourself.” Holly stands up and keeps her eyes on the sky. Valerie follows her gaze and frowns.
“Is that one of those angel things you were tellin' me about?” she asks and Dawson's head snaps up.
“Oh fuck,” he whispers as he stands up and moves back towards the window. “Should we go inside?”
“No,” Holly says as she watches it swoop closer. It's soaring with massive, gray wings like two dirty sheets that flap in the wind as it circles down towards us. “There's just one.”
“Just?” Dawson scoffs as he presses his back to the wall and slides down. “Speak for yourself.”
A raucous screech cuts across the air like a siren as the DeadBorn goes into a dive and comes hurtling down at us like a rocket. I think it's going for Holly which puts a flutter in my chest and dries my mouth out so that I can't even swallow. There's no saliva in there now, just fear.
“Be careful,” I whisper as the face of the creature becomes clearer, revealing two dark eyes that might as well be stone for all the emotion that's in them. Its nose is pointed and thin, just like its long, boney arms and legs. The DeadBorn's naked, but it doesn't have any discernible gender, just a gray sinewy body that looks more like a piece of beef jerky than it does a person.
Holly waits until it's close, too close in my opinion, and then fires one round out of the shotgun. The creature's head explodes and she's forced to dive to the side as the body comes crashing down onto the roof. It smashes through and slumps onto the heads of the shouting, leaping lopers beneath. Before I even get the chance to see if the rotten angel is dead, they've already started to tear it apart and push the rotten bits of flesh into their gaping mouths. I turn to the side, horrified at the new wave of stench that manages to penetrate my nearly dead nostrils. Dawson vomits and I don't blame him, but Valerie remains stoic.
“Holy fuck, Holly,” she says. “Are you friggin' crazy?” Holly looks down into the writhing mass and wrinkles her nose.
“Maybe a little,” she admits as she tries to smile. “But it does come in handy sometimes.” I sidestep the hole in the roof and come around the opposite side so that I'm as close to Holly as I can get.
“Yeah, well, what the fuck are you going to do when a whole flock of those fucking things comes down on us?” Holly shrugs and grabs me by the hand, pulling me up the incline of the roof so that we can sit next to Dawson with out backs to the wall and our eyes on the sky.
“When are we going inside?” I ask Holly, knowing that she's got a plan for this, too. We've left a pile of wood by the window so that when we finally do, we can board it up.
“When she gets here,” Holly whispers, eyes scanning the horizon. It's getting too dark to really make out what's going on, but the sounds of crying and jostling are getting louder. It's happening and there's nothing I can do about it. I've accepted that and now feel a strange sense of peace; Dawson, on the other hand, hasn't. He doesn't like it when he's not in complete control over a situation. I think that's what's bothering him so much now. “The more of these things we take out now, the longer we'll last. Once we go inside, that's it. We're pretty much helpless. If we go in too soon, we could die.” I nod my head and watch as Valerie circles the roof, examining the sky as best she can in the waning light.
When she comes back around, she shakes her head. We all sigh with temporary relief.
“If a flock of those fucked up angels from hell come, then I'm out of here, no matter what you say,” Dawson mumbles as he fingers an empty gun. I reach down, grab a baseball bat and hand it to him. He stares at it for awhile before he tosses the gun aside and takes it.
“Deal,” Holly says and then pauses. There's a new sound now, one that the wind has just picked up and carried to us. It's a chorus of voices, chanting. My first thought is that somehow there's a group of survivors out there. After all, I've never heard any of these creatures talk. And just before I realize how ridiculous that idea is, I make out the words in the chant. Holly gasps and nearly drops her shotgun. She's heard it, too.
“What are they saying?” Valerie asks as she tilts her head to the side and frowns. Holly doesn't answer, so I'm forced to do it for her. I clear my throat and both Valerie and Dawson glance over at me.
“They're saying 'Holly.'”
***
Sixty-Four Hours And Forty-Nine Minutes After …
There's a parade of unborn children marching towards us.
The words Holly, Olly, Olly are drifting through the air along with an ominous blanket of fog, pulled in by the humid heat of the day. I even think, though I'm not positive, that it's going to rain.
“How perfect,” Dawson says, face as white as the zombie that's hanging from the edge of the roof, legs swinging back and forth, jostled by the crowd that she's used to get up here in the first place. “A storm's a comin'. Fuck me.” Holly sighs and stands up, taking the shotgun with her. She pauses in front of the DeadBorn and looks down into white-blue eyes and a face that used to be pretty.
“Sorry,” she tells it and then she bashes it in the forehead with the butt of the gun. Its head snaps back, but it doesn't fall. Holly does it again. Still, nothing. She then pulls the knife out of her pocket and proceeds to cut off the monster's fingers. It's too much for me, so I look away.
“Holly, Olly, Olly.”
“Where's that nickname come from anyway?” Valerie asks as the dangling loper finally falls back into the seething crowd. Holly stands up, wipes the blood on her black sweatpants and thinks for a moment.
“I don't know,” she replies finally. “Honestly, I have no fucking clue.” Dawson looks at her for a long moment and then snaps his fingers.
“I know where it's from,” he says as he glances over at Valerie. Then he looks at me, and I know that whatever he's going to say is going to annoy me. Or make me jealous. Probably both. “Those cards you used to get on your birthdays, they always said Holly Olly. I thought it was kind of … ” Dawson looks at Valerie again and then maybe because he just doesn't give a shit and thinks we're all going to die, says it anyway. “Cute, so when we started dating, I called you that. You never really liked it anyway.”
“The sender of the cards?” I ask and Holly purses her lips.
“A secret admirer,” she says with a sigh. “I should've known. I should've put two and two together, but I never did pay much attention to them.”
“Don't be so hard on yourself,” Valerie says, not sounding the least bit jealous. That makes one of us. It's a stupid emotion and I know it, so I push it down and try to smile.
“You mean you should've known that the anonymous sender of the creepy birthday cards was your necromantic … ” I almost say birth mother, but then I realize that Holly hasn't told Valerie or Dawson that fact yet. “Stalker.” Holly laughs, but it only lasts a second. It's hard to be cheerful with the night and the fog and the horde of dead beneath us. The only good news is that there's so many of them that they've kept the ooze spitters (of which there are now three) and the two new fire faces that have shown up, away.
All around us, the sounds of the marching dead are coming closer, preceded by the row of children dressed in blood that we can see pretty clearly from the light of the parking lot. Half the group is in shadow, but
half is all we need to see. They're the ones who are chanting, calling Holly's name with broken throats and eerie voices. Some of them are walking while others are floating. There are babies, infants even, swaddled in dirty blankets, as well as school age children with backpacks still wrapped around their tiny shoulders. They've been coming for awhile, taking their time, calling her name. Black and silver light flickers around them like lightning and when they pause at the crest of the hill near the bird blind, we're all shocked to see one of them step forward from the group and speak to us.
“Holly!” it shouts over the din of screeching and the crashing of broken glass that signals disaster for us. The horde has opened a window with the sheer weight and frenzy of their numbers. It was only a matter of time, and we all know that it won't be long before more follow. Once the boards go, once there's even one entrance, they'll crowd inside until they find us, rip us apart and bring us back as one of them. “Would you come down here, please?”
Holly looks at me, and we both know that there's no way in hell she's going. The weird part though is that the unborn even asked. Holly turns back to it and steps closer to the edge of the roof. The zombie that's looking up at her now is a boy with brown curls and a pair of white and yellow pajamas with some kind of pattern on them, baby chicks maybe. He's missing both arms and an eye, but the remaining one is gazing at Holly with affection.
“I want to talk to you,” he tells her, but it's pretty obvious that while his voice is his own, the words are not. The DeadBorn are no longer capable of speech by themselves. The unborn boy is the puppet and Patricia is the ventriloquist.
“Call them off,” Holly tells the boy. “And I'll consider it.” The kid is already shaking his head, bloody brunette curls flying, spattering the sides of his pale face with red.
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