The Zombies: Volumes One to Six Box Set

by Macaulay C. Hunter

  He stumped along to the driveway. A long tollbooth arm extended over it, and within a little box of a room were two soldiers. One came out and pointed a semi-automatic at them. Zaley put up her hands, and Corbin did the same although with the bow.

  “What do you want?” the soldier called angrily.

  “Please, we heard that we could get Zyllevir here,” Corbin said.

  “Place all of your weapons on the ground! Backpacks, too.”

  They unloaded the bow and quiver, the knives and backpacks and Zaley’s stick. The soldier made them step away from their belongings and kept the gun trained on them as the other one put on gloves and inspected everything. Then he patted them down, starting with Corbin, who said, “Be careful. I might be bleeding on my leg. I got caught in a trap.” The man told him to drop his pants. Corbin fumbled with the button and tugged them down. He stood in the puddle as the man walked around him. It was a little embarrassing, but thankfully he hadn’t been told to take off his underwear, too.

  “Pull them back on,” the man said, and Corbin did. “You bleeding anywhere, lady?”

  “No, sir,” Zaley said. He allowed her to leave her pants on and just patted her down. A third soldier dipped under the tollbooth arm and strode out to the end of the fence, where he checked the road in both directions. There was a stamp on his neck. Corbin relaxed. The two soldiers without stamps weren’t worried about being in the infected one’s presence.

  “Clean,” the soldier doing the patdowns said when he stepped away from Zaley.

  “Put their things in the box and I’ll take them in,” said the one with the semi-automatic. He jerked his gun to motion that they should follow him. Corbin dipped under the arm and entered the base.

  There were several two-story buildings separated by strips of dead grass, all of them spread out over a wide distance. It didn’t seem very much like a base, in which Corbin had expected to see a lot of men and women doing jumping jacks or moving equipment. Everything was quiet. To one side, another tall, opaque fence shielded everything but the second stories of the buildings behind it. The man wasn’t leading them that way. Corbin wanted to ask where they were going, but was too intimidated to inquire. They’d get there soon enough, and then the question would be answered.

  Another soldier was coming down the path. Their guide stiffened and saluted. The other one was of a higher rank then, although he wasn’t dressed in any way that signified it. Then they were walking again.

  They came to a building like all the others, and stepped inside a foyer. A long red line was painted on the walls. It was a place for Sombra Cs. The soldier passed them off to a stamped nurse with an 11% infection, and he guided them to a room holding six empty beds. Then he told them to sit and wait while he checked on another patient. Closing the door behind him, brisk footsteps went down the hallway. The red stripe had continued all the way into the room, where it only broke for the window.

  “We made it,” Zaley said. “We actually made it.”

  Corbin wouldn’t feel too reassured until he had Zyllevir. He also missed his bow, which had nearly grown into an extra appendage. Taking a bed, he rested his leg as Zaley looked out the window to the grounds.

  Footsteps rang out and the door flew open. Framed in the doorway was Austin, who let out a yell and ran into the room. “Oh my God! It’s really you!” He was dressed in fatigues with an apron over it. Shocked, Corbin leaped off the bed. Then all three of them were yelling and hugging, their voices spilling over each other and the world feeling friendlier to Corbin all the time.

  Readjusting his clothes, Austin displayed his torso and said, “Look, Zaley! We’re bullet buddies!” A bandage was taped to his abdomen. “All three of us can do PT together now.”

  “Are Micah and Mars here?” Corbin asked.

  His high spirits dampening, Austin said, “No. I was hoping they would be with you.”

  “No. We haven’t seen them since that night on the mountain,” Corbin said.

  “I got here a long time ago and have just been praying . . . I asked all the dudes at the gate to watch out for you guys. The base is short on staff for the Sombra C chow hall, so that’s where I’ve been working. They said I could stay and do that until everyone leaves, and that lets the doctor keep an eye on the bullet wound. But it’s healing.” He pulled out Mars’ favorite Pocket Animal and squeezed it. “They’ll show. You two showed. So they’ll show.”

  The nurse returned to treat Corbin’s leg. Zaley and Austin sat on either side of the bed to watch. Hissing when the nurse slid tweezers into one puncture to pull out a piece of debris, Corbin said, “I didn’t think they’d allow you to just work around here, Austin. Aren’t they worried that you’ll hear secret maneuvers or something?”

  “In the Sombra C chow hall? No,” Austin said. “There are plenty of areas I can’t go though. I’d get stopped if I tried. I mostly stay in the chow hall. There are fifty, sixty soldiers here with Sombra C and they’re not allowed to eat in the general one.”

  “Don’t they all eat . . . you know, MREs or something?” What Corbin knew about the military came from war movies.

  “No. The Army has a contractor for food services, but the company is struggling to meet all of the need. You never know what will make it through. A shipment of MREs was supposed to get dropped off, but the truck vanished on the way and so did the guys driving it. Those MREs were supposed to go out with soldiers in the field.”

  Corbin grimaced and gripped the sheet as the tweezers sank in again. Zaley flinched beside him. “Do you have antibiotics here that you can give him?” she asked the nurse, who nodded and pulled out a piece of fabric from the puncture.

  “And a Sombra C test,” Corbin said in a winded voice. “She needs a Sombra C test. A feral grazed her with his teeth a few weeks ago. She’s been taking Zyllevir just in case.”

  “Smart,” the nurse said.

  “No. No Sombra C, Zaley,” Austin said in horror.

  The hole in the back of his leg had a lot more wedged inside it than the two on the front. It hurt so much that the nurse stopped to inject him with a local anesthetic. Then Corbin lay there placidly, feeling pressure but not pain. “Where is the base moving off to?” he asked.

  “No one will tell me,” Austin said with a furtive look that said he knew the answer but couldn’t say it in front of the nurse. “They could be going anywhere. Southern California is such a mess. Or they could be going after Prime somewhere else. Pitch ordered tens of thousands of troops overseas. Everyone is battling over oil. There’s still fighting going on over at the harbor in Sonoma, but not like there used to be. A truck took some Sombra Cs there a week ago and only came under a little fire. It was the last trip before the Army moves on.”

  “The harbor? Austin, you should have gone with them!” Corbin exclaimed.

  “But you guys were coming here, if you were still alive,” Austin said. “I couldn’t go.”

  He had given up a ride to the harbor. That was insane! Corbin wanted to shout at him for being an idiot, and hug him for being a good friend. The nurse got the last of the debris from the wound and Zaley said, “Does he need stitches?”

  “No. But I’m going to cover these up,” the nurse said. “A week of antibiotics should do it, twice a day and don’t stop taking them no matter how fine you feel.”

  “I know,” Corbin said.

  Zaley didn’t get her Sombra C test because an emergency arose elsewhere in the hospital and the nurse was called away. Austin led them to a room at the far end of the hallway where civilian Sombra Cs had been kept on the base until they could be moved to the harbor. The room was lined on both sides with beds, each of which had a curtain that could be drawn around it for privacy. Most were drawn back.

  Austin had the bed by the window. The picture of Micah and Mars was on his bedside table. They looked so happy. Picking it up, Zaley said, “It’s Micah. She’ll come. She comes through everything and anything.”

  “It took you guys a long time to
get here,” Austin said. “And you didn’t have to do it with a baby. That has to be slowing her down.”

  Or she was dead, Corbin thought. He kept it to himself. Austin was so firm in his hopefulness, and Zaley was smiling at the picture. Corbin also kept back the natural question of how long they wanted to wait for her. When the soldiers left Arquin next week, it would stop being a safe place. In fact, it would become a very dangerous one. Sombra Cs could still show up here for drugs and the only pills around would be what had been given to Corbin and Austin, and possibly Zaley. This was only a very temporary respite. Then they had to go to the harbor.

  Austin had given up a trip to the harbor for them, and already Corbin was planning how soon they could declare Micah dead and split. He was an asshole. He was also in some pain. The anesthetic was wearing off. Selecting a bed, he stretched out and asked, “Where are they really going, Austin?”

  “North,” Austin said from the window. “Oliver said north to Washington. He wouldn’t tell me where exactly. They want to bust up these militias before they really get entrenched, stop the supply lines that slip through Canada and give them weapons. I’ll get you guys some other clothes. There are bags of things in a linen closet.”

  “Who’s Oliver?” Zaley asked, looking out the window with him.

  “A guy.”

  “Well, we didn’t think Oliver was a girl’s name,” Corbin said in light teasing. Oliver had to be a guy that Austin liked.

  “How old is he?” Zaley asked.

  “Nineteen, almost twenty. He’s from San Diego,” Austin said. “When everything started going down, his parents and younger sister fled for Canada. He doesn’t know if they made it.”

  “And?” Corbin prompted.

  “It’s not like how you’re thinking. He’s just a friend, and barely that. I almost never see him. He has Sombra C, too.”

  “Okay,” Corbin said, dropping the teasing tone. “Was he infected when he joined up?”

  “No. They don’t take Sombra Cs. If you get it while you’re serving, they’ll keep you, but they won’t take you that way. He signed up right after Sombra C dropped on the world and got infected at the end of basic training. A guy had it and no one knew. Light wasn’t bothering him too much, his muscles hadn’t gotten stiff yet, and he didn’t talk a lot anyway so no one thought any differently when he got real quiet. Then he just went feral one day at formation. The drill sergeant died in taking the guy down. Oliver and some others got bitten trying to help. He doesn’t like to talk about it. That’s okay. I don’t like to talk about the party.”

  Corbin didn’t even like to think about the party, that feral pulling the younger student away, biting into Corbin . . . the screaming and shooting . . . Footsteps went down the hallway at a run and didn’t stop at the door to the room they were in. Austin said, “Private Oliver Dillinger. That’s the lowest rank. Officers get better pay than enlisted, but most of them have a bachelor’s degree. He doesn’t want to be an officer. They just push paper around.”

  “And what does he do?” Zaley asked.

  “Takes orders. Loads and loads of orders. Shooting at Shepherds, at militias, shaggies, confiscating their guns and ammo. It’s a snake with a hundred heads. Cut off one and it’s no good. There are still ninety-nine more. So they’re going to cut it off at the neck. Jesus, did you hear about Prime?”

  “They lost some of their cabinet,” Corbin said.

  “Yeah. Their fake president is on the run, too. The back of Prime has been broken. The Army is seizing control of the ports, a lot of the roads, the companies that make Zyllevir and other drugs. It isn’t over yet, and it won’t be over for some time. But Prime can’t keep this up anymore. That’s what the guys talk about at meals. Prime isn’t going to win this in the long run. The question is how much of the country will be left when they’re gone.”

  If Prime went up in smoke and people stopped supporting Shepherds, Corbin might be able to return to Cloudy Valley one day. But he couldn’t pick up the threads of his old life there. Those were gone. Even if returning was possible in a year or two or five, he’d be too old to finish up his senior year of high school, and he’d live in constant mistrust of his neighbors. It had been his own community to throw him out. No, he wasn’t going back there. Cloudy Valley would have too many missing faces and bad memories. All he wanted of his hometown was his parents. It had been so long since he’d seen them.

  “They don’t get paid,” Austin was saying to Zaley as he fought to untie the knot of his apron behind his back. She rotated her finger and he turned around to let her do it. “Even if they did, there’s nothing to spend it on. They’re told the money will come later. The guys bitch about it but they trust that it will happen. One just stays for the food. We might feed them weird shit, whatever gets here, but they’re fed.”

  “I thought they’d just leave if they weren’t paid,” Zaley said.

  “There have been some AWOLs. No one’s going to chase them down, but they’re going to be real sorry if someone from the base comes across them. Most are probably just going home to their families, but they broke a commitment to the country.” Austin looked personally offended at that. “Don’t tell anyone what I am. I don’t know that most people care, but some really will.” Corbin didn’t know how Austin being gay would come up in conversation, but he made a mental note to keep it hidden.

  The nurse knocked and came in with a Sombra C test, which he set up on a rolling table. Corbin’s heart sank into his groin. Zaley’s expression was inscrutable as the nurse prepared everything. Corbin got off the bed and stepped behind her, where he pulled her against him and wrapped his arms over her stomach. His leg yowled and he thought shut up to it.

  “Is this going to determine only if I’m infected, or what percent I am?” Zaley asked.

  “Both,” the nurse said.

  When he beckoned to her, all three of them went together. “Please be negative,” Austin whispered. There were tears in his eyes. Corbin’s eyes were no different. If he had only been faster to chase her down upon the mountain . . . if he’d fought the feral harder . . . he had done everything he could, and it just hadn’t been enough.

  Zaley squeezed their hands and started to cry herself. Then she laughed a little and said, “I’ve spent weeks wanting to know, and now I don’t. I don’t want to know at all.”

  Corbin closed his eyes as the test was administered. He pressed his head to her hair, Austin’s arm around his shoulders. The medical equipment clinked and ticked as they stood in a clutch. Please, God, negative. Be negative. Don’t do this to her.

  “We have to do it again,” the nurse said.

  Corbin opened his eyes. “Why?”

  After taking the sample, the nurse said, “The results were inconclusive on the first test. It happens.”

  He performed it again with Corbin praying fervently to a spot of light on the wall. Negative, negative, negative . . . Zaley leaned into him and he tightened his arms. She was his, but she wasn’t. She belonged to fate, and he wasn’t in control of that. Please, please, be negative.

  “I’m sorry,” the nurse said quietly. “It’s positive.”

  Fuck you, God. I’ll never ask You for anything again. In a temper, Corbin said, “What’s her percent?”

  “Almost undetectable, far below one percent. It’s as low as an infection can possibly be. It won’t even show up on some of the oldest, less exacting tests.” His finger moved over a scale to show them, but the numbers were hash to Corbin’s sight.

  “I’m like you guys now,” Zaley whispered.

  “Oh Jesus, I’m sorry,” Austin said in devastation. “Zaley, I’m so sorry.”

  “We’ll supply you with plenty of Zyllevir pills, and the harbor has much more in stock if that’s where you’re going,” the nurse said. “Because we don’t have the equipment to give stamps here, you will be required to wear a red necklace while on the grounds. I’ll have one sent to you.” After packing up his things, he exited the room. Austin mu
mbled an apology that he had to get to the chow hall to prepare for the next meal. He reclaimed his apron and went out the door.

  A tear slipped off Corbin’s cheek into Zaley’s hair. As hard as he had tried, he failed. But he’d made her take the Zyllevir. Had she gone these weeks without it, the nurse wouldn’t have found such a low reading that it was nearly off the scale. Corbin had done that much right. And for now, the pills were working. Her infection was in stasis.

  “I’m sorry I wasn’t faster that night,” he whispered.

  She turned in his arms and pressed her open lips to his. He backed away automatically as his brain replayed the same old fear of the tiny risk that he was going to infect her with his Sombra C.

  A jolt of electricity ran through him. He stared at her in a new light as she waited patiently for him to grasp what she had already put together. He couldn’t infect her through his saliva or his blood, through sex. She had the virus herself. He wasn’t the dirty to her clean, and his mind couldn’t conceive of her as dirty. She was beautiful. And she hadn’t ever thought of him as dirty, even if that was how he’d felt about himself. That feeling disappeared in a snap.

  Ignoring the complaints of his leg, he picked her up. Her legs went around his waist and he walked over to the bed to set her down. Then he climbed into it to kiss her as much and as deeply as he wanted.

  Micah

  They had paid.

  She liked making them pay. When she shot the solitary hunters, she stole through the trees to where they had fallen and placed her shoe on their wounds. They writhed and screamed as she smiled and ground in her heel. It was the same smile she had once given her baby. It was full of love.

  Only at first had she shot to kill, aiming for heads and torsos. After that, she did her best to injure, going for the legs, the shoulders, aiming for one’s ass as he stopped to take a piss against a boulder. The killing would come in time, when she was ready to be merciful. When they could no longer run from her, and had no more energy to fight. Her arms were slashed from knives, her chest and face bruised from punches, but she was still walking and they were not. She carved an M into each dead body. M for Micah. M for Mars. Then she relieved them of their belongings and adopted what she needed for herself.