They had just passed him when one of them stopped mid-stride and began sniffing the air, its body stiff as it leaned back hungrily. When it began to moan and snarl, the other two paused and sluggishly turned to their counterpart, eyes widening, lips pulling back in anticipation.
Houston pressed himself between the wall and the plant, not daring to breathe.
All of them turned in his direction. He shuddered when he saw their hideous visages, ravaged with shredded strips of flesh and weeping sores. The one with the broken leg was missing an eye, the hollow, pus-filled socket swiveling towards him eerily.
The three began to shamble to the apartment complex entrance when two cars collided down the street. The loud bang immediately caught the zombies’ attention, and preferring the definite possibility of a meal versus the need to investigate and possibly come up with nothing, they turned and trudged towards the direction of the noise.
Houston leaned back and exhaled. He wiped the sweat from his forehead and waited until the figures were out of sight. Then he rose to his feet and in a crouching run, gun ready, headed for the Trans Am.
Swiftly unlocking the door, he jumped in and grinned as the powerful engine roared to life.
Speeding down the streets and narrowly missing abandoned vehicles and the steadily increasing number of infected, Houston reached a back road that would take him around the congested highways.
When he finally came to a fork in the road that offered north and south routes, he felt painfully torn. Going north would take him to Massachusetts, to his parents. He was sure they were worried about him, and he prayed that they were somewhere safe. Their secluded cabin nestled in the mountainside was especially tempting considering the toxic city from which he had just left.
But south would take him to Green Acres, Georgia, to Haven.
He let the car idle, its engine rumbling loudly, as he contemplated everything. Taking a deep breath, he noticed the picture of Haven that sat in front of the speedometer. She was sitting atop a stunning golden palomino, leaning forward to hug the horse around the neck as she smiled from ear to ear. He stared at it for a few seconds before revving the engine and guiding the Trans Am down the southbound route.
***
Haven rolled down the window of the Cavalier. After nearly two hours of driving, the stale air in the car was making her feel nauseous. Using her knee to steer, she pulled her hair into a high ponytail.
She’d opted to take a less used route to get to Brett’s university in case the main roads were unnavigable with traffic. Rosemary had mapped out an alternate way that would keep her in the unpopulated countryside, “horse country” as Haven always liked to call it. While she had lived in the city for several years, nothing brought Haven more peace than an old country road lined with horse farms, with no speed limit signs in sight.
It brought back memories of when she was younger. Haven would gather up her brother and sister for late-night drives in the summertime, roll down the windows, and sing to the radio at the top of their lungs. She would drive to a big lake an hour away, and they’d eat Taco Bell and play in the water and sand until the wee hours. It had been moments like these that had bonded the siblings after their parents’ deaths, reinforcing their support of each other and giving them glimpses of joy as they coped with their loss. Even after their grandmother had so generously taken all three of them in, Haven vowed that she would try to make their upbringing as normal as possible.
Orange, yellow, and red leaves flew by in a blur as she sped down the road, and Haven breathed deeply of the crisp autumn air. She was relieved that she had yet to see any of the zombies she’d seen on television. Not one. But she would have rather faced a dozen of them instead of the men who had tried to rape her today.
Haven clenched her teeth as she tried to erase the disgusting feel of the pervert’s tongue on her body, squeezing the steering wheel tightly until her knuckles turned white. She felt rage rise within her and was glad that no one could see her dark expression from behind her gold-rimmed Aviator sunglasses. While she had been shell-shocked and vulnerable earlier, those emotions had mutated into something much more ominous.
It was her weakness, her undoing. She had kept her anger from her childhood in check over the years, but it was still there, simmering just below the surface. She already knew the trigger. All it would take was an act of violence against someone she loved. Then that pent-up anger would become something destructive and unstoppable.
A large red farmhouse appeared at her left, its presence interrupting her thoughts. She was getting close.
Mere minutes later, she reached the small town, a population that couldn’t have boasted more than a couple thousand inhabitants. Quaint, family-owned businesses were set up in buildings that had been built in the early 1900s. Its primary source of revenue and attraction derived from Monte Verde University and the students that remained there nine months out of the year.
“Sweet baby Jesus,” Haven suddenly murmured.
It would have been a serene country town reminiscent of something depicted in a Norman Rockwell painting had everything not been so desolate and abandoned.
Haven stopped at an intersection. The two-lane road before her was empty save for a few cars parked along the street. Several shop windows were broken. The doors of a country store had been torn off. Wind blew along the streets scattering trash while stray dogs sifted through the remnants in search of a tasty treat. Clothes hung days before remained on the clothesline, the bright sun beginning to bleach them little by little. Haven winced when she saw blood-stained sheets blowing forebodingly in the wind.
Where is everybody? she thought as she shifted slightly to avoid running over an old brown suitcase in the middle of the road, its contents strewn about haphazardly.
She rolled up her window and kept the car cruising at a slower speed through the ghost town, scouring the area in search of life.
Something was off.
All of a sudden, Haven stiffened just as a man slammed into the driver’s side window and disappeared, a bloody hand print the only evidence that he’d been there. She yanked the wheel to the right, and the car swerved violently, narrowly avoiding a row of trees outside an ice cream parlor.
The action caused the vehicle to take on an unintended trajectory. She screamed as the Cavalier collided with an electric pole head-on.
The airbag hit her face instantly. She sat slumped against it in a daze, stunned and unmoving for a few moments. The metallic taste of blood filling her mouth accompanied by a sharp pain gradually brought her back to reality. With shaky fingers, she reached up to examine the source of the bleeding. When she gingerly pulled her hand back, blood coated her fingers. She had bitten her tongue when the airbag hit her face. Haven felt weak and dizzy, her ears ringing and her head spinning.
Without warning, she leaned over and vomited onto the passenger seat. She groaned and wiped her hand across her mouth. Lifting her head, she groggily looked at the front of her car. The hood was folded and scrunched against the pole.
How could she have lost control of the car so quickly? Despair engulfed her. She shifted her gaze beyond the hood, and her breath suddenly caught in her throat.
Ahead, hundreds of the undead moved purposely towards her, their putrid stench wafting up through the air vents in the car.
Haven immediately realized that some kind of diversion would be needed, but she didn’t have time to consider all of her options. The zombies were close.
She looked to the rear of the vehicle. Nothing dangerous prowled about. Grabbing the car keys, her gun, and an extra magazine, she pushed the button below the steering wheel to open the trunk, glancing behind her as it slowly opened. The people who had sold her the Cavalier had told her that the back seat was not strapped down and could easily be secured by taking it in to the dealership. Haven had never bothered to do so. This minor flaw gave her an escape, one that would keep her more hidden than if she exited the vehicle through one of the side doors. As steal
thily as she could manage, she crawled to the back seat and yanked on the corner of the seat cushions. She then shimmied her way through the trunk, grimacing as her head spun and the metal of the back seat scraped at her torso and hips.
Her right foot had just touched the gravel beneath her when she felt the car bump backwards ever so slightly. The smell of rot filled her nostrils, and she realized they’d reached the car.
She carefully lifted her second foot out of the trunk, and staying low to the ground, made a mad dash for the bushes behind the Cavalier. Haven crouched into the shrubbery as she watched the zombies surround the vehicle. Those who had yet to notice the migration of their comrades and lingered at the gates of the school pummeled mottled, bloody fists against the metal barrier.
Tears stung her eyes as she stared at her car and realized this was good-bye. With the Cavalier, it had been love at first sight. At the ripe-old age of twenty-one, it was her first car, and she had proudly procured it with her own money. That meant something to her. Most everyone had laughed at her when she told them how excited she was about her purchase. Her brother would poke fun at her and present fantastical scenarios where if she had the option, would she trade the Cavalier in for a sparkling new Ferrari? She had always answered in the negative. They couldn’t understand her infatuation with such a plain little car, but she didn’t care what they thought. She loved it.
Holding the keys so tightly in her palm that she nearly broke skin, she pressed the alarm button on the small remote. The loud blaring commenced straightaway, and sure enough, numerous marred faces turned towards the source of the noise, heads cocked so that they nearly touched their shoulders. Their haunting, vacant eyes were twice as scary when the headlights illuminated their black pinprick pupils, and they stared about curiously trying to find the meal that awaited them. Mouths opened and closed in hunger revealing blackened teeth that formed an almost sinister grin. Her chest tightened, and Haven lost her breath for a moment as she sat there in total fear, their vast numbers overwhelming her. Finally following each other, they pressed forward, dragging their limbs with arms outstretched as they approached the vehicle.
Determinedly, she shook her head, forcing herself to pull it together. The monsters weren’t going to feast on her tonight. She was on a rescue mission, and she would find him.
Chapter 13:
Colin kept up a fast jog for a couple of miles before stopping to catch his breath. He hunched over, resting his hands on his knees and breathing heavily.
He had always been a natural athlete, but burdened down with a full duffel bag and sword hindered him considerably.
While he knew the zombies couldn’t run, some of them moved faster than he was comfortable with, and he didn’t feel like fighting off any others.
He slowly straightened and looked around. He was in the middle of nowhere. Miles of lush forest surrounded him. He held his breath and listened for anything unusual. Not a car could be heard, but a few birds chirped merrily in the distance. He sighed and leaned against a tree, hungry and thirsty.
He needed just a moment to put the pieces together. He’d seen a zombie movie or two in the past, but he had never imagined such a nightmare becoming reality.
He swallowed hard and for the first time in a long while, felt crushing sadness.
His dad. Gone.
He rubbed his eyes in exhaustion, trying to forget what he’d done, yet no matter how hard he tried, the memory stained his soul. Colin had stabbed him. His father. Plunged a sharp blade into his body.
“Dad,” he whispered aloud. “I’m sorry.”
He sank to the ground in grief, his head cradled in his hands. “I’m sorry I didn’t do more. I’m sorry I didn’t call you enough... that I didn’t visit you.”
Although his mother had left his dad for another man, Colin had always harbored a certain resentment towards his father. As a teenager, he envied his friends whose dads who took them to games, played rugby with them, joined them at the pubs for a good brew. All his dad did was work.
Now that his father was gone, it hit him how selfish and unappreciative he’d been. His family had been poor, but in spite of all of this, his father had fed them and provided them with every material good they needed.
It was his mother who had left his father, not the other way around. She had found a wealthy, younger man and had wanted to maintain a relationship with Colin as though nothing had ever happened. She would always give him lavish gifts in the hopes that her decision to leave his father could be overlooked. Looking back, Colin realized that she didn’t want to cope with the guilt. She had abandoned all of the promises that she had made to Jack when they had married, to remain faithful in sickness and health, for richer or poorer...
Deep down, Colin knew that part of why he held such disdain for marriage and monogamy was because he didn’t have any faith in it. And that wasn’t his father’s fault.
Now he was dead. Or undead. Colin would never get the chance to tell him that.
“I’m sorry I picked the wrong one, Dad.”
He swallowed hard and ran a hand over his head.
In the distance, carrying on the wind, he heard the moans.
“Bloody hell,” he said.
He rose to his feet, picked up his duffel bag, grabbed the sword, and headed towards the hills.
***
It seemed like the highway would continue forever. Mark risked a glance over his shoulder and saw that the undead were still in hot pursuit. He wiped a hand over his forehead, dirty sweat smeared on the back. There was dense forest on either side of him, but he didn’t feel comfortable venturing into the dark, foreboding woods without any sense of direction.
Mark fought back tears as he listened to the screams and wails behind him. Every so often, the sound of shattering glass or twisting metal echoed down the massive highway to his young ears. He tried to pretend that he was in some sort of action-packed Bruce Willis movie, only this time, instead of terrorists, he was being chased by zombies. His stomach turned when he remembered that his mother never let him watch horror movies because she wanted to keep him as “innocent” as possible for as long as she could. Unbeknownst to her, Mark had been watching R-rated action movies with Alex for the past year now, but his knowledge in the realm of horror movies was rather limited. If he was honest with himself, he really didn’t want to watch them either. They really scared him. He’d seen snippets of the first “Scream” movie, and it had traumatized him to the point that he couldn’t sleep alone for a month and would sneak into his sister’s room with a pillow and blanket and sleep on the floor.
Each step down the gravel made him gasp with exhaustion, his legs threatening to give out at any moment. He felt as though he’d been running for hours and desperately wished he had his bike.
The sun was setting now, and Mark realized he couldn’t keep up his stumbling jog for much longer. He needed to find shelter, but he didn’t want to go into the forest. He didn’t want to face those monsters alone in the dark.
While most of the cars he came across had been vacated hours before, there was a small comfort in being able to touch them as he jogged past. He could see the glint of their metal as darkness approached. It was a reminder of something familiar, and when he looked nervously at the forest that surrounded him, he recognized nothing. He only saw a dark abyss beckoning him to his death, twisted, gnarled branches ready to ensnare him by his clothes and hair and offer him as an unwilling sacrifice to the creatures that thirsted for his flesh.
Stopping to catch his breath, Mark leaned against a blue Honda CRV. Darkness had fallen, and he became overcome with despair. He hadn’t seen a sign of his family since he began his trek to find them. He could hear the moaning of the zombies getting closer behind him, and he could vaguely see their white eyes cutting through the darkness, their hunched silhouettes flickering against the dim light of the moon. These things were tireless.
Sadly, he shook his head. He sure wasn’t Bruce Willis. He was just some poor, st
upid kid who should have run more in P.E. class.
He looked around and saw that the passenger door of the CRV was open. He scrambled around to the other side of the vehicle and climbed in, trying to do so as carefully and quietly as possible. He winced as he pulled the door closed. As much as he hated to leave the door barely secured, he didn’t want to alert the creatures of his presence by slamming it shut. Mark wasn’t sure if they were following him, or if they were all just headed in one direction as a collective group. He didn’t care to find out.
Scurrying to the back seat, he found a dark-colored sleeping bag. He inched down until he was wedged between the seats on the floor, then he pulled the sleeping bag over his body and held his breath as the first of the monsters brushed against the CRV.
***
“I guess we could play cards,” Rosemary said to Faith after they had finished loading the last of the non-perishables that Haven and Rosemary had retrieved from Wal-Mart into the attic. Rosemary all but collapsed on a comfortable green leather chair in the den in front of the bay window overlooking the backyard, looking ten years older.
“It’s so quiet here. I haven’t heard anything abnormal all day,” Faith stated, standing on her tiptoes to reach the deck of cards Rosemary kept at the top of the bookshelf.
“Yet. Give it time. Once the sickness clears out the cities, it will spread to the countryside. Mark my words. I’m worried about Haven and Brett.” She sighed and rested her face in her hands.
Faith touched the cross around her neck and sat down across from her grandmother, her eyebrows furrowed in concern.
“Grandma, it’ll be okay. We just have to stick together. It’ll all be fine.” She tried to smile and touched Rosemary’s arm. “How does a game of bull sound?”
Rosemary patted Faith’s face and nodded tiredly. “Sounds good, sweet girl.”
The Good, the Dead, and the Lawless: The Undoing Page 15
