Horizon

by Sophie Littlefield

  When they reached the far side of the bridge, Smoke took one side of the opening and motioned them to spread out. “Now we make some noise.”

  They started whooping and hollering, and the infected paused and turned their heads. The expressions on their faces were disturbingly, stirringly innocent, a combination of curiosity and good-natured interest, like children at a matinee when the curtains part. Their babble went up a few decibels and they turned gracelessly, bumping into each other and squawking with irritation, shoving at one another.

  A couple of them lumbered toward the bridge, but most of the others, their attention fixed on the Hot Topic display—sunglasses and belt buckles and sequined tops all hung just out of their reach—stayed where they were.

  Without warning Shel ran forward onto the bridge. She whooped and shot at the ceiling, hitting the skylight with a tinkling of glass that rained down not far from them, sparkling as it fell.

  “Come and get me, cocksuckers,” she screamed. “Come on, I know you want me. I’m good, I’m good, I’m sooooo good, you know you want to sink your teeth in me.”

  She danced along, shimmying and waving her arms, dangerously close to the other end. If any of them decided to run for it, she was doomed.

  “Shel, you’re too close!” Smoke yelled, and then Nadir burst past him, sprinting to her, grabbing her free hand and dragging her back.

  Shel fought him, screaming. “No! Let go of me! Come on, I had them!”

  It was their struggle that seemed to make the difference. There was a swell of excited chatter, a few garbled cries of excitement, and the group of infected turned toward the bridge. Several pressed forward onto the ones closest to them, knocking one of them over, a middle-aged woman with a fussy short haircut that was sticking straight up on one side and a necklace of purple beads that bounced against the ground when she fell. An overweight man with his shirt unbuttoned, exposing a hairy, pale stomach, stepped right on her outstretched leg and reached in front of him with grasping hands.

  “Shit,” Terrence breathed at Smoke’s elbow.

  “Keep it together, boy,” he snapped. He was trying to get a shot at the heavy infected, but Shel and Nadir were in the way.

  “Get back here!” Bart screamed. “Nadir, come on!”

  Smoke saw what had scared him: a skinny Beater in a velour tracksuit was pushing her way through the clump, moving more quickly than the rest of them, her mouth open and her tongue waggling.

  Nadir tugged Shel, dragging her backward, and with his free hand he fired. He hit the big man in the chest, slowing him, but not stopping him. Others pressed around him as he wobbled.

  Nadir’s second shot took out the wiry woman seconds before she reached him.

  “Go, go,” Smoke ordered. “Bart, Terrence—you’ll have to take the other side by yourselves.”

  They ran for it. Smoke could hear their footsteps ringing through the great empty cavern of the mall, echoing through all the wasted space that had once cost untold sums of money to heat and cool, Before. All that money, all the shit in these stores, mountains of crap that no one really needed.

  The crowd of Edenites was yelling, a terrified sort of cheering. Smoke hoped they’d have the sense to stay where they were. He heard banging, and prayed Dor was getting closer with the door.

  Two-thirds of the infected were on the bridge now, stepping on and around the bodies of the big guy and the wiry woman.

  “Hold back,” Smoke yelled to Nadir. The worst thing he could do would be to create a blockage on the far side of the bridge; then the things would split off into two groups, get distracted, wander in different directions.

  Nadir seemed to understand. He quit firing and dragged Shel back with him. In seconds they were back on Smoke’s side of the bridge, out of breath, Shel’s eyes red and watery.

  Terrence had made the circuit down the hall and across the bridge and back up the other hallway, Bart right behind him, but they were going too fast. They needed to let all the infected follow the first ones onto the bridge, where they would be sitting ducks.

  “Wait up!” Smoke yelled. Terrence looked over at him and nodded, then stopped, pressing his back against the entrance of a candle shop.

  There was a noise from below.

  A scream and a great clanging from the first floor. Smoke looked over the rail. A coffee shack in the center of the lounge area shuddered, and four figures burst out of the door, knocking over a café table.

  Beaters. Mature ones.

  They must have been nesting inside the little shack. And they were headed for the escalator. The one that would take them straight up to the end of the mall where the Edenites were huddled.

  “Oh, Jesus God,” Shel breathed, and then without pause she shot, over the edge, down into the mall. It was an impossible shot and Smoke grabbed her arm.

  “No,” he yelled into her ear. “Save your ammo. Focus on the ones here. The others will deal with those.”

  It was the only thing they could do. But once the Beaters got up the stairs, there would be nothing to stop them from attacking. Even if Smoke and his companions laid every one of the things on the bridge to waste, it could well be at the cost of losing everyone else.

  But there was nothing else he could do. The roving mass had nearly made its way entirely onto the bridge. Terrence was slinking down the hall toward them, waiting for the stragglers to catch up. Bart was a few paces behind him, looking like he was about to throw up.

  He still had a couple more clips—how many rounds, he wasn’t sure. He’d just stand here and pick off the things that staggered toward him until he ran out, counting on the others to herd them onto the bridge or blast them from the other side.

  A scream rose above the din, singular among all the others because he knew that voice.

  Cass

  Smoke forced himself to stay focused on the scene ahead of him, knowing that if he abandoned his post to go to her now he’d doom them both. And yet every fiber of his being rebelled as he lined up his shot.

  Chapter 36

  CASS RAN TO the side and looked down, just in time to see them reach the escalators. Three of them had no hair at all, and one had a few greasy hanks at the back of its head. At least one of them was missing fingers. These Beaters had been infected for a long time, and their bodies were starting to disintegrate. In a month, maybe two, they’d finally die from the sheer punishment they routinely suffered and inflicted on each other—even their hyper immune system couldn’t save them after they lost enough blood and took enough blows to their savaged bodies.

  But until then, they were more dangerous than ever. Hungrier. Faster. Unstoppable.

  She ran back to her father, who was cradling Ruthie, rocking her and singing. “Dad, I’m going to help Dor. Just—just keep her safe.”

  She pushed through the crowd, knowing how ridiculous her words were. There was no way to help. There was no such thing as safe.

  “Where are we at?” she demanded, after forcing her way to Dor’s side. Sammi made room for her, her face white with fear.

  “Last one,” Dor muttered, sparing her a quick glance with his flint-spark eyes. “Got the other two hinges out. Shot off the caps and pried out the pins, but this one’s corroded or something, can’t get it free.”

  His hands were bloody, and the screwdriver he was using to chip away at the blockage slipped from his hands. “Fuck!”

  “Let me.” Cass seized it from him and wiped it on her shirt, leaving his blood streaked on the fabric. “Tell me, show me—”

  And he did, his quiet voice in her ear, speaking slowly, steadily, the way he’d done so many times before when it was just the two of them, when he’d cajoled and urged her to the dark heights where they both sought release. She let everything else fall away until it was just her and
him and the thing that must be done, his voice, his lips brushing her ear, her hands and the glinting metal and the greasy mechanism and every bit of her energy focused on the task until suddenly the pin fell to the floor with a clang and then everything, the sounds and the people and the fear came rushing back and she was pushed away from the door as the crowd surged forward.

  “Back, back!” Dor yelled from three feet away that felt like a thousand, and he and others jammed their blades into the space between the wall and the door and heaved and pulled until it gave a little, just a little and down the mall there was screaming and shooting and Cass could not bear to look so she turned away and found Red and took her daughter back, burrowed her baby’s sweet face into the crook of her neck and kissed her hair and swore it was going to be all right.

  Sunlight and screaming. An earsplitting metal-on-metal groan as the door was pulled away from the frame. Four, five men grunting and sweating with effort, and the metal door bent but did not break. The opening grew until it was a foot, eighteen inches wide, and the crowd roared and pressed forward and they would not be stopped now, but the space was not wide enough for them all to pass through, they would kill each other trying, there was Craig Switzer shoving Mrs. Nguyen out of the way, his hand on her face, mad with fear—

  And then his throat exploded, blood everywhere, his mouth open with surprise, and his hand slipping slowly off poor Mrs. Nguyen.

  “Stand back or I’ll shoot again,” Dor yelled, and the crowd hesitated and backed up just a fraction of an inch, enough to spare the ones suffocating at the front, and the door budged a little more and a little more, until there was room for a person to slip through sideways and Phil Booth forced his way out to the other side before Dor could do a thing about it.

  He cursed and shot at the floor, chipping up a chunk of concrete at the base of the door. “You go when I say you go or you’re dead. Harris. Benny. Go through and man the other side. One of you help the people through and the other keep everyone together. Women first. Kids. Old people. Line up and so help me God you fuck this up I’ll shoot you so fast you won’t know what hit you.”

  It was working. The crowd had retreated—just a little farther, but enough—and the women were being helped along, sliding through, crying. Ingrid went with all the children and then Suzanne, and Dor seized Cass’s arm and tried to push her through but she fought him.

  “They’re going to be here in a second,” she shouted, but Dor had been so focused on forcing his way out that he didn’t know, he didn’t know about the four struggling up the stairs, and he’d sent two of the only armed men through the door, and Cass knew he had to stay here to make sure the others got out.

  “Who—”

  “It doesn’t matter,” she said, and then she told a lie, the only way she could make him let her go. “I’m just going to get my dad, I’ll be back in a minute.”

  Red was at the end of the line of older people, him and Zihna, and Cass handed him Ruthie and kissed his cheek, and he gave her his gun and whispered that he loved her, her father understood what she was going to do, his eyes were terrified but he took Ruthie and followed Zihna through the crack to the outside—and Cass ran.

  Far ahead, on the bridge, there was fighting and screaming and dying, but that was not Cass’s fight. Behind her the terrified crowd continued its exodus. She was alone, she was the only one left to face the ones coming up the escalator. They were terrible at stairs, they stumbled and lost their balance and that was all that had saved her so far; one had stumbled and was splayed upside down halfway down the metal staircase, but the other three clutched each other in a grunting scrum that had nearly reached the top.

  They spotted her, and the closest one—God, it was impossible to believe it had ever been human, with its gaping mouth-hole and sunken eye sockets and torn-off ears and pulped flesh—it saw her and it screamed, and Cass couldn’t help screaming back as she shot it, the gun jerking in her hands. She did not know this gun, it was her father’s gun, it was unwieldy and old and it was too heavy for her, the report traveling up her arm through her elbow into her shoulder, and her palm slipped as she tried to rack the slide.

  And the thing kept coming. She’d shot it in the chest and it had gone clear through, but too high, too high. A shard of bone protruded and one arm lay limp as it seized at her with the other. No, no, no, it was too late to run, they were too close, she’d fucked it up, it was an easy shot and she’d failed, and then it was on her, its bone-fingers clutching the fabric of her shirt, yanking her toward it, its mouth open and drooling and its rotting brown teeth shiny with saliva. She put her hands on its head and shoved, anything to keep the snapping teeth away, but she was not strong enough. The mouth closed on her forearm even as she fought it, pushing and writhing with all her might, but there was nothing in the world stronger than a Beater’s lust and this one was mad with its hunger for her and she felt the sharp pain as it bit down, saw the blood spurt from her arm as it ripped her flesh.

  Explosions, so close, and the thing fell away from her, rolling back onto the stairs, falling on its companions who shoved it out of their way and kept coming. Then more shots, a staccato burst of them, and their bodies jerked and seized and went limp, and there was Terrence, leaning over the edge with that insane gun of his and one more burst took out the last one and it died upside down on the stairs, staring up at the skylights with empty eyes.

  Cass, sinking to the floor, her hand closing over her wound—she looked up and found that she was staring into the barrel of Bart’s gun.

  “No, no, don’t do it! Don’t shoot her!”

  It was Sammi, racing toward them, her hair flying behind her.

  “Sammi, stay back,” she screamed. Bart’s gun hand was shaking from adrenaline; there was no telling what he’d do in the heat of the moment. “Go to your dad!”

  “No, Bart, don’t, you don’t understand.” Sammi ignored her, her sneakers slapping on the smooth floor of the mall, echoing around the giant space. Behind her was pandemonium, the crowd pushing through the narrow opening, Dor yelling, people screaming. “Cass can’t get the fever, she’s immune.”

  “What the fuck are you talking about?” Bart waved the gun back and forth between Cass and Sammi.

  “Sammi, go, please,” Cass said, her heart caught in her throat as she prayed that Bart would stay calm. “Please just back away. Go outside and we’ll, I’ll—it’s going to be fine, I promise.”

  “No!” Sammi’s voice turned into a wail, and tears glistened in her eyes. “Cass, he doesn’t understand, make him understand. Bart, she got attacked a long time ago and she got better and she can’t get the fever again. She’s, like, immune.”

  Bart stared at her for a long, breathless moment, his eyes narrowed, and for a second—a quivering, hopeful second—she thought he might lower his gun.

  But then, instead, he raised it and pointed it squarely between Cass’s eyes.

  “Look away, little girl,” he muttered.

  Cass heard the click and squeezed her eyes shut and when the shot came she was thinking that she would have done the same.

  Down on all fours, pain searing her forehead, the echo of the sound filled Cass’s ears. Blood poured into her eyes, but she was alive.

  In front of her, Bart was clutching his hand and screaming, and his gun lay on the floor.

  Smoke. Smoke staggered toward them and then his leg gave out and he sank to the floor. His strength had finally run out. He’d used every bit of adrenaline for the fight, and then somehow he’d made it close enough to shoot Bart in the hand to keep him from killing her. Cass put her hand to her scalp, found that the bullet had only grazed her, felt torn flesh but no bone. It was nothing.

  “Sammi,” she said weakly, and the girl knelt down and leaned into her, sobbing, and Cass hugged her hard, feeling her strong heartbeat against her neck.

>   “We’ve got to move,” someone yelled, his hand on her shoulder. Cass looked up, blinking. Terrence. He offered her his hand, then withdrew it. “That’s true?” he demanded. “You’re really immune?”

  “She is, damn it,” Smoke said, and with a huge effort forced himself to his feet. “We need to get them out of here.”

  “We all need to get out of here,” Terrence said. He helped Sammi up, supporting her with an arm around her waist, and Sammi leaned against him, still snuffling, wiping at her tearstained cheek.

  Despite the gravity of the situation, Cass felt a stirring of gratitude and hope. The dam between her and Sammi had broken; the girl had let Cass comfort her, embrace her. Sammi could have left Cass for doomed, could have been rid of her forever, but instead she’d tried to save her.

  “Let them go first,” Smoke ordered Terrence, but he looked like he was going to fall again so Cass hooked an arm around him and half dragged him to his feet. Terrence hastened Sammi along toward the exit and Bart followed after him, bleeding a trail of droplets.

  Cass took one last look at the mall. Bodies lay everywhere, blood pooling on the floor and dripping down the escalator. There were undoubtedly more of them, the shelterers who’d made innocent mistakes as they tried to save each other, who’d paid with their souls. Even now they were probably rousing themselves from their delirious fevered slumber, staggering out from their dark corners, from the remains of the shops where they once bought their designer shoes and their thirty-dollar lipsticks and their coffee grinders and cell-phone accessories.