"It's too late!" yelled Maylee. "Everybody back!"
The guards aimed at the door. Dalton rushed to one side. Maylee backed up, ready with her bat.
With a loud crash and splintering of wood, the panther burst from the door. The guards fired. Bullets tore into the cat and it fell to the floor. It roared, angry and dying, smearing blood across the floor.
Maylee rushed up, her bat ready. The panther recovered and smacked the bat from her hand. The force knocked Maylee to the floor and her bat flew across the room.
"Maylee!" yelled Mom.
The guards shot again, peppering the panther with bullets. It bled but didn't fall. Maylee tried to move but had no time. The panther leapt.
Dalton rushed up from one side with Maylee's bat, slamming down on the panther’s head. The panther slammed to the floor with a loud “crack”. It tried to move but couldn't, just growled and writhed.
Maylee climbed to her feet. The guards fired into the cat, finishing it off. Maylee noticed Park had returned and was shooting also. He looked pale and shaken. Lilly was with him. She looked like she'd been crying.
Dalton shook the gore from the bat.
"Thank you," said Maylee.
Dalton smiled, handing her the bat. "I believe this is yours."
As things fell quiet around them, it became obvious the groans outside were growing louder. People rushed in from other rooms, done with their attempts to shore the house up. They looked grim.
Mom looked grim, too. She limped over to the nearest window.
* * *
Angie peered through the boards at the window. Corpses were everywhere. They stood atop the corpses who had fallen into the trenches. West’s failsafe had bought them time, but not enough. There were just too many. The house would not stay secure for long. They couldn’t wait for the sisters to find them. Angie’s plan was falling apart.
Groans grew loud around them. Dead hands pounded on the walls and windows, shaking the wooden boards and the front door violently.
Angie moved away from the window. She looked behind her and up to the second-floor landing. There was one trick of West’s left. "Everyone up the stairs!"
The townsfolk rushed up the stairs to the landing. Maylee and Dalton followed, along with most of the guards. The rest stayed on the first floor with Angie. The others peered over the landing at them.
Angie and the guards pulled out a series of long, thick, metal spikes that held the bottom of the stairs to the floor.
Almost as one, the windows around them shattered. The door gave way and crashed inward. The corpses poured in, staggering and grasping.
"Hurry!" yelled Angie.
* * *
Beulah's surroundings switched to the center of town. She looked around hurriedly and saw a post covered in abandoned chains, lying fallen on the ground. Beulah wondered if it was what had been holding the children back.
The children. She could sense them somewhere, but couldn't place it. Where were they? She could feel them, she could always feel all of the chosen ones, but with the barrier gone she should have been able to pinpoint them directly. Why couldn't she? She sensed a faint presence coming from where she knew the farmhouse to be, but it was weak, not enough to be the group of children.
Sharon appeared next to her, then shoved Beulah in anger. Beulah slid through the snow, stopping when she hit a stack of barrels.
Sharon stomped over to her. "Where are the children?"
"Don't you know?" said Beulah, smiling and trying to look calm.
"I can't sense them at all! They should be crying out like beacons! I sensed them from the church when that woman took them across your barrier! Where are they?"
Beulah ran over and punched Sharon across the face. Sharon fell to the ground and rolled. She stood.
"Wait..." said Sharon. "I can sense something. Something small, but not enough—"
"You've lost, Sharon!" said Beulah, rushing to her. "They are lost to you." She raised her fist to punch.
Sharon caught her fist mid-punch. "You can't sense them either, can you?" she said, squeezing so tightly Beulah nearly cried out. "No, you can't. If you could, you'd be killing them yourself!"
She slammed Beulah's hand to the ground, pulling Beulah with it. She slammed into the snow. Sharon kicked her, sending her rolling. She stood, her stomach clenching from the blow.
Sharon stomped toward her, enraged. "Where are the children!"
* * *
Angie and the others were now all up the stairs and on the second floor landing. Ladders were piled on the landing next to them. Everyone watched as corpses poured into the room. They groaned and hissed, jerked and stumbled. They were filling up the lower level. In a few moments they would reach the stairs.
The guards fired down on them. Maylee, Dalton and Angie pulled spikes from the top of the stairs. The stairs creaked as they pulled the spikes free.
The corpses reached the stairs and started up.
"Hurry!" said Angie.
She, Maylee and Dalton pulled the spikes free and the corpses stumbled up at them.
Finally the last spike was free. Angie, Maylee and Dalton stood.
"Now!" shouted Angie. Everyone near the top of the stairs stomped on them. The stairs shook violently as they stomped. The corpses kept coming.
They all stomped again and the stairs came free of the landing. They toppled to one side, breaking as they crashed down. The corpses fell back to the first floor, some crushed by the fallen stairs. They rest crowded around the first floor, moaning up at the landing. At what remained of World Memorial.
Angie looked over the house. The corpses were tearing it apart. Trying to get to them. Trying to get to anything human. She stepped away from the landing and looked to those with her. Maylee, Dalton, Park and Lilly. The guards and the townsfolk.
"Okay,” said Angie, “you should all be safe up here. We can’t wait for the sisters any longer, though. We’ll have to bring them to us." She walked away from the ledge. Park, Maylee and Dalton went with her.
Lilly began to follow. Park held up a hand. "No, Lil, stay here. This part's too dangerous."
Lilly looked both sad and angry.
"I'll take it easy," Park promised.
That seemed to help. Lilly nodded, her face softer.
The four of them moved away from the group. Angie leaned in close, speaking softly.
"Okay," she said. "Maylee, Dalton, there's something I didn't tell you about plan B."
Twenty Six
Angie climbed from the attic window and out onto the roof. The air was cold and snow coated the shingles, but she could still get a foothold. Park, Maylee and Dalton climbed out with her, and her children looked worried.
Corpses crowded around the house, more than had made it inside. Many more.
"They all seem to be around the house," Park noted.
"Good," said Angie.
She looked over the town. It appeared empty. The storm howled all around them. Angie could see more of it from her vantage point. It was chaos. Whole trees were coming uprooted, falling over and pushed around by the violent wind. Swirling snow and large debris were everywhere. But as before, it stayed outside of the bubble protecting the town.
She heard noise below her. Sharon and Beulah had appeared in the square. They were fighting, yelling at each other and landing blows that would have killed a human.
"Hey!" she yelled. The sisters stopped and looked up at her. Angie called down to them. "I see you got over the line. That's good. Saves me the trouble of finding you!"
Sharon strode toward the house. "Where are the children?" she demanded.
Here we go, thought Angie. Plan B. She stared down at them for a moment, listening to the cold wind whip around.
"You want to know where the children are?" Angie yelled. "Call off your army and I'll give them to you!"
Beulah's mouth fell open in shock. Sharon glowered up at her, looking uncertain.
"I mean it!" yelled Angie. "Do it and I'll giv
e them to you!"
Sharon stared up at her. Silence hung over all.
Beulah stomped over, staring up at Angie. "What the hell are you doing, Angela?”
Sharon smiled. Slowly, the corpses began to pull away from the house. The animals too. They came from all around the building. The ones inside stumbled back out, all gathering around Sharon. They stretched back behind her in a huge mass. They moaned but stayed perfectly still.
"What the hell are you doing, Angela?!" yelled Beulah.
"Ending this!"
Beulah stepped up further. "You can't let her win!"
"I don't care anymore!" Angie yelled back. "I'll show you both where the kids are! Whichever one of you gets to them first can do what they like. Knock yourselves out."
Sharon smiled, obviously confident she had the upper hand. Beulah looked uncertain but said no more.
Angie stared down at them a moment, then turned to head back across the roof. Park, Maylee and Dalton followed, all quiet.
They made their way back inside and down the attic stairs to the second floor landing. Everyone around them was silent, nervous. Park walked over to the stack of ladders and grabbed one. He set it down to the now-empty first floor. Angie climbed down, her ankle smarting. Park, Maylee and Dalton followed.
They strode across the empty living room to the front door, which hung open from when the corpses had burst in. They headed through it.
Once outside, they stopped on the porch. Angie walked to a small lever set into the wall. She pulled it down and a metal plank sprang up inside the trench, bridging the porch and the town square. One last little touch from West.
Silently, she and the others walked down the porch steps and across the plank. The corpses still trapped in the trench moaned up at them. Then they were across and standing in the snow.
Sharon and Beulah were waiting for them. Sharon stepped up to Angie. "I could crush you like a bug! Tell me where they are!"
Angie felt the power radiating from Sharon. It was overwhelming, terrifying. But she held her ground and kept her face calm. "Crush me and you'll never know. Crush anyone else and I'll never tell you."
"I think that you might if I crush enough," said Sharon. The nearby buildings shook as she spoke.
"Really?" said Angie, cocking an eyebrow despite the terror in her stomach. "I'm giving up the kids. How much leverage will killing these ungrateful townspeople give you?"
Sharon scowled and kept quiet. Beulah looked angry and confused. Angie could tell she was making new plans, figuring how to turn this to her advantage.
"I have some conditions," said Angie. "My kids, including Dalton, live. Park lives. Lilly Lives. And I live."
Sharon frowned. "Which one's Lilly?"
"She's in the house," said Angie. "She's the only other of the children in there."
Sharon looked at the house. "I knew I felt something over here!" she started toward it.
"Don't bother," said Beulah. Her confusion was gone. She'd resolved something in her ancient, powerful mind. "The other children aren't there. If they were, we'd have sensed them."
Sharon stopped and scowled. She looked to Angie. Angie felt like the look could crush her, but she didn't show it.
"Just her and the boy?" said Sharon. "The rest are mine?"
"Or mine," said Beulah, butting in. Angie felt the same power from Beulah, but it was different. Beulah's power was more focused, as though Sharon could crush mountains, but Beulah could arrange them.
"Yes," said Angie.
"Fine," said Sharon.
"Agreed," said Beulah.
Angie smiled, looking between the two of them. "Follow me."
She set off through the town. Park, Maylee and Dalton followed her. The sisters followed them. The mob of corpses and animals filed in behind Sharon. Angie wondered how they all must have looked. The woman with her cane, leading her children, a man, two ancient somethings and an orderly mob of corpses though the ruins of the town.
As they walked, Angie again felt massive power coming from Sharon and Beulah. She wondered if she was doing the right thing. She kept walking, trying her best to not look intimidated.
They turned a corner and headed down a long line of ruined trailers. Beulah spoke as they walked. "I'm surprised your daughter and son are going along with this, Angela. They always struck me as fighters."
"They're my children," said Angie. "They listen to me."
"And Parker?" said Beulah.
"I don't give a shit one way or the other," said Park.
"Smart for a primate," said Sharon.
They walked the rest of the way in silence. The storm howled safely above. Angie took them around two more bends and brought them to the back of town. A wide open area stood there, lined by trailers and fire barrels. The camper stood at one corner, beaten but otherwise alright.
And against the far wall, guarded by Carly and a line of guards, stood the children. They were huddled together and frightened.
Around the whole group stood a moat of blood. Angie had dug it and filled it using the blood Dr. Graham had collected and cultivated. Blood that sat in a bucket nearby.
Beulah looked at the children and the moat. She saw the bucket of blood next to Angie. It was already full again.
Beulah smirked. "Mine?"
“Yep,” Angie replied.
"Clever," said Beulah, stepping into the open area. "You made your own protective barrier. That's why we couldn't sense them."
"They're mine!" said Sharon, starting across the area. The corpses followed her. The children shrunk back. A few of their eyes flashed white and they cried out in pain.
Sharon stopped. "Damn it!" She held up her hand and the corpses backed out of the area.
Beulah smiled. "You see, Angela? She can't let her minions get too close to them. The children are so ripe now that their presence could set them off, even at that distance. And if that happens, I've won. She'll have done my work for me. She never was much of a strategic thinker."
Sharon turned and spat at her. "And you can't set them off without letting go of all your other towns!"
Angie sighed. "So you're both stuck. Big whoop. Deal’s a deal. There's the kids. We square?"
The two sisters scowled at her. Then Sharon smiled.
Whooping in fury and triumph, the remainder of the flock raced into the area. Angie had forgotten about them. They rushed for the children. Angie knew the blood would be no barrier to them.
"Don't kill them!" yelled Sharon, still smiling. "Keep them alive and away from the dead things!"
Sharon turned, still smiling, to Beulah. "Not much of a strategic thinker, sister?"
Shots rang out from all around, tearing through the flock. Too many shots to have come from the small band of guards with the children. The flock fell screaming into the snow, bleeding from the wounds erupting across their bodies. They fell and died.
Angie turned and looked behind her. The rest of the townsfolk and guards lined all the buildings leading up to the area. They leaned out of windows and stood on roofs. Angie was impressed at how quickly they'd all gotten out of the house and into position.
She turned back to the sisters. "Actually, you both sort of suck."
She limped over to something the sisters had missed. A wooden stick was jammed into the snow. Blood flowed on either side of it. Angie knelt down and plucked the stick from the ground. The blood closed behind it.
Completing a second, larger circle of blood that encompassed the entire area the sisters stood in. It enclosed the campers, the trailers, almost the entire open space. The kids huddled behind the far edge, protected in their own circle. Angie, Park, Maylee and Dalton stood at the near edge. The corpses were behind them, still held in place by Sharon.
Beulah and Sharon looked around them, realization flooding their expressions.
Angie smiled. She limped over to the bucket of blood. She picked it up, jiggled it at them, then set it back down. "This stuff really is neat."
She smiled
at them as anger spread across their faces. "What's wrong?" she asked. "You guys can't just poof out of the magic circle? I thought so. Otherwise one of you would have just appeared in town and had your way a long time ago."
"What are you doing, you insect?!" roared Sharon, stomping toward her but stopping before she got to the barrier.
"I think it's called winning," said Angie.
Sharon scowled. The corpses started to move again, this time toward Park, Maylee and Dalton. As they drew near, the children screamed and flashed. The corpses stopped.
"GODDAMMIT!!!" yelled Sharon, so loud the ground shook.
"So what is your plan, Angela?” Beulah said. “To just leave us here?"
"I could, couldn't I?" said Angie. "Just leave you here. Who knows how long it would be before you got out?"
"You can't just leave us here!" screeched Beulah. "I make your world run! I make your history!"
"You manipulate and kill!" Angie yelled back.
"For the grand design! For the greater good!"
"There is no good in killing innocent people!"
"That's not for you to decide!"
"Are you saying you're both gods?"
Beulah stared at her. "We've been here a long time. And we’ve never known another."
Angie stepped over to the bucket. "No more plans, no more schemes. We must be free. Free from this and free from you."
"What are you talking about?" said Sharon.
Angie picked up the stick from before. The one that had held the circle open so the sisters could cross it. She dipped the stick in the blood and held it up. The blood clung to the stick.
Angie tossed the stick at the barrier. It flew across without incident, landing inside.
"Well look at that," said Angie.
"Mom?" said Maylee.
Angie hoisted the bucket up and held it in front of her. She looked to Maylee and Dalton. "This is the part of plan B I didn't tell you."
She lifted the bucket over her head and tipped it over. Beulah's blood poured down across Angie’s face and arms. It ran down her whole body, coating her, clinging to her. It felt alive.
World Memorial Page 38
