After being chased from one corner to the next, she gave up and tried a new tactic: hauling ass.
She wasn’t the only living person on the street. Pockets of people moved in on the football stadium. They ran, walked quickly. Some were armed, while others seemed to think their wits would save them from the deaders.
They didn’t.
She watched men, women and screaming children all hauled to their deaths. But that wasn’t the worst part, because all of those bodies would soon join the hordes.
She was something else, someone else. She moved with the crowd but was not a part of it. Where she needed to, she killed. It didn’t even have to be a deader; she lashed out with her sword at any threat.
A rotund man with a bald head drew her with his cries. He was out of gas, run down and had no chance. He had fallen into a gutter beside the road, right next to the old, crumbling sidewalk. Seattle never had enough funds to fix the paths where tourists walked, but they always had enough to build stadiums.
She went to him, and he looked up at her like she was his savior. A deader moved from a body toward her. He was at least six feet tall and lanky. His surfer hair should have been hip, but now it dripped blood like a set of weird extensions. The creature closed in on her, but she was having nothing to do with him.
She was exhausted, and her gut ached. The pain between her legs was hard to forget, but even harder to deal with was the constant feeling of having been torn apart by one of the little piggies. Just like this little piggy that cowered near her feet. Just like the one she had maimed and left for the dead a few minutes ago.
She lashed her foot up and caught the deader in the side. He was coming at her with those ridiculous claws for hands. Her foot made contact, and she used the momentum to drive herself into him. Her hand swept past her face, and her elbow followed. She caught him right under the chin, and he spun away and went down.
She could have easily followed up with a blow to the back of his head. She could have split him open with her short sword. But as he fell on the little piggy, she thought she actually heard the fat man squeal in fear.
Then he screamed in pain.
She ran onward and came at last to the entrance to the field.
She nearly went down. Her legs had almost no strength left, and her arms felt weighted down. The sword was a bar of lead that dragged her toward the ground. She wanted to give up and lie down, but she wouldn’t give these guys the satisfaction of watching her fall.
“I said drop it!” A man yelled at her. When had he said it before? And how in the hell did she get here?
She was in a haze of misery. She had flashes of the trip back, but nothing substantial. Mark, where was he? How was it that the only thing she could think about at that moment was his face?
She fought to steady her hand as she lowered the blade. It almost dipped to the ground, but she refused to drop it. It was hers; she had purchased it, practiced with it, bloodied it, and eventually killed with it. They had a history, Kate and this sword, and no man in a green suit was going to separate her from it.
Another joined him and pointed a gun at her. He spoke, but she had trouble processing the words. Of course she wasn’t bitten; of course she wasn’t one of them. The words came out in a jumble, slurred and bereft of conviction.
“Have you been bitten?” the other man screamed as he chambered a round. Why do they always do that? she wondered in some vague region of her mind that was still lucid. Why do they always chamber a round to emphasize a question? It was enough to point a gun at someone’s head; you didn’t have to be an asshole about it.
She tried to reason, to tell him everything was okay, but those words didn’t come out. Instead, she said the only thing that she wanted to be remembered for.
“Fuck you, asshole.”
Then a hole opened up, and she swam toward it.
Johnny Lee
“Ah shit. You guys alive?”
“As alive as you,” the other guy said. They both looked like hell. Like they’d been chewed up by deaders and spit out.
“None of you bit, right?” LeBeau asked.
“Nope, but we’re having a very bad day. Very bad, man, and it is going to be a hell of a lot worse if you bust my damn head open,” the shorter one said.
“We thought you was with them dead things,” LeBeau said.
“Thanks. Name’s Lester, and this tall gawky fuck is Grinder. I don’t know what’s wrong with him, so I apologize in advance.”
“Fuck you, Les. I got us out, just admit it.”
“Got us in too. I don’t think there’s enough water in this town to cover all the showers I want to take,” Lester said, staring down at his clothes.
“You guys smell like death. Know that?” Johnny Lee turned away. The smell was so bad it offended even him, and he lived on the streets for Christ’s sake. “Why you gotta crash my party, man? We ain’t got room for y’all here.”
“Why?” Lester turned on him. “Because fuck you, that’s why. Think I wanna be out there with those things? Or in a cage with tall and gnarly here? I don’t; no one does. So just give us some space, man!”
Johnny Lee LeBeau started to say something back, a nice loud retort that would set the other man straight. This was his street. His domain. He ruled with iron lungs and a voice loud enough to wake the dead. People feared him; they were afraid he would go off on them at any moment. He could stroll down the street swearing at the top of his voice, and all the suits and skirts did was get the hell out of his way.
But not this bastard. Guess he was all right, even if he did smell like a shit house.
“You know something? You all right.” Johnny nodded more to himself. Fuck you, that’s why. He was going to file that one away for a rainy day.
“Just so we’re cool.” The man looked pissed, but not at him. Everyone was pissed. This was the granddaddy of a pissed-off day. There wouldn’t be another day like this. Hell, they would all be lucky to be alive by the end of the week.
“We cool. I’d shake your hand, but I don’t want any of whatever that stank is touching me.”
“I wouldn’t wanna touch me either. Wish I had a drink, a nice big bottle of rum.”
“How ‘bout vodka?” Johnny asked.
“Vodka? Hell, I got weed. Let’s get fucked up and celebrate the end of the world!” Grinder leaned in to offer his two cents.
The kid was a mess. He had hair to his ass, was tall and lanky, and was dressed in black, which was stupid in this damn heat. Couldn’t the end of the world come around the end of September? That was a fine time to be in the city. Trees changing color. The gray of October just around the corner. Not a lot of rain, not like the monsoon that would engulf the city for the next four months. He didn’t mind the rain anyway. He had spent weeks in a soul-sucking place that rained for a week straight. Humping too, always humping from one damn place to another. Nam was a bitch, but coming back home had been worse. Stared at, threatened, accused of killing women and babies, even chased away from more than one bar.
Lester was trying to be the leader, but the lanky kid didn’t look like he needed to be led anywhere. They seemed to know each other, though, so he decided not to press.
Grinder claimed to be in some band, but LeBeau figured he was just like everyone else in Seattle. You couldn’t walk down the street without tripping over someone who was involved in the music scene. Not a one of them worth a damn, not a single one.
LeBeau refused to call him Grinder. Sounded gay to him, like he was going to wrap Johnny in a hug and grind against him. He had done some ridiculous things to stay alive over the years, but that wasn’t one of them.
Mike
I wanted to cheer the big guy on, but a fast-moving figure in green caught my eye. The person—make that the woman, judging by her long black hair—leaped over a deader that was bent over from a gut shot, and landed on two feet, then went into a forward dive to absorb her momentum. She danced to her feet and lashed out at a female deader that tri
ed to catch hold of her. A kick landed, then another as she executed a gorgeous turn in the air like a psychotic ballerina. That could only be one person.
“Don’t shoot; she’s one of us!” I yelled. No one even looked at me, but at least they didn’t kill her.
Kate jumped over the bodies, sword at her side. If she was going for some kind of superhero look, she was pulling it off with great aplomb. She drew level with Chip, who only had a few feet to go to reach the emplacement. The Guardsmen had finally set up their heavy weapons, and the sound of clanks and clicks as belts of ammo were fed came fast and furious.
Come on, Kate!
She leapt over the big man, Chip, one foot brushing his shirt as she sailed over his head. He was on his side but still fighting. Kate clearly wanted to keep going, but something drew her eyes to the man withering before her. He scratched at the ground. His voice keened in pain. I wanted to do something, anything!
Kate said something I couldn’t hear, something that sounded Asian, then she drove the point of her short sword into the back of his neck. He dropped without a sound and was still.
Kate walked the rest of the way to the post and was escorted inside under guard. One kept a handgun aimed at her head. Kate regarded the man like he was nothing, but she went along. I was afraid to think what would happen if they performed their usual inspection of all incoming civilians.
I followed and hoped I could somehow intervene if it came to blows.
I shouldered the automatic as I rushed toward Kate. She stood on unsteady feet but wouldn’t drop the sword. I had to help her. She couldn’t meet an end like this, gunned down by strangers after going out on a rescue mission.
The entrance was a battlefield, and no amount of yelling on my part was going to stop them from blowing her away. As if to punctuate my thoughts, a blast from one of the big machine guns met the charging deaders. Body parts flew, and blood erupted in a tidal wave. There were at least twenty-five armed soldiers in the area, and they were all aiming at anything that moved.
The flood didn’t stop. I tried not to look. Most of the cries came from the living caught in the crush. I had seen men and women charging the station as the mounts were set up, but it was no longer possible to separate who was alive and who was a deader.
Kate was all I cared about. I reached her just as she fell. Someone tried to stop me and yelled that she was one of them. I didn’t listen, didn’t want to. I threw my body on top of her and held my hand up.
“No! We have to check her. She went out to rescue one of your own. Don’t shoot her down like she doesn’t matter. She matters!” I yelled.
The man drew level with me, and I watched as a big gun barrel swiveled down to stare back into my eyes. I have never been a hero, never been one to stand up to bullies or trouble. I once avoided a side street because a couple of teens were drinking beer from a paper bag. It wasn’t that I was afraid. I just preferred to avoid confrontation.
This was not something I could avoid. If the soldier pulled the trigger and killed us both, no one would know. No one would care.
“Just check her!” I screamed in a voice I didn’t even recognize as my own. “Aren’t there enough bodies already?”
Then the gun boomed behind me again. For a moment, I thought it was going off next to my head and the next feeling I would have was my brains splattered all over the pavement.
“Hawkins! Get your ass over here!” someone yelled.
A team arrived as he slowly lowered the gun. I stared up at the men in clean white getups that looked like some kind of space-age hazmat suits. A thick rubbery material covered their arms, and gloves of the same substance hid their hands. They also wore masks, which seemed ridiculous, since the virus wasn’t airborne.
The soldier looked up at the men, then at me. His eyes went to whoever was calling to him. The gun wavered. I had a crazy moment where I saw myself reaching out and snatching the pistol, taking it away and then grabbing Kate and making for the trains.
The soldier left at a run. He didn’t even holster his gun, just kept it level and took aim at a deader that was clinging to the fence.
Rubber hands closed in on my arms and pulled me up. Then they took Kate and led us into the building. Behind me, the sound of machine guns tore the day apart.
The holding area was a nightmare. It was massive, easy to section off for concerts or conventions. Now it was a series of cages. The back of the room extended so far that it was hard to make out the far wall through all the various enclosures.
The smell was terrible. Sweat, fear, waste and misery made the room reek like a back alley. I tried not to breathe through my nose, but it was no use. I swear I could taste the misery in the air. Piles of trash lay around overfilled waste bins, and I doubted anyone would be emptying them today.
Men, women and children stood around various areas. They all had the same nervous energy about them, as if they were going to bolt at any second. Furtive looks and panicked eyes made me want to run back outside. A man was hauled out of line and forcibly taken to a sectioned-off area. The men who took him were none too gentle, and he was far from a willing participant. He fought them, and I thought I even heard a snarl. As he was hauled away, the room went silent. Every head turned a fearful eye on the man. Was he one of them?
They gave us a once-over as we walked to a holding area. As soon as we entered, they took my gun. I started to tell them I only had it to help at the entrance, but no one cared.
The two large men who’d followed us inspected Kate. One held a gun while the other looked over her exposed flesh. She was strangely silent as they ogled her. She didn’t even flinch when they probed an area on one hip.
“I don’t know what you did to end up in a blood shower, but I’m glad I wasn’t on the other end of it.” One of the guys—Torres, if the name stenciled to his shirt was to be believed—tried to be jovial with her. She didn’t even look at him. She just walked, no strutted, like she was dressed in a hot dress and heels.
“Girl is fucked up,” the other guy muttered. His nametag read, “Belshaw.”
“You would be too if you went out on a rescue mission with some of your guys and then were abandoned. She barely made it back alive,” I said none too quietly.
“Not my problem. All I care about is if one of you brought back any bugs. If you’re clean, then you can go free after they process you. If not, well, there are worse ways to go than that room over there.” He motioned to the back of the room. The part he was talking about was chained off. Huge white sheets had been hung from the ceiling. There was no way to see inside. I shuddered.
“What do you mean by process? We have to get to the trains right away,” I objected.
“You aren’t going anywhere for a while. Besides, the trains aren’t rolling, last I heard.”
“Not what I heard. I heard that they’re rolling soon. They’re about to get everyone out.”
I was thinking about being trapped in here, in a cell or holding area, when the deaders arrived. When they overran the guard stations, flooded over the walls and started slaughtering all the civilians.
I didn’t want to panic, but I felt it rising anyway. I felt like I was about to peel the skin off my body just to get away from the nightmare that invaded my mind.
“Nah. You heard wrong.” But the two looked at each other.
“They’re coming, and we’re all screwed. Just let us go. You can tell she isn’t infected.”
“Sorry, pal, we got to treat you just like everyone else. So off to the pens you go.”
The boom of gunfire continued as we talked. It grew faster and louder as the moments ticked by and we were maneuvered through the throng of people.
There was a crash from the entrance, then more gunfire. This time closer than before.
“Shit,” Torres said, and I felt his hand slip.
I needed to move, needed to get away, but I didn’t think I stood a chance against this trained man. I had seen Kate in action, and I knew she could put up a g
reat fight if she needed to, but she seemed to be in shock.
A familiar-looking Guardsman brushed past us with a woman in tow. The girl looked at Kate, and something passed over her face, some sign of recognition.
Kate went rigid when the guy passed her. She followed with her eyes, eyes that were still dead, but I thought I saw something, some look of rage that was barely perceptible. Like a blink that never finished.
Another crash, and then people were screaming.
The door was thrust open, and a group ran in. They dropped to their knees and stared firing. The sound was enormous, like someone had set off firecrackers in a bucket.
Kate must have had enough. Her head snapped up, and she took one look at the men. Her eyes were still lifeless. I had only known her a few days, but this was a Kate I had never seen before.
We were only twenty or twenty-five feet away when I saw the first deader on the other side of the windows.
The guys holding us stared at the mass of men and women running from the deaders. A group of the fiends crowded through the guard post and overwhelmed the people manning it. They made a heroic stand, but it was no good. The guy on the heavy machine gun kept firing even as he was overrun. He was pulled away from the gun, and then they were feasting on him. It was chaos inside with everyone screaming and running, but I swore I could hear him the loudest.
Kate must have had enough. She did a neat trick where she stepped to the side of the guy holding her, shrugged her arm, then whipped her hand up and caught him across the chest. She had snuck her leg around and behind him. A sharp twist, and he hit the ground hard enough for his head to bounce.
I didn’t have any fancy moves, and the guy guarding me outweighed me by about fifty pounds. He looked at me with a smirk, like he was daring me to try something like that on him. Then his face went slack as an errant bullet punched through his shoulder. Other shots rattled overhead.
Among the Dead Book 2 (Among the Living) Page 21
