Dead of Night: The Nephalem Files (Book 3)

by Douglas Wayne

  I struggled against the seatbelt, trying desperately to get one of my hands free to release it. A move I knew would be foolish, but not any more foolish than staying in here was going to be. I wrested them free and pulled them to my right, grunting through the pain. My finger's followed the strap to the plastic clasp that held the belt in place. As my fingers found the button, I took a deep breath and pressed it.

  My head hit the roof of the car hard, causing stars to cloud my vision and my head to pound. I was still conscious, but I knew I would be dealing with the effects of a mild to moderate concussion for the next few days.

  I brought my knees under me, sat up, and rubbed my head on Ross' head rest. It took some pressure off my head, but I knew the pounding would return as soon as I stopped, so I bit down and pulled back.

  Outside of the shattered windows I saw hundreds of feet surrounding the car. Panic set in as I noticed the ones in front shuffling their feet trying to push themselves inside. I was thankful that they didn't have the wherewithal to know to open the doors, but I knew better than to bank on them being stupid for too long. Eventually the person controlling them would end up here and see her minions all bunched up around a single car and walk up to investigate.

  Even if she didn't, I knew we were sitting ducks in here. We couldn't get out without a fight we would likely lose, especially seeing how I was blocked from drawing in essence again.

  I crawled between the seats and to Cummings' body on the floor. Getting a closer look I noticed a gash on the side of his face which was resting on the rear view mirror that had been pulled from the shattered windshield in the crash. His chest rose and fell slowly. He was breathing, which was good news as I was concerned about what would happen if he had died with the necromancer being so close.

  I looked him over, noticing a key ring attached to one of his belt loops by one of those fake climbing hooks you can buy at nearly any department store. My mind immediately started going over the potential consequences of even reaching for the keys. These weren't two ordinary cops that would struggle to get the necessary paperwork filed to bring be back if I were to leave town. These were two federal agents with the authority to track me down not only here, but over most of the world.

  As much as I didn't want to push my luck, the other option wasn't much better. Being trapped in a car surrounded by the undead was one thing, but being trapped in the same car while restrained was another. If something were to happen and they were to get in, I needed the ability to move my hands to defend myself.

  I positioned my back against the back of the front seat, close to where the keys were. I bent forward and pushed my butt back, bringing me in even closer. The awkward angle had my lower back and hamstrings screaming, not to mention my arms that were forced to search for the keys from an unnatural angle. It took a couple of minutes, but eventually I felt the metal clip on the tip of my fingers. I reached back further and grabbed the clip.

  A hand touched my shoulder and I jumped, slamming the back of my head against the back of Cummings' seat. I turned around and saw Ross' large hand grasping my shirt. His face was red with anger, or perhaps because of the blood rushing to his head, either way, he glared at me and said, "you aren't getting away from us this easily."

  "I'm not trying to escape," I lied. "Kinda hard to help the two of you with my arms restrained behind my back."

  Ross opened his mouth, but before he could say a word I heard a whooshing noise. "What was that?" he asked.

  Thick black smoke billowed into the cab, giving us our answer. "We need to get out of here," Ross said, placing one hand on the roof and the other on the latch to his seatbelt.

  "Don't do that," I said, leaning back to grab the keys again. "Can't let you get hurt. If something happens I can only carry one of you out of here." I didn't want to say it, but considering the attitudes the two of them have had to me since they first pulled me over a few days ago, Cummings was going to be the one I saved.

  "So I'm supposed to just let you grab his keys, unlock your cuffs, and hope you don't leave me hanging?"

  "Don't you have a gun?"

  He gave me an understanding look and watched as I grabbed the keys, unlatching the hook from Cummings' belt loop and taking it into my hand. I fumbled through the keys, searching for one that was smaller than the others. I found it quickly, but managed to drop them while trying to stick the key into the handcuff lock.

  "Bring them here," Ross said, stretching his arms down to grab the keys. Reluctantly, I handed them over, but a few moments later I heard the click as he released the band around one wrist, followed by the other.

  Keeping my word, I carefully maneuvered around Cummings' body, placing my shoulder against Ross' hip and pushing my body upward, holding him in place while he stretched his arms downward, placing his palms flat against the roof of the car. I counted to three and released the seatbelt. His body shifted slightly, but my shoulder held the shifting weight in place as his legs came free, slumping over my back. Slowly, I kneeled down to the ground allowing Ross to his feet.

  "What do we do now?" Ross asked.

  "Whatever we do, it needs to be quick."

  I looked over and noticed Ross fiddling with the door handle. Before I could stop him, he thrust his shoulder against the door, grunting as he pushed. Thankfully, the door didn't budge or make a noise.

  "Don't try that again. The car is surrounded by the dead. If that door opens, we will be engulfed by them in a matter of minutes."

  "Then how do you suggest we get out. If the fire reaches the fuel line or fuel tank, we will be engulfed by something nearly as bad."

  "Worse," I admitted. Scanning the car I searched for another way out. Each of the doors were pinned closed, thanks to the force of the impact the roof had with the pavement. The windows were shattered, but with the horde of dead around the cars, we would be dead long before one of us were able to get out of the car. I was about to give up and tell Ross to try another door when I had an idea.

  "Does the back seat to the car pull out?" I asked.

  Ross shrugged. "Normal squad cars don't have that feature, for good reason. Ours was more of a street model, so it might still be there."

  I crawled back under the seat and felt around the cushion to the back seat, looking for a hook or a latch to pull. Not finding anything visible on the outside, I thrust my hand in the crack between the seat and the back.

  My hand happened upon a small strap, so I grabbed it and pulled. The back seat tilted forward, revealing the darkness of the trunk. Through the tendrils of light that poked through the shattered windows, I noticed a plastic case lying on the top of the trunk. I reached inside and grabbed it, turned, and asked Ross, "is this important?"

  "Backup gun," he said. "Take it. It's already loaded."

  "Not going to get in trouble for letting a suspect have your gun, are you?"

  "Right now, I don't care what my supervisors think. The way I see it, I can give you the gun, giving us double the chance of clearing a path to safety. Its that, or I try to take everything out on my own. I carry a spare magazine, but we could be overwhelmed long before I'm able to reload."

  I nodded. What he said made a lot of sense. The only problem was that I had a crippling dislike for firearms, particularly pistols. It was something I'd have to get over in a hurry, if I wanted to get out of the car alive.

  I opened the case and grabbed the gun and held it in my hand. It was a lot heavier than I had imagined it would be. In the movies, they make them seem like they were light, easily carried and aimed with just one hand.

  "Hold it with two hands. It has a bit of a kick. Not to mention, one handed shooting only works in the movies."

  I nodded and grabbed the spare magazine out of the case, closed it, and set it out of the way.

  "How are we going to do this?" Ross asked as I placed the spare magazine in my pants pocket.

  "The hard part is going to be getting out with Cummings. We need to get him in the back so we can pull him out
in a hurry. With the damage to the roof, and the angle of the car, it's hard to tell how many are behind us, so we should assume the worst. We need to take Cummings, and place him in the trunk. I'll hang near the driver's side while you take a spot next to Cummings. When you are ready, I'll throw the switch, opening the trunk. That will be the worst part. Hopefully, Cummings' body doesn't roll out onto the street, or this whole thing will have been in vain."

  "We could try to strap him down somehow."

  I shook my head. "I need to be able to lift him up quickly."

  "I'll carry Cummings, you handle the dead."

  "You're the better shot," I countered. "Way better."

  "Never shot one before?"

  "Never held one before."

  Ross sighed. "Fine. You carry Cummings while I take out the dead. You've seen these things in action, what is the plan of attack?"

  "The last person I saw fight them cut off their heads. Apparently severing the spinal cord shuts them down. That would be like hitting a silver dollar from fifty yards out, so I recommend you try to shoot them in the head. There are hundreds of zombie movies where that tactic works. They usually get their ideas from the real world, so I think it's safe to assume it will work here as well." I didn't want to tell him about how severing the spinal cord wasn't enough to stop them in some zombie movies. He was a glorified cop, and probably ex-soldier. If he wasn't able to react to failed tactics on the fly, this wasn't going to work either.

  The wind shifted, sending some of the black smoke back into the cab. We both coughed harshly until the wind shifted again, clearing the air and allowing us to breathe.

  Ross looked at me and said, "if that's the plan, lets get a move on. I can't take much more of that."

  - 18 -

  Ross positioned himself on the roof of the trunk in front of Cummings. He placed his body in front of the other officer, ensuring Cummings' body didn't roll out onto the street, handing the undead an easy meal. I heard two clicks from the trunk telling me he had chambered a bullet and released the safety. He had already prepared my gun, which pressed against my back as it was wedged in my pants at my belt line.

  "You ready?" I asked as quietly as possible.

  "Do it."

  I pulled the lever to the trunk. It slammed against the ground hard, sending Ross sprawling to the ground. Cummings' body rolled once, but otherwise stayed on the top of the trunk like we had hoped.

  I hurried through the upside down car, careful not to cut myself on the shattered glass. The gunshots started by the time I'd reached the trunk. Bodies fell around the rear of the car.

  As I stepped out into the sunlight, I noticed the scene. Nearly two dozen of the walking corpses were around the car. Where they had been relatively docile while we were in the car, they were now fully alert to our presence and apparently very hungry.

  I dragged Cummings' body out of the trunk, pulled his body to a sitting position, kneeled, and lifted him over my shoulder. Thankfully he was lighter than he looked though it still took a lot more effort to keep him on my shoulders than I had imagined.

  Ross continued his fire against the dead, dropping them with well placed shots to the head. On the ground, the bodies that had been shot remained unmoving on the ground. The head shot theory had worked, or at least appeared to look that way.

  It took a few steps for me to fully gain my balance and head towards Ross, who was clearing a path through the dead, following a stream or canal just south of the lake.

  "Where are we headed?" I asked, forcing my legs to go as fast at they could while holding an extra two hundred pounds over my shoulder.

  "Away from them."

  We continued south, following a roadway as it passed through a residential section of town. I hoped he wasn't leading us closer to the necromancer, but it wasn't like we had a load of options. Going back to the north was out of question as most of the undead had been focused that way. There were still dozens of them ahead of us, but they were more spread out, making it easier to avoid them as we ran down the street.

  Two blocks down the road, I heard the click of Ross' gun, telling me it was out of bullets. He ejected the magazine, grabbed another one off of his belt and inserted it in the gun. He chambered a bullet in time to shoot one between the eyes of a dead woman who was closing in to bite.

  "You still good?" he asked as he put a bullet into another as it leapt out from behind a tree.

  "He's getting heavy," I said, struggling to stay on my feet. "Not used to carrying this kind of weight."

  "Tell me someone who is," he said. "Need me to carry him for a while?"

  "If I could shoot worth a darn, I'd be all over it."

  "You'll be fine," he said, closing in. He stopped next to me, dropped to one knee, and patted his shoulder. Getting the point I carefully leaned over, allowing Cummings' limp body to drape over Ross' shoulder. With a grunt he placed his arm around the body and stood up, then pulled his gun out of its holster on his hip.

  Reluctantly, I pulled the gun from my back and held it in the air. The weapon felt odd in my hands, not an extension of my arm like some of my old police friends, namely Trevor, had always told me. I held the weapon up, aiming it with two hands at the nearest undead. The body was vaguely feminine guessing by the dress though it was hard to tell with the massive amount of decay. Most of the skin was gone from the body, exposing the bones and wisps of muscular tissue holding things together.

  I breathed in and pulled the trigger, but nothing happened. "Safety, dummy," Ross said, leveling his gun at the decayed woman and blowing a hole in her skull. The body dropped to the ground instantly, head shattering further as it hit the pavement.

  My face flushed as I looked at the gun and flipped the switch to disengage the safety. "Told you I'm no good with them." Ross just shook his head and pressed forward.

  As we made our way down the street, the numbers of the dead diminished, eventually to the point where we only had a few of them still in front of us. Behind us was another story, but we ignored those as we kept going. We reached an intersection with a road that crossed over the canal. Ross quickly moved over the road and headed to the east.

  I looked back to the north and saw the remnants of the horde we had just passed through. There were easily close to a hundred of them shambling down the roadway towards us. I was thankful that we had made it through, but knew better than to stop, knowing the dead would be on us in moments if we did.

  Stepping onto the warm pavement of the bridge, I could finally feel the flow of essence around me. I took a deep breath, drawing as much as I could into my body, and turned around.

  "What are you doing?" Ross asked, kneeling down to rest on the other side of the bridge.

  "Saving us." I focused my magic on the grass and trees along the side of the road. The vegetation grew slowly at first until it blanketed the open field and even half of the street. The branches of the tree sprawled out, making it look more like a bush than a tree after a few moments.

  The first of the undead stepped into the brush. Within a few short steps the grass had grown up her legs and wrapped around her waist, halting her movement entirely. Others followed her lead, getting trapped by the vines well before they could reach us.

  "How'd you do that?"

  "We must've gotten out of the necromancer's range. She has an aura that cuts me off from my power."

  "Your power?" He carefully laid Cummings down on the concrete sidewalk and sat down next to him. Panting heavily, he rubbed the shoulder he'd just been carrying Cummings on.

  "Never mind," I said, jogging across the bridge. On the other side my trap was slowing the group of dead, but it was starting to become overwhelmed as the massive horde of undead plowed through. "We need to move, now."

  "But whatever you did is stopping them." He was still bent over, trying to get his breath back.

  "There's too many of them. They will be through in a few minutes."

  "Then we should rest."

  "We have two choices.
The first is that we get up and continue running wherever you were taking us."

  "Back to headquarters."

  "A building? That's the last place we need to be."

  "We'd have help taking them down," he said. "The other agents."

  "We'd just have more people to defend. Whoever is doing this, can always create more. Every person that dies between here and there is another person that can become one of them. It was bad enough running them close to a residential section as it was. The last thing we need to do is to run through more."

  "Didn't know that," he said. "Guess we shouldn't run them past the college then."

  "Definitely not."

  "What's the other plan?"

  "I take down the bridge."

  "How can you do that?"

  "Same power I used to create the vines. I can use it on the bridge too." It wasn't an ideal scenario, but it was the best I had with short notice. While the city would whine and moan about losing another way across the canals, it was a lot better than creating a large rift in the middle of the city. Bridges were much easier to replace.

  "Will that stop them?"

  "Don't know. As long as they can't swim or find another way across, it should. Saying they aren't smart enough to go back to the dam up north or the other bridge down south."

  "You can just destroy those too, right?"

  "I could, but the government doesn't really like people destroying their infrastructure."

  "Can you do anything else? Like make fire or something?"

  I nodded. "There are just too many for me to take down. I'd be tapped long before half of them were down."

  "Tapped?" he asked.

  "No time to explain. Should I take down the bridge or not?" I wished I had my digital recorder on me, in case the decision came back to haunt me later. He hesitated and had a blank expression. Without his word, I didn't want to risk the charge. I was already in enough trouble with these two as it was without adding another charge to the mix.

  "Answer! Now!" I demanded.

  "Take it down," Cummings said weakly. "I'll call headquarters and have them send a cleanup squad in."