Broken (Book 3 of The Guardian Interviews)

by Michael Clary

  “So their leader is someone from the United States military.” Dudley mused aloud.

  “No, we never met the military man. The Monster is someone else, someone who works for the military man.”

  I had heard enough. I really didn’t care who did what. I planned on killing all of them, and the so-called leader of their little group was the best place to start. I walked over and stood once more in front of our prisoner.

  “How many of you are there?” I asked.

  “Forty of us came to your country,” the man mumbled and coughed. “Many fell to the Monsters rages. Some of us were sent to kill the woman. Twenty remain in El Paso.”

  “How do I find the Monster?”

  “You go to El Paso, and he will find you.”

  “Fair enough,” I answered.

  I went behind the prisoner, and after a swift cut with the knife, he was free. The man reluctantly got to his feet. I then went to Dudley and held out my hand. It took a moment for him to register what I wanted but eventually he handed me his battered .45. It was a bit of a shock to see the weapon. To this day, I’m still not sure how he got it back after he surrendered it at the banquet hall.

  Anyway, I tossed the pistol at our former prisoner. He was clumsy about it but he caught it. I squared off against him. Dudley and Nick backed out of the way. The former prisoner looked at the weapon in his hands. The pistol was cocked and loaded. All he needed to do was bring it up and pull the trigger.

  His eyes met mine.

  I smiled.

  He wasn’t very quick. I could have put at least three more bullets in him in the time it took him to raise the gun. I settled on only the one.

  The three of us watched his body crumple to the floor in a heap. I picked up Dudley’s gun and handed it back to him.

  “I wish you would quit doing that,” Dudley said.

  “So do they,” I answered.

  “We’ve got problems, you guys,” Nick interrupted. “Mr. Hardin was right. There is something in the wind. I bet those agents are working for the bad guys, which means everythings a big cluster-fuck full of Albanians, black suited government agents, some military dude, some asshole called the Monster, and all of them want to arrest us or kill us.”

  “He’s right,” Dudley agreed. “For whatever reason, the government has turned against us.”

  “We don’t know how bad it is,” I said. “This could only be a small group. Hardin still has our backs. I’m sure he’s working on it.”

  “Mr. Hardin is MIA,” Dudley said. “We haven’t been able to reach him.”

  “He’s probably pretty busy trying to figure out who’s coming after us,” I said. “He’ll make contact after he gets somewhere. In the meantime, we continue as we were. We’re going to El Paso, and we’re going to bring down the man responsible for the death of my wife.”

  “Jax,” Dudley whispered. “She’s not…you don’t…“

  “Just let it go,” I said. “I’m grabbing some shut-eye. You guys should do the same. We’re heading out at sunset.”

  I walked away. I had nothing more to say. I didn’t want to talk about my feelings. I didn’t want my friends to try and console me. I wanted the anger. I wanted the rage.

  I spent the day in a sort of trance. I was deadening my sorrow. If I let what happened to Skie consume my mind, I would fall apart. I would collapse upon the floor and never rise. She was my “everything”, and she was dying. For all I knew, she was already gone.

  A part of me wanted to call the hospital and find out if she was still alive, but I was terrified of the answer. I couldn’t stand the thought of somebody telling me that she had died during the night. So, I put my feelings away. I locked them deep down inside me. When all was said and done, when the people that hurt her were all rotting in the ground, I would go back to my wife but not before. The uncertainty was better than the impending sorrow.

  After seeing the damage they did to her… Well, that was an almost mortal wound that rocked most of my sanity right out of me.

  What was left was frightening. I was little more than a beast. A raging sea thrashed and churned inside me. I couldn’t wait to let it out. I couldn’t wait to destroy the Monster.

  Anyway, that’s how I spent the time. I didn’t sleep; I just sat by the window and looked out upon the forest. I wasn’t aware of the passage of time. I wasn’t even aware that the sky was darkening until Dudley knocked gently and entered the room. He had to call my name a few times before he got my attention.

  “What is it?” I mumbled.

  “The sun is setting,” Dudley answered.

  “Then let’s go,” I said.

  We took the SUV and left the motorcycles behind. I didn’t plan on running from anyone. If someone stood in my way, I was going to take them down hard, and they weren’t going to get back up. Still, we took the secret roads out of town and never met any resistance.

  The drive from Ruidoso to El Paso normally takes around three hours. We made the drive in about two hours, and it only took that long because we switched vehicles three times. Curiously, it was Dudley that hotwired our borrowed vehicles.

  “You stole three cars?”

  I prefer the term “borrow” and, yes, we “borrowed” three cars. Those damn agents had the highway covered in check points. The hunt was on, and we could no longer use the road. So, we “borrowed” four-wheel drives and went straight through the desert.

  It wasn’t too difficult for us even though we almost got spotted by a helicopter with a searchlight once or twice.

  As easy as the journey was, entrance to our destination proved to be much more difficult. El Paso was blocked by a gigantic fence, and I’m not talking about some sort of average chain link. No, this fence was close to fifteen feet high, covered with barbed wire, and went on as far as I could see. It suddenly occurred to me that I hadn’t been on this side of El Paso since the outbreak. I had no idea a fence like that even existed.

  We could have ditched the vehicle and climbed over but walking through zombie infested territory just wasn’t a good idea. Instead, we followed the fence back to the highway. After climbing a few hills, we saw gigantic watch towers with blazing lights in the distance.

  We also saw fires.

  Of course we knew what had happened just from following the fence. There were no guards. There was a walkway on top of the fence for patrols but it was vacant. The walkway had been deserted.

  When we reached the highway and stood before the towering gates, our worries were confirmed. The fence had been attacked.

  We searched for survivors and found none. Vehicles were overturned and burning. The road was torn up. Military structures were reduced to rubble. The fallen lay sprawled across the landscape where they died. Most of the bodies were riddled with bullet holes. Some of them were beaten to death, as if someone had battered their bodies until the bones shattered and the skulls caved in.

  An entire battalion of soldiers had met their end here, attacked by a force they never anticipated. A force they were unprepared for. Those brave men kept the zombies from escaping. They died so that something even worse than the dead could enter the city.

  Eventually, I was able to pull my eyes away from the ground. I looked over, and I saw that the gates were wide open and hanging from their hinges. Now, these gates were huge. They were also very solid. They had to be. In case of an emergency, these gates needed to be strong enough to hold back the zombies.

  “Who the Hell could have done this to so many soldiers?” Dudley asked.

  “I’m not sure,” I answered, “but I mean to find out.”

  “It looks like every soldier on this side of the mountain came to help,” Nick said.

  “I’m guessing about a hundred and fifty to two hundred dead,” Dudley said. “Why didn’t they radio in for some real backup?”

  I picked up a fallen radio from a pile of rocks and cement. The casing had been shattered, and the wires and other components inside were falling out the cracks.
r />   “Who said they didn’t call for help?” I whispered.

  “You think they were abandoned?” Nick asked.

  “Oh shit,” Dudley said. “How many times have we tried to get into contact with Mr. Hardin? We haven’t made contact with him or anyone else since he called me at the hospital.”

  “You think the headquarters was attacked?” Nick asked.

  “Why else would nobody be communicating with us?” I asked.

  “Dude,” Nick grumbled. “It’s not possible. There’re only twenty of these Albanian fuckers. Twenty guys couldn’t tear through our headquarters and then do all this damage. At our headquarters alone, there are a couple hundred soldiers, and that’s not counting the elite groups that help clean out the city.”

  “Maybe,” I admitted. “But something kept the big guns from arriving.”

  “You don’t think any zombies got out do you?” Dudley asked.

  I looked at the damaged gate once again. Then I cast my eyes down the road in the opposite direction.

  “I don’t think so,” I answered. “Most of the soldiers were armed with sniper rifles. They probably kept the area pretty clean. Still, with the noise of battle, and the smell of blood in the air, it won’t be long before this place is a hot zone.”

  “I bet I can fix those gates,” Nick said. “It won’t be extremely secure but it should hold until someone with some know-how gets here.”

  I thought about it for a bit. I didn’t want to waste time fixing stupid fences. I wanted to chase after the man that ordered the attack on my wife. Still, I couldn’t leave the gate open. I couldn’t risk the outbreak spreading outside the city.

  “All right, Nick,” I said. “See what you can do about the gate. Dudley, you scout around and see if you can find anything that might be interesting.”

  While Nick and Dudley went to work, I climbed to the top of the fence underneath the spotlights. The walkway was damaged. I could see hundreds of bullet holes. I also saw some heavy scarring that probably came from an explosion of some kind.

  My guess was that the men at the gate were attacked suddenly and violently. They called for backup, and the only help they received came from soldiers farther down the fence. All the enemy had to do was open up and fire whenever someone new arrived on the scene.

  Still, something wasn’t right. The soldiers were combat trained. A piece of the puzzle was missing. Nick was correct; twenty men couldn’t take out so many soldiers. Unfortunately, I wasn’t exactly in a good state of mind. I wasn’t spending enough time trying to puzzle out what was happening all around me.

  “Your thoughts were on your wife?”

  The question came out bluntly and without tact. The General was so shocked by the question; it took him a few moments to reply.

  My thoughts were random and chaotic. There was still a great need to know if she was alive, and that need was growing in intensity with each passing moment. I wanted her to be alive. I needed her to be alive. Realistically, I didn’t have much hope. Not after speaking with the doctor, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to bear the news. That was the important part, that’s why I didn’t make the call. I knew I wouldn’t be able to bear it if she was gone. I just wasn’t strong enough. So I continued to tell myself to wait. I continued to push it off until the right time. Deal only with what I could handle. Punish the men responsible.

  Mind you, these thoughts were all locked deep inside the cellar of my mind but that didn’t mean they weren’t still there. They clawed at the doors that barred their way. They scratched at the walls, and echoes of their need would creep into my mind. Is she still alive? Is she still alive?

  I would immediately shove away the slightest glimmer that managed to escape, and then I would refocus on what was before me. Still, I wasn’t all there. I should have been watching out for Nick. I should have been keeping an eye open for shamblers.

  I heard movement farther up the road. It was a dull sort of slapping sound that pulled me away from my internal struggle. I looked below me. Nick was wedged into the gate. His position was so awkward; he couldn’t reach for his pistol in the holster at his side, and his rifle was nowhere to be found. I watched as he struggled frantically against the gate but he appeared to be somehow stuck.

  I couldn’t find Dudley. He was lost somewhere in the carnage of burning cars and broken buildings. It was up to me. I raised my rifle. I put the red dot on the first zombie that came before me. I fired. I missed. I cursed. I fired again. I missed again.

  The third shot was a hit. The shamblers legs turned to jelly and he collapsed mid-run. His friends were close behind him. They tripped over his body and skidded down the street.

  I fired on the first one to his feet. I took him out instantly. I fired on the second zombie, and I missed the headshot. Instead I plugged a hole into her shoulder, and spun her around. My second shot went into her ear. She dropped on top of the other two.

  I sighed deeply and realized that I was covered in a cold sweat. It worried me that I missed so many times. That wasn’t like me at all.

  There were more zombies in the distance.

  I could hear their moans. I could see their faint outlines becoming clearer and clearer. Eventually I heard their screams. Dudley had finally appeared. He immediately began helping Nick free himself from the gate.

  I tossed my rifle over my shoulder, and jumped off the fence into El Paso. I didn’t roll when I landed. I just absorbed the shock with bent legs and then walked over towards Dudley and Nick.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “His leg is pinned,” Dudley answered.

  “I didn’t expect the gate to weigh so much,” Nick said. “When I popped it back into the hinge it slammed into me and got my leg.”

  “Can you get him free?” I asked Dudley.

  “Almost there,” Dudley replied. “Just a few more seconds.”

  “Okay,” I said. “I’ll buy you some time.”

  In the center of the road, I took a knee, and aimed my weapon. That’s when I noticed that my hands were shaking. I watched them for just a brief moment, took aim, and fired off a shot.

  I hit the zombie on the chin, and removed most of its lower jaw. My second shot hit its shoulder. My third shot left a puckered red hole in the center of its chest. My mind flashed to Skie. She had a hole in her chest.

  I started hyperventilating. My vision blurred; I couldn’t aim. I became so dizzy I fell to my side. I could hear Dudley screaming for me. I felt something wet against my waist. I reached my hand under my shirt, and it came away wet with blood.

  I had forgotten about my bullet wounds. I never healed them up properly. During the day I had managed to splash just enough water on them to stop the bleeding but I still had a hole in my stomach.

  It trickled blood occasionally during our drive. I knew this because the trickle felt like a bug crawling down the inside of my bite suit, and annoyed the shit out of me. The jump off the fence must have royally screwed up the injury. The trickle had increased to a flow.

  I tried to find my feet but the asphalt of the highway was too inviting. I was tired. I hadn’t slept. Dudley kept shouting at me. I wanted to see what he was getting so upset about but turning around to look at him seemed to require too much effort on my part.

  Something landed on top of me. I felt the weight of it slam into my body. There was a tugging sensation against my bite collar. It was irritating, so I tried to smack it away. A horrible pinching sensation ignited my arm on fire. I think it was the sudden pain in my arm that snapped me out of my stupor.

  A shambler was latched onto my arm. She was biting down on the bite suit so it wasn’t puncturing flesh, but she had ahold of the skin under the sleeve as well, and it hurt like Hell. I freaked out and began beating my fist against the top of her head.

  She barely seemed to notice.

  I felt another slam. The zombie hit my legs, and again came that horrible pinching feeling; this time it was in my thigh. The bite suit did its job; it did its jo
b very well, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t feel the pain.

  I screamed out.

  I didn’t have the strength to get them off of me, and I was getting pissed. Obviously, I still wasn’t in my right mind. I’m not sure if that was because of the sudden blood loss due to my stomach wound or my emotional state, but it never once occurred to me to grab my weapon and shoot them.

  The zombies were jerking me all over the road as they gnawed their teeth against my bite suit. At some point, I got a good look down the road. There was an even larger group of zombies headed right for me.

  I panicked and struck my attackers even harder. In response to my clumsy attack they doubled their efforts to find the flesh and blood underneath the suit.

  At that point, I really thought the end was rapidly approaching. I didn’t stop struggling because giving up isn’t in my nature, but I really thought they were going to get me.

  A blade whistled through the air, the sound ending abruptly with a moist crunch. The female that had me by the arm flopped on top of me. There was another whistle of air and the zombie that had me by the leg dropped to my side.

  Dudley pushed the female shambler off of my chest. His machete was barely dripping any blood; his strikes were that deadly. I felt rather proud of him.

  He dropped to a knee, put a hand on my chest to keep me down, and he began firing at the charging zombies. Beyond him, Nick had taken the same position and was firing his weapon.

  The fight was over inside of five minutes.

  “What the Hell happened to you?” Dudley asked.

  “Stomach opened up,” I answered.

  He unzipped my utility vest, lifted my shirt, and took a look at the wound.

  “Son of a bitch, Jaxon,” He growled. “Why didn’t you heal that before we left?”

  “Because I’m an idiot,” I answered.

  Apparently, all three of us were idiots, because not a single one of us had a drop of water. Sure, we grabbed some backpacks but unfortunately they were all devoid of water. We did, however, have an experimental blood clotting agent. It burned like hell when Dudley dumped it on the bullet hole but it did stop the bleeding.