“We can’t just leave people to die,” Alex finally said.
“They may already be dead,” Max replied.
“We won’t know until we check. I say we go,” Rafe said.
Alex nodded and Max shrugged. Rafe peeled out of the parking lot, headed in the direction of the voices. When they turned down a residential road, he slammed on his breaks. A mass of infected blocked the truck's way as they fought to get down the street. In the middle of the street two men could be seen, one swinging an axe, the other swinging the butt of a shotgun like a bat. Behind them were women and children, looking up and down the street for safety.
Without discussion, the Duncans jumped from the truck. The sound of the doors slamming brought the attention of the nearest infected. Alex and Max stepped forward together, Alex with her machete and Max with her tomahawk. Black gore flew as they slashed at limbs and impaled heads. Max brought down two infected by severing the tendons at the back of their legs. As they slumped to the ground, Alex followed with her machete, ending them permanently.
Max groaned aloud when she stepped in the gore of intestines that had spilled from an infected that was coming at her. Her disgust only fueled her desire to wipe the area of the dead. Using the spiked end of her tomahawk, she dropped the infected body to the ground, so it could join its entrails.
Together the Duncan siblings fought their way toward the living, picking off the infected together as a team. They were a fluid machine, reading each other's movements and knowing where they could help. Max found a void in her mind as she moved methodically, keeping her siblings safe and killing the threat that they faced.
When they were face to face with the living men and the infected were dead on the ground, Max was heaving for breath. The men eyed the Duncans warily, and Max didn’t blame them. She looked down at herself, gore coated her clothing, and she was sure there was stuff stuck in her hair. Alex approached the group and using her diplomatic mom voice, introduced them and asked if they could help further.
The strangers weren’t up for trusting random people on the street, so they said their goodbyes. Max, Alex, and Rafe gathered at the back of the truck, each of them filthy from the fight. Max dug a San Francisco t-shirt from her pack. They wiped down with paper towels and water before changing into semi clean clothing.
“This is our life now, isn’t it?” Max asked.
“Killing infected and taking names?” Rafe asked.
“I guess. Sometimes I can’t believe this is where we are,” Max replied.
“There are times I live in a complete state of confusion, but yes, this is the life we have now. This is the world we are faced with. And I’m so glad we’re facing it together,” Alex said, as she reached over to grab something from Max’s hair. She tossed it away, and Max was glad she didn’t get a chance to see what it was.
“What’s next?” Rafe asked.
“That’s the real question, isn’t it,” Alex said.
“It’s not over, even though Callahan is gone,” Max added.
“No. ‘The Suit’, he’s the one that started all of this. He’s the one responsible for this infection. And he’s the one that is going to come after us next,” Rafe said.
“Then we go on the offensive,” Alex replied.
The three siblings got back into the truck and headed further into town. They left the infected bodies where they fell. There was no time for burials or knowing who they were. The world they lived in now was full of rotting corpses on every corner, some still walking, searching for their next meal.
As Max searched the shopping centers and neighborhoods for places to scavenge, she thought about how far they had come in a few months. Without her siblings, she knew she never would have gotten as far as she had. Though she got the revenge she had been hoping for, nothing would fill the void she had in her chest from the loss of Cliff.
Survival was their only goal. Doing that meant they had to protect their family from the infected, but also any living threat that may come. Max couldn’t help but feel that their largest fight was coming on the horizon. She just hoped that together, they were strong enough to face it.
Acknowledgments
Thank you so much for joining the Duncan family on their survival journey. I hope you enjoyed this story as their lives continue to unfold during the apocalypse. To keep up with more of their stories, be sure to follow along on my website courtneykonstantin.com. I also post updates on my Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/AuthorCKonstantin.
This family is near and dear to my heart. They continue to grow and evolve. Thank you to my brainstorming bestie for working through all the nooks and crannies with these stories. I know I can always turn to you with the strangest ideas and you’ll help get me on a path of writing them out.
It’s good that I have a great editor, since I have issues with commas apparently. Pam Ebeler from Undivided Editing keeps me on track with those evil little things, making sure I am able to concentrate on the bigger picture. Thanks for all your hard work Pam, I appreciate you!
The Sundown Series is almost at its close. Be sure to stay tuned in for the 6th and final book of the series!
Sundown Series | Book 5 | Vengeance Page 34
