John raised his hand again, but not for a bid. “Listen, Cassie, I’m willing to go to nine barrels, but I’ll retract my bids if you give me the girl. Really, do you hate them both so much to pay out this much?”
Cassie looked torn between her different hatreds. “If I do, how much will I owe?”
“That’ll be between you and Yuri," John said, scratching his head beneath his Phillies cap. "This wasn’t a formal auction. He’s just playing us to get the most out of the situation.”
“Cut her loose,” Cassie ordered, snapping her fingers. “I’ll give you four for this man and not a drop more.”
At first Yuri’s face went hard at losing his chance at a bidding war, however he waved a hand as if to say it was nothing. "Four it is, but that's on top of three you promised to pay for this small man and of course three for girl from before." When she nodded he grinned at the haul he had bargained for. "You are generous to your enemy. A fine display for a leader."
"Yeah, I can be generous," Cassie agreed. "But he will be worth it. Having him as my slave will be well worth it."
Colonel Williams, who had been standing alongside the other leaders smirked at this. "Wrong. He won't be your slave. If he's taking the girl's place, he'll be dead of the fever by this time tomorrow."
"No, I want them switched," Cassie demanded.
"But we already inoculated this little man here," Yuri said. "By sunrise he will be immune. And girl is no longer yours. We can not let her be victim unless you buy her back. No, we will have this other man die of fever. It will be good, he is big."
Cassie's large doe-eyes went to slits as she realized she wasn't going to get everything she wanted. "You white-boys trying to play me?"
John laughed nastily. "Hardly. What's happening is that your hatred is getting in the way of your common sense. You're more interested in death than in life. We should be protecting women and children. We should be freeing these people not..."
The colonel interrupted, "Slow down, cowboy. Unless you're going to volunteer we're going to need someone to step up and test the vaccine. Are you going to do it?"
"No," John said. "But I still want the girl. She was part of the deal."
Deal or no deal, John didn't get her just then. Everyone rightly assumed that a free Sadie was a dangerous Sadie. She stayed the night chained just out of reach of two men whom she loved and a zombie that tore open the skin at its neck to try to get at them. Their only consolation was that after many hours it crushed its own larynx with the chain and could no longer moan.
The crowds slowly died away and the three of them, and the zombie, were left with an oversized guard of fifteen men. Three were Yuri's men and were armed with AR-15s. The others were basically paranoid babysitters who watched each other more than they watched the prisoners.
"Alright, Ram. Tell me this part of some master plan to escape?" Neil joked. His joke was flat, but he still barked out a high laugh that betrayed how nervous he really was. Though it wasn't exactly a secret; his face was as pasty white as it could get and his insides were all a jitter.
Ram dropped his chin to his chest. "I wish. They have every way onto this boat watched. They were on me before I could even stand up. Philly was a little better, except I almost got killed there. If it wasn't for Jillybean I would have been..." He stopped at the shock on their faces. "I'm sorry. I forgot to mention she stowed away with me. I bet you were worried."
"Is she...?" Neil couldn't bring himself to finish the sentence.
"No, she's alive," Ram said after a quick look to the watchers. "North of here by the river," he said in such a low whisper that it was easier to read his lips than it was to hear his words. "She should be ok for a little while. But what about Sarah and the baby? Please tell me they got away."
Neil swallowed and opened his mouth but when that was all he could manage, Sadie intervened, "That evil fake Jesus has Eve. He bought her as if she was a freaking goat. And Sarah...I don't know. They took us away and I haven't seen her since. But if I had my guess, I would bet the colonel has her. That rat-bastard was eyeing her real hard."
They lapsed into a long silence that was broken only by Sadie fingering the length of her shackles in a constant rattle. It was a simple length of chain hooked to itself twice with padlocks: once in a loop around her neck and again after passing through a ring set into the floor.
"If we had a screwdriver we could escape," Sadie said. She had given up on the chain and was inspecting the ring bolt attached to the deck. "Anyone got a screwdriver?"
"We'd also have to get past them," Ram said, lifting his chin at the watchers.
Neil cleared his throat. "I think we have to admit to ourselves that we're not going to be rescued. We've been in our fair share of scrapes, and one of us always came through. But I don't think it's going to happen this time. Sarah's our only chance and she's not a fighter. She can't take on this many guys, and I don't want her to try. Maybe...maybe we should pray."
"Yeah," Ram said in a choked voice.
The two men went quiet for a long time. Sadie clicked her chain until she couldn't take it anymore. "I don't know what I should be praying for," she burst out in a rush. "I want God to kill them all. I want him to sink this boat, and I know that's not right, but it's all I can think about right now! It's not fair that you two...that you two..." She broke down sobbing and Neil cried with her.
His coming torture formed a black mist on his mind making it impossible for him to think beyond it. He cried quietly, ashamed of his tears and thankful that the dark hid them. He cried deep into the night until the stars had crossed the sky.
By first light, as individuals began to claim their spots for the coming event, Neil was all cried out. He still had his fear, however and now, with it, disgust. Like spectators at a football game, people brought blankets to spread on the cold steel decking, and one brought a pair of folding chairs. Most brought food and all chatted happily. The zombie finally turned away from salivating at the three prisoners; instead it swung about to the larger mass of humanity. It stretched out on its chain and began snapping its teeth like a guard dog. Neil had to wonder if he did have a screwdriver just then, would he free himself or would he free the zombie and let it go hog-wild on the people?
Time went slowly by and each minute was an agony of waiting. Every ten seconds or so Neil scanned the crowd anxiously. He didn't know whether or not he wanted Sarah there. Part of him desperately needed the moral support, the other part couldn't bear to see the pain in her eyes he knew he would see.
Ram passed the time meditating, breathing deeply and focusing on floor just in front of his knees. Even when the faction leaders came in he didn't stir. It was only when Yuri declared: "Now for the test!" did Ram do more than glance up.
"Do you want to go first?" he asked Neil. The three humans had moved as far from the zombie as their chains would allow. The beast, on the other hand, was having its chain lengthened.
Neil shook his head while simultaneously nodding. He then swept the crowd for the hundredth time, looking past each of the leering faces, searching for someone that wasn't there. He knew on a certain level that they weren't going to be rescued and yet there was still that part of him that held out hope. That part of him demanded to know, where were the explosions? Where was the gun fire? Where were the commandos rappelling down from silent helicopters at the last minute to save the day? He even looked for little Jillybean.
"No one's coming, Neil," Ram said, seeing the look on his face. "Like you said, it's just us this time."
The zombie was pushed toward Neil; he flinched back so that its teeth snapped just inches away and its vile breath coated him in a horrid mist. They were so close to each other that Neil could see right down its black throat.
"Step right up!" Yuri cried with flare. "Come! Let it have a taste or we let out its chain even more." The crowd called for more chain to be released regardless. They wanted blood and lots of it.
"Do it, Neil. Right now. Get it over with." Ram o
rdered like a drill-sergeant. "Do it! Don't let them see you be afraid."
It was easy for Ram to say. He never seemed to be afraid of anything. Neil was the opposite. Everything scared him and this, being eaten by a zombie, scared him the most. He looked down at his hands—they curled in toward his chest.
"Just do it," he whispered to himself. This was going to be nothing compared to what Cassie was going to do to him. This was only a bite...a horrible, diseased-filled, deadly bite, but still just a bite.
Grimacing in fear he stuck out his left forearm. The zombie did not hesitate. It retracted its black lips and launched itself on the flesh, sinking its teeth deep and shaking its head side to side like a rabid pit-bull. The pain was immediate and intense. It overrode Neil's ability to think straight—a high scream, one that would embarrass him later, ripped from his throat, causing the crowd to roar in laughter. He barely heard. His mind was on the pain. Instinctually he began to beat the zombie on the face with his right fist—and all the while the crowd laughed and pointed.
Though it seemed like ages to him, the zombie tore out a hunk of Neil's flesh in seconds only. It then chewed loudly inches from Neil's tear-stained face while he held his arm gingerly. He could almost feel the disease running up his veins.
When the zombie finally swallowed it was prodded back by guards holding long poles and then sent toward Ram. He didn't flinch as Neil had. Instead he stepped forward and where the zombie was bound, he had his hands and arms free. With a quick move he grabbed the monster's head in both hands and spun it around to face the crowd. The move so surprised them that everyone in the front row leaned back.
"This is what you created," Ram said in a voice that carried over the crowd's babble. "Look at it. This could've been your father or your brother. It could've been your best friend. It could've been anyone, but now it is the face of hate and greed! And let's not forget fear. You're all so afraid that it's turning you into the monsters. This is what I see when I look at all of you."
The crowd heard and began to glance at each other—some skeptically, some with strained smiles, some with a tinge of fear, some with wisdom in their eyes. These last were few in numbers and they alone nodded at the truth.
Yuri was quick to intervene before Ram undermined him any further. "He is wrong! People, you must not listen to him. He says the opposite of truth. He says lie. We are here to save you from becoming like this thing." Yuri pointed toward Ram and the zombie, but which he meant wasn't clear. "But if you do not want vaccine, then you are free to leave."
No one left, though many shuffled their feet and refused to meet Ram's gaze.
Shaking his head in disgust, Ram allowed the zombie to bite him. Just like Neil he gave up his left arm, though he did not flinch or cry out. When his blood ran and colored the floor he tore his arm away.
Sadie watched this with hatred in her eyes. Without thinking she strained against her chain. Ram shook his head at her. "It's done," he said.
This simple statement ended the spectacle. The zombie was killed with a blow from a bat and disposed of; callously it was flung over the side of the ferry. Then it became a matter of waiting and few hung around for very long. Neil pleaded for Yuri to release Sadie, but in a fit of depression she refused. "Where would I go? My place is here, at least for now."
What should have been a long miserable day of waiting turned out to be only miserable. Just when they wanted time to stand still, the hours flew by. At one in the afternoon Ram was unchanged. The same was true at three. He told them the story of how he'd been scratched in Philadelphia and how he had lived. There was hope and determination in his brown eyes as he recounted that day.
The people who came by, now did so with an air of disappointment. Sadie usually lashed them with her tongue:
"Keep walking, ghoul!"
"You sorry he's going to live?"
By six even Yuri was getting nervous. He had Ram's temperature taken and then retaken. "Doesn't look good for sales, does it?" Sadie asked, not bothering to hide her malice from any. "Who's going to need your fancy vaccine when both of them live?"
By seven Ram's eyes were fever bright.
Chapter 37
Sadie
New York City
"Come on, Ram, fight it," Sadie whispered. She was like the cut-man in a boxer's corner. "It's nothing but a few germs. You are tough. The toughest man I know."
The encouragement was useless. Within the hour the delirium had him raving. "Don't look at me, Trey," he screamed at Neil. "Stop it! Stop looking. With your bug eyes full of bugs. Full of bugs."
Neil turned away to look at the wall with gritted teeth and wet cheeks. He stared uselessly at a seam in the old boat. It was a natural seam created by time and weather, which, extending from the top of a girder, made its way down its length, gaining in width as it did. "This world is falling apart," Neil murmured.
"Full of bugs," Ram whispered. "The world is full of bugs. Like fishing bugs and zebras and monsters. Trey knew it. Trey that stupid fuck!"
"It's going to be ok, Ram," Sadie soothed. She didn't know the name, Trey, however she did understand about zebras and fishing bugs and monsters all of these alluded to Jillybean. It was a subject that she felt had to remain secret. "Trey's not here. Do you know where he is, Ram?" she asked to change the subject.
He nodded in a sweaty luster. "He's gone fishing. He's drown face down in the brown. I killed him. He drown in the brown. In the brown! There was water and I said it would be ok and he said we would drown. Like a clown, in a gown and a frown and hound and a mound..." His words tapered off.
Ram was quiet for a minute until one of the ghoulish spectators threw a pencil at him. "Come on! Let's hear more about the hound and the mound." The people with him laughed, until Sadie, quick as lightning, zinged the pencil back at them full force. One of them gave a shout of pain, much to her dark joy.
"Hound, mound, found, round," Ram said. His eyes swam in his gently rocking head; he turned them to Sadie. "I'm sorry, Julia. I love you and I could love you more, but my head hurts...it hurts so bad. Do you believe me?”
“Yes,” Sadie whispered. Her throat was dangerously near to closing all the way. She could feel the emotions gripping her right where she breathed.
“I'm sorry,” Ram said.
"You have nothing to be sorry about," Sadie replied. She prayed then. As a sign of her lack of faith, she prayed that Ram would die quickly. In her mind he was so far gone that not even God could save him. "Why don't you lie down and sleep," she suggested.
His fevered mind found the suggestion agreeable and he slumped over with his face on the steel decking. More people came to gawk and though quite a few made snide or evil remarks, Sadie refused to respond, fearing to wake the man.
At half-past eight Ram began to make guttural noises from deep in his throat and a little while later he woke. He turned his cadaverous eyes on Sadie and then launched himself bodily at her. Only the chain kept him from rending her bit by bit.
Sadie went to her knees and cried, with the zombie stretching out his fingers only inches away. "I'm done!" she screeched to the guards. "I can't do this anymore. Let me out! Let me out!"
Neil tried to yell with her, but his voice locked and cracked; he could only pound on the deck until Yuri showed up.
"Finally," the Russian said as he saw what had become of Ram.
"Please kill him," Sadie begged.
The idea seemed to insult Yuri. "What? How you say this? I can not kill my exhibit. He and this little man are now exhibit. They show my vaccine is good. Da. They stay put until black woman go away tomorrow morning, and then I don't know what. Not good for little man, I suspect. Big man? He is already dead so nobody cares."
"Then release her," Neil said, indicating Sadie. "She's not yours and she's done nothing wrong."
Yuri considered this. "This, I could do, buuuut..."
"There is no but," Neil said cutting in on the Russian’s drawn out word. "The Whites bought her. She should be free
to go to them."
Yuri nodded in a tepid manner. "Yes, is true, but the Whites they are not so strong. I think your little girlfriend is better here. She keep you company. Is nice, da? Is safe."
"Safe?" Neil asked. "Is she in danger? I thought no weapons are allowed on board. Not even knives."
"What is it that I can say?" Yuri asked with an over-done shrug. "The Blacks have much oil. It gives them much power. Things happen. Now there are more and more bodies in river every day. I do what I can, but this girl is special. The queen black, she hates this girl. Is only safe right here."
"Maybe he's right..." Neil began.
Sadie cut right across him, "No. I can't stay here, not with Ram like this. I can’t, it hurts too much. And besides I don't want to stay on this boat." For a brief second she held her hand at waste height. Neil nodded his understanding.
"Let her go," he said to the Russian.
When Yuri left to get the keys to her shackle, Sadie moved as close to Neil as she could. The crowds were beginning to trickle back to see the final outcome. In a whisper she asked, "What do I do?"
Neil's face was puffy and red and in the dim light he barely seemed himself. He tried to smile and it was achingly sad for Sadie. "Run,” he said. “God gave you beautiful, fast legs. Use them! Find Jillybean and make a run for it."
"What about Sarah and Eve?" she asked. Her voice then dropped an octave, "What about you?"
"I think it's best if you forget about me," he said. "And Sarah, if she's with the colonel. And Eve, too."
Sadie couldn't believe this. "You want me to just give up. Look what they did to Ram for Christ's sake!"
Neil didn't look at the beast that was swinging its strong arms just inches away. "What do you think I'm trying to keep from happening to you? I don't want you to end up like him, and I definitely don't want you to end up like me. You heard what Cassie has in mind for me. She's going to skin me alive and probably hang me out..."
"Stop!" Sadie whispered harshly. Her face felt hot except where newly formed tears ran streaks down her cheeks. "Don't say that, please."
The Undead World (Book 2): The Apocalypse Survivors Page 34
