by Fitch, E. M.
Kaylee wasn’t aware she was whimpering until Jack gently shushed her. His arms came all the way around her body and he pulled her against his chest. She was surprised to find she was also shaking. “Quiet now,” he said. “They’re most active when they first wake.”
Kaylee bit her lip and held her breath, releasing it slowly after a few moments. But her blood still rushed in her ears, a low throb that beat to the sound of her sister’s name.
Emma. Emma. Emma.
After all their planning, all the care they took, in one stupid little miscalculation, one error…
Emma’s infected.
Bitten.
Gone.
Just like Mom. She’ll never be my little sister again.
Kaylee couldn’t help the sob that broke through.
“Shh!” Jack warned in a hiss, gripping her tighter against his chest. She buried her face there and felt her tears soak his tee shirt, his zipper scratched against her cheek.
The infected were moving now, the ones closest to the shaft of light were screeching, Kaylee could hear their teeth grinding together, their nails scratching for purchase on the thick concrete walls. The bodies closer to them were groaning, breaths rasping unevenly through filthy throats.
And then came the sound of tearing, of ripping flesh. Kaylee whipped her head up in surprise.
They were eating.
All she could see of Jack was the whites of his eyes, and they gleamed down at her in shock. She turned out of his embrace and pressed her chest to the wall, feeling him push into her even closer as she did. She mashed her face between the cold concrete and the pipe, scraping her cheek as she turned so one eye could see the wakening throng.
In the clear shaft of white light she saw them, the swarm of infected, and they were feeding. Larger men and women were eating their sleeping companions, waking them with their teeth. Strips of streaming flesh were pulled from bone and the victims were waking with screams, backs arching in pain, eyes rolling back as what little life they had left went draining out of them. The basement echoed with groans and shrieks; the musty air became saturated with the rusty, metallic scent of blood. And dark rivers ran from the center of the carnage and out toward the remote corners.
“I’ve never seen them do that,” Kaylee breathed in disbelief. “They’re eating each other.”
“Kaylee, shush, please,” Jack whispered, pleaded, his mouth pressed to her ear.
A boy turned. He was smaller than the adults, thinner at least. He was probably no older than Kaylee when he was bitten. His yellow eyes searched through the darkness and Kaylee drew in a hurried breath.
His gaze zeroed in on their pipe and he stepped in their direction. Kaylee froze, unable to look away, unable even to warn Jack. And it was only now that she realized how very exposed he had left himself, only now did she realize how he must have been trying to keep her protected by placing his own body between hers and the infected; because if this boy found them, Jack would be bit. She reached her hand back to him and found his thigh. She squeezed. It was the best warning she could give.
The boy drew closer; his gaze fevered, eyes wielding. He staggered over a pile of stirring bodies, bodies that had not yet felt the sunlight. He snarled, a ripping sound coming more from his chest than his mouth, and even in the silhouetted light, Kaylee could see the dripping sores covering his lips.
But his footsteps staggered, his body fought him as he drew deeper into the darkness. With a final, shuddering gasp, he fell. His body crashed, unresponsive, over a pile of sleeping bodies. And his fellows didn’t pause to consider what had drawn him into the shadows. They grabbed his heel and pulled, and his feebly stirring body was devoured.
Kaylee felt Jack release a breath and she turned back into him. His arms were braced on either side of her and she could feel the tension rolling off him.
“They can’t get us here,” she whispered, rising up on her toes to whisper directly in his ear.
“So long as the light doesn’t shift towards us,” he replied. “It’s only one o’clock. We’ll see soon.”
Chapter Ten
The tears continued to drip down Kaylee’s face until her cheeks were glazed but she wasn’t sobbing any longer. Her eyes felt heavy-lidded and hollow, tools used only for gazing and crying with no effort wasted on conveying emotion.
The light had shifted, but in their favor. As the rays hit body after body, waking them from their extended slumber, the infected woke ravenous. It took only moments for them to turn on each other, to sink filthy, splintered teeth into the remains of their one-time friends and family members. Kaylee and Jack had watched, and with each tear of muscle from bone Kaylee thought of her sister. She remembered Emma’s face as she had matured through the years. The round cheeks of childhood, rosy with youth women had tried for ages to mimic with blush. The growth spurt that had slimmed her and lent distinction to her cheekbones. The month when she had thought glasses were “cool” and so wore a fake pair everywhere. And worse even than that, the one ridiculous haircut with those horrible short bangs. But she couldn’t picture her with yellow eyes, nor fractured teeth, and especially not the wild, feral look that the boy that had spotted them had flashed.
“Twilight,” Jack whispered, his lips very nearly resting on her ear. Kaylee nodded her understanding. She forced her eyes to blink, surprised by how dry they felt, especially when tears continued to leak towards her chin. She pulled away from Jack, having to twist out of his arms to do so, and dragged her left hand over her face. She winced as pain shot up her arm. She had forgotten her wrist was broken.
The realization of that one burst of pain brought all the others into sharp relief. Her hip throbbed and pulsed, the bones popping and cracking when she shifted. Her shoulder was tender and most likely bruised. Actually, when she shifted her weight a bit, attempting to alleviate the pins and needles shooting up her leg, she discovered that her entire left side felt like one big bruise. If she had been coherent enough to thank God, she might have offered thanks for the instinct to protect her head. Her skull felt relatively free of injury. Though the desiccate ache of her eyes, the never-drying trail of tears on her cheeks, and the pulse of swollen sinuses served as a reminder that there were far worse things than some scrapes and scratches.
Emma.
“I think we should wait at least an hour after complete dark,” Jack whispered, stepping closer to her as he did. Kaylee felt her back pressed to the cold concrete wall and she shivered involuntarily. “This batch doesn’t act like the ones on the surface, they’re too hungry.”
Kaylee nodded again, completely sure Jack could feel her head bob against his chest, even if he couldn’t clearly see her.
“We can run for the fire station then,” he pressed and Kaylee had the odd notion that he seemed nervous. “I’ll get you home.”
Kaylee tilted her head back to look at Jack, her chin bumped his collarbone, and she felt the mask her face had composed itself into crack as her eyebrows drew together in confusion.
Why is he nervous? Once it’s dark, we’ll be safe. We could stroll home kicking cans and howling at the moon. The infected won’t wake.
Emma won’t wake…
“Is that, I mean, it’s okay with you?” he mumbled, leaning back to catch her eye. He seemed concerned and… wary.
Kaylee nodded again, trying to peer through the dark to see his expression. All that shone back at her were anxious eyes.
“I promise to get you home, Kay,” he murmured, pulling her back into his embrace. She went willingly. After all, she had been in his embrace this whole long day, let his arms hold her together as she grieved, cowered into him as the light had first started to shift and for one horrifying moment they thought it was coming towards them. Falling into his chest had felt like the most natural action in the world.
And it was comfortable too. Kaylee could recognize that even through the aching feet and protesting knees, through her bruises and cuts. His hold wasn’t just protective, like her
father’s; or warm and friendly, like Andrew’s. (Though it most certainly was both of those.) His grip was very nearly possessive. Every line of his body pressed against hers and he shifted almost imperceptibly as she did. His lips brushed against her, passing her neck and hair to whisper in her ear. His fingers pressed just so…
Kaylee shivered again, not even having the excuse of being backed into a concrete wall to blame it on. Jack’s hands rubbed down her back in response and Kaylee nuzzled further into him. The action brought back a clear memory, though nothing had been clear at the time. The night Kaylee first met Jack he had known she’d hit her head because she had cuddled into him. Funny, the action didn’t seem so strange now.
“Kaylee?” Jack whispered, his breath a warm rush of air against her neck. “Say something. Please.” His voice sounded strangled towards the end and Kaylee blinked through the seemingly endless stream of tears. He seemed nervous again, unsure and scared, and Kaylee was confused as to what could make him feel that way. The last rays of twilight were dimming. The sky visible from the hole in the floor was a deep purple, the color of a fresh bruise. The bodies that were strewn around them were barely twitching, no infected had even tried for a bite in over half an hour.
“Are you okay?” Kaylee croaked, leaning back from him once more to gaze up, even though the attempt was futile in this light. Her voice was broken and cracked, sounding as though her throat was lined in sandpaper. But she forced the words out, worried over Jack.
When was it I last spoke? she thought remotely, realizing she couldn’t remember.
Jack laughed and Kaylee started at the sound.
“Am I okay?” he asked, chortling and then pulling her flush against him. He chuckled into her hair before he placed a light kiss. And it hit her then. He was worried over her, worried that she had lost her mind, gone crazy and despondent, catatonic in her grief.
Well, I had, hadn’t I? Just for a bit.
“You were worried about me,” she said, voicing it as the fact that it was and not a question.
“You weren’t speaking,” he whispered, all traces of amusement gone. “And your face was…” He trailed off though Kaylee could hear the disquiet that laced his tone.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, her lips ghosting over his shirt. “Emma.”
She got the last word out, but only barely. A fresh sob caught in her throat and she bit her tongue to hold it there, sick of crying. Her arms were twitching and she felt her breathing speed up. Anger was fueling her now and she had never, not once, not even when her mother stood there watching Kaylee abandon her, wanted to kill the infected as she did now. Frantic ideas flew through her mind, images of her fingers encasing the handle of a gun, or her arms swinging an ax high before bringing it down time and time again. It was their fault her sister was gone, their fault she was bitten. But then a singularly awful thought flashed through her mind: her finger squeezing the trigger of a shotgun pointed at Emma, watching her blood spill to the pavement and her eyes roll back, turning to find her mother and father watching her in horror. Kaylee shuddered and leant heavily into Jack.
“I hate them,” she cried into his damp, cotton shirt.
“I know,” he answered and Kaylee didn’t like the level of understanding and malice that infused his words. She knew if she could see him now she would see hardened features and a faraway look. She knew he’d be remembering his own witnessed massacres, remembering the day he got the news that his family was gone, remembering watching his friends and classmates with gnashing teeth as he made his escape from school. He hated them on a level far more intense than she did. He wanted them to die, every last one of them, Emma and her mother included.
“But it’s not their fault,” she whispered, feeling him stiffened under her as she did. She heard him release a huff of frustration. It seemed he had no other response.
The sky was nearly blackened now. Pinpoints of light brightened to contrast their inky surroundings and a pale moon replaced the set sun. The basement was getting colder by the minute and the thin material of Kaylee’s shirt did nothing to keep in any warmth. She realized belatedly that her body was shivering when Jack wrapped his arms around her, pulling her back to him and enclosing her in the folds of his opened sweatshirt once again.
It was very warm against his chest. His scent was now familiar and reassuring, the smell of pines almost erased by his stint in the city, but the musky, woodsy undertones remained. His deep even breaths and reassuring heartbeats lulled her senses. As sore as she was, she almost drifted into sleep.
“It’s time,” he whispered. She pulled herself away from him, folding her left arm across her stomach as she did, attempting to keep in his warmth. He moved silently across the floor, linking fingers with her and pulling her with him. The blackness pressed them from every angle. Only the faint stars that shone above betrayed the broken floorboards they had first fallen through. Kaylee supposed, as she toed through the bodies and slipped over slick trails of blood, that there must be a door to this basement somewhere. But with the limited light and chaos of their first moments in the darkened room, neither she nor Jack had seen it. Now all she wanted was to get out, to see her father and Andrew again, to know what happened to her sister.
Had they chucked her out, once they realize the truth of her statement? Had they killed her? Was that one loud, shocking boom that sounded first really a shot into her sister, the end of her short life? Or was it from the rooftop, aimed at clearing their path?
There were so many questions that Kaylee wanted answers to, even though she wasn’t sure she could live with them once she found out.
Could I look at Mr. McCormick again, if it were he that pulled the trigger? Could I trust Dad or Andrew if they hurled Emma out to face her end in the streets?
“How do we get out?” Kaylee asked, intent on breaking through her poisonous thoughts as she gazed through the opening. Even standing on her toes she wouldn’t have been able to reach the top edge. Jack was silent as he walked the perimeter of the small circle, the moonlight glancing off his inky hair, making the tips gleam.
“I could boost you out.”
“That’s stupid,” Kaylee said. “I couldn’t pull you out.”
“You could run for help and come back.”
“No!” she all but shouted. “I won’t leave you.” She spoke through grit teeth though instead of the growl of protest she had intended, her statement sounded more like a whine, a low plead.
“Kaylee,” Jack started, his voice placating, but she interrupted.
“I’ll boost you up, you can pull me up after.” The silence that followed was loaded with disapproval, but Kaylee was determined. She would not be losing anybody else today, not even for a moment. “C’mon,” she prompted, slapping her knee lightly as she knelt down.
“But your hand—” he mumbled, his eyes shining down at her.
“Will be fine,” Kaylee interrupted, the throb that pulsed through it making her words a lie. “You’ll help me,” she amended.
“I don’t like it,” he grumbled but his placed his foot gingerly on her thigh. Kaylee wrapped her good arm around his leg to prop him. “Ready?”
“Go for it,” she huffed, bracing herself as he pushed his weight unto her right leg.
“I can’t reach,” he hissed, and she heard his fingertips scramble for a hold before he landed next to her.
“My shoulder,” she gasped, feeling the sting of pain his weight had shot through her left side.
“Kay, I—”
“C’mon,” she growled, tugging at his shirt. “Get me out of here.”
It might have been her last demand and how she was asking him to take care of her, but he complied almost immediately. She grunted as he flung himself up once more, gritting her teeth when his boot found her collarbone, but she felt his weight shift as he caught hold of a loose crossbeam and hoisted himself through. She thrust him up with her good hand, giving him whatever momentum she could supply. His feet dangled in her fa
ce for just a moment, swinging so close she was almost kicked, before he disappeared from view entirely. There was a creak of loose floorboards, the beams groaning under the weight that was now walking across them. Then with a scuffling across the dusty boards, the silhouette of Jack’s head appeared. Kaylee imagined him grinning down at her.
“Ready?” he asked, a definable pleasure in his voice at being free of the basement. Kaylee stood shakily and extended her right hand in answer as he leaned lower to grasp her. Her feet left the floor and she was suspended in air that felt like pitch before her wrist scraped against the floor above. Kaylee scrambled to get her left elbow unto the floor. Jack grabbed her hurt arm, letting her right hand grip the floorboards, and he hauled her out.
She fell unto him, his arms encasing her, and he collapsed back unto the dirty floor. His breath came in heavy pants for a moment and she rose and fell with his chest as he breathed. She went to move off him, to let him draw breath with ease, but he tightened his hold, pressing her to him. She let her head settle into the crook of his neck and her eyes drift close.
This embrace felt different. His arms relaxed and his hands ghosted up her sides. One settled low on her back and the other cupped her neck, still holding her to him. His breathing softened and Kaylee thought she heard the sound of her name whisper past his lips.
“Thank you,” she said softly, her lips moving over the skin of his neck. “You came after me. I don’t know what I would have... Thank you.”
He squeezed her lightly. “I’ll always come after you, you idiot,” he said. His tone was light and teasing but his pledge seemed sincere. A shiver of irritation rolled up her spine.
“Don’t promise me things,” Kaylee replied, rolling away from him despite his grip and sitting up. She winced as her left hip throbbed against the sudden motion. But she didn’t want to hear promises only to have to remember them later when they were broken.
