The Purge of Babylon Series Box Set, Vol. 3 | Books 7-9

by Sisavath, Sam

  If it were only his arms or aching body, he would have been happy. His throat throbbed too, the windpipe bruised, and God knew what other damage he had suffered. He took some comfort in the fact he could still breathe, so at least he wasn’t wheezing anymore.

  “You think they’re out there?” Jordan asked.

  She sat next to him at the back of the cage, both of them wearing their jackets. She had helped him put his on, Keo flinching with pain the entire time. The spot gave them a perfect view of the dead (again?) blue-eyed ghoul’s malformed ass and back. Its head was tilted to one side, the way it had done more than once during its interrogation of him. It almost looked as if it were embracing the cage, arms and legs wrapped around the bars, refusing to let go.

  “Willie boy cut off their heads and stuck them on pikes,” Danny had told him. “I don’t know why, but they responded to it. The black eyes. They stayed away from the farmhouse all night.”

  Gaby had confirmed Danny’s story. Not that Keo ever doubted it, though he had to admit that sometimes the ex-Ranger had a tendency to exaggerate. He hadn’t, that time.

  “This is crazy,” Jordan said. “Why would they stay away just because we killed him? It. Whatever.”

  He glanced down at his watch. 10:11 p.m. It wasn’t even midnight yet. There were still nine hours before sunrise.

  Goddamn Texas winters.

  Jordan moved closer so they could share their body heat. “It wanted him, didn’t it? Frank.”

  He nodded.

  “Does that mean he’s still alive?” she asked.

  “Maybe,” he said softly.

  “Hopefully?”

  “Maybe that, too.”

  You out there, Frank? You still alive, buddy?

  Can you hear me now?

  He smiled.

  “What?” Jordan said. When he gave her a questioning look: “You had a stupid grin on your face.”

  He shook his head. “Just thinking of a joke—”

  Tap-tap-tap.

  He stopped in mid-sentence.

  The sounds had come from above them. From the roof.

  They both looked up in time to see a pair of figures flitting across the cracks, temporarily blocking the streams of moonlight. Next to him, Jordan’s body went rigid before she reached down and picked up the spork from the floor. Blood, like mud, caked the stumpy tines.

  Tap-tap-tap.

  That came from outside the barn.

  Tap-tap-tap.

  From all around them.

  Tap-tap-tap...

  He and Jordan sat in silence and waited. He could hear her accelerated heartbeat, the sound of her fingers tightening around the spork’s handle.

  Saved by a spork, he thought. Never in a million years did he ever think he’d have to rely on an eating utensil to survive the end of the world.

  They waited and waited, but the creatures never made any attempts to enter the barn, though he could hear them easily enough through the rotting barn walls. They sounded agitated and restless, and yet they never tried to come inside. Maybe they could see through the cracks and saw the dead blue-eyed ghoul hanging off the cage door. Or maybe they just, somehow, knew.

  After a while, he noticed the ones on the roof above them had simply…left.

  “This is freaky,” Jordan whispered.

  Better than dead.

  “I don’t think they’re coming in,” she added, just a trace of barely restrained hope in her voice. “God, I can’t believe we’re going to survive this. Jesus, Keo, Jesus…”

  He looked over and was surprised to see her crying silently next to him. He reached over and brushed the wet drops off her cheeks, even though doing so made his entire arm feel like it was going to fall off at the socket.

  She gave him a pursed smile and shook her head. “I’m ten years old again,” she said, alternating between choking back tears and laughing.

  He smiled and put his arm around her, grimacing with pain, and pulled her to him. She came willingly, leaning her head against his shoulder. It hurt like a sonofabitch, but he didn’t let her know that.

  In the semidarkness, with little to do and even less to hear, he found himself thinking about the last few weeks. It was funny how things had worked out. He had come to Texas to find Gillian, but had found Jordan instead.

  He had to admit, it wasn’t an entirely bad trade. Not bad at all.

  26

  Gaby

  She landed on the tiled floor with a loud thump! and, in a crouch, immediately sprang up. The suffocating blackness was the first thing she noticed, followed by the two figures lying on the floor in front of her, their outlines visible in what little moonlight had managed to punch through the front windows of the hardware store. Her forefinger tightened against the trigger and she almost pulled it but stopped herself just in time because neither body was moving.

  She hadn’t stood up for more than a second before there was another thump! behind her. Nate, falling through the attic door after her. He was so close as he landed that he probably had to do some fancy maneuvering at the last second to avoid crashing into her. It was her fault; she had forgotten to move out of his way.

  She did that now, taking a step forward, the rifle in front of her. She swung it left, then right, scanning the darkness.

  Christ, it was dark.

  “Danny!” she hissed.

  “That’s my name, don’t wear it out,” a voice said, just before a lone shadow appeared from around one of the many shelves that separated the back of the store from the front. If she hadn’t heard his voice first, Gaby might have fired because she could only see a dark specter blanketed in shadows, moving toward her.

  “Jesus, Danny,” she said.

  “No, just Danny.” He stopped and crouched before reaching her.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Those other two—start stripping them.”

  “What?”

  “Their clothes. Grab them quick, before they come back.”

  “Before who comes back?” Nate said behind her.

  “Spider-Man and his amazing friends, who else?”

  She glanced back at Nate, who was slowly lowering his rifle. She could just barely make out his soft blue eyes in the darkened store.

  He met her gaze and shrugged. “I should have known he was too stupid to die.”

  “I heard that,” Danny said.

  “You were supposed to.”

  The dead man closest to her was lying on his stomach, his head turned to one side so that the protruding breathing apparatus of a gas mask over his face was easy to make out. He had on a brown jacket, and a rifle lay next to him, within reach of his extended fingers. Gleaming brass casings surrounded him like a police chalk outline.

  When she turned the dead man over onto his back, he had on a black uniform underneath. There was a name tag, but she didn’t waste the second it would have taken trying to squint out the letters. He was a collaborator—a dead one—and that was all she needed to know.

  Nate moved past her and toward the second body. He crouched and pulled off the man’s jacket to get at the uniform underneath. He glanced back at her before the two of them looked over the counter at Danny on the other side. He was already unbuckling the third dead man’s gun belt while keeping one eye on the front door.

  She followed his gaze, but couldn’t see anything out there.

  “Danny,” she said.

  “Less talk, more stripping,” he said.

  “Is this going to work? The uniforms?”

  He didn’t answer her.

  “Danny…”

  “Sure,” he said, his grin just barely visible in the semidarkness. “Put everything on. Uniform, gun belt, and gas mask—the works.”

  She wasn’t sure if she believed him, or if he even believed it himself, but she turned back to her man anyway. Her fingers were trembling slightly as she pulled down the jacket’s zipper.

  The collaborator was younger up close, probably in his mid-twenties, with short bla
ck hair and hazel eyes. There was a hole in the middle of his forehead, where blood pooled. His face looked frozen in a state of shock.

  Better you than me, she thought, and pulled off his jacket.

  The pants and shirt were a size too big for her, but she fixed both at the same time by tucking the hem of the shirt into her waistband and tightening the gun belt another notch. There was surprisingly little blood on the clothes. At least, in the darkness of the hardware store. It would probably look different in the morning.

  If she was still alive to see morning.

  Nate hadn’t been quite as lucky. His man had bled out so much he made a face the whole time he was pulling the shirt on, then zipped up a jacket over it. He picked up a gas mask from the floor next. “Is this really going to work?”

  “I don’t—” she started to say.

  Danny interrupted her, snapping, “Put them on now,” from the other side of the counter.

  She glanced over, surprised by the edge in his voice, but something else drew her eyes past him, and she saw the silhouetted figures moving outside the store on the sidewalk, their emaciated forms like dancing shadows against the moonlight.

  Ghouls.

  She sucked in a large breath and pulled her gas mask on, then grabbed the dead soldier’s M4 she had laid on the counter. The ammo pouches around her waist were full again after combining the leftover magazines with the ones she had been carrying since this morning. She touched the butt of her Glock, just to make sure it was still in the holster along her hip.

  Nate had wandered over to stand next to her, clutching his own stolen M4. His appearance, with his lengthening Mohawk sticking out above his gas-masked face, made for a menacing sight, like something out of a bad post-apocalyptic movie.

  “Stay here,” Danny said, taking a step forward.

  “Where are you going?” she asked, wondering if her voice sounded as odd as his did through the gas mask.

  “Gotta let them know we’re in here, so they don’t come in for a closer look.”

  “Danny…”

  “Trust me.”

  She sighed and clutched the rifle tighter, watching Danny walk toward the front of the store to stand about five feet from the windows. He had stopped in a pool of moonlight, as if presenting himself to the swarm of undead things outside.

  God, Danny, I hope you know what you’re doing.

  His presence didn’t go unnoticed, and the creatures surged toward the store seconds later. The sight of them rushing forward made her catch her breath, and it took everything Gaby had to fight the instinct to retreat. She didn’t, because there was nowhere to go. The only escape was up, back into the attic—and then what? Could they really survive up there all night?

  “I think it’s working,” Nate whispered next to her.

  The ghouls were pressing themselves against the glass panes, some sliding their bodies back and forth, leaving thick clumps of liquid in their wake. A bony elbow tap-tapped against another section of window, though she wasn’t sure if the creature was doing that on purpose or if it just couldn’t help itself because of its mangled arm. They hadn’t made any attempts to enter the store through the lone door yet, which was the best indication Nate could be right, that this might actually be working—

  One of the creatures glared past Danny and straight at her.

  Her legs might have wobbled slightly, and when her hands showed signs it might follow suit, she tightened her grip around the rifle to keep them busy. The sight of them rubbing themselves against the glass and peering in at Danny (and her) made her skin crawl. She willed the rest of her body to remain still, and slowly, very slowly, they obeyed.

  Then, one by one, the creatures pried themselves from the windows and raced off up the street. The sight of them, simply pulling back and disappearing one by one by one, leaving thick films of brown and white (and yellow?) liquids behind to mark their presence, made her breath quicken even more so than when they were staring in at her.

  “Sonofabitch,” Nate said breathlessly next to her.

  Danny turned around and began walking back to them. He looked calm, as if he hadn’t just been playing who-will-blink-first with a swarm of ghouls, with just a thin wall of glass between them a few seconds ago.

  “I can’t believe that worked,” Nate said.

  “Oh, ye of little faith,” Danny said.

  “It must be the uniforms and gas masks. They’re using them as some kind of identifying markers. Like dogs.”

  “Like dogs?” she said.

  “That’s what they are, when you get down to it. Just animals. Not any smarter or dumber. And it’s pretty easy to trick an animal, even one that runs on two feet.”

  Danny finally reached them and pulled off his gas mask.

  “I never doubted you for a second,” she smiled at him.

  “Not even a second?” he smiled back.

  “Okay, maybe just a pinch,” she said, pinching her fingers in front of her.

  Danny grinned, and from the look on his face, he probably had a clever comeback ready, but he was interrupted by a loud squawk that blared across the store, followed by a muffled voice from somewhere in the darkness.

  “Come in, Perkins,” the muffled voice said. “You still there?”

  “That’s a radio!” Nate said, dropping his voice to almost a whisper for some reason.

  “Find it!” Danny said.

  Nate searched behind the counter while she looked on the other side, and Danny went through the aisles, scanning the floor.

  “Anything?” Danny called.

  “Nothing,” she called back.

  “It’s not back here,” Nate said.

  “Keep looking!” Danny said.

  Another squawk from somewhere in the darkened store, followed by, “Perkins, come in.”

  The voice sounded clearer (and closer!) this time, and she hurried toward a corner, feeling like a blind man groping for a clue.

  There!

  She snatched it up from the floor, said, “Got it!”

  Nate and Danny hurried over as the radio squawked again, and this time a new voice said, “If they’re not answering, it means they’re dead.”

  “All of them?” the first voice asked.

  “What do you think, genius? If the others are still around, they’d answer, wouldn’t they?”

  “What now?” a third voice asked. “Do we go in after them?”

  “We don’t even know where they were when the shooting started,” the second man answered.

  “Somewhere in the middle of town,” the first said, though he didn’t sound entirely convinced.

  She knew leaders when she heard it, and there wasn’t one among the three they were listening to now. There was too much doubt in their voices and too little certainty. You couldn’t hope to lead men with that kind of wavering. She had learned that much just watching Will at work.

  “Can’t go in there now, not with all that activity,” the second voice said. “Nightcrawlers are all over the place like fucking cockroaches in heat. They must be chasing something big. I don’t wanna get in the middle of that.”

  “So what, just leave them in there?” the first one asked.

  “It’s risky, that’s all I’m saying.”

  “We should wait till morning,” the third man said. He was trying to sound confident, and failing. “We’ll get reinforcements then. That’s assuming whoever’s in there is still alive after tonight. That’s a big if.”

  “Yeah, I like that idea even better,” one of the other two said. She was losing track of who was who; there was a mechanical distortion through the handheld radio that made the voices start to blur together.

  “Tomorrow,” someone else said, clearly relieved.

  They waited to hear more conversation, but the radio remained quiet.

  After a while, Danny grinned at her and Nate and said, “See? Told you. Easy peasy.”

  Then he let out a big sigh.

  Just in case the dead soldiers’ friend
s decided to risk entering the town anyway, they dragged the third body behind the counter and deposited it in a pile with the other two. They left the attic door open with the rope connected to the ladder dangling down, in case they needed it in a hurry. She didn’t like the idea of being cornered up there again—the brief but hellacious gun battle from earlier still fresh in her mind—but it was preferable to facing the snake pit of ghouls gathered outside the store at the moment. She could still see them occasionally moving back and forth across the store’s glass walls.

  Danny had locked the front door just to be safe, not that any of them thought it was going to do a hell of a lot of good if the creatures decided to assault the building anyway. The glass windows weren’t going to hold for very long, at least not between now and morning. The lock was more for the benefit of any humans that might be poking around. If nothing else, it would provide them with an early warning.

  They crouched behind the counter with the bodies a few feet behind Gaby. She did her best to ignore their presence, which was difficult because it seemed like her boots squeaked on their blood or she kicked a stray brass casing whenever she moved. Nate was on the other side of the back counter, and Danny had taken up position in the middle. Danny sat against the back wall now, another one of the dead soldiers’ M4s in his lap. His recently acquired jacket was zipped up all the way to his neck, and he looked like a turtle with its head stuck out of the opening.

  They had all removed their gas masks for the sake of comfort, though at the moment, with the stink of the bodies nearby, she was having second thoughts.

  “What happened?” she asked Danny. She wasn’t quite whispering, but she kept her voice low enough that she could be heard and still hear anything approaching the store.

  Danny looked over. “When?”

  “After you jumped down.”

  “I shot them.”

  “All three?”

  “I got lucky. It was dark and they were preoccupied with trying to pinpoint where you and Nate Dogg were up in the attic. That, and they probably didn’t expect me to jump down the way I did. You know, all idiot-like.”