“Yup. A whole lot of them.”
“And my friends? Did you see where they went?”
“They ran in the right direction. If they keep going, they’ll make it. I’m more worried about us. There’s a bunch of zombies running around these streets.”
“How far is the church?” Chas asked.
“It’s the Methodist on Fourth Street about three blocks away,” she said.
Chas craned her head to look out into the street and spotted an old sedan standing with the driver’s door open. “If we can get to that car, I can get us out of here.”
“How?” the girl asked. “We don’t have the keys.”
“Maybe not, but I can hotwire it.”
“You can?”
“Uh, huh. I just need a few minutes.”
The girl considered this and nodded. “All right. Once it’s clear, we make a run for it.”
“Deal,” Chas said. “What’s your name, by the way?”
“I’m Anke. You?”
“Chas.”
“Nice to meet you, Chas.”
“Likewise.”
“Okay, when I say go, we go. Got that?” Anke asked.
Chas nodded.
Two minutes later, Anke took a final look before whispering, “Now!”
Together, they burst out into the open street and ran toward the sedan. Anke dove in first after quickly checking it was empty. Chas followed, shimmying into the driver seat and closing the door with a sigh of relief. “We made it.”
“Only if you can start this thing,” Anke said with a pointed look.
“Right. Here goes.” Holstering the gun, Chas drew her knife, the same one Uncle Al had given her for her birthday.
The gleaming blade brought back memories of the Ferris wheel and everything that had happened that night. It seemed like an eternity ago now.
With nervous fingers, Chas pried open the plastic cover on the steering column and pulled out the battery, ignition, and starter wire bundle. Praying she got it right, she stripped the insulation from the battery wires and twisted them together. Next, she connected the ignition wire to the battery wires.
The dashboard lights flared to life, and Chas nearly screamed with delight. “Yes!”
“Um, Chas?” Anke said.
“Yes?”
“That’s awesome and all, but you’d better get the motor running now. We’ve got company.”
“What?” Chas raised her head and immediately regretted it. A swarm of zombies was headed their way and would reach them within seconds. “Damn.”
“Hurry!” Anke shouted.
“I can’t. If I don’t get this next part right, I’ll electrocute myself,” Chas said, ducking down once more.
With trembling fingers, she tripped the starter wires, being careful not to touch them with her bare hands. Gritting her teeth, she sparked them against the battery wires. The engine turned but didn’t catch, and Chas nearly cried with frustration.
A thud on the window caused her to jump, and Anke screamed as zombies surrounded the car. They beat on the windows with their fists, and their snarling faces filled their vision. “Chas, please. Get us out of here.”
“I’m trying!” The second time ended just like the first. In failure. The car wouldn’t start.
By now, they were completely surrounded, and the car shook as the crowd of infected rocked it back and forth on its wheels. Anke clung to her seat, and it took everything Chas had not to panic and drop the wires.
“Please start. Please, please, please,” she begged as she sparked the wires a third and a fourth time. With a roar, the engine caught, and she quickly revved the motor to keep it running before detaching the starter wires.
With a sigh of relief, Chas jammed the car into reverse. “Hold on, Anke. We’re getting out of here.”
“About time,” Anke said then shrieked as the glass next to her face shattered. Hands reached inside to grab her, and Chas jammed her foot on the gas.
The sedan shot backward like a bullet from a pistol. Zombies went flying in every direction as Chas shifted into drive and shot up the street with a screech of tires. They thudded over several bodies, the old car rocking like a ship on stormy waves.
Chas gripped the wheel with both hands, trying not to throw up when a spray of thick, black blood washed across her window. Thank heavens it was intact, or she would’ve gotten a faceful. “Are you okay, Anke?”
“I’m fine,” Anke replied, twisting in her seat to watch the last of the zombies fade from view as they raced away. “Where’d you learn how to do that?”
“It’s a long story,” Chas replied, not wanting to get into her family history right then. “Which way to the church?”
“Keep straight for two blocks then make a sharp turn right,” Anke said.
Chas nodded. “Okay.”
Hope filled her chest as they drew closer and closer. The only thing that mattered now was getting to the church. Her friends would be there. They had to. Maybe the survivors will help us save the camp too.
She glanced at Anke. The girl looked about the same age as her. Maybe a year or two older. She was built like an athlete, and her tan attested to a life spent outdoors. Her brown hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and she looked as excited as Chas felt.
“Thanks for saving my life back there. I owe you one,” Chas said.
“No worries. You just saved my ass too, so I guess we’re even,” Anke replied with a wave of her hand.
Chas grinned. “I suppose we are.”
“Turn right here,” Anke said, and Chas turned her attention back to the road.
She made a sharp turn without slowing down but screamed when a concrete barrier appeared right in front of them. There was no time to stop, and they slammed into the wall nose first.
Metal crunched as the front of the car crumpled into a ball, and Chas threw up her hands as she was thrown forward by the impact. Her head hit the windshield, and pain shot through her neck and spine. The taste of copper filled her mouth, and she coughed as a dribble of blood ran down her chin. For the second time that day, darkness swooped down to claim her.
“Anke,” she whimpered, fighting to stay awake. Silence met her call, and Chas slumped forward as the world faded to black.
Chapter 18
Chas’ consciousness dipped in and out, her eyelids fluttering as she became aware of movement all around her. Hands gripped her arms and hauled her from the car. It had to be zombies. She tried to fight them, mewling her protests like a weak kitten. I don’t want to die. I can’t let them bite me…eat me.
The hands ignored her efforts, and she was pulled from the wreck and onto the tar. This was it. She was going to die. Gravel stung her palms as she struggled against their hold, expecting teeth to sink into her flesh at any moment.
That didn’t happen.
Instead, she was lifted into the air and laid down on something hard. A board, maybe. Or, a stretcher. Voices filled the air around her, and fingers pried her eyelids open to shine a bright light into her pupils. People. Survivors like her.
“Stop…it hurts.” In truth, everything hurt. It felt like her body had been tossed into a meat grinder and spat out the other end. Nothing felt like it belonged. She felt disconnected, disjointed. A broken doll pieced together again but all wrong.
Her brain flashed to the moment of impact. The screech of metal on concrete. A distant scream. Silence. Awful silence.
“Anke. Where’s Anke?”
“Sh, your friend’s right here. She’s fine,” a voice said in a soothing monotone. “Relax. You need to relax.”
“She’s okay?” Chas mumbled, her head drooping to the side as the darkness swarmed in again, dragging her into its cold embrace.
It felt like hours had passed before she woke again. This time, she came awake with a gasp, shooting upright to find herself lying on a bed. She blinked at the bright fluorescent light in the ceiling before looking down at her body.
Nothing looked familiar.
>
Her clothes were gone, and her frame was covered in a white gown like the ones you got in a hospital. Her bare legs were mottled with purple bruises, but a fresh dressing covered her old wound.
Chas lifted her hands and felt her face. Her fingertips ran over a line of stitches close to her hairline. Her lower lip was swollen, cut on the inside, and her head ached. Stitches. That meant medical treatment, which indicated other people.
“Where am I?”
The church. They were heading for the church when…Chas gasped. “Anke!”
She jumped off the bed and ran to the door, jiggling the handle. It was locked. She banged her fists on the door. “Hello! Anyone out there?”
Nobody answered.
Eventually, Chas gave up and sat down again, surveying the room. All it contained was a single bed and mattress, a small table, and a toilet in the corner along with a washbasin. A glass of water stood on the bedside table, and she greedily gulped it down. Her parched tissues sucked up the precious liquid with relief. As if on cue, her bladder clenched, and she jumped up to empty it. Afterward, there was nothing left to do but wait.
The hours passed slowly, and Chas grew more and more frustrated. She spent the time pacing up and down and banging on the door. Not once did she get an answer. At one point she dozed off only to resume her furious tirade once more when awake.
“What the hell is wrong with these people? Are they crazy? Nuts? Cannibals?” Chas shouted, bouncing up and down on the hard mattress. “Open the freaking door!”
As if in answer to her prayers, a key turned in the lock, and the door swung open to reveal a stern-looking man old enough to be her father. He carried a gun, and he wasn’t smiling. Not one bit.
Chas had jumped up, ready to attack whoever opened her room, but now she swallowed, fear curling in her stomach. “Um. Who are you?”
“Follow me, please,” he said, ignoring her question.
“What?”
But the man was already gone, and after a second’s hesitation, she hurried after him. The outside looked much like the inside had. Bare and cold. Brightly lit. A long corridor stretched past more doors like hers to an exit at the end, and the mystery man was already half-way through it.
Chas sped up to a jog and slipped through the door just as it swung shut again. She looked around, surprised to find herself inside a clinic. Hospital beds lined the wall, and nurses bustled to and fro. A doctor was making notes on a clipboard, and the sharp tang of antiseptic filled her nostrils.
“What is this?” Chas asked.
“This is the infirmary, dear,” a matronly woman in a white overcoat answered. A name tag labeled her as Inge. “Now, would you please follow me? I need to clear you for release.”
“Release?” Chas asked, now thoroughly confused.
She glanced behind her and noticed that the mystery man had taken up a guard-like position next to the door she’d just exited. He stood stock still, hands folded and face blank. Not once did he even look at her.
“You must excuse Mr. Peterson,” the nurse said. “He takes his job very seriously.”
“More like Mr. Got-a-stick-up-my-bum,” Chas muttered as she followed Inge toward one of the hospital beds. “What exactly is his job? And where are we? Who’s in charge?”
“Sit down, please,” Inge said, indicating the bed.
Chas did so with reluctance. “Fine, but can you please tell me what’s going on? I’ve been locked up for who knows how long, and I’m looking for my friend, Anke, and no one will answer any of my questions!”
Inge sighed. “Of course, dear. I’m sorry for the confusion. We’ve got a very carefully worked out system here, and sometimes it’s easy to forget how scared and frightened you must be.”
“I’m not scared. I just want answers,” Chas said, folding her arms across her chest.
“I know, dear. All in good time, but first, I need to do your final exam so you can be released into the general population.”
“What does that even mean?” Chas said, her frustration growing more acute by the minute.
“When you arrived, you were injured. We treated you as best we could, but after that, you had to go through what everyone new here does: Quarantine,” Inge said. “It’s to ensure that nobody on the inside turns into a zombie.”
“That’s what it was all about?” Chas asked.
“Yes, and I’m sorry if you felt lonely or frightened, but we’ve found it’s the best way to keep the infection out.”
“So…if he opened the door, and I was a zombie, Peterson would’ve killed me?” Chas asked.
Inge ducked her head. “That’s his job.”
“Wow. No wonder he can’t crack a smile.”
“Precisely, and now that you’ve passed quarantine, I can release you after a final check-up to make sure you’re in good health.”
“Okay,” Chas said, giving in to Inge’s ministrations. “What about Anke?”
“Anke was more severely injured in the crash than you were, but she’ll be fine. We’ll just have to keep her here a bit longer to make sure she heals.”
“Can I see her?”
“Not now, dear. Maybe later. She’s resting at the moment,” Inge answered.
“All right. As long as she’s okay,” Chas said, making a note to check in on her new friend later on. “What about my other friends?”
“Others?”
“Yes, I lost them on the outside, but they were headed here. A boy named Dean, and two girls, Vanessa and Emily,” Chas said.
“Ah, yes. I remember them. They’ve been released already. You’ll see them soon enough.”
“Oh, thank heavens. I was so worried about them,” Chas said, sagging with relief.
Inge smiled as she took Chas’ blood pressure and checked her stitches. “How do you feel? Any pain?”
“Everything hurts.”
Inge chuckled. “It’s bound to. You were properly banged up when you arrived, poor thing. Here’s your medicine. Antibiotics and painkillers. Be sure to take them on time and to finish the course.”
“Thanks,” Chas mumbled as she accepted the two bottles of pills.
“Here are your belongings, freshly laundered,” Inge said, handing over a plastic bag. “I’ll close the curtains so you can get dressed.”
Once she was out of the hospital gown and wearing her own clothes, Chas felt more like herself. She quickly noticed that her weapons were gone, though. “Where’s the rest of my stuff?”
“In the armory. It’ll be returned once you’ve proven to be trustworthy or get a job that involves exposure to the outside,” Inge explained.
“I see.” Chas frowned as a thought occurred to her. “Tell me. Am I a prisoner here?”
Inge laughed. “Goodness, no. You can leave anytime you want, dear, though why you’d want to I can’t even begin to fathom.”
“I have my reasons.”
“If they involve other survivors, be sure to speak to our leader first. He’ll be more than willing to help if they need rescuing. He’s a good man,” Inge said. “Now, run along, dear. If you hurry, you can still catch dinner in the cafeteria. Your friends are bound to be there.”
“Where?”
Inge gave Chas directions, and in her eagerness to see her friends again, Chas didn’t bother with any more questions. She quickly left the infirmary and followed Inge’s rough map until she reached a set of double doors with a sign that said “Cafeteria”. With a deep breath, Chas pushed open the doors and entered.
***
The low hum of voices and the clink of cutlery on glass met her ears along with a blast of warm air. Tables and chairs filled most of the room and three-quarters of it was full of people having supper.
Curious stares turned her way, and Chas froze on the spot, a hot blush rising in her cheeks. She hated being the center of attention. “Um…”
“Chas!” A familiar voice cried followed by two more.
Within seconds, she was surrounded by her friends, Dean, Van
essa, and Emily. Hugs were exchanged amid glad cries before she was led to a table. The rest of the room faded away amid the reunion, and it got even better when Dean proudly introduced his parents.
Chas glanced from the couple to him and back again. “They’ve been here the whole time?”
He nodded. “Safe and sound.”
“Oh, I’m glad for you!” Chas said. “You’ve been so worried about them these past few weeks.”
“And we about him,” Dean’s mother replied with tears in her eyes. “We’re just happy you kids made it out alive.”
Dean patted her hand, while Emily and Vanessa turned to Chas.
“What happened to you?” Emily asked. “I was so worried. One minute you were there, the next you were gone.”
“It’s a long story,” Chas said, dropping into a chair with a groan.
“We’ve got time,” Vanessa said, handing Chas a plate of food. “Do tell.”
Chas gave a rueful shrug before eyeing her plate. It was standard fare. Mash, peas, and a meaty gravy, but she was too hungry to care. In between big bites, she told them her story, much to their horrified amazement.
“You’ve got more lives than a cat, you know that?” Emily said.
“No wonder you look like you’ve been dragged through a thorn bush,” Vanessa added. “Your hair is a mess.”
Chas quirked an eyebrow. “Thanks, but now it’s your turn. Tell me what happened to you lot while I was gone.”
“Not much. We ran into a patrol from the church, and they brought us here. We tried to get them to look for you, but they wouldn’t. Not before we were cleared and declared clean. Seems it wasn’t necessary anyway as you came to us,” Vanessa explained.
While her friends were chattering, the cafeteria doors opened to admit another group of people, though Chas hardly noticed. It was only when Vanessa abruptly stopped talking that she realized something was amiss.
Chas looked from Vanessa to Emily to Dean, taking in their strained looks and pale faces. With deliberate care, she swallowed her food and asked, “What’s wrong?”
Her question was answered when a familiar voice from behind caused her to freeze in her chair. Every hair on the nape of her neck rose in recognition, and her lips curled back in a hiss she could barely contain.
Gen X: The Undead Adventures of Chas (A Young Adult Zombie Apocalypse Thriller Book 3) Page 10
