by M. D. Massey
I was happy to see him go. But he did leave me a present, something he said was a “break glass in case of emergency” kind of thing. It looked like those atropine auto-injectors they used to give soldiers, that you were supposed to self-inject if you were exposed to chemical weapons. Everybody knew they would only keep us fighting a few minutes longer, although we were told it was a life-saving measure.
“What the hell is this?” I asked.
“It’s something the lab geeks cooked up,” he said, “for Cerberus operatives—soldiers like you and me who made it through the trials. Command knew that even with the serum we couldn’t go toe-to-toe with the worst things that are out there. Ancient vamps and ’thropes, oni, liches, and the like. So, they had the eggheads cook up a sort of booster serum for us. It’s like adrenaline on crack. It’ll burst your fucking heart if you’re not careful, but if you gotta go out in a blaze of glory, well”—he shrugged—“injecting that shit will make it happen.”
I tucked the injector in my pocket. “Thanks, I guess.”
He chuckled. “Soldier, trust me—if you have to use it, the last thing you’ll be doing is thanking me.” He shouldered his ruck and headed down the hall toward the exit without another word.
What a dick, I thought.
We kept the place locked up tight most of the time. There wasn’t any sense in running patrols outside, since the area was overrun by deaders during the day and infested with bloodsuckers at night. We had the whole Coastal Pack living in there, along with what remained of the settlers, Colin and his LARPers, plus the Doc, Bobby, Gabby, and me. Being shut in and under the constant threat of death left everyone on edge, and the natives were getting restless.
The LARPers wanted to go back to Austin. The settlers wanted to head out west, find some land that was relatively free of deaders, and start over. The ’thropes were ready to head back to the coast, and say screw the Dallas coven. And honestly, I couldn’t blame any of them. Hell, I wanted to cut and run myself.
But the reality was that Calypso and her brood were hanging close. The minute any of us made a break for it, she’d hunt them down. I figured she had a lair somewhere nearby, close enough to keep an eye on us, but far enough away to make it difficult for us to find. And at the rate she was throwing vamps at us, I also suspected she was grabbing punters and scavs and turning them in order to add to her ranks.
She wouldn’t come at us hard, not yet. Not until Kara turned up. I think she believed that if I was in enough danger, eventually my ex would show up and try to save me. Seemed like a gamble to me, but Calypso must have been sure of herself, otherwise she’d have high-tailed it back to Dallas with all the intel she’d collected. Then it’d all be over, for all of us—vaccine or no.
With nowhere to go, I spent a lot of time waiting, healing, training, and thinking. Calypso was making a tactical error by not leaving with that intel, and I kept trying to figure out a way to use it against her. After several days of contemplating our situation, I hatched a plan… but I only revealed part of it to the others.
Early one morning, I gathered everybody in the mess hall to address them. Not just the key players, but everyone, because everyone was going to have a role to play if we were going to pull this freaking thing off. Besides, the Doc had been juicing anyone who’d take the serum, and while she only had about a fifty-five percent success rate, the ones it had worked on were champing at the bit.
Between the juiced LARPers and settlers, the ’thropes, Colin’s voodoo, and myself, I gave us a fifty-fifty chance of survival against Calypso and her vamps. It’d have to do.
I stood in front of everyone and addressed them with as much presence as I could muster. “Folks, you all know we’re stuck between a rock and a hard place. That bloodsucking witch and her vamps are out there, waiting for us to make a wrong move.”
“Don’t forget the deader dogs,” Bobby interjected. Gabby nudged him in the ribs. “What? They’re creepy and hard to kill. I just didn’t want anyone to forget.”
“No one can forget those perros from hell, payaso!” she hissed. “Now be quiet, for once.”
I cleared my throat. “As I was saying, we’re kind of stuck here. We have enough food to feed everyone for maybe a month, maybe less. Hunting has become harder to do, since the vamps are herding the undead toward us at night, leaving the area aboveground swarming with cold bodies.”
“Who kill and eat anything that moves,” Mickey muttered, “including wild game.”
“That’s right,” I said. “Meaning foraging and hunting are no longer practical survival strategies. We can’t stay here much longer, because we’re going to run out of food. And we can’t leave, because except for the ’thropes, none of us can get far enough away from here in a single day to avoid being slaughtered by Calypso and her brood.”
Samson spoke up from the back, where he was leaning against the wall like a statue. “We’re not abandoning anyone.”
He looked at his adopted son, and I got his meaning clearly. He was staying because Bobby was staying. I wondered how long it’d be before he had a mutiny on his hands. That was one of the reasons I had decided to make a move. I needed the Coastal Pack backing my play if it was going to succeed.
“I appreciate that, Samson. Really, I do. But if we keep ourselves locked up inside here, we’re just sitting ducks. Eventually Calypso will wear down Colin’s traps, or she’ll find a way to break through them—”
Colin cut me off. “She’s been working on it, believe me. They’ll hold, for a time, but eventually she’ll get through.”
“Right,” I continued. “So, we either wait and allow ourselves to get slaughtered, or we take the fight to her.”
Anna addressed me directly from the front row. “Scratch, we don’t even know where she’s hiding out.” She turned to face the rest of the group. “I’m all for going down fighting, but if we just run around out there blind, she’ll pick us off one by one.”
I nodded. “Exactly right. So, we find her lair, and then we go there during the day and take her out.”
“Didn’t you already try that?” one of the settlers said.
“I did, but I didn’t know what I was up against. Now I do. And if we attack during the day, chances are good that most of her vamps will be resting and dormant. Hopefully we’ll only have to deal with her, and maybe one or two others.”
Samson nodded. “The numbers seem to be in our favor. But just how do you plan on dealing with Calypso herself? From what I gather, she’s a primary. They eat hunters and ’thropes and shit them out for fun.”
I didn’t want to tell them how I intended to deal with her, but I had a plan. It was a gamble, but I thought it might work. “Don’t worry about Calypso, because I’ll be handling her.”
Colin looked at me like I was insane, but he kept his mouth shut. There was some grumbling from a few of the others, but for the most part people were nodding their heads and agreeing with me.
“So then, it’s settled. First, we locate their lair—then, we take the fight to them.”
Colin cornered me in an empty hallway, soon after everyone who had attended the meeting had dispersed. “What’s this bullshit about you taking out Calypso on your own?”
I motioned for him to follow me into an empty office, and closed the door behind us. “Look, I know it sounds crazy, but trust me—I have a plan.”
“A plan to get yourself killed.”
“I’ll admit that the odds are stacked against me. But if the Dallas coven gets their hands on all that enriched plutonium buried at Pantex, we’re going to be royally and completely screwed. We have to stop Calypso—not just because she’s a threat to the group, but because we need to keep that intel out of the vamps’ hands.”
He rubbed his forehead and growled. “I can’t believe I’m agreeing with you on this, but you’re right. Still, someone in Dallas is going to know if we take Calypso off the board… her master or one of her broodmates. Vamps are weird like that—sort of semi-telepathic wh
ere their offspring and siblings are concerned. They will come at us in force, Scratch. You can count on it.”
“We’ll just have to cross that bridge when we get to it. Let’s deal with one crisis at a time.”
“If you say so.”
“Anyway, the first step is to track her back to wherever she’s been hiding out. I need you to take one of your Wild Boys who got juiced and a ’thrope, and work the western sectors to see if you can find a scent trail back to their lair. I’ll take Bobby and Gabby to check the east side of the base. We’ll meet back here tonight and compare notes.”
The big swordsman pursed his lips, then nodded. “Consider it done. Just be sure you don’t try to take on Calypso and her brood if you find them before I do.”
“Not a chance; not with the kids with me. We’ll attack them in force, when we’re damned good and ready.”
“Alright then. Happy hunting.” Colin gave me a half-assed, pseudo-military salute and headed off to gather his people. I sat on the desk in the office, taking a moment to consider the situation at hand before I did the same.
There was more to my plan than what I was telling him. For example, I intended to haul ass away from the group if Calypso opted to escape rather than fight. That would at least take the heat off everyone else, but I couldn’t let them know my intentions. Otherwise, Bobby, Gabby, and maybe even Colin or the Doc might decide to tag along. No way I’d let that happen.
I also already had a plan to deal with the Dallas coven, after we handled Calypso and her followers. It was sketchy, at best, but I was fairly certain I could make it work with the Doc’s help. But first, we had to find Calypso.
Bobby and Gabby were standing outside the office door when I exited. Gabby had her hands on her hips and was giving me the evil eye, while Bobby was whistling and trying to look like they hadn’t been eavesdropping.
“Cut the act, Bobby. I know you guys were listening in on our discussion.”
Gabby tongued her cheek and sighed angrily. “I don’t know if I’m more pissed that you still insist on referring to us as ‘kids,’ or that you’re planning on sacrificing yourself for the group.”
I shrugged. “It’s kind of become my hobby. Anyway, I have a plan.”
Bobby threw his hands up in the air. “You always have a plan, Scratch. And that’s what worries me.”
I started walking down the hall to get my gear, and they followed behind. “Like I told Colin, let’s deal with one crisis at a time. The first order of business is finding Calypso, so grab your shit and let’s move out.”
Gabby caught up to me and smirked. “We’re already geared up, because we know how you think. Well, I’m geared up, anyway—all wolf boy here seems to think he needs is a pair of board shorts and some Vans.”
“Hey, don’t bust on me for bucking the post-apocalyptic, Mad Max, paramilitary fashion thing everybody seems to have going on. I may not look good in camo, but I can rock a pair of board shorts and a Hawaiian shirt.”
“And the enemy can see you coming from a mile away, estúpido.”
Bobby pulled out a cheap pair of neon orange sunglasses and put them on. “Shee-it, I’m so smooth, nobody sees me coming if I don’t want them to.”
Gabby rolled her eyes. “Yeah, you’re right—they smell you coming long before they see you, perro.”
Twenty minutes later, we were outside the Facility and running a sweep of the eastern perimeter. We’d started by checking every exit on the eastern side of the Facility, especially those that we knew the vamps had tried to breach. Picking up a trail was tricky, because the vamps were highly intelligent and knew how to avoid leaving signs of their passage.
I suspected that the farther out we went, the more likely we were to find a trail, as they’d probably be less careful farther away from the Facility. And I was right. We picked up a trail about a mile from the southernmost exit.
Bobby was down on all fours, sniffing the ground around a tree nearby. “Sneaky bastards. Looks like they’ve been jumping from tree to tree to avoid leaving a scent on the ground.”
I knelt down to look at the trail he’d picked up, and followed it further southwest with my eyes. “Let’s see where it leads.”
It didn’t take us long to figure out that we were headed straight toward the hospital where we’d first ran into Bobby’s Pack.
Gabby gave me a knowing look. “You thinking what I’m thinking?”
“The tunnel we saw in the elevator shaft? Yeah, that’s what I was thinking. I bet we were right on top of one of her lairs the whole time, and didn’t even know it.”
When we got within a mile or so of the hospital, we spotted a deader dog patrol. Calypso was using them to monitor and guard her lair during the day, just as she had back at the Reserve Center. I motioned for the kids to hide until they passed.
“Colin mentioned that it’s possible she can see what they see,” I said. “So, it’s imperative that we don’t get spotted. And we can’t leave a scent trail they can pick up, either. They’ll know we were here, and Calypso will move her lair.”
Bobby looked at me and tilted his head like a dog. “What’s our play, boss?”
“We need to confirm that they’re hiding out in the hospital. But if we don’t make it back to the Facility by the time Colin and his team return, they’re going to come looking for us.”
Gabby frowned and looked at Bobby. “This is the part where he gets rid of us so he can hatch one of his suicidal plans.”
I sighed. “I’m not going to try to take out Calypso on my own. But I do need you two to head back to the Facility to let them know what we found. Meanwhile, I’m going to find someplace nice, high, and secluded, where I can keep an eye on the hospital from a distance. I’ll stay out of sight and head back in the morning to let you know if our hunch is right.”
“One of us should stay with you,” Bobby said.
“Nope. One person can hide their scent, but two or more might get detected. We can’t risk it, so just listen to me for once, alright? I’ll be fine, trust me.”
“Famous last words,” Gabby muttered. “C’mon, wolf boy, let’s head back and tell el caballero what we found.”
“The cowboy?” Bobby asked with a confused expression.
“That’s a vaquero, dummy. A caballero is a knight.”
“She means Colin,” I said.
“Oh… right!” He raised a finger in the air. “Hey, we should all get code names. That way, if we’re overheard, our enemies won’t know what we’re talking about.”
“I vote that you should be culero,” Gabby said, deadpan. “Scratch, we’ll see you back home in the morning. Be safe.” She’d already started heading back, while Bobby considered her suggestion.
“Cool Arrow? I like it! But what should we call you?” The kid was so lost in thought, it took him a moment to realize she’d left him behind. When he did, he gave me a wave before running after her. The pair continued arguing at a whisper as they disappeared into the brush.
I waited until they were long gone, then found a relatively fresh deader wandering alone. I lured it into a building, where I killed it and used its guts to cover my scent. After I’d disguised my human odor with deader scent, I looped around in a wide arc—south, then east, then north. Finally, I headed back toward the hospital from the eastern side, where I suspected the vamps’ patrols would be light.
I was correct, and managed to make it to an office building about a mile from the hospital undetected. From there, I’d set up on one of the upper floors and observe the area. If the hospital actually was Calypso’s hideout, I’d find out soon enough after dark.
Despite the presence of the deader dogs in the area, there were plenty of undead inside the building when I entered. I had no idea whether they’d ignore me, now that my body was getting my deader infection under control. In any case, I needed those deaders left undisturbed, to avoid tipping off any vamps to my presence. I tapped on a window on the north side of the building to draw their attention, t
hen snuck around the east side to peek through one of the main doors.
All clear. Moving as silently as possible, I searched the bottom floor until I found the stairs. I listened at the door and heard nothing but silence. I was picking up deader movement behind me, so I opened the door to the stairwell and quickly ducked inside.
Except for a small sliver of light coming from under the door, it was pitch dark inside. I waited by the door listening intently, cautious of a deader ambush. They might not have been able to infect me anymore, but a swarm could sure as hell chew me to bits.
As my enhanced vision adjusted to the gloom, two slender figures began to take shape on the landing above me. One was shorter, lean, and feminine, while the other was tall and almost skeletal in appearance. I blinked several times, trying to make sense of what I was seeing, and wondering if I was hallucinating.
A familiar whisper told me that my mind was definitely not playing tricks on me.
“Hey there, tall, scarred, and handsome… come here often?”
WIVES
“Kara?” I whispered, dumbstruck.
“And your old chum, Donnie,” another familiar and incredibly creepy voice replied. It sounded like dry leaves rubbing against a gravestone, with a faint echo underneath punctuating each syllable. “We’ve been keeping this lovely lady company, Scratch—I certainly hope you don’t mind. You never struck me as the jealous type… no, not at all.”
As my eyes fully adjusted to the thick darkness in the stairwell, the two figures before me came into focus. Kara was wearing jeans, work boots, a Johnny Cash t-shirt that was two sizes too small, and a leather bomber jacket. She had her auburn hair in a ponytail, pulled out the back of an Astros baseball cap. Her right hand held the barrel of a Barrett .50 caliber sniper rifle, and her left rested on the hilt of heavy machete.
She looked beautiful… and heartbreakingly undead.
