by Jack Flacco
“Give me a boost.” Wildside said, having left a trail of blood from his foot to the fence.
“Wildside, I know you’re intent on killing yourself, but how long do you think you’ll survive if you don’t look after that foot?”
Wildside’s eyes crashed on his foot. He tore a strip of cloth from his shirt and stuffed the tip into the hole of his shoe. He then tied the remainder all around his foot. “Are you now going to give me a boost?”
Then they appeared. Two of them. In among the trees. Wildside spotted them first, then Randy. Eaters. About fifty feet away, their nostrils flared. They must have smelled the boys’ blood. Randy recognized their look. They shook as the frenzy took over and propelled them forward.
As Wildside screamed, “Get me over that fence!” the helicopters kept battering the crowd of zombies from their perch in the sky. Bullet after bullet, the undead fell. Some rose back to life while others collapsed in pools of emerald blood. Distracted by the mayhem below, the pilots did not notice how close their choppers were flying from the temple towers behind. They also did not notice the zombies that had scaled it all the way to the top, roosting on the obelisks. No, they did not notice. Had they, they would have commanded their attack from a further distance.
Instead, the undead’s molten, white eyes grew even more sinister. Three eaters hung from the towers. Two from one side, one from the other. They screeched and screamed and gurgled their hatred for the flying monsters. No more. They wanted no more death of their brothers and sisters. They wanted silence.
Straight away, the daring three jumped. Two landed to one side of the chopper’s landing gear while the third missed and fell, splattering to the ground. The impact of the two knocked the airborne vehicle off balance, sending it twirling and swirling in the air. The zombies swung, back and forth, locked to the feet of the metal beast. The helicopter’s pilot couldn’t get the throttle back in place. It spun through the sky like a wild horse until its main rotor blades sliced into the other helicopter, bursting both into flames. One of the zombies fell to its death as the intertwined jumble of metal veered forward and screamed to the ground, crashing into the auditorium. A ball of fire, orange as gold with black plumes of ash burst into the air. The impact threw the surrounding bodies of the military and the crowd everywhere. Flying through the air, one of the undead splattered all over the temple wall, sliding to the ground, leaving a trail of lime over the white facade.
While the survivors rose from the ashes, Ranger, Matty and Jon descended the stairs to the lobby of the North Visitor’s Center. When they turned the corner, there, at the door where the building arched, the one-eyed zombie stood with two others behind. It spotted Ranger, his old nemesis who had taken his eye from him. A curl danced along the monster’s lips to create a smile. It then revealed its yellow-stained, rotting teeth as it hissed.
“Ranger? I don’t like this.” Jon said.
“Me neither.” Matty said.
“Okay.” Ranger pulled his shotgun from his holster with a slow hand. “Matty. Do you have your gun?”
“Yeah.” She lugged her gun into the open.
“Good. I want you to back away to the rear exit, run across the street and find a truck for all of us. Wait there. Do it slow. Go.”
“I’m not leaving you here alone. I can help. We can take them.”
Ranger spun around and glared at her. “Protect Jon. I’m doing this. Understand?”
Without any further arguments, the kids drew away, disappearing from Ranger’s sight.
Left alone with the three gluttonous savages, Ranger erected his posture. He threw away the shotgun to the side and unsheathed his knife from its resting place. It was his time. Staring at them in their cold, vacuous eyes and drawing the blade across his left hand, he spilled his own blood.
The scent of Ranger’s life poured into their nostrils. They sucked in the aroma. They began to tremble and shake.
The frenzy took hold.
Randy pushed Wildside to the top of the fence.
The two zombies jumped from the trees and scurried toward the boys.
Wildside flipped himself over the fence and dropped to the ground landing on the foot shot at by the sniper. Twisting in agony, he pushed his back against the fence for support. He screamed. At the same time, pain flooded his face.
Randy began scaling the fence, but he should have done it sooner. The eater reached, pulled, and dragged him to the ground. The memory of Matty came to him, her beautiful face, her warm smile. He kicked the first zombie in the face, driving the entity toward the fence, then he pounded the second zombie with his fists. It didn’t work. It dove into Randy’s shot arm and sunk its teeth into his flesh. Randy screamed, and the adrenaline coursed through his body like a thousand volts, jolting him from the ground to thrust the evil from him.
The first creature Randy had kicked to the fence, wobbled against it, shaking off the confusion. Its eyes hunted for the familiar scent. Behind him. Wildside. Through the holes in the chain-link fence, it injected its fingers. The pale digits hooked into Wildside’s shirt. It tugged at it, trapping the boy. The dark creature snapped its teeth at the teen, but no flesh came to him. It poked and pulled the shirt tighter around Wildside’s neck, choking him.
Seeing this, Randy searched the ground. He found it. A stone. He pulled it from the garden. He jumped to help Wildside. The second zombie intercepted, tackling him. This time, Randy had help. He smashed the stone into its forehead. No effect. The undead dunked its head into Randy’s shoulder. Never again. Randy used the sharp edge of the stone and plunged it into the side of the zombie’s temple. That did it. The limb-ripper fell over shaking in seizures.
The first zombie kept choking Wildside with his own shirt, shrieking at the lad, clawing the fence, wanting a bite from the bleeding boy.
The hit came quick. Randy sunk the rock into the crown of the choking zombie’s head. The creature froze in time, and dropped to the ground, lifeless.
Wildside swung around and crawled from the fence, panting, massaging his neck. He pointed at Randy. “Behind you!”
The second and last surviving zombie jumped Randy and the stone fell from his hands.
After Ranger had sliced his own hand and the zombies’ frenzy captured their appetites, two of the three charged for the attack, leaving the one-eyed zombie behind, shaking. Ranger backed away, knife at the ready. These did not move like the others. They had agility to their step.
The first one careened, plowing into Ranger. But he was ready. He slashed its throat and left it to bleed on the floor. The second one pounced on the undead killer without waiting. Its jaws locked on Ranger’s forearm forcing him to drop the knife and roar his pain. With his free arm, he wailed punch after punch at the zombie’s head until it released his arm. Once liberated, he grabbed the liver-sucker by the shoulders and slung it against the wall. Convulsing, the entity slid to rest on the floor.
As Ranger marched toward the demon to finish the job, the first zombie that’d attacked him, swooped on his back, ramming him into the wall. Just as it opened its mouth to take a bite of the zombie slayer, Ranger threw himself backward, knocking the monster’s head on the floor. A stunned look seized the creature, enough time for Ranger to do his deed. Loosening its grip from his neck, Ranger spun around to straddle the rotting thing, then with all his strength, he plunged his hand into its open wound he had cut earlier into the front of the demon’s throat. Ranger wasted no time, through the bulge his hand created in its neck, he snapped the spinal column to a shrill and shriek, and tore its head off, killing the beast.
The head rolled to the feet of the one-eyed zombie.
When Ranger pulled his hand from the monster, he had no time to worry about the green goo covering. The other zombie rose from its stupor and staggered toward him with death in its eyes and hunger in its belly. Still straddling the body of the dead zombie, Ranger turned to the moaning then searched for his knife. He spotted it a few feet away.
The eater d
idn’t give him a chance. It leapt on Ranger’s back, throwing him to the floor. Face to face, the festering fiend brandished its rotting teeth. It seethed, dripping saliva on Ranger’s cheek.
As the zombie laid siege on Ranger, so had Randy’s bone chewer laid siege on him. The evil force had pinned the boy to the ground. It screamed into the air before the frenzy sparked its stare at the young meat.
“Hey!” Wildside waved his arms behind the fence. “Hey, you!”
The creature rolled its stare to Wildside.
Wildside tugged at his appendage soaked in blood, ripped it off and waved it around. “Do you smell that? Do you like it? It’s all yours. Come and get it.” He crawled to the edge of the fence squeezing the rag through the chain-link fence.
Stupid zombie. It caught a whiff, inhaled, and ascended from Randy toward the fence. Bloodlust baited its desires as it drooled and dragged to its prize.
“That’s right, c’mon.” Wildside dangled the blood-soaked appendage through the fence. “Here you go.”
When the bag of worm meat reached the fence, it stretched its paws and grasped the rag. It brought the cloth to its nostril and sucked in the aroma of the dressing dripping in blood. Like a feline, it got high sniffing on its catnip.
In an instant, a sharp stick exploded from its eye. Randy had punctured the back of its head, drilling a hole straight through to the other side. The monster crumpled to the ground, joining its friend that had passed.
Gasping, Randy dropped to his knees, holding on to the fence with one hand.
“Get up, Randy.” Wildside said. “Get up!”
“I can’t—I can’t do it anymore.”
“You can. And you will. Get up!”
“I can’t go back.” He closed his eyes. “The sniper will shoot me.”
“Listen to me, okay? Matty’s waiting for you. She needs you. She can’t go on without you. She thinks about you all the time. Nothing can replace you—not me, not Ranger—nobody.”
His head drifted to allow his gaze to meet with Wildside’s face. “She needs me?”
“Yeah, she needs you.”
The corners of his mouth pulled to a slight smile. “Kind of melodramatic, don’t you think?”
“I’ve had someone say that to me before.” He chuckled.
Blood droplets trickled from Randy’s wound. He cringed, pulling on the fence as he pushed with his legs to a standing position.
Wildside crawled to a sitting position, popped erect to one foot, and hopped to the fence. He fished in his pocket to retrieve the wristwatch Ranger had given him. “Take this. When you disappear in the trees set the stopwatch for fifteen minutes. I think that’s how long it took us to get here.”
“How are you going to know when to…?” Randy didn’t want to say the words. How could he ask him when he was planning to kill himself?
“I saw a clock inside the building.”
“Oh.”
Wildside hopped away from the fence.
“You could have let me die.”
“What’s that?”
“I said you could have let me die. Why didn’t you?”
Wildside pulled his eyes to one side. After a moment he said, “Get out of here. Matty’s waiting for you.”
In the North Administration Building, the zombie had Ranger in its grip.
“Why do you have to be so disgusting?” Ranger said, plowing his green blood-covered hand into the zombie’s mouth, smashing its teeth.
The meat-sucker hollered, let go of Ranger, and scrambled its hands to its mouth. With its fingers, it felt for the damage. For Ranger, it served distraction enough for him to roll and reach for his knife. But the toothless entity wouldn’t have it. It sped to jump Ranger again. This time, Ranger was ready for it. When the zombie hurled itself on him, it crashed to its death. Ranger rolled the body off with the knife sticking in the zombie’s face. At the last second, Ranger had aimed the knife erect and plunged it into the beast.
Now, at the same time he rose to his feet and towed the knife from the creature’s head, the realization struck the monster warrior—he had one more battle to go—the one-eyed zombie that had stood in place since the beginning. It’d waited for Ranger to finish the job on its friends before tilting its head, baring its teeth, and hissing at the demon killer.
About twenty feet away, Ranger tossed the knife next to his shotgun. The damage he planned on doing didn’t involve weapons. No, Ranger reserved his most awful punishment, punishment of death with his bare hands to those special zombies that believed the apocalypse came by nature to even the score with man. The headless body could attest to that.
Then it happened, the one-eyed zombie tore like thunder and raced to hit Ranger head-on. Instead of a frontal assault, it ducked Ranger’s swing and bit him in the leg in passing. A side assault. It stopped ten feet behind the bleeding fighter and repeated, sprinting hard, ducking another swipe from the zombie slayer. It rested from where it’d started with blood in its mouth and the frenzy taking hold. It quivered like violence.
The blood dribbled from the bites on Ranger’s legs. It didn’t faze him. He waved the creature to him. “C’mon, you little rat. Come on back.” The creature listened. The frenzy controlled it. It dashed toward Ranger, but this time, Ranger leaned in with his back, colliding full-force with the predator. Like a quarterback, he’d flattened the evil scum. “You’re not so tough, are you?” he walked toward it.
After shaking off the impact, the creature hopped on all fours. It waited, drool trickling from its mouth. When Ranger attempted to plop his hands on it, it reeled, taking another bite from his left leg and vanishing behind him. The zombie had left a gash.
While Ranger pondered on another strategy, Wildside removed the tarp from the hitch. Randy waved to him, and disappeared into the trees, setting his stopwatch.
Wildside turned on the bomb’s digital display. He looked through the window at the empty space on the wall of the South Administration Building. No clock. He set the timer for fifteen minutes and pressed the red button starting the countdown. He’d built a timer for the bomb after all. Randy would have never left Wildside if he knew the bomb had a timer. Wildside had lied.
Dragging his injured, bleeding foot, Wildside’s back made contact with the building wall. He slid to the ground, sitting with his arm resting on one knee. He closed his eyes for a moment thinking how if he didn’t volunteer to stay behind, both he and Randy would have died by the bullet of the sniper’s rifle. He’d lost too much blood, and Randy didn’t need to carry his extra weight on his injured shoulder. It was better this way. His sacrifice saved Randy. But there was no time to rest. First, he heard the rustling through the trees. Then he opened his eyes and saw them. A crowd of eaters that’d escaped from the soldier’s butchery, the helicopter assaults and the explosions.
Twelve minutes left.
“We have to help Ranger.” Matty said, pulling her gun from behind her back. “He’s getting killed.”
“No.” Jon locked his hands on her arm, tugging her away from the corner where they’d watched the fight.
“He’s not going to survive another swipe. It’ll next go for the kill.”
“Let it go, Matty.” He forced her to look at him. “He’s got to do this on his own.”
“You’re not going to say it’s a guy thing, are you?”
“We have to trust him.” He waited until he saw her nod then said, “He gave us a job to do. He’s doing his. Now let’s do ours.”
As they exited the back of the building to look for another vehicle, a remnant crowd of the undead began to pound on the glass doors of the North Administration Building. Locked from the inside, Ranger remained safe. But for how long?
Ranger eyed his shotgun and knife. Bitten three times, the wobble in his legs made them feel like sticks ready to break from under him. He slunk away from his weapons, his determination convincing him he could do without.
The one-eyed zombie wound for another attack. It bolted toward Ra
nger with a fury in its eyes and a sprint in its legs. It leapt, opening its teeth, aiming its bite at the human’s neck. Matty knew. How did she know the creature would lunge for the kill? At the last second, Ranger blasted a punch so hard to the zombie’s jaw that it sent the creature flying, slamming against the glass. Its brothers and sisters screamed the hate from the depths of their throat. They continued to thump on the glass.
Ten minutes left.
Wildside’s eyes veered to the fence that protected him. A clump of undead lined the outside of it, clawing it, pulling it. The frenzy set in. They wanted the boy. Six turned into a dozen, which turned into two dozen as more of them spilled from the trees to attack the fence.
Meanwhile, Ranger had his own agenda. He kicked the one-eyed zombie in the stomach. Then, he laid hold of its head and beat it with his fist.
But the undead entity sneered. Before Ranger could land another blow, it batted his fist away and sprung on top of him like a lion. They tumbled and rolled for a time, the eater aiming its bites at his neck while Ranger choked it.
This went on until Ranger sunk his hand into the zombie’s mouth, grabbing its jaw, cracking it wide open. The creature jumped from Ranger squealing.
Seven minutes left.
Matty and Jon dashed through the parking lot pulling on every vehicle door. When one of them opened, they rummaged through the visors and the center compartments to find nothing.
“Why are we looking for keys? Wildside can hotwire the truck.” Jon said.
“When everybody gets here, I don’t think he’ll have time to do much of anything other than start the engine. Keep looking.”
Ranger didn’t have to search for anything. With the one-eyed zombie festering at its dangling jaw, he rose to retrieve his holster and his weapons. At that instant, he spotted Randy through the windows emerging from the trees. Then he saw Randy’s face when he realized zombies had overrun the complex. That was Ranger’s queue to get out of there.
But the eater had one more trick it wanted to show Ranger. It ripped its jaw from its hinges and threw it to the floor. It charged Ranger with all the strength it had left.
