Screams of the beasts echoed through the garage. Though, to his relief and surprise, this level of the garage was vacant of any creeping shadows. Will wondered if most the creatures who’d been loitering out here had migrated upstairs after the commotion David had caused when he’d fled.
He turned when he heard a loud crash again behind them, and after a few moments, banging started on the door they’d just exited.
“We’ve gotta hurry,” Sam said.
Will scanned the parking garage, and his eyes immediately fell on a Ford Escape twenty yards away from where they stood. Not on the vehicle necessarily, as much as the body he could see sprawled beside it.
“Come on,” he called back as he jogged toward the vehicle.
Flies buzzed around the rotted flesh. The corpse wore what was left of a long-sleeve plaid shirt and a pair of khakis. Like the body they’d passed inside the hospital, the bones had been nearly picked clean. It lay in a pool of blood which was infested with small worm-like insects. Will covered his nose to try and mask the smell, but its strength couldn’t be ignored. He wondered if he’d ever become accustomed to the smell of the rotting dead, the longer he lived in this new world. He knelt down next to the body just as Jessica, Sam, and Brandon arrived behind him.
“What’re you doing?” Jessica asked.
Will ignored her and began rummaging through the dead man’s pockets. He also tried to put into the back of his mind what he was doing. The inside of the man’s pockets were wet, likely from all the blood. He felt something crawling on his hand and withdrew it quickly to find a small white worm slugging across his knuckles. He slapped at it, then turned and gagged. Behind him, someone threw up, but he didn’t look to see who in the group it had been.
The banging at the door grew louder, and Will knew it was only a matter of time before the horde made it through. He reached back into the pockets of the corpse and continued to search for keys to the Escape. Finally, he found them in the breast pocket of the man’s shirt after having rolled him over onto his side, and after seeing the man’s battered face. It was a strange place for someone to put their keys, but he was thankful to find them. He looked back and flashed them toward the others. Will could tell from the way Brandon wiped his mouth that he was the one who’d vomited.
“Beats the hell out of trying to hotwire it,” Will said. “Come on, get in.”
Will opened the back door and Jessica jumped in, followed closely by Sam. Brandon ran around to the side of the vehicle and joined Will up front as he turned the key in the ignition. The engine turned over without a fuss, and a stream of static blared through the speakers. Will shut off the stereo with a swipe of his hand and looked at the gas gauge. It was three-quarters of the way full, and he let out a sigh of relief.
Putting the vehicle into reverse, Will backed out of the parking spot and came to a stop with a clear path in front of him. He stared into the rearview mirror.
“What are you waiting on?” Brandon asked. “Go!”
But Will hesitated. “We can’t. We have to wait.”
Sam put up his arms. “What the hell for?”
“We need to wait on those things to bust out of that door so they follow us out of here. If we don’t, we’re either gonna have a hell of a time getting back into the hospital when we get back, or they could even join their friends upstairs and bust through that door.”
Will looked over to Brandon and could see he wasn’t sure about the plan. They were silent, and it sounded like the door could come down at any moment. When he looked at it in the mirror, he could see it starting to give.
“He’s right,” Jessica said. Brandon looked back at her, and Will’s gaze went to her in the rearview mirror. “We need to let them get through that door and then ease out of here so they follow us outside. It might even keep them out of the garage for good.”
Brandon sighed and looked back to Will. “I hope you’re right about this. If the garage fills up in front of us, we’re gonna be trapped. Not sure this little thing is gonna be able to pound over too many of them.”
Will tightened his grip on the steering wheel, and the monsters roared behind them as the door slammed to the ground.
Chapter 7
Gabriel
A clock above the door leading to the garage ticked with every second that passed, and Gabriel eyed it intently. He’d moved a small table out into the main corridor so that he could wait and listen for his friends to return. At the other end of the hall, near the elevators, Holly and Sarah shared a similar task, manning the door to the stairwell in case the four re-entered the hospital from that direction. A shadow caught Gabriel’s attention, and he turned to see Marcus setting down a cup of hot tea on the table before sitting down.
They sat in silence for a moment, the ticking clock fighting to be heard above their steadied breaths.
“You think they’ve even made it out of here yet?” Marcus asked.
“Hope so.”
Marcus took no time changing over to a deeper subject. “You still got that same plan of headin’ to D.C. once we go and get the boy?”
Gabriel simply nodded.
Marcus took another sip of his tea and was silent.
Gabriel could see in Marcus’ eyes that he had more to add, so he decided to ask the next obvious question.
“Why do you ask?”
“I don’t know,” Marcus said. “Thinkin’ of taggin’ along if you wouldn’t mind.”
Gabriel furrowed his brow. “You don’t wanna stay here? I assumed you’d all stay in your new little utopia here. Hell, I would if I didn’t have a family to get back to, and the responsibility to get Dylan back to his parents.”
“Shit, man. Ain’t nothin’ left for me here. I’ve lived in Tennessee all my life. And considerin’ I’m not sure how much life I got left, I may as well go out and see what else the world has to offer.”
Gabriel turned and smiled. “You’re not dyin’, man. Not anytime soon.”
“Come pretty close the last few days. Shit gets you thinkin’, ya know?”
Thinking about his downtrodden relationship with his wife, Gabriel knew exactly what Marcus meant. If he died before finding his family, his final emotion would be regret. And if he made it to Washington and couldn’t find them—or worse, discovered them either dead or turned Empty—he wasn’t quite sure how he’d live with himself. He’d tried not to think too much about either of those two scenarios, but times like these where he had little to do but swim in his thoughts made it all the more difficult not to ponder what could be awaiting him.
“Alright,” Gabriel said. “I’m gonna run to my room for a few minutes, then we can go gather the bodies.”
Marcus nodded. “Go do your thing, brother.”
Gabriel patted Marcus on the back, then stood.
On the way to his room, he tried to think of other things he could do to procrastinate having to go move Will’s mother.
Jessica
As the vehicle eased forward, Jessica kept an eye on the large group lumbering behind them, allowing Will to stay focused on getting them out of the parking garage. So far, Will’s plan was going off without a hitch. He’d turned a corner to head down to the next level of the garage, and the creatures had followed.
“This speed is perfect,” she said. “They’re coming after us like they think they’re gonna catch us.”
“But we’re not gonna let that happen,” Brandon said, presenting it almost like a question.
“Not planning on it,” Will said. “But maybe if they do, you can jump out and distract ‘em for us.”
Jessica smiled, but Brandon didn’t find it funny, narrowing his eyes.
As they passed the third level, Jessica watched another small group of Empties join the existing horde. If Will had driven past a few moments later, this new group would have been blocking the way in front of them.
“Hey, I think your plan garnered the attention of their friends,” Jessica said.
“Good,” Will sai
d. “Hopefully that’ll make for a clearer path when we get back.”
They reached the exit unscathed. The fire truck Will’s group had come to the hospital in still sat in the same spot they’d parked it.
“Looks like the tires are blown out,” Will said, speaking of the fire truck.
“David must’ve shot ‘em on his way out,” Sam said.
Jessica looked ahead as Will exited the well-lit garage and entered the pitch black darkness of the night. He was finally forced to turn the headlights on. When he did, three Empties appeared in the beams, standing just yards away from the hood of the SUV. He tried to swerve, but ended up hitting one of them. A second creature slammed its hands on the hood while another banged against the glass. Jessica looked back and saw the oncoming horde approaching fast.
“Go!” Brandon yelled.
Will hesitated. “I’ve gotta make sure this group follows me.”
The Empty screamed, continuing to pound on the glass. Jessica had remained calm and trusted Will this entire time, but now even she was becoming nervous. She looked back again and saw the group getting closer. The SUV began to shake, and she looked to the side of the vehicle to see the three beasts pushing against it.
“Will,” Jessica said with a tremble, “I think he’s right—we need to—”
“Just trust me,” Will said, cutting her off.
The Escape crept forward again, and one of the Empties banged on the window immediately beside Jessica. The creature had once been a woman, and was somehow still wearing radiant red hair and an open blouse. Will eased out into the street, and another two Empties came up from the other side of the car. They’d apparently been wandering down the sidewalk and been drawn in by the commotion. Jessica could feel the sweat form on her brow. She became distractingly wet under her arms and on her palms, and she rubbed her knees nervously, an old habit she’d had since middle school.
“Tell me when the entire group is out of the garage,” Will said, speaking to any of the three in the car who might still be listening to him and not the creatures.
It was hard to be sure with no light behind them, and with just trying to see past the glowing eyes of the approaching horde, but Jessica couldn’t see anymore creatures within the lighting of the garage.
“It looks clear,” she said.
Glancing back at her through the rearview mirror, Will asked, “You sure?”
“Positive,” she lied.
She jolted back against the seat as Will punched the gas. Out of the corner of her eye, Jessica saw the Empty who’d been knocking on the door beside her fall. Will drove another thirty yards before slamming on the breaks and turning the car a hundred and eighty degrees. The lights faced the horde now, who seemed to be walking faster now to try and reach the SUV.
“I think you’ve led them far enough,” Brandon said. “Please, go.”
Jessica leaned up and put her hand on Will’s shoulder.
“Come on,” she whispered. “Let’s get out of here before we push our luck. They’re not gonna go back into that garage. They’re gonna continue to follow us, even when we’re long gone.”
Will hesitated, then finally turned the vehicle around.
Jessica leaned back and quietly sighed. She understood the intention in Will’s plan, and it was smart. But the way he’d gone about it still felt a touch reckless. Brandon sat in the front seat with his arms crossed, and he looked like he’d lost his patience with Will altogether.
In minutes, they were pulling onto the ramp for I-40, headed for Brandon’s dad’s house.
Chapter 8
Will
Brandon’s father, Jack Nix, owned a house on the western outskirts of Knoxville. It wasn’t the same house Brandon had grown up in; his mother still resided in that house. They’d divorced on the tail end of Brandon’s teenage years when he’d just turned twenty. So his father, a hard-working independent contractor, had bought a small ranch-style home on a couple of acres, giving him at least a little space from his neighbors.
When they arrived at the road Jack lived on, the lights in most of the houses were off. The street lights were no longer on, and Will assumed that they must have lost power in the neighborhood. Two houses had small gleams of light on the inside, likely drawing power from generators. No Empties appeared to be in the street, but Will had the headlights turned off so as to not draw any attention. Through the silence, they could hear that there were indeed beasts out there somewhere, but they didn’t sound to be too close. Thankfully, the moon was full and provided them with a little bit of light, though Will could still barely see beyond a few yards in front of the car.
“We’re almost there. It’s just up here on the right,” Brandon said.
Easing the car forward, Will’s heart raced. He had a feeling that one of the creatures would jump out in front of the small SUV at any moment, but it had yet to happen, leaving him all the more on edge. Sweat surrounded the perimeter of his hands on the steering wheel as he waited for Brandon to tell him they’d arrived.
“Slow down,” Brandon said, “the driveway’s right here.”
Will saw the entrance to the driveway and eased the car into it. The outline of the house appeared and Will tapped the brakes just as they approached the garage. He put it into park, and then they sat quietly and listened for Empties surrounding the area.
After a few moments, Jessica whispered, “Sounds clear.”
Will looked over to Brandon. “So, what’s the plan? Do you have a key?”
Shaking his head, Brandon said, “Not on me. Left that at my house.” He looked back toward his father’s home. “I think we should go around the back just in case any of the neighbors are still home. People around here are pretty damn protective, and I know they’d look out for my old man’s shit.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Will said.
“What do you want me to do?” Sam asked.
“Stand outside the car and keep a look out,” Will said.
Sam nodded.
“Hope his place hasn’t already been raided,” Will said.
“Only one way to find out,” Jessica said, and Will heard her door click open.
Leaving the key in the ignition, Will pulled the handle and joined Jessica outside. He grabbed her by the arm.
“I think you should stay in here.”
“Why?” Jessica asked.
“Because one of us needs to keep the car running. You already have a hurt shoulder, so it makes sense for you to be ready to get us the hell out of here. Sam can stand outside and keep a look-out.”
“Alright,” Jessica said, sighing.
“If either of you see or hear anything strange, honk the horn three times,” Will said.
“Roger that,” Sam said.
Will turned to head behind the house, and Jessica called his name. He looked back to face her.
“Don’t do anything stupid in there,” Jessica said.
Will shook his head. “I won’t.”
Empties howled off in the distance. Will could even hear them shuffling through the fields behind Jack’s house, but creatures didn’t appear to be an immediate threat. The windows and door at the back of the house were still intact and looked untouched—a good sign that no one had raided the place yet.
Brandon walked over and tried to turn the handle to the back door, but it was locked.
“No surprise there,” he said.
Will looked to the houses on either side of them and saw that they were shrouded in darkness. The closest house with lights on was three houses down on the other side of the street. What made him most nervous were the Empties that he could hear in the distance behind the house.
“We’re gonna have to be quick,” Will said. “Those things don’t sound too far away. Is there a ditch or anything back there that would prevent them from getting to us?”
“No,” Brandon said. “It’s a clear path. All that land is undeveloped.”
“Do you know exactly where he keeps his guns?”
> “Yeah, he’s got a case back in his bedroom.”
Will drew in a deep breath. A shovel leaned against the wall next to him and he grabbed it.
“Well, I hope so,” Will said. “‘Cause there’s no easy way to do this, and we’re definitely going to attract attention.”
He lifted the shovel up onto his shoulder, almost like a baseball bat.
“Ready?”
Brandon drew in his own deep breath. “Yeah, I guess.”
On that mark, Will reared back and swung the shovel into the window, shattering the glass on the first try. The sound was deafening. Their clock began to tick.
Brandon reached through the window and unlocked the door. He opened it, and the two men headed inside.
Jessica
Jessica turned around, looking to other houses on the street to see if anyone had heard the window break. Everything looked the same, but she now worried that any Empties in the area would have been attracted by the crash and be heading toward the house. They’d heard some of the creatures when they’d come from the end of the street, so they knew there were some lurking around, though she couldn’t hear any now.
“Everything okay, Sam?” she whispered.
Sam poked his head through the passenger side window. “So far, so good.”
She turned her wrist over, gripping the steering wheel tight.
“Please, hurry,” she mumbled under her breath.
Will
Directly on the other side of the back door was the kitchen, and Will found himself standing on the tile floor near a granite top island that reflected the moon’s light coming in from a window above the sink. He awaited Brandon’s lead.
Empty Bodies Box Set | Books 1-6 Page 36
