I ran back to the bedroom and packed up the laptop, nearly dropping it as I shoved it into the carrier and swung it up diagonally across my shoulders. Ted was grunting with effort as I arrived back in the living room, his swings growing more and more erratic.
“Okay, we need to clear a path to the fire escape. I’ve got our retreat covered.”
Ted handed me back my ax and together we mowed down a path. It wasn’t very clear, and more than once I felt my heart fly up into my throat as a hand grabbed my sleeve or shoe. Ted went first with Matt and Phil, Janette sandwiched in the middle carrying my bottles. Matt got one hand on Dapper’s collar, pulling the mutt along. I heard the window open and the clang-clang of their feet on the metal grates of the fire escape. My hands were locked so tightly around the ax I could feel my knuckles creaking with rage. If I didn’t hold it tight, it’d slip right out of my grasp from the sweat. I put the lighter in my mouth, and it was hard to breathe and swing, but I managed. The apartment was filling up and the noise was astounding—screeching and groaning, a whole buffet’s worth of hungry, angry, desperate undead shoving themselves through the door. They were tearing at each other just trying to get to us.
“Okay! We’re out!”
I took the lighter out of my mouth. “Get down the ladder. Go! Go!”
I ducked into the kitchen and out onto the fire escape, keeping the window open. The apartment was filled to capacity now and there were bodies wriggling into the kitchen, mouths hanging open, tongues missing altogether or hanging by a thread of muscle. I’d never made a Molotov cocktail before but I’d seen it on TV and that would just have to be good enough. I lit the first wick and, having no idea how long to wait, tossed it right away. This was both a good and bad decision.
The cocktail exploded somewhere in the living room and the blast was unbelievable. It reached through the kitchen, the heat of it slamming through the window and into my chest. I almost went ass over head off the balcony, but I managed to stumble back up to my feet, my back screaming in pain. There was warmth on my face where the blast licked my skin. I skidded down the ladder and beckoned the others away. I jogged backward a few paces before lighting the second one and hurling it at the window. Fire and body parts shot into the air, cascading over our heads and the retaining wall. We were out behind the store now and the building was beginning to burn.
I remember Dapper whining as he sat at my feet.
“Right,” I said, turning to face the others. I knew I looked crazy because they were gaping at me like I’d completely lost my mind. “Ted, you’re coming with me. The rest of you head for the university. We’ll meet you there.”
“But … where are you going? You have to come with us,” Janette said, still clutching the third bottle to her chest.
“Ted and I have some unfinished business to look after,” I told them. I shook Matt’s hand and then Phil’s. “You’ll be fine, I know you will. It’s not far. Take care of that bottle, Janette. Use it if you have to. Take Dapper with you, okay?”
Janette nodded, but I could see the look in her eyes. She was thinking: ten blocks, ten blocks, that may as well be in Sri Lanka. Trembling, she dragged Dapper away. He didn’t want to go with them but I knew it was safer. I knew I wasn’t in my right mind right then.
Ted and I circled around the retaining wall, giving the building a wide birth. The crackle of fire reached the street level. The entire top floor of the apartments was ablaze, the smoke and flames twinkling in the windows. The street was almost empty, littered here and there with debris, scorch marks and brown, faded bloodstains.
Sure, Zack had a good head start on us but he was slow, weighed down, and we knew what direction he was headed. He wouldn’t come back to the apartments and he wouldn’t go near the university. There was no catharsis, no time to mourn Holly or to worry about the others. Ted and I were light on our feet, armed, and pushed forward by something terrible, something consuming. And both of us were burning for a fight. We were out now and there was no stopping us. Zack was out there, yeah, but so was my mom and now was my chance to find her once and for all.
COMMENTS
Isaac says:
October 6, 2009 at 11:21 pm
Allison I know you’re pissed but be careful. Don’t get reckless or we’ll never hear from you again.
Brooklyn Girl says:
October 6, 2009 at 11:56 pm
Isaac is right. You’re grieving, you’re afraid but you have to keep your head screwed on tight. Tell Ted I know his pain. We sent one of our own to his maker and it was the best choice I’ve made in a while. Keep yourself safe, Allison, and post again soon.
October 7, 2009—Things Fall Apart, Pt. II
We headed east pursuing Zack, jogging down the right lane of Langdon.
“What do you think he’s got? Ten minutes? Fifteen minutes on us?” Ted asked.
“Ten,” I replied. “I’d put it at ten.”
He had just ten minutes, but ten minutes could make all the difference. If he was smart he wouldn’t slow down even with the precautions he put in place. I hoped that he underestimated us, that he slowed down to a walk as soon as the apartments were out of sight. They were still burning behind us, the black smoke thickening the atmosphere.
“So what’s the plan if we do catch him?” Ted whispered. We were trying to keep a low profile, which meant soft voices and soft feet. There weren’t many Groaners about, just a few lost Floaters drifting around in the alleys. As we headed away from the city center the roads got a little clearer, less cluttered with cars and Vespas and bicycles.
“I don’t give a shit about the food, Ted. I just want to teach this asshole a lesson. But safety first, okay? We don’t know if he managed to get a weapon. Play it like we want the food back, that it’s all we’re interested in.”
“You really think he’ll believe that?”
“No, but it might be enough to get him to come in close—close enough.”
We were about to dodge around a charred SUV when I saw it. It was pearly brown, wedged near the blackened tire, dusted with soot. Ted stumbled to a stop when he saw me go over to the tire and kneel. I picked it up, the leather purse cool and smooth in my hands.
It was my mother’s.
“There’s no way,” Ted said, reading my face. “She wouldn’t get this far off Main Street.”
“Maybe not. But if they were chased…”
There was nothing around the SUV or the purse or the tire, just scarred road and ash. I kept expecting to find blood or some sign of my mom but it was just the purse, abandoned, seemingly without a fight. I could see that Ted was impatient, waiting, but I had to know. Inside the purse her wallet was missing. There was a hairbrush, a pack of gum, a few coins and a blue Post-it note stuck to the bottom lining. I took it out carefully, recognizing her handwriting at once.
Aunt Tammy
Fort Morgan
Liberty Village
Liberty Village was underlined twice and the handwriting was sloppy, rushed. The word Tammy was smudged and runny.
“What does that even mean?” Ted asked, peering over my shoulder.
“Aunt Tammy lives in Fort Morgan. No idea what Liberty Village is,” I replied, trying hard to hold back the cold knot in my throat. If I breathed, if I swallowed too hard, I’d cry. I stood, holding the purse and the note. “She must have heard from Tammy. Maybe that’s where they’re headed.”
“I thought they were going to the apartments.”
“So did I,” I said, frowning. “But maybe they wanted to take us to Fort Morgan. Maybe that’s where she’s going now. Jesus, they got so close. Just a few blocks more and…”
“Allison…”
“I know,” I said, looking up. Ted was half-poised to run, his arms flexed, trembling. I put the Post-it in my pocket and shouldered the purse. There was no sign of my mom or her companions, no indication of what direction they’d gone. I had to make the call. Ted would never do it for me.
“Zack first,” I told him. ??
?Then the campus. They might have gone there if they were ambushed.”
“You sure?”
“Yes, I’m sure. Let’s go.”
We glanced down each alley, making sure he hadn’t dodged off the main road. The buildings were so dilapidated, so hollow that it was unlikely he’d stop here. If he did, we’d have spotted him through the broken, empty windows. Ted and I sped up again, unwilling to tire.
When we made it about eleven blocks from the apartments, we reached a dead end, literally. Right in front of us was a cemetery, a quiet little plot with maybe sixty or so tombstones. In silence we slowed to a stop, standing just in front of the low, wrought-iron fence. It would be easy to jump, but neither of us made a move.
“It’s not like Night of the Living Dead, they’re not going to jump out of the graves,” I told him, but there was no confidence there, no authority. Ted nodded and looped a leg over the fence, dropping down on the other side.
“Allison,” he murmured, but he didn’t need to. I’d seen it too. In the distance, across the field of speckled headstones and weepy, low-hanging trees: a flash of brown, of yellow. It was Zack, his afghan and the boxes. He paused beneath a tree, bent double, catching his breath probably. Lucky for us, running with your arms full of twenty-pound boxes is exhausting work.
I lifted a finger to my lips and we slid across the graveyard together, soundless shadows whispering across the spongy ground. The ax felt heavier in my grasp, as if it were asking me to take a moment and consider my actions. I was wary of every twig, every crisp leaf, afraid that one snapping branch and Zack would be off and running. The tree he slumped against was probably ten yards off, so Ted and I slunk around to the left, trying to keep the trunk of the tree between us and Zack. The problem with an ax is that it’s a short-range weapon; you have to get in close, real close. Suddenly I was wishing I hadn’t given Janette that last cocktail. I couldn’t think of anything more satisfying than watching Zack go up in a crackling blaze of flames.
And of course I nearly botched it, stepping on a wayward twig just a few feet from the tree. Zack’s head snapped up and around. The boxes dropped out of his hands as soon as he saw us and he was off, sprinting across the northern edge of the graveyard. All sense of stealth abandoned, Ted and I pursued, chewing up the ground, closing the gap until Ted, springing forward, managed to trip him up. His legs tangled and he fell, tumbling forward, making a few rotations on the ground before trying to get up and keep running. But it was too late. We had him.
Ted stopped him with a preliminary whack to the ribs. Zack crumpled on the ground at our feet, panting and holding his hands up in defense. He stared up at us, his eyes wild with terror. He could see things more clearly now, he could see who we were and what we were prepared to do.
“Please!” he cried, crab-walking away from us. Ted cracked him fast and hard on the knee to slow him down. “God! Just! I’ll do whatever you want, take the food! Take it! Jesus—I’m sorry, okay? I’m so sorry.”
“No you’re not. Not yet.”
His right foot came away at the ankle. It only took one sweep of the ax. There was so much blood, more than I expected, and it rushed out in jerking sprays, pumped hard by his racing heart. He could hardly shout but he started in on gibberish, stringing nonsense together as he tried to flail out of our reach. We let him go a few feet, watching him squirm away like a centipede missing its tail.
“Turns out you’re a star, Zack … or Jack—which is it? We heard all about you on the radio, about how you stole from the university, from a relief effort,” I said, catching up to him. There was nothing more for him to do, nowhere to go. “What the fuck is wrong with you? We’re all in this together, you motherfucker.” I punctuated that last word with his other foot. I could see he was about to pass out so I put the ax down. Ted tapped his cheek with the end of the bat.
“We’re going to leave you now, Zack. I do hope you remember my face when they come for you.”
Ted and I turned to go, silent, bound by a deep, profound loathing for what we’d just done. But as hard as I try, there’s no regret to be found. I can still hear him muttering “Please, please” over and over again as he lay in the tall, dead grass.
We didn’t make it ten feet before we realized our serious mistake. I was beginning to understand what made these things tick, and fresh blood certainly does seem to have the same effect as a church bell. They’d been called, summoned, driven out of hiding by the scent of Zack’s suffering. It made the bombardment in the apartment look like a trip out for ice cream.
They came surging toward us from every surrounding block. There was no cover, no way out, just a solid sea of these things lurching toward us. I knew that even if we managed to cut through the first few lines we didn’t have the coverage to make it safely through to the street.
Behind us, Zack was dying, really dying, becoming one of them. He wouldn’t get far without feet, but it didn’t make me feel any better about our predicament. The graveyard suddenly smelled like a graveyard should, wet and sandy and sweet with too much decay. Ted and I stood back to back, waiting, letting them come. It began to rain; the clouds opened up and let loose.
I briefly thought about climbing a tree, waiting there for help, but I knew it was easier to face them this way than to sit up in a tree like an idiot, waiting for a rescue party that doesn’t exist. I looked at my mom’s purse and hugged it close to my chest.
“It’s been real, Ted,” I said. “I promise, if you go first I’ll finish you off.”
“Thank you. It’s been a pleasure, Allie.”
I felt calm, secure in the knowledge that at least I might go down swinging, struggling. I wouldn’t starve to death in a break room or get scurvy and waste away in a university gymnasium, I would die on my feet and with Ted. And maybe my mother was already gone. Maybe I had found the last clue to her existence. I felt like I could breathe again, like I could see the end and it really wasn’t so bad. But I did wish for my mom, to see her one last time.
Just as I was starting to get real comfortable with the idea of dying, just as the groaning and scraping had reached its peak, I heard an earsplitting racket from the street. Gunfire, tons of it, spray after spray of bullets. I covered my ears, deafened. The heads and bodies surrounding us exploded, turned to liquid ash by the unbelievable firepower going off in every direction. Through the haze of vaporized goo and tissue I could see a big black form, a truck, and hanging out the back a figure. The truck smashed through the nearest line of Groaners, splattering them across our shoes. It was a truck all right, a gutted Land Rover with a cargo net for a ceiling. I couldn’t imagine what kind of mental case drove this thing, but I found out soon enough when the man hanging off the back jumped down to us. He fired off a few rounds into the Groaners creeping up behind Ted and me. I was too stunned to move, awed by the miraculous arrival of these two angels.
“They okay?” the driver shouted, jumping out.
“Seems so,” the other said, yanking off his mask. They were both dressed in black fatigues and flak jackets. Soldiers, maybe. The nearer one had a blue and red patch on his right sleeve with a crown and a bird. He had flaming red hair and a ginger beard and pale, pale blue eyes. He looked at both of us, his brow furrowed.
“May I ask what you two kittens are doing out here?”
I opened my mouth to grunt out an answer, but from behind us came a terrified scream. It was Zack, still alive, pulling himself toward us, scooting along on his elbows. The red-haired man took one look at the ax in my hand and Zack’s missing feet and grabbed me by the wrist. It felt like my arm was going to come right out of its socket as he pushed me toward the truck.
“Fucking hell … It’s like that, is it?” he asked. He had an accent, British, but it was weak. The driver leveled his rifle at Ted and nodded toward the car.
“Sir? Sir! This isn’t what it looks like,” I told him, struggling for air. My arm was killing me, twisted and pulsing, shot through with pain.
“Yeah, I’
ve heard that one before,” he said, laughing humorlessly as he tossed Ted and me into the back. “Gone a bit mad, have you? I’d love to shoot you right now and leave you with that poor bastard, but I think I’d rather toss you in lockup and let you think about it for a few days.”
“No! You don’t understand, sir. He stole from us! Those boxes, go look, I swear, he took all our food!” I shouted, struggling against his iron grip. Ted tried to say the same but the man cuffed him across the face. “Don’t hit him! What is wrong with you? We’re on your side! Jesus Christ, let us go! We’re not criminals. Why aren’t you listening to me? Listen to me, you fucking idiot!”
He raised his hand and I shut my mouth, settling back against the hard steel of the truck. The vehicle jerked to life, the boxes left on the ground, jumbled and opened like a few abandoned toy chests. Zack watched the truck roll away, his hand reaching after us.
They blindfolded us and our hands were secured. It didn’t feel like handcuffs; zip ties maybe. We were more or less tossed out of the truck and onto pavement, then yanked around until we could stand. They marched us up a steep hill, no stairs, gun firmly planted between my shoulder blades. They took my laptop and our weapons and all I could think about was getting that ax back, and persuading this jerkoff that I wasn’t a maniac. I suppose persuading him with an ax might have proven just the opposite, but I was too angry and confused to care.
A door swung open. I could tell from the sound of the hinges and the riotous noise inside just where we were: the gymnasium. It’s that sound, the way the words bounce around off the high ceilings and wood floors, the way sneakers squeak and squeal on the shiny surface. The soldiers’ boots clapped rhythmically as they pushed us through the gymnasium. We went through another set of doors, into a cool, damp hallway, and then down two short flights of stairs. It felt like a basement, moldy-smelling and claustrophobic.
They took our blindfolds off and left us in the dark in separate rooms. I was tossed into a little office with a window. The red-haired soldier left my hands bound. He smelled like fireworks and scotch. The table in the corner had a heavy layer of dust and a few blank spaces, voids where a computer monitor and keyboard might have been. Everything smelled perpetually wet, ruined, like it was once flooded and never completely dried out. It was probably a coach’s office, but they certainly made it feel like a cell.