Dane waited in front of the ARL, pacing back and forth, glancing left to right, with his hands in his pockets. He took each step slowly, so he barely impacted the ground and made little noise.
He heard the rasp then, like a far-off breeze caught in a tree, but hollow and filled with malice.
He stopped, looked into the distance, toward the gate, and saw the shifting, shuffling silhouettes within the darkness.
"Shadows among shadows," he sang, in a low murmur.
Dane stepped around to the back of his truck, its rear already open. He pushed aside the emptied kerosene tank, and grabbed one of the flares from his work box.
The long rasp grew louder, drew closer, until it stopped being a single rasp and became many all at once.
"The ghosts of old ghosts," he sang.
He lit the flare, and its hot white-red light illuminated his stern face and steely gaze.
"They all die in the light."
Dane dropped the flare, and flame burst from the ground, streaking ahead of him, into the distance, under and against the guard station, a wall of fire forming several hundred yards out.
"Where the living live," he finished, with a nod.
He watched.
The zombies blindly walked through the fire one-by-one. The rasps silenced as the flame consumed the swell of air within their vacant chest cavities. The last fragments of their rotting flesh burned, darkest smoke rising into the sky, oils bursting and spraying out from their bodies.
Dane's expression diminished.
Several more stepped through the fire, igniting. The blaze intensified over them, bright white-orange in the night, the flame fueled by the bubbling fats of their decomposing bodies, like a shambolic candle.
They staggered, disoriented, but did not stop, only slowed. And even if it was only barely, they were still advancing.
"Well, shoot," he muttered. "Girls, I hope you're getting things sorted."
*~*~*
Dylan and Lacey emerged from the facility and into the night. A flash of bright blue light illuminated the sky and steadily dimmed to dark.
"That light," Lacey said. "It's from the tower!"
They crept in the dark behind a fenced area containing a massive satellite dish. Further ahead was a car park, with several jeeps. Beyond the facility, in the distance, was a massive hangar. Its doors were open, the empty space leading to a runway.
And in the courtyard between the ARL and the hangar was a massive radio tower, fifty stories high. Its beacon flashed brightly, visible as far as twenty miles away, well into the city.
Lacey stared out into the courtyard, eyes wide with horror.
More than one hundred zombies had congregated around the tower sending out the Z-Rays. They stood in various states of decay, some holding a sharp object. A knife or a screwdriver, or a slender piece of slate.
"You can fix this, right?" Dylan said. "You can do… whatever?"
Lacey was too terrified to speak, simply nodding.
"Okay," Dylan said. "I'll get them away from the tower for you."
Lacey gasped, grabbing Dylan. "Wait! What are you going to do? No!" she whispered loudly.
Dylan smiled wickedly. "Hey, babe. I've got your back!"
She took off then, hurrying away from the courtyard and to the nearby car park.
*~*~*
Dylan searched around, making sure there were no zombies around her, and then jumped into the first jeep. Already feeling mighty in its high seat, she tugged her fingerless gloves taut with an eager grin. She turned the key, and the jeep roared to life. She giggled, then shouted, "Rock and roll!"
Dylan tore into the courtyard, speeding past Lacey. She flashed the jeep's lights at the mass of undead and honked at them, the diesel engine thrumming loudly. And steadily, they began to turn toward her.
"Come and get me, fuckers!" she shouted. "All-American cutie coming at ya!"
Dylan turned subtly, cresting the edge of the gathering.
Thump! Bash!
She grunted, grinned as she bounced and jerked in her seat, slamming into any stray zombies. They splattered against the front of the jeep, slimy meat spraying around her, and more fell under its large wheels and were flattened with a sickening squish.
She laughed, enjoying herself deeply, and hoped that it would be enough to help Lacey.
As she drove away from the courtyard, toward the grassy field and its barb-wire fencing, she glanced back.
The zombies were all watching her, and began following the jeep.
"That's right, you dead-ass dorks," she said. "Follow me to victory!"
She slowed and honked aggressively.
*~*~*
Lacey watched as the jeep's lights receded into the distance, its sounds following. The crowd of zombies began to thin as they followed her into the night.
"Oh, Dylan," she said softly, putting a hand to her heart. "Be safe."
The zombies were soon on one side of the tower and moving away. She had a clear shot at the ladder. She took a breath, and thinking of Dylan, found the strength to sprint out into the courtyard.
The nearest zombie was no more than twenty yards away, gripping a potato peeler. Lacey quickly scrambled up the ladder, propelling herself up its metal rungs.
The zombie stopped and turned. And through its shattered orbital fissures, recognized a moving presence, and acted on its programming.
*~*~*
Dylan turned away from the fence, slowly heading alongside the hangar, attempting to keep the flock of corpses following behind her. She watched as Lacey made her way up the ladder, a zombie starting toward her. A few others nearby, sensing the disturbance, joined it, a domino effect starting.
"Aw, shit!"
Dylan turned hard, her body pulled to one side of the jeep, and sped into the courtyard. The engine roared as she glared ahead. And gripping the wheel, pedal to the floor, she drove straight into the leading zombie.
Thud!
It flung off the front of the jeep, flew into the air, its limbs tearing away from its mealy body. The corpse splattered behind her. She looped around, returning to the mass that had swarmed behind her, and slowed, determined to keep them after her and away from Lacey.
*~*~*
Lacey watched from six stories high as Dylan skirted the tower and raced back toward the hangar, amazed by her mad driving.
Most of the zombies that had begun toward her were following after Dylan now, but a few were still coming, sensing her, and soon one reached the base of the tower. It gripped the rung. Even if it couldn't climb up, Lacey wasn't sure how she was going to be able to get down again.
Just keep going, she thought. Dylan's counting on you.
She looked upward, still ascending, the beacon's blue-white flash even more intense in the dark around her.
Finally, she was at the controls. She glanced out, and could see Dylan cutting across the distance, a loud speck with many zombies shuffling after her.
Lacey opened the terminal, tapped at its screen. The interface loaded, and she began at its menu.
She smiled widely. She knew this program! It was simple and could be rewritten from here. She looked down. The zombie had gotten far up the ladder, much more than she had realized. Two more were waiting below.
There was only one way out. Lacey tapped at the screen, keeping a mental map of the route she was taking, and the codes and formulas she would need to invert the signal's resonance while keeping it steady and broadcasting across the city.
It was a great deal to remember, but she ignored her doubts, her fears, and using her knowledge and training, did what she had to do.
*~*~*
Dylan swooped along the side of the facility, zombies still behind her. She could see the zombies at the base of the tower. One had already climbed up its ladder. She panicked, doubting she could near the tower without bringing along the rest of the flock, or strike the zombies without damaging the tower itself.
"You've got to hurry, Lacey! Move that sexy little ass!"
Dylan passed the ARL, completing a full circuit, and drove toward the field and its fence again. As her lights illuminated the dark ahead, she gasped. There were twenty or more zombies spread out, waiting for her. She realized her mistake. A bunch of zombies looked like a bunch of zombies in the rear view mirror. She hadn't considered that some of them would straggle or become confused.
"Fuck!" she growled, running into some and dodging others.
She wasn't going fast enough to plow through them, though, and she was slowed to a crawl. Zombies advanced on her from all sides, their rasps drowned by the engine. One was suddenly beside her. Dylan yelped as it swiped. She pulled away, its hunting knife dragging across her arm, and turned the jeep sharply into another zombie. She shook in place, feeling genuine fear.
*~*~*
Lacey pulled two cables from the terminal, switched them around to compensate for the adjusted energy output, then returned to the interface. She navigated its codes and prompts, driven by her fears and emboldened by Dylan, putting herself in danger out there for her. And with a final tap on the screen, Lacey completed the program. She smiled. It was ready to load.
The zombie grabbed her ankle. Lacey screamed, looked down. The protruding bone tips of its rotting fingers pierced her skin, blood spilling out. She kicked, tried to pull away, but its grip was too strong. It was more recently deceased than the others. Only its skin had decayed, thin like wax paper and splotched in pink and red.
It rasped at her, milky eyes quivering and fluids leaking from its orifices.
Lacey focused on the terminal as she whimpered, tapping through its prompts, and with a final strike over the LAUNCH symbol, the program rebooted.
A deafening buzz sounded and sparks burst from the transmitter. Lacey cried out and covered herself, struggling to free her foot from the zombie grabbing her. The beacon's light surged, and the sky illuminated fully.
The world quieted as the light steadied, pulsing soft white, and in the calm after, the zombie's grip loosened. It simply fell, dropping limply to the base of the tower with the other two.
*~*~*
Dylan powered across the field, the zombies suddenly collapsing around her. She rocked and jostled as she drove over them. And hearing the squish of their bodies and crunch of their bones under her, she smiled.
"Fuck yeah! That's my girl!"
Dylan spun the jeep around, freely driving over the inanimate bodies as she returned to the tower.
*~*~*
Lacey hopped from the bottom rung skipped away from the fallen bodies in a shaky hobble.
Dylan pulled up, bringing the borrowed jeep to a sudden and jarring halt. She chuckled as she sprang out and raced to Lacey.
"You did it!" she cheered. "You're so fucking awesome!"
And they embraced in celebration, oblivious to the rotting bodies around them.
"No way! Your driving was awesome," Lacey said. "You were really giving those things the run-around. I never could have done that."
"Well, my best girl needed to be kept safe," Dylan said. "There's nothing I wouldn't do for her. For you."
In the quiet of the night, Lacey looked deeply into Dylan's eyes, sparkling with each flash of the beacon's new light, and shared her smile, knowing she was standing with the woman she loved more than any other in the world.