Chapter Sixteen

 

 

 

 

 

I dropped the radio and charged out of the tent, almost barreling into Punch, who stood just outside.

“Flex, I heard what your friend said. I might have an answer.”

“Tell me while we run, man.”

We took off down the path, eating up real estate with each leg extension and footfall. The vibration of our feet pounding the trail must have drawn rotters, for several of them emerged from the thick growth of trees on either side of the path.

A quick shot from my Glock took some out, missed others. Punch used his multi-round shotgun on a few, blasting them back to hell.

I didn’t have time to make sure any of them were dead. I ran full out, with Punch right beside me.

I hit something with my toe and flew face first into the wet dirt and leaves with a thud. It knocked the wind out of me, and as I rolled onto my back to catch my breath, I saw a branch swing down, its sharpened spike biting only air.

My momentum had saved me, and Punch must have cleared the trap. The tripwire had been all but invisible. Punch held a hand out to me, and I grunted back to my feet. After bending down to take two of the first deep breaths I could muster since my tumble, we ran again, this time keeping our eyes aimed at the ground.

“Tell me about your idea, man,” I wheezed.

“I have four boxes of Flechette Shells,” said Punch. “Total of 20 rounds. They used them during the Vietnam war to draw snipers out of trees. Called ‘em beehives, among other things.”

“What’s different about ‘em?” I asked. The vehicles were in view now, and I ran faster.

Punch kept up. “Flechettes are like little spears, but small. These rounds have like 20 or so inside. You want penetration, you got it. They even have little fins on the tail to make ‘em fly true, at about 2000 feet per second.”

We reached the car, and since we still had to hash this shit out anyway, I caught my breath while Punch ran through the details.

“Okay,” I said when he was finished. “So that fits the bill. Now I gotta figure out how to impregnate ‘em with the estrogen blocker.”

“We can’t get the gunpowder wet, Flex,” said Punch. “But the flechettes are well above it, so if we were to dip them somehow, or inject the stuff into the end of the shell, that ought to do it.”

“I got syringes,” he said. “The ones from the pharmacy and and more that Perry threw in the bag.”

“Okay, okay,” said Punch. “So we maybe pop the needles off to make a bigger hole, and inject the stuff right into the shells.”

I unlocked the SUV and opened the rear door to get to the bag of medications. After digging around in the bag for what felt like ten minutes, I finally dumped it inside the Toyota and sorted through the bottles.

“Got ‘em,” I said. I popped the cap on one and tapped it into my hand. “Fuck!” I said.

“Capsules,” said Punch. “We need to mix it with something. Something thick, like a gel.”

“We’ll need to crush them, though,” I said. “These are like time-release beads or something.”

“Anything will work. You got tools in here. Got a scraper or anything like a putty knife?”

I looked around and found a flat file, about an inch wide and ten inches long. Punch grabbed it. “This’ll work. We’ll just crush it like a junkie breaking up meth rock.”

We both jumped as lightning struck somewhere to the south of us, followed by a crack of thunder, almost right on top of it. The storm had appeared to pass, but now, as we looked up, more ominous clouds were rolling in.

“Hurricane Georgie ain’t exhausted yet,” I said. “Okay, ideas. You said we need something like a gel.”

“Yeah, something that will coat the flechettes,” said Punch.

It hit me. “Fuckin-A,” I said, and ran around to the passenger side door. I opened it, reached inside and popped the glove box open. I pushed the Bushnells aside and pulled out a bottle of Aloe Vera after sun gel.

I held it up. “Punch, this’ll work, right?”

“Hell yes, it will. Get the syringes, man.”

He reached into his cargo pants pocket and pulled out four five-round boxes of flechette .12 gauge shells, and dumped each box in the back of the truck. “Things are illegal in a bunch of states,” he said.

Punch flipped the carpet away to reveal a hard, plastic surface, and I started breaking open the capsules and dumping them in a pile. Punch used the flat file to crush them into a fine powder. One side of the file was smoother than the other and didn’t take too much of the powder into its grooves.

Another bolt of lightning hit a tree that could have been no more than a thousand feet away. As we watched, it caught fire and half of the tall pine split away, crashing to the ground. The strike and explosion had been simultaneous, telling us we needed to get our asses under cover and moving.

“Let me know when to add the gel, man,” I said. “I only hope this shit doesn’t neutralize the chemical properties of the blocker.”

“It’s our best shot,” said Punch. “Go ahead and put it in.”

I squirted the gel on top of the now fine powder, and Punch found a small, straight stick on the ground to mix it together. The medication did dissolve into the gel, and soon it looked like it would be enough. I’d gone through two of the bottles containing thirty pills each.

“Let’s get injecting,” he said. “But not too much. Just enough to coat the projectiles.”

“Can you open them and re-close them?”

“Of course I can,” said Punch. “I had lots of time on my hands when I wasn’t fighting for my life.”

I could feel my wife and son’s lives slipping away as we prepared to save them.

It was a horrible fear that I never want to experience again.

 

*****

 

“You’re crowning,” said Scofield. “Jesus, girl, you’re timing is impeccable. Can you do me a favor, Charlie, and not push? Just try to breathe deeply and don’t push for now, okay? Just until we take care of Flexy?”

“I’ll try,” she breathed, and it was followed by a whimper as she tried to control her muscles.

Trina and Taylor were terrified now. Their mostly organized world had deteriorated, and they weren’t handling it very well. I thought of what I could do to occupy them.

“Girls, go to Charlie and I want each of you to take her by the hand and help her stay calm, okay?” I said. “Can you do that for me?”

Charlie held out both of her hands and the girls went to her, their tears still coming, but now there was something to keep them occupied. Something important.

“I’ve never done this,” said Hemp. “Doc, you’ll need to talk me through it.”

“I can do it,” said Doc Scofield, eyeing Charlie. “You stay with your girl there, and I can do it. Gem, would you prefer to look somewhere else?”

I was holding my son in my arms, pressing the oxygen tight against his face. His color was worsening, but his eyes were still open and bright. He would be crying at that moment, I knew, but he couldn’t get enough air in his lungs to do it.

“I’m not going anywhere,” I said. “I’ll sit in the captain’s chair and hold him. Will that work?”

“Sure, I just need him still,” said Scofield.

I went to the captain’s chair and began spinning it around, but movement outside the windshield caught my eye.

Red pinpoints danced as though floating through the air. The sun had sunken to dusk and they were clearly visible in the distance.

I held my son more tightly as I finished turning the chair and prayed to myself.

“Hemp, where are your scalpels?” asked Doc Scofield, snapping on a clean pair of nitrile gloves.

“Second drawer from the left,” said Hemp, even as he ran to open it himself. He pulled out a small, plastic tray encased in a baggie and unzipped it, sliding it out. He held it out to Scofield, who took the scalpel from the tray.

Hemp said, “It’s already sterilized and ready for use.”

Jim came back to where I sat with my son and knelt down. “Tilt his head back, can you?” he asked.

I did. Flexy didn’t even fight me. I could feel how weak he was.

Hemp checked Charlie again, then went to the cupboard, which was now leaning sharply forward because the wall to which it was attached had lost its rigidity. He pulled out four towels and tried to close the door three times before abandoning the effort. The remaining towels fell out onto the floor.

He spread one towel out on Flexy’s chest and the others he stacked on my leg, ready for Scofield should he need them.

The doctor felt my son’s neck right in the center, where a man’s Adam’s apple would be. Then he ran his finger down another half inch. “This should be the sweet spot,” he said.

“Should be?”

“It’s an expression, Gem,” he said. “I actually showed up for med school the day they taught us this.”

“Ha ha,” I said. “I’m freaked out enough.”

The pounding outside grew more intense. The walls flexed in and out, and I started to smell something on fire outside. I guess the doctor could tell I was on the edge of losing it.

He patted my shoulder and said, “Gem, I’m going to make a horizontal incision right here, about a half an inch wide and approximately a half inch deep – just enough to enter the airway. Then I’ll insert the pen and we’ll tape it all up securely. Can you handle it?”

“You can handle it,” said Charlie. “Right everyone? She can handle it. If I can sit here with a half-birthed baby inside me, Gem can handle her little boy getting a tracheotomy.”

I looked up at Charlie. “I didn’t know you realized this was going on,” I said.

“Jesus, Gem,” said Charlie, looking exhausted, but smiling. “I’m fucking stoned, not stupid. We’re in a box the size of a school bus. He’ll be okay, sweetie. Isis practically said so.”

I laughed, despite my terror. Charlie had a way of doing that to me. “Got it,” I said.

Nelson said, “Right on, dude. You can handle it, Gemmy.”

“Have you ever done this before, Jim?” I asked. I didn’t want to distract him; I wanted to make conversation and look anywhere except at the spot where there would soon be a hole in my son’s throat.

But I knew the answer. Jim Scofield wasn’t an ER physician or an EMT. He was just a small town doctor who delivered a lot of babies.

My son was a baby, so that was good. I held my breath anyway and nodded. I found I couldn’t find my own voice anymore, so I shut up.

“Okay now, Gem,” said Scofield. “There’s gonna be a little blood, but it’ll seal up when we get the tube in his airway. Plus, he’s gonna cry because we don’t have any anesthesia, but I’ll make it as fast as I can, okay?”

I nodded and looked Jim in the eyes. “Just go,” I said. “Be careful.”

He nodded. Jim pressed the scalpel blade to my son’s neck and drew it straight and cleanly from left to right, his fingers steadying his hand against my son’s neck.

It felt as though he were dragging the blade across my heart.

As the blood flowed from the wound, Flexy struggled in my arms; I held him still.

Hemp had taken apart a pen and cleaned the hollow tube with alcohol. He came over, took the scalpel from Scofield and gave him the pen.

“Here goes nothin’,” said Jim.

The pen had been a ball point retractable, but the cone-shaped end looked as though it would fit more easily than the old Bic pens you saw people use on television.

The pen slid right in. Blood immediately sputtered out of the end, then there was none. I could hear my son’s breath, fast and free. His color began to improve immediately. Amazing.

Hemp held out some cloth tape he tore off a roll and Scofield took it, taping it around the pen protruding from Flexy’s neck.

When he was satisfied, he looked at me. “He looks good, Gem,” he said.

“Thank you,” I said. “Now go take care of Charlie.”

“What’s that smell?” asked Lola. She looked out the side window. “Jesus Christ! We’re on fucking fire!”

“What?” said Bug, jumping up and running over. “Where the hell?”

“That tree must’ve been struck by lightning,” said Lola, pointing out the window. “Big branch caught and dropped against the lab.” She practically pressed her face against the glass. “I can’t see what’s on fire, but it does smell like fiberglass or something.”

Serena went over to where Lola looked out. “Yeah,” she said. “That’s plastic of some kind. Rachel, I know this is getting to be a habit, both in California and here, but we need you now. Can you get up there and douse the flames before we’re engulfed?”

Bug looked out again. “One good thing is, the fire’s cleared the walkers away from this side, but that won’t do us any good if we –”

He stopped talking, staring at Trina and Taylor, who were still holding Charlie’s hands and being brave. They stared at Bug, willing him to finish his sentence.

“Give me a boost and start filling buckets,” Rachel said. “Bug, you’re a big guy. Dave, you get my other foot.”

“These walls are ready to fall in,” said Dave. “Will this thing even support your weight?”

“It should,” said Hemp. “The exterior shell is pretty strong despite the fact that the overall structure is faltering. If the walls don’t shift sharply to one side or the other she should be fine.”

“Should be fine?” asked Nelson. “I’m going with her.”

“Let her get up there first to see how well it supports her,” said Hemp.

Nelson shook his head and I didn’t remember seeing him that agitated. “Nel, once you get her up there, take another hit of weed. You need to be sedated.”

I looked down at Flexy. He was still upset, but he was calming in my arms. I would not relinquish him to anyone else until my husband got back home.

Bug had knocked the sky vent out and had ripped the flange piece off in two quick motions with his big hands. The pieces clattered to the floor and immediately, he said, “Come here and step up.”

Rachel stripped off all but her bra and panties. No modesty, no hesitation.

She shot me a quick glance and I nodded and mouthed the words, “Thank you.”

“Let’s go,” said Bug.

Rachel was used to taking orders. She did so immediately. Bug lifted her right foot and she fed her left arm and her head through the small, square hole. Once she pulled her right arm up and through, the rest was just Bug using brute strength to push her up and out.

Nelson was there immediately, holding up a bucket of water. The ceiling of the mobile lab bent inward with her weight, but no splintering or cracking sounds interrupted all of us holding our collective breath.

“I’m okay,” she said. Then: “Oh, my God.”

“What?” asked Nelson.

“Red dots everywhere,” she whispered. “Oh, my God.”

“The fire,” said Bug. “Rachel.”

She took the bucket of water from Nelson and we could see her walking across, each footfall bending the ceiling inward. She was a foot from the edge.

I heard a hissing, which was a good sign. Seconds later she was back.

“More,” she said. “Two or three more should do it.”

“Push now, Charlie,” said Scofield, sitting again between Charlie’s legs. “Nice and steady, and don’t forget to breathe.”

“I’m right here, darling,” said Hemp. I watched him watching his Charlie, and I loved him. I loved that he loved her. I loved that Flex and I found her and brought her home to him.

Charlie blew out, then drew in a big breath and pushed with all her might. She screamed and the girls cried and I smiled and cringed at the same time.

“Here he comes,” said Scofield. “Okay, the head’s out.”

I wanted to go over, but Flexy had fallen asleep in my arms finally, so I sat there and watched, tears rolling down my face.

“Yuck!” said Trina, looking at me with a look of disgust on her face. “Is that what I looked like?”

“I’m sure it’s pretty close,” I said. “But I wasn’t there, sweetie.”

Scofield worked his hands and said, “Shoulders are out now.” He gave the baby an easy twist, and with one hand, took the towel from across his leg and filled it full of brand new baby. He looked at Isis, who had walked clumsily over to where he sat. She was smiling.

Jim examined the newborn as Hemp gave him the scissors. He clipped the umbilical cord and quickly wrapped a rubber band around it.

“Is he okay?” asked Charlie, sitting up on her elbows, the girls still squeezing her hands. Her brows were raised, and there was love and hope in her eyes.

“Good lookin’ boy,” said Scofield. “And he’ll be fine, once we get him crying.”

Doc Scofield carried him quickly to the sink and lay the child inside, rubbing it briskly with the towel. A moment later, we all heard the tiny cough, followed by the new cry of a living, breathing baby.

“So it is a boy?” asked Charlie. “Isis? You did know.”

“I knew you would be happy,” she said, her mouth opened in a big smile, her oversized teeth gleaming. “His name’s Max.”

We all stared at Hemp and Charlie for confirmation.

 

*****

 

I drove as fast as I could down Highway 72. We’d made quick work of saturating the flechettes within the shotgun shells with the estrogen blocker-enriched aloe vera gel. Now we just had to figure out how to efficiently take down all the red-eyes with our limited rounds.

I got on the radio to Punch. “Tyger River’s coming up,” I said. “We had it cleared on the way here, but I don’t know if Cara and her crew blocked it off again.”

There were a lot of rotters crossing here when Tony and I were heading north. I didn’t see any now. We’d done our little part to decimate them, but that didn’t mean much; there were nine times as many of them as us.

I knew at that point that I was a mere five miles away. The trip north had taken much longer, but most of the work we’d done to clear the roads on the way north was still in effect. No new crashes, no washed out roads other than what we’d already dealt with.

The bridge came into view, and we could see all the cars on it that we had pulled out of the way to allow us to pass. The hurricane’s force must have been tremendous for a while, anyway. As I approached the bridge, I saw one car on its side against the rail, and as we looked down, we saw another two had somehow been blown off the bridge.

Maybe from that tornado that Gem had told us about.

“Must be a good feelin’, Flex,” said Punch.

“It is,” I said. “How’s the grape runnin’?”

“Sweet,” he said. He zigzagged behind me as I maneuvered around the cars, following the sole open path of roadway across the bridge.

The river below was nothing like the Catawba had been. It still churned and roiled, having overflowed its banks by probably ten feet on either side, but I could see where it had already receded around three feet from where it had been at full tilt boogie.

I got that from Janis Joplin’s last band name. Always liked it. To me, it’s always been the equivalent of “the max,” and describes pretty well how Hurricane George blew through the Carolinas at exactly the wrong time.

Once we cleared the bridge, we were open again. Within another two miles, the parade of walking dead came into view.

Staggering shamblers in filthy, rotted clothing, their sunken eyes and skeletal bodies reminding me of their goddamned immortality without a bullet or ninja star or knife to the brain.

They emerged as if materializing from the woods on the sides of the road, and I slowed the Land Cruiser to fifteen miles per hour and just mowed them over. I yanked on the AK-47’s firing rope, blasting the crowns of their heads into a chunky mist until I was out of filled magazines for the weapon.

They pushed against the vehicle and slid away as I rolled past them, some of their legs slipping beneath the Toyota, and I’m sure the GTO behind me. I ran these over like bleeding speed bumps. Bleed bumps.

“Another mile, Punch,” I said, pressing the pedal down more. Ahead was some kind of natural wash. The zombies that had been moving along the street had bunched up there, and I saw that some had moved into the forest, probably taking a deer trail.

The draw to Whitmire, where my family was, was undoubtedly stronger than their ability to ignore it. Some stepped into the wash, which appeared to be around three feet deep, and were whooshed away by the flowing water. I was fairly certain I could get through, but I wasn’t sure about the GTO.

I got on the radio. “Punch, park that thing. You won’t make it through this, and I can’t stop to hook you up to the winch cable and pull you across. Too big a hurry.”

“Not a problem, Flex,” he said. He pulled the car off the road and hopped out with his shotgun and backpack. He got to my car, opened the rear door, threw his pack in and got in front.

I looked at him. He stared back, on his face what I might call a grateful smile. Sure. I recognized it. We’d saved quite a few people along the way since the zombie problem started, and it was a familiar look. Maybe Punch, with his military skills, had only been a prisoner in his own mind, but Tony and I showing up that day had flipped some switch that made him realize that inaction was his only barrier to obtaining freedom again.

“You’re gonna have to pardon the first impression you’re gonna get there,” I said. “Sounds like the shit has not only hit the fan, it’s smashed it. Being a Marine, you know where shit rolls, and you and I are downhill, brother. It’s on us.”

He hefted his Saiga and said, “All twenty flechette rounds are in here.” He reached to the floorboard and brought up the super soaker. “And we filled these at our last stop. We’re good to go.”

“We’ll play it by ear when we get there,” I said.

“You should call them,” said Punch. “Tell ‘em we’re almost there.”

“Good idea,” I said. I picked it up and pressed the button. “Gem, Hemp? You there?”

“You are so not military,” said Punch.

“Flex?” came a voice. It was not very familiar, but sounded kind of like Dave Gammon.

“Bug?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he said. “Flex, we thought we had the fire out, but I guess a wheel caught, and now the undercarriage is burning. Floor’s starting to get hot, man.”

I floored the vehicle and if a zombie got in my way he’d just get cut in half. I made a left onto our access road.

“I don’t see any flames, Bug,” I said. “I’m coming down our road now.”

“It’s underneath,” he said. “We can’t even see it, but we can sure smell it. We’re getting choked up in here.”

“Nothing Lola can do to draw ‘em somewhere else?”

“Maybe there would be, but she’s trapped inside, and she can’t fit through the ceiling vent like Rachel can.”

The house came into view. I stared. Punch said, “Wow. They were inside when that happened?”

I pushed the button again, a million things on my brain, and I just started spewing them. “Bug? How’s my son? How’s Gem? How’s Charlie? Did she have her baby yet?”

“They’re fine,” he answered. “We’re all lying on the floor now to stay out of the smoke. Floor’s hot, Flex. We gotta get out of this thing or we’re all roasted.”

He was keeping his voice low, but I knew the girls were listening to everything he said.

We rounded the corner of the house and a large tree had fallen in our path.

“End of the line, bud,” I said. “Grab your toy gun, your shotgun and every handgun you have. And remember to preserve the flechette rounds. Only use them on red-eyes.” I threw the SUV in park.

“Got it,” he said.

“Hold on, Bug,” I said into the radio. “We’re coming around the corner. I smell the fire, too.” It smelled like burning plastic and rubber.

“You should be in here,” he said, his voice strained.

We approached the corner. I reached into my pocket and drew in my breath.

I’d never been called on to estimate a crowd size. I’d put the one in front of me at a thousand. Hundreds must have been pressing in on the motor home.

It was now full dark, and the moon was trapped behind a thick cloud cover. The wind still blew at probably twenty-five miles an hour, but it was like mere trade winds compared to its former power.

“Put Gem on the line,” I said into the radio.

“I’m here, babe,” she said. “I couldn’t help myself. I had to crawl over to get the other radio.”

There was a pause. “Flex? I’m so glad you’re back. My mind was beginning to do stupid stuff.”

“I wouldn’t leave you guys,” I said. “You’re what got me back. Is Flexy okay?”

“You’ll see. What’s your plan?” she asked.

“Hold on, Gem.”

I talked it out with Punch. We moved through the rubble of the house and worked our way to the only remaining wall; the one that stood five feet from the mobile lab. Both of us were on WAT-5, so we didn’t worry about detection from the masses. The red-eyes had a sixth sense, but so far, none had turned to spy us.

“They need out of there,” said Punch. “Only one door, right?”

“Yep,” I said.

“Okay. I got something.”

He told me his plan.

“That might work,” I said. “Fastest way to get them out.”

I got on the radio and told Gem and Bug what needed to happen. Neither argued.

 

*****

 

The generator had died, and there was no ambient light except for several LED flashlights that some of us had in our pockets. It had become a staple item in our survival inventory. I had a headlight on, as did Hemp and Dave Gammon.

“Everybody, lie as flat as you can on the floor. Girls, no heads raised, not even an inch, you got that?”

“Yes, Gemmy,” the girls said together.

“And keep Bunsen and Slider down, too,” I said. “It’s very important.”

“I got Slider here,” said Dave. “Serena’s holding Bunsen down.”

Rachel and Nelson had taken a far corner. The floor was hot, and I swore it would burn through and scorch us all if something didn’t happen soon. It was easier to breathe down on the floor, but not by much.

The rain had stopped, and now only the wind whistled past the open vent above us. Some of the wind made its way to the interior, helping move the air inside, but it wasn’t enough. There were too many of us consuming oxygen and the fire below us seemed to pre-heat it before it reached our lungs. It felt like I was breathing through a smoldering sock.

A huge explosion sounded, and the mobile lab dropped on one end, throwing the floor on an angle.

“That was the tire blowing out!” yelled Hemp. “Front left, from our angle.”

“That’s where the fire I couldn’t get to was burning,” said Rachel. “I’m sorry, but I couldn’t lean out that far.”

Then we heard hissing, popping and muffled, animalistic shrieks. The walls began pushing in farther, for we could no longer hold them back and be on the floor at the same time.

In the light of our headlamps and LED flashlights, we watched the walls in flux, moving in and out, cracking and bending.

The hiss-popping continued, and above our heads, water began to pour in on us.

 

*****

 

“Spray it up as high as you can, Punch!” I said. “Make it rain, buddy! The more you wet ‘em the more we take down and the quicker we can get to the red eyes!”

“Got it,” he shouted back, and we separated. I saw a red-eye to my right and spun my Daewoo toward her, firing as I turned to avoid giving her a chance to make a defensive move. I’d seen that trick in the waiting room at the prison in Concord and so many other places.

The rounds blew her red eyes through the back of her head and she collapsed into the crowd of melting zombie bodies. The three-round burst punched the same number of holes in the mobile lab’s now thin sheathing. I hoped everyone was on the floor as we’d instructed them.

I told myself I didn’t have to worry, but I backed toward the destroyed house again and pulled the radio from my clip as I watched Punch water down another twenty or so rotters.

“Gem, are you guys down?”

When she came back, her voice was shaking and she sounded frightened. Not like my Gem. “Yeah, Flex. That last one rattled the blinds, but that’s all.”

“Stay there. It’s gonna get messy. When we give you the go-ahead, I want someone to kick that fucking door open and you all get the hell out of there as fast as you can, okay?”

“Yes!”

“Just wait, then,” I said. I put the radio back on my belt.

“Get over here, Punch,” I said. “Right in front. Hurry!”

Punch had done well. Most of the standard-issue rotters were now on the ground, bubbling like the La Brea Tar Pits. As they melted, bubbles in their muck would expand larger and larger before popping, sending small spatters into the air.

“Clear enough?” he asked, moving beside me, his eyes ever watchful. More of the zombies moved in where their brothers and sisters had fallen, and now it seemed the majority was of the more intelligent variety.

“Time to try this fucker out,” he said. “Flex, is that one over there?”

I followed his pointing finger. The creature stood with her back to us, but her straight hair blew in the wind, untangled. She was five feet away.

“My guess is yes,” I said. “Don’t shoot her in the head. Hemp says just introducing the blocker into her system should be enough.”

“Good,” he said. “It’ll tell us if this shit is gonna work.”

He raised his gun. She turned and launched herself toward us simultaneously.

“Fire!” I shouted.

Punch fired. The booming explosion shattered the night, dominating the howling wind and the hiss-popping of the melting zombies around us. What happened next amazed me.

She dropped in mid-flight, smashing into the sticky, wet pile of the dead creatures around us. Seconds later, she pushed herself from the muck that clung to her hands and arms like rubber cement and got back to her feet.

She looked downward, her attention on the wound in her distended stomach, and as we watched, the skin there peeled away and the fetus within her slid from its cold, dead chrysalis, dropping with a sodden thud into the mass of melted, black-red slime at her feet.

From her belly, she began splitting up to her chest, her neck, then her face. Her skin peeled away, revealing only her skeletal framework beneath, and finally, her oh, so lovely hair and scalp fell from her frame and slid down what remained of her body.

The bones began to disintegrate, and she dissolved into the ground. She had not made a sound. Her destruction was complete.

I slapped Punch on the back and said, “Let the fucking flechettes, fly, but focus on a path out of that goddamned lab first.”

I pushed the button on my radio again. “This is it! Everybody flat on the fucking ground! Stay below the one foot high mark!”

Punch stood back dead center from the entry door to the lab. No more of the standard issue walking dead remained, having been reduced to a sea of goo.

All that were left on their feet were red-eyes. It seemed that they turned toward us all at once. Punch stuck to the plan.

“Now!” I shouted. He let flechette round after flechette round fly. I took as many out with the Daewoo as I could, until we had cleared a path about ten feet wide, centered at the door.

The goddamned mobile lab started to look like Bonnie and Clyde’s 1934 Ford on the day they died. I hoped everyone inside had followed our instructions or they’d be dead, too.

 

*****

 

As Flex and Punch fired away outside, the blinds, upholstery and walls blew into fragments that rained down upon those of us cowering inside. The side window had blown out with the onset of their attack, and directly in the line of fire, the chair Charlie had just used to deliver her baby was peppered with bullet holes. Tiny metal rods stung our exposed skin as they hit the opposite wall of the lab, bounced off and dropped. They were hot and sticky and I had no idea what they were at the time, but they didn’t seem to pose a threat.

The onslaught continued for at least five solid minutes before things outside fell silent. The smoke was thick and smothering and I could hardly breathe. I worried for my son and all of us inside, but mostly for him. The little tube in his neck was his only airway, and what he had to breathe wasn’t what I’d consider up to the EPA’s clean air standards. I also worried for Charlie’s newborn son, facing this battle in his first minutes of life.

“Gem!” came Flex’s voice over the radio. “Get out of there! Kick that fucking door open and prepare to step in some sticky crap, but keep going. Got me?”

“Everybody!” I shouted. “You heard. Up, up!”

“We just go?” asked Lola. “I still hear them,” she said. “Still in my head. There’s lots of them,” she said.

“Flex is right,” said Isis. “They have cleared a path.”

Nelson, skinny as he was, scooped up Trina, and Dave grabbed Taylor. Neither child cried or argued. Their expressions were fixed, determined and watchful.

Our girls had come quite a long way over the past months, and almost seemed unfazed by anything that happened. Sometimes they lost it emotionally, but we were seeing children grow up in madness for the first time in our lives. They were adapting.

I wondered if it was similar to what children went through when the wild west was the destination of early settlers seeking their version of the American dream; wagon trains attacked, children and adults killed by the natives of the land who did not welcome the invading white men and women.

I suppose they had as much a chance of talking themselves out of trouble as we did. Their children were taught that it was one of the hazards of their world, just as ours were told about the strange humans with pink and red eyes who hungered for their flesh.

I’d rather have taken my chances as a child in the old west.

Bug held Isis and I held Flexy, careful not to bump his new breathing tube, and Charlie held her little Max.

They had always intended to name a boy Max to honor Max Romero, Hemp’s friend from the CDC whose death I detailed in my chronicle, and the man who had allowed us to take the very RV we were currently ready to escape from. Strangely, Isis had known his name before he was born.

Had the baby been a girl, her name was to be Emma. Not after anyone – just because Charlie loved the name.

Charlie was on her feet and I could see the pain in her face.

“Are you okay, Charlie?” I asked. “Can you do this?”

“I don’t have a choice,” she said. “Hemp needs to be ready to use his gun and there’s no way I’m letting go of my son.”

“How’s your pain?” I asked.

“I had a baby a few minutes ago,” said Charlie. “Worse still, I don’t think I dropped the placenta yet.”

“Holy, shit. You are one tough bitch,” I said.

“You want tough?” she asked me. “It’s a new world, Gem,” she said, a twinkle in her tired eyes. “When it does come out, I’m curing it and making a Bota Bag out of it.”

I laughed out loud, mostly at the image in my head, and Charlie stifled her laugh. Probably either because it hurt or she was afraid a placenta flying out of her might be a bit more extreme than an accidental fart.

Bug stood in front. “Everybody ready?”

“Yes!” everybody yelled in unison.

He stood back about two feet and kicked the door, which was already barely fixed in its frame. It ripped from its hinges and fell straight forward, landing so as to serve as a ramp and walkway over the first few feet of dissolving zombies who lay near and far, side to side as far as we could see in the darkness.

I looked up and saw a beautiful sight comprised of my Flex and another man who could only be Punch, about ten feet from the door. They scanned the area and fired their weapons intermittently. They used three round bursts rather than full auto, clearly to preserve ammo, and dangling from their belts were two colorful super soaker water guns.

Bug dropped out with Isis, walked across the door until it came to an end, and stepped into the gooey pile of dead walkers. The smell was horrific and assaulted me the moment the door fell, but I choked down the bile that threatened to force its way from my stomach.

Punch and Flex kept their eyes on us, still alternately turning and firing at the red-eyes moving in. The prize the creatures wanted was now visible, and they came without regard for their own safety. Isis was a pull they could not deny, and I realized we were seeing the true intensity of the phenomenon for the first time.

I let Dave and Nelson go first because they were carrying our girls, and I needed to keep an eye on them. Hemp went out next, his gun in the firing position, and his left arm around Charlie’s waist. He supported her through the sticky thickness at the end of the door until they stepped up on the piles of destroyed construction debris beyond.

When I got to the end of the fallen door and stepped off into the biological scum, my feet sank into it and I nearly fell forward each time I attempted to pull one foot out to plant the other. The reek was more intense and pungent and I felt myself getting lightheaded.

“Watch out!” yelled Nelson, who had turned around to watch my progress. He gripped Trina in his left arm as he did his best not to lose his balance and topple over into the slime at our feet. At first I had no idea why he had yelled, but even as he pressed Trina’s face into his shoulder, he brought his arm back and flung it forward, the silver Ninja star whizzing past us at a distance of around a foot, angled sharply upward.

It was thrown so quickly I couldn’t follow its flight path, but when I turned to look at the top of the burning laboratory, I spotted his target. Even in the swirling, black smoke billowing from the rig, I saw the red-eye’s head whip backward.

When a sudden gust of wind blew the smoke away from her for a moment, I briefly caught her red eyes as they faded to black. The creature that had been standing atop the collapsing mobile lab, likely ready to leap on me and my child, fell and plunged through the roof, crashing into the interior of the rig, blasting sparks out the door as she hit bottom.

I must have been staring as though in a daze, because the next thing I remember is Flex taking me by the arm and pulling me along. I held onto my son, careful of his new, plastic appendage, and went to Flex.

“Hurry, Gem,” he said, not mincing words. “You go to the SUV and lock yourself in,” he said. “You and Charlie and all the kids. Here, take this.”

He passed me his Glock.

“What are you going to do? Come with us,” I pleaded.

“We gotta finish this,” he said. “I want every last red-eye dead and gone. This estrogen blocker shit seems to do it, so no time like the present.”

“I love you, Flex.”

“Hurry,” he said. “God, it’s good to see you two.” He peeled the blanket away from our son and gasped, seeing the pen sticking from his throat. He looked at me. “Gem, what happened? Is he okay?”

“His throat was blocked from the Diphtheria. You have the antitoxin, right?”

“I do,” said Flex.

“Then he’ll be fine,” I said. “For now he can breathe.”

He kissed his son on the cheek and kissed my lips briefly. “Go,” he said. “Be careful.”

 

*****

 

After Gem and our boy were out of the mix of things, I monitored the others. As Doc Scofield moved to step down onto the door, his ankle twisted and he fell forward, rolling off the door and into the slime.

I threw the Daewoo over my shoulder and ran up to him, pulling him up. I got him back on the ramp and past the dissolving zombie bodies.

“Thanks, Flex,” he said. “You boys got here just in time.”

“Earlier would have been better. Get to the truck with Gem and them. You can’t help with that ankle.”

“I’m sorry, man,” he said. “Didn’t want to let you down.”

“You deliver Charlie’s baby?” I asked.

“I did,” he said.

I patted him on his slimy back. “Then don’t apologize because you’ve had a good day, Jim. Now get over there.”

He hobbled off and I realized that Dave, Nelson and Bug must’ve heard my instructions to Gem because they were running with the girls in their arms toward the Land Cruiser. Doc Scofield was soon behind them.

Everyone heading for the Land Cruiser had to skirt around the fallen tree branch that had prevented us from driving in closer, but I watched them until they all reached the truck.

Lola ran up beside me breathing hard, her long knife in her right hand and a Glock in her left. “I’m gonna do what I can, Flex,” she said.

She stood there in front of me, her look unwavering, her blonde hair a crazy mess. Her red eyes held their own luminosity. I hadn’t known her long, but I understood she had been a literal lifesaver to Dave and the rest of them in California.

I turned to fire at another red-eye who had appeared around the corner of the lab, the roof of which was now fully engulfed in orange-yellow, licking flames. I knew we had to get clear of it, because there were propane tanks inside that would blow as the fire progressed.

“Care to elaborate?” I asked, shielding my eyes from the flames that turned Lola into nothing more than a silhouette against them.

“That big field over there,” she said, pointing. “Behind the lab. I can try to draw them in there, and you can get a firing squad together to take ‘em all down.”

“You’ll be fighting Isis’s pull,” I said. “Can you compete with her?”

“I did before,” said Lola. “Not at her advanced stage – I mean, she wasn’t freaking talking back then, but it was only a week or so ago. So yeah. I’ll try.”

“Okay, but if shit gets sketchy, I want you to hightail it to my Toyota and get safe with the girls.”

“Not really my style,” she said, spinning her knife in her hand. “I’m a take action kinda girl.”

“So was Gem,” I said. “Sure you’re up to it?”

“I’ll get to the field and call them,” she said. I asked no further questions, because Lolita Lane ran into the night, now ablaze with brightly burning flames.

From the corner of my eye I saw Serena pulling both of our huge dogs by their collars toward the Land Cruiser.

I hoped there would be room for them.

I searched the yard. Gem’s car was nowhere in sight. I pulled my radio from my belt.

“Gem,” I said. “Where’s your car?”

She came back almost immediately. “Don’t worry about that!” she said.

“I need it to put the dogs in,” I said. “They’re comin’ your way, but they can’t fit in the SUV with you guys.”

“Shit, Flex, it’s on the other side of the mobile lab, but it’s probably on fire,” she said. “We’ll fit them in.”

I didn’t answer her. I ran on the outside edges between the melted zombie bodies and the rubble from the house, and cut right. I saw Hemp about fifty yards to my left, and spotted a huge horde of red-eyed females moving toward my SUV.

I had to abort my plan. Hemp was forty yards to my right. I called to him, waving my arms.

He looked over at me and called, “Yeah, Flex!”

I pointed at the advancing red-eyes. “Flank ‘em on their right side! I got the left! Dave, if you can hear me buddy, get that Crown Vic away from the mobile lab if you can!”

I lowered the radio and yelled into the night, “Punch! Where are you, Punch?”

The wind carried my words away as they fanned the flames before us. I ran toward Hemp and as I rounded the corner of the mobile lab, I saw Lola charging toward the open field. I hoped she would begin her call soon. Things were getting out of control. I had no idea where Nelson was.

I ran, my lungs burning, until I was about fifteen feet away from Hemp. He had been firing constantly, but at that moment his gun fell silent. I looked around and realized that the many red-eyes who were near us just minutes before were gone.

Vanished. Of course. They were hiders.

The wind had turned and the smoke shifted direction, now billowing toward our driveway and the SUV where Gem, Charlie and the children had retreated for refuge. The pungent, black smoke made it impossible to see not only where the intelligent females had gone, but the SUV itself.

 

 

*****

 

Jim Scofield had gotten to the truck last, so we were able to tuck him into the very rear of the SUV, still allowing room for others I hoped would make it to the vehicle.

It appeared that floor mats had been taped up over the front seat side windows, but I could also tell the glass was gone, so despite the fact that they limited visibility, we left them in place.

I was in the front seat holding Flexy, and Charlie sat in the middle with her newborn baby in her arms. She looked utterly exhausted. She was quiet and morose; so unlike my friend.

“The child is there,” said Charlie.

My heartbeat stopped and I stared at her.

“Charlie, are you okay?”

Tears rolled down her face and she held her child closer to her as though someone might take Max away from her.

“Charlie, it’s okay,” I assured her. “You took the wafer. You’re fine.”

I could do nothing more than put my arm around her and let her know that I was there for her. Always.

I glanced in the back seat. Both girls stared out of the window into the dark, smoky blackness, their haunted eyes reflecting the flickering, distant firelight.

A pounding came on the rear driver’s side door, but we couldn’t see out because of the heavy tint. Trina leaned over to unlock the door.

“No, Trina!” I shouted, but it was too late. The door flung open and to my relief, Bunsen jumped in, landing atop Trina and Taylor, followed by Slider. Serena followed the dogs, pushing with all her might to stuff them in and jump in herself. She yanked the door closed behind her.

“I’m sorry!” she said, hardly able to speak, her voice raspy. “There’s so much going on out there that nobody focused on these guys!”

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!” shouted Trina, hugging the dogs’ necks and crying. Taylor was also in tears.

“I dropped my goddamned gun so I can’t go back out there,” said Serena. “Did you see Dave anywhere?”

“No,” I said. “Not since we got in here, but we can’t see much of anything.” I got on my radio and pushed the button. “Flex!”

There was no answer. I transmitted my message anyway. “Jim, Serena and the dogs are in with us!”

He didn’t respond. The tension within the vehicle was palpable.

Right after we’d gotten to the Land Cruiser, Bug had run up and deposited Isis with us, who now stood on the driver’s seat holding onto the steering wheel, peering through the gap in the shattered windshield, that for some reason was fortified with what appeared to be the missing third-row seat from the Toyota.

The thick smoke from the blazing RV blew directly toward us, killing our visibility. With half a windshield, the reeking soot was drifting into the interior of the cab, and it was hard to breathe. We might as well have all been blind.

The wind suddenly shifted again, clearing the heavy smoke away for the moment. As if by divine intervention, a break in the clouds above us allowed the faint light of the moon to illuminate the area in front of the Land Cruiser.

Nothing but rubble spread out before us except for the distant, leaping flames from the RV fire. I let out my breath. With the heavy smoke, I had been blinded. With it gone, I felt far more at ease.

Charlie seemed to have calmed. I slid my arm from around her and retrieved my Uzi from the floorboard. There was a Glock down there, too, but I knew I would not fire either one with two babies so close to me.

With a sigh, I placed the Uzi back on the floor and started on what might have been my fiftieth prayer of the longest day of my life.

Suddenly the scene before us changed from marginally serene to intense.

I gasped as directly in front of us, no more than twenty feet away, what had to be a hundred red-eyed females rose swiftly to their feet.

Charlie’s hand gripped my wrist.

“Jesus, Gem, you see that?” asked Scofield from the back of the Land Cruiser. I adjusted the rear view mirror to see his eyes, wide, alert and frightened.

The monsters before us appeared organized – at least for them. Standing almost in an army marching formation, shoulder to shoulder, five zombies wide and maybe twelve or thirteen deep all in a row, the horde of red-eyes now advanced on us.

Aside from the differences in their clothing and heights, I could not have told one from the other.

I hit the headlights on the SUV, turning on the high beams in an effort to blind them with the light. Perhaps they didn’t utilize their vision in the same way humans did, for they did not seem fazed. Now that I could see, however, it struck me that some of the bulges in their stomachs appeared to have been almost full term pregnancies at the time of their deaths and conversion into evil; others were in indeterminable stages of gestation.

“Mothers and Hungerers,” said Isis. “Mothers want me,” she added. “Hungerers want us all.”

With that, the red-eyes moved in with a fluid motion, separating into two groups that began surrounding the SUV.

I reached up to pull the handle of the AK-47 on top of the Toyota, but Charlie stopped me, her eyes still red, but now sharp and focused.

“Gem, you can’t shoot them!” she screamed. “The boys might be in the line of fire!”

She was right. I lowered my hand and situated Flexy in my arms, desperation in my heart, my brain racing like a freight train. “Girls, eyes on your knees, now!” I shouted. Then I turned toward the strange, beautiful infant standing in the driver’s seat.

“Isis,” I said, feeling my heart pounding in my ears. “Can you stop them? Can you send them away?”

“I can send them nowhere,” she said. “But if I can allow them to see me, I can reveal to them who I am not,” she said.

“What do you mean, who you are not?” I asked.

“As I said before,” she said. “They believe I am their child. If I see them, as with the Mother in the basement, I can show them.”

At that very moment, something changed. The many dead women before us started to turn away. As she watched, Isis smiled. “Lolita Lane calls them,” she whispered.

“Lolita –” I began, then realized it was Lola. I had heard what she did in California.

“Where is she?” asked Charlie. “I don’t see her anywhere.”

“Oh, she’s out there,” I said, as the army of rotters turned their backs to us. “Thank God.”

 

*****