As the World Dies (11 page)

    "Get up! Get up!" Stacey's voice was shrill.

    Sean managed to get to his feet and deftly avoided the grasp of the zombies lunging toward him. Hobbled by his fall, he rushed toward the ATV, dragging his one leg behind him. The zombies continued to fall out of the window and land hard on the ground. A few busted open their heads or broke their necks. The zombies sliding down to the ground piled up in a heap of twisting arms and legs. Luckily, they didn't seem to know how to untangle themselves and get up.

    Sean was almost to the ATV when some faster, fiercer zombies rounded the corner of the house.

    "We gotta go," Eric exclaimed and the ATV lurched forward.

    There was no time to wait for Sean and they both knew it.

    With an unbelievable amount of willpower, Sean pushed his body to the limit despite his pain and managed to throw himself onto the trailer behind the ATV. The hands of the pursuing zombies grabbed for him and one or two managed to snag his clothes. Sean twisted his body in an attempt to get free from the grasping creatures and shouted for Eric to go faster. He kicked his legs to dislodge the zombies while trying to hold onto the edge of the trailer.

    "Sean! Sean!" Stacey's arms were painfully tight around Eric's waist and she screamed as one of the zombies tried to pull itself onto the trailer as the ATV gained speed.

    The scarily fast, still fresh zombie tried to use its handhold on Sean's shirt to pull itself onto the trailer. Sean managed to get one foot on the creature’s chest and shoved it as hard as it could. It tumbled away into the high grass as the ATV turned onto the dirt road that led into the wooded hills.

    "He made it," she gasped with relief. "He made it!"

    Eric kept his gaze steady on the road ahead of them. He wasn't sure if he felt relief or not. His body was tight with fear and frustration. He felt Pepe squirming around in his jacket and took a deep breath to steady his nerves and his hands. The dog poked his head out of the collar of the jacket and Eric felt the comforting softness of the dog's fur underneath his chin.

    Stacey laid her head against the back of his shoulder and he could feel her body shuddering with her sobs. In the rear view mirrors, Eric saw the more fleet footed zombies trying to chase after them, but slowly, they began to drop away as the ATV rode faster up the dirt road and away from the bed and breakfast that had been his safe haven. Behind them, on the trailer, Sean curled up in a tight ball, exhausted and overwhelmed.

    "Where are we going," Stacey asked.

    "I don't know," Eric answered.

Chapter Fifteen

War Stories

    As the ATV grumbled up the dirt road dragging the overloaded flat trailer behind it, Eric took deep breaths trying to soothe his frazzled nerves and bring his heart rate down so it wouldn’t feel like it was about to burst out of his chest.

    Stacey clung to him, her head still on his shoulder, her sobs fading as she gained control. They were both soaked in sweat and the warm breeze did nothing to soothe their hot flesh. Pepe adjusted himself so he could rest his chin on the edge of Eric's jacket collar and snuggle against Eric. His little heart had been racing, too, and Eric could feel the small dog slowly relaxing.

    "I don't see any following," Stacey said in his ear. Her voice sounded ragged with emotion.

    Eric checked his mirrors again. The roof of bed and breakfast was dropping away from view beneath the treetops as they climbed the hill. He still couldn't believe it was over. His safe haven had been destroyed so quickly it did not seem real. How he could have ever believed that he could stay in relative comfort until the rescue team arrived? In this world, nothing was truly safe anymore or stable.

    "Can we stop? My brother is in a lot of pain." Stacey's voice was very strained.

    Eric shook his head. "Not until we crest the hill. Not until we're out of sight of them for sure. I don't want to risk us, okay?"

    He glanced into the rearview mirror on his right side to see that she had turned to look back on the form on the trailer. Looking forward, she caught sight of his reflection in the mirror. Their gaze met in the reflective glass and she nodded slowly.

    "I understand," she answered and her voice was full of despair.

    Eric could see that her brother, Sean, was lying in what looked to be a very uncomfortable position on the blue plastic tarp Eric had used to cover his boxed up supplies. He quickly returned his gaze forward as they climbed higher up the bumpy dirt road. The trees thinned out as they traveled and one side dropped away to reveal the colorful carpet of wildflowers in the pasture far below.

    Again, Eric was struck by how beautiful the day was and yet so deadly. At last they crested the hill and the amazing panorama of the Texas Hill Country came into view.

    Pulling over to the side of the road, Eric shifted gears and the ATV grumbled low as it idled. Stacey immediately slid off the back of the vehicle and ran back to the trailer. Eric followed, unzipping his jacket and pulling Pepe free. The Jack Russell Terrier looked around with interest but did not fall into a barking fit. Eric took it as a good sign. He set Pepe on the ground and slid the loop at the end of the leash onto his wrist.

    Pepe immediately began sniffing the tires, the ground, his shoes, Stacey's shoes, etc…

    Stacey leaned over her brother and he awoke with a start. He had passed out from the pain. For a second he didn't recognize her and drew back sharply, and then he realized where they were and relaxed.

    "We made it?"

    "Yeah, Sean. We made it. But you're pretty banged up," Stacey answered, relief slowly filling her voice. "We need to stop the bleeding…" Her hand hovered over his bloodied arm.

    "What happened?” Eric untied some of the rope holding the blue tarp in place and fumbled for the First Aide kit.

    " To get out of the community center, we had to bust out one of those damn extra thick Plexiglas windows," Sean explained wincing as his sister studied his still bleeding wounds. “Who makes windows five inches thick? That was freaking crazy.”

    "I only saw dead things through the windows. Where were you guys?"

    Eric pulled open the big tin box and Stacey grabbed up some cotton and alcohol.

    "There is an office block in the back. It's where the Chamber of Commerce folks are. There are these huge old metal doors between that area and the Community Center. We've been on the Chamber of Commerce side," Sean explained. He winced as his sister began to clean up his arm so she could see where he was bleeding from.

    "So you couldn't get out?" Eric asked.

    "Nope. They chained all the doors shut," Sean answered then gasped as his sister found what she was looking for and began to apply hard pressure to staunch the bleeding.

    "To keep us safe," Stacey said sourly.

    Eric handed Stacey some gauze and she took it gratefully. Her fingers were red with her brother's blood and Eric felt a little lightheaded by the sight. It made him think of all the blood in the car where Brandy had died.

    "So we couldn't get out once it went bad. The Sheriff had the keys and he was the first one down when those…those…"

    "Zombies," Eric offered helpfully.

    Sean looked at him and Eric could see the disbelief in his eyes at the sound of the word despite all he had seen. Slowly, he nodded. "Yeah, zombies. The soldiers from the crash and some of the rescue guys were mauled by one of the…we thought he was just crazed from his injuries…one of the survivors of the crash. They were being treated in the main room of the community center and the Sheriff was questioning the pilot when suddenly one of the soldiers just got up off his bunk and bit into the Sheriff’s face."

    Stacey grimaced at the memory and checked the wound. It was still bleeding. "It went bad fast."

    "Real fast," Sean agreed. "About half those wounded guys started getting up and attacking people and those people started attacking people."

    "And we were trying to get out but the doors were chained."

    "So my Dad and another guy started herding everyone toward the doors to the office area. It was a mad crush and…" Stacey faltered. She shrugged and continued to press down hard on her flinching brother's arm.

    "How many got into the office area?"

    "Twenty-three," Sean answered softly. His dark eyes glittered with tears. "Two died of wounds and…"

    "Got up. Coop bashed their brains in with a fire extinguisher."

    "Your dad?" Eric swallowed hard thinking of the strong older man who had sacrificed himself at the house.

    "Yeah. Everyone, even us, called him Coop. He's the town football hero and the coach of the Blazing Riders high school football team," Stacey answered. "Or…he was."

    "He gave his life for us to get away," Sean said to his sister and laid his hand over hers. "He held them off on the stairs so I could get up to the fire slide. He was brave until the end."

    "I know." Stacey blinked and tears fell down her dirty cheeks. "I know. But I'd rather have him here than gone."

    Sean nodded and was unashamed of his own tears. “He just wanted us to live.”

    Eric looked down at Pepe who was sniffing around the edge of the trailer. "I…lost someone, too."

    "Yeah, well, we lost the whole damn town we grew up in," Stacey answered him pointedly and gave him a hard look. "The whole damn town."

    Her brother reached out to calm her and she sniffled loudly.

    Eric felt sickened by his own selfishness and sat down on the edge of the trailer. "I'm sorry. I am.” He looked at her apologetically. “I know seeing so many die is horrible and…”

    Stacey shook her head. “I’m sorry. I have no right to snap at you. We’ve all lost so much.”

    Eric let out a slow breath. “I didn't know anyone was alive in the community center. If I had known, I would have tried to rescue you."

    "How could you know we were there?" Sean shook his head. "Don't feel guilty."

    "When did it all go wrong?" Eric stared at his dirty fingers and tried not to think too hard about Brandy.

    "The first night we were in there, believe it or not. The Sheriff rounded up everyone that had not left town into the community center," Stacey answered. "But the wounded got up and started eating us up like we were a buffet. And like Sean said, we barricaded ourselves into the offices, lived off the vending machine and the lunches the staff had brought and put in the refrigerator in the lunch room."

    "Coop…our dad…kept trying to get us out, but the Sheriff had us locked in real good. All these heavy damn storm doors chained shut. Super thick windows… We started on one of the windows and it took forever to chip through that stuff."

    "Built during the cold war. I think they thought it was A-bomb proof." Stacey rolled her eyes. She peeked at Sean's arm and looked satisfied. Reaching out for the First Aid kit, she gave Eric a slight smile.

    He felt she was trying to apologize for earlier and he smiled back.

    "We were almost through when those things finally broke through our barricade. We locked ourselves in the office where we were busting out the window and it was a race to get the glass broken out in time. Once the opening was big enough, we started evacuating. The plan had been to go to the high school and get into a school bus, but it was just a crazed scramble at the end." Sean winced and made a terrible face as his sister began to dress his wounded arm. The deeper wound was no longer trickling blood and the smaller wounds seemed to be closing. "The football players tried to hold the door shut."

    Eric flashed back on the mad pursuit up the hill. The fastest of the undead had seemed very fresh and looked like football players. "Oh. Wow."

    "Yeah. We evacuated the old people, the women and the kids first. But those things got in and were already…" Sean lowered his head and rubbed his eyes. "They were…"

    "Coop realized what was happening and shoved me out the window. Sean was trying to help and our dad told him to get out just as a bunch of them busted in through the damn wall! Some add on modern wall made of cheap materials. Their weight must have done it in." Stacey's hands were a shaking as she slowly wrapped her brother's arm.

    "Dad and I were the last ones out. Some of them grabbed for me and I did this crazy dive out the window and fucked up my arm." Sean shook his head. "We got outside and Coop was trying to get everyone rallied together when those fast ones started coming out the window after us. Coop shouted for everyone to run. And those still alive…"

    "We ran," Stacey said in a tremulous voice. "We ran. But they ran us down. The fast ones. The new ones. The ran down the old folks, the kids…the…the…" Stacey let out a strangled sob and turned away from Eric and Sean. Her shoulders trembled and she sniffled loudly as she tried to regain her composure.