In the Lone and Level Sands (75 page)

Layne knelt down. He put his hand on Jessi’s
shoulder. She slapped him in the face, and then turned away. She
pulled her knees to her face and cried, rocking back and forth.

“I hate to sound insincere,” Garrett said,
“but we need to get the fuck out of here.”

With many of the barricades open, zombies
were heading for the intersection.

With a heave, Kyle lifted a piece of
bleacher, and Dex pulled Ralph free. Ralph hadn’t been the only one
under there; a zombie reached out from the rubble and sank its
teeth into Kyle’s arm. Kyle screamed, and dropped the bleacher. A
pile of rubble it had been supporting came tumbling down, burying
Kyle’s entire lower half.

“Fuck!” Dex said. Layne forced himself to
move, and rushed over to help.

“Help, help me!” Kyle said. “Get me out
of—Aah!”

No one could see, but they all knew that the
zombie was still alive beneath the rubble, glad to be trapped with
a fresh meal. Kyle screamed.

“Get him out of there!” Layne said. Ralph
and Dex tried to move the bleachers, but nothing seemed to budge
more than an inch or two. Garrett grabbed a beam and lifted, but it
hardly moved.

“It’s eating me, it’s killing me!” Kyle
said. Everyone had rushed to his aid, except for Jessi, who
remained where she was, sitting on the pavement.

Warren jammed a gun into the nearest crack
he could find. Garrett saw what he was doing, and lifted the beam
again. Warren had a bit of space, and opened fire. He emptied the
gun into the crack.

Kyle had broken into tears. He was no longer
screaming, but blood was trickling out of a gap and along one of
the beams, where it fell to the ground below. Whether it was
Kyle’s, the zombie’s, or both, Layne didn’t know. He tried to lift
the rubble off of Kyle.

“Kyle, it’s okay, you’re going to be okay,”
Ralph was saying. Kyle shut his eyes tightly, cried, and reached
for Ralph’s hand. Ralph looked almost reluctant, but took it, and
squeezed.

“Kyle, we’re going to get you out of there,”
Layne said.

Kyle shook his head. “Don’t you get it? It’s
over! It’s over. I’m a dead man. I’m dead now, Layne.”

The others exchanged glances. Keely looked
away, and then her eyes widened, and she screamed “No!”

Jessi, who had crawled over to where the
majority of Kara had come to stop, was cradling a bloody, hairy
mass in one arm, and reaching for a gun with the other.

“Jessi, stop!” Layne said. He hesitated,
torn between Kyle and Jessi. He never moved. Jessi put the gun to
her head and pulled the trigger.

As his knees hit the ground, his skin
scraped and began to bleed. Layne wished it had been different. He
wished she would’ve blamed him, turned the gun on him, and killed
him instead. His hands touched the ground, his tears poured onto
the pavement, mixed with rain that began to fall with no
warning.

Layne looked at the mess lying on the ground
before him, saw mother and daughter folded together, permanently
asleep, passed on to a world far better than this one could ever be
or had ever been.

When he returned to Kyle, the rain was
falling harder. Kyle was struggling to keep it from entering his
mouth. Ralph spread his shirt out in a sort of shield.

“I don’t want to be one of them,” Kyle
said.

“Okay,” Layne replied. He found a pistol
nearby. He looked at the others. Most turned away. “I’m sorry.” The
words felt trivial, they felt empty and meaningless. He wished he
hadn’t said them.

“Layne, we… We agreed to do this. We agreed
to follow you.” It didn’t help.

“Guys,” Layne said, “take what you need.
Find weapons. I’ll meet you outside. You don’t have to see
this.”

“Wait,” Kyle said. “Ralph, will you stay
with me? Will you do it?”

Ralph looked up at the sky. He choked down
his sadness and said, “Yeah, Kyle. I’ll stay. I’ll do it.”

“I don’t want to die alone.”

The others said their goodbyes, then walked
down the nearest street. The remaining torch light faded as they
went, and they disappeared into darkness.

Kyle’s skin was already turning pale. “Do
you want to say something?” Layne asked Ralph. Ralph stared at his
friend.

“Can you leave us alone?” Ralph said. Layne
nodded, and walked down the street to join the others. “Kyle.”

“Yeah.” Kyle could barely talk. Ralph closed
his eyes.

“I’ll see you in the next life.”

Ralph pulled the trigger, and the gun
clicked.

He took a deep breath. He began to walk
backwards.

“Don’t,” Kyle said. “Don’t leave me. Don’t
let me die alone.”

“I’m sorry,” Ralph said. He looked around
for something, anything. He looked back at Kyle, whose eyes had
closed. When they opened again, they were different, they were
empty. Kyle thrashed and groaned.

Ralph saw the others at the end of the
street. They were all staring at something on the ground. The
darkness enveloped him, and his eyes tried to adjust. Ralph felt
cold. He felt alone. He joined his friends and saw that they were
looking at a large message spray painted on the ground.

GOD IS DEAD

Layne looked at Ralph. He put his hand on
Ralph’s shoulder.

“He held my hand,” Ralph finally said. “He
reached for my hand, he didn’t want to be alone.” He tried not to
choke. “And for a moment, just a tiny, short little moment, all I
could think about was how wrong it was for two men to hold
hands.”

“Ralph,” Layne said. He put a hand on
Ralph’s shoulder. “Nobody is going to blame you for—”

“
I
am!” Ralph tore away from Layne’s
hand. “I’ll never forget this! My friend died! He needed me, but my
head got stuck someplace it’s been my whole life, while his was
ending right in front of me!”

“Ralph,” Katie said. Ralph dropped to his
knees, crying. The rain came down harder. Time went by.

“They’re wrong, you know,” Ralph said. He
sniffed hard and stood up, rubbing his eyes with his entire sleeve.
“Whoever wrote it is wrong.” Lightning struck in the distance, a
roll of thunder echoed past. “God isn’t dead. He’s laughing.”

65

In the Fort Knox Infirmary

Evan felt every surge of pain from the wound
in his abdomen as he lay in the recovery room, but it had been
dulled by the medication coursing through his body. The pain would
pass; he was glad to be alive.

He looked down at his torso, which was
covered in bandages. A spot of red showed faintly through. Soon,
Dr. Faulkner walked into the room.

“How’re you feeling?” he asked.

“I’m feeling fine, now.” Evan chuckled as if
to drive the point home.

“That’s good to hear.”

“So, will I be able to leave today?”

“Yes, actually. I can clear you now. Just
try to take it easy, Mr. Jacobson.” Evan nodded and sat up. “We’ll
have some clothes in here for you to change into momentar—”

“Good morning, Daddy!” Mal said as she and
Cynthia entered the room.

“Morning, Mal!” Evan extended his arms and
hugged her. Cynthia turned her head to Dr. Faulkner.

“Does he have to stay in here much longer,
Doctor?”

“No, he’s all ready,” Dr. Faulkner said with
a smile. “He’s still got some healing to do, but he can leave right
now if he feels up to it.” Evan nodded.

****

“I can’t believe where we are, what we’ve
done,” Evan said. The eight survivors sat in a circle in the rec
room. “It’s amazing really. I mean, not in a good way, but in a
million years I never would’ve dreamt up anything like this.”

“We’re lucky to be alive,” Cynthia said.

“A lot’s changed in such a small amount of
time,” Vanessa said. “I thought I wanted to stay when my husband
was bitten. I guess we think a lot of silly things in the heat of
the moment, don’t we?”

“Not silly,” Daisy replied. “Interesting
things. The type of stuff that wouldn’t come to us under different
circumstances. I don’t think it was silly of you to want to stay by
your husband’s side.”

“Thanks.”

Stephanie and Jason were sitting close to
each other. At one point, Jason locked fingers with Stephanie.
“Some are good,” he said. He looked at Stephanie, then the rest of
the group. Stephanie didn’t say anything, but smiled. “I know it’s
kinda bad to say, but if none of this had happened, I’d never have
met Stephanie.”

“You could have gotten into an accident back
in Chicago,” Daisy said, “and then your princess in flashing lights
would’ve come to the rescue. You’d be the guy to pretend to be
unconscious to get mouth-to-mouth.” She laughed.

“I wouldn’t doubt it. I wanted to try that
since seeing
The Sandlot
as a kid, but I never got the
chance. The lifeguard was always some oily guy.” Stephanie
laughed.

“I wondered when you would say something,”
Evan said. “I’ve seen how you two are.”

“Well, here it is,” Jason said. “No secrets
anymore.” He grinned. Evan smiled, looking from Jason and Stephanie
back to Cynthia.

****

It was July 2
^nd.
A zombie, once a
middle-aged, heavyset woman, wandered close to one of the
entrances. She uttered curious, uneven grunts as she heard men
laughing, talking, and other noises just beyond the door. The
zombie stumbled slowly toward it. Her feet were bare, nearly black
from dirt and congealed blood, and left faint bloody footprints
along the way.

A few other zombies in close proximity also
picked up on the noise, and began hobbling along. One was a lost
soldier, another an elderly man with a medium-length white beard
caked with dried blood. The three zombies moved toward the door,
with the fat one leading.

The soldiers inside were off duty and were
drinking. Adrian was there, sitting in a chair in a corner of the
room with a bottle of Jack. He swigged a mouthful, felt the burn,
and let the magic happen. He thought about his best friend. Sean
was in one of the Fort Knox cells, and it was his fault. Partly, at
least. He hadn’t seen the signs. He knew Sean was going through a
rut, hell, a chasm, but he didn’t do anything but keep his
distance. He wasn’t there for Sean, and Sean had snapped. There
wasn’t a whole lot for Sean, now. Adrian took another blast.

Clark and Aimes were both present. Clark had
always been the life of the party, and he needed some fun. Aimes,
however, was there because he was thinking about Julie and his
baby-to-be a lot more often since his talk with Cynthia and
Vanessa. He couldn’t help feeling depressed, almost enough to make
him believe there was no hope for them after all. So, he had taken
a few sips of a beer, and that had turned into a full can, then
another. Soon Aimes was feeling pretty good, and Clark was entirely
gone.

“I’m glad—” Aimes said, his words slurring.
“Glad that I came ov—er here, man!”

“See, it’s just,” Clark said. Then he
appeared to have lost his train of thought, but soon caught it.
“Soooo much more fun if you let yourself slip a little… A little
bit. You gotta have
some
fun from time to time, or else…”
Clark formed a gun with his hand, put it against his head, and
pulled the trigger. His mouth made a loud and very unrealistic
gunshot effect.

“That’s right, Clark!” Aimes said with a
sloppy grin on his face. Seeing how drunk Clark was, Aimes decided
to make his current beer the last of the night, though Clark seemed
to have more powerful demons inside him that needed killing.

After a few minutes, Clark’s eyes began to
water.

“Hey, buddy,” Aimes said. “What’s eatin’ you
up?”

“Nah. Nothing, man.”

“Don’t give me that bullshit, Clark. Tell
me… Tell me. What’s wrong?”

“I’m just thinking about my girlfriend. I
did… everything to save her! But there… there was nothing I could
do!”

“Don’t blame yourself.”

“It’s so hard.”

“I’m sorry, man,” Aimes said, being as
sincere as a drunk man could. Clark began to cry.

There was a sound at the door. Clark looked
up with bloodshot, tear-filled eyes. “Who’s that at the door?”

“I-I don’t know.”

“We can’t let anyb-body else die because of
these crazy pe-people,” Clark said. He stood up and took a few
wobbly steps toward the door.

“Be careful,” Aimes said. He stood up and
followed Clark. Clark cracked the door and looked outside.

“You guys n-need a place to wait this shit
out?” he said. He didn’t even notice the blood, the blank stares,
or the way they were moving.

“Hrnnnnnnn?” the fat zombie said.

“Place to stay!”

“Dejehhh!” The fat lady’s eyes narrowed,
realizing there was food, and lots of it.

“Clark, I don’t think these are—”

The fat woman shoved through the door and
tackled Clark. He screamed as she dug into his neck, pulling out
muscle, tendons, and skin in one bite. Blood sprayed from Clark’s
neck like a sprinkler. The other soldiers turned to the sound, and
Aimes drew his gun and fired at her head, right on top. Blood
splashed out just as she was going in for another bite, and she
collapsed on top of Clark.

“Shit!” a soldier farther off said. He
pulled out a gun and approached. “What happened?” He shot one of
the other zombies, who was trying to get in on Clark. Aimes shot
the old man zombie. Another soldier closed and locked the door.

“I-I don’t know. I gotta—” Aimes went to his
knees, found handholds on the woman’s body, and tried to push it
off his friend.

“Hurry,” Clark said. “I d-don’t wanna die
under this bitch!”

Aimes looked down at his friend with a big
tear-ridden grin, but Aimes wasn’t happy. He didn’t mean to smile.
He was horrified and he felt like God had played a cruel trick on
him.

“I’m doing it, I’m t-trying.” Aimes looked
up at one of the other soldiers. Most of them were gawking. “Go get
help!”