S.W. Tanpepper's GAMELAND: Season Two Omnibus (Episodes 9-11) (151 page)

The women turned their eyes toward him. Collectively, they could've frozen magma.

“We're not leaving,” Mister Corben asserted.

“And in the mean time we—”

“Kelly's still alive,” a tiny voice said. Kyle Corben pushed through the forest of legs and went to his mother. “My brother's coming home.”

“Kyle, go back to bed,” his mother whispered. But he refused to leave her side.

Walter B shook his head and resumed his place against the wall. He wasn't in the mood to argue, which was very uncharacteristic of him. “Discussing things” in a heated manner was how he usually communicated with people, but at the moment he wasn't feeling up to taking on a gang of women. He felt like pure shit.

His stomach lurched as the image of the massacre in the truck came to mind for about the fiftieth time in the past hour. The damn scene was going to give him nightmares for weeks to come. A small amount of puke, complete with half-digested chunks of lunch, bubbled into the back of his throat. He swallowed it back down, wincing at the way it burned.

“We'll discuss this further after we return with some supplies,” Gilfoy said. “Do I have two more volunteers?”

Walter could feel the request directed at him, but he pretended not to hear, and he purposefully avoided looking at the copper. He just wanted to find a dark hole and crawl into it until someone with some real authority, like the government or the military, regained control of the situation. That, and he wished this damn pressure in his head would go away. It felt like an overripe watermelon getting ready to burst.

 

They'd been walking for nearly three and a half hours and had just reached the wall near the place where Doctor White had brought them in when Jessie collapsed.

“I can't,” she said. Reggie could feel her trembling as he raised her head to give her some water. “I can't go any further.” She closed her eyes.

“We're almost there. Just a little more. Come on, you can do it.” He looked around them, alarmed by how quickly the sky was clouding up, and for once he was thankful that the ground this close to the wall was barren. It gave the Undead fewer places to hide.

There were several buildings ahead, a cannery they'd given wide berth to that first day coming in. The place certainly had the appearance of not having seen a human soul in years, whether living or otherwise, and there were no footprints in the dried mud to suggest it was anything but abandoned. Nevertheless, a few days had passed since the rain, and with the wall no longer pumping out its poison, there was nothing to keep the Undead away.

It was an iffy proposition, but if they had to spend the night somewhere, in there was better than out in the open.

Of course, that was assuming they'd even last the night. The way his head felt, he wasn't sure if the activation signal had been sent or if it was just stress he was experiencing.

“I should've made you eat something back there.”

“Not hungry,” she whispered. “Just tired. So tired.”

Now he cursed his stupidity for stopping off at White's house. He should've just driven straight here to begin with and screw the old woman. But his conscience wouldn't allow him to do it.

After trying several times, he'd finally gotten the car to start again, and since they were only a mile away by then, he made the rash decision to fetch White and the girl. Jessie had fallen asleep crying, so he left her in the car with the engine running while he ran inside.

He was startled to find the door wide open and the house empty. No blood. No sign that anything had gone wrong.

Nobody leaves their doors open during the apocalypse, Reg old boy. She's gone.

He snatched up the doctor's pack, not caring anymore what had happened to her, and left.

The engine died less than a block away. This time, no matter what he tried, it wouldn't restart, so they got out and walked.

They didn't talk. Jessie was too deep in her grief that he didn't even try to engage her, other than to remind her to keep putting one foot in front of the other. He kept himself occupied watching for Infecteds.

“Come on, Jessie,” he whispered. “Just a little further. We're almost there.” He gave her a gentle shake, but she didn't respond.

Thunder rumbled in the distance. The sky was quickly growing darker. He reached beneath her to pick her up. They needed to keep moving. They needed to get off the island. He didn't want to die in here.

As he stood, he felt the first small explosion of pain in the back of his head. His vision went opaque for a moment, then cleared. The pain vanished, but the episode left him panting.

After another minute, he tried again. He stood and turned toward the buildings. Then he stopped.

The dog blocking his path was the same color as the dirt. It regarded him with what looked like curiosity in its eyes.

Reggie stepped forward. It didn't move.

“Nice doggie,” he murmured. “Let us pass, please.”

It wagged its tail, but still didn't move.

“Come on, dog.” He took another step.

This time the animal bared its teeth and growled.

Reggie stepped back and it stopped.

“I don't have time for this.” He tried again, and once more the animal raised its hackles and let out a low rumble from its throat.

“Get out of my way.”

The growl grew louder.

“What the hell is wrong with you?”

In the gloom off in the distance, Reggie saw the figures emerge from the shadows of the empty buildings and from the woods beyond. The Undead were there. They had already moved in.

Reggie stepped back, and the dog matched him. The curious look had returned. The menace was gone.

“Those are the bad people,” Reggie said.

The dog tilted its head at him.

“You're not going to bite me, are you?”

Getting no response, Reggie slowly turned and walked carefully away. He tried not to make any sudden movements. He could sense the dog following him.

“Fine,” he said in a low voice over his shoulder, “you can tag along. I'll give you my last can of soup when we get to wherever we're going, but then you have to leave us. And, please, no barking.”

 

Spray from the falls pelted Jessie's face. The water was pleasantly cool, not the icy cold she expected it to be on such a frigid winter day. She clung to the railing as the boat rocked and the mist soaked through her clothes.

But then the deck dropped out from beneath her feet and flung her over the side. She cried out, thrusting her arms out in a futile attempt to stop herself from drowning. The water rushed up at her, and when she hit, it was unyielding. She felt her breath leave her lungs.

She opened her eyes, gasping and coughing.

Reggie knelt beside her, his head in his hands. Tears streamed from his eyes, and he groaned in pain.

She could feel it too, and so she knew that it was starting. They were already too late. They'd never get home before the implant activations were complete.

She let the rain hit her face, big fat drops of it falling from a mercurial sky. It was starting to get dark.

She looked over again and she could tell by the way his shoulders were jerking that he was crying, and not just from the pain.

“Reggie.” She reached over and buried her fingers in his hair. “It's okay. We tried.”

He groaned again, but didn't answer.

“I'm so sorry,” she whispered. “Sorry for what my family did. We're cursed, we Daniels. We must be cursed for all of this to happen to us. First my grandfather, and then my father. Both of them, actually.” A wry smile twisted her lips. “My mother and Eric. All of us.”

“No,” Reggie moaned. He raised himself up and his face was smudged with dirt. “You're not responsible for what anyone else has done.”

“No? How can you say that? Look at all the people who've died because of me. Kwanjangnim Rupert. And Jake and his uncle. Micah. Siennah Davenport. That girl, Tanya.” She ticked them all off on her fingers. There were so many of them. “G-ma Junie. Even Ashley.
Especially
Ashley.”

“You didn't—”

“And Kelly.”

“It's not your fault. None of this was your fault.”

“I was reckless, irresponsible. Arrogant. I've always been that way.”

“How can you say that?”

“How? Look at me. I knew what a mess I was, and yet I brought a life into this world, didn't I? A life that I had no right to.”

“It wasn't just your decision.” He raised up, shaking his head as if to rid it of cobwebs.

Jessie knew the pain had left him for the moment. The niggling sensation in her own head was gone, too.

“If I remember my sex ed instruction correctly,” he said, “making a baby requires two parties of the opposite sexual persuasion to be present at the same place and time. If there was ever a more willing and level-headed guy than Kelly, I've never met him. He knew what he was doing. He would've wanted this.”

The pain in Jessie's heart swelled until it seemed it would burst out of her chest.

He gripped his head for a moment and cringed. But the pain this time was fleeting. “God, I think they're actually
trying
to torture us.”

“It'll be over soon.”

“No, Jessie!” He staggered to his feet and reached down for her hand. “I'm not giving up.”

She chuffed at the sentiment. How many times had she made the same promise over the past two months? How many times had she failed to live up to that promise?

The sky rumbled and drew their attention away from each other for a moment. The rain was getting harder.

“Come on, Jess.”

“I'll walk,” she told him. But she let him pull her up.

“We're almost at the bridge,” he told her. “In a half hour, we'll be on the other side of the wall.”

She knew they were just going through the motions now. “In a half hour, we'll be dead. Maybe an hour, which would put us somewhere in the middle of the Sound.”

He shrugged. “I've never been the kind of guy who could just sit around and let things happen to me, you know that.”

She shook her head at him.

“Besides,” he added, brushing the rain from his eyes. He pointed toward the edge of the path behind them. “We can't disappoint our guardian angel.”

“Our what?” Jessie squinted into the rain, but she didn't see anything.

“He kept us from getting into trouble back there.”

“Who did?” she started to say, but then she saw him.

Reggie touched her arm. “Come on, Jess. He'll follow.”

But she didn't move.

“He's harmless, don't worry. He's been following us for a while. I think he's hungry.”

Jessie stepped toward the dog.

“He won't let you get near him, Jess.”

But she wasn't listening to him. Her heart was pounding hard in her chest.
It can't be.

The dog slipped deeper into the brush.

“Shinji?”

She kneeled down and called his name again.

Slowly, tentatively, the dog stepped out and came to her.

 

The pain returned with a vengeance as they climbed down into the storm drain. Reggie's grip slipped, and he fell from the ladder. Thankfully, he was nearly down already and the worst that happened was that he twisted his ankle. Of course, it was nothing compared with the pain in his head. This time, it was much worse, and it lasted longer. Even if they made it out of the tunnel, they knew they'd never reach the mainland.

Jessie tried to shoo Shinji away, to make him go back, but he whined. She tried scaring him off, even yelling. He flattened his ears against the back of his head, but wouldn't go. She didn't want him to be out in the middle of the Sound with them when they died. He'd be stranded in the boat, and who knew where the current would take them?

But he whined and barked so desperately that she finally gave in and lowered him down to Reggie in the tunnel. By the time she had reached the bottom herself, Reggie had poured half of his last can of soup into a depression in a rock and Shinji had already finished it. He offered the rest to her, but after a few swallows she didn't want anymore. Nor did he. So Shinji got the rest.

“Yum, cream of mushroom,” she murmured. “Not much of a last meal.”

Reggie gave her a dour look and shook his head.

What had started off as a sprinkle soon turned into a heavy downpour. It was, indeed, like standing in Niagara Falls. They were both drenched as they began to make their way down the tunnel beneath the wall. Shinji led the way, as if he knew exactly where he was going. Reggie took up the rear.

“Just letting you know, it gets tight real quick,” he warned.

Jessie shoved her pack ahead of her. She didn't know why she continued to carry it, though it did make her feel better. There was nothing in it that she needed anymore.

She could hear Reggie doing the same with his.

She easily made her way through the tight spot and was closing in on the other end when she heard Reggie call out in anguish. “I'm stuck.”

“Exhale,” she told him, and kept going.

The down slope had leveled off so that she could now see the opening slightly above her. Shinji was pacing past the opening, pausing each time to stop and look in and whine with worry. The rain beyond was a curtain of gray. She could hear the ocean behind it. She could smell the salt water, and suddenly she was glad that Reggie had forced her to come this far. She realized that she didn't want to die inside.

“Jessie?”

His voice was distorted by the tunnel walls.

“Jessie, I'm stuck.”

She stopped to rest. The tunnel had sprung a leak, and the water was running up her shirt. It was cold, cloying, and it brought back memories of their dive on the day they'd first broken onto the island.