The Rabid: Rise (20 page)

27

Breakfast goes off without a hitch and everyone is packed and lined up just after sunrise.

“We’re making some good time today. Up and at
em’. Ain’t got Norton here talking our goddamn ears off and glad handing every survivor like he’s running for re-election.” Marv is puffing on one of his skinny cigars. He’s turned in my direction. The white smoke rolls over my face in waves.

Smells better than corpses and stopped up shitters.

Fuck it.

He g
ases it, slow, checking the rearview to make sure the rest of the column is moving in sync with him.

The radio in the cup hold
er squawks to life. “How’re you feeling up there, Tim?” It’s Bethany.

“Little tired.
Kinda nauseous from all the cigar smoke, but I’ll live.”

Marv gives a throaty little chuckle, somehow emitting even more smoke than before.

“How far do you think we’ll get today?”

“Not much farther than
yesterday, unless everyone wants to start running.”

“Yeah,” there’s a pause, a burst of static, as if she’s observing the crowd, “I don’
t think that’s gonna happen.”

“Well, we’ll have to make d
o.”

“The Indians did it.”

“Which ones?”

“You know, the Cherokee,
that trail they had to walk on? I remember it from history class.”

“You mean the Trail of Tears?”

“Yeah!”

“Sis, you do know that thousands of them died, right?”

Silence.

Static.

“Oh.” She doesn’t say anything else after that.

Marv clears a ball of mucus from his throat and spits out the window. “You know, I remember that shit.”

“What shit?”

“The Trail of Tears.”

“Oh, you were there?” I laugh.

“Ha
ha,” he flicks some ash out the window. “Fuck you, smart ass. No, I was sayin’ from school, I remember the lesson. Some messed up shit they did to them red men. Some messed up shit.”

“Yeah, that’s humanity for you.”

He takes another long drag. “Yep, ain’t that the sad story. Us rebuilding like this, from the ground up, maybe things can change. New history. New people. Learnin’ from the old stories. Not makin’ the same mistakes.”

I shake my head. “Doubtful.”

“Well now, don’t let anyone accuse you of being the optimist.”

I wave a cloud of smoke towards the open window. “No, I suppose I’m not.”

“Why? Who shit in your Cheerios, son?”

“It’s not about being an optimist or being a realist. You’re still a human being. I’m still a human being. All those people back there, slogging along in this chilly ass air with just the clothes on their backs and some shit food in their bellies, they’re still human beings. We’re irrational animals. Back us into a corner, threaten us with starvation, beckon us with a throne, and we’ll commit atrocities. We’re always one bad season away from being another history lesson for future generations to shake their heads at. Humanity rises and falls, it’s all cyclical, and that’s how the stories are written.”

Marv lets the smoke seep from between his lips. His eyes narrow. He looks to me and then back to the road. He removes the little cigar from his lips and pops the tip against the edge of the window, discarding more ash. “Man...I’m just gonna work on my fuckin’ smoke. It’s too early for this shit.”

28

I don’t exactly know when the attack started. They are already streaming down the hills on either side of us and tearing through the lines before I know what is happening.

It’s
our gunner that gets my attention, he kicks the back of my seat and yells, “WE’RE UNDER ATTACK!” After that, everything else is drowned out as the .50 springs to life above me. It sucks the sound away and shakes the vehicle back and forth as if it’s strapped to a washing machine.

“Let’s go, let’s go!” I don’t know if Marv can hear me. Nevertheless, he throws us into park, picks his weapon up and slides from his seat, vanishing on the opposite side of the Humvee.

I come out on one knee. Expecting just to start picking targets and firing.

No such luck.

It’s overwhelming.

It’s chaos.

Everything is tangled.

Rabid and Refugee blend together. One person.

Teeth rip into flesh. There are screams of panic. Of death. Screams pleading for help. People ducking between the clash of bodies and crying out for their loved ones.

As I move up the
line, a figure crashes into my waist, wrapping their arms around me. I bring my elbow down, hard, right into the center of their spine and flip them across my knee with one arm, laying them out on their back as I level my rifle at their head and prepare to pull the trigger.

It’s
a woman. Bloodied. Crying. Not Rabid.

She raises her hands, shaking. “God, please, don’t hurt me. Have you seen my son?”

I consider her for a moment, looking for any obvious bites.

Nothing obvious.

As I turn away to continue moving, I can still hear her voice echoing above the storm, “My son, please, help me, someone!”

I’m approaching the next Humvee. A man is being slammed up against the hood by a Rabid. He’s bawling, trying to press the
decrepit head back. It breaks through his defenses, time and time again, tearing fresh chunks of flesh from his arm with each nip.

I put a round through both of their heads
, ending the struggle and the suffering.

More refugees fall from the crowd, rolling across the back bumper of the Humvee. Rabid clinging to their flesh. Sealing their coffins with a single bite. There are more targets than I have bullets for.
More Rabid being created every second.

I hear them
coming at me from the left. Their groans give them away. Their mating call. Their lust for my flesh preventing them from getting the drop on me. I don’t have much room to maneuver. I fall back against the passenger door of the second Humvee, wincing as the mirror pops me in the back of the head. The first Rabid is close enough that I don’t even have to aim. I don’t hear the gunshot. I just see the top of his head explode. After that, I shoulder my rifle and select my targets.

One shot. One dead Rabid.

I don’t have the ammo to afford a miss.

They fall around me
, marring the highway with their black blood.

My hands grow weak as I look up at the hill in front of me. Hundreds of them. Maybe thousands. Black dots rushing towards us like some demonic avalanche.

The .50 gunner above me stops firing and leans over. “Tim, I’m almost out of ammo. There are too goddamn many! We’ve got to get the fuck out of here, now!”

“Concentrate all you’ve got on that hill!” I point. “When you’re out
, grab whoever you can and go!”

“My driver is dead!”

“Then grab whoever you can and drive it your goddamn self!”

He swings
around and concentrates his fire on the ensuing tide of dead rushing towards us from the hill. Large swaths of earth and gore explode into the air beneath the force of the large caliber rounds. They trip and fall across the bodies of their dismembered and disemboweled comrades, but, they keep coming, unhindered by the face of death.

They’ve seen it once. What’s a second
go around the graveyard?

I’ve g
ot to get to Momma and Bethany.

I look down the line.

I see their Humvee.

The gunner on top
is firing indiscriminately into the terror-stricken crowd.

I don’t see them.

The doors are open, but I don’t see them.

I begin to shoot my way through the mob in front of me
, breaking into a slow jog. Moving down the line. Death to my right and left. Hopping over the bodies that fall in front of me.

Cold fingers wrap across my arm.
I swing and hammer my reaper across the face, breaking free.

“Help!”

“God, no, no, no!”

“Get this fucking thing off of me!”

It’s all noise. There’s nothing that can be done. It all fades in and out. One desperate call replaced by another as I duck and weave my way up the column. Bodies fly. Body parts fly. I leap across fallen corpses and roll beneath swinging arms.

Almost there.

Someone grabs my elbow and turns me.

Marv. “We gotta get the fuck out of here! We’re done! Overrun! These people, they’re all dead, man! We need to grab a vehicle and go!”

“Not till I find Bethany and my
ma!”

“Well, I’m fuckin’
goin!”

I pull my .45 and jam it against
his belly. “Marv, you take one of these vehicles and sprint ass outta here before I say so and you better pray I don’t see you down the line.”

He just stares. I don’t see any fear or rebellion. There’s nothing. Just a man weighing his options.

I leave him to his thoughts.

I’m a few feet
away. There’s only a tangled crowd of Refugees and Rabid standing between me and the third Humvee.

I raise my rifle and prepare to carve a path. My targets are all Rabid
or they’re on their way to becoming Rabid. At least that’s what I tell myself. I step across the bodies, aiming and firing. Elbowing and kicking my feet. Watching the sidelines for stray teeth and claws.

The .50
on the third Humvee goes dry just as I arrive.

Fucking figures.

The gunner pulls his sidearm and gets to work. Teeth bared. In it for the long haul.

I check the inside of the Humvee.

Nothing.

Just shell casings.

Shuffling.

Gurgling just over my shoulder.

I swing the butt of my rifle around and catch the Rabid across the jaw. The beast spirals to the ground and I stamp down on the back of its head with my boot heel until the skull shatters and the contents within splatter across the pavement like an egg being dropped into a frying pan.

I move to the bumper
, peering desperately into the battling mob, trying to find something familiar.

Just blood and bodies.

I check the magazine on my rifle.

Not much left.

I’ve got the .45 and an extra mag. Then, that’s it. They’re both blunt instruments after that. They won’t get me far.

Four bodies
come tumbling out of the battle and fall before me. Clawing. Biting. Arms and legs kicking this way and that. Blood and spittle flying. Muffled screams.

Two Rabid?

No, three Rabid, one unfortunate soul.

A blanket of fatty flesh is ripped free and thrown to the ground at my feet. I take aim and fire into the mass of bodies. They vibrate and come to a rest. My gun is dry. I toss it to the ground and draw my pistol. Ready to make my final stand
, looking for my next target.

“Move, move the fuck out of the way!”

Katia!

She’s coming in from my left
, slicing through the crowd. Heads roll and limbs fly. She keeps one shoulder down as she pushes her way through.

She’s got a sword in one hand and her other is curled around...

Bethany.

..oh God, no...

Bethany is soaked through with blood, head lolling, eyes barely open.

“Tim!” Katia kicks a Rabid
behind the knee, drops him and cleaves his head with her blade. “Grab her! Come on!”

I run in and catch Bethany in my arms, my knees
buckling slightly as I absorb her weight.

Two Rabid charge
us. I slide my pistol arm around Bethany’s back and send a round through each one of their heads.

“Is she bitten?” I ask, pulling her back towards the Humvee.

“Just get her in the vehicle, Tim. We’ve got to get the fuck out of here!” Katia’s hair, what little there is of it, is plastered to her head with sweat and gore. Her shirt is torn. There’s a long slice across the bottom of her abdomen that’s leaking fresh blood down the front of her pants. She doesn’t seem to mind. She keeps moving, slicing and dicing our path to safety.

“My
momma...” It suddenly hits me as I’m loading Bethany into the passenger seat. I turn to go back.

Katia is there. A firm hand planted against my chest. “Tim, we’ve got to go!”

“But...”

“She’s gone! Okay! Gone! I saw her go down!”

“No! Let me go! Let me go!” Something shatters inside of me and spirals away into the darkness. Beyond my grasp. I know Katia is telling the truth. I fall into her arms as my eyes bleed. As a pain takes hold inside of me that is unlike anything I’ve ever felt.

She props my face in her hand
s and beholds my brokenness with tender eyes. “I’m so sorry, Tim but now is not the time to mourn.”

I nod with numb recognition.

I stumble into the passenger seat, propping Bethany up in my lap, letting her head fall against my chest.

Katia runs around to the driver side and jumps behind the wheel.

The .50 gunner in between us, his pistol empty.

“What about everyone else?” he asks, breathlessly.

“There is no
everyone else
. Hang on.” Katia turns the key and floors the gas pedal, pressing me into my seat and sending our gunner slipping and sliding backwards across the expended shells of ammunition. She bursts through the crowd, running down survivor and attacker alike. There are no favorites. They burst and pop beneath our tires. Speed bumps on our path to survival.

Survive or die.

Momma...

For a
second, I even think of Marv.

Did he make it?

Fuck, I should have just told him to go ahead and get out while the gettin’ was good.

But
…mostly, I just think of Momma. Lying back there. Bloody and broken on the battlefield.

I’m glad I didn’t have to see her like that.

Glad I saw her this morning.

Glad I hugged her
and kissed her cheek; told her that I loved her.

It doesn’t slow the tears. It just makes them sting a little less.