They Walk (31 page)

I only have a moment to rejoice in the fact that he is getting what he deserves, when Hunter blocks a hit and shoves Gabe off him. I try to yell for Gabe, but my voice just comes out in another coughing fit, that leaves me curling into myself gasping. When he gets his balance back, Hunter is already on his feet and rushes at him with a yell.

Gabe is ready though and as Hunter is almost to him he punches him.

When Hunter turns from the hit, Gabe slams into him and knocks him into the wall. Before he can hit him again though, Hunter knees him and shoves him back now. They circle each other like sharks, and I try to call out to them to stop fighting, but I can’t even catch my breath yet. Hunter kicks out at him, but Gabe blocks him easily. As Hunter is about to strike out at him again, Gabe rushes at him before I can call out to him to not too. When they collide, they fall back into the wall, except it’s not the wall at all.

It’s a window.

From the speed in which they are falling, they crash right through it and fade from my line of sight.

Not caring that my throat is still burning, I scream with all I can, and I scramble to my shaky legs.

On my feet now, the world tilts and spins so much that I almost fall to the floor. But I force myself to the broken window, and practically fall into the frame so that I can peer out of it. Outside, it’s completely dark now and it’s raining so hard that I have a hard time seeing where they are. They had fallen out into an alley of sorts, but it is much larger, with a couple feet between the next buildings. Squinting, I see movement, and I see that they are still fighting, even if they are both bleeding freely now.

Beyond them in the darkness, I see more movement and I know they won’t be alone for much longer.

I scream for Gabe again and start to go out the window, before remembering the ax.

I spin around and quickly scan the room, until I see it at the door on the floor, where I dropped it. I rush over to it, and ignore the way my body feels shaky when I bend over to pick it up. I even ignore the way my head spins, when I turn back for the window. When I reach the window sill again, I see the guys fighting and the movements beyond them are turning into person sized shadows, and know that I don’t have any time to waste.

Grasping the ledge with my free hand, I place my leg over the side.

I jump out not caring about getting cut on the glass.

I land on my feet easily and don’t even stop to gain my balance. I just dart toward the shadows that are getting closer to the guys. As I pass them, I try to not notice how Hunter just hit Gabe and made him fall to the ground. One of the dead is closest than the others and I rush at a dead blonde girl and swing the ax out at her without thinking.

My head is throbbing now with every step I take, but I refuse to let it distract me.

If I live through the dead that are rounding the side of the building, then I deal with my pain then. The dead girl I swing at must have dies days ago, because her flesh is so soft that when I hit at her neck, her head cuts off instead of her falling to the ground. I don’t have time to be shocked and amazed though, because there is another dead guy wearing glasses that is running towards me.

I spin around to raise the ax and face him head on.

But I get so dizzy when I start to turn that I feel myself beginning to fall to the ground.

By the time I land, I don’t even have time to register the fact that I feel claustrophobic on the ground with the rain falling on me, when the dead guy is falling on top of me. Snapping his jaw near my throat, I recover enough to get the ax between us. Used to being trapped this way by now, I easily pushes him off, plus he’s smaller than another person I doesn’t like to think about. As he stumbles back, I quickly get to my feet, and he lunges again.

I’m ready though and I swing at him and catch the side of his head knocking his glasses off.

He falls to the ground now still clawing at my legs as he does, and I deftly pull the ax from his head. I have to struggle a little bit, his flesh isn’t as soft as the girls, but once free I bring the ax down into his neck. From one hit, his movement still.

Breathing hard and trying to not noticing the shaking, I glance around for Gabe.

I force my attention away from the dead bodies that are pooling together around the side of the building, and instead I search to the sounds of a fight. They don’t seem to be as into the fight as they were before, both are slowing down and limping. Even in the rain, I can see that they are both covered in blood.

I thank the Heavens that I managed to keep the dead from Gabe at least.

In the opposite direction from them I can see shadows coming closer, and I can’t tell if it is deader or not. I’m about to call out to them to watch out, when Gabe moves in and punches Hunter hard enough to distract him, while he shoves him to the ground.

The world slows down to me then, and I see everything as if it’s in high definition clarity.

As Hunter falls to the ground, his head flies back and smacks the pavement with a resounding bang. From the impact he coughs, and turns to the side and spits out blood from his mouth. Even from all the way across the way, I can see the shadows near them almost take a collective breath before they rush to Hunter. One gets to him first, and it’s an older fat man that is dragging cords of his intestines behind him like a security blanket.

He falls onto Hunter from behind his head and latches onto his left collar bone.

He screams as the man tears into him, but he doesn’t try to fight him off and is staring up at something. Following his line of sight, I find Gabe, and realize that he is just standing there watching him with a cold expression on his face.

I’m frozen in place and don’t know if I should do something. I mean yeah, this jerk was just trying to kill me a couple minutes ago, but no one should be eaten to death. I still can’t bring myself to leave my spot though, and I know I should do something; the dead at my back will be close soon too.

But as I watch, Gabe slowly lifts his gun, like he doesn’t really want to.

He aims it over Hunter’s shoulder, and shoots the dead man that is biting him in the head.

Chapter Fifty Four

The dead man unlatches himself when he gets shot in the head, and falls back off of Hunter.

He curls onto his side, and I know it won’t be long now for the other dead to make their way to him, since he’s bleeding harder now. Gabe is still standing in the same position with the gun raised, and he hasn’t taken his eyes off of Hunter. Not caring about the dead approaching from my back, I force my shaky legs to run to where Gabe is.

Even as I slip on the wet ground, I don’t stop until I’m standing next to him.

He doesn’t look up as I reach him, and it makes me worry. What if I was one of the dead? He would be already on the ground by now, and I would have lost him forever. At our feet I can hear Hunter crying over the sound of the rain and the dead, but I don’t pay him any attention as he thanks us.

Instead, facing Gabe, I lightly touch his arm that is holding the gun.

He flinches as if I hurt him and I notice the way his arm quivers and the gun starts to shake in his hand. My heart breaks for him, and I know what’s running through his head, it’s going through mine too. Hunter was bitten and will soon be turning, and with the dead coming we can’t afford to leave him at our backs alive.

It might seem cold, but this is something I have to make myself live with now.

If it was me, I would want to die before I turned. My stomach rolls at the thought of trying to attack someone I love, and I don’t want that. I don’t know about Hunter, but he should get the same sympathy I suppose, regardless of his actions. Of course, he might not see it that way, not everyone does.

“
He’s going to turn like the others isn’t he?” Gabe whispers so low, that I almost don’t hear him at first.

Looking at Gabe fully now, I see how much more hurt he is than I first thought. His bottom lip is split and is dripping blood down his chin, and has a cut over his right eyebrow. One of his eyes is almost so swollen, that he can’t keep it open fully. I notice then, that he is leaning over a bit, like he can’t stand so straight because he hurts.

I feel rage burn inside me, and all at once any sympathy I felt for Hunter gets washed away with the rain.

With the hand that I placed on Gabe’s, I slowly lower it so that he is not aiming at Hunter now. Gabe glances at me and I can see his eyes widening, and I know what he must be thinking. That I’m going to let Hunter live, but that’s not true. Dragging my hand down his arm, I cover his hand with mine, so that we both hold the gun. I hold Gabe’s gaze for another moment, and I can see that it’s dawning on him what I plan to do.

He nods at me like he approves, and I grip the gun tighter as he pulls his hand away.

He steps almost behind me so that he’s out of the way, but can still watch. I let his presence comfort me, and take away anything that could make me hesitate. I turn back to Hunter, who is now curled into a fetal position and is rocking back and forth making these mewling noises over and over.

I take a step towards him, and his head shoots up so that he is looking at me now.

“
Please don’t, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean too.”

I almost want to laugh at him, how can he be this weak thing after what he was doing not that long ago?

This only fuels my fire though, and I know I can’t let him go. With the rain weighing me down, I take another step closer to him and raise the gun with one hand. I leave my other hand at my side, and let the ax rest on the ground.

“
Did I ever tell you about my ex-boyfriend Hunter?” I say, as I make my voice sound as empty as I feel.

He looks confused for a second, not understanding what I’m getting at and he looks from me to Gabe.

Finally resting on me, he slowly shakes his head no.

I now aim the gun right at him, and he flinches as if I already shot him. “No? Well, you should know that I killed him.”

As his eyes go even wider in alarm, I squeeze the guns trigger.

He falls back onto the wet pavement with a pop from the gun. He’s still now.

Not shooting a gun in a while, I didn’t realize that there would be a kick to it and luckily I was holding it so hard that my hand hurts. Even with my aim on Hunter, it still went a little wide but still caught him in the head. I was aiming for right between the eyes, but I’m just glad I don’t have to shoot him twice. With my arm still raised, I can feel myself shaking and I wonder why.

Is it bothering me that I killed him, and should it?

I guess I should feel something, mostly because it would probably make me worse than him if it didn’t. I feel something in my eyes, and my vision blurs and that’s when I realize that I’m crying. I can feel Gabe from behind me come closer and oh so slowly, he puts his arms around me.

He helps me lower the gun with his hands on mine, and once he does I spin in his arms, and hold him as tight as I can. He holds me equally as tight, and distantly I can hear him saying something to me, but it’s lost beyond the roaring of my ears. I can guess what he’s saying though, probably something like everything is going to be alright, but how can it? After what I just did we can’t even wait to have a moment to deal, because we have more of the dead still coming for us.

My head is pounding vigorously now and I don’t know how much longer I can stay on my feet. I still cling to Gabe though, even more if possible, and let the rain wash away my guilt. I’m about to tell Gabe that we’re about to have company, when we hear a loud booming that sounds like fireworks from around the front of the Library.

We pull apart and look in the direction, just in time to see the dead that were approaching burst apart in pieces. Amongst the steam in the rain, I know it was a grenade when we see Noah running in our direction firing into the dead left standing with the Uzi. Except he’s not alone, trailing behind him are a small group of people with makeshift weapons.

Two in particular catches my eye.

“…
Mommy.” I hear myself whisper.

The ax in my arms suddenly becomes weightless and I let it fall from my numb fingers.

It’s barely hitting the wet ground and I’m already running full out.

I crash into my mother and am just wrapping my arms around her, and my father is at her side and hugging me at the same time. I take in their appearance like I’ve never seen them before, or like it been a while, and I guess it has. My mom’s long dark hair is pulled up in a messy bun, and her dark eyes are bright with unshed tears. My dad is still bald as ever, and like always it makes his light eyes stand out. They are both in dingy clothes like my own, and are covered in dried blood, like my own. Even if they look as bad as I do, it’s still so good to see them.

That I know they don’t care that when I hug them I get fresh blood all over them.

The others of their group are still hitting and shooting at the dead that won’t go away, and as Noah shoots the Uzi he makes his way towards a shocked Gabe. I half turn away and see him dragging the machine gun and the ax after him, and not really paying attention to what’s going on. His eyes are on my parent’s faces, and then they shift to mine, and ghost of a smile appears on his face.