Trepidation (4 page)

When I glanced ahead, I gasped. The whole back parking lot was empty and fenced in with towering barbed wire. Z’s minions stood guard around each side, armed with shotguns to take care of any prisoners who tried to escape. Like victims forced into the Coliseum in ancient times for the entertainment of the sick masses, my friends were battling zombies; without weapons, they were fighting with every bit of strength they had to stay alive. Jimmy didn’t make it, and my heart sank as I watched him kick and thrash, screaming bloody murder as zombies pulled out his intestines, causing rivers of crimson blood to gush and pour onto the white snow.

“Oops. Look like that one’s a goner,” Z said in a mocking tone, touching my shoulder.

I ran to the fence and shook it. “No!” I shouted. I shut my eyes, unable to watch any the carnage any longer. I knew his screams would be etched into my mind forever.
How could Z’s men stand there and do nothing? They’re all as sick as their psychotic leader!
I spun around and stared hard at him. “Let them go!” I shouted. “How can anyone be this...sadistic?”

He peered at me with wild eyes. “As I said, this is only the beginning.”

I
couldn’t believe Z would make our men fight against zombies in some kind of sick game. “If you let them go, I’ll personally deliver your message to Max,” I said. “You’ve made it quite clear.”

“Oh, you’ll talk to Max anyway,” he said. “I only need one messenger to survive.”

“Everyone has a price,” I said. “What’s yours?”

“Charlie’s head on a platter,” he said, “for killing my brother.”

“Hmm. Well, it seems we have a common enemy. He killed my girlfriend too,” I said. “Let me help you take him down.”

“Who says I need your help?”

“I know a lot of the scientists, and I have pretty much have free reign in the city,” I wagered. “I can get information you can’t.”

Z pointed to the left corner. “See the injured over there?”

“Were they bitten?”

“No. My men roughed them up. I wanted to see if the others would protect them or if it’d be every man for himself.”

“These men have character,” I said.

“It seems they do. They’re selflessly protecting each other, all except for that one. His legs were broken when we threw him in, so I guess he didn’t stand much of a chance,” he said, pointing to Jimmy, who was being devoured by zombies.

“This is sick!” I said. “I thought the zombies were monsters, but you? You’re just—”

“Calm down, Dean. I gave them a few weapons,” Z said.

“And that makes everything all right?”

“Let’s see if
you
have character,” he said. “Half of them are injured and won’t last too much longer. I’ll let those out if you’ll go in their place.”

“And you promise not to hurt them worse or kill them?” I asked.

“I might be sadistic, as you put it, but I’m not a liar. I always keep my word. If you survive, I’ll let you all go.”

I held out my hand. “Deal. Now get them outta there.”

He shook my hand firmly.

“And I want a weapon,” I demanded.

“That wasn’t part of the deal,” he said with a sinister laugh. 

Z gave the order to release the injured men, and they scooped up the wounded from what looked like a prison yard and let them out. Then, with a hard shove, they threw me inside.

I immediately sized up the battle. There were about five of us. At least a dozen of the zombies had been slain, but ten more were coming. I needed a blunt weapon, something that would allow a brain-killing stab. I frantically glanced around, and then I saw it. One of the dead freaks was a security guard in a dirty, torn uniform, and there was a nightstick attached to his belt. I ran over and snatched it, more than ready to deliver some blunt force trauma.

“Dean!” Jared said.

I didn’t even greet him, for the anger in me was surging too much when I heard zombies sickeningly slurping away as they fed on a fallen comrade. I’d done guard duty with Jimmy, and he had been a friend to me. I grabbed a zombie by its shoulders and threw it to the ground. With my heel, I crushed its head like a rotten watermelon. I kicked the next one and smashed its rotting face in. Black gore exploded, and a horrible stink filled the air. Some of the other men finished off their zombies and headed over to help me. In no time, with flaring tempers and mindless, brute strength, we killed the monsters who had taken Jimmy away from us.

“More are comin’ this way!” Jeremy said.

“I’ll take the two to the far left,” I said.

He nodded. His breath became ragged, and his hands balled into white-knuckled fists as he stared ahead.

It reminded me of our stint in Kingsville, without the huge crowd cheering the zombies on. Something heavy pushed down on my lungs, making it hard to breathe as a 200-pound walking nightmare climbed on my back and snapped its jaws near my ear, clawing at the air. With the help of two men, I kicked it off of me, and it fell over in a heap of rotting skin. I punctured its head with one clean thump of my steel-toed boot. Its skull shattered with a loud
crunch
, cracking like an egg.

I let out one killing stroke after another, hoping to gain the upper hand. One zombie started to come at me, then walked right past me, as if its vision was somehow impaired. I whacked it in the back of the head, and it went down with a loud
pop
. “What’s the matter?” I shouted. “Not enough Vitamin A in the brains you been eatin’, buddy?” I asked as I smashed its skull for good measure, not wanting to risk it coming back and attacking one of the others.

The snow and ice was so slippery that some of the naturally clumsy zombies couldn’t keep their balance. We took full advantage of that, but it wasn’t exactly safe for us either. As soon as one of our own slipped, the zombies pounced. Joe screamed when one went straight for his neck. I slammed my nightstick against its head so hard that some of its black teeth shattered and sprayed on Joe. Joe covered his face as I rolled the zombie off of him, then stomped its face; it exploded when I drove the skull-crunching hit home.

Then the most inconceivable thing happened: Jimmy walked toward me. As he groaned, what was left of his intestines dragged along behind him. He’d been gutted, and it was a gruesome sight.

I knew I had to put him down. I shook my head. “Jimmy, I’m so, so sorry.” I ran at him, but before I could get to him, Ned smashed his head with his crowbar.

Jimmy crashed down into the snow, and Ned fell to his knees, sobbing.

“Get up!” we all yelled.

“This isn’t over,” I said. “More are coming!”

As fury consumed Ned, he took down a zombie with his bare hands and stomped its head over and over—a rage I understood because I’d felt it many times.

I peered around me at all the dead zombies littering the ground, and then I walked toward to Z and his men. “Done,” I said. “We had a deal. Now let us go.”

“But they’re not all dead,” he said.

“Yes they are.”

Z pulled out his gun and lifted it high in the air, then fired off a few shots, which didn’t seem to make much sense to me.

“Dean!” Jared called. “That’s the dinner bell.”

“What?” I asked.

He pointed at the snow drifts way off at the back of the make shift prison yard. “Those gunshots are...a dinner invitation!”

I gasped at the piles of snow shaking and lifting as if something was trying to break out. A hand burst through, followed by another, till dozens and dozens of rotting hands were reaching out of the snow. A zombie with bright red hair poked its head through the snow, then worked its legs loose. At the exact same time another burst through, followed by another. 

We all exchanged terrified looks, knowing our fight had only begun.

I
turned back toward Z. “You know we can’t fight them with these crappy weapons.”

He smirked. “As I said, weapons were not part of the deal.”

“Get us outta here, man,” I begged.

He shook his head. “If I were you, I’d get as many as I could while they’re still trapped in that huge snow drift we plowed.”

If looks could have killed, he would have been a dead man. I raced through the snow to a drift where a zombie was still buried. I let out a deep breath and rammed the nightstick right through its skull. Its lifted hand fell back into the snow, and a red river trickled from its head wound. “Kill them!” I shouted. “Get as many as you can before they get to their feet!”

“You heard Dean!” Ned shouted. “This ain’t no winter wonderland! Get to work, boys!”

We all started smashing zombie heads with whatever makeshift weapons we could find. Those who had no weapons used their feet to smash heads in.

A zombie, covered in snow and ice, with matted, dirty blonde hair came at me from the left. I brought my knee up high, to my chest, and kicked it, delivering a powerful blow. It fell backward and crashed into the snow. I thrust my nightstick straight into its forehead and watched as its deteriorating face caved in like a rotten melon. I gasped for breath; all that fighting took a lot out of me, as it was physically draining and strenuous work. My muscles ached, and I was out of breath, but my adrenaline surged, allowing me to keep delivering blow after lethal blow.

Limping along, a zombie in a torn, dirty, bloody suit came from my right. As I swung my nightstick, cracking its skull, another lunged for my neck. I wrapped my leather-gloved hands around its decomposing neck and hooked my leg behind its leg, then swept my leg against its calf, forcing it to fall. The clumsy thing was no challenge, and it dropped to the ground easily. I delivered the lethal blow as gore exploded from its head.

Joe, armed with a golf club, screamed, “Four!” and whacked a zombie next to me.

It didn’t go down and only bent his weapon.

I went over to take care of it, but Joe beat me to the punch—or rather to the kick, since he booted its knee out, slammed it to the ground, and furiously finished it off with a series of bone-crushing stomps.

When the next frozen freak came at me, I lost my footing in a slippery patch of ice and fell backward. The zombie came right at me, so I placed my nightstick horizontally in its mouth to block the bite. I kicked and thrashed, but that didn’t help; even if I broke every bone in its decayed body, it wouldn’t stop going for my jugular. Fortunately, Ned saved the day by slicing its neck with the end of his shovel. Black goo and gore gushed all over me, like recycled motor oil, and I had to turn my head to avoid tasting it. After I kicked the thing off of me, Ned decapitated the flesh-eater.

Another devilish monster lumbered through the snow. Its sunken eyes were glazed over, and its flesh was falling off. As if it had had far too many repeat visits to the plastic surgeon, it’s nose was only hanging on by a few strands. Moaning, it reached for me with its bloody hands, but within five seconds flat, I’d bashed its head in, and it was lying dead at my feet. “How’s that for a nose job?” I asked the dead thing.

Three more zombies suddenly came at me, but I didn’t hesitate to put them out of their misery. I smashed the one to my left, then the one to my right. The third one leapt at me, and I jumped back against the chain-link fence. I gave it a powerful kick that caused it to stumble backward, but it wasn’t down for the count. A standing jump-kick shoved the creature, at least twice my size, ten feet away. When it finally toppled over, one of my comrades finished it off for me with a kick of his boot and a whack from his bat.

I couldn’t remember my savior’s name, but he was wearing a long trench coat covered in mud and grime. He held up his bat and grinned from ear to ear. “Nothin’ smashes a skull like a Louisville Slugger.”

“True,” one of the guys said, “until the flimsy thing cracks.” He held up a wrench proudly. “This is much better.”

“Great job, you guys,” I said, laughing at their banter.

Ned came over and clapped my shoulder. “I think we got ‘em all.”

I tried to catch my breath. “We hit hard,” I said between gasps. “That’s how it’s done!”

“You’re a natural-born zombie slayer, kid,” he said, “just like your brother.”

“Thanks.” The compliment meant a lot to me, more than he’d ever know. Wiping slime and gore off my face, I walked over the fence and shook it.

Z clapped his hands. “Bravo!”

“Are you happy now? I’m tired of these games. Now let us go!”

“Like I said, I’m a man of my word,” he said, unlocking the door in the fence.

Catching my breath, I walked out of Hell as Z’s minions all pointed guns at us.

“Everyone can leave but Dean,” Z said, “unless I can kill Claire in his stead.”

“What!? You know I won’t leave without her,” I said.

“None of us will,” Jared assured me. “We
all
go,” he said to Z, “every single one of us.”

I shook my head. “Take me to Claire. Where is she?”

“She’s just...chilling.”

“And what does that mean exactly?”

“She’s having fun out back, at the swimming pool.”

“Swimming? But it’s wintertime,” I said.

He held out his hand and caught a few snowflakes. “Hmm. In that case, maybe we better hurry.”

Anger boiled inside of me. I wanted to rip him apart, but I knew I had to stay calm if I was going to see Claire. When my friends began to get riled up, I told them it’d be best if they’d just take their free pass and leave, and I assured them that Claire and I would catch up with them soon, even though I didn’t know if that was true or not.

“No! We’re not leaving without you,” Jared said.

“Aw. How touching,” Z said. “But if you don’t leave within the next sixty seconds, I’m putting a bullet in the head of every single one of your injured.”

“Get them home,” I said to Jared. “They need medical help.”

Jared clapped my shoulder. “All right, but we’ll be back...with backup,” he whispered in my ear. “We’ll get you outta here, both of you, one way or another.”

I nodded.

“The clock is ticking, gentlemen!” Z yelled.

Jared shot me a long look and bit his lip, as if he was debating whether to go or stay and fight.

“Go!” I said, knowing that if he lifted one finger, the injured would be killed immediately; as Z said, he wasn’t one to go back on his word. “Claire and I will be fine, and the lives of these men are in your hands. It’s no time for a standoff, Jared. You don’t want their blood on your hands, right?”