Coyote (31 page)

She saw the Professor, leaning against the other wall, his damaged leg not supporting him at all, weakly flailing at two thumpers who had jumped onto his chest at the same time.

Stab, hack, kick, and repeat.

The Professor was the worst off, as she had expected. At some point, she realized that he was no longer effectively defending himself, and was soaking up the attacks of the thumpers more than he was parrying them or striking back.

She took a half-step sideways, trying as best she could to take on more of the creatures headed his way, but she could not reach them all.  Out of the corner of her eye, as she fought off one, two or three of the creatures, she could often see another getting through his defenses and using its stabbing claw to open a fresh wound on his failing body.

And yet, he still stood. Neither he nor the others gave way. She does not know how many they killed, but the dead creatures covered the floor, lying two, three or four deep—enough that she could no longer see the floor itself.

Stab, hack, kick, and repeat.

In her exhaustion, time became a foreign, subjective concept. She did not know how long she fought, how long she stood, how long she had struggled—only that it was a long time.

Stab, hack, kick, and repeat.

But everything comes to an end.

At one point she realized the flow of the thumpers was slowing. Perhaps it was because they had to crawl over the piles of their own fallen to get at their prey. But no, that was not it. There were fewer coming through the door—that miraculous, life-saving door which still hung crookedly in its frame, limiting the number of thumpers that could enter the room at one time. Now, instead of a constant flow of lithe, dark bodies dropping through the holes, she saw the occasional gap, where a hole stood vacant for a moment or two before another creature filled it.

Still: stab, hack, kick, and repeat.

Soon she found herself able to look up occasionally to see what was coming. She found herself better able to deal with the number of thumpers coming at both her and the Professor.

And then, suddenly, she stabbed one, hacked its body into two twitching pieces, kicked it away so the body would not trip her, and… no others came to take its place.

Looking around, she saw Bait pulling his broken machete from the body of one thumper as the Mule blocked the leap of another with his arm, and smashed it to the floor with his gore-covered axe. Nothing more moved before her.

Behind her she saw the dog, standing in its own pile of mangled creatures, stumble unsteadily over to a final, twitching thumper and shake it apart before dropping it. The dog let its head droop almost to the floor for a moment, and then looked up, looking her in the eyes. It was hurt, lifting one leg entirely off the ground and swaying in exhaustion. But in its face, she saw the wild joy and the ferocity to echo her own.

Suddenly that joy needed to come forth. She yelled, she cried, she howled. It was a combination of exhaustion and exultation, mixing together in a roar that burst from her lungs, giving voice to the storm within. The dog joined her, raising its own voice in the same song its distant ancestors had sung over their own kills. The others looked on, all slumped against the walls or floor, not understanding. But it did not matter. She understood. She and the dog.

When she was done, there was only silence in the room. Silence, underlined by the heavy breathing of the rest of the group. With her roaring call, the energy and the emotion that had held her upright flowed out of her, and she fell to her knees, though still she would not let her weapons fall from her hands.

She looked to the others. They were all staring at her, though only the dog’s eyes held understanding. But they didn’t speak. They didn’t question her, and that was enough.

All of them were staring at her. All but the Professor.

---

She had noticed him sliding down against the wall and slumping to the floor, just as most of the others had done. Now, focusing more closely on him, she saw his pose was different than the others.

The Professor was lying curled on the floor now, though not in a pose of rest or recovery. He was torn and bloody, no longer able to stand. His was a pose of ruin—of agony. The fight had cost each of them, in wounds and exhaustion. But, already wounded when it began, the fight had cost the Professor much more. Maybe everything.

He was not dead—not yet, at least. Instead, he twitched, quivering, taking sucking, gurgling breaths as his many, deep wounds bled onto the ground beneath him. His clothes were torn and ragged, and beneath them shone redly wet flesh and bone, ripped and punctured, exposed to air it was never meant to see.

Shuffling forward on her knees, she crouched by his form, thinking, hoping, that he might be unconscious, but he was not. He was aware of every gaping hole in his ruined body—every twitching nerve as it dutifully sent its message of pain to his brain, letting him know what had been done to him.

He looked into her eyes, and one hand grabbed onto her ankle as she crouched next to him. Then the hand let go, as if in his distress the Professor still remembered she would not want to be touched.

“Help me,” he said.

She looked at him solemnly. “She cannot help you.”

He looked at her and they shared an understanding: they both knew he would not survive this. Then he closed his eyes for a moment. When they opened again, she saw certainty on his face.

“I wanted to tell you,” he said.

“What?”

“I got it wrong.”

“She doesn’t understand.”

“About what’s next. About what we’re doing. That’s what I’ve been thinking about all winter. Ever since this started, I’ve been focused, thinking about surviving, about rebuilding. We have to. We can’t just stay alive. You know that, right? We have to rebuild the world we had.”

He looked at her, perhaps expecting an answer, but she remained silent.

“Those of us that remain, we… We are all that’s left. It’s our job, now, to put society back together. Maybe, maybe even better than it was, huh? Maybe we can skip things like prejudice and greed this time. Maybe, if the right people are there to say the right things.”

Again he paused. Blood ran from the corner of his mouth and he tried to spit, wetly, working to clear it from his throat. He didn’t seem like he wanted a response from her this time. He was just marshaling his thoughts—and maybe trying to gather the strength to say what he wanted to say as his body continued to bleed.

“You’re one of the right people, you know?” She frowned at this, but he continued, rushing to push past any objections she might voice. “You don’t think it, but you are. You’ve taken care of us, even though you didn’t want to. You’ve seen how the others follow you, even when you wish they didn’t. These are the leaders we need—leaders who are focused on what needs to be done, what is best, not on how to keep themselves in power.”

Again he stopped. His speech was obviously costing him, but she would not stop him. He had nothing else left.

“And I still believe that, but… but I got some of it wrong. Beast is right, too.”

At this, she raised her eyebrow.

He tried to smile, but it quickly turned into a grimace, then a wet cough, shaking his poor body and causing new spasms of pain to run across his features. When he had recovered, he continued.

“Yes, that surprises you. It surprised me, too, when I realized it. But think about it. We can’t rebuild yet. We can’t rebuild until we have something to build on. Do you see?”

But his speech began to slow now, even as his emotions rose. She wondered how long he could go on.

“We can’t rebuild,” he continued, “until we have something to build on. What use trying to put something together when those things out there are waiting to take it apart? No, we’ve got to take it back first.”

His gaze had drifted as he spoke, but now he looked into her eyes again.

“You’ve got to take it back. You and Beast, Bait and the Mule. Even the dog. And there have got to be others out there, too. You’re fighters and you’ve got work to do. Take our world back. Drive the monsters back to wherever they came from. Reclaim what we once had. Then, then… then it will be time to rebuild. But first you must fight. First you have to take it back.”

He coughed twice more, blood arcing from his lips. She could see the pain etched in his features, but he was too weak even to protest.

“Now,” he wheezed—his voice was getting weaker, “pick me up. Take me upstairs. Patch me up.”

“It will only hurt you,” she said. “Bandages won’t save you.”

“No. No, do it. Come on, help me. Help me.” He was almost whispering now as he pled his case.

“You will not survive this,” she said.

His arms stopped their ineffectual movement. He took a moment to gather the strength to reply. “I… I know.” He paused again. “It’s just…”

His eyes closed for a moment and she thought maybe he was slipping away, but then they opened again.

“I’m afraid,” he wheezed.

“She understands,” she said. Her knife was still in her hand. Swiftly, she moved it to his throat. His eyes widened, but before he could draw the strength to voice any protests, she dragged the blade across his throat, pressing down and cutting deeply.

There was surprisingly little blood. She had expected it to spurt in the rhythm of his heartbeat, or to flow thickly down his chest, but it merely oozed out of the cut, pooling on the already bloody floor beneath him. Maybe it was because so much of his blood had already left his body.

He blinked at her twice, hunching his shoulders and curling his arms as if beginning to rise from the ground, but then he subsided. As his body relaxed, his eyes slipped from hers, to gaze off into some distance none of the others could perceive. His body hitched a few, last gurgling breaths but she could see from his empty gaze that he was no longer present.

She stood, turning away from the body.

Behind her, she saw the others. They had risen, and stood now in a mute semicircle, even the dog, looking alternately at her, at the Professor’s body and at the dripping knife in her hand. Nobody spoke.

They looked at her and she looked back at them for a long time—maybe a minute or even two—silent, watching, thinking, waiting. It was clear to her that they were unnerved by what she had done, but couldn’t see a better path either. She had no apologies to make. Now they all felt that this moment would be a turning point, and they all were waiting direction.

“It is time to leave,” she said. “Today, pack your things, gather provisions, and sharpen your weapons. Tomorrow she walks away from here.”

“Where are we going?” asked the Mule.

“She will continue east,” she answered.

“And why?” challenged Beast. She could see he was still challenging what their purpose was—would they hide, or fight?

For her, the decision had been made.

“If you need a purpose, what better one that to fight back? None of you know for certain if this is happening only here in this little corner of Oregon or if humans are being wiped off the face of the earth. But these creatures have killed everyone you knew and destroyed everything you once had.

“So now she will fight back. If it is just here, or if it is across the whole world—if these are aliens, demons, mutants from a lab, or something none of you have imagined yet, the course is plain. She will fight.”

She didn’t tell the others about the rest of the Professor’s plan. That was too far off, too nebulous a goal. It was something to think about in the future. For now, she would fight.

“She has told you since you chose to follow that there is no plan, and you will most likely die. You still will most likely die, and so will she. But she will fight before dying.  That is the plan: to fight before dying. And if you come with her, it must be to fight alongside her.”

Still they all looked at her. “So will you fight?” she asked.

“You know I will,” said Beast.

“Of course,” huffed the Mule, looking insulted. She didn’t know why he was taking offense, until Bait spoke up.

“Shit, girl, you don’t have to ask him,” said Bait with a grin. “He’ll follow you anywhere.”

The Mule looked at Bait angrily, and then at the ground, but said nothing.

“And I’ll come along,” continued Bait. “Nothing else better to do, is there?”

She didn’t understand Bait’s teasing, or the Mule’s anger, but it was enough to know that it was decided. The group was hers now and there was no turning back. She would lead them. They would go out into the world, and they would hunt the creatures that had been hunting them.

She would lead them and she would fight with them but, she promised herself, she would not care about them.

She limped away from the rest of the group without another word, intent on preparing herself for tomorrow. The others would get themselves ready.

The dog followed at her heels. The dog’s decision had never been in doubt.

And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death,

And Hell followed with him.
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