Hissers II: Death March (23 page)

“I know, Am. I reckon we might be their only hope. And we’ll need them if your friend’s going there with this package.”

“What package is that?” asked Marlene.

“Don’t know. Even Am here doesn’t know. We just know it might be hope.”

“Sounds like bad poetry,” Nathan said. “If you head out there you’re gonna die. You should stay.” He put his hand on Am’s shoulder.

She looked up
at him, caught his eyes. They were the eyes of a young man afraid to be alone. He was still here with his mother, which had to be grounding him, even if his dress and attitude spoke of rebellion. No, he was going to stay with his parents and never leave. Am was not ready for that. With her parents dead, there was little else to dedicate herself to except finishing this last stretch of road.

She needed to find Connor. She had been thinking of him too much lately. How he was the la
st thing that existed that represented a sense of home. Maybe he needed her too. Who knew.

“No,” she said to Nathan, “
we have to go. My friend is going there.”

“How do you know
he’s…?”

“I know Connor. I know he’s alive. You just ha
ve to know him to know he’s…he just doesn’t give up, you know. He’s probably already there. Maybe scared and alone but there.”

“Maybe he got there and is in the lab?”

That thought hadn’t even occurred to her, but now it made her heart race. She couldn’t lose Connor too. “Well that certainly settles it then. Doug?”

“Yeah, Am, let’s get rolling before it gets dark.”

“Just like that, huh?” Ron said. “After all we’ve told you, you’re gonna play the fools-rush-in game?”

“Yup.”

“What’re you gonna do for weapons? We don’t have any we can lend. Maybe some lead pipes and stuff but we’re keeping our firearms. Like I said, it’s barren hills for the next one hundred and fifty miles. You’re gonna need
something
.”

“I guess we’ll figure something out.” With that, Doug looked at Amanita, at Nathan, and
gave them a quick nod. He waved goodbye to Ron and and Marlene and left the structure.

Amanita turned and faced Nathan, once again
studying his features. His green eyes, bed head hair do, and bathtub chain necklace. “Sorry,” she said. And then without thinking, without giving herself a chance to back down, leaned in and kissed him. He stood frozen, shocked, but finally kissed her back, his flushing face almost red enough to light up the sheet metal wall beside them. His mother coughed, but there was amusement behind it.

Their lips parted and
she said, “See ya, drummer boy.” She raced after Doug and got in the truck.

SATURDAY, 3:35

The boat jumped the waves, nearly tossing its occupants into the ocean. Connor held onto the gunwale with white knuckles, salt water mist stinging him in the face. Andy huddled behind the driver’s seat, doing his best not to shake with fear. Cleo and Hugh watched the waters ahead of them with narrowed eyes, scoping out any danger and looking for ways around the choppy parts.

Olive sat at the stern, watching the waters behind them, gun in hand. 
She still squinted like she could see something beneath the water, even though there was likely nothing. The zombie from the snack shack had kept pace with them for a little while, shuffling through the waves, then along the bottom of the water, until Cleo was able to get the boat hotwired. But the odds that any hissers were following them now was slim. Still, no one was taking any chances.

A
half mile off to their left, the coastline steadily slid by as if it were on a dolly. Connor marveled at some of the large houses on the cliffs, not just because they were luxurious, but also because they look so precariously perched above the beaches it was a wonder they didn’t fall in at the first strong gust of wind.

The air over the land
was becoming browner, hazier, and Hugh remarked that they were definitely entering southern California. Connor wanted to feel excited for some reason. Perhaps because he and Seth had played some many video games that took place in Los Angeles that he always figured the first time he saw the place it would be sunny and green and full of movie stars and fast cars. But it just looked useless. Drab. A little dirty as well.

Olive moved away from the back and sat next to him. “Hey, kid, we’re almost there. I can’t believe it myself.
I just hope we don’t walk into a city of those undead things. Being out in the woods and on the highways fighting them is one thing, being in a major city is another. Let’s pray we’re ahead of the plague.”

“
Either that or it’s all we’ll find.”

“Not funny, Connor.”

“Olive, what do we do if the information on the drive is worthless? Where do we go from there? I mean, what if all the world gets changed and we can’t fix it?”

“I dunno. I suppose we go wherever we want.
It’s not like it’s our job to fix it anyway. They’ve still got fighter jets in the air and I can’t imagine the entire military is disbanded so we can just sit and wait until they regroup.”

“But what if they don’t. Where do we go?”

“Maybe some island that never got infected. Or some far off stretch of wilderness so far removed from life no one would find us. What are you thinking?”

“Some
place safe where we don’t have to fight every day. I just don’t know where that place is anymore. Maybe some big cruise ship we can anchor off the coast of an island, just in case. That might be cool. Although I did play a video game that took place on a cruise ship that was overrun with aliens, so maybe it’s not a great idea. ”

“
I think it’s pretty good. Hang on.” She approached the helm. Connor heard her asking Hugh how long before they got to a dock. He said he didn’t know and that it likely wouldn’t be for another couple hours.

Connor
watched the water, wondering if there were sharks down there. He thought about the couple of times he’d gone fishing at the lake with his father. He’d caught a large mouth bass once that had put up a fight for about twenty minutes. It was a hard won victory, but he had eventually gotten it reeled in. Then he’d felt bad once he saw it in the boat. It was bleeding from its mouth, and when he’d yanked the hooked out he’d ripped open one of its gills. He’d tossed it back and it had disappeared under the water in a flash. Even wounded and yanked from its element, its instinct to survive had never waned. Whether it had lived or died he didn’t know.

“Something is in the water,” Cleo said, pointing over the starboard gunwale. Connor scanned the water, expecting a small boat or maybe even a shark fin. But he saw nothing.

“Where?” Hugh asked. Andy managed to sit up high enough to look over the side and take a look.

“I swear I saw something,” Cleo said. “I saw, like, something come up out of the water for a second.”

“A fish?” Olive asked.

“Bigger.”

“A dolphin. Don’t they swim off the coast of Southern California?”

“I know what a dolphin looks like. It wasn’t a dolphin. It looked like an arm. A human arm.”

Now everyone except Hugh—who was driving the boat—was on the starboard side looking at the water.

“Nothing,” said Olive

“I’m telling you,” Cleo answered. “I know I’m not crazy. It looked like—”

A
massive geyser of sea water hit them, and an undead beast of arms and legs and heads burst out of the water and grabbed the side of the boat, yanking it down and spilling everyone into the frigid Pacific.

Connor felt the cold of the ocean engulf him; h
is body threatened to go into shock as the icy water chilled him to the bone. Sound was cut off as he flipped himself over underwater, his heart pounding, righting himself and lurching for the surface which seemed years away. Something hit him. He gasped, salt water rushed down his throat, choking him, burning his insides. It hit a second time, kicked him in the ribs, and panic set in. He was sure it was the creature, sure that it would start tearing him into bite-sized chunks. But he felt the rubbery soles of sneakers and realized it was one of his boat mates kicking as they swam. When his head broke the surface, he sucked in a gulp of air and looked for the boat. It was way off to his right, floating in the waves, evidently having continued on its path.

A head popped up next to his. It was Andy, and he was fighting to stay afloat
, clearly not the strongest swimmer. He mouthed something that looked like
shit
but Connor couldn’t be sure. Cleo and Olive appeared behind him, both of them swimming toward the group.

“Where is it?” Olive yelled, her eyes swiveling crazily as she searched for the monster. It was nowhere in sight. “Where did it go?”

“No idea,” Connor said, realizing for the first time he’d dropped his gun. It was no doubt lying among the seaweed and coral on the ocean floor.

“The boat!” Cleo yelled. “We gotta get to the boat.”

“Swim for it,” Olive said, her teeth already chattering, her lips blue.

Connor made for the boat,
his shoes weighing him down and making it incredibly hard to swim in the rough sea. His hands and arms were so cold he could barely feel them. With every stroke he expected the beast to grab him and drag him under. In the brief second he’d seen it before it tipped the boat, he had seen all of its arms and legs and heads covered in seaweed. It was a hisser, all right, but how it had managed to swim was anyone’s guess. Or had it just been wallowing on the sea floor until they’d happened by it? Had it been tracking them?

Andy swam by next to him, doing the dog paddle.  Cleo was true to his words, and was the fastest swimmer. He was almost at the boat when something came out of the water and dragged him under.

Olive screamed. Andy stopped paddling and did his best to tread water.

“
Fuck! Where’d it go!” Olive shouted.

Connor
tried to stay still, only using his arms and hands to stay afloat, keeping his legs together, hoping that the creature wouldn’t notice him if he didn’t make noise, but he could not help splashing again as the waves crested over him and threated to drown him. “It got him,” he said through a shivering jaw, fighting to stay on top of the rolling water. “It got Cleo.”

“Cleo!” Andy yelled. “No!”

“
We have to get to the boat while it’s got him,” Connor said. His words were insensitive but he knew this game, knew this this was their only chance to survive. If it had Cleo then Cleo was dead. Olive knew it too, and nodded. Together they swam for the boat, which was now listing in the current.

They had gone twenty feet when the sea turned red
to his right. If it was Cleo’s blood, Connor couldn’t tell but he knew it was somebody’s. It was thick and looked almost purple at times, spreading out and heading right for him. He paddled sideways, trying to stay away from it, knowing the monster was somewhere in it, but it was closing on him.

“Stay away from the blood!” he yelled. Both Andy and Olive saw it now too, and swam sideways, cutting around it.
It bubbled up with renewed ferocity, as if the hisser were purposefully spitting it toward the surface.

“There’s the boat,” Andy said, pointing.

And then Andy was gone, yanked under the water like Cleo had been. There one second, gone the next.

Olive scr
eamed and lost control, flailing as she swam with all her might. Again, Connor knew their only chance was that the hisser stayed preoccupied with Andy long enough for him and Olive to get to the boat. He kicked as hard as he could, keeping an eye out for anything red, suffering the icy water to his very core. The boat finally coughed to life, began to turn, come back for them. At the wheel, Hugh yelled for them to swim faster. He pulled up beside them and ran to the gunwale, throwing his hands over. “It stalled! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! Quick, grab my hands! C’mon!”

Olive was there before Connor, lurching
up out of the water like a sea lion making for a hoop at Sea World. Hugh caught her, yanked her up and over into the boat in one swift motion. She turned back, sea water running down her face, and screamed something inaudible. Connor reached the side of the boat, which yawed in the water and hit him, pushing him backwards away from the craft. Backwards in front of the hisser which had now popped up from under the waves just behind him. He screamed, fighting to get back to the boat. He hit the fiberglass side and tried to scramble up. Olive was reaching down, trying to get his hands. Her eyes were wide and he could see by the horror on her face that the creature was right on top of him.

“Screw you!” Hugh
yelled, leaping off the boat and drop kicking the monster. Both the former cop and the hisser went under the waves and disappeared.

“Gimme your hand, Connor. Don’t look back. C’mon, reach!”

If he had Olive’s toned, dancer body this might be easier, but he was not as tall as her and might even weigh more. He waited for the boat to roll in the waves, and when it pitched down he stretched himself up as far as he could. Olive caught his hand, pulled him up until he could grab the side and heave himself on board. He scanned the deck for a gun but found nothing. The only weapon in sight was an oar affixed to a storage rack on the side. He unfastened it and held it up, ready to hit the hisser if it appeared near the boat.