Hollowmen (9 page)

17.

A twig snapped right behind us, and I whirled around, expecting to find a blood-thirsty monster. Instead it was only Boden, trudging downhill to us by himself. I stood up, wanting to ask him why’d he come back here, but I was too afraid to make a sound.

Without a word, he bent down and picked up Max. He swung Max around to his back, so Max wrapped his arms around his neck. Then Boden started hurrying back up the hill, moving as fast he could without making noise.

I followed after him, determined to keep his pace. I’d had a bit of a break waiting with Max, and I felt a second wind coming. Or maybe that was the adrenaline from thinking that Boden was a zombie about to tear us to pieces.

Based on the fading sound of their death groans, I guessed the zombies were moving slower than us. They were wandering without a real purpose, possibly drawn to the scent of people but without a clear target. We were on a mission to get away from them.

When the zombies sounded far enough away for that it was safe to talk, I finally asked Boden why he’d come back.

“I noticed that you and Max weren’t with the group anymore,” Boden said.

“You didn’t need to come back and risk running into zombies.”

“I don’t leave anyone behind,” Boden said simply. “Not if I can help it.”

“How’d you know we hadn’t been eaten by zombies already?” I asked.

“I didn’t,” Boden admitted. “But I figured the kid had just needed a break.”

“Thank you for coming back for us,” Max said, and I realized that I hadn’t thanked Boden either. “Remy wouldn’t go on without me.”

“And she shouldn’t have,” Boden said, and then looked over at me. “But she could’ve asked for help.”

“Thank you,” I said and lowered my eyes.

It took a little while, but we caught up with the others. They weren’t going as fast as Boden and I were, which made sense because by that time we couldn’t even hear the zombies anymore. We’d left them behind.

We made it to the top of the hill and then went back down again, which was much easier. Boden was even able to put Max down, and he walked down into the valley below. It was dark by the time we reached it, but we kept going until we could find some place safe to camp out.

Fortunately, we didn’t have to walk very long. We found a picnic area and what appeared to be some kind of lodge. It was a huge log cabin with all the windows boarded up. The front door was metal, and it had been left open.

Bishop and Boden went in first to check it out. Using a stick and an old rag, Boden made a torch, and lit the rag on fire with a match. But it didn’t take him long to scope out the inside and see it was all clear.

It was basically one huge room with a linoleum floor. It reminded me of my old high school cafeteria, except for a few stuffed animal heads on the wall and the blood splattered on things.

In the back was a cafeteria-style kitchen, but it was separated by a metal curtain that came down from the ceiling to the countertop. Boden checked that out briefly, and then shut the door to the kitchen, closing it off.

Other than the two small bathrooms, that was it for the lodge. The main room had a fireplace on one wall, and three wooden pick tables lined up in the middle of the room. The only signs that people had once stayed there were a few pieces of clothing, a couple of empty tin cans, and some other garbage. And the splattered blood, of course.

The windows had been boarded shut so well that not an ounce of light got through the cracks. Boden and Serg gathered wood outside, then started a small fire for light and for warmth, since it was getting cold in here.

They took two of the picnic tables and set them in front of the double metal doors at the opening of the lodge. With that, we were essentially closed off from the world and probably the safest we’d been in a long while.

We all ate supper quickly, without really saying anything. The day had exhausted us. According to Boden’s calculations based on the map, we’d walked nearly forty miles. That was quite a feat, considering how much we’d walked the day before, and the day before that.

Stella hadn’t walked as much as the rest of us, but she was falling asleep while she was trying to eat. Bishop made up a bed for her, using some of her clothes for a pillow and blanket.

Shortly after that, everyone else started hunkering down for the night. lay laid next to Stella, and Bishop, Teddy, and Serg were asleep pretty quickly.

Boden, Daniels, Nolita, and I stayed up, sitting around the fire in a semi-circle. I wasn’t sure whether Boden meant to keep watch again tonight, although I didn’t really feel like we needed it. After the nightmares I’d had last night, I wasn’t eager to get to sleep, not until I would pass out cold, too deep asleep to moan or make a sound.

I’m not sure why Daniels and Nolita were staying up, but they sat awfully close to one another. Nolita had packed a thin army blanket with her, and they shared the one blanket between the two of them. It was wrapped over their shoulders like a shawl, and she rested her head on his shoulder.

They’d been doing that kind of stuff all day. Every time I saw them interact, they were touching or whispering something to each other. It was gross.

And I say that not just because I had feelings of revulsion for Daniels. Something about flirting during the apocalypse felt disgusting. It felt wrong to fall in love when people were dying all around you.

That’s part of the reason I’d refused to feel anything for Lazlo for so long. That and because of how things had turned out. We’d been separated, the way I’d always known we would, and one or both of us would probably end up dead soon.

When I thought of him now, I tried not to feel anything. The best way to do that would be not to think about him at all, but I hadn’t mastered that yet.

“How much longer until we hit Canada, do you think?” I asked.

“A week.” Boden shrugged. “It depends on how fast we go. Maybe a week longer until we’re far enough north for the zombies to stop following.”

He sat cross-legged with his hands held out toward the fire, warming them. I was leaning back, stretching my legs out, and with my arms propped beside me. It put too much pressure on my abdomen when I sat up normally. When I put my hand over my shirt, the incision felt swollen and warm.

“You think the zombies are following us?” I asked.

“They definitely are,” Daniels said. “That’s what I was saying at the quarantine. They’re following people wherever they go.”

“They won’t find us here, will they?” Nolita asked, her Southern accent sounding alarmed.

“Eventually.” Boden put his hands down and rested his elbows on his knees. “Hopefully not tonight, but we’re pretty well boarded up if they do.”

“What do you suppose happened to the people that were staying here?” Nolita looked around, admiring how closed off the lodge was. “Why do you think they left?”

“Probably for the same reason we left the quarantine,” Boden said. “The zombies surrounded the place. Given enough time, they would’ve gotten in. It’s better to run while you still have the chance to.”

“Maybe they did get in,” I said and motioned to the dried blood on the fireplace. “And there aren’t any bodies because they’re all zombies now.”

“One thing’s for sure,” Boden said sadly. “Zombies will always find a way in.”

“How much do we really know about them?” I asked, turning my attention to Daniels. “You’re the resident expert. What do you actually know about them?”

“I spent more time studying the virus itself than the actual zombies.” Daniels attempted to shy away from the question. “Anything I say about their behavior is sheer speculation.”

“But it’s your speculation that caused us to the leave the quarantine,” Boden said.

“No, a brutal zombie attack did that,” Daniels corrected him.

Boden’s expression hardened. “You’re arguing semantics. You’re the one who said that the zombies weren’t going to stop coming, that there were too many of us together making our scent too strong.”

“Yes, that is what I believe,” Daniels said. “But I can’t say that it’s an absolute fact. I can’t say much for certain about the zombies.”

“Well, what do you
believe
then?” I asked.

“They’re attracted to us, possibly by our pheromones, possibly by something else that we don’t even know about.” Daniels stared off as he spoke. “They’re getting smarter, and they communicate in some way more than sounds.”

Nolita gazed up at him, her face aglow from the fire, and she had an expression of pure unabashed reverence and love. She took his hand in hers and squeezed it, but Daniels didn’t seem to notice. He was too lost in thought.

“They do talk to each other,” Boden said. “We’ve heard their death groans and howls.”

Daniels shook his head “The death groans are just sounds. I think they make them unconsciously. The howls they do to alert the others when they’ve found food, but they have to have another way to communicate with such a vast group and to organize in the way that they are.”

“To say that they do something unconsciously suggests that they do things consciously, that they have a
consciousness
.” I rubbed my forehead, trying not to think about the implications.  

“Maybe not individually, but they seem to have a collective consciousness,” Daniels explained. “A hive mind, like bees or ants.”

“How?” I asked. “How is that possible?”

“I don’t know.” Daniels shook his head again. “But I don’t fully understand how any of this is possible. Even in a particle form, the virus would communicate with itself.”

“What do you mean?” Boden leaned forward, listening intently to Daniels.

“I would isolate individual viruses and keep them in separate petri dishes,” Daniels said. “In one dish, I would expose them to human blood, and the virus would immediately rush to it and infect it.

“When I put the virus under the microscope, they would be moving towards the infected blood, going towards where the virus was already invading,” Daniels went on.

“How do you know the virus wasn’t just drawn to the blood?” I asked.

“They were, when they were close enough to it,” Daniels said. “But since it was only a drop of blood, it had to be in the same dish for the virus to notice.  If I had uninfected blood near the virus but not in the same dish, when I looked at the virus under a microscope, I saw no change in its reaction. The virus simply moved aimlessly around the dish.”

“So you’re saying the virus can communicate with itself?” I asked. “And that form of communication can span a distance far greater than the scent of blood or any other clue we’re giving off?”

“That’s what I think, yes,” Daniels nodded.

“When a zombie finds us, everything infected with the virus knows about it,” Boden summarized. “And the larger the colony of zombies, the louder the virus gets, attracting more zombies, and so on.”

“Exactly,” Daniels said. “That’s why we needed to leave the quarantine. We’d attracted far too many zombies, and they’re strong and determined.”

“What happened when you exposed the virus to my blood?” I asked.

“Your blood?” Nolita looked confused and glanced between Daniels and me. “What’s special about your blood?”

“I’m immune to the virus,” I said, brushing her off. At this point, I didn’t care who knew about it. I just wanted to find out what Daniels knew. “So, what happened with my blood?”

“When I put your blood in a petri dish, the virus didn’t do anything,” Daniels said. “Normally, it rushed toward the blood. But with yours, it only interacted with your blood when it accidentally came in contact with it.”

“Then what happened?” I asked.

“It tried to attack your blood, the way I’d seen it do before,” Daniels said. “But when it engulfed your cells, the virus acted strangely. Instead of expanding and growing, latching onto things and mutating them, it moved erratically. Then it died.”

“It died?” I asked. “My blood actually kills the virus?”

“Well, viruses can’t die, not exactly,” Daniels said. “But it froze. It stopped moving or interacting with anything, so essentially, yes it died.”

“Holy shit,” Nolita said, looking a little stunned.

“Your blood like poison to them,” Daniels said, then exhaled deeply. “Unfortunately, I was never able to figure out why or how to harness that.”

“So you know that the zombies are strong and they can talk to each other,” Boden said. “But you have no idea how to stop them?”

“Essentially, yes,” Daniels nodded grimly.

18.

All those months, after everything they’d done to me, and they hadn’t learned a single thing. I wanted to yell at him. I wanted to swear and punch him. But I didn’t. I just balled up my fists and closed my eyes.

And not just because it would wake everyone and freak them out if I just started randomly beating the shit out of Daniels.

Because despite everything, I knew that I would’ve done the same thing as him. Maybe I would’ve given the patient more pain meds, but I would’ve tested for everything, tried anything to learn how to stop this.

In the end, it was the lack of a cure that frustrated and pissed me off, not everything I’d endured for it.

“But you’re sure they don’t like the cold?” Boden asked.

“Like most other things, when exposed to the cold, the virus slowed down considerably,” Daniels said. “At the right temperature, it stopped moving completely. The cold doesn’t kill them, but it can freeze them.”

“And unlike us, they don’t know how to bundle up or create fire,” Boden said.

“Right,” Daniels said. “If we can find someplace cold enough, and make it stable for us, we should be able to survive a long time.”

“Assuming we have enough food and supplies to last us,” Boden said.

“We have food, and we can hunt,” Nolita said. “We’ll just have to get more resourceful.”

Daniels smiled down at her, as if suddenly remembering she was there. “And I believe we can do that.”

“Speaking of which, there’s a kitchen here.” Nolita pulled away from Daniels and stood up. “I should see if there’s any food that they left behind.”

“I’ll go with you,” Daniels offered.

Using a stick they’d brought in for the fire, Nolita made a torch. Then she and Daniels went back into the kitchen to explore and hopefully bring back some food.

Boden and I were left in silence, which gradually began to feel awkward. I was never one for small talk, but I didn’t want go to sleep yet.

“So what’s your story?” I asked him.

“My story?” He shrugged. “I don’t have one.”

“I don’t know anything about you,” I said. “I don’t even know your first name.”

“It’s Charlie.” He smiled at that and extended his hand to me. “Charlie Boden.”

“Remy King,” I said and shook his hand. “Nice to meet you.”

“Likewise.” He leaned back, stretching his legs out in front of him. “I really don’t have a story, though.”

“How’d you end up the quarantine?” I asked.

“I was in the army,” Boden said. “This was back before the zombies. I didn’t have any money for college, and there were no jobs in the town I grew up in. So I joined the army, thinking I’d do a couple years in the Middle East, build a career, then come home and go to school, get a job, all that.”

“And then the virus happened,” I said.

“I’d finished basic training, but I hadn’t gone overseas,” Boden said. “And then instead of fighting an enemy, I was staying here, killing my fellow Americans.”

“So you were in it from the start?” I asked.

“Yeah.” He chewed the inside of his cheek and rubbed the back of his neck. “At first we started rounding up the zombies, trying to get them all together to test them. Then we were getting them in holding cells, exterminating them.

“This was before we really understood what was happening and what they were,” Boden said. “They were newly turned, and they still looked like people. They were women and children, and we were slaughtering them.

“I remember once very clearly thinking, ‘This must be how the Nazis felt.’”

“You can’t say that,” I said. “You can’t believe that. They massacred people for no reason. You were killing monsters.” 

“I know.” But the way he said it, I wasn’t sure that he did. “We did what we had to do, and I still do what I have to do. I don’t regret it, and I don’t question it. There’s no other way to stop a zombie. You can’t reason with it or cure it. You just have to kill it.”

“That is true,” I said. “There’s nothing else you can do when it comes to zombies.”

“The thing is …” He paused, thinking. “How do we know that they’re not buried down there somewhere? The humanity in them, the people they used to be. How do we know they aren’t still in the heart of every zombie?”

“I think maybe they are,” I admitted. “But that’s even more of a reason to kill them. If I was a crazed monster without control of my body or my actions, I’d want nothing more than for you to put a bullet in my head.”

“Anyway …” He shook his head, clearing it. “That’s my story. I graduated high school, and I’ve been a soldier ever since. The past couple years are a blur of zombie murder.”

“So what happens if we get settled somewhere?” I asked him. “Do you think you’ll be able to settle into civilian life?”

“I could ask you the same question.” He turned to me with a knowing look in his eyes.

Something clattered in the kitchen, giving me a reprieve from our conversation. I didn’t want to answer his question because I didn’t know how I could. When this was all over –
if
this was ever over – how would I ever be able to lead any kind of normal life? How could I ever put all of this behind me and go back to feeling
human
again?

“Nolita and Daniels have been gone for a while,” I said. “I should go check on them.”

Before Boden could say anything more, I got to my feet. My legs still ached from all the walking, but it wasn’t bad. I didn’t bring a torch with me when I went back to the kitchen because I knew they had one.

I pushed the door open, and I saw the torch’s dim light. They’d set it in some kind of holder, like a metal vase, and the light shimmered off the reflective surfaces of the stainless steel around it. The kitchen was surprisingly large, almost as big as the main room of the lodge.

The main part of the kitchen, where the torch was, had the ovens and prepping area. It was mostly clean back here, like it had been in the front room of the lodge, aside from a little bit of garbage and some blood.

The back part of the kitchen was where the pantry and fridges were. Wire racks covered in pots and pans separated the front part from the back. Through the racks, I could see movement, but I couldn’t tell what.

I heard something, panting and what might have been a death groan. I didn’t want to alert a zombie, so I crept quietly towards the back. I grabbed a large metal pot from where it sat on a stove, since that would be better than no weapon.

I rounded the corner to the pantry, steeling myself for a zombie attack, but found something more gruesome: Daniels and Nolita were having sex.

She had her back pressed against a rack, her arms stretched above her, holding herself up. A few scattered canned goods were still on it. She’d taken off her pants and underwear, so her bare legs were wrapped around Daniels.

Her shirt was pushed all the way up, and Daniels had his face buried in her neck. His pants were down, and I got a full view of his ass before I realized what I was seeing and looked away.

“Oh my god,” I said and rolled my eyes.

“Remy!” Daniels said in surprise, and I heard the shelves rattle as they scrambled to detangle themselves. “What are you doing back here?”

“Can we get a little privacy?” Nolita snapped.

“Sure, have all the privacy you need,” I said. “Just make sure you bring the food with you.”

I was walking away and about to round the pots and pans when something caught my eye. The fire from the torch was shining through the shelves, and it reflected off the stainless doors of the fridges and freezers. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the light moving.

I turned back around in time see the fridge door opening and a hand reaching out. Not just any hand, but a thin one with long, yellowed fingernails. A zombie.