Least Likely To Survive (30 page)

Thinking back on my fun little acid trip, I evaluated what I’d been doing and what Mr. Jell-O had said to me.  It was pretty obvious it was my subconscious’ way of rehashing the apocalypse up until that point, and the symbolism wasn’t lost on me.  I knew the things the creature had said were true, and all stuff I needed to own up to and face, but damned if I just wasn’t ready to do that now.

Thoughts drifting, I mulled over the horrible ache in my chest at missing Jack.  In just a few short days he had come to mean everything to me, and the idea that I would never see him again twisted my insides to the point I couldn’t breathe.  Picturing his crooked smile in my mind, I felt the tears start to slide down my nose and puddle onto the musty mat below me.  I had been alone so long I didn’t even realize how much I needed someone around.  I found it somewhat ironic that it was only at the end of the world that I discovered the benefits of human companionship.  His face was still at the forefront of my mind as I drifted into an uneasy sleep.

I felt more than heard the sound of footsteps approaching my cot.  I kept my breathing even as I opened one eye.  I again had no idea how long I had been asleep, but figured it couldn’t have been too long as the lights were still out.

In the dim light I could make out the shape of a large, stocky man creeping towards me.  Peering into the darkness, his shape was a hulking silhouette, and it was only when his face was inches from mine that I recognized him as one of the guards who had been there when Ian was poisoning me.

“You’re not very pretty, but you’ll do,” He whispered into my face as he stroked my hair.  Bile rose into my throat at the stink of his breath on my skin, and I felt my stomach bottom out at the intent of his words.  My pulse sped and for a brief moment I thought I might puke again.  I knew what this fucker was going to do, and the blind panic set in.

I sat up so fast I banged my head against the wall.  “
Get the fuck away from me
!” I spat into his face while scrambling as far into the corner as I could.

His features twisted in anger, he growled something I couldn’t make out and yanked me back by my hair.  Even in the dark, I could see he was nothing spectacular.  Brown hair cropped short, and eyes the color of mud.  He wasn’t attractive, or ugly, just plain.  The only thing notable was the horrible glint in his eyes, and the smirk on his face.  I knew what he was going to do; hell, it wasn’t the first time I had been in this situation, but I definitely wasn’t going to go without a fight.

He grabbed my shirt and tried to twist me around while I continued to fight him.  “This will be a lot easier for you if you don’t fight me,” he growled as he struggled with the button on my pants.

For all my kicking, I couldn’t land the right angle, so I half turned and punched him right in the face.  I wasn’t sure how effective it had been until the blood started pouring out of his nose.

“You fucking cunt!  You’re going to pay for that!” He wiped his arm across his face, smearing a trail of blood across his cheek.  Before I could wind up for another hit, he pulled his arm back and a giant fist came crashing at me.  Shooting, blinding pain exploded across my cheek from where he hit me, and I almost blacked out from the impact.  I was pretty fucking sure he had broken something, but knew the moment I stopped fighting, I was done for.

“
GET THE FUCK OFF ME!”
I half screamed, half cried as I reached towards his face again, this time with fingers bent.  I felt my nails find purchase in his greasy flesh, and dragged them down, trying to cause as much damage and pain as possible.  He pulled my hand off his face with a grunt, and twisted my arm so hard behind my back I wondered if my shoulder would relocate.  Pausing in his attempt to undo my zipper, he pulled his other arm back and hit me again, this time landing a direct hit to my mouth.  My lips caught my teeth, and my mouth filled with blood.  There was so much of it trying to run down my throat, I started to choke.  The choking forced me to briefly stop struggling against him, and terror welled up as he finally managed to get my pants down past my knees, while flipping me all the way onto my stomach.

I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t cough; all I could do was try to spit out as much of the blood pulsing from my mouth as the horror of it all set in.  My muscles froze up from fear, and I started to sob when I heard him spit on his hand. 
“Not again, this can’t be happening again…”
I thought desperately until I felt him shove his cock so hard into me that I felt something tear. 

My face was shoved into the mattress so violently, I was having a hard time breathing past the blood and tears.  With every thrust, I felt him grunt his triumph, as the fire in me slowly died.  The pain was so intense, I wanted to pass out, and would gladly give up consciousness to not be in my body right now.  I wanted to float up out of my skin and fly so far from this place that I would never find it again.  I had been here before, and I swore to myself I would never let it happen again, but found that for all my fight, there wasn’t anything I could do; he was stronger.

With a final shove, I felt the warm sensation of semen filling my insides, and he pulled out of me.  All I could do was lay there and cry as I felt the leftovers mixed with blood trail down my thighs. 

I heard his zipper behind me as he pushed off me and stood.  “Fucking whore, you know you loved that,” the hatred poured out of him with his words; this was a man who hated women.  I thought that he would just leave now that he was finished, but I was wrong.

He dragged me off the cot to the ground and started kicking me anywhere his boot could find purchase.  Still crying, I curled up into a ball, using my arms and hands to protect my head and face as much as possible. Kick after kick rained down on me, and I actually wished for death.  He didn’t say anything, just kept kicking and kicking, and each time his boot made contact, I wondered if that was going to be the hit that ended me.  After a while, I started to go numb and hoped to God that I passed out soon.  Just as I was sure he was going to beat me to death, he landed a kick to my head so hard, I actually watched the blackness fade in around me, and thankfully, finally, lost consciousness.

“Angela, wake up.”  The words trickled to my ears in a whisper soft as a gentle breeze.  I felt hands rubbing my back as I started to wake.  “Angela, are you still with us?” without opening my eyes, I recognized the voice belonging to Dr. Fields.  Still lying on the cold tile of my cell, I curled further into a ball and the tears started again.  There wasn’t a part of me that wasn’t screaming in pain; I knew things were broken, and was sure one of my eyes wasn’t going to open even if I tried. 

The memories of what had happened swarmed around me, still visceral and as real as if they were still occurring. I could still feel his hands ripping my clothes as I fought.  I fought.  Crying harder, the idea sickened me that for all my strength, for all the zombies I had killed, I couldn’t fight off one determined stranger.  Foolishly thinking that the drug I had been given was the worst violation; I was terribly wrong.  That was the frosting on the fucked up cake of what had been done to me.

Not the first time.  Not the first time I had been beaten and raped, but the last time I was so far gone I was hardly aware of what was happening.  Last time the drugs were flowing freely through my veins, subduing my awareness to the point I didn’t care.  And here I was thinking that I never wanted to be that high again; leave it to some villainous Neanderthal to prove me wrong.

I couldn’t say anything, just lay there sobbing quietly while I felt the doctor cleaning me up.  She dragged a cold rag between my legs to mop up the evidence of my assault.  She poked and prodded my ribs and limbs, and all I could do was whimper.  I had never felt so defeated, and wanting to die; every ache that became apparent solidified my need to leave this world.  Fuck this; I didn’t want to live in a world where even during an apocalypse, people still felt the need to turn on each other.  I hoped the zombies stormed this place and ate every last motherfucker in here.  We all deserved to die for our sins; myself included.

Apparently finished with her examination, Dr. Fields yanked and twisted my pants back up, and set me to rights.  She ran a hand down the side of my face, and it was then I decided to meet her eyes.

Opening the eye that wasn’t swollen shut, I glared up at her from the floor.  I knew it wasn’t entirely her fault, but as she was the only person around, I aimed all of my hate into that one look. 

Her face looked tired and old; deep lines were etched around her eyes and her mouth, and I couldn’t help but notice the look of defeat she held.  This woman had been beaten into submission as well, although probably not in the same fashion as I had been.  There was a faded greenish-yellow welt on her cheek, and tears had started to pool up in the corners of her eyes. 

“I’m so sorry, Angela.  This was never supposed to happen,” she whispered as she gently caressed my face.  I wanted to hate her, but couldn’t find the strength.  With a sigh, I closed my eyes and rolled back over.

I felt her reach down and put something in my hand, as she got to her feet and left the room.  Her shoes were soundless as she shuffled out of the door, and I heard it creak with finality as she shut it.

I was alone again, except this time everything had changed.  It was still dark in my cell, but I stayed on the floor, afraid to move.  The pain was exquisite as I carefully tested each limb for movement.  I rolled over onto my back and stretched out my arms and legs.  I flexed my wrists, my ankles; bent my knees and rolled my shoulders: it all worked. 

Miraculously nothing was actually broken, although the movement hurt like a sonofabitch.  I reached up and poked each of my ribs, the result of which was less optimistic.  The bastard had broken at least one for sure.   To complete my inventory, I reached up and attempted to discern the overall condition of my face.  My left eye was still swollen, but I was able to open it at least partially, and my lip was split and starting to scab.  It wasn’t right.  I shouldn’t be healing this fast, yet here I was: able to move without too much issue.

It had to have been the serum.  There wasn’t any other explanation for this, and I guess it made sense in a way, considering it had corrected my vision.  It wasn’t too far off to surmise it had allotted me super-human healing abilities.  I wasn’t a scientist by any stretch of the imagination, but it made sense that something designed to bring zombies back to life, might give a regular person unusual abilities.  So far I could see better than I’d ever been able to in my life, and my body was healing pretty fucking fast from what I could only guess was the kind of beating meant to kill me.

The sudden realization that maybe Ian had sent the guard to rape and beat me on purpose made my stomach sour and churn.  What if the whole thing had been on purpose to test me?  Anger started to boil in my veins at the thought, until I remembered Dr. Fields.  If I was supposed to have been dead, why send her in to check me out?  Maybe it was to see if I was still alive, or to see if the damage had been life threatening.  It didn’t make sense to kill me after injecting me; wouldn’t Ian have wanted to study the effects of his serum before disposing of me?

I knew I wasn’t going to figure this shit out until my next visitor, so I turned my attention to the object Dr. Fields had placed in my hand.  Running my fingers along it, I discovered a short plastic handle attached to a rather long, sharp blade.  It would seem the good doctor had left me with a knife.  I curled my fingers around the hilt and smiled into the darkness.  Zombies or not, I was going to kill them all.

Chapter 19: Breaking Out.

There are moments in your life when you stop and are forced to appreciate the significance they carry.  I knew this was one of those moments.  It seemed ironic that in the last few days I had gone from boring IT Professional to badass Zombie Killer, to scared victim curled up on a cold floor in the dark.  If someone had asked me last week what I’d be doing this week, I would’ve been hard-pressed to come up with any answer, let alone dream up this shitstorm.

And yet here I was.  So what to do?  At some point they would come get me so Ian could do some more mad scientist-like crap with me, and when it happened, I needed a plan.  So far I was sure of a few things:  First, they all had to die.  If the world was resorting to Marshall Law, then I didn’t see the harm in taking out anyone who gave new definition to ‘depraved’. 

Second, I had to find Jack and the kids and get the fuck out of here.  I still had an island to get to, and after this, there was no way in hell I wasn’t going to make sure I ended up in the only place on the planet I was sure I could find some peace.  That and if the last god-only-knows-how-many-hours had shown me anything, it was that I loved them, and I wasn’t nearly as tough as I thought I was.

I supposed that was the point, though.  Usually things don’t happen to reinforce your self-esteem, but to test it and blow it apart completely.  I was aware that the events preceding this moment were done to me, not by me, and I was pretty sure it made no difference.  I couldn’t go back, I couldn’t change it, and I wasn’t sure I would’ve done anything different leading up to getting captured. 
On second thought, passing this place completely might’ve been a better option….