Mad Swine (Book 2): Dead Winter (29 page)

Dropping the SKS to the ground, I grabbed the crazy in a headlock and started to wrench the damn thing’s head, trying to break its neck. I jumped into the air and then let all of my weight come down, keeping the thing’s neck tightly in the chokehold. I hit the ground hard enough to knock the wind out of me again and my elbow struck the ground hard enough to stun and numb my forearm. The satisfying snap of the thing’s neck breaking beneath my two hundred pounds was worth the pain.

Although the thing was not dead, the broken neck put it out of commission, at least for the time being. I pushed myself to my knees and tripped when I tried to get to my feet. I crawled forward, grabbing the SKS as I moved toward Ray. I remembered the folded bayonet and extended the eight inches of steel, locking it over the end of the barrel.

Using the SKS as a crutch, I struggled to my feet, almost falling again when my sudden movement and the windblown snow created a sense of vertigo. I attacked the bastard that was still harassing Ray, beating it again with the stock of the SKS. I stabbed the bayonet through one of its eye sockets, hoping the damn thing was finally dead.

I felt a hand fall upon my shoe and realized the creature that first attacked me had found us. I kicked the creature again, knocking it back. In full panic mode now, I grabbed Ray by the arm and started to pull him away from our attackers. The wind whipped snow into my face and Ray’s body created heavy drag against the thick snow. I heard Ray screaming still, but I couldn’t focus on his words. I just kept pulling, moving forward as fast as I could trying to create distance between us and our assailants, hoping to lose them in the cover of the blizzard.

When I dragged Ray about fifteen feet or so I felt the weight of one of them on his back again. I suddenly felt as though this battle had been going on for hours and there was no end in sight. It was time for me to lie down and die here because no matter what I did, I couldn’t get away from the godforsaken creatures.

The sting of blinding pain as the thing’s teeth tore into the fleshy part of my neck just below my right ear brought me back to reality with sharp clarity. I screamed in both fear and anger; I screamed in frustration; the warrior within me screamed, begging to be set free.

Slamming my head back, I head butted the son-of-a-bitch and then threw myself to the right, taking us both to the ground. Before I could get to my knees, I felt the pressure of teeth on my arm, but the thick material of my coat saved me from another bite. Its fingernails found the flesh of my face and tore skin away. Warm blood covered my cheeks and I reached out blindly, grabbing its face. I found its eyes and jammed my thumbs deep within the orbital sockets.

“Die you motherfucker, die!” I screamed, squeezing my thumbs deeper, deeper. I pulled my thumbs from its eyes and started to pound its face, hammering with my fists, using them like sledgehammers. “Die, die, die, God please die you motherfucker!”

When my blows sent sharp pains up to my elbows, I ceased my assault and rolled away, expecting the thing to grab me again. The damned abominations seemed unstoppable.

Staggering to my feet, I grabbed Ray’s arm again and pulled, dragging him through the snow again. One foot in front of the other, I dragged Ray in my wake until my legs suddenly collapsed and I fell to my knees. My lungs were on fire, stinging with every inhalation. The cold snow bit at my face, my head. My hat got knocked off in the scuffle. The scratches burned on my face, and the bite on my neck felt like hot acid burning through my flesh.

I couldn’t shake the feeling that the thing I had blinded was still alive, still crawling toward us. I had to move;
we
had to move or we’d die here. If the thing didn’t come back for us, the cold would drain the life from our bodies.

Turning toward Ray brought all kinds of pain from all over my body. Warily, I pulled myself closer to Ray and looked the man over. Ray was bloody; his face gouged and scratched. A piece of his ear was missing. His right glove was off and two of his fingers were missing. Ray was as good as dead. I knew it and Ray knew it, too.

“I told you to go,” Ray whispered. He could barely open his eyes because blood pooled in his sockets. “Just leave me here, Matthew. I just want to stay here. Let me just stay here for a little while.”

I shook my head. “You’re not going to die here, Ray.”

With all the will I could muster, I got to my feet. I remained hunched over for a moment trying to catch my breath. Getting my hands underneath Ray’s arms, I pulled him into a sitting position. Against his protest, I lifted him in a jerking motion and got my left shoulder under him. Carrying him like a fireman would carry a victim from a burning building, I took one step and then another. Every step was a battle now.

I pushed on for what seemed a very long time; I no longer had any sense of time. The wind was loud and the snow disorienting. After some time, I noticed that Ray was silent, but I continued to move on. I had a frightening moment when I thought I may have circled back at some point. Confused and exhausted to the point of collapse, I pushed on. Remembering a cadence from my days in boot camp, I sang in my head, my lips moving and watching the fumes of my hot breath preceding me. I don’t remember seeing the two figures emerge. I was alone with Ray and then there were arms around me, pulling me to the ground. I thought I saw Brian’s face looking over me, but he couldn’t be here. The other figure’s face was covered with a thick scarf. The creatures were hiding their faces now. Why were they hiding their faces?

I struggled when they tried to pull Ray away from me, striking them with my fists. They lifted me to my feet and dragged me forward. I realized Ray was no longer on my shoulder. I shoved the damn creatures off me, striking one of them in the face and kicking the other in the abdomen. The one that looked like my brother grunted and doubled over. I found Ray, but I couldn’t lift him, God help me I couldn’t lift his body.

“Ray is dead,” one of the undead said to me. Now the undead were speaking?

Lifting Ray into my arms, I studied his face. His eyes were open, but they were unseeing. His lips were pulled back into a grimace, frozen back in a frightful look of pain.

“You killed him!” I shouted. “You want me? Take me now then! Come on and take me now!”

I let Ray’s corpse slide from my lap. I couldn’t hold myself up any longer and I fell to my side. The freezing snow burned my face. The blowing snow pelted me, like hundreds of tiny needles piercing my skin. And then I was on fire, my body was on fire. I closed my eyes waiting for death.

“Take me, you bastard, while you can.”

I woke from a nightmare I could not remember, yet the fear of it remained after my eyes opened. My breathing was labored and my heart felt like stone within my chest. My brow was covered in sweat, a deep sweat that soaked my hair, yet my body shivered horrendously. I was cold to my bones, to the marrow. All over my body I felt again as though needles of ice were piercing my skin. Neither the soaked blanket that wrapped my body, nor the fireplace in front of which I lay, could warm me.

My eyes fought to close although I struggled to keep them open. I knew not where I was or how I’d gotten here. The cold that pressed all around my body zapped my energy; I felt exhausted. My mind could not focus on anything but the cold. I snuggled deeper into the blanket, pulling it tightly up under my chin. I scooted my body closer to the fire, desperate for its warmth…

“Ray…I won’t let you die, here.”

* * *

Later, I don’t know how much later, the fire was still going but it no longer raged as it once did. Sweat drenched my body; my shirt was plastered to my skin and I could feel rivulets of sweat tracing their way down my brow and neck. I noticed the blanket beside me, so close to the fire. I must have kicked it off in my restless slumber. With too much effort, I reached for the blanket and pulled it away from the flames. It was soaked, completely and thoroughly, obviously from my sweat. I no longer shivered from the cold; instead, a fire was burning deep within my core, burning its way throughout my body, scorching hot. I could almost feel it radiate from my own skin.

The Mad Swine infection spread through my body with every beat of my heart. The heat was intense and the pain overwhelming. My hair felt as though it was ablaze. The bite on my neck and the scratches on my face were oozing some sticky liquid. Arms, legs, hands and feet felt torqued, as though the bone beneath my flesh had been contorted by arthritis.

“God, please take me now,” I begged. My voice sounded completely foreign to me. “I’m not immune,” I croaked. My laughter came out sounding hoarse and insane. “Fuck you, Ravi.”

The pain took me, thankfully, and I blacked out again.

* * *

Voices
.

For a moment I suspected I heard voices, snippets of hushed whispers coming from somewhere beyond my vision. I could not focus on the words; the heat was overwhelming. Shifting and turning; a struggle just to turn away from the fireplace. My bones ached tremendously, as if the very marrow within was boiled and the bones had become brittle from the immense heat. Through gritted teeth, I rolled my body backward. The floor was cool beneath my back, felt so nice, yes, so nice. The fire was still too close; I tried again to roll away and succeeded getting onto my right side. The fire was now to my back, and although I still felt it, it no longer scorched my skin.

Exhausted, feeling as though I’d run for long miles, I closed my eyes and focused on calming my labored breathing. The sweat on my face acted as a cooling agent as finally cool air reached me, but even the cool air was not enough to quell the fire burning inside. Within minutes, my face was on fire again, the heat coming from below the skin. It was almost too much to bear. I began to pray for sleep again, just let me sleep, unfeeling. I called out for my wife, Alyssa, and then realized she was dead. Mark was dead. Katie was dead. I wanted to be dead.

The voices come to me again, closer now. No, not closer, just louder; still hushed, but more urgent. Stan’s voice. What was he saying? I lifted my head, only an inch, trying to hear. My neck cannot support the weight and my head fell back. Brian’s voice is louder; his words carry to me through a tunnel.

“If that’s the case, I’ll deal with it myself. But until then, no one fucking touches him. Just keep everyone the hell out of here.”

Stan responded, but his words were lost to me. I thought I heard Lara’s voice, sweet Lara. I tried to picture her face but my mind had already lost focus. The darkness, the cool darkness behind my eyes folded around me and I went to it.

* * *

Ray gripped my hands tightly; his nails dug into the meaty flesh of my hand leaving half moons. There was blood in my eyes, obscuring my vision, but the fear on Ray’s countenance was clear. I could not see what gripped his lower half and I wasn’t sure that I wanted to. Ray’s screams hurt my ears, penetrated my skull and made my brain vibrate. They were killing him.

My muscles strained against the unseen hands that gripped Ray; I was locked in a bloody game of tug-of-war against an invisible enemy. I was determined not to let them have Ray and I redoubled my efforts to pull him free.

“Save yourself,” Ray said to me and his voice was soft, pleasant. He no longer appeared frightened. “Leave me alone, why don’t you?”

“They won’t have you!” I shouted. “They won’t have me!”

With one great pull fueled by anger, I heard a popping sound and both Ray and I were free. On my knees, I dragged Ray away from the unseen hands. Stones and glass cut my knees, shredding my pants and biting into my flesh, but I kept going. Finally, I stopped and looked at Ray.

He stared up at me with dead eyes. Below the waist, was a pool of blood; his legs were gone. Ray had been torn in half.

* * *

I started awake, sputtering for breath. My mouth was dry and my throat was raw and burning. When I brought a fingertip to my lips they felt swollen, engorged. The skin was cracked and the pain was mind-numbing.

Water
. I needed water. I was dying, the heat burning me up from inside. My body was literally cracking and shriveling. My tongue felt like sandpaper and when I licked my lips, a bolt of pain tore through my face so severely, I once again prayed for death, but God would not take me. I was in hell.

Much, much later I awoke on the sofa. It was not my sofa, I knew that upon waking. It was hard and it smelled musty. The wool-like material felt scratchy. The room was dark, but the shadows of firelight flickered across the ceiling like a mysterious sea of shadows ebbing and flowing against an alien shoreline.

For long minutes I watched the shadows and listened to the crackling of the fire, the only sound that filled my ears. I became aware of the fact that I was neither cold nor hot. The slick, clamminess of sweat no longer clung to my skin. I touched my face and felt dry scabs rather than sticky pus. My lips were no longer swollen and cracked.

Lifting my head I looked at my body. I was wearing a blue and black flannel shirt and dark blue jeans. My feet were clad in dirty socks. I looked at my hands expecting to see the half moons scars on the fleshy parts of my palms. My hands were smooth and clean.