The Regulators - 02 (13 page)

It was dark when I woke up.

I took another bath to finish the job. I was rewarded by a
vast amount of energy. I felt good. It had taken some time, but I was back to
normal. I put on my clothes and gear next. They were a little stiff, but at
least they were dry.

I had no idea where I was.

I went downstairs and out into the backyard. There were
still some zombies there. I shot them immediately before they could let out a
scream. I didn’t want to spend the rest of the evening running again. After
they dropped, I went to the rock wall and took a look at my surroundings.

I was a stone’s throw away from Sunland Park Drive. In a bit
of confusion, I looked back at my temporary lodgings and realized that it was
the old home of my high school buddy. The interior was different, but the
exterior was unmistakable. I laughed at the situation and wondered idly whether
or not I had sought refuge in a slightly familiar place, or if I had just
stumbled in here by pure coincidence.

Then I realized just how far I was from the rest of my team
by foot. That sobering thought wiped the smile right off my face before I
realized there were abandoned cars all over the place. I didn’t need to walk
back; I could freakin’ drive back. I went back into the house and entered the
garage. There was, I kid you not, an actual cherry condition 1977 Firebird
Trans Am. I was in love. All I could think about were those old Smokey and the
Bandit movies that I used to watch when I was a kid. I was in geek heaven. This
thing still had the bird on the hood. I was going back to my team in style.

I quickly checked the dash; there were no keys in the
ignition. I ransacked the house for about an hour before I finally found them
in a kitchen drawer. The car rumbled like a thunder god when I revved up the
engine. I buckled Merrick into the passenger seat, hit the button for the
garage door, and squealed down the driveway.

I was loving life.

Then, I saw a brief glimpse of a woman in a white dress. I
hit the brakes immediately. I was still in front of my old friend’s house, but
I saw her directly across the street. It looked like she jumped from the roof
of one house onto the roof of the next house and then vanished down the back
side of the roof.

I looked over at Merrick as if she could explain what I had
just seen. Her tail began to wag excitedly. She was just happy to be in a car.

I briefly wondered if I still had some zombie toxins
coursing through my veins. Neither healthy humans nor zombies could make a jump
that far. It was easier to believe that I imagined it, but I knew deep down
that I hadn’t.

Trouble was coming. Hell, trouble already paid me a visit. I
was positive that it had something to do with that rooftop bounding freak.

“
Why were you so
positive
?”

I guess it was because there’s only so much weird shit that
you can chalk up to coincidence. Someone set a trap for us, and now I’m
suddenly seeing a woman jumping superhuman distances on the rooftops of houses.

Nah, I had no idea what she was, but I knew she was up to no
good. I just didn’t know what her game was.

I was about to find out.

I drove slowly enough to scan the rooftops as I hit Sunland
Park Drive and drove towards Mesa. I didn’t see anything, but from somewhere up
in the distance I heard the familiar sound of a zombie scream.

I wasn’t alarmed. It was too far away to be screaming
because of me, and even if it was, I was in a Firebird Trans Am. It wasn’t as
tough as my Jeep, but it was a hell of a lot faster. Regardless, I slowed my
pace. I didn’t want to slam into a shambler and jack up my new ride. That sort
of thing could end up ruining my fun and making me walk back after all.

The intersection of Mesa and Sunland was blocked by cars.
There was no way to get through it. There were also a number of shamblers, but
they were headed away from me and down the street.

Well, I was going to join them. There were a number of
different side streets that would get me back to Mesa. As I was back tracking
to one of those side streets, I heard the unmistakable sound of bumpers
colliding and bending metal. Why I was hearing the sounds of a car crash minus
the squealing brakes I had no idea, but I was hearing it rather clearly and I
was also hearing more of the zombie screams.

I turned up a street called Thunderbird. It was the first
street I came upon that would lead to Mesa Street. Imagine my surprise when I
saw all the abandoned cars blocking my way. Some of those cars were rather
smashed together. I kept thinking back to when we led the survivors out of El
Paso. I remembered that those of us playing decoy had used Mesa, but I couldn’t
remember a bunch of smooshed cars blocking the intersecting streets.

There were more shamblers here as well, but none of them had
eyes for me. They were headed farther up Mesa towards the sounds of grinding
metal and smashing vehicles. The sounds were too clear this time to make me
question what was going on. Someone or something was blocking my access.

My thoughts drifted to the woman in the white dress; I
couldn’t imagine why she would want to cut me off from Mesa. It just didn’t
make any sense, but I knew the zombies weren’t doing it. I squealed the tires
as I made a violent U turn and headed back the way I had come.

In behind a small shopping mall is an actual alleyway that
led through the mall to a large parking lot that bordered Mesa. It’s tiny, and
maybe not a lot of people use it, but I had used it many times when I was too
impatient to wait for the lights at the intersections that were now blocked.

I drove through the opening in the chain link fence behind
the shopping mall and made my way towards the alley as quietly as the rumbling
car would allow me. When I reached the alley, I was pleased to see that it
wasn’t blocked. After the alley was the fairly empty parking lot and not much
else between me and Mesa. I was almost there.

I headed through it slowly and on the lookout for any
danger. When the nose of my car began to inch its way free of the alley, I
heard the screeching sound of tires on asphalt and the immediate response of a
car alarm. All of this happened just before a small truck was shoved in front
of the open end of the alley. The truck slammed into the curb and a light post
right after it clipped the front of the Firebird. I wasn’t sure what was worse,
the cosmetic damage on my new vehicle or the fact that someone was fucking with
me.

I thought about how long this game of blocking my access to
Mesa could go on. I quickly realized that it could continue until the cows came
home or until it attracted so many zombies that passing Mesa would prove
impossible, even if I did manage to get around the blockades. With great reluctance,
I unbuckled Merrick and jumped out of the vehicle. I pulled my pistol out of
its holster just in case I could get a shot off at my annoying stalker.

Merrick crawled under the truck while I climbed over the
bed. Once on the other side, I scanned the area and found nothing to shoot at.
The area was free and clear. Hell, there weren’t even any zombies around. They
had all been led away farther down the road.

I was getting pissed.

Merrick and I bolted across the parking lot, reached Mesa
Street and managed to find some cover behind a group of abandoned cars just as
a hoard of shamblers flooded into the parking lot in search of prey.

I had the grim satisfaction of reaching my destination
despite my adversary’s attempts to prevent me from doing so. Then, I thought
about how far we’d have to hoof it, and I realized that my adversary didn’t
care about me reaching Mesa; she just wanted me out of the car.

“
How did you get to
that conclusion
?”

I just thought about the situation. The blockades were only
going to stop my car. None of them were going to present much of a problem if I
was on foot. Also, I was pretty far from where I had last left my team. There
was a lot of walking distance and a serious amount of danger between where I
currently was and where I was headed.

I was being hunted.

“
You were being hunted
?”

Yeah, and I’d be easier to follow on foot.

“
And you thought it
was the woman
?”

I sure did. She was just too much of a coincidence to be
ignored. Yet, I didn’t really care about that; I was more annoyed to be playing
someone else’s game. I needed to turn things around and play my own game. I’ve
always hated playing by other people’s rules. This was no exception.

My hunter wanted me on foot. I understood that well enough.
She also probably wanted me out in the open so I’d be easier to pick off when
the right moment came.

It was time to screw up her game.

Merrick and I bolted from cover to cover until we passed the
burnt remains of Tito’s old apartment building. We went around the rubble and
came once again to Thunderbird; this time on the opposite side of Mesa. It was
the same side of the street Dudley and I took, back when we rescued Tito.
Anyway, Merrick and I didn’t head toward the desert this time. Instead, we
turned left on a street called Westwind.

“
You were headed back
to your friends
?”

I was headed in that direction. My hunter was probably
expecting it and I didn’t want to disappoint. My guess was that the attack
would come when I reached the spot I left my team. I wasn’t positive of this,
but I had spent an entire day pretty much out of commission and nothing tried
to kill me so she had to be waiting for something. Also, there were no attacks
while I was traveling. There were plenty of opportunities, but no attacks. Here
I was, all alone and out in the open, and I was, as of yet, unmolested. She had
to be waiting for something.

Another thing I should mention is that travelling this
distance was really very time consuming. Merrick and I had to duck and hide
constantly to avoid being detected. There were that many zombies wandering
around. Mostly it was the lone shambler, but one scream and we’d be in some
serious trouble. One time, we had to hide and wait in a darkened office
building as a herd of hundreds made their way past us. That alone took the better
part of an hour.

The second we hit Westwind we broke into a serious run. I
felt eyes on me, and I didn’t like it a bit. I was positive I was being
followed. I didn’t see anything, I didn’t hear anything, but I knew it. I was
being followed. I was being hunted and toyed with.

We ran for a pretty long time. I had to constantly remind
myself that just because there was a new player in the game didn’t mean that
the old players were any less dangerous. The zombies still needed a respectful
amount of attention. I didn’t want another bite to deal with.

I made my move on a street called Tarascas. We broke right
and hauled ass to the first two story house we found. Once there, I tried the
front door, and, to my surprise, it was unlocked. Merrick gave a low growl as
soon as we entered.

I pulled my pistol.

Clearing a house is never my idea of fun. I hate any kind of
situation in which something can jump out at me from the dark. I think we even
previously had some sort of conversation about this.

Anyway, I didn’t want something to jump out and bite me on
the ass while my attention was elsewhere, so I went from room to room as
rapidly as possible. There were three zombies in one of the downstairs
bedrooms.

As soon as I got close to the bedroom door, the door flew
open and all three of them rushed out at me. I backed up as rapidly as I could
and tapped them in the head, one after the other.

The upstairs held the last of the homes inhabitants. It was
a pretty nasty customer, let me tell you. It was an old fat man in a nightgown
of some sorts. The rot was evident; it always is. I think I’ve gotten somewhat
immune to how nasty these things look. So it wasn’t the rot in his face that
grossed me out. It was the rot on his legs that did that. For whatever reason,
this particular zombie had been spending his time in the half filled bathtub of
the master bedroom. The skin on his legs was literally peeling off as he
scrambled out of the tub and came at me. I shot him in the head immediately and
then threw a blanket over his legs so I didn’t have to look at them anymore.

After that, we went out on the balcony. From the balcony, I
climbed to the roof. Merrick wasn’t happy to be left behind, but I didn’t want
to heave her heavy ass over my shoulder and make the climb. Once I was on the
roof, I took cover behind a short wall that marked the boundary of the rooftop.

After that, I waited.

As time went by, I began to get a little nervous. Maybe my
plan wasn’t going to work. Maybe I had already lost my opportunity. Clearing
the damn house had taken around fifteen minutes according to the Luminox watch
on my wrist. Fifteen minutes would have been more than enough time to have
traveled through the area.

I saw movement.

I wasn’t exactly sure from where, but I saw movement on the
rooftops. Yes, there it was again, a shaggy head peeking up over the rim of a
building across Westwind, the lady in the white dress. Not that I was very
surprised.

I couldn’t see her too well. It was dark, and she was pretty
far away on the opposite side of Westwind. It looked as if she were sniffing
the air.

Suddenly, she was bounding across the roof. She was moving
way too fast to be human. It was pretty unbelievable watching her move, and
that’s coming from a guy that kills zombies for a living.

When she reached the edge of the roof, she didn’t even slow
down. She just vaulted through the air and came down upon another rooftop. From
rooftop to rooftop she traveled with amazing speed, and then she came to a
street called Cresta Bonita. If she turned left on that street, she would be
headed in the direction of Oveja.