The Regulators - 02 (31 page)

The moment seemed to drag on and on. The coffin was by no
means modern. It was one of those old western style jobs. Bare wood and cheaply
made. It looked as if it would crumble if I stomped on the lid. That’s when I
noticed the hinges. This coffin wasn’t the kind that gets nailed shut. It had
hinges on the side so it could be opened and closed.

I held my breath as I reached out and grabbed a hold of the
corner of the lid. I put myself in a position that would allow me to dive out
of the way if she came flying out at me and I began to lift the lid. The hinges
creaked loudly, and I jumped away causing the lid to slam down with a loud
crack.

Dudley jumped about a foot.

Then he started to snicker.

“Maybe you should lift it up,” I said. “That way I can nail
her with the tomahawk if she grabs a hold of you.”

“Good luck with that idea,” Dudley said.

I opened the coffin.

It was empty, just a little bit of dirt on the bottom.

“There must be another tunnel that we missed,” said Dudley.

“There wasn’t another tunnel,” I replied. “I followed the
blood drops. She had to have gone this way.”

Dudley came away from the tunnel we had used to get into the
room and stood next to me besides the coffin. I thought for a moment and once
again began to search the floor for blood drops with the beam of my flashlight.
Perhaps there was another tunnel leading out of this room that we had missed in
the darkness.

Dudley began to search as well. We looked near three of the
four corners but came up empty handed until Dudley began to search the dirt
floor near the final corner of the room.

“Jaxon,” Dudley said. “I think I found something. It might
be a blood…”

He didn’t finish his thought. A pale hand came down from
between two ceiling boards and grabbed him by the hair. We never looked up. The
new tunnel was above us in the ceiling. It was plain as day and we never even
noticed it.

Dudley twisted and turned as the hand tried to pull him up
through the boards and into the new tunnel. His frantic movements saved his
life. The vampire couldn’t pull him into the hole. Given a few more seconds,
she might have been able to do it, but I wasn’t about to give her those few
seconds.

I swung the tomahawk into her outstretched arm and damn near
severed it. Actually, I was somewhat shocked that the arm didn’t come flying
off, but vampires are built pretty damn tough. Still, the wound deadened the
arm. It went immediately limp, and I shoved Dudley out of the way and sprayed
automatic fire into the hole.

I was rewarded by a crumbling noise above my head, and I had
to step out of the way as the vampire fell from the hole onto the dirty floor.

She looked horrible. Her skin was as white as paper. Her
tutu was smeared with black blood and slimy dirt. The skin on her face and arms
was burnt horribly, and worst of all, the tomahawk wound in her head had not
yet closed, and I could see a piece of her brain.

“Wait,” she gasped as I walked towards her with my tomahawk.

I paused for just a moment, shocked that she was actually
asking me not to attack her. I couldn’t remember her doing anything other than
threatening me or insulting me.

“You win,” the vampire said. “I’ll leave. Just go away, and
I won’t bother you anymore.”

For the very first time, I could see the actual fear in her
dead eyes.

“Where’s my friend?” I asked. “What did you do with him?”

The only answer I received was a quiet, dry laugh. So I
pulled back my tomahawk and prepared to deliver what I was hoping would be the
final blow of the fight.

“Leave me alone,” the vampire said as she suddenly slammed
into me and ran from the room and into the tunnel leading back to the bedroom.

“Fuck me,” Dudley said. “How the hell can she still be
moving?”

“Beats me,” I answered. “But did you notice how much she’s
slowed down?”

Dudley didn’t bother to answer. Instead, he followed me back
the way we had come. I could just see her feet disappear up the hole under the
bed as we entered the first room. I limped in pursuit and had just started to
climb the hole when I heard the sound of Merrick attacking and the vampire
screaming.

I climbed to the top of the hole just in time to catch
Merrick out of the air as the vampire threw her away. I quickly set Merrick
back down on her feet and then straightened up to face the vampire.

She stood in the corner of the room. She was crouched and waiting
for just the right moment to pounce on me.

“Leave me alone,” she whispered. Her voice sounded like a
little girl.

“Not a chance,” I answered.

She found her moment when Dudley poked his head out of the
hole and I briefly looked in his direction. What she didn’t realize was that I
wasn’t really distracted. I just gave her a fake out because I wanted her away
from the wall.

To her shock, I met her charge and before her good arm could
close around my body I ducked down and picked her straight up into the air by
her legs. I didn’t try to flip her over or slam her down onto the ground.
Instead, I never stopped charging forward. I just ran with all the speed my
wounded leg could muster, right to the blackened bedroom window and dove head
first through the painted glass into the bright morning sunlight of the
backyard.

I felt the wet drip of blood from a dozen small cuts on my
face due to the broken glass as I tumbled and rolled on the cold grass. I felt
me knee pop and threaten to explode. Yet I managed to find my footing and
locate the vampire.

She had tumbled from my grasp, but she hadn’t tumbled very
far. She looked me straight in the eyes for just a moment and then she began to
scream as the smoke rose from her body and her skin began to blister and crack.
Dudley emerged from the broken window and began to fire shot after shot into
her chest whenever she tried to crawl away.

A burning vampire is a difficult thing to watch. They seem
all too human as they twist and contort in agony. The smell is nauseating. The
end is almost too far away. Her features had been burnt away completely when I
finally took pity on her.

I swung my tomahawk with all my might and cleaved through
her neck. The screaming stopped instantly, and I began to notice the bright and
clear morning for the first time. It was almost beautiful if I looked away from
the melting corpse at my feet. I’d never been much of a daylight person, but at
that moment I was certainly grateful.

Dudley and I watched the copse sizzle and pop until there
was nothing left but ash. The flames never came forth. I think I was a little
disappointed at that. I was hoping to see a much more impressive death. What we
got was a slow and torturous end.

Then we heard the sounds of muffled gunfire and the screams
of many zombies. I’m positive that the battle with the zombies had been raging
on all along as we watched the vampire dissolve, but only now when we were
satisfied that she wasn’t coming back and Dudley had kicked away the largest
pile of ash with his boot did the realization begin to hit us.

We were trapped.

I leaned on Dudley and we hobbled to the back door of the
house. Merrick rushed forward from the bedroom and jumped into my arms. Now
that the vampire was dead she wanted her fair share of attention. I gave her a
quick scratch and joined Nick at one of the front windows.

The zombies were everywhere.

I radioed immediately to Hardin and told him to drop off a
shit-ton of ammo. Then I looked towards the survivors. All of them were
emaciated and weak looking. They wouldn’t be able to make a run to the Jeeps.

“We’ll make a stand here,” I announced. “I need some time to
come up with a plan.”

“Not a problem,” Dudley said. “The house doesn’t have a lot
of windows. We can board things up and give you some time to repair your leg
and head.”

“Dude, get off me,” Nick said. It was the last thing I heard
as I slid ungracefully into him and passed out.

“
You passed out
?”

Right on top of Nick. One second I was standing there and
then I wasn’t.

“
Why did you pass out
?”

I had been taking some serious damage since I got to the
hotel. My messed up leg was the worst of it, but I’m pretty sure that I had a
concussion and possibly some broken ribs. I was also exhausted.

“
You had all that
going on
?”

Yeah, vampires hit hard.

“
Why didn’t you tell anybody
?”

Who am I going to tell? It’s not like anyone could have done
anything. Besides, I can put most problems to the side and get on with my job.
The leg was the only thing giving me trouble.

“
I’ve heard from more
than a few people that you are relentless in a fight. They sort of think it’s a
little spooky. Would you agree
?”

I would agree. I have no problems with that one. When it’s
time to fight, I’m going to do so until I can no longer do so. I guess it seems
a little spooky, but I am the Guardian after all. I can absorb more damage than
the average person and continue to function.

“
How long was it
before you woke up after passing out on Nick
?”

I think I was out for about ten hours or so. I could have
shaved maybe five or six hours off of that if someone would have woken me up,
but the boys thought that I needed the rest.

I actually woke up to the sounds of screaming.

One second I was nestled firmly under a layer of sleep and
then I began to hear the screams. They were distant at first, but they soon became
louder and louder. The muffled thumps of silenced weapons came next.

I opened my eyes.

I was in a bathtub full of warm water. My clothes were
cleaned and folded on top of the sink. My weapons, boots and backpack were
stacked in a pile next to the clothes. The only thing I had on was my underwear
and my wristwatch.

I looked at the time and realized that it was only a few
hours until dark. The screaming began again. It sounded like Georgie. I wanted
to tell him to shut the hell up because he was irritating the hell out of my
headache. Then I realized that I no longer had a headache. My leg was all
healed up as well. In fact, I felt pretty damn good.

I stood up in the tub and grabbed a large towel to dry off
with. When I was dry, I caught my reflection in the mirror. I was looking
pretty healthy and energetic as far as I could tell. Nothing to complain about
until Georgie barged through the door.

“Jaxon,” Georgie shrieked. “We’re in trouble. They are
breaking through our barriers.”

Fortunately, at that point I had my pants on.

“Did you forget how to knock?” I asked. “Or are you trying
to sneak a peek at my awesomeness?”

“What?” Georgie asked before it dawned on him that I was
just joking around. “Seriously, we’re in trouble.”

I could see the panic in his eyes, but to be honest, I
wasn’t really impressed. Georgie tends to panic on a somewhat regular basis.

“They’re inside the house,” shrieked out another voice and
this one actually caused me some alarm. It was a female voice, and I didn’t
recognize it at all.

I threw on the rest of my gear, shoved my Ti-lite folding
knife into my pocket, checked that my Recon 1 folding knife was on my belt,
threw my blood stained Harley Davidson hat on top of my head and ran out of the
room.

Things were bad.

Even the backyard was full of zombies. When the backyard is
full of zombies, you can be sure that the entire house has been surrounded. I
ran immediately up to the first woman I saw. She was one of the survivors from
the pit.

“Where are they?” I asked.

She pointed a shaky finger towards the kitchen and I went
running. I didn’t like what I saw when I got there. Merrick had a zombie by the
back of the neck and was shaking him around the linoleum floor, but there were
two others headed right towards me and even more attempting to climb through
the broken window.

I took out one of the zombies with my tomahawk. It was easy
enough. The first hit is always pretty easy. The zombies never see it coming.
It was an angled cut to the forehead. The blow just barely sliced the brain,
but since no momentum was lost upon impact, I was able to swing the tomahawk
all the way around in a wide arc and miss my second target.

The bastard had ducked and grabbed me around the waist. It
was a pretty much wasted effort. I was too healthy and full of energy. I
shattered his nose on my knee and then elbowed his temple to smack him loose.
While I was doing that, I ordered Georgie to fire upon the broken window so no
more of them got inside the house.

I finished off my second zombie as he was climbing back up
to his feet. It was a simple chop to the back of his head. After that, I told
Merrick to release her new toy, and I chopped that zombie as well.

Georgie was in full panic mode as he fired aimlessly towards
the window. He wasn’t being very effective so I told him to go find some nails
and something we could use to board it up and I took his place.

Shooting a hole through every head that popped up into my
sites was pretty much the easiest job I’d had since I returned to El Paso.
Merrick was even wagging her tail happily as I fired merrily away.

Eventually I realized that I could in fact do two things at
once and tapped my earpiece and asked for Dudley.

“What’s up?” Dudley asked.

“Oh, I’m just curious about how long we’ve been under
attack?” I asked nonchalantly.

“We had some problems in the morning,” Dudley answered. “But
it only started getting really bad about forty minutes or so ago.”

“What happened forty minutes ago?”

“Damned if I know,” Dudley answered. “They just started
coming out of the woodwork. We’ve been keeping them out, but more and more are
showing up. Maybe we should call for an extraction?”