The Village of Dead Souls: A Zombie Novel (32 page)

The woman cut him off. "You hail from ancient
Greece
. Yeah, I remember you."

"You have the advantage of remembering
me,
but may I get-"

Again,
she interrupted. "I'm Hellion. Welcome back. It's been a while since I've heard your name mentioned. You'll find this world is much different now from the one you remember." Her eyes focused on something in the far distance. "We're on our way to take down a meat lab. Stick with me and I'll eventually get you back to your clan."

Several blocks later, they came to three olive green inflated
Quonset hut
s. Undead grouped around the fallen soldiers who recently guarded the buildings and feasted on their bodies pulling out organs and flesh like a pack of hyenas. Another soldier, with a large hole punctured through the left side of his chest, walked up to Hellion. "Those two buildings are empty, just some tables and chairs." He pointed to the closest hut. "We heard some human moaning in this one, and formed a perimeter around it just like you instructed."

"Gather units blue and red to storm the place. Let's see what the humans were so intent on protecting."

The soldier waved his arm to signal five other dead soldiers to follow him. With a small
explosion,
blowing the metal door down, they ran inside through the small wall of smoke. Hellion motioned her hand for Prometheus to follow her.

Inside the dark building, she pulled out a flashlight. The beam gave glimpses of a makeshift laboratory. Metal autopsy tables with the carved up remains of former zombies, microscopes, Bunsen burners, and a few vertical glass coolers filled the room. At the far end, her soldiers had surrounded a human woman with shoulder length blonde hair. She wore a white lab coat and held in front of her the nozzle end of a
flamethrower
keeping her attackers away. She continued to yell out in her strange moans as a clear signal to stay back. Behind the lady scientist
,
stood five narrow cages
,
each with a single naked motionless zombie. Hellion said, "It's been a while since we captured a meat lab still in operation."

One of her soldiers asked, "What should we do?"

"Kill her and see if any those bodies still have a soul inside."

"But if
we
move closer
,
she's going to burn us."

Hellion pulled a knife from a sheath on her hip and threw it like a
fastball
. It landed right in the scientist's chest
,
causing her to release the
flamethrower
. She dropped to her knees
,
still babbling out long sentences of her untranslatable language. As blood oozed out from between her fingers, she pointed to Prometheus. Her eyes opened wide with a look of surprise on her face, giving the impression she recognized his body. She let out a few more groans and fell dead to the floor
,
as blood poured from her wound
,
and flowed across the ground.

The soldier with two holes in his chest stood near the cages. While poking at one of the bodies
,
he said, "It looks like these are all empty."

"Use that flamethrower to burn the bodies. This scientist lady probably injected them with the anti-virus. We don't want any of ours to come along
and feed
on them."

From the cage at the far end came a weak voice. "I'm not dead."

Turning her flashlight to the dark corner, they saw a naked dead woman holding the bars of her cage and staring back. She had long dark hair and smooth white skin
,
which showed almost no decay
,
except for the dried bullet hole in her chest over her heart. Hellion grabbed a set of keys from the dead scientist's pocket and tossed them to a soldier. "Let our sister out of the squirrel cage."

With the
door
open, the nude woman quickly stepped over to the dead scientist, pulled her lab coat off and slipped it on herself. As she buttoned the center button, she kicked the dead woman's body in the stomach. "How do you like that
,
bitch? I'm wearing your jacket. I bet that pisses you off." She reached
over, grabbed a small bell from the nearby table,
and rang it. "It's time for your medicine
,
"
she
said
,
as she again kicked the dead woman in the stomach. Ringing the bell a second time, she yelled, "Pay attention
.
Your
friends are going experience intense pain for the first time in years as they slowly die."

"I'm guessing it was bad." Hellion said
,
as she watched the lady continuously kick the dead woman.

The undead
lady
stopped her beating and tugged at her coat to straighten it out. "I've been in that cage for years. Watching her
torture
the
other re-ans
and
waiting for the day it would be my turn. I must have been her control subject." She spit on the dead scientist. "Either that, or she had a crush on me."

"You referred to us as re-ans
,
so I'm guessing
that
you must be a modern."

Prometheus stepped forward and said, "Greetings. What is your name and from-"

Hellion pressed the palm of her hand into the Athenian's face cutting him off and pushing him back. She said, "I'm Hellion
.
I'm the leader of this rebel unit."

The lab coat
lady
finger
combed her hair back and said, "I've heard of you. Some of my cellmates said they had fought with you. Name's Janel
,
but my friends call me Salsa."

"Salsa?"

"Yeah, that's my nickname. It went with my profession."

Hellion squinted her left eye and replied, "And that profession was?"

Salsa scanned the room and saw all the soldiers staring at her. "Pole dancer." She gave a quick glance to her figure. "I had a nice body before, but this one is smoking hot. I could have made so much more money with this bod."

As smiles crossed the faces of the undead men, Prometheus asked, "What is a pole dancer?"

Hellion replied, "I'll explain later."

Outside the building, the orange sky had turned black with smoke
,
blocking out the moon. Random rubble fires provided the only light. Hellion stood next to her two new arrivals as they watched
the
undead
wandering
aimlessly through the ruins of the city. Salsa mentioned, "Things sure have changed since I last stood outdoors. What city is this?"

Hellion replied, "It used to be
Denver
."

Another soldier with more holes in his chest, walked up to her and said, "We have some believers approaching."

"Great,
a sermon right is
just what I need now."

Prometheus turned and saw a small group of undead
walking
toward them. A smile came to his face as he recognized them. "Captain Bartholomew, the fair lady Patricia and the good Egyptian Nemi."

The pirate captain, now sporting an eye patch
,
stopped
a few feet away and said, "Madam Hellion, We be hearing you captured a meat lab. Did ya be finding anyone?"

Hellion motioned her head toward Salsa. "This chick was one of their test rats." She placed her hand on Prometheus' back. "Green eyes here happens to be one of your lost puppies. I think you'll want him back."

Patricia stepped close to the young soldier's body and studied his eyes. "No. It can't be." She gave him a hug. "Brother Prometheus. It has been three long years since we have seen you last."

"
Blimey
, just when I thought there be nothing about dis world dat would surprise me. The Greek man be coming back again."

"Are you the pirate captains
that
I've heard about?" Salsa asked.

"Aye, we be the only pirates in these parts."

She faced Hellion. "I'm grateful and indebted to you for rescuing me, but I really want to hang with these guys for a while. I guess
,
I'm leaning more toward their cause than yours."

Hellion motioned her head toward the pirate captain. "Go ahead. You will not be much of a soldier if you don't want to be here."

As Prometheus and Salsa walked away with the pirates, he mentioned, "This
world
has changed rather dramatically since I last walked this ground."

Patricia replied, "Yes, the descendant's numbers have decreased to the point their society has collapsed. When we last spoke, it was a civil war between the living and the dead. The war evolved into a true apocalypse of the dead. As one of those walking dead, I fear for what may become of this world."

Bartholomew continued, "Even our clan be having nightly debates about us continuing to collect the strings of life. There be so few living left, we don't know if we can save them anymore."

Prometheus asked, "Why do you continue this war if it is killing those we intend to save?"

"We be not killing da living as fast as the plague."

"What plague?"

Salsa joined in the conversation. "It's called the Omega virus. It began spreading around the globe back at the start of this re-an uprising. Nobody paid attention to it at first. Bodies rising from the dead got more attention than a few people coughing up
blood did
. Once the health community realized what they had on their hands, there were not enough scientists and labs left to find a cure. A few years back when I died, the virus was killing more people than the re-ans."

Prometheus glanced toward the lady pirate. "The fair Patricia. Do you not carry the gift of a remedy for this plague?"

"Yes, this is my job to pass a cure for the Omega plague on to our descendants. Unfortunately, we still have no idea how to pass this to them
,
and they are still intent on wiping, us from the surface of this planet."

* * *

Daniel Cronsworth placed another lit candle under the little iron boiler of a miniature tabletop model steam engine. The heated gas from the tank shot through narrow twisted copper tubes into the cylinder
,
which pushed the piston back and forth. The piston turned a wheel connected to a small generator with wires running to a single light bulb. The dim yellow light flickered across the map spread
out
on a
piece
of scrap plywood, set atop a few cinderblocks. Several
men
in the civilian
militia
stood around the makeshift table and studied the parchment.