Undead 02 The Undead Haze (27 page)

I turned onto my back and found she’d made faster progress than I would’ve liked. She was in front of the hatch, awkwardly bending down to grab at my foot.

Why waste bullets? I kicked, aiming for her chest and hoping I’d knock her down into the first story. But my lack of success was embarrassing. My boot crunched and dug deep into her ribs. When I tried to yank it back, it only brought her closer to me.

My foot was stuck.

She was small, maybe about fifteen before she died, but despite her light weight I couldn’t shake her off. Globules of congealed blood and chunky bile pumped out of her mouth each time I tried to dislodge her.

Using my other foot, I gave her ribs another firm kick. This time she flew off. My boot came free with an audible sucking noise. Down the gaping hole in the floor she went.

I crawled across the small distance to the door. After pulling it shut, I tied it with a piece of the rope I’d cut off.

There wasn’t time to revel in the close call. Once I looked about the room and saw what I’d just risked my life for, an overwhelming sense of grief took hold of my entire body.

There was a desk, a cot, and a bureau. On the domed ceiling and walls, countless white crosses were spray painted, mocking me with their crazy, feverous design.

What wasn’t there was a cage with Blaze in it.

That dominant, snide part of me chided the emotional, desperate side.
Did you really think you’d find a cage with her in it? You’re so fucking stupid
.

My other side rebutted.
It’s not over yet. She’s here somewhere.

You lead him on a wild goose chase, you idiot. We’re
both
going to die now
.

“That’s enough!”

I bit my chapped, quivering lip and squeezed my eyes shut. The rhythmic pounding of the undead downstairs faded into one obnoxious blur. That fuzzy feeling the Oxy gave me dimmed.

Another one won’t hurt
, I thought as I popped a pill into my mouth.
Isn’t this what
normal
people do? Make it all go away with a pill?

I wasn’t crazy. I was just having an inner dialogue, not hearing voices. I just needed to regroup.

But how? This was supposed to be it. The final destination. End all be all. Every time I
regrouped
I had a clear plan, and usually a backup plan. But most of the time my plans were half-assed at best. I needed to level with myself. Had I been flying by the seat of my pants the whole time? What was I supposed to do now? Even if I had come up with an alternative, the situation was beyond control.

My only exit was packed with zombies. I was freezing and in pain.

It all hit me at once. I
was
fucking stupid. Who goes that far to try and have a chance at that obscure, useless concept called “love.” What was I thinking? Every justification I made along the way was for naught. There was no point in trying anymore. The spark of determination and conviction that got me to the beach was overwhelmed by the cruel hand of reality.

Blaze wasn’t here.

Instead of regrouping, re-justifying, or giving myself a pep talk, I laid on the sticky wood floor, ready to let the hypothermia take me.

Chapter 26

Beatrice Wright had gotten used to the smell of cooked human flesh. After a while, she learned to block it out. When she blew up Fort Christian’s propane tanks, the fatty, oily scent was nothing more than another fact of apocalyptic life.

The explosions were a last ditch effort to get the undead out of the church and courtyard. Minister Encler kept all the weapons and boat keys in the bureau upstairs, far out of the reach of his “disciples.” All Blaze had to do was get them coming in her direction and she could loop around, get inside, and Rambo the fuck out of that place.

Many zombies caught fire, but not nearly enough. Blaze climbed rooftops and darted around shanties until she had a clear view of the church. She tightened her grip around the crowbar she’d scrounged up from somewhere.

Of course
the doors had to be shut.
Of course
the undead were too stupid to get them open. They weren’t even locked for fuck’s sake! The damned things were still shambling around inside the church instead of coming to the barbeque.

Then she saw something happen she never expected. A figure with fiery red hair came out of nowhere, limp-running to the church doors. Was he on drugs? Did he have any
clue
what was in there? What kind of idiot…

It hit her. The one and only, fucked-her-over-big-time, Cyrus V. Sinclair. She recognized his face before he disappeared inside. What was
he
doing on the island?

Cyrus V. Sinclair. If anyone asked Blaze, the V stood for vile.

Months ago, when she woke up alone in the middle of nowhere, she was confused and hurt. She barely knew who she was, let alone
why
she was. After a day of wandering through a fucked up town called Goldbar, she remembered who helped her get that concussion. Blaze went back down the highway to the broken bridge, only to find her prized Mustang wrecked and flooded on the side of the riverbank.

No Sinclair in sight.

She’d have gone to Frank’s cabin, but she had no clue where it was. She gave up without trying to find it, and spent a couple weeks in a farmhouse off the side of Highway 2, not far from the bridge. She used the time to let her head heal and build strength for the journey, reverting to her original plan from back in Monroe. Lay low out East near the mountains then go to the island.

When she felt the slight chill of fall, she began her trip to Samish Island. It didn’t take her long to raid Goldbar for supplies and a couple guns, get a vehicle, and reach her destination, even though she’d been abducted by the groups of Cannibal Crazies (as she liked to call them).

The whole journey, she rode on the hope that she’d find her brother. It was silly, sure, but it was something. She knew if he was alive, that’s where he’d be headed.

Then the incident with Minister Encler almost ruined her. He abducted her at Samish, effectively turning every Fort Christian inhabitant against her by claiming she was a witch. Something about how the first frost of fall happened the night she showed up. Later, it was obvious that the minister was trying to reunify the group. His control over them had already slipped.

Being kidnapped was bad, but nothing she couldn’t handle. Getting to the island and finding out it was taken over...that was harder to take. It meant Beau wasn’t there, or if he was he would be captured, too.

The whole thing
almost
did her in, but not quite. She knew to wait until the time was right to escape. After that she planned on killing every single motherfucker who’d even
looked
at her the wrong way since she got there.

Three days ago, before the unspoken restlessness of the colony ran its logical course and the people rebelled, she escaped The Cage.

Blaze laughed under her breath. The Cage was their term for lockdown in one of the smaller, windowless shanties. There were three of them, used for Encler’s disciples who misbehaved. Blaze was a permanent resident in one.

It was a classy place to stay compared to the trucks the Cannibal Crazies had put her in. Food and church once a day, a roof over her head, and hey, no attempted rape. Encler was a lunatic but he taught them sex of any type, if it wasn’t with him, was a mortal sin.

That was wrong, she guessed, but it worked to her advantage. The only thing she didn’t prefer were the beatings she’d get three or four times a week.

She banished the memories and focused back on the present.

Cyrus.

In her short time with him, she’d noticed his inability to follow through. He thought he was strong and calculated, but he was just as bipolar as any other person she’d met. And the pet ferret? What the hell? Did he think he was in a Disney movie?

She exhaled slowly, taking her eyes away from the church and leaning against the shanty at her back. Blaze would kill for a cigarette. She’d gone cold turkey since she been there, but it wasn’t enough to break the deep rooted need.

A flash of regret swept over her. Then as quickly as it came it was gone.

Blaze took her time circling the church once more, running past the slows and killing the runners. When she saw an opening, she wasted no time. She darted across the courtyard.

Chapter 27

Since when could a zombie climb? Were the undead changing? The fingers and boots jamming into the shotgun holes in the wall were fast. Not clumsy at all. I lay on my side, shivering, as the tip of a crowbar shot through one of the holes. The curved end jerked the wooden panel off.

I couldn’t muster up the energy to move. The second Oxy was in full force, making me feel light headed and apathetic. It would make my death a lot easier.

Another plank clattered away. Bright sunlight poured into the room. I squeezed my eyes shut and flopped onto my back.

I readied myself to die. But instead of ragged screams and grasping hands tearing me apart, I heard steps. Then nothing.

“Well, well, look who it is. The cocksucking fucker who left me for dead. And I thought we were buddies, Cyrus.”

Great
, I thought.
There she is again.

“Get away from me, zombie Blaze. I’m not in the mood.”

“Are you on drugs, you dumbass? Do I look like a zombie? Can zombies climb walls?”

There she was, hovering over me. She scowled. That ragged scar down her left cheek blended into a new scar on her forehead. Dirt and smears of blood coated her skin. Her hair had grown longer, but still shot off in different directions.

It had been so long since I saw the woman, I’d forgotten what she looked like. The photo I stole from Beau portrayed a Blaze that no longer existed. The one standing over me was the survivor on overdrive I met months ago. A feral insanity dwelled behind her dark eyes.

This wasn’t the zombie Blaze that haunted my dreams. That woman was a fabrication my subconscious cooked up to confuse me, to more effectively guilt-trip me. But then again, the person in the room with me…I wasn’t sure I knew her either. From the brief time I spent with her, something captivated me. Was that same callous, practical, and cool woman still within her?

Snap out of it, Cyrus. Are you a romantic now? You can’t decide she’s changed based on the look in her eyes.

I sat up. My head swam. All I could think to say was, “I came to find you. To rescue you.”

“Rescue me?” Blaze didn’t wait for another response. She turned on her heel, marching over to the bureaus I’d seen earlier. Under her breath she muttered, “Fucking idiot. I’m rescuing him!”

So much for riding in on a white horse to save her.

My name is Cyrus V. Sinclair. I wished the V stood for valiant, but it was more like valueless in that moment.

She rammed her crowbar between the bureau doors, breaking it open. Weapons of all types were packed in rows in the small space. Blaze repeated the process on the other bureau, with similar results. An old .22 rifle fell over, crashing onto the ground. A bullet whizzed by me. My ears rang.

“Be a little more careful—”

“Hey!” she cut me off. “I don’t want to hear a
word
from you.”

“What’s the problem?” I pushed myself to my feet. “What the hell did I do? I came all this way to save you.”

She took a deep, long breath then turned to face me. That wildness was gone. Cold, calculating Blaze seemed to be in control again. “Let’s resolve this right here, right now. I’m not getting any younger and I want to get the hell off this island.”

“Okay.”

“You left me for dead back in Startup.”

I took a step towards her, but stopped when I saw her fists tighten.

“That’s not true,” I said. “I woke up and you were gone. I looked for hours and couldn’t find you. I swear.”

“Yeah? You didn’t look hard enough. We shouldn’t have been in that situation to begin with. If you’d been paying attention, you wouldn’t have driven off that bridge.”

The scene came back to me as though it happened only moments ago. Golden sunlight caressing her face. My gaze catching hers. Not being able to look away when I realized I
felt
something for her.

“When I met you, I changed. I—”

Her hand came up to silence me. “I changed my mind. I didn’t know you were going to get so fucking heavy on me. I thought this was going to be fast. We’re not on movie time here, Cyrus. This is real life. A minute is a minute. With every one you waste, more undead gather outside.”

I felt so stupid. That was happening an awful lot lately.

She saved me from having to say anything more. “Are you able to shoot?”

“Yes,” I said.

“There are plenty of guns in here, but the problem is ammunition. The nutjobs weren’t into conserving ammo, so we can’t stay and just pick them off from up here.” She surveyed the contents of the bureaus. “Help me sort what’s left. We take whatever gun has the most rounds.”

I helped her, trying desperately to act sober and focus on the task. A bone-shaking shiver coursed through me. My knees almost buckled.

Instead of sympathetic words, Blaze looked at me and asked, “What’s your problem? Can you climb?”

If she was going to be a jerk, so was I. I mustered up some fire and spat back, “Does it look like it? I’m fucking freezing to death.”

“What? Did you swim here?” She turned away and yanked open the lower drawers on the bureau. Miscellaneous papers and other junk flew as she dug through them. She finally came up with bunches of clothing and tossed them at me. “Get your act together. It would be nice to have another trigger finger to help out, but I can get out of here on my own if I have to.”

I bent down, snatching up the heap of clothes. Two pairs of dusty jeans and an obnoxious green sweater were all I had to choose from. I moved away from her and peeled off my cold, stiff garments. My skin erupted into gooseflesh when the cold air hit. I wasn’t going to look stylish, and what I did have wasn’t that warm, but it was better than the chilly alternative.