Z Children (Book 1): Awakening (25 page)

It came at me in
a flash. A blur of motion that made my mind fill in the blanks.

The teeth of the
beast- its fur a golden blonde like a retriever- snapped at the loose fabric of
my canvas jacket and gained purchase. Without hesitation, I laid my pistol
against my arm and fired directly into the animal’s face. Somewhere, beneath
the layer of action, I heard a subconscious scream.
Nooooo!

The .45 recoiled
into my palm and the beast’s teeth loosed as it fell to the ground in an
explosion of gore. It took several moments for me to realize… to let the
adrenaline surge wane and look past the crimson-turned-black Rorschach print on
the pavement. The 180 grain hollow point destroyed all it came into contact
with and today was no different. My victim was motionless on the ground.

I stared at what
I had done.

In front of me,
prone and lifeless, was a kid. A child. An innocent. I lived the life I did,
because of moments like this. Because I couldn’t handle being the executioner
anymore. Yet, today, my past had visited me in haunting, blood-soaked reality.

Falling to my
knees, I began to sob. My .45, normally so familiar- an extension of my own
body- seemed strange now. It was an anvil in my hand, ready to fall and crush.
Ranger’s body pushed up against me, but I ignored him. I didn’t deserve his
comfort. I had just shot a kid. Not more than six years old. A child dressed in
little overalls and shiny red boots. My body was shaking, the remaining
adrenaline trying to find an outlet. The tears continued to fall- hot,
uncontrollable rivulets down my face.

Why the hell had
he attacked me? Was he just scared? Had I just murdered a child for being
scared? Shit. Shit. Shit… I killed a kid.
The words were an evil mantra in
my head, a marching chant sung over and over again during boot camp so many
eons ago.

Regaining my
composure was a challenge. Tucking the .45 away into my pack helped. I needed
it out of sight.

No one around
these parts, not a cop to arrest me. I could just walk away if I wanted. I
stood in a veritable no man’s land and it was just me, a dead adult male, and a
dead… boy. A boy whose hair used to be the color of golden fields.

Oh beautiful,
for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain…

The brittle
surface of my composure, so recently mended, threatened to crack again, crack
into a million little pieces, much like the brain of the child I’d slaughtered.
I looked down at the boy’s body. I couldn’t look at what was left of his face.
I just stared at him. He wasn’t right, Yes. There was something abnormal about
him. The thought calmed me slightly… as if the child being ‘not normal’ could
assuage some of my guilt. His body was pale, the green-blue of veins peeking at
the surface, and gray-purple bruises beneath his eyes. And his eyes… rather his
‘eye’ (the left eye, the only thing left somewhat intact from the .45 round)
was filmy, a thick opaque mucous obscuring the iris’ color. That eye, that left
eye, lolled out of the boy’s mutilated face. It lay against the pavement, an
unsettling, unseeing thing.

Ranger pushed
against me again. This time, my hand found his soft head and I rubbed it, more
for his comfort than my own.

Maybe for a minute,
maybe for an hour, I wasn’t sure how long my eyes were fixated on my victim,
but at some point my eyes moved from child to adult. And I noticed the bite
marks; dozens and dozens of symmetrical wounds on his arms, face, everywhere.
These weren’t from an animal. Most predatory animals create ragged, ripped
wounds- harder to repair, harder to heal. These were human, two distinctive
semi-circles of multiple impressions.

A mixture of
primary and permanent teeth, not quite a full set yet. A child’s mouth had made
these injuries.

I glanced around
the immediate area once again, making sure there were no more threats and then
I moved closer to the adult male. Ranger followed closely, his ears perked. If
anything was coming for us, he’d warn me.

Standing over
the man now, I ingested details, nuances of the man’s body, as my eyes roved
over him. Glass shrapnel embedded in his cheeks and forehead. The line of bites
along his forearms. The gaping hole in the throat was smaller than I’d
originally thought; the dried blood and loose skin flapped around the unnatural
orifice, unholy flesh curtains revealing the truth about the adult’s fate. It
was just big enough to rip away the windpipe and severe a bleeder. An efficient
way to kill, no unnecessary effort. And what about all the other bites?
Idle
fun,

This was a
child’s work. A cat playing with a vole, batting it around until it tired of
the game and was ready for a snack. The poor fellow hadn’t gone down without
fighting though.

Inside the
truck, I found a single-action revolver, a six shooter… only one shot missing.
But there had been no bullet wounds on the body of the boy; I would have
noticed. I had stared at his slight form for what felt like hours, digesting
the consequences of my own instinctual actions.

Holding the
revolver in my hand, I studied the rest of the vehicle’s interior. A rifle with
a scope was hung in the back glass, a classic Texan truck decoration. I hadn’t
seen it before, placed so low it was almost hidden behind the seats.

There wasn’t a single
surface inside the vehicle that wasn’t touched by death. A splatter on the roof
lining resembled a rabbit. Indeed, I could have stood all day playing ‘name
that cloud’. Except it wasn’t puffy white cumulus and lacey strata forming
peace signs and ponies.

Where had the
bullet ended up?

After a moment I
saw it- the driver’s rearview mirror was shattered, the bullet’s exit point
easy to see at the edge of the roof. That explained the shrapnel in the man’s
face.

In my head, I
formed a complete picture of what had happened. It was a scenario that did not
sit easily with my rational mind. But I knew, from experience, that sometimes
the most unlikely possibility proves to be the truth. That’s just fact, plain
and fucking simple. And the fact I knew now was- the kid had murdered the man
in a way that was more akin to a full-grown serial killer with intense internal
motive and a distinctive modus operandi.

My eyes moved
once again to the dead child.

You a killer,
Boy?

I mentally paused,
as if expecting a response. I wanted answers. And I sure as hell wasn’t
waltzing into a strange town without them.

I didn’t want to
look at the boy and man any longer. I dragged them closer together roughly and
without respect; it was an unceremonious affair, but I’d lost my hesitations
around dead bodies a long time ago. I’d quelled my self-pity, horror, and
grief. They were dangerous emotions I simply didn’t deserve them. The kid was
an animal and I was forced to put it down.  When people are dead, they are
dead. Plain and simple. The body was just a shell then, fertilizer and vulture
feed. That belief wavered slightly once I saw the tall and slight forms next to
one another. In that moment, I saw a father and son. I hadn’t noticed before,
but they both had the same hair, golden and shiny.

Grabbing the
dark tarp from the truck bed, I covered them. And then they were gone; it was
done; I could breathe again. The world came rushing back, everything that
existed outside of the carnage now hidden. Ranger was my companion again, not
just a fixture at my side, a head to rub absently.

“Well, Ranger,
today is one of those days, the kind we don’t really care for much. The kind of
day we wish we were back in the shit rather than living free.” The dog looked
at me, his head cocked to one side. He understood my words; he always did.

***

I was sitting in
the driver’s seat of the truck now, my pack hung over the top of the open
driver’s door; Ranger was in the bed of the truck, resting, but also playing sentinel.
There had been water, like I thought. The container was heavily splattered with
blood and fluids. We were thirsty, damn thirsty, but… maybe not that thirsty. I
had also found a second, smaller blue tarp in the bed of the truck. I wanted a
barrier between myself and the blood and fluids on the bench seat. There could
be a contagion factor- like Ebola.

The truck keys
were in the ignition, hanging at an angle like the man had shut the truck off
in a hurry, but hadn’t had time to finish the job and take the starter key full
out. Before cranking the engine, I pointed the A/C vents downward; they sported
drying blood- some of it oxidized pitch black. Last thing I needed was that
shit blowing in my face. A tarp barrier under my ass wouldn’t do me a bit of
good if that happened. 

Once cranked,
the feel of cool air was refreshing, even if I could only feel it against my
lower waist and upper thighs. My fingers thrummed against the steering wheel
absentmindedly and I pulled them away quickly, feeling a dampness there that
was likely more bodily fluids. Sitting in the truck was like walking into a
Biohazard 3 without gear, you may as well French kiss a meningitis patient.

Sitting still,
my mind wandered.

Even if the kid had
killed his father, no one would buy a self-defense plea. They’ll say I could
have restrained him. And maybe I could have… but I thought he was a dog, I
swear to god I thought he was a dog. I don’t want to be here. I don’t want this
shit anymore.

To drown out the
voice in my head, I switched on the radio, and fiddled with the dials until I
heard a voice- alto, his tone slightly alarmist.

“The best advice
we can give you at this time is to stay indoors and…”

Even if the kid
was rabid and crazy, I still shot him in the head; a good DA will just ask one
question: “Why didn’t you just restrain the child?”

I told my head
to shut the hell up.

“
The CDC is
still working on an answer for the sudden outbreak of psychosis infecting the
children…”

Maybe the radio should
shut the hell up instead.

I’ll just tell
them I had a PTSD moment; after all, that’s what my lawyer will recommend. But
it wasn’t PTSD. It was training. People don’t understand that there’s a
difference. You can’t just shut down training, become civil again. That’s not
how it works.

“
In
cooperation with local and national…”

“God damn radio,
just shut the hell up already!” I reached for the off button, but my brain
stopped me and forced my ears to listen.

“We repeat. This
is not a test. This is an actual National emergency. The President of the
United States is warning all citizens to remain calm and stay inside their
homes. If you have small children under the age of ten, lock them in a safe
room and call the authorities.  More information will be available at a
later time. For now, the best advice we can give is to follow the President’s
directive: Stay indoors and lock up!

“The military in
conjunction with the CDC is still working on an answer for the sudden outbreak
of psychosis infecting children. These children are extremely dangerous and
will attack without provocation. If you are bitten, report immediately to the
nearest hospital. The World Health Organization is also working in cooperation
with local and national medical experts to contain the problem.

“This is not a
test.

“Repeat. This is
not a test!”

I stared at the
radio; my mind doing backflips.

No one was going
to put me in jail for killing that kid.

Sounded like the
whole fucking nation needed a pre-pubescent population purge.

What. The. Hell.
Is. Going. On?

Then I pulled
the rifle off its rack above the headrests and, on a hunch, I opened the glove
compartment on the passenger’s side and found two boxes of bullets- one for the
revolver and one for the rifle. The weapons were welcome additions to my
well-worn 1911.

***

I woke up with a
headache. It had only been a short nap, not really doing my body any good.
Ranger stirred, huffing as I shifted him off of my chest.

I always seemed to
wake up with a headache nowadays. It was hard sometimes to separate the fantasy
from the reality first thing in the morning, and the effort to achieve that
separation was a blatant invitation to migraine city.

The dreams are always so real
. Maybe because
I’d lived the images before. Running, shooting, yelling, and it always ends the
same way- with a boy’s head exploding as he’s screaming my name. Usually, it’s
the little boy in Kandahar; but this time it was the golden-haired farm child. I’d
never seen his face, so I gave him my face. And the horror of killing my dream
self was almost as terrible as waking up.

I positioned
myself on the ground, bent arms propping the rifle up with the scope the
perfect height to survey the area below the outcropping of rock where I’d
slept.