Dead Sea (7 page)

    "Hit it again," Malik cried. "Smack that son of a bitch."

    I did. I struck the zombie on the side of the head, and its mask flew off. Its face looked like a bowl of spoiled spaghetti. Black mold grew on its skin. I slammed the shotgun down again and the skull cracked. The zombie quit twitching and lay still. Bending over, 1 picked up the hockey stick and wiped the mud and gore off of the handle.

    "Here." I tossed the stick to Malik. "Think you can use this?"

    "Hell yeah, I can." He grinned like a kid who'd just unwrapped his Christmas presents. Then he swung the stick around in a circle, making a sound like a light saber.

    "Knock it off, Malik," Tasha said. "You're gonna get blood on me."

    "No I ain't. I know what I'm doing. Next zombie we see, I'm gonna crack it in the head just like Lamar did."

    "Now you're talking," I said. "Just don't hit me or your sister with it"

    "You should have given it to me," Tasha said. "He's too little to hit anything with it."

    Malik frowned. "Say's you."

    "It's not fair."

    "We'll find something for you," I promised Tasha. "Don't worry."

    After I'd cleaned the gore off the shotgun butt so that I wouldn't accidentally infect myself, we continued on. I wiped the sweat from my brow and wished for a cold beer or just some water. The hot summer temperatures combined with the heat from the fires had made it pretty much unbearable. Add to that the fact that we were running and then fighting and then running again-I was exhausted. Sweat dripped from the tip of my nose and soaked my already wet clothes.

    We came across some other survivors as we neared Fells Point, an area of the city where mostly rich, white college kids from the suburbs went to drink on weekends. It was full of bars and music stores and vintage clothing shops-stuff like that. (They called it vintage clothing, and paid top dollar for the shit. Meanwhile, you could buy the same pair of pants at the Goodwill store for a dollar). Every night, you'd see Eminem wannabes stumbling around drunk, shouting to each other, groping their girlfriends or even strangers passing by, pissing in alleys and puking all over the brick sidewalks.

    Now Fells Point was a battleground. We'd cut through a very narrow alley, the old kind with crumbling brick archways over it. We heard the gunshots and the screams but they were muffled by the buildings on each side of us. It wasn't until we'd reached the end of the alley that we really saw what was happening. There was a riot going on in the central market area-human versus zombie and even human versus human. It was hard to keep track of anyone. Hard to focus. I held out my hand, motioning for the kids to stay behind me. Then 1 stared in disbelief.

    The street was littered with body parts and un-moving corpses, and the gutters ran with blood. Gunfire echoed off the buildings and smoke filled the air. It was a nightmare. The stench, the screams, the chewing sounds. Even over the explosions, you could hear the zombies as they fed.

    I saw a car that was upside down, its tires sticking up in the air like the legs of a dead animal. It must have just wrecked right before our arrival because there were people still inside it. They screamed as the zombies pulled them out through the shattered windows and ripped into them, tearing their flesh with teeth and hands. Another corpse staggered by a burning antiques store. Its arms were missing. Someone shot it from inside the store. The store's display window shattered, and the zombie crumpled to the sidewalk. Then the store's roof collapsed with a roar, sending fiery embers soaring into the night sky. Someone, probably the shooter, screamed inside the burning building.

    In the street, a pack of undead dogs chased a woman and her baby. A zombie pit bull ripped the infant from the fleeing mother's arms and tore it apart, shaking the screaming baby like a rag doll. A wayward bullet took down the mother a second later. At least I hope it was wayward. Maybe the shooter had been aiming for the dogs and hit her instead. Or maybe they were aiming for her after all; a mercy shot. There were a lot of zombie animals among the chaos. Mostly rats and dogs, but I also saw a few dead cats and what I think was an iguana. The dog zombies moved faster than their human counterparts, and I wondered why that was. Maybe it was because they had four legs instead of two, or maybe they hadn't been dead long.

    A man stumbled by us, close enough for me to reach out and touch if I'd wanted to. He wasn't dead yet, but he was certainly dying. His hands were clasped around his bleeding stomach, trying to hold his guts in. Half-dollar sized drops of blood speckled the pavement behind him. A child zombie in bloodstained rags trailed after him, chewing what looked like a length of intestine. The man seemed oblivious to his pursuer and the zombie seemed in no rush. I shot it in the back of the head as it passed by us. The man never paused. Just kept walking. I ducked back into the shadows, worried that my Good Samaritan act may have given away our hiding place.

    But it didn't matter because a second later things got even worse.

    Civilians in a commandeered half-track barreled through the crowd, crushing both the living and the dead beneath the vehicle. A teenaged corpse in a Slipknot shirt tried to climb up onto the half-track, but one of the men kicked him back down with a boot to the face. Another of the men opened fire with a mounted machine gun. Bodies-both living and dead-jittered and danced as the rounds punched through them. I gasped. These guys didn't care who they shot. They were just as bad as the zombies-maybe even worse. The dead couldn't use guns. Clearing a path, the vehicle rolled on. The humans they'd just killed stayed dead. They were the lucky ones.

    Another man ran by us. He was carrying a rifle.

    "Hey," I shouted, trying to get his attention.

    "Get the fuck out of here," he gasped, and kept running.

    I started to tell him that we didn't know where to go. Figured he might know of a safe place. But he rounded the corner and disappeared.

    The median in the middle of the brick-lined street was carefully landscaped, full of trees, flowers and shrubs. As I watched, the treetops burst into flames, fed by the fire in the antiques store. More. stray bullets chewed up the pavement. Something shattered a car's windshield nearby us, and chunks of cement sprayed through the air. The stench grew stronger; decay, cordite, burning fuel and flesh. The screams got louder.

    "What are we going to do?" Malik asked. He didn't sound brave anymore. He sounded like a scared little boy on the verge of tears.

    That was when the idea of making it to the harbor actually occurred to me. I was pissed off at myself for not thinking of it earlier, when we'd been fleeing in that direction anyway. Fells Point bordered the Inner Harbor area. The Inner Harbor was Baltimore's main tourist attraction. It had the National Aquarium, the big Hard Rock Cafe, the three-story Barnes and Noble store, Port Discovery, the World Trade Center, Fort McHenry, the Maryland Science Center, the Pier Six Concert Pavilion (I'd seen Erik B and Rakim along with some other old-school hip-hop acts there last year), tons of shops and restaurants and bars, and quick access to hotels, the stadium, and the convention center. But Inner Harbor was also just what its name implied-a fucking harbor. It emptied out into Chesapeake Bay. The open water-someplace where the zombies couldn't reach us, just like I'd promised the kids.

    There were ships and boats all along the waterfront. The
Pride of Baltimore II,
which was a reproduction of an 1812-era clipper ship. The
USS Constellation,
the last Civil War vessel still afloat in America, built in 1854 and still seaworthy. Both of those were out of the question. 1 didn't know the first thing about sailing one, but I knew that you needed a whole crew just to get underway. There was a coast guard vessel, the
USCGC Spratling,
which they let tourists tromp around on. It had permanently replaced the
Cutter Taney,
which had been sent out for repairs and restoration a year or so ago. Before that, both coast guard vessels had been open to the public. Again, the
Spratling
was out of the question, just like the other big ships. But there were smaller boats, too; ferries, water taxis, and tour boats. Hell, there were even paddleboats, and I certainly knew how to operate one of those. There were also several marinas nearby full of yachts and fishing vessels and pleasure cruisers.

    I didn't know shit about boating, but how hard could it be-especially given our alternatives? If we could reach the Inner Harbor or one of the marinas without getting killed or eaten, and manage to steal a small boat, we'd be well away from land before the entire city burned to the ground. Even if I could just cast off from the dock, we'd at least be able to drift far enough out into the bay to where the zombies couldn't touch us. Maybe even into the ocean. Drifting on the open sea was better than staying here.

    The Inner Harbor was only a few blocks away. No telling how many zombies and crazy fuckers with guns we'd encounter between here and there. It would be tough, but what choice was there? We had to try.

    I ushered the kids even farther into the shadows and then I knelt down. The smoke was really getting bad, and when I spoke, my throat felt raw and dry.

    "Listen," I croaked. "I have an idea, but you guys are going to have to stick close to me and do exactly as I say. We're going to try to get to a boat-"

    Tasha interrupted. "What boat?"

    "Any boat. There's hundreds of them at the harbor. All we have to do is get there."

    "How?"

    "Well, we're gonna have to make a run for it. That's why I'm-"

    "Run?" Tasha looked stunned. "Out there? Into that mess? Are you crazy?"

    "I know it's dangerous, but there's no other way. Everybody is fighting each other. If we're quick, the zombies might not even notice."

    "I ain't afraid," Malik said-but his eyes said different.

    "I am," Tasha admitted. "I don't want to go out there, Mr. Reed. Please don't make us."

    I squeezed her hand, hoping to calm her down. Instead, she began to cry.

    "I don't want to go. They'll get us. Just like everyone else. All our friends. Momma…"

    Sobbing, Tasha flung herself against me, her arms wrapped tightly around my neck. Malik started to sniffle, and then he began crying, too. I pulled him to us in a three-way hug. 1 held them while their tears and snot soaked into my already wet shirt. From the street came more shots and screams, followed by a volley of nearby machine gun-fire.

    "Guys," I said softly, "I don't know what else to do. The city is on fire. Don't you see? It's reaching here already. We just can't stay put, and we can't fight them all. All I know to do is run. The water is our only chance. I promise-I promise you that I won't let those things get us. I'll die first."

    I knew deep down inside that I meant it. I'm no hero. Earlier that night, I'd watched a woman get slaughtered outside my apartment and I'd done nothing to help her. A few moments before, when I'd shot the child zombie, it had been more out of instinct than any desire to help the creature's prey. But in the short time I'd known Malik and Tasha, I'd grown fond of them. They seemed like good kids. Brave. Resourceful. Didn't deserve the crappy hand life had given them. They deserved something better; a fighting chance at least. Besides, they'd saved my life. Figured I should return the favor.

    I meant what I said. I'd die before I let the dead claim them. But my promise was a lie, because the minute I was dead, there'd be nothing I could do to protect them. Instead, I'd be hunting them, just like the other zombies.

    Malik pulled away from me and wiped his nose on the back of his hand. Then he wiped that on his shirt. After a moment, Tasha stepped back as well.

    "How many bullets we got left?"

    I shrugged in defeat. "I don't know, Malik. I've lost count."

    "Don't matter," he said. "I've still got my stick. If they come at us, I'll take them down while you two run."

    Grinning, I stood up.

    "Okay, here's the plan. We run out into the street and turn right. Stay on the sidewalk if possible and stick close together. Next street up, we're gonna go, left. That will take us out to the old Sylvan Learning Center building. There's a marina near it-some kind of private yacht club for rich folks. If the gates are locked, we'll have to climb. If I remember correctly, the fence is like twelve feet high. Are either one of you scared of heights?"

    They shook their heads in unison.

    "Can you climb?"

    They nodded.

    "Good." I nodded. "Once we're over the fence, we should be good to go."

    "Smooth sailing?" Tasha asked.

    For a second, I didn't realize she'd made a pun. Both of them began to giggle, elbowing each other and laughing at the joke. Then I laughed with them-until a low growl made the sound dry up in my throat.

    It was a zombie dog, a pit bull, the one who'd killed the baby only a few moments before. Apparently, it was still hungry and looking for dessert. It stood at the mouth of the alley, blocking our way into the street and making all my planning and pep talks pointless. It took another step forward, its claws clicking on the bricks. It didn't growl again; just watched us silently with black, staring eyes. A pale white tongue drooped from its mouth. A broken rib jutted from its rancid flesh, and there were large patches of fur missing from its maggot-infested hide. Guts hung out of its open stomach. A big metal tag around its collar said the dog's name was Fred. Despite my terror, I almost started laughing when I saw that. Fred wasn't what you named a pit bull. The people in my neighborhood gave their pit bulls names like Killer or Butcher or Satan. Fred was what you named a good dog, a shy and timid dog, the type to inch toward a stranger with its tail tucked firmly between its legs and its ears drooping down.