Riposte (The Redivivus Trilogy Book 2) (9 page)

Solemnly, Aaron nodded in agreement. “Mom, get some rest. I’ll take first watch.”

Although she was reluctant to accept his offer at first, she saw the same determination in her son’s eyes that she had seen in Sean’s eye so many times before. Giving him a hug and a kiss, she acquiesced, and began laying out one of their bedrolls. Emotionally and physically drained, she was asleep before her head hit the pillow.

As Aaron dutifully scanned the area for any sign of danger, his gaze came to rest on his mother’s sleeping form. He thought about his father, and about the conversation he and his mother had earlier that evening.
How can she be sure he’s infected? Maybe he doesn’t even know he’s okay?
Struggling to find resolution between his mother’s logical argument and his own hopeful doubts, he looked toward the house across the street. There, in the upstairs bedroom window, backlit by the dim glow of a flashlight, stood a figure Aaron knew to be his father. Casting a sideways glance at his mother, Aaron decided he needed to get a closer look at the man in the window.

Creeping silently out of cover, Aaron moved stealthily across the street to the front yard of the house. His young heart leapt in his chest as the man in the window began tapping on the glass, beckoning him to come inside. Overjoyed, Aaron raced around to the rear of the house where he found the door unlocked. Once inside the darkened house, it took him a few moments to locate the stairs leading to the second floor. When he reached the top of the stairs, he walked quickly down the hallway toward the room in which he had seen his father. Seeing the man standing at the window still banging on the glass, Aaron called out in confusion, “Daddy, I’m over here! I knew you were okay!”

To the young boy’s delight, the man stopped tapping on the window and slowly turned around. Although he could see few details in the poor light, the figure’s outline confirmed that it was his father. Unable to contain his joy any longer, Aaron stepped forward and was glad to see his father do the same. In a few short steps they reached one another near the center of the room. Aaron threw his arms up wanting nothing more than to wrap his father in a tight embrace. While the thing that had been his father did the same, what transpired was far from a heartfelt hug. In that horrible moment, the boy felt the painful reality that his mother had been right.

* * *

The bright light of the early morning sun jolted the woman awake.
How long was I asleep? Where’s Aaron?
Frantically, she searched the area around their makeshift camp looking everywhere for her son. When her eyes came to rest on the small object lying in the middle of the street in front of the house, she knew the answer to her question.

In a flash, she was on her feet and racing toward the house where her husband had met his demise. Although she could not see Aaron anywhere, her suspicions were confirmed when she passed the small action figure abandoned in the middle of the road. Quickening her pace, she moved to the back door of the house. Her heart sank when she saw the door standing ajar. She knew Sean would never have left the door open.

Cautiously, she slipped into the house, thankful for the illumination afforded by the rising sun. Straining her ears, she heard nothing to indicate anyone occupied the house, infected or otherwise.
Had Sean opted to take his own life instead of allowing the infection to do so?
They had spoken of that very thing previously, and both agreed they would do so if they had the means. Upon reaching the stairs, she heard the unmistakable cry of a young child coming from somewhere on the second floor. A cold chill, like a malevolent serpent, slithered up the length of her spine before wrapping itself around the base of her brain. “My God! That’s impossible!”

Her motherly instincts shifted into high gear as she climbed the stairs and rushed down the narrow hallway toward the source of the sound. When she rounded the corner into the room where Sean had delivered his last, doomed message, she stopped dead in her tracks. The scene spread out before her was one of unimaginable horror. The noise she heard had indeed come from a toddler, or at least what had been a toddler in the recent past. It stood on unsteady legs, leaning forward against the rail of a crib against the wall to her right. Both arms outstretched as if beckoning for someone to pick him up, the infected child yearned and pleaded to be released from its prison.

Her gaze followed the direction of its reaching arms before settling on the image that would be emblazoned on her retinas for as long as she lived. At that moment, she truly hoped it would not be long. Less than ten feet away, crouched on the sullied carpet amidst a dark crimson ring of gore, was the thing that had once been her husband, Sean. The ruined carcass responsible for the stains was hardly recognizable, as it lay sprawled beneath the infected man.

The near frantic mewing of the infected child intensified at the sight of her, causing the thing on the floor to shift its hollow eyes in her direction. She shuddered at the sight of the wiry black lines emanating away from the vacant pupils. They looked as though they were made of frosted glass that had been cracked by the blow of a hammer. Thick, sanguinary drivel clung to its chin, bouncing slightly with each closure of its snapping jaw. Instantly overwhelmed with nausea, she felt bile flood the back of her mouth. If the abomination on the floor noticed her at all, its dark, blank eyes did not initially betray that fact.

While she repeatedly told herself that the ravaged body lying on the floor could not possibly belong to her son, the cold, sinking emptiness that punched a hole straight through her chest begged to differ. Spreading outward like an endless wave, the gnawing cold relentlessly coursed through her extremities before creeping up through the base of her skull and enveloping her brain. Her vision clouded over, painting the entire macabre scene in a surreal, dreamlike quality.
Oh God, no! Please not Aaron! Let it be anyone but Aaron! Please, no! No! No! No!

The monster’s snarling maw jolted her back to the nightmare in front of her, causing her mind to thaw and the numbness throughout her body to regress by several degrees. As it struggled to its feet, a small, lifeless hand loosely clutching a plastic inhaler fell into view. In that instant, the painful reality slammed into her like a Mack truck, squashing any delusion she tried to throw in its way—Aaron was dead.

Moving with the automaticity of blind rage, she grabbed the rocket-shaped lamp setting on the changing table just inside the door. She closed the distance in three quick steps, and without a second thought, brought the base of the lamp down on her infected husband’s skull. Heedless of the first crushing blow, it continued its attempt to stand. Redoubling her efforts, she repeatedly slammed the lamp against its head until she heard the sharp crunch of bone breaking, and the thing crumpled to the floor in a motionless heap. Chest heaving from the exertion, she stared in disbelief at the gore-soaked bludgeon in her hands. Although covered in blood, hair, and flesh, the lamp remained surprisingly intact. When she saw the stark white, jagged edges of bone protruding from Sean’s deflated skull, she turned and vomited.

As though operating on autopilot, the woman made her way out of the godforsaken house. After leaving her dead family behind, she wandered aimlessly for days. Through good fortune and random chance, she ran into very few of the infected as she walked. Those she encountered she simply continued past, avoiding their reaching hands by sheer luck alone. While her body continued moving forward, it was as if the rest of her had died in that room with her husband and son. Hungry, thirsty, and exhausted beyond belief, she finally collapsed onto the sidewalk of an unknown street in an unknown town.

Some time later, part of her mind caught up with her withering body lying on the street—not willing to completely abandon the flesh and blood that had served it well for so many years. When she finally regained some voluntary control, she gently forced her bleary eyes closed, wanting very much to keep them that way for eternity. A low rumble in the distance sounded like thunder, and when a gust of wind blew past, she imagined she was being pulled upward through the sky toward the heavens. As she strained to hear the slowly, burgeoning noise of her salvation, her eyes fluttered open against her will.

The sun overhead was devastatingly bright, and it shone into her eyes as though it were trying to burn a hole straight through to her soul. Her corneas seemed to pop and sizzle, desiccating under the sun’s intense barrage. A shadow mercifully passed through her field of vision, offering a brief reprieve from the burning agony. The rumbling continued to intensify until she felt as though she must be inside the thundercloud itself. All at once, her leg bumped into something as the sound of the thundercloud disappeared.
I made it. I’m finally home.

As she lay there anxiously waiting for whatever came next, she felt her presence of mind slowly returning. Around her she heard what sounded like the shuffling of boots against the concrete sidewalk, followed by several grunts of exertion and a dull, pulpy, chopping noise. Several drops of rain fell upon her exposed skin. A gruff voice startled her as it shattered the placid silence she had been enjoying.

“Dammit all, Chowder! You got that shit all over her! She better not get infected ’cause of you!” said the disembodied voice.

When she opened her eyes she saw three men looming over her, quarreling amongst themselves. She pressed her eyelids together tightly, as if that might somehow allow her to hide herself from whomever or whatever was nearby. Failing to keep her traitorous lids sealed shut, she blinked several times hoping to clear the men away like flecks of dust trapped in her tears. Unfortunately, when the men finally moved, it was toward her. While her stoic, near catatonic outward expression remained unchanged, she felt a profound sense of dread and fear roiling inside her as the men roughly hauled her to her feet.

All three men were Caucasian and appeared to be in their early forties, though their weathered appearance made it hard to be certain. Even without the motorcycles, their long dirty hair, matching beards, and predominately leather attire made them look like part of some biker gang. A portly man holding a bloody length of pipe flashed a lascivious grin in her direction. His only two visible teeth, broken off near the gum line, were stained unhealthy shades of yellow and brown.

As his warm breath mixed with the cool afternoon air, she could almost see its vile stench, reeking of rotten beef and stale cheese.

“I’m Chowder, sweetheart. What’s your name?”

Looking away in disgust, she imagined that the three men did not look much different before the world crumbled like a withering pile of dog shit.

Hearing no reply, the irritated man continued. “I said, ‘I’m Chowd—’ ”

Another of the formerly disembodied voices spoke up, “Enough talk, Chowder! Let’s get her back to the house. I don’t like being out here all exposed.” This voice, she learned, belonged to Bill, the apparent leader of the small band of merry men. Aside from the fact that he managed to string together complete sentences intermittently, she saw very little to set him apart from the disgusting man-pig named
Chowder
. After binding her wrists for
her own safety
, Bill heaved the woman onto the back of his motorcycle before climbing on himself.

“Turtle! Chowder! Let’s ride!” With a great rumbling growl, their bikes sparked to life, and they sped down the road.

As they pulled up to a house in the once exclusive, gated community of Hermitage Estates, she noticed a tremendous amount of destruction strewn across its lawn as well as those of the neighboring houses. It looked like a war zone, as if a violent battle had been waged in the not-so-distant past. Smoldering embers of a fading conflagration were all that remained of the house across the street from where they parked. Several bodies lay contorted at odd angles among the debris. Some appeared to have succumbed to gunshot wounds while others were burned. She shuddered as she saw the remains of one of the infected staked out on the front lawn of the burnt out house.

She couldn’t help but overhear the remarks passed between the filthy men as they made their way inside the bullet-riddled house.
All of this from an attack by one person?
It seemed that Turtle, Chowder, and Bill were three of five remaining members of their original group that was comprised primarily of bikers. A few other men had joined them, and all but two had been killed as well. They came under attack a couple of days ago by a man hell-bent on taking what they had rightfully claimed according to their version of events. She had serious doubts about the accuracy of their story. While their numbers had been nearly cut in half, they succeeded in killing the attacker by burning him in the house across the street. Bill became the de facto leader of the motley crew when their original leader, Eskimo, was killed in the fighting. As Bill secured her bound wrists to the leg of the dining room table she thought about how careless the men were to let so much information slip.

Several minutes later, one of the two remaining men stormed into the room dragging a slightly older woman who appeared to have been beaten to within an inch of her life. The tall, muscular man looked to be in his late twenties, despite the premature balding that left him with an impressive widow’s peak. His narrow-spaced eyes and prominent lop ears gave him a rather syndromic appearance, akin to the never-seen, older brother of the banjo playing boy from
Deliverance
. He flashed an odd, aloof grin in her direction as he tied the woman to another of the table legs. The woman whimpered softly, her breath coming in shallow gasps, but otherwise she displayed no significant signs of life. Staring at the brutalized woman lying on the rug next to her, the reality of her situation crystallized in her mind.
I am going to die here.