Season of Rot (24 page)

At the crack of dawn, they looted the last of
the edible food for breakfast, then set out eastward once more.
They found the road their regiment had marched in on and followed
it towards the Mississippi River and the army’s beachhead. It
seemed like every other hour of the long trek, they could hear the
howls of the dead in the distance. Sometimes the cries came from
behind them; other times they came from ahead—the men had no choice
but to continue on.

“We must have pissed them off,” Clint said.
“They weren’t this far east as we came in.”

“Or maybe other squads have already retreated
to the beachhead along this road and the dead followed them,” Grant
pointed out. “Either way, it was just a matter of time until they
headed east. That’s why we were sent here, to stop them before they
did. It’s what a disease does; it spreads.”

“Holy shit!” Clint exclaimed. A supply wagon
sat in the middle of the road ahead of them. Two horses were
harnessed to it, very much alive, though in poor shape and clearly
spooked. Bodies covered the road around the wagon, and an
overturned Gatling gun lay in the wagon’s bed; a soldier’s body was
propped against it, rotting in the heat of the sun.

Clint broke into a run for the wagon.

“Clint!” Hank shouted, but the private didn’t
even slow down.

As he reached the wagon, the soldier on the
Gatling snarled and sprung at him. It wrestled him to the ground,
and with jagged fingernails it slashed his cheek.

The others advanced more cautiously with Hank
in the lead, checking bodies as they went.

“God help me!” Clint wailed, managing to roll
out from underneath the dead man’s assault. He drew his Colt and
jammed the barrel against the man’s forehead.

At the sound of the shot, the woods around
the road roared to life with the hungry cries of the dead.

“Get the horses loose!” Hank barked, swinging
to meet the corpse of a farmer that charged at him from the trees.
Hank put a shot into its chest to slow the thing down, then put a
second round into its face. The farmer hit the gravel road with a
thud.

With his knife, Grant cut one of the horses
free of its harness. The terrified animal fought to run as the dead
poured onto the road, and Grant was barely able to hold it in
place. Had the horse not been a trained military animal it would
have been long gone the second he managed to get it loose.

Grant and Hank exchanged a sad glance as the
others fired wildly to stem the tide of the dead.

“Go!” Hank ordered.

Grant didn’t hesitate. He mounted the animal
and kicked its sides. The horse didn’t need any encouragement; it
cut a path through the dead and charged away from the battle. Grant
didn’t look back as the gunfire turned to screams.

Hank was the last to fall. He stood alone on
the road as the dead circled him. His empty rifle smoked in his
hands. “Come on, you pieces of shit! Come on and end this!”

He met the first one head-on and busted its
skull with the butt of his weapon, but then, moving as one, the
dead dragged him to the gravel, gnawing on his flesh even before
his body hit the road. Hank screamed as they ripped his intestines
from his stomach and passed them around. An ugly, deformed corpse
with no nose leaned over and assaulted him with its rank breath.
The thing tore into Hank’s throat, and blood spurted into its
face.

Except for the chewing sounds, the road had
fallen silent.

#

Near dawn, Grant’s horse gave out and he was
forced to continue on foot toward the beachhead. Far in the
distance, he could hear cannons discharging, and clouds of smoke
rose from beyond the trees.

Longing for his rifle, Grant paused and drew
his Colt. He counted three rounds left in the chamber and hoped
they would be enough to see him the rest of the way.

As he stood, weapon in hand, a dead woman
staggered out of the bushes to his right. He jerked his gun up, but
held his finger on the trigger.
She’s blind
, he
realized.

The bulk of her face was gone, as were her
eyes, and her tissue looked burnt, as if she’d been caught in an
explosion. A long trail of her insides spilt from her waist and
dragged on the dirt behind her as she lumbered forward, oblivious
to his presence. A low moan rose from her throat as she continued
past Grant, deeper into the woods. He couldn’t keep his eyes from
following her. He felt a mixture of hatred and pity he didn’t think
he’d ever be able to describe for his readers should he make it
home.

When the woman had vanished, Grant turned and
continued towards the sound of the battle. The gunfire was louder
now, and the cries of dying men intermingled with rifle fire. He
reached the edge of the trees and ducked down as two dead men raced
past him into the conflict on the river’s shore. The whole
riverbank was a mass of blood and bodies, most of which lay
unmoving. Only here and there in scattered formations were there
soldiers left to hold the beachhead. Grant couldn’t distinguish the
wounded from the dead in the sea of human flesh that littered the
shore.

The army was in full retreat. Men were
paddling small boats into the river’s currents as massive
steamboats continued to fire at the shoreline with cannon
emplacements. Grant heard the hiss of an incoming ball and ducked
even lower as it exploded among the bodies.

As blood fell from the sky, Grant hopped to
his feet and made a dash for the river. Hundreds of dead Indians
were swarming out of the woods upstream. It looked as if all the
tribes had finally united against the invading white man. Many of
the dead clutched tomahawks out of instinct or some lingering
phantom of their humanity, though it was clear they didn’t know how
to use them. Several of them noticed him and with a cold, curdling
war cry changed their course, running headlong in his
direction.

In that moment, Grant knew the West was truly
dead. If a people so noble and so courageous had failed to survive,
what hope did Easterners have against them?

Grant chose the clearest route to the water,
dodging the arms of a corpse sitting on a mound of its own shredded
flesh. Its legs were nowhere to be seen.

Grant hit the river and waded in without
slowing down, splashing his way along until the bottom was out of
reach and he was swept up by the currents. The water was freezing
cold, a brown mixture of blood and mud; he swam as hard as he
could.

Through the thick clouds of smoke hanging on
the surface of the water, he could see the fleet of mighty
steamboats more clearly, the last great defenders of the eastern
shore. As the current tugged him south, he struggled to swim
eastward. His left foot brushed something underwater and he felt a
hand close around his ankle. His head splashed under and he came
face to face with the bloated remains of a fat man trapped in the
rocks below.

Water flooded Grant’s lungs as he tried to
scream, and moments later the murky waters of the Mississippi
flowed a tiny bit redder.

Epilogue

President Johnson stood before Congress. Most
of the faces stared at him with open contempt, still riled at him
for allowing the Southern states into the Union after the slave war
without harsher punishments for their transgressions. Even now, in
the face of the darkness brewing in the West, they wanted their
vengeance. Did they not understand what was happening in their own
country? Were they too lost in the past to save the future? He
prayed not.

“Gentleman, I have asked you all to gather
for this emergency session because this morning I received some
most bleak and frightening news. Our push westward has failed and
our army is in a state of retreat.”

Murmurs and gasps of horror rose in the
crowd.

Johnson steadied himself and continued. He
knew he would take the blame for the army’s failure in the long
run, assuming he lived long enough to see things return to
normal.

“It is worse still, I’m afraid. I have been
informed that the dead are now crossing the Mississippi in enough
numbers to be a threat to us all. The plague has come ashore in the
East, good sirs, and if we do not stop it now, we’ll have no other
chance.”

As the room broke into chaos and panic,
Johnson paused to take another deep breath and prayed he would be
strong enough to lead this country to victory over such an
unnatural and unholy foe.

He called for order and the congressmen
settled enough for him to be heard.

“Now, gentlemen, this is what I suggest we
do...”

As he laid out his plans for the next line of
defense, outside in the streets of Washington a homeless man
staggered out of an alleyway. A woman turned to him on the busy
corner to ask if he was in need of help. The man’s hands closed on
her neck as she tried to scream.

Bystanders recoiled in horror as the man
pulled her close and bit into the top of her skull. The authorities
came running to see what the trouble was, and the end of the world
truly began.

Rats

One

Warren snuck a glance through the boards
covering the living room window. The dead were everywhere, at least
three dozen of them wandering up and down the street in search of
their next meal. He doubted very much that they would find one.
They didn’t seem intelligent enough to search the houses on their
own, and the monster wasn’t here to lead them anymore.

The thing had just up and left an hour ago
after it had guided the dead into the Petersons’ home. Warren
supposed it had thought they were the last ones hiding on this
street, and he was glad the thing was gone. The dead he could deal
with, but that monster had been something beyond his
comprehension.

It was what they called a demon, and it
looked like a rat, with four razor-sharp primary teeth and beady
black eyes that reflected moonlight, only the thing stood on two
legs, seven feet tall. Just like a man, though there was nothing
human about it. It reminded him of some kind of fairy-tale demon.
He could’ve sworn it had hissed in frustration when it left the
neighborhood without prey.

“Daddy,” Emily said, placing her tiny hand on
Warren’s hip.

He looked down into her sad blue eyes. “What
is it, honey?”

“Mommy wants you to come back to the
basement.”

Warren nodded. He picked up his P-90 from
where he’d propped it near the window and followed his daughter
downstairs into the candlelit room. As he entered, he made sure to
shut and lock the heavy door behind him.

Jessica was staring at him, her green eyes
bloodshot from a seemingly endless flood of tears that she cried
every time they managed to get Emily asleep.

“Don’t worry, baby,” Warren said. “The dead
can’t get in here and that thing is gone. It’s not up there now.
Everything’s going to be okay.”

Emily wandered over to Jessica, who scooped
her up. Warren could tell Jessica wanted to scream at him for
locking them into this tiny basement to die, but she was holding
her tongue for their daughter’s sake.

“The worst of it’s over,” Warren tried to
assure her. “It’s just a matter of time until the dead wander off
and we can make a break for it.”

Jessica nodded, trying to force a smile.

A scratching sound filled the room.

Warren frowned. “What the hell is that?”

“I don’t know,” Jessica said. “It started
while you were upstairs. It starts up and then dies down every few
minutes.”

“Why didn’t you come and get me before now?”
Warren asked, holding in his rage.

“I... I think it’s coming from behind the
washer,” Emily said. “It’s not the monsters trying to get in, is
it, daddy?”

“No, I don’t think so. The monsters are all
up on the street.” Warren moved over to the washing machine and
slid it away from the wall. The second he did, he knew he’d made a
terrible mistake. The whole section of wall behind it had been
scratched away, and a mass of rats came pouring into the
basement.

“Oh God!” Jessica yelled.

Warren sprayed the rats with his P-90 on
instinct, and the gun boomed in the small space. He fought
helplessly to stop the rodents, realizing that he was the only
thing standing between them and his family. Trying to get a better
aim at their center mass, he backed away from the wall and smashed
one of the rats beneath his heavy boot. Emily squealed behind him
and Jessica cried out in pain as the rats raced their way up her
legs, eating holes into her flesh as they went.

“No!” Warren screamed.

And then the walls gave way and the entire
room flooded with rats, so many that he drowned in them as their
teeth ripped and tore into his skin.

#

Warren awoke in a shower of glass as a bullet
blew out the window above his head. At first he could feel the rats
all around him, but he managed to shake off the nightmare as he
rolled from the car’s backseat onto the floorboard, taking his M-16
with him. His family had died long ago, but he was still alive and
wasn’t going to die if he could help it.

“What the hell is going on?” he shouted, not
quite ready to hazard a look outside.

Matt slammed into the side of the car near
the shattered window. He was panting and nearly out of breath.
Warren glared up at him, silently demanding an explanation. Outside
the car, the gunfire had stopped.

“Are you okay, sir?” Matt managed to ask.

Warren stepped out of the car and, brushing
chunks of glass off his clothing, took a look around. The sun was
just beginning to stir in the morning clouds. Jenkins and Scott
stood out in the field, well beyond the camp perimeter. Behind
Warren, inside the large circle of vehicles which made up the
convoy, the camp was a flurry of activity as people started their
day. Clearly, they weren’t under attack, which left Warren more
than a bit pissed off at the rude awakening. Only a single body lay
between him and his men in the field.