The Hungry 4: Rise of the Triad (The Sheriff Penny Miller Series) (20 page)

“Sheppard? Zombies are nearby and they are closing fast.”

“You must be sensing the ones still locked up.”

“No, these aren’t locked up. And they are right on top of us, I can feel them.”

Sheppard and Alex peered into the smoky darkness with their rifles up. They exchanged glances and drew closer together. They saw nothing, but Miller had their full attention.

“Are you sure, Penny?” Sheppard whispered.

Now where the hell are they?
Miller thought.
There is no one else on this floor that we know of, and no other way to get in…

Still, the eerie feeling persisted.

Miller risked a peek around the corner. And that’s when the two downed mercenaries—both riddled with bullet holes and drooling blood—began to writhe around. The accelerated one managed to sit up.

Alex saw it too. He said, “Oh, fuck my life. What’s left of it, anyway.”

The guards groaned. Then they clumsily rose up to lean against the wall. They glared down at Miller with their eyes milky white. The sound followed.
Uhh-hhuunnhh!

Alex groaned with frustration. “So those motherfuckers were infected?”

Sheppard shook his head. His face showed a deep sadness, a palpable sense of regret. “No, not infected, you guys. Accelerated.”

So if we buy it tonight,
Miller thought,
we’ll turn, too…?

The sadness, the deep hunger, the pain of the two dead men in close proximity chewed into Miller’s tired brain. She struggled to block them out but failed. They were just too close.

Miller said, “Take them both off the board, Karl.”

Sheppard nodded. He raised his M-4 and squeezed off two quick, neat shots to the heads of the two newly minted zombies. Miller winced, for with each shot a feeling of close contact was lost. It was almost as if she had lost a part of herself.

“Talk to me, Karl.”

Sheppard confirmed her suspicions. “That was the reason I stopped working on the Enhanced Bioweapons project, and instead kept looking for the cure, in spite of Rubenstein’s game playing. I’m so sorry, Penny, Alex. If you’re accelerated when you die, you do become a zombie. You do so whether you got a shot of the toxic accelerant or not.”

“So that’s what the son-of-a-bitch wasn’t telling me,” said Miller. “He made me become one of them when I injected myself.”

“No, that wasn’t it, Penny,” said Sheppard, almost timidly.

Miller looked at Sheppard, wide eyed. “What do you mean, that wasn’t it? There’s something else? Something
worse?
Are you shitting me?”

“I’ll have to explain everything later.”

Alex said, “Explain now.”

Miller closed her eyes. “No, he’s right. We need to get Scratch.”

Before anyone else could speak, a loud clanking sound came from the end of the corridor. It began down where Rubenstein’s labs were located. An object skipped like a stone and rolled closer. All three of them looked down.

A grenade.

Miller was still too distracted by the fresh connection with the undead and that terrifying conversation about turning zombie. Before she could react, Alex had already picked the hot grenade up and hurled it back down the corridor. He had just enough time to join them behind cover. The grenade exploded.

The channeled shockwave was like a sucker punch. It hit them full force, knocking all three of them to the ground. That hadn’t been an ordinary grenade.

Miller’s ears were ringing. Smoke was everywhere. Her vision was blurry. She rolled over and checked herself for wounds. She couldn’t find any. Then she checked Sheppard. He was out cold. He was bleeding from where his head had struck the floor, but otherwise seemed okay. Alex was already standing up, cradling his weapon. The new dose of fear had him jacked up even higher.

Miller shook Sheppard gently. He grunted and coughed. His eyes opened.

“Let’s not do that again.” Sheppard put his hands against his ears. “I feel like I sat through four rock concerts without ear plugs.”

Miller stood up. She stretched and shook herself clear, but suddenly a new wave of fear and despair washed over her. She tried to shake off the queasy feeling, but it wouldn’t go. “Get up. We’ve got incoming. Fresh kills.”

Alex tensed. Sheppard got up slowly, leaning on Miller for support. The three of them stood close together, listening.

Sure enough, from down towards Rubenstein’s labs, a host of moans and groans wafted towards them through the smoke and haze.
Huuhh-uhhhnn! Hunhh…

Alex and Sheppard raised their weapons, but Miller gestured for them to wait. The two men obeyed without question.

“We don’t want to kill them just yet.”

Alex said, “Okay, but why the hell not?”

“Just cool your jets. I have an idea.”

Her mind was under attack again. Every instinct she had told her to run from the invaders. Miller fought those primal instincts. Instead of trying to block out the gut-wrenching feelings of terror and confusion, she leaned against the wall and deliberately opened herself up to two of the approaching zombies. Miller stiffened and mumbled. The men watched her with concern on their faces. Her features contorted. She twitched and moaned. Miller seemed completely possessed.

Sheppard came up close. He whispered in Miller’s ear, his voice heavy with concern. “What are you doing, Penny? Please be careful.”

“Quiet, I’m trying to complete a triad,” Miller said, without further explanation.

Sheppard backed away. Miller kept her eyes closed. She tried to surf along the top of the sickening presences writhing in her mind. She fumbled for connections and worked to make sense of a dark new world. She had no idea of how to properly do what she was trying to do, but the basic concept seemed reasonable. So she reached out as she had before, and allowed herself to be connected with the two new zombies she was sensing. They accepted her at once, perhaps because she was clearly the most intelligent. Their fear and confusion hit her like a sledgehammer, the deep horror of their plight felt overwhelming. The persons were no longer there, just the base appetites. Their animal minds were still intact and their bodies relatively undamaged, despite their both having sustained fatal injuries. They were confused about this new state of existence. Brand new, but they would just have to do.

Miller wished she had let Rat complete the experiment out in the desert. She would have understood more about how the triad connection should properly work. Still, she had a decent feel for it now. She had ordered an assault on the hanger, with the entire horde, so she certainly ought to be able to command a simple triad.

“Penny?”

“Zip it. Don’t fuck with me right now.”

Alex said, “Whatever you’re doing, you’d better hurry up.”

Miller concentrated. She remained against the wall, but in her mind it was just as if she’d stepped out into the corridor and was looking back at a distant image of their current position. Just a moment later, she saw another dark, blurred shape shift positions at the far end of the corridor. Miller could feel the presence of a second zombie, perhaps a few feet away, but no sense of sight was coming from that one. The experience was revolting. Her skin was crawling with disgust, but she kept focusing on her goal. She had to find and save Scratch, whatever the cost, even if it was to her very sanity.

There was no way to know whether what she wanted to do was possible but she had to try. She seized the zombie minds and took charge of the triad. The creatures obeyed. She ordered the creatures to turn around and go back. They were to survey the area for any living humans.

Humans! The very thought of them was suddenly delicious. Her mouth filled with saliva and her stomach complained of emptiness. Miller had to fight the connection. Her proximity to Sheppard and Alex made her want to bite them.

Miller continued to see through her new hosts. There were more humans around, some deeper in the offices, hiding beyond the zombies. She could smell the people now and hear them whispering. Miller let go. She didn’t need to command the zombies to approach the live bait. Their hunger took over. They shambled forward, mumbling and groaning. She held on to them, needing the information they could provide. She needed to be certain where Scratch was being held. Part of Miller knew that Sheppard and Alex were watching her with real concern, unclear about what was going on inside. Miller couldn’t risk losing control of her zombie scouts to explain things. If she did, they’d slaughter the humans. Karl and Alex would just have to trust her and wait.

Miller continued to absorb the sights and sounds flickering through her zombie charges. She could see blurry shapes scrambling to move out of the way of their assault. One of the humans was whimpering like a frightened child, but with the voice of an adult.

“Rubenstein.” Miller spoke involuntarily. The sound of her own voice caused her to lose control of one of the zombie scouts. It immediately attacked a human being but failed to bite. It took all of Miller’s willpower to force the creature to back off and keep searching so that she could find out what lay ahead. She used it to search for her man.

“Where are they?” asked Sheppard, impatiently. He was still near her ear. “Can you sense where Rubenstein is hiding?”

“Wait.”

Sheppard couldn’t help asking. “Do you see Scratch?”

Miller ordered the zombies to leave the humans alive. She told them move on down the corridor as bait. She was their triad leader, and they would have to have to sacrifice themselves for the good of the group. They both understood that basic concept at once, though it did take all Miller’s will to coerce them into forgoing that one last meal. They were quite frustrated at being deprived. Miller focused her energy, calmed them down. She let her connection with the zombies sink into the back of her mind, and finally turned back to Sheppard.

“Come with me.”

Sheppard hesitated, eyes wide. “Down there?”

Alex said, “What just happened?”

“Look, either you’re both coming or not. I don’t have time for the two of you to lose your beer nuts now.”

Alex and Sheppard followed reluctantly, weapons at the ready. Miller led them down the smoky, dark corridor at a dead run, just slow enough for Sheppard to keep up. Despite her desire to fully disconnect from the zombies, she could feel one fall on a human further away from Rubenstein’s group and thus knew when it started to feed. The twisted feeling was ecstatic, almost orgasmic. Miller almost lost her footing as she ran. She could hear the poor man’s screams coming down the corridor. The human part of her took over again. She headed that direction.

“What’s going on now, Penny?” asked Sheppard. His voice was shaking. “Be careful, you’re in uncharted waters here.”

“Never mind all that. Rubenstein is right around the corner. Both of you listen up. No matter what happens, just hold your fire until I tell you it’s okay to shoot.” Miller hoped that Rubenstein wasn’t the man the zombie was already munching on. She didn’t think so, but couldn’t tell for sure. Besides, she wanted to tear off a piece of him herself, now more than ever.

There were three zombies in the room now, the two she had felt before and the new one who was just bitten. They seemed to have formed their own triad since she’d surrendered command. They were surrounding a profusely sweating, terrified man. A man who cowered in a corner covered with soot and debris. He was splattered blood that had come from other people.

“Penny, Karl, save me!” Rubenstein cried, without a trace of irony.

Miller shot the most damaged zombie in the head. It dropped like a loose bag of sticks. She felt it die. Instead of shooting the other two, she reached out to them with her mind and told them to stand back. That it was her turn to feed. Confused and angry, the duo stopped where they were, though the smell of Rubenstein’s nervous sweat and the proximity of Miller, Sheppard, and Alex whipped them into a frenzy.
Unhhhh… hunhh….

“Where’s Scratch?” Miller said, squatting down next to Rubenstein. “Tell me or you’re dinner.”

“I don’t…”

“I can only hold them back for a moment or two, Artie. Where’s Scratch?”

“I swear…”

Miller cut him off. She turned to one of the zombies, a tall soldier with blonde hair who was missing his lower face. She mentally released him. “Okay, big guy. This one’s all yours.”

The huge zombie lurched forward, hands raised, remaining upper teeth bared, clearly eager to consume Rubenstein’s flesh. Alex and Sheppard stepped back.

“All right, I’ll take you to him,” Rubenstein cried. “Don’t let them eat me!”

Miller ordered the big zombie to stop again. He raged inside but obeyed the leader of the triad. She turned to face them, ordered them to stand still, pointed her rifle, and shot each one neatly in the forehead. A wave of relief washed over her. They were free and now so was Miller. The connection was finally broken.

Miller and Sheppard each took one of Rubenstein’s arms. They hauled him to his feet.

“Here’s the way this is going to work, Artie,” Miller said. She slapped him hard enough to bruise his cheek. “You take us to Scratch and you live. Otherwise, I’ll kill you myself and I promise, you will ask me to hurry up.”

“I’ll take you there,” Rubenstein whispered. “Come this way.”

Miller was instantly frustrated. Rubenstein was limping, already slowing them down. As if reading her mind, Alex put Rubenstein’s arm over his shoulder and helped him along. His face showed his disgust at having to assist.

“Where are they, Artie?”

“Right through this door,” said Rubenstein. Alex took him inside, and before Alex could turn around or stop him, Rubenstein slammed the entrance closed with his foot, locking Miller and Sheppard out of the room.

There were sounds of a struggle on the other side of the door. Suddenly Miller could feel and smell fresh zombies nearby. It was some kind of a trap. Still, Scratch was in there somewhere, hopefully still alive.