The Queen of the Dead (29 page)

They rocked back and forth as if they were on an uncalm ocean. Jeremy held the axe but didn’t know what to do. Was it time to fight? He hesitated and looked into the eyes of the dead. There were so many of them. How did it get this bad?

“You’re a dumb bastard,” the priest helped settle John behind his rifle, “but a bastard nonetheless.”

“Don’t give me any shit about what happens after I do this,” John said with a hint of delirium in his voice.

“It’s not for me to decide what happens,” Father said. He looked back over his shoulder at the clamoring horde. “I can give you the sacrament, if you’re ready.”

John tried to laugh but choked again; he spat a wad of blood into the truck. “You need to say the words for an entire world, looks like. Get outta here.”

Father hastily performed the sign of the cross and leapt down onto the pavement; the zombies moved aside for him while Jeremy sat in the truck bed beside the twitchy old man, who smelled like mildew and cheese.

Jeremy couldn’t take his eyes away from the soldier buried in the barricade of cars and trucks.

Sergeant John Charles was going to give his life for a greater cause, just as he promised he would the day he signed on the dotted line.

***

“It’s okay to be afraid,” John said while he steadied himself. “I’m just a man.”

He drew his sidearm and started popping open skulls with single shots. They looked up at him and waited for the bullet, like they wanted to be released from their curse. He felt dizzy and cold; his aim was unsteady and he missed a few of his shots, but the hardest part was reloading. When he ejected the clip, he ground his teeth to ward off the pain in his fingers. He’d been frostbitten before, but this felt like the icy flame had penetrated every bone and muscle that he needed to move.

Only a few more bullets left.

Why couldn’t he remember his wife’s face? She used to tell him she was proud of him, that she would always stand by his side. But he couldn’t see her anymore, and he grasped at the memory. Her name eluded him. There was only a field of flowers and the train of a wedding dress. Corn stalks and sweat. Crows escaping into the bright blue sky. Standing for the Pledge of Allegiance.

There was nothing else. No more bullets for the gun, no more memories. Nothing that could belong to him, nothing that could be part of him.

He sank back into the truck bed. He wanted to get up, to keep going; he thought about being drunk, but he wasn’t even sure what that meant. Words tagged his consciousness and fled. Whispers from strangers who should’ve meant something to him.

John willed himself to sit up. On the other side of the barricade, hundreds of the dead surged forward from every corner, every shadow. They looked like people, but they weren’t. A rainbow of colors swaying, rocking back and forth; people who moaned as if they were all trying to wake up at the same time.

He focused his attention on the shiny black rifle that was sitting in the truck with him. The weapon’s name almost came back to him, but he wasn’t sure if he would remember how to fire it.

Hands would remember for him.

He kicked aside the bottles with their gasoline-soaked rags. The petroleum smell was almost enough to overpower the rot; he’d grown too familiar with it, had actually become used to the smell of decay so much that any other smell stood out. His bones ached while he picked up the rifle with its 26-inch barrel. A thought drifted through his mind: Vincent had good taste in guns.

The weapon meant something to him; he wanted it in his arms. Another thought assaulted his memory as he reeled backward in the truck bed, nearly losing his balance while shadowy creatures climbed over the hoods of cars while his vision blurred; he had a blanket all his own when he was a little boy and he took it with him wherever he went.

“I can do this,” he choked on a thick wad of blood in the back of his throat. His stomach churned. With his forearm wrapped around his stomach, he doubled over and his bowels filled the back of his pants. Warm urine and liquid shit ran down his legs and filled his boots.

“A shitty way…” he started a sentence and reached with his free hand for the big delivery truck. He wrapped the rifle over his shoulder by its strap and grabbed onto the trailer with both hands. Just keep focused…

His shoulders burned and each joint in his arms, each vein, felt like it would explode in a spray of blood and marrow. What was he doing? He didn’t understand why he was hanging there, until he heard heavy thuds against metal; he looked back and saw people climbing on top of cars. They wanted to get him, it seemed, and there was something wrong with them. Something unnatural about the way they moved.

He was trying to get away. John heaved himself up and over onto the trailer. He lay prone and positioned the rifle over his shoulder. Bolt-action AR-30A1. Five shot magazine. Adjustable sight. There were more rounds packed into his belt. Automatic responses to stimuli focused his wavering concentration on the rifle and the crowd below him.

The gun jolted against his shoulder when he pulled the trigger, but he could hold on. He aimed at someone’s head and fired. Aimed again and fired. They wanted to kill him and he didn’t know why. It was okay, though. This was nothing more than a nightmare he’d had before.

Fire. Adjust aim. Fire. Adjust aim. Fire.

Reload the weapon. His shaking fingers didn’t want to work. The gun barrel smoked but he couldn’t smell it; he wanted to smell it, to smell anything.

John’s entire body convulsed; his head dangled over the edge of the trailer as he vomited through every pore on his face. He thought about water being dumped over his head as blood and bile exploded out of his mouth and through his nose. Faces he didn’t recognize reached for him. Hands with broken fingernails and shredded flesh clawed at the air.

He felt lighter, maybe a bit better. He was Sergeant John Charles. A mercenary who specialized in Black Ops for government projects. The US government. There was a mission, a building on fire, something about a tank or a crashing helicopter. A woman’s face on the dashboard of a jeep crawling over sand dunes half a world away, the sun’s heat choking the breath from his chest. Snapping to attention because he was supposed to salute the general.

Lying on his back, he emptied all the rounds for the rifle out of his belt. Bullets rolled and slipped over the edge. He tried to wipe his face, but smeared blood and snot across his face instead. The sky was the color of rust.

He rolled back to the gun and watched his hands touch the metal and grip the trigger.

“I regret that I have…” They were words someone else was speaking. He fired the gun. “I regret that… I have…” He choked and coughed again. His right arm would no longer move, though he wasn’t aware it had given up on him. Vision disappeared from his right eye.

With his free hand still on the trigger and the gun braced against his shoulder, he aimed through the sight at another exposed skull. “I regret that I have but one life to give…”

His head felt heavy, and he spat blood through his teeth to utter words that had been programmed into his heart. “I regret that I have but one life to give to my country.”

Nobody could say when he stopped talking, but one word, one name, followed him into the discolored sky.

Megan.

***

When Kathy heard the truck outside, she had a good idea who it was. Ronnie had come back for them, or maybe the priest with all his bullshit remembered them.

Rose stood in front of the window and pushed the curtains back. Macon jumped up and grabbed his rifle. Poor kid. He’d seen his own parents die, but he kept on smiling. Kathy could only wonder at her parents’ fate; she wasn’t sure if she was luckier than the boy.

“A blue truck,” Rose said and moved aside so Macon could see. “Three men. One of them’s Father. Not sure about the other two.”

“About damn time,” Kathy took a deep breath.

“I bet he found a place for us to go!” Macon announced.

“Fucking kid,” Frank wheezed from his wheelchair.

Kathy already assigned things to carry on their way out. Instead of waiting around and twiddling her thumbs until Father returned, she organized their escape plan. Backpacks full of water bottles and bullets collected from the street by Father from his visit to the barricade to collect supplies. Macon had his rifle, and she had a handgun. Rose was given one of the shotguns, though she hardly seemed interested in the weapon, or thankful to have it.

She was used to waiting around; now the moment had come to leave, and she wasn’t emotionally prepared to take the plunge. They were going back out there together. As much as she wanted to get the hell out of the nursing home and find her family, those dead people stood in her way.

Whatever crazy plan Father was cooking up, Kathy had to stay the course; she was the one who took care of Frank and Macon, and they would take her to her parents. She had to make sure they were okay. The entire time she spent trying to help others keep their shit together, was time she should’ve applied to her own well-being and that of her family.

But Rose was still looking out the window.

“What’s the problem, sweet pants?” Frank asked the stranger.

Rose was almost too pretty to be real. Kathy still wondered how she managed to keep herself alive on the street. She looked like an airbrushed cover girl for a men’s magazine. She hardly said a word and rarely blinked. The girl had to be on drugs or she was in serious shock.

“We’re outta here,” Kathy said to Rose, “unless you feel like staying for breakfast, I suggest you come with us.”

Rose looked away from the window. She held her hands near her waist like a well-mannered girl who was waiting to be admonished for breaking curfew.

“You’re good people, and I want you to make it,” she said.

“Uh… What’s your point?” Kathy asked. “You can make it with us. Maybe you could help. One more person with a gun could make all the difference.”

“There’s something I have to do,” Rose looked at them calmly. “It’s dangerous, but I don’t know if I can do it. I’m going to skip ahead to Selfridge on my own.”

Kathy wasn’t about to argue with her.

“Can we get the fuck out of here?” Frank asked.

“Keep the damn gun,” Kathy said to Rose. “Stay out of the way or come with us.”

“I’ll protect you,” Macon said. “I did it once already. I’m good with this gun, so you don’t have to worry.”

Rose smiled and crouched near the boy. She smiled at him and traced the edges of his ear with her fingertips. “That’s nice of you. You really are a good shot. I need you to protect Kathy and Frank, just like you protected me.”

“Macon,” Kathy gestured for him to grab her hand. She stared at Rose, and the slender, busty girl returned her gaze.

The woman was just as mad as everyone else was. Kathy had to accept it and move on. Let her do whatever the hell she wanted.

Kathy patted the gun at her hip, thankful her father taught her how to use it. She had a feeling violence was in her future.

***

“I’m not sure how we’re getting out of here,” Father said.

The crowd of dead around the nursing home had thinned enough for them to get inside the gate with the truck, but the feeble zombies were re-focused on the blue pickup.

Jeremy was confident he could still hear the gunfire from John’s battle on the barricade. He wasn’t providing a good enough distraction; he was supposed to be throwing cocktails into the street to light up the town. Father and John had guessed the dead would be drawn to the flame like moths to light. The plan seemed like it was going to be a bust.

And they would be trapped inside the nursing home, or worse.

They were parked in front of a building that had its doors thrown wide open. Not a single corpse lingered in the front lobby. What the hell was going on?

“Get in there and help,” Father jumped out of the truck. “Two women, an old man in a wheelchair, and a boy.”

Jeremy stood up and held his axe. It was difficult enough just to stand in the armor, so most of his hand-to-hand skills would be useless. But the axe made him feel comfortable. The armor made him feel safe.

“He’s still out there!” the general shouted from inside the truck. “Hundreds of those dead bastards are coming back this way.”

“Nothing we can do about it now,” Father said, his eyes scanning the crowd. “I promised I would help these people, just like I helped you.”

“You didn’t help me,” the general said. “Didn’t you learn nothing? Don’t you see what’s happening? These things keep coming because we’re not stopping ‘em. We’re not doing anything about it. Just running and running, but we ain’t helping.”

“Just go inside,” Father looked up at Jeremy, “Macon might be happy to see the Tin Man.”

The square-jawed priest had a way with words, but it wasn’t enough to keep anyone calm now. The dead were coming.

Four people were going to die trying to save four others. Why was an old man worth dying for? How could a dude who might keel over and die at any moment, make a difference? The priest was insane, just like the general. Jeremy only had to look down at the armor on his body and realize he was no different.