The Risen: Remnants (12 page)

Chapter
14

A
feather flirts with my face. The gentle tip travels along my cheek before trailing to my neck only to repeat the pattern. It sways back and forth over me, gently waking me. A hand tugs on my arm, trying to roll me over. The playful feather is a sharp contrast to the forceful hand whose fingers are starting to bruise my flesh. The feeling switches from seduction to something different, startling my mind to a faster pace of consciousness. When Genny screams, the last fog of sleep slips away and the smell hits me, bringing me wide-awake.

My eyes open to stare into the terror-filled set across from me. Genny is staring at something behind me, mute and frozen with what she is seeing. Her body shakes so hard that the material of the sleeping bag crackles like static with the vibrations.

My eyes roll to my side and meet the faded, glazed eyes of a little girl. Her once light brown hair is now matted, making the shade darker at the tangled ends. Her face is blank as if she was startled by the scream. Her eyes are searching my face for the next outburst without any emotion of her own. Those tiny fingers are firmly applying more pressure to my arm. It feels as though she is trying to peel the flesh from my bones. My skin screams under the pain and I’m afraid to call out for help, fearing what it may trigger her to do.

We are at an impasse. She seems to be waiting for me to react and I am waiting for the flesh to be shredded from my arm. My mind is shutting down as I stare at this little girl. It is pouring itself into a tight, locked box knowing what is about to happen, not only to me, but also to what I may have to do to her.

The face that once smiled and was the pride of her parents is dried and crusted from things my mind doesn’t want to acknowledge. There is a perfect, clean pattern from where her tongue had licked it away when it was still fresh as if it were the remains of a messy dessert that once coated her face. I can remember Genny doing that at this girl’s age and I groan in my mind with the comparison.

Her school uniform with its blue and green plaid has dark markings on her chest. It extends wide, almost from shoulder to shoulder and the paper nametag she wears for what was supposed to have been a fun field trip reads the name “Becky” in the unsteady script of small children.

I imagine the stain to be where her victim’s blood pooled while she was eating, soaking her with her sin. The white collar of her undershirt is spotted with more stains, destroying the innocence she once held with the brutal honesty of what she is now. This little girl that one sat in a room filling papers with crayon creations is a murderer. Her tiny fingers no longer spread the colors of pastel paints, but the blood of her victims.

She smiles at me when we both feel the warmth of my blood begin to glide down my arm. It drips to the cloth of my shirt like a steady tapping finger waiting for my next move. It is waiting for me to save myself. It is
hoping
that I will save myself.

“Mom?” Genny’s voice snaps the child’s head in her direction.

The child, Becky, tilts her head to one side with an unnatural slow grace. Her matted hair no longer the cascading waves of what it was, sticks to the side of her raised face, falling forward to frame just her eyes. The eyes that no longer see with the child-like wonder of the world, but with the hunger of an animal that can’t be abated.

All around us, the group is beginning to stir. Becky’s eyes roam the room from her tilted position, seeing the others for the first time, but she doesn’t show any emotion if her mistake startles her. She is still, just her eyes moving from one bag to the next plotting and planning in the way these things do. When her eyes fall to me, I know she has put the pattern of our deaths together in her mind, and mine is first.

She stares mutely at me with a face still plump from that chubbiness of youth. She can’t be more than four and it fills me with pity for what has happened to her and for what I know I am going to have to do to save myself and my daughter from her. Her fingers no longer press into my flesh. Her emotions are withdrawn, shielded behind the lack of empathy she now carries for those around her. She is still the perfect hunter and she proved this by luring me into her trap.

She knew quickly that she was outnumbered. Even with her strength from the lack of feelings in her body, she would not be able to overtake us all. Attacking me quickly would cause noise, further alerting those she fears with her kill and survival motives. She doesn’t fear death the way we do. She only fears not being able to achieve her kill and then survive for the next. When you can’t feel pain, you don’t fear death. She just craves the deaths of others.

The killer in her knew I was not a threat to her. I am not the type of prey that fights without being motivated. I’m a runner and I have proved it to her by sitting here this whole time waiting on her next move. She further lowered my defense by lowering her attack. Almost presenting a sense of unease or weariness to me with diabolical designs, but now that she has me where she wanted, she shows her true form.

There was not a sliver of hesitation with her attack. I have relaxed my body, making it pliable to force and she uses that to her advantage. With a calculated pattern, she yanks my arm down, forcing my body flat while allowing her to straddle me with one smooth act. It is so sudden that I am confused by the rapid shift of her mood and lose against her strength. She smiles in her small victory, thinking the battle is already won.

She made one mistake when she picked me to attack first, though. Something she couldn’t possibly understand being void of her soul and lost to her memories of humanity. I am a mother. I will fight if I have to.

Her entire upper body leans in for the attack. Her arms shoot forward, aiming her hands for my shoulders with hopes of further pinning me down. Those same sharp baby fingers with torn nails that pressed into my arms now pierce my neck like talons, locking us together. She flexes them like a needle seeking a vein, looking for a way critically to wound me. She knows she must find a way to kill me before others can come to my rescue. Since she lacks the strength to break my neck, she is trying to bleed me out.

Her face is close to mine, trying to intimidate me so I will fear her, preventing me from fully fighting back. Her hair hangs around us like a dingy, velvet curtain blocking the sight of us from the others. Hunched over like this, she is keeping a low profile, better hiding her from untrained, sleep-filled eyes. She has planned my murder in her mind but in my mind, I’m still planning my life.

I let go of my fears and thoughts, letting myself sink to the same level of animalistic behavior as her. My fingers sink into her hair on the back of her head, the knots providing me with the perfect grip. I can feel small things crawling up my hand from her scalp. It almost steals my nerve with the roll of my stomach, but her fingers dig deeper and the pain snaps my mind back to focus. Anchoring my fingers, I tug her backwards and scream with the lightening hot pain of her talon-like fingers raking my flesh. My vision blurs from it, ebbing my strength to pull her off me.

Still latched to her hair, she fights against me to turn her head. It sends more of the things crawling along my arm with their escape from her efforts to free herself. I can feel their tiny bodies inching up me with what could be confused with a tickling sensation if I wasn’t aware of what they are. Maggots from her rotting flesh are being scattered around me, and on me, invading my mind with further proof of the nightmare “Becky” has become.

She begins to pull against my hand, letting me tear the hair from her head. It’s not just her hair that is giving away with her strength. The sick sound of her flesh separating from her skull rolls my stomach again. Something thicker than blood washes the maggots away as she mutilates herself to be free from my grasp.

The demon child still sits on me. Her arms outstretched to me with her hands hooked like claws slashing the air trying to reach me. Slowly she is sitting back up as her scalp shreds and I scream. I scream with each punch I land into her face that refuses to stay down. I scream with each punch that breaks bones into fragments in her baby-shaped face. I scream with each punch that knocks her head back with the dark, thick bloody ruin it becomes. I scream as Peyton finishes the job with one life ending thrust of his knife into her same ruined face.

Collin hauls “Becky’s” limp corpse away, freeing me. Tremors start in my chest and radiate outwards, enslaving my body. I have no control as I shake, gasping for air. Peyton pulls me to him, rocking me, helping me collect myself. He whispers, assuring me that I’m okay. He tells me, “You’re safe now. It is over.” I watch a stray maggot climb the leg of my jeans whispering that it is not over. It will never be over until the maggots are claiming me, too.

I look over to see Genny sobbing in the arms of Alicia. Somewhere in the fight Alicia arrived, pulling Genny far from me and to safety. She nods at me, her tears streaking her face, letting me know that she has my daughter and that I can focus on collecting my sanity. Already the layers of calmness start to enfold me just knowing that Genny is safe.

“Looks like you need a nurse.” Ginjer cringes, shuddering as she wipes away the tiny parasites from my body. “How was it even able to get this close? What if it had just attacked instead of stalling, for whatever reason that it did?” Ginjer looks to the man that holds me with her questions. She places every fault of the failure at the feet of a man that is supposed to be ensuring the security of our lives, if it is fair or not.

Terrence is shy with shame over failing us. He says, “It’s my fault. I must have dozed off. It was my watch.” His whisper fractures, too heavy to support his guilt. “I’m sorry.”

Some of Ginjer’s anger evaporates with Terrence’s contrition. Alicia’s just burns brighter.

“What if it had been Genny? Or Kent?” Alicia hurls her voice at him. Her emotions are choking her and she is seeking a release. “What apology would you give standing over your son’s grave?”

We all flinch, feeling the pain of her question, but I know she is just getting started. Collin knows it, too. He kneels down in front her with a face filling with worry. With her still clinging to Genny, he begins whispering his version of soothing words to them both. He hopes to stall the growing storm of Alicia’s anger before the full force of it lands, crashing around us and doing damage that we might not be able to repair.

Some damage is already done, leaving Terrence broken with the vision she has planted in his mind. He sits against the glass doors, head balanced on arms resting on his knees. Alicia’s comment may have been out of line, but the truth of it is heavy on his conscious.

Ginjer examines the wounds on my neck with a bored expression. She stretches the skin, encouraging fresh blood to seep, letting it flow adding more layers to the already drying streaks. She does the same with the half-moon marks on my arms.

“Do you think they will get infected?” I ask the question that has become a top fear with any wounds now that medical facilities are stripped or rare to find.

“No, I am sure she washed her hands after the last person she ate.” If Ginjer had smiled with the comment, I am sure I might have praised her for her off sense of humor, but the same bored expression adds a sting to her words.

“Your bed side manner sucks.” I tell her and she does smile.

The humor is short lived, ending abruptly with Genny’s scream. The smell of my blood in the air was like blood in the water to a shark. My screams were the ringing of a dinner bell. I called them all to the table and they stand staring at us waiting for their meal. After all, a van doesn’t carry just one child.

Chapter
15

T
hey stand staring at us. Their faces are slack, showing no response with us spotting them. Their eyes move together with brains that possess no original thoughts or personality. They are bound together by the craving of our flesh and they work better together now in death than they ever did when they were alive.

The girls are dressed similar to how “Becky” was. The plaid jumpers over their white shirts of different sleeve lengths and wide, white collars are shaded with stains. The shine on their black, patent leather Mary-Jane style shoes is dulled with white scuffs marring their once perfection. Their tender flesh is disfigured from the damage that was either done to them or from the deaths they have caused. It is torn, some with wide strips of skin missing, from their limbs that ooze black liquid thicker than any blood I have ever seen. In the sheen, I can see the parasites squirming around within these gashes reflecting the dim light with their bodies.

The randomly placed boys are not any better for the senses. They wear shredded and torn dark navy slacks that show the abuse their bodies have endured. Their white collared shirts are an array of shades with each merging with the other in irregular patterns; a tie-dye effect of murders and mayhem. Together they are a collection of horrific mannequins, still and lifeless.

“Peyton,” Alicia hisses her whisper. She is sliding backwards, towing Genny with her, trying to place the most distance between them and those standing at the entrance of the hallway. Their eyes roll to her in unison and it is unnerving.

Peyton knows we are all waiting for some guidance or a plan of action from him. I can feel the tightness in his arms around me as a compilation of strategies runs through him. We are poorly equipped for this with no real weapons but a few bats and one handgun. When we ran from the camp, taking the time to load the supplies was not high on the survival list and no one thought to bring in anything useful from the two vehicles that we have here. We were so eager to find each other that we forgot how dangerous things are now. This oversight might just cost us our lives.

Peyton glances to Terrence and they share a silent agreement. When Terrence stands, it pulls the children’s attention from Alicia and Genny. Their faces show the first signs of anger, seeing his movement as a signal for something starting. Collin stands, yanking their heads back to our side of the room, the tension building in their small bodies brings the monsters they are closer to the surface. Peyton gives me a tight squeeze as he is the last of the men in the room to stand. The standing men have their full attention now and their full hatred filled with carnal desires.

With their first step towards us, Collin times a perfect kick to the body of fallen “Becky”, sending it rolling to them. All motion halts in whatever was their last movement they took. They become statues; pale flesh and blank eyes staring at the object on the ground in front of them. Their minds rush through the possible information it contains trying to solve the riddle of what it is and why it should matter to them. Peyton was hoping for their hesitation and now he has it.

“Move,” His hand comes down to grasp mine to help me stand. My legs are still shaky and I feel as if I am walking on plough mud. Each foot seems to sink deeper than it needs to find footing.

Ginjer and I walk backwards slowly, hoping our silent steps will go unnoticed by their locked minds. Alicia and my daughter fill the spot behind us with Collin and Peyton filling the area in front of us. Kent is waiting by Terrence for us to reach them with our parade of escape.

The smallest of the girls hisses. Her mind has reached the conclusion of what lays before them. Like a wave, the knowledge ripples outwards from her, spinning their heads towards us. Their anger spills forth in howls of rage and animates them with demonic desires.

“Go!” Peyton turns, shoving us around, no longer trying to sneak away.

Terrence has already unbolted the locks on the double doors. They stand wide and waiting for us to run through. We don’t have the weapons to stop them, but they no longer run fast. Their bodies don’t have the same degree of control any longer with their tendons and tissues degenerating with decay at this stage of their life span. Only in the beginning were they able to keep up. Now most are clumsy, but still just as determined and just as deadly if they catch you.

Collin tosses Terrence one of the long velvet ropes as we rush through. With Peyton pressing against the doors to hold them closed, Terrence weaves the rope through the handles before knotting it and turns to run again. As secure as the rope looks, no one is willing to sit and test the theory.

Peyton and Collin lift Kent from either side to add speed to their escape. Alicia, Genny, Ginjer and I never pause on the path to our car. Genny tosses the keys to Alicia over the roof of the car and we all pile in, slamming the doors with an urgency to leave. The Jeep has already begun pulling out of the lot. The large tires are abusing the asphalt with its haste.

The doors of the theater shove open before the rope wrenches them back. Its thick material is absorbing the abuse from their tiny hands. The knot isn’t. I watch each shove extend further out in the yo-yo process from the back seat of the car. The dog pile of their shrieking faces comes into view for pulses of time.

“Alicia, we need to go.” The warning in my voice pulls Alicia’s head over her shoulder to see what I am watching.

“Shit.” Alicia thrusts the car into reverse. The tires scream against the asphalt as if they too have seen what is trying to pursue us.

Another fling of the gears and the car lurches forward towards the Jeep that has been waiting for us at the exit. The knot has relented, allowing the children to escape from their prison. They rush into the parking lot, spilling around the cars and screaming their outrage. Like a satanic children’s chorus, their wails fill the area with the different pitches of their voices.

With us safely on the streets pulling away from them, the children slow with their bodies returning to the inanimate state of saving their energy for the next chance they may find to hunt. Some part of them knows this chase is pointless. So they wait with just their eyes following us down the street from heads tilted in different degrees. Their faces go back to mute, bored expressions with time meaning nothing to them.

I have to laugh when I notice where their pursuit has halted. They stand with the backdrop of the white van spread behind them. The clowns dance, peeking from behind them, with their floating balloons casting a twisted image of a birthday party. The children have come full circle. They stand by the same method of transportation that brought them here that fateful day months ago.

“Can’t hurt to look?”
The question echoes in my mind. We were wrong.

The Jeep slows, coasting to a stop ahead of us when we are a few miles from the theater. Alicia pulls beside it and cuts our engine. She collapses against the steering wheel with a similar effect mimicked by the rest of us. We have had enough time to settle our hearts but our bodies are exhausted.

Dawn is breaking. The first rays of the sun are chasing away the dark night sky. Stars start to retreat, their shine diminished by the sun’s glory. We were attacked twice in one night, but the sun still shines, proving that we live to see another day.

I exit the car, feeling the need to feel the sun as it breaks through the darkness. Pastel shades of orange and hues of pinks extend like fingers stretching after being a long clamped fist. The sun is the palm from which they extend and it holds the hope that we each crave to discover again. Stepping away from the car, I let myself focus on just the colors painting the sky. I let go of all the fear and despair tonight has brought me. I release the guilt I have carried. I simply stand, watching and wondering if somewhere, someone is doing the same. We have survived and no matter what comes today or the many tomorrows we still may face, it can’t take that away from us.

“Pretty,” Peyton stands beside me watching the colors mesh together. “It is easy to forget sometimes there are still pretty things left around us.”

“Even if we are standing in blood covered clothing?” I tease him, knowing what I must look like and refusing to think he was flirting.

“Even if we are standing in blood covered clothing.” He nudges me with his arm and a smile. He tells me, “You were pretty brave back there. Taking that thing on like that.”

“I don’t know what you two find so amusing. If tonight wasn’t proof that there is no hope left for us, then I don’t know what more you need to happen to see it.” Alicia says, breaking into our conversation feeling defeated and broken. She tells us, “There is nowhere safe anymore. Every time we think we are, they come. They find us. I’m so tired of running.”

She hangs her head, trying to hide her tears with her dark brown hair. Her arms are crossed, holding herself, so afraid to be touched because she fears it will break that last straw of strength she is fighting to tightly hold. We give her the space she needs, as my sister was never one to climb her walls willingly. She is the fighter between the two of us, but when it comes to her emotions, she is the runner.

“We will find somewhere. I have to believe that. I have to believe that there is a place where we will be safe, or what is the point to keep going? There are other people out there, just like us. Just trying to make it. We’ll find them.” Peyton’s pep talk was meant for Alicia, but he meets everyone’s eyes when he says it. He tries to share his beliefs with his conviction, stirring some sense of hope inside us, but words are not enough anymore. Filled with so much doubt, not even Terrence, with his hero worship of the man, can look at him. “We don’t know if we are the only ones left from our camp. They may have chosen to go out on their own, to just keep driving. We can’t know for sure. We may never know, but we can’t let that deter us or break us. I’m not ready to just lie down and wait for those things to kill me. As long as I am able, I will keep fighting. I will fight for every sunrise and I will remember every person we’ve lost. But I will not, I cannot, believe that there is no hope. Not after how far we have come. I won’t. I won’t believe that.” Peyton’s voice started out gentle, coaxing our attention to him. It ended embedded in steel with his refusal to die.

“There has to be a place.” Terrence echoes the sentiment. He pulls Kent close to him, hugging the only family he has left with the obvious desire to see to his safety. Not just his body safe, but just like me, he wants some semblance of a life for his kid.

This is no way for a sixteen-year-old to live.

“We have got to find some kind of steady place or at least more people. If anymore of us die, the kids may be left alone.” Collin voices his fear. “Who is going to look after them?”

Please Lord, don’t let my daughter see me die today.

“Say we do find new people, how do we know we can trust them? What safety is there really in numbers anymore? How are we going to divide up what supplies we keep finding with more people?” Alicia asks as her walls are rebuilding brick by mortar brick.

Who will be the first to scuff the lines drawn in the sand?

Genny and Kent are staring at each other. They are lost in the adult debate that is being held around them. For them, the only real question they have is centered around their growing feelings for each other.

In a weird twist of fate, the reason we came here may just become the reason that we have to stay.

My past thoughts lap around me, edging me forward with the decision that I know I must make. The way Ginjer has been staring at me with disapproval, she also knows what is about to happen.

“I may know a place.” The words that I have been dreading free themselves from my tongue. Finally, I feel as if I can exhale now that the decision has been made.

“No,” Ginjer comes toward me with anger trailing her. “We can’t take them in. He’s been bitten for God’s sake.”

She is pointing at Kent, but I don’t understand what she is saying.

“His leg,” She explains when I don’t catch on to her reason, sharing the same shock and perceptions. “Those things bit him. That’s how he got the wound.”

“…and I have been clawed.” I am still not comprehending her fear of Kent.

“He’s been bitten. He could
turn
!” Ginjer stresses the last word, drawing the one syllable out to make it more ominous than it is.

I put all the pieces together now. All of her animosity for the boy she has been expressing is all from her fear of his leg. Her fears of how the wound happened, and what she fears in her mind that it could possibly mean for the rest of us.

“Turn? What are you talking about? Turning?” Kent’s voice is a high octave of outrage over what has been insinuated about him. “I’m not turning!”

“Now just wait a minute –” Terrence begins his defense of his son, but Peyton cuts him off before the conversation melts into anger and insults.

“Everyone just wait a minute. Let’s all just breathe for a moment.” Peyton stares at the divide that has formed with one mistrustful sentence.