The Scattered and the Dead (Book 1): A Post-Apocalyptic Series (18 page)

But he hadn’t just seen their kind. He’d seen two of these men before. In his kitchen. They had the same blank looks on their faces when they killed his parents. One was short with wide-spaced eyes and a fat face that reminded him of a frog. The other had overgrown brown hair hanging over his eyelids and curling out from the back of his neck. His face was sallow except for the bunched up puffs of flesh around his eyes.

The truck zoomed, cresting a small hill and dipping down on the other side so just the top was visible. Black smoke splooged out of the stack, looking like liquid somehow.

The heat of rage flushed his face, hot blood beating through his neck, his cheeks, his eyes, his temples, his forehead. His vision fluttered once as he stood. He didn’t know if he was on the verge of fainting from standing so abruptly or blacking out in some kind of rage. Being high on pills made this animal process his body was progressing through seem very distant and strange.

He rose to follow the truck, jogging in the direction it went. Out here in the fields of dead corn, he could tail them from a safe distance, at least for a while. He could follow the only sound that rang out over the empty world.

Baghead

Rural Oklahoma

9 years, 126 days after

The Delta 88 eased up next to a small cinder block building set off by itself. Thistle sprouted through every crack in the asphalt parking lot, standing a good three feet high in most places. The Delta 88 toppled them, the bumper knocking them over, splitting some of the stalks.

Bags turned toward the building itself, a small cement cube that looked windowless from his vantage point. The bushes looked to have gotten out of hand and then died, leaving oversized brown husks that crowded the front door.

“Place used to be a veterinary clinic,” Delfino said. “Not a lot of frills, but I liked the location, the lack of windows, and the secure front door.”

They got out of the car, and Bags stretched. An ache set in behind his knees upon standing, and his calves felt like there must be anchors attached to them. His legs already felt dead after just an hour in the car. He couldn’t imagine how they’d feel at the end of their trek.

They elbowed through the bushes to the front door, a heavy steel thing, and Delfino unlocked it. A hinge squawked as he pushed it open, and they hesitated a moment before that threshold. Bags looked into the shaded interior, unable to make out much detail.

The light from the door revealed a wood paneled front counter, where people must have checked in before having their dog’s balls chopped off years ago. Shadows shrouded everything else.

“After you,” Delfino said, his upturned hand waving toward the doorway.

“I guess chivalry remains alive and well in the post-apocalypse.”

Bags entered, stale smells coming upon him right away like a mixture of dried spit and raw potatoes. The air seemed different inside. He felt the dry of it in his nostrils. He opened his eyes as wide as they’d go, making out a doorway behind the counter but little else.

The soles of Delfino’s shoes shuffled over the tile floor behind him, and he turned to see the driver’s silhouette still framed in the light streaming through the doorway. Delfino sidled past him and walked through the doorway behind the counter, disappearing into the dark.

“Should I shut the door?” Bags said.

“Nah, leave it. For the light.”

“You can actually see back there?”

“Well enough. I don’t want to light any lanterns. We’ll be in and out in a couple minutes.”

Something thudded to the floor in the backroom, something heavy, and after a beat, it scraped over the floor. Bags watched the black doorway as the sound crept closer.

Delfino took shape in the rectangular opening, stooping to slide a large metal cooler over the floor. It looked like it would have been an antique when Bags was a kid.

Delfino stood, his back jerking on its way up and a grimace pulling back his lips to flash his teeth for an instant. He put his hands on his hips.

“I’ve got enough water in here for us to make it the whole way. Got a little food, too, but we’ll need to get more along the way. It’s cool, though. There are places for that.”

“So that thing fits in your trunk?”

Delfino laughed.

“Great thing about driving an old car. I can squeeze this big fucker in the back seat. In fact, I can hide it back there.”

“Want some help moving it?”

“That would be awesome.”

They lifted the metal box and toted it toward the light. Bags expected it to be heavy, and he wasn’t disappointed. It was a load. They slowed in the doorway to avoid any elbow-to-door-frame collisions and got back up to speed as they moved out into the light, nearing the car.

“Right here is good,” Delfino said.

They placed it in the sand next to the Delta 88, and Delfino climbed into the back. He peeled the upholstery off of the bench seat, and one half of the seat itself pulled right out. The front corner of the pad popped off just as easily. Delfino tossed the bulk of the seat out, hanging onto the corner.

“OK, in she goes,” Delfino said.

They put the cooler in the back where the seat had been, attached the corner piece of padding to it, and Delfino spread the upholstery over it.

He turned to Baghead, the grin on his face teetering on the verge of laughter.

“Looks legit, don’t it?”

“Yeah, it looks good.”

“I like to put a blanket over it, too. That way if anyone searches the car, they’ll feel like they’re really digging in when they peel that blanket back and see regular old upholstery underneath.”

“Smart. But will anyone be searching the car?”

Delfino’s grin faded.

“More than likely, yeah.”

Mitch

Bethel Park, Pennsylvania

42 days before

They circled around the side of the house, tall grass mashing under their feet. Mitch ran a hand along the windows, pushing and testing for something unlocked. Nothing so far. It seemed so quiet out here. He swallowed hard, his heart racing like some neighbor would see them and call the police, but he knew the cops had more pressing concerns at the moment—riots and zombie apocalypses, namely.

The backyard smelled like flowers and dust and some sweet green plant smell he could never identify. A pair of huge pine trees blocked their view of the alley with a little stone bird bath in front of them.

“Are we breaking in to Grandma and Grandpa’s?” Matt said.

Mitch looked at the boy. He expected to find his son’s face concerned but instead saw him smiling, his eyebrows raised, his eyes open wide. He looked more excited than anything.

“Not yet,” Mitch said. “We might have to, though.”

“Is something going on?” Kevin said. “Something we should know about.”

Mitch sighed.

“Yeah,” he said. “I’ve kind of been waiting for the right time to lay it all out, but yeah, there is something I need to tell you.”

“Does it have to do with the riot?” Kevin said.

“In a way, yeah.”

They fell quiet, taking the step up onto the concrete square that comprised the back porch. Mitch opened the screen door, tried to twist the knob beyond that. Nope. Locked.

He took a few steps back to survey the scene. There was only one window along the back of the house, a small pane of frosted glass that led into the bathroom. He looked back at the pines that penned them in, separating the yard from the alley, giving it a sense of privacy.

“So are you going to tell us what’s going on or what?” Kevin said.

“In a minute. Let’s get inside first.”

He picked up a rock and tossed it through the bathroom window. It put a hole the size of a cantaloupe in the frosted glass, cracks splaying out from there in all directions. Mitch tucked his hand into the sleeve of his jacket and knocked the rest out piece by piece, reaching into the opening to knock as much as he could onto the ground outside rather than the bathroom floor. With the glass clear, he stuck his head in to get a look.

The bathroom smelled stale. He smelled soap, but under that he sensed stuffiness. It took a second for his eyes to adjust to the dimness inside. The toilet came into focus first, a pink carpet seat cover staring back at him. It was about three feet from the window to the floor, he thought. That would work. He popped his head back.

“OK, you’re going through, Matt,” he said. “Be careful of any broken glass in there and then come around and unlock the back door.”

“Me?” Matt said.

“Yeah,” Mitch said. After a second he added, “You’re the only man for the job.”

Grabbing him by the waist, he lifted his son over his head to stick him through the window feet first. The kid’s eyes went wide as he hit that moment of descent when his feet were inside and his torso was still outside. Must feel like hell to be out of control like that, Mitch thought.

Matt supported his weight by propping his elbows on the window frame as it got to the point that Mitch could no longer hold him. The boy eased himself the rest of the way, his back bending like he was limboing the last little bit in. His head disappeared into the house, and all was silent for a beat.

“Everything OK?” Mitch said.

No answer.

Oh, shit. What if he’d just sent his youngest son into some zombie death trap? Nothing of the sort crossed his mind until just this moment. Christ on a crutch. Nobody should be more prepared for something like this than him after this morning, and he wasn’t. At all.

He stutter-stepped forward, sticking his head back into the window, hands scrabbling at the place where the aluminum siding and window sill met.

“Matt?” he said into the gloom, waiting for his eyes to adjust again. He blinked, trying to speed up the process of pupil dilation.

No answer. He could feel his heart flexing in his throat again, like a stupid frog inflating and deflating that bubble of soft flesh under its chin over and over again as fast as possible.

Then he heard a sound outside, a crack and a scrape, and he yanked his head out of the window again. He twisted his neck about, trying to find the source of the noise. Movement out of the corner of his eye led him to see Matt propping open the back door.

The boy seemed quite pleased with himself. His smile struck Mitch as glib.

The back door led into the kitchen. They all moved in about seven paces and stopped just short of the dining room. The snack bar stood between them and the rest of the house, a marbled yellow chunk of countertop that looked very 70’s with a chrome pole supporting it.

“Hello?” Mitch called out.

No answer aside from the clock ticking on the wall.

He found himself reluctant to go farther, somehow uncomfortable with the idea of pressing into this seemingly empty house. He wondered where Janice’s father and stepmother were. Somewhere not answering their phone, apparently. That didn’t seem promising, though he wouldn’t mention it to the kids.

“Hello?” he called out again.

No reply.

“Should we split up?” Matt said.

“I think we’ll stay together,” Mitch said.

Matt nodded. Mitch found humor in his son’s sudden desire to be some kind of scout, but this wasn’t the time to indulge him.

He strode into the dining room, green carpet appearing beneath his feet, taking the place of the kitchen tile. He banked right, gazing into the living room. No one. Only empty recliners and a couch. Kevin took a piece of candy from the dish on the coffee table.

A left down the hall followed by a quick scan of the bedrooms revealed similar emptiness. They weren’t here. He’d known when they were standing in the kitchen, but now he was sure. He led them back into the living room and stopped, unsure exactly what to do next.

He looked down, saw the bright white of his shoes against the green carpet. From there, his eyes moved to the TV screen out of habit. It wasn’t on, but he could see their reflections there in the plasma screen, the three of them standing in this vacant living room. Something about the image refocused him.

“OK, they’re not here right now,” he said. “And that’s OK. We’re looking for a key.”

“Now should we split up?” Matt said.

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“Hey, wait a minute,” Kevin said. “You said you were going to explain what was happening.”

Mitch looked at his older son out of the side of his eye. At this oblique angle, he looked more like his mom than ever, a smaller version of her, yeah, but that pissed off look on his face was one she wore often. He was right, too, of course. Mitch needed to tell them.

So yeah. This was going to suck.

“You guys know what zombies are, right?” he said.

They nodded, Kevin throwing in a shrug. Mitch paused. Hm... maybe he was taking the wrong route with this.

“Look, lots of people are sick, right?” he said. “You’ve heard about that?”

“Yeah,” Matt said. “Danny Turner says that they bleed to death out of their buttholes. He says he saw them talk about it on TV.”