“Can they break windows?” Santiago asked, directing my gaze to where one of them was banging its bloody fists against the pane.
“At that rate, yeah.”
Another Rabid used its skull to smash against the window. There was a crash in the living room, followed by the howl of Rabids as they began crawling through the busted window, tearing apart their flesh in the process. It was an endless stream, their snarls echoing off the walls as they sniffed the air and zeroed in on us.
“We’re going to have to fight our way out,” I told Santiago with my gun in one hand and my machete in the other. “I’ll fuck up as many as I can while you lead us to the front door. Then we run like hell for home and hope someone sees us coming and opens the gate.”
“Yes, boss,” he replied, all business now.
Above my own thumping heart were their groans of hunger and their wet, phlegmy wheezing. Their movements were erratic, feral, as they leapt on top of the furniture, sizing us up. I pointed my Glock and aimed, ticking them off like it was a carnival shooting game while counting down the rounds. I didn’t have another replacement mag because I hadn’t expected a fight. We were only picking strawberries in a field for fuck’s sake, but that’s what happened when you let your guard down for even a moment. Fucking Rabids jumped your ass.
And as I berated myself, I painted the walls of the house with blood. Gross patterns of brain matter and gray, decaying tissue were splattered everywhere as we edged along the far wall of the living room, neither of us turning our backs on them. Santiago swung his crowbar, crushing skulls like he was hitting home runs, but there were just too many.
The back door finally gave way and more Rabids poured in through the kitchen. With only a couple rounds left, I holstered my gun and hurled whatever objects I could find. A vase, a lamp, some weird-looking sculpture. One nailed a Rabid right in the forehead, temporarily disorienting it while I swung my machete and slit its throat. I gut-stabbed another on my way to the door. Still, they came for us with their skeletal fingers reaching toward us, grasping at my arms, my legs, my face…
The walls felt like they were closing in, the edges of my vision turning black.Breathe, goddamnit.Five steps to the front door, a half-mile to the front gate. Would we make it?
“Come the fuck on,” Santiago shouted. I felt a yank on the back of my jacket as he practically dragged me through the front door. I reached into my pocket and pulled out a grenade. Tearing out the pin with my teeth, I hurled it into the pit of Rabids, hoping that would at least slow them down, since I was a shit runner. The explosion rocked the foundation of the house,the ground trembling beneath us. The force of the explosion stunned us both as we collapsed on the ground. I shielded my face from the flying debris and wet bits of Rabid. My hearing was fucked. All I could see was smoke and fire. The stench of charred flesh made my eyes water.
Kitten–had I told him I loved him?
“Let’s go,” Santiago shouted, yanking me to my feet. I pulled it together and started running after him, both of us hauling ass down Shady Oaks Road toward the gate. Wylie was there already, fiddling with the locks. Footsteps pounded the pavement behind me, but I didn’t dare look back. That was how they got you, right? You turned around and boom, you were fucking dead. Gunshots rang out–Macon picking off Rabids from the watchtower. My heart was in my throat and I still couldn’t get enough air.
Something knocked into me from behind and tackled me to the ground. My chest hit the pavement, knocking the wind out of me, and two arms with superhuman strength held me there. I reached for my hunting knife and came up empty. Fuck me, I’d forgotten to replace it. My machete was trapped at my back, my Glock painfully digging into my hip and out of reach. The only weapon I had left was a baton, which I yanked from my belt and extended with a flick of my wrist.
A searing hot pain set fire to my neck, and I screamed like an animal at how fucking bad it hurt. That fucker had bit me. It bit me! Fueled by adrenaline and rage, I beat the thing off of my back with my baton before it could chomp down again.
“Cipher, get up,” Santiago shouted. He was at the gate now, leaning heavily against it while motioning for me to join him. Artemis had her bow raised, trying to get off a shot, but I was standing in the way. The Rabid who’d attacked me was back on its feet, ready to spring at me again. I stumbled backward and away, pulling out my Glock to finish him off while at the sametime Macon lit up the Rabid’s body with bullets. The bastard twitched and moaned, body full of holes, then finally fell and lay dying in the street. I reached up to assess the damage done to my neck and pulled away bloody fingers.
Fuck me. This was bad. This wasreallyfucking bad.
If I were a better man, I’d have put my Glock to my temple and ended it right then, but selfishly, I wanted to see Kitten one last time.
I holstered my gun and ran.
EIGHT
KITTEN
There waschaos at the front gate. Macon was firing from the watchtower, Teresa was screaming, my brother was shouting, and Cipher…
“Where is he? Where’s Cipher?” I demanded of my brother, shaking his shoulder to get his attention.
“He’s coming. He’s there.” Santiago pointed down the street to where Cipher was half-running, half-hobbling toward the gate. A bloody Rabid was lying in the street behind him, and more were coming up the road. I took off in a sprint and when I reached him, threw one of his arms over my shoulder, and practically carried him the rest of the way home. As soon as we were through the gate, he shoved me away from him.
“Kitten, don’t touch me. Everyone, stay back.” He held up his casted arm as if to ward us off. His other hand gripped his neck.
“Cipher, what’s wrong?” His panic was starting to get to me too. He was Mr. Calm, Cool, and Collected, but something had him rattled. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Macon descending the watchtower ladder with the rifle slung across his back. Perhaps he’d come to finish off the Rabids clustered outside our gate?
“Kitten, I just wanted to tell you that I love you,” Cipher said. He pulled his hand away from his neck. His fingers were covered in fresh, red blood. Had he been wounded?
“Cipher,” I said, my own terror rising. “What is happening right now?”
“It’s okay. It’s going to be okay.”
He grabbed his Glock and put the muzzle of it to his temple.
“Cipher, what the fuck?” I shouted as everyone else went deadly silent.
