Badlands Trilogy (Book 3): Out of the Badlands (23 page)

Chloe’s legs finally woke up. She lunged forward and darted out and around the two men, heading toward the double doors leading into the building. She heard Lester yell something indiscernible behind her, but she didn’t stop to look. Instead she ran as quickly as she could, nearly slamming into the door when she got there.

She yanked the door open and flung herself inside, tripping over the threshold. She fell forward and her knee slammed into the floor. Pain flared and she cried out, glancing behind through the closing door. She saw Lester get to his feet, bloody knife in hand. He stared at her, his chest rising and falling until the door mercifully closed.

Ignoring the pain in her knee, she got to her feet and ran. Every step hurt, but she pushed on, knowing that death pursued her from behind. Ahead, the bend in the hallway approached. She glanced back to see one of the double doors open, flooding the hallway with light. Lester’s silhouette appeared, looking twice as tall as he once had.

Looking like the shadow of a monster.

She rounded the corner and limped onward as fast as she could, the cold and hard sound of the door at the end of the hallway closing behind her.

Lester stood above the dead man on the ground, watching Chloe limp down the hallway, away from him. The door closed and she disappeared from sight.

She’d slipped right through his fingers.

He’d never catch her now and once she got back to the others, they’d round him up and put a bullet in his head for his trouble. He wasn’t about to let that happen. This was the end of the line. He could feel it. It had been a good, long run, but it had finally come to an end. That he could accept, but he couldn’t accept going out on anyone else’s terms.

No, he’d make his own exit, his own way. His own terms.

Lester inspected the automatic rifle still clutched in the hands of the dead man lying on the ground below him. An AR-15, thirty round magazines, probably downloaded to twenty-eight. A quick search of the body revealed three more magazines. He did the math in his head…more than a hundred rounds. A good start.

Lester pocketed the magazines and retrieved the rifle before heading toward the double doors, a grin on his face.

Going out on his own terms sounded like a fine idea. He opened the door and stepped inside the building.

* * *

Ed heard the sound of the girl screaming before she entered the common area, rousing him from a light sleep. His pulse quickened as adrenaline flowed, snapping him fully awake in seconds.

“Who is that?” Trish said, her eyes opening quickly as she sat up.

“Chloe,” Ed said. “The new girl.”

A moment later Chloe burst into the room. “He’s coming!” she screamed.

Now Zach and Jeremy were awake. Ed glanced around the room and saw others begin to awaken too.

“He’s crazy!” Chloe yelled, still running across the room, dodging the people still sitting on the floor. She made it to the far side of the room and stopped. She turned and faced the others. “He has a gun!”

Those four words snapped Ed out of his fog. “Go,” he said to Trish. They got Zach and Jeremy up and to their feet as murmurs grew into nervous talk. Confused looks abounded throughout the room.

“What the hell is that girl talking about?” Dario yelled, rubbing his eyes.

“What’s going on, Dad?” Zach asked.

“Go,” Ed said. “Now. Out the door.”

Years spent on the road had trained both Zach and Jeremy to follow their father’s instructions. They both sprinted toward the door, hand in hand with Trish. Ed followed, pistol now in hand. He looked back at the group and yelled. “Everybody out!”

“What the hell’s going on here?” a gruff voice called out. Ed turned to find Tex standing in the room, drawn in from the commotion. Three men with pistols stowed in side holsters accompanied him.

“The girl,” Ed said, pointing to Chloe.

“Lester,” Chloe said. “He has a gun. He’s already killed somebody.”

“Shit on a stick,” Tex said. He turned to one of the men with him, a slim middle-aged man with a thin mustache. “Get the others and—”

Tex’s body jerked as his head exploded in a chunky, red slurry. His body remained upright for a second before plummeting to the floor.

“Get down!” the man with the mustache yelled before a hole appeared in his throat. He fell to the floor as gunfire crackled from the hallway. The room erupted in panic. Those on the floor scrambled to their feet, desperately searching for their pistols. Others ran away from the sound of the gunfire. It was absolute pandemonium.

Ed pushed Zach and Jeremy through the doorway and out of the room. By now some of the formerly sleeping survivors had made it to the doorway and were pushing their way through side by side, blocking the way for others—including Ed. Someone pushed him out of the way, knocking him to the floor. He looked up at the panicked crowd to see Kevin crowded in alongside Dario and the others.

More gunfire erupted and Kevin’s body jerked madly. Blood splattered, coating Dario and the wall and Ed. Dario yelled and went to the floor. Ed got to his hands and knees, taking cover behind a chair that barely covered him. He heard more gunfire and saw Terry crouched behind an overturned table, firing his pistol at the attacker.

Following Terry’s aim, Ed located their attacker. A moment later Lester appeared with an automatic rifle in his hands and a smile on his face, pacing around the room. Lester spied Herb running toward the door and put a bullet in his back. The older man fell hard, blood pooling around him.

Ed took cover as Lester emptied the magazine quickly, unloading a dozen rounds before the rifle went silent.

He’s out of ammunition
, Ed thought. He rose slowly from behind the chair, searching for their attacker, but Lester was nowhere to be seen. He glanced toward Terry, but he couldn’t see his red-headed friend. He saw more bodies lying on the floor, but couldn’t make out who they were.

A sound came from the hallway. Lester was reloading, but out of sight. Ed could do nothing until a moment later when Lester reappeared. Ed fired a round, but missed. Lester began unloading the second magazine, sending bullets zipping across the room, punching holes in the wall and ricocheting off the floor. Ed could hear Lester laughing between the report of each fired round.

Ed remained crouched behind the chair, feeling exposed. The gunfire seemed to go on forever, shot after shot rang out in the small room, echoing like cannon fire. Acrid gunpowder smoke filled the air. Someone moaned from within the room. Ed’s heart pounded, his mouth dry.

Then the gunfire stopped. Ed didn’t wait for a second opportunity. He rose from behind the chair, located Lester, and pulled the trigger three times. Lester stumbled out of sight.

“Terry!” Ed yelled.

No response.

“Terry!”

Slowly, Terry rose from behind the table that he’d been using as a shield, his eyes shifting left and right. Ed saw blood spatter covering him.

“Where’d he go?” Terry asked.

“Down the hallway, I think.”

Ed stepped out from behind the chair and made his way to the fallen bodies of Tex and his two men. He retrieved an automatic rifle and two pistols. Terry appeared behind him and Ed handed over one of the pistols.

“You okay?” Ed asked.

“Not my blood,” Terry said.

“Come on,” Ed said.

The two men headed down the hallway.

The bullet wound in his leg hurt, but it wasn’t fatal. Lester had enough medical training to know that. Not like it mattered much. Eventually they’d get him. He limped down a hallway, completely unaware as to where Chloe had gotten off to. He badly wished he could find her; even putting a bullet in her head would be enough now. If only he’d made his move back at the farmhouse.

But everyone died with at least a few regrets.

Lester came across a room and stopped. He cocked his head to the side and listened hard. Whispers. Somebody inside who thought they could hide. A quaint notion, but with two more magazines left in his pockets, hiding wouldn’t do anybody any good.

He released the partially spent magazine and replaced it with a full one. He returned the partial to his pocket. He’d use that one later; for now he needed as many rounds as he could get.

He approached the door and stood to the side before reaching out and jiggling the handle. Locked. Immediately the whispers ceased. Lester waited for bullets to fly, but none came.

Lester stood in front of the door and inspected the lock. It was a flimsy thing, offering up nothing in the way of significant resistance.

“Little pig, little pig, let me in,” Lester mumbled. He might have even chuckled.

He kicked the door hard, planting his foot just beside the knob. It sprung open more easily than he’d imagined, causing him to fall forward with unexpected momentum. Two shots rang out, the bullets sailing just over where Lester’s head had been only a moment earlier.

Lester pointed the rifle and fired twice, taking down the shooter. A woman, mid-thirties, haggard face.
Not my type
, Lester thought wryly. Red bloomed in two spots on her chest as she fell to the floor. Perhaps a dozen people—mostly women and children—filled the small room, huddled together.

Lester heard the sound of footsteps from the end of the hallway. His pursuers had come for him, just not soon enough.

He grinned and pulled the trigger.

He didn’t stop shooting until every last person in the room stopped moving.

* * *

Ed rounded the corner and saw Lester enter a room at the far end of the hallway. A few moments later the chatter of gunfire echoed from within.

“Oh, god, no,” Ed heard himself say. He felt numb all over.

At least a dozen shots rang out before Lester stepped out of the room and glanced toward Ed and Terry. He turned and aimed the rifle.

Ed and Terry both dropped to the floor as three gunshots exploded in the hallway, followed by the click of an empty chamber. Getting to his knees, Ed leveled the pistol, aimed and fired two shots. The first shot missed, the second caught Lester in the hand, causing him to drop the rifle. He cried out, but didn’t pause. Instead, he turned in the opposite direction and ran, darting down the adjacent hallway and out of sight.

Ed and Terry pursued Lester down the long hallway. As Ed passed the room from which Lester had emerged, he stopped and stared inside, transfixed. He saw ravaged and bloody bodies piled on top of each other.

And so many children.

He wondered if his family was in that room. He felt dread and panic fill him up.

“Come on!” Terry yelled from the hall.

Ed turned away from the carnage and rejoined Terry as they resumed their chase.

* * *

Pain roared through Lester’s hand as blood dripped to the floor, creating a trail behind him. With his rifle now gone and his left hand useless, he could only run. The building he found himself in turned out to much larger than he’d originally thought, with dimly lit corridors spanning in various directions. Problem was, in all the excitement Lester wasn’t sure exactly where he was.

The thought occurred to him that he might be able to hide out somewhere in the building. Find a room they didn’t use, maybe crawl up into the space above the ceiling. If he could hold out for a day or so he could possibly sneak out. Maybe at night, while they slept. There weren’t that many people left, at least not that Lester could tell and they’d inevitably leave something unguarded, some crevice not searched.

He needed time to think. Time to come up with a plan. He scanned the hallway and found two doors. Limping on a wounded leg (and trying to ignore the fact that climbing a fence with said leg would be impossible), he tried the first door. Locked. He moved on quickly to the second door and tried the handle.

The knob twisted in his hand. Lester pushed the door open and slipped into the small room, closing the door behind him. Sunlight filtered in from a glass block window perched high on the far wall, illuminating the room in a dirty hue.

He turned from the door and spotted a man lying on a bed a few feet away. His face was bruised, his lips swollen and cracked. Somebody had worked this guy over good.

“Who are you?” the man on the bed asked.

Using his uninjured right hand, Lester retrieved his knife. He needed to shut this kid up before he alerted the entire place. Besides, it’d be nice to open one more throat before he left the place. Guns just weren’t as personal.

Knife poised, he took a step forward.

With all the gunfire, Jasper knew something was very wrong, but with his injuries he knew wasn’t going anywhere. He felt completely useless just lying there and not being able to do something to help. Anything could be happening. Had the compound been attacked? Were the people who’d kidnapped him coming back to finish the job? Or had the building been invaded by those strange and frightening apex carriers they’d seen?

What if Tex turned on them? Maybe he sold them out to those creeps who destroyed his face.

When the door to his room opened, Jasper held his breath. He hoped it was a friend, maybe Ed or Emily. Or at least somebody who could tell him what was going on and help get him out of the room. If someone could at least put a gun in his hand…

But he didn’t know the man who entered. And that wasn’t good.

“Who are you?” Jasper asked.

The man didn’t reply. Instead, he brandished a long, sharp knife.

Jasper swallowed hard.

The man with the knife took a step forward.

This is it
, Jasper thought.
Mr. Death has finally come back to collect. All those years after the virus the inevitable had just been postponed.
He thought of his brother Robbie, long dead since the virus struck. Was there such a thing as heaven? Would he see his brother again?

Lying on the bed and watching the man with the knife, Jasper found that somewhere along the line, after years spent not caring whether he lived or not, he’d become just a little afraid to die.

The man across from him gripped the knife and took another step.