Beyond the Barriers (Novella): Ghouls (5 page)

Another undead fell onto me. Its mouth clamped onto my lower leg but my pants prevented the teeth from penetrating. I kicked and got a glancing blow in but it was all I had. I was completely spent and about to die. I dug deep for any reserves but my body was completely out of juice.

I grabbed him by his lank and greasy hair and yanked his head close. His green eyes burned hate into mine. I ignored the two zombies scrambling to bite my legs, managed to lift the Desert Eagle, and place the barrel under his chin. My hand drifted as I fought to squeeze the trigger. If I was going to die I was going to take this fucking ghoul with me.

S
omething
boomed
nearby
. Then another gun went off with several loud pops. Good, Jon and Janet must have been giving them hell. At least I would be the only one who died here. If they could carve a path, they’d be free in no time.

Something pulled one of the zombies away and my leg was free. I wanted to reach down and touch the place where its teeth had tried to rip away my flesh. I was horrified I’d discover that I’d been bitten.

The ghoul snarled and tried to pull back. I pulled the trigger but his head darted out of the way, though whether from luck or some freaky preternatural instinct I couldn’t say. The gun
boomed
and nearly flew out of my weak grip.

The ghouls shrank away from the explosion but I didn’t let go of his hair. Hands and teeth clawed at my left leg as I tried to shake it loose.

More
pops
around me and splatters as blood and guts hit the ground. Something cold splashed across my face and I wiped it away. Blood. Black and rotten, smelling powerfully of iron.

The ghoul smacked my hand aside and, this time, I lost my grip and the gun slid across the ground.

I managed to get my left hand under his chin and kept him from biting me.

I kicked at his body. My legs, knees, and feet became weapons as I thrashed under the ghoul, but I wasn’t going to last more than a few seconds. I was out of energy. Completely spent from the efforts of the last few days.

Someone grabbed the ghoul’s hair and ripped upward. The ghoul’s head twisted and its eyes went livid with rage. Hair ripped out in a huge chunk, it was flung to the ground.

I punched the ghoul in the nose and it crunched under my knuckles.

The ghoul went on the defensive and disengaged but I wasn’t done with him.

Dragging in a ragged breath, head stuffed with cotton and my mind reeling, I refused to let go.

I hit him again even as my would-be rescuer got a hold of the ghoul’s shirt collar and pulled the creature off me.

More gunshots echoed around me and I had the urge to curl up in a ball. I was just as likely to get shot by one of my companions as get bit by a zombie.

Rolling to my side, I took the ghoul with me, then got my knees between us. I lifted my hand as I came upright and drove my fist into the ghoul’s face again. Something snapped inside of me and I went at the green-eyed monster. I battered him over and over again, fists rising and falling until there was something like pulp under me. When he finally stopped twitching, I crawled away and vomited up everything that was in my stomach.

“Jesus Christ, Tragger. Remind me to never piss you off.”

Someone touched the back of my neck. A hand that was cool and soft. I looked around and smiled even though the act of drawing my torn lips around my teeth sent fresh spikes of pain through my face.

“Lisa,” I said.

She looked harried and glanced around the area as shaped moved around us. I recognized a few from the camp she’d established in my old neighborhood. Men, women, and even a few kids moved among the mass of zombies bashing in heads. Knocking them down and breaking necks. It was an efficient but gory job that they went at with something like gusto.

“You okay, big guy?”

“I’d hug you but I don’t think I can move,” I said.

“That’s okay. You smell like shit anyway.”

I snorted back a laugh and wiped my mouth.

Then I collapsed.

A few minutes later they helped me out of the area. I stayed lucid but I was also in a daze and the world took on a surreal feel as they dragged me away.

I didn’t exactly pass out but I was certainly in a daze. We moved away from the battleground, leaving piles of bodies. Some still twitched or tried crawling across the ground. But the others, along with Scott and a newly acquired crowbar he wielded with gusto, turned the last few zombies into twice dead corpses.

The morning was gone and afternoon was setting in. Clouds drifted by, cutting the sun’s rays in and out as we staggered away. Lisa stuck to my side, as did Maddy. I recognized the Asian nurse who’d healed Katherine when I brought her to Lisa’s collective. Katherine had been shot by a ghoul who’d stalked us at the cabin up in the hills.

Lisa’s men and women set up a camp with the remains of the trucks and vehicles from the enclave near my old house and arrayed the vehicles so that, in the event of trouble, they’d be able to make a hasty exit. That came not long after I’d met them. I had been attempting to capture a ghoul so I could understand what they wanted. It had gone sour and an army of the dead had assaulted the location.

As I scanned the new area of operation, I let out a little gasp. There was my armored SUV, and it was mostly in one piece.

“You kept her,” I said.

“We did but we repurposed the vehicle. Stick around this time and maybe you can have her back,” she said with a smirk.

“Thank you for rescuing us, Lisa.”

“Not sure I should have. When you show up, things go to hell fast,” she said with a grimace.

“I’m sorry about what happened, Lisa. Genuinely sorry,” I said lamely.

“Erik, it wasn’t just the ghoul you tried to bring back. We had a patrol out who were on their way to report the mass of undead. You bringing the ghoul back wasn’t what set them off. We were about to be surrounded anyway. I guess they’d been planning it for a while, judging by how organized they were.”

“Before you showed up, Edward, one of my guys, was bitten. Did he get away?” I asked.

“We took care of him. Scott did, actually. It was quick,” Lisa assured me.

I nodded and fought off passing out.

I got a grip and told Lisa about the hellhole we’d been tossed in. I told her about the people who were stuck in cages and forced to eat the flesh of the dead. She didn’t speak and, instead, gave me her full attention. I spilled everything about the days we were stuck in there. I talked about Haley and how Lee had executed her in front of us. Then I told her about killing him and liberating the living from the camp.

I explained how we’d hid for a day and licked our wounds. During that time some of the refugees had left out little group, leaving us with our few remaining friends. I thought of Chris and how he’d made a run for it when we’d been attacked. Where was he now?

Lisa had taken a seat on the ground with her legs crossed in front of me. At one point, she leaned forward and patted my hand. I appreciated the contact but I didn’t want to feel sorry for myself.

A familiar figure approached us and I couldn’t help but grin.

“Thomas,” I said.

“That’s me. And look at you. You’re a fucking mess,” he said.

Thomas and Pat had been the first people I’d met at the Wal-Mart. They’d allowed me to stay, and it was thanks to them that I’d met Katherine. Pat was dead but the fact that Thomas was here, with Lisa’s group, reminded me there still hope in the world.

“They found us in the woods and saved us,” Lisa said. “We were attacked by dozens of the green-eyed monsters, along with a small army of the dead. They trashed a lot of our trucks but we managed to escape. The wreckage is a few miles to the east,” Lisa said.

“Hey. We’re here to help each other our, right?” Thomas said with a wry smirk. “It was Tragger here who told us all about you.”

“So what happened to Katherine?” I asked.

“She was taken along with a few others,” Lisa met my eyes. “We tried to get her back but they dragged her away. They got about half a dozen of our guys and escaped. We’ve looked day and night for them but it wasn’t until yesterday that we found any sign.”

I waited, expecting them to tell me that Katherine was dead.

“We think it’s them, but there’s a problem,” Thomas interjected. “After we escaped, we thought those who had been captured would be killed, but we found signs of something unexpected.”

“Very unexpected,” Lisa said.

“Just tell me if she’s dead,” I said.

“Don’t know for sure, but there’s a place where a bunch of people are being held,” Lisa said.

“Great. Another ghoul camp.”

“Not quite. It’s a camp all right, but its run by people,” Thomas said.

“What do you mean?”

Lisa stood up and stretched her legs. She brushed leaves off her pants, and then looked me in the eye.

“They seem to be helping the ghouls,” she said.

“What?” Scott said in shock, beating me to the punch.

“Not only helping, I think they worship the green-eye’s.”

Just when I thought the world had gone completely insane it did its best to one-up itself.

M
addy took care of me
, but all I wanted to do was get out of the seat.

They’d taken me into a beat up, old silver RV that was stacked from floor to roof with boxes and crates of supplies. A dozen packs of distilled water sat in one corner, covered with a box of old music tapes and magazines. I spotted a stack of comic books and thought about how relaxing it would be to lay down and read one. Didn’t matter what it was about, I just wanted to chill for an hour. The past week had been a journey into hell I didn’t want to think about.

She treated me with the same methodic and cold precision she’d done before. Salve for abrasions and, in one spot on my left arm, she said she needed to apply stitches to an open wound.

“Ow,” I said.

“Don’t be such a baby. I haven’t even started stitching yet.”

“Don’t you have any lidocaine or something?”

“This is the end of the world. We save that stuff for the big wounds like Katherine had. Remember the gunshot? Suck it up, Tragger.” She scraped dirt out, and then applied straight alcohol.

I remembered Katherine getting shot and how I’d raced back to find help. I remembered it all too well. Maddy had probably saved her life.

I gritted my teeth and clenched the chair arm with my free hand.

Katherine was out there and every moment I waited was another one she grew farther and farther away.

Maybe it was time to consider the fact that she might be dead. For all I knew, she had been killed, or worse, was one of the dead.

The cut burned like it was on fire. I squinted my eyes as Maddy put a piece of string into a sewing needle.

“Won’t it heal on it’s own? Christ, just put some superglue in it and push it together,” I said. I’d seen that in a movie once.

“Trust me, Tragger. This is the best way to treat this kind of wound, unless you want to go out and find me some glue. In the meantime, this will probably get infected and you’ll have to get your arm chopped off in a few weeks. Your call,” she said with a little smirk.

“This is going to suck,” I muttered.

“I’ll be quick. I used to sew up a lot of cuts at my old job. I’m a pro.”

“Are you Korean?” I asked in an attempt to take my mind off what she was about to do to me.

“Half. Dad was in the military and my mother is from Pusan,” she said as she set the needle next to my skin.

“That’s cool.”

The needle bit into my skin and she whisked the thread through and into the other side of the wound. She tugged it tight, and then looped it over and pushed again.

“It’s better if you don’t look,” she said.

“Glad you’re not following your own advice,” I said through clenched teeth.

I tried her idea and looked away, but it was all I could do to sit still while she pushed the needle through again and again. After a minute, she cinched it tight, tied off a knot, and then cut the string. She took the alcohol again and, despite thinking it couldn’t hurt any more, I was very wrong. The fresh dab went on cold before pain raced up my arm once again like a lightning bolt.

“Keep it clean. I’m going to put gauze on and tape the wound. Come back tomorrow and I’ll clean it just to make sure you don’t get an infection,” Maddy said.

“Sure, doc. It will be my first stop.”

“Don’t whine, Tragger. It’s for your own good.”

The bandage was cut from an opened package of gauze, which made sense. Conserving supplies was more important than ever.

I left the RV and made my way back into camp, hoping to get more information about Katherine’s whereabouts. Weariness dogged my steps as I stumbled across a small group of tents. One of the men who looked familiar from the Wal-Mart days gestured for me. He’d grown out his beard but he had sharp blue eyes surrounded by a layer of crows’ feet. He, like most of us now, looked like a mountain man.

“Got an extra sleeping bag. I heard about what you did, Erik. We all did. You saved a lot of people from those things. Least I can do is give you this.” He handed me a bundle.

“Thanks. What’s your name, man?”

“I’m Neil. We met once, but briefly. I didn’t have all of this,” he said and touched his facial fur.

“Thanks, Neil. I’ll return it later.”

“Take your time, brother. Now go find a quiet place and take a short nap. An hour isn’t going to kill you,” he said.

I thanked him again and wandered off. A section of camp was surrounded by long pine branches. I rolled out the sleeping bag and tried to ignore the smell of old sweat. I crawled inside it, intent on taking his advice and closing my eyes for an hour at most.

I didn’t wake up until the next day.

* * *

“
Y
ou gonna live
, Boss?” Scott nudged my leg with his foot.

“The fuck?” I sat up and my head swam.

“Guess the answer’s yes,” Scott said. He squatted next to my sleeping bag and looked me over.

“How long?”

“How long you been out or how long have you been snoring? Same number of hours. About sixteen,” he said.

“Ah hell.” I rolled out of my cocoon. The morning chill hit me immediately so I stretched my arms and legs. The wound Maddy had stitched up throbbed in pain. I peeled the gauze aside and found I’d bled through the stitches so I shifted the dressing to a clean place and pressed it back down. I’d see Maddy after I had a bite to eat.

Scott took me to an RV that had food. Something like MREs, but for civilians. The packaging was similar to food I’d eaten in the field. My meal today was chili mac. I ripped into mine without even using the heating bag. It came with something claiming to be corn bread. The package I opened had yellow crumble in it. I dumped them into the main pouch and ate like a king. Then wished I had another. Scott surprised me with a can of pork and beans.

“You remembered,” I said with a wink.

“Just like old times, eh?” He laughed. “Figured a white boy like you would kill for some pork and beans.”

The day we had dragged the ghoul back to Lisa’s enclave we’d raided my old house and turned up the food I’d stashed months ago. I’d offered Scott some refried beans and he’d made a joke about being Mexican.

We found a quiet spot and Scott produced a can opener. We took turns digging spoonfuls out of the little container while savoring the flavor. Even cold they were the best damn beans I’d ever eaten, and that included the ones my father used to slow cook on the barbecue.

“I feel like I got beat up,” I said.

“You did. Then you got beat up again. You’re a lucky son of a bitch, that’s for sure,” Scott said.

“I don’t feel lucky. Maybe it would have been better if we all bit it at the start of this mess.”

“Bullshit. Staying alive is what we do. Fighting is what we do. If we give up what kind of world are we going to leave?”

“Didn’t know you were such a philosopher.” I chuckled. “So what’s the situation out there today?”

“Nothing’s changed. They’re antsy to get moving but something in the woods sent a recon team back to ask for assistance. Oh and that asshole Chris turned up last night. Almost got his ass shot off.”

“What did they do with him?”

“I don’t know. I told Lisa to keep an eye on him but she said she wasn’t a jailer. I told her that he has a grudge against you. She said she’d have someone watch but she didn’t seem to care much about a grudge. Something about the new world sorting itself out,” Scott said. “Anyway, I guess they let him wander away. Heard he was gone this morning.”

“He left?” I said.

“Yeah. Guess he didn’t like the food,” Scott said. “Or maybe he just doesn’t like people. Guy’s a jerk. Let it go.”

We polished off the beans and Scott let me dig out the last of the pork. Chris was gone and that was a plus. I didn’t need that kid constantly taking up my peripheral vision. There were enough dangers out there to worry about.

“Are Jon and Janet doing okay?” I asked.

“Seem to be. Jon has already started helping them with logistics.”

“What about that little kid that was with us?”

“He didn’t make it out of the ambush. Sorry, man.”

I sighed and fought the urge to pound the earth with my fist. So many people gone. Innocence didn’t matter when the dead came for you.

“So what’s this situation you were talking about?”

“Don’t know. They’re having a meeting in a few minutes. That’s why I came to wake you up.”

“Great,” I said. “You know all I want to do is search for Katherine.”

“I know, but whatever happened to that recon team, I thought you might want a heads up before we head off again.”

“You don’t have to go with me, Scott.”

“I know, brother. But you got my back and I got yours. Let’s see what’s up. Sounded to me like they think it will help find the remains of the caravan.”

I nodded, grateful he was still willing to stick by my side. The way things were going, I was just as likely to get us killed as find Katherine.

I rose and went to find a latrine.

* * *

I
wanted
to lick my wounds while I headed out to find Katherine. As Scott and I continued to talk, a complete picture of what had occurred in the last few weeks appeared. Lisa and her crew had deserted their location, fully intending to setup a new one. They’d been beset by ghouls who were assisted by humans. They’d fought and some of the trucks had been captured or destroyed. It was only by sheer chance that Thomas’s group had stumbled on the remains of the destruction and, a few hours later, ran into Lisa’s group. They’d been in a pitched battle with a small army of the dead when Thomas had flanked the zombies and made short work of them.

The ghouls faded into the woods and hadn’t been heard from since.

I joined the debriefing and listened in from behind a couple of other men and women who looked familiar.

“Okay people,” Lisa was saying. “We know some of our own were taken a couple of days ago, and this is the first hint we’ve had so far as to their whereabouts. I need five or six who are willing to investigate. You’ll be outfitted with full kits and ammo, food, and water. But this is an extended recon. Not a full assault force. We need to know what the ghouls are doing and where they’re going. If you can free the prisoners then do it. Bring them back here.” Lisa said as she looked around the little group.

The group broke up and I approached Lisa. She looked harried. Her hair was done up in a tight bun. She wore a set of hunting camouflage and carried a large caliber handgun on her hip. She was a far cry from the cute housewife I’d known when she and Devon lived down the block from us.

“Tragger. I asked for you because this might help you find Katherine. One of our guys found something strange and we’re sending out a full team to investigate. We aren’t in the search and rescue business, not normally, but this demands attention. I don’t know if Katherine is with them or if it will even lead you to her location. It’s what we’ve got right now. You interested in going along?”

“Count me in, Lisa.”

“Do me a favor, Erik.” Lisa said. “Don’t even think about bringing a ghoul back to camp.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it. I’m sure I said it before but just in case, I’m sorry I dragged that one back to the old location.”

“I have some gear set aside for you. What’re you packing?” She nodded at my vacant waist.

“Got a desert eagle and a shotgun. I could use some ammo.”

“We have a case of weapons. I know for a fact that there’s an M4 without anyone’s name on it. You interested?”

“Hell yeah, I am. Got any .44 rounds?”

“See that truck?” She pointed at a big Ford pickup with an older green camper on the back. “Ask for Molly. She’ll get you settled.”

“Perfect. When do we leave?”

“Fifteen minutes. Get some chow while you’re at it. We don’t have the best food in the world but it’s better than going hungry,” she said.

My stomach growled at the thought of food. What had I had to eat besides cliff bars and energy drinks over the last few days?

“Thanks, Lisa. For thinking of me, and for everything,” I said.

“You’re a valuable asset, Erik. Do right by us and we’ll do right by you,” she said, and then went to meet with one of her team members. They leaned over a map and studied red lines that had been drawn on the paper. Jon pointed out landmarks and helped us establish a route.