Contagious (49 page)

“
Really?” His face lit back up.

“
Yeah,” I said. “Someone besides me should know how to do it,” I added with a wink.

“
Awesome!” Jason exclaimed. “Thanks!”

“
No problem.”

Hayden patted him on the back. “Good luck tomorrow. Stay vigilant.” Jason beamed and trotted away. “I think he likes you,” he said with a laugh.

“
No, he likes Ray. I’m too bossy for him.”

“
You are pretty bossy…and bitchy.”

“
Shut the hell up. I’m joking. I know I am.”

“
You’re not really. You act tough, and you are. And you’re a good person inside.”

“
Thanks,” I said, not knowing if I truly agreed to that. We visited with the Cs for a bit. Parker drew pictures for Hayden and me. The kid was a pretty good artist for his age. He gave me a picture of a girl in a tree, shooting arrows down at a pile of bloody zombies. Hayden’s picture was of everyone on the porch with Hayden in front, blocking everyone from harm.

Hayden and I stayed together for the rest of the day. We played with Argos, drove to the fields to see how the new cows were settling in, and he attempted to teach me how to play poker. After dinner, we went up to our room to watch a movie.

Hayden munched on potato chips while I picked out what to watch. I was really getting tired of watching movies. There wasn’t anything else to do and it beat being almost killed by zombies. I was looking forward to our mission. It was simple, it was just the two of us, and we would get to be somewhere warm.

“
Since we don’t have to get up early tomorrow,” I said and shook the bottle of tequila in the air. My stomach churned at the thought of taking a shot of it. I traded it for a bottle of Captain Morgan and sat at the foot of Hayden’s bed. Unscrewing the lid, I pressed the bottle to my lips and took a swig. Hayden took a drink and passed the bottle back to me. I took another drink, accidentally swallowing more than I meant. I coughed and reached out for my apple juice.

The stupid comedy we watched seemed funnier after having several shots. I didn’t realize that I was actually drunk until I got up to pee. The room spun and I almost fell.

“
You alright there?” Hayden asked, not affected by the alcohol one bit.

“
Yeah. I’m, uh, fine.” I staggered down the hall, running my hand over the wallpapered drywall for support. I decided to wash my face and ended up splashing water down my front. I didn’t think (or care) to dry it.

“
Fall in?” Hayden asked when I crawled over him. I must have looked confused because he added, “You’re shirt is wet.”

“
Oh, yeah. It’s just water.”

He laughed. “I figured so.”

I had a tank top on under the wet, brown, long-sleeved hooded sweatshirt. I pulled it off, the hood getting caught around my head. Hayden laughed again and helped me take it off. I felt incredibly tired and really wanted to snuggle up next to Hayden. My drunken mind was thinking very inappropriate things about the muscular soldier at the moment.

To distract myself, I unbraided my hair. I shot the elastic hair band across the room and smiled when it landed on my bed.

“
You’re pretty with your hair down,” Hayden commented, reaching up to touch the wavy locks that fell around my face.

“
Thanks,” I mumbled. “It’s in the way down. Not good for zombie killing.”

“
You’re not killing zombies right now.”

I couldn’t argue with that. I nestled up against him, finding comfort in the beating of his heart. I think he said something else. I didn’t catch it before I fell asleep.

I woke up alone in Hayden’s bed. It was nine o’clock already. I was so incredibly thirsty. Dragging myself from the warmth, I made my way to the bathroom to get a drink, brush my teeth, and shower. A plate of breakfast was waiting for me when I got back into our room. I smiled and dug in.

I spent the rest of the day with Raeya, who wasn’t happy about us leaving again. I assured her it would be an easy trip. Hayden and I would avoid any places that were too crowded with the undead and we wouldn’t risk anything for the samples. Besides the time we’d spend driving, it would probably only take a day—two at the most—to get what we needed.

I packed my bag, happy to not fill it with sweaters and long underwear. We had no particular destination in mind other than driving southwest, stopping when we felt like it. We left right after breakfast. The other A1s hadn’t known about our second mission. I wondered how Fuller would explain that one.

“
Have you ever taken blood before?” Hayden asked once we started the drive.

“
Nope. You?”

“
No. How are we gonna know how to do it?”

“
It can’t be hard. Especially if they are dead. Oh, maybe we can cut them open and suck up the blood that pours out.”

“
Do you think that would work?”

“
Maybe. I can find a vein on a crazy, but I’m not sure about the zombies. Do their hearts even beat anymore?”

“
Yes.”

“
What?!” I don’t know what surprised me more: the answer or the fact Hayden knew it.

“
Very, very slowly. Medically, they are dead. A human couldn’t survive with a heartbeat that slow. Their blood is thick, as you know, but it still goes through their system.”

“
How the hell do you know this?”

“
Dr. Cara told me. I assumed it was true.”

“
So are they technically alive?” I asked.

“
No. It has something to do with the central nervous system and random firings of neurotransmitters or something that makes muscles spasm…I didn’t follow anything she said. It sort of makes sense.”

“
In what way does that make sense?”

“
If you had no blood flow, your tissues would die. And they wouldn’t be able to move. They’d crack apart,” he said.

“
Too bad they don’t.”

“
Yeah, that’d be too easy.”

Parts of the highway were deserted. When we came to a blockage of stalled cars, we’d either exit, turn around, or go off-roading, hoping to find another road soon. I was loading clips when Hayden suddenly jerked the wheel. About five hours into our journey, it was about time we saw some action.

“
What is it?” I asked, when I saw nothing but emptiness.

“
You’ll see,” he told me with a grin.

“
I’ll see what?”

“
A surprise.”

“
Really, you have a surprise for me?” I asked dubiously.

“
Yes. I can’t say I planned it, though.”

“
Ok.” I loaded another clip before it came into view. I felt like a kid going to a candy store. I stashed the bullets away and unbuckled, eager to get out and explore the huge outdoor sporting goods store. “This is genius!” I exclaimed, rolling down the window. We were in a fairly populated part of Texas. The lake behind the store eliminated some of the threat at least; we didn’t have to worry about zombies rising from the water.

The parking lot was as full as it would have been during normal business hours. That was good and bad news. The good news was that no one had time to loot and leave. The bad news was that people, or what used to be people, were inside.

We parked close to the doors, which weren’t locked. Guns at the ready, we got out of the truck. Nothing jumped out or staggered over to eat us. I looked at Hayden. He nodded ever so slightly and approached the door. He waved his hand and I followed.

The doors opened easily, allowing the horrible smell to escape. We both balked at it, covering our noses in disgust. Along with festering zombies, rotting corpse parts, and decaying food, the huge fish tanks were full of dead fish and skuzzy water.

Zombiefied customers meandered around. Some were so far in the S3 stage it would be a waste of ammo to shoot them. The bag of vials was around my neck. This might be a good time to get some good S3 samples.

When a rather deteriorated S3 caught scent of us, she limped forward and tumbled down the stairs. With a snort of laugher, I shot her in the head. The firing echoed throughout the building.

“
It’s go time,” Hayden said with a wicked smile. A dozen zombies stumbled my way. Bullets rained down, finding new homes in the squishy skulls of what used to be people. Hayden went up the stairs and took out everyone up there. “It’s clear!” he shouted.

“
Same here,” I called back. The zombies had done most of the work already. In the crazy stage, they must have killed most of the patrons. I pulled my shirt over my nose, gagging at the smell of death. It was so strong it burned my eyes. Hayden and I met in the hunting section.

“
We should have come here a long time ago,” he said, his eyes feasting on the glorious display of guns and ammo.

“
You’re telling me,” I said, kneeling down, removing the bag. Once they weren’t moving, I couldn’t be sure if any of the zombies were in the S2 stage anymore. By the way they smelled, all were rotting from the inside out. I jammed the needle into the arm of what used to be a gray-haired, old woman. I pulled back on the syringe without success.

“
Here,” Hayden suggested. In one swift swipe, he slit open her wrist. Brown, chunky blood oozed out. He nearly gagged and looked away. “That is so freaking nasty!”

I don’t think I’d ever smelled anything worse. Holding my breath, I tried to suck up the goo.

“
It’s too thick,” I said, retching just a little.

“
There has to be a bottle we can put it in somewhere. But we don’t have to do it now.” He looked around. “I don’t know what to take first.”

“
I know, me neither,” I excitedly exclaimed, standing up and away from the nasty S3. “Weapons. I really want to get my hands on a Benelli 12 gauge.”

“
I love it when you talk like that,” Hayden joked. “This is better than Christmas,” he said, carrying an armload of shotguns. “I wish we had more room.”

“
We can come back, can’t we? I mean, it’s not that far. We can make a twenty-four hour mission out of it.”

“
Yeah. We can. We will,” he said definitely. He looked me up and down when I emerged from behind the counter with three pistols and a .45. Blushing ever so slightly, he looked away. “I’ll get ammo. Why don’t you get arrows and any other archery thing you want? Keep an eye out.”

“
Will do.” I hauled as many arrows as I could carry to the front door, putting it in the pile with our guns. Hayden, having already filled bags with bullets, was off in the camping section. After bringing down several compound bows, three crossbows, and more arrows, I met up with him.

“
Freeze dried food. Doesn’t taste good, trust me, but it’s good survival food,” I told him. I had to run down to the registers and get more bags. We loaded them with whatever we thought would be helpful from the camping section. Leaving Hayden to finish getting food, I went over to look at footwear. As stylish as my tall, leather boots were, they were not comfortable at all and had minimal traction.

I put on a pair of combat style hunting boots. They were comfortable and fit well over my jeans. Having left my good jacket on the forest floor in South Carolina, I was currently wearing one that came from the compound’s supply. I stripped it off, decided I hated the ugly sweater I had on and went shopping for something new.

The red plaid shirt was soft. I put it on, stupidly liking how similar it was to my old shirt. It reminded me of the farm in Kentucky. I buttoned it halfway, slung the crossbow over my back and picked up the M9.

“
You look hot,” Hayden said, appearing behind me.

I looked down at my redneck fashion. “Oh yeah, so hot.” I smiled, thinking he was joking. I checked the sizes of jackets, hoping to find my size in the black Columbia coats I was looking at. “We should put this stuff in the truck and see how much room we have left.”

“
Good idea.” He turned quickly and strode off. We were able to go back for a few more weapons. I got more arrows and a few accessories, like arm guards and arrow rests. Hayden picked up a set of carbon arrows.

“
Now I see why you like to get your arrows back. These are expensive,” he told me.

“
Yeah. Nothing like losing an eighty-something dollar arrow in the woods. Well, one arrow doesn’t come out to that, the whole thing does, but you know what I mean.”

We packed as much as we could into the truck, leaving room to work the machine gun if need be. Sitting on the tailgate, Hayden opened a bag of freeze dried cheesecake. He mixed it with water and set it down.

“
It has to sit for awhile. Want to go get our S3 blood while we wait?” he asked.

“
Yeah, ‘cuz that’ll make me hungry.” We laughed.

We went back in and up to the camping section. Hayden handed me a rubber container with a tight fitting lid. He went off to find the grossest S3 he could and I went back to my old woman.

I set the bowl down, got out my knife and stopped. If I touched her, I would get covered in zombie ooze.
Really, Hayden should do this since I know he’s immune
, I thought. After finding a pair of thick, leather gloves, I cut open the other wrist, holding it up by her fingers. I slid the bowl under and waited for the revolting blood to slime out of her dead veins.

I snapped the lid on the container, wiping the drips off with the gloves. I put both containers inside a plastic shopping bag, tied it and put it in another. We took our cheesecake to the dock behind the store. It was almost peaceful, sitting by the water next to Hayden, eating in silence.

“
This isn’t bad,” he told me. “Maybe we should go back for more.”