Dead Living (24 page)

“I can't see shit up here,” Larry called
back.

Aaron started kicking the tiles out around
him for more light, on both sides of the wall. Sam fought panic as
the tiles fell on the many corpses below. The supply room was full
of them now. They reached up at the fresh food only a few feet
away.

Aaron locked eyes with the surgeon thinker.
He stood in the middle of the supply room. While the undead around
him fought for position, he just looked around, like he was
searching for something.

He's looking for something to climb on.

Aaron tapped Sam on the shoulder. “That's the
thinker,” he said, pointing. “That one right there.”

Sam followed his finger, and for the first
time, she actually saw it. She trusted Aaron with her life, but she
wasn't with him completely on the idea of a walker that could
think. Even the one he pointed out in the Pit back at Lexington,
the one he called Sweatpants, didn't look special to her.

But this one, she could see it.

It wasn't so much what the surgeon was doing,
but what it wasn't. He didn't roar or moan in frustration that he
couldn't reach the humans. He had a gleam in his eye as he searched
the supply room.

He stumbled into the corner and grabbed a
chair.

Sam's eyes grew wide. She could see what it
wanted to do. “We have to get moving.”

“Where?” Larry said. “We have nowhere to
go.”

“James, where's the nearest stairs?”

“Back where we came from. Obviously we can't
go that way. There's another stairwell down the hallway in front of
us. But even if we stay up here, they'll just follow us all the way
down.”

Aaron knew he was right. “Alright, when I
make my move, you all drop down and take off running. I'll be right
behind you.”

He maneuvered around Sam as best he could.
She tried to grab his hand as he went by, but he shook her off.

“What are you doing?”

He didn't answer. He went around James, then
Scott. He had to get to a spot near the hallway outside the supply
room.

“I said what the hell are you doing?”

He kept one hand on the support beam Larry
was using and kicked a few more tiles out. The hallway was right
below him, near the supply room door. Undead were still piling into
the room, but a few stopped in the hallway to look up.

He patted Larry on the back. “Okay, don't
stop till you hit the stairs.”

Before Larry could say anything in protest,
Aaron dove from the ceiling onto the crowd of walkers near the
door. Sam screamed in fear and surprise. Aaron and the undead
crashed to the floor.

Larry didn't hesitate, and jumped down. There
was a walker a few feet away that Aaron missed. Larry shot it in
the head. He helped Scott climb down, then James. The two of them
sprinted down the hallway. Sam jumped down on her own, then pulled
against Larry's hand.

“We have to help Aaron.”

Larry took a quick look at the pile. The
walkers struggled to climb to their feet, fighting against their
own lack of balance and rotting muscles. To Larry, it looked like
they were swarming Aaron.

“We can't help him. Let's go!”

He grabbed her hand and pulled her along. He
saw James and Scott just getting to the stairwell door at the end
of the hall. A corpse tried to lunge at them from a side office,
but a shot from Larry dropped it to the ground.

They were nearly to the door when Sam pulled
free of Larry's grip. She gave him a hard look. She was numb, but
she was certain of one thing.

“I'm not leaving Aaron.”

Larry grabbed her shoulders. “He's gone. He
sacrificed himself to-”

He stopped when he saw movement from where
they came from. Someone was running toward them, which he knew even
the freshest of walkers had trouble doing.

“Holy shit,” he said slowly.

Aaron stopped in front of Larry and Sam. He
breathed hard, just a little winded from the ceiling dive. He had
trouble pulling himself out of the pile of corpses. His foot pushed
into one's stomach as he stood up. He still had a bit of intestine
on his shoe. He leaned over on his knees for a second while
everyone just stared at him in disbelief. Sam dropped to one knee
and held his face in her hands.

“Aaron?”

“Yeah?”

“Are you bit?”

“No.”

“How-?”

He cut her off with a wave of his hand. The
mass of undead lead by the surgeon were slowly gaining ground, and
there was another group coming from their right as well. “Come on,
let's hit the stairs.”

They moved into the darkened stairwell. James
took a step going down, but Larry stopped him. He saw movement
right before the door shut, and now they could all hear them, just
ten steps down.

“Corpses,” he said.

“Can we fight our way through them?”

Listening for only a second answered the
question. They couldn't see them on the stairwell, but the walkers'
moans told them there were more than they could handle.

“We have to go up.”

They ran up the stairs to the third floor.
Aaron peered through the glass window, knowing there were walkers
right behind them.

They didn't see the single walker coming down
the stairs from the fourth floor, just a few feet from them.

It jumped on James. The doctor panicked and
started screaming. He couldn't see the walker attacking him. He
tried to push back with his hands, and felt his fingers slide into
the walker's eyes. He spun around, out of control.

Aaron moved in to help. James toppled over
the railing, taking Aaron with him.

“We've gotta move!” Scott shouted.

Larry threw open the door. Enough light
spilled in from the hallway to let them see what was happening.

James was all the way over the railing,
hanging on by a single hand. His other hand clutched Aaron's wrist.
Aaron had the two backpacks of medical supplies. James had dropped
them when they went over the railing. The walker that attacked
James had fallen to the bottom, three floors down.

A long way down.

Aaron looked to his left to see the walkers
only about fifteen feet away, all gathered on the steps. The
stairwell was full of them. They moved in from the first and second
floors, their noses full of the delicious scent of fresh meat.

He saw the surgeon in the middle of the
undead. Thinker or not, he was hungry.

Larry and Scott grabbed James' arm and
started pulling. Sam held the door open. She fired at a few walkers
limping toward them on the third floor. If they didn't hurry,
they'd be surrounded on all sides.

Aaron looked up at James. The doctor's face
was full of pain. He held on with all his might, but his grip was
slipping, and Aaron knew it. Larry and Scott had a hold on him, but
Aaron felt his wrist slip a bit in James' grasp.

He knew this was the end of the line. He was
angry, and only had himself to blame. Everything could have went
differently, but he wasn't willing to give up his secret.

Aaron tossed the two backpacks straight up as
hard as he could. Scott reached out and caught them.

James' strength finally gave out.

Aaron fell down the middle of the stairwell.
They didn't hear him scream, or meet his fate at the bottom,
because of the sound of the undead.

Sam still held her post at the door, shooting
the walkers that stumbled closer. She risked a look back and saw
them pulling James over the railing. The undead were almost on
them. She waited for the men to pull Aaron up, but instead they
moved past her into the hallway.

“Where's Aaron?”

James was trying not to fall apart. “I'm so
sorry,” he said, tears filling his eyes. “I just couldn't hold
on-”

Sam took a deep breath. “Then we go and get
him.”

Larry grabbed her shoulders and pulled her
inside the hall. He shut the stairwell door, knowing the undead had
a tough time with doorknobs. If one of them could think, like Aaron
said, then they had to keep moving.

“He's gone,” he said. “I'm sorry,
Samantha.”

Larry knew Samantha was the strongest woman
at Lexington. But her face twitched just a little as she fought
emotions she wasn't used to.

“Come on,” Scott said. “We have to get out of
here.”

Sam let them lead her through the hospital,
but her mind was far away.

Aaron woke up, but couldn't open his eyes.
The pain immediately hit him, all throughout his head. He tried to
sit up, but a wave of nausea washed over him, and he had to lay
back down before he vomited. He groaned and tried to wipe the sweat
from his forehead.

He felt a warm hand grab his own. It wasn't a
walker. Sam? The hand felt too small.

“Charlie? I think he's awake.”

He willed himself to open his eyes. He looked
up at a blurry image of someone sitting next to him. Slowly, the
world slid back into focus. A young girl, no more than ten years
old, held onto Aaron's hand. She was a cute kid, even with her
dirty face and tangled blond hair.

He tried to sit up again. A man knelt down
and put a hand on his chest.

“Whoa there, friend. I wouldn't move just
yet. You've been drifting in and out for a half-moon cycle. I doubt
you're ready to be hopping up and down.”

Aaron didn't bother fighting him. “Where am
I?”

“Hell. I'm sure you already knew that.”

He sat up slowly and studied his
surroundings. They were in a moving truck, similar to the ones they
used at Lexington. There wasn't a sliding door to get to the front
cab, and the rear door had been removed. In its place was a set of
iron bars, welded together and secured to the back decades ago.

It was a mobile prison.

“Do you think you can stand up?” the man
named Charlie asked.

Charlie and the little girl both helped Aaron
to his feet. He lost his balance for a moment. He had to put a hand
on the side wall to steady himself.

Aaron had so many questions. He looked at
Charlie. Charlie looked about ten years older than Aaron. He had
bright red hair with freckles. He didn't even wear a shirt, but
Aaron saw why. He had given it to the young girl at his side. He
looked frail and malnourished.

“Who are you?”

“My name's Charlie. This little girl here is
Amanda.” Charlie pointed at a teenage boy with his back to them
near the bars. “The grumpy guy over there is Derek.”

Derek turned his head slightly and gave a
short wave.

“Come on, Derek,” Charlie said. “Aren't you
even gonna say hello to the man?”

“Why? He's just more water we have to
share.”

Charlie and Amanda shared a look. Aaron got
the impression Derek's attitude was something they were battling
with.

“What's your name?” Amanda asked.

“Aaron. What exactly is going on here? How
did I get here?”

“You're in a slave camp.” He pointed outside.
“These bastards make trips up and down the old east coast, taking
people they find, and trading them for supplies. People as
property. Kinda makes you sick, doesn't it? As for how you got
here, well, I'm a little fuzzy on that. I can only go by what I
hear when these pricks walk by. They found you while clearing out a
hospital on the other side of town, near the front lobby where
there weren't many corpses. You were real lucky.”

Lucky
, Aaron thought.
If they had left me
alone, I would have woken up and walked back to Lexington. Now they
think I'm a slave.

Aaron had dreams of stumbling through the
hospital from the stairwell after he'd fallen onto a pile of
walkers. Apparently they were more than dreams.

He walked to the iron bars and leaned against
them like Derek. He gave the young teen a nod. Derek sneered.

Aaron studied the place as best he could.
They were in a fenced-in yard of some kind. There was a gate off in
the distance, with the road leading away from the place. There were
heavy trees surrounding them, but there were gaps where he could
see houses just beyond.

Armed men walked around the yard. There were
trucks, crates, drums of water. These men were surviving, just like
Lexington, although their methods were much different.

A familiar scent touched Aaron's nose, right
before he heard their song. He looked to what he thought was the
center of the yard, and saw six walkers chained to an old light
pole, like dogs on a leash.

“What is this place?” Aaron asked.

Charlie stood next to him and ruffled Derek's
hair. The teen pulled away and joined Amanda near the front.

“I don't remember much about the old world,
but when the snow was bad, they used to throw salt on the roads
with these huge trucks. This place used to keep the trucks and
salt.”

Aaron nodded. A state highway facility. He'd
read about them before.

He watched as a group of three men walked by
the restrained walkers. They reached out in frustration. One of the
men playfully held out his hand, teasing the creatures.

Charlie noticed Aaron staring at the corpses.
“Four of those corpses used to be in the truck two down from us.
They were planning an escape with two of the slavers helping them.
They keep them as a little reminder in case we get out of
line.”

“There's other trucks here?”

As an answer, he heard a pounding on the wall
from the truck parked next to them.

“Hey Charlie?” a female voice called. “Is the
new guy awake?”

“Yeah, Sherry, he's awake.” Charlie gestured
with his head to the wall next to them. “They keep the women and
men separate, for obvious reasons. Can't have any naked loving,
right? I'm guessing there's probably fifteen slaves here.”

An older man walked by. He carried a shotgun
and chomped on a cigar. “Hey. Did anyone say you could talk back
and forth in there?”

“Go away. No one's talking to you.”