Dead: Siege & Survival (40 page)

Authors: TW Brown

BOOK: Dead: Siege & Survival

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“They brought this on themselves,” Fiona said, obviously reading my expression. “You didn’t actually kick them out. They were leaving anyway. In fact, you did just the opposite in demanding they leave the girl.”

I tried to let that sink in, but I still felt responsible. My actions had led to their eventual decision to risk it out in the wild instead of stay here where there was food and shelter.

The two of them both went in and left me to my thoughts. There had been so much in the past several hours. I had to wonder if life would ever settle into anything like a routine. Maybe just a few days where absolutely nothing happened.

“Steve.”

I knew that tone. Hell, it didn’t seem like there was any other. I turned to find Sunshine standing in the door with Cheryl Coates. Both were in tears.

They didn’t need to tell me. I may not be the brightest bulb on the tree, but I’m no idiot. I just nodded and moved past them. I felt their hands brush me, like they could take away some of the pain or something. Or maybe they just wanted to let me know that I wasn’t alone. But that was a lie. When it came to what was about to happen, I could not be any more alone. None of them would have to do what was required of me. None of them could ‘share’ in the experience. This one would be all mine…and so would the everlasting pain that came with it.

The entry area was a sea of faces. I noticed Dr. Zahn, Melissa, Jon, and Thalia missing. Everybody else was standing on one side of the room as far away from the door that opened to where Emily waited like that distance would somehow help.

I walked to the door and took a deep breath. I knew for a fact that once I walked through it, nothing would ever be the same again. This wasn’t like a hot bath or jumping into a pool where you just plunge in and get past the initial shock. This was a shock that would last until the day I died.

As my hand clutched the doorknob, I suddenly realized just how full of crap all manner of fiction used to be. Whether it was movies or television, there just seemed to be this magic surge of inner-strength that consumed the hero of a story when confronted with something terrible. Maybe that was what I was waiting for as I stood here. I think the real truth was that I was scared.

When I turned the doorknob and opened the door, my brain did its best to shield me. The room swam and I didn’t really see anybody or hear anything except Emily. Her tiny frame was on the bed, the white sheet that was pulled up to her chin had obviously just been changed and seemed to bathe her in an ethereal glow.

“She is sleeping now, Steve, but I don’t expect her to last the night,” Dr. Zahn whispered in my ear.

I glanced at her and wondered for whose benefit she chose to whisper. Everybody in this room—Thalia included—knew what was happening and had experienced it so many times. This was not some sort of secret.

“Are you sure about doing this yourself?” Jon asked.

I had a million things that I could say to what seemed like such a simple question. Instead, I just looked at him. His expression indicated that he got the gist of my thoughts.

I moved beside the bed and looked down at her. I did my best to block out the stench. I just wanted a moment with Emily that I could keep safe in my heart for when the sun came up tomorrow. Unfortunately, whatever it was that did this was bent on ruining that possibility. Her face was a waxy shade of sickly yellow. There was a single black vein that snaked its way up from her neck and bloomed into a varicose web that marred her left cheek.

“Steve,” Melissa was at my elbow, she had Thalia by the hand, “we’ll be right outside.”

I nodded. One by one, each of them said something to Emily, and then left. I only heard Thalia.

“Bye, sissy. I promise to teach Buster to shake like you wanted.”

How could something that simple be able to break me in half? I held it until I heard the door shut, and then the tears came in a torrent. I prayed to God or whatever is in charge that I would eventually be able to stop.

I have no idea how much time passed, but eventually I was able to breathe again. I wiped the sheen of sweat off of her face with a nearby towel. When I was done, I considered that towel briefly. I was supposed to just place it over her face when she stopped breathing and then there was a spike and a mallet sitting just to my right on the table.

Could it really be that easy?
I wondered.

My eyes drifted to the window. I could see the coming clouds that signaled yet another storm. More snow would mean that it would be even harder for the zombies to reach us. It also meant that we would have a rougher go of it if we needed to leave for another food run. And with each passing day, we came closer and closer to being wrapped in a sort of arctic cocoon with no assurances of what we might become by the time we were able to escape it.

“I’m sorry, daddy,” Emily whispered in a voice so faint that I was almost certain that I had imagined it.

I looked down to see her tracer-laced eyes looking up at me. Tears were trickling from them, but instead of looking shiny and bright, they just looked rheumy and sick. I wanted to say something, but the words all died in my throat.

“I’m scared,” Emily whispered, and then her eyes closed again.

I was certain that this was it. I still held the towel in my hand that I was supposed to use to cover her face. I watched her chest, and it continued to rise and fall, but in shorter, more agonizingly small bursts.

I looked at the window once more. A few snowflakes were already starting to fall.

I unfastened the restraints and scooped Emily up in my arms after unlatching the window. A few short minutes later I was wading through the snow and out into the woods. I kept Emily pressed close to me and could still feel her breathing.

She weighed almost nothing in my arms as I pushed myself to move faster. I needed to be as far out into the woods as I could before she stopped breathing. It was like a deadly game of ‘Hot Potato’ at this point.

My only real fear as I pushed on was that I would not realize when she stopped breathing. She would die and come back and tear into me before I knew what had happened. Nothing could have been farther from the truth.

I felt her body shudder once and then go still. My brain was trying to tell me that she would turn instantly. It always took time; maybe a few minutes, maybe hours. But it was never instant. Still, I was embarrassed when I stumbled to a halt and dropped her unceremoniously to the ground.

I drew my blade, knelt down, and pulled the sheet back. I kept repeating to myself over and over that as soon as her eyes opened and I saw what she had become, that I would end it. I kept trying to tell myself that it was an end to her suffering, but how did I know? How do any of us know?

All we know for certain was that once you died, you came back as one of those things. But they did not seem happy or sad any more than the ants in an anthill. We saw them as evil or monstrous because they were a threat to our lives. Yet not one of those things had actively sought me in some way that would lead me to believe it was after me alone. We’d already seen them go after a noise and continue on when whatever had cause that sound had long since moved in another direction. They didn’t hunt us so much as stumble upon our location.

A low moan broke the stillness. I looked down just as Emily’s eyes opened. In them, I tried my hardest to see anything of the little girl that I had come to know and love.

I moved away and watched as she struggled free of the sheet that she had been wrapped in. The snow offered her little help as she broke through the crust and sank in it, momentarily disappearing from view.

Slowly, she rose to her feet. Her head moved in that jerky bird-like fashion and her limbs were like a wind-up toy that was in its last fits before becoming still until wound once more.

“Oh, Emily,” I breathed.

Her head snapped my direction and she seemed to freeze in place. She tilted one way and then the other as if considering me. This was very similar to the behavior of that other child-zombie from outside that compound. Any other zombie would already be stumbling towards me, wanting nothing more than to take a bite out of me. Yet, this zombie that had once been my Emily simply stood and seemed to study me as much as I studied her.

I was careful to keep my hands away from any of the hilts sticking up from my belt. I don’t know what I hoped for. Did I think that she would mouth the words, “Good bye” or something? Yet there I stood, unwilling to draw a weapon and kill the child that I had taken as my own all those months ago.

I remembered all those times of reading to her and Thalia. I remembered that day beside the trench when we discovered the zombie of her dad, Randall Smith. I can still hear every single word she said to him that day as she said farewell to him before we torched the whole bunch.

Yes, I was very aware that this was still a zombie standing just a few feet away. But, so far, she had made no move to attack.

I don’t know how long we stood there, but eventually, she turned her back on me and walked away. I stood there until she had vanished through some trees. Then I stood there some more. I kept waiting for Emily to come back.

It was almost dark by the time I returned home. When I walked through the door, questions came from every side. I ignored them and went to bed. The dreams began almost as soon as my eyes closed.

I dreamt of Emily. Not the zombie, but the little girl. In the dream, she laughed.

The Dead Return May 30, 2013: