Defensive Instinct (Survival Instinct Book 4) (50 page)

“Do you want to look for someplace else?”

“No, I doubt we’ll find anything better than this.”

“So what’s our plan?” Canary asked from the darkest corner, where Rose was helping her get comfortable.

James turned to Jamal. “Were you expected to walk back, or is the U-boat supposed to return for you?”

“The sub is supposed to come back in a week.”

“A
week
?” That sounded like a very long time to Doyle.

“There’s enough food provided we ration. Other than the tarp and what few medical supplies I have, that bag is stuffed with as much food from the caches as we could fit.”

“It would probably take us a week to walk to the container yard anyway, what with having to circle around the Black Box,” James sighed.

“Will Canary be okay for that long?” Doyle asked.

“She should be fine, as long as we keep her hydrated.”

“Is there a clean water source nearby?” Doyle wondered next.

“Not far from that tree where James found me is a fresh water stream. It should be all right if we boil it, and if you don’t want to risk the fire, I don’t think small sips will kill us.”

“No, it’ll just kill us with dysentery,” Rose commented.

“We’ll make a small fire for boiling,” James decided, “but we’ll build it beside the sea, away from our camp here. We should also keep our eyes open for anyone from that hostile group following the trail. It’s really easy to tell which way we’ve gone; they’ll be able to follow it even after a few days.”

“That’s partly why I was to wait here a week,” Jamal nodded.

“We should send someone to spy on the Black Box, see what they’re up to,” Rose suggested.

“Maybe, but not today; it’s too late for that. We should make sure this area is as secure as we thought, find the easiest route to the stream, pick a spot for our fire, and settle in for the rest of today.” Orders came easily to James.

“So we’re going to live in this cave for a week?” Doyle groaned.

“Looks like it. Best get comfortable.”

Dragon squatted at the bottom of his large cage, huddled in a corner full of his own waste. The bird was hungry, but he didn’t dare move. It was night-dark, too dark to see by, and there were sounds: horrible clanging and banging sounds coming from all around. He heard gunshots, a sound he was able to imitate, but they were slowly receding, fading. He knew what the groaning sounds were from: the things that should be dead. Queer creatures that ought not to be. He had never tried to imitate them and never would. He had no interest in trying to speak with such things. In the dark he roared, a mighty sound he had seen other living things retreat from. He roared and roared, until his little throat was sore and he was thirsty as well as hungry.

The bullets had dried up. At times a gunshot would ring out above the din, but for the most part they were all gone. The only ammo that remained were the rounds people had decided to hold onto in case of the most dire of emergencies. Misha didn’t know what that would be, but he wouldn’t begrudge them. He might have held onto one bullet himself had he thought of it.

Misha, along with almost everyone else, had finally come down off the containers. They formed ranks in the alleys between the metal boxes, bladed weapons at the ready. One row of humans would meet the zombies, hacking and slashing, destroying skulls, while the others held back. When that first row felt overwhelmed, they drew back from the dead mob, retreating behind the rest of the people, while the second row waited for the zombies to come a bit closer, so that the slain wouldn’t be under their feet. Misha stood in the second row, awaiting his turn. He had no idea where his dogs were. Some might still be up on the containers, but others were let down. He knew that at least Powder, his tallest dog, was somewhere between this column and the one facing the other direction, sniffing humans for infection. The rest of his pack was scattered.

“Fall back!” someone in the battling front row cried out.

There was some bumping and jostling as Misha and his row pressed forward through the retreating row.

“Evans?” Suddenly, the big man with the sword was on Misha’s left where he hadn’t been before. He had been part of the first row.

“I’m not done yet,” he growled, perhaps recognizing Misha, perhaps not.

It was because of Evans that they were doing this. Several people had watched the mad man fall from the containers and thought him dead. The bullet-riddled corpses below had broken his fall, miraculously saving him from injury. As people watched, Evans had gotten his feet under him and started swinging that sword of his. At any moment, people were sure he was going to be overrun, but he kept attacking, kept surviving, until eventually someone jumped down to help him. People began to realize that hand-to-hand was effective between the containers, where the number of zombies was limited to how many could fit between them. It didn’t take long before everyone was down between the containers with blades in their hands.

Evans was soaked in blood from head to foot, only a few patches clear of gore. Someone else had managed to stop him long enough to upend a bottle of water over his face and wipe clear his eyes and mouth, but it could easily have been too late: Evans might be infected. Misha figured he knew this as they took their positions; it would certainly explain how he managed to keep going.

As his blade thunked into the first skull, Misha forgot about his hunger. With the second, he forgot about his thirst. The third skull allowed him to forget about how he needed to sleep, while the fourth seemed to make the weariness of his limbs disperse. He stopped counting after that. For every zombie he took down, another stumbled forward into its place, often tripping on the corpses of its fallen kind. Their lack of co-ordination slowed them down considerably as they stepped over the full dead, struggling to keep their balance. When he had time to think, Misha wondered how many zombies had been trampled by their own, or were still moving, trapped beneath the other corpses. There was no time to have such thoughts, however. All that mattered was where his blade landed and keeping track of the men to his left and right.

“Fall back!”

It seemed like the call came too soon, but as Misha retreated, all of his ailments returned, worse than ever, and he saw a lot more dead bodies ahead of him than he had before. As he threaded back through the waiting lines, he saw the nervous expressions on those who hadn’t yet been at the front line. At the back of the column, where people had taken their turn, they wore different expressions: they were hard and tired. Several looked asleep on their feet, but stepped forward when the lines moved. Behind Misha there was a bit of an argument about getting Evans away from the front line.

“Here, water.” Misha didn’t see who had thrust the large cup into his hands; he just mumbled a thanks. He wanted to swallow the water in one gulp, but resisted. Instead, he made his way to the small, magnet-backed mirror someone had hung up in the space between the backs of the human columns and waited his turn to check his face for blood. There wasn’t much; most of the zombies’ blood was too thick to spray, splattering instead lower down on his clothes. Still, he took a clean rag from his back pocket and wiped off the dabs that concerned him. It would have come off better if he used some of the water, but he wanted to drink it, not wash with it. As soon as he knew it was safe to do so, that no blood would mix in, he downed his cup in one go.

As Misha turned to form the next line, someone on the container above him got his attention.

“Here, a bit of food.”

Misha didn’t bother to identify the offering; he just accepted it and ate as he walked. Powder pushed her way through some men and women, and bumped her nose between Misha’s shoulder blades. The Great Dane was a gangly and very tall dog, and she gave Misha’s entire body a thorough sniffing.

“I’m all right, girl,” he told the dog, pushing her big nose away. “Go check the others. Go. Sniff check.”

The dog stared at him a moment longer, then went back to threading between people, sniffing them all over. How the dogs could tell the difference between an infected human and the zombie remains that soaked into their clothes, Misha had no idea. What he knew was that no one wanted one of the dogs to start growling at him or her.

Misha joined the back line, between two different people than before. As the front line changed out, Evans was forced back along with them. Misha watched as the big man accepted his water, took some offered food, then consumed them both as he pushed his way back to a line closer to the front. Misha wasn’t so eager, content to wait at the back.

Bit by bit, his line moved forward; the first line always ending up a little farther back, the zombies moving ever closer. He was barely aware of who was around him. He’d catch sight of a familiar face, maybe recall their name and what he knew about them, but then forget again shortly after they were out of sight. He wondered how many faces he would never see again, how many people had died today. He had seen the man on the community centre get tossed off the roof by his fellow travellers but not why. Others had slipped from the containers and, unlike Evans, were injured in the fall or couldn’t get their legs back under them before the zombies piled on top. It seemed there was always someone screaming as their limbs were torn from their sockets. Or was that just in Misha’s head? He thought he sometimes screamed while hacking and slashing, but he couldn’t tell. He could no longer tell the difference between his voice and someone else’s. The ringing tinnitus in his ears from all the gunfire certainly didn’t help, but at least that seemed to be slowly fading as the ammo depleted, suggesting it wasn’t permanent. Others might not be so lucky.

The next time Misha’s line moved, they were once more the second line. Everyone had their turn at least once and were now on their second pass. When the call was shouted, Misha dutifully stepped forward with the rest of them, lifting his bloody machete for the first strike.

“Kill me when we’re called back,” a voice spoke to Misha from the left.

He glanced over between kills and the man beside him showed Misha a bloody bite on his arm. Misha hadn’t even seen him get bitten, but the evidence was plain.

“Will you?”

“Will I what?” Misha caved another skull in.

“Kill me when we’re called back. I’ll take down as many as I can right now, but I’m not going to risk that I might be a quick turner. I won’t put the back of the columns in danger like that. So will you do it? Drive that blade into my head when we’re called back?” Several more zombies were taken down as the man spoke.

“You could just stay at the front,” Misha suggested offhandedly as he kicked a corpse off his blade.

“I’m tired, man. I just want it over with.”

“All right.”

No more words were spoken between them. When the call to change lines was sounded, Misha didn’t hesitate. The man who was vaguely familiar to him barely had time to nod at Misha before the bloody blade slammed into the side of his head. Although his skull was harder than that of a long-dead zombie, the blade sank deep enough to drive the light out of his eyes. There was a strangely peaceful look on his face as the man dropped to the ground, where Misha attempted to free his machete from his cranium. He yanked it out just before a zombie reached him and used the momentum to slice off the dead thing’s head. As he made his way back to the waiting lines, the former second line having already taken position, people were shouting at him. It wasn’t until he reached them and they started grabbing at his arms that he realized what they were saying.

“What the fuck is wrong with you? Traitor! How could you do that?” The words jumbled together, spilling out in several voices.

“He was bit!” Misha shouted back. “Look at his arm, he was bit! He asked me to do it! Ask the man on his other side, he must have heard! He was bit! He asked me!
He asked me
!”

The first few lines jostled Misha as he tried to get through, pushing and sometimes even spitting on him. Then he was shoved to the ground, and just like that, he was forgotten. As he crawled between legs, someone grabbed his arm and helped him back onto his feet. Misha looked up to find it was once again Evans. This time he wasn’t bullying his way forward, but waiting in a line with a group of others. Misha thanked him, but Evans didn’t seem to hear, his eyes locked forward. Misha made his way to the space between the columns to see if he could get another drink. He didn’t find one this time, but someone offered him a whetstone so that he could sharpen his blade again after wiping off some of the gore.

Everyone lost track of how many times they had been on the front line, the back of their column slowly moving toward the back of the other column. At least that column, the one on the community centre side, seemed to stay in place due to the fewer number of zombies over there. Misha continued to line up, continued to wait his turn, continued to slay the dead coming toward him.

“Fall back!”

Misha moved forward with his line once again. He raised his arms and started swinging at dead flesh. By then, he couldn’t really feel anything anymore. Beneath his clothes, he was slimed with sweat and his muscles ached, but the swimming in his head was all that seemed to exist. His body had become so used to the routine, Misha had to focus more on keeping from fainting, than he did on his blade. The next dead face, and the next dead face, finding them kept him upright. When suddenly there was no next dead face, Misha swung his machete anyway, assuming something had happened to his vision.

When the cheering finally got through to him, Misha snapped awake. There was no next dead face, because there weren’t any zombies moving toward him, at least not any that were close to him. In fact, there seemed to be only four zombies that were both on their legs and stumbling through the other corpses between the front line and the end of the container row. The cheering was because they had reached the back of the horde and no more zombies were seen coming over the walls.

Misha couldn’t believe it. He stood there, stunned, his eyes wide and barely seeing the thick carpet of dead before his feet. Had it really happened? Had they survived the onslaught? He looked to those on either side of him. Some were like him, staring in dazed confusion, while others were smiling, cheering, and laughing. Looking behind him, he saw more of the same, even a couple who were sobbing tears.

“We did it?” Misha turned to the man on his right only to realize that it was Dr. Richards.

“It seems we did.” His face was equally stunned, but slowly he turned back into himself. “There’s going to be wounded.” And like that Dr. Richards was gone, disappearing through the column. Where he thought he was going Misha had no idea; no one had set up a triage for the wounded.

“What do we do now?” Misha wondered aloud.

He wasn’t the only one thinking that, as a couple of others started to voice the same question. Soon, the joy simmered down as everyone wondered what to do next. Was there a plan? Were their leaders still alive?

“I need a few volunteers to come with me.” Evans held his sword up above the column as he waded forward through it. “We’re going to take care of the stragglers. Some of you others should get back up onto the containers and see what’s happening elsewhere. The rest of you stay here, rest, and continue to hold this position. Wait for orders.”

Everyone was so tired it didn’t look like anyone was going to volunteer.

“I’ll help,” Misha spoke before he even knew what he was saying.

His voice got a few others to volunteer, and soon some people were climbing up the ladders back onto the containers.

“Powder!” Misha called for his dog. She happily bullied her way through the humans to reach his side. “Sniff check,” he commanded while pointing out over the alley of corpses. Powder whined, but after some encouragement, she headed out over the dead.

“What’s that about?” Evans asked Misha as he handed him a canister of water.

Misha gulped down the warm, nearly hot liquid before answering. “Dogs can’t get infected. She’ll find anything still moving underneath that, and she’s heavy enough to cave in any chest cavities that we would. It should keep us safe from most bone shards if we follow her.”

“Will she get hurt?”

“I certainly hope not, but I can clean and bandage any cuts she might get.” Misha didn’t like the thought of any of his dogs getting hurt for him, but right now he couldn’t think like that. Right now they still had a job to do.

Evans and his small group of volunteers began to follow Powder out onto the bodies. He led the way, but Misha stuck closely behind him, watching the big dog. Powder wouldn’t get close to any corpses still standing upright, their legs firmly wedged between the bodies of others, so as they approached the first one, she hung back, her tail tucked tightly between her legs. Evans found his own way to the standing zombie, being careful to step on what looked solid. Still, his foot often sank into the mire of organs, bones, and flesh.

Behind him, Misha heard one of the other volunteers retch.

“You okay?” he asked, glancing back only briefly.

“Yup,” came the weak reply, “it’s just the stench is so much worse when you’re on top of them.”

Misha wished the man hadn’t pointed out the reek because he had managed not to focus on it until then.

“Just pretend it’s a bog; that’s what I did when I had to cross a mess like this once before,” a different volunteer suggested. Misha decided it was best not to ask when the man had done this before.

Once Evans had thrust his blade through the face of the zombie, Powder moved forward again and they followed. A few times she stopped and growled at the ground before backing away. No one had to ask if that meant she found something still moving. Misha quickly learned he didn’t care if Powder growled at the ground or not, and found himself stabbing every head he passed, just in case. Other than to pick out the round lumps of skulls, he didn’t identify the mess. He didn’t dare start to pick out what was limb, what was torso. If he had begun to see the slop for what it really was, he might have thrown up, and he couldn’t afford that with the meagre amount of food currently in his belly.

They went as far as they could between the containers until they reached the corpse pile at the end, the one the zombies had been climbing to get on top of the containers. It was too high for them to continue.

“Should we climb it?” the man behind Misha asked, the one who said they should pretend it was a bog.

Evans looked ready to try.

“No,” Misha answered before he could move. “It’s too risky. Part of that might cave in, or landslide.”
Body slide
. “It would be too easy to get trapped underneath.”

The thought of having dozens of corpses on top of them while they suffocated in their rot put even Evans off the idea. Instead, the small group turned around and headed back to the column. Now bringing up the rear, Misha got to see he wasn’t the only one stabbing at every visible head.

When the man right in front of him tripped, Misha grabbed the back of his shirt and kept him upright.

“Thanks, man.”

Farther along, someone else wasn’t so lucky. His foot must have caught on a long bone and he went down. Instead of trying to break his fall with his hands, he was able to overcome the instinct and use his arms as a splatter shield for his face while attempting to twist over onto his back. He landed on his side among the dead with a solid squish and a pop. The man behind him swiftly moved forward to help him back up.

“Are you all right? Did anything cut you?” he asked.

“No. No, I think I’m okay.”

Still, the man who helped him stand checked his clothes for any tears or freshly flowing blood. Even a small cut in this mess would kill him.

Powder was happy to be back on concrete, her tail swinging from side to side, heedless of anyone around her. Misha had to say he was glad for the same as he stepped alongside her. Although she hadn’t whined and wasn’t favouring any legs, Misha checked her over for cuts anyway. Just because she couldn’t get infected by the zombie virus, didn’t mean she couldn’t get other infections.

No one was doing much. People had found places to sit on the concrete, their backs against the container walls. More had climbed up on top of the containers and sat along the edges, their feet dangling over the sides. Ever since that one idiot mentioned the smell, it had been invading Misha’s senses more and more. He felt repulsed by it, and soon started feeling sick. Maybe the air would be slightly fresher up above where there was the chance of a breeze, so he headed for the nearest ladder.

Powder whined as Misha left her. He promised he’d be back and scratched behind her ears, someone else taking over the job once he started climbing. Still, she whined until he was out of sight over the edge.

The stench still found Misha up above, but it didn’t seem to be as sharp so he thought he might be able to tolerate it. Of course the stink was in his clothes, so there was no way to completely escape it. The dampness of his feet wasn’t from water, and his pants were a completely different colour than they used to be below his knees. He wanted to take his sweater off but wasn’t going to risk that just yet. Most of it was stiff with blood, and he wasn’t sure he’d be able to get it back on once removed.

“Any orders come over yet?” Misha asked the woman nearest to him.

“Only that the injured are to be taken to the last couple of containers,” she said, pointing. “The only ones not completely surrounded by a corpse carpet.”

“I don’t know why they’re bothering,” another woman added, and Misha was surprised to see it was Yasmin. She definitely wasn’t part of his column, so she had either stayed up above, or had been in the next alley over. “Any injuries in this mess are sure to be infected.”

“Some might be okay,” the other woman told her hopefully. “And depending on how recent the infection is, amputation might save them.”

“Pretty sure the amputation would kill them. It’s not like we can get at our medical supplies.”

Misha left the women to their argument. His body was tired, but still flooded with adrenaline and he found he had to keep moving for a little longer. At least he was able to stick his machete back into the sheath on his hip and give his arms a break. They felt like big, wet, useless noodles.

As he shuffled along on top of the metal, a couple of people eyed him suspiciously. Misha couldn’t blame them: he knew what he looked like, and would have also warily eyed someone moving with the same shambling gait. There was no way to tell who had become infected, and those that had might prove to be quick turns. Someone didn’t have to be very far from Misha to wonder if he could be a zombie. Fortunately, he wasn’t the only human staggering around, and no one was going to risk killing survivors. Not after all the losses they had just taken.

At the opposite end of the container, Misha was able to see the community centre and what Yasmin had been talking about. Another carpet of corpses covered the concrete between the containers and the structure. Along the building’s sides, they were stacked several bodies deep, completely blocking the doors. If the medical supplies were in there, there was no way to get to them until those corpses were cleared away.

The same goes for our food
, Misha thought as his stomach burbled.

Men and women carefully tread across the body field, making sure everything was fully dead. Two of Misha’s dogs were out there, big bulky Guard, and stumpy Barrel. The badger named Root was also terrorising the grounds. Misha spotted his gore-streaked body popping in and out of gaps between limbs and torso cavities, actively hunting down and killing any zombies that might still be moving. Root was very good at taking down lone zombies with his fierce claws and teeth, but he was a scary little devil when at it. Misha looked around for his owner, the former zookeeper who had found him as a lone cub and raised him. She was the only one who could properly tame him, especially when he was on a rampage like this, but she was nowhere to be seen. Misha prayed she wasn’t dead, as it would most likely mean death for Root.

Turning his gaze to the water beyond the rocky shore, Misha thought he saw splashing. Remembering the dead who had staggered out of there, he headed toward it, thinking the worst. Although the number of corpses between the containers lessened as he headed in that direction, the breeze was coming from behind, pushing at Misha’s back and bringing the stink with it. At least zombies didn’t carry flies, but now that they were fully dead, the buzzing hordes would start to show up. As with the dogs, Misha didn’t know how the insects could tell the difference between a zombie and a dead zombie, but it seemed they could.

As he crossed the ladder to the last row, he was met by Rifle on the other side. There were wounded humans and doctors scattered all about. There were even some non-doctors assisting, either holding patients down, or acting as executioner for those who were infected and desired a quick death. It was chaotic. Misha had thought the screaming was in his head, a leftover ringing, but here was the source. People were crying out either in pain or horror or grief. There were more than Misha expected. A couple of people had taken friendly fire from badly aimed shots, some had been cut by blades during the crowding of the columns, at least one man that Misha could see was suffering from a gun that had exploded in his hands near his face. As he stood next to Rifle, the old dog leaning against his leg, Misha watched as a man started trying to amputate his own arm. It didn’t look like he had been bitten, and based on the reaction of others they didn’t think he had been either, but the man was sure. Misha felt weak, his legs trembling beneath him.

Rifle whined and looked up at Misha, his old brown eyes full of concern.

“I’m all right,
bratishka
,” he patted the dog’s head with his blood-soaked gloves. “I’m all right,” he repeated over and over again as he crossed the containers. On the other side, the splashing was revealed to be people who were wading around in the salt water, which was good.

A long, gently angled ladder leaned against the containers so that the rungs were more like stairs. Lifting Rifle up into his arms, still muttering into his fur, Misha was able to make his way down. At the bottom, he didn’t put Rifle down but continued to the water past the rocks. Without bothering to remove any of his clothes, he kept walking, straight into the shallows.