El Paso Under Attack - 01 (32 page)

The pile of zombies bit and tore into one another in an effort to grab a hold of my husband. The pile itself must have been six feet high. There was no sign of Jaxon. There was nothing moving in there that was human.

Time went by. Second after second ticked away on a clock I didn’t possess. That scream was still inside of me. It needed to come out. I had just lost my husband. I hated them. I wished for a weapon. I wished for the power to fight them, to make them suffer for killing the man I loved.

I opened my mouth to scream obscenities at them. To curse them, to say hateful things as if my words could damage them as much as they had damaged me, what came out was something different entirely.

“GET UP JAXON! GET UP!”

People looked at me with pity in their eyes as if I was some poor little woman that couldn’t accept the fact that she just lost her husband.

They were right.

What they didn’t know, was that Jaxon really, really hates to lose. What they didn’t know was just how incredibly tough Jaxon truly is. It comes from something inside of him that I will never truly understand.

The man is no quitter and I truly think he heard me scream.

The pile of zombies rose up two or three feet and collapsed once again. Then…it exploded. Zombies flew ten feet in all directions.

Jaxon stood alone.

He was covered in gore. Merrick walked over to stand next to him. He puffed out his chest and screamed at his attackers. They screamed right back and charged again.

He met them with a beautiful violence. It was beautiful because for the first time, I thought he may actually be able to win. Violent because all the carnage, blood and sickening noises that came forth when steel met bone was something out of a nightmare.

I loved it.

I loved that he was breaking them. I loved that he was crushing them. He was exhausted, injured and in severe pain and he was winning.

No one could believe what they were seeing. The people on both sides of the fence stood transfixed. They held their collective breaths since the battle began and I had yet to hear them exhale.

“We need to get the gates open or all this will be for nothing,” said Miriam. “We can’t lose Jaxon. Look at him, he’s been bitten. If he doesn’t heal soon, he could die.”

How the hell I was going to get the gates open was beyond me, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to try.

I ran to the decontamination units and screamed into the doctor’s face.

“What the hell are you doing? Crass won’t open the gates until these things are finished.”

“They’ve been finished for awhile now lady,” answered the doctor. “Crass doesn’t seem to care.”

That son of a bitch was dragging his feet just like I thought he would. I had had enough. He wanted my husband to die. That was something I refused to allow. I don’t know where I got the courage, I don’t know where I found the strength, but I found a piece of metal pipe that was discarded by the side of the decontamination unit and brought it down on the head of the first soldier I found.

Of course, I had only hit his helmet, but when he spun around in pain and surprise, I hit him again in the face. He fell to the ground unconscious and I picked up his rifle.

Jaxon and Georgie had taken me shooting a few times. It wasn’t anything that I really enjoyed, but I knew how to flick off the safety. Crass wasn’t hard to find. He was by the fence, watching my husband fight for his life. Crass seemed to be enjoying the show. He had a smile on his face right up until the moment I jammed the end of the rifle barrel into his face as hard as I could.

He staggered a few steps back and then glared at me with furious eyes.

“Open those gates or I’ll blow your fucking head off,” I told him.

It only took him a moment to realize that I was serious. He walked with me right behind him over to two soldiers guarding the entrance. The soldiers looked at me, but did nothing. I find that odd considering I had a rifle leveled at the back of their commanding officer. Maybe they were glad the ass was finally getting what was coming to him.

He ordered the gates open.

That’s when the oddest thing I think I’ve ever seen happened (not counting reanimated corpses of course). Nobody moved. All those survivors did not rush forth to safety. They stayed transfixed as my husband fought for their lives.

Jaxon had fallen once again. It wasn’t from any blow, or maybe it was from the hundreds he had already received. The zombies rushed to close in on him. He struggled with his own exhaustion to rise and meet them.

Out of the blue, Georgie entered the battle. Apparently, he hadn’t given up all his weapons. He had a pistol and he was shooting down every single zombie that neared Jaxon. Georgie was on fire. It was as if he couldn’t miss.

Then, he was standing next to Jaxon. Jaxon was rising once again to his feet. He moved slowly, but soon had his tomahawk back in his hand. He’d lost his knife. He wasn’t going to be happy about that.

Georgie, Merrick and Jaxon fought and fought until all the zombies were destroyed. It didn’t take them long. It didn’t take them long at all.

Jaxon was covered in blood and gore. He was also apparently not finished. He shambled towards the edge of the bridge. The zombies on the other side reached and screamed for him. Some of them even tried to brave the rushing waters, only to be swept away in the current.

Jaxon screamed back. He screamed out his challenge with everything that was left in his body.

Like I said, my man is no quitter.

She laughs at her own little joke, but I know she’s right. I’ve seen the footage. The entire world has seen the footage. Every now and then, you can still see it being played on the news. Every now and then, you can catch a one hour special on TV that analyzes the man and the footage.

“What happened next?
”

His strength finally gave out. Jaxon fell and Georgie immediately helped him to his feet. The two of them, along with Merrick slowly walked back to the fence. Some of our friends went towards them to help Georgie with Jaxon; he was pretty out of it. Dead on his feet so to speak, I think he was even going in and out of consciousness.

When they neared the fence, the crowd parted to let him through. Everyone was reaching out to touch him. Some of the people even began to pray for what they thought was their fallen hero. They saw the bites. They saw the tears in his flesh. Any normal man would have turned inside of an hour.

Jaxon is far from being a normal man.

Miriam immediately went into action. She was barking orders at everyone. Jaxon was now completely unconscious as the poison spread throughout his body.

“It’s way too hot for him,” said Miriam. “He’s exhausted himself. I need to get to work immediately.”

When Miriam gives orders, people listen. In seconds, he was brought to the decontamination unit and stripped down. Georgie took his tomahawk and held it for him. Jaxon would be wanting that back.

Merrick snapped at anyone that tried to keep her away from my husband.

Miriam began hosing Jaxon off with a water hose like thing that was attached to the wall, kind of like one of those moveable shower heads. The wounds were already yellow and rimmed with puss. The water actually hissed when it hit the damaged areas, but the worst of the infection was literally being washed away right before my eyes.

After that, she had him placed in some sort of muddy bath. I was shocked at first. I couldn’t believe that that was all she or they or anyone was going to do for him.

“Mother earth will heal her chosen son,” said Miriam with a smile on her face. “It will work; your man is strong…very, very strong.”

All of our friends were watching through the glass wall. None of them would leave until they were sure Jaxon was going to be alright. When they heard the good news, their cheers were simply thunderous.

All in all, I think Jaxon was unconscious for about three days. Georgie, Lucy, Dudley, Kingsley, Ivana, Merrick and I never left his side until the moment he woke up. When that happened, the others went outside to give us some time.

He smiled at me. There was a billion dollars in that smile and I hugged and kissed him despite all the mud and muck.

He wasn’t about to stay there, he immediately got out of the mud bath, toweled off and dressed.

Nobody tried to stop him. I think they were all just baffled that he was moving around. Miriam waved the doctors and scientists away from him.

Together, along with Merrick, we stepped out of the decontamination unit and Jaxon stepped into fame.

Everyone was there and they were all saluting him. Jaxon was too stunned to really react; he just hugged me to him a little bit tighter.

I remember, that I was laughing. I was as happy as could be. My husband was safe and we were finally leaving this nightmare behind.

“You did it baby,” I said. “You saved everyone. You’re a hero now.”

He didn’t reply. He had seen Crass and despite the soldiers trying to usher us to the waiting helicopter, Jax rushed over to him to ask about the other caravan that was led by Tito.

Major Crass, being the asshole that he is refused to answer Jaxons question, instead he threatened to have my husband arrested if he didn’t leave immediately. I felt bad for Jaxon. He had no idea how much Crass hated him. He was dumbfounded at the animosity. Which was probably a good thing for Crass; Jaxon normally wouldn’t stand for being treated like that. I led him gently away to our friends and the waiting chopper.

He fell asleep the minute we were in the air.

Jaxon woke up when we began to descend. A clearing had been made in the thick pine forest of his parent’s front yard.

“
Can you tell me where that is?
”

New Mexico. Ruidoso to be exact, Jaxons parents own a big cabin up there. He likes to ride his bike around in the mountains, so we’re always going up there.

I saw his parents on the front porch waiting for the chopper to land. They looked worried and they also looked relieved. I wasn’t allowed to make any phone calls during this entire ordeal. In fact, I had only this very morning been able to contact my own parents. I wasn’t too worried, they live outside of El Paso and I therefore had no real reason to be worried, but man oh man were they worried about me.

My kids came running out of the woods. They had been taken to the cabin earlier in the day. To say the least, they were happy enough not too cramped inside a motel room any longer.

As we left the chopper, it immediately rose back into the air. It was then I noticed our many body guards. They had sent at least ten soldiers to the cabin to make sure we were safe and sound, or maybe they were here to make sure Jaxon didn’t leave.

No chance in that. My husband was exhausted. He barely said a word to anyone. He immediately went straight to the shower and spent over two hours scrubbing. When I finally went to check on him, he had just finished shaving and was in the process of dousing his body with cologne.

“I can’t get the smell out of my nose,” he told me.

He wasn’t right. Miriam had warned me about this. She said that he would eventually go through some kind of post traumatic stress. It’s the byproduct of all the killing he was involved in. As a matter of fact, she told me that most Guardians are eased into the violence. Jaxon was put in a sink or swim situation. There were bound to be some negative effects. Still, she told me that it wouldn’t last long.

I helped him find some lotions and hair products that smelled pretty. It wasn’t enough. He jumped back into the shower and began scrubbing furiously. Afterwards, he slept for two solid days.

I would check on him every few hours or so, but he never stirred. Nobody could tell me when the last time he slept had been. Merrick for her part was perfectly happy being with Jaxons parents. She loved his mom, but she would sneak into his room and check on him almost as much as I did.

When Jaxon finally woke up, he had a glass of Pepsi and went right back to his room for another shower. I was worried that he hadn’t eaten. His entire body looked different. Not only slimmer, but somehow stronger, it’s hard to explain, but my husband had changed.

Five days after we had come to the cabin, Georgie dragged Jax out of the bedroom to watch something on the TV. The rest of us had known since our first night at the cabin about the fifteen minutes of footage, but this was the first time Jaxon had seen it.

He watched it for about 3 minutes and then left the room with a dull expression. Georgie felt pretty bad and began to worry that he caused even more harm on Jaxons psyche.

That evening, when we went to bed Jaxon began to have the nightmares. Miriam had warned me about this as well. All the Guardians went through this. It was pretty much where they learned to fight and they learned about the kinds of things they would have to fight. Jaxon would wake up in a cold sweat.

Another evening, he heard a noise outside the cabin and tore off into the woods with his tomahawk. It was just a deer, but he almost killed it anyway. He couldn’t sleep for the rest of the evening. I had no idea how to help him. He sat looking out the window until the sun rose in the sky.

Another week went by and everyone was worried about him. He rarely left the bedroom. His mother wanted to take him to a shrink. This definitely wasn’t the Jaxon we all knew and loved. All of us were careful about even talking to him. The slightest thing could set him off. The look of anger that would come into his eyes was frightening.

When Miriam finally arrived at the cabin one morning, I almost cried I was so relieved.

“You warned me that he would have a difficult time, but I’m really worried. He’s not acting right, he can barely sleep, he barely eats and he won’t talk to anybody about it.”

“Well how would you act if you went through the things he went through?” she answered with a motherly pat on my head. “It’s time that he learns about his destiny.”

I called Jaxon into the kitchen and gave him a cup of coffee as I introduced him to Miriam. He shook her hand politely and settled in to drink his coffee and ignore her. Miriam wasn’t about to put up with the silent treatment.