Fallocaust (The Fallocaust Series) (98 page)

“Get off, now,” Asher shouted.

I didn’t have time to ask why, I trusted him as much as I hated it and jumped off. I took this opportunity to get better shots in. They were running towards us so fast though it was starting to make my pulse race. Just when I thought we had lost the mass of them, I could see more white flailing bodies behind them. Panting, yelling and gnashing splintered, broken teeth.

I heard a whine and a screech. I looked over and saw Asher half on the dirt bike, half holding it up. In front of him was a steep incline, one we could have never gotten up on if both of us were weighing down the bike.

I watched as he pressed down hard on the throttle. The bike jolted him off balance and carried him with a taught jerk up the ridge. As soon as it was on level ground, Asher let go of the bike, falling into the greywaste floor. The bike toppled onto him.

“Fuck!’ I heard Asher swear. I lowered my gun, and climbed up the ridge. The bike still idling, but muffled over the screaming that was coming closer with each passing second.

I pulled the bike off and helped him up. As I sat backwards on it, I saw the fingers of a raver groping the ridge as he tried to climb up.

His fingers were radiated and petrified, leaving bare sun stained finger bones to grasp and claw the greywaste ground. As they dug into he dirt, I saw the top of his scabbed head as he tried to pull himself up.

Then he was pushed down, another raver took his place. This one was smaller but more agile. He swung a bare leg onto the ridge and started to pull himself up. I could see white skull under his red and crusted scalp.

He looked at me and gnashed his teeth, sharpened and broken into points. I could see the blackened remains of a tongue long shredded to ribbons. As he rose I saw more boney fingers groping the ridge, then legs as the others followed his lead.

They got further away as Asher road on. I raised my gun and pulled the trigger hoping to snipe the leading one.

Click

“Oh fuck me...” My heart fell into my throat. I was about to reach for the combat shot gun when I felt something slam hard into me.

The next thing I knew I was flying through the air. I closed my eyes and braced myself as best as I could for impact.

I landed hard on my back, feeling the wind get knocked out of me. I rolled to my side and tried to get up, but suddenly I felt a searing, gnawing pain in my side.

My eyes snapped open and I snarled like an animal. I pushed the raver off of me and grabbed my pistol. I shot him in the head twice and scrambled to my feet.

I heard a deafening shriek and swung around, there were two more behind me. Both females dressed in torn dresses, their tangled blond hair caked in shit and dirt. Their heads were lowered but their milky eyes were staring at me like I was their dinner. They snarled at me and bared their stained and broken teeth.

The left one charged at me first. I shot her in the head and put a bullet into the remaining ones chest. I could still hear screaming all around me, it was distorting my senses. I whirled around trying to find them, but all I could see was greywaste.

I turned to run back to where I thought the bike was when I felt myself get tackled again.

I felt it bite down on my shoulder. I put my hand on his face and tried to wrench him off but his jaw had locked. I stood up, with the raver chewing on my shoulder and whirled around to scan the surroundings. I found what I was looking for.

As its teeth chewing into my shirt and skin I turned around and slammed him up against one of the trees. He screamed and sank his teeth in again, I could feel warm sick running down my neck and back which I think was partially his putrid blood. I stumbled forward and slammed him again, a clenched scream of pain escaping from my lips as he bit down deeper.

My senses once again went screwy as I heard a loud gunshot, then the jaw loosen off of my flesh. I was about to grab my gun when I felt a hand seemingly come out of no where and pull my shoulder.

“Let’s go!” It was Asher. I held my pistol, looking around in the moonless darkness. I could hear them but my ears had been too  buggered by the gunshots and the screaming. They ached and throbbed in protest.

“One of them tackled you right off the bike, I have it running again. Come on, there are more out there,” Asher gasped, he sounded out of breath. I gave him a quick look to see if he was injured but if he was he was hiding it.

I whirled around as I heard a hissing snarl. I raised my pistol and quickly put down a younger looking one.

I swore. “They’re fucking stupid as shit but you get a wack of them and you’re in trouble.” I got onto the bike and held my shoulder. I could feel blood seeping through my fingers. I looked behind me and saw three more white shadows in the distance. I wanted to save my bullets so I let them run. If they got too close for comfort I’d shoot them but as for now I wanted to concentrate on hearing the ones I couldn’t see. The ones hiding behind trees or rocks ready to rip us apart.

I opened the barrel of the pistol, I had two more bullets left.

Another two joined the silhouettes behind us, their wailing screeches mixing in with their counterparts. Their screams were fucking attracting every raver from here to Aras. What had once been a dozen had swelled to fuck knows how many. It seemed like no matter how many lost our trail, or how many we shot. More were taking their place.

My heart pounded in my chest, I watched with a tight throat as another four joined them.

I was leading them to Aras, I hope the enforcers and the sentries had their guns ready. I swallowed the needles in my throat and braced myself as Asher started weaving quickly between cars. I looked behind me, into the cold, dim blue darkness for any sign of the block.

I felt the dirt bike shudder again, and then a desperate twist of the throttle. The bike gave a lurch but it was slowing down.

“Asher?” I said nervously, his breath was a nervous rattle. His heart pounding like the pistons underneath us. He might be made of tough stuff but he was still human, and I could tell his resolve was slipping with every desperate lurch of the throttle.

“Just a tight corner...” Asher’s voice was thin. The bike leaned to its side and I helped him by putting my foot down to help brace. He slowly weaved us between a broken tractor trailer and a mini van. I cursed and held on to the pistol as the horde of ravers got closer to us.

I saw a pack of three, faster than the others, speed up as they saw us slow. Out stretching their willowy arms towards us, teeth gnashing as if anticipating what our flesh would taste like.

“Asher!” I said more hastily.

Asher looked behind him, I saw his face pale. He quickly turned back to the road and gave the throttle a pull.

His panicked jerk of the throttle stalled the fucking dirt bike.

“ASH!” I shouted, knowing I wasn’t helping the situation. I turned back and aimed my gun.

I shot the first one, it fell not six feet behind me. The second one went down ten feet behind him. The dirt bike sputtered and whined. The remaining one, lunged over the hood of the van and fell onto the pavement. He got up and ran towards us. I pulled out my combat knife and jumped off of the dirt bike. As he opened his mouth to bite my face off I slashed his throat.

Stinking putrid blood sprayed from the gaping open wound. I kicked him away and got back onto the bike, waiting for that asshole to start it again. I could hear it sputter and whine, over Asher’s frustrated, and bordering on desperate cursing.

Then a large gathering of them appeared from behind the tractor trailer.

The engine whined and struggled again.
I bet he flooded it... I bet he fucking flooded it. You’re handing us a death sentence you stupid Morosian retard.

“I don’t know if this is going to start,” Asher said panicked.

My heart leapt into my throat. I reached into my pocket and pulled out the only thing I could think of.

I ripped off the pin of the grenade and chucked it into the amassing group.

With the grenade still airborne, I heard the dirt bike screech to life. At the same time a relieved moan from Asher that sounded more like an intense orgasm.

“Drive!” I hollered, I felt another jerk as he pulled the throttle. I had never felt more relieved to feel us moving.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw the grenade bounce into the group. I shielded my eyes. “Prepare your asshole!” I shouted.

There was a ear-splitting explosion behind us, and a flash of light that illuminated the moonless sky. After the first several seconds of brilliant light faded I watched with glee as the body parts twisted and spun in the air. They landed on the tractor trailer and van behind us with a sickening but satisfying chorus of thuds.

That bought us time. The remaining ravers were looking around in confusion. The ones who could still walk, or had avoided the blast were in a stunned silence, looking around dazed.

“What the fuck was that?” Asher asked.

“Grenade,” I called back, “and it’s all I have left for fire power, we need to book it.”

The ravers shook themselves of their stunned silence as the grey ash started to settle. They burst through the thick smoke and started running towards the dirt bike again. Their arms flailing to match their wide stumbling gape. I could see their blackened teeth grinding and snapping at us as they let off howl after shrieking howl.

I reached into my pocket, but all I had was the C4, it was useless right now, there was no way I would be able to get a lighter going on this bike. I kept feeling around for something.

When I couldn’t find a thing that would be of use, I drew my hand back up. I made the mistake of looking down. My hand was covered in shiny blood, flowing both from my side and the bite wounds on my shoulder. I’d be fine.

“We should have radio now, get us some fucking back up!” Asher called from behind me. Once again the dirt bike strained under an uneven road. As we slowed down the still very large hoard started to gain on us again. I grinded my teeth, but never had I felt such a living electricity around us. I was in danger, possibly about to get ripped from limb to limb... but fuck I hadn’t felt this alive since I took Killian’s innocence.

I brought out my radio with a bloodied hand and pressed on the mouth piece. “Aras, Aras, Aras, any fucking one in Aras. Now!” I called into it. Well anyone but Killian, he would break the sound barrier with is hysterical screaming if he did.

“You made that fucking explosion? What are you doing
!” The shock in Matt’s voice had bumped it several registers. He knew I meant business if I didn’t even bother with our radio signs.

“I need men on the wall, we’re on a dirt bike we have at least two dozen ravers trying to eat us. We have injuries. We’re coming in from the north. Do NOT have anyone on the ground outside the walls.”

Then a voice I hadn’t heard in awhile came on the radio.
“Reaver? Where are you? Who's we? Who's hurt?”
He was probably wondering how fucking crazy I was for bringing Killian out here. I wasn’t sure how much of Asher he had seen.

“We’ll be in the north gate soon, open the gate. We’re-” The bike hit a pot hole and I was almost thrown off of the bike. The radio didn’t make it though, it bounced out of my hand and landed beside a rusted out pickup truck. The ravers ran right past it, their arms outstretched and desperate.

“Hold on, Reaver. I’m going to speed through this last stretch of road,” Asher called. “We’re on the strip, if you fall off just fucking abandon ship and run to the gates.”
“Got it,” I called. I was still holding my pistol even though it was useless right now. I felt better with it, at least I could wing it if I needed to. My M16 too if it came to that.

I looked at the white group of disease infested, crazed sub humans behind us. I was amazed to see there was over two dozen of them now. We had quite the clan following us. The quad would have never gotten us this far this fast. It would have been a suicide trip if we didn’t have this fucking bike.

There was a bump as the speeding bike hit a patch of road, I could feel the blood running down my leg now.

I looked behind me and saw the flood lights of Aras coming closer. I could see my men on the walls, watching and waiting, the lights making them dark ominous figures. The gates were open, with more silhouettes in front of them. My cavalry had arrived.

“The gates open!” Asher called, I heard him turn up the throttle.

Then I was airborne again.

I don’t know what he hit, all I knew is he hit it. My limbs went flying up as I flew through the air, landing hard on the loose dirt below in front of the bike.

I didn’t have time to feel pain or shock, they were right behind us.

Time slowed to a crawl in the next several moments. I shot to my feet before I even had a chance to realize how hard I had fallen. I ran over to Asher.

Asher’s eyes were half open, he was dazed and confused. The dirt bike was beside him, its wheel still spinning and its head light illuminating the ground and the dust motes in the air.

I heard shrieks and hollers all around us, the sound of gun fire and the loudest noise yet, the deacon’s howling and barking at the aliens invading their land. Again it scrambled my sharp but overwhelmed senses. It took everything I could to concentrate on getting us to safety.

I picked up Asher by the collar and started dragging him towards the gates.

Then there was thuds all around me. I could see my sentries jumping to the greywaste floor, their guns unloading clip after clip into the ravers. I walked past them, dragging Asher behind me.

“Get in!” I heard shouting and realized it was me. “There are too many, get back on the walls!”

Above I could see the sentries running on wooden bridges they had lowered over the deacon’s cages, jumping onto the ground to shoot my ravers. No you idiots... there are too many.

I could hear screaming, the ravers screaming. My men where hooting and hollering, so much gunfire... the deacons were going insane in their cages, my chest was vibrating so hard it felt like I had swallowed an amp. More screaming... but it wasn’t ravers.