Fire Birds (22 page)

“Fook yah, hoo-mahn,” I said in a whisper.

I went into each room, my bat’leth ready. I found each room unoccupied. I saved the bedroom at the end of the hall for last. I turned the knob and pushed the door open. Princess Leia was already standing. We regarded each other in silence. The only change from the night before was that her hair had fallen some in front and hung down in her face. For some reason, it made her even more attractive.

Her top lip curled back, and she hissed.

“You know what sucks?” I said to her and stepped just shy of the line on the floor. “The shitty thing is that the future of humanity, if there is one, won’t include any contributions from you. Instead, the DNA and genes or whatever that are passed on will be from shitheads–cavemen–like Bruce and Corndog…and me. Well, if there are any women left, that is.”

She ran at me. The chain snapped taught, but she continued until her bare feet pawed the air and she slammed down on her back. She lay there gagging against her collar. I wondered if she’d broken her own neck. She squirmed and a puddle of urine spread beneath her.

“Damn shame.”

I stepped out, shut the door, and went back to the living room. Bruce was definitely gone. I looked at my watch. It was twenty minutes before ten. The meeting with Pastor Andrew at the old shopping plaza would be underway soon. Bruce knew about the meeting. Sara wanted Bruce to know about it, which meant...

Hell, I had no idea what that meant. I had to get there to stop whatever ugliness was about to go down…or participate in it…or…something. All I knew for sure was that there were angry people showing up for a meeting, and I needed to be one of them.

The AR-15 and bug out weapons were in my truck, but there was no way I could get in there with the crowd around the truck and garage. I looked at my watch again. I didn’t have time; I had to go. I went to the windows again for a look. The north side of the house–the side with the driveway and garage–was the most infested side. There were zombies on the lawn on the south side of the house, but I thought if I left the house in a hard run, I could pick my way through them and get clear.

I took a moment to clean my nose. I pulled at the Batman mask, but it was so snug, and my face was swollen where Bruce had kicked me; it hurt like crazy. I decided to leave it and cut it off when I had more time. Then I grabbed a small bottle of water, had a quick drink, and left via the front door. I only used my bat’leth twice in my escape from the immediate area. The things weren’t really that interested in me, because they had honed in on the sound of the horn. By the time they noticed me and made up their “mind” to come after me, I was past them.

That end of town had been blown to hell by the tanks weeks before. There was a lot of rubble, burned-out cars, and fallen poles and trees. A few houses and businesses had survived unharmed, but not many. Even if I found a car, there would be too much debris on the road to get it out. My only option was to hoof it for two or three blocks until things cleared up.

My head was throbbing with every heartbeat, and I had an intense pain behind my eyes. I was going to have to lay off the drinking some. Alcohol, the thing that was keeping me alive, was killing me. The cape produced a lot of drag and slowed me down. Unfortunately, it was sewn into the suit.

It wasn’t lost on me that if there had been anyone left in the world watching, I would have been a sight. A hungover Batman carrying a bat’leth, dodging and hurtling obstacles on a zombie-populated, rubble-strewn street would have been an awesome thing to witness. I grinned a little thinking about it as I leapt over a fallen streetlight and felt the cape flap behind me. Then the thought came to me that Batman ought to have a bat’leth. It was a Bat’leth, after all. I looked down at the weapon and noticed something I’d never noticed before. The damn thing sort of resembled the Bat Symbol.

“Whoa,” I whispered. “Holy Klingon coincidence, Batman.”

Either my mind was blown or I was still a little drunk. I was sure I had just made a huge discovery that needed to be mulled over and debated in the internet forums.

Batman has a bat’leth; your argument is invalid, hoo-mahn.

Too bad the only person left on Earth to appreciate my discovery was a psychopath with a ninja sword and a grudge against my girlfriend.

I entered an area where there was more road than there were holes. The buildings were in better condition, as were the cars. In a nearby driveway, I saw a red Jeep that looked promising. I ran over to it, and was disappointed to find it occupied by a whole family of zombies, including a toddler in a car seat. I was about to leave when I looked into the open garage and spied a blue moped. I went in and looked it over. The front tire was a little low, but not flat. It didn’t look like it was missing any parts. I opened the fuel tank then rocked the bike. Gasoline sloshed inside. I had never ridden one before, but I didn’t think it would be that difficult to start.

I was wrong. I pushed buttons and turned knobs. I looked for a place for a key. None of it worked. I was frustrated, but it was a moped; I could just ride it like a bicycle. Wrong again. The pedals were really difficult to push. Just as I was about to get off and run some more, my foot slipped on the pedal and caused it to go backward. The engine made a noise. I turned the pedal, stood, and pushed down hard. The engine sputtered. I tried again, and it came to life. It was loud, like a chainsaw.

I hooked my bat’leth on the back of the bike and out I went. I checked my watch. It was five minutes after ten. The old shopping plaza was on the south side of town near Wal-Mart and Lowes Home Improvement–two miles, maybe more. I was going to be late, but hopefully not too late. I buzzed down 8th Street, passed the museum, took a left on Broadway, dodged a cluster of zombies, took a right at the courthouse, passed the east side of the First Baptist Church, leaned onto Water Street, and leaned again onto South 6th Street. I was hunched over the handlebars, my cape was flapping, and I was eating bugs.

South 6th Street became Burger Road. The abandoned cars and undead were more numerous. I maneuvered through them and zipped into the parking lot at almost fifteen minutes after ten. There was a group of zombies following me, but they weren’t fast enough to be a threat.

The lot was large and uncluttered. The old shopping plaza had been the hottest spot in town when I was a kid, and at that time it was not uncommon to find the lot nearly full. Then several years ago, the big chain stores moved down the road, and the stores that were left just didn’t attract the large crowds. I used to think all that asphalt was a big waste of space, but now I was grateful for the emptiness, because I could see any potential threats. This was probably the reason why Pastor Andrew had chosen this location for a meeting.

Between the shoe store and the movie theater was a circle of cars. I did a quick look around for the yellow muscle car and the RV, but I didn’t see either of them. However, I did see a yellow car on the far end of the lot. It was far away, but it looked like someone was inside it behind the wheel. I presumed it was Sara waiting to meet Bruce as her letter had indicated.

When I got closer to the circle of cars, I noticed a man and a woman inside. They were both wearing masks over their noses and mouths, and they were armed. They seemed relaxed. They watched me–Batman on a moped–drive around the circle and never once pointed their guns at me.

I stopped, killed the engine, and put down the kickstand. The two in the circle stared at me but didn’t speak. I lifted my hand in a tentative wave.

“Andrew?” I said.

The man returned the wave and chuckled, “Is it Halloween?”

“Sorry about the costume,” I said. “It’s a long story.”

“Are you alone?” he asked.

“That’s my friend over there,” I said and pointed to the yellow car.

Andrew looked at the car then studied me a moment. “The car wasn’t here yesterday, but there ain’t nobody in it. What you see behind the wheel is a mannequin.”

I squinted toward the car again, confused.

“I think he’s crazy, Andrew,” the woman said. “He’s dressed funny, and he thinks a mannequin is his friend.”

I looked out toward the road. The zombies that had followed the sound of my engine were arriving. “May I come in there with you? I can explain.”

“Of course,” he said.

I dismounted the bike, heard the crack of gunfire, and then gasoline streamed out of a hole in the moped’s fuel tank. I immediately ducked down.

“What the hell are you doing?!” I yelled. “I’m unarmed!”

“It wasn’t us,” Andrew called back.

Another shot went off and hit the moped’s seat.

“There’s no cover over there!” Andrew yelled to me. “Get in here with us!”

Another bullet hit the asphalt behind me. I scrambled toward the cars, slid across the hood of a Honda, and landed inside the circle tangled up in my cape. The woman helped me up, then pulled me against a car door on the other side. There was another shot and a bullet punched a hole in a windshield.

Pastor Andrew was peering up over a car with binoculars.

“They’re over there on the other side, Dan,” he said into a radio, “on the roof of that jewelry store.”

“I see ‘em,” a voice came back. “It’s a woman and a man. I can take ‘em.”

“Whoa,” I said. “Stop…who is that?”

“My brother is on the roof of the theater,” the woman said. “He’s a good shot.”

“No!” I said. “Stop him! I think it’s Sara. Stop him!”

I stood up and waved my arms, “Don’t shoot!”

The woman grabbed my cape and yanked me down again. Another bullet hit the car behind us.

“Stay down, dumbass,” she said.

“Make it a warnin’ shot, Dan. Try not to hit ‘em.”

Andrew looked over his shoulder at me then turned back to his binoculars. Dan fired twice. There was silence.

The radio hissed then, “They’re backin’ down. Let’s move this while we can.”

“We’re movin’,” Andrew said. He clipped the radio to his belt then he and the woman ran to the other side of the circle and climbed into a blue car.

I stood and looked toward the jewelry store. If Sara was over there, I wanted to get over there too. Because of my Batman getup, she had probably mistaken me for Bruce Lee, even though I was shorter and lacked his girth. The zombies were at the circle by that time, and some of them were reaching over the cars for me.

“Get in the car,” the woman yelled to me. “It’s not safe here!”

I had to get the Batman mask off so Sara would know it was me. I pulled on my mask again and winced in pain.

“Now, dammit, or we’re leaving you!”

Reluctantly, I climbed into the back seat with her. There was a duffle bag and a shotgun between us. As soon as my door was shut, Pastor Andrew cut the car out of the circle and wheeled to the front of the theater. Dan ran out of the building carrying a rifle with a big scope and got in the front seat. Pastor Andrew stepped on the gas, curved back toward the shopping plaza, then around the side and connected with a side street.

The woman pulled down her mask and glared at me. She was maybe five years older than me. She had some gray in her dark hair and a few lines around her eyes and mouth, but she was very attractive.

“Who the hell is Sara, and why was she shooting at you?” she said.

Her brother turned in his seat to look at me, and Pastor Andrew’s eyes kept bouncing up to the rearview mirror.

“She’s my girlfriend, and–”

“Oh, well, that explains everything,” she said.

Her brother laughed.

“No,” I said. “She thinks I’m someone else.”

“So it’s Batman that she hates,” her brother said and laughed again.

Pastor Andrew took a hard left, and we all had to brace ourselves in the turn.

“There’s this other guy in town. She thought I was him.”

“Why don’t you take that silly mask off,” the woman said.

“I can’t,” I said. “My face is swollen. It hurts. If you have some scissors, I could cut it off.”

The woman bent forward and pulled a knife from her boot.

“Hold still,” she said.

Pastor Andrew took a right turn, and we braced ourselves again.

“Take it easy, Andrew,” she said. “I’ve got my knife out back here.”

“I don’t think so,” I said. “Let’s wait until we stop.”

“Oh, hush and hold still.”

“Better watch her,” Dan said with a grin. He held up his hand to show me it was missing the pinky finger. “Look what she did to me.”

“Danny, turn around.”

Dan laughed and faced front. She grabbed the mask and peeled it away from my face just enough to get the knife between. I shut my eyes. The cold steel of the blade pressed against my face. Then I heard the sound of the fabric tearing away.

“There,” she said. “You should be able to get it off now.”

I reached up and grabbed the pointed bat ear and gave it a good yank. There was the relief of air hitting my sweaty head.

“Thanks,” I said and looked over at her. She had an odd look on her face.

“Well, look at you,” she grinned. “You made it.”