Sadie Walker Is Stranded (31 page)

Huh.

“So … that’s a no? You think he’s guilty?”

I thought of the little pig Noah had carved for Shane. It just didn’t seem right that he could do something so thoughtful and then … well, you know.

Moritz chuckled softly, brushing crumbs from his pants and depositing his plate on the ground. He rested his elbows on his knees and leaned forward, pursing his lips in a way that made me feel stupid and patronized.

“No, I do not believe he is capable of such crimes. Whoever or whatever hunts us is not smart but determined. There is savagery there, not planning. Noah is a bright boy. Were he our enemy I would perhaps feel better about it. At least then there might be a pattern, some sense of what’s to come.” Moritz redirected his gaze to the fire and the jumping sparks illuminated the dark reaches of his pupils.

“Hold on—whoever or
whatever
? You … think it might not be human?”

“Is that so hard to believe? Just a few months ago I did not believe that the dead could walk and kill, but I was proven wrong. I could be proven wrong in other fundamental ways.”

“You’re not making me feel any better here, Moritz.”

“My apologies. I didn’t know that was the goal.”

“It’s not. I just…” Suddenly the food on my plate was even less appetizing. I shoved it away, feeling guilty for being wasteful and then feeling stupid for feeling guilty because it was my damn stomach.

Silence and the flames. I wondered what Whelan might be up to. I wondered if Shane wanted a bedtime story. I wondered about the quiet, shuffling footsteps and the whispers that sounded oddly heavy and strained and why there were so damn many of them emerging out of the water-washed peace of the night.

“Whelan,” I muttered, jumping to my feet, leaving Moritz staring after me with his mouth hanging open. “Run,” I called back. “Come with me!”

And then the beach was filled with them. It was like someone had banged on a dinner triangle, summoning the local undead to rise up and hop on down to the buffet. Whelan and Banana were in their cabin, losing badly to Nate and Andrea at charades. At least that’s as much as I could glean while huffing and puffing and shrieking at them to get the guns.

Andrea rushed out by me, bee-lining for the cabin where Shane was napping.

The hard, metallic slide and lock chorus of faith-instilling badassery began, and Moritz and I were politely shoved out of the way as first Nate, then Banana and finally Whelan emerged from the cabin. Their arsenal never failed to impress.

“Stay near the fire,” Whelan instructed, tightening the buckles on his chest holster. “If anything gets too close, holler.”

Word to your fucking mother. Moritz and I clamored back toward the warmth of the fire. Stefano soon joined us and Andrea wasn’t far behind, tumbling out of the cabin with Shane on her back. Improvising, I grabbed a protruding branch from the fire, deciding that I could Jane of the Jungle it if anything broke through the gunfire.

“It’s okay,” I told Shane with a smile that stayed put only as long as I faced him. “Just stay close.”

That was most definitely the plan, as all of us huddled near the fire pit, standing as close as we could without actually bursting into flames. The darkness exploded, rifle fire illuminating the mayhem in yellow-white bursts of color and noise. Smoke drifted, gunpowder singeing my nostrils as our protectors fanned out, creating a tight triangle. Whelan shouted orders to them as they lit up in turn, glimpses of pale, gaunt faces appearing when the silence split again with a pulse of gunfire. It was like a disco club nightmare, the starless night swallowing up the coherent pictures of just what we were facing. How many? From what direction? It was impossible to tell, the only images quick, flashing there, too fast to be seen, surreal and violent.

But soon the undead had something to say about it, groaning and wheezing, their voices undercutting the pop, bark, rattle of the rifles. Shane’s whimpers became cries as he clung to Andrea’s neck, his wide eyes visible just above her shoulder, giving him the appearance of some terrified bush baby holding on to a branch for dear life. We circled the fire, panicked, every single one of us panting as we watched the perimeter, eyes peeled for any stragglers heading for us. One made it, shuffling toward us, naked, her left arm blown apart at the shoulder. You had to admire that kind of determination—limb torn off by bullets and still coming for us. She only had one hand to grab with, her mouth a perpetual snarl, the lower part of her jaw missing, torn away, leaving only a hollow scowl and lazily unhinged tongue.

I don’t think even humid, rancid garbage smells that fucking bad.

I dipped the burning branch into the flames again, swinging the torch at her with all the coordinated grace of someone trying to dance a bee out of their bra. But my spazzy swinging worked, pushing her back, giving Whelan the time to see the flame in my hand soaring back and forth. I saw his face in the sudden brightness thundering out of the rifle’s barrel. It didn’t make me feel any better, not when I could see an entire legion of those things behind him, coming from the water. It was just a flash, a millisecond of strobing lights where I saw his grimace, his furrowed brow, and then the wet, slimy faces creeping up behind him.

We were surrounded. There were way, way too many, and the thought of Whelan being dragged down into the surf with them paralyzed me. Moritz grabbed my elbow, guiding me back into the safety of the fire’s glow.

“Noah,” I mumbled. “He’s not here.”

“I fucking told you it was him!” Stefano shrieked. “What did I tell you?”

“Shut up and concentrate,” Andrea said, shoving him.

Impossible. It couldn’t have been Noah … but Stefano was right. He wasn’t with us. There was no time to consider the possibilities—that maybe he got caught off guard by the first wave of undead and had been killed before we even noticed. Or maybe he was orchestrating the whole thing. Maybe he had figured out some way to lure the dead to the camp, deciding that we were too close to the truth, too close to figuring out he was the killer …

Footsteps pelted toward us, heavy, fast footfall that couldn’t belong to a zombie. Noah careened into the light, stopping just inches from the flames themselves. He was flushed, out of breath, and before Stefano could chime in with some smart-ass accusation, Noah had torn the torch out of my hands.

“Hey!” I shouted, scrambling for it. “What are you doing? Where the hell have you been?”

“There’s too many.” His eyes were wild, huge, dirt streaked down his face and sand clotting his curls. “What’ll it take, Sadie, for you to believe me?”

I wanted to answer. “Nothing. I already do,” was ready on my lips. But Noah left us, sprinting out into the roiling war zone outside the circle of light. Dimly, as if I had lost all control of my body, I watched my arms go for him, my hands reach, but it was like he simply disappeared, there one minute, dissolved by darkness the next.

We watched the arc of the torch, the fire flickering, threatening to go out as Noah raced toward the water. He started shouting, jeering, raising holy hell. Whelan called back.

“Get back to the others!” Whelan roared, another burst of gunfire nearly drowning out his voice. “What the fuck? Noah! Noah?”

“Come get me, you fuckers,” Noah was shouting, taunting and dancing the fire back and forth. “Here—you want some blood? Have some fucking blood!”

I didn’t have to see to know what he was doing. And the blankness around us began to move, the horde enticed by Noah and whatever blood he had spilled. The moaning intensified, hungry and constant, a hum that became a drone that became a chorus. The torch moved, bouncing away toward the dock. Now Banana and Nate had joined in, trying to call Noah back. The torch lowered and a wavering, orange pool of light spread at Noah’s feet. He was being followed, not just by two or three undead, but by dozens. Their feet shuffled into the light, then hands. His taunting stopped, overtaken by panicked screams.

“Oh, my God,” Andrea whispered. “He can’t be serious.”

“Still think he’s guilty?” I hissed.

Stefano sniffed.

Our gunmen picked off what members of the horde they could, but not fast enough. Noah would be devoured if he didn’t move. But there was nowhere to go. He was trapped, pinned by the undead before him and the water below. Still, we watched, dumbstruck, as the torch danced down the dock.

“What is he—” Andrea began, siding up next to me. Shane grabbed onto my shirt, squeezing.

“Whelan!” I could see it. I could see it all unfolding. It would be an accident, just an error in judgment, a well-meant gesture that might only make us worse off. “Whelan, you have to stop him!” I rushed out of the safety of the circle, jogging down toward the water.

“Go back,” Whelan said as I collided into his side. The smell of gunpowder was overpowering, ashen and bright. “Get out of here. Now, Sadie.”

“We have to stop him!” I pointed. Whelan followed the trajectory of my finger. Then he was darting off toward the dock, leaving behind the imprint of his warmth, a shadow, and that lingering smell of gunpowder.

Down on the dock, Noah’s torch flared. Banana took my hand, her clips empty, her skin clammy and too-warm. I heard Whelan’s heavy tread on the dock planks and then heard Noah’s scream. The torch overbalanced, falling in a slow arc that would have been beautiful were it not so foreboding. He had tripped, or been pushed or maybe tackled, but not into the water. The effect was instantaneous. Clothes caught fire, undead screaming their unnatural cries as the flames spread and jumped, feeding. Noah’s voice dimmed, overwhelmed, the undead consuming him even as the fire consumed them all.

More disturbingly still, none of the zombies attempted to put themselves out. They had found one meal and would destroy it. That was their one purpose. They made no effort to peel off and dive into the water. They simply burned—burned as they ate, screaming in protest of the flames even as they did nothing to stop them.

And then everything could be seen perfectly as the flames found new paths, leaping up as the whole tangled, burning mess of Noah and the slavering mob tumbled into the boat. It was bigger than Arturo’s Ketch but still a sailboat. Whatever additive was in the wood spurred the fire and the greedy flames were soon searing a path straight up the mainmast.

“Back up!” Whelan had turned, fleeing down the dock toward us. “Fuck, fuck, fuck …
Get back
!”

Banana dragged me toward the cabins, both of us walking backward as we watched, horrified and transfixed, as our best hope to leave the island went up in flames, and Noah with it. The tuffs of fire on the dock went out, sputtering, as the boat became one blazing cone of heat and light. Whelan caught up to us, pushing insistently, gasping for breath as he shouldered us back toward the others.

It was obvious why. The flames covered the deck of the sailboat and touched, inevitably, the outboard motor’s gas compartment. One collective gasp went up as the back of the boat seemed to rear up, exploding, shards of flaming wood streaming out in every direction, arcing like a Fourth of July display. The smell of char and gasoline filled in the space around us as the fireball became one mass, undead indistinguishable from wreckage.

A single moan trickled over from my left, silenced a second later by Whelan’s rifle barking back. I couldn’t move. The surface of the water seemed to be igniting, the boat burning down, its cast off pieces in flames until they too dwindled, spent. The bulk of the sailboat would take a while to flame out, but when it did …

Unless we could all fit into Whelan’s canoe or fix Arturo’s boat, we were stuck. We were stranded.

TWENTY

We had come to a point where even articulating the losses was too difficult. Condolences were given with looks, touches on the shoulder or back, and the silence was more comforting than any longwinded speech.

Every time I opened my mouth to say something, even something as mundane and little as “good morning,” I found my throat closing up. It was easier to say nothing and avoid the threat of tears.

Losing Noah and the boat did something to Whelan. He took every loss hard, but this one was different. He helped me bury all but one of Noah’s books. I wanted one to keep around, foolishly, to sort of remember him by, or maybe to keep it as a reminder of why sometimes keeping your damned mouth shut is a good idea. He had saved us, given us another day, destroyed a massive number of zombies, but also—accidentally—destroyed our safest chance at relocating. That realization was slowly settling over everyone, blanketing us in a quiet melancholia that made eating breakfast together a reflective affair.

But Whelan fought against the tide of despair, eating his breakfast quickly before striding away, quick and determined.

He decided that without the boat the next best thing would be a raft. I know it sounds foolish, but we all grieve in different ways, and it obviously gave him a comforting sense of purpose. The raft began taking visible shape by midmorning. I appreciated that he was doing his best to get us a way off the island, but it also did strike me as, well, a little misguided. His energy, I thought, would be better spent fishing with us, finding Arturo’s boat, making provisions for the advancing winter and trying to figure out what exactly was in that creepy blue house.

Shane helped me sort blankets and clothing that needed to be washed. Everything smelled like the smoke from the burning boat. We would have to wash things in batches, since the cold was too dangerous now to risk wearing damp clothing.

We sat together at the campfire with the sound of Whelan’s ax thunking an even, sharp staccato. Shane’s fingers trembled as he pulled up a blanket and shook it out.

“Do you want to talk about Noah?”

I didn’t want the silence to hurt Shane. There was no way I was going to let him absorb the carnage from last night without at least making a go at conversation.

“He didn’t do anything,” Shane said, hiding his face from me with the outstretched blanket. I knew the carved pig was among the contents in his pockets. He had been taking it out from time to time and turning it over in his hands.