Survival Paranoia (Survival series) (10 page)

Lorna studied the sleeping form in the passenger seat of the minivan. Todd was exhausted, and Max was out cold in the back as well. Their day had gone from bad to worse quicker than she’d have imagined possible. They’d barely made it out of that freaking school alive… many didn’t.

With heavy hearts, and even heavier backpacks, she and Davis had finally made it back to the school. Tito had helped them put down the two zombies he’d inadvertently disturbed before putting a pistol to his temple and blowing his brains out. They had no chance of stopping him. Lorna hadn’t even been aware he’d brought a gun with him, as he knew she disliked firearms. The two survivors had snatched up his heavy load and divided it between them before running for their lives. A single bullet had the power to stop a zombie, but it carried the risk of drawing a horde their way.

They hadn’t even entered the front doors of New Delaware before they’d heard the screaming. They quickly divested themselves of the gear, drew their weapons and followed the commotion to the cafeteria. The blood stopped Davis cold, but Lorna waded into the fray. She wasn’t sure what had gone wrong on the previous run, but someone had come back infected. It was a bloodbath. There were crying children and scared adults, perfect targets for the zombie moving among the crowd. Lorna drove her knife through the back of its skull with ease, wincing as the blade continued through to the leg of the young woman who was being gnawed on. She didn’t hesitate, but withdrew the blade and plunged it into the woman’s eye. She would have turned and they couldn’t risk it.

She stood, taking in the scene before her. There were at least three dead, but Davis was taking care of that even as she watched. He carried an actual stake in the belt of his pants for such occasions, and was using it methodically on anyone who’d been struck down.
Satisfied, she turned her attention to the rest of the room, only to find that she was being watched with fear and anger by most of the people gathered.

“You killed her,” an older woman sobbed, rushing over and gathering the head of the bitten woman in her lap. “Lisa, oh baby, my poor girl,” she cooed, stroking the bloody hair as she hugged the body tight to her breast.

Lorna winced, realizing Lisa must have been her daughter. “She was bitten,” she said defensively. “She would have turned. I’m sorry,” she finished, knowing the apology was lame. She wasn’t sorry, but she could think of nothing else to say. The woman had been a danger to them all. If she’d not been killed there would have been a similar outbreak later on. She turned and shouted, “Davis,” but was unable to finish her warning.

A man had crept up behind him as he’d prepared to stake one of the children who’d been bitten.
Before he had time to be aware of the danger, the stake was wrenched from his hand. The man, one of the newest to be brought into the school, plunged it into Davis’s chest. His mouth opened and closed, but no sound came out as he slumped to the floor beside the crying child. The man scooped the little girl up and turned malicious eyes towards Lorna.

She didn’t stop to see what would happen next. Thes
e people had been safe too long. They’d forgotten anything they might have learned when living out there during the first days of the infection. She knew Todd’s shift didn’t start for another hour, so she ran to their rooms, relieved when she found him there with Max and Tori. She ignored the creepy child as she hastily explained what had happened. When she told him she was leaving, he said nothing, getting to his feet and grabbing their bags.

“You can’t leave,” Tori said calmly as she walked towards the door of the classroom that had been their home. “Max is my friend.” She tapped one dress shoe impatiently on the floor as she folded her tiny arms over her chest defiantly.

Lorna glared at her. “Your home is here, Tori, but Max’s is with us.” She took her bags from Todd’s outstretched hand and scooped Max into her arms. The child didn’t fight her, but a tear rolled down one pale cheek. Guiltily, she kissed Max’s head and pushed past the angry child in the doorway. Ignoring the squawk of indignation, Todd did the same, following silently as Lorna slid through the halls. He frowned slightly as Lorna gathered two of the bags of food to take with them, but he didn’t protest. All the supplies they’d carefully gathered while on the road had been turned over to the residents of New Delaware upon their arrival. They’d gather more along the way, but they needed something to get them through the first night. The last thing they saw was Tori standing on the steps of the school, holding a teddy bear in one hand and a knife in the other, her eyes blank as she watched them drive away.

Lorna drew herself back to the present as she pulled alongside a gas station. Taking Todd’s advice, she’d finally agreed it was time to leave the state. There was nothing for them in Delaware but bodies and memories. They would need to fuel the van before they went any further, and they didn’t have anything to drink, either, but they would try their luck elsewhere. She’d heard Virginia was nice this time of year.

She didn’t know how long
they’d been on the road, but summer was drawing to a close when they passed the sign announcing they’d arrived in South Carolina. They stopped for supplies as needed, and sometimes they even found a house to their liking and spent a week there, but mostly they enjoyed the open road. They stuck to small streets, avoiding highways and the interstates. They’d learned that lesson the hard way, and the memory stuck with them. The interstate was nothing but an unending traffic jam of caskets masquerading as cars and trucks.

The nights were cooler, and they
had commandeered a trunk of blankets from one elderly woman’s home… after they’d put her down, that was. Todd was softer-hearted than she, and used one to cover the prone body after she was, finally, dead. Of course, that
could
have been Lorna projecting. Maybe he’d covered the corpse just so Max could be spared from the horror.

The country was beautiful, but driving through it might be the last mistake they’d make. They’d spent the last two days sleeping in the van. The roads hadn’t been ten
ded in God-knows-how-long, and they had a broken axle. Todd knew how to fix it, but they’d been unable to find the supplies to do so, even if they’d been somewhere safe enough to risk the time.

There was a farmhouse two miles back that had netted them supplies, but they were dangerously low
on water and couldn’t risk staying put any longer. After a few harsh words and a whispered conversation, they’d agreed to head back the way they had come. There was a camp three miles back that Lorna had deemed too risky, but there were few options left now. Thirst was as dangerous as any of these creatures.

It was a long walk, and Max was cranky. They’d given the majority of their food and water to her, but she was still thirsty and there was less than half a bottle left. Although Todd was exhausted from
splitting guard duty with Lorna, he insisted on carrying Max so they could make better time. Now that they had a plan, he was anxious to get there before dark.

Although Lorna was more cautious, Todd’s enthusiasm was contagious. She missed being able to close her eyes without fear. She missed regular meals and drinking each time she felt thirsty. Most of all, Lorna missed
baths. Not just a quick shower or sponging clean in the sink, but actual baths in hot water where she could soak until her fingers and toes wrinkled.

The trip was made in silence. It took them nearly two hours with frequent rest stops along the way. Lorna
offered to carry Max for a bit since Todd was slowing down from the prolonged weight. He protested, but his heart wasn’t in it. The little girl was small, but after a half hour she seemed to weigh more than the backpacks they’d once carried.

Even with the delays, they were eventually within sight of the camp. Lorna stopped to study the scene before her, even as Todd continued on eagerly. Max was once more clinging to his back like a monkey, but the weight didn’t deter him so close to his goal.

Lorna called to him frantically. “Todd, something’s wrong here,” she said urgently. “They should be hailing us at this point, shouldn’t they? I don’t like this.”

He turned back to her, exasperation writ large across his features. “
You’ve made your feelings clear on the matter,” he said coldly. “We need supplies, and my daughter needs someplace safe. No one said
you
had to come with us.”

She watched him, surprised at the hurt his words triggered. She’d been with Max and Todd longer than she had been on her own. They were family now, or so she’d thought. But he was determined to continue forward, no matter how she felt. Grimly, she tightened the straps on their one remaining pack and
trudged along behind them. He’d remained exasperatedly naïve throughout their journey. Perhaps it was her fault, she considered. She’d done her best to keep them safe, and he’d been allowed to remain nearly as sheltered from their reality as Max. If there was danger here, he might not realize it soon enough.

She studied the camp from tired eyes. She knew something was wrong, but her fuzzy brain couldn’t seem to make
sense of the scene before her. There were fences surrounding the camp, but a low gate provided access. Lorna saw a hodgepodge of housing before her. Tents were scattered amongst RVs, trucks, cars and vans. There were fire pits before her, but no lingering smell of smoke, nor any tendrils drifting to the sky above. No movement could be seen within its perimeter either and that seemed off. Shouldn’t there be people still out and about? The sun was rapidly setting, but it wasn’t dark quite yet.

She quickened her steps. They needed to leave. There was something drastically wrong, even though the military patrolled the perimeter. If the camp was so safe, why were there so many guards but no one else within sight? Were the people being held captive within? The only thing Lorna was certain of was that this was not the place for them.

Just as she grasped Todd’s arm, trying frantically to pull him back before he crossed the barrier, she heard Max’s scream. She finally understood what was wrong with the camp. There were no survivors here. She tugged her machete free with one smooth motion and sank the blade through the zombie’s neck. She didn’t stop to revel in her success… there were more where that one had come from. The military had been overrun… the proof was before her, as the zombies in camouflage struggled to get past the gate. Todd was clutching Max to his chest, tears rolling large and unchecked down his face as he looked at his daughter. She held one arm tight to her body, but even in the fading light, Lorna could see where a chunk of flesh had been torn from the girl’s arm.

Lorna hoisted her pack higher on her back before tightening the straps. She’d lost a lot of weight over the last two weeks… weight she could ill-afford to lose. Still, she didn’t seem to have much of an appetite any longer, and ate only when her stomach growled in protest. She drank copious amounts of water, and that kept hunger at bay. If only it stopped the dreams…

The zombie soldiers let out an inhuman cry at the promise of fresh meat, drawing others from the shadows of the camp. Lorna didn’t know how long they’d been dead… or undead… but there had been civilians within the barricade as well. She tugged at Todd’s arm, frantic now, but he refused to budge. He clung to his daughter, kneeling in the dirt and keening in pain. Max had passed out… at least Lorna thought the girl was still alive. She wouldn’t be for long, however. The change was rapid, and it wouldn’t be much longer before he was holding a hungry shell of what used to be his daughter.

A loud crack drew her attention back to the gate. It was a weak thing, held in place by a meager bicycle chain. The horde pressed against it hungrily, straining the hinges as the fought to get to the humans before them. With one last protest, the gate gave way and the zombies fell all over one another in an effort to be the first to food. It was like some grotesque twist on slapstick comedy, she thought tiredly as the
things
tangled with each other. One would gain its feet only to be pulled back down by another.

“Todd, we need to go. Come on,” she said, brandishing the machete and removing the head of the first to get within spitting distance of the father and daughter. His grief put him beyond caring, however, and he made no move to stand.
She nipped forward and killed another pair of zombies in fatigues, no longer wasting her breath. She couldn’t get through to him, not while his child lay dying in his arms. She focused instead on eliminating the threat before them, but knew the effort was futile. Even as she watched, more swarmed the broken remnants of the gate. There were at least fifty of them, and she couldn’t kill them all. Not alone.

“Todd, please,” she cried, backing away from the approaching menace. He spared one glance for her, and his expression was bleak.
Then he pulled his unconscious child closer to him as though he could change the future if he merely wished hard enough. Lorna knew there was no saving him. His daughter was dead… he didn’t intend to survive without her. She darted forward, taking out the closest threat to him. With a heavy heart, she gripped his hair in one fist, bringing his mouth to hers in a crushing kiss. Then she planted a softer kiss on Max’s forehead before turning her back on the pair of them and running back the direction they’d come.

Lorna pushed the memories away, but she could still hear Todd’s screams echoing in the corridors of her mind. She imagined he was one of them now. He and Max were together in her mind, a zombie father and daughter shambling aimlessly in search of food. Would the urge to protect his daughter transcend death? She didn’t know, and refused to dwell on it. All she knew was she wouldn’t head back that way again. She couldn’t bear the thought of running into them down the road. They were dead, but she still had a life to live.

The first night was terrifying. She tried not to travel after dark, but she had no choice. The sun had set during her mad dash for the van, and she’d made the last mile without even the pale light of stars to guide her way. She’d spent one last sleepless night in the van before setting out at first light. She carried two empty backpacks with her but didn’t stop to scavenge until the third day. By then she was staggering down the road, weaving drunkenly from side to side. She couldn’t have cared less about eating, but she needed water desperately.

Four houses later, she had a nice haul. One pack was filled with water while the second she’d stored food in. She didn’t care that the crackers were likely stale. They’d fill the aching hole in her stomach, even if the taste left something to be desired. She had
food and water. She had a few sharp knives to defend herself, and her favored machete. She was a survivor, after all. She’d be fine.

One thing she knew for sure…
Lorna was on her own once more, and this time she intended to stay that way. Anyone who linked their fate to hers was doomed.
She
might live a long life, but she’d live it alone. She wouldn’t risk any attachments from this point forward.

Taking a meager sip of water, she slipped the bottle in one of the pockets of her cargo pants. It had been nice to find a house where the owner had once been her size, she mused. Then, blanking her mind once more, she turned to the road before her and ventured on. Lorna wanted to cover another few miles before darkness fell.