Mass Extinction Event (Book 3): Days 46-53 Page 20

  "Hopefully the chefs will have that fish ready for us by the time we get back," he continues. "After a hard day like this, a man needs good food, and it's even better if he caught it himself."

  The other loggers are already heading back through the trees, but Mark seems to be hanging back a little so he can examine the equipment, and I figure I should stick with him. The community doesn't have a leader, as such, but Mark clearly inspires the respect of all the other men here, which means that I'm naturally drawn to work with him. Having seen the mess in Chicago, I'm determined to ensure that I play my part in pushing the people here to do their absolute best.

  "Are you capable of making tough decisions?" he asks eventually, as he takes his gloves off. It's getting late, and I can barely see his face, but while the tone of his question was casual, I'm convinced that he's trying to get a better idea of my character.

  "Of course."

  "Give me an example."

  "I killed my brother," I tell him. "I mean, he was dying already, but I finished him off because I didn't want him to suffer anymore. It all happened about a month ago."

  “How'd you do it?” he asks.

  “I only had a spade, so...”

  My voice trails off as I find myself briefly reliving that moment.

  "Sounds like a very admirable approach," Mark says after a moment. "Not a lot of men would be able to do something like that. Human attachment is a weakness these days, at least when it's applied without thought. The new world requires an entirely new perspective."

  "It was the right thing to do," I explain, as we turn and make our way through the trees. "He was in agony. I'm not saying it was easy, 'cause it wasn't, but I weighed it up in my mind and I decided it was the best option. Of course, he came back a few days later after he got infected by whatever the hell that thing was, but he was strong enough in the head to break through and still be himself."

  "Fascinating. I've got to admit, I still don't understand those zombie creatures. I'm just glad they're gone."

  "I saw a few of them up close," I tell him. "They were just, like, rotting cadavers. Most of them, anyway. They all spoke with the same mind, like each of them knew what the others were seeing. There were so many of them, but eventually their bodies just broke down and collapsed."

  "Good thing, too," Mark replies. "I can't imagine how we'd have dealt with things if we'd been overrun. We'd have been out-numbered, that's for damn certain. Sometimes, I worry that they might come back, but if -"

  Before he can finish, there's a scream from up ahead, followed by another. I turn to Mark, but he's already started to run, and I quickly set off after him. Dodging between the trees and almost losing my footing several times, I eventually drop the bag of tools I've been carrying, and as soon as we get out beyond the edge of the forest I see that a crowd is starting to gather down by one of the cooking sites. Just about managing to keep pace with Mark, I race through a sea of bodies until I come to a halt and see a figure on the ground, with blood flowing freely and soaking into the grass.

  "Did you get her?" a voice shouts.

  "She got away!"

  "Kaylee..." I whisper, as I suddenly realize that I recognize the dress being worn by the injured girl. Hurrying forward, I kneel next to her, but as I reach out to check if she's okay, I'm shocked to see that a thick chunk of flesh and bone has been gouged out of her face, right on her left cheek just a couple of inches above the corner of her mouth. Her eyes are open, staring down at the grass, and even without touching her I can already tell that she's dead.

  "Jesus Christ," Mark says, standing behind me. "What the hell happened here?"

  "It was that mad-woman," a voice says. "She attacked her without provocation. She just came up and took a swing at her."

  "Kaylee?" I say softly, putting a hand on her shoulder and gently nudging her.

  No response.

  She's gone.

  "What mad-woman?" Mark asks. "Who did this?"

  "The woman who came with them," the voice continues. "The one who was always waving the laptop around and refusing to work. She was watching for a while, and then she came over, said something to the girl, and then she swing at her with something. I think it was one of the axes from the tool pile. Whatever it was, it only took one strike to knock a chunk of her face away."

  “Was there an argument?” Mark asks.

  “No,” the voice replies. “The girl was working. It all just happened out of nowhere.”

  "Kaylee?" I whisper, leaning closer to her despite the fact that her wound is wide open. I can see her meat glistening in the low evening light, and the look in her eyes is one of surprise. "Kaylee?"

  "She's dead, Thomas," Mark says, reaching down and putting a hand on my shoulder. "Do you have any idea why your friend would have done this?"

  "Quinn?" I pause for a moment, before getting to my feet and looking around. "She was never my friend. Where is she?" I ask, feeling a slow fist of anger starting to build in my chest. I swear to God, if I get my hands on her, I'm going to make her suffer.

  "She ran that way," one of the other men says, pointing back toward the crest of the hill. "She was sobbing and ranting, but I couldn't make out a word of it."

  "She wouldn't..." I pause for a moment as I try to make sense of whatever's happening. "There's no way she'd do this. She's crazy, but she's not a murderer. I mean, I don't really know her very well, but I swear, she's not the kind of person who'd just do this without good reason."

  "I think we have evidence to the contrary," Mark replies, grabbing a white sheet from one of the nearby campsites and placing it over Kaylee's body. Blood immediately starts to soak through the fabric, and after a moment I have to turn and look away. My mind is almost completely blank, as if my brain has seized up.

  "There was a look in her eyes," says one of the women standing nearby. "It was like she'd been possessed."

  "Let's not have that kind of talk," Mark says calmly. "No-one's been possessed. Whatever happened, it was the work of..." He pauses, as if he can't find the right words. "Thomas," he continues eventually, "is there anything you can tell us that might explain why your friend Quinn -"

  "She's not my friend," I say darkly. Looking down at my hands, I realize they're trembling. “How many times do I have to tell you?”

  "Do you have any idea why she'd want to hurt Kaylee?"

  I shake my head.

  "Has she ever shown violent tendencies before?"

  I shake my head again. Somehow, words seem completely inappropriate.

  "We have to go and find her," says a voice nearby. "It was cold-blooded murder. There's no way we can let her get away with it."

  "She has to die," says another voice. "She might come back and do it again. We're not safe while she's out there!"

  "We can't ignore this," Mark says, turning to me. "You realize, don't you, that -"

  "I agree," I say, my voice tense with anger and sorrow. "We have to find her and kill her."

  "That's not quite what I said -"

  "It's the only answer," I continue, looking back down at the sheet and seeing that one end is almost completely soaked in blood. "All she wanted was a painless death. She talked about it the other day. She said she wanted it to be quick enough that she wouldn't even know it was happening. This can't have been painless."

  "She screamed," says one of the women standing nearby. "She staggered a couple of feet, clutching her face as the blood poured out, and then she collapsed. It probably took a minute, maybe a minute and a half for her to die. She was twitching for a while, almost like a fish when it's been landed. I was starting to think we should try to end her misery, but then she passed."

  "She must have been in agony," I reply, still staring at the sheet as I try to work out what must have been going through her mind. For a moment, all I can think about is the last time I spoke to her, when she asked me to go for a walk with her. Maybe if I'd agreed, and come back from the forest a little sooner, she'd still be alive.

 
"We'll bury her properly," Mark says after a moment. "We've never had something like this happen, not since we got here, but we'll give her a proper resting place. She was one of us, even if it was only for a day, and she deserves our respect and love."

  "And then we'll go and find the woman who killed her," says another voice.

  "We don't have the resources to launch a witch hunt," Mark replies. "Besides, do you really think she'd come back?"

  "I know where she's going," I say, turning to him. "She's following that damn signal."

  “Maybe we should just let her go,” he says. “If she's on foot, she won't last too long. She'll probably just end up collapsing and dying out there.”

  “That's not good enough,” I say firmly. “I want to know she's dead. I want to see her suffer for what she did.”

  “We'll find her and bring her back,” Mark continues. “She'll be given a fair hearing, and witnesses will be able to testify against her. Once that's done, a vote will be taken, and if the majority choose execution, we'll put her to death.”

  “And if they don't,” I continue, “then I'll kill her myself.”

  Part Seven

  Day 52

  Elizabeth

  “Okay,” I whisper to myself, sitting on the arm of the sofa with the crutches in my hands. “You can do this. Toad's wrong. You're not some weak-assed cripple who's gonna sit around for the next week being waited on.”

  I take a deep breath.

  It's time.

  Another deep breath.

  Damn it, why am I delaying this?

  Looking down at my stump, I can see a faint patch of blood showing through the bandage, but no other colors. Toad has repeatedly warned me that although red is okay, anything else might indicate another infection. I didn't sleep last night, instead spending all my time staring up at the ceiling and thinking about everything that's happened over the past few weeks. The pain in my leg was keeping me awake, although Toad gave me some painkillers that helped to make it at least slightly bearable. I've only got enough pills for another day or so, though, which makes me worried about what'll happen when they run out.

  Still.

  I'm not a cripple. There is no way that I, Elizabeth Marter, am going to let the small matter of an amputated right leg bring me down. I've spent more than enough time wallowing in self-pity. Now's the time to get back up.

  I'm fine, and it's time to prove it.

  Adjusting my grip on the crutches, I take another pause and try to summon as much strength as possible, before finally hauling myself up. Using my left foot to keep myself more or less balanced, I have little trouble getting upright, and although I feel a little wobbly, I'm finally able to arrange myself more or less comfortably. Once I'm sure I can stay up, I use the crutches to take a faltering step forward, disturbing more dust in this dark, wretched little room. To be honest, this is turning out to be much easier than I'd expected. Toad acted like I wouldn't be able to get about at all, but I guess he underestimated me. Not for the first time.

  “What do you think of me now, huh?” I whisper. Damn it, I wish he was here to see this, instead of sleeping upstairs.

  Making my way across to the window, I look out at the dull gray morning. Dan Hodge's farmhouse is surrounded by a forest of tall, thin pine trees, resulting in a subtly creepy atmosphere. I can't shake the fear that more of those creatures are going to come marching out of the gloom, at any moment, but so far everything seems fairly peaceful. For a moment, I'm almost able to forget about the fact that I've only got one leg, but the dull, relentless pain soon comes back to bite me. The worst part is, I swear I can feel my right foot resting against the floor, even though my actual right foot was left in the clearing before we came down here.

  Turning, I carefully make my way back across the room. As I reach the door, I notice a bundle of boxes and wires on a nearby table, and closer inspection reveals what appears to be a radio system. Reaching down, I pick up one of the boxes and find that it's some kind of battery, although I don't really know how any of this stuff works. Still, it's tempting to think that maybe we could get this thing up and running, and then we could try to make contact with the outside world. I don't know what Toad's thinking, but I'm starting to wonder if maybe we might be able to survive after all.

  Hell, that's a pretty big change. This time yesterday I wanted him to leave me behind. That was when I thought I was crippled, though. Now I'm starting to think that I can not only get about, but maybe I can even be useful.

  Heading through to the hallway, I eventually come to the foot of a flight of stairs. My initial instinct is to turn back, but finally I force myself to start making my way up to the next floor. It's a slow journey, made slower by the fact that I'm determined to do it right, but after a few minutes I'm halfway up. I stop to get my breath back, feeling a little annoyed by the fact that I'm so slow, and then I resume the climb until finally I get to the top. Only one of the doors is open, so I make my way through and find a small, dark room. For a few seconds, I'm vaguely aware of movement nearby, and as my eyes adjust to the gloom I'm finally able to make out a figure on an old mattress. I hobble over to take a closer look, and with a faint smile I watch as Toad turns over and stares up at me.

  “Hey,” I say, fully aware that he's probably surprised to see me.

  “What are you doing up here?” he asks, sitting up with a dazed, barely-awake look on his face.

  “Surprising you.”

  He looks down at my right leg, and it's clear that I've succeeded in giving him a shock. He seems unable to believe that this is really happening, but I guess it's just another example of his tendency to underestimate me.

  “It's really not that hard,” I continue. “Turns out I've already got some pretty good upper-arm strength. I'm a bit slow right now, but I figure I'll get that sorted soon enough, and...” I pause, unable to stifle a self-satisfied smile. “Yeah, so here I am. Not bad, huh? It didn't even take too long, either. I kinda just kept it slow, made sure not to take any risks, and got on with it. I know you wanted me to sit around on the sofa for a week, but there's no way I could have done that.”

  Looking down at his bare chest, I spot the scar from his recent injury. It's larger than I remember, and it's hard to believe that only a month or so has passed since those days. Despite having only known Toad for a short while, and despite the fact that I told him I hated him yesterday, I'm starting to think that I like the guy more than I realized. At the back of my mind, there's even a hint that maybe I'm becoming attached to him in ways that I don't want to admit.

  “Do you want to sit down?” he asks, keeping the sheets covering his lower body as he shifts out of the way.

  “Nah,” I reply. “Once I'm up, I'm up. I'm hungry, though. What kind of food do we have around this place? Please tell me the guy who lived here before had something for us. Even moldy bread would be good right now.”

  “I found some canned food in the kitchen,” he replies. “None of it looks very appetizing, but beggars can't be choosers. Wait a few minutes and I'll -”

  “I'll do it,” I say, turning and making my way back to the door. “If you can get Rachel up, I'll try to sort out some kind of breakfast. Oh, and I think I found an old radio. We should probably get it working and see if there's anyone out there. You never know, there might be some kind of emergency broadcast that's got information we can use. Either that, or we can get in contact with someone who can help us out.”

  “Maybe we can -”

  “Oh, and I think the weather's going to turn. There are some pretty dark clouds coming this way. That's all the news for now, but I'll keep you posted if there are any more developments.”

  Without waiting for him to reply, I head out of the room and start the slow process of getting down the stairs. I can't help but feel a little pleased with myself, though, since I've managed to surprise Toad and show him that I'm sure as hell not going to sit around being helpless. The days of feeling sorry for myself are over, and I want to make Toad
realize that we might be able to make a go of things here at the farm. More than anything, I feel as if I'm finally done with searching for a new home. With a lot of work, we might be able to make this place habitable.

  The first stage of this nightmare might actually be over.

  Thomas

  “I don't know what to say,” I mutter, standing by the side of the grave. “I didn't really know her very well.”

  I dug the grave this morning, using just an old shovel that Mark found for me and working through the scorching heat, and now Kaylee's body is down at the bottom, wrapped in a white sheet. Given the nature of her injury, I didn't much feel like seeing her face again, so I just let some of the others prepare her body, and they did a pretty good job. The sheet is covering most of her, except her bare feet which are sticking out at the bottom. There's no blood on the sheet, though, which is good; that's what I was most worried about.

  And now...

  And now I have no idea what to say.

  “There's no right or wrong way to do this,” Mark whispers, standing next to me. “I just thought you'd like to say a few words so that the others might get a better idea of who she was.”

  “But I don't know who she was,” I reply, glancing over at the handful of people who have come to attend this makeshift funeral, and who are waiting patiently for me to give some kind of speech.

  “You knew her better than anyone else here,” he replies.

  “Yeah, but that's not saying much.” I turn to him. “We're wasting time. We should be out there, tracking Quinn down and bringing her back so she can pay for what she did.”

  “There'll be time for that soon enough,” he says, putting a hand on my shoulder. “She's not going to get far, not without food or water. Just take a moment to mourn your friend.”