Curse of the Immune (5 page)

After a moment and once the water clears out of my ears, I hear a barking sound. A low, raspy bark that seems the kind that comes from a small dog. In that instant, I feel relief that something else has gotten the attention of the undead.

While waiting for the zombies to clear off the stage, I release my other foot from my sneaker. Once the coast is clear, I climb back onto the stage and gaze around. I see the object of the ghouls’ attention—a small black-and-white tail-less dog jumping around and barking like crazy.

With no time to waste, I run off the platform, over the bridge, and toward the hill. I make it onto the grassy field that leads to the base of the hill, when I see the mob notice me and decide I might be tastier. I get that sour stomach-bottoming-out feeling.

Here we go again.

I have a good amount of distance on them, so I’m not in immediate danger. I run to the hill, barefoot once again, and hurry upward. I think of back home when zombie Ellen had trouble going up the stairs and hope that’ll be the case here.

The area of the hill I ascend is clear of trees. Years ago, Diamond Hill was used by snow skiers, and this is the last of the cleared trails. When I’m halfway up, I turn to see zombies falling over each other on the hill.

“Yes!”

Off in the distance, I see the little dog still jumping and barking at a few zombies that are intent on eating him. That dog saved my life. I can’t just leave him.

I whistle as loudly as I can, then yell, “Come here, boy!”

The dog ducks between two zombies and runs for the hill. He zooms past the bumbling hoard without incident and comes straight for me. Once here, he hops on hind legs in front of me, and I see he actually is a
he
.

“Hey, boy, want some company? I know I could use some.” I scratch him on the head. “Okay, boy, we’d better get moving.”

I continue up the hill. “Come on, dog. Let’s go.” He watches me as I walk away. “Hey, dog, those things are coming. Come on!” The freaking dog just sits and tilts his head. I walk back to him and he jumps up and runs around me, then up the hill. Once he’s about twenty feet away, he sits back down and looks at me.

“What’s the matter with you?” I move toward the dog, and when I get close, he again takes off farther up the hill. “Whatever, dog, as long as we’re going up.” He repeats his routine over and over. I never had a dog, so I can’t be sure, but I think he’s playing with me. So finally, after about the seventh time, I get close and lunge to grab him. Trying to pick him up, he answers me with a low growl. I take that as a warning and release him.

“You’re a weird little thing, aren’t you? But you did save my life. So have it your way.” I turn to check on the progress of our stalkers. They’re at a safe distance, falling over one another but still in pursuit.

The dog and I walk the rest of the way to the top of the hill. Then we follow a path on the ridge. As we walk together, I wonder what his name is. He doesn’t wear a collar so I can’t check his license for it. I’m not going to call him boy forever, so I decide I’ll name him. I think through the common ones like Rover, Max, and Buddy. None seem to fit ‘til I remember a dog from my favorite princess movie when I was little. Okay, maybe I still like to watch the movie from time to time. Anyway, there was a dog named Bruno, and he helped the princess when she needed him most.

“What do you think, Bruno?” I watch him for a response. He doesn’t seem to object and that’s good enough for me.

I look down the hill and see from the parking lot to about halfway up the hill is swarming with the undead. My stomach sinks.

“C’mon, Bruno, we gotta get out of here before those things get too close.”

We walk the rolling ridge until we come to a water tower that’s fenced in. I consider it for a place to rest, but I quickly discount it. If zombies surround it, I’d be trapped till I’d starved. But I guess at least I wouldn’t go thirsty.

Thinking about food makes me realize I’m starving. I haven’t eaten all day; I’ve been kinda busy trying not to get eaten. I need to find a way off this hill and find somewhere to get some food. I know of a convenience store down on the road, but I have no idea how to get there from where I am. So I just continue on our path.

Bruno and I walk a little farther. Bruno insisting on leading—and come to a house.

“I didn’t know houses were built up here. Let’s check it out. Maybe find some food.”

We creep closer and see two people in the yard. We walk slowly and quietly, and I desperately hope they’re actually living. It’s hard to see through the thick brush, so we sneak closer, and suddenly, Bruno stops and growls. I shush him, and then I see what he sees. They’re zombies, and they’re eating what must have been their family dog.

“Let’s get back,” I whisper, but it’s too late. They’re looking right at me with those awful glowing eyes, their mouths covered in Rover’s blood.

“Run!”

I take off to the left and keep the house in sight. Where there’s a house, there must be a road. I sprint to the opposite side of the house and see a garage. I run for it, get to the driveway, and run down it, slipping and sliding but staying upright. The dust is way more slippery on the hardtop than over natural terrain.

I hear a rapid clicking noise behind me. I turn and see Bruno trotting, his nails on the pavement making the sound. The two zombies are still coming for us, making their way to the driveway too.

We get to the road by the neighborhood we were in before running to Diamond Hill. We’ve made a complete circle, but this time it is void of zombies, for now. I start up the road for the police station, seeing as now I’ve lost my appetite. I just want to get to safety. I’ve had enough of all this running and being chased.

Bruno runs ahead and stops. His ears perk up and his head tilts back and forth.

“Hear something? Well, we need to keep going, so let’s go.” I turn to walk up the street, but that stupid dog takes off running into the neighborhood.

“Bruno, no!”

Chapter Nine

Like an idiot, I follow Bruno into the neighborhood, knowing it could still be infested with zombies. I try to keep up with him, but with the slippery dust all over the street, I can’t go all out. Bruno slips a few times, mostly while turning, but can run much faster than me on the orange crap. He’s getting pretty far away from me, and I hope he’ll stop soon. I don’t want to be left alone. I also don’t want to attract undead attention by calling out to him.

As I’m about to lose him, he finally stops. I run carefully to catch up. I really don’t want to fall on my bruised butt again. He seems to be listening for whatever it was that sent us on this wild goose chase. Before I get to him, he growls and takes off again.

We’re going into an older part of the plat. Houses are bigger, some kept up nicely, while a few seem to be slowly deteriorating. Bruno stops at a two-story house, and I can see why. Two kids, younger than me by a few years, are on the second floor with a window open and partially hanging out of it, waving arms and calling for help. I stop and take a good look, rub my eyes, and look again. They’re indeed of the living, a boy and a girl, and a huge sense of relief washes over me as I realize Avril and I aren’t the only two actual living human beings in the area. That also gives me some hope that Luke isn’t zombified.

Beneath them are six hungry ghouls, and I worry they’re doomed. I hurry behind a house and hide. Looking back, I see five more zombies coming after me. They’re more than a hundred feet away.

“Oh my God.” I freeze as a burning sensation expands in my chest. It’s a feeling of pure panic. Now I am doomed. My brain spins on that terrifying thought, and I remain unable to react. I’m just not made for this survival crap.

My attention focuses on my demise, but it seems to get derailed as I hear a barking noise, a
Bruno
barking noise. I move to peek around the side of the house I’m cowering behind and see that crazy, stupid dog running in circles as the six zombies chase him. They’re away from the kids’ window now, so I can do something.

I run out into the open and under the window. “Come on, guys. Get out of the house!”

The girl answers, “We can’t! We’re trapped in the room! We got those things banging on the bedroom door! Don’t have much more time!”

“Well, then you need to jump!”

“It’s too far down! Go in the back and get the trampoline!” the girl says.

I quickly check over my shoulder and see zombies in the street. The ones Bruno was keeping busy have noticed me as well. Time is running out fast, so I run for the backyard and grab hold of the trampoline. I pull it while walking backward, taking short, choppy, quick steps to the window.

The slow undead are closing in, so as soon as I put the trampoline in place, I yell, “Jump!”

The boy lands as I holler. It seems a foot helped him through the window. He bounces a few times, and then I grab him. As soon as the boy is clear, the girl jumps. She bounces twice, then hops on the ground.

“Follow me!” the girl yells.

I instinctively obey. I just want to get moving in a direction opposite the ghouls. We run to the backyard and into the abutting woods. We just go through the tree line when we see zombies sporadically throughout the forest, and they definitely see us. We’re completely surrounded and out of options, or so I thought.

“This way!” the boy yells. He runs into the woods, and I hesitate.

“They’re all over the place. Can’t you see?” I hiss.

I don’t need him to answer, as I see him climbing up a haphazardly made ladder attached to a thick oak tree with an equally haphazardly made tree house in it.

He quickly makes it to the top of the ladder, turns, and yells, “C’mon, guys! It’s our only chance!”

The girl goes next while I call for Bruno. He runs to me, believe it or not, and I pick him up despite his growling protests. We scramble up the ladder while a zombie literally snaps at my heels. It isn’t easy climbing up wooden planks nailed to a tree with a dog in one arm, but I manage without falling.

I get to the top and push through the square hole in a large piece of plywood that makes up the floor of the little structure. The walls are simply four sections of four-foot stockade fencing and no roof. The three of us barely fit—four if you count Bruno.

I sit and feel my throbbing butt. I decide to kneel instead. When I release Bruno, he sniffs around, checking out the cramped place. The kids sit opposite me on the other side of the hole.

“Sorry, guys. I tried to help you, and look at us now—trapped again,” I say.

“Yeah, well, thanks anyway. Our foster parents were about to crash through the door. It may not be perfect, but we’re safer up here. I’m Maria Bento, and this is my brother Guillermo.”

“Guille for short,” Guille says.

“I’m Lea, and this is Bruno. Thank him too. He’s the one who found you.”

Maria scratches Bruno behind his ears, and he seems pleased.

I look below and see the undead gathering around the tree, looking up at me with those glowing eyes. I back up against the fence wall. “Glad those things don’t climb trees.”

“Let’s hope they don’t have the ability to learn new skills, or we could be in serious trouble,” Maria says.

Maria seems strangely calm, not at all like she just jumped from her bedroom window to prevent her foster parents from eating her. Guille seems shaken up, as he should. He sits with his legs pulled to his chest, with chin on his knees, and shivers like he’s freezing when it’s at least eighty degrees out.

And yes, I immediately notice the fact they are foster kids.

“How old are you guys?” I ask.

“I’m eleven and Guille is nine. How about you?”

“Fourteen. You said you’re foster children? So are my brother and myself… and a girl I heard on the radio. So far, that’s all the survivors I’ve come across.”

“And they’re all fostered? That’s strange. What are the odds all the people you’ve encountered would be foster children? Never mind all being, I’m assuming, teens and younger,” Maria adds.

“That’s right. You know, you don’t talk like any eleven-year-old I know.”

“That’s ‘cause she’s all brain. She even has a camera in her brain,” Guille says.

“What my incredibly average brother is trying to say is I have an above-average IQ with a photographic memory, which isn’t entirely accurate. I can remember things in great detail, but it isn’t involuntary. People with photographic memories remember everything they encounter; I only remember what I wish to in that detailed capacity.

“Oh,” I reply.

“Like I said, all brain,” Guille says.

“Anyway, you said you had a brother. Where is he?” Maria asks.

“He went to try and help his girlfriend, and I’m trying to find help for him because he never came back.” I tell them my little story of my day and how I got to where I am now.

“Well, that explains why you’re wet and barefoot,” Maria says. “And Bruno saved you too.” She gives him another quick scratch behind the ear. “I love Boston Terriers. My grandfather had one back when I had a family.”

“What happened?”

“Seven years ago, my parents died in a fire at their work. They worked for a research lab. Grandparents died in a car accident that same year.”

“G.H. Labs?”

“How’d you know?”

“That’s how I lost my parents. I guess we found another connection,” I say.

“Amazing. I know the G.H. stands for growth hormone, but what could that have to do with why we’re unaffected by the contaminant that’s afflicted the world?”

“I don’t know, and I doubt we ever will. All their work went up in flames.”

We sit in silence for a few minutes. The truth is it isn’t very silent with the moaning and hissing coming from below. I feel the need to say something to get my mind off those things. “Guille, tell me something about yourself.”

He seems surprised at my question. “I’m scared, I’m sad, and I’m never going home.”

“Yeah.” He summed it up pretty well.

“He was only two when we lost our parents,” Maria said. “Bob and Lisa were the only parents he ever knew.”

“I’m sorry about your foster parents. Things are different now, that’s for sure, but at least you have each other. And I’m here now and we’ll get through this together, somehow.” I hope that sounded better to Guille than it did to me.