Death Plague Omnibus [Four Zombie Novels] (48 page)

A gentle tap brought me back. I left them as they began to nail posters of my ugly mug on house doors, and I glared at Linda. “What part of don’t ever touch me, did you not understand?” I growled.

The woman shrank back, pressing herself against the damp wall. “I’m sorry, hunter, truly I am. It’s just…”

Her whimpering burrowed under my skin, making me itch. Perhaps a light slap would instil a little discipline.  I shook myself; listen to me, I now was thinking just like those arrogant fuckwits above me. Yeah, you got it, their thoughts had contaminated me, seepage was inevitable, but thankfully it was only one way. If they did learn that one of their kind was under their feet, my hopes of finding my sister would end here and now.

I shook myself again, getting rid of their contamination, only to find the woman still in the same position, this time, though, her face displayed just a hint of confusion. I realised that I’d tuned her out, missing whatever she wanted to tell me. “Wait, where are the brats and your husband?”

She pointed at three dark shapes disappearing around the corner. “The boys went on ahead.” Tears ran down her cheeks. “It’s what we normally do, it’s just that…”

I couldn't bear to listen to anymore of her whiny noise. I decided to get what I wanted from a more direct route instead. I lunged forward, grabbing both her ears and pulled the struggling woman up until her nose touched mine. Her terror overshadowed and crushed every other emotion. The woman truly believed that her time had come, that I was about to bite out a chunk of her face. I grinned, not bothering to deny her fear. After all, her belief that she was about to die made it so easy to find a route into her most intimate areas.

My eyes locked onto hers, and it struck me for the first time that she looked very similar to my mother. Same colour eyes and hair, the age would have been close as well. I stopped myself from continuing the comparisons lest the images of my dead father biting into mum's face popped up and ruined everything.

I pushed. My probes tearing through what fragile barriers the frightened woman managed to erect. They dissolved like wet tissue, giving me total access. I ignored the obvious, seeking out what distressed her before I grabbed the woman's ears.

The faces of three hunters filled my vision; their almost black eyes carried their history of two decades of hunting and feeding. Dead fish gazes each assessed the woman on the floor. They conversed without speaking. I recognised the motions, a brief nod, several frowns, and a couple of grim smiles before a male in his late forties wearing his long dirty blond hair in a tight braid grabbed Linda’s arm and dragged her up. Her heart beat wild, and although she didn’t believe they knew of her secret, it didn’t stop her body from reacting to the close proximity of the three huge men.

He reached into her mind, taking what information he required before throwing her back onto the ground. That took me by surprise. Was there no end to her talents? Without warning, the past event that Marcus showed me once more began to nibble away at my confidence. Damn him for showing that. So, somehow, she was able to compartmentalize her mind, only giving access to what she deemed. Was she doing the same to me now? I had no way of knowing.

The three hunters left her, raced over to a narrow junction, and jumped onto a rusted metal fire escape before disappearing inside a mill. The woman shivered, wrapping her arms tight around her body whilst weeping. The hunters were chasing a bunch of human bandits who had been preying on the locals for the past few month, taking food and supplies from their victims and killing whoever got in their way. She wanted them all dead, and yet despite all of that hate, she would never betray their positions to the Town’s so called enforcers.

The woman counted to ten before she turned her head the face a solid stone wall. Decades of dropped litter had created two deep mounds of foul smelling rubbish at either side of her. She whistled once, and the mound shifted. Crushed plastic bottles, drinks cans, and assorted unidentifiable pieces of crap rained down on the woman as two figures stood up.

Both were slight of frame, one in his late twenties, the other ten years older. Apart from the age gap, there was nothing to distinguish between them. The dirty rags they wore, black work boots, and short cut matted hair were interchangeable, as was the contempt they shared for Linda. The two men ran in the opposite direction, not caring that she had just saved both their lives.

The woman shrieked, and I found myself hurtling upwards, the ground pulling away at incredible speed. I snapped open my eyes and gritted my teeth, not wanting this woman to know just how much that unsettled me.

She blinked, drew a deep breath, and then pointed to a gap just a few feet from where we stood. I hadn't even been aware that it existed. Leaning past the woman, I saw a flight of worn stone steps leading upwards. It didn't take a genius to work out why she was so troubled.

So her family wasn’t the only ones who knew of these underground rat runs, not that this information came as a surprise to me. As the cats prowled the streets, the playing mice scurried back into the holes in the skirting boards. Only one group of mice made their way down here. These mice must have believed that they were the targets.

"Did you see them come down here?"

Her lip quivered. "Please, don't let them hurt my boys."

I jumped over her body and raced after them. I already sensed their presence and found, to my annoyance, that the bandits had already spotted the three males fleeing from them. They had already dismissed the appearance of the hunters above ground and their original plan to loot a few abandoned homes; these excitable humans now had a more pleasing mission. The bandits knew that the family was tainted. Their energized minds showed me exactly what they had planned for them. I had to give them credit for their ingenuity.

Each one was worth a sack full of food, the only commodity of any value in this town— that and live ammo for what few weapons left. These humans were so hungry, I could sympathize; I had been in that situation on many occasions. Even so, I was obliged to stop them. As I chased after them, I had to ask the obvious question: if the tainted was worth so much, why hadn’t the bandits turned in Linda? I ground my teeth in frustration, yet another annoying mystery. It could wait, those bandits were getting closer to their prey.

The family had just realised the bandits were behind them, energy levels fuelled by adrenalin boosted their speed, but even that wasn’t enough. The bandits knew how to run. They’d get to the family before I did.

I pelted after all of them, my feet splashing through shallow puddles; this was one complication that I could do without. Would the three of them fight back? It seemed stupid to me that the family would even be running away from these bandits, considering both of them were nothing much more than skin and bones; hell, they were even thinner than my last meal.

A cry of agony crashed through my mind, and I sighed deeply. So much for not allowing them to hurt their boys. I was within visual range of them now. The two bandits had caught one of the sons. Two crossbow bolts stuck out of the back of his head. The two remaining family members stood together. At that very point, I almost switched sides. I looked at these miserable tainted idiots holding each other and actually watching the bandits reload. They hadn’t given up on life, they were just unable to retaliate.

“Do your parents know you have them?” I yelled, casually strolling towards the four of them. I kept my wide grin fixed, wondering who would fire first. My money was on the youngster. The older guy would have questions to ask, mainly why my face was plastered all over the town. My next quip stayed where it was. They both turned and fired at me.

Their reflexes were faster than I anticipated. Both bolts slammed into my chest. I folded and struck the floor, cursing myself for even allowing them to fire. I must be getting old. They could have easily smashed into my face. If that had happened, I wouldn’t be lying on the ground grinding my teeth in anger, listening to their slapping footsteps.

The younger man reached me first. At least I was right about one prediction. I snapped open my eyes, both arms lashing out, crashing against the backs of his ankles. The resulting crack of bone told me he wasn’t likely to get up.

The older man eyed me as I got up and pulled out the two bolts. I had to admire his guts, there was barely a tremor in his hands as he reloaded. It would be a head shot this time, no doubt about it. The groaning boy flickered his eyes. They bulged when I leaned forward and picked him up and ran at the older man at full speed. His bolt left the crossbow, and I had to jerk my head back to avoid the point from blinding me when it passed through the injured boy’s face. This was one determined man. I threw the corpse, nodding with satisfaction as it found its target.

Even with the weight of the corpse on his body, this joker was still crawling towards his weapon. He’d never get there before I reached the pair of them, but that didn’t stop him from trying. You had to admire the man’s tenacity. He had more guts in his little finger than all three of the males in the tainted family put together.

I crouched, grabbed the corpse by the hair, and pulled it to the side. “Do you know what I am?” The man didn’t need to speak; I took his affirmation straight out of his head, as well as another interesting nugget of info.

This one, and the mother of the surviving kid, knew each other from old. There was history between them, and to make matters more interesting, the shivering daddy had no idea. I mentally shrugged to myself—like I cared.

“Your sister is dead, Colin,” snarled the bandit. “I fucked her to death.”

His words ignited my fury, only tempered by the shock of him knowing that I even had a sister. The only ones who knew of my search were dead. I gripped his wrist tight and squeezed, waiting for the crack.

He gritted his teeth. Not one protest left his slimy lips.

“She was a fine piece of meat, Colin.” The man finally howled as the fragile bones splintered. “My cock has been where you always wanted to go!”

The red mist of fury descended over my eyes like a thin film. “Shut your dirty little mouth!” I screamed, and pulling my arm back, I punched him in the mouth. My fist forced broken teeth into the back of his throat. I gripped the inside of his cheeks, held his forehead down and pulled, ripping away muscle and skin. “Your reluctance to die is going to be your downfall,” I hissed, curling my fingers around the man’s jaw. Even through the agony, he knew what I was about to do next. His bulging eyes pleaded with me to stop. I shook my head. “No, I don’t think so.” With one swift jerk, the man’s jawbone came away, trailing blood covered tendon and ripped muscle.

“So you think you know my sister, you piece of shit?” I plunged my thoughts into his, desperately seeking out the information I craved. There she was, walking through the same welcoming post I passed on my way into town. My sister paused by the post, reached up and brushed her fingers over the rotting skeleton, her features puzzled.

I saw her through this dying man. He was crouched behind a rusting hulk of a large car. He took his gaze off her and glanced at his companion. I expected to see lust in his eyes; it was obvious that these fuckers now had something to do with her disappearance. I only saw fear in those dark eyes. The man then…

I leapt up and slammed my boot into his side. The fucker had just died on me! This wasn't supposed to happen. I spat in the old bastards face, noting the hate was still evident in his cloudy eyes. He'd known exactly what fucking buttons to press.

It wasn't a complete loss, I suppose. My sister definitely had been here, and she was still in one piece. That stuff about the vile acts was just fantasy. Danielle was alive and well, she just had to be. 

I looked towards the family, noting that in the confusion the mother had managed to sneak her way into their embrace. I believe that phrase applied to me as well, I never knew when to give up either, not only with seeking out Danielle, but also with these sad specimens.

“Can we continue now?” I asked, wiping my hands on my trousers. They all looked away from the dead boy and nodded. I sensed hesitation in their movement, probably expecting me to bury them or something. After all, it’s not as if I could do anything like eat him, not with all of that shit running through his veins.

From the emotions leaving Linda, Marcus, and the surviving child, Nathaniel, they viewed the boy’s death with the usual regret. In this violent world, grieving for a lost soul wasn’t as physically powerful as it was before the Turning. Not the most outstanding observation, I confess, considering every single survivor would be psychologically fucked until the day they die. Even here, in what was probably the safest place for a human to be, these people wouldn’t be able to mourn properly. I accepted that, we accepted death far more easily than the previous generation. There were, on occasion, times when I did wondered if something was at play here, something deeper than the relief to be able to keep breathing.

I believe that we are all slaves to Mother Nature. That bond all the more visible since our species split. The humans have dwindled to almost nothing now. The few that remain might be having the odd baby but certainly not enough to restock the planet. Even if by some chance the humans did go at it like bunnies and had million more babies, how long would it be before the shambling dead sniffed out all that new fresh meat?

We hunters were doomed from the start. That bitch gave us every tool needed to thrive in this upside down world except for the most important tool, the ability to create new life. We teetered on the edge of extinction, and that foresight would be imprinted into every cell in our bodies.