Deathly Contagious (24 page)

“You alright? You lost a lot of blood.”

“I think so,” Brock answered, his voice hollow.  He assessed the situation that had gone from bad to worse in less than sixty seconds. He trudged into the road. “You guys go home.”

“Get in the truck,” Ivan told him. Brock looked away. “Callias that is an order. Get in the truck. Now.”

“No. I-I can’t. I can’t go back. Just leave me here. It will be easier.”

Jenna raised her hand and pointed to the bloody bandage on Brock’s arm. What happened clicked in her mind. “He’s infected, isn’t he? Amy bit him!”

“Yes,” Brock replied gravely. “See, I can’t go on with you. Just go.” His stoic expression broke and emotion took over. His eyebrows pushed together with worry. “I’m not going to risk hurting you guys. You’ve been more like a family to me in the last few months then my family has in my whole life. Go home and carry out the mission.”

“No way,” Hayden said, walking over to Brock. He put his hand on Brock’s shoulder.

“No!’ Brock yelled and pushed Hayden away. “I was bitten!” He held up his arm. “It’s only a matter of time before I snap too. Leave me here. Or…or kill me! I don’t want to become one of them,” his voice broke as his real fear escaped.

“We don’t know if you’re infected,” Hayden tried to calm him down.

“I was bitten!” Brock yelled again, almost on the verge of hysteria. “What else do you need to know?” He took his gun from around his waist, clicked the safety off and cocked it. “Shoot me. Do it fast and get it over with. Underwood, please! Just do it!”

“Don’t listen to him,” Ivan shouted. “Callias, you’re going home with us. We can put you in the quarantine and if—”

“Goddammit, no!” Brock yelled and turned the gun on himself. Hayden jerked away, not knowing what to do to keep Brock from shooting himself in the head. “I’m not going to become one of them! I know what they do, I’ve seen too much death. I’m not going to contribute.” He closed his eyes.

“Brock, no!” I cried. “Please.”

“I’m disappointed, Riss. I thought you’d understand. We have to do what needs to be done.”

“I’ve been bitten!” Hayden told him. “Twice.”

“Don’t lie to me, Underwood.” Brock stuck the gun under his chin. I shook.

“I’m not lying! I’m immune and so is that little boy, Parker. Padraic and Cara are working on a vaccine. That’s why I get my blood taken so often,” Hayden said quickly.

Brock’s arms faltered. The gun lowered an inch.

“And that’s why Riss and I went out on that mission alone. We had to get blood samples from zombies.” He extended his arm. “Look, bite marks.” As soon as Brock’s eyes shifted to Hayden’s arm, Hayden moved so swiftly I almost didn’t see it. With the slide of his arm, he knocked the gun out of Brock’s hand. Then he quickly swung and clocked Brock in the side of the head.

Brock blacked out, falling backward. Hayden caught him with ease, hooking his hands under Brock’s armpits. He carefully lowered him to the ground and picked up the gun. Ivan rushed over, and the two Marines brought their comrade into the truck. I stripped Brock of the rest of all his weapons. After I dropped them in the bed of the truck, I let out a breath and realized how fucking terrified I had been.

“What are we gonna do with him?” Hayden asked, shooting a repulsed glance at Jared.

Ivan shook his head. “Leave him?”

“You can’t just leave me!” Jared shouted. He gripped the arrow and pulled in the opposite direction of how it had entered his shoulder. I contemplated opening my mouth and telling him that he was doing it wrong. When I remembered him turning his gun on Hayden, I opted not to.

“He won’t make it long on his own,” Hayden observed.

I grinded my teeth, staring at Jared. Was it wrong I wanted to leave him too? Hayden walked over to me.  I put my hand on his chest, feeling his racing heart. He took a step closer and put his hand on my waist. He looked into my eyes and shook his head. Knowing what he was thinking, I gently put my hand on his cheek.

“It’ll be ok…somehow,” I promised, though I felt like I was lying.

“Yea,” he distantly agreed. “Somehow.”

“What are we going to do with that guy?”

“I don’t know. Killing zombies is one thing; I’ll shoot with no hesitation. S1’s even…yea they’re alive, but they won’t be for long. But killing a person, a living, uninfected person, seems wrong.”

“He was going to shoot you,” I reminded him. “He drew first.”

Hayden shook his head ever so slightly. “No, Ivan did.”

He was right. Ivan had been the first to draw his gun. I didn’t even want to wonder if this whole mess could have been avoided. “He was defending his friend.”

Hayden nodded and swallowed. “If it had been you, I…I don’t know what I would have done. It probably would have been worse.”

Impulsively, I stood on my toes and kissed him. We quickly broke apart, taking a step back from one another. Hayden turned to Jared.

“It’s not our decision,” he said finally. “We take him back and let Fuller decide what to do with him.”

Ivan nodded. “Ok.”

“He’s not riding with us,” I stated. One, I didn’t want to be around someone who tried to hurt Hayden—I might be tempted to finish what I started. Two, we didn’t need any more blood in the truck. And three, there were a shit ton of weapons in our vehicle. Obviously, we couldn’t trust Jared. “Stop pulling,” I told him. “You won’t bleed out with the arrow in you.”

“Are you sure?” he asked, his voice full of fear.

“No,” I answered honestly. “It’s a guess,” I added with a shrug.

None of us noticed the crazy until it ran up and knocked Char over. I sprung into action, racing over and kicking the crazy in the chest. It reeled, quickly recovered and lunged at me. I ducked, swung my leg out and kicked the crazy’s feet out from under him. I didn’t have any weapons on me.

A shot rang out and the crazy’s brains splattered out. I let out a breath and looked up; Hayden stood a few yards away with his pistol still aimed at the S1.

“Thanks,” I said calmly. I rolled the crazy over, thinking no one wanted or needed to see his dead face. “Let’s go.”

Jared struggled to his feet. “H-how am I supposed to sit in a car with this?”

I shrugged again. “Don’t know. You can figure that out. Don’t lean back, I suppose.”

“Take it out! It hurts!” he cried and pulled on the arrow again, yelling out as the shaft of the arrow moved. I waited, watching him yank on it some more. He only had a few inches to pull until the back of the arrow head hit his back. He screamed when it did.

“We need to go,” Hayden instructed. “It is not secure here and…” he trailed off, casting his eyes at Brock, who lay in the truck. “Move,” he instructed.

“Maybe we shouldn’t,” I overheard Jenna whisper. She eyed me nervously.

“Then don’t,” I snapped. I grabbed the crazy’s ankles and dragged him off the road; we were going to have to drive this way back to the home improvement store. Ivan got in the driver’s side and fired up the engine of the truck. Owen, Char and Jenna didn’t move. “Are you coming or not?” I asked impatiently.

Char looked at Owen. “How do we know we can trust you?”

“You can’t,” Hayden answered. “But we are going. We have to take care of our friend. You can follow or you can go on your way. No one’s gonna force you.” He turned his back, sighed, and got into the truck. I got in last, sitting in the back next to Brock. I gently lifted his head and resituated it against me thinking it was more comfortable for him. The truck rolled forward. Hayden turned around, watching to see if the others would follow. The car grew smaller and smaller until it was barely visible anymore.

Hayden turned back around. I brushed Brock’s hair off of his face and put my hand on his. I had been so focused on not losing Hayden, I never stopped to think about how much it scared me to lose anyone else. Ivan and Brock—and even Rider and Wade—were my friends too. I cared about them a lot, and, like Brock said, we were each other’s family now.

I wished I could go back in time. We never should have let Amy get in the truck with us. Not one word was spoken as the truck sped along the road. Brock twitched and let out a groan. I held onto his hand. He blinked open his eyes.

“Orissa?” he asked when I came into his view.

“Yea. Hi,” I said dumbly, not knowing what else to say. Slowly, he sat up and looked at his arm. His face fell when he saw the bandage.

“Fuck. I hoped it was a dream.” He ran a hand over his head. “Let me out.”

“No,” Hayden said so loudly it almost startled me. “If I have to hit you again, I will. And next time you won’t wake up so soon.”

Ivan’s grip on the steering wheel tightened. He looked at Brock in the rearview mirror but didn’t say anything. His lips were pulled in a tight line of worry.

“Were you lying?” Brock asked. “About being bitten?”

“No,” Hayden said seriously. “I’m not. Orissa knows it’s true.”

“She would agree with anything you say,” Brock said with a hint of laughter.

“No, I wouldn’t,” I told him. “But it’s true. I saw it happen the second time. It happened after I fell out of the tree. We never told anyone.”

Ivan took his eyes off the road. “Why would you do that? Put us all at risk?”

“Riss knew,” Hayden stated. “She would have—”

“—not said anything,” Ivan interrupted.

“I would have!” I retorted.

“Really?” he nearly snarled. “Then why didn’t you?”

“Because I knew he’d be fine! It was the second time he had got bitten. I didn’t want anyone to act irrationally.”

“I can’t believe you let her cloud your judgment,” Ivan accused Hayden. “You never would have lied before.”

“I didn’t lie!” Hayden argued.

“Guys!” Brock yelled. “Stop!” Silence fell over the four of us. “Things got a little…out of hand back there but we can’t fall apart.”

“You’re right,” Ivan said. “Sorry, Underwood.” He looked over his shoulder. “And Penwell. You’d do the right thing, I know it.”

“Thanks, sorry too,” I said, though, honestly, I didn’t feel like I needed to apologize. I crossed my arms and exhaled. Ten minutes crawled by.

“Look!” Brock exclaimed, turning around.

“They’re coming,” I said under my breath. Something sunk in my heart. Was it disappointment? I shook my head. Why did I not want the others to be safe at the compound?

“Good,” Hayden said with no emotion. The rest of the ride to the compound could only be described as awkward. Brock shifted nervously in his seat, Ivan still radiated anger and Hayden didn’t say a word. When the driveway came into view Brock asked,

“What should I do?”

“Keep your mouth shut,” I responded quickly. Ivan glared at me. “People act dumb when they’re scared. Especially when they’re expecting something,” I reasoned.

“They’ll look for symptoms,” Hayden continued explaining. “And you will feel them,” he told Brock. “I did.”

“What if I do go crazy?” Brock wearily asked, his dark eyes big with fear.  

“We will be there,” Hayden assured him. “If we can handle a shit ton of zombies, we can handle one S1.”

“But you’re not infected,” Ivan stated, being optimistic for the first time in a while.

“You might not be,” I agreed. “We got to you right away. I pushed some blood out, I don’t know if it did anything, but it made sense to do it to me. And Hayden poured an entire bottle of peroxide on the cut. You really could be fine.”

“Do you really believe that?” he asked, his voice wavering.

“Yes,” Ivan, Hayden and I said in unison.

“Ok,” Brock said, nodding, though the worry in his eyes said otherwise. He pulled on a long sleeve shirt to cover up the bite. “Riss, you’re covered in my blood.”

“I’m always covered in blood,” I flatly stated and then laughed. “No one will suspect a thing.” I leaned over Brock and grabbed a roll of gauze and several alcohol wipes. I stuffed it down my bra. I looked at Brock and smiled. “You’ll be fine.”

“Yea.” He bit his lip and nervously folded his arms. I reached up to pull on my braid, forgetting my hair was in a rat’s nest of a bun. Oh joy, that was going to be fun to brush out. I seriously considered cutting my hair as we drove up to the gate. Hayden got out to open it, closing it after Owen’s car passed through.

“And what are we going to do about them?” Brock asked, nervously looking over his shoulder.

“I’ll talk to Fuller,” Hayden said as he got back into the truck. “I’ll tell him we had no choice, that they gave us reason to—”

“—and he’ll ask what that reason was,” Brock countered. “Guys, I know you want to protect me and all, but I don’t see how this is going to work.”

The truck bumped along the long gravel drive. I closed my eyes and exhaled. Ivan rolled down his window and waved at the A3’s, exchanged a few quick words with them about our companions and rolled through the automatic gate.

 “He’s right,” Hayden reluctantly admitted. “And if…if things aren’t ok, we will have lied. Plus, we all know those guys will say what happened. I’ll talk to Fuller,” he stated. “And work something out.”

We stopped and Ivan put the truck in park. He hesitated, holding the keys in his fingers but didn’t cut the engine. He nodded to himself, as if saying it would all be alright and turned the truck off. Hayden and Brock went into the compound, leaving Ivan and me to deal with the civilians.

Jared staggered out of the car; he had lost more blood than I anticipated. The idiot must have pulled on the arrow again. Ivan and I walked over to them.

“You have to be quarantined,” Ivan told to the civilians.

“So do we,” I felt compelled to explain.

“And someone will take care of your shoulder,” Ivan continued, glaring at Jared. “Then it will be decided what to do with you.” His dark eyes drilled Jared. “Things need to be run very smoothly here. We don’t want any bad apples.”

“How long do we have to be quarantined?” Jenna shyly asked as she looked around the compound grounds with curiosity.

“Twenty-four hours,” Ivan said. “In there.” He pointed to the barn. “You’ll be given food, water and blankets for sleeping.” His eyes met mine, telling me to lead the way while he stayed behind, keeping an eye on Jared. Though, at this point, I didn’t think the guy was much of a threat. We walked into the barn, meeting up with three A2’s on the way. They ushered the four civilians into stalls and explained how the quarantine process would work as Ivan and I left.