Man Eaters (2 page)

As the chaos neared her Harley, Dallas studied as the blonde teenage boy in the driver’s seat jumped out of the SUV and ran toward Dallas. Three of the killers turned their attention to him and started moving after him, arms outstretched like he would be a great meal. The boy stopped to help an elderly woman to her feet before casting a worried glance back over his shoulder.

He wasn’t going to make it.

Scrambling carefully down the cable to where the kid was, Dallas reached down and grabbed his wrist. “Take my hand!” They were ten feet away when Dallas looked into their faces marred with blood and fleshy debris. “Come on!” she yelled, pulling the kid as hard as she could. At five feet eight, Dallas possessed a firefighter’s strong physique. Fueled by fear and adrenalin, she yanked the kid so hard she almost lost her balance on the cable. Grabbing the handrails, the kid backed away from the men and women reaching up for him with bloody fingertips.

That was the first time Dallas heard the moaning up close, and it froze the marrow of her bones. Each one of them was making the exact same sound; part moan, part grunt, all creepy. She felt like she had just fallen into a horror movie.

“Thank you,” the boy said, moving higher up the cable.

“Where you going?”

“Higher. They can’t climb. Climbing is a higher level brain function, and they’re dead.”

Dallas didn’t move. She could barely hear him above the wind that buffeted the screams, groans, and car horns. Did he say they were dead? “What do you mean, dead?”

“Come on. Trust me. Higher is safer. For now.”

Trust him? He was what? Fifteen? Sixteen? He believed this murderous attack was by a bunch of dead people? Too much Walking Dead.

Dallas stopped to look at the carnage below. Bodies and body parts were strewn all over the deck of the bridge and the attackers wandered about the blood, in search of the living. The way the attackers walked...the way they tore into human flesh...and that moaning. Could this kid be right? Was she looking at some sort of apocalypse?

“Holy shit on a rice cracker. Look at that!”

Torn away from the macabre scene below, Dallas followed his gaze high up on the bridge. “What in the world—”

The woman who had been on the other side of the bridge had actually scaled the cable until she came to the crossbeam and was walking across it like a tightrope walker.

“That’s insane.” Dallas said, amazed anyone could be courageous enough or crazy enough to walk across the steel beam several stories above the bridge deck.

“Oh man, I’d wet myself,” the teen said. “Heights make my palms sweat.”

“Maybe she’s coming to attack us.”

The kid turned to Dallas. He had light blue eyes and short blond hair that swept across his forehead. All he was missing to be a flashback to the seventies was a puka shell necklace, and she was pretty sure he had one at home. “Nah. She definitely isn’t one of them. I told you—”

“They can’t climb. Yeah. But how—”

“Come on. We need to get higher. As long as they can see us, they’ll try to get to us.” The kid moved up the cable, hanging on to the handrails as he moved.

The higher up they went, the less she could hear the screams of the victims but the more she could see the destruction and mayhem below. The dead were everywhere and the mob seemed to grow larger. Vehicles were blood-smeared, and those still inside were often surrounded by those beating on the windows on the Oakland side of the bridge. They were wreaking havoc and killing everyone in their path. Young and old, men and women, people of all races chased after those who ran for their lives.

One man caught Dallas’s eye as he weaved through and around cars until he stood trapped by three of the mob. They weren’t attacking him, though. They just stood there staring at him like they were unsure of what or who he was. Dallas hoped he would climb up on the cable, and he did...only to hurl himself off the side of the bridge and into the choppy bay waters below.

“What’s...what’s happening?” When Dallas turned to the boy, she saw him waving to the young woman.

“What are you doing?”

“Calling her over here. I told you, she’s not dead.” He moved up the cable and helped the woman down to where they stood. “That was amazing!” The boy said excitedly to the woman, who wasn’t even winded.

“Didn’t see as I had much choice. I didn’t really want to be alone up here.” She shrugged.

Dallas saw no fear in this woman’s clear eyes. She was stunningly beautiful, standing there in Wrangler jeans, Frye boots, and a brown leather bomber jacket that had seen better days. Attached to her belt was a ring of rope. Her hair color, up close, with the sun reflecting off it, was more auburn than brown, and she stood slightly taller than Dallas.

“What the hell is going on down there?” the woman asked, turning her gaze to the carnage below. “It’s like a bloody zombie flick.”

“Well, I know I’ll sound like a crazy kid, but you’re not too far off. I’m pretty sure those moaning people are dead.”

“I can see the dead ones on the deck, it’s the living I don’t—”

“That’s what I’m saying. They are all dead.”

The woman and Dallas quickly looked at each other.

“You mean...just like zombies?”

He nodded. “These people are a lot like the undead in a video game I’ve played called Man Eaters of the Living.”

Dallas looked more carefully at the victims who had been attacked. Most of them were no longer where they’d fallen, but had managed to stagger to their feet to join the crowd, torn and tattered flesh hanging from their bones.

“I know it’s hard to believe and you probably think I’m just some stupid gamer with an over-active imagination, but just watch. Those who have been attacked...they rise again, only to join the horde.”

“The horde?”

He shrugged. “Well, that’s what they’re called in the game.”

Dallas said nothing, but kept her gaze on the woman who had been attacked by the man in the gray suit. It didn’t take long for her to raise up, her throat half torn from her body, her cheek ripped open from multiple bites, to slowly stand, look around her and wander toward the horde.

“What else do you know?” The young woman asked.

“Well, they can’t climb because things like that and swimming are higher level activities and they are, for the most part, brain dead. See, look. That guy over there is missing his arms and yet, he’s walking around.”

Dallas shuddered. “So basically, you’re telling us those...things...are dead.”

“Or undead as they’re called in the gaming world. Just note, climbing to higher ground is usually the dumbest thing you can do because these things can out-wait us for weeks. They never get tired, never need to sleep, and will never give up. Don’t do whatever you’ve seen in the movies. No roofs, no trees no attics. We’re safe for now only because they can’t see us.”

“What are you, some Zombie Einstein?” The woman asked, smiling at him.

The boy shrugged. “I’ve been called worse.”

“Well, Einstein, what’s our next move?”

He scrunched up his face as he thought. “Obviously, they came from the City, so that’s out. We can’t stay up here very long, but we’ll need them to clear out first. We can’t afford to go down there as long as one is still there. Once you are bitten, you’re toast.”

Dallas wrapped her arms around herself, feeling both internal and external chills. The group of undead was moving toward the east bay. “Where are they going?”

“Wherever the living are. If they aren’t stopped before they get to Oakland—” He paused and shook his head.

“What? Then what?”

“Well, it’ll be like the plague, and a lot of people will die...or not die, as the case may be.” Einstein suddenly looked out toward the water, as if there was something he couldn’t bear to see.

“You okay?”      He blew out a breath. “That man eater down there in the jean jacket is...was...my friend. We were going to get tattoos today.”

“What happened?”

“We both decided to make a run for it. He...he didn’t make it.”

The woman put her arm around him. “I’m so sorry.”

Einstein slowly turned around. “We’ll all be sorry if we don’t get off the bridge soon. We’ll be trapped between those who’ll go toward the city and those who’ll go toward Oakland.”

“Surely, people must have called the police.”

“Or the news. Where are the news helicopters?” Both Dallas and the woman looked to Einstein, who shrugged.

“In the games and movies I’ve seen, the government shuts the press down because of the panic that could ensue.”

“You think that’s what is happening here?”

“You know people videotaped this with their cells, so yeah, I think someone shut them down.” He pulled his phone out. “They won’t want people to panic, so they’ll take over the news.” He looked at his phone. “Yeah, no signal. It happens fast. The shit is gonna hit the fan right quick.”

“Won’t we need to evacuate Oakland and Berkeley? If those things get into the East Bay—”

Before Dallas could finish her sentence, two Blackhawk helicopters appeared on the horizon.

“Get down!” Einstein cried, flattening himself onto the cable.

Dallas and the woman followed suit. “What the fuck? Aren’t they the good guys?”

“Thank God the military has arrived.” Dallas said, hugging the cable.

With snipers perched on the decks of the helicopters, the Blackhawks hovered above the blood-soaked bridge while the snipers put bullets into the heads of the man eaters. One-by-one, the zombie heads exploded as bullets ripped through their brains.

“I’ll be damned,” the woman said. “Einstein was right.”

As the undead fell—truly lifeless—to the ground, those living people still in their vehicles got out and waved at the snipers, who then promptly shot them in the head as well.

“What the fuck?” The woman said, mouth agape as the snipers shot anyone who moved. Even those who had remained in the safety of their cars were shot with high-powered bullets through the windshields and side windows.

“Keep your head down. They’re not taking any chances,” Einstein said. “They’ll kill everyone they see.”

Dallas watched as one of the Blackhawks peeled away. “Don’t you think the smartest thing to do would be to blow up the bridges leading to San Francisco?”

The woman and Einstein stared at her.

“Cut off the main arteries like we would do in a state emergency? I’m a firefighter. It’s what you do to contain any spreading.”

“You’re right. We need to get the hell out of here.” The woman rose just as the helicopter moved further down the bridge. “But we’ll never make it on foot.”

“We don’t have to.” Dallas replied. “We can take my Harley.”

“Your bike will never get through the mass,” she said, zipping her jacket up. She had these piercing eyes that reminded Dallas of a hawk’s eyes by the way they took everything in.

“Maybe not, but the snipers will have a much harder time of hitting us on the back of a motorcycle.” Einstein nodded. “I’m in, but we’d better get going.”

Dallas did not make a move as she stared down at the dead bodies of the hundred or more people the snipers’ bullets had found. “I’ll get to the Harley and get her started. Once I get the bike turned around, Einstein get on behind me and...” Dallas hesitated, looking at the woman.

“My friends call me Roper.”

“Roper, hop on behind him. It’ll be a tight squeeze, but you’ll need to give me room to shift and ride. Have either of you ever ridden on a bike?”

Roper nodded. “Rider and bitch.”

Einstein shook his head.

“Lean with me. If I lean left, so do you. If I lean right, so do you. If it looks like we are going to crash, stay with the bike. Don’t try to jump off. Stay. With. The. Bike.”

They both nodded and together all three moved as quickly as they could down the cable.

When they were low enough to be able to jump down, Dallas did, her Harley boots making a solid sound as she landed on the deck. Roper wasn’t far behind, and they both caught Einstein, who, like many gear-heads, wasn’t terribly agile or physically confident.

“Oh crap.” Einstein pointed in the direction of the city.

Shielding her eyes from the sun, Dallas saw three more helicopters in the distance. Throwing her leg over the saddle, she backed the Harley up and was almost completely turned around when the now familiar moaning came from behind her.

Without taking her hands off the handlebars, Dallas glanced over her shoulder. Walking toward her was an older man with half his face missing. It looked like he was grinning with only one side of his mouth.

“Get on!” Dallas ordered the others, starting the bike.

Einstein leapt on so fast and hard Dallas was barely able to keep from dumping the bike. As she pulled it back to center, she looked in the rearview mirror in awe as Roper drove a buck knife into the man’s eye socket and pulled it out, blood clinging to the knife.

The man eater crumpled to the ground and Roper hopped on behind Einstein as three more came toward the loud roaring of the motorcycle. “Go! Go! Go!”

Yarding on the throttle, Dallas had to swerve to miss one of the undead coming back toward them.

“Control, Dallas. Keep control,” she muttered to herself. Up ahead, she could see blocked lanes and hundreds of dead people, most of whom sported a bullet hole in their heads.

Torn between getting off the bridge before it exploded and zigzagging in and out of the stalled traffic, Dallas slowed down as she approached the now dispersing horde. If she crashed, they were dead anyway, either from a bullet, a bomb, or a bite from one of these hideous creatures.

“Wait. Slow down a sec!” Roper cried. “That cop car!”

Dallas had been focusing so much on the road she had almost missed it.

“We’re gonna need a weapon,” Roper said. “Or we’re sitting ducks.”

Dallas slowed to a stop, and Roper hopped off and carefully looked in, knife poised. “Damn. Shotgun is locked up.”

Dallas took her left hand off the grips and pointed. “The release is on the floor next to the brake. Just step on it.”

Roper did so and, after three unsuccessful attempts, heard the click as the shotgun holder released it. Just as she grabbed the rifle, a face popped up on the other side of the wire mesh.