The Dark Trilogy (2 page)

Letting go of the bat, Jeff pushed back against the wall even harder, doing his best to burrow through the drywall. The bat clattered to the floor, and Mark took a single wavering step forward before collapsing. His head slammed into the concrete with an audible thud.

Jeff stood stiffly next to the slumped body for what seemed an eternity. He stared into his neighbor’s eyes as a torrent of emotions poured over him. Irrationally, he feared the repercussions of murdering his neighbor, though if Mark could speak, he would probably argue that he wasn’t dead. Instead, the ghastly creature stared balefully up at Jeff as small noises burbled from his shattered throat. Unable to move his body, Mark continued to grind his teeth and hiss, unchecked rage carved on his face.

When Jeff’s heart rate settled and he could breathe normally, he unglued his eyes from the man at his feet and looked at his wife, whose appendages were no longer twitching. She lay crumpled, her legs bunched up underneath her, and Jeff could see the rubber burn marks on the floor beneath her scuffed sneakers. It was clear she had struggled fiercely, even as Mark sank his teeth into her throat.
She was always a fighter,
he thought. Now that Ellen’s face was no longer obscured, Jeff could see that her eyes were open, a look of terror still on her face. There was agony in those green eyes … an agony that must have been the last thing she felt.

Jeff’s knees gave way, and he crumpled to the ground. Slamming his eyes shut, he willed the horrible images of Ellen’s death that were burned into his retinas to go away. He felt dizzy and nauseated, but since he had not eaten in nearly a day, there would probably be nothing but dry heaves when the sickness finally overpowered him.

That was when he heard a bloodcurdling scream from down the street.

***

It had taken every last bit of his willpower not to curl up in a ball when he heard the noises coming from less than a block away. They had tracked him down. By the time he levered himself up from the floor and moved past Mark to slam and lock the door, he could hear them getting closer. His neighbors were closing in on the house. Jeff didn’t have the strength to look outside and see how many there were. Instead, he leaned against the door, panting and exhausted as the moans grew louder.

Before he could even register it consciously, something made his body tense. He tried to blot out the noises outside so he could capture the other sound just hitting his ears. He looked at the door leading into the house.

Adrenaline flooded Jeff’s system again as reality came crashing down. The sound coming through the door was clearer than the muffled roars of anger and hunger from outside, and yet … it sounded very familiar.

He began to hyperventilate, shaking his head in disbelief. How could he have been so stupid? How could he have blanked out and forgotten?

But the blood splatters in the laundry room confirmed what the cold, calculating part of Jeff’s brain already understood, though the rest of him refused to believe it.

Mark wasn’t the only one who had gotten into the house.

Jeff flew through the door. Everything inside him screamed that he had to move quickly, get inside, and stop these marauders. But as he heard the moans from upstairs, he feared he was already too late.

Jeff steeled himself as he rushed inside, hoping against hope that he was wrong, that somehow these monsters that had once been human had not found his children’s hiding place upstairs.

***

A short time later, Jeff returned to the garage, his eyes dull, his arms splattered with blood. The aluminum bat was slung over his shoulder, dripping a thick, tar-like substance.

He ignored the pounding and screams of rage outside the garage door. They had found him, after all this time. The insanity outside had finally broken into his home and annihilated everything he knew.

As he slumped to the wooden steps, the small window on the side door shattered. The noise of breaking glass was quickly followed by the sound of fists thumping on the thick slab of wood nailed behind it. Jeff idly wondered how long his jury-rigged barricade would hold up, and he wondered whether it really mattered anymore. He set the bat down and rested his chin in his hands, propping his elbows on his knees.

As he sat listening to the scratching and clawing, interspersed with ragged fists splattering against the wood, he glanced down at the two bodies in the garage. He took a deep breath, doing his best to ignore the thick taste of death that came with it. Mark was facing away, so at least the man wasn’t staring at him.

Jeff’s eyes slid from Mark to the pile of gas cans in the corner. Several propane tanks sat next to the smaller canisters, along with some other odds and ends he had picked up a few weeks back when things had started getting dicey. He shook his head in disbelief. Back then, their worst concern was potential power outages and being forced to use the barbeque grill for all their cooking.

His eyes left the pile of supplies and moved back toward his wife. Jeff wondered when he was going to cry. His eyes were still dry, even as he looked at the ragged, bloody hole Mark had left where her throat had been. He hadn’t cried inside the house, even as he cradled his dead daughter and whispered her name over and over again.

The pounding outside was getting louder. It sounded like there was an army of them out there. They hadn’t moved to the front yard yet, but it wouldn’t be long. Then it was only a matter of time before they tore through the hastily nailed-up boards and plywood covering the windows and found their way inside.

Twisting his neck around to loosen up the stiffness, Jeff stood up. He gazed down on his wife, recalling how her eyes used to sparkle like a thousand tiny emeralds. That green was gone now, replaced with the telltale cloudiness that warned of infection.

When her hand twitched, Jeff backpedaled, slipping on the stairs and falling hard on his ass. His body grew cold as it became clear what was happening, and he slumped in defeat, painfully aware of what he had to do.

Her hand twitched again. Ellen was waking up.

Jeff snatched up the bat and cradled it to his chest. His hands felt weak and useless, but he held onto the aluminum cylinder as though it were a security blanket.

Suddenly, a sound like a head ramming against the side door made him jump. The wood began to splinter.

Spying Mark out of the corner of his eye, Jeff saw that despite a broken neck, his neighbor had managed to shift his head enough to stare at Jeff again. The hunger in those eyes was undeniable, and Jeff knew he couldn’t bear it if he had to see that same look in Ellen’s eyes.

Taking another deep breath, he stood and lifted the baseball bat. The fear was gone, replaced with a depthless despair. His wife’s legs were starting to move. Her eyes were still vacant and empty, but wouldn’t be for long.

“
I love you honey,” Jeff choked out as he felt the strength return to his hands. He gripped the bat tighter and raised it above his head.

The first swing took every ounce of courage he had.

The ones after that came a lot more easily.

Chapter 2

Ten minutes later, Jeff was in the kitchen, stuffing the remnants of his dwindling food supply into his son’s backpack. There wasn’t much left, just some half-eaten boxes of cereal and dry noodles to gnaw on. That was what it had come to. It was why he had left the house to search for supplies. Jeff staggered under the sudden realization that his family had died for a few cans of beans and some crackers.

He angrily jammed the last of his meager rations into the bag and ran toward the steps leading to the second floor. From the back of the house came the sound of more glass shattering. He had covered the big picture window with plywood, and it was holding for the moment. The wood vibrated under a barrage of hammering fists, but stayed in place. He rushed up the stairs, taking them two at a time.

Glad to get away from the stench of infection filtering through the windows and doors, he took a right into his office, trying his best not to look at the shattered door on the left side of the hallway and the carnage that lay beyond it.

Jeff rummaged through one of his bookshelves, found the souvenir mug he sought, then dumped its contents on the desk. He sifted through the coins, bits of paper, and other faint memories until he spotted a tiny key. After that, it was only a matter of retrieving the lock box from the top of the bookshelf; then he was staring at his gun. The tiny nickel-plated weapon with the black grip was still in its original box. Jeff looked at the etched wording on the barrel: MODEL RAVEN CAL-.25 AUTO. He picked up the small clip sitting next to it and slid it into the gun. He nearly laughed. It was a pea-shooter that carried a meager six bullets in the clip. He shoved it in his pocket and promptly forgot about it.

Now it was on to rifling through the desk for his pocketknife and Maglite. Once he’d found them, Jeff looked around his office. That was it. He sighed and shook his head. He was no survivalist, but he knew enough to realize that a baseball bat, a purse gun, and a heavy flashlight probably weren’t going to get him very far.

As he turned to leave, he spied something else on one of the bookshelves and stared at it for a moment. It was the photo of Ellen and the kids on their last vacation at the lake. Jeff remembered taking the picture. It had been early, maybe about six a.m. Ellen had been trying to drag the kids out of bed for ten minutes. They didn’t want to go out on the boat and didn’t want to swim. They just wanted to sleep. She started tickling them, and after a couple of minutes, the three were wrestling in a tangle of sheets, screaming and giggling. The photograph had been spontaneous; Jeff had grabbed the camera out of his bag without thinking. They were smiling, laughing, their eyes lost in a moment of pure bliss. When he showed Ellen the picture, she hated it. Her hair was a mess, and she had no makeup on. When he put it on display in his office, she was angry until he explained, “Everything that matters to me is in that picture. It’s you and the kids, happy. That’s all I care about.” She never said another word about it.

Jeff’s fingers quivered as he traced the outline of their faces. Another angry scream filtered from below, and he tore his eyes away from the picture. Cramming it into his pocket, he headed back downstairs.

It’s time to go.

The urgent thought beat out a staccato rhythm inside his head as he made it back to the main floor. Rushing into the garage, he could hear the roar outside. They were actually starting to throw their bodies against the side door now. The sound of them crashing against the house was nearly overwhelming, but Jeff ignored it and tossed his few supplies into the minivan. Snatching up the baseball bat, he ran back inside.

He was out of breath when he reached the front door. He bent at the knees and tried to suck in as much air as possible, tried to settle down. The noise wasn’t nearly as bad here. The mob had not spread to the front door yet, which worked well with his hasty plan. He snatched up the hammer he’d dropped there a few minutes before and started prying at the two by four nailed across the door.

It took some effort, but within a couple of minutes, the board was down, and the only thing that stood between Jeff and the outside world was a deadbolt.

He dug into another pocket and pulled out the key to the car sitting in the driveway. Palming the dark plastic key fob, he pressed the red alarm button. The urgent honking cut through the tumult of screams and moans that had nearly driven Jeff’s family mad over the past few weeks. For a moment, it seemed as if this new noise, so shocking and ordinary, would overpower all others. But it was not to be. A tide of rage carried the volume of his neighbors above that of the horn as they began attacking the car.

“
Stupid mother fuckers,” he snorted with disdain. After listening for a few more seconds, he pressed the red button again, and the alarm cut off, replaced with the sound of wet slaps on the hood of the Impala. Glass shattered, and Jeff could imagine a thick press of bodies trying to get at whoever had been honking the horn.

He strained to hear as much as possible. There was frustration and rage, but more importantly, he heard no one on the porch ready to punch a hole through the front door. Taking a deep breath, he scooped up the baseball bat and put his hand on the deadbolt. Jeff turned his head, allowing himself one last look around the house. He wanted to remember it as it had once been, not what it was about to become. Nodding to reassure himself, he tried to keep his breathing steady as he turned to face the door.

He flipped the deadbolt, then tensed as his hand slipped down to the knob.

“
Well, here goes nothing.”

Jeff opened his front door.

Chapter 3

A wall of sound washed over Jeff. The depth of the noise was profound, and he felt as if he were on a stage, the world around him vibrating with excitement. His skin contracted around every hair on his body all at once. The sensation was almost painful as the goose bumps puckered his flesh and the sound jarred his bones.

There was the smell as well. It had been out there before, when he had slithered through the neighborhood, but nothing like this. The stench, the miasma from a hundred infected and befouled bodies, had no discretion as it poured over him, baptizing him in its corruption.