When The Light Goes Out (28 page)

"Guys." The voice was low, and I had to lean close to Ian to catch the next part. "Go."

"Ian, I'd sooner saw off my foot with a rusty spork than leave you here!" I shouted, glaring down into his eyes. "You know that!" "If you don't go, you'll die too Excel."

"I don't taste good." "Pardon?"

"They gave up on eating me before, I mean. They got me cornered and stuff, and were about to eat me, but stopped and walked away. I'm safe." I didn't add on the silent 'I hope' that ran through my mind. Because that wasn't something I wanted Ian to know. I tried to keep my voice as confident as possible to make him feel better.

Bastard saw right through it though. "A fluke. Get the hell out of here." "No!"

"Cathy, take her. PPlease. I I can't" "I'm not going either Ian."

"What?!" He actually managed to raise his voice to a normal level about then.

"I'm not going either Ian. I'm not leaving you to this fate. You're a good kid. You don't deserve this." "Who're you to dedecide?!"

One supposes Ian was forcing himself to be angry. One figured he was doing it in hopes of scaring us away from him. But I just lifted one of his arms, putting it around my shoulder as I tried to get him to his feet. It was about this point that I began cursing every gym class I ever skipped. Every opportunity to go to the park that I passed up. If I'd done even one of those things I may have had a chance.

Then Cathy was going to his other side, helping with the lifting. And the three of us started wobbling along.

"Who am I to decide" Cathy grunted under the weight, but we were beginning to pick up speed (or would momentum be the better word choice?) "Whether I leave a young boy to die or not?"

"I'm nnot that young." Ian grunted for other reasons. "You're barely an adult!" I countered his claim.

"Look who's ttalking." He countered mine.

But we were still going, one wobbling mass trying to outrun another wobbling mass. The only difference was the second wobbling mass was bigger, and cannibalistic. And moving faster than we were. Pitiful, isn't it? We were being outrun by a group of zombies. Several of which had no legs.

We were going to die.

If I knew my horror movies, the darkening sky agreed with me too. "Leave me here guys, at least it'll buy you time to to to get aaway." "No, Ian!"

"We'll be fine, it isn't that bad."

"Yeah, sure. We we we are being out ppaced by a group of zombies. What could ppossibly be worse?!" "It could start raining."

I couldn't tell you which curse word slipped out of my mouth with the first crash of thunder.

"What the fuck is this shit?!" I demanded then, shooting my gaze up to the sky. "Why are you fucking with us?!"

I couldn't remember cursing quite so much when I was growing up. Sure, my mouth wasn't the cleanest in the world, but I did have manners, and common sense. I paced myself. At that moment in time my mouth was a gutter, and we were slowing down as the rain started.

And it didn't start slowly either.

No, that would have been convenient.

It immediately started pouring buckets.

Buckets
.

"What the fuck?" I just kept repeating the question as I struggled to keep my own feet under me. My socks were soaked and squishy in a matter of minutes. My pants we sliding down my legs, because the extra weight the water caused. I was beginning to curse my lack of belt. Seriously.

"Frustrated?"

"Ian, If I bust my face, you're coming down with me. You realize that, right?" "You shshould leave me."

"No."

"We won't."

"Now shut the hell up about it, all right?"

It was almost on cue that thunder crashed, lightening lit the sky, and I face planted. Cathy, magically, managed to keep Ian off of his face. But I was mumbling dirty words into the puddle I was kissing. So close to the floor, I could almost hear the dragging of feet behind us, and had to force myself back up.

It was much more difficult than it sounds. Trust me.

Even more than the difficulty of getting up, Cathy never stopped pulling Ian along. For a moment I found it sort of odd. She was outright refusing to leave Ian behind, but willing to leave me? I thought about it until I considered the fact that, hey, I was the one able to walk on my own two feet. She probably needed to keep him moving or fail at her mission of mercy.

If it could be called that.

In a way it was kind of mean that we were forcing him to go on. I simply couldn't imagine the kind of pain he was in.

So I staggered for a moment, and then managed to catch up. Snagging Ian's arm again, I forced it over my shoulder for support. Maybe even for a little comfort. It was certainly offered when he got a tight grip, and grinned. Just a little.

It was enough for me.

"We'll make it Ian. We'll make it." "I'm sure."

"You don't sound it."

Ian shot me an incredulous look, before weakly shaking his head. Apparently my small talk was doing absolutely nothing for him. I wanted it to calm him down. Cheer him up. Whatever. Something. I just wanted him to feel better.

The little voice in my head called me an idiot. He had a hole, or two (or a dozen) in his stomach. Maybe (probably) in other places that I didn't think of. That I couldn't see. It wasn't putting me at ease. It was probably what was making him so tense. I could feel his hand clenching, and un-clenching on my shoulder. At several points, when his nails dug in, it was painful. But I overlooked it.

Then it all stopped.

Without warning, all of the tension faded.

At that exact moment, Cathy and I went down under dead weight.

At first I wasn't sure what happened. All I knew was that Ian got ten times heavier, and my knees buckled. I could swear my ankles were going to break before I went down. Luckily there was no disgusting crack. No debilitating pain. Just knees scraping against the floor. I felt the flesh of my palm rip open as it rubbed the pavement to keep me steady.

It wasn't a pleasant feeling at all. "Ian?"

He didn't respond. "Ian?!"

Still nothing.

In the odd position, I shook him a little bit. Shuffling him around on my shoulder to jar him. But his head just flopped back and forth. Nothing more. I didn't know if he was dead. Didn't know if he was suddenly going to rear back and bite me. I didn't entirely care if he bit me or not. I still didn't plan on leaving him.

"Cathy?" "Hold on."

The body got even heavier as Cathy moved from beneath him. But I didn't complain. I wanted to know what she was going to do. And I swore, silently, to myself, that if she thought she'd get away with whipping out her gun to shoot him, she was sadly mistaken. Such an action was going to cost her part of her shin.

"Cathy?"

"I I'm not getting a pulse."

My blood ran cold then.

"No" I couldn't quite form the words. "No pulse?" I didn't quite understand. Rather I did understand, but refused to acknowledge it. Even a little.

"He's" Cathy choked then. Raising a hand to cover her mouth, she sobbed. I found that I couldn't.

"Come on." "Wh-What?" "Come on!"

Cathy stared at me like I had three heads, not understanding what I was telling her to do. Her confusion annoyed me for a quick moment, before I shook Ian's body a little again. Trying to indicate his other arm with my head.

"Help me pick 'em up." "But he's"

"I don't care. I'm not leaving him here." "But what if he"

"Then I'll kill him myself!"

And I meant it. I wasn't going to leave Ian there to be eaten if he wasn't already infected, or come after us once he was reanimated. I was going to bring him with us if it took every ounce of energy left in me. Because I guess I'd just grown that attached to him.

Cathy didn't move. "Cathy!"

"But I"

"Cathy,
please
!"

She moved then, wrapping her arm about the boys shoulders like she had earlier. The walk that followed was stressful. At several moments I swore my legs would give out. I could swear I felt muscles tearing. I was soaked down to my undies, and beginning to shiver. I was cold, my stomach hurt from the strain of carrying the boys body, but I didn't give up.

I refused to give up.

It was perhaps the first time such foolish stubbornness ever helped me. It kept me moving.

Then came the roar.

At first Jesus at first I thought it was the rain rushing by. Or the blood rushing in my ears. Something completely innocent. Something completely harmless. But the weight on my shoulders suddenly grew, and I fell face first to the floor. Scraping my already cut palm in an effort to keep Ian from hurting himself. I wasn't entirely sure why I bothered with the effort if he was

The thought made me choke.

I knew then that there would be no coming to terms. The noise continued.

The weight got heavier. "Oh dear God!"

I turned.

There was something on Cathy. Just sort of..

Sitting there. "Cathy?"

It was just sitting. "Cathy?"

It turned to me. "Cathy?"

It had the red eyes of a zombie. "Oh"

I couldn't quite get the 'my God' out before the thing jumped at me. Needless to say Ian went face first into a pile of whatever was on the floor as I raised an arm to protect myself. I didn't mean to drop him of course, it was just a moment of absolute horror that loosened my grip. I'm pretty sure I screamed at one point or another as well.

Regardless.

One swift blow from my arm and the creature flew to the ground. I pulled out the gun and shot.

It didn't move.

I didn't know when the gun stopped being jammed. "Cathy?!"

She groaned. "
Cathy
?!"

I didn't know how many bullets I had left. "I'm I'm okay."

I let out a breath I didn't realize I was holding as the girl stumbled to her feet. She looked startled, and scared, but no worse for wear as she reached down, pulling the boy up slightly. It was about then that I remember I dropped him, and grabbed him up alongside Cathy again.

Then came the question. "What the hell was that?"

Cathy was slightly breathless, not that I could blame her. I even agreed with her question. I had no clue what it was. All I knew was that it wanted to eat us. And was slightly dead. Re-dead. Whatever. So I looked in the direction it'd gone before I managed to shoot it.

"I'm not sure."

I went to check, gently resting Ian against Cathy's arm so as to keep her on her feet. I didn't want to kill the girl, that was for sure. But even when I was sure she'd stay on her

feet, I moved quickly, and carefully toward the dead creature. Laying there, bled dry and staring on the floor was I couldn't help but burst into laughter. The entire situation was so damned ludicrous.

"What?"

I kept laughing. "Excel!"

"It's a squirrel!"

"Aa"

"A
squirrel
! How the
hell
did a squirrel get you down?" "It drop kicked me!"

"A squirrel?!" "Yes!"

"A squirrel?"

"Yes, it did! Stop looking at me like that!"

It took me a minute, and a glance over my shoulder to regain myself and rush back over to Cathy. Apparently, while we were distracted by flesh eating squirrels our hobbling followers hadn't stopped following. The were indeed catching up and, as I moved with Cathy, Ian resting on both our shoulders, I could swear we were moving slower.

"I'm sorry Cathy."

"What?" She sounded confused. "I'm tired. I'm slowing us down."

"No. No. It's not you. I think I messed up my ankle." "Can you carry him?"

"I
will
carry him."

I smiled at her determination, as it was something to be respected. Honestly, if she was in pain I was proud to be in her company as she kept trucking along. She faltered no more than I, myself did. She kept pace.

She didn't look back once.

This was much unlike myself. I kept shooting nervous glances over my shoulder, trying to gauge exactly how long we had before we were going to have our throats ripped out. By my not so trust worthy estimation, we had maybe five minutes. Ten tops. Then the group would finally have caught up with us.