"Marcus? Marcus, get up right now!"
Marcus gasped awake. He'd been having a nightmare, the first one he could remember since all this crap started. He was running through the blackened city streets of his hometown. Burning skyscrapers lit the night sky like funeral pyres. The dead were everywhere. They were coming for him. Reaching for him with cold, clammy hands and glowing yellow eyes...
He looked around, trying to get his bearings. It was night and the moon was out, casting a ghostly silver half-light across the world. Maya was standing over him, the terror plain on her face. Behind her, he saw someone else, Jacob, getting dressed. Ed was stirring in the other bunk.
"What...what's going on?" he gasped, badly frightening, the nightmare still wrapped around him like a shroud.
"We just got a distress call from the enclave down the street, at the Kirkman residence," she said. Her voice was shaking, he realized she was just as frightened, but she was holding onto herself, and that gave him some strength of his own.
He sat up. "What kind of call? I mean, what's happening?" he asked, throwing the blankets back. He'd gone to bed in the bottom bunk of the outdoors tent after getting Sam home and having dinner with everyone else. She'd told them stories about Andy Pimms.
"Zombies," she whispered.
"I'm ready," Jacob said.
"You need to get Ed up," Maya said. "I need to make sure we've got our guns."
Marcus turned, reached up under his pillow and pulled out his M9. "I've gone mine," he said and he stood up.
"Good, get Ed up, we're going," Maya replied.
Marcus hastily grabbed his holster and reattached it to his belt. He was extremely glad that he had gone to bed fully clothed that night, including his shoes. He wasn't sure why at the time, but he just had a bad feeling, a shiver of cold paranoia, that made him want to be ready to leap up at a moment's notice. And it had paid off, apparently.
"Ed, come on, get up," Marcus said, shaking him.
"I'm up, I'm up," Ed mumbled. He was terrible at getting up in the mornings. Marcus pulled the blankets back and Ed groaned.
"Ed, people are dying!" Marcus snapped.
That got him moving. "What?!" he cried, sitting up and banging his head on the top bunk. "Shit!" he snapped.
"Quiet, you two!" Jacob snapped.
"The people at the Kirkman place, they're in trouble!" Marcus hissed.
"Okay, okay..." Ed hurried up. He, too, had gone to bed mostly dressed, though Marcus wasn't sure if this was a side effect of sleeping in a public place or sleeping outside. All he had to do was slip on his shoes and he was good to go.
Soon, the four of them emerged from the big tent, each of them toting pistols and backpacks, ready to head into the darkness.
Lily stood by the front gate. Overhead, Sam sat in the watchtower.
"Please be careful," Lily said, looking worried and disheveled. "I don't know how bad it is, but it sounded bad."
"They're definitely shooting up a storm down there," Sam said.
"Where's Pastor Will?" Marcus asked. "Isn't it his watch?"
"He's too sick," Lily replied, just as worried about that, too.
"Marcus, come on!" Maya hissed.
No time to worry about that now, no time for anything. He said quick goodbyes to both women and hurried out of the gate after Maya, Ed and Jacob. Maya and Jacob both had flashlights, which they used to guide their way down the dirt path. They managed to make it through the backyard of the nearest house, down their driveway and onto the road before they encountered the undead. But they had an advantage.
There were about six of them up ahead, walking away from them, towards the sounds of the gunfire. There were a lot of gunshots. He heard the high bangs of pistol fire and the occasional, low boom of a shotgun blast. In the ghostly moonlight, Marcus spied a good dozen zombies even further down the road, climbing over the privacy wall surrounding the Kirkman residence. This was bad. This was a fucking nightmare.
As one, the four of them raised their pistols and made quick work the half dozen zombies they had come upon. Without a word, the quartet hurried down the rest of the way. Marcus and Maya took the charge, opening fire on those few zombies who hadn't made it over the wall yet, while Ed and Jacob turned around, sweeping the area behind them and to their sides, as there were even more zombies being drawn in by the noise.
For a moment, there was nothing but the gunfire. The world was reduced to still shots, single frames painted in stark black and white by the blinding flash of the muzzles. Marcus put a round through the eye of a young woman in a waitress's uniform, saw her head snap back as she sank to her knees, blood and brains flying into the night air in a thick spray. Shaking from adrenaline and terror, he adjusted his aim and put down a man in hunting gear, a large, dark hole appearing on his forehead. He listened to the others fire around him.
It took about three minutes, but they managed to at least stem the tide of zombies and stop any more from actually entering the property. Marcus felt the press of time as he slapped a fresh magazine into his pistol, (he was so glad that he'd forgotten to take it out of his pocket, even if his hip hurt now from sleeping on it.)
"Let's go!" Maya shouted. "Handheld weapons out! We don't want to hit any friendlies!"
Marcus nodded, holstered his pistol and pulled out his trusty crowbar. How many zombies had he put down with this thing? At least a few dozen by now. He was first through the gate, which was open. They passed the large crate that Daniel liked to stand guard on in his Korn shirt. The post was vacant. There were bodies in the front yard. The windows that led into the living room were shattered. A heap of bodies writhed around inside.
Someone was screaming.
Marcus jumped in through the broken window, hardly feeling it as a shard of glass still stuck in the window frame cut into his leg. He raised his crowbar, and then stared in horror, frozen where he stood, unable to comprehend what he was seeing.
Daniel lay on the floor of the kitchen, being literally torn apart by zombies. One had grabbed his arm and ripped it off. Another two were eating his leg, rending it into chewed up meat. Yet another one had torn his stomach open. His guts, foamy and bright red and purple in the harsh, bleak light of the flashlights, had fallen out. The zombie grabbed a handful and brought it up to its mouth, chowing down.
And, through all this, Daniel was screaming.
Suddenly, a gunshot sounded and a hole appeared in his head.
Marcus snapped his gaze over to the source of the gunshot, which had broken him from his stupor. It was Maya. She had killed the poor bastard. The zombies all heard the gunshot and let out a collective roar. They began to rise, turning, reaching for the newcomers. Marcus felt a fury, a bloodlust unlike anything he had ever felt before, settle over him. He raised the crowbar and brought it around in a tight arc, crushing the skull of the nearest zombie. Before that undead horror even fell back, he was bringing the crowbar down on the skull of another.
The world seemed to kind of go away after that.
When it came back, he was breathing heavily, sitting on the floor, in a great deal of pain. The muscles in his arms burned. Maya was standing over him.
"Marcus...Marcus, are you okay?" she asked, genuine worry in her voice.
"I...yeah...I..." he coughed. "I'm not sure what happened."
"You kind of went berserk there. You killed a lot of zombies..." She hesitated, looked away for a moment. "Marcus, I don't think anyone made it."
He looked up at her, startled. "What?"
"We found almost everyone...they're all dead. The zombies got in and..." She shook her head, paused, opened her mouth to say something.
Then, from somewhere deeper in the house, Marcus heard Jacob called out: "We've got a live one over here!"
Both of them shot to their feet. They hurried through the wrecked and ruined house, over the corpses of the fallen, and found Ed standing in the doorway of the back bedroom. Marcus had a momentary flash to the last time he was here, (was that just yesterday?), when he'd seen Linda step out of this very door.
Marcus pushed his way gently passed Ed, who seemed to be in shock and let himself be pushed softly to the side. The bedroom looked oddly untouched. In the bed lay an unmoving form. Jacob was crouching down next to the bed. At first, he took the body in the bed as a corpse, but then it came to him that it wasn't.
It was Danica, the damaged paramedic from New York. She was still alive. Her eyes were open and she was breathing...but she wasn't responding at all to Jacob's soft inquiries. There was a bit of blood on her, but she didn't seem all that torn up.
"We have to get her out of here," Maya whispered.
"She won't say anything," Jacob replied.
"We'll help her up," Maya said, tucking her pistol. "But we need to go. Marcus, get on the radio, try to find Doc Hanson."
"Okay," Marcus replied.
Jacob and Maya took on the task of getting Danica up out of bed while Ed stood guard and Marcus pulled out his radio. He spent about five minutes on it, trying to raise Doc Hanson, before he finally got a call back.
"Ugh...yeah, this is Hanson, come back."
"Oh, Doc, thank god. We need your help. Can you come to the church right away?" Marcus replied. He saw that Jacob and Maya had actually got her up and standing, but she still seemed to be in her stupor. They all began to head out of the broken house.
"Uh...yeah. Yeah, I'll be there in about ten minutes. What's going on?" he asked.
Marcus gave a quick outline of the events that had occurred. Doc Hanson was silent for a long moment. "Good lord," he said finally. "I'm coming."
Marcus thanked him and then helped Ed guard Maya and Jacob while they guided Danica out of the house and onto the street.
They started heading back to the church.
They managed to get Danica back to the church without any real trouble. She didn't say anything the entire time but she didn't stop them from guiding her, either. They brought her down to the basement infirmary and had her lay out on one of the beds there. At this point, everyone but Pastor Will was awake. Alan joined them down in the infirmary.
"Everyone else is dead?" he asked.
"Yes, Alan," Maya replied dully.
"Jesus, this is what fucking happens when you get sloppy and you stop paying attention to the world around you-"
"God, shut the fuck up Alan!" Lily cried.
"Don't talk to me like that you-"
"Alan, go back to bed," Maya said coldly, staring at him.
"Now," Marcus added.
Alan stared at them all for a long moment, everyone but Sam had come downstairs into the basement infirmary, she had stayed in the tower, keeping watch. Then he turned and marched up the stairs without a word.
"God, I can't believe they're all gone," Lily whispered. She looked pale and horrified, stricken with grief and fear.
"Yeah. I..." Marcus couldn't think of anything to say. All he kept seeing was Daniel and his guts being pulled out like a party favor, foamy and purple...
A moment later, heavy footfalls sounded on the wooden stairs leading down to the infirmary. Everyone turned and saw Doc Hanson, looking weary but still tough as nails, carrying his black doctor's bag. He walked silently over to the bed where Danica lay, and the others parted for him like the Red Sea.
Over the next five minutes, he examined her, and, at one point, told everyone else to leave, that they both needed some privacy. Marcus imagined he was going to examine the rest of her, to make sure she wasn't bit or cut. They all left without argument. As he began climbing the stairs, he winced in pain as a lance of agony shot up his leg.
"You okay, Marcus?" Maya asked as the others broke away from them and headed back to the church.
"Yeah...my leg..." he replied, staring down at it. It was still bleeding.
"Shit," Maya whispered. "Come on, we need to get that fixed up."
She took him back to the makeshift bedroom and rooted around in her stuff until she came up with a portable medical kit.
"Take off your pants," she said.
He did, too tired and worn out to feel awkward. Then he sat down on one of the beds and winced as she examined the wound. "Well, I've had some basic first aid training. This isn't too bad. I can patch you up," she said.
He nodded his ascent and winced again as she set to work. She cleaned out the wound with some particularly painful antiseptic, then gave him a little shot that slowly made the area go numb. "Probably shoulda done that first," she mumbled.
"Gee, thanks," Marcus replied.
She laughed and then began bandaging the wound. "There," she said once she was finished. "We'll check it in the morning, but it looked like it was clotting fine."
They both glanced over as Doc Hanson walked slowly along the side of the church. Marcus pulled his pants back on.
"How is she?" Maya asked.
"Physically? She'll be okay. A few scrapes and bruises. Mentally, though..." he sighed and shook his head. "From what I recall, she was already a bit fragile. I came across her a few times, since we're both in the same field. She drank a lot, saw a lot of nasty things in the big city...Lily has agreed to stay down there with her. She's cleaning her up right now, putting a new change of clothes on her. She's in a state of shock. She should come out of it by tomorrow or so...I hope. It's hard to tell. Even though she was fragile, she was tough, too. I do remember that.
"Now, I've got to go. I got another call. Someone's sick with something...I think it's the same thing Will has. I took a moment to check in on him. He's not doing so hot. Keep an eye on him, huh? I think there's something going around."
"Yeah, sure, Doc. Thanks for coming," Marcus replied.
"All in a day's work...or night's work, I guess," Hanson replied.
Then he was gone, leaving through the front gate, closing it firmly behind him and getting into his truck. They listened to the motor rev and then disappear. Marcus felt like it was time to go back to sleep. Already, Jacob and Ed had climbed back into their bunks. They had been mercifully delivered back to the land of slumber. He felt tired...but he also felt like he was on the verge of freaking out or something.
He looked over at Maya.
She seemed lost as well.
"Maya. Would it-would it be too much to ask...nevermind."
"No, what is it?" Maya asked, turning fully to face him.
"I don't want to come off as weird or anything, but could you lay in my bed with me, just for a bit? I just...I feel like I'm going to break down or something and, I don't know, even simple human contact feels like it might go a long way towards helping me not lose it."
"I...yeah, I'm kind of feeling that myself. I know what it feels like, Marcus. I saw a lot of nasty combat over in Afghanistan. Yeah, it's fine," she said.
"Thank you," he replied, breathing a sigh of relief.
This time, he kicked off his shoes, and shrugged out his backpack. After setting it down, he stuck the M9 under his pillow and laid down on the bed, beneath the blanket. The night had gotten colder. Maya got into the bed with him, beneath the blankets as well. He lay facing her and she wrapped her arms around him. Almost as soon as she did, he hugged her back and began to cry. It surprised him as much as the wake up call had a little over an hour ago. He managed to keep quiet, sobbing almost silently against her shoulder.
"It's okay," Maya whispered. "It's okay. I'm sorry, Marcus. I'm so sorry. I know how it feels. Just let it out," she said quietly.
He cried for nearly five minutes, hugging her fiercely. When he was finished, he suddenly felt a lot better. He was still scared, still disgusted, still horrified...but all of it felt far away and distant. Marcus supposed that he had hit an emotional dump valve, momentarily emptying himself out. He pulled his head back, took a deep breath and let it out. Then he sniffed and let it out a short laugh when he saw the wet spot on Maya's shirt.
"Oh man, I'm sorry," he said.
Maya laughed. "It's okay," she replied.
Marcus tried to say something else, but then he suddenly yawned, a big one, and lethargy came down like a hammer.
"Me too," Maya said, yawning. "Go to sleep."
"I...okay."
He rested his head on the pillow, and Maya rolled over and pushed herself against him. Cautiously, he put an arm around her. She didn't react poorly to it. She put her own arm over his. He felt comfortable and calm.
He began drifting off to sleep.