Ashton Memorial (37 page)

“Just fall already,” said
Maylee, whacking the corpse across the chest. It fell and stayed
there.

She turned to see Park brandishing a rock as
the second corpse, a man with mutton chops and a wet gaping wound
in his chest, reached for him. Park dodged the man's grasp and
rammed the rock into his skull. The man fell back, dark blood
seeping from a split in his forehead. Park grunted and threw the
rock. It smashed into the man's forehead. The crack spread and the
man fell down. He hit the pavement and did not get up.

“One left,” said Maylee,
nodding at the remaining corpse. It was a chubby lady with a
Baby On Board
T-shirt.
Maylee's stomach fell when she realized the woman wasn't chubby.
She was pregnant.

“Fuck me,” said Park. “You
take that one.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“Just kidding. Give me the
bat.”

“No,” said Maylee, gripping
the bat and watching the pregnant woman hiss and stagger around.
“I've got it.”

“Just give me the damn
bat.”

“No!” said Maylee with a
force that surprised her.

Apparently it surprised
Park too. “Fine. Have at it, kid.”

Maylee readied herself, watching the
pregnant corpse stumble.

Then a sharp “crack” rang
out. Like a gunshot. The pregnant woman jerked and drew back,
stiff. She fell forward, revealing a dart embedded in the back of
her head. The woman was still.

Maylee looked around, confused. Then saw
figures standing on the stoop of the office. One was holding a
rifle.

It was Mom.

* * *

Angie lowered the gun, watching the pregnant
corpse fall. Her heart leapt. Dalton was right about what he'd seen
out the window.

“Maylee!” yelled Angie,
slinging the rifle over her shoulder and rushing off the
stoop.

Maylee, standing across the
walkway over the bodies of several corpses, lowered her bat. She
looked like she could cry. “Mom!”

Angie and Maylee ran for each other. Park
was there too. He stuck his hands into the pockets of his hunting
jacket and slowly walked over, behind Maylee.

Angie grabbed Maylee and
hugged her tight. She held her as long as she dared and Maylee
didn't resist. Then she pushed her back and held her by the
shoulders, looking her up and down. “Are you hurt? Were you
bitten?”

“No, Mom, no,” said Maylee,
looking relieved and exhausted and somehow sad. “I'm fine. I'm
fine.”

“Maylee!” yelled Dalton
from the stoop of the office. Angie let go of Maylee and turned to
see Dalton standing on the stoop, covering his nose from the stench
of the dead body hanging from the tree. He started down the
stoop.

“Wait, Dalton,” said Angie.
“Stay there. We're coming.” She trotted back toward the office,
motioning for Maylee and Park to follow. They did.

Dalton backed up, back into the office.
Maylee rushed along with Angie. Park walked slowly, quickly falling
behind them.

They reached the stoop and Maylee jerked
back, bringing up her bat and looking so determined it frightened
Angie. Angie followed Maylee's eyes to the body hanging from the
tree.

“Wait, honey, no,” said
Angie, turning back to Maylee. Maylee was already lowering the bat,
looking relieved.

“Someone got that one
already,” said Maylee.

“Yeah,” said Angie, not
knowing what to make of the comment. Maylee sounded
disappointed.

Maylee wrinkled her nose
and brought her jacket sleeve to her face. “God it
smells.”

“Been there a while,” said
Angie. Park reached the stoop, silent and looking down. Angie
opened the door and motioned Maylee and Park inside. “It was there
when we got here.”

“How long have you been
here?” said Park. It was the first thing he'd said since they
arrived.

“Just since this morning,”
said Angie, shutting the door. Maylee and Park looked wet, dirty
and beaten. Angie realized there were only two of them.

“Where's Ella?” said
Angie.

Park shook his head. Maylee looked down.
Angie realized why Maylee looked so sad.

“Fuck,” said Angie,
quietly. “I'm sorry, Park.”

“Everyone
really
needs to stop
saying that,” said Park.

Angie said nothing for a moment. Dalton
crossed his arms and looked down. Angie looked at Park, then
Maylee, then back at Park. She tried to think of what to say.
Finally she decided there was nothing to say. She nodded to herself
and turned.

She briskly walked to a gun case set along
the far wall of the office. Several rifles hung inside. She grabbed
one, then grabbed a box of darts from the shelf above the rifles.
She turned and strode back to Park.

“Here,” she said, handing
the rifle and box to Park. “They're just tranquilizers but the dart
tips are long enough to puncture the brain.”

Park nodded and took the
rifle and box. He slung the rifle over his shoulder and put the box
in his jacket pocket. “Miles better than what I've been
using.”

“I'm hungry,” said
Dalton.

“Me too,” said Maylee,
already looking more like Angie's daughter than the killer Angie
saw earlier.

“Yeah,” said Angie,
sighing. “That's a common theme around here. No food in the office,
either. Vending machine’s broken open and raided. And to add to all
the fun, crazy zookeepers are keeping people out of the
restaurant.”

“Joy all around,” said
Park.

The loud speakers around the office crackled
to life. The four of them jerked in surprise.

Gregory's voice rang out.
“Good afternoon, citizens of Ashton Memorial.”

Angie turned to the others,
sighing. “And that asshole keeps talking.”

“We've heard it too,” said
Maylee.

“Ella said he's got Lori,”
said Park.

“Did he just say
'citizens?'“ said Dalton.

Gregory continued, his
voice booming around the room. Angie heard it coming from outside
too, from speakers throughout the zoo. “We are working hard for
your safety.”

Angie cocked her head,
listening. Whenever Gregory paused, she heard a fainter version of
his voice coming from somewhere else in the room, a fraction of a
second late. “Anyone else hear that echo?”

Gregory continued to drone on about how hard
he was working to protect everyone. Angie ignored the content,
listening for the echo, trying to place where it came from.

Finally she located it.
Across the room, in one of the chairs, was some sort of small
handheld device.
AM
PerComm
, said a logo etched into the side.
Angie guessed it stood for “personal communicator.”

Gregory droned on in the
background. Angie clicked a large button on the side of the
communicator and held it to her mouth. “Hello?”

Gregory made no sign he'd heard her. He kept
talking, now praising the bravery of the Keepers. Angie noticed he
used the same terms the people at the Zoo Bites had used. She also
noticed he was talking about them as though they were some sort of
police force. Or army.

“Hello?” she said, clicking
the communicator and trying again. This time she noticed her own
voice echoing from another chair in the room. She walked over to
the chair and found a second communicator laying there.

She clicked the button.
“Testing,” she said into the communicator in her hand. Her voice
echoed from the second communicator in the chair.

Frowning, she turned the
communicator over in her hand, looking at it more closely. Gregory
continued talking in the background. On the side of the
communicator, she found a dial with two settings. One said
Direct
and the other
said
Broadcast
.
It was set to
Direct
. Angie clicked the dial to
Broadcast
.

She clicked the button on the side and held the
communicator to her mouth. “Hello?”

Her own voice boomed out over the speakers
around the room. She heard it echoing from the speakers
outside.

Gregory stopped
mid-sentence. “Who is this? This channel is not for citizen
use.”

Angie clicked the
communicator. “My name is Angela Land and I am not your
citizen.”

“You live within my
borders, ma'am,” said Gregory's booming voice. “Now please get off
my channel.”

Angie clicked the communicator. “Do you have a girl
with you? A girl named Lori?”

“Help!” yelled a girl's
voice over the speakers. She sounded farther away than Gregory, but
clearly audible.

Maylee and Dalton gasped.
Park stepped forward. “That's her. That son of a fucking
bitch.”

Angie held up a finger to Park, indicating
to wait. Gregory was silent for several seconds. Angie guessed he'd
turned off the microphone. Then there was an audible click and
Gregory returned.

“Citizens,” he
started.

Park snatched the
communicator from Angie. He screamed into it, louder and with more
force than Angie had ever seen Park exhibit. “Give me back my
fucking daughter you fucking dog-cunt!”

Angie took the communicator
back from Park. “What he said.”

Gregory sighed through the
speakers. “I built Ashton Memorial, ma'am. You and your friends
need to respect me.”

“Whatever,” said Angie,
clicking off the communicator and dropping it into her pocket. She
strode to a map display hanging by the door. She snatched out a map
and shoved it into her other pocket. She turned back to Park,
Maylee and Dalton.

Park nodded. “You thinking
we got guns and a map now?”

“Yep,” said Angie. “That
pretty much sums it up.”

She motioned for the others to follow and
turned toward the door. As they exited, she pulled the communicator
from her pocket. Gregory was talking and talking. The rain pounded
relentlessly now.

Angie clicked the communicator on as she
walked. The others walked close behind her. Park had his rifle out
and ready.

“Shut up,” said Angie into
the communicator, feeling a little thrill as her voice echoed all
throughout the zoo.

Gregory stopped
mid-sentence for the second time. “I thought you had finally
developed some sense.”

“And I thought I told you to shut up. We've got guns
now. Guns and a map. We can move much more quickly now. So here's
what's going to happen. We are going to march to the restaurant and
your people will give us food. Then, we're finding you and we're
getting Lori.”

Angie stopped mid-stride as she saw a corpse
emerge from the rain in front of them. It was a young woman with
broken glasses and a large gash running down both forearms. Rain
pooled in her wounds and she ground her rotting teeth.

“There,” said Angie to
Park, pointing.

“Got it,” said Park. He
aimed the rifle and fired. The corpse stumbled backward as a dart
thudded into its forehead. The corpse fell to the ground,
still.

Gregory had been silent this whole time.
Angie clicked the communicator on and kept walking. The others fell
in behind her.

“You didn't even know about
the restaurant, did you?” said Angie. Her voice echoed all around.
“You have no idea what your own people are doing. You don't own
shit. You don't run shit.”

Angie stopped and pointed.
“There.”

Park nodded and aimed at a corpse that had
staggered from behind a tree. It was an old man wearing a ripped
tank top and missing part of his scalp. Rain collected in the holes
in his skin and ran slimy rivulets down his cheeks. He gurgled and
came at them. Park fired and the man fell, dart deep in his
forehead.

“Thanks for all the help,
by the way,” said Park.

“Mommy's on the phone,”
said Angie. She motioned for the others to continue and they
pounded through the rain. She was going from memory. They could
round a few more bends before she would have to get out the map and
find the quickest way to the restaurant.

They came around one of those bends and
found themselves by the hyena exhibit. The hyenas ran around
furiously in the rain. They snarled and bit at the wooden fence
separating them from Angie and the others. Angie looked across the
exhibit, finding the light that indicated the door at the back. The
light was red. She assured herself the animals couldn't get to
them. Maylee watched the hyenas warily. Angie suspected she'd had a
different experience with wooden fences. Angie hoped that whatever
it was, it was an isolated incident.

“Which way?” said Dalton,
wrapping his jacket tightly around himself in the rain.

Angie nodded to their right
and clicked on the communicator. “But whatever,” she said, hearing
her own voice echo around. “We'll go to the restaurant, which you
have no control over, get some food, which you'll have no control
over, then we'll find you and get Park's kid. And you'll have no
control over it!”

Angie clicked off the communicator,
listening to her voice fade from the speakers. Through the rain and
growling animals, she heard something else. People, far off, little
pockets of them spread throughout the zoo. It sounded like they
were cheering.