Days Of Perdition: Voodoo Plague Book 6 (22 page)

The walk to the casino was uneventful.  We moved with me on
point, happy to have night vision again, Rachel and Martinez side by side in
the middle and Zemeck bringing up the rear.  Dog stayed tight to my right leg,
ears up and nose constantly twitching as he padded along silently.  There was
no breeze to carry scents to him, but that also worked in our favor as our
smell wasn’t being carried to any infected in the area.

My head was on a swivel, watching for both infected and
survivors.  The thermal scan had shown a few small groups of what had to be
infected at different spots around the exterior walls of the casino, and I
didn’t want them to have any advance notice of our arrival.  I was also worried
about potential attacks from infected wildlife.

I had no idea if razorbacks ranged into this part of the
country or not, but after dealing with the ones in Arkansas, then seeing the obviously
infected bats in Texas, I wasn’t in the frame of mind to trust any animal we
encountered.  But, we didn’t encounter any, moving to the edge of the paved
parking lot without incident.

The lot was so large the building was still over two hundred
yards away and I paused when Dog let out with a quiet growl.  Holding up a
clenched fist I stopped our advance and looked down at him.  His eyes were
locked on the structure to our front and I was reasonably sure he had caught a
sound or scent of the infected group that was clustered beneath the helipad.

After another scan of the area I got us moving forward
again, treading lightly across the smooth asphalt.  Dog would growl occasionally
to let me know there was still danger ahead, but I wasn’t able to see them
yet.  Slowly the details of the building resolved in my NVGs as I drew closer.

We were approaching at an oblique angle to the edge of what
had resolved into a truly impressive structure.  Even though the interior of
the building was only one level, the walls soared nearly fifty feet into the air,
which I suspected created an almost cavernous feel to the inside.  Made of
smooth stucco there was the occasional symbol embedded into the stone that
represented something from the heritage of whatever tribe had built the casino.

Despite knowing that I had Indian blood in my veins courtesy
of ancestors on my mother’s side, I’d never had an interest in the culture and
ignored the designs other than to take note of their presence.  What I wanted
to see was a maintenance ladder that ran from the ground up to the roof.  At
the moment that was much more interesting to me.  But, I wasn’t seeing one on
this side.

Reaching the wall, I flattened my back against it and gave
the rest of the team a moment to join me before sliding along to a corner.  I
could hear them before I saw them, the snarling of several males.  Pausing at
the edge I signed for the rest of the group to hold and peeked my head around
to get a view of what we were dealing with.

Eleven infected were in the immediate area, five males and
six females.  All were just standing there, the females’ heads tilted back to
stare at the parapet far above them, the males swaying slowly back and forth as
they waited for something to happen.  I was preparing to raise my new rifle and
start dropping the females when movement farther out caught my attention.  It
was two infected lying on the ground.

At least I thought they were just lying on the ground, until
I looked closer and was stunned into immobility.  A male infected was on his
back, a female straddling him as they mated.  What the hell?  I knew the
females were getting smarter, or probably to be more accurate they weren’t
having as much of their cognitive functions damaged by the virus as it mutated,
but to be having sex? 

I didn’t even want to think about the implications of the
infected mating.  For that matter, I had no idea how the infected’s minds were
being impacted by the virus.  Was this mating for procreation, or was some part
of their disease riddled brains seeking out sexual pleasure?    

A touch on my shoulder startled me back to reality and I
turned.  Rachel was looking at me with a curious expression that was mirrored
on Martinez’ and Zemeck’s faces.  Peeling the NVGs off I handed them to Rachel
and motioned for her to take a look.  We traded places and she peered around
the corner.  The way her body went stiff I could tell she had spotted the
amorous couple.

Finally I tapped her shoulder and she turned around with a
look of stunned horror on her face.  Next I waved Martinez and Zemeck forward
for a look.  This wasn’t a peep show; I just wanted everyone to be able to
confirm what I had seen.  There had been hope that the infected would
eventually start dying off and the survivors would be able to reclaim the
world.  But if they were procreating, well, hell, it wasn’t good.

I could tell Rachel wanted to talk about this new
development, but I waved her off.  We had the information.  Discussing it could
wait until I had Katie safely in my arms.  Zemeck had gotten a look and also
had a count and mental picture of the location of the infected.  Using hand
signs I told him his area of responsibility was the left and I would take the right. 
He nodded and I raised three fingers, counting down. 

When my last finger folded into my fist we stepped around
the corner together, rifles up, and began engaging the infected.  Two females
dropped simultaneously then two more before the others realized something was
wrong.  One of them turned and emitted the beginning of a scream before Zemeck
shot her between the eyes.

We kept targeting and firing, quickly putting down all of
the females.  I paused a heartbeat when I realized the female in the act of
mating was still so occupied that she hadn’t noticed us.  Walking forward I
started shooting the males and she finally stopped grinding her pelvis on the
male and looked around.  I shot the last male standing and stood with a steady
aim at her head.

She turned back to the male and lunged down, tearing his
throat out with her teeth, dark blood jetting into the air from his severed
carotid artery.  Slowly she got to her feet and turned to face me, pants around
her ankles.  My aim wavered as she bent down, grasped the waistband of her
jeans and pulled them up to cover herself.

“What the hell is going on?”  Rachel said quietly from
behind me.

I didn’t know how to answer that question.  This was a whole
new level of behavior from the females and quite frankly it creeped me the hell
out.  Remembering why I was here in the first place I said the hell with it and
pulled the trigger.  The female’s head snapped back and her body fell across
the male she’d just killed after mating.

My heart was pounding and I took several deep breaths to
calm down and refocus on the task at hand.  A quick scan for any more infected
came up empty and I turned to face the group.  All of them looked as shocked as
I felt.

“We’ll talk about it later,” I said, reaching out and taking
my NVGs back from Rachel.

I scanned the wall and was disappointed to not see any way
to access the roof.  Turning to Zemeck I nodded and he walked a few yards away
from the building before turning and looking up at the roofline.  He must not
have liked what he saw as he backed up another couple of yards, lowered his
rifle and raised the grappling hook launcher.

Aiming high, he pulled the trigger and there was a low thump
followed by the hiss of high-pressure air being released.  A high strength
polymer hook shot into the sky trailing a length of lightweight rope.  The hook
sailed out of sight over the edge of the roof, then the rope softly slapped
against the wall.

Grabbing the line I began pulling to drag the grappling hook
across the roof.  There were knots tied into the line every eighteen inches
that gave me a good grip.  They were there to help climbers grip the rope and
I’d forgotten just how long it had been since I’d gone up the outside of a
building.  Putting it out of my mind I tugged hard when the hook grabbed
something solid on the roof. 

The rope felt secure but before I started up the wall I held
onto a knot and pulled myself a few inches off the ground.  Everything seemed
secure even with my full body weight hanging from the line.  Swinging my legs
up I clamped my feet together on the rope, boot soles resting on a knot and
reached for the next one above my head.  Hand over hand I climbed, keeping my
feet securely on the line each time I reached for a new grip.

There was a time when I would have let my legs swing and
trusted in just my upper body strength.  There was a time when I could scamper
up a rope like a monkey.  Have I mentioned I’m not twenty any more?  Now, if I
went too fast I could miss a grip and fall.  Too slow and my muscles would
fatigue and my grip would slip.  I tried not to think about either of those
scenarios and just went up at a nice, steady pace.  I might have been a little
slower than I used to be, but I still made it up the rope and over the parapet
in a reasonable amount of time.

When my head cleared the edge, I paused long enough to scan
the roof for any threats.  Not seeing any, I came all the way up and as soon as
I was on the roof, stood and raised the rifle for a more thorough scan.  Still
all clear.  Looking down over the edge I waved to let them know all was good
then headed to check the Pave Hawk.

I paused when I saw the man sitting in the cockpit.  He was
either dead or asleep, head hanging down as he slumped forward in the flight
harness.  Still, I approached the helicopter carefully, pulling the door open
quickly with my rifle up and ready when I got there. 

There was no need to check.  The smell hit me the instant
the door came open.  It was bad, but nowhere near as bad as it would get.  Not
knowing how quickly we might need to be able to depart I took a moment to
release the harness and work the body out of the aircraft.  The man hadn’t been
dead long as his body was still stiff with rigor mortis.  It was difficult to
force the rigid limbs into the angles needed, but I kept pushing and pulling
until he came free and tumbled to the roof.  Dragging the corpse a few feet
away from the Pave Hawk I decided to leave the door open to allow the stench of
decomposition to air out.

The plasti-cuffs binding Roach’s hands behind the chair back
finally parted.  Suppressing a groan as his arms came in front of his body for
the first time in hours he leaned forward and breathed deeply until the worst
of the pain passed.  He was locked in a small utility closet, having been
hauled away by the new arrivals.  At first he’d been relieved to see them as
the Major’s wife was about a second away from putting a bullet in his head when
they showed up, but they weren’t interested in talking to him.

He had been roughly dragged to his feet and marched to a
small closet that smelled of cleaning supplies.  A steel framed chair had been
brought in and he’d been forced to sit on it, his hands pulled behind the back
and secured.  Each ankle had also been strapped to a chair leg, the large men
ignoring his attempts to speak with them as they worked.

Once he was secured they had slammed the door and left him
in the dark.  Sitting there, throat and balls aching from where Katie had attacked
him, he forgot all about that pain as he listened to a conversation from
outside the door.

“Jimmy’s going to like that one.”  One of the men said with
a chuckle.

“No shit.  He’ll be happy.  Hasn’t had a bitch to use since
we had to hit the road.”

Both men had laughed then moved away from the door.  Roach’s
blood had run cold.  He had always looked at women as nothing more than objects
for him to use for his own sick pleasures, but had never imagined finding
himself on the receiving end.  Terror spurred him to start testing his bonds.

The plastic ties were very tough, but he eventually found a
rough spot on the chair’s metal frame.  It was at the very limit of the reach
of his bound hands, but there was a tiny, sharp edge where the legs had been
welded to the seat that hadn’t been ground completely smooth.  It wasn’t much,
but it was his only option.

Torqueing his upper body into an uncomfortable position he
began moving his hands up and down, rubbing the tie on the spot.  Finally,
after several hours of work, his hands were free.  Grasping the tie holding his
right leg to the chair he pulled, but there was no way he could break loose. 
Looking around he hoped to spot something he could use to cut free.

A small of amount of light leaked in through a ventilation
grate in the lower half of the door.  While it was dark in the closet there was
still enough illumination for him to see.  To his right was a rack of shelves
loaded with one gallon jugs of cleaning chemicals.  He briefly considered
finding one that was corrosive enough to weaken the plastic and allow him to
break free, but dismissed the idea out of fear of what the compound might do to
his flesh if it was harsh enough to eat plastic.

On the other side of the room were neatly stored brooms,
mops and buckets.  Nothing there.  Twisting his head around he spotted a small workbench
with three drawers.  Half standing up into a crouch he lifted the chair and
hobbled to the back of the closet, pulling the top drawer open.  It was stacked
full of clean, glass ashtrays.  The second one held neatly folded cleaning
rags, the third stacked with boxes of paper match books and a row of cork
screws for opening wine bottles, both with the casino’s name and logo printed
on them.

Slipping a corkscrew into his pocket, Roach grabbed one of
the matchbooks and sat down on the seat, leaned forward and struck a match. 
The odor was sharp and acrid and he worried someone outside the closet might
detect it and investigate, but pressed ahead and held the flame to the plastic
around his left ankle.  Soon the smell of burning petroleum was added to the
mix as the white plastic tie began to bubble.

Roach pushed with his leg and the bond stretched half an
inch before the match burned down to his fingers and he dropped it on the
concrete floor.  Lighting another he held it at the same point and as the flame
burned out his leg broke through the weakened material.  Quickly he lit another
and began working on his right.  Two matches later he was free, suppressing a
shout of triumph.

As he stood up the door was suddenly yanked open and the
light that shone in after being in the dark for so long momentarily blinded
him.

“Anxious little fellar, ain’t you?”  A deep voice said a
moment before he was grabbed and pulled out of the closet.

Roach’s eyes hadn’t fully adjusted to the light, but he
could tell he was facing a very large man.  Another man stood behind him, but
he couldn’t make out his features as he squinted.

“Billy, my new friend and I are going to get acquainted,”
the giant man said, the undertone in his voice sending a thrill of fear and
revulsion through Roach.  “Make sure we’re not disturbed.”

“You got it, Jimmy.”  The man answered.

Roach was panicking.  Barely able to take a breath, eyes
darting around as he looked for any escape route.  When Jimmy turned his head
to nod to Billy, he lunged away and to the side.  He didn’t know where he would
go, just knew he had to get away from the man.  He didn’t even make it a step
before Jimmy’s massive fist lashed out and struck him on the side of the head.

He stumbled and fell, nearly losing consciousness.  Jimmy
stepped over him, reached down and wrapped a huge hand around his upper arm. 
Lifting him to his feet he leaned in until his face was almost touching
Roach’s.

“Go ahead and fight, sugar.  That just makes it better!”  He
said with a grin then planted a wet kiss directly on Roach’s mouth.

Roach wanted to tear away from the man and run, but the grip
on his arm was like iron and he was afraid to antagonize him.  Jimmy broke the
kiss and stood back to his full height, a head taller than Roach, turned and
headed directly to a door with a small brass sign on it marking it as
“PRIVATE”.  Roach had no choice but to walk with him as the man’s hand
tightened on his arm to bring him along.  A scream of “NO” began to build in
his head and he didn’t know if he was actually shouting it or not.