Sighing, I give him the ax.
Once as it’s in his arms, he immediately goes into his house.
I follow right behind him with Dan right behind me. We make it right to the entrance and I can already see what was making the noise. It’s Gabe father. He has a big bite in his stomach, and something is hanging out and dragging on the floor. He seemed to be stuck or something, caught between the sofa and the wall towards the back of the room. But upon seeing Gabe come into the room, he begins reaching for him. With his antics, he gets a little more strength and pushes the couch forward, just enough that he can rush around at him. Who by the way, hadn’t moved from the spot he’s been in since I walked in.
“
Gabe, watch out!” I yell, and try to run to him but Dan grabs me around the middle, holding me to him.
He comes out of his shock then, and when his father is almost to him, he knocks him aside with the hilt of the ax. His dad stumbles into the sofa, but gets right back up snapping his jaw and rushes for Gabe again. He steps back and gripping the ax in both hands he raises it high. He swings it around as his dad gets close enough to touch, and brings it down into his neck.
The blow sends them both to the ground with the ax lodged inside.
His father is still struggling to get up to get to him, and will a yell he stands and pulls the ax free.
I want to look away, but with tears in my eyes, I watch as he brings the ax down again into his neck. It takes two hits for his head to be dissected, but Gabe is still hitting with it even when his dad stopped moving. He yells suddenly, and falls to his knees and drops the ax. When he starts shaking, I pull free of Daniel and run to him.
I have my hand raised and am about to touch his shoulder, but he flinches away from me. Shaking his head, he gets to his feet. He stares down at his father for a second, then walks back over to the couch and picks something up. He touches something on it, and it clicks. Satisfied at whatever it is, he puts it into the belt of his jeans.
He turns to us then, and I see that it’s a handgun.
“
You can have the ax back Maggie, I don’t need it anymore.”
With that he walks right out the front door and makes his way back to the truck. He passes by us all, and I know we wear the same expressions of shock, despair and of course sympathy.
“
You sure you don’t want to get a change of clothes?” Sam calls out. Claire is standing beside him, and she smacks him on the arm.
“
What did I say?” He’s rubbing his arm and looking confused.
“
Idiot. You think he wants anything after what just happened? Just get in the truck.” She follows after Gabe and gets in the front passenger seat again.
Sam figuring he’s driving again goes to get behind the wheel. Maria and I get in the back, and before Emily can get in the way back with Gabe, Dan stops her. He gets in the back with him instead. Gabe doesn’t look at him, but I can tell he’s grateful to have his friend right now. I try to ignore them, not wanting to intrude. But I can’t help but to feel his pain. I know it’s not the same, but we both had to kill someone we cared about. And trust me, it’s not easy. I can still feel the pain hidden inside me, just trying to push it forward to break me. With tears in my eyes, I pray that it’s not worse where we are going.
I know it will be though we’re getting closer to the city now.
Chapter Twenty Five
We are heading to Sam’s house next, since he’s the closest. After driving through our subdivision, we come to a stretch of road that seems bare enough. As we get to the end of it though, we reach the start of our small village. The road splits into three separate streets, the one in front goes through the village square with the shops are. On either side of us, the streets lead to more houses. The end of all three roads leads to the highway going straight into the nearest city.
Which, if we don’t find anyone that knows what’s going on, is where we are likely to go?
Right now, we’re going to go down the street on our right and to Sam’s house. To say the conditions down here are much worse would be an understatement. There are literally cars flipped over and smoking like they were on fire not that long ago. From where we turn, you can actually see the dead shuffling down the main drag. And I’m so glad we’re not going that way, I don’t think we could handle killing thirty or more of our neighbors right now.
Going down the street, we have to drive slowly.
There are cars and belongings blocking the way, so Sam has to swerve in and out of the way. Some of the houses are smoking here, and with the doors open and can see movement inside. The truck stops in front of a small ranch style house, after only going down a few blocks. There aren’t any cars in the driveway, and the front door is wide open.
“
I gotta say, by the way our day is going I really don’t want to go inside.” Sam says as he turns off the ignition anyway. “Dammit.” He opens the door and slams it behind him.
He doesn’t get far though, he leans into the side of the truck and flips the fire poker onto his shoulders. I know we should all be jumping at the chance to help our friend face the awful truth that things won’t be alright inside, but I can’t make myself move. Sam is right, the way things are going there is no way it’s going to be alright. I’m about to reach for the door handle against my better judgment, when the back hatch opens. I swivel I my seat to see Gabe getting out brandishing the gun, with Dan right behind with the bat. Sighing, I grip the ax and get out joining them and it’s hard not to notice that I’m the only other one that does.
“
Maggie, get back in the truck.” Gabe grumbles, not even looking at me.
“
Not going to happen. You ready Sam?” I say.
He only nods but his eyes get exceptionally large as he turns to go. I can see the fire poker shaking in his arms, as we make it up the walkway and get closer to the open door. The first thing we see when we cross the threshold, is blood. It’s everywhere, like someone dumped out a pool full of it and flung it into the room. The afternoon light coming through the windows make it look like the color of rust, and I know that it’s because it’s old.
His house looks like ours except that nothing has been removed only tossed around in an attempt to flee. But with the dried blood, I don’t think anyone made it out of here alive. Not that I’m going to be the one to say to Sam though. He doesn’t seem to think the blood is old because he drops the fire poker, and begins yelling and running into all the rooms. Dan is the one to follow him on his search. Gabe and I seem to be rooted to where we first walked in just through the door. I think if death ever had a smell, it would smell like this house. It smells like raw hamburger and pennies, if that even makes any sense.
I force myself to breathe through my mouth and try not to gag.
Sam and Dan come back towards us then, and I can already see the tears flowing down Sam’s cheek.
“
They can’t be dead, at least not like the things we saw. They would still be here right?” He whispers.
I glance behind me at the open door, and know that they could have gone out after someone else. But I keep that to myself. I want to believe that my parents are fine, and I’m not going to take that away from him. So instead, I place my hand on his shoulder and guide him out the door. Dan and Gabe follow behind and we hurry back to the truck with the others.
When we climb in, Claire is now in the driver’s seat with Maria in the front with her. Emily is in the very back and is holding the door open and reaching for Sam. Sullenly, he climbs in and she slams the door. No sooner did the rest of us squeeze into the back together, does Claire drive us farther down the street. Maria’s house is next.
It takes no time at all to reach her house, since it’s only a few blocks down from Sam’s. Hers is the same kind of ranch style, and the street doesn’t get any better, but I do notice that her front door is closed. She does to and points to the car in the driveway. She’s out of the truck and running before we even come to a stop. By the time we get out and are trying to catch up, she’s already flinging the front door open.
She disappears inside and I can her scream.
Dan gets to the door first, quickly followed by Gabe and me. We come to a stop where Dan is standing off to the right of the entrance. At his feet, Maria is crying over a body. He bends down and takes her in his arms and this makes her cry harder. Since he moved out of the way, I see that it’s an older version of her, and that it must be her mom. What’s pretty shocking though, is the fact that not only is there a chunk of her shoulder missing, but her face has been shot. Not that I’m an expert with gun wounds, but if someone’s face was shot a couple times, this is what it would look like. Gabe notices it the same time as I do, and he raises his gun and takes the safety off.
“
What are you doing?” Dan says as he leans around Maria to glare at Gabe.
“
Not to be disrespectful, but she was shot after she was turned. That means we might not be alone.”
“
What?” Maria screeches and pulls away from Dan to get to her feet. She frantically looks between us, before darting away to the back of the house.
“
Damn it Gabe.” Dan says as he hurries to catch up to her.
Gabe and I share a look and make our way to where they disappeared. At the back of the house, it branches off to two small hallways on either side. The right hallway leads to the kitchen and dining room. To the left there are three bedrooms and a bathroom. I know where Maria is going before she gets to a closed door. See, I’ve been to her house a couple of times in the past. My parents don’t really trust Dan to be alone with a girl, so I’m usually their chaperone. And most times, when Maria and my brother need alone time, I hang out with her younger brother. We usually spend our time jamming out to guitar hero in his bedroom.
That’s where Maria is rushing to right now.
She comes to a stop at the door and shoves it open with a bang against the wall. Dan tries to stop her from going in, but she pulls away and runs inside. Gabe and I hurry to Dan’s side and peer into the room. It looks like a tornado went off inside, but then that’s nothing new, it looked like this when I was here last week.
Maria walks over slowly to the bed on the far wall. Sitting at the foot of it, is her brother Michael. He hasn’t moved since the door opened, and is just staring into space. He’s two years younger than Maria, but looks like he could be her older brother. Resting in his lap is a hunting rifle, and I realize how they’re mom was shot, by him. She kneels in front of him and gently touches his cheek.
Slowly he comes out of his stupor enough that his eyes turn to her.
“
I didn’t mean too, ‘Ria.” He says as tears begin to fall down his cheeks.
“
Oh Mikey, it’s not your fault I swear.” Maria tells him as she takes him in her arms.
“
She came home hurt and then tried to attack me. I didn’t know what else to do.”
“
Mikey listen to me now, did she bite you?”
“
Bite me? No. I ran to dad’s study and found his rifle. The door broke down and I just reacted. Dad said never to touch his gun; he’s going to be so mad.” He starts shivering and sobbing in her arms then.
“
Shh, don’t worry about it. I’m here now and I won’t let anything happen to you I promise.” She looks to us and Dan joins her on the floor.
With her brother in her arms, she smiles sadly. I turn away then. With tears in my own eyes again, I jog around Gabe and out of the house. As soon as the late afternoon sun hits my cheeks, I let the tears fall in waves. Blindly I make my way to the truck, and the door opens as I get close and Sam leans out.
“
What happened?”
I just shake my head, and shove him over so I can get in. Shutting the door behind me, I hate the way everything is turning out. I don’t know if I can take much more, and so I lean back into the seat and close my eyes.
If I’m going to face the gates of hell, I need a five second break.
Chapter Twenty Six
As the sun is setting, we are all packed back up in the truck and are heading to Emily’s house. It took almost an hour before the others came out of Marias house, but they had Michael with them. It had to have taken some convincing to get him out of his room. Not that I blame him, if the monsters were in his house, it doesn’t make sense to go out where there could potentially be more of them. But he got in the truck with no problem; he’s sitting with Dan and Maria in the back.
Claire is driving again with Emily up front beside her, so that leave Sam, Gabe and I in the middle.
Emily’s house is farther away from the other’s we went to. Her small two story duplex stands at the end of the road before it branches off into a side street leading to the highway. At this end of the street it’s almost quieter somehow. There are less and less things in the road and even fewer movements in the shadows. Pulling into her empty driveway feels more like just going to a friend’s house, and less like a disaster waiting to happen.
Once the truck is off, Emily doesn’t make a move to get out, but neither do the rest of us.
“
Push over Sam, let me out.” Gabe says.
Sam hesitates for a second before jumping out and holding the door for Gabe. Taking the gun out of his belt, he goes to Emily’s door and opens it for her. With wide eyes, she just stares at him like the rest of us are. One arm resting on the door, he leans into her.