“You’re not walking anywhere,” the professor said. “You’re home now.”
Rachel raised her voice. “What the hell—” and the murmurs rose and fell, now discordant as unease rippled among the four dozen or so Zapheads crammed into the living room. Campbell put his finger to his lips and she finished in a whisper. “I’m not home. I’m headed for Milepost 291. And I have to find Stephen.”
“That little boy that was with you in Taylorsville?” Campbell wondered if she was delirious. The infection was likely poisoning her whole system. The boy could be dead and she might be in denial.
“He’s in the woods all alone,” she whispered.
“You won’t be any good to him if you die,” the professor said, examining her leaky wound. The flesh around the gash was gray, while bubbling pustules cratered up from the raw opening.
“We need to remove her pants,” the professor said.
Campbell glanced around at the looming faces and their strange, glittering eyes, lips working as they mumbled. “No way are we getting a knife out in this crowd. They see you cutting her pants away and who knows how they’ll interpret it?”
“If they wanted to kill me, they would have killed me in the woods,” Rachel said. “I told you, my leg’s fine.”
With a lurch of effort, she propelled herself upward, attempting to stand. The sudden motion triggered silence among the Zapheads. Before anyone could react, her leg gave way and she collapsed back onto the couch. The Zapheads flailed and swayed in imitation of her movement, each of them falling to the floor. The scene would have been comic if it hadn’t been so unnatural and bizarre.
The professor slid his makeshift robe from his shoulders and draped the sheet over Rachel. “We’ll fix you,” he whispered.
Naked, the professor turned to the Zapheads and crouched low, and then stood, motioning them up with his hands. They stood in unison, focusing on him instead of Rachel. The Zap woman Campbell thought might be the professor’s love interest moved to his side and pressed her nude flesh against his.
Campbell put a hand on Rachel’s forehead, and then stroked her hair to comfort her. Then he untied her boots and removed them. The professor and Campbell rolled up the sheet so her wound was exposed while most of her body remained covered.
“What do you think?” Campbell whispered, so low that even Rachel couldn’t hear.
The professor’s gray eyes were solemn but glinted with a mad inner knowledge. “We’ll have to amputate.”
“Shit,” Campbell said. “No way.”
“What are you two talking about?” Rachel said, woozily. Exhaustion must have finally hit her like a midnight tide rolling in.
“She’ll either lose her leg or her life,” the professor said.
“You’re not a doctor.”
“No, but I’m a scientist. I know necrotic flesh when I see it, and I know what blood poisoning can do if it reaches the heart.”
Campbell nodded at the Zapheads. “What about them? You think they’ll just watch like it’s the Packers and Bears teeing off on Monday night football? The first cut and they might go wild. There won’t be enough of her left to fill a chili bowl.”
“Hey,” Rachel called out, apparently unaware of the professor’s diagnosis. “Just get me fixed so I can find Stephen.”
“Hey,” repeated four dozen Zaphead voices. “Hey hey hey.”
Campbell smelled the wound once more, then headed for the kitchen to get a knife.
CHAPTER NINE
“Looks like we’re soldiers now,” Jorge said, standing sentry by the front door.
“Oh, hell no,” Franklin said, checking the magazine of the semiautomatic he’d taken from Hayes. “They’re solders. We’re freedom fighters.”
Robertson had regained consciousness but was in no shape to fight off the rest of the squad. But Franklin wasn’t even sure the other soldiers had heard the gunfire; otherwise, they would have come barging in minutes ago. Still, he wasn’t going to leave the young lady and her dad until he was sure they were safe.
At least as safe as anyone could be in After.
“Does it bother you?” Jorge asked, scanning the yard and the surrounding houses.
“Does what bother me?”
“Killing.”
“You know I treat my goats and chickens like royalty. But those things…” Franklin spat in disgust. “They’re lower than animals. Lower than Zaps, even.”
“I am ashamed,” Jorge said. “Not for killing them, but because I no longer feel any regret. Or anything.”
“You ought to feel like a goddamned hero,” Franklin said. “You probably saved that girl’s life. If not her life, at least whatever chance she had at a future.”
“If that would have been Marina, I would hope someone would do the same.”
“You’re worried sick about your family, aren’t you?”
“Some things are in God’s hands.”
“Well, it was God’s hands that just got yours bloody, so I’d put plenty of salt on that wafer before I swallowed it.” Franklin checked the living-room window, and then looked in the kitchen. “They’re stocked with food and supplies.”
“Do we take them with us?”
“They’re better off staying put. They’ve got a system that works, and Zapheads haven’t bothered them. They’re making it.”
A muted thunderclap erupted in the distance, followed by a staccato burst of noise.
“The rest of the patrol,” Jorge said.
“Sounds like they’re a good ways down the mountain. I’ll bet they didn’t even hear our little party.”
“Then what are they shooting at?”
“Probably each other. Most survival preppers believe you have to sacrifice your morality, because helping others makes you weak. When you cross that attitude with whatever line of bullshit Sarge has been feeding them, you get a bunch of psychos with assault rifles playing Wild West.”
“It’s not the world I want to raise my family in,” Jorge said.
“I guess you can ask God why His hands screwed that one up,” Franklin said, slinging his weapon over his shoulder and going back through the house to check on Robertson and his daughter.
Robertson was conscious and alert, his head swathed in a folded pillowcase. He rested on the bed, propped against the headboard. His daughter wiped his face with a wet towel. Franklin and Jorge had piled the two bodies in the closet and shut the door. Franklin figured that was all the memorial crypt the assholes deserved, but the stench of decomposition would make the house unlivable in a day or two.
“How you feeling?” Franklin asked the injured man.
“Like I drank two quarts of bourbon, only without the giggles,” he said.
“I want to thank you,” the girl said, not meeting Franklin’s eyes. He figured she was still ashamed about what had almost happened to her, even though she had done nothing wrong. She just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time when the wrong thing came along.
Guess that can be said for all of us.
“You two have done okay for yourselves so far,” Franklin said. “Goes to show that most of us are better off without people, because a big slice of the population will always be maniacs. Only now they don’t have to answer for their sins.”
Robertson put his arm around his daughter. He likewise probably felt shame for not protecting her well enough. “Strength in numbers, though. If you hadn’t been here—”
“Then they wouldn’t have been here. We’re all just making this up as we go along.”
“I was a fool,” the man continued. “I thought hiding was the best plan, laying low and hoarding, instead of looking for other survivors.”
“Well, no telling how many preppers are holed up in their private bunkers, ready to drink their own piss for the next twenty years. I don’t call that a ‘life’ for a free man.” The teen finally met his eyes and he gave a crooked smile. “Free woman, either.”