Carson pointed at Kimberly, “I think I’ll start with you Kim, it’ll give Alison more time to think about us.”
Kimberly broke her eye contact with Alison and turned her head in the opposite direction. Kim’s chest and stomach convulsed in deep sobs. From the trees, a pair of crows cawed down at the scene.
Carson loomed over Kimberly, contrasted by the bright blue sky behind him. The dark shapes of the crows flew over Carson’s silhouette like dark specters.
Alison’s ears throbbed from a sharp crack. Her head ached from the buzzing whine in her head. The deafening pitch soared through her ear-drums like they were being squeezed through a pin-hole. Carson staggered back and fell out of sight.
“Ahhhhhh”, he moaned, “My shoulder.”
“When I was a young kid,” a man’s voice said, “my dad told me animals are always trying to tell us things. Those crows took off telling you a bigger fucking predator was coming this way. I listen; that cat back at the meeting, must have been telling us about your bite mark. Might have been even telling us about what a freak you are.”
Rex stepped into Alison’s view with an AK-47 pointing in the direction of her out-of-sight husband. His gun spat fire as the Spartan let lose another round. Alison watched the shell casing spin up into the air flipping end over end. It whistled downward to clank on the top of the truck.
“Doc, next round goes in your heart if you keep trying to move.”
Carson cried in agony. “Please don’t hurt me, it’s not my fault. She attacked me.”
Rex knelt down between the truck and Alison, and set his rifle down. From his pocket he pulled out a knife; it clicked open in his hand. He looked down at Alison; her face was bruised much like the girl beside her. Their eyes were wild with fright and desperation.
"Alison, can you hear me?" he said.
She nodded her head yes at him.
"I’m going to cut you out of this tape, but I don’t want you to move so just hang in there and listen to my voice." He moved the blade near her face and slid it under the blanket cutting at cloth and tape. He cut the blanket off her chest and down to her stomach. He saw the ball of massed tape around both her hands. Rex found the end of the tape and pealed it back unwrapping her hands a layer at a time. He faced the doctor and spared him a glance as he continued to untie Alison. The doctor lay on the ground groaning but alive.
"He lumped you up pretty good,” Rex said to Alison. “But he's in pretty bad shape at the moment. I shot him twice, once in each shoulder."
Rex untwisted the last layer on Alison's hands except for the one against the skin. "This part is going to sting a little," He said. He yanked at the tape separating it from the skin of her hand. Alison's eyes winced in pain, but her hands separated free of their bondage. She flexed her fingers while he went to work on cutting the tape from her arms. He pulled the tape away from her clothing and cut the gap between. Alison reached up with her freed arms and hands and pulled on the tape closing her mouth. She dug her finger at the seam and pealed the tape away from her skin. Alison sucked in a deep breath as she broke the seal on her mouth. The tape popped open freeing her face.
"I thought I was dead," Alison's voice cracked. He cut away the last of the tape on her leg's completely freeing the young woman. She tried to sit up but dropped back down after only getting a few inches off the ground.
"Not too fast" Rex said. "You likely have a concussion. Let me help you into a sitting position."
"I don’t know how you found me,” Alison said. “Thank you, Rex. Thank you."
"I'm sorry I was late," he said.
"No, it was the best birthday present anyone has ever given me," Alison said.
"Put your arm around me,” Rex said. “I’m going to sit you in the back of the truck." He easily lifted her into the open cargo hatch of the SUV. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a familiar .38. "You dropped something," he said as he handed it to her. “What's her part in this?" Kimberly looked up at Rex and Alison with pleading tearful eyes.
"Mistress." Alison said. "She was in on it." Terror spread across Kimberly's face and her body convulsed in muffled sobs.
In the sky, the crows came cawing back across the cornfield with a dozen more of their brethren. "Ha ha ha," Mike laughed on the ground. "Did you see that?" "Did the birds tell you? They said the dead are coming. They’re coming to get you fuckers?"
Alison braced herself on the side of the vehicle with one hand and stood up facing Mike. In her left hand her thumb pulled the hammer back on the .38 special. "Mike," she said, "You really disappointed me on my birthday."
She squeezed the trigger and the gun jumped in her hand. Mike took the slug right in the face. His brains exploded out of the back of his head.
Rex pulled his .45 and clicked the safety off walking over to Mike's body. The heavy caliber round barked out louder than its little sister as he put another round in Mike's head.
He walked over to Kim, the girl continued to sob on the ground. "Alison says you're guilty," Rex stated. "We don’t have a lot of time, because your boy-toy over there was right. We’re not alone here, and those things are likely coming across the field right now. We've made a hell of racket with the guns, so they know right where to find you. I’m going to ask you a question, and I can’t stress enough that you be completely honest. Since your mouth is all tapped up, simple yes or no answers will do fine. Are you guilty?"
A wash of liquid streamed down Kimberly's face as she tightly closed her eyes, her head shook, "Yes."
Alison walked over to Kim with the gun in her hand and pointed it at Kimberly.
"You deserve it," Alison said. Alison then lowered the gun and kneeled down. "I think Kim and I can settle up later." She reached down and snapped the necklace Mike had placed on Kimberly's neck. "I have a feeling Carson bought this for me." She threw the necklace on Carson's dead corpse while Rex bent down and cut away the tape holding Kimberly.
Chapter Eleven
Eason closed the gate on the ramp behind him that led out to the seats of the East upper decks. Mike and his wife Helen were cut off from the press of people and lost on the level below.
The dead had pushed through three of the main gates and taken over the lower levels of the stadium. There were people still down there trying to climb to higher levels, but the dead outnumbered them. The dead had shattered the glass below him to the club level and decimated the people taking refuge there. There might still be people hiding in the luxury suites, assuming someone had the keys to open them up.
Eason pulled the slide on his shotgun open and pushed several cartridges into the magazine. Behind him, people scrambled up walkways to get into higher seats.
Three of the undead rounded the ramp and locked on to Eason standing on the other side of the gate. Eason pushed the breach of the shotgun closed and stuck the barrel through the metal bars of the gate. The closest zombie wore the uniform of a City of Pittsburgh Police Officer. The zombie was Mike Fennel.
Eason backed away from the gate as Mike scrambled up the ramp at him.
He depressed the button on his radio, "North side upper deck gate secure."
"This is South gate, we couldn't get it closed, there’re coming thr-," the message was cut short.