Authors: Better Hero Army
Seven
As the sun set, the train wound its way up into the foothills known as the Nobs. Tom and Penelope sat in their chairs on one side of the train while the soldier lay on the couch. The doctor sat in a chair against the wall with her eyes closed, a blanket covering her upper body. Penelope stared out the window, watching the reflection of the doctor and the soldier as much as the forest passing outside. Tom still held her hand even though his eyes were shut. She could tell he wasn’t actually asleep, though. None of them were.
The forest gave way
to a sudden rise, but the train continued its level course, driving downward against a sheer wall that rose out of nowhere. Penelope held her breath, sitting upright as the stone rose to engulf the train completely, turning suddenly into a pitch black canopy.
“Ung,” Penelope grunted, pulling free of Tom’s touch. She
stepped back from the window.
“What?” Tom asked worriedly as he stood.
“Ung,” she grunted again, signing
out, dark
.
“Penny, it’s a tunnel,” Tom told her. “It’s alright. We’ll be out of it in a minute. Just watch.”
The train lurched the passengers forward, nearly throwing Tom and Penelope to the floor.
“Or maybe not,” Tom said sarcastically.
The abruptness of the braking wore off and Penelope felt the weight of the train let loose again for a moment, then the brakes grabbed hold once more, this time more fiercely. Penelope crouched down and put her hands on the floor to keep from falling. The train slowed like that for what felt like minutes until they came to a halt inside the dark tunnel.
“Bad,” Penelope whispered as she
stood.
Tom
pressed his face against the glass, looking forward, trying to see what was happening.
“What’s going on?”
the doctor asked.
“The train
stopped,” Jones said.
O’Farrell glared at him, shaking her head in disgust.
“I figured that much,” she replied. “Do you think there’s a problem?”
“If there is, Houston will let us know about
it,” Jones said.
“Yeah, but what if Houston’s having a heart attack, or something?”
“Then Hank will let us know.”
“Mason,” she grumbled. “Sometimes you’re impossible. Can you just go find out what’s happening?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Jones replied, sitting up from the couch and grabbing his jacket. The bandage covering his left arm looked the same as it did the first time Penelope saw it a day ago. A thick circle of blackened, dried blood at its center with a thin line of similarly dried blood as though it had oozed toward the floor while he was standing. His bite wound reminded her of her own and she rubbed at her scar absently.
“We need to change that dressing soon,” O’Farrell said.
“It can wait,” Jones replied as he slid his arm into the black jacket. Jones treated it with the same kind of painful reverence that Tom gave his own shoulder.
Jones was zipping up the jacket in front of the door when it suddenly opened. Hank stood on the other side and both men stiffened in shock.
“Oh, good, you’ve got a jacket,” Hank said, stepping into the coach and closing the door behind him.
The chill from outside reached Penelope.
She shivered, but was happy to inhale fresh air. The pervasive smell of zombies still lingered in the coach, but it was far less in the front lounge car than back in the sleeper cars. The outside air was a welcome arrival.
“We need help clearing the tracks,” Hank went on. “Grab a couple nooses from the closet over there.”
“Nooses?” Jones asked. “What kind of obstruction are we talking about?”
Penelope leaned her head against the window
where Tom stood, expecting to see a horde of zombies shambling alongside the train tracks, but the only thing she saw was darkness and a line of light where the front of the train was stopped.
“We’ve got some biters in the tunnel ahead of us,” Hank said.
Penelope leaned back away from the glass.
“So run them down,” Jones replied.
“Houston says he won’t.”
“That’s fine,” Jones
said, walking over to Tom. “Can I borrow your shotgun?”
“No shooting, either. They’re children.”
Penelope didn’t like the sound of that. Where there were children, there were always adults. She signed the word
danger
to Tom.
“I know,” Tom said
under his breath to Penelope. “Hank, I agree with Jones. Run them over.”
“Argue with the driver,” Hank said
, jacking a thumb over his shoulder. “There’s only about a dozen of the little nippers.”
Penelope looked out the window again at the
blackness. She saw her own reflection and that of Doctor O’Farrell zipping up her jacket. O’Farrell crossed the coach to the shelf next to the tripod where an assortment of cameras were kept and she took one to look at. Penelope picked up her own jacket and waited for Tom’s direction. Tom didn’t move, nor did the soldier.
“
Jesus, come on,” Hank grumbled, pushing past the soldier to get to the closet.
“
Hank, going out there is stupid,” Tom argued.
“Like your i
dea about going to Midamerica is any better. You gonna help us out?”
“What?”
“Get a noose, kid,” Hank said, yanking open the closet door. Inside were several noose poles as well as padded sleeves and neck guards to go over jackets and vests. Hank assessed a couple and tossed a pair to the soldier, then another to Tom. “Put those on.”
“I know how to handle biters,” Jones complained.
“The doctor doesn’t have another hit of that curative if you get bit again,” Hank said to Jones. “Put the sleeves on and let’s go. You too, kid,” Hank said to Tom. He dragged out four poles and started for the door. “Come on, time’s a wasting.” Hank thrust a pole into the soldier’s hands. He put another noose pole by the door and pushed his way out into the cold again.
Tom sighed and plucked his jacket off the chair.
“You two stay here,” Jones ordered the women as he slid on the pair of padded arm guards.
“I want to see this,” O’Farrell replied
, slipping the strap of the camera over her head.
“Like hell,” the soldier said. “Stay here where it’s safe.”
“Like hell,” she told him.
Tom
yanked the arm guards over his own jacket and strapped the neck guard in place. Penelope tugged on his arm and he looked her way.
Zombies near
.
Danger.
“How can you smell that from in here?” Tom asked. She pointed to her head. “Oh, you just know. Well, I don’t disagree. Do you want to stay here?”
Penelope shook her head.
“
Then I’ll bring a little extra protection with us, just in case,” Tom said, picking up the shotgun from where he had left it on the floor.
Eight
The
frigid air didn’t bite as hard as Penelope expected when Tom opened the coach door. He led her out and down the ladder onto the gravel embankment on which the whole train rested. Penelope saw the grayness of the outside world through a small window in the darkness behind them. Everything surrounding that window was black stone hidden by the shadows of the cave. Ahead of the train was bright light that shone yellow over a deep, long expanse. The others stood at the edge of the light.
The air wavered
in temperature, and with the warmer pockets came the smell of diesel choking out every other scent. The slow and unpredictable breeze pushed hot exhaust over them from the top of the train. Even the chirping, grinding sound of the engine at idle wavered with the winds.
Penelope caug
ht brief echoes of the childrens’ chorus between the lulls of the growling engine. She understood their tone; wails of terror and confusion.
“I’m not running over any children,” Houston said to Jones.
His breath didn’t fog as he spoke. Only the wind brought the cold. Penelope held her hand out to feel warmth emanating from the walls themselves.
“They’re zombies,” Jones replied.
“They’re still people. They’re children.”
“You make a magazine with naked zombie women on the cover,” Jones pointed out.
“They’re not naked,” Houston snapped. “They’ve got clothes, and they’re
models
.”
“
Zombie models,” Jones replied.
“They were models before they were bit
.”
“Huh?”
“That’s how I got the idea in the first place. I brought one of them in and the registrar told me she was that model Shyla, you remember her? Bah, before your time, but that’s when I got the idea. I had her disinfected professionally. No scars. And she’s trained—not slab trained—she knows the difference between people and a meal.”
“If she can string three words together
, she sounds like the perfect date,” Jones said.
“Ah, stuff it, soldier boy. I’m not running over any children, and if you shoot one, you’re walking home.”
Tom put a hand up to fend off anymore banter. “How many more tunnels will we be going through?”
Houston continued to glare at Jones, who stared
back with steady stoicism.
“How many tunnels?” Tom asked, stepping between the two.
“This is the only one we’ll have trouble with,” Houston said.
“
I asked how many,” Tom told him. “They’re all trouble.”
“A few more, but this is the Duncan Tunnel.”
Tom shrugged and shook his head.
“It’s the
Duncan Tunnel
. A mile long with vent shafts for limited light and aeration. All the other tunnels are short. They don’t make good hiding places. I always have trouble coming through here because it’s warm in the winter and cool in the summer. Funny, though. It used to be only adults. A few hits of the air horn ran them off.”
“A few hits of the shotgun will do the same,” Jones interjected.
“No guns,” Houston snapped. “Those are people in there. Children!”
“They’re
biters
,” Jones replied.
“Not by choice,” Houston said slowly.
“Then what are you proposing?” Tom asked. “Drag them out behind us? They’ll just come up behind us when we’re not looking.”
“No,” Houston said. “We’ll put them in the cargo
holds like I was saying.” Houston pointed toward the middle car, the one with the berths Tom and Penelope saw the other zombies in.
“Up in those nice living quarters? With your cover models?”
“What the hell were you doing in there?” Houston growled at Tom.
“We were heading for the kitchen, but ran into your harem.”
“You didn’t hurt them, did you?” Houston asked. He was angrily concerned, stepping closer to Tom.
Penelope growled by Tom’s side.
“They’re in their rooms,” Tom replied evenly. “What are you carrying biters on board for, anyway?”
“You work at the kennels,” Houston snapped. “Would you put my girls in there?”
“Can we stop arguing and get this over with?” Hank yelled. “Catch and contain.”
“Fine,” Jones said.
“And don’t worry about room,” Houston added. “There are eight deep cargo bays on each side. Two can fit in each compartment. I’m going to go move the train up closer to the first clutch. You boys do the rest.”
No one argued. Houston nodded and started back toward the engine.
“Why do I get the feeling he forgot to mention something is going to be inside one of those cages?” Jones asked.
“Seriously,” Tom agreed.
“No one works alone,” Hank put in. “We all catch and carry back down the same side, together. Ladies, we’ll need your eyes both ways while we do it. Come on, let’s get this over with.”
A light
on the engine came on, enough for them to see the length of the train front to back. Hank led them all out in front of the snowblower. With its headlights on, its mouth appeared even more sinister, as though it were alive, and craving for them to step in its way. The children stood clustered together a few hundred feet further into the tunnel, at the edge of the train’s light. It looked like a small clutch of only five or six, but they were so close together Penelope couldn’t tell. They did that when they were frightened or cold, clutching each other for comfort and warmth.
O’Farrell knelt down to take photographs of their advance. Penelope stood behind her, watching front and back as the train began to creep
up the tunnel behind them.
“Here,” Tom said, handing the shotgun to Penelope. “Shoot it in the air if anything comes sneaking up behind us.”
They nodded to one another and Tom followed Hank and Jones.
“Just grab one and pull it out,” Hank yelled. “They’re blind in the headlights.”
“Yeah, well so am I,” Jones shouted.
The train chirped and lurched forward behind Penelope and O’Farrell. They began moving forward with the men to stay ahead of the
ominous snowblower. As the train pushed its way further into the tunnel, it felt as though the walls narrowed, becoming only wide enough for the train to slip by if Penelope leaned her back against them. She nudged O’Farrell’s shoulder to get her attention. O’Farrell looked back with alarm and got up to walk deeper into the tunnel and to stay ahead of the slowly trundling train. The growling diesel drowned out the wailing of the children, and the scent of zombie was everywhere in the tunnel now that she was ahead of the diesel fumes. Penelope could only rely on her sight. It worried her because she knew it was her worst sense. In the stretching and shrinking shadows cast by the moving train, everything came alive.
The men reached the clutch of children and Hank made the first catch. He stepped to the edge of the group, swung a noose over a child’s head, and pulled it gently back with its hands clutching at its neck. Penelope touched her own neck.
Peske used to throw a noose over her, too, every time he let her out of a cage. A noose in the morning to go from the duck to her cage on Biter’s Hill so that everyone could gawk at her. A noose in the afternoon to go with him for lunch. He liked using her to keep people away from the hot dog stand while he ordered a half dozen for them to share. Even veteran hunters kept a respectful distance as he casually held the pole over his shoulder and placed their order, not paying attention to Penelope as she growled at anyone getting too close. Then another noose in the evening on the way back to the duck, where he would put her away for the night. Even a noose when she went to the bathroom or washed at the river’s edge. Sometimes he would let her noose go to help her with the shampoo, or to give her some ketchup for the hot dog, but it was always around her neck outside.
Tom made an awkward lunge and missed his first target. Hank called him back and traded poles, giving Tom the child Hank already caught, then Hank went in for his second
catch.
The train crept closer to Penelope and she looked back to see it only a few yards behind. O’Farrell kept walking, leaving Penelope alone with her memories. The closeness of the train startled Penelope and she
jumped ahead, landing on uneven stones. Her ankle turned and she pitched forward.
She had been carrying the shotgun in both hands the way Tom taught her, one hand near the trigger, one hand on the stalk. The extra weight of the weapon helped pull her down. She turned slightly in an effort to free her hands, but the ground came up at her too fast.
The shotgun erupted as the butt hit the gravel, her finger still trapped over the trigger.
Boom!
The noise echoed like nearby thunder, rumbling through the tunnel even over the sound of the closing engine. Beneath her she saw the wooden cross ties that held the tracks together. Penelope turned her head to see the snowblower coming close. It loomed with a menacing intent to grab up her legs and scoop her into its maw.
She
screamed. Her own voice scared her, it came so loudly. She rolled away from the tracks just as the train clanked and screeched to a stop only a foot away. Her heart raced, pounding harder than any time in her life that she could remember, which dislodged a memory of a time more frightening, and for a moment the barrage of activity played itself out in her mind with no regard to her frazzled emotions. Being near death had a way of bringing back buried things, and for Penelope it was the vision of a black woman in a white lab coat hovering above her, a white mask over her nose and mouth, and her hazel eyes staring down on her through clear plastic glasses.
“
Okay twenty-two, let’s see what you do,” Doctor Kennedy said as she turned a needle toward Penelope’s chest. Penelope felt fire burning through her body, an acid that washed through her veins until her heart stopped beating and everything went dark.