"No," she said in disbelief.
Adrenaline flooded her veins, and she pulled the hulking beast—450 pounds of solid muscle—off of Cole with ease. Her friend was breathing and looked unscathed aside for a handful of scratches and scrapes. She held her breath and rolled Cole to his stomach. Slowly, she lifted a portion of his hair to expose the silver device that she had felt in the dining room. It was a mirror image of the one that was embedded into the beast.
"No!" she screamed.
Red lights flashed in Sam's eyes as she screamed out. She was drunk with rage and anger. Her eyes scanned the sandy surface until they locked on a jagged rock the size of a softball. She picked up the stone and smiled as it burned her palms. The pain felt good. It felt real. She hoped it would wake her up from this horrible nightmare. But this nightmare was as real as the pain.
She stumbled back to the midnight runner and dropped to her knees. The creature's chest raised and lowered rhythmically as its lungs filled with air. She looked to Cole who was breathing in and out in the same rhythm as the beast.
Sam choked back tears and lifted the sharp stone in the air, high above her head. She swung it down with a primal scream and buried it deep into the creature's neck. Dark red blood poured from the puncture wound. She pulled out the stone and lifted it again. Her arms trembled fiercely and she let out another scream. She swung again and crimson splattered onto the hot, yellow sand each time she did. She lifted the stone over and over, each time digging it deeper and deeper into the creature's neck. Each time screaming inaudible profanities and cursing whatever god would take away everything that she loved.
Over and over.
Faster and deeper.
She had swung the rock until every muscle burned within her arms and chest. Until there were no more tears to cry. Until she was coated with the blood of the midnight runner and its head severed from its body.
She sat in the sand for a long time and silently sobbed and stared at the creature's blood soaking into the sand. Alex remained slumped by the doorway of the bunker, Nick tending after her. From time to time, the ground would shake violently as echoes of the underground city collapsed underneath them. Sam wasn't worried about the ground beneath caving in. She wasn't worried about anything anymore.
After a long time, Sam hit the middle button on the remote again and Cole stirred from the catatonic state. He woke confused and gawked at the grim landscape stretched out around them. The bodies and blood. It made her sick to her stomach.
"What happened, Miss Sam?"
"Nothing," Sam said. Her words were cold and reproachful. "You passed out. That's all."
"Are you okay?"
"Yes." She didn't look at him.
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
"I reckon a thank you is in order."
"For what?"
"Saving my life."
Tears stung at her eyes. She hadn't saved anyone. They had all died or soon would die. She shook her head but didn't say anything. After a few minutes, he retreated to the doors of the bunker where Alex and Nick were resting.
She stared into the distance as the sun beat down on them. A few minutes later, Nick joined her. He took a seat next to her but didn't speak at first. He picked at the leaves of a brittlebush.
"You should come over in the shade," he said after a long time.
"I'll be fine," Sam whispered.
There was another long moment of silence as Sam eyed the horizon. A great road stretched out in front of them, the blacktop faded and crumbled. Sam could only guess where it would lead. There were no maps in the binder or the bag. She would have to rely on Cole to lead them to Concordia. She assumed Holden had told him the way. Assumed they were heading in the right direction when the truck had flipped. And she assumed the worst about what would become of him. The thought brought a fresh round of tears to her eyes.
"What now?" Nick asked.
Sam pointed to a blue and red metal sign sticking up near the road. The paint was faded, and the sign was cracked down the middle but the number on it was still legible. It read 'EAST' and underneath '15' although the words were extremely faded.
"We head east. That's what."
"How far?"
"I don't know."
"And your friend?" Nick asked.
Sam looked over at Cole. Alex had laid her head in his lap and he stroked the young girl's hair. The other giant hand rubbed the back of his head and his face twisted into puzzlement. As if he could sense Sam was watching, he looked up at her, and she turned back to the sign. She made one last assumption. Nick had put two and two together. He knew what would happen to her friend. And that scared her most of all.
Finally, Sam whispered, "When it happens, I will deal with it."
Nick nodded. Sam eyed the boy and met the cold-tempered stare in his hollowed eyes. She knew what the nod meant. It was an understanding. It meant that when the time came, if she didn't take care of things, he would.
If Nick were as adept as she thought he was, then he could see the same cold stare in her eyes. Her stare that echoed his.
When the time comes, I'll kill him myself.
They stared at each other for a moment longer and then Nick retreated back to the bunker entrance where the tiniest bit of shade could be found.
Sam held her spot, baking in the hot heat of the sun and continued to plot out their next move. They would stop in the city on the sign and gather whatever supplies they could scavenge, kill whatever monstrosities lie in wait, and then continue to the bastard city.
She knew that one if not most of them would die along the way to Concordia…but not her. She would keep going until things were right in the world again. Until she had saved it. Because that's what she had been
designed
to do. After a long time, when her shoulders started to turn pink and she could no longer bare the heat, she decided to join the group.
They decided to wait until sunset before moving out. They scavenged the dead bodies and pieced together clothing for Alex and Nick. They would look for more clothes along the way.
The temperatures grew bearable and the bright red blood had baked into the sand and turned it black. The sun idled on the horizon casting the last rays of orange and yellows across the skyline. The four of them took their first steps forward. The escaped children of Lost Angel had fled shortly after Sam had killed the beast, or maybe during, she didn't know…she didn't care. All she knew was there were only four of them now.
They had no food and a limited amount of ammo, but Sam had a purpose. She would carry on until she reached Concordia and then she would claim vengeance for Jordan's death. For Rebecca's death. She would get retribution for the citizens of New Hope and those of Lost Angel. And when Cole Porter turned into one of the midnight runners and she had to take his life, she would get revenge for that as well. The sign under the interstate marker was a green one. The white letters barely legible, but Sam could still read it.
Las Vegas – 266.
It would take at least a week to walk there…perhaps longer. Maybe months to make it to Concordia. But she would persevere. There were questions that had to be answered and more importantly retributions that needed to be paid. And in-between this forsaken place and their goal was a world full of the infected. A world full of halfways waiting to bring them down.
PART THREE: CONCORDIA
1
Steel skeletons stretched from the desert floor and kissed the dawn sky. Piles of rubble and mortar lay at their feet like shed skin. Las Vegas was nothing more than a forgotten graveyard nestled in the wastelands of a godforsaken world. Sam glassed the city gates from afar, counting the halfways near the entrance. There was at least a dozen. Maybe more. The government had walled up the city in the same way as New Hope, but the gates hadn't held.
The remnants of the city provided a sense of relief for Sam. It shot a giant hole in the General's millennial theory and she guessed that Holden's assessment of 300 years was closer to the truth. Although the thought of three centuries passing without her knowledge didn't give her the warm fuzzies.
She focused the lens on the rotting corpses as they trundled near the pyramid's entrance. A man in a frayed business suit hobbled across the boardwalk with his neck canted at a 90-degree angle. He stumbled past a woman wearing a pink show costume as she gyrated her hips in his directions. A dozen others seemed to be following similar ritualistic routines from their old lives.
Sam shifted her weight, and the scaffolding groaned underneath her. She had perched herself on the edge of a billboard, fifty feet in the air. The metal creaked again, and she inched back from the edge. The wind picked up, and she grabbed the railing. The entire sign swayed, and her heart climbed into her throat. Coming up here wasn't the brightest idea, but it had been necessary. She shoved the telescope into her pocket and made her way back to the service ladder. Carefully, she climbed down the rungs where Cole was waiting.
"What'cha think?" he asked as she reached the ground.
Sam shook her head.
"We gots to do something, Miss Sam. Those kids are gonna die soon if we don't get 'em some real food. Hell, we all will."
"I know," she whispered.
She looked to the west and her eyes fell upon the two refugees from Lost Angel. Nick and Alex, two skeleton-thin effigies of their former selves, huddled together in the middle of the sand-swept road. They hunkered against the concrete divider and Nick suppressed a harsh cough with the crook of his arm. Blood spattered the sleeve of his shirt and Sam looked away.
He was dying. They all were.
It had taken them a little over two weeks to walk to Las Vegas. They had been fortunate with the water supply and had filled their jugs on three separate occasions. But food had been limited to a few handfuls of mesquite beans and banana yucca fruit. They'd need protein if they expected to make it across country. Sam's stomach rumbled, and she looked back to the city.
"We can't risk it. One of those halfways gets a whiff of us and they'll swarm faster than we can run away. There aren't enough bullets to fight off a horde and I couldn't swing a weapon if my life depended on it. Hell, I can barely carry this bag anymore."
Cole nodded.
"How much water do we have left?" Sam asked.
Cole examined the two gallon jugs hanging around his neck. "A day's worth," he said. "A day and a half if we cut back."
"We can't afford to cut back."
"Then a day's worth."
They found the jugs in a junkyard outside Lost Angel. They spent a full day scavenging for supplies and ended with an ancient metal pot, a Bic lighter, half a binocular, some string, a couple rusted knives and a duffle bag. Cole had tied the jugs together with the length of string and worn them around his neck without complaint.
They lucked out for the first dozen miles of their trip and hiked through the foothills of a lush mountain range. Sam had spotted a stagnant pond from the road and they had made camp for the evening. They emptied the canvas duffel bag, filled it with rocks and dirt and they filtered the water through it. Then they gathered some limbs from the brush, lit a fire and boiled the water. Sam made everyone drink as much as they could stomach before leaving and then they filled the jugs to the brim.
When they had reached the desert, their luck had run out. They had resorted to extreme rationing over the last week and the inside of Sam's mouth felt like sandpaper. She let Cole's words resonate in her mind.
"How much more can we cut back?" Sam asked after a long moment.
Cole didn't answer.
"What about ammo?"
"Got a full clip in my sack. Three rounds left in the rifle."
"Next time we make camp, I want you to switch clips. We need to hold on to those three rounds, just in case."
"In case of what?" Cole asked.
"You know what," Sam answered. "One of us gets bit and turns…" Sam hesitated trying to keep the image of Nick or Alex as a halfway far away from her mind's eye. "If push comes to shove, do you think you can bash one of their brains in?"
"Naw," Cole said. "Don't reckon I could. But I don't reckon I could shoot 'em neither."
"Let's hope it never comes to that," Sam said.
Sam returned the makeshift telescope to the pant-leg of her cargos and ran her bandaged hand through her thick matted hair. It was dry and gritty and she had contemplated hacking it off with one of the knives about 12 times a day since leaving Lost Angel. She would give anything for a shower.
"Where's Concordia from here?"
"If I remember the maps Deckard showed me," Cole said and looked at the sun hanging low in the hazy sky, "should be due east. Little ways to the North. Middle of the country."
"If you remember?"
"Been a long time," Cole said. "Been over a month since we left New Hope. Even longer since he showed me. But I suppose I still remember them pretty good."
Sam sighed. "We passed another big roadway a couple miles back. Looked like it was heading east. I say we head that way."
"Okay," Cole said and scratched his bushy beard. "What about food?"
"We'll keep scavenging. Maybe once we get out of the desert we can hunt."
"Desert's a big place. We're gonna need food before—"
"What do you suggest?" Sam interrupted. "I'm doing my best here."
Cole looked to the ground. "I know ya are. It's just—"
"It's just what?"
"I'm worried about the boy. He didn't have a lot of meat on his bones to start. He's not doing good."
Sam turned back to Nick. His face was gray and sunken and blood stained his lips. "I know," she said.
They started back toward Alex and Nick but Cole stopped her before they got within earshot. "Miss Sam?"
"Yeah?"
"You've been looking in that book of yours every night," Cole said. "The one you found in Doc's bag."
"Yeah," Sam said. She looked away, afraid to meet his gaze, and out toward the sky. The sun stagnated just below the horizon, not yet ready to stretch out and brighten the day. Instead, the eastern skyline was pink with large purple clouds hanging low in the air. To the west, the darkness kept its stranglehold on the forthcoming morning.
"You ain't found anything that talks about what this thing is they put in my head, have you?" Cole wrung his hands together and frowned. "Or how to take it out? Or what the other two buttons do on the remote—"
"No," Sam interrupted. She looked at him and prayed he couldn't see through her lies. His face twisted in disappointment and Sam looked away again. It hurt to lie to him. "I promise," she continued, "if I find something, you'll be the first to know."
Cole ran a giant hand through his hair and rubbed the back of his scalp. After a long moment, he said, "Okay, Miss Sam."
They resumed walking until they reached Nick and Alex. As they neared, the children clambered to their feet, an unwarranted optimism coating each of their faces. A pang of guilt shot through Sam's heart.
"Any luck?" Alex asked.
Sam shook her head. "City's crawling with halfways."
"Goddammit," Nick said. He started to say something else but broke into another coughing fit. Sam cringed as more red spittle flew from his lips. The episodes were getting worse. It wouldn't be much longer.
Alex tried to speak but her words caught and instead she burst into silent sobs and collapsed back to the asphalt. The small-framed girl had already lost ten pounds and Sam wondered how much more she could stand to lose. Tears streaked down her soiled cheeks and Nick knelt down and wrapped a stick-thin arm around her.
"So what do we do?" Nick asked.
"Concordia is east of here," Sam said. "We head that way and pray for water. Pray for food."
"No offense," Nick said, "but I stopped praying a long time ago. What if we go around the city and try to sneak in through a rear entrance."
Sam shook her head. "We'll scavenge anything and everything on the way, but we need to keep heading toward Concordia. It's the best course of action."
"How do you know that?" the boy asked. "How do you even know Concordia is real?"
"It's real," Sam affirmed.
"And so what if it is," Nick sputtered. "What's the point if we all die trying to get there?"
Sam didn't answer.
Nick kissed his sister atop of her head and then coughed again, this time into his hands. When the coughing subsided, he wiped his palms onto the legs of his jeans leaving two faint trails of blood behind.
"We need to keep moving," Sam said. She lifted the doctor's handbag from the broken pavement. "It'll be noon in a few hours. If it's as hot as it was yesterday then we'll need to set up camp and wait until nightfall to resume travel." Neither Nick nor Alex protested. Instead, they gathered the rest of the gear they had pieced together throughout the trip and turned back in the direction they had come.
A half-mile from the entrance to the city they passed a broken-down slot machine slumbering on its back in the center of the road. The words and paint were faded to the point of transparency from decades, or perhaps centuries, of living under the cruel desert sun. Sam felt as faded and far removed from reality as the broken-down machine.
The group slowed as they passed the charred frame a vehicle. A skeleton slouched against the car door and stared back at her from the driver's seat. There was another in the passenger seat and two smaller ones in the rear. Sam wanted to feel sorry for them but she couldn't. They had been lucky the ones.
Cole grabbed her by the arm and Sam nearly screamed aloud.
"What?" Sam whispered.
"Halfway," Cole whispered back.
She signaled for Nick and Alex to stop and then eyed the stretch of road ahead. Standing next to the concrete divider, 200 yards away, was a person. Sam pulled the telescope from her pocket and looked through it.
"It's a woman—" Sam said, and then corrected herself, "was a woman." The decayed flesh was a sickly gray color and pocked with open sores that oozed black pus. The woman looked down between her knees and then back to the horizon.
"Is it alone?" Cole asked.
She glassed the area but saw no one else.
"Looks that way." She dropped the looking glass into her pocket and unsheathed the chef's knife from her waistband. "It wasn't here when we passed the first time. We'll need to be on the lookout for others."
The knife's stainless steel blade had rusted from years of being exposed to the environment and the tip was dull, but it was a quiet alternative to the rifle. She could sever the halfway's spinal cord without drawing attention from others in the area.
"You want me to handle it?" Cole asked.
Sam shook her head. "No. Stay with the children."
"You want the gun?"
"No," Sam said. She grasped the handle of the knife and started toward the creature.
She measured each step and moved silently across the broken blacktop using the cars as cover. The halfway continued to stare at the ground as she moved within striking distance. She raised the knife above her head and prepared to jab it into the back of the dead woman's neck. And then she saw what had captured the halfway's attention. Lying in-between the decomposing legs of the woman was an infant—a rotten, leathery cord tethering the child to its mother.
Sam gasped and fell backward. She stumbled over a piece of debris and dropped the knife. The halfway looked up at her and screamed, and Sam had to cover her mouth to stifle a whimper. The woman's glassy eyes darted back and forth from the child to Sam. It yelled something inaudible and then took a step toward her. Sam grabbed blindly for the knife afraid to take her eyes from the dead woman. The halfway took another step closer, but the umbilical cord pulled taught. It had caught on a piece of rebar jutting from the divider. The dead woman screamed once more at Sam and then returned to the child.
Sam picked herself up from the pavement and took a tentative step forward. She couldn't take her watery eyes off of the child. It too was crying. Its skin was the same ashen color as its mother and pocked with the same infectious sores and gaping wounds of exposed muscle and tissue. The dead woman growled and shrieked as Sam took another step closer, but it didn't leave the child's side.