Carson
Ryder: Former marine/Former police officer/Suffers from retrograde amnesia/
Searching for clues to his past/Lost his wife and daughter
Taryn
Mills: Survivor found outside the Starlight Hotel/Lost her boyfriend, George
Verdi, to the Biters/Not afraid to use a gun/No known family
Nikki
Fox: Former registered nurse/Never married/Lost contact with her family during
the first initial weeks of the outbreak
Reggie
White: Born and raised in Arkansas/Has never left the state before
Scotty
Loomis: Originally from Utah/Friends with Reggie/A perpetual fountain of random
facts and useless information
Corey
Smith: Doomsday prepper/Lives in a fortified compound with a tremendous arsenal
of weapons
Paul Langstrom:
Former police officer/Originally from Detroit/Transferred to NYPD in
2008/Worked narcotics
Luke
Chen: Runner/Competed in the Olympics/Knows how to use a gun but he prefers a
katana
Dominic
DeVito: Originally from New York/Not too bright/Afraid to use a gun for fear of
shooting himself or someone else
Amy
Greene: First survivor who was taken in by Corey/She is a recovering alcoholic
IN THE FLESH
By Daniel Skye
PART THIRTY
FIGHT TO THE DEATH
Day Three Hundred and Eleven.
They had made it safely down the
shaft, all the way past the basement floor. They had discovered the underground
lab that Willard Pickman had spoken of. And they had stumbled upon what was
left of the cure.
Someone had already beaten them to the
punch. And they had smashed every vial. In a matter of seconds, all hope was
lost. They weren’t going to be heroes. They weren’t going to save the world.
They felt like fools just for thinking they could make a difference.
“I don’t get it…” Corey trailed off.
“Who would do this?”
“Eli Carver,” Ryder said. “He’s still
out there. I told you we should’ve killed him when we had the chance.”
“You don’t know it was him for sure.”
“The only other people who knew about
this place are dead,” Ryder pointed out.
“Ok, maybe it was Eli. It doesn’t make
any difference now. We failed.”
“No we didn’t,” Paul said, sifting
through the shards of broken glass. In the jagged debris, he found two
unscathed vials, still sealed.
* * *
Outside, they scanned the area for
Biters. When they were in the clear, they walked towards the pickup and tossed
their guns into the bed. “Your turn to ride in the back,” Paul said to Ryder and
grinned.
“I don’t think so,” Ryder said.
“Excuse me?” Paul asked, bemused.
“First, there’s something I need to
get off my chest. You said you started out as a cop in Detroit. Then you got
transferred to a precinct in New York and worked narcotics. Which precinct did
they transfer you to?”
“What does it matter?” Paul asked and
shrugged his broad shoulders.
“Just answer the question,” Ryder
demanded.
“The fourth precinct,” Paul said.
“So you were working on Long Island?”
Ryder asked. “Cherrywood to be exact.”
“So, what? What’s the big deal?”
“The big deal is I finally remember
everything that happened. You and I were partners. We worked narcotics together
for years. Officer Friendly, they used to call you that because of your explosive
temper. Before all this crazy shit went down, we were set to make a bust. But
you got greedy. You double crossed me. Your own partner. Killed the dealers and
took their money and their stash. When I refused to play along, you bashed me
good with the butt of your gun. More than once. I lost consciousness. Woke up
in that hospital where Damien Albright found me. It’s because of you I was in
that coma. It’s because of you I got separated from my wife and daughter. It’s
because of you they’re dead and not with me. It’s because of you I spent the
better half of a year suffering from retrograde amnesia.”
“Hey, I have no clue what you’re
talking about, buddy.”
“I’ll give you one chance to confess
before I kill you,” Ryder said. “Just man up and tell the truth. Do the
honorable thing.”
“Fuck you,” Paul spat. “You don’t
scare me. You want a confession? Yeah, I did it. I robbed those junkies and
left you for dead in that apartment, made it look like they did it to you and I
was just trying to put a stop to it by putting a bullet in them. You were
getting soft and I was getting tired of playing by the rules. We could’ve had a
good thing going, you and me. But you always wanted to be the hero.”
“You’re fucking dead,” Ryder said
frankly.
Paul glanced back towards the bed of
the pickup, where they had thrown their guns. “Don’t even think about it,”
Ryder shook his head. “You’re a big guy. Fight me like a man. No weapons.”
“You want me?” Paul asked, pounding at
his chest like a gorilla. “Come and get me, bitch.”
“Ask and you shall receive,” Ryder
said, lunging towards him. He fell back and Ryder landed on top of him, ramming
his knee into his gut. Paul grunted as Ryder mounted him and laid into him with
punches.
Paul managed to roll him off and get
back to his fight. Ryder took a swing, but Paul ducked and his fist went around
him. It left his midsection exposed and Paul took advantage of the opportunity,
landing one punch to the gut and ramming the other fist into his side.
Ryder was wobbly, but he refused to go
down as Paul’s massive fist collided with his face, re-breaking his nose.
Blood trickled down his nostrils as he
staggered back against the side of the pickup. Paul went to connect with his
face again, but he ducked the blow this time and Paul’s fist shattered the
passenger side window.
Corey made no attempt to break them
apart. He watched it all unfold with unblinking eyes and never uttered a word.
Not even when they busted his window.
Ryder caught him with an uppercut to
the jaw and Langstrom staggered back, leaving himself open for a barrage of
knee strikes to the chest. Ryder was certain he’d heard something snap, but
Paul just kept coming.
He tackled Ryder and they rolled
across the hot, sticky asphalt, throwing jabs and knees; some landing, others
missing.
Ryder was able to get the advantage
and apply a chokehold on Paul, and it was all elementary from there. Ryder used
just the right amount of force and pressure, and snapped his neck like a giant
twig.
The boom of the shotgun nearly blew his
eardrums out. He thought Corey had shot at him for a second until he looked up
and saw the Biter tumble to the asphalt, its head split open.
“Hurry up,” Corey said. “More are
coming.” They hopped into the pickup and Corey floored it out of there as a
colony of rotting, shambling Biters staggered across the asphalt, slowly
pursuing them.
They’d be across state lines by the
time those Biters made it to the next town.
On the road, Corey tried to process
what he’d seen as they drove in silence. Up until that point, he didn’t view
Carson as a threat. Just an ally. But now he’d seen firsthand what Ryder was
capable of. And he had to admit, he was kind of scared of him.
“I know what I did back there goes
against your whole set of rules,” Ryder said, breaking the silence. “And for
that I apologize. But that son of a bitch had it coming. Believe me when I say
I don’t mean you or your people anymore harm. It’s just Paul I had a beef with.
And now that’s been rectified.”
“You killed a man,” Corey said. “Snapped
his neck like it was nothing.”
“That man put me in a coma,” Ryder
said, trying to justify his actions. “He’s the reason I’ll never see my wife
and daughter again.”
“When you put it that way, it’s hard
to side against you,” Corey said. “I guess if I had a wife or a child, I’d
understand better. But I don’t. Still, I understand what it’s like to lose a
family member. So I can empathize with you. If some bastard did that to me, I
guess I’d want to kill him to. I’m not saying you did the right thing. I’m just
saying I understand.”
“I don’t want this to change our
relationship,” Ryder said. “I’m here to help in any way that I can.”
“I know,” Corey said. “And that’s why
I want you to stay. Even after what you did. But I need you to do me a favor.”
“Name it,” Ryder said.
“Don’t tell anyone what really
happened. If anyone asks, we lost Paul on the road. The zombies got him. That’s
it. Nothing more.”
“Deal,” Ryder said, nodding.
“Shit,” Corey said, punching the
steering wheel. “We forget the vials. Paul had them in his jacket.”
Ryder held out the two vials, still
intact. “I’ve got them,” Ryder said. “I’m not sure how this stuff works. But we’ll
figure it out. Until we do though, we need to keep it in a safe place.”
“Why? You don’t trust the group?”
“It’s not the group I don’t trust. It’s
Eli Carver. If he’s still out there, there’s no telling if he’ll return.”
* * *
Day Three Hundred and Twelve.
Ryder and Smith returned to the
compound safely. The same could not be said for Paul Langstrom. Everyone knew
what his absence meant. They didn’t have to inquire to figure it out. But they
did anyway. And Ryder and Smith stuck to their story. The Biters got Paul on
the road.
Scotty Loomis was keeping watch and
there to let them in at the gate. Corey parked his pickup and went inside his
manor to be alone for a while.
When he came out, he had just one
question for Luke Chen.
“Why does my room smell like sex?” Corey Smith inquired.
Nikki Fox could see something was
bugging him. So she approached him when they had a moment alone.
“Is there something you want to talk
about?” she asked.
“I remember everything,” Ryder told
her. “The blow to the head. Waking up in that hospital. Caroline and Charlotte
and all my buddies in the four precinct. My mom and dad. My grandparents. My
buddy, Joe. He was Charlotte’s godfather. It’s just…I don’t know…overwhelming.”
“It’ll pass,” she assured him. “And I’m
sorry to hear about Paul.”
“Don’t be,” Ryder said. “His death was
not in vain.” He showed her the glass vials. “There’s hope for the future after
all.”
To Be Continued With Part Thirty One: THE
FUTURE IS UNWRITTEN
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