Waking Up Dead

ass. Because they weren’t driving through them at high speed now. Now the horde was right outside the fucking door.

Another thud followed the one she’d created as they tried to make their way in— the bastards—and she stepped away from the door, back to Luke.

“A half hour?” she asked Sebastian. “Until they get in here?”

“About,” he said. “Give or take…well according to my calculations…but obviously they’re theoretical…so ah, yes, I haven’t actually tested them or anything.”

Jackson frowned, knowing how prone Sebastian’s calculations were to error. He was no mathematician. “Let’s say fifteen then.”

“How long before the people at the camp realize?” Luke asked, and Jackson looked to Pete, because this was his territory more than hers, even though this was her job now, and what were the fucking odds of that? Three days in and she got a horde. Just her luck.

“That we’re dead? Or that we’re dead?” Pete asked.

Luke shrugged. “Either or.”

“Enough with the negatives already,” Jackson said. Though she knew they were right. There really was no way out of this one.

Another thump, a strangled groan and a series of wails accompanied her words. Jackson gripped Mandy as hard as she could to the point where the bones in her hands actually hurt.

“Maybe in a couple of hours,” Pete said. “Nancy will sound the alarm then.”

“It’ll alert camp, at least,” Luke said, “that something’s wrong, so there’s the silver lining.”

Jackson took a deep breath as she thought about that lining and in a way it made her feel better. That the camp would survive, one of the last bastions of humanity remaining. Nancy was smart and she’d know something was definitely up when they didn’t return. Likely she’d have all the guards out manning the wall. Of course, any chance of a cure would be lost after today. With Sebastian dead there would be no one to continue his work. No normality, not pulling the world back to how it was. Right about now Jackson couldn’t find it in herself to think about that. Her mind was focused on one thing and one thing only: the bloodbath to come.

“Well,” Pete said, breaking the silence, “I have to say I never saw this one coming. The bastards are ganging up, are they? Building hordes?”

“We saw one a week or so ago,” Luke replied. “Jack thought they were massing to take down some survivors.”

“It was the only thing that made sense,” she said.

“And on that basis it means they’re coming after the camp here,” Luke added. “Though whether it’s the same horde, I don’t know. Probably not, considering the logistics and the fact we took quite a few of them out, so this is something they’re all doing. Maybe like the burrowing. Fuck.”

“Took them out how?” Pete asked and Luke shook his head.

“We ran them over.”

“Ah…”

“So maybe,” Sebastian interrupted, his gaze not lifting, because he was busy sorting through various liquids, “they’re just passing by here on their way to the camp? They don’t know what we’re doing here at all, and if Jay wasn’t outside, they might not even have spotted us?”

“Maybe,” Luke said slowly.

“Seb, what are you doing?” Jackson asked.

“Looking for a defense,” was all he replied.

She eyed his potions but couldn’t imagine what he could possibly find to take down hundreds. One-on-one no doubt, he could pump the damn things full of stuff to make them scream. But this many? No, the doctor wasn’t going to save them. “The door,” she said. “What do we do? Out or in? We need to make a decision now.”

“I’d rather fight them here,” Pete said. “Restricted space and all.”

“Unless they all get in,” Luke said. “We’d be fucked then. They’d overwhelm us.”

“So the door then?”

She sighed and pushed past them to grab the bars. Now was not the time for a fucking debate. “I’m making the decision for us. We’ll go for it. Only way.”

The bars were set in a complicated system of interlocking grooves—Sebastian’s design of course—and Jackson got started on the first one immediately. Luke joined her after a moment and took hold of the right-hand side, followed by Pete and then Jay.

“Do we run or fight?” Luke asked as he turned a cog.

Pete twisted the bar and pulled at the same time Jackson pushed. “Fighting seems a bit kamikaze, but you know me, I never get tired of killing the bastards, and if this is my last stand, I want to make it count, not be pounced on while I’m running away.”

“Same,” Jay said. “I’ll go down fighting.”

The first bar was removed in no time and they all began on the next. “We’ll make it count,” Jackson said. “What else is there to do but that?”

They twisted the second bar at the same moment a large thud sounded. Everyone turned—even Sebastian, who was still rifling through his stuff—and looked at the door. A large dent was obvious right in the middle and Jackson knew that such a dent meant the beginning of the end. The strength of metal was in its rigid qualities. Once that began to fail it was a whole lot easier to get through.

She wiped a hand across her sweat-soaked brow and began to pull on the second bar with Pete. It came off and they all moved down to the next. Just three more to go but the space was getting tight.

“You guys should hunt out any extra weapons,” she told the two men as they pulled on the third bar. “Help Seb with whatever he needs. There isn’t space here for all of us.”

“Saw some hatchets over there.” Pete nodded in the direction of the cage where Two-h-ee was leaking. The two men hurried over, and she and Luke began to remove the third bar.

“The things you do to get me alone,” Luke said, and Jackson smiled—despite everything—she smiled.

“What can I say? I’m helpless against you, Luke.”

“I wanted to tell you something,” Luke began, as they pulled off the third bar.

He was right next to her. The two of them half crouched, his breath fanning against her face. She was reminded irresistibly of the time outside the bank when it had tickled her neck, and she’d thought that he was going to be a major distraction. And hadn’t she been right?

“That you had the rocket launcher all along,” she said. “You were holding out on me? Damn you, Luke.”

He shifted and turned one of the cogs. “Not quite.”

Another cog and Jackson pushed, her arms aching. “What then?”

“Kind of hoped we’d have more privacy,” Luke said slowly. “When I imagined it, I mean.”

The tone of his voice told Jackson plenty and a flush traveled up her skin. Her heart race increased to the point of pain and she wondered if the zombies banging on the metal could hear it. I know what this is…

She paused for just a second before pushing again, her voice suddenly serious. “No, don’t do this. Not now.”

“Because it’s the end?” he asked softly.

“Because I don’t want to think you’re doing it because it is the end.”

Luke sighed. “You think way too little of me, Jack”

The flush reached her hairline and Jackson swallowed, super aware that the zombies’ death groans were increasing in volume, the pounding getting louder, and the others moving frantically to find things to help them fight a war that was already lost. “I think way too much of you, and that’s why I can’t do this right now.”

“There won’t be another time,” he said. “As much as I want to believe otherwise, you know there won’t be. When we leave here, we’re probably going to die.”

Jackson pushed the bar free. They moved down to the final one. “I know. Seems almost like it’s past due.”

“Don’t say that.”

“Even if it’s the truth?