Robin snuffed out the torch and Milly eased into the hallway. Sunlight spilled into the corridor through an open door and they headed for it. The day outside was bright, the air crisp and dry, and Milly’s eyes hurt as they adjusted to the light.
A twelve-foot brick wall surrounded the armory complex and Axe’s compound occupied the northeast corner where the base captain had lived. To get there they had to cross two hundred yards of open grass and hardpan. Virals patrolled the walls, and several marched around the polygon-shaped armory building.
Milly took Robin’s arm, and they walked across the yard, eyes down. Snarls and guttural speech came at them from several of the diseased, but they didn’t come closer. The virals here were less deformed than others she’d seen. They had no gashes, walked normally, and still controlled their eyes, but they were pink and emaciated and senseless. Axe had said an insatiable hunger drove them mad, and the virus hollowed out their brains and took up residence there. Milly thought the shock collars might have something to do with their disposition.
Halfway across the yard three large Uruks blocked their way. They yammered and screamed, jumping up and down like dogs excited to see their master. Milly brought up the gun and yelled in the deepest voice she could muster. “Back on post or I’ll give you a jolt, you godforsaken shitballs.” She’d heard Axe say that a hundred times.
The virals fled like geldings at the sight of a knife, and Milly and Robin crossed the last hundred yards, passing into the thick stand of soldier pines that surrounded the compound’s inner wall. Axe had planted the trees, and she dared not look up for fear of seeing what was strung between the evergreens as a warning to any who approached. The skins of people were stretched above, their shapes unmistakable, and their message as clear as air.
The trees thinned and Milly stepped over the ring of ashes that surrounded the compound and was the first line of defense. Robin followed, and said, “He ever tell you what the ashes thing meant?”
“He told me the diseased are afraid of fire above all else, and ash is fire’s cousin,” Milly said. “I asked a few years ago. After stepping over it a million times.”
They came to a tall, ramshackle wooden gate that stood ten feet and was flanked on both sides by a barricade made of stones, wood, rusted-out cars, and other pieces of the lost world. They paused before the gate as Robin fumbled through the keys. When she found the one she was looking for she let out a sigh of relief, unlocked the gate, and they passed through.
Chapter Twenty-two
Year 2075, Pass Christian Armory, Mississippi
The old brick house sat nestled in the northeast corner of the complex, and a white picket fence surrounded the remnants of a small lawn. Barriers of wood, metal and chain-link fence zigzagged like a maze all around the house. Two rocking chairs sat on the porch, and three dogs rested beneath a pile of scrap metal that formed a crude portcullis. The white picket fence looked freshly painted, and wild flowers and weeds sprang from every crack and patch of dirt. Tall poles were spaced around the house at intervals of ten feet, and skulls rested atop them. To their left the wall of blood baked in the midday heat.
Milly gagged. “I can’t abide that,” she said.
“Hearing his ignorant ass talk about it was worse,” Robin said.
The name of every person Axe had ever killed was finger-painted on the large wooden canvas in blood. If Axe couldn’t find out the deceased’s name, he assigned a number. In the lower right was the notation “1-23 unknown.” Milly traced Peter’s name, and her stomach burned.
Both women knew how to get through the maze and where the traps were. Salt and Pepper, the black and white husky twins, bolted down the steps of the house and through the twisted metal entrance to meet Milly and Robin. They jumped and sniffed, howling and whining. Helga, an old German shepherd, followed. She walked and watched the scene for a few seconds, then turned and headed back to the house like a supervisor who’d seen enough to be satisfied the job was being done.
Inspection complete, the huskies bolted for the house and Milly and Robin followed.
“We’re bringing them with us, right?” Robin said.
“No question. Larry and Turnip also,” Milly said.
“Tester’s going to love that,” Robin said.
They entered the house and barred the doors. Milly could only do so much with one arm, but she could walk OK and her ribs didn’t hurt too badly. She did her best to make no abrupt movements so as not to pull on the healing wounds, but overall she was steadier with each step.
Despite having shared the house with Axe for over six years there were still rooms Milly had never been to. Every door had a lock, and sections of the house had been off-limits to her. Robin flipped through the key ring and opened every door and what they found was unsurprising.
Adaline’s room was untouched. Years of dust lay on every flat surface and time and mice had gnawed away the bedspread and mattress leaving only springs and the metal bedframe. Plastic toys, and doll heads lay on the floor, and faded posters of long-gone rock groups adorned the walls.
Axe’s room was plain and unadorned: a bed, a dresser, and a table with a lamp, but nothing remained of the lampshade except the metal frame, and there
