Katie ran ahead of them, in the front, her revolverblazing away. After every six shots, she would drop back and refill therevolver with bullets from her pocket, quick, efficient, and heartless, the wayshe had been back at the road next to the Coliseum. Where were they going?
They moved east, away from the river, sticking to themiddle of the road. There were cars abandoned everywhere, but the dead thinnedout ahead of them. They could move around them now without firing, but therewas no way that they would be able to stop. The girl over his shoulder washeavy, and he knew that she would have to run with them sooner or later. Theyhad gone three blocks, uphill, and he wasn't yet recovered from his flight fromtwo days before, when they had escaped the tenement. The muscles in his thighsalready burned.
He could see that some of the others were in much thesame shape. The other black man in the group, the one that had the telltalesigns of homelessness about him, was hop-limping up the road, a heavy bag ofguns thrown over his shoulder. The white cowboy stuck close to his side, hishead constantly scanning from side to side. Zeke moved forward calmly, heseemed indestructible.
To his right, he saw Rudy huffing and puffing, digging inhis bag for something, and Lou thought, He isn't long for this world.Except for Clara, Joan's somewhat hobbled friend, the women of the group seemedto be in much better condition than the men. Funny how that worked.
"Hey!" he yelled to the girl slung over hisshoulder. Her sobbing had lessened, and her arms hung slack. "Hey!"he yelled again. "You think you can walk? We're never going to make it ifI have to carry you the whole way." The others looked over at him, thesmall bit of conversation seeming out of place among their mostly silent groupas they weaved around the dead.
The girl said nothing. "I need you to wake up, girl.This is life or death now; we ain't got time to be sad."
"Shhh," Katie yelled at him from the front ofthe group. Lou didn't appreciate the command to be quiet. He was about to saysomething, when a sudden noise shut him up. It was the sound of engines. Theyheld their ground as the sound became louder, and that's when they saw it, thevehicle that had destroyed the fences, rounding the corner, its headlightsshining directly on them. There was a line of cars following the vehicle, lessthan there had been at the Coliseum. Lou hoped that they had lost a good amountof people.
Lou set the girl down on the ground, and said,"Playtime's over, girl."
"Be ready," Zeke hissed.
Chapter 36: Not Enough Beer to Go Around
After they had torn down the fence, they had circled awayfrom the Coliseum. Ace stood in the turret, trying to make sense of everythingthat was going on. At that point, he wished he could fly up in the air, grab abucket of popcorn, and watch the carnage. He couldn't see everything, but thethings that he could see were hilarious to him. First, he knew that the rescuecenter was thoroughly fucked.
The Turtle bounced and rocked as they drove wherever thehell they pleased. Slutty Rivets wheeled the vehicle about, and Ace watched asthe line of cars they had brought with them, slowed to a crawl, damaged by thebodies they were smacking into, stalling on piles of bodies, and generallydriving to their own doom. There had been some thirty cars, and as they circledaround, Ace liked to imagine that he could see their faces through the windowsof their vehicles, cursing him for leading him to their death. They were foolsfor following him.
He heard shattered glass, gunfire and screaming, asymphony of death that was music to his ears. They sat in a grassy strip awayfrom the Coliseum, but close enough to see what was going on. The giantfloodlights showed him a roiling mass of arms, heads and limbs advancing uponthe soldiers in front of the Coliseum.
The soldiers fired their guns. The line of cars achievedvarying levels of success in escaping the Coliseum, and they stacked up behindhim, still intent upon following him to their own doom, though he had alreadyled half of the to their death. Ace cared nothing for them; he was merelyinterested in seeing how long they would stick around. The majority of them hadbelieved that they were going to the refugee center for safety, and that Acewas some sort of apocalyptic hero trying to save as many people as he could.
Ace laughed atop the Turtle. Ace didn't save people. Itwas up to people to save themselves. He was safe, he was insane, and he waschaos. As he watched the confusion and the mess, a white sedan broke free fromthe dead, zooming past the Turtle. Where would they go? The answer cameto him instantly. Nowhere.
Ace maneuvered the turret on the machine gun and blew thecar apart. Its tires popped, and the rounds from the fifty caliber machine gunmowed through the car as if it were made from cheap foil. The car swerved intoa concrete divider and tipped up on its side. He watched, as a man insidestruggled to get out of the vehicle. He heaved himself out of the driver sidewindow, and stood on top of the car, looking around to see what had happened.
He spotted the Turtle's headlights, and it was as if theman instantly knew who was responsible for his situation. Ace waved at him,before he pulled the triggers of the machine gun again. The man was blown topieces and Ace laughed.
"You're a madman, Ace," Slutty Rivets yelledfrom inside the Turtle.
"Don't you forget it!" he yelled back.
From somewhere, a new noise emerged. It wasn't thescreaming of the dead, the occasional honking of a horn from someone fightingfor their life strapped into their car, or the muted gunfire of the soldiersinside the Coliseum. "That's our signal!" Ace yelled over the noise,as a helicopter appeared in the night sky.
Ace
