No Refuge from the Dead Read online

  He probed through Sage’s thick fur. His pulse pounded in his ears.

  But there was nothing sticky or wet. No blood.

  “You’re a good girl, Sage,” Cliff said, stroking Sage’s head. “A good girl.”

  Then he forced her mouth open, checking inside. No scratches he could see. At least there seemed to be no external wounds. But her lack of lacerations didn’t explain her persistent whining.

  There was something else.

  He gingerly caressed what felt like a hard knot near her hip. “Her leg. Something's wrong with it.”

  Sage wagged her tail and tried to stand. The rear leg with the hard knot gave out. She slumped back onto the bench. Her leg didn't move.

  “Oh, God,” Cliff said. “What did that thing do to you?”

  How would Sage get around in a world like this half-paralyzed? Morbid thoughts chased through Cliff’s mind about what that meant for her. His chin sagged against his chest, and he brushed his hands through his hair.

  “Can’t use her leg,” he muttered to himself. “What do I do?”

  “Her leg’s dislocated,” Jason offered.

  Cliff turned. “Dislocated? She’s paralyzed.”

  “No, no,” Jason said. “I swear. Look, man.” He used a finger to probe Sage’s hip. She yelped.

  “Stop,” Cliff said, grabbing Jason’s arm.

  “No, man, look. This is where her leg is supposed to be. Inside that joint, right?”

  “How do you know it’s dislocated?”

  “I had a golden retriever as a kid,” Jason said, starting to ramble again. “Just like pretty much everyone else on my street. He had hip dysplasia. You know, goldens are prone to that.”

  “Get to the point.”

  “Yeah, well, when he got older, when the joint got bad, his leg came out a couple times.”

  Cliff winced.

  “It was bad, man,” Jason said. “But he didn’t need surgery or anything. Just needed that leg bone pressed back into the joint, you know?”

  “No, I don’t know,” Cliff said. “Are you telling me you know how to do it?”

  “I watched the vet do it both times.”

  “But you didn’t do it?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “How’d he do it?” Cliff hated asking this, but what other options did they have? “The only time I’ve seen a dislocated limb put back in place was on TV. And that was on a damn person.”

  “I don’t exactly know.”

  “You got to know something.”

  “He just kind of pulled it out a bit then pushed it into the socket, man.” Jason clapped his hands together. “Like, smack! There you go.”

  Cliff tried to bite back his seething rage. It wasn’t the kid’s fault neither of them really knew how to help Sage. And for God’s sake, Jason had saved her life.

  “We have to try then,” Cliff said.

  “I don’t know, man. I don’t think I can do this.”

  “Then you hold Sage’s head down. Keep her from biting us and yowling.”

  Jason nodded, seemingly relieved not to be the one to try jamming the femur back into place.

  Sage quieted. Her brown eyes scanned Cliff’s face as if she sensed something was about to happen. The dog still whimpered, and Cliff knew it was about to get a hell of a lot worse.

  Cliff’s singing voice was shit. He had no delusions of being some hidden operatic genius on one of those goddamned reality TV shows. He’d never sing himself out of his shitty apartment.

  But he started singing in a shaky, quiet whisper now. For Sage’s sake. Softly, but firmly.

  “Nessun dorma! Nessun dorma! Tu pure, o Principessa.”

  He did his best to mimic Pavarotti as he gingerly felt around Sage’s joint, racking his mind for how he’d seen this shit done on TV. Not that that was much help. Sage intermittently panted and whined with the touches.

  Jason kept his wide eyes trained on Sage, not even looking up as Cliff continued to sing. The dog seemed to relax.

  And with a slight crescendo in the aria, he pressed in Sage’s femur.

  -6-

  Sage yelped. Jason tried to hold her mouth closed, but the noise echoed violently in the locker room. For a moment, Cliff thought it hadn’t worked, that he’d just made Sage’s pain worse.

  Then Sage pushed herself up. She stood, favoring her leg. But all the same, she was standing. Her tail wagged as she nuzzled Cliff.

  “You’re a good girl.” Cliff rubbed Sage’s head and was rewarded with the dog’s slobbering tongue.

  A monstrous shriek erupted outside.

  “We got to go, man,” Jason said.

  Cliff helped Sage off the bench. The shepherd walked with a limp toward the exit, but she was no longer whimpering.

  “How far is the SUV from here?” Cliff asked.

  “It’s north by maybe a half mile or so,” Jason said. “I think...”

  “What do you mean you think?”

  Another howl.

  “Is it or isn’t it north of here?” Cliff asked. “Can you tell me where it is?”

  “I don’t exactly know.” Jason said. “I never actually made it to the car. Those Skulls saw me before I could even clear the Visitor Center.”

  “Then let’s go find that damn SUV,” Cliff said, “before those things find us.”

  They rushed out of the locker room and down the road. The horizon was a paler purple than before. The first hesitant hints of morning were beginning to show.

  Cliff tried not to ascribe too much meaning to the coming dawn. Normally, he preferred wandering around in the dark where the Skulls couldn’t see him and he couldn’t see them. But now that he had seen them, they would never be unseen. Those bastards would haunt his nightmares, even if the military managed to squelch them all from existence. The promise of an approaching dawn begged him to be optimistic. They would find the SUV. They would find Jason’s friends.

  They would make it to Kent Island. He and Sage could live there safely.

  But they hadn’t even found the vehicle yet, and the voices of the Skulls were still chasing them.

  Over the parking lot they went, then they followed a wooden fence. Cliff avoided the occasional human or horse skeleton. He shivered when they neared a set of smaller skeletons, one with a pair of pink shoes still on. They trekked alongside the road, careful to stay where they had at least some cover.

  They passed a lone boot in the middle of the road next to a shredded suitcase. The boot had filled with water. There was no second boot nor a body.

  The farther north they went, the more bones and human belongings they came across. There were cars with cracked windshields and corpses and skeletons hanging out the sides. Cliff hadn’t remembered passing this much death on his way south into the park. Maybe as things got worse, more people had ventured into the park with thoughts like his. And maybe some of those people were already infected, setting off a chain reaction as they succumbed to the bioweapon or virus or whatever the hell it was turning people into Skulls.

  One by one, they must’ve fallen ill and attacked each other. The small skeletons flashed through his mind. Good God. And families? He could only imagine a mother or father or son or daughter transforming and attacking the rest of them.

  He shivered. It was definitely not from the cold.

  “Think we’re close?” Cliff asked.

  “All I know is it’s supposed to be near the bridge,” Jason replied.

  Cliff wanted to ream the kid. Couldn’t he do better than that? Near the bridge was about as helpful as saying near the miles-long beach. But Sage trotting along beside him was enough to remind him to cut the kid some slack.

  “We’ll find it,” Cliff said. “Then get back to your friends and get the hell out of here.”

  “Can’t wait, man.”

  Sporadic cries from Skulls hunting along the shore and through the woods resounded over the landscape. Cliff realized he was never returning to that camper. Several times, they were f
orced to reroute to avoid Skulls, but they kept pushing north. The sky brightened as they traveled.

  Then Cliff’s heart leapt. “That’s the ranger’s,” he said.

  “Yeah, that’s it!” Jason said.

  They sprinted toward a white SUV with a forest-green stripe across it. There was a decal over the forward wheels proclaiming “Park Ranger.”

  Jason fumbled with the keys and unlocked the vehicle. He started to get into the driver’s seat. “Ah, man, maybe you better take it.”

  Cliff shot him a nonplussed look.

  “Look, you know this park better than I do,” Jason said. “If we’re driving around, trying to get away from Skulls or something, you’re better off driving this thing than me.”

  “Fine.” Cliff opened a side door to let Sage in before he got into the driver’s seat. Jason ran around to the passenger’s side.

  Jason sat rigidly in his seat. Sage panted from the backseat, now closer to her former self, her tongue lolling from her mouth as she looked around excitedly. As soon as Cliff started the ignition, he was going to find out far more than whether this SUV was actually going to get them out of here. The rumbling engine would give away their position immediately. Any Skulls in the vicinity were going to charge straight out of the woods.

  Cliff held his breath and twisted the key. The ignition clicked a few times, almost shattering Cliff’s hope they were getting out of here. Then the engine let out a throaty growl. The fuel gauge showed it was at almost two-thirds full.

  And as Cliff had expected, he and Jason weren’t the only ones interested in the sound of a working vehicle. The woods came alive with Skull cries piercing enough to be heard inside the SUV. The first couple came barreling down the road behind them. Cliff slammed the car into reverse and backed out of the parking spot. The Skulls grew larger in the rearview mirror. A crimson beard stained the mouth of one, and its claws were painted red. Its stomach bulged slightly under the bony plates growing haphazardly over its body. It must have just finished a meal, and now the bastard wanted seconds.

  Cliff wouldn’t give the Skull or its comrade the satisfaction. He slammed down the pedal, and the SUV took off, kicking up a spray of rocks. The Skulls continued running after them as they burst off the gravel road and onto asphalt.

  “Visitor center,” Cliff said. “Next stop. Think your friends can be ready fast?”

  “Very fast,” Jason promised. “Very fast, man.”

  “I hope so.”

  The SUV took them away from the Skulls even as more poured out of the woods and beach after them. Slowly, the pack behind them grew distant as Cliff wound between other crashed vehicles and crunched over bones. A few times, he had to drive off-road to skirt around a wreck. Soon enough, they made it to the bridge, the only roadway off the island and to the Visitor Center.

  It was covered with Skulls.

  -7-

  There was no turning back now. Cliff gunned it. The SUV’s engine roared, but it was no match for the shrieks of the Skulls. The monsters ran at him as if they were in some macabre jousting match. Their claws flashed in the morning sun. Eyes glinted red, and yellowed bone plates rattled against each other. They lunged at the SUV in a ravenous frenzy.

  Bodies slammed against the front bumper and dented the hood. A Skull smashed into the windshield, scrabbling desperately for purchase. Cliff swerved and shook the beast off. Another went under the SUV with a sickening crunch. Skull after Skull cracked against the vehicle. Fissures spread through the windshield.

  One of the Skulls slid over the front hood and grabbed onto a rail on the roof. It hammered at the glass. Cliff kept his foot on the pedal, accelerating into more of the monsters even as the bastard on top of the vehicle pounded away, causing new cracks.

  Jason squirmed. “Son of a bitch! What are we going to do, man?”

  “Keep going.”

  They rammed into more Skulls. Their bodies rag-dolled away with broken bone plates and twisted limbs. Blood covered the windshield, and Cliff turned on the wipers, smearing crimson over the busted glass. The Skull on top of the vehicle stopped slamming the windshield. It grabbed one of the wipers and tore it off.

  Then they were over the bridge, on the side with the Visitor Center. Cliff twisted the wheel hard, and the SUV screeched into the parking lot.

  “Hold onto Sage!” he yelled.

  Jason turned in his seat as Cliff slammed on the brakes. Sage shot forward into Jason’s arm. The Skull flew over the front of the vehicle and skidded across the pavement. It tried to stand, but its back legs appeared useless now, its spine broken after being tossed from the vehicle.

  Cliff smashed the pedal down again. Another sickening crunch sounded as the SUV crushed the monster. He pulled up to a path with wooden rails along either side leading to the Visitor Center. Despite the masses on the bridge, there were no Skulls outside the Center.

  “Where are those Skulls you were talking about?” Cliff asked.

  “I don’t know what happened,” Jason said. “Maybe they got bored and left.”

  Cliff glanced at the bridge. The Skulls that had survived were running toward them. Even with broken and battered limbs, they continued toward their escaped prey. “I doubt they got bored.”

  Then with the orange panes of skylight seeping into the parking lot, he saw it. Shards of glass glowing golden near the front door.

  Going into that building to search for a bunch of twenty-somethings like Jason suddenly didn’t seem all that bright. In fact, given everything Cliff had just been through, it seemed damn near suicidal.

  He didn’t need to go in there. He had Sage, and they were both safe. Jason might protest, but if Cliff started driving westward until they hit Kent, the kid wouldn’t really be able to do anything about it. Cliff had already bent his rules getting Jason this far. Now adding a bunch of others to the mix?

  “We going in there, man?” Jason asked with a tremor in his voice. “My friends might be in trouble.”

  Cliff ignored him and looked back at Sage. Her brown eyes met Cliff’s for a second then looked away. She stared at the Visitor Center, standing up on the seat.

  “Yeah,” Cliff said finally. “We’re going in.”

  He leapt out of the driver’s seat with the car still running. They were going to need to make this fast: grab the others, load back in, and then get the hell out of there before those Skulls caught up.

  Up the path he charged, unslinging his bow and nocking his first arrow. He brushed aside the broken glass in the entrance so Sage wouldn’t cut herself. After the dog, Jason crept in. Light poured in through the windows of the entrance, illuminating floating dust motes. Dark stains mottled the carpet, and the coppery odor of blood drifted amid the stench of death.

  Jason’s face went pallid, and he retched. Cliff glared at him until the young man got control of himself with a hand over his mouth.

  Cliff waited for a sound or any indication of where the others might’ve gone. He heard footsteps and scratching coming from the souvenir shop. Taking careful steps, he avoided the refuse spilled over the floor until he reached a toppled shelf. Books lay strewn over his path, and in front of him stood a Skull.

  It faced another doorway that had been barricaded with shelves. Its mouth was stuck in a permanent snarl. Patches of hair sprouted between the gnarled horns growing from its head. Bone plates rattled together as it scratched at the shelves. The muscles and flesh beneath the bone were shriveled and brown, as if the thing were starving.

  Cliff nocked an arrow, pulled back the bowstring, then let it fly. The arrow lanced through the flesh in the Skull’s neck. Black blood poured from the wound, sluicing over the overgrown shoulder blades and bones erupting from its skin.

  The Skull turned and let out a shrieking wail as it ran.

  Cliff managed to unleash another arrow. It struck the Skull’s neck. Blood gurgled from the Skull’s mouth, but it didn’t slow. Cliff dodged the monster. The Skull collided with the wall behind him. Jason grabbed a pole fr
om a metal clothes rack, shaking loose the sweatshirts and T-shirts. He bashed the pole into the Skull’s head, cracking bone.

  Taking his knife from his sheath, Cliff jammed the blade into the Skull’s open mouth. The beast clamped down on the metal as Cliff drove it in. More warm blood spilled over the knife’s hilt, and finally the Skull let out a hissing death rattle. It slumped forward.

  “Where are your friends?” Cliff asked, recovering his breath and the arrows jutting from the dead Skull.

  “I don’t know,” Jason said. “We were all camped out in the front room, but if they’re gone...”

  “Then we’ll find them.”

  Cliff ran back to the barricade of bookshelves in the gift shop. That barricade hadn’t happened by accident. He knocked on the first shelf.

  “We’re here to help! Let us in!”

  There was a muffled voice behind the shelves, but Cliff couldn’t make out the words. Before he had a chance to ask the person to repeat himself, Sage let out a fearsome snarl. Another two Skulls appeared in the entrance to the gift shop. Jason battered the first with the pole. Most of the hits splintered off bits of the Skull’s horns and bone plates, but the injuries didn’t seem to slow the monster down. It lashed out with wicked claws and snapping teeth.

  Sage lunged at the second Skull. She had learned the power of the Skulls from her first bout and didn’t spend too long clinging onto any one limb. Instead, she bit and snapped, jumping at the Skull then retreating.

  Cliff charged the monster sparring with Sage first. He held a loose arrow in each hand and directed both through the eyes of the monster. There was an oozing pop as the arrows plunged through the Skull’s scarlet eyes and into the gray matter behind them. The Skull fell slack, and Cliff turned his attention on the other.

  Jason seemed to be playing defense now, parrying each strike of the claws with the dented pole. The Skull roared in frustration. Voices from outside responded almost immediately, howls and shrieks filling Cliff’s eardrums. They didn’t have long.