The Shelter

CHAPTER SIX: Does someone have to DIE

CHAPTER SIX: Does someone have to DIE to get some peace and quiet?


As I stepped out into the parking garage, I heard the shelter door slam home behind me. The air was thick with dense fog and I smiled at my luck. The fog would give me the cover I needed to search for Katie. I silently moved through the city, padding my way through the parking garage to the spot where I had first seen Katie.

I remembered she had been carrying a sack. My guess was that it was food rations. But why? What was she up to? And then it came to me...Mrs. Walters said that Katie wanted to help the people. The only thing that could make her come back out here so soon would be that she found someone, and that they needed her. She must be someplace close by.

It was quiet as I moved forward from one building to the next. Where were all the Crazies? Where was Katie? I felt a cold spot in the pit of my stomach.

In the distance, I saw the glow of several fires; fifty gallon drums stuffed with broken wood and paper - people standing around them to keep warm. It looked like an old camp for the homeless.

As I drew near, I could hear their voices...grumbling and making slurping sounds - they were feeding.

In the remaining crumbled corner of a Penny’s Department Store, I caught sight of three people hanging from re-bar that protruded from the ceiling. Their arms were tied above their heads, their naked bodies’ gutted and hanging slack and lifeless as they dangled inches from the floor like slaughtered meat. There were two women and a child. One of them was Katie Travis.

I was too late.

The Crazies stood around the fires keeping themselves warm while they fed. I felt my lip curl into a snarl as I watched them—my anger mounting. This ain’t my fight, I told myself. These people were getting along just fine before I showed up—I don’t owe them a thing—they’re not my responsibility—definitely not worth risking my life for. Colorado's calling—I can just turn around and leave right now.

I laughed.

Using the rubble as cover, I got within striking range of the first group. Silently, I pulled my sword from its sheath. There will be people in Colorado who’ll need my help too. I can’t just walk away—can’t say who lives and who dies. If I do, I’m no better than these Crazies.

I stepped out into the open and casually approached them. There were men...women and they were all cannibals—no better than a bunch of animals. As I stepped into their midst, I whirled through them like a tornado - flashing steel and dealing out death.

I plowed through them, weaving in and out of harms way—they fell like wheat. Moving from one group to the next, half their number fell before they even knew what hit them. Several men scrambled for their weapons that leaned against a nearby wall. I overtook them and they fell screaming. Several shots rang out from behind me, but never even came close.

Then someone slammed into me from the side and I fell hard against a metal pipe. I heard the shattering bone in my shoulder and felt the throb of unrelenting pain. Rolling free, I gutted the man and jumped to my feet—my left arm hung limp and useless at my side. Then I charged the survivors screaming like a mad man. Several turned and ran, the ones that stayed, died.

Wiping my blade clean on a dead woman’s shirt, I sheathed it, and stumbled with exhaustion to where Katie’s body hung.

Her bowels lay at her feet—her vital organs crudely removed. The same for the other two, but the child was missing a leg. I tried not to look into their faces because I knew they had been alive when the cutting began. With my good arm, I cut Katie down and gently laid her upon the rubble. There was a pile of rations from the shelter next to her. The Crazies didn't want the food—only the flesh.

I cut the others down. The mother and son were not infected. They had survived somehow and Katie found them and brought them food.

I heard a noise down the street. They were gathering. They wanted their food back and I was too injured to deny their numbers.

Bending to Katie’s body, I took the locket from her neck and shoved it into my pocket—then disappeared into the fog.