Chapter 10

     Dale looked at me, his eyes saying he  was sorry. From over his shoulder his automatic rifle was being pointed into the hanger. Everyone stood still, the room was silent. So silent you could hear the breathing of every single person in the room.

     "Okay, shitheads," a deep Russian accented voice came from behind Dale. "You will all listen to me now. If you don't, well..." he butts the stock of the AR hard into the nape of Dales neck. He winces and falls to the ground holding the back of his neck. I take a step forward and the AR is trained on me in seconds. "Uh, uh, uh, mister, Stanley." The Russian says with a sneer.

     "Who are you and how the fuck do you know my name?" He completely ignores my question and turns his head to the left, eyeing Cassandra.

     "You sure have stirred up a lot of trouble." He walks over to her and Cassie. Cassie stands up and blocks the path to her mother. The Russian stops and looks her up and down. He slaps her. It happened so fast that I hardly seen his arm move. It was just a blur and Cassie was falling to the ground, her face red and blood dribbling from the corner of her mouth.

     Anger rises in me. I rush him. Without even looking at me he unholsters a pistol strapped to his thigh and fires. A stinging sensation flares on the right side of my face. I hold up a hand to it and blood is leaking from a graze wound. How the fuck? He didn't even glance at me.

"That's you're last warning, Jack." He warns, his accent starting to annoy the fuck out of me. Dale gets to his hands and knees, a knot starting to bulge from the back of his neck. The Russian grabs Cassandra by her hair. She whimpers, "now, before we were so rudely interrupted," he looks back at my with a familiar smile, the smile of a killer. "You're coming with me, all of you. If you resist, you will be killed. It's your choice."

"That's bullshit, you can't just come in here and tell us..." the guy that was screaming about the alarm is cut off by a gunshot. He stands there for a few seconds, his arm still raised in protest before he falls face first into the ground. Blood pooling from the gunshot he suffered to the head. The room goes wild, people scream and cower.

Two more gunshots go off, but into the ceiling. "Shut the fuck up and get outside. You have two minutes or another one of you is dying." I wipe the blood from my face and look towards Dale. He looks back and nods his head to the Russian while he has his back turned.

I mouth the words no and nod my head. Dale smiles, winks and charges towards the Russian. God dammit, Dale! I think to myself as I charge also, I can't let him do it on his own. Dale reaches the Russian and rips the holster from his thigh and throws it across the room. The Russian twists and turns until dropping an elbow into Dales back. Hard. I heard the vertebrae pop. Dale falls to the ground wincing. I wind my arm back to throw a hook as I'm closing the distance to the Russian. He looks at me and I swing. I hit him so hard it hurts my entire hand, his jaw dislocates and teeth in the back of his mouth comes loose.

Dale gets to his hands and knees once more. The Russian starts laughing, he looks at me and jerks his jaw. It snaps back into place with a loud pop, he spits the teeth at Dale. He grabs me by the back of the neck and uppercuts me in the stomach so fast I have absolutely no time to react. My vision blacks out for a few seconds as my feet lift from the ground. It felt like being stabbed by thousands of knives simultaneously. I double over holding my stomach, my vision slowly comes back to clarity. Holy shit.

The Russian knees Dale in the face and he falls onto his back. He struggles to get up but the Russian kicks him hard in the head. I stand up, the warrior inside giving me strength. I swing a left hook, he ducks, I send a right uppercut his way but he dodges. I try to straight jab him but he dodges to the left and counters with a strong right hook. The room begins to spin. Blood starts to fill my mouth.

He grabs my by the hair on the top of my head. I'm seeing triples. The warrior in me beaten to his knees for the first time. He delivers another left hook, blood sprays the floor to the left of me from my mouth.

He leans in close and whispers, "I tried to warn you." He lets me go and points his gun at Cassie. "You, hold his head up." She doesn't move, she just stares at him. "You think this is a game, child?" He fires the gun. The bullet misses her head by inches. "Do it, now!" Cassie, walks in my direction, tears beginning to fall from her eyes. Before she holds my head up, I look at the Russian.

"Hey, asshole." I say, he turns around and I spit the rest of the blood in my mouth in his face. He wipes his eyes and an ugly smile crosses his lips.

     "Oh, I'm going to thoroughly enjoy this." He spins and walks towards Dale, who's on the brink of unconscious. He looks at me. Every part of me tingling with anger. He raises his steel toed boot above Dales neck. I fight Cassie to get up but he points the gun at her head. I stop moving. Defeated, once again. First with Lauren, now with Dale. I don't know what to do.

     The Russian continues to smile. He looks at Dale, who says, "I'll see you in hell, you terrorist mother fucker, when Jack kills you." The Russian smiles wider and stomps Dales throat. It's crushed almost completely flat, the sides of his neck oozing out broken pieces of trachea and esophagus. Blood pooling the floor. He's dead almost instantly. His feet kick and twitch for a few seconds before he passes.

     "YOU MOTHER FUCKER!" I stand up, ripping myself from Cassie's grasp. Tears drowning my eyes, making my vision blurry. Anger tearing through my body, filling me with adrenaline and pure rage. I charge the Russian. Ready to rip his limbs off and feed him them before he dies. Just inches away from the Russian a stinging sensation appears in my right arm. The room starts to spin and my eyelids get heavy. My charge slows and look to my arm. A dart sticks out of it. I pull it out and look at it before my vision goes completely black. 

                                   ...

"Jack! Get up now please!" My body shakes but it's extremely hard for me to respond. My lips won't move, my eyes won't open. I lay there, thinking I imagined the voice. Is that someone moaning? I ask myself as I sit in the blackness, not a care in the world.

"Jack, now please, we're going to die if you don't!" Someone rocks my body back and forth violently. The smell of smoke fills my nostrils. The moaning sound getting louder. "JACK!" Someone screams and a smack strikes my face, my eyes snap open and my hand thrusts to the neck of the person who smacked me.

Her pleading blue eyes staring into mine. Its Alyx. I let go of her throat. Smoke is rising above us and it's getting extremely hot, this when I notice the raging fire inching ever so closer to Alyx and me. the moaning sounds like it's right in my ear. I'm becoming more aware of my surroundings, "Where's that Dale?" I ask. She looks at me and everything comes flooding back, like a tidal wave.

I snap up right and there he is. Laying on his back, completely lifeless. His dead eyes staring at the ceiling, as if pleading God to help him. Tears fill my eyes. The grogginess beginning to fade. Why was I asleep? I ask myself, then that too comes back. A tranquilizer dart lays inches away from my arm. I look at Dale again, that's when I notice the undead piling into the hanger. My strength starts coming back and I begin to stand up. An undead falls to its knees and bends over Dale. I don't fucking think so. I stumble on the first few steps but I eventually gain my balance.

I kick the zombie hard in the side of its head, my foot caving in it's skull. I grab Dale under his shoulders and drag him. His head only hanging on by what remains of his spine. I try to drag him but I lack the strength to do it on my own.

     "Alyx, help me!" I scream. She sits there, frozen in fear. "We're going to die if you just sit there, come on!"

     "Just leave him, Jack, there's no point!" She screams back, looking to the stairs leading up to the second floor.

     "No! I'm not leaving him. Either help me or we both fucking die here right beside him!" The fire inching closer, along with the flaming undead. Two forms of death are so close, yet Alyx just sits and stares into it.

     She looks at me, then the the stairs, and then the undead. She jumps to her feet and runs to my side grabbing dale under his left shoulder.

     "On three! One, two, three!" We begin heaving Dales body towards the stairs. We're both breathing heavily, smokes beginning to fill the air if we don't hurry, we're going to die from asphyxiation.

As we reach the stairs my strength begins to come back, "run up and look for an exit, fast!" I yell over the flames and the undead. Alyx sprints away and into an office upstairs. "Alright, Dale, one final push and we're home free man." I say, tears beginning to fall onto his police uniform. I heave him up the stairs one by one. The zombies only a few more feet from the stairway.

"There's a window in here, but it's about a fifteen foot drop to solid pavement!" Alyx screams from the door of the office.

"It'll have to do!" I yell back, dragging Dale to the door. "Almost there buddy." Memories of him I always goofing around at the precinct flood mind. He's the one who taught me the streets of New York, taught me all the codes that would come through the radio. "Almost there," I repeat.

As I reach the door, I spot another gas canister hidden behind some boxes. "Here! Take Dale into the office! I have an idea!" Alyx looks at me, worry filling her eyes. "Trust me!" She takes Dale under his arms and slowly but surely begins dragging him into the office.

I throw the boxes onto the staircase in a desperate attempt to slow the zombies. It doesn't work very well, they just trample over them and continue on to fulfill their one and only need. The smoke is getting think now, it's extremely hard to breath and to see. I start rolling the canister towards the door of the office. The zombies are nearing the top of the stairs fast. This is taking too long.

I bend down in a squatting position and grab the canister around the middle, with a yell full of anger, sadness, fear, remorse and every negative emotion possible to a human I heave the canister onto my shoulder. I slowly walk, the canister throwing off my balance, to the door. As I make it through Alyx slams it shut. Dale is sitting, propped up against a desk, his head hanging awkwardly on his chest. There's a large window spanning from the corner of the room to the door overlooking the inside of the hanger. The zombies moving behind the glass, beating on the window and door to try and get in.

     I walk the canister to the corner of the room, by the window. As I'm laying the canister down the window busts and a zombies stray hand grabs my shirt and tears most of it away from my body. The rest falls to the ground, my bare torso now exposed. "Jack, hurry up!" Alyx screams standing at the window.

     There's a valve at the top of the canister. I open it and the sound of gas being leaked into the air can be heard and smelled. The zombies begin clumsily falling into the office. I kneel in front of Dale. "Goodbye, old friend. I'll see you on the other side." I take his badge off of his chest and put in my pocket.

     The zombies that fell into the room are more focused on the moving meat rather than Dale. That's perfectly fine to me. "Go!" I scream to Alyx, waving her to jump out of the window. She jumps and disappears into the night. I sprint and dive through the window, just as I fly over the window sill the gas ignites, the whistle of the flame flowing into the canister sounding like freight train right behind me.

     The explosion blasts me into the wall of the other hanger, I hit it hard. Fuzzies begin to cloud my vision. I hit the ground and all the air is blown from my lungs. The fire shoots through the window and then get sucked back in. Smoke being expelled from the window rises until it disappears into the night sky.

     I sit up, feeling extremely dizzy. A warm liquid flows down the side of my head and down my neck. I put my hand to the source of the blood and pull it away fast because it stings like a bitch. I split my head open. Once the dizziness fades I see Alyx on the ground clutching her ankle and wincing in pain. I can't hear her though, she's shouting something but I can't make out what she's saying. All I hear is ringing.

     She points behind me. I turn my head to see a zombie bearing down on me. I put a hand to its throat to stop it from tearing out my wind pipe. Three more are following the zombie that's attacking me, I put a hand on the side of its head and use it's awkward angle to throw it off of me. I stand up and stumble before falling back down, a wave of nausea flowing over me.

The ringing in my ears won't go away, I still can't hear anything at all. I stand again, putting my hand on the side of the hanger to gain a little more balance. The trees spin and it feels like I'm floating. I fumble my way to Alyx. I'm in no condition to be carrying her, but I'll be damned if I don't try.

I hold out a hand, she grabs tight and pulls hard, nearly bringing me down in the process. She puts an arm over my shoulder and uses me like she would a crutch. We stumble behind the hanger, the ringing in my ears beginning to piss me off. Although, the dizziness is beginning to fade. The dump truck is parked awkwardly by the gate. It's our only way out of here.

Zombies are scattered far and wide on the airstrip, the sound of the explosion we cause on the gate must've traveled for miles, not counting the gunshots the Russian fired off. That piece of shit. Just thinking of his smug ass face pisses me off.

Alyx is starting to get heavy, the zombies are shambling towards us, desperate to have our flesh between their teeth.

Out of the corner of my eye I see a pack of the four legged creatures, rabids, I think to myself. They act like animals who suffer from rabies. I see a pack of rabids hauling ass in our direction.

Alyx begins to hop faster and I have to adjust my speed or she's going to take us both down.

We make it to the truck, I help Alyx in just a rabid jumps. It slams into the passenger side door, slamming the door shut. I slip my arm out just before it gets caught between the door and the cab of the truck. I sprint to the other side of the truck and throw myself in the drivers side door, that was left open. I slam the door shut. The rabids slamming themselves into the cab and the dumpster of the truck trying to get to us.

The ringing in my ears slowly begins to fade as I reach for the ignition. Dammit! The keys aren't there. A rabid flys into the windshield, splitting its head open and spider webbing the windshield. I frantically run my hands over the seat of the truck. Nothing. Fuck, come on! I pat the floor board until my hand runs against something cold and metallic. Thank you, Jesus. I say internally as I slide it into the ignition.

The truck vibrates as the engine roars to life. I slam the manual transmission into first gear, I pop the clutch and the truck lurches forward. I feed it gas to stop it from stalling. The rabids continue to ram themselves into the truck. I grind the clutch into second gear and hit the gas, there's no time to turn around, the engine climbs in RPM's, I shift to third gear and smash through the gate.

The truck lurches left and right as I drive over the metal and the bodies of zombies. I take a hard right onto the highway and the truck nearly flips. Alyx screams but it sounds like a whisper to me, the ringing still taking a majority of my sense of hearing. She reaches for the dash and holds on for dear life as the truck evens out on the highway.

     Sweat pours from my body. The blood in my hair and on the side of my face already coagulated and dried on. Every part of me hurts. I have a killer head ache and my stomach is in knots. Not because I'm nervous, but from the hit I took.

     "Where's Cassie!?" I scream over the ringing in my ears. Alyx looks at me, I make out the words 'you don't have to yell'

     "She and her mother and everyone else was taken." I hear her speaking, but it sounds like she's whispering.

     "Speak up!" I yell, and point to my ear, "I can't hear!"

     "They were taken by that Russian guy! I slipped outside before anyone could notice, I didn't see them take you so I went back in. They threw gasoline everywhere and lit a match, that's why the place was on fire!" She screams back.

     "Which way did they go!?" She points backwards. I slam the brakes and downshift back to first gear. I don't even bother doing a three point turn, I just drive all the through the grass and do a U-turn.

     "You could warn someone next time." Alyx says with a sigh. After that the ride is silent. The road is straight so there isn't a need to ask for directions. The ringing in my ears slowly begin to fade until it's completely gone.

     "How long was I out after they left?" I ask Alyx.

     "About 15 minutes." A huge weight is lifted off of my shoulders. That means that couldn't of gotten very far. I smash the gas and switch to fifth gear.

     "We have to catch up to them, I can't lose Cassie. I just can't."

      Alyx looks at me. "It seems there's more than meets the eye when it comes to you two." She says.

     "What? No. I'm 27, Cassie is 18. It's not like that. Cassie is like the little sister that I never had, if I loser her I have absolutely nothing left to live for." The thought of something happening to her makes my eyes tear up.

     As we barrel down the highway I begin to see zombies bodies smashed and knocked to edges of the road. Their close. I think to myself. As we fly down the highway I try to muster up a plan to save everyone.

"There they are!" Alyx points to two little red dots in the distance. It's their taillights. I stomp the gas, the speedometer climbing through the low hundreds now, the engine roars and black smoke billows from the exhaust pipe.

The lights become larger as the dump truck closes the distance. "Okay," I say aloud. "I have a plan, but it's really faulty." I look at Alyx.

"Well?"

"As soon as I get close enough, I want you to take the wheel and keep us close enough so I can jump on the their vehicle."

"What's your plan from there?"

"There's nothing else from there, I'll make it up as I go." I say

"You're absolutely out of your God damned mind." Alyx says looking at me with a ridiculous face.

"Maybe I am, maybe I'm not, all I know is I'm rescuing the people in the truck." We're almost right behind them now, I press the gas pedal all the way to the floor, the engine whines but keeps up the pace. "Alright, grab the wheel," I say, opening the drivers side door. Alyx slides over and takes the wheel, I keep my foot on the gas pedal until she's fully over. We're right beside their truck now. It's a nondescript black truck with a large tail to seat extra people. The window to the passenger door opens up and a mercenary sticks his body out while aiming an AK-47 at me. I duck behind the door of the truck and balance on the step used to get in the truck. Bullets riddle the outside of the door

As soon as there's a cease in gun fire I climb on top of the dump trucks cab and steady myself. The wind is blasting at these high speeds, it feels like standing behind a jet engine. I prepare myself for the jump across the trucks. One, two, "THREE!" I say aloud and jump. The pavement under me flying by at over a hundred miles per hour.

I hit the top of the other truck and roll one time, that's all I can risk or I'd fly off the side of the truck. I stand but keep my knees bent to avoid being picked up by the wind. The passenger of the truck climbs up and out of the passenger window, AK in hand. I walk forwards, unable and afraid to try to run. He gets to his knees and aims the gun at me. The high winds makes it harder to aim, I can see him struggling to line up the sights.

     As I get closer his facial expression changes from a sly smile to look of worry, I knock the barrel of the gun to the left, he pulls the trigger and sprays the top of the truck. The bullets ping and pang off the top of the truck. It's bulletproof.  I punch him in the nose, his eyes start to water and he puts a hand up to his face. Big mistake. I snatch the gun from his hand.

     He tried to hold on but he fell forward. I shoulder the automatic rifle and fire into his head. The bullets go through and hit the metal of the truck and bounce back. They come back through, they rattle around in his head and turn his brain into soup.

    I make my way to the passenger door and swing my feet through first, kicking the driver in the face. The truck swerves hard to the left. I punch him the face and reach over him and pull the door latch. I kick him again, he slides but his grip on the steering wheel keep him planted. He swings but I bat the strike away.

    I fire the gun into his forearm. His grip slips and I kick him in the face, he flys out of the truck, his screams cutting through the wind. The truck swerves left and right, threatening to flip. I grab the wheel and struggle to regain control. There's a door that leads to the back of the truck that swings open.

     "You? You're not dead yet?" A familiar Russian voice asks. He tries to hit me but I was expecting it, I avoid the hit and stop the brakes. He flies forward into the windshield. While he's struggling to get up I hold the AK with one hand and fire. The gun climbs, the recoil too much to hold back with hand, although one of the bullets hits home. He yelps and puts a hand to his shoulder. I kick him in the face, once, twice, three times. "This ones for Dale!" I scream and kick him a fourth time. He slams into the door, his elbow hitting the latch and releasing the door, it opens and he flies out. I look in the rear view mirror.

     He rolls for a long time but, just as he's beginning to become a little speck in the mirror, he stands up. How the fuck? I look in the back of the truck. Everyone is tied to handles that line the wall of the back. Their mouths and eyes covered with rags. I drive the truck for about another five miles before stopping, just in case what I had seen in the mirror really happened.

Alyx stops beside me and gets out of the dump truck, climbing to the passenger side. "They're all bound," I say, nodding to the back of the truck. We both go back, each taking a side and we start to untie everyone.

As I go down the line I come to Cassie. As soon as I take the rag from her eyes they light up. I take the rag from her mouth and she outbursts, "holy shit, jack, you're ripped!" She points to my abs and pectoral muscles. I untie her hands and she wraps her arms around me, tears beginning to fall on my shoulders. "I thought I'd lost you," she said through the cries. She squeezes harder.

"Ah, not so tight, I'm sore as a dog." She let's go.

"Sorry, sorry," she apologizes and looks at my face. "You're head looks like shit," she criticizes, picking at the dried blood. Alyx unbinds Cassies mother.

As soon as the gag is off of her mouth her mother says, "language," she smiles and apologizes.

I brush Cassie's attempts to clean my face off and tell her that there will be time for that later.

I look at Cassie's mom, "was this the group of mercenaries you meant?" I ask her.

"This was three of them, there's nine more. The rest must still be with Thomas, my husband."

     "Are you sure they are going to Charleston?" I ask.

     "Yes. That's what they told us when they came to our house. There's some facility there that they work from."

     "Okay, then that's where we're going." I say. I step into the middle of the tight space and address everyone. "Okay, people, listen up." I wait for the murmuring to die down. "This truck is headed for Charleston, South Carolina. If you do not want to go with us, then by all means you can take the dump truck and go wherever you want to."

The murmuring begins again, people talk with each other and decide what they are doing. I do a quick head count and there's a total of eleven people, including me, Alyx, Cassie and her mother. Five people stand,

Including James, the on who turned the alarm off and say their goodbyes. Alyx hands one of them to key to the truck, I hand them the AK along with a few extra clips and their off.

I introduce myself to the remaining two. "I'm Jack Stanley. I'm an ex-marine and an ex NYPD officer." They nod.

One speaks up, "My name is Terry, it's nice to meet you, Jack." I nod and give him a smile and look to the other guy.

"I'm Devin," he says, his New York accent very deep.

"Okay, Terry and Devin. I hope you know that this won't be an easy journey. I expect you both to help when we get to Charleston. If you don't know how to shoot or defend yourself, I'm plenty qualified to teach you." They nod. "I'm sorry we couldn't of met on better circumstances." I walk back to the front of the truck and turn the ignition.

I drive for about fifteen minutes before we find an old farm house. I pull the truck into the drive way. Cassie and I do a quick sweep of the house and it proves to be empty. Everyone finds a seat in the living room. As I'm going to sit down Alyx grabs my wrist and pulls me to the kitchen. She grabs a rag and turns on the water.

"Your ankle seems to be doing better," I say.

"I think I just landed on it wrong, it's fine now." She dabs the rag across the graze on my cheek. I wince and suck in air. "Sorry." She cleans the dried blood from my face and out of my hair. She runs the rag down the front of my body where the blood had flown, cleaning it.

I sit down and roll the pants leg up that was grazed. I remove the blood soaked, make shift bandage and toss it in the trash, the wound being fully clotted over now.

"Why don't we take the bedroom?" Alyx asks with a smile.

"Why don't we?" I ask back. "But we won't be doing anything besides sleeping tonight, I'm dead tired and I'm just got the living shit beat out of me." She rolls her eyes.

"Fine."

I walk to the living room, "everyone find a place to sleep, we have an early morning to wake up to." A collective okay fills the room. Alyx takes me by the hand and leads me to the bedroom. She closes the door. I throw myself across the bed, immediately regretting it as my body aches.

Alyx stands at the foot of the bed, she removes her shirt and takes off her pants, very sensually, if I might add. "I hope you don't mind, I find it hard to sleep in clothes." She says, blushing in the dark.

"I don't mind at all." I say, also blushing. She crawls in the bed beside me and lays my arm over her torso and scoots close to me.

"I know we just met and all, but its been forever since I've had the touch of a man." She slides my hand lower down her body.

As much as I want too, I just don't have it in me right now. "Who even are you, Alyx? I ask, diverting the situation.

"Well, my name is Alyx Vendetta. I grew up in Oklahoma and went to school for accounting. I was the preppy girl in high school, you know, the one who dated the quarterback and had all the nice clothes. But when I got to college I realized that none of that really mattered. I began to focus more on my studies. I got a bachelors degree in accounting and landed a job with a firm in New York. That's about where my story ends."

     She starts to pull my hand again. "Look, Alyx, as much as I want to, and believe me, I do. I can't. I don't have it in me right now." She sighs. "You're a very beautiful woman, and I do find myself attracted to you." I sit up on an elbow and look down at her. "I'm sure there will come a time when we'll have another chance to..." she kisses me, hard, pressing her lips against mine.

     "Shut up, Jack." My cheeks start to get hot. I lay my head back down.

     "Maybe just one more," I say, a newfound energy coming from somewhere within me. I lean over and kiss her, slowly and passionately. She bites my lower lip and teases me. The night heats up and clothing begins to be removed piece by piece.

     It's over almost as fast as it started I roll over, we're both breathing heavily.

     "That was better than expected." She says.

     "Than expected?" I ask, raising an eyebrow in the dark.

     "You knew what you were doing." She says, I can't see it but I know she's smiling.

     "You're such a tease, you know that?"

     "So I've been told."

     I roll over in her direction and put my arm back over her torso she rolls onto her side and scoots even closer towards me. "Good night, Jack," she says.

      "Good night, Alyx." Within seconds the exhaustion falls over me and I'm consumed by sleep.