The death scream was strange. Even as the zombie atop him died it emitted a strange two-tone cry that he had never heard before. It rang oddly in his spiritual hearing almost a cross between a coyote howling and police siren.
There were still zombies left to fight, but they had reacted to the new cry in an unexpected way. They scattered.
David was genuinely expecting the final phase of the fight to be extremely unpleasant, with a real risk of being overpowered.
With Katie blinded and him struggling out from under the fallen corpse he had just executed the lack of immediate attacks came as a relief as the zombies shuffled away in apparent panic.
Just as David got free and was considering whether chasing one and killing it to try and get a normal death cry to try and group them up again was a good idea Katie called urgently.
“David, what’s happening?” She had dropped the gun and was moving in a defensive crouch holding the baton they had found for her as a backup weapon.
David, immediately stopped, her words made him think; he was in terrible shape, Katie was blind. Starting a new fight, while it would have cleaned up the last enemies, wasn’t smart so he repiled.
“The zombies are scattering, it’s almost as though they swarm when their fellows die but the last leader did something. It’s death cry made them run.”
“Oh, good. We couldn’t fight them all could we… I can’t see yet, we need to get to Camila. Can you help me?”
Swallowing David nodded, keeping to himself that he could still sense the weird ball of free Nath on the runway. Despite everything, Camila wasn’t safe yet.
They started fumbling their way down the jetway finding a door labelled restricted access alarmed hanging open, letting the hot summer air into the building.
Then it was down the stairs with Katie clutching to him even as her eyesight was starting to come back and they were outside after pushing through a second door, also apparently alarmed.
Lacking power, no alarms sounded and the doors had push bars to let people through in an emergency.
Once out on the Tarmac they could look up at the planes hooked up to a couple of nearby gates along with the ground support vehicles and even a couple of airport buses spread throughout the area.
The mess of cargo netting covering Camila was the only thing on the ground near them. As David hustled them over, he was focused on his spiritual hearing, both to understand what was happening to her and also to try and head off any ambush they might encounter, or just a random zombie stumbling on them once the initial panic faded.
It was clear that Katies’s sight was returning the moment she made out Camila’s still form and broke into a clumsy stumbling run to reach her friend.
By the time David got there she was struggling with the tangled Cargo netting and crying in a low broken voice.
“Cammie, Cammie, wake up. It’s all right. We killed the bitch who did this to you. You just need to wake up…”
David reached down and started to help untangle the netting to free the trapped girl.
Her face was marked with livid bruises. Her jaw, the side of her head and nose were swollen. She moaned when they moved her and he could see why. Her right arm looked gruesomely like it had developed a second joint between elbow and wrist.
It would take too long to cut the cargo netting, at least with the tools they had here, so David continued the grim process of untangling Camila from net that clearly had kept her down while they worked.
All the while his spiritual hearing gave him disturbing news. There were multiple Nath attached to her somehow and he was hearing a constant high-pitched whine like a broken piece of electronics.
A quick question to Katie confirmed that this was a purely spiritual noise and with a grim expression David spoke.
“I’m going to use my spell on her. We need to get her free of the netting, it will be easier with her rigid. That’s your job. I’m going to try and do something about the Nath that are attacking her.”
She looked alarmed and opened her mouth to speak.
“No time for discussion, are you ready?”
Katie looked deep in his eyes, nodded then spoke.
“Cammie would rather die than become one of those ungodly monsters. Don’t stop no matter what.”
David nodded and then unleashed his magic.
“HALT!”
The power was enough to lock Camila into rigid immobility and halt the swirling, swishing sound of the agitated Nath slowly sinking into her. David reached out allowing his tendrils of willpower, devoid of Nath spirits now to flow into Camila, searching for the Nath he could hear.
The fact that to his senses the Nath existed inside Camila’s body, which only happened when the possessed a corpse was bad. The fact that his power also reached into her rather than gripping the outside of her ‘shape’ like an octopus grabbing a shell was worse.
A confused welter of information flooded back to him.
Uncertainty…
Warmth…
Ear ache…
Pain… Pain everywhere, but especially a throbbing Jaw, sharp, stabbing pain from a tensed right arm arm and… aching, stabbing pain that worsened with every breath radiating out from the right breast back through the ribs?
David flushed in sudden embarrassment as he realized that he was feeling Camila’s pain. That somehow he was able to intrude on her mind.
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He pulled back a little, careful not to grab and hold as he did and the sensation faded.
The Nath remained. Aware of his presence and writhing in confusion after his intrusion and withdrawal. Grimly David reached back in and like an octopus fishing in murky water started probing for the Nath.
What followed was profoundly disturbing and strangely intimate as flashes of sensation and emotion marked his probing, followed by bursts of simpler emotions as he locked onto a Nath and moved to extract it.
The first time was the worst as he paused barely enough to get a strong grip and reinforce his hold with more strands of willpower before pulling sharply to extract the Nath.
Camila screamed and spasmed as Halt broke and Katie had to hastily hold her down to stop her thrashing entangling her further.
After that David moved slower and took the time to wrap his strands around the Nath cruising under Camila’s surface. The technique that seemed to work the best was slow, soothing domineering contact followed by a firm but gentle flip to bring the Nath out once most of his tendrils were wrapped around them.
As he grimly fished for one after another, pursuing them by sense of hearing he perfected the technique.
It was a little like tickling trout. All slow calm movement until the target relaxed and was surrounded then a quick movement to extract them from the media of Camila’s body, or soul, or wherever these things resided. Pull it out before dragging it, almost by instinct into his court.
He had to repeat the agonizing process thirteen times before Camila was finally free. Each extraction garnered a reaction from her, sometimes a moan but the worst couple elicited clear sharp screams.
By the end David was wrung out, completely spent both in terms of resources and willpower. Katie was holding Camila’s head on her lap and speaking softly to her unconscious friend.
David slumped, not sure how long he could keep going for, even if his system could keep him running on Stamina it was all just too much right now.
So he just sat he took a moment to call up his status and see if his sense was correct.
He smiled grimly, he had made his choice. Reinforce was above ten now along with Halt. Even though he hadn’t thought of it as a core part of his identity it was locked in now. It had consumed a lot of health but kept him going through quite a beating. He paid silent tribute to Convert and the spirits he butchered to keep going.
It had all worked the way he wanted it to. A wry thought floated through his mind.
Maybe I should buy a lottery ticket…
He just let himself lie there on the hard concrete for a minute, his senses extended to warn him of any approaching zombies. Or he supposed mutants though he doubted any lived in the vicinity of the airport given the scary organization of the Nath.
Finally, largely because the concrete was uncomfortable and he was getting very hot in all the padding he started picking at the tape and slowly shedding the protective layers he had used to try and tank the zombies.
He still couldn’t believe the plan had worked as well as it did.
Finally, having wrestled his way out of the second bullet proof vest and having untaped the heavy protective padding and armor plates pulled from within two more vests from his limbs David groaned and started to move before the hot concrete became too uncomfortable on suddenly less protected skin.
“Uggh, Let’s get inside. I need a drink, and we have to figure out how to get everyone out. I don’t think the convoy is still here. At least I hope they retreated…”
Katie nodded, then rose to her feet. Her energy levels were a lot better than his at least…
Slowly the two of them moved off towards the terminal carrying Camila between them.
It took them several goes to make it up the stairs, in part because David was so tired and in part because of the soft whimpers of pain each time they jostled Camila. By the time they got there David was running on fumes and totally distracted by keeping Camila steady and the carry smooth.
Which is probably why he didn’t notice until they were actually in the terminal again that things were not as they left them.
Carl was awake and lying on the ground, the submachine gun braced against a chair and pointed at them with his pinkie finger against the trigger. His hunched position radiated pain and his injured hands were unlikely to achieve a controlled shot.
He gasped and slumped when he saw them.
“Oh, sweet Jesus am I glad to see y’all.”
David felt a surprisingly strong rush of relief as he saw another person conscious.
“Carl, you beautiful bastard! I’m so glad to see you awake.”
Katie gasped.
“Your hands! Are you all right?”
“No, not even close but I’m not dead and that was what I thought I would be when I got dogpiled by zombies.”
He looked round. “Our people, is this all that made it? I haven’t checked what about the kid? I saw him go down…”
David spoke softly. “Charlie is in a bad way. He was still alive when I checked on him but beaten badly. They did to his head what they did to your hands. Sarah too…”
“Well shit. Did you kill the blind bitch? She has magic. Like yours in fact.”
“Katie got her. Used that gun you’re holding.”
Carl gave a bloody, fierce grin.
“Well, it looks like this is my new favorite piece.” He paused and looked guilty then focused on Katie. “Umm, unless you want to keep her?”
Katie just shook her head. “Maybe it makes more sense for me to use it in the short term, but I wouldn’t mind you keeping the gun…” She made a point of saying it, not her.
Carl just grinned. Then he looked around.
“So, how the fuck are we going to get out of this? Is Mark or one of his medics around?”
Katie’s face fell. “No signs of Mark. We must look, he wasn’t there at the battle so I have to hope he got out.”
David nodded. “I didn’t see him but at least some of his group got out and made it to the convoy before I got back to the terminal.”
Then he turned serious. “There are still more bodies and more zombies scattered around, they all ran when their queens last minion died. Yes, I’m calling the grey-haired woman the zombie queen and the fast ones are ghouls all right?”
Both of them looked at him funny as his burst of geeky anxiety about naming things that didn’t quite fit his fantasy frames of reference surfaced.
Katie brought him back to reality.
“There was a first aid station near security, we should be able to get in, hopefully with that keycard if the locks still work. Then we can try and bring people round.”
David nodded. Then spoke softly. “Go together or split up?”
Katie grinned and replied. “Dur, together.” Then she got serious. “Horror movie decisions aside we have to risk everyone, again, while we get help.”
The next two hours were agonizing, at least until the pain they were all in was dulled by medicine extracted from the medical center.
After they were able to get a few more people conscious and onto the list of walking wounded. A combination of electric people movers and stealing a pair of courtesy buses got everyone out.
During their cursory search they found twenty-seven of their raid group dead. Seventeen at the ambush site and eight who died in the departure hall where they had been stored. The last two in other locations where they had gone down fighting. They couldn’t search the whole terminal or look for more survivors…
It was a depleted group of thirty-four individuals, far less than half their original number with a lot of people unaccounted for that limped away from the airport.
Mark was still missing.
Billy and Bessie weren’t. They were found just outside the terminal surrounded by broken zombies in front of the access road that led back to where the convoy was parked. Bessie’s head was resting on Billy’s still form.
A bloody trail showed where she had dragged herself to him.
Carl summed it up. Casting an eye over the chaos.
“They were fast, and had that spirit dog thing to cover if they cut and ran. They chose to stand here. Shielding people.”
Blinking back tears, he gestured wordlessly to empty road. The convoy got out. Billy stood to let the support group escape, along with all the survivors they had already rescued.
