The Gates of Byzantium

CHAPTER 3 WILL

They showed up sometime around ten at night. He guessed between 300 to 400, maybe more because his vantage point was limited. Grime, Texas, like most small towns around the state, was surrounded by trees, and you never knew how many of them were in the darkness of the woods.

He watched through night-vision goggles as they spread out across the street below him. Darting, hunched over, black-shaped moving things—ghouls. Already preternatural, they looked even more so in the green phosphorus.

Through the earbud in his right ear, Danny was, of course, making with the jokes.

“So this businessman has an extremely important trip coming up. It’s make or break for the company, depending on whether he gets the client to sign on the dotted line. The guy is desperate, and during his presentation, he starts sweating and knows he’s not making much of an impression. So he makes a decision to just go for it, starts undressing, falls to his knees in front of the client, and begs, ‘Please, sir, give me this contract and I swear I’ll suck your dick!’ The client gives him a pitying look and says, ‘I’m sorry, son, but that’s just not how the Church rolls these days!’ But then the client leans down and in a hushed voice adds, ‘But would you happen to have a younger salesman you could send over?’”

“Oh, a Church sex joke,” Will whispered into the throat mic. “Really? That all you got?”

“It’s funny because it’s true.”

“Are we speaking from experience here?”

“Hey, that’s between me and Father Al. He had very soft hands.”

“Oh, Danny,” Carly said, and Will could picture her rolling her eyes at him back in the basement a few streets over.

Will was alone, crouched against the edge of the clock tower along the side of the town’s Main Street. He was twenty-five meters up, high enough that anyone on the streets below couldn’t see him. The clock tower looked more like a church steeple, and getting to the very top required climbing some rickety stairs he hadn’t been confident wouldn’t shatter the first time he put pressure on them.

Grime was a small town that used to house around 2,000 people, and like most small towns, it was squeezed into a few square miles. Will figured he was somewhere in the center of town, with Route 69 about eight hundred meters to his right.

“Speaking of which,” Danny said in his right ear, “how’s the show out there?”

“I see about 300 to 400 ghouls. Maybe more. They’re searching the city, so keep your heads low.”

“It’s as low as it can go, buddy. I got the girls covered. You just keep from getting dead.”

“Will do.”

He heard Lara’s voice: “Don’t do anything stupid.”

“I’ll try my best.”

“I mean it, Will,” she added, and he could hear the burden in her voice. “I have too much invested in you.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Danny made the sound of a cracking whip.

“Shut up, Danny,” Lara said.

Will smiled, and watched a couple of the creatures peering into a bright red truck parked at the curb below him. They spent no more than a few seconds on it before bounding up the street to join the swarm flowing southbound, so many that they swallowed up the roads and streets with their vast numbers.

Maybe 400, maybe more…

“So what’s the verdict?” Danny asked. “You just out for a walk, or is there something worth watching out there?”

“They’re definitely looking for something.”

“Aren’t they always looking for something? What else is new?”

“It’s been eight months since The Purge. I’m pretty sure they’ve cleaned out every small town like this one. And even if they were just looking for survivors, they wouldn’t need 400 to do it. No, they’re looking for something specific.”

“Us,” Lara said.

“Yeah,” Will said. “I think they’re looking for us. And have been since we left Starch.”

“You sure you’re not just indulging in your paranoia again?” Danny asked.

“It’s not paranoia if there are blood-drinking creatures chasing you.”

“I saw that coming from a mile away.”

“I’ll radio back if something happens.”

“Roger that.”

Will laid the Remington 870 tactical shotgun on the concrete floor behind him. He only carried the shotgun and a Glock in a hip holster with him, having left his tried and true M4A1 assault rifle back at base. His weapons were loaded with silver ammo, the only thing besides sunlight that could kill the ghouls. Silver, even a tiny amount, once exposed to the creature’s bloodstream, caused a kind of chain reaction that destroyed it almost instantly. Because of that, his group collected silver like junkies, smelting and recasting it into bullets whenever they got the chance. Sunlight was the only thing the ghouls feared more, but it was a little harder to wield the sun as an offensive weapon.

Night hadn’t done a lot to temper the heat around him, and Will was already sweating underneath the black T-shirt and stripped-down urban assault vest. He reached down and touched the handle of the cross-knife, in a sheath strapped on his left hip, just to make sure it was still there. The knife’s double-edged blade was covered in silver, and it was a reminder of that very first night when all of this started — The Purge, as they had come to call it. That was when Will had discovered the killing properties of silver, the main reason they were still alive to this day. He hated to think it was superstition, but he did feel naked without the knife on him at all times.

He heard glass breaking from somewhere behind him and moved to the other side of the clock tower. Two dozen ghouls streamed up the driveway of a house. They had accessed the residence through the windows — their usual M.O. — and gaunt figures flitted across the second-floor windows, briefly visible in the moonlight. After a while, the ghouls came rushing back out, down the same driveway, then spilled back out into the night, spreading out in different directions.

They’re definitely looking for something…

Will had suspected it, but he had become convinced when they had stopped for a few days at a small incorporated community called Village Mills about six kilometers back. There was no reason for the ghouls to be there. The place was barely a blip on the map, and Will made sure to keep their vehicles away from the main roads. Over the months, they had become good at hiding their tracks. And yet, there they were, about a hundred or so of the creatures, scouring through the few buildings in the area.

Looking, searching for something.

Someone.

This wasn’t a ghoul scouting party in search of random survivors. He was convinced of that now. This was a ghoul hunting party. They were being hunted. Will, Danny, Lara, and the others. And they had been ever since they had abandoned Harold Campbell’s facility in the town of Starch, Texas, three months ago.

In the back of his mind, Will wondered if she was down there, too…

He blocked out the rickety noise as he climbed down. He hopped the last couple of meters to the floor below just to be safe, and as soon as the soles of his boots touched the hard concrete, he breathed a sigh of relief.

Another day, another dollar.

He clicked the Push-to-Talk switch connected to the radio clipped to his vest. “Danny, I’m headed back now.”

“Grab some breakfast, will ya?” Danny said.

“McDonald’s or Burger King?”

“You even have to ask? Mickey D’s all the way. Grab me one of their world-famous Big Breakfasts. The one with hotcakes.”

“You want syrup with that, too?”

“What are you, high? Of course I want syrup with my hotcakes.”

“I’ll grab a dozen on the way back.”

“My man.”

Will pushed at the heavy display case in front of the clock tower’s glass doors, just enough to squeeze through. He stepped outside, blinking under the bright sun, then glanced down at his watch: 7:11 a.m.

He passed the red truck from last night, then jogged up Main Street. He turned left farther up the street and kept walking for a hundred meters or so until he came to a big, white two-story building at the end of the street. The Miller Hill House was surrounded by white picket fences that looked tiny next to its huge, towering frame. More importantly, it had a solidly built basement with only one way in.

By the time Will reached the house, Danny and Carly were outside with the girls, Vera and Elise. The eight-year-olds were racing around the overgrown lawn snatching up flowers and sticking them in each other’s hair, blades of grass rising as high as their chins. They looked happy, oblivious to the empty world around them. Vera was Carly’s sister, but Elise had come to them from Dansby, Texas, back when they still had the safety of Harold Campbell’s facility to fall back on. It seemed like another lifetime ago.

Danny glanced over. “I don’t see my Big Breakfast anywhere.”

“They were fresh out.”

“Ugh. That’s the last time I send you on a breakfast run.”

Carly said, “Lara’s fixing breakfast in the dining room.”

“Great idea,” Danny said, “keeping radio silence all night. Lara was real happy about it, too.”

“Be quiet, Danny,” Carly said. “I’m sure Will feels bad about it already.”

“I hope you’re wearing a cup,” Danny grinned.

“Oh, Danny,” Carly said, and punched him on the shoulder.

Danny feigned pain as Will walked past them.

They made for an odd couple. Tall, lanky Danny, with his blond hair and California surfer looks — though he was as Texan as Will — and the smaller Carly, with her darkening red hair. When they were together, it was hard to tell Carly had only turned twenty recently and Danny was ten years older than her. The end of the world tended to age you. Or in the case of Danny, kept you exactly the same.

Will climbed up the steps of the Miller Hill House and slipped into the foyer. The place had that overwhelming old home smell about it and had been blood-free when they had arrived yesterday. Which made sense. Who was going to flee to an old historical home when bloodthirsty creatures attacked?

Lara was walking past the open kitchen door, her blonde hair tied back in a ponytail. Haircuts were in short supply these days, and his own hair was getting noticeably longer. He felt the stubble along his chin and made a mental note to take the time to shave in the next few days.

“Morning,” he said.

Lara looked back at him. She was wearing cargo pants and a T-shirt like everyone, opting for practicality over fashion. The cargo pants had pouches that were useful for carrying supplies, and the T-shirt was, well, it was hot out there. She had a bundle of silverware in her hands.

“Hey,” she said back. “I almost have everything ready.”

She had laid plates for the six of them, with the day’s rations spread out along the length of a table big enough for ten diners. The windows were open, and sunlight filtered into the room. The world looked and sounded different from in here. He could almost believe everything was fine outside.

Lara and Carly insisted on this whenever they could. It was their way of holding on, and Vera and Elise seemed to appreciate it just as much. He could have done without breakfast at a table, but then again, he and Danny were trained to sleep in mountain caves and survive on Meals, Ready-to-Eat rations. Eating off a plate was gratuitous, but it made Lara smile, even if she wasn’t smiling at him now as she went around the table laying the silverware next to the plates.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“For what?”

“Carly said you were waiting to hear from me last night. I didn’t…” He was going to say, “I didn’t know,” but thought better of it. Instead, he said, “I’m sorry. I should have known you would be worried.”

“Of course I’m worried, Will. I’m always worried. I love you. That’s what we do when we love someone and they’re hiding out in a clock tower at night by themselves. We worry.”

“I’m sorry,” he said again.

“Stop saying that.”

He reached for her arm as she walked past him. She tried to jerk it free, but he held on tight and pulled her against him.

“Let me go, Will,” she said, gritting her teeth at him. “I’m not in the mood.”

He held her against him and sought out her mouth and kissed her deeply. She fought him for a moment, but then gave up after a while and kissed him back.

He had forgotten how good she smelled, even if it was just water and soap. It didn’t matter how much sweat and dirt she had on her from the constant moving, the constant living in someone’s abandoned home or dank, confined basement. Lara always smelled like home.

She softened after the kiss and pressed her body against his. Will stroked her hair, then blew playfully at her forehead.

“Don’t do that again,” she whispered. “Last night. Ever.”

“I won’t.”

“Promise me.”

“I promise.”

“I’m always worried about you,” she said softly.

“I know. It wasn’t fair of me to do that. I’m an idiot. I know that.”

She laughed softly. “No, you’re not. You’re just…you.”

“That doesn’t sound like a good thing.”

“It is. But it can also be frustrating, because you’re not aware of it. You and Danny. You don’t know how Carly and I worry when you guys are out there on your own. One of you out there alone is hard enough, but sometimes, I think it’s harder when both of you are together. You know why?”

“No.”

“Because you numbskulls think you’re invincible when you’re together. It’s annoying.”

He laughed. “Sorry.”

“Just don’t do it again,” she said, and pulled away and smiled at him, and he thought the sunlight reflecting off her crystal-blue eyes was the loveliest thing God ever created. “I love you, Will.”

“I love you, too,” he said, and kissed her again.

“Yuck, get a fucking room,” Danny said behind them.

Danny and Carly came into the kitchen, Elise and Vera rushing past them, joined invisibly at the hip like always. The girls hopped into chairs at the table and scanned the food.

“What are we having today?” Vera asked.

“Vienna sausages, canned fruits, and turkey MREs,” Lara said. “And oh, maybe some SPAM for later if you’re both good. Dig in.”

“Yum, SPAM,” Danny said. “It’s like home all over again. If by home you mean hell.”

Carly punched him in the thigh.

While they had made the Miller Hill House their base last night, their vehicles were stashed in a garage two streets away. After breakfast, while Lara and Carly and the girls got their supplies ready to move, Will and Danny walked over to fetch their trucks.

They carried M4A1 assault rifles, their old weapons from Afghanistan. The M4A1s were their weapons of choice in the daytime, when spreading power took a backseat to distance and accuracy. There was also the fact that if they had to shoot something in daylight, it was usually someone, and they didn’t need to waste silver bullets for that.

Grime, Texas, in the morning was eerily quiet and devoid of activity, like every other small town they had occupied for the night since Starch. Will would have been satisfied with spending however many years he had left within the facility’s gray concrete walls with Lara, but the decision was never his.

“So, they’re following us,” Danny said.

“They’re hunting us,” Will said. “As far as I can tell, they’ve been on our ass since Starch. We’re going to have to shake them sooner or later. One of these nights, they might catch us in a bad spot, and it won’t be pretty.”

“Just to let you know, I only have enough C4 left to blow up a house or two, so whatever crazy Plan Z you come up with next, be advised.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

Danny’s mastery of C4, a skill he had learned during their time serving in Afghanistan, had been invaluable since The Purge. First in Houston, then later on the road to Starch. But they were running out of C4, and it didn’t look like they were going to find more any time soon. Unlike guns and ammo, which were lying around everywhere, military-grade explosives were impossible to find, even in Texas. Go figure.

“We might not have to do anything drastic,” Will said. “We know they’re hunting us, but they don’t know that we know. We can take precautions. Double our alertness. Now, instead of putting the vehicles two streets down, we do four. Et cetera.”

“That sounds like a plan. A very convoluted one, but a plan nonetheless.”

The radio clipped to Will’s vest squawked and he heard Lara’s voice: “We’re done, guys. Whenever you’re ready with the trucks.”

“Roger that,” Will said. “ETA five minutes.”

“See you then.”

“Tough girls,” Danny said. “I have to admit, they’re handling this pretty well. The kids, too. I thought there would be more freaking out. More second-guessing. It must be my Captain Optimism rubbing off on them.”

“That, or your bad BO.”

“Either/or,” Danny said.

The blue and black Ford Rangers were in the same garage of the two-story house where they had stashed them last night. The Rangers were roomy four-door vehicles that got great gas mileage, a major consideration when they had found them at a used car lot some months back. The fact that the trucks were also called Rangers made them serendipitous, even though Will didn’t particularly put stock in that kind of thing.

The plastic moving crates filled with their expendable supplies were in the back of the trucks underneath heavy tarps. Their main supplies, like weapons, ammo, and enough food and water to last a month, were back at base.

They drove the Ford Rangers back to the Miller Hill House, where Vera and Elise were waiting outside on the front curb amidst a pile of backpacks, carry-on luggage, and a pair of red crates with their emergency ration of food and water. The girls were dutifully clinging to a pair of ammo bags, each one weighing almost as much as them put together.

Carly and Lara came out of the house with more carry-on luggage as they pulled up to the curb.

“Silverware?” Will shouted over at them.

Lara held up one of her luggage bags and jingled it. “I cleaned the place out. The Millers will be super pissed when they get home.”

“It’s a good thing they’re all dead.”

“Sucks to be them,” Danny said.

They turned right off Main Street and headed south on Route 69/US 287, and before long, Grime, Texas, faded into their rearview mirror. Will drove the black Ranger up front with Lara in the passenger seat, while Danny followed in the blue Ranger with the girls. They kept twenty meters between them in case Will had to make an emergency stop.

Months after the end of the world, there were signs other survivors had begun using the roads again. They saw it in the dwindling cans of non-perishables in store shelves, empty boxes of beef jerky, and suddenly empty store refrigerators that used to be piled high with warm drinks. There were also more obvious signs, like cars recently pushed to the sides of roads or old pile-ups untangled in order to get big vehicles through.

Lara was engrossed with the ham radio in her lap. She was making minor adjustments to the dial, honing in on the familiar Federal Emergency Management Agency frequency, where they had first encountered the looped message. She stopped only when the soothing female voice drifted through the speakers. Like all the other times, they found it while the message was in the middle of its pre-recorded loop:

“…Song Island in Beaufont Lake in Louisiana. We are broadcasting on the FEMA frequency to any survivors out there. We want you to know there is hope. There are survivors on Song Island. We have food, supplies, electricity, and protection against the darkness. If you are receiving this recorded message, we encourage you to make your way to us. I repeat: we have food, supplies, electricity, and protection against the darkness.”

There was a pause of a few seconds, then the message resumed from the very top:

“Hello. If anyone can hear me out there. This is Song Island in Beaufont Lake in Louisiana. We are broadcasting on the FEMA frequency to any survivors out there…”

The message was broadcasted day and night, every day. It was unchanged from the time they had originally picked it up four months earlier. It was probably appropriate that Elise had been the one to discover the message while showing Vera how to work the ham radio. Elise had, after all, come to them because she was playing with a ham radio.

Beaufont Lake was not on Will’s radar, but finding it on a map was easy enough. It was about twenty-five kilometers from the Texas-Louisiana border, past Sabine Lake and close enough to Interstate 10 that they would be able to take the long stretch of road once they joined it off Route 69.

They were traveling cautiously, like they always did, with the Rangers moving at a steady thirty miles per hour — sometimes forty if they were feeling especially brave that day. Speed was not an option here.

Slow and steady survives the darkness.

And besides, Song Island was advertising safety and protection. If it really was safe, the island would still be there a week or a month from now. And if wasn’t, then it was never as safe as the people broadcasting claimed in the first place. Either way, Will wasn’t going to be hurried. Not now, not with so much at stake.

Lara turned the radio off and put it back down on the floor. “Is it possible? Can an island be that safe?”

“It could be. We’ve never thought about ghouls and water. Maybe they can’t swim.”

“Why wouldn’t they be able to swim? Nothing about their physiology indicates an adverse reaction to lake water. I think they might even float better than us. They’re mostly just skin and bones.”

“Why do they melt in sunlight? Why do they fold up and die if you prick them with a little bit of silver?” He shrugged. “Eight months later, what do we really know about them?”

“You’re right,” Lara said, and she leaned back against her seat. “We should know more about them by now. I should have discovered more. I feel like I’m the one dropping the ball here.”

“Take it easy. You’ve done pretty well for a third-year medical student.”

“Ah, to be a fourth-year medical student,” she said wistfully, and allowed herself a rare smile. “I wonder how Song Island is broadcasting the signal?”

“There could be a radio tower on the island or nearby that they’re bouncing their signal off. It doesn’t have to be that strong of a signal. Without all the usual traffic, you could probably contact someone on the other side of the world these days and get a perfect connection.”

“It has to be someone who knows about the FEMA frequency.”

“That makes sense. Maybe military, or ex-military. A former government official. They did promise protection, so maybe they even have a standing army on the island. Or a civilian army of some type.”

“That would be nice, wouldn’t it? An army?”

“I wouldn’t mind one.”

“Maybe you can finally make captain,” she teased.

“I’ve always wanted to be a captain.”

“Why stop at captain? How about General Will?”

He laughed. “I’ll settle for major.”

It was a body in the middle of the road, and Will almost ran over it.

He was maneuvering around a beat-up Jeep parked in his lane when he saw it, popping up out of nowhere not much farther up the road. It looked like a big lump of road kill rotting in the sun, but he had seen bodies before — too many to mention — and he knew instinctively it was a man.

Will jammed on the brake and fought the steering wheel. Lara let out a shocked gasp as the seatbelt clenched against her body. Will quickly glanced at this side mirror and saw Danny pulling up behind him. If he had been going any faster than thirty-five, he would have easily run the body right over.

Slow and steady survives the darkness…

Will put the Ranger in park and grabbed the M4A1 resting against his seat. “Stay here and keep low.”

“Be careful,” Lara said, catching her breath as she pried the seatbelt free.

He hopped out of the truck but stayed behind the open door. He heard another door opening behind him, then Danny’s voice from his vest radio: “Don’t tell me you almost got us into a wreck over a squirrel.”

“Body,” Will said. “Make that bodies.”

There was a second body nearby, closer to the side of the road. An older man, face up, sun-beaten white face staring at the bright, cloudless sky. Congealed blood underneath his head, and the telltale signs of a bullet hole in his left temple.

“Dead?” Danny asked.

“One for sure. The other one undetermined.”

“Well, let’s determine it, then.”

Will scanned the areas to his left, then right. The highway had four lanes, with the north- and southbound lanes separated by walls of trees to both sides. He instinctively flashed back to the early days after The Purge, when they had been caught in a road ambush.

Never again…

He glanced back at Lara, crouched low in front of her seat, clutching her Glock in one hand. She mouthed, “What now?”

He shook his head, then looked back at Danny standing behind his truck’s open door, M4A1 at the ready, eyes scanning the road and trees. Carly was crouched low in the passenger seat of the second truck, and the two girls were invisible in the back, just the way they were trained.

“I don’t see anything,” Danny said.

Will looked down the road at the bodies again. He focused on the one in the center. Big, about six-two, with a thick, shaggy beard and dark curly hair. The man lay on the road with his face toward Will. He had been shot. More than once, from the placement of blood underneath his body. A hole in the man’s leg, another one somewhere along his shoulder. Dull black eyes were staring back at him—dead?

“I see two bodies,” Will said into the radio. “Gunshots. One’s one hundred percent dead. The other one is probably dead. Wait—”

He saw movement from the big man. It hadn’t been much — just enough to get his attention. He focused on the man’s right hand, waiting—there. The man had moved his pinky finger. As Will watched, the finger moved again, then a third time.

“Looks like the second body’s still kicking,” Will said.

“I see bullet holes in the Jeep behind us,” Danny said. “Shell casings along the shoulder. Looks like a firefight.”

Will scanned the trees to his left and right again, then made up his mind. “Cover me.”

“Go for it,” Danny said.

Will slipped out from behind the door and rushed toward the man in the middle of the road. He passed the first body, which didn’t move as he glided past it. As he moved forward, he heard a truck door slam farther behind him, then quick footsteps chasing — Danny, moving forward from his truck to take over the position at the door of Will’s Ranger.

Will moved quickly, keeping low, toward the survivor in the road.

The man looked worse up close, though not by much. The hot sun had been baking him for a while. Amazingly, he was still alive, chest moving, if just slightly. Will crouched next to him and felt for a pulse. There. It wasn’t very strong, but it was enough.

The man’s eyes fixed on Will. Cracked lips struggled to make a sound.

“You don’t look like a decoy,” Will said, smiling down at the man.

The man moved his head side to side. Or tried to, anyway.

No.

“You sure?” Will asked.

The man nodded. Or something that resembled a nod.

Yes.

Will watched the man for a moment, trying to read his soul through dull brown eyes. He was in his mid-thirties, but there was a lot of mileage there. Will saw a stubbornness that bordered on being impressive.

His radio squawked and he heard Lara’s voice: “Will, if he’s still alive, we can’t just leave him out here.”

Will considered his options. Saving this man’s life didn’t fit into his priorities, which were simple: stay alive, and keep everyone else alive, too. Will could leave him now and not think about it ever again. Smart people with medical degrees called it triage. Will called it practical survival.

His radio squawked again, and he heard Danny’s voice this time: “What’s the call, Kemosabe?”

“I’m trying to decide,” Will said.

“Decide faster. I hate standing out here with my nuts in my hands.”

“Uh, great visual, babe,” Carly said through the radio.

“I love you, too,” Danny said.

Will realized the man was saying something. Or trying to. He was drooling blood, and would have been coughing up blood, too, if he had the strength.

How was this guy even still alive?

Will leaned in closer. “I can’t hear you. Say again.”

“Sandra,” the man said, with as much life as he could muster. “Sandra…”