Rabbit dug into the softness of a pudding cup as he watched Sheppard disappear into the brush. The cracking and snapping of twigs beneath his feet made it sound like he was starting a fire of his own.
Buck, down on all fours, blew on a small tepee of twigs and sticks trying to get them to ignite. His pony-tail hung like a curtain sash and for a moment he looked like he was deep in prayer. He managed to coax a small flame into existence and the others crept closer to the growing warmth. The Ranger looked cold and disheveled like he'd just emerged from a week of frat house hazings. Amber looked into the growing tongues of fire. Her stare was vacant and devoid of all emotion- too tired, too distraught, too emotionally drained to give a damn.
Rabbit felt an urge to be alone. He grabbed a can of soda and went to sit on a fallen tree by the path Sheppard had taken. Cracking the pull-tab open he took a swig filling his mouth with the sweet acid taste and set the foaming can down on the log beside him. Like Sheppard, he too thought of all that had happened today and the overwhelming sadness of it made his heart sink. The tears began to well up in his eyes. He’d lost his best friend; his father; his innocence and people were after him for what end he could only imagine. Yet, like Sheppard, he realized the importance of their trek. They had to make it to safety and warn others of the evil that had been unleashed. They would place the magnified beacon of light on this debacle and bring down whom ever was behind this. If not the silent minority who pulled the stings, hidden behind massive desks of oak and mahogany, then at least people like Grant would pay for their frontier justice.
Rabbit tried to gain his composure. He had to be strong for Amber. She too, had suffered a great loss today and only by helping each other through this would they endure. The boy swung his foot over the log to straddle it while he waited for Sheppard’s return, knocking the soda from the log with his knee as he did so.
"Damn it!" Rabbit hissed under his breath as he reached down to grab what was left of the fallen soft-drink. His hand sank into what felt like soft moss, but the smell...was all too familiar; putrid and vile- the smell of death and decay. Rabbit reluctantly looked down to see a body laying face down on the other side of the fallen tree, the soda can resting on its side in the small of the back. A froth of expelled liquid, sizzling like peroxide from a scabbed patch of skin. Rabbit’s fingers had sunk into one of the wound releasing the pungent odour from split flesh.
Rabbit yelled as he fell backward and away from the corpse, landing with a thud on the ground and scraping his hand vigorously on the grass. The others turned quickly. Buck was the first to reach the boy and pull him up. “What the hell was that about?”
Rabbit couldn’t speak, only gazing back at the big man with eyes wide. That’s when Amber screamed in terror. On the opposite side of the log the dark figure of a man appeared, slowly clawing its way up to a standing position. The light from the fire danced on his muddy features. There was a hissing sound and the eyes opened, but were only black pockets of nothingness disintegrated by the sickness. A few maggots wriggled from the cracked crevices of its upper lip above a steady stream of yellowish puss. His naked chest was covered in welts of broken lesions that suddenly seem to leak black wetness of blood as if his insides were a wealth of oil.
Grimsby yelled. “What the fuck?!”
Buck quickly scooped up the boy and raced back to the fire. “Len shoot it!”
“With what? A tranquilizer dart? How do you tranq a dead body?”
Amber continued to scream as the dark figure moved forward with uneven steps, toward them and into the light of the fire. They could now see a trail of dried blood and urine down the inseam of the pant leg, the brownish tributaries of blood from the ears and lesions around the face, broken open with excessive scratches. One of the man’s arms appeared to be broken as it hung at an awkward angle and the neck seemed slightly askew as if , it too, had been broken in a fall, or by someone. Still the figure skulked forward.
Sheppard emerged from the forest. The chaos of the camp swirling around him. He grabbed the biggest piece of wood he could find. He charged toward the figure from behind and swung with all his might, cracking the man across the side of his face and shattering the cheek bone and several teeth with a sickening crunch as the figure’s head snapped to the side- the ear easily pounding the shoulder. The wood disintegrated into a shower of splinters leaving Sheppard holding just the stump of his weapon.
The man fell backward in a crumpled heap with one leg twisted at the knee cap and underneath the weight of the body. Sheppard stood poised over the body and ready for another strike- to drive the pointed stub into the attackers throat, or chest, but none would be necessary. There was no more movement. The first blow had been enough.
Amber’s screams had turned to quiet sobs while Buck comforted her. Sheppard dropped the butt end of wood. “Malcolm toss me something from the clothes line.”
Buck retrieved a rain jacket and pitched it to Sheppard who promptly threw it over the body.
“What the fuck?!” Grimsby gasped again. “We haven’t been through enough already we have to contend with zombies now?”
“This happened before.”
“What?! When?”
“At the Vilgrain house in Coram- Rabbit are you OK? What did you do?”
“I....I didn’t mean to touch it. It was an accident...my hand...”
-“Will someone please fill me in to what I just think I saw?”
“Something about the boy. He can reanimate the dead somehow. It’s one of his gifts-”
“Gifts?” Grimsby scoffed waiving the tranq gun at the dead man. “That is not something I want to open on Christmas morning!”
“This is one of the reasons Grant wants the boy so bad Len. Our bodies run to some extent on electrical impulses. Medical science has shown that all living creatures maintain electro-chemical processes in their bodies - human beings more so, because of the electrical activity in our brains. The highest pulse frequency in our motor nerves is around 250 Hz. Rabbit is wired differently. His electrical impulses, when he needs them, seem to be off the chart. Think of him as a car battery, or a defibrillator jump starting a heart."
“Great! We’re on the run with the son of God.”
Amber shouted. “Leave him alone! He's not a freak.”
"No one is calling him that Amber, but Rabbit is special and needs more time to learn to conrol his abilities." Sheppard grabbed Rabbit’s shoulders. “Promise me Rabbit don’t touch anymore dead people.”
The boy shook his head in rapid agreement. “Don’t worry I won’t.”
Grimsby continued his tirade. “I can’t take this anymore. I’ll take my chances alone. Shit! What was I thinking when I joined this expedition?”
“Len! Get a grip! You’re best chance to get out of this is with Rabbit by your side. Can’t you see that? You think if they catch you by yourself you’ll be able to talk your way out of it? When they get the information they want from you- and they will get it- you’ll end up a lab rat until there’s no more use for you. Then you’ll hope by Christ, Rabbit will be there to reanimate your dead ass. We have to stick together.”
Grimsby finally lowered the tranq gun and placed it back in its case. “I’m sorry...it’s just that..it’s been quite the day.”
“For all of us Len. Don’t forget that- Come on we’ve need to move. Everyone down to the lake.”
Sheppard stayed behind to douse the flames of the fire while the others worked slowly through the trees along a thin path to the water side. When Sheppard joined them he found Buck sitting in the middle of the canoe holding onto both sides as Grimsby, Rabbit and Amber tried to push the canoe. If it weren’t for the seriousness of their situation Sheppard might have laughed at the sight. Instead he ran to help the others push.
“Malcolm you’re going to have to get out.”
“I’m fine right here where I am!”
“You’re too heavy. We can’t get the canoe from dragging on the bottom.”
Grudgingly, Buck climbed out with the skill of a clumsy waiter, back into the water. He helped get Amber and Rabbit into the canoe then, with great effort joined them in the middle while almost capsizing the vessel. Grimsby vaulted himself into the front and Sheppard the rear taking up the paddles and beginning to dig into the water. Together they moved silently and swiftly across the lake which had calmed down to a shimmering sheet of glass with the onset of darkness.
It was a good forty-five minutes before they could see the charcoal outline of the opposite shore. At that time the canoe began to waiver gliding hard right and then left.
Grimsby mumbled. “Sheppard, what are you doing back there? You’re not helping. What, did you suddenly forget how to paddle?”
Sheppard pulled his oar from the water and placed it across his knees and bowed his head with a sigh, while the others turned to look at him. “Sorry. I’m just tired. Malcolm would you mind taking it from here?” He handed the oar up to Buck, who despite his fear, took it and managed to get the rhythm going again with Grimsby.
Rabbit turned and looked at Sheppard with grave concern. “You’re sick aren’t you?”
“I’m tired Rabbit. That’s all.”
The boy cocked his head to the side and peered at Sheppard with a piercing gaze. A single tear rolled down his cheek. “You don’t have much time. It will happen tomorrow. I see the aura growing around you.”
Thunder rumbled in the distance as the rain was set to move in for another drenching. Behind them on the western shore, several searchlights ripped through the darkness scouring the forest from above. Grant and his people were back. They were being hunted once more.
