“How long do we have?” Sam asked.

            There was obvious suspicion in his voice.

            “I don’t know for sure, but it won’t be long until they notice that the squad hasn’t reported back.  After that, they’ll tear this town apart looking for something to kill.  Even if they don’t search tonight, this place’ll be crowded with zombies during the day.  You’ll never get anywhere on foot,” she said.

            Though she was standing in the shadows, Jack had the suspicion that her expression would be nearly impossible to read.  Her voice was cold and calculated, but she was trying to cover an overwhelming impatience.  One thing was for sure, the girl was just as frightened of the killers as Jack was.

            As the girl looked around the room, Jack took a look at her rifle.  Now that was a piece of hardware.  He was not quite sure of the make, but the fire arm was long, and had a scope mounted on the end.  From the looks of the muzzle and handle the rifle had been modified so it would be useful for both close range combat and sniping.  As the girl held the rifle over her head, the shoulder strap hung down below her chin.

            Jack recalled the end of their chase.  He remembered seeing the window of the truck shatter, and he heard the same had happened to the sports car.  Jack supposed that the girl in the door way had been the one to fire the shots.

            “Stand the gun against the door frame, and step forward,” Sam said.  “Keep both hands where we can see them.”

            Though the only light in the liqueur store came from the moon and the stars outside, Jack could swear he saw an anger and frustration, growing inside of the stranger.  It was more intense than any other malice he had witnessed.  Though she was clearly pissed, the girl did as Sam instructed.  She had probably predicted a reaction like this.

            “Okay, now put you hands in the air and back away, I want to ask you a few questions.”

            On Sam’s remark, her composure finally broke.

            “Didn’t you fucking hear me?” the girl yelled.  “They could be here in less than an hour!  Once you hear the engines it’s too late!”

            Sam’s composure stayed the same.

            “I just want to take a minute to ask you a few questions.  Then we can go.”

            “Fuck all of you!  If I hadn’t heard you guys being shot at I could have been half way to Canada by now!”

            She slowly picked up her rifle, slung it over her shoulder, and strolled out of the door.  Sam stormed after her.  Jack and the others followed Sam in visible surprise.

            “You’re not going anywhere bitch!”

            The girl began running faster, but not fast enough.  She darted for a black Mustang parked outside of the liqueur store.  Before she could reach her getaway car, Sam grabbed her arm, and yanked as hard as he could.

            The girl spun around, and punched Sam in the face.  Sam cried out in pain and surprise as the closed fist struck his nose.  A string of blood and snot flew through the air.  The girl turned around and tried to open the car door again.

            Jack, Paul, and Zach watched the spectacle in astonishment, but Sam had quickly recovered from the blow.  This time, he lunged at the girl, and grabbed her hair.  She grabbed his hand, and tried to turn around, but Sam quickly put his knee in her back, and forced her to the ground.

            He then pulled out his pistol and pointed it at the girl’s head.  She stopped struggling.

            “Pull another trick like that and I’ll shoot you in the back,” Sam drew in hard breaths, and evicted them with much more force.  “I’ll aim low so it won’t kill you.  Then I’ll leave you out here.  Got it?”

            The girl said nothing.

            “I’ll take that as a yes.”

            Jack had just noticed that his rifle was pointed at Sam.  He looked at the other two soldiers, standing to his right.  Paul gaped.  Zach dutifully pointed his rifle at the detainee.  If he was as shocked as the others, Zach hid it well.

            Jack had never seen Sam lash out at anyone in that manner.  He must have been a lot more rattled then he let on.  He was smart not to trust the girl, but to brutalize her like that was going too far.

            Jack stepped forward.

            “Hey, take it easy Sam.”

            Jack tried to switch off the safety only to discover that it had already been disengaged.  He was just glad that he had not pulled the trigger.

            Sam looked up at Jack, then at the girl, then at Jack again.  He put his pistol back in his holster, then pulled the girl off of the ground by her collar.  Though he had been visibly shocked when he realized what he had done, Sam was unapologetic.

            “Okay, we’ll ask questions later,” Sam said.  “Right now I want to pick up a few parts from the jeep.”

            Sam had discarded his rifle while pursuing the girl, so Zach went to retrieve it.

            “Zach, load up the car, Jack and Paul come with me.”

            He pulled the girl along by the arm.

            “You’re coming too.”

            She offered no resistance.

            “Zach, I want all our supplies in that car by the time we get back.”

            “Got it!” Zach answered.

            As Sam continued his stride toward the alleyway, pulling the girl along with him, Jack and Paul kept pace.  Though darkness had peaked over an hour ago, the night seemed stranger and darker with each passing moment.  It also seemed to grow.  Less a week ago, Jack thought the only people alive were the ones in his colony.  Now they knew of at least two other groups, and there was the girl.  There was no telling where she might have come from.  It was unlikely that she was with the attackers, but she seemed to know about the raiders and how they fought.  If the other colony had known, they might have been able to fight off the invaders.  Maybe she’d picked up the knowledge from the assault, but how did she survive?  If she did not come from the desecrated colony, then where was she from?

            The night’s events were giving Jack a headache.

            “How did you find us?” Sam asked.

            The girl paused for a moment, then said “I tailed you at a distance for a while.  It wasn’t that hard, because you were moving so slow.  I didn’t see you stop, but your door was the only one unchained and closed.”

            “Shit,” Sam said.  “So they would have found us pretty easy.”

            The girl nodded.

            “How do you know so much about them?”

            “It’s a long story.  I’ll tell you when we’re in a safe place.”

            Sam tried to hide his growing impatience.  After a few moments, he took a deep breath and succeeded.

            “Alright,” Sam said.

            The violence and malice in Sam’s demeanor seemed to fade together.  Maybe he was starting to relax, or maybe he was hiding it, and waiting for the right moment to strike.

            When they reached the alleyway, Sam led the way in.  The alley was still as silent and dead as when they had ditched the jeep, which had only been around fifteen minutes ago.  It seemed much longer.

            “How old are you?” Sam asked.

            “Eighteen,” she answered.

            “And you have sniper training!  You nailed those bastards at fifty miles an hour,”

            “From a fourth story window,” she added.

            “That kind of training doesn’t happen overnight.  Hell there’s no use for that kind of shooting unless you mean to shoot people,” Sam’s eyes narrowed as he let the last two words escape.

            Shoot people.  If Sam was right, then this girl was a trained assassin.  If the other colony had trained soldiers for that kind of combat, they would have won the skirmish.  Shoot people.  Even if they did train snipers to shoot targets moving that fast, why would they give that training to a young girl?  In the military, Snipers were usually trained by special forces.  They worked their way up from grunt levels.  There was a lot of intensive training.  The girl must have started training when she was fourteen or even younger.  The word “shit” escaped Jack’s thoughts through his lips.

            Amazingly, Paul remained silent.

            “Paul, get the battery from the jeep, Jack hold steady.”

            Both soldiers did as instructed, and Sam looked to the prisoner.  Apparently the same thought crossed his mind.

            “Where did you com from?  Why would they train a young girl as a sniper?” Sam asked.

            “I told you, I’ll tell you later.”

            Sam began to grow impatient again, but held his temper.

            “Okay, but answer this one now.  How old where you when they started training you?”

            “Ten.”

Sam was silent.

            “They didn’t send me into combat until I was fifteen.”

            That statement shocked Jack, and chilled him to the core of his very essence.  Jack’s colony did not let anyone leave the base until they were eighteen.  They did give everyone basic weapons training for the purpose of self defense, but they never forced children into a combat zone.  How could anyone send a fifteen year old girl out to die?

            Jack took a moment to gaze at their mysterious prisoner.  Though he now saw her in a newer light, they still new nothing about her.  Hell, they didn’t even know her name.  One thing was for sure: she did not look like a hardened soldier.  She was so tiny, at maybe five foot-four, and very slender.  She didn’t look like she could put up a fight against a large opponent.  Her features were delicate and she moved with the smooth grace of a dancer.  Her subtle movements would call attention even in a crowded room.

            Suddenly, Jack was nearly overwhelmed by the urge to learn her name.  He watched the street instead.

            “Got it!” Paul called out.

            “Good, let’s bring it back to the…”

            Sam’s order was cut off by the nearby purr of an engine.

            All three soldiers and the young assassin watched the street, in silence.  Paul set the car battery on the ground behind the jeep, and joined the others with his rifle aimed.

            The three of them were in the middle of a bottleneck.  The only place to hide was behind the pile of garbage, where the jeep was abandoned.  If they went in there, there would be no way out.  If the killers had returned, the four of them were dead.

            The engine crept closer, growing louder as it made a casual approach.  The slow movement seemed strangely out of character for the killers.  And why hadn’t they heard gunfire?  Zach was more exposed than the four stooges in the alley.

            A black shape crept into view, and their visitor stopped in front of the alley.  It was the Mustang.  Zach emerged from the window and shouted, “I thought I’d bring the car over to save a trip.”

            There was a moment of silence, then someone behind Jack sighed with relief.  Paul jogged back to the jeep to retrieve the battery, and Sam advanced towards the Mustang.

            The assassin made her way in front of him and said, “I know a safe place.”

            “Good, I’ll drive,” Sam responded with a voice filled with intensity.

            Sam clearly wanted most of the advantages, and Sam driving meant that Sam ran the show.  Surrounded by troops loyal to the driver, it would be hard for the assassin to kill him and take the wheel.  If they were headed into a trap, Sam would at least stand a chance of getting his troops to safety.

            “The ammunition is in the back passenger seats.  It’s gonna be tight in there,” Zach said.

            “I know,” Sam said, “Put the battery in the trunk.”

            Sam turned to the girl.

            “You’re up front with me.  I need you to tell us where we’re headed but if you give us any bullshit…”

            Sam tapped his rifle.  The girl nodded.

            “I know.”

            “Good.  Remember you’re a prisoner until I know I can trust you.”  Sam looked around at his surviving troops, and said: “Move out!”

            “I have a couple of spare gas cans and parts in the trunk.  That’ll be enough to get us there, but we have to get pretty far away from the city.”

            “Just tell me which direction to drive,” Sam instructed.

            She told Sam to drive west, and that it did not matter which road he took, because they were going to be out for a while.

            From the back seat on the passenger’s side, Jack did not have a good view of the assassin, so he peered out of the window.  The Mustang was moving fast.  As the landscape blurred behind them, and ate their dust, Jack could not make out any particular shapes in the darkness.  He wondered what would happen if they hit one of the ghouls moving as fast as they were.  Would they go off of the road?  Would they lose control?  Would they flip over?  In the end, Jack figured Sam knew what he was doing.  Their leader had lost his cool a few times tonight, but Sam would never kill his own troops.

            They must have been on the move for twenty minutes before the girl told Sam to start heading north.

            As Jack rested his head on the window, he realized how tiered he was.  He had not slept much the night before.  In fact, he had spent a good deal of it roaming around after the nightmare.  The damn nightmare.  Jack wished he didn’t have to sleep again.  But his eyelids grew heavy, like sheets of solid steel.

            Paul nudged Jack in the ribs.

            “What?”  Jack asked.

            “You must have been snoozing for the last half an hour.”

            “Damn.”

            “Come on, it’s probably not too much further.  She just told Sam to move south.”

            “What?  Didn’t she just say ‘north?’  Where in the hell are we going?”

            “Beats me,” Paul said, “It seems like we’re heading in a giant circle.

            “You can slow down now,” the girl said, “We’re almost there.”

            Sam remained silent, but cut the Mustang’s speed in half.

            “Okay, make a left onto this street.”

            They were in the middle of the ruins of a once crowded city.  Most of the buildings stood, seemingly untouched by time.  The first floor windows were shattered, but the windows on the floors above were still intact.  Aside from the Mustang moving through the massive cityscape, there was no movement.  The place was utterly dead.

            “Okay, pull next to that building on the right,” the girl said, “There’s a garage, where we can store the car, but we’ll have to use the fire escape to get to the second floor.”

            Without a word, Sam did as the girl instructed.

            “I’ll open it up for you,” she said.

            “Just a second,” Sam looked back, “Paul, Jack… give her a hand.”

            The Mustang was a two door vehicle, as Jack waited for the girl to get out, then Jack leaped out, leaving the door wide open.  Paul followed, more composed than the younger soldier, and closed the door.

            The girl looked back, and scowled at Sam.  Then she moved toward the steel door, which was large enough to fit a Mack truck.  Jack took a moment to admire her figure, and watch her tight little butt wiggle as she walked.

            Suddenly, Jack felt ashamed.  He started blushing, and looked away.

            The girl stooped down, and uncoiled a metallic chain, which was wrapped around a hook.  The hook was fixed to the ground.  Taking the chain in both hands and grunting the girl pulled back.  The steel door began to rise.

            “He sent you guys out here to help me.”

            Jack and Paul rushed over to aid the girl.  Jack took a hand hull of chain in front of the girl, and began to tug.  Paul stepped in front of Jack, and took most of the weight.  The door opened faster that it had before.  When the base reached about seven feet in the air, the girl stopped tugging.

            “Alright, wrap it around the hook.”

            Jack and Paul pulled a little more to give some slack, and the girl wrapped the chain, securing the door.  They let go, and it dropped a couple of inches, and then hung suspended in the air.  She waved the Mustang through.

            Sam pulled into the garage, and parked the Mustang in the stable.  He and Zach stepped out of the car, and began to pull out the back packs.

            “Hold on a second,” the girl said, “I want to rig the door to open from the inside.  Take the chain.”

            “Go ahead,” Sam instructed.  “Jack, stay on the other side for a second.  Paul, Zach, get the chain in here.”

            Sam stayed alert, and kept his rifle ready.  Zach set the backpacks aside, and moved to the door.  He stood ready, and Paul headed into the garage.

            When Paul was clear of the doorway, the girl unwrapped the chain.  The gate slammed against the ground with a boom.  If anyone had been under the falling slab, the force would have been beyond fatal.

            Once again, the door cranked open, and Jack and the girl stepped back inside.

            When they were clear, the door fell with a harsh thud again.

            The girl made her way to the window, where a metal ladder had been welded to the wall.

            “We’re going to have to get to the second floor.  This is a dead zone, but a few zombies might have wandered in here,” she said.

            From what Jack could see inside the garage, the only exits were the window, and the steel gate.  The space was large enough to fit three, maybe four more cars, but the Mustang was the only vehicle parked inside.  The black, metallic ladder bolted to the wall, looked like part of a fire escape.

            “We’ll find a new car tomorrow morning,” the girl said.

            “Is there anything lying around?” Sam asked.

            “They always leave a few things behind.”

            She climbed the ladder, opened the window, and crawled out.

            “Come on,” she said.  Her voice was slightly muffled from being outside.

            “Grab our stuff,” Sam said.  “Pass it up as we go.”

            Sam was the first to follow the girl.  Jack followed next. Paul then climbed out, but stopped so Zach could pass the back packs.  When all six were passed up, Zach followed.  Sam and Jack had already climbed into the second story window, where the girl stood, waiting for them.

            “They didn’t leave the generators, so there’s no power,” she said, lighting a lantern, “but we have these.”

            “That’ll do fine,” Sam said.  “I don’t want them to see us.”

            “We’re safe here.  They’re a good forty miles south of here.”

            The light from the lantern chased the shadows far enough to give Jack the first good look at the girl’s face.  His heart thumped faster, and he felt himself breathing rapidly.  She was gorgeous.  Her complexion was pale, her nose was small and cute, and the only blemish on her face was a small scar on her right cheek, possibly a knife wound.  Though he had a good view of everything else, Jack could not see what color her eyes were.

            Paul and Zach made quite a bit of scuffling noise as they joined the others.  Zach had come in last, and Paul was still carrying all of the packs.  He handed one to Zach, then one to Sam, and one to Jack.  Zach carried his shotgun, and had the rifle slung over his shoulder.

            There were six chairs sitting around a family dinner table.  The table was covered in dust, and looked as though it had been abandoned for weeks, perhaps months.  The dust coating was much thinner than that Jack was used to seeing on sites abandoned for twenty years.

            Zach set his gear beside one of the chairs, brushed the dust off, and took a seat.  The others followed.  Sam turned his gaze over to the girl.  His temper had clearly faded, and he had regained his composure.

            “Now you’ve got a long story to tell.  You can start with your name.”

            “Helen.  Helen York.”

            Helen.  The name suited her, just like Helen of Troy, the face the launched a thousand ships.

            “I’m Sam, that’s Paul, Jack, and Zach, watch out for him.  Any way, how do you know so much about the raiders?”

            “I’ve lived among them for the last eleven years.  They found me when I was seven and killed my parents.  They trained me as one of their killers.”

            Sam looked shocked but not surprised.  He took a deep breath.

            “Who are they?”

            “They’re a plague.  They’re locusts, nomads.  They stay one place until they use up the food and fuel, then they move on the next place to destroy.  If there’s anyone where they settle down, they attack.  They cleanse the unholy, and steal their young so they can boost their numbers in future generations.”

            “Cleanse the unholy?”

            “They hide behind the guise of moral divinity.  Their leader claims to be the second coming.  I don’t know weather he believes it or not.  His name’s Roger Calhoun.”

            “What else do you know about this clown?”

            “Not much.  There’s a rumor that he used to be in covert ops before this…” Helen waved her hand around the room.  “As far as I know he never fought in any wars though.  He met most of his higher ups in Canada, and they came to the states after everything went to hell.”  She looked at the floor for a long moment, took a deep breath and said, “I want him dead.”

            Jack couldn’t blame her.  He hadn’t even met the guy and he wanted Calhoun dead.

            Sam gave Helen a moment to gain her composure.

            “How many colonies have these people destroyed?”

            “I don’t know, maybe five since I’ve been with them.”

            “And how many of these assholes are we up against?”

            “Roughly three thousand,” she said.  “Only about a third of them are soldiers.  Several of them are out on scouting missions.  Many of them weren’t trained very well, but the Black Angels are the ones you’ll have to worry about.  They’re Calhoun’s elite guard, and tactical strike unit.  There are only two hundred or so of them.”

            “Shit, only two hundred?” Zach blurted.

            “How many casualties did they take storming that base?” Sam asked, ignoring Zach.

            “I’d say very few, but I slipped away before the action began.  They probably think I’m dead.”  She looked towards the window for a second.  “They used explosives on the main gates, and used large trucks as battering rams and troop transports.  The ground troops were supported by an automotive cavalry.  The battle was probably almost finished by the time the troops left the trucks.”

            Sam was speechless.  If the battle had been won by the time the troops set foot on the battle field, then they were just there for cleanup and torture.  Jack thought of the corpse imprisoned with no arms and legs and whatever had unnerved Sam inside of the domed shelter.  None of that was in self defense or combat.  Who knew what other atrocities they would have witnessed if the search had continued.  Sam looked as though the same thoughts were on his mind.

            Paul recited a quick and silent prayer, and crossed himself.

            Helen raised her head, and looked directly into Sam’s eyes.

            “You’re not from that base,” Helen pointed south.  “Why were you here?”

            Sam thought for a moment, perhaps pondering weather or not he could trust her.

            “We got a distress call from the base as it was attacked.  There was a lot of gunfire, but we thought there was a breach and the undead were overrunning the place.  The last couple of words they got out were about a cure.”

            Helen said nothing.

            “Let’s get some rest,” Sam said.  “We’ll stay up in shifts of two.”

            “I’ll take the first shift,” Paul said.

            “I’m not sleepy either,” Zach said.

            “Good, I’m tired as hell,” Sam said.

            Jack simply walked into the next room, and sat against the wall.  He wondered how in the hell he was going to sleep after all he had seen and learned, but that didn’t seem to be a problem.  With his legs spread out in front of him, Jack felt himself drift away.

*

            There were no zombies to shoot.  Zach patrolled the second story, looking for any movement outside.  Every step of the way, bible boy followed.  Inside, the building was silent, and as the old poem went, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.  With Sam, Jack, and the little hottie asleep down the hall, the only movement was from the two assholes strutting around, looking out of all the windows.

            Occasionally, the floor creaked under Zach’s feet.  There were no other signs of life, so Zach settled down at a window facing south.  That was the direction of the psychos.

            There were three lawn chairs folded inside of the room, so Zach unfolded on, and sat down.  Paul settled next to him.

            “Do you think we can trust her?” bible boy asked.

            “Do we have a choice?”

            “I guess you have a point.”

            “In all honesty I’d rather be surrounded by the rotting fly magnets.  I know what to expect from them.”

            God, Paul annoyed the hell out of Zach.  It wasn’t that he held any malice towards older soldier.  It was the whole God thing.  It unnerved Zach.  His biggest fear was that all of the other soldiers would begin to pray when they should be shooting.  In a pinch action, not words to a great invisible man in the sky meant the difference between life and death.  Though God might help in the afterlife, he was nowhere to be found in this world.  Humanity had to rely on itself.  Paul did seem to know that action saved lives; after all he had survived a car wreck on a street full of decomposing flesh eaters.  If Paul had sat on the pavement and prayed, he would not be taking the guard shift with Zach.  In light of this, Zach’s feeling was more dislike than distrust.

            Paul said nothing for a moment, and stared out of the window.

            Still looking ahead, Paul asked “why would anyone want to do that to another human being?”

            He seemed off, and distant.  He must have been thinking about the other base, and the massacre.

            “You didn’t see what we saw.  Just to know that such evil… existed…” he trailed off and went silent again.

            Zach found himself in an awkward position.  If he didn’t do anything about it, he would have a sobbing bible thumper on his hands.

            “There’s always been evil in the world,” Zach finally said.  “Some people feed off of the chaos.  We’re just lucky enough to live among people who don’t.  What did you see anyway?”

            “I’d rather not say what those bastards did to those women.  They didn’t even look like they had been armed.”

            Zach was in shock, bible boy never cursed.

            “As I said, I’d rather be surrounded by mindless flesh eating fly fiestas.  They only eat you when they catch you.”

            Zach looked outside, at the dead world around them.  There were no zombies to shoot.

            “Damn, I just want to blow off a little steam.  Just one; that’s all I ask.”

            Without realizing it, Zach had looked straight up at the ceiling, and said the closest thing to a prayer he had said in years.  Ah to be little and believe in such fairy tails as Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny, and God again.  That would be nice.

            Zach had also realized that he heard Paul curse.  That boy never uttered a dirty word, not ever.  The world seemed ever stranger.

            “Damn it’s hot in here,” Zach said.

            It was hot in there.  During the day, the temperature had reached eighty to eighty-five degrees, and the windows in this building were all closed.  Paul stood up, and opened theirs.

            “Should we open the rest?” Paul asked.

            “Probably not,” Zach said, “If anyone does come by, they might see the windows.”

            Paul sat down, and they were silent for the duration of their watch.

*

            Helen navigated her way through the darkness.  Though she had not set foot in this building since the cultists had abandoned it, she still knew every crevice, corner, and doorway.  She knew which floorboards creaked, and where the stability of the structure was questionable.  She could move in utter silence.

            As she crept past a room, Helen glanced inside, and saw the tall, lean blond, Paul.  Sitting to his right was the shorter soldier with black hair, Zach.  He was the one she had been told to watch out for.  Both soldiers had their hair cut in crew, and neither looked like they were much trouble.

            Helen passed the watchmen, and walked into the entry room, where they had come in.  One of the chairs had been taken into the next room, along with their bags.  Hers were still in the Mustang, but she would not need them until morning.  If the four men were going to kill her, it would be later rather than sooner.  They still needed her, though she doubted their story about a cure.

            Sooner or later, the nomads would move from their current hole, and the next stop would probably be the home of her escort.  That necessity ensured her survival until Calhoun was dead.  Or until they decided they couldn’t trust her.

            She supposed it didn’t matter much.  Once Roger Calhoun was no longer breathing, the life of Helen York was no longer important.  Her work would be finished.

            Helen roamed into the next room, where the two soldiers were sleeping.  She looked first at the black man.  He said his name was Sam.  He was sleeping soundly in a chair, and snoring.  The troop leader had directed quite a bit of rage at her earlier tonight, but she couldn’t blame him.  He had lost half of his squad.  He was bound to be tense, especially if he had not fought other living humans in years.

            Her eyes then turned to the younger soldier, Jack.  He was not sleeping so soundly, but stirred and grunted on the floor.  Every so often, his hand swung at some phantom that existed not in the confines of the room, but in the abyss of his nightmare.  Finally, the boy cried out, and his eyes spring open.

            Before his disorientation went away, Helen sat down on the floor next to the soldier, who seemed more like a scared little child than a badass zombie killer.  He looked around the room, his wide eyed terror diminishing as he realized where he was.  She wouldn’t have been surprised if his terror grew again with the realization that this whole night was not some terrible nightmare.

            The two made eye contact, and Jack seemed a bit surprised to see Helen sitting next to him.

            “It’s okay,” she gave the boy’s shoulder a squeeze.  “You were having a nightmare.”

            “I know,” he broke eye contact, and looked at his feet.  “I have the same one damn near every night.”

            He paused for a second.  Not making eye contact, the boy’s gaze drifted about the room.  After a moment, he told Helen about the nightmare in excruciating detail.  The tower, the sewer… his parents.  Jack told her how his father died, and how he had to put a bullet in his mother’s head after she lost a battle with cancer.

            Jack took a deep breath, and said “But this time it was different.”

            She gently massaged Jack’s shoulder.

            “The sewer tunnel was the same, but after that… I was on the street, and not in a graveyard.  There were zombies pouring out of everywhere.  I swung my torch at some, but they weren’t afraid.  I shot others.  They went down.  But then the zombies all ran away.  I heard engines coming closer.”

            The boy took a deep breath, and seemed to be holding back sobs.

            “I ran to get away but I hit a dead end.  No a dead end formed around me.  There was a jeep closing in on me.  Somebody was shooting at me, but not to kill.  No, they were shooting at my feet.  I desperately clawed at the brick wall, trying to climb up but my fingers started to bleed.  My blood smeared all over the walls, but I still clawed the hell out of it.”

            Jack paused again.  Helen continued to rub his shoulder.  She was surprised by how open the boy was with her.

            “Finally the jeep stopped and pulled up beside me.  The door swung open, and I saw my mother looking just as I remembered her in life, only with a bullet hole in her head, and a hundred pounds lighter.  My dad was in the driver’s seat.  He’s different every time I see him.  This time, he was barely recognizable.  His face was missing and one of his arms was gone.  His chest had been ripped open, and his stomach had been torn out.  The smell of rotten flesh was thick in the jeep, but so was the scent of… popery.”

            Jack paused for a moment, and let out a single soft melancholy chuckle, as if caught by a fond memory.  After the chuckle passed, the boy’s grim mood surfaced again.  He got back to his story.

            “The jeep was also flooded with blood.  When the door swung open, red rushed out.  My mother wore her worried look, and dad’s was stern.  ‘Join us honey’ mom said.  Then she grabbed me with her cold hands.”

            Jack made brief eye contact again, then looked away.  Helen stopped massaging his shoulder and slid a little closer.

            “I’m sorry to bring you down like that,” Jack said.

            “It’s okay.  We’ve all got out stories.”

            He smiled at her, but said nothing else.  The two strangers just sat there in silence.  Minutes later, Helen watched Jack fall asleep.

            He no longer stirred, or groaned in torment.  He just rested peacefully.

            Sam snored in his chair.

            What Helen told Jack was true.  Everyone had their stories.

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