Manel Loureiro - Dark Days

“We’ve got company!” I yelled at the top of my lungs.

I’d heard that phrase in dozens of Hollywood movies. When the heroes said it in the heat of battle, it sounded confident, manly and strong, but to my ears, it sounded like the shrill screech of a terrified eunuch.

Lucia and Prit looked up, startled, and stepped up their efforts to start the pump. I set one knee down on the blazing hot ground and shifted my rifle off my shoulder.

I calculated the chances we’d make it out of this. I’m no math whiz, but I quickly realized there was no way we could fill the Sokol’s tank before that crowd reached us. For a moment I thought I’d piss myself.

What the hell. It was as good a day as any to die. At least we’d go down swinging.

My hands were sticky with sweat. Behind me I heard Prit and Lucia struggling to start up the pump manually since there was no electricity to run the motor. The nun had joined them, willing, as always, to lend a hand, but there was so little space inside the fence and she just got in the way. I understood perfectly why she was there. I wouldn’t want to be alone as those harbingers of death closed in.

I had my own problems. The Undead wobbled unswervingly down the runway toward us, dragging their feet. We were about fifteen hundred feet from the terminal, a considerable distance for those creatures to cover, so we had a little time. But it wasn’t enough to get the fuel pump running and load the fuel into the Sokol’s tank.

There were thirty bullets in the HK’s magazine and I had two more magazines clipped to my belt. I made mental calculations again and realized it was impossible for me to stop that Unhuman tide. Or even slow it down.

I had less than a hundred bullets against more than two hundred creatures. If that weren’t bad enough, I’d only fired the weapon a couple of times. A few days ago, in a field, the Ukrainian had given me a crash course. I wasn’t a great shot to begin with, even worse at that distance. I’d mostly taken the Undead out in hand-to-hand combat with a considerable amount of luck.

“What the fuck’re you doing?” Lucia yelled. “Shoot! God dammit! Shoot!” That girl could swear like a truck driver, especially when she was scared.

“Please! Stop them!” Sister Cecilia’s voice joined in, panicked.

Stop them . Are you fucking kidding me? Why don’t I just waltz over there and invite them to get a beer at the airport bar? Or go to the beach, get a tan, and play volleyball!

Panic was creeping through me, cold and secretive. Time seemed to stand still. I couldn’t think clearly. Despite my friends’ cries, I stayed there on one knee, stiff as a board, in the middle of the runway. Suddenly, one of the Undead, a tall, middle-aged guy wearing shorts and a faded T-shirt, bumped into his neighbor and fell flat on his face. One of his flip-flops was long gone and his bare foot was completely destroyed from being dragged on the ground. At that moment, I saw every detail in sharp focus: the white bone sticking out of the guy’s foot; the sun shining in the distance; the delicate scent of decay blowing in on the wind; blades of grass shyly poking up through a crack in the pavement next to my knee…

“SHOOT!” Prit roared, red in the face, the veins in his neck about to explode, as he pumped the lever like a man possessed.

That shook me out of my trance. I lined up the sight the way the Ukrainian taught me, adjusted it to its maximum magnification, and aimed at the crowd, letting my mind go totally blank.

Through the sight, I saw that sea of monstrous faces as clearly as if they were right in front of me. Men, women, children, young and old, high class and low class, all with a sinister glow in their eyes. Those dead eyes filled me with dread and raised the hair on the back of my neck. On a dive years ago, I saw that same dark, detached look up close—in the eyes of a gray shark.

My first shot was high; it wasn’t even close to the Undead I was aiming at. The next several shots were on target, and four bodies lay limp on the runway. In that lapse of time, the Undead had advanced another hundred feet and were closing in. Seized with panic, I realized I could only bring down a handful of them, at most, before they were on top of us. Unconsciously I began to pray while I was shooting.

A cough came from the hose connected to the pump, then a series of clangs echoed from under the ground, and finally the pungent smell of benzene filled the air. The tank was open. A jet of fuel leaped from the mouth of the hose lying on the ground and stained the runway.

Pritchenko let out a wild cry of joy, while Lucia happily patted his back, but then his cry quickly died in his throat. In seconds, the jet of fuel went from a strong stream to a trickle and then nothing.

“That can’t be,” he muttered. “That just can’t be!”

“Lucia!” I heard him shout, as I replaced the magazine in my rifle. “Tell me what the pressure gauge says when I press this lever! Ready?” The Undead were within five hundred feet.

“Anytime, Prit!” Lucia yelled.

When the Ukrainian pressed a lever, a shrill whistle rang out as air that smelled of fuel wafted out of the pump.

“What does the dial say?” screamed Prit. “Tell me what it says!”

“Mark nine hundred!” Lucia answered, as scared and confused as the rest of us.

The Undead had advanced another fifty feet. More than a dozen bodies dotted the runway now. They were close, very close.

“Shit!” the Ukrainian shouted, punching the valve. “Shit,” he said over and over as he furiously threw a wrench into the Undead crowd.

I stared for a moment. Pritchenko’s eyes were flooded with tears and his expression was one of utter desolation.

“The tank’s empty. Just air inside. It’s empty.”

“It’s over,” I whispered.

“It’s over,” Prit repeated, a deep sadness in his voice, his arms limp at the sides.

All the color drained from Lucia’s face, as she fell back against the fence. Prit looked at the two women, then down at the HK in my hands. Don’t let them suffer the indignity of being Undead , his eyes said.

He didn’t have to say a word. I knew what I had to do. We wouldn’t let that crowd take us alive. I hoped I’d have the guts to finish the job and that my hand wouldn’t shake when my turn came.

I turned to Lucia. She was white as a sheet and trembling like a leaf but she had a determined look in her eyes.

She stared into my eyes and nodded. She knew what came next. I read “I love you” on her lips. “Me too,” I said. My soul was torn in two by what was going to happen. I shuddered. Tears ran down my cheeks and I couldn’t see clearly.

I raised the gun and aimed at Lucia. A few seconds later, we heard a rattling coming down the runway. Lucia had closed her eyes and braced herself for the impact of the bullets. When nothing happened, she opened her eyes and saw my astonished expression and Pritchenko’s and Sister Cecilia’s spellbound faces.

That rattle was not a firearm. It was a helicopter, approaching fast.

“There!” the Ukrainian shouted, pointing to a tiny dot on the horizon that was growing larger by the minute. “Headed right for us!”

To say that hope was reborn in us was putting it mildly. But the helicopter was still a couple of minutes away and the Undead were closing in. They were less than three hundred feet away. That didn’t give us enough time.

“Head for the control tower!” shouted the Ukrainian. “Run! God dammit! Run!”

“Wait,” I said as I jammed the last magazine in the HK. The first Undead were now within a hundred feet of us. “I can’t leave Lucullus!”

My poor cat, frightened by the gunfire, meowed plaintively in his carrier back in the helicopter’s cabin. I handed my rifle to Pritchenko and raced back to the helicopter, loading the spear gun slung on my back as I ran. I had only six spears left, but that was better than nothing.