Chapter 21
Carlos dared not call out for help, nervous about what creatures might be attracted to the sound of his voice. He was alone in the dark, stumbling down overgrown paths, feeling like a mouse in a maze. He listened carefully for anything creeping around nearby, but there seemed to be blessedly few zombies around here. Which made sense, since with only one way to enter, no zombies would have accidentally wandered into the park, and few people would have been in the park when the infection took hold. But Carlos still froze at each waving branch and rustling bush, expecting death to come at every corner.
He heard the creature in the trenchcoat screaming a few times and tried to go in the general direction of the sound. Part of him felt thankful that Jill ran off, leading the creature away from him, but he immediately felt guilty for feeling that way. But hearing the creature’s angry screams actually lifted his spirits, because it meant Jill was still alive. She must have had some kind of plan when she ran off, Carlos was sure of it.
All he could really do was keep moving forward and looking for some sign of the command post. He crept along the paths and soon found a wooden bridge that crossed over a stream. To his great relief, there was an open area beyond the stream, with light posts on each side of the wide main path, which was flat and level but still unpaved. The light spread out across the field, barely reaching the trees that bordered it.
Carlos walked gratefully into the light, feeling almost safe, and scanned the open area. Up ahead of him, he caught movement, and quickly raised his gun. From out of the shadows just on the other side of the light posts, a zombie shambled into the light.
So there were zombies here. Carlos wondered how many more there were, if he had unknowingly passed any of them stumbling through the woods. He held his rifle up as the zombie took a few steps toward him, gazing at him with bloody eyes, hands hanging down with chunks of scabbed flesh hanging in places.
Carlos squeezed off a shot and the zombie’s head jerked with a crack. It toppled over backwards, brains spilling onto the dirt.
“Lo siento mi amigo,” Carlos whispered.
As soon as he lowered his gun, he felt the ground tremble underneath his feet. He stumbled backward in a panic and grabbed onto one of the light posts, but suddenly the entire section of ground lifted up, the path breaking in half, a huge crack splitting the earth.
The ground dropped out from under him, like a sinkhole opening up, and he slid down into a wide chasm in the ground, covering his head as rocks and chunks of dirt came down around him in a sudden avalanche. There was a loud tearing sound as the earth cracked open, swallowing him whole. He rolled onto his side and fumbled for his rifle, which was half buried in loose dirt. He glanced around and tried to guess how far he had fallen; the top of the hole was only about twelve feet above him, almost close enough for him to climb up.
The sinkhole was about thirty feet wide, and Carlos saw that it extended farther than that behind him, but the ground there had not collapsed yet. At the bottom of the hole, water splashed, turning the loose dirt into churning mud. Carlos’ boots sucked into the mud and he climbed up onto a drier pile of dirt, trying to climb up.
From out of the pile of loose dirt and rocks across from him, something moved. He spun around, as more dirt slid down to reveal a monstrous brown shape concealed under the ground, a huge circular mouth lined in writhing tentacles like little teeth. It moved forward, spitting dirt, and emitted a high-pitched hiss, the gaping maw opening to reveal a tube-like mouth lined with teeth.
Carlos screamed and opened fire, his machine gun blasting away with a booming roar. His feet slipped in the mud and he fell backwards against the side of the edge of the hole, his back pressed into the dirt as the gun rattled in his hands.
The enormous thing under the ground, a mutated snake or worm grown to gigantic size, twitched and hissed as the spray of bullets riddled its head. Puffs of dirt and bursts of pinkish fluid squirted from the bullet holes.
The gun clicked empty and Carlos immediately snagged a new clip from the ammo pack hanging from his shoulder. He slammed the new clip in as the huge worm emerged farther from the hole, its bulk filling the sinkhole. It opened its mouth wider as Carlos raised the gun, loading a new bullet into the chamber. He pulled back on the trigger, screaming in terror as the gun blasted right into the worm’s head, blowing holes through the side of its head.
The worm shook fiercely, dirt and rubble scattering around it. Carlos did not let up, and the sound of gunfire and screams filled the air.
With a grown and a hiss, the worm shuddered and flopped over sideways, the front of its massive face a mess of bullet holes and seeping blood. Wrinkly brown flesh hung in ragged tatters, exposing the pinkish muscle underneath. Blood and other liquid poured from the huge mouth. More dirt and earth crumbled down into the pit as the monster’s huge body came to a rest.
“Vete a la chingada! Hijo de puta!” he shouted, waving the gun victoriously. He slumped back against the dirt and slid into a sitting position, resting the gun across his legs. He fumbled with another clip and snapped it into the gun.
After a few minutes, he calmed down and slowed his rapid breathing. Slinging the gun across his back, he climbed up the dirt mound and lifted himself out of the hole. He walked the long way around the edge of the huge pit, looking down at the mutated worm creature. From above, he was stunned at just how large it was. The worm’s body extended all the way across the pit and into the ground on the other side; it was at least thirty feet long, and big enough around to have eaten him in one bite.
His head snapped up when he heard gunfire up ahead. It didn’t seem like it was very far away, maybe a hundred yards or less. He held his rifle in both hands and ran off down the path, hoping that he wasn’t the only person to get lucky tonight. He didn’t know if Jill was the one shooting or not, but he didn’t hear the creature in the trenchcoat, so if it was Jill, she was shooting at something else.
Not long after, Carlos saw floodlights lighting up the sky nearby, and emerged from the trees to see the command post up ahead.