Free Bleeders by Max Boone Page B

Alison said. "Maybe to conserve energy."
    "Or maybe they just forgot to hit all the switches," I added. "You want me to ask the next soldier I see?"
    "Don't give me your attitude, you asked me to be here."
    "Sorry, I get a bit grouchy after I come back from the dead."
    Even in the dim light, I could see her shake her head. I still had it.
    We left the steam pipes behind and I led the way down the hallway toward where we would eventually find a way out. The stadium's basement was as large as you'd expect, with corridors weaving past rooms devoted to plumbing, electric, storage, archives, and of course the team locker room and clubhouse. During a game, or any time it had a full staff, the place was alive with voices and movement, but now it had become like a ghost town. The only sounds were the hum of generators and electrical boxes.
    I looked back to check that Jeremiah was still following us. He was like a half-blind dog following our feet as we made our way through the darkened corridor. "How's he doing," I asked.
    "Quiet," Alison whispered.
    "Relax, they can't-"
    "Shh!" She grabbed my hand to silence me. I was about to yank my arm away when I realized what she was talking about- there was a sound in one of the rooms up ahead. It was a low thump that repeated every few seconds, and it came from what I remembered to be one of the janitorial closets. The next working overhead light was directly in front of the closet's doorway, like a stagelight at the world's shittiest play. I looked back at Alison for what to do. She shrugged as if it say, This was your idea.
    I motioned for her to stay put and edged forward a few more feet. Again came the sound- thump...thump...thump...not quite evenly spaced where you could say it was mechanical. The room was about fifteen feet ahead of me now.
    I cleared my throat, sounding more nervous than I planned. "Hello," I called out, barely above a whisper.
    "What are you doing," Alison hissed.
    "There's no way I'm getting any closer until I know what that noise is," I hissed back.
    "What if you-"
    THUMP. The noise came even louder, reacting to our voices. There was no way to turn back, the only way out through that corridor, yet we weren't exactly moving forward, either. I was about to suggest we duck into one of the electrical rooms when someone came stumbling out of the janitor's closet and into the light. He came out so fast he bashed into the opposite wall with a messy crash. He pushed off the wall and looked back and forth. In the flood of the overhead light, I made out his face and recognized it instantly. He wore the same overalls I remembered him for. The man who had been so nice to me when he didn't have to had a lot more gray in his hair now.
    "Andre?"
    He twitched in my direction. My stomach dropped. In the light his dark red eyes bled down his sallow face. He sniffed and coughed, his face angry in a way I never thought possible for him.
    He was a Bleeder.
    "Stay back," I told Alison, pointing to Jeremiah. "Keep him away." I was thinking as much for his safety as I was my own- the last thing I needed right then was the big guy going full infected while I tried to fight off another.
    Andre ran directly at me, covering ten feet of hallway in a matter of seconds. He shouldn't have been able to move that fast at his age, but he was on the latest, greatest energy drink on the market, and it only came in one flavor: red. Before he could close the last five feet, I reached into the dark and grabbed whatever I could find in all the junk that cluttered the corridor. My hands found something with a weird texture, but I had no time for second choices so I pulled it back and held it over my head, ready to strike.
    It was an over-sized foam hand. "Ahh, fuck," I moaned.
    Andre tackled me. The foam hand flew from my hand as I fell back into the clutter and the dust and the shadows. He fell with me snarling and screaming for my blood, but I kept him from getting too close and taking a chunk of flesh.