Ex-Isle by Peter Clines (electronic reader TXT) 📕

A sound brushed against his ears. He’d almost missed it under the crackle of the burning lawns and bushes. He focused on a spot between his shoulder blades, felt an itch, and pushed himself up into the air. His boots went up a foot, then a yard, and then he was twenty feet over the pavement, looking out at the burning buildings and trees.

A mob of ex-humans stumbled and staggered up the street. At least another two hundred of them. Men and women and children, all reduced to dead things with endless appetites.

St. George had been expecting the sounds of the fire and shouting humans to attract the dead. There were probably similar groups closing in from the east and west. He’d expected them much sooner, truth be told.

He went higher. A few hundred feet up the smoke thinned out and he could see for a few miles in every direction.

The city of Los Angeles had been dark for almost five years now, even more so on moonless nights like this one. Downtown was a shadowy hand stretching up toward the starry sky. To the west he could see the black expanse of the Pacific.

The only real light came from below him. The Mount, formerly just a refortified film studio, had expanded out from the studio’s original boundaries. Now it was a huge square that stretched over a good chunk of Hollywood. Surrounding it was the Big Wall, shining lights out into the surrounding streets.

The undead filled those streets. Hordes like concert crowds shuffled through the shadows. There were always a few hundred around the Wall, but now four or five times that were closing in, drawn by the flickering firelight and the noises that came with it.

St. George tapped his radio. “Captain? Company’s coming. Time to go.”

“Freedom to St. George. Copy that, sir. What direction?”

“All of them. Pull everyone back inside the Wall. We’ve got maybe five minutes.”

“St. George,” shouted a voice behind him. “Drop’s ready.”

He flew back to the triple-stacked cars of the Big Wall. People dashed back and forth across the series of platforms that topped the structure. A dozen of them prepped water drops for him—trash cans and tall recycling bins, all doubled up so they wouldn’t burst when he lifted them. Usually rainwater filled them, but that went fast in a big fire like this one. The crew had hoses and filled the containers as fast as they could from the weak streams.

The rest of the Wall-walkers, armed with rifles and pistols, watched for exes. Many of them also carried baseball bats, golf clubs, and other blunt instruments. If an ex slipped past the firefighters, the guards made sure the dead didn’t get any closer.

St. George dropped down next to a plastic trash barrel. A man with scruffy blond hair yanked his hose away and stuck it into the next container. “Should have another one ready in about two minutes,” he told the superhero, gesturing at one of the other barrels.

St. George nodded and worked his fingers underneath the trash barrel. He grabbed the rim with his other hand and heaved. His feet lifted up off the Big Wall and he soared back to the flames, water sloshing out as he went.

A nearby lawn with a medium-sized apple tree burned. He swooped down through the air and shook water out of the barrel. It splattered through the leaves of the tree and smothered most of the fire. He made another pass and dumped the rest of his water across the tall grass. The lawn wasn’t out, but it was enough for one of the firefighting teams to leap in with their blankets and pound out the last licks of flame.

A blackened, steaming ex lumbered toward the team. St. George dropped down and slammed it with the barrel. The impact knocked the dead thing back into a gaunt zombie in a charred business suit. Both of them tumbled to the ground.

He flew back to the Wall and swapped his water barrel for a full one. He could empty all twelve faster than the teams could fill them back up, so he’d drop a few hundred gallons, then keep the exes away from the firefighters until the water team got three or four more refilled. Then the whole cycle would begin again.

He dumped the water across the fire line’s right flank. Fifteen gallons crashed down onto an ex, a scrawny teenaged girl with a bloody, mangled shoulder, and slammed it to the ground. He emptied the next two barrels over the roof of one of the burning houses and heard the flames hiss as they fell back. Another fifty gallons of water spread across the house’s yard. The last one he sloshed across the left flank, soaking a pair of burning grapefruit trees and the lawn behind them. The fire retreated for a moment, then lunged forward again.

Below him, he saw a pair of firefighters swing a wet blanket down on a patch of flames with a thump. Air and dirt blasted out from either side as the fabric struck the ground. They dragged the fabric back into the air and brought it down again. Their feet stomped out the last few licks of fire.

A gust of wind cleared the smoke and St. George saw a trio of exes heading toward the firefighters. The weathered thing in front wore denim shorts and a T-shirt blackened with old blood. He was pretty sure it had been a woman at some point.

When he could, he still tried to identify them. It was important to remember them as victims, not just as a threat. He knew it wasn’t a popular view.

He dropped down to smash the exes with the water barrel. As he did, a slim form raced out from behind the fire line and tackled the dead woman, driving it back into the smoke and knocking down the pair of zombies behind it. The ex clawed at the air,