Tankbread 02 Immortal Read Free

had to do this, for the baby. Nothing else mattered right now. The dead would not have her child.
    The storm drove the dead into a frenzy. Each roar of thunder and eye-searing flash of lightning overwhelmed their senses. Else knew they had no filters, no protection from the stimulus of their sensitive ears and eyes. Being dead destroyed a lot of the brain. Being infected and dead meant what was left drove you to walk, feed, and infect others.
    Sweat ran down Else’s face. Every muscle clenched and she bore down with a long, low moan. Something slipped deep inside her. With a wet slithering sound a wet lump emerged from between her legs. Reaching down, Else cupped a hand around the tiny head and shoulders. With a final push the baby sluiced out of her and into her hands.
    Laughing through a sudden upwelling of tears, Else lifted the tiny form up to her chest. A quick scan satisfied her that everything was correct. The baby, a boy she realized with heart-clenching delight, wriggled in her hands and began to cry with a shrill mewling sound. The evols outside crashed against the door and the walls. Else ignored them and laid her son down on the bed. Taking the knife from the hot water, she cut the umbilical cord where it joined the baby’s abdomen and tied the oozing stump off with a piece of string. Smiling down at the tiny, yet perfect human, she wrapped him tightly in a muslin sheet and small blanket she had prepared.
    The contractions continued, but the thrill of seeing her son for the first time left her immune to this lesser pain. “It’s just the placenta, the final stage of labor,” she spoke to him the way she always had, explaining everything as if he had asked a question. Gathering the baby up, she held him to her breast. Getting him into position for real was harder than she thought. He mewled and nuzzled but didn’t latch on.
    “You have to suck, baby. It’s what makes the milk come.”
    The scratching at the door continued. Fingers pressed under the door and around the slight gap where the bar held it closed. The sounds of a grunting argument came through the wood and then the fingers withdrew. A moment later a loud crash shook the hut. The door shuddered and cracked. Silence for a moment and then another impact. This one burst the door from its hinges and sent it flying against the far wall.
    Evols crowded through the space, snarling and snapping at each other as they pushed their way inside. The first two dropped to their knees and smeared their fingers and faces in the fresh blood and fluids pooled on the wooden floor, slurping and sucking the nutrient-rich goo off the boards. The others stumbled around, confused by the empty room.

Chapter 2
     
    Else clutched the crying baby to her naked chest and hurried through the trees. A hatch in the back wall of the hut meant she always had a second exit, as the place had no windows. There had been no time to dress, and the wind-driven rain had her shivering as she splashed through puddles with numb feet. The thunder crashed and the lightning came close on its heels. Every flash blinded her night vision, and the branches and deadfall slashed at her bare skin. She could hear the river over the approaching storm. The rushing chatter of the rising flood was loud enough to keep her bearing in the right direction. Else broke through the trees, the ground underfoot turned to sucking mud. She struggled through it, balancing the baby in one arm and trying to keep him out of the rain and wind.
    A hand lashed out of the darkness and she fell back, twisting the baby away from the evol and dragging herself away through the mud. In the next flash she saw the wide space of river mud was littered with struggling corpses.
    Grabbing a branch from the muck, she leaned on it and probed the ground ahead. The wind tore at her hair and the mud scraped up to her knees. Leaning forward, she pulled her feet one at a time out of the mire. The evols trapped in the mud reached out to her,