THEM (Season 1): Episode 2 Read Free

trigger break, I remembered that we were all alone out here with night coming on fast. So, I released the trigger and just pistol-whipped the thing repeatedly until I felt its head cave in with a loud crunch. It dropped in a heap and I kicked it away from me, continuing past it into the master bath from where it’d emerged with the .45 at the ready to make sure there weren’t any more surprises waiting for me. Once I was certain that all the corpses present were blessedly and truly dead, I ran down the stairs two at a time to get Gabby inside so I could barricade us in before nightfall.
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[2 ]

PARCHED
    I got Gabby off the mule and carried her inside, gently laying her down on the couch to rest until I could get the house locked up tight. I also set the animals loose outside and shooed them off after unloading all our gear, which was a regrettable but necessary action. Leaving them tied up would only result in attracting all manner of undead nasties to the place, and it would also keep the animals from being able to flee if cornered. Sure, I could bring them inside, but horse hooves on tile and concrete made a lot of noise; even on carpet they’d be loud as hell. By turning them loose, at least they’d have a chance to run if danger came around, and chances were good they’d wander back come morning. That is, so long as they weren’t being pursued by a horde of the living dead. Better them than us, I thought, but I still felt bad about it.
    Heading back up the steps, I noticed a pull-down attic door that looked promising. As far as I could tell this place didn’t have a basement or bunker, but for a temporary safe house, an attic could do in a pinch. If deaders came in the place, they’d never be able to reach us in the attic. And if one of the more intelligent occult species came in the place, the attic door would create a choke point that would make it easier to stage a strong defense. So long as I could keep Gabby quiet tonight, we might be okay.
    A quick look in the attic told me that whoever built this place had built it right, as the attic floor was covered in plywood and the rafters were well insulated. I guessed that they’d probably intended to make it into another room at some point, before the Great War had put a dent in their plans. Bummer for them, lucky for me. I hauled Gabby up there along with some blankets for a pallet, followed by our gear. I also left the HK up there and left the Colt near my gear (cleaning it later would give me something to pass the time), and set to barricading the front door.
    The back door was already nailed shut and secure, so I put the front door back in place as best as I could and started moving stuff in front of it. First a bookcase, then a china cabinet, then a sofa with a love seat stacked on top. Fortunately, the front entry faced a wall, so once I started stacking stuff against the door and wedging it against that wall we were pretty secure.
    Once that was done, I wiped up a few drops of blood that had fallen on the steps when I was carrying Gabby to the attic, spraying it down with some bleach-based cleaner I found in the kitchen. Then I hauled the dad’s corpse to the stairs, and also brought grandpa out and laid them both over where I’d cleaned up the spill, hoping that the desiccated and rotting corpses would mask the scent of fresh blood. After scavenging the house for foodstuffs, I stuffed another body in an old sheet and dragged it all over the house, and then left it on the couch to cover the bloodstains Gabby had left there, again in hopes of covering our scent in case something did get past my makeshift barricade.
    Scent really wasn’t an issue with zombies and ghouls; most of them operated on sound, so stealth and sound discipline were your best camouflage. However, a vamp could smell fresh blood hours after a wounded victim had passed; I’d actually witnessed them tasting the air like a lizard, tracking wounded prey for miles. They were nasty,