Abbie
The lock wouldn’t budge. No matter how many smacks I gave it, the damn rusted thing just wouldn’t give. I sighed, and I put the wrench back in my bag. Taking a step back from the chained door, I looked up at The Cypress. From this specific entrance, I could try to scale some supports near the door and break an upper window. The sand and the wind might make it a bit difficult, but I needed this fuckin’ score. I couldn’t go back empty-handed again. Hueso wouldn’t take me back.
I braced the metallic supports and kicked off the ground. Inch by inch, I hugged my way up one of the poles to the little platform above the entrance. I had to brace myself every now and then against the fierce tugs of the sandstorm, but at least my coat and goggles kept me from too many cuts.
After a little while, I got to the top of the support where I could reach and grab the edge of the platform. I muscled my way up, and from there I could see that the window I had been targeting had already been smashed open. Nothing I didn’t expect, but still. Didn’t feel right.
I took my wrench and cleared out the rough glass edges. If I wanted back out, I’d need to secure my rope to something fixed outside. There was this boxy AC vent that looked pretty solid. I kicked it pretty hard and it dented, but it didn’t budge. It’ll do, I guess.
A quick knot later, I was lowering the rope into the dark mall. From the window, I couldn’t see much of anything--especially through my thick goggles which were already dark. The rope began to ease up as it lowered onto the floor. I gave a couple quick tugs to make sure the AC vent would keep. It creaked and groaned, but it didn’t come loose. I lowered myself into the window, and I rappelled down the rope onto the floor.
It was always nice to get a break from the sandstorm, no matter how short of a break it was. Plus, the mall was nice and shady and cool. I removed my goggles and helmet, and my ratty hair tumbled down. I tied it back in a messy bun to keep it out of my eyes, and I removed the flashlight from my bag. The click resounded in the empty mall, and the dense beam illuminated a circle in front of me.
The stores still had signs like ‘CLEARANCE’ and ‘ALL THINGS MUST GO’ and ‘WE SHOOT LOOTERS’, some signs more professional than others. The tiles on the ground were covered in a very fine layer of sand that had managed to float through the few broken windows. The skylights, however, were completely dark due to the cover of layers and layers of sand. Except for, of course, the one the missile shattered, which shed a faint light onto the food court.
King’s Things. Auntie May’s Cookies. Arrivederci Pizza. Tech Stop. Half-stepped escalators. A suspended elevator. A couple plastic playthings for little children. A defunct missile. A pool of stagnant liquid. And, of course, all of the skeletons of the people who got locked in the mall when the military decided it was for the best.
Mannequins covered in years of grime and dust sat idly in corners and windows, still playing ball or cooking barbeque or whatever the fuck a fake person does all this time with their fake friends in their stylish outfits. I approached one to see if it would look back at me. It didn’t. A small girl with red skin and puffy cheeks in the window, however, did. My reflection. I frowned. The mannequin kept on smiling.
The silence of the mall was a nice break from the howling winds outside, but it was still very eerie. My heavy boots made footsteps that would echo the cavernous food court, and the shadows cast by objects illuminated by the flashlight would dance on the walls in unsettling ways. I decided that didn’t like spending time here, and the sooner I found some toys for Hueso the sooner I could leave this place.
It was a wonder that some stores still had objects in them. The Natural World had a good amount of supplies in it, but Hueso didn’t really need supplies. Freeze-dried fruits were nice, but ever since Anderson stole that one truck from the Steeltoes we haven’t really had to worry about getting food.
Guns and ammo, on the other hand, were incredibly needed. Luckily, this store still had some hunting rifles and had a decent stockade of bullets for them, too.
I shouldered a bag full of four hunting rifles and as many boxes of ammo as I could pack in there. I also grabbed a handful of attachments. I didn’t know how any of this worked, and I didn’t know models or types or whatever. Denny would, though, so this was probably good enough to make Hueso take me back.
Somewhere in the far corner of the mall, I heard the tinkling of little shards of glass hitting the ground. Heavy padded footsteps began to sound. I froze in terror. The stories were fucking true. The mall still had fucking Abbies.
Fuck.
Fucking fuck.
Metal groaned from the same direction, and now there were two sets of footsteps: one lumbering and large, and the other a rapid scuttle on the ground.
Shitshitshitshitshit.
I took one of the rifles out of the shoulder bag and grabbed a box of ammo from behind the counter of the store. I shakily loaded the rifle with two slugs.
I flashed the light over to the closed glass doors, and outside stood a small roach-like Abbie on all four limbs with little strands of hair hanging on to its scalp. The boils on its face made it seem to squint with dark, beady black eyes at me. Next to the small Abbie was a massive hunk of flesh. The muscles were grossly overdeveloped, so much so that they must’ve torn the skin like a shirt that fit too tight. Its face was droopy and somewhat melted, barely clinging to the skull that housed it. The large one let out a loud, long groan with slight inflections before lumbering towards the door and grabbing its handle and ripping it open. I took the chance to shoot through the door while it was close to it, and the bullet--along with all of the shards of glass that came free of the door--grazed and danced off its dense muscle layer of skin. It shrieked in pain.
The roach Abbie chittered and leapt into the large one’s hand, and the large one slung the roach like a baseball pitch towards me.
Screeching in anger, the roach swung one of its hands with extremely long and blackened nails at me in the air. The flashlight skittered loose from my hand, and I swung the butt of the rifle at it as it came close. I only managed to knock it a little off course into the rows of shelves.
The roach was growling and groaning in the dark aisles of the store. I pointed the rifle in its general direction and fired. A howl of pain, and then nothing.
The larger one stopped its crying, and it roared from outside The Natural World. I dove for the flashlight, still beaming in the dark. My swollen fingers reached around the cold metal shell of the flashlight, and I lifted it up towards the big one, who was trying to rip a bench from the floor and, to its credit, succeeding. The metal legs bent and the screws busted off as it swung the bench from its legs which were installed in the floor. He threw the bench into the store, and I dove for cover in the aisles. The big one, as it turned out, wasn’t aiming for me. It was aiming for the aisles themselves, which tipped over with the heavy impact of the bench and began to knock into one another like dominoes.
I tried to scramble out from the inside of the aisles, but I wasn’t quick enough. The tipping shelf trapped me in a small tent of metal. I tried to crawl out, but my foot was caught by one of the metal shelves.
The big one began to lumber into the store, pushing aside the knocked aisles and piles of supplies. I struggled to get loose, knowing that the Abbie would find me within moments, but my foot was really wedged.
A large foot came down into view of the small metal tent that I was trapped in, and I covered my mouth. Strangely, another large foot came down past the aisle, and the foot in view lifted out of sight. It wasn’t going for me, apparently.
A resounding whoomph came from the aisle next to me, and I felt the shelf that trapped my foot shift away briefly. I slid my foot out, and I began to army crawl out of my metal trap.
The big one made another whoomph-sound. After getting free of the tent, I loaded my rifle with two more slugs and cautiously walked towards the big one as silently as possible. The big Abbie lifted one of the shelves next to me and was sitting in the aisle facing the dark corners of the shop.
A soft wheezing noise came from the Abbie, and I pointed my flashlight at the prone body. It looked back at the light, and I could see past its massive shoulder and swollen-yet-baggy face. It kneeled next to the downed roach Abbie which was lying face-up in a pool of brownish blood, beady black eyes still open wide in shock.
The big one looked at me through the bright light I cast onto it, trying desperately to meet my eyes. It blubbered, struggling to get sounds out from its thick malformed lips. Every sound it made frustrated it. Fat tears made of dirty blood and salty water began to stream down its face.
“Doooh… duuuuuuh…” the groans were clearly hard-fought and forced through the distorted vocal chords. It emphatically opened its mouth with every sound to better let the sound escape from its mouth, and with the monstrously large jaw opening up I could see that the big Abbie’s tongue was completely purple and black as well as massive. The tongue sat confined by the Abbie’s dirty, rotting orange teeth.
I tried to shush and calm it through its anguish, but it was inconsolable. The big Abbie began to slam its fist on the ground, but not aggressively. Not aggressively towards me, anyways. It was frustrated, and its tears grew fatter and fatter.
“Daaaaaaah… duuuuuuuh…” It smacked its head a couple times, and then reached over and sifted through the piles of garbage near it with its massive, meaty fists with vigor. It found a metal plate that fell off the shelves, and it looked at me and made a repeated, shaking motion with pointed fingers on the plate.
“Do… do you things understand English?” Although I hadn’t seen many Abbies in my life, the few rare ones from when the bomb dropped didn’t show any level of understanding or human behavior. They were vicious, rabid creatures. This one seemed… intelligent.
It nodded its tumor-riddled head vigorously. It made the same motion again, but this time with grunts to emphasize what it meant. I could only guess it wanted a writing utensil. In the very least, it wanted something to scratch on the plate.
I backed out of the cramped aisle and looked for some chalk. The store sold some climbing gear, so it wasn’t unreasonable for them to have a block of climbing chalk that could be large enough to be used by this Abbie’s hands.
Luckily, the store had plenty of chalk. Most of it was broken into small chunks, but I found a decently intact block that would fit his hand. It would be small, but it would work.
I brought the chunk over to the Abbie, and he forced a nod as he outstretched a hand. I put the block in his hand, and his fleshy mitts enveloped the block. He pressed it against the plate and, with imprecise movement, began to crudely write.
DOTER DED, he wrote. Underneath, he wrote KIL ME.
He stopped crying when I found out he understood English, but with the completion of his basic message, he began to cry again. This time, he bared his teeth and uncomfortably smiled while he did it.
I nodded, and raised the rifle. He just kept nodding and wheezing as he cried. To my surprise, my hand was shaking, and he saw this. He reached a hand up towards the barrel and pressed the nose of the rifle against his head, keeping the gun steady. He looked up at me pleadingly.
I closed my eyes and pulled the trigger. The bang was deafening in the silent mall. He fell to the ground next to the roach, lying in the dirty blood with a hand over her and a sad smile on his face.