The Becoming: Revelations by Jessica Meigs Read Free Book Online Page A

spared the woman a dirty look before turning on his heel and bolting in the direction of the gate. He ran right into the thickest part of the mass of infected trying to invade the Westin.
    Alicia shouted as the stinking bodies of the infected closed in around him, but Ethan couldn’t make out her words. Nor did he care to. He had a more important task at hand, one entailing saving all their asses, since the ones in charge seemed too helpless to do it themselves.
    It was a stupid idea, though, Ethan reflected as he jammed his Glock underneath a waitress’s chin and squeezed the trigger before moving on to the next infected obstacle blocking his path. Alicia had all the ammunition; she hadn’t bothered to give him so much as a spare magazine. It wouldn’t be long before he ran out of what he had. And then he’d be right back where he’d been just over a month before.
    Ethan couldn’t spare time to think on that. Not right now. Not when he had a job to do. He plowed on, shoving and kicking and shooting his way through the infected, struggling past them toward the gate. Through its links, he saw the forms of more infected approaching the building. He had to put a stop to this before any more gained entry, or the building would never be secured again. And there was no way they could evacuate over one hundred people safely.
    Ethan shoved his foot against the stomach of a large man grasping for him. The infected man was a behemoth, massively muscled and standing at least six inches taller than he. His stomach felt like it was made of solid stone. Despite that, the impact of Ethan’s foot managed to force him back several feet into the mass of other infected. This bought Ethan enough time to lift his Glock again and plug a bullet into the large man’s skull. The man tumbled to the floor in a heap.
    The slide of Ethan’s gun locked back. Ethan grimaced and jammed the weapon into the waistband of his jeans. Only one more infected man stood directly between him and the gate, though more still surrounded him on each side. Ethan waded through the infected grasping at him and reached the man in three long strides. He grabbed the man’s shoulder and rammed the heel of his right hand against the man’s nose. The cartilage shattered, driving into the man’s brain, and he sagged against the gate and fell to the concrete.
    With the last of the immediate obstacles out of the way, Ethan threw himself at the gate, grasping it and slamming it to the floor. A hand caught between the gate and the concrete, its owner an elderly woman with two visibly broken legs, who clawed at Ethan’s ankle. Ethan gritted his teeth and grasped the gate more firmly, slamming it against her hand with all the strength in his body. Bones snapped, and with another strike, the appendage ripped free. Then the gate fell fully shut.
    “Where the fuck’s my backup?” Ethan shouted over the din of infected echoing through the garage. A thud against the gate pushed it an inch inward, jolting Ethan forward. He braced his heels on the concrete and pushed back, grasping the gate tightly and nearly hanging off it to keep it closed. A snap of gunfire rang out to his left, and then Dominic was beside him, two thick lengths of chain in one hand and his rifle in the other. He slung the rifle’s strap over his shoulder and slid the chains in place, wrapping them around and over and under the gate and then attaching them to anything that would hold them—including the large, thick pipes that ran along either side of the gate’s entryway—before slapping padlocks into place. Then, still without speaking, he handed Ethan a fresh magazine of ammunition and moved away, raising his rifle again and firing into the remaining infected.
    The mop-up that followed was quick and brutal. Working methodically, the four of them swept the infected, goading them into corners of the garage or shoving them to the floor and firing bullets into their brains. Ethan felt robotic, almost