Chapter 27: Cue and the Vertical Village pt 1

“We call it the Vertical Village!” Daniel says with pride as he waves us around a corner to see the half collapsed sky scraper in front of us. It was cracked in the middle, and the top half fell into a building beside it and got stuck there. All around the tower, plants were growing and overflowing from the building. Around the sides, scaffolding and stairs led to the middle of the building, and all around the base was a crater filled with water.

“Rumor is this was a human hideout, and the demons dug all around the building to collapse it, but they burst a water main and flooded the holes. The top of the building collapsed, but they only really managed to floor the first five floors when the building sank.” Daniel tells them as they approach the building.

Gunner helps Cue and Trigger off the tank and then walks behind them as they begin to climb the stairs.

“The water is toxic tho. Over the years, zombies and rats have fallen in and taken over what dry places they can find, or die in the water. Hell, there could even be an EHEC in there somewhere,” Daniel rattles on. “So the lower levels are off limits, living quarters are the mid levels, and the roof and floor beneath are for growing plants, as well as the outside of the building.”

“This is a pretty established colony,” Trigger says, keeping her voice even as they reach mid-level and the eyes of a dozen or so men look out on them.

“We started as just one couple, after the angels left. We jokingly call them our Adam and Eve.” Pete tells them, bringing up the rear.

“That explains why you all look so similar,” Cue said mindlessly, taking in the climbing vines of beans as they passed a giant hole in the wall. They were all inbred for over a couple of hundred years. They could be clones.

“That’s right! We’re all family!” Daniel says with a fake and ominous laugh. “The doc is probably up in the garden with his herbs.”

They continued to climb the building, level after level, and everywhere they went the men stared at them with a look none of them could quite place. It was a mixture of longing, jealousy, and fury that Gunner should have women and they should not.

It made the hairs on the back of Cue’s neck stand up. She knew those looks, and she’d experienced the result of looks like that quite recently. She shivered, the rape replaying in her mind over and over.

Trigger noticed her shiver and wrapped her arm around Cue’s shoulders and pulled her close under her arm. “I won't let anything happen to you, Cue,” she whispered fiercely into her ear. “You are my girl now, no one will take you from us.”

Cue ducked her head and leaned into Trigger as they walked. She had never felt so loved before, and it made her stomach tighten in a strange way. A way she only felt when she was alone. She pressed her face into the swell of Trigger’s chest as they finally came to a stop and closed her eyes.

“Here we are,” Daniel announced, showing them to the top floor of the broken building. Rows and rows of vegetables and fruits covered the whole expanse, and in the corner, a small man in a long white tattered jacket tended to herbs and spices Cue had only ever dreamed of.

The doctor was bent over his plants, his shaggy, salt and pepper, curly hair covering his face. He wore thick rimmed glasses and had a pure grey beard covering the bottom half of his face.

“Hey, Doc?” Daniel called.

The doctor jumped and cried out in surprise, turning so fast his coat whipped around and knocked down a pot of what looked like mint. Cue, having never really interacted with plants, bent and picked up the plant curiously. While the people around her were talking, she became entranced by the plant. The look, the smell, the taste.

She gently repotted it and tucked it under her arm, clearly intent on keeping it.

“That is not for sale!” The doctor squawked, trying and failing to snatch it away from her.

“Alex, is it?” Trigger asked, as Gunner shifted between the doc and Cue.

“Yes, and your friend is a thief!” he cried.

“If you touch my girl, this community will be having a funeral because I will throw you off the fucking building.” Trigger said, her face split with an absolutely charming smile, which made the threat all the more ominous.

“I–I–” the doctor stuttered, then seemed to deflate and drop his small shoulders. “Fine, I’ll do it. And she can have the damn plant.” he said with an annoyed huff.

“And there you have it!” Daniel said, clapping one hand on Doc's shoulder and the other hand on his son’s. “You can stay! We will have an apartment cleaned for you, and while we wait we will get you guys fed, what do you say?”

“We could eat,” Trigger said dismissively. She did not like the doctor’s shady attitude toward her pregnancy, and especially didn't like the creepy look in his eyes when he saw the fullness of her belly. The whole place creeped her out and she wanted nothing more than to be alone where she could talk to her man and her woman about this.

She tucked Cue under her arm again and nodded to Daniel to lead the way.

“A group of many words…” Daniel said quietly, but waved them along back down to the residential area, his son taking up the space next to Cue.

When they got to the room for eating they stopped in their tracks. It was a massive room, almost the whole floor, but the middle of the room was open with rusted and broken railings around it. They walked closer, weaving through tables and men eating, to look over the side, all the way down to where zombies were drowning in the lower levels.

Around them there were small openings in the wall that people stood inside serving food or selling goods. Here, some men looked different. Possibly survivors that decided to take shelter here.