The Inroad Chronicles (Book 1): Legion Seed

by Erickson, Brian

  Ann shook her head. “No, it makes me jumpy.”

  Ron took a sip and shrugged his shoulders. “I checked the monitor, and nothing’s in the yard. When I came back in I reset the barricade stronger than before. If any of ‘em were at the door we’d see them grouped at the door pushing.”

  Ann’s eyebrows pinched up as she placed a finger over her lips. “Yeah but, Ron, what if they already moved the barr...”

  They both looked with a start as Cassius let out a baritone bark loud enough to hurt their ears. He growled and barked again then scraped the door with a massive paw.

  “Wha…” Ron started toward the door and stopped dead when a dense thud vibrated through the door and cut his breath short. First one, then another, and another, pretty soon continuous thumps vibrated through the door somewhat giving the impression of the drumming of water droplets in a deluge.

  Ron slowly set his coffee down as he stared at the door. Of all the objects to focus on, he could not peel his eyes off the bloody handprint he had left there before. He blinked a couple times and looked over at Ann who stared back at him. He saw only concern welling in her eyes and knew they mirrored his. “Ann, can you check the monitor again?” Ron swallowed forcefully as a burning sensation rose in his abdomen.

  Ann looked at the monitor and gasped. “Oh my God! You have to see this Ron.” She put her fingers up to her lips as a tear welled up in one eye.

  Ron quickly crossed the room and whipped the monitor around with a jerk. “Oh no, fuck! I knew somethin’ was really off.” He continued staring at the monitor with a locked jaw.

  The banging on the door continued without pause, as he watched several figures approaching from different directions. They seemed to follow each other the way herd animals do, without independently evaluating their choices. If one decided to change directions, or swerved away, the ones trailing followed in unison until they amassed a small army. Ron’s face really sank when he saw that they passed right underneath the camera, obviously not hindered anymore by the barricade. He punched the wall. “Damn it! They’re down here with us. I had this feeling that we should have left when we had the chance. Now we’ve got nowhere to run unless we bust outta here.”

  “What are we going to do?” Ann’s voice trembled, and the color drained from her face.

  Ron planted his fists on the table as he stared at the monitor. “We have to get out of here. This place is compromised. Based on what I’ve seen so far, I have to assume that these things will keep coming. We can’t stay here forever. It’s just that simple. We have to get up to the car before their numbers swell to the point where we can’t kill them all. It’s the only way I can see out of this.”

  “But how are we gonna do that, Ron? Look at ‘em. They’re everywhere! They’re…”

  “I know…I know.” Ron wrapped his arms around her shoulders and pulled her into his chest, but her breathing rate continued to escalate. He let out a long exhale as he pressed his palm on his forehead. “Let me think for a second.” He looked around at the walls, the ceiling, the doors, and his guns. A bead of sweat formed on his temple and ran down his face while he gnawed on his bottom lip. Then his eyes shot wide open. “These walls are just a bit thinner than the ones on the outside.” He pointed around the room at the partitions separating the main room from the kitchen, storage room, and the bedroom. “It’s risky as hell, but…”

  “What? What are you thinkin’?

  “Maybe it’s better if you don’t know. I think you should just hide and let me do it.”

  Ann swiped her arm through the air the same way one would move a person aside. “No, absolutely not! I’m not going to hide and pray while you haul off with some half-cocked, crazy plan. I can’t lie there hoping that the next thing that touches me is you, and not some awful devil.”

  “That’s the way it’s going to be anyway, Ann, whether you like it or not.”

  “Well at least I’ll know what to expect. Now tell me.”

  Ron slowly nodded and smacked his lips. “All right, the plan is…”

  ✹✹✹

  The young group saw dozens of scattered figures meandering in the valley through the Humvee’s windshield. They all seemed to migrate in the same direction, swaying from side to side as they shuffled. Some of them used the road, others the ditches, and more in the fields. Since leaving their college, the group had traveled a long time without encountering another soul, and abruptly seemed to have caught up with the vanguard of a migrating group.

  They all sat with their mouths agape staring down into the herd.

  Jeremy stared down the gun’s sights with one eye closed and his finger on the trigger. “Should I open fire?”

  “No!” The group answered in unison as they watched the creatures lumbering toward an unseen goal.

  Laura leaned on the dashboard as her eyes swept over the scene. “They must have some sort of intelligence to move in a unit like that.”

  Jeremy stuck his head inside the hatch. “Hey, when you guys finish talking, I’ve got a really clean shot.”

  Donnie shot him an icy stare in the rearview mirror. “Relax, besides, they’re out of range.”

  Jim chimed in with a pained voice as his skin flushed white. “I don’t wanna sit here anymore.”

  “Uh-oh…fag boy’s gettin’ nervous, better shoot ‘em.” Jeremy wore an unmannered smile on his face.

  Meg slapped both hands on the seat in front of her and pushed herself up toward the gun turret with venom in her eyes. “Look, you half-wit! Stop it right now!” She pointed at him, hacking the air with her bony finger. “You’ve been a real asshole all day. Just because you’re holdin’ a big gun doesn’t give you the right. We’re all in this together. Every one of us lost friends too. You’re not special. Now get your shit under control and start helping the group or get out!” As she spoke her last words her voice got deeper and her eyebrows pinched in toward her nose. She hacked her finger at him one last time and fell back into her seat, crossed her arms, and stared out the window.

  Jeremy recoiled, eyes half-shut and glazing over. His body looked hollow and hunch. It reminded Donnie of a man recovering from a kick to the gut, not words of truth.

  “Fine!” Jeremy's face had turned red and one eye looked a little watery. He stood all the way up into the gun turret and buried his head in one arm as a few tears found there way into the light.

  Down below Jim turned toward the window and hid a smile from the group. The others looked away for several moments, and all fell silent.

  A short while later Donnie finally spoke delicately, in a near whisper. “Okay, see there where our next road goes off to the right. Some of them are coming from that direction, but not too many. They all seem to be headin’ for the city. We just need to find a way around all these ones in front of us, and we can bypass most of them down that road.”

  Jim turned away from the window and pointed behind them. “I saw a dirt road a little ways back; maybe it meets up with that one somewhere.”

  Donnie nodded and looked back at him in the rearview mirror. “Jim, you just did somethin’ useful, good job.”

  Jim nodded with his lips forced into a smile, but he had fire in his eyes. “Glad to help.”

  Donnie reversed up the hill and turned around. A short distance away he found the dirt road and hung a left onto it. Thick barbwire lined the sides, held up by narrow logs. “This looks like private property doesn’t it?”

  Meg looked at the barbwire and back at the road. “Yeah, this probably leads to a farm.”

  Up ahead it curved around some trees at the edge of a forest, and trailed off into the shadows. He drove on, going slowly, and then shade blanketed the windshield as they entered the canopy. Glimpses of a house peaked through the trees before disappearing again, and it came into full view when the driveway curved around a knot of saplings. It looked old and reminded them of the many Civil War era homes that still popped up in the South from time to time. Four slightly cracked Corinthian pillars sup
ported a charming mezzanine over the veranda, and an old paint job, peeling off in flakes of white, added to the house’s antique charm.

  Donnie had stopped driving and they were still staring at the house when a woman with wiry, gray hair came running out screaming. A man wearing khakis and a flannel shirt staggered out after her barefooted, closely followed by a child in blue pajamas. The man and boy swayed as they staggered after her, without concrete control over their movements. With the three so close, the group could easily see the difference between the woman’s rosy complexion and the pasty, white skin of the other two.

  When the woman spotted the SUV, she turned toward it, screaming as she ran. “Help me! Help! They’ve gone crazy!” She ran up to the hood and crashed her hands down, then over to the passenger side windows, fists pummeling the glass and yanking the door handles.

  Donnie hammered his fist into the roof. “Jeremy, you’re on!”

  In the same second that the words left Donnie’s mouth, Jeremy let the minigun sing. It made a high pitched, whining sound as bullets sprayed followed by streaks of fire. They tore into the two creatures, shredding them no different than wet paper. The gun fired with such frightening power that in the same breath of shots that ripped them asunder, chunks of stone fell off the house as well, and one of the pillars had a larger crack above a missing chunk.

  The woman ran in front of the Humvee and collapsed to her knees. “No! They were sick. You didn’t have to kill ‘em!”

  Standing up in the turret, Jeremy looked down with a with a dark face. “They were sick all right. But sure as a fox near a roost, they had to die.”

  The woman stood up and tightened her jaw. “You murderer!”

  Donnie opened his door and stepped out onto the running board waving the heel of his palm in the air. “Ma’am. Listen, we’re very sorry, please let me explain. They were not going to get better. And they were not the family you knew anymore. They weren’t people anymore. This disease does somethin'. It kills people, but they still walk. If you'd seen what we've seen. We buried our friends, and they came back and killed one of us. He did the right thing, trust me.”

  She pounded the hood with tears streaming down her face. “That’s a lie!”

  Then Laura leaned forward staring at a patch of red near the woman’s hand. “Donnie, look at her wrist. Do you think she’s been bitten?”

  They all looked and saw the telltale set of teeth marks near her her hand, and recognition crossed their faces.

  Donnie cleared his throat to speak, but he could not bring himself to make eye contact. “Ma’am, how did you get that bloody wrist?”

  “My husband bit me, like he had Rabies or somethin’.”

  Everyone’s expression sank at those words, and their lowered eyes seemed to have already carried out the woman’s sentence.

  “I’m sorry to hear that, Ma’am, very sorry.” Donnie looked down at the ground for a second and then up at Jeremy, who met his gaze, and he merely nodded then buried his eyes back into the dirt.

  “Yeah,” Jeremy whispered almost under his breath, and pursed his lips. He stared at the SUV’s roof for a while and played his fingers along the gun’s handle. He looked at the woman who stared back at him with fire raging in her eyes. Just as quickly he averted his eyes and turned away. “Shit!” He finally mashed his lips together and stood up straight in the turret, aiming the gun at her head.

  “What are you doin’?” The woman’s brow furrowed as she raised her hands. “You dirty, little shits. Don’t you have any respect for life?”

  Jeremy forced himself to look at her. “I’m sorry, Ma’am. I really don’t wanna do this.”

  “Then why’re you doin’ it then? Stop pointin’ that gun at me! Stop it now! Don’t kill me, please!”

  Jeremy’s bottom lip poked out as his eyes glazed over and turned red. “I’ve got to, you’re gonna turn.”

  “No!” The woman shielded herself with her arms.

  Jeremy squeezed his eyes shut and pulled the trigger. The gun whined with the sound of an angry animal, and images of his two friends feasting on Kyle’s guts pounded his eyelids. When he opened them, the minigun had cut her down and removed her legs. He wept. “I hate these things!” He fought the tears as his hands balled up into two cudgels and pounded the roof of the vehicle. “Let’s go get some more!”

  Donnie crouched by the door with his hands on his head. “We will soon enough, soon enough.” He looked away as Jeremy tried to stop crying, but his sobs kept on coming. Donnie gripped the steering wheel and pulled himself inside, and his eyes met Laura’s in the rearview mirror. They stared at each other for a few uncomfortable seconds; then he threw the gear into drive and parked in front of the house.

  They got out and began scavenging around the property. Outside they found a couple pitchforks and proceeded inside the house for supplies. Holding the makeshift weapons out in front the way saw soldiers with spears in movies. They cautiously sneaked from room to room but found nothing. With the house clear, they all raided the closets simultaneously in search of more clothing. They erupted into laughter and high fives when they discovered the family had a collection of heavy coats, and several lighter jackets for layering up. They also found some sweaters and better pants. Jeremy and Donnie decided to wear denim overalls, because they adjusted easier for a better fit.

  Jim got shafted as the couples took all the best clothes first. He lifted some leftover items from a pile, as if leafing through a newspaper and let them fall back down carelessly. He finally grabbed some jackets that fit together awkwardly but felt warm, a denim one underneath a red Nylon windbreaker.

  “We must be in trouble, because if we weren’t, I would never step out of the house looking like this.” Meg waved her hand down at her apricot colored clothes. She and Laura had opted for Long Johns and stretchy sweats to cover them, since the woman’s waist size far exceeded theirs.

  “It doesn’t matter. Let’s go.” Laura walked out with a dismissive wave of her hand, fairing no better in her red and blue garments.

  They did not know the nature of the disease, only that something passed from one person to another through contact, so they stayed away from any opened food, such as leftovers, potato chips, and cereal, but took everything that was not opened.

  Donnie found a hunting rifle and a shotgun, both of which had plenty of ammunition to last awhile.

  In the little boy’s room Meg and Laura discovered some binoculars. Each of them looked around out the window but only saw gnarled, old trees.

  Donnie also found a hacksaw in a drawer and sawed off half the shotgun’s barrel just as Laura walked up.

  “Why’re you doin’ that?”

  Donnie stopped and looked up from the sawing. “Well, shotguns don’t have a great range anyway. This way I can hold it with one hand if needs be and maneuver inside the Hummer or indoors or whatever.”

  Laura crossed her arms. “Well be careful, don’t blow anyone’s brains out or anything.”

  Donnie chuckled and resumed sawing. “That’s exactly what I plan to do but only to one of those Lurchers.”

  They threw all the loot through the rear hatch and drove off. The driveway continued as a dirt road that cut through the property behind the house leading out to some fields that alternated between high grasses and seasonal vegetables. After they had driven about halfway through the first field the road they wanted came into view, but they saw two problems. One, something large lay on its side with two figures crouched over it. Two, another barbwire fence separated them from the road, and they had to find a way to get the Humvee through it quietly and safely.

  Meg raised the binoculars to her eyes and cringed. “Oh my God, two of those things are eating a horse. Yuck!”

  “Lurchers, I'm callin’ ‘em Lurchers now.” Donnie said as his eyes searched the field they had to drive through. He noticed the binoculars and grabbed them and peered through. “Let me see. Yeah, and that’s not all. I can see some still coming down the road too. T
his little shortcut has helped, but we haven’t escaped yet.”

  Jim seemed to shrink into the back seat. “We’ll never escape.”

  Everyone turned and glared at him in silence.

  Finally, Donnie broke his stare and turned back to peer out the front windshield. “I think we’ll all just pretend we didn’t hear that, Jim. And if you feel like saying something so uplifting and inspirational again, how about you just not, got it?”

  “All I got to say to that is: it ain’t over ‘til the big girl does her thing. Know what I mean?” Jeremy nudged Jim’s shoulder with his foot. Jim shrugged it off and scooted closer to the window.

  Laura stared at the undead tearing into the horse’s flank with their teeth. “I’m with Jeremy. I say we go down there and just rip those bastards apart.” As she spoke, her hands formed into claws.

  The rest of the group leaned away from her and gave her the same stare they gave Jim.

  She raised her hands and let them fall in her lap. “What? Don’t look at me like that. You know it’s true.”

  Jeremy nodded his head and caught Donnie’s eyes in the mirror. “She’s right. They all deserve to die.”

  Jim shook his head with a chuckle. “And you guys call me overly dramatic.”

  Meg also stared at the dead devouring the horse with a big frown. “No, it’s true. These things are out to get us, and have the advantage of numbers. We can’t run from ‘em all. Where’re we gonna go? Now we have weapons, and we should defend ourselves, even if that means hunting them down. I’ve hated guns all my life, because I’ve only seen my Dad shoot helpless animals for sport, and then he would preach to me about how it’s our constitutional right and what not. But now I’m glad those guns have been there all along, because we need ‘em. If people didn’t keep the tradition alive, then we wouldn’t have anything except a couple pitchforks and a hacksaw. Then where’d we be? My father tried to explain that to me, but I never understood it or really tried to, I guess, ‘til just now.” She looked down at her trembling hands and wiped a tear as she stared into her lap.