“Because I don’t think we can fit everything and all of us into two. We’ve seen and read enough zombie apocalypse shit to know the basics. Make sure you have food, water, and medical supplies. Be able to defend yourself—”
“Both long-range and up close,” Pam interrupts to finish Dave’s sentence for him.
“And lastly?” Dave asks, looking from his son’s faces to Pam’s.
“Besides finding a defendable location that also protects you from the elements?” Ben asks.
“And never get involved in a land war in Asia?” Joe adds with a grin.
“Or entering into a wager with a Sicilian when death is on the line?” Zack chimes in with the obligatory lisp.
“Boys. You three make me very proud,” Dave tells his sons. “But you’re sort of pissing me off right now because you know the point I’m trying to make.”
“Sorry, Dad,” Zack says, getting serious again and turning to Dakota. “You never split up.”
“Bad shit always happens when you split up,” Ben adds.
“Stay together. Even if things take longer. You always, stay together,” Joe says.
“No exceptions,” Pam adds, looking approvingly at her sons.
“None,” the three young men agree in unison.
“Thanks, Mom,” Dave says to Lynn as she starts placing steaming mugs of coffee on the marble countertop. “Zack. I’m guessing your car’s full of stuff.”
“Pretty much,” Zack replies. “We’ve got a little bit of room left, but not much.”
“Ben. You’re going to need to ride with Mike and Lynn,” Dave says.
“Why don’t I ride with you guys?” Ben asks.
“Because we’ve already got Joe and Dakota in ours.”
“And Bongo,” Joe adds.
“For now,” Dave replies but doesn’t look away from Ben.
“I’d still fit,” Ben says.
“Probably,” Dave sort of agrees. “But it’s a long drive to Amy’s house.”
“In Seattle?” Mike asks, his mug frozen in place between his lips and the countertop. “Why Seattle?”
“Because it’s a long fucking way away from here,” Dave answers. “And she’s got a house almost large enough to hold us all while we ride this out and see what happens.”
“Isn’t that an awfully long drive?” Lynn asks, bringing the last set of steaming mugs to the group.
“The sooner we start moving west, and the farther we go, the better off we’ll be.”
“Why not east?” Dakota asks.
“Population density increases the risks.”
“Seattle’s pretty densely populated?” Mike scoffs.
“We’re not going to Seattle. I’m just giving you a point of reference. We’re heading to Amy’s and they live to the west, not east. Look! I can’t force any of you to go with us,” Dave says, glancing at Pam for confirmation to continue, which she gives with a subtle nod. “But that’s where we’re heading. You can do whatever you want to. You’re all adults. Except for the nose-pickers,” he says, pointing to Jaxon and Braxton. “But I’m telling you, we’re better off if we stay together and head west. I know it’s a long drive and we’ll need fuel along the way, but we’ve got a better chance of finding it the farther we put between us and Ohio.”
“I was just asking,” Mike says, taking a sip of his black coffee.
“We’re in,” Joe says, speaking for him and Dakota.
“That’s why we’re here,” Brigette adds.
“I’ve got nothing better to do,” Ben mutters, throwing a casual glance toward the windows.
“How about you?” Dave asks Pam. “We’ve talked about this before, but I need to know you’re all in on this.”
“You had me at blood and semen, baby,” Pam says, giving Dave a soft smile as she slides their shared mug a few inches in his direction.
Chapter Five
“It’s almost time to check in with the old man,” Nichols tells Brooks, referring to Colonel Charles Beaurite.
Carolyn took an unexpected exception to the sergeant’s use of the familiar nickname when he’d referred to the colonel. Not because she felt any emotional connection to the man, other than the professional respect she had for him. That was something his rank afforded him and her years of service under his command justified. It also wasn’t like she’d never used the moniker from time to time. Thinking about it, she knew she’d used the term far more than just on occasion. After a little more introspection, the reason for her annoyance with the reference to the camp’s ranking officer became clear to her. If this operation went as she’d planned, she’d be on the fast track to a big promotion and assigned a command of her own. She’d be damned if she’d allow any of her subordinates to ever refer to her as the old lady. She was certain Beaurite was aware of the nickname used by the troops at Fort Bolivar and wouldn’t take offense by its use. She’d known ranking officers who’d worn it like a badge of honor. She couldn’t control what her soldiers might call her outside of her presence, but she could damn well skin them alive if any of them let it slip in front of her. All the same, she decided to let Nichols’ unintended slight go for now until she had her own set of birds pinned to her shoulders.
Glancing at her watch, Brooks sees they’ve been driving for over forty-five minutes since the clean-up in the gully. They hadn’t seen any signs of the infected since then, but she knows that doesn’t mean they’re not out there, just keeping their distance. They’d surprised her back there, with their orchestrated change in tactics. It wasn’t too hard to believe they might just be waiting to spring another one on them if they stopped. She also knew if they failed to check in with the colonel, the joint chiefs had given him the authority to order the carpet bombing to begin. This would turn most of the state into a charred parking lot. She didn’t have any moral dilemma over this part of the fail-safe for the operation, but she wanted to be well clear of it when the fire came raining down from the heavens.
“Pull over up there,” Brooks tells Patel, pointing to the shoulder of the road ahead of them. She fingers the mic on her throat before speaking again. “Private Cameron, can you hear me?”
“That’s a go from Cameron,” a voice replies from her earpiece.
“As soon as we stop, I need a satellite link with the colonel, ASAP. Understood?”
“Roger that, Major,” Cameron replies.
“Sergeant Turner,” she continues, addressing one of the squad leaders in the cargo area behind her through the comms device.
“Go for Turner,” he replies.
“Post your squad around Cameron when we stop. I don’t want as much as a squirrel getting near us.”
“Understood, Major.”
Within five minutes, the squad was positioned, Cameron had the encrypted link established and Brooks was waiting for Colonel Beaurite to come onto the secured line.
“Carolyn. What do you have for me?” Beaurite asks the instant he comes on the line. In every operation she’d been part of in the past, the colonel’s tone had always been neutral and dispassionate. He’d remained calm, objective, and digested every piece of intel before giving further orders. She’d learned from him by example and strove to mirror his ability to remain detached enough to make the hard choices. Everyone under his command drew some bit of strength from this. The old man never lost his shit, so there was no reason any of his men should be misplacing theirs. She’d worked with him long enough to pick up in his tone something that betrayed an edge of urgency. This immediately made Brooks understand the severity of the situation they were in. She’d just seen first-hand what the infected were capable of and was prepared to give her report as scheduled. But she couldn’t shake the feeling they were all fucked, and her career mentor already knew just how bad.
“We’re on the ground and about fifteen clicks from ground zero,” she reports.
“You should have been there over an hour ago. What’s the delay?”
Brooks went through a brief, but concise re
port of their initial contact, glossing over the losses they’d suffered as much as she could without withholding information. She then recounted what had transpired in the gully during their second encounter with the uncontained infected. She paused, giving the colonel time to absorb the details of her report.
“Is there any doubt in your mind the infected were acting on intellect rather than instinct?” he asks immediately. “Do you believe they intentionally set up the distraction on the freeway and then orchestrated the attack on your squads?”
Brooks considered the question for a moment before answering her commander. “I suppose it could have been coincidence,” Brooks answers. She doesn’t believe what happened was by accident, but with the way the colonel had phrased his questions, she didn’t think it prudent to rule out the possibility or speak in absolutes.
“Carolyn!” Beaurite snaps. “I have to report back to the joint chiefs in five minutes, so I don’t have time for you to be uncertain! The other reports we’ve received paint a pretty bleak picture there and I need you to either confirm or not!”
“You have other teams on the ground, sir?”
“Damn it, Major! We don’t have time for you to be asking me questions! Are the infected organized?”
“In my opinion, sir—” she begins.
“Yes or no!” the colonel interrupts.
“Yes.”
“Fine,” Beaurite replies. He takes a deep breath and exhales slowly before he speaks again. “Don’t bother going to ground zero. Our other reports say it’s been overrun by the infected and there’s no saving it. I want you to head to Columbus. You ordered the potentially infected already being detained to be moved to the stadium on the northern edge of the city.”
“How did you…” she starts to ask. But she instantly suspects Captain Walker of running to the old man after she’d dressed him down at the airport, so she cut the question off. She’d deal with the captain on her own.
“Once you’ve got them all in the stadium,” Beaurite continues. “I want them all destroyed. Don’t bother trying to sort them out. Better safe than extremely sorry, Carolyn. Is that understood?”
“Crystal, sir,” Brooks answers.
“When that’s done, I want you to take your entire team and move north to Mansfield as soon as you can.”
“Why Mansfield, Colonel?”
“Because we’re increasing the red zone by another fifty miles in all directions. That’ll put you outside the fire perimeter when we sterilize the location. We’re starting isolation protocols within the hour,” he tells her, referring to the blocking of all cell phone and internet communications. This is a step the military took when things were about to get messy and the flow of information needed to be strictly controlled. This also meant the only signals getting into or out of Ohio would be through sat-links. Even if some civilian had one of those satellite phones or some other form of link, those could be quickly identified and shut down as soon as they attempted to use them. As a precaution, all sat comms would still be looped through a time delay program so they could be blocked if necessary. Even hers.
“Is Operation Washout a go?” Brooks asks, already suspecting the answer.
“Based on the report you just gave and the others we’ve received, Carolyn… I don’t see that we have any other choice but to burn the entire red zone. Maybe the whole state if that doesn’t work.”
Brooks was still curious about just who was submitting these other reports, but she kept the question to herself and simply replied with, “Anything else, sir?”
“No,” he replies.
“Then I’ll check back in again at zero hundred hours,” she says, preparing to disconnect the call.
“Carolyn,” the colonel stops her.
“Yes, sir?”
“If I’d known…” he begins but chokes back the rest of the words and changes direction. “Be careful, Major.”
“Yes sir,” she replies a second before the line goes dead.
Chapter Six
“I still don’t understand why we don’t just get an RV or something,” Dakota says, setting down his empty mug.
Dave wouldn’t want to admit it, but taking a few minutes to regroup and sip a cup of coffee while they tried to get their shit together hadn’t been a horrible idea. Lynn had even fixed Jaxon and Braxton their own mugs of hot chocolate to drink. It was either so the young boys didn’t feel left out from the grown-ups while everything went crazy, or it was her way of keeping busy and her mind off everything going to shit around them. Either way, the boys were enjoying their cocoa and Lynn now had the task of cleaning up the empty cups and such to occupy her thoughts.
“Did you see an RV in the driveway when we pulled in?” Pam asks Dakota.
“No. But maybe we could find one,” Dakota offers.
“They’re too big to be easily maneuverable,” Dave jumps in. “Besides, they add a false sense of security. They look and handle like a tank, but they’re mostly thin aluminum panels and a lot of glass. Every time someone decides to take the RV in a horror movie, it always ends in ruin. Usually they end up rolling the damned thing over trying to avoid a stray dog or a baby carriage.”
“Or some stupid high-speed maneuver,” Pam adds.
“Right, babe,” Dave replies. “Or they get bogged down in the middle of a horde or from hitting too many bodies and destroying the engine.”
“Then the zombies either push the RV over on its side, or they just go right to smashing out the windows, prying it open and eating everyone inside,” Pam points out.
“So, we stay away from those. We stick to smaller vehicles so we can maneuver through traffic or go off-road as a last resort. But we keep the number of vehicles to a minimum to avoid being too spread out.”
“When did we decide they’re all zombies?” Mike asks.
“What the hell do you call that?” Dave replies, pointing at the Betty-burrito.
“Right now, I’d call it a mess. But I’m not sure I’d use the term zombie,” Mike answers.
“Right. Maybe she was just sick,” Lynn suggests. “I mean, maybe she just had a really bad case of the flu and was delirious or something.”
“Mom. I know you two were trapped in the basement and all, but when we came in,” Dave says patiently, glancing at Joe. “Betty was dead. Not just a little dead. But full-on, proper dead. I mean, passed, the fuck, on. And then you saw her. She tried to eat my face off!”
“And then I had to shoot her in the head to kill her,” Joe adds.
“I’ve been meaning to tell you. Thank you for that, by the way,” Dave says, lifting his hand to offer a fist-bump to him and Joe responds by attempting a high-five. “Save it,” he tells him, pulling his hand back before Joe slaps it. “We’ll work on it later.”
“I thought you were gonna… Gawd!” Joe replies.
“Anyway,” Dave says, turning back to Mike. “Trust me. She was a zombie.”
“And there’s more out there,” Zack says, having stepped away from the others to peek out the window. “I told you we didn’t have time to screw around.”
Dave and Mike immediately join him on either side. They look through the window, over the top of Ben’s car and to the yard where Zack’s pointing. Three people, or what used to be people, are shambling around the front of the house belonging to the Bakers across the street. Dave sees the three zombies are in varying levels of fucked-upness. One is obviously a woman. Her ripped blouse is hanging in tatters from the waistband of her twisted skirt. Her ample, naked breasts are swaying, fully exposed as she shuffles around the edge of the structure. Before any of this started, Dave thinks she might have been a physically attractive woman. Big boobs sitting above a tapered, full waist leading to the swell of her hips. She probably had countless numbers of admirers in an earlier day. But her upper half looks like it’s been bathed in blood, probably due in part from the last unfortunate person she’d encountered. The rest of the drying blood came from the ravaged wound on her neck and shoulder. E
ven from this distance, he can see the dark, raggedly exposed meat. There’s a noticeable amount missing in some spots. Making the subtle line that should be leading from the nape of her neck to the edge of her shoulder look like a sticky, lunar landscape. The absence of all that muscle tissue is causing the woman’s head to dip to the right each time she pounds on the clapboards of the exterior walls.
The other two look like men from their builds. One’s face and chest is drenched in blood and is lurching around with a severe limp. Most of Limpy’s left calf muscle is missing, and the pant leg having provided little protection, hangs in bloody rags. He’s dragging the leg behind him, barely able to remain upright. Limpy slams his fists against the outside walls of the house in jerky movements, trying to bludgeon his way inside as he stagger-steps along the perimeter of the home.
The other man’s face and chest are also coated in gore like his friends, but his only visible wound is to the meaty part of his left shoulder. It looks like there’s a single bite, based on the crimson outline on his denim shirt. A blood trail runs from the mouth-sized hole in his upper sleeve, and down to the loose cuff. Both of his hands are caked in congealing fluids up to his forearms. This one appears to be less focused on the neighbor’s house than his companions are, and he’s scanning the other houses on the block. As he pivots in place with his hands rhythmically balling into fists as he sniffs the air, his gaze passes to the front of the Foster’s home.
The sheer curtain drifts down into place as Dave, Mike, and Zack, all take a quick step back from the glass. The creature’s milky eyes lock onto the movement in the front window and he turns his body to face the front of the house.
“Nobody. Fucking. Move,” Dave says in a quiet tone and tries not to move his mouth. “It’s cool,” he continues, now speaking to the ghoul across the street. “Nothing to see here. Nobody’s home. Just go back and hang with your buddies…” he mumbles.
The zombie takes a step closer like he can hear Dave’s words. He takes two more convulsive steps forward. Dave can feel the monster’s eyes burning holes into his chest, even though he’s confident he’s masked by the interior shadows and the distance. The creature takes another lunging step, sniffing the air and preparing to call bullshit on all of Dave’s lies. But his attention is instantly jerked away from the Foster’s home when the other male finally makes his way to a window. The sound of shattering glass pulls it away from the Foster’s home and back to the neighbor’s house. The three zombies converge on the open entry point with Limpy in front. The other two clamber over and around their hobbled comrade, trying to navigate through the missing window to get to the tasty morsels they hope to find inside. Dave continues watching in horror as Limpy catches a lucky break, somehow managing to get his good leg slung over the broken glass of the windowsill. His good fortune quickly ends when he slides the thick muscle of his thigh down one of the remaining shards stuck in the pane. The razor edge cuts deep into the flesh, laying it open and exposing the bone, causing the leg to fail. With no support from his legs, the monster falls sideways out of the house and into the flowerbed below, taking the curtain hanging from the inside with him. The remaining zombies waste no time stomping him deeper into the mulch, using their fallen comrade’s writhing body like a stepstool to climb through the window.
The F*cked Series (Book 2): Proper Page 8
