by Brown, TW
At last they came out of the hazy smoke and Jason rolled down the window as they rocketed through an intersection. The traffic lights were dark, and with no other vehicles in sight, Jason did not even ease up on the accelerator in the slightest bit.
“That was worse than the cell block day room on chili night,” Jason quipped, trying to bring some levity. He glanced to his right and saw no reaction from either of the women.
They continued to drive towards Portland. Every mile that clicked off on the odometer was both a blessing and a curse. The blessing came in their being just that much closer to their destination. The curse came in the form of the shadowy figures flitting by. Some wandered open parking lots, other strolled the highway itself as the undead became more and more prevalent.
“How?” Rose whispered.
“People refusing to believe until it was too late, and then some folks still denying it up to the very end,” Jason replied. “Seriously, did you ever think for a moment that zombies could really happen? That is stuff out of the movies and comic books. That is George Romero and Stephen King shit…not something that could actually go down in the real world.”
***
“You take care of Violet yet?” Erin asked after they’d driven on for a few more minutes.
“Umm…no. Why?” Rose answered tentatively, hearing something in the other woman’s tone that sent off warning signals.
“That is how it is happening so fast.”
Rose thought about it for a moment. Twice she opened her mouth to protest, but each time, she shut it. She knew what Erin’s point was as well as the fact that she could not refute it. Hell, it had almost cost her her own life. She had clung to some sort of false hope all the way up to the moment when she’d been shoved into that bedroom with her sister, nephew, and niece; the latter of which had been free. Even then, she had raged at Hank Reynolds when he’d killed Crystal.
“What time did your friend say that they were making a break for it?” Jason asked. His eyes were flicking around the surrounding area and then down to the gas gauge. “We might make it to Legacy, but we won’t make it back on this tank. We need to get gas.”
“You really think anyplace is gonna be open?” Rose asked. So far, they had practically been the only living people on the roads up to this point. A fact that chilled her as her mind flipped through all the times she had driven to her sister’s house. She could not ever recall one time where she’d been the only car on Highway 26.
“I ain’t looking for a place that is open,” Jason replied, his voice tight from the tension.
Without warning, he suddenly veered to the right. The familiar sign of a Fred Meyer parking lot leapt into her field of vision. Dodging one lone zombie that was stumbling across the entrance, they banked hard to the left, tossing Rose to the right of the backseat where she felt her right arm’s funny bone hit something hard enough to send electric spasms to the tips of her fingers.
The car came to a screeching halt under the awning and Jason jumped out. He started for the main building and then stopped and opened his door, sticking his head back inside.
“Both of you stay put.” Erin opened her mouth, but he cut her off with a raised hand. “This isn’t about if you are capable. It is about I am gonna do some stuff in a hurry and I don’t need you in the way. If you see anything coming, honk the horn and we are outta here.”
He did not wait for another word and simply slammed the door. Rose watched through the window as he approached the squat, gray building where the top of a register could be seen. He reached down and grabbed something from the ground and turned his head as he smashed it into the window. It took a few more tries and made a lot of noise, but eventually, the window gave way.
He vanished through the gaping hole after clearing a path with one arm wrapped in his jacket.
“I think he’s done this before,” Erin quipped.
“Looks like it,” Rose agreed, taking a few seconds before realizing that Erin had made the comment as more of a joke.
A moment later, lights were coming on at each of the bays. Jason emerged and rushed to the pump beside the car. Erin rolled the window down and stuck her head out. “Can I use my gas points?”
“Funny,” Jason sniped, a flurry of activity as he shoved the nozzle in and squeezed the handle. “And how about your windows, you want them washed, maybe have me check the fluids?”
“Damn, how long were you in prison?” Rose called. This received a chuckle from Erin that was only made bigger when Jason shot a scowl over one shoulder.
“Hate to cut this party short, but we got incoming!” Erin pointed forward. Sure enough, five figures were headed their way. The awkward gait and low moans confirmed that these dark shadows were not members of the living.
Jason glanced up and then back at the readout on the pump. He seemed to weigh something in his head for a moment before speaking.
“Take ‘em down. We have no idea if or when we might get another opportunity like this. We need to fill this baby up.”
Erin didn’t wait a second before throwing open the door and drawing the large, heavy blade at her hip. Rose had grabbed a hand axe from the garage before they’d left. She’d used it more than once to cut firewood down to kindling on many occasions at her sister’s house. She imagined that there were probably better weapons, but it had stuck out from everything else in the garage. Perhaps solely due to its familiarity; but, whatever the case, that was the weapon she had (except for the pistol at her side which they had agreed beforehand only to use as the very last resort).
Erin swung and took the top third of the skull from an elderly woman who crumbled in a heap. That prompted Rose to call out, “I’ve fallen and I can’t get up!”
She had no idea where this was coming from. It was not like her to make jokes; especially bad ones and in such poor taste. Still, it made her feel good when Erin shot a crooked smile at her before moving on to the next target.
Rose stepped up to a man that had obviously never jogged a day in his life. His jowls were even more pronounced with the droop to his skin that death seemed to give. He had at least three chins and a belly that left no doubt that this man had not seen his own penis, except perhaps in a mirror, for a long time.
Bringing her arm up and back, Rose judged the obese man’s next step perfectly and brought the weapon down hard. The head of the hand ax crashed through skull and cleaved all the way to the bridge of the man’s nose. A second later, Rose yelped in pain. The first explosion came from the sting her hands felt from the shock of the blow, the second came when the man toppled. The ax was buried and wedged firmly in the skull; coupled with her death-lock grip, she felt her wrist turn viciously and then give an audible snap as her hand was twisted with sudden violence.
“Rose!” Erin yelled, yanking her machete free from her third zombie.
The final remaining zombie was another man. This one was shorter and of Hispanic origin. His black hair had a huge patch missing where it had apparently been ripped out by the roots. Rose was on her side with her back to the approaching zombie, she never saw it until it flopped onto her and began to paw at her with its cold, dead hands.
Jason seemed to appear out of nowhere. He grabbed the monster by its collar and yanked it back and away just as its mouth came within a hair’s breadth of clamping down on the bridge of Rose’s nose.
A long strand of some sort of dark mucous dripped from the undead man’s mouth and into Rose’s. The woman coughed suddenly as she choked on the vile, thick fluid. Erin was kneeling beside her now and turning her onto her side, slapping her hard on the back.
“Cough it up, Rose!” Erin urged.
She tried, but it had gone down the wrong pipe and now she was struggling to breathe. With weak, mewling croaks, Rose tried to scream, cry, anything if it would get that foul taste from the back of her throat.
She closed her eyes as she continued to struggle, but they popped open an instant later when she was greeted behind her eyelids by the si
ckly, washed out face of the man who had just tried to bite her. She could see every single tracer in his milky eyes, the absolute lack of any emotion as the man leaned in with the intention of taking a piece of her.
At last, a pinhole seemed to open and allow in just the slightest bit of oxygen. Rose tried to gasp and suck it in, but could still barely get enough to push back the sense that she would suffocate and drown in the unholy saliva of one of the walking dead.
She was aware of arms scooping her up and then she was tossed unceremoniously into the back seat. She hit her head on something and felt the world start to fall away, but she would not allow that darkness to come. She was terrified that, if her eyes closed, they might never open, or worse…she would see the face of that zombie as it drew near to try and bite her.
“Sorry about that!” Rose heard Jason holler as he slammed the door and vanished from view. A moment later she heard the sound of screeching tires. She was stricken with the funniest thought, I didn’t know my car had that kind of power.
***
“Get that stupid dog back to the house and shut it up!” Ken snapped as he brought his pistol around and fired pointblank into the face of the zombie that dared to take a swipe at him.
He felt the adrenaline dump another batch of its magic elixir into his system. The problem was that he did not know how much longer he would be able to count on that resource.
It had started about twenty minutes ago, but it seemed like hours. Oddly enough, it had been the barking of that cursed black and white dog that alerted Ken and Juanita that there was a problem.
Of course, if the barking would have failed, he was pretty certain that the sounds of a meaty hand slapping the door would have woke him up in a hurry. Ken sat up, his old cop reflexes kicking in immediately as he had a Glock in his hand before his eyes were even all the way open.
Juanita sat up from the couch as Ken passed, but before he could reach the door, another loud noise made him take a step back as a window shattered off to his right. The blinds crashed to the floor as the upper half of a woman who had most of the right side of her face missing from a bullet that had not ended her came clawing through the broken window. Ken stepped over and lifted his booted foot high. He brought it down on the back of the neck of the female zombie.
Stepping over had given him a clear view outside. Somehow, several of the undead had made their way inside the fence. His mind immediately jumped to the Reynolds kid. He just had a feeling.
Juanita had finally gotten into action, but the dogs were having a fit and barking like crazy. The black and white kept lunging in at the downed zombie woman until Juanita pushed the animal aside and drove a large butcher’s knife into its temple.
Looking out the window, Ken spotted a pair of zombies at the door. Both were slapping and pawing at it, oblivious of his presence. Stepping back, he grabbed Juanita and pointed at the door and then held up two fingers. She nodded. It wasn’t until he yanked the door open and flung the first one to the floor that he could get his hands on that he questioned his reason for hand signals. Were the zombies going to understand him if he gave instructions?
As Juanita took out the one on the floor, Ken stepped in and shoved his Glock under the chin of the other zombie. He knew there had been talk about conserving their bullets, but he wanted these walking bags of filth dead for good. Firing, there was a pulpy burst of brain and skull fragments as the bullet exploded out the top of the zombie’s skull.
Now that he was outside, Ken could get a better idea of what they were facing. At least a couple dozen undead were coming towards the house. His eyes caught sight of something that made him pause for just an instant. One of the undead was Hank Reynolds. The kid had been savagely torn apart by what had to have been several zombies. Most of his insides were now outside. The gaping hole in his middle was horrific to look at as organs that Ken could not begin to identify actually seemed to clog the hole in their quest to be dumped out and onto the ground. The entire left arm was torn away leaving nothing more than a stumpy nub of jagged bone.
Moving down the front of the house, Ken cast a longing glance at the still-open tailgate on his pickup. There was an arsenal in the back of that thing that could arm a small third world nation. He’d made up his mind that he would not move everything into the house until he was satisfied that he would be staying.
Oddly enough, he had not come to that conclusion yet. While it certainly seemed like a wise choice, Ken had a difficult time seeing himself riding out the apocalypse with these people. Not that he’d ever even remotely considered such things ever happening, but if this was the end of civilization, he wasn’t sure he wanted to be around anybody.
As he stepped to the right to avoid the outstretched arms of the nearest zombie, he brought his Glock up and jammed it against the temple of the awkward creature and fired. The bullet passed through and promptly punched a hole in a curtained window. He winced inwardly and told himself to be more careful.
That thought prompted a flood of things that he’d done wrong up to this point. As he made his way from one zombie to the next, oblivious to the fact that he was making his way towards the front gate, he reflected on how careless he’d been. If he wanted to survive (an idea that he was still not convinced of yet), then he was going to need to make smarter decisions.
It was as he was sliding in a fresh magazine and letting the slide load the next round that Ken chose to stay. These people would need a strong leader. He had not seen anybody that had impressed him back at Erin’s place. He sure as hell wasn’t going to trust these people’s fate to a convict.
At last, he reached the gate. It was still locked. Glancing to the left and right, it took him a few moments to find the break in the fence. Walking with brisk purpose, Ken could see several more of the undead stumbling along on the road that ran parallel to the property. Taking a good look around, he made out a half dozen more small clusters of zombies, along with a few lone figures that were headed his direction.
When he reached the part of the fence where the barbed wire had snapped, he put bullets in the heads of the five that were entangled and thrashing around on the ground, each oblivious to the rips and tears that they were inflicting on themselves as the barbs dug furrows in arms, legs, chests and even faces.
There was no way he could do anything to repair the fence at the moment. The opening was a good three yards wide from post to post. He was still considering his options when a noise behind him made him spin and bring up the Glock.
“Whoa!” Juanita yelped as she threw up her hands and stumbled back. The black and white dog was at her side, his nose sniffing the air; there were no signs of the other two.
Maybe they were the smart ones, he thought. He lowered his pistol. “We got trouble.”
That had been all he’d had the chance to say before the next wave arrived. Actually, they were still a good ten or twenty yards from the gaping hole in the fence, but that stupid dog had rushed out, barking and snapping at the first group of three. Ken had noticed how all the other groups seemed to orient on the dog. Whether it was the noise or the tempting snack the mutt made, he didn’t know, but he was going to use that to his advantage.
He sent Juanita back to the house to fetch a leash. He made it very clear that she needed to make sure that the other two dogs were shut inside the house. When she returned, he had already dropped eight more undead, but at least thirty or forty more were closing in on him and the dog.
He clipped the leash to the dog’s collar and started up the road. The beauty of this rural location was the abundance of wooded areas.
“C’mon, mutt.” Ken gave the leash a tug.
“His name is Imp,” Juanita corrected.
“I don’t care.”
Ken turned and started up the road with Imp and Juanita in tow. He would pause every so often to let the dog bark and the zombies to re-gain some ground. At last he spotted a good place to duck into the trees. He waited once more until the zombies were close enough and t
he dog was having a conniption fit before ducking into the woods.
He had never considered the possibility that there would be any zombies in the woods. That had almost cost him his life. He was walking backwards, urging the zombies to follow. The dog had grown more agitated by the minute. When it suddenly turned and lunged behind them, Ken was spun around and found himself face-to-face with a woman that reached for him with a hand missing two fingers that had been bitten off; recently if the wet smear down his jacket’s left sleeve was any indication.
Ken jammed the gun into the face of the undead woman. “Get that stupid dog back to the house and shut it up!” Ken snapped as he fired pointblank into the face of the zombie.
“Which way do I go?” Juanita asked, her gaze darting from Ken to the still approaching group of zombies that had followed them from the road and into the woods.
Ken pointed to his left. “Go that way a good hundred yards or so and then turn for the road. Move fast and keep that dog quiet. I will take these damn things a bit deeper into the woods and then lose them. I’ll meet you back at the house as soon as I can.”
“What about the hole in the fence?”
“One thing at a time,” Ken called over his shoulder as he stomped away. A second later, he began belting out the song, Friends in Low Places by Garth Brooks.
He kept his head on a swivel this time, aware that that stupid dog had probably saved his life a moment ago. Once again, he’d been careless. That had to change, starting now. He sang louder when he was sure that the zombies were tracking him instead of Juanita and that dog. From what he had observed so far, sound definitely had an effect on these things. That had to be something they could exploit.
“…where the whiskey drowns and beer chases my blues away…” Ken warbled as a plan began to form in his head.
***
“My poor car,” Rose sighed as the trio climbed out.
The large blue and white sign of Legacy Hospital could be seen through some trees. They simply needed to go up and over a couple of blocks.
