“Do you see somebody?” asked Rogers. He leaned toward Halverson.
“It’s one of the things,” answered Halverson, crestfallen. “Let’s go.”
The Taurus didn’t move. Rogers kept leaning toward Halverson trying to catch a glimpse of the creature through Halverson’s window.
Halverson watched the ghoul snag the head of the person in the rear of the stake truck and tear it off. Blood splashed out of the victim’s mutilated throat all over the back of the truck.
When it came to ripping human heads off necks, the ghouls seemed to possess superhuman strength, Halverson realized. The very proximity of a fresh human brain drove the creatures into a rabid frenzy. Most of the time, on the other hand, the creatures seemed to possess faint, neurotic strength because of their dearth of muscle tissue. Only their brains and nerves were reanimated.
The creature struck the head repeatedly against a stake in the truck, trying to crack open the skull and get to the brains inside.
“I can’t stand watching this,” said Rosie from the backseat. “Do you guys have a barf bag up front?”
Rogers accelerated the Taurus.
As they approached a freeway underpass, Halverson could discern something hanging from the bridge. There were three male bodies dangling by their necks at the ends of ropes that were secured to concrete balusters that skirted the roadway on the bridge.
Their faces twisted into grimaces, the figures were writhing at the ends of their ropes.
“How come they’re still alive?” asked Rogers. “Did they just get hanged?”
“No. Look at their faces.”
Rogers squinted. “They’re hard to make out in this smog.”
“They’re zombies. They have white eyes.”
“Why hang the damn things? What good will that do? Look at them writhe. They’re still alive, if you can call it that.”
As they swung at the ends of their ropes, the creatures kicked with their legs and flailed haplessly with their arms.
“As a deterrent to the other creatures,” said Halverson. “It’s a warning to the ghouls to stay away from this area.”
“They look obscene,” said Rosie.
“Then living people must have done it to them,” said Rogers.
Rogers sounded like he was clutching at straws. Halverson sensed a tinge of desperation in Rogers’s voice.
“But what kind of living people?” said Halverson. He gazed off into the distance.
Rogers turned to face Halverson. “What do you mean?”
“They must be vigilantes. Lynch mobs are what vigilantes are all about.”
“You think there are paramilitary outfits around here?”
“Some kind of private armies.”
“That could bode ill for us.”
“What are you talking about?” said Rosie. “We can hook up with them whoever they are and help each other out.”
“Or they might want to take whatever we have for themselves,” said Halverson. “They’re making their own laws on the fly. They’re a separate government unto themselves.”
“It’s not like we have much to offer.”
“We have cars and weapons,” said Rogers.
“That’s what people want during times of war,” said Halverson. “I suggest we beat it out of here. I doubt they take kindly to strangers here.”
“Those hanged zombies could even be a message to us humans, as well as to the ghouls, to stay out of their territory.”
Halverson picked up on the green sign for the northbound 405 freeway entrance ramp coming up on their right.
Rogers saw the sign at the same time. He turned onto the ramp.
“I’m glad I’m not as cynical as you guys,” said Rosie. “I don’t know how you get through life like that.”
“We’re being realistic,” said Halverson.
“We don’t want to take any more chances than we have to,” said Rogers.
Rosie flung up her hands in exasperation. “But I thought the whole idea of us leaving the airport was so that we could team up with other living people.”
“Not everybody out there wants to be teamed up with.”
“When people lynch living zombies from bridges, that’s sending out a warning to leave the area, not an invitation to stay,” said Halverson.
“If you don’t want crows in your yard, you put out a scarecrow.”
“We’re not crows,” said Rosie. “We’re fellow humans.”
“We could also be considered competition in the struggle for survival.”
Rosie shook her head. “You can see anything you want to see.”
The freeway was a mess, Halverson could see. Abandoned cars littered the lanes. He wasn’t sure Rogers could even drive on it. Halverson could not tell if there was a clear route through the maze of parked vehicles. It was like driving through an obstacle course.
Rogers decided to try his luck. He cruised onto the freeway, searching for an opening in the jumble of metal cars and trucks parked higgledy-piggledy.
“Where did these zombies come from?” said Rosie. “That’s what I want to know.”
“There are different theories,” said Halverson, recalling the information he had gleaned at the CIA about the plague and its causes.
“Like what?”
“One is that the ghouls are the results of a Chinese experiment with nanobots gone awry.”
“Nano-whats?”
“No. Nanobots. They’re tiny robots. Doctors can implant them in your brain to repair the brain’s neural connections.”
“They have the technology to do this now?” asked Rosie incredulously.
Halverson nodded. “The thing is, the nanobots still function in your brain even after you die. They hijack your brain to command it to move your limbs, etc.”
“You think that’s what’s raising corpses from the dead? Nanobots?”
“Let me finish.”
“There’s more?”
“To preserve themselves the nanobots order their host to bite another body so they can pour into the new host’s body. Once they’re inside the new host, they shut down the host’s cortex (which is responsible for resisting the invasion of nanobots) while leaving the brain stem intact so they can control it.”
“If it’s these nanobots, then it’s not a plague.”
“That’s another theory, that a plague is turning people into zombies. The plague is attacking the entire body, destroying it, and taking over the brain. The brain is the only organ left ‘alive,’ so to speak. This so-called alive brain can’t think or solve problems. It can tell the body to do only one thing—eat. The brain controls the nervous system, which causes the zombie to move and eat.”
Rosie glanced askance at him. “How do you know so much about this?”
“I’m a journalist. I was writing an article about it.”
“You seem to be awfully well informed,” said Rogers.
Halverson caught Rogers cutting his eyes at Halverson suspiciously. “I have good sources.”
“It doesn’t really matter what’s causing these things. What matters is, they’re here and we have to destroy them to stay alive.”
Steering wheel in hand, Rogers negotiated his way deliberately through the abandoned vehicles parked on the freeway.
Halverson started in his seat. “What’s that up ahead on top of that car’s hood?”
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Somebody was sitting cross-legged on the hood of a black town car in the adjacent lane up ahead of Halverson. The person had his back to Halverson. As well, thermals were rising from the cars distorting the image of the person. The thermals prompted Halverson to recall how hot it was. He wiped the sweat off his brow with the back of his arm.
He reached for a plastic liter bottle of water that he had brought with him from the restaurant and had attached to his belt. He unscrewed the white, ridged plastic bottle cap. He swigged the water.
“What’s he doing?” asked Rogers.
“It’s
hard to see,” answered Halverson. “He’s got his back to us. It looks like he has something in his hand. Maybe if you get closer.”
Rogers managed to drive closer through the hodgepodge of cars parked every which way.
“Oh no!” said Rosie. She covered her gaping mouth with her hand.
Halverson could see that the person on the hood of the town car was trying to crack a human head against the front edge of the hood. The ghoul kept hammering the bloody head against the hood’s metal rim.
“I guess those zombies hanging from the overpass didn’t get through to this ghoul,” said Halverson.
“I doubt anything gets through to those things,” said Rogers. “They have no fear.”
“They’re too stupid to fear anything,” said Rosie.
“Why should they fear dying?” said Halverson. “They’re already dead.”
“They’re totally screwed up.” She pulled a face. “I don’t see how they can even exist.”
“They defy the laws of nature,” said Rogers. “By all rights, the zombies should be dead and cease to exist like every other living thing that dies. And yet . . .” He trailed off.
Halverson watched the ghoul pounding the human head against the hood. Rapt in its chore, the creature paid no attention to him.
At last the creature managed to crack open the skull. The skull broke apart like an eggshell as the ghoul pulled it apart and watched the oozing grey brain matter fall onto the scorching hood. The brain sizzled and smoked on contact with the sun-baked hood.
Rosie perused the cars surrounding the Taurus. “Where are all the people?”
“Either they turned into ghouls or they’re hiding somewhere,” said Halverson.
Halverson watched with disgust as the ghoul scooped the spongy, parboiled brain off the town car hood and scarfed down the grey matter like it was Hawaiian poi.
Sickened by the sight, Rosie looked in the opposite direction. “Can’t we just get out of here?”
“It doesn’t look that way,” said Rogers, surveying the area. “I don’t see any clear path forward on this freeway. We’d make more headway using surface roads.”
“When the plague or whatever hit, everybody must’ve taken to the freeways to cut and run,” said Halverson.
“The freeways turned into death traps.”
“Let’s figure it out later,” said Rosie. “Let’s just scram now.” She paused a beat. “Could somebody at least kill that thing on the town car? It’s making me sick just thinking about it.” With her hand she shielded her eyes from the sight of the creature.
Halverson observed with revulsion the creature working its jaws chewing the squelching brain in its mouth. Halverson raised his MP7 to charge it at the ghoul. He changed his mind. He lowered the MP7.
“It doesn’t even know we’re here,” he said. “All it cares about is stuffing its stomach. It’s not gonna be a problem for us. We need to conserve our ammunition.”
“Sooner or later we’re gonna have to kill every one of those things,” said Rosie.
“It’ll have to be later, then. We can’t afford to waste ammo right now. There’s no telling how many of those things we have yet to meet up with.”
“Then let’s split before I throw up back here.”
Rogers had to back the Taurus off the freeway. He had come to a dead end in front of him.
He slowly backed the car toward the nearest ramp of the car-crammed freeway.
Rosie was peering out the Taurus’s rear window. “Oh no.”
“What?” said Rogers.
“What’s going on back there?”
Halverson craned his neck around to look out the back window. He picked up on a VW van parked on a surface street. The van seemed to be rocking back and forth. It was hard for him to tell at this distance.
“Is that our van?” he asked.
“Sure looks like it,” said Rogers.
“Who’s driving it?”
“I think Ray is. Or Foster.”
“What’s happening to it?” asked Rosie, gazing at the van. She bit her lower lip, concern etched on her face. “Seems to be rocking. They must be in trouble. Can’t you drive out of here any faster?”
“Piece of cake. Just move all of these cars out of my way,” Rogers said in frustration.
She faced Rogers. “I’m sorry.”
“Forget it.”
Steering wheel in hand, Rogers continued weaving his way through the blockade of vehicles, backing the Taurus up.
It was hard enough driving forward through this junkyard of cars, Halverson knew.
Rosie returned to peering out the rear window, her eyes huge. “I don’t like the looks of this.”
Zombies seemed to pop out of nowhere and swarm all over the van. Some were hammering the van with their fists. Others were rocking it, trying to overturn it, it looked like to Halverson.
“No wonder the van was bouncing and shuddering,” he said. “The ghouls were pushing it from the other side.”
“Jesus!” said Rosie. “We need to help them fast. Where are Lemans and Tom? I don’t see their two cars.”
Rogers looked disgusted. “Lemans probably peeled off on his own by now.”
“Yeah. He’s got our back,” said Halverson acidly.
“I thought they were both right behind us the whole time,” said Rosie. “I never thought to look.”
“I don’t know,” said Rogers. “I was too busy trying to blaze a path on the freeway to pay attention to our rear.”
The van seemed to be rocking and juddering more and more, Halverson could see. It was only a matter of time before it tipped.
Rosie screamed.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
The van tipped over on its side toward Halverson. The zombies pawed at the overturned van like ravenous beasts. Smelling food, the zombies crawled onto the van’s side and clubbed the windows with their bare hands.
The creatures reached through the broken windows and yanked out passengers.
“We’ll never get there in time to help them at this rate,” said Rosie.
“We might make better time on foot,” said Halverson.
“I doubt it,” said Rogers, steering wheel in hand as he continued driving backward on the freeway. “The van’s the best part of a mile away, at least.”
Rosie screamed again.
Halverson watched in horror as several of the creatures latched onto Foster’s arms and hauled him out through one of the van’s shattered windows. Foster was kicking and firing his MP7 at the same time to no effect. Because the creatures clasped his arms, Foster was unable to train his MP7 on the things. He ended up firing harmlessly up into the air. Besides, there were just too many of the ghouls. Their swarming tactics served them in good stead.
A female ghoul with grey hair and a wrinkled, sneering face clutched Foster’s head and wrenched it with her lust-induced strength. In consternation Halverson watched the ghoul tear Foster’s head away from his throat.
Blood jetted in a thick stream out of the throat of Foster’s decapitated body, soaking the zombie’s face. The ghoul seemed to relish the feeling of the hot blood on her face. She lapped at the blood voraciously, flicking her tongue with short rapid strokes.
The ghouls hauled another passenger out of one of the van’s broken windows.
Kicking and screaming, the twentyish ponytailed blonde with a pink scrunchie in her hair fought in futility against the mob of zombies as they amputated her arms. Blood spurted everywhere, soaking the creatures as they munched on the girl’s arms.
Sickened by the sight, Halverson clambered out of the moving Taurus.
“Hey,” said Rogers, watching him. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“I can’t just sit in this car watching the rest of us die at the hands of those things.”
“You won’t get there in time on foot. What’s the point?”
“For sure we won’t get there in time in this car.”
Halverson stumbled onto the asphalt. H
e fell to his hands and knees. He got to his feet on a dime. Arms thrusting like pistons, he pelted down the freeway. Try as he might, he could not gain any significant ground on the Taurus, though he did manage to outstrip it. Even so, the creatures remained out of range of his MP7.
Nonplussed, Halverson watched the creatures hoist Ray out of the van. Ray killed at least two of them with his MP7 as they wrestled him out. But more zombies ganged up on Ray.
Ray’s MP7’s magazine must have clicked empty, decided Halverson, for Ray hurled the weapon at a zombie that was attacking him. The weapon crashed into the creature’s head with such force that it brained the zombie. But another zombie immediately took the dead creature’s place and clawed at Ray.
Halverson felt impotent as he watched the massacre helplessly from this distance. Ray took out a lot of zombies, punching their heads and clubbing them with the butt of his Sig Sauer semiautomatic, all in a losing cause.
Like sharks the zombies had been whipped into a feeding frenzy by the sight of fresh blood that was streaming all over the van. Even the gutter beside the overturned van was running with blood.
Halverson heard Rogers yelling at him from behind. Halverson could not make out Rogers’s words. Gasping for breath, Halverson paused a moment to recuperate air in his aching lungs. He looked back at Rogers in the driver’s seat of the Taurus and tried to ascertain what Rogers was saying.
“Forget it,” it sounded like Rogers was saying to Halverson. “There are too many of them. We’ll end up like Ray and Foster.”
“We have to try to help them!” Halverson called back to Rogers between gulps of breath.
“Look how many of them are over there!”
Halverson wheeled around to take in the spectacle of the creatures massing around the van. Indeed, there seemed to be hundreds of them congregating around the downed van with more of them converging even now on the spot.
The van and its environs looked like a slaughterhouse steeped in blood and entrails as zombies ripped apart Ray’s stomach and passed the intestines to fellow creatures.
“We’ll be committing suicide if we go over there now,” said Rogers.
Zombie Apocalypse Page 18
