Zombies!
Book 4
“Nowhere to Hide”
R S Merritt
Text Copyright © 2019 Randall Scott Merritt
All Rights Reserved
This series is dedicated to my beautiful wife and family. My reasons for forcing myself out of a nice warm bed each day.
Cover Design By:
Harry Lamb
Table of Contents
Chapter 1: The Prodigal Son
Chapter 2: Come Again Some Other Day
Chapter 3: Roadside Assistance
Chapter 4: Hammer Time
Chapter 5: Better Living Through Chemistry
Chapter 6: One Bite at a Time
Chapter 7: Branded
Chapter 8: Apply Direct Pressure
Chapter 9: Hurry Up and Wait
Chapter 10: Missing Web MD
Chapter 11: Looting by the Numbers
Chapter 12: Downtown
Chapter 13: Scavenger Camp
Chapter 14: Wake Up Call
Chapter 15: Now What?
Chapter 16: Knock Knock
Chapter 17: Empty Inside
Chapter 18: Eyes in the Back of Your Head
Chapter 19: Roll On
Chapter 20: Going Toe to Toe Tag
Chapter 21: The Real Deal
Chapter 22: Road Trip from Hell
Chapter 23: Baiting the Trap
Chapter 24: Careless and Reckless
Chapter 25: Springing the Trap
Chapter 26: Bouncing Back
Chapter 27: Secret Rendezvous
Chapter 28: Street Racing
Chapter 29: Convoy
Authors Note:
Other Books by R S Merritt
Chapter 1: The Prodigal Son
“Shut up and get in the car before the angry Zombies eat us please.” Kia said while shoving Kyler on the shoulder to get him moving faster. Kyler focused on putting one foot in front of the other. His whole body was numb from whatever Kia and Diamond had fed him that morning. Everything was blurred and round and even the threat of Zombies eating him alive didn’t really resonate. He stumbled towards the beat-up looking Jeep Cherokee parked in the overgrown grass in front of the double-wide they’d spent the night in. He stumbled a few more steps before falling face first into the tall grass and succumbing to the soothing waves of darkness.
He woke up to something scratching the back of his neck. He was folded uncomfortably into the crowded back seat of what he guessed was the Jeep Cherokee he’d been limping towards before blacking out. His mouth tasted like blood and his body ached. The scratching feeling turned out just to be the normal feeling he was getting now that his burns were scabbing over. Kia and Diamond had logged almost thirty minutes trying to figure out if they should nickname him Freddie Krueger or the Phantom of the Opera. Kyler had asked to see a mirror and been relieved to see they’d just been toying around with him. The skin on his face was an angry red and he was going to end up with some scarring, but he’d still need a mask to go Trick or Treating.
“You awake?” Kia asked from the passenger seat up front. She’d heard him moan and turned her head in time to catch him looking around.
“Unfortunately. I wish I could just sleep through this whole healing process and wake up for the healed part.” Kyler responded. He was happy that with enough water and rest he no longer sounded like a ninety-year-old two pack a day retired trucker.
“Not to put anything else on you but we’re switching you over to regular Tylenol and antibiotics for now. We can’t roll into the outpost with you high as hell on oxy without looking like we’re trying to prove a point or something. You don’t want to take too much of that stuff anyway. Trust us on that one.” Kia turned her head to look out the passenger window away from Kyler. He took that to mean the conversation was over. He put his head back on the seat after guzzling half a bottle of water. Feeling slightly better after downing the water he slipped back into an uncomfortable and completely non-restful slumber.
The sound of bare hands smacking on the window woke him up. Kia slammed her foot on the brake pedal and spun the steering wheel. Kyler rolled off the back seat onto the floorboards of the jeep. The sun was up. He could see the hands hitting the car on the windows on both sides. He heard Diamond yelling at Kia to get them the hell out of there. Their voices almost lost inside a jeep that was starting to sound like the inside of a drum set during a heavy metal drum solo. Kyler fully agreed with the sentiment of getting the hell out of there. The sound of glass cracking only made him want to endorse that plan even more strongly.
He checked himself for weapons. The weapons he’d become so used to having strapped to his body were missing. He felt naked. He climbed up on the seat to search for weapons in the piles of junk lying all over the backseat. He didn’t see his weapons anywhere but there was a ton of pills. The car ricocheted backwards. Kia must’ve given up on evasive maneuvers and decided to just try her luck driving backwards. If they lived through this Kyler planned to have a chat with Kia about how to not drive into large crowds of Zombies. He could’ve understood if it was nighttime, but this made zero sense.
The sounds of hail on a small tin shack died down as Kia’s reverse gamble paid off. The sound made by the tree she hit after jumping a ditch backwards was pretty loud though. Kyler felt himself blacking out again and fought it. He didn’t have time for that passing out garbage if he was going to live through the next ten minutes. Up in the front seats Kia and Diamond were throwing open their doors and yanking supplies out of the jeep. They hadn’t been in reverse for very long so there’d be Zombies on top of them soon. Kyler worked himself up into a sitting position. From the sitting position he could see out the cracked front windshield.
They were sitting at an angle in a shallow ditch with weeds up to the hood. They must be propped up on a log or something since they’d come to rest at a pretty crazy angle. More disturbing than the geometry of their current position was the large contingent of dead eyed Zombies screeching their hatred as they charged towards the disabled jeep. Kia saw Kyler sitting up. She tossed him his knife from the front seat. Then she turned and ran into the woods behind the jeep. Kyler stared down at the knife wondering what the hell Kia had been thinking.
“Sorry!” Diamond yelled as she disappeared after Kia.
Kyler barely heard the pathetic apology over the din of the approaching mob. He doubted he’d be able to outrun them in his current condition. He worked himself up into the front driver’s seat instead. He may have missed it with the concussion and everything else going on, but he didn’t recall feeling the jeep being shifted into drive to try and get them out of the ditch. He hoped that was the case and that even with the weird angle the jeep was sitting at he could still drive himself out of this mess.
He sat down in the driver’s seat. He was giving himself about a ten percent chance of getting out of this ditch alive. The keys were in the ignition, so he turned them with his foot planted firmly on the brake. A loud screeching noise came from the engine as he belatedly realized the jeep was already running. A different type of screeching noise erupted from the throat of an adrenalized Zombie who sprang through the air and buried itself headfirst in the jeeps windshield. Kyler was now covered in broken glass sitting next to the bloody corpse of the dead Zombie. It must’ve broken it’s neck when it opted to drive it’s body full speed through the windshield in an attempt to get at him.
Kyler shifted the jeep into drive and slammed his foot down on the gas pedal. The engine revved up but nothing else happened. He tried shifting into reverse with the same result. With a sinking feeling in his gut he acknowledged Kia and Diamond may have had the right idea. He glanced down at the
knife he’d let fall into his lap still wondering what kind of Rambo crap Kia had expected him to pull with it. He shifted the jeep back into drive to try again as the first wave of Zombies bounced onto the wrecked jeep. Their weight pushed the jeep down on the concrete pipe it was balanced on. Kyler felt the tires bump into the ground.
Not expecting it to work he slammed his foot down on the gas pedal again and let out a happy shriek when the jeeps tires caught purchase in the dirt on the side of the ditch. He felt himself being jerked forward. He kept the hammer down and let the jeep bounce its way out of the ditch. More Zombies smacked into the front of the jeep and one managed to end up upside down in the passenger seat trying to reach over and claw at Kyler. Kyler was doing his best to avoid the Zombies grasp by hiding behind the body of the dead Zombie who’d smashed the windshield out in the first place.
Not really knowing what else to do he spun the wheel hard to the left when he felt he’d gotten back on the road. There were too many Zombies around him for him to be sure, but he went ahead and aimed the front of the jeep in the direction he thought he should be moving in and just kept going. The jeep was being buffeted around the road by the mob trying to get in and get at him. The Zombie in the passenger seat managed to get a grip on his hair and was yanking him painfully over towards him. Kyler took his knife and sawed on the bottom of the Zombies arm until bright red arterial blood was spraying all over him and the interior of the jeep.
Arms were reaching through the windshield trying to get at him. His unwelcome passenger was still yanking on him as it slowly died from loss of blood. If it figured out how to worm over the body and windshield parts blocking it from Kyler before it bled out, he knew he was dead. That was one of about a thousand ways he figured he may die in the next twenty seconds. With nothing to lose he kept the jeep barreling its way through the herd towards the possibility of escape.
Then there was just open road in front of him. Open road in front of him and a Zombie head poking its way towards his crotch with its mouth opening and closing feverishly. If there was one thing that could make Kyler stop the jeep and jump out this soon after outpacing the herd behind him the thought of the Zombie getting its teeth into his junk was definitely it. He ran around the jeep to the other side and opened the door. The Zombie was pulling off some serious yoga trying to spin around to get at him. Not really aiming the knife at anything in particular Kyler went Norman Bates on the Zombie until it finally stopped moving.
He pulled the corpse out and left it on the ground. He ran around to the other side of the jeep to climb back in the driver’s seat. Looking behind him, he saw he still had a little bit of time before the first wave of Zombies caught back up to him. Acting on impulse he ran to the back of the jeep to see if there were any weapons stashed back there. He shifted some boxes around and found his rifle, pistol, some magazines and loose ammunition. It looked like most of the stuff he’d been carrying around in his pack. He also saw some bottled waters and a pack of barbeque flavored rice cakes. Grabbing all that he ran back around to the front seat and got the jeep moving back down the road.
He was thinking about his next move. He needed to figure out where he’d ended up at and then make for the outpost to see if he could locate the commander. Hopefully, he could just blend back into the Brotherhood. He decided he’d keep up the mission to find out as much as he could about the Brotherhood since it coincided with his primary mission of keeping himself alive. Happy to have a firm course charted out he began looking around for road signs that might give him a clue as to where he actually was.
With no rear-view mirror Kyler didn’t even notice that he was still covered in Zombie blood. He just knew he needed to find a gallon of hand sanitizer at some point to soak himself with. His definition of gross had changed in ways only possible for someone coming of age in this new normal. He cringed when it occurred to him that he was driving down the road covered in blood using the corpse of the dead Zombie in the middle as an elbow rest. He thought about stopping to dump the body but put it off for now since he needed a place to set the rice cakes he was snacking on.
Chapter 2: Come Again Some Other Day
The rain was coming down hard. It was the kind of afternoon thundershower that would ruin any plans for a nice day out. Rain coming down so hard it would’ve brought the interstate to a standstill in the old days. Randy watched as the rain came in sideways whipping against the sliding glass doors in the back of the house. It looked completely miserable outside. It was the perfect time for him to drag his wife and kids out on the road.
“You want us to take our children and stroll through a monsoon in the middle of the night to try and get out of here?” Kelly asked him. She looked less than thrilled by the idea. Where Randy was thinking it was genius, she was not giving him the kind of look one would typically reserve for being in the presence of a noble prize-winning idea. She was giving him the same look she reserved for his other brilliant ideas like shaving the dogs at home to save money.
“The crap weather outside will keep them from flying drones around and seeing us trying to get the hell out of here. They’ll have pretty much zero visibility from any of their lookouts. Hopefully, it makes them so miserable they all decide to stay inside. After the swarm hit them it seems like they’d want to spend some time recovering anyway. I just have a feeling like we need to be getting out of here as soon as we possibly can. I’m not going to feel safe anywhere near territory controlled by the Brotherhood.” Randy said. Now that he was vocalizing the plan, he began to feel an even stronger sense of urgency to get his family out of there.
“How are we supposed to march the kids through all that rain? We won’t have any visibility either. We’d wander right into a herd or a Brotherhood outpost before we even realized it. We don’t even know where we’re going. Most of the places we’ve seen so far have sucked about as much as this place does so what’s the difference?”
“The difference is I’m pretty sure when that Captain Amos guy shows up, he’s going to figure out we killed a bunch of his men plus the principal of the school. He’s going to get some men together to come after us. I don’t want to be this close to him when he starts looking. It sucks but we’re going to have to walk out of here. They’ll spot us too easily if we try to drive out.”
“What’s Tony think?” Kelly asked. She was hoping to find an ally. It wasn’t a very strong hope based on hearing the urgency and determination in Randy’s voice. She was already resigning herself to dragging the kids through the rain all night. It really was going to suck but most of what they had to do to survive in this brave new world registered pretty high on the misery scale, so she’d suck it up. Especially if it meant keeping the girls safe. Randy opened the door and they walked out into the living room to find Tony.
Tony was sitting in an easy chair he’d turned to face the sliding glass doors. They had the blinds pulled tight and a sheet spread out over the top of it, but you could still see and hear the rain pounding into it. Tony looked up as they walked in and winked at them.
“Enjoying your talk?” He said with a smile. He stretched out his words in such a way as to make Kelly blush and Randy punch him in the arm.
“Get your mind out of the gutter. We actually were trying to figure out our next steps. I say we hit the road as soon as the sun goes down and try to use this rain to shield us. No cars or anything just see how far we can get on foot.”
“Everybody knows married people making out is gross. I was actually just thinking the same thing about trying to get out of here. I think the sooner the better. I just don’t know how we drag everyone along on foot and survive. I’m with you on not driving though. As far as where we should go. We know they’re using Port Canaveral and the ports on the east coast. I say we head for the gulf coast and try to find a boat and head for Texas or Louisiana.” Tony responded. He’d obviously been busy weighing their options as well.
“How are we going to get the kids to walk from here to Tampa without getting eat
en by Zombies or shot by the Brotherhood? I know you both think we shouldn’t grab a car but why don’t we take advantage of the rain? We should grab a van and drive to Tampa as fast as we can? We could be there before morning if the roads are clear enough. Anybody tries to stop us we shoot them.” Kelly said. She understood their reasoning but there was no way she was agreeing to try and walk the kids halfway across the state in the middle of the night during a Zombie apocalypse in the pouring rain.
“That sounded like her foot coming down to me.” Tony said.
“Walking sucks anyway.” Randy agreed. He’d been thinking it through some more and not really seeing another way to make it work either.
“There’s a van in the garage but I think it’s dead. You guys want to go grab a new battery? There’s an AutoZone right down the street.” Kelly said. She’d obviously been planning on going down this path the whole time.
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