by Germann, Tom
Steven nodded at the walkie talkie on the dashboard. “Do you want to squash this? It doesn’t seem very military and I was thinking maybe the city could hear us.”
Captain Wagner shrugged then grunted as they hit a larger than average pothole. “I really wish the people here had done a better job fixing their roads.” He paused. “But to answer your question. I don’t want to stop the chatter. We still haven’t had any real break since we got here. It’s hot as hell, no one has had much sleep or even any sort of good sleep. We’ve been on guard and we have flesh eating zombies. Oh, and we can’t find anybody else and people are probably already thinking there are no other living humans in this world except for onesie or twosies. Everyone needs to be able to release a bit of pressure by joking around or figuring out how those things see and operate. I’ll address it when it becomes a problem, that’ll be soon enough.”
The conversation trickled off shortly after and the convoy kept driving in radio silence.
Steven kept his eyes on the road and the occasional zombie heading toward the convoy. Some of the corpses looked in bad shape while others looked almost normal except for their stiff legged walk.
The sound of the vehicles wasn’t loud but as the miles passed, more and more of the dead were appearing in the distance ahead and to the sides.
Steven carefully reached forward and picked up the small walkie talkie, never taking his eyes from the road he brought it to his lips.
He kept turning it carefully in his one hand trying to find the button and quickly took his eyes off the road to look at it.
Steven pushed the button. “This is Steven. Have you all noticed we are seeing more infected as we go along? Over.”
“Caisson, yupp. Coming up on a city like this I bet there are lots more infected. It only makes sense. After all everyone ran away from where they lived to a refugee collection point if they heard about them right? So, like with us, any infected who saw them leave would have followed. Or more likely some of the people who made it to the city were infected. Or infection was already there. If this city really is as large as we think it is I bet we are looking at half of the inhabitants are infected. Hopefully the military cleared them out and we just have burnt out areas and lots of fortifications to deal with.” There was a pause. “But I really doubt it. Caisson out.”
Steven looked over at Wagner. “I’m so glad Mr. Caisson is such a font of happy, positive thoughts. It’s almost like he knows nothing can go wrong…”
Wagner just snorted, he never even looked up from the book he was reading. Steven glanced over quickly and saw the chapter title. ‘The Proper Form for Junior Officers to Take with Their Betters’. Steven made a face. The chapter like most of the rest of it was garbage. A list of the proper ways for a junior officer to bootlick to get ahead. All the best to the good Captain, may he enjoy the brown-nosing mess that was this worlds military.
Steven looked ahead and focused on his driving.
The miles passed slowly but surely, and the convoy was getting closer to the city.
THE HORDE
M
iles back down the road just now coming out of the hills a larger horde is on the march. Such a horde would instill terror in anyone. Well over a thousand people walking along making no noise with no talking whatsoever. Completely counter to what any large crowd of people does.
The horde is grotesque with ragged clothing and bodies visible at any distance. Get any closer and the stench would overpower any stomach. Not the fresh smell of death. The smell after bodies have started to rot in the burning heat of summer.
Any closer and anyone would see the bite marks, torn clothing, barely attached limbs and the milky white eyes staring out from slack jawed faces, some missing eyes, ears, or other skin.
Of course, anyone at a distance would quickly discover how much distance the infected could cover when they detected fresh food. It’s all the living were to them. Food.
This horde was moving, following the highway. They would not stop unless they found other survivors who would provide a distraction. As they walked others would join them regularly so as time passed the horde had grown larger, much larger.
While they moved slowly they didn’t stop and they didn’t rest.
A NICE AREA
T
hey drove on at their slow pace for hours. Passing the occasional farmhouse or small village just off the road they saw the same scenery repeated over and over. Fire damage was the most obvious from a distance. Broken windows and smashed in doors were harder to see.
As they drove through a small village, the blood smeared all over the wall of a garage and the stack of bodies lying under it was obvious.
They kept the windows rolled up and drove on, thankful they had filled the gas tanks the night before in the barn.
While they had seen relatively few of the undead earlier now they were seeing more. Usually one or two near the farmhouses and many more in the small villages. As the vehicles drove by the dead turned and started following them. They didn’t raise their arms, they just turned and started a shuffling walk after them.
They had been closing on the city slowly getting closer when they had to stop on the road as the one problem car was overheating.
They didn’t pull off to the side they simply stopped in the middle of the road in an area clear of wrecks or stalled out cars.
All the vehicles stopped but were left running and everyone unloaded with the soldiers forming a cordon around the stopped convoy.
Behind them less than a mile away was the first of the undead. It seemed to pick up speed when it saw the vehicles idling with everyone standing around them.
Sam shut the vehicle down while Jimmy lifted the hood and looked at the small steam cloud jetting out of the radiator. It kept spraying out even after the vehicle was shut down.
Sam joined Jimmy at the front.
“See Sam? I told you these vehicles had some issues. The radiator has a pinhole leak and the damn hose for the coolant is cracked as well. I wonder who built this thing? An untrained monkey?”
Sam went to the pickup truck where he pulled out a tool box from the service centre and brought it to the front of the vehicle. The two men pulled out a replacement hose and after arguing about it Jimmy just ripped the old one away causing steam to shoot out of the radiator.
“I told you Sam! Should have hired American workers who knew what they were doing! Not some damned monkeys! I ain’t never seen anything built this poorly before.”
The steam was no longer spewing out of the radiator and both men started arguing about how to best patch the pinhole while removing the old clamps and attaching the new hose.
At the back of the column Vajjer and Caisson were standing with Sue watching the long zombie column staggering down the road after them.
Vajjer looked at the other two. “I told you. They can hear, or maybe they feel the vibration of noise and it’s a trigger for food thoughts in their rotting brains.”
Caisson shook his head. “There’s one saw us stop and its coming after us faster now. None of them came running after us. They turn as they hear the cars then they start walking. I tell you they can think somehow. Why run after the cars when we can drive away faster? They know we’re going to stop and are just walking along. Maybe they catch up to us at night or maybe we have to stop like we did now because a vehicle breaks down. They think.”
Standing just to the side Sue shivered in the day’s heat. “I really hope you guys are wrong. I don’t need to hear about smart zombies. I don’t want them finding us and figuring out how to open locked doors, or use tools or even rig up traps. It’s like a bad movie where there is no good ending.”
Vajjer looked at Sue while Caisson kept an eye on the zombie which was slowly approaching. It was getting close and was starting to move faster almost in a hobbling run and its arms were starting to come up. It was too far away to hear but all three could imagine it groaning as it got close
r to them.
“Sue, we’re just talking, but we do need to figure out how smart these things are or even just how they track us. See, I would have thought a corpse in this heat for a few days would be rotting apart but almost all these things look like they just recently became zombies.”
Caisson took a knee and brought his rifle up chambering a round and carefully sighting on the zombie. He yelled out. “Taking a shot.” His rifle rose and fell several times then barked once. The creature spun around almost falling.
It straightened, turned then started toward them again.
The rifle barked a second then a third time. The third time the zombies head exploded backward spraying back along the route it had come.
Caisson stood up and cleared his rifle. “That’s done. Wish I had done it on the first shot though.” He worked the action several times before slinging the rifle and facing outward to keep an eye out.
Vajjer looked toward the rest of the convoy. “Hey! Everyone look OUT toward the fields where you’re supposed to be looking. Don’t look at us.”
He turned back to Sue. “If we can figure out how they operate and what’s going on than we can be ready for most of what could happen. If we don’t have a clue and don’t question we’re like the guys in the zombie movie then we die, right? Always look two steps ahead, or more and expect the unexpected. Gad, reminds me of tour.”
Next to him Sue nodded. “I know what you mean but it’s hard to keep thinking that they’re zombies. I, I keep seeing people walking toward us and wonder if we couldn’t help them somehow?”
Caisson didn’t turn. “They’re zombies Sue. Keep it in your mind. We are nothing but food for them so until someone comes along and tells us there is a cure to dying and rotting we focus on keeping ourselves alive.”
They stood silently for a second and in the background, they could hear either Jimmy or Sam hitting metal with metal.
Sue kicked a rock on the road and adjusted her web belt. The shotgun slipped off her shoulder but she caught it before it fell.
Caisson looked over at her briefly. “How are you holding up?”
After a second Sue spoke quietly. “I’m okay. I have a problem when I have the time to think about it. I honestly think Tracy is doing better than I am.”
Both men looked at her briefly before facing outward again.
Vajjer spoke first. “You’re kidding, right? So far, Tracy has done a lot of crying and seems hung up on authority figures. Where you have stepped up and are doing. How is she doing better?”
Sue adjusted the shotgun on her shoulder so the strap was not rubbing on the same spot.
“You don’t understand. Tracy and I have been best friends forever. She just grew up really protected and when she went off to College she ended up hanging out with a group of losers who talk big but do nothing. Tracy has always been strong but she cries and carries on a bunch first. It’s like she needs to get it out of the way before she gets up and does. Me? I lock everything inside and just keep working away at stuff. But I end up falling at some point. I don’t think it helps that we’ve all been picking on her as much as we have. My only excuse is, I am as freaked out as everyone else and I’m being stupid. But I almost can’t help it.”
After considering for a second Caisson spoke up. “She seems to be very judgemental if she is as good a friend as you say. Harping on us, calling you a slut a couple of times. So, you’re saying she’s just freaked out like the rest of us? I think she snapped.”
Sue looked off into the distance seeing more zombies advancing. “We always argue. It doesn’t mean anything. You’re guys. You’re taking how you see us both act at face value. But really isn’t it just what everyone does when they first meet someone? You don’t know someone until you know them. Every guy here sees me as a hot stacked chick. Good looking but no real brains. They see Tracy and they think lefty who wants to march in protest against ‘baby killers’. Nope. Not her. This is all just outside of anything she dealt with. Shit. Do you know Tracy was on a committee at school setting up ‘safe zones’ within the school? They had guys who went there because they were upset by pictures they had seen on social media. That’s what she is sort of used to right now. Not what was reality.”
Any further conversation was stalled as an engine roared to life behind them then everyone heard the slam of a hood.
Caisson started backing away toward the vehicles. “Conversation time is over. Let’s load up and get out of here.”
Everyone jumped in the vehicles and they slowly started rolling off.
The first zombies were just starting to pick up speed as they were getting close to the vehicles.
As soon as the vehicles drove off the zombies slowed again.
The tail of infected they had picked up in the morning was hundreds strong now and still walking.
THE OUTSKIRTS
O
ne second they were driving along with fields running off into the distance then it was like a switch had been thrown and they crossed a thin neatly trimmed section of grass running off into the distance on either side of the road.
They were in the suburbs.
It had taken almost half a tank of gas to make it this far. But they had finally made it to the city outskirts.
The highway continued in a straight line heading for the city centre. The skyline wasn’t dominated by skyscrapers as it would be at home. This city skyline was full of shorter buildings with only one or two tall buildings.
The outlying suburbs of Freetdorf looked bizarre to the group as they drove through. It was as if different rings had been dropped around the city. The outer ring held larger houses with double car garages, the next ring inside single car garages, then carports, just driveways then houses right on the edge of the city had nothing.
Every house looked like its neighbour as if they had been cloned and laid out in a formation for some unknown reason.
There were still no speed limits posted but the highway now had stop signs regularly on a grid system which they ignored as they drove along.
They still saw the undead but the further away from the city there were fewer. It was only as they drew closer that the number of dead started rising sharply.
The damage was also less obvious on the outside. Closer in, entire neighbourhoods seemed to have burned and there was still a cloud of smoke in the distance.
As they came to the edge of the city itself they started to see some signs giving direction.
The lead vehicle slowed to a halt.
“Jimmy, industrial area is the next right but it seems to just lead us into the southern part of the city. I ain’t seeing any street signs at all either. I don’t know how long it’s going to take us to find this refugee centre if it ain’t marked up somehow.”
“Wagner, take the right and we’ll break up and drive up and down in a grid. The city isn’t too large. I bet we find the building fast. When we do find it, we don’t drive right in. We drop whatever vehicle isn’t seen off somewhere to the side then go in. Everyone got that?”
A chorus of “got it” and “Clear” came back over the walkie talkies.
The convoy slowly picked up speed again and the vehicles took the exit to the right.
The zombies that had started following the convoy when it entered the city kept following. As a tail, it seemed to stretch back out to the suburbs.
As the vehicles drove along the main road they split off from one another and started driving up and down the connecting side streets looking for any sign of the refugee centre or train tracks.
In the built up industrial area there were less of the undead walking around but the group which was following them slowly, kept advancing after them in the many streets.
During one of the many slow turns as they quartered the industrial area they noticed something.
“Mmm Tracy here. Is anyone else noticing if you get ahead of them then turn they don’t really follow you? They just keep going
in a straight line.” There was a pause. “No! Don’t! They squeal! Great. Our brakes squeal and I think they heard us cause they’re coming down the road after us now. Over.”
“Caisson. Good stuff catching that. Now we know what to do when we find the building. Over.”
“Wagner. What sort of plan did you have? Over”
“Caisson. We park the truck, drive off far away and have a fire fight and maybe start a fire then drive fast away from the building going a nice distance before turning back. Over”
“Wagner. Good plan. Out”
It was only a few minutes later when they crossed the train tracks and just a few minutes later when Jimmy called out. “I gotta big building just off this rail line and I see someone on top. He’s waving at us and pointing down the road. I think it’s the entry. It looks like a soldier. He’s got one of those caps on and a slung rifle.”
“Caisson. Alright let’s go drop a vehicle a few blocks away. He only saw Jimmy so I recommend the station wagon as she seems rock solid. Over”
“Wagner, okay everyone head over to the fire station we saw. It’s nearby. We’ll leave the station wagon there then go do our distraction. Over.”
There was a distant honking noise then all the vehicles were pulling up outside the fire station they had seen earlier. It was a three-story building and painted bright red with a huge mural of a Dalmatian taking up most of the front of the building.
The station wagon was parked right in front of the fire station and locked after they covered the items in the vehicle with a tarp.
After that they all piled into the vehicles and slowly drove away from the fire station. There were only a few dozen zombies in sight at this point but there were many more wandering around.
The smaller convoy stopped at a large intersection, a crossroads for two major roads which ran through the industrial area and the vehicles were left running while everyone but the drivers climbed out. After a quick conversation, it was agreed they needed to have as many undead as possible heading toward them before they drove off and hopefully lost them with the majority heading onward in a straight line away and out of the city.
