Apex Predator

by Glyn Gardner

  Maria crawled for several steps and then launched herself back to her feet. C’mon! You can make it! The zombies were right on top of her, but she managed to evade their grasp. Jen continued to cover her retreat. Suddenly, a look of pain and surprise crossed the girl’s face. She stumbled forward again, this time her right fist grasping her chest. From 25 meters away, SSgt Brown could see blood begin to run down the front of the girl’s shirt.

  She fell forward, reaching for the group. NO! She tried to stand again. A look of pain crossed her face. She collapsed to the concrete, a bullet fired from one of their rifles had hit her center mass. She was swarmed by the hoard of recently animated zombies.

  SSgt Brown counted noses. He could see everyone but Theresa. Shit, where was she? The humvee with Jen still firing from the turret ring pulled out in front of them, Theresa at the wheel. Well, that answers that, he thought.

  “Jackson, follow the girls!” The young trooper stopped firing and dropped into the driver’s seat of the LMTV. He gunned the gas. The truck lurched. SSgt Brown and Mike almost fell over. Kerry did, sliding face first all the way to the tail gate. She split her chin open on the steel floor of the truck bed.

  Theresa stayed in the median for about 500 meters before she pulled out onto the empty highway. Jen couldn’t help but think that for a kid who is too young to drive, she did a good job of getting them out of that death trap.

  About two miles up the road, the median rose above the road, and there was a stand of trees there. Jen could see tire tracks leading into the trees. She remembered this was one of the places Louisiana’s finest liked to hide and run radar. She told Theresa to pull in between the trees. Jackson pulled the big truck in behind her. Everyone dismounted.

  “Is everyone ok?” asked SSgt Brown. They could still hear Willie’s machinegun firing in the distance. They all shook their heads. He could see that Jen and Theresa had tears rolling down their cheeks.

  “Shit guys,” he started. “I’m sorry. I had no idea…”

  “Stop,” Kerry interrupted. They all looked at her, shocked that she would choose this time to say something. They stood there, jaws agape, staring at the still bleeding cut on her chin

  “Just stop,” she continued. She wiped some blood from her chin with the sleeve of her shirt. “We all agreed that it was a good idea. Not one of you, or them for that matter, objected to it. SSgt Brown, it wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t Willie’s fault, or even that piece of shit Wilcox’s fault. Let’s just not do it again.” She turned and climbed into the back of the LMTV.

  Jackson took a step closer to his sergeant. “It wasn’t your fault, boss. Hell, I didn’t think about it either. You doin’ a good job keepin’ us alive.”

  SSgt Brown looked into his trooper’s eyes. He could see that Jackson meant it. He shook his head. “Thanks Jackson.”

  “Hey boss, we need you up and in the fight. You the only thing keepin’ this bunch of misfits from gettin’ eaten. So, what’s next?”

  “Let’s see where we stand on ammo and supplies,” replied the NCO. The NCO turned to the group. “Who managed to grab their rucksack?” Jackson, Jen and Kerry raised their hands. The others did not. “Ok, let’s check ammo, and see what we still have for supplies.”

  He was not happy about the results. They had lost one of the emergency radios, a bunch of ammo. They were down to about 800 rounds of 5.56/ .223 and 100 rounds for the M2 on the humvee. That was the good news. Theresa only had about 15 rounds of 12 gauge shells in her pockets. Mike had about 40 rounds for his pistol and SSgt Brown was down to about 28 rounds for his .45’s. Those would be hard to come by.

  The good news was they were able to scavenge about 50 gallons of fuel for the trucks, and a couple of cases of MRE’s. That should keep them going for the next two or three days. The humvee also had 2 radios, and they both worked. One was set to an encrypted channel, the other was unencrypted. They would need to monitor both.

  The humvee also had a camouflage net strapped to the top. SSgt Brown ordered them to leave it behind. He didn’t think that they’d need it anytime soon, might as well save the weight. Both vehicles also had a set of pioneer tools: an ax, pick, and shovel. He chose to keep those.

  He looked at his watch: 11:35.

  “Alright folks,” he announced. “Grab some chow. We’re moving out in 30 minutes.”

  Jackson broke into one of the boxes of MRE’s. He took one he like and handed one to each of the group. He sat down in the bed of the LMTV and ate his lunch. SSgt Brown took his meal and sat in the passenger seat of the humvee. While he ate, he flipped the radios through the preset channels of the radios: nothing. Well, he’d keep an ear out for something. He finished his meal.

  “Ok, let’s mount up. Jackson, you and Mike take the LMTV. Jen, Theresa and Kerry are in the humvee with me. We keep moving east. We’ll lead.” They mounted their respective vehicles, and began driving. Kerry drove the humvee, Jen and Theresa took turns in the turret ring. SSgt Brown continued to flip through radio channels.

  They continued down the empty road. The road here was flat and wide. There were trees on both sides of the road. Through the few breaks in the trees, SSgt Brown could see zombies walking in the fields. Usually he saw one or two. Occasionally he could see a larger group. Most didn’t pay attention to them. One group in particular did seem to begin wandering toward the road as they passed.

  About 15 miles down the road, Kerry slowed to a stop. There about a half mile in front of them was a large group of zombies. They hadn’t seemed to have noticed the living yet. Jackson pulled the LMTV beside the humvee. Mike rolled down his window.

  “What the hell is that?” he asked.

  “Looks like a pack of bad guys,” SSgt Brown replied. “You think it might be the ones that hit the convoy back there?”

  “Could be,” the young trooper responded.

  “You see a way around them?”

  “Not from here. It looks like there is something across the road.” SSgt Brown climbed out of the turret ring, and stood on top of the humvee. He could see several metal struts hanging over the road on the north side. It looked like the Eiffel tower had fallen over. Ah, now he recognized it. There was a cell phone tower crossing the road. He wondered if this was an accident or maybe someone got smart and dropped a road block across the path of the pursuit.

  It worked. The cell tower appeared to cross all four lanes. Now, it looks like they were going to need to find a way around this.

  “Mike, you know of a way around this?”

  “Well, there was an exit a mile or so back. I bet we could hit Highway 80. It should be south of the interstate. Or, there’s some train tracks that runs parallel to the interstate somewhere north of the highway.”

  “Ok, you and Jackson lead the way. I’d rather hit the highway than the train tracks. Hate to get a busted truck.” Mike leaned back into the truck, and began issuing orders to Jackson. He backed the LMTV up and executed a three-point-turn. Kerry followed them. They back tracked to the onramp that Mike had seen. After exiting the highway, they turned south along a little two lane road.

  South of I-20 15 miles East of Bossier City

  Things were not going the way Lt Jason Allen Cruzan had planned. In fact they had gone completely and utterly wrong. He was a platoon leader in B Company 326th Engineer Battalion. It was he and a squad from his unit that had destroyed the cell tower that SSgt Brown had found across the highway.

  It was supposed to be an easy mission. He would take one squad and his Platoon Sergeant took another squad to create road blocks along I-20 to slow the advance of the hoard of zombies pursuing the soldiers evacuating along I-20 to the east.

  At first, things were going great. His team had arrived at the cell tower, finding it relatively free of bad guys. They set their charges, and blew the tower. It fell exactly as he had calculated, crossing all four lanes of traffic. That’s when things had started to go wrong. His command humvee wouldn’t restart after the detonation. Try as he might, Pv
t. Adams couldn’t get the thing to turn over.

  After cross loading all of their gear and crowding into the remaining humvee, they continued east for about half-a-mile. Then things really got bad. His Platoon Sergeant had already blown the next road block. He could clearly see the column of smoke and hear the detonations to their east.

  The roadblock was textbook perfect. There were seven tall trees crisscrossing the road. It was meant to stop foot traffic from using the road. It was even more effective at hindering one overloaded humvee. Worse, the driver of the humvee had failed to program his radio with the unit’s radio frequencies. He tried several times to raise someone on the radio but it was to no avail.

  After consulting the map, he realized they were in big trouble. By now, the remainder of the column should be on the other side of Minden. That meant that his unit would have to traverse what command called a high density population center on foot. That was not good.

  He dismounted the remainder of the squad and ordered them to move south and east, skirting the city and, he hoped, find some transportation. That was exactly what they did not find. They ran into another small hoard of zombies.

  After a brief, but violent battle, his unit was able to break contact with the zombies. But, not before losing two members of his squad. Sgt Mendoza and Pvt Adams were separated from the group and killed. He would never forget the screams.

  The remaining five men continued on, searching for transportation. As darkness began to fall he ordered his point man, Pvt Williams, to find a place to hole up for the night. They found one of those private storage facilities, surrounded by a chain linked fence. The squad hopped the fence and found an unlocked storage unit.

  Lt Cruzan couldn’t believe his bad luck. Not only did they have to stay the night in a metal building with a giant garage door on the front and no escape route but he found it occupied.

  Apparently a middle school science club had been traveling through this area when they ran across several zombies. One of the teachers and three of the children were killed before the group was able to find shelter in this storage unit.

  Now, instead of five soldiers trekking across the state of Louisiana trying to catch up with their unit; he was the leader of five soldiers, three school teachers, and seven middle school kids. To make matters worse, the civilians were hungry. Damn, now he was the mayor of a refugee camp.

  The group had spent a long and uncomfortable night sleeping on the concrete floor. His soldiers had given away most of the food they carried to the children. He knew that food and transport were his most immediate priorities.

  He debated leaving the children in the storage unit and taking his soldiers out to forage. That thought was quickly pushed aside as he walked out of the storage unit. There, at the fence, were at least twenty zombies. He didn’t believe that they knew his people were here, they weren’t moaning. But, they seemed to be fascinated with the fence. They just weren’t trying to go anywhere.

  One of the zombies turned and faced the young Lieutenant. Their eyes met. It let out a loud moan. The rest of the zombies began turning their heads, looking for prey. Lt. Cruzan ducked back inside the storage unit. But the damage had been done. The entire group began moaning and slamming their fists on the fence. He could see that it wouldn’t take long before the fence fell.

  He yelled to Sgt Procell to get everyone ready to move. He fired several shots into the mass of decaying flesh. Several of his men also engaged the threat. Suddenly the fence came down and the wave of monsters began advancing excitedly at their prey.

  “Run!” he yelled. They all ran directly away from the zombies. His troopers helped the civilians over the fence before jumping over themselves. SPC Pittman and one of the children were unable to make it over the fence before being engulfed by the mass of zombies. The rest of the group ran.

  They found an empty convenience store about two miles away. He sent Sgt Procell and Pvt Jefferson in to grab what food and water they could carry. They returned without incident. The group took a few minutes to eat and drink before he ordered them to move out again.

  They made it about another mile or so before they ran into another larger group of zombies. Pvt Jefferson led the group into a red-brick church. The zombies eventually got in, and the group had been forced to retreat upstairs to the choir loft. They had shot several zombies as they tried to stumble up the stairs. This effectively kept the rest of the zombies on the ground floor.

  And that was the situation in which Lt Cruzan found himself. Four soldiers, three teachers, and six kids stuck in the choir loft of a church. They had four rifles, little food, less water. Ammo was good for now, but wouldn’t last long. They couldn’t go down, and the zombies couldn’t come up. He thought he really knew how a rat in a trap felt. BANG! BANG! BANG!

  Sgt Procell was sitting in one of the pews in the choir loft, shooting down into the Nave. Lt Cruzan placed his hand on the NCO’s shoulder, quietly telling him to knock it off.

  “Why El-Tee?” the Sergeant asked in his thick North Carolina drawl. “You think we’re getting outa this? Were pinned up here, and we ain’t getting’ out”

  “You ready to give up already?” the officer asked.

  “Fuck El-Tee,” he replied. “I’m getting sick of these fuckin’ things.” Every time we turn around we run into them and people get killed. Now we got kids to feed and protect? We’re toast, sir. You just don’t know it yet.” He re-shouldered his rifle and began firing again. BANG! BANG! BANG!

  Lt Cruzan didn’t know what to say. He didn’t want to give up. He had to keep going. But what the young Sergeant said made some sense. They just might be in a pickle they can’t get out of. No! He decided he wasn’t ready to give up yet. There had to be a way out. He just needed to find it.

  “Sgt Procell,” he whispered into the NCO’s ear. “Let’s save some of that ammo. I think we’re gonna need it later.”

  “Yes sir,” he replied as he shouldered his rifle and fired several more rounds.

  The convenience store South of I-20

  SSgt Brown was sitting on top of his humvee, eating an MRE for dinner. Mmmm, he thought, Spaghetti with meat sauce. It sure wasn’t like mom made, but it beat the heck out of pork skins and cinnamon buns. The rest of the group was eating dinner too. Jackson was standing in the bed of the LMTV keeping watch.

  The convenience store they stopped at a few minutes before had a rack with maps in it. SSgt Brown couldn’t remember when he’d seen a paper road map at a gas station. They were lucky. Well, sort of. The map showed them how screwed they were. This part of the state only had two major thoroughfares running east to west. I-20 was obviously blocked. That left Highway 80, and it ran through the middle of every population center between Shreveport and Vicksburg. Not good.

  Bang, Bang, Bang. All eyes turned to the south. They could hear the sound of gunfire and it wasn’t very far away. SSgt Brown put down his meal, hopped down from the humvee, and climbed into the LMTV with Jackson. “Sounds like M-16’s boss,” Jackson reported. “It sounds kinda close too.”

  “Well looks like we’re done with dinner,” replied the NCO. “Guess we got some more folks that need rescuing. You guys up for it?” They all shook their heads yes. He knocked on the cab of the truck where Kerry and Theresa were eating.

  “It’s time to move out girls. Jen, you drive the humvee. Jackson you’re driving this thing. Theresa and Mike, you guys are in the back here. Kerry, you’re riding shotgun for Jackson. Everyone stay in your trucks. We’re safer here than on the ground.”

  Jen jumped in the driver’s seat of the humvee. When SSgt Brown was in the passenger seat, she pulled the vehicle away from the curb. A quick glance in the big side mirror, showed Mike and the rest of the group behind them in the big Tan colored truck.

  “Keep it slow,” SSgt Brown ordered. He slid his window down and stuck his head out.

  Bang! Bang! Bang! They were getting closer. It sounded like it was just around the next curve in the road. He told Jen to stop
and he exited the vehicle. He pointed at Jackson and held up a single closed fist and then pointed at the ground. Stay here.

  He climbed back in the humvee, and told Jen to ease around the corner. As they rounded the corner, Jen’s heart skipped a beat. There was a brick church with a huge hoard of zombies surrounding it. Jen estimated at least 100 soulless monsters.

  Bang! Bang! Bang! It was obvious that the shooting was coming from inside. They couldn’t see any windows, and none of the zombies outside seemed to be effected by the gunfire. That could only mean one thing. The survivors were inside, and they were trapped.

  “Ok, you remember the story of the Pied Piper?”

  “Sure,” Jen replied. “The guy led the rats out of town, and then the kids when the town folks didn’t pay his fee.”

  “You think you could lead that group of zombie away from that church?”

  “Sure, but you’ve got to roll that window up.”

  He chuckled at her attempt at humor. “Good. Now back us up to the truck so we can fill them in.” She did. SSgt Brown climbed out of the vehicle and climbed into the bed of the truck. He told the others his plan.

  “Jackson, just make sure we and the zombies are clear before you head in. And remember, we don’t know who’s in there. We don’t want another run in with the Bubba brothers do we?” He looked at the young redheaded girl. They all shook their heads no.

  “Good. If they are reluctant to come out at all, leave ‘em. Good luck.” He pulled a small two-way radio out of his vest, indicating Jackson to do the same.

  “Hope we won’t stretch the range of these things. Call us when you’re finished. We’ll beat feet back to you.” Jackson nodded. SSgt Brown remounted his vehicle.

  “Ok Jen, let’s do this.” She pulled forward again. This time she stopped about 30 meters past the entrance to the church parking lot. She looked at the big NCO. He nodded. BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! She hit the horn several times. The zombies responded as expected. The ones they could see turned to face the new stimulus. She flashed the lights several times, and gunned the engine. The group of zombies began shuffling towards her and SSgt Brown.