“If the slow ones are dead, why do they need to eat?” Jeremy wondered out loud.
“I don’t know. The reports I read didn’t mention it. I think one reason may be that biting is the best way to spread the infection. Or maybe they do still eat because the mind is already programmed with that basic instinct. Maybe they do it for actual sustenance. Maybe it’s all three,” his father said.
Kathy drove the entire way. They saw some fighter jets off in the distance from time to time. They saw a few people out gathering supplies, but they had been far away from the road and didn’t seem to want visitors. They saw the same things that they had coming from Texas to Florida. The same kinds of things around the small town where they now called home, but just more of it in the areas that had larger amounts of people. What they saw on the trip to Spring Hill was the same. Death and infected, but just more of it.
Jim took off his cap and rubbed his hair that he had cropped short the night before. He had always liked the way it tickled his scalp a little as he did. Maybe it was just a nervous tic, but it calmed him. He stepped into the turret and put his cap on backwards. They were close to the hotel now.
Jim brought the binoculars to his eyes. Until then, they had only once seen more infected gathered in one area than they witnessed around the hotel that day. That time was when they were on the way to Florida from Texas, and this horde was not too far behind in size. It grew as they watched.
Kathy kept some distance between them and the mass of infected as she drove slowly by the building. Her brother scanned for possible ways to rescue those inside. They could hear the sounds of sporadic gunfire of varying calibers from the building as they took in the scene.
The survivors had told them that they were on the fourth floor. They said they occupied two adjoining rooms; one that faced north, the other facing west. Jim could see a person waiving frantically from the broken window on the north side. “Tell them we see them,” Jim said.
Chris called on the Ham radio and passed along the message.
While the MRAP circled around the building, many of the infected walked, staggered, and limped toward them. This still left what looked like over a thousand around the building.
Jim stepped down from the turret platform and closed the hatch. He sat down in a seat, lowered his head and sighed.
After a few long seconds, he raised his head and looked at his sister and sons. “I think it’s too risky,” Jim said.
Kathy alternated between looking back at her older brother and at the road.
“Can we try, Dad?” Jeremy asked. Kathy and Chris echoed Jeremy’s question.
Jim nodded. “Okay. We’ll give it a try,” he said. Jim moved to the front of the vehicle and called the survivors in the hotel.
After several attempts, the man identified as Frank answered the radio.
“Do you have a ladder by any chance?” Jim asked.
“Negative,” Frank replied. “Any fire departments around here, Frank?” Jim asked.
The man at the other end of the radio said to standby while he checked with the others that had lived nearby.
A few seconds later, the man they knew as Frank told them a small fire station was a few blocks west of their location on the same road. “Okay, Frank. We’re going to try to find a ladder and try to draw as many as we can away,” Jim radioed. He cursed at himself for not thinking to have a ladder already strapped to the MRAP.
A few blocks away turned into ten before they located the fire station. They had outdistanced infected that had followed from the hotel. Once they had drawn away as many as they could, they had to try and put some space between themselves and the infected so they could have a chance to get out and check the fire station.
However, there were many more infected to fill in the ranks along the way. Kathy drove slowly by the fire station so her brother and nephews could look in the open bay doors. No vehicles remained inside the double-bay station. Jim asked Kathy to turn around when she could and drive back by the building.
Kathy stopped when Jeremy and Chris called out that they had seen ladders.
“In the back. Hanging on the wall,” Jeremy said, and pointed.
Jim asked Kathy to pull forward and circle the block.
“Here’s the station again,” Kathy said and pointed as she made the last right turn on their second approach of the building.
Jim stood up and moved to the turret. “We’re going out the top, guys,” Jim said.
Chris and Jeremy followed their dad up and out onto the roof of the MRAP.
As they neared the fire station, Kathy slowed down enough for Jim, Chris and Jeremy to be able to jump off relatively safely. They hit the pavement and immediately sprinted toward the firehouse. As they ran into the dark interior of the open bay, four infected ran out to meet them. After several gunshots the runners were killed.
“Grab this one,” Jim yelled out and picked up an end of the extension ladder.
Chris grabbed the other end and he and his father carried the ladder at a jog toward the open bay door. With one free hand they shot at infected, but aiming proved difficult for Jim and Chris with only one hand to steady and shoot their rifles.
They could hit the closest of the infected accurately in the head, but that put them much closer than anyone wanted.
Jeremy provided the most accurate of their gunfire and had to keep moving, circling his father and brother to kill most of the walkers that trudged toward them as they made their way.
“Stop!” Jim yelled out as they walked out the open bay and put down his end of the ladder. He ran over and picked up a bullhorn that sat on a worktable and slung its strap around his neck as he ran back to the ladder. When he picked the ladder back up, Chris and Jeremy didn’t wait to be told, and started moving toward the MRAP again.
Chris and Jim tossed the aluminum ladder on the roof of the MRAP and the three climbed back inside through the rear doors. They went up onto the roof through the turret again and while Jeremy pulled up the ladder, Chris and Jim shot infected that grabbed it.
“Go, Aunt Kathy!” Chris yelled over the radio as the three of them secured the ladder to the roof. Once safely back inside, Kathy stomped down on the accelerator and the heavy armored vehicle plowed forward, crushing several infected. Back inside, the three worked at catching their breath.
“What’s the megaphone for?” Jeremy asked.
“I hope a distraction,” Jim replied.
Chapter 27
Kathy continued to keep the MRAP moving. Not too fast, just enough to keep from being surrounded. The amount of infected attracted by the engine noise as it drove continued to increase.
Jim turned the power switch to ON and pulled the trigger on the bullhorn. Nothing happened. He pulled open the battery cover and found it empty. “I need some C batteries,” Jim said as he started looking through their supplies.
Chris and Jeremy joined in but had no luck.
Finally they just emptied two flashlights to come up with the eight batteries they needed. The high-pitched squeal of feedback when Jim pressed the trigger again indicated the obvious it worked.
“There. The Burger King,” Jim said, and pointed at the building beyond the windshield.
“Man, I could mess up a Whopper right now,” Chris said.
“I want some McDonald’s French fries,” Jeremy countered.
Jim went to the back of the vehicle and hooked up an external speaker to his iPhone, tore off several inches of duct tape from a roll and stuck it to his left shirtsleeve for easier access later. “Get me close, Kathy, so I can put this stuff on the roof,” Jim said, and opened the turret hatch.
When his head breached the opening, Jim could smell ozone in the air. A look around and the clouds confirmed the chance of rain. “Shit. Sunshine State, my ass,” Jim said and went back inside. He grabbed a plastic bag and wrapped it around the iPhone speaker and the megaphone.
Jim picked a song and set it to loop. He taped down the trigger of the bullhorn
and set everything on the roof of the Burger King. Jim hit PLAY and climbed back inside the MRAP and closed the hatch.
“Go, Kathy,” Jim said.
As Kathy drove away from the building and back towards the hotel, they heard What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong begin to play.
“Kathy, take us back and hide us behind that gas station near the hotel,” Jim asked.
When they reached the station, Kathy pulled in and stopped between the back of the building and the privacy fence that lay behind it. She shut down the engine to draw less attention.
“Now we wait and see if it draws those bastards away from the hotel,” Jim said.
Over the next half hour or so, the gunshots from the hotel finally faded and stopped. Kathy answered the radio call from the hotel when they reported the diversion seemed to be working. Many of the infected had left the outside of the structure. However, many remained inside in the halls.
The survivors inside the hotel said they heard the music and stopped shooting. They didn’t want to keep the infected from being drawn away from the song playing over the bullhorn and they also only had a handful of ammunition left.
The skies opened up and the sound of the rainfall competed with the song that played in the distance.
“I’m going to climb on the gas station roof and take a look at the hotel. You guys recheck your gear,” Jim said, and was soaked when he opened the hatch to the turret.
Jim pulled himself onto the roof of the MRAP and took care to quietly shut the hatch. He jumped up from the roof of the MRAP, grabbed the edge of the roof of the station and pulled himself up and over. Jim belly-crawled to the peak of the roof and with the naked eye and binoculars he checked the area.
He was pleased the music seemed to have drawn most of the horde away from the hotel, but many still remained. Too many. Jim radioed for Kathy to standby in the MRAP and for Chris and Jeremy to join him on the roof. The three men spread out along the peak of the roof and fired at the infected near the hotel.
The combination of the humidity and rainfall kept the sound of their suppressed gunshots from carrying far. The song playing also added to them being able to remain unnoticed by the infected.
Jim and his sons had been firing almost steadily for about a half hour. Around fifty to seventy infected still remained. Those were the ones they could see.
“I don’t know how much longer that iPhone or the bullhorn is going to last. Let’s go for it now,” Jim said.
They returned to the inside of the MRAP and quickly stowed fresh magazines for their rifles in their vest pouches. Jim called the hotel and told them to be ready, gave them an abbreviated version of the plan and then signed off. In the MRAP they didn’t waste time to call in a report to the farm; they knew they would be listening in on the radio traffic.
Kathy pulled in front of the hotel just past the northwest corner and then quickly backed the MRAP along the west side of the building. While Kathy maneuvered the multi-ton armored vehicle into place, Jim, Chris, and Jeremy knelt on the roof of the MRAP in preparation to unstrap and extend the ladder to the window.
The plan was for the survivors to climb down the ladder once it was in place. The rain coming down made balancing on the roof of the MRAP and handling the ladder difficult. Before Kathy had come to a stop near the window, Jim and his sons had started lifting and extending the ladder.
The ladder just reached the bottom edge of the windowsill; Chris and Jeremy held it in place against the bottom of the turret to help keep it stable. They heard gunshots start again from the fourth floor rooms above them and a broad-shouldered man leaned over the windowsill.
“We can’t get out the window!” The man said and then disappeared back inside.
Jim looked at Chris and Jeremy. “Hold what you’ve got. I’m going up,” he said and started to climb. The aluminum ladder wobbled and slid left and right as he ascended. The man’s head reappeared out the window from above.
“Hold the ladder!” Jim yelled. The man reached over the windowsill, his armpits resting on it as his large arms reached down and held the top of the ladder and stopped its movement.
Jim was at the midway point when he heard Chris or Jeremy yell, “Runners!”
Then came the sound of multiple gunshots from below. Jim stopped his ascent and looked down at the roof of the MRAP. Both Chris and Jeremy each held the ladder with one hand and with the other shot infected that continued to throw themselves out the second and third story windows at his sons.
Although most were shot and then fell to the ground, some got too close as they jumped without fear towards Chris and Jeremy from the windows and landed on the edge of the MRAP’s roof. They were shot down and stopped moving or joined others that fell off or clung on to the edges of the roof of the vehicle and tried to crawl up.
As he looked down it didn’t take Jim long to know it was only a matter of time before one or both of his sons was dragged or fell from the roof of the vehicle to be eaten alive or infected.
“Chris. Jeremy. Let go of the ladder!” Jim yelled.
Neither looked up but they both yelled “No!” and kept firing.
“Please don’t let go,” Jim said as he looked up at the man holding the ladder.
Jim wrapped an arm around the ladder and held on tight. “Kathy, please drive out of here before Chris and Jeremy get killed,” Jim radioed.
Kathy didn’t reply, she immediately drove forward, scraping the ladder across the roof of the MRAP as she moved.
Jim then had a terrifying though, what if they still hold on while she’s moving?
They tried at first to keep their grip on the ladder but they had heard their father’s radio transmission. They let go and both looked up at their father. He could see the frustration on their face but also understanding.
“You got to climb! I can’t hold you much longer!” The man yelled down at Jim. He hung out the window past his chest now, gripping the ladder.
Jim holstered his pistol and climbed. The ladder was jostled by the impact of infected as they lunged for it. Jim tried not to, but he looked down each time the ladder shook.
He felt the ladder shake again from an impact while he climbed, and Jim looked down and saw two infected climbing over each other and up the ladder behind him. Jim looked up and could see the added strain on the man’s face as he fought to hold on. His jugular veins and those in his large arms distended from the exertion as he held the weight of three moving people.
“Hurry, man! I’m going to flip over!” the man yelled out in pain and desperation.
Jim reached the top and the only way in the window was to climb over the man holding the ladder. Jim did his best not to step on the man as he climbed in the window and over his shoulder.
As soon as Jim was more than half way in the window the big man let out a loud groan as he dropped the ladder. It and the two infected fell to the ground below.
Jim got to his feet and looked to his right to thank the man, and noticed the man was in a wheelchair. The man had his head up and his mouth open as he gasped for air.
Through the gasps he said, “I’m Frank. You must be Jim,” and extended his right hand that shook from the extreme exertion.
Jim took the hand and shook it. At the same time he shook Frank’s hand, he made radio contact with Kathy and his sons to make sure they were okay.
“Yes, I am. Thank you Frank,” Jim said and then started to try and think of a new way out.
Jim looked around the room and saw what Frank had meant about the not being able to climb down the ladder. With his strength Jim didn’t doubt Frank would have been capable but there was an ongoing struggle for two men and a woman that held the room’s door closed. The woman sat on the floor and leaned against the door as the men stood and leaned against it. They shook in rhythm with the door as it was pounded from the other side. If they let go the door would instantly come down.
Jim noticed the stench of urine and feces. He gagged several times before he stuck his
head out the open window seeking fresh air.
“Couldn’t waste water on flushing. You know?” Frank said.
Jim nodded as he gagged again and regained his composure.
Jim offered the survivors water from his CamelBak. Frank politely declined but the others thanked him as he moved close to each of them so they could drink from the tube connected to the pack. They still had a supply of food but no more water.
“Where are the others?” Jim asked.
“We’re all that’s left now,” Frank answered and quickly introduced the others.
The woman’s name was Erika and the other two men were Josh and Sean.
Josh and Sean were traveling to Florida from Michigan to visit their mother when the outbreak occurred and had forced them to hole up in the hotel.
Erika had been with her husband and daughter when they escaped the infected in Tampa, south of their current location. They had stopped at the gas station across the street from the hotel to scavenge for supplies when they were attacked by infected.
Erika’s daughter and husband were killed and she was chased inside the hotel. Frank had lived nearby and witnessed Erika and her family being attacked. He had left the relative safety of his home to try and help the family, and became trapped with her and the others.
Jim looked around the room and the adjoining one for possible ideas on a way out. He looked through the peephole in both doors. He couldn’t tell the exact number of infected that were packed in the hallway, but knew there were too many for the hall to be an option.
Jim looked out the windows and saw what he didn’t want, but had expected. The dark skies from the rainstorm had brought out more infected. The quick ones weren’t hidden in the darkness anymore.
Out the north-facing window, he noticed a lower roof over the main entryway to the hotel for shielding guests from the elements as they drove up and checked in or out. It was below and to the left of the room that they were in.
“Ideas, Jim?” Frank asked and moved over to the battered door to help the others. He climbed out of his wheelchair and braced the door with one arm and the other arm against the wall.
Omega Pathogen: Despair Page 17
