by Damon Hunter
It turned back to Ana in time for her to bury her hatchet into its skull. She stabbed it in the throat to be sure and kicked it away.
“You saved me,” Ana said to him as he rolled to his feet.
Ben wiped the green pus from his face and said, “I guess I thought I’d make my last act a good one. You probably ought to kill me now.”
“Seems a shitty way to say thank you.”
“Yeah, well, we live in a shitty world.”
Ana raised her hatchet, but stopped when she heard Talbot yelling, “Help.”
“Maybe that asshole will actually find a cure,” Ana said to Ben before she turned and ran towards Talbot’s voice.
Ana turned the corner and saw Talbot on the ground with the vampire rotter on top of him. He had shoved an aluminum suitcase into the thing’s mouth, keeping it from biting him. As Ana ran at them, the rotter yanked the case out of Talbot’s hands.
It would have bitten him, but it saw Ana coming at him with her axe raised. It caught her arm as she brought the hatchet towards its forehead. It pulled her toward its open jaw but she halted the progress by sticking the knife in its face. The vampire rotter tossed her away.
Ana landed hard. She watched the rotter pull the knife out of its face and toss it aside. Talbot was trying to crawl away but the rotter stomped down on him, pinning him to the ground with its foot.
Ana rolled over, planning to attack with the axe again, and saw the gun Talbot had lost. She put down the axe and scooped up the pistol. Talbot was trying to fend off the rotter’s oncoming teeth when Ana put a bullet in the rotter’s forehead.
Talbot pushed the dead rotter off of him, picked up the suitcase, and said, “We need to get to the chopper.”
Ana said, “Duck,” and raised the gun at Talbot’s head.
He did as she said and she fired twice, dropping the second vampire rotter coming at them fast.
She and Talbot turned and ran for the chopper. Ana expected to see Ben there and wondered if she would have to shoot him, but he was not around. They made it around one corner and had to stop. The road between them and the chopper had filled with infected soldiers and other checkpoint employees.
“How we going to get through them?” Talbot asked.
“I don’t know,” Ana said.
“You don’t want to anyway,” a voice behind them said.
They turned and saw Vance standing there.
“How are we going to get to the chopper?” Talbot asked.
“We aren’t. Even if we could, it wouldn’t matter. We don’t have a pilot anymore.”
“Then what?”
Vance pointed back to the transport. “I may not be able to fly a chopper, but I can drive that thing.”
“Then what are we waiting for?” Talbot said as he turned and started running for the open transport.
“Wait,” Ana yelled at him, remembering how Ben was ambushed by the transport, but he was already moving. Ana caught him, grabbing him by the shoulder and saying, “You don’t want to go in there yet.”
Talbot looked at the infected now coming at them from the other end of the street along with the growing horde closing the distance as Vance limped towards them and said, “Why not?”
Ana did not have to say anything as an ambler stumbled out of the transport and careened their way.
Ana stepped in front of Talbot and chopped it in the head with her hatchet. Talbot stayed behind her as they entered the transport. The rest of the transport was clear until they made it to the cockpit. The driver was still in the seat, struggling to sit up. He had buckled himself in before being bitten. In his current rot-infected state, he could not figure out how to free himself from the safety restraints.
Ana finished him with a hatchet chop to the cranium before undoing his belt and pulling him off the seat.
“I’ll get him,” Talbot said as he began to drag the corpse to the exit. “You load your guns.”
Ana found an already loaded rifle and stepped to the entrance. Vance was coming, but he was struggling with his bad leg and even the amblers were closing the distance.
Ana raised the rifle and said to Talbot, “Go help him, I’ll cover you.”
Talbot ran to Vance as an ambler was about to grab him from behind. Vance was going to turn to take it out with his Sick Slaying Stick when Talbot reached him.
“Keep moving,” Talbot said as he pulled Vance forward so the ambler’s swipe missed him by inches. “Stop to fight one and you’ll have to fight them all.”
Vance nodded as he leaned on Talbot to help him walk. He felt a bullet go by his ear as Ana put a round between the ambler’s eyes.
“That was a little close,” Talbot said.
“Yeah, let’s keep moving so she doesn’t have to do it again,” Vance replied.
Ana stepped to the side of the entrance so they would have a clear path and she could select targets without having to shoot between the two men. She fired and dropped three more who were closing the gap. She turned to see the ones coming the other way were closing the distance. She directed her fire that way until the magazine went dry. She put down the rifle and drew the pistol, putting the last few rounds into infected heads.
By the time she reloaded the rifle, Vance and Talbot were inside. Instead of firing more bullets, they closed the hatch.
Vance limped to the front and took the wheel as Ana took the seat next to him.
“I hope it starts,” Vance said.
“No shit,” Ana replied. “Only one way to find out.”
The key was already in it, so all Vance had to do was hit the start button. The big, armored transport fired up immediately.
“Nice to have something go our way,” Vance said as he plowed through the horde of infected in their path.
The horde of rot victims could do nothing to stop the powerful transport. Soon they were out of Escondido and on the road heading west.
Once they were out of immediate danger, Talbot said, “Thank you, both of you. Your actions today may have saved the world.”
“Good thing you didn’t kill us,” Vance said.
“Not that you didn’t try hard enough,” Ana added.
“I know, and you’ve both saved my life multiple times,” Talbot said and then looked at Ana. “You have probably saved me three times just in the last couple of hours. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” Ana replied. “Just remember, after you save the world I still owe you an ass kicking.”
“Fair enough,” Talbot said.
Vance dug his phone out of his pocket and said, “I should call Donna. She has been trying to call me for awhile.”
“Given how this went, I almost wish I had gone with them,” Ana said.
“Yeah,” Vance replied as he hit the buttons to return his ex-wife’s call.
“Ben and Chase certainly wish they had gone with them,” Ana said.
“Novak and Fan might feel the same way,” Vance said as the phone continued to ring without an answer.
“They didn’t sacrifice themselves for nothing,” Talbot said. “I’ll make sure of that.”
“No answer,” Vance said as he cut the connection. “I’ll try Katelin.”
Chapter 31
Interstate 10 - Goodyear, Arizona
They had stopped in the road as Katelin spotted the roadblock up ahead. They were almost to Phoenix, which must have been where the Quarantine Zone extended to. Bo took the next exit and they were working their way east, trying to decide where to go off road and avoid the checkpoint. They had stopped to look at the landscape in front of them to see if there was anything to stop them when Katelin’s phone vibrated in her pocket.
Katelin didn’t want to answer. She didn’t want to be the one to bring the bad news. She had done a lot of hard things over the last few days, including a lot of killing. Some of the killing was people who had just been friends minutes before. Talking to her dad seemed much worse than pulling a trigger, but she answered.
“Dad?”
<
br /> “Yes.”
“It’s good to hear you. When you didn’t return mom’s calls, I worried.”
“Sorry, as you might have guessed, I was busy. I tried your mom, but she isn’t answering.”
“I know.”
Vance detected something in her voice. “Is she okay?”
“No.”
“Can I talk to her?”
“No.”
“What happened?”
“She was bit and unlike you and I, she was not immune.”
“How? You were in the air and home free.”
“Long story.”
“Where are you now?”
“Goodyear, Arizona.”
“Why so far?”
“The Quarantine Zone has been growing.”
“All the way to Goodyear?”
“Further, we were looking for a way around the roadblock.”
“Are you safe?”
“Relatively speaking. It actually looks like Goodyear was evacuated instead of overrun.”
“Once I get on open roads I can get up to a hundred miles per hour easy. I can be to you in about three and half hours. Can you wait that long?”
“What are you driving?”
“TMRT transport,” Vance said. “Dr. Talbot has already put out contacts telling them what we have. I think they will let us through, he’s already working on what he thinks will be a vaccine so I can’t see them turning us away. If not, this thing is as good or better off road as anything, plus it is hard to shoot. Let me come and get you.”
“Okay.”
“Is everyone else okay?”
“No. It’s just Bo and I.”
“The kid?”
“It’s just Bo and I.”
“Shit.”
“Pretty much how I feel. I take it since you have what you were looking for, you did better than us.”
“No, only Ana, Talbot and I made it.”
“But you found the stuff with the cure?”
“We found Talbot’s stuff, which he thinks will lead to a cure.”
“Then I guess that’s as close to a happy ending as we’re going to get.”
* * *
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