Kyler wanted to scream and rage at her. He wanted to laugh in her face. If Rodriguez had gotten what he wanted, then her and her family would be dead in a ditch. Rodriguez and Kyler would be chilling out in style with promotions at some secluded camp. Rodriguez had never wanted to betray Krantz. It’d gone against everything the man stood for. He might not have cared about the Brotherhood or any of that, but he’d considered Krantz his leader. He’d betrayed him because of his friendship with Kyler. That betrayal had killed him. He’d sucked down too many pills to try and escape the guilt. It was all too much.
“I think a burial in the lake would work for him. He was also practical so make sure you get his pack and any ammunition or weapons off him.” Kyler found himself saying out loud. It sounded like the person answering Kelly was a different person. Someone outside of himself. Guilt was wracking his body. Guilt and anger at Rodriguez for being weak and letting this happen.
“Can you steer?” Randy asked. He’d woken up Caitlyn and let her know what was going on. She was staring sadly at Kyler completely unsure of what to say to him. Kyler nodded and took the wheel while Randy and Kelly disappeared below decks again. When they emerged this time, they were carrying a blue tarp between them that’d been taped closed in a long tube. Kyler cut the throttle and waited for the boat to drift to a stop while Kelly and Randy carried Rodriguez to the stern of the little yacht.
“Do you want to say anything?” Kelly asked Kyler. Kyler didn’t trust himself to speak. He asked her to say a few words for him. She nodded and visibly searched for the right words to say. When she got herself pulled together, she bowed her head and stuck her hands out. Caitlyn, Kyler and Randy all joined together in a semicircle in the back of the boat around the blue tarp.
“Dear god. This is a hard path you’ve set before us. A path where we’ve lost many friends and loved ones. We want to thank you for bringing two strong protectors into our lives. Kyler and his friend Rodriguez saved us lord. We know that as well as we know anything. They put their lives at risk so that our children could live. Greater love hath no man than that they lay down their lives to protect others. Rodriguez laid his down to save us and we are eternally grateful to him even as we are to Kyler. Please let Rodriguez find the peace he never found on earth when he reaches you in heaven lord. Amen.”
Kyler and the others joined in on the amen. Kyler felt like he should be sobbing but he was emotionally drained. All he could do was stare vacantly and accept the condolences being showered on him by this family he’d saved by sacrificing his friend. It dawned on him that it was a sacrifice any soldier should be willing to make. That’s the life they choose and no matter how gruff the exterior it did ring true that underneath all of that Rodriguez did love his fellow man. With that thought circulating in his mind he helped Randy pick the tarp up and slide it over the side. It was heavy with whatever weights they’d added to it to make it sink.
Kyler whispered a goodbye to his friend before being escorted down to the cabin to get some sleep. He didn’t think anything would be able to make him drift off but seconds after his head hit the pillow, he was fast asleep. Kelly made room for herself on the pullout with Myriah and the kids. She was also trying to keep an eye out on Kyler to make sure he was ok. She fell asleep still watching him.
Chapter 34: The Lookout
The boat shuddered hard and switched direction waking Kyler up. A couple of the girls snuggled up to Kelly sat up confused and scared as well. Groggy as hell their rest was completely shattered by Caitlyn running in and hissing loudly to wake up and grab their weapons. Kyler jumped off of the couch he was lying on and stumbled over a bunch of bags lying on the ground. They’d unloaded most of the supplies from the van down into this little cabin they were all camped out in. A sound like a very aggressive hailstorm echoed in the cabin.
“What’s going on?” Kelly asked shining a light around the cabin and stumbling out of the bed. The kids all started waking up and she had to remind them to calm down and keep quiet.
“The bridge is up ahead and they’re shooting at us from it. Dad hit reverse and is trying to back up now.” Caitlyn hissed. She was in a complete panic. Kyler nodded and ran up the stairs to see what was going on. He had his M-16 and a hunting rifle with him. He slid into the bridge area and crawled over to where Randy was hunched down beneath a shattered windshield. Random parts of the bridge showing the damage of taking fire.
“How many of them are there?” Kyler asked.
“I only saw one muzzle blast. Whoever it was tore into us though.” Randy said.
“If we don’t go under that bridge, they’ll have us cornered in this section of the lake.” Kyler said. He was thinking they may be able to work their way around through the woods or something like that, but the better option was getting everyone to the South Carolina state line as soon as possible. The sooner they could shake Krantz and the Brotherhood the more likely they’d lead long and productive lives. Which probably gave them each another year or two in terms of apocalyptic lifespan.
“If we go under that bridge the guy will light us up again. I say we turn around and make a run for it.” Randy said. “What do you think?” He asked looking at Kyler.
“I say we have drive forward at full ahead while we blast away at the guy on the bridge and bust through. If nothing else the gunfire will attract all kinds of Zombies, so they won’t be able to find us anyway. We may even get lucky and kill the guy on the bridge. Unless he’s smart, then he’ll just hit the deck and wait for us to cruise on by.”
“You want to do what now?” Kelly asked. She’d joined them up on deck. Caitlyn was also sticking her head out of the hatch to see what was going on. Myriah was in charge of getting the little kids to all huddle under the mattress in the cabin. Kelly was hoping that would stop any stray bullets that managed to penetrate the hull of the boat.
“I want to full ahead and blast away at the guy on the bridge. I think if we fall back, we’re just falling back into their trap and they’ll have us. There’s a time to run and hide and a time to come out of the corner swinging. I think this is the time to come out swinging. One guy on a bridge who happened to see our boat isn’t something I’m way worried about. He’s probably already scared that Zombies are on the way from all the shooting he’s already done.” Kyler finished.
“Alright. Who drives and who shoots?” Kelly said giving her consent to go this way.
“Woah. You sure you want to do this? This is us charging into a firefight. The guy on the bridge has the way better position. He’s shooting down at us. We won’t even know where he is until he starts shooting. We have a cabin full of little kids. We’re talking about driving straight into a full-on gun battle against a guy with an automatic rifle.”
“You steer.” Kyler said looking at Randy. “Kelly and Caitlyn get hidden on the sides of the bridge and start shooting as soon as we have a clue where he is. I’m going to take this hunting rifle that someone spent a ton of money on this very nice scope for and try to see if I can snipe this guy as soon as I see him. Show me about where you saw him shooting from? Assuming everyone’s good with this idea.” Kyler said.
“I’m not.” Randy said looking around him like he was surrounded by crazy people. “I’m not good with putting my wife and kids back in range of some asshole shooting at us from off a bridge. Not when we can turn around and cruise out of range and hit the woods and escape that way.”
Kyler was already setting up on the bridge with the rifle. He was looking through the scope in the general area Randy had pointed out as the location he’d seen the gunfire coming from. He squeezed off a round. Answering gunfire came back almost instantly. The shooter on the bridge was standing up resting his rifle on the concrete side railing. Kyler could see him plain as day through the powerful scope in the moonlit night. He honestly couldn’t believe the guy was actually trying to hit them from this distance shooting in automatic mode.
A couple of bullets did hit the boat, but most went harmlessly into t
he water. The ones that did hit them ricocheted off into the water or the air. It was still terrifying to have bullets striking the boat they were in. Any of those random shots could kill them just as dead as a well-placed shot if their luck didn’t hold. Kyler sighted in on the man on the bridge and exhaled slowly while he squeezed the trigger. He knew he’d taken the shot correctly when he was surprised by the sound of the rifle going off. He saw the man on the bridge stumble backwards and sent a few more shots after the first one to make sure the guy either died or at least didn’t feel like looking over the railing again any time soon.
“I think I got him.” Kyler said still focusing completely on scanning the bridge for any sign of that shooter or any friends he may have.
Randy took that as his cue to push the throttle all the way forward. Kelly and Caitlyn both started taking shots at anything on the bridge that looked like it may be a person. The idea being to keep anyone who was on the bridge from feeling overly comfortable about peeking over the railing to see where they were or take a shot at them. They made it under the bridge without any more issues. When they came out the other side a shooter was waiting for them.
There was no way for them to tell if it was the same shooter or someone different but as soon as they came out the other side of the bridge they were deluged with a storm of automatic fire. They’d been in position to take fire and return it, but the ferocity of the onslaught almost overwhelmed them. Kyler ignored the bullets striking all around him and focused on the areas the fire was coming from. He systematically shot at the area he assumed the shooter to be in until the firing stopped. He couldn’t take all the credit as Kelly and Caitlyn had also returned fire. Randy had even pointed his pistol in the direction of the bridge and squeezed off every round in his magazine while also steering the boat at full speed.
Then they were past the danger. Kyler realized he was alive and didn’t have any new bullet holes in him. He swung around to check on everyone else. Miraculously enough they’d all made it through with just a few minor injuries. Caitlyn had been grazed by a bullet along her arm and Kelly had been hit by bullet fragments or glass or something and was bleeding pretty bad from her neck. Ignoring the blood coming of her she turned and ran down into the cabin to make sure all the littles were ok as soon as it was apparent that they’d survived.
“I guess there was more than one guy after all.” Randy said.
“Yeah. Guess it was riskier than I thought it’d be.” Kyler said.
“We lived. That’s all you can really ask for anymore. We’re a couple hours from sunrise and we’re still breathing. More importantly my wife and kids are all still breathing. I’ve got you to thank for that. You go ahead and consider yourself a part of this family if you want. You evidently make just as many dumb decisions as the rest of us.” Randy said.
Kyler chuckled. Kelly came up and told them everyone was fine downstairs. The sun came up and instead of trying to hide somewhere they decided to press on avoiding any more bridges. Based on the map they should be able to make it as far as the lake went up north without going under any additional ones. They picked out a spot to aim for that was as far north as they could get, and Randy kept the throttles at full. The men on the bridge were bound to have notified the Brotherhood that they were in a firefight with a boat. It was a race now to see who could get to the north shore of the lake the fastest.
It was a race they were determined to win.
Chapter 35: Called Back
Krantz restrained himself from pulling out his pistol and shooting the morons who’d let a boat full of women and children shoot their way past them. The men stood in front of the service station where they’d met up to give him an account of what’d happened. They’d been chasing the fugitives for a couple of days now and Krantz just couldn’t get past the fact that these guys had been less than fifty feet above them and hadn’t been able to stop them. The idiots had even managed to get shot themselves. Only one of the men wasn’t sporting bandages covering up bullet holes.
“How come you didn’t get shot?” Krantz asked the one man who wasn’t hurt.
“I stayed back behind the railing a bit more than these two and was setup on the back of the bridge to take them out if they made it under.” The man answered nervously. He should’ve been nervous. Krantz was pissed and the guy had just basically said that he’d hid more effectively than the other two. He hadn’t tried as hard to shoot the people on the boats who were making fools out of all of them.
Krantz planted his combat boot hard into the cowards crotch. When the man doubled over Krantz slammed his metal gloved fist into the back of his head knocking the wheezing man on the ground. The man lay there whimpering in the fetal position. Krantz took his anger out on him. He vented by kicking the crap out of every part of the man’s body ending with several stomps to his head. One of the stomps had a little more impact than the others and the guy stopped twitching and just lay there.
Breathing hard Krantz walked back towards his truck to issue orders to get men on the bridge to the north and get boats in the water to search for the fugitives. He saw his driver was waving frantically for him to come over. Krantz jogged the rest of the way over to his truck. He listened attentively to the orders he was given. He started to protest and say he was close to finishing his original mission then thought better of it and just acknowledged the orders.
He got on the radio and sent the orders out to the three groups of clearers under his command to scrub the fugitive hunting mission and rendezvous back at the outpost on 595 outside Atlanta. Even though they were letting their quarry escape Krantz felt he still may get a shot at the traitors. Based on the orders he’d gotten it sounded like the Senator was rounding up men to take South Carolina just like they’d already taken Tennessee. Kyler and Rodriguez better keep heading north until they saw elves and toy shops. Otherwise, Krantz was going to find them and when he did there’d be hell to pay.
Authors Note
Thank you again so much for coming on this journey with me. If you’re enjoying these books, please take a few seconds and leave a review. It really helps me out as an author if I can collect some stars and positive comments. I’m excited about where the story is taking us and what’s going to happen next with Kyler and the family. All of this is taking place as I’m getting ready to move my family into a new home. This one happens to have a large conservation area behind it that we’re already making up stories about. I can’t wait to freak out the kids with some “It Came out of the Woods” type stories. I promise not to let those get in the way of getting Book 6 in this series released though!
Thank you again so much for reading this series. It means the world to me that other people can enjoy seeing what I see when I close my eyes and enter Kyler’s world.
Other Books by R S Merritt
Need more Zombies? Check out the Zournal series:
The Zournal Series
Looking for something a little different? Try the Son of the Keeper Series.
Son of the Keeper
Zombies! (Book 5): Greater Love Hath No Man Page 30
