Harry either shrugged or responded to kick-back before looking over to me as I booted a zed’s head into the end-zone, “I don’t know, they said something about the west gate and fucked right off! I figured you guys needed the help more though!”
The truck started to shake and shift under our feet as the charging zeds slammed into it and I could see that we were seconds from having a gap wide enough for them to squeeze into the camp.
Adrenaline finally kicked into high gear and things started to slow down as I let my gun hang idly by my side, I felt as useless as I was.
The steady click of Greg’s RPK firing thick round after round into the zeds at his feet along with the constant groans and screeches were the only thing I could hear.
Then someone called out “Grenade!” And I was frozen in time while everyone else jumped from the truck and ran.
Harry tried to pull me along with him, but I wouldn’t budge, I couldn’t help it. He gave up and ran off while I was stuck in WWI with Wolf in the trenches.
I saw the fire before I felt or heard anything. The truck lifted into the air as hot shrapnel and fire tore through it.
I’m sure it was at that moment I decided that death didn’t really suit me.
I kicked off the side and flipped backward through the air. I thought that I’d land on my feet and run for my life, but the truck had other plans, exploding when I was less than five feet from it and sending me three times higher into the sky than I’d expected.
For the briefest moment I could see the end of the horde and, in that moment, felt hopeful.
Then I saw mostly ground and exploded truck.
I tried to catch myself as I hit the ground but I was going too fast to land and more splatted. The only lucky part of it was that the explosion had given me a few seconds to get up and start limping over to the others who were running and shooting backward, “Hold! Hoooooold! Keep this position and keep firing!”
The retreating bandits seemed to be half and half with listening. My supporters weren’t with that particular group and I had no one to back me up.
One of the bandits decided to take advantage of that, “Fuck you man! I ain’t stickin’ around her-” I silenced him with a single shot to the forehead from my pistol.
I didn’t like doing it like that, though it seemed like the only way that they’d listen, “Any more rebels!? Good! Then hold your fucking position and keep these undead mother fuckers from getting in!” And just like that they were following my orders.
I knew that saving the camp was impossible. I knew that since the wall had been breached the camp was forfeit and we needed to retreat, but I couldn’t have these rapists and murderers running free. I had to keep them under control for as long as possible.
The zeds hadn’t been game enough to pass the burning truck yet. Like they knew that fire meant death or, at least, Steve did, but it was clear that they were starting to get ready for an attack.
My bandit battalion had apparently decided that was a good time to take a bit of a break.
I disagreed.
I stomp-limped over to one of the younger looking bandits while stuffing my pistol back into my chest holster, forcing it to fall off for some unclear reason, but I didn’t let it deter me.
I grabbed the bandit’s M4 wielding arm and pulled it up so he was sort of aiming, “Enjoy the pretty lights later, shoot the damn things!”
He shook his head back to life before waking up from whatever daydream had absorbed him and started shooting, leading as an example to all the rest.
While they started mowing the zeds down I went over and grabbed up my trusty holster and proceeded to look it over as I wandered toward the back of the group.
Something had sliced through three of the straps at some point in the explosion. I started patting myself down and found something sticking out from my left shoulder and another tender spot in my chest lining up with the hole in my shirt. I tugged on the point on my shoulder but it was clearly stuck from there.
With two of my fingers and my thumb I reached through the hole and into my flesh, wincing and biting into my lip so hard that it bled while I fought off the urge to howl.
Then I found it, a single strip of corrugated metal sheeting about an inch wide and, as I found out while pulling it out with a growl of pain, a good foot long.
Within a few seconds my body had healed up but not before letting me know how close to death I was with a few mouthfuls of blood.
It was very gross.
I pushed my spare pistol into my pocket and kept the other one out, shooting and looking for a rifle when I could.
The zeds had finally decided it was time to start attacking, ignoring the dangers of the flame. Fortunately we had enough automatic weapons to slow them.
Unfortunately, not enough to stop them altogether, “Everyone! Pull back but keep firing!”
One zed managed to get to our firing line and chomped down on the neck of the young bandit who I’d pushed to hold his ground.
I acknowledged my mistake and rectified it by shooting his head at an angle so that it blew out the zed’s brains as well. As they slumped backward I grabbed the M4 and went to fire but got nothing but a ‘click’.
“Well, that explains that. Clip!” As soon as the word had left my lips a clip came flying from my right side and I reloaded, “Cheers!”
A familiar thump sounded behind me before I got lightly prodded in the back, “John!” Harry yelled over the gunfire.
I felt slightly annoyed that Harry had decided that it was an appropriate time to have a conversation but I obliged him, “What is it!?” My words were drowned out by a thunderous explosion closer than the last ones, “And watch your fire!”
“Yeah yeah! Listen! S is gone!”
I immediately lost all interest in the horde and spun on my feet, “What do you mean gone!?”
He shrugged as he continued to walk backward and fired another grenade past me, “I don’t know, Clara saw it, apparently he’s the one who tossed the ‘nade, then he fucked off to God-knows-where in a hurry!”
Fear started to swap out for anger, “You guys get out of here! I’ll go find S!” I went to run and felt Harry grab my shirt, tearing it the rest of the way open, “Oh for…” I ripped the rest of it off and one of the bandits wolf-whistled, “KEEP FIRING! Why’d you do that!?”
Har gestured to the armed bandits then to the horde, “We kind of need you! The walls have fallen and, for some stupid reason the people we just took prisoner are armed to the teeth again!”
He was right and I knew it, I didn’t like it though. I snatched his grenade launcher out of his hand just as he shoved the sixth grenade into its place, and gave him the M4 before he could complain, “Everyone fall back! Retreat to the west gate ASAFP!”
Harry looked at me confusedly, “That means you Har! Move it!” I growled as I pushed him in the chest.
I turned back around and, with the launcher in one hand and a pistol in the other, started sending grenade after grenade into the sprinting zeds while I stepped back as quickly as I could without tripping. They were everywhere, and I mean everywhere.
No matter where I looked in the 180° ahead of me a hungry face was always there waiting.
I’d just run out of ammo in the launcher when I decided running was probably the best option. I pegged the useless hunk of metal at the nearest zed, turned tail and legged it through the camp.
Explosions went off all around me as the free bandits and some of the less traumatised women made full use of the unrestricted armoury.
The once beautiful park was quickly becoming a bloody warzone.
“Get to the west gate!” I yelled to everyone I passed, only a few listened though, the rest seemed so completely absorbed by their task of riddling every zed with as many bullets as they could.
I thought ‘Power to ‘em’.
I mean, how often do you get to really do your part in the apocalypse? Well, that and they were providing a brilliant source of d
istraction for those of us who made it to the gate.
I reached a point and was met by seven bandits behind three of those water filled barriers for roads. The moment I came into their view they took aim for a few seconds before letting me go past to the west gate, which was more a pile of broken bits of metal and concrete than an actual gate.
‘Kate, Harry, Wolf, Greg, Marcus, Clara’ I mentally checked off each of their faces and realised I was missing one.
It took me longer than it should before figuring out that it was me.
Other than them there were no more than fifty survivors, half were women lucky enough to be on that side of the camp when the wall fell and the other half bandits.
All of them still very armed.
Poor Choices
The gunfire hadn’t stopped since I got to the wall, but it did seem to have gotten further away and I figured that the zeds were following those who were going anywhere but the west wall.
But I didn’t care about the zeds or the people they pursued, I was much more interested in an issue closer to home.
“Why the fuck did you think it was a good idea to arm them Wolf!?” I’d dragged my fellow survivor from the rest of the group so I could scold him in peace.
“I don’t know. I just-” He stammered.
“You just what? Decided it’d be a good idea to not only give these… these… ‘people‘ weapons, but also to just walk off?”
He shoved me in the chest, “Leave me the fuck alone, alright! We were getting attacked and, in case you can’t tell, we still are and you think now is a good time to lecture me on right and wrong?”
I wanted to punch him in the face for shoving me, but I knew he was right. “That doesn’t change the fact that you wandered off though, we could’ve used your help on the wall.” I said calmer than I had been but still clearly angry.
Before Wolf could answer Kate walked in between us and faced me sternly, “It was me. He didn’t think giving them weapons was a good idea either, and I noticed something going on over here. Wolf wanted to go to you guys but I told him to come with me.”
I’m not sure whether it was her cross tone surprising me or just her presence but I’d calmed down a significant amount, “Alright, look I’m sorry, it’s been a big day.”
“Bullshit!” She snapped, “That’s bullshit John and you know it! You can rip into Wolf but ‘oooh, better be nice to Kate’. Fuck you!”
Having her get so angry at me was a less than fun experience. Actually, it was possibly the most painful thing to happen that day and the sun had only just gone down.
“Fine, you want me to treat you the same way? Tell me, what was so fucking important that you deemed it necessary to leave us to fight off the population of a small town?” The gruffness I was trying to get out wasn’t quite working.
“Steven. He was milling around here and then just ran off the second we got close. Like he was doing some kind of recon.” A lot of the anger in her voice had dissipated, which I was incredibly grateful for.
The tension that had been bubbling in our little area was easing, even with the new information that a super-zombie was less than a hundred metres from me not too long ago. “Did you see where he went?” They both shook their heads once they were standing side-by-side.
“He was too fast,” Wolf said calmly, “by the time we got to the gate he was in the wind.”
His words hung in the air for a time while we all thought. Kate looked at both of us, “We can’t stay here guys, not now that he knows where we are. And you saw those zeds John.”
I nodded, “The behaviour was completely different to what we’re used to. They knew what they were doing, in the way they entered, all attacking the weakest point like that?”
Then Wolf brought up a fact that we’d all been thinking but had been avoiding the best we could, “Can you imagine what it’d be like if they regrouped and pushed again?”
I shuddered, probably a side-effect of both that terrifying image and the fact that I still didn’t have a shirt.
We had to figure out what was going to happen.
“Hey John!” Greg whisper-shouted, “Come here!”
I broke away from the think tank and made my through the crowd of shivering women toward Greg who was perched up on the concrete wall, looking over it while exposing as little of himself as he could.
I climbed up the ten foot mess to meet him and he pointed over the wall, “There’s some of those alien people making their way here.”
Hoping he was wrong I looked over and instantly saw them a few houses away from the park. “Well, that’s just what we need.” I said as I dropped back down into cover. I looked over the small crowd of women and bandits, still armed.
“Based on how long it’s taking them to search each of the places it’s going to take maybe ten minutes before they find us. What are we going to do?” He asked worriedly.
It took me a while to respond while I pondered, “Get the others, I’ll figure it out.” He didn’t bother letting me know he heard me and instead slipped into the crowd and disappeared.
I couldn’t think properly, all I could focus on was how angry Kate had gotten with me. Nothing else mattered at that moment.
Then Neysor bellowed my name and I organised my priorities. In the two minutes it took for Greg to get back with the others the zeds had clearly moved a sizable distance from us and I’d figured out what we were going to do. I’d also got a spare black long-sleeve shirt from one of the more maternal women.
Lovely woman. Bit odd.
“Where’s Mark?” I asked.
Greg shrugged, “I cou-”
Clara raised her bloody hand, “He’s having a bit of a moment. Today’s been rough on him.”
“Ah, wait…”
She shook her head, “No, he hasn’t got anything to drink.”
I nodded thankfully and got started with a very simple “We’re fucked.” To which I got collective confusion from my team, “Solidly. A very powerful, very pissed alien is on his way here and is probably going to kill us all.”
Harry ditched his confused expression and adopted a more approving one, “Right then. So what are we going to do?”
Wolf went to say something but stopped when Kate shot him a sharp look, “We need to run you guys, survival of the fittest. Yeah John?”
I umed and ahed a few times before shaking my head no, “Actually, I need volunteers. We’ll lead the aliens away while the others lead these people to safety. So, can I get a raise of hands?”
Almost instantly Greg and Harry’s hands shot up enthusiastically followed by a sort of ‘eh’ Clara. Kate and Wolf stayed quiet and unmoving though, it stung and I blamed myself.
“Not you Harry and Clara, I need you guys on crowd control, plus, I need someone to watch Mark and you guys and him really clicked.”
Harry didn’t seem overly impressed with his new assignment, “Why the Hell am I on baby-sitter duty? I should be out there watching your back.”
I understood why he was upset, I would’ve been as well, but I knew that the crowd would be much more comfortable following a human rather than Kate or Wolf. I also figured that if I did leave them they’d bail on them and come help us instead.
I was stupid.
“I know Har, but I need you on this. Also, I need you guys to round up as much ammo and weapons as possible without drawing the horde. Get some of the bandits… men to help you out.” It was difficult for me to accept that the men that I’d been calling bandits for so long were just people now, at least until things settled down enough to have an actual ‘heart-to-heart’ with some of them. “Oh, and could you bring me my backpack from the duffle? Everyone else meet back here when you’re done getting ready.”
Clara had gone to get started on her task of rousing Mark while Harry stared me down with his brow furrowed, like he was trying to read my mind.
Eventually he gave up, nodded and moved on.
I looked over to Wolf, “Come on guys, we could really
use your help.”
Again, Wolf went to say something but Kate beat him to the punch, “You guys will be fine John, we’re more needed here.” It took longer than it should’ve for a person to agree but Wolf nodded surely.
“Alright, you guys get to work then,” before I could even finish my words they’d walked off, “looks like it’s just you and me Greg. Want me to go over it?”
He shrugged then shook his head, “I’m sure I’ll get it as we go. And when has one of your plans ever not changed partway through?” He said jokingly.
I smiled, which felt weird and I became acutely aware that it had been a little while since I’d properly done it, “Hey! Before I met you guys every plan I made worked perfectly!”
“Sure sure.”
We shared a laugh for a second and he came up and sat down on the concrete pile with me, checking over his shoulder a few times to make sure he wasn’t visible to the street.
For a while we just watched as the group milled around and whispered amongst themselves. I didn’t bother to listen in, I wasn’t interested. They could’ve been planning to turn on us or were weird with the sudden change in leadership or any number of things.
It didn’t matter.
All that mattered was getting them and my team to safety.
Harry was the first to return, tossing me my backpack, which I rustled through and found the cylindrical device integral to the plan. Another full minute passed before Kate and Wolf showed up, empty handed, and finally Clara a few seconds later.
“Where are all the guns?” I asked the still sort of off Kate.
“There’s a few blokes keeping guard holding onto them, they’re good to move when we are.”
I nodded and pretended to ignore the bitter tone in her voice, “Alright, good. We’ll move now and the second ‘Pale-Face and the Gang’ are on us you move these people somewhere safe, we’ll find you when we can. ‘Til then just keep moving until you’re positive you’re in the clear. Understood?”
My commanding words were met with scattered nods and one shrug.
The Mulligan Planet 2 (The Mulligan Planet Trilogy) Page 5
