by D. J. Molles
He brought the rifle up. It was not his usual M4—that leaned on the cab of the LMTV at his feet—but a scoped hunter’s rifle that stayed with whoever was on watch. He settled himself against the cab, feeling the cold roof through his jacket. He pulled the rifle in, sighted through the scope, the telescopic image swishing and swashing back and forth until he found what he was looking for.
“Son of a bitch…” Harper slapped the top of the LMTV. “Wake up! Everybody wake up!” He ran to the back of the cargo bed and shouted at the vehicle directly behind him. “Hey! Wake the fuck up! Get everyone up!”
Flashlights started blazing, filling the cabs of the vehicles with startled and confused faces.
Harper turned to the front again, found Mike and Torri Reagan stumbling out of the LMTV, their rifles in hand, their shoulder bags dangling.
“What?” Mike said blearily. “What’s going on?”
“Mike, fire the truck up.” Harper looked at the woman who held her rifle between her knees and used both hands to pull her brown hair out of her face and into a rubber band. “Torri, get on the radio and let ‘em know we got incoming. Keep your door open so I can feed you information as I get it.” The previous day they had come to the same conclusion as LaRouche and had switched their radios to a subchannel. “Make sure you’re on the right channel.”
She nodded. “I got it.”
Harper raised his rifle again. “Everyone sits tight,” he said to Torri. “No one starts bugging until I say so.”
Torri clambered back into the LMTV just as it rumbled to life, shuddering beneath Harper’s feet. He huddled over the rifle and scope again and tried to get a better picture of what was going on in the depression a mile ahead of them.
Not one object passing over the windshields repeatedly, but a line of bodies moving in single file. He sniffed the air, couldn’t yet smell the stench of the infected. Through the scope he could see the individual bodies, but not faces or other descriptive factors. Just their silhouettes against the moon-reflection of the windshields.
Someone climbed into the truck bed behind him.
He took his eyes off and found Julia joining him.
“What’s happening?” She asked, picking crust from the corners of her eyes. “Infected?”
Harper refocused and made a noncommittal noise. “They’re not running, but they’re certainly not taking their time either. Hard to tell in the dark but…I’d say…twenty or so?”
The click-snick sound of Julia checking the chamber of her rifle. “That’s a large pack…or maybe a really small horde out past their bedtime.”
“I’d have to go with a pack. Still…” he sniffed and wiped his nose. “Odd to see ‘em walking down a road like that. More horde behavior than pack behavior.”
“They never cease to surprise.”
Harper bit his lip. “You think they might pass us by?”
“We’re in the middle of the road.”
“Yeah.”
“They’re gonna follow the path of least resistance.”
“Right to us.”
Julia pointed down the hill. “Let ‘em clear that snarl of vehicles and get about halfway up the hill. Then light ‘em up with the fifty and we’ll clean up the rest.”
Harper looked at her. “Sounds good to me. You’re okay with it?”
She seemed unwilling to look at him. “Yeah, well…” She shook her head and turned away. “I’m not gonna put others in danger to save my own conscience.”
“We can give them a warning shot.”
She stopped at the tailgate, appeared to consider it.
Harper pressed. “It won’t make any difference. Let the fifty fire a burst over their heads. If they charge, we’ll take ‘em out as planned.”
She nodded, then hopped down to deliver the message.
Behind him the convoy grumbled to life. A few quiet voices could be heard over the engines, people asking where items were that they had somehow lost while they slept, and now urgently needed. In anticipation of having to move quickly, several of the men stood on the overgrown grassy shoulder, great gouts of steam pouring from the ground as they all pissed and looked around with wide eyes as though afraid of getting caught.
All the flashlights had since been extinguished. None of the vehicles turned on their headlights. They were still just under a mile away, and the sound of the engines could probably not be heard from that distance. Even if it were to be heard, Harper didn’t think the noise alone would cause the infected to start making that horrible screech and sprinting for them. It might make them curious, though.
He scoped them again.
They were like coal black smudges, the distinction between their head and their bodies coming from the moonlight on their pale faces.
All fully clothed?
From behind him and to his right, one of the Humvees with the M2 mounted on top rolled up to their position and stopped adjacent to Harper’s LMTV. Julia stood up out of the driver’s seat. Gray poked his head up through the turret, rubbing the sleep out of his face.
Julia waved for Harper’s attention. “Where are they now?”
Harper looked through the scope again. “About to start comin’ up the hill.” He paused for a long moment, emitting a long, uncertain noise. “Ummmmm…Hold off for a minute.”
“What’s wrong?” Julia’s voice strained as she stretched to see down the road. “What’re you seeing? Talk to me, Harper.”
“Eh…” Harper looked out over the scope, then at Gray, then at Julia. “I don’t know if they’re infected.”
“What makes you think that?” Julia asked.
Harper’s eyes went back down the road. “Well, I think they spotted you moving up. Now they’re just standing there. Watching us.”
Julia followed his gaze back down the road as though she might make eye contact with one of them and know for sure.
Harper was already moving. He laid the scoped rifle down and picked up his old M4, a little scratched, the matte finish worn down in a few places. He slung it on his shoulder, then jogged to the back of the LMTV and swung down out of the cargo bed.
He rounded the Humvee. “Get in,” he motioned Julia into the truck.
Torri kicked the LMTV door open and looked down at Harper with her hands raised in question. “Where you going?”
“Tell everyone to sit tight.” He jammed himself into the tight seating, Julia just now sitting down in the driver’s seat and closing her door. Harper leaned back, directing his voice towards the turret. “Gray!”
“Yup?” the man’s voice was soft, like everything was normal.
Like everything was just fine.
“If those…people, or infected, or whatever…if they start moving towards us, you light ‘em the fuck up and don’t stop until every last one of ‘em’s dead.”
“Okay.”
Harper shifted in his seat, trying to work around his bulky gear and uncomfortable straps. “Julia, ease us down this hill. Go slow.” He put a hand out as though to stay her from stomping the gas. “Go real slow.”
She nodded and popped the emergency brake. The Humvee shuddered, then began to roll slowly down the hill. As they started downward, and the hood of the Humvee dipped, the strange image came into view. The road stretched out before them, the blacktop seeming to soak up what little light there was to see with. The waist-high grass on either side of the road undulating like a sea of silver. At the bottom of the hill was the mish-mash of abandoned vehicles. And halfway up the hill stood the twenty or so figures, jumbled together in a tight group like their single-file line had collapsed in on itself.
Julia let the vehicle roll a few more yards, then the brakes squealed and it halted. “You want me to keep going?”
Rather than respond, Harper pulled the little black handle that let the driver’s side window drop. “Gray, you keep ‘em covered, you hear?” He hollered back as he pulled himself partly through the window. “Just sit here for a minute, Julia. Let’s see what they do.”
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Reason would suggest that if they were infected, they would have already attacked. But being on the road, Harper had learned that this was not always the case, particularly when they were inside their vehicles. Different infected reacted differently to the vehicles. Some charged, the mere presence of something that moved and made noises enough to send them into a frenzy. Others Harper had observed staring at the vehicles with what looked like confusion, first jogging towards them, then backing up, as though they were not sure whether it could be attacked or not. Still others stood by placidly at the edge of the woods while they drove passed, not looking at the vehicles themselves, but the people inside, and they appeared to understand that while they were in the vehicle, they could not be easily attacked.
With his upper torso shoved through the narrow opening of the window, he took a deep breath of the icy air, then waved his arms twice over his head and hollered out in a loud voice. “Hey! We’re friendly! Don’t shoot! Say something so we know you’re sane!”
One of the figures lurched forward like they’d been hit with a cattle prod. Harper’s throat tightened and he reached inside the vehicle, his fingertips touching his rifle.
Then the figure raised its arms above his head, and Harper heard a voice: “Don’t shoot! We’re not crazy! We’re not crazy!”
A shuddering breath issued out from between Harper’s clenched teeth. His fingers closed around the barrel of his rifle, more to steady himself than anything. When he had regained some control of his heart and lungs, he waved the man towards him.
“Walk towards me!” he shouted.
The man looked back behind him, as though conferring with the others about whether this was a wise choice. Harper pulled back into the Humvee and kicked the door open. He looked to his left, made eye-contact with Julia as he slid out of his seat and his boots hit the blacktop.
She nodded. “We got you.”
He took the rifle, holding it with only one hand so that the muzzle pointed at the ground. His left hand he raised to show that he didn’t mean to use it, and he began walking slowly towards the other man. The stranger seemed to accept Harper’s gesture as a sign that there would not be a shootout, and began walking down the white hash marks of the line dividers towards Harper.
The walk seemed to last forever, stretching well into awkwardness, and Harper wished he had driven a little bit closer. But within the span of a couple minutes, the two men were face-to-face, stopping about a yard or two from each other, neither quite comfortable getting within arm’s reach. Caution still took precedent. No one in this world ran to each other with hugs.
Harper sized the other man up, as he was sure the other man was doing to him. The stranger was tall and broadly built, perhaps thirty years old or more. Wiry black hair on top, graying at the temples. Thick eyebrows that hovered over darkly inquisitive eyes. Not particularly tough or dangerous looking, but no pushover either.
“Mack,” the man said.
“Harper,” came the response. “These your folks?”
Mack glanced behind him. “No. Just a group I’m traveling with.”
“Why you movin’ at night?”
“Haven’t stopped for the last twenty four hours, ‘cept for water or food…when we can find it.”
Harper quirked an eyebrow. “Seems like you’re in a rush.”
Mack pulled his coat around him. Harper could see the bulge of something on his right hip. “Any way we can pass through here?”
Harper nodded. “We’re not thieves, Mr. Mack. You’re free to leave if you’d like. We won’t stop you. But I’d hope we could help each other out.”
Mack looked at the ground. “We don’t have anything to give you.”
“You’re coming from where we’re going.” Harper motioned up the road. “You have information for us. Like what’s keeping you marching for twenty-four hours.”
Mack’s right hand hovered loosely around his hip. “Okay. What do you have to offer?”
“What do you need?”
“We need water. Food. A few of our group are sick—not infected, though,” he added quickly.
Harper let his hand rest on his rifle. “You seem like a stand-up guy, Mack. But let me say something just to make myself feel better…”
“If we cross you, you’ll kill all of us?” Mack asked with a note of sarcasm.
Harper smiled. “Something like that.”
“Don’t worry. We’re not going to cause trouble.”
“You speak for your group?”
Mack looked behind him at the huddled figures that had pressed forward just slightly in an attempt to overhear what was being said. “Yeah. I speak for the group.”
Harper pointed up to the top of the hill, over which he could just make out the bulk of the lead LMTV’s cab. “We got a convoy of vehicles just on top of that hill. If you agree to play nice, we can help each other out and you’re welcome to join us up there.”
Mack nodded. “I’ll let the others know.”
Harper watched the other man turn and start back towards his group. Bringing his rifle in a little tighter, Harper turned to face his Humvee and made his way back to it. From the shadowy interior, he could see Julia watching him as he drew nearer.
“So, what’s the deal?” she asked as he pulled the passenger door open.
Harper sat with a groan. “More refugees. On the run.”
“Where from?”
“Don’t know.” He pointed a thumb back. “Gonna do a little meet and greet up at the convoy. Might get some useful intel out of them.” He looked at Julia. “Discreetly keep some of our boys around our trucks, and tell them to watch closely. We don’t know these people.”
***
Dawn started as a light blue smudge on the horizon. By then, the convoy was filled with the quiet rumble of conversations held between people that did not want to be overheard by anything lurking in the woods. The two groups mingled and pestered each other with an endless slew of questions, while Harper and Mack stood at the tailgate of the Humvee Julia had driven.
Mack held a water bottle in one hand, and an MRE “entrée” in the other. Between gulps of water and spoonfuls of chili mac, he stared out at the small crowd and spoke in a low voice. “Most of us are from Danville, Virginia, but a few are from further up north. Three weeks ago I was living with a group of survivors, doin’ alright for ourselves. Took up shop in an old, stand-alone grocery store.” He shrugged. “We made it work. Me and fourteen others.”
He took another enormous bite of food, washed it down with some water. “About three weeks ago we’re out hittin’ a neighborhood for scraps—water, canned food, anything we can find—and we come across a group of five. They tell us there ain’t nothing left up north, and that we better get up and leave out while we got the opportunity.”
Mack paused. “Didn’t believe ‘em. But maybe a week after that, we wake up and hear this noise. Man…” his eyes found Harper’s like he was looking for something to cling to. “…I can’t even really describe it. Honestly, I thought it was a jet. There were so many of them. So loud. All of them screamin’ back and forth like that.”
He pushed his food around inside the brown package. “We didn’t have time to take anything. Just had to leave. Lot of folks didn’t make it out, or got separated. I was by myself. No idea what happened to the others.” He tossed his head in the direction of his group. “Met up with these folks a couple days after that, and we been on the run ever since.”
Harper folded his arms across his chest and waited what he felt was an appropriate amount of time to show deference to the man’s story. “You said you’ve been moving for the last twenty-four hours. Something rushing you?”
“Yeah,” Mack finished his food and crumpled the plastic pouch that it came in. “There’s a big crowd of ‘em, seem to be following us. We noticed them a few nights ago. Or heard them anyways. I recognized the sound from when I heard them hit Danville.”
Harper swallowed, wished for his own bottle of wat
er to cure his suddenly dry mouth. “How many?”
“Can’t say,” Mack made an uncomfortable face. “We haven’t laid eyes on ‘em yet. The one that hit Danville was massive. Packed the streets. At least a few thousand, I’d say. Probably more.” He played with the cap of his water bottle. “But I can’t say about this new crowd. Hell, maybe it’s the same ones. Maybe they been following us all the way from Danville.”
Harper swore under his breath. “When’s the last time you heard them?”
Mack looked skyward, as though the answer were up there somewhere. But whatever he had intended to say was lost in a sudden swelling of shouts, someone screaming, and a third person yelling, “Drop it! Drop it!”
And then a single, jarring gunshot.
CHAPTER 12: BAD GUYS
In the span of a second, the quiet gathering erupted into chaos.
It was like a chain reaction, beginning at the back end of the second LMTV, where the noises had come from, and then surging out through the crowd like ripples in a pond. Harper watched in amazement as the people began to move about, mindless and panicked, like an anthill that had been kicked. They converged at the back end of the LMTV, pressing in, and then the two groups began to separate like oil and water.
Harper was off the tailgate of the Humvee and running. He plunged into the crowd, shoving his way through and not realizing until he was already mired in a tangle of bodies that he hadn’t grabbed his rifle. He hazarded a glance back, couldn’t see the Humvee through the bodies, but could see Mack, a head taller than everyone else, moving in his wake.
It seemed everyone in the crowd was yelling something, and in the mess of voices, Harper could not hear anyone in particular, but instead snips of voices and words:
“Help him!”
“He’s dead!”
“Get back!”
“…move…”
