Hubbard did a double take as he and Rowe moved cautiously between two bookshelves. Did somebody just run across the other end of the room? He wished his carbine had a light on it like Sergeant Frays’ M4. All of a sudden he heard Robles shout “Contact!” followed by the punching cardboard noise of the man’s carbine going off, the noise of the shot muffled by the makeshift suppressor attached to the weapon’s muzzle a few feet to his right.
“Oh God! Please don’t! Stop!” a high female voice shouted as a pair of hands showed themselves over the top of a nearby bookshelf. “I don’t have a gun! Don’t shoot!” From where he was standing Hubbard could see the pair of dirt stained hands shaking like leaves in a stiff breeze. The top of a head slowly slid up into view.
“C’mon out of there!” Sergeant Frays shouted as she carefully stalked forward with her M4 pointed at the woman. “Keep your hands up!” She pointed the carbine at the woman while the others moved in to provide security. Frays covered the woman while Pittman moved up to search the woman.
“Put your fuckin’ hands on the shelf!” Pittman snarled into her ear as he shoved the woman towards the nearest bookshelf. “Don’t move a fuckin’ muscle!”
Carl sat nervously in the bed of the truck drumming his fingers on the side. His stomach churned and gurgled after Aim and the others had disappeared into the interior of the library. Being about a foot away from like six pounds of C4 wired to blow inside a steel cage studded with nails and random bits of jagged metal did not settle his nerves any. Chill the fuck out Carl scolded himself as he glanced around the vacant street Aim can take care of herself and the rest of them.
Carl checked the safety on his shotgun and made sure it was loaded for the eighteenth time. The only other person around was Grimes who sat in the cab behind the wheel. He glanced through the rear window.
The woman seemed to notice him looking at her and gave the younger man a nervous smile in the truck’s rearview mirror. It felt like she was melting. Sweat soaked her camouflage shirt and made her butt stick uncomfortably to the faux leather bench seat. Occasionally a slight breeze would find its way through the cracked windows taunting her with a split second of relief before receding leaving her stifling in the truck’s cab.
Grimes also fidgeted as well, constantly making sure the windows were only cracked open (to prevent anything from reaching inside and grabbing her if Carl happened to be looking the other way), ensuring the snap on the sheath of the machete on her belt was unfastened, double and triple checking that the sling of her SKS would not get hung up on anything if she had to get to it in a hurry. She awkwardly reached over her shoulder to slide open the rear window.
“Hey Carl want some water?” Stacie asked as she flipped open the little cooler on the bench seat next to her and stuck a bottle of generic spring water through the window. Carl nodded thanks and took it, gulping down the unappetizingly warm liquid. Something made Grimes jump and turn around. Did she just see something peek out of that storefront a block down the road?
Grimes took a few deep breaths and tried to convince herself it was just some trash from the overturned garbage can in the middle of the street.
She swallowed hard and wiped the sweat away from her brow, squinting and shading her eyes to try and discover if it was indeed her nerves playing tricks on her. What sounded like footsteps crunching on broken glass came from an alley just out of sight across the street. A chill ran down her spine despite the serious case of swampass she was developing.
“Hey…Grimes…did you…?” Carl asked quietly as he crouched in the bed of the truck and tried to look in several different directions at once.
“Yeah. I dunno. Just keep quiet.” the woman stage whispered as she loosened her machete in its sheath. She wished that Stark or somebody had given her a pistol instead of the almost two feet of steel.
A figure appeared out of the alley a few moments later. Carl went prone, leaning around the truck cab to cover the man as he walked towards the vehicle with his hands raised over his head. “Hey!” the man said loudly as he took a few more tentative steps towards the truck. It was obvious to Grimes that the man had had a pretty rough time of it: his denim jacket was tattered and filthy, his jeans streaked with grease and god knew what else. The stranger’s tee shirt was spattered with what looked like old bloodstains. He seemed friendly enough though. The stranger seemed to be grinning under his tangle of beard growth. “Look…is it alright if I come over? Do you have a first aid kit? My friend fell out a window and hurt himself pretty bad.” he said as he took off a ratty looking daypack and set it carefully on the ground. “I’m normal, I swear! I ain’t been bit or nothin’!”
Grimes sighed, indecision wracking her. The man seemed healthy enough. “Get your friend and bring him out here!” she called loudly. The woman fingered her carbine and cast a glance back towards the building wishing that Sergeant Frays would come out. “Get him right out here in the open and I’ll see what I can do, alright?”
“Okay! I’ll be right back!” the stranger shouted as he turned and hustled off into the alley he had come from. Grimes slowly opened the door and climbed out of the truck then reached across to the passenger’s side and retrieved her carbine leaving the door open so she could scramble back inside and haul ass if need be.
After a few moments the stranger returned with another slightly shorter equally filthy man. The second stranger limped along with his arm over the first man’s shoulders. Grimes could plainly see fresh blood on the leg of the second man’s pants. She frowned and slung her carbine after retrieving the small first aid kit from under the driver’s seat of the truck.
Grimes crossed the debris strewn street towards the two men already trying to get the first aid kit opened as she tried to remember what to do from that Red Cross class she had taken like three years ago. Something flashed in the wounded man’s hand and every muscle in Grimes’ body seemed to cramp excruciatingly at the same time. “Nnnnngahhhhhahaahh!” the woman groaned as she collapsed into a panting agonized heap.
A pair of hands grabbed her under the armpits and lifted her roughly from the blacktop. Whadafagwazdat? Grimes wondered to herself. She could hear two people talking loudly right next to her but their voices did not sound familiar at all… Whoever had her started dragging her away and she tried to fight but her limbs were too cramped up to even move.
The gunshot sounded like a thunderclap and something warm and wet splattered across her face as she fell to the ground. She landed in just the right way to see the owner of the second voice crumple to the ground a half second after the second booming shot. The dying man’s face was only a few feet from hers as he coughed blood a couple times then went still.
She sat up, her body feeling like some kind of racetrack for charley horses. Carl hopped down from the bed of the truck and came towards her on the run slinging his shotgun over his shoulder as he came near. His heart froze in his chest as he helped Grimes to her feet. “Oh shit…” Carl muttered under his breath. “C’mon! Get up!”
If their arrival in the big pickup truck had not stirred up the infected in the area the two shotgun blasts certainly had. Already Carl could see at least eight or ten slouched, moaning figures stumbling out from behind wrecked vehicles or out of abandoned storefronts on either side of the street. One crashed through a second story window and landed like a bag full of broken sticks on the sidewalk. It rasped and moaned, a shattered arm flopping around as it tried to reach for them then started laboriously dragging itself towards the two humans.
The two of them rushed to the truck as an ever increasing crowd of the creatures gathered all of them in varying states of decay. Carl leapt into the bed as Grimes hobbled on stiff legs towards the driver’s seat. Her fingers slipped on the keys a couple times before she managed to get the truck’s engine fired up. Grimes threw the truck into reverse scattering a handful of the creatures like fleshy bowling pins.
Carl blasted a zombie in the face then ratcheted a fresh round into the chamber as he s
lid around the bed of the truck. He fumbled in the pocket of his jeans and came out with a handful of twelve gauge shells the young man’s nerveless fingers dropping one or two as he refilled the shotgun’s magazine. Another pallid face appeared and Carl rammed the muzzle of his weapon into its open mouth and evaporated the thing’s skull as its clammy hand closed around the barrel.
There was a hollow pop coming from the front of the library and another creature fell. “Grimes! Get the heck up here!” Sergeant Frays shouted as the rest of the squad hustled down the steps at the front of the building and took up a defensive position.
The truck squealed to a halt at the front of the building and everyone scrambled into the bed of the vehicle. Carl blinked at the ratty looking girl sitting near him. “Who the hell is this?” he shouted then turned his attention back to the creatures following them down the street.
“What happened?” Frays asked in return, eyeing her brother as if she expected to hear that he had screwed up somehow. “Well?”
Carl rolled his eyes. “Some guys showed up. They tried to kidnap Grimes but I stopped them.” He looked at the strange woman again. “Now mind answering my question?”
“We found her hiding inside.” Frays said loudly over the din of the truck’s motor. She turned to the disheveled woman now huddled nervously in the corner of the stake bed. “It’s going to be alright, ma’am. We just gotta finish something real quick and we can go home.”
The truck was coming up to a four way stop. “Take a right up here!” Frays shouted into the rear window of the truck. The truck swerved and Frays noticed more infected coming out to greet them. “Aw crap…”
The side street ahead of them was blocked by what looked like a delivery truck on its side. Either side of the street was lined with big live oaks that looked like they were in desperate need of a trimming. The neighborhood association’s going to be ticked! Frays thought crazily. She banged on the roof of the truck cab and shouted “Go around! Go around!”
The truck’s engine roared and the vehicle turned sharply to the right as Grimes attempted to steer it around the obstruction. A loud crunch sent a shudder through the truck and everyone slid around the bed of the truck like a wave. First everyone was thrown forward then back against the tailgate. Frays tried to suck air into her lungs. At some point somebody had smashed her into the back of the cab of the truck and knocked the wind out of her something fierce. It also occurred to her that there was at least one person on top of her when a knee ground into her thigh and a palm pressed down on her face.
Frays cried out and shoved whoever it was off of her. “Sorry! Sorry, Sergeant!” Pittman said as he helped the woman up. “Is anybody hurt? What’s the plan?” There was a chorus of groans and moans almost like the bed of the truck was full of reanimated corpses.
“There’s another car over there!” Carl shouted and pointed towards a gigantic late model Ford parked in the driveway of a two story colonial a few doors down. Jittery with panic he hopped down from the truck and started helping others get down. Grimes came around the front of the truck and stood there with a dazed look on her face. There was a thin trail of blood leaking down the side of her head.
Rowe screamed when he hopped down from the truck and fell. There was blood streaming from what looked like a crushed leg. “The fuckin’ bomb crushed my leg!” he shouted as Robles helped him up. “Oh holy fuck! Let’s go! C’mon!”
Now close to three dozen zombies were closing in on them pouring out of abandoned homes, lurching through overgrown yards. Frays almost laughed when one of them, a grey skinned old man with scabrous bits of gore trapped in its flowing beard, tripped over a long dead sprinkler and impaled itself on a faded picked fence. The creature seemed to lose its ability to moan with the sharpened one inch by two inch stakes perforating its lungs but the putrescent senior citizen still wriggled and grasped for them like an insect pinned to a display board.
“Get to the car. I’ll switch on the bomb.” Sergeant Frays said quickly. Carl reached out and caught his sister’s arm as she started to climb back into the bed of the wrecked truck. The woman glared at her little brother, her dark brown eyes blazing with adrenaline.
“I’ll do it, Aim.” Carl said as he started to climb into the truck. Now Frays pulled him back. “What?! You start that goddamn car and I’ll take care of this, alright?”
Frays stopped and nodded then hustled off towards the massive boat of a Ford. It made sense. She could hotwire a car with her eyes shut and Lacey had shown all of them how to activate the IED before they left Freedom earlier in the morning. The woman ran as fast as her aching lungs would allow towards the car.
Carl climbed into the bed of the truck and started the CD player the explosives were wired to. He could not help but roll his eyes when he recognized the tune coming out of the home stereo’s speakers. The opening notes of the song Zombie by the band The Cranberries accompanied him as he toggled the switches activating the timer and the explosives. A thump at the back of the truck made him glance over his shoulder.
A small crowd of zombies groped for him through the gaps between the metal slats on the side of the truck bed, their jaws snapping as the creatures growled hungrily. “Fuck…” the young man muttered as he climbed onto the cab of the truck. “Awww FUCK!”
There was easily a half dozen crowded around the front of the truck. An idea formed when he noticed the low hanging branch within arm’s reach. The young man stood on the top of the truck’s cab and leapt, catching the branch. With a grunt of effort Carl swung his legs up and scrambled onto the top side of the tree limb.
‘Ranger crawling’ along the smooth bark of the tree limb the young man came to the trunk and cautiously got himself into a sitting position before standing and groping around the tree. It took a few tries but he managed to get hold of a branch on the other side and cautiously work his way around so that he was crouched on the far side of the tree from the truck. He scuttled out onto the branch for a few feet then swung his legs down and dropped to the ground.
A couple shots whizzed by his head as he sprinted for the car. “WATCH WHERE YOU’RE FUCKIN’ SHOOTING, ASSHOLES!!” Carl roared as he ducked, staggered, fell and scrambled to his feet again.
By the time he got to the car his big sister had the car’s massive V-8 engine rumbling and sputtering away. They crammed themselves into the car as if they were a group of college students trying for a kind of record. Robles, Hubbard, Pittman and Grimes stuffed themselves into the rear seat while Rowe, the stranger and Carl crammed in beside Frays in the front.
“Buckle your seatbelts, everybody!” Frays shouted as she threw the Ford into drive and mashed down the accelerator. Frays could not help but get a little thrill out of the feeling of the raw power of the deceptively impressive car. The tires squealed as she pulled out of the driveway and hauled butt down the road.
Zombies stumbled into the vehicle’s path but the late model car’s steel and aluminum construction sent them flying. It was really something. She felt absolutely untouchable, like she could do no wrong. A glance at the speedometer said that she was doing about thirty or thirty five steering around wrecked cars and debris. A wide grin spread slowly across her face as she maneuvered the car back towards the FOB.
“Hey Grimes, you alright?” Pittman asked. The woman had looked a little loopy and unsteady on her feet before they had crammed into the car. His breath caught in his throat when he noticed that her head was lolling back and forth whenever Sergeant Frays made a turn. “Grimes? Grimes!” He reached out, caught the woman’s wrist and gave her arm a shake.
He let out a grateful sigh when Grimes opened her eyes and looked at him. “What?” She blinked several times as the events of the last few minutes fell back into place. She had hit a tree with the truck and now Sergeant Frays was driving them home in a stolen car. Wait…not home but that fort thing that the soldiers built.
“You okay?” Pittman asked as he continued squeezing Grimes’ wrist. She leaned forward a littl
e bit so that she could look him in the eye and smiled.
“I’m fine, I promise.” Grimes said as she took his hand in hers for a second. “I’m just a little tired.” He nodded. It looked like the bleeding on her forehead had not gotten any worse though she still looked kind of glassy eyed and confused.
Frays glanced at the new addition to their group out of the corner of her eye once they were out of town and headed back towards the FOB. “What’s your name?” she asked. The woman merely shrugged and looked at the transmission hump under her feet.
There was some confusion at the gate when they rolled up in a different vehicle than they left with though Frays was able to keep the guys on guard duty from riddling the beat up old Ford with holes. The first stop was the Med Center to drop off Rowe, Grimes and the stranger they had picked up. After that she dropped her other soldiers off at the gate of trailer park and told them she would be back to let them know what else was going on today.
Frays and her brother exchanged small smiles when they pulled up to the TOC, the Ford’s motor sputtering and spewing clouds of black exhaust. She immediately recognized Lacey’s lanky form waiting near the entrance to the hotel as they pulled into the parking lot. The kids were playing with the rocks spread under the shrubs next to the building. “C’mon Carl.” Frays said quietly as she killed the engine and opened her door. “Get some of the stink washed off you while I brief the Major.”
The two children came towards Frays at a run as soon as they recognized her. “Hey kiddos! I’m so glad to see you!” Frays exclaimed as she knelt and swept them up into a big bear hug kissing the both of them on the cheek as carried them back to their father. The woman grinned at Lacey as she set the children down. “I have to go make my report and then we’ll go get lunch, alright? How’s that sound?”
Outbreak: Long Road Back Page 22
