by Dirk Patton
“Oh shit is right,” I said and hit the throttle and threw the truck through a screeching U-turn.
Heading back the way we had just come from we quickly encountered the females that had raced across the park and followed us out onto the road. They ran straight at us with no fear.
As we reached the front of the pack I backed off the throttle and dropped our speed to just under 30. Even the heavy, welded push bar on the front of the truck could only take so many impacts from all the human bodies running at us. The first two were bulled aside by the truck with stomach clenching thuds, but the third female was young and looked to be in excellent shape.
With a leap she cleared the front of the truck and slammed into the wire mesh covered windshield. The wire did its job and absorbed the impact. If not for it we’d most likely have had the female in our laps as she’d have crashed right through the already compromised glass.
I kept driving, mowing down females as we went, then we were clear of the pack. But we still had our passenger who had a death grip on the wire mesh. I tried slamming on the brakes at 40 miles an hour, but all this did was get a yelp from Dog when he was thrown against the backs of the front seats. The female still clung like a barnacle.
“Shoot her!” Rachel’s voice was up a couple of octaves and I could hear the stress in it.
“I don’t want to put another hole in the windshield,” I said as I tried swerving the big truck from side to side to shake the infected loose. The maneuvers had about as much effect as when I slammed on the brakes. Dog, with no seatbelt, was definitely getting the worst of it.
I had an idea and kept my eyes open, finally spotting a large, empty parking lot. Roaring in to the lot I spun the wheel and jammed on the brakes, the truck coming to a stop in a cloud of tire smoke after sliding sideways for twenty feet. The female was thrown off balance, staying on the truck with the grip of only one hand.
In a flash I had my door open and jumped out, raising my pistol to acquire my target. I was shocked to see that the female had already regained her balance and had her feet under her ready to spring. Without hesitating I fired and the heavy hollow point slug nearly decapitated the body. She flopped dead onto the hood and I had to walk around and drag the body off the truck.
“Fuck these things are fast!” I said to myself as I hurried back to the driver’s side of the cab.
Back in the relative safety of the truck I checked the area and saw no immediate danger. A quick search of the duffel bags yielded the GPS I’d found as well as an old school road map. I handed Rachel the GPS and some batteries and asked her to get it running while I checked the map. I also reminded her to keep watch so we didn’t get surprised again.
The map was hard to see and I reached up to turn on the reading light before I realized how dark it had gotten. The clouds had made it to us and the low bellies were swollen with rain. As I watched the first drops struck the windshield, slowly at first then quickly becoming a torrential downpour.
The noise of the rain on the metal roof of the truck was almost deafening, but nothing compared to the bone jarring blast of sound from thunder that cracked right over our heads. The thunder had blasted at the same time as we saw the brilliant flash of lightning so it had to be very close.
Dog started whining and Rachel turned to comfort him as another blast of lightning lit the world around us with a strobe effect. In the strobe I could see shambling and running figures coming towards us. Damn it, I just needed two minutes to look at a map.
Stomping on the throttle we roared out of the parking lot and turned north away from the main road that seemed to have a good population of infected. We were quickly in residential neighborhoods, most of the houses smaller ranch style homes that had been built in the 70s and 80s as Atlanta continued to sprawl and the northern suburbs boomed.
The rain was relentless, now driven at an angle by the rising wind. Water was coming in around my duct tape reinforcement of the windshield so the glass was wet inside and out. Visibility wasn’t much more than to the end of the hood.
We passed another park, barely visible in the rain, then back into another neighborhood of single story homes, these slightly newer and mostly constructed of the brick that is so common in construction in the Atlanta area. We didn’t see a light, movement or an infected anywhere and I started to think we should shelter in one of the homes for the night.
The problem was that we had no way of knowing if a house was occupied by people hiding out, full of infected, or sitting empty. I had no desire to shoot it out with a homeowner who was just defending his home. Neither did I really want to open a front door and have to deal with the infected lady of the house.
The storm made my decision for me. The rain increased in volume and the wind picked up, rocking the three ton truck like it was a Tonka Toy. Lightning continued to flash overhead and we watched a tree explode on a ridgeline directly in front of us when lightning stuck it.
“OK, enough,” I said. “See any good possibilities?”
Rachel peered through the storm as I drove, then suddenly sat up and pointed, “There! The one with the garage door up.”
I spotted the house she pointed out. It was a small brick one story with an attached two car garage. The house was dark and the front door closed, but the garage was open and empty. I was willing to take the odds that this house had been abandoned in a hurry.
I turned into the driveway and continued into the garage. There were no hiding places to check or worry about so I jumped out and released the garage door from the automatic opener track then pulled it down. The truck was still running, quickly filling the garage with stinking diesel exhaust fumes so I rushed to disconnect the wires and shut the engine off.
The fury of the storm lashing the aluminum garage door was so loud I could hardly tell the truck was no longer running. I made a mental note to find an electrical switch to wire into the truck so we didn’t have to twist two wires together every time we wanted to start it.
It was dark in the garage, but I brought out my looted flashlight and pulled the pistol.
“Dog,” I called, and he jumped to the front seat then down to the garage floor through the door I’d left open.
Rachel stepped out of the truck, Glock in hand. I looked at her and she glared back at me. “Don’t say a word, Mr. Bad Ass. I’ve saved your life twice now, and I’m getting a little tired of being left behind in the truck.”
I looked at Dog who seemed to be smiling at me, shook my head and moved to the door into the house. Dog came up beside me and gave it a good sniff then stood still looking at me, waiting for me to do something. I didn’t know how he’d react if there were either people or infected on the other side of the door, but I didn’t think in either case he’d be as calm as he was.
16
Clicking the safety off on the pistol I quietly turned the door knob and eased the door open. All was quiet, or at least any sounds within the house were masked by the raging storm outside. As the door swung open I paid attention to Dog, trusting him to be an early warning if the house was inhabited.
Dog just stood quietly at the open door, nose twitching. I stepped into the hallway and Dog stayed by my side. Rachel brought up the rear, padding silently in her bare feet. We quickly checked the entire house and found it empty. With that out of the way I made sure all the doors were securely locked and all the windows were covered. I didn’t want any visitors.
The house looked like it had been home to a couple. There were three bedrooms, two of them musty smelling and being used for storage. The master was a shambles with drawers pulled out of the dressers and left lying on the floor amidst heaps of clothing. It looked like someone had packed and left in a hurry.
The kitchen was small and not particularly clean, but the cupboard was well stocked with canned foods. The range was gas burning and I was happy to hear the hiss of natural gas when I turned the knob. The gas didn’t ignite because the range used an electric starter and the power was off, but a simple matc
h would solve that problem and we’d have a hot meal.
Rachel checked the water and it was still on, and it even got hot as she let it run. Must be a gas hot water heater with a pilot light.
“First shower!” She grinned across the room at me.
I grinned back. “I’ll make dinner while you clean up. Keep your pistol close and leave the bathroom door open. If you hear me shout…”
“Got it,” She answered, still smiling. Apparently not even the end of the world could dampen her spirits when a hot shower was available. Rachel went down the hall to the bathroom and moments later I heard the shower start up.
The storm still raged outside as I started pulling cans out of the pantry. A large can of chunky beef stew went into a bowl on the floor and Dog devoured it in less than a minute, licked the bowl spotlessly clean and went over and laid down in the corner with a contented sigh.
I found a large skillet and after getting the stove top lit put it on the burner and started adding the contents of several cans. I wouldn’t win any culinary awards, but as I added two cans of Spam, a can of baked beans and another of corn I thought the aroma coming from the skillet was one of the best I’d ever smelled.
Giving everything a stir I searched some more cabinets and found a couple loaves of sourdough bread. Cutting the tops off each loaf I hollowed out the insides and put each on a plate, the bread from inside the loaves on the side. Each one made a perfect bread bowl.
The shower had been off for a few minutes and I was about to go looking for Rachel when she walked into the kitchen.
“That smells fantastic,” She said, coming over to the stove to look in the skillet. Rachel had found clean clothes in the master bedroom closet that almost fit. She had on a pair of cotton shorts that were short enough to not leave much to the imagination and a thin T Shirt that was stretched almost impossibly tight over her breasts.
“And it’s ready. Hope you’re hungry,” I answered, trying to keep my eyes from drifting to the hard nipples stressing the thin fabric of the shirt or the long legs left bare by the short shorts.
I scooped generous portions of the skillet contents, I didn’t even have a name for it, into the bread bowls and carried them to the table while Rachel found water glasses and filled them at the sink for us. A quick search of drawers yielded a couple of spoons and we settled down at the table.
The kitchen was almost dark due to the heavy clouds outside and the closed blinds at all the windows, but I didn’t care to show a light that might be seen by either survivors or infected. We both dug in, too hungry to spend any time talking. From across the room Dog watched us, his chin on his front paws. When my food was half gone I was able to slow myself down and enjoy eating the meal.
“So I was thinking about why those infected showed up at the park when we stopped this afternoon,” I said, then shoveled another spoonful into my mouth.
Rachel paused with a spoon half way to her mouth and looked at me with raised eyebrows. I chewed, swallowed and continued.
“I think it was the sound of the truck idling. I think mechanical sounds are going to draw these things like a moth to a flame. I’ve got to find a switch I can wire into the truck so we can shut it off and start it easily when we stop.”
“How many of them do you think are out there?” Rachel asked, getting up to refill our water.
I thought for a minute before answering, “I don’t have a clue. So far we’ve seen far more infected than we have survivors. I’m shocked the nerve gas was so effective and spread so fast. Based on what we’ve seen so far it seems like most of the population has been infected.”
That thought hit both of us like a slap in the face. Suddenly my food didn’t taste good anymore and I put the remains on the floor for Dog who gladly polished it off for me. When he was done I picked the plate up and washed it in the sink. Not that it mattered, but old habits die hard.
I made another tour of the house, checking windows and doors to make sure we were secure. The worst of the storm had passed, but it was still raining and now completely dark outside. I put a piece of duct tape over my flashlight lens and poked a small hole in it so only a tiny beam of light could make it out.
Using the muted flashlight I carefully covered the master bedroom windows with blankets, taping the edges to the wall with more duct tape to prevent any light from escaping. The battery powered LED lantern I had looted had a night light setting and I turned it on in the bedroom for Rachel then went to the living room and covered those windows as well, taping the blankets as I had in the master bedroom. I’d be sleeping on the couch tonight. There was only one bed in the house and I’d already decided to give it to Rachel.
Next I retrieved a 12 gauge shotgun I’d found in the outfitter store vault and showed Rachel how to load it, rack the slide and where the safety button was. After having her rack a few shells through the gun and reload it she was about as familiar with a shotgun as she was going to be until we were somewhere safe that I could teach her how to aim, control and fire the weapon.
I showered with my pistol in the shower with me, safe inside a plastic zip sandwich bag I’d found in the kitchen. The hot water felt wonderful and released a lot of the tension I was carrying in my shoulders and upper back.
Dried off I dressed in the khaki camouflage cargo pants I’d found at the outfitter and a matching camo T-Shirt. I tried on the steel toed hunting boots, which fit well, and left them sitting open and ready at the edge of the couch.
With a fully loaded assault rifle on the floor next to me and a loaded pistol in my waist band I laid back on the couch. I closed my eyes but the voice of a long gone instructor popped into my head, ‘Check everything, check it again, then check to make sure you checked it right, numb nuts.’
I smiled at the memory of Sergeant Willis, swung my feet to the floor and made another round of the house with Dog padding along at my side. All the doors and windows were locked tight. The blankets in the bedroom were still tightly covering the window and Rachel was breathing heavily as she slept, cocooned in a light blanket with only her face exposed.
I turned off the lantern’s night light to save the batteries and headed back to the living room, feeling my way in the dark. Passing one of the other bedrooms I stepped in and up to the window that looked to the street in front of the house. Carefully moving the curtains an inch open I looked out at the rain soaked front yard.
The clouds were breaking up and a small amount of moonlight lit the street. I stood there watching for a few minutes, but nothing moved. I was about to close the gap in the curtains and go to bed when movement across the street caught my eye. My pulse picked up until I identified the fat raccoon that waddled into view. He stopped and sniffed the air then slowly made his way up the street. I closed the curtains tight and went to bed.
17
I snapped awake when Dog growled deep in his chest, my hand automatically grasping the butt of the pistol in my waist band. I drew the weapon and swung my feet to the floor silently, watching Dog to try and figure out what had him agitated. He was staring intently at the front window of the living room. I couldn’t hear anything, and didn’t have any idea what time it was other than early as it was still dark.
I stood up carefully and made my way to the bedroom next to the living room, eased my way up to the curtains and a millimeter at a time opened them enough to see out the window. All the clouds had moved out and there was enough moonlight for me to see what must have been hundreds of infected stumbling down the street, all headed to the north.
They filled the street, flowing around abandoned cars and spilling up onto the lawns of the houses that lined the road. Both males and females moved together, the females appearing much more coordinated in their movements. Occasionally children could be seen in the crowd, and just like the adults the males were slow and uncoordinated, but the females moved with almost animal-like fluidity and grace.
I closed the curtains as slowly and carefully as I had opened them and quietly backed awa
y from the window. Deciding it was best to wake Rachel in case we were discovered I made my way out to the hall and down to the master bedroom where she was sleeping.
She hadn’t moved since I’d done my last check of the house before going to sleep, still wrapped up in the blanket and snoring softly. I knelt onto one knee, leaned over her and put a hand over her mouth to prevent her from crying out in case I startled her.
Her eyes instantly flew open wide with panic and she started struggling. I wrapped my other arm around her, using the blanket to help control her movements and put my lips against her ear.
“It’s OK, it’s me. There’s infected outside. We can’t make any noise,” I whispered in her ear.
She stopped struggling but her body remained tense. Slowly I released her then removed my hand from her mouth, ready to clamp it back in place if she started to speak. When it was obvious she was under control I stepped back and she sat up and shed the blanket. I motioned for her to follow me, using my taped flashlight to give her enough light to see.
Rachel stood up, crossed her arms across her breasts and followed me to the other bedroom. Again I very cautiously opened the curtains enough to look out and was dismayed to see that the number of infected had grown. Just a few minutes before what had been a steady stream had now grown to a tightly packed mass of human bodies flooding through the neighborhood.
I moved aside and Rachel looked out the opening. She caught her breath but made no other sound. After a moment she moved back and I carefully put the curtains back in place. Fumbling in the dark I reached out for her, felt her arm and followed it down until I took her hand in mine. I led her through the darkened house out to the living room where Dog still stared at the front windows with his ears at full alert.
Pulling Rachel to me I put my lips back to her ear and whispered, “Let’s get dressed and ready to move, just in case. I got hunting clothes and boots for you from the outfitter. I’m going to turn my flashlight on so we can see. Don’t make a sound.”
